5.07. Chapter 1 - Jehovah's Introduction of His Servant and a Summary of His Redeeming Work
Chapter 1 Jehovah’s Introduction of His Servant and a Summary of His Redeeming Work The Divisions
We will now seek, apart from controversy and criticisms, to look into the heart of this great prophecy, and I will make no further apologies if in the handling of this chapter I do so in the full light which is thrown upon it in the New Testament as well as the Old. The whole prophecy divides itself into three sections. The first section consists of Isa_52:13-15, and may be described as God’s Ecce Homo. In it God introduces His Servant, and seeks to direct the attention of all men to Him. This introductory section is really a summary of the whole prophecy, and contains in brief the whole story of Messiah’s sufferings and the glory which should follow. The second section, consisting of Isa_53:1-9, is primarily the lament and confession of penitent Israel in the future, when the spirit of grace and of supplications shall be poured upon them, and their eyes are opened to behold Him whom they have pierced. The third section, consisting of the last three verses, sets forth the blessed fruit of Messiah’s sufferings, or the glory which should follow. The prophecy really begins and ends with a description of the exaltation and glory of the Righteous Servant, but in between the mountain-tops of glory lies the deep valley of shame and suffering, which “for us men and our salvation” He has to pass.
“Behold My Servant” The prophecy begins with the word הנה, hinneh (“behold”) This is the little word by which in Scripture God seeks to call the attention of men to matters which are of the utmost importance for them to know. Here it is on His beloved and only-begotten Son in the form of a servant that He would have our eyes fixed.
We may note in passing that several different times is the Messiah introduced in the Old Testament by this word “behold,” and in four different aspects. Here (as in Zec_3:8, which refers back to the passages about the Servant of Jehovah in the second part of Isaiah) it is “Behold My Servant.” In Zec_6:12 we read, “Behold the Man whose name is the Branch”; and in Zec_9:9 of the same prophecy, the announcement to the daughter of Zion is, “Behold, thy King cometh unto thee”; while the proclamation in the sublime prologue to the second half of Isaiah unto the cities of Judah is, “Behold your God”; and that it is of the Epiphany of God in the person of the Messiah that the prophet speaks is evident from the whole context of those chapters. Under these four different aspects also is Messiah spoken of by the name of “Branch”—“the Branch of Jehovah” (Isa_4:2); “the Branch of David” (Jer_23:5-6); “My Servant, the Branch” (Zec_3:8); and “the Man whose name is the ‘Branch’” (Zec_6:12). The Man—the Servant—the Son of David—and the Son of God. And this fourfold portraiture of the Redeemer in the Old Testament corresponds (as I first pointed out in a small work many years ago)1 to the fourfold picture of our Saviour in the New Testament.
1 Rays of Messiah’s Glory: The Branch, or, Four Aspects of Messiah’s Character. The subject is also more fully dealt with in the exposition of the 3rd chapter of Zechariah in The Visions and Prophecies of Zechariah.
We have four different and independent accounts of the Life of Christ, and so harmonious and similar are the main features and facts about His character and work in all the Four Gospels that no one who has ever read them has had to be told that they all speak of the same blessed Person. Yet each one of the Evangelists was led by the Spirit of God to portray a different aspect of His character.
Over the Gospel of Matthew—which was primarily written for the Jews, and which sets forth Christ as the Redeemer-King of Israel, the Messiah promised to the fathers—the inscription may be written, “Behold thy King.”
Over the Gospel of Mark—a summary more of His deeds than of His words, written, in the first instance, for the practical Roman world of power and action—the words, “Behold My Servant” are, so to say, inscribed, for there it is the Servant aspect of our Saviour that is portrayed before us—“how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power; who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed with the devil; for God was with Him.” In the Gospel of Luke, written primarily for the Greek, who, in the New Testament, stands as the representative of the Gentile world, it is as the Son of Man that He is pictured to us, who, by His human nature, stands related as Kinsman-Redeemer to the whole race, and is therefore able and willing to save men of all nations and kindreds and peoples who turn to God through Him. Over this Gospel the words, “Behold the Man whose name is the Branch,” may be written; while over the Gospel of John, which was designed neither for Jews nor Gentiles, neither for Greek nor Roman, but for the Church—the congregation of the faithful, those whose eyes are opened to behold His glory, “the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth”—“Behold your God” are graven in letters of gold. In our chapter, however, it is as the Servant that He is introduced to us by the Father—as One who is sent to accomplish a work and to fulfill a mission. And it is with special satisfaction and complacency that God speaks of His only-begotten Son in His charter as Servant. “Behold My Servant, ” whom I uphold; Mine elect (“My chosen One”), “in whom My soul delighteth”—one reason being, perhaps, because in this respect this ideal Servant stands out as the great contrast, not only to Israel nationally, who was called to be God’s servant, but proved unfaithful, but to all other men. The curse of man and the cause of his ruin is pride, self-will—the striving to be independent of God, and seeking to strike out a career for himself. By seeking to be free, and thinking that freedom consists in doing, not what he ought, but what he pleases, man landed himself in bondage to sin and Satan. But here is One who says, “Lo, I am come; in the scroll of the book it is written of Me, I delight to do Thy will, O My God: yea, Thy Law is within My heart,” and who, when on earth, could say, “I came down from heaven, not to do Mine own will but the will of Him that sent Me”; “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work.”
Insignificant, fallen man ever aims at exalting himself, but here is One who, though in the form of God counted not His equality with God a prize (“to be grasped” at), but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant “and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the Cross.” No wonder, then that the Father points with delight to Him, saying, “Behold My Servant,” and would have our eyes fixed on Him, not only as our Saviour, but as our example, that we might follow in His footsteps. This true Servant of Jehovah, we read, “shall deal prudently.” The verb השכיל, his’kil, primarily means “to act wisely,” but since “wise action as a rule is also effective,” and leads to prosperity, the verb is used also sometimes as a synonym for “prosperously.” It is used in such passages as 1Sa_18:14, “And David was acting wisely in all his ways, and the Lord was with him”; and in David’s charge to Solomon (1Ki_2:3), “And keep the charge of the Lord thy God . . . in order that thou mayest act wisely in all that thou doest.” In Jer_23:5, this verb is used directly of the Messiah, and describes one feature of His blessed rule, “Behold the days come, saith Jehovah, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper (his’kil, ‘deal wisely’), and shall execute judgment and justice in the land.” Here, in Isa_52:13, it is used to describe the action of the Servant of Jehovah in relation to the great task which is entrusted to Him. “He shall ‘deal wisely’ and accomplish His great work skilfully”—an assurance, as it were, at the very outset, that “the pleasure of Jehovah shall prosper in His hand.” He shall be exalted and extolled (“lifted up”), and be very high. There is an ancient Rabbinic Midrash on this sentence, which says, “He shall be exalted above Abraham; He shall be lifted up above Moses, and be higher than the ministering angels,” I sometimes think that when the inspired writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews sat down to write that wonderful and comprehensive treatise on the supremacy and greater glory of the Messiah, and took for his keynote the little phrase “better than”2, and proceeded to show how Christ was greater, and higher, and “better” than the angels, than Moses, than Joshua, than Aaron and the whole Aaronic priesthood and ritual, and than all the types and shadows of the Old Covenant, the substance and fulfillment of which are to be found in Him alone—he must have had the thought expressed in this Midrash in his mind.
2 Heb_1:4
Yes, our Lord Jesus is exalted above Abraham, the father of the faithful, who stands at the head of the history of the peculiar people, whose history also prefigures and unfolds the story of Redemption, inasmuch as He is not only Abraham’s Son but Abraham’s Lord, whose day Abraham rejoiced to see “from afar,”3 though whom the great promise that in Abraham’s seed all the families of the earth should be blessed is realized, and in and through whom the history of Abraham and of the nation which sprang from his loins receives its true significance and glory.
3 Joh_8:56 And “He is lifted up above Moses” because He is the Mediator of a better covenant which rests upon better promises, who brings us out of a greater bondage than that of Egypt, and whose “law of the spirit of Life” implanted in our hearts enables us to render that obedience to God which the mere letter of the law graven on tablets of stone could not do. And “He is higher than the angels, for to which of the angels did God say at any time, Sit thou on My right hand till I make thine enemies the footstool of thy feet?” which is the height of exaltation attained by the Servant of Jehovah as the Son of Man, who through the deepest sufferings enters into glory.4
4 “Rosenmuller observes on verse 13b, ‘There is no need to discuss, or even to inquire, what precise difference there is in the meaning of the separate words’; but this a very superficial remark. If we consider that רום, “rum,” signifies not only to be high, but to rise up (Pro_11:11) and become exalted, and also to become manifest as exalted (Psa_21:13), and that נשא, ni’sa’, according to the immediate and original reflective meaning of the niphal, signifies to raise one’s self, whereas גבה, gabah, expresses merely the condition, without the subordinate idea of activity, we obtain this chain of thought: he will raise up, he will raise himself still higher, he will stand on high. The three verbs (of which the two perfects are defined by the previous future) consequently denote the commencement, the continuation, and the result or climax of the exaltation; and Stier is not wrong in recalling to mind the three principal steps of the exaltation in the historical fulfillment, namely, the resurrection, the ascension, and the sitting down at the right hand of God. The addition of the word מאד, m’od, shows very clearly that וגבה, v’gabah, is intended to be taken as the final result; the Servant of Jehovah, rising from stage to stage, reaches at last an immeasurable height that towers above everything besides.” (Delitzsch) The climax in the height of His exaltation, as set forth by the three verbs in this sentence, is expressed by the word מאד, m’od, lit. very much, with which the sentence ends. “He shall be exalted and lifted up and be high very much, or exceedingly.” Of the glorious fulfillment of it in the person of our Lord Jesus we are told in the New Testament. “Wherefore”—because for our salvation He descended so low, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross—“God also hath highly exalted Him”; yes, “far above all principality and power, and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come.”5 5 Eph_1:20-23; Php_2:9-11 But after what may be called this preface of glory, which tells us at the very outset what shall be the end of His path of humiliation, the next verse of this introductory section gives a glimpse of the valley of sorrow and suffering through which the Servant of Jehovah has first to emerge—the valley which is, so to say, lengthened out and extended in the more detailed account of His sufferings in the next section, Isa_52:14-15 are in the Hebrew linked together by the words כאשר, ka’asher, “like,” or, “just as,” and כן, ken, “so.” They express, if I may so put it, the balance of proportion, and announce in advance that the effect shall be commensurable with the greatness of the cause. Let me first translate these verses literally.
“Like (or, ‘just as’) many were astonished at Thee (‘so marred,’ or ‘disfigured,’ or ‘distorted’ was His visage more than that of any man, and His form more than the sons of men)6—so shall He sprinkle many nations,” etc.
6 Delitzsch renders, “So disfigured, His appearance was not human and His form not like that of the children of men”; and Von Orelli, “So disfigured was His visage beneath man’s, and His form so unlike man’s.” The sudden transition from the second to the third person is not exceptional, but is found in many other places in the prophetic writings.
It is generally agreed among commentators that the words which I have enclosed in brackets must be regarded as a parenthesis and explain the reason of the astonishment at Him on the part of many. The verb שמם, shamem, which is rendered “astonished,” means to be desolate or waste; to be thrown by anything into a desolate or bereaved condition; to be startled, confused, as it were petrified by paralysing astonishment.7 Even to such an extent will many be astonished at Him because of the greatness of His suffering, which shall cause His blessed countenance and form to be so “marred” that it shall appear, as it were, “disfigurement” itself, without any trace of the grace and beauty which belong to the human face and figure.8 7 See its use in Lev_26:32; Eze_26:16
8 “His appearance and His form were altogether distortion (mishchath, an expression stronger than mashchath, which means distorted—lit. away from men, out beyond men), i.e., a distortion that destroys all likeness to man.
“The Church before the time of Constantine, pictured to itself the Lord, as He walked on earth, as repulsive in His appearance; whereas the Church, after Constantine, pictured Him as having quite an ideal beauty. They were both right: unattractive in appearance, though not deformed, He no doubt was in the days of His flesh; but He is ideally beautiful in His glorification. The body in which He was born of Mary was no royal form, though faith could see the doxa shining through. It was no royal form, for the suffering of death was the portion of the Lamb of God, even from His mother’s womb; but the glorified One is infinitely exalted above all the ideal of art.” (Delitzsch) By these strong words and expressions the Spirit of God seeks to give us a glimpse into the depth and intensity of the vicarious sufferings of our Saviour, and of the greatness of the cost of our redemption; and as we contemplate this picture of the Man of Sorrows, with the “face” which for us was “marred” more than that of any man, and with His form bowed and and disfigured more than the sons of men, may our hearts be stirred with shame and sorrow for the sin which was the cause of it all, and with greater love and undying gratitude to Him who bore all this for us! But as His humiliation and sufferings were great, yea, “more than that of any other man,” so also shall the blessed fruit and consequences of them be. Isa_52:15 is, so to say, the antithesis to Isa_52:14, and sets forth the state of glory after the suffering. “Like (or ‘just as’) many were astonished at Thee (because His visage and form were distorted by suffering ‘beyond men’)—so shall He sprinkle many nations; kings shall shut their mouths at Him” with astonishment and reverence, for that which could not “have been told them” by any man, and which was previously altogether unheard of, shall they now “see” and “understand”; or, in the words of Isa_49:7, which might be described as Isaiah 53:1-12 in miniature, for it summarizes in few words the sufferings of the Messiah and the glory which should follow—“Kings shall see and arise, princes and they shall worship, because of Jehovah that is faithful, the Holy One of Israel who hath chosen Thee”—they shall see that the One whom man humbled God has exalted; that He who was despised of man, and abhorred of the nation, is, after all, He whom the Holy One of Israel hath chosen; that in spite of their vain counsels, and their individual and united efforts, His kingdom progresses, and is destined to triumph—and they shall “arise” from their thrones in token of reverence, and shall signify their submission and allegiance by prostrating themselves before Him in worship; and all this “because of Jehovah that is faithful” to His covenants and promises, “even the Holy One,” who will never draw back from His word, and shall, by espousing and vindicating His Servant’s cause, make it manifest in the sight of the whole world that He hath chosen Him! In a measure this has already been fulfilled. Because “He hath humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross, therefore also God hath highly exalted Him, and given unto Him the Name which is above every name; that in the Name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
Already before the crucified Nazarene kings must rise from their thrones, and princes fall in the dust, not, indeed, necessarily because their hearts have been subdued by His grace, or their eyes opened to His essential glory as the Son of God, but because they have found out by experience that it is no longer safe to resist His power. But even though the obedience be feigned, and the worship be outward, it is still a testimony to Christ’s exaltation, and to the faithfulness of Jehovah, in lifting Him out of the valley of humiliation, and appointing Him His “First-born, higher than the kings of the earth.” But we are looking forward to a fuller, more visible, and universal fulfillment, when He who was ”despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” shall be the acknowledged King over the whole earth, and when—
“He shall have dominion from sea to sea And from the River unto the ends of the earth.
They that dwell in the wilderness shall bow before Him; And His enemies shall lick the dust. The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents; The kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts:
Yea, all kings shall fall down before Him;
All nations shall serve Him” (Psa_72:8-11) But I must return for a moment to Isa_52:15 concerning which there has been much discussion. Most modern scholars object to the rendering of the word יזה, yazzeh, by “He shall sprinkle,” as is given in the Authorized and Revised Versions of the English Bible, and translate the phrase, “so shall He startle,” or “make to tremble,” or “cause to leap”—i.e., either for joy or fear—on the ground chiefly that the parallelism between the fourteenth and fifteenth verses
It is true also, as another writer observes, that it is specially set apart and used for the sprinkling with the blood of atonement and the water of purification.9 9 It is used, for instance, in Lev_4:6; Lev_14:7; Lev_16:14-19; Num_19:19, and in many other places.
Delitzsch, who himself renders the word “He shall make to tremble,” writes: “The hiphil hizzah (to sprinkle) generally means to spurt or sprinkle (adspergere), and is applied to the sprinkling of the blood with the finger, more especially upon the capporeth and altar of incense on the Day of Atonement (differing in this respect from zaraq, the swinging of the blood out of the bowl), also to the sprinkling of the water of purification upon a leper with the bunch of hyssop (Lev_14:7), and of the ashes of the red heifer upon those defiled through touching a corpse (Num_19:18); in fact, generally, to sprinkling for the purpose of expiation and sanctification. And Vitringa, Hengstenberg, and others, accordingly follow the Syriac and Vulgate in adopting the rendering adsperget (he will sprinkle).
“They have the usage of the language in their favour; and this explanation also commends itself from a reference to נגוע (nagua’) in Isa_53:4, and נגע (nega’) in Isa_53:8 (words which are generally used of leprosy, and on account of which the suffering Messiah is called in b. Sanhedrin 98b by an emblematical name adopted from the old synagogue, “the leper of Rabbi’s school”), since it yields the significant antithesis, that He who was Himself regarded as unclean, even as a second Job, would sprinkle and sanctify whole nations, and thus abolish the wall of partition between Israel and the heathen, and gather together into one holy church with Israel those who had hitherto been pronounced “unclean” (Isa_52:1).”
It is true that nazah (“to sprinkle”) is usually construed with the accusative, in which case the preposition על, al “upon,” should follow the verb. But slight deviations and irregularities in the construction of phrases do sometimes occur in the Hebrew Bible; they do not, however, alter the meaning of words, and in this case, though nazah al would mean “sprinkle upon,” yazzeh by itself still means “sprinkle,” or, more properly, “besprinkle.”
Secondly, the only other passage in the second half of Isaiah where another form of this same verb occurs10 is Isa_63:3, and there the word most certainly means “sprinkle.” It is alleged against the rendering of the phrase, “so shall He sprinkle,” that “there would be something very abrupt in the sudden representation of the Servant as priest”; but there is no more abruptness, it seems to me, in the introduction of this idea of priesthood in this passage than in the sudden transition from the exaltation described in Isa_52:13 to the depth of humiliation in Isa_52:14.
10 ויז v’yez, which is qal future, 3rd person sing, masc. of the verb נזה. In this introductory section we have, as stated at the beginning, a brief summary in terse, condensed form, of the whole prophecy, which is fully developed in Isaiah 53:1-12. And to my mind it would seem strange if there were no reference also to the priestly atoning function of the Servant (of which the next section is so full), in this introductory summary.