Isaiah 43
TLBCIsaiah 43:8-44
Israel as God’ s Witness in the Assembly of the Nations (43:8— 44:23) The prophet’ s proclamation now returns to the assembly of nations (43:8-9), and then to Israel, God’ s witness, and the message she is to proclaim before the world (43:10-13). This leads to a repeated proclamation that God is going to do a new thing: he has prepared a second Exodus of his people (43:14-21). That is, as soon as Second Isaiah introduces the theme of Israel’ s mission among the world of nations, he turns immediately to the question of God’ s salvation in order that the faith of the broken community can be restored. As background, verses 22-28 speak again of the past when Israel “ burdened” God with her iniquities. That is the reason he delivered her to destruction (vs. 28). This is followed in 44:1-5 with the description of the New Israel formed by God’ s Spirit.
In 44:6-8 the prophet turns to the message which God wants Israel to proclaim. In the whole of the past there has been only one effective power and force in the world, and that is God himself and none other. This leads to a long insertion which in transmission has lost much of its lyric character: 44:9-20 is a satirical essay on the man-made idols of the human race. Then the prophet hears God’ s appeal to Israel to return to him, after which there is a triumphant call to the whole assembly of heaven and all the peoples of the earth to break forth into singing (44:21-23). The Nations Assembled The trial scene of the nations, first introduced in 41:1-4, is again introduced. The blind and deaf nations of the world are called to assemble. The issue to be decided is the meaning of the current history and the past preparation for it. The peoples of the world are challenged to bring forth their witnesses who can give testimony that will be acknowledged as correct. Israel’ s Calling as God’ s Witness The mention of witnesses in verse 9 is followed by God’ s direct statement to Israel: “ You are my witnesses.” What Israel is to know, believe, and understand, and what she is supposed to proclaim to the world, is that the God who has declared himself to Israel and made himself known in his acts of salvation is God and God alone. There is no savior apart from him. “ I am God, and also henceforth I am He; there is none who can deliver from my hand; I work and who can hinder it?” (vs. 13). In the midst of a world full of gods, this dramatic and forthright clearing out of the vast amount of underbrush is remarkable testimony. The focus of religious attention must be single. In the whole action of God in the past, as he has made himself known to Israel, there has been no other power associated with him. He alone has done it, and of this fact Israel is to be the witness before the world.
His is the only effective power in the world. What he chooses to do none can hinder. God’ s New Salvation Reiterated No sooner has this forthright message been given to Israel as the sum of her testimony to the world, than the prophet immediately turns back to the theme of Israel’ s coming salvation. God is going to send to Babylon and break down the bars of her prison and lead a new Exodus. The concentration in verses 18-19 on the new things which God is about to bring forth as over against “ the former things” should not be interpreted as though the former things were without meaning for the present. It is, instead, a matter of getting the servant of the Lord to look forward to a future which the nation assumed it did not have. A highway is to be prepared in the terrible desert, and God himself will lead his people across it. They need fear no wild animals, nor will they go without water. God will do this for the people he has formed for himself “ that they might declare my praise.” Here are gathered together in one short poem many of the themes of the prophet with regard to Israel. There is a strong and insistent emphasis upon Israel as God’ s chosen people. His acts in the days of old in forming a nation for himself were not in vain; they were not annulled in the Assyrian and Babylonian destructions of Samaria and Jerusalem. Now is the time of the new Exodus, the New Israel. This is the “ new thing” which will be far more glorious than the first Exodus. Central in the prophet’ s words, however, is the purpose of God’ s action: it is that Israel shall be his witness before the world. God’ s Past Indictment and Judgment of Israel The prophet now turns abruptly from the present and future to the past sin of Israel, reiterating the correctness of the messages of the earlier prophets. Israel has not been burdened with a heavy sacrificial system, and as a result her people have not had to bring many offerings of various types. Yet at the same time they have not brought God worship at all but have burdened him with their sins (vss. 22-24). In verses 26-28 God challenges Israel to present her case in court and let the matter be equitably decided. Every one of Israel’ s leaders or mediators has sinned against God, and that is the reason why Israel was delivered to “ utter destruction.” The term so translated is an old word drawn from the institution of holy war in Israel’ s early days as a nation, when pagan peoples and property were to be offered up as a holocaust to God. This was a way of purifying the land, and of hallowing it for the new use to which it was to be put.
The prophet proclaimed that God was using Assyria and Babylonia to bring holy war against Israel, and here the reference is to the destruction of the nation as a purifying holocaust. Nevertheless, always in the background is the statement that the punishment is past and that God has blotted out the nation’ s transgressions (vs. 25).
The New Israel by God’ s Spirit The prophet hears God’ s voice reaffirming to Israel that she is his servant, his chosen, and saying again, “ Fear not.” The thought in verses 3-5 now turns to the new nation of Israel that is to be formed. God will pour out his Spirit and his blessing upon her future offspring so that they will be as numerous as grass and reeds by a flowing stream. Israel believed that during the first period in the Promised Land, the period of the Judges, God ruled Israel directly and for periods of crisis raised up leaders and empowered them by his Spirit to do their work. In prophetic eschatology God’ s new age will be a time when the New Israel will all be possessors of the Spirit. The most familiar statement of this work of God among the future people is Joe 2:28-29. In the New Testament this prophecy of the age to come is seen as having been fulfilled in Christ. The Church is nourished and formed by God’ s Spirit, and her birthday is at Pentecost, when the disciples experienced the outpouring of God’ s Spirit in their midst (Acts 2). Israel’ s Message as God’ s Witness The message to which Israel is to be witness before the world, first specified in 43:10-13, is now described again. There is no other effective power in the universe than the God who is Israel’ s Redeemer, “ the Lord of hosts.” If there is, let that power speak up and explain the past and the future. Yet, the people of Israel need not be afraid; God’ s sole sovereignty had been revealed to them of old and they are his witness. There is no other “ Rock” on which they can rely. This is the first use in Second Isaiah of one of the old words used to describe the dependability, the strength, and the protection of God. God as the “ Rock” is a sure and strong refuge and protection in time of danger. (See, for example, Deuteronomy 32:4; Deuteronomy 32:15; Deuteronomy 32:18; Deuteronomy 32:30-31; 1 Samuel 2:2; and 2 Samuel 22:2-3 for earlier and very effective uses of the same metaphor, which is also common in the Psalms.) Satire on Idols and Their Worshipers The original text of Second Isaiah seems to have been interrupted at this point for the introduction of verses 9-20. Verses 21-23 could well be interpreted as a proper continuation of verses 6-8. The original poetic structure of verses 9-20, if there was such a thing, is no longer clear. Yet even if the verses owe their present expansion to the school of Second Isaiah, the spirit of the great prophet himself and some of his characteristic phrases are present. As a response to the question and its answer in verses 7-8 this section on idolatry is a remarkable satire. People who make their own gods and set them up as witnesses are in a pitiable situation.
Such witnesses “ neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame” (vs. 9). After a detailed description of the making of an ancient image (vss. 12-17) and of the way a human idol-maker uses part of the same wood to burn in a fire to cook his food and to warm himself, the prophet or his disciples portray the plight of the idolater with the greatest possible irony by remarking, “ He prays to it and says, ‘ Deliver me, for thou art my god!’” (vs. 17). People who do this sort of thing simply have no discernment whatever. They do not ask, “ Shall I fall down before a block of wood?” Such a person “ feeds on ashes; a deluded mind has led him astray, and he c ann ot deliver himself” (vss. 18-20). Of course, no polytheist of antiquity would have acknowledged these words of the prophet as a fair description of his religion. The ancient idols were in no way meant to confine the great cosmic deities. They called the great gods to the mind of the worshiper and, since they were “ like” the gods they stood for, they in some measure shared in the divine holiness and could be used as proper foci of attention in worship. The Israelite prophet, however, refused to acknowledge that there was any reality whatsoever behind the image. To him the ancient worshiper was trying to worship a fetish, something that had no power to do anything. We see the prophets to have been correct in this adverse judgment, because it is true that the religions about which they were speaking died with the death of the people and civilizations which had formulated them. The ancient gods died when their civilizations died! “ Remember These Things, O Jacob” The precise object of the term “ remember” in this section
is unclear. In the present editing of the text of the prophet it would refer to the section on idolatry and the sole Lordship of God (vss. 6-20). Yet verse 22 seems to refer back to 43:22-28. God has forgiven all of their earlier transgressions and now invites his people: “ Return to me, for I have redeemed you.” At this remarkable announcement of the graciousness of God, the prophet suddenly calls for the whole host of heaven and all that is on earth to break forth into singing (vs. 23). The great deed of God has been decided upon and can be spoken of as having been completed: “ For the Lord has redeemed Jacob, and will be glorified in Israel.” The joy and the triumph of this prophetic faith and of its vision of God’ s future is one of the significant characteristics of this literature.