The Oxford Handbook of Isaiah (OXFORD HANDBOOKS SERIES) 0190669241, 9780190669249

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T H E OX F O R D H A N D B O O K O F

ISA I A H

the oxford handbook of

ISAIAH Edited by

LENA-SOFIA TIEMEYER

1

1 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2020 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia, 1969- editor. Title: The Oxford handbook of Isaiah / edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer. Description: New York, NY, United States of America : Oxford University Press, 2020. | Summary: “The book of Isaiah is one of the longest books in the Hebrew Bible. It contains some of the most hauntingly beautiful passages in the entire Bible, and it has influenced Judaism and Christianity to an exceptional extent. Many of its passages feature in the liturgies of the synagogue and of the church. In Jewish tradition, the threefold acclamation of God’s holiness in Isa 6:3 is recited in prayers throughout the day: it is, for example, among the benedictions framing the recitation of the Shema’ in the morning and part of the central prayer called the Amidah. In Christian tradition, Isa 7:14 is understood to predict the virgin birth; and Isa 9:1–7, the incarnation. Isa 40:3–5 is identified as speaking about John the Baptist, and Isa 52:13–53:12 is read on Good Friday to illustrate Jesus's suffering, death, and resurrection”—Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2020020745 (print) | LCCN 2020020746 (ebook) | ISBN 9780190669249 (hardback) | ISBN 9780190669263 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Bible. Isaiah—Criticism, interpretation, etc. Classification: LCC BS1515.52 .O94 2020 (print) | LCC BS1515.52 (ebook) | DDC 224/.106—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020020745 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020020746 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America

Contents

Contributorsix Abbreviationsxiii

Introduction Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer

1

PA RT I   QU E ST ION S R E L AT E D TO T H E F OR M AT ION OF T H E B O OK OF I S A IA H 1. The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure Jacob Stromberg

19

2. The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History Uwe Becker

37

PA RT I I   K E Y PA RT S OF T H E B O OK OF I S A IA H 3. The Oracles against the Nations Hyun Chul Paul Kim

59

4. Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse J. Todd Hibbard

79

5. The Narratives about Isaiah and Their Relationship with 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles Shelley L. Birdsong

95

6. Isaiah 40–55 Katie M. Heffelfinger

111

7. Isaiah 56–66 Andreas Schüle

128

vi   contents

PA RT I I I   T H E WOR L D B E H I N D T H E T E X T 8. The Neo-Assyrian Context of First Isaiah C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays

145

9. Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background Joseph Blenkinsopp

159

10. The Book of Isaiah: Persian/Hellenistic Background  Kristin Joachimsen

176

PA RT I V   T H E M E S A N D L I T E R A RY M OT I F S SPA N N I N G T H E B O OK OF I S A IA H 11. God’s Character in Isaiah Patricia K. Tull

201

12. Monotheism in Isaiah Matthias Albani

219

13. Sin and Punishment in the Book of Isaiah  Blaženka Scheuer

249

14. Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah Frederik Poulsen

265

15. Davidic Kingship in Isaiah H. G. M. Williamson

280

16. Exile in the Book of Isaiah Dalit Rom-Shiloni

293

17. The Servant(s) in Isaiah Ulrich Berges

318

18. Wisdom in Isaiah Andrew T. Abernethy

334

19. Eschatology in Isaiah Soo J. Kim

352

contents   vii

PA RT V   T H E B O OK OF I S A IA H A S L I T E R AT U R E 20. The Poetic Structures in Isaiah J. Blake Couey

377

21. The Poetic Vision of Isaiah Francis Landy

393

22. Use of Metaphors  Göran Eidevall

409

PA RT V I   I S A IA H I N SE L E C T T E X T UA L T R A DI T ION S 23. Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls George J. Brooke

429

24. Isaiah in Greek Abi T. Ngunga

451

25. Isaiah in Aramaic William A. Tooman

469

26. Isaiah in Latin Anni Maria Laato

489

PA RT V I I   I S A IA H I S SE L E C T R E L IG IO U S T R A DI T ION S 27. Isaiah in Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions Antti Laato

507

28. Isaiah in the New Testament Steve Moyise

531

29. Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah Marvin A. Sweeney

542

viii   contents

30. Canonical Reading of Isaiah John Goldingay

559

31. Isaiah in Art and Music John F. A. Sawyer

574

PA RT V I I I   SE L E C T I DE OL O G IC A L R E A DI N G S OF I S A IA H 32. Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah Sharon Moughtin-Mumby

601

33. Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah Mark G. Brett

621

34. Isaiah in Liberation Theology Carol J. Dempsey, OP

637

35. Interpretive Context Matters: Isaiah and the African Context in African Study Bibles Knut Holter

655

36. Reading Isaiah in Asia Maggie Low

670

Author Index Reference Index

683 695

Contributors

Andrew T. Abernethy  is Associate Professor of Old Testament at Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois, USA. His most recent volume is The Book of Isaiah and God’s Kingdom (IVP Academic, 2016). Matthias Albani is Professor of Old Testament at the Evangelische Hochschule Moritzburg, Moritzburg/Dresden, Saxony, Germany. His most recent article is “Kalender.” In Handbuch für Alttestamentliche Anthropologie (Mohr Siebeck, 2019). Uwe Becker  is Professor of Old Testament at the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, Germany. His most recent article on Isaiah is “Jesaja, Jeremia und die Anfänge der Unheilsprophetie in Juda.” Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 6, no.1 (2017): 79–100. Ulrich Berges is Professor in Old Testament Exegesis at the Faculty of Catholic Theology at the University of Bonn, Germany and extraordinary Professor in the Department of Old Testament Studies, University of Pretoria, South Africa. His most recent article is “The Individualization of Exile in Trito-Isaiah: Some Reflections on Isaiah 55 and 58.” In Images of Exile in Prophetic Literature, edited by J. Høgenhaven et al. (FAT II; Mohr Siebeck, 2019). Shelley  L.  Birdsong  is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at North Central College, Naperville, Illinois, USA. Her most recent volume is the co-edited Partners with God: Theological and Critical Readings of the Bible in Honor of Marvin A. Sweeney (Claremont Press, 2017). Joseph Blenkinsopp  is John A. O’Brien Professor Emeritus of Biblical Studies at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana, USA. His most recent volume is The Beauty of Holiness: Re-reading Isaiah in the Light of the Psalms (T&T Clark, 2019). Mark G. Brett  is Professor of Hebrew Bible at Whitley College, within the University of Divinity, Melbourne, Australia. His most recent volume is Locations of God: Political Theology in the Hebrew Bible (Oxford University Press, 2019). George J. Brooke  is Rylands Professor of Biblical Criticism and Exegesis Emeritus at the University of Manchester, and Visiting Professor of Biblical Studies at the University of Chester, England, UK. His most recent volume is the co-edited T&T Clark Companion to the Dead Sea Scrolls (T&T Clark, 2019). J.  Blake Couey is Associate Professor of Religion at Gustavus Adolphus College, St. Peter, Minnesota, USA. His most recent volume is Reading the Poetry of First Isaiah: The Most Perfect Model of the Prophetic Poetry (Oxford University Press, 2015).

x   contributors C. L. Crouch  is David Allan Hubbard Professor of Old Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California, USA. Her most recent volume is Translating Empire: Tell Fekheriyeh, Deuteronomy, and the Akkadian Treaty Tradition (FAT; Mohr Siebeck, 2019), with Jeremy M. Hutton. Carol J. Dempsey,  OP, is Professor of Theology (Biblical Studies) at the University of Portland, Oregon, USA. Her latest article is “Metaphor in the Minor Prophets,” in The Oxford Handbook on the Minor Prophets, edited by Julia O’Brien (Oxford University Press 2020). Göran Eidevall  is Professor in Hebrew Bible at the University of Uppsala, Sweden. His most recent volume is Amos: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (AYB; Yale University Press, 2017). John Goldingay is Professor of Old Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California, USA. His most recent volume is Old Testament Ethics (InterVarsity, 2019). Christopher B. Hays  is D. Wilson Moore Professor of Ancient Near Eastern Studies at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California, USA. His most recent volume is The Origins of Isaiah 24–27: Josiah’s Festival Scroll for the Fall of Assyria (Cambridge University Press, 2019). Katie M. Heffelfinger  is Lecturer in Biblical Studies and Hermeneutics at the Church of Ireland Theological Institute, Dublin. Her most recent article is “The Servant in Poetic Juxtaposition in Isaiah 49:1-13.” In Biblical Poetry and the Art of Close Reading, edited by J. Blake Couey and Elaine T. James (Cambridge University Press, 2018). J. Todd Hibbard  is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of the Religious Studies at the University of Detroit Mercy, Michigan, USA. His most recent volume is the co-edited The Book of Isaiah: Enduring Questions Answered Anew (SBL Press, 2014). Knut Holter  is Professor of Old Testament, Centre for Mission and Global Studies, VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway. His most recent article is “Texts of Affirmation Rather Than Negation: Jesse N. K. Mugambi and African Biblical Studies.” In Religion and Social Reconstruction in Africa, edited by Elias K. Bongmba (Routledge, 2018). Kristin Joachimsen is Professor in Old Testament/Hebrew Bible at MF-Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society, Oslo. Her most recent article is “Esther in Shusan.” In Foreign Women—Women in Foreign Lands, edited by Angelika Berlejung and Marianne Grohmann (Orientalische Religionen in der Antike; Mohr Siebeck, 2019). Hyun Chul Paul Kim  is Harold B. Williams Professor of Hebrew Bible at Methodist Theological School in Ohio (MTSO), Delaware, Ohio, USA. His most recent volume is the co-edited Second Wave Intertextuality and the Hebrew Bible (SBL Press, 2019).

contributors   xi Soo J. Kim  is Professor of Old Testament Professor of Old Testament at Central Baptist Theological Seminary, Shawnee, Kansas, USA. Her most recent article is “Contact Points between Korean Shamanism and Bible in Korea.” In Oxford Handbook of Bible in Korea (Oxford University Press, forthcoming). Anni Maria Laato  is Adjunct Professor in Systematic Theology at the Åbo Akademi University, Åbo/Turku, Finland. Her most recent article is “Biblical Mothers as Images of the Church.” International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church 19 (2019): 44–58. Antti Laato is Professor in Old Testament Exegetics with Judaic Studies at Åbo Akademi University, Åbo/Turku, Finland. His most recent volume is The Origin of Israelite Zion Theology (LHBOTS; T&T Clark, 2018). Francis Landy  is Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. His most recent article is “Traps and Metaphors.” In Profeti Maggiori e Minori a Confronto/Major and Minor Prophets Compared, edited by Guido Benzi et al. (Nuova Biblioteca di Scienze Religiose; LAS, 2019). Maggie Low is an Old Testament faculty member at Trinity Theological College, Singapore. Her most recent article is “An Egalitarian Marriage: Reading Ephesians 5:21–33 Intertextually with Genesis 2.” Asia Journal of Theology 33, no. 1 (2019): 3–10. Sharon Moughtin-Mumby  is Visiting Research Fellow at King’s College London, UK. Her most recent volume is Sexual and Marital Metaphors in Hosea, Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Ezekiel (OTM; Oxford University Press, 2008). Steve Moyise  is Visiting Professor at Newman University, Birmingham, England, UK. His most recent volume is the co-edited Exploring Intertertextuality: Diverse Strategies for New Testament Interpretation of Texts (Wipf and Stock, 2016). Abi T. Ngunga  is Pastor of St Andrews Baptist Church, Scotland, UK. His most recent volume is Messianism in the Old Greek of Isaiah: An Intertextual Analysis (FRLANT; Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2012). Frederik Poulsen is Assistant Professor of Old Testament at the University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark. His most recent volume is The Black Hole in Isaiah (FAT; Mohr Siebeck, 2019). Dalit Rom-Shiloni is Associate Professor of Hebrew Bible at the Department of Biblical Studies, Tel Aviv University, Israel. Among her recent articles is “From Prophetic Words to Prophetic Literature: Challenging Paradigms That Control Our Academic Thoughts.” JBL 138, no. 3 (2019): 565–586. John F. A. Sawyer  is Honorary Fellow at the School of Divinity, Edinburgh University, Scotland, UK. His most recent volume is Isaiah through the Centuries (Wiley-Blackwell Bible Commentary Series; John Wiley and Sons, 2018).

xii   contributors Blaženka Scheuer  is Senior Lecturer in Old Testament Studies at Lund University, Sweden. Her most recent article is “Animal Names for Hebrew Bible Female Prophets.” Bible & Critical Theory 15 (2019): 29–33. Andreas Schüle  is Professor for Theology and Exegesis of the Old Testament at the University of Leipzig, Germany. His most recent volume is Theology from the Beginning: Essays on the Primeval History and Its Canonical Context (FAT; Mohr Siebeck, 2017). Jacob Stromberg is a Visiting Lecturer at Duke Divinity School, Durham, North Carolina, USA. His most recent article is “Figural History in the Book of Isaiah: The Prospective Significance of Hezekiah’s Deliverance from Assyria and Death,” in Imperial Visions: The Prophet and the Book of Isaiah in an Age of Empires, edited by Reinhard Kratz and Joachim Schaper (FRLANT; Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2020). Marvin A. Sweeney  is Professor of Hebrew Bible at the Claremont School of Theology, c/o Willamette University, Salem, Oregon, USA. His most recent volume on Isaiah is Isaiah 40–66 (FOTL; Eerdmans, 2016). Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer  is Professor in Old Testament at Örebro School of Theology, Sweden. Her most recent volume is the edited Prophecy and Its Cultic Dimensions (JAJS; Vandenhoeck &Ruprecht, 2019). William  A.  Tooman  is Senior Lecturer in Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and­ Co-director of the Institute for Bible, Theology, and Hermeneutics at the University of St Andrews, Scotland, UK. His most recent volume is the co-edited Standards of (In)Coherence in Ancient Jewish Literature (Mohr Siebeck, 2020). Patricia  K.  Tull  is A.  B.  Rhodes Professor Emerita of Old Testament at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary, Kentucky, USA. Her most recent volume is Inhabiting Eden: Christians, the Bible, and the Ecological Crisis (Westminster John Knox Press, 2013). H.  G.  M.  Williamson  is Regius Professor of Hebrew Emeritus at the University of Oxford, UK, and an Emeritus Student of Christ Church. His most recent volume is Isaiah 6–12 (ICC; Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018).

Abbreviations

ÄAT AB ABD

Ägypten und Altes Testament Anchor Bible Commentary Anchor Bible Dictionary, 6 vols. Edited by David Noel Freedman, New York: Doubleday, 1992 ABG Arbeiten zur Bibel und ihrer Geschichte ABR Australian Biblical Review AbrN Supp Ancient Near Eastern Studies Supplement Series AfO Archiv für Orientforschung AfO.B Archiv für Orientforschung. Beiheft AJBS African Journal of Biblical Studies AJS Review Association for Jewish Studies Review AMI.E Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran AnBib Analecta Biblica ANEM Ancient Near East Monographs AOAT Alter Orient und Altes Testament AOS American Oriental Series ArOr Archiv Orientalni ASOR American Schools of Oriental Research ASTI Annual of the Swedish Theological Institute ATD Alte Testament Deutsch AThANT Abhandlungen zur Theologie des Alten und Neuen Testaments AUM Andrews University Monographs BaF Baghdader Forschungen BASOR Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research BAT Botschaft des Alten Testaments BBB Bonner Biblische Beiträge BEATAJ Beiträge zur Erforschung des Alten Testaments und des Antiken Judentums BETL Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium BibRev Bible Review BIOSCS Bulletin for the International Organization of Septuagint and Cognate Studies BIS Biblical Interpretation Series BJRULM Bulletin of the John Rylands University Library of Manchester

xiv   abbreviations BJS BKAT BTA BTB BThS BTZ BWANT BZAW CBQ CBET CBQMS CC ConBOT CORO COS CRHPR CSCA CSHB CTJ CurBS CUSAS DCLS DDD

DJD DSD EBib EBR

ECC EJ EThL ETR EuroJTh ExpTim FAT FB FIOTL

Brown Judaic Studies Biblischer Kommentar. Altes Testament Bible and Theology in Africa Biblical Theology Bulletin Biblisch-Theologische Studien Berliner Theologische Zeitschrift Beiträge zur Wissenschaft vom Alten und Neuen Testament Beiheft zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Catholic Biblical Quarterly Contributions to Biblical Exegesis and Theology Catholic Biblical Quarterly Monograph Series Continental Commentaries Coniectanea biblica. Old Testament Series Centrum Orbis Orientalis Context of Scripture. Edited by William W. Hallo and K. Lawson Younger Jr. Leiden: Brill, 2003 Cahiers de la Revue d’histoire et de philosophie religieuses Centre for the Study of Christianity in Asia Critical Studies in the Hebrew Bible Calvin Theological Journal Currents in Biblical Research Cornell University Studies in Assyriology and Sumerology Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature Studies Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible. Edited by Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst. 2nd Extensively Revised Version. Leiden: Brill, 1999 Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Dead Sea Discoveries Etudes bibliques Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception Online. Edited by Christine Helmer, Steven L. McKenzie, Thomas Römer, Jens Schröter, Barry Dov Walfish, and Eric Ziolkowski. https://www.degruyter.com/view/db/ebr. Eerdmans Critical Commentary Encyclopedia Judaica, edited by Fred Skolnik and Michael Berenbaum. New York: MacMillian, 20072 Ephemerides Theologiae Lovanienses Etudes Theologiques et Religieuses European Journal of Theology The Expository Times Forschungen zum Alten Testament Forschung zur Bibel Formation and Interpretation of Old Testament Literature

abbreviations   xv FOTL FRLANT GAT GThT HAR HAT HBM HBS HBT HCOT HeBAI HKAT HSM HThKAT HTS HTS HTR HUCA ICC IDB IEJ Int IOS JAAR JAB JAJS JANER JAOS JBL JBS JBTh JCP JGS JHS JJS JLH JNES JNSL JQR JR

Forms of the Old Testament Literature Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments Grundrisse zum Alten Testament Gereformeerd Theologisch Tijdschrift Hebrew Annual Review Göttinger Handkommentar zum Alten Testament Hebrew Bible Monographs Herders Biblische Studien Horizons in Biblical Theology Historical Commentary on the Old Testament Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel Göttinger Handkommentar zum Alten Testament Harvard Semitic Monographs Herders theologischer Kommentar zum Alten Testament Harvard Theological Monographs Hervormde Teologiese Studies Harvard Theological Review Hebrew Union College Annual International Critical Commentary Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, 4 vols. Edited by George A. Buttrick. New York: Abingdon Press, 1962 Israel Exploration Journal Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology Israel Oriental Studies Journal of the American Academy of Religion Journal of the Aramaic Bible Journal of Ancient Judaism. Supplements Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions Journal of the American Oriental Society Journal of Biblical Literature Jerusalem Biblical Studies Jahrbuch für biblische Theologie Jewish and Christian Perspectives Journal of Gender Studies Journal of Hebrew Scripture Journal of Jewish Studies Journal of Literature and History Journal of Near Eastern Studies Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages Jewish Quarterly Review The Journal of Religion

xvi   abbreviations JSJ JSJS JSNTS JSOT JSOTS JSP JSPS JSSM JSSS JTI JTS KAT LAI LHBOTS LNTS LThK LUA MGWJ NABU NCBC NEA NEB Neot NETS NICOT NIGTC NovTSup NTM NTS OBC OBO OBT OTE OTG OTL OTM OTRM OtSt PBVM PIBA POS

Journal for the Study of Judaism Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplement Series Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha Supplement Series Journal of Semitic Studies Monographs Journal of Semitic Studies Supplement Series Journal of Theological Interpretation Journal of Theological Studies Kommentar zum Alten Testament Library of Ancient Israel The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies Library of New Testament Studies Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche. Edited by Michael Buchberger, Josef Höfer, and Karl Rahner. Freiburg: Herder, 1957–1965 Lunds universitets årsskrift Monatsschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judentums Nouvelles Assyriologiques Brèves et Utilitaires New Century Bible Commentary Near Eastern Archaeology Neue Echter Bibel. Altes Testament Neotestamentica New English Translation of the Septuagint. Edited by Albert Pietersma and Benjamin G. Wright. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007 New International Commentary on the Old Testament New International Greek Testament Commentary Novum Testamentum, Supplements New Testament Monographs New Testament Studies Orientalia Biblica et Christiana Orbis biblicus et orientalis Overtures to Biblical Theology Old Testament Essays Old Testament Guides The Old Testament Library Oxford Theological Monographs Oxford Theology and Religion Monographs Oudtestamentische studiën Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Proceedings of the Irish Biblical Association Pretoria Oriental Series

abbreviations   xvii POT PRSt PSB PTM RB RBL RevQ RINAP RRBS SAA SAIS SBL SBLAIL SBLDS SBLEJL SBLMS SBLSCS SBLSP SBLSymS SBS SBT SDB SEÅ SHANE SHBC SJ SJLA SJOT SJSJ SJT SNTSMS SRB SSN SSU StBibLit STDJ TAPS TB TDOT

ThLZ

De Prediking van het Oude Testament Perspectives in Religious Studies Princeton Seminary Bulletin Princeton Theological Monograph Revue Biblique Review of Biblical Literature Revue de Qumran Royal Inscriptions of the Neo-Assyrian Period Project Recent Research in Biblical Studies State Archives of Assyria Studies in the Aramaic Interpretation of Scripture Society of Biblical Literature Society of Biblical Literature Ancient Israel and Its Literature Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series Society of Biblical Literature Early Judaism and Its Literature Society of Biblical Literature Monograph Series Society of Biblical Literature Septuagint and Cognate Studies Society of Biblical Literature Seminar Papers Society of Biblical Literature Symposium Series Stuttgarter Bibelstudien Studies in Biblical Theology Dictionnaire de la Bible, Supplément Svensk exegetisk årsbok Studies in the History of the Ancient Near East Smyth & Helwys Bible Commentary Society of Jesus Studies in Judaism in Late Antiquity Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism Scottish Journal of Theology Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series Studies in the Reception History of the Bible Studia Semitica Neerlandica Studia Semitica Upsaliensia Studies in Biblical Literature Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah Transactions of the American Philosophical Society Theologische Bücherei Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament, 15 vols. Edited by Robert J. G. Johannes Botterweck, Helmer Ringgren, and Heinz-Josef Fabry. German original: Theologisches Wörterbuch zum Alten Testament. Translated by John T. Willis. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1974– Theologische Literaturzeitung

xviii   abbreviations ThZ TRE TRINJ TRu TUAT TVZ UF UTB VT VTS VWGTh WBC WMANT WUNT ZABR ZAW ZDMG ZRGG ZTK

Theologische Zeitschrift Theologische Realenzyclopadie. Edited by Albrecht Döhnert et al. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1977–2011 Trinity Journal Theologische Rundschau Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments I–III. Edited by Otto Kaiser. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 1982–1997 Theologischer Verlag Zürich Ugarit Forschungen UTB GmbH Vetus Testamentum Vetus Testamentum Supplement Series Veröffentlichungen der Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft für Theologie Word Biblical Commentary Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament Zeitschrift für Altorientalische und Biblische Rechtsgeschichte Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche

I n troduction Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer

The book of Isaiah is one of the longest books in the Hebrew Bible. It contains some of the most hauntingly beautiful passages in the entire Bible, and it has influenced Judaism and Christianity to an exceptional extent. Many of its passages feature in the liturgies of the synagogue and of the church. In Jewish tradition, the threefold acclamation of God’s holiness in Isa 6:3 is recited in prayers throughout the day: it is, for example, among the benedictions framing the recitation of the Shema’ in the morning and part of the central prayer called the Amidah. In Christian tradition, Isa 7:14 is understood to predict the virgin birth; and Isa 9:1–7, the incarnation. Isa 40:3–5 is identified as speaking about John the Baptist, and Isa 52:13–53:12 is read on Good Friday to illustrate Jesus’s suffering, death, and resurrection.1 The book of Isaiah is also one of the most complex books because of its variety and plurality. It has, accordingly, been the focus of scholarly debate for the last two thousand years, with no sign of consensus in sight. It reflects many different historical and societal settings, among them debates with Judah’s kings, promises of restoration after Judah’s destruction, and problems in the post-monarchic community. It addresses a wide range of audiences, from the private words spoken to King Ahaz and King Hezekiah to proclamations to the Persian conqueror Cyrus. It communicates its messages through multiple literary genres, including divine oracles, parables, and narratives. The Oxford Handbook of Isaiah offers merely a glimpse of the manifold riches of the book of Isaiah. The topics it covers were selected with the goal of providing readers with a cornucopia of different views. The result does not form a unified standpoint; rather, the individual contributions mirror the wide and varied spectrum of scholarly engagement with the book. The contributors’ chapters likewise represent a broad range of scholarly traditions. I have consciously included scholars from diverse continents and religious affiliations to ensure that the ongoing global scholarly discussions are well represented. The handbook is divided into eight parts. Part I contains two chapters that address overarching issues of structure and history of composition. Jacob Stromberg’s chapter 1 seeks to identify a macro-structure of the book of Isaiah. When we read it as a coherent whole—namely, as the “vision of Isaiah of 1  See further, John F. A. Sawyer, The Fifth Gospel: Isaiah in the History of Christianity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).

2   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer Jerusalem” (Isa 1:1)—we can see that the book of Isaiah falls naturally into two halves: in the first thirty-nine chapters, the reader inhabits the world of the prophet Isaiah prior to the destruction of Jerusalem and the ensuing exile of much of its population. In the final twenty-seven chapters, the reader is catapulted into the future that the prophet foresaw but did not live to see. In this half of the book, only God speaks. At a lower level, the book of Isaiah consists of several interconnected subunits. Chapters 1–12 contain oracles of judgment and salvation for Israel and Judah, with the focus on the latter nation, whereas chapters 13–27 offer corresponding oracles of judgments against the nations. In parallel, chapters 13–27 connect thematically forward with chapters 36–39 through their shared focus on Assyria. The oracles in chapters 28 to 35 likewise connect thematically, backward to the material in Isa 1–12 but also forward to the oracles of salvation and restoration in Isa 40–55. Finally, chapters 56–66 bring the book to a close. Here, the predicted eschatological salvation reuses and reverses the earlier visions of doom in the first half of the book (cf. Soo J. Kim). Chapter 2 by Uwe Becker concerns the gradual composition of the book of Isaiah and offers a deliberate contrast to Stromberg’s chapter because it emphasizes diversity and development rather than cohesion. Early biblical scholars focused on matters of authorship and assigned Isa 1–39 and Isa 40–66 to different authors. Subsequently, Bernhard Duhm argued that the last twenty-seven chapters stemmed not from one but two authors—namely, Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah, and he further assigned the four socalled Servant Songs to yet another author (cf. Berges). Duhm also highlighted the unlikelihood that all of Isa 1–39 was composed by a single author called “Isaiah,” suggesting instead that passages such as chapters 24–27 and 36–39 were as late, if not later, than the material in Isa 40–66. More recently, the interest in the prophet Isaiah has receded and to a large extent been replaced by a focus on the book of Isaiah. Whereas some scholars have explored the book from a literary or theological perspective, others have explored questions related to its compositional history. Looking in more detail at this latter group, we see that two basic models for understanding the history of Isaiah exist: (a) the book consists of originally independent texts that were joined together by later redactors; and (b) the later parts of the book were written as a literary continuation of the earlier material. The five chapters in Part II zoom in on key sections in the book of Isaiah. In chapter 3, Hyun Chul Paul Kim offers a succinct analysis of the so-called Oracles against the Nations (OAN) in Isa 13–23. These oracles are unlikely to form an authorial unity; they betray instead an extended textual development beginning in the eighth century and reaching well into the post-monarchic period. The oracles offer expansions of some of the ideas presented in Isa 1–12 (cf. Stromberg), and they also connect with the following oracles in Isa 24–27 (cf. Hibbard) and Isa 30–31, 34. The genre of the OAN is not unique to Isaiah; Amos, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel contain similar OAN. This type of oracle may have a cultic origin or begun as a war oracle. Their key message in Isaiah is dual: God’s judgment on the nations will bring salvation to Judah (cf. Soo J. Kim). At the same time, Judah, with its leadership and elite, is not spared criticism. In parallel, the OAN emphasize God’s kingship (cf. Williamson), but also the hubris of human empires (cf. Brett) and the human devastation of natural resources through warfare (cf. Dempsey).

Introduction   3 Chapter 4, by J. Todd Hibbard, explores Isa 24–27. These four chapters contain a varied group of texts—prophetic oracles, hymns, laments—that probably form late additions to the book of Isaiah (contra Crouch and Hays). In the final form of Isaiah, they can be read as the conclusion of the OAN (cf. Hyun Chul Paul Kim). The question of dating Isa 24–27 is a vexed one in scholarship. The oracles lack clearly datable references, which has left scholars to date the material in view of its thematic and linguistic content or based on its textual allusions to other biblical material. Moreover, the texts in Isa 24–27 may not all stem from the same time but, instead, testify to gradual textual growth. Speaking exegetically, the identity of the city in Isa 24:10, 12; 25:2; 26:1, 5; 27:10 and whether these passages refer to the same city constitute a notorious crux interpretum. Other bones of contention concern the interpretation of the “eternal covenant” in Isa 24:5 and the extent to which extent Isa 26:19 betrays the hope of resurrection. Finally, although Isa 24–27 is often called the “Isaiah Apocalypse,” it is far from clear that this collection of texts really forms an apocalypse. Shelley L. Birdsong, in chapter 5, explores Isa 36–39 and its textual relationship with the similar material in 2 Kgs 18–20 and 2 Chron 32. These texts all describe an event (or possible events) that took place in Judah during the reign of King Hezekiah. One scholarly conundrum concerns the existence of independent sources that the various books utilized and transformed to create their respective accounts of these events. Another issue that has kept scholars occupied relates to the origin of the tradition itself, whether it is in 2 Kgs (and later in 2 Chron) or in Isaiah or whether the origin is in neither context but instead reflects an independent tradition from which both books drew. A parallel question concerns the unique character of each version and how each distinct literary context influences the reader’s appreciation of the narrative. The version in 2 Kgs 18–20 emphasizes Hezekiah’s flaws as a monarch and how his descendants paid the price for his sins. Slightly differently, the Isaianic version stresses both Hezekiah’s piety, as reflected in his prayer, and how he also fails to stay firm in his reliance on God. In this version, Hezekiah becomes a warning example of mistakes not to make. Finally, 2 Chron portrays Hezekiah positively: although he sinned, he also repented. Katie M. Heffelfinger in chapter 6 discusses the uniqueness and interconnectedness of Isa 40–55, a part of Isaiah often called “Deutero-Isaiah” (cf. Becker). From the perspective of redaction-criticism, many contemporary scholars question the authorial unity of Isa 40–55 and not only distinguish the Servant Songs from the rest of the material, but also differentiate between Isa 40–48, Isa 49–52, and Isa 54–55 (cf. Berges). Looking more at the final form of Isa 40–55 shows that the text is characterized by its poetic language filled with images and metaphors, and its use of tension and juxtaposition (cf. Couey and Landy). Thematically, Isa 40–55 stresses the contrast between judgment and comfort, the “New Exodus” motif, and restoration. In parallel, it allows for voices that challenge the divine voice. Despite its unique features, Isa 40–55 is an inherent part of the book of Isaiah: it builds on Isa 1–39 and forms the platform for the later Isa 56–66. These connections are emphasized by shared vocabulary and shared themes, such as the focus on God’s grandeur, holiness, and incomparability, and on his ability to

4   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer control the past, present, and future (cf. Albani). Each consecutive step of growth of the book takes up and transforms the motifs used in the earlier parts. Andreas Schuele’s chapter 7 discusses the final eleven chapters of the book of Isaiah that since Duhm (cf. Becker) have been assigned separate authorship and are often called Trito-Isaiah. Their overarching structure and interconnected history of textual formation are much debated. Much scholarship favors seeing Isa 58–62, constituting two subsections, as the earliest core composition. Isa 58–59 gives the impression that the repercussions of the Babylonian era are still being felt: the city and its temple have not yet been rebuilt. Isa 60–62 then portrays the salvation that Israel can expect if they heed God’s voice and emend their ways. The second composition, Isa 63–66, likewise consists of two subsections. The prayer of repentance in Isa 63:7–64:11 is furnished, and receives a not wholly positive answer in Isa 65–66: it promises God’s presence to a select few who are true and faithful rather than to the entire people (cf. Scheuer). The overarching message of Isa 56–66 is about self-expectation and the gap between pious gestures and moral actions. In the new community, identity as a member of God’s people depends not on birth and origin but on each person’s choice and effort. Part III contains three chapters that each look at the world within and behind the text of Isaiah. As the preceding chapters have already addressed, there is no neat division between Isa 1–39, 40–55, and 56–66 in terms of dating; rather, there is overlap between the various literary subsections of Isaiah. In chapter 8, C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays address the Neo-Assyrian background to (some of) the texts in Isa 1–39. There is material that relates to, for example, the “year King Uzziah died,” that is, 742 bce (Isa 6:1); the Syro-Ephramite War of 734–731 bce (Isa 7); the Ashdod Affair of 714–712 bce (Isa 20); and the siege of Jerusalem by Sennacherib in 701 bce (e.g., Isa 10; 22:8–11; 36–37). Israel, owing to its geographical position and political maneuvering, was spared direct Assyrian domination throughout the larger part of the eighth century. Yet, after Hezekiah’s refusal to pay tribute to Sennacherib (r. 704–681), the Assyrians destroyed the city of Lachish and besieged Jerusalem. After that, Judah and Jerusalem do not seem to have rebelled against their overlord again. The fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire between 611 and 609 bce may be reflected in Isa 24–27 (contra Becker, Hibbard, and Joachimsen). From the perspective of the book of Isaiah, the Neo-Assyrians were Yhwh’s tool and subordinate to his will (e.g., Isa 10). He alone was responsible for the empire’s downfall (Isa 30). Joseph Blenkinsopp in chapter 9 continues the historical survey and addresses the Neo-Babylonian role in the message of the book of Isaiah and its presence in the book. Isa 13:1–22 predicts disaster for the Neo-Babylonian Empire at the hands of Yhwh and the nations under his command. Its downfall is presented as having cosmic significance. The following Isa 14:3–23 expands on the hubris of the Babylonian ruler and how, described in mythological language, he will ultimately fall. Isa 21:1–10 continues to describe the demise of the Neo-Babylonian Empire at the hands of the Elamites and Medes. The tone changes in Isa 39, as it heralds the rise of Babylon as the NeoAssyrians’ successor. Finally, Isa 47 depicts Babylon as a dethroned queen sitting mourning in the ashes. In addition, much of Isa 40–48 contains polemic against

Introduction   5 Neo-Babylonian religious beliefs and practices, with a focus on its supreme deity, Marduk (cf. Albani). Kristin Joachimsen’s chapter  10 concludes Part III by discussing the Persian and Hellenistic background of the book of Isaiah. Many of the texts in Isaiah were written during the Persian and Hellenistic eras and deal with issues connected with events in this wider political context. During these periods, prophecy came to be a more scribal endeavor, and the completion of the book of Isaiah is an illustrative example. Much of the prophetic discourse relates to empire and to the experience of imperial domination. Isa 41–48 depicts the emperor Cyrus as Yhwh’s tool (cf. Crouch and Hays) and his obligation to do Yhwh’s bidding. In this manner, the book of Isaiah not only assigns authority to the Persian Empire but also undermines that same authority (cf. Brett). There may also be evidence in Isa 40–48 of a polemic against the Zoroastrian religion of the Persian Empire (cf. Blenkinsopp). The emphasis in this text on the existence in one deity alone may, for instance, be understood as a reaction to Persian claims of Marduk’s supremacy (cf. Albani). Looking to the later Hellenistic period, several scholars favor such a late dating of, especially, Isa 24–27 (contra Crouch and Hays) and Isa 63–66. If this is the case, then the current book of Isaiah reached is final form in the fourth or possibly even the third century bce (cf. Becker). Part IV contains nine chapters that address important characteristics or themes that run throughout the book of Isaiah. The first three chapters explore God’s character and actions as expressed in Isaiah. Chapter 11 by Patricia Tull focuses on God’s character in Isaiah. In Isaiah, as well as in much of the Hebrew Bible, God is described as a personal God, whose thoughts and feelings are closely connected with those of his people. He is bound to Israel through family ties as its parent and redeemer-kinsman. God is also conceptualized as Israel’s ruler, a farmer of the land, the Creator of Israel and the world, a warrior, and a guide. Furthermore, God is understood as a God who desires: he desires justice and a close relationship with his people, and he makes plans and works actively toward achieving these goals. He is a jealous deity who punishes his people’s misdeeds but also desires reconciliation with them. God is also a deity who speaks. His words are eternal and effective (Isa 55:11) and unhampered by prophetic protest; rather, the divine plan stands firm and unopposed (cf. Sweeney). Finally, and above all, God in Isaiah is a God who acts. He is a destroyer: he raises militarily powers (indirectly) against Israel (Isa 9:8–21) and against the nations (Isa 40:23–24); he terrorizes and humiliates those who exalt themselves (Isa 2:10–17); and he brings vengeance (Isa 59:17). He is also a healer and a restorer: he comforts Jerusalem after destruction (Isa 12:1; 40:1); he guides and protects his people (Isa 40:11); and he inspires justice (Isa 42:1), etc. In sum, he creates both light and darkness (Isa 45:7). Matthias Albani in chapter 12 likewise looks at the perception of God in Isaiah, with focus on monotheism. It is commonly held that Isa 40–55 contains the earliest articulation of monotheism, here understood as the belief in a single God to the exclusion of the existence of any other god. In this discussion, it is worthwhile differentiating between, on the one hand, incomparability and uniqueness and, on the other hand, singleness. Only the latter excludes the existence of other deities. The expressions of monotheism in

6   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer Isa 40–55 are best understood as a polemic against the religion of the conquering Babylonians and Marduk, its chief deity. Isa 40–55 emphasizes that Yhwh, rather than Marduk, is the Lord of Fate and Creation. The reference to the stars in Isa 40:25–26 and 41:22–29, for example, may constitute a direct attack on the tenet of Marduk theology that held that Marduk directs the course of the stars: only Yhwh can predict the future! This polemic became even sharper during the reigns of Nabonidus and Cyrus. It is possible that the conflict between Nabonidus and the Marduk priesthood may have been a catalyst for the formulation of monotheism in Isa 40–48. Although the Babylonians and the Israelites agreed that Nabonidus’s veneration of the moon god Sin was wrong, the Babylonians saw Cyrus as Marduk’s chief tool, whereas the Israelites argued that Yhwh had called Cyrus. Blaženka Scheuer’s chapter 13 continues to explore the theology of the book of Isaiah, with emphasis on the way it depicts sin and punishment. In Isa 1–39, sin is often understood to be a breach of social justice: injustice, corruption, theft, murder, and deceit are all portrayed as crimes against not only humanity but also God. God is a deity who defends the poor and oppressed, and any neglect of these groups is taken as a personal affront to him. The realm of social justice is intimately connected with the realm of worship. God cannot accept the praises of people who in parallel commit the - crimes (Isa 1:10–17). God punishes these sins with the help of war and destruction. Turning to Isa 40–55, the situation is different insofar as sin is less about social justice and more about matters that directly endanger Israel’s relationship with God. Israel does not want to hear what God is saying (Isa 42:20). Idolatry is also a matter of sin because it shows distrust in God’s protection and provision for his people. Notably, there is no direct correlation between sin and punishment in Isa 40–55; rather, the people are being called to repentance because they have now been delivered. Finally, Isa 56–66 reverberates the thoughts of Isa 1–39—namely, the incompatibility of social injustice and worship—and also emphasizes the sin of idolatry (cf. Isa 40–55), whereas the envisaged punishment of the sinners is often pushed into the eschatological future. The lament in Isa 63:7–64:11 stands out in this respect as it questions the fairness of God’s decision to inflict punishment on his people for sins that they cannot help but commit (cf. Schuele, Sweeney). The next four chapters investigate themes that serve as leitmotifs throughout the whole or parts of Isaiah. Frederik Poulsen’s chapter 14 looks in detail at its portrayal of Zion/Jerusalem. The notion that God has chosen Jerusalem as his holy residence and to be its divine king who will protect it from its enemies is central to the book of Isaiah as a whole. It also has parallels in ancient Near Eastern literature. At the same time, it is not possible to speak of a single image of Zion/Jerusalem in Isaiah; rather, the book contains divergent images. On the one hand, the motif of God’s protection of Zion/Jerusalem is an inherent feature. God will raise up enemies who will surround the city, but he will also save his city from any immediate danger (Isa 17:12–14; 29:1–8; 36–37). On the other hand, the destruction and later restoration of Zion/Jerusalem is an equally prevalent motif. Although the actual destruction is never mentioned in Isaiah, it lurks in the gap between Isa 39 and Isa 40 and is presupposed by the material on both sides (e.g., Isa

Introduction   7 6:11–13; 22:1–14; 44:26, 28; 64:10; cf. Rom-Shiloni). The book of Isaiah further portrays Zion/Jerusalem as both Judah’s capital and the universal center of all nations. It will be the source of God’s teaching (Isa 2:2–4), the destination of the nations’ pilgrimage (Isa 66:18–24), and its temple will be a house of prayer for all people (Isa 56:1–8); yet those who refuse to acknowledge its supremacy will perish (Isa 14:1–2; 49:22–23; cf. Brett). Alongside its focus on Zion/Jerusalem, the book of Isaiah also shows a sustained interest in the notion of Davidic kingship. Hugh Williamson in chapter 15 investigates how the Davidic monarch is perceived throughout Isaiah, both in texts written in Jerusalem during the reigns of independent Davidic kings and in texts composed in the post-monarchic era. The interest of the historical character Isaiah in the practical concerns of God’s rule over his people is well illustrated by Isa 32:1: the just rule of a king should extend into all areas of life, coming close to what we today may call “social justice.” Likewise, Isa 9:6–7 and 11:1–9 speak of a royal figure who, endowed by the Spirit of God, ensures a sound judicial and social administration for the benefit of the poor and needy. The later parts of Isaiah pick up and transform this ideal. Instead of a human king, however, many post-monarchic Isaianic passages (Isa 41:21; 44:6; 52:7) describe God’s kingship over Israel. In parallel, other post-monarchic passages transfer the role of the Davidic monarch to a group of people (Isa 55:4–5), as well as to the Servant, who will bring justice and defend the poor and the weak (Isa 42:1–4). Finally, Isa 61:1–4 picks up these royal prerogatives as it speaks of the ideal deliverer, a passage that is reapplied in the new social circumstances of the time in Luke 4:16–21. Dalit Rom-Shiloni’s chapter 16 explores another significant theme that runs through the book of Isaiah, namely, exile. Although this theme is not always pronounced—it is sometimes present only as an absence, such as the “gap” between chapters 1–39 and 40–66 (cf. Landy and Poulsen)—it nonetheless permeates the entire book. Isa 1–39 contains relatively few references to deportation; the key theme is rather that of subjugation to a foreign power (Assyria, Babylon). This notion is often alluded to through references to its aftermath, namely, a destroyed and depopulated land. In contrast, Isa 40–66 emphasizes the return from exile. The text often directly addresses the historical situation in the sixth and fifth centuries bce, but it also uses the theme of exile to reflect retrospectively on these experiences. Both deportation and return are depicted with the help of metaphors from the realm of family life and nature: deportation is likened to a divorce or an bird’s empty nest, and return is conceptualized as a release from prison or birds’ returning from migrations. In both cases—deportation and return—the focal point is theological: God is responsible for the deportation of his people, as well as for bringing them back (cf. Tull). Throughout the book of Isaiah, the location of the Remnant, that is, the survivors, shifts. Whereas Isa 1–39 describes the Remnant as having never left Judah, Isa 40–66 considers the Remnant to be those who have returned from exile. In chapter 17, Ulrich Berges offers an in-depth discussion of the prominent theme of God’s Servant(s), present in the latter part of Isaiah. Since Bernhard Duhm, the four socalled Servant Songs (Isa 42:1–4; 49:1–6; 50:4–9; 52:13–53:12) have often been distinguished from their surroundings in Isa 40–55. In today’s scholarly context, this view has been nuanced: there are clear links between the Songs and their immediate literary

8   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer c­ ontext in Isaiah. The Servant Songs form a unique collection of texts, yet their individual depictions of the Servant(s) do not form a homogenous unity. First, do all four Songs refer to the same Servant? Second, do they speak about a single Servant or a collective entity? Third, do these Servant(s) represent a certain individual, or do they function as a symbol for a community or an ideal? Moreover, what does it mean to be God’s Servant? In a sense, the obedient servant can be found in every Israelite who confesses that Yhwh is the only true God and savior. The fourth Servant Song stands out in its focus on the Servant’s suffering. In this regard, it may be compared with those texts in Isa 49–54 that depict Zion’s suffering and exaltation, as well as with other literary representations of suffering in Job and Lam 3 (cf. Dempsey). In the final chapters of Isaiah, the single Servant becomes many (Isa 54:17b; 56:6; 63:17; 65:8, 9, 13, 14, 15; 66:14): they are the offspring of the Servant and the progeny of mother Zion, and they are God’s own disciples. The final two chapters in Part IV examine how the book of Isaiah interacts with broader topics such as wisdom and eschatology. Andrew  T.  Abernethy in chapter  18 looks at how wisdom is perceived throughout Isaiah. There has been an interesting shift in scholarly interest in the intersection between wisdom and prophecy in general, and between wisdom and Isaiah in particular. Whereas earlier scholarship often focused on the prophet’s relationship with wisdom traditions, personified through his interaction with the “wise men” (Isa 3:1–3; 5:21; 29:14), more recent scholarship has shifted attention from prophet to book to explore wisdom as a literary motif. For example, the notion of a “wonderful counselor” in Isa 9:5, as well as many expressions in Isa 11:2, relates closely to what is found in Proverbs. Isa 40–55 shows affinity with Job in terms of its portrayal of the Servant (Isa 53:11/Job 38:1–42:6), and with Proverbs in terms of its portrayal of the banquet (Isa 55:1–2/Prov 9:1–6, 11). Turning to how Isaiah conceptualizes wisdom, several texts in Isa 1–39 lament Israel’s lack of wisdom: the people lack knowledge and understanding, and this lack originates in their failure to benefit from God’s wisdom. Isa 40–55 continues yet also transforms this theme: God’s wisdom is infinitely deeper than that of Israel; Israel’s lack of wisdom often results in futile idol worship. The w ­ isdom theme is less prominent yet still extant in Isa 56–66: the wicked are often characterized as lacking understanding, and anyone who pursues wisdom is not welcome. The book of Isaiah spends a lot of ink envisaging the future and what may be called the “end times.” Soo J. Kim in chapter 19 looks at the use of eschatological language in  Isaiah—language that is understood to be universal (spatial: involving the whole world), ultimate (temporal: no room for reversal), and radical (extreme degree of ­transformation)—to help the audience to endure national hardship and to encourage them to practice ethical living during these times in order to reach the anticipated ­dystopia/utopia. First, the book of Isaiah presents time as a moving scale: given the long history of its composition, a given present can be one reader’s past and another reader’s future. Second, the dystopia of one group of people (e.g., the nations) can be the utopia of another group of people (Israel). Isaiah depicts dystopia as either like something (the land of confusion, Sodom and Gomorrah, or a desolated wilderness) or going into something (entering Sheol). These depictions of dystopia serve to rationalize the present difficult situation and to initiate the restoration era. In parallel, Isaiah depicts utopia in

Introduction   9 terms of God’s victory over Sheol, and God’s ensuing transformation of nature. The resulting new world is one of both continuity and discontinuity: the old world is not replaced; it has been dramatically changed. In all these descriptions, the intertwined destinies of Jerusalem (cf. Poulsen) and the Remnant (cf. Rom-Shiloni) form two fixed points around which all revolves. The book of Isaiah consists nearly exclusively of poetry, apart from the narratives in Isa 6–8, 20, and 36–39. The three chapters in Part V are therefore devoted to literary aspects of the book of Isaiah, with a focus on its poetic structures, language, and style. J. Blake Couey in chapter 20 provides a plethora of illustrative examples of how the poetry in the book of Isaiah works. Short units of “poetic lines” constitute the basic unit of poetry. They display a striking variety of shapes: they are of different lengths, and they often form independent clauses and, not rarely, also dependent clauses. They further consist of a single clause with a verb, its associated noun, and frequently also a prepositional phrase. As in most biblical poetry, lines in Isaiah occur in couples and are held together by various types of parallelism. In contrast, single, isolated lines are uncommon, occurring nearly always only at the beginning or at the end of a poem. Turning to larger units, enjambment is a common feature. A section of four lines may contain two parallel statements, where the lines within the couplets are enjambed (A/B//A’/B’). Isaiah contains long poems that stretch across whole chapters. They are held together by a variety of poetic features, such as inclusio and the repetition of keywords, despite their diverse content and thematic shifts. Finally, the whole book of Isaiah can be understood as one long poem, due to the affinity between Isa 1 and 65–66. Francis Landy’s chapter 21 discusses more broadly the “poetic universe” that the book of Isaiah constitutes. The book is identified as a “vision” and, as such, it provides the reader with something that is beyond normal sight. It is, furthermore, conceptualized as God’s word to Israel, and in it, the prophet presents what he sees that is beyond normal human communication. In a sense, the prophet seeks to communicate what essentially cannot be communicated. The book does not need to be read linearly because it does not convey a clear, logical development. Instead, Isaiah, as any other poetic book, can be read backward or forward. It also lacks a precise beginning and end, and instead testifies to multiple possible beginnings and endings. At its center is destruction and exile (cf. Poulsen and Rom-Shiloni), but it is surrounded by salvation and restoration. The book of Isaiah, further, has an anthological quality; it contains a history of ideas and presents how they have changed with changing circumstances. The book of Isaiah is also a family romance, depicting God’s relationship with his people Israel and his city Jerusalem. The relationship is characterized on the surface by patriarchal values, yet these are problematized as God becomes increasingly feminized throughout the book (cf. Low and Moughtin-Mumby). Turning from structure to content, Göran Eidevall in chapter 22 investigates the use of metaphors in Isaiah: how are metaphors used rhetorically to proclaim its theological messages, and what can they tell us about its theological dimensions? Metaphors can serve propagandistic purposes as they portray key entities. The portrayal of the foreign nations in Isaiah, for example, ranges from the overly threatening to the merely helpless,

10   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer the portrayal of Babylon in Isa 47 as a degraded former queen being a case in point. This image simultaneously emphasizes Zion’s corresponding rising fortune as God’s beloved city. In a different manner, the use of traditional female images to depict God in much of Isa 40–66 may appeal to its downtrodden exilic audience (cf. Moughtin-Mumby and Rom-Shiloni). The book of Isaiah testifies to a wide range of metaphors, among them the conceptual metaphor people are plants, where human beings are like grass or flowers, whereas nations or dynasties are like trees. Other metaphors are family oriented and seek to denote Israel’s relationship with his people. God is described as Israel’s king, as well as their father and mother (cf. Williamson, Low). Similarly, Zion-Jerusalem is depicted as a daughter, a wife, and a mother. She develops throughout the book of Isaiah, from being a forsaken and barren woman to having the privileged position of God’s beloved spouse and the mother of many children (cf. Poulsen). Parts VI to VIII deal with the book of Isaiah in its later textual and religious reception, as well as its use in more recent ideological interpretations. Part VI looks at Isaiah in four distinct manuscript traditions. George Brooke in chapter 23 offers a comprehensive overview of the presence and use of the Isaianic material in the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is widely held that there are twentytwo copies of the book of Isaiah from the Qumran Caves. Four of these manuscripts cover nearly the whole book (1QIsaa, 1QIsab, 4QIsab, and 4QIsac). Many of the other manuscripts attest either to material from Isa 1–33 or from Isa 34–66, suggesting that the book of Isaiah was copied in two halves during the Second Temple Period. Some of these manuscripts stand close to the MT, whereas others preserve textual variants, some of which correspond with other known versions of Isaiah, and some of which are otherwise unknown. Taken together, these manuscripts help us to understand better the transmission of Isaiah in the Second Temple Period. The nonbiblical material from Qumran, furthermore, sheds light on the uses of the book of Isaiah. On a legal issue, the Damascus Document (CD 10:17–19), for example, employs Isa 58:13 to formulate rules pertaining to the Sabbath. Likewise, the Hodayot (1QHa 16:5–17:36) attest to the widespread poetic appeal of Isaiah. Last but not least, several commentaries (pesharim, e.g., 4QpIsa A, B, and C) cite verses in Isaiah as the prophetic basis for their interpretations. Abi Ngunga (chapter 24) surveys the book of Isaiah in Greek traditions. During the second century bce, Isaiah was translated into Greek by an author living in the Jewish community in Alexandria in Ptolemaic Egypt (cf. Holter). This translation, commonly referred to as the Old Greek (OG), is part of the Greek Bible called the Septuagint (LXX). The Greek text is preserved to us in Codex Alexandrinus (A) and Codex Vaticanus (B), as well as in the revised versions of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. It is also quoted extensively in the literature of the Church Fathers. Comparisons between these different versions and that of the Masoretic Text can shed light on the history of the development of the Hebrew text: a different text may be a sign of a different Vorlage. Alternatively, it may inform us about the theology and contextual concerns of the translators, since a variant text may, rather, testify to their own theological views. The Old Greek of Isaiah was used by both Jewish and Christian communities. It was used, for example, in Greek-speaking Jewish communities in the Mediterranean world, including

Introduction   11 by Josephus. Likewise, it is quoted in the New Testament and employed to support specifically Christian interpretations of Isaiah (e.g., Isa 7:14; 53:7). William Tooman (chapter 25) likewise explores the reception of the book of Isaiah in the Jewish Aramaic Targumim. The official Targum to Isaiah is part of Targum Jonathan to the Prophets. It may have originated in the Land of Israel (cf. TIsa 65:4) but subsequently been redacted in Babylon (cf. TIsa 18:1; 29:9). Additional material was composed even later by the Jewish communities in both places. These Aramaic translations were used in synagogues, alongside the Hebrew text, for education and private study. The Isaiah Targum offers a theological commentary on the biblical text. For instance, it transformed many, but not all, of the anthropomorphic portrayals of God in the Hebrew Bible to protect the divine incomparability and inscrutability and to render him more transcendent. It also altered such passages that cast doubt upon God’s justice, mercy, and loyalty toward Israel. The Targum also aimed to uphold God’s covenant relationship with Israel and the validity of his future promises to Israel. Among other issues of concern is the coming of the Messiah. As in early Christianity, the identity of ­ Isaiah’s Servant(s) was a prime concern (cf. Berges). Notably, the Targum transforms the Servant in Isa 52:13–53:12 from being a suffering figure (MT) into a victorious champion of suffering and identifies him with the Messiah (cf. Antti Laato). Finally, Anni Maria Laato in chapter 26 investigates the ways in which the Latin textual traditions have received and transformed the book of Isaiah. Originally, the Vetus Latina (the collective name of all Latin translations prior to the Vulgate) used by the Church were translations of the LXX. These translations probably originated in actual situations: a given text was needed for practical purposes in a sermon or for a liturgical occasion. Yet ongoing discussions with the Jewish community and the uneven quality of the early translations demanded a translation that was based directly on the Hebrew text; thus Jerome’s Vulgate came into being in the fourth century ce. Jerome’s translation of Isaiah was accompanied by his commentary to the book, wherein he explains his translation and provides historical and theological interpretations. In all these Latin translations, the emphasis on messianic prophecies and Christology, combined with polemics against the Jews, stands out (cf. Moyise). The Church identified with Zion and the people of God, whereas the Jews were categorized as those whom the prophet rejected. Isaianic passages of specific interest in this discourse were Isa 2:3, understood to clarify the relation between the Old and the New Covenant, and Isa 6:9, where the Jews were equated with those who do not hear and see despite having ears and eyes. The next five chapters in Part VII look more closely at the reception of Isaiah in ancient and modern Jewish and Christian traditions. These readings are ideological in character insofar as they engage in a dialogue between the texts in the Hebrew Bible and other texts and allow the perspective of the latter texts to influence their reading of the former. Antti Laato (chapter 27) explores the role that the book of Isaiah has played in Rabbinic and other early Jewish texts. Beginning with what can best be called “historical and biographical perspectives,” the idea of a bipartite book that speaks about Israel’s past, present, and future history can be traced back to Ben Sira and is endorsed by, among others,

12   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer Josephus and (later) Ibn Ezra. Midrash sought to complement the scant information about the prophet Isaiah by elaborating on Isa 36–39, which speaks about the prophet’s encounter with King Hezekiah, as well as on Isa 1:7 and 10, which can be interpreted as a hint toward the prophet’s martyrdom during the reign of Manasseh (cf. Sawyer). Other interpretations have focused on Isaiah’s eschatological message, particularly on the Messiah (Isa 11), the pilgrimage of the nations (Isa 2:2–4; 60:1–22; 66:18–21), Gentile Torah study (Isa 2:2–4), a New Exodus (Isa 11:12; 27:13), and longevity and paradise (Isa 65:17–25). The interpretation of Isa 53 has played an important role in Jewish-Christian dialogue and confrontation for centuries (cf. Berges and Tooman). There are four prevalent Christian misunderstandings of the rabbinic exegesis of this chapter. In particular, it cannot be argued that (a) Isa 53 was intentionally avoided in the synagogue liturgy, (b) the collective interpretation of the Servant originated with Rashi in the Medieval Period, (c) Targum Jonathan’s translation is consciously anti-Christian, and (d) the extant messianic interpretations of Isa 53 are in line with Christian doctrine of a suffering and dying Messiah who atones for the sins of the people through his own death. Steve Moyise in chapter 28 investigates the function of Isaiah in the New Testament and beyond. The Early Church often appealed to the book to enhance the Gospel (cf. Anni Maria Laato). Speaking only about Isa 40, Luke 3:4–6 and John 1:23 identify the “voice in the wilderness” of Isa 40:3 with John the Baptist, who paved the way for Jesus’s ministry; the depiction of an unfathomable God in Rom 11:34 draws on Isa 40:13; and the description of the enduring quality of God’s word in 1 Pet 1:25 alludes to Isa 40:7–8. Other Isaianic passages of specific interest are the Servant Songs, where Jesus is identified as the Servant, as well as the description of the anointed prophet in Isa 61:1 (cf. Luke 4:18–19). In other cases, the NT writers draw on Isaiah to depict the people around Jesus. The divine command in Isa 6:9–10 to make the people deaf and blind (cf. Sweeney and Anni Maria Laato), for example, is employed in Mark 4:11–12 to explain Jesus’s teaching methods. Turning to Paul’s writings, references to Isaiah serve to deepen the discussions of three main themes: the inclusion of the Gentiles, Israel’s rebelliousness, and Israel’s ultimate fate. Similarly, Revelation draws on Isaiah to enhance its descriptions of John’s visionary experience, use of visionary titles, and depictions of eschatological judgment and salvation. Taken together, the book of Isaiah was clearly a very popular and influential book in the first century ce. Modern scholarship has seen the rise of many theological and ideological approaches to the Hebrew Bible in general and the book of Isaiah in particular. The current volume focuses on two important and influential interpretations of Isaiah, one Jewish and one Christian. Marvin Sweeney in chapter 29 discusses the new significance that many passages obtain when being read in the aftermath of the Shoah. The end of Isaiah emphasizes disappointment: all of Israel has not been restored, and Yhwh is not universally recognized as Lord of the world; the vision of world peace has not materialized, and no Davidic king sits on the throne in Jerusalem. This unsatisfactory situation, in turn, raises the question of Yhwh’s power, presence, and righteousness, as well as his apparent failure to protect his people from invasion and destruction. Further, the divine commission to the prophet in Isa 6:9–10 to render the people blind, deaf, and ignorant (cf. Moyise)

Introduction   13 constitutes a moral problem: Isaiah is commanded to prevent Israel’s repentance to ensure the fulfillment of Yhwh’s destructive plans. The command is immoral on two grounds: first, Yhwh is willing to murder his people for his own purposes; second, Isaiah fails to protest and thus becomes a collaborator in the crime. Other Isaianic passages, such as Isa 7:1–25 and Isa 54:7–10, stress Yhwh’s hiddenness or his neglect of his eternal covenant with Israel. These passages together suggest that Israel (and humanity) cannot depend on Yhwh to protect them; instead, they must work in partnership with him to ensure the righteousness, holiness, and integrity of the world. Looking at the book of Isaiah from a modern Christian perspective, John Goldingay’s chapter 30 discusses its significance when seen from a canonical perspective. When we read a text, we can explore what lies behind the text (i.e., what the original authors may have meant), what lies in the text (what the text itself says), and what lies in front of the text (what the reader brings to the text). A canonical approach belongs to the last category, insofar as Christian readers desire to read Isaiah as “Scripture.” This approach can, however, take different shapes. First, the book of Isaiah was written by many authors, yet it is possible to view it as a canonical work insofar as chronologically later authors considered themselves to have the authority to read and rework earlier texts. For example, Isa 60:1–2 picks up Isa 8:23–9:1 [Eng. 9:1–2] and Isa 65:25 takes up Isa 11:6 and 9. Second, the book of Isaiah is a canonical work in the sense that its final form was shaped to convey a certain message and to provide a certain theological perspective. As such, a canonical reading means taking Isaiah in its entirety as a theological whole, reading the message of divine judgment in its first half in connection with and from the standpoint of the message of salvation in its second half. Third, a canonical reading may also mean reading the book of Isaiah as part of a canon, in the sense that it has a certain moral authority. The NT reads Isaiah as a key resource to understand and articulate insights about Jesus and about God’s relationship with his people (cf. Moyise). John F. A. Sawyer (chapter 31) investigates the ways that Jewish, Christian, and Islamic artists and composers have conceptualized the language and imagery of Isaiah. First, although the biblical book does not provide much information about the life of the prophet, Christian painters throughout the centuries have filled the gaps by providing details to Isaiah’s commission in Isa 6, his interaction with King Hezekiah in Isa 36–39, and his martyrdom (a tradition known to the early Church and the ancient Rabbis; cf. Antti Laato). Given the significance of the book of Isaiah in the NT (cf. Moyise), the prophet Isaiah is, moreover, often depicted alongside NT characters. Turning to the content of the book, the image of the tree of Jesse (Isa 11:1–3); the return of the divine warrior after battle (Isa 63:1–6); the lamb led to the slaughter (Isa 53:7); and the world vision of peace, when the swords will be beaten into ploughshares (Isa 2:4) are all commonly depicted motifs in paintings and sculptures. In recent times, the image of a realm where animals and humans dwell together in peace (Isa 11:6–9) has become a popular motif in art. Select Isaianic passages have also often been put to music in hymns, liturgical songs, spirituals, and popular music in both Christian and Jewish traditions. Handel’s Messiah is probably the best-known example, and features, in order of appearance, Isa 40; 60:1; 9:5 [Eng. 6]; 53:3–6, 8; 50:6; and 52:7.

14   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer The concluding five chapters in Part VIII continue to focus on the way different communities have read, interpreted, and appropriated the Bible. Many people, scholars and laypeople alike, consciously or unconsciously define biblical interpretation as a traditionally Western, male endeavor. The chapters here challenge this often-tacit assumption by highlighting how the Bible has been and continues to be read across the world by diverse groups of people from different backgrounds and with shifting interests. They present mere glimpses of the richness of current biblical interpretation. As in Part VII, the interpretation is often driven by concerns and ideologies that are not immediately inherent in the biblical texts themselves. Some readings are politically motivated; others are geographically driven. What holds them together is the attempt to make the Bible relevant for readers today. Biblical studies is more than the history of ancient Israel and its religious expressions; it is a vibrant and ongoing communal endeavor that seeks to change people’s lives here and now. The book of Isaiah raises many issues for both feminist and womanist approaches. Sharon Moughtin-Mumby discusses six of them in chapter 32. First, the personification of Jerusalem as a woman runs like a golden thread throughout Isaiah and reaches its culmination in Isa 40–55. These portrayals present feminist readers with substantial challenges: Jerusalem is cast as a powerless and passive victim, and the overarching perspective is androcentric (cf. Eidevall and Landy). Second, Isaiah employs other female entities as a synecdoche of the guilty people. These descriptions often combine images of violence and sexual language, and rape is used to represent the deviation and shame that will befall the people. Third, the description of real women in Isaiah is often negative (Isa 3:16–4:1; 27:11; 32:9–14). Fourth, it is possible that some of the authors responsible for Isa 40–55 may have been women, given the prevalence of metaphors connected to traditionally female roles. Fifth, and connected with the preceding issue, feminist and womanist exegetes have highlighted the metaphoric descriptions of God as mother (Isa 49:15; 66:13), midwife (66:9), and woman in labor (42:13–14; cf. Low). Finally, womanist scholars, especially, have emphasized how the Servant in Isa 40–55 can serve as a symbol of the black woman’s experience of being silenced and treated like a servant/slave (cf. Dempsey). Mark G. Brett in chapter 33 explores the ways that the book of Isaiah reflects the effects of imperialism, as well as how it has been received in colonial and anticolonial contexts. The book—created in the shadow of the Neo-Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, Persian, and Hellenistic Empires—naturally contains discourse on empire. Many texts in Isa 1–39 express anti-imperial rhetoric (e.g., Isa 10:14–15; 14:4–23). The situation in Isa 40–66 is more ambivalent, as there is no binary contrast between the colonizer and the colonized. In fact, an anti-imperial attack on Babylon can be construed to reflect support of the imperial Persian administration. Several key motifs in Isaiah deserve scrutiny from a postcolonial perspective. The notion of a Torah with imperial reach (Isa 2:2–4, cf. 42:4) testifies to the idea that Zion cannot rest securely until all other nations have been brought to judgment and then aligned with Israel’s interests. Differently, the visions of peace in Isa 11 and 65 offer a muted resistance to imperial violence, dreams of grandeur, and ensuing exploitation. The call to return and restoration in Isa 40–55, where the

Introduction   15 returning exiles may have been supported by imperial interests, has been termed “colonial” by some biblical critics. Alternatively, select texts in Isa 56–66 express hope for reconciliation between different social groups in Judah and offer an invitation to the nations to be part of a recreated earth. Carol J. Dempsey in chapter 34 focuses on the use of Isaiah by predominantly but not exclusively South American Liberation Theologians. Especially, the motif of the Suffering Servant (Isa 52:13–53:12) has come to serve as a symbol of the suffering, not only of poor and downtrodden humanity, but also of the mistreated Earth (cf. Berges and Moughtin-Mumby). This approach to the biblical text is called “the hermeneutical circle,” whereby the community is both the interpreter of the text and the subject of interpretation. Poor communities identify themselves with the voice of the prophet speaking out against injustice, and the message of the book is transformed to speak directly to their specific situations. Isa 3:12–15, for example, has been read within the context of the injustices committed against the Dalit community in India. At the same time, this reading strategy may interpret the biblical text against the grain as it points out its inherent structures of oppression, especially against women and children. Dempsey concludes by encouraging us to read Isaiah not only as a literary work or a theological treatise but also as a tool for speaking out against, for example, patriarchy, hierarchy, the abuse of power, economic inequity, and a violent deity. Knut Holter’s chapter 35 investigates African translations and interpretations of the book of Isaiah. Although “Africa” as a cartographic, cultural, and political concept is younger than the second century bce, one could argue that the LXX is the first “African” translation of the Hebrew Bible (cf. Ngunga). As such, African interaction with the Bible goes back to its very beginning. Holter focuses on a modern example—namely, how Isaiah is being presented in so-called Study Bibles, which are Bibles that intersect two major reading communities: that of the scholarly world and that of lay readers. Holter highlights how the three Study Bibles under scrutiny offer contextually conscious perspectives. The African Bible (Roman Catholic) conflates practices mentioned in Isaiah with contemporary practices as a way of addressing actual social concerns. It also explores the inculturation of church and faith in (African) culture and society. In contrast, the Prayer and Deliverance Bible (Pentecostal) refers to Isaianic texts as it endeavors to prepare pastors and laypeople for Christian ministry and spiritual warfare. Finally, the Africa Study Bible (mainstream Protestant) emphasizes the Christological interpretations of the prophecies in Isaiah (cf. Anni Maria Laato) and the spiritual aspects of restoration. It further compares the exile in Babylon with the African experience of slavery. Maggie Low concludes the handbook in chapter 36 by looking at some of the ways in which the book of Isaiah has been read and interpreted in the pluralistic environment of Singapore (Christian, Buddhist, Taoist). Reading Isaiah in an Asian context, imbued with the values of Confucianism, emphasizes the fatherhood of God. Its depictions of a perfect divine father, who not only disciplines his children but also loves them unconditionally, may serve as a role model for Asian families. At the same time, the use of traditionally female images attributed to God throughout Isaiah provides a helpful corrective

16   Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer to patriarchal values (cf. Moughtin-Mumby). Together, Isaiah’s masculine and feminine portrayals of God foster a complementary kind of feminism because God is, after all, multidimensional and beyond gender. Similarly, throughout Isaiah, the idea of God’s holiness resonates intuitively with many Asian readers. At the same time, the combination of ritual and the spiritual (e.g., Isa 56) with ethics and social justice (e.g., Isa 2; 58) offers an important lesson to many Asians, who tend to disconnect the two realms. Finally, the tension between universalism and particularism in much of Isaiah, represented by the Servant and Zion, can teach the people of Singapore to work together across social, religious, and racial boundaries. The Servant goes far beyond the Confucian values in this respect, as he does not limit his ministry to his own people (53:8) but extends his ministry to “many” (52:15). It is my hope that this handbook will serve as a useful tool and companion for future study on Isaiah. It has been delightful to be given the opportunity to create this Handbook and to work with the talented authors responsible for its chapters. Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer Aberdeen, Scotland, June 2019

PA RT I

QU E ST IONS R E L AT E D TO T H E FOR M AT ION OF T H E BO OK OF ISA I A H

chapter 1

The Book of Isa i a h: Its Fi na l Struct u r e Jacob Stromberg

1.1. Prolegomena How one perceives the structure of Isaiah has a direct bearing on how one reads it. The word “structure” has been used in different ways in relation to texts. As a “purposeful arrangement of parts within a whole,” structure inheres in all texts.1 It is a quality of texts produced by the desire that the reader (or listener) should experience a sequence of words as coherent—be the extent of that sequence great or small. Understood this way, structure is a means to a communicative end. The very question of whether a pattern “exists in the text—whether it has any relevance and any claim to perceptibility—turns on the question of what it does in the text.”2 The book of Isaiah is characterized by structure at the local level in that much of it consists of a series of poems dominated by the typical relationships between lines and poems found elsewhere in biblical poetry. These poems are segmented into parts (lines) that have been coordinated by various means to form wholes (the poem). Segmentation and coordination are indispensable qualities of text structure in general, necessary for making coherence. If structure emerges into perception in the experience of reading in relation to what structure does in the text, then what kind of reading does the structure of the book of Isaiah presuppose? It is obviously a reading undertaken with a high degree of competence in biblical Hebrew poetry. But does such a reading also involve the ability to respond to macrostructural signals that enable levels of coherence beyond the individual passage? Modern scholars have long experienced some aspects of the ­macrostructure 1   Oxford English Dictionary Online, s.v. “structure, n.,” http://www.oed.com.proxy.lib.duke.edu/view/ Entry/191895?isAdvanced=false&result=1&rskey=bREXzc& (accessed May 17, 2018). 2  Sternberg, Poetics, 2.

20   Jacob Stromberg of large-scale compositions in the Hebrew Bible—such as Isaiah—as alien to their own intuitions or ideas about what constitutes a book.3 For some scholars, Isaiah is nothing more than a loose anthology of original and secondary material that lacks a macrostructural coordination of its parts.4 Without strategies of coordination, the book of Isaiah as such would lack structure in the just-mentioned sense. This conclusion is not secure for several reasons. First, the “assumptions or habits of text coherence” presupposed by an ancient text like Isaiah are probably not identical to those “assumptions or habits” familiar to modern scholars as readers themselves.5 Indeed, the reading habits underlying much of the history of modern scholarship are alien to those presupposed by this literature to the degree that they have been generated by the desire to critically reconstruct the experiences of the prophet or the formation of his book. Second, though more than one author stands behind the final form of the book of Isaiah, we have good so-called empirical evidence that bookmakers in ancient Israel were capable of creating structured works of their own using preexisting sources.6 Finally, though scholarship has long regarded Isaiah as two or more independent works, a formidable body of research is now persuasively arguing that this text was to be received as a single meaningful whole.7 Here, however, there is a danger of substituting those diachronic descriptions of the unity of Isaiah for the kind of reading that the structure of this book presupposes. It is doubtful that the depth dimension of the text—what scholars take as evidence for the history of its development—was ever assigned the role of meaning signal for the ancient readers by the ancient text producers. That role was assigned to the structure of the book. Thus, the ancient reading habits presupposed by the shape of Isaiah should not be confused with the mental operations at work in the diachronic modes of reading cultivated by modern academics. Lastly, to call Isaiah a “book” is to call it a text above all else. Just what constitutes a “text” has been the subject of considerable analysis. For the sake of economy, I appeal to Alexander Samely’s well-informed definition: “A text is a complex verbal entity, usually a plurality of sentences or other units of meaning, whose de facto boundaries or verbal and literary signals invite constructing the meaning of any one of its sentences/units in the light of the meaning of all others.”8 The very first sentence of the book of Isaiah offers the reader precisely this sort of invitation: “The vision of Isaiah, son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, the kings of Judah” (Isa 1:1). The single source of the vision (God), the single recipient (the prophet), the discreet period of time in which the vision was received (“the days of . . . the kings of Judah”), as well as the specification of its subject matter (“concerning Judah and Jerusalem”)—all these serve to invite the reader to receive what follows as a discreet and unified whole. From the first sentence, Isaiah presents itself to the reader as a “text.” And its length warrants labeling it a “book,” which is not to say that it was designed to be read as a stand-alone book.9  Barton, “Book.”   4 Roberts, Isaiah, 2.   5  Samely, “Studies,” 772.  E.g., Chronicles.   7  For literature, see Stromberg, Introduction.   8 Samely, Profiling, 22. 9   Cf. Kratz, Israel, 100. 3

6

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   21 In sum, a text invites “constructing the meaning of any one of its sentences/units in the light of the meaning of all others.”10 It is the role of structure to enable the perception of these parts and to guide their coordination in the mental performance of reading. Accepting both the invitation of Isaiah and the conclusions of recent diachronic research, I will attempt to describe the macrostructural features of the final form of this prophetic book, mostly setting aside matters of its prehistory for the reasons already given. Needless to say, restrictions of space prohibit more than a cursory treatment here.

1.2.  The Two Halves of the Book of Isaiah Most scholars agree that the book of Isaiah divides itself into two halves (chapters 1–39 and 40–66). The second half of the book presents the vision of Isaiah in a completely different mode than does the first half. In chapters 1–39 one finds several titles and narratives that are arranged chronologically in a sequence that leads up to Hezekiah’s confrontation with the Assyrians. This chronographic material explicitly relates the first thirty-nine chapters to the prophet Isaiah (Isa 1:1; 2:1; 6; 7:1–17; 8:1–4; 13:1; 14:28; 20; 36–39). Throughout chapters 1–39, the reader is projected back into the days of Isaiah the prophet by means of this narrative thread. At the very beginning of this sequence of chronological references is the book’s title, in 1:1. Since this title defines the entire historical scope of the prophet’s ministry as spanning the years from Uzziah to Hezekiah, it is almost certainly deliberate that immediately after chapters 36–39—the narratives concerning Hezekiah—all such references to the prophet disappear from the book. The second half of the book contains no titles or narratives of the sort that one finds in the first half. No explicit attempt is made to locate the voices of chapters 40–66 within the period of the narrative account of Isaiah’s ministry given in chapters 1–39. Instead, one encounters a striking temporal dislocation built into the self-presentation of the second half of the book, differentiating the way it presents the vision of Isaiah from that in the first half. By design, the oracles in chapters 40–66 require the reader to accept that they speak, not to Isaiah’s contemporaries, but rather to a period after the prophet himself had passed from the scene. By contrast, the oracles in chapters 1–39 never appear to place this requirement on the reader. Instead, these oracles speak as if to those present in the days of the prophet. This temporal dislocation emerges with special clarity when one compares the references to Babylon in chapters 1–39 with the references to Babylon in chapters 40–66. The second half of the book presents the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and the Judean exile—events that occurred long after Isaiah’s death—as events that had already happened by the day of the audience. In this half of the book, these events are not presented in a predictive mode, but rather are presupposed in historical retrospect, be it in 10

 Samely, Profiling, 22.

22   Jacob Stromberg the mode of supplication (63:17; 64:7–11) or as the basis of an imperative to the speaker’s audience (48:21). By contrast, the first half of the book presents the threat posed by Babylon (39:6–7) and its own subsequent downfall (chaps. 13–14) as predictions about the future issued in the days of Isaiah the prophet. Accordingly, where Isaiah is said to have foreseen a restoration after the Babylonian exile (13:1; 14:1–4), the second half of the book proclaims this to its audience as a reality of their time. In this respect, that which had belonged to the distant future in the first half of the book is now at hand or has already come to pass. While this temporal shift has played a central role in developing models for the history of the book’s formation, that whole line of inquiry cannot be substituted for the problem of structure as it has been defined here. Structure, in this sense, addresses a different issue. From the point of view of those who gave the book its final shape, how were the ancient readers supposed to encounter such a break and coordinate the two halves of the book? These references to Babylon strongly suggest that the reader was supposed to relate the halves of the book in a prophecy-and-fulfillment schema. This conclusion is supported by evidence in both halves of the book.11 In sum, in the first half of the book, the reader is made to inhabit the days of the prophet himself, listening in “real time,” as it were, to Isaiah speak. By contrast, in the second half of the book, the reader is transported to a later period after the prophet had passed from the scene, into the wake of the Babylonian destruction that he had foreseen. Here, the reader, projected into this later period, listens to voices speaking the vision of Isaiah the prophet to a latter-day audience, an audience living in a time about which the prophet spoke, but did not himself expect to see. In the latter half of the book, the human voice(s)—which emerges in brief autobiographical cameos (49–50; 61)—remains anonymous. The only voice that is explicitly identified is that of God himself, whose presence the book portrays as transcending the temporal divide separating it into two halves. The acceptance of this theological claim—the goal of so much of the rhetoric in the latter half of the book (e.g., 41:4; 44:6, 24; 46:10)—turns out to be the most important postulate given to the reader for coordinating its two halves into a single meaningful whole, the vision of Isaiah of Jerusalem.

1.3.  The Isaianic Narratives and the Structure of the Book At a lower level, the book consists of several subunits (1–12; 13–27; 28–35; 36–39; 40–55; 56–66). What follows gives some of the reasons for these divisions and explores their interrelationship. It does so by drawing attention to the narrative logic of the book, wherein the Hezekiah narrative plays a pivotal role. In Isa 1–39, the titles and narratives have a chronological arrangement, which can only have been deliberate. These come to   Seitz, “Prophet”; Williamson, Book.

11

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   23 an end with the Hezekiah narrative, giving the first half of the book a narrative arc that terminates with the story about this Davidic king. Moreover, immediately after Isaiah pronounces the future Babylonian judgment in this narrative (chap. 39), the reader enters the very different temporal landscape of Isa 40–66, which assumes that this judgment has already come to pass.

1.3.1.  Isaiah 1–12 Isa 1–12 deals primarily with judgment and salvation for Israel and Judah, with Jerusalem and Judah accorded a special place. Isa 13 begins a new section with oracles against foreign nations. Internally, Isa 1–12 presents itself as a unit, as is suggested, for instance, by its beginning and ending. It begins exhorting God’s children to repent (chap. 1). It ends with a hymn of praise (chap. 12). The opening exhortation recounts their present suffering at the hands of foreigners, the instruments of divine judgment (1:5–9). The concluding hymn (a response to chap. 11) celebrates their future restoration at the hands of foreigners, acting as the agents of God’s salvific purpose. Accompanying this is a restoration of knowledge and justice. In Isa 1, “Israel does not know [‫ ”]ידע‬its God, and the leadership in Jerusalem lacks justice (‫)ׁשפ״ט‬, which will be restored after a purifying judgment (1:3, 10–20; 1:17 ← 1:23). In Isa 12, the people celebrate the fulfillment of Isa 11, which envisions the return of justice (‫ )ׁשפ״ט‬to Jerusalem under the rule of a Davidic king (11:4). In the days of this king (upon whom will rest “the spirit of the knowledge [‫ ]דעת‬and fear of Yhwh [11:2]), the earth will be filled with “the knowledge [‫ ]דעה‬of Yhwh” (11:9). The foreign nations “will seek him”; and he will stand as the “signal” to which they are drawn for Israel’s restoration (11:10–12).12 This event would be like the Exodus when the Egyptians were to come to know (‫ )יד״ע‬Yhwh.13 Indeed, each passage echoes one of the two “songs” of Moses in the Pentateuch.14 According to Isa 1, the people lived in the days of judgment foreseen by Moses in Deut 32, a fitting introduction to the presentation of the prophet in these chapters.15 According to Isa 12, their future restoration would be like the Exodus celebrated by Moses in Exod 15, a fitting conclusion to chapters that consistently depict judgment and salvation (primarily in connection with Assyria) on analogy to Israel’s bondage in Egypt and exodus from it.16 The “center” of chapters 1–12 has long been regarded as 6:1–9:7.17 Breaks beginning at 6:1 and 9:8 suggest that this is a meaningful unit, as do its beginning and ending. The first verse of this section takes place in the year of the death of the Davidic king (Uzziah) and begins with a vision of God, “the king,” sitting upon his throne (‫)על כסא‬, ready to pronounce judgment on his people (6:1, 5). The last verse of this section envisions the  Stromberg, Isaiah, 183–205.   13  Cf. Exod 3–4; 6–14.   I am grateful to Andrew Teeter for this observation. See now Schwartz, “Mirrors.” Cf. Roberts, Isaiah, 20, 192    15  Isa 8//Deut 31. 16   Isa 12:2//Exod 15:2; Isa 4:2–6//Exod 13:21–22; 14:19–20; Isa 5:1, 2//Exod 15:1, 17; Isa 6:10//Exod 3; 4:21; 6–14; Isa 5:25; 9:12–10:4//Exod 7–15; Isa 10:24, 27//Exod 1–2; 5–6; Lev 26:13. See also Isa 10:26; 11:15–16. 17  Barthel, Prophetenwort, 37–65. 12

14

24   Jacob Stromberg r­ e-establishment of the Davidic kingdom after this period of judgment comes to an end, a time when there will be “no end to peace” and a new king sitting upon the throne (‫ )על כסא‬of David (9:7).18 Moreover, the presentation of kingship here plays a pivotal role in chapters 1–12. For instance, the announcement of the judgment upon Israel at the hands of a foreign nation(s)19 in 5:26–30 has been carefully referenced in what follows such that a major turning point comes with the royal oracle in 9:1–7.20 The nation summoned by God in 5:26 is identified as Assyria in 7:17–20 (‫ קצה‬+ ‫)ׁשר״ק‬. This identification initiates two cycles, each envisioning the end of Assyrian oppression followed by a renewed Davidic kingdom of global significance (8:1–9:7; 10:5–11:16).21 The transition from oppression to renewal in each cycle is marked by a clear reversal of the prophecy in 5:26–30. In Isa 5:30, God promises a time of darkness and distress, which comes to an end in 8:22–9:2, where the darkness and distress give way to light (‫מעוף־מועף‬//‫ עריפיה‬+ ‫ חׁש״ך‬+ ‫ הנה‬+ ‫)נב״ט‬. According to 9:1–7, that light would be the renewed Davidic kingdom. In Isa 5:25–26, God lifts a “signal” to summon nation(s) in judgment on his people because of his anger and outstretched hand. In Isa 11:10–12:6, God does this again but for the restoration of his people because his anger subsides (‫ ׁשו״ב‬+ ‫ ידו‬+ ‫ אף‬+ ‫)ונׂשא נס לגוים‬. According to 11:10, that “signal” would be a Davidic king with a renewed kingdom. Thus in what follows, Isa 5:26–30 is taken up both in the development of the threat of the Assyrian king (7:18) and in connection with precisely those points at which this threat gives way to a renewed Davidic kingdom in each of the two lengthy royal oracles in Isa 1–12. The dark days foreseen by 5:26–30 would end with the renewed Davidic kingdom in 9:1–7 and 11. All of this suggests a pivotal role for 6:1–9:7 within the first section of the book. As Peter Ackroyd observed, the Hezekiah narrative has been deliberately coordinated with Isa 6:1–9:7.22 Elsewhere I have sought to develop this line of argument, which can only be summarized here.23 By means of a series of parallels, Hezekiah’s response to the Assyrian threat to Jerusalem has been set on analogy to the response of his father (Ahaz) to the threat posed to Jerusalem by the Syro-Ephraimite coalition (7:1//36:1; 7:3//36:2; 7:2//37:1; 7:4//37:6; 7:11//37:30; 7:17//36:6–9). These parallels enable the reader to compare the two kings, their responses to their respective crises, and the outcomes in each case. The relevance of this comparison involves the conditions necessary for God to honor his covenant with David (7:2, 9, 13, 17; 37:35; 38:5). Initially, Hezekiah is contrasted with Ahaz. Confronted by a threat from the Syro-Ephramite kings, Ahaz’s disbelief prevented him from activating God’s commitment to David, and instead he brings the “king of Assyria” against Judah in “days” to come (7:9–17). By contrast, Hezekiah responds piously to the threatening writings (‫ )ספרים‬of the Assyrian king, going to the “temple” (‫ )בית‬to pray for divine deliverance “so that all the kingdoms of the world will know [‫ ]וידעו‬that you alone are Yhwh” (37:14–20). God responds to Hezekiah’s prayer by sending the Assyrian  Barthel, Prophetenwort, 113, n. 28.    19  On the text, see Williamson, Isaiah 1–5, 396.  Williamson, Book, 116–143. Cf. Barthel, Prophetenwort, 44, 125, 182; Becker, Jesaja, 145–148; Beuken, Jesaja 1–12, 156, 208, 319.    21  Isa 9:4 is related to Assyria in Isa 10:27 and 14:25. 22  Ackroyd, Studies, 105–120. Cf. Conrad, Reading, 35–51.   23  Stromberg, “History.” 18

20

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   25 i­nvaders off, a response grounded in God’s commitment to David (37:35). However, the peace achieved here is quickly undermined by the last episode of the Hezekiah story, when he is again sent writings (‫ )ספרים‬by a Mesopotamian king, the king of Babylon (39:1). Where the Assyrian writings were malignant, the Babylonian writings were benign. And where Hezekiah responded to the Assyrians with a visit to the “house” (‫ )בית‬of Yhwh and a concern that the nations should “know” God, his response to the Babylonians was precisely the opposite of this. Hezekiah showed the Babylonians every “house” (‫ )בית‬in his kingdom except the house of Yhwh, whom he does not mention to them—despite the fact that God’s healing of Hezekiah had occasioned their visit(38; 39:1). Here the narrative returns to a comparison with Ahaz, as the sin of Hezekiah brings the “king of Babylon” against Judah in “days” to come (39:6–7//7:17). What the Ahaz and Hezekiah narratives work in tandem to demonstrate is the predictability of Israel’s omnipotent God in working out his commitment to David. God would honor his covenant in the face of a threat when the Davidic king turned to him in trust, but any disbelief on the part of the king put him in jeopardy (7:9). The analogical rhythm of this narrative structure gives it a prospective function. Just as God honored the Davidic covenant during the Assyrian crisis, so also will he do during the Babylonian crisis to come, provided the necessary conditions (illustrated by Hezekiah’s response to the Assyrians) are met. Conversely, the sin of Hezekiah would be no more of an impediment to a future fulfillment of this covenant than was that of Ahaz. In this light, it cannot be a coincidence that immediately following the Hezekiah account comes the second half of the book, which addresses those living in the wake of Babylonian destruction. Indeed, this half of the book exhorts all Israel to “fear not” (‫ )אל תירא‬and offers a renewal of the Davidic covenant to Jerusalem (41:10; 55:3). This narrative relates closely to the previously mentioned two cycles in chapters 1–12, each envisioning a renewed Davidic kingdom after the overthrow of the Assyrian king. In fact, Ackroyd noted that the royal oracle in 9:1–7 has been coordinated with this narrative by means of citation: “The zeal of Yhwh of Hosts will accomplish this”(‫)קנאת יהוה צבאות תעׂשה זאת‬.24 This phrase, which serves as a divine assurance for the fulfillment of the royal oracle (9:7), is repeated in the Hezekiah story precisely where God promises him that he will honor the covenant with David by repelling the Assyrians and saving Jerusalem (37:32). Earlier in the book, the fulfillment of this royal oracle is made to depend on the overthrow of the Assyrians “in my land” (9:3 → 10:27; 14:25). Accordingly, the citation of this royal oracle in chapter 37 suggests to the reader that Hezekiah (a Davidic king) could be its fulfillment. However, at its conclusion, the narrative quickly dispels this expectation. Hezekiah, having been told that “days” (‫ )ימים‬are coming when his kingdom will be dismantled by the Babylonians, responds by noting that “there will be peace [‫ ]ׁשלום‬and security in my days [‫”]ימי‬ (39:8 → 38:3). Since the days to come would not be like his own, this statement simultaneously reminds the reader that Hezekiah, because of his good deeds, was able to bring “peace,” but that by his failure, he had limited the scope of that “peace.” This,  Ackroyd, Studies, 118.

24

26   Jacob Stromberg the last line of the story, seems carefully calculated to tell the reader that, although Hezekiah had earlier looked like the fulfillment of the days anticipated by 9:1–7, in the end, he was not: the scope of peace (‫ )ׁשלום‬in those days would be “without end” (9:7). The narrative initially leads the reader to regard Hezekiah as the fulfillment, only to then tell the reader that he was not. The portrait moves from good Hezekiah to bad Hezekiah to provide a figure or type of the as yet future fulfillment. The fulfillment of 9:1–7 will be someone like good Hezekiah without the failure that limited the peace to his days. Good Hezekiah models how the covenant with David can be activated in the time of crisis. Bad Hezekiah assures the reader that he was not the fulfillment. Given the role the second royal oracle (chap. 11) assigns to the Davidic king as a conduit for the knowledge (‫ )יד״ע‬of God to the nations—precisely where Hezekiah succeeded in responding to the Assyrians but failed in receiving the Babylonians—much the same could be said in relation to this passage: the portrait of Hezekiah is nothing more, but also nothing less, than a type of its fulfillment.

1.3.2.  Isaiah 13–27 Chapters 13–27 are the next major unit in the book. Isa 28 begins a series of “woes” (‫)הוי‬ against Ephraim and (primarily) Judah. Internally, chapters 13–23 are composed of ten oracles each introduced with ‫מׂשא‬. These ten oracles are followed by an eschatological extension or global summary of them in chapters 24–27.25 One important aspect of the macrostructure of Isa 13–27 requires the reader to see how these chapters have been arranged to enable comparison with chapters 1–12. The following chart partly illustrates the relationship between Isa 13:1–14:27 and Isa 1–5.26 Isaiah 1–5 In the vision about Judah and Jerusalem “which Isaiah son of Amoz saw”)‫אׁשר חזה‬ ‫)יׁשעיהו בן אמוץ‬, the “mountain [‫ ]הר‬of the house of Yhwh” will be “lifted up” (‫)נׂשא‬, established “at [‫ ]ב‬the head of the mountains [‫]ההרים‬,” and “all nations [‫ ”]גוים‬and “many peoples” (‫ )עמים רבים‬will go there because “instruction” and “the word of Yhwh” go forth from there. Instructed by Yhwh, the “many peoples” (‫ )עמים רבים‬will learn “war” (‫ )מלחמה‬no more (2:1–4).

Isaiah 13:1–14:27 In the oracle against Babylon “which Isaiah son of Amoz saw” (‫)אׁשר חזה יׁשעיהו בן אמוץ‬, an imperative goes forth, “upon a windswept mountain [‫ ]הר‬lift up [‫ ]ׂשאו‬a signal, raise [‫ ]הרימו‬a sound to them,” in order to assemble “a sound of the multitude on the mountains [‫]בהרים‬, the likeness of a multitudinous people [‫ ”]עם רב‬for “war” (‫ )מלחמה‬against Babylon (13:1–4).

  Cf. Sweeney, Books, 64–78.   Cf. Barth, Jesaja, 114–115; Berges, Buch, 159–160; Teeter, “Isaiah,” 195; Zapff, Prophetie, 213–217.

25

26

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   27 Isaiah 1–5 However, in the meantime, there is a threat to all Israel from a Mesopotamian king, rallied by God, who lifts (‫ )נׂש״א‬a “signal” (‫)נס‬ to “nations” (‫“ )גוים‬from afar” (‫ )מרחוק‬and from the “end” (‫ )מקצה‬of the “earth” (‫הארץ‬ [5:26]). This threat is because God’s hand is outstretched (‫ )ידו נטויה‬against his people and his anger is not turned back (‫ׁשב‬ [5:25]). Outcome: God’s children were not like Sodom and Gomorrah in their destruction because they were left a remnant, the daughter of Zion (1:8–9),27 despite being “wicked seed” (‫[ זרע מרעים‬1:4]). Being like Sodom and Gomorrah in their morality, the leaders are exhorted to heed “the word of Yhwh” and the “instruction of our God” (1:10), presumably with an eye toward the fulfillment of 2:2–4 that follows.

Isaiah 13:1–14:27 This is the threat to the Mesopotamian king from those rallied by God, who lifts (‫ )נׂש״א‬a “signal” (‫ )נס‬to “nations” (‫)גוים‬ “from a distant land” (‫ )מארץ מרחק‬and from the “end” (‫ )מקצה‬of the heavens (13:2–5). This threat is because God’s hand is outstretched (‫ )ידו נטויה‬against all nations, and who can turn it back (‫[ יׁשיבנה‬14:26–27])? Outcome: Babylon will be like Sodom and Gomorrah in their destruction (13.19), because they are a “wicked seed” (‫[ זרע מרעים‬13:20]).

The second half (Isa 14:28–27:13) bears a similar relationship to chapters 6–12; both begin in a way that invites comparison. Isaiah 6 “In the year of king Uzziah’s death” (‫)בׁשנת מות המלך עזיהו‬, Isaiah received “Seraphim” (‫)ׂשרפים‬, each “flying about” (‫)יעופף‬, and he was commissioned with a message of judgment against God’s people (6).

Isaiah 14:28–32 “In the year of king Ahaz’s death” (‫)בׁשנת מות המלך עזיהו‬, Isaiah received an oracle of judgment against the Philistines wherein they would face a worse threat than the one already experienced, a “flying Seraph” (‫[ ׂשרף מעופף‬14:28–32]).28

In each case, the judgment announced takes the form of Assyria. And in each case, the reader discovers this in the narrative material that follows each passage (chaps. 7–8; 20). Significantly, both narratives are coordinated with the story of Hezekiah (on chap. 20, see 1.3.2.); and both speak of a divine “sign” (‫ )אות‬at the time of foreign threat against a city, Jerusalem/Ashdod (7:1–17; 20). Finally, both sections (Isa 6–12 and 14:28–27:13) conclude with a promise that God will gather his “dispersed” (‫ )נד״ח‬people from the lands of “Egypt” and “Assyria,” bringing them from “the River” and the “sea/wadi of Egypt” to his “holy mountain” (‫הר הקדׁש‬/‫ )הר קדׁשי‬on that day (11:9–16; 27:12–13).29

27   Along with 5:26–30, this speaks of devastation brought by Assyria, on which see Williamson, Isaiah 1–5, 47–73, 395–410.    28 Becker, Jesaja, 273. Cf. Ackroyd, Studies, 175. 29  Steck, Heimkehr, 60–64; Sweeney, Books, 92–93.

28   Jacob Stromberg Several features of Isaiah 13–27 suggest a relationship with the Hezekiah narrative, not least the structural analogy of these chapters to Isa 1–12, just noted. I limit the discussion to three examples from the oracles against the foreign nations, which have been arranged into two parallel sets of five oracles each introduced with ‫מׂשא‬.30 ‫ מׂשא‬about Babylon (13:1–14:27) The Medes (‫ )מדי‬are the agent of downfall (13:17).  ‫ מׂשא‬about Philistia (14:28–32) A question (‫ )מה‬is posed in relation to messengers (v. 32). ‫ מׂשא‬about Moab (15–16) Provision made for the refugee (‫נד״ד‬ [16:2–3]). Postscript regarding the timing of the oracle (‫ )כׁשני ׂשכיר‬when the “glory of Moab” will be humbled (16:13–14)  ‫ מׂשא‬about Damascus (17–18) A focus on the demise of the northern kingdom of Israel at the hands of the Assyrians  ‫ מׂשא‬about Egypt (19–20) Yhwh’s plan (‫עצ״ה‬/‫ )יע״ץ‬against Egypt (19:3, 11, 17)

‫ מׂשא‬about Babylon (21:1–10) The Medes (‫ )מדי‬are the agent of downfall (21:2). ‫ מׂשא‬about Dumah (21:11–12) A question (‫ )מה‬is posed in relation to a watcher (v. 11).  ‫ מׂשא‬about Qedar (21:13–17) Provision made for the refugee (‫נד״ד‬ [vv. 13–17]). Postscript regarding the timing of the oracle (‫ )כׁשני ׂשכיר‬when the “glory of Qedar” will be humbled (21:16–17)  ‫ מׂשא‬about the Valley of Vision (22) A focus on the preparations made in Jerusalem in the light of Assyrian aggression ‫ מׂשא‬about Tyre (23) Yhwh’s plan (‫עצ״ה‬/‫ )יע״ץ‬against Tyre (23:8–9)

First, two passages stand out here for their focus on Israel rather than on foreign nations. These two passages are set in parallel: the downfall of Aram and Ephraim at the hands of the Assyrians is set parallel to Jerusalem’s response to the threat by the same empire (chaps. 17–18//22). This arrangement recalls the narrative analogy established between Isa 7:1–17 and 36–39. In Isa 7:1–17, the prophet reassures Ahaz with the news that his enemies, Aram and Ephraim, will soon fall to the Assyrians. But the refusal of Ahaz to accept this assurance leads to the Assyrian threat to Judah and Jerusalem in the days of his son. This threat comes to fruition in Isa 36–38, when the Assyrians capture all the fortified cities of Judah (‫)ערי יהודה הבצרות‬, and advance on Jerusalem with threats aimed at making it capitulate. Hezekiah, however, resists and turns to Yhwh in prayer, who then delivers the city. The reader, who is clearly supposed to understand Isa 22 in the light of Isa 17–18, will discover several features that enable a comparison between these two oracles. For instance, on the day that Ehpraim’s fortified city (‫ )מבצר‬comes to an end because of Assyria, man will look (‫ )רא״ה‬upon his maker (‫ )עׂשהו‬and not look (‫ )רא״ה‬upon the altars that he himself has made (‫[ עׂש״ה‬17:3–8]). Set in contrast to this is the response of the leadership in Jerusalem to the Assyrians. They saw (‫ )רא״ה‬the city being breached and responded by fortifying (‫ )בצ״ר‬the wall and making (‫ )עׂש״ה‬a reservoir for the water of old pool, instead of looking (‫ )רא״ה‬to its maker (‫[ עׂשיה‬22:8–11]). As a consequence, Shebna,  Berges, Buch, 142–143.

30

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   29 “who is over the house” of David, would be demoted and Eliakim will take his place (22:15–25). In the story of Hezekiah, Eliakim, not Shebna (now a scribe), is now “over the house” (36:3, 22; 37:2). The repetition of this point draws attention to many other details of the Hezekiah narrative that contrast the response of Hezekiah to the Assyrians and death in chapters 36–3831 with the response of Shebna to the same threats in chapter 22. Their responses are contrasted to highlight the differing outcomes: judgment for Shebna in chapter 22, deliverance for Hezekiah in chapters 36–38. The second feature related to the Hezekiah narrative is the account of the Assyrian siege of Ashdod and the sign act of Isaiah at that time (chap. 20). As with Isa 22, this account deals with looking to the wrong source of confidence (‫[ נב״ט‬20:5–6; 22:8–12]). An analogy is established between the two narratives. Isaiah 20 In the “year” that “the king of Assyria” besieges and captures Ashdod, he sends (‫ )ׁשל״ח‬one of his officials. At that time, Isaiah is told to remove sackcloth (‫)ׂשק‬ and go about for “three years” as a “sign” (‫ )אות‬against the Egyptians who would be taken captive by the Assyrians. Consequently, the Philistines who trusted (‫ )נב״ט‬in Egypt for help would be ashamed. 

Isaiah 36–37 In the “year” that “the king of Assyria” captures the fortified cities of Judah, he sends (‫ )ׁשל״ח‬one of his officials to Jerusalem, who tells its leaders that they were foolish for trusting (‫ )בט״ח‬in Egypt for help. Hezekiah and his men cover themselves with sackcloth (‫ )ׂשק‬and seek God’s help. In response, Isaiah is sent with a message to the king, which includes an agricultural “sign” (‫ )אות‬lasting three years symbolizing the eventual flourishing of a Judean remnant after the Assyrian king is sent away (36:1–9; 37:1–2, 22–35). 

Confirming the interrelationship of Isa 20 and Isa 22 in connection with their importance for the Hezekiah narrative, Hezekiah is given an oracle of deliverance (rebuking the king of Assyria) that alludes to both passages. Isaiah 20:5–6; 22:1, 10–11 “And they will be dismayed and ashamed [‫]וחתו ובׁשו‬ of Cush their object of trust and of Egypt their glory. And the inhabitant [‫ ]יׁשב‬of this coastland will say on that day, ‘Behold, thus is the object of our trust to which we fled for help to be delivered from the king of Assyria. How can we escape?’ ” (20:5–6) “[W]hat do you mean that you have gone up, all of you, to the roofs [‫ ?]לגגות‬. . . you counted the houses of Jerusalem, and you tore down [‫ ]ותתצו‬houses to fortify [‫ ]לבצר‬the wall. You made a collecting place between the walls for the waters of the old pool; and you did not look to its maker, its former of old [‫ ]עׂשיה ויצרה מרחוק‬you did not see.” (22:1, 10–11)    Cf. Stromberg, “History.”

31

Isaiah 37:26–27 “Have you not heard? From long ago I made it [‫]למרחוק אותה עׂשיתי‬, from days of old I formed it [‫ ?]ויצרתיה‬Now I have brought it, that you should lay waste fortified [‫ ]בצרות‬cities into heaps of ruins [‫]נצים‬. And their inhabitants [‫ ]ויׁשביהן‬are powerless; they are dismayed and ashamed [‫וחתו‬ ‫]ובׁשו‬. They have become herbage of the field and green grass, grass on roofs [‫]גגות‬.” 

30   Jacob Stromberg This theocentric account of Sennacherib’s capture of the fortified cities of Judah (37:26–27) likens the fate of their inhabitants to that of the Philistines, who also trusted in Egypt (chap. 20); simultaneously, it contrasts the folly of trusting in fortified walls rather than God (chap. 22) who has the divine power to preordain the destruction of those fortified cities that is now at hand. Significantly, Isa 20, the only narrative in chapters 13–23, is located strategically at the conclusion of the first set of five oracles. Isa 17–18 and 22 belong to the overall parallel structure of the oracles against the nations and so presumably contribute to its purpose. And an allusion to these chapters concludes Isa 13–27.32 All of this suggests that the Hezekiah narrative—strategically related to each of these—has been assigned a significance for the whole of chapters 13–27. The third feature of chapters 13–23 to note here is the “codicil” to the oracle against Babylon in 14:24–27. It is somewhat unusual that this short passage speaks about Assyria. It tells of God’s “plan” to “break” Assyria “in my land,” so as to remove the yoke of the Assyrians from his people (vv. 24–25). Verses 26–27 universalize this “plan” by directing it against “all the earth” and “all the peoples,” making the defeat of Assyria a model for what God would do to any nation that would put a yoke on his people.33 Presumably for this reason, this codicil against one Mesopotamian empire concludes an oracle against another: God’s plan against Assyria (14:24–27) prefigures his plan against Babylon (13:1–14:23). He would “break” the rod of the king of Babylon as well, setting his people free from their captors once again (14:1–5). Several features of Isa 14:24–27 suggest a relationship to the Hezekiah narrative, only two of which I will mention here. First, Isa 14:25 takes up that line of thought—­developed in 9:4 and then in 10:27—regarding the Assyrian yoke to be removed from the shoulder of the people.34 As noted, this line of development suggests that the royal oracle in Isa 9:1–7 would be fulfilled in the days of Hezekiah, which, according to the narrative, saw the repelling of the Assyrians from the land. Second, the reference to breaking Assyria “in my land” also ties its fulfillment to the events recounted in the Hezekiah narrative where God defeats the Assyrians in the land of Judah.35 Since this defeat of the Assyrians becomes a type with universal significance in Isa 14:26–27, the deliverance recounted in the Hezekiah narrative also becomes a type of things to come, not least the overthrow of Babylon to restore God’s people. The fall of Babylon and subsequent restoration of the people are central in the latter half of the book, so that the Hezekiah narrative has likely been assigned a significance for that material as well.

1.3.3  Isaiah 28–35 The next unit in the book begins in chapter 28 with a series of “woe” (‫ )הוי‬oracles (28:1; 29:1, 15; 30:1; 31:1; 33:1). After a brief word against Ephraim, these oracles turn to Jerusalem (28:14) and thereafter deal with events that led up to Sennacherib’s invasion   Isa 27:9–13 → 17:5–8; 18:3; 22:8–14. Cf. Sweeney, Books, 64–93.   33  Teeter, “Isaiah,” 195.   Cf. Barth, Jesaja, 105; Beuken, Jesaja 1–12, 102–103.   35  Cf. Becker, Jesaja, 208–211.

32

34

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   31 of Judah in 701, the topic of the Hezekiah narrative. In chapter 33, the final “woe” oracle announces the destruction of an unnamed foe and the restoration of Jerusalem, where God’s kingship will be recognized. Following this are two further passages that have been carefully coordinated with what precedes them:36 an announcement in chapter 34 of a judgment against all nations, with a focus on Edom, and a declaration in chapter 35 that God will make the wilderness of his people blossom once again. Like Isa 13–27, the whole section concludes on a note that echoes the ending of chapters 1–12.37 Thus, after the overthrow of the Assyrian oppressor in Isa 31:4–9 (cf. chap. 10), there is a renewed interest in kingship in chapters 32–33 (cf. chap. 11), followed by judgment on Edom in chapter 34 (cf. 11:14) and the provision of a “highway” upon which God’s people may return home in chapter 35 (cf. 11:16).38 Like the twofold cycle in chapters 1–12, both of the last two “woes” in chapters 28–35 envision the overthrow of an oppressor followed by a focus on kingship and restoration. The first “woe”, Isa 31:1–32:20, finds a close parallel in the Hezekiah narrative.39 It begins with the accusation that the people’s reliance (‫ )ׁשע״ן‬on Egypt, their trust (‫ )בט״ח‬in them for “horses” and “chariots” against Assyria, would be of no help, words that find a precise echo in the speech of the Assyrian official in the Hezekiah narrative (31:1–3; 36:5–10). The oracle then turns to a promise that God will defend (‫ )גנ״ן‬Jerusalem against their Assyrian attackers to deliver (‫ )נצ״ל‬them, using precisely the language for this deliverance as it is recounted in the Hezekiah narrative (31:4–9; 37:11–35; 38:6). On the day of their deliverance they would forsake the idols that their “hands” had made (‫)עׂש״ה‬, language that recurs in Hezekiah’s prayer for deliverance, where he confesses that idols are merely “the work (‫ )מעׂשה‬of the hands of man” (31:7; 37:19). While the people foolishly relied upon Egypt, which is “man and not God [‫]אדם ולא אל‬,” the Assyrian invaders will flee from a consuming “sword not of man [‫( ”]לא אדם‬31:3, 8). In the narrative in which the Egyptians are seen to be an ineffectual help, God delivers Jerusalem from the Assyrians supernaturally, as it were, by using an angel to slay a large number of them so that in the morning they withdraw (37:36–38). Immediately following the promise of deliverance from the Assyrians in chapter 31 is the statement, “Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness” (32:1). This links the repelling of the Assyrians from Jerusalem with the reign of a king, which reinforces the impression that this oracle has been coordinated with the Hezekiah narrative. If so, it is surely significant that chapter 32 describes the restoration in terms reminiscent of the conclusion to the royal oracle in 9:1–7, exactly the text underlying the promise of deliverance in the Hezekiah narrative.40 The second of the two concluding “woe” oracles (chap. 33), which, not incidentally, references the gifting of the “spirit” in 11:2 (33:6), envisions a time when God “will save us” (‫ )יוׁשיענו‬from the enemy and no one in Jerusalem will say “I am sick” (‫חליתי‬ [33:22–24]). As noted by Odil Hannes Steck, these statements recall each of the two parallel episodes in the Hezekiah narrative:41 the deliverance of Jerusalem from Assyria in response to Hezekiah’s prayer, “save us [‫ ]הוׁשיענו‬from his hand” (37:20); and the ­deliverance of   Cf. Berges, Buch, 199–207.   37 Berges, Buch, 249–265; Steck, Heimkehr, 64.   Note also 30:9//10:17; 30:7 (→ 2:8, 10)//10:33–34 (→ 2:11–17); 32:1//11:4–5; 33:6//11:2; 35:9//11:6–9. 39  Becker, Jesaja, 208–211, 257–263.    40 Barth, Jesaja, 211–213.   41 Steck, Heimkehr, 57–59. 36 38

32   Jacob Stromberg Hezekiah from his sickness (‫ )חל״ה‬unto death (38)—the second episode having been narrated on analogy to the first.42 An association (if not identification) with Assyrian aggression is reinforced by 33:19 (→ 28:11). For Steck, the Hezekiah narrative has a typological function vis-à-vis the fulfillment of chapters 33 and 35. A comparison with chapter 35 is surely invited by the immediate juxtaposition of the promise that the redeemed returning to Zion will be kept safe—specifically, that no violent animal will go up (‫ )על״ה‬upon their “highway” (‫ )מסלול‬home (35:8–10; cf. 11:6–9)—with the statement that the king of Assyria went up (‫ )על״ה‬against the fortified cities of Judah, captured them, and sent a messenger to a “highway” (‫ )מסלה‬where he could relay Sennacherib’s threatening message to Hezekiah in Jerusalem (36:1–2). The ensuing narrative contrasts what Sennacherib was able to do to these fortified cities with what he would not be allowed to do to Jerusalem because of Hezekiah’s pious response to the threat (compare 37:22–29 with 37:30–35). In this way, Hezekiah (‫)חזקיהו‬, who obeyed the imperative “do not fear” (‫[ אל תירא‬37:6]), becomes an example to those commanded by 35:4 to “be strong, do not fear” (‫)חזקו אל תיראו‬. For just as Sennacherib was not allowed to go up into Jerusalem (despite his boast in 37:24), so would no dangerous animal be allowed to go up upon the path of those exhorted to emulate the example of Hezekiah. This has significance for the latter half of the book: Isa 51:10–11 is a direct reference back to this very passage (35:9–10) and resembles Sennacherib’s boast, claiming for himself that in the book which otherwise is God’s prerogative alone (11:15–16; 19:5–6; 37:25).

1.3.4.  Isaiah 40–55 and 56–66 This whole narrative structure in Isa 1–39 has been assigned a critical role for understanding chapters 40–66. To understand how this comparative structure functions in the latter half of the book, it is necessary to briefly consider how this part of the book is structured. Chapters 40–66 divide into two related halves (40–55 and 56–66). Chapters 40–55 are preceded and followed by clear breaks: Isa 39:8 concludes the Hezekiah narrative, whereas Isa 56:1 begins a new section in the book. Internally, chapters 40–55 display a unity of subject matter—the fall of Babylon and the restoration of Zion—as well as obvious “bookends.” The beginning and ending of this unit emphasize the efficacy of the divine word (‫ )דבר‬and also contrast the ephemeral nature of human “faithfulness” (‫)חסד‬ with the “sure mercies [given] to David” (‫ )חסדי דוד הנאמנים‬by God (40:6–8; 55:3–11).43 Chapters 40–55 are themselves divided into two sections (40–48 and 49–55) with distinct topics, language, and emphases.44 Running through the whole of chapters 40–55, however, is a series of hymnic passages responding in praise to divine deliverance. These “hymns” come to a conclusion in the last two verses of this section after the renewed offer of the Davidic covenant (55:3, 12–13).45 Chapters 56–66 exhibit a concentric   Stromberg, “History,” 71 n. 17, 82 n. 39.    43  Cf. Berges, Buch, 385–387.  Berges, Buch, 325–331; Stromberg, Introduction, 34.   45 Berges, Buch, 328–331.

42

44

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   33 arrangement that sets them off as a unit of text.46 This structure includes the promise of ingathering to God’s “holy mountain” (56:1–8//66); complaints that deliverance remains aloof, each followed by a divine response (58:1–59:21//63:7–65:25); and a divine theophany to punish the wicked (59:15–20//63:1–6). At the center of this structure is a focus on the restoration of Jerusalem (60–62). Like Isa 40–55, this unit also concludes with a reference to the future of the Davidic promise (65:25 → 11:6–9).47 These two sections have been coordinated with the aim of developing the larger prophecy-­and-fulfillment schema in the book (see 1.3.1.). Whereas chapters 40–55 announce the potential fulfillment of the promises of restoration found earlier in the book, chapters 56–66 explain why they remain unfulfilled in the audience’s present.48 For instance, the promise that the period of “darkness” would give way to a period of “light” after the defeat of the foreign oppressor in 9:1–7, initially related to the overthrow of Assyria (9:4 → 10:26–27; 14:24–27), is connected to the downfall of Babylon in chapters 40–55.49 This sequence then forms the subtext of Isa 56–66.50 Here, the “darkness” remains in the present even after an apparent return to the land, and becomes the object of complaint (59:9–10). The “light” remains an object of hope for the future, provided that God’s people practice “justice” and “righteousness” in the present (58; 60). In Isa 56–66, the promised deliverance has been delayed and the future holds a new act of judgment that will result in a remnant who will inherit Jerusalem (57–59; 65–66). This scenario has already played itself out before the eyes of the reader in the first half of the book where a remnant in Jerusalem is spared during the Assyrian assault on Judah. Indeed, the depiction of this in the first half of Isaiah serves as a model for its eschatological rehearsal in the final chapters of the book (8:6–8//66:10–12; 37:3//66:9; 37:30//65:21).51 A theological premise that shaped much of the prophetic and historiographic literature of the Hebrew Bible posits that the past portends the future or, to put it the other way around, that the future will be analogous to the past.52 Such a principle explains not only elements of the structuring of chapters 1–39, but also the placement of the second half of the book on analogy to the first half, as partly illustrated in the following chart.53 Isaiah 1–39 6—God, the king (‫)מלך‬, appears in glory (‫)כבוד‬ in judgment. In view of this, there is a commission (‫ קול קרא‬and ‫ )קול אמר‬for judgment, so that the eyes and ears of the people will not see or hear leading to a lack of understanding.

Isaiah 40–66 40—God, the king (‫)מלך‬,54 will appear in glory (‫ )כבוד‬in deliverance. In view of this, there is a commission (‫ קול קרא‬and ‫)קול אמר‬ for deliverance, so that the eyes and ears of the people will see and hear leading to understanding.55

 Stromberg, Introduction, 42–48.   47  Stromberg, 67–72.   Stromberg, “Restoration,” 195–218.    49 Williamson, Book, 63–77, 125–143. 50   Gosse, “Isaiah 8.23b,” 57–62; Fishbane, Interpretation, 497–498. 51  Stromberg, Isaiah, 97–101, 226–227. 52  Fishbane, Interpretation, 318–379; Stromberg, “History.” 53   Cf. Ackroyd, Studies, 105–120; Conrad, Isaiah; Stromberg, Introduction, 37, 113–127; Stromberg, Isaiah, 30–32; Stromberg, “History.” 54   Isa 40:10; 41:21; 43:15; 44:6; 52:7.    55  Isa 41:20; 43:8, 10. 46 48

34   Jacob Stromberg Isaiah 1–39 7–8—The divine king sends a reassuring message to Ahaz on the highway (‫)מסלה‬: Do not fear (‫)אל תירא‬. There is a guaranteed downfall of the enemy (the Syro-Ephraimite coalition) at the hands of a foreign nation (Assyria) with accompanying deliverance: the enemy’s plan/word (‫דבר‬/‫ )עצה‬will not stand (‫יקום‬/‫[ לא תקום‬7:5, 7; 8:10]). If they obey, then the Davidic covenant will be honored (‫[ אמ״ן‬7:9]). There is an assurance that God is “with” (‫ )עם‬those addressed. Failure to heed the divine word leads to a future judgment (Assyria). The prophet preaches to a disobedient audience, so that he lives in a time of judgment among those who walk in darkness (‫[ ההלכים בחׁשך‬9:1]). God will hide his face (‫ )המסתיר פניו‬for a time. The prophet “waits” (‫ )קו״ה‬for him and the period of “light” (‫ )אור‬after “darkness” (‫)אפלה‬. Teaching is sealed up among “my disciples” (‫[ בלמדי‬8:17–9:1]). Judgment is pronounced on Edom/Bozrah (34): Bloodshed is explained (‫כי יום נקם ליהוה‬ ‫[ ׁשנת ׁשלומים לריב ציון‬vv. 7–8]). This is immediately contrasted with the restoration of Zion (35): The glory (‫ )כבוד‬of Yhwh will be seen (‫[ רא״ה‬v. 2]); The glory of Lebanon (‫ )כבוד לבנון‬will be given it (v. 2); There will be a highway (‫ )מסלול‬for God’s people, the way called holy (‫ )ודרך הקדׁש יקרא לה‬for the redeemed (‫[ גא״ל‬vv. 8–10]). 36–38—Bearing “fruit” like a “vineyard,” a remnant goes forth (‫ )יצ״א‬from Jerusalem, being spared the Assyrian assault because of seeking Yhwh (37:31–32). Thus, the attempt to destroy (‫ )ׁשח״ת‬the whole of Judah is stopped (36:10). It is stopped “on account of David my servant” (‫למען דוד עבדי‬ [37:35]). This is God’s response to the prayer of Hezekiah (37), a demonstration of the zeal (‫ )קנאה‬of Yhwh (37:32; cf. 9:7). Leaving the enemies as corpses (‫)פגרים‬, God acts in deliverance to spread the knowledge of himself among the nations (37:20, 36).   Isa 40:3; 41:8–13.

56

Isaiah 40–66 40–55—Prepare the highway (‫ )מסלה‬for the coming of the divine king. Do not fear)‫אל‬ ‫ ;)תירא‬there is a guaranteed downfall of the enemy (Babylon) at the hands of a foreign nation (Persia) and accompanying deliverance: Yhwh’s plan/word (‫דבר‬/‫ )עצה‬will stand (‫יקום‬/‫[ תקום‬40:8; 46:10]). If they obey, then the Davidic covenant will be honored (‫[ אמ״ן‬55:3]). There is an assurance that God is “with” (‫ )עם‬those addressed.56 Failure to heed the divine word leads to a future judgment. In chaps. 50–51, a prophet, like the disciples (‫)כלמודים‬, preaches to a disobedient audience, so that he was forced to walk in darkness (‫[ הלך חׁשכים‬50:10]). In chaps. 58–60, God hides his face (‫הסתירו‬ ‫ )פניו‬and they “wait” (‫ )קו״ה‬for “light” (‫)אור‬, which will appear after judgment (59; 60; cf. 64:6). Till then, they walk about in darkness (‫[ באפלות נהלך‬59:9]). Restoration is announced for Zion (60–62): The glory (‫ )כבוד‬of Yhwh will be seen (‫רא״ה‬ [60:2]); The glory of Lebanon (‫ )כבוד לבנון‬will be given it (60:13); There will be a highway (‫ )מסלה‬for God’s people, a way (‫ )דרך‬for the people called holy (‫)וקראו להם עם הקדׁש‬, the redeemed (‫[ גא״ל‬62:10–12]). This is immediately contrasted with judgment on Edom/Bozrah (63): Bloodshed is explained (‫[ כי יום נקם בלבי וׁשנת גאולי באה‬vv. 3–4]). 65–66—Like “sweet wine in a cluster,” a remnant goes forth (‫ )יצ״א‬from Jacob, being spared the judgment because of seeking Yhwh. Thus, the attempt to destroy (‫)ׁשח״ת‬ the whole is stopped. It is stopped “on account of my servants” (‫[ למען עבדי‬65:8–9]). This is God’s response to the prayer of 63:7–64:11, where the supplicant asks God, “where is your zeal [‫]קנאתך‬,” and implores him, “return on account of your servants” (‫[ ׁשוב למען עבדיך‬63:15, 17; cf. 42:13; 59:17]). Leaving the enemies as corpses (‫)פגרים‬, God acts in deliverance to spread the knowledge of himself among the nations (66:18–24).

The Book of Isaiah: Its Final Structure   35

1.4. Summary The first half of Isaiah has been given a narrative structure that recounts the commission of the prophet and culminates with the story of Hezekiah. On the principle that the past portends the future, this narrative sequence (together with the oracles it frames) has been made the key to understanding that future, foreseen in the second half of the book. Accordingly, the second half of Isaiah begins immediately after the Hezekiah narrative with a reference back to the prophet’s commission, rebooting the whole earlier sequence for the sake of the ancient reader’s encounter with what follows it in the book.

Bibliography Ackroyd. Peter R. Studies in the Religious Tradition of the Old Testament. London: SCM Press, 1987. Barth, Hermann. Die Jesaja-Worte in der Josiazeit: Israel und Assur als Thema einer produktiven Neuinterpretation der Jesajaüberlieferung. WMANT 48. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1977. Barthel, Jörg. Prophetenwort und Geschichte: Die Jesajaüberlieferung in Jes 6–8 und 28–31. FAT 19. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997. Barton, John. “What Is a Book? Modern Exegesis and the Literary Conventions of Ancient Israel.” In Intertextuality in Ugarit and Israel, edited by Johannes C. de Moor, 1–14. OtSt 40. Leiden: Brill, 1998. Becker, Uwe. Jesaja—Von der Botschaft zum Buch. FRLANT 178. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997. Berges, Ulrich. Das Buch Jesaja: Komposition und Endgestalt. HBS 16. Freiburg: Herder, 1998. Beuken, Willem A. M. Jesaja 1–12. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2003. Conrad, Edgar W. Reading Isaiah. OBT 27. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1991. Fishbane, Michael. Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel. Oxford: Clarendon, 1985. Gosse, Bernard. “Isaiah 8.23b and the Three Great Parts of the Book of Isaiah.” JSOT 70 (1996): 57–62. Kratz, Reinhard G. Historical and Biblical Israel: The History, Tradition, and Archives of Israel and Judah. Translated by Paul Michael Kurtz. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Roberts, J. J. M. First Isaiah. Hermeneia. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2015. Samely, Alexander. “Jewish Studies and Reading.” In “Let the Wise Listen and Add to Their Learning” (Prov 1:5): Festschrift for Günter Stemberger on the Occasion of His 75th Birthday, edited by Constanza Cordoni and Gerhard Langer, 757–789. Studia Judaica 90. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2016. Samely, Alexander. Profiling Jewish Literature in Antiquity: An Inventory, from Second Temple Texts to the Talmuds. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Schwartz, Ethan. “Mirrors of Moses in Isaiah 1–12.” In The History of Isaiah: The Making of the Book and Its Presentation of the Past, edited by J. Todd Hibbard and Jacob Stromberg. FAT. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, forthcoming. Seitz, Christopher R. “How Is the Prophet Isaiah Present in the Latter Half of the Book? The Logic of Chapters 40–66 within the Book of Isaiah.” JBL 115 (1996): 219–240.

36   Jacob Stromberg Steck, Odil Hannes. Bereitete Heimkehr: Jesaja 35 als redaktionelle Brücke zwischen dem Ersten und dem Zweiten Jesaja. SBS 121. Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1985. Sternberg, Meier. The Poetics of Biblical Narrative: Ideological Literature and the Drama of Reading. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985. Stromberg, Jacob. “Deutero-Isaiah’s Restoration Reconfigured.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by LenaSofia Tiemeyer and Hans M. Barstad, 195–218. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Stromberg, Jacob. “Figural History in the Book of Isaiah: The Prospective Significance of Hezekiah’s Deliverance from Assyria and Death.” In Imperial Visions: The Prophet and the Book of Isaiah in an Age of Empires, edited by Reinhard G. Kratz and Joachim Schaper, 64–82. FRLANT 277. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2020. Stromberg, Jacob. An Introduction to the Study of Isaiah. T & T Clark Approaches to Biblical Studies. London: Bloomsbury T & T Clark, 2011. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Third-Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Sweeney, Marvin A. Reading Prophetic Books: Form, Intertextuality, and Reception in Prophetic and Post-Biblical Literature. FAT 89. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014. Teeter, Andrew. “Isaiah and the King of As/Syria in Daniel’s Final Vision: On the Rhetoric of Inner-Scriptural Allusion and the Hermeneutics of ‘Mantological Exegesis.’ ” In A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam, edited by Eric F. Mason and Samuel I. Thomas, 169–200. JSJS 153/I. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Williamson, H. G. M. Isaiah 1–5. ICC. London: T & T Clark, 2006. Williamson, H. G. M. The Book Called Isaiah: Deutero-Isaiah’s Role in Composition and Redaction. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. Zapff, Burkard M. Schriftgelehrte Prophetie—Jes 13 und die Komposition des Jesajabuches: Ein Beitrag zur Erforschung der Redaktionsgeschichte des Jesajabuches. FB 74. Würzburg: Echter, 1995.

chapter 2

The Book of Isa i a h: Its Composition History Uwe Becker

2.1. Introduction Among the prophetic books of the Old Testament, the book of Isaiah is a special case. With its sixty-six chapters it is not only the longest written work of prophecy that has been transmitted to us. It also brings together under the superscript of Isa 1:1 parts that are unlike each other and that at first glance are difficult to reconcile: “The vision of Isaiah, the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.” Three basic observations can be drawn from this superscription, and they lead us directly to the question of the composition of the book. First, the superscription functions as a heading not only for chapters 1–12 or 1–39 but for the entire book of Isaiah. Second, although the book is called a prophetic “vision,” only a few parts of it fit the term. In other words, the superscription expresses a certain— and presumably late—understanding of the prophetic mission; the entire book is considered a divine revelation. Third, every reader knows that the Judean kings listed in 1:1 belong to the eighth century and the lifetime of the prophet Isaiah but do not cover the second part of the book, chapters 40–66. The mention of Cyrus, king of Persia (Isa 44:28; 45:1) suggests another historical background. These basic observations led rather early to the thesis of multiple authorship: chapters 1–39 (Proto-Isaiah) contain the words of the prophet Isaiah from the eighth century; chapters 40–55 are traced back to an anonymous writer in the Babylonian exile called Deutero-Isaiah; and the third part of the book, Isa 56–66 (Trito-Isaiah), is attributed to a post-exilic prophet also unknown to us. This “classic” division of the book into three parts, which goes back to Bernhard Duhm (1847–1928) and many forerunners, has increasingly been called into question in

38   Uwe Becker more recent Isaiah research. On the one hand, interest has shifted from the person of the prophet (or prophets, if one includes Deutero-Isaiah) to the book in its entirety as a literary work sui generis. On the other hand, it is acknowledged that the three parts of the book are more closely affiliated in terms of their formation than Duhm and his successors thought. In no sense are we dealing with three originally independent books that were put together more or less arbitrarily. On the contrary, there are many common themes, literary links, and intertwined connections running throughout the entire book. These shared themes testify to methodical editorial activity. For this reason, current research faces the difficult challenge of explaining the relative unity of the book of Isaiah, on the one hand, and the undeniable differences among its various parts, on the other. How did the Großjesajabuch (Isa 1–66) evolve into its complex final form? Redaction criticism (Redaktionsgeschichte) has proven to be the methodological key in Middle European and Anglo-American scholarship, with varying emphases, of course.1 Occasionally, the terms “composition” and “composition history” are used to imply a slight difference to redaction criticism.2 Whereas redaction criticism is concerned with the precise reconstruction of the origin of the book from its beginnings to its final form, teasing out each respective editorial profile in the process, “composition history” is as a rule associated with a more modest endeavor.3 It has to do with the weaving of individual texts into larger compositions that resulted finally in the book of Isaiah as we know it.4 But in fact, the concepts are essentially the same, since both attempt to elucidate the complex literary growth process that lies behind Isa 1–66. Although recent scholarship has demonstrated that it is possible, to a certain extent, to read the book of Isaiah as a single literary work, it is not a book in the modern sense. It has no clear or even unified scope, such as one might expect of an author and his or her work. Rather, it looks back from the perspective of a long history that began with the words of the prophet Isaiah of Jerusalem in the eighth century and extends to the “final form” in the second century bce. The book of Isaiah as we have inherited it thus covers a time span of almost six hundred years, reflecting the multifaceted religious and theological history of the period from the Assyrians to the Seleucid rule. Thus, behind the book of Isaiah and its centuries-long history there is a multifaceted process of theological reflection that deserves to be brought to light. One of the main tasks of Hebrew Bible scholars, as Rainer Albertz puts it, is “to restore the ‘frozen dialogue’ of the Old Testament to a living theological discussion between different groups and parties.”5 This particularly applies to the book of Isaiah. If one attempts to uncover a unifying bond, a common theme or leitmotif in the book of Isaiah, this tentative response could be offered: in every part of the book, from the first to the last chapter, Zion plays a pivotal role—its endangerment and protection. With some justification, one could designate the entire work “the book about the future 1  Compare the methodological considerations in U. Becker, Exegese, 81–103. 2  Compare the history of research in Berges, Book of Isaiah, 1–37. 3  The different (German and English) terms are discussed in Van Seters, Edited Bible, 284–296. 4  Cf. Berges, Book of Isaiah, 34–37. 5 Albertz, History, 12.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   39 of Zion,”6 although other theological themes, such as “the holiness of God,” or the issue of “righteousness and justice” appear no less frequently and have given shape to the different parts of the book.7

2.2.  Bernhard Duhm and the Threefold Division of the Book The three-part division of the book of Isaiah into Proto-, Deutero-, and Trito-Isaiah is usually associated with Bernhard Duhm (1847–1928) and his epoch-making commentary on Isaiah (1892).8 But long before Duhm, it was widely understood that from Isa 40 onward, an author other than the one of the first thirty-nine chapters of the book was speaking.9 Thus the beginning of the critical study of the book of Isaiah and the “discovery” of the non-uniform character of the book may be traced to at least a hundred years earlier, to the work of the Göttingen scholar Johann Benjamin Koppe (1750–1791). In 1778 the famous Isaiah commentary of the London Lord Bishop Robert Lowth (1710–1787) had been published, and Koppe had edited the very quickly prepared German edition with accompanying annotations.10 In his notes he also commented briefly on some parts of the book of Isaiah that, in Koppe’s view, could not longer be attributed to the eighth-century prophet. These included not just the oracle against Moab in Isa 15–16 and Isa 30:1–27, but also chapter 50, which he dated to the time of the exile.11 But Koppe made no further remarks concerning the composition of Isa 40–66. At about the same time, Johann Christoph Döderlein (1746–1792), a professor in Altdorf and then from 1782 on in Jena, began to ponder whether Isa 40–66 might fit better in the time of the Babylonian exile.12 But the thesis of dual authorship in the book of Isaiah came to have broad influence in the scientific community only with the work of Johann Gottfried Eichhorn (1752–1827), who had been teaching in Jena since 1775 and after 1788 in Göttingen. Eichhorn integrated the ideas of Koppe and Döderlein in the third volume of his Einleitung in das Alte Testament (1783).13 This was not only his bestknown work; it also enjoyed an unusually broad distribution outside the circle of professional biblical scholars. Other important studies followed, so that it is possible to say that already around the year 1800 a new conception of the origins of the book of Isaiah was being developed that assumed a later, exilic composition of Isa 40–66.

6 Kaiser, Grundriß, 29–66. 7  Cf., e.g., Williamson, “Isaiah, Book of,” 372–375. 8 Duhm, Buch Jesaia, v–xix. 9  Compare the exhaustive treatment of the problem by Moser, Umstrittene Prophetie. 10  The German translation was published in 1779–1781, shortly after the English edition (1778). 11  Cf. Lowth, Jesaias, vol. 2 (1780), 43, 130, 233–234 (see Moser, Umstrittene Prophetie, 11–13). 12  Cf. Moser, Umstrittene Prophetie, 13–14. First the date of 1780 is mentioned; later, in 1788, Döderlein clearly votes for an exilic origin of Isa 40–66. 13 Eichhorn, Einleitung, 3:52–57.

40   Uwe Becker Duhm’s achievement essentially consisted in the further elucidation of this concept. Both the differentiation between Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah and the disentanglement of the Servant Songs of Isa 42:1–4; 49:1–6; 50:4–9; and 52:13–53:12 came to be associated with his name. Furthermore, he demonstrated in his commentary that considerable portions of Proto-Isaiah could not be traced back to the prophet of the eighth century but were to be dated in part to a much later time.14 Duhm considered, for example, that the Isaiah legends of Isa 36–39 might have originated in the time of Ezra. He dated Isa 23:1–14 and 19:1–15 to the fourth century and went so far as to date the socalled Isaiah Apocalypse (Isa 24–27) in the second century. So Duhm assumed a comprehensive history of development for the first part of the book of Isaiah, which spanned the eighth century to the second century bce. Strangely enough, Duhm did not pursue the idea that the growth of Proto-Isaiah could have also encompassed the origins of Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah. Duhm’s influence on the generations that followed remained enormous. Well into the twentieth century, the three parts of Isaiah were largely treated as separate books. Not only do the relevant introductions to the Old Testament provide eloquent testimony to this, but so do the commentaries, which also orient themselves to a three-part division. Until very recently, as the problems of Duhm’s three-part hypothesis have been felt more and more strongly, commentaries have continued to appear that in principle do not venture beyond the horizon of the respective parts of the book. As examples one might name the—in their own ways masterful—expositions of J. J. M. Roberts about Isa 1–3915 and of H.-J. Hermisson covering Isa 40–55.16 From the current perspective, it seems peculiar that the closely related question of how the three individual parts of the book came to be found in one volume was rarely posed. An essential reason for this may have to do with the conception of the prophet that shaped Duhm and his successors.17 The three parts, or at least Isa 1–39 and 40–55, were traced back to prophetic personas who stood in a special relationship with Yhwh and preached with direct, divine authority. Alongside that was the very high value placed on the “actual” authentic sayings (whether those of the eighth-­century Isaiah or those of Deutero-Isaiah) compared with the “inauthentic” redactional portions of the books. The prophet was considered a rhetorical genius and theologian. He stood as a shining figure over against the “second-class” pupils and imitators who collected his words and passed them on, for better or worse. The task and challenge of exegesis therefore consisted of teasing out the authentic words of the prophets from their historically embedded context and bringing the prophetic voice, the viva vox, back to life. In contrast, relatively little interest was shown in the origin of the book.18 14  Cf. Duhm, Jesaja, 18–22. 15 Roberts, First Isaiah. 16 Hermisson, Deuterojesaja. 17  Cf. Reventlow, “Prophetie,” 259–274; Schmid, “Deutungen,” 225–250. 18  The exception proves the rule: cf., e.g., the study of J. Becker, Isaias.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   41

2.3.  The Rediscovery of the Essential Unity of the Book Since approximately the 1970s, the classic division of the book of Isaiah into three parts associated with Bernhard Duhm has been increasingly called into question from different points of view. The change in scholarly perspective associated with this change can, with good reason, be said to represent a paradigm shift.19 The orientation to the person of the prophet was replaced by an interest in the book, making it possible to speak of a “rediscovery of the book’s essential unity.”20 What factors and developments have contributed to this new orientation? 1.  If one considers American scholarship first, the influence of Brevard  S.  Childs (1923–2007) can scarcely be overemphasized. His “canonical criticism” led to a new, theologically grounded perspective on the final form of biblical books.21 For such a theological, and not just historical, reading of the Bible, the supposedly preliminary stages of the text in the form of prophetic sayings or source documents are of no particular interest. Only the form of the canon of scripture received by the Church is of importance. The differentiation of literary layers, which is a distinguishing characteristic of the Eurocentric, historical-critical interpretation of scripture, plays no decisive role in this approach. In his own commentary on Isa 1–66, Childs emphasizes that the question of literary precursors of the book of Isaiah, though not unimportant, basically represents a theologically fruitless line of endeavor.22 2.  A “secular” version of “canonical criticism” has emerged from the discipline of literary studies and may be summarized under the heading New Literary Criticism.23 Here, too, the goal is a more precise delineation of the final form of the text, by means of literary-critical (literaturwissenschaftliche) description—that is, the text as artefact. The meaning of the text is thus no longer to be found in the supposed intention of the author, but is to be deduced by the reader. Terms such as “reader response criticism” and “reception aesthetics” (Rezeptionsästhetik) are employed. As one might easily imagine, this methodological approach challenges the literary-critical (literarkritische) “fragmentation” of the biblical text associated with continental European scholarship. Since the 1990s, this approach has been applied in many studies of the book of Isaiah, with all its complexities.24 19  Cf. esp. Steck, Prophetic Books. 20  See the history of research in Vermeylen, “L’unité,” 11–53; Sweeney, “Book of Isaiah,” 141–162; Sweeney, “Reevaluating Isaiah 1–39,” 79–113; Melugin, “Isaiah 40–66,” 142–194; U. Becker, “Jesajaforschung (Jes 1–39),” 1–37, 117–152; U. Becker, “Tendenzen der Jesajaforschung,” 96–128; Höffken, Jesaja. 21  Cf., e.g., Childs, Introduction. 22  Cf. Childs, Isaiah, 1–5. 23  Compare the review article of Oeming and Pregla, “New Literary Criticism,” 1–23, and the collection of Alter and Kermode, Literary Guide. Cf. also Barton, Reading, 140–157. 24  Cf. Melugin and Sweeney, New Visions. The second part of the book is entitled, “Is Meaning Located in the Reader?”

42   Uwe Becker 3.  An institutional factor also comes into play. Since the beginning of the 1990s, the Formation of the Book of Isaiah Seminar of the Society of Biblical Literature has been an important platform for discussion. Chaired at the beginning by Roy  F.  Melugin (1937–2008) and Marvin A. Sweeney,25 the seminar brought various new interpretive proposals that went beyond the classical historical-critical approach, especially Duhm’s division of the book into three parts, into vigorous debate. Among those who paved the way for this “Isaiah Seminar” were Peter  R.  Ackroyd, writing on Isa 1–12,26 and Ronald E. Clements, in his article on the unity of the book of Isaiah.27 Not least is the work of Rolf Rendtorff, who in various studies of the composition of the book of Isaiah (in German and English) played an important bridging role between the work of English-speaking and German-speaking scholars.28 The goal of these and similar studies was to demonstrate the interwoven integrity of individual texts (e.g., Isa 6; 36–39;29 or 56–66) within the whole book and thereby to establish its relative unity. By way of example, two works can be cited, from both the English- and Germanspeaking realms. First is the 1988 dissertation by Marvin S. Sweeney entitled “Isaiah 1–4 and the Post-Exilic Understanding of the Isaianic Tradition.” In his meticulous analysis of these four chapters, Sweeney connects his seminal observations on the structure of the entire book of Isaiah with the redaction-critical question of its origin. In his view, Isa 1–39 reflect the development of the book as a whole: “The early Isaianic tradition found in chapters 1–39, was interpreted, supplemented, edited, and presented in relation to Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah. In essence, the concerns of the latter part of the book dictated the final redaction of the first part.”30 In this way Sweeney’s study builds a bridge between English-speaking and German-speaking scholarship, the latter of which is primarily concerned with the origin of the book. A similar trajectory is followed by the second example, the study of Ulrich Berges, “The Book of Isaiah” (German edition 1998; English translation 2012).31 He, too, takes the entire book of Isaiah as his point of departure, posing synchronic and diachronic questions, and presents its origin as a multistage linking of partial compositions (Teilkompositionen). His analysis brings together a description of the surface structure of the book with questions of textual integrity. The study is innovative and essential insofar as it demonstrates that the older division into Proto-, Deutero- and Trito-Isaiah is only partially correct, since the three parts of the book are much more closely interwoven redactionally than was previously thought. 4.  Since the 1970s, redaction-critical exploration of the book of Isaiah from the European side has generated more intense discussion. This approach, too, has led to a rediscovery of the book with a focus on the history of its origin. Two phases may be distinguished. In the first phase, which was still completely within the scope of Duhm’s 25  Compare the edited volume of Melugin and Sweeney, New Visions. 26  Ackroyd, “Isaiah I–XII,” 152–171. 27  Clements, “Unity,” 93–104, 247–248. 28  Rendtorff, “Komposition,” 141–161; “Jesaja 6,” 162–171; and “Book of Isaiah,” 32–49. 29  Cf. Seitz, Zion’s Final Destiny. 30 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–4, 185. See also his commentary: Isaiah 1–39. 31 Berges, Book of Isaiah; German original Das Buch Jesaja.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   43 t­ ripartite division, analyses of each part of the book were undertaken. Important contributions to the research were made by the Marburg Old Testament scholar Otto Kaiser (1924–2017) in his commentary on Isa 1–39.32 Numerous other studies from the 1970s and 1980s gave rise to a differentiated and complicated conception of the development of Proto-Isaiah.33 Decisive in this regard was the insight that it was no longer just a matter of recovering the authentic, “actual” words of the prophet within their historical context, but was also about appreciating the productive work of the editors, who continually revised and updated the prophetic legacy. In the second phase, exemplified by the Old Testament scholar Odil Hannes Steck (1935–2001) in Zürich, Duhm’s three-part division of the book of Isaiah was taken off its hinges, so to speak, using redaction-critical means. Steck was able to demonstrate that Isa 56–66 did not represent the proclamation of an independent “Third Isaiah,” but rather showed successive literary revisions of Isa 40–55.34 In addition, his thesis concerning Isa 35 became well known—namely, that this text functioned as a “bridge” between Proto- and DeuteroIsaiah, in other words—was oriented from the very beginning to Isa 40ff.35 One might even designate such inner-prophetic literary processes as “tradent prophecy” (Tradentenprophetie) or “scribal prophecy.” To summarize the four factors and developments presented here, the following seems evident. Since the 1970s, the book of Isaiah as a literary work sui generis has become a topic of interest for Isaiah scholarship in both Anglo-American and German circles. Notwithstanding their strongly differentiated motivations and exegetical methods, one may discern in these new approaches a more or less pronounced retreat from Duhm’s three-part division of the book. Furthermore, and closely tied to this, a turning away from the person of the prophet is evident. In many studies, it is the book of Isaiah as a whole (the Großjesajabuch) that is considered the principal point of departure for analysis. This is the case even though the paths that have led to this book are described in varying and sometimes even adversarial ways. The current controversies surrounding the origin of the book of Isaiah can be traced back to the contrast between diachronic and synchronic perspectives. Should analysis of the book of Isaiah in principal be oriented to its final form for methodological reasons, as Childs’s approach appears to conclude (“synchronic approach”)?36 Or should the reconstruction of a many-layered process of growth be considered a requirement and a necessity (“diachronic approach”)? That these approaches are not mutually exclusive should be obvious.37 Ulrich Berges refers to the need for a “diachronically reflected synchrony.”38 For the book of Isaiah that lies before us is not a modern literary work, but—to express it figuratively—a complex building, for which many builders over many centuries collaborated. Its different styles and configurations are still visible. 32 Kaiser, Jesaja 1–12; Kaiser, Jesaja 13–39. 33  Compare the history of research in U. Becker, “Jesajaforschung,” 1–37, 117–152. Two studies from the seventies should be named explicitly: Vermeylen, Du prophète Isaïe, and Barth, Jesaja-Worte. 34  Cf. Steck, Studien. 35  Cf. Steck, Bereitete Heimkehr. 36  Cf., e.g., Conrad, Reading Isaiah, or Miscall, Isaiah. 37  Cf. Williamson, “Synchronic and Diachronic,” 211–226. 38 Berges, Book of Isaiah, 34.

44   Uwe Becker In other words, in order to understand the book of Isaiah, it does not suffice simply to describe its final form. Rather, it is necessary to probe its history and understand its development.

2.4.  The Composition History of Isaiah 1–66 In the current discussion, there are essentially two basic models for understanding the origin of the book of Isaiah as a whole: 1.  According to the first model, Isa 1–39 and 40–55 are to be traced back to two initially independently transmitted literary works, which can be attributed to two distinct prophetic figures: the Isaiah of the eighth century and an anonymous prophet, DeuteroIsaiah, from the sixth century. Later, these units were literarily joined together with so-called bridge texts. As Steck demonstrated in his brief study entitled Bereitete Heimkehr (1985), a redactional bridge is hidden behind Isa 35 (and also in Isa 11:11–16), which joined the two formerly separate books together for the first time soon after the death of Alexander the Great.39 Whether or not Isa 35 in fact represents a joining together of these parts of the book for the first time, may be called into question, as W.  A.  M.  Beuken does. He discerns already in Isa 33 and 34 substantial linkages to Deutero-Isaianic texts.40 At any rate, both complexes, Isa 1–39 and 40–55 (if one for the moment provisionally grants this traditional demarcation) are much more closely interconnected literarily than had been supposed in earlier scholarship, which was primarily interested in determining the authentic voice of the prophet. 2.  In the second model, Isa 40–55 is considered a literary continuation of Isa 1–39, which makes it necessary to dismiss the notion of an autonomous Deutero-Isaiah. The thesis of Rainer Albertz, from 1990, received considerable attention in this regard.41 His argument relates chiefly to Isa 40, which he claimed was incomprehensible by itself but was connected literarily to Isa 6. Even the Deutero-Isaianic references to the “former things” (e.g., Isa 42:9; 48:3) can easily be construed as relating to Proto-Isaiah.42 In 1994, H. G. M. Williamson formulated yet another, more comprehensive rationalization for a model of Fortschreibung in a study entitled The Book Called Isaiah: DeuteroIsaiah’s Role in Composition and Redaction. His thesis is that Isa 40–55 originated as a literary expansion and extensive reworking of the Proto-Isaianic heritage. His line of argument proceeds in two major steps. First, Williamson shows that distinctively DeuteroIsaianic texts are directly dependent literarily on Isa 1–39 (above all, Isa 40 in relation to Isa 6). “Deutero-Isaiah” considered his own work an unmediated expansion and opening of the “sealed” heritage of Isaiah (cf. Isa 8:16–17; 30:8). In his second step, Williamson 39 Steck, Bereitete Heimkehr. 40  Beuken, “Jesaja 33,” 5–35; Beuken , “Lament,” 78–102. 41  Albertz, “Deuterojesaja-Buch,” 241–256. 42  Cf. Albertz, “Deuterojesaja-Buch,” 243–249, 252–253.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   45 compiles arguments and indications that suggest a systematic reworking of the Proto-Isaianic corpus by Deutero-Isaiah himself. To him are to be attributed not only Isa 8:21–23a; 11:11–16; and 12:1–6, but also the interpolation of 2:2–4 (by means of 2:5), the “relocation” of 5:25–29 (by means of 5:30), and the insertion of Isa 13–14 (by means of 13:1; 14:1–4a, 22–23). Unlike Steck, Williamson emphasizes that the first bridge between Isa 1–39 and 40–55 is not Isa 35, but already Isa 33, written by “Deutero-Isaiah” himself. This theory of ongoing composition is contagiously simple and attractive, because it not only sketches out a plausible reconstruction of the origin of the book of Isaiah, but also attempts to solve the riddle of the anonymous prophet Deutero-Isaiah. Nonetheless, there are critical questions to pose. Reservations are provoked, first of all, by the thesis that Isa 40–55 is a literarily homogeneous corpus. Not only have the Ebed-Yhwh songs long since been identified as additions (according to Duhm already), but there are other passages that do not belong to the basic content. In other words, the Deutero-Isaianic chapters, Isa 40–55, have undergone a longer history of composition, as a series of more recent German studies have shown.43 To cite one example: an analysis of the first chapter, Isa 40:1–11, demonstrates that verses 40:6–8, which evince a close relationship to the report of Isaiah’s call in Isa 6, are literarily secondary.44 This means that the lines of interrelatedness between Proto-Isaiah and Deutero-Isaiah do not pertain to the basic components of Isa 40–55, but were secondarily introduced. Only with the insertion of Isa 40:6–8 is Isa 40 reshaped into a report of prophetic call in imitation of Isa 6. The basic components in Isa 40:1–5*, 9–11* were intended to prepare the people for the return of the divine king Yhwh. Further examples could easily be mustered. Taken together, they support the traditional assumption that Isa 40–55 represents in essence a once-independent literary work, which only later was brought together with Isa 1–39. Thus, the first model seems the more probable one. In fact, the demarcation between Isa 1–39 on the one hand and 40–55 on the other is clearly visible, despite the presence of several bridge texts.45 It is more difficult to assess the “Trito-Isaianic passages” in Isa 56–66. That these chapters exhibit a certain similarity with Isa 40–55 has long been acknowledged. The border between both complexes cannot be drawn as precisely as that between Proto- and Deutero-Isaiah.

2.5.  The Character of the “Trito-Isaianic” Passages (Isaiah 56–66) The similarities in language and style between Isa 40–55 and 56–66 led Walther Zimmerli many years ago to the conclusion that Trito-Isaiah had been a student of Deutero-Isaiah.46 Disregarding Zimmerli’s orientation to the person of the prophet, his 43  See section 2.6. 44  Compare the recent analysis by Weidner, Ende, 49–62. 45  Cf. Seitz, Final Destiny, who points to the transitory character of Isa 36–39. 46  Zimmerli, “Sprache Tritojesajas,” 217–233. Cf. the important collection of studies by Tiemeyer and Barstad, Continuity and Discontinuity, see esp. Tiemeyer, “Continuity,” 13–40.

46   Uwe Becker thesis contains an important observation that has since developed into an influential redaction theory. It asserts that chapters 56–66 do not constitute a formerly in­de­pend­ ent book of prophecy, but instead consist of editorial interpretative texts that were successively appended to either Isa 40–55 or the entire extant book. It was, above all, Steck and his students who developed this thesis and confirmed it in numerous studies.47 Overall, what they have demonstrated is a multitiered process of ongoing writing activity that begins in Isa 60–62 and that is appropriately described as “scribal prophecy.” Three major phases in the history of composition of Isa 56–66 can be delineated: 1.  In the first stage, Isa 40–55 was expanded by the basic components of Isa 60–62. Its themes are the glorification of Zion, the return of the diaspora, and the role of the nations. Later segments within Isa 60–62 (e.g., 62:10–12) already presuppose ProtoIsaiah (cf. Isa 35). 2.  A further expansion in Isa 56–59, once again composed of various clusters, is concerned with the conditions of salvation, which has evidently not proceeded as expected in Isa 60–62. The reason for the delay in salvation is found in the deplorable state of affairs in Jerusalem, which may only be alleviated through repentance. A division among the people of God is thus indicated. 3.  The last great stage encompasses the (not itself unified) complex of Isa 63–66. A great lament of the servants of God is found in Isa 63:7–64:11 (an expansionary segment composed for this context). There is, in addition, a response to the lament in Isa 65–66, which announces the demise of those who abandon Yhwh and attach themselves to the worship of idols. At the same time, these chapters lead back to the beginning of the book, in Isa 1. In the final phases of the book of Isaiah, a division among the people of God is already taken for granted. In 2011, Jacob Stromberg brought forward another model that, though similar in  principle, was somewhat simpler in its implementation.48 The subtitle of the study  shows quite clearly what he—following in the footsteps of his teacher H. G. M. Williamson—wanted to demonstrate: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. In a way not much different from Steck’s analysis, Stromberg assumes multiple redactional stages in Isa 56–66. A frame consisting of 56:1–8 and 65–66 was positioned around the earlier core in Isa 60–62. Older segments can be found in the lament of 63:7–64:11 and in the Edom oracle of 63:1–6. In this way, the author of the frame in 56:1–8 and 65–66 is revealed as a “reader” of an available book of Isaiah, who at the same time leaves his signature on distinctive passages. Stromberg not only traces the juridical purification over Jerusalem in 1:27–31, the word concerning the remnant of Israel in 4:2–6, and the brief gloss in 6:13bβ back to “Trito-Isaiah,” but also the insertion of the Isaiah-Hezekiah legend in Isa 36–39, taken over from 2 Kgs 18–20. 47  Cf. esp. Steck, Studien zu Tritojesaja; Steck, “Autor,” 219–259; and Kratz, “Tritojesaja,” 233–242. See also the concise commentary of Zapff, Jesaja 56–66. 48 Stromberg, Isaiah after Exile, cf. also his Introduction.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   47 Even though the analyses of the components of Trito-Isaiah are in some respects clearly different, we see a similar tendency in more recent scholarship, whereby TritoIsaiah is not an autonomous prophetic person but coheres closely in terms of composition history with Isa 1–55. Furthermore, the oldest segments, which are almost unanimously assumed to be in Isa 60–62, are especially similar to “Deutero-Isaiah.” It makes sense then, in analyzing the book of Isaiah to distinguish between the “First” Isaiah (1–39) and the “Second” Isaiah (40–66). Duhm’s division of the book into three parts should be given up entirely. It is of interest only for the history of interpretation. One more observation should be added. Not even the component parts of Second Isaiah are an original literary unit but are also the result of successive development.

2.6.  The Role of “Deutero-Isaiah” (Isaiah 40–55) There is a remarkable division between English-speaking and German-speaking scholars with regard to the composition of Isa 40–55. Whereas the former tend to continue holding to the unity of these chapters, the latter have developed a much more complicated view of their growth. At first glance, chapters 40–55 of Isaiah do in fact appear to constitute a coherent literary unit.49 Not only do they share common themes, such as the new salvation after judgment and the return of God (and the people), which seem to spring from a unified, creative intentionality. But there are also distinctive literary points of reference. For example, Isa 52:7–10 alludes consciously to the beginning of the book in Isa 40:1–5 (having to do in this case with the return and enthronement of Yhwh). Similarly, Isa 55:1–11 and 40:6–8 clearly form a bracket (the theme here being that of the proclaimed word that will not return empty). Both these literary brackets already suggest, however, that whereas the beginning of Second Isaiah may be agreed upon, its conclusion is much less clearly recognizable.50 For this reason, in more recent—especially German-speaking—scholarship, it is increasingly taken for granted that the basic core of Second Isaiah is found in Isa 40–48* (or just 40–46*), and evidently framed by 40:1–5 and 52:7–10.51 There is a change in tone after Isa 49. It is no longer the people (“my people”) who are being addressed in the divine speech, but, increasingly, Zion. In addition, a curious shift takes place from the expectations focused on Cyrus to hope in Zion. This appears to suggest, therefore, that in the second part of Isa 40–55 another hand is at work, one focused on the theology of Zion (various texts in 49:14–54:17). Other apparent additions include not only the Servant Songs (e.g., 42:1–4; 49:1–6; 50:4–6; 52:13–53:12) and the polemical passages 49  Cf. Williamson, Book Called Isaiah, and many others. 50  Cf. Weidner, Ende. 51  Cf., e.g., Kratz, Kyros; van Oorschot, Babel; Hermisson, “Einheit,” 287–312; Steck, Gottesknecht. Weidner, Ende, also gives an overview of the current debate.

48   Uwe Becker against idolatry (e.g., 40:19–20), but also those segments concerned with the delay of salvation on account of the guilt of the people of God (e.g., Isa 43:22–28; 48:1–11). Isa 60:1–14 found its way into the book relatively early, probably before Isa 55.52 This suggests that there was never a book of Second Isaiah that ended with Isa 55. It is no surprise, then, that both Beuken and Berges draw the line of demarcation between Second Isaiah and Third Isaiah after Isa 54.53 The collection of Second Isaiah owes its present form to a long editorial process that started with the basic core in Isa 40–46 (or 48). Its various augmentations were added in part to a core that was still independent but also inserted, in part, into what was becoming the Großjesajabuch. Whether there was ever a collection that encompassed Isa 40–55 now seems more questionable than ever. One should add that reasonable doubts have been expressed recently about the Babylonian origins of Second Isaiah.54 The foundational layer, written entirely from the perspective of Jerusalem, is concerned with the expectation of God’s return, not that of the people.

2.7.  The Composition of Isaiah 1–39 and the Core of the Book Even if Isa 1–39 is no longer the sole focus, and instead the entire book must be made the point of departure for any investigation of the history of the book’s composition, one thing is clear: the beginnings of the book can only be found in the so-called Proto-Isaiah. What are the central problems associated with the origin of Isa 1–39? The current state of scholarship is fraught with controversy, for several reasons. In earlier scholarship, the origins of Isa 1–39 were thought of in terms of the classical collection model. The book contains, above all, a compilation of prophetic sayings from the eighth century that were made into a book by pupils of the prophet (Prophetenschüler). At the same time, a considerable number of post-Isaianic sections were recognized (e.g., Isa 24–27), as was editorial activity. Yet these redactional, post-Isaianic parts did not receive any particular literary or theological appreciation in their own right. Thus, that which may be called the “classic” image of Isaiah developed out of this perspective over the course of the twentieth century. The proclamations of the prophet were divided into several—­ usually four or five—biographical phases, which corresponded with key events in contemporaneous history. During the turbulent early period of his activity, the prophet gave expression to social criticism (Isa 5). In the time of the Syro-Ephraimite War, he attained his theological profile (Isa 6–8). And in his later years, around 701 bce, he was able to look back on past events with a mature theological consciousness (Isa 28–31). This division has the advantage of elucidating the rather disparate Isaiah traditions—for example, the 52  Cf. Weidner, Ende, 195–211. 53  Cf. Berges and Beuken, Buch Jesaja, 191–195, and also the commentary Berges, Jesaja 49–54. 54  Cf., e.g., Barstad, Way; Klein, “Zieht heraus,” 279–299.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   49 ­ eculiar interchange of salvation oracles and judgment oracles—with reference to differp ent periods of time and contexts of proclamation.55 In this way, an impressive and closed picture of the prophet and his ministry of almost exactly forty years came to be. But starting in the 1970s, fissures began to appear in the walls of this enclosed building, which could no longer be explained on the basis of the person of the prophet and the various circumstances of his proclamations. The idea of more extensive editorial activity was gradually accepted, whereby the prophetic traditions were transmitted, supplemented, and updated. An important role was played in this regard by the study of Hermann Barth, a student of Steck, concerning the “words of Isaiah in the time of Josiah” (Jesaja-Worte in der Josiazeit), which appeared in 1977. Barth attempts to demonstrate that a group of texts having to do with the deliverance of Zion and the destruction of Assyria stem from the time of Josiah as a “productive reinterpretation of the prophetic tradition”56 (e.g., 8:9–10; 8:23b–9:6; 14:24–27). Even though this thesis, which was taken up in English-speaking circles by Ronald E. Clements,57 encounters more critical re­sist­ ance today,58 it is methodologically important. It not only demonstrates how the prophetic tradition was extended in later generations, but also reveals how creative and theologically innovative these later editors were. Current scholarship on “Proto-Isaiah” is difficult to summarize. The various views and their underlying assumptions are too widely disparate. Nevertheless, it is possible to recognize certain trends. Disputes between “maximalists” and “minimalists” play a considerable role in this regard. It comes down to the question of how highly valued authentic Isaianic material is. On one side are the exegetes, such as Hans Wildberger or J. J. M. Roberts and, to certain extent, also H. G. M. Williamson, who trace a considerable portion of Isa 1–39 back to the prophet himself. On the other side are theories that assume that there is a relatively small core of prophetic material and attribute the bulk of the tradition to later editorial activity.59 This distinction does not tell us much about the hermeneutical assumptions of these positions. For it is apparent even in the commentary by Williamson to what extent the proportion of later extraneous editorial material is assumed. This makes it clear how strongly the redaction-critical perspective of the complete book of Isaiah has influenced scholarship in the meantime. There is another issue that is closely associated with this controversy. What was the character of the original proclamations of Isaiah? Was it essentially oriented to salvation prophecy, such as the older saying in Isa 8:1–4, also suggested by such scenes as 7:1–9 or 36–37? Here the prophet is depicted as counselor or adviser to the king who pronounces judgment on the enemies of Judah.60 According to this model, the prophet of salvation 55  Cf., e.g., Wildberger, Jesaja 28–39, 1579–1586. 56 Barth, Jesaja-Worte, 301 (“produktive Neuinterpretation prophetischer Überlieferung”). 57 Clements, Isaiah. 58  Cf., e.g., Williamson, “Theory,” 3–21, who argues against the unity of the “Assur redaction” and in favor of a later dating of a couple of texts. 59  Cf. Kaiser in his commentary on Isaiah; and, e.g., U. Becker, Jesaja. 60  Cf. U. Becker, Jesaja; U. Becker, “Jesaja, Jeremia,” 79–100; and de Jong, Isaiah. Compare also the short but substantial evaluation of the problem in Kratz, Prophets.

50   Uwe Becker becomes a prophet of judgment only secondarily. From a literary point of view, this is illustrated by the saying against Judah in Isa 8:5–8, which is clearly appended secondarily to 8:1–4 and reorients the judgment against Judah to the rejection of God himself. Such a theological perspective is still missing in the older and apparently Isaianic proclamation 8:1–4. From this point of view, the prophet Isaiah would more closely resemble his ancient Near Eastern colleagues (especially from the Neo-Assyrian period), who, despite their isolated criticisms, reflect the salvation prophecy of the royal court.61 The “classic” alternative model, which understands Isaiah as a proclaimer of judgment throughout, must substantiate its position based on literary-critical analysis of individual texts. The assessment of the so-called “memoir” in Isa 6–8 from the time of the SyroEphraimite War (734–732) plays a role here whose importance is hard to exaggerate. Which parts might be traced back to the prophet himself, and what must be attributed to later editors? Here, too, current scholarship is fraught with disagreement. It becomes apparent in any case that the “memoir” also represents a literary construct that, in its current form, exhibits a long history. If the prophetic commissioning of Isa 6:9–11 can no longer be traced back to the prophet and if, additionally, the narrative in Isa 7 (in the third person) is considered a later insertion connected to the Isaiah legends of Isa 36–37,62 then a new picture emerges. According to this view, Isa 6–8 contains the nucleus of the book of Proto-Isaiah and reflects in the history of its composition a time frame of several centuries. Its beginnings could be found in Isa 6:1–8 and 8:1–4, 16, and this would then constitute the earliest shape of the book of Isaiah.63 It is possible that this earliest book of Isaiah could have been supplemented from the front as well as from the back. If so, it would help explain why the call narrative in Isa 6 is not located closer to the beginning of the book, as is usually the case, instead of in its current position. The second great complex, which up until now has been traced back to the prophet Isaiah, is Isa 28–31. Its traditional placement in the prophet’s latter period of activity— that is, during the time of the Assyrian threat of 701—stems from its location in the book of Proto-Isaiah and from subtle hints about the historical situation (cf. the sayings against an alliance with Egypt in Isa 30:1–5 and 31:1–3). At the same time, however, these “Assyrian” chapters also exhibit distinctive literary connections with the first part of the book of Isaiah (cf. also Isa 5–12). The saying in 29:9–10, for example, refers back to Isa 6:9–11 (cf. also 28:12). Many additional examples could be mentioned. The impression is thus formed that Isa 28–31 reformulates and extends earlier texts in the book of Isaiah that can themselves no longer be traced back with confidence to the prophet.64 These chapters are thus shown to represent internal expansions of the book, which pick up themes from the earlier Isaianic material and apply them to new situations. In the case of the chapters discussed here, this could refer to the hazards of the year 701, but just as well to the destruction of the state in 587 bce. This case demonstrates how it is possible to distinguish, within the repertoire of Proto-Isaiah, between earlier material that might be traceable back to the prophet 61  See esp. de Jong, Isaiah. 62  See also Barthel, Prophetenwort. 63  Cf. U. Becker, Jesaja. This argument is (of course) highly debated. 64  Cf. Kratz, “Jesaja 28–31,” 177–197.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   51 ­ imself, and multiple substantial expansions from later times. When it comes to Isa 33 h and 35, however, a connection to the corpus of Second Isaiah is already assumed (or established). That could also apply to the introductory chapter of Isa 1, which, like an overture, resounds with themes from the entire(!) book. Here, too, it is difficult not to conclude that essential components of this chapter were conceived for a Großjesajabuch that already existed.65 It is therefore no longer possible to understand the making of Proto-Isaiah without considering Isa 40–66. Despite all the differences, this may be the most important insight of contemporary scholarship.

2.8. Conclusion When we talk of the “unity” of the book of Isaiah, we do not mean that it was composed by a single author. Rather, it is evident that two independent complexes are involved— the core of Isa 1–32 and that of 40–46(48). In a complicated redaction-critical process, they have been brought together and expanded in many ways. This insight has several consequences for the exegesis of the book of Isaiah: (a) The person of the prophet (or several prophets, like First Isaiah and Second Isaiah) can no longer serve as an appropriate point of departure for analysis; only the book that we have received can: The given text must be the starting point of the analysis.66 (b) Redactioncritical analysis of Isa 1–39 must always proceed with attention to the whole book of Isaiah. This means that questions of intertextual referencing must constitute a significant part of the work. Of course, it will not suffice to compile an inventory of textual interconnectedness as many “intertextual” studies do. Rather, the issue of identifying referring text and its referent will need to be addressed. The multiplicity of hypotheses concerning the origin of the book of Isaiah, which have been discussed here in summary, may have a disconcerting effect. The divergent lines of development in the English-speaking and German-speaking worlds are particularly noteworthy and conspicuous. But differing exegetical traditions are quite normal and at best fruitful. It should not be forgotten that the different models used for explaining the composition of the book of Isaiah evolved from the complexity of the text itself. To conclude with a quotation from Hugh Williamson: “what counts is not so much the answers that are proposed as the fact that all the scholars, in careful consideration of the material at hand, come up with related questions.”67

Bibliography Ackroyd, Peter. “Isaiah I-XII: Presentation of a Prophet.” In Congress Volume Göttingen 1977, edited by John A. Emerton, 16–48. VTS 29. Leiden: Brill, 1979 (= Ackroyd, Studies in the Religious Tradition of the Old Testament, 152–171. London: SCM Press, 1987). 65  Cf. Eck, Jesaja 1. 66  Cf. Steck, Prophetic Books, 25. 67  Williamson, “Isaiah, Book of,” 370.

52   Uwe Becker Albertz, Rainer. A History of Israelite Religion in the Old Testament Period. Vol. 1, From the Beginnings to the End of the Monarchy. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994. German original: Religionsgeschichte Israels in alttestamentlicher Zeit. Band 1: Von den Anfängen bis zum Ende der Königszeit. GAT 8/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992. Albertz, Rainer. “Das Deuterojesaja-Buch als Fortschreibung der Jesaja-Prophetie.” In Die Hebräische Bibel und ihre zweifache Nachgeschichte. Festschrift Rolf Rendtorff. Edited by Erhard Blum, Christian Macholz, Rolf Rendtorff, and Ekkehard Stegemann, 241–256. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1990 (= Albertz, Geschichte und Theologie. Studien zur Exegese des Alten Testaments und zur Religionsgeschichte Israels, edited by Ingo Kottsieper and Jakob Wöhrle, 239–255. BZAW 326. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2003). Alter, Robert, and Frank Kermode, eds. The Literary Guide to the Bible. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987. Barstad, Hans  M. A Way in the Wilderness: The “Second Exodus” in the Message of Second Isaiah. JSSM 12. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1989. Barth, Hermann. Die Jesaja-Worte in der Josiazeit: Israel und Assur als Thema einer produktiven Neuinterpretation der Jesajaüberlieferung. WMANT 48. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1977. Barthel, Jörg. Prophetenwort und Geschichte: Die Jesajaüberlieferung in Jes 6–8 und 28–31. FAT 19. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997. Barton, John. Reading the Old Testament: Method in Biblical Study. Rev. ed. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1996. Becker, Joachim: Isaias: Der Prophet und sein Buch. SBS 30. Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1968. Becker, Uwe. “Die Wiederentdeckung des Prophetenbuches: Tendenzen und Aufgaben der gegenwärtigen Prophetenforschung.” BTZ 21, no. 1 (2004): 30–60. Becker, Uwe. Exegese des Alten Testaments: Ein Methoden- und Arbeitsbuch. UTB 2664. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 20154. Becker, Uwe. “Jesajaforschung (Jes 1–39).” TRu 64 (1999): 1–37 and 117–152. Becker, Uwe. “Jesaja, Jeremia und die Anfänge der Unheilsprophetie.” HeBAI 6, no. 1 (2017): 79–199. Becker, Uwe. Jesaja: Von der Botschaft zum Buch. FRLANT 178. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997. Becker, Uwe. “Tendenzen der Jesajaforschung 1998–2007.” TRu 74 (2009): 96–128. Berges, Ulrich. The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition and Final Form. Translated by Millard Lind. HBM 46. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012. German original: Das Buch Jesaja: Komposition und Endgestalt. HBS 16. Freiburg: Herder, 1998. Berges, Ulrich. Jesaja 49–54. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2015. Berges, Ulrich. Jesaja: Der Prophet und das Buch. Biblische Gestalten 22. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2010 (English: The Prophet and His Book. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012). Berges, Ulrich, and Willem A. M. Beuken. Das Buch Jesaja: Eine Einführung. UTB. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2016. Beuken, Willem A. M. “Isaiah 33 als Spiegeltext im Jesajabuch.” EThL 67 (1991): 5–35. Beuken, Willem A. M. “Isaiah 34: Lament in Isaianic Context.” OTE 5 (1992): 78–102. Beuken, Willem A. M. Jesaja 1–12. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2003. Beuken, Willem A. M. Jesaja 13–27. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2007.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   53 Beuken, Willem A. M. Jesaja 28–39. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2010 Childs, Brevard S. Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture, Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979. Childs, Brevard S. Isaiah. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Clements, Ronald E. Isaiah and the Deliverance of Jerusalem: A Study of the Interpretation of Prophecy in the Old Testament. JSOTS 13. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1980. Clements, Ronald E. “The Unity of the Book of Isaiah.” Int 36 (1982): 117–129 (= Clements, Old Testament Prophecy: From Oracles to Canon, pp. 93–104, 247–248. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1996. Conrad, Edgar W. Reading Isaiah. OBT. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1991. Duhm, Bernhard. Das Buch Jesaia übersetzt und erklärt. HKAT III/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 19685. Eck, Joachim. Jesaja 1—Eine Exegese der Eröffnung des Jesaja-Buches: Die Präsentation Jesajas und Jhwhs, Israels und der Tochter Zion. BZAW 473. Berlin: de Gruyter: 2015. Eichhorn, Johann Gottfried. Einleitung in das Alte Testament. Band 3. Leipzig: Weidmann & Reich, 1783. Hermisson, Hans-Jürgen. Deuterojesaja. 3. Teilband: Jesaja 49,14–55,13. BKAT XI/3. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2017. Hermisson, Hans-Jürgen. “Einheit und Komplexität Deuterojesajas: Probleme der Redaktionsgeschichte von Jes 40–55.” In The Book of Isaiah/Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures, unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, edited by Jacques Vermeylen, 287–312. BETL 81. Leuven: Peeters, 1989 (= Hermisson, Studien zu Prophetie und Weisheit: Gesammelte Aufsätze, 132–157. FAT 23. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1998). Höffken, Peter. Jesaja: Der Stand der theologischen Diskussion. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2004. Jong, Matthijs J. de. Isaiah among the Ancient Near Eastern Prophets: A Comparative Study of the Earliest Stages of the Isaiah Tradition and the Neo-Assyrian Prophecies. VTS 117. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Kaiser, Otto. Das Buch des Propheten Jesaja: Kapitel 1–12. ATD 17. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 19815. English: Isaiah 1–12. OTL. London: SCM Press, 19832). Kaiser, Otto. Der Prophet Jesaja: Kapitel 13–39. ATD 18. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1973. English: Isaiah 13–39. OTL. London: SCM Press, 1974. Kaiser, Otto. Grundriß der Einleitung in die kanonischen und deuterokanonischen Schriften des Alten Testaments. Band 2. Die prophetischen Werke. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 1994. Klein, Anja. “ ‘Zieht heraus aus Babel’: Beobachtungen zum Zweiten Exodus im Deuterojesajabuch.” ZTK 112 (2015): 279–299. Kratz, Reinhard Gregor. “Jesaja 28–31 als Fortschreibung.” In Prophetenstudien: Kleine Schriften 2, 177–197. FAT 74. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011. Kratz, Reinhard Gregor. Kyros im Deuterojesaja-Buch: Redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu Entstehung und Theologie von Jes 40–55. FAT 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991. Kratz, Reinhard Gregor. The Prophets of Israel. CSHB 2. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2015. German original: Die Propheten Israels. Wissen 2326. Munich: C. H. Beck, 2003. Kratz, Reinhard Gregor. “Tritojesaja.” In Prophetenstudien: Kleine Schriften 2, 233–242. FAT 74. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011. Lowth, Robert. Jesaias neu übersetzt nebst einer Einleitung und critischen philologischen Anmerkungen. Aus dem Englischen. Mit Zusätzen und Anmerkungen von Johann Benjamin

54   Uwe Becker Koppe. 4 vols. Leipzig, 1779–1781. English original: Isaiah: A New Translation. With a Preliminary Dissertation, and Notes Critical, Philological, and Explanatory. London: J. Nichols for J. Dodsley and T. Cadell, 1778. Mathews McGinnis, Claire, and Patricia  K.  Tull, “Remembering the Former Things: The History of Interpretation and Critical Scholarship.” In “As Those Who Are Taught”: The Interpretation of Isaiah from the LXX to the SBL, edited by Claire Mathews McGinnis and Patricia K. Tull, 1–27. SBLSymS 27. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Melugin, Roy F. “Isaiah 40–66 in Recent Research: The ‘Unity’ Movement.” In Recent Research on the Major Prophets, edited by Alan J. Hauser, 142–194. RRBS 1. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2008. Melugin, Roy F., and Marvin A. Sweeney, eds. New Visions of Isaiah. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Miscall, Peter D. Isaiah. Readings. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1993. Moser, Christian. Umstrittene Prophetie: Die exegetisch-theologische Diskussion um die Inhomogenität des Jesajabuches von 1780 bis 1900. BThS 128. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 2012. Oeming, Manfred, and Anne-Ruth Pregla. “New Literary Criticism.” TRu 66 (2001): 1–23. Oorschot, Jürgen van. Von Babel zum Zion: Eine literarkritische und redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung. BZAW 206. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1993. Rendtorff, Rolf. “The Book of Isaiah: A Complex Unity. Synchronic and Diachronic Reading.” In New Visions of Isaiah, edited by Roy F. Melugin and Marvin A. Sweeney, 32–49. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Rendtorff, Rolf. “Jesaja 6 im Rahmen der Komposition des Jesajabuches.” In The Book of Isaiah, edited by Jacques Vermeylen, 73–82. BETL 81. Leuven: Peeters, 1989 (= Rendtorff, Kanon und Theologie: Vorarbeiten zu einer Theologie des Alten Testaments, 162–171. Neukirchen-Vlyun: Neukirchener, 1991). Rendtorff, Rolf. “Zur Komposition des Buches Jesaja.” VT 34 (1984): 295–320 (= Rendtorff, Kanon und Theologie: Vorarbeiten zu einer Theologie des Alten Testaments, 141–161. Neukirchen-Vlyun: Neukirchener, 1991). Reventlow, Henning Graf. “Die Prophetie im Urteil Bernhard Duhms.” ZTK 85 (1988): 259–274. Roberts, Jimmy J. M. First Isaiah: A Commentary. Hermeneia. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2015. Schmid, Konrad. “Klassische und nachklassische Deutungen der alttestamentlichen Prophetie.” Zeitschrift für Neuere Theologiegeschichte/Journal for the History of Modern Theology 3 (1996): 225–250. Steck, Odil Hannes. “Autor und/oder Redaktor in Jesaja 56–66.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretative Tradition, vol. 1, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 219–259. VTS 70/1. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Steck, Odil Hannes. Bereitete Heimkehr: Jesaja 35 als redaktionelle Brücke zwischen dem Ersten und dem Zweiten Jesaja. SBS 121. Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1985. Steck, Odil Hannes. Gottesknecht und Zion: Gesammelte Aufsätze zu Deuterojesaja. FAT 4. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992. Steck, Odil Hannes. The Prophetic Books and Their Theological Witness. St. Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2000. German original: Die Prophetenbücher und ihr theologisches Zeugnis. Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1996. Steck, Odil Hannes. Studien zu Tritojesaja. BZAW 203. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1991.

The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition History   55 Stromberg, Jacob. An Introduction to the Study of Isaiah. T&T Clark Approaches to Biblical Studies. London: T&T Clark, 2011. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Sweeney, Marvin A. “The Book of Isaiah in Recent Research.” CurBS 1 (1993) 141–162. Repr. in Recent Research on the Major Prophets, edited by Alan J. Hauser, 78–92. RRBS 1. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2008. Sweeney, Marvin  A. Isaiah 1–4 and the Post-Exilic Understanding of the Isaianic Tradition. BZAW 171. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1988. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39 with an Introduction to Prophetic Literature. FOTL 16. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Sweeney, Marvin A. “Reevaluating Isaiah 1–39 in Recent Critical Research.” In CurBS 4 (1996) 79–113. Repr. in Recent Research on the Major Prophets, edited by Alan J. Hauser, 93–117. RRBS 1. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2008. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Continuity and Discontinuity in Isaiah 40–66: History of Research.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans  M.  Barstad, 13–40. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Isaiah 40–55: A Judahite Reading Drama.” In Daughter Zion: Her Portrait, Her Response, edited by Mark J. Boda, Carol J. Dempsey, and LeAnn Snow Flesher, 55–76. SBLAIL 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia, and Hans M. Barstad, eds. Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Van Seters, John. The Edited Bible: The Curious History of the “Editor” in Biblical Criticism. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006. Vermeylen, Jacques. Du prophète Isaïe à l’apocalyptique: Isaïe, I–XXXV, miroir d’un démi-­millénaire d’expérience religieuse en Israël. 2 vols. EBib. Paris: Gabalda, 1977–1978. Vermeylen, Jacques. “L’unité du livre d’Isaïe.” In The Book of Isaiah/Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures, unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, edited by Jacques Vermeylen. 11–53. BETL 81. Leuven: Peeters, 1989. Weidner, Alexander. Das Ende Deuterojesajas: Eine literarkritische und redaktionsgeschichtliche Studie zur Entstehung von Jes 40–60. FAT II/94. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2017. Wildberger, Hans. Isaiah 28–39. CC. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2002. German original: Jesaja 28–39. BKAT X/3. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchner, 1982). Williamson, H.  G.  M. The Book Called Isaiah: Deutero-Isaiah’s Role in Composition and Redaction. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. Williamson, H. G. M. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary of Isaiah 1–27. Vol. 1, Commentary on Isaiah 1–5. ICC. London, T&T Clark, 2006. Williamson, H. G. M. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 1–27. Vol. 2, Commentary on Isaiah 6–12. ICC. London: T&T Clark, 2018. Williamson, H. G. M. “Isaiah, Book of.” In Dictionary of the Old Testament Prophets, edited by Mark  J.  Boda and J.  Gordon McConville, 364–378. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2012.

56   Uwe Becker Williamson, H.  G.  M. “Synchronic and Diachronic in Isaian Perspective.” In Synchronic or Diachronic? A Debate on Method in Old Testament Exegesis, edited by Johannes C. de Moor, 211–226. OtSt 34. Leiden: Brill, 1995. Williamson, H. G. M. “The Theory of a Josianic Edition of the First Part of the Book of Isaiah: A Critical Examination.” In Studies in Isaiah: History, Theology and Reception, edited by Tommy Wasserman, Greger Andersson, and David Willgren, 3–21. LHBOTS 654. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017. Zapff, Burkard M. Jesaja 56–66. NEB 37. Würzburg: Echter, 2006. Zimmerli, Walther. “Zur Sprache Tritojesajas.” In Gottes Offenbarung: Gesammelte Aufsätze zum Alten Testament, 217–233. TB 19. Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 19692.

PA RT I I

K E Y PA RT S OF T H E BO OK OF ISA I A H

chapter 3

The Or acle s aga i nst the Nations Hyun Chul Paul Kim

3.1. Introduction The Oracles against/about the Nations (hereafter, OAN) have taken a backseat in discourses of Isaiah scholarship, both because of the disturbingly judgmental overtones and the seemingly disjointed composition. However, in recent decades, scholars have recognized the significance of each section in the book of Isaiah as a whole.1 Instead of reconstructing the earlier original layers, redactional studies readjusted the methodological goals to discover the situations of the editors, and identifying their implications for re-readers.2 Keeping the contributions of the trends of both synchronic (holistic) and diachronic (redactional) approaches, this study will address the OAN’s history of formation, function in the book of Isaiah, and key themes.

3.2.  History of Formation The older scholarship of discovering the so-called genuine Isaianic words (ipsissima verba) remains disputable, if not unconvincing. Nevertheless, scholarly consensus on the history of formation points to the complex editorial processes that range from the eighth-century prophet down to the exilic and post-exilic eras of the scribes. One of the earliest compositional layers signifies the eighth century bce. King Uzziah’s death (6:1; 734 bce) alongside the Syro-Ephraimite War and, subsequently, Tiglathpileser III’s campaign (735–732 bce) lay a foundational historical background for   Melugin, “Isaiah 40–66,” 142–194.  Lessing, Interpreting Discontinuity, 12–38.

1

2

60   Hyun Chul Paul Kim chapters 1–12. Then, Ahaz’s death (14:28; ca. 727 bce) and the reign of Hezekiah alongside Ashdod’s (Philistine) revolts against Sargon II (14:28–32; 20:1; 713–711 bce) after the fall of Samaria (722 bce) mark a pivotal chronology for the core Isaianic materials of chapters 13–23. Thus, Hezekiah’s dilemma to acquiesce to join the neighboring nations’ alliance with Egypt against Assyria underscores chapters 18–19, referencing Cush and Egypt which seem to have affinity with Isaiah’s prophetic career (cf. Isa 22). Within these compositions, scholars also consider portions of these core materials as the seventhcentury Josianic editions (e.g., 14:24–27; 15–20; 23), although controversy remains as to whether chapters 15–16 and 23 are pre-exilic or later.3 Accordingly, a safer scholarly consensus regards the core portions from 14:28–32 toward chapter 22 (especially Isa 14:28–32 and 17–20; Isa 22 remains contested) as the Isaianic, or pre-exilic, compositions.4 The fringe portions (Isa 13:1–14:23; 23), together with various editorial glosses within the inner portions, mark the exilic and post-exilic redactions. Concerning these later compositional strata, Ulrich Berges surmises three exilic and post-exilic redactional stages: (exilic/Babylonian) “Babylonizing” edition, (post-exilic/Persian) “Zionizing” edition, and (later/even Hellenistic?) “sinners versus pious” edition.5 Behind these redactional layers, we detect unique thematic efforts: “The great advantage of the recent redactional analysis is that an attempt is made to recover an editorial intention that shaped the corpus into a unified whole.”6 First, the “Babylonizing” edition has the function of reapplying the presumably earlier anti-Assyrian oracles into the anti-Babylon oracles—hence the exilic redaction (Isa 13–14; 21). Core materials (whether or not they were originally independent) include 13:17–22; 14:5–21; 21:1–10, to which the Babylonizing redaction added the day of Yhwh passages (13:6–16) and the passages that specifically name Babylon (14:3–4; 14:22–23).7 A prime example of this redaction can be found in 14:24–27, which eclipses an antiAssyrian oracle with an anti-Babylon oracle. The catchphrase of the “outstretched hand” (14:26–27), as Marvin Sweeney argues, may have originally been linked to the pertinent earlier oracles with the same phrase (5:25; 9:11, 16, 20 [MT 9:12, 17, 21]; 10:4) through the Josianic redaction.8 Afterward, the Babylonizing redaction of 14:24–27 coalesced the fall of Assyria with that of Babylon, joining in “the one plan of God the destruction of the arrogant oppressor from both the eighth and sixth centuries.”9 This accentuates the explicit polemic against Babylon, the most terrifying enemy empire.  Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 57–59, 215; Clements, Isaiah 1–39, 5–6.  Cook, Sign, 45, surmises the four oracles—Philistia (Isa 14:28–32), Moab (Isa 15–16), Damascus (Isa 17), and Egypt (Isa 19)—as the likely earliest collection. 5  Berges, Book of Isaiah, 137–161. 6  Childs, Isaiah, 116. See also Lessing, Interpreting Discontinuity: “Discontinuities occur in prophetic texts because later communities [Sitz-in-der-Gemeinde, as opposed to Sitz-im-Leben] needed to adapt the prophetic message to their current situation” (p. 35). 7   Hamborg, “Reasons,” 146. 8  Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 212, 233. 9  Childs, Isaiah, 124. Similarly, on 22:1–14, consider Beuken, “Obdurate”: “It forms an amalgam of various calamitous events which befell the city: the siege of 701, the downfall of 586, and other comparable dangers to its survival” (pp. 60–61). 3

4

The Oracles against the Nations   61 Such a d ­ enouncement of Babylon coheres with the anti-Babylonian claims of 21:9 (“Fallen, fallen is Babylon”; cf. 23:13). Second, the “Zionizing” edition continues the negative dismissal of the Babylonian tyranny. Yet this redaction simultaneously contains a more positive attitude toward other nations worldwide and the hope of the salvific role of the restored Zion. Berges identifies several passages as the Zionizing redactional works (13:2; 14:1–2; 16:1, 3–5; 18:3, 7; 19:16–25; 23:17–18). Many of these references share common motifs with the texts of Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah. H.  G.  M.  Williamson has suggested 14:1–2 as a Deutero-Isaianic editorial hinge that juxtaposes the previously extant texts of 13:2–22 and 14:4b–21.10 These references coincide with the Deutero-Isaianic and Trito-Isaianic motifs of the nations’ attending to (reversal of fortune), or even joining, the children of Israel (16:1, 3–5; 18:3, 7).11 Thus, the “on that day” passages of Egypt’s restoration, alongside Assyria’s, in 19:16–25 (and also Tyre’s in 23:17–18) portrays the fulfillment of the Abrahamic blessing of many nations, as a prototype of the universalistic inclusion or conversion of non-Jews and diasporic Jews in the Second Temple era.12 Third, the “sinners versus pious” edition can be considered contemporary with the “Zionizing” editorial stage. Yet, just as the anti-Babylon polemic (of the Babylonizing redaction) leads to the pro-Zion motif of the nations’ servitude and pilgrimage to Zion (of the Zionizing redaction), we find another separation—that is, the righteous/poor/needy versus the wicked/insolent/arrogant (13:9, 11; 14:5, 20–21, 30, 32; 16:13–14; 17:2, 12–14; 21:2, 10, 16–17; 22:19–23; 23:15–16).13 If the anti-Babylon or pro-Zion trends concern Israel’s external relationship with foreign nations, the division addresses the internal struggles within the (postBabylon) reconstruction Yehud. In this case, we may have editorial correlations between these redactional references and Trito-Isaiah.14 Whereas the tension is predominantly among the groups of Yehud in Trito-Isaiah, these redactional references are placed in the OAN section, dealing with foreign nations. Berges views the role of Zion’s openness to the nations (cf. 2:2–4) in thematic continuity—rather than conflict—with the “restricting admittance to the righteous.”15 This thematic development aligns well with the ensuing traditions of Judaism, where Torah piety would become as important as—if not more important than—one’s genealogy or e­ thnicity.16 Likewise, the tension among the groups of the community, under the c­ apstone control of the empires, paves a way for the theological growth toward the later apocalyptic motifs in Second Temple literature (cf. 2 Esdras 3–14).  Williamson, Book Called Isaiah, 156–175. Lee, Redactional Study, further construes 14:1–2, 26–27, 32b; 16:1–4a; 18:7; 19:16–17; 23:8–9, 11 as editorial expansions by the same late-exilic editor responsible for chapters 40–55 (p. 184). 11   Jenkins, “Development,” 241, observes Isa 16:1–5 as a late pericope, having no literary parallel with Jeremiah 48. For a recent redactional investigation on Isa 18–20, see Cook, Sign, 159–164. 12  Berges, Book of Isaiah, 152–153. We should note that in much of the Second Temple period literature, Assyria (instead of Babylon or Persia or Greece) plays a role of a formidable empire (e.g., Tob 1; Jdt 1). 13  Stromberg, Introduction, 16–18, interprets 16:13–14 as an update on the preceding oracle on Moab. But note that Beuken, “Must Philistia,” 52, considers 14:28–32 as an original unit, traceable back to the prophet. Williamson, Book Called Isaiah, identifies 13:4–5, 9–13 (within Isa 13) as later editorial works of universalizing tendency.   14 Stromberg, Introduction, 41–54. 15  Berges, Book of Isaiah, 154.   16 Collins, Invention of Judaism, 60. 10

62   Hyun Chul Paul Kim

3.3.  Function in the Book of Isaiah as a Whole The OAN section, far from being an isolated island, plays a significant role in its place and function as an essential component for the entire book of Isaiah both compositionally and conceptually.

3.3.1.  The OAN in Relation to the Preceding Texts (Isaiah 1–12) The placement of the OAN section in the book of Isaiah presents linguistic and thematic expansions of chapters 1–12. First, the OAN, in a prototype primarily focused on Assyria and Egypt, may have adopted 11:12–16 as the rhetorical and thematic template. The list of the nations in 11:12–16 (Philistia, Edom, Moab, Ammon, Egypt, and Assyria) coincides with the core nations in chapters 13–23 (Assyria, Philistia, Moab, Cush, and Egypt). The Assyria-Egypt ring structure of the OAN segment (Isa 14–20) thus may have resembled the sequence of 11:11–16.17 Likewise, the historical descriptions of key political events make crucial links, though these are more thematic than chronological. For example, the unique superscriptions (1:1 and 2:1) can only be found at the beginning of the OAN section (13:1). The year of Uzziah’s death in 6:1 connects to the year of Ahaz’s death in 14:28, both reports providing rough thematic backdrops of the domestic and international political events. Also, the threat of the Syria-Ephraim coalition against Zion in chapter 7 coheres with the rivalry between Damascus-Samaria and Jerusalem in chapters 17–18.18 In the same way, these threats of anti-Assyrian coalitions connect to the Philistine revolt against the Assyrian king Sargon in 20:1, as well as the likely revolt of Hezekiah against the Assyrian king Sennacherib in chapters 36–37. Furthermore, W.  A.  M.  Beuken delineates substantial overlaps between chapters 10–12 and chapters 13–14 in terms of the motif of “highness.” Thus, the expressions of Babylon’s splendor (13:11, 19) contrast not only with the exalted ones as the divine instrument (13:3), but also with Yhwh’s own exalted name (12:4; cf. 2:6–22). This theme of the Babylonian king’s hubris (Isa 13–14) further echoes that of the Assyrian king (10:5–19). Likewise, the tall trees that are to be cut down (10:33–34), alongside the “rejected branch” (14:19), contrast with the branch and stump of Jesse (11:1, 10).19 The “rod” and the   Kim, “Isaiah 22,” 7; Seitz, Isaiah 1–39, 115–119.   Beuken, “Damascus,” 64. Beuken offers further examples of correlations, e.g., 12:6 → 14:32 → 16:1 → 18:7, and also 13:2, 4 → 17:13 → 18:3, 6 (p. 78). 19   Beuken, “Song of Gratitude,” 102–110. In addition to the correlation between 11:1 and 14:19, Beuken delineates more detailed linguistic and thematic correlations (e.g., 11:4 → 14:5–6; 11:10 → 14:1, 3; 11:2 → 14:26; 11:9 → 14:13, 20; 12:6 → 13:20; 10:32 → 13:2; 1:9 → 13:19–20; 10:19–21 → 14:22; 2:2–5 → 13:2–3; 2:1–5 → 13:5). 17

18

The Oracles against the Nations   63 s­ erpent’s “root”—Assyria—that struck the “root” of Philistia (14:29–30) reverts back not only to the “rod” of divine anger against Israel (10:5) but also to the “root” of Jesse who is empowered to slay the wicked with the “rod” of his mouth (11:1, 4).20 Accordingly, the OAN in the present form echo and reconceptualize the key motifs of chapters 1–12. Yhwh’s outstretched hand (14:26–27) references the same hand stretched out against Israel (5:25; 9:11, 16, 20 [MT 9:12, 17, 21]; 10:4).21 Now the divine hand is raised against Assyria, Babylon, and all the nations. The “day of Yhwh” (2:12) as a divine announcement against all haughty kingdoms in chapters 1–12 likewise opens the OAN with the pronouncement of divine anger against Babylon and other nations (13:6, 9, 13).22 As Seth Erlandsson observes, the OAN do not stand in isolation to the rest of the book, because “the threat from Assyria and the promises of Jhwh to David and Zion dominate the design of chapters 1–12.”23 The OAN allude to the preceding texts, with the continuous theme of the sovereignty of Yhwh now extended beyond Israel toward surrounding nations and superpowers.

3.3.2.  The OAN in Relation to the Following Texts (Isaiah 24–66) Beyond the inner-biblical correlations to the immediately preceding section (Isa 1–12), the OAN form notable links to the rest of the book of Isaiah. Scholars have observed many linguistic and thematic connections between chapters 24–27 and the OAN. Berges, for example, observes the thematic continuity of Babylon’s devastation between 13:1–14:23; 21:1–10; and 24:10–12; 25:2.24 The divine “atonement,” blocked by the iniquity of the obdurate Jerusalemites (22:14), will be made available when Jacob’s iniquity is “atoned” (27:9).25 In particular, the motif of “city” such as Babylon (and Jerusalem) in the OAN continues in thematically expanded ways with the “chaos city” (and the “strong city”) in chapters 24–27.26 Thus, many scholars regard chapters 24–27 as a deliberate compositional extension of chapters 13–23, in terms of the motifs of the judgment on the nations, cities, and chaotic mythological forces.27 With chapters 28–35, we observe comparable political events for historical background. The “city” Ephraim and its recalcitrant leaders thus become an object lesson and warning for the leaders of Jerusalem. Hezekiah’s alleged alliance with Philistia and Egypt against Assyria (Isa 14; 17–18) likewise recurs with a scathing warning against the reliance upon Egypt (Isa 30–31). In a larger scope, as though forming an inclusio,   Beuken, “Must Philistia,” 55.   Within the OAN, Yhwh’s outstretched hand forms a kind of inclusio (14:26–27 and 23:11). 22   Boadt, “Re-examining,” 184. 23   Erlandsson, “Burden,” 5. In Jeremiah scholarship, scholars note that this is true in the case of Jeremiah’s OAN: “It turns out to be no longer possible to treat the collection of Jeremiah 46–51 as an isolated, secondary appendix.” Peels, “You Shall Certainly Drink,” 85. 24  Berges, Book of Isaiah, 136.   25  Beuken, “Obdurate Short-Sightedness,” 62. 26   Beuken, “Damascus,” 80. See also Kim, “City, Earth, Empire,” 35–59. 27  Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 346–348; Tull, Isaiah 1–39, 258–259, 367–370; Seitz, Isaiah 1–39, 115–126. 20 21

64   Hyun Chul Paul Kim the oracle against Edom (Isa 34) further resumes the OAN with the continuous yet climactic themes of judgment upon Babylon (Isa 13–14) and Edom (Isa 34)—the two nations condemned for the fall of Judah (cf. Ps 137). Whereas both Babylon and Jerusalem face punishment in the OAN, chapters 34–35 wrap up with contrasting fates between Edom’s doom and Judah’s bloom. While chapters 36–39 seem out of place in the whole book, we find notable links with the OAN. The unique phrases with the common motifs of Jerusalem’s crisis—such as the “upper pool” (7:3; 36:2) and the “lower pool” (22:9; cf. 22:11)—bring together these two remote sections. Even the names of two officials—Shebna (22:15; 36:3) and Eliakim (22:20; 36:3)—deliberately build literary connections.28 The parallel patterns of threats by Assyria (Isa 7–11; 36–37) and Babylon (Isa 13–14; 39) legitimate the interconnections. According to Christopher Begg, these correlations of the OAN and chapters 36–39 adumbrate the “Babylonizing” of these components, emphasizing Babylon as the recurring and eventual target (Isa 13–14; 39).29 In addition to the Deutero-Isaianic or Trito-Isaianic redactional impacts in chapters 40–66, the fates of many nations in the OAN correspond to the peoples, nations, coastlands, “ends of the earth,” kings, and foreigners of these final chapters. The anti-Babylon diatribe of the OAN recurs in chapters 46–47, just as the anti-Edom oracle in chapter 34 reverberates in chapter 63. Not only daughter Babylon’s fate, but also daughter Zion’s fate interconnects with the oracle of divine comfort amid desert-like Babylonian exile. Thus, key words such as “wilderness” (21:1), “desert” (21:13), and “valley” (22:1) in the oracles against Babylon and Jerusalem (Isa 21–22) reappear in the opening oracle of DeuteroIsaiah: “In the wilderness, prepare the way of Yhwh, make straight in the desert a highway for our God; let every valley be lifted up” (40:3–4; cf. 35:1, 6).30 Just as the “day of Yhwh” motif (which brackets the OAN in 13:6, 9 and 22:5) links the OAN section back to chapters 1–12 (2:12), this “comfort” motif in the promise of the restoration of Jerusalem (40:1–2; cf. 49:13; 51:3; 52:9; 66:13) in chapters 40–66 connects to the OAN section of “no comfort” to Jerusalem (22:4). Finally, the theme of schism between the pious and the wicked, which is especially notable in chapters 53–66, mirrors the implicit tension between the afflicted and the abusive in the OAN—both sections hinting at the triggering antecedents of the later eschatological and apocalyptic developments.

3.3.3.  The OAN of Isaiah in Comparison with the OAN of Amos, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel Although they contain unique elements, the OAN of Isaiah also have much in common with those of other prophetic books. Comparing similar patterns in other books can illuminate additional insights concerning the function of the OAN within the book of Isaiah. The OAN in Amos 1–2 uniquely start the book of Amos (cf. Zeph 2–3), whereas   Kim, “Isaiah 22,” 12.    29  Begg, “Babylon,” 122.   Kim, “Isaiah 22,” 16. Consider also the occurrence of “desert” and “sea” together in 16:8.

28

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The Oracles against the Nations   65 the OAN in MT Jeremiah end the book of Jeremiah. Otherwise, the OAN are usually placed in or near the middle of the books, for example, (Proto-)Isaiah, LXX Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. First, in Isa 1–39, the OAN take the central place in a roughly tripartite structure.31 Scholars consider this tripartite structure in its final form as mirroring those of Ezekiel (oracles against Israel in chaps. 1–24; OAN in chaps. 25–32; oracles of salvation for Israel in chaps. 33–48) and LXX Jeremiah (oracles against Israel in Isa 1–24; OAN in Isa 25–32; oracles against Judah via Baruch in Isa 33–52). In Ezekiel, the OAN function as a prelude for the salvation of Israel. In contrast, LXX Jeremiah concludes with the judgment on both nations and Israel. In comparison, Isaiah’s OAN overlap with both perspectives— not only judgment on Jerusalem (Isa 22) and Samaria (Isa 17), similar to LXX Jeremiah, but also punishment of the oppressive “destroyers” (Isa 13–14; 21; 33), similar to Ezekiel.32 Second, the OAN of Isaiah start with Babylon, and intertextually pick up the end of the OAN of MT Jeremiah, together intensifying the anti-Babylon polemic in a larger scope. Admittedly, the pattern of Samaria at the climactic end of Amos’s OAN is similar to that in Isaiah’s OAN. However, unlike Amos 1–2, Jerusalem’s demise is penultimate (Isa 22), followed by the oracle against Tyre (Isa 23). Also, whereas Israel’s sin outweighs that of other nations in Amos 1–2, it is Babylon’s sin that stands out in Isa 13–23. To reiterate, MT Jeremiah uncharacteristically places the OAN at its conclusion (cf. Isa 46–52). According to Moon Kwon Chae, MT Jeremiah’s reordering of the OAN signifies a shifted tripartite structure (judgment against Judah in Isa 26–45, against the nations in chapters 46–49, and against Babylon in Isa 50–51), thereby making Jeremiah’s conclusion “a hopeful finale, with the oracles against Babylon at the end, through which Israel’s restoration will be brought forth.”33 This theme of hope at the end of MT Jeremiah opens Isaiah’s OAN, with the common motif of Babylon’s demise. Babylon is the ultimate target both in Jer 50–51 and Isa 13–14 (cf. Isa 21; 46–48). The declaration that “Babylon will sink, and not rise again” (Jer 51:64) resounds in the proclamation, “How you have fallen from heaven” (Isa 14:12; cf. 21:9). The shame placed upon Bel and Marduk (Jer 50:2) recurs in the humiliating cowering of Bel and Nebo (Isa 46:1). The admonition to “flee from Babylon” (Jer 50:8) will be echoed in the same call to “get out of Babylon” (Isa 48:20).34 Third, we should note that Isaiah’s OAN in the final form do not take the central place. Rather, for the entire book of sixty-six chapters, the OAN (Isa 13–23) function as another opening section, along with chapters 1–12. The twofold opening chapters (Isa 1–2) present the themes of the divine warning and restoration of Israel/Judah (Isa 1) and of nations/peoples, who will witness Yhwh’s exaltation over any haughty ones (Isa 2).35 Thus, the first section (Isa 1–12) addresses the calamity and renewal of Israel/Judah, as introduced in chapter 1. Then the second section (Isa 13–23) deals with the fates and ­fortunes of the nations, as introduced in chapter 2. In a nutshell, chapters 1–12 concern  Seitz, Isaiah 1–39, 121.   Note the same Hebrew words—“destroyers” and “betrayers”—in 21:2 and 33:1 (cf. 16:4). 33   Chae, “Redactional Intentions,” 590. 34   See Beuken, “Common and Different Phrases,” 53–73. See also Erlandsson, Burden, 154–159. 35  Kim, Reading Isaiah, 29–41. 31

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66   Hyun Chul Paul Kim Zion, and chapters 13–23 concern Babylon (among other nations), and both signify the tales of two cities throughout the book of Isaiah.36 This initial strife between Babylon and Zion continues as strife between two cities (the “chaos city” and the “strong city,” Isa 24–27), two daughters (the “destroying city” Babylon and Zion, Isa 28–33), and two kingdoms (Edom and Judah, Isa 34–35). Such a dichotomous tension continues in Deutero-Isaiah’s anti-idol and anti-Babylon oracles (Isa 40–48), opposite the Servant Jacob-Israel and daughter Zion, with their offspring (Isa 49–57). The schism between the righteous (pious/penitent remnants) and the wicked (recalcitrant/corrupt leaders), especially within the community of post-exilic Yehud, concludes the book (Isa 58–66). Viewed as a whole, Isaiah’s central section lies in chapters 36–39, which bespeak the crises and deliverances both of the nation Judah under the Assyrian threat (Isa 36–37; cf. Ps 2:1–2) and of the individual Hezekiah from mortal disease (Isa 38; while foreshadowing the impending Babylonian exile in chapter 39; cf. Ps 103:1–2).37 Accordingly, this central section mirrors the contention between Babylon and Zion in the OAN in the contention between the Assyrian king Sennacherib and the Judean king Hezekiah. The overall themes accentuate human piety and trust in God rather than the military might, the ultimate restoration of Zion and of Yhwh worshippers over against daunting empires, and the incomparable control and sovereignty of God over all creatures.

3.4.  Key Messages To explore key messages of the OAN, a brief recap of the theories of the origin of the OAN in general may be in order. One theory is that they have a cultic origin that traces back to the Egyptian execration texts or to ancient Near Eastern treaty curses pronouncing doom against enemy rulers. This liturgical origin is often tied to the setting of the royal coronation ritual during the New Year’s festival against the mythological conflict “between chaos and cosmos.”38 Related to the cultic origin, scholars also posit the OAN as a response to lament psalms, and thus analogous to salvation oracles.39 Another theory finds the origin in the war oracles. Duane Christensen conjectures conceptual transformations of the war oracles that are closely associated with the holy war tradition, first into prophetic judgment speeches against both enemy nations and Israel (during the pre-exilic era, e.g., Amos 1–2) and then into the transhistorical shifts culminating in the eventual restoration of Zion (during the exilic era, e.g., Jeremiah’s OAN).40 These hypotheses of origin provide helpful background for retrieving key messages in the OAN. Although the itemization is by no means exhaustive, we can select the f­ ollowing   Davies, “Destiny”: “In a sense therefore the book of Isaiah is ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ ” (p. 100).  Kim, Reading Isaiah, 165–167. 38   Geyer, “Another Look,” 87. See also Lee, Mapping Judah’s Fate, 9–10. 39   Hayes, “Usage,” 89–90. 40  Christensen, Prophecy and War, 281–283. See also Hagedorn, “Looking at Foreigners,” 432–448. 36 37

The Oracles against the Nations   67 themes from the OAN.41 First, these OAN pronounce divine judgment upon enemy nations, thereby implying the salvation of Israel/Judah. Put simply, the enemy’s (the oppressor’s) misfortune is our (the oppressed) fortune. The overwhelming majority of these texts contain prophetic oracles against the nations, not for them. In a sequential flow, whereas Israel and Judah were under the divine judgment in chapters 1–12, the horizon now expands to include many nations, especially those directly or indirectly involved in the hardships of Israel and Judah. For all their oppression and abuse, those nations are served with their just deserts. The fundamental Torah rule (cf. 1:10; 2:3) applies to all the nations in the world: justice (and consequence) first, and mercy afterward. The ideal of divine presence versus the reality of divine absence brings theodicy to the fore. Israel and Judah hear of the impending downfall of neighboring enemies, one after another. Israel and Judah, too, hear of their own downfall. Although the overall tone of these oracles is offensive to modern readers, we should be mindful that Israel and Judah were frequently the underdogs, bullied by superior neighboring forces. Egypt, Assyria, and Babylon were too dominant for the tiny kingdoms of Levant to take even a jab at them. Thus news that Assyria had been overtaken by Babylon, and then that Babylon had fallen, would have been a source of unflinching hope and meaning-making. Evil, in whatever form, must be conquered, overcome, blocked, denied, or, at least, exposed. As war oracles, the OAN may have inspired courage among a vulnerable, suffocated people. As cultic liturgies, the OAN may have represented the “curses” of the trampled, the resistance outcries of the voiceless.42 Rainer Albertz delineates this dual aspect of the OAN—curse on the enemy and salvation for Israel—as a unique byproduct of the exilic situations, “a radical shift from their preexilic function” to “a medium of retaliation against a superior opponent, invulnerable in the political arena.”43 Second, this criticism in the OAN includes Yhwh’s own people, particularly the privileged, powerful leaders of Israel and Judah, who are warned against joining foreign alliances. As in Amos 1–2, the OAN in Isaiah do include Jerusalem as one of the targets of divine judgment, which is not the case in Jeremiah or Ezekiel. In fact, if we exclude the oracle against Tyre (Isa 23), the oracle against Jerusalem (Isa 22) forms a climactic conclusion, much the same way the oracles against Judah and, ultimately, against northern Israel culminate in Amos 1–2. We should keep in mind that the primary (if not exclusive) audiences of the OAN, and of the entire book of Isaiah, were the Israelites/Judeans, and not the foreign nations. How, then, are we to make sense of this inclusion of Jerusalem in the list of nations under divine judgment? Two interpretive proposals deserve our attention, as both theories congruently condemn Israel’s and Judah’s privileged leaders. The first proposal outlines the implicit message of the OAN against relying on aid from foreign nations. Graham Hamborg even argues that the essential message of the 41   Davies, “Destiny”: “The book is more like a billboard on which different political parties or religious groups daub their slogans one on top of the other than a corpus which has a unified perspective” (p. 106). 42   Tremblay, “Comment comprendre”: “les oracles contre les nations étaient de l’ordre du souhait en contexte de conflit, de la prière à son dieu en contexte polythéiste, donc une arme politique et militaire” (p. 66).    43 Albertz, Israel in Exile, 185, 188.

68   Hyun Chul Paul Kim OAN is judgment on Israel, as opposed to salvation for Israel.44 Alliances with Philistia or Egypt against Assyria indicate that judgment on Philistia or Egypt includes judgment on Israel. This theory has been criticized because this kind of warning against coalition is neither frequent nor explicit in the OAN. Nevertheless, the anti-alliance message remains significant, as a similar message recurs in chapters 28–31.45 The second theory proposes that core nations in the OAN may betray polemics against urban elites. Though limited to the study on Zephaniah, Adele Berlin proposes intertextual correlations between the OAN in Zephaniah and the Table of Nations in Gen 10. Berlin argues that Philistia, Cush, and Assyria represent the descendants of Ham, denoting the Canaanites (Gen 10:6–20), who will become subservient to Israel, the descendant of Shem.46 Thus, Zephaniah contrasts the city-dwelling inhabitants of Assyria and Philistia, soon to become deserted lands and animal dens, with Judah’s rural shepherds, who will possess Moab and Ammon. Interestingly, in Isaiah’s OAN, we also find Babylon, Assyria, Philistia, and Cush. Isaiah, too, denounces these citydwelling nations. Notably, Jerusalem, the religio-political capital of the kingdom of Judah, is also indicted in Isaiah’s OAN (cf. Zeph 3:1–8). Here, too, the accusation of Shebna, the high royal official in Jerusalem, may underscore prophetic criticism against urban elites. Third, the OAN emphasize the underlying concept that Yhwh is the true King of all nations, whose plan controls the course of history.47 Readers learn that Assyria was a mere tool for carrying out God’s intention to punish his own people (10:5–6, 15). The implicit message in the OAN asserts that it is not the formidable empires of Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, or Persia but God who controls the ebb and flow of world affairs as the true sovereign Lord of the world. Therefore, not only Israel or Judah, but all nations are under Yhwh’s reign and held accountable for their wrongdoings. Hence the theme of the “two-sidedness” of Yhwh, in that the God who punishes (or abandons or disengages insolent leaders and abusers of Jerusalem) for justice and righteousness is the very God who restores Jerusalem, taking the side of the poor, needy, and upright.48 We should note that MT Jeremiah’s OAN start with Egypt (Jer 46) and end with Babylon (Jer 50–51). In Isaiah’s OAN, which comprise ten oracles initiated by the 44   Hamborg, “Reasons,” 158. Consider also Marzouk, Egypt as a Monster: “For Ezekiel the political alliance between Egypt and Judah stands for religious apostasy” (p. 42). 45   In a recent study on the OAN of Ezekiel, Lee, Mapping Judah’s Fate, similarly concludes that, instead of the “implicit hope” or “hubris” themes, Ezekiel’s OAN represent the “oblique judgment” theme, criticizing Judah’s alliance with the “indictments directed obliquely at the people in Jerusalem, the capital city of the kingdom of Judah” (p. 18). 46   Berlin, “Zephaniah’s Oracle,” 181–183. 47   Crouch, “Ezekiel’s Oracles,” 479. Note also Amzallag and Avriel, “Cryptic Meaning”: “The Isaian poet approaches the fall of kingship, its divine legacy, and of the cult of dead kings as consequences of the abuse of power. . . . This led both to the deliverance of the nations from tyranny and to the acknowledgment of Yhwh as the God worshiped not only by the Israelites but by all the nations” (pp. 661–662). 48   Beuken, “Obdurate Short-Sightedness,” 57.

The Oracles against the Nations   69 c­ atchword “burden” (massa’; or “pronouncement” or “shout”), scholars identify two parallel columns: ‫( משא‬Named/Concrete Nations) 13:1 = Babylon (+ Assyria) 14:28 = Philistia 15:1 = Moab 17:1 = Syria/Ephraim + Cush 19:1 = Egypt

‫( משא‬Cryptic/Symbolic Nations) 21:1 = “the desert of the sea” (Babylon) 21:11 = Dumah 21:13 = “the desert plain” (Arabia) 22:1 = “the valley of vision” (Jerusalem; cf. 22:25) 23:1 = Tyre49

Both columns start with Babylon (“river”; nahar) and conclude with Egypt (“sea”; yamm) and Tyre (a seaport). Read together, two superpowers—Egypt and Babylon— take up the main stages of both hubris and impending humiliation.50 Steed Vernyl Davidson interprets these two poles—Egypt and Babylon—as “flip sides of a vinyl record” of survival through “escape and withdrawal” (exodus) and “adjustment and adaptation” (exile).51 The fact that Isaiah’s OAN have ten oracles may echo the ten plagues of the old Exodus tradition.52 Isaiah’s OAN, which start with Babylon, function to pick up MT Jeremiah’s OAN in intertextual dialogues, anticipating the new Exodus in Deutero-Isaiah: Yhwh who vanquished Egypt of the old Exodus will quell Babylon of the new Exodus. Furthermore, Csaba Balogh proposes that the structural frame of the “river” and the “sea” constructs Isa 13–23 as the royal “stele of Yhwh” (cf. 19:19). This format resembles the Mesopotamian royal stele, depicting the Assyrian king with his patron deity subjugating the entire range of the Mediterranean Sea (upper sea) and the Persian Gulf (lower sea). Isaiah’s OAN mirror this ideology and enlarge it to incorporate Egypt as well.53 Both structure and ideology thus underscore Yhwh as the true ruler of the world. Moreover, the two-part format of ten “burden” oracles may mirror the twofold format of the six-day creation in Gen 1. In the creation account, the first set of three days recurs in the second set with comparable contents. In Isaiah’s OAN, both columns start with Babylon and end with nations related to the sea. Interestingly, the word “chaos” (tohu) in Gen 1:2, in its anti-Babylon nuance, correlates with the “chaos (tohu) city” in Isa 24:10 (cf. 41:29; 44:9).54 Yhwh the creator (light and order) will contain and control Babylon (darkness and chaos).55 Additionally, according to Sweeney, the foreign nations in the list are those that were under “the hegemony of the Persian empire,” accentuating the 49   Kim, “Isaiah 22,” 14. Ulrich Berges, The Book of Isaiah, 126, 141, takes Isa 20 (narrative) to be the center of these two columns. 50   Likewise, Ezekiel’s OAN devote substantial portions to Tyre (Ezek 26–28) and Egypt (Ezek 29–32), as opposed to other neighboring nations (Ezek 25). The theme of pride accentuates the downfall of Tyre and Egypt in Ezekiel.    51 Davidson, Empire and Exile, 172–176. 52  Kim, Reading Isaiah, 79.   53 Balogh, Stele of Yhwh, 348–349. 54   Ahn, “Story and Memory,” 336–338. 55   See Berges, Book of Isaiah, 137. Geyer, “Mythology,” elucidates this mythological correlation: “(a) in terms of the myth, [Yhwh] subdues the waters of chaos, and (b) in terms of history, [Yhwh] overcomes the nations” (p. 145).

70   Hyun Chul Paul Kim message that it is not Marduk, Ahuramaza, or the Persian king but Yhwh from Zion who controls the world.56 Instead of Pax Persica, Isaiah’s OAN proclaim Pax Yhwh. Fourth, the OAN expound the theme of hubris, especially the vain glory and daunting splendor of the empires.57 This message of pride describes two related rivalries: Yhwh versus Babylon, as well as Zion versus Babylon. On the one hand, the message intensifies the polemical contrast between Yhwh and Babylon.58 Isaiah’s OAN explicitly single out the Babylonian empire, which brackets the core portions of the OAN (Isa 13–14; 21; cf. 23:13). Just as Yhwh accuses Assyria of its arrogance (10:12), now at the outset Babylon hears its own downfall (13:11). The taunt of the king of Assyria rings aloud with his vain insolence (10:8–11, 13-14; cf. 14:24–27; 37:22–29), which now echoes more intensely with the harshest taunt song against the king of Babylon (14:4–21). Comparing Frantz Fanon with this prophet, Christopher Hays avers the rhetorical value of the tyrant’s demise: “The desecration of the king’s corpse is another aspect of the Isaianic song’s curse . . . . The death of the ruler signifies life for others.”59 The prophetic decry against this tyrannical empire anticipates its humiliating collapse, proclaimed in chapters 46–47, while vanquishing Babylon’s pride traces back to the thesis-like introduction in chapter 2, which ascertains that Yhwh alone will be exalted over all that is haughty (2:12–17). On the other hand, the message against the empire’s empty pride sharpens the polemical contrast between Zion and Babylon. Admittedly, in Isaiah’s OAN, neither Samaria (17:3–6) nor Jerusalem (Isa 22) is exempt from the divine judgment. Nonetheless, whereas the OAN include small hints of future restoration for many nations, Babylon’s demise is irreversible. Assyria and Egypt can find hope for a peaceful future (19:20–25; cf. 18:7). Tyre, too, can expect a glimmer of hope (23:17–18). But not Babylon. Unlike other empires, Babylon’s doom is final and complete. The remnants of Israel and Judah will have a restorative future, but Babylon’s future is naught. The OAN present the tale of two cities—Zion versus Babylon. In the fundamental confrontation between daughter Zion and daughter Babylon, the former, with Israel’s remnants, will receive compassion (14:1) but not the latter. Indeed, the prophet likens Babylon’s fate to that of “Sodom and Gomorrah” (13:19), just as daughter Zion, too, is compared to “Sodom and Gomorrah” (1:8–9). However, unlike Babylon, a dramatic rescue remains open to Zion (cf. 14:1–3; 18:7).60 The promise of refuge and restoration is 56  Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 216–217. Steed Davidson, “Violence,” unveils the ideological undercurrents of the OAN: “The oracles conscript support for Persia as the divinely chosen superpower and guarantor of peace from among Yehud’s elite, while at the same time convincing those elites that Persian ruler bodes well both for Yehud’s security and its vested territorial interests” (pp. 24–25). 57   Hamborg, “Reasons,” 158. Conrad, Reading Isaiah: “The Lord’s planned warfare against the nations is against the proud . . . in all the earth” (p. 59). 58   Babylon is not the only nation condemned for its hubris. The prophet’s staunch rebuke includes Moab’s pride (16:6, 14), Jacob’s glory (17:4), and Tyre’s haughtiness (23:9), just like that of Assyria (cf. 10:12; 37:23–29). However, in the present form of Isaiah’s OAN, Babylon stands out as the main target. 59   Hays, “Isaiah as Colonized Poet,” 62. 60   Concerning the thematic contrast between Zion and Damascus/Samaria, see Beuken, “Damascus”: “The composition of chapters 17–18 opens where ‘Damascus is removed from being a city [. . .] the fortress (Samaria) will disappear from Ephraim’ (Isa 17:1–3) and it ends with ‘the place of the name of Yhwh of hosts, Mount Zion’ (18:7)” (p. 77).

The Oracles against the Nations   71 available to the afflicted and needy of Zion (14:32; 16:1), with a righteous judge from the tent of David (16:4–5) and rejuvenated hope in God for the faithful community (17:7). The motif of restoration of remnants distinguishes the fates of the two cities, which will be further developed in chapters 24–27 (between the “strong city” and the “chaos city”). Fifth, the OAN’s prophetic announcement against the nations contains the tendency of abstracting away from concrete historical referents, such as the shifts from Babylon to any dominating empires as well as from the tension of specific nations versus Israel to that of the wicked/powerful versus the righteous/afflicted.61 The resulting message of judgment and hope thus applies to different audiences across generations and geography. Besides the fact that most rulers of the nations are not specified (except 20:1), many clues for chronological events, regimes, or locales are missing. Redactionally, John Barton elucidates that this generalizing tendency moves “to the point where we can no longer at all readily ask whether or not its predictions or warnings were ‘correct.’ ”62 As Beuken elucidates, “The oracle’s lack of sufficient historical references thus facilitated its multiple application. It could be used on any occasion when the question of international policy was urgent, whether the danger came from Assyria, Egypt, or Babylonia.”63 Considering that the final forms of the OAN were most likely addressed to post-exilic Judeans, the fluidity in the message makes it clear that God will deal equally with any arrogant, formidable empire which tries to oppress God’s people. At the same time, the setting of the post-exilic community points to the increasing internal sociopolitical and religious tensions, whether in Yehud or in diasporic communities. In the OAN, most Assyrian, Egyptian, and Babylonian kings are unnamed, and the poor, needy, and remnants remain abstract and universal. In fact, even the exact identities or the historical information on the officials—Shebna and Eliakim—in ­chapter  22 seems dubious.64 Through this universalizing tendency, the message is ­applicable to ongoing post-exilic generations with divine reassurance for the upright amid rampant abuses by the reprobate. Sixth, despite unhindered accusations against the unruly nations, and against Judah’s own capital, the OAN do signify radical, even paradoxical, inclusion of foreigners and outsiders. Here, as elsewhere in Isaiah, we have a fluid conceptual tension between particularism and universalism.65 The hermeneutical premise goes as follows: just as Yhwh punishes the nations, so Yhwh can punish Israel and Judah; conversely, “the nations’ destiny in relation to Yhwh is thus not so different from Israel’s destiny,”66 in that the divine concern and care for Israel/Judah can be extended to the nations (cf. Jonah 4:10–11). Concerning the various passages that denote the message of inclusion, scholars propose at least two interpretive perspectives. On the one hand, those “salvific” (as opposed   Geyer, “Mythology”: “One outstanding fact is that direct historic reference is lacking in the major collections (IJE [= Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel])” (p. 136). 62  Barton, Isaiah 1–39, 89. Note also Beuken, “Must Philistia”: “To a certain extent, therefore, Philistia loses its ethnic identity and becomes a symbol for the adversaries of Zion in general . . . In the fact of every world power, only Jerusalem will hold firm as a place of refuge” (p. 56). 63   Beuken, “Must Philistia,” 59.    64  Na’aman, “Violation,” 464–465. 65   Peels, “You Shall Certainly Drink,” 87–88.    66  Goldingay, “Theology of Isaiah,” 183. 61

72   Hyun Chul Paul Kim to “judgmental”) oracles in Isaiah, including those in the OAN, predominantly (if not exclusively) concern the Judean diasporas exiled or dispersed throughout the world rather than foreigners.67 This perspective may appear to be exclusive, but taken from the context of later Persian and Hellenistic diasporic environs, when the dislocated descendants would have to wrestle with dual or multiple ethnic, linguistic, and cultural identities, the message of their restoration can be an inclusive one. We have numerous contract documents from Elephantine in the upper Nile of Egypt that portray the Jews struggling to preserve their identity with or without the temple, ritual, and Torah. Later Second Temple literature depicts the lifestyles of the Jews in Alexandria, in the lower Nile of Egypt, who had to deal with the complexities of Egyptian, Alexandrian, Persian, Greek, and Hebrew/Jewish cultural, religious, and political identities.68 Accordingly, concerning the texts of radical transformation of Egypt and Assyria (19:18–25), Richard Schultz notes, “What is most striking here is . . . that this occurs far away from Mount Zion and without a mediating role being played by Israel.”69 On the other hand, these gloss-like passages in the present form (especially, “on that day” passages with eschatological notions in both the OAN section and Isa 24–27) signify a universalistic outlook, inclusive of foreigners, outsiders, and, later, even proselytes.70 Whether these texts intended concern for non-Judeans or not, they point to ideals beyond the immediate contexts or audiences. It is as though the prophetic oracles that originally solely addressed the people of Israel/Judah have been expanded to attract larger audiences. These ideals of unity and harmony align with the ideals of the peaceable kingdom (11:1–9). Likewise, alongside the comparable passages in Isa 40–66, inasmuch as the nations are to be subdued and chastised, they are also offered the possibility of inclusion in the divine care and blessing (cf. Gen 12:1–3) going back to the thesis-statement in Isa 2:1–4: “This [19:18–25; cf. 27:12–13] is more than the personal faith in adversity enjoined on Judeans by the prophet in chapters 1–12; it is a stunning picture of the nations coming to worship the God of Israel (cf. 2:3).”71 The OAN do not stop at the resolute curses of enemy oppressors, but also envision the possibility of their shalom. Seventh, the OAN penetrate the message of ecology (earth) and economy (food)— two of the most basic elements of human and animal existence—that are intertwined with human actions (e.g., war, destruction, and usurpation). Ironically, issues around ecology and economy are alarmingly pertinent in today’s industrialized capitalistic world as well. As in other sections, the OAN frequently describe the divine judgment in   Croatto, “Nations,” 145; note also on p. 159: “Nothing here implies the inclusion of a universalistic message of salvation for the nations. On the contrary, such a message is strongly excluded.” Kaiser, Isaiah 13–39, 73, interprets 16:4–5 that “this hope is really of comfort only to the Jews. . . . It is of no benefit to the Moabites.”    68 Cohen, Beginnings of Jewishness, 1–10. 69   Schultz, “Nationalism and Universalism,” 134. Consider also Raabe, “Prophetic Oracles”: “But the OAN can also envisage benefits for the nations themselves” (p. 239). 70  Berges, Book of Isaiah, 142–178. Wildberger, Isaiah 13–27, likewise interprets 16:1–5 against the post-exilic setting that, as opposed to salvation only for Israel, salvation is “for other peoples also” (p. 145). 71   Johnston, “Faith in Isaiah,” 112. 67

The Oracles against the Nations   73 terms of the devastation of natural resources: crops fail; the fertile fields languish because of drought; famine affects animals and humans alike; and the cities lie devastated. One may, then, wonder whether and how these natural disasters, often depicted as having been caused by God, have anything to do with human beings? Admittedly, many of the described calamities seem beyond human control. However, beneath the rhetorical aspects of the poetic expressions, much of the content pertaining to food and loss is intrinsically related to the “ecocide” of ancient Near Eastern warfare, such as blocking water resources, hacking down fruit trees, and stealing massive resources (e.g., Isa 15:5–6).72 In light of the “imperial-retributive” schema of the prophet’s theo-political rhetoric, Andrew Abernethy expounds numerous descriptions of food as both punishment and restoration by Yhwh, through the agents of the empires.73 In the OAN, the sword “devours” the Babylonians (13:15; 14:19). The vines of Sibmah, as famous as “the Napa Valley of Moab,” come to ruin, and their harvests are not pressed into wine, depicting the invading army’s demolition of the vineyards (16:8–10).74 Harvests in Damascus and Samaria are devastated as well (17:5–6). Birds and beasts will consume the fruits and branches of Cush (18:4–6). Frenzied feasting amid siege and starvation hauntingly portrays societies gone awry both in Babylon (21:5) and in Jerusalem (22:11–13), which connotes that “through similarities with Babylon’s inappropriate feasting in 21:5, Isa 22:12 places Jerusalem on par with the Babylonians.”75 Tyre, once equated with the “harvest of the Nile” (23:3), will undergo economic collapse and starvation (23:17–18). These depictions address ecology and economy, as the depletion of agricultural resources accompanies the collapse of sustenance and nourishment, largely due to the empire’s siege attack and destruction. Underneath the prophet’s warnings of impending judgment lie vehement criticism and outrage against destructive human violence. The role of the empires as tools for the divine purpose do not excuse their human decisions to devastate fields in siege warfare, usurp crops from subjugated people, or brutally massacre their fellow human beings.76 Through the principle of tit for tat, lex talionis, history has shown that the misery visited on others by the cruelty of those with immense power and wealth is ultimately also visited on them. The evil of greed, overindulgence, and oppression by the powers that be (e.g., the empires) have caused unimaginable pain to many, as well as the unalterable devastation of the earth. The fundamental remedy, according to the prophet, is to do good in both domestic and international realms (1:16–17). Thus the OAN reiterate the historical events of calamity and restoration by way of the most tangible hardships of agrarian starvation and societal devastation vis-à-vis the theology of food and war: “If you agree and obey, you will eat the good of the earth; but if you refuse and disobey, you will be eaten by the sword” (1:19–20).   Wright, “Warfare,” 423–424, 456–457.    73 Abernethy, Eating in Isaiah, 54–93.  Abernethy, 61.   75  Abernethy, 63. 76   Wazana, “War Crimes,” 500–501, interprets Amos’s OAN as the prophetic criticism against “abuse of power” that “went too far” with “excess cruelty.” 72 74

74   Hyun Chul Paul Kim

3.5. Conclusion The OAN (Isa 13–23) form an essential fulcrum for the whole book of Isaiah, akin to the careful placement of each act in a play or each scene in an opera. As with the crucial compositional and rhetorical place and function of chapters 1–12, the OAN, too, fulfill essential roles in the book of Isaiah as a whole. That is, the OAN cannot be interpreted fully without chapters 1–12, and vice versa, and the OAN connect in linguistic and thematic mutuality to subsequent chapters as well. As the essay has delineated, the OAN present key messages that are as significant as those of other sections of the book. Rooted in the ancient cultic oracle and war oracle traditions, Isaiah’s OAN represent the prophet’s outcry against abusive powers, whether powerful empires (against their oppression and hubris), domestic rulers (against their tendency to rely on foreign alliances at the expense of the poor among their own people), or “busybody” apostates (against the never-ending wicked groups).77 Nevertheless, the OAN do not stop at casting these staunch condemnations against evil; they also envision resolute futures of peace over war, hope over despair, and inclusion over exclusion. This inclusive hope, in the impending kingdom of God, is open to the descendants of Israel/Judah and even to foreign nations, while the reprobate are excluded, whether Jews or non-Jews. What does the study of the OAN offer to biblical scholarship? The OAN present the value of both diachronic and synchronic studies. Instead of chopping away variant segments, the redaction analysis of the distinct strata can inform how each generation struggled to preserve the inherited traditions, adapted to shifting contexts, and reapplied them to new challenges and aspirations.78 Furthermore, the synchronic approach points out the importance of literary and thematic comparisons of Isaiah’s OAN with the OAN of other prophetic books. The intertextual study of the various yet comparable OAN among the prophetic books can yield significant insights. Moreover, the historical, cultural, and political issues inherent in the OAN invite interpreters to read these prophetic texts in dialogue with the pertinent issues of exile, empire, colonialism, war, trauma, theodicy, justice, peace, and so on. The ancient messages of the OAN are startlingly, and inspiringly, relevant to the history, sociology, politics, economy, ecology, theology, and more, of the twenty-first century world.

Bibliography Abernethy, Andrew  T. Eating in Isaiah: Approaching the Role of Food and Drink in Isaiah’s Structure and Message. BIS 131. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Ahn, John. “Story and Memory: Old Testament.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Theology, vol. 2, edited by Samuel  E.  Balentine, 332–343. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015.  Boer, Sacred Economy: “Tyre is a little kingdom that embodies the status of the middleman or busybody” (p. 175).    78  Sanders, “Adaptable to Life,” 551. 77

The Oracles against the Nations   75 Albertz, Rainer. Israel in Exile: The History and Literature of the Sixth Century b.c.e. Translated by David Green. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2003. Amzallag, Nissim, and Mikhal Avriel. “The Cryptic Meaning of the Isaiah 14 Māšāl.” JBL 131 (2012): 643–662. Balogh, Csaba. The Stele of Yhwh in Egypt: The Prophecies of Isaiah 18–20 concerning Egypt and Kush. OtSt 60. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Barton, John. Isaiah 1–39. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Begg, Christopher T. “Babylon in the Book of Isaiah.” In The Book of Isaiah/Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, edited by Jacques Vermeylen, 121–125. BETL 81. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1989. Berges, Ulrich F. The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition and Final Form. Translated by Millard C. Lind. HBM 46. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix, 2012. Berlin, Adele. “Zephaniah’s Oracle against the Nations and an Israelite Cultural Myth.” In Fortunate the Eyes That See: Essays in Honor of David Noel Freedman in Celebration of His Seventieth Birthday, edited by Astrid  B.  Beck, Andrew  A.  Bartelt, Paul  R.  Raabe, and Chris A. Franke, 175–184. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995. Beuken, Willem A. M. “Common and Different Phrases for Babylon’s Fall and Its Aftermath in Isaiah 13–14 and Jeremiah 50–51.” In Concerning the Nations: Essays on the Oracles against the Nations in Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, edited by Andrew Mein, Else Kragelund Holt, and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 53–73. LHBOTS 612. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2014. Beuken, Willem A. M. “From Damascus to Mount Zion: A Journey through the Land of the Harvester (Isaiah 17–18).” In “Enlarge the Site of Your Tent”: The City as Unifying Theme in Isaiah; the Isaiah Workshop—De Jesaja Werkplaats, edited by Archibald  L.  H.  M.  van Wieringen and Annemarieke van der Woude, 63–80. OtSt 58. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Beuken, Willem A. M. “Must Philistia Carry on Wailing? The Enduring Message of a Prophetic Oracles Addressed to a Hostile Nation (Isa. 14.28–32).” In What Is It That the Scripture Says? Essays in Biblical Interpretation, Translation, and Reception in Honour of Henry Wansbrough, edited by Philip McCosker, 50–59. LNTS 316. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Beuken, Willem A. M. “Obdurate Short-Sightedness in the Valley of Vision: How Atonement of Iniquity Is Forfeited (Isa 22:1–14).” In One Text, a Thousand Methods: Studies in Memory of Sjef van Tilborg, edited by Patrick Chatelion Counet and Ulrich Berges, 45–63. BIS 71. Leiden: Brill, 2005. Beuken, Willem  A.  M. “A Song of Gratitude and a Song of Malicious Delight: Is Their Consonance Unseemly? The Coherence of Isaiah Chs. 13–14 with Chs. 11–12 and Chs. 1–2.” In Das Manna fällt auch heute noch: Beiträge zur Geschichte und Theologie des Alten, Ersten Testaments: Festschrift für Erich Zenger, edited by Frank-Lothar Hossfeld and Ludger Schwienhorst-Schönberger, 96–114. HBS 44. Freiburg: Herder, 2004. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 1–39. AB 19. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Boadt, Lawrence. “Re-examining a Preexilic Redaction of Isaiah 1–39.” In Imagery and Imagination in Biblical Literature: Essays in Honor of Aloysius Fitzgerald, F.S.C., edited by Lawrence Boadt and Mark  S.  Smith, 169–190. CBQMS 32. Washington, DC: Catholic Biblical Association of America, 2001. Boer, Roland. The Sacred Economy of Ancient Israel. LAI. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2015. Chae, Moon Kwon. “Redactional Intentions of MT Jeremiah concerning the Oracles against the Nations.” JBL 134, no. 3 (2015): 577–593. Chae, Moon Kwon. “Theological Reflections on the Oracles against the Nations.” HBT 37 (2015): 158–169.

76   Hyun Chul Paul Kim Childs, Brevard S. Isaiah. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Christensen, Duane L. Prophecy and War in Ancient Israel: Studies in the Oracles against the Nations in Old Testament Prophecy. Berkeley, CA: BIBAL Press, 1975. Clements, Ronald E. Isaiah 1–39. NCBC. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1980. Cohen, Shaye J. D. The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. Collins, John J. The Invention of Judaism: Torah and Jewish Identity from Deuteronomy to Paul. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2017. Conrad, Edgar W. Reading Isaiah. OBT. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1991. Cook, Paul M. A Sign and a Wonder: The Redactional Formation of Isaiah 18–20. VTS 147. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Croatto, J. Severino. “The ‘Nations’ in the Salvific Oracles of Isaiah.” VT 55 (2005): 143–161. Crouch, C. L. “Ezekiel’s Oracles against the Nations in Light of a Royal Ideology of Warfare.” JBL 130 (2011): 473–192. Davidson, Steed Vernyl. Empire and Exile: Postcolonial Readings of the Book of Jeremiah. LHBOTS 542. New York: T&T Clark, 2011. Davidson, Steed Vernyl. “Violence in National Security Arrangements: The Case of the United States, the Caribbean, and the Nations in the Oracles against the Nations.” In La Violencia and the Hebrew Bible: The Politics and Histories of Biblical Hermeneutics on the American Continent, edited by Susanne Scholz and Pablo  R.  Andiñach, 13–37. Semeia Studies 82. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2016. Davies, Graham. “The Destiny of the Nations in the Book of Isaiah.” In The Book of Isaiah/Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, edited by Jacques Vermeylen, 93–120. BETL 81. Leuven: Peeters, 1989. Erlandsson, Seth. The Burden of Babylon: A Study of Isaiah 13:2–14:23. Lund, Sweden: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1970. Erlandsson, Seth. “Burden of Babylon: A Study of Isaiah 13:2–14:23.” Springfielder 38 (1974): 1–12. Geyer, John  B. “Another Look at the Oracles about the Nations in the Hebrew Bible: A Response to A. C. Hagedorn.” VT 59 (2009): 80–87. Geyer, John  B. “Mythology and Culture in the Oracles against the Nations.” VT 36 (1986): 129–145. Goldingay, John. “The Theology of Isaiah.” In Interpreting Isaiah: Issues and Approaches, edited by David G. Firth and H. G. M. Williamson, 168–190. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009. Hagedorn, Anselm C. “Looking at Foreigners in Biblical and Greek Prophecy.” VT 57 (2007): 432–148. Hamborg, Graham  R. “Reasons for Judgement in the Oracles against the Nations of the Prophet Isaiah.” VT 31 (1981): 145–159. Hayes, John. “The Usage of Oracles against Foreign Nations in Ancient Israel.” JBL 87 (1968): 81–92. Hays, Christopher B. “Isaiah as Colonized Poet: His Rhetorical of Death in Conversation with African Postcolonial Writers.” In Isaiah and Imperial Context: The Book of Isaiah in the Times of Empire, edited by Andrew  T.  Abernethy, Mark  G.  Brett, Tim Bulkeley, and Tim J. Meadowcroft, 51–70. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2013. Jenkins, Allan K. “The Development of the Isaiah Tradition in Isaiah 13–23.” In The Book of Isaiah/Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, edited by Jacques Vermeylen, 237–251. BETL 81. Leuven: Peeters, 1989.

The Oracles against the Nations   77 Johnston, Philip S. “Faith in Isaiah.” In Interpreting Isaiah: Issues and Approaches, edited by David  G.  Firth and H.  G.  M.  Williamson, 104–121. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009. Kaiser, Otto. Isaiah 13–39. Translated by Richard A. Wilson. OTL. London: SCM Press, 1974. Kim, Hyun Chul Paul. “City, Earth, and Empire in Isaiah 24–27.” In Formation and Intertextuality in Isaiah 24–27, edited by J. Todd Hibbard and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 25–48. SBLAIL 17. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2013. Kim, Hyun Chul Paul. “Isaiah 22: A Crux or a Clue in Isaiah 13–23?” In Concerning the Nations: Essays on the Oracles against the Nations in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, edited by Andrew Mein, Else Kragelund Holt, and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 3–18. LHBOTS 612. London: T&T Clark, 2015. Kim, Hyun Chul Paul. Reading Isaiah: A Literary and Theological Commentary. Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2016. Lee, Jongkyung. A Redactional Study of the Book of Isaiah 13–23. OTRM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Lee, Lydia. Mapping Judah’s Fate in Ezekiel’s Oracles against the Nations. ANEM 15. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2016. Lessing, R. Reed. Interpreting Discontinuity: Isaiah’s Tyre Oracle. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2004. Marzouk, Safwat. Egypt as a Monster in the Book of Ezekiel. FAT II/76. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015. Melugin, Roy F. “Isaiah 40–66 in Recent Research: The ‘Unity’ Movement.” In Recent Research on the Major Prophets, edited by Alan J. Hauser and Schuyler Kaufman, 142–194. RRBS 1. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix, 2008. Na’aman, Nadav. “A Violation of Royal Prerogative: The Shebna Prophecy (Isaiah 22.15–19) in Context.” JSOT 40 (2016): 451–465. Peels, H. G. L. “ ‘You Shall Certainly Drink!’: The Place and Significance of the Oracles against the Nations in the Book of Jeremiah.” EuroJTh 16 (2007): 81–91. Raabe, Paul R. “Why Prophetic Oracles against the Nations?” In Fortunate the Eyes That See: Essays in Honor of David Noel Freedman in Celebration of His Seventieth Birthday, edited by Astrid  B.  Beck, Andrew  A.  Bartelt, Paul  R.  Raabe, and Chris  A.  Franke, 165–183. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995. Sanders, James A. “Adaptable to Life: The Nature and Function of Canon.” In Magnalia Dei: The Mighty Acts of God: Essays on the Bible and Archaeology in Memory of G. Ernest Wright, edited by Frank Moore Cross, Werner E. Lemke, and Patrick D. Miller Jr., 531–560. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1976. Schultz, Richard L. “Nationalism and Universalism in Isaiah.” In Interpreting Isaiah: Issues and Approaches, edited by David G. Firth and H. G. M. Williamson, 122–144. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009. Seitz, Christopher R. Isaiah 1–39. Interpretation. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1993. Stromberg, Jacob. An Introduction to the Study of Isaiah. T & T Clark Approaches to Biblical Studies. London: T&T Clark, 2011. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39. FOTL 16. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Tremblay, Hervé. “Comment comprendre les oracles contre les nations chez les prophètes?” Science et Esprit 67 (2015): 51–68. Tull, Patricia K. Isaiah 1–39. SHBC 14a. Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2010. Wazana, Nili. “ ‘War Crimes’ in Amos’s Oracles against the Nations (Amos 1:3–2:3).” In Literature as Politics, Politics as Literature: Essays on the Ancient Near East in Honor of Peter

78   Hyun Chul Paul Kim Machinist, edited by David S. Vanderhooft and Abraham Winitzer, 479–501. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2013. Wildberger, Hans. Isaiah 13–27. Translated by Thomas  H.  Trapp. CC. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1997. Williamson, H.  G.  M. The Book Called Isaiah: Deutero-Isaiah’s Role in Composition and Redaction. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. Wright, Jacob  L. “Warfare and Wonton Destruction: A Reexamination of Deuteronomy 20:19–20 in Relation to Ancient Siegecraft.” JBL 127 (2008): 423–458.

chapter 4

Isa i a h 2 4–27: Th e So - Ca l l ed Isa i a h A poca ly pse J. TODD Hibbard

4.1. Introduction The book of Isaiah presents critical interpreters with a variety of issues that call for investigation. It is arguably the case that no section within the book encapsulates so many of these issues as chapters 24–27, the so-called Isaiah Apocalypse. These four chapters are nestled between two larger recognized sections in the scroll of Isaiah, the Oracles against the Nations (Isa 13–23) and the Assyrian oracles (Isa 28–32). Though they are generally not thought to come from Isaiah himself, the chapters nevertheless fit nicely in the Isaian theological and literary world. The four-chapter section opens with an ominous warning that Yhwh is about to lay waste and despoil the land/earth,1 an act that will affect all regardless of religious, social, or economic status (24:1–3). The first section continues (24:4–13) by stating that a curse decimates the natural world, especially viticulture, because people have violated a perpetual covenant (‫)ברית עולם‬. Human joy ceases as a result. The unit continues by introducing an unnamed city characterized by desolation and chaos.2 Another brief section commences with an abrupt change of tone and content: an unspecified “they” sing and praise Yhwh throughout the world (24:14–16a). This contrasts with a first-person voice (“I”) lamenting ongoing treachery (24:16b–c).3 Finally, the unit closes on another 1  The term ‫ ארץ‬occurs twenty-three times in these four chapters. Its meaning is not always clear, however. In some cases, it appears to mean “earth”; in others, “land” seems to be the best definition. Additionally, the term ‫תבל‬, “world” occurs four times in these chapters (24:4; 26:9, 18; 27:6); it only occurs twelve times total in the latter prophets (nine of which are in Isaiah). 2  For more on the unnamed, anonymous city, see section 3.1 of this chapter. 3  Isa 24:16b is difficult and unclear. Indeed, the LXX of the text is entirely different, suggesting either a different Vorlage or an intentional change.

80   J. TODD Hibbard f­oreboding note: the earth’s/land’s inhabitants cannot escape. Indeed, the earth/land staggers like a drunkard, soon to fall and never to rise again (24:17–20). A brief second unit begins with an “on that day” (‫ )ביום ההוא‬formula announcing Yhwh’s intention to punish heavenly and earthly rulers by imprisoning them (24:21–23). This marks Yhwh’s royal reign in Jerusalem. The next section, 25:1–5, makes up one of the two songs in these chapters (the other is 26:1–6). This first song celebrates Yhwh’s “wonderful plans” (‫)פלא עצות‬, which in this case apparently refer to the destruction of the unnamed city (25:2). The speaker limns that Yhwh’s actions constituted shelter from the ruthless inhabitants of the foreign city.4 It is followed in 25:6–10a with an announcement that Yhwh has prepared a sumptuous feast for all peoples (likely a continuation of 24:21–23). This accompanies the notice that Yhwh will swallow Death (‫)מות‬, which is probably an allusion to the Canaanite deity Mot,5 and a pronouncement that Yhwh will wipe away all tears. The following statement, 25:9–10a, presents the voice of the community (first-person plural) declaring that they have waited for Yhwh’s salvation, made manifest in his hand which has come to rest “on this mountain”—that is, Zion. Isa 24:21–23 and 25:6–10a make the case for Yhwh’s sovereignty over all other heavenly and cosmic forces while simultaneously expressing his benevolence for humankind. All this activity unsurprisingly occurs on Mount Zion (24:23; 25:10a; cf. 2:3). An expected skewering of Moabites in 25:10b–12 portrays residents of a Moabite city being brought low because of their pride. Whatever its origin and purpose, this text contains one of the few references to a known geopolitical entity in these chapters. Finally, a second song follows in praise of the “strong city” found in Judah (26:1–6). The psalm anticipates its gates opening to welcome the righteous nation (‫)גוי צדיק‬. This city appears to be the counterpart to the former fortified city, now a heap (25:2). Additionally, the poor and needy who were provided refuge in the earlier psalm here trample the city brought low (25:5; cf. 26:6), using language found also in the anti-Moabite passage (‫שחח‬ and ‫)שפל‬. How the origin of these disparate texts relate is unclear, but in the final form of the MT as it now exists they appear connected. In the longest unit in these chapters, 26:7–19, the community pleads with Yhwh to intervene on its behalf against the wicked who appear not to acknowledge Yhwh and, rather, enjoy favor. By contrast, the community confesses that Yhwh has ordained well-being for it even if it is failing to experience it at present. The section contains an interesting claim that has sometimes been read as an early affirmation of resurrection (26:19), but the dead here more likely represent the community or nation (cf. Ezek 37:1–14). The section concludes with a brief two-verse admonition to the community to “take cover” until Yhwh’s wrath against the earth’s/land’s inhabitants because of their violence ceases (26:20–21). The final chapter of our text begins with the first of three “on that day” proclamations in chapter 27, one that again calls to mind earlier Canaanite mythic traditions but 4  The reading ‫ארמון זרים‬, “foreign fortress,” in 25:2 has an alternative in two Hebrew manuscripts and the LXX suggesting ‫זדים‬, “arrogant.” 5  See Cho and Fu, “Death and Feasting.” A slightly different view has recently been put forward by William Barker, who sees the reference to either personified or demythologized “death,” with Mot in the background. See Barker, Isaiah’s Kingship Polemic, 30–68.

Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse   81 refracted through ancient Israel’s religio-mythic traditions. Leviathan of the sea will be punished by Yhwh (27:1; cf. Ps 74:13–14). The second “on that day” passage features Yhwh intoning about his “pleasant vineyard”—that is, Israel (27:2–6; cf. 5:1–7). He acts as its keeper, placing the vineyard under an obligation to produce the proper growth; failure to do so will require the keeper (Yhwh) to destroy it. This gives way to a prophetic rumination about the cause and purpose of divine punishment against Israel (27:7–11). We encounter here reflections on exile, cultic acts, and Israel’s general failure to understand. The chapter is rounded off with a third and final “on that day” pronouncement, this time a declaration of Yhwh’s intention to re-gather exiles from Assyria and Egypt to Jerusalem (27:12­–13). This relatively brief overview of chapters 24–27 reveals how disparate their contents are. They possess first-person singular, first-person plural, and third-person speaking voices, and contain allusions to nonbiblical West Semitic myth and both prophetic and hymnic poetry, just to name a few features of their literary diversity. That said, the chapters are linguistically and thematically congruent with much else that we find in Isaiah (e.g., cf. 11:11–16 and 27:12–13). Before concluding this discussion, something should be said about the placement of these chapters in the larger book. Simply put, why do these chapters appear here in the book? This question is important for two reasons: first, Isaiah displays a complex and intentional literary architecture, which implies that the placement of the chapters must serve some purpose; second, nearly all scholars recognize that these chapters are a later redactional addition to the book. The section follows the Oracles against the Nations, a collection of nine massaot (“oracles”) as well as supplementary material in Isa 13–23 that is primarily about foreign nations. The section precedes a series of Isaianic oracles in chapters 28–32,6 mostly critical of Israel’s and Judah’s political actions and frequently linked to political and military events of the eighth century bce. Chapters 13–23 show evidence of redactional assemblage. Scholars argue that materials in these chapters can be linked with the eighth through the sixth centuries (at least). Chapters 28–32, by contrast, show fewer signs of redaction in a much later period. The five woe sayings (28:1–4; 29:1–4, 15–16; 30:1–5; 31:1–3) constitute the scaffolding upon which the remainder of the section sits. These have been supplemented with other sayings that are reflective of the late eighth-century Assyrian crises, none of which requires us to see them as substantially later. Hence, unless we adopt the view that chapters 24–27 originated in the earliest period of the book’s development, we are left to conclude that this material was added after chapters 13–23* and 28–32. Why was it added at its present location in the book?7 One possibility sees these chapters rounding off the Oracles against the Nations with a universal perspective.8 This view is based, in part, on the absence of specific nations from the chapters (largely), 6  Scholars are divided about how far this unit extends. Minimally, it ends at chapter 31, though some extend the unit to chapter 33 or chapter 35. 7  It should be noted that this question must be addressed even if one sees these chapters as an early submission to the Isaiah scroll. 8 Berges, Jesaja, 139–198; see also Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 346–347.

82   J. TODD Hibbard s­ eemingly replaced by a universal perspective (based on the number of times ‫ ארץ‬and ‫ תבל‬occur). Against this view, we must acknowledge that this explanation accords better with Isa 24–26 than with chapter 27. Collins casts doubt on the idea that these chapters were composed to provide a literary conclusion to the Oracles against the Nations, because the emphasis on the ‫( קרית תהו‬24:10) and the reference to the “disgrace of his people” (25:8) “bespeak an existential situation that gave rise to these oracles.”9 It is not clear, however, that seeing the chapters as having a literary and structural function in the book must be understood in opposition to their having an existential origin. Both can be true. This is the position argued by Willem A. M. Beuken, who sees literary connections with chapters 13–23 and 1–12 but also as originating in the aftermath of the conquest of Jerusalem.10 One consistent theme of chapters 13–23 is Yhwh’s sovereignty over the nations, an idea driven home forcefully in chapter 24. Elsewhere in the remaining chapters one sees literary linkages with chapters 11 and 12. Though there is not space here to work out all of the connections in detail, suffice it to say that literary and theological associations with passages in Isa 1–12 and 13–23 suggest that 24–27 were in some sense positioned here to round off these two larger sections.

4.2.  Dating Isaiah 24–27 Arguably the most unresolved issue in the history of research on these chapters revolves around their date. The question of their date is interesting in its own right, but other issues are affected by this question, including their theological characterization and sociological coordinates. The chapters have attracted suggestions ranging from the eighth to the second centuries bce. What accounts for this broad spectrum of possibilities? First, the text is referentially ambiguous, even for a book like Isaiah that is replete with referentially ambiguous passages. Though historical entities like Moab (25:10), Assyria (27:12–13), and Egypt (27:12–13) appear, they prove largely unhelpful for assigning dates to the text. Second, the numerous references to an anonymous city (24:10, 21; 25:2; 26:1, 5; 27:10) point to the chapters being intentionally vague and ambiguous. A third complication arises from their redaction. While scholars agree that these chapters have been subject to redaction, there is no real consensus about the history or details of that redaction. As such, with some important exceptions, discussions about the date of this text tend to apply to the form of the text as it now stands, a situation dependent more on the historically ambiguous contents of the chapters than on a desire to privilege the text’s final form. Consequently, scholars have situated these chapters into a variety of historical contexts. What emerges as of more interest than the actual date interpreters assign various portions of the text are the criteria used to establish dates. Therefore, instead of simply cataloging the various dates scholars have proposed, a more interesting and instructive approach might be to survey the reasons exegetes have adopted particular dating schemes. 9  Collins, “Beginning,” 142.

10 Beuken, Jesaja 13­–27, 310–312.

Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse   83 Among those who date the text early, one important factor seems to be a desire to connect it in some way to the historical Isaiah of the eighth century bce.11 Some scholars have rejected claims that our chapters display differences in language and style from material that is more securely linked to the eighth-century Isaiah, thereby opening the door to assigning the chapters to Isaiah himself. Others regard the imagery of Isa 24 as reflective of the eighth-century earthquake mentioned in Amos 1:2 and Zech 14:5. Recently, William Barker has argued that the text constitutes a prophetic polemic for Yhwh’s cosmic kingship that takes up and recasts portions of the West Semitic mythic tradition associated with Ba’al.12 In his view, this necessitates an early date. Dates in the seventh century bce have also been proposed. For example, Heinrich Gratz proposed a setting in the seventh century bce based primarily on his view that the references to the city were to Nineveh and Psammeticus’s destruction of its wall.13 J. D. W. Watts argued for a date in the reign of Manasseh based on his interpretation of the history of this period and the language of these chapters.14 A more recent suggestion for a date in the late seventh century and early sixth century has been put forward by J. J. M. Roberts, who thinks the language, “tantalizingly vague” though it is, fits the Josianic era and its immediate aftermath well (but before Jerusalem’s destruction).15 A similar date has been proposed by C. Hays, who, in recent articles and a monograph, argues for the book’s Josianic-period origins based, in part, on his identification of the unnamed city with Ramat Rachel and on issues of Hebrew diachrony.16 The most common criterion used by interpreters to date most of these chapters, however, rests on attempts to determine the identity of the previously mentioned unnamed city. Several scholars read the texts about the destroyed city as reflective of a specific city’s destruction at a given historical moment. They then assign a date to the text corresponding to that identification (see below). The most common candidate mentioned in the commentary tradition is Babylon. However, identifying the city with this ancient Mesopotamian city does not offer a simple solution because Babylon was sacked or conquered on multiple occasions from the seventh through the fourth centuries, all of which have been suggested as possibilities.17 Hence, what we see is that merely identifying the unnamed city with Babylon provides no solid and sure criteria in the dilemma about the text’s date, since the general descriptions provided in the text present the exegete with several historical moments as viable candidates.18 11  Hayes and Irvine, Isaiah, 295–320; Oswalt, Isaiah 1–39, 23–8, 441–3; Beek, “Erdbeben”; van Zyl, “Isaiah 24–27.” 12 Barker, Isaiah’s Kingship Polemic. 13  Gratz, “Auslegung.” 14 Watts, Isaiah 1–33, 298–300, 310­–12. 15 Roberts, First Isaiah, 306. 16  Hays, “Date”; Hays, “Let It Make Peace with Me”. 17  The city was attacked, sacked, or conquered by Sennacherib (689 bce), Cyrus (539 bce), Darius (521 bce), Xerxes (482 bce), and Alexander (331 bce). For Babylon in 539 bce as a possibility, see Henry, Glaubenskrise, 17–34. For 485 bce, see Lindblom, Jesaja-Apokalypse, 110. For 331 bce, see Rudolph, Jesaja 24–27, 62–63. 18  This is true not only when exegetes identify the city with Babylon, but with Jerusalem or even Moabite cities. This period of ancient Near Eastern history is one of almost constant upheaval and conflict, often involving the same antagonists repeatedly.

84   J. TODD Hibbard A slightly different approach was taken by Jacques Vermeylen, who nevertheless appealed to Babylon as the fallen city as a key element in his dating proposal.19 He saw Isa 24–27 as comprising three successive literary strata, the growth of which was achieved through a process of relecture.20 The first stage, 24:1–13, 18b–20, completed by 26:8–9, 11–13, 16–18, 20–21, constituted an allusion to Xerxes’s destruction of Babylon in 485 bce and rounded off the Oracles against the Nations (Isa 13–23). He dated it to the quarter century following that destruction. The second stage (24:14–18a; 25:1–5, 9–12; 26:1–6, 7–18; 27:2–6), originated at the end of the fifth century or the beginning of the fourth and was the result of a re-reading of the earlier chapters based on a distinction between the “just” and the unfaithful Jews. Finally he isolated several later additions from the Greek era dealing with the Samaritan controversy (27:7, 8b, 9–11), eschatological conflict (24:16, 21–23; 27:1), a messianic banquet reflective of Jewish missionary activity (25:6–8), and the return of the exiled diaspora (27:12–13).21 Statements dealing with the death of the impious (26:14) and resurrection (25:8; 26:19) were probably also added at this point. So, while the identity of the anonymous city is the starting point for Vermeylen, he employs literary and theological criteria to understand the latter two stages. Still other criteria have been proposed for dating the text. William Millar championed prosodic analysis as the key to assigning a date and concluded that the text exhibited certain prosodic features that compared favorably with the anonymous author of Deutero-Isaiah (Isa 40–55), which suggested a sixth-century date in his view.22 While not following Millar’s prosodic arrangement, Dan Johnson, too, has argued that the text’s composition should be dated largely to the sixth century. He argues for multiple stages of composition beginning in the aftermath of the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 bce and continuing into the restoration period following Cyrus’s conquest of Babylon in 539 bce.23 Hence, his criteria are largely historical. Beuken and Donald Polaski date the text to the Persian period, though for different reasons. Polaski, following Sweeney, dates the text to the Persian period based on two primary factors.24 First, he reads Isa 27:8 as a reflection on the exile. Second, he adopts Sweeney’s understanding of the final form and purpose of the book. Based on this, he concludes that these chapters fit best sometime between the end of the exile and the time of Ezra’s mission. Beuken, on the other hand, dates the text to the Persian period on the basis of his reconstruction of the book of Isaiah’s textual development and Isa 24–27’s place in that development.25 Others who have dated the text to the era of the Second Temple have tended to do so based on either theological criteria, especially this text’s 19  Vermeylen, “La composition”; Vermeylen, Isaïe, 349–381. 20  Vermeylen’s reading of Isa 24–27 is consistent with his overall interpretation of the book’s development. In his view, the book’s growth occurs through a process of redaction and relecture (rereading) that continued until the third century bce (Isaïe, 2–3). 21  Interestingly, Plöger read the theme of reunification of all Israel and the return of the diaspora as indicative of an earlier period­—that of Ezra and Nehemiah. Once again, we see that this text permits many possible interpretations; see Plöger, Theocracy, 77–78. 22 Millar, Isaiah 24–27, 61, 117. Millar did not suggest common authorship between Isa 24–27 and 40–55. Blenkinsopp suggests that the text’s composition and redaction may have begun contemporaneously with Isa 40–48, though for different reasons. (Isaiah 1–39, 348). 23 Johnson, Chaos, 17. 24 Polaski, Authorizing, 58–59. 25 Beuken, Jesaja 13–27, 310–313.

Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse   85 alleged constellation of late theological ideas such as resurrection from the dead (see 25:8; 26:19; cf. Dan 12:2) and an apocalyptic worldview, or identification of late Second Temple political, social, and historical realia as the textual referents. On the latter, scholars have read the mythological monsters of Isa 27:1 as the Ptolemies and Seleucids26 or the fall of the Macedonian empire and the rise of Rome.27 Others have seen later Second Temple sectarian conflicts as well as the sorts of theological ideas found in Daniel (i.e., resurrection of the dead).28 However, the lower end of the historical continuum was first proposed by Duhm in his seminal commentary, where he argued that the original layer of this text stems from the time of Antiochus Sidetes (ca. 135 bce) and the latest portion, 25:9–11, belongs to the time of Alexander Jannaeus (ca. 103–76 bce), with other layers in between.29 While Duhm’s hypothesis must have seemed plausible at the time, the discovery of the many Isaiah manuscripts among the Dead Sea Scrolls, including the complete 1QIsaa, has rendered his suggestion practically impossible, since the earliest of these manuscripts dates to the second century bce. What I hope to have demonstrated in this selective discussion is the wide variety of proposals for how and when to date this material. Given the diverse approaches noted here, it seems unlikely that any consensus regarding their date is on the scholarly horizon.

4.3.  Literary Issues: Structure, Form, and Redaction Though this section of Isaiah comprises only four chapters, several challenging literary issues confront the interpreter. The chapters exhibit a diversity of literary forms that has prompted much discussion among scholars. Additionally, scholars are divided over the structure and redaction of these chapters. The form-critical, redactional-critical, and structural questions posed by these chapters are some of the most complex in the book.

4.3.1.  Literary Forms Over a century ago, Duhm distinguished between songs (Dichtungen) and apocalyptic oracles in chapters 24–27. While the identification of the oracles with the apocalyptic has essentially been abandoned, scholars have generally continued to see two kinds of literature in these chapters.30 Nearly all exegetes affirm the existence of songs 26 Kaiser, Isaiah 13–39, 178–179. 27 Procksch, Jesaia, 306. 28 Plöger, Theocracy, 53–78, esp. 77–78. It should be remembered that Plöger assigns this text to the same period as Zech 12–14 and Joel, a conclusion certainly not accepted by everyone. 29 Duhm, Jesaia, 172. 30 Duhm, Jesaia, 172. He identified the oracles, the older of the two groups, in 24:1–23; 25:6–8; 26:20–27:1, 12, 13; the songs (also identified as Dichtungen) are found in 25:1–5, 25:9–11; 26:1–19 + 25:12; and 27:2–5.

86   J. TODD Hibbard in 25:1–5; 26:1–6;31 and 27:2–5. The first of these uses language drawn from hymns (25:1: (‫יהוה אלהי אתה ארוממך אודה שמך‬, and the example from Isa 26 is specifically called a song (‫)יושר השיר הזה‬. The argument for identifying a song in 27:2–5 is based largely on its relationship to the earlier “Song of the Vineyard” in Isa 5:1–7, even though formal elements associated with songs are lacking. Other songs have sporadically been identified. The material labeled oracular by Duhm and others is also generally agreed upon, though the precise delimitation of the oracles is also debated. That the opening oracle of Isa 24, whether extending to verse 3 or verse 6,32 is a prophetic oracle appear clear given verse 24:3b: ‫כי יהוה דבר את הדבר הזה‬. One finds prophets pronouncements as well in 24:16b–20; 25:6–8 (which also concludes with ‫)כי יהוה דבר‬, and 25:9–12. Isa 24 concludes with the first of seven ‫“ ביום ההוא‬on that day” addenda (24:20; 25:9; 26:1; 27:1, 2, 12, 13), which introduce oracular material (24:20), hymnic content (26:1), or eschatological additions (27:13). Isa 27:7–11, some of the most difficult content in these chapters, do not, in my opinion, neatly conform to any biblical Gattungen. Isa 26:7–21 is also somewhat enigmatic form-critically. Most scholars are inclined to describe much of it as a lament,33 although they do not all agree on how far it extends. The problematic Isa 26:19 has been described by many as a Heilsorakel that answers the preceding prayer (particularly v. 14).34 The verses that remain have generally eluded form-critical classification.

4.3.2.  Structure and Redaction The diversity of opinion about form-critical matters in these chapters is matched by the general diversity of views on the question of structure. This has been driven largely by an attempt to find some unity in the chapters, a situation based in part on the lack of agreement in form-critical matters. J. Lindblom offered a creative reading of the chapters when he argued that the core composition consisted of a cantata performed at a festival in the Jewish community.35 While others have noticed liturgical elements in Isa 24–27, most scholars have not accepted Lindblom’s argument that these chapters comprise a cantata, given our lack of knowledge about liturgical matters in the Second Temple pe­riod.36 William Millar attempted to describe the overall structure of these chapters somewhat differently. He looked to the Ugaritic Baal Cycle and its thematic pattern of threat, war, victory, and feast and argued that they provided the proper structural and thematic context in which to place Isa 24–27. He divided the four chapters into six units,37 each of which contained at least some portion of the stated 31  Scholars disagree about the delimitation of the song in Isa 26. Proposals include 26:1–6 (the dominant view), 26:4–6 (Henry, Glaubenskrise, 31), 26:1–14 (Lindblom, Jesaja-Apocalypse, 40–52), and 26:1–19 (Duhm, Jesaia, 40–46). 32 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 350; Clements, Isaiah 1–39, 200. 33 Plöger, Theocracy, 64–68; Lindblom, Jesaja-Apokalypse, 40–46. 34 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 368; Lindblom, Jesaja-Apocalypse, 63. 35 Lindblom, Jesaja-Apocalypse, 69. 36 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 346. 37  Isa 24:1–16a; 24:16b–25:9; 25:10–26:8; 26:13–15; 26:16–27:6; 27:12–13.

Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse   87 pattern. In fact, he identified the two middle sections of the pattern, war and victory, in every section, but only 24:16b–25:9 and 26:16–27:6 contained every element within the ­pattern.38 In my view and in the view of many others, the fact that Millar is able to uncover the complete pattern only twice out of six textual units diminishes the strength of his proposal and, consequently, calls into question the structural divisions he makes in the text. Moreover, the thematic structure he outlines depends on several textual emendations to Isa 24–27 that he proposes, many of which are presented to justify his accompanying prosodic analysis.39 This tends to undermine the value of his prosodic, structural, and thematic analyses. In an attempt to retain some sense of the text’s unity, Johnson suggests a tripartite division of the text, each part of which is related to the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 bce.40 According to Johnson, the first section corresponds to 24:1–20 and originated on the eve of Jerusalem’s final devastation. The second section, by far the longest, comprises 24:21–27:1 and was composed during the exile. The final section, 27:2–13, was also composed in the exilic period, but after the ascent of Cyrus. The key elements in the three sections respectively are lament and return to chaos, Yhwh’s imminent victory, and the reunification of Israel. Another method for assessing the text’s structure was proposed by a group of Dutch scholars, who devoted considerable attention to the delimitation of textual units within Isa 24–27 as a key to its structure. H. J. Bosman uses a method that pays special attention to the “syntactic and text-syntactic phenomena that bring cohesion to the text.”41 It results in a text whose structure is divided along syntactic lines—that is, into clauses, sentences, and paragraphs. Harm W. M. van Grol, however, employs a more conventional method, analyzing the verse by means of meter and rhythm.42 His prosodic analysis is based on divisions into cola, verse lines, strophes, and stanzas, and pays special attention to stress and accent within each line. Neither scholar’s analysis appeals to the more traditionally defined form-critical categories. These two studies make the point that no “assured results” exist when it comes to the consideration of this text’s individual units. What this brief, and by no means exhaustive, survey of discussions about the structure of Isa 24–27 has demonstrated is the lack of agreement that exists in this area. The similarity in each of these discussions is the belief that the text is a unified composition in some sense, whether that unity is liturgical (Lindblom),43 thematic (Millar), syntactic (Bosman), or related to the same historical experience (Johnson). Whether this is true, 38  See his summary chart, Millar, Isaiah 24–27, 70–71. 39  For instance, Isa 27:7–11 does not fit with the kind of prosody that he attempts to uncover, so it is conveniently expunged from his textual analysis. This kind of hypothetical and arbitrary treatment of the text offers no real solution. 40 Johnson, Chaos, 16–17. 41  Bosman, “Syntactic Cohesion.” 42  Grol, “Analysis.” In many ways, his methodology mirrors Millar’s prosodic analysis but not his discussion of structure (Isaiah 24–27, 23–64), the primary difference being Grol’s reticence to produce an emended text. Millar, on the other hand, emends the text often in order to match his scansion, and this diminishes the value of his study in my opinion. More will be said about Millar’s analysis later. 43  Although recall that in Lindblom’s argument he eliminated several texts as Zusätze, most notably 26:15–19.

88   J. TODD Hibbard however, turns out to be an open question. The idea that the four chapters represent a tight literary or conceptual unity has been challenged altogether by Blenkinsopp.44 Even those who find some level of literary unity in the text do not insist that the entire text was composed by the same author. Rather, nearly all exegetes maintain that the text bears signs of a redactional history. This redaction has been described in several ways, many of which have been noted above in the section 1 above, on the text’s date. Other suggestions include the Wachstumhypothese presented by, among others, Wildberger45 or through a process of relecture as described by J. Vermeylen. Both of these suggestions find the growth of the text to be an exegetical undertaking that reads existing layers of the text in new contexts and giving rise to new textual creations. While these and others mentioned earlier constitute interesting suggestions, it appears that the precise details of the redaction of this text will continue to evade us.

4.4.  Critical Interpretive Issues Several important interpretive issues confront the reader of these four chapters as well. While exegetical difficulties abound in Isaiah, this section of the book presents interpreters with several questions unique to this material. Space permits only a limited discussion of the most important of these in the history of interpretation of Isaiah 24–27.

4.4.1.  Identity of the Anonymous City Of all the issues that have vexed interpreters throughout the history of interpretation of Isa 24–27, nothing seems to have elicited as much comment as the identity of the unnamed city. References to it occur in each of the four chapters, demonstrating its interest for the author(s) and prompting several questions (24:10, 12; 25:2; 26:1, 5; 27:10).46 Does each mention have the same city in view? Do the two different terms used for “city” (‫עיר‬, ‫ )קריה‬signify any difference in meaning? Does any real historical city stand behind any of the references, or should “the city” be interpreted symbolically? Answers to these and related questions vary. As I mentioned earlier, the most often mentioned candidate for the unnamed city is Babylon.47 Scholars adopting this view have not all argued for the same historical moment, however; some argue for Babylon circa 539 bce, some for 485 bce, and 44 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39. He writes: “The four chapters comprise a number of loosely connected passages of uneven length, the sequence of which manifests no immediately obvious logical order” (p. 346). 45 Wildberger, Isaiah 13–27, 450–451. 46  The identity of these cities apparently confounded early translators of Isaiah. See van der Kooij, “Cities of Isaiah 24–27.” 47 Henry, Glaubenskise, 17–34; Rudolph, Jesaja 24–27, 61–64; Lindblom, Jesaja-Apokalypse, 72–84; Otzen, “Traditions.”

Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse   89 still others for 331 bce. Others have argued the case on literary rather than historical grounds, noting connections with the specific references to Babylon in Isa 13 and 14.48 A second candidate is Jerusalem, though arguments in its favor prove quite diverse.49 Some see the text’s touchstone as the destruction in 586 bce; others argue for Jerusalem on more symbolic or literary grounds.50 A third group of scholars argues that the references to the unnamed city apply to several different cities; that is, they do not all have the same city in view. Suggestions include Babylon, Samaria, Jerusalem, or a Moabite city.51 Finally, other scholars have eschewed historical interpretations altogether, opting instead to interpret the references symbolically or literarily.52 As one can see, the unnamed city is sufficiently vague to permit any number of interpretive methods and conclusions. Because of this, certainty is elusive. Nevertheless, it seems unnecessary to conclude that all mentions refer to the same city, given that most of the portrayals are quite negative but at least one is quite hopeful (26:1).

4.4.2. Covenant Isa 24:5 makes reference to a ‫ברית עולם‬, an “eternal covenant” in a passage documenting how the inhabitants of the earth (or land) have transgressed. In addition to the covenant, one reads of violations involving ‫ תורות‬and ‫חק‬. Given that this text claims that this covenant has been broken (‫)הפרו‬,53 exegetes have wondered if the phrase has any covenant in so referenced in the Hebrew Bible in view. Elsewhere, ‫ ברית עולם‬is identified with Yhwh’s promise not to destroy the earth by inundation (Gen 9:16 [P]); Yhwh’s covenant with Abraham (Gen 17:7, 13, 19 [P]; Ps 105:10//1 Chron 16:17); the covenant of Sabbath (Exod 31:16 [P]; Lev 24:8); and the covenant with David (2 Sam 23:5). Additionally, the phrase is used several times in the prophetic literature to imagine a future covenant that Yhwh will make with his people as part of the expectation of restoration (Isa 55:3; 61:8; Jer 32:40; 50:5; Ezek 16:60; 37:26). Is Isa 24:5 an echo of any of these texts or traditions? Blenkinsopp thinks that the passage is drawing on this and other traditions from Gen 1–9 in whatever form it then existed to imagine a reversal of creation via the abrogation filtered through Noahic/flood texts.54 Johnson draws attention not only to the covenantal texts (primarily P) noted here, but also to ways in which Isa 24 might also allude to the Mosaic covenant, specifically as noted in Deuteronomy.55 Polaski goes further and 48  Vermeylen, “La composition,” 5–38, esp. 6–8. 49 Hanson, Dawn 314; and Millar, Isaiah 24–27, 15–21. 50 Scholl, Elenden, 173; Doyle, Apocalypse, 44–45; and Redditt, “Once Again.” 51 Kessler, Gott, 173; Johnson, Chaos, 17, 29–35 (he never explicitly deals with the city in 27:10); and Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 312, 317. 52 Wildberger, Isaiah 13–27, 50; Clements, Isaiah 1–39, 198–199; Plöger, Theocracy, 56; Kaiser, Isaiah 13–39, 185; Biddle, “City of Chaos.” 53  The oddity of claim that an “eternal covenant” has been broken has not gone unnoticed by commentators, some of who think the claim is nonsensical. Because of this, some exegetes have attempted to understand ‫ עולם‬differently here (e.g., as “ancient,” or “covenant in perpetuity”). 54 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 351–352. 55 Johnson, Chaos, 27–29.

90   J. TODD Hibbard finds in the reference an “active negotiation” with several other covenantal traditions, including P, Deuteronomy, and the Davidic covenant.56 Elsewhere, I have attempted to chart an inner-Isaianic discourse about covenant that takes account of the other texts in Isaiah that mention the ‫ברית עוֹלם‬.57 What is clear from these attempts to understand the reference to covenant here is that the author is likely using the phrase to capture several different ideas about covenant in describing the cause of divine judgment being depicted. In other words, several covenantal ideas are bound up in the text’s use of ‫ברית‬ ‫עולם‬, and it brings together multiple notions of covenant that are useful for imagining the people’s transgressions.

4.4.3. Apocalyptic Since the time of Smend and Duhm, scholars have referred to Isa 24–27 as the “Isaiah Apocalypse.” This designation has been based largely on a denoting of the characteristics of apocalypses and then finding them in the chapters, most notably, an eschatological orientation. However, this labeling turns out to be problematic on several counts, at least. First, scholars do not agree about what constitutes the characteristics of an apocalypse or apocalyptic writing. Second, even when scholars agree about such characteristics, they do not always agree about their presence in Isa 24–27. Finally, there is the need to distinguish more clearly between apocalypse as a literary genre, apocalyptic eschatology as an idea, and apocalypticism as a feature of sociologically defined groups.58 In more recent years, many scholars, myself included, find themselves in agreement with the description put forward by Collins and others that sees an apocalypse as a genre of revelatory literature with a narrative framework, in which a revelation is mediated by an otherworldly being to a human recipient, disclosing a transcendent reality which is both temporal, insofar as it envisages eschatological salvation, and spatial insofar as it involves another, supernatural world.59

It is clear based on this definition that Isa 24–27 is not an apocalypse. Hence, in my view, the “Isaiah Apocalypse” designation for these chapters should be dropped once and for all. Rejecting the genre designation of apocalypse for these chapters still leaves open the question of whether they display apocalyptic elements. Hendel, among others, has cautioned against drawing a sharp distinction between the prophetic and the apocalyptic because the seeds of the latter are found in the former in a variety of ways.60 Indeed, since apocalyptic texts (e.g., Daniel) construct their literary worlds from preexisting prophetic texts we should expect to find resonance between the two. Put differently, prophecy is one textual fund from which apocalyptic writers draw to build their own textual and intellectual worlds. It is not incorrect, then, to think of a continuum between 56 Polaski, Authorizing, 94–145. 57  Hibbard, “Breaking.” 58 Collins, Apocalyptic Imagination, 2. 59 Collins, Apocalyptic Imagination, 5. 60  Hendel, “Isaiah”; see also Barton, Oracles of God, 200; and Clements, “Interpretation.”

Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse   91 the two. Are there aspects of Isa 24–27 that point toward the apocalyptic end of the continuum? I would suggest three elements in particular: the cosmic tapestry of divine action (e.g., 24:21–23), use of mythic tropes or images (e.g., 25:6–8; 27:1), and language about resurrection (26:19).61 None of these on its own would be sufficient to label our text as apocalyptic. The appearance of all three in such a small textual world, however, pushes the reader in that direction of what will, eventually, come to be called apocalyptic. So while it would be anachronistic to label our text apocalyptic in its origin, it is suggestive of the literary and intellectual trajectory that will eventuate in inter alia, Daniel and 1 Enoch. In that sense, the label is fitting.

4.4.4. Resurrection Isa 26:19 has been put forward as a text stating perhaps the earliest expression of resurrection in the Hebrew Bible. This text is sometimes also read in association with 25:7 which depicts Yhwh swallowing Death. The text of Isa 26:19 reads: Your dead (‫ )מתיך‬shall live, Their corpses (rd: ‫)נבלתם‬62 shall rise Those who dwell in the dust Awake and sing! For your dew is radiant dew And the earth will give birth to the dead (‫)רפאים‬

Does this text present a clear notion of individual resurrection? Earlier generation of scholars were inclined to answer in the affirmative, in part because they linked the text with apocalyptic thought.63 If so, this would constitute the earliest notion of resurrection in the Hebrew Bible and serve as an important antecedent to Dan 12:2 (usually adduced as another early such reference). However, the text must be read as part of the lament preceding it, in which 26:14 helps to elucidate the meaning here. In verse 14, the author notes that the dead shades of the enemy will not live, because Yhwh has punished them. Additionally, verses 16–18 speak to the expected revival of the community, an expectation that has apparently failed to materialize (note the imagery of failed birth). By contrast, in verse 19, the author affirms that all appearances to the contrary, the community, metaphorically the “dead,” will, in fact, become alive once again (see Ezek 37:1–14).64 If this reading is correct, it seems to suggest that the author is unconcerned with individual ­resurrection; 61  The reader will note that I have not included an eschatological orientation among the items in Isa 24–27. Though it is sometimes said that these chapters possess this characteristic, it is unclear to me what that means. I imagine that those taking this view have in mind something like the “on that day” texts in these chapters, but I am unconvinced these are truly eschatological. At any rate, given the ubiquity of these statements in Isa 1–39 generally, I hesitate to list this as a quality unique to Isa 24–27. 62 MT: ‫ ;נבלתי‬suggested emendation ‫ ;נבלתם‬LXX reading for this verse is an interpretive recasting. 63  E.g., Puech, La croyance, 66–73; Nickelsburg, Resurrection, 30–31. 64  Beuken, “Toten.” A communal interpretation has recently been put forward by Kleger, who bases his argument on his understanding of the literary unity and structure of Isa 24–27. See Kleger, “Struktur.”

92   J. TODD Hibbard rather, the imagery and language offer hope to the community about its future. This is not to say the text is eschatological; on the contrary, the reconstituted community appears to be anticipated rather soon. Whether the author would have affirmed individual resurrection or not is impossible to know because that is not the issue to which he speaks.

4.4.5. Intertextuality Finally, scholars have drawn attention to Isa 24–27 for their intertextual character. Intertextuality as a mode of analysis has been ascendant since the turn of the millennium, and these chapters have not escaped notice for their purported quotations, allusions, and echoes of other texts in the Hebrew Bible.65 Important connections have been made with other texts in the Isaiah corpus as well as to other texts across the contents of the Hebrew Bible. Analyses that attend to this quality of the text have had to contend with methodological questions about how best to make persuasive cases for such connections, particularly given the difficulties in dating these chapters. Indeed, this way of reading the text is not without its critics, who argue that the project is in many respects too subjective and based on a tenuous stratification of texts in many instances. Nevertheless, according to those who see intertextual connections, the purpose of drawing on earlier textual traditions was to situate these chapters within an emerging body of authoritative literature and to reinterpret or extend those textual traditions into later contexts (historical, social, hermeneutical).66 Elsewhere, I have categorized these intertextual connections along four lines: universalization of judgment, universalization of salvation, responses to perceived unfulfilled prophecies, and offering contributions to inner-Isaianic thematic discussions.67 This conclusion rests, in part, on taking stock of the cosmic and universal canvas that several examples of intertextuality paint on, as well as the Isaian tradition that the author(s) of the chapters inherit. The recognition of the intertextual character of the chapters also points to their essential scribal nature (though in a way that differs from Isa 56–66). To the degree that this conclusion has merit, it suggests this approach to understanding these chapters might offer essential clues to the later stages of the Isaiah scroll’s development.

Bibliography Barker, William D. Isaiah’s Kingship Polemic: An Exegetical Study of Isaiah 24–27. FAT II/70. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014. Barton, John. Oracles of God: Perception of Ancient Prophecy in Israel after the Exile. London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1986. Beek, Martinus A. “Ein Erdbeben wird zum prophetischen Erleben.” ArOr 17 (1949): 31–40. Berges, Ulrich. Das Buch Jesaja: Komposition und Endgestalt. HBS 16. Freiburg: Herder, 1998. 65  See, e.g., Wildberger, Isaiah 13–27, 465–466; Day, “Case”; Sweeney, “Textual Citations”; Polaski, Authorizing; and Hibbard, Intertextuality in Isaiah 24–27. 66 Polaski, Authorizing, 49–70. 67 Hibbard, Intertextuality 24–27, 216.

Isaiah 24–27: The So-Called Isaiah Apocalypse   93 Beuken, Willem A. M. “ ‘Deine Toten werden leben’ (Jes 26,19): ‘Kindliche Vernunft’ oder reifer Glaube?” In Schriftauslegung in der Schrift: Festschrift für Odil Hannes Steck zu seinem 65. Geburtstag, edited by Reinhard Kratz, Thomas Krüger, and Konrad Schmid, 139–152. BZAW 300. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000. Beuken, Willem A. M. Jesaja 13–27. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herders, 2007. Biddle, Mark E. “The City of Chaos and the New Jerusalem: Isaiah 24–27 in Context.” PRSt 22 (1995): 5–12. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 1–39. AB 19. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000. Bosman, Hendrik Jan. “Syntactic Cohesion in Isaiah 24–27.” In Studies in Isaiah 24–27: The Isaiah Workshop, edited by Hendrik Jan Bosman and Harm W. M. van Grol, 19–50. OtSt 43. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Cho Kang-Kul, Paul, and Janling Fu. “Death and Feasting in the Isaiah Apocalypse (Isaiah 25:6–8).” In Formation and Intertextuality in Isaiah 24–27, edited by J. Todd Hibbard and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 117–142. SBLAIL 17. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2013. Clements, Ronald E. “The Interpretation of Prophecy and the Origin of Apocalyptic.” In Old Testament Prophecy: From Oracles to Canon, 182–188. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1996. Clements, Ronald E. Isaiah 1–39. NCBC. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1980. Collins, John J. The Apocalyptic Imagination. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 20163. Collins, John J. “The Beginning of the End of the World in the Hebrew Bible.” In Apocalypse, Prophecy, and Pseudepigraphy: On Jewish Apocalyptic Literature, 137–155. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2015. Day, John. “A Case of Inner-Scripture Interpretation: The Dependence of Isaiah xxvi.13–xxvii.11 on Hosea xiii.4–xiv.10 (Eng. 9) and its Relevance to Some Theories of the Redaction of the ‘Isaiah Apocalypse.’ ” JTS 31 (1980): 301–319. Doyle, Brian. The Apocalypse of Isaiah Metaphorically Speaking. Leuven: Peeters, 2001. Duhm, Bernhard. Das Buch Jesaia. HAT 3. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1892. Gratz, Heinrich. “Die Auslegung und der historische Hintergrund der Weissagung in Jesaia Kap. 24–27.” MGWJ 25 (1886): 1–23. Grol, Harm W. M. van. “An Analysis of the Verse Structure of Isaiah 24–27.” In Studies in Isaiah 24–27: The Isaiah Workshop, edited by Hendrik Jan Bosman and Harm W. M. van Grol, 51–80. OtSt 43. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Hanson, Paul. The Dawn of Apocalyptic: The Historical and Sociological Roots of Jewish Apocalyptic Eschatology. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1979. Hayes, John  H., and Stuart  A.  Irvine. Isaiah: The Eight Century Prophet. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1987. Hays, Christopher B. “The Date and Message of Isaiah 24–27 in Light of Hebrew Diachrony.” In Formation and Intertextuality in Isaiah 24–27, edited by J. Todd Hibbard and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 7–24. SBLAIL 17. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2013. Hays, Christopher  B. “Let It Make Peace with Me”: Isaiah 24­–27 as Josiah’s Overture to the North. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019. Hendel, Ronald S. “Isaiah and the Transition from Prophecy to Apocalyptic.” In Birkat Shalom: Studies in the Bible, Ancient Near Eastern Literature, and Postbiblical Judaism Presented to Shalom  M.  Paul on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday, vol. 1, edited by Chaim  H.  R.  Cohen, Victor Avigdor Hurowitz, Avi  M.  Hurvitz, Yochanan Muffs, Baruch J. Schwartz, and Jeffrey H. Tigay, 261–279. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2008. Henry, M.-L. Glaubenskrise und Glaubensbewahrung in den Dichtungen der Jesaja-apocalypse. BWANT 86. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1967.

94   J. TODD Hibbard Hibbard, J. Todd. “Breaking an Eternal Covenant: Isaiah 24:5 and Inner-Isaianic Discourse about Covenant.” In Covenant in the Persian Period, edited by Richard Bautch and Gary Knoppers, 195–209. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2015. Hibbard, J. Todd. Intertextuality in Isaiah 24­–27. FAT II/16. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. Hibbard, J. Todd, and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, eds. Formation and Intertextuality in Isaiah 24–27. SBLAIL 17. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2013. Johnson, Dan G. From Chaos to Restoration: An Integrative Reading of Isaiah 24–27. JSOTS 61. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1988. Kaiser, Otto. Isaiah 13–39. Translated by Richard  A.  Wilson. OTL. Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1974. Kessler, Werner. Gott geht es um das Ganze: Jesaja 56-66 und Jesaja 24-27. BAT 19. Stuttgart: Calwer, 1960. Kleger, Roland. “Die Struktur der Jesaja-Apocalypse und die Deutung von Jes 26,19.” ZAW 120 (2008): 526–546. Kooij, Arie van der. “The Cities of Isaiah 24–27 According to the Vulgate, Targum, and Septuagint.” In Studies in Isaiah 24–27: The Isaiah Workshop, edited by Hendrik Jan Bosman and Harm W. M. van Grol, 183–198. OtSt 43. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Lindblom, Johannes. Die Jesaja-Apokalypse. Lund, Sweden: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1938. Millar, William R. Isaiah 24–27 and the Origin of Apocalyptic. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1976. Nickelsburg, George  W.  E. Resurrection, Immortality, and Eternal Life in Intertestamental Judaism and Early Christianity. HTS 56. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006. Oswalt, John N. The Book of Isaiah 1–39. NICOT. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1986. Otzen, Benedict. “Traditions and Structures of Isaiah XXVI–XXVII.” VT 24 (1974): 196–206. Plöger, Otto. Theocracy and Eschatology. Translated by Sean Rudman. Richmond, VA: John Knox Press, 1968. Polaski, Donald. Authorizing an End: The Isaiah Apocalypse and Intertextuality. BIS 50. Leiden: Brill, 2001. Procksch, Otto. Jesaia. Vol. 1. KAT 9. Leipzig: Scholl, 1930. Puech, Émile. La croyance des Esséniens en la vie future: Immortalité, résurrection, vie éternelle? Histoire d’une croyance dans le judaïsme ancien? EBib 21. Paris: Gabalda, 1993. Redditt, Paul L. “Once Again, the City in Isaiah 24–27.” HAR 10 (1986): 317–335. Roberts, J. J. M. First Isaiah. Hermeneia. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2015. Rudolph, Wilhelm. Jesaja 24–27. BWANT 9. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1933. Scholl, Reinhard. Die Elenden in Gottes Thronrat. BZAW 274. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39: With an Introduction to the Prophetic Literature. FOTL 16. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Sweeney, Marvin  A. “Textual Citations in Isaiah 24–27: Towards an Understanding of the Redactional Function of Chapters 24–27 in the Book Isaiah.” JBL 107 (1988): 39–52. Vermeylen, Jacques. Du prophète Isaïe à l’apocalyptique. Vol. 1. Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1977. Vermeylen, Jacques. “La composition littéraire de l’apocalypse d’Isaïe (Is., XXIV–XXVII).” EThL 50 (1974): 5–38. Watts, John D. W. Isaiah 1–33. Vol. 1. WBC 24. Waco, TX: Word, 1985. Wildberger, Hans. Isaiah 13–27. Translated by Thomas  T.  Trapp. CC. Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Fortress, 1997. Zyl, A.  H.  van. “Isaiah 24–27: Their Date of Origin.” In New Light on Some Old Problems: Papers Read at the 5th Meeting Held at the University of South Africa, Pretoria 30 January–2 February 1962, edited by A. H. van Zyl, 44–57. Potchefstroom: Pro Rege, 1962.

chapter 5

The Na r r ati v e s a bou t Isa i a h a n d Their R el ationship w ith 2 K i ngs a n d 2 Chron icl e s Shelley L. Birdsong

5.1. Introduction The thrice-told story of Hezekiah and Isaiah in 2 Kgs 18–20, Isa 36–39, and 2 Chron 32 is a treasure trove for literary and historical-critical investigation. In recent decades, experts have agreed that the most innovative interpretations must utilize both approaches.1 Therefore, my aim is to explore these three stories as distinct literary and theological creations while simultaneously discussing their developmental interrelationship.2 The discussion will move forward chronologically from the historical events mentioned in these texts to their creation, development, and final canonical placement. Throughout, I will demonstrate that the writers/redactors of Kings, Isaiah, and Chronicles all used and refashioned multiple sources in order to fit them into unique contexts, which resulted in distinct portrayals of king and prophet. Together, they create a multivocal and dialogic Bible, which invites readers to continue re-imaging its characters in new spaces and time.

1  Joel Anderson, “Rise.” 2  Following Ackroyd, “Historians and Prophets.”

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5.2.  What Happened? Little consensus has materialized regarding the events during the reign of King Hezekiah of Judah (ca. 727–687 bce),3 despite the fact that scholars have unearthed a substantial amount of literary and archaeological evidence from Judah, Babylon, and Assyria. The invasion of Judah by Sennacherib in 701 bce causes the most debate. Consequently, only details corroborated by both biblical and nonbiblical sources have earned unanimity. These include the following: (a) King Sennacherib of Assyria invaded Judah advancing toward Jerusalem; (b) he destroyed multiple cities along the way; (c) he returned home and was killed; and (d) at some point, Hezekiah paid Sennacherib tribute. All other details are given disparate weight, which has led to wildly dissimilar conclusions. But the questions remain: Did Sennacherib ever go to Jerusalem? Were troops deployed? Was the city blockaded or besieged? Did the kings dialogue via messenger, changing the course of events? Why did Sennacherib go home? Did Hezekiah pay Sennacherib one tribute, or did he pay him multiple tributes, and if so, when and how? Such mysteries will continue to captivate historians for the foreseeable future.4

5.3.  Sources as Reflections on “What Happened” Although we are not completely certain about every detail concerning the Assyrian invasion of Judah in 701 bce, we can be sure that the biblical authors had their own versions to tell. To do so, they consulted an array of sources, borrowing and refashioning them at their own discretion.5 Questions about when, how, and why redactors reformulated their sources stimulate another scholarly debate.

5.3.1.  The Source Debate Critics have been trying to carve out the original sources used to create Isa 36–39 and 2 Kgs 18–20 since the late nineteenth century.6 The traditional breakdown is into two major parts and two-subparts: A = 2 Kgs 18:(13)14–16 [14–16 not present in Isa 36–39] B = 2 Kgs 18:17–19:37//Isa 36–37 3  We are not even certain about his dates. 4  For the most recent investigation, including the history of scholarship, see Matty, Sennacherib’s Campaign. 5  2 Kgs 20:20 and 2 Chron 32:32 mention other sources. 6  Chronicles is generally left out of the source debate because it is a decidedly different retelling of events. It will be taken up separately.

Narratives about Isaiah   97 B1 = 2 Kgs 18:17–19:9a, 36–37//Isa 36:1–37:9, 37–38 B2 = 2 Kgs 19:9b–35//Isa 37:10–367

Opinions on where these sources precisely begin, end, and reconnect has kept the discussion alive since Bernhard Stade first laid out the subdivision of B in 1886.8 Critical issues include where to put 2 Kgs 18:13, which source is most historically reliable, why B1 lacks an ending, and how many smaller insertions are included within. The main proponents of and interlocutors with this traditional theory include Brevard Childs,9 Ronald Clements,10 Paul Dion,11 Christof Hardmeier,12 and Francolino Gonçalves.13 Klaas Smelik14 and Christopher Seitz15 have provided the most well-known critiques. Although the discussion surrounding these sources remains active, the central assumptions have arguably grown stagnant.

5.3.2. A  New Source and Redaction Proposal Sometimes, when the discussion appears stuck in a theoretical eddy, it is useful to offer a novel alternative to prompt reconsideration of the reigning assumptions. In this spirit, I would like to propose a new set of sources and their redactional development (including 2 Kgs 20//Isa 38–39) with an eye toward characters, terminology/language, and narratological coherence.16 I also have a second, and perhaps more practical, purpose. I want to suggest to contemporary Bible readers that we should see ourselves as part of a longer history of interpretation, in which readers, like redactors, have the power to reform characters and their meaning by placing them in new contexts. With these aims in mind, I will lay out a brief sketch of my alternative sources and their redactional development. Although much more could be said about each source/redaction and its dating, for the sake of space, I will limit my discussion to their literary features and address each development in the order I believe it occurred.

5.3.2.1.  Source S (Sennacherib Source): 2 Kings 18:13; 19:9–19, 35–36//Isa 36:1; 37:9–20, 36–37 Source S is a cohesive unit that uses Sennacherib’s name rather than simply his title as “king of Assyria” (2 Kgs 18:13//Isa 36:1; 2 Kgs 19:16, 36//Isa 37:17, 37).17 The themes ­center on kings and their gods, including Hezekiah’s reliance on the God of Israel 7  2 Kgs 20//Isa 38–39 is often relegated to a secondary status in the source debate. 8  Stade, “Miscellen.” For a quick layout of the discussion that has followed, see Hess, “Hezekiah,” 30–36. 9 Childs, Isaiah; Assyrian. 10 Clements, Isaiah; Jerusalem. 11  Dion, “Sennacherib.” 12 Hardmeier, Prophetie. 13 Gonçalves, L’expédition. 14  Smelik, “Distortion.” 15 Seitz, Final Destiny. See also Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 460–485. 16 Evans, Invasion, 39–85, also put forth a fresh proposal for similar reasons. Our analyses lead to different formation theories, which ultimately supports his concluding reflection that source-critical hypotheses are a subjective art, which may produce more pitfalls than advantages for biblical exegesis. 17  There is one other use of Sennacherib’s name in Isa 37:21; however, it is part of Isaiah Redaction One, which deliberately uses language from Source S and Source R to bring all three narratives together.

98   Shelley L. Birdsong (2 Kgs 19:10–19//Isa 37:10–20). Both Sennacherib and Hezekiah, rather than their officials, are the main characters. They communicate via “messenger” (‫ ;מלאכים‬2 Kgs 19:9, 14//Isa 37:9, 14), and neither Sennacherib nor his forces ever reach Jerusalem.

5.3.2.2.  Source R (Rabshakeh Source): 2 Kings 18:17–36; 2 Kings 19:8//Isa 36:2–36:21; 37:8 Source R is an episode consisting principally of a speech by the Assyrian Rabshakeh. It is bookended by an inclusio concerning the king of Assyria, the Rabshakeh, and Lachish. The characteristics of R (particularly in contrast to Source S) include the lack of a name for the Assyrian king and the inclusion of the Rabshakeh, Eliakim, Shebna, and Joah as representatives for their kings (who largely do not act in the narrative). The Assyrian army comes to Jerusalem. Concepts of note include the repetition of the king of Assyria being referred to as “the great king” (‫ ;הגדול המלך‬2 Kgs 18:19, 28//Isa 36:4, 13), Judah’s reliance on Egypt as well as on God, and the use of “master” (‫ )אדון‬and “servant” (‫ )עבד‬language (2 Kgs 18:23, 26–27//Isa 36:8, 11–12).

5.3.2.3.  Redaction I1 (Isaiah Redaction One): 2 Kings 18:37–19:7, 20–34, 37//Isa 36:22–37:7, 21–35, 38 The next stage of development is a redactional inclusion of Isaiah and his prophecies concerning Sennacherib’s demise and thus the deliverance of Jerusalem.18 The two prophetic blocks do not make up their own cohesive unit, per se; rather, they were likely separate prophetic sayings that were simultaneously written/edited and woven into the two larger narratives of S and R. Redactional seams are present at 2 Kgs 18:37–19:2//Isa 36:22–37:2 and 2 Kgs 19:20//Isa 37:21, and the prophecies borrow language from both S and R. For example, they include the use of Sennacherib’s name from S, “master” and “servant” language from R, the named servants of Hezekiah and the Rabshakeh from R, and borrowed terminology such as “hearing” (‫ )שמע‬and the “mocking” (‫ )חרף‬of God in S. It is uncertain whether the redactor inserted R into S while simultaneously fusing in I1, or whether the earlier two sources were already combined.19 Regardless, the I1 redactor addresses the Rabshakeh’s taunt, the Assyrian king’s message, and Hezekiah’s personal prayer to Yhwh from a prophetic perspective not present in the two earlier sources. Moreover, while S clearly narrates the demise of the Assyrian army and Sennacherib’s return home, what ultimately happens to Sennacherib is still open for question and is thus addressed by these additions. The prophecy of Sennacherib’s death is given in an inserted prophecy in 2 Kgs 19:7//Isa 37:7, and its fulfillment is added at the very end, in 2 Kgs 19:37//Isa 37:38. 18  I have chosen to label the redactional additions to the earlier “sources” as such because they are not necessarily independent, preexisting texts appended to the source block. Generally, they are smaller pieces seamed in or perhaps written into the narrative. In this way, I understand redactors to be authorial rather than minor editors. See Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 13. 19  If R was inserted into S between 2 Kgs 18:13//Isa 36:1 and 2 Kgs 19:9//Isa 37:9 before reaching the hands of the redactor of I1, R-S would still be a cohesive narrative.

Narratives about Isaiah   99

5.3.2.4.  Redaction I2 (Isaiah Redaction Two): 2 Kings 20:1–11// Isa 38:1–6, 21–22, 7–8 Redaction I2 was attached to the fused composite text of R, S, and I1. It shares many features with I1, including the character Isaiah and his prophecies, the giving of a sign, and the literary structure of two separate prophecies enclosing a prayer from Hezekiah.20 However, the content and setting of the prophecies are different. Instead of focusing on the king of Assyria and the deliverance of Jerusalem, I2 gives two personal and contradictory pronouncements to the king—he will die from his sickness, and then that he will recover and live for another fifteen years.

5.3.2.5.  Redaction I3 (Isaiah Redaction Three): 2 Kings 20:12–19//Isa 39:1–8 Redaction I3 is a short piece that also includes Hezekiah and Isaiah; however, it introduces the new characters of Merodach-Baladan and his envoys. It also includes a prophecy, but it is severe and has no contradictory word of salvation. The redactor of I3 attaches the appendix “seamlessly” by alluding to Hezekiah’s sickness and recovery in the previous episode.

5.3.2.6.  Source HP (Hezekiah Psalm): Isa 38:9–20 [no parallel in Kings] Most have agreed that the Hezekiah Psalm in Isa 38:9–20 was added after the narrative block had been inserted into Isaiah. It was an independent psalm that the redactors felt worked with the king’s sickness and near-death experience, as well as with the Isaian context. Its placement within I2 in Isaiah gives rise to some text-critical issues. It particularly results in an ordering of the text that is different from that in Kings. Evidence from 1QIsaa substantiates that Isaiah manuscripts suffered from transmission issues with the verses surrounding the psalm.

5.3.2.7.  Source A 2  Kings 18:14–16 [no parallel in Isaiah] The plus of 2 Kgs 18:14–16 dubbed Source A still stands. It is a composite text. Clues include the following: each verse has Hezekiah doing a different form of obeisance; all the verses give different accounts of how much gold or silver was sent (or not sent); the terminology for the temple shifts (v. 15: “house of Yhwh,” ‫ ;בת־יהוה‬v. 16, “temple of Yhwh,” ‫ ;)חיכל יהוה‬Hezekiah is called “king of Judah” (‫ )מלך יהודה‬in verses 14 and 16 but not in verse 15;21 and a new time formula appears in verse 16. All this evidence suggests that Source A is not a cohesive whole purporting one historically accurate version of what happened.22 Moreover, it was likely added after the narrative had already been inserted into the book of Kings. 20  Isa 39 only has two prophecies, whereas Kings has three. 21  He is also called the king of Judah in v. 13. Scholars regularly point out that Hezekiah’s name is spelled differently in vv. 14–16. 22  Critics have spent considerable time and energy deciding whether or not these three verses are the most historically reliable. The recent trend has been to question the earlier assumption that they are.

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5.3.2.8. Conclusion The formation of the Hezekiah and Isaiah narratives (henceforth HIN) was a complex process, but this evolution never destabilized the text’s unity or ability to produce meaning. The document actually solidified into a chorus as the layers of voices (sources, redactions) were put into harmony with preexisting ones. This polyphonic view of the HIN affirms the diachronic development of the text(s) without forsaking its literary coherence at every stage.23 It also paves the way for the larger polyphonic dialogue between Kings, Isaiah, and Chronicles. Finally, it invites new interpreters to follow the redactors’ lead and add their own voices to the chorus.

5.4.  The “Original” Context Much of the source and redaction debate relies on whether or not the HIN are original to the book of Kings or the book of Isaiah. Because of the overwhelming similarity between the two, most scholars have assumed that one must have borrowed from the other. In general, Kings has been given priority ever since Wilhelm Gesenius first proposed that Isa 36–39 was taken from Kings and appended to Isa 1–35 in 1821.24 Some of his reasons include the following: (a) the end of Jeremiah was brought over from Kings; so, too, this text was brought over from Kings into Isaiah; (b) the large plus in Isa 38:9–20, as well as other text-critical issues, suggests that Isa 36–39 is later and therefore secondary; (c) the prose style flows better with Kings as a narrative than with the poetic text of Isaiah.25 There are a few dissenters, including Peter Ackroyd,26 Klaas Smelik,27 Christopher Seitz,28 and Joel Anderson and Pieter Venter,29 who have challenged each of Gesenius’s claims. First, the comparison between 2 Kgs 25/Jer 52 and 2 Kgs 18–20/ Isa 36–39 is weak. It is more appropriate to compare Isa 36–39 to Jer 37–45, since these texts are prophetic narratives with extended dialogue rather than narratorial historiography. Second, Gesenius’s text-critical conclusions are over-simplistic and leave his argument wanting.30 Thorough analysis reveals both pluses and minuses in each book, which points toward independent development of each tradition rather than a primacy for Kings. Third, the conclusion that Isa 36–39 does not fit in a book of poetic prophecy is incorrect. There are several narrative components throughout Isaiah that make chapters 36–39 unexceptional, not to mention that much of the prophetic narrative includes Isaiah’s poetic oracles.31 Finally, there are thematic links in the chapters surrounding 23  Cf. Evans, “Hezekiah-Sennacherib.” Evans and I share similar views of the characters in the HIN as polyphonic, although our perspectives on the redactional element differ. 24 Gesenius, Commentar, 932–939. 25  I have borrowed this condensed version of Gesenius from Carr, “What Can We Say,” 585. 26  Ackroyd, “Historians and Prophets,” 18–54. 27  Smelik, “Distortion,” 70–93, esp. 71–74. 28 Seitz, Final Destiny, 96–116. Seitz is in conversation with Smelik throughout these pages. 29  Anderson, “The Rise,” 156–158; Anderson and Venter, “Isaiah.” 30  Anderson, “The Rise,” 156–157; Anderson and Venter, “Isaiah,” 51. 31 Seitz, Final Destiny, 103. Smelik argues that the inclusion of a latter prophet (Isaiah) in the Deuteronomistic History is more unusual, making the priority of Kings suspect (p. 72).

Narratives about Isaiah   101 Isa 36–39 that could point to the priority of Isaiah over Kings. These counterpoints put all Gesenius’s conclusions into question. So what is the original context for the HIN? A suggestion usually proposed but rarely taken up in earnest is that neither book is the original context.32 As my proposal in the previous section suggests, the HIN make up a composite text that developed independently of Isaiah and Kings; only later was the block added to each book, where it also underwent editing.33 This theory takes the pluses and minuses in each version seriously.34 It also explains why it can simultaneously fit in each context and the variant ordering works in each narrative framework. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it allows each text including the sources to maintain their value, rather than being relegated to a derivative status. That said, though their value remains equal, their meaning inevitably changes when placed into a variant context. It is to these distinctions that I now turn.

5.5.  Kings 18–20 in Context The story of Hezekiah in the Deuteronomistic History could have easily survived without 2 Kgs 18:13–20:19. It would have portrayed Hezekiah positively, stressing his religious reforms, commitment to God’s commands, and rebellion against Assyria, all of which are part of his divinely conferred prosperity (2 Kgs 18:1–8). Hezekiah’s list of accolades would have stood in stark contrast to the deeds of Hoshea, the king of Israel, whose story interweaves with his own. Unlike Hezekiah, Hoshea did not listen to God, and so an Assyrian king came up against him and ultimately destroyed Samaria (2 Kgs 18:9–12). But then redactors intervened. The HIN and Source A were included, and they changed the shape of the king’s legacy. No longer would Hezekiah be the perfect king, doing only what was right in the sight of Yhwh. Instead, he evolved into a complex character who experienced episodic moments of weakness (illness, doom) and of strength (recovery, salvation) presaged by the prophet Isaiah.35 Consequently, Hezekiah and Isaiah become intertextual links in the chain of rulers and prophets within the Deuteronomistic History. When read in its literary context, 2 Kgs 18:13–20:19 demonstrates that Hezekiah is not much different than the failed kings of Israel. In 2 Kgs 18:13, instead of being contrasted with Hoshea, Hezekiah begins to parallel him. Like Hoshea, Hezekiah is attacked by an Assyrian king, which implies that Hezekiah must have veered from his commitment to Yhwh; that is why Hoshea was attacked and destroyed (v. 12). Source A (2 Kgs 18:14–16) reinforces the insinuation. Hezekiah exemplifies his rejection of Yhwh when he gives 32  E.g., Anderson and Venter, “Isaiah,” 51. See also Clements, Jerusalem, chaps. 7–10, who follows Stade’s sources but not his view of the primacy of the account in Kings. 33  Cf. Seitz, Final Destiny, 104, 141, 185–191, who argues that various chapters were crafted for Kings or Isaiah and then transferred and edited for the other context. 34  I follow Seitz, Final Destiny; Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39; Raymond Person, “II Kings”; and Childs, Isaiah, in proposing that the HIN underwent their own textual development once in Kings and Isaiah. For thorough text-critical notes, see Roberts, First, 445–466, 476–477, 487–488. Cf. Root, “Scribal.” 35  Cf. Becking, “Realpolitiker,” who views Hezekiah as ideal exemplar in Kings despite the multiple redactional layers that produce his polyphonic character.

102   Shelley L. Birdsong his allegiance to Sennacherib. He repents to his political suzerain (v. 14), takes the treasure of Yhwh, and gives it to a foreign king (vv. 15–16). This reversal of Hezekiah’s depiction interrupts all notions of him as a righteous king. To make matters worse, Hezekiah’s obeisance to Sennacherib intertextually aligns him with two other monarchs who paid tribute to Assyria—Menachem and Ahaz. Menachem assassinated the Israelite king who preceded him (2 Kgs 15:14), attacked his own town and “ripped open all the pregnant women” (2 Kgs 15:16), and paid the king of Assyria to “turn back” so that he could maintain his power (2 Kgs 15:19–20). Ahaz, Hezekiah’s father, also paid off the Assyrians to protect himself and did so using treasure from the house of Yhwh, just as his son had (2 Kgs 16:7–9).36 Such intertextual alignments debase the presentation of Hezekiah. Thus, when the interpreter reads the Rabshakeh’s speech to Hezekiah’s people in 2 Kgs 18 little doubt is cast on his words about Hezekiah’s potential weaknesses. When the Rabshakeh condemns Hezekiah for his reliance on Egypt, it underlines his negative association with Hoshea, who naively trusted in Pharaoh (2 Kgs 17:4). It also foreshadows the terrible consequences Judean kings will face when they engage Egypt, including the murder of Josiah (2 Kgs 23:29) and the capture of Jehoahaz (2 Kgs 23:33–34). Hezekiah’s character grows more complex as he begins to interact with Isaiah. Their scenes together intertextually link them to numerous other king-prophet narratives in the Deuteronomistic History, some of which include the stories of Saul and Samuel, David and Nathan, Jeroboam and Ahijah (and the man of God from Judah), Ahab and Elijah (and other prophets), Jehoram/Joram and Elisha, and Josiah and Huldah. In all of these narratives, the kings are presented as complicated personas, rather than caricatures, and receive both positive and negative prophetic words regarding their kingdoms or personal destinies. The following table outlines the strongest intertextual connections.  

Hezekiah

The king does evil but is not punished personally; receives a prophecy that his child(ren) will suffer. 2 Kgs 20:12–19: Hezekiah shows Babylonian envoy treasure houses; Isaiah prophesies that all of the treasures and the sons of Hezekiah will be taken to Babylon; Hezekiah calls the prophecy good because there will be peace in his days.

The king responds to a negative circumstance with act of humility (usually tearing clothes and/ or prayer), and prophet/God responds positively, changing the circumstance. 2 Kgs 19:1–7, 35–37: Hezekiah tears clothes after Rabshakeh’s speech; he puts on sackcloth and goes to the temple; Isaiah proclaims that the king of Assyria will hear a rumor, return home, and fall by the sword; king returns and dies. 2 Kgs 19:9–37: King of Assyria sends a threat to Hezekiah; Hezekiah goes to temple, prays, and Isaiah prophesies that the Assyrian king will not attack Jerusalem but return home; he returns and dies. 2 Kgs 20:1–11: Hezekiah is ill and is told he will die; Hezekiah prays; he receives prophecy of an added 15 years to his life and the protection of Jerusalem.

36 Seitz, Final Destiny, 57–59, has previously made the connection between Hezekiah and Ahaz in their capitulation to Assyria.

Narratives about Isaiah   103 Other kings David

Jeroboam

2 Sam 12:1–15: David has sex with Bathsheba and has Uriah killed; Nathan tells him he has sinned and the sword will never depart from his house, but he will not die, instead his child shall die.

1 Kgs 12:25–13:10: Jeroboam makes two golden calves and places them at Bethel and Dan; he offers incense at the altar; a man of God from Judah prophesies against the altar, and Jeroboam tries to seize him and his hand withers; king entreats the man and the favor of God; man of God prays for him, and he is restored.

Jeroboam

Ahab

1 Kgs 13:33–14:16: Jeroboam continued to do evil; Jeroboam’s son Abijah becomes ill; Jeroboam sends his wife to Ahijah, who proclaims that because of the sins of Jeroboam every male in his house will be cut off and die, including the child.

1 Kgs 21:20–29: Elijah prophesies that Ahab’s house will be cut off like Jeroboam’s; Ahab tears clothes and is dejected; word of yhwh comes to Elijah that Ahab will not see disaster because he humbled himself.

Ahab 1 Kgs 21:1–29: Ahab covets Naboth’s vineyard; Jezebel plots to kill Naboth; after he dies, Ahab takes his vineyard; Elijah prophesies that his house will be cut off like Jeroboam’s; Ahab tears clothes and is dejected; word of Yhwh comes to Elijah that Ahab will not see disaster because he humbled himself, instead it will come to his sons.

Jehoram 2 Kgs 5:1–14: King put in difficult position by the king of Aram, who requests that he heal his army commander, Naaman, who has leprosy; Jehoram tears his clothes, so Elisha heals the man. 2 Kgs 6:24–7:20: Ben-hadad besieges Samaria, and the city is starving; women admit to eating a child; Jehoram tears his clothes, revealing sackcloth, and makes an oath; he goes to Elisha, who prophesies that Samaria will be free again tomorrow; later, Yhwh causes the Arameans to hear the sound of a great army, so they flee, and Samaria is free. Josiah 2 Kgs 22:8–20: Josiah hears book of the law, tears his clothes, and has his officials inquire of Yhwh concerning the matter; they come to Huldah, and she says God’s wrath will come; however, since Josiah has a penitent heart, humbled himself, tore his clothes, and wept, yhwh heard his prayer; Huldah tells him he will die in peace.

The overlap of the HIN with these other kings and prophets is telling. To begin, Hezekiah is not in great company. Ahab and Jeroboam are the worst kings of Israel according to the Deuteronomistic History, and the prophets usually censure them. Moreover, several of these kings bring on generational punishment for their sins, which will negatively affect their descendants. For Hezekiah, the consequences are the broadest, resulting in the exile of all his people.37 However, in these vignettes, some form of prophetic or 37  Josiah may appear to be an exception, as he is generally free of culpability for the conflict in the story. However, the prophecy that he would die in peace does not actually come to fruition; instead, he is inexplicably murdered.

104   Shelley L. Birdsong divine pardon arises. Jeroboam, Ahab, Jehoram, Hezekiah, and Josiah all have a moment of humble penitence, which secures a positive change in their circumstances. David, Jeroboam, Ahab, and Hezekiah all avert the terrible disaster that they had personally instigated. That is not to say that their escape is cause for celebration; it is not, since the disaster is only delayed. But a modicum of peace is given to these kings, which complicates how readers should interpret them. What does all this mean for Hezekiah in Kings? It indicates that though Hezekiah may have begun as “the good guy” in the first few verses of 2 Kgs 18, that all changed once 2 Kgs 18:13–20:19 was added. The inserted text, in light of its context and intertextual connections, irreversibly soils Hezekiah’s character. He has become a human king in a monarchical saga in which prophets and narrators unwaveringly point the finger at kings for later suffering, particularly the exile. The weight of all the kings’ sins far exceeded their instances of virtue, and so—even though they got moments of respite— their descendants paid the price.

5.6.  Isaiah 36–39 in Context The HIN in Isa 36–39 play out differently than they do in Kings. The absence of Source A, the presence of Source HP, and the prophetic context rather than a monarchical one lighten the condemnation of the king, though he does not, as many previous scholars have posited, escape unscathed.38 Instead, Hezekiah serves as a warning to the returning exiles that even the restored and redeemed can still make mistakes. To avoid that, they need to curb false senses of security, steer clear of relationships with foreigners, and listen to the prophets. All these exhortations were already present in First Isaiah, but the redactors wanted to be clear that the ancient prophetic words still applied, even to those as righteous as Hezekiah. So they tempered the optimism that was coming in Second Isaiah with Hezekiah’s short cautionary tale. In this way, I follow a host of other scholars who see the HIN as a bridge or transition between First Isaiah and Second Isaiah, which primarily functions as a typological exhortation to the exilic and post-exilic communities.39 Isa 36–39 functions as a bridge because Hezekiah’s story and the prophecies he receives from Isaiah embody the hardship of war and death (Isa 1–33), as well as the hope of healing and new life (Isa 40–55). As such, it is a tale from the past that serves as an example for future generations—namely, the returning exiles. In Isa 37–38, Hezekiah’s actions exemplify how the righteous should respond in times of trouble. When Assyria 38  Those who find Hezekiah’s character wholly positive or significantly idealized in Isaiah include Bostock, Portrayal; Seitz, Final Destiny; Sweeney, Isaiah 1–4; and Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39. Those who hold a more nuanced view include Sehoon Jang, “Hezekiah”; Archibald van Wieringen, “Diseased”; and Song-Mi Park, Hezekiah. 39  See, e.g., Melugin, Formation; Smelik, “Distortion”; Ackroyd, “Interpretation”; Ackroyd, “Isaiah 36–39”; Clements, “Unity”; Clements, Jerusalem; Seitz, Final Destiny; Wagner, “Salvation.” The latter four spend time on Hezekiah as typological exemplar for the (post-)exilic context.

Narratives about Isaiah   105 was invading his nation, Hezekiah sent to Isaiah to pray (Isa 37:2–4) and prayed himself (Isa 37:15–20) for God’s intervention. As a result, God rewards Hezekiah’s righteousness with a prophecy of doom for Sennacherib and one of salvation for Jerusalem and its “remnant” or “band of survivors” (Isa 37:32). Similarly, when Hezekiah grows so sick that he might die, he cries out to the Lord asking him to remember the king’s faithfulness and righteousness (Isa 38:2–3). God heeds the request and heals Hezekiah. In virtuous response, Hezekiah lifts up a prayer of thanks (Isa 38:9–20). In this final episode, Hezekiah exemplifies what the healed and restored should do; they must give thanks and worship Yhwh in the temple (Isa 38:19–20). Unfortunately, Hezekiah also demonstrates what one should not do. Instead of fully depending on God at all times, he supplemented his religious hopes with foreign ­alliances. First, he Hezekiah looked to Egypt when Assyria moved toward Judah, despite Isaiah’s repeated condemnation of doing so (Isa 30:1–3; 31:1–3). Isaiah says their help will be “worthless and empty” (Isa 30:7), and the Rabshakeh claims that Egypt will injure Hezekiah rather than provide him with support (Isa 36:6). Isaiah and the Rabshakeh are proven correct. Egypt does not save Hezekiah. Instead, God does, decimating the Assyrians (Isa 37:36). This miraculous salvation provides Hezekiah with a second chance to show his faithfulness to God. Yet instead of learning his lesson, Hezekiah befriends the Babylonian envoys and reveals his own great wealth to them (Isa 39:1–2).40 Despite all that Yhwh had done for Hezekiah, he neglected his psalms of praise and exalted himself, trusting in his foreign relationships. Consequently, God chooses no longer to intervene, and Isaiah foretells the exile of Hezekiah’s children to Babylon (Isa 39:5–7). Thus the king, who had shown himself to be so faithful previously, fails this time, and it has substantial consequences. His story reveals that divine deliverance is not necessarily perpetual; it must be earned continually. The meaning underlying Hezekiah’s failed second chance is apropos for the returning exiles. Though their ancestors had allied themselves with foreign nations, they were being given an opportunity to behave differently. Yhwh saved them from Babylon, just as God had saved Hezekiah from Assyria. Now the exiles must ask themselves if they will welcome the next “Babylon,” as Hezekiah had done in his moment of false security. The story implores the reader not to make the same mistake. Reliance on God is the only option. That is what provides salvation; that is what heals and restores. The didactic message of the redactors is also undergirded by the intertextual dialogue created between Hezekiah and Ahaz. Putting Hezekiah in dialogue with his father allows the exiles to reflect on prophetic signs and the consequences of generational sin. The HIN in Isaiah have strong intertextual links back to Isa 7–9, where Ahaz interacts with Isaiah at the same place where the HIN begin (Isa 7:3; 36:2). Like Hezekiah, Ahaz receives signs from the prophet. But Ahaz refuses the signs, whereas Hezekiah accepts them gladly and even asks for them. The contrast elevates Hezekiah over his father as the more righteous king. However, Hezekiah will still pay the price for Ahaz’s self-righteousness. The prophecies given to Ahaz come to pass during Hezekiah’s reign. It is on his watch that the king of 40  “His” (3ms suffix) appears five times in v. 2.

106   Shelley L. Birdsong Assyria comes like a flood into Judah (Isa 7:8). Furthermore, Hezekiah could have become the righteous “Immanuel” prophesied to Ahaz, but he fell short because he eventually made the same mistake. Just like his father, he becomes self-righteous, not only when he entertains the Babylonians, but also when he breathes a sigh of relief that the consequences will not affect him personally (Isa 39:1–2, 8). His pride and self-absorption maintain the generational sin, and his descendants would suffer for his wrongdoings. For those very descendants, reading Hezekiah’s story in the book of Isaiah had to strike a chord.41 The returnees needed to stop the cycle of sin. If they wanted their children to live in the land in peace, then they had to right the wrongs of their ancestors Ahaz and Hezekiah. They must remain humble and trust the words of the prophets, including Isa 36–39.

5.7.  Chronicles 32 in Context Scholars generally agree that the Chronicler had access to multiple sources when he recrafted the history of Judah, including some version of the HIN. However, the Chronicler did not follow his sources strictly, as the redactors of 2 Kgs 18–20 and Isa 36–39 did. Thus, the retelling of Hezekiah’s story is quite different in Chronicles, and its context drastically alters his presentation. On the whole, Hezekiah is portrayed much more positively in Chronicles, a fact on which almost all scholars agree.42 First, Hezekiah receives longer treatment in Chronicles even though it features little dialogue, a diminished account of Sennacherib’s invasion, and no prophecies from Isaiah. Such omission of potentially tarnishing material is typical of the Chronicler.43 Moreover, to control the story, the Chronicler recounts events in a third-person omniscient form and puts extensive emphasis on Hezekiah as the ideal king. He enacts religious reforms, prepares the temple and priests for their duties, invites all of Judah and Israel to Passover, and more (2 Chron 29–31). He prays multiple times, including making an appeal for the healing of his people (2 Chron 30:18–20), an entreaty for salvation from Assyria (2 Chron 32:20), and a supplication for his own healing (2 Chron 32:24). God always answers. Hezekiah is repeatedly called “faithful,” and the narrator summarizes the time of his rule as the greatest since the time of Solomon (2 Chron 30:26). In addition, he is a wonderful military leader, who encourages the troops (2 Chron 32:7–8) and personally sees to the preparation for the battle against Assyria (2 Chron 32:1–6). These are vivid contrasts to the presentation of Hezekiah in Isa and Kings, where he mainly communicates through his retinue and is rarely seen except with Isaiah. In Chronicles, he is a king of the people, and he needs no intercessor, politically or religiously. Second, the Chronicler exalts Hezekiah via contrast by placing his story right between the stories of Ahaz and Manasseh, who are reportedly evil (2 Chron 28:1; 33:2). 41  I presume the HIN had a significant impact on earlier generations as well before the narrative was inserted into Isaiah for an exilic and post-exilic audience. Jehoiachin certainly would have felt the weight of this story if he had been aware of it (Clements, Jerusalem, 121). 42  See, e.g., Becking, “Realpolitiker,” 191–194; Japhet, Chronicles, 974–998; Klein, Chronicles, 456–470. 43  Throntveit, “Relationship.”

Narratives about Isaiah   107 Their depictions play out in relationship to the God of Israel and the king of Assyria. When Ahaz is under attack by Aram as a result of his religious sins, he tries to get help from Assyria. Instead of giving Ahaz aid, the king of Assyria oppresses him (2 Chron 28:20). The Chronicler directly correlates the horrible results with Ahaz’s plundering of Yhwh’s temple to pay tribute to Assyria (v. 21). Similarly, Assyria attacks Manasseh because he ignored the righteous callings of God (2 Chron 33:11). Hezekiah stands in relief to these two kings. Assyria does come up against him, but not because of an act of unfaithfulness (2 Chron 32:1). On the contrary, Hezekiah is presented as a righteous victim, who did nothing to incite such military action.44 His righteousness is further displayed when Hezekiah prays to the Lord and trusts fully in divine protection, unlike Ahaz and Manasseh. As a result, Hezekiah is saved. These contrasts are more polarized than the complex correlations made in Kings and Isaiah, and they put more emphasis on Hezekiah as a zealous religious figure than a complex political one. Finally, the Chronicler connects Hezekiah intertextually with several other kings who pray. After the captive Manasseh is brought to Babylon, he humbles himself and entreats Yhwh (2 Chron 33:12–13). God hears Manasseh’s prayer and restores him to his kingdom, where he enacts religious reforms. Similarly, Hezekiah has a moment of weakness and pride (2 Chron 32:25), but like Manasseh, he quickly humbles himself, thereby keeping God’s wrath at bay. The two other kings who most frequently pray in Chronicles are David and Solomon.45 Like these preeminent kings, who offer righteous supplications to Yhwh, especially in relationship to the temple (1 Chron 17 and 2 Chron 6), Hezekiah is presented as a religious man who cares for the temple and exalts the Lord in prayer. In Chronicles, Hezekiah’s intertextual connections to other prayerful kings elevate him in contrast to his connections to evil monarchs in Kings, who pray only in desperation. Although Hezekiah has a brief lapse of pride in Chronicles, it gives him the opportunity to be repentant and righteous. The debacle with the Babylonian envoy in Kings and Isaiah is further presented in Chronicles as a mere test in which he prospered (2 Chron 32:30–31). Essentially, all aspects of Hezekiah’s character that could have been viewed poorly before are rewritten or omitted in Chronicles, thus making Hezekiah an ideal king.

5.8. Conclusion Just as Jeremiah is understood as a rolling corpus, so, too, are Kings, Isaiah, and Chronicles, especially in their relationship to the HIN.46 The traditions of kings and prophets were myriad, and the process of their gathering, combining, and editing 44  Contra Kings, where it is explicitly noted that he rebelled. 45  Many have commented on the correlation of Hezekiah with David and Solomon in Chronicles. See Japhet, Chronicles, 998; Throntveit, “Relationship.” 46 McKane, Jeremiah, uses this concept to explain how the unwieldy book of Jeremiah came to be. See also Park, Hezekiah, who refers to the development of Hezekiah’s character as one of “rolling development” and a collage of voices.

108   Shelley L. Birdsong occurred over hundreds of years and through a tumult of political and theological shifts. Somewhere along the way, the various parts of Hezekiah and Isaiah’s stories came together and were deemed worthy enough to be used multiple times by various redactors, and so the smaller rolling corpus was subsumed into larger rolling corpuses that were taking on the shape and message of each new context. Such a conceptualization has much to contribute to the conversation about textual meaning and its ability to be transformed by both editors and readers throughout time. The diachronic process reveals a great truth to contemporary audiences, namely, that readers are essentially redactors; they can update the text in their own historical moment by putting it into new contexts. Presenting the biblical texts and their authors/­interpreters in this way helps deconstruct the myth that the Bible is an untouchable monolith. Instead, it is a living and changing document, which can continually adapt to its environment, producing multiple and dialogic meanings.

Bibliography Ackroyd, Peter R. “An Interpretation of the Babylonian Exile.” SJT 27 (1974): 328–352. Ackroyd, Peter R. “Isaiah 36–39: Structure and Function.” In Von Kanaan bis Kerala: Festschrift für Prof. Mag. Dr. Dr. J. P.M. van der Ploeg O.P. zur Vollendung des siebzigsten Lebensjahres am 4. Juli 1979: überreicht von Kollegen, Freunden und Schülern, edited by W. C. Delsman and J. P. M. van der Ploeg, 3–21. AOAT 211. Neukirchen-Vluyn and Kevelaer: Neukirchener and Butzon & Bercker, 1982. Ackroyd, Peter R. “Historians and Prophets.” SEÅ 33 (1968): 18–54. Anderson, Joel E. “The Rise, Fall, and Renovation of the House of Gesenius: Diachronic Methods, Synchronic Readings, and the Debate over Isaiah 36–39 and 2 Kings 18–20.” CurBS 11, no. 2 (2013): 147–167. Anderson, Joel E., and Pieter M. Venter. “Isaiah 36–39: Rethinking the Issues of Priority and Historical Reliability.” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 65, no. 1 (2009): 49–55. https://doi.org/10.4102/hts.v65i1.123. Becking, Bob. “Between Realpolitiker and Hero of Faith: Memories of Hezekiah in Biblical Traditions and Beyond.” In Remembering Biblical Figures in the Late Persian Period and Early Hellenistic Periods, edited by Diana V. Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi, 182–198. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Bostock, David. A Portrayal of Trust: The Theme of Faith in Hezekiah Narratives. Paternoster Biblical Monographs. Milton Keynes, UK: Paternoster, 2006. Carr, David M. “What Can We Say about the Tradition History of Isaiah? A Response to Christopher Seit’s Zion’s Final Destiny.” In Society of Biblical Literature 1992 Seminar Papers. edited by Eugene H. Lovering, Jr., 583–597. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1992. Childs, Brevard. Isaiah. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2000. Childs, Brevard. Isaiah and the Assyrian Crisis. SBT 2/3. London: SPCK, 1967. Clements, Ronald E. Isaiah and the Deliverance of Jerusalem. JSOTS 13. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1980. Clements, Ronald E. Jerusalem and the Nations: Studies in the Book of Isaiah. HBM 16. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011. Clements, Ronald E. “The Unity of the Book of Isaiah.” Int 36 (1982): 117–129. Dion, Paul E. “Sennacherib’s Expedition to Palestine.” Eglise et Théologie 20 (1989): 5–25.

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110   Shelley L. Birdsong Wagner, Thomas. “From Salvation to Doom: Isaiah’s Message in the Hezekiah Story.” In Prophecy and Prophets in Stories: Papers Read at the Fifth Meeting of the Edinburgh Prophecy Network, Utrecht, October 2013, edited by Bob Becking and Hans M. Barstad, 92–103. OtSt 65. Leiden: Brill, 2015. Wieringen, Archibald L. H. M. van. “The Diseased King and the Diseased City (Isa. 36–39) as a Reader-Oriented Link between Isa. 36–39 and Isa. 40–66.” In “Enlarge the Site of Your Tent”: The City as Unifying Theme in Isaiah, edited by Archibald L. H. M. van Wieringen and Annemarieke van der Woude, 81–93. OtSt 43. Leiden: Brill, 2001.

chapter 6

Isa i a h 40 –55 Katie M. Heffelfinger

6.1.  History of Formation Despite the widely acknowledged recent increase of interest in final form oriented studies of the book of Isaiah and portions thereof,1 there remains general scholarly interest in the question of editorial work on the various component sections.2 Chapters 40–55 (hereafter Second Isaiah) have both been the subject of redaction-critical studies and figured prominently in studies of the formation of the whole of Isaiah.3 In what follows, I will describe some elements of the history of redaction-critical study of Second Isaiah and then describe some of the possibilities for composition study opened up by recent inquiries into poetics and oral culture.

6.1.1.  Redaction Criticism Rainer Albertz observes that “redaction criticism approached Deutero-Isaiah much later and more slowly than the other prophetic books.”4 Nevertheless, a variety of significant redaction-critical proposals for these sixteen chapters appear in the literature. Many such proposals are available, and “no consensus has emerged.”5 As Blenkinsopp puts it regarding the “process of formation . . . practically every conceivable position has 1  I wish to express my gratitude to Collin Cornell for his assistance in accessing sources needed to write this article and to Patricia K. Tull for her insightful comments on an early draft. 2  Regarding the rise of interest in whole-book studies, see Melugin, “Isaiah 40–66,” 142–194; regarding the composition of Second Isaiah, Tate, “Book of Isaiah,” writes that “it is probable that Second Isaiah is the product of a redactional history” (p. 31). 3  See Albertz, Israel, 381–392, for a helpful overview of recent redaction-critical proposals. Williamson, Book, gives a prominent position to these chapters in his argument about the growth of the book of Isaiah. 4 Albertz, Israel, 381. Berges, Book, 300, comments similarly. 5 Mettinger, Farewell, 18, n. 26. Childs, Isaiah, 291, comments similarly.

112   Katie M. Heffelfinger been adopted in the modern period.”6 The Servant Songs, Hymns, and framing devices for sections and for the whole have figured heavily in studies of the composition of this portion of the book of Isaiah. As this survey will demonstrate, despite agreement about the importance of these features, scholarly reconstructions based on the observation of these components vary widely. The contention that the so-called Servant Songs represent an interpolation into the book goes back to Bernhard Duhm.7 As Childs comments, Duhm “laid the foundation for later redactional analysis that sought to interpret a portion of Second Isaiah independently of the corpus as a whole.”8 This approach to the Servant Songs has exerted considerable influence over studies of Second Isaiah’s composition. Scholars who treat the Servant Songs as a separate strand in their compositional studies include Hans-Jürgen Hermisson and Claus Westermann. Hermisson isolates the Servant Songs from the earliest layer of text in Second Isaiah, treating them as a separate collection, added to the earliest layers prior to the addition of layers typified by interest in expectation of imminent salvation and the idol makers.9 Westermann treats the Servant Songs as “a separate strand.”10 He proposes that most of the text and the primary arrangement of the oracles go back to the prophet Deutero-Isaiah himself, but indicates a number of later additions, including the Servant Songs, an insertion within the Cyrus oracle, the passages concerning the creation of idols, “occasional admonitions and accusations,” and what he refers to as “Amen glosses.”11 Trygvve Mettinger agrees with Westermann about the importance of the hymns, but draws from them very different conclusions about the composition of Isa 40–55.12 Indeed, treating the hymns as primary evidence for his composition study, Mettinger concludes that the Servant Songs are integral to the whole of these chapters.13 He points out the extent to which the independent status of the Servant Songs has influenced Westermann’s interpretation of the evidence, noting that Westermann differentiates between the hymns that follow Servant Songs and those that do not, and treats the ­former as later additions.14 He comments, “If Westermann’s attention had not been dominated by the idea of the ‘Servant Songs,’ he would scarcely have arrived at this understanding of the function of the hymns.”15 In contrast, Mettinger demonstrates that hymns play a role “bracket[ing]” three significant passages “set[ting] them

6 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 73. 7 Duhm, Buch, 284. 8 Childs, Isaiah, 291. 9  Hermisson, “Einheit,” 309–311. He notes that his proposal is a preliminary one and that a number of questions remain (p. 310). 10 Westermann, Isaiah 40–66, 29. 11 Westermann, Isaiah 40–66, 28–30. Interestingly, Westermann thinks the first three Servant Songs were written by the prophet Deutero-Isaiah but added to the book at a later date (p. 29). 12  See Westermann, Forschung, 161, on the importance of the hymns. 13 Mettinger, Farewell, calls them “the best point of departure for an analysis of the composition in ch. 40–55” (p. 18). 14 Mettinger, Farewell, 19. Mettinger concludes that Duhm’s excision of the “Servant Songs” is disproven on “linguistic, form critical, compositional, and contentual” grounds (p. 45). 15 Mettinger, Farewell, 19.

Isaiah 40-55   113 in high relief.”16 He thus describes the structure of Isa 40–55 as exhibiting key passages ­highlighted by the hymns that frame them. The central one of these, 49:1–12, he concludes, “both separates and unifies the two parts of the book” (i.e., 40–48 and 49–55).17 The other two of these highlighted sections occur at “approximately the middle of each half of the book.”18 Importantly for Mettinger’s project, two of these three highlighted sections are among the group of “Servant Songs” delineated by Duhm. Mettinger’s work, though it does not primarily aim at a full compositional analysis, constitutes an important shift in thinking about the place of the Servant in Second Isaiah and has opened up new lines of inquiry, particularly an increase in readings that consider the relationship between the Servant and Zion.19 Another proposal that treats the hymns as key evidence but draws significantly different conclusions about composition is that of Ulrich Berges. Also drawing on what he identifies as the major structural devices—that is, the hymns and instructions to depart—Berges identifies four primary layers of development in chapters 40–55.20 He considers the hymns “the most obvious structural features within chaps. 40–55,”21 and indicates that the “Exodus commands” structure the chapters in “three parts (40–48; 49–52; 54–55).”22 His proposal assigns to “exilic tradents” the compiling of the “oracle materials” from the “exilic prophet,” which results in a version of chapters 40–48 punctuated by hymns.23 This composition is then further developed by the returned exiles in the “first Jerusalem redaction” to incorporate 49–52 and 40:1–5, 9–11.24 A “second Jerusalem redaction” attaches 54–55 and 40:6–8 as a response to the “delayed salvation.”25 Berges understands the fourth servant song as a separate addition.26 Interestingly, the primary structural devices that Berges identifies (hymns, commands to depart) are assigned to multiple hands in his redactional proposal.27 Similarly, the Servant Songs, while “an integral part of the textual corpus,” derive from multiple redactional layers.28 Rainer Albertz’s work also draws together observations about the role of the hymns and the incorporation of the Servant Songs. He sees two conclusions to the work as ­indications of two main redactional stages, and views the use of eschatological hymns as 16  Mettinger, 20. 17  Mettinger, 24. 18  Mettinger, 21. 19  On the limits of his study, see Mettinger, Farewell, 26. See, e.g., Sawyer, “Daughter,” 89–107; and Schmidt, “Servant and Zion.” 20 Berges, Book, 385. He indicates “to a lesser extent the verses of the ‘pious vs sinners’ theme . . . function as markers.” 21 Berges, Book, 306. 22  Berges, 385. 23  Berges, 335. 24  Berges, 386. 25  Berges, 386. 26  Berges, 377. 27  The “golah redaction” includes the command to depart in 48:20–21. See Berges, Book, 344. But, Berges notes, the command in 52:11–12 appears to belong to the “first Jerusalem redaction” (pp. 353–354), and the final departure text, 55:12, belongs to the portion of the book that he identifies as the “second Jerusalem redaction[’s]” composition (pp. 360, 376). Similarly, while Berges presents the “golah redaction” as incorporating hymns into its shaping of 40–48 (p. 335), other hymnic passages he identified (e.g., 52:9–10) fall outside the range of chapters attributed to the “golah redaction” (p. 306). 28 Berges, Book, 316. Berges indicates that the Servant Songs “themselves hardly play a structuring role” (p. 310). As noted above, Berges treats the fourth Servant Song as an addition made chronologically later than the “second Jerusalem redaction” (p. 377). However, he gives the “golah redaction” credit for the placement of the first Servant Song (p. 335), and considers that the “first Jerusalem redaction” placed the second Servant Song (p. 344).

114   Katie M. Heffelfinger framing devices as an indicator of early redactional incorporation of the elements framed by them.29 Because one of the Servant Songs appears inside such a frame, he concludes that “at least the Servant Song in 49:1–6* was an indispensable part of the very first edition of the book of Deutero-Isaiah.”30 As the foregoing survey demonstrates, despite agreement that the hymns function as significant structuring devices, scholars have differed on what their importance means for the history of the composition of the book. Among scholars who agree that the hymns play a compositionally structuring role, there remains wide divergence about the number of redactional layers and the place of the Servant Songs within the development of the corpus.

6.1.2.  Other Approaches Redaction criticism, as this discussion has shown, has played a significant role in the study of Second Isaiah. It is, however, not the only possible approach to the composition of these chapters and their relationship to the whole.31 As Claire Mathews helpfully points out, “The images that we use to talk about the book of Isaiah grow out of our presuppositions concerning the text, and either limit, or enlarge our understanding of it.”32 Mathews employs “a musical metaphor,” referring to Isaiah as “a prophetic chorus,” one she describes as “polyphonic.”33 Similarly, Goldingay and Payne emphasize Second Isaiah’s “spiral . . . character” and compare it to “a symphony or suite.”34 Such conceptions take account of important features within the text. Features that merit increased consideration in further work on the composition of Isa 40–55 include the poetic character of these chapters and the probable oral mode of delivery. Attention to a style and level of cohesion that is typical of biblical Hebrew poetry in general, and of Second Isaian poetry in particular, points toward caution in assigning discontinuities and tensions to different editorial hands. While conceptual and stylistic inconsistencies have featured as important factors in the construction of redaction­critical approaches to these chapters,35 interestingly, Hermisson, who works within a redaction-­critical model, helpfully sounds a note of caution about employing the technique in ways that smooth out theological complexities or treat poetry in prosaic ways.36 As Roy F. Melugin noted, “wider reading in literary criticism . . . might result in a significant lowering of confidence in the kinds of redaction-historical analysis currently in 29 Albertz, Israel, 393–394. 30  Albertz, 394. 31  Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 1:7, enumerate a number of reservations about the method. 32 Mathews, Defending Zion, 179. 33  Mathews, 179. 34  Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 1:19. 35  Childs, “Retrospective Reading,” and Couey, “Poetry and Redaction,” both point out the extent to which “allegedly conceptual tensions” (Childs, 368) and “thematic incoherence” (Couey, 3) have been employed as a redactional criterion. 36  Hermisson, “Einheit,” 292. See also Williamson, Book, 22, who discusses Hermisson’s various cautions about compositional reconstructions.

Isaiah 40-55   115 vogue among many biblical scholars.”37 This has indeed proven to be the case among some interpreters. Melugin’s proposal that we might allow “poetry [to] function with its own kind of referentiality,” has pointed toward a divergent perspective on the relationship of Second Isaiah’s component poems.38 As Goldingay and Payne helpfully indicate, “the assumption that poets and prophets aim at or achieve succinctness and consistency is gratuitous.”39 Indeed, recent studies of biblical Hebrew poetry have emphasized that such poetry frequently employs a non-narrative style which is governed more by juxtaposition than by thematic evenness.40 Isa 40–55 is arguably dominated by such poetry.41 Second Isaiah employs sudden shifts of speaker and theme, and ideas and motifs regularly appear in tension with one another.42 That is, Second Isaiah arguably employs tension and juxtaposition as a mode of poetic meaning-making.43 If this is the case, it should lead to particular caution in assigning materials to different redactional hands based on their apparent discontinuity with their immediate contexts.44 Indeed, regarding Duhm’s position on the Servant Songs, Tull Willey appropriately comments that “hyperbole and paradox, and the logical tensions that result from them, permeate not only this character, but the entire text of Second Isaiah, and are not easily resolved on a rational level.”45 Each of these observations, in its own way, points to the need to treat discontinuity and tension as redactional criteria with particular caution. Such characteristics appear typical of Second Isaian style. This observation does not rule out the likelihood of redactional activity, as Couey has insightfully argued.46 It does, however, make it somewhat more complicated to reliably discern.47 Indeed, appreciation of discontinuities and tensions as meaningful elements of the text’s mode of proclamation, though complicating composition study, may open fruitful lines of interpretive inquiry. A second matter related to the poetic character of these chapters that has a bearing on both compositional and interpretive questions is the relationship between poetry, ­persuasiveness, and prophetic activity. Richard Clifford, for example, contrasts his own approach to “lengthy” units and a conception of the prophet as “orator” with that of the 37  Melugin, “Recent Form Criticism,” 57. 38  Melugin, “Recent Form Criticism,” 57. E.g., regarding First Isaiah, Couey, Reading, observes that traits often regarded as compositional markers, such as “shifts in theme or style” are features that “occur frequently in poetry” (p. 19). 39  Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 1:7. 40 Dobbs-Allsopp, Biblical Poetry, 10, describes the minimal presence of narrative verse in the Hebrew Bible. His chapter “The Idea of Lyric Poetry in the Bible,” 178–232, describes significant features of nonnarrative Hebrew poems and articulates the interpretive significance of these characteristics for poems that exhibit them noting that “prophetic verse, even when it moves most decisively away from any kind of strong lyric sensibility, nonetheless holds much in common with the lyric poetry of the Bible” (p. 228). See also Couey, “Poetry and Redaction,” 4. 41  See Heffelfinger, I Am Large. 42 Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 63–65. Melugin, Formation, comments, “in Deutero-Isaiah verses and strophes break in without any apparent relation to the context” (p. 6). 43 Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 66–67. 44  Couey, “Poetry and Redaction,” 4. 45  Tull Willey, Remember, 177. 46  Couey, “Poetry and Redaction,” 4. 47  Couey, “Poetry and Redaction,” notes that “redaction is not the only, or always the best, explanation for such discontinuities” (p. 4).

116   Katie M. Heffelfinger “author as lyric poet.”48 However, poetics and persuasiveness are not mutually exclusive.49 At least as far back as Muilenburg’s work, the term “rhetorical” has been used in the discussion of these chapters by various scholars and in a variety of ways.50 Clarification in this area is to be desired as work on these chapters continues. In addition to poetics, orality is a significant consideration that should be borne in mind in assessing the composition of these chapters. Goldingay and Payne helpfully point out that the methods and materials that are known from the period of composition ought to play a role in our expectations of how the text might have come together. They describe the redactional approach as “presuppos[ing] a process” which is “difficult to conceive in the age of the scroll.”51 Many redaction-critical proposals allow for an oral stage for these chapters. Berges, for example, uses language of the “exilic prophet’s preaching” and treats the core of 40–48 as going back to that figure, and being later collected and compiled by the exiles.52 However, studies that focus on the nature of compilation of oral prophecy represent a potential area of future further focus in composition studies of Second Isaiah. It seems highly likely that these chapters were presented to their original audience as oral poetic prophecy. Whether written for oral performance or performed orally and later recorded in writing, the likelihood that the exiles were a largely “oral culture” is quite high, making primarily written dissemination of the prophecies unlikely.53 Interestingly, Second Isaiah differs from many other prophetic collections within the Hebrew Bible, because the explicit markers of the compilation process familiar in such collections are notably absent from these sixteen chapters.54 In comparison with other prophetic collections, most particularly Isa 1–39, Second Isaiah lacks the markers one might expect to find. These include both “historical notices” (e.g., Isa 6:1; 7:1; Amos 1:1) and headings announcing the word (hadābār, e.g., Isa 2:1; Jer 7:1; 11:1; cf. dĕbar Ezek 6:1; 7:1; 12:1; Joel 1:1), a vision (ḥăzôn, e.g., Isa 1:1; cf. without ḥăzôn Amos 7:1, 4; 8:1), or an utterance (massaʾ, e.g., Isa 13:1; 15:1; 17:1; 19:1; 21:1, 11, 13; 22:1; cf. a similar phenomenon without the term massaʾ in Jer 48:1; 49:1, 23, 28).55 This absence of formal markers presents a distinctive set of problems for compositional analysis. It has the potential to suggest that the final redactors intended the work to be read as a unified whole, and particularly in light of the oracles preceding and connected by more formal means to the prophetic ministry of Isaiah of Jerusalem.56 48 Clifford, Fair Spoken, 4. 49  See further, Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 23–26. 50  Heffelfinger, 9–10, n. 28. 51  Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 1:7. A similar critique is leveled by Baltzer, “Book,” 262. 52 Berges, Book, 334–335. 53  See, e.g., van der Toorn, Scribal Culture, 10–11. Interestingly, van der Toorn considers DeuteroIsaiah part of a “ ‘scribalization’ of prophecy,” and likely written (p. 203). 54  Melugin, “Isaiah 40–66,” treats Second Isaiah as “the work of a collector of earlier speech-units” (p. 144). Melugin, Formation, comments that “in its final form the collection has deliberately eradicated any indicators of the process of growth” (p. 175). 55 Melugin, Formation, discusses the absence of “narratives and brief historical notices characteristic of other prophets” (pp. 176–177) and highlights the particular contrast with Isa 1–39 in this regard. 56 Melugin, Formation, 177. Similarly, Seitz, “Book of Isaiah 40–66,” claims that reading 40–55 “as an extension of the vision of Isaiah” means “reading this material on something of the terms those who preserved it meant for us to” (p. 321).

Isaiah 40-55   117 As Dobbs-Allsopp indicates, scholarly work with poetic texts “now needs to be ready to temper or reframe its governing assumptions and preferred technologies of criticism in light of the requirements of a potentially very different kind of literacy and textuality forged at the interface of a deeply informing orality.”57 As with assumptions about consistency, tension, and thematic unity, such a shift in expectation about the means and mode by which texts were produced can only have a significant impact on the models of composition that are offered when scholars operate from such assumptions.

6.2.  Function in the Book of Isaiah as a Whole The book of Isaiah is distinctive among the Major Prophets because it spans the Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian periods.58 Chapters 40–55 stand as the primary exilic period voice in the sixty-six chapter whole. Although the chronological distance between the events recounted in chapter 39 (the Babylonian visit to Hezekiah during the period of Assyrian dominance) and the widely held date for the announcement of comfort (539/540) could lead to an expectation that these sections of the book would offer distinct messages, it has become increasingly clear that there is some relationship between the parts of the whole. However, scholars differ on the nature of that relationship.

6.2.1.  Approaches to the Whole One highly influential work in this discussion is H. G. M. Williamson’s The Book Called Isaiah.59 Williamson presents a case for influence in two directions between First Isaiah and Second Isaiah. He argues that the exilic prophet understood his own work as “an integral continuation”60 of the work of Isaiah of Jerusalem. Williamson argues on the basis of a number of thematic and lexical connections between passages in the two b ­ odies of work that Second Isaiah knew an early version of First Isaiah.61 He further claims that Second Isaiah understood himself to be announcing the time of deliverance anticipated in the work of the eighth-century prophet, especially in light of the ­references in the former’s work to “the writing down of his words under secure ­conditions so that they may

57 Dobbs-Allsopp, Biblical Poetry, 5. 58 McEntire, Chorus, 7, comments on Isaiah’s similarity to the Book of the Twelve in this regard. Schramm, Opponents of Third Isaiah, 50, also notes that Isaiah spans these historical periods. 59  See Williamson, Book, esp. his summary of his argument (pp. 240–241). 60 Williamson, Book, 113. 61 Williamson, Book, notes “Deutero-Isaiah must have read an earlier form of the work and been influenced by it sufficiently to adopt a considerable number of its themes and modes of expression” (p. 93).

118   Katie M. Heffelfinger act as a witness in future, more hopeful days.”62 He contends that the exilic prophet intentionally appended his work to that of the eighth century prophet and edited the earlier work in light of his own.63 Williamson’s approach to the development of the whole book gives a prominent role in the shaping of the book to the exilic prophet.64 However significant Second Isaian work might be to the composition of the whole, Williamson’s proposal does not give the exilic prophet the final hand in composition. He treats some passages as elements of further redaction and sees 56–66 as being both later than and the likely cause of some further redaction of 1–55.65 Although the field has largely rejected a position, associated with Duhm and his followers, that the three sections of the book of Isaiah were composed separately and only later joined,66 Williamson’s approach is not the only way of viewing a compositional relationship and unity among these parts.67 Rendtorff, for example, also notes a discernible and intentionally created unity among the sections, as well as the significant place of chapters 40–55.68 However, his approach differs from Williamson’s emphasis on the development of Isa 40–55 out of 1–39, and he gives a dominant hand to those responsible for chapters 56–66 in unifying previously distinct materials.69 Rendtorff ’s observations highlight the extent to which overlapping themes and terminology are used in distinctly differing ways in 1–39 and 40–55 and are unified with the whole in passages that he understands as forging links. For example, he views chapters 1, 12, and 35 as drawing connections to chapter 40 and he articulates the ways that justice (mšpṭ), righteousness (ṣdq/ṣdqh), and salvation (both nouns and verbs from the root yšʿ) are used in particular pairs (righteousness with justice as a human obligation in 1–39; and righteousness with salvation as a divine action in 40–55), which are brought together in 56:1.70 Rendtorff ’s analysis indicates specific disjunctions of thinking between 1–39 and 40–55, which the author of 56:1 “is fully conscious of ” and “combin[es] in this verse for the first time.”71 That is, whereas Williamson’s observations of shared themes and vocabulary led him to postulate the intentional development of Second Isaiah out of First, Rendtorff ’s analysis leads him to propose that there was more original distinction between these materials that were linked by a later hand. Rendtorff ’s approach treats Isa 40–55 as the first unified component of the book, a part he calls “the heart of the present composition.”72 He leaves open the question of whether chapters 1–39 come together independently or entirely as part of the formation of the book.73 Regarding 56–66, he sees it as “hardly conceivable that . . . [it] ever had an independent existence.”74 His position points to a process of formation that brought together chapters 1–39 and 56–66 around an exilic core.

62  Williamson, 106–107 (citation 106). 63  Williamson, 240–241. 64  Williamson, 240–241. 65  Williamson, 20. 66  See Hays, “Book of Isaiah,” 550. 67  See Tull, “One Book, Many Voices,” 284–289, for a useful overview. 68 Rendtorff, Canon, 155, 167. 69  Rendtorff, 168–169. 70  Rendtorff, 150–55, 162–164, 184. 71  Rendtorff, 184. 72  Rendtorff, 167. 73  Rendtorff, 168. 74  Rendtorff, 169.

Isaiah 40-55   119

6.2.2.  Shared Vocabulary, Themes, and Formal Features Second Isaiah shares vocabulary and themes with passages in both chapters 1–39 and 56–66.75 Additionally, its contribution to a book that exhibits a kind of unity extends to its theological outlook and the way the form of writing conveys that outlook. Isaian texts emphasize the particular grandeur, holiness, and incomparability of Israel’s God (e.g., Isa 2:17; 6:5; 33:5; 40:12–26; 46:9; 57:15; 63:11, as well as the frequent use of the epithet qĕdôš yiśrāʾēl, “the Holy One of Israel,” e.g., Isa 1:4; 5:19; 30:11, 12, 15; 43:14; 45:11; 47:4); the reliability and majesty of Yhwh’s word (e.g., Isa 9:8; 24:3; 40:8; 55:11; 66:5); and the deity as one who controls the past, the future, and the fate of nations (e.g., 2:2–4; 10:5–11; 14:24–27; 42:8–9; 43:18–19; 44:6–8; 46:8–11; 60:4–7; 65:17).76 Together these themes offer a vision of the deity that is irreducible and beyond human categorization. While the first thirty-nine chapters of Isaiah convey their message through a mixture of prophetic poetry and prose, chapters 40–55 present an intensification of the frequency of the poetic mode of discourse. Couey has helpfully described the prophetic poet’s “voice” in First Isaiah as “by turns sarcastic, antagonistic, erudite, heartbroken, confident, hopeful—in short, as complexly constructed as the poems themselves.”77 Second Isaiah, standing juxtaposed to the collection of eighth-century-oriented texts, moves its focus away from the human prophetic voice and relies much more heavily upon the speaking voice of the deity.78 That voice employs a similar range of tones. Like the collection that preceded it, its “poems frequently call attention to their status as speech,”79 not inappropriately for a corpus that conveys the power of the divine word, and exhibits a “significant sense of disconnect among the parts.”80 These features convey a theological perspective that glorifies the deity and does so through literary forms that emphasize Yhwh’s majestic speaking presence and rejection of limitations imposed by human expectations. Juxtaposition and nonnarrative movement become the norm after chapter 39, driving home the message that Israel’s experience emerges from the hand of the God whom no human controls or determines. The similarity of First and Second Isaiah in this regard is striking. Regarding a First Isaian passage, Couey describes this complex theological orientation, noting that “it may simply be that Isaiah expected Judah to experience divine 75  See, e.g., Williamson, Book, esp. 92–94. 76  The repetition of reference to the divine word in chapters 40 and 55 is widely commented upon. See, e.g., Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 2:378. Concerning the emphasis on Yhwh’s word, see also the discussion of distinctive Isaian introductions to oracles in Williamson, Book, 79–81. Regarding “Holy One of Israel,” Williamson, Book, comments on the “unprecedented density of usage of the phrase in the book of Isaiah” indicating that “any attempt to explain its usage in the later chapters without reference to the fact that it is distinctively characteristic of the book as a whole would be perverse” (p. 43). 77 Couey, Reading, 206. 78 Melugin, Formation, also employs the language of chapters 39 and 40 having been “juxtaposed” (p. 178). Regarding voices in Second Isaiah, see further, Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 161–166; and Tull, “Who Says What,” 157–168. 79 Couey, Reading, 206. 80  Couey, 205.

120   Katie M. Heffelfinger action in such inconsistent, if not outrightly contradictory, ways over the course of the crisis of 701 bce.”81 In a later theological crisis, that of exile, Second Isaiah takes up a parallel position and stands juxtaposed to Isaiah of Jerusalem’s proclamation. Links between these two sections resonate poetically via echoes produced by references to the former things and the presentation of the speaking deity.82 Rather than looking for a narrative progression between the sections of the book, a move complicated by a wide historical gap, the text’s own presentation offers the possibility of treating the relationships on analogy with poetic parataxis.83 That is, prophetic materials from distinct historical situations stand juxtaposed in the present text, inviting the reader to find resonances as well as dissonances between them.84 There is, of course, a temporal progression between these sections, but no “narrative” relating these distinct historical periods of prophetic activity overtly ties the sections, and the disjunction between chapters 39 and 40 is more prominent than is continuity in this regard. Indeed, the poetic opening words of Second Isaiah break into a previous narrative context regarding an earlier period without explanation or introduction. This juxtaposition is not merely the successive adding on of later prophetic texts.85 Rather, as Schramm points out, “the growth of the book cannot be conceived as having arisen from the simple juxtaposition of the three major blocks of material. It appears, rather, that at each successive stage in the book’s growth the earlier material was reshaped by the concerns of the later material.”86 Instead, conceiving of the relationships between 1–39, 40–55, and 56–66 in light of poetic considerations means employing “nonnarrative strategies of reading, where fragmentation and the accommodation of fragmentation” are part of the readerly response to what stands as a likely intentional development by an editorial hand.87 In an Isaian poetic mode, the exilic voice takes up images and theological claims and re-presents them in a new voice to a new crisis.

81  Couey, 185. 82 Williamson, Book, 67–77, details a proposal for the development of the “former things” and “latter things” motif by Second Isaiah out of a First Isaian passage. 83  See the proposal of Couey, “Poetry and Redaction,” who argues for reading “the textualized Book of Isaiah as a collection of . . . poetic sequences” (p. 5). For a helpful discussion of parataxis, see Dobbs-Allsopp, Biblical Poetry, 199–200. 84  This approach builds upon the insights of Melugin, Formation, 87–89, who argues that the arrangement of units within Isa 40–55 works on “analogy” (p. 87) with the form “inside the genre unit,” noting that within “the individual genre unit language is not used discursively.” Melugin’s approach applies the mode of cohesion of individual units to the arrangement of Isa 40–55. Such an approach expanded to the relationship between larger bodies of text, 1–39, 40–55, 56–66, is suggested here. As with Melugin’s proposal, such an approach does not minimize the importance of editorial hands. Rather, with Melugin, one might say that “the method assumes the likelihood that the arranger, sharing something of the spirit of the poet understood that he was dealing with the language of poetry and arranged his material in artistic fashion also” (p. 89). 85  As Hays, “Book of Isaiah,” notes, “As more and more attention is drawn to the interconnections among the book’s sections, it becomes more and more difficult to imagine that the authors and tradents of the book’s later strata worked without paying close attention to the earlier strata” (p. 550). 86 Schramm, Opponents of Third Isaiah, 50. 87  Dobbs-Allsopp, “Poetry, Hebrew,” 555.

Isaiah 40-55   121 Isa 40–55 appears even more closely bound to Isa 56–66. From a literary perspective the style of Isa 40–55 is more similar to Isa 56–66 than to Isa 1–39. It has become common to disparage the poetic quality of Isa 56–66 in comparison with that of Isa 40–55.88 However, Sommer quite rightly highlights a significant number of similarities in poetic style throughout Isa 40–66.89 Similarly, Baltzer comments on the immediate impression of Isa 56–66’s “poetic qualities” gleaned from the first chapter.90 Historical narratives and narratives about the life of the prophet remain absent. The prophet continues to be anonymous. Parataxis continues between units (e.g., 58:14/59:1; 59:21/60:1; 62:12/63:1) as do refutations of implied quotations (e.g., 56:3, 12; 58:3). Some favorite terminology from Second Isaiah continues (e.g., grass 66:13; marriage imagery 62:4–5, birth imagery 66:7), as do apparent allusions to First Isaian materials (e.g., 59:3/1:15; 65:25/11:6-8).91 Some of Second Isaiah’s characteristic poetic techniques disappear or diminish in these chapters, for example, participial chains extolling the deity (though note 56:8). Contrasts between judgment and comfort continue; however, these are given a more obvious temporal progression than had been common in Second Isaiah (though note 54). Distinctive themes emerge in this portion of the book that merit attribution to a somewhat different rhetorical setting (e.g., Temple, though note 44:28), and there is further development of motifs that are familiar from Second Isaiah here (e.g., birth and maternal imagery become more frequent). A concern about Yhwh’s servant continues from Isa 40–55 into 56–66. As Willem Beuken has noted, however, although within 40–55 the servant references are singular until 54:17, within 56–66 they are plural.92 Each of these shared features point toward a close connection between 40–55 and 56–66.93 Third Isaiah, if it is a separately authored unit at all, appears to have been written drawing upon other Isaian materials, including Second Isaiah, sharing themes and imagery with them but developing them in a discontinuous and tensive way, one not out of harmony with Second Isaiah’s internal tensions and movement.94 It is clear that the variety of proposals regarding the composition of the whole of Isaiah, as well as studies oriented toward the interpretation of the whole, reserve an important place for Isa 40–55. It appears that such study will be a focus of work on these chapters for some time to come.95 88  E.g., Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56–66, says of Isa 56–66: “At no point is it informed by purely aesthetic considerations, and thus, where a pleasing effect is obtained, it is more by accident than by design” (p. 37). Hanson, Dawn, refers to a portion of Isa 60 as having “a grotesque mixing of metric patterns” (p. 59). 89 Sommer, Prophet Reads, 188–189. 90  Baltzer, “Book,” 270. 91 Emmerson, Isaiah 56–66, refers to the female personification of Zion as “one of the most striking themes serving to link Second and Third Isaiah” (p. 42). Gruber, “Motherhood,” 353, notes the distinctiveness of “maternal expressions” in Isa 40–66. Williamson, Book, regarding Third Isaiah, refers to “numerous citations of and allusions to both earlier parts of Isaiah” (p. 19). 92  Beuken, “Main Theme,” 67–87; see also Seitz, “Book of Isaiah 40–66,” 318. 93  Beuken, “Main Theme,” presents the servant observation as an element in “an argument for the idea that the three principal parts of BI were not composed independently of one another” (p. 67). 94 Schramm, Opponents of Third Isaiah, 21, urges caution about rejecting the idea of single authorship of 40–66, noting that stylistic differences and apparent contradictions are not in themselves determinative. See also Sommer, Prophet Reads, 191–192. 95  See further, Melugin, “Isaiah 40–66,” 142–194.

122   Katie M. Heffelfinger

6.3.  Key Messages Second Isaiah offers, above all, an encounter with Yhwh through the deity’s voice.96 This encounter reflects the crisis of exile and forges relational renewal through a number of poetic and thematic devices. Tension and juxtaposition are key to the way this body of materials, however compiled, ultimately makes meaning.97 Interwoven motifs, departure commands, refutation, and compelling personification contribute to a message that offers a realistic comfort, one that takes account of the audience’s apparent sense of abandonment. Its message of comfort, restoration, and reconciliation is one that wears away audience resistance poetically. It does not aim solely to move the audience to a specified action, such as return, though that is certainly one aspect of its intended outcome. Rather, it works intensely and affectively, re-establishing trust, and realigning loyalties.98 Comfort is a significant theme that has played a dominant role in many assessments of the message and meaning of Second Isaiah.99 Yet the opening proclamation of comfort stands in tension with numerous indictments, refutations, and expressions of divine wrath (e.g., 42:14–25; 43:22–28; 45:9–25; 48:1–11; 50:1–3).100 Yhwh’s voice, in which the majority of the text’s lines are presented, speaks with confident grandeur throughout, and the attitudes this voice adopts toward the audience include both consolation and anger.101 A poetic paratactic style characterizes the movement between units. That is, the poetry exhibits sudden shifts of topic, theme, or mood, without explanation or narrative development.102 Concepts and motifs stand in contrast, paradox, and even open contradiction to one another (e.g., “remember the former things,” Isa 46:9; “do not remember the former things,” Isa 43:18 NRSV). These elements, when read as a meaningful final form, are aspects of these chapters’ poetic mode of meaning-making. Typical of Second Isaian style is the picking up of thematic threads and developing them in divergent ways. Cosmic creation images, water, fire, the wilderness, birth, and 96  Kapelrud, “Main Concern,” referring to Second Isaiah’s exilic-period audience, writes, “To reach them with the words of God, the only real God, was his primary concern” (p. 51). See also Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 161–166, 275–276. 97  Cf. Clifford, Fair Spoken, who points to the “persistent use of five contrasted concepts” (p. 39). 98  See further, Heffelfinger, I Am Large; “Servant”; and Tull, “Who Says What,” 159. 99 Westermann, Isaiah 40–66, refers to “Comfort, comfort my people” as “the words which serve to summarize the prophet’s whole proclamation” (p. 13). Muilenburg, “Book of Isaiah,” calls “comfort” a “major theme throughout” (p. 403). Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55 (pp. 53–54) describe the restoration of Jerusalem in “comfort” language as the third of five elements of Second Isaiah’s “theological perspective” (p. 49) that they delineate. 100  See, e.g., Kapelrud, “Main Concern,” on “harder and harsher” elements (p. 52). 101  See further Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 175–274. Such a mixture leads Kapelrud, “Main Concern,” to conclude: “The usual designation ‘prophet of consolation’ may thus contain some truth, but not the whole and probably not the most important truth” (p. 52). 102  For a definition of parataxis, see O’Connor, “Parataxis and Hypotaxis,” 879; for discussion of such features in biblical poems see, e.g., Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations, 13.

Isaiah 40-55   123 marriage, among other themes, appear and reappear in different combinations and with different aims.103 In places, passages appear remarkably similar (e.g., Isa 49:14–26 and 54) yet on closer inspection convey somewhat divergent perspectives and emphases.104 The chapters offer comfort, explicitly, repetitively, and emphatically, but they do not do so through an unmitigated stream of consoling language. Rather, by juxtaposing consolation and wrath, the poetry intensifies the appeal of the offered comfort and underscores the sovereign right of Yhwh to claim the title “Comforter.” The homecoming motif has attracted attention and has been central in some influential readings of the prophet’s proclaimed message. Clifford, for example, states his interpretation with exemplary clarity writing, “Second Isaiah, in a few closely argued speeches of considerable length urges his fellow Judahites to join him in that act through which they will become Israel.”105 It is evident in context that Clifford means to associate “becom[ing] Israel” with “the new Exodus-Conquest,” a motif he calls “the central idea of Second Isaiah.”106 Return and reconciliation are indeed key elements of this work’s proclamation of comfort, and yet the passages that command the exiles to depart Babylon do not stand alone as the clear and single aim of this text’s prophetic message. They present one mode through which reconciliation can be envisioned and realized in the exiles’ experience. Geographic restoration,107 as envisioned in Isa 48:20; 52:7–12, pairs with relational reconciliation (e.g., marriage imagery in Isa 54:1–17),108 the obliteration of fear and shame (e.g., 41:10, 13, 14; 43:1, 5; 44:2, 8; 51:7; 54:4) and the abandonment of divine wrath (48:9; 54:8–9) to illustrate a “comfort” that addresses the crisis of exile on multiple levels. Another feature that merits consideration in determining overall message is the citation and rebuttal of complaint. In two places the divine speaking voice cites the voices of figures who represent the audience or are closely associated with them (Jacob and Zion) and 103  Cf. Clifford, Fair Spoken, who notes regarding Second Isaiah: “The core of his thought he often only alludes to; he counts on the tradition to be so deeply ingrained in his audience’s heart and head that mere hints suffice for the whole to be called up” (p. 38). Clifford sees the message as conveyed through “the use of paired ideas or polarities” (p. 5). For a list of repeated images, see Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 285–286. 104  The two passages share a feminine personification, the theme of the multiplication of her children, and apparent references to rebuilding. However, in Isa 49:14–20, there is a rebuttal of Zion’s complaint (vv. 15–21), a contrast between her apparent forgetfulness and the divine memory (vv. 15, 21), and an emphasis on the continuity of the divine concern for her (vv. 15–16). In chapter 54, the tone directed at the barren woman is overwhelmingly consoling, and the admission of momentary abandonment (vv. 7–8) contrasts with the promise of continual attention in 49:16. 105 Clifford, Fair Spoken, 5. 106  Clifford, 5. 107  See Tiemeyer, Comfort, for an argument in favor of “a Judahite provenance” for Second Isaiah (p. 2). 108  See Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital Metaphors, esp. 23–30. Moughtin-Mumby indicates problems with scholarly reference to “the marriage metaphor,” particularly that not all such language “is inherently related to marriage” and the tendency to imply that “such metaphorical language is homogeneous” (p. 24). In observing the explicit references to “husband” in Isa 54:5, Moughtin-Mumby comments on “the rarity of an explicit marital metaphor in the prophetic books” (p. 132) and indicates that “the tendency of traditional scholarship to find ‘the marriage metaphor’ everywhere has desensitized many to the potential impact of 54:5. Thus, paradoxically, where a marriage metaphor finally appears, its significance is passed over” (p. 133).

124   Katie M. Heffelfinger refutes their charges of divine forgetfulness or abandonment (Isa 40:27–31; 49:14–50:3).109 Tull emphasizes the rhetorical power of such passages, writing that “these represent, and seek to enact, the conquest of views presumably found in the audience’s own world.”110 These passages point both to the perspective to which the poems are likely addressed, and the centrality of the Yhwh-Israel relationship to the work’s overall concerns. Recent scholarship has widely recognized the extent to which these chapters develop their message through allusion. Key studies by Tull Willey, Sommer, and Linafelt have highlighted the extent to which the exilic prophet-poet drew upon other Israelite literature to convey the text’s message.111 These include Jeremiah, Psalms, and First Isaiah.112 The book of Lamentations also contributes vital context for these chapters’ proclamation.113 While Lamentations complains against an apparent divine silence and Zion’s lack of a comforter, Second Isaiah thematically announces divine comfort and does so emphatically in the divine voice, breaking any such silence with its announcement of comfort.114 Thus, Second Isaiah’s message of relational reconciliation between Yhwh and Israel addresses concerns voiced by other biblical texts and bolsters its own message’s claims through heavily allusive language.115 Second Isaiah develops its message of relational renewal through compelling personifications. Much attention has been devoted to the “Servant,” both in studies of the text’s composition and in interpretive work. Tull Willey offers the illuminating insight that the juxtaposition of the Servant with Zion is an element of Second Isaiah’s intertextual relationship with Lamentations.116 In Lamentations, Zion dominates and “the man” appears as the somewhat more hopeful element in chapter 3.117 Second Isaiah juxtaposes the two repeatedly, and through the Servant’s progressively increasing identification with Yhwh and the explicit refutation of Zion’s complaint and somewhat negatively tinged characterizations, works to realign audience loyalty from Zion to Yhwh’s work through the servant.118 Thus, working alongside the encounter produced by the dominance of 109  Kapelrud, “Main Concern,” 56. 110  Tull, “Who Says What,” 168. 111  Tull Willey, Remember; Sommer, Prophet Reads, and Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations. 112  On Second Isaiah’s relationship with Jeremiah, Psalms, and Pentateuch, see, e.g., Tull Willey, Remember, 267–269. Sommer, Prophet Reads, 167–169, highlights both Jeremiah and portions of First Isaiah, and also notes the use of Psalms and some Pentateuchal texts. Williamson, Book, 113, as noted, argues for a literary relationship with First Isaiah. By contrast, Tull Willey, Remember, states that in Second Isaiah, “substantive signs of influence by the eighth-century prophets Isaiah, Micah, Amos and Hosea are not easily found” (p. 270). 113  See further Tull Willey, Remember, 265–266. 114  On divine silence in Lamentations, see Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations, 39. Regarding Second Isaiah’s response see Tull Willey, Remember, 130–132; Heffelfinger, “ ‘I Am He”; Heffelfinger, I Am Large, 98. 115  See Sommer, Prophet Reads, who sees this use of allusion as “a means of persuasion” (p. 159). Tull Willey, Remember, 263–264, also discusses the rhetorical impact of this feature. 116  See Tull Willey, Remember, 105, 218. 117  Tull Willey, Remember, notes that “just as Second Isaiah seems to have reemployed Daughter Zion from Lam 1–2, likewise the poet seems to have recollected the figure of Lam 3, casting him in the role of Yhwh’s servant” (p. 218). 118  Heffelfinger, “Servant.”

Isaiah 40-55   125 Yhwh’s speaking voice, these personifications develop Second Isaiah’s rhetorical aims of urging the audience toward reconciliation and acceptance of divinely offered comfort.

6.4. Conclusion Isa 40–55 stands as the main exilic voice in the larger book of Isaiah. Discussion will undoubtedly continue about how it came to be in the form in which it now stands, and about what role it played in the formation of the book as a whole. Similarly, discussion about the key messages of these chapters is far from closed, and it is to be hoped that continued work will further unpack the richness of their message and meaning. Application of new insights and approaches, such as attention to poetics, clarification of understandings of persuasiveness, and appreciation of scribal and oral practices, as well as integration of these with older models offer significant promise.119

Bibliography Albertz, Rainer. Israel in Exile: The History and Literature of the Sixth Century b.c.e. StBibLit 3. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2003. Baltzer, Klaus. “The Book of Isaiah.” HTR 103 (2010): 261–270. Berges, Ulrich F. The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition and Final Form. HBM 46. Translated by Millard C. Lind. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix, 2012. Beuken, Willem A. M. “The Main Theme of Trito-Isaiah ‘The Servants of Yhwh.’ ” JSOT 47 (1990): 67–87. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 56–66. AB 19B. New York: Doubleday, 2003. Childs, Brevard S. Isaiah. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Childs, Brevard S. “Retrospective Reading of the Old Testament Prophets.” ZAW 108 (1996): 362–377. Clifford, Richard J. Fair Spoken and Persuading: An Interpretation of Second Isaiah. Theological Inquiries. New York: Paulist Press, 1984. Couey, J.  Blake. “Poetry and Redaction in the Book of Isaiah.” Paper presented at SBL Formation of Isaiah Section. Boston, MA, November 18, 2017. Couey, J.  Blake. Reading the Poetry of First Isaiah: The Most Perfect Model of the Prophetic Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Dobbs-Allsopp, Fred W. Lamentations. Interpretation. Louisville, KY: John Knox Press, 2002. Dobbs-Allsopp, Fred W. On Biblical Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Dobbs-Allsopp, Fred W. “Poetry, Hebrew.” In New Interpreters’ Dictionary of the Bible, vol. 4, edited by Katharine Sakenfeld, 550–558. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 2009. Duhm, Bernhard. Das Buch Jesaja. HAT 3. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1914. 119 Rendtorff, Canon, 171, comments on the possibilities offered by divergent methods. Couey, “Poetry and Redaction,” also points to the potential that “historical and literary approaches . . . could mutually inform one another” (p. 2).

126   Katie M. Heffelfinger Emmerson, Grace I. Isaiah 56–66. OTG. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Goldingay, John, and David Payne. Isaiah 40–55. 2 vols. ICC. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Gruber, Mayer I. “The Motherhood of God in Second Isaiah.” RB 90 (1983): 351–359. Hanson, Paul D. The Dawn of Apocalyptic. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1975. Hays, Christopher B. “The Book of Isaiah in Contemporary Research.” Religion Compass 5, no. 10 (2011): 549–566. Heffelfinger, Katie M. “ ‘I Am He, Your Comforter’: Second Isaiah’s Pervasive Divine Voice as Intertextual ‘Answer’ to Lamentations’ Divine Silence.” In Reading Lamentations Intertextually, edited by Brittany Melton and Heath Thomas. LHBOTS. Bloomsbury T&T Clark, forthcoming. Heffelfinger, Katie M. I Am Large, I Contain Multitudes: Lyric Cohesion and Conflict in Second Isaiah. BIS 105. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Heffelfinger, Katie M. “The Servant in Poetic Juxtaposition in Isaiah 49:1–13.” In Biblical Poetry and the Art of Close Reading, edited by J.  Blake Couey and Elaine  T.  James, 184–198. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. Hermisson, Hans-Jürgen. “Einheit und Komplexität Dueterojesaja: Probleme der Redaktionsgeschichte von Jes 40–55.” In The Book of Isaiah/Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, edited by Jacques Vermeylen, 287–312. BETL 81. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1989. Kapelrud, Arvid S. “The Main Concern of Second Isaiah.” VT 32 (1982): 50–58. Linafelt, Tod. Surviving Lamentations: Catastrophe, Lament, and Protest in the Afterlife of a Biblical Book. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000. Mathews, Claire R. Defending Zion: Edom’s Desolation and Jacob’s Restoration (Isaiah 34–35) in Context. BZAW 236. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1995. McEntire, Mark. A Chorus of Prophetic Voices: Introducing the Prophetic Literature of Ancient Israel. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2015. Melugin, Roy F. The Formation of Isaiah 40–55. BZAW 141. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1976. Melugin, Roy F. “Isaiah 40–66 in Recent Research: The ‘Unity’ Movement.” In Recent Research in the Major Prophets, edited by Alan J. Hauser, 142–194. RRBS 1. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2008. ­­­­­Melugin, Roy  F. “Recent Form Criticism Revisited in an Age of Reader Response.” In The Changing Face of Form Criticism for the Twenty-First Century, edited by Marvin A. Sweeney and Ehud Ben Zvi, 46–64. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2003. Mettinger, Tryggve  N.  D. A Farewell to the Servant Songs: A Critical Examination of an Exegetical Axiom. Translated by Frederick  H.  Cryer. Scripta Minora. Lund, Sweden: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1983. Moughtin-Mumby, Sharon. Sexual and Marital Metaphors in Hosea, Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Ezekiel. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Muilenburg, James. “The Book of Isaiah, Chapters 40–66: Introduction, and Exegesis.” In Interpreters’ Bible, vol. 5, Ecclesiastes, The Song of Songs, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, edited by George Arthur Buttrick, 381–773. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1956. O’Connor, Michael Patrick. “Parataxis and Hypotaxis.” In New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, edited by Alex Preminger and T. V. F. Brogan, 879–880. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993. Rendtorff, Rolf. Canon and Theology: Overtures to an Old Testament Theology. Translated by Margaret Kohl. OBT. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1993.

Isaiah 40-55   127 Sawyer, John F. A. “Daughter of Zion and Servant of the Lord in Isaiah: A Comparison.” JSOT 44 (1989): 89–107. Schmidt, Uta. “Servant and Zion: Two Kinds of Future in Isa 49.” In “My Spirit at Rest in the North Country” (Zechariah 6.8): Collected Communications to the XXth Congress of the International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament, Helsinki 2010, edited by Hermann Michael Niemann and Matthias Augustin, 85–91. BEATAJ 57. Oxford: Peter Lang, 2011. Schramm, Brooks. The Opponents of Third Isaiah: Reconstructing the Cultic History of the Restoration. JSOTS 193. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Seitz, Christopher R. “The Book of Isaiah 40–66: Introduction, Commentary, and Reflections.” In New Interpreters’ Bible, vol. 6, Introduction to the Prophetic Literature, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Baruch, Letter of Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, edited by Leander E. Keck et al., 307–552. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 2001. Sommer, Benjamin D. A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusion in Isaiah 40–66. Contraversions. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998. Tate, Marvin E. “The Book of Isaiah in Recent Study.” In Forming Prophetic Literature: Essays on Isaiah and the Twelve in Honor of John  D.  W. Watts, edited by James  W.  Watts and Paul R. House, 22–56. JSOTS 235. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Toorn, Karel van der. Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007. Tull, Patricia K. “One Book, Many Voices; Conceiving of Isaiah’s Polyphonic Message.” In “As Those Who Are Taught”: The Interpretation of Isaiah from the LXX to the SBL, edited by Claire Mathews McGinnis and Patricia K. Tull, 279–314. SBLSymS 27. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Tull, Patricia K. “Who Says What to Whom: Speakers, Hearers, and Overhearers in Second Isaiah.” In Partners with God: Theological and Critical Readings of the Bible in Honor of Marvin A. Sweeney, edited by Shelley Birdsong and Serge Frolov, 157–168. Claremont, CA: Claremont School of Theology Press, 2017. Tull Willey, Patricia. Remember the Former Things: The Recollection of Previous Texts in Second Isaiah. SBLDS 161. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997. Westermann, Claus. Forschung am Alten Testament: Gesammelte Studien. Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1964. Westermann, Claus. Isaiah 40–66: A Commentary. Translated by David M. G. Stalker. OTL. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1969. Williamson, H.  G.  M. The Book Called Isaiah: Deutero-Isaiah’s Role in Composition and Redaction. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994.

chapter 7

Isa i a h 56 – 66 Andreas Schüle

7.1.  History of Research The technical term “Third Isaiah” (or Trito-Isaiah) was coined in the late nineteenth century by the Swiss scholar Bernhard Duhm, who was at the time one of the leading experts in the field of prophetic literature.1 According to Duhm, the book of Isaiah owes its existence to three individual prophets: the historical Isaiah of Jerusalem, who lived in the second half of the eighth century bce; a nameless prophet (“Second Isaiah”), who witnessed the downfall of the Babylonian Empire and the return of the exiled Jews to their homeland; and a student of this Second Isaiah, who prophesied to the generations after the return from exile. While Duhm supports a one-prophet hypothesis for Isa 56–66, he also recognizes the particular character of these chapters as a literary composition. More specifically, he sees two sections: Isa 56–60* and Isa 61–65(66)*.2 The first begins with the famous promise of salvation for foreigners and eunuchs and ends with the great vision of people streaming to Zion in Isa 60. The broadening of the perspective, along with the possibility of expanding the people of God to include individuals and groups that do not belong to Israel by genetic descent, frames this composition, at the center of which stands the critique of Israel (Isa 57–59). The second section opens with the appearance of the messianic spirit-bearer (Isa 61:1–3) and closes with the announcement of the new heaven and the new earth (Isa 65–66). Again, salvation history is the frame, this time around Israel’s confession of sin (Isa 63:7–64:11). In their own ways, both compositions emphasize the contrast between the divine promises and Israel’s dubious suitability as the people of God. Those who followed Duhm kept his perception of two sections, but these sections were increasingly viewed diachronically.3 A different approach was presented by Claus Westermann and Odil 1  For an overview of this, see Moser, Prophetie, 93–96. 2 Duhm, Jesaia, xv, xx, 390. 3 Moser, Prophetie, 96–98.

Isaiah 56–66   129 Hannes Steck, which is widely regarded as the standard model today.4 The starting point for this model is the dependence of Third Isaiah on Second Isaiah, which Steck sees as centered in Isa 60–62.5 In view of this dependence, he concludes that these chapters originally served as a new ending for Isa 40–55.6 However, Isa 60–62 was then sandwiched between materials of different genres and theological content. What was initially seen as a conclusion to Isa 40–55 thus came to be perceived to be the core of its own literary structure. This relative independence is further illustrated by a framework, which Steck recognizes primarily in Isa 56:1–8 and 65 (with Isa 66 as an ending designed for the book of Isaiah as a whole).7 A critical examination of these models cannot be given here.8 The problem with Steck’s approach may be that it offers a hypothesis that is plausible for the origin of Isa 60–62 but less so for the surrounding texts. Furthermore, it raises the question of why Isa 56–66 follows the development model of independent book with a core and a frame, though for Steck, in contrast to Duhm, Third Isaiah was never an independent piece of literature.

7.2.  Two Core Compositions If one examines Third Isaiah for elements of structure and arrangement, duplications become readily apparent.9 For example, there are two passages in which (eschatological) salvation is discussed: Isa 60–62 and Isa 65–66. These two passages parallel each other in that they both connect the final salvation events with Zion. The final age of the world dawns on Mount Zion, which has with repercussions for the whole cosmos. Furthermore, it is striking that there are not only two sections that deal with salvation expectations but also two that deal with Israel’s guilt. Even with a prevailing hope that Israel will finally find peace in Zion, no attempt is made to disguise the insight that Israel does not (yet) deserve it. In Isa 58:1–59:21, this is expressed in the form of prophetic criticism of both social and cultic issues. In Isa 63:7–64:11, this criticism is articulated in the form of a prayer of repentance by the people, who lay out their failures and insufficiencies before God. Viewed in the context Isa 56–66, the passages of criticism and promise form two theologically consistent compositions:   Criticism Promise Composition 1 Isa 58:1–59:21 (prophetic criticism) Isa 60:1–62:12 (messianic age) Composition 2 Isa 63:7–64:11 (self-accusation) Isa 65:1–25; 66:1–24 (new heaven and earth) 4  Cf. the research summary of Höffken, Jesaja, 91–100. 5 Steck, Studien, 14–19. 6  Steck, 17. 7  Steck, 36. For the frame of Third Isaiah in particular, see Stromberg, Exile, 40–72. 8  For a recent overview and critique of current research, cf. Tiemeyer, “Continuity,” 13–40. 9  For the following, cf. also Schüle, “Prophetische Kritik,” 225–246.

130   Andreas Schüle Interestingly, Steck already recognized that the promise of a new heaven and a new earth in Isa 65 should be understood as God’s answer to Israel’s prayer of repentance.10 The prayer of repentance is a form of self-accusation to which God (not uncritically) reacts. This raises the question as to whether one should understand chapters 58–62, too, as such a composition. For reasons that are peculiarly protestant, this approach has rarely been considered. Already Duhm had judged that Third Isaiah showed a marked tendency toward a “works righteousness” and, thus, was a theological step backward from Second Isaiah. According to Duhm, in Third Isaiah, salvation must be earned and purchased, as opposed to the free grace of Second Isaiah.11 Since then, this assessment has been represented in various forms. According to this understanding, Isa 60–62 contains an unconditional promise of salvation, whereas the announcements of Isa 58–59 are conditional.12 This divergence is seen as so fundamental that one cannot assume these to be part of a unified planned composition. And yet, what has been seen as “works righteousness” since Duhm could be the actual point of Isa 58–62: Israel should change its ways in order to be ready for the coming salvation, which is exactly what the “headline” in Isa 56:1 says: “Maintain justice, and do what is right, for soon my salvation will come and my deliverance be revealed” (NRSV).13 Overall, it is noteworthy that there are some “red threads” that connect Isa 58–59 and Isa 60–62. Criticism and promise are united by the light-dark metaphor that is characteristic of Isaiah as a whole. Israel’s state is seen as grasping in the dark and as a state of confinement and death (Isa 59:9–10):14 Therefore justice is far from us, and righteousness does not reach us; we wait for light, and lo! there is darkness; and for brightness, but we walk in gloom. We grope like the blind along a wall, groping like those who have no eyes; we stumble at noon as in the twilight, among the vigorous as though we were dead.

This self-evaluation positively correlates the image of light with the healing that will come with God’s (final) revelation, when the people finally put an end to their injustices (Isa 58:8): Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly; your vindicator shall go before you, the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.

What are here juxtaposed as analysis of the present and promise for the future becomes an expression of fulfillment in Isa 60:1–2: Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. For darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but the Lord will arise upon you, and his glory will appear over you. 10 Steck, Studien, 38. 11 Duhm, Jesaia, 389. 12 Steck, Studien, 18, 28–30; Stromberg, Exile, 12–13; Smith, Rhetoric, 164–186. 13  Schüle, “Build,” 90–102. 14  Biblical quotes are taken from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) unless otherwise indicated.

Isaiah 56–66   131 Salvation will come and even now already announces itself. Yet for Third Isaiah, it is also critical that Israel takes its role in the salvation event seriously, through appropriate cultic and ethical measures. In other words, piety and orthopraxy are integral components of salvation.

7.2.1.  The First Composition: Isaiah 58:1–62:12 With this in the background, we can take a closer look at the critical prophecies from Isa 58–59 and Isa 63–64.

7.2.1.1.  Isaiah 58–59 In Isa 58–59, one gets the impression that the repercussions of the Babylonian era are still being felt: the temple lies in ruins, and the city is not yet truly habitable (Isa 58:12). More important is the atmosphere conveyed. Although the exile was in fact over, there had not yet been any real experience of salvation. The political situation had certainly changed; the Persians may have been more tolerable overlords than their predecessors; yet neither in its internal nature nor its external form was Israel more than a province on the margins of the Persian Empire. Israel had not become any holier since the time of the exile; its sense of righteousness was not more pronounced, and its vulnerability to the worship of foreign gods no less alarming than in earlier periods (this impression is particularly conveyed in Isa 57:3–13). This realistic and self-critical view of the situation is found in Isa 58–59 and explains the qualitative leap between the here and now and the hoped-for salvation depicted in Isa 60–62.15 The project of a “new beginning” after the exile had not yet reached its goal. Furthermore, the prophecy of Third Isaiah contains a very clear sense of self-expectation. Precisely because the true Israel is not just any people, it must not resign itself to the abuses and flaws of what some (or even most) perceive to be “normal.” In Isa 58:1, someone, presumably a prophet, is charged with reproaching Israel for its apostasy: “Shout out, do not hold back! Lift up your voice like a trumpet! Announce to my people their rebellion, to the house of Jacob their sins.” Following that, the gap between pious gestures and moral actions, as seen in the indifference to the poor and needy, is denounced (Isa 58:4–7): Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to strike with a wicked fist. Such fasting as you do today will not make your voice heard on high. Is such the fast that I choose, a day to humble oneself? Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush, and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin? 15  Williamson, “Jacob,” 225.

132   Andreas Schüle Although this may sound like the social criticism of the book of Amos, there is a ­difference. Here, it is particularly about ritual and worship seeming to have no real meaning for or impact on ethics. This is shown first in terms of fasting. Fasting (in the sense of regulated rituals of self-denial and repentance) seems to have arisen in the exilic/post-exilic periods (see, e.g., the fast days in Zech 8:18–19).16 Third Isaiah makes the accusation against his audience that, though they hold to the practice of fasting, their actions contradict the spirit of these rituals. Someone who truly recognizes and regrets their transgressions and, thus, fasts cannot subjugate others but should take care of the needy. The other example that Third Isaiah addresses in this context is Sabbath observance (Isa 58:9b–12, 13–14): If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in. If you refrain from trampling the Sabbath, from pursuing your own interests on my holy day; if you call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honourable; if you honour it, not going your own ways, serving your own interests, or pursuing your own affairs; then you shall take delight in the Lord, and I will make you ride upon the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of your ancestor Jacob, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

The Sabbath as a weekly holiday is a central identity marker to the exilic/post-exilic community. As with fasting, it goes to the core of the emerging Jewish identity during these periods.17 Just as fasting is a rite that should have a real effect on one’s attitude and behavior toward one’s neighbor, the Sabbath is a rite that is meant to honor God (Isa 58:13). Here, too, Third Isaiah’s audience falls short as they go about their everyday activities or engage in empty talk (Isa 58:14). Thus, the prophetic criticism is primarily directed at themes of Jewish identity and, more precisely, the gap between orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Third Isaiah acknowledges that his audience does indeed seek after God (Isa 58:2). The criticism, however, is that this does not give rise to the appropriate ethical attitudes and behavior or to true fear of God. Unlike in the books associated with the eight-century prophets, Third Isaiah does not announce God’s judgment against Israel as a result of these grievances. The consequence of Israel’s failure is not punishment but instead delayed salvation. Deportation, loss of 16 Lux, Prophetie, 22–26. 17  For the role of Jewish identity markers (particularly the Sabbath), see Barstad, “Isaiah 56–66,” 53–61.

Isaiah 56–66   133 land, and the destruction of the temple are no longer threats, presumably because the people had already experienced this and, in some sense, it was already in the past. The observation and evaluation of the social and cultic deficits continues into Isa 59, although the conclusions are different. Here, too, one finds the picture of a people that lags behind what it should be. Particularly memorable is the picture of Israel’s sins hiding God’s face (Isa 59:1–2): See, the Lord’s hand is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. Rather, your iniquities have been barriers between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.

It is worth noting several things about these verses. There is no threat of God’s wrath or judgment; rather, it is argued that Israel has obstructed their relationship with God through their own behavior.18 The relationship between the people and God is broken and with it, also, the prospect of salvation and healing. This motif of disruption or separation is expressed with the verb ‫( בדל‬hiphil), “to divide, separate.” This verb is firmly anchored in the priestly concept of order. God divides and differentiates the different parts of the world from one another and, in so doing, establishes them (Gen 1:4, 6, 7, 14, 18). This notion corresponds with instructions found in the Holiness Code that deal with the separation between the sacred and the profane (Lev 20:25–26). In Isa 59:2, this priestly terminology is taken up and turned upside down. With its sin, Israel creates a separation precisely where it should not exist, namely between God’s ear and the prayers of Israel. Here the text could take the turn that we know from Isa 58—namely, encouraging and exhorting Israel to turn from its sins and toward its God. That is not what happens here, though. Instead, following the confession of sin, all hope for change is transferred entirely to God (Isa 59:9).19 Thus, God arrives on the scene and takes on the role of the sole savior: He saw that there was no one, and was appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm brought him victory, and his righteousness upheld him. He put on righteousness like a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head; he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and wrapped himself in fury as in a mantle. (Isa 59:16–17)

In the context of Isa 59, this narrative passage is understood as God’s reaction to Israel’s confession of sin.

7.2.1.2.  Isaiah 60–62 Viewed in its larger context, Isa 60–62 envisions the salvation that awaits Israel once they have taken the prophetic admonition in Isa 58–59 to heart. Recent research has 18  The penitential prayer (Isa 63–64) stands in tension to this; here exactly the opposite is said— namely, that God caused the people to turn away from God (Isa 63:17). 19  Cf. Bautch, Glory, 2.

134   Andreas Schüle shown that these three chapters are likely not of one mold.20 Isa 60 is a prophetic oracle for Mount Zion as the recipient of God’s grace. However, Zion’s salvation appears to be something almost otherworldly, because it requires no less than a complete makeover of the world as one knows it: sun and moon will be retired, since the only source of light in this world-to-come will be God’s own glory (Isa 60:2, 19). In the political realm there will be a dramatic shift: no longer will Israelites be the ones who offer tribute to foreign nations; rather, the nations, in a ceaseless stream, will come and pay homage to the God who resides on Mount Zion (Isa 60:3–16; cf. Isa 49:17–26). Yet even in this blatant triumphalism, Isa 60:21 seconds the general sense in Isa 58–59 that Israel has yet to become a righteous people. There is a significant change in perspective and sentiment as one transitions from Isa 60 to 61. Here, a prophetic figure announces the good news of liberation and healing to a group of people who are described as imprisoned and suffering (Isa 61:1; cf. Isa 42:22). But whereas Isa 60 envisions the return of Zion’s scattered children from the far ends of the world, the addressees in Isa 61 appear to be the people who are living among the ruins of Jerusalem, waiting for the desolation to come to an end (Isa 61:4), which connects with the view of the destroyed city in Isa 58:12. Interestingly, Isa 61:2 seems to employ the idea of a “year of release” (“a year of Yhwh’s favour”) that ends the time of servitude to foreign nations. It is quite conceivable that Isa 60 was written with the different diaspora groups in mind, whereas Isa 61 addresses the Judean population that had remained in the country. Isa 62:1–9 may well be an intentional synthesis of Isa 60 and 61, since here the prophetic voice (apparently the same as in Isa 61) returns to Zion’s fate and rejoices in her impending restoration. There is also a slightly different, less triumphalist and more modest, perspective on the foreign nations; they are not cast in the role of vassals of Zion but instead appear as bystanders who witness Zion’s righteousness and glory. Similarly, the redemptive experience of Zion’s children is not that they will finally become the suzerain but that they will be able to enjoy their own produce rather than having to surrender it to other nations (Isa 62:8–9). Looking at Isa 58–62 from a sociological point of view, one notices that Israel is presented as a largely monolithic society. All the people are targeted by the prophetic critique in Isa 58–59, and they are all the recipients of the salvific promise in Isa 60–62. This may not reflect the differences between the various groups that subsequently came together in the Persian province Yehud after the exile, but it does reflect that such differences had not yet led to solidified divisions between these groups. The operative distinction is Israelites versus foreign nations, “us” versus “them.” This distinction, however, changes, in the second composition of Third Isaiah.

20 Spans, Stadtfrau, 63–67; for a recent proposal to read Isa 60–62 (with the rest of Third Isaiah) as a unity, cf. Abalodo, Structure, 115–185.

Isaiah 56–66   135

7.3.  The Second Composition Turning to the second composition of Third Isaiah, one encounters several literary genres that one would not ordinarily expect to find in a prophetic book. In particular, this second composition is characterized by the “people’s prayer of repentance” (Isa 63:7–64:11) and the divine response to this prayer (Isa 65:1–25).

7.3.1.  The Prayer of Repentance Recently, a lot of work has been done on this particular genre.21 It seems that this form was defined, if not first developed, in the post-exilic period and, as such, captures the religious self-identity of Israel during this period.22 The prayer of repentance is divided into roughly two parts:23

1. Retrospection: the memory of God’s earlier miracles—Isa 63:7–14 2. Introspection: the confession of their own guilt before God—Isa 63:15–64:11

The first part, the retrospection, looks back to the time of the exodus and the desert wandering up through the entry into the land, where God “brought the people to rest” (Isa 63:14) as expressed here in Deuteronomistic language. This phase, “the days of old,” has a three-part structure that is reminiscent of the pattern of historical interpretation known from the Deuteronomistic History (e.g., in the so-called judges cycle).24 In Third Isaiah, the drama of history is described in three acts: (a) God finds God’s people in need and saves them out of love and mercy (Isa 63:8–9); (b) the people turn away from God (Isa 63:10), whereupon God hands them over to their enemies; and (c) Israel remembers its prehistory, Moses, and the salvation from Egypt and, thus, is finally brought to rest by God’s spirit (Isa 63:14). This pattern is then applied by the community to its own present situation. Again, it is recapitulated that God has rejected his once-beloved but now, as before, rebellious and disobedient people (Isa 63:17): Why, O Lord, do you make us stray from your ways and harden our heart, so that we do not fear you? Turn back for the sake of your servants, for the sake of the tribes that are your heritage. 21  Boda, “Confession,” 21–27; Balentine, “Ready,” 11–16. 22  Bautch, “Lament,” 98. 23  A more detailed outline than can be developed here is offered by Bautch, “Lament,” 86–87. 24  Many have observed that the prayer of repentance uses Deuteronomistic language and thought forms (cf. Bautch, “Lament,” 88–90). This does not need to be understood as Deuteronomistic theology, however, but may rather be a critical reflection on whether the Deuteronomistic view of history can apply to the current situation. This may also apply to the priestly theology represented in Ezra 9 and Neh 10 among other passages (cf. Boda, “Confession,” 34–43).

136   Andreas Schüle Apparently, this ties into the expectation from the prayer that God will once again, as in “the days of old” reclaim his people and bring them to rest (Isa 63:19a): “We have long been like those whom you do not rule, like those not called by your name.” This rescue is still to come. Israel finds itself, as it has before in its history, at the point where the turn toward salvation is expected to happen but has not yet occurred (Isa 64:7–12): There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquity. Yet, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. Do not be exceedingly angry, O Lord, and do not remember iniquity forever. Now consider, we are all your people. Your holy cities have become a wilderness, Zion has become a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation. Our holy and beautiful house, where our ancestors praised you, has been burned by fire, and all our pleasant places have become ruins. After all this, will you restrain yourself, O Lord? Will you keep silent, and punish us so severely?

This is where the prayer ends, which begs the question of whether the old pattern still applies, whether the third step—God’s mercy—will come through once again. The fact that God had not yet intervened and the temple remained in ruins raised the possibility that the relationship with God had been ultimately and irreversibly severed. It is interesting that here, unlike in Isa 58 and 59, evidence of Israel’s guilt apparently does not (any longer) require a prophet. The prophetic criticism has become Israel’s self-accusation. That Israel calls upon its God for salvation can be found in all the stages of the formation of the Old Testament, but the self-accusation and admission of their sin is only in the later layers, to which Isa 63–64, Neh 9, Ezra 9, and Dan 9 most likely belong.25 In Third Isaiah, the prayer of confession is directed toward God (Isa 64:15) and addresses God as “father” (Isa 63:17; 64:7).26 This is the only such occurrence in the Old Testament. In all other uses of God as “father,” it is said that God is Israel’s father (Deut 32:6) or God expresses disappointment that Israel does not (or not rightly) call upon God as father (Jer 3; 4:11; 31:19). Thus the prayer of repentance can be read as Israel finally doing what it had failed to do before—supported by the hope that God would still be willing to accept the role of father.27

25  An important aspect of the literary form of the prayers of repentance is the density of intertextual references, which suggests that the ideas presupposed by these prayers already exist in a wide swath of parts of the Old Testament. Cf. Boda, “Confession,” 46–49, and specifically on the book of Isaiah as a whole, Gärtner, “Why,” 156–162. 26  For this theme as a whole, see Böckler, Gott, 185–219. 27  The designation of God as father can be seen in the new definitions of kinship relationships that Third Isaiah chooses as an expression of identity; cf. Bautch, Glory, 96–98.

Isaiah 56–66   137

7.3.2.  God’s Answer to the Prayer of Repentance God’s reaction makes it clear that in Third Isaiah the prayer of repentance is not just a confession of sin28 but is, in a narrow sense, an address to God that expects an answer. Thus, Third Isaiah creates space for a critical perception of this prayer of repentance insofar as God’s answer is not exactly what the prayer of repentance hopes for. This becomes clear in comparing Isa 63–64 with Neh 9. In Nehemiah the prayer of repentance is not followed by a divine speech but by the voluntary agreement of the people to obey the Torah (Neh 10). This voluntary agreement, in turn, suggests that a new beginning is possible. In Neh 9, the possibility is open for Israel as a collective to become what it always should have been, provided that it takes the Torah of its God to heart. For Neh 9, the self-purification of the people of God is decisive in enforcing internally the definition of the Torah and externally the separation from all foreign influences. The situation in the divine speech in Isa 65 is different.29 There is no (longer a) promise that God will have mercy on God’s people as a whole but only on those who prove to be true and faithful.30 The pattern of the past is adopted in Isa 65, but at the same time, a new election is announced. This innovation lies in the opening, with its difficult language (Isa 65:1–2): I was ready to be sought out by those who did not ask, to be found by those who did not seek me. I said, “Here I am, here I am,” to a nation that did not call on my name. I held out my hands all day long to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices.

It is unclear at this point whether the statement “I let myself be found by those who did not want to know anything about me” refers to the time of the first revelation of Yhwh to Israel—that is, in the Exodus from Egypt and the giving of the Torah at Sinai—or to the whole of the history of Israel from the beginning through the exilic period. It is clear, however, that God’s perception of the past is completely different from that expressed in the people’s prayer of repentance. It is not the dramatic relationship cycle of initial affection, the people’s apostasy, and the subsequent reconciliation. Isa 65, contrary to this depiction, provides a summary in which Israel collectively was never really interested in God (“I let those who never asked for me seek me”). In this way, the actual theme of the divine speech is the question of who will be God’s people in the future. 28  For the form-critical connection between penance and confession, see Bautch, “Lament,” 90. 29  Rom-Shiloni, “Setting,” 67, shows that Israel’s prayer of repentance established the “orthodox” form of belief and pushed back on other, less-orthodox forms, such as the “lament of the people” in the post-exilic period, at least within certain groups. This is how Neh 9, particularly, should be characterized. Because of the divine speech, however, Isa 63–64 would then be seen as a critical take on this orthodoxy. The fact that God does not accept this prayer as the foundation for a new covenantal relationship but creates an image of the true servants of God should be seen as evidence of the religious diversity of post-exilic Judaism. 30  Cf. Gärtner, “Why,” 152.

138   Andreas Schüle Third Isaiah illustrates this new beginning with the image of the vineyard, as is typical of the book of Isaiah as a whole (Isa 65:8): Thus says the Lord: As the wine is found in the cluster, and they say, “Do not destroy it, for there is a blessing in it,” so I will do for my servants’ sake, and not destroy them all.

The statement “Do not destroy it, for there is a blessing/could be a blessing in it” is probably a proverb that generally urges caution against discarding things too quickly, because one can never know if there is some good in it.31 Third Isaiah connects this proverb with the image of the vineyard, in which something good could still be found. Thus, this image of the vineyard stands in contrast with that of Isa 5:1–7 and Isa 27:2–6, particularly with the fact that God does not reject the vineyard as a whole (Isa 5) or rebuild it all together (Isa 27). Instead, God seeks the good within the vineyard. The good juice is to be preserved while the pulp is to be discarded. This image, in turn, also calls to mind the image of Yhwh as the one pressing the grapes under his feet in Isa 63:1–6. This image is applied to the true servants of God in Isa 65:9, that is, to those who are to come forth from Jacob/Israel just as the new wine comes forth from grapes: I will bring forth descendants from Jacob, and from Judah inheritors of my mountains; my chosen shall inherit it, and my servants shall settle there.

The idea is that this people of God does not yet exist but is just now emerging. Verse 9 marks a new idea: God will (pf. cons.) bring forth descendants of Jacob who shall inherit the land. The Gola is not referred to alone or even primarily here. For Third Isaiah, unlike Ezra/Nehemiah, there is no group predestined for God’s work of salvation. Thus Isaiah speaks of “progeny” (seed) but not with the addition of “holy” as in Ezra 9:2. For Ezra/Nehemiah, there is indeed something like a DNA of the true Israel that begins with Abraham, whose “rest” is in the Gola, and it is from this nucleus alone that the postexilic new beginning will be formed. In contrast, for Third Isaiah, the true servants are those who act according to the will of God, as expressed in Isa 66:2–5, who “tremble” before the Word of God.32 Viewing God’s answer within the social and historical context of Yehud naturally raises the question of whether Third Isaiah identified particular groups of his time with the “servants of God” in contrast to other groups that did not belong to this category. In this regard, there are three possibilities: (a) One can think of the different groups that developed a sense of their Jewish identity in the Persian period in potentially conflicting ways: the non-exilic Jews, the Babylonian Gola, and diaspora groups in other parts of the world (e.g., Egypt).33 Perhaps the conflict between Jerusalem and the Samaritans also played a certain role here. (b) The “servants of God” and their opponents refer 31  Cf. Blenkinsopp, Isaiah, 276, with the note on Deut 9:26. 33 Schramm, Opponents of Third Isaiah, 112–172.

32  In contrast, see Ezra 9:4; 10:3.

Isaiah 56–66   139 to ­different groups (or strata) within a particular societal framework. Thus, current research considers the possibility that Third Isaiah belonged to Levitical circles that rebelled against the Zadokite priesthood.34 (c) It is finally possible that the new people of God, to whom a new heaven and a new earth are promised (Isa 65–66), was a collective movement made up of members of various groups within the Judean society.35 This new prophetic movement would have made societal boundaries permeable, since membership was not defined by birth or origin, but by choice and effort. In support of this third possibility, Isa 56:1–8 states that even foreigners and eunuchs are granted entry into this new people of God.

7.4. Conclusion Overall, one can observe characteristic shifts in the perception of prophecy within the two parts of the composition of Third Isaiah.36 We can now state that these shifts are primarily due to an altered understanding of the historical relationship between God and people. The first composition is based on the paradigm of the history of judgment and salvation found in Second Isaiah. The periods of Israel’s history, old Israel, the exile, and the return, form the episodes of an overall narrative arch that would reach its ­conclusion in a final and irreversible period of salvation. Yet this process came to a standstill, and it is just here that the prophecy of Isa 57:14–62:12 begins. The criticism of Israel has as its goal to regain the momentum of salvation history. The emphasis of Isa 63:7–65:25 is different. Here, too, the paradigm of salvation history is initially called upon in the form of the prayer of repentance, but it is thoroughly refuted by the divine response. The somewhat revolutionary prophetic message is that God was now collecting his people anew and from those who are truly God’s “servants.” Thus, belonging to the people of God would be a question of self-determination and self-commitment to the will of God. Making this clear, with all its consequences (cf. Isa 66), is the final task of prophecy.

Bibliography Abalodo, Sebastien. Structure et Théologie dans le Trito-Isaïe: Une contribution à l’unité du Livre. Tesi Gregoriana 208. Rome: Gregorian & Biblical Press, 2014.

34  This view was pioneered by Hanson, Dawn of the Apocalyptic, 95–96. 35  Schüle, “Who Is the True Israel?,” 174–176. 36  What had to be neglected here are the connecting pieces that connect the two parts of the composition (Isa 63:1–6) or establish the connection with Second Isaiah (Isa 56:1–8, 9–12; 57:1–13). Neither was the relationship between Isa 65 and 66 specifically dealt with. In Isaiah research since Duhm, Isa 66 has been considered to have been composed as the conclusion of the whole book of Isaiah.

140   Andreas Schüle Balentine, Samuel. “I Was Ready to Be Sought Out by Those Who Did Not Ask.” In Seeking the Favor of God, vol. 1, The Origins of Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism, edited Mark J. Boda, Daniel K. Falk, and Rodney Alan Werline, 1–20. SBLEJL 21. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Barstad, Hans. “Isaiah 56–66 in Relation to Isaiah 40–55: Why a New Reading Is Necessary.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans Barstad, 41–62. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Bautch, Richard. Glory and Power, Ritual and Relationship: The Sinai Covenant in the Postexilic Period. LHBOTS 471. New York: Bloomsbury, 2009. Bautch, Richard. “Lament Regained in Trito-Isaiah’s Penitential Prayer.” In Seeking the Favor of God, vol. 1, The Origins of Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism, edited by Mark J. Boda, Daniel K. Falk, and Rodney Alan Werline, 83–99. SBLEJL 21. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 56–66. AB 19B. New York: Doubleday, 2003. Böckler, Annette. Gott als Vater im Alten Testament: Traditionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zur Entstehung und Entwicklung eines Gottesbildes. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 2000. Boda, Mark  J. “Confession as Theological Expression: Ideological Origins of Penitential Prayer.” In Seeking the Favor of God, vol. 1, The Origins of Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism, edited by Mark J. Boda, Daniel K. Falk, and Rodney Alan Werline, 21–50. SBLEJL 21. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Duhm, Bernhard. Das Buch Jesaia. HKAT III/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 19143. Gärtner, Judith. “ ‘Why do you let us stray from your paths . . .’ (Isa 63:17): The Concept of Guilt in the Communal Lament Isa 63:7–64:11.” In Seeking the Favor of God, vol. 1, The Origins of Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism, edited by Mark J. Boda, Daniel K. Falk, and Rodney Alan Werline, 145–163. SBLEJL 21. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Hanson, Paul D. The Dawn of the Apocalyptic: The Historical and Sociological Roots of Jewish Apocalyptic Eschatology. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1975. Höffken, Peter. Jesaja: Der Stand der theologischen Diskussion. Darmstadt: WBG Academic, 2004. Lux, Rüdiger. Prophetie und Zweiter Tempel: Studien zu Haggai und Sacharja. FAT 65. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Moser, Christian. Umstrittene Prophetie: Die exegetisch-theologische Diskussion um die Inhomogenität des Jesajabuches von 1780 bis 1900. BThS 128. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 2012. Rom-Shiloni, Dalit. “Socio-ideological Setting or Settings for Penitential Prayers?” In Seeking the Favor of God, vol. 1, The Origins of Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism, edited by Mark J. Boda, Daniel K. Falk, and Rodney Alan Werline, 51–68. SBLEJL 21. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Schramm, Brooks. The Opponents of Third Isaiah: Reconstructing the Cultic History of the Restoration. JSOTS 193. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1995. Schüle, Andreas. “Build Up, Pass Through: Isaiah 57:14–62:12 as the Core Composition of Third Isaiah in the Book of Isaiah.” In Enduring Questions Answered Anew, edited by Richard Bautch and J. Todd Hibbard, 83–110. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2014. Schüle, Andreas. “Von der prophetischen Kritik zum Bußgebet des Volkes: Der Abschluss der Prophetie in Tritojesaja.” In Denkt nicht mehr an das Frühere! Begründungsressourcen in

Isaiah 56–66   141 Esra/Nehemiah und Jesaja 40–66 im Vergleich, edited by Maria Häusl, 25–46. BBB 184. Bonn: Bonn University Press, 2018. Schüle, Andreas. “Who Is the True Israel? Community, Identity, and Religious Commitment in Third Isaiah (Isaiah 56–66).” Int 73, no. 2 (2019): 174–184. Smith, Paul Allan. Rhetoric and Redaction in Trito-Isaiah: The Structure, Growth, and Authorship of Isaiah 56–66. VTS 62. Leiden: Brill, 1995. Spans, Andrea. Die Stadtfrau Zion im Zentrum der Welt: Exegese und Theologie von Jes 60–62. BBB 175. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015. Steck, Odil Hannes. Studien zu Tritojesaja. BZAW 203. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1991. Stromberg, Jacob. Israel after Exile: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Continuity and Discontinuity in Isaiah 40–66: History of Research.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans Barstad, 13–40. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Williamson, H. G. M. “Jacob in Isaiah 40–66.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans Barstad, 219–229. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014.

PA RT I I I

T H E WOR L D BE H I N D T H E TEXT

chapter 8

The N eo -Assy r i a n Con text of First Isa i a h C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays

8.1. Introduction “First Isaiah”, or Isaiah 1–39, includes texts from a number of different historical periods, but the core of these chapters is associated with the prophet Isaiah ben Amoz (or, Isaiah of Jerusalem), who lived and worked in the eighth century bce. Isaiah ben Amoz seems to have had a lengthy career. Isa 6:1 refers to a vision that took place in “the year King Uzziah died,” that is, 742 bce. Other early sections of the book contain prophecies about political events over a number of years, from the Syro-Ephramite War of 734–731 bce (e.g., Isa 7), to the Ashdod Affair of 714–712 bce (Isa 20), to the siege of Sennacherib in 701 bce (e.g., Isa 10; 22:8–11; 36–37). While it is possible that the prophet’s career began earlier or extended later than these dates, or both, it is not demonstrable. Because the Babylonian and Persian periods will be addressed in greater detail in the chapters 9 and 10 of this volume, this chapter focuses on the Neo-Assyrian period in which Isaiah of Jerusalem was active. After a discussion of the passages in Isa 1–39 that are the most likely to stem from this period, we will examine how the message of these texts may have been impacted by the experience of Assyrian hegemony over the kingdom of Judah and the literary role that Assyria plays in the book.

146   C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays

8.2.  The Book of Isaiah in the Neo-Assyrian Period The initial stages of the formation of Isaiah should be understood in light of what we know about the compilation and editing of Assyrian prophecies.1 In the Sargonid royal courts, prophetic oracles were preserved in daily records, later compiled for special occasions. Whether Isaiah’s prophecies were initially recorded by court scribes or by Isaiah and his disciples (8:1, 16), the book’s existence makes it clear that at some point they were viewed as having been validated by subsequent events and that it was for this reason that they were collected together and preserved. That this original eighth-­ century collection of oracles underwent further later editing and expansion en route to becoming the extant book of Isaiah is undisputed, but the extent and nature of this editing is a matter of significant contention. Some limit the surviving work of Isaiah ben Amoz to a handful of verses. It is likely, however, that large portions of chapters 3–23 and 28–31 are attributable to Isaiah ben Amoz. The corpus of such passages is sometimes called “Proto-Isaiah.” A number of these passages are discussed below. The reign of Josiah in the late seventh century may have been another important period for the book’s formation, if suggestions that waning Assyrian power prompted an anti-Assyrian redaction are correct.2 The material associated with this period has been variously identified, but the best theory is that it sought to accentuate positive aspects of Isaiah of Jerusalem’s prophecies, augmenting them during a period in which Jerusalem and Judah enjoyed relative peace and prosperity.3 Assyria’s withdrawal from the Levant near the end of the seventh century would have contributed to an optimistic mood in Judah, thanks to greater political and religious autonomy. Isa 32 and 33 may be from this time; their vision of Jerusalem as “an immovable tent whose stakes will never be pulled up” (33:20) makes more sense prior to the city’s destruction in 586 bce than after. It also seems likely that the book underwent a double redaction analogous to that of the Deuteronomistic History, in which a late seventh-century version was supplemented during the exile or just afterward; the insertion of chapters from 2 Kings, only lightly revised, in chapters 36–39 reflects the concerns of the second of these. Presumably, these prose narratives were inserted to explain Isaiah’s place in the history of the nation. Isa 34 and 35 appear to be from the same period as Second Isaiah. A final issue concerning the date of material in chapters 1–39 is presented by Isa 1 and 2, each of which has its own superscription. Both superscriptions refer to “Judah and Jerusalem,” using a formulation characteristic of Chronicles and Ezra. Isa 2 has much in common with 40–55, while chapter 1 is redolent with images typical of chapters 56–66. Both chapters were most likely added to the book as part of the addition of these later sections. 1  De Jong, Isaiah. 2 Barth, Jesaja-Worte; Sheppard, “Anti-Assyrian.” 3 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39; de Jong, Isaiah; Hays, Origins of Isaiah.

Isaiah and the Neo-Assyrian Background   147

8.3.  The Neo-Assyrian Empire and Its Impact on the Kingdom of Judah The Neo-Assyrian Empire expanded rapidly across the ancient Near East between the ninth and seventh centuries bce. Assurnasirpal II (r. 883–859 bce) is usually considered the founder of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, building a kingdom that reached from the Taurus Mountains to the Euphrates. He established a new capital city at Kalhu, an impressive city built on taxes, trade, and tribute payments from vassal nations. This “yoke of Aššur” was a great burden to smaller client states. The empire began a westward expansion in the middle of the eighth century, the effects of which were felt most acutely in the northern territories of Aram and Israel. Ahab of Israel came into conflict with Shalmaneser III (r. 858–824 bce), as a federation of western kings attempted to throw off Assyrian control. According to Shalmaneser’s Kurkh Monolith, Ahab led one of the larger contingents of the coalition, mustering ten thousand soldiers and two thousand chariots. Although the outcome of these clashes is unclear, Shalmaneser’s Black Obelisk records the receipt of tribute from Jehu of Israel just a few years later. Assyria stagnated for much of the next century, though the period saw the rise of the queen Shammuramat, the wife of Shamshi-Adad V (r. 823–811 bce) and the basis of the later Greek legends about Semiramis. In the mid-eighth century, Tiglath-Pileser III (r. 744–727 bce) brought new energy to Assyria’s imperial ambitions. He re-subdued Babylonia and Urartu and campaigned into Syria-Palestine, including taking tribute from Menahem of Israel (r. 746–737 bce). The heavy taxation that was the price of Assyria’s support for Israel’s kings would have been costly and therefore controversial; tiring of Assyrian domination, Israel joined an anti-Assyrian coalition akin to that of Ahab, hoping to replicate the relative success of similar coalitions in the ninth-century. Ahaz of Judah, however, refused to join the coalition. This set the stage for the greatest historical conflict between the Northern and Southern Kingdoms: Israel’s coalition attacked Judah in 734 bce in the Syro-Ephraimite War, intending to replace Ahaz with a ruler more sympathetic to its goals (2 Kgs 16:5–9; Isa 7). Judah weathered the assault, however, and Tiglath-Pileser wiped out the coalition in his western campaign of 734–731 bce. Israel’s king, Pekah (r. 734–731 bce), was killed and replaced with Hoshea (r. 730–722 bce). Tiglath-Pileser also removed some of Israel’s territory and made it into Assyrian provinces, leaving just the area around Samaria as a vassal state. Hoshea soon sought the support of Egypt, and Assyria therefore besieged and destroyed Samaria in 722–721 bce. This is remembered in Isa 28:1–4. Sargon II turned the kingdom into the province of Samerina and claimed to have deported more than 27,000 Israelites; surely many others fled, some to Judah and others elsewhere. Until this point, Judah’s location and lesser significance had largely shielded it from the direct impact of Assyrian power. That came to an end with the destruction of Samaria. Following the dissolution of the Northern Kingdom, the new provincial territory of Samerina was directly on Judah’s doorstep, mere miles from Jerusalem.

148   C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays Rebellions in Philistia then prompted another Assyrian campaign and the formation of the province of Ashdod in 712 bce, bringing Assyria closer also on Judah’s western flank. In his Great Summary Inscription, Sargon claims that he summoned all the western kings to attend the dedication of the city of Dur Sharrukin in 706 bce. Though not explicitly named, it is possible that Hezekiah and other members of the royal court of Judah were among those present. Sargon met his end on the battlefield in 705, a uniquely awful fate for an Assyrian king. It likely prompted a celebration in Judah (Isa 14), and it certainly prompted Hezekiah (r. 715–687 bce) to repeat the by now familiar pattern of forming an anti-Assyrian coalition and withholding tribute. Sargon’s successor, Sennacherib (r. 704–681 bce) was not free to campaign to the west until 701 bce, but the consequences were disastrous: his annals record forty-six Judahite cities that had been pillaged and claim that he took more than two hundred thousand people and animals as spoil. The city of Lachish was destroyed, and Jerusalem was probably besieged. Surprisingly, Judah survived as a client state and Hezekiah was allowed to remain on the throne, though he was forced to pay heavy tribute and Judah was stripped of its western territories. Isaiah compared it to “a shelter in a cucumber field” (1:8)—that is, the only thing still standing. The reasons for this are disputed. By the turn of the seventh century, Assyrian control over the southern Levant had largely been solidified. Although Sennacherib was killed in a palace coup, he was succeeded by his designated successor, Esarhaddon (r. 680–669 bce), who was able successfully to fend off other brothers who were vying for the kingship. These events are referred to very briefly in 2 Kgs 19:36–37 and Isa 37:37–38, which report that the murderers fled to “Ararat”—that is, Urartu. Esarhaddon’s diplomatic skill allowed him to pacify his existing empire, then campaign successfully in Egypt between 675 and 671 bce. This expansion was furthered by his son Assurbanipal (r. 668–631 bce). By 664 and 663 bce, Assurbanipal had campaigned as far as Thebes, whose plunder was memorialized by the prophet Nahum (3:8–9). The rapid conquest of Egypt stands in contrast to the more gradual Assyrian expansions through the eighth century. But the Assyrians’ control over Egypt required multiple campaigns to achieve and was never very thorough; it was mostly oriented toward the extraction of wealth and carried out through the operations of local Egyptian agents, including Assyrian-installed puppet kings. From Judah’s perspective, the seventh century was largely peaceful or, at least, unmarked by military interventions; most vassals had learned the hard way that rebellion was not worthwhile. For example, Esarhaddon seems to have faced only a single uprising during his reign. Manasseh of Judah (r. 698–644 bce) is recorded by the Assyrian annals as a dutiful vassal who made regular tribute payments. Tribute payments for the palace at Nineveh are specifically mentioned; representatives from Judah may have taken these items all the way to Nineveh.4 Assyria disappears from the biblical narrative after Sennacherib’s death, but that does not reflect historical reality. A long reign such as Manasseh’s (r. 698–644 bce) would not have been possible without the Assyrians’ tolerance. It is also hard to imagine that 4 Leichty, Royal Inscriptions, 23.

Isaiah and the Neo-Assyrian Background   149 Assyria could have pressed so far south, even into Egypt, had they not been in firm control of the Levant. Indeed, a Judahite troop contingent appears on the lists of vassal troops provided for the Assyrians’ Egyptian campaigns. Recent excavators of Ramat Rahel, four kilometers outside Jerusalem, have argued that the site served as an imperial center, which places Assyrian political and military representatives in close range of the Judahite capital itself.5 Despite occasional unrest, usually in conjunction with the death of an Assyrian king, the upper hand in the southern Levant was clearly Assyrian. Assyria’s grasp on the region created an imperial sphere of influence in which immediate concerns about political subordination could give way to economic and cultural matters. Radiating out from these imperial centers, this influence extended to most aspects of life in provincial and vassal territories, from national politics to material goods.6 Assyrian ceramic wares, or local imitations of them, for example, are found in almost every Iron Age site in the region, and Mesopotamian iconographic influences are recognizable across the southern Levant. Despite Assyria’s fearful reputation in Israel and Judah, its culture was quite influential, including its literature, art, and architecture. Assyrian culture was not typically imposed, but spread primarily through prestige and emulation, as the story of Ahaz copying an altar from Damascus indirectly illustrates (2 Kgs 16:10–16). Assyrian activity in the west was also designed to control the lucrative trade routes between Philistia and Arabia, as well as the passageway to Egypt. The military ensured political stability by quelling rebellions, so that Assyria could supplement its imperial wealth by exploiting regional economies. The interconnectedness of military and economic activities is seen in the fact that many Assyrian military garrisons doubled as trading outposts. Imperial highways and extensive support staff made the military and communications networks more effective. The proceeds of increased trade benefited Assyria via tribute payments made to the empire, as well as through conventional commercial trading activities by which Assyrian elites gained access to goods produced elsewhere. Judah was known even in central Assyria as a major grain producer.7 The same geography that made Judah a political battleground also positioned it to benefit from these Assyrian-driven commercial activities. The oracle in Isa 19:23–24 envisions that “there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian will come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria . . . On that day Israel will be the third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth.”8 It appears that the royal and trading classes profited from the increased trade.9 This new wealth production may also have led to intrasocietal tensions in Judah between the palace and the landowners who felt the pinch of taxation most acutely.10

5  Lipschits et al., “Palace and Village”; Hays, Origins of Isaiah. 6  Blakely and Hardin, “Southwestern Judah”; Crouch, Making of Israel. 7  Faust and Weiss, “Judah.” 8  Although this passage is often considered a utopian vision of a late period, its earliest form is quite plausibly rooted in the geopolitics of the eighth or seventh centuries. 9  Dalley, “Recent Evidence”; Holladay, “Hezekiah.” 10 Seitz, Theology in Conflict, 42–51.

150   C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays Esarhaddon sought to ensure a smooth succession and continuity of Assyrian control over these territories by making his vassals and his own people swear loyalty to his son Assurbanipal (r. 668–627 bce). These oaths concerning the succession are often compared to biblical covenants, especially Deuteronomy.11 Assurbanipal himself had a long and seemingly successful reign, albeit plagued at home by a civil war with his brother Shamash-shum-ukin, whom Esarhaddon had appointed to rule Babylonia. The Assyrians seem to have held Babylonia in high esteem for its venerable cultural and religious traditions, according it special status and relative independence, but the relationship was frequently an uneasy one; Sennacherib, too, had fought a brutal war to keep Babylonia under Assyrian control. In this instance, Assyria was able to quell what was essentially an internal uprising, brother against brother, though it took four years. By that time, Egypt had again thrown off Assyrian rule, this time for good. Assyrian politics become murkier in the last third of the seventh century bce. Like other very long reigns in ancient Near Eastern history, Assurbanipal’s likely led to contention over succession and the stagnation of imperial systems. Historians frequently remark on the mystery of the empire’s seemingly rapid decline. Unfortunately, the Assyrian records more or less disappear after 639 bce, a reflection of weakening Assyrian power both at home and abroad. The period of Assyria’s decline also saw an upswing of Babylonian power, and historians are mostly reliant on Babylonian sources. Indeed, joined by the Medes and the Scythians, Babylonia began to attack Assyrian cities in 615 bce. It appears that the Assyrians were taken by surprise by the sudden need to defend their heartland, overextended across a sprawling empire and defensively unprepared at home. Key central cities such as Kalhu and Nineveh were built with an eye to concerns such as display, access, and water use, rather than defense, because the Assyrian philosophy of warfare was to attack preemptively.12 Awareness of Assyrian vulnerability was no doubt responsible for the efforts of several vassals to reassert their independence, especially after the fall of Nineveh to the Babylonians in 612 bce, after a siege of only three months. Their major cities in ruins, the remnants of the Assyrian court and military apparently fled westward, where they survived for a while with Egyptian support. Most of the western rebellions eventually failed in the face of these Egyptian exertions. Remarkably, no account of the Assyrians’ final extinction has yet come to light in surviving documents, even those of the Babylonians who vanquished them. Nebuchadnezzar II (r. 604–562 bce) appears to have employed an Assyrian scribe or two at his court, as Babylonian documents from 603 and 600 bce have been found in the Neo-Assyrian dialect.13 But overall, Assyria was simply swallowed up by the Neo-Babylonians, never to re-emerge. The crumbling of Assyrian power was felt in Judah, even though Egyptian influence the quickly filled vacuum. There are no records of Assyrian presence in Palestine after 645 bce,14 and Assyrian control was certainly over by 630 bce. In this context Judah began to reassert its political independence, albeit not immediately. Josiah’s reforms, probably 11 Crouch, Israel and the Assyrians. 13  Brinkman, “Unfolding the Drama.”

12  Melville, “New Look.” 14 Stern, Archaeology, 4.

Isaiah and the Neo-Assyrian Background   151 based on some version of the Deuteronomic laws, have often been thought to be a program meant to subvert Assyrian hegemony. If this was the case, these assertions were indirect; the Assyrians did not impose their religion on their vassal states, so any Assyrian tendencies in Judah’s religious practice had been taken on voluntarily, as a form of elite emulation.15 It has recently been argued that Assyria’s fall was reflected in Isa 24–27, and that the “fortified city” with its “palace of foreigners” (25:10) that is repeatedly described in those chapters as ruined refers to an Assyrian administrative complex near Jerusalem at Ramat Rahel. On this view, the retreat of Assyrian governors and soldiers back to the homeland occasioned celebration in Judah, in which a victorious Yhwh (25:1–3) was imagined as hosting a victory feast on Mount Zion (25:6–8), and the fallen Assyrian outpost was contrasted with the still-invincible “strong city,” Jerusalem (26:1). Josiah, speaking for Yhwh, closes the section by inviting the territory of the ­former Northern Kingdom to reunite itself with Judah now that the Assyrians are gone (“make peace with me”: 27:5).16

8.4.  The Neo-Assyrian Empire and Its Impact on First Isaiah The Assyrian Empire serves numerous functions in the prophetic texts associated with Isaiah ben Amoz. From Judah’s perspective, Assyria’s role changed even during the eighth century. Assyria saved Judah from a Syro-Ephraimite coalition in the 730s, only to return and destroy much of Judah thirty years later, in 701. Thus, in Isa 7, the prophet advises Ahaz, the king of Judah, not to fear the Syrians and Ephraimites and describes the Assyrians as saviors. God summons the Assyrians (7:18) to save Judah, and they are literally “God with us” in 8:8 (Hebrew: Immanuel). But in the text as it now stands the Assyrians are also described as a punishment (8:6–7) and a devouring pestilence (7:19, 23–25). This may be interference from a later and more negative perspective on the Assyrians; for example, the sweeping “up to the neck” (8:8) may evoke Sennacherib’s campaign of 701 against Judah, in which only Jerusalem survived. That same campaign is reported in Isa 36–37, a passage imported almost verbatim from 2 Kgs 18–19. The tensions introduced by the redaction of the book are apparent. This negativity is visible also in the book’s most dominant image of Assyria—namely, the empire as the epitome of terror and an earthly manifestation of divine wrath. Byron’s poem “The Destruction of Sennacherib” aptly reflects Assyria’s reputation: The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold, And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. 15  Berlejung, “Assyrians”; “Shared Fates.”

16 Hays, Origins of Isaiah; Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39.

152   C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays Despite the fact that Assyria was an advanced civilization, this terrorizing, militaristic image matches its self-portrayal and surely reflects a significant aspect of the empire’s historical reality. Isa 5:26–28 offers a vivid description of the military prowess of this “people from the ends of the earth”: Here they come, swiftly, speedily! None of them is weary, none stumbles, none slumbers or sleeps, not a loincloth is loose, not a sandal-thong broken; their arrows are sharp, all their bows bent, their horses’ hoofs seem like flint, and their wheels like the whirlwind.

The Assyrians are similarly portrayed—as a nation too powerful to resist, even with military help—in Isa 20’s oracle against Egypt and Kush: “The king of Assyria will lead away the Egyptians as captives and the Ethiopians as exiles, both the young and the old, naked and barefoot” (20:4). A pact with Egypt is condemned in Isa 28:15, 18 as a “covenant with death”; not even with Egyptian help will Judah be able to resist Assyrian might. Assyria introduced itself to smaller nations through terror as an intentional part of its “diplomacy.” In the Rabshakeh’s speech at the wall of Jerusalem (Isa 36), for example, the Assyrian representative comes to the Judahites with threats intended to induce despair: You cannot rely on words; you cannot rely on allies; you cannot repulse a single one of my captains; even your god has deserted your cause. When the Jerusalem court officials ask him to speak not in Hebrew but in Aramaic, so that the common people will not understand, the Rabshakeh—far from complying—continues in Hebrew and turns up the volume on his threats: “Has my master sent me to speak these words to your master and to you, and not to the people sitting on the wall, who are doomed with you to eat their own dung and drink their own urine?” (v. 12). Understood naturalistically, as a reflection of the conditions of a city under siege, this threat is awful enough; understood as a reference to a view of the afterlife in which the unattended dead are thought to eat feces and drink urine—as, for example, in the Egyptian Book of the Dead—it is even worse.17 The Rabshakeh threatens nothing less than death to those who resist Assyrian domination. One should not doubt that the biblical rendering of this interchange sheds light on historical Assyrian practices. The story shows at its core “a clear knowledge of Assyrian officialdom and techniques of war, and the definite impress of Assyrian power.”18 That these warnings were no hollow threat may be seen in the claims of violent conquest made by Assyrian kings in their inscriptions, filled with vocabulary of destruction and  death. Typical methods of dealing with rebellious cities are recorded in one of Tiglath-Pileser’s inscriptions: I smashed Bit-Šilani completely, like a pot. Sarrabanu, their great royal city, I laid waste as though ruined by the flood, and I despoiled it. Nabu-ušabši, their king, I impaled 17  Xella, “Sur la Nourriture.”

18  Machinist, “Rab Šāqēh,” 166; Machinist, “Assyria.”

Isaiah and the Neo-Assyrian Background   153 before the gate of his city and exposed him to the gaze of his countrymen. His wife, his sons, his daughters, his possessions, the treasure of his palaces I despoiled.19

When Assyrians came to conquer a rebellious city, they typically spoke of “demolishing,” “destroying,” and “burning” (napalu, naqaru, ina isati saraptu). There is a strong component of psychological warfare involved in such actions.20 Indeed, they function as a warning to anyone considering resisting Assyrian dominance in the future. The explicitly public nature of the impalement of enemy leaders under successive Assyrian kings, from Tiglath-Pileser III to Sennacherib, exemplifies this intention: exposing the impaled bodies in the sight of the general population demonstrated the consequences of resisting Assyrian power and served as a public warning to anyone tempted to imitate them. What might at first seem to be pure cruelty had a specific imperial function, namely, to discourage future opposition to Assyrian dominance.21 Although the general population could be considered guilty for its role in a kingdom’s failure to submit—thus justifying the collateral damage to which they were subject when their kings failed to comply with Assyrian wishes—the most extreme violence was targeted at kings and other leadership figures whose persistent rebelliousness was considered the paramount obstacle to Assyrian domination. From the Assyrian perspective, this violence was a necessary response to smaller kingdoms’ resistance to Assyrian authority. Those who submitted immediately suffered less; by contrast, those who had previously submitted to Assyrian authority, only later to attempt to throw off the Assyrian yoke, were subject to violent repercussions. The moralizing of war violence is apparent in the Assyrians’ own inscriptions, which describe Assyrian violence as a response to the “sinfulness” or “wickedness” of rebel kings and kingdoms.22 The ideological conflation of these categories is visible in Assyrian terminology: ḥīṭu signifies both a sinful person and a rebellious person, while lemnu and bēl lemutti simultaneously denote both the “enemy” and one who is “wicked, evil.” It is possible that these royal inscriptions, including their accounts of rebellions, the sieges of foreign cities, and the aftermath of these cities’ defeat, were read out to ­tribute-bearing visitors to the Assyrian capitals, or that certain episodes were narrated ad hoc by palace officials, guiding foreign delegations past graphic depictions of these events on the walls of the royal palaces. All this amounted to a form of psychological warfare intended to induce submission. Oppenheim, usually a defender of Mesopotamian culture, sums it up: The terrifying mask that was deliberately turned toward the outside world was undeniably effective. The Old Testament reflects in numerous poignant passages the fear 19 Tadmor, Inscriptions, 122–123. 20 Oded, War; Saggs, The Might. 21  Notably, the intended audience of these performances of conquest shift under Esarhaddon, from the conquered to native Assyrians in the homeland, reflecting Esarhaddon’s precarious claim to the throne. Crouch, War and Ethics, 140–141. 22 Oded, War; Crouch, War and Ethics.

154   C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays inspired by Assyrian military might and by the ruthless aggressiveness directed against all those nations that found themselves in the path of Assyrian expansion.23

There have been some recent efforts to rehabilitate Assyria’s reputation, or at least to better understand the ways in which the imperial machine grounded its acts of extreme violence in ideological and theological foundations.24 Nevertheless, there remains a great gulf between Assyria’s self-image as a universalizing purveyor of order and peace and its enemies’ image of it. The brutal manifestation of Assyrian military power exposed the prophets to unforgettable atrocities of war that echoed through their im­agery. Thus, for example, Isa 5:25: “The anger of Yhwh was kindled against his people, and he stretched out his hand against them and struck them; the mountains quaked, and their corpses were like refuse in the streets.” Despite the negativity with which the Assyrians are presented in Isaiah, the empire is conceived as serving a crucial purpose in Judah and Israel’s histories as an instrument of divine justice. In the oracle of Isa 10:5–6, God reveals Assyria to be his weapon against unrighteousness: Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger— the club in their hands is my fury! Against a godless nation I send him, and against the people of my wrath I command him, to take spoil and seize plunder, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.

Although earlier prophetic traditions, including Amos’s vision of the Day of the Lord and Hosea’s warnings about the consequences of Israel’s unfaithfulness, imply that Yhwh’s punishment may be effected through the rampaging of foreign nations against Israel and Judah, First Isaiah is the first extended exploration of this notion with reference to a single, specific foreign nation. Isaiah’s contributions on this point would later be elaborated by Jeremiah and Ezekiel as they unfolded the theological implications of the Babylonians’ conquest of Jerusalem. If Isaiah’s declaration of Yhwh’s authority over foreign kings and their armies is not remarkable enough, he then takes the point even farther. The Assyrian king’s involvement in the divine plan is completely unwitting: But this is not what he intends, nor does he have this in mind; but it is in his heart to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few. (10:7)

With such assertions Isaiah directly undermines the Assyrians’ claim to divine ­authority—either from their own gods or from their enemies’ gods—for their c­ onquests. 23  Oppenheim, “Neo-Assyrian,” 133–134.

24 Oded, War; Crouch, War and Ethics.

Isaiah and the Neo-Assyrian Background   155 In defiance of the Rabshakeh and the theology that he represents, Isaiah declares that it is Assyria that is in the dark theologically and that its assumptions concerning the divine will are incorrect. Indeed, Isaiah attacks a classic element of Assyrian theological justifications for its military devastation when he describes the Assyrian army as the “mighty waters of the river” that Yhwh “brings up” against Rezin (Isa 8:6–7). Whereas the Assyrian tradition conceived of its king as being entrusted with the weapons of Marduk, the royal warrior god of Enuma Elish, including his flood-weapon, Isaiah claims power over the waters for Yhwh alone.25 Assyria’s subordination to Yhwh’s will is also expressed by passages that warn of the consequences when Assyria goes beyond its commission. The oracle in Isa 10 promises that Assyria’s domination has a definite limit: “When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the arrogant boasting of the king of Assyria and his haughty pride” (v. 12). The poem ends with rhetorical questions that reinforce the opening lines: Shall the ax vaunt itself over the one who wields it, or the saw magnify itself against the one who handles it? As if a rod should raise the one who lifts it up, or as if a staff should lift the one who is not wood! (10:15)

This attribution of Assyria’s ultimate accountability to Yhwh likely reflects the sense that the might of the empire is too great for historical redress; only God can overcome it. Isaiah’s portrayal of Assyria as God’s unwitting tool not only undermines Assyrian theological claims, but lays the foundations for monotheism much earlier than is usually observed.26 The Assyrian emperor used titles such as “king of the universe,” and “ruler of the four corners (of the earth)”—and Isaiah responded with the declaration that Yhwh alone was king of the universe. Baruch Levine has therefore argued that monotheism developed as a reaction to the universalizing claims of the Neo-Assyrian Empire.27 Besides Isa 10:5–15, this idea is implicit in 14:24–27 (“Yhwh of hosts has planned, and who will annul it? His hand is stretched out, and who will turn it back?”). The assertion that Yhwh controls the shape of world history is effectively “an explicit statement of Isaiah’s monotheism.”28 Following on from this conception of Yhwh as in control of world history is a conviction that Assyria will receive its judgment in due course. At the end of Isa 30, Yhwh the divine warrior strides forth in wrath against a terrified Assyria, striking it with a rod just as it struck Israel and Judah (30:27–33). The vanquished Assyrian king will not rest in peace but will be burnt to a crisp (30:33). This and the death threats of the Rabshakeh are 25 Crouch, War and Ethics. 26  Explicit monotheism (the denial of the existence of other gods) is more commonly thought to be the innovation of Second Isaiah; a few recent scholars have, however, explored the theme in Ezekiel. 27  Levine, “Assyrian Ideology,” 411–427, building on Machinist, “Assyria,” 719–737; Machinist, “Rab Šāqēh at the Wall of Jerusalem,” 151–68. See also Aster, “Image of Assyria.” 28  Levine, “Assyrian Ideology,” 423.

156   C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays both examples of Isaiah’s use of a rhetoric of death inspired by the words and actions of the Assyrians. Similarly, Isaiah declares that the deceased Sargon II, slain on the battlefield on a western campaign, will not receive a proper burial and welcoming into the afterlife but will be mocked by the other dead kings and made to sleep forever in a bed of maggots and worms (14:9–11).29 A native official named Shebna is likewise threatened with an ignominious afterlife and told he will be cast out from his luxurious individual tomb (Isa 22). Eventually, Assyria becomes the second of many nations (Egypt being the first) to represent the prototypical foreign imperial power that is judged by God. Later, this role would be usurped by Babylon, in which form it was taken to universalizing extremes; in Daniel, Babylon stands in for Persia or Greece, and in Revelation it stands for Rome. The shadow of the Neo-Assyrian Empire also hangs over Isaiah in ways that go beyond its direct military and political impact. Judah’s status as a client state to Assyria, for example, carried heavy financial obligations (cf. 2 Kgs 15:19–20). This economic burden was not shared equitably among all social classes as the eighth-century prophets repeatedly testify. Isaiah condemns those who “join house to house, who add field to field, until there is room for no one but you, and you are left to live alone in the midst of the land” (5:8). This reflects a situation in which farmers lost their land due to taxes and debts which they could not repay.30 The consequences of the “yoke (tax) of Assyria” was arguably one of the key provocations of Isaiah’s emphasis on social justice. Last but not least, the Assyrians function in Isaiah’s message as part of the book’s meditations on kingship, and the Assyrian kings are often presented as negative examples of the institution. In Isa 10, the Assyrian ruler is unaware of the real shape of history and goes beyond the will of Yhwh. In Isa 14, his aspirations to power and hopes for the afterlife are drastically undermined. At the ends of Isa 30 and 31, the Assyrian king is humiliated and punished by God. These contrast with the positive images of Davidic kingship in Isa 9, 11, and 32.31 In the most extended episode contrasting kings, Sennacherib appears as the foil to Hezekiah in Isa 36–37. He sends his messengers to Jerusalem with haughty, boastful rhetoric, claiming in part that Yhwh has given the city to him because of his displeasure with Hezekiah. But Hezekiah humbles himself and seeks Yhwh in the temple (Isa 37), and thus receives a word of assurance from the prophet. Afterward, the Assyrian forces are said to be wiped out at the walls of Jerusalem; the assassination of Sennacherib is reported as if it had followed these events immediately, though it did not take place until 681 bce. The storyteller has telescoped history to draw a contrast between the two kings. 29  On the identification of Sargon II in Isa 14, see Hays, Death. 30  Houston, “Social Crisis.” 31  This is not to suggest that the book takes a strictly ethno-nationalist view of kingship. Ahaz is also presented as a faithless ruler (Isa 7), and even Hezekiah is criticized for his policies (Isa 22:8–11); the latter is eventually portrayed as a short-sighted fool (Isa 38–39).

Isaiah and the Neo-Assyrian Background   157

8.5. Conclusion The Neo-Assyrian Empire constituted the domineering historical and political backdrop to the prophetic activities of Isaiah ben Amoz. Assyria’s military power, its extraction of the economic resources of vassal states, and its theological interpretation of these activities as the will of the Assyrian gods deeply impacted the theology of the eighthcentury prophet, as well as the subsequent bearers of his traditions. In defiance of Assyrian claims to the contrary, Isaiah declared that Yhwh alone was the king and ruler of world history.

Bibliography Aster, Shawn Zelig. “The Image of Assyria in Isaiah 2:5–22: The Campaign Motif Reversed.” JAOS 127 (2007): 249–278. Barth, Hermann. Die Jesaja-Worte in Der Josiazeit: Israel und Assur als Thema einer produktiven Neuinterpretation der Jesajaüberlieferung. WMANT 48. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1977. Berlejung, Angelika. “The Assyrians in the West: Assyrianization, Colonialism, Indifference, or Development Policy?” In Congress Volume: Helsinki 2010, edited by Martti Nissinen, 21–60. VTS 148. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Berlejung, Angelika. “Shared Fates: Gaza and Ekron as Examples for the Assyrian Religious Policy in the West.” In Iconoclasm and Text Destruction in the Ancient Near East and Beyond, edited by Natalie Naomi May, 151–174. Oriental Institute Seminars 8. Chicago: Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 2012. Blakely, Jeffrey  A., and James  W.  Hardin. “Southwestern Judah in the Late Eighth Century b.c.e.” BASOR 326 (2006): 11–63. Brinkman, John A. “Unfolding the Drama of the Assyrian Empire.” In Assyria 1995: Proceedings of the 10th Anniversary Symposium of the New-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, Helsinki, September 7–11, 1995, edited by Simo Parpola and Robert M. Whiting, 1–16. Helsinki: NeoAssyrian Text Corpus Project, 1997. Byron, George Gordon, Lord, The Complete Poetical Works. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. 1905. Crouch, C. L. Israel and the Assyrians: Deuteronomy, the Succession Treaty of Esarhaddon, and the Nature of Subversion. ANEM 8. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014. Crouch, C. L. The Making of Israel: Cultural Diversity in the Southern Levant and the Formation of Ethnic Identity in Deuteronomy. VTS 162. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Crouch, C. L. War and Ethics in the Ancient Near East: Military Violence in Light of Cosmology and History. BZAW 409. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2009. Dalley, Stephanie. “Recent Evidence from Assyrian Sources for Judaean History from Uzziah to Manasseh.” JSOT 28 (2004): 387–401. Faust, Avraham, and Ehud Weiss. “Judah, Philistia, and the Mediterranean World: Reconstructing the Economic System of the Seventh Century bce.” BASOR 338 (2005): 71–92. Hays, Christopher B. Death in the Iron Age II and in First Isaiah. FAT 79. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011.

158   C. L. Crouch and Christopher B. Hays Hays, Christopher B. The Origins of Isaiah 24–27: Josiah’s Festival Scroll for the Fall of Assyria. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019. Holladay, John S., Jr. “Hezekiah’s Tribute, Long-Distance Trade, and the Wealth of Nations ca. 1000–600 bce: A New Perspective.” In Confronting the Past: Archaeological and Historical Essays on Ancient Israel in Honor of William G. Dever, edited by Seymour Gitin, J. Edward Wright, and J. P. Dessel, 309–331. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006. Houston, Walter. “Was There a Social Crisis in the Eighth Century?” In In Search of Pre-exilic Israel: Proceedings of the Oxford Old Testament Seminar, edited by John Day, 130–149. JSOTS 406. London: T&T Clark, 2004. Jong, Matthijs J. de. Isaiah among the Ancient Near Eastern Prophets: A Comparative Study of the Earliest Stages of the Isaiah Tradition and the Neo-Assyrian Prophecies. VTS 117. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Leichty, Eric. The Royal Inscriptions of Esarhaddon, King of Assyria (680–669 BC). RINAP 4. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2011. Levine, Baruch. “Assyrian Ideology and Biblical Monotheism.” Iraq 67 (2005): 411–427. Lipschits, Oded, Yuval Gadot, Benjamin Arubas, and Manfred Oeming. “Palace and Village, Paradise and Oblivion: Unraveling the Riddles of Ramat Raḥel.” NEA 74 (2011): 2–49. Machinist, Peter. “Assyria and Its Image in the First Isaiah.” JAOS 103 (1983): 719–737. Machinist, Peter. “The Rab Šāqēh at the Wall of Jerusalem: Israelite Identity in the Face of the Assyrian ‘Other.’ ” Hebrew Studies 41 (2000): 151–168. Melville, Sarah C. “A New Look at the End of the Assyrian Empire.” In Homeland and Exile: Biblical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies in Honour of Bustenay Oded, edited by Gershom Galil, Mark J. Gellar, and Alan R. Millard, 179–202. VTS 130. Leiden: Brill, 2009. Oded, Bustenay.War, Peace and Empire: Justifications for War in Assyrian Royal Inscriptions. Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag, 1992. Oppenheim, A. Leo. “Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian Empires.” In The Symbolic Instrument in Early Times, edited by Harold  D.  Lasswell, Daniel Lerner, and Hans Speier, 111–144. Propaganda and Communication in World History 1. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1979. Saggs, H. W. F. The Might That Was Assyria. Great Civilizations Series. London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1984. Seitz, Christopher R. Theology in Conflict: Reactions to the Exile in the Book of Jeremiah. BZAW 176. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1989. Sheppard, Gerald T. “The Anti-Assyrian Redaction and the Canonical Context of Isaiah 1–39.” JBL 104 (1985): 193–216. Stern, Ephraim. Archaeology of the Land of the Bible. Vol. 2, The Assyrian, Babylonian and Persian Periods, 732–332 bce. Anchor Bible Reference Library. New York: Doubleday, 2001. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39: With an Introduction to the Prophetic Literature. FOTL 16. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Tadmor, Hayim. The Inscriptions of Tiglath-Pileser III, King of Assyria. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1994. Xella, Paolo. “Sur la Nourriture des Morts.” In Death in Mesopotamia: Papers Read at the XXVIe Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, edited by Bendt Alster, 151–160. Mesopotamia 8. Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag, 1980.

chapter 9

Isa i a h a n d th e N eo -Ba by l on i a n Backgrou n d Joseph Blenkinsopp

9.1.  Prophecy and International Politics In the section on Prophecy in his Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, Max Weber identified a  concern with social injustice as a major characteristic of Israelite prophecy. Viewed as a religious issue, social injustice within Israel served to explain why the wrath of the God of Israel was inflicted on his people, and why that came about more often than not through the agency of foreign nations. Weber therefore drew the further conclusion that “the primary concern of the prophets was with foreign politics, chiefly because it constituted the theater of their god’s activities.”1 The prophets, he  continued, communicated their urgent message about social justice and  injustice by means of vital, emotional preaching delivered either orally or in written form. In his study of Ancient Judaism, unfinished at his untimely death in 1920, Weber observed that the Israelite prophets to whom books are attributed would have appeared to their contemporaries as political demagogues or pamphleteers, and that this was a kind of prophecy which would not have been tolerated in the great Near Eastern empires contemporary with the prophets of Israel.2 One ­illustration of this last point that comes to mind is the execution, some would say 1 Weber, Economy and Society (Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft), 439–451. 2 Weber, Ancient Judaism, 267–269. Weber did not understand “demagogue” in the commonly accepted pejorative sense; he used the term to refer to one who espouses a cause and promotes it by addressing people in a public place, citing Socrates as an example. On Weber’s understanding of prophecy, see my History of Prophecy, 34–36, with references on pp. 30–31.

160   Joseph Blenkinsopp martyrdom, of the Judaean diaspora prophets Ahab ben Kolaiah and Zedekiah ben Maaseiah for speaking out against oppression under the Babylonian empire ruled by Nebuchadnezzar II (Jer 29:21–23). Weber’s thesis is supported by the abundance of polemic in the prophetic collections against foreign nations, in the first place, the great empires—Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Seleucid and, eventually, Roman. The category “oracles against foreign nations,” including those against the aforementioned imperial powers, is attested in most of the prophetic books, beginning with Amos and including Isaiah, as we shall see.3 The attitude toward empire was not, however, uniformly negative; witness the different positions and strategies vis-à-vis the Babylonian empire during the period preceding the fall of Jerusalem in 586 bce. The party in favor of actively pursuing independence from vassal status by open revolt is referred to in Jeremiah and the historical record as “the people of the land” (‫ ;)עם הארץ‬this is the same party that had put Josiah on the throne after killing the conspirators who had assassinated Amon his father (2 Kgs 21:23–24), and who some years later assured the succession of his son Jehoahaz (2 Kgs 23:30). These ardent nationalists and supporters of the dynasty were in alliance with prophets in Judah such as Hananiah ben Azzur, who made a high-risk and unsuccessful prophecy of independence from Babylon within two years, but then died following a successful prophecy of his death by Jeremiah (Jer 28). There were prophets of the same persuasion in the Babylonian diaspora who were denounced by Jeremiah (Jer 29:8–9), including the two executed by Nebuchadrezzar mentioned earlier. After the conquest of Jerusalem, sixty of these nationalistic “people of the land” were among the first to be executed by the Babylonian general Nabuzaradan (2 Kgs 25:19–21), confirming that they formed a recognizable faction. Leading the opposition to revolt was the powerful family of Shaphan, a high official during the reign of Josiah, a position the Babylonians gratefully acknowledged when they apppointed Shaphan’s grandson Gedaliah governor of the Babylonian province of Judah, perhaps as vassal king, a few years after the fall of Jerusalem (2 Kgs 25:22–26; Jer 40:5–6). Jeremiah was the spokesman for this faction, no doubt regarded by its opponents as the party of appeasement and collaborators with the Babylonian conquerors (2 Kgs 24–25; Jer 37–44). As a codicil to Weber, let us add that Babylon as the center of the Babylonian empire and residence of its powerful gods is reflected in the Genesis Tower of Babel story, a mythicized version of the building of the city and its temple Esagila, with its temple tower, or ziggurat (Gen 11:1–9). The story is perhaps dependent on the account of the founding of Babylon (Babel) in the epic Enûma Eliš (VI 60–62), but the Genesis version cleverly uses the phenomenon of linguistic differentiation as symbolic of noncommunication, dispersion, and collapse—in other words, a critique of empire. In real time, 3  Amos 1–2 (Syria, Philistia, Phoenicia, Edom, Ammon, Moab); Obadiah (Edom); Nahum (Assyria); Zephaniah (Philistia, Moab, Nubia); Jeremiah 46–51 (Egypt, Philistia, Moab, Ammon, Edom, Syria, Kedar, Hazor, Elam, Babylon); Isaiah 13–23 (Babylon, Philistia, Moab, Syria, Egypt, Phoenicia); Ezekiel 25–32 (Ammon, Moab, Edom, Philistia, Phoenicia, Egypt).

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   161 the establishment of the city was the work of Sargon I, founder of the dynasty of Akkad in the twenty-fourth century bce. In the biblical account of origins his counterpart is Nimrod in the land of Shinar (i.e., Babylonia), the proto-imperialist and mighty hunter before the Lord (Gen 10:8–12), and according to rabbinic tradition, the ruler under whom the builders of the city and tower worked.

9.2.  Babylon in Isaiah 1–39 Babylon is first named in chapters 1–39, the first major section of the book, in a series of ten prophetic oracles against foreign and hostile peoples (chaps. 13–23). The series is divided into two pentads, in both of which the first of the five deals with imperial Babylon as the successor to imperial Assyria (13:1–22; 21:1–10). A mocking lament for the death of a king of Babylon and his arrival in the Underworld—a somewhat unsubtle case of Schadenfreude—has been added to the first of these (14:1–23). Chapters 1–39 end with an account of a visit of a Babylonian delegation from Merodach Baladan (Marduk-apla-iddina) of Babylon to Hezekiah in Jerusalem. The apparent purpose of the visit was to convey the friendly greetings of the Babylonian king, then a vassal of Assyria, to his Judaean counterpart. The visit ends with Isaiah’s prediction of exile in Babylon (39:3–8), which then serves to link with the prophetic announcement of return from exile in the following section of the book.

9.3.  Oracles in Isaiah 13–23 It is commonly accepted that Isaiah 13–23 forms a distinct section of the book, “a single large unit constructed intentionally by a redactor.”4 Immediately preceding it, the psalm in Isa 12:1–6 rounds off the first subsection of the book, and the series of sayings against foreign peoples, each bearing the title ‫( משׂא‬oracle), is confined to Isa 13–23, the only exception anywhere in the book of Isaiah being Isa 30:6, an oracle dealing with something entirely different—lions, snakes, donkeys, and camels in the Negev. The distinctive character of Isa 13–23 is somewhat obscured by the profusion of eschatological additions in both chapters 13–23 and chapters 24–27 introduced with the familiar incipit “on that day” or something similar.5 On the other hand, the only foreign nation mentioned in Isa 24–27, a section often referred to as “the

4 Wildberger, Isaiah 13–27, 1–2. 5  In Isa 13–23 (13:9; 17:4, 7, 9; 18:17; 19:16, 18, 19, 23, 24; 22:5, 8, 12, 20, 25); in Isa 24–27 (24:21; 25:9; 26:1; 27:1, 6, 12, 13).

162   Joseph Blenkinsopp Isaian Apocalypse,” is Moab (25:10b–11), but not presented as a distinct oracle.6 The ­oracle series is set out in two groups of five, both beginning with an anti­-Babylonian oracle. The first pentad begins with Babylon and ends with Egypt (Isa 19:1–15); the second begins with a saying bearing the textually uncertain title ‫ משׂא מדבר ים‬and concludes with the prediction by an unnamed ecstatic prophet of the imminent fall of Babylon (Isa 21:1–10).7 To the first oracle is attached an assurance of the return of Judaeans exiled in Babylon, not surprisingly since their repatriation depended on the overthrow of Babylon and with it the Babylonian empire. There follows a poem celebrating the fall of an unnamed tyrant (14:3–23). The description of this tyrant would apply to any one of several rulers during the Neo-Assyrian period, and may in fact have applied originally to one or other of them, but if so, it must have been seen to fit a king of Babylon, most probably the great Nebuchadrezzar II, conqueror of Jerusalem. The prediction of the defeat and undoing of the Assyrians in Yhwh’s land, following the Babylon oracle and the arrival of the king of Babylon in the Underworld (14:24–27), unaccountably breaks into the carefully structured oracle series and is chronologically out of place. It will bring to mind the account in Isa 36–37 of the failure of the Assyrian emperor Sennacherib to subdue Jerusalem, his withdrawal to his own country, and his death at the hands of his sons. But then we go on to note that the following saying, against the Philistines (14:28–31), is also set in the Assyrian period, specifically in the year of the death of king Ahaz (715 bce). The same for the other oracles in the first pentad of the series: Moab (15:1–16:11), necessarily involved in all Assyrian campaigns to the west; Damascus (17:1–3), part of the Assyrian province of Samerina since 722 bce; Egypt (19:1–15), the most formidable opponent of the Assyrians to the west and partner in antiAssyrian rebellions. All these oracular statements presuppose the Neo-Assyrian rather than the Neo-Babylonian period, thereby permitting the hypothesis that a first series of oracles dealing with Judah’s relations with other nations during the ascendancy of Assyria was expanded and updated during or after the rise and relatively brief duration of Babylonian imperial rule (626–539 bce). The change was brought about by simply adding oracular statements about Babylon at the beginning of both halves of the series (Isa 13:1–22; 19:1–15). It was, after all, Babylon rather than Nineveh that became the paradigm of imperial hubris, especially after the conquest of Jerusalem, and remained so

6  The title “Isaian Apocalypse,” commonly assigned to Isa 24–27, may go back to Bernhard Duhm, who remarked that Isaiah might as well have written the book of Daniel as Isaiah 24–27. See his Buch Jesaia, 172. 7  On the face of it, the title translates as “the wilderness of the sea” but other interpretations are on offer, too many to list and evaluate here. Since the oracle goes on to encourage Elamites and Medes to attack an unnamed city, and the passage ends with the announcement of the imminent fall of Babylon, the title may be an attempt to translate the Akkadian mat tam-tim or kur tam, the Sealand, i.e., the region inhabited by Chaldaean tribes in southern Mesopotamia near the Persian Gulf, including the island of Bahrain, now known as the Shatt al Arab, home to the Marsh Arabs. See my Isaiah 1–39, 324.

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   163 until it was supplanted by Rome.8 The message conveyed by this structuring of the oracle series is that there is no essential difference between Assyrians and Babylonians. Both are empires, which, like all empires throughout history, embody injustice on a massive scale, in the first place by denying freedom to other peoples, a message that is easily understood in our postcolonial epoch. One important difference should, ­however, be mentioned. It appears that the Babylonians did not continue the Assyrian practice of cross-deportation, hence Jerusalem did not share the fate of Samaria, whose population was, to a considerable extent, replaced by foreign peoples (2 Kgs 17:24), thereby excluding the possibility of an eventual return. Judah, in contrast, as a vassal of Babylon, was shielded from the further expansion of the Edomites to the south, which was well underway by the reign of Nebuchadrezzar.9

9.4.  The Oracle on Babylon: Isaiah 13:1–22 The first of the oracles predicting disaster for Babylon consists of four stanzas (vv. 2–5, 6–8, 9–15, 16–22), only the first and last of which deal with real or imagined historical events, and only the last shows identifiable names: Medes, Babylon, Chaldaeans, and Arabs. The second and third stanzas present a vivid scenario of the end time, the “day of Yhwh,” prefigured in the fall of Babylon in much the same way as the final consummation is prefigured in the fall of Jerusalem in the eschatological discourse of Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels (Mt 24 and parallels). In Isa 13 the fall of Babylon is an event of cosmic significance; as John Skinner put it, “The air is alive with the demon cries of havoc and war.”10 The final stanza has generally been understood to refer to the conquest of Babylon by the Persian Cyrus II, in October 539 bce, but there are problems with this view. First, there is no record of the Medes, who certainly qualify as coming from “a distant land, a far horizon” (v. 5), taking part in the conquest. In the second place, the account of what happened to the city—depopulation, ecological degradation, a return to nature as the haunt of wild animals and satyrs/goat-like creatures of corrupt intelligence and malevolent will—is inconsistent with what we know from our primary sources—namely, the Cyrus Cylinder, the Nabonidus Chronicle, and the Verse Account of the reign of Nabonidus. These indispensable sources attest to a low-key entry of the 8  Edom, though not of imperial dimensions, served as an interim object of opprobrium, apparent in the fierce anti-Edomite rhetoric in Isa 34:1–17, 63:1–6, and elsewhere in post-exilic prophetic writings. Its role is acknowledged in the Targum on Isa 34:9, “The streams of Edom shall be turned into pitch,” which reads “the streams of Rome shall be turned into pitch.” 9  Elias Bickerman, From Ezra, may have had Edom in mind in writing: “If Jerusalem had not been part of a Gentile empire, the nomads would have driven the Jews into the sea or swallowed up Palestine, and the rock of Zion would have been the foundation of an Arabian sanctuary a thousand years before Omar’s mosque” (p. 10). 10 Skinner, Prophet Isaiah, 114.

164   Joseph Blenkinsopp Persian troops into Babylon that was supported by influential elements of the Marduk priesthood, followed by continuity of rule under Cambyses, son of Cyrus.11 To this situation the Greek-language sources add little of value.12 However, Medes are often linked with and sometimes confused with Persians. According to Dan 9:1, the Persian monarch Darius was born a Mede, and in Jer 51:11 we are told that the spirit of the kings of the Medes was roused to attack and destroy Babylon. As for the lurid description of postconquest Babylon: it follows a familiar hyperbolic pattern that is similar to the scenario presented in Jer 50–51, which may have provided the model for Isa 13:1–22, and along the same lines as Isa 34:5–17 with respect to Edom, both with the same postdisaster animals left in possession—hyenas, ostriches, jackals, and wildcats.

9.5.  Isaiah 14:3–23: The King of Babylon in the Underworld This poem attached to the first of the oracles is called a ‫( משׁל‬v. 4a, mashal), a ­figurative and often enigmatic type of composition often translated as “parable.” The “parable,” however, is in reality a parodic lament or dirge, indicated by the mandatory initial ‫ איך‬introducing the two stanzas of the poem (v. 4b, “How the tyrant has come to nothing!”/v. 12, “How you have fallen from the sky!”). The closest parallels would be the mock lament over the city-state of Tyre in Ezek 28:11–19 and the assembly of “great powers” in the Underworld, including Egypt, Assyria, and Elam, in Ezek 32:17–32. Isa 14:3–23 is, in fact, a parody of empire and imperial pretensions. The empire is identified as Babylon only in the brief introduction (14:3–4a) and conclusion (14:22–23), perhaps to leave the poem applicable to any empire at any time in history beginning with Rome.13 The oppressor referred to in the first line also remains unidentified; the survivors of the obliterating attack on Jerusalem in 586 bce would naturally think of Nebuchadrezzar II, who died in 562 bce; but other Babylonian rulers fit the description of the tyrant who “in anger struck down peoples with unerring blows, who in fury trod nations underfoot with relentless 11  On the sources and their accounts of the event, see Beaulieu, Reign of Nabonidus, 219–232; Kuhrt, Ancient Near East, 656–661; Briant, Histoire, 50–55 = From Cyrus to Alexander, 40–44. For easy access to the sources in translation, see ANET (2nd ed., 1955), 308–316. 12  Xenophon (Cyropaedia VII 5, 20–30) presents Cyrus as a well-educated Hellenic gentlemanturned-soldier; Herodotus (1 190–191) places the conquest of Babylon in the spring rather than the autumn as in the inscriptions. He reports that it came about by draining the river that runs through the city to make it fordable, a strategy unknown to the Cyrus Cylinder, which states that the city opened its gates to the Persians. Herodotus also says that this was the first time Babylon was besieged and taken, which is certainly not the case. Josephus (C. Ap. 1:150) speaks of a pitched battle between Nabonidus and Cyrus which also contradicts our primary sources, unless he was referring to the battle at Opis on the Tigris, more a slaughter than a battle, mentioned in the Nabonidus Chronicle. 13  See, for example, Rev 17–18, which reproduces in its own idiom much of Isa 13–14 and 47.

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   165 ­persecution”  (14:6 NEB).14 The reaction of the whole earth is a special feature of the poem. The earth relaxes and breaks out into song, and even the pine trees and cedars of Lebanon get to speak, expressing their pleasure that now no one comes to cut them down. We are reminded that the destruction of the Lebanon cedar forest was well under way by the collapse of the Assyrian empire toward the end of the seventh century bce, by which time, to take another example, the Syrian elephant had been hunted to extinction. If the Assyrians and Babylonians had been more ­technologically advanced, they would no doubt have done more damage to the flora and fauna of the Middle East. The dirge comes to its finale with the rousing of the long dead, kings and commoners, from their sleep, and their assembling to greet the newcomer and escort him to his sleeping quarters: you will have maggots for your mattress and worms for your blanket—welcome to the Underworld! The second stanza (14:12–21) uses an old myth, best represented by Phaeton son of Helios the sun god or, in another source, of Eos the dawn, who aspired to drive the chariot of Helios, lost control, and was struck by a thunderbolt of Zeus. Like other Greek myths, this one may have borrowed from a Phoenician-Canaanite source reproduced in a Ugaritic text, featuring the god Hêlēl son of Shaḥar (the Dawn), no doubt inspired by the rise of the planet Venus, the morning star, and its rapid disappearance at sunrise. This myth of the fall from grace of a rebellious deity is now recycled to designate the fate of a proud and overbearing ruler of the Babylonian empire. He is described in this stanza as having overweening ambition, striking down all the nations,15 destroying cities, refusing to allow prisoners to return to their homes (v. 17b), ruining his own land, slaying his own people, and, finally, being dishonored in death and cast out of his own grave (14:18–20). This last feature has proved the most stubborn obstacle to identifying the ruler in question. The candidates range from Tiglath-Pileser III, who also ruled Babylon (d. 727), to Nebuchadrezzar II (d. 562) and Nabonidus in the Neo-Babylonian period  (d. 538).16 My own preference is for Sennacherib (d. 681) as the original referent. He was murdered by two of his sons, as we learn from an inscribed prism of Esarhaddon his successor and from the biblical record.17 His titulature is especially grandiose, describing him as king of the universe and the four quarters of the world, his eight campaigns led to the defeat and often the destruction of numerous nations from Asia Minor to the Sealand.18 His assassination, which opened the 14  The description of the tyrant in both stanzas is not necessarily to be taken literally; for example, the maggots and worms of v. 11 do not necessarily imply that his body was left unburied. However, Nebuchadrezzar claimed in the Wadi Brisa rock relief in Lebanon to have torn down cedars with his bare hands, and we must assume that he did not allow his Judaean prisoners to go free and return home (v. 17b). 15 Reading ‫ כל גוים‬for ‫ על גוים‬at 14:12b with LXX, cf. ‫ כל מלכי גוים‬at 14:18a. 16  For Tiglath-Pileser III, see Hayes and Irvine, Eighth-Century Prophet, 227–289. On either Nebuchadrezzar II or Nabonidus as the most plausible candidates, see, inter alios, Clements, Isaiah 1–39, 140. 17  For Prism S, see Luckenbill, Ancient Records, 2:200–201; also 2 Kgs 19:36; Isa 37:37–38. 18 Luckenbill, Ancient Records, 2:115–59.

166   Joseph Blenkinsopp way for the succession of Esarhaddon, may well have led to the dishonoring of his corpse, though nothing is said of the disposal of his body or the bodies of any of the other candidates.19

9.6.  Fallen, Fallen Is Babylon: Isaiah 21:1–10 This oracle is the first in the second pentad, as noted earlier, and is followed by oracles against Duma (Edom?), Arabia, “the Valley of Vision,” and Tyre. In it, the seer speaks in his own name in announcing his “grim vision.” The title, “An Oracle: the Wilderness of the Sea” is the subject of a great deal of textual emendation and debate.20 As I noted earlier, a reference to the Sealand, the delta of the Tigris and Euphrates in the southernmost part of Mesopotamia, the Shatt al Arab, which was the homeland of Chaldean tribes including the Bît Yakin and the seedbed of the royal Babylonian dynasty, is most probably intended. Also, the Negeb in Isa 21:1 refers to the same region south of the city Babylon, and not to the Negev in southern Judah. There are problems also with the unity and continuity of the oracle. The first section, 21:1–4, describes the unsolicited onset of a condition of ecstasy or mental dissociation that is well attested throughout history in many different cultures: bodily discomfort compared to labor pains in childbirth, convulsive movements, rapid heartbeat (cf. Jer 4:19), trembling and a sense of weakness (cf. Hab 3:16). In 21:8–9, however, it is a question of a solicited visionary experience. The seer is a watchman or lookout on his watchtower who is admonished to listen very hard—a quite different situation, therefore.21 Instead of viewing this as evidence that Isa 21:1–10 is composite, however, we might read it as follows: the seer has a vision of the attack on Babylon by Elamites and Medes, here as elsewhere probably meaning Persians, which will put an end to a distressful situation for many, including Judaeans forcibly expatriated (vv. 1–4). At this point (v. 5) the seer envisions what is going on meanwhile in the city, reproducing a tradition reported in Dan 5 about the banquet of Belshassar, son of Nabonidus, at which the participants make sacrilegious use of the sacred vessels from the Jerusalem temple. The tradition appears in more succinct form in Herodotus, who informs us that as the Persian army was approaching, in the city, “they were dancing and making merry at a festival which 19  Other options: Sargon II by Ginsberg, “Reflexes,” 49–53; Nebuchadrezzar II by Vanderhooft, Neo-Babylonian Empire, 128–129. An exhaustive survey of opinion to the time of writing can be found in Wildberger, Isaiah 13–27, 40–77, though his proposal that “Babylon” is a symbolic name standing for the Persian Empire (p. 49) is hard to accept. It would be odd to use the name Babylon, the city conquered by the Persians, as symbolic of the victors. 20 LXX τὸ ὅραμα τῆς ἐρήμου (“the view of the wilderness”) and 1QIsaa‫“( מדבר דברים‬the wilderness of words/things”) are not any clearer. For details and references, see my Isaiah 1–39, 323–325. 21  For the prophet as watchman or lookout, a kind of antenna or early warning system for the community in which he functions, see Ezek 3:17; 33:1–9; Isa 52:8; 56:10; Jer 6:17.

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   167 chanced to be toward, till they learned the truth only too well” (Hist. 1:191). At this point the seer is told to appoint a lookout and to give him his instructions (vv. 6–7). He does so, and the lookout sees messengers approaching in a chariot bringing the good news that Babylon has fallen and its gods, defeated by the God of Israel, lie smashed on the ground (vv. 8–9). The seer then turns and addresses his Judaean contemporaries who had suffered so much at the hands of the Babylonian empire, using an agrarian image signifying crushing, flailing, and pulverizing, which is what empires usually do. Looking back over these oracles, we would want to ask: For whom were they written? What was their intended use and function? If they were intended as anti-Babylonian propaganda, among which groups did they circulate? Perhaps a faction like the “people of the land” in the last decades of the monarchy? And how did they circulate? Are they a transcript of pamphlets for the use of demagogues in Weber’s sense of the term or a later written-up version of what the prophet as demagogue had said in public or what someone thought he might have said? We simply do not know the answers to these questions; we can only ask them.

9.7.  Isaiah 36–39 At some stage in the formation of the book of Isaiah, chapters 36–39 were attached to chapters 1–35. This final section contains an account in chapters 36–37, roughly parallel with 2 Kgs 18:1–19:38, of Jerusalem during the reign of Hezekiah (715–687 bce) under mortal threat from an Assyrian punitive expedition. The Assyrian campaign in Judah was probably a reaction to Judah’s participation in the revolt of the Babylonian king Mardukapla-idinna (Merodach Baladan in 39:1), nominally a vassal of Sennacherib, the Assyrian overlord.22 Isa 36–37 contains two versions of Isaiah’s intervention in public affairs during this punitive campaign of Sennacherib, the first solicited (Isa 36:1–37:7 = 2 Kgs 18:17–19:8), the second unsolicited (Isa 37:9–38 = 2 Kgs 19:9b–37). The second episode (Isa 38:1–22 = 2 Kgs 20:1–11) contains the following incidents: a serious illness for Hezekiah and the prophet’s prediction of imminent death, followed soon after by a reprieve of fifteen years; the miracle of the sun’s shadow on the palace steps; and the healing of the king by Isaiah, now in the guise of physician. The final episode (Isa 39:1–8 = 2 Kgs 20:12–19) describes a visit to the king, now convalescent, from envoys sent by Merodach Baladan. The visit was ostensibly to congratulate Hezekiah on his recovery; an only slightly more plausible motivation for a journey of almost five hundred miles than scientific curiosity about the sun’s eccentric shadow on the palace steps suggested by the Chronicler (2 Chr 32:31). It is reasonably clear, however, that the envoys from Babylon were in Jerusalem to solicit Hezekiah’s participation in another attempt by Merodach Baladan to throw off the Assyrian yoke. The account of the visit ends with Isaiah’s prediction of the 22  2 Kgs 20:12 has berodach for Isa 39:1 merodach, but the latter is a disphemistic play on the name Marduk, principal Babylonian deity, a component of the king’s name, Marduk-apla-iddina.

168   Joseph Blenkinsopp deportation and exile of the royal family to Babylon (39:5–7 = 2 Kgs 20:16–18). Since we know from the Assyrian record of Sennacherib’s fourth campaign that the revolt of Merodach Baladan took place in 703 bce, about two years before the Assyrian campaign in Judah,23 the account of the visit must have been deliberately placed at the end of chapters 36–39, no doubt to conclude with Isaiah’s prediction of exile (39:5–8), thus linking with the anticipation of return from exile at the beginning of Deutero-Isaiah. We should add that since the narrative of the crisis in chapters 36–37 concludes with Sennacherib breaking camp, returning to Nineveh, and being assassinated by his two sons while at prayer in the temple of Nisroch, his god (Isa 37:36–38), it could not have been composed before 682 bce, the year of Sennacherib’s death, or maybe even at a later date. Isaiah’s message to Hezekiah assuring him that the Lord of Hosts will save his city, and that “from Jerusalem a remnant shall go forth and survivors from Mount Zion” (37:31, 35), will bring to mind passages about Zion as a safe place of refuge protected by the Lord of Hosts (4:2–6; 10:20–27), together with the apostrophes to Zion in Third Isaiah (59:15b–20; 62:1–5), which represent a mature stage in the formation of the Isaian collection.24

9.8.  Babylon in Isaiah 40–48 Babylon is named four times in Isa 40–48 (43:14; 47:1; 48:14, 20) and Chaldaeans is named another four times (43:14; 47:15; 48:14, 20), and neither term appears at all in chapters 49–55 and 56–66. Though the fall of Babylon had already been announced in the oracle series discussed in the previous section (Isa 21:8–9), there is a gap of almost a century and a half between the last events recorded or referred to indirectly in chapters 36–39—the death of Hezekiah in 687 bce (2 Kgs 20:6; Isa 38:5) and that of Sennacherib in 681 bce25—and the fall of Babylon to the Persian king Cyrus II in 539 bce, an event anticipated throughout chapters 40–48. The gap covers a period marked by events of the greatest importance: the fall of Nineveh to the Medes and Chaldaeans (Babylonians) in 612 bce celebrated by the prophet Nahum, the relatively rapid decline and fall of Assyria and its empire, and the founding of the Neo-Babylonian Empire with the accession to the throne of Nabopolassar in 625 bce. It is especially surprising that there is nothing about the disaster of the fall of Jerusalem, the events that led up to it, or the deportations that followed it. Perhaps it may have seemed to contrast too painfully

23 Luckenbill, Ancient Records 2:121–22. 24 Childs, Assyrian Crisis; Clements, Deliverance of Jerusalem; Blenkinsopp, “Hezekiah and the Babylonian Delegation,” 107–122. 25  The extension of Hezekiah’s life by fifteen years predicted by Isaiah is consistent with, and probably based on, the account of the reign in 2 Kgs 18:2, 13. For the events surrounding Sennacherib’s death at the hands of two of his sons and the succession of Esarhaddon, see the inscriptions in Luckenbill, Ancient Records, 2:199–203.

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   169 with the rescue of Jerusalem/Zion over a century later.26 The linkage between chapters 1–39 and 40–48 is therefore made at the literary level and not at all at the historical level. After the addition of Isa 36–39 to the book, Isaiah’s prediction of exile during the reign of one of Hezekiah’s descendants (39:5–7) connects with the anticipation of return from exile in Isa 40. Absent these four chapters, the theme in Isa 35 of the pilgrim highway, the via sacra, creates a more direct link with the call addressed to prophets to prepare a highway for the return of the expatriates.27 But once the temple was destroyed and rendered uninhabitable, their God was exiled with them, and he returned from exile with them; witness the call at the beginning of the section to prepare “a highway for our God” (Isa 40:3, 9; also 52:8).28 As strange as this idea of a god being exiled and returning from exile may sound to us today, it fits a pattern well attested at that time; for example, on his famous cylinder, Cyrus claims to have repatriated the gods of Sumer and Akkad, who had been exiled by the impious Nabonidus, by bringing them back to their own cities. In parallel, Isa 46:1–2 maintains that the Babylonian deities Bel and Nebo (Marduk and Nabû) were destined for exile. We see, then, how the rebuilding of the temple and resumption of the temple liturgy were implicit in the anticipation of a return from Babylon.

9.9.  Babylon in the Context of the Theological Politics of Isaiah 40–48 From the Isaian perspective, the conflict between Judah and the imperial power of Babylon was, in the first instance, a conflict between deities; hence the polemical tone in evidence throughout this section of the book, the prevalence of rhetorical questions, and the use of judicial genres and terminology. The central issue in these chapters is the claim made by the prophet on behalf of Yhwh to sponsor the conquests of the Persian king Cyrus II, which would lead to the fall of Babylon to the Persians and the dismantling of the Babylonian empire, and therefore to the repatriation of deported Judaeans, the rebuilding of the temple, and the restoration of the temple cult. In the context of 26  For Berges, Buch Jesaja, 325–328, explaining and coming to terms with the disaster had to give way to the prospect of a new future full of hope for Jerusalem/Zion. He finds an explanation in Isa 51:17–23: Jerusalem has drunk from the cup of Yhwh’s wrath after having to offer its back to those who beat it, parallel with the fate of the Servant of the Lord (Isa 50:6). 27  On chapter 35 as a bridge to chapter 40, see Wildberger, Jesaja 28–39, 1330–1341; Steck, Bereitete Heimkehr. It is well known that Charles Cutler Torrey, one of the enfants terribles of biblical studies, argued that chapters 34–35 and 40–60 form a single work from one author, a writer of the highest genius; revisit his Second Isaiah, 53–67 and 279–301. 28  The exile of the “Glory” (‫ )כבוד‬in stages is described in Ezek 9:3; 10:4, 18–19; 11:22–23; Ezekiel attests to its presence in the chariot throne vision in the Babylonian diaspora (Ezek 1:4–28); and he witnesses in vision the return of the ‫ כבוד‬that once again fills the temple (Ezek 43:1–5), as it did after the building of Solomon’s temple (1 Kgs 8:11).

170   Joseph Blenkinsopp that time—let us say from the successful revolt of the Persian tribes led by Cyrus against Astyages king of the Medes in 550 to the fall of Babylon to Cyrus in 539—the claim may be viewed as a refutation of the commissioning of Cyrus by the Babylonian supreme deity Marduk announced on the propagandistic Cyrus Cylinder: He (Marduk) scanned and looked through all the countries searching for a right­ eous ruler . . . He pronounced the name of Cyrus king of Anshan, declaring him to be ruler of all the world . . . he ordered him to march against his city Babylon.29

The claim is supported in the first place by presenting Yhwh God of Judah as cosmic creator and therefore as incomparably superior to the Babylonian gods, including Marduk (Bel), supreme among them. The creation theme is in evidence throughout Isa 40–48: it is rare and quite different in emphasis in Isa 49–55, and appears in Isa 56–66 only with reference to the creation of a new heaven and new earth (Isa 65:17).30 In 40–48 the description of creation is at first reading similar enough to the Genesis version (Gen 1:1–2:4a) to convince several scholars that it is dependent on it, an understandable conclusion but one that ignores the differences. Both use the ­standard creation term ‫ברא‬, but the Isaian text uses other terms not used by the Genesis version, for example ‫יצר‬, characteristic of the alternative Genesis creation narrative (Isa 43:10; 45:7, 9, 18, cf. Gen 2:7, 8, 19), and ‫( צולה‬hapax) in place of ‫“( תהום‬the Deep,” Isa 44:27 cf. Gen 1:2). The scenario is also different in significant respects.31 A difference of a more substantial theological nature appears in the statement of Yhwh in Isa 45:7: I form light and create darkness, I bring about well-being and create woe; It is I, Yhwh, who do all these things.

In the P creation narrative, Yhwh God separates light from darkness but creates only light while insisting at each stage on the goodness of creation.32 Here, both darkness and light, woe and well-being are created by Yhwh. 29  ANET, 315. On the Cyrus cylinder and other texts relating to the fall of Babylon, see Ilya Gershevitch, Cambridge History, 2:532–61; Dandamaev, Political History, 47–53; Briant, Histoire, 1:50–55. 30  In Isa 40–48: 40:12–17, 21–22; 43:10; 44:24; 45:9–12, 18; 48:13. In 49–55: 51:9–10 presents the Combat Myth often associated with the creation of the world; 54:5 speaks of Yhwh as “God of all the earth” but not in a creation context (54:5). It is clear that this parody of the Babylonian cult of images is a wilful misrepresentation of their real meaning for those engaged in the cult. See Dick, “Mesopotamian Cult Statue,” 43–67. 31  For more on this issue, see my essay “Cosmological,” 493–499. 32  The creation of both light and darkness is often explained against the background of early Zoroastrian doctrine, but it is doubtful that such a clear formulation could be expected as early as the reign of Cyrus. See Duhm, Buch Jesaia, 342, and, more recently, Dykesteen Nilsen, “Creation”; Herbert Haag, “Ich mache Heil”; and DeRoche, “Isaiah xlv 7,” 11–21.

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   171 The features peculiar to the version of creation in Isa 40–48 can best be accounted for as a kind of mirror-imaging of the standard Babylonian mythic and cultic text Enûma Eliš (“When on high . . .”) recited on the fourth day of the great spring akitu festival. This text, written in seven columns, was composed and recited to the greater glory of Marduk, supreme ruler over the gods and sponsor of the Babylonian imperial enterprise. It presents the creation of the world and its inhabitants as a byproduct of conflict among the gods, reflecting in their sphere the violence endemic to imperial rule in the human sphere. It is extremely repetitive, no doubt due to its use in the cult in which repetition is to be expected, but it may be briefly summarized as follows. At the beginning there was only the male deity Apsu, representing the abyss of sweet water, and his female counterpart Tiamat, representing the ocean’s salt water. Their intercourse, the mingling of the waters, produced the other gods. In the course of time these gods rebelled against the rule of Apsu, who decided to kill them because they disturbed his rest. One of them, Ea, god of wisdom, took preemptive action and by applying magic killed Apsu instead. Tiamat then waged war against the gods to avenge her partner and appointed one of eleven monsters, Kingu, to lead the attack. Terrified, the gods persuaded Marduk, son of Apsu, to lead them, and he agreed to do so on condition of being proclaimed supreme among the gods. Marduk emerged victorious and, after a grisly account of the slaying of Tiamat, he created the earth and sky out of her dismembered body and the inhabitants of the earth out of the blood of Kingu. In gratitude to Marduk, the gods built for him the great temple complex Esagila in Babylon, with its ziggurat. The story ends with the proclamation of Marduk’s kingship and the recital of his fifty titles.33 In responding to the theology of Enûma Eliš, and therefore the theology implicit in the akitu festival, the Isaian author rejects, in the first place, the idea of cosmogony as a sequel to theogony, that is, the idea that human beings appear on the scene as actors in a narrative already in progress, one which they do not own and over which they have no control: Before me no god was formed and there will be none after me. (43:10) There is no god apart from me, a god who overcomes and saves; there is none but me. (45:21)

The incomparability of Yhwh God, one of the great themes of Isa 40–48 (40:18, 25; 43:11), may be read as a rejection of the same claim made on behalf of Marduk in Enûma Eliš: “No one among the gods can equal him” (VII 14, 88); hence the polemic against the manufacture and veneration of images of deities, a special feature of Isa 40–48. We recognize, of course, that this polemic is a deliberate misrepresentation of the place of the cult image in Babylonian religion.34 Space permits only one example of the ­mirror 33  For the text of Enûma Eliš, see Heidel, Babylonian Genesis, and for a summary and comments, see Saggs, Babylonians, 330–338. 34  Dick, “Mesopotamian Cult Statue,” 43–67.

172   Joseph Blenkinsopp i­maging of the Marduk theology in the book of Isaiah. We saw earlier that, unlike the Genesis account of creation, in Isa 45:7 Yhwh creates darkness and woe, as well as light and ­well-being (cf. Deut 32:7). Marduk likewise commands destruction as well as creation (VI 131), but in doing so requires the assistance of the god Ea, who is famous for wisdom. Yhwh, on the contrary, acted alone: Who has advised him as his councillor? With whom did he consult to be enlightened? (Isa 40:13–14, cf. Enûma Eliš VI 38).

9.10.  Queen Babylon Dethroned (Isaiah 47:1–15) We come now to a poem that presents Babylon, capital city of the Neo-Babylonian empire, as a queen splendid and proud, adept at the magical arts, but now dethroned, humiliated, and reduced to slavery. The poem has no title, but the 3–2 meter, the “limping measure,” belongs to the category of the lament (qînāh), but in this case obviously a mock lament, either anticipating or celebrating the fall of the city. Division into stanzas, of somewhat unequal length, is indicated by the imperatives addressed in peremptory fashion to the subject: “get down from your throne” (v. 1), “sit in silence” (v. 5), “listen to this” (v. 8), “persist in your spells” (v. 12). Feminine personification of cities is quite common, for example, with Nineveh (Nah 3:4–7), Sidon (Isa 23:12), Tyre (23:15–16), and, of course, Zion/Jerusalem. The description of her fate no doubt reflects what only too frequently happened to female prisoners in Babylon’s many brutal wars. Reduced to slavery and to the hard task of grinding meal at the hand mill would often be their lot,35 and being exposed naked would have been common, as with the woman Nineveh, also a “mistress of sorcery” (Nah 3:4–5). The fate of Queen Babylon is for the most part attributed to her necromantic and magical practices designed to predict the course of the future and ward off danger.36 The prejudicial nature of these comments is obvious. They should be contrasted with the more balanced attitude to the intellectual culture of Babylon in the story about Daniel and his companions at the court of the great Nebuchadrezzar. After enrollment in a three-year curriculum in “the literature and language of the Chaldaeans” (Dan 1:4–5), they acquired a high level of 35  The verb ṭāhan (grind) can have a sexual connotation. Job swears that if he has ever seduced a woman, “let my wife grind for another, and let other men kneel over here” (Job 31:10). The condemnation of Samson to grinding grain in prison, typically a task for female slaves, was intended as a kind of symbolic emasculation (Judg 16:21). 36  The reuse of Isa 21:9 with reference to Rome, the new Babylon, in Rev 14:8 and the more ample development in Rev 18:1–24 dwells on prostitution (porneia) rather than divination and magic.

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   173 competence in “every aspect of literature and wisdom” (1:17), not excluding skill in the interpretation of dreams and heavenly phenomena.37 Though immigrants were forced to expatriate, they were about to profit by an education and culture more ancient and sophisticated than any other in the Near East, including that of Israel. In the Isaian context what is most significant about this mock lament is the parallelism in contrasting what is said about Queen Babylon with the Woman Zion. Whereas Babylon is to get down from her throne and sit in the dust, Zion is told to get up from the ground and ascend the throne (52:2). Babylon is forced to expose herself, but Zion is told to put on fine garments (52:1). Babylon is shamed, but there will be no more shame for Zion (54:4). Babylon is now a captive, but Zion, who had once been sold into slavery, is now redeemed from captivity (52:3–6). Babylon is widowed and childless (47:8–9), but Zion has many children.38 If this last analogy is pursued further, it will be seen that Marduk, head of the Babylonian pantheon, is the husband of Queen Babylon; and in fact, Marduk’s claim to preeminence and incomparability is echoed by his spouse: “I am, and there is none other” (Enûma Eliš VII 14, 8, cf. Isa 47:10). The claim notwithstanding, her husband was shown to be unable either to give her children or rescue her.

9.11.  A Footnote As always, many issues remain to be addressed, many questions to be answered. One issue lurking behind those the chapter has already addressed is what the authors of the different kinds of material in Isaiah really knew about Babylon and the Babylonians, their intellectual, judicial and legal culture, their religious beliefs and rituals, not to mention their long and distinguished history from the time of the great Hammurapi. These questions have generally been reduced to the issue of the location of the authors at the time of writing, whether in Judah or in expatriate communities in Babylonia. This issue is still sub iudice and the arguments cannot be rehearsed here but, in any case, the location makes little difference to our understanding of what the Isaian prophets actually have to say about Babylon.39

37  The wisdom in question (‫ )חכמה‬which allegedly led Queen Babylon astray (Isa 47:10) has a more restricted reference in the poem. One of the best accounts of the intellectual culture of Neo-Babylonian Babylon with respect to religion, literature, mathematics, astronomy, and medicine is that of Saggs, Babylonians, 283–391. 38  Isa 49:2–21; 54:1–4; 60:4, 8–9; 66:7–9. 39   The main lines of the debate about location can be followed in Barstad, Babylonian Captivity; Tiemeyer, Comfort; and Blenkinsopp, “Continuity-Discontinuity,” 77–88.

174   Joseph Blenkinsopp

Bibliography Barstad, Hans  M. The Babylonian Captivity of the Book of Isaiah: “Exilic” Judah and the Provenance of Isaiah 40–55. B-Skrifter 102. Oslo: Novus forlag, 1997. Beaulieu, Paul-Alain. The Reign of Nabonidus King of Babylon 556–539 b.c. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989. Berges, Ulrich. Das Buch Jesaja: Komposition und Endgestalt. HBS 16. Freiburg: Herder, 1998. Bickerman, Elias. From Ezra to the Last of the Maccabees: Foundations of Post-Biblical Judaism (1949). New York: Schocken, 1962. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “Continuity-Discontinuity in Isaiah 40–66: The Issue of Location.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans  M.  Barstad, 77–88. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “The Cosmological and Protological Language of Deutero-Isaiah.” CBQ 73 (2011): 493–499. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “Hezekiah and the Babylonian Delegation: A Critical Reading of Isaiah 39:1–8.” In Essays on Ancient Israel in Its Near Eastern Context: A Tribute to Nadav Na’aman, edited by Yairah Amit, Ehud Ben Zvi, Israel Finkelstein, and Oded Lipschits, 107–122. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. A History of Prophecy in Israel. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 19962. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 1–39: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Briant, Pierre. From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire. Translated by Peter T. Daniels. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2002. Briant, Pierre. Histoire de l’empire perse de Cyrus à Alexandre. Vol. 1. Leiden: Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten/Paris: Fayard, 1996. Childs, Brevard S. Isaiah and the Assyrian Crisis. SBT 2/3. London: SCM, 1967. Clements, Ronald E. Isaiah 1–39. NCBC. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1980. Clements, Ronald E. Isaiah and the Deliverance of Jerusalem. JSOTS 13. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1980. Dandamaev, Muhammad  A. A Political History of the Achaemenid Empire. Translated W. J. Vogelsang. Leiden: Brill, 1989. DeRoche, Michael. “Isaiah xlv 7 and the Creation of Chaos.” VT 42 (1992): 11–21. Dick, Michael B. “The Mesopotamian Cult Statue: A Sacramental Encounter with Divinity.” In Cult Image and Divine Representation in the Ancient Near East, edited by Neal H. Walls, 43–67. ASOR 10. Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2005. Duhm, Bernhard. Das Buch Jesaia übersetz und erklärt. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 19224. Dykesteen Nilsen, Tina. “The Creation of Darkness and Evil (Isa 45:6C–7).” RB 115 (2008): 5–25. Gershevitch, Ilya. The Cambridge History of Iran. Vol. 2. The Median and Achaemenian Periods. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. Ginsberg, Harald L. “Reflexes of Sargon in Isaiah after 715 b.c.” JAOS 88 (1968): 49–53. Haag, Herbert. “Ich mache Heil und schaffe Unheil (Jes 45,7).” In Wort, Lied, und Gottesspruch. Festschrift Joseph Ziegler, vol. 2, edited by J. Schreiner, 179–185. FB 1–2. Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1972.

Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Background   175 Hayes, John H., and Stuart A. Irvine. Isaiah the Eighth Century Prophet: His Times and His Preaching. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1987. Heidel, Alexander. The Babylonian Genesis: The Story of Creation. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 19512. Kuhrt, Amélie. The Ancient Near East c. 3000–330 b.c. Vol. 2. London: Routledge, 1995. Luckenbill, Daniel D. Ancient Records of Assyria and Babylonia. Vol. 2. London: Histories and Mysteries of Man, 1989. Saggs, Henry W. F. The Babylonians. A Survey of the Ancient Civilisation of the Tigris-Euphrates Valley. London: Macmillan, 19882. Skinner, John, The Book of the Prophet Isaiah Chapters I–XXXIX. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 19152. Steck, Odil Hannes.Bereitete Heimkehr: Jesaja 35 als redaktionelle Brücke zwischen dem Ersten und dem Zweiten Jesaja. SBS 121. Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1985. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Torrey, Charles Cutler. The Second Isaiah: A New Interpretation. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1928. Vanderhooft, David S. The Neo-Babylonian Empire and Babylon in the Latter Prophets. HSM 59. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1999. Weber, Max. Ancient Judaism. Translated and edited by Hans H. Gerth and Don Martindale. London: Collier Macmillan/New York: The Free Press, 1952. Weber, Max. Economy and Society. Berkeley: Universsity of California Press, 1968. Weber, Max. Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft: Grundriss der verstehenden Soziologie. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 19564. Wildberger, Hans. Isaiah 13–27. Translated by Thomas  H.  Trapp. CC. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1997. Wildberger, Hans. Jesaja 3: Jesaja 28–39. BKAT 10. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1982.

chapter 10

The Book of Isa i a h: Persi a n/Hel l en istic Backgrou n d Kristin Joachimsen

10.1. Introduction Produced over centuries, the book of Isaiah is embedded in the broader historical, political, social, and religious context of the ancient Near East.1 This chapter focuses on the Persian and Hellenistic background of the book’s texts that relate to the fifth to third centuries bce. The depiction of the Persian king Cyrus as a rising power in Isa 44:28 and 45:1 has been considered an especially significant marker for the earliest dating of these texts. Isa 40–55 generally is taken to reflect a historical setting around the time of Cyrus’s conquest of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, in 539 bce. Many scholars locate the historical and geographical context of Isa 40–48 in Babylon and of Isa 49–55 in Yehud. These texts are taken to mirror the end of the Neo-Babylonian Empire and the emerging Achaemenid Empire. Isa 56–66, also located in Achaemenid Yehud, has been placed slightly later, after the temple construction, which is conventionally dated early in the reign of Darius (520–515 bce). Although the majority view among scholars is that the main final edition of the book of Isaiah took place during the Persian era, some have suggested that further additions were made during the Hellenistic period. Topics scholars have associated with the Persian context of the book of Isaiah concern Cyrus, creation, monotheism, and universalism. These are often viewed as relating, in one way or another, to Achaemenid imperial ideology. Texts that appear to offer current historical allusions or that are related to literary features associated with what is labeled proto-apocalyptic (e.g., Isa 18–23; 24–27; 56–66) 1  Many thanks to Prof. Diana Edelman for valuable comments to and suggestions of improvements of this study.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   177 are dated to the Hellenistic period by some scholars.2 A Hellenistic reception of the book of Isaiah can be illuminated by Hellenistic variants of the book, such as Old Greek Isaiah and Qumran 1QIsa. Apart from a flattering portrayal of Cyrus as a benign ruler and foreign benefactor of the Yehudites in Isa 41–48, there are no explicit references to the Achaemenid Empire in Isaiah; no other kings, such as Darius, for instance, are mentioned. The texts do not seem to be concerned with the central or local leadership and administration of empires; no governors, high-ranking officials, or judges are mentioned by name, and no army or taxation is closely identified.3 The texts are prophecy, poetry, and religious rhetoric addressing the centrality of Israel, Jerusalem, and the people of Yhwh in the divine plan, including the role of the peoples. Scholars have used terms such as drama,4 dreams and fantasies,5 vision,6 and utopia7 to describe the divine intervention in Isaiah. At the same time, religion and politics are intertwined; deities and rulers overlap. A significant aspect of the prophetic discourse concerns identity formation when there has been the loss of monarchy, land, and, for a while, also temple. It further relates to the experience of exile and return, including the reconfiguration of land, community, and temple, as well as Torah, cult, and an orientation toward the future. Isa 56–66 reflects divergent views of the temple restoration: although some texts support the temple project (60:1–3, 13–15; cf. 57:5–10; 65:1–7), other texts depict it as unnecessary, because Yhwh does not need a humanly constructed dwelling place on earth (66:1–6). It is important to be aware of the marginality of Yehud within the Achaemenid Empire. The text reflects various versions of center and periphery, with, for instance, Yehud, exile, or the broader Achaemenid Empire as points of view.

10.2.  Prophecy in Persian Yehud To approach the Persian and Hellenistic background of Isaiah, it is important to bear in mind what kind of texts we are dealing with, and by extension, what we can expect to learn about historical, political, social, and religious realities from such “highly poetic, 2  Even though redaction-critical models of Isaiah are not the main focus of this chapter, it should be noted initially that many redaction-critical studies deal exclusively with text-internal or intratextual readings, with no or few considerations of an external world/context. One recent example of this type of study is Stromberg, Isaiah after Exile. Other redaction-critical models, however, such as those of Kratz and Albertz, seem to imply that the texts are scrutinizing certain historical-political situations. More on this in sections 10.4, 10.8 and 10.9. 3  However, the downfall of kings and rulers in general is mentioned; see nn. 14 and 23, as well as influx of ‫“ חיל גוים‬the wealth of the peoples” (60:5, 11; 61:6) and, ‫כבוד גוים‬, “the wealth of the peoples” (66:12). 4 Baltzer, Deutero-Isaiah; Watts, Isaiah 34–66; Tiemeyer, Comfort. 5  Blenkinsopp, “Second Isaiah.” 6 Quinn-Miscall, Reading Isaiah. 7  Ben Zvi, “Yehudite Collection,” 158–159; Linville, “Playing.”

178   Kristin Joachimsen open ended literature.”8 Just as religion, ethnicity, propaganda, and book have been used as analytical categories to study the book of Isaiah, prophecy, too, is a scholarly construct, defined as a form of mediation of divine knowledge. The transcription of oral prophecy into text requires a community that repeats, adapts, interprets, and reinterprets the prophetic message according to its own purposes. The attention paid in present scholarship to the transmission, recontextualization, and extension of the prophetic process differs from previous foci, where scholars regarded the earliest material as the most authentic and considered the later additions to have lesser value. How and why prophecy came to be written down, reapplied, and extended is related to the context of scribal culture. Scribes are commonly associated with the palace (king) or the temple (priest) or said to have worked independently; in any case, they are often considered part of an elite. After 587 bce there was no king and for a while no temple, and during the Persian period, control was in the hands of the Achaemenid Empire. At the same time, many scholars take the Persian and early Hellenistic periods to be the most productive time spans for scribal activity in Yehud, including a shift from a concern with individual prophets to a focus on prophetic writings as cultural productions.9 The diversity of the prophetic material suggests that the scribes behind the texts were not spokespersons for a single political or religious view. The material has been depicted as both multivoiced and as “shared, integrative discourse” without dissecting the various voices into different “schools” or “circles.”10 One recent trend is to regard the prophetic discourse as written by and for Jerusalem-based and temple-centered literati in the late Persian and early Hellenistic periods, who are more or less the same scribal elite who also produced the Pentateuch and the so-called Deuteronomistic History.11 There is disagreement among scholars about what those who shaped Isaiah were doing, as well as about who they where and why they did it. Certainly, scholars also debate whether historical prophets lie behind Second Isaiah and Third Isaiah or whether the texts were produced by collective authorship, such as, for instance, Levitical ­singers.12 Rainer Albertz claims that the prophetical books were made public: in the case of Second Isaiah (40:1–52:12*), he suggests that it was being read in the ‫סוד‬, which he identifies as “the gathering of all the men of a settlement that takes place every evening.”13

10.3.  Isaiah and Empire The prophetic discourse of the book of Isaiah related to empire and the experience of imperial domination. In Isaiah, the relationship of both Yhwh and Israel with foreign 8  Linville, “Playing.” 9  Edelman and Ben Zvi, Production. 10  Ben Zvi, “Towards an Integrative Study,” 25. 11  Cf. Edelmann and Ben Zvi, Production. 12 Berges, Book of Isaiah. 13  Albertz, “Public Recitation,” 105.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   179 nations, such as Assyria, Egypt, Babylon, and Persia (and in some scholars’ interpretations, also the Ptolemaic and the Seleucid rulers), is composite, expressing a whole range of attitudes, including loyalty, ambivalence, and opposition to empires. These great powers serve Yhwh in the deity’s dealing with Israel. They are also becoming arrogant, leading to their own downfall. The roles of the foreign kings, both as allies of Yhwh (if not of Israel, upon whom they are inflicting calamity) and as enemies of this deity, are characterized by ambiguity. While Babylon is mentioned in different ways,14 and Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sheba are depicted as ransomed peoples (43:3–4), Cyrus is not called Persian. Instead, this foreigner is incorporated into Yhwh’s plan; the Persian king’s conquest of Babylon delivers the people of Yhwh. Isaiah ends with a new world order of Yhwh, where the deity shall make new heavens and a new earth (66:22).15 In this vision of the future, when all shall acknowledge Yhwh, foreign peoples are included alongside Zion, Jerusalem, and Israel. In an imperial vision of Yhwh’s reign, there shall be a steady influx of tribute and peaceful pilgrimage to Zion by people from all parts of the world (60:1–16) as well as the defeat of its enemies (66:24). The relationship of text and history is one of the cruxes in biblical scholarship in general, including Isaianic studies. The prophetic discourse is certainly embedded into broader historical, political, social, and religious contexts. At the same time, James Linville refers to a tendency among Isaiah scholars to pursue “patterns of coherence between the worldview apparently espoused in a text and the historical circumstances that are considered to lie behind.”16 Joseph Blenkinsopp, for instance, identifies 41:25 with some of Cyrus’s concrete campaigns (cf. also 41:2–5).17Also, Albertz’s redactioncritical model applies the anonymous oracles—which have been identified as referring to Cyrus—to Darius (42:5–7; 45:11–13*; 48:12–15). Albertz assigns these texts to the first edition of Second Isaiah, which he dates to 520 bce.18 Such attempts to tie the prophetic text to detailed historical events risk historizing the poetry and metaphors by blending the world in the text with constructions of what is regarded to be the historical and social background of the text. Apart from paying attention to the genre and language of Isaiah, the linguistic turn has also taught us that the relationship between text and the external world is not a one-to-one correspondence.19 Even though it is impossible to identify concrete historical references in the texts, the texts are certainly products of encounters and dynamics of cultural threads.

14  In the present context, note the depictions of the devastation of Babylon and the humiliation of its deities—versus Cyrus—in, e.g., 43:14; 45:1–2; 46:1–2 (more on the Babylonian deities Bel and Nebo to follow); 47; 48:14–15. Babylon/Chaldeans are elsewhere mentioned in 13:1, 19; 14:4, 22; 21:9; 39:1, 3, 6, 7; 48:20. 15  Cf. Israel becoming “a light to the nations” in 49:6; cf. 2:2–5; 45:14; 60:1–16; 66:18–23. 16  Linville, “Playing,” 287. 17 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 206. When it comes to Isa 45:1, however, Blenkinsopp stresses: “It would be hazardous to assume that it refers to specific occasions” (p. 249). 18  This is based on Albertz’s support and adjustment of Kratz’s redaction-critical model, in which Cyrus is central. See Albertz, “Darius.” See more on Kratz’s redaction-critical model in n. 56. 19 Clark, History.

180   Kristin Joachimsen

10.4.  The Achaemenid Empire (ca. 550–330 bce) The emergence of the Achaemenid Empire began with the defeat of the Median king Astyages by the Persian king Cyrus II the Great (559–530 bce), in Ecbatana around 550 bce. Cyrus went on to conquer the Lydian kingdom in the 540s and the Neo-Babylonian Empire in 539 after defeating the last Babylonian king, Nabonidus (555–539 bce). Cyrus also conquered tribes in Central Asia, where he was killed in 530. His son Cambyses conquered Egypt in the 520s, and his successor, Darius I (521–486 bce), added northwestern India to the empire. The Achaemenid Empire reached its climax under Darius I and his son Xerxes I (486–465 bce), when it extended from the Indus River Valley to Northern Greece and encompassed parts of the Balkans, all of Egypt and Libya, and the Aegean islands. The extensive empire lasted until it was defeated by the Macedonian Alexander III the Great (336–323 bce) and its final ruler, Darius III, was murdered (336–330 bce) in 330 bce. When the Persian king Cyrus defeated the Babylonian king Nabonidus and took over his dominion in the west, the region of the former kingdoms of Israel (Samaria) and Judah (Yehud) that had for decades been part of the Neo-Babylonian Empire became Achaemenid. When, sometime later, the former Neo-Babylonian Empire was divided into the provinces of Babylonia and Ebir-Nari, Yehud and Samaria became part of the latter.20 The Achaemenid Empire was characterized by diversity—multiethnic, multilingual, and multicultural—and was influenced by the policies of the earlier Assyrian and NeoBabylonian Empires.21 While Achaemenid historiography in general has been criticized for both Hellenocentrism and Iranocentrism, one might likewise ask whether there have been Judeocentric or bibliocentric interpretations of Achaemenid policy and religion among biblical scholars. When scholars study Persian Yehud from perspectives taken from the biblical texts, there is a risk that they will overestimate the significance of Yehud in Achaemenid imperial policy, as well as of the movement from exile to restoration. Whatever material we are dealing with, however, must be understood on its own terms and within its own cultural context. This sounds obvious but is not always taken sufficiently into consideration. It is not unusual to criticize various materials for being “biased” or not “authentic,” but this material has never claimed to satisfy historical­critical needs. It suits its own ends. A more critical evaluation of the different sorts of material has led to greater attention being paid to local variations and genre differences instead of assuming a universal Achaemenid imperial ideology. This matter will be further illuminated in sections 10.6 and 10.7. 20  Wiesehöfer, “Acahemenid Rule,” 171. Wiesehöfer further suggests that this division took place in the first year of Xerxes I, i.e., 486 bce (p. 181). 21  Gates-Foster, “Achaemenids.”

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   181

10.5.  Cyrus in the Book of Isaiah Allusions to Cyrus are scattered throughout Isa 41–48. Although there is no consensus in the scholarship about which texts allude to the Persian king, the following texts often are considered: Isa 41:1–4 (5–7), 21–29; (42:5–9); 44:24–28; 45:1–7 (8), 9–13; 46:(5)9–11; 48:12–15 (16a). Cyrus is depicted as an instrument in Yhwh’s hand and as his anointed (45:1), whose mission is to rebuild Jerusalem and its temple to Yhwh (44:26, 28), to release the exiles (45:13),22 and to subdue peoples, kings, and cities on Yhwh’s behalf.23 Cyrus is called by name by Yhwh (45:4), labeled a shepherd (44:28) and Yhwh’s friend (48:14) and is designated “a bird of prey” from the east (46:11, cf. 41:2) and northeast (41:25), one who did not know Yhwh (45:4) as well as one who shall summon Yhwh’s name (41:25). Since Isa 40–55 has few references to the Davidic dynasty and its potential restoration (55:1–5), some scholars claim that the responsibility of the Davidic kings to build the temple is passed on to Cyrus. Thus Yehud, rather than the Davidic dynasty, will enjoy Yhwh’s eternal covenant.24 Lisbeth Fried claims that the historical prophet Second Isaiah legitimizes the contemporary Cyrus as “the Davidic monarch, heir to the Davidic throne,” and illustrates this claim with counterparts in Egypt and Babylon: “Like Udjahorresnet in Egypt and the priests of Marduk in Babylon, Deutero-Isaiah handed over to Cyrus the royal Judean title of ‘Yhwh’s anointed’, as well as the entire royal Judean court theology associated with it.”25 Contrary to most scholarly interpretation of the role of the Persian king Cyrus as a liberator of the returned exiles, Philip Davies underlines that Cyrus is a conqueror and that the material in Isa 40–55 is propaganda for the Persians. As such, Cyrus is depicted as a divine agent for creating the world order, while Yhwh is a universal deity, dressed as a Persian deity, like Marduk and Ahuramazda. In 22  The ingathering is depicted as taking place not only from Babylon but from the east, west, north, and south (i.e., a version of merism) etc., cf. 43:5–6; 49:12; 60:4, and from the ends of the earth in 41:9. For more ingathering motifs, see 11:12; 40:11; 43:16–21; 44:1–5; 49:5, 8, 17–21; 54:2–3, 7, 11–14, 18; 56:8. 23  On the defeat of Babylon, see n. 14. In Second Isaiah, it is not only Babylon that shall become subdued but also idol makers (41:29; 44:9–20; 45:16), peoples, and kings (41:2–3; 45:1; 49:7 [and ‫מׁשלים‬ “rulers”]; 22–23; 52:15), ‫“ רוזנים‬rulers” (40:23), ‫“ רוזנים‬governors” (41:25) as well as 45:14: “Egypt’s wealth and Nubia’s gains and Sabaites, long of limb, shall pass over to you and be yours. Pass over and follow you in fetters, Bow low to you and reverently address you: ‘Only among you is God, There is no other god at all!’ ” The term ‫“ גוים‬peoples” in Isa 40–55 is a designation for those who are not called by the name of Israel, in 40:15, 17; 41:2; 42:1, 6; 43:9; 45:1, 20; 49:6, 7, 22; 52:10, 15; 54:3; 55:5. Further, pl. ‫עמים‬ occurs as a designation of the nations in 49:22 as a parallel to ‫גוים‬, and as a contrast to ‫ עם‬in 51:4–5. In 42:5, the meaning might be less specific: “Thus says God, Yhwh, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to ‫‘ עם‬the people’ upon it and spirit to those who walk in it.” Cf. 40:7 and “daughter of Babylon.” 24 Perdue, Israel and Empire, 98. 25  Fried, “Cyrus as the Messiah,” 390. This comparative material will be further commented upon in section 10.6 and 10.7. Fried dates Second Isaiah between the return of exiles under Sheshbazzar and the dedication of the temple in the sixth year of Darius. This dating means that the predictions of Cyrus’s rise were made sometime after it in fact happened.

182   Kristin Joachimsen this “Yahwistic ideology of world empire, . . . the Judaean national god ensures the wellbeing and triumph of his own nation by means of benevolent world empires which he controls.”26 Jon Berquist regards Cyrus’s depiction as the anointed one with God-given authority to rule Yehud in Isa 44:24–45:8 as Persian imperializing ideology.27

10.6.  Achaemenid Imperial Policy: King, Deity, and Local Norms Within the broader context of the Achaemenid Empire, we may associate Cyrus’s execution of Yhwh’s kingship over Jerusalem with the Achaemenid kings’ adaptation of the title and status of local monarchs of the past. Conquering kings offered support and received local acceptance. A few illustrations of this follow:28 In the Udjahorresnet inscription in Egypt (dated early in the reign of Darius I), the Achaemenid king Cambyses is given Pharaonic titles.29 This Egyptian scribe, priest, and naval officer, who had formerly served at the temple of Neith in Sait, praises Cambyses for learning about the gods of this local temple of Neith. The conquering Achaemenid king is presented as appropriating local Egyptian royal court traditions, and in this way becoming Pharaoh and legitimating his rule over Egypt. Additionally, Cambyses supports the restoration of the local cult. It should be emphasized that this inscription reflects local Egyptian concerns, and that the situation cannot be generalized to reflect something that happened in the entire Achaemenid Empire. The Cyrus Cylinder (dated to 539 bce) tells how the Babylonian deity Marduk uses the Achaemenid king to restore his sanctuaries and how the conquering king appropriates local Babylonian royal court traditions. The context of the text is Cyrus’s conquest of the city of Babylon. The Cyrus Cylinder has been central in discussions of the transition from the Neo-Babylonian Empire to the Achaemenid Empire and of the dating of the book of Isaiah. Many scholars claim that the Cyrus Cylinder was promulgated after Second Isaiah or the main part of it (between 550 and 538 bce).30 In the Cyrus Cylinder, the Persian king boasts that Marduk has ordered him to go to Babylon and restore the worship of Marduk, which the Babylonian king Nabonidus had neglected (lines 5–10). Nabonidus is said to have carried away the gods of the Babylonian temples before the 26  Davies, “God of Cyrus,” 220. 27  Berquist, “Postcolonialism,” 22. While it is common to highlight the ideological character of the Cyrus Cylinder, Davies and Berquist seem to confirm that the presentation of Cyrus in Isaiah was based on this cylinder. More on this in section 10.7. 28  The comparative material referred to is not exhaustive but offers some illustrations of how Achaemenid imperial ideology has been applied to illuminate the presentation of the Persian king Cyrus in Isaiah. 29  For an English translation of the Udjahorresnet inscription, see Kuhrt, Persian Empire, 117–122. 30  Cf. Blenkinsopp, “Theological Politics,” 138. By placing the author prior to the fall of Babylon in 539 bce, he might anticipate the events.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   183 conquest by the Persian king (ll. 32–33). Marduk has singled out Cyrus as a ruler of special righteousness, awarded him victories and royal power, and acknowledged him as a ruler over all—Babylon, Sumer, and Akkad (ll. 11–12; 20–21). In Amelie Kuhrt’s seminal article from 1983, she stresses the ideological character of the cylinder. She also claims that the presentation of Cyrus as a builder and restorer of sanctuaries and as the one who returns deities to their local places has its forerunners in the scribes of the Assyrian king Assurbanibal and his father, Esarhaddon, who had applied this ideology in legitimating their rule in Babylon.31 In an updated study, Kuhrt argues that “each motif in the Cyrus Cylinder was drawn from a repertoire of traditional Mesopotamian themes, used by earlier claimants to the Babylonian throne to legitimize their rule.” They share the same interests as their predecessors, related to conquest, effective domination, and the collection of taxes. These conventional traits are regarded as royal, political, and religious propaganda.32 Anne Fitzpatrick-McKinley highlights that the circumstances of the various instances of Persian benevolence toward local sanctuaries are very different and that there are not enough examples to support a claim that the Achaemenids executed a universal imperial policy: “The politics reflected in the Cyrus Cylinder must remain restricted to our discussion of Babylonian cities that, as the Assyrians had learned, were well capable of resistance and rebellion and hence careful handling.”33 In addition to the differences in genre, it is of uttermost significance to take the “Babylocentric” perspective of the royal Cyrus Cylinder into account and, likewise, the “Yehudocentric” perspective of the poetic prophecy about Cyrus. In both instances, we are dealing with individuals who are elected to the kingship by the local deity, the Babylonian Marduk and the Yehudite Yhwh respectively. The local(-universal) deity grants Cyrus victory over the previous ruler, Nabonidus/Babylon, and the conquering Cyrus is presented as the ally of the local deities and the benefactor of the local population, supporting the restoration of the local cult and encouraging a return of deportees to their former homes. Whereas the Cyrus Cylinder concerns the relationship of Marduk and the Babylonians only, the prophetic text concerns the relationship of Yhwh and the Yehudites. To put the comparison into perspective, we might add that in Isaiah, the Babylonian deity Marduk is among Yhwh’s rivals.34 Marduk is not mentioned by

31  Kuhrt, “Cyrus Cylinder.” 32  Kuhrt, “Ancient Near Eastern History,” 110. Other texts, where Cyrus is presented as restoring local temples and the cult, are the Nabonidus Chronicle (English trans. in Kuhrt, Persian Empire, 50–53) and the Verse Account of Nabonidus (English trans. in Kuhrt, Persian Empire, 75–80). 33  Fitzpatrick-McKinley, “Continuity,” 149, with further references to Machinist and Tadmor, “Heavenly Wisdom.” 34  In this regard, both Yhwh’s uniqueness (cf. such utterances as “There is no other than Yhwh” in 43:11–13; 44:6–8; 44:22–25; 48:14–16, as well as statements that Yhwh is “the first and the last” in 41:4; 43:10–11, 13; 44:6, 8) and the polemics against other deities (cf. 40:18–20, 25–26; 41:5–7, 21–29; 43:9–13; 44:6–20; 46:1–2, 5–9; 48:3–5) are part of the broader prophetic discourse.

184   Kristin Joachimsen name but is present in a satire of Babylonian deities in 46:1–2, where the weaknesses of Bel and Nebo are portrayed before their fall.35 Among Achaemenid historians, classicists, and biblical scholars, the Achaemenid Empire has had a reputation for religious tolerance and support of the restoration of cities and temples, which owes partly to depictions of Cyrus’s support of local deities and the cult. In addition to Isaiah, Ezra, Nehemiah, Haggai, and Zech 1–8 talk about how Persian rulers allowed those who had been exiled to return to Yehud and sponsored the restoration of the city of Jerusalem, the Yhwh temple, and its cult.36 In Ezra 1:2–4 and 6:3–5, Cyrus is mentioned as the author of a decree that permits the return of exiles from Babylon to Yehud.37 The term “tolerance” has, however, been criticized for being both inappropriate and anachronistic. Various other interests have been offered as explanations for practices related to this attitude. Mary Brosius, for example, explains the assumed tolerance as part of the empire’s attempt to control potential revolt by subjects who may have felt oppressed.38 Heleen ­Sancisi-Weerdenburg states: “In the polytheistic mind every god, even the god of the most hated enemy, can exist and have power, and it is therefore better to remain on good terms with every god.”39 Michael Kozuh also nuances this by claiming that when “locals lent their gods and language of liberation to the Achaemenids, this is more a factor of local power dynamics than of any Achaemenid ideology or policy.”40 I shall now take a closer look at this dissolution of binary opposition between ruler and ruled by considering a more subversive potential of the presentation of Cyrus in Isaiah.

35  In response to scholars who relate this passage to the Babylonian controversy of Nabonidus and Cyrus in the Cyrus Cylinder, Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, in accordance with others, comments: “This is, perhaps, to put too much confidence in what is a flagrantly propagandistic document” (pp. 250–267). 36  Gruen, “Persia,” shows how depictions of Persian kings in both Ezra and Nehemiah, 1 Esdras, Dan 6, the Greek additions to Daniel, and Esther likewise contain mocking elements. See more on Gruen’s analysis of this material as Jewish appropriation in section 10.6. 37  There has been some discussion in biblical scholarship about whether the Cyrus edict referred to in the book of Ezra is authentic or not; see Grabbe, “Persian Documents.” What I would like to emphasize in this regard is that this “edict” must be read on its own terms, related to the rhetorical role of documents in the book of Ezra in general. This relates to Davies, “Biblical Studies,” 57, who stresses how a focus on more rhetorical and fictive elements in a text implies neither that it is being regarded as “divorced from reality or fraudulent” nor that it is without historical significance. Rather, it shows that historical referents are not needed to validate a narrative. Cf. the role of Cyrus in the book of Isaiah in section 10.7. 38 Brosius, Persians, 1–3, 48–51. Likewise, the invitation to rebuild the temple may reflect the use of temple buildings as places for tax collection. 39  Sancisi-Weerdenburg, “Colloquium,” 279. Cf. Sancisi-Weerdenburg, “Yauna,” 234–237. In other presentations of Cyrus, this Persian king is depicted as less tolerant: see Kuhrt, “Achaemenid”; “Ancient,” 117. Cf. Kratz, “Nabonidus to Cyrus,” who also treats more composite presentations of Nabonidus found in various materials. 40  Kozuh, “Torture,” 292.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   185

10.7.  Cyrus as the Other: Resisting Imperial Hegemony Scholars have highlighted the undermining potential in how Cyrus is placed under the authority of the deity of Israel. According to Eric Gruen, the presentation of Cyrus seems to be “more subversive than supportive,”41 while Göran Eidevall speaks about “suppressed opposition”42 and Ehud Ben Zvi highlights how the terminology applied to Cyrus has much in common with ( and much that is different from) Jacob/Israel/the servant and Abraham, which he explicates as an appropriation and reshaping of imperial memory in Isa 40–55.43 Cyrus is used to provide (additional) legitimacy to Yhwh and Yehud, in which the power of the Persian king is not imperial power but comes from Yhwh (and not Marduk one might add), while the center of the prophetic discourse is Yehud and Jerusalem (and not Susa). In this prophetic rhetoric, Yhwh constantly proves that he is the one and only one; the deity who has power in creation, history, and predictions of the future. As part of the broader picture, Cyrus carries out Yhwh’s will; he will perform the deity’s purpose (44:26; 46:10; 48:14). In recent scholarship, the imperial context of the prophetic discourse has been illuminated by perspectives taken from postcolonial studies. Such studies have contributed to more refined analyses of what might be called “work from within the system.” Postcolonial studies is a common name for cultural studies of former colonies, emphasizing the power relationship between the previous colonizers and their colonies, between rulers and the oppressed and marginalized. Even though postcolonial theory is developed using material and situations that in many ways differ from what underlies Isaiah, biblical scholars might benefit from consideration of its theoretical underpinnings related to identity, othering, the execution of power, marginalization, and ideology, as well as accommodation and resistance to empire. One concept that has proven fruitful in this regard is James Scott’s “hidden transcript” as a response of resistance to empires. Scott applies this concept in scrutinizing how subordinate groups employ strategies of resistance that go unnoticed by superordinate groups. He explains that a hidden transcript is “always present in the public discourse of subordinate groups” but remains beyond the reach of the powerful, because the messenger is either anonymous or disguised.44 Using the concepts of “hybridity” and “mimicry” (which are interwoven), the cultural critic Homi Bhabha challenges the dichotomies that might be embedded in identity discourses. He rejects the simplistic polarizations of, for example, “us” and “them,” empire and colony, superior and subordinate, and center and periphery, speaking instead of hybridities of cultures.45 No culture remains static but is interrelated and embedded in 41  Gruen, “Persia,” 72. 42  Eidevall, “Propagandistic,” 113. 43  Ben Zvi, “Yehudite Collection,” 157–158, n. 39. 44 Scott, Domination, 19. 45 Bhabha, Location, 112.

186   Kristin Joachimsen a dynamics of reformulation, owing to conquests, migration, and cultural encounters. A hybrid identity within imperial hegemony has been articulated as an identity that both accommodates to and resists the empire. Additionally, by speaking of mimicry, Bhabha seeks to explicate how the colonized might establish a counternarrative that works to deconstruct the imperial narrative by seeming to imitate the imperial culture but, in fact, rejects it through mockery and derision.46 This terminology about cultural responses to imperial domination might illuminate an analysis of the interplay of Yehudite and imperial narratives, in which a presentation of Cyrus—the Persian king and foreigner—in the book of Isaiah might allow for the adoption, adaption, and alteration of some roles within the empire. Whereas in the Cyrus Cylinder this Persian king attributes his victory to the Babylonian Marduk, in Second Isaiah he is Yhwh’s instrument. Cyrus’s success in dismantling the Babylonian empire (41:1–5, 25–29; 43:14; 45:1–7, 13; 46:11; 48:14–16) is due to Yhwh and for the benefit of the Yehudites. Cyrus’s conquest of the Medes, Lydians, and Ionians is not at stake here and, in fact, the rebuilding and repopulation of Jerusalem took place after his reign. While Yehud is marginal within the Babylonian and Achaemenid empires, it is the center of Cyrus’s activity in Isaiah. As opposed to the Cyrus Cylinder, where the Persian king is speaking himself, in Isaiah, Cyrus is not quoted but only depicted and exclusively so from the perspective of Yhwh worshippers. When Cyrus undertakes the responsibility to rebuild and maintain the temple, this foreign monarch fits within the Yehudite world view. The Persian king has become “Yehudized,” acting in favor of Yhwh, Jerusalem, and the Yehudites. Cyrus resembles an insider; his outsider image becomes blurred with his Yhwh-istic traits as the builder of Yhwh’s temple, yet he is not a stereotypical insider either. Additionally, he differs from other foreign monarchs—no one else is “Yehudized” like him.47 The presentation of Cyrus in Isa 41–48 is interwoven in a prophetic discourse in which the other is neither part of a strategy of exclusion within a system of binary opposition nor part of a strategy to unambiguously portray him as being outstanding. Both the portrayal of Persian Cyrus as a savior and the presence of polemics against and the mockery of other deities and their worshippers might be described as significant “­others”, whose task in the poetic prophecy is to uncover who Yhwh and Israel are. Berquist interprets the conspicuous silence regarding Persia in large parts of the Hebrew Bible as a theological justification for a colonial Yehud.48 It is more accurate to regard the texts as neither anti-Babylonia nor pro-Persia but pro-Yhwh, with Israel in a more ambiguous position: at a time when the political independence of Yhwh’s people has disappeared, Israel expresses doubt in Cyrus and lack of trust in Yhwh (45:9–13).

46  Bhabha, 86. 47  Eidevall, “Propagandistic,” shows how the book of Isaiah both upholds and undermines the Assyrian, Egyptian, Babylonian, and Persian empires, with a blend of loyalty, ambivalence, and opposition. 48  Berquist, “Postcolonialism and Imperial Motives,” 22.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   187

10.8.  “I Who Form Light and Create Darkness”: Creation and Cosmology Creation is one of the characteristic topics of Isaiah, which is said to owe to Persian influence. It is furthermore often related to Achaemenid imperial ideology, including a connection to Zoroastrianism. Davies, for instance, locates the composition of Second Isaiah in Yehud in the fifth century bce, “reflecting the ideology of a newly re-founded cult of a universal single high god, worshipped without images, and thus modelled on Ahura Mazda.”49 He claims that the local god is identified with the imperial god, and that in this way, Yhwh becomes the universal high god and the god of the empires, residing in the temple in Jerusalem. While commenting on the lack of consensus about whether the cult of Yhwh in Jerusalem was influenced by Zoroastrianism, Davies lists several aspects that have been referred to as influential, including monotheism, a ban on icons in the cult, angelology, the sovereign spirit/deity of evil, belief in resurrection, and an increased concern about purity.50 Isa 45:6c–7 is one text that he and others relate to Zoroastrianism: “I am Yhwh and there is no one else, I who form light and create darkness, I bring wellbeing / prosperity (1QIsaa “good”) and create woe/disaster; I, Yhwh, do all these things.” The only direct link between Zoroastrian creation myths in the material that dates to the third century ce at the earliest and Achaemenid religion and imperial ideology is the name of the deity Auramazda. This name represents a main deity in Achaemenid royal inscriptions, and the foremost benevolent Zoroastrian god is also called Ahura Mazda. The claim that the Achaemenids were Zoroastrians is ­contested, however, because it relies on later texts. Using later Zoroastrian material to construct Achaemenid religion and ideology assumes continuity from the fifth and fourth ­centuries bce to the third century ce at the earliest, which is methodically unsound.51 Reinhard Kratz likewise analyses Isa 45:6c–7 within a context of Achaemenid royal ideology, claiming: “Documentation of the ideology and practice of Achaemenid rule is

49  Davies, “Judahite Prophecy,” 204. 50  Davies, “Judahite Prophecy,” refers to neither Zoroastrian sources nor secondary literature related to the discussion, nor does he give any references to Achaemenid material. Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 250, argues that Isa 45:7 is a polemic against Zoroastrianism, while in a later study, “The Cosmological and Protological,” 499, n. 21, he refutes that. Nilsen, “Creation in Collision,” claims that 45:7 is directed against Babylonian rather than Zoroastrian dualism. 51  No Zoroastrian text is dated earlier than the Sasanian period, that is, the third to seventh centuries ce. Kratz, “Isaiah and the Persians,” n. 26, claims that among Iranologists, the dating of Zoroaster and his teaching range from the second millennium bce to the Achaemenid time or later, referring to Boyce and Grenet, History of Zoroastrianism, vols. 2 and 3; Boyce, “Religion of Cyrus the Great,” Stausberg, Die Religion Zarathustras, 26–31; 157–186; and Zarathustra. Kratz discusses whether Isa 45:6–7 can be compared with the Gathas (Yasna 44), but concludes that, because of the uncertainties with the dating of the Zoroastrian material, the dualism in 45:6–7 cannot be ascribed to Zoroastrian influence. Likewise, on his discussion of monotheism, see n. 59 below. I am grateful to Prof. Kratz for providing me with a copy of his article prior to publication.

188   Kristin Joachimsen only attested from Darius onwards.”52 Significantly for Kratz, the statements of creation related to the figure of Cyrus in Isa 42:5; 45:12; 48:13 (cf. also 44:24; 45:7) differ from those statements of the creation of Israel, of salvation and from other world-creation statements that he locates in Isa 40–48*—that is, in what he defines as the earliest writing in his redaction-critical model. What is new in the Cyrus texts, according to Kratz, is that the notion of creation of the world serves to provide the space for a universal, political world order . . . [i]n which a royal figure (Cyrus) is instituted as the earthly representative of the divine world order for the salvation of Israel and of all nations, as a “covenant of the people (of mankind)” and as “light of the nations,” as stated in Isa 42:6 (in allusion to and reformulation of Isa 49:6).53

Kratz compares statements associated with Cyrus about the creation of heaven and earth with what he regards as a stable, constituent element of creation in Achaemenid imperial ideology. He considers a characteristic feature of this ideology to be that the god Ahura Mazda is placed at the top of the Persian pantheon, as the creator of earth and heaven. Kratz relates this to Yhwh, who “in Isa 42:5; 45:12 and 48:13, created earth and heaven (usually in this order!), the people on earth and the blessings for the people, and finally, called and appointed the Persian king (DNa 1–5).”54 Kratz claims that this Achaemenid ideology started with Darius I. In support, he refers to Darius’s tomb inscription at Naqs-iRustam (DNa 1–5) and Darius I’s Bisitun Inscription (DB 6–8), in which the Persian king establishes and enforces a universal political world order and law set down at creation and made subordinate to him by Ahura Mazda.55 Thus, Kratz’s redaction-critical model of Isaiah is based on his construction of Darius’s ideology, in which the influence of this version of an Achaemenid imperial ideology is a terminus a quo for Second Isaiah.56 Kratz criticizes scholars who read a one-to-one correspondence between the depiction of Cyrus in Isaiah and in the Cyrus Cylinder from 539 bce, as deriving historical 52  Kratz, “Isaiah and the Persians,” writes: “The few inscriptions, which are written in the name of Cyrus, are considered by experts to be retrojections from the Darius era” (p. 5). He does not give any references to this. Kratz concludes that since “the memory of Cyrus the Great lived on in Babylon, Egypt, Iran and Greece long after 539 bce” (p. 7), he regards a dating of both Isa 40–48* and what he regards as the Cyrus supplement to after 539 bce as possible. More on Kratz’s redaction-critical model in n. 56. 53  Kratz, “Isaiah and the Persians,” 12 (quote). 54  Kratz, 9. 55  For English translations of Darius’s tomb inscription at Naqs-iRustam, see Kuhrt, Persian Empire, 502–503, and for the Bisitun inscription, 141–158. 56  In Kratz’s redaction-critical model of Isaiah (Kyros, 175–191), he detects five different redactional levels. He dates the third level, called the Cyrus supplement, to the reign of Darius I, 520–515 bce. The two basic criteria for his distinction between different redactions are shifts of grammatical persons and conceptual inconsistency. In support, Kratz offers a meticulous analysis of Isa 45:1–7, in which he differentiates between two conceptions of Cyrus: the basic layer and the Cyrus supplement. In the earlier layer (45:*1, 2, *3, 4, 6, 7), Cyrus is called as Yhwh’s anointed, whose task it is to conquer Babylon and to liberate Yhwh’s servant Jacob/Israel. In the Cyrus edition (45:*1, 3b, 5ab), Cyrus is identified as Yhwh’s servant, whose deliverance of Jacob/Israel serves as a light to the nations.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   189 reality from the imagined literary situation. From a historiographical point of view, however, his own reading does not seem to be fundamentally different from those that he criticizes. Like other scholars, he also attempts to identify references in the texts to specific historical events. Whether one dates the texts to 539 or 520 bce, there is no principal difference when it comes to the relation of the text to external reality. Additionally, one also needs to consider the difference in genre between biblical poetic prophecy and the Achaemenid royal inscriptions. Again, we touch on the challenge that pervades the entire discussion of the historical background of prophetic discourse—namely, the scholarly risk of historizing the poetry and metaphors by blending the world in the text with constructions of what is regarded to be the historical and social background of the text. Kratz’s comparison of the texts by combining a creation topic with Cyrus in Isaiah and Achaemenid royal inscriptions is at risk of offering a reductionist and simplistic analysis. As we have seen in several previous instances, one cannot assume a straightforward grafting of external influence. Should a broader cultural context be taken into account, it is unsound to convey such a one-dimensional, isolated interpretation; the topic of creation is part of an ongoing process that cannot be scrutinized with such meticulous precision without also considering broader Neo-Assyrian and Babylonian traditions, as well as previous Hebrew traditions.57 Other scholars, who do not share Kratz’s redaction-critical model, emphasize that the topic of creation must not be distinguished from other statements about Yhwh as the unique creator, the creation of Israel, the creation of salvation, or other types of worldcreation statements in Isa 40–55. Moreover, in Second Isaiah creation motifs are juxtaposed with literary motifs that depict Yhwh as having power over Israel, Babel, and Cyrus. Instead of constructing an entire story on the basis of “earth and heaven,” I prefer to highlight poetic features, such as the clusters of parallelisms and merisms in the Cyrus oracle of 44:24–45:7, the density of repetitions, paradoxes, and elaborations in this pe­ric­ope, as well as its broader literary context.

57  Blenkinsopp, “Cosmological and Protological,” states: The exaltation in Isaiah 40–48 of the God of Israel as supreme and incomparable, cosmic creator and controller of the course of history including the career of Cyrus can be constructed as a kind of mirror image of the ideology expressed in dramatic form in the akitu new year festival, and in the literary form of Enuma Elish, the myth recited and perhaps enacted on the fourth day of this ritual of renewal. (p. 506) Likewise, Nilsen, “Creation in Collision?” argues that utterances of Yhwh as the unique creator in Isa 40–48 might be seen as both adaptions and refutations of Babylonian creation traditions. In terms of both these comparative studies, I would like to stress that in any kind of comparison, the differences are as interesting—and as significant—as the assumed similarities. Crouch, “Adapting the Cosmological Tradition,” examines how Isa 40–55 adapts pre-exilic traditions of Yhwh as warrior, king, and creator but without the previous interconnectedness of the motifs. In this study, the Cyrus texts are interpreted on the same literary level as the other creation motifs.

190   Kristin Joachimsen

10.9.  “I am Yhwh, there is no other”: Monotheism Monotheism also is regarded as one of the characteristic topics of Isaiah and has been explained as having resulted from Persian influence.58 As we have already seen, Davies lists monotheism as one aspect of Zoroastrianism that might have influenced the cult of Yhwh in Jerusalem.59 Kratz claims that “the exclusive monotheism of Deutero-Isaiah is closely associated with the figure of Cyrus.” This claim stems from his redaction-critical model. In what he labels the first written stratum of Isa 40–48*, he argues that the “trial speeches against the nations and their gods” emphasize Yhwh’s uniqueness.60 Cyrus, a foreign king, is appointed for the sake of Jacob-Israel (45:4) and as proof of Yhwh’s uniqueness (45:7). Kratz relates this statement to the Babylonian controversy over Nabonidus and Cyrus, in which “the DeuteroIsaianic texts follow the position of the Babylonian priest of Marduk to a certain extent.”61 In comparison, Yhwh takes the place of the supreme god, instead of Sin (Nabonidus’s favored deity) or Marduk (the deity who uses Cyrus). While Sin and Marduk are the highest among many gods, Yhwh is the only deity.62 Kratz argues that exclusive monotheism is something that has developed “from the biblical tradition itself,” in which “the imperial vision in Isa 40–48 changes into an eschatological vision of the universal rule of Yhwh.”63 58  For a brief overview of the discussion of the contested category of monotheism, with special attention to Isaiah, see MacDonald, “Monotheism and Isaiah,” without, however, any particular view to the Persian background. 59  Davies, “Judahite Prophecy.” Kratz, “Isaiah and the Persians,” offers two arguments for why an assumed Zoroastrian monotheism is not relevant for a comparison with Isaiah. His discussion relates to Isa 46:1–2 but could in principal be extended: when Achaemenid inscriptions after Darius mention Ahura Mazda as the only god, these statements have to do with the literary form of the inscriptions. This form lends itself to the presentation of Ahura Mazda as a dynastic and imperial god. He is, however, not presented as the only one. Rather, other inscriptions present him alongside other gods, including local deities. See more on Zoroastrianism in n. 51. 60  Kratz, “Isaiah and the Persians,” 13 n. 29: “Whether the trial speeches and the Cyrus oracle led an independent existence before the basic writing (Grundschrift) seems doubtful to me now; both could have been drawn upon then and there for the composition.” Cf. the polemics against other gods in the trial speeches in 46:1–2 (see n. 34). 61  Kratz, “Isaiah and the Persians,” 13. 62  Kratz, 14, adds: “This being the first time in the history of religion of Israel and Judah.” 63  Kratz, 17. In contract, Smith, God in Translation, 149–185, explains Israelite monotheism as a response to the imperialistic claim of a Mesopotamian concept developed from Enuma Elish and Ludlul bel Nemeqi, i.e., “a theism in which the deities are regarded as aspects or functions of a chief god, with political power often key to its expression” (p. 169). Second Isaiah responds with a counterclaim on behalf of Yhwh (45:5), which Smith dates to before the emergence of the Achaemenid Empire (p. 177). Olyan, “Isaiah 40–55,” argues that there is no monotheism in Second Isaiah. Expressions that have been interpreted as such are to be understood instead as claims about Yhwh’s incomparability and unique power and agency. Olyan concludes: “If there is anything radical and unprecedented about Isaiah 40–55, it is rather the poet’s rhetoric, which seems to suggest a new meaning and more restricted use for the word ‘god’ (‫( ”)אלהים‬p. 190).

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   191

10.10.  The Hellenistic Dating of Isaiah Due to Literary Features and Historical Allusions A Hellenistic context has been identified for texts within the book of Isaiah that are related to certain literary features or regarded as offering historical allusions to known events in that period. The literary features are associated with such terminology as eschatological and apocalyptic, whose definitions are contested. Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer offers an overview of the discussions concerning Isa 18–25; 24–27; and 56–66;64 others also relate Isa 13–14 and 34–35 to the Hellenistic period. Tiemeyer stresses that the prophetic eschatology and proto-apocalyptic terminology applied in this regard denote sets of ideas and motifs but do not constitute a literary genre, and shows that Isa 24–27; 34–35; and 56–66 are often considered to be proto-apocalyptic.65 John Collins distinguishes between this-worldly eschatology (national restoration, e.g., Isa 11) and cosmic eschatology (e.g., Isa 24–27). He shows how both topics appear in preexilic and post-exilic literature and thus cannot be used as an argument for Hellenistic dating.66 Since it obviously is difficult to date such literary motifs with precision, scholars who opt for a Hellenistic dating add arguments based on historical allusions. Blenkinsopp is a good example; he claims that the oracles against the nations in Isa 18–25 were continuously updated into the Hellenistic era, in response to changed historical situations.67 Odil Steck is a scholar who has argued most prominently for a Hellenistic dating of parts of the book of Isaiah. He assumes that parts of Isa 56–66 (Third Isaiah) deal with what he labels a final universal judgment (universales Weltgericht). This idea presupposes that the texts are a response to the breakup of the Persian Empire and its fragmentation by the Diadochi and the Syrian wars in the Hellenistic era. In Steck’s view, the final text of the book of Isaiah was written between 312–311, and the final redaction of the book as a whole took place between 302/301 and 270 bce.68 He interprets the lament 64  Tiemeyer, “Prophetic Texts.” 65  Tiemeyer, 263–264. 66  Collins, “Prophecy, Apocalypse and Eschatology,” 49. He further claims that the difference between prophetic and apocalyptic eschatology cannot be described as a contrast between this-worldly eschatology and cosmological eschatology. In his view, the decisive distinction between prophetic and apocalyptic eschatology relates the judgment of the dead in Enoch and Daniel. In terms of Isa 24–27, Collins, “Beginning of the End,” 145, says: “Proposals range from the eighth century to the second, although the later extreme is shown to be untenable by the discovery of the scrolls of Isaiah at Qumran.” He adds that the majority of scholars dates all these chapters to the Persian period. 67  See, for instance, Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 343–345, on words against Phoenicia in Isa 23: “Since 5 seems to interrupt the flow rather sharply, it may have been slipped in with reference to Alexander’s seven-month siege of Tyre in 332 on his way to Egypt” (p. 343). He also supports the growing consensus that the use of the term apocalypse to describe Isa 24–27 should be abandoned (p. 346). 68 Steck, Studien zu Tritojesaja, 30–40, 192. Steck’s precise datings follow the five Syrian wars that took place in 274–271, 260–253, 246–241, 221–217, and 201–200/198 bce.

192   Kristin Joachimsen in Isa 63:7–64:11 [12] as a response to the capture of Jerusalem by Ptolemy I in 302/301, and 65–66 as utterances of condemnation of Hellenistic cults. Since Isa 56–66 refers to neither historical events nor historical individuals, and since statements about political or social conditions are metaphorical, Steck’s precise datings have met with extensive criticism.69

10.11.  Hellenistic Variants: Old Greek Isaiah and Qumran 1QIsa The reception of the book of Isaiah in a Hellenistic context can be illuminated by preserved Hellenistic variants of the text in which the prophecy is repeated, adapted, and interpreted. For many scholars, the Old Greek Isaiah, dated to the second century bce, has been valuable primarily as a witness to the underlying Hebrew Vorlage and its reception in later texts. As such, this textual variant has played a secondary role and has been seen to have little value on its own. However, there is an increasing tendency to read the Greek variant in its own right as a Hellenistic document intended for a Hellenistic audience and characterized by what has been labeled “Septuagint hermeneutics.”70 Studies of 1QIsaa add yet another dimension of the transmission and reshaping of Isaianic prophecy. In the Qumran caves, twenty-one copies of the book of Isaiah have been found. 1QIsaa is the oldest known manuscript of the book, for which C14 dating has given a range from 335–122 bce, while the writing is dated to circa 100 bce on the basis of paleographic arguments.71 Årstein Justnes shows how 1QIsa has been regarded as a “biblical” text of Isaiah, and often evaluated first and foremost as textual witnesses to the “original” work.72 He asks whether the “time has come to write a commentary on 1QIsaa that deals with the preserved text, in its own right, interpreted in its historical and cultural context.”73 A focus on Old Greek Isaiah and Qumran 1QIsa as part of the Hellenistic context of the book of Isaiah might point to a significant perspective that has recently been highlighted in biblical scholarship: the pluriformity and polysemy of texts, where there is no dividing line between production and reception. While the transmission of text, implying repetition, adaption, interpretation, and reinterpretation, is neither an original nor a new idea in biblical studies, insights from reception studies might contribute to more nuanced analyses in our field.74

69 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56–66, 57–58; Tiemeyer, “Prophetic Texts,” 269–272. 70 Wagner, Reading the Sealed Book. 71  Justnes, “Great Isaiah Scroll,” 98. 72  Justnes, 93. 73  Justnes, 108. 74  Cf. Breed, Nomadic Text, 15–51, who criticizes how biblical scholars seem to operate with the concept of an original or “ideal” text and adjacent original (or “ideal”) contexts.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   193

10.12.  The Future Direction of the Debate What can we expect to learn about Persian and Hellenistic historical, political, social, and religious realities from the book of Isaiah, a composition that uses prophecy, poetry, and religious rhetoric to address the centrality of Israel, Jerusalem, and the people of Yhwh in the divine plan, including the role of the nations? As we have repeatedly seen, a fundamental challenge that runs throughout the discussion of the historical background of prophetic discourse is the risk of blending the world in the text with constructions of what is regarded as the historical and social background of the text. This challenge can be scrutinized from different perspectives; I will highlight two: the role of comparison and the role of interdisciplinarity. As we have seen, many scholars study Yehud within the broader context of Achaemenid imperial policy: Berquist (sec. 10.5), Davies (secs. 10.5, 10.8) and Kratz (sec. 10.8), for instance, filter the texts about Cyrus in Isaiah through scholarly constructs of such an ideology. When does a comparison work and when does it not? While we have seen many attempts to identify references in the texts to specific historical events, in other instances, scholars claim it would be too “hazardous to assume that it refers to specific occasions,” or they warn against putting “too much confidence in what is a flagrantly propagandistic document.”75 As regards the Persian, Hellenistic, or other proposed cultural contexts of Isaiah, it is necessary to pay attention to the different “genres” of material being compared. Without taking literary genre into consideration, we risk offering reductionist and simplistic analyses. The straightforward grafting of an external influence onto the text leads to one-dimensional and isolated interpretations. As Fitzpatrick-McKinley reminds us: “Persian use of Babylonian cultural symbols and Cyrus’ self-representation as the king of Babylon who fulfilled all the functions of native kings was not something innovative, and the expertise seen in Persian ­propaganda in how to use native culture as a means to legitimate foreign rule was most likely based on traditions about the policies of some earlier Assyrian kings.”76 Various material shows how the conquering Persian kings offer and receive local acceptance, and these instances must be connected to the specific local context, whether Egyptian, Babylonian, or Yehudite. The material that has been applied to illuminate this topic is characterized by great diversity, regarding genre and local variations and, by implication, also different interests. This diversity, in turn, means that we cannot assume that we are dealing with a uniform Achaemenid royal ideology. Although scholars are pursuing historical allusions and influence,77 Linville states: “The point of most comparative 75  Quotations from Blenkinsopp referred to in nn. 17, 35. 76  Fitzpatrick-McKinley, “Continuity,” 140. 77  This is especially prominent in Kratz’s redaction-critical model on Isaiah, based on his construction of Darius’s ideology. Cf. section 10.8, as well as Steck’s precise datings of what he regards as the Hellenistic text of the book of Isaiah, cf. section 10.10.

194   Kristin Joachimsen religion is not to force similarities between traditions or events, but to gain some new perspectives.”78 This approach provides a bridge to the next aspect, interdisciplinarity. Recent cultural studies have contributed to an orientation toward reflexivity, including a critique of representation and dichotomization.79 Furthermore, postcolonial studies have proven fruitful in analyzing questions of identity and power and have also supplied an increased understanding of cultural dynamics, with foci on constructions of “others” and of boundaries. This approach encourages less one-dimensional and atomistic interpretations. It should be repeated that, even though it is not possible to identify concrete historical references in the texts, the texts are certainly products of encounters and dynamics of cultural threads. However, the prophecy of Isaiah certainly does not scrutinize the broader international political situation; it might tell us something about Yehud but much less about the broader Achaemenid Empire. Finally, it is my hope and wish that scholars continue to read the poetry of the texts. Rather than smooth away the “otherness” of the text at the expense of domesticating it to fit one’s own categories or make the text “one-dimensional” to fit one’s own ways of thinking, we need to be challenged and surprised by its “strangeness.” Through its metaphors and imagery, the prophetic discourse transmits, preserves, interprets, challenges, and undermines. By its otherness, the voice of the text also is a valuable, knowledgebased resource in our multicultural time of differences!

Bibliography Albertz, Rainer. “Darius in Place of Cyrus: The First Edition of Deutero-Isaiah (Isa 40.1–52.12).” JSOT 27 (2003): 371–383. Albertz, Rainer. “Public Recitation of the Prophetical Books? The Case of the First Edition of Deutero-Isaiah (Isa. 40:1–52:12*).” In The Production of Prophecy: Constructing Prophecy and Prophets in Yehud, edited by Diana V. Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi, 96–110. London: Equinox, 2009. Bachmann-Medick, Doris. Cultural Turns: New Orientations in the Study of Culture. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2016. Baltzer, Klaus. Deutero-Isaiah: A Commentary on Isaiah 40–55. Hermeneia. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2001. Ben Zvi, Ehud. “On Social Memory and Identity Formation in Late Persian Yehud: A Historian’s Viewpoint with a Focus on Prophetic Literature, Chronicles and the Dtr. Historical Collection.” In Texts, Contexts and Readings in Postexilic Literature Explorations into Historiography and Identity Negotiation in Hebrew Bible and Related Texts, edited by Louis C. Jonker, 95–148. FAT II/53. Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2011. Ben Zvi, Ehud. “Towards an Integrative Study of the Production of Authoritative Books  in  Ancient Israel.” In The Production of Prophecy: Constructing Prophecy and Prophets in  Yehud, edited by Diana  V.  Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi, 15–28. London: Equinox, 2009.

78  Linville, “Playing,” 276.

79 Bachmann-Medick, Cultural Turns.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   195 Ben Zvi, Ehud. “The Yehudite Collection of Prophetic Books and Imperial Contexts: Some Observations.” In Divination, Politics and Ancient Near Eastern Texts, edited by Alan Lenzi and Jonathan Stökl, 145–169. ANEM 7. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014. Berquist, Jon  L. “Postcolonialism and Imperial Motives for Canonization.” Semeia 75 (1996): 15–35. Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture (1994). London: Routledge, 2004. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “The Cosmological and Protological Language of Deutero-Isaiah.” CBQ 73 (2011): 493–510. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2002. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “Second Isaiah—Prophet of Universalism.” JSOT 41 (1988): 83–103. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “The Theological Politics of Deutero-Isaiah.” In Divination, Politics and Ancient Near Eastern Texts, edited by Alan Lenzi and Jonathan Stökl, 129–143. ANEM 7. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014. Boyce, Mary. “The Religion of Cyrus the Great.” In Achaemenid History III: Method and Theory, edited by Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenburg and Amelie Kuhrt, 15–31. Proceedings of the London 1985 Achaemenid History Workshop. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten, 1988. Boyce, Mary, and Frantz Grenet. A History of Zoroastrianism. Vol. 2, Under the Achaemenians. Handbuch der Orientalistik. Leiden: Brill, 1982. Boyce, Mary, and Frantz Grenet. A History of Zoroastrianism. Vol. 3, Zoroastrianism under Macedonian and Roman rule. Handbuch der Orientalistik. Leiden: Brill, 1991. Breed, Brennan  W. Nomadic Text: A Theory of Biblical Reception History. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2014. Brosius, Mary. The Persians: An Introduction. London: Routledge, 2006. Clark, Elizabeth A. History, Theory, Text: Historians and the Linguistic Turn. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004. Collins, John J. “The Beginning of the End of the World in the Hebrew Bible.” In Thus Says the Lord: Essays on the Former and Latter Prophets in Honor of Robert  R.  Wilson, edited by John J. Ahn and Stephen L. Cook, 137–155. London: T&T Clark, 2009. Collins, John  J. “Prophecy, Apocalypse and Eschatology: Reflections on the Proposals of Lester Grabbe.” In Knowing the End from the Beginning: The Prophetic, Apocalyptic, and Their Relationship, edited by Lester L. Grabbe and Robert D. Haak, 44–52. JSPS 46. London: T&T Clark, 2003. Crouch, C. L. “Adapting the Cosmological Tradition in Isaiah 40–45.” SJOT (2011): 260–275. Davies, Philip R. “Biblical Studies: Fifty Years of a Multi-Discipline.” CurBS 13 (2014): 34–66. Davies, Philip R. “God of Cyrus, God of Israel: Some Religio-Historical Reflections on Isaiah 40–55.” In Words Remembered, Texts Renewed: Essays in Honour of John F. A. Sawyer, edited by Jon Davies, Graham Harvey, and Wilfred G. E. Watson, 207–225. JSOTS 195. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1995. Davies, Philip R. “Judahite Prophecy and the Achaemenids.” In Assessing Biblical and Classical Sources for the Reconstruction of Persian Influence, History and Culture, edited by Anne Fitzpatrick-McKinley, 203–215. Classica et Orientalia 10. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2015. Edelman, Diana V., and Ehud Ben Zvi, eds. The Production of Prophecy: Constructing Prophecy and Prophets in Yehud. Bible World. London: Equinox, 2009. Eidevall, Göran. “Propagandistic Construction of Empires in the Book of Isaiah.” In Divination, Politics and Ancient Near Eastern Texts, edited by Alan Lenzi and Jonathan Stökl, 109–128. ANEM 7. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014.

196   Kristin Joachimsen Fitzpatrick-McKinley, Anne. “Continuity between Assyrian and Persian Policies toward the Cults of Their Subjects.” In Religion in the Achaemenid Persian Empire: Emerging Judaisms and Trends, edited by Diana  V.  Edelman, Anne Fitzpatrick-McKinley, and Philippe Guillaume, 42–84. Orientalische Religionen in der Antike 17. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016. Fried, Lisbeth S. “Cyrus as the Messiah? The Historical Background to Isaiah 45:1.” HTR 95 (2002): 373–393. Gates-Foster, Jennifer. “Achaemenids, Royal Power and Persian Ethnicity.” In A Companion to Ethnicity in the Ancient Mediterranean, edited by Jeremy McInerney, 175–193. Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World. Chichester, UK: Wiley Blackwell, 2014. Grabbe, Lester L. “The ‘Persian Documents’ in the Book of Ezra: Are They Authentic?” In Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, edited by Oded Lipschits and Manfred Oeming, 531–570. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006. Gruen, Eric. “Persia through the Jewish Looking-Glass.” In Jewish Perspectives on Hellenistic Rulers, edited by Tessa Rajak, Sarah Pearce, James K. Aitken, and Jennifer M. Dines, 53–75. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007. Justnes, Årstein. “The Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa) and Material Philology: Preliminary Observations and a Proposal.” In New Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Essays in Honor of Hallvard Hagelia, edited by Markus Zehnder, 91–113. Perspectives on Hebrew Scriptures and Its Contexts 21. Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2014. Kozuh, Michael. “On Torture and the Achaemenids.” JAOS 129 (2009): 287–293. Kratz, Reinhard  G. “From Nabonidus to Cyrus.” In Ideologies as Intercultural Phenomena, edited by Antonio Panaino and Giovanni Pettinato, 143–156. Melammu Symposia 3. Milan: Università di Bologna & IsIao, 2002. Kratz, Reinhard G. “Isaiah and the Persians.” In Imperial Visions in the Book of Isaiah, edited by Reinhard G. Kratz and Joachim Schaper. FRLANT. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, forthcoming. Kratz, Reinhard G. Kyros im Deuterojesaja-Buch: Redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu Entstehung und Theologie von Jes 40–55. FAT 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991. Kuhrt, Amelie. “The Achaemenid Persian Empire (c. 550–330 bce): Continuities, Adaptions, Transformations.” In Empires: Perspectives from Archaeology and History, edited by Susan E. Alcock, Terence N. D’Altroy, Kathleen D. Morrison, and Carla M. Sinopoli, 93–123. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Kuhrt, Amelie. “Ancient Near Eastern History: The Case of Cyrus the Great of Persia.” In Understanding the History of Ancient Israel, edited by H. G. M. Williamson, 107–127. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. Kuhrt, Amelie. “The Cyrus Cylinder and the Achaemenid Imperial Policy.” JSOT 25 (1983): 83–97. Kuhrt, Amelie. The Persian Empire: A Corpus of Sources from the Achaemenid Period. Vol. 1. London: Routledge, 2007. Linville, James R. “Playing with Maps of Exile: Displacement, Utopia, and Disjunction.” In The Concept of Exile in Ancient Israel and Its Historical Contexts, edited by Ehud Ben Zvi and Christoph Levin, 275–293. BZAW 404. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010. MacDonald, Nathan. “Monotheism and Isaiah.” In Interpreting Isaiah: Issues and Approaches, edited by H. G. M. Williamson and David G. Firth, 43–61. Nottingham, UK: Apollos, 2009. Machinist, Peter, and Hayim Tadmor. “Heavenly Wisdom.” In The Tablet and the Scroll: Near Eastern Studies in Honor of William W. Hallo, edited by Mark E. Cohen, Daniel C. Snell, and David B. Weisberg, 145–151. Bethesda, MD: CDL Press, 1993.

Isaiah and the Persian/Hellenistic Background   197 Nilsen, Tina Dykesteen. “Creation in Collision? Isaiah 40–48 and Zoroastrianism, Babylonian Religion and Genesis 1.” JHS 13 (2013): 1–19. Nilsen, Tina Dykesteen. “The Creation of Darkness and Evil (Isa 45:6c–7).” RB 115 (2008): 5–25. Olyan, Saul M. “Is Isaiah 40–55 Really Monotheistic?” JANER 12 (2012): 190–201. Perdue, Leo  G. Israel and Empire: A Postcolonial History of Israel and Early Judaism. With Warren Carter. Edited by Coleman A. Baker. London: Bloomsbury, 2015. Quinn-Miscall, Peter D. Reading Isaiah: Poetry and Vision. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Sancisi-Weerdenburg, Heleen. “Colloquium Early Achaemenid History.” Persica 9 (1982): 274–284. Sancisi-Weerdenburg, Heleen. “Yauna by the Sea and Those across the Sea.” In Ancient Perceptions of Greek Ethnicity, edited by Irad Malkin, 323–346. Center for Hellenic Studies Colloquia 5. Washington, DC: Center for Hellenic Studies, Trustees for Harvard University, 2001. Scott, James C. Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990. Smith, Mark S. God in Translation: Deities in Cross-Cultural Discourse in the Biblical World. FAT 57. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Stausberg, Michael. Die Religion Zarathustras: Geschichte, Gegenwart, Rituale. Vol. 1. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2002. Stausberg, Michael. Zarathustra und seine Religion. Munich: C. H. Beck, 2005. Steck, Odil Hannes. Studien zu Tritojesaja. BZAW 203. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1991. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Will the Prophetic Texts from the Hellenistic Period Stand Up, Please!” In Judah between East and West: The Transition from Persian to Greek Rule (ca. 400–200 bce), edited by Lester L. Grabbe and Oded Lipschits, 255–279. London: T&T Clark, 2011. Wagner, J.  Ross. Reading the Sealed Book: Old Greek Isaiah and the Problem of Septuagint Hermeneutics. FAT 88. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013. Watts, John D. W. Isaiah 34–66. WBC 25. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005. Wieserhöfer, Josef. “Achaemenid Rule and Its Impact on Yehud.” In Texts, Contexts and Readings in Postexilic Literature, edited by Louis C. Jonker, 171–186. FAT II/23. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011.

Pa rt I V

THEMES AND L I T E R A RY MOT I F S SPA N N I NG T H E BO OK OF ISA I A H

chapter 11

g od’s ch a r acter i n isa i a h Patricia K. Tull

11.1. Introduction To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him? (Isa 40:18) This quotation from the beginning of the exilic portion of Isaiah captures a central question about God’s characterization in the book—and in scripture and theology in general.1 How can human language, which is founded on metaphorical comparisons, presume to describe a being claimed to be fundamentally incomparable? Yet the prophet known as Second Isaiah set out to do just that, alongside the other theologians who contributed to the vast book of Isaiah, choosing likenesses to describe God and God’s activities in order to fuel audiences’ theological imaginations. In turn, Isaiah presents a microcosm of the Bible’s complexity concerning God’s character. In Isaiah, as in most of the Hebrew Bible, God is presented not as capricious, but as intentional, initiating events and responding to human behavior. This does not mean, however, that God’s depiction is either consistent or agreeable to modern sensibilities. Isaiah’s first chapter confronts us with an image of God as a parent who severely beats those who disobey. The assumption that further beatings should improve Israel’s behavior would not be well received by many today. Although differences with the prophets do create reading problems for modern people, contemporary assumptions that align with those of the ancient writers may obscure readers’ vision even more. Biblical writers’ characterizations of God are so vivid and specific, and have been so widely accepted by Christians and Jews since, that readers can easily overlook the constructive nature of these portrayals. The writers clearly used imagination when creating portraits of humans who might or might not have been 1  I would like to express my gratitude to Katie Heffelfinger for her comments on an early draft of this essay.

202   Patricia K. Tull ­ istorical figures. Even more imagination was required to build portrayals of a God h who, according to most biblical writers, could not be seen and refused to be represented visually. Not only the self-evident metaphors, but all language about God is imaginative and metaphorical. This language constructs the unseen world of religious experience— projects “the way things really are” beyond visible events—and can only do so on the basis of the world its users know.2 In that light, it is not surprising that a God whom we first glimpse in scripture as a mysterious spirit who “hovered over the face of the deep” is most often described in human terms, doing things that humans do. Acknowledging the human constructs embedded in all speech about God can help readers maintain a distinction between human attempts to describe God and whatever ineffable divine reality exists. Thus readers need not become entangled in questions such as, “Why did God behave so violently in ancient times?” or “Why did God speak inconsistently?” but, instead, can ask what the ancient authors intended in their own settings and what we may learn from that. Divine character is conveyed not only through the many names, metaphors, and adjectives Isaiah employs, but also through the intents, speeches, and actions that are imputed to God. Nearly all of these develop a single root idea: that God is a singular superhuman “person”—not multiple deities nor simply a force or principle—who stands in relationship to humans. From this understanding flow other, more specific, descriptions of divine behaviors. The following broad characteristics are shared more or less across the biblical canon in various hues, including in Isaiah:

1. A personal God—both in the sense of being a “person” and in the sense of being personally related to humans (as kin, friend, ruler, etc.); 2. A God who desires certain things for—and from—the created world, especially humans; 3. A God who communicates those desires in speech transmitted through human intermediaries, often prophets; 4. A God who acts powerfully on humans and the natural world to realize those desires;3

2  As McFague, Metaphorical Theology, put it, “We who attempt to speak about God are social, cultural, and historical beings with particular perspectives influenced by a wide range of factors. . . . [The Scriptures] were written by limited people who expressed their experiences of divine reality in the manners and mores of their historical times” (p. 3). Fretheim, Bible, 116–118, affirmed that biblical characters, including God, are literary constructs, and warned against either identifying the “real God” who transcends human texts with the deity embodied in the Bible, or denying any relationship between the reality of God and the textual God. 3  Scholars have less frequently tried to identify the metaphors that are inherent in verbs than to note those among adjectives and nouns. Three exceptions are Brueggemann, Theology, 145; Patrick, Rendering, esp. 63–113; and Sternberg, Poetics, 322–325.

god’s character in isaiah  203 Isaiah’s beginning verses put all these attributes on display in relation to one another: The vision of Isaiah son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Hear, O heavens, and listen, O earth; for the Lord has spoken: I reared children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib; but Israel does not know, my people do not understand. (1:1–3)

The first verse characterizes the poetry that follows as “the vision of Isaiah.” Thus it explicitly acknowledges that the words are funneled through the imagination of a particular human in a particular place and time. The second verse introduces God as speaking and plunges right into divine speech. God assumes the roles of parent to rebellious children and of husbandman to beasts who fail to respond intelligently. These two metaphors fund the depiction of a God who desires better from Israel, and begin to suggest consequent divine actions. As the first chapter of the book of Isaiah unfolds, the people are criticized as sinful, evil, corrupt, and estranged, and as persisting in these wrongs despite the punishment they have endured. Metaphorically, this punishment is described as a severe beating that results in a wounded body. The prophet points to the actual landscape—desolate ­country, burned cities—before claiming, still in the divine voice, that it was God who savaged the nation nearly to extinction. In short, a God who takes personally the behavior of Israelites toward their deity and toward one another communicates, in first-­person speech, divine desires and the actions needed to realize those desires, as well as frustration that the desired effect has not been achieved. This chapter will investigate the particulars of this framework in Isaiah. I will first survey the variety of names and presentations of God standing in relation to humans, usually as a “person,” though a few nonhuman metaphors appear as well. Second, I will describe the desires the God in Isaiah expresses for humans in general and Israel in particular. Third, I will examine the prophets’ presentation of God as speaker and, finally, the actions the prophets claim God carries out. Because of Isaiah’s length and complexity, this chapter cannot be comprehensive. But I hope it will offer a framework for thinking further about how God is presented in Isaiah and among the prophets. A word about organization: it is well known that Isa 1–39 finds its inception with Isaiah son of Amoz in the last third of the eighth century bce, but that it incorporates words of others spanning several centuries. Sorting these passages into distinct authors or times is not possible. Isa 56–66 likewise appears to be a composite work, with a textual order bearing little relationship to historical sequence. Only Isa 40–55 seems a relatively unified body of poems that are more or less associated with the mid- to late sixth century. Despite these complications, for the sake of order, I will generally proceed from First to Second to Third Isaiah in each section of the chapter.

204   Patricia K. Tull

11.2.  A Personal God Setting out to describe the divine character emerging in the Bible’s first six books, Jerome Segal quoted Epicurus, a Greek philosopher in the fourth century bce, who wrote of God, “The blessed and immortal nature knows no trouble itself nor causes trouble to any other, so that it is never constrained by anger or favor.”4 Segal responded, “A god of that sort bears no relationship to the God we find in the Hebrew Bible.”5 Speaking specifically of the prophets, Julia O’Brien agreed: “The portrait of an impassive, impartial God is not biblical; the prophets in particular insist on a God passionately invested in human affairs and emotionally affected by their outcomes.”6 In Isaiah, God is anything but dispassionate. God may be hidden or inscrutable, as 45:15 notes, but remains deeply interested in human affairs. God is credited with a large number of names and roles in Isaiah that underscore divine personhood. The first chapter alone introduces nearly all the divine names found in the book: • Yhwh (1:2, 4, 10, 11, 20, 28). Usually translated “the Lord,” the name by which God was introduced to Moses in Exod 3:14–15, and shared across most of the Hebrew Bible. • Qədôš yiśrāʾēl (1:4). The “Holy One of Israel,” occasionally simply qādôš, “Holy One.” This designation appears more frequently in Isaiah than in all the other books of the Bible combined. If “the Holy One” seems to refer to God as “unapproachable in majesty,”7 the nearly ubiquitous qualifier “of Israel” implies a close bond with worshipers. Though it is rare otherwise, the designation appears in all sections of Isaiah, equally often in Second Isaiah as in First Isaiah. Third Isaiah employs it only in the deeply intertextual chapter 60, yet insists that God is one who both lives in heaven and dwells with the humble (57:15; 66:1–2). • Yhwhṣəbāʾôt (1:9, 24). Usually translated “the Lord of hosts,” another name found frequently in Isaiah, especially in chapters 1–39. • ʾĔlōhîm (1:10). “God,” often used with a possessive pronoun (“our God,” “your God,” etc.) or noun (“God of Israel,” “God of Jacob”), or in conjunction with Yhwh (“the Lord your God”). • Hāʾādôn (1:24). Found only in Isa 1–19, always preceding “the Lord of hosts”; generally translated as “Sovereign” or “Almighty” and thought to be related to pre-Israelite Jerusalem. See the related ʾĂdōnāy in the list of “other divine designations,” next. • ʾĂbîr yiśrāʾēl (1:24). “Mighty One of Israel,” found only here, but related to ʾăbîr yaʿăqōb, “Mighty One of Jacob” (49:26, echoed in 60:16).

4 Segal, Joseph, 81. 5  Segal, 81. 7 Mettinger, Search, 152.

6 O’Brien, Challenging, 123.

god’s character in isaiah  205 Other divine designations appearing in Isaiah are: • Ădōnāy (3:15 and frequently throughout). “The Lord”; in Isa 1–39 it often occurs alone but sometimes precedes Yhwh ṣəbāʾôt, particularly when attention is being drawn to startling divine speech or action. In Second and Third Isaiah it occurs only as Ădōnāy Yhwh, “Lord God.” • Haṣṣaddîq (24:16). “The Righteous One,” a term more often used for righteous humans. Related to it in 26:7 is another possible term, although the Hebrew syntax is unclear: yāšār, possibly “Just One.” • ʾĔlōhîm ḥay (37:4, 16). “The living God,” found only in a narrative section indebted to Deuteronomistic writers (see Deut 5:26; Josh 3:10; 2 Kgs 19:4, 16; Jer 10:10; 23:36). Like First Isaiah, Second Isaiah concentrates divine names and attributes in the initial chapters. The range of names employed in Second Isaiah is not as broad as that in First Isaiah, but it is made up for by a range of participial and adjectival descriptions of God, as well as an imaginative range of metaphors. Possessing names, of course, personalizes God. Beyond such names, many roles are imputed to God through nouns, participles, and images functioning as metaphors.8 The prophets rejected the practice of representing God visually through what First Isaiah called ʾĕlîlîm (“worthless things”) and Second Isaiah called pəsîlîm, images carved from wood or stone. But their mental landscape, unencumbered by visual aids, ranged freely in imaginative verbal images.

11.2.1.  Family Member God appears as a parent in Isa 1:2–4, disciplining children in vain. Parenthood is also implied in 30:1, 9, where Jerusalem’s leaders are called “rebellious children” and “faithless children.” In Second Isaiah, God is compared to both a father and a mother whose “children” (here Cyrus of Persia), the prophet claims, should not be second-guessed (45:10–11). God is also likened to a mother laboring (42:14), nursing (49:15), or comforting her child (66:13). God as father appears in 63:16 and 64:8. In 50:1 and 54:5–8, in im­agery responding to Jeremiah’s claim of divine divorce in 3:1, 8, God is presented as Zion’s husband, who once abandoned her but is now returning (cf. also 62:4–5, 12).9 The idea of God as redeemer-kinsman coming to the aid of distressed family members becomes a potent symbol in Second Isaiah, who may have been the first to adopt it as a metaphor for God as one who restores a “disturbed divinely sanctioned order.”10 The redeemer was obliged to help family members who were suffering a catastrophic loss of 8  For an extensive lexicon of divine titles and attributes found in Second Isaiah in particular, see Bonnard, Isaïe, 497–505, 520–546. 9  On the connection to Jeremiah in Isa 50:1, see Tull Willey, Remember, 200–204. 10 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 201, 111.

206   Patricia K. Tull property (Lev 25:24–25), freedom (Lev 25:47–49), life (Num 35:10–27), or spouse (Deut 25:5–10). The particulars of such transactions seem less important to Second Isaiah than the claim that God is present as redeemer and helper (41:14), and thus has a claim on Israel (43:1; cf. also 44:6, 22–24; 47:4; 48:17, 20; 49:7, 26; 51:10; 52:3, 9; 54:5, 8). This identification of God with the redeemer-kinsman is also carried forward in parts of Third Isaiah (59:20; 60:16; 62:12; 63:9, 16). Sometimes paired with “redeemer” is another participle, “savior,” one who serves to defend vulnerable individuals or groups from human attacks, yet not necessarily as a family member (see in this regard Deut 22:27; 28:29; Judg 3:9, 15; 12:3). Although First Isaiah portrays God as sending a (presumably human) savior to deliver the Egyptians from oppressors (19:20), the word “savior” is not used in Second Isaiah to characterize Cyrus, who fills a similar function. Rather, “savior” is claimed solely as God’s role (43:3, 11; 45:15, 21; 49:26; 60:16; 63:8).

11.2.2. Ruler Ordinarily, First Isaiah associates security with the reign of an ideal human ruler, as in chapters 9, 11, and 32. But God enters as king in unforgettable majesty in chapter 6. In the year the human king dies, Isaiah describes seeing God sitting on the divine throne, attended by heavenly beings who proclaim that God is “holy, holy, holy,” terrifying the prophet, who realizes he is standing in the divine king’s presence. But references to God as king otherwise remain muted and late in First Isaiah: 24:23 speaks of God reigning in Jerusalem, and 33:22 affirms God as judge, ruler, king, and savior. Royal language for God is emphasized much more in Second Isaiah, beginning with the image of God’s return as a triumphant warrior in 40:10 (cf. the repeat of this imagery in 52:7, accompanied by the announcement, “Your God reigns”). It becomes explicit in 41:21 (cf. 43:15; 44:6), where God is identified as Jacob’s king; and 45:23 (“to me every knee shall bow”). In 66:1, the poet imagines God calling heaven God’s throne. Associated with the vision of God as ruler come a handful of abstract nouns denoting a splendor or majesty that belongs rightly to God, and can be bestowed by God at will, but manifests itself as vain arrogance in humans who claim it for themselves. In 14:11 the humiliated emperor’s majesty is brought down to Sheol (see also 5:14; 10:34; 13:11, 19), while in 2:10, 19, and 21 God’s glorious majesty (two synonyms paired) terrifies the earth’s inhabitants, and in 60:15 God makes the recovering city of Jerusalem majestic forever.

11.2.3. Farmer God is often compared to a farmer, not only in 1:3, and not only tending oxen and donkeys, but elsewhere cultivating and destroying vineyards, lopping off branches, and processing grapes (5:1–7; 18:5; 27:2–5; 63:1–3). Each of these images involves a threat of destruction. Isa 28:23–28, in contrast, though it draws lessons from forceful farming

god’s character in isaiah  207 processes, claims that the land is ploughed and the grain threshed no more than is necessary for its own good. In 10:15 and surrounding text, imagery of God as a woodchopper appears. Isa 40:11 envisions God as a shepherd, gently leading sheep (see also 49:9–10); and Isa 44:3–4, as a farmer planting trees.

11.2.4. Creator God’s creation of the world in general and of Israel in particular appears especially in Second Isaiah. Metaphors of architecture (40:12); building or, more specifically, laying foundations (14:32; 28:16–17; 48:13; 51:13, 16; 54:11); spreading a tent (40:22; 42:5; 44:24; 45:12; 51:13, 16); or molding pottery (29:16; 45:9; 64:8) are employed to this end. Occasionally, God is also identified as “maker” (17:7; 29:6; 45:9, 11; 51:13; 54:5). Second Isaiah’s description of the God of Israel as creator of the world is frequently associated with an incipient notion of monotheism in Israelite theology, though scholars differ regarding the extent of this prophet’s monotheistic claims. See more in section 11.5 and subsections, on divine actions.

11.2.5. Warrior/Destroyer Prevalent throughout Isaiah is the metaphor of God as a warrior who destroys nations. At some points, God fights against Israel’s enemies, but at others, against Israel itself. Yhwh ṣəbāʾôt, “Lord of hosts,” is often connected with this imagery. See more in section 11.5 and subsections.

11.2.6. Guide Here and there, God appears as teacher or guide. This is most prominent in 2:2–4, where the nations come to Zion to learn the ways of peace (see also 42:4; 51:4, which likewise reflect on international divine teaching). Even amid the violent imagery of chapter 1, God’s speech is characterized as “teaching” (v. 10; see likewise 5:24). Isa 30:20–21 meditates on God’s teaching through affliction but preferring to guide graciously, saying to a responsive people, “This is the way, walk in it” (see likewise 29:24). Isa 48:17–19 reminds a later audience that God “teaches you for your own good”: had they responded, prosperity rather than destruction would have been theirs. Modeling receptivity, the servant figure in 50:4 describes being awakened daily to hear God “as those who are taught” in order to teach others (v. 5). The metaphor of God as teacher covers a wide range of events. It comes with the hope that experience will be kind but the recognition that it is sometimes harsh. Closely related is the metaphor of judge. In 2:2–4, God appears on Mount Zion not only as giving instruction but as arbitrating between nations. There is little distinction

208   Patricia K. Tull between judge and prosecuting attorney making accusations of injustice (3:13–14). Normally, the judge is understood as a vindicator (33:22), but not always (66:16). This is a role that human leaders could fulfill (1:17, 23, 26; 3:2; 11:3–4; 16:5; 59:4), but often do not. The image of God setting forth a case against other gods in court dominates early parts of Second Isaiah (41:21–29; 43:9–12, 26; 44:8–9), but no particular noun defines God’s role in these scenarios.

11.2.7.  Nonhuman Images Human images dominate, but nonhuman images also appear. God appears as a lion growling over its prey in 31:4, and in the very next verse, as birds hovering overhead to protect Jerusalem. In his prayer in 38:12, King Hezekiah likens God to a lion breaking all his bones. More often, nonhuman imagery for God invokes fire (connoting destruction) or rocks and shelter (connoting protection). Isa 10:16–17 presents the Holy One as a flame devouring Assyria. See, similarly, 26:11, and the devouring fire in 29:6. In four metaphors mashed together in 30:27–28, God’s tongue is like a devouring fire (see also vv. 30, 33), but God’s breath is like an overflowing stream “to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction, and to place on the jaws of the peoples a bridle that leads them astray.” For other images of divine fire, see 6:13; 9:19; 27:4; 33:12–14; 42:25; 47:14; 64:2; 65:5; 66:15–16, 24. Some rock and shelter imagery resembles its frequent use in psalms, such as the everlasting rock in Isa 26:4 and refuge, shelter, and shade in 25:4. See likewise 30:29; 44:8; 51:1. But some of it appears ironic. In 8:14 God is described as sanctuary, and then as stone and rock that one strikes against or trips over, followed by trap and snare in quick succession, inverting imagery that normally would offer comfort into threats. In 17:10 God is a rock of refuge, but in a context that denies benefit, since the people have forgotten this.

11.3.  A God Who Desires As we have just seen, Isaiah’s portrayal of God’s radical disappointment with Israel dominates the book’s opening chapter. But it is not until verse 17 that what God wants to see is specified: “Seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow.” These actions are presented as so fundamental to God’s wishes that no practices of worship will replace them. God’s desire for social justice is supported by behaviors that both reward and punish, as described in verses 19–20. If the opening chapter offers a potent negative view of human behavior, the beginning of chapter 2 offers the reverse: the prophet’s vision of a desirable relationship among God, Israel, and the nations, presumably reflecting God’s aims. In this vision, one of several Isaian descriptions of divine/human restoration, God guides and rules all people to

god’s character in isaiah  209 the end that peace may reign. Thus, divine desires are set forth from the book’s beginning in both negative and positive terms. In these chapters, the complex subject of God’s desire concerning other nations begins, ambivalently, to appear, as it will throughout all stages of Isaiah’s development. Throughout First Isaiah, judgments against human behavior are interwoven with visions of a desirable future, variously described. Isa 5:7 concludes the vineyard parable by spelling out what God wants: “he expected justice, but saw bloodshed; righteousness, but heard a cry!” (v. 7). The section that follows in 5:8–23, and again in 9:8–10:4, describes undesirable behaviors: land grabbing, drunkenness, impudence, deceit, self-indulgence, bribery, leadership failure, and concocting of unjust legal statutes. Most of this material agrees with and illustrates other ethical discussions in Israel’s scriptures, suggesting that human social justice is inseparable from regard for God. Images of a restored world constructed according to God’s design also punctuate Isa 1–39. Isa 9:6–7 [Heb 9:5–6] once again projects peace with justice, this time not because of divine rule but rather because of the reign of a descendant of David. Isa 11:1–9 offers a catalogue of divine desires, envisioning a king who rules in wisdom, knowledge, and fear of the Lord, issuing judgments supporting the poor and meek against the wicked. So powerful is this king’s influence that peaceful coexistence extends even to animal predators and their accustomed prey. The chapter continues with hope for dispersed Israelites’ return and reconciliation with Judah (11:12–16). Further visions of restoration elucidate what other voices in Isaiah imagine God desiring: Isa 25:6–9 describes an eschatological feast hosted by God. Not only do guests enjoy rich foods, but God swallows up death and wipes the tears from all faces, satisfying long-awaited yearnings. Yet this passage, unlike its counterparts in chapters 2 and 11, is not followed by a vision of world order, but by a dreadful judgment against the neighboring nation of Moab, complicating the standing of other nations in God’s designs. Isa 27:2–6 returns to the vintner metaphor, this time imagining that Jacob and Israel will “fill the whole world with fruit.” Isa 30:23–25 employs somewhat ambiguous language to imagine an agricultural setting where God provides timely rain to produce a rich harvest and to satisfy farm animals. Isa 32:1–8 returns to the royal theme, envisioning human rulers reigning in righteousness and justice, providing protection for those who are otherwise vulnerable, and setting standards for wisdom and nobility. Further on in the chapter, the prophet imagines that “justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness abide in the fruitful field” (v. 16), with the effect of peace, quietness, trust, and security. Some of these various images may proceed from the prophet Isaiah himself, while others arise much later. Some involve a distinct form of governance, while others do not. They are scattered throughout a text more often characterized by vivid portraits of poor human behavior that demonstrate what God deplores. The desires that God is said to hold for Judah and Israel are often characterized in First Isaiah as God’s “plan” (ʿēṣâ), which God has “planned” (yʿṣ) and which will surely be fulfilled (5:19; 14:24–27; 19:12, 17; 23:8–9; 25:1; 28:21). Second Isaiah reaffirms God’s plan in 46:9–11, employing a second, parallel term, ḥēpeṣ, which seems to be preferred (42:21; 44:28; 48:14; 53:10; 55:11).

210   Patricia K. Tull The desire for improved social order remains implicit in Isa 40–55. But this prophet more often voices God’s desire for divine/human reconciliation and exiles’ return to Jerusalem. God is portrayed as having both made and chosen Israel (41:8–9; 43:1, 7, 10, 15; 44:1–2; 49:7). Reconciliation with God entails recognizing and repenting of past sins (42:24–25; 43:24–25; 44:22; 50:2), repudiating other gods and their idols and relying on Israel’s incomparable God, the only deity capable of action (40:18–20; 41:21–29; 42:17; 45:9–11; 46:1–9; 48:5), and taking advantage of Cyrus’s advent to return and repopulate Jerusalem (40:11; 41:2–3, 25; 43:5–7; 44:14, 24–28; 45:13; 48:20; 52:8–12; 55:7). Other divine purposes will result: ecological healing (41:18–19; 43:19–20; 44:3; 55:12), the attraction of other nations to God’s and Israel’s sphere of influence (45:22–23; 44:5; 45:14; 49:22–23; 52:15; 55:5), and international justice (42:1–4; 49:6–7; 51:4). While Second Isaiah’s language flows with repetition, its vision of what God desires remains fairly consistent. Isa 56:1 forges a meeting point between First Isaiah’s and Second Isaiah’s messages.11 Whereas in First Isaiah God’s desire for human justice prevails, and in Second Isaiah God’s promise of divine justice takes center stage, this verse pairs the two, enjoining that the audience carry out human righteousness (ṣədāqâ) by maintaining justice, because soon divine righteousness (ṣədāqâ), manifested as salvation, will be revealed. God’s prioritizing of social justice becomes especially clear in chapter 58, which is reminiscent of the juxtaposition of worship and injustice in chapter 1. Here God is portrayed as responding to queries about the ineffectiveness of the people’s worship and fasting. God insists that an acceptable fast is a fast from inequity, with behavior that is fair to employees and generous to the hungry and homeless. While the insistence on social justice found in First Isaiah returns in Third Isaiah, themes of proper, nonidolatrous worship that were important to Second Isaiah reappear as well, especially in chapters 57 and 65. Visions of prosperity for Jerusalem are expanded. Not only do the prophets imagine God extending the community to those formerly on the margins, such as eunuchs and foreigners (56:1–8), and creating a city where lives are long and peaceful (65:17–25), but Jerusalem is imagined as the recipient of the wealth of nations (60:5–7, 11, 16; 61:5), served by foreigners and their kings (60:10, 12, 14; 66:5). These visions tend to collide with one another and may even threaten the relative consistency of the divine character seen up to this point in the book. Third Isaiah seems to represent an ideological battleground over the relationship between Jerusalem and the nations, as well as the status of the Jerusalem community overall. International relationships have been fraught throughout the book, but become intensely so in Third Isaiah.12 Chapters 60–62 proclaim a glorified Jerusalem served by all others, whereas chapters 56 and 65–66 imagine that any who serve God will be welcome, but rebellious members of the chosen nation will not. In either case, God is portrayed as desiring 11  Rendtorff, “Isaiah 56:1,” 181–189. 12  These relationships are described in ways that leave ambiguity about Second and Third Isaiah’s interpretations of God’s intentions toward the nations. Although commentators have traditionally seen something of a missionary intent in some of the passages concerning the nations, Croatto, “Nations,” 143–161, for instance, sees no such message.

god’s character in isaiah  211 ­ aximum participation in Yhwh’s community with resultant peace and prosperity. But m the mix of participants, Jewish and Gentile, depends on the ideology of particular contributors.

11.4.  A God Who Speaks Much of the Hebrew Bible presents God as a talking, acting participant in human drama. But when the eighth-century prophets begin to address their audiences in God’s name, they introduce a new genre of divine self-presentation: a God who powerfully speaks through a human intermediary, sometimes at great length. Biblical prophets often present God’s communiques in the third person. But they also offer their messages as actual words from God, in first-person speech in prose and, more often, poetry. Thus prophetic mediators show God speaking freely with humans. Stepping aside, as it were, to spotlight God’s own speech, the prophets vividly convey a God who expresses wishes for humans as a human ruler might for subjects. The prophets convey little struggle to discern God’s words; rather, the words appear to flow directly from heaven into their mouths. Their most evident struggles involve their dismay at understanding these words only too well. Amos, the earliest of the eighth-century prophets, begins with Yhwh roaring from Zion in a continuous stream for at least five chapters, before Amos narrates his own encounters with God. Hosea and Micah are likewise dominated by divine first-person speech. Isaiah’s first presentation of divine speech, cited at the beginning of this chapter, commences immediately after the superscription and prophetic introduction: “I reared children and brought them up…” (1:2). Nearly all of the chapter that follows appears as God’s speech, expressing frustration with a nation that has rebelled and is estranged. The prophetic voice is so deeply aligned with this voice that it is often unclear when it has taken over. Clues such as first- and third-person pronouns and the occasional “says the Lord” sometimes remind us, but at several points, here and elsewhere in Isaiah, it is difficult if not impossible to tell which speech is being presented as prophetic and which as divine. Based on Isaiah’s first chapter and on other eighth-century prophetic books, we might expect to find the same volume of divine speech throughout Isa 1–39. But most of Isaiah’s words present God’s desires and actions in the third person. Isaiah often reports God as having spoken to him or in his ears (5:9; 8:1, 3; 18:4; 21:6, 16; 22:14; 31:4), a prophetic locution not found in Second and Third Isaiah, though it is common in Jeremiah and Ezekiel.13 Only in chapter 6, where the prophet describes God in the temple, do we observe dialogue between God and the prophet. There Isaiah is given a dire, ironic message. To people who have thus far ignored divine words, God directs Isaiah to say, “Keep listening, but do not comprehend; keep looking, but do not understand” (v. 9). The apparent 13  An exception may be found in 49:3 on the part of the servant, not the prophet.

212   Patricia K. Tull intent is that they will die because they were being offered riddles instead of warnings. Yet in the very next chapter we find the prophet bringing King Ahaz not God’s baffling words but a different divine message, one of support encouraging trust (7:4–9). This juxtaposition raises questions about the nature of God’s words in chapter 6, and suspicions that this contrary message may not, in fact, contravene God’s efforts to encourage the nation’s healing. Rather, it may be designed, when straightforward communication has broken down, to goad the prophet’s audience to respond.14 Isaiah’s failure to argue for mercy as his predecessors Abraham and Moses did (Gen 18:20–33; Exod 32:7–14) may not show resignation or lack of nerve so much as recognition of this terrible message’s paradoxical intent to influence behavior. In the end, he essentially tells readers not “keep listening but do not comprehend” but instead, “I saw God, who sent me to say, ‘keep listening but do not comprehend,’ ” a more complex message. While divine speech can be found in all parts of Isaiah, the metaphor of God as a speaker is exploited to its greatest extent in chapters 40–55. Some 63 percent of its verses are identified as divine speech.15 Not only is God presented as the primary speaker from chapter 41 on, but God’s words are affirmed as vital and effective, beginning with 40:8, “the word of our God will stand forever,” and continuing to 55:11, where God’s word is said to “accomplish that which I purpose.” Other prophetic works begin with superscriptions introducing the prophet followed by lead-ins to the divine speech, such as Jeremiah’s “Now the word of the Lord came to me, saying . . .” (1:4). But 40:1 dispenses entirely with preamble: “ ‘Comfort, comfort my people,’ says your God.” Though the prophetic voice takes over and prevails in chapter 40, divine speech recommences forcefully in 41:1 and continues throughout with briefer, and always affirming, interjections by the prophet and other witnesses. The metaphor of God as one who can and does speak in human language is fully exploited in Second Isaiah to portray a God zealously desiring reconciliation with Israel and striving to persuade humans to cooperate. Isa 56–66 is as varied in divine speech as it is in authors. Chapter 56 begins with divine words that continue for eight verses. But this passage is followed by lengthy sections in chapters 56 and 57 that do not identify speakers. When the divine voice resumes in 57:11 and again in 58:1, it comes without introduction (see also 65:1). In chapters 60–62, even more than the poetry of Second Isaiah that these chapters echo, the divine voice weaves in and out among the human voices without introduction, resembling not a report of divine speech nor a dialogue between the prophet and God, but the prophet’s seeming to shift subtly in and out of the divine persona, making his point in whichever register best suits his purpose, in a monologue that verges on the antiphonal. For instance, chapter 62 begins, “For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent,” and only at the end of verse 2 do we discover that the speaker is the prophet.16 After five verses, God interjects without introduction, “Upon your walls, O Jerusalem, I have 14  For further discussion, see Tull, Isaiah 1–39, 146–147. 15  For a full discussion, see Tull, “Who Says What,” 157–168. 16 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56–66, 233, demonstrated the difficulty of sorting these verses out when he noted arguments that the first verse may be divine speech, though he agreed with most commentators that it is human.

god’s character in isaiah  213 posted sentinels; all day and all night they shall never be silent” (v. 6). That verse does not end before the prophet joins in, saying, “You who remind the Lord, take no rest” (v. 6). The beginning of verse 8 introduces a divine oath, which occupies the remainder of the verse. A half-verse follows in the third person, followed by another half-verse in divine first person. Chapter 60 functions similarly, and chapter 61 provides clear-cut divine speech only in verse 8. Most, if not all, of the prophetic voices contributing to Isaiah do so by presenting God as speaker, sometimes the primary speaker. Second Isaiah offers the highest volume of divine speech, First Isaiah the lowest, and Third Isaiah wavers in between. Unlike in some prophetic books, Isaiah’s divine voice does not inspire the prophet’s protest, and even Isaiah’s mild questioning in chapter 6 remains understated. The divine plan communicated in Isaiah evidently stands firm, at least in the prophets’ views.

11.5.  A God Who Acts Above all, God is portrayed as one who acts powerfully to bring about divine desires. As we might expect, First Isaiah is laden with destructive, often violent divine actions, while Second Isaiah primarily communicates creative and restorative actions, and Third Isaiah is somewhat mixed.

11.5.1.  Destructive Actions Unsurprisingly in view of the wars of the times, we find the theme of God’s doing battle against opponents—sometimes Israel, sometimes enemies—throughout Isaiah, beginning in the first chapter. Isa 5:1–7 portrays God as a vintner who dismantles what he had built and planted because it failed to produce good fruit. Further on, in verses 26–30, this violence is described as carried out literally, as the prophet claims divine responsibility for military incursions. Following a series of woe oracles directed against unjust leaders in Israel and Judah, Isaiah describes God as signaling to a faraway nation, which comes when called, fierce and ready to fight. Isa 9:8–21, a continuation of the poetry begun in 5:8, claims that God has repeatedly, in anger, raised adversaries against Israel, and 10:5 explicitly describes God as having commanded Assyria to attack, and as pla­nning in turn to destroy Assyria for its arrogance (v. 25). If much of the destructive activity described in Isaiah 1–12 is couched in war language, the prophet also attributes more unusual punishments to God: terrorizing and humiliating all who exalt themselves (2:10–17); removing leadership so social chaos results (3:1–7); and afflicting wealthy women with scabs and removing their finery (3:17–24). Isa 13 and 14 turn divine violence outward. The target of the army that God is mustering is first identified as the whole earth (13:5, 9, 11). But when the army is specified (the Medes, v. 17), only Babylon is named as the victim (v. 19). Chapter 14 goes on to describe

214   Patricia K. Tull the death of a tyrannical king. Babylon’s presence here is difficult to explain, but the later empire may have been superimposed on a section that originally referred to Assyria (see 14:25). Where we might most expect divine violence, in the oracles about the other nations in chapters 15–23, violence is surprisingly muted, and the nations’ destruction is described in passive verbs that, with few exceptions (19:2–4, 14; 23:8–9), decline to declare an agent. At times, compassion is expressed toward other nations, as in 19:20, where God is said to defend and deliver Egypt. But God’s destructive activity returns with a vengeance in the proto-apocalyptic chapter 24, where the prophet describes God’s plan to make the earth desolate and scatter its inhabitants. Chapter 34 likewise describes divine violence against nations in general, and Edom in particular. The story of Jerusalem’s siege in Hezekiah’s time in chapters 36–37 features God’s angel striking down nearly two hundred thousand soldiers who are besieging Jerusalem, demonstrating that, contrary to the Assyrian Rabshakeh’s claims, Israel’s God is indeed more powerful than Sennacherib. God’s acts of violence return in Second Isaiah with a narrow scope. Here, God’s destruction of Jerusalem is acknowledged, but it is set firmly in the past (40:2; 42:24–25; 43:28; 48:10–11; 51:17–20), and it is sometimes metaphorized as testing to purify (48:10). Second Isaiah does not by any means contradict earlier portrayals of divine wrath, but instead views it as having been restrained and forsworn (48:9; 54:9).17 Destruction is now directed against Israel’s enemies. Salvation comes through war turned outward, as God leads Cyrus to destroy Babylon and set captives free (40:23–24; 41:2, 11–12, 15–16, 25; 43:14; 45:1–3; 46:1–2; 47:1–15; 48:14; 49:25–26; 51:8, 22–23). There are passages in Third Isaiah, too, that place God’s judgmental actions in the past, such as 57:17, and emphasize forbearance, healing, and comfort on God’s part (vv. 15–19; Isa 60–62). But emphasis on God’s continuing punishment returns in Third Isaiah. As in previous chapters, God’s violent strife against humans is sometimes directed against Israel, and sometimes against Israel’s enemies. Like previous sections, this one takes seriously the people’s sin and the barriers wrongdoing creates between God and humans. Isa 59 consists of a poignant poem decrying the prevalence of injustice. The divine response is portrayed as preparing to come as a warrior clothed in “­garments of vengeance” (v. 17) to repay enemies—who here are not foreign oppressors but whoever defies God. But a passage that stands as mirror to this one, directly on the other side of the central chapters 60–62, turns divine violence outward instead. In 63:1–6, not Judah but neighboring Moab is targeted. Despite the deployment of violence against the chosen and other nations alike, the nationalism seen in Second Isaiah still appears in parts of Third Isaiah, such as in chapter 60, in which foreign nations bring to Jerusalem not only returning exiles but also their wealth. “The nation and kingdom that will not serve you shall perish” (v. 12), underscoring Third Isaiah’s fraught treatment of foreigners. 17  According to Miles, God, in Second Isaiah, God “drastically transforms his own mood by strategic omissions, substitutions, and expansions and by the adoption of a tone of tender, almost maternal solicitude” (p. 220).

god’s character in isaiah  215 The ambivalence of Isaiah’s final form concerning the standing of other nations is especially striking toward the book’s end. In the final two chapters, following a lament over God’s past destruction of Jerusalem that appears to place blame on God for the people’s sin (63:17; 64:5, 7), the prophet draws a line between those in the community whom God will destroy and those who will be spared. Those who forsake God will be destined to the sword while God’s servants (here redefined to signify not the whole nation but only an elect few) will enjoy prosperity (65:12–15).18 This theme of destruction for some and salvation for others reappears in chapter 66, where, in the final two verses, “all flesh” come to worship God, while the dead bodies of rebels are found outside (66:23–24).19 Julia O’Brien has helpfully retraced the history-of-traditions path that scholars in the “Harvard school” delineated in the metaphor of the divine warrior. Although this path began in ancient Near Eastern stories of combat among gods, and shifted to claims of divine support for the Davidic kings, the prophetic books mark a new stage: the portrayal of God as fighting against evil both inside and outside the community.20 According to the prophets, including Isaiah, human injustice provokes divine anger, which in turn leads to vengeance against wrongdoers, whether within or without Israel. Divine violence reflects the perception that God cares about human ethics and about misbehavior’s victims.21 While modern readers tend either to defend divine violence for its passion for justice or to abhor it for its horrific effects, O’Brien suggested a more complex response, affirming the need for justice in societies both ancient and modern while critically examining specific ways divine justice is described.

11.5.2.  Creative or Restorative Actions A few redemptive actions are attributed to God in First Isaiah, such as restoring Jerusalem’s just leadership after violently purifying the city (1:26), providing a protective canopy after washing away Jerusalem’s stains (4:4–6), comforting the city after the wrath ends (12:1), delivering Egypt from oppressors (19:20–21), saving Jerusalem after allowing the surrounding nation’s destruction (chaps. 36–37), and healing Hezekiah after

18  For more on this strategy of redefinition and the passage’s negative response to the lament, see Tiemeyer, “Two Prophets,” 185–202. 19  Miles’s (God) ponderings over First Isaiah’s presentation of God’s thinking about other nations applies even more to Third Isaiah: “What are we to conclude?” he asks. “Does the Lord God want to defeat, humiliate, and punish the other nations of the world? Does he want to subordinate them to Israel in a new social order and a new creation? Or does he intend for them to join Israel as coequals in his service? Each of these sharply opposed views is expressed with equal, uncompromising rigor” (p. 216). 20 O’Brien, Challenging, 103. 21  As Heschel, Prophets, explained, “Justice, mishpat, is the measure of [God’s] anger. Divine sympathy for the victims of human cruelty is the motive of anger . . . God’s anger is not a fundamental attribute, but a transient and reactive condition. It is a means of achieving ‘the intents of [God’s] mind’ ” (vol. 2, pp. 68–69).

216   Patricia K. Tull t­ hreatening him with death (chap. 38). In First Isaiah what is said about God’s actions toward Egypt applies as a pattern overall: “The Lord will strike Egypt, striking and ­healing; they will return to the Lord, and he will listen to their supplications and heal them” (19:22). That is to say, restoration can only come after divinely afflicted suffering. Most of God’s restorative actions seem to occur in sections of First Isaiah that are ­commonly thought to be appended to the original prophet’s sayings. First Isaiah rarely attributes acts of creation to God, going no further than occasionally calling God Israel’s “maker” (17:7; 29:6). But in Second Isaiah, by contrast, God is repeatedly described as creating. God creates the stars, the heavens, the earth, and humankind (40:26, 28; 42:5; 45:12, 18; 54:16); light and darkness, weal and woe (45:7); the natural landscape (41:20); the nation of Israel (43:1, 7, 15); righteousness (45:8); and unfolding events (48:7). Other verbs of creation in Second Isaiah move up and down the metaphorical register: making, forming, founding, stretching out, spreading out, and establishing. Divine actions that affirm, comfort, and restore are also repeatedly named. Most of the metaphors used of God, such as shepherd, builder, redeemer kinsman, mother, farmer, potter, and returning husband (all discussed earlier in the article) contribute to the message that God desires and is bringing about an enduring kinship with Israel. The whole earth’s maker is now recreating the lost nation and restoring the destroyed city, and will thereby comfort the descendants of those who suffered displacement and loss. God carries out a variety of constructive activities, such as comforting Zion (40:1; 49:13; 51; 51:3, 12; 52:9); choosing (41:8–9; 42:1; 43:10; 44:1–2; 45:4; 49:7) and redeeming Israel (43:1; 44:22–23; 48:20; 52:3, 9); helping (41:10, 13–14; 44:2; 49:8; 50:7, 9); saving (43:3, 11, 12; 45:15, 17, 21, 22; 46:4; 49:25–26; see also 44:17; 45:20; 46:7); freeing prisoners (42:6; 49:9; 51:12); creating paths for returning exiles (43:19) and bringing them home (43:5–6; 49:18–23); guiding, protecting, strengthening, and even carrying the nation (40:11, 29–31; 41:10; 42:16; 43:1–2; 46:3; 48:17; 49:10); renewing the landscape (41:17–20; 44:3); rebuilding the city (44:26) and the temple (44:28); inspiring justice (42:1); teaching right­eous­ness (42:4, 21; 48:17; 50:4; 51:4); sweeping away transgressions (43:25; 44:22); pouring out God’s spirit (44:3); and making Israel a witness before the nations (42:6; 49:6; 52:15; 55:5). Thematically summarizing the dramatic turn in divine activity, Second Isaiah announces on God’s behalf, “I form light and create darkness, I make weal and create woe; I the Lord do all these things” (45:7). Third Isaiah does not use the metaphor of creation as prominently as Second Isaiah does, except in 65:17 (“I am about to create a new heaven and a new earth”). But the language of restoration, especially in chapters 60–62, echoes Second Isaiah’s usage and sometimes extends it further. God gathers Israel, specifically eunuchs, foreigners, and “others besides them” (56:8; cf. 60:4, 7), and will gather all nations to see God’s glory (66:18). God will heal and comfort the contrite, whom God struck in anger (57:15–18); God will answer, guide, and restore the just (58:9–12). God’s glory rises upon the restored nation (60:1–2), causing other nations to bring Israelite children and the nations’ wealth to Jerusalem (60:3–7; 61:6; 66:20) and causing righteousness to spring up (61:11). Visions of divine restoration filled with symbolism continue through chapter 62 as God vindicates and delights in Jerusalem. In the final two chapters, as noted before, restoration is granted to God’s

god’s character in isaiah  217 “­servants” (65:9, 13–15; 66:14), but not to those who rebel. God will provide the servants with prosperity, happiness, and longevity in the restored city (65:13–25; 66:12–14).

11.6. Conclusion Where the prophets are concerned, desperate times call for desperate measures. For modern readers who have witnessed in history the abuses inspired by a God considered violent, the violent characterizations of the divine in much of Isaiah may seem ­deplorable.22 Yet for ancient audiences, for whom the possible encroachment of foreign invaders was a dreadful reality, claims that Yhwhremained in charge and acted not capriciously but for the nation’s ultimate salvation, though not comforting in any way we might recognize, may at least have made sense, preserving order and divine competence. The inconsistency of God’s portrayal over time can be perceived largely in the relative harshness and lenience attributed to God by various prophets who were interpreting various circumstances. And while the book of Isaiah shows divine engagement throughout, it offers hints of a perception of God’s receding from human view that will grow among subsequent writers in the Hebrew Bible and New Testament (see, for instance, 1:15; 8:17; 30:20; 40:27; 45:15; 54:8; 57:17; 58:3; 59:2; and, especially, the laments in 63:7–64:12). In their treatments of characterization, students of biblical narrative have by and large begun with E. M. Forster’s round and flat characters, fine-tuning definitions in various ways.23 Round characters display complexity, can change or grow, and are not necessarily consistent. As Robert Alter put it, there is “an abiding mystery in character as the biblical writers conceive it,” which contributes to their becoming “indelibly vivid individuals in the imagination of a hundred generations.”24 Such is the God of Isaiah. After striving for sixteen chapters to portray God to the sixth-century audience, Second Isaiah claims on God’s behalf, “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways” (55:8). Even if they wavered or differed on specifics, those who variously contributed to Isaiah’s composite artistry imagined an incomparable deity fully engaged with Israel over the centuries of its tumultuous ­history. The prophets’ strategies for portraying the divine as a powerful speaking, acting “­person” communicating specific desires for humankind decisively contributed to the vivid yet mysterious character whom Christians and Jews call God. 22 O’Brien, Challenging, noted, “The one thing that most troubles people about the Old Testament is its violence. People regularly plead with me to say something positive about the violence of . . . God’s angry tirades in the Prophetic Books” (p. 101). 23 Forster, Aspects, 75. See in this regard, descriptions of characterization developed by Auerbach, Mimesis, 3–23; Alter, Art, 114–130; Berlin, Poetics, 23–42; and Sternberg, Poetics, 322–325. Although character is most often considered in narrative contexts, Brown, Wisdom, has shown that these insights can be applied to biblical poetry as well (pp. 5–9). 24 Alter, Art, 126, 114. Patrick, Rendering, agreed: “A persona who is perfectly consistent is not very lifelike” (p. 48).

218   Patricia K. Tull

Bibliography Alter, Robert. The Art of Biblical Narrative. New York: Basic Books, 1981. Auerbach, Erich. Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1953. Berlin, Adele. Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative. Bible and Literature Series 9. Sheffield, UK: Almond Press, 1983. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 56–66: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19B. New York: Doubleday, 2003. Bonnard, Pierre  E. Le second Isaïe: Son Disciple et leurs éditeurs: Isaïe 40–66. EBib. Paris: Gabalda, 1972. Brown, William  P. Wisdom’s Wonder: Character, Creation, and Crisis in the Bible’s Wisdom Literature. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2014. Brueggemann, Walter. Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1997. Croatto, J. Severino. “The ‘Nations’ in the Salvific Oracles of Isaiah.” VT 55 (2005): 143–161. Forster, E. M. Aspects of the Novel. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin, 1963. Fretheim, Terence, and Karlfried Froehlich. The Bible as Word of God in a Postmodern Age. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1998. Heschel, Abraham. The Prophets. 2 vols. New York: Harper Colophon, 1975. McFague, Sallie. Metaphorical Theology: Models of God in Religious Language. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1982. Mettinger, Tryggve N. D. In Search of God: The Meaning and Message of the Everlasting Names. Philadelphia: Fortress, 2005. Miles, Jack. God: A Biography. New York: Random House, 1995. OBrien, Julia. Challenging Prophetic Metaphor: Theology and Ideology in the Prophets. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2008. Patrick, Dale. The Rendering of God in the Old Testament. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981. Rendtorff, Rolf. “Isaiah 56:1 as a Key to the Formation of the Book of Isaiah.” In Canon and Theology: Overtures to an Old Testament Theology, translated and edited by Margaret Kohl. OBT. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1993. Segal, Jerome M. Joseph’s Bones: Understanding the Struggle between God and Mankind in the Bible. New York: Riverhead, 2007. Sternberg, Meir. The Poetics of Biblical Narrative: Ideological Literature and the Drama of Reading. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Two Prophets, Two Laments and Two Ways of Dealing with Earlier Texts.” In Die Textualisierung der Religion, edited by Joachim Schaper, 185–202. FAT 62. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Tull, Patricia K. Isaiah 1–39. SHBC 14A. Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2010. Tull, Patricia K. “Who Says What to Whom: Speakers, Hearers, and Overhearers in Second Isaiah.” In Partners with God: Theological and Critical Readings of the Bible, edited by Shelley Birdsong and Serge Frolov, 157–168. Claremont, CA: Claremont School of Theology Press, 2017. Tull Willey, Patricia  K. Remember the Former Things: The Recollection of Previous Texts in Second Isaiah. SBLDS 161. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997.

chapter 12

Monotheism i n Isa i a h Matthias Albani

12.1.  Monotheism as a Controversial Concept In order to address the notion of monotheism in Isaiah, we must first clarify the term.1 Monotheism is generally regarded in research as differentia specifica of early post-exilic Judaism, and in general as a constitutive characteristic of the Jewish religion until our time. Scholars in both religious and Old Testament studies have, however, in recent years increasingly questioned whether monotheism is the appropriate term for the scientific description of religions, because it is usually implicitly or even explicitly linked to a negative evaluation of so-called polytheistic religions.2 A long-running debate on monotheism versus polytheism has arisen, particularly as a response to the Egyptologist Jan Assmann’s provocative theses regarding the essential potential of monotheism for violence.3 In much of the research that is carried out from the perspective of the history of religion, monotheism often appears as either the point of departure or the goal or culmination of the development of the studied religions.4 Monotheism is thus seen as the theological norm by which the intellectual and religious history of different cultures can be measured. The introduction of more nuanced terms, such as “monolatry,”5 “monotheiotitism,”6 “henotheism,”7 and “henolatry,”8 into religious studies testifies to 1   I would like to express my warmest thanks to Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer, who translated my article from German to English(!). 2   For a discussion of monotheism, cf. Stolz, Monotheismus, 33–47; Ahn, Monotheismus, 1–24. 3  Assmann, Unterscheidung; Assmann, Monotheismus. 4   See also Ahn, Monotheismus, 1–10; Stolz, Monotheismus, 9–12. 5   Cf. Bertholet, Wörterbuch, 403; Hartmann, “Monotheismus,” 74–75. 6   Landsberger, “Eigenbegrifflichkeit,” 369. 7  Bertholet, Wörterbuch, 235; cf. also Hartmann, “Monotheismus,” 78 (Mesopotamia); and Horning, Der Eine, 233, 239–240, 241–242, 244, 249, etc. 8   Hartmann, “Monotheismus,” 78–79.

220   Matthias Albani the ­inadequacy of the reductionist “monotheism versus polytheism” scheme for reaching a differentiated understanding of ancient Near Eastern religions. Biblical conceptions of the divine, too, are historically more open and dynamic than is often assumed. Scholars today therefore speak of implicit and explicit forms of monotheism, exclusive and inclusive ideas, and evolutionary and revolutionary systems, and they differentiate between the singleness and the uniqueness of God.9 From a heuristic point of view, however, the somewhat schematic juxtaposition of polytheism and monotheism is still indispensable for reaching a more differentiated picture of the respective concept of God, whereby the concrete religious, cultural, and historical references become clear. In the present ­chapter, the term monotheism is thus to be understood in the traditional sense of belief in a single God, which, in contrast to monolatry and henotheism, basically excludes belief in the existence of other gods. This decision does not reflect any dogmatic or ­philosophical evaluations of monotheism or polytheism, but instead relates to the understanding of the germane texts from Isaiah and their religious-historical ­connections and backgrounds.

12.2.  Expressions of Monotheism in the Book of Isaiah When we look at the entire book of Isaiah, it is striking that clear monotheistic statements can be found only in Isa 40–55 (Second Isaiah), especially in Isa 40–48. Julius Wellhausen expressed this insight in his famous dictum about the hypothetical anonymous exiled prophet: Unser Prophet ist wie trunken von der Idee des Allmächtigen, der Hymnus von ihm rauscht in gleichmäßigem Gewoge durch alles, was er sagt. Er zuerst feiert ihn nicht bloß als Lenker der Weltgeschichte, sondern auch als den Schöpfer der Natur, des Himmels und der Erde, als den Ersten und Letzten, den Einzigen und Alleinigen.10

The following discussion will therefore focus on the texts in Isa 40–48 and ask about their historical and religious-historical contexts. Before that, however, I will outline the way God is conceptualized in the other parts of Isaiah. Despite the now complicated editorial history research situation, I employ the usual classification of the book of Isaiah as developed by Bernhard Duhm—namely, First Isaiah (1–39), Second Isaiah (40–55), and Third Isaiah (56–66).11

  See Stolz, Monotheismus, 4–6; Schmid, “Differenzierung,” 11–19; Ahn, “Monotheismus,” 1–10.  Wellhausen, Geschichte, 150–151. 11   See further, Tiemeyer, “Continuity”; Schmid, “Literaturgeschichte,” 97–101, 132–137, 164–164; Zenger, Einleitung, 440–451. 9

10

Monotheism in Isaiah   221

12.2.1.  Monotheism in First Isaiah and Third Isaiah First Isaiah—that is, the texts in Isa 1–39 attributed to the prophet Isaiah ben Amoz in the Neo-Assyrian epoch—does not convey an exclusive monotheism. It is, however, but a small step from the royal imagery associated with God, expressed by the Jerusalem prophet, to monotheism. According to Isaiah, the king of the heavenly hosts seated in Zion is at the same time the Lord of history, whose glory fills the whole earth (Isa 6:3), whose counsel extends “on the whole earth,” and whose hand is stretched out over “all peoples” (Isa 14:26). These texts express the universal power of the Jerusalem God, the Holy One par excellence. His works in history concern not only Israel but all nations, especially the proud empires, such as the Assyrian imperial power, that are humiliated or even destroyed by Yhwh Sabaoth (cf. Isa 10:5–19; 14:25). The portrayal of God in First Isaiah is not associated with a principled negation of the ancient Near Eastern world of gods, as is the case in Second Isaiah (cf. Isa 44:6–8; 45:5–7; 14:21–22). For the prophet Isaiah, the Assyrian deities hardly matter; his focus is on the unfettered historical efficacy of Yhwh Sabaoth rather than undertaking a theological reflection on Yhwh’s sole divinity. The heavenly court of the Holy One enthroned in Zion is, according to 6:2–7, surrounded by seraphim—that is, subordinate divine beings who apparently belong to the heavenly hosts of Yhwh Sabaoth (cf. 1 Kgs 22:19–22).12 Isaiah is still completely influenced by the royal temple theology of Jerusalem, found also in the royal ascent songs in the Psalter (Pss 93; 95; 97; 98; 99). According to Hans Wildberger, this historically oriented conception of God is reflected in the designations of God as “the Holy One of Israel,” “the Lord,” “Yhwh of Hosts,” and “the king.”13 This trice-holy God, enthroned in Zion, is judging his people for their many sins and passionately calling for the execution of law and justice in Israel, especially in Jerusalem as the “city of justice” (e.g., Isa 1:26; 5:7). If one wanted to classify this royal Jerusalem conception of God, then one could perhaps speak of a monolatry with a universal tendency, but one in which polytheistic ideas still resonate schematically. Isa 1–39 also contains some sections that must have been composed later. For example, what is usually referred to as the “Isaiah Apocalypse” (Isa 24–27) conveys an eschatological view of history that includes the entire world. The notion that Yhwh, as the judge of the whole world, is the only God powerful in history is not discussed here, as it is in Isa 40–55 (henceforth Deutero-Isaiah), but is instead a self-evident conviction. When Yhwh Sabaoth rules in Zion, he will punish the “powers in the heaven” and the “kings of the earth” (Isa 24:21–23), and the sun and moon will be ashamed. There is only one divine king who rules supremely over all powers and dominions in heaven and on earth. The stars revered by the other peoples as representatives of the highest divine powers are completely disempowered. This passage resonates both Deutero-Isaiah’s disempowering the celestial

  Cf. Keel, Jerusalem, 70–73.   13  See Wildberger, Königsherrschaft, 1:75–84.

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222   Matthias Albani powers (Isa 40:25–26) and Isaiah’s temple vision, according to which the “whole earth” is filled with Yhwh’s glory (Isa 6:3). Even death is disempowered by Yhwh: But your dead will live, Lord; their bodies will rise—let those who dwell in the dust wake up and shout for joy—your dew is like the dew of the morning; the earth will give birth to her dead. (Isa 26:19 NIV)

Of course, commentators debate whether this verse refers to the resurrection of the dead or merely to the restoration of the people of Israel.14 Whichever way you interpret the passage, however, the monotheistic Yhwh faith inevitably raises the question of whether the world of the dead can truly be distinguished from the sphere of power of the Almighty Creator and Redeemer God, as emphatically as it is in other places in the Hebrew Bible (see Isa 38:18; Ps 88:6). Whereas Isa 65:17–20 promises the righteous a long and fulfilled life in the era of new creation (Heilszeit), the much younger Isaiah Apocalypse speaks of the ultimate defeat of death at the end-time feast of joy in Zion (Isa 25:8). Here we encounter the final consequence of biblical monotheism: when all the powers against God are defeated, the last and toughest enemy of God—namely, death—must finally be overcome! The oracles of doom against the foreign nations (Isa 13–23) and the promises of salvation (Isa 33–35) also do not belong to the original layer of First Isaiah and are usually dated to the exilic/post-exilic period.15 These texts likewise speak of Yhwh’s unlimited power over history and the expectation of universal judgment, which will lead to Israel’s redemption. Even the sky and the stars are affected by Yhwh’s judgment (Isa 34:4–5). Yhwh’s all-cosmic rule can thus be understood in terms of monotheism even though there is no explicit monotheistic negation of the gods. Instead, the powerlessness of the “idols of Egypt” (Isa 19:1) and the perplexity of the Egyptian diviners (Isa 19:3, 12) are emphasized. These formulations in Isa 24–27 are reminiscent of and were likely inspired by Deutero-Isaiah (cf. Isa 47). Deutero-Isaiah’s monotheism is, likewise, taken for granted, and never explicitly addressed, in Isa 56–66. The various texts presuppose the end of the exile and the return of the exiles from Babylon, as they promise Zion’s end-time salvation (Isa 60–62; 65–66) up and against the sobering reality of the post-exilic community (Isa 56–58). Recent research has largely abandoned Bernhard Duhm’s conventional image of a single prophetic persona called “Third Isaiah,” in favor of seeing Isa 56–66 as a gradually grown body of texts.16 Nonetheless, these texts share a uniform monotheistic image of God: Yhwh is the almighty creator of the world (Isa 65:17–18; 66:1–2);17 he is Lord of History (Isa 60), who will create universal justice (Isa 59:15–21), to whose sanctuary in Zion all peoples will make pilgrimages (Isa 60–62; 66:18–24; contra 63:1–6). The

  Cf. Zenger, Einleitung, 448.   See Wildberger, Königsherrschaft, 2:149–153; Kreuch, “Jesaja,” sec. 5, “Zur Entstehung des Buches.” 16   See Tiemeyer, “Continuity,” 13–25.    17  Tiemeyer, 40. 14 15

Monotheism in Isaiah   223 expected ­coming salvation is cosmic in scope: “See, I will create new heavens and a new earth” (Isa 65:17). In view of this universally effective Creator God, any action of other deities is no longer conceivable and thus neither needs to be fought against polemically nor to play a role in the end-time redemption drama. A special feature of the monotheistic image of God in Third Isaiah is the explicitly maternal character of Yhwh: “As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you” (Isa 66:13a). As to the historical background of the Trito-Isaianic message of salvation and consolation, scholars usually argue for an early post-exilic date prior to the reconstruction of the second Temple (cf. Isa 66:1–4) at a time when the audience was distressed by the failure of Deutero-Isaiah’s exuberant promises of salvation to materialize. The message of salvation is thus being ­universalized and rendered valid for all humankind (see Isa 56:6–8).

12.2.2.  Monotheism in Second Isaiah As has been hinted at, overt monotheistic statements exist only in Isa 40–48 (the core of Deutero-Isaiah). This section contains statements on the “incomparability” and “uniqueness” of Yhwh, on the one hand, and on his “singleness,” on the other, which should be distinguished for the sake of conceptual clarity.18 Whereas the first two categories can also be found in hymnal praise of God in a polytheistic religion,19 “­singleness” applies only monotheism in a strict sense. Earlier biblical texts also contain “­incomparability statements,” but they explicitly assume the existence of other gods (cf. Exod 15:11; Ps 89:7–9).20 In Isa 40–48 it is nonetheless clear that the statements about Yhwh’s incomparability should be understood as monotheistic expressions, as evidenced by the incomparability statement of 44:7 (‫ )ומי כמוני‬situated between the singleness statements in Isa 44:6 and 44:8.21 Here Yhwh’s incomparability can be deduced by the fact that only he can predict what is “coming.” This ability to foretell the future is mentioned in the court proceedings in 41:22–29 as evidence of the gods’ “nothingness,” something which in turn implies Yhwh’s executive power. In Isa 46:9, too, the singleness statements are linked directly to the incomparability statement. Below are the relevant passages that explicitly address Yhwh’s incomparability and singleness: • Yhwh’s incomparability: Isa 40:18, 25; 44:7; 46:9–10 • Yhwh’s singleness: Isa 43:10–11; 44:6, 8; 45:5–7, 14, 18, 21–22

  See Wildberger, “Monotheismus,” 250–251.   See Stolz, “Unvergleichlichkeit,” 11–15; Labuschange, Incomparability, 33–63. 20   Cf. Müller, “Gott,” 307–311. 21   Cf. also Kratz, Kyros, 192–193. Regarding the monotheistic character of Deutero-Isaiah’s “incomparability” statements, see Stolz, “Unvergleichlichkeit,” 17–20, 23. 18

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224   Matthias Albani The definition that the monotheistic understanding of God in principle excludes the existence of other gods identifies only a surface aspect of monotheism. In a sense, it is merely an empty frame, which must be filled with content. Notably, the monotheism of the Egyptian “heretic pharaoh” Akhenaten differs significantly from that of DeuteroIsaiah. With Akhenaten, the idea of Aton as the sole creator and preserver of the natural and social world is at the heart of the understanding of God. Aton is understood as the origin of all things, but not in the sense that he is a creator who is distinct from the world, as in the Judeo-Christian and Islamic traditions. Instead, he is understood as an immanent deity who exposes all things to himself: “Du machst Millionen von Gestalten aus dir, dem Einen, Städte und Dörfer, Äcker, Wege und den Strom.”22 This monotheistic “Emanation Doctrine” of Akhenaten is thus distinctly different from Deutero-Isaiah’s monotheistic theology of creation, in which there is a marked difference between the creator and the creation. Another difference with Akhenaten’s monotheism is that the creation theology in Deutero-Isaiah is not an end in itself but the means to prove Yhwh’s power over history (see sec. 12.3. below). The following substantive aspects are important in view of Deutero-Isaiah’s monotheism.

12.2.2.1.  The Aspect of Power Monotheism in Isa 40–48 conveys the belief in an almighty God who alone directs history (e.g., Isa 41:21–29; 44:6–11; 46:9–13.) and created the cosmos (e.g., 40:12–31; 44:24; 45:7). In contrast, several gods differentiate between their distinct areas of power. From a religious-phenomenological perspective, the notion of divine singleness is not, according to Gerardus van der Leew, primarily “eine Negation seiner Vielheit, sondern eine leidenschaftliche Affirmation seiner Gewaltigkeit.”23 Thus, the Almighty God is also the incomparable God. As expressed in Isa 40:18, 25, “With whom do you wish to compare God?” The question at stake here is that of power (see sec. 12.3.2). Yet the confession of Yhwh’s incomparable power stands in opposition with the experiences of historical reality of the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem and the subsequent exile. DeuteroIsaiah’s monotheistic commitment to Yhwh as the sole director of history thus has a “counterfactual” character.

12.2.2.2.  The Aspect of Singleness On the one hand, the existence of other gods seems to be fundamentally disputed in Isa 40–48. Isa 43:10b, for example, says: “Before me no god was formed, nor will there be one after me.” (Isa 43:10 NIV) 24 On the other hand, Yhwh’s powerful effectiveness seems to be at the heart of the matter: Yhwh is the only effective God! As the trial speeches show, Deutero-Isaiah seems to reckon with other deities, yet they are i­ neffective and therefore

  Quote from pp. 115–117 of Akhenaten’s Aton-Hymn; cf. Koch, Geschichte, 339.   Quote from Wildberger, “Monotheismus,” 249. 24   Cf. Isa 44:6–8; 45:5–6, 18, 21–22; 46:9; 47:10; 48:11–12. 22 23

Monotheism in Isaiah   225 “void” (see, e.g., Isa 41:23–24), just as the nations and their rulers before God are “like nothing” (Isa 40:17–24).25 This polemical passage could, however, also be understood as merely an effective rhetorical figure, which is not necessarily based on a conviction that the other gods that are mentioned exist. Whether the prologue Isa 40:1–11 alludes to the heavenly council (cf. 1 Kgs 22:19; Isa 6) is disputed.26 Deutero-Isaiah apparently shuns anything that might give the ­former deities in the heavenly council a visible profile up and against Yhwh. After all, the prophet can still hear heavenly voices (Isa 40:3, 6) that do not come from Yhwh.27 The former deities, in a sense, thus remain in an “auditory existence” to serve as Yhwh’s mouthpiece. As divine beings, however, they are not worthy of attention, let alone worship. For Deutero-Isaiah, the crucial issue is that of effectiveness. Deutero-Isaiah concludes expressively with the words “your works are utterly worthless” (Isa 41:24, 29); they “accomplish nothing good.” It is possible to “choose” them, but “whoever chooses [them] is detestable” (Isa 41:24).28

12.2.2.3.  The Aspect of Universalism As the only effective God, Yhwh is also the universal God. As the Israelite faith of God became detached from land, royalty, and temple, a spatial and temporal universalization of the conception of God took place. This universality of Yhwh (cf. Isa 40:15, 22) enabled his followers not only to worship him in any place and at all times, but also to develop a new religious identity in exile. For this reason alone, it is most likely that the Babylonian exile was the historical place for the formation of such a universal, unrestricted conception of God. Paradoxically, the theological demarcation from the ancient Near Eastern world of gods in Deutero-Isaiah led to the universal demarcation of the Israelite image of God.

12.2.2.4.  The Aspect of Salvation Deutero-Isaiah’s monotheistic argument is not an independent theological topic but has a soteriological-pastoral “auxiliary function”: the demonstration of omnipotence, uniqueness, and universality enables the prophet to rebuild the exiles’ faith in Yhwh’s saving power (cf. Isa 40:27–31; 43:10–13). Israel can rely on him in almost triumphant confidence, because his power is total and his rule finds no limit in any other power.29 If the crucial aspect of Deutero-Isaiah’s monotheism is Yhwh’s universal effectiveness, Deutero-Isaiah’s audience must have found it particularly pertinent. The following section aims to substantiate this presumption, supported by the important monotheistic texts in Isa 40–48 and the religious-historical context during the Neo-Babylonian reign of Nabonidus.   Cf. Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 24.   Cf. Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 91; Cross, “Council”; Elliger, Deuterojesaja, 12; Baltzer, Deutero-Jesaja, 22; Seitz, “Divine Council”. 27   Cf. Koch, Propheten II, 124–125.   28  Schmidt, “Monotheismus,” 239. 29  Wildberger, Monotheismus, 254. 25

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226   Matthias Albani

12.3.  The Justification of Monotheism in Second Isaiah Isa 40–55 falls into different compositional layers, and it is commonly assumed that the core layer in Isa 40–48 consists of the words of a prophet acting in Babylonian exile or a prophetic author group.30 This core includes, above all, the disputation words, the Cyrus oracles, the trial speeches, and possibly also the idol fabrication texts (often considered secondary).31 This article contends that Deutero-Isaiah’s monotheism is best understood as stemming from the historical and religious-historical context in Babylon during the latter part of King Nabonidus’ reign.32 As such, it is uncertain whether this fundamental change in the idea of God—so important in terms of religious history—is a purely intra-Israelite development, or whether there is evidence that the “theological thinker” Deutero-Isaiah33 also received theological impulses from his religious environment when he formulated the monotheistic concept of God. The monotheistic argument in Isa 40–48 is not an independent topic but serves, above all, to underpin the central historical message of hope—liberation by Cyrus and the triumphant return of life from exile. However, belief in the historical power of the Israelite god had been badly shaken by the events since 597 bce. As evidenced by the disputation words, Deutero-Isaiah’s good news therefore failed to elicit the positive response from the exiles. That is why the prophet had to make every argumentative effort to restore the confidence of the Israelites in the historical power of God.34 Yhwh had to be shown to be incomparably powerful, the one who confidently directs world history and thus is able to defeat an overpowering opponent like Babylon and its seemingly superior gods. Isa 46:1 mentions explicitly the divine king Marduk (Bel) and his divine son Nabu (Nebo), the two gods upon which Nebuchadnezzar II, the conqueror of Jerusalem, founded his reign.35 In Isa 40–48, two main arguments are put forward to show the incomparability and singleness of Yhwh, up and against the religion of the conquering Babylonian superpower: 1. Yhwh is incomparable and single, because he alone is able to predict and realize the “future” (“evidence of prophecy”—41:21–29, 25–29; 42:8–9; 43:8–13; 44:6–8; 45:21–22; 46:9–10).36 2. Yhwh is incomparable and single because he is the creator of the world (e.g., 40:12–26; 45:5–7, 18). 30   For source- and redaction-critical discussions, see, e.g., Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 26–43; Werlitz, Redaktion; for Deutero-Isaiah as the work of a group of prophets, see, e.g., Albertz, Religionsgeschichte, 431–446; Werlitz, Redaktion, 106–110; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 37–43. 31   See Werlitz, Redaktion, 221–237. 32   Cf. Albani, Gott; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 43–45.   33  Steck, “Deuterojesaja.” 34   Isa 40:12–31; 45:9–13; 46:5–11; 48:1–11; cf. Preuß, Deuterojesaja, 52. 35   For Nebuchadnezzar’s imperial ideology, see Vanderhooft, Empire, 23–51. 36   See, e.g., Steck, “Deuterojesaja,” 287–291; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 215–223.

Monotheism in Isaiah   227 Evidence of prophecy (Weissagungsbeweis) and statements about creation are two sides of the “monotheism coin,” so to speak, in Deutero-Isaiah. But to what extent could these two monotheistic arguments gain persuasiveness in the described exilic crisis ­situation? Was there any particular historical and creative theological impetus for this kind of argumentation in the late period of exile, or does it reflect a more retrospective interpretation from the perspective of the post-exile period?

12.3.1.  Monotheism and “Evidence of Future-Telling” Tell us what the future holds, so we may know that you are gods. Do something, whether good or bad, so that we will be dismayed and filled with fear . . . . Who told of this from the beginning, so we could know, or beforehand, so we could say, “He was right”? No one told of this, no one foretold it, no one heard any words from you. I was the first to tell Zion, “Look, here they are!” I gave to Jerusalem a messenger of good news. (Isa 41:23, 26–27 NIV)

Deutero-Isaiah’s argument that Yhwh alone can truly predict the “future”37 is formulated in direct polemics against the (Babylonian) gods38 and the divinations related to them (cf. Isa 44:25).39 Deutero-Isaiah locates the reason for the calamitous hubris of the Babylonians in their pride in divination and magical arts (cf. Isa 47:5): You have trusted in your wickedness and have said, “No one sees me.” Your wisdom and knowledge mislead you when you say to yourself, “I am, and there is none besides me.” (Isa 47:10 NIV)

Yhwh is already described as a judging God, who humiliates the proud and powerful, in First Isaiah (2:17; 10:12). Babylon’s blasphemous claim to singleness must therefore challenge God’s reaction and is clearly at odds with Yhwh’s claim to singleness in Deutero-Isaiah (e.g., Isa 44:6; 46:9).40 This claim is the decisive theological reason for the judgment of Babylon (Isa 47), which, precisely under the last Neo-Babylonian ruler Nabonidus, relied ideologically on mantic knowledge (see secs. 12.3.6–12.3.7). The evidence of prediction, which speaks of Yhwh’s sole and universal power over both history and the future, speaks in favor of a Babylonian location of Deutero-Isaiah’s message in Isa 40–48. The art of divination was blossoming in Mesopotamia. The

37   See further, Preuß, Deuterojesaja, 47–48, 64–69; Steck, “Deuterojesaja,” 287–291; Kratz, Kyros, 163–168; Stolz, “Monotheismus,” 172–175; Klein, “Beweis,” 267–272; on OT prophecy and divination, see Koch, Propheten, 17–29, 53–63. 38   So also Elliger, Deuterojesaja, 316–317; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 216–219. 39   Cf. 41:23; 43:9; 44:7; 45:21; 48:14. 40   On the motif of Babylon’s hubris, see also Gen 11:1–9; Isa 14:12–20; Jer 51:53; Dan 4:25–30.

228   Matthias Albani belief that the gods determine the fate of humanity (šīmtu) and show them (especially kings) future events through all kinds of heavenly and earthly omens was one of the characteristic features of the Babylonian-Assyrian religion.41 From a quantitative point of view, omen literature was the most important genre of Akkadian literature; according to Leo A. Oppenheim, it accounts for about 30 percent of the Akkadian texts that are known to us.42 Beginning in the Neo-Assyrian period, at the latest, astral divination was the royal authoritative mantic practice (what Oppenheim called “royal art”),43 with which the results of all other divination practices had to coincide (cf. “Diviner’s ­manual”).44 Babylonian astrology was so highly regarded that it was also received by the Greeks and Egyptians.45 Therefore, Deutero-Isaiah shakes a cornerstone of the Babylonian “state religion” when it denies the Babylonian gods the power to foretell the future. The ability to foretell the future represented divine strength, and the one who possessed the “tablet of fate” (tuppi šīmāti) held the supreme divine power.46 But, in view of the success and the obviously superior imperial power of “daughter Babel,” where did the prophetic certainty—that it was not the Babylonian gods but Yhwh who possessed the sole power of destiny—come from?

12.3.2.  Yhwh versus Marduk—Who Is the Lord of Fate and Creation? There is clear evidence in Isa 40–48 that Deutero-Isaiah’s argumentation, with regard to both “prophecy evidence” and “proof of creation,” is oriented toward the Babylonian chief god Bel-Marduk (including his son Nabu47), whose cult had monotheistic tendencies. The two Babylonian main gods are named in Isa 46:1: Bel bows down, Nebo stoops low; their idols are borne by beasts of burden. The images that are carried about are burdensome, a burden for the weary. (NIV)

Tellingly, these are the only names of deities attested in Isa 40–55. The imagery of transporting the images of Bel and Nebo into “captivity” may be a polemical nod to the

  On the Babylonian concept of fate (šīmtu), see Lawson, Fate, 79–107, 127–128; contra RochbergHalton, Fate, 363–371. 42  Lawson, Fate, 128. 43  Oppenheim, Mesopotamia, 224; Pingree, Astral Omens, 18–19; Pongratz-Leisten, Herrschaftswissen, 26–46. 44   Oppenheim, “Manual,” 197–220; see also Koch-Westenholz, Astrology, 137–139. 45   See further, van der Waerden, Anfänge, 253–267; Pingree, Astral Omens, 21–29. 46   See further, Lawson, Fate, 24. 47   The scribal god Nabu is closely associated with the Marduk cult; for his importance in the New Year’s Festival ritual; see Black, “New Year Ceremonies,” 55–56; for a prayer, in which Nabu is designated “Carrier of the Tablet of Destiny,” see Lawson, Fate, 55–57. 41

Monotheism in Isaiah   229 ­ rocession of the gods during the Babylonian New Year.48 At this Babylonian main festip val, the universal power of Bel-Marduk was celebrated and impressively proclaimed for everyone.49 Deutero-Isaiah, however, depicts the images of the main two divine players of the festival bow down together and being loaded and transported into captivity. It thus makes sense to interpret Isa 46:1–2 as a parody of New Year’s Day.50 The only controversial issue in research concerns the historical situation of the text.51 Hans-Jürgen Hermisson aptly points out that the dramatic description highlights the theologically decisive moment in the fall of Babylon: the powerlessness of the gods.52 The main thing that matters is the recognition of the powerlessness of the Babylonian gods, so that the deportees may place all their hope on Yhwh. If the prophet wants to convince the exiled Israelites of the God of Israel’s supreme power over history, then he has to demonstrate the powerlessness of Bel-Marduk. As the king of the pantheon, Marduk owns the “tablet of destinies” and determines, together with his son Nabu, the fortunes every year at the New Year festival.53 Numerous omens concerning the country’s fate in the coming year were linked to the appearance of the Marduk statue at this festival.54 In the “Epic of Creation” Enuma Elish, retold on the fourth day of the New Year’s festival in honor of the king of the gods, Marduk captures the “tablet of destinies” (ṭuppi šīmāti) in the fight against Tiamat and her helpers, thereby becoming the royal ruler of the cosmos (Enuma Elish IV, 121–122).55 Even before the fight with Tiamat, Marduk presents the gods with the condition in the event of his victory: [L]let me ordain destinies instead of you. Let nothing that I shall bring about be altered, Nor what I say be revoked nor changed. (III, 120–122)56

World creation (or rather world design) and determination of destiny are two sides of the same coin in the Enuma Elish. The possession of the tablet of destiny gives Marduk universal creative ability and control over fate (mušîm šimâte). Lawson summarizes this notion as follows: “with the tuppi šimāti in his possession Marduk is able to do wondrous things: he constructs the form and substance of the universe and establishes the order for everything in it.”57 Marduk’s power of fate is also extolled in

48   Cf. Vanderhooft, Empire, 177–178; in contrast Werlitz, Redaktion, 223–224, connects the creation of the text with the idol-translations that Nabonidus carried out in 539 bce. See further, Albani, Gott, 79–80; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 446–449. 49   Cf. Pongratz-Leisten, Ina Šulmi īrub, 83–84, 90; Hutter, Religionen, 77. 50  Vanderhooft, Empire, 178–179; Preuß, Verspottung, 218. 51   See Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 446–449; Ehring, Rückkehr, 258–260. 52  Hermisson, Deuterojesaja, 102. 53   See Hutter, Religionen, 79; Black, “New Year Ceremonies,” 50; Lawson, Fate, 116–121. 54   Cf. Pongratz-Leisten, Ina Šulmi īrub, 257–265. 55   See Lawson, Fate, 19–23; Albrektson, History, 92.   56  Foster, “Epic of Creation,” 396. 57  Lawson, Fate, 23.

230   Matthias Albani hymns and prayers.58 Of all the Mesopotamian gods, Marduk is awarded the most epithets and characteristics in terms of determination of fate.59 According to Babylonian understanding, Bel-Marduk was regarded as the supreme power of fate and as God of history par excellence. Three Mesopotamian texts from different epochs illustrate this: the Marduk prophecy (twelfth century bce),60 the Babylon inscription of Esarhaddon (seventh century bce),61 and the Babylonian Nabonidus Stele (sixth century bce).62 All three texts offer theological interpretations of catastrophes in Babylon’s history, when the city was conquered and the Marduk statue was exiled to the enemies. Does Deutero-Isaiah in Isa 46:1–2 allude to these events? The destruction of Babylon by Sennacherib in 689 bce—a good hundred years before the destruction of Jerusalem—was probably still painfully present in the collective memory of the Babylonians at the time of the Deutero-Isaiah. This destruction, as well as the exile of the Marduk statue, was not understood as a testament to Bel-Marduk’s impotence, however, but as an expression of his anger: Marduk himself has ordered the demise of his city and sanctuary. The three texts thus convey a consistent historical theological interpretation! The Esarhaddon inscription also mentions the reason for the divine anger—namely, the sins of the Babylonians. The social offenses listed there could equally well appear in a prophetic oracle of doom. After a fixed time span, the Babylonian deity has anew compassion for his city and brings about a new period of peace. In the Babylonian inscription of Esarhaddon, this allotted period of devastation is seventy years—just as it is written about Jerusalem in the book of Jeremiah (Jer 25:11–12; 29:10)!63 According to this Marduk theology, the repeated destructions of Babylon throughout the centuries had thus led to an interpretation of history very similar to that found in the OT relation to the catastrophe of 587 bce. It can be assumed that the Judeans became aware of these traditions during the Babylonian exile. Thus, Marduk’s universal power of destiny and history prior to the Persian conquest of Babylon constituted a pressing theological challenge for the Israelite Yhwh worshippers in exile. The crucial question in the years after 587 was: who really determines the course of history—Bel-Marduk or Adonai-Yhwh?

  For examples, see Livingstone, Court Poetry, 7 (“Hymn of Assurbanipal,” 10–11); Lawson, Fate, 57–59.   See further, Lawson, Fate, 40–41.   60  Cf. translation TUAT II, 65–68. 61   Textual edition: Borger, Inschriften, 10–30.   62  Cf. the text section in TUAT I, 407. 63   See Albani, Gott, 86–87; for Esarhaddon’s Babylonian inscription with regard to Deutero-Isaiah, see Ehring, Rückkehr, 118–128. 58

59

Monotheism in Isaiah   231

12.3.3.  The Monotheistic Meaning of the Rise of Cyrus in Second Isaiah and Nabonidus’ Religious Politics Now, for Deutero-Isaiah, the decisive history-theological argument in his ­monotheistic evidence of prophecy is the triumphal march of the Persian king (Isa 45:1–7). Only Yhwh correctly predicted these events that have now arrived; he alone called Cyrus by name, and he set his armies in motion. Together, these events constitute proof to the prophet that the Babylonian deities are nothing and void (Isa 41:21–29), whereas Yhwh is the only effective God, the Lord of History and of the world: I am the Lord, and there is no other; apart from me there is no God. I will strengthen you, though you have not acknowledged me, so that from the rising of the sun to the place of its setting people may know there is none besides me. I am the Lord, and there is no other. (Isa 45:5–6 NIV)

Interestingly, the Marduk prophecy contains a similar statement about the universal rule of the Babylonian king of the gods from the “rise of the sun to its downfall”: I am Marduk, the Great Lord. I am always watching, walking watchfully over the mountains, I watch, a watchman roaming the lands. I am he, who in all the lands— from sunrise to sunset—am constantly roaming. (obv. lines 7–12)64

The religious “competition” between the divine rulers Yhwh and Marduk becomes even more pronounced when we look at another prominent cuneiform text from the period of transition to Persian rule: the so-called Cyrus Cylinder depicts the victorious Persian king as Marduk’s tool (in contrast to Isa 45)! Since the publication of Rudolf Kittel’s 1898 essay “Cyrus and Deuterojesaja,” the parallels between the Cyrus Cylinder and DeuteroIsaiah’s Cyrus sayings have been well known.65 In it, Cyrus explicitly attributes his victorious campaign against Nabonidus to Marduk’s orders: By his own plan, he did away with the worship of Marduk, the king of the gods; he continually did evil against his (Marduk’s) city. Daily, [without interruption…], he [imposed] the corvée upon its inhabitants unrelentingly, ruining them all.66

Marduk therefore chose Cyrus to free Babylon from his sacrilegious king. It is clear from the well-known Nabonidus Chronicles that over the course of his reign, the last Neo-Babylonian king showed more and more interest in the cult of the moon god Sîn

  Quote from COS 1:480–410; see also Albani, “Monotheismus,” 197; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 402–403.   Kittel, “Cyrus,” 149–162.    66  Quote from COS 2:314–316.

64 65

232   Matthias Albani in Harran and, indeed, at the expense of Marduk.67 Thus, in the last inscription, known from the reign of Nabonidus, only Sîn is praised as the “King of the Gods” and “God of the Gods”: O Sîn, lord of the gods, king of the gods of the heaven and the underworld, god of the gods, who dwells in the great heavens, when you joyfully enter that temple, may you speak favourable words for the Esagil, the Ezida, and the Egišnugal, the temples of your great godhead.68

For the Babylonian Marduk priesthood, it must have been an egregious provocation that Esagila and Ezida, the temples of Marduk and Nabu in Babylon and Borsippa, are referred to in this text as the temple of the moon god. The usurpation of the temples of the king of the gods and his son Nabu was, according to Paul-Alain Beaulieu, a major component of the reform sought by Nabonidus. (The Nabonid stele is pictured in Figure 12.1, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabonidus.)

Figure 12.1.  Nabonidus stele

  See further, Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 43–65; Lewy, “Cult of the Moon,” 405–489.  Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 61.

67

68

Monotheism in Isaiah   233

Figure 12.2.  Circular astrolabe

Nabonidus’ intention to seize the Marduk temple for Sîn is also testified in the so-called stanza poem, a diatribe of the Marduk priesthood against Nabonidus.69 Furthermore, in Nabonidus’ later inscriptions the epithets normally associated with Marduk are attributed to the moon god. The epithet “God of the Gods” (ilāni ša ilāni), used in the above-mentioned last inscription, known from the reign of Nabonidus , is particularly remarkable. According to Beaulieu, this is “probably the highest epithet ever given to a god in the Mesopotamian tradition. In the last years of his reign, Nabonidus was no longer hesitant to publicize his fanatical devotion to Sîn and his intention to

  See Beaulieu, 218–219; cf. 61.

69

234   Matthias Albani r­ elegate Marduk to nearly total oblivion.”70 In another of Nabonidus’ prayers, the moon god is praised as the supreme God who holds all divine offices in his hand: O Sîn, lord of the gods, whose name on the first day (of the month) is “crescent of Anu,” you who “obscure” heavens and shatter the earth, (who) gathers to himself Anu’s office, (who) controls Enlil’s office, who holds Ea’s office, in whose hands are grasped all heavenly offices, leader of the gods, king of the kings, lord of lords, who does not reconsider his order, and you do not utter your command twice, with awesomeness of whose great godhead heaven and earth are filled, in the absence of whose features heaven and earth are upset, without you who can do what?71

Beaulieu characterizes Nabonidus’ exuberant veneration of the moon god Sîn with the term “fanaticism.” His religious policies went well beyond what was common in a polytheistic society.72 One certainly cannot speak of monotheism, because the denial of the existence of other gods is not explicitly documented; yet based on what we know from Nabonidus’ inscriptions, the term “henotheism” is also inadequate.73 The planned usurpation of the temples of Marduk and Nabu for the moon god shows that Nabonidus’ “fanatical” worship of Sîn was not only a theoretical-theological matter, but also had far-reaching practical cultic and political consequences. The state religion of the Neo-Babylonian Empire was apparently to be subordinated to the Sîn cult and the entire empire united in the worship of the everywhere visible and revered moon god.74 From the extant textual evidence from Nabonidus’ reign, however, it cannot be determined whether Nabonidus—as Akhenaton once did in Egypt—sought a monotheistic, or, at least, a monolatric religion.

12.3.4.  Inclusive Monotheism in Marduk Theology and Babylonian Astronomy With his passionate veneration of the moon god, Nabonidus incurred the enmity of the mighty Marduk priesthood. Scholars have long noted the “monotheistic” tendencies in Marduk theology. In an essay from 1975, Wilfred G. Lambert brought the concept of monotheism back into discussion in Ancient Near Eastern Studies.75 He cites a text

 Beaulieu, 62.   71  Beaulieu, 60–61.   For the notion of “sins against Sîn,” see Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 64. 73  Bertholet, Wörterbuch, 235, defines henotheism as “Monotheismus des Affekts und der Stimmung.“ 74   See further, Lewy, “Cult of Moon,” 486–489. 75   Lambert, “Pantheon,” 191–199, see esp. 197–199. 70 72

Monotheism in Isaiah   235 (CT 24 50, BM 47406, obv.) that identifies various important gods of the Mesopotamian pantheon with Marduk: Uraš (is) Marduk of planting. Lugalidda (is) Marduk of the abyss. Ninurta (is) Marduk of the pickaxe. Nergal (is) Marduk of battle. Zababa (is) Marduk of warfare. Enlil (is) Marduk of lordship and consultations. Nabû (is) Marduk of accounting. Sîn (is) Marduk who lights up the night. Šamaš (is) Marduk of justice. Adad (is) Marduk of rain. Tišpak (is) Marduk of troops. Great Anu (is) Marduk of . . . Šuqamuna (is) Marduk of the container. [(is)] Marduk of everything.76

In Lambert’s view, this Neo-Babylonian text presents Marduk as a “monotheistic” deity, and other similar texts support this “extreme doctrine.”77 The various gods of the pantheon no longer represent individual beings but are regarded only as functional aspects or hypostases of the one God. Several scholars speak of “inclusive monotheism” with regard to this “equation theology,” which does not deny the existence of other gods but interprets them as different aspects of an exceptional deity such as Marduk.78 The acclamations at the end of Enuma Elish consist of a list of Marduk’s fifty names, “fifty” being Enlil’s symbolic number (the earlier head of the pantheon). These are the epithets of the various gods whose functions Marduk has taken over. With this inclusive identification of the gods as Bel-Marduk, the stripping of the gods’ power has reached its culmination. The gods must show Marduk, the “sun god of the gods” (Enuma Elish VI, 127), absolute obedience. One passages in the Enuma Elish shows that Marduk’s total power in the world of gods relates to his control of the stars. In a kind of “fitness test,” the hero of the gods proves his abilities to the other gods by making a constellation disappear and reappear (Enuma Elish IV, 17–28).79 He is then designated king of the gods. This idea is related to the fact

76  Lambert, “Pantheon,” 197–198; cf. Hartmann, “Monotheismus,” 64; Parpola, “Assyrian Cabinet,” 398–401. 77   Lambert, “Pantheon,” 198; cf. Hartmann, “Monotheismus,” 64. 78   Van der Toorn, “God (I),” 678; cf. Stolz, Monotheismus, 53–58; contra Hutter, Religionen, 38. 79   See Albani, Gott, 53–55.

236   Matthias Albani that the stars were regarded as “images” and “locations” of the great gods (Enuma Elish V.1). To deviate from one’s prescribed astral orbit was considered a “sin” (annu; Enuma Elish V.7). As his star Neberu-Jupiter, Marduk is conceived as the commander of the celestial armies. Marduk’s reign over stars and gods is also explicitly emphasized at the end of tablet VII: Marduk, in his appearance as Neberu-Stern, should: Let him fix the paths of the stars of heaven; Let him shepherd all the gods like sheep; Let him bind Tiamat and put her life in mortal danger. (Enuma Elish VII, 130–132)80

The constitution of the astral orders, on the one hand, and the destruction of the chaos power, Tiamat, on the other, are here presented as two sides of the same coin. The divine cosmos is thus manifested primarily by the firmament. The emphatic disempowering of the Babylonian gods in Marduk theology, which finds visible expression in the orderly regulated pathways of the “star sheep” on the firmament, is probably also connected with the upswing of Babylonian astronomy in the last third of the second millennium bce.81 Marduk’s rise in Enuma Elish, in any case, is associated with a strong dethronement of the other astral deities. The gods praise Marduk’s incomparability just before they call out his fifty names (Enuma Elish VI, 121–VII, 137): At the mention of his name, let us show submission! . . . Let his lordship be superior and himself without rival. (Enuma Elish VI, 102, 106)82

Today knowledge of the regularity of the movements of the stars is self-evident. At that time, however, this was a new discovery whose significance was almost unappreciated, which also changed the understanding of the gods represented by the stars! The astronomical compendium mul.apin features not only the regular movement of the stars, but also assigns the constellations to the gods of the pantheon.83 The circular astrolabe (“Three Stars Each”) from Mesopotamia is the visible expression of the notion of astronomical regularity.84 (illlustration 2: Circular astrolabe, Horowitz, Mesopotamian Cosmic Geography, p. 156 or J. Evans, Ancient Astronomy, p. 10) When it is rotated, it can be used to simulate the heliacal risings of the monthly stars on the eastern horizon.85 Enuma Elish alludes to this idea by stating that when Marduk set up the calendar year,

  Lambert, Mesopotamian Creation Myths.   See further, Albani, Gott, 4–5, 61–68; depending on van der Waerden, “Wissenschaft,” 204–205, 240–252. 82   Lambert, Mesopotamian Creation Myths. 83   See the introduction by van der Waerden, “Wissenschaft,” 64–83; as well as the textual editions by Hunger and Pingree, mul.apin. 84   For the circular astrolabes, see van der Waerden, Anfänge, 62–63; Evans, “Ancient Astronomy,” 10–11. 85  Horowitz, Geography, 154–192. 80 81

Monotheism in Isaiah   237 he placed “three stars” for each of the twelve months (Enuma Elish V, 3–4). The mighty moon god must also follow the astronomic-calendrical law of Marduk (Enuma Elish V, 12–22); he is completely involved in the order of creation of Marduk “to mark the day (of the month) every month, without ceasing” (Enuma Elish V, 13).86 The Babylonian ­theology of creation, celebrated at the New Year’s festival, is thus essentially shaped by the idea that dominion over the heavenly bodies and the gods that they represent constitutes the foundation of the chief deity’s cosmic central power.87

12.3.5.  Monotheism and “Proof of Creation”: The Law of the Stars Given this religious-historical background, is it conceivable that Deutero-Isaiah’s monotheism was influenced by the newly sketched creative texts of Marduk theology in Babylon? There is some evidence of this: in the disputation word in Isa 40:25–26, the prophet asks his compatriots to whom the God of Israel can be compared and points them to the stars, which march daily in the sky like a disciplined army: “To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one and calls forth each of them by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing. (Isa 40:25–26 NIV)

This divine sign of power in the night sky, visible to everyone, could in the Babylonian exile also refer to the newly sketched ideas of Marduk theology, according to which ­Bel-Marduk directs the courses of the stars—and the deities represented by them—and thus dominates the cosmos. For, especially in the night sky, according to Babylonian understanding, the incomparable power of the supreme God is manifested.88 It is unlikely that this cosmic claim to power would have escaped the notice of the Israelites living in Babylon, given the strong propagandistic quality of the Marduk theology.89 A ritual text for the New Year, in which Bel-Marduk is invoked as an incomparable “God of Heaven and the Earth” (“Dimmerankia”) can, for example, shed light upon Isa 40:26.90 The prayer invokes fifteen star-gods and ends with the words: “There is no other lord!”91

  Foster, “Epic of Creation,” 399.   See further Albani, Gott, 49–73; Rochberg-Halton, Laws of Nature, 30–34. 88   The vision of the chariot in Ezek 1 likewise has a Babylonian background. Cf. Uehlinger, “Ezekiel 1,” 140–171. 89   See further, Albani, Gott, 27–29, 78–82. 90   TUAT II, 217–218; for dating, see 212; for a discussion of content, see Albani, Gott, 69–73. 91  Cohen, Calendars, 445. 86 87

238   Matthias Albani Marduk’s universal claim of supremacy, recognizable in the stars, was an existential theological question for Israel in exile. The veneration of the stars in pre-exilic Israel (Deut 4:19; 17:3; 2 Kgs 21:3; 23:5, 11 etc.) and the fear of the “signs of heaven” (Jer 10:2) is clearly evidenced in some biblical texts from the Assyrian-Babylonian epoch and also reflected in iconography.92 Therefore, the perception of divine power in the night sky was in vogue even among Israelites at that time. According to Deutero-Isaiah (Isa 40:26; 45:12), however, the view to the stars does not reveal Bel-Marduk’s sole dominion over the cosmos; rather it emphasizes the incomparable power of the God of Israel, who, as creator of heaven and earth, is the only God (Isa 45:18). In Isa 40:12–26, DeuteroIsaiah thus offers a kind of creative, theological counterdeclaration to the Babylonian New Year,93 when Enuma Elish was recited, and Marduk’s universal creative power proclaimed and celebrated. Above all, however, the creation statement in Isa 40:26 also supports Deutero-Isaiah’s decisive monotheistic argument in favor of Yhwh’s universal historical power—namely, the vocation of Cyrus and his triumphal march against Babylon (cf. Isa 41:2, 25–29; 45:1–7). Isa 45:12–13 formulates this heavenly and earthly command of Yhwh Sabaoth in a kind of “compendium” of Deutero-Isaiah’s message: It is I who made the earth and created mankind on it. My own hands stretched out the heavens; I marshaled their starry hosts. I will raise up Cyrus in my righteousness: I will make all his ways straight. He will rebuild my city and set my exiles free, but not for a price or reward, says the Lord Almighty. (Isa 45:12–13 NIV)

Already, the disputation speech in Isa 40:21–26 emphasizes that the Creator God Yhwh (40:22), who created and commands the celestial powers (40:26), can also destroy the earthly rulers (40:23–24). The juxtaposition of “earthly rulers” and “celestial powers” in 40:23–24 and 40:26 is based on the ancient Near Eastern view that kings and stars are closely related. What the rulers on earth represent are the stars in the sky (cf. Isa 24:21), namely Beings of Power, which seem to determine the course of the world, but, according to Deutero-Isaiah, are in fact ruled by Yhwh.94 By means of astral divination, the Mesopotamian kings tried to fathom the will of the gods represented in the stars. The king appears together with the symbols of astral deities in numerous Mesopotamian illustrations, including of Nabonidus on different ­steles. The stars represent the visible manifestation of the divine guardian powers of Mesopotamian royalty. When Deutero-Isaiah points to Yhwh as creator and commander of the astral powers (Isa 40:26; 45:12) and, at the same time, ascribes to him the greatest possible cosmic sphere of action (“from the rising of the sun to the place of its setting”; cf. Isa 45:6), then this entails that the God of Israel can both give power to kings

  Cf. Keel and Uehlinger, GGG, 322–429.   See Albani, Gott, 78–82, 183; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 154–156.   94  See Albani, Gott, 153–156.

92 93

Monotheism in Isaiah   239 who are in his favor anywhere in the world (Cyrus, cf. Isa 41:25) and deprive kingdoms that have aroused his wrath (Babylon, cf. Isa 47) of their power. After the cosmic question of power has been clarified in principle in the “Overture” in Isa 40:12–31, the chapters from Isa 41 onward address the concrete historical con­ sequences of this theological decision. Isa 41:2 alludes to Cyrus coming from the east, who, as Yhwh’s tool, will subjugate the kings and peoples and turn them into dust and chaff (cf. 40:24). Just as Yhwh, as the heavenly commander in Isa 40:26, “calls” the stars by name when they rise, he also invokes his earthly “solar hero” Cyrus and his armies, who will rise from the east.95 The phrase ‫ קרא בשם‬in 40:26 and 45:3, 4 conveys a clear thematic correspondence:96 the Creator, who directs the vast cosmic cycle of the army of stars from east to west, is also able to guide the earthly victory run of the Persian and his armies, so that one can learn from east to west that there is no God apart from Yhwh (45:6). In Deutero-Isaiah’s “compendium,” Isa 45:11–13 expresses this heavenearth parallelism directly: the Creator God, who commanded heaven’s army (45:12), also awakened Cyrus in righteousness and paved the way for him to rebuild his city and free his prisoners (45:13).97 Yhwh, who created (‫ )ברא‬the stars (Isa 40:26), also creates salvation and calamity in history through his Messiah Cyrus: for Babylon calamity, for Israel peace. The Lord and Creator of the stars is thus at the same time the Lord and Creator of history. This idea is also represented in an analogous manner in Marduk theology: Marduk is both the creator of the order of the stars and the leader of the heavenly army (Enuma Elish V. 1–25; VII. 15–17,130),98 as well as the one who called “Cyrus, the King of Anjan,” “pronounced his name to rule over all space,” and ordered him to march to Babel with his “extensive troops” (Cyrus Cylinder).99 In parallel, the Esarhaddon stele tells us that the Babylonian Divine King, enraged by his sinful city of Babylon, marked the decided calamity for the city in the stars: the angry Marduk caused the stars on the celestial paths of Enlil, Anu, and Ea to produce only ominous signs, whereupon the catastrophe fell upon the city. The premature pardon of Babylon is similarly written in the night sky, visible in the change of the courses of the heavenly bodies.100 The Babylonian stele of Nabonidus, which likewise attributes the fall of the city to Marduk’s wrath, also alludes to the events depicted in the Esarhaddon inscription about the destruction of Babylon by Sennacherib in 689 bce.101 In these Mesopotamian inscriptions, Bel-Marduk is thus the universal divine power, who guides the courses of the stars and the course of history, and thus brings about salvation or calamity for Babylon.

  Isa 41:2, 25; 42:6; 45:3–4; 48:15; for Cyrus as “hero of the sun,” see Koch, “Stellung,” 354–355; Albani, Gott, 237–239. 96   Cf. Hossfeld and Lamberty-Zielinski, “‫קרא‬,” 132. 97   Cf. Albani, Gott, 235–236; Hossfeld and Lamberty-Zielinski, “133–132 ”,‫קרא‬. 98   Cf. Albani, Gott, 53–68, 184–195, 230–239.    99 Cf. TUAT I, 408. 100   See Albani, Gott, 85–88. 101  Cf. TUAT I, 407; Albani, Gott, 88–90; Ehring, Rückkehr, 100–111. 95

240   Matthias Albani

12.3.6.  Monotheism in Isaiah 40–55 and the Babylonian Religious Conflict Notwithstanding the texts steeped in the Marduk theology tradition quoted here, Nabonidus’ “fanatical” veneration of the moon god Sîn as king of the gods clearly constituted a total affront to the Marduk cult. To a certain extent, Nabonidus’ elevation of the moon god to the status of king of the gods has to be understood as a “hostile takeover” of the divine functions of the Babylonian king of the gods. This probably also reawakened fatal memories among the Babylonians of the Babylon-hostile religious policy of the Assyrian king Sennacherib, especially since Nabonidus liked to portray himself as the successor of the Sargonids, especially Assurbanipal.102 Sennacherib thoroughly destroyed Babylon in 689 bce and deported Marduk’s statue to Assyria. Above all, through his theologians, he transferred Marduk’s functions as god king and world creator to Assur. All that remained was a strongly disempowered Marduk as an incantation god.103 In the Assyrian version of the Enuma Elish, Assur takes the place of Marduk. The Babylonian akītu festival and its associated cult topography were also transfered to Assur.104 Above all, Nabonidus’ religious policy had drastic practical and cultic consequences for the veneration of Marduk. During Nabonidus’ long-standing stay in Arabia in Tayma (553–539 bce), the New Year’s Festival in honor of the national god, Marduk, which was so important for the Babylonians, had to be canceled because of the king’s absence.105 Nabonidus himself justified his “Arab Exile” in an inscription by referring to the Babylonians’ lack of reverence for the Moon God.106 There is, however, some evidence that an “orthodox” Marduk opposition to the absent king’s religious policy was able to form during the reign of Nabonidus’s son Belshazzar’ interim reign. The religious conflict culminated after the return of Nabonidus from Arabia, when the king officially wanted to elevate the moon god Sîn that he revered to the head of the pantheon.107 The Marduk priesthood, together with the Babylonians allied with it, had already made contact with the Persians a few years before the bloodless conquest of Babylon and had engaged in pro-Persian propaganda in the king’s absence.108 The so-called Verse Account of Nabonidus, which in its present form dates back to Persian times, testifies to this.109 The poem was probably written to use as public propaganda against Nabonidus.110 Nabonidus’ opponents awaited Cyrus the coming liberator, who would

  Cf. Vanderhooft, Empire, 51–59, esp. 57–59.   See Frahm, Einleitung, 287–288.   104  Frahm, 285. 105   See Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 186; Black, “New Year,” 53–54. 106   See Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 62–63. 107  Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 203–219. 108   Cf. Smith, “II Isaiah,” 417–418. 109   Text edition in Smith, Capture and Downfall; Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 214–219. 110   Von Soden, “Kyros und Nabonid,” 64. 102 103

Monotheism in Isaiah   241 reinstate the old rights of the Marduk cult, as is later described on the Cyrus cylinder following the conquest of Babylon. The striking correspondence of Deutero-Isaiah’s Cyrus expectation with the statements on the Cyrus Cylinder probably should be understood against this background: an obvious explanation would be that Deutero-Isaiah joined this pro-Persian propaganda group of Marduk priests and expected that Cyrus would end their captivity.111 Yet, whereas the Babylonians saw the liberator Cyrus as the tool of their chief god, Marduk, who had been insulted by Nabonidus, Deutero-Isaiah saw in Yhwh alone the director of history, who had called Cyrus by his name. In this situation, there was apparent competition between Marduk and Yhwh. As in the case of the theology of creation, Marduk was considered the ultimate ruler of destiny. Deutero-Isaiah thus had to confront the Babylonian beliefs in this area112 to convince his compatriots of the historical power of Yhwh. In favor of Deutero-Isaiah’s argument, the fact that there appeared to be disagreement among the Babylonians with regard to the future role of Cyrus may have been of great importance.113 Nabonidus states in an inscription that he received in a dream at the beginning of his reign a prophecy from Marduk and the moon god Sîn regarding the Persian king, which clearly contradicted the expectations of Nabonidus’ domestic political enemies. One can assume that these inner-Babylonian political divergences strengthened Deutero-Isaiah’s conviction: the future revelations of the Babylonian gods are ineffective (cf. Isa 41:22–29) and the predictions of the Babylon diviners useless (see Isa 44:25; 47:11–15). In Nabonidus’ dream, Cyrus appears as Marduk’s “servant” (cf. Isa 42:1), as in the Cyrus cylinder, but he will intervene in Nabonidus’ favor to defeat the enemy Medes. It is also important that Marduk is the God who reveals the future events in the dream to Nabonidus at the beginning of his reign: In the beginning of my everlasting reign they (Marduk and Sîn) caused me to see a dream. Marduk, the great lord, and Sîn, the luminary of heaven and the underworld, were standing together. Marduk spoke to me: “Nabonidus, king of Babylon, carry bricks on your horse, build the Ehulhul and establish the dwelling of Sîn, the great lord, in its midst.” Reverently I spoke to the Enlil of the gods, Marduk: “(But) that temple which you told (me) to build, the Mede surrounds it, and his might is excessive.” Marduk spoke to me: “The Mede whom you mentioned, he, his country and the kings who march at his side will cease to exist.” (And indeed), when the third year arrived, he (Marduk) aroused Cyrus, king of Anšan, his young servant, who scattered the large (armies) of the Mede with his small army, and (who) captured Astyages, king of the Medes, and took him to his country as captive.114

  So Smith, “II Isaiah,” 417–418; 399; Kratz, Kyros, 165; Werlitz, Redaktion, 171.  Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 43–45; cf. Kratz, Kyros, 165.   113  Cf. Kratz, Kyros, 165. 114   Quote from Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 108; cf. Oppenheim, “Interpretation,” 202–206. 111

112

242   Matthias Albani In the dream, Nabonidus witnesses an encounter between Marduk and Sîn in their astral manifestation forms as Jupiter and Moon. During the reign of the last Babylonian king, astral divination played a central role.115 Nabonidus, however, is not dealing with the traditional form of astral omen science but with a peculiar synthesis of astrology and oneiromancy116 that served to give the usurper the means of political propaganda to legitimize his rule.117 For a king who promoted the cult of the moon god Sîn, the great significance of astral signs is not surprising. In the dream, the king is commissioned by Bel-Marduk to rebuild Sîn’s temple (Echulchul) that had been destroyed by the Medes in Harran. Nabonidus then points out to Marduk that the region around Harran is threatened by the Medes. Marduk, however, replies to the king that this danger will not last much longer. Finally, Nabonidus confirms Marduk’s prediction: after three years, Marduk raised “his young servant” Cyrus, who with “his small army” then beat the Medes and thus eliminated the danger for Nabonidus’ temple building project.118

12.3.7.  Deutero-Isaiah’s Prophecy versus Babylonian Divination Nabonidus thus saw in Cyrus a “Marduk’s servant,” as well as an ally of his policies, and was apparently sure that he had the Persian king under control. Nabonidus’ long stay in Arabia likewise suggests that he did not see Cyrus as a threat. This was a delusion that ultimately doomed him.119 The Nabonidus, who boasted about his mantic wisdom, had completely misjudged the political situation. There is some evidence that the Cyrus statements in Deutero-Isaiah are oriented toward Nabonidus’ astrology- and ­oneiromantancy-based propaganda regarding Cyrus’s role as “Marduk’s servant.” At the same time, the opponents of Nabonidus within the Marduk priesthood also regarded the Persian king Cyrus as Marduk’s tool, as is clear from, for example, the Cyrus Cylinder. Thus, the sparring Babylonian parties both maintained that Marduk was the one deity in charge of Cyrus’s destiny! Accordingly, Deutero-Isaiah used Cyrus as a polemic against Marduk theology to show that Yhwh is the only god powerful in history. According to Deutero-Isaiah, divination and magic are instruments of power in the service of Babylonian royal ideology,120 which had become a deceptive delusion of

  See Berger, Jesaja 40–48, 275–289.   Cf. Oppenheim, “Interpretation,” 202–206; Berger, Jesaja 40–48, 280. 117   See Beaulieu, Nabonidus, 110–113.   118  See Beaulieu, 108. 119   Cf. Berger, “Imaginäre Astrologie,” 285. 120   Parpola, “Mesopotamian,” defines “Mesopotamian wisdom” as “as an extension of Mesopotamian religion. It should be clearly recognized that with Mesopotamian science we are dealing with a sophisticated, well organised and comprehensive system of thought that had largely grown out of the necessity to advise and protect the king in his capacity as the god’s earthly representative” (p. 56). 115

116

Monotheism in Isaiah   243 omnipotence that contradicts Yhwh’s claim to singleness (Isa 47:10). Babylon’s ill-fated hubris as “queen of kingdoms” had its roots in its pride in its mantic arts (Isa 47:5). This misconception, according to Deutero-Isaiah, inevitably resulted in its judgment (Isa 47:11–15). Faith in Yhwh’s universal creative power and in Babylonian divination are incompatible (see Isa 44:24–25). The astrologers, in particular, are the targets of the prophetic criticism. Isa 47:13 states: All the counsel you have received has only worn you out! Let your astrologers come forward, those stargazers who make predictions month by month,121 let them save you from what is coming upon you. (Isa 47:13 NIV)

The astrologers are here called upon to come forward with their advice for preventing the imminent demise of Babylon, yet this is derided in the following verses as a futile undertaking. The astrologers will also perish, together with Babylon (Isa 47:14–15). Even astrology, as the highest form of divination art, can neither foresee nor prevent Babylon’s coming downfall. Since Nabonidus used his dream revelations and astrological wisdom as propaganda to legitimize his usurpation of the throne,122 it is likely that DeuteroIsaiah was aware of them. Deutero-Isaiah never mentions the name Nabonidus, but his fate seems to touch the Jews even centuries later, as the Aramaic Qumran text 4Q242 (= 4QPrNab ar/OrNab) shows.123 It tells us that the king, who was struck with a serious illness, came to know and glorify the only true God in Tayma. In Jewish tradition, Nabonidus became a “true monotheist.” The final phase of Nabonidus’ reign thus seems particularly plausible as a historical background to Deutero-Isaiah’s polemic against Babylonian diviners. As the last Babylonian king, trusting in his mantic wisdom, heads to his demise, Deutero-Isaiah increasingly sees Yhwh’s power over history as vindicated. Consequently, according to him, only Yhwh can reliably predict future events—above all, the triumphal march of the Persian king. In the confrontation between Israelite prophecy and Babylonian divination, the key question for Deutero-Isaiah is that of real divine power. We should thus agree with Reinhard Gregor Kratz when he writes: “Inspiriert vom Auftreten des Kyros und genährt von der Auseinandersetzung mit verschiedenen babylonischen Deutungen dieses Geschehens, stößt der Prophet somit—erstmalig—zu einer argumentativen Begründung des Monotheismus vor.”124

121   For an introduction to Babylonian astronomy/astrology, see Albani, Gott, 62–63, 108–109; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 500; Hermisson, Deuterojesaja, 153–154. 122   See further, Berger, “Imaginäre Astrologie.” 123   See, e.g., García Martínez, Qumran, 116–136; Koch, “Gottes Herrschaft,” 95–101. 124  Kratz, Kyros, 167.

244   Matthias Albani

12.4. Conclusion The formulation of the exclusive monotheistic confession in Isa 40–48 is best understood in the historical context of Israel’s political and religious crisis situation in the late years of Babylonian exile. Above all, the proof of prophecy and the creation argument of Deutero-Isaiah can be interpreted in a meaningful way against the background of the imminent conquest of Babylon by Cyrus during the reign of the last Neo-Babylonian king, Nabonidus. According to Deutero-Isaiah, Yhwh is unique and incomparable because he alone truly predicts the “future” (Isa 41:22–29)—currently, the triumph of Cyrus—which will lead to Israel’s liberation from Babylonian captivity (Isa 45), as was once the case during the Exodus from Egypt (see Isa 43:16–17). This “evidence” is directed against the Babylonian deities’ claim to possess the power of destiny and the future: predominantly against Bel-Marduk, to whom both Nabonidus and his opponents appeal in their various political assertions regarding Cyrus. According to Babylonian conviction, Bel-Marduk has the universal divine power, who, on the one hand, directs the course of the stars and thus determines the astral omens, and, on the other hand, directs the course of history, including the liberation of Babylon from Nabonidus’ rule (cf. Cyrus Cylinder). As an antithesis, however, Deutero-Isaiah proclaims Yhwh as the sovereign divine creator and leader of the both course of the stars in heaven and the course of history on earth: It is I who made the earth and created mankind on it. My own hands stretched out the heavens; I marshaled their starry hosts. I will raise up Cyrus in my righteousness: I will make all his ways straight. He will rebuild my city and set my exiles free, but not for a price or reward, says the Lord Almighty. (Isa 45:12–13 NIV)

Moreover, the conflict between Nabonidus and the Marduk priesthood over the question of the highest divine power (Sîn versus Marduk) may have had a kind of “catalytic” function in Deutero-Isaiah’s formulation of the monotheistic confession. Whereas none of the Babylonian gods can be granted the supreme power over creation and history because their predictions of the future have been proven wrong, Yhwh alone has correctly announced the Persian king’s triumph against Babylon. The emergence of the exclusive monotheistic statements in Isa 40–55 in the transition phase from NeoBabylonian to Persian rule thus seems particularly likely.

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246   Matthias Albani García Martínez, Florentino. Qumran and Apocalyptic. STDJ 9. Leiden: Brill, 1992. Hartmann, Benedikt. “Monotheismus in Mesopotamien?” In Monotheismus im Alten Israel und seiner Umwelt, edited by Othmar Keel, 49–81. Biblische Beiträge 14. Fribourg: Schweizerisches Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1980. Hermisson, Hans-Jürgen. Deuterojesaja: (Jes 49,14–55,13). BKAT 11/7–12. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1987. Hornung, Erik. Der Eine und die Vielen: Ägyptische Gottesvorstellungen. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1971. Horowitz, Wayne. Mesopotamian Cosmic Geography. Mesopotamian Civilizations 8. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1998. Hossfeld and Lamberty-Zielinski, “‫קרא‬,” ThWAT VII (1993), 144–145. Hunger, Herrmann, and David Pingree. mul.apin:An Astronomical Compendium in Cuneiform. AfO.B 24. Horn: Berger & Söhne, 1989. Hutter, Manfred. Religionen in der Umwelt des Alten Testaments I: Babylonier, Syrer, Perser. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1996. Kaiser, Otto, ed. Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments I–III (TUAT). Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 1982–1997. Keel, Othmar. Jerusalem und der eine Gott: Eine Religionsgeschichte. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2011. Keel, Othmar, Christoph Uehlinger, and Thomas H. Trapp. Gods, Goddesses, and Images of God in Ancient Israel. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998. Kittel, Rudolf. “Cyrus und Deuterojesaja.” ZAW 18 (1898): 149–162. Klein, Hans. “Der Beweis der Einzigkeit Gottes.” VT 35 (1985): 267–273. Koch, Klaus. Die Propheten. Vol. 1, Assyrische Zeit. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1995. Koch, Klaus. “Die Stellung des Kyros im Geschichtsbild Deuterojesajas und ihre überlieferungsgeschichtliche Verankerung.” ZAW 84 (1972): 352–356. Koch, Klaus. Geschichte der ägyptischen Religion: Von den Pyramiden bis zu den Mysterien der Isis. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1993. Koch, Klaus. “Gottes Herrschaft über das Reich des Menschen: Dan 4 im Licht neuer Funde.” In Die Reiche der Welt und der kommende Menschensohn: Studien zum Danielbuch. (Gesammelte Aufsätze), edited by Martin Rösel, 77–119. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1995. Koch-Westenholz, Ulla. Mesopotamian Astrology: An Introduction to Babylonian and Assyrian Celestial Divination. Carsten Niebuhr Institute of Near Eastern Studies Publications 19. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 1995. Kratz, Reinhard Gregor. Kyros im Deuterojesaja-Buch. FAT 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991. Kreuch, Jan. “Jesaja / Protojesajabuch.” 2015. http://www.bibelwissenschaft.de. Labuschagne, Caspar Jeremiah. The Incomparability of Yahweh in the Old Testament. POS 5. Leiden: Brill, 1966. Lambert, Wilfred G. “The Historical Development of the Mesopotamian Pantheon: A Study in Sophisticated Polytheism.” In Essays in the History, Literature, and Religion of the Ancient Near East, edited by Hans Goedicke and J. J. M. Roberts, 191–199. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975. Lambert, Wilfred G. Mesopotamian Creation Myths. Mesopotamian Civilizations 16. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2013. Landsberger, Benno. “Die Eigenbegrifflichkeit der babylonischen Welt.” Islamica 2 (1926): 355–372. Lawson, Jack N. The Concept of Fate in Ancient Mesopotamia of the First Millennium: Towards an Understanding of Šīmtu. OBC 7. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1994.

Monotheism in Isaiah   247 Lewy, Julius. “The Late Assyro-Babylonian Cult of the Moon and Its Culmination at the Time of Nabonidus.” HUCA 19 (1946): 405–489. Livingstone, Alasdair. Court Poetry and Literary Miscellanea. SAA 3. Helsinki, Finland: Helsinki University Press, 1989. Longman, Tremper, III. “The Marduk Prophecy.” In COS, 1:480–481. Müller, Reinhard. “Der unvergleichliche Gott: Zur Umformung einer polytheistischen Redeweise im Alten Testament.” In Gott–Götter–Götzen, edited by Christoph Schwöbel, 304–319. VWGTh 38. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2013. Oppenheim, A. Leo. Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977. Oppenheim, A.  Leo. “The Assyrian Cabinet.” In Vom Alten Orient zum Alten Testament: Festschrift für Wolfram Freiherrn von Soden zum 85. Geburtstag, edited by Manfred Dietrich and Otto Loretz, 379–401. AOAT 240. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1995. Oppenheim, A. Leo. “A Babylonian Diviner’s Manual.” JNES 33 (1974): 197–220. Oppenheim, A. Leo. “The Interpretation of Dreams in the Ancient Near East.” TAPS 46, no. 3 (1956): 179–373. Oppenheim, A.  Leo. “Mesopotamian Astronomy and Astrology as Domains of the Mesopotamian ‘Wisdom.’ ” In Die Rolle Der Astronomie in den Kulturen Mesopotamiens: Beiträge Zum 3. Grazer Morgenländischen Symposion (23.–27. September 1991), edited by Hannes D. Galter, 47–59. Grazer Morgenländische Studien 3. Graz, Austria: RM Druck- & Verlagsgesellschaft, 1993. Parpola, Simo, Assyrian Prophecies. SAA 9. Helsinki, Finland: Helsinki University Press, 1997. Pingree, David Edwin. From Astral Omens to Astrology: From Babylon to Bikāner. Serie Orientale Roma 78. Rome: Istituto italiano per l’Africa et l’Oriente, 1997. Pongratz-Leisten, Beate. Herrschaftswissen in Mesopotamien: Formen der Kommunikation zwischen Gott und König im 2. und 1. Jahrtausend v.Chr. SAA 10. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press, 1999. Pongratz-Leisten, Beate. Ina Šulmi īrub: Die kulttopographische und ideologische Programmatik der akītu-Prozession in Babylonien und Assyrien im 1. Jahrtausend v.Chr. BaF 16. Mainz: Zabern, 1994. Preuß, Horst Dietrich. Deuterojesaja: Eine Einführung in seine Botschaft. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1976. Preuß, Horst Dietrich. Verspottung fremder Religionen im Alten Testament. BWANT 92. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1971. Rochberg-Halton, Francesca. “Fate and Divination in Mesopotamia.” Archiv für Orientforschung Beiheft 19 (1982): 363–371. Rochberg-Halton, Francesca. “Where Were the Laws of Nature before There Was Nature?” In Laws of Heaven—Laws of Nature: Legal Interpretations of Cosmic Phenomena in the Ancient World, edited by Konrad Schmid and Christoph Uehlinger, 21–39. OBO 276. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2016. Schmid, Konrad. “Differenzierungen und Konzeptualisierungen der Einheit Gottes in der Religions- und Literaturgeschichte Israels.” In Der eine Gott und die Götter: Polytheismus und Monotheismus im antiken Israel, edited by Manfred Oeming and Konrad Schmid, 11–38. AThANT 82. Zurich: Theologischer Verlag Zürich, 2003. Schmid, Konrad. Literaturgeschichte des Alten Testaments: Eine Einführung. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2008. Schmidt, Werner H. “Monotheismus II. Altes Testament.“ In TRE 23 (1994), 237–248. Seitz, Christopher R. “The Divine Council: Temporal Transition and New Prophecy in the Book of Isaiah.” JBL 109 (1990): 229–247.

248   Matthias Albani Smith, Morton. “II Isaiah and the Persians.” JAOS 83 (1963): 415–421. Smith, Sidney. Babylonian Historical Texts Relating to the Capture and Downfall of Babylon. London: Methuen, 1924. Soden, Wolfram von. “Kyros und Nabonid. Propaganda und Gegenpropaganda.” In Kunst, Kultur und Geschichte der Achämenidenzeit und ihr Fortleben, edited by Heidemarie Koch and David N. MacKenzie, 61–68. AMI.E 10. Berlin: Reimer, 1983. Steck, Odil Hannes. “Deuterojesaja als theologischer Denker.” Kerygma und Dogma 15 (1969): 280–293. Stolz, Fritz. Einführung in den biblischen Monotheismus. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1996. Stolz, Fritz. “Jahwes Unvergleichlichkeit und Unergrundlichkeit: Aspekte der Entwicklung zum alttestamentlichen Monotheismus.” Wort und Dienst 14 (1977): 9–24. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Continuity and Discontinuity in Isaiah 40–66: History of Research.” In Continuity and Discontinuity. Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans  M.  Barstad, 13–40. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Toorn, Karel van der. “God (I).” In DDD, 352–365. Uehlinger, Christoph. “Ezekiel 1. Babylonian Cosmological Scholarship and Iconography: Attempts at Further Refinement.” ThZ 57 (2001): 140–171. Vanderhooft, David Stephen. The Neo-Babylonian Empire and Babylon in the Latter Prophets. HSM 59. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1999. Vorländer, Hans. “Der Monotheismus Israels als Antwort auf die Krise des Exils.” In Der einzige Gott: Die Geburt des biblischen Monotheismus, edited by Bernhard Lang, Morton Smith, and Hermann Vorländer, 84–113. Munich: Kösel, 1981. Waerden, Bartel Leendert van der. Erwachende Wissenschaft: Ägyptische, babylonische und griechische Mathematik. Bd. 2, Die Anfänge der Astronomie. Wissenschaft und Kultur 23. Basel: Birkhäuser, 1980. Wellhausen, Julius. Israelitische und jüdische Geschichte. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1921. Werlitz, Jürgen. Redaktion und Komposition: Zur Rückfrage hinter die Endgestalt von Jesaja 40–55. BBB 122. Berlin: Philo, 1999. Westermann, Claus. Das Buch Jesaja: Kapitel 40–66. ATD 19. Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1968. Wildberger, Hans. “Der Monotheismus Deuterojesajas.” In Jahwe und sein Volk: Gesammelte Aufsätze zum Alten Testament: Zu seinem 70. Gebrtstag, edited by Hans  H.  Schmid and Odil H. Steck, 249–273. Theologische Bücherei 66. Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1979. Wildberger, Hans. Königsherrschaft Gottes: Jesaja 1–39. Vol. 1, Das Buch Der Prophet Jesaja und seine Botschaft. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1984. Wildberger, Hans. Königsherrschaft Gottes: Jesaja 1–39. Vol. 2, Die Nachfahren des Propheten und ihre Verkündigung: Der Text. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1984. Zenger, Erich. Einleitung in das Alte Testament. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 20169.

chapter 13

Si n a n d Pu n ish m en t i n the Book of Isa i a h Blaženka Scheuer

13.1. Introduction The fall and destruction of the two biblical kingdoms, Israel in the late eighth century bce and Judah in the early sixth century bce, are two events in history that elicited a great deal of literature in the Hebrew Bible (HB). Biblical authors, redactors, and editors sought to explain the logic of these fateful events in accordance with the norms of their time: the destruction was God’s punishment for the sins of the people.1 As the only prophetic book of the HB, Isaiah covers the downfall of both kingdoms, and not deviating from the norm, presents a comprehensive and vivid assessment of the depravities that caused such a horrific punishment. Yet in line with many of the books of the HB, the book of Isaiah does not merely explain but also instructs. Editing the collection, the authors/redactors of fifth- and fourth-century Yehud were not primarily in need of elucidating events long passed, but required clarification of the realities of their present, as well as of their future. One particular piece of that clarification concerned the reliability of the deity they swore by. Living with the dire consequences of the downfall of the two kingdoms, amid an empire that served many gods, the authors/redactors of Isaiah offered a theodicy, justifying Yhwh’s actions, and thus declaring Yhwh to be the only god they could trust and must serve.2 Such a propensity for theodicizing is clearly present in the varied expositions of the connection between punishment and sin throughout the book of Isaiah, but it is also quite explicit in the frame of the book, comprising Isa 1 and Isa 65–66, ­completed at

1  For a comparison with the ancient Near East traditions, see Berlejung, “Sin and Punishment.” See also van der Toorn, Sin and Sanction. 2  As noticed by Eichrodt, “Faith,” 31–32. See also Crenshaw, “Theodicy.”

250   Blaženka Scheuer the last stages of the redactional growth of Isaiah.3 Isaiah opens with a grand scene depicting a lawsuit held before the heavens and the earth, when Yhwh presents charges against the Israelites: the Israelites rebelled against their God; they rejected Yhwh’s authority and broke off their commitment to him (Isa 1:2). The word used to describe this break up is ‫פשע‬, the most common word in the HB for depicting actions of rebellion against a ruler, divine or human.4 This word describes a violation against an established relationship and is, when used in reference to the acts of the Israelites against Yhwh, one of the main words for sin in the HB. The word is also the last word for sin used in the book of Isaiah and proclaims the ultimate judgment of those who persist in their rebellion against Yhwh (Isa 66:24). Thus, as they collected and arranged the texts, the authors/redactors seem to have found in the Israelite rejection of Yhwh an answer to the all-commanding query of their time: What reasons did Yhwh have to bring his people down, and more importantly, what reasons does he have to keep them down still? Bracketed within this principal view, the three parts of Isaiah exemplify the ways in which such rejection became concretized in politics, society, and a cult.

13.2.  Sin in Isaiah 1–39 The book of Isaiah introduces its rhetoric of rebellion through the metaphor of a dysfunctional family: “Hear, O heavens, and listen, O earth; for the Lord has spoken: I reared children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against me” (Isa 1:2).5 The subsequent chapters in Isaiah disclose the identity of the accused: they are the leaders of the society, those in power making political and military decisions, the men in command of the legal system, prophets and priests, and the king himself (Isa 1:23; 3:12; 5:23; 7:12–13; 9:15–16; 10:1–2; 28:7–8). The accusation concerns the abuse of the power and authority vested in the nobles of the society. Isaiah argues that, despite their good upbringing, the sons of Yhwh grew up to be ignorant, lawless, and corrupt (Isa 1:3–4). Isaiah identifies three general areas in which these men stand accused of ignorance: social justice, cultic practices, and military/political alertness.

3  For a survey of shared themes of Isa 1 and Isa 65–66, see Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 378–379. See also Olley, “No Peace,” 363; Boda, Severe Mercy, 191. 4  Rolf Knierim emphasizes the concrete action of turning against, falling away from, breaking up, rather than a psychological attitude of rebellion. As such, accusations of rebellion are at home in juridical contexts. See Knierim, Hauptbegriffe, 176, 180. See also Roberts, First Isaiah, who says that it is “primarily a political term and shows again that the prophet is thinking in legal categories” (p. 20). Not so Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 59. Cf. Williamson, Isaiah 1–5: “rebelled against parental authority” (p. 34). 5 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision.

Sin and Punishment in Isaiah   251 First, Isaiah is clearly of the opinion that social injustice is a rebellion against Yhwh (Isa 1:23, 28; 3:13–15; 32:6–7; cf. the ways of the righteous in Isa 33:15). The leaders of the community oppress their people through injustice, corruption, theft, murder, and deceit (Isa 1:16–17, 21–23; 5:8, 20, 23; 30:12). Amid injustice, they indulge in excessive partying, drinking, and the acquiring of goods (Isa 5:11–13; 28:1–14) and cannot therefore fulfill their duties as leaders, prophets, or priests. As a deity who defends the poor and oppressed, Yhwh takes this neglect as a personal offense and responds in order to save the oppressed from unmitigated injustice (Isa 3:13–15; 5:15–16, 25; 29:19–21; 30:18).6 Second, Isaiah forcefully claims that worship of Yhwh is inseparable from social justice. The men of Judah have blood on their hands. They steal and commit murder. They take bribes at every opportunity. And all the while, they are relentlessly attentive to their cultic practices (Isa 1:10–17). For Isaiah, the corruption of the society and the exploitation of the weak obliterate the very essence of the cult. Cultic offerings amid gross cruelty and injustice are an outrage, an abomination (‫ )תועבה‬before Yhwh (Isa 1:13). Isaiah is not critical of the cult itself, but of the cult administered by corrupt criminals who have blood on their hands.7 Not realizing this connection, the leaders demonstrate remarkable ignorance about the character of Yhwh. In addition, once corruption and social injustice take hold of the society, the worship of other gods occurs simultaneously, and Isaiah accuses his people of making themselves idols to worship beside Yhwh (Isa 1:29; 2:6–8; 31:7). Third, a significant number of the accusations in Isaiah concern pointless political alliances with other nations, such as Egypt or Assyria (Isa 30:1–7; 31:1–3, cf. Isa 7:10–17). The main point of this critique is that turning to other powers of the day demonstrates a rejection of Yhwh: “Alas for those who go down to Egypt for help . . . but do not look to the Holy One of Israel or consult the Lord!” (Isa 31:1). In Isaiah’s view, the Israelites have the greatest source of power and protection right there among them, a fact that eliminates any need to form alliances with the military powers of their day. Looking for help elsewhere, besides being worthless, is a sin that ultimately leads to destruction (Isa 30:12–14). Notable among the indictments against the male elites of the society are the accusations against the prominent women of Jerusalem (Isa 3:16–24; cf. also 32:9–20). These “daughters of Zion” are self-confident, proud, and seductive. The prophet lashes out at them in indignation: their rich adornments shall be stripped off, and their beauty shall be replaced by shame (Isa 3:24 reading with 1QIsaa).8 It is a regular feature of prophetic speech to address a city or a country as a woman, particularly in accusations and condemnations, and Isaiah is no exception (Isa 1:21; 17:10–11; 23:8–17). However, the daughters of Zion in Isa 3:16–24 are not metaphorical women but real ones. They are wealthy 6  For the responsibilities of gods in ancient Near Eastern societies as defenders of the oppressed, see Fensham, “Widow.” 7 Eidevall, Sacrificial Rhetoric. 8 Stiebert, Construction of Shame, argues that shame, a recurring idea in Isaiah, “pertains to an unsound moral condition, to the disapproved of practice of idolatry and to a dysfunctional relationship between humanity and deity” (p. 108). As such, shame is not impressed upon women in particular.

252   Blaženka Scheuer and beautiful, and they know it as they flirt and indulge in their prosperity. Isaiah’s reason for condemning this behavior is obscure, which has incited scholars interpreting this passage to generously offer details of the sins implied in this otherwise rather harmless conduct.9 Motivated, no doubt, by the changes of norms in their own society, scholars of the turn of the millennium stressed the obvious fact that to punish haughtiness with humiliation, poverty, shame, and sexual assault is to punish in excess of what must be considered appropriate or just for Isaiah’s time. Bäckersten argues that the whole passage serves as a metaphor of the political hubris of Judah and as an illustration of Judah’s arrogance and consequent punishment.10 In a similar manner, Williamson sees here a condemnation of arrogance, yet in his view, the women stand themselves accused of “unnatural self-elevation.”11 Yet it is important to separate two questions that are often confused in scholarly discussion. The question, “What is the sin of these women?” is different from the question, “Why are they punished?” Cheryl Exum describes this text as just another prophetic example of female sexuality being branded a sin.12 However, no words for sin are used, merely the introductory reference to the women as high/noble or proud (‫)גבה‬. John Strong argues that pride is not in itself a bad thing because it can be an indicator of “an appropriate estimation of one’s social status or worth vis-à-vis the community.”13 However, Isaiah seems to be saying that such pride is unseemly amid the looming demise of the kingdom state. In this literary context, any display of one’s worth is bound to lead to disgrace and shame before long (Isa 2:11; 5:15). In this respect, the inappropriateness of the noble women’s behavior is comparable to their husbands’ overindulgence in drinking and acquiring riches.14 The punishment of these women, I would argue, does not primarily have to do with their conduct. The reason these women are punished is that they are possessions of their husbands. In the HB, men’s success is often measured by the beauty and status of their women—as is their failure.15 The humiliation and sexual assault of their women demonstrate the ultimate downfall of the prominent men of Judah, as revealed in the universal judgment of Isa 13:16: “Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses will be plundered, and their wives ravished.” The punishment of noble women in Isaiah is merely a means to an end—another dimension added to the many punishments of the corrupt and ignorant noblemen of Judah.

9  For a survey of such discussions, see Davies, Double Standards, 55–56. 10 Bäckersten, Isaiah’s Political Message, 191. 11 Williamson, Isaiah 1–5, 289. 12 Exum, Plotted, 114. 13  Strong, “Sitting,” 57. 14 Davies, Double Standards, 56. 15  The same principle is at work in the idea that Yhwh was brought into disrepute in the world through the destruction and shaming of his “wife” Jerusalem and the consequent deportation of her children into the exile (Isa 48:11; 52:4–6).

Sin and Punishment in Isaiah   253

13.3.  Punishment in Isaiah 1–39 Yhwh’s response to the sins of the Israelites is one of war and destruction. The terminology of military violence is abundant: the people will be struck down (Isa 5:25), devoured by the sword (Isa 3:25; 5:26–30), broken and crushed (Isa 1:28; 30:13), destroyed, and consumed by fire (Isa 1:25). The Israelite men will be punished through a violation of their belongings, their houses, their women, and they themselves will be taken to exile (Isa 5:13–14). Yhwh’s reaction is expressed through words such as “reckon” (‫ ;פקד‬Isa 10:12; 13:11; 24:21) or “repay” (‫ ;שלם‬Isa 59:18; 65:6–7), and through the image of Yhwh’s hand stretched out in anger (Isa 5:25; 9:16; 14:26–27; 63:10) to crush and destroy (‫ ;שבר‬Isa 1:28; 14:25; 30:11, 13). This is a punishment that pushed the land further into the chaos of injustice that the leaders so willfully practiced (Isa 9:19–21). Particularly interesting is the logic of punishment declared in Isa 6:10–11. It seems that Yhwh’s punishment of the Israelites is the almost complete annihilation of their nation and land through war (Isa 6:11), yet this punishment is facilitated by an act of God. In a calculated tranquility, Yhwh makes a decision that has bewildered readers and scholars of Isaiah ever since, right up until the present day: Yhwh takes away the basic preconditions required for an individual to make decisions—her ability to comprehend and calculate her options— and thereby takes away her chance of evading the disaster hovering above her. The surprising fact is that, aside from the general statement about “people of unclean lips” (Isa 6:5), Isa 6 does not specify any sins that could explain such an extreme act by Yhwh. To explain the rationale of the punishment in Isa 6, the authors/redactors needed the forceful accusations in the preceding chapters. The people there are accused of not seeing, not caring, and not wanting to understand or acknowledge the works of Yhwh (Isa 1:3; 5:12).16 Instead, they are boastful of their own understanding, might, beauty, and superiority (2:11; 3:16; 5:18–19). The punishment for such pride, which verges on hubris, seems simply to be to leave the individuals in that same state of hubris, forcing them to suffer the negative consequences of their ignorance and wrongdoing.17 In a way, Isa 6 summarizes the main point of Isa 1–39— namely, the sequence of sin and punishment has now reached a point of no return.

13.4.  Sin in Isaiah 40–55 The second major part of the book of Isaiah starts in chapter 40, with a declaration that the wars of Jerusalem have now ended and that the debts are paid in full. This fact has significant consequences for the way that Isa 40–55 presents ideas of punishment 16  Beale, “Isaiah 6:9–13,” argues that punishment in Isa 6 is executed on account of idolatry among the Israelites. 17  Hayes, “Spirit,” reads Isa 6:9–10 against the wisdom language recurrent in Isa 1–39, concluding that Yhwh is not merely exposing delusion in this text but also instilling it.

254   Blaženka Scheuer and sin. First, Isa 40–55 continues to view the exile through the metaphor of a family, a family that has been shattered and dispersed yet is now being regathered and reunited (Isa 43:5–7; 45:11–13). Isa 40–55, too, claims that the downfall and consequent exile of Judah was Yhwh’s punishment for the rebellion and obstinacy of the Israelites (Isa 42:25; 43:22–28; 48:18; 50:1). However, Isa 40–55 does not specify these transgressions in terms of the social injustice of the leaders in the past. It is as if the sins relevant for the audience of Isa 40–55 were those that directly endangered their relationship with Yhwh, forcing Yhwh to abandon them as demonstrated through the tragedy of the Babylonian exile. Second, and following on from the above, the sins of the exilic generation primarily concern their ignorance: they have a mistrust of, and a reluctance to reunite with, Yhwh. The Israelites are accused of acting as if they have no knowledge of Yhwh’s power (Isa 40:21). They have an unwillingness to hear and be alert to what is being said about Yhwh, notwithstanding that they are fully capable of understanding (Isa 42:20). Instead, they speak misguidedly, complaining about Yhwh against their better judgment (Isa 40:27), and invoking him in a fraudulent way (Isa 48:1). The conclusion seems to be the only possible one: the Israelites are still rebels (‫)פושעים‬, who, undeterred of the horrors of the exile, seem to have learned nothing (Isa 42:25).18 A particularly targeted category of sinners in Isa 40–55 is that of the hypothetical transgressors usually identified as “those who” do such and such. The nature of sins that these individuals are charged with is that of apostasy among the Israelites of the exilic generation: those who choose idols (Isa 41:24; 44:9–11), speak of idols as their gods (Isa 42:17), bear witness for the idols (Isa 44:9), or pray to idols (Isa 45:20). All these individuals are blind to the absurdity of idol worship. Among these hypothetical transgressors are also those who question Yhwh’s deeds, plans, and decisions (Isa 45:9–10). There is no reason to assume that Babylonians would ever question anything that Yhwh does, and the Babylonians’ worship of their gods was not considered wrong, only pointless (Isa 47). The Israelites are the target of these charges (Isa 40:18–20; 46:5; 48:5). These texts, deliberately imprecise, aim at shaming or even intimidating the Israelite idol-lovers out of their infatuation and back to Yhwh to whom they belong (Isa 42:17; 55:6–7).19 While such stern accusations of sin in attitude (distrust) and in deed (idolatry) would in Isa 1–39 bring forth a flood of horrors of approaching judgment, Isa 40–55 takes a different approach and speaks of salvation instead.

13.5.  Punishment in Isaiah 40–55 The ideas of punishment in Isa 40–55 are unique in some aspects not only to the book but also to the HB in general. Isa 40–55 argues that those who choose the gods of the nations may enjoy the benefits of that choice now, but they will soon also share their 18  For an analysis of the accusations against the Israelites in Isa 40–55, see Scheuer, Return, 32–59. 19  For an argument for the subversive nature of these texts and of aniconic ideology in ancient Israel, see Levtow, Images of Others.

Sin and Punishment in Isaiah   255 ­ isgrace (Isa 42:17; 44:9; 45:24), implying a view of punishment as an inevitable cond sequence of a bad choice. At the same time, this part of the book does not stipulate any punishment for the sins of the present generation of the Israelites. Rather, their transgressions—their ignorance, doubt of Yhwh, and reluctance to listen—serve as the basis for the calls for repentance (Isa 44:21–22; 55:6–7). The direct correlation between sin and punishment seems to be broken or, at least, on hold in Isa 40–55. It is rather remarkable, then, that here we find one of the most disturbing views on sin and punishment in the HB. Isa 52:13–53:12 offers an accumulation of words and images that speak of punishment for sin: stricken (‫)נגוע‬, hurt by God (‫)מכה אלהים‬, afflicted (‫)מענה‬, pierced (‫)מחלל‬, crushed (‫)מדכא‬, and attacked (‫)הפגיע‬. The punishment, however, did not fall upon the guilty, but upon an innocent party (Isa 53:5–6), upon “a Servant.” This idea of the vicarious endurance of punishment in Isa 53, which has been extensively discussed in scholarship,20 can be understood as Yhwh’s way of solving the problem of sin, in a context in which the traditional options—through the cult or prophetic ­intersession— were no longer available.21 Punishment in this text can also be seen in legal terms as the removal of the guilt caused by the sins of the people. Guilt or debt, expressed in Isa 53:10 in the word “guilt offering” (‫)אשם‬, indicates that the Servant becomes a sacrifice required for the atonement of the Israelites.22 Seen within its historical context, Isa 53 seems to rationalize the Israelite defeat through the Babylonian exile by claiming that it was Yhwh’s plan all along, and expressing reconciliation between the exilic community of Babylon—the Servant—and the Israelites of Yehud.23 Either way, the correlation between sin and punishment in Isa 53 seems to indicate that punishment here becomes a matter of principle, not justice.

13.6.  Sin in Isaiah 56–66 While Isa 40–55 hints at a risk of a group of Israelites rejecting Yhwh for other gods even after the end of the exile, Isa 56–66 is very explicit on this matter; it clearly identifies groups among his own people who reject Yhwh in thought, word, and deed. The metaphor of a family reaches its peak in the last part of Isaiah when the Israelites assert that Yhwh is their father (Isa 63:16), but also when the breach between the children is complete (Isa 65–66).24 Only two passages in this part of Isaiah speak of the past sins of the Israelites (Isa 57:14–21; 63:7–14), confirming the view of the two preceding parts of Isaiah, that the punishment through exile was a reaction to the sins of the Israelites. These sins are ­specified 20  For a survey, see Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 217–218. For a survey of the reception history of Isa 53 in Jewish and Christian traditions, see Janowski and Stuhlmacher, Suffering Servant. 21  Spieckermann, “Conception.” 22  Janowski, “He Bore Our Sins.” 23 Hägglund, Isaiah 53. 24  For the discussion of the genre of this text, see Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 350–352.

256   Blaženka Scheuer not only in terms of provocation and rebellion against Yhwh, but also in terms of social injustice. Specifically, it was a desire for unjust personal gain that caused Yhwh’s fury in the past (Isa 57:17). Unjust gain is a sin of corruption and bribery, a profit made through violence or theft (Isa 33:15), and as such is a particular sin of the leaders of the Israelites (1 Sam 8:3; Jer 8:10; 22:17). The present sins of the Israelites attract particularly sharp scolding in Isa 56–66, especially in regard to distrust in Yhwh’s good intentions and power: “Your iniquities have been barriers between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear” (Isa 59:2). These iniquities are those of the leaders of the people: they are blind and careless, and love to drink and be idle (Isa 56:9–12), they oppress the weak, do not feed the hungry, and do not give shelter to the homeless. Instead, they pervert justice, bring violence, and are useless in everything they do (Isa 59:1–8, 13–14). Further, Isa 56–66 makes a direct connection between social injustice and the corruption of the cult, forcefully asserting that social injustice is not compatible with worship of Yhwh (Isa 58:1–14). However, the critique of Isa 56–66 is more explicit, identifying a neglect of Shabbat, of Jerusalem, and of keeping dietary laws as particular problems of the Israelites (Isa 58:13–14; 65:4, 11–16; cf. Isa 56:1–8). In a similar manner, Isa 56–66 is more explicit about worship of other gods than previous parts of Isaiah are. He calls these people “the children of a sorceress” (Isa 57:3), explicitly targeting those who worship their gods through abhorrent practices, such as sexual perversion and the sacrifice of children (Isa 57:5, 9).25 In the last two chapters of Isaiah, the statements about sins of groups among the Israelites seem to intensify, as the divide between the sinners and the righteous ones among the Israelites deepens. In the last chapter of the book, the degree of depravedness has reached the heart of the Israelite worship of Yhwh, miserably entangled with social injustice, ritual impurity, and idol worship (Isa 66:1–4; 66:17). These sinners hate and banish those who revere Yhwh’s word (Isa 66:5), separating themselves from the family of Yhwh.26 The last chapter of Isaiah corroborates this separation: “These have chosen their own ways, and in their abominations they take delight” (Isa 66:3). In his choice of word, ‫שקוץ‬, “a detestable thing, an idol,” Isaiah revisits the ideas of sin presented in Isa 1–39—namely, that cultic offerings amid social injustice are detestable to Yhwh (‫תועבה‬, “an abomination,” Isa 1:13). In this manner, Isaiah reinforces his view that morally repulsive deeds, cultic neglect, and idolatry are cognate sins.

25  For a description of the Canaanite practices possibly intended in Isa 57, see Ackerman, Every Green Tree. 26 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56–66, 83.

Sin and Punishment in Isaiah   257

13.7.  Punishment in Isaiah 56–66 The major problem that the audience of Isa 56–66 had to deal with was the fact that the expected restoration of the land, the temple, and the leadership of Judah simply failed to materialize. Yhwh’s explanation for this is that the people do not live according to his will (Isa 56:1; 59:1–9). Although Isa 56–66 does not mention explicit punishment for such a distrust, a consequence akin to punishment can be discerned in the promise that if they stop sinning, they will be blessed (Isa 58:11), their city will be rebuilt (Isa 58:12), and they will inherit the land (Isa 57:13; 59:20). The rhetoric of punishment escalates toward the end of Isaiah. Initially, Isa 56–66 declares that those who worship other gods will not inherit the land and will not come into possession of the Temple Mount (Isa 57:12–13). Isaiah, as if provoked by their indifference to his admonishment, has another outburst against the idol worshippers, asserting that Yhwh will bring upon them their worst fears (Isa 66:4)—they shall be slaughtered, hungry, and thirsty; they will be put to shame; and they will howl from pain and from their broken spirit (Isa 65:12–16; 66:5). Ending the book, a redactor of Isaiah reinforced, one last time, the destiny of the rebels: punishment will haunt them into their deaths. The ferocity of these statements discloses a great portion of frustration. The authors/redactors of Isaiah, identifying themselves with the trembling ones, the ones expelled, oppressed, and powerless, fought to keep their beliefs in Yhwh’s redemption alive in a context that threatened the very foundations of their existence. Against the background of relative political stability of the Persian Empire, Isa 65–66 relocates the punishment of the sinners to the eschatological future.

13.8.  Sin and Punishment of the Nations in the Book of Isaiah The book of Isaiah speaks recurrently of large empires of the time, such as those of Egypt, Assyria, and Babylonia, but also of smaller nations around Judah, such as Philistia, Edom, Nubia, Tyre, and Sidon. These nations play an important part in the sinpunishment nexus in the book, primarily as agents for the punishment of the Israelites. The agent, however, fell victim to hubris, exceeding the limits of its mission. Assyria developed into an empire characterized by injustice, cruelty, and oppression. When Yhwh’s punishment descends like a “wielding whip” (Isa 10:26), Assyria will be shattered (Isa 14:25), devoured by sword and fire, and fade away like a sick person (Isa 10:16, 18). Babylon, too, exceedingly proud and boastful exclaims, with hubris, that “no one is like me” (Isa 47:8). Babylon’s punishment matches Assyria’s; Yhwh himself will fight against her until she experiences the complete decline of her power and is given over to evil, disaster, and ruin (Isa 13:19–22; 47:7–8).

258   Blaženka Scheuer Although powerful empires of the time are punished for hubris, those that are less powerful stand accused of pride. So the punishment for Tyre and Sidon (Isa 23:8–9), and Moab (Isa 16:6–7) will be downfall through fear, starvation, and war. The punishment of these nations substantiates Isaiah’s claim that military alliance with these states is worthless. The case of Egypt illustrates this point well. Without obvious reason, such as reference to a particular transgression or even pride and hubris, Isaiah declares that Egypt will be punished by a despotic ruler, through natural disasters, and through the mental incapacity to make wise decisions (Isa 19:1–17). In fact, a punishment of Egypt is a punishment of the Israelites by proxy: if the Israelites trust in Egypt, then Egypt’s fate will be theirs.27 The nations are also accused of hubris through their kings and leaders. Isaiah addresses Sennacherib (Isa 37:22–29; cf. 10:12) for mocking Yhwh, and the king of Babylon (Isa 14:3–22) for being a merciless oppressor, a king who destroyed his own land. His punishment is utter disgrace even in death: he will have no burial place, and his dynasty will end with him.28 Thus, pride, hubris, and the oppressive deeds that emanate from them are the main problem of the nations in the book of Isaiah. It is important to stress is the fact that Isaiah never condemns the nations for worshipping their gods. Idolatry is a sin only for the Israelites. The nations are not punished for the worship of their gods—they are punished in spite of it (Isa 16:12).29

13.9.  Vocabulary and Metaphors for Sin Sin in the Hebrew Bible has been studied in primarily two ways: through a focus on the etymology of particular words, and through a study of images and metaphors that denote sinful behavior. Thus, Rolf Knierim’s classic study focuses on the etymology and use of the three words most commonly used for sin in the HB: ‫פשע‬, “to rebel to transgress,” ‫חטא‬, “to commit sin, to do wrong,” and ‫עון‬, “iniquity, guilt.”30 These words are well represented in Isaiah. As the encompassing idea of sin in Isaiah, rebellion is expressed in a variety of other words such as ‫מרה‬, “be disobedient” (Isa 1:20; 3:8), ‫סרר‬, “be stubborn” (Isa 1:23; 30:1), ‫“ נאץ‬despise, scorn” (Isa 1:4; 5:24; cf. 52:5), ‫עזב‬, “forsake, leave” (Isa 1:4; cf. 41:17; 55:7). Moreover, Isaiah uses other words for sin in terms of doing evil, such as ‫רעע‬, “be evil” (Isa 3:11; 14:20; 31:2) and ‫רשע‬, “wicked, criminal” (Isa 3:11; 48:22; 55:7). In cases where Isaiah wishes to express the totality of human sin, he uses an accumulation of words, as exhibited in Isa 1:4: “Ah, sinful (‫ )חטא‬nation, people laden with iniquity (‫)עון‬,

27  Hamborg, “Reasons.” 28  On the opposite side, Cyrus is held in high regard as the servant of Yhwh through whom Yhwh will save his people (Isa 45:1). Isaiah does not mention Persia at all. 29 Scheuer, Return. 30 Knierim, Hauptbegriffe.

Sin and Punishment in Isaiah   259 offspring who do evil (‫)רעע‬, children who deal corruptly (‫ )שחת‬who have forsaken (‫)עזב‬ Yhwh, who have despised (‫ )נאץ‬the Holy One of Israel, who are utterly estranged (‫”!)זור‬31 Sins resulting from pride and hubris are prominent in Isaiah as a serious problem for both the Israelites and the nations. It is important to stress the difference between pride, which refers to one’s self-esteem, and hubris, which is an exaggerated form of selfesteem, an attempt to usurp “roles and positions that should be solely ascribed to the gods.”32 Hubris is viewed as a sin by all ancient Near Eastern societies. The Israelites, just as the smaller nations around them, are charged with pride (Isa 2:11; 3:16; 9:8; 28:1).33 Pride, though not a sin in itself, seems to keep the Israelites blind to their social ­depravity and political mistakes. Thematic patterns and metaphors used to describe the idea of sin as well as its consequences in the HB is another fruitful area of research.34 In order to understand the ideas of sin in the HB, scholars must understand the metaphors that convey them. Joseph Lam asserts that metaphors establish a “rhetorical framework for talking about the intersection of notions of sin, guilt, and punishment.”35 He identifies four general metaphors of sin in the HB, metaphors that can be traced in the book of Isaiah as well. First, sin is described in terms of a “burden” carried by the sinner, who is thus described as “being heavy with sin” or heavy with the guilt caused by the sin (Isa 1:4). Likewise, sin is a burden that Yhwh also carries and that makes him weary (Isa 1:14; 7:13; 43:24). Second, sin is an “account” of transgressions, which is kept by Yhwh, who repays them through an act of retribution (Isa 53; 65:6–7; cf. Isa 43:25). Third, sin is described as a “path” on which one walks, particularly when walking away from Yhwh or when following one’s own path (Isa 9:16; 53:6; 65:2). Fourth, sin as a “stain” upon, or impurity of, the sinner occurs throughout the book (Isa 1:15–17, 18–20, 25; 4:4; 59:3; 64:5).36 Isaiah speaks of uncleanness caused by sin and injustice (Isa 1:21–26), but also personal insight of one’s impurity before Yhwh (‫ ;טמא‬Isa 6:5; 64:5). Likewise, the corruption and defilement (‫ )חנף‬of the Israelites are manifest in their lies about Yhwh, which in turn lead to the corruption and exploitation of the weak in society (Isa 32:6; 33:14).37 Isaiah states that everyone among the Israelites is profaned in this way (Isa 9:16; 10:6), but also that human ignorance and rejection of the divine laws resulted in the pollution of the whole earth which now faces an apocalyptic judgment (Isa 24:5). The judgment in this part of Isaiah takes on a ­specific

31  See also Isa 59:12, where the Israelites confess the full extent of their sins before Yhwh, and Isa 6:7, where Isaiah is cleansed with coal from the altar. 32  Strong, “Seat of God,” 55–81. 33  In the HB, pride is expressed through words such as ‫ גאוה‬,‫רום‬, and ‫גבה‬, yet there are no particular Hebrew words for hubris. 34 Anderson, Sin: A History; DiFransico, Washing Away Sin; Lam, Patterns. 35 Lam, Patterns, 14. 36  Lam, xi, 14–15. 37  While the word ‫ טמא‬refers to both ritual and moral impurity, ‫ חנף‬refers only to moral impurity. See Barton, Ethics, 196. For comparison with the cultures of Mesopotamia, see van der Toorn, Sin and Sanction.

260   Blaženka Scheuer form due to its genre, which by default makes the questions of sin and punishment into a transworldly event involving both earthly and cosmic judgment.38

13.10.  Punishment in Isaiah: Natural Consequence or Divine Retribution? The correspondence between sin and punishment in the HB has been discussed in terms of either divine retribution for sin39 or the natural consequence of sin.40 Punishment as a divine retribution for sin is seen as a direct act of Yhwh, initiated and executed by him as a personal response to a violation of legal or moral law. Punishment as a natural consequence of sin does not require a deliberate act but is a cause and effect process merely supervised by Yhwh. Koch argues that Yhwh’s role in prophetic texts is not to act as a judge, but to make sure that a deed results in its corresponding consequence.41 Engaging critically with Koch, Barton argues that the HB “bears witness to both an automatic and an interventionist way of understanding the nexus between guilt and punishment.”42 Yhwh not only supervises the punishment, but also personally executes the judgment, which is, in turn, often based on universal moral laws shared by all humans.43 The appeal to common sense is evident in Isaiah’s introductory plea contrasting the absurdity of the Israelite ignorance with the knowledge and intelligence of animals (Isa 1:3). This tendency to see punishment as a common-sense reaction is further corroborated throughout the book: in Isaiah’s parable of the unproductive vineyard (Isa 5:1–6), in Isaiah’s arguments against idol-worship (Isa 40:18–26), and in Yhwh’s argument against the total annihilation of the Israelites (Isa 65:8).44 Punishment in Isaiah can be seen in terms of a satisfaction or a repayment of a debt created by the sins,45 in terms of purging46 and purifying47 the Israelites (Isa 1:21–26;

38  The sins of the inhabitants of the earth are described in a general manner as not following the ordinances and laws, which in turn are deeply rooted in religion and in the understanding that the deity is the lawgiver and keeper of righteousness in the country. This is the sin that is often condemned by the prophets (Amos 5:3; 6:9–10; Isa 6:11–13). See Roberts, First Isaiah, 314. 39  Eichrodt, “Faith.” 40  Koch, “Vergeltungsdogma.” 41  Koch, “Vergeltungsdogma.” 42 Barton, Ethics, 212–221, 217. 43  Barton, “Natural Law.” 44  Krašovec, “Doctrine,” 83; cf. Bäckersten, Political Message. Thus, also Avrahami, “Foul Grapes”: “Part of the punishment decreed for the ‘stinking grapes’ is, therefore, rotting and withering, which stand for destruction, infertility, and instability” (p. 354). 45 Anderson, Sin: A History. Anderson argues that the idea of debt portrays the sins of the Israelites as an obligation “that must be repaid or ‘satisfied’ by means of the exile” (p. 73). This understanding of sin came to be reconceptualized in Jewish and Christian traditions, in which sin was a debt that the sinner was required to repay, often by enduring suffering of some kind. 46 Boda, Severe Mercy. 47 DiFransico, Washing Away Sin.

Sin and Punishment in Isaiah   261 4:2–6; 48:10), but can also be seen as simply an outburst of Yhwh’s anger and wrath (Isa 47:6; 57:17) and a demonstration of his power (Isa 33:10; 45:23–24). Yhwh punishes because he turned the Israelite sinners into his enemies (Isa 63:10; 66:14), and he is utterly annoyed by their pretence (Isa 65:5–6). The book of Isaiah demonstrates a variety of reasons and ways for Yhwh to punish sin, yet his punishment is always related to the nature of the sinful deed and is therefore always justified (Isa 29:19–21; 30:18). Miller concludes that in making these connections between sin and punishment, “the prophet focuses the attention of addressee(s) and all others who listen in on the character of the sinful deed by announcing a punishment like unto it.”48

13.11.  Sin and Punishment in the Book of Isaiah The ideas of punishment involve hindsight. Making bad choices and forming bad alliances are deeds that are bound to bear consequences, and social injustice will always lend itself to criticism, particularly after a breakdown of such society. However, a corrupted society can bloom for a long time and the outcome of political alliances can be evaluated only after some time and with all the facts at hand. The authors/redactors of Isaiah had both time and facts. These they interpreted according to their needs, rationalizing the choice of Yhwh as the god for the Israelites, in a context where other gods seem to prevail, upheld by the military and political triumph of their worshippers. In spite of its complexity, and its historical situatedness, the book of Isaiah presents quite sophisticated views on sin and punishment, timeless notions to ponder. First, Isaiah stresses ignorance as a serious problem throughout the book. The ignorance does not concern religious matters but social ones having to do with one’s knowledge of one’s responsibilities in the society. Swearing by the God of heavens and earth, the God who controls history, might be an easy rhetorical strategy for any people in search of religious restoration to use, yet swearing by a deity who demands social justice and moral obligations requires something in return. Attempts to excuse injustice with religious piousness are abhorrent and relentlessly condemned. Second, in all the fierce condemnations and punishments of sin, Isaiah gives voice to the human experiences of unjust punishment. When the Israelites in a lament (Isa 63:15–19) address Yhwh as their father (Isa 63:15–16), they boldly reproach Yhwh as the one who causes them to sin. They ask Yhwh to repent, to change his ways and behave as the father and sovereign he is (Isa 63:18–19). In an echo of Isa 6, this text evokes the unfairness of the punishment that has been inflicted on them for sins that they cannot help committing.49 The answer that the tragedy and consequences of the exile were 48 Miller, Sin and Judgment, 137. 49  McLaughlin, “Their Hearts”; Gärtner, “Why Do You Let Us”; Scheuer, “Why Do You Let Us.”

262   Blaženka Scheuer s­ imply a punishment for people’s sins is not enough, as human inadequacy cannot be the final justification of her suffering. Thereby, Isaiah moves toward the rationale of sin and punishment that will dominate later wisdom literature, particularly in the book of Job.

Bibliography Ackerman, Susan. Under Every Green Tree: Popular Religion in 6th-Century Judah. HSM 46. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1992. Anderson, Gary A. Sin: A History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009. Avrahami, Yael. “Foul Grapes: Figurative Smells and the Message of the Song of the Vineyard (Isa 5:1–7).” VT 67 (2017): 341–356. Bäckersten, Olof. Isaiah’s Political Message: An Appraisal of His Alleged Social Critique. FAT II/29. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Barton, John. Ethics in Ancient Israel. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. Barton, John. “Natural Law and Poetic Justice in the Old Testament.” JTS 30 (1979): 1–14. Beale, Gregory K. “Isaiah 6:9–13: A Retributive Taunt against Idolatry.” VT 41 (1991): 257–278. Berlejung, Angelika. “Sin and Punishment: The Ethics of Divine Justice and Retribution in Ancient Near Eastern and Old Testament Texts.” Int 69 (2015): 272–287. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 56–66: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19B. New York: Doubleday, 2003. Boda, Mark J. A Severe Mercy: Sin and Its Remedy in the Old Testament. Siphrut 1. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2009. Crenshaw, James L. “Theodicy and Prophetic Literature.” In Theodicy in the World of the Bible, edited by AnttiLaato and Johannes C. de Moor, 236–255. Leiden: Brill, 2003. Darr, Katheryn Pfisterer. Isaiah’s Vision and the Family of God. Literary Currents in Biblical Interpretation. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1994. Davies, Andrew. Double Standards in Isaiah: Re-evaluating Prophetic Ethics and Divine Justice. BIS 46. Leiden: Brill, 2000. DiFransico, Lesley R. Washing Away Sin: An Analysis of the Metaphor in the Hebrew Bible and Its Influence. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Eichrodt, Walther. “Faith in Providence and Theodicy in the Old Testament.” In Theodicy in the Old Testament, edited by James L. Crenshaw, 17–41. Issues in Religion and Theology 4. London: Fortress, 1983. Eidevall, Göran. Sacrificial Rhetoric in the Prophetic Literature of the Hebrew Bible. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 2012. Exum, J. Cheryl. Plotted, Shot, and Painted: Cultural Representations of Biblical Women. JSOTS 215 / Culture, Gender, Theory 3. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Fensham, F.  Charles. “Widow, Orphan, and the Poor in Ancient Near Eastern Legal and Wisdom Literature.” JNES 21 (1962): 129–139. Gärtner, Judith. “ ‘. . . Why Do You Let Us Stray from Your Paths . . .’ (Isa 63:17): The Concept of Guilt in the Communal Lament Isa 63:7–64:11.” In Seeking the Favor of God: The Origins of Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism, edited by Mark J. Boda, Daniel K. Falk, and Rodney A. Werline, 145–163. SBLEJL 21. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Hägglund, Fredrik. Isaiah 53 in the Light of Homecoming after Exile. FAT II/31. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008.

Sin and Punishment in Isaiah   263 Hamborg, Graham  R. “Reasons for Judgement in the Oracles against the Nations of the Prophet Isaiah.” VT 31 (1981): 145–159. Hayes, Katherine  M. “ ‘A Spirit of Deep Sleep’: Divinely Induced Delusion and Wisdom in Isaiah 1–39.” CBQ 74 (2012): 39–54. Janowski, Bernd. “He Bore Our Sins: Isaiah 53 and the Drama of Taking Another’s Place.” In The Suffering Servant: Isaiah 53 in Jewish and Christian Sources, edited by BerndJanowski and PeterStuhlmacher, translated by Daniel P. Bailey, 48–74. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004. Janowski, Bernd, and Peter Stuhlmacher, eds. The Suffering Servant: Isaiah 53 in Jewish and Christian Sources. Translated by Daniel P. Bailey. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004. Knierim, Rolf. Die Hauptbegriffe für Sünde im Alten Testament. Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn, 1965. Koch, Klaus. “Gibt es ein Vergeltungsdogma im Alten Testament.” ZTK 52 (1955): 1–42. Krašovec, Jože. “Is There a Doctrine of ‘Collective Retribution’ in the Hebrew Bible?” HUCA 65 (1994): 35–89. Lam, Joseph. Patterns of Sin in the Hebrew Bible: Metaphor, Culture, and the Making of a Religious Concept. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. Levtow, Nathaniel  B. Images of Others: Iconic Politics in Ancient Israel. Biblical and Judaic Studies 11. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2008. McLaughlin, John L. “Their Hearts Were Hardened: The Use of Isaiah 6, 9–10 in the Book of Isaiah.” Biblica 75 (1994): 1–25. Miller, Patrick D. Sin and Judgment in the Prophets: A Stylistic and Theological Analysis. SBLMS 27. Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1982. Olley, John W. “ ‘No Peace’ in a Book of Consolation: A Framework for the Book of Isaiah?” VT 49 (1999): 351–370. Roberts, J. J. M. First Isaiah: A Commentary. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2015. Scheuer, Blaženka. The Return of Yhwh: The Tension between Deliverance and Repentance in Isaiah 40–55. BZAW 377. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2008. Scheuer, Blaženka. “Why Do You Let Us Wander, O Lord, From Your Ways?’ (Isa 63:17): Clarification of Culpability in the Last Part of the Book of Isaiah.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by LenaSofia Tiemeyer and Hans Barstad, 159–174. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Spieckermann, Hermann. “The Conception and Prehistory of the Idea of Vicarious Suffering in the Old Testament.” In The Suffering Servant: Isaiah 53 in Jewish and Christian Sources, edited by BerndJanowski and PeterStuhlmacher, translated by Daniel P. Bailey, 1–15. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004. Stiebert, Johanna. The Construction of Shame in the Hebrew Bible: The Prophetic Contribution. JSOTS 346. London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2012. Strong, John  T. “Sitting on the Seat of God: A Study of Pride and Hubris in the Prophetic Corpus of the Hebrew Bible.” Biblical Research 56 (2011): 55–81. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 40–66. FOTL. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2016. Toorn, Karel van der. Sin and Sanction in Israel and Mesopotamia: A Comparative Study. SSN 22. Assen, Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 1985. Williamson, H. G. M. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 1–27. Vol 1, Isaiah 1–5. ICC. New York: T&T Clark, 2006.

264   Blaženka Scheuer

Further Reading Janowski, Bernd. Ein Gott, der straft und tötet? Zwölf Fragen zum Gottesbild des Alten Testaments. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 2013. Klawans, Jonathan. Impurity and Sin in Ancient Judaism. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Krašovec, Jože. Reward, Punishment, and Forgiveness: The Thinking and Belief of Ancient Israel in the Light of Greek and Modern Views. VTS 78. Leiden: Brill, 1999. Lindström, Fredrik. God and the Origin of Evil: Contextual Analysis of Alleged Monistic Evidence in the Old Testament. ConBOT 21. Lund: C. W. K Gleerup, 1983. Mein, Andrew, Else K. Holt, and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, eds. Concerning the Nations: Essays on the Oracles against the Nations in Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. LHBOTS 612. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015.

chapter 14

J erusa l em /Daughter Zion i n Isa i a h Frederik Poulsen

14.1. Introduction The fate of Jerusalem is a central issue in the book of Isaiah. As Jacob Stromberg states, “Zion’s destiny is arguably the most pervasive theme in the book.”1 The immense interest in this place is already obvious in the introductory title of the scroll: “The vision of Isaiah son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem” (1:1). Scholars often refer to the eighth-century prophet, who is thought to be responsible for the oldest core of material in the book, simply as Isaiah of Jerusalem. Counting the occurrences of its names alone demonstrates the significant and extensive role of this city and its people in the prophetic book as a whole. The name “Jerusalem” occurs no less than forty-nine times, and the poetic synonym “Zion” is mentioned forty-seven times.2 The terms do not only refer to the physical city or the geographical location of the Temple Mount (e.g., 2:3; 10:12; 30:19), but also to the inhabitants who live there (e.g., 51:16) or to the personification of the city, existing in­de­pend­ently of its population (e.g., 1:27; 49:14; 52:1). Regarding the latter, the expression “Daughter Zion/Jerusalem” (rather than “the daughter of Zion/Jerusalem”), in p ­ articular, pictures the city as a woman (e.g., 1:8; 37:22; 52:2; 62:11). What is of initial s­ ignificance is Yhwh’s

1 Stromberg, Introduction, 62. 2  “Jerusalem” often parallels “Zion” (see Isa 2:3; 4:3; 30:19; 31:9; 40:9; 41:27; 52:1; 62:1; 64:9). Some scholars take the two terms to be synonymous. Barry Webb, “Transformation,” for instance, claims that “Functionally, . . . the two terms are synonymous and the variation in their usage is not, in itself, semantically significant” (p. 68, n. 1). In contrast to this view, Goldingay, Theology, argues that “whereas ‘Jerusalem’ can be used as a down-to-earth geographical term, ‘Zion’ is always a more dominantly religious or theological term for the place where Yahweh lives” (p. 111).

266   Frederik Poulsen special relation to this place and its people: “Yhwh Sebaot dwells on Mount Zion” (8:18); “Yhwh has founded Zion” (14:32); “Mount Zion, the place of the name of Yhwh Sebaot” (18:7); and “Yhwh Sebaot will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem” (24:23). Jerusalem is the city of God, a center of salvation and wisdom for the people of Yhwh and for all the nations of the world.

14.2.  Theological Tradition and Literary Theme It is customary to refer to the complex of theological motifs associated with Jerusalem as the “Zion tradition.”3 The basic features of this tradition are that Yhwh has chosen Jerusalem as his holy residence, and that he, as its divine king, will protect the city against attacking enemies. Until the 1980s, scholars mostly focused on the religious and ­tradition-historical background of this alleged tradition, insofar as the idea of the holy mountain where the main deity lives and manifests his rule is widely attested in the cultures of the region, for instance, in Egypt and Mesopotamia. In his influential study of the most important Zion psalms (Pss 46; 48; 76), Edzard Rohland, a student of Gerhard von Rad, listed four central characteristics of this motif; Hans Wildberger subsequently added a fifth one: (a) Zion is the highest mountain; (b) a river goes out from Zion; (c) Yhwh’s victory over the chaos waters on Zion; (d) Yhwh’s victory over hostile kings and nations on Zion; and (e) the pilgrimage of the nations to Zion.4 There are obvious extrabiblical parallels to several of these elements, for instance, in the poetic cycles from Ugarit.5 A basic assumption for Rohland, von Rad, and others of their time was that the idea of Jerusalem as the chosen and protected dwelling of the deity existed prior to the Israelite conquest of the city as part of the Jebusite-Canaanite cult. Accordingly, the Old Testament psalms adopted and developed this pre-Israelite tradition. While Psalms regard Yhwh’s choice of Jerusalem and battle against its enemies on the holy mountain to be a mythological reality referring back to the past (e.g., Pss 46:2–8; 132:13), the p ­ rophets were largely seen to reinterpret the mythic tradition as an eschatological reality. With regard to the relationship of the “Zion tradition” to the prophet Isaiah, Gerhard von Rad, for instance, claimed that the eighth-century prophet drew extensively on an existing tradition of Yhwh’s choice and protection of Jerusalem (like the one contained in Pss 46; 48; 76) and readdressed it to his own time of the Assyrian crisis.6 In other words, the prophet Isaiah was thought to actualize or demythologize a theological idea

3  See the reviews in Dekker, Zion’s Rock-Solid Foundations, 283–318; Poulsen, Representing Zion, 2–10. 4 Rohland, Erwählungstraditionen, 141–142; Wildberger, “Völkerwahlfahrt.” 5  See Smith, “Mythmaking.” 6  Von Rad, Old Testament Theology, 155–169.

Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah   267 rooted in the ancient traditions of Israel. Similarly, John H. Hayes saw the origin of the tradition of Zion’s inviolability in pre-Israelite traditions, but argued that Isaiah radically changed it in two ways.7 First, the prophet called for faith in Yhwh as a condition of salvation and protection (7:9; 30:15; 31:6). Second, he placed the attack on Jerusalem within the arena of Yhwh’s activity and work, insofar as destruction is directly assigned to Yhwh (29:1–8), or to Assyria as his rod of punishment against the city for its sin and infidelity (10:5–6). Other tradition-historical studies that are more recent include Jaap Dekker’s exhaustive exegesis of the Zion text of Isa 28:16 in the preaching of the eighthcentury prophet and the extent to which he was dependent on an already existent Zion tradition.8 Nevertheless, this approach to the theme of Jerusalem/Zion in Isaiah has important drawbacks. The object of study is often reduced to the motif of divine protection of the city against hostile forces (e.g., 1:4–9; 14:24–32; 17:12–14; 29:1–8; 31:4–9). Furthermore, the examined material is in practice limited to Isa 1–39 and, in particular, to those passages that historical-critical scholars deem to be or contain authentic words of the eighth-century prophet.9 In accordance with the general shift of interest from the pristine preaching of Isaiah of Jerusalem to the entire book assigned to him, recent studies of Jerusalem/Zion have stressed the centrality of this theme for the literary composition as a whole. In the words of Ulrich Berges, “The book of Isaiah is a ‘drama of Zion’ in which the readers or hearers witness the transformation of Jerusalem from a place of judgement into a place of eschatological salvation for the people of God and the nations.”10 Antti Laato likewise argues that the fate of Zion undergirds the final edition of Isaiah.11 To him, the failed attempts by the Assyrians to conquer Jerusalem in Isa 1–39 form an ideological-historical paradigm that highlights Yhwh’s ability to save his city from defeat and humiliation—and his willingness to do so again as proclaimed in Isa 40–66. Furthermore, Maggie Low has attempted to demonstrate that the metaphor of Mother Zion in Isa 49–54 draws extensively on the Zion theology of Isa 1–39.12 An early example of this final-form approach is the essay by Barry Webb.13 His thesis is that the transformation of Zion is the key to both the formal and the thematic structure of the book of Isaiah. Initially, visions of the transformation of sinful Jerusalem into a salvific and eschatological reality frame the composition (Isa 1; 65–66) and there is a sustained focus on the city throughout all the parts of the book. In Webb’s view, Isa 36–39, which forms the transition between the two major parts of the book, is surrounded by six units (1–12; 13–27; 28–35; 40:1–51:11; 51:12–55:13; and 56–66), each of which ends with praises of Yhwh being uttered in or on the way to the new Zion.14 Furthermore, a central element in the overall message of Isaiah is purifying judgment and the concept of a faithful and purified remnant. While the identification of the ­remnant is not 7  Hayes, “Tradition.” 8 Dekker, Zion’s Rock-Solid Foundations. 9  Otto, “‫ צִ ּיֹון‬ṣîyôn,” 348–349. 10 Berges, Isaiah, 24. 11 Laato, About Zion; “Zion Theology.” 12 Low, Mother Zion. 13  Webb, “Transformation.” 14  Webb, 81.

268   Frederik Poulsen c­ onsistent—a pious remnant on Zion in Isa 1–39, the returning exiles in Isa 40–55, and the righteous servants of Yhwh in Isa 56–66—the production of this remnant illustrates the salvific transformation of Jerusalem and, directly related to this, the transformation of the cosmos. As noted, scholars such as Berges, Laato, and Webb have focused on the transformation of Jerusalem as it develops throughout all the sixty-six chapters of Isaiah. In contrast to these works that roughly follow the literary flow of the book itself, I will approach the issue thematically by grouping the textual material into different motifs. My assumption here is that Isaiah contains several divergent images of Jerusalem/Zion.15 Some texts depict Jerusalem as a secure place that Yhwh defends against attacking enemies, whereas other texts portray Jerusalem as a conquered and devastated city that Yhwh is about to restore and repopulate. The next three sections thus examine certain aspects of Jerusalem according to the vision of Isaiah, including Yhwh’s protection of the city and the surviving remnant of people, the restoration and glorification of the destroyed city, and Jerusalem as a worldwide center for peace, wisdom, and worship.

14.3.  Yhwh’s Protection of Jerusalem and the Holy Remnant Isaiah broadly interprets the enemy attack on Jerusalem as Yhwh’s judgment against his people. It is the punishment for their sin and transgression consisting in political disloyalty, social injustice, and religious infidelity. This event is thought to be defining; it is a day of judgment. Enemies will attack “on that day” (5:30; 7:18), and King Hezekiah refers to the time of the Assyrian attack as “a day of distress, of rebuke, and of disgrace” (37:3). The description of the approaching army—“a nation far away”—in 5:25–30 is truly frightening. The arrival of this terrifying and supposedly invincible army serves one distinct purpose: to make the imminent danger of invasion as critical as possible. There is no escape unless Yhwh changes his mind. The opening of the book (1:2–9) roughly sketches the structure of this thought. Yhwh urges heavens and earth to be witnesses that his people have rebelled against him. They do not know him and refuse to recognize him as God. Therefore, punishment will come. Foreigners have invaded the land and its cities and burned the fields all the way to the capital. In the middle of this inferno, Daughter Zion is left like a guarded, or besieged 15  Recent studies have drawn attention to the abundance of diverse and even contrasting images of Jerusalem/Zion in the Old Testament as a whole (e.g., Dow, Images of Zion, 43–110), and in Psalms in particular (Körting, Zion in den Psalmen). My own book on Jerusalem/Zion in the prophets (Poulsen, Representing Zion) investigates what I consider to be two main motifs regarding the fate of this place. These two motifs stand in structural tension with each other. The classical Zion motif designates the inviolable city and Yhwh’s defeat of the city’s enemies, while the dynamic Zion motif designates the dynamic development and transformation of the city: it is destroyed and abandoned, yet eventually rebuilt and repopulated.

Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah   269 (‫)נצורה‬, city—like an island of safety in a sea of hostility and death (cf. Ps 46). The inhabitants of the city quietly recognize that if Yhwh had not left a few survivors, Zion would have become like the entirely annihilated cities of Sodom and Gomorrah (cf. Gen 19). After the ravage of enemies, Zion appears as the only undamaged place. Another central element in the opening section is the idea of a remnant of people who survive while everything else is being extinguished. The motif of Yhwh’s protection of Jerusalem against invading enemies is scattered throughout the book. The turning point of Isa 29:1–8 is precisely Yhwh’s sudden and unexpected intervention to save his city. Initially, however, he is pictured as the great attacker. He will besiege Jerusalem with towers and raise ramps against it; foreigners and tyrants will conquer it. Nevertheless, Yhwh himself unexpectedly intervenes and slaughters the enemies. As readers are informed, this is the fate of everyone who fights against Mount Zion. A similar moral lesson concludes Isa 17:12–14 after the multitude of roaring nations have been forced away: this is the fate of those who attempt to despoil and plunder the people of Yhwh. In both passages, the enemies—the agents of Yhwh’s punishment against his people—have surrounded Zion and inspired its inhabitants with fear and panic, but in an instant, suddenly, divine salvation replaces judgment. Yhwh’s way of acting appears to be thoroughly ambivalent. On the one hand, he assembles and leads enemies to attack Zion; on the other, he saves the city from imminent dangers of defeat and invasion. The enemies thus play a double role; they are both a tool of Yhwh’s anger and an object of his judgment. Isa 10:12 reflects this tension: when Yhwh has finished all his works on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem (namely, to judge his own people), he will visit and punish the enemies. This is also the case in Isa 14:24–27, according to which divine punishment does not only concern the attackers, but all the nations as such. The hand formerly raised against the people of Yhwh has now been turned against their enemies. It shall become a place of refuge for the poor and needy, where they can lie down and rest in safety (14:30, 32). As noted above, John H. Hayes has argued that the idea of Zion’s inviolability is radically altered in Isaiah by the introduction of a condition for the salvation of his city.16 In Psalms, Yhwh’s protection is solely dependent on his free and sovereign will (e.g., Pss 2 and 46), but some texts in Isaiah suggest that the attitude of the people is of significance. This is, at least, a possible reading of Isa 31:4–9 and its imperative call to turn to Yhwh: Yhwh can save Jerusalem, but he will only do so if the unfaithful inhabitants repent. The people have to turn away from their rebellious and arrogant way of acting, the behavior that caused the presence of enemies in the first place. Alternatively, they must turn to Yhwh because they have survived the attack.17 As noted, Yhwh’s protection of his city in Isa 1–39 is portrayed in a certain historical context. This is obvious already in the initial heading of the book (1:1) which places the narrated events of the book in the second part of the eighth century bce and the danger of invasion by Assyria, the great empire of this century. Since the middle of the ninth century, this empire had extended its power and territory. The ascension of T ­ iglath-Pileser 16  Hayes, “Tradition,” 425–426.

17 Goldingay, Theology, 118.

270   Frederik Poulsen III in 745 bce added weight to this development. According to Isaiah’s interpretation, the Assyrians are in the service of Yhwh (7:17–25; 8:5–8; 10:5–19, 24–27). They are his punishing tool in the judgment against the haughty people of Jerusalem. Facing the threat of total extinction, the people must realize in what they trust. Do they hope for Yhwh? Or do they put their trust in military equipment and political alliances with foreign states? Two ways of acting with regard to this divine test are revealed in two of the book’s key narratives: the story about the unfaithful King Ahaz (Isa 7) and the story about his son, the faithful King Hezekiah (Isa 36–37). Formal and stylistic features relate the two stories to each other.18 Both are introduced by an indication of time (7:1; 36:1), and both take place at the same geographical location (7:3; 36:2). Nevertheless, the two protagonists respond very differently to the prospect of invasion. Ahaz panics and is afraid to trust in God, whereas Hezekiah keeps calm and enters the temple to seek advice and courage from Yhwh. As father and son, they are opposite characters. The supposed historical background for the Ahaz story in Isa 7:1–17 is the SyroEphraimite Crisis in 734–732 bce. To protect themselves against Assyria’s expanding empire, the Syrians (Aram) and the Northern Kingdom of Israel attempt to force the Southern Kingdom of Judah and its king, Ahaz, into a military coalition. When Ahaz and his nation refuse, King Rezin of Aram and King Pekah of Israel attack Jerusalem to put pressure on them. Although the kings do not conquer the city, Ahaz nevertheless trembles in fear. The prophet Isaiah, who acts as his political adviser, meets him “at the end of the conduit of the upper pool on the highway to the Fuller’s Field” (7:3). The surprisingly detailed description of this location indicates that Ahaz is there to inspect Jerusalem’s water supplies because of the enemy siege. The prophet’s son Shear-Yashub, whose name means “a remnant shall return,” accompanies him. The message of Isaiah is simple. Ahaz must return to Yhwh and trust him alone (cf. 28:16; 30:15). He shall neither prepare for battle nor seek help from the Assyrians. Yhwh’s famous statement in 7:9 summarizes this message: “If you do not stand firm in faith, you shall not stand at all.” In other words, Yhwh will only save Jerusalem if the people cease to fear and begin to believe firmly in their God. Nevertheless, Ahaz is apparently unwilling to do so, so the prophet urges him to ask for a sign. Again, Ahaz refuses, but Yhwh himself then presents the sign of the Immanuel-child, a sign that as a formulation of hope points beyond the present distress. The meaning of the name Immanuel (‫“—)עמנו אל‬God is with us”—points to the child as a visible sign of Yhwh’s protective presence. Within the book of Isaiah, it is tempting to interpret this promised child as Ahaz’s son Hezekiah, who in stark contrast to his father remains loyal to Yhwh. “Immanuel” might also suggest a subtle play on the refrain in Ps 46 about Yhwh Sebaot who “is with us” (‫ ;עמנו‬46:8, 12). The account of the miraculous deliverance from Assyrian invasion in Isa 36–37 renders the idea of the inviolability of Jerusalem in a narrative form (cf. 2 Kgs 18–19). The alleged background of the story is the Assyrians’ siege of Jerusalem in 701 bce. At the opening of the story, it is significant that the Assyrian king, Sennacherib, 18  Webb, “Transformation,” 69–70.

Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah   271 sends his army to the capital after the conquest of all the fortified cities of Judah (cf. Isa 1:7–9). In other words, Jerusalem appears to be the last bastion of the Davidic kingdom. The Assyrians mock the inhabitants of the city for relying on Yhwh alone, and their leading officer, the Rabshakeh, arrogantly asks: Do you really think Yhwh can save Jerusalem from my hand? After this threat, Hezekiah covers himself with sackcloth, enters the temple, and humbly prays for help. Yhwh promises to crush the enemies and to leave some survivors. A divine promise frames the announcement of salvation in Isa 37:33–34: Sennacherib shall not come into this city! During the night, Yhwh’s angel sets out and kills 185,000 soldiers in the Assyrian camp. When the inhabitants of Jerusalem awake, there are only dead bodies. Interestingly, Yhwh’s deliverance of Jerusalem also happens “for the sake of my servant David” (Isa 37:35). An explicit link is thus established between the salvation of the city and the preservation of the Davidic monarchy, including King Hezekiah as its representative (cf. 2 Sam 7; Pss 2; 132). A central element in Yhwh’s protection of Jerusalem is the concept of a remnant of survivors (1:9; 7:3, 22). The “remnant” (‫ ׁשארת‬or ‫)ׁשאר‬, that is, the remains, are the few among the sinful people who have escaped the purifying judgment of Yhwh. Now they will blossom anew. In Isa 10:20–23, after the ravage of the Assyrian king, the remnant of Israel and the survivors of Jacob will return to Yhwh in faith. At last, so it seems, a remnant responds to the call for faith and repentance (7:9; 28:16; 30:15; 31:6). Yet only a small portion of the great people of Israel shall return; everyone else is lost without hope. Isa 37:30–32 envisions the future of this pious group of survivors. They are the root from which a new and faithful people shall sprout. Similar metaphors of fertility occur in the description of the remnant in Isa 4:2–6. The branch of Yhwh will be glorious, and the fruit of the land shall be the pride and glory of the survivors of Israel. Yhwh will purge the remainders in Jerusalem with a spirit of judgment and burning, and they shall be called holy. The creation of a cloud by day and shining of fire by night over the entire site point to Yhwh continuous and protective presence on Mount Zion. Implicit in the concept of a pious remnant is the radical separation between the right­ eous and wicked, the latter of whom must be extinguished to purify the city and restore its justice. The language of purifying judgment pervades Isa 1:21–28. Jerusalem, which has been turned into a whore filled with murders, shall be transformed into a faithful city again: “Zion shall be redeemed by justice, and those in her who repent, by right­ eous­ness. But rebels and sinners shall be destroyed together, and those who forsake Yhwh shall be consumed” (1:27–28). Deliverance here implies the removal of “internal” enemies—corrupt leaders and haughty inhabitants—who threaten the order of social life. A further vision of a purged Jerusalem appears in Isa 33:14–24. A devouring fire will remove all the sinners in Zion. Only those who embody the moral ideal of justice will enjoy protection and provision on the holy mountain (cf. Pss 15; 24). Jerusalem shall be a city of festival, and the waters will flow as calm streams in the city. The iniquity of the people who live there will be forgiven. There is no illness, no anxiety for the future: “Yhwh is our king; he will save us” (33:22).

272   Frederik Poulsen

14.4.  The Destruction and Restoration of Jerusalem Visions of restoration and repopulation dominate Isa 40–66. What is striking in Isaiah as a whole is that the destruction of Jerusalem is never spelled out. Unlike other prophetic books that explicitly announce and depict the fall of the city and the people’s deportation to Babylon in the early sixth century bce (e.g., Jeremiah and Ezekiel; cf. 2 Kgs 24–25), the latter part of Isaiah simply seems to presuppose that these traumatic events have taken place. At the center of the book, where readers would expect to hear about the catastrophe, there is just an empty space. The destruction of Jerusalem and the exile thus hide in a “black hole” between Isa 39 and 40.19 Perhaps an account of these events has been left out deliberately to warrant the theological idea of Zion’s i­n­vi­o­la­bil­ity.20 Nevertheless, from a literary point of view, this gap constitutes an anticlimax in the prophetic book. Nothing is there. No vision, no light. The gap represents a desolate and ruined Zion, insofar as the place of life and salvation has collapsed into nothingness. It has become silent and dark. Although there is no explicit account of the devastation of Jerusalem, there are hints of it throughout the book. At the end of the commission of the prophet in Isa 6, a proclamation of divine judgment sounds: Jerusalem and its surrounding land shall be completely destroyed and the surviving remnant shall be removed to remote locations (6:11–13). The only thing that will remain in the land is vast emptiness. Furthermore, the pronouncement of the doom of Jerusalem in Isa 22:1–14—as part of Yhwh’s larger judgment against all nations (Isa 13–23)—shows no signs of hope. Enemies will crush the city, and its self-confident inhabitants will die without having been forgiven for their sins. No one can escape divine judgment, and the prophet desperately laments the future destruction of “my people’s daughter” (22:4)—that is, Jerusalem. Finally, the visit of foreign emissaries in Isa 39 points forward to the deportation of treasures and peoples to Babylon and the end of the Davidic monarchy, and “nothing shall be left” (39:6). There shall be no remnant at all. Jerusalem will be emptied of life, wealth, and significance. As noted, Isa 40–66 presupposes defeat and deportation. References to this critical situation mostly occur in the context of visions of restoration: the empty Jerusalem shall be inhabited, the ruins of Judah’s cities shall be raised, and the temple shall be rebuilt (44:26, 48). The devastated land shall be raised, and the waste and desolate heritages apportioned and crowded with inhabitants (49:8; 19). Yhwh will turn all the waste places of Zion and her desert into a fertile garden, and the ruins shall burst into songs of joy (51:3; 52:9). The ancient ruins and former devastations shall be rebuilt, and people will repopulate the desolate towns (54:3; 61:4). It is of significance that several of these passages contain terminology and motifs from the central prediction of ruination in

19  See Poulsen, Black Hole.

20 Berges, Isaiah, 47.

Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah   273 Isa 6:11–13.21 Within the book as a whole, these latter reflections certainly suggest that a complete destruction of Jerusalem and the land as foreshadowed in this key passage came true. There is further evidence of a thorough execution of divine punishment in the communal lament in Isa 63:7–64:11. This psalm-like text looks back on past calamities and mourns the destroyed and humiliated state of the holy city: “Zion has become a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation” (64:10). Again, all this is supposed to have taken place in the gap between Isa 39 and 40. Female imagery is a powerful means of depicting a destroyed and empty Jerusalem.22 The comparison of the capital city to a woman opens for a series of associations and images that add strong emotions and drama to the portrait of the city’s fate. Other prophetic texts use female imagery extensively in their descriptions of Yhwh’s punishment of Jerusalem and its loss of social status (e.g., Jer 2–3; Ezek 16; 23). In Isaiah, most of the cases that portray Jerusalem as a personified woman contain negative connotations (see, however, the positive image of the fearless and independent Zion in 37:21–29). At the opening of the book, Daughter Zion is isolated and surrounded by the ravages of her enemies (1:8–9). Yhwh mourns the critical state of his city, which is full of sin: “How the faithful city has become a whore” (1:21). An example of the citizens’ transgressions is present in the judgment against the haughty daughters of Zion in 3:16–4:1. The latter verses of this passage present Yhwh’s threat against Lady Jerusalem. Because of her loss of men and warriors in battle, “her gates shall lament and mourn; ravaged, she shall sit upon the ground” (3:26). The image of a mourning woman sitting on the ground is close to that in Lamentations (e.g., Lam 1:1). According to Isaiah, Jerusalem shall be ravaged or, better, emptied (‫ )ונקתה‬of her inhabitants, who will be carried off or killed. Despite of the hints of the coming humiliation of Lady Jerusalem, a lengthy description of her desolation and degradation simply disappear in the gap between Isa 39 and 40. Nevertheless, the downfall of Lady Babylon in Isa 47 can be read as a description of what had happened to Jerusalem earlier, insofar as the fortunes of both are to be reversed. While Babylon shall enter a disgraceful state of public derision, Jerusalem will regain her former honor as the wife of Yhwh. The humiliation of Lady Babylon thus offers a glimpse of how Yhwh might have treated Lady Jerusalem in the silent gap at the center of the book. At the opening of Isa 40, Jerusalem is in great need of consolation and redemption (40:2), yet Zion will soon be called to bring good news of liberation to others (40:9; 41:27). The capital shall be restored and filled with divine salvation (44:26, 28; 46:13). These brief announcements of restoration anticipate the extended development of this theme in Isa 49–66.23 In these chapters, two central female images illustrate the suffering and abandonment of Jerusalem: a wife who has lost her husband and a mother who has lost her children (e.g., 49:14–21; 50:1–3; 51:17–21; 52:1–6; 54:1–10; 62:1–5; 66:7–13). Significantly, the loss of children and the state of widowhood are exactly the two miseries that will strike 21 Williamson, Book Called Isaiah, 51–55. 22  Compare my extended treatment of this theme in Poulsen, Black Hole, esp. chap. 7. 23 Goldingay, Message, 318.

274   Frederik Poulsen Lady Babylon in 47:8–9, emphasizing the intertwined fates of Babylon and Jerusalem. Both types of women, which are essential in the poetry of Lamentations, are in a socially vulnerable position, with no male protectors (husband, children) to guard their honor. Lamentations is also of relevance here, especially regarding Isa 49–54, because of intertextual links between these biblical books in their shared focus on desolate Jerusalem. While Lamentations depicts the city as an abandoned and childless woman, Isaiah addresses this woman with divine promises of marriage and innumerable children.24 Zion’s complaints about abandonment and social isolation frame the portrait of the desolate city in Isa 49:14–21. The passage opens with bitter accusations that Yhwh—the heavenly king and protector—has forsaken and forgotten his city. The first claim may be true (cf. 3:26; 6:11–13; 50:1; 54:6; 60:15; 62:4); but Yhwh counters the second one. He will never forget his beloved city. As a mother takes intimate care of her child, he will pay continuous attention to Jerusalem. Certainly, the plans for the future restoration of the city and its walls are inscribed on the palms of his hands. Soon the children of Zion, the exiled inhabitants, will return and repopulate their mother city. It is interesting to notice that in this passage Zion appears to be set over against her returning citizens. The city is portrayed as a mother who has lost her children; she is alone and barren, and her places and land are desolate and wasted. The image of Zion here is really that of an empty city that has been entirely destroyed and bereaved of its inhabitants. However, now Zion shall simply lift up her eyes and passively observe the returning people coming to her from all the corners of the world (cf. 11:11–16; 27:12–13; 35:1–10; 43:5–7; 49:9–12; 51:9–11). The returnees shall be ornaments of the restored city, a motif indicating that Lady Zion is seen as naked, uncovered by the removal of her inhabitants. The enemies of Zion have stripped off her garments and left her in a humiliating and shameful state of nakedness. A similar thought is present in 52:1–2, where Daughter Jerusalem is urged to dress up attractively and replace her bonds of subjugation with beautiful garments. The mention of ornaments also suggests an idea of splendor, comparable to the vision in 54:11–12, where the restored city shall be rebuilt with malachite and sapphires and covered with precious stones. Isa 49:14–21 culminates in Lady Zion’s self-perception as a bereaved and infertile woman: “I was left all alone.” The trope of social isolation and complete solitude is rather close to the opening verses of Lamentations 1. Nevertheless, implied or hiding behind Zion’s complaint is a divine promise to reverse her fate. Once again, Yhwh will take her as his wife, and she will be full of people once more. The description of Jerusalem as a bereaved and barren mother recurs at the opening of Isa 54:1–10. A prophetic voice urges a feminine addressee to burst into joyful singing. Implied in this command is a call to change the mode of lamentation into one of joy. Like famous women in the history of Israel, Lady Jerusalem is unable to have children and must suffer from public humiliation. However, just as Yhwh enabled them to c­ onceive 24  Recent studies devoted to intertextual matters have attempted to show that the author(s) of Isaiah 49–54 deliberately reused language and images from Lamentations to respond to its dire laments and theological issues. See, e.g., Tiemeyer, Comfort, 347–361; Tull Willey, Remember, 48–50, 86–89. As Patricia Tull Willey claims, “Attention to the language and motifs of Lamentations reveals a deeply contrapuntal relationship between the two books” (p. 89).

Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah   275 and give birth to healthy sons, so shall Jerusalem become the mother of innumerable children. It is not clear, however, whether numerous children will return from banishment to their mother city and fill her, or whether desolate Jerusalem herself as the barren matriarch is thought to give birth to a new population. In favor of the latter option is the vision of the miraculous birth of children in Isa 66:7–13, a passage that likely draws on material from earlier chapters of the book. The initial verse states: “Before she was in labour, she gave birth; before her pains came upon her she delivered a son.” Mother Zion conceived a child even before the beginning of birth pangs—that is, before any clear indication that a birth would occur. As in 54:1, there is a note of surprise; the birth of a son appeared suddenly and unexpectedly. In an instant, the new Jerusalem shall rise from the ashes to be populated by a new people. All who formerly mourned the destiny of the city shall rejoice with her. A clear distinction is set up between Zion herself and her inhabitants (cf. 49:14–21). Yhwh will turn Jerusalem into a fertile and abundant place of life, wealth, and joy—the city shall become a center of divine consolation. Returning to 54:1–10, the designation of the city “desolate” (‫ )ׁשוממה‬is ambiguous; presumably, it points both to Jerusalem as a barren woman who suffers from childlessness and social isolation and to Jerusalem as a physical city that suffers in the aftermath of defeat and destruction.25 Nevertheless, the imminent restoration of city will result in an expansion of great measure. The inhabitants will need more space (cf. 49:20), and they will possess and repopulate the surrounding land. The imagery then shifts from that of a childless mother to that of a forsaken wife. Yet the past humiliations of Yhwh’s abandonment of Jerusalem shall end. As redeemer and restorer, he will remarry his beloved city and restore its honor. Yhwh will call his beloved one back like an inconsolable woman who has been forsaken or a young wife who has been cast off. Both similes point to the re-establishment of the broken relation between God and his city. The metaphor of marriage occurs in Isa 62:4–5 too. Jerusalem is portrayed as a bride at a royal wedding (cf. 49:18). The city will receive a new name and thereby a new status. Previously, Jerusalem has been called “Forsaken” and her land “Desolate” to illustrate the shame of divine banishment and the severe consequences of this punishing act; now, the city shall receive the name “My Delight Is in Her” (‫ )חפצי־בה‬and her land will be called “Married” (‫ )בעולה‬to illustrate Yhwh’s renewed concern for her fate (cf. 62:12). In 54:7–10, Yhwh intensely promises that despite his past abandonment and anger, he will choose Jerusalem again and show his city-wife great love, devotion, and compassion. Yhwh’s promise is outstanding: “For the mountains may move and the hills may tremble, but my steadfast love shall never move from you, and my covenant of peace shall never be shaken” (54:10). The allusion to famous Zion psalms is subtle. Yhwh’s love for his city is as steadfast as Mount Zion, which cannot be shaken despite the trembling of mountains and peoples (Pss 46:3, 6–7; 125:1). It will endure forever.

25  Cf. Low, Mother Zion, 138–144.

276   Frederik Poulsen

14.5.  Jerusalem as a Center for All Peoples The inclusion of foreign nations in Yhwh’s salvific realm is a central theme in Isaiah.26 A key element in this theological thought is that Jerusalem will become a center for all peoples of the world. It expresses a profound hope for a bright and peaceful future without war, destruction, and death. The visions of worldwide pilgrimage to Jerusalem thereby form a kind of response to those texts that portray the nations and foreign peoples as attacking enemies (e.g., 5:25–30; 17:12–14; 29:1–8). Formerly, Yhwh raised “a signal for distant nations” (‫ )נס לגוים מרחוק‬to judge his people (5:26). Now, he shall raise “a signal for nations” (‫ )נס לגוים‬as a sign of salvation (11:10, 12; 49:22; 62:10). The nations shall recognize the futility of their own gods and turn to Yhwh as the only true God (45:22–25). They shall assist the exiles in their return to Jerusalem (14:1–2; 49:22–23; 66:20), but will also themselves enjoy the benefits of divine salvation (42:1–9; 49:1–6; 51:4–6). Jerusalem becomes a universal symbol for the foreigners’ participation in the worship of Yhwh. The restored temple on the holy mountain shall be “a house of prayer for all peoples” (56:1–8). Yhwh will gather foreigners and bring them to worship him in Jerusalem. “Foreigners and exiles have the same status; they are all people whom Yahweh is ‘gathering.’ ”27 A prominent illustration of the nations’ pilgrimage to Jerusalem is the vision of Isa 2:2–4. “In days to come,” the nature of the mount of Yhwh’s house will change ­dramatically—it will be established as the highest mountain of the world. All nations will be drawn to it by its exaltation. They will come of their own free will and go up to the house of the God of Jacob to glorify Jerusalem. Yhwh’s mountain will become a center for wisdom and instruction that shall stream out to the world. Yhwh’s torah here serves the same cosmos-creating function as the temple source in the visions of other prophets (Ezek 47:1–12; Joel 4:18; Zech 14:8; cf. Gen 2:10–14; Ps 46:5). Just as the life-giving river flows out from Zion to the infertile and barren regions of the surrounding land, the teaching of Yhwh goes out to all peoples who are thirsty for wisdom. The vision of peace parallels that of worldwide understanding. Weapons will be beaten into farm implements, and no one will learn the arts of war anymore. The metaphor of light is dominant in the pilgrimage of foreigners in Isa 60. The light and glory of Yhwh will illuminate Jerusalem in such a way that the city, like a magnet, draws foreign kings and nations to itself. The exalted city will become a bright spot in darkness and the foreign peoples who are covered by thick darkness will stream to it to see its light and vindication (vv. 1–3). The final verses of the chapter even indicate that the sun and moon will no longer be the primary sources of light, because Yhwh himself will be an everlasting light for Jerusalem (vv. 19–20). In contrast to Isa 2:2–4, however, the nations appear largely as subservient to the people of Jerusalem (cf. 14:1–2; 26  See Poulsen, God, His Servant, and the Nations, 198–205. 27 Goldingay, Theology, 123.

Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah   277 49:22–23); those who refuse to serve will perish. They shall carry wealth to the city and assist the scattered Israelites in their return from the Diaspora. Even those who previously despised Jerusalem and oppressed it shall bow down and call it “the City of Yhwh, the Zion of the Holy One of Israel” (v. 14). In this manner, the foreign peoples restore the glory of Jerusalem, both by bringing gifts and by acknowledging it as the holy place from which light and blessing go forth.28 According to the concluding vision in Isa 66:18–24, Yhwh will gather all the peoples, and they shall come and see his glory. He will send missionaries to areas far away that have not heard about him, and they shall come to Jerusalem, bringing the kindred of the exiles as an offering to Yhwh on his holy mountain. Everyone (“all flesh”) will unceasingly come to worship before Yhwh. Perhaps even the foreigners will serve in the temple as priests and Levites (cf. 56:1–8).29 In any case, Jerusalem becomes a sacrificial center for all who turn to Yhwh and recognize him as the only true God. The contrast set up in the final two verses between the faithful who enjoy the blessings of the temple and the rebels outside it who must suffer from eternal punishment accords with the contrast between the righteous remnant and the wicked in earlier parts of Isaiah (e.g., 1:27–28). In the end, the proper relationship to Yhwh is not defined by nationality or ethnicity, but by individual confession and ethics.30 The idea of Jerusalem as a center for worldwide peace is also present in the marvelous vision of Isa 11:6–9. Here, the envisioned harmony does not concern the relation between peoples (2:4), but is more fundamental in nature: man and beast will dwell peacefully together. There is neither cruelty nor destruction on the holy mountain of Yhwh, and the wisdom and knowledge of Yhwh cover the earth. Reading this passage in light of Gen 3 suggests that Zion is not only the place where the original state between man and animals shall be re-established, but also the place where the disrupted relationship between God and man shall be restored.31 Again, “knowledge of Yhwh” (‫)דעה את־יהוה‬ will fill the world (cf. 2:2–4). As mentioned, the holy mountain is the location of Yhwh’s victory over the forces of chaos, hostility, and death in the mythological hymns of ancient days (Pss 46:3–4, 7; 48:5–7; 76:4, 6–7). At this very place, Yhwh will ultimately bring death to an end. According to Isa 25:6–10a, the divine king will invite all peoples for a festival banquet of rich food and delicious wine, an immensely life-giving and blessed meal. On his mountain, plausibly Mount Zion in Jerusalem (cf. 24:23), Yhwh will destroy the shroud or sheet that is spread over all nations—a poetic figure for lamentation and loss. He will swallow up death forever and thus wipe away the tears on all faces. On his holy mountain, there shall be no more mourning, no more death. The concluding praise catches the joy and ecstasy of this event: “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us. This is Yhwh for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation” (25:9). For the hand of Yhwh—his presence and protection—will rest on this mountain! 28 Westermann, Isaiah 40–66, 361. 29  Westermann, 426. 30  Webb, “Transformation,” 79. 31  See, however, the cautious remarks in Childs, Isaiah, 103–104.

278   Frederik Poulsen

Bibliography Berges, Ulrich F. Isaiah: The Prophet and His Book. Translated by Philip Sumpter. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012. Childs, Brevard S. Isaiah. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001. Dekker, Jaap. Zion’s Rock-Solid Foundations: An Exegetical Study of the Zion Text of Isaiah 28:16. OtSt 54. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Dow, Lois K. D. Images of Zion: Biblical Antecedents for the New Jerusalem. NTM 26 Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011. Goldingay, John. The Message of Isaiah 40–55: A Literary-Theological Commentary. London: T&T Clark, 2005. Goldingay, John. The Theology of the Book of Isaiah. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2014. Hayes, John H. “The Tradition of Zion’s Inviolability.” JBL 82 (1963): 419–426. Körting, Corinna. Zion in den Psalmen. FAT 48. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. Laato, Antti. “About Zion I Will Not Be Silent”: The Book of Isaiah as an Ideological Unity. ConBOT 44. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1998. Laato, Antti. “Understanding Zion Theology in the Book of Isaiah.” In Studies in Isaiah: History, Theology and Reception, edited by Tommy Wasserman, Greger Andersson, and David Willgren, 22–46. LHBOTS 654. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017. Low, Maggie. Mother Zion in Deutero-Isaiah: A Metaphor for Zion Theology. StBibLit 155. New York: Peter Lang, 2013. Otto, Eckart. “‫ צִ ּיֹון‬ṣîyôn.” In TDOT 3:333–365. Poulsen, Frederik. God, His Servant, and the Nations in Isaiah 42:1–9: Biblical Theological Reflections after Brevard S. Childs and Hans Hübner. FAT II/73. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014. Poulsen, Frederik. Representing Zion: Judgement and Salvation in the Old Testament. Copenhagen International Seminar. London: Routledge, 2015. Poulsen, Frederik. The Black Hole in Isaiah: A Study of Exile as a Literary Theme. FAT 125. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2019. Rad, Gerhard von. Old Testament Theology: The Theology of Israel’s Prophetic Traditions. Vol. 2. Translated by David M. G. Stalker. Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1965. Rohland, Edzard. “Die Bedeutung der Erwählungstraditionen Israels für die Eschatologie der alttestamentlichen Propheten.” PhD diss., University of Heidelberg, 1956. Smith, Mark S. “Myth and Mythmaking in Canaan and Ancient Israel.” In Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, vol. 3, edited by Jack M. Sasson, 2031–2041. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1995. Stromberg, Jacob. An Introduction to the Study of Isaiah. T&T Clark Approaches to Biblical Studies. London: T&T Clark International, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Tull Willey, Patricia. Remember the Former Things: The Recollection of Previous Texts in Second Isaiah. SBLDS 161. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997. Webb, Barry G. “Zion in Transformation: A Literary Approach to Isaiah.” In The Bible in Three Dimensions: Essays in Celebration of Forty Years of Biblical Studies in the University of Sheffield, edited by David J. A. Clines, Stephen E. Fowl, and S. E. Porter, 65–84. JSOTS 87. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield University Press, 1990.

Jerusalem/Daughter Zion in Isaiah   279 Westermann, Claus. Isaiah 40–66: A Commentary. Translated by David M. G. Stalker. OTL. London: SCM Press, 1969. Wildberger, Hans. “Die Völkerwallfahrt zum Zion: Jes. ii 1–5.” VT 7 (1957): 62–81. Williamson, H. G. M. The Book Called Isaiah: Deutero-Isaiah’s Role in Composition and Redaction. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994.

Further Reading Maier, Christl M. Daughter Zion, Mother Zion: Gender, Space, and the Sacred in Ancient Israel. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2008. Seitz, Christopher R. Zion’s Final Destiny: The Development of the Book of Isaiah. A Reassessment of Isaiah 36–39. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1991.

chapter 15

Dav idic K i ngship i n Isa i a h H. G. M. Williamson

15.1. Introduction The book of Isaiah shows a greater interest by far in Davidic kingship than do those of any other of the prophets. The reason is simple. The prophet himself worked in Jerusalem, the capital of Judah, in the second half of the eighth century bce. This was the seat of the Davidic dynasty, and for whatever reason, Isaiah clearly had easy access to the kings under whose reigns he lived. The earlier prophets in whose names we also have books, Amos and Hosea, spoke mainly to the inhabitants of the northern kingdom of Israel, and part of the traditional raison d’être for that kingdom was precisely that it had established itself in rebellion against the Davidic monarchy. It is thus likely that the positive references to David and his descendants in those books (e.g., Amos 9:11–12; Hos 3:5) reflect either tangential or later viewpoints. Isaiah’s near contemporary Micah was a Judean, but his concerns reflect more those of the country than of the city dwellers. Later on, Jeremiah and Ezekiel worked under the impact of the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians and the removal from power of the Davidic monarchy, so that, again, their outlook will inevitably have been different. In this respect, therefore, Isaiah stands out as distinct. A second distinctive feature of the book that has an impact on our topic is that different parts of it are very clearly addressed to different audiences, in quite distinct settings. In addition to the parts that relate to the ministry of Isaiah over a period of some thirtyfive years, the second part of the book, beginning in chapter 40, relates to the circumstances at the end of the Babylonian exile as Cyrus the Persian, mentioned by name at 44:28 and 45:1, came to establish the Persian, or Achaemenid, empire. The third main part of the book, beginning at chapter 56, seems to reflect the period after the return of some of the exiles from Babylon to Judah and the rebuilding of the temple. This simplified summary, amplified elsewhere in this handbook, overlooks the further point that

Davidic Kingship in Isaiah   281 these three main sections are not watertight. They show some considerable diversity within themselves (especially the first part in chapters 1–39), giving rise to many different theories about the composition history of the book. The precise details of authorship need not concern us here. What matters is that within the one book we find reflections of periods when there were Davidic monarchs within the sovereign kingdom of Judah, as well as of situations when there were no such kings nor any realistic possibility of their immediate restoration. It is therefore imperative that we ask not only what the first author meant by his presentation but also how that was understood in the following centuries when the kings had ceased to reign. There is a subtle depth to the book because of its long period of composition, and it is important to be aware that this dimension may have influenced the final form of the work as we now have it.

15.2.  Davidic Kingship in History It may be simplest to start this survey with some words that were clearly not written by Isaiah but that recount an incident in which he was one of the major players—namely, Isa 7:1–17. The setting is the so-called Syro-Ephraimite crisis, when, around the year 734 bce, the kingdoms of Syria and Israel (“Ephraim”) invaded Judah in an attempt to coerce her into joining a coalition that they were putting together to resist the advance of the Assyrian king Tiglath-Pileser III. They were unsuccessful in both aims: Judah did not join, and both Syria and Israel, along with several others of the petty Levantine states at the time, suffered defeat. The main strategic Assyrian goal of opening a direct route to Egypt was achieved. As the story is recounted in Isa 7, however, by no means all this background is mentioned. To understand the author’s main concerns in writing, it is important to focus on what is actually written, not on knowledge we derive from elsewhere (a mistake into which too many commentaries involuntarily fall). The focus in the narrative as given is not on Assyria (which is mentioned only right at the end as a separate threat), nor on the desire to bring Judah into some coalition, but rather on the aim of the invading parties to replace the present king of Judah, Ahaz, by an otherwise unknown Tabeel (v. 6). Furthermore, though we can see historically how this plan might have been the means whereby the coalition desired to bring Judah on board, so to speak, it is presented in the text more as a threat to the Davidic dynasty as a whole than just to Ahaz as an individual. In the introductory verse 2 we are told of the alarm of “the house of David” at the news of the Syro-Ephraimite advance. In verse 13 the famous Immanuel prophecy is explicitly addressed, not to Ahaz, as we should expect, but to “the house of David” (and all the associated verbs are plural, not singular). In the last verse of the passage, while the address is directly to Ahaz, he is associated there with “all your father’s house.” Finally, the concluding saying of the first half of the passage, the famous “If you do not stand firm in faith, you will not stand at all,” is again cast as a plural, so that we should probably assume that it, too, is addressed to the house of David as a whole rather than just the

282   H. G. M. Williamson individual king. In addition, its wording seems to echo part of the dynastic promise from Nathan to David in 2 Sam 7:16 and its later reiterations, so further underlining the importance of this whole complex of ideas for the author of this passage. Given that this narrative was obviously written some time after the events it describes, it is tricky to be sure whether this emphasis on the dynasty derives from Isaiah himself or from the later author. As we shall shortly go on to see, it is likely that Isaiah shared these sorts of concern but used them to emphasize a different point. Here, our author seems initially to have developed this concern in the direction of an assurance that the promise to David that one of his descendants would always rule in Jerusalem could be relied upon, as underlined by the reassurance that the first half of the passage gives to Ahaz in face of the threat to have him deposed in favor of an unknown (but probably Aramaean) puppet of the coalition. That changes radically in the second half of the passage, however, when, in view of Ahaz’s lack of faith, Isaiah turns away from him and the Davidic house in order to announce the advent of a quite separate royal figure (this being the most probable interpretation of the Immanuel figure). Inasmuch as this sort of sentiment is very close to what we find in Jer 22:30 with 23:5–6, we may tentatively conclude that our author, too, was reflecting on the impact of the fall of Jerusalem and the deposition of its king in the light of the original promise through Nathan. He stresses equally the assurance of the promise to provide continuity and the radical discontinuity of turning from the established Davidic line in a new and unexpected direction. I conclude from this passage, therefore, that the Isaiah of history had a firm interest in Davidic kingship and that over time this was taken further than he himself envisaged, away from practical concerns for the rule of God over his people in the direction of more radical future hopes. In many ways, this narrative passage is linked with the more extended narratives in Isa 36–39 (which have a close parallel in 2 Kgs 18–20). While Isa 7 treats the faithless Ahaz’s confronting an invader, chapters 36–39 treat the later faithful Hezekiah, who also confronted an invader, this time the Assyrian king Sennacherib. Parallel scenarios and phraseology unite the two passages, often by way of contrast. Although there is not so marked an emphasis on the Davidic dynasty in these later chapters, the theme is not wholly absent. The promise to defend the city in 37:35 and the promise to heal Hezekiah from his mortal sickness in 38:5 are both linked with David (as in the parallel Kings passages). To the extent that these prose narratives that include references to David’s house and dynasty and to the promises that were vested in him relate to specific historical events, however strongly interpreted, we may conclude that Isaiah himself and the book that developed from his initiation treat the theme of Davidic kingship as a given for preexilic Judah. For the kings in Jerusalem and for their subjects, this all afforded a sense of stability in a God-given institution on which they could rely in times of crisis. (I note here in passing that, despite later Christian appropriation, the reference to the “key of the house of David” in 22:22 is made mainly to elevate the status of Eliakim, who will carry it, and that from our present narrow point of view, it serves only to underline the importance of the Davidic house in the social values of its contemporaries.) The time

Davidic Kingship in Isaiah   283 would come when that crude confidence came to be challenged by the overthrow of the dynasty, but before we proceed to consider that we should turn next to see what Isaiah the prophet and poet made of this theme. Does it coincide with the view of the historians, or does he present his own perspective?

15.3.  Davidic Kingship in Isaiah’s Poetic Compositions A proverb is cited in Isa 32:1 (similar in many ways to Prov 8:15–16), which neatly encapsulates Isaiah’s understanding of the purpose of kingship, whether Davidic or other: A king should reign so as to bring about righteousness, and princes rule so as to maintain justice [my translation].

This pairing of justice and righteousness comes about a dozen times in the first half of the book, often also in connection with “truth.” As this is not language we commonly use today, it needs some further unpacking. By observing uses in context, including topics with which these values are contrasted, we soon learn that this goes far beyond just the administration of the criminal legal system (though that is included). It speaks instead of the need for probity, including compassion, in all walks of social and political life; we might even go as far as to gloss it with the phrase “social justice.” This may have taken quite different forms in antiquity than it does today, but the general area is one of obviously continuing need at various levels of local, national, and international life. According to Isaiah’s presentation, these qualities had once been characteristic of Zion in what he portrays as the golden era of Davidic rule, even though things have declined seriously since (1:21–23). He concludes his famous parable of the vineyard by asserting that God still looks for these qualities in the present time, but that he finds instead only their opposite—bloodshed and the cry of oppression (5:7, with the clever use of word play). However, he is confident that they will once again characterize the restored Zion of the future, as pictorially God, as builder of the new city, declares: “I will make justice the line and righteousness the plummet” (28:17). These qualities characterize God’s own rule and activity (5:16; 28:6, 17); they were distinctive of Zion’s golden age, and will be so again when God restores her (1:21–26; 28:17; 32:16–17; 33:5); he looks for them still and regularly exhorts the people to that end in the present or condemns their absence or perversion (1:17; 3:10; 5:7, 23; 10:1–2). Although several of the references just listed come from the hand of later editors, they demonstrate that the later tradents were fully in accord with the fundamental tenets of Isaiah’s own theology. This clearly was a central concern to the authors of the first part of the book, and indeed the perversion of justice and righteousness was a significant cause of the judgment that Isaiah anticipated.

284   H. G. M. Williamson What we shall now see as something distinctive to Isaiah is that in his poetic oracles about the Davidic king, he added a concern for the maintenance of justice and right­ eous­ness to the inherited assumption of God’s promise to the dynasty and the national security that it implied. The promise and the security were not ends in themselves, for either the dynasty itself or even a nationalistic sense of superiority among the people. Rather, they provided a position of stable security from which the Davidic king could serve his people. In an inversion of the standard feudal model, in which those at the ­bottom of the pile work to resource those at the top, the concept in Isaiah is that in an admittedly hierarchically organized society, those at the top—supremely the Davidic king—should serve those over whom they rule to ensure social justice. Thus, in the well-known oracle at the start of chapter 9, there are three short amplifications explaining how and why the darkness in which the people have been walking has turned to light. The third, in verses 6–7,1 announces the birth of a royal child as a gift of God to his people. The child’s status is clear not only from the exalted names he carries but also from the fact that he is associated with “the throne of David and his kingdom.” In his reign there will be endless peace. Looking back on the preceding sections of the poem, we may regard this as applying to peace from external threat and oppression. Looking forward, however, it also clearly relates to circumstances within the kingdom, to social peace and well-being. The syntax at this point does not delay on the prosperity of the throne and kingdom but sees their whole purpose as being “to uphold and establish it with justice and with righteousness.” I regard it as disappointing that a standard English translation like the nrsv starts a new sentence at this point, as if to give equal weight to both parts of the statement. In fact, the prophet indicates that the whole of the privileged status of this child is assured precisely so that he might be better positioned to inaugurate and maintain justice, righteousness, and peace within his dominion. Questions have been raised, of course, as to whether this can possibly have been a hope the eighth-century prophet entertained or whether it is a much later messianic type of hope. In my opinion there is good reason to maintain that it indeed comes from Isaiah. Given that, as we shall see, the later part of the book takes a radically different approach from this kind of expectation, it is difficult to see how it could belong with that material. Its focus on the birth of a child of the dynasty as a source of joy seems to have its most natural setting in the days of the monarchy, and its concern to stress the centrality of justice and righteousness fits well with what we know from elsewhere of Isaiah’s main concerns. The language (especially when we realize that the names are theophoric) is no bar to courtly celebration, as some of the royal psalms also show. And, as a whole, the first part of the poem certainly includes, at least, an interest in the deliverance of the northern kingdom from its current oppression (darkness), a concern that is of no ­interest to much later writers.

1  Where verse numbers differ between the Hebrew text and English translations, I consistently follow the translations.

Davidic Kingship in Isaiah   285 Why then, it may be asked, has it come to be so firmly linked with more eschatological messianic hopes? The reason is not what it says in itself but, instead, the position it has been given in the course of the developing growth of the book. In brief, it follows on now from a short series of much later additions to the first-person material by Isaiah in ­chapter 6 and the first part of chapter 8. Once 8:19–20, and 8:21–9:1a had been added, the oppressive darkness from which the poem describes deliverance is no longer just the partial subjugation of the northern kingdom following the Syro-Ephraimite debacle discussed earlier but a more universal distress and darkness, initially, perhaps, as experienced in the later Babylonian exile and then expanding in even more universalistic directions. To read the poem in that new and wider context obviously entails expanding the horizons of its applicability as well. Comparable considerations improve our understanding of the other great passage relating directly to Davidic kingship—namely, 11:1–9. This passage is in two main sections. The first, in verses 1–5 (which, of course, seem directly to continue 10:33–34), speaks of a royal figure being endowed with the Spirit of God in order the better to judge the poor with righteousness: He will not judge according to what his eyes see, nor reach a judicial decision according to what his ears hear, but rather he will judge the case of the needy with righteousness, and reach a judicial decision in the case of the poor of the land with equity; and he will smite the ruthless with the rod of his mouth, and slay the wicked with the breath of his lips; and righteousness will be the girdle around his waist, and faithfulness the belt around his loins [my translation].

The rare expression that “the spirit of the Lord will rest upon him” occurs only twice elsewhere, at Num 11:25–26 and 2 Kgs 2:15. Unlike the more vigorous verbs used for the endowment of the charismatic judges with the Spirit, this gentler term seems from these contexts to speak rather of succession in office, with an emphasis on administrative ability. And that ability is required precisely to undertake the kind of judicial role in relation to righteousness, especially for the poor and needy, that we have seen earlier. The only really new element here is the apparently violent removal of the ruthless and wicked. If we limit our view to these verses alone, there is no reason they should not come, like the passage in chapter 9, from the time of Isaiah. It has sometimes been objected that verse 1 presupposes the fall of the dynasty at the hands of the Babylonians, so that this has to be a post-exilic oracle. The objection is not well founded, however. If 10:33–34 originally represented a threat against all that is proud in the land, our verse would refer not so much to a restoration after foreign invasion as to the hope of a fresh beginning after God has purged his people by some unstated means. The language here is chosen partly out of consideration for the immediately preceding context (trees, etc.); partly by the fact that the destruction is of royal (and perhaps wider) hubris, quite unrelated to

286   H. G. M. Williamson military prowess; and partly by a desire to present the vision of a totally new start in the judicial and civic spheres without that necessarily presupposing the complete loss of all that had gone before. There is a close parallel in 28:16–17, where the establishment of a new or renewed Zion speaks of a foundation stone without commentators necessarily drawing the conclusion that the old Zion has been physically razed to the ground. This looks like the image of a return to pure origins (hence the reference to Jesse rather than David; the use of “Bethlehem” in Mic 5:2 is comparable) with the use of colorful rhetoric rather than a description of military defeat and extermination. In both cases, the need for such imagery certainly implies strong criticism of the prevailing status quo. In neither, however, is there any necessary implication that the institution in question is already a matter of the past. When we turn to 11:6–9, however, we find ourselves in a different world indeed. There is a move from the hope for a king who will administer justice in a good way (a prominent hope of Isaiah himself) to a utopian vision involving a transformation of the natural order. The contrast between the presentation in verse 4 of the forceful imposition of justice and the vision of idyllic peace in verses 6–8 is patent; according to verse 4, the ruthless animals should be eliminated, not transformed into peaceloving creatures. If, therefore, we conclude that verses 6–9 have been added later to the original core in verses 1–5, we may conclude that it is the joining up of these two sections of the poem that has led to the later dominant messianic interpretation of verses 1–5. Just as the later positioning of 9:1–7 led from a celebration of a royal birth, with all the hopes invested in that circumstance, to what may be called a messianic hope, so too with 11:1–5 + 6–9. The hopes for sound judicial and social administration expressed in the new Davidic king envisaged at the start of the passage become a utopian and hence inevitably distant future hope for an even greater son of Jesse.

15.4.  Other References to David in Isaiah 1–39 The other references to David in the first part of the book of Isaiah are somewhat obscure and it is doubtful that we should make too much of them. Isa 29:1–8 is introduced by the interjection “Ah, Ariel, Ariel, the city where David encamped!” (and see, too, the comparable reference in verse 3, if a popular emendation is adopted). Why Jerusalem should here be called Ariel is much discussed, as is the following passage that it introduces. More relevant, however, is the observation that nowhere else, including especially in the account of David’s capture of Jerusalem in 2 Sam 5:6–10 and 1 Chron 11:4–9, is there any indication that David ever “encamped” there (or, indeed, besieged it). All we can conclude is that Isaiah was aware of some (oral?) traditions about David that have since been lost to us. The impact on the theme of kingship seems minimal, however.

Davidic Kingship in Isaiah   287 Similarly, in the middle of an oracle concerning Moab, we find the generally overlooked promise that When the oppressor is no more … . . . then a throne shall be established in steadfast love in the tent of David, and on it shall sit in faithfulness a ruler who seeks justice and is swift to do what is right. (Isa 16:4­b–5; NRSV)

It is probable that these verses come from a time well after Isaiah himself. On the one hand, we may note that the author has clearly picked up on the main theme we have already discerned with his talk about seeking justice and doing what is right. When that is combined with establishing a throne and referring to David without the title “king,” it looks as though 9:7, especially, lies in the background of our passage. On the other hand, the remainder of the oracle is more or less unprecedented. The “tent of David” occurs only here, for instance, and we cannot be sure what is in mind; the sanctuary is sometimes called a tent, and the words translated “seek” and “swift” are both used in relation to Ezra (see Ezra 7:6 and 10). Is there, perhaps, an attempt to bring together royal and priestly or scribal elements in the characterization of this figure? Certainty eludes us, but as a late addition to the work, it clearly cannot have a major bearing on our analysis of the main theme in the book as a whole. To sum up this discussion of the first half of the book, as soon as we move beyond the simple acknowledgment that the Davidic dynasty exercised kingship over Judah during Isaiah’s lifetime, we find that the prophet put his own distinctive gloss on it. Whether now or in imminently future expectation the whole purpose of kingship was the maintenance of “justice and righteousness.” The divine promises of security were not an end in themselves but a sure standpoint from which the king might serve his people for their benefit. Failure to do so would end in judgment, and as time wore on, this came to be identified in quite a number of later small glosses in the text as referring to the Babylonian conquest of Judah and Jerusalem and the exile of most of the leaders of the nation to Babylon.

15.5.  The Democratization of the Davidic Ideal In the second half of the book we find that in many respects things have changed, though there is an underlying element of continuity that we shall also need to take into account. So far as the terminology of kingship is concerned, we find that it is focused exclusively on God, who is mentioned as “the king of Jacob” (41:21), “the king of Israel” (44:6),

288   H. G. M. Williamson and “your [i.e., Israel’s] king” (43:15). In addition, the expression “your God reigns [as a king]” occurs at 52:7. By contrast, there is no reference to the human king of Israel or Judah whatsoever. There is only one mention of David, and that is equally significant because of the radically new perspective that it brings. In Isa 55:3b God is reported as saying: I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast sure love for David.

There are sufficient striking verbal parallels to guarantee that the covenant here referred to is God’s covenant with David, as inaugurated in the oracle of the prophet Nathan in 2 Sam 7 and echoed, as we noted earlier, in many subsequent passages in the historical books, the Psalms, and some of the prophets. The promise that David’s family would always rule in Jerusalem had been dealt a harsh blow, of course, by the Babylonian conquest and destruction of much of the capital city. Zedekiah, the last Davidic king, was tortured and taken captive to Babylon (2 Kgs 25:7), as had Jehoiachin before him (2 Kgs 24:12, 15; 25:27–30). How the biblical authors responded to this severe theological dissonance varied, of course, but none came up, at least in so forthright a manner, with the remarkable suggestion presented here. Like many other languages, but unlike modern English, Hebrew is able to distinguish between singular and plural “you.” In the verse under consideration the “you” is plural. The effect, in other words, is to transfer the promise to David as an individual to the ­plurality of readers of this part of Isaiah. Though these readers are not explicitly identified here, it seems likely that they include those labeled “Jacob/Israel” in chapters 40–48 and Zion/servant in chapters 49–55. Whether a narrower group within these large entities is envisaged is debated but is somewhat anachronistic. We tend to speak of a “faithful remnant” or an “ideal Israel,” or words to that effect, but that may mean little more than our attempt to accommodate the prophet’s address to our categories of thinking. Whatever we conclude, however, the case seems clear that a group, a community, whether large or small, is here taking the place in God’s program that was once filled by David and his successors. And just as in the past, David was (again, ideally) Israel’s “leader and commander” and God’s “witness” to them that he was “the Holy One of Israel,” so now Israel, in turn, as a collective adopts that same role in relation to the other nations (55:4–5). Obviously, there are ways in which the people cannot function as a king in relation to the nations, but some important aspects of the role can, so to speak, be transferred to them, and that will form an important part of the continuity between the first part of the book and this second one. Once we grasp the scope of what is here envisaged, we can readily begin to appreciate the way the prophet, in his addresses to his collective audience, sometimes uses terminology that was previously typically used for royalty. For instance, the encouragement to “fear not” in the face of difficult circumstances was directed to both Davidic kings in the first part of the book: to Ahaz in 7:4–9 and to Hezekiah in 37:6. Now, in the second part, the expression occurs regularly in oracles addressed to Israel, for example, 41:8–13,

Davidic Kingship in Isaiah   289 14–16; 43:1–7; 44:2–5. Similarly, the frequent references in these chapters to the fact of God “choosing” Israel probably has its origins in the distinctive application of the language of election to the Davidic king. And finally, there are indications that the prophet was influenced in several respects by the royal Psalm 89, and it may be from this source that he derived his notion of the people of Israel as God’s servant (see at least, and without controversy 41:8, 9; 43:10; 44:1, 2, 21; 45:4; 48:20), just as there the king had been (cf. Ps 89:3, 20, 39).

15.6.  The Royal Servant Who Brings Forth Justice With all this as background we may now turn to a passage that in my opinion helps to draw many of these strands together: Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my spirit upon him; he will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not cry or lift up his voice, or make it heard in the street; a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench, he will faithfully bring forth justice. He will not grow faint or be crushed until he has established justice in the earth; and the islands wait for his teaching. (Isa 42:1–4)

This passage has, with some justification, from early times received a messianic ­interpretation; that should not, however, prevent us from asking first about a historical reading in its present literary context. Parts of the language used about this servant are extremely close to what is said about God’s servant Israel in the preceding chapter, especially 41:8–9. There is, therefore, scarcely room to doubt that in the present context, the same must be true of the servant in our passage as well. The servant addressed in chapter 41 is now presented to the wider world in chapter 42. It is true that Israel as the prophet currently sees her is in need of encouragement to have faith in God, and many oracles in these chapters are concerned with addressing that issue, but that need not mean that Israel is not expected to take the “royal” role that we expect based on 55:3. This conclusion is strongly supported by the list of attributes of the servant as detailed in the first few lines of the poem. Several offices, such as priest and prophet, as well as king, are designated as that of a servant elsewhere in the Old Testament, but the only one

290   H. G. M. Williamson to whom every attribute is also applied elsewhere is the king. Obviously, therefore, the servant is here presented as a royal figure, in line with what we have by now come to expect. The more important question in many ways is that of what task he is expected to perform. Astonishingly, in the space of just four verses, we are told three times that his role is to “bring forth justice to the nations” or the equivalent. Commentators have stumbled badly over the significance of the word “justice” here, glossing it as, for instance, “­religion,” “truth,” “the principles of true religion,” “issue a decision,” and “revealed law.” Anyone reading this passage in the light of the passages about the king in the first half of the book will have no doubt, however, that this is the same as in the expression “justice and righteousness.” Just as the Davidic king in the pre-exilic period was responsible for the maintenance of social justice in the community, so, too, the transfer of that role to Israel in its new status implies that it will bear a similar responsibility in the wider world of the nations. It is a remarkable vision. And it will not be achieved, apparently, by “grandstanding,” with public noise and show, but rather in discreet ways, by means of witness and example. Davidic kingship in Isaiah as a whole, therefore, is less about status and more about a necessary role in society, whether that society be national or international.

15.7.  An All-Encompassing Figure In the third part of the book (Isa 56–66) there is no reference to David at all, and the references to “king” and related terms are not relevant for our present subject: gentile kings are referred to at 60:3, 10, 11, 16; 62:2, while the “kingdom” in 60:12 is also gentile. At 57:9 the word rendered “king” in some translations is taken by others as a reference to the deity Molech. Even if it is indeed “king” (e.g., “and thou wentest to the king with ointment, and didst increase thy perfumes, and didst send thine ambassadors far off, and didst debase thyself even unto hell,” rv), the reference is obscure. Because of the preceding context most regard it as a reference to a pagan deity. The minority who refer it to a human king agree that it must be a foreign king, whether of Persia or of some other power. Finally, at 62:3, Zion is told that she will be “a royal diadem in the hand of your God,” a striking image from which we can hardly deduce anything about the socio-­ ideological status of the community. Despite this lack of direct evidence, it may be suggested that the famous passage at the beginning of Isa 61 at least contributes to the theme that we have been tracing. The first few lines of the poem are full of expressions that recall those in chapters 40­–55 who were to be used by God for the deliverance of his people. Nobody can miss the echo in the first line, “the spirit of the Lord is upon me,” of part of 42:1 (and see, too, 11:2), “I have put my spirit upon him,” which we have just been discussing; the same royal servant is here by implication. The continuation “because the Lord has anointed me,” however, recalls Cyrus in 45:1, the only other character is the book who is said to be anointed. Then again,

Davidic Kingship in Isaiah   291 “he has sent me to bring good news” reminds us of those heralds of good news who feature in 40:9; 41:27; and 52:7. And so on. It looks as though in some idealized form the prophet here is gathering together and reaffirming as still valid all the promises of deliverance and salvation that had been adumbrated earlier and that had not, perhaps, turned out to be so immediately fulfilled as might initially have been hoped. If so, the question then arises as to what task is expected of this figure. Although the answer is spelled out in fuller detail than the simple couplet “justice and righteousness,” it can be seen at once that it is moving in very much the same circles: the addressees in view are “oppressed” and “broken hearted”; they “mourn,” are in “ashes,” and are of a “faint spirit”; and like the community depicted in such passages as 42:7; 49:24–25; and 52:2, they include “captives” and “prisoners.” Though the political and social circumstances have changed beyond all recognition, the task of this character is the same, mutatis mutandis, as that of the Davidic king in the first part of the book.

15.8.  Messianic Hope For many readers, the passages primarily discussed in this chapter will be most familiar from their liturgical use, with a clear messianic interpretation, during Advent. And this has long been the approach shared (albeit differently applied) by both Judaism and Christianity. It follows from our approach that this can be simultaneously affirmed and qualified. It is obvious that Jesus, born into a socially modest family and living under Roman occupation, could not act with the sovereign freedom of a Davidic king in Jerusalem. Nor were his circumstances the same as those in the Babylonian exile or the early period of restoration thereafter. Yet it was not coincidental that, according to the account in Luke 4:16–21, he read the passage from Isa 61 at the start of his public ministry and declared: “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” He was patently not saying that such fulfillment meant that this scripture had no further relevance, any more than when some of the other passages are quoted elsewhere in the Gospels. Rather, he was proclaiming that the role envisaged in all the passages, which had to be variously applied to fit the changing circumstances at the times of their first delivery, would also shape the pattern of his ministry. In his very different world he, too, would be concerned for justice and righteousness without discrimination for those in need of it. But of course, that did not exhaust the prophetic vision. The messianic application has therefore to be qualified in the sense that such necessary work as was first entrusted to the Davidic kings remained as a manifesto for the community which followed later, as well as for individuals, and to that extent, it remains open-ended for communities and individuals who ­follow after them, no matter how changed their circumstances may be.

292   H. G. M. Williamson

Bibliography Heskett, Randall. Messianism within the Scriptural Scroll of Isaiah. LHBOTS 456. New York: T&T Clark, 2007. Leclerc, Thomas L. Yahweh Is Exalted in Justice: Solidarity and Conflict in Isaiah. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2001. Schmid, Konrad. “Herrschererwartungen und -aussagen im Jesajabuch: Überlegungen zu ihrer synchronen Logik und zu ihren diachronen Transformationen.” In Prophetische Heilsund Herrschererwartungen, 37–74. SBS 194. Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 2005. Wegner, Paul. An Examination of Kingship and Messianic Expectation in Isaiah 1–35. Lewiston, NY: Mellen Biblical Press, 1992. Williamson, H. G. M. Variations on a Theme: King, Messiah and Servant in the Book of Isaiah. Carlisle, UK: Paternoster, 1998.

chapter 16

Ex ile i n th e Book of Isa i a h Dalit Rom-Shiloni

16.1. Introduction One could say that, in its received form, the book of Isaiah “saw” the implementation of exile and “took part” in the (partial) return from it.1 In its long history of literary evolution from the eighth to the fifth centuries bce, this prophetic collection could potentially have reflected on the Neo-Assyrian deportations, theoretically from both Israel and Judah (Isa 1–39; taking 733 bce to be the year of the commissioning of Isaiah son of Amoz, Isa 6:1), down to the Neo-Babylonian exiles (as reflected in editorial elaborations, e.g., Isa 37). The prophetic authors of the later units could have experienced exile in Babylon. Some of them could also have anticipated and possibly also participated in the return from the Babylonian exile; thus they could have been writing from Yehud in the early Persian period (e.g., the anonymous prophetic voices in Isa 24–27; 34–35; 40–66). Moreover, the final formulation of the book of Isaiah stretches on through an even ­longer period; the book is said to have been completed by the third century bce, long after the authors of its later sections had re-established themselves in their homeland (e.g., passages in Isa 24–27 and 56–66). This long span of time generates both the great opportunities and the immense difficulties scholars of the book of Isaiah face when considering the references to exile in this prophetic book. The one thing scholars seem to agree on is that the theme of exile in Isaiah does not take the central stage it could (or should) have taken. Hence,

1  I thank Francis Landy, Shalom Paul, and Hugh Williamson, who read previous versions of this chapter. The comments they each expressed in writing were of great value to me, required rethinking and, at times, even significant revisions of my arguments. Obviously, any faults in this study are my own. I further thank Dr. Ruth Clements for her insightful comments on style and thought.

294   Dalit Rom-Shiloni scholars debate such questions as, Is exile (in terms of both deportation and return) an aspect of the historical circumstances against which the prophecies of Isaiah son of Amoz, or those of Second (and Third) Isaiah, should be read? And, if this “historical” path is taken, which stages (“waves”) of the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian deportations receive attention in this heterogeneous book? Or, is exile a theme for theological reflection, written long after the fact of any exile and return as an ex eventu reflection on historical memory, as a metaphor, or even as a historical fantasy made up for the sake of diverse theological, ideological, and sociological agendas? The study of the book of Isaiah has seen all treatments, and exile in Isaiah remains one of the great riddles of this prophetic collection.2 This scholarly ambiguity stems from the fact that this book, in its various units and as a whole, leaves readers with only fragmentary information about the effects on Israel and Judah of one of the most influential facets of imperial policy in the entire ancient Near East of the first millennium bce. For reasons that will become clear, I tend to understand allusions to exile in Isaiah as reflecting historical circumstances in both the eighth and the sixth centuries bce. Nevertheless, I do recognize that throughout this book’s long history of composition, the theme of exile in Isaiah has also become a focus of theological reflection, confronting realities, or their cultural memories, time and again in the course of three hundred years (and possibly more). Hence, this chapter has four main goals. First, I hope to set out all the information we have on exile and on possible exilic setting(s) in Isaiah, focusing the discussion according to the book’s main literary units (chaps. 1–39 [i.e., 1–23; 36–39],3 chaps. 24–27; 34–35; 40–48, 55; 49, 56–66); thus, the rubric of “exile” refers both to waves of deportation and to waves of return. Second, I will note biblical and extrabiblical elements grounded in history, imperial ideology, and theology that may shed light on the Isaiah materials. Third, I will explore the notion of exile as metaphor, distinguishing between the connotations of exile as tenor and exile as vehicle. Fourth, throughout, I will evaluate scholarly treatments of exile in Isaiah. These fall mainly in the categories; that is, on the one hand, the understanding of references to exile in Isaiah (to both deportation and return) as embedded in historical events, which are the focus of theological reflection in later prophetic proclamations, and, on the other hand, the understanding that language of exile in Isaiah is purely metaphorical, retrospectively employed in the prophecies for a variety of reasons.

2  This is the point of departure for Poulsen, Black Hole; see the up-to-date bibliography there. 3  For reasons of convenience, I use Isa 1–39 to designate “First Isaiah”; though, obviously, even chaps. 1–23 and 36–39 are literarily complex and include passages from the eighth to at least the sixth centuries bce. See, for instance, Clements, Isaiah and the Deliverance of Jerusalem; and “Prophecies of Isaiah,” 421–436; Williamson, “Isaiah 6,13,” 119–128.

Exile in Isaiah   295

16.2.  Deportation as a PoliticalMilitary Strategy of Subjugation in Isaiah The practice of deportation is documented in diverse Assyrian and Babylonian records that date mainly from the ninth to the sixth (and then the fifth) centuries bce. NeoAssyrian sources expose the imperial points of view. As records left by subjugators, they tell of the royal initiatives and the administrative operations required to handle complicated policies of dislocation.4 Neo-Babylonian records attest only rarely to the specifics of imperial deportation policy; but they also include direct and indirect sources and archives relating to the deportees who resettled in Babylonia.5 Hebrew Bible (HB) sources—historiography, prophetic literature, and psalmody—suggest the other side of the coin. Almost uniquely among contemporary literary corpora, they set forth reflections by the subjugated peoples, by those who had suffered as the targets of these imperial policies. The book of Isaiah is even more special within the HB because of its reflections on the phenomenon of exile in all its phases—deportation, life in exilic setting(s), and return. The study of Isa 1–39 has given rise to many publications on Judah’s vassal status under Assyria.6 Significantly less attention has been given to explicit (and implicit) references to Neo-Assyrian (or Neo-Babylonian) deportations in this part of the book. For example, Oded mentions only five passages in Isa 1–39 that refer to these Neo-Assyrian deportations (Isa 5:13; 6:11–13; 10:13–14; 11:11–12; and chaps. 36–37).7

16.2.1.  Unpacking Exile in Isaiah: Deportation in Seven Points The available information about deportation in Isaiah may be categorized under seven points that unpack the experience of exile. As has long been recognized, all the biblical and extrabiblical evidence taken together gives only limited historical pictures of each of the waves of deportation from Israel and Judah. Moreover, these sources are particularly limited in what they say about the social, psychological, cultural, and even i­deological 4 Oded, Mass Deportations; War; Babylonian Exile, 27–84, 99–124; Fales and Postage, Imperial Administrative Records, xiii–xxxv. 5  On the deportation policy, see Vanderhooft, Neo-Babylonian Empire; Oded, Babylonian Exile, 125–196. References on Yahwistic deportees in Babylon, see Zadok, “Nippur Region”; “Early History”; Earliest Diaspora; and “Onomastics from Yahūdu”; Abraham, “West Semitic”; “Negotiating Marriage”; Jursa, Economic History; Pearce, “Continuity and Normality”; Pearce and Wunsch, Documents; Berlejung, “Social Demarcation Lines.” 6  E.g., Machinist, “Assyria and Its Image”; “Assyrians and Assyria”; “Order and Disorder”; and “Ah, Assyria”; de Jong, Isaiah; “Window”; Abernethy, “Eating”; Aster, Reflections. 7 Oded, Babylonian Exile, 31–32, 37, 71–72, 104.

296   Dalit Rom-Shiloni and theological dimensions of the experiences endured by the Israelite and Judean communities (among other peoples of the ancient Near East). Among the sections of the book, Isa 1–39, not surprisingly, has the most complete range of information on the subject, and these chapters form the basis of the discussion that follows; unpacking the experience of deportation in each of the book’s units in turn also highlights the lacunae we face on some of these points, and accentuates the questions left open for further investigation.

16.2.1.1.  Circumstances of Deportation As an aspect of Neo-Assyrian imperial policy, deportation was the last step in taken in wars against rebelling vassal kingdoms. Following a defeat by the fierce imperial enemy, and by the order of the emperor, conquered royals, officials, artisans, and laypersons (men, women, and children) were forced into exile (see, e.g., 2 Kgs 15:29; 17:5–6; 25:11–12, etc.).8 Yet in biblical theological reflections on war, Yhwh is often considered the agent of deportation (e.g., Deut 28:36; 2 Kgs 17:18, 23; 25:20).9 Judgment prophecies against Israel and Judah in Isa 1–39 refer to human military invasion, siege, and devastation. According to the prophetic theological point of departure, these political-military attacks are carried out under divine initiative. Yhwh is seen as either the sole agent of annihilation (Isa 1:19–20, 29–31; 3:1–15 and 3:25–4:1; 5:1–7, 8–10; 8:11–15; 28:1–13, 23–29; 29:1–12, 13–14; 31:1–3, 4) or as the one who has summoned the enemy troops against his own people (1:7–8; 5:25–30; 8:5–8; 9:7–11; 10:1–4; 29:1–10, 11–12; retrospectively in the consolation of 30:18–26). The prophetic passages that present the military campaigns as coming through the initiative of the human enemy are the exception (7:1–9 [Aram and Israel]; 9:1–6; 10:24–26 [Assyria; in this instance, Yhwh is to summon others against the attackers, 26]; 31:5 [Yhwh is to protect Jerusalem from unspecified enemy]; 36:1–2 [Assyria]). All these passages attest to the horrors of subjugation to the Assyrian regime in the conquered land (9:1–4[6], 7–20[10–11]; 10:20–23[21], 24–26[24]; 36:1); some also mention the existence of Assyrian provinces in the land (e.g., 8:19–23). However, none speak of deportation as a part of this suffering. Explicit references to deportation as the culmination of a campaign of war are relatively few in the judgment prophecies of Isa 1–39 (5:11–17[13]; 6:11–13[12]; 7:10–16[17], 18–25[20]; 8:1–4[4]; 10:5–7[6], 8–10; 17:9–11; 22:1–14[3, 8]; 36:16–20[17]; 39:6–7). These passages use verbs denoting exile, either with the human enemies as the active agents, or with the people of Judah as the (active/passive) object: ‫( אסר‬bind), ‫( ברח‬run away), ‫( גלה‬deport), ‫( נדד‬flee, wander about), ‫( הסיר‬remove), and ‫( עזב‬leave, abandon). Only once is Yhwh specified as the agent of exile: ‫“ ורחק יהוה את האדם‬for the Lord will banish the population” (Isa 6:12). Deportation includes taking away humans, armory, goods, and booty in general (using ‫“ בז‬plunder” and ‫“ שלל‬capture, rob,” e.g., 10:6). Far more numerous than references to exile per se are more general references to oppression by 8  On the deportation of entire families, see Fales and Postage, Imperial Administrative Records, 153, 167, 170–174, and p. 109, fig 18; Becking, Fall of Samaria. 9  Rom-Shiloni, “Deuteronomic Concepts.”

Exile in Isaiah   297 the Assyrian ­overlords (at least thirty-two passages in comparison to only eleven passages to deportation). This relatively minor attention to exile is also apparent in proclamations of assurance and consolation addressed to Israel (e.g., Isa 10:27–32; 29:5–8), which forecast release from Assyrian bondage, but do not mention either previous deportation(s) or a possible return from them. A similar relative absence of a notion of exile is at play in the prophecies against the nations (PaN). Yhwh acts against his people’s enemies, yet deportation is not part of the judgment against them (8:9–10; 10:12, 15–19, 20–23, 24–26; 13:14–16, 19–22; 14:24–27, 28–32; 15:1–9; 16:6–12, 13; 17:12–14; 18:1–6[5b–6]; 19:1–4, 5–10, 11–15; 31:5, 8–9; note in reference to the day of Yhwh, 2:6–22; and the triple consolation of Israel, Egypt, and Assyria, 19:16–25). The PaN that do end in exile are those addressed to Moab (16:1–4[2]) and to Damascus and Ephraim (17:1–6[1, 5–6]), where the verbs ‫( עזב‬leave, abandon), ‫( הסיר‬remove), and ‫( נדח‬be scattered) recur. These overall observations are significant and may lead to several quite different conclusions. From a historical point of view, we might deduce from these data that subjugation to a foreign power—first the Assyrians and subsequently the Babylonians—was experienced as the most difficult challenge, more difficult than the challenges of dislocation, or, alternatively, that dislocation was experienced as part of this broader challenge. Alternatively, from a sociological perspective, we might interpret the emphasis on subjugation in Judah as representing an orientation of prophetic voices from within the land rather than from the exiled populations; in this case, Isa 1–39 would represent the voices and viewpoints of communities that had remained in Judah, from the eighth, ­seventh, and/or sixth centuries bce.

16.2.1.2.  Aftermath of War and Deportation: An Empty Land, yet a Remnant War that culminates in exile is portrayed in the sources as utterly destructive, leaving the stricken land empty of inhabitants. Neo-Assyrian royal inscriptions relate that the king and the imperial army took away all the inhabitants of the conquered lands.10 HB sources imply the same total deportation; note, e.g., 2 Kgs 15:29: “He captured . . . the entire region of Naphtali”; 17:6 (cf. also 17:23): “He deported the Israelites to Assyria.” This dynamic is further implicit in 17:24–40, which details the transfer of other conquered populations into the territories of the Northern Kingdom, which await, empty (v. 27). The same portrait is painted in reference to Judah, e.g., in 2 Kgs 25:21, 26; and often in prophecy, for example, Jer 33:10. Only rarely do biblical sources mention a remnant of the people left behind in the land (e.g., 2 Kgs 19:30–31). Furthermore, in reference to the Neo-Babylonian deportations (597 and 586 bce), the historiographical report accentuates the downtrodden social status of this remnant (2 Kgs 24:14b; 25:12, 10  See, for instance, Sargon II’ s Khorsabad (Dur Sharukin) Summary Inscription on the fate of Yamani king of Ashdod, Fuchs, Sargon II, 196–198, 219–222, ll. 90–112; and the conquest of Samaria, Gadd, “Inscribed Prisms,” 179–180, cols. iv, ll. 25–49.

298   Dalit Rom-Shiloni 22–26); in any event, even this remnant is said to have fled to Egypt (2 Chron 30:5–6, 10; 35:17–18). However, explicit and implicit references in the HB, as well as extrabiblical evidence, indicate that waves of deportation have always left a remnant in the land.11 Deportation in Isa 1–39 is portrayed as total depopulation, yet several prophecies recognize the existence of a small remnant of Yhwh’s people (Isa 1:7–8; 4:2–6[2, 3]; 6:11–13; 7:10–16[16]; 28:5; 32:9–14; 37:4, 31, 32).12 (a) This selected, even holy, entity within the land contains the seeds of continuation: ‫פליטת ישראל‬, “the survivors of Israel,” is defined as ‫קדוש יאמר לו‬, “Shall be called holy,” Isa 4:2–6[2, 3]); (b) This one-tenth of the Judean population designates the trunk from which the trees/the people will revive (“stumps are left even when they are felled: its stump shall be a holy seed,” 6:11–13); (c) The repeated personal name ‫“( שאר ישוב‬Shear-jashub,” in 7:3) and the passage that elaborates on this name, 10:20–23, indicate that this remnant is pious and loyal to Yhwh. Except for 6:11–13, these other passages do not mention deportation in any explicit way; nor do they refer to an ingathering of the dispersed or to a return of deportees. Rather, the remnant is dependent on its subjugators (as could be gathered from the future hope: ‫על מכהו‬ ‫ להשען‬. . . ‫לא יוסיף עוד‬, “shall lean no more . . . upon him that beats it,” Isa 10:20), and seems to have resided in the land. While scholars debate the identity of this remnant, along with the possible historical setting of Isa 37:4 and verses 31, 32, the one clear thing is that this remnant has never left the land (i.e., in the previous wave[s] of deportation), and is therefore considered the object of a continuing divine promise. This tendency in Isa 1–39 stands, then, in contrast to the single passage in this part of the book, Isa 11:11–16 (11, 16), where ‫( שאר עמו‬New Jewish Publication Society: “the other part of His people”) designates the dispersed peoples of Israel and Judah (v. 12), that is, a group of exiles gathered from many different diasporas. Identifying the remnant with these returnees, and diminishing the status of those who had remained in the land, is well documented in reference to the Neo-Babylonian deportations, found in 2 Kings, Ezekiel, the editorial strands in Jeremiah, and Second Isaiah.13 Isa 1–39 may be considered, therefore, either as earlier than the shaping of this Babylonian exilic ideological position or as clearly reflecting a different conception of exile (closer to Deuteronomy, e.g., Deut 4:25–28), where dislocation equals calamity, and therefore survival and national-religious continuity may develop only among those who remain in the land. In any event, this latter conception informs the native Judean observation on the phenomenon of war and deportation (presented in sec. 16.2.1.1).

16.2.1.3.  Social Dimensions of Deportation The information in both the HB and Neo-Assyrian records is very incomplete in relation to this aspect, and thus leaves open the following questions: What types of people were deported in the different waves of the Neo-Assyrian (733 and 720 bce) and Neo-Babylonian exiles (597, 586, and 582 bce)? Was each group of deportees made up of a specific elite social stratum or a mix of different social circles? Who remained in 11 Oded, Mass Deportations. 12  Heaton, “Root ‫שאר‬.” 13 Rom-Shiloni, Exclusive Inclusivity, 104–120.

Exile in Isaiah   299 the homeland? What was the nature of the relationship between homeland and diaspora communities? Isa 1–39 contributes only minimal information that might help to answer such questions. Chapters 36–39, which refer to the crisis of 701 bce do not designate any specific social groups (or strata) as under threat of exile. Rather, the Rav-Shakeh’s speech targets the entire people of Jerusalem (37:12–20[17]). In contrast, the prophecy against Hezekiah (39:1–8), focuses on the royal family and predicts its deportation to Babylon (vv. 6–7), hence, this passage tells us only about the fate of this delimited group. An exceptional and enigmatic passage in Isa 1–39 is “The Valley of Vision” prophecy (22:1–14). Following a battle, the officers have been chained together and driven into exile (vv. 2b–4, 8; note the semantic field of exile: ‫[ אסר‬bind], ‫[ גלה‬deport], ‫[ נדד‬flee, wander about]). Instead of the mourning expected after such a calamity (vv. 4, 12), verses 13–14 refer to joy in Jerusalem, celebrations by those that remained in the city. Is this merely the joy of relief following the Assyrian withdrawal from Judah in 701? Or does it also denote the he­don­is­tic joy of the lay remainees, for having been spared from that partial deportation of officials and leaders? In reference to the relationship between homeland and diaspora communities, I have already noted the very different dynamic of 11:11–16, where “remnant” denotes those who were sent into exile; this passage does not mention any people who remained in the land.

16.2.1.4.  Destinations of Deportation According to HB sources, deportees are either sent to specific places (e.g., 2 Kgs 17:6) or scattered “to the wind”—namely, to many different places (e.g., Jer 49:32, 36). Isa 1–39 does not make any clear reference to the destinations to which Judean ­deportees were to be taken. The Rav-Shakeh’s speech (36:16–20) calls the people of Jerusalem to surrender and promises life and resettlement in a land “like your own” (v. 17). Although Isaiah’s prediction to Hezekiah (39:1–8[6–7]) specifies that the royal ­family will be taken to the Babylonian royal court, it has nothing to say about the destinations of other deportees.

16.2.1.5.  The Nature of the Journey Extra-biblical records shed some light on the long and life-threatening, months-long journeys that deportees endured, as they travelled across the Fertile Crescent to reach Assyria, Babylonia, or any of the more peripheral regions.14 Quite remarkably, HB sources refer hardly at all to this distressing aspect of exile. Rather, general cliché phrases are used, e.g., ‫“( ויגל את ישראל אשורה וישב אתם בחלח‬He deported the Israelites to Assyria and settled them in Halah,” 2 Kgs 17:6; 2 Kgs 24:15). 14  Assuming that deportees (as armies) could not be led through the deserts, the walking distances from Judah to Assyria and Babylon are estimated to be 1,000 kilometers to 1,500 kilometers respectively, walking over the nourished Fertile Crescent trade routes. Ezek 33:21 is often mentioned to designate the five-month trip from Judah to Tel Aviv; a minimal calculation of a 25-km walk per day brings to about seventy days of walk (Israel Ephal, oral communication).

300   Dalit Rom-Shiloni This cliché style appears once in Isa 1–39, in the Rav-Shakeh’s speech, with the phrase ‫“( ולקחתי אתכם אל ארץ כארצכם‬and take you away to a land like your own,” 36:17). Only three passages in this book unit furnish a bit more information about the journey: (a) In Isa 5:11–17, the verb ‫( גלה‬sent to exile), followed by descriptors of hunger and thirst (with no reference to siege or destruction), denotes the judgment against the exaggerated drinking and feasting in Jerusalem (v. 13; see also Amos 6:4–8). This sequence strengthens the possibility that the hunger and thirst in 5:13 describe the horrors of the journey into exile. (b) Isaiah is ordered to perform the symbolic act of walking naked and barefoot for three years (20:1–6, a prophecy against Egypt)15 in order to illustrate the poor conditions and the shameful destiny of Egypt and Kush when they are led into captivity (v. 4; see 2 Chron 28:15; in Amos 2:16, nakedness designates defeat, not exile). This symbolic action also threatens the Philistines of Ashdod and implicitly Judah by hinting at their own upcoming fates (Isa 20:6). (c) Isa 21:13–15 proclaims an oracle against Arabia, in which caravans of Dedanites and residents of Teima are called to assist ‫­“ נדד‬wanderers”—that is, refugees of war—with water and bread.

16.2.1.6.  Deportation and Continuity Can life in exile be a continuation of life before the dislocation of deportation (e.g., Jer 29:1–7)? Or should deportation only portend additional calamity and disruption (e.g., Lev 26:33, 36–39; Ezek 5:2, 10, 12; Deut 4:27–28)? Isa 1–39 gives two opposing answers to these questions. (a) As an element of imperial propaganda, the Rav-Shakeh promises those to be deported a smooth continuation of the life they have always known, resettled in a land “like your own” (Isa 36:17). (b) The “Vision of Babylon” (Isa 13:1–14:32) contains several passages on the Day of Yhwh. Isa 13:14–16 illustrates the results of those wrathful divine actions that affect the world (‫תבל‬, v. 11; the land, ‫הארץ‬, vv. 9, 13, 14) and the individual nations. Those who have been deported will flee, returning to their respective homelands, only to suffer additional calamities there (rather experience a restoration of continuity with the past; vv. 15–16).

16.2.1.7.  Relocation and Resettlement We may think about relocation from at least two angles, that of the deporting empire,16 and that of the deportees themselves.17 Among the questions only partially answered in extra-biblical sources, are: how and where were the deportees relocated, and what was their legal, economic, and political status within the Neo-Assyrian, the Neo-Babylonian, and then the Persian empires? HB sources clarify hardly any of those aspects. In Isa 1–39, only the Rav-Shakeh speech refers to the fate of deportees after arrival in their new settlements; he promises that they will be able to continue the cultivation

15  For prisoners led naked and barefoot, see Fales and Postage, Imperial Administrative, 106, fig 17. 16  Eph’ al, “Western Minorities”; “Political and Social Organization”; Oded, Mass Deportations; Babylonian Exile; Berlejung, “Social Demarcation Lines.” 17  Zadok, “Nippur Region”; “Early History”; Pearce and Wunsch, Documents.

Exile in Isaiah   301 of grain and vines (36:16–20). In a personal judgment addressed to Shebna (22:15–22), though, deportation means disgrace, loss of social status, and death (vv. 17–19).

16.2.2.  Deportation in Other Units of the Book 16.2.2.1.  Isaiah 24–27 This unit does not mention any of the seven components that demarcate the experience of deportation. God’s warlike actions are directed against the whole world (‫הארץ‬, in 24:1–6; ‫האדמה‬, in 24:21, etc.); targeting all the nations (24:12–17, 21–23; 25:1–5; 25:6–12); leaving anonymous cities destroyed (24:10, 12; 25:2). The description of vast destruction includes ecological catastrophe (24:3, 18–20), agricultural disaster (24:4, 7, 13), and cessation of joy (24:8–11); but there is no mention of a dislocation of peoples. Within this portrayal of destruction in Isa 24:1–20 we do find some references to people who remain in the land, a population substantially decreased in number (v. 6 ‫“ ונשאר אנוש מזער‬And but few men are left”; v. 13, see the discussion of this theme in sec. 16.2.1.2). In Isa 27:7–11, the land is presented as having been left empty (v. 10), yet there is no mention of exile. Isa 24:11–12, on the other hand, does use the language of exile and remnant, but only in a metaphorical sense (see sec. 16.5.1 below). It seems sound to conclude that the authors of Isa 24–27 are aware of the phenomena of deportation (see sec. 16.3 below), although they do not present deportation as the last step in eschatological war.

16.2.2.2.  Isaiah 34–35 These chapters contrast the fates of Edom and Zion.18 Colossal destruction awaits Edom and its capital, Bosra, which will affect its entire ecological system (34:9–10) and bring profound desolation upon it (34:11–15). Yet deportation does not figure in the divine chastisement of Edom; whereas return from exile is presented as the comforting future of Zion (see sec. 16.3).

16.2.2.3.  Isaiah 40–66 This section is governed by the theme of return. Nevertheless, there are some reflections on deportation that reveal (at least) an acquaintance with this tactic as the last stage in war, and as a divine judgment (see sec. 16.2.1.1), see 42:22–25 (v. 22, ‫עם בזוז ושסוי‬ ‫והוא‬, “Yet it is a people plundered and despoiled”); and 50:1. In a prophecy of reversal, in 45:14–17[14], it is said that Israel will subjugate and lead others as captives; and in 46:1–3, deportation will be the punishment of Babylon. Compare these passages, however, to references to subjugation as the ultimate divine punishment, with no explicit mention of deportation (43:22–28; 47:6–7).

18 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 450–451.

302   Dalit Rom-Shiloni

16.2.3. Summary While deportation is not a major element in portrayals of judgment in the book of Isaiah, this study showcases the extent to which this theme was utilized in Isaiah for the various needs of prophecy. References within Isa 1–39 suggest a familiarity with the phenomenon of exile, presented by prophetic authors of the Judeans who remained in the land (from the eighth and/or the sixth centuries bce). Reflections on deportation from the point of view of its immediate victims are rare in these chapters. Thus, working through the units of the book validates the longtime scholarly consensus on the NeoAssyrian setting for the bulk of Isa 1–39 (with some later elaborations up to the early Neo-Babylonian period). The later units of the book (chaps. 24–27, 34–35, and 40–66) seem either almost to avoid the mention of deportation, or to focus on the return. This observation accords with the (early) Persian period contexts of these units and pri­ma­ rily reflects the experience of those who returned to the land from deported communities, a phenomenon to which we now turn.

16.3.  Return from Exile in Isaiah: An Actual Experience or a Theological Expectation Construct? Isa 40–48/55 and 49/56–66 show a clear emphasis on the return, whereas the passages of consolation in Isa 1–39 (11:11–16; 14:1–2; 27:12–13) yield only scattered references to the return. Lexical and thematic similarities in these passages to the second part of the book have led scholars to treat them as reflecting “the perspective of the restored post-disaster community”—interpolated into the earlier section by later editors.19 The theme of the return in Isaiah has also spurred two scholarly approaches: one that situates the prophecies within the sixth/fifth centuries, spoken to exilic and post-exilic Judean communities;20 and another that understands the return as a theme, metaphor, theological concept, divorced from the historical circumstances of both deportation and resettlement, and conceived and developed during the later Persian period by Jews long resettled in Yehud, thus could be termed “posthistorical” in the distant historical circumstances it reflects.21

19 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 281, on Isa 14:1–2. 20  See, e.g., Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39; Isaiah 40–55; Albertz, Israel in Exile. The discussion below addresses also the scholarly suggestion that the return in Isa 40–55 is observed by nonexiled Judeans (see sec. 16.4, “Exilic Settings”). 21  Landy, “Exile”; Becking, “We All Returned”; “In Babylon”; Halvorson-Taylor, Enduring Exile; Poulsen, Black Hole.

Exile in Isaiah   303

16.3.1.  Unpacking Exile in Isaiah: Return to the Homeland in Seven Points Trying to unpack the experience, or the literary portrayal, of the return in Isaiah is even a bigger challenge than that of dealing with deportation, a challenge that requires consideration of (at least) two points about the sources at hand. From a comparative perspective, any information we have concerning a return from exile is largely drawn from the HB itself, with hardly any data from extrabiblical sources (except for the very general information in the Cyrus Cylinder).22 Moreover, on the one hand, Babylonian archives confirm the ongoing residence of Judeans in Babylon throughout the Persian period; and on the other, archaeological evidence in Jerusalem (and more generally in Yehud) for this era is interpreted as the remains of a radically small Judean population in the city and in its surroundings.23 The following discussion asks what can be gleaned about the concrete phenomena of the return from indications in the book of Isaiah.

16.3.1.1.  Circumstances of Return Quite different from deportation as the last step of war in prophecies of judgment, and unlike the historiographic report on the Cyrus edict (Ezra 1:1–4; 2 Chron 36:22–23), prophecies of consolation, particularly in Isa 40–66, portray the return as solely a matter of divine initiative (40:6–8, 10–11, 27–31; 41:8–13, 17–20[17, 20]; 42:14–17; 43:1–7; 16–20; 44:24–28; 48:20–22; 49:1–6[5b, 6], 8–13, 14–21[18–20]; 51:4–8, 9–11; 55:6–13[12–13]; 57:14–19[15, 18]; 59:15b–21; 60:10b; in a universalistic vision, Yhwh gathers all nations to his holy mountain in Jerusalem, 66:18aβ–24[20]).24 Clusters of epithets for Yhwh accumulate in this part of the book, among them ‫“ מלך‬king” (e.g., 43:15; 44:6); ‫ בורא‬or ‫יוצר‬, “creator” of his people (e.g., 43:15; 44:24); the one who chose Jacob/Israel to be his people (e.g., 41:8–13). But the most dominant epithets are ‫ מושיע‬and ‫“( גואל‬savior,” e.g., 41:14; 43:11, 14; 44:6; 45:15; 47:4; 48:17; 49:7, 26; 52:9; 54:5, 8; 59:20; 60:16; 3:9, 16). Furthermore, in leading the repatriates, Yhwh himself returns to Zion/Jerusalem (e.g., 40:9–10; 52:7–10, 11–12; 59:20; as also 35:4). Human involvement in deliverance from exile is rare, and limited to the roles that Yhwh has commanded them to take: (a) the nations are to be Yhwh’s agents to bring back Zion’s sons and daughters (49:22–26); and (b) unique to Isaiah, Cyrus is glorified as God’s “anointed one” (44:24–28[28]; 45:1–8, 9–13), acting under Yhwh’s instructions (45:2–5). The community addressed is that living in Babylon. Yhwh has roused Cyrus from north and east to deliver them (41:25). More broadly, Yhwh delivers Jacob/Israel from the “end(s) of the earth” (41:9; 43:5–6 [the four corners of the earth]; 49:6[6]; 62:10–12[11]). 22  For the Cyrus Cylinder, see Cogan, COS, 2:315–316. 23 Lipschits, Fall and Rise, 134–184; Finkelstein, “Jerusalem,” 501–520. 24  The return as a divine initiative appears further in Deut 30:3–5. Compare those presentations of the return to the portrayal of deportation as the last step of war in prophecies of judgment, as also in to the historiographic report on the Cyrus edict (Ezra 1:1–4; 2 Chron 36:22–23). Those sources usually portray Yhwh as summoning the human enemy against his people, see above.

304   Dalit Rom-Shiloni Repeatedly the prophecies present Yhwh himself as returning to his land and city, leading the repatriates (e.g., 40:5, 9–11). In this configuration, Yhwh left Jerusalem with the exiles (49:14; 54:7); he was with them in their foreign abode (52:5, 12); and is now expected to return with them (52:8: ‫בשוב יהוה ציון‬, and 12; 59:19–20). Return as a purely divine initiative is found also in a few passages in Isa 1–39 (11:11–16; 14:1); Isa 24–27 (26:4; 27:12); and Isa 35 (4, 10).

16.3.1.2.  Aftermath of Return Other HB texts (Haggai, Zechariah, Ezra-Nehemiah) tell of gradual and partial waves of return from Babylon to Yehud (throughout 538–520, and then on through the mid-fifth century bce), or focus on the continuing diasporic life within the Persian empire (the book of Esther). While extrabiblical information is partial, Babylonian sources confirm that Judeans remained in Babylon and gradually spread to other diaspora communities (e.g., the Al-Yahudu documents, the Bit Murashu archives, and more). In contrast to these indications, yet in accord with the book’s portrayals of deportation as an all-encompassing event, the return in Isa 40–55 is portrayed as a single, general event, affecting the entire community of Judean exiles. This impression may be gathered from the inclusive designations of the addressees of these prophecies as “Jacob”/”Israel” (e.g., 40:27–31; 41:8–13(8); 43:1, 14–15; 49:1–6; see sec. 16.4.3 below); or “my people,” ‫לאומי‬/‫( עמי‬e.g., 51:4–8; 52:1–6[3–4], 7–10, 11–12; 55:1–5, 6–11). In addition, Zion/Jerusalem, the cities of Judah, and the land all await, eager and empty, for the returnees (e.g., 40:9). Zion mourns that she had been left alone by Yhwh and long forgotten, empty of residents (49:14–21[14]; 54:1–10[1]; 54:11–17[11–12]; 62:1–9[4–5]; 62:10–12[12]). The return means a reversal of this situation (49:18–21; 54:2–4; 62:2b–4, 6), the restoration of deserted lands (49:8–13). In all these prophecies, nothing is said of any remnant of the community left behind, found within the land upon the return. The desolation and emptiness of the land are also highlighted in Isa 35, which speaks of the transformation of the landscape (vv. 1–2; the ways through the desert, 6b–8). Human transformation is restricted to the people in exile (vv. 3–6a), and the repopulation of Zion will take place only with the return of the redeemed exiles (vv. 9–10).

16.3.1.3.  Social Dimensions of the Return Scholars struggle to understand the sociological makeup of the returnees. Were they descendants of the Jehoiachin exiles, or of the 586 and 582 exiles? Were they from particular social strata among the exiles? The book of Ezra-Nehemiah does not supply such information, apart from the fact that from the authors’ perspectives, the core leadership of the exilic community remained in Babylon. Consequently, the Babylonian returnees (‫ )שבי הגולה‬are continuously considered peripheral to the main Babylonian exilic community; they are accused by them of improper religious behavior (e.g., Ezra 9–10; Neh 5–7:5, 8–10, 13).25 25  See Bedford, Temple Restoration; “Diaspora:Homeland,” 147–166; Rom-Shiloni, Exclusive Inclusivity, 34–41.

Exile in Isaiah   305 Isa 40–66 leaves most of these questions unresolved. While there is no identification with any specific Judean community of deportees, a very powerful and inclusive Babylonian exilic ideology governs this unit of Isaiah, whether written in Babylon or later by Babylonian-Repatriates back in Yehud. As mentioned above (sec. 16.3.1.2), the deportees are the targets of messages of consolation, called “Jacob/Israel” and “my ­people”; Isa 49–55, 60–62 identify the returnees with Zion/Jerusalem (49:14–21; 51:1–3, 9–11, 17–20, 21–23; 52:1–6, 7–10; 54:1–10, 11–17; and 62:1–9). Passages such as 49:22–26 draw connections between these various group designations, and in 51:12–16, “Zion” is identified as “my people.” Furthermore, the prophecies apply national traditions to the repatriated exiles, invoking the blessing of Abraham and Sarah for descendants (51:1–2); the concept of “Jacob/Israel” as the chosen people (e.g., 41:8–13); Exodus traditions (to portray return from exile as a second exodus; e.g., 43:16–21). Reinstitution of the cult in the Temple seems to be restricted to the community of repatriates and those foreigners that will attach themselves to Yhwh, whose epithet is ‫“( מקבץ נדחי ישראל‬Who gathers the dispersed of Israel,” Isa 56:1–8[8]). The diverse authors in chapters 40–66 construct the exclusivity of the Babylonian exiles and then the repatriated exiles as continuing the people of Yhwh over against other Yahwistic groups and, in particular, those who remained in Judah following the Neo-Babylonian deportations. These authors employ three basic strategies to denigrate any “others”: The first is that the land, following the deportations, is portrayed as empty (Isa 40–55 and 60–62), devoid of any inhabitants and waiting for the returnees to refill it (see sec. 16.3.1.2 above). Second are the hierarchal distinctions between the Babylonian repatriates and those who remained. Although the exact definitions of the opposing groups in Isa 56–66 are not always clear, the internal struggle seems to be one of legitimizing the claims of the returnees to be the true people of God over the claims of all other groups. The repatriates, stereotypically evaluated as pious and devoted to Yhwh (e.g., 51:7; 54:17; 60:21; “my servants” and “my chosen ones,” 65:13–14, 15–16; “my ­people,” “my chosen ones,” and “an offspring blessed by Yhwh,” 65:22–23; 66:5–9), are pitted against “others” who are disobedient, immoral, etc. (e.g., 50:10–11; 57:3–14; 65:1–7; those “who forsake Yhwh,” 65:11–12; 66:1–4).26 The prophetic speaker(s) in these chapters may plausibly be identified as member(s) of this community of Babylonian repatriates back in Judah.27 And the third is assimilation to the repatriate community. Sporadically in 56–66, we hear of “the foreigners who attach themselves to the Lord” (56:3, 6), a phrase that appears to designate individuals or groups who assimilate into the repatriate community by meeting its standards for membership. Within chapters 24–27, Isa 26:1–6 portrays the return of the highly esteemed “right­ eous nation [. . . a nation] that keeps faith” (v. 2), which is to return to the empty cities in the land of Judah. In Isa 34–35, the exilic community is first designated as ‫“( נמהרי לב‬anxious of heart,” 35:4), a group that needs strengthening and encouragement. But then, they are 26  Rofé, “Isaiah 66:1–4”; Schramm, The Opponents. 27 Rom-Shiloni, Exclusive Inclusivity, 99–136; challenged by Tiemeyer, “Review.”

306   Dalit Rom-Shiloni t­ ransformed as well; they arrive in Zion in a state of eternal joy and are now called ‫גאולים‬ and ‫“( פדויי יהוה‬redeemed . . . the ransomed of the LORD,” vv. 9, 10; and see 51:11).

16.3.1.4.  Destinations of the Return The targets of return are generally specified as the homeland, Judah/Israel; Yhwh’s city, Zion/Jerusalem; and the cities of Judah (e.g., Zech 1:7–17; Ezra 1). This is also the case in Isa 40–48, 49–55, 60–62 (40:1–2, 9–11; 44:24–28; 46:8–13[13]). Interest in the ­re-­establishment of Jerusalem grows in chapters 49–66 (49:14–21; 51:1–3[3], 9–11; 61:1–9[3]; 62:1–9[4], 10–12; 65:19–25[21–22, 25]); the highland vegetation (55:12–13); the desolated lands (49:8–13); and even the local deserts (40:3–5) are enlisted as transforming into fertile lands, assisting the returnees’ resettlement. Yet, many consolation prophecies in chapters 40–55 do not announce the destination of the return, and rather seem to focus on the journey itself (40:27–31; 41:17–20[18, 19]; 42:14–17; 43:16–20; 48:20–22; 57:14–19, see sec. 16.3.1.5). The earlier chapters of the book contain just a few references to the return (11:11–16; 14:1–3), and in another two of the book’s units (chaps. 24–27 and 34–35), references to the return in fact close the unit. Isa 24–27 ends with a description of how Yhwh will gather the people from Assyria and Egypt one by one (27:12), to serve him on “the holy mountain in Jerusalem” (v. 13b). Isa 34–35 ends with a reference to Zion as the target of the return (35:10).

16.3.1.5.  The Nature of the Journey In contrast to the almost total lack of descriptions of the journeys of dislocation in Isa 1–39, Isa 40–55 portray in vivid colors the journey out of Babylon and back to Judah. While this journey is long and tiring, Yhwh empowers Jacob with swiftness (40:27–31[29–31]) and with the ability to overcome thirst and hunger (41:17–20; 49:8–13); and yet, leaving Babylon is not to be hurried, as if running away (52:11–12; and Jer 50:8, in contrast to the haste in Isa 48:20; Jer 51:45). Famous for their beautiful portrayals of nature, prophecies in Isa 40–55 emphasize that God will profoundly transform the ecological conditions in order to allow deliverance. Large deserts turn into landscapes of flowing waters, which dramatically affect flora and fauna, to ease the journey back (40:3–5; 41:17–20; 42:14–17; 43:16–20; 48:20–22; 49:8–13).28 Theologically, these prophecies proclaim that restoration from the Babylonian exile is sure to take place, and it requires a profound change of entire biological systems. It is, therefore, for God to take care of and to re-form. This could be one reason those prophecies do not address the final target of the return, and hardly present transformation of the land of Judah itself (see sec. 16.4 below, item 6.). In Isa 35 (vv. 5–9) the journey back includes the transformation of humans (disabilities are instantly overcome, vv. 5–6); nature (desert turns into flowing waters, v. 7); and risky roads become safe (vv. 8–9). 28  Compare these passages to two passages (57:14–19[14]; 62:10–12) where anonymous addressees are called to take action and prepare the way back. See Rom-Shiloni, “Nature Imagery, “ 202–208.

Exile in Isaiah   307

16.3.1.6.  Return and Continuity Return is portrayed as the hoped-for conclusion to the period of distress. Isa 40–55 emphasizes language that proclaims Yhwh’s commitment to re-institute the covenant relationships with his people: Yhwh has chosen Jacob/Israel (43:8–13[10], 16–21[20b]; 44:1–5), and presently strengthens his people (e.g., 40:27–31); the formula ‫ אל תירא‬is repeated (41:8–13, 14–16; 43:1–7).

16.3.1.7.  Relocation as Return The prophecies of Haggai and Zechariah, as well as Ezra-Nehemiah, attest to some of the difficulties, such as struggles with drought and economic distress, that the returnees had to face upon their resettlement in the land of Israel (e.g., Hag 1:3–11). It is remarkable to note that neither Isa 40–55 nor 56–66 reflect any of those difficulties. Rather, chapters 49–55 and 60–62 refer to the restoration of Zion/Jerusalem when it becomes packed with returnees (49:14–21; 51:1–3, 9–11; 52:1–6, 7–10; 54:1–10, 11–17; 60:1–4, 5–17; 61:1–9). Isa 56–66 reveal struggles that may be contextualized entirely within the realm of the reinstitution of life in Jerusalem, for example, observance of the Sabbath; establishment of cultic personnel in Yhwh’s mountain and temple (56:1–8[8]); ­denigrated leadership (56:9–12); admonitions of the adversaries (whoever they might be) concerning their religious (cultic and moral) behavior (57:3–14; 58; 59; with communal lament and confession of sins, 59:9–15a; 65:1–7).29

16.3.2. Summary Can we evaluate more uniformly the portrayal of return in Isaiah, and distinguish the “historical” from the “a-historical” references? The parallel points, and even more the differences, between the portrayals of deportation and return, suggest that in fact the book of Isaiah includes both types of material—indications of the historical experience of exile (deportation and return), and not least reflections on these experiences long after the fact. The common denominator that seems to govern portrayals of both deportation and return from all angles is the theological perspective. It is Yhwh that has expelled his people, and that likewise promises return. Framing exile theologically may thus explain this constant tension between contemporary experience and later theological reflection. One clear difference between portrayals of deportation and return in Isaiah is the attitude toward the remnant. While in Isa 1–39 (apart from 11:11–16; 14:1–2; and chaps. 24–27, 34–35), the remnant designates those remaining in the land—that is, those who were never deported—Isa 40–66 (as also those late passage and units in 1–39) consider

29  Of special note is the long communal lament of 63:7–64:11, which focuses on past divine salvation and the people’ s sinful history, and laments the current continuous distress confronting Jerusalem and Judah’ s desolation (64:8–10), but throughout has no mention of exile, deportation, or return.

308   Dalit Rom-Shiloni the remnant to be those who have returned from exile, and completely ignore the ex­ist­ ence of other Yahwists in the land.

16.4.  Exilic Settings: Geography and Sociology Isaiah’s several literary units illustrate not only a progression in theme (from destruction to restoration), and in time (from the eighth to the fifth centuries), but also changes in location: from Jerusalem and Judah to Assyria (possibly to peripheral regions of the Assyrian Empire), in Isa 1–39; and from Babylon back to Persian Yehud, in Isa 40–66 (as also in Isa 24–27, 34–35). While the first two changes (of theme and time) are under wide scholarly consensus, the change of location has been contested. The present discussion comments only on the geographical (and thus sociological) setting(s) of Isaiah 40–66 and brings forth comments on this scholarly debate. To answer two questions—first, can we validate a Babylonian context for the prophecies in Isa 40–48/55; second, do Isa 49/56–66 reflect a Babylonian exilic ideology, even if they were written by the repatriates, back in Yehud—the following observations should be taken into consideration: (1) Isa 40–48 exhibits broad familiarity with Babylonian culture—that is, political culture, religious practices, literary compositions, and language. Scholars have long pointed out similarities of phrasing and themes to Babylonian royal inscriptions;30 Babylonian votive inscriptions (40:19–20);31 divination, especially the use of omens (e.g., 44:25, reading ‫ ברים‬for bārû (diviners); 47:8–15[9b, 12–13]);32 the manufacture of idols (41:6–7; 44:9–20; 46:5–8);33 processions of gods (46:1);34 and more.35 (2) These chapters likewise show an acquaintance with Babylonian recent history and are familiar with its capital’s fame and the life in it: The city walls (‫הדורים‬ from dūru “city walls”) opened before Cyrus (45:1b–2a);36 its wealth (45:3); and its luxurious lifestyle (47:1, 8). (3) Isa 40–48, 49–55 contain explicit calls for the people to leave Babylon (48:20; 55:12; compare to 52:11–12, which may be localized already in Yehud); Isa 49–66 features anonymous calls to build the highway for the repatriates (57:14–19[14]; 62:10–12), as well as metaphoric descriptions of their return from afar like migrating birds (60:8–9), or as released prisoners (61:1).

30  Kittel, “Cyrus”; Behr, “Deutero-Isaiah”; Paul, “Deutero-Isaiah”; Williamson, “Isaiah 40,20.” 31  Eph’ al, “Linguistic and Cultural Background.” 32 Paul, Isaiah 40–66, 246. 33 Koole, Isaiah III, 1:13. 34  Koole, 1:13. 35 Paul, Isaiah 40–66, 19–22. 36  Williamson, “Setting,” 259–261.

Exile in Isaiah   309 (4) Isa 40–48, 49–55, and 56–66 (as also 35:4) have explicit announcements of Yhwh’s return to Zion/Jerusalem (see 16.3.1.1 above). (5) The Jacob/Israel prophecies in Isa 40–48 address the Babylonian exilic community in Babylon; and while Jerusalem seems to be the setting of chapters 49–55, 56–66 (e.g., 52:11), the addressees are designated as ‫שביה בת ציון‬/‫( שבי ירושלים‬e.g., 52:2), and Yhwh’s epithet is ‫“( מקבץ נדחי ישראל‬Who gathers the dispersed of Israel,” 56:8). Hence, prophetic messages build in-group identity of the exilesrepatriates according to themes of continuity, annexation of national traditions, and entirety; and likewise, though implicitly, exclude the out-group of any others (see sec. 16.3.1.3 above).37 (6) Isa 40–48 illustrate familiarity with Babylonian landscapes and flora.38 The term ‫( המסכן‬musukkannu) was clearly unfamiliar to a Judean transmitter(/editor), who glossed it as ‫( עץ לא ירקב‬in 40:20);39 and ‫ בבין חציר‬probably stands for a green bīnu (tamarisk) tree, retaining its Babylonian name.40 Moreover, these chapters furnish mixed evidence from the perspective of geography, as they describe the journey back as a magnificent transformation of desert landscape and large water flows on the way (see secs. 16.3.1.5 and 16.5.1 below), but have almost nothing about the arrival to the land and its physical state (see sec. 16.3.1.4). This raises the possibility that the authors of Isa 40–48 were primarily familiar with the landscape characteristics of Mesopotamia, rather than with those of Yehud. However, Isa 49–55 and Isa 56–66 focus on Jerusalem and Judah, yet, surprisingly, only relatively few passages portray the city’s physical or geographical restoration (49:14–21; 51:1–3[3]; 54:11–17; 60:16–17; 61:3–7; 62:1–9[4]) and, again, hardly any pay attention to the more profound and comprehensive need to revive the land from its desolation (cf. Ezek 36:6–15).41 (7) Prophecies of return in Isa 40–48, 49–55, and 56–66 portray the land as awaiting empty for Yhwh’s people to return (see 16.3.1.2 above). This empty land language, that thus continues while back in the land, serves as an important marker for the Babylonian exilic ideology shared and continuously held by the repatriates. (8) Returning to Zion (and to the cities of Judah) is seen as the destination for the redeemed exiles (see 16.3.1.4 above). This “land/city orientation” is a well-­recognized feature in other prophetic presentations of consolation within the Babylonian exilic ideology.42 37 Rom-Shiloni, Exclusive Inclusivity, 99–121. 38  Koole (Isaiah III, 1:13) added two other examples: transport of goods by ships on the rivers (43:14); irrigation systems for agriculture (47:2). Yet, though they clearly refer to a Babylonian context, these two are doubtful; compare to Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 225–226; Paul, Isaiah 40–66, 213–215, 290–291. 39  Williamson, “Setting,” 261–265, esp. 263, and references there; with the possibility that ‫ תרומה‬is another loan word coming from tarīmtu(m) “levy, gift,” (p. 264). 40  Williamson, “Setting,” 265–266. 41  Isa 62:8 and 65:21–22 reverse curse traditions, e.g., Deut 28:30–33, 49–51, or employ Isa 11:1–10. 42 Rom-Shiloni, Exclusive Inclusivity, 270.

310   Dalit Rom-Shiloni All of these features support the idea that chapters 40–48 were composed in Babylon for the exilic community there, and that the bulk of the remainder of chapters 49–66 could indeed be called the “Jerusalem chapters,” composed in Yehud for the repatriate community (as proposed by Haran, Paul, and others).43 Both sections (40–48 and 49–66 [or still subdivided into chaps. 49–55, 56–66]) tie the two Babylonian communities of deportees and then repatriates together as sharing the same exilic ideology, crafted by deportees in Babylon and brought back with them to Persian Yehud.44 A different approach has been advocated by Mowinckel, Barstad, Seitz, and Tiemeyer, who have each argued that Isa 40–66 represent the voices of authors who never experienced deportation themselves. Rather, they spoke about Babylon from a distance (cf. Isa 43:14; 48:20; 52:11), and were part of the community that remained in Judah under subjugation to the Mesopotamian empires (Babylon and then Persia).45 The use of different Israelite traditions (specifically, the Exodus traditions) testifies, according to Barstad to the high quality of this poetry, but there is no reason to assume a place of composition outside of the land of Judah;46 for Barstad, this nineteenth-century scholarly paradigm is unsound, and has misled Isaiah scholarship.47 Tiemeyer argued that the merely superficial knowledge of Babylonian (Akkadian) language, religion, literary style, and customs cannot represent more than the influence of the successive Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian subjugation and control of the Levant. Both Isa 40–55 and 56–66 were composed in Judah, focused on Jerusalem, and are close in theology to Lamentations.48 This approach is based on the recognition that Zion/Jerusalem is of great interest in Second/Third Isaiah,49 and that the physical aspects of relocation and the day-to-day challenges involved in both Babylonia and then back in Yehud are barely addressed in this collection. Both points are valid, although I challenge their interpretation. As I have indicated, I am persuaded by arguments for the Babylonian background of chapters 40–55 (and possibly also 60–62), and by the proposition that theology and ideology developed in Babylon by the exilic community was brought back to and developed in Yehud by those anonymous prophets of chapters 49/56–66. Yet, several substantial questions concerning the Babylonian contexts of chapters 34–35, 40–66 (or at least 40–48) seem still to await answers.50 For example, in relation to location: were the Judean deportees resettled (together) in the city of Babylon, or were any of the communities represented here settled in any of the peripheral cities about which we now know much more? In relation to sociology: were the deportees of Isa 40–66 remnants 43  Haran, “Literary Structure,” 127–55; Between Ri’ shonot and Hadashot, 29–32; Paul, Isaiah 40–66, 6–8; Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 42–54, 114–115; and see Williamson, “Jacob,” 219–229; “Setting,” 253–267, for his arguments to distinguish between chaps. 40–48 and 49–55, and again 56–66. 44 Rom-Shiloni, Exclusive Inclusivity, 134–136. 45  Mowinckel, “Komposition,“ esp. 244 and n. 1; Barstad, “So-Called Babylonian Influence”; Way; Babylonian Captivity; Seitz, Reading and Preaching; and Tiemeyer, Comfort; Tiemeyer, “Imperial Influence”; “Continuity.” 47 Barstad, Babylonian Captivity. 46 Barstad, Way; Babylonian Captivity. 48 Tiemeyer, Comfort; “Imperial Influence.” 49 Seitz, Reading and Preaching, 117, argued this for First Isaiah as well. 50  These same questions might also be relevant to Isa 24–27 and 34–35.

Exile in Isaiah   311 of the 597, or of the 586 (and 582) waves of deportation? Does this collection of prophecies reveal any specific group identities, or does it rather construct an inclusive exilic ­orientation? In relation to ideology, were the deportees closer in their theological and ideological orientation to Jeremiah (and his followers/editors) or to Ezekiel (and his followers/editors)?

16.5.  Metaphors for Exile, and Exile as Metaphor The theme of exile in the book of Isaiah has often been discussed through the lens of metaphor theory. Two quite different approaches have been employed, framed by different understandings of tenor, vehicle, and their interaction.51

16.5.1.  Metaphors for Exile (Deportation and Return) As a traumatic experience of dislocation, exile plays the role of tenor in metaphors that utilize diverse vehicles throughout Isaiah. The common denominator of these metaphors is the emphasis on dislocation as tantamount to annihilation. In them, it is therefore often difficult to distinguish between military devastation and exile. Deportation is dramatized through human metaphors; for example, the shaving off and disposing of human hair are likened to death resulting from dislocation (7:20). Family and legal metaphors of divorce and commercial transactions portray Yhwh as the agent of expulsion (50:1). Harvesting grain and olives, gathering most of the crops, recognizes the vast disaster exile brings, and scant quantity of remnant left in its aftermath (17:5–6). More common among these metaphors is nature imagery.52 The phenomenon of birds nesting upon the ground (10:14), where abandoned eggs may be easily collected by passersby with no resistance from the parent birds (v. 14b), illustrates the ease with which the Assyrian emperor can dislocate the peoples under his rule.53 The finality of Moab’s exile is conveyed through the image of migrating birds and their nestlings driven away, leaving their nests empty (16:2, evoking Deut 22:6–7). The horrors of exile as the last stage in conquest are illustrated through the image of fleeing gazelles and abandoned sheep (13:14). Metaphors for the return are taken either from the human realm of imprisonment, celebrating the release of captives (61:1); or again from nature imagery—the repatriates are like birds migrating back to their nesting places (60:8–9). Most common are nature 51 Halvorson-Taylor, Enduring Exile, 11–21; Poulsen, Black Hole, esp. chaps. 4–7. 52  Rom-Shiloni, “Nature Imagery,” 189–215. 53  Rom-Shiloni, 194–197.

312   Dalit Rom-Shiloni images that demonstrate Yhwh’s agency in the return, as a caring shepherd who gathers his flock (40:9–11; and implicitly in 11:12), and as transforming creation for the benefit of the journey back. The latter image may be found in sixteen passages in chapters 35 and 40–66, which mix imagery of water sources and landscape characteristics in two patterns. First, the transformation of these natural entities affects flora and fauna and enables the journey back (e.g., 35:1–9; 41:17–20). The entire natural arena participates in this profound transformation to allow a safe, pleasant, and joyful return (e.g., 51:9–11), testifying to Yhwh as the sole agent of the return. Second, transformations of landscape and water construct the theme of creation, with no explicit reflection on the return, but with an emphasis on Yhwh’s control over his entire world (e.g., 44:21–23; 45:1–8). Eleven such passages (in both patterns) conclude with explicit theological statements that proclaim or reflect recognition of Yhwh as the agent of salvation (e.g., 41:20; 42:16; 49:13); as re-creator (e.g., 45:8b; 50:2a); and as recommitted to his people (e.g., 44:23b; 51:16b).

16.5.2.  Exile as Metaphor Landy asserted, “Isaiah is all about exile—but in a way it is not about exile at all.”54 This seeming inconsistency in the representation of exile in Isaiah led Landy to consider exile as vehicle to various tenors—that is, death, grief, distress, coping with catastrophe, trauma—to the point that “Zion itself is a place of exile”;55 the ambiguity of ‫ שוב‬as both “return” and “repent,” allows exile to designate survival. In parallel, the return in Second Isaiah for Landy is a “bliss,” a utopia, “which is never quite accomplished.”56 While this is a reasonable list of associations, it seems to me that there is no sound way to distinguish reactions toward exile from reactions to any other event of defeat and destruction. Such observations raise methodological questions concerning possible criteria for classifying exile as metaphor (i.e., as vehicle).57 Halvorson-Taylor suggested that distinctions of time and space between the arenas of exile and the arenas of the author(s) led them to reflect upon exile from afar, to treat it as metaphor, and to transfer it from the historical political arena to the theological sphere.58 Accordingly, by the time of the Babylonian deportations, exile could stand for divine anger, leading to “discontents, sufferings, and alienations.” In addition, exile functions to convey “a sense of alienation from God,”59 which required confrontation with theodical questions.60 HalvorsonTaylor focused only on chapters 40–55 of Isaiah, where she found portrayals of God as redeemer (‫)גאל‬, and thus “exile now becomes a metaphor for economic servitude.”61 All those points (and others presented in the study) are valid theological themes and

54  Landy, “Exile,” 241. 55  Landy, 250. 56  Landy, 247. 57  By way of comparison, an example of a metaphoric usage of exile (as vehicle) is found in Isa 24:11bα–12 ‫ נשאר בעיר שמה ושאיה יכת שער‬.‫גלה משוש הארץ‬. Here, “joy” is deported away, and “desolation” and “ruins” remain in town. 58 Halvorson-Taylor, Enduring Exile, 11–13. 59  Halvorson-Taylor, 11. 60  Halvorson-Taylor, 15. 61  Halvorson-Taylor, 41.

Exile in Isaiah   313 e­ motions to consider, but I do not see them restricted to the phenomena of exile in Isaiah (see secs. 16.2 and 16.3 above). More focused on experiences of exile (“forced labour, imprisonment, worldwide scattering, spiritual disorientation, and abandonment”), Poulsen read the entire book of Isaiah through lenses of exile as metaphor. In his overall portrayal, Poulsen pointed out the thematic-theological prevalence of restoration from exile in Isaiah, that is, the reversal of fortunes by which “images of divine redemption, gathering, guidance, and restoration often eclipse those of past and present suffering.”62 The foregoing discussion hopefully established the concrete and the theological uses of exile (deportation and return) in Isaiah, much beyond its assumed metaphorical secondary uses.

16.6. Summary The many different prophetic authors represented in the book of Isaiah present exile from a theological perspective (as elsewhere in the HB and in other ancient Near East sources). Isaiah portrays God as the agent of exile for both deportation and return. Yet, behind these theological perspectives, authors in all units of the book are familiar with the political phenomena, observed mostly by those afflicted by deportation. Whether based on actual experience, or on more distant memories, the book of Isaiah adds unique dimensions on exile. As Seitz pointed out history, theology, and literary complexity are profoundly intertwined in Isaiah.63 This chapter has suggested a variety of approaches to one particular historical-political phenomenon that was reflected in this rich prophetic literature composed during the events and in their aftermath, for theological, ideological, and sociological reasons.

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63 Seitz, Reading and Preaching, 19–20.

314   Dalit Rom-Shiloni Albertz, Rainer. Israel in Exile: The History and Literature of the Sixth Century b.c.e. Translated by David Green. StBibLit 3. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2003. Aster, Shawn Z. Reflections of Empire in Isaiah 1–39: Responses to Assyrian Ideology. Ancient Near East Monographs 19. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2017. Barstad, Hans M. The Babylonian Captivity of the Book of Isaiah: “Exilic” Judah and the Provenance of Isaiah 40–55. Oslo: Novus: Instituttet for sammenlignende kulturforskning, 1997. Barstad, Hans M. “On the So-Called Babylonian Literary Influence in Second-Isaiah.” SJOT 2 (1987): 90–110. Barstad, Hans M. A Way in the Wilderness: The “Second Exodus” in the Message of Second Isaiah. JSSM 12. Manchester, UK: University of Manchester, 1989. Becking, Bob. The Fall of Samaria: A Historical and Archaeological Study. SHANE 2. Leiden: Brill, 1992. Becking, Bob. “In Babylon: The Exile in Historical (Re)construction.” In From Babylon to Eternity: The Exile Remembered and Constructed in Text and Tradition, edited by Bob Becking, Alex Cannegieter, Wilfred van der Poll, and Anne Mareike Wetter, 4–33. Bible World. London: Equinox, 2009. Becking, Bob. “ ‘We All Returned as One’: Critical Notes on the Myth of the Mass Return.” In Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, edited by Oded Lipschits and Manfred Oeming, 3–18. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006. Bedford, Peter R. “Diaspora: Homeland Relations in Ezra-Nehemiah.” VT 52 (2002): 147–166. Bedford, Peter R. Temple Restoration in Early Achaemenid Judah. JSJS 65. Leiden: Brill, 2001. Behr, Jacob W. “The Writings of Deutero-Isaiah and the Neo-Babylonian Royal Inscriptions: A Comparison of the Language and Style.” MA thesis, University of Pretoria. Printed by B. Rubinstein & Co., 1937. Berlejung, Angelika. “Social Demarcation Lines and Marriage Rules in Urban Babylonia and Their Impact on the Golah.” In Tell It in Gath: Studies in the History and Archaeology of Israel: Essays in Honor of Aren M. Maeir on the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday, edited by Itzhaq Shai, Jeffrey R. Chadwick, Louise Hitchcock, Amit Dagan, Chris McKinny, and Joe Uziel, 1051–1077. ÄAT 90. Munich: Zaphon, 2018. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 1–39. AB 19. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2002. Clements, Ronald E. Isaiah and the Deliverance of Jerusalem: A Study of the Interpretation of Prophecy in the Old Testament. JSOTS 13. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1980. Clements, Ronald E. “The Prophecies of Isaiah and the Fall of Jerusalem in 587 bce.” VT 30, no. 4 (1980): 421–436. Cogan, Mordechai. “Cyrus Cylinder.” In COS, 2:315–316. Duhm, Bernhard. Das Buch Jesaia. HKAT 3/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1892. Eidevall, Göran. Prophecy and Propaganda: Images of Enemies in the Book of Isaiah. ConBOT 56. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2009. Eph’ al, Israel. “On the Linguistic and Cultural Background of Deutero-Isaiah.” [In Hebrew.] Shnaton: An Annual for Biblical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies 10 (1989): 31–35. Eph’ al, Israel. “On the Political and Social Organization of the Jews in Babylonian Exile.” In XXI. Deutscher Orientalistentag: Vom 24. bis 29. März 1980 in Berlin, Vorträge, edited by Fritz Steppart, 106–112. ZDMG Supplement 5. Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1983. “Eph’ al, Israel. “The Western Minorities in Babylonia in the 6th–5th Centuries b.c.” Orientalia 47 (1978): 74–90.

Exile in Isaiah   315 Fales, Frederick M., and J. N. Postgate. Imperial Administrative Records. Part II, Provincial and Military Administration. SAA 11. Helsinki, Finland: Helsinki University Press, 1995. Finkelstein, Israel. “Jerusalem in the Persian (and Early Hellenistic Period) and the Wall of Nehemiah.” JSOT 32 (2008): 501–520. Fuchs, Andreas. Die Inschriften Sargons II aus Khorsabad. Göttingen: Cuvillier, 1994. Gadd, Cyril J. “Inscribed Prisms of Sargon II from Nimrud.” Iraq 16 (1954): 179–180. Halvorson-Taylor, Martin A. Enduring Exile: The Metaphorization of Exile in the Hebrew Bible. VTS 141. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Haran, Menachem. Between Rishonot (Former Prophecies) and Hadashot (New Prophecies): A Literary-Historical Study in the Group of Prophecies Isaiah XL–XLVIII. [In Hebrew.] Jerusalem: Hebrew University Magnes Press, 1963. Haran, Menachem. “The Literary Structure and Chronological Framework of the Prophecies in Is. xl–xlviii.” In Congress Volume Bonn 1962, edited by Martin Noth, 127–155. VTS 9. Leiden: Brill, 1963. Heaton, Eric W. “The Root ‫ שאר‬and the Doctrine of the Remnant.” JTS 3 (1952): 27–39. Jong, Matthijs J. de. Isaiah among the Ancient Near Eastern Prophets: A Comparative Study of the Isaiah Tradition and the Neo-Assyrian Prophecies. VTS 117. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Jong, Matthijs J. de. “A Window on the Isaiah Tradition in the Assyrian Period: Isaiah 10:24–27.” In Isaiah in Context: Studies in Honour of Arie van der Kooij on the Occasion of his SixtyFifth Birthday, edited by Michaël N. van der Meer, Percy van Keulen, Wido van Peursen, and Bas ter Haar Romeny, 83–108. VTS 138. Leiden: Brill, 2010. Jursa, Michael. Aspects of the Economic History of Babylonia in the First Millennium BC. AOAT 377. Munich: Ugarit Verlag, 2010. Kittel, Rudolph. “Cyrus und Deuterojesaja.” ZAW 18 (1898): 149–164. Koole, Jan L. Isaiah III. 3 vols. HCOT. Kampen, Netherlands: Kok Pharos, 1997. Landy, Francis. “Exile in the Book of Isaiah.” In The Concept of Exile in Ancient Israel and Its Historical Contexts, edited by Ehud Ben Zvi and Christoph Levin, 241–256. BZAW 404. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010. Landy, Francis. “Reading, Writing, and Exile.” In The Concept of Exile in Ancient Israel and Its Historical Contexts, edited by Ehud Ben Zvi and Christoph Levin, 257–274. BZAW 404. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010. Linville, James R. “Myth of the Exilic Return: Myth Theory and the Exile as an Eternal Reality in the Prophets.” In The Concept of Exile in Ancient Israel and Its Historical Contexts, edited by Ehud Ben Zvi and Christoph Levin, 295–308. BZAW 404. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010. Lipschits, Oded. The Fall and Rise of Jerusalem. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2005. Machinist, Peter. “Ah Assyria . . . (Isaiah 10:5ff): Isaiah’s Assyrian Polemic Revisited.” In Not Only History: Proceedings of the Conference Held in Honor of Mario Liverani, edited by Gilda Bartoloni and Maria G. Biga, with Armando Bramanti, 183–218. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2016. Machinist, Peter. “Assyria and Its Image in the First Isaiah.” JAOS 103 (1983): 719–737. Machinist, Peter “Assyrians and Assyria in the First Millennium.” In Anfänge politischen Denkens in der Antike: Die Nahöstlichen Kulturen und dei Griechen, edited by Kurt A. Raaflaub, 77–104. Schriften des Historischen Kollegs. Kolloquien 24. Munich: Oldenbourg, 1993. Machinist, Peter. “Order and Disorder: Some Mesopotamian Reflections.” In Genesis and Regeneration: Essays on Conceptions of Origins, edited by Shaul Shaked, 31–61. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 2005.

316   Dalit Rom-Shiloni Mowinckel, Sigmund. “Die Komposition des deuterojesajanischen Buches.” ZAW 49 (1931): 242–360. Oded, Bustenay. The Early History of the Babylonian Exile (8th–6th Centuries bce). [In Hebrew.] Haifa: Pardes, 2010. Oded, Bustenay. Mass Deportations and Deportees in the Neo-Assyrian Empire. Wiesbaden: Reichert, 1979. Oded, Bustenay. War, Peace, and Empire: Justifications for War in Assyrian Royal Inscriptions. Wiesbaden: Reichert, 1992. Paul, Shalom M. “Deutero-Isaiah and Cuneiform Royal Inscriptions.” JAOS 88 (1968): 180–186. Paul, Shalom M. Isaiah 40–66: Translation and Commentary. ECC. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2012. Pearce, Laurie E. “Continuity and Normality in Sources Relating to the Judean Exile.” HeBAI 3 (2014): 163–184. Pearce, Laurie E., and Cornelia Wunsch. Documents of Judean Exiles and West Semites in Babylonia in the Collection of David Sofer. CUSAS 28. Bethesda, MD: CDL Press, 2014. Poulsen, Frederik. The Black Hole in Isaiah: A Study of Exile as a Literary Theme. FAT 125. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2019. Rofé, Alexander. “Isaiah 66:1–4: Judean Sects in the Persian Period as Viewed by Trito-Isaiah.” In Biblical and Related Studies Presented to Samuel Iwry, edited by Ann Kort and Scott Morschauser, 205–217. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1985. Rom-Shiloni, Dalit. “Deuteronomic Concepts of Exile Interpreted in Jeremiah and Ezekiel.” In Birkat Shalom: Studies in the Bible, Ancient Near Eastern Literature and Post-Biblical Judaism Presented to Shalom M. Paul on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday, edited by H. Cohen et al., 101–123. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2008. Rom-Shiloni, Dalit. Exclusive Inclusivity: Identity Conflicts between the Exiles and the People Who Remained (6th–5th Centuries bce). LHBOTS 543. New York: T&T Clark, 2013. Rom-Shiloni, Dalit. “Nature Imagery within Images of Exile: General Survey and Metaphoric Functions.” In Images of Exile in the Prophetic Literature: Copenhagen Conference Proceedings 7–10 May 2017, edited by Jesper Høgenhaven, Frederik Poulsen, and Cian Power, 189–215. FAT II/103. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2019. Schramm, Brooks. The Opponents of Third Isaiah: Reconstructing the Cultic History of the Restoration. JSOTS 193. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Seitz, Christopher R. Reading and Preaching the Book of Isaiah. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39. FOTL 16. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Continuity and Discontinuity in Isaiah 40–66: History of Research.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans M. Barstad, 13–40. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Imperial Influence on the Language and Content of Isaiah 40–55.” In Isaiah and Imperial Context: The Book of Isaiah in the Times of Empire, edited by Andrew T. Abernethy, Mark G. Brett, Tim Bulkeley, and Tim J. Meadowcroft, 122–136. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2013. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Review of Dalit Rom-Shiloni’s Exclusive Inclusivity.” In Exclusivity and Inclusivity in Post-Monarchic Society and Literature: A Conversation on Dalit Rom-Shiloni’s “Exclusive Inclusivity”: Identity Conflicts between the Exiles and the People Who Remained

Exile in Isaiah   317 (6th–5th Centuries bce), edited by Mark Leuchter. JHS 18 (2018): 1. doi.10.5508/jhs.2018. v18.a1. Torrey, Charles C. The Second Isaiah: A New Interpretation. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1928. Vanderhooft, David S. The Neo-Babylonian Empire and Babylon in the Latter Prophets. HSM 59. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1999. Williamson, H. G. M. “Isaiah 40,20: A Case of Not Seeing the Wood for the Trees.” Biblica 67 (1986): 1–20. Williamson, H. G. M. “Isaiah 6,13 and 1,29–31.” In Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Festschrift Willem A. M. Beuken, edited by Jacques van Ruiten and Marc Vervenne, 119–128. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1997. Williamson, H. G. M. “The Setting of Deutero-Isaiah: Some Linguistic Considerations.” In Exile and Return: The Babylonian Context, edited by Jonathan Stökl and Caroline Waerzeggers, 253–267. BZAW 478. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2015. Zadok, Ran. The Earliest Diaspora: Israelites and Judeans in Pre-Hellenistic Mesopotamia. Publications of the Diaspora Research Institute 151. Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University Press, 2002. Zadok, Ran. “The Nippur Region during the Late Assyrian, Chaldaean and Achamenian Periods, Chiefly according to Written Sources.” IOS 8 (1978): 226–332. Zadok, Ran. “Notes on the Early History of the Israelites and Judeans in Mesopotamia.” Orientalia 51 (1982): 391–393. Zadok, Ran. “Notes on the Onomastics from Yahūdu.” NABU 3 (2015): 85–86.

chapter 17

The Serva n t(s) i n Isa i a h Ulrich Berges

17.1.  Introductory Remarks In recent decades1 there have been fierce debates between proponents of synchronic and of diachronic approaches—that is, those who try to determine the composition and meaning of the final text, on the one hand, and those who study the historical development that led to the present literary form, on the other.2 Based on all the many discussions that have taken place, there remains little doubt that the preconditions and circumstances of the initial authors and readers form an integral part of the exegetical endeavor. Odil Hannes Steck has put it this way: “We should occupy ourselves not with the way in which a book of the Prophets can be read then and now,—the possibilities are legion—but with the way in which, if need be, it must be read within the context of its formative period according to the will of its creators, because this determines the formation as a historical process. It depends on the signals contained in the book itself, as well as on the receptional processes that show up in the book itself!”3 Regarding the huge scroll of Isaiah, there can be virtually no doubt that it was not the work of a single prophet or author alone. The book of Isaiah is not just a book; it is a literary cathedral that was built over roughly four centuries, from the end of the eighth ­century to the end of the fourth century bce. What applies to those great monuments of stone and glass also holds true for this majestic prophetic scroll. On the one hand, it is too wide-ranging to be regarded as a single composition: on the other hand, it is too cohesive to be perceived simply as a combination of disparate bits and pieces.4 The 1  I am grateful to Mrs. Felicity Stephens for correcting the English in this article. 2  Among others, compare the overview given by McGinnis and Tull, Interpretation. 3 Steck, Prophetenbücher, 17 (my translation). 4 Berges, Book, 3; see also Berges, Jesaja 40–48; Jesaja 49–54.

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   319 ­ rogram of the early modern interpretations of the book of Isaiah, which aimed to libp erate the supposedly oldest traditional cores from imitative expansions and mindless deformations, to thereby lay bare the purest and richest part of the divine communication, is obsolete.5 Furthermore, the actual difference of opinion between the synchrony and diachrony camps does not lie in the question of whether the biblical texts evolved historically; it has to do with to what extent the genesis of the text can be accurately retraced and made plausible over the time span of more than 2,500 years. Notwithstanding the many disagreements, one point seems to be generally accepted. Before the single words and utterances, there is the prophetic scroll: “This is the current position: before the prophet stands the book. Whoever wants to reach the prophet is first pointed towards the book. For a long period of time, the dominating inquiry was concerned with the prophets as persons, therefore the pressing task at hand is the clarifying inquiry into the prophetic books.”6 But the final form is not the solution; it is instead the starting point on the road of interpretation. The insight into the importance of the compositional structure of the book has far-reaching consequences because it prevents the exegete from analytically dividing the elements that create overall structures.

17.2.  The Four Servant Songs: From the Separation to Integration With these preliminary remarks in mind, one can fruitfully address the theme of the servant in the book of Isaiah. As in so many areas of Isaiah research, Bernhard Duhm played a most significant role. In his commentary from 1892, he not only invented “Second Isaiah,” he also separated Isa 42:1–4; 49:1–6; 50:4–9; and 52:13–53:12 from their surroundings. He called these texts “Ebed-Jahwe-Lieder”—that is, Servant Songs, which originated at the end of the fifth century bce. The hero of these songs seems to have been a historical figure: teacher of Torah, preacher, and just person who was finally killed because of his faithfulness.7 Following Duhm, these passages show some connection in thought and wording with Deutero-Isaiah, as well as with Jeremiah and Job, but their presentation of the servant is totally different. Whereas the servant in Isa 41:8–9; 44:1, 2, 21; 45:4; 48:20 is called “Jacob/Israel,” the servant in the songs remains unidentified (except in 49:3). Contrary to the servant Jacob/Israel, who is depicted as blind, deaf, and disobedient, the nameless servant is blameless and stands in opposition to his sinful contemporaries. According to Duhm, the Servant Songs may have constituted an independent collection that later was inserted into the main text, or they were purposely added. He voted for the first option because of the supplements to the songs in Isa 42:5–7 and 50:10–11 that linked the former composition of the Servant 5  Cf. Jeremias, “Prophetenwort.” 7  See Duhm, Buch.

6 Steck, Prophetenbücher, 7 (my translation).

320   Ulrich Berges Songs with the later text of Deutero-Isaiah. These insertions occurred simply at those points where there had been sufficient space at the margin, between breaks or paper layers, without taking care of the literary context.8 Duhm’s impact is still very strong in academic circles, but the “literary habitat” of the anonymous prophet Deutero-Isaiah has continually decreased over the last few decades and is now mainly restricted to Isa 41–45. More important than the continuous reduction of Deutero-Isaianic chapters is the growing doubt about whether one can get behind the first composition at all. According to Jürgen Werlitz, the Grundschrift, the basic textual layer, formed a mixtum compositum right from the beginning.9 According to him, the basic document, the ­oldest part of which is found in Isa 42:14–44:23*, included material of different origins (words about Cyrus, judgment oracles, disputation words, some passages of the ­so-called polemics against foreign gods).10 At present a majority of scholars share the view that skilled literary writers composed and compiled texts of different origins into what we have now as chapters 40–66. Contrary to Duhm, the Servant Songs and also the polemics against foreign idols (40:18–20; 41:6–7; 44:10–17; 46:6–7) cannot be excluded ipso facto from the basic script. The assumption that the Servant Songs were introduced more or less randomly into the composition has been abandoned, owing to the strong connections between the servant within the poems and outside them. Further, the way in which the servant occurs within and outside the poems is nearly identical: the address (e.g., Isa 41:8, 9; 42:1), his election by God (e.g., 41:9; 42:1), the creation from the motherly womb (44:2, 24; 49:5), his formation (44:21; 49:5), the divine support (41:10; 42:1), God’s spirit on him (42:1; 44:3), his honor by God (43:4; 49:5), his justice (40:27; 49:4), his glorification by God (44:23), and God’s glorification through him (49:3). But despite the erroneous position that the Servant Songs were originally unrelated to Isa 40–55 and were introduced only haphazardly into the composition, the unique character of these poems must be safeguarded.11 These passages are too close to the main text to be separated from it, but at the same time, they are too different to simply be treated as indistinguishable. In contrast to Duhm and many after him, the exegesis of the book of Isaiah is obliged to respect the intentional interweaving of the servant inside and outside the poems. Rainer Kessler introduced the concept of “perspectival identification” to keep a grip on this interplay between the named servant Jacob/Israel and the unnamed one. He thereby tried to overcome the all-too-simple dichotomy between an individual and a collective interpretation of the servant of God.12

8  See Duhm, Jesaia, 311. 9  See Werlitz, Redaktion. 10  See Werlitz, “Jesaja, Jesajabuch,” 789; Redaktion, 289. Compare the same skepticism expressed by Leene, “Suche”: “Meines Erachtens hat es eine solche Grundschrift nie gegeben” (p. 818). 11  Contra Mettinger, Farewell. 12  See Kessler, “Kyros,” 150–151.

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   321

17.3.  Jacob/Israel and the Servant in the Servant Songs If any interpretation has to take into account the close relationship between the ­servant inside and outside the so-called Servant Songs, how does that linkage work? In Isa 42:19–21 God asks who would be as blind as his servant and deaf like his messenger, and in 43:10 he announces to those who abandon their blindness and deafness: “You are my witnesses and my servant whom I have chosen.” Nothing shows more clearly the collective understanding of the individual literary figure of the servant than this transition from the plural (“my witnesses”) to the singular (“my servant”). The shift is indisputable since it occurs more often in the Hebrew text of these chapters. Thus, one reads in Isa 41:27, in preparation for the first Servant Song: “The first shall say to Zion, Behold, behold them: and I will give to Jerusalem one that brings good tidings.” The mebasser will be formed of those who accept the call to bring the message of salvation and renewed hope to Jerusalem and Judah. The fact that the herald stands immediately before 42:1–9 is not accidental but points to the servant in the songs (cf. 48:16 before 49:1–6). The ones who are willing to accept the task of comforting Jerusalem are the heralds of good tidings and constitute the servant. In this way, the sudden change to the plural at the end of 42:9 finds a plausible solution too. In 44:26 Yhwh confirms the word of his servant (singular) and fulfills the plan of his messengers (plural). The singular reading “his servant” is supported by 1QJesa, 4QJesb, LXX (παιδὸς: αὐτου˜), and Vulgate (servi sui). The plural reading (LXXA; Tg. “his servants, the righteous”) presents the ­lectio facilior adjusting “his servant” to the plural “his messengers.” The shift between plural and singular (cf. 42:18–19; 43:10; 44:8; 44:26; 48:6) has to be respected because it highlights an important aspect of the servant’s identity.13 At the beginning of the third song, the eved declares: “The Lord God has given me the tongue of limmudim, to know how to sustain with a word the one who is weary: he wakened morning by morning, he wakened my ear to hear as the limmudim” (Isa 50:4). The word limmudim is used only here; in 8:16 (Isaiah sealed the Torah in his disciples); and, for the last time, in 54:13 (all children of Zion shall be taught by God). For the prophetic authors, the time had come for the sealed message to be read and understood in their own circle. Those who overcome unbelief and doubt are invited to proclaim the renewed kingship of Yhwh. To them belong the beautiful feet of the one who brings good tidings to Zion, saying: “Your God reigns!” (Isa 52:7). The so-called Servant Songs and the passages about Israel/Jacob as servant create a beautiful vision of what it means to be God’s eved. Everybody who testifies to Yhwh’s renewed salvific activity, initiated by the appointment of Cyrus as shepherd and anointed one, is, in fact, God’s servant. This has to be seen against the background of the profound doubt as to whether the God of Israel was still able and willing to provide 13  Cf. Berges, “Construction.”

322   Ulrich Berges s­ alvation for his people. The obedient servant is to be found in every Israelite who confesses that Yhwh is the only true God and savvior. This identification of the eved implies necessarily that one must leave Babylon, the land of worship of foreign deities, and return home to Jerusalem and Judah. Whoever does not quit the land of exile (48:20) bears the name Israel/Jacob only superficially and ignores the consequences of this failure (48:1). The ones who remain in Babylon frustrate Yhwh’s plan to prove his uniqueness in front of foreign nations and deities by guiding his people back home. On the contrary, the deaf and blind servant Jacob/Israel was purified and chosen in the furnace of misery (48:10) to become God’s minister before his people and the nations. Thus, it is only as a consequence of his return to Jerusalem and Judah that the servant is identified with that kind of Israel in whom Yhwh glorifies himself (49:3). Pointing to the unique kingship of Yhwh, the servant is drawn close to God and takes on royal characteristics. Thus he is described as “high and lofty” (52:13; cf. 6:1). This cannot be seen primarily or even exclusively as a trait of the ancient Near Eastern royal ideology since, in the book of Isaiah, Cyrus is never referred to as king nor are Judean kings ideologically glorified.14 Taking into account the matches between Cyrus and the serv­ ant, there is no doubt that the eved surpasses the Persian in authority. Both are grasped by Yhwh (42:6; 45:1), both are called by him (Cyrus: 45:3–4; 46:11; 48:15; servant: 42:6; 49:1), and both implement his will (44:28; 48:14; 53:10). Yet in contrast to the servant, whom God commissioned in his mother’s womb (49:1), Cyrus does not know the God of Israel (45:4). Whereas the Persian operates using military power (41:2–3; 45:1–3; 46:11; 48:14), the servant is weak and sorely afflicted (42:2–3; 49:7; 50:6–7; 52:13–53:12). Cyrus certainly conquers the nations, but only the servant brings them Torah and light (42:4, 6; 49:6; 52:15). The servant’s mission really begins once the Persian’s mission has been accomplished—that is, after the defeat of Babylon (cf. Isa 46–47). Taking Isa 40–48 together, Cyrus and the servant play complementary roles. The Persian king, unlike Nebuchadnezzar in the book of Jeremiah (Jer 25:9; 27:6), is not the royal servant of Yhwh. Cyrus is only God’s military and political instrument for the implementation of the divine plan.15 The Persian takes care of the fall of Babylon and the liberation of the people of God, the servant is responsible for the theological appraisal of this epochal change. Cyrus creates the facts and the servant, in his capacity as mediator of the covenant and light of the nations, interprets them as God’s salvific action. Cyrus follows the divine plan without knowing Yhwh. The servant, however, has received the spirit of God in order to proclaim before Israel and the nations that Yhwh holds firm control of history. The servant renders this witness not only by his words but also by the means of his own destiny. Rainer Kessler interprets the difference between Cyrus and the servant figure as follows: “Cyrus always remains distinct from Jacob/Israel. The relationship between Israel and the eved is different, for these two entities are closely related to each other. This is not only because Israel is explicitly referred to as the eved, it is also due to the eved’s special 14  Cf. Laato, Servant, 155, with particular proximity to the Josianic royal ideology. 15  Contrary to Grätz, “Botschaft.”

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   323 mission to Israel as well as his consistent anonymity. In contrast to Cyrus, this makes the boundary between Israel and eved fluid.”16 The servant becomes not only visible in the servants of Isa 54–66 but is already hinted at in Isa 49–54. So he represents all those who live as disciples in a community of learning (Isa 50:4). The particular wording points to an allusion to the Mosaic concept of a community of learning as found in Deuteronomy (cf. Deut 4:1, 5, 10, 14). But now it is not Moses but Yhwh himself who is the teacher of the servant’s offspring and of Zion’s children. The prophetic coloring becomes evident in Isa 51:16: “I have placed my word in your mouth and have covered you with the shadow of my hand in order to pitch the heavens [like a tent] and to lay the foundations of the earth and to say to Zion: ‘You are my people!’ ” The prophetic commission to preach the word (cf. Deut 18:18) is thus transferred to the community in Zion! In 59:21 this prophetic ability is perpetuated in the offspring, in all those in Jacob who turn away from sin.

17.4.  The Fourth Servant Song The longer the servant bears witness to Yhwh’s plan of salvation, the more he is confronted with massive opposition, since the situation in post-exilic Zion/Jerusalem certainly did not live up to the servant’s claim. This is the background to the fourth Servant Song (Isa 52:13–53:12). Admittedly, the majority of exegetes still interpret the text as a testimony to Deutero-Isaiah’s suffering and martyrdom.17 For Duhm himself, the fourth Servant Song pointed to the suffering and violent death of an anonymous Torah teacher. But against these individual interpretations, the disapproval of Julius Wellhausen is still compelling: “It is a hazardous supposition to think of an incomparably great prophet who was martyred in exile, perhaps by his own people—a prophet who then disappeared. The statements do not fit the profile of a real prophet. Such a one does not have the task of converting all the pagans, still less did a real prophet succeed in that task.”18 The reasoning is clear: had a historical person been put to death, and had his disciples been responsible for the written account of this martyrdom, his name and identity would have been transmitted. Another point of critique consists in the question of what could be meant by the post-mortal offspring in Isa 53:10, given the fact that the hope for an individual resurrection hardly occurs prior to the second century bce? Contrary to that, a collective understanding of resurrection that implies hope for restoration of post-exilic Israel is well documented in Ezek 37. Against this backdrop, Isa 53 16  Kessler, “Kyros,” 150. 17  Cf., e.g., Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55: “a kind of panegyric or funeral oration soon after the prophet’s death” (p. 79). 18 Wellhausen, Geschichte, 152, n. 1: “Die Annahme ist abenteuerlich, daß im Exil ein unvergleichlicher Prophet, womöglich von seinen eigenen Landsleuten, zum Märtyrer gemacht, dann aber verschollen wäre. Die Aussagen passen auch nicht auf einen wirklichen Propheten. Der hat nicht die Aufgabe und noch weniger den Erfolg, alle Heiden zu bekehren” (my translation).

324   Ulrich Berges probably constitutes a literary reflection on the conflict between the returnees from the Golah and the residents who had not been deported (cf. the reference to Abraham in Isa 51:2 and Ezek 33:24). The servant back home expresses the hope that his compatriots who were spared from deportation would acknowledge his suffering for the sins of the many. Some commentators follow the collective interpretation of the first three songs but switch to the individual for the fourth song.19 Others such as Otto Kaiser maintain the collective also for the last song, seeing here a salvific service of Israel to the nations: “Israel is the guilt-offering for the unwitting sins committed by the multitudes who do not know the living God and his will . . . The ancient promise to the patriarchs that all the nations would be blessed through the seed of Abraham is thereby fulfilled. Salvation history has arrived at its destination.”20 However, not only does the Jewish tradition contradict this interpretation, but there is a complete lack of evidence in the Old Testament of such a role for the people of God on behalf of the nations. The position of the fourth Servant Song between the chapters on Zion in 52 and 54, which speak of her miraculous exaltation to royal dignity, has to be taken seriously.21 In 52:13 the servant is raised to the heights of the divine king. The connections to Isaiah’s throne vision in chapter 6 are manifold. The purpose of the hardening of Israel’s heart was to prevent Israel from converting and thereby bringing about their healing (6:10). Now, however, a collective body declares that “through his wounds we are healed” (53:5). Whoever confesses this has the hardness of his heart removed and belongs to the serv­ ant community (53:10; 54:3).22 The right understanding of the “many” in 52:14 and 53:11–12 is essential for the interpretation of the fourth song. The rabbim are not identical with the “many nations” (goyim rabbim) in 52:15, but denote the majority in Israel itself (cf. Exod 23:2; Jer 20:10; Pss 3:3; 4:7; 31:14; 71:7). Those of the “many” who accept the fate of the servant as a salvific event for themselves do belong to the “We”—that is, to the offspring of the servant and Lady Zion, the desolate one who has never been in labor (54:1). Despite the different word, this statement might be an allusion to the sickness of the servant (53:3, 4, 10). The exaltation of the servant to the highest heights after having been beaten and insulted mirrors what will happen to the royal bride after she has endured the deepest humiliation. When this happens to the servant, the kings of the nations will shut their mouths and see what had never been told to them and apprehend what they have never heard (52:15): “That which has never been recounted or heard in the whole world will become manifest. The servant Zion, who has been disfigured by his blows, will raise himself like a king, high and very lofty.”23 Just as for the servant, Zion’s exaltation is entirely dependent on Yhwh as the only true king. Like the male servant, female Zion, too, is both a literary individual and a social collective. Both missions go beyond that which an individual is capable of

19  So, e.g., Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, ad loc. 20 Kaiser, Knecht, 118 (my translation). 21  See Berges, “Zion.” 22  See Kustár, Wunden, esp. 178–180, 201. 23 Otto, Krieg, 135 (my translation).

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   325 a­ ccomplishing—namely, the actualization of Yhwh’s covenant with his people in such a way that it will be a light for the nations (42:6; 49:6). In the same way as for all true prophets, the servant is equipped with the word of God as his only weapon (49:2). His statement that he has exhausted himself in his attempt to bring Jacob/Israel back to God (50:4–5) reflects his disappointment at his failure to motivate more than a small portion of exiles to return home. This experience of failure has been part of the prophetic mission since Moses (cf. Num 11:14–15; cf. Elijah in 1 Kgs 19:4–8; Isaiah in Isa 8:16–18; Jeremiah in Jer 15:10–11 and 20:7–10). The servant has to be seen in the context of other literary representations in postexilic times. All these figures encapsulate important theological issues. The problem of innocent suffering is spelled out in the character of Job, the endurance under the wrath of God in the suffering man of Lam 3, and the fate of the persecuted prophet in the confessions of Jeremiah.24 It is interesting to note that the servant in the third song (Isa 50:4–9) is presented as a prophetic figure much more than in the two previous ones. He is increasingly portrayed as the ideal figure of one who suffers on behalf of Yhwh and his word with its peak in the fourth Servant Song. The Dutch scholar Henk Leene rightly links this with the upcoming group of the servants: “The servant represents in the t­otality of the book of Isaiah the connecting element between the historical Israel and the post-exilic group of the pious. On the one hand the servant stands for Israel transformed by God himself and on the other he symbolizes the prototype of those who in Trito-Isaiah are called the servants of God. These servants are his offspring. In Is 65 they are called the juice in a cluster of grapes because they were trusting only in the word of God precisely as the servant did in Is 50.”25

17.5.  From the Servant to the Servants According to Marvin Sweeney, Isa 49:1–52:12 can be summarized as “Yhwh’s Announcement of Salvation for Zion.”26 A strong compositional feature that includes Isa 53–54 is the alternation of passages dealing with the servant, on the one hand (49:1–13; 50:4–11; 52:13–53:12), and Zion/Jerusalem, on the other (49:14–50:3; 51:1–52:12; 54:1–17a). Following Sweeney, the last section of the book of Isaiah consists of 55:1–66:24, the “Exhortation to Join the Restored Israel.”27 The final part sets the conditions for participation in this renewed relationship with Yhwh: “Chapters 55–66 begin and end with speeches which discuss Yhwh’s criteria for selecting those who fulfil His conditions for participation in the covenant. This is because these chapters are primarily concerned

24  Cf. Meyer, “Klagelieder,” 583. 25 Leene, Hemel, 10 (my translation); cf. Blank, Faith: “The servant of God is nothing but the personification of Israel as prophet” (p. 80). 26 Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 168. 27  Sweeney, 231.

326   Ulrich Berges with discussing the nature of the new covenant community, the selection of those who will be a part of it, and the rejection of those who will not.”28 Bearing this in mind, the fact that beginning at the end of Isa 54, the “servant” in the singular is consistently replaced by the “servants” in the plural (cf. 54:17b; 56:6; 63:17; 65:8, 9, 13, 14, 15; 66:14) gains special importance. In a continuous reading of Isa 40–66 the servants are the offspring of the servant (53:10) and the progeny of mother Zion (54:3). They are the disciples of Yhwh, his limmudim (54:13), if they listen to his word, just as the servant was attentive and obedient to the divine word, as the disciples are (50:4). In the same way that he could rely on God’s justification (50:8), they can be sure that Yhwh will be their vindication (54:17). Just as nobody could prove him guilty, none will be able to declare the servants guilty. Their heritage does not consist in a portion of land (cf. Isa 49:8; 58:14; 63:17), but in the guarantee of God’s help and protection. The term nahalah conveys a certain resemblance to Levitical thinking since the Levites did not possess any share in the Land. Their inheritance was the service before Yhwh (Josh 18:7a); they received a tithe of the offerings (Num 18:20–21, 23–24, 26; 26:62; Josh 14:3), and God himself was their share (Deut 10:9; 12:12; 14:27, 29; 18:2; Josh 13:14, 33; Ezek 44:28). It is not by chance that the servants are mentioned for the first time in 54:17b, at the end of the alternation between servant and Zion in Isa 49–54 and just before the reference to the divine promise on behalf of David in 55:3. The Qumran scribes of the Great Isaiah Scroll saw the importance of the first mention of the servants in 54:17b and marked it by three devices in the manuscript. Except for a single word, the line before is left empty (vacat); they placed a tiny horizontal stroke beneath that line (paragraphos), and there is a small space after verse 14b (spatium). If one takes Isa 54:17b as seriously as these scribes in Qumran did, the consequence for the composition lies at hand, because the section on the servant and Zion in Isa 49–54 is followed by the last section about the servants. Accordingly, Isa 55 functions as a bridging chapter with closer ties to what follows than to what precedes (cf. the everlasting name that shall not be cut off in 55:13; 56:5, the clapping trees in 55:12–13, and the promise to the eunuch in 56:3 that he will no ­longer be a dry tree).29 None of this invalidates the link of 54:10–11 back to 40:6–8 regarding the powerfulness of the divine word, but the driving force is now shifted to what follows, up to the end of the book of Isaiah. The exclamation hoy in 55:1 that constantly introduces a woe oracle (e.g., Isa 5:8, 11, 18, 20; 10:1; 18:1; 45:9–10) ought to be understood here as an urgent appeal (cf. Zech 2:10–11). The addressees are faced with the alternative of either joining the servants or rejecting them. The term “servants” (abadim) embraces the whole composition (54:17; 56:6; 65:8–9, 13–15; 66:14). They are the ones who tremble at God’s word (66:5) and are presented as a minority group under the growing pressure by the authorities in Jerusalem.30

28 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–4, 88. 29  Cf. Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 298; Sweeney, Isaiah 40­–­66, 232. 30  Cf. Blenkinsopp, “Servants”; “Sect”; “Servant”; Ruszkowski, Volk, 91–92.

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   327

17.5.1.  Davidic and Prophetic Traits of the Servants If the addition in Isa 54:17b comes from the servants, then they appropriate God’s ­promise and support to their own group.31 If this is correct, the reference to the covenant according to the assured love for David in 55:3 has to be seen in a new light: it is not just a “Broadening of the Covenant Commitment”32; after the superscription in 54:17b, it reads as a programmatic statement of the servant community. The former David was appointed to conquer nations; the David now is called to receive strangers and foreign peoples into the community of those who accept Yhwh as God and king. The servants are the nagid, the leader, not of Israel alone but also of nations (cf. 1 Sam 13:14; 25:30; 2 Sam 5:2; 6:21; 7:8). But this time there is no mention of violence since the nations come freely to God’s city. The servants do not guide only Israel; they lead all people who are willing to gather in Zion, the earthly abode of the heavenly king. The fact that the term “people” (goy) stands in Isa 55:5a once with the singular and once with the plural might indicate that individuals and groups of people are expected to join the feast in Jerusalem. The covenant with David makes reference to the known passages in 2 Sam 7; Ps 89; and Ps 132. In contrast to Jer 23:5 and Ezek 34:23–24, however, in Isa 55:3 there is no expectation of a renewed Davidic monarchy. Why is David named at all since, in contrast to Isa 1–39, chapters 40–66 do not otherwise mention him?33 Otto Kaiser puts it this way: “It is nevertheless striking that although our prophet evokes the memory of the ancient promises to David, at no point does he expressly state the hope that a new David would arise. He had already solemnly proclaimed Cyrus to be the anointed one of Yahweh in 45:1. The political royal office has thereby already been allocated.”34 This statement has to be modified in two directions. Firstly, in the book of Isaiah, the only undisputed king and creator of the destinies of Israel and of the nations is Yhwh. As already underlined, Cyrus is not the royal servant of Yhwh. The Persian functions only as God’s military and political instrument for the implementation of his plan. Secondly, the royal office belongs to the servant and the servants as his offspring and that of mother Zion. Indeed, compared to the portrayal in Ezek 37:24–26, where David is depicted as returning as king, shepherd, and prince, Isa 55:1–5 reads like a counterproposal. In addition to prophetic and royal dignity, the servants ascribe priestly characteristics to themselves. This is done in close connection to Zion in Isa 61, the central piece of Isa 60–62.35

31 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 366. 32  Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 363. 33  David in Isaiah 1–39: 7:2, 13; 9:6; 16:5; 22:9, 22; 29:1; 37:35; 38:5. 34 Kaiser, Knecht, 125 (my translation). 35  Hugenberger, “Servant,” also comes to the conclusion that the servant is characterized by royal and priestly traits, albeit by different means: “prophetic, royal, and priestly traits in the portrait of the servant” (p. 139).

328   Ulrich Berges

17.5.2.  The Priestly Traits of the Servants in Isaiah 61 The focal point of these chapters is the divine gift of the spirit to the righteous in Zion. Just as the exiles who were willing to return home were gifted with God’s spirit (cf. 42:1; 44:3; 48:16), so, too, their offspring are equipped with divine strength for the restoration of Jerusalem. The previous commitment to liberation from Babylon and the Diaspora (cf. 42:7; 49:9) has been transformed into a fight for liberation from economic oppression. The theologically important verb basar, “to proclaim good news” (40:9; 41:27; 52:7), functions now in the realm of social ethics. Those who strive against the disintegration of the post-exilic society (cf. Isa 58; Neh 5) are called “oaks of righteousness” (61:3). Only through the “righteous” (60:21) can the destiny of Jerusalem as “city of righteousness” (1:26) be realized. Isa 61 brings Exod 19:6 into play, which speaks of the priestly function of the people of God in the midst of the nations. Now the ones gifted with the spirit of God are told: “You shall be priests of Yhwh” and “ministers of our God” (Isa 61:6). Prophetic charisma and priestly dignity distinguish the servants, who may have come from circles that, while not being strictly priestly, were connected to the cult. The promise that their double portion of shame shall be recompensed with a double portion of the land (61:7) also points in this direction. Not only will they receive the wealth of the nations, as “priests of Yhwh”; they will also receive a second piece of property in their countries. The hyperbolic value of these expectations has to be underlined. The ones who did not even possess land in their own countries will be fed by the riches from the nations and by a share in foreign countries.

17.5.3.  The Servants in the Collective Prayer of Complaint in Isaiah 63:7–64:11 The term “servants” is also found in the collective prayer of complaint in 63:7–64:11. The text includes, after a solemn introduction (63:7) and a historical review (63:8–14), a petition for God’s deliverance (63:15–64:11). There had been no petition in the complaint of Isa 59:9–15a, because the ones who by their fervent prayers bring to mind the mercy of Yhwh (63:7) had not yet been appointed. Their greatest source of distress was the fact that God held back his mercy (63:15). Twice in this prayer Yhwh is addressed as father (63:16; 64:7; cf. Tob 13:4). This occurs frequently in the Old Testament, for example, in a comparison (Isa 45:10; Ps 103:13), as a promise of election (Exod 4:22; Hos 11:1), and in the context of a royal adoption formula (2 Sam 7:14; Ps 2:7). Unusual, however, is the statement in Isa 63:16 that Abraham and Israel do not know the petitioners. Once again, a Levitical coloring is detectable since, in the blessing of Moses, Levi is presented as one who has no connections whatsoever to his father, mother, or other family members. In the same way the Levites were entirely bound to Yhwh, becoming interpreters of his word and assistants at the altar (Deut 33:8–10). The petitioners in Isa 63:7–64:11

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   329 see themselves as equally dependent on Yhwh. They are convinced that God will act in favor of those who wait for him (64:3; cf. Isa 8:17; 30:18). In solidarity with the nation, they acknowledge their sinfulness (64:4b–6), and through their confession they belong to those who turned from sin in Jacob (59:20). Ardently they approach God: “Turn back for the sake of your servants, for the sake of the tribes that are your heritage” (63:17). In the Psalter, the term “servant” in the singular (e.g., Pss 19:12, 14; 27:9; 31:17) and in the plural (e.g., Pss 34:23; 69:37; 79:2, 10; 90:16; 135:1, 9, 14) designates those who regard themselves as reliant on the help of their divine master. Thus, the term later became a designation for the pious. This is in line with the fact that the honorary title ­“servant” is applied, among others, to Moses (Ps 106:23), David (Ps 89:4), and to righteous i­ ndividuals in general (Pss 105:6, 43; 106:5; 1 Chron 16:13; Sir 46:1).

17.5.4.  The Servants in Isaiah 65–66 The term fits very well in the last part of the book of Isaiah because the servants of Yhwh, offspring of the true servant Jacob and the royal bride and mother Zion, consider themselves protected by God’s support and justification. It is because and in favor of them that Yhwh gives an answer to the collective complaint. He assures them that he will not destroy his people because in the servants there is still a blessing (65:8). It is that very persistence of the relation to his people embodied in the servant that prevents him from treading the grapes so violently that nothing would be left. The servants are the result of the post-exilic hardship, just as the juicy grapes stand for the good wine at the end of the treading process. Therefore, it is not by chance that the term “servants” is found seven times in Isa 65 (vv. 8, 9, 13 [3x], 14, 15). Only after the clear partition between the servants and their adversaries can the vision of a New Jerusalem take place (65:16b–25). The separation begins with a messenger formula (65:8) that picks up the image of God’s treading of the winepress (cf. 63:3). The servants do not belong to the offspring of Esau, but to that part of true Israel that confessed its sins and turned back to Yhwh. They are the descendants of Jacob, the heirs of his mountains in Judah, the elected ones (65:9, 15, 22) in the same way that the servant was elected (cf. 42:1; 43:20; 45:4). It is only because of the blessing that resides in the servants (cf. 61:9; 65:23) that God’s treading does not lead to total destruction. They will not only enjoy the right of residence in Zion, the entire territory of ancient Israel, from the Sharon Plain in the west to the Valley of Achor in the east, will be at their disposal (65:9–10; cf. 57:13; 60:21). As befits the “nation of holiness” (62:12), the holy mountain is only open to those who honor Yhwh and do not prepare a table for Gad and Meni, the deities of fortune and destiny (65:11; cf. 57:13). The choice between curse and blessing (cf. Deut 28) is offered to each individual depending on whether they turn to or away from Yhwh. Whereas Israel was threatened with hunger and thirst if it did not serve Yhwh with heartfelt joy (Deut 28:47–48), now the servants are promised food, drink, and gladness of heart (Isa 65:13–14). Just as Zion (62:2–4, 12) received a new name that sealed a positive future, the servants, too, receive a different name (65:15–16).

330   Ulrich Berges They are called “those who swear Amen to God” and who bless themselves in this name. Yhwh is no deity of fortune or destiny; he is instead the God whose word is reliable. After the separation between the faithful servants and their enemies, the text moves to the vision of a new creation (65:16b–25). In the literary context, the servants are the first beneficiaries of that hopeful situation, because Yhwh stands very close to them (65:24). The key expression “former troubles” refers back to the juxtaposition of “former and latter” in Isa 40–48 (41:22; 42:9; 43:9, 18; 46:9; 48:3), where one encounters the central concept of newness too (41:15; 42:9; 43:19; 48:6; cf. 62:2). It is not the old heavens and the old earth that should be forgotten, but the old troubles! Anything chaotic and hostile to life is banned. Whereas in Isa 11:6–9 this is implemented by the Davidic shoot, here there is no reference to such a royal figure. One last time the “servants” are mentioned is Isa 66:14. Whereas in chapter 65, Yhwh had spoken with the adversaries about the servants, now he speaks with the servants about their adversaries: “You shall see, and your heart shall rejoice; your bones shall flourish like the grass; and the hand of Yhwh shall be known towards his servants and his indignation towards his enemies.” Apparently, there was still an important question left open for clarification, having to do with the value of the sacrificial cult in the New Jerusalem and the importance of the temple as such. The answer leaves no room for doubt: more important than the temple is Yhwh’s power as creator. This does not make the temple superfluous, but it does put the building activity in the right perspective, for everything depends upon the correlation of cultic behavior and social behavior. In a fierce polemic, the servants accuse their adversaries of sacrificing animals and killing people at the same time. The enemies of the servants are explicitly identified as enemies of God (66:6b, 14b). Zion is no longer the mother of the returnees from Babylon and the dispersion; she is the mother of the community of the servants (66:7–14). She gives birth to her offspring so suddenly (v. 7) that there is not even time for the birth pangs to set in. Yhwh stands by Lady Zion’s side as a midwife during the birth of the community of the servants. The offspring promised to the servant (53:10) are the children of Zion (66:8). They will no longer suffer adversity; instead, they will drink their fill at her comforting breast (66:11; cf. 60:16) and be carried in her arms (66:12; cf. 49:22; 60:4). The community of servants continues to experience Yhwh’s motherly comfort well into adulthood. The promise that their bones would blossom like fresh grass picks up on the vegetation metaphor in Isa 41:18; 51:3; 58:11 and at the same time alludes to the vision of the valley of dry bones in Ezek 37. The restriction to the servants is, however, very meaningful because only their limbs will blossom, not those of their adversaries! The conclusion consists of an eschatological vision of Jerusalem (66:18–23) framed by vivid images of the destruction that will come over the apostates (66:15–17, 24). The judgment of the defectors that had already been spoken of at the beginning of the book (cf. Isa 1:2, 28) will be definitively implemented. The unquenchable fire (1:31) devours the apostates (66:24). The true veneration of God in Jerusalem can no longer be achieved by Israel alone. Instead, he will be glorified by all flesh (66:23, cf. v. 16)—that is, by all the members of Israel and the nations who break away from foreign cults and adhere to Yhwh alone.

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   331

Bibliography: Berges Berges, Ulrich. The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition and Final Form. Translated by Millard C. Lind. HBM 46. Sheffield, UK: Shefflied Phoenix Press, 2012. Berges, Ulrich. Jesaja 40–48. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2008. Berges, Ulrich. Jesaja 49–54. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2015. Berges, Ulrich. “The Literary Construction of the Servant in Isaiah 40–55: A Discussion about Individual and Collective Identities.” SJOT 24 (2010): 28–38. Berges, Ulrich. “Zion and the Kingship of Yhwh in Isaiah 40–55.” In “Enlarge the Site of Your Tent”: The City as Unifying Theme in Isaiah, edited by Archibald L. H. M. van Wieringen and Annemarieke van der Woude, 95–119. OtSt 58. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Blank, Sheldon H. “A Jewish Sect of the Persian Period.” CBQ 52 (1990): 5–20. Blank, Sheldon H. Prophetic Faith in Isaiah. Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1967. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2002. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “The Servant and the Servants in Isaiah and the Formation of the Book.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretative Tradition, vol. 1, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 155–175. VTS 70.1 / FIOTL 1. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “The ‘Servants of the Lord’.” PIBA 7 (1983): 1–23. Duhm, Bernhard. Das Buch Jesaia. HKAT 3/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 19685. Goldingay, John, and David Payne, Isaiah 40–55. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary in Two Volumes. ICC. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Grätz, Sebastian. “Die unglaubliche Botschaft: Erwägungen zum vierten Lied des Gottesknechts in Jes 52,13–53,12.” SJOT 18 (2004): 184–207. Hugenberger, Gordon P. “The Servant of the Lord in the ‘Servant Songs’ of Isaiah: A Second Moses Figure.” In The Lord’s Anointed: Interpretation of Old Testament Messianic Texts, edited by Philip E. Satterthwaite, Richard S. Hess, and Gordon J. Wenham, 105–140. Carlisle, UK: Paternoster, 1995. Jeremias, Jörg. “Prophetenwort und Prophetenbuch: Zur Rekonstruktion mündlicher Verkündigung der Propheten.” JBTh 14 (1999): 19–35. Kaiser, Otto. Der königliche Knecht: Eine traditionsgeschichtlich-exegetische Studie über die Ebed-Jahwe-Lieder bei Deuterojesaja. FRLANT 70. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1959. Kessler, Rainer. “Kyros und der eved bei Deuterojesaja: Gottes Handeln in Macht und Schwäche.” In Christus und seine Geschwister: Christologie im Umfeld der “Bibel in gerechter Sprache,” edited by Marlene Crüsemann and Carsten Jochum-Bortfeld, 141–158. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 2009. Kustár, Zoltán. “Durch seine Wunden sind wir geheilt”: Eine Untersuchung zur Metaphorik von Israels Krankheit und Heilung im Jesajabuch. BWANT 154. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2002. Laato, Antti. The Servant of Yhwh and Cyrus: A Reinterpretation of the Exilic Messianic Programme in Isaiah 40–55. ConBOT 35. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1992. Leene, Henk. “Auf der Suche nach einem redaktionskritischen Modell für Jesaja 40–55.” ThLZ 121 (1996): 803–818. Leene, Henk. Een nieuwe hemel en een nieuwe aarde: Slotakkoord van het boek Jesaja. Amsterdam: Vrije Universiteit, 2002.

332   Ulrich Berges McGinnis, Claire Mathews, and Patricia K. Tull, eds. “As Those Who Are Taught”: The Interpretation of Isaiah from the LXX to the SBL. SBLSymS 27. Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2006. Mettinger, Tryggve N. D. A Farewell to the Servant Songs: A Critical Examination of an Exegetical Axiom. Scripta minora Regiae Societatis Humaniorum Litterarum Lundensis 3. Lund, Sweden: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1983. Meyer, Ivo. “Die Klagelieder.” In Einleitung in das Alte Testament, edited by Erich Zenger, Christian Frevel, Heinz-Josef Fabry, Georg Braulik, and Georg Hentschel, 578–584. Studienbücher Theologie. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 20128. Otto, Eckart. Krieg und Frieden in der Hebräischen Bibel und im Alten Orient: Aspekte für eine Friedensordnung in der Moderne. Theologie und Frieden 18. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1999. Ruszkowski, Leszek. Volk und Gemeinde im Wandel: Eine Untersuchung zu Jesaja 56–66. FRLANT 191. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000. Steck, Odil Hannes. Die Prophetenbücher und ihr theologisches Zeugnis: Wege der Nachfrage und Fährten zur Antwort. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1996. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 40–66. FOTL 19. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2016. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–4 and the Post-Exilic Understanding of the Isaianic Tradition. BZAW 171. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1988. Wellhausen, Julius. Israelitische und Jüdische Geschichte. Berlin: de Gruyter, 19589. Reprint, 1981. Werlitz, Jürgen. “Jesaja, Jesajabuch.” 1996. In LThK 53. Werlitz, Jürgen. Redaktion und Komposition: Zur Rückfrage hinter die Endgestalt von Jesaja 40–55. BBB 122. Berlin: Philo, 1999.

Further Reading Blum, Erhard. “Der leidende Gottesknecht von Jes 53: Eine kompositionelle Deutung.” In Gottes Wahrnehmungen: Helmut Utzschneider zum 60. Geburtstag, edited by Stefan Gehrig and Stefan Seiler, 138–159. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2009. Budde, Karl. Die sogenannten Ebed-Jahwe-Lieder und die Bedeutung des Knechtes Jahwes in Jesaja 40–55: Ein Minoritätsvotum. Giessen: Ricker, 1900. Clements, Ronald E. “Isaiah 53 and the Restoration of Israel.” In Jesus and the Suffering Servant: Isaiah 53 and Christian Origins, edited by William H. Bellinger and William R. Farmer, 39–54. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press, 1998. Clines, David J. A. I, He, We, and They: A Literary Approach to Isaiah 53. JSOTS 1. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1976. Reprint, 1983. Conroy, Charles. “The Enigmatic Servant Texts in Isaiah in the Light of Recent Study.” PIBA 32 (2009): 24–48. Conroy, Charles. “The ‘Four Servant Poems’ in Second Isaiah in the Light of Recent Redaction-Historical Studies.” In Biblical and Near Eastern Essays: Studies in Honour of Kevin J. Cathcart, edited by Carmel McCarthy and John F. Healey, 80–94. JSOTS 375. London: T&T Clark, 2004. Haag, Ernst. “Der Gottesknecht als Jünger Jahwes: Tradition und Redaktion in Jes 50,4–9.” In Der menschenfreundliche Gott: Zugänge—Anfragen—Folgerungen: Alfons Thome zum 75. Geburtstag, edited by Heinz Feilzer, Andreas Heinz, and Wolfgang Lentzen-Deis, 11–35. Trier: Paulinus-Verlag, 1990.

The Servant(s) in Isaiah   333 Hägglund, Frederik. Isaiah 53 in the Light of Homecoming after Exile. FAT II/31. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Joachimsen, Kristin. Identities in Transition: The Pursuit of Isa. 52:13–53:12. VTS 142. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Laato, Antti, Who Is the Servant of the Lord? Jewish and Christian Interpretations on Isaiah 53: From Antiquity to the Middle Ages. Studies in Rewritten Bible 4. Turku, Finland: Åbo Akademi University, 2012. Labouvie, Sandra. Gottesknecht und neuer David: Der Heilsmittler für Zion und seine Frohbotschaft nach Jes 60–62. FB 129. Würzburg: Echter 2013. Landy, Francis. “The Construction of the Subject and the Symbolic Order: A Reading of the Last Three Suffering Servant Songs.” In Among the Prophets: Language, Image and Structure in the Prophetic Writings, edited by Philip R. Davies and David J. A. Clines, 60–71. JSOTS 144. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1993. Leene, Henk. “Kan een fictionele gestalte onze plaats innemen? Overwegingen bij de uitleg van Jesaja 53.” GThT 93 (1993): 232–253. Ruppert, Lothar. “Mein Knecht, der gerechte, macht die Vielen gerecht, und ihre Verschuldungen—er trägt sie” (Jes 53,11): Universales Heil durch das stellvertretende Strafleiden des Gottesknechtes?” Biblische Zeitschrift 40 (1996): 1–17. Sawyer, John F. A. “Daughter of Zion and Servant of the Lord in Isaiah: A Comparison.” JSOT 44 (1989): 89–107. Schipper, Jeremy. Disability and Isaiah’s Suffering Servant. Biblical Reconfigurations. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Seitz, Christopher R. “ ‘You Are My Servant, You Are the Israel in Whom I Will Be Glorified’: The Servant Songs and the Effect of Literary Context in Isaiah.” CTJ 39 (2004): 117–134. Whybray, Roger G. Thanksgiving for a Liberated Prophet: An Interpretation of Isaiah Chapter 53. JSOTS 4. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1978.

chapter 18

W isdom i n Isa i a h Andrew T. Abernethy

18.1. Introduction The separation between wisdom and prophecy was understandable. Their differences seemed stark: pro-government versus anti-government; reasoned reflection versus ecstatic revelation; a creator deity versus a covenantal, saving Lord. A divorce between wisdom and prophecy seemed inevitable, but scholars began to observe commonalities between them. Besides, if wisdom and prophecy had been able to live in the same house for a few thousand years, they were perhaps not as incompatible as some suspected. The first half of this chapter tells the story of the reconciliation between wisdom and prophecy in the research on wisdom in the book of Isaiah. There is, however, another process of reconciliation unfolding in studies on the book of Isaiah. Although many distinct strands and sections of Isaiah have been isolated from one another, scholars are attempting to understand the significance of and the process by which these strands have been joined in canonical matrimony, as one book. As will become apparent, studies on wisdom in the book of Isaiah have not yet been undertaken in light of the book’s unity. Thus, the second half of this chapter will offer an overview of wisdom throughout the entire book of Isaiah, highlighting the similarities and differences between their uses in their respective parts of the book.

18.2.  Wisdom in Isaiah in Research A survey of research on wisdom in Isaiah offers a glimpse into the process of reconciliation between wisdom and prophecy, as scholars seek to understand the place of the ­wisdom tradition in prophetic utterance.

Wisdom in Isaiah   335

18.2.1.  Research on Wisdom in Proto-Isaiah Most scholarship on wisdom in Isaiah focuses on Isa 1–39, with an emphasis on clarifying the nature of the relationship between prophecy and wisdom.

18.2.1.1.  Isaiah as a Wise Man Turned Prophet Johannes Fichtner’s provocative study on the topic jump-started the exploration of a range of interests in the prophet Isaiah and wisdom.1 During a time when wisdom and prophecy were treated as dichotomous, Fichtner observed that, in comparison to other prophets, Isaiah of Jerusalem’s relationship to wisdom was unique. The prophet Isaiah critiques the “wise men” inside (3:1–3; 5:21; 29:14) and outside Israel (19:11–12), yet he uses terminology and forms from the wisdom tradition at a higher rate than any other prophet, primarily to assert the superiority of Yhwh’s wisdom and that Yhwh will mobilize a future king to reign with divine wisdom through the spirit (11:2). To explain how Isaiah can reject “wise men” but also utilize wisdom traditions, Fichtner argued that Isaiah was originally among the “wise men” in Israel, but that his call as prophet led him to realize that the “wise” lean on the wisdom of other nations and their own insights, and not on Yhwh. Although Isaiah does not renounce wisdom, he “resists its representatives because they have disassociated themselves from their most basic foundation and become corrupt in false self-confidence and godlessness.”2 A decade later, Robert Martin-Achard, building on Fichtner, argued that the prophet Isaiah’s call in chapter 6, with its elevated vision of God and its negative vision of human capabilities in understanding, led Isaiah to convert from sage to prophet, one who summons trust in Yhwh’s wisdom, which is superior to human wisdom (7:9).3

18.2.1.2.  Isaiah and the Wisdom of the Wisdom School Although many did not agree that Isaiah of Jerusalem was a convert from “wise man” to prophet, research continued to explore the nature and extent of wisdom influence on the prophet Isaiah.4 J. William Whedbee argues that the prophet Isaiah’s use of parables (1:2–3; 5:1–7; 28:23–29), proverbial speech (10:15; 29:15–16), “summary appraisal forms” (14:26; 17:14; 28:29), and woe oracles derives from the wisdom tradition.5 What is more, Isaiah applies to Yhwh the concept of “counsel” (‫ )עצה‬to highlight how Yhwh’s trustworthy plan transcends human wisdom. Whedbee concludes that although Isaiah was 1  Fichtner, “Isaiah.” 2  Fichtner, “Isaiah,” 437. While not directly addressing the question of Isaiah’s relationship to “wise men,” Anderson (“Isaiah”) argues that Isaiah was a scribe for the king, which included the responsibility of being a counselor to the king and educating some among the nobility. 3  Martin-Achard, “Sagesse.” 4  E.g., in 1955, Lindblom, “Wisdom,” though not convinced that the prophet Isaiah was a former “wise man” (p. 197, n. 3), argues that wisdom traditions influenced the prophets, especially Isaiah. In 1965, McKane, Prophets, argued that Isaiah was among the prophets who attacked “old wisdom” utilized in the royal court (pp. 65–72) to assert that wisdom alone belongs to Yhwh (pp. 79–83). 5 Whedbee, Isaiah, 80–109. Wolff, “Micah,” 81–82, also assumes that “woe” oracles derive from the context of clan wisdom. These claims by Whedbee and Wolff lack evidence.

336   Andrew T. Abernethy not a “wise man,” he used the wisdom tradition because it had currency in those days, making his message as effective as possible. Whedbee thus challenges the field to recognize that wisdom and prophecy are not at odds, because wisdom based on empirical observation and wisdom deriving from visionary revelation are both valid, according to Isaiah.6 Joseph Jensen sought to clarify Whedbee’s claim that wisdom and prophecy can operate together. Focusing on the prophet Isaiah’s depiction of Yhwh as teacher, father, and king, along with several texts where the prophet speaks of God’s ‫( תורה‬1:10; 2:3; 5:24; 8:16, 20), Jensen argues that the book of Isaiah teaches that Yhwh is both the one whose plan for history is inscrutable and the one who imparts wisdom for day-to-day life.7

18.2.1.3.  Isaiah and Wisdom in the Israelite Worldview Although previous scholarship has focused on how the prophet Isaiah’s message interacts with the teaching of wisdom by a school of “wise men,” the recognition that wisdom was part of the Israelite worldview, and not confined to the teaching of a particular class of “wise men,” shifted the focus to the use of wisdom by the prophet.8 A number of scholars recognized how Isaiah’s emphasis on Yhwh’s exaltation naturally leads him to assert that Yhwh is the source of all wisdom.9 Jürgen Hermisson extends this approach the furthest by arguing that though wisdom is not normally associated with the “wonders” of God, Isaiah declares that wisdom relates to God’s plan to establish his purposes through wonders in the future.10 Although scholars since Fichtner have made similar observations, the difference resides in understanding Isaiah’s message as an appropriation of wisdom motifs from Israel’s “shared approach to reality” rather than in response to a particular school of thought. From this perspective, Hugh Williamson and John Barton argue that a social ethic grounded in the wisdom tradition serves as the basis for the prophet Isaiah’s indictments, yet Isaiah uniquely anchors this ethic in “the reality of God’s exaltation which gave everything in society and nature its subordinate but ordered place.”11

18.2.1.4.  Wisdom and Redaction in Proto-Isaiah Moving beyond the tendency among scholars only to consider the role of wisdom in texts thought to derive from the prophet Isaiah, Jacques Vermeylen examines the motif of wisdom in the literary unit known as First Isaiah (chaps. 1–39), which, he maintains, includes later additions that pertain to wisdom.12 The first layer of redaction, according to Vermeylen, is evident in two passages about the ideal king that stem from the time of Josiah. He argues that ‫“( פלא יעץ‬wonderful counselor,” 9:5); terms and phrases from 11:2, such as ‫“( דעת‬knowledge”), ‫“( עצה‬counsel”), ‫“( בינה‬understanding”), ‫חכמה‬ (“wisdom”), and ‫“( יראת יהוה‬fear of Yhwh”); and the concept of the king as the one 6 Whedbee, Isaiah, 152–153. 7 Jensen, Tôrâ. 8  Whybray, “Prophecy.” 9 Morgan, Wisdom, 76–83; Van Leeuwen, “Sage,” 301–302. 10  Hermisson, “Prophetie,” esp. 117–118. 11  Williamson, “Isaiah,” 141. See Barton, Ethics, 130–144. 12  Vermeylen, “Proto-Isaïe.”

Wisdom in Isaiah   337 who establishes justice relate closely to the teachings of Proverbs.13 The second layer of redaction, which Vermeylen describes as the work of the Deuteronomistic editor during exile, is more closely connected with the prophetic tradition than the wisdom tradition, although 1:3 may derive from the wisdom tradition.14 In the third layer of redaction, coming from the post-exilic era, additions incorporating wisdom traditions increase in a pietistic direction, as is evident in the theme of the knowledge of God (11:9; 33:6b), the fear of the Lord (11:3a; 33:6b), the parable of the farmer (28:23–29), and an increasing focus on the promise of justice (3:10–11; 14:27; 17:14; 25:1; 31:2).15 A challenge with Vermeylen’s study is that not everyone will agree with his redactional schema; for instance, nearly all of his predecessors on wisdom in Isaiah date the messianic texts (9:1–6; 11:1–5) and the parable (28:23–29) to the time of Isaiah.16 Yet despite the disagreement on the approximate dates of the given texts, Vermeylen’s study has a major benefit—namely, its recognition that the wisdom motif deserves attention at the corpus and book level within Isaiah.

18.2.2.  Research on Wisdom in Deutero-Isaiah Scholarly discussion on the wisdom theme in Isa 40–55 revolves around the direction of influence between Deutero-Isaiah and wisdom books, the evaluation of wisdom forms and motifs in the corpus, and how wisdom relates to the servant.

18.2.2.1.  Deutero-Isaiah, Wisdom, and Direction of Influence In 1927, Robert Henry Pfeiffer sought to explain how Second Isaiah came to advocate for monotheism. The answer, according to Pfeiffer, is found in Job’s influence on Second Isaiah. The book of Job—of Edomite origin—portrayed God as a creator of the entire world in a very abstract sense, but Second Isaiah appropriated Job’s mythic ideas to depict Yhwh as the creator God, who is closely involved in history to redeem his people Israel.17 Samuel Terrien also argues for Job’s influence on Isa 40–55, cataloging many possible conceptual and linguistic connections.18 The problem with this argument is that many of these connections could simply derive from a common linguistic heritage and may not be indicative of direction of influence. For instance, Will Kynes argues that Job draws on phrases from promises and praises in Deutero-Isaiah as a sort of parody.19

18.2.2.2  Deutero-Isaiah and Wisdom Forms and Themes There are several forms and motifs in Deutero-Isaiah that receive attention as they relate to wisdom. Meindert Dijkstra compares Isa 40:12–31 with Job and ancient Near 13  Vermeylen, 46–48. 14  Vermeylen, 48–53. 15  Vermeylen, “Proto-Isaïe,” 53–57. 16  E.g., Fichtner, “Isaiah,” 436; Whedbee, Isaiah, 51–67, 141–143; Morgan, Wisdom, 79–81. 17  Pfeiffer, “Origin,” 193–206. 18  Terrien, “Remarques.” 19  Kynes, “Job.”

338   Andrew T. Abernethy Eastern literature, and he concludes that Second Isaiah adopted a wisdom discourse pattern of reflective prose from the ancient world to make his case to the exiles regarding Yhwh’s transcendence.20 Additionally, some scholars argue that the summons to all who are thirsty to come to the waters, to buy, and to eat in 55:1–2 draws upon the wisdom tradition of Lady Wisdom’s banquet in Prov 9:1–6, 11 (cf. Sir 24:19–22),21 whereas others understand the passage as the invitation of a merchant,22 albeit with wisdom elements incorporated. Furthermore, Donn Morgan catalogs a range of thematic parallels between Isa 40–55 and Wisdom Literature: God as creator, hiddenness, and the fear of the Lord.23

18.2.2.3.  Deutero-Isaiah, Wisdom, and the Servant Another intersection between wisdom and Isa 40–55 relates to the statement that God’s servant will be satisfied by his knowledge (‫יׁשבע בדעתו‬, 53:11). What knowledge is being referred to? James Ward argues that during an era of exile, when Israel was skeptical, as evidenced in Job and Ecclesiastes,24 Second Isaiah aims to offer “a new word to interpret the course of history and give meaning to [the exile’s] lives.”25 This message, which resonates with Job 38:1–42:6, is that God remains involved behind the scenes and has a plan for “universal justice.” This justice will come first via Cyrus in the judgment of Babylon and the release of captives, and then through Israel, God’s servant, by spreading the knowledge of God abroad. The servant’s “knowledge” in 53:11, then, is “knowledge of God—of God’s oneness, power, righteousness, sovereignty, benevolence, and saving activity.”26 Thus, the servant is willing to die for his message without resorting to violence because of his confidence in God’s commitment to ultimately establish justice.27 Ward’s study is one of the few that allows the literary context across an entire corpus in Isaiah to illuminate how a specific wisdom motif is to be understood.

18.2.3.  Research on Wisdom across the Book of Isaiah Several scholars attempt to consider the motif of wisdom within Isaiah as a whole. Lindsay Wilson catalogs numerous wisdom forms, vocabulary, and themes in Isaiah and suggests that the theology of God as Creator throughout Isaiah creates a vantage point for God’s rule to be expressed both through creation (wisdom) and his saving intervention.28 Eric Ortlund traces how the motif of spiritual blindness reflects a lack of wisdom on Israel’s part, which warrants Yhwh’s judgment, while the book anticipates a time when leaders—both the Davidic king (11:1–5; 32:1–8) and the servant (52:13; 53:11)—will be endowed with wisdom that will be spread abroad to the peoples

20  Dijkstra, “Lawsuit.” 21  E.g., Begrich, Deuterojesaja, 59–60; Muilenburg, “Isaiah,” 642; Blenkinsopp, Isaiah, 369. 22  E.g., Korpel, “Metaphors,” 49–50; Abernethy, Eating, 122–124. 23 Morgan, Wisdom, 114–119. 24  Ward, “Knowledge,” 122–123. 25  Ward, 123. 26  Ward, 129. 27  Ward, 134. 28  Wilson, “Wisdom.”

Wisdom in Isaiah   339 under their rule.29 Although both works attempt to reflect on “wisdom” within the book as a whole, neither identifies any connections with wisdom in Isa 56–66, nor are they sensitive to the unique vantage points on wisdom that the various sections of the book provide.

18.2.4.  Research on Wisdom, Intertextuality, and Isaiah Amid the challenges of discerning when wisdom is in play within Isaiah, scholars have repeatedly utilized the wisdom traditions as expressed in Job, Ecclesiastes, and, especially, Proverbs as a basis for establishing the presence of wisdom traditions in Isaiah.30 Interest in intertextuality has led some scholars to explore how these wisdom books relate to Isaiah. Will Kynes employs intertextuality to reflect on the direction of influence between Job and Isa 40–55. In light of Job drawing on Ps 8 as a parody, he argues that the phrase ‫“( אין חקר‬there is no searching”) that Job 9:10 and Isa 40:28 share; the use of interrogative questioning ‫“( מי יׁשיב‬who shall turn back”) and ‫“( מה־תעׂשה‬what will you do/ make”) in Job 9:12 and Isa 43:13 and 45:9; and the idea of frustrating (‫ )מפר‬the wise (‫)חכמים‬ in Job 5:12–13 and Isa 44:25 also function in such a way that the author of Job draws on Isa 40–55 as a parody of the praise and promises in Second Isaiah.31 The challenge here is that the phrases Kynes draws upon are not very strong, a point he acknowledges,32 so it is difficult to evaluate whether there is any influence at all, let alone a direction of influence.33 Nonetheless, the great benefit of Kynes’s work is that he compares the functions of these shared phrases in their respective literary contexts rather than just amassing lists of parallel phraseology. Also in the area of intertextuality, Richard Schultz examines connections between Ecclesiastes and the entire book of Isaiah. Although Schultz finds nothing conclusive about direction of influence and intentionality, he observes that bringing these two books into dialogue exposes the shared experiences of the audiences that both books, from their unique vantage points, address.34

18.2.5.  Assessment and Paths Forward The foregoing survey reveals a recurring interest among scholars in identifying the source and nature of the influence of wisdom traditions on Proto-Isaiah and

29  Ortlund, “Blindness.” 30  E.g., Fichtner, “Isaiah,” 432; Morgan, Wisdom, 24–25; “Wisdom,” 213; Van Leeuwen, “Sage,” 299. 31  Kynes, “Job.” 32  Kynes, “Job,” 100. 33  One might explain the relationship between the phrases in the opposite direction, as, e.g., Childs, “Psalm 8,” 29, explains the use of Job in Ps 8 in a way that is opposite to Kynes’s explanation. Isa 40–55 may be offering hope, where Job was bleak. 34  Schultz, “Qoheleth”; “Sage.”

340   Andrew T. Abernethy ­ eutero-Isaiah and these prophetic reactions to such traditions. Although these historiD cal interests remain valid avenues of inquiry, the shift in Isaiah studies to examining the book of Isaiah as a whole with an eye toward its unity offers a new vantage point for considering wisdom in Isaiah.35 Three methodological reflections will clarify how the study will unfold in the second half of this chapter. First, if one is to approach Isaiah as a “book,” it seems optimal to begin by approaching it synchronically, and then asking diachronic questions.36 Second, because we have indications that the order of the book was intentional, even if there is some debate about its precise divisions, a synchronic reading will ideally unfold sequentially across the entire book.37 A sequential reading will allow for the wisdom motif to be understood within the literary contours of the various sections and arrangement of the entire book. Third, a study of wisdom in Isaiah requires clarity on how to identify when a wisdom element is in fact present, or what it even is. This is an inescapable challenge, yet several reflections on wisdom will, at least, clarify the approach taken here. To begin, because there is no agreement on how to define wisdom,38 it is safer to focus on what constitutes “wisdom” and to utilize Wisdom Literature—Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes—as the most authoritative constitution of the wisdom tradition in ancient Israel.39 This wisdom, however, was not restricted to a “wisdom school” in ancient Israel—an institution that Stuart Weeks has demonstrated likely did not exist40—although there did seem to be a group of wise men by the time of Jeremiah (Jer 18:18). Wisdom, instead, developed across society over many generations, so it was likely part of the general outlook of Israel that came to be expressed and refined when written as “Wisdom Literature.”41 For this reason, it is best not to confine the search for wisdom in Isaiah to an exact quotation or a “wisdom form.”42 Instead, there needs to be latitude for prophets to appropriate a fluid wisdom tradition that was part of the fabric of society for their own purposes, yet the primary way of controlling what one might count as “wisdom” should be based on whether or not there are conceptual or linguistic (or both) affinities with the wisdom traditions found in the Wisdom Literature.43 There must, then, be a balance between 35  See foundational studies by Childs, Introduction, 311–338; Clements, “Unity.” 36 Steck, Books. 37  For thematic studies that employ a sequential approach, see Darr, Vision; Abernethy, Eating. Iser, Reading, argues persuasively that in a sequential reading, networks of association naturally form in the reader’s imagination as one reads with an eye toward where the book is moving (prospective reading) and with associative awareness of what has come before (retrospective reading). 38  See Sneed, “Wind.” E.g., compare a general definition that incorporates reflection on all of life experience (von Rad, Theology, 1:418) and one that narrows to reflections pertaining to the royal court (McKane, Prophets, 53). 39  Morgan, “Wisdom,” 213; Whybray, “World,” 227–228. See the helpful note of caution, however, from Kynes, “Wisdom,” 30–33, regarding how the classification “Wisdom Literature” can blind some from finding wisdom elsewhere in the canon. 40 Weeks, Wisdom, 74–91, 132–156. Cf. Whybray, Tradition, 15–54. 41  Whybray, “Prophecy,” 185–186. 42  For an overview, see Sneed, “Wind,” 39–67. 43  For a similar approach, see Van Leeuwen, “Sage,” 297; Morgan, Wisdom, 24–25.

Wisdom in Isaiah   341 prophetic freedom and the boundaries established through affinities with the wisdom tradition expressed in Wisdom Literature. Thus, the present study will follow the motif of wisdom sequentially across the movement of the entire book, while using Wisdom Literature as a means of justifying the passages in Isaiah that might actually have a wisdom element.

18.3.  Overview of Wisdom in the Major Sections of Isaiah In light of the recent trend in scholarship to examine the unity of Isaiah, it is essential to have a survey of the land across the entire book in a way that is mindful of the similarities and differences in uses across sections of Isaiah. After a sequential, synchronic overview of wisdom in the various sections of Isaiah, several diachronic questions will be offered.

18.3.1.  Wisdom in Isaiah 1–39 In Isa 1–12, there is a prominent emphasis on Israel’s lack of wisdom in dismissing the Holy One. Chapter 1 presents Israel as being less knowing (‫ )ידע‬and understanding (‫)בין‬ than animals (1:3; ‫ ׁשור‬Job 6:5; 21:10; 24:3 [with ‫ ;]חמור‬Prov 7:22; 14:4 [with ‫)]אבוס‬, for they do not know who their Lord is and have refused the Holy One (1:3–4).44 Using the same verbal roots as 1:3, the Holy One decrees in chapter 6 that the unwise nation will remain unable to understand (‫ )בין‬and know (‫)ידע‬, as Isaiah’s preaching will only perpetuate the unwise status of Israel (6:9–10). One of the ways Israel’s lack of wisdom manifests itself is in the form of pride (‫גאה‬: 2:12; 9:8; cf. Job 40:11–12; Prov 15:25; 16:19), for it is Yhwh alone who is to be exalted (e.g., Isa 2:11, 17). Such pride is apparent when Isa 5:21 utilizes an expression common in Proverbs to describe this nation: ‫חכמים בעיניהם‬ (“wise in their own eyes,” 5:21; cf. Prov 3:7; 12:15; 26:5, 12, 16; 28:11). Even Assyria is chastised for assuming that their success depends upon their own wisdom (10:13).45 What is more, those who accumulate property through injustice (5:8–10) and who become intoxicated with drink (5:11, 22) assume that they are unshakable, so they mock Isaiah’s message about Yhwh’s plan, presumably the one to use Assyria and, later, Babylon to punish his p ­ eople, saying: “Let the plan of the Holy One of Israel (‫ )עצת קדוׁש יׂשראל‬come near and come about, so that we might know” (5:19).46 Such a disposition typifies the 44 Whedbee, Isaiah, 26–43. Although ‫ ידע‬is evenly distributed across the Hebrew Bible / Old Testament, the combination of ‫ בין‬and ‫ ידע‬in verses in the Hebrew Bible (35 times) is most common in Wisdom Literature (13 times) and Isaiah (8 times). 45  On pride and being wise in one’s own eyes, see Morgan, Wisdom, 80–81. 46  On plan in Isaiah, see Jensen, Tôrâ, 55–58.

342   Andrew T. Abernethy reason Israel will go into exile—“my people go into exile from a lack of ‫( דעת‬knowledge)” (5:13), understood as not being mindful of Yhwh’s wonders and work (5:12).47 Not only is the nation of Israel unwise, but the leaders who should exemplify wisdom in Israel—the ‫( ׁשפטים‬judges) and ‫( יועצים‬counselors)—are unwise, too, for not promoting justice for the vulnerable and will find their stature in the community diminished (3:3).48 Although judgment is coming against this unwise nation and its leaders, there is hope that after judgment, a new crop of ‫ ׁשפטים‬and ‫ יועצים‬will rule in such a way that justice will be upheld (1:26). Furthermore, Yhwh will establish a Davidic king who will bear the name ‫“( יועץ פלא‬wonderful counsellor,” 9:5) and will have a spirit of ‫“( חכמה‬wisdom”), ‫“( בינה‬understanding”), ‫“( עצה‬counsel”), ‫“( דעת‬knowledge”), and ‫“( יראת יהוה‬the fear of the Lord,” 11:2) in order to bring about justice (9:6; 11:4–5).49 This new era of justice and peace will result in the knowledge (‫ )דעה‬of Yhwh filling the earth (11:9). During such a time, Zion will become a hub to which the nations will stream to benefit from Yhwh’s wisdom (2:2–4).50 Thus, in Isaiah 1–12, wisdom revolves around Yhwh being its source. So, a lack of wisdom entails not aligning with Yhwh, as is evident in pride, injustice, presumption about security, or mocking the prophetic word about God’s plans. The restoration of wisdom in Israel and among the nations presents Yhwh as the source of wisdom who establishes leaders and grants them the wisdom necessary to establish justice and peace under Yhwh’s rule. In Isa 13–23 and 24–27, the theme of pride and the supremacy of Yhwh’s ‫ עצה‬are the prominent wisdom motifs, because these sections extend concepts that applied pri­ma­ rily to Israel in Isa 1–12 to the nations and entire world.51 Drawing on a wisdom tradition that pride will result in the fall of humans (e.g., Prov 8:13; 16:18; 29:3), the oracles that frame chapters 13–23—Babylon, Moab, and Tyre—declare that Yhwh will cause these proud nations to fall (Isa 13:11, 19; 14:11; 16:6; 23:9), a point asserted again regarding Moab in 25:11. Thus, by confronting the nations for a sin they share with Israel, pride, chapters 13–27 extend the message of Isa 1–12, that Yhwh’s exaltation has implications not only for proud Israel but for the entire world.52 At the basis of judgment for the proud is Yhwh’s ‫עצה‬.53 In Isa 14, God summarizes his message against Babylon by stating: “just as I have planned (‫)יעצתי‬, it will stand (‫( ”)תקום‬14:24). The prophet/editor 47 Beuken, Jesaja 1–12, 150; Williamson, Isaiah 1–5, 372. 48 On ‫ יועצים‬as counselors connected with wisdom but not necessarily trained in a “wisdom school,” see Van Leeuwen, “Sage,” 299–303. 49  Of the thirty-eight occurrences of ‫ בינה‬in the Hebrew Bible, nearly two-thirds occur in Job and Proverbs. Of eighty-eight occurrences of ‫דעת‬, thirty-nine occur in Proverbs, ten in Job, seven in Ecclesiastes, and eight in Isaiah. And ‫ יראת יהוה‬occurs three times in Isaiah (11:2, 3; 33:6), three times in Psalms (19:10; 34:12; 111:10), once in 2 Chronicles (19:9), and twenty-eight times in Proverbs (e.g., 2:5; 8:13; 9:10). The word ‫ חכמה‬occurs throughout the HB, but it occurs most frequently in Proverbs (42x), Ecclesiastes (28x), and Job (18x). The collection of these terms with a strong affinity to wisdom traditions in Isa 11:1–5 portrays the ideal king in light of wisdom. 50  See Jensen, Tôrâ, 68–84. 51  On Isa 13–23 and 24–27 within 1–39, see Seitz, Isaiah 1–39, 116–119; Sweeney, “Citations.” 52  Hamborg, “Reasons,” 156–158. 53  Although the term ‫ עצה‬is not confined to the circles of “wise men,” Jer 18:18 associates ‫ עצה‬with “the wise (‫ ”)חכם‬and the term occurs throughout Job (e.g., 42:3) and Proverbs (e.g., 8:14; 19:21).

Wisdom in Isaiah   343 offers a c­ oncluding statement to this same oracle, again drawing on ‫עצה‬: “This is the plan planned (‫ )העצה היעוצה‬concerning all the earth . . . for Yhwh of Hosts has planned (‫ )יעץ‬and who can frustrate it (‫( ”?)יפר‬14:26–27). Isa 14:24 and 14:26–27 relate linguistically back to Isa 8:10: ‫ ולא יקום‬. . . ‫“( עצו עצה וְ ֻת ָפר‬the plan planned will be frustrated. . . and will not stand”). Whereas Isa 8:10 declares that the plan (‫ )עצה‬of the threatening nations (cf. 16:3) will not succeed (‫קום ;פרר‬+‫)לא‬, chapter 14 declares that Yhwh’s plan (‫ )עצה‬to judge Babylon will indeed come to pass (14:24, 26–27). Similarly, the Oracles against the Nations (OAN) conclude with an oracle against Tyre that directly connects Yhwh’s ‫עצה‬ with his intention to humble their pride (23:8–9). In Isa 19, the prophet mocks Pharoah’s wise (‫ ;חכם‬19:11, 12) advisers (‫ ;יעץ‬19:11) who offer their own ‫( עצה‬19:3, 11) but are unable to declare what Yhwh has planned (‫ )יעץ‬concerning Egypt (19:12).54 In contrast to the ‫ יועצים‬of Egypt, Yhwh is the ultimate ‫יועץ‬, whose ‫ עצה‬to judge Egypt will become reality (19:17). With Yhwh’s ‫ עצה‬specifying his plan to judge the particular nations of Babylon, Egypt, and Tyre in the OAN, the song in 25:1 captures the sentiment of those who will be the recipients of Yhwh’s salvation after he brings judgment to the entire world (chap. 24; 25:2). Praise will come to Yhwh “for you have accomplished wonderful plans (‫”)פלא עצות‬ (25:1; cf. 9:5). Thus, Isa 13–23 and 24–27 extend Yhwh’s judgment to those who are unwisely proud from Israel and Assyria in chapters 1–12 to particular nations in the Near East and to the entire world, for Yhwh alone is to be exalted. It is Yhwh’s ‫ עצה‬that has the ultimate sway over reality, including the judgment of oppressive nations, not the ‫ עצה‬of the supposedly wise counsellors of the nations. Isa 28–32 returns the book’s attention to Israel and Judah. As a series of woes confront the wayward nation, the motif of God’s wisdom being greater than human wisdom spreads throughout these chapters. In a parable that presents Yhwh as the source of a farmer’s wisdom in planting, harvesting, and manufacturing crops (28:23–28), a summary statement draws an analogy between divinely endowed creational wisdom and God’s wondrous (‫ עצה )פלא‬that can be trusted in the midst of and in the aftermath of God’s judgment through Assyria (28:29; cf. 25:1; 28:9).55 In fact, the wisdom of the wise men will perish as God works his wonders (‫ ;פלא‬29:14). The human ‫ עצה‬that forging an alliance with Egypt will preserve Judah is not from Yhwh (30:1–2).56 According to Williamson, “The problem with human alliances is that they exalt human strength above its natural place.”57 Instead, they must come to see that God is indeed the “wise one” (‫חכם‬, 31:2). There is hope that after Yhwh works his wondrous counsel in bringing judgment there will be a remnant who find God to be their teacher (28:26; 30:20) and a leadership who counsels noble things (32:7). Thus, in these chapters the major contrast is between the supposed wisdom of foreign alliances and the inscrutable and incomparable wisdom of Yhwh.

54 McKane, Prophets, 70. 55  On Isa 28:23–29 within the context of the Assyrian crisis, see Whedbee, Isaiah, 60–67. 56  Fichtner, “Isaiah,” 432–434. 57  Williamson, “Isaiah,” 140.

344   Andrew T. Abernethy In a triptych of texts (33, 34–35, 36–39) that serve as a transition between 1–32 and 40–66,58 chapter 33 is the only text in which the wisdom motif plays a noteworthy role. As Yhwh’s exaltation is anticipated (33:5; cf. 2:11, 17), God himself will be Zion’s “abundance of salvation wisdom (‫)חכמה‬, and knowledge (‫)דעת‬, and the fear of Yhwh (‫)יראת יהוה‬, that will be its treasure” (33:6). This is the only instance in the Hebrew Bible where ‫יׁשועה‬ (“salvation”) combines with any of these wisdom terms. Uniquely, then, by uniting the theology of God being Zion’s ‫( יׁשועה‬12:2; 33:2) with terms related to wisdom from Isa 11,59 Isa 33:6 expresses the understanding that Yhwh’s wisdom will be richly on display in saving Zion. In summary, a number of wisdom motifs interrelate the various subsections within Isa 1–39. Although the people mock what Isaiah claims to be God’s ‫עצה‬, there is a per­ sist­ent claim that Yhwh’s ‫ עצה‬to judge Israel (cf. 5:19; 28:29 [with ‫)]פלא‬, Babylon (14:26), Egypt (19:17), and all nations (25:1 [with ‫ )]פלא‬transcends human knowledge. Additionally, when human leaders who are supposed to be “wise” (1:21–26; 3:3; 19:11, 12, 17; 29:14) find themselves at odds with Yhwh’s plan revealed through the prophet, particularly as this relates to abuses of power and forging foreign alliances, the message in Isa 1–39 is that Yhwh will prevail as the true “wise man” (19:17; 31:2) and ultimately establish a new era of wise leadership (1:26; 9:5; 11:2).

18.3.2.  Wisdom in Isaiah 40–55 The wisdom motif in Isa 40–55 has a degree of similarity with its use in Isa 1–39, but it has its own distinct flavor. First, the superiority of Yhwh’s wisdom in contrast to human wisdom is prominent in Isa 40–55. In a context of exile, when Israel is wondering if their ‫“( דרך‬way”) is ­hidden from God’s view and if God has overlooked their ‫“( מׁשפט‬justice/right,” 40:27), Isa 40:13–14 challenges them to recognize that Yhwh is in no need of human ‫“( את־מ י נועץ ויבינהו וילמדהו בארח מׁשפט וילמדהו דעת ודרך תבונות יודיענו‬Who is consulted and gave him understanding? Who taught him in the path of justice? Who taught him knowledge, and made known the path of understanding to him?” (40:13; cf. 40:21).60 Since God is the creator before whom the nations, their leaders, and their idols are incomparable,61 Isa 40 declares that God’s unrivaled wisdom should assure the suffering exiles that their ‫ דרך‬and the ‫ מׁשפט‬due them will be attended to with unrivaled wisdom. Additionally, using language that resonates with 14:27 (cf. 8:10), Isa 46:10 praises Yhwh as the one whose ‫ עצה‬will come about (‫—)קום‬namely, his ‫ עצה‬to use Cyrus (44:26; 46:11). The certain success of Yhwh’s plan contrasts with the outcome of the supposed wisdom (‫)חכם‬ 58  There is, of course, great debate over whether Isa 1–33 or 1–39 make up the first half of the book. See Berges, Isaiah, for an overview of arguments and a view that treats 33, 34–35, and 36–39 as texts that serve as a bridge between 1–32 and 40–66. 59  On the relationship between Isa 11 and 33:6, see Beuken, “Jesaja 33,” 16–17. 60  Also observing the relationship between vv. 14 and 27, see Koole, Isaiah, 119; Oswalt, Isaiah, 72. 61  On God as creator and his relationship with rulers in Prov 8 and Isa 40, see Grosse, “Création.”

Wisdom in Isaiah   345 of soothsayers and astrologers in Babylon (44:25 with ‫ ;חכמים‬47:13 with ‫)עצה‬. Thus, even with no evidence from empirical observation to maintain trust in Yhwh, God’s people are not to turn to soothsayers; instead, God in his unfathomable wisdom is to be trusted as one awaits the outworking of God’s ‫ עצה‬to save his people.62 Second, although Yhwh’s wisdom is superior, his people Israel continue to lack wisdom. Unique to Isa 40–55 within Isaiah, this lack of wisdom connects to idolatry. In a polemic against idols in Isa 44, the prophet reflects on how idolaters will use half of a piece of wood to make a fire and the other half to form an idol, praying to it and asking for deliverance. Obviously, according to the prophet, ‫“( אל־לבו ולא דעת ולא־תבונה לא ידעו ולא יבינו כי טח מראות עיניהם מהׂשכיל לבתם ולא־יׁשיב‬they do not know and do not understand, for their eyes are stuck shut, their hearts from comprehending; and he does not take it to heart, lacking knowledge and understanding,” 44:18–19). By utilizing such an accumulation of terms for wisdom ‫ידע‬, ‫בין‬, ‫ׂשכל‬, ‫דעת‬, ‫)תבונה‬, it is apparent that idolatry is a prime illustration of a lack of wisdom and understanding. In fact, Isa 55, itself laced with wisdom terminology, concludes by calling on the audience to come and listen to a God who offers water free of charge (55:1–3), in contrast to the gods of the nations who leave their worshipers thirsty (44:12) and drain the money of the worshipers (cf. 46:6–7).63 Idolatry is the epitome of folly; turning to Yhwh is wisdom. Third, in view of Israel’s lack of wisdom, a goal of Yhwh’s saving interventions is increasing knowledge and comprehension of who Yhwh is. Throughout Yhwh’s history with Israel, Yhwh granted Israel a privileged place as witnesses to his actions so that Israel might know (‫ )ידע‬and understand (‫ )בין‬that “‫“( ”אני הוא‬I am he,” 43:10). In fact, Yhwh plans to transform the wilderness—likely a metaphor for desolation in the aftermath of Babylonian invasion—into a fertile forest, with the expectation that upon seeing this Israel will know (‫ )ידע‬and comprehend (‫ )ׂשכל‬that it is Yhwh, the Holy One of Israel, who is behind this transformation, which he had spoken about in advance (41:20; cf. 45:3, 6). Such knowledge will even be apparent to the nations (49:23). Even the nations will come to understand (‫ )בין‬in the aftermath of God’s use of a suffering servant (52:15). Thus, although there is a sense that Israel should know (‫ )ידע‬and understand (‫ )בין‬Yhwh’s greatness in creation (40:21), there is an expectation that a great increase in wisdom among Israel and the nations will transpire in the wake of Yhwh’s works of redemption for exiled Israel. Fourth, the notion of wisdom intersects with the leading agents in Yhwh’s plan. As noted above, Isa 44:26 and 46:11 both refer to Cyrus as a unique embodiment of Yhwh’s ‫עצה‬. Additionally, as Ward argued, the servant orients his outlook of hope beyond suffering and toward the ‫ דעת‬that Yhwh will ultimately vindicate Israel. In summary, in a time when Israel is not wise, Isa 40–55 calls upon them to trust God’s unmatchable wisdom instead of worthless idols. In fact, there is the expectation that as 62  This is not to imply that Yhwh’s revelatory activity is not involved in wisdom gleaned from empirical observation. 63 Abernethy, Eating, 120–139.

346   Andrew T. Abernethy Yhwh establishes his wise plan of bringing salvation to Israel and the nations that God’s people will come to know God and recognize his inscrutable wisdom.64

18.3.3.  Wisdom in Isaiah 56–66 Although scholars have neglected the wisdom motif in Isa 56–66,65 there are numerous examples of wisdom traditions at work in these chapters, nearly all of which serve to depict the wicked. The most obvious instance is when Isa 59:7 and Prov 1:16 utilize the exact phraseology: ‫“( רגליהם לרע ירצו וימהרו לׁשפך דם‬their feet are running to evil, and they are hastening to pour out blood”).66 Also in Isa 59, the community is described in such a way that ‫“( סר מרע‬the one turning from evil”) is not safe (v. 15). Since nearly every instance of ‫ סר מרע‬occurs in Job and Proverbs (Job 1:1, 8; 2:3; 28:28; Prov 3:7; 14:16; 16:6, 17), it seems that Isa 59:15 is making a point that Israel was so corrupt that someone ­pursuing wisdom by turning from evil would not be welcome by this community. Additionally, Isa 56:10–11 describes the rebellious as those who ‫“( לא ידעו הבין‬they do not know with understanding”), which is evident in their quest for unjust gain (‫ ;בצע‬Prov 1:19; 15:27). Since twenty of the twenty-seven instances where ‫ בין‬and ‫ ידע‬occur in the same sentence outside Isaiah are in wisdom literature, and ‫ בצע‬is condemned in Proverbs, the rebellious are again described as being unwise. Furthermore, Isa 63:17 resonates with wisdom traditions, as those praying implicate God in their own lack of w ­ isdom: “Why are you causing us to wander (‫ )תתענו‬from your ways (‫)מדרכיך‬, O Yhwh, and you have hardened our heart from fear of you (‫”?)מיראתך‬. The combination of ‫ דרך‬and ‫ תעה‬resonates with Prov 12:26 and 21:16, and perhaps Job 12:24, and the combination of ‫ יראה‬and ‫ לב‬only occurs in Isa 63:7 and Prov 23:17, making it likely that this is again an occasion when wisdom ­tradition is impacting the depiction of the rebellious as unwise. Unique, however, is the daring claim that Yhwh is to blame for such wandering and such a lack of fear of him. Finally, in response to the preceding prayer, God depicts the apostates as ‫ההלכים הדרך לא־טוב‬ (“those walking the path not good”) in 65:2, which corresponds very closely with Prov 2:20 and 16:29, yet in this context pertains to false worship. By doing so, God places the responsibility for being unwise back on the ‫“( עם סרר‬apostate people”) to whom he has been calling over and over again (65:1). Thus, there are numerous occasions where wisdom tradition enables Isa 56–66 to depict the rebellious in the audience as unwise. These examples of wisdom in Isa 56–66 are primarily statements about the lack of wisdom in the community of the time. The exception to this is in Isa 57:15. Within the Hebrew Bible / Old Testament, it is only in Isa 57:15 and Prov 29:23 that ‫“( ׁשפל־רוח‬lowly in spirit”) occurs. In Prov 29:23, the contrast is between the proud (‫ )גאוה‬who will fall and the ‫ ׁשפל־רוח‬who will receive honor. By asserting that Yhwh dwells with the 64  For remarks on conceptual affinities between Isa 40–55 and Job, see Terrien, “Remarques,” 300–308. 65  Ortlund, “Blindness,” even claims that aside from 56:11 there are no affinities with the wisdom tradition in 56–66. 66 Goldingay, Isaiah 56–66, 195.

Wisdom in Isaiah   347 ‫ ׁשפל־רוח‬to revive them in 57:15, this is a claim that such a class of people receive God’s favor not simply because they are “broken” but because in this brokenness there is an orientation of being that can blossom into a wise community by living under the exalted Holy One (cf. 66:2). Admittedly, Isa 56–66 does not develop some of the prominent wisdom motifs from earlier in the book. There is no mention of God’s ‫עצה‬, nor are attacks levied at supposed groups of the “wise” (‫יועצים‬, ‫)חכמים‬. Although Isa 60 does pick up on the motif of the nations streaming to Zion from Isa 2:2–4,67 the emphasis on the nations streaming to Zion to receive wisdom from Yhwh is not made explicit. Perhaps these notions have already been established by this point in the book, and Isa 56–66 no longer needs to highlight Yhwh’s incomparable wisdom or the futility of human advisers. Amid some of the aims of Isa 56–66 to justify an eschatological judgment and to motivate the rebellious, the wisdom tradition contributes to this purpose by depicting the audience as a perpetually unwise people.

18.3.4.  Synthesis and Diachronic Implications From the preceding overview of the wisdom motif across Isa 1–39, 40–55, and 56–66, several similarities and differences between these sections emerge. First, in both 1–39 and 40–55, the main function of the wisdom motif is to emphasize how the divine ‫ עצה‬transcends empirical observation. There are differences, however, in how Yhwh’s ‫ עצה‬is understood. In 1–39, Yhwh’s ‫ עצה‬relates to the outworking of his plan to judge Israel (5:17; 28:29) and the nations (14:27; 19:17; 25:1), particularly during the Assyrian and Babylonian eras. In 40–55, Yhwh’s ‫ עצה‬relates to his unforeseeable plan to restore, including him doing so through Cyrus (44:26; 46:11), and to save his people in such a remarkable way that they will know that he alone is God (cf. 46:10; 44:26). As for Isa 56–66, no explicit “wisdom” terminology brings an emphasis upon Yhwh’s plan, although in depicting as “unwise” those who turn away from God, there is the assumption that wisdom is evident when a community aligns with Yhwh. This lack of living wisely serves as the basis for eschatological judgment. Second, 1–39 and 40–55 each contains a critique of existing officers who were supposed to be “wise.” There are two major difference between these sections as they relate to wisdom and leadership. The nature of the officers differs: the ‫( ׁשפטים‬1:26; 3:3), ‫יועצים‬ (1:26; 3:3; 19:11), and ‫( חכמים‬29:14) are targets in 1–39; and soothsayers and magicians (44:24; 47:13) are the primary recipients of critique as it relates to leadership and wisdom in 40–55. Another difference is that Isa 1–39 anticipates a restoration of wise human leadership (1:26; 9:5; 11:2) that will benefit society, whereas in Isa 40–55 Yhwh’s positive use of leaders relates to their role in the outworking of Yhwh’s wisdom, not ­necessarily 67 Berges, Isaiah, 58–63, claims that 2:2–4 operates in conjunction with 1:27–28 to reflect the dynamic of repentance in 56:9–59:21, followed by Zion’s salvation from an international perspective in 60–62.

348   Andrew T. Abernethy their role as embodiments of wisdom (44:26; 46:11), unless one were to interpret hiphil ‫ ׂשכל‬in 52:13 as describing the suffering servant as being wise instead of successful (cf. also 42:4). As for Isa 56–66, there is no explicit criticism of leaders who are supposed to be wise or anticipation of the establishment of wise human leadership. Third, all three major sections of the book utilize wisdom traditions to describe the people as unwise, and all three sections use the combination of ‫ ידע‬and ‫ בין‬in doing so (1:3; 6:9; 44:19; 56:11). There are, however, differences in how the lack of wisdom is illustrated. In Isa 1–39, injustice, pride, mocking the prophetic word, and seeking foreign alliances constitute the primary evidence of their lack of wisdom. In Isa 40–55, idolatry is the primary way of depicting how Israel is unwise. In Isa 56–66, injustice and idolatry illustrate a lack of wisdom, though it uses different phraseology than is used in 1–39 and 40–55. Now that the synchronic survey in the chapter has set forth the data, there are several diachronic questions that subsequent studies should consider addressing. Here are two. First, given the recent interest in how the author(s) of 56–66 wrote with a conscious awareness of 1–39 and 40–55, even adding materials to those sections to draw the entire book together, one wonders why some of the prominent wisdom traditions from 1–39 and 40–55 were not developed in 56–66.68 What implications would this have for those like Vermeylen who label some of the passages with wisdom emphases in 1–39 as postexilic, when such do not occur in 56–66? Second, in light of Gerald Sheppard’s work on the addition of wisdom sayings in the editing of books like Hosea,69 there are a number of summary statements containing possible wisdom elements, particularly in the early parts of Isaiah, should be considered (e.g., 2:5, 22; 14:26–27).

18.4. Conclusion The differences between the book of Isaiah and Wisdom Literature are unmistakable, yet wisdom traditions are certainly among the elements that contribute to the materials that make the book of Isaiah. Although the paralysis of uncertainty regarding the most fundamental questions about wisdom—about its definition, genre, and social location in Israel—could prevent one from offering a constructive articulation of the place of wisdom in Isaiah, the aim of this chapter has been to draw attention to the place of wisdom throughout the entire book of Isaiah. Although there are similarities and differences between how wisdom traditions operate in the various parts of Isaiah, there is a consistent use of the tradition to depict Yhwh as the incomparable source of wisdom, while not dismissing wisdom made available via observation within creation, and, as a result, to portray Israel and the nations as wise or unwise in light of whether or not they are in proper relation with the Holy One, their Creator (41:20; 43:15).

68 Stromberg, Isaiah.

69 Sheppard, Wisdom.

Wisdom in Isaiah   349

Bibliography Abernethy, Andrew  T. Eating in Isaiah: Approaching the Role of Food and Drink in Isaiah’s Structure and Message. BIS 131. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Anderson, Robert T. “Was Isaiah a Scribe?” JBL 79 (1960): 57–58. Barton, John. Understanding Old Testament Ethics: Approaches and Explorations. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2003. Begrich, Joachim. Studien zu Deuterojesaja. BWANT 25. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1938. Berges, Ulrich  F. The Book of Isaiah: Its Composition and Final Form. Translated by Millard C. Lind. HBM 46. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2012. Beuken, Willem A. M. Jesaja 1–12. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2003. Beuken, Willem A. M. “Jesaja 33 als Spiegeltext im Jesajabuch.” EThL 67 (1991): 5–35. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2002. Childs, Brevard S. Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1979. Childs, Brevard S. “Psalm 8 in the Context of the Christian Canon.” Int 23 (1969): 20–31. Clements, Ronald E. “The Unity of the Book of Isaiah.” Int 36 (1982): 117–129. Darr, Katheryn  P. Isaiah’s Vision and the Family of God. Literary Currents in Biblical Interpretation. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994. Dijkstra, Meindert. “Lawsuit, Debate and Wisdom Discourse in Second Isaiah.” In Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Festschrift Willem A. M. Beuken, edited by Jacques van Ruiten and Marc Vervenne, 251–271. BETL 132. Leuven: Peeters, 1997. Fichtner, Johannes. “Isaiah among the Wise.” In Studies in Ancient Israelite Wisdom, edited by James  L.  Crenshaw, 429–438. Library of Biblical Studies. New York: Ktav, 1976. English translation of “Jesaja unter den Weisen.” ThLZ 74 (1949): 75–80. Goldingay, John. Isaiah 56–66. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary. ICC. London: T&T Clark, 2014. Grosse, Bernard. “La création en Proverbes 8,12–31 et Isaïe 40, 12–24.” Nouvelle Revue Théologique 115 (1993): 186–193. Hamborg, Graham R. “Reasons for Judgment in the Oracles against the Nations of the Prophet Isaiah.” VT 31 (1981): 145–159. Hermisson, Hans-Jürgen. “Prophetie und Weisheit.” In Weisheit in Israel: Beiträge des Symposiums “Das Alte Testament und die Kultur der Moderne” anlässlich des 100. Geburtstags Gerhard von Rad (1901–1971), Heidelberg, 18.–21. Oktober 2001, edited by David J. A. Clines, Hermann Lichtenberger, and Hans-Peter Müller, 111–128. Altes Testament und Moderne 12. Munich: Lit-Verlag, 2003. Iser, Wolfgang. The Act of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1980. Jensen, Joseph. The Use of Tôrâ by Isaiah: His Debate with the Wisdom Tradition. CBQMS 3. Washington, DC: Catholic Biblical Association, 1973. Koole, Jan L. Isaiah III. HCOT 11. Leuven: Peeters, 1997. Korpel, Marjo C. A. “Metaphors in Isaiah lv.” VT 46 (1996): 43–55. Kynes, Will. “Job and Isaiah 40–55: Intertextualities in Dialogue.” In Reading Job Intertextually, edited by Katharine Dell and Will Kynes, 94–105. LHBOTS 574. London: Bloomsbury, 2013.

350   Andrew T. Abernethy Kynes, Will. “The Modern Scholarly Wisdom Tradition and the Threat of Pan-Sapientialism: A Case Report.” In Was There a Wisdom Tradition? New Prospects in Israelite Wisdom Studies, edited by Mark R. Sneed, 11–38. SBLAIL 23. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2015. Lindblom, Johannes, and D. Winton Thomas. “Wisdom in the Old Testament Prophets.” In Wisdom in Israel and in the Ancient Near East: Presented to Professor Harold Henry Rowley in Celebration of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday, 24 March 1955, edited by Martin Noth, 192–204. VTS 3. Leiden: Brill, 1955. Martin-Achard, Robert. “Sagesse de Dieu et sagesse humaine chez Esaie.” In Maqqél Shâqédh, La branche d’amandier: Hommage à Wilhelm Vischer, edited by Françoise Mies, 137–144. Montpellier: Causse, Graille, Castelnau, 1960. McKane, William. Prophets and Wise Men. SBT 44. London: SCM, 1965. Morgan, Donn  F. “Wisdom and the Prophets.” In Studia Biblica 1978: Sixth International Congress on Biblical Studies, Oxford 3–7 April 1978, vol. 1, Papers on Old Testament and Related Themes, edited by Elizabeth A. Livingstone, 209–244. JSOTS 11. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1979. Morgan, Donn F. Wisdom in the Old Testament Traditions. Atlanta, GA: John Knox, 1981. Muilenburg, James. “The Book of Isaiah: Isaiah Chapters 40–66.” In The Interpreter’s Bible, edited by George A. Buttrick et al., 381–773. New York: Abingdon, 1956. Ortlund, Eric. “Spiritual Blindness and Wisdom Traditions in the Book of Isaiah.” In Riddles and Revelations: Explorations into the Relationship between Wisdom and Prophecy in the Hebrew Bible, edited by Mark J. Boda, Russell L. Meek, and William R. Osborne, 75–94. LHBOTS 634. London: Continuum, 2018. Oswalt, John N. The Book of Isaiah: Chapters 40–66. NICOT. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1998. Pfeiffer, Robert Henry. “The Dual Origin of Hebrew Monotheism.” JBL 46 (1927): 193–206. Rad, Gerhard von. Old Testament Theology. 2 vols. Translated by David M. G. Stalker. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Schultz, Richard L. “Qoheleth and Isaiah in Dialogue.” In Reading Ecclesiastes Intertextually, edited by Katharine Dell and Will Kynes, 57–70. LHBOTS 587. London: Bloomsbury, 2014. Schultz, Richard L. “Qohelet as Eschatological or an Anti-Apocalyptic Sage? Hebel, the Evil Day, and Divine Judgment in the Book of Ecclesiastes.” In Riddles and Revelations: Explorations into the Relationship between Wisdom and Prophecy in the Hebrew Bible, edited by Mark J. Boda, Russell L. Meek, and William R. Osborne, 199–214. LHBOTS 634. London: Continuum, 2018. Seitz, Christopher R. Isaiah 1–39. Interpretation. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2011. Sheppard, Gerald T. Wisdom as a Hermeneutical Construct: A Study in the Sapientializing of the Old Testament. BZAW 151. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1980. Sneed, Mark  R. “ ‘Grasping after the Wind’: The Elusive Attempt to Define and Delimit Wisdom.” In Was There a Wisdom Tradition? New Prospects in Israelite Wisdom Studies, edited by Mark R. Sneed, 39–67. SBLAIL 23. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2015. Steck, Odil Hannes. The Prophetic Books and Their Theological Witness. Translated by James D. Nogalski. Atlanta, GA: Chalice, 2000. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Sweeney, Marvin  A. “Textual Citations in Isaiah 24–27: Toward an Understanding of the Redactional Function of Chapters 24–27 in the Book of Isaiah.” JBL 107 (1988): 39–52. Terrien, Samuel  L. “Quelques remarques sur les affinités de Job avec le Deutéro-Isaïe.” In Volume du congrès: Genève, 1965, 295–310. VTS 15. Leiden: Brill, 1966.

Wisdom in Isaiah   351 Van Leeuwen, Raymond C. “The Sage in the Prophetic Literature.” In The Sage in Israel and the Ancient Near East, edited by John G. Gammie and Leo G. Perdue, 295–306. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990. Vermeylen, Jacques. “Le proto-Isaïe et la sagesse d’Israël.” In La sagesse de l’Ancien Testament, 2nd ed., edited by Maurice Gilbert, 39–58. BETL 51. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1990. Ward, James M. “The Servant’s Knowledge in Isaiah 40–55.” In Israelite Wisdom: Theological and Literary Essays in Honor of Samuel Terrien, edited by John Glenn Gammie, 121–136. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1978. Weeks, Stuart. Early Israelite Wisdom. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. Whedbee, J. William. Isaiah and Wisdom. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1971. Whybray, Roger  N. The Intellectual Tradition in the Old Testament. BZAW 135. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1974. Whybray, Roger N. “Prophecy and Wisdom.” In Israel’s Prophetic Tradition: Essays in Honour of Peter Ackroyd, edited by Richard Coggins, Anthony Phillips, and Michael  A.  Knibb, 181–199. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. Whybray, Roger N. “The Social World of the Wisdom Writers.” In The World of Ancient Israel: Sociological, Anthropological, and Political Perspectives, edited by Ronald  E.  Clements, 227–250. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. Williamson, H. G. M. Isaiah 1–5: A Critical and Exegetical Commentary. ICC. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Williamson, H. G. M. “Isaiah and the Wise.” In Wisdom in Ancient Israel: Essays in Honor of J. A. Emerton, edited by John Day, Robert P. Gordon, and H. G. M. Williamson, 133–141. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. Wilson, Lindsay. “Wisdom in Isaiah.” In Interpreting Isaiah: Issues and Approaches, edited by David G. Firth and Paul D. Wegner, 145–167. Nottingham, UK: Apollos, 2009. Wolff, Hans Walter. “Micah the Moreshite: The Prophet and His Background.” In Israelite Wisdom: Theological and Literary Essays in Honor of Samuel Terrien, edited by John Glenn Gammie, 77–84. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1978.

chapter 19

Esch atol ogy i n Isa i a h Soo J. Kim

19.1. Introduction One of the factors that makes the book of Isaiah popular among Christians is its use of Christocentric hermeneutics to connect Isaian eschatology with New Testament events and prophecies.1 In this context, most of the “prophecies” in the book of Isaiah appear to anticipate fulfillment in either the first coming of Christ or his anticipated second-coming discourses. However, many New Testament texts that modern interpreters have cited as proof-texts in their eschatological understandings of the book of Isaiah are indeed the long-term products of the intertextual readings/writings by the ancient authors.2 Therefore, seeking the one-by-one fulfillment in the New Testament or in actual history is not a recommended goal in understanding the eschatology of the book of Isaiah. In this chapter, we shall study the eschatologically addressed rhetorical discourses in the book of Isaiah, designed for projected transformation. The language of these eschatological texts is strong enough to be universal, ultimate, and radical to rationalize the national crises, as well as to encourage readers to practice proper ethics during those critical periods. This chapter aims to unpack this thesis to understand the eschatology of the book of Isaiah as well as the book itself.

1  Examples include Gressmann, Der Messias; Mowinckel, He That Cometh; Witherington, Isaiah; Vasholz, “Character,” 39–59. 2  Examples of Isaiah in the study of Revelation include Mathewson, “Isaiah”; Fekkes, Prophetic Traditions; Mouw, Kings.

Eschatology in Isaiah   353

19.2.  Eschatology in the Book of Isaiah Before jumping into the main discussion, we need to clarify several key concepts and terms for the discussion. First, I will address the brief overview on the issues in defining the term “eschatology” in the biblical interpretation. Then, I will define my alternative term, “eschatologically addressed discourses.” Finally, I will segmentize the complicated temporality in the book of Isaiah.

19.2.1.  Issues in Defining the term “Eschatology” Affirming that the term “eschatology” comes from the Greek word eschatos, Jerry Walls defines it as “the study of the final end of things, the ultimate resolution of the entire creation.”3 According to this teleological definition, we would expect some “final” events to influence the entire world. However, as David Petersen highlights, such a definition raises several issues.4 The concern primarily arises from the awareness of the gap between the perception of eschatology as a branch of systematic theology and the understanding of the Hebrew Bible as theological reflections based on the ancient Israelites’ worldviews throughout historical periods. In other words, the tension comes from two different perspectives on the Bible; as a literary document of theological reflections on ancient Israel history or as the highly reliable historiography of ancient Israel from which one can read the final destiny of the universe.5 To minimize this gap, ­scholars of eschatology in the Hebrew Bible have developed two main categories: one narrowly defined category that deals with eschatological concepts as a branch of systematic theology,6 and one more broadly defined category that understands such texts as rhetorical expressions of the author’s perception of his or her present reality.7 These two categories have given rise to three different positions, two of which stem from the narrow definition (although they eventually end up at opposite conclusions) and one that stems from the broader one. The first group of scholars seeks to create a coherent Christian eschatological account from Genesis to Revelation and uses traditional eschatological vocabularies, such as death, the Messiah, redemption, final judgment, new heaven and earth, and so on.8 The second scholarly group, though it starts from the same logic as the first group, refrains from consulting any theory on ­eschatology from the Hebrew Bible because, in their view, it does not have any eschatology in this narrow sense.9 In contrast, the third group of scholars, in an attempt to

3  Walls, “Introduction,” 4. 4  Petersen, “Eschatology,” 576. 5  Cf. Conrad, “Prophet,” 312. 6 McGrath, Christian Theology, 553–577. 7  Jenni, “Eschatology,” 126–133. 8 Vos, Reformed Dogmatics. 9  Cf. also Lindblom, Servant Songs, 103.

354   Soo J. Kim include the Hebrew Bible in the discussion of eschatology, extends the definition of eschatology to include texts expressing future hope. This position, contra the first one, rejects a New Testament (NT)–oriented systematic approach but, contra the second one, does not exclude discussion of eschatological texts in the Hebrew Bible. Focusing on the liturgical aspects of ancient Israel, Sigmund Mowinckel (adhering to the second position) discards any attempt to combine the strict definition of eschatology with future hope.10 His attempt can be interpreted as an effort not to be influenced by the NT or systematic theology, yet ironically, it directs us to extract the same notion of the NT eschatology from the Hebrew Bible, as if the principle in the former should guide the interpretation of the latter. Turning to the meaning of “eschatology,” does “eschatology” in the Hebrew Bible deal with a series of final events of this world or does each book—with its own agenda— expect the continuation of this world despite various vivid depictions of “eschatological” events? In other words, do we see the authors’ pre-perception of the world to come, or is their “eschatological” rhetoric based on their conviction about the end of the present world order? Do we learn about ancient Israel’s rhetoric and their theological understandings of their era? Alternatively, do we get a glimpse of the unguaranteed reality behind that rhetoric, which, according to some scholars, reveals the divine plans beyond this world? Donald Gowan and Bill Arnold respectively affirm that eschatology should include the transformed world in this present world.11 In contrast, George Nickelsburg distinguishes sharply between the present world and the eschatological world by defining the latter as “the ultimate, decisive end to the present order and the beginning of a totally new order,” but he keeps the continuity of the present world.12 For Theodorus Vriezen, eschatology is the change into something very different, even though it would happen within the framework of history.13 Petersen and others contend that the traditional use of the term “eschatology” in the study of the Hebrew Bible has misled its readers.14 “Mislead” would be a mild evaluation, however, since this phenomenon might be the result of a directed reading based on a certain hermeneutical presupposition. The real dilemma lies in the discrepancy between the term and its content. Even if we expand the definition of eschatology with various adjectives such as “broad” or “ongoing,” the aura of the term “eschatology” as the sense of “end” or “last” cannot be easily erased. What we need, therefore, eventually is to employ a more appropriate term, fitting both the concept and the expression. Yet, in keeping with current scholarship, I shall continue to use the term “eschatology” in its adjectival and adverbial forms: “eschatological” and “eschatologically.”

10 Mowinckel, He That Cometh, 125–154. 11 Gowan, Eschatology; Arnold, “Eschatology,” 24–25. 12  Nickelsburg, “Eschatology,” 580, 596. For the full discussion on the NT’s supersession theory over the OT, see Thielecke, Glaube, 208–209. 13  Vriezen, “Prophecy,” 199. 14  Petersen, “Eschatology,” 576; Nickelsburg, “Eschatology,” 580.

Eschatology in Isaiah   355

19.2.2.  “Eschatologically Addressed Rhetorical Discourses” What does my term “eschatologically addressed rhetorical discourses” mean? As Guy Cook argues, “discourse” in the broadest sense means any language used for ­communication.15 Thus, my term makes us aware that we are dealing with a literary work, the uniquely written reflections of ideas and customs of certain periods. “Rhetorical discourse” here refers to the discourse of persuasion using the already established conventions between speaker and audience.16 The first two words, “eschatologically addressed” require more discussion. As the adverb “eschatologically” and adjective “addressed” suggest, my approach emphasizes that the eschatological language is a working rhetorical device for expressing something else underneath it rather than a straightforward description of one’s visionary experience of the afterlife or the end series of this world. Regardless of its eschatological and apocalyptic colors on the surface level of the text, the underlying conceptions deal with issues in the present world. As Arnold points out, discussions on eschatology would be better off dealing with adjectival consultation rather than independently distinct genres.17 This chapter defines characteristics of “eschatological” throughout the prophetic literature in general and in the book of Isaiah in particular with three adjectives: universal, ultimate, and radical.18 “Universal” (spatial) means that the place of the events covers the whole world, whereas “ultimate” (temporal) gives a determinative aspect as final, thus there is no room for the reversal. “Radical” reflects not only the extreme degree of transformation from “the intrinsic depravity of the present world,”19 but also the reader’s anxious waiting for the divine interference. Because the peaceful utopia shall come after passing the judgment period, the text encourages its readers to endure that period.

19.2.3.  The Matter of Time: Tantalizing Temporality Time is an unavoidable topic in eschatology. The temporality of the book of Isaiah indicates that there are more than three typical time segments—past, present, and future. To make different rhetorical and theological meanings, Isaiah adopts a dynamic variety in 15 Cook, Discourse, 6. 16 Iser, Act of Reading, 34. For further discussion of “author,” “audience,” “conventions,” “fiction,” and “reading,” see Booth, Rhetoric; Culler, Structuralist Poetics; Tompkins, Reader Response Criticism; Suleiman and Crosman, Reader; Mailloux, Interpretive Conventions. For the biblical accounts, see also Fowler, Loaves and Fishes; “Reader,” 31–53; Resseguie, “ReaderResponse,” 307–324; Petersen, “Reader,” 38–51; Detweiler, Reader Response Approaches. 17  Arnold, “Eschatology,” 34; Lindblom, Prophecy, 422. 18  In the same context, Petersen, “Eschatology,” 576, uses “radical,” “cosmic,” and “fundamental difference” as key words for the characteristics of eschatology. 19  Arnold, “Eschatology,” 34.

356   Soo J. Kim temporality including the distant past, near past (or present perfect up to the discourse time), present, impending future, near future, and distant future. In the earlier chapters of Isaiah, the impending future frame serves to threaten the literary audience regarding the fall of Jerusalem and Judah to the invaders. In contrast, the near future frame projects the vengeance against those invaders. The book shows various editorial seams and diachronic layers that make readers aware that the characters of the book were not standing on the same temporality. The realization of this phenomenon is crucial for our discussion because the earlier authors’ future references, even using the eschatological images and languages, can be viewed by the later authors as referring to the past, either fulfilled or unfulfilled. The authors of Second Isaiah and Third Isaiah, for example, might not treat all eschatological texts in First Isaiah as prophecies to be fulfilled a long time later. Instead, the authors must have attempted to interpret their time as the time of the fulfillment of the earlier prophecies, including the eschatologically addressed rhetorical discourses. If the discourse shows dystopia, the narrated future of the earlier characters often becomes the present to the following ­characters. When people lament their long-time loss of the temple and the land in Isa 64:10–11, for example, those dystopian misfortunes greatly overlap with the earlier warning of the impending future in Isa 5:25–30. Then, how about the future in utopia?20 Unlike the future in dystopia, the future in utopia does not readily come to life for the later characters and readers. Tantalizingly enough, hope in the utopian future is still the future to come, no matter where the readers stand. With the use of eschatological language for the distant future, readers of all periods find themselves in the eternal present or unending liminal period. Those discourses might be originally designated to stand in the unreachable time for anybody so that this picture even produces otherworldly senses for the reader. Accordingly, the famous utopian eschatological texts—all nations’ streaming to Mount Zion to learn Torah in 2:2–4, a peaceful holy mountain in 11:6–9, and a new heaven and earth in 65:17–25—are read as the utopian future by readers in any era. These inaccessible utopian (including nostalgic) images are exclusively attributed to the distant past or future. As such, they differ from the range of dystopian illustrations that cover the near past through the present to the near future—that is, time frames that are accessible and relevant to readers. The past works similarly. While the near past is expressed as the present perfect, which has influenced the discourse time, the distant past appears too far away to reach. As we shall see in the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, the dystopian past is used in First Isaiah as warnings or even threatening tools to call to repentance. Thus, beyond the readers’ historical memory, the author brings the collective memory of the image of Sodom and Gomorrah close enough to readers.21 In contrast, 20  As we shall see in more detail, “dystopia” means the intensive expression on the dysfunctional, chaotic, and violent place to imagine, based on the sense of the radical wrongness of the present world, while “utopia” means the maximum ideal places to imagine, rather than the impossible and nonexisting place. Cf. More, Utopia; Ben Zvi, Utopia and Dystopia. 21  For the study of collective memory and historical memory, see Halbwachs, Collective Memory; Durkheim, “Elementary Forms,” 136–138.

Eschatology in Isaiah   357 the utopian past, such as the Garden of Eden imagery or the divine victory in the Exodus battles, is used to recall God’s sincerity and sovereign power and to encourage the audience (especially the readers of Second Isaiah) to return to Jerusalem. Moving to the present or present perfect, the book of Isaiah begins, following the typical pattern of the prophetic literature of the Hebrew Bible, by evaluating the present crisis: the people have abandoned the way of Yhwh and corrupted the Jerusalem t­ emple. In between the distant past, when God had showed his face in kindness, and the distant future, when God will come back to them, the people should endure the absence of God as Yhwh hides his face. In other words, the present remains liminal in tension and crisis. Interestingly, Isaiah conceptually assigns one person’s life span from the near past to the near future—no matter how long it would take practically. The trial time is short enough to say that the suffering people and the people in the restoration periods can be identical. By doing so, theoretically, the very same character as a remnant can experience all the sequences of the divine plan, from judgment to restoration. This homogeneous logic is also well expressed in the destiny of Jerusalem/Zion, who will not die in Yhwh’s judgment but instead be abandoned for a certain period. This continuity emphasizes the importance of transformation as a key to opening the eschatologically addressed utopian era. When the Isaian remnants appeal to Yhwh to re-enact the utopian memory, Yhwh in turn asks them to be transformed into a faithful servant to implement the projected restoration. Thanks to the gradual growth of the book throughout centuries, the temporality of Isaiah and readers’ identifications of their eras are moving dynamically. The task of the character to make the transformation possible is always waiting for the reader’s activation to become a suitable character in the projected “­eschatological” community. The observation of the dynamic interaction that comes from the flexible applications of the present situation and the tantalizing utopian future is the essential key to understanding these eschatological discourses.22 In sum, the divine judgment in the impending future is set up based on the impossible self-transformation of the past wrongdoings, while the anticipated transformation is in the distant future. In the meantime, readers in the present time frame are asked to live in the unending liminal periods and to act as agents to implement the project. Finally, we can clarify several temporal terms in this understanding. Like other prophetic books, Isaiah uses conventional time markers including “on that day,” “day of Yhwh,” “after many days,” or “on the latter days.” These terms must be discussed together with the spatial dimensions; thus, in this section, I shall briefly mention the “latter/later days”—that is, the most controversial term in the discussion of eschatology. Unlike other temporal remarks that denote both future warning and salvation, the term ‫ אחרית הימים‬is used only positively to designate a blessed future for the target audience in Isaiah. The expression “after many days” (‫ )מרב ימים‬in 24:22 should be understood in the same manner as a day of vindication for Jerusalem. Marvin Sweeney points out that the tendency to interpret this phrase as the end of history is influenced by the

22  For the role of the author of Third Isaiah, see Stromberg, Isaiah.

358   Soo J. Kim Greek version of the term en tais eschatais emerais.23 Hans Wildberger has compared the Hebrew expressions with cognate expressions in other Semitic languages and emphasizes the variation of its connotative meanings, including the end days of the world. Yet Wildberger reaches the same conclusion (a future time in general) by emphasizing its appearance in the pre-exilic passages.24 Nickelsburg understands the term “latter/later days” as the day of “decisive break with the present.”25 Utopias in this timeframe are thus to be this-world events in the distant future, not in the otherworld.

19.3.  Dystopia as the Ground for Transformation Due to the high expectation in the book of Isaiah of Jerusalem being the center of the universe, both the punishment of Jerusalem and its vindication have considerable impact. Thus the language of the judgment and restoration stretches beyond the regional or national level to encompass the whole universe, fitting into the category of “universal.” Walter Brueggemann understands this dystopia as the necessary process to redress the existing violence.26 In this section, we will see how the book of Isaiah uses temporal and spatial expressions of dyspian concepts for making the ground of transformation.

19.3.1.  Making Dystopia through the Temporal Comparison Richard Hiers understands dystopia as the classical prophet’s warning upon Israel and Judah, which takes the form of either natural disasters or military invasions due to their covenant breaking.27 His account does not reflect the full picture, however, since the same spatial remark dystopia denotes at least two distinctive targets of God’s wrath: Israel and Judah in the impending future and the nations in the near future.

19.3.1.1.  Dystopia as Warning: Judgment upon Jerusalem in the Impending Future The term “the Day of Yhwh” most typically conveys the eschatological judgment and salvation upon Jerusalem and Judah. Although the exact term is attested only in the Oracle against Babylon (13:6, 9) in the book of Isaiah, variant forms appear in other texts, including “Yhwh has a day” or “the day of X of Yhwh.” In 2:11–21, for example,

23  Sweeney, “Eschatology,” 184–185. 25  Nickelsburg, “Eschatology,” 592. 27  Hiers, “Day,” 82.

24 Wildberger, Isaiah 1–12, 88. 26 Brueggemann, Theology, 244.

Eschatology in Isaiah   359 the statement “on that day” conveys that the entire earth will become the target of God’s wrath on behalf of Jerusalem. The day of Yhwh is clearly designed to bring down any proud nation. It is, however, equally clear that the destinies of the punished nations are not comparable. When the judgment is directed to Jerusalem, the punishment eventually becomes penultimate as a necessary process toward the purification, as illustrated by the judgment passage in 2:5–4:1 and the ensuing restoration passage in 4:2–6. In other words, the ultimate salvation of Zion follows the ultimate punishment upon those nations (cf. 10:12, 25; 27:7; 47:6). In terms of a rhetorical strategy, this impending crisis is used as a call to repentance, as well as a theodicy regarding the tragic events of Judah.

19.3.1.2. Dystopia as Vindication: Judgment upon Judah’s Enemies in the Near Future  Richard Howells’s catchphrase “one person’s utopia is another’s dystopia”28 is an apt description of Isa 14, where the exiles’ return to Jerusalem (14:1–2) occurs in the middle of the punishment of Babylon. Regarding this “dystopia making judgment,” the Oracles against Nations in Isaiah often show both historical and metaphorical dimensions. The days of vengeance upon Babylon (13:1–22; 47:9) and Edom (34:8; 63:1–6), for example, designate in parallel the year of recompense for Zion. For instance, the description of the punishment upon Babylonia (the chief among all nations in the sixth century bce) in 13:10–13 uses eschatological and even apocalyptic images such as the end of heaven and the hosts of heaven.29 Meanwhile, in both Isaiah and other prophetic books, Edom often represents not only the nation of Edom but also serves as a symbol for all nations.30 Speaking of Edom as a representative of all nations, prophecies in 34:6–17 and 63:1–6 are in several aspects eschatologically addressed discourses.31 First, the oracles focus more on punishment than on its reasons. Second, the punishment is depicted as the planned blood-drenched sacrifice to vindicate Israel. Third, the punishment does not contain the possibility of restoration; that is, the judgment of Edom is final and universal, and it functions as a case in point to teach all nations.32 Judah and Edom form opposite parallels, where Edom is a foil character or Judah’s “proximate other.”33 The juxtaposed presentations of the fall of Edom (Isa 34) and the rise of Zion (Isa 35) illustrate this relationship well.34 In contrast, the other nations are depicted in the different dystopian language. Assyria and Egypt, for instance, will eventually survive and even become Judah’s allies (cf. 19:23–25). In other words, the dystopian judgment would work as penultimate rhetoric to them, too. Isa 24–27, using “on that day” (‫)ביום ההוא‬, constitutes a more explicit metaphorical case. Here, the host of heaven and the kings on earth together become the target of God’s 28 Howells, Critical Theory, 8. 29 Bordjadze, Darkness Visible. 30 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 445; Nogalski, “Another Nation,” 115–134. 31  For the parallel studies between the two passages, see Vermeylen, Du prophète, 441–442. 32 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 443–444. 33 Irudayaraj, Violence. 34 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 436. Cf. Levenson, “Temple,” 275–298; Levenson, Sinai.

360   Soo J. Kim punishment (24:21). Mythological language, including the Leviathan (27:1), is employed to maximize the cosmic effect of Yhwh’s universal ruling through the battle.35 Willem Beuken identifies Mount Zion as the place of Yhwh’s judgment, where his sword (66:6) will defeat the chaos monster Leviathan (27:1), the nation Edom (34:5–6), and anyone who forsook his holy mountain (65:11).36

19.3.2.  Making Dystopia through the Spatial Notions Many figurative presentations of dystopia in Isaiah fall into two spatial categories: becoming “like” someplace or going “into” somewhere. Images such as the land of confusion, Sodom and Gomorrah, and the desolated wilderness, belong in the first category: something will become like these images. In contrast, the image of Sheol belongs in the second category: it denotes the ultimate dystopia that swallows up everything. The chaotic inversion of the creation order is to become like the land of confusion. To answer our thematic question—does this image depict the end of this world or not—I suggest recalling the aftermath of the flood in Gen 9. Even at the discourse level, did the flood cause the end of this world and did God create an entirely new world? The answer is no: even though the flood was a very severe universal-level disaster, creatures ­continue their life on the same ground—that is, in this world. Likewise, Isa 13:2–16 depicts the land of confusion at the universal level, yet as the punishment will fall (only) upon sinners, there must be survivors (13:12). Together, these passages suggest that this chaotic description does not project the end of the world; more likely, it predicts the fall of Babylonia by Media/Persia. Isa 24 likewise speaks of a few survivors (24:6) in the midst of the eschatological shaking (24:1–4). This chaotic depiction employs eschatological narratives, among them the shaking and uprooting of the earth (2:19; 21); the shaking of mountains (5:25; 13:13; 14:3, 9, 16; 23:11; 28:21; 32:10, 11); and the covering of the earth with darkness due to the absence of the light (5:30). These descriptions claim that Yhwh himself will uproot the firm universal orders that he established at creation. Dystopian depictions are thus the eschatologically addressed punishment. They serve to rationalize the nullification of the firm (conditional) covenant: the people broke the solemn c­ ovenant first. The second dystopian metaphor is Sodom and Gomorrah, the well-known ­imagery in the collective memory of a condemned nation. Genesis tells that Yhwh turned Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes using a natural disaster from heaven (Gen 19:24–25). This natural catastrophe story left a stronger impression in people’s memory than what destructions by foreign invaders did, and , with its universal, ultimate, and radical characteristics, thus came to serve as an image of the eschatological dystopia. This memory is referred to throughout Isaiah. Whereas God’s mercy enabled Judah and Jerusalem to survive such a severe punishment (1:8–10), Babylonia could not avoid it (13:19–22). 35  De Vries, Old Revelation, 38–63, esp. 45.

36  Beuken, “Sovereign Rule,” 106–107.

Eschatology in Isaiah   361 Moreover, the description of Edom in Isa 30:33 and 34:6–17 employs the ultimate destruction language of Sodom and Gomorrah (pitch, sulphur, smoke, and fire) and it reuses the language of countercreation (“confusion” and “emptiness”) from Genesis. The third simile, the image of the desolated wilderness, is ubiquitous in this dystopia, and is applied not only to Jerusalem, Judah, and Israel, but also to all other nations. The detailed characteristics include desolation (1:7); lack of water (1:30; 19:5–6); lack of shade, and being hot, dry, and empty (22:18). The wilderness plays a unique role in Isaiah. Whereas the wilderness in the original Exodus narratives denotes a liminal place of discipline that Israel must traverse, the wilderness in Isaiah is turned into a symbol of abandonment. In other words, the returnees will not experience the wilderness period in the “second” Exodus. Instead, as we shall see, this wilderness image serves as the counter-image to that of the well-watered garden. Turning to the second category, Sheol is the abode of ultimate death. There are parallels between the use of Sheol in Isaiah and in ancient Near Eastern myths, among them the myth of Athtar’s fall in the Ugaritic Baal Cycle37 and Enkidu’s journey in the Sumerian Gilgamesh Cycle.38 As Michael Heiser highlights, however, one main difference is the Isaianic emphasis of Sheol as the place of the rebel’s permanent expulsion.39 Like Jerusalem, Sheol is both a place and a persona.40 The book of Isaiah presents the hierarchical orders along with the vertical lines of the heights from the new heaven to Sheol.41 As a place, Sheol is the metaphoric indicator of the lowest and farthest place.42 This place is known as Hades in Greek and Sheol in Hebrew, denoting the “pit,” “cistern,” or simply the “earth” or “underneath.”43 This abode of the dead appears throughout Isaiah: in the woe oracle (5:14), the oracle against Babylon (14:9, 11, 15), and the judgment against Judah (28:15, 18). This long-existing Sheol now opens its mouth and swallows the condemned people. In parallel, Sheol constitutes an imaginable independent persona—namely, Yhwh’s arch enemy. Based on the lack of a definite article before the word, Walter Zimmerli conjectures that Sheol is a proper noun.44 These two characteristics of Sheol are intertwined and together depict the opposite of restoration. First, Sheol in the woe oracle in 5:14 is the place of extremely torture for those who are greedy; it denotes exile far from the presence of God. This description is related to the images of the punishment of Jerusalem and Judah in 5:24–30. As we shall

37  Gray, “Horon,” 27–34; Smith, Origins; Matthews and Benjamin, Parallels, 166. 38  Black et al., “Gilgamesh, Enkidu and the Netherworld,” 31-40; Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 287–288. 39  Heiser, “Mythological Provenance,” 368. 40  Lewis, “Dead,” 102. 41 Tuan, Space. For the inversion character of Death the Swallower in ancient Israel and the ancient Near East, see Hays, “Swallowing Death,” 103–116. 42  “Metaphoric” and “Indicator” together suggest that we must not apply the illustrations to the literal descriptions by assuming that they would actually happen in the future. Those are conventional as well as creative metaphoric expressions. Since they were, we assume, conventional, one can only assert that they reflect the worldview of the book of Isaiah. 43 Johnston, Shades. 44 Zimmerli, Ezekiel, 2:152; Wildberger, Isaiah 13–27, 60.

362   Soo J. Kim see, the very image of swallowing God’s wicked people is ultimately reversed by Yhwh’s swallowing up Death in 25:8.45 Sheol also appears in the Oracle against Babylon in 14:3–23 (14:9, 11, 15), a text presumably written with the Persian defeat of Babylon in mind.46 The dictator is placed in Sheol, and peace comes on earth (14:7). The contrasting depiction reaches its climax in the description of the Babylonian king, called the Morning Star, who attempts to reach the furthest spot, the Mount of Assembly (14:12–14), but instead ends up at the bottom of the pit, Sheol (14:15–20). In identifying the characteristic of Sheol, readers experience discrepancy due to the mixed usages between 14:9 and 14:18. In the earlier situation depicted in 14:9, all dead kings resided in Sheol and welcome the Babylonian king when he comes there. In the context of 14:18, however, dead kings rest in peace in their graves while the Babylonian king remains a wandering spirit. So, while Sheol used to be a realm of the dead (14:9), now (14:14) it represents the place for the one who should be isolated and erased from the memory of the living world. The third context of Sheol occurs in the prophetic judgment against the leaders of Judah in 28:14–22.47 There, the prophet condemns them for being arrogant since they were proud of their contract with death/Sheol (14:15). Sweeney interprets this passage within the context of Isaiah’s dissuasion of Hezekiah’s attempt to make political alliances with foreign nations against Assyria in the late eighth century bce.48 As Francis Landy argues, the severe degree of the condemnation, using language like Sheol, suggests that the text intends the reader to perceive the seriousness of the people’s rebellion when they formed alliances with other nations.49 So far, we have noted that dystopia serves both to rationalize the national crises as a necessary purification process and to initiate the restoration era for the remnants. The eschatological language of dystopia eventually serves the purpose of depicting Israel’s transformation—that is, the overall theme of Isaiah.

19.4.  Utopia in the Projected Transformation As utopian presentations usually appear in the projected time and the inaccessible space, in conceptualizing utopian worlds, the book of Isaiah also utilizes many spatial expressions in the nostalgic past or the distant future. In this section, we will see how the author uses the utopian concept to reverse the earlier dystopian warnings and curses,

45  Lewis, “Dead,” 103. 46 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 213–214. 47  Blenkinsopp, “Judah’s Covenant,” 472–483; Stewart, “Covenant,” 375–377. 48 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 367–368; Kaiser, Isaiah 13–39, 250–252. 49  Landy, “Tracing the Voice,” 141.

Eschatology in Isaiah   363 and eventually to restore Jerusalem and its residents. We will also recognize the book’s strong attachment on Jerusalem and remnants in this utopian depiction.

19.4.1.  Interwoven and Parallel Effects From its very beginning, the book of Isaiah interweaves presentations of judgment and restoration upon Jerusalem and its people. Even in the midst of the condemnation of the immoral and impious lives of the city residents, Isa 1 includes the restoration plan for Jerusalem/Judah (1:26–27). Isa 2 shows the same pattern, yet in the opposite order, by starting with the ideal vision of Jerusalem/Mount Zion as the ­center of the universe. The word of Yhwh shall come from the city (2:3) and the justice of God will be practiced from there (2:4). Although Gowan points out that the unique description of the ideal Zion in 2:2–4 lies in the absence of transition from judgment,50 his comment appears to reflect an unawareness of this interwoven rhetoric. In contrast, paying attention to the larger structure of Isa 2 which mainly illustrates reality of the city, Sweeney detects in these three verses an emphasis on the ideal city role. Accordingly, Jerusalem needs first to go through the purging process to achieve this honorable position.51 After condemning Jerusalem up to its fall in Isa 3, Isa 4 resumes its restoration with the “remnants” who shall experience dystopias and utopias in Jerusalem/ Israel (4:2–4). As we shall see, this remnant concept plays a pivotal role in connecting the two eras, that is, the time of judgment in the impending future and the time of restoration in the distant future. Chapters 24–27, known as the Proto-Apocalypse of Isaiah, are not an exception. The lament over fallen Jerusalem in 27:7–11 is followed in 27:12–13 by the promise of the exiles’ return. The announcement of Yhwh’s help for the remnant (28:5–6) appears in the middle of the announcement of Yhwh’s judgment against Ephraim (28:1–4; 28:7–8). This interwoven strategy does not end in First Isaiah; the conclusion of the book eventually also shows this juxtaposition of hope (66:22–23) and judgment (66:24). This rhetorical and theological strategy aims to persuade the audience/readers. In its performative dimension, the presenter can use this up-and-down sequence as two contrastive options: the way of life and the way of death. By the same token, these in­ter­woven passages implicitly urge the reader to choose the way of restoration, not destruction. This is a typical rhetorical convention to convince the audience (cf. Deuteronomy and Ps 1). Turning to parallel passages, both straightforward and reversal, Isaiah is filled with recurring themes and illustrations of the same topics. Whereas Barry Webb points out that Isaiah begins (1:2) and ends (66:22) with heaven and earth as witnesses,52 Ronald Clements locates the thematic pair of Isa 2–4 in Isa 60 or 62.53 According to Sweeney’s intertextual reading of Isaiah from the perspective of the Exodus tradition, restoration of Zion and the people in Isa 35 and 62:10–12 can be read as the fulfillment 50 Gowan, Eschatology, 11, 56. 51  Sweeney, “Book of Isaiah,” 64, 89. 52  Webb, “Zion,” 68. 53  Clements, “Light,” 35.

364   Soo J. Kim of Yhwh’s invitation of Jacob in 2:5 to join the nations’ streaming to Mount Zion.54 Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer further highlights the parallel discourse about Jerusalem in 40:1–5 and 60:1–2.55 Such paired presentations suggest that the book of Isaiah employs radically contrastive languages to show the stark difference/disconnection between judgment and restoration, punishment and salvation, and present and future. In dealing with these prophecies and fulfillments, or restoration after the judgment, the book of Isaiah often uses “eschatological” expressions—universal, radical, and ultimate. Accordingly, images of both dystopia and utopia appear in the metaphorically constructed spaces in the eschatological texts, in the same way that typical prophecies of salvation and doom often appear together. Isaiah contains many examples of reversal prophecies: regarding the status of Jerusalem and the people’s destiny and behaviors. In the present context, I shall focus on Yhwh’s victory over Death/Sheol and chaos. The woe oracle in Isa 5:14 describes how Sheol opens its mouth toward the greedy. Later, in 28:14–18, the prophet not only mocks the leaders of Jerusalem who brag about their covenant with Sheol but also warns that their covenant will soon be nullified. Ultimately, in 25:8, Sheol, rather than being rebuked, is swallowed by Yhwh who reverses all the destinies.56 The disappearance of Death is often interpreted in the context of the NT concept of resurrection of the dead.57 Within the book of Isaiah, however, the relationship between Sheol and Yhwh focuses more on peace and security, as well as justice and retribution, in this world. As such, it emphasizes Yhwh’s complete control over Death—that is, the culmination of all the factors hindering shalom. Secondly, chaos and its counterpart, a new heaven and earth, together stress the dramatic transformation. Isa 51:6–8 depicts God’s justice and salvation as the basis for God’s unfailing covenantal relationship and reminds the reader of the contrastive picture of the shaken heaven and earth. To end the chaos, which Yhwh himself had ordered for the sake of punishing Jerusalem/Judah (45:7), he will fix the shaken earth and rolled up skies and transform them into a new heaven and earth (65:17; 66:22). Abraham Sung-ho Oh reads Isa 65:20–23 as “a deliberate reversal of the covenantal woes” in Deut 28:30 and 39.58 As Richard Middleton argues, this “this-worldly prophetic expectation” is the visualization of the universalized healed and redeemed community in the rebuilt Jerusalem.59 The concept and the expression of a new heaven and earth are both eschatological, as they are universal, ultimate, and radical. As James Muilenburg maintains, this new world is the radically changed situation of the current world rather than the replaced present world.60

54 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 55, 94–96, 435, 451. 55  Tiemeyer, “Continuity,” 30. 56  Lewis, “Dead,” 103. 57  E.g., John 11; 1 Cor 15. 58 Oh, Heavens, 206. 59 Middleton, New Heaven, 24. 60  Muilenburg, “Book of Isaiah,” 754–755.

Eschatology in Isaiah   365

19.4.2.  Two Fixed Points: Jerusalem and Remnants If the book of Isaiah is designed to exalt the sovereign and Holy One of Israel, knowing his plan is an equally important task for the reader. In dealing with the dynamic and complicated history, from the Syro-Ephraimite crisis to the return of the Babylonian exiles, the book of Isaiah sets up two fixed points: the restoration of Jerusalem and the existence of the remnants. Accordingly, both Jerusalem and the remnants should be recognizable and called by their original names. The book of Isaiah presupposes a target audience who will experience the entire purification process, from warning to disaster, from disaster to exile, and from exile to return with hope for the future. When we read that the “former things will be forgotten” (65:17), we need to ask in whose memory they shall be forgotten. The new things are introduced as the fulfillment of long-time prophecies that people have heard but not yet seen (48:6). The same principle is applied to Jerusalem: Jerusalem in Isaiah is abandoned and isolated, but she will eventually be re-established by her returning husband Yhwh. Understanding these two fixed points enhances the concept of continuity in Isaiah, where surviving Jerusalem and remnants become witnesses of God’s power and sincerity.

19.4.2.1.  Jerusalem: Space and Persona Reading Isaiah as the “Drama of Zion,” Ulrich Berges points out that Jerusalem undergoes a dramatic transformation from being the place of judgment to “a place of eschatological salvation.”61 The utopian depiction of the city of Jerusalem mainly features one of two images: the signpost to the nations (the light on the mountain as the source of life and truth) and the ideal dwelling place (the well-watered garden). 19.4.2.1.1.  The Light on the Holy Mountain As chaos is created from the absence of light in the city, so the arrival of utopian New Jerusalem requires the bringing back of that light. Clements, commenting on Isa 35:1–10, points out that the vivacious image of New Jerusalem as the “Metropolis of Light and Healing” is one of the main themes of biblical eschatology.62 In 60:1–4, light upon New Jerusalem in the midst of darkness alludes to the ninth plague in the Exodus narrative. Along similar lines, the wilderness-related imagery (tabernacle, cloud, fire, smoke, and Mount Zion) in Isa 4:5–6 recalls Mount Sinai in Exod 19 and Num 10.63 Nations will gather and come to Zion when she shines the light (60:1–22; 61:9). They will serve for Jerusalem (61:5) while Israel will be the priests of Yhwh (61:6) as an example to the world (62:2). Understanding Isa 62 as the fulfillment of the eschatological expectations of the earlier chapters, Oh describes restored Zion as the heavenly Temple city, located in New Heaven and Earth. There, the broken covenant will be restored; vindicated servants will eat and drink with joy; nature will be changed into paradise, and Yhwh will rule as 61  Berges, “Isaiah,” 155–157. 62  Clements, “Light,” 57–69; Jerusalem, 223. 63 Gowan, Eschatology, 12; Arnold, “Eschatology,” 28; Sweeney, “Book of Isaiah,” 64, 89.

366   Soo J. Kim the universal king.64 Notably, these activities fit an earthly city. Moreover, the notions of no harm on the holy mountain (11:9), the strong fortress (26:1), God’s protection of Jerusalem like birds hovering (31:5), God’s judgment from Zion (31:9), and the unmovable security of Jerusalem (33:19–20) support continuity and the ultimate security of Jerusalem once it has been set up after the exile.65 19.4.2.1.2.  Well-Watered Garden and Vineyard In parallel, the New Jerusalem is conceptualized as a well-watered garden (58:10–12) or a restored vineyard (27:2–6), surrounded by the wall of salvation and praise of the gate (60:18). As Patricia Tull argues, Isaiah utilizes agricultural images as signs of human conditions and uses them to denote the return to the creation status (in Genesis).66 These images depict the remarkable change of Jerusalem in 62:4, from ‫“( עזובה‬forsaken”) and ‫“( ׁשממה‬desolate”) to ‫“( חפצי־בה‬my delight is in her”) and ‫בעולה‬ (“married”). As Middleton points out, the picture shows Yhwh’s twofold salvation: the deliverance from what impedes people’s well-being and the resulting restoration.67 Yhwh not only sentences the decisive judgment upon his vineyard in 5:6–7, the same deity also confirms its ultimate restoration after slaughtering the Serpent in Isa 27. The wilderness and the dry land shall be transformed into springs of water and blossom, and healing will happen to all the people in this process (35:1–6; 41:18–20). Emotional transformation will also take place—the growling in the midst of darkness (5:30) will turn into the joyful drawing the water from the walls of salvation (12:9)—and people will recognize that the Holy One of Israel is responsible for this restoration (41:20; 43:19–21). Thus, Jerusalem shall finally be transformed from being a city of blood into a city of righteousness. This transformation and recognition, in turn, emphasizes the author’s concept of continuity.

19.4.2.2. Remnants The concept of remnants in the book of Isaiah is broad enough to embrace all characters who get the benefits of the restoration, including Jacob-Israel, the Servants, Daughter Zion, and even the converted foreigners and nations. Accordingly, the uniqueness of Isaiah regarding the qualification of remnants lies in its mixed messages which make interpreters hesitate to reach the simple conclusion. The first mixed message stems from ambiguity. Depending on the denotation of the semantic meaning of ‫ׁשוב‬, as physical returning to Zion or as repenting in Zion, the remnants in 1:27 can be either a case of “remnants will become righteous later” or “the right­eous will become the remnants.” The ambiguity occurs also in 4:3 (‫)והיה הנשאר בציון והנותר בירושלם קדוש יאמר לו כל־הכתוב לחיים בירושלם‬. On the one hand, “those who are called holy” may be a select group among the remnants in Jerusalem/Zion (e.g., NIV and AV). On the other hand, the lack of preposition between the three clauses suggests that all three groups—remnants, holy people, and the recorded ones—are one identified group (e.g., 64 Oh, Heavens, 137. 66  Tull, “Persistent,” 20.

65 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 452. 67 Middleton, New Heaven, chap. 4

Eschatology in Isaiah   367 ESV, JPS, NRS). Walter Brueggemann reads this verse with Ezek 9:10 (those whose names are written down for death) and identifies the survivors with those written ones for life in Jerusalem.68 Meanwhile, the symbolic name of Isaiah’s son sh’ar yashub in 7:3 indicates the geographical selectivity of the remnants (cf. also 8:16) by identifying them as the survivors in the turmoil. Isa 52:1–12 expresses the same notion by excluding the uncircumcised and defiled people. The metaphoric use of darkness-light images is closely related to the ethical standards of the book of Isaiah.69 The context of 3:10–11 upholds the distinct destinies of the righteous and the wicked in accordance with their deeds. Isa 59:20 uses both ethnic and ethical qualifications to differentiate between those who depart from the sins and the rest of the children of Jacob. Finally, the gloomy end of the book (65:1–7; 66:3–6, 24) suggests that the eschatological vision is not universally inclusive to save all but instead distinguishes between different groups.70 In parallel, 56:3 and 66:2 go beyond the ethnic group of Israel and include anyone who joins Yhwh, mourns in their heart, and fear the word of God. In contrast, in Isa 4:2–4 the holiness of the remnants will be achieved by God’s initiative purification of their filthy garments rather than by any human qualification. Isaiah often depicts the arrival of the utopian era as independent of human repentance. As Blaženka Scheuer asserts, repentance may not be the condition for salvation; rather, it plays a motivating role to renew the relationship with God.71 A synchronic reading of Isa 8 and 9, for example, leads us to recognize that the dramatic change from gloom and darkness to light and gladness will happen suddenly to the land of Israel. Jeremiah Unterman explains this inconsistent phenomenon as the different ethical demands in the pre-exilic (strong demand), exilic (no or little emphasis on the repentance), and post-exilic (reappearance of high standards of ethics or repentance) situations.72 Gowan also points out this tendency in his analysis of the ethical dimensions in Second Isaih and Third Isaiah.73 If this is the case, we need to understand the absence of ethical request in the exilic period as the (momentary) disappearance of the precondition for the restoration but not its total nullification. Using Gerhard Hasel’s historical category of remnant,74 Ernst Jenni assigns the eschatological remnant notion to the post-exilic period.75 In contrast, Paul Kim identifies it as the self-identification of the “we” group as the righteous people rather than the historically remaining group in the land during the exilic period. He furthermore concludes that the remnant concept identifies the prophet’s faithful followers as Zion’s children.76 Webb also argues that the remnant concept in Isaiah is not static; it has instead 68 Brueggemann, Isaiah 1–39, 42. 69 Koenen, Ethik, 153; Beuken, Jesaja, 164; Jenner, “Worship,” 129–133. 70 Clements, Jerusalem, 35. 71 Scheuer, Return, 131. 72 Unterman, Justice, 141–177. 73 Gowan, Theology, 175. 74 Hasel, Remnant. Meanwhile, Tiemeyer, Comfort, 219–220, suggests that both Zion-Jerusalem and Jacob-Israel represent the Judahite community. 75  Jenni, “Remnant,” 32–33. 76 Kim, Reading Isaiah, 17–18; A similar concept of the exhortation to the insiders can be found in Sweeney’s commentary, Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 91.

368   Soo J. Kim ­ eveloped dynamically alongside the historical stages of ancient Israel and works as a d vehicle to transform the people of God.77 Following Kim, it is not necessary to limit their presence to the post-exilic era; rather, I would emphasize that the concept of remnants itself suggests that the book of Isaiah is interested in this world, not the other world. Beyond their qualifications, the remnants in Isaiah also show the dramatic transformation of Israel from being the target of God’s wrath to becoming his servants. Regardless of the identification and roles of the Messiah figure, Servant(s), JacobIsrael, or Zion-Jerusalem, survivors are now in the remnant group.78 The ministry of Yhwh’s servant in 42:1 forms a parallel to the prophet’s calling of Jacob to guide the nations to Yhwh by being a light of the nations on Mount Zion (2:5) and to the Messianic figure (Isa 9).79 Compared to the blind and deaf servants in 42:18–22, the servant in 42:1–4 is indeed an ideal figure.80 As both Westermann and Sweeney have pointed out, the nations are waiting for the transformed Jacob/Israel to carry out this longplanned mission.81 The book of Isaiah restricts the role of the human agent for the sake of exalting the almighty Yhwh on whom salvation entirely depends. As Petersen argues, Isaiah does not emphasize the restoration of the Davidic dynasty, but instead portrays Cyrus (45:1) or even God himself as a universal king. When the book nonetheless refers to the Davidic covenant, it is in a much more democratized form that involves the whole nation (55:3).82

19.5.  Theological Purposes: Moving on to the New Era Now In this section, we will finally ask theological meanings of the eschatologically addressed rhetorical discourses. The questions include how the book of Isaiah embraces all generations of readers and encourages the ethical life to those who live in the liminal situatoins.

19.5.1.  Discontinuity within Continuity Indeed, a matter of continuity/discontinuity should be determined according to the ­status of the characters. Do the discourses illustrate one’s afterlife, or will the later generations of the literary audience experience the eschatologically expressed new era in 77  Webb, “Zion in Transformation,” 73. 78  For the dynamic relationship between the Messianic figure and the servant and his offspring in Deutero- and Trito-Isaiah, see Oh, Heavens, 134. 79 Gowan, Eschatology, 35. 80  Wilcox and Paton-Williams, “Servant Songs,” 79–102. 81 Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66; Westermann, Isaiah 40–66, 424. 82  Petersen, “Eschatology,” 581.

Eschatology in Isaiah   369 this world? Who would suffer and who would appreciate all the post-eschatological benefits? Middleton argues that the notion of an otherworldly destiny is derived from a Platonic concept.83 Above all, we can understand the prevalent continuity in Isaiah as a manifestation of the strong tendency to preserve Jerusalem/Mount Zion, which is unpacked both in spatial and temporal dimensions. Spatially, the New Jerusalem continues on earth (as in the land of Israel). Temporally, despite being desolated, Zion continues her life during the judgment time (40:9; 52:1–2). This continuity is sharply contrasted in Ezekiel, where Jerusalem, the wife of Yhwh, receives the death sentence and never regains her name. This concept also appears in Isa 40–66 in the divine role as go’el (“redeemer of kin”) of the Babylonian captives. As we observed in the discussion of temporality, the text is pushing the readers to move on to the eschatologically addressed new era now, not postponing the move to the next generations or to their afterlife. This perpetual liminality invites us to read Isaiah as the unending dialogue among generations, that is, between the earlier and later authors with their audiences.84 To use an analogy from our time, this is like a Facebook post, titled “Divine Plan for the Transformation of Jerusalem,” with innumerable replies, likes, and dislikes. Respondents are not all contemporaries of the author but include many trans-generations. The relationship between the reader and the character in terms of identification plays a crucial role. No matter what the historical time line, the audience “you” in, for example, Isa 1 is treated as the same person “you” in Isa 66. This almost unlimited extended identification by employing continuity enables readers to adopt the author’s exhortation as their own ethics and the promise as their own hopeful future. This ethical exhortation is the underlying themes and intentions of the text behind the eschatologically addressed rhetorical discourses. These discourses encourage the readers to practice the already suggested ethics (the Torah in 2:4) in their daily routine. In this matter, the book of Isaiah keeps the balance between the sovereignty of Yhwh in his master plan to restore his people and the human response to the divine callings. Continuity is a very intentional rhetoric of the book of Isaiah to coalesce all the periods in the book as well as all its readers throughout generations.

19.5.2.  Rhetorical Strategy of the Eschatologically Addressed Discourses As we have observed, the eschatological aspects of Isaiah, defined by “universal,” “ultimate,” and “radical,” suggest that the book often treat events in historical time as events beyond time. The same grammar should be applied to the spatial concepts

83 Middleton, New Heaven, 24.

84 Clements, Jerusalem, 13.

370   Soo J. Kim when physical places in the eschatological texts are depicted using otherworldly spatial languages. This rhetorical strategy serves two purposes. First, rhetoric or the awareness of rhetoric as a genre gives freedom to both author and reader because the inquiry of the verification of the fulfillment is wrapped by the metaphorical and eschatological or even mythic languages. In this way, some convictions can be held without the pressure to verify every single fulfillment of the prophecy in actual history. Second, this eschatological rhetoric enables the book of Isaiah to deliver hope of eternal security as part of an ongoing process, that is, a hope for all generations of readers. The “way metaphor”85 in Isaiah, for example, shows much variety: the way for Yhwh to return (40:3); the way for God’s people to return, directly from Assyria to the land without staying in the wilderness (11:6); the way for the holy remnants (35:8–10), etc. The way metaphor also expresses the ethical attitude on the eschatological hope; hope even in God’s judgment (26:8). Finally, the book guides the readers to become readers on the way. If the Way is the means to restoration and eschatological ethics, what should be the content of this ethics? Isaiah suggests that the Torah should be the guide.86 From the beginning, the book establishes that Israel’s problem is that they do not understand the Torah, that is, the instruction of how to live as God’s people (1:2–4), and this failure brings about the exile (5:13). Indeed, 8:14–15 expresses Torah as a stumbling block to Israel. Accordingly, the solution should come from the discovery of the Torah, not only within the Israel community but in the world at large (2:3).

19.6. Conclusion This chapter began by defining eschatology of Isaiah as the study of eschatologically addressed rhetorical discourses. Then, it examined the dynamics of time and suggested more specific segments of temporality to understand the process of divine transformation. Based on the time frames, it illustrated several dystopias and utopias in the eschatologically addressed discourses. There, the two fixed points—Jerusalem and the remnants—serve as witnesses through the ages. In the synthesis, this chapter has argued, a strong tendency for continuity leads readers of all ages to apply the ethical dimensions of each text to their own liminal situations. Torah, the unshaken word of God, aims to lead all readers to join the community on Mount Zion for the eternal hope in this world. Once they have passed the purification process, they are asked to become transformed by joining the divine projected transformation plan.

85 Lund, Way Metaphors, 19. 86  The term “Torah” occurs twelve times in Isaiah (1:10; 2:3; 5:24; 8:16, 20; 24:5; 30:9; 42:4, 21, 24; 51:4, 7).

Eschatology in Isaiah   371

Bibliography Arnold, Bill T. “Old Testament Eschatology and the Rise of Apocalypticism.” In The Oxford Handbook of Eschatology, edited by Jerry L. Walls, 23–29. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Ben Zvi, Ehud, ed. Utopia and Dystopia in Prophetic Literature. Helsinki: Finnish Exegetical Society, 2006. Berges, Ulrich. “Isaiah: Structure, Themes, and Contested Issues.” In The Oxford Handbook of Prophets, edited by Carolyn J. Sharp, 153–170. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. Beuken, Willem A. M. Jesaja deel IlIA: De Prediking van het Oude Testament. POT. Nijkerk, Netherlands: Callenbach, 1989. Beuken, Willem A. M. “Yhwh’s Sovereign Rule and His Adoration on Mount Zion: A Comparison of Poetic Visions in Isaiah 24–27, 52, and 66.” In The Desert Will Bloom: Poetic Visions in Isaiah, edited by A. Joseph Everson and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 91–107. SBLAIL 4. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009. Black, Jeremy, Graham Cunningham, Eleanor Robson, and Gábor Zólyomi. The Literature of Ancient Sumer. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 1–39: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19. New York, NY: Doubleday, 2000. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “Judah’s Covenant with Death (Isaiah xxviii 14–22).” VT 50 (2000): 472–483. Booth, Wayne C. The Rhetoric of Fiction. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961. Bordjadze, Karlo V. Darkness Visible: A Study of Isaiah 14:3–23 as Christian Scripture. PTM 228. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2017. Brueggemann, Walter. Isaiah 1–39. Westminster Bible Companion. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1988. Brueggemann, Walter. Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1997. Clements, Ronald E. “A Light to the Nations.” In Forming Prophetic Literature: Essays on Isaiah and the Twelve in Honor of John D. W. Watts, edited by James. W. Watts and Paul R. House, 57–69. JSOTS 235. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Clements, Ronald E. Jerusalem and the Nations: Studies in the Book of Isaiah. HBM 16. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011. Conrad, Edward. “Prophet, Redactor and Audience.” In New Visions of the Book of Isaiah, edited by Roy F. Melugin and Marvin A. Sweeney, 306–326. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Cook, Guy. Discourse. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989. Culler, Jonathan. Structuralist Poetics: Structuralism, Linguistics, and the Study of Literature. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1975. Detweiler, Robert, ed. Reader Response Approaches to Biblical and Secular Texts. Decatur, GA: Scholars Press, 1985. De Vries, Simon J. From Old Revelation to New: A Tradition-Historical and Redaction-Critical Study of Temporal Transitions in Prophetic Prediction. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995. Durkheim, Emile. “From the Elementary Forms of Religious Life.” In The Collective Memory Reader, edited by Jeffrey K. Olick, Vered Vinitzky-Seroussi, and Daniel Levy, 136–138. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Fekkes, Jan. Isaiah and Prophetic Traditions in the Book of Revelation: Visionary Antecedents and Their Development. JSNTS 93. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1993.

372   Soo J. Kim Fowler, Robert M. Loaves and Fishes. SBLDS 54. Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1981. Fowler, Robert M. “Who Is ‘The Reader’ of Mark’s Gospel.” In SBLSP, edited by Kent Richards, 31–53. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1983. Gowan, Donald E. Eschatology in the Old Testament. New York: T&T Clark, 1986. Gowan, Donald E. Theology of the Prophetic Books: The Death and Resurrection of Israel. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1989. Gray, John. “The Canaanite God Horon.” JNES 8 (1949): 27–34. Gressmann, Hugo. Der Messias. FRLANT 43. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1929. Halbwachs, Maurice. The Collective Memory. New York: Harper & Row, 1980. Hasel, Gerhard F. The Remnant: The History and Theology of the Remnant Idea from Genesis to Isaiah. AUM 5. Berrien Springs, MI: Andrews University, 1974. Hays, Christopher B. “Swallowing Death at Tel ʿEton.” JNSL 44 (2018): 103–116. Heiser, Michael S. “The Mythological Provenance of Isa. xiv 12–15: A Reconsideration of the Ugaritic Material.” VT 51 (2001): 354–369. Hiers, Richard H. “Day of the Lord.” In ABD 2:82–85. Howells, Richard. A Critical Theory of Creativity: Utopia, Aesthetics, Atheism and Design. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2015. Irudayaraj, Dominic S. Violence, Otherness and Identity in Isaiah 63:1–6: The Trampling One Coming from Edom. LHBOTS 633. London: Bloomsbury, 2017. Iser, Wolfgang. Act of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978. Jenner, Konrad D. “The Worship of Yhwh on the Holy Mountain in Light of the Idea of the Return.” In The New Things: Eschatology in Old Testament Prophecy. Festschrift for Henk Leen, edited by Ferenc Postma, Klaas Spronk, and Eep Talstra, 129–133. Maastricht, Netherlands: Shaker, 2002. Jenni, Ernst. “Eschatology of the OT.” In IDB 2:126–133. Jenni, Ernst. “Remnant.” In IDB 4:32–33. Johnston, Philip. Shades of Sheol: Death and Afterlife in the Old Testament. Leicester, UK: Apollos, 2002. Kaiser, Otto. Isaiah 13–39: A Commentary. Translated by Richard A. Wilson. OTL. Philadelphia: Westminster John Knox, 1974. Kim, Hyun Chul Paul. Reading Isaiah: Literary and Theological Commentary. Reading the Old Testament. Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2016. Koenen, Klaus. Ethik und Eschatologie im Tritojesajabuch. WMANT 62. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1990. Landy, Francis. “Tracing the Voice of the Other: Isaiah 28 and the Covenant with Death.” In The New Literary Criticism and the Hebrew Bible, edited by J. Cheryl Exum and David J. A. Clines, 140–162. JSOTS 143. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1993. Levenson, Jon D. Sinai, and Zion: An Entry into the Jewish Bible. Minneapolis, MN: Winston Press, 1985. Levenson, Jon D. “The Temple and the World.” JR 64 (1984): 275–298. Lewis, Theodore J. “Dead, Abode of the.” In ABD, 2:101–105. Lindblom, Johannes. Prophecy in Ancient Israel. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1962. Lindblom, Johannes. The Servant Songs in Deutero-Isaiah: A New Attempt to Solve an Old Problem. LUA 1, 47/5. Lund, Sweden: G. W. K. Gleerup, 1951. Lund, Øystein. Way Metaphors and Way Topics in Isaiah 40–55. FAT II/28. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007.

Eschatology in Isaiah   373 Mailloux, Stephen. Interpretive Conventions: The Reader in the Study of American Fiction. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982. Mathewson, David. “Isaiah in Revelation.” In Isaiah in the New Testament, edited by Steve Moyise and Maarten J. J. Menken, 189–210. London: T&T Clark International, 2005. Matthews, Victor Harold, and Don C. Benjamin. Old Testament Parallels: Laws and Stories from the Ancient Near East. Fully Rev. and Expanded ed. New York: Paulist, 1997. McGrath, Alister E. Christian Theology: Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell, 2001. Middleton, Richard J. A New Heaven and a New Earth: Reclaiming Biblical Eschatology. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2014. More, Tomas. Utopia (1516). Edited by George M. Logan and Robert M. Adams. Reprint: Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. Mouw, Richard J. When the Kings Come Marching In: Isaiah and the New Jerusalem. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2002. Mowinckel, Sigmund. He That Cometh: The Messiah Concept in the Old Testament and Later Judaism. Translated by George W. Anderson. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1954. Muilenburg, James. “The Book of Isaiah, Chapters 40–66: Introduction and Exegesis.” In Interpreters’ Bible, vol. 5, Ecclesiastes, The Song of Songs, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, edited by George Arthur Buttrick, 381–773. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1956. Nickelsburg, George. W. E. “Eschatology: Early Jewish Literature.” In ABD 2:579–594. Nogalski, James D. “Not Just Another Nation: Obadiah’s Placement in the Book of the Twelve.” In The Book of the Twelve and Beyond: Collected Essays of James D. Nogalski, 115–134. SBLAIL 29. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2017. Oh, Abraham Sung-ho. Oh, That You Would Rend the Heavens and Come Down! The Eschatological Theology of Third Isaiah (Isiah 56–66). Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2014. Petersen, David L. “Eschatology.” In ABD, 2:575–579. Petersen, Norman R. “The Reader in the Gospel.” Neot 18 (1984): 38–51. Resseguie, James L. “Reader-Response and the Synoptic Gospels.” JAAR 52 (1984): 307–324. Scheuer, Blaženka. The Return of Yhwh: The Tension between Deliverance and Repentance in Isaiah 40–55. BZAW 377. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2008. Smith, Mark S. The Origins of Biblical Monotheism: Israel’s Polytheistic Background and the Ugaritic Texts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. Stewart, Alistair C. “The Covenant with Death in Isaiah 28.” ExpTim 100 (1989): 375–377. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Suleiman, Susan R., and Inge Crosman. The Reader in the Text: Essays on Audience and Interpretation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980. Sweeney, Marvin A. “The Book of Isaiah as Prophetic Torah.” In New Visions of Isaiah, edited by Roy F. Melugin and Marvin A. Sweeney, 50–67. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Sweeney, Marvin A. “Eschatology in the Book of Isaiah.” In The Book of Isaiah: Enduring Questions Answered Anew; essays Honoring Joseph Blenkinsopp and His Contribution to the Study of Isaiah, edited by Richard J. Bautch and J. Todd Hibbard, 179–195. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2014. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39, with an Introduction to Prophetic Literature. FOTL. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 40–66. FOTL. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2016. Thielecke, Helmut. Der evangelische Glaube: Grundzüge der Dogmatik. Theologie des Geistes 3. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1978.

374   Soo J. Kim Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Continuity and Discontinuity in Isaiah 40–55: History of Research.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans M. Barstad, 13–40. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Tompkins, Jane P., ed. Reader Response Criticism: From Formalism to Post-Structuralism. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1980. Tuan, Yi-Fu. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1977. Tull, Patricia K. “Persistent Vegetative States: People as Plants and Plants as People in Isaiah.” In Desert Will Bloom: Poetic Visions in Isaiah, edited by A. Joseph Everson and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 17–34. SBLAIL 4. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009. Unterman, Jeremiah. Justice for All: How the Jewish Bible Revolutionized Ethics. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2017. Vasholz, Robert. “The Character of Israel’s Future in Light of the Abrahamic and Mosaic Covenants.” TRINJ 25 (2004): 39–59. Vermeylen, Jacques. Du prophète Isaïe à l’Apocalyptique: Isaïe, I–XXXV, miroir d’un ­demi-millénaire d’expérience religieuse en Israël (coll. Études Bibliques). 2 vols. Paris: J. Gabalda, 1978. Vos, Geerhardus. Reformed Dogmatics. 5 vols. (1910). Translated and edited by Richard  B.  Gaffin Jr. Vol. 5, Ecclesiology, The Means of Grace, Eschatology. Bellingham: WA: Lexham Press, 2016. Vriezen, Theodorus C. “Prophecy and Eschatology.” In Congress Volume, Copenhagen 1953, edited by Aage Bentzen, 199–229. VTS 1. Leiden: Brill, 1953. Walls, Jerry L. “Introduction.” In The Oxford Handbook of Eschatology, edited by Jerry L. Walls, 3–18. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. Webb, Barry G. “Zion in Transformation: A Literary Approach to Isaiah.” In The Bible in Three Dimensions, edited by David J. A. Clines, Stephen E. Fowl, and Stanley E. Porter, 65–84. JSOTS 87. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1990. Westermann, Claus. Isaiah 40–66. Translated by David M. G. Stalker. OTL. Philadelphia: Westminster John Knox, 1969. Wilcox, Peter, and David Paton-Williams. “The Servant Songs in Deutero-Isaiah.” JSOT 42 (1988): 79–102. Wildberger, Hans. Isaiah 1–12: A Commentary. Translated by Thomas H. Trapp. CC. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1991. Witherington, Ben, III. Isaiah Old and New: Exegesis, Intertextuality, and Hermeneutics. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2017. Zimmerli, Walter. Ezekiel: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel. Vol. 2. Translated by James D. Martin. Hermeneia. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983.

Pa rt V

T H E BO OK OF ISA I A H A S L I T E R AT U R E

chapter 20

The Poetic Struct u r e s i n Isa i a h J. Blake Couey

20.1. Introduction The book of Isaiah consists almost entirely of poetry. (The only exceptions are narratives in Isa 6–8 and 36–39, which themselves include inset poetry, and short prose passages scattered throughout the book.) Indeed, this prophetic corpus contains more poetry than any other biblical book except the Psalter. For this reason, readers must understand how poetry works to make sense of Isaiah, particularly those who are more accustomed to the conventions of narrative or rhetorical prose. Like other literature that is regarded as poetry in different languages and cultures, biblical poetry consists of perceptibly patterned discourse. It is segmented into relatively short lines, punctuated by pauses, and typically joined in groups of two or three. These groups of lines in turn form poems, sometimes but not always with discrete subunits. Because biblical poetry is nonnarrative, its structure is achieved without recourse to plot or linear progression. Instead, groups of lines are organized around formal or thematic principles, which typically involve both repetition and variation. No two poems are exactly alike; the audience discovers the structure as they encounter the poem. This chapter explores the variety of poetic structures in the book of Isaiah. It begins with the shapes of poetic lines, then moves to groups of lines, then to larger poetic subunits, and then to whole poems, before concluding with some reflections on the arrangement and ordering of poems across the book. Much of the discussion holds true for biblical poetry more broadly, but distinctive or characteristic tendencies in Isaianic poetry will be noted when appropriate.

378   J. Blake Couey

20.2.  Poetic Lines The line is the basic unit of poetry. The recurrence of line breaks, with sufficient frequency to remain at the fore of the audience’s experience of the poem, distinguishes verse from prose in the Bible.1 The resultant rhythm would have been audible to listeners who were hearing these poems read aloud, which is how their earliest audiences would likely have encountered them. Although nothing demands that these pauses would be graphically represented in the written texts, it is not surprising that they sometimes were. (Such is the norm today for printed, English-language poems.) Already among some Qumran biblical manuscripts, poetic line breaks are marked by extra spacing, albeit inconsistently. Prophetic books do not receive this treatment, however, with the single exception of 1QIsaa L, 8–22 (Isa 61:10–62:9), where small spaces divide the text into units that correspond to poetic lines.2 Although it is a limited sample, the arrangement of lines in this passage proves instructive. Marked segments range between 2 and 6 words and 5 and 14 syllables in length, averaging 3.3 and 8.7, respectively. Most are single clauses that are syntactically and semantically parallel to a contiguous clause. When this is not the case, a line may be a dependent clause (e.g., the relative clauses at the end of 62:2 and 62:8) or a discrete clausal element (e.g., the prepositional phrase at the beginning of 62:6). All of the lines, then, are either end-stopped or conservatively enjambed. While the manuscript does not mark the line grouping, parallelism or syntactic dependency joins lines in pairs in most cases, with the exception of an apparent triplet in 62:6a, in which textual variation between 1QIsaa and the MT significantly affects the lineation. It is unclear why this section of Isaiah alone receives special formatting, but the division of lines is consistent with those marked in other Qumran manuscripts. Equally significantly, much of the rest of Isaiah permits division into comparable units. As a result, we can be relatively confident that our understanding of the poetic structure of Isaianic poems is similar to that of an ancient audience.3 Even so, the identification of line breaks necessarily remains provisional in the absence of manuscript evidence. Most lines of biblical poetry consist of a single clause containing a verb and its associated noun and/or prepositional phrases.4 The frequent coincidence of line breaks and clausal boundaries helps to establish the sense of the line as a discrete entity. This perceived coherence is often reinforced by sound-play, which in biblical poetry occurs primarily at

1 Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 92–93; Geller, “Prosody,” 610–611. A few interpreters identify the pairs or triads of (mostly) parallel clauses as the line; see Alter, Art, 9; Williamson, Isaiah, 2:8. For arguments for the smaller unit as the line, see Couey, Reading, 29–30; Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 20–29. 2 Tov, Scribal, 3, 136. 3 Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 40, notes that Robert Lowth, in his Lectures on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews (1753), proposed the same lineation for 62:5 that appears in 1QIsaa, nearly two hundred years before the discovery of the Qumran manuscripts. 4 O’Connor, Verse, 87.

The Poetic Structures in Isaiah   379 the level of the line.5 Despite attempts to identify metrical norms, the recent near consensus that biblical poetry is free verse seems correct.6 That is, the phonological structures of lines are not governed by quantifiably regular patterns over sustained intervals. At the same time, line lengths fall within a confined range, unlike some contemporary free verse in which they may vary wildly. Disagreement exists over the exact limits,7 but in general poetic lines in Isaiah contain between two and six words or stresses and four and sixteen syllables. This upper limit may be slightly higher than in other biblical poetic corpora, although there are only a few examples of such lines. Most lines fall just below the midpoints of the ranges; three words or stresses and eight syllables is the average across the book. Despite the existence of what might be considered a typical form, the poetic lines in Isaiah exhibit a striking variety of shapes. Two common kinds of variation include the number of verbs and length. Lines with multiple verbs result in greater dynamism, as in Isa 8:9–10, where five of the seven lines contain two verbs. In each case, the second action undermines the first (e.g., “gird yourselves”/“be dismayed,” “plan”/“be frustrated”), enhancing the poetic claim that the nations’ attempts to resist divine action will not prove effective. The final line of the unit, which provides the rationale for these confident assertions, stands out as a nonverbal clause following this glut of verbal action: ‫כי עמנו אל‬, “for God [is] with us.” Two-verb lines are especially common in Second Isaiah and frequently appear in clusters (e.g., 40:20–26; 41:9–16; 46:4–8; 47:1–5).8 Lines with pairs of imperatives help establish the sense of urgent expectation that runs throughout these chapters (e.g., 45:20; 46:8; 47:1; 55:1). This section of the book opens with just such a line—“Comfort, comfort my people” (40:1)—and double-imperative lines addressed to Jerusalem provide an overarching sense of coherence across Isa 51–52 (51:9, 17; 52:1, 11).9 Though less frequent, lines with three verbs provide even more concentrated pockets of energy, such as 57:17: “I struck them, hiding myself, and I grew angry.” This burst of action—the lines on either side contain only a single verb—creates an impression of the deity’s excessive fury. In 28:13b, a line with two verbs parallels a line with three verbs to form a couplet that depicts the demise of Judah with relentless force: So they’ll walk and stumble backward, And be injured, ensnared, and entrapped.

Morphological and phonological repetition enhances the punch of the second line, as all three verbs are niphal perfects (‫נׁשברו‬, ‫נוקׁשו‬, ‫ ;)נלכדו‬I have attempted to capture something of the effect in translation by using verbs beginning with “in-” or “en-.” On the other hand, some lines contain no verbs. Sometimes a verbal line is paired with a nominal line, a form of parallelism in which the deep structures match syntactically 5 Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 70–73. 6 Couey, Reading, 40–44; Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 95–103; O’Connor, Verse, 64–65. 7  See Couey, Reading, 47–48; Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 50; Geller, “Prosody,” 610; O’Connor, Verse, 75, 87. 8 Collins, Line, 220–223. 9 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 40–55, 330–331.

380   J. Blake Couey even though the surface structures do not (e.g., 14:29b; 25:1a; 49:9b; 58:10b).10 Lines without verbs may establish closure through terminal modification, as in 5:711 and 17:14. The opposite dynamic occurs in 54:5, where three verbless lines are followed by a climactic verbal line. Verbless lines with the independent pronouns ‫אנכי‬/‫“( אני‬I”; 43:11, 13, 15; 45:5–6, 22; 49:26; etc.) or ‫אתם‬/‫“( אתה‬you”; 41:9; 44:21; 48:4, etc.) appear frequently in Second Isaiah, identifying the deity or the implied audience. Some poetic lines in Isaiah consist only of noun sequences that function as the compound subject or object for a verb in another line, such as 5:12 (musical instruments) or 41:19 (types of trees). Usually, only one or two such lines occur, but longer lists appear in 3:2–3 (civic officials) and 3:18–23 (types of jewelry).12 Length offers additional possibilities for variation. Despite the limited range of line lengths in biblical poetry, noticeable differences can still be achieved, especially toward the upper and lower limits. Entire poems may be comprised of short lines, such as 56:9–57:2.13 Twenty-six of twenty-eight lines contain only two to three words, and all of them are only four to eight syllables long. These short lines give the poem a distinctive rhythm and quickened pace, further distinguished by an unusually high concentration of nonparallel lines. Long lines more typically occur within isolated groups. At times, they simply offer rhythmic variation, but not infrequently, their length is connected to their content. Isa 14:26, a pair of five-word lines with twelve and thirteen syllables, respectively, describes the universal reach of divine control, and the expansive length of the lines reinforces this claim. In 17:6, a triplet of long lines (eleven, thirteen, and ten syllables) marks the end of a poetic unit, standing out from the shorter lines that precede it. The increased length mimics the numerical parallelism in these lines (“two or three”//“four or five”).

20.3.  Line Groups Single, isolated lines are uncommon in Isaiah. They usually occur at the beginning or end of a poem. A single line opens a poetic section in 30:6: “Burden of the beasts of the Negev.” Despite its similarity to superscriptions in Isa 13–23, its poetic character is signaled by the play on multiple meanings of ‫“( מׂשא‬burden,” “prophetic oracle”) and the repetition of the labial consonants ‫ מ‬and ‫ב‬. The final clause of 9:6 (Eng. 9:7) is best taken as a single line concluding the poem in 8:23b–9:6 (Eng. 9:1–7). Nearly identical single lines appear in 48:22 and 57:21 (“There’s no peace, says Yhwh/my God, for the wicked”), concluding not only their respective poems but also larger sections within Isa 40–66. Other possible examples of single lines could be adduced, but their division is uncertain.

10 Berlin, Dynamics, 54–56. 11  See Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 142. 12  For the poetic character of these lists, see Couey, Reading, 105–106. 13  On short-lined poems more generally, Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 126–127.

The Poetic Structures in Isaiah   381 As in all biblical poetry, the majority of lines in Isaiah appear in groups of two (couplets), and groups of three (triplets) are less common but not infrequent.14 The majority of line groups are held together by parallelism, with lines that share perceptibly similar syntactic structures, frequently reinforced by associated semantic content and sometimes by phonological similarity. Israel does not know; My people do not understand. (1:3) Bronze doors I will shatter, And iron bars I will cut. (45:2) For not to eternity will I contend, And not to perpetuity will I be angry. (57:16)

The prevalence of parallelism creates a sense of measured discourse. A line is heard or read, followed by a second one with striking correspondences. Most poems in Isaiah unfold in this way, which poses some risk of predictability or even monotony. The appearance of single lines, triplets, or nonparallel lines offers occasional rhythmic relief, but the parallelism itself also proves highly pliable. One possibility for adding greater complexity into parallel structures is conflicting equivalence, when terms are parallel at one linguistic level but not another.15 Two cases occur relatively closely in Isa 13. In verse 10b, a negative statement is parallel to a positive one: The sun will darken (‫ )חׁשך‬in its rising, and the moon will not shine (‫ )יגיה‬its light (‫)אורו‬.

The words ‫ חׁשך‬and ‫ אורו‬are lexically but not grammatically parallel, as the verb ‫ חׁשך‬syntactically matches the verb ‫יגיה‬. A few verses later, the deity threatens to “make men rarer than pure gold” and “humanity than the gold of Ophir” (v. 12). Despite being different parts of speech, “make rare” (‫ )אוקיר‬is phonologically parallel to the proper name Ophir (‫)אופיר‬, an unusual case of rhyme in biblical poetry. Other examples can be found in 5:23 and 26:7, in which words derived from the same root are not grammatically parallel. A common variation in couplet structure in Isaiah is an internally parallel line, with two short clauses, followed by a single, longer clause that is parallel to each of the preceding. Watson has termed this structure the “A– A– // A—” pattern.16 Wail, gate! Cry out, city! Melt in fear, Philistia, all of you! (14:31a) They are hardly planted; they are hardly sown; Their stock has hardly taken root in the earth. (40:24a)

14 Couey, Reading, 69–108; Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 74–84. 15 Berlin, Dynamics, 83, 128. 16 Watson, Traditional, 187–189; see also Couey, Reading, 36–37.

382   J. Blake Couey This structure appears throughout Isa 1–39 (e.g., 5:2a; 24:7; 33:8b) and 40–55 (e.g., 41:10b; 49:10a; 51:17a), but is much less frequent in 56–66 (59:13a). According to Watson, these couplets contain “the equivalent of three lines packed into two.”17 Making explicit this sense of excessiveness, A– A– // A— couplets in 40–55 often have the particle ‫אף‬ (“moreover”) at the head of one or more clauses (40:24a; 41:10b, 26b; 45:21a; 48:12b). Along with the semantic overload, these couplets also offer a rhythmic flourish, as the quickened pace and internal pause in the first line contrast with the seeming elongation of the second line, despite its more typical shape. While the majority of couplets in Isaiah contain end-stopped, parallel lines, a not insignificant minority display enjambment, with the second line containing either a clausal component that completes the first line (vocative, subject, object, etc.) or a subordinate clause to it. For you will be ashamed because of the oaks In which you delighted (1:29a) In yhwh will be vindicated and boast All the offspring of Israel. (45:25) Hear the word of Yhwh, Tremblers at his word. (66:5a)

Enjambed lines offer a rhythmic alternative to end-stopped lines, as the weaker syntactic break at the end of the first line moves the poem along more forcefully. The number of enjambed lines varies from poem to poem, but on the whole, they occur more frequently in the first half of Isaiah. A common form of enjambment in Isaiah is a single line introducing a quotation, followed by one or more lines containing the content of the quotation, which serve as the object of the introductory frame. Not surprisingly for prophetic poetry, most of these are divine speech introduced by a variation of the messenger formula, “Thus says DN” (e.g., 7:7; 28:16; 50:1; 66:12); alternatively, the quotative frame may occur as the final line of the group (e.g., 1:11a, 18a; 19:4; 41:21; 55:8; 65:25; etc.).18 As a striking exception, almost every instance of the messenger formula in Isa 40–48 has been expanded to take up an entire couplet or triplet, by adding either divine epithets or descriptions of the addressees (42:5; 43:1, 14, 16; 44:2, 6, 24; 45:1, 11, 18; 48:17; cf. 49:7).19 Concentrations of enjambed lines also occur in some poems that evoke the lament genre, such as 14:4–21; 15:1–16:12; 23:1–16, and 47:1–15. Triplets may occur at any point in a poem, sometimes simply for the sake of variation and other times for emphasis. Clusters of triplets are particularly emphatic. Three consecutive triplets occur at the midpoint of the oracle against Tyre in 23:7–9. In 45:5–7, key claims about Yhwh’s uniqueness appear in a series of triplets. In 64:7–10 (Eng. 64:8–11), 17 Watson, Traditional, 176. 18 Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 86, 390, n. 401, regards the messenger formula as a separate single line in most cases. 19 Collins, Line, 138.

The Poetic Structures in Isaiah   383 three triplets develop a set of communal complaints, with the longer line groups underscoring the extent of the community’s suffering. Triplets frequently mark the conclusions of poems (e.g., 2:22; 14:32; 22:14; 63:6), providing terminal modification following a run of couplets.20 Triplets with three parallel lines are used with particular flourish in Second Isaiah. Isa 43:14b; 43:28; 45:7; 47:6a, and 51:6aβ describe threefold divine actions, while 42:22a; 42:24b; and 48:4—note the three verbless lines in the latter—contain threefold descriptions of God’s people, emphasizing their subjection or disobedience. A pair of triplets in 48:1 establishes a strong expectation of parallelism across the first five lines, only to take a surprising twist in the final line: Hear this, house of Jacob, Who are called by the name of Israel, And who came forth from the loins of Judah, Who swear by the name of Yhwh, And by the God of Israel they invoke— But not truly and not rightly!

In 49:12, a description of the return of Judahite exiles, the parallelism becomes increasingly specific, from a general direction (“far away”), to geographic directions (“north and west”), to a geographic name (‫סינים‬, “Sinim”). Triplets also make it possible to mix parallelism and enjambment. In some cases, matching sentence components appear in the parallel lines, with the predicate in the nonparallel line (e.g., 2:12; 19:7; 34:4b; 57:3). Typically, the parallel lines are contiguous, but in 56:9, an imperative in the middle line is framed by parallel vocatives in the first and third lines. Alternatively, the parallel lines may be separate independent clauses, with a sentence complement or subordinate clause in the third line (e.g., 34:5; 43:20b; 48:18; 54:11; 65:10). Larger sequences of connected lines usually contain discrete couplets or triplets joined by an overarching structural device, as discussed in the next section (sec. 20.4).21 In particular, consecutive couplets with parallel lines function almost like quatrains. In some cases, however, a group of four lines lacks a conspicuous internal break and may best treated as a single unit. In Isa 9:3 (Eng. 9:4), for example, three lines with noun phrases seem incomplete without the predicate in the fourth line, especially because the accusative marker ‫ את‬in the first line alerts the reader to expect a governing verb. Other possible quatrains include 29:13a; 30:1; 41:1; 51:13; 54:16, and 64:10 (Eng. 64:11). Five-line groups are even less common, and they almost always consist of a linked triplet and couplet. A group of five lines in Isa 18:2, with three parallel lines in the middle, resists obvious division and may be an unusual example of a poetic pentad.22 20 Couey, Reading, 67, 100; Williamson, Isaiah, 2:8; cf. Alter, Art, 35; Watson, Classical, 183. 21 Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 82–84; Watson, Classical, 185. 22  See further, Watson, Classical, 187–189.

384   J. Blake Couey

20.4.  Larger Poetic Units A variety of strategies establish connections between contiguous line groups, although the units thus formed are seldom uniform in length or predictable in arrangement. Like the lines within them, couplets and triplets may be connected by parallelism. Occasionally, all of the lines within contiguous groups are parallel (e.g., 44:5; 60:17a; 61:1b–3a). More often, parallelism occurs between the respective first and second lines of the contiguous couplets, while the lines within the couplets are enjambed (A/B//A’/B’). This structure occurs frequently across Isaiah,23 as illustrated by the following examples: Ah, the roar of many nations, Like the roaring of the seas they roar; And the clamour of peoples, Like the clamour of powerful waters they clamour. (17:12) He made my mouth like a sharp sword; In the shadow of his hand he hid me. He made me a polished arrow; In his quiver he concealed me. (49:2)

While most cases of line-group parallelism involve two couplets, longer runs are possible (three couplets in 3:9b–11; 29:4–5a; 47:11; four couplets in 41:11–12; three couplets and a triplet in 1:18b–20). Although couplet parallelism appears across the book, it is most prevalent in Isa 40–55, where single poems frequently contain multiple examples (e.g., 52:1–11). In addition to pairs of couplets, parallelism also links couplets with triplets in 40–55 (40:12; 42:5; 49:21; 50:1, 8a; 51:6a). The frequency of connections across line groups contributes to the expansive feel of this section of Isaiah. Throughout the book, but especially in Isa 1–39, couplet parallelism creates surprise by establishing audience expectations through repeated patterns, only to deviate from them. In 29:4, for instance, the terms “earth” (‫ )ארץ‬and “dirt” (‫ )עפר‬are repeated across a pair of couplets to describe Jerusalem’s apparent destruction. The first line of verse 5 initially seems to extend this portrayal with the rhyming phrase “fine dust” (‫)אבק דק‬, but the final word of the line reveals that the phrase actually describes Jerusalem’s enemies, as the city is miraculously delivered. A different structure pairs one couplet containing parallel clauses with another couplet containing parallel subordinate clauses or clausal adjuncts, each of which is syntactically dependent on each line of the preceding couplet (A/A’//B/B’). O’Connor calls this structure “mixing.”24 Examples appear across Isaiah, although more frequently in the first half:

23  Willis, “Alternating,” 62–69.

24 O’Connor, Verse, 132, 421.

The Poetic Structures in Isaiah   385 Against a godless nation I send him, and against the people of my wrath I order him, to spoil spoil and to plunder plunder, and to trample them down like refuse in the streets. (10:6; note the A– A– // A— structure of the second couplet) Therefore, the heavens I’ll shake, And the earth will quake from its place, At (-‫ )ב‬the wrath of Yhwh of hosts, and on (-‫ )ב‬the day of his burning anger. (13:13)

Although most cases involve two couplets, mixing spans six lines in 10:1–2; 40:2, and 61:10, with the latter involving multiple levels of syntactic dependence. Due to its generally paratactic character, biblical poetry often eschews more explicit syntactic marking, but it occurs somewhat more frequently in prophetic poetry.25 Where they do appear, subordinating particles or adverbs and syntactic frames can join multiple line groups, sometimes spanning a dozen or more lines. Some examples include conditional statements (1:9; 48:18–19; 58:9b–10, 13–14; etc.); ‫ כן‬. . . )‫“( כ(אׁשר‬just as . . . thus,” 31:4; 52:14–15; 65:8); ‫“( כי‬because,” 3:8; 43:3; 61:11, etc.); ‫“( לכן‬therefore,” 5:13–14; 51:21; 61:7b, etc.); ‫על־כן‬ (“therefore,” 16:9, 11; 24:15; 59:9, etc.); and ‫“( ועתה‬and now,” 5:3, 5; 43:1; 44:1, etc.). Larger-scale patterns like inclusio or chiasm may operate across entire poems, as in biblical poetry more generally.26 The oracle against Tyre in Isa 23 contains the most extensive inclusio, with an entire couplet nearly repeated at the beginning and end of the poem: Wail, ships of Tarshish, For destroyed is your fortress.27 (v. 1b, 14)

Smaller-scale inclusios frame poems in 1:2–20 (“for [the mouth of] Yhwh has ­spoken”), 1:21–26 (“faithful city”), and 3:1–15 (“the/my Lord, Yhwh of hosts”). Chiasm is uncommon in Isaiah at levels larger than the line group, but it is used effectively in Isa 28, as the people’s claims in verse 15 are systematically reversed by the deity in verses 17b–18, triggered by the promise to establish Zion as a refuge in verses 16–17a: A – “we’ve cut a covenant with death // made a pact with Sheol” (v. 15a) B – “overwhelming flood, when it passes by, will not reach us” (v. 15b) C – “we’ve made a lie our refuge // in falsehood hidden ourselves” (v. 15b) D – “I’m establishing a foundation in Zion” (v. 16–17a) C' – “hail will sweep away refuge // waters will overwhelm shelter” (v. 17b) A' – “covenant with death annulled // pact with Sheol won’t stand” (v. 18a) B' – “overwhelming flood, when it passes by // you’ll be trampled by it” (v. 18b) 25 Couey, Reading, 116; Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 140. 26 Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 191–192; Watson, Classical, 206–207, 282–287. 27  Verse 1b in MT reads “destroyed without a house,” but most commentators emend ‫ מבית‬to ‫מעזכן‬ (“your fortress”).

386   J. Blake Couey The last two elements (A’ and B’) do not occur in the expected order, but the reversal makes possible the extension of the final image through the repetition of “pass by” (‫ר‬-‫ב‬-‫)ע‬ into verse 19. Smaller-scale connections also shape sections of poems. Successive lines across multiple line groups may begin with the same word (e.g., “day” in 2:12–17; “spirit” in 11:2) or morphological feature (e.g., first-person singular imperfect prefixes in 1:24b–26a; participles in 46:10–11a), a phenomenon known as anaphora. Perceptually weaker, but still noticeable, the same word may open contiguous line groups but not every line within them (e.g., “new moon” in 1:13b; “so that/for the sake of ” in 45:3b–4a; “see” in 41:29–42:1; 55:3–4, and 58:3b–4a). Although less common, line-final repetition (epistrophe) is also attested.28 Successive couplets are linked by the repetition of the verb ‫“( אוביׁש‬I will dry up”) at the ends of the B-lines in 42:15. In 45:2, four consecutive lines end with firstperson singular imperfect verbs, with three of the four in the piel stem.29 Another option is anadiplosis, the repetition of a word or phrase at the end of one line and the beginning of the next. Most often, this structure appears within couplets (e.g., 29:17; 35:8a; 59:6b), but it also connects line groups. The verb ‫ח‬-‫ת‬-‫“( פ‬open”) appears at the end of the second couplet and beginning of the third couplet in 45:1. Sustained anadiplosis is a prominent structural feature in Isa 26, where it occurs within couplets in verses 3, 6, 7, and 11, and between couplets in verse 5.30 Less patterned networks of verbal repetition are another possibility, especially the recurrence of keywords (Leitwörter) like “wail” (‫ל‬-‫ל‬-‫ )י‬in Isa 15–16 or “Egypt” (‫ )מצרים‬and “Nile” (‫ )יאר‬in Isa 19. Isa 46:1–7 uses the verb ‫“( נׂשא‬bear”) as a keyword (vv. 1, 3, 4, 7), reinforced by the cognate noun ‫“( מׂשא‬burden,” vv. 1, 2) and the semantically parallel verbs ‫“( עמס‬load, carry,” vv. 1, 3) and ‫“( סבל‬carry, support,” v. 4 [twice], v. 7). The use of these verbs reinforces the poem’s central distinction between the dynamic activity of Yhwh and the inertness of the images of Babylonian deities. Morphological repetition also provides coherence across a poem, such as the preponderance of second-person feminine morphemes in 57:3–13. Many poems in Isa 40–55 contain high concentrations of first-person morphemes (e.g., 45:1–7) and participles (e.g., 44:24–28). Similarly, semantically parallel terms can provide thematic structure. This strategy is used with great effectiveness in Isa 59. A fourfold indictment in verse 3 uses four terms for body parts (“hands,” “fingers,” “lips,” “tongue”). Different words for roadways appear in four consecutive lines in verses 7–8 (“highway,” “road,” “track,” “path”).31 This semantic cluster overlaps with a complex of terms denoting legal or ethical correctness in 59:8–17 (“justice,” vv. 8, 9, 11, 14, 15; “righteousness,” vv. 9, 14, 16, 17; “truth,” vv. 14, 15; “­uprightness,” v. 14). These are in turn balanced by a remarkable variety of terms for misdeeds, 28 Watson, Classical, 276–277. 29  Reading with the MT qere at the end of the first couplet. 30  The repetition is not always exact. In 26:5, only one of the verbs has a pronominal suffix. In 26:7, the repetition involves the root (‫)יׁשר‬, not the precise terms. Such eschewal of total repetition is not uncommon in biblical poetry. 31  Alonso Schökel, “Isaiah,” 174, 177, notes that “four-part parallelisms” are common in the second half of the book.

The Poetic Structures in Isaiah   387 i­ncluding “iniquity” (vv. 2, 3, 12), “sin” (vv. 2, 12), “falsehood” (vv. 3, 13), “wickedness” (vv. 4, 6, 7), and “rebellion” (v. 12 [twice], v. 13). Other examples include a list of anatomical terms in 30:27–30; catalogues of animal names in 11:6–8; 30:6–7; and 34:13b–15; and an itinerary of city names in 10:27b–32.

20.5.  Whole Poems Perhaps the most heavily structured poem in Isaiah is 9:7 (Eng. 9:8)–10:4, in which a repeated couplet serves as a refrain: For all this, his wrath hasn’t turned, And still his hand’s outstretched. (9:11b, 16b, 20b [Eng. 9:12b, 17b, 21b]; 10:4b)

In its original form, the poem likely included 5:25–29, as the same refrain appears in verse 25b.32 The refrain divides the poem into at least four stanzas of approximately equal length (thirteen to fourteen lines). In both its putative original and present forms, it builds intensity through a series of past environmental and military catastrophes to a threat of future judgment. The refrain moves the poem forward, relativizing the apparent finality of earlier catastrophes and building anticipation for a future one. At the same time, the lines of the refrain are noticeably shorter than other lines of the poem (seven syllables vs. eight to fifteen syllables), closing each stanza by terminal modification. The opposite movement takes place within the refrain, which consists of a string of mostly monosyllabic words punctuated by the three-syllable word “outstretched” (‫)נטויה‬, which in fact prosodically stretches out the end of the couplet. By contrast, most of the poems in Isaiah do not display such overt structures. Instead, a variety of features connect lines and line groups—sometimes into relatively discrete sections, sometimes into irregular and inconsistent clumps. Some tropes or devices run across the entire poem, whereas others operate only locally. The resulting poems exhibit a loose sense of coherence. Precisely how this happens is unpredictable from poem to poem, and each must be appreciated on its own terms.33 The following brief treatments of three poems from across Isaiah illustrate the diverse structural possibilities within this literary corpus. The outer boundaries of the book’s opening poem, 1:2–20, are marked by the inclusio “for (the mouth of) Yhwh has spoken.”34 Within these boundaries appear two sections of roughly equal length (vv. 2–9, 10–20). Both begin with the imperative verbs “listen” and “give ear” (vv. 2, 10) and conclude with conditional statements 32  See Williamson, Isaiah, 1:400–405, with references to previous scholarship. 33 Couey, Reading, 108–111. 34  Although the precise division of units within Isa 1 is debated, these structural features at least mark vv. 2–20 as a distinct subunit (Williamson, Isaiah, 1:7–11, 29–30).

388   J. Blake Couey (vv. 9, 18b–20). The repetition of “Sodom” and “Gomorrah” in verses 9–10 bridges the two parts. Other thematic motifs appear throughout the poem, most notably images of animals (vv. 3, 11) and eating (vv. 3, 7–8, 11, 19–20). Despite these unifying effects, however, differences in tone and topic give each half of the poem its own integrity, even as shifts in speaker and theme create a sense of fragmentation within them. A strong case can be made that the poem in its current shape is composite.35 Nonetheless, this tension between the parts and the whole is characteristic of many biblical poems, including most in Isaiah. Three voices speak in the first section. In verses 2–3, Yhwh expresses frustration with rebellious “sons.” Verses 4–8 are addressed to the audience, presumably in the voice of the prophet. Much of this subsection is loosely organized into groups of three: three charges of unfaithfulness against the audience in verse 4b, three injuries to their beaten collective body in verse 6, three battle-scarred landscapes in verse 7, and three similes depicting Jerusalem’s perilous survival in verse 8. In verse 9, first-person plural language indicates that the Judahite people now speak, expressing relief that Yhwh left them a few survivors, unlike what happened in Sodom and Gomorrah. The next section of the poem opens in the prophet’s voice, which immediately undercuts the people’s assertion by addressing them as “rulers of Sodom” and “people of Gomorrah” (v. 10). The poem returns to divine speech in verse 11, the mode in which it will remain until the end. The second half is remarkably consistent in its rhythm, with largely short- to medium-length lines in unbalanced, enjambed couplets, but noticeable changes in pace occur. A pair of long parallel lines (twelve and fourteen syllables respectively) stands out in verse 11b, their length poetically mirroring the excess of sacrifices that they critique. The pace quickens with a series of lines containing two imperatives in verses 16–17, then slows down again with long conditional statements in verses 18–20. The concluding triplet (v. 20) achieves formal closure through its inclusive echo of the opening triplet, even as the poem remains thematically open-ended, calling the audience to choose between two possible futures. Different structural principles govern Isa 24. A single keyword, ‫“( ארץ‬earth”), appears sixteen times in the poem, reinforcing the central theme of global destruction. Its prominence is sonically reinforced by other words with initial ‫א‬, such as the repeated verbs ‫“( אבל‬dry up”) and ‫“( אמל‬languish”) in verses 4 and 7. These examples point to another unifying feature of the poem: a glut of sound repetition. Some of the most striking sonic flourishes are achieved through artificially modified morphology or syntax.36 Root repetition is prominent, including verbs with cognate infinitives (vv. 3, 19, 20) or cognate accusatives (vv. 3, 22). It reaches absurd proportions in verse 16b, a couplet in which all five words are forms of the root ‫ד‬-‫ג‬-‫“( ב‬act treacherously”). Finally, the poem contains nine clear triplets (vv. 2a, 2b, 4, 8, 11, 19, 21, 22, 23b), and other verses could be similarly divided (e.g., vv. 3, 5, 14). On a conservative estimate, at least one-third of the line groups

35  See Roberts, Isaiah, 17–18; Williamson, Isaiah, 1:7–11. 36  Williamson, “Sound,” 1–5.

The Poetic Structures in Isaiah   389 are triplets, an unusual departure from the usual dominance of the couplet.37 The other chapters of the so-called Isaiah Apocalypse (Isa 25–27) also feature high concentrations of sound repetition and triplets, although not to the same extent. Despite the coherence established by these features, the strongest structural connections in the poem occur within line groups. Several display parallelism at the semantic, grammatical, and phonological levels (vv. 3a, 4, 12), often with outright repetition (vv. 4, 8). The triplet in verse 19 is tightly crafted, each line consisting of a qal infinitive absolute, a hithpolel perfect from the same root, and ‫ ארץ‬as the subject.38 Contiguous line groups may be connected, but these connections are not usually sustained very long. In verse 2, six lines are joined by the repetition of (‫ כ)אׁשר‬. . . ‫“( כ‬like . . . like”). A loose thematic focus on the absence of singing, alcoholic beverages, or mirth threads in verses 7–11, overlapping with images of a ruined or desolate city in verses 10–12. Verse 17 threatens the “inhabitant of the earth” with the alliterative triad “terror, trench, and trap” (‫ופח‬ ‫)פחד פחת‬.39 One of these terms appears again in each of the next four lines in verse 18a, which unfold as a kind of narrative vignette. Although they are not repeated further, their sounds reverberate into verse 18b, where the verb “opened” (‫ )נפתחה‬contains the same consonants as “trench” (‫)פחת‬. Grammatical repetition links verses 19 and 20a. As noted, each line of verse 19 has a hithpolel perfect and cognate qal infinitive; the two lines of verse 20a respectively contain a verb with cognate infinitive and a hithpolel perfect. Such connections across line groups create an effect of forward movement, but they fall short of continuous, sequential development. Indeed, many of the line groups could be rearranged without dramatically affecting the poem’s meaning.40 By contrast, the closing poem of Second Isaiah (55:1–13) achieves a stronger sense of ordered progression, although not without abrupt thematic shifts.41 The first half of the poem is held together by a series of repetitions. Imperatives appear in nine lines in verses 1–3 and 6, typically at the beginning, and several verbs are repeated (“come,” “buy,” “eat,” “hear”). In verses 1b–2a, ‫“( בלוא‬without, what does not”) appears in four consecutive lines, while contiguous couplets in verses 4–5 begin with ‫“( הן‬see”). The second half of the poem is held together by extensive repetition of the particle ‫“( כי‬because”; vv. 8, 9, 10 [twice], 11, 12). Verses 10–11 are especially tightly connected by the multi-level syntactic frame ‫“( כי כאׁשר … כי אם … כן … כי אם‬just as . . . but rather . . . so . . . but rather”), which spans twelve lines. Two additional structural features should be noted. First, over 90 percent of the lines are parallel (forty-four of forty-seven), and the nonparallel lines occur in a single triplet (v. 11a). This represents a marked increase from the rest of Isa 40–55, where a little over two-thirds of the lines are parallel. The overwhelming dominance of parallelism 37  See Wildberger, Isaiah, 473, 494–495 (although he proposes different line divisions in several cases). 38  Assuming slight emendations; see Williamson, “Sound,” 5. 39  This attempt to capture the sound-play in English was first proposed by Alter, Art, 153, 218; cf. Alonso Schökel, “Isaiah,” 182 (“scare,” “snare,” “snag”). 40  See Dobbs-Allsopp, Poetry, 199–200; Heffelfinger, Large, 62–63. 41 Heffelfinger, Large, 133–136.

390   J. Blake Couey lends the poem an impression of patterned predictability, which reinforces some of its major themes, including the efficacy of the divine word and the value of repentance. At the same time, the isolation of nonparallel lines within a single triplet focuses the reader’s attention on the key claim that Yhwh’s word will achieve its intended purpose. The other prominent feature is the high number of lines with multiple verbs (twelve of forty-seven, nearly a quarter of the total). These lines stand out even more because many other lines contain no verbs at all, either because they are nominal statements or because the verb from the previous line has been gapped. A line with three verbs in verse 1b sets the stage for this rhythm, and bursts of energy appear more or less consistently throughout the poem. The effect subsides slightly before the end, as verses 12–13 contain no such lines. The sense of energy is maintained rather in verse 12b by the shape and content of two long lines (sixteen and eleven syllables): The mountains and hills will break before you into song, And all the trees of the field will clap their hands.

This emotional climax of the poem feels all the more satisfying because of the way that the pockets of verbal intensity have built up to it.

20.6.  Isaiah as a Poetic Collection By way of conclusion, it is worth considering how awareness of poetic structures in Isaiah might affect one’s understanding of the shape of the book as a whole, which has been a focus of recent scholarship. Many large-scale organizing features of the book are similar to those of individual poems. It is widely accepted that the repeated language in Isa 1 and 65–66 forms a kind of inclusio around the book. The emphasis on the divine word in 40:8 and 55:10–11 has also been taken as an inclusio marking the limits of Second Isaiah,42 and more recently, a potential inclusio has been identified in 57:14 and 62:10, delimiting the center of Third Isaiah.43 Chiasms are another device spanning multiple chapters. For instance, the prophetic narratives and royal oracles in 6:1–9:6 (Eng. 9:7) are framed by a double chiasm of ‫ הוי‬oracles and the “for all this” refrain in 5:8–25 and 9:7 (Eng. 9:8)–10:4. A chiastic structure has also been proposed for Third Isaiah, with thematically matching units on either side of a central core in Isa 60–62. Near and distant repetitions also play a role in the macrostructure of the book. The recurring particle ‫ הוי‬holds together a series of poems in 28:1–31:9, much as it does a single poem in 5:8–30, and the repeated line “There’s no peace, says Yhwh/my God, for the wicked” in 48:22 and 57:21 divides Isa 40–66 into three sections. Interestingly, the structures created by these devices sometimes conflict. For instance, is Isa 56 the first chapter of a major 42  But see the objections by Heffelfinger, Large, 136–137. 43  Schuele, “Isaiah 57,” 96–97.

The Poetic Structures in Isaiah   391 s­ ection of the book, or is it the penultimate chapter within a different section? Although these competing cues can be plausibly explained as features of different editions of the book,44 they are not inconsistent with the loose structures that typify Isaiah’s poetry. Indeed, given its overwhelmingly poetic character, it should be no surprise that the book as a whole would display a poetic structure—marked by nonnarrative discourse, associative logic, and parataxis—in contrast to the more linear or even narrative structures sometimes proposed.45 In this sense, the closest biblical analogue for the structure of Isaiah may be Psalms. Both books contain an opening chapter that seems to serve as a kind of introduction to the book. Both have sequences of poems that form relatively discrete units. The prophetic narratives in Isa 6–8, 20, and 36–39 have a contextualizing function not unlike the superscriptions to many psalms. And the final chapters of both books appear to be successive endings that accrued over time. There remain, of course, significant differences between the two, not least their respective genres—although even here there are points of contact, such as the high number of both laments and hymns in Isaiah. These suggestive similarities may suggest a fruitful approach to reading Isaiah holistically as a poetic book.

Bibliography Alonso Schökel, Luis. “Isaiah.” In The Literary Guide to the Bible, edited by Robert Alter and Frank Kermode, 165–183. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1987. Alter, Robert. The Art of Biblical Poetry. New York: Basic Books, 1985. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 1–39: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2002. Berlin, Adele. The Dynamics of Biblical Parallelism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985. Collins, Terrence. Line-Forms in Hebrew Poetry: A Grammatical Approach to the Stylistic Study of the Hebrew Prophets. Studia Pohl: Series Maior 7. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1978. Couey, J. Blake. Reading the Poetry of First Isaiah: The Most Perfect Model of the Prophetic Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Dobbs-Allsopp, F. W. On Biblical Poetry. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. Geller, Stephen A. “Hebrew Prosody and Poetics. I. Biblical.” In The Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, edited by Roland Greene, 610–612. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 20124. Heffelfinger, Katie M. I am Large, I Contain Multitudes: Lyric Cohesion and Conflict in Second Isaiah. BIS 105. Leiden: Brill, 2011. O’Connor, Michael Patrick. Hebrew Verse Structure. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 19972. Roberts, J. J. M. First Isaiah. Hermeneia. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2015. Schuele, Andreas. “ ‘Build up, Pass Through”: Isaiah 57:14–62:12 as the Core Composition of Third Isaiah.” In The Book of Isaiah: Enduring Questions Answered Anew: Essays Honoring 44  Cf. Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 1–39, 83. 45 Heffelfinger, Large, makes such arguments for the structure of Isa 40–55.

392   J. Blake Couey Joseph Blenkinsopp and His Contribution to the Study of Isaiah, edited by Richard J. Bautch and J. Todd Hibbard, 83–110. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2014. Tov, Emmanuel. Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. STDJ 54. Leiden: Brill, 2004. Tull, Patricia K. Isaiah 1–39. SHBC. Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2010. Watson, Wilfred G. E. Classical Hebrew Poetry: A Guide to Its Techniques. JSOTS 26. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1986. Watson, Wilfred G. E. Traditional Techniques in Classical Hebrew Verse. JSOTS 170. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1994. Wildberger, Hans. Isaiah 13–27. Translated by Thomas H. Trapp. CC. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1997. Williamson, H. G. M. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 1–5. ICC. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Williamson, H. G. M. “Sound, Sense and Language in Isaiah 24–27.” JJS 46 (1995): 1–9. Willis, John T. “Alternating (ABA'B') Parallelism in the Old Testament Psalms and Prophetic Literature.” In Directions in Biblical Hebrew Poetry, edited by Elaine R. Folis, 49–76. JSOTS 40. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1984.

chapter 21

The Poetic V ision of Isa i a h Francis Landy

So is Isaiah a blinded text awaiting the insightful critic? Or is Isaiah such a blinded text that only a blinded critic can read it? Or is it the case that only blind readers can imagine (with a trace of the Latin imaginare “picture mentally”) the insightful text produced by whatever the sign “Isaiah” stands for? Blind writer, blind reader? Blindsight of both writer and reader may produce the kinds of insightful readings of Isaiah which this strange biblical text invites. This the most visionary of texts calls for the most visionary of readings . . . I remain convinced that reading a book such as Isaiah calls for profoundly imaginative acts of interpretation.1

This chapter is an attempt to meet this challenge by Robert Carroll, and, indeed, the challenge of the book of Isaiah: to respond to the visionary poetry of Isaiah with an interpretation that, if not visionary, is imaginative and takes into account the visionary intensity of the poetry. Isaiah is a ḥǎ z ôn, a “vision” (1:1), a word that implies something beyond normal sight, and intimations of preternatural percipience recur throughout the book. For example, the Davidic heir in 11:3 judges “not according to the appearance of the eyes”; Jerusalem in 22:1 is “the valley of vision,” a designation ironic in context. To be a blinded critic is to be dazzled by the excess of light, and to recognize that we do not always know where we are going or what the text says. The literary critic J. Hillis Miller writes of criticism: “You might fall into an unforeseen pit or enter a blind alley, an aporia, a blank wall, in the act of writing or feeling your way blindly.”2 To feel one’s way blindly, however, requires very close attention, and tentativeness, in trying to understand poetry of extraordinary density and complexity.

1  Carroll, “Blindsight,” 93.

2  Miller, “Stories,” 61.

394   Francis Landy “Poetry is notoriously difficult to define,” as J. Blake Couey says at the beginning of his book on the poetry of First Isaiah.3 The boundary between poetry and prose is uncertain; different genres may be classified as poetry; there are minute interactions, between sound and sense, between form and content, that render the quest for a definition elusive. The difficulty is compounded in the case of Hebrew biblical poetry by the absence of formal criteria, such as meter, and of any native term for poetry: we do not know if the ancient Israelites thought in terms of our distinction between poetry and prose.4 This has not stopped scholars from seeking the secret of biblical verse. For example, Couey starts his discussion by saying that “lineation is the basic feature that distinguishes verse from prose,”5 which overlooks the fact that prose may also be lineated. There is no essential difference between biblical poetry and prose; they use the same techniques, though with different degrees of regularity and toward different ends. It is often thought, for instance, that parallelism is the principal formal characteristic of biblical poetry, but many poems are nonparallelistic, and parallelism is common in prose.6 Parallelism, like all the other rhetorical devices of biblical poetry (and prose), is infinitely flexible, and is a technique for generating meaning. It may amplify a statement, intensifying it;7 it may subtly modify it; it may simply mark out the ritual space of po­etry.8 As Dobbs-Allsopp illustrates,9 parallelism generates rhythm, as the s­ econd, or B, clause complements and completes the first, or A, one. The notional equivalence between the two (or more) parts of the parallelism permits the play of likeness and difference that is the elementary form of metaphor; thereby, the poetic fabric is knit together and dissevered. Moreover, parallelism operates on several linguistic levels: semantic, syntactic, morphological, and phonological, and suggests equivalences between them. Parallelisms may be subdivided and participate in larger structural complexes: one parallelism may match another one, or a remote one. To give an example from the very beginning of Isaiah: šim‘û šāmayim wĕha’ǎzînî ’ereṣ, “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth” (1:2): the virtual synonymity of “hear” and “give ear” (šim‘û, ha’ǎzînî) evokes the contrast of heavens and earth, and is subtended by the strong alliteration of Šim‘û Šāmayim and ha’ǎzînî ’ereṣ, with its opposition of fricatives and vocalics. Each phrase, moreover, has a two-stress, trochaic rhythm, and may be subdivided into corresponding halves, as if the sound play is the basis for an intrinsic relation: the heavens are essentially hearing, the earth is all ears, and so on.10 The two phrases c­ ombined complement the third: kî Yhwh dibber, “for Yhwh has spoken,” as speech finds an audience. Thus parallelism is a means for constructing intricate poetic

3 Couey, Reading, 1. 4 Kugel, Biblical Poetry, 69. 5 Couey, Reading, 21. 6  Parallelism presents its own problems of definition. On this, see Berlin, Dynamics. 7 Alter, Art, 62–84. Alter’s book remains the best guide to biblical poetry in all its variety. 8  On poetry as a ritual space, see Blasing, Lyric Poetry, 55–57. 9 Dobbs-Allsopp Biblical Poetry, 143–162. 10  Note the serendipity that the sound play can be duplicated in English.

The Poetic Vision of Isaiah   395 c­ onfigurations; it is with these configurations, and not on the techniques that produce them, that I am primarily concerned. Isaiah is visionary poetry, as Carroll says; and its visionary quality differentiates it from all nonprophetic poetry, since its language is not merely human. Any message coming from God is charged with an ultimate authority; any response to it, therefore, has extreme significance. The message from outside the human realm renders human language imperfect and provisional; Isaiah, in his inaugural vision, admits to being among a people of “impure lips” (6:5), and thereafter, after being purified by the seraph, his language is different from all others. The poet listens to (or sees) that which is beyond the human purview, and which disrupts normal communication and poetics. Hence the paradox in the commissioning scene of chapter 6 that the prophet can only communicate indirectly, by instilling miscommunication, that what he has to teach is nonpercipience, despite the intensity of seeing and hearing, what Robert Carroll calls “blindsight.”11 The visionary poet belongs to what Pieter Craffert calls “the shamanic complex,” typical of Mediterranean societies, in which access to alternate states of consciousness is combined with a therapeutic function, to cure the ills of society.12 Poetic, political, and ethical agendas are aligned; the alternate state of consciousness corresponds to a new vision of society and its values. Isaiah is a book, composed over several centuries in very different circumstances, whose unity and thus poetic vision is always in question. Scholars traditionally divided it into three parts—Proto-, Deutero-, and Trito-Isaiah—with distinct styles and ideologies.13 Since the 1980s, however, there has been a growing awareness that the parts are composite, and that the book has been composed as a unity, at least retroactively.14 The unity may be thematic,15 structural,16 the result of processes of reading and interpretation,17 or attribution to a single prestigious prophet;18 the vision encompasses the whole of history and imposes on it a single story, from the eighth-century crises through death and exile to glorious restitution. The comic, U-shaped plot is typical of prophetic books and encapsulates the story of the Bible as a whole.19 The in­ter­de­pend­ence of prophetic and historical writings has been well explored by Ian Wilson.20 But the story is only told against the background of its disenchantment. One does not know much about the editors and final composers of the book, but they lived in a world in which Judah was a tiny, impoverished subprovince of a great empire. The hopes of the Davidic dynasty and the divine election 11  On this, see esp. Liss, Prophetie. 12  Craffert, “Shamanism.” 13  The three parts correspond to chaps. 1–39, 40–55, and 56–66 respectively. 14  The literature is enormous. See Rendtorff, “Zur Komposition”; Vermeylen, Isaïe; Steck, Studien; Williamson, Book Called Isaiah; Ferry, Isaïe; and Stromberg, Isaiah after Exile, for a representative sample. 15  See especially Clements, “Unity”; “Beyond Tradition History”; “Light to the Nations”; “Arise”; and several essays in his Jerusalem and the Nations. 16  Liebreich, “Compilation”; “Compilation (continued),” pioneered this approach. See also Lack, Symbolique; and O’Connell, Concentricity and Continuity. 17  In addition to Steck, Studien; Williamson, Book Called Isaiah; and Stromberg, Isaiah after Exile, see Sommer, Prophet; and Tull Willey, Remember. 18  Ackroyd, “Isaiah I–XII”; Ben Zvi, “Isaiah.” 19 Frye, Great Code. 20 Wilson, Kingship.

396   Francis Landy of Israel were remote indeed. The book, then, may be a wish fulfillment; the happy ending is deferred beyond the horizon of the book, and the voices of despair persist more or less until its very end, for instance, in chapters 63–64. Vision becomes word becomes text becomes book.21 The transitions present their own problems: how does one find words for what one sees, how does writing stage the immediacy of the words, what processes of revision are there? Once a book has been completed, however, it suggests a totality; there is nothing left to be seen, done, or written; the pieces all fit together, and the reader is left to figure it out in darkness. Hence the image of the sealed book in the metatextual parable of 29:11–12: And the vision of all shall be for you like a sealed book, which when they take it to one who knows how to read,22 saying, “Read this, please,” he will say “I cannot, for it is sealed.” And when the book is given to one who does not know how to read, saying, “Read this, please,” he will say, “I do not know how to read.”

The vision of everything is then invisible, concealed in a book that is enclosed, inaccessible to both the literate and illiterate. We are left with our efforts of interpretation, which add nothing to what is written. We do not know if the sealed book is our book of Isaiah, or if our book is equivalent to the totalizing vision. In 34:16 the reader is urged to inquire (daraš) of the book of Yhwh, in which nothing is missing; our book may be a prefiguration, a fragment of that book, an intimation of what might have been. Within the book itself, there are implications of continuance outside the book. In 59:21, Yhwh promises the perpetuation of the word through the generations, “for ever”; in 8:16, the teaching (tôrah) is sealed within the disciples, who are, as it were, living books. It may be sealed even from themselves, a secret they carry with them, subject to continued efforts of opening, which can only be resealed, for instance, through metaphor.23 Our book, like every book, is only one possible version of the book that might have been. Every book could have been different, and every book is rewritten and recombined in the reader’s imagination. It may be read forward or backward; one can begin from the end, as well as from the beginning. This is especially the case with rereading, and memorization, since in antiquity most books would be internalized, inscribed on the heart.24 In a poetic book, moreover, the narrative sequence is only one possible arrangement; one reads for echoes and correspondences, often very remote ones. The narrative is repeated, over and over, in the course of the book; there is no simple trajectory from beginning to end. Further, there is no logical connection, no causal rela21  I am not thinking of actual processes of composition, of which we know little, but of logical relations, in which vision leads to audition, which is written down and subsequently collected into a book. Orality and literacy are interdependent and, as Dobbs-Allsopp, Biblical Poetry, puts it, “interfacial” (p. 318). 22  Literally, “book.” Dobbs-Allsopp, Biblical Poetry, 307, thinks that this means that the document was already known even before it was read, given the difficulty of reading in ancient times. See, however, Evans, “Exoticization.” 23  For the interaction of secrecy and revelation in esoteric literature, see Wolfson, Language. 24  See esp. the discussion of ancient reading and educational practices in Carr, Writing.

The Poetic Vision of Isaiah   397 tion, between beginning and end. Suddenly, and for no reason, catastrophe turns into deliverance. There may be historical circumstances, such as the advent of Cyrus, ethical reformation, and the completion of Israel’s punishment (40:2), but nothing explains the transformation the book portends. Moreover, one does not know what the end is. R. E. Clements once published an article entitled “Isaiah: A Book without an Ending?”25 but in reality there are many endings: chapters 32, 33, 35, 39, 52:12, 55, and 62 have all been proposed as conclusions of different editions of the book. The grand climax of chapter 66, impressive as it is, need not have been ultimate.26 There are competing final scenarios. Chapter 2 juxtaposes a vision of universal peace with one of utter destruction. We do not know which follows which or whether they happen simultaneously, but clearly, they are incompatible. Proto-Isaiah envisages a renewed Davidic dynasty; in 55:3, the Davidic promise is transferred to Israel; and in Trito-Isaiah the question of sovereignty more or less disappears. The distinction between Israel and the nations that was prevalent through most of the book is replaced in the last chapters by that between the righteous and the wicked; the nations are included in Israel’s salvation, while the wicked suffer perdition. This may result in a new transethnic definition of Israel, as Ulrich Berges has proposed.27 Not only are endings ambiguous, so are beginnings. Chapter 1 begins with the appeal to heaven and earth, which I have already discussed. It recalls the creation of heaven and earth at the beginning of Genesis, as well as Moses’s valedictory song in Deut 32:1.28 Isaiah begins where Moses left off, and thereby inserts itself into the history of prophecy. Many scholars believe that chapter 1 was constructed as an introduction to the book, perhaps from fragments elsewhere, and it has close correspondences in chapters 65–66.29 The heavens and earth summoned as auditors in 1:2 give way to the new heavens and new earth, and thus a new creation, in 65:17 and 66:22. Chapter 2 begins again with the “word that Isaiah son of Amoz saw over Judah and Jerusalem.” We begin at the end, with nations’ ascent of Zion and learning the ways of Torah, in a passage with echoes of Eden. It is the familiar topos of Endzeit ist Urzeit. In chapter 6, Isaiah’s commissioning scene is also an initiation; its displacement from the beginning of the book suggests that the prophet’s biography is not coterminous with his prophecy. Origins are multiple and indeterminate. The different beginnings and endings may be evidence for diachronic development and of competing ideologies in the book, as well as for a tolerance of multiple points of view in the Second Temple period, but they also are problematic for unified reading and 25  Clements, “Isaiah.” 26  Carr, “Unity in Isaiah.” 27 Berges, Jesaja, 168. For the contrary position, that the reference is to exiled Israelites, see Croattó, Imaginar. See also Tiemeyer, “Death or Conversion.” 28  For the connection between Isa 1 and Deut 32, see Wildberger, Isaiah 1–12, 9; and Fisch, Poetry, 64–78. I am aware that this suggestion is a diachronic minefield, since the priority of all these texts is in doubt. 29  Föhrer, “Jesaja 1,” is usually credited as the originator of this idea, and has been followed by many others. Williamson, Isaiah 1–5, 9–12, provides a cautious assessment. See also Beuken, Jesaja 1–12, 60; and Ferry, Isaïe, 42. Isa 2:1–5 is often included in this introduction.

398   Francis Landy vision. Will there be a Davidic heir who will inaugurate an era of universal peace and justice? Will Cyrus take over the Davidic role, releasing the captives? Or will it be Israel, witnessing to or for the nations? Or will it be the prophet, comforting mourners? One may take prophecies like 11.1–9 in isolation, but the more there are, the less coherence there will be. At the center of the book, as of Israelite/Judean history, are destruction and exile, first of Samaria in 722 bce, and then of Jerusalem in 586 bce. The disaster meant the end of the Israelite kingdoms, and but also much more, since those kingdoms, with the temple(s) at their center, were at the intersection of sacred geography and history, and of Israel’s destiny as a chosen people, with, in the case of Judah, its own divinely appointed monarchy. The relationship of Yhwh and his people and, with it, that of Yhwh and the world, was apparently at an end. The fall of Jerusalem meant the disappearance of its values, its culture, and the demise of its god, just as Asshur perished with the defeat of Assyria.30 The Deuteronomistic History is, at least on one level, an obituary. The loss of temple and kingdom resulted in two things: perpetual mourning, and the attempt to reconstitute the institutional foundations even in their absence, which correspond, psychoanalytically, to the alternatives of “acting out” and “working through.” David Carr, in particular, has argued that the Bible is traumatic literature, an enterprise that asserts meaning despite catastrophe.31 The other side of meaning is meaninglessness, an anomie that threatens the entire metanarrative. The skeptical voice repeatedly comes back, despite every effort to repress it. The trauma is evident in the dislocation of language, for example in the gap between present alienation and what the French critic Maurice Blanchot calls the “impossible future,” and the search for a poetry adequate to the vision and the horror.32 This would be especially true of sacred poetry, such as psalms, which was attached to temple and monarchy, and which expressed the values and the symbolic world of ancient Israel. Isaiah was the heir of a millennial tradition, which had to be rethought with the loss of everything that world signified. Hence the new poetic language required a transvaluation of values, an undoing of old structures. A perennial trope in Isaiah, as in much mystical literature, is that true knowledge, the knowledge of Yhwh, is contrary to conventional wisdom. At the same time, the past is irrecoverable; alongside visions of a new age, there is the persistence of exile, despite the restoration;33 the dead will never be brought back to life. One can tell the same story again and again, but the more one repeats it, the less one is sure that it will end—or, indeed, that there is a story. The many beginnings and endings may testify to the plurality of views in the Second Temple period, and to the anthological quality of the book, but they might also be seen diachronically, not as evidence for a real historical development, but as contributing to the story the book tells of itself. In other words, it is a narrative about ideas, and how 30 Liss, Unerhöhrte, 288. 31 Carr, Holy Resilience. For the relationship of history and trauma, see LaCapra, Writing History, and Wyschogrod, Ethics of Remembering. 32  Blanchot, “Prophetic Speech,” 79. See also Liss, Unerhöhrte, 272. 33  See esp. Halvorson-Taylor, Enduring Exile, Poulsen, Black Hole.

The Poetic Vision of Isaiah   399 they change in different circumstances. From this point of view, the most notable feature of the book is the two-hundred-year gap between the imagined setting of ProtoIsaiah, which concludes with the Assyrian crisis in 701 bce, and the proclamation of the return of the exiles at the beginning of Deutero-Isaiah. The discontinuity differentiates it entirely from the other Major Prophets, Jeremiah and Ezekiel.34 The two worlds are radically contrasted, and yet are assumed to be conjoined, for instance through the transposition of ideas. As we have seen, the linear sequence, from creation to the new creation, from Abraham and Sarah to their remote descendants, coexists with the recursiveness that insistently links beginning to end. As in the Odyssey, the hero returns home after many adventures, only to find that it has irrevocably changed. The book is a family romance.35 It is patriarchal, as is all biblical literature. A single male god goes in search of a bride and the end of the book celebrates the nuptials, at least in anticipation. It is pervaded by familiar prophetic imagery,36 whereby Zion/Israel is condemned as a prostitute (1:21) and reclaimed as the divine spouse. The book alternates, as does other prophetic literature, between extremes of misogyny and idealization; the female figure is the object of divine violence, desire, and pleasure. The women, moreover, are substitutes for the men: in 1:21–23, for instance, Zion’s harlotry is a metaphor for the corruption of its elite classes. The parabolic love song of 5:1–7 is decoded as referring to the audience of male inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem.37 Feminization is pejorative, projecting guilt momentarily onto the other gender and mingling sexual greed with disgust; at the same time, since the real subjects are men, it reinforces gender boundaries. However, it is not quite so simple. Gender hierarchies are always liable to be reversed. The book begins with Oedipal transgression: “Sons I have reared and exalted, and they have rebelled against me” (1:2). They do not acknowledge Yhwh’s paternity (1:3); there is no mother. Yhwh apparently inseminates by himself; the seed is of “evildoers,”38 the sons are “corrupt,” suggesting a process of degeneration starting from Yhwh himself. In the following verses, the rebellious sons are beaten to pulp, in language that is familiar from sapiential literature; God the Father’s chastisement anticipates a major theme in the book, according to which Assyria and its successors are the agents of God’s wrath. They are punished perhaps because of their ignorance—this will be elaborated over the course of the book, for instance, in the inversion of social values—their inability to be proper posterity. Thereby God threatens to destroy himself, his own terrestrial future, 34  James Nogalski, “Isaiah and the Twelve,” 78, has recently proposed that in this respect Isaiah is like the Book of the Twelve. However, the narrative gap in the Book of the Twelve is much shorter (even granting that the Twelve were considered a single book). On this, see Ben Zvi and Nogalski, Two Sides, and my response, “Three Sides.” 35  Pfisterer Darr, Isaiah’s Vision. See also Sharon Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital Metaphors, 117–155. 36  The “pornoprophetics” debate has been a recurrent motif in feminist biblical criticism since the 1980s. See Setel, “Poets and Pornography”; Brenner, “Pornoprophetics Revisited”; Carroll, “Desire.” 37  Landy, “Parable.” 38  One may note the powerful alliteration of zera‘ mĕrē‘im, to intimate that the seed is intrinsically evil. The whole passage is replete with elaborate word plays.

400   Francis Landy an ever-present ultimate horizon. But as the masculine progeny of a solitary male god, their punishment may be a sign of repression, of that which is excluded from the monotheistic order. They may represent prohibited desire, for instance, for the female consort of Yhwh, the evidence for which is found both archaeologically and throughout the Hebrew Bible. In Isaiah, this desire is attested by the voluptuous worship of other deities, and by a pun on the word ’elâ linking sacred trees to the goddess.39 In 1:8, however, a daughter appears: bat ṣiôn, Daughter Zion or the daughter of Zion.40 The daughter is effectively the same as the sons: both are figures for Israel/ Judah’s relationship to God. If the sons evoke the sadistic violence of the divine father and rivalry between generations, the daughter is associated with tenderness, survival, and erotic potential. The father retreats into the background. If bat ṣiôn is the daughter of Zion, Zion is clearly maternal. She becomes the principal parental figure in the book, the object of its concern, nostalgia, and reclamation. Her maternity is reflected in the designation of the “daughters of Zion” in 3:16 and 4:4, all of whom are exemplifications of the “daughter of Zion” or “Daughter Zion” herself. But then there is the question of who is the father? Is it Yhwh? And if so, why does he excoriate his daughters’ beauty in 3:16 and cleanse them of their excrement in 4:4? The daughters merge with the mother, and thus evoke the marital imagery that subtends the drama of the book. It begins with estrangement. Corresponding to the perfidy of the sons is the corruption of the Temple courts in 1:10–15. This, too, is a familiar motif in the prophets, that God does not need sacrifices, but ethical behavior.41 The Temple is the site of divinehuman communication; God’s disgust means a disruption of the relations between heavens and earth, with all its implications, for instance, for God’s patronage of the Davidic dynasty. Disgust is the reverse side of sexuality; the sexual implications are made explicit in the succeeding comparison of the “faithful city” to a prostitute (1:21). Disgust is a symptom of what Julia Kristeva calls “the abject,”42 those aspects of the female body the infant (and patriarchal society subsequently) rejects, casts out, and desires. Hence the recurrent preoccupation with excrement in the book.43 Curiously, however, this image disappears. Zion is never again called a prostitute; there is hardly even any condemnation of Temple ritual, though there are displaced echoes of it in the last chapters.44 The image of the prostitute is transferred to Tyre, the world emporium, in chapter 23; there, however, the prostitute’s earnings will become “holy to Yhwh,” transformed into the maintenance of those “who sit before him,” presumably in Zion, 39  For the pun, see 1:29–31 and 6:13, with echoes through the book. The verb ḥam ̌ adtem, used for tree worship in 1:29, has sexual connotations (e.g., Song of Solomon 2:3). 40  An interminable debate swirls around whether bat ṣiôn should be translated “Daughter Zion” or “Daughter of Zion.” See, for example, Stinespring, “No Daughter of Zion,” and Floyd, “Welcome Back.” It hardly matters. 41  See, e.g., Hos 6:6; Amos 5:25; Mic 6:6–7. 42 Kristeva, Powers of Horror. 43  Isa 4:4; 25:10–11; 28:8; 36:12. 44  E.g., in the polemic against insincere fasting in Isa 58:1–8, though there is no mention of sacrifices. See also Isa 29:13.

The Poetic Vision of Isaiah   401 with all the metaphorical transpositions that implies, for instance of economy into song. The prostitute is the one who feeds the habitués of the Temple and, ultimately, God himself. Alongside the image of prostitute is another image of Zion, that of Torah. In 2:2–4 the nations come to Zion, to learn the ways of God; Zion is the matrix from which Torah, and the resulting peace, emanate through the world. In 11:9, correspondingly, Yhwh’s holy mountain is a zone of nonviolence, from which knowledge of Yhwh fills the earth. Torah is a feminine subject, corresponding to the masculine “word of Yhwh” in 2:3. As the language that comes forth from Zion, it is a maternal presence that speaks to and embraces the world. Everyone is connected to that source. In 3:25–26, Zion is a widow, bereft of her menfolk and her warriors. The widow is a figure of pathos, on the margins of patriarchal society, and the object of social responsibility as well as the possibility of exploitation: “Give justice to the orphan, advocate for the widow” (1:17). If the husband is Yhwh, he is absent, and responsible for the destruction. In the preceding verses, he has disfigured the daughters of Zion and stripped them of their clothing, in a list remarkable for its protractedness (3:16–24). Stripping a woman bare and sending her into exile is a recurrent prophetic fantasy,45 and suggests, by its very excess, a fear of feminine beauty, pride, and attractiveness: “because the daughters of Zion have walked tall, stretching their throats and fluttering their eyes” (3:16). The daughters, like the prostitute, represent the danger of sexuality to patriarchal control; the trajectory from daughter to widow leads through death to their purification in 4:4. The daughters are equivalent to, or complement, the male remnant who are “written for life in Jerusalem” (4:3), in a text that may be the book of Yhwh and correspond to our book. They live in the text, which bears their imprint (especially if they compose it). But they also participate, with or as the daughters, in the wedding canopy (ḥuppâ), which represents the consummation of the relationship of God and Israel (4:5), and which reenacts their intimacy in the wilderness. As the book progresses, the bridal imagery intersects with that of the mother who loses her children and finds them again. Exile is metaphorically death, and death is an ultimate exile. The children who return, the community of survivors, are revenants, “the children of your bereavement” (49:20), the dead come back to life. They find “the place too narrow,” presumably Jerusalem, which will be more populated than before the destruction, but also the maternal space, represented by Zion. The mother says, “Who gave birth to these?” (49:21), as if she cannot believe her eyes or her own maternity. It is a haunting fantasy, or a fantasy of haunting, rendered the more poignant by being imagined by the prophet, who is himself one of the exiled children. Moreover, the dead can never be brought back to life, the past can never be erased, no matter how glorious the restoration. Zion has been destroyed, and she is in exile (49:21) together with her lost children. Later in the book, we hear of the “mourners of Zion” (61:3), who pray for her constantly (62:1, 6–7). Yhwh himself declares that he constantly visualizes Zion’s walls, which are now ruined and desolate, and contain an empty space (49:16). Yhwh holds 45  Hos 2:4–15 and Amos 4:1–3 are examples of elements of this fantasy.

402   Francis Landy the memory of Zion, including that of Zion thinking he has forgotten her (49:14). The dead and exiled children mourn the dead and exiled mother, mourning for them. A similar image is found in 32:12: “Upon breasts mourners, upon the delectable fields, over the fruitful vine.”46 The context is tranquil women (v. 9) who are called upon to lament, ostensibly over the failure of the harvest, which anticipates the destruction of the land and city (vv. 13–14). Lament is a female specialty throughout the Mediterranean;47 mothers may mourn sons, wives husbands, and so on. Here, however, the mourners (sōpdîm) are on the breasts, and mourning over them; the breasts are metaphors for the fertility of the land, especially given the frequent maternal imagery used for its produce. Instead of mothers mourning infants, infants are mourning mothers; the lamenting women are figures for the desolation over which they grieve, stripping themselves bare in a ritual of self-humiliation (v. 11). The infants are literally on the breasts, suckling the milk of lamentation, imbibing death instead of life. The transfer of imagery is confirmed by the sonorous shift from breasts (šādayim) to fields (śĕdê), which are graphically almost identical. Both the fields and vineyards have erotic connotations; for instance, the word ḥemed, which I translate as “­delectable,” evokes passion. In 5:14 there is another female representation of death: Sheol. Sheol opens her limitless (bĕlî ḥôq) mouth and swallows up drunken revelers, who typify the corrupt society condemned in the woe oracles of 5:8–23. Death drinks the drinkers, a conceit repeated in 28:7.48 Sheol opens a space in the midst of the poem that threatens to destroy all its significations. It is the antithesis of Yhwh and of the apotheosis of Zion in the latter part of the book. Sheol may be associated with the Strange Woman in Proverbs, whose ways lead to death (Prov 7:27; 9:18), and thus to the image of the prostitute in 1:21 and the nexus between sexuality and danger. It also suggests the skeptical question, running throughout the book, whether there is in fact a future, as the pun between Sheol and the word for “question” (šĕ’ôl) intimates. Yhwh is increasingly feminized through the book.49 It is not that masculine images disappear. Yhwh marches forth from Edom in bloodstained garments, like a typical warrior god, in 63:1–6. In 40:10–11, at the end of the Prologue of Deutero-Isaiah, he returns in triumph from exile, evoking both martial and pastoral representations of divine kingship. The initial Oedipal conflict of fathers and sons is displaced, first onto a succession of divinely appointed sons who initiate a new era, and are “signs and ­portents” from Yhwh (8:18), and then onto that of the relationship of the prophet and God, as a model for that of God and Israel. It is then reversed at the end of the book. 46  Commentators emend in various ways, or speculate that the reference is to a mourning ritual. This weakens the force of the metaphor. 47  Cf. Jer 9:16. See Grimes, Deeply into the Bone, 243–251, for a description of contemporary Greek practices; and Hasan-Rokem, Web of Life, 108–129. 48  It is inverted in Isa 25:7, in which Yhwh swallows death. 49 Trible, Rhetoric of Sexuality, was one of the first to point to the female imagery for God in the Hebrew Bible: “in this poetry the divine and the maternal intertwine” (p. 38). On Deutero-Isaiah, see Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital Metaphors, 117–155, and Løland, Silent or Salient Gender.

The Poetic Vision of Isaiah   403 In the lament of 63:7–64.11, the community acknowledges Yhwh as their sole father (63:16; 64:7), who has rejected them. Female and male images of God are frequently paired: 45:10 decries those who question God’s paternity or maternity; 42:13–14 juxtaposes comparisons of Yhwh to a warrior and a woman in labor. In 66:8–9 Zion and Yhwh collaborate in giving birth to her children. Yhwh says, “Shall I break the waters, and not give birth?”50 Yhwh has a maternal function here, as in 42:14. A comparable text is 49:21, in which Zion says of her resuscitated children, “Who gave birth to these?” and one answer might be Yhwh. Yhwh then is the super-mother, who will never forget, even when all other mothers do (v. 15). These representations are metaphorical, and frequently distanced through simile. Simile constructs a second-order reality; often in Isaiah, we find similes nested within each other, or a whole string of similes, each of which comments on or modifies the other. If Yhwh is like a warrior and then a parturient woman, the two represent different aspects of divinity, a tension between them, or a slippage from one to the other. Each brings with it its train of associations, from the culture, from elsewhere in the book, or from the canon. Each is intertextual. The laboring woman, for instance, is a commonplace for anguish, fear, and potential joy. In 21:3, the prophet/poet experiences pangs like a laboring woman in the face of his terrifying vision. In 42:14, the image is developed through a sequence of verbs for the pain and effort of labor, “I gape, I breathe, I gasp,” which import the enormity of the birth, which recapitulates the crossing of the Red Sea and thus Israel’s nativity (vv. 15–16). Elsewhere Yhwh is imagined as being present in the womb, or as accompanying Israel from the womb. In 49:1, the poet says, “Yhwh called me from the womb, from inside my mother he invoked my name.” The voice of Yhwh may be different from the uterine environment, it may suggest another point of origination and the double nature of the poet/prophet as both the representative of God and the human subject; nonetheless, it is experienced in the womb, it accompanies maternal sustenance. In 46:3–4, Yhwh patiently bears Israel from the womb to old age, a lifelong prolongation of the child’s ambiance. Yhwh in both cases may be grammatically masculine, perhaps paternal, but may also precede or encompass the gender binary. Gender switching may also be accomplished through metonymy. For example, in 51:9–10, the grammatically feminine arm of Yhwh is apostrophized as crushing the sea monsters and evaporating the sea, in a recollection of the primordial conflict with chaos. Its femininity is emphasized by the repeated exclamation, “You (f.) are she who crushed Rahab . . . are you (f.) not she who dried up Sea.” The arm is clearly a feminine hypostatized aspect of God, albeit imagined as the divine warrior in his mythic triumph. As with violent goddesses cross-culturally, the image subverts gender stereotypes. Its femininity is confirmed by a wordplay. It is the one who pierces (mĕḥôlelet) the sea monster,

50  The normal meaning of the Hiphil ’ôlîd would be to “procreate,” but that is clearly not the sense here.

404   Francis Landy Tannin. A few verses earlier, Sarah gives birth (tĕḥôlel) to Israel (51:2). Sarah is evoked as the arch-mother of Israel; she, together with Abraham, may be the “rock” and the “well” from which Israel was extracted, and both words are metaphors for God and have feminine connotations.51 The juxtaposition suggests that the defeat of the Sea is the other side of, the precondition for, the birth of Israel, as indicated in the conclusion of the passage in verse 10: “who makes the depths of the Sea a way for the redeemed to pass.” The metonymy may be read in two ways. It may be a feminine image, or mask, for an essentially phallic deity. Or, if the arm is identical to Yhwh, it may suggest an intrinsic femininity, dissimulated by stock masculine language and imagery. The suppressed goddess reappears in the guise of Yhwh. Yhwh takes on masculine and feminine positions strategically and rhetorically, not necessarily because Yhwh is beyond gender, but because in a monotheistic universe, as emphatically proclaimed in Deutero-Isaiah, Yhwh encompasses both. This brings us back to metaphor, and thus to poetic vision and Robert Carroll’s metaphor of “blindsight” for the imaginative work of the critic. According to the commissioning scene in 6:9–10, Isaiah is a book that is not meant to be understood. “Hear attentively, but do not understand; see intensely, but do not perceive.” One of the processes in the book, never completed, is the journey to enlightenment, when the eyes of the blind will be opened (35:5). The task of the blindest of people, according to Deutero-Isaiah (42:19) is to bring “light to the nations” (42:6; 49:6), culminating in the injunction to Zion to shine and roll away the darkness from the world in 60:1–3, in a repetition of the first act of creation. Metaphor is a transfer, from the unknown to the known, from the incomprehensible divine vision to human language. In Isaiah, it always communicates incommensurability, even when apparently clear. The book requires, as Carroll says, “imaginative acts of interpretation,” which will always leave us, nonetheless, struggling in darkness. This is because metaphors are open-ended, ambiguous, and frequently paradoxical.52 Moreover, they have ramifying implications; Jerusalem, for instance, is every city.53 For example, in 49:21, Zion says of herself that she was “exiled,” and “wandering.” Zion here is clearly not the ruined city but its people, or perhaps, the city is imagined accompanying the people in exile, as in later Jewish thought. Then Zion, in its bewilderment at its miraculous progeny, is in fact the exiles, wondering at their rediscovery of the mother, and coming home. There are several intersecting stories in Isaiah, of which what I have called “the family romance” is but one. There is the story of the Davidic dynasty, of Israel’s relationship to the nations, and the trajectory from ignorance to knowledge. I will isolate one point with which to conclude. In 61:1, the poet/prophet says, “The spirit of my Lord Yhwh is upon me; because Yhwh has anointed me, to proclaim good news to the poor.” 51  In Deut 32:18, for instance, the rock (ṣûr) as a metaphor for God is described as giving birth to Israel; in the same text (v. 14), in the form of the crag (sela‘), it suckles it. 52  For ambiguity in the metaphors of Deutero-Isaiah, see Kim, Ambiguity. 53  See, for instance, Carroll, “City of Stone.”

The Poetic Vision of Isaiah   405 The passage as it continues is full of intertextual associations, metatheses, and cumulative metaphors for the transformation it heralds. It is the last appearance of the royal theme in the book.54 As in 11:2, the spirit of Yhwh is on the speaker; as in 45:1, he is anointed. But he is not a Davidide or Cyrus. It lacks, moreover, all the attributes of royal rule. He will not found a world-wide empire, like Cyrus; he will not bring about a universal reign of justice through his supernatural gifts. Instead, he bequeaths us his poetry. And that is what we are left with.

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54  For the connection with 11:1–9, see Sommer, Prophet, 80. See also Zapff, Jesaja 56–66, 390.

406   Francis Landy Carroll, Robert P. “Desire under the Terebinths: On Pornographic Representation in the Prophets; a Response.” In A Feminist Companion to the Latter Prophets, edited by Athalya Brenner, 275–307. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Clements, Ronald E. “ ‘Arise, Arise, for Your Light Has Come’: A Basic Theme in Isaianic Tradition.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretive Tradition, vol. 1, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 441–445. VTS 70.1 / FIOTL 1.1. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Clements, Ronald E. “Beyond Tradition History: Deutero-Isaianic Development of First Isaiah’s Themes.” JSOT 31 (1985): 95–113. Clements, Ronald E. “Isaiah: A Book without an Ending?,” JSOT 97 (2002): 109–126. Clements, Ronald E. Jerusalem and the Nations: Studies in the Book of Isaiah. HBM 16. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011. Clements, Ronald E. “A Light to the Nations: A Central Theme of the Book of Isaiah.” In Forming Prophetic Literature: Essays on Isaiah and the Book of the Twelve in Honour of John D. W.Watts, edited by James W. Watts and Paul R. House, 57–69. JSOTS 235. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Clements, Ronald E. “The Unity of the Book of Isaiah.” Int 36 (1982): 117–129. Couey, J. Blake. Reading the Poetry of First Isaiah: The Most Perfect Model of the Prophetic Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Craffert, Pieter F. “Shamanism and the Shamanic Complex.” BTB 41 (2011): 59–67. Croattó, José S. Imaginar el Futuro: Estructura retórica y querigma del Tercer Isaías. Buenos Aires: Lumen, 2007. Darr, Katherine P. Isaiah’s Vision and the Family of God. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994. Dobbs-Allsopp, Fred W. On Biblical Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Evans, Paul S. “The Exoticization of Ancient Culture in Some Recent Applications of Orality Studies to the Bible.” JBL 136 (2017): 749–764. Ferry, Joëlle. Isaïe: “Comme les mots d’un Livre Scellé” (Is 29,11). Paris: Cerf, 2008. Fisch, Harold. Poetry with a Purpose: Biblical Poetics and Interpretation. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988. Floyd, Michael H. “Welcome Back, Daughter of Zion.” CBQ 70 (2008): 484–504. Föhrer, Georg. “Jesaja 1 als Zusammenforschung der Verkündigung Jesajas.” ZAW 74 (1962): 251–268. Frye, Northrop. The Great Code: The Bible and Literature. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006. Grimes, Ronald L. Deeply into the Bone: Reinventing Rites of Passage. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. Halvorson-Taylor, Martien. Enduring Exile: The Metaphorization of Exile in the Hebrew Bible. VTS 141. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Hasan-Rokem, Galit. Web of Life: Folklore and Midrash in Rabbinic Literature. Translated by Batya Stein. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2000. Kim, H. C. Paul. Ambiguity, Tension, and Multiplicity in Deutero-Isaiah. StBibLit 52. Bern: Peter Lang, 2003. Kristeva, Julia. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. Translated by Leon S. Roudiez. New York: Columbia University Press, 1982.

The Poetic Vision of Isaiah   407 Kugel, James L. The Idea of Biblical Poetry: Parallelism and Its History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981. Lack, Rémi. La Symbolique du Livre d’Isaïe: Essai sur l’image littéraire comme element de structuration. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1973. LaCapra, Dominick. Writing History, Writing Trauma. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014. Landy, Francis. “The Parable of the Vineyard (Isaiah 5:1–7), or What Is a Love Song Doing among the Prophets?” Studies in Religion 34 (2005): 147–164. Landy, Francis. “Three Sides of a Coin: In Conversation with Ben Zvi and Nogalski, Two Sides of a Coin.” JHS 10, art. 11 (2010): 1–21. Liebreich, Leon. “The Compilation of the Book of Isaiah.” JQR 46 (1955): 259–267. Liebreich, Leon. “The Compilation of the Book of Isaiah (continued from JQR 46 (1955): 259–267.” JQR 47 (1956): 114–138. Liss, Hanna. Die Unerhöhrte Prophetie: Kommunikative Strukturen prophetischer Rede im Buch Yesha’yahu. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2003. Løland, Hanne. Silent or Salient Gender? The Interpretation of Gendered God-Language in Hebrew Bible, Exemplified in Isaiah 42, 46, and 49. FAT II/32. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Miller, J. Hillis. “What Do Stories about Pictures Want?” Critical Inquiry 34 (2008): 59­­–97. Moughtin-Mumby, Sharon. Sexual and Marital Metaphors in Hosea, Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Ezekiel. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Nogalski, James. “Isaiah and the Twelve: Scrolls with Parallel Functions in the Corpus Propheticum.” In Profeti Maggiori e Minori a Confronto/Major and Minor Prophets Compared, edited by Guido Benzi et al, 77–92. Rome: Librería Ateneo Salesiana, 2019. O’Connell, Robert H. Concentricity and Continuity: The Literary Structure of Isaiah. JSOTS 188. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1994. Poulsen, Frederik. The Black Hole in Isaiah: A Study of Exile as a Literary Theme. FAT 125. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2019. Rendtorff, Rolf. “Zur Komposition des Buches Jesaja.” VT 34 (1984): 295–320. Setel, Drorah T. “Poets and Pornography: Female Sexual Imagery in Hosea.” In Feminist Interpretation of the Bible, edited by Letty M. Russell, 86–95. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1986. Sommer, Benjamin. A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusion in Isaiah 40–66. Contraversions. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998. Steck, Odil Hannes. Studien zu Tritojesaja. BZAW 203. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1991. Stinespring, William F. “No Daughter of Zion: A Study of the Appositional Genitive in Hebrew Grammar.” Encounter 26 (1965): 133–141. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Trito-Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Death or Conversion? The Gentiles in the Concluding Chapters of Isaiah and the Book of the Twelve.” JTS 68 (2017): 1–22. Trible, Phyllis. God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality. OBT 2. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1978. Tull Willey, Patricia. Remember the Former Things: The Recollection of Previous Texts in Second Isaiah. SBLDS 161. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997. Vermeylen, Jacques, ed. The Book of Isaiah—Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures unité et complexité de l’ouvrage. BETL 81. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1989.

408   Francis Landy Wildberger, Hans. Isaiah 1–12. Translated by Thomas H. Trapp. CC. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1991. Williamson, H. G. M. Isaiah 1–5. ICC. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Williamson, H. G. M. The Book Called Isaiah. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. Wilson, Ian D. Kingship and Memory in Ancient Judah. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017. Wolfson, Elliot R. Language, Eros, Being. New York: Fordham University Press, 2005. Wyschogrod, Edith. An Ethics of Remembering: History, Heterology, and the Nameless Others. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1998. Zapff, Burkard M. Jesaja 56–66. NEB. Würzburg: Echter, 2006.

chapter 22

Use of M eta phors Göran Eidevall

22.1. Introduction The field of metaphor studies, based on modern metaphor theory, is now firmly established as a vital area of biblical research. A multitude of articles and monographs on metaphorical language in Isaiah appeared during the last decades. This is far from surprising. As readers throughout the centuries have observed, the book of Isaiah is replete with imagery.1 A complete survey of all the metaphors and similes found in Isa 1–66, and of all the relevant scholarly studies, would exceed the scope of this chapter. I shall present and discuss some of the major trajectories in previous research, as well as a number of recurring (types of) metaphors that have attracted scholarly interest because of their theological or ideological implications. First, though, it is necessary to provide some definitions and distinctions regarding the terminology that is used in metaphor analysis.

22.2.  Defining Metaphor What is a metaphor? How does it work? Among all the definitions that have been suggested, I find the one offered by Janet Soskice most useful as a point of departure: “Metaphor is that figure of speech whereby we speak about one thing in terms which are seen to be suggestive of another.”2 This concise formulation has the advantage of being compatible with all the competing versions of modern metaphor theory. It does not, however, include a sufficiently detailed description of the metaphorical process.

1  See, e.g., Melugin, “Poetic.”

2 Soskice, Metaphor, 15.

410   Göran Eidevall According to several influential theorists, the two “things” that are involved in a metaphorical utterance should be understood as two different semantic fields or conceptual domains. More precisely, language that pertains to one domain, henceforth called the source domain (corresponding to the terms “vehicle” and “vehicle field”), is deployed in order to map or (re)structure another domain, the target domain (what others would call the “tenor” or “topic domain”).3 In the example “life is a journey,” our understanding of life (the target domain) is thus structured by concepts linked to traveling (the source domain). Some metaphors can be regarded as fundamental in relation to language and culture, because of their capacity to generate a rich variety of ideas and linguistic expressions. According to the conventions of cognitive metaphor theory, they are called conceptual metaphors, and written like this: life is a journey.4

22.2.1.  Modern Metaphor Theory and Textual Analysis Modern metaphor theory has several important implications for the analysis of biblical metaphors. For the purposes of the chapter, they can be summarized as follows:

1. Metaphorical language is not merely a matter of one word substituting for another, in the service of rhetorical embellishment. Hence, a semantic analysis of the lexeme(s) used is a necessary but insufficient tool in interpretation. 2. A metaphorical utterance cannot be replaced by a literal paraphrase; such paraphrasing will inevitably entail the loss of some cognitive or semantic content. The interpreter should instead aim for a description of the effects of the interaction that is taking place between the two domains, for instance, between “life” and “journey.” 3. For the practical purposes of analysis, the formal distinction between metaphor (“A is B”) and simile (“A is like B”) is of marginal importance, since the same process of cross-domain mapping or (re)structuring is at work in both.5 On the cognitive and semantic level there is no difference between the two utterances “life is a journey” and “life is like a journey.” 4. To avoid blurred boundaries between metaphorical and non-metaphorical expressions, it is of paramount importance to distinguish between motif and metaphor. Whereas we would expect a study of agricultural motifs in Isaiah to include all attestations of pertinent vocabulary, a study of agricultural metaphors should preferably focus on non-literal instances of relevant motifs, such as ­sowing and harvesting. Scholars may have good reasons for including both 3  For a detailed discussion of the relations between these terms, and the theories attached to them, see Stienstra, Husband, 17–40. See also Eidevall, Grapes, 19–26. 4  On cognitive metaphor theory in general, and the example life is a journey in particular, see Kövecses, Metaphor, 22–62. 5  With Soskice, Metaphor, 58–61.

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   411 ­ etaphors and motifs in their investigations into various kinds of imagery.6 m Owing to the vague or ambiguous character of the literary context, it is sometimes (and perhaps especially in Isa 40–66) difficult to define the topic of the discourse. Consequently, it may become almost “impossible to distinguish the metaphorical from the literal.”7 The following presentation, however, will mainly focus on clear-cut cases of metaphorical usage.

22.3.  Trajectories in Previous Research on Metaphors in Isaiah Since the book of Isaiah consists mainly of poetry, literary or ideological readings of this prophetic book cannot avoid commenting on its use of metaphors and similes. In the following, an attempt is made to create an overview of a vast and expanding scholarly field.

22.3.1.  Metaphor as a Stylistic and Rhetorical Device Besides parallelism, the use of metaphor is one of the most prominent defining features of biblical poetry., including the book of Isaiah. Before the breakthrough of modern metaphor theory, studies that were characterized by a narrow focus on the stylistic aspects of “imagery” tended to treat metaphor as a decorative device.8 More recently, some scholars have chosen to emphasize the rhetorical aspects—that is, the prophetic use of metaphors for persuasive purposes.9 As Francis Landy has shown, however, close examinations of the poetic function of metaphors, informed by modern metaphor theory, can be fruitfully combined with explorations of the theological dimensions of the book of Isaiah.10

22.3.2.  Metaphor and Macrostructure In a pioneering study on “symbolism” in the book of Isaiah, Rémi Lack demonstrated that large sections are held together by certain types of metaphors. For instance, tree and vegetation imagery would seem to serve as a unifying factor in Isa 5:25–11:16.11 In addition, Lack called attention to the crucial role of shared motifs and metaphors in the book’s editorial framework, consisting of chapters 1 and 65–66.12 According to recent studies, the different parts of the book of Isaiah are indeed linked to one another by means of pervasive metaphorical themes. Plant-related metaphors, 6  See, e.g., Lund, Way Metaphors, and “My Way.” 7  Tull, “Persistent,” 27. 8  For an illustrative example of such an approach, see Muilenburg, “Isaiah,” 388. 9  Thus Gitay, “Why Metaphors?” 10  See Landy, “Vision.” 11 Lack, Symbolique, 44–60. 12  Lack, 139–141.

412   Göran Eidevall far from being confined to chapters 5–11, occur throughout the book (see secs. 22.4.1 and 22.4.2 below). Portrayals of Yhwh’s people as rebellious children constitute another thematic thread running from chapter 1 through chapter 66.13 Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer has listed a range of additional motifs and metaphors that tie chapters 40–55 and 56–66 together.14 Clearly, related metaphors contribute to a sense of continuity within Isaiah as a whole. At the same time, they may convey a sense of contrast. Comparing two thematically connected passages at the beginning and at the end of the book, the descriptions of desolate daughter Zion in 1:7–9 and of Zion as a nursing mother in 66:7–12, Chris Franke has highlighted aspects of reversal and transformation.15

22.3.3.  Metaphor and Redaction Criticism One metaphorical expression can give rise to several others. This observation has some bearing on studies of the redaction history of Isaiah. As noted, the editorial framework of Isa 1–66 was to a large extent constructed with the help of recycled metaphors. This indicates that the re-use, or reversal, of metaphors might also have been an important editorial technique elsewhere in the book. It is, for instance, evident that the vineyard song in Isa 5:1–7 served as a major source of inspiration for the author of 27:2–6, which looks like a hopeful response, or epilogue.16 In many other cases, though, it is difficult to determine the direction of influence or the relative dating.17

22.3.4.  Metaphor, Ideology, and Propaganda Many metaphorical expressions in the book of Isaiah serve propagandistic purposes. They occur in passages that describe foreign nations in a distorted way, either as immensely ferocious and threatening (Isa 5:26–30; 28:2) or as utterly weak and helpless (29:5; 41:2). Such hostile images of empires and neighbors are not restricted to chapters 13–23. It is worth noting that in passages reflecting the political situation during the so-called Syro-Ephraimite crisis and its aftermath, the Northern Kingdom (Israel/Ephraim) is treated like an enemy (in relation to both Judah and Yhwh).18 Interestingly, similar metaphors are used about Assyria and Israel/Ephraim.

13  See Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 46–84; Melugin, “Figurative,” 286–288, 300. 14  Tiemeyer, “Continuity,” 26–40. 15  Franke, “Like a Mother,” 38–40, 44–50. 16 Nielsen, There Is Hope, 116–123; Doyle, Apocalypse, 341–352, 371. 17  See the (somewhat self-critical) reflection in Nielsen, “From Oracles”: “Having stressed the openness of imagery for reinterpretation or reuse I must admit that we do not, as a matter of fact, have a chance to specify when the oracle was used and reused” (p. 26). 18 Eidevall, Prophecy, 133–150, 163, 190–191.

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   413 Both nations are likened to a sick person who is wasting away (Assyria in 10:18; Jacob = Israel in 17:4), and both are depicted as forests devastated by fire (Israel in 9:17–18 [Eng. 18–19]; Assyria in 10:16–19). Whereas Egypt is rather consistently portrayed as a dangerously helpless helper (30:1–3, 7; 31:1–3; 36:6), the images of the Babylonian Empire are more varied.19 The portrait of Babylon in chapter 47 can be characterized as a negative counterpart to Daughter Zion. The (formerly) mighty city/empire is here depicted as a queen who has been degraded to slave status (vv. 1–7), and as a mother who has become widowed and bereaved (vv. 8–9). Contrasting female images of Zion as a queen-like figure restored from slavery and childlessness are found in 49:20–21 and 52:1–2 (see 4.3 below).20 Assyria is often pictured as a tool in the hands of Yhwh. The main effect of such instrumental metaphors is to downplay the notion of autonomous agency. In Isa 10:5–15, an anonymous Assyrian ruler, personifying the empire, is described as a “rod (‫ ”)ׁשבט‬and a “staff (‫( ”)מטה‬v. 5). The language used is somewhat ambiguous. It may sound respectful, especially since both ‫ ׁשבט‬and ‫ מטה‬could denote a royal scepter. At the same time, it is well suited for disrespectful discourse, as the concluding words of this prophecy show (v. 15b): “As if a rod (‫ )ׁשבט‬would wield him who lifts it, or as if a staff (‫ )מטה‬should lift the one who is not (made of) wood!” The royal scepter has here been wrought out of the foreign ruler’s hand, so to speak. Seemingly without a will of his own (and, perhaps significantly, without a name), the Assyrian king is instrumentalized and reduced to a tool. No longer the wielder (subject), he is being wielded (object) by the supreme king, Yhwh.21

22.3.5.  Metaphor and Gender A number of metaphors used in Isa 40–66 have attracted the interest of feminist scholars. Compared to the remainder of the Hebrew Bible, this part of Isaiah is relatively rich in female imagery (that is, in metaphors and similes where the source domain is related to the lives and roles of women). Both Zion and Yhwh are here portrayed as mothers (Isa 42:14; 45:10; 49:15, 18–21; 50:1; 54:1–2; 66:7–14; see further, 22.5.2 and 22.5.3 below). Quite possibly, the traditional female personification of Jerusalem (and other cities) has served as a source of inspiration for the passages that speak similarly about God.22 Hanne Løland has argued that gender is a “salient” feature in the latter passages.23

19  Eidevall, 96–132. 20  See further Franke, “Reversals,” 119–123. 21  For more detailed discussions on the metaphors in Isa 10:5–15 and their implications, see Eidevall, Prophecy, 42–49, 179–183; “Propagandistic,” 115–116. 22  Thus Schmitt, “Motherhood.” 23 Løland, Silent, 93–96, 133, 195–201.

414   Göran Eidevall Interestingly, the female metaphors that appear in a passage like 66:7–14 do not associate women with weakness. On the contrary, they emphasize the ability of mothers to protect and comfort.24 One may ask: Why Isa 40–66? How is the high concentration of feminine imagery in these chapters best explained? Mayer Gruber has suggested that the anonymous prophet called Deutero-Isaiah employed such language because he was addressing women who were inclined to worship other deities.25 Alternatively, and in my view more likely, maternal metaphors were used because they might appeal to both men and women in exile. As Sarah Dille has pointed out, “The unusual prevalence of explicitly feminine language may be especially evocative of the home.”26 From yet another perspective, such a personification of a community would seem to be designed to evoke sympathy for those persons or groups who had become victims of oppression.27

22.3.6.  Metaphors in Interaction The combination of metaphors drawn from divergent source domains is a recurrent and characteristic feature of the literary world of the book of Isaiah. As shown by Cheryl Exum, in a study of a number of passages within Isa 28–32, juxtaposed similes can interact in various ways, reinforcing or modifying each other.28 Indeed, seemingly contradictory metaphors may, on closer examination, turn out to be compatible, because of shared entailments.29 In a study of maternal and paternal metaphors in Isa 40–55, Dille has demonstrated the interpretative potential of a textual analysis that focuses on the effects of such juxtapositions.30 Some combinations of images may present a real challenge to the interpreter. Isa 31:4–5 is a case in point. At first, Yhwh is portrayed as a rapacious lion, prepared to do battle (v. 4). Then suddenly, his protective care is likened to fluttering birds. These two depictions of divine agency are strikingly divergent.31 I agree with Exum that verse 5 probably “represents a later stage in the development of the tradition, which reinterprets and transforms verse 4 into a word of promise.”32 In several respects, though, this passage remains ambiguous and enigmatic. If Yhwh is described as defending Jerusalem in the same way that a lion would defend its prey against a band of shepherds, what does that imply? And, why is Yhwh likened to a flock of birds, rather than a majestic eagle or vulture (cf. Deut 32:11)? 24  See Franke, “Like a Mother,” 48–49. 25  Gruber, “Motherhood,” 357–358. 26 Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 177. 27  So McKinlay, “Usefulness,” 101. 28  Exum, “Broken Pots.” 29  See Brettler, “Incompatible.” 30 Dille, Mixing Metaphors. 31  For a more extensive discussion, see Eidevall, “Lions.” 32  Exum, “Broken Pots,” 337.

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   415

22.4.  Metaphors for the Human Condition: People as Plants Metaphorical expressions connected to the cross-cultural conceptual metaphor p­ eople are plants are frequently attested in the Hebrew Bible.33 The book of Isaiah is no exception. On the contrary, such imagery would seem to play a particularly prominent role in this prophetic book.

22.4.1.  A Pervasive Conceptual Metaphor Again and again, throughout the entire book of Isaiah, both individuals and nations are depicted as plants of different kinds: as flowers, trees, or grain. In a ground-­breaking work, Kirsten Nielsen called attention to the extensive metaphorical use (and the occasional reuse) of tree motifs in chapters 1–39.34 More recently, Elizabeth Hayes has analyzed some instances of the conceptual metaphor people are plants in chapters 40–66.35 Extending the scope of her study to the book of Isaiah in its entirety, Patricia Tull speaks of “a vast field of variegated agricultural images, filling the book from one end to the other.”36 Previous research has tended to focus on the source domain(s) involved in the plantrelated metaphors used in Isaiah. Consequently, important aspects of thematic continuity throughout Isa 1–66 have been highlighted. However, to reach a better understanding of the semantics of particular vegetation metaphors, and a better grasp of their theological and ideological dimensions, I believe it is necessary to make a further division into subcategories based on target domains. This would help scholars to move from the study of literary motifs and themes to the analysis of the metaphorical restructuring of conceptual domains. To begin with, it is a remarkable fact that vegetation metaphors are never used about God. This is hardly a coincidence, considering the ubiquity of such imagery in the book of Isaiah. In similes and metaphors that draw on the domain of agriculture, God is typically assigned the (human) role of farmer. Yhwh thus may be portrayed as a planter (5:2) or a reaper (18:5), but not as a plant. In several passages, God acts as “a human

33  For an overview of relevant texts and key terms, see Frymer-Kensky, “Planting.” On the relevance of the conceptual metaphor people are plants for the interpretation of biblical texts, see Basson, “People are Plants.” See also Lakoff and Turner, More Than Cool, 6, 12–15, 41. 34 Nielsen, There Is Hope, 71–239. 35  Hayes, “Fading,” 96–101. 36  Tull, “Persistent,” 22.

416   Göran Eidevall destroyer of vegetation.”37 The deity’s exertion of power, for instance, is depicted in terms of the activity of tree-felling (10:33–34), but Yhwh is never likened to a tree. I suggest that this can be explained as the result of deliberate editorial efforts to avoid associating the God of Israel with weakness and vulnerability. Conversely, such connotations made plant imagery suitable as a way of describing human existence as utterly dependent on divine support.

22.4.2.  Human Beings Are like Grass or Flowers Evidently, the conceptual metaphor people are plants is linked to the idea that human life is a process of gradual growth. In this fundamental respect, men and women resemble grass and grain. In the Hebrew language, the construction of metaphors and similes based on this analogy is facilitated by the fact that several lexemes (lexicalized metaphors?) can be used about both plants and human beings. For instance, while ‫( זרע‬zrˁ) can refer to either seeds of grain or male semen (and, by extension, human offspring; cf. Isa 1:4; 6:13; 43:5), ‫( יונק‬yônēq) may signify both a “suckling (infant)” and a “shoot” (Isa 11:8 and 53:2).38 All stages in the life of a human being, from the cradle to the grave, can be described by means of vegetation imagery.39 First, the human plant is sown, and then it begins to grow and thrive (more or less). This stage is exemplified by Isa 53:2 (about Yhwh’s servant): He grew up before him like a tender shoot (‫)כיונק‬, and like a root out of dry ground. (NIV)

In subsequent life stages, a woman or man, metaphorically depicted as a fructiferous plant, may produce “fruit” (‫—)פרי‬that is, children (Isa 13:18)—and/or deeds (3:10). In the final stage—that is, death—humans are often pictured as withering flowers or leaves. This aspect of the people are plants metaphor is also expressed elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible (see, e.g., Ps 103:15), but it seems to be especially prominent in Isaiah. Several vegetation-related similes and metaphors in Isa 40–66 convey notions of frailty and mortality.40 We find an illustrative example in 40:6b–8. Here the brevity of life is expressed by the phrase “all flesh/creatures/people are grass, and its faithfulness/ constancy like the flower of the field” (‫כל הבשר חציר וחסדו כציץ השדה‬, v. 6b), in combination with repeated references to the fact that the grass is bound to wither and the flowers are bound to fade (vv. 7a and 8a). In this passage, human perishability stands in contrast to

37  Tull, 25. 38  See further Frymer-Kensky, “Planting,” 131; Tull, “Persistent,” 21. 39  For additional examples from the Hebrew Bible, see Basson, “People are Plants,” 577–581. 40  See, in addition to the passages discussed below, also Isa 51:12 and 64:5 [Eng. v. 6].

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   417 divine permanence: “the word of our God will remain forever” (v. 8b). Yhwh is seen as the one who creates all living beings, with his word, but also as the one who takes away their life, with his breath (v. 7b). A similar perspective on the transience of human beings in general (and, possibly, rulers in particular; cf. 40:23) is brought about by the metaphorical formulations in 40:24: Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth, when he blows upon them, and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stubble. (NRSV)

In certain contexts, however, the conceptual metaphor people are plants may connote vitality. Isa 66:14 is a case in point. As Franke observed, the contrast between this prophecy of restoration and 40:6–7 “is extreme.”41 According to 66:14, the bones of the future inhabitants of Jerusalem “will sprout like grass (‫)כדשא‬.” Another utopian passage, 65:22, demonstrates that trees, as opposed to most other plants, may stand for durability and longevity: They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. (NRSV)

22.4.3.  Nations and Dynasties Are like Trees All the examples cited thus far refer to human individuals in general, but plant metaphors may also be used about various collectives. Dynasties and nations are often depicted as trees, because trees can stand for continuity, as well as plurality. While the present structure of a (royal) family or a nation may be conceived of as a trunk with many branches, roots usually stand for ancestry, and fruit for descendants.42 An elaborate example of such metaphorical language is found in Isa 37:31: “The surviving remnant of Judah shall again take root downward, and bear fruit upward” (NRSV). This hopeful prophecy, which allegedly addresses the nation of Judah in the midst of the Assyrian crisis, foregrounds the regenerative capacity of those who will survive a future disaster. Elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, Israel (that is, the Northern Kingdom), is typically pictured as a vine (see Ps 80:9–17 [Eng. 8–16]; Jer 2:21; 6:9; Hos 10:1). In several cases, this type of imagery is also used more generally about the relationship between the peo-

41  Franke, “Like a Mother,” 47.

42  See Frymer-Kensky, “Planting,” 132–134.

418   Göran Eidevall ple, pictured as a vine or a vineyard, and Yhwh, portrayed as a vintner.43 The vineyard song in Isa 5:1–7 represents a metaphorical narrative based on this type of metaphorical ­language.44 Here a wine producer, Yhwh, recounts how he ended up destroying his vineyard (Israel), because of the bad quality of the grapes. I find it likely that this prophecy originally referred to the fate of the Northern Kingdom.45 Note that in verse 7 an identification is made between Israel and the vineyard, whereas Judah is called “my delightful planting.” The image of the Davidic dynasty as a tree is not spelled out in detail in the book of Isaiah, but it surfaces in 11:1, in the context of a vision of a ruler who will uphold justice: “A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots” (NRSV). Toward the end of the book, this royal tree metaphor has been replaced, so to speak, by a more democratic vision: a depiction of those among the people who maintain justice as “a well-watered garden” (58:11; NIV).

22.5.  Metaphors for the Human-Divine Relation: Monarchy and Family In the book of Isaiah (and, more generally, in the Hebrew Bible), metaphors used about God tend to be relational.46 That is, they do not primarily describe the deity’s appearance or qualities. Instead, they focus on the relationship between Yhwh and his people, or between Yhwh and the world. In what follows, I shall discuss two major types of such relational imagery, monarchic metaphors and familial metaphors. Within the latter category, the main focus is on parental imagery, with a special emphasis on maternal metaphors.

22.5.1.  God as King A vast number of biblical depictions of divine power and agency can be linked to one underlying conceptual metaphor of great theological significance—namely, god is king.47 Attestations of such metaphorical language are scattered all over the book of Isaiah. In the famous vision report in chapter 6, Yhwh is “seated on a throne” (6:1). On other occasions, the divine ruler is portrayed as a supreme judge (2:4; 33:2; 41:21). 43  For a detailed study of all attestations in the Hebrew Bible, see Pantoja, Metaphor. 44  For an insightful interpretation of Isa 5:1–7 as a metaphorical narrative (rather than parable or allegory), see Nielsen, There Is Hope, 87–108. 45 Eidevall, Prophecy, 191. See also Sweeney, Isaiah, 130–131. 46  See Doyle, “Prophet Isaiah.” 47  See Brettler, God Is King. See also Moore, Moving Beyond.

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   419 Scholarly interest in the use of royal metaphors in Isaiah has, however, mainly focused on chapters 40–66. According to Tryggve Mettinger, divine kingship functions as a “hidden structure” in Isa 40–55.48 As Marc Brettler has shown, this applies to chapters 56–66, too.49 If one adopts this perspective, it becomes possible to view apparently diverse metaphors as parts of a larger conceptual pattern. There is, admittedly, a stark contrast between the idyllic depictions of Yhwh as a shepherd in 40:11 and 49:9b–12, on the one hand, and the more violent images of the deity as a victorious warrior in 52:7–10 and 63:1–6, on the other. Nevertheless, all of them can be analyzed as instances of the same underlying metaphor, god is king. This notion is explicitly stated in Isa 43:15: “I am Yhwh, your Holy One, Israel’s creator, your king” (see also 41:26; 44:6; 52:7). One may add the observation that all the passages mentioned have one more thing in common—namely, an emphasis “on the relationship between the divine suzerain and his subjects.”50

22.5.2.  God as Father and Mother Family-related metaphors are frequent throughout the book of Isaiah.51 One may identify two significant conceptual metaphors that underlie several passages in the book: god is a parent and the people are god’s children. These two are closely intertwined. Hence, in the examples discussed here, each instance of god is a ­parent must be understood as a relational metaphor. It is, furthermore, important to notice that, whereas Yhwh is typically portrayed as a perfect parent (according to ancient norms), the children (Yhwh’s people) are often described as wayward and rebellious.52 Sometimes God is likened to both a mother and a father at the same time. In Isa 45:10, which is part of a disputation speech (vv. 9–13), these two (implicit) metaphors interact with a depiction of Yhwh as artisan (v. 9), as complementary images of the deity’s power to create life:53 “Woe to anyone who says to a father, ‘What are you ­begetting?’ or to a woman, ‘With what are you in labor?’ (NRSV).54 In another

48  Mettinger, “In Search.” See further, Berges, “Zion and the Kingship.” 49  Brettler, “Incompatible,” 103–110. 50 Moore, Moving Beyond, 142. 51  See Darr, Isaiah’s Vision. 52 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 46–84. For a more recent study that foregrounds the role of the children in Isaiah’s parent-and-child metaphors, see Lapsley, “Look! The Children,” 91–102. 53  With Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 116–117. 54  The MT is somewhat incongruous; ‫“( ולאשה‬and to a woman”) is not an exact equivalent of ‫“( לאב‬to a father”). Note that the alternative rendering “to his father . . . to his mother,” attested in several modern translations (e.g., NET and NIV), finds support in the LXX, which has: τῶ πατρί . . . τῆ μητρί.

420   Göran Eidevall ­ assage, 46:3–4, the emphasis appears to lie on those aspects of (ideal) parental care p that apply to fathers and mothers alike:55 Listen to me, O house of Jacob, all the remnant of the house of Israel, who have been borne by me from your birth, carried from the womb; even to your old age I am he, even when you turn gray I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear; I will carry and will save. (Isa 46:3–4, NRSV)

The word “father” (‫)אב‬, used as a divine epithet, is attested three times in Isaiah. On closer examination, though, this metaphorical usage is in fact restricted to one passage, 63:7–64:11 [Eng. 64:12], which is best described as a communal prayer.56 In 63:16, the emphasis lies on notions of kinship and responsibility, in a situation characterized by abandonment or, metaphorically speaking, by orphanage. Yhwh is here invoked as both “our father” and “our redeemer” (‫ ;)גאל‬the latter term denotes a person who acts as next of kin, for instance, in order to rescue someone from debt slavery.57 In 64:7 [Eng. v. 8], the two divine designations “our father” and “our potter” stand in perfect parallelism. Clearly, this utterance foregrounds the people’s dependency on the deity’s creative power. By way of contrast, yhwh is never explicitly called “mother” (‫ )אם‬in the book of Isaiah. Nonetheless, maternal metaphors are conspicuous in the depictions of divine agency in the latter part of the book, that is, in chapters 40–66. Arguably, it is possible to delineate a development from the first occurrence to the last that roughly corresponds to the sequential (early) stages of motherhood. In Isa 42:13–14, two divergent, yet to some extent consistent, similes have been combined: Yhwh is first likened to a shouting warrior (v. 13), and then to a panting and crying woman in labor (v. 14).58 The emphasis lies on the deity’s determination to act on behalf of the addressees. In this context, then, the image of a woman about to give birth would seem to carry predominantly positive connotations.59 As noted, Isa 45:10 contains an implicit image of Yhwh as a woman who actually gives birth. When a baby is born, the mother will usually become deeply attached to it. This is “the strongest bond known” between two human beings.60 In some cases, though, women do abandon, neglect, or even forget their children. These exceptional cases appear to serve as an important background for the metaphorical language used in 49:14–15. In response 55  According to Dille, Mixing Metaphors, the formulations used in Isa 46:3–4 have “a relatively weak connection to parental imagery” (p. 36, n. 48). Hanne Løland, argues, by contrast, that this passage (metaphorically speaking) ascribes female gender to the deity. See Løland, Silent, 135–164. She even claims that Yhwh here is “said to have a womb, a ‫( ”בטן‬p. 164). 56  For a detailed discussion, see Niskanen, “Yhwh as Father.” 57  This type of metaphorical language plays a prominent role in chapters 40–55. See Mettinger, In Search of God, 162–166. 58  For different evaluations and interpretations of this intriguing juxtaposition, see Bergmann, “Like a Warrior”; Brettler, “Incompatible,” 117–118; Darr, “Like Warrior”; Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 48–73. 59  The use of such metaphorical language in stereotypical depictions of anguish and failure is frequently attested in the Hebrew Bible, as well as in literature from other parts of the ancient Near East. See Bergmann, “Like a Warrior,” 42–46; Darr, “Like Warrior,” 565–567. 60 Løland, Silent, 195.

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   421 to Zion’s (i.e., the people’s) complaint, God asserts that she/he is a good mother, who simply cannot forget her beloved child (as opposed to mother Zion, see 49:21!):61 Zion said, “Yhwh has abandoned me, the Lord has forgotten me!” Can a woman forget her nursing infant, and have no compassion on the child of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. (Isa 49:14–15)

A good mother provides love and protection. She is always there for her baby, nursing and comforting. In Isa 66:13, Yhwh’s role in restoring the fortunes of his/her people is described with the help of such an idealized image of maternal care: “As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you; you shall be comforted in Jerusalem” (NRSV). The passage 66:7–14 is, however, dominated by depictions of another good (metaphorical) mother—namely, Zion/Jerusalem (vv. 7–12). Apparently, God’s nursing care here is, to some extent, thought to be carried out by (or, channeled through) the personified city.

22.5.3.  The Many Roles of Lady Zion: Daughter, Wife, and Mother According to a widespread convention, frequently attested in the Hebrew Bible, the gender of a city is always feminine. Hence, cities tend to be personified as women.62 It is therefore far from surprising that the designation “daughter Zion (‫)בת ציון‬,” used about Jerusalem, occurs seven times in the book of Isaiah (1:8; 10:32; 16:1; 37:22 [twice]; 52:2; 62:11). It fits the wider pattern, as in the passages that address foreign cities as “daughter X” (10:30; 23:10, 12; 47:1). In several cases, one may speak of a lexicalized or dormant metaphor since we are dealing with formulaic language. In certain situations, however, a dormant metaphor may be awakened.63 Regarding Jerusalem, several prophecies in Isa 40–66 display vivid sceneries, based on the metaphorical concept a city is a woman: 49:14–26; 50:1–3; 51:17–23; 52:1–2; 54:1–6; 60:1–5; 62:1–5; 66:7–14. Taken together, they form a fragmented narrative about Jerusalem’s destruction, depopulation, and eventual restoration.64 The figurative language employed in these passages is held together by a conceptual metaphor, namely, god is a husband. To be more precise, the concept that informs the biblical texts under discussion can be formulated as follows: yhwh is the husband of his people.65 61  See further, Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 131–151. 62  See Biddle, “Figure of Lady”; Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 126–131; Schmitt, “Motherhood,” 567–569. 63  See Eidevall, Grapes, 34. 64  For detailed discussions of Zion’s female roles in Isaiah 40–66, see Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 165–204, 221–224; Maier, Daughter Zion, 161–204. For a postcolonial reading, see McKinlay, “Usefulness.” 65  See further, Stienstra, Husband. On the impact of this metaphor (yhwh is the husband of his people) in Isaiah 24–27, see Doyle, Apocalypse, 374–376.

422   Göran Eidevall In chapter 49, Lady Zion, having complained that she is forsaken (v. 14), is surprised to witness, after a period of bereavement, the arrival (or return) of numerous children (that is, inhabitants; vv. 18–21). Judging from 50:1, where Yhwh declares that their marriage has not been dissolved, the personified city/nation has complained that her husband has divorced her. In 51:17–20, Lady Zion is described as traumatized, because of the loss of children in the past. However, a reversal of roles is prefigured (51:21–23). In 52:1–2, she is exhorted to put on fine clothes and to celebrate the end of slavery.66 The passage 54:1–6 highlights two further changes of Lady Zion’s status: from barrenness to being a mother of many children, who is encouraged to make room for them (vv. 1–3), and from widowhood (v. 4) to the privileged position of a beloved wife (vv. 5–6).67 In 54:5, Zion is told that “your husband (‫ )בעליך‬is the one who made you, his name is Yhwh of hosts.” While the motif of the advent of a multitude of sons and daughters resurfaces in 60:4, the passage 62:4–5 reiterates the marriage motif. The sequence of female portrayals of personified Jerusalem/Zion reaches its climax in chapter 66. Here the city is praised as a woman who has been granted the possibility to give birth to a son (that is, an entire nation) without labor and pain (vv. 7–8). Apparently, the idea that Yhwh is Zion’s husband is downplayed in this context. In verse 9, the deity would rather seem to act as a (male) midwife.68 The ensuing utterances (vv. 10–12) address the (future) inhabitants of the city, as if they were infants, all of them. In verse 11 they are invited to find comfort at Lady Zion’s breast, and to drink deeply “from her glorious nipple (‫—”)מזיז כבודה‬metaphorically speaking. Then there is a switch of images: in verse 13 Yhwh acts as a nursing mother. As observed by Franke, “God is now compared to Zion.”69 This passage, 66:7–14, serves as an excellent illustration of an important aspect of the use of metaphors in the book of Isaiah: at times, novel constellations and contextualizations of conventional imagery contribute to the transformation of literary and theological conventions.

Bibliography Basson, Alec. “ ‘People are Plants’: A Conceptual Metaphor in the Hebrew Bible.” OTE 19 (2006): 573–583. Berges, Ulrich. “Zion and the Kingship of Yhwh in Isaiah 40–55.” In “Enlarge the Site of Your Tent”: The City as Unifying Theme in Isaiah, edited by Archibald van Wieringen and Annemarieke van der Woude, 95–119. OtSt 58. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Bergmann, Claudia. “ ‘Like a Warrior’ and ‘Like a Woman Giving Birth’: Expressing Divine Immanence and Transcendence in Isaiah 42:10–17.” In Bodies, Embodiment, and Theology 66  Here, in 52:1–2, the depiction of Zion can be seen as a counterimage to the portrayal of Babylon in chapter 47. See sec. 22.3.4 above. 67  Arguably, the widow metaphor should not be pressed too far. Rather than imply that a previous husband has died, it expresses experiences of abandonment and lack of support. See Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 132–134; Doyle, Apocalypse, 228–229. On the complicated issue whether Zion or Yhwh should be seen as the people’s (metaphorical) mother in this and other passages in Isaiah 40–55, see also Low, Mother, 111–148. 68  Franke, “Like a Mother,” 44–45. 69  Franke, 49.

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   423 of the Hebrew Bible, edited by Tamar Komionkowski and Wonil Kim, 38–56. LHBOTS 465. New York: T&T Clark, 2010. Biddle, Mark E. “The Figure of Lady Jerusalem: Identification, Deification and Personification of Cities in the Ancient Near East.” In The Biblical Canon in Comparative Perspective, edited by K. Lawson Younger, Baruch Halpern, William W. Hallo, and Bernard F. Batto, 173–187. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 1991. Brettler, Marc Zvi. God is King: Understanding an Israelite Metaphor. JSOTS 76. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1989. Brettler, Marc Zvi. “Incompatible Metaphors for Yhwh in Isaiah 40–66.” JSOT 78 (1998): 97–120. Darr, Katheryn Pfisterer. Isaiah’s Vision and the Family of God. Literary Currents in Biblical Interpretation. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994. Darr, Katheryn Pfisterer. “Like Warrior, like Woman: Destruction and Deliverance in Isaiah 42:10–17.” CBQ 49 (1987): 560–571. Dille, Sarah J. Mixing Metaphors: God as Mother and Father in Deutero-Isaiah. JSOTS 398. London: T & T Clark, 2004. Doyle, Brian. The Apocalypse of Isaiah Metaphorically Speaking: A Study of the Use, Function and Significance of Metaphors in Isaiah 24–27. BETL 151. Leuven: Peeters, 2000. Doyle, Brian. “The Prophet Isaiah and His Relational Metaphors.” In Prophets and Prophecy in Jewish and Early Christian Literature, edited by Joseph Verheyden, Korinna Zamfir, and Tobias Nicklas, 31–40. WUNT 286. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010. Eidevall, Göran. Grapes in the Desert: Metaphors, Models, and Themes in Hosea 4–14. ConBOT 43. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1996. Eidevall, Göran. “Lions and Birds as Literature: Some Notes on Isaiah 31 and Hosea 11.” SJOT 7 (1993): 78–87. Eidevall, Göran. “Propagandistic Constructions of Empires in the Book of Isaiah.” In Divination, Politics and Ancient Near Eastern Empires, edited by Alan Lenzi and Jonathan Stökl, 109–128. ANEM 7. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014. Eidevall, Göran. Prophecy and Propaganda: Images of Enemies in the Book of Isaiah. ConBOT 56. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2009. Exum, J. Cheryl. “Of Broken Pots, Fluttering Birds, and Visions in the Night: Extended Simile and Poetic Technique in Isaiah.” CBQ 43 (1981): 331–352. Franke, Chris. “ ‘Like a Mother I Have Comforted You’: The Function of Figurative Language in Isa 1:7–26 and 66:7–14.” In The Desert Will Bloom: Poetic Visions in Isaiah, edited by Joseph Everson and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 35–55. SBLAIL 4. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009. Franke, Chris. “Reversals of Fortunes in the Ancient Near East: A Study of the Babylon Oracles in the Book of Isaiah.” In New Visions of Isaiah, edited by Roy F. Melugin and Marvin A. Sweeney, 104–123. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996. Frymer-Kensky, Tikva. “The Planting of Man: A Study in Biblical Imagery.” In Love and Death in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Marvin H. Pope, edited by John H. Marks and Robert M. Good, 129–136. Guilford, CT: Four Quarters, 1987. Gitay, Yehoshua. “Why Metaphors? A Study of the Texture of Isaiah.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretive Tradition, vol. 1, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 57–65. VTS 70.1 / FIOTL 1. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Gruber, Mayer. “The Motherhood of God in Second Isaiah.” RB 90 (1983): 351–359. Hayes, Elizabeth R. “Fading and Flourishing: The Rhetorical Function of Plant Imagery in Isaiah 40–66.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development

424   Göran Eidevall in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans M. Barstad, 89–101. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Korpel, Marjo. “Metaphors in Isaiah lv.” VT 46 (1996): 43–55. Kövecses, Zoltán. Metaphor: A Practical Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 20102. Lack, Rémi. La symbolique du livre d’Isaïe: Essai sur l’image littéraire comme élément de structuration. AnBib 59. Rome: Biblical Institute, 1973. Lakoff, George, and Mark Turner. More Than Cool Reason: A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1989. Landy, Francis. “Vision and Voice in Isaiah.” JSOT 88 (2000): 19–36. Lapsley, Jacqueline. “ ‘Look! The Children and I Are as Signs and Portents in Israel’: Children in Isaiah.” In The Child in the Bible, edited by Marcia J. Bunge, 82–102. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2008. Løland, Hanne. Silent or Salient Gender? The Interpretation of Gendered God-Language in the Hebrew Bible, Exemplified in Isaiah 42, 46, and 49. FAT II/32. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Low, Maggie. Mother Zion in Deutero-Isaiah: A Metaphor for Zion Theology. StBibLit 155. New York: Peter Lang, 2013. Lund, Øystein. “My Way—My Right: Persuasive Discourse in Isaiah 40–66.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by LenaSofia Tiemeyer and Hans M. Barstad, 125–144. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Lund, Øystein. Way Metaphors and Way Topics in Isaiah 40–55. FAT II/28. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007. Maier, Christl M. Daughter Zion, Mother Zion: Gender, Space, and the Sacred in Ancient Israel. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2008. McKinlay, Judith E. “The Usefulness of a Daughter.” In Isaiah and Imperial Context, edited by Andrew T. Abernethy, Mark G. Brett, Tim Bulkeley, and Tim J. Meadowcroft, 85–106. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2013. Melugin, Roy F. “Figurative Speech and the Reading of Isaiah 1 as Scripture.” In New Visions of Isaiah, edited by Roy F. Melugin and Marvin A. Sweeney, 282–305. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Melugin, Roy F. “Poetic Imagination, Intertextuality, and Life in a Symbolic World.” In The Desert Will Bloom: Poetic Visions in Isaiah, edited by Joseph Everson and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 7–15. SBLAIL 4. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009. Mettinger, Tryggve. In Search of God: The Meaning and the Message of the Everlasting Names. Translated by Frederick H. Cryer. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988. Mettinger, Tryggve. “In Search of the Hidden Structure: Yhwh as King in Isaiah 40–55.” SEÅ 51–52 (1986–87): 148–157. Moore, Anne. Moving beyond Symbol and Myth: Understanding the Kingship of God of the Hebrew Bible through Metaphor. StBibLit 99. New York: Peter Lang, 2009. Nielsen, Kirsten. “ ‘From Oracles to Canon’—and the Role of Metaphor.” SJOT 17 (2003): 22–33. Nielsen, Kirsten. There Is Hope for a Tree: The Tree as Metaphor in Isaiah. JSOTS 65. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1989. Niskanen, Paul. “Yhwh as Father, Redeemer, and Potter in Isaiah 63:7–64:11.” CBQ 68 (2006): 397–407.

The Use of Metaphors in Isaiah   425 Pantoja, Jennifer Metten. The Metaphor of the Divine as Planter of the People: Stinking Grapes or Pleasant Planting? BIS 155. Leiden: Brill, 2017. Rüterswörden, Udo. “Erwägungen zur Metaphorik des Wassers in Jes 40ff.” SJOT 2 (1989): 1–22. Schmitt, John J. “The Motherhood of God and Zion as Mother.” RB 92 (1985): 557–569. Soskice, Janet M. Metaphor and Religious Language. Oxford: Clarendon, 1985. Stansell, Gary. “The Nations’ Journey to Zion: Pilgrimage and Tribute as Metaphor in the Book of Isaiah.” In The Desert Will Bloom: Poetic Visions in Isaiah, edited by Joseph Everson and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 233–255. SBLAIL 4. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009. Stienstra, Nelly. Yhwh Is the Husband of His People: Analysis of a Biblical Metaphor with Special Reference to Translation. Kampen, Netherlands: Kok Pharos, 1993. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39. FOTL 16. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Continuity and Discontinuity in Isaiah 40–66: History of Research.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans M. Barstad, 13–40. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “The Watchman Metaphor in Isaiah lvi–lxvi.” VT 55 (2005): 378–400. Tull, Patricia. “Persistent Vegetative States: People as Plants and Plants as People in Isaiah.” In The Desert Will Bloom: Poetic Visions in Isaiah, edited by Joseph Everson and Hyun Chul Paul Kim, 17–34. SBLAIL 4. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009.

Pa rt V i

ISA I A H I N SE L E C T T E X T UA L T R A DI T IONS

chapter 23

Isa i a h i n th e Qum r a n Scrol l s George J. Brooke

23.1. Introduction The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, especially those in eleven caves at and near Qumran between 1947 and 1956, has stimulated fresh directions of research in many areas of biblical studies.1 This survey chapter will engage with the finds from the Qumran caves and offer a brief summary description of the copies of Isaiah and the issues surrounding them, together with some small consideration of the use of Isaiah in the other compositions from those caves.2 It is important to note at the outset that simply because a manuscript was found in a cave at or near Qumran does not require that it was written and copied at the Qumran site; for most scholars, it is likely that the majority of the Qumran scrolls merit the label “Qumran” merely because they were discovered in the cave there, not because of authorship or the location of scribal copying. The finds from the Qumran caves are commonly organized in two ways. From one point of view, they are divided into two groups according to the location of the cave— namely, those naturally formed in the foothills some distance from Qumran (notably Cave 1) and those that are man-made in the marl terraces near the building remains of Qumran proper (notably Cave 4). Such a differentiation might signal, for instance, some details about the use and function of particular scrolls. Some scholars have suggested, 1  For up-to-date information on all aspects of the Dead Sea Scrolls, consult the online bibliography of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature of the Hebrew University (orion.mscc.huji.ac.il). The bibliography is searchable and has dozens of items of significance to the study of Isaiah, both in general and in relation to specific passages. 2  I have written several studies on Isaiah in the Dead Sea Scrolls. This chapter is based in part on those studies and further discussion of many points can be found in them. See esp. Brooke, “Isaiah 40:3”; “Isaiah in the Pesharim”; Isaiah at Qumran; “Bisection”; “Isaiah at Qumran”; and “Non-scriptural Dead Sea Scrolls.”

430   George J. Brooke for example, that the deposits in Cave 1 are akin to those in genizot; as such, manuscripts as 1QIsaa would have been buried in jars because they were for some reason no longer in use.3 Those manuscripts coming from the man-made Cave 4 near the site of Qumran itself might have been used more regularly in the daily life and practices of the community that occupied the site. However, from another point of view, the manuscript finds from the Qumran caves are also commonly divided into three groups according to their literary c­ ontents: (a) About a quarter of the manuscripts contain compositions that are considered to reflect the life of the community that lived at Qumran and the wider movement of which it was a part; these are commonly labeled “sectarian.” (b) About half the manuscripts contain general Jewish literature of the late Second Temple period, though the selection in the Qumran caves is notably consistent in its outlook and was no doubt in the caves because the sectarians were, for the most part, sympathetic to it; several of these compositions are in Aramaic, and some of them, like parts of the Enoch writings, were known in some form before the discovery of the scrolls, but most are previously unknown nonsectarian Jewish literature of the period. (c) The third category, about a quarter of the extant manuscripts, are the so-called “biblical” scrolls, though the label “biblical” is somewhat anachronistic. These “biblical” scrolls show two things that have to be held in tension: on the one hand, they demonstrate that the texts of the Hebrew scriptures known in early medieval manuscripts are remarkably continuous with what was around a thousand years before; but on the other hand, these manuscripts contain numerous variants, both major and minor, which show that for many books, two or more textual editions were in circulation in the centuries before a particular text-type was selected for each chosen canonical book. It is this variety that has stimulated new research on the history of the transmission of the biblical text, not least, fresh considerations of the Greek and the other versions.4 Notably, variants in those versional traditions are no longer so readily considered to be the responsibility of the translators, but are more commonly recognized as belonging to the history of the transmission of the Hebrew texts from which the translators variously worked.

23.2.  The Copies of Isaiah from the Qumran Caves In this section of the essay I will consider the manuscripts which have been understood by their editors to be copies of the book of Isaiah, I will describe some of the features of the text of Isaiah in those manuscripts and the issues that such features raise, and I will briefly consider the form of Isaiah as that might be implied in the evidence to be found in those manuscripts. 3  See, e.g., Stökl Ben Ezra, “Old Caves”; Popović, “When and Why?” 4  See esp. van der Kooij, “Isaiah in the Greek Bible”; Wagner, “Translation”; Wilk, “Vision.”

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   431

23.2.1.  The Manuscripts It is widely stated that there are twenty-two copies5 of the book of Isaiah that are from the Dead Sea caves.6 The basic list can be set out as follows: Manuscripts of Isaiah (Whole Book; First Half; Second Half): Ms. name

Ms. number

Number of fragments

Contents

1. 1QIsaa

Almost complete MS

 

Isa 1–66

2. 1QIsa

1Q8

Numerous

Isa 7:20–66:24

3. 4QIsaa

4Q55

18

Isa 1:1–33:17

4. 4QIsa

b

4Q56

49

Isa 1:1–66:24

5. 4QIsa

c

4Q57

82

Isa 9:3–66:24

6. 4QIsa

d

4Q58

16

Isa 45:20–58:7

7. 4QIsae

4Q59

24

Isa 2:1–14:24

8. 4QIsa

f

4Q60

31

Isa 1:10–29:8

9. 4QIsa

g

4Q61

8

Isa 42:14–43:24

Qumran Cave 1: b

Qumran Cave 4:

4Q62

2

Isa 42:4–11

11. 4QIsai

4Q62a

2

Isa 56:7–57:8

12. 4QIsa

j

4Q63

1

Isa 1:1–6

13. 4QIsa

k

4Q64

5

Isa 28:26–29:9

14. 4QIsa

l

10. 4QIsa

h

4Q65

2

Isa 7:14–8:14

15. 4QIsam

4Q66

5

Isa 60:20–61:6

16. 4QIsa

n

4Q67

1

Isa 58:13–14

17. 4QIsa

o

4Q68

1

Isa 14:28–15:2

18. 4QpapIsa

4Q69

2

Isa 5:28–30

19. 4QIsaq

4Q69a

1

Isa 54:10-13

20. 4QIsa

4Q69b

1

Isa 30:23

5Q3

2

Isa 40:16–19

Mur3

1

Isa 1:4–14

p

r

Qumran Cave 5: 21. 5QIsa Wadi Murabbaʽat: 22. MurIsa

5  Images of the fragments of 1QIsab and all the fragments of the Cave 4 Isaiah manuscripts are freely available online on the website of the Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library. Images of 1QIsaa are freely available online on the website of the Shrine of the Book (Israel Museum). 6  See, e.g., Lange, Handbuch, 258. Lange offers the most thorough summary survey of the Dead Sea Isaiah materials (258–296).

432   George J. Brooke Some brief comments on the material evidence are worthwhile. Although there seem to be eighteen manuscripts from Qumran’s Cave 4, it is noteworthy that only two of those have been assigned fragments with contents that more or less cover the whole sixty-six chapters of Isaiah (indicated in italics in the table). For the other sixteen manuscripts, the parts that survive either belong to the first half of the book (chaps. 1–33, indicated in bold in the table) or the second half (chaps. 34–66, indicated in normal font). It is noteworthy that in 1QIsaa there is a rare gap of three empty lines at the end of column 27, exactly halfway through the manuscript. The gap occurs at the end of Isaiah 33. There has been considerable debate about the significance of this gap, but it seems that it indicates that in at least some scribal circles in Second Temple Judaism, Isaiah was copied in two halves.7 After completion, the two halves would have been stitched together. Thus, the evidence from Cave 4 might indicate that, in many instances, what survives are unattached halves of the book; if some of those halves were intended for each other, then the number of manuscripts from the cave would be reduced somewhat. The physical remains from Cave 4 are yet to be fully assessed from this perspective.8 It is important for scholars to keep in mind the data available from the study of the material evidence of the manuscripts. Not only might this assist in the better appreciation of scribal practices in late Second Temple times, but it also helps in the discussion of the functions of Isaiah, at least for some Jews. Because of their relatively large size and tidy format, Emanuel Tov has designated several biblical scrolls from Qumran as “deluxe,” but not all the manuscripts of Isaiah from Qumran should be designated as deluxe editions of the book, perhaps intended for public use in worship or study. Even a manuscript such as 1QIsaa, which is constructed as a large manuscript of fifty-four columns and thirty-three lines per column, has such a significant number of corrections, especially in its second half, that in the end Tov is reluctant to describe it as deluxe.9

23.2.2.  The Text of Isaiah In addition to the material evidence, the manuscripts of Isaiah have been studied for what they might indicate about the text of Isaiah in the two centuries before the fall of the Temple in 70 ce. The initial discussions focused especially on 1QIsaa and 1QIsab, which were two of the first seven manuscripts from Cave 1 to come to the attention of scholars and to pose challenges to Hebrew Bible text critics.10 John Trever and William H. Brownlee were both at the American School in Jerusalem when 1QIsaa was brought there in February 1948: Trever’s photographs of the so-called Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa) have been reproduced many times and used as a reference point for the study 7  Much of the discussion is summarized in Brooke, “Bisection,” 73–94. 8  The issue of bisection in the processes of transmission and translation has also been discussed in relation to the book of Ezekiel. 9  Tov, “Biblical Texts,” 160. 10  The initial publication of 1QIsaa was in Burrows, Dead Sea Scrolls.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   433 of the scroll, and Brownlee developed a long-standing interest in Isaiah at Qumran.11 1QIsab was acquired for the Hebrew University by Eliezer Sukenik. The two manuscripts were eventually brought back together when the State of Israel purchased 1QIsaa from Archbishop Athanasius Samuel; both 1QIsaa and 1QIsab are now housed at the Shrine of the Book on the campus of the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.12 There has been much further work on the Cave 1 Isaiah manuscripts.13 Two items are of constant importance. The first is the analysis of the language of 1QIsaa by Eduard Y. Kutscher. Kutscher investigated the orthography, pronunciation, morphology, vocabulary, syntax, and the proper nouns. For him, 1QIsaa reflects “a later textual type than the Masoretic Text. Further, it will be seen that the linguistic anomalies of I Isaa reflect the Hebrew and Aramaic currently spoken in Palestine towards the end of the Second Commonwealth. Hence, it is possible to postulate that I Isaa (or its predecessors) is descended from a text identical (or at least very similar) to that of the Masoretic Text, but by no means can we assume the converse.”14 Although more recent studies have slightly adjusted some of Kutscher’s insights, including noting that there is probably less Aramaic influence in 1QIsaa than Kutscher had proposed, overall, his work remains largely uncontested. The second item of importance for the Cave 1 copies of Isaiah is now a standard reference point: it is the principal edition of the two Cave 1 Isaiah manuscripts in the Discoveries on the Judaean Desert Series.15 For 1QIsaa, dated to the last quarter of the second century bce and therefore almost certainly not copied at Qumran, the principal edition states clearly that “after working many years on this volume, the present editors are convinced that a single scribe originally copied the entire book, and that a series of subsequent hands made a few corrections and inserted expansions.”16 The tendencies in the orthographic differences in the two halves of the scroll are best attributed to the Vorlagen upon which each depends. One of the subsequent hands is widely recognized also to be that of the scribe of the Cave 1 copy of the Rule of the Community (1QS). There are various scribal marginal marks in the manuscript: (a) there are sixty-six paragraph markers (horizontal lines with either a hook or circular loop), probably inscribed by the original scribe and reflecting his source text; (b) there are thirteen palaeo-Hebrew taw crosses, possibly introduced by a subsequent reader to mark important passages; and (c) there are several other marks also possibly introduced by a subsequent reader 11  See especially Brownlee, “Text of Isaiah VI 13”; “Manuscripts of Isaiah”; “Servant, I”; “Servant, II”; “Messianic Motifs, I”; “Messianic Motifs, II”; and Meaning. 12  The story of the discoveries and acquisitions of the various scrolls has been told many times. See especially Fields, Dead Sea Scrolls. 13  For 1QIsaa, see, e.g., Parry and Qimron, Great Isaiah Scroll; Ulrich and Flint, Qumran Cave 1.II. For 1QIsab, see Sukenik, ‫ ;אוצר‬Flint and Dykstra, “Newly Identified Fragments”; Ulrich and Flint, Qumran Cave 1.II. 14 Kutscher, Language, 2–3. 15  Ulrich and Flint, Qumran Cave 1.II. See also Ulrich, Biblical Qumran Scrolls, 330–557. See the important reviews of DJD 32 by Tigchelaar and Williamson (see the bibliography below). See further Williamson, “Scribe and Scroll.” 16  Ulrich and Flint, Qumran Cave 1.II, 63.

434   George J. Brooke to ­indicate significant passages. The principal edition notes over 2,600 textual variants between 1QIsaa and other ancient and medieval witnesses and versions of Isaiah. According to the editors, each needs to be assessed on its own merits, and 1QIsaa contains some readings that might be deemed “superior,” depending on what criterion is applied in the assessment of the variant. Overall, although the Vorlagen of 1QIsaa are undoubtedly similar to the MT, as Kutscher proposed, 1QIsaa also contains many variants that might characterize it as having interpretative features of a local kind. The 2010 principal edition of 1QIsab is also significant for instigating fresh consideration of that manuscript. Its text of Isaiah has often been characterized as closer to that of the MT than 1QIsaa, but it is now clear that its text is more variable than was previously thought. In addition to the Cave 1 manuscripts, the most significant additional textual information on Isaiah at Qumran is undoubtedly the collection of up to eighteen copies of the book that come from Cave 4.17 Not all of these manuscripts, some of which are extant in only a few small fragments, are necessarily copies of the whole book of Isaiah. However, there are now several preliminary studies of the textual status of Isaiah in the Qumran library in light of these manuscripts. The results of these have been summarized by James C. VanderKam and Peter W. Flint: “For the book of Isaiah the scrolls and other ancient witnesses preserve apparently only one edition, with no consistent patterns of variant readings or rearrangements. Some manuscripts are especially close to the Masoretic text: 1QIsab, 4QIsaa, 4QIsab, 4QIsad, 4QIsae, 4QIsaf, and 4QIsag. Other scrolls, most notably 1QIsaa (and 4QIsac), contain many highly instructive variants from the traditional form of the Hebrew text, which offer valuable insights on the late stages of the book’s composition and provide many improved readings.”18 This statement depends on how an edition is defined, but there is some agreement among scholars that the Isaiah manuscripts do not contain any major variants such as those that are discernible in the longer and shorter forms of Jeremiah or in the significant differences between the Hebrew texts of Exodus. It is clear from the early study of 1QIsaa that, though scholars were initially much stirred by its variant readings, it very soon was being classified overall as a local or popular (vulgar) text. As one scholar has remarked, at least among manuscripts and text traditions, being labeled vulgar is no recommendation.19 It is to be hoped that the publication of all the Cave 4 Isaiah manuscripts and the fresh principal editions of both 1QIsaa and 1QIsab will lead to detailed analysis of all the Isaiah scrolls and the reinstatement of 1QIsaa as a significant exemplar of the text.20 Such fresh studies will no doubt reflect the

17  For 4Q55–4Q69b, see Skehan and Ulrich, “Isaiah”; Mizrahi, “Writing as Reading”; Green, “4QIsc.” For 5Q3, see Milik, “Isaïe,” 173. For a recent list of all the passages of Isaiah still extant in all the Dead Sea biblical scrolls, see Ulrich, “D.” For a good brief overall survey of Isaiah at Qumran, see Ulrich, “Isaiah, Book of.” 18  VanderKam and Flint, Meaning, 131–132. 19  Høgenhaven, “Isaiah Scroll,” 152. 20  For comments on the limited use made of 1QIsaa in modern English translations, see Scanlin, Dead Sea Scrolls, 126–132.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   435 shift that has taken place in textual criticism in recent decades as variants are understood not primarily as indications of the introduction of errors, but as often having some deliberate purpose.21 The value of the readings in the Isaiah manuscripts needs careful reconsideration.22 In 1998 the two-volume translation and analysis by Odil H. Steck asked a number of questions of 1QIsaa, some of which had indeed been asked by the first generation of Qumran scholars but needed to be asked again.23 In particular, his questions include whether close examination of the scribal marks and layout of the text can improve the understanding of how a late Second Temple scribe understood the prophetic book. More significantly, a few scholars who are responsible for commentaries on Isaiah have taken the Qumran evidence for the book seriously; the most insightful comments have been made by Joseph Blenkinsopp and Hugh Williamson.24 Thus the evidence from the Qumran caves is increasingly, and increasingly subtly, being used by those working on the text of Isaiah and how it was transmitted in the late Second Temple period. What emerges from the study of the Cave 4 Isaiah manuscripts is a picture of a largely stable text tradition for Isaiah. Gene Ulrich has concluded that “the extant textual ­evidence . . . from the scrolls, the Masoretic Text, and the Old Greek, all points to a single main edition of the work circulating in Judaism in the late Second Temple period. Although there are numerous types of variants, they all appear to be what can be classified as individual textual variants; that is, each of the variants seems to be an isolated instance, in contrast to there being a general tendency or pattern displayed by a significant group of variants indicating that someone had intentionally set about making a systematic or large-scale revision of the book.”25 Based on this general assessment, the overall comment of Peter Flint is worth repeating: “Consonantal MT Isaiah may have been the most prevalent text available to the Qumranites, since the majority of individual, clear citations seem to be of the proto-Masoretic type.”26 Despite the numerous variants, by the late Second Temple period, the text of Isaiah was remarkably stable. One particular issue about the textual variants in the manuscripts of Isaiah from the Qumran caves concerns whether or not they might be understood as “sectarian,” as reflecting in a restricted or exclusive way the ideology of the movement of which the occupants of the Qumran site were a part. The classic example of a sectarian reading

21  A principal exponent of this shift was Shemaryahu Talmon. For part of his approach to 1QIsaa, see his classic study “1QIsaa as a Witness.” Note, too, e.g., the comments on the text of Isa 8:11 in 1QIsaa by Kratz, “Jesaja,” 243–244, who sees 1QIsaa deliberately reading the verb there as a form of ‫סור‬, not a form of ‫ יסר‬as in the MT. Kratz has also noted the similarities with LXX Isaiah (p. 246) to indicate that this kind of exegetical reading is not an isolated mater. A very fine study of the exegetical elements in textual transmission is Mizrahi’s “Writing as Reading.” 22  See, e.g., Ulrich, “Developmental Composition,” who has argued that 1QIsaa frequently witnesses to the “original text,” whatever might be meant by that designation. 23 Steck, Jesajarolle. 24 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah; Williamson, Isaiah 1–27. 25  Ulrich, “Isaiah, Book of,” 386. 26  Flint, “Interpretation,” 404.

436   George J. Brooke in a biblical text is the way in which the Samaritan Pentateuch in a few places privileges Mount Gerizim. William Brownlee was among those who have been inclined to read some of the variants in 1QIsaa, for example, as sectarian. A striking example that he discussed involves the reading of the verbal form ‫ משׁחתי‬in Isa 52:14 of 1QIsaa. Over against the stand­ard Masoretic reading corrected to ‫משׁחת‬, “marred,” Brownlee and others have produced a translation such as “I so anointed his appearance beyond anyone else.”27 Brownlee supported his particular reading and interpretation of the text by reference to the sectarian compositions such as the Rule of the Community, where he reckoned to find a similar messianic understanding reflected in much that was written. In fact, Brownlee reached his understanding of 1QIsaa’s Isa 52:14 only after a period in which he had reckoned it to be a scribal error. Comparison with the motif of “sprinkling” in the Rule of the Community convinced him otherwise. Gene Ulrich has revisited the issue of sectarian variants in the biblical manuscripts from Qumran.28 For 1QIsaa, which is the prime candidate among the Isaiah scrolls, he considers three possible sectarian variants, the reading in Isa 44:25 of ‫( יסכל‬with samek) in 1QIsaa, 1QIsab, 4QIsab, and the LXX, “to render their knowledge foolish,” over against ‫( ישׂכל‬with a śin) in the MT, “to render their knowledge wise.” Since this particular lexeme, ‫( שׂכל‬with śin), is thematic of community identity through wordplay, it might be concluded that there is a sectarian reading in the manuscripts here to avoid the use of the term.29 But Ulrich points out that what modern readers perceive as a wordplay could simply be the result of the confusion of sibilants in the process of transmission, resulting in a minor lapse. The fact that sometimes there is word play in scripture itself is certainly capitalized upon in the sectarian compositions, and indeed there are instances when variants in the biblical manuscripts are used for sectarian purposes,30 but that is not the same as saying that the variants have been deliberately introduced into the scriptural text to exclude certain readers. It could even be the case in this instance that the variant arises out of a consonantal shift under the influence of Aramaic ‫( יסכל‬skl), “to be wise.” Or again, the famous and infamous reading in Isa 53:11 of “he will see” (‫ )יראה‬in the MT, without any expressed object, over against “he will see light” (‫ )יראה אור‬in 1QIsaa, 1QIsab, 4QIsab, and the LXX should not be understood as indicative of sectarian intervention, even though light plays a significant role in the self-designation of the community as “sons of light.” This is because it is likely that when probable parallelism is taken into account, then none of the witnesses seems to preserve the original text; furthermore, the wide attestation of “he will see light” (1QIsaa, 1QIsab, 4QIsab, and LXX) undermines the

27 Brownlee, Meaning, 205. The first to propose this understanding was Barthélemy, “Grand rouleau,” 546–547. Barthélemy was concerned to see whether messianic readings could be discerned that might then have been altered by later Jews (in the proto-MT) to inhibit the Christian use of Isaiah. 28  Ulrich, “Absence,” 183–185. 29  See also Harding, “Wordplay.” 30  E.g.,1QpHab 11:8–14 (on Hab 2:16) contains use of both the MT’s “uncircumcised” and what may lie behind the LXX reading of “staggering”; this is described and discussed in the most detail by Lim, Holy Scripture, 50.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   437 opinion that here there is a particular intervention from a section of the sectarian movement, Essene or otherwise.31 As a result of these technical text-critical investigations it has become increasingly apparent that there are no sectarian variants in 1QIsaa or, for that matter, in any of the Isaiah scrolls from Qumran.32 The same can be said with a large measure of confidence about the rest of the so-called biblical manuscripts from Qumran: they do not contain sectarian exegetical interventions.33 It is becoming increasingly important for all the variants in the Qumran scriptural scrolls to be considered on a much more equal footing than has generally been the case. A final comment on the text of Isaiah as attested in the manuscripts from the Qumran caves concerns the explicit citations of Isaiah in the pesharim, the biblical commentaries, and in some other compositions. Should those explicit citations be used for text-critical purposes or viewed as very likely to be forms of the text that were altered for exegetical reasons to anticipate the ensuing interpretation. The editors of both the Cave 1 and Cave 4 manuscripts of Isaiah have studiously avoided using the explicit citations of Isaiah in other compositions in their assessments of the variants of Isaiah as attested in the fragmentary manuscripts that contain Isaiah alone. Others, however, have made a case for taking the evidence of such citations more positively for text-critical purposes.34 Even Peter Flint, one of the editors of DJD 32, has arrived at a similar conclusion, that the citations in the pesharim provide evidence of textual readings: “The pesharim, as expositions of Scripture, are best classified as textuallybased studies, but none of the individual pesharim conforms entirely with any of the extant editions,” and “despite their general agreement with the consonantal text of the MT, the pesharim include distinctive readings also found in 1QIsaa and LXX Isaiah; in particular, the text found in 1QIsaa (or one very like it) may well have formed the basis of 4QpIsaa.”35 The presence of Isaiah in other compositions found in the Qumran caves (apart from 4Q176) raises similar text-critical issues. Armin Lange has provided a provisional list of textual information, indicating the affiliations of most of the readings.36 It is notable that of the seventy-four items with variant readings in the citations and allusions identified by Lange, only seventeen are nonaligned readings; of those, most are very minor morphological variants, and none could possibly be understood as a “sectarian” variant, deliberately introduced to make a sectarian point. This observation

31  Ulrich also considers whether the reading of “the last things” in 1QIsaa Isa 41:22 (over against MT’s “their end”) is sectarian, but he concludes that such adjustments are not applied consistently enough in the text to merit sectarian status. 32  Green, “4QIsc,” 120–145, has argued persuasively that the scribal habits concerning the divine titles attested in 4QIsac are further evidence of ideological presuppositions shared with Judaism very broadly. 33  As I concluded in Brooke, “E pluribus unum,” 119: “There is nothing particularly distinctive or sectarian about the pluralism of the biblical texts as discernible in the Qumran caves.” 34  See, e.g., Brooke, “Qumran Pesharim.” 35  Flint, “Interpretation,” 404–405. 36  Lange, “ ‘Which Is Written.” In Lange, Handbuch, 290, the list contains seventy-four variants, of which sixteen are deemed unaligned.

438   George J. Brooke makes a persuasive argument for the inclusion of all this evidence in any analysis of the textual transmission of Isaiah in the late Second Temple period. Such a conclusion does not mean that when Isaiah is used in other compositions that there is no interaction of the text and its use; a significant study on how scriptural text and its ensuing commentary are related, mutually informing one another in a nonarbitrary way, has been offered by Shani Tzoref.37

23.2.3.  The Form of Isaiah Many first-generation scrolls scholars made groundbreaking analyses of the language of the Isaiah scrolls,38 but did not pay much attention to the layout of the text on the manuscript. To be sure, the marginal marks in 1QIsaa provoked several studies, but with regard to the form of Isaiah, it is worth making observations on the bisection of the scroll and its overall paragraphing. It could be that the evidence from the Qumran caves not only allows modern readers to see how Isaiah was copied in late Second Temple times, but also that such copying practices encouraged or reflected particular understandings of the book as a whole. On the bisection of the scroll the most detailed early observations were those William Brownlee published on the topic after having delivered a paper at the 25th International Congress of Orientalists in Moscow in 1960.39 Most modern readers of Isaiah are educated to think of a major division in the book belonging between chapters 39 and 40. But “the gap between chapters 33 and 34 in the Complete Isaiah Scroll, together with orthographic peculiarities of each half, point to the practice of bisecting the Book of Isaiah into two scrolls: (a) chapters 1–33 and (b) chapters 34–66.”40 In 1928, C. C. Torrey, exceptionally among modern interpreters, proposed that Isaiah 34–35 belonged to Second Isaiah, though he did not try to explain the presence of Isaiah 36–39 in their present position.41 Brownlee proposed that the division of the book of Isaiah in two reflected an ancient understanding of the literary structure of the book, so that each half was made up of seven parallel sections: 1–5//34–35; 6–8//36–40; 9–12//41–45; 13–23// 46–48; 24–27//49–54; 28–31//56–59; and 32–33//60–66. Though some of the parallels seem forced, some also seem suitable. It may be, as Brownlee pointed out for the Isaiah scroll and as others have done in relation to various biblical and other classical compositions, that longer works were conceived in two sections, perhaps for the ease of putting

37  Tzoref, “Textuality.” 38  For Isaiah, see esp. Kutscher, Language; Language . . . :Indices and Corrections by Qimron. 39  Brownlee, “Literary Significance.” 40 Brownlee, Meaning, 247. 41 Torrey, Second Isaiah. Kahle, Handschriften, 72–77, was the first to suggest that 1QIsaa had two parts, separated from one another between Isa 33 and 34, with the text of each part having different characteristics. Strangely, Brownlee, Meaning, 247, observed that with such observations Kahle proposed that 1QIsaa explicitly supported Torrey’s theory, but Kahle never made that association in his 1951 work, though he does show knowledge of Torrey’s work on Second Isaiah.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   439 them on scrolls that would not be overly bulky. For Isaiah there seems to be some ancient evidence that the book was viewed as being made up of parts; Josephus describes Isaiah’s prophecies as “left behind in books” (Ant. 10.35).42 The overall form and structure of the book of Isaiah has been reconsidered by Jesper Høgenhaven.43 Although he did not take note of Brownlee’s insights, Høgenhaven has observed that the oracle of chapter 40 would make much better sense if there was a narrative framework for it. In a similar way, beyond the mere practices of scribal copying, the Cave 4 Isaiah manuscripts, most of which only contain either chapters 1–33 (namely, 4QIsaa, 4QIsae, 4QIsaf, 4QIsaj, 4QIsak, 4QIsal, 4QIsao, 4QpapIsap, 4QIsar), or portions from chapters 34–66 (4QIsad, 4QIsag, 4QIsah, 4QIsai, 4QIsam, 4QIsan, 4QIsaq, 5QIsa), may reflect an understanding that the book of Isaiah had a two-part form with subsections. In a survey of Isaiah materials, Peter Flint briefly considered the bisection of the scroll, noting that the break occurs exactly at the end of column 27 of a 54-column scroll. Then he asked: “Could those who copied this scroll have seen some significance in the more universal emphasis on the nations found in Isaiah 34, and thus viewed chapters 1–33 and 34–66 as two parts of the book on the basis of content?”44 Delimitation criticism may also have a part to play. This has been anticipated in some ways by Steck who comprehensively described the marginal marks and internal paragraphing for the smaller sections of 1QIsaa. Steck argued that the layout on the manuscript provides significant clues for how modern critics might begin to interpret its various pericopes.45 There have been some other detailed studies of the paragraph divisions in ancient biblical manuscripts, but the attention paid to such divisions, at least as far as the MT is concerned, has been stimulated mostly by those who now work in the field of delimitation criticism.46 For the part the complete set of Isaiah scrolls from Qumran may play in such study, Gene Ulrich has made a start by offering some examples (Isa 19:15–16; 23:1–2; 34:9–10, 17) while wisely insisting that the evidence “is the production of the last person who copied the text, not necessarily of earlier copies; if one wishes to see in these final products the intentions or indications of original authors, there is a weighty burden of proof required to establish a continuous link.”47 Although an English translation of 1QIsaa is available (interspersed with readings from other Isaiah manuscripts), it is a pity that its editors do not seem to have made any attempt in their translation to represent the paragraphing of the text as it is on the manuscript.48

42  See esp. Cook, “Dichotomy.” 43  Høgenhaven, “Isaiah Scroll,” 156–157. 44  Flint, “Book of Isaiah,” 236. Flint refers to Brownlee’s Moscow article on the bisection of Isaiah in his footnotes. 45  In his German translation of 1QIsaa Steck indicates precisely where the various spaces occur and the paragraph markers. 46  Korpel and Oesch, Delimitation Criticism; see esp. the contribution by Tov, “Background.” 47  Ulrich, “Impressions and Intuition,” 280. 48  Abegg, Flint, and Ulrich, Dead Sea Scrolls Bible, 267–381.

440   George J. Brooke

23.3.  The Use of Isaiah in the Nonbiblical Scrolls Much has been written on the role of Isaiah in the nonbiblical compositions found in the Qumran caves. Something of the diversity of that use can be summed up under five headings.

23.3.1.  Legal Use Over against the majority view in later rabbinic texts that Halakhah should take the Torah as its sole point of reference, it has become apparent in the scrolls from the Qumran caves that at least some Jews in antiquity sometimes juxtaposed the Torah with the Prophets in formulating new legal positions. The locus classicus for this phenomenon is preserved in the so-called Damascus Document (also known as the Zadokite Work). In Manuscript A (CD 10:17–19), Isa 58:13 is juxtaposed with ­allusions to other texts to assist in the formulation of extended rules for Sabbath observance.49 The prophets can be used to provide ways to read and interpret the Torah or even to supplement it; they can also indicate the way in which the Torah itself can be understood as a prophetic text whose hidden meanings the prophetic texts proper can sometimes reveal.

23.3.2.  Narrative Use Since there is little narrative text in Isaiah, it is not surprising that there is also little narrative interpretation of Isaiah among the Dead Sea Scrolls. Usually narrative interpretation forms the basis for discussions of the so-called rewritten Bible, such as with the Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen), which provides adjusted and often expanded narratives for large parts of the stories about Noah and Abraham. However, most scholars who have looked at the Qumran evidence are agreed that in relation to the compositions that eventually find their way into the part of the Hebrew Bible known as the Latter Prophets, there is a sharp distinction. On the one hand, there are Isaiah and the Twelve Minor Prophets and, on the other hand, the books of Jeremiah and Ezekiel. For the ­former, it is now commonly observed that there are no extensive rewritten forms in any of the extant compositions from the Qumran library. For the latter, several increasingly well-known rewritten forms have come to light that are part of a history of the rewriting 49  As has been discussed most extensively and insightfully by Jassen, Scripture and Law, who also has a detailed discussion of the extended Sabbath laws based on Isa 58:13 in other Dead Sea Scrolls compositions.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   441 and reuse of Jeremiah and Ezekiel in antiquity that was already known about before the scrolls were discovered. With Isaiah and the Twelve, not only is it the case that there are no extensive rewritten forms of these books, but also, it is only these books among the Latter Prophets that receive extant treatment as pesher, explicit running commentary formulaically introduced.50 There seems to be a correlation here: implicit interpretation through rewriting for Jeremiah and Ezekiel, explicit interpretation through commentary for Isaiah and the Twelve. How is this difference between the prophets to be explained? Since Isaiah is the most quoted prophet among the sectarian Dead Sea Scrolls, and is used in at least five different running commentaries,51 it seems as if the difference in the handling of the prophetic sources rests in some aspect of their authority and status or, at least, in how that was recognized from generation to generation. Perhaps the relative textual stability of Isaiah is indicative of a particular kind of authoritative status gained at a relatively early stage in the Second Temple period. Such relative textual stability seems to confirm the possibility that those who transmitted the text of Isaiah perceived it to be a literary unity. We have come full circle and are back to asserting the great significance of the paragraph divisions and layout as attested in the Great Isaiah Scroll; though there may be a literary bisection, that can in fact be read as supporting rather than undermining the overall literary unity of the work, once some kind of literary structure is sympathetically observed. Although there is no major rewritten version of Isaiah among the scrolls, it is possible that the major fragment of 4Q500 is a rewritten form of the poetic narrative about the vineyard in Isaiah 5.52 It has also been surmised that some narratives about Isaiah from the late Second Temple period might have had counterparts or even exemplars in the Qumran caves but the chances of survival simply no longer allow us to see this.53

23.3.3.  Poetic Use There is widespread use of Isaiah in the poetry and liturgical compositions found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. By its very nature, such use is allusory and implicit, not explicit with the citations marked by introductory formulae. By way of example, let us consider the way that Julie Hughes has read the “sustained artistry” of 1QHa 16:5–17:36.54 Throughout the poem there is the sustained use of various parts of Isaiah to give the poem a three-part structure. The first movement (1QHa 16:5–27) is a series of proverbial images that set out a picture of planting (Isa 61:3): a planting that leads the reader to 50  On the Isaiah Pesharim, see Brooke, “Isaiah in the Pesharim.” 51  Conveniently accessible in Horgan, Pesharim, 70–138, 260–261. 52  See esp. Brooke, “4Q500 1.” 53  For example, the Ascension of Isaiah has sometimes been linked directly with the Qumran community. See Flusser, “Apocryphal Book.” See also Philonenko, “Martyre d’Ésaïe.” For a helpful introduction, see Knight, Ascension. 54 Hughes, Scriptural Allusions, 135–183.

442   George J. Brooke the shoot from the stump at its center (Isa 11:1); a planting that is a recollection of Eden (Isa 51:3) and the water of life, where teaching rains (Isa 30:20); and a planting that discloses the hand of the gardener tending the stump (with echoes of Isa 5:1–7). The second movement (1QHa 16:27–17:6) is a lament that is introduced by a stanza that is based on Isa 53:1–4. The movement seems to be of three parts, the second of which is also ­introduced by an allusion to Isaiah, this time Isa 50:4, with its reference to the “tongue of a teacher.” The third movement is a “Psalm of Confidence” (1QHa 17:6–36) based around a combined interplay of Ps 94:19 and Isa 63:15. Hughes justifiably concludes that the “main influence upon this poem appears to be Isaiah. One could consider it as a meditation upon various themes/motifs which occur in Isaiah 40–66.”55 It is as if the movements of the whole poem resonate with the experiences of the speaker, which are also intended to be the experiences of the community members hearing the poem; the comfort of God is made available as those in exile are brought home after judgment and are vindicated. With motifs from Isaiah, the poem leads the hearer through preparation for return, testing, and vindication. The use in turn of Isa 41:17–19; 49:13–15; 50:4–9; 53:1–4; 60:13–61:3; and 63:15–16 create a sustained exegesis that situates the poet and his audience in the experiences of the exilic prophet and his fellow exiles. Of additional note in Hughes’s overall analysis is that it seems to confirm the impression that Isaiah was read in two parts in the late Second Temple period: all the key structural allusions fall in the second “half ” of Isaiah. And, inasmuch as the first part of Isaiah is particularly prominent in the pesharim in the middle to end of the first century bce, so it is intriguing to note that it is the second part of Isaiah that seems to have been especially significant in the second century bce poems of the Hodayot.

23.3.4.  Prophetic Use The principal purpose of the prophetic interpretation of Isaiah is the identification of some aspect of the experiences or ideas of the movement, because that is thought to be anticipated in Isaiah and fulfilled in the present or in the near future. The present and near future are conceived as the end times, so for the movement such fufillment is eschatological.

23.3.4.1.  Running Commentaries: The Pesharim Most commonly such prophetic fufillment has been associated with the pesharim, that is, the biblical commentaries. There are six commentaries on parts of Isaiah, five from Cave 4 (only 4QpIsa C is written on papyrus) and one from Cave 3.56 Not surprisingly, particular attention is paid to reading the promises of Isaiah as eschatological predictions, especially since those might concern the coming of the Davidic messiah and 55 Hughes, Scriptural Allusions, 167. 56  The most detailed commentary is provided by Horgan, Pesharim.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   443 the restoration of Jerusalem. When all the Isaiah commentaries are put alongside one another it is clear that they are not all copies of a single commentary. It is worth drawing attention to some of the features of the Isaiah pesharim. Firstly, it is not impossible that some of the so-called continuous pesharim, such as 4QpIsa B (which jumps from Isa 5:14 to Isa 5:24) or 4QpIsa C (frags. 8–10 seem to jump from Isa 14:8 to Isa 14:26), should be thought to have been put together from extracts from other more continuous works. Secondly, in some of the extant fragments of 4QpIsa A and 4QpIsa C there is surviving interpretation of the same scriptural verses. There are two types of significant difference between the two commentaries. To begin with, the scriptural verses are divided into lemmata in slightly different ways in each pesher. The comments that follow each lemma refer to the passages where there is overlap between the two manuscripts: 4QpIsa A, fragment 1, column 1, has Isa 10:20–21, followed by interpretation; fragments 2–6, column 2, probably has Isa 10:22–23, with 10:22a repeated in a secondary citation in the interpretation; Isa 10:24–27 with brief interpretation; and Isa 10:28–32. 4QpIsa C, fragments 4–6, column 2, cites Isa 10:20–22a, with a probable ­secondary re-quotation of Isa 10:22a; then Isa 10:22b–23 as a logical run on rather than as a separate lemma; then Isa 10:24 (or more). Although there is a re-quotation of Isa 10:22a in both versions, in 4QpIsa A, it follows the initial citation of Isa 10:22–23, and in 4QpIsa C, it follows the citation of Isa 10:20–22a. The principal lemmata are delimited differently. Furthermore, the interpretations given to the verses that do overlap do not seem to coincide. For example, the interpretation of Isa 10:20–21 in 4QpIsa A refers to “Israel,” “the men of his army,” and “priests,” whereas in 4QpIsa C the few extant words concern “the final [days],” and “going into captivity.” The interpretation of the re-quoted Isa 10:22a in 4QpIsa A covers two-and-a-half lines and is rendered as “[Its interpretation concerns] [ . . . to des]troy on the da[y of slaugh]ter; and many will per[ish . . . ] [ . . . but they will be s]aved, surely, by their plan[ting] in the land [ . . . ].” In 4QpIsa C the interpretation covers a single line and is rendered as “Its interpretation concerns the reduction [ . . . ].”57 Even allowing for slight differences in column width, the length of the interpretations indicates considerable variance.58 Both the previous points seem to indicate without much doubt that the two commentaries on Isaiah were not the same composition. It is such a conclusion that has resulted in the designations of the Isaiah pesharim being adjusted from having raised superscript letter tags, indicating copies of the same composition, to having capital letters, indicating different compositions.

23.3.4.2.  A Prophetic Thematic Commentary: 11QMelchizedek In addition to the explicit running commentaries on parts of Isaiah which reflect the movement’s eschatological concerns, it is clear that Isaiah also played a part in other exegetical works. In the principal surviving column of 11QMelchizedek (11Q13) Isaiah 61:1–2 acts as a thread in the thematic commentary that is created on the basis of Lev 25. The various scriptural citations in what survives (Lev 25:13; Deut 15:2; Isa 52:7; Pss 7:8–9; 57  The quotations are all taken from García Martínez and Tigchelaar, Dead Sea Scrolls, 1:313–329. 58  On this, see Brooke, “Textual Plurality,” 153–155.

444   George J. Brooke 82:1–2) can all be related to Isa 61:1–2, which “stands behind our document and appears in the form of Stichwörter at crucial points.”59 Three comments can be made. The first is that the dominance of Isa 61:1–2 reflects the kind of eschatological outlook that those who compiled the thematic commentary of 11QMelch shared. Second, Isa 61:1–2 can be seen as controlling the reading of texts from the Torah; this is indicative of an aspect of the use of the prophets, especially Isaiah, that is known elsewhere in the sectarian scrolls, as mentioned earlier. Third, it is possible that the use of Isa 61:1–2 in this way reflects use of the passage more widely in Judaism of the time, as has been argued by those who juxtapose 11QMelch with Luke 4 and the depiction of Jesus’s activity in the synagogue.60

23.3.4.3.  Other Explicit Citations: The Rule of the Community Isaiah also played a part in the exegetical understanding of the development of the sectarian movement. The availability since 1991 of all the manuscripts from the Qumran caves has prompted a reconsideration of the dating of the periods of occupation at the Qumran site.61 It is likely that the occupation of the Qumran site did not take place until the first quarter of the first century bce, at the earliest. As a result of this archaeological re-dating, it has also become important to rethink the way in which some of the sectarian compositions in the library should be considered. For example, it is known that the Rule of the Community has a long and complex history: first, there is the history of the composition of the text,62 and second, there is the history of its recensions.63 The extant copies of the Rule of the Community (one from Cave 1 and up to ten from Cave 4) indicate that the community went through a process of formation, reformation, and rejuvenation. It is interesting to note that Isaiah played a part in such structural changes in the community during the first century bce.64 The example to be considered briefly concerns the famous use of Isa 40:3, “Prepare in the wilderness the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a path for our God.” At a first stage this citation seems not to be used in what might be thought to be the earliest forms of the Rule of the Community (now represented by some forms of the Rule from Cave 4). However, at a second stage the citation is introduced into the composition as that is now found in the Cave 1 version of the Rule (at 1QS 8:15–16). There it is interpreted as follows: “This (path) is the study of the Law which He commanded by the hand of Moses, that they may do according to all that has been revealed from age to age, and as the Prophets have revealed by his Holy Spirit.” Given that the Rule of the Community came to be compiled over s­ everal decades, it is 59  Miller, “Function,” 467. Miller has been supported by Sanders, “Isaiah 61,” 90–91. 60  On the possibility of lectionary selections including Isa 61:1–2, see Perrot, “Luc 4,16–30.” 61  See Magness, Archaeology. 62  Murphy-O’Connor,“Genèse littéraire,” long argued that the Rule of the Community had a fourstage composition history. 63  For the Rule of the Community, see esp. Alexander, “Redaction-History,” and Metso, Textual Development. 64  See Metso, “Use.”

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   445 entirely possible to envisage a period in which this text from Isa 40 functioned metaphorically (as its ensuing interpretation suggests) as motivation for the study of the Law in the expectation of the imminent eschatological arrival of the Lord. All this could take place before there was ever a Qumran site to be occupied.65 However, at a subsequent third stage in the development of the movement, perhaps after the occupation of Qumran in the first quarter of the first century bce, the text seems to be reused with an additional literal force. The “preparation in the wilderness” is no longer simply a metaphor for separation “from all those who have not turned aside from all injustice” (1QS 9:20). The “preparation in the wilderness” has come to have a literal referent and can be applied to the way in which some of the movement takes upon itself a move, for whatever reasons, to the actual wilderness. What was suitably taken metaphorically in one generation becomes significant literally in another.66 Thus a reconsideration of the history of the movement in light of the renewed understandings of the archaeology of Qumran, produces new ways of perceiving how traditions, including the uses of Isaiah in the Rule of the Community (most especially Isa 40:3), seem to have changed as the composition shifted from one historical context to another.

23.4. Conclusion There is much to be learned from the Dead Sea Scrolls about the text, transmission, and use of Isaiah in the late Second Temple period. The evidence is not necessarily straightforward, but it is a rich resource for the better appreciation of the understanding and reception of the book of Isaiah at the formative stages of Judaism and Christianity in antiquity.

Bibliography Abegg, Martin G., Peter Flint, and Eugene C. Ulrich. The Dead Sea Scrolls Bible: The Oldest Known Bible Translated for the First Time into English. San Francisco, CA: Harper San Francisco, 1999. Alexander, Philip S. “The Redaction-History of Serekh ha-Yaḥad: A Proposal.” RevQ 17 (1996): 437–456. Barthélemy, Dominique. “La grand rouleau d’Isaïe trouvé près de la Mer Morte.” RB 57 (1950): 530–549. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 1–39: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. Isaiah. AB 19. New York: Doubleday, 2000. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 40–55: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19A. New York: Doubleday, 2001. 65  1QS 8:15–16 belongs to what Murphy-O’Connor has suggested is the earliest form of the “Manifesto,” in a pre-Qumran stage. 66  As I have argued in more detail elsewhere; see Brooke, “Isaiah 40:3”.

446   George J. Brooke Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Isaiah 56–66: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. AB 19B. New York: Doubleday, 2002. Brooke, George J. “E pluribus unum: Textual Variety and Definitive Interpretation in the Qumran Scrolls.” In The Dead Sea Scrolls in Their Historical Context, edited by Timothy H. Lim, Larry W. Hurtado, A. Graeme Auld, and Alison Jack, 107–119. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2000. Brooke, George J. Isaiah at Qumran: Updating W. H. Brownlee’s The Meaning of the Qumrân Scrolls for the Bible. Occasional Papers 46. Claremont, CA: Institute for Antiquity and Christianity, 2004. Brooke, George J. “Isaiah in Some of the Non-scriptural Dead Sea Scrolls.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 243–260. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Brooke, George J. “Isaiah in the Pesharim and Other Qumran Texts.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretive Tradition, vol. 2, edited by Craig Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 609–632. VTS 70.2 / FIOTL 1.2. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Brooke, George J. “Isaiah 40:3 and the Wilderness Community.” In New Qumran Texts and Studies: Proceedings of the First Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Paris 1992, edited by George J. Brooke with Florentino García Martínez, 117–132. STDJ 15. Leiden: Brill, 1994. Brooke, George J. “On Isaiah at Qumran.” In “As Those Who Are Taught”: The Interpretation of Isaiah from the LXX to the SBL, edited by Claire M. McGinnis and Patricia K. Tull, 69–85. SBLSymS 27. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Brooke, George J. “The Bisection of Isaiah in the Scrolls from Qumran.” In Studia Semitica: The Journal of Semitic Studies Jubilee Volume, edited by Philip S. Alexander, George J. Brooke, Andreas Christmann, John F. Healey, and Philip C. Sadgrove, 73–94. JSSS 16. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. Brooke, George J. “4Q500 1 and the Parable of the Vineyard.” DSD 2 (1995): 268–294; Reprinted in The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament, 235–260. London: SPCK. Brooke, George J. “The Qumran Pesharim and the Text of Isaiah in the Cave Manuscripts.” In Biblical Hebrew, Biblical Texts: Essays in Memory of Michael P. Weitzman, edited by Ada Rapoport-Albert and Gillian Greenberg, 304–320. JSOTS 333 / The Hebrew Bible and Its Versions 2. London: Sheffield Academic, 2001. Brooke, George J. “Textual Plurality in the Pesharim.” RevQ 30, no. 2 (2018): 143–157. Brownlee, William H. “Certainly Mašaḥti!” BASOR 134 (1954): 27–28. Brownlee, William H. “The Literary Significance of the Bisection of Isaiah in the Ancient Scroll of Isaiah from Qumran.” In Trudy Dvardtsat Pyatogo Mezhdunarodnogo Kongressa Vostokokovedov, vol. 1, pp. 431–437. Moscow: Tzolatel’stvo Vostochnoi Literatary, 1962. Brownlee, William H. “The Manuscripts of Isaiah from which DSIa Was Copied.” BASOR 127 (1952): 16–21. Brownlee, William H. The Meaning of the Qumrân Scrolls for the Bible with Special Attention to the Book of Isaiah. James W. Richard Lectures in Christian Religion Given at the University of Virginia. New York: Oxford University Press, 1964. Brownlee, William H. “Messianic Motifs of Qumran and the New Testament I.” NTS 3 (1956–57): 12–30. Brownlee, William H. “Messianic Motifs of Qumran and the New Testament II.” NTS 3 (1956–57): 195–210. Brownlee, William H. “The Servant of the Lord in the Qumran Scrolls I.” BASOR 132 (1953): 8–15.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   447 Brownlee, William H. “The Servant of the Lord in the Qumran Scrolls II.” BASOR 135 (1954): 33–38. Brownlee, William H. “The Text of Isaiah VI 13 in the light of DSIa.” VT 1 (1951): 296–298. Burrows, Millar ed. The Dead Sea Scrolls of St. Mark’s Monastery. With John C. Trever and William H. Brownlee. Vol. 1, The Isaiah Manuscript and the Habakkuk Commentary. New Haven, CT: American Schools of Oriental Research, 1950. Cook, Johann. “The Dichotomy of 1QIsaa.” In Intertestamental Essays in Honor of Józef Tadeusz Milik, edited by Zdislaw J. Kapera, 7–24. Qumranica Mogilanensia 6. Cracow: Enigma Press, 1992. Fields, Weston W. The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History. Vol. 1. Leiden: Brill, 2009. Flint, Peter W. “The Book of Isaiah in the Dead Sea Scrolls.” In The Bible as Book: The Hebrew Bible and the Judaean Desert Discoveries, edited by Edward D. Herbert and Emanuel Tov, 229–251. London: British Library, 2002. Flint, Peter W., and Nathaniel N. Dykstra. “Newly Identified Fragments of 1QIsab.” JJS 60 (2009): 80–89. Flint, Peter W. “The Interpretation of Scriptural Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls: Quotations, Citations, Allusions, and the Form of the Scriptural Source Text.” In A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam, edited by Eric F. Mason, Samuel I. Thomas, Alison Schofield, and Eugene Ulrich, 1:389–406. JSJS 153. Leiden, Brill, 2012. Flusser, David. “The Apocryphal Book of ‘Ascensio Isaiae’ and the Dead Sea Sect.” IEJ 3 (1953): 30–47. Reprinted in Judaism and the Origins of Christianity, 3–20. Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1988. García Martínez, Florentino, and Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar. The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Green, D. “4QIsc: A Rabbinic Production of Isaiah Found at Qumran.” JJS 53 (2002): 120–145. Harding, James E. “The Wordplay between the Roots ‫ סכל‬and ‫ שׂכל‬in the Literature of the Yaḥad.” RevQ 19 (1999): 69–82. Høgenhaven, Jesper. “The Isaiah Scroll and the Composition of Isaiah.” In Qumran between the Old and New Testaments, edited by Frederick H. Cryer and Thomas L. Thompson, 151–158. JSOTS 290 / Copenhagen International Seminar 6. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1998. Horgan, Maurya  P.  Pesharim: Qumran Interpretations of Biblical Books. CBQMS 8. Washington, DC: Catholic Biblical Association of America, 1979. Hughes, Julie A. Scriptural Allusions and Exegesis in the Hodayot. STDJ 59. Leiden: Brill, 2006. Jassen, Alex P. Scripture and Law in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Kahle, Paul. Die hebräischen Handschriften aus der Höhle: Franz Delitzsch-Vorlesungen. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1951. Knight, Jonathan. The Ascension of Isaiah. Guides to Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Kooij, Arie van der. “Isaiah in the Greek Bible of Symmachus and Second Century Judaism in Palestine.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intraand Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 99–112. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Korpel, Marjo C. A., and Josef M. Oesch, eds. Delimitation Criticism: A New Tool for Biblical Scholarship. Pericope 1. Assen, Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 2000. Kratz, Reinhard G. “Jesaja in den Schriften vom Toten Meer.” In Prophetenstudien: Kleine Schriften II, 243–271. FAT 74. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011.

448   George J. Brooke Kutscher, Eduard Y. The Language and Linguistic Background of the Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa). STDJ 6. Leiden: Brill, 1974. Kutscher, Eduard Y. The Language and Linguistic Background of the Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa): Indices and Corrections by Elisha Qimron. STDJ 6a. Leiden: Brill, 1979. Lange, Armin. Handbuch der Textfunde vom Toten Meer. Band 1: Die Handschriften biblischer Bücher von Qumran und den anderen Fundorten. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009. Lange, Armin. “ ‘Which Is Written in the Words of Isaiah, son of Amoz, the Prophet’ (CD 7.10): Quotations of and Allusions to the Book of Isaiah in Qumran Literature.” In With Wisdom as a Robe: Qumran and Other Jewish Studies in Honour of Ida Fröhlich, edited by Károly D. Dobos and Miklós Kőszeghy, 275–287. HBM 21. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix, 2009. Lim, Timothy H. Holy Scripture in the Qumran Commentaries and Pauline Letters. Oxford: Clarendon, 1997. Magness, Jodi. Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2002. Metso, Sarianna. The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule. STDJ 21. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Metso, Sarianna. “The Use of Old Testament Quotations in the Qumran Community Rule.” In Qumran between the Old and New Testaments, edited by Frederick H. Cryer and Thomas L. Thompson, 217–231. JSOTS 290 / Copenhagen International Seminar 6. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1998. Milik, Józef T. “Isaïe.” In Les “Petites Grottes” de Qumrân: Exploration de la falaise, les grottes 2Q, 3Q, 5Q, 6Q, 7Q à 10Q, le rouleau de cuivre, edited by Maurice Baillet, Józef T. Milik, and Roland de Vaux, 173. DJD 3. Oxford: Clarendon, 1962. Miller, Merrill P. “The Function of Isaiah 61:1–2 in 11QMelchizedek.” JBL 88 (1969): 467–469. Mizrahi, Noam. “Writing as Reading: Aspects of the Interpretative Transmission of Isaiah in Qumran: 4QIsac (4Q57) for Isa 24,2.7.15 as a Case Study.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 29–59. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Murphy-O’Connor, Jerome. “La genèse littéraire de la Règle de la Communauté.” RB 76 (1969): 528–549. Parry, Donald W., and Elisha Qimron. The Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa): A New Edition. STDJ 32. Leiden: Brill, 1999. Perrot, Charles. “Luc 4,16–30 et la lecture biblique de l’ancienne Synagogue.” In Exégèse biblique et Judaisme, edited by Jacques E. Ménard, 170–186. Strasbourg: Palais Universitaires, 1973. Philonenko, Marcus. “Le Martyre d’Ésaïe et l’histoire de la secte de Qumrân.” In Pseudépigraphes de l’Ancien Testament et manuscrits de la Mer Morte, vol. 1, pp. 1–10. CRHPR 41. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1967. Popović, Mladen. “When and Why Were Caves Near Qumran and in the Judaean Desert Used?” In The Caves of Qumran. Proceedings of the International Conference, Lugano 2014. STDJ 118; Leiden / Boston: Brill, 2016. Sanders, James A. “From Isaiah 61 to Luke 4.” In Christianity, Judaism and Other Greco-Roman Cults 1: Studies for Morton Smith at Sixty, edited by Jacob Neusner, 75–106. SJLA 12. Leiden: Brill, 1975. Scanlin, Harold. The Dead Sea Scrolls and Modern Translations of the Old Testament. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House, 1993. Skehan, Patrick W., and Eugene C. Ulrich. “Isaiah.” In Qumran Cave 4.X: The Prophets, edited by Eugene Ulrich et al., 7–143. DJD 15. Oxford: Clarendon, 1997.

Isaiah in the Qumran Scrolls   449 Steck, Odil H. Die erste Jesajarolle von Qumran (1QIsa): Schreibweise als Leseanteilung für ein Prophetenbuch. SBS 173. Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1998. Stökl Ben Ezra, Daniel. “Old Caves and Young Caves: A Statistical Reevaluation of a Qumran Consensus.” DSD 14 (2007): 313333. Sukenik, Eliezer L. “‫”אוצר המגילות הגנוזות שבידי האוניברסיטה העברית‬. Jerusalem: Mosad Bialik and the Hebrew University, 1954. Talmon, Shemaryahu. “1QIsaa as a Witness to Ancient Exegesis of the Book of Isaiah.” ASTI 1 (1962): 62–72. Reprinted in The World of Qumran from Within: Collected Studies, 131–141. Jerusalem: Magnes Press/Leiden: Brill, 1989. Tigchelaar, Eibert J. C. “Review of Eugene C. Ulrich and Peter W. Flint, Qumran Cave 1.II: The Isaiah Scrolls. Part 1: Plates and Transcriptions; Part 2: Introduction, Commentary, and Textual Variants (Discoveries in the Judean Desert 32). Oxford: Clarendon, 2010).” RBL 12 (2011). Torrey, Charles C. The Second Isaiah: A New Interpretation. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1928. Tov, Emanuel. “The Background of the Sense Division in the Biblical Texts.” In Delimitation Criticism: A New Tool for Biblical Scholarship, edited by Marjo C. A. Korpel and Josef M. Oesch, 312–350. Pericope 1. Assen, Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 2000. Tov, Emanuel. “The Biblical Texts from the Judaean Desert: An Overview and Analysis of the Published Texts.” In The Bible as Book: The Hebrew Bible and the Judaean Desert Discoveries, edited by Edward D. Herbert and Emanuel Tov, 312–350. London: British Library, 2002. Tzoref, Shani. “Textuality and Identity in the Qumran Pesharim on Isaiah.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 133–165. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Ulrich, Eugene C. “The Absence of ‘Sectarian Variants’ in the Jewish Scriptural Scrolls Found at Qumran.” In The Bible as Book: The Hebrew Bible and the Judaean Desert Discoveries, edited by Edward D. Herbert and Emanuel Tov, 179–195. London: British Library, 2002. Ulrich, Eugene C. The Biblical Qumran Scrolls: Transcriptions and Textual Variants. VTS 134. Leiden: Brill, 2010. Ulrich, Eugene C. “D. The Biblical Texts from the Judaean Desert: 2. Index of Passages in the ‘Biblical Texts.’ ” In The Texts from the Judaean Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series, edited by Emanuel Tov, 192–194. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon, 2002. Ulrich, Eugene C. “The Developmental Composition of the Book of Isaiah: Light from 1QIsaa on Additions in the MT.” DSD 8 (2001): 288–305. Ulrich, Eugene C. “Impressions and Intuition: Sense Divisions in Ancient Manuscripts of Isaiah.” In Unit Delimitation in Biblical Hebrew and Northwest Semitic Literature, edited by Marjo C. A. Korpel and Josef M. Oesch. 279–307. Pericope 4. Assen, Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 2003. Ulrich, Eugene C. “Isaiah, Book of.” In Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scroll, edited by Lawrence H. Schiffman and James C. VanderKam, 384–388. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Ulrich, Eugene C., and Peter W. Flint. Qumran Cave 1.II: The Isaiah Scrolls. Part 1: Plates and Transcriptions; Part 2: Introduction, Commentary, and Textual Variants. DJD 32. Oxford: Clarendon, 2010. VanderKam, James C., and Peter W. Flint. The Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Their Significance for Understanding the Bible, Judaism, Jesus, and Christianity. San Francisco, CA: Harper San Francisco, 2002.

450   George J. Brooke Wagner, J. Ross. “Translation and Interpretation in Old Greek Isaiah.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 63–84. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Wilk, Florian. “ ‘Vision wider Judäa und wider Jerusalem’ (Jes 1 LXX): Zur Eigenart der Septuaginta-Version des Jesajabuches.” In Frühjudentum und Neues Testament im Horizont Biblischer Theologie, edited by Wolfgang Kraus and Karl-Wilhelm Niebuhr, 15–35. WUNT 162. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003. Williamson, H. G. M. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 1–27. Vol. 1: Isaiah 1–5. London: T&T Clark, 2006.. Williamson, H. G. M. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 1–27. Vol. 2: Isaiah 6–12. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018. Williamson, H. G. M “Review of Eugene C. Ulrich and Peter W. Flint, Qumran Cave 1.II: The Isaiah Scrolls. Part 1: Plates and Transcriptions; Part 2: Introduction, Commentary, and Textual Variants, DJD 32 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2010).” JTS 63 (2012): 230–234. Williamson, H. G. M. “Scribe and Scroll: Revisiting the Great Isaiah Scroll from Qumran.” In Making a Difference: Essays on the Bible and Judaism in Honor of Tamara Cohn Eskenazi, edited by David J. A. Clines, Kent H. Richards, and Jacob L. Wright, 329–342. HBM 49. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012.

chapter 24

Isa i a h i n Gr eek Abi T. Ngunga

24.1. Introduction Way back in the 1970s, after quoting the following words from the prophet Isaiah: “with an alien tongue the Lord will speak to this people” (Isa 28:11 RSV, emphasis added), John Olley rightly remarked that even though the Greek language was not what the prophet had initially intended when referring to “an alien tongue,” these words nevertheless appropriately described the circumstances of the Jewish community in Alexandria in the Hellenistic period with respect to their sacred Scriptures. To many of these Jews, as Olley went on to correctly observe, “Hebrew had become a strange tongue, and God’s word was to come to them in Greek, the language of their foreign rulers and neighbours.”1 It was in such a setting that Isaiah in Greek, commonly referred to as the Old Greek of Isaiah (OG Isaiah), as one the most intriguing and exciting parts of the so-called the Greek Bible (LXX), had its origin. Although no precise date can be offered regarding our OG Isaiah version, the current consensus among scholars is that this important piece of Jewish theological literature was the work of a singular translator, produced in the Hellenistic period sometime in the second century bce. This belief is based mainly on a number of vocabulary and syntactic features seen in the language the translator used, his use of various terms specifically related to Hellenistic Egypt, and his occasional allusions to events in the history of Ptolemaic Egypt.2 In the process of producing his translation, which he did while working for the Jewish community in Alexandria, to which he himself belonged, the Jewish translator of Isaiah in Greek employed various exceptional creative mechanisms. Besides his literal renderings of his source text, the translator’s innovative maneuvers included his muchobserved deviations from it. These divergences, termed “free” renderings, are perceived in a significant number of pluses, minuses, lexical choices, variants, neologisms, 1 Olley, Righteousness, 1 (emphasis mine).

2  Ngunga and Schaper, “Isaiah,” 457–458.

452   Abi T. Ngunga l­iberties taken with word order, and so on, contained in this version compared to its Hebrew parent text. There is currently no single explanation that can be said to account for all those differences. Various factors might be seen as the raison d’être behind the translator’s “free” renditions. These include the translator’s misinterpretation of some of the Hebrew terms underlying his Greek text, the grammatical and stylistic motives (a topic that still awaits greater scholarly attention), the translator’s way of “actualizing” the prophecies, his use of neologisms, and his aim to enhance the coherence of his text.3 Additionally, what are called the transformations due to Semitic interferences—namely, semantic changes within Hebrew and the spread of Aramaic that was already taking place in the Second Temple Period—may have influenced the translator in his enterprise.4 The translator’s use of intertextuality (a hermeneutical method, which reveals that he knows the book of Isaiah backward and forward) in dealing with the sacred texts at his disposal is another possible factor.5 Furthermore, there is also the fact that “free” renderings appear more frequently “in the lyric and prophetic passages.”6

24.2.  Text and Its Transmission Considerations of space prevent a thorough analysis of the numerous issues related to the text of and transmission of the OG Isaiah, as well as to any attempt to classify the various manuscripts witnessing to the ancient text. Given these restrictions, this chapter will simply provide a condensed panorama of the different stages in the rich history of tradition concerning our text and its transmission as handed down to us. It will seek both to throw some light on the processes that influenced the origin and growth of the text, and to determine some of the possible theological and literary inclinations of the time, of which the said processes were the expression.7 Of all the prophetic books of the Bible, Isaiah is the one most frequently transmitted, most often employed, and most variably interpreted. As far as its ancient Greek version is concerned, until the earliest printed editions became available, the history of this text in Greek (as in the case with other books of the LXX) consisted simply in the production and copying of manuscripts. A significant number of printed editions are now available for the whole of OG Isaiah. Based on our current knowledge, the main four ones are those by Tischendorf, Swete, Rahlfs, and Ziegler.8 The Ziegler edition is known as the “Göttingen edition.” It differs in a few places from that of Rahlfs. Moisés Silva, for instance, has found that there are “approximately ninety places where the two editions differ.”9 While “many of these 3  Ngunga and Schaper, 461–462. 4 Byun, Influence; Ngunga and Schaper, “Isaiah,” 460–462. 5 Ngunga, Messianism, 41–47. 6 Ottley, Book of Isaiah, 111. 7 Seeligmann, Septuagint Version, 135. 8 Tischendorf, Vetus Testamentum graece, 267–326; Swete, Old Testament, 101–222; Rahlfs, Septuaginta, 566–656; and Ziegler, Septuaginta, 123–370. 9  Silva, “Esaias,” 823.

Isaiah in Greek   453 v­ ariations are relatively minor,” Silva has correctly observed,10 careful examination of every instance against its context within the literature is encouraged, as this might produce astonishing results.11 Given this prospect, a study that could deal with and evaluate all the differences between Ziegler’s and Rahlfs’s editions would be welcome. Ziegler’s and Rahlfs’s editions are the base texts from which modern translations (in English, German, French, and Spanish) are done. Respectively, these translations are A New English Translation of the Septuagint (NETS),12 Septuaginta Deutsch (LXX.D),13 La Bible d’Alexandrie (BA),14 and La Biblia Griega Septuaginta (LBG).15 It is important to note that some of these translations differ slightly (or perhaps substantially?) from each other in a few places. For instance, the phrase καί στήσει εἰς κρίσιν τὀν λαὸν αὐτοῦ (OG Isa 3:13) is translated in the BA as “il mettra son peuple en jugement,” while NETS reads “and he will make his people stand to judge them” (cf. LXX.D, which reads “und wird sein Volk zum Gericht einsetzen”). In OG Isa 8:11, the phrase Τῇ ἰσχυρᾷ χειρὶ ἀπειθοῦσι τῇ πορείᾳ τῆς ὁδοῠ τοῦ λαοῦ τούτου λέγοντες is read in the BA as “ils désobéissent à la main forte, en paroles, en marchant sur la route de ce peuple.” NETS translates it as “with a strong hand do they reject the course of the way of this people,” and LXX.D has “Mit mächtiger Hand verweigern sie sich dem Gang auf dem Weg dieses Volkes.” It would be interesting to do a study on these modern translators’ choices of terms or expressions, even in some of the instances where they tend to agree in their translations. In the case of the latter, more intriguing would be to examine how throughout their translation(s) they rendered a particular term that carries some theological overtone. One could, for instance, look at the BA, NETS, and LXX.D translators’ renderings of the verb ῥυομένοις. This is interesting because in OG Isa 51:10, they all translate it in the passive sense to read respectively: “ceux qui sont délivrés,” “those being delivered,” and “machte für Gerettete.” These renditions might be acceptable, but one is still puzzled when one bears in mind that in other places within the OG Isaiah, ῥυομένος carries the meaning of “deliverer” (e.g., in OG Isa 5:29 for ‫ נצל‬and 59:20 for ‫)גראל‬.16 Besides the four standard printed editions just mentioned, there are also two other Greek printed editions of the text of OG Isaiah, known as Ottley’s edition17 and the “Reader’s Edition” by Lanier and Ross.18 As far as the issues surrounding the manuscripts that witness to the text of OG Isaiah are concerned, it is hard, as with any other book of the Greek Bible, to make a clear decision concerning the main channel of the transmission of this text. This difficulty has to do with the fact that, out of the large number of the manuscripts that were once in ex­ist­ence, only some have been handed down to us, most of the other ones having been lost. Be that as it may, the consensus among scholars is that the Codex Alexandrinus (A) best preserves the text of OG Isaiah. It has been observed that the Codex Vaticanus 10  Silva, 823. 11  Ngunga and Schaper, “Isaiah,” 456. 12  Silva, “Esaias,” 823–875. 13  Kraus and Karrer, Septuaginta Deutsch, 1231–1286. 14  Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, Vision que vit Isaïe, 7–145. 15  Fernández Marcos, “Libro de Isaías,” 125–222. 16 Ngunga, Messianism, 195–196. 17 Ottley, Book of Isaiah. 18  Lanier and Ross, Septuaginta, 907–1080.

454   Abi T. Ngunga (B), even though it is the oldest manuscript and furnishes the basis of all the more commonly used editions of the Greek Bible, “does not deserve its usual place of honour” when it comes to the text of OG Isaiah.19 The main reason for its downfall is that the Codex of Vaticanus of OG Isaiah contains Hexaplaric elements—that is, elements from versions of the LXX that circulated after Origen, which incorporated his revisions of the Greek text.20 One of Seeligmann’s conclusions from his investigation into the history of the text of OG Isaiah was that “this text has been subjected in the course of time to many, either partial or complete revisions.”21 Before Origen, three translators discontented themselves with the LXX in the second century ce. There are: Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. Each produced a “revised” version of the LXX. Though their versions did not survive as continuous texts, many of their words and clauses were recorded in numerous patristic quotations and in the margins of manuscripts of the LXX and the Syrohexapla, a literal Syriac rendering of Origen’s “restored” LXX text. Undertaking his new translation of the Hebrew Bible, Aquila, as a proselyte to Judaism, adhered as closely as possible to the Hebrew text. In Isa 53:4b, for instance, against the OG Isa, which speaks only of the Servant who is ἐν πληγῇ,“in plague” or perhaps “wounded,” for ‫“ אלהים מכה‬smitten by God,” Aquila expands this with ἐν πληγῇ ὑπὸ Θεοῦ “wounded by God.” This example reveals that Aquila’s version aimed to be verbum de verbo exprimere. Be that as it may, his produced literalistic version also shows sometimes important interpretative tendencies. This is the case in Isa 9:5–6 (OG Isa 9:6–7): MT:

‫ למרבה המשרה ולשלום איך־קץ‬. . .‫כי־ילד ילד־לנו בך נתך־לנו ותהי המשרה על־שכמו‬

OG:

ὅτι παιδίον ἐγεννήθη ἡμῖν, υἱος καὶ ἐδόθη ἡμῖν . . . Μεγάλη ἡ ἀρχὴ αὐτοῦ καὶ τῆς εἱρήνης αὐτοῦ οὐκ ἔστιν ὅριον ἐπὶ τὸν θρόνον Δαυιδ . . .

Aquila:

ὅτι παιδίον ἐγεννήθη ἡμῖν υἱος ἐδόθη ἡμῖν καὶ ἐγενετο τὸ μέτρον . . . πολλής τῷ μέτρῷ . . .

Departing radically from the OG in this instance, Aquila renders μέτρον for ‫משרה‬. His choice seems best understood as a reference to the rabbinic concept of middah, ­“meas­ure” (cf. Lev 19:35; Deut 25:15; Mic 6:10; Zech 1:16). If this is correct, it would mean that here the Greek Bible of Aquila depicts an image of a teacher-messiah who is an authority, being familiar with the halachic hermeneutic of the Law.22 Regarding Symmachus, although his background is, admittedly, debated (Ebionite, Samaritan, or Jewish Christian?), what is certain is that he is a scholar who converted to Judaism. He aimed to produce a translation in elegant Greek with some degree of interpretation. As a result, his version is commended by both Church Fathers (especially, Eusebius of Caesarea and Jerome) as it is quoted more frequently than that of Aquila or Theodotion and modern scholars for its clarity and its good Koine usage.23 Symmachus’s 19 Ottley, Book of Isaiah, 9. 20  Ottley, 9. 21 Seeligmann, Septuagint Version, 177. 22 Bacher, Die exegetische Terminologie, 102. 23  De Montfaucon, Hexaplorum, who said, “Interpretatio Symmachi clarissima et elegantissima omnium est” (p. 90). Cf. also Gonzáles Luis, La versión, who wrote: “un griego claro, y fluido” (p. 367).

Isaiah in Greek   455 work is of an exegetical nature. Stemming from second-century Palestine, he promoted a different “religions and political identity.”24 For instance, in Isa 25:7: MT:

 . . .‫ובלע בהר הזה פני־הלוט על־כל־העמים‬

OG: Sym:

ἐν τῷ ὄρει τούτῳ παράδος ταῦτα πάντα τοῖς ἔθνεσιν ἡ γὰρβουλὴ αὕτη ἐπι πάντα τὰ ἔθην . . . καὶ καταποντιεῖ ἐν τῷ ὄρει τούτῳ πρόσωπον τοῦ ἐξουσιαστοῦ τοῦ ἐξουσίαζοντος πάντων τῶν ἐθνῶν . . .

As we can see, this passage in Symmachus differs significantly from its Hebrew counterpart. Against the MT’s reading of a covering that is cast over all peoples, Symmachus takes his readers to see God, who will exterminate “the face of the ruler who has power over all the nations.” Since his version is a Jewish document, it is more likely that he interpreted this verse as referring to the ruler of the world (more specifically the Roman emperor). His choice of both the noun ἐξουσιαστης and the verb ἐξουσίαζω for ‫לוט‬, which is likely based on the combination of the Hebrew (‫ )לוט‬with the root ‫שלט‬, is an interesting one in light of σκοτία as another equivalent Greek word used for this root by Aquila and Theodotion. In Isa 32:15: MT:

 . . . ‫עד־יערה עלינו רוח ממרום‬

OG: Sym:

ἕως ἂν ἐπέλθῃ ἐφ᾿ ὑμᾶς πνεῦμα ἀφ᾿ ὑψηλοῦ . . . ἀνάψυξις ἐξ ὕψους . . .

As in the previous example, here Symmachus distances himself hermeneutically from the idea conveyed in the MT, which aptly reads the “spirit (‫ )רוח‬from on high” will be poured out as part of the proclamation of salvation. Instead of “spirit,” Symmachus has ἀνάψυξις “respite,” “relief.” Although his rendition may have had a different vocalization, such as ‫( ֶרוַ ח‬compare also ‫ ְרוָ ה‬instead of ‫)רּוח‬, ַ it makes his readers see that the period of salvation will be marked by the idea of relief (cf. Acts 3:20, “times of relief (καιροὶ ἀναψύξεως) may come from the presence of the Lord”). Theodotion (who has some points of contact with Aquila) seems to have produced a free revision of the LXX (rather than an independent version) going back to the Kaige. For instance, in the opening phrase of Isa 52:15, against the OG Isa’s reading of ὅτως θαυμάσονται ἔθνη πολλὰ ἐπ᾿ αὐτῷ, “thus shall many nations will marvel at him” (for ‫)כך יזה גום רבים‬, Theodotion (also Aquila) renders this Hebrew phrase as ῥαντίσει, “he shall sprinkle.” His translation here seems to suggest that the Servant spoken of in this passage is like a priest who will sprinkle “many nations” to purify them from sin. In the last phrase of the Servant Poem of Isa 52:13–53:12, against the OG Isa’s expression of vicariousness, in which the Servant διὰ τὰς ἁμαρτίας αὐτῶν παρεδόθη “was handed over because of their sins,” Chrysostom (as shown in the apparatus provided in the

24  Wilk and Gemeinhardt, Transmission, 7.

456   Abi T. Ngunga Göttingen edition) attributes to Theodotion the reading et impious torquebit, “and he will torture the impious.” Thus Theodotion’s version exhibits a radical departure from that of the OG Isaiah. Before we move on to Origen, it is worth noting that the few examples just mentioned relevant to the works of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion reveal a few things. They witness to the growth in the transmission process of the text of OG Isaiah from its genesis. They also reflect the different needs of their given communities, including the desire within the early rabbinic movement in Palestine for a faithful Greek translation of the emerging standard Hebrew text. Origen, as a Christian theologian-scholar of Alexandria (185–253 ce), undertook a massive project for the Alexandrian Greek Bible by comparing the Greek versions (of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion) with the Hebrew text of the day. He produced what is known as his Hexapla (comprising six columns), laying out in column 1, the biblical Hebrew text; in column 2, the transliteration of the Hebrew text into Greek characters; and in columns 3, 4, 5, and 6, the Jewish translations of Aquila, Symmachus, the Septuagint, and Theodotion, respectively.25 The most important feature of Origen’s work is the distinctive character of his revised Greek text. And this was to be found in the fifth column (containing the restored Greek version “the Septuagint”). Given the intended goal of Origen’s work for the church, which was to settle the dispute between Christians and Jews about the biblical texts, the fifth column was a vital tool. Consequently, it was copied separately and quickly became the authorized Greek version of the Bible for the Christians who were in Palestine at the time. Not only was it copied extensively, but it was also promoted by the church leaders for centuries. As far as the text of OG Isaiah is concerned, Origen saw that Isa 40:7b–8a (MT) was missing from the LXX. So he inserted that material into the text in his fifth column. Besides Origen’s hexaplaric recension, another Christian recension, known as the Lucianic (or, more accurately, the Antiochene) version saw the light of day. The transmission of Isaiah in Greek continued its trajectory beyond all these printed editions, later Greek translations, and recensions. For OG Isaiah also appears in the socalled secondary versions. The main ones are the Vetus Latina (or Old Version), Vulgate, the Syriac, and the Coptic versions. Some of the manuscripts of the text of OG Isaiah were also translated into other languages, including Arabic, Armenian, Georgian, Gothic, Ethiopic, and Slavonic. Various parts of the text of OG Isaiah are also contained in the writings of Hellenistic Jewish authors (e.g., Philo and Josephus), early Patristics writings, and the NT. All these versions and writings, which came after Origen’s work, are often important witnesses to issues that are relevant to the text of OG Isaiah. For example, in Isa 53:2, the Armenian version reads: “patmeçak dãm zandiman nora jibr manouk, jibr armat i carawowt erki,” which Weber translates as “Wir haben erzählt ihm gegenüber gleichwie ein Kind, wie ein Wuzerelschoß in dürrem Land.”26 This Armenian reading corresponds exactly to the wording of OG Isa 53:2. It is significant evidence with respect 25  Jobes and Silva, Invitation, 48.

26 Weber, Irenäus Schrift, 2:631.

Isaiah in Greek   457 to a w ­ ell-known textual and exegetical problem that is present in this verse. Its Greek text departs radically from the Hebrew, which presents a great difficulty. So difficult is its exegetical problem that even Ziegler, in his critical (Göttingen) edition, emended ἀνηγγείλαμεν, “we announced before him,” to ἀνέτειλειλε μέν, “for he sprang up before him,” without any manuscript or patristic evidence whatsoever.27 In addition to their significance related to the various challenges linked to the key text-critical issues, those versions and writings also reflect the historical truth that the transmission of a text may help one to view its history, to some extent, as a reflection of its spiritual history. For more detailed discussion of this issue, precluded here by a lack of space, see work by Swete, Ottley, Seeligmann, Ziegler, Jellicoe, Botte and Bogaert, Jobes and Silva, and Dorival, Harl, and Munnich.28

24.3.  History of Study The history of investigation into OG Isaiah is primarily an attempt to solve the issue of the numerous and qualitative differences that exist between this text and its parent text. The Masoretic tradition and the Qumran manuscripts attest to the discrepancies from that book on various levels; these have been the subject of meticulous research. The earliest research approached Isaiah in Greek mainly as a translational text. Scholars such as Ottley29 and Fischer30 aimed to provide an explanation for why this text differs so greatly from its Hebrew counterpart. According to them (hence their approaches), there are two hypotheses that try to explain these differences. The first is that the translator’s knowledge of Hebrew may have been strongly limited. The other is that the translator may have read a model of the text that is different from the Hebrew text we now possess. Although this line of investigation has produced many valuable insights, it has several limitations. For the OG Isaiah translator, as Le Boulluec and Le Moigne (two well-established experts in the field of OG Isaiah) have recently concluded, “possède une vision propre et réfléchie de son œuvre.”31 They also claimed that “on peut en effet montrer que, dans une immense majorité des cas, le traducteur connaît et comprend les éléments du texte qu’ il a en face de lui; les divergences sont voulues, et mues par un project littéraire, ou théologique.”32 As will be noted, this approach also fails to

27 Ziegler, Septuaginta, 320. 28 Swete, Introduction, 29–86; Ottley, Book of Isaiah, 1:9–35; 2:xii–xvi, xxxi–xxxiii; Seeligmann, Septuagint Version, 140–158; Ziegler, Septuaginta, 7–115; Jellicoe, Septuagint and Modern Study, 74–171; Botte and Bogaert, “Septante,” 650–676; Jobes and Silva, Invitation, 37–43, 46–63; and Dorival, Harl, and Munnich, La Bible Grecque, 211, 119–172. 29 Ottley, Book of Isaiah. 30 Fischer, In welcher Schrift. 31  Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, Vision que vit Isaïe, 150 (emphasis original). 32  Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, 150.

458   Abi T. Ngunga see the internal coherence of this Greek text, whose translator “témoigne . . . d’une vision propre du message biblique.”33 Putting an end to this atomistic approach, a different trend of investigation has emerged among scholars who have been looking at Isaiah in Greek not only as a translation but as a version in its own right. Their aim has been to try to see whether the dissimilarities between the text of OG Isaiah and its Hebrew counterpart make sense in the literary context of OG Isaiah itself, without explaining them in relation to its source text. This trend was championed by Ziegler34 and Seeligmann.35 After studying the relationships among the variants in the Greek version of Isaiah, they discovered that certain words or expressions can only be evaluated within their context and with due reference to parallel passages. That is to say, according to this approach, it is wrong to lift a particular term or expression from Isaiah in Greek (which differs from its MT counterpart) out of context and study it separately. Seeligmann, for instance, describes this as “a realisation which, methodologically speaking, is certainly fruitful.”36 Subsequently, building on both Ziegler’s and Seeligmann’s strong foundation, a significant number of articles and monographs devoted to Isaiah in Greek were written. At the beginning of this phase, there was a stimulating article on OG Isa 25:1–5 by Coste.37 After comparing his text with MT, Coste concluded that, as a translational text, OG Isa 25:1–5 showed itself to be “comme un échec presque complet.” However, when it is analyzed as a literary unit in its own right, Isa 25:1–5 in Greek is “une composition ordonnée et cohérente.” Coste further concluded that this passage in Greek, as a literary and conceptual text, shows that an active interpretive plan by the translator was at work, as a reflection of his personal faith and piety. Coste’s work was followed by that of das Neves, Olley, Koenig, van der Kooij, and Ekblad.38 In our century, as interest in OG Isaiah keeps growing, other monographs and articles have been written or edited, including by Baer, Le Moigne, Troxel, de Souza, van der Kooij and van der Meer, Ngunga, Vorm-Croughs, Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, and Byun.39 These scholars have stressed the number hermeneutical elements present in the text of OG Isaiah. Because of this, the vast majority of differences between the Hebrew and the Greek texts of Isaiah can best be explained on the basis of a thorough understanding of the objectives and procedures of the OG Isaiah translator. Accordingly, the approach to OG Isaiah must not only be philologically focused, as in the earliest period, but also a contextual and theological one. However, when it comes to the question of how much interpretation OG Isaiah actually reflects, these scholars differ. Some take the maximalist view by classifying the translator’s work under the rubric of Erfüllingsinterpretation. They also stress that more substantial quantities of theological exegesis are found 33  Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, Vision que vit Isaïe, 151. 34 Ziegler, Untersuchungen. 35 Seeligmann, Septuagint Version. 36  Seeligmann, 132. 37  Coste, “Le texte Grec d’Isaïe xxv,” 1–5. 38  Das Neves, Teologia; Olley, Righteousness; Koenig, L’Herméneutique; van der Kooij, Textzeugen; Oracle of Tyre; and Ekblad, Isaiah’s Servant. 39 Baer, When We All Go Home; Le Moigne, “Le Livre d’Ésaïe”; Troxel, LXX-Isaiah; de Souza, Eschatology; van der Kooij and van der Meer, Old Greek of Isaiah; Ngunga, Messianism; Vorm-Croughs, Old Greek of Isaiah; Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, Vision que vit Isaïe; and Byun, Influence.

Isaiah in Greek   459 in this text. The translator’s theological and exegetical motives are often seen to have played an important role in the preparation of the gospel message during the rise of early Christianity. Others scholars, presenting a different view to counter the dominant idea of recent decades, prefer the minimalist view, which takes into account the mechanical style of the Isaiah Greek translation and the fact that several deviations of the text reflect a different Hebrew Vorlage. According to them, the translator’s way of translating is rather determined by another interest, namely, his concern to convey the sense of the Isaianic text to his Greek readers. Besides the two main methods exhibited in both the maximalist and the minimalist views in which the context of Isaiah in Greek is given due attention—namely, those of translation technique and theology that have just been outlined, van der Meer has more recently revived a forgotten and yet an important approach to this text of OG Isaiah, which was first hinted at by Ziegler.40 Van der Meer calls it “a papyrological perspective.”41 According to him, this view has much to offer to the study of the Greek Bible in general and of OG Isaiah in particular. It enhances, for instance, the proper context for understanding the text of OG Isaiah in its own right by taking into account the wider cultural context of the contemporaneous Greek inscriptions and documentary papyri produced in the Hellenistic and Roman periods. Furthermore, it helps not only to correct some of the persistent misperceptions concerning the Greek translation of this text, but also to position this literature in its historical and social context. From the survey that has been presented here on the history of investigation into the text of OG Isaiah, one can see that this important piece of Jewish literature will continue to generate scholarly interest, as it has done since the earliest times. Some of the fruitful areas of research, which are either untouched or still awaiting further exploration, include studies continuing in the direction begun by van der Meer and the contribution of the text of OG Isaiah to the history of biblical interpretation.

24.4.  History of Reception and Interpretation Without claiming to do full justice to all matters pertinent to the reception history and interpretation of OG Isaiah in all its forms and stages, this section briefly looks at some of the interpretations in both Jewish and Christian writings, which either use or depend on this text of Isaiah in Greek. This will allow us to appreciate its theological and exegetical aims as expressed by the Greek Isaiah translator and echoed within the subsequent periods of history.

40 Ziegler, Untersuchungen, 175–212.

41  Van der Meer, “Papyrological Perspective,” 107–133.

460   Abi T. Ngunga

24.4.1.  Early Jewish Interpretation In early Judaism, the ancient Greek biblical texts including OG Isaiah were considered a source of hope in times of (national) crisis. Echoes of their use are heard in the writings of Philo (especially, in his announcing of each quotation with a formula such as φησί, εἶπεν, λέγει, λέγεται, γέγραπται, thus producing a few passages from Isaiah) and Josephus (especially, in Ant. i. Proem), for starters. There are also many other writings from Hellenistic Jewish authors belonging to a period just antecedent to the rise of the earliest Christian literature, which provide us with some hints of how the Greek Bible and OG Isaiah, in particular, were used and interpreted in their given communities. For instance, Swete provides two instances where the writer of Wisdom, who knows Isaiah in Greek, uses it: OG Isa 3:10 (in Sap. ii.12) and OG Isa 44:20 (in Sap. xv.10).42 Swete also points to the influence of Isaiah in Greek shown by the translator of Sirach, who, in his writings in 4 Macc 18:14, makes a direct citation of OG Isa 43:2. Furthermore, Swete correctly observes that the Sibylline Oracles 3 and 5 also include possible instances where OG Isaiah is in use (see, e.g., Sibyll. 3.606, χειροποίητα . . . ἐν σχισμαῖς πετρῶν κατακρύψαντες, an expression borrowed from OG Isa 2:19–21; Sibyll. 3.708 uses OG Isa 11:6–9; and Sibyll. 5. 414–415 uses OG Isa 19:20). OG Isaiah is also referred to in the fragmentary documents from other Hellenistic Jewish writers, including Demetrius, Eupolemus, Aristobulus, and others. While a few studies have been carried out,43 such as that from Horbury—which here and there mentions a few references to the work of these Jewish authors in connection to their use of the OG Isaiah—more comprehensive research into the writings of these non-Christian Hellenists, which could yield some interesting results, remains a mostly untouched direction of research.

24.4.2.  Early Christian Interpretation The NT abounds in references to and quotations from the OT. Swete, for instance, offers a table showing forty-one passages of Isaiah in Greek that are formally quoted in the NT.44 We have also noted elsewhere the frequent citations of this text in the NT as listed by others.45 Like LXX-Psalms, OG Isaiah had a significant influence on NT (and later Christian) hermeneutics for two main reasons. In general, though it is undeniable that the NT writers drew from a large pool of traditions, it is also unquestionable that for most of these authors, the Greek texts, which constituted authentic and authoritative Scriptures, were their only source.46 In particular, the effect of OG Isaiah is based mostly on the various distinct theological interpretations expressed in some of its passages by the translator. 42 Swete, Introduction, 372. 44 Swete, Introduction, 385–386. 46 Dines, Septuagint, 143.

43 Horbury, Jewish Messianism. 45 Ngunga, Messianism, 19, n. 23.

Isaiah in Greek   461 There are numerous examples that highlight the distinct impact that OG Isaiah had on the NT writers, especially in instances where Isaiah in Greek differs from its source. Here are a few of them from some parts of Isaiah (which, as a piece of literature regarded as one unified corpus), which enjoyed interested in early Christianity. They are concerned with the interpretation of the person of Jesus by NT writers.



1. As he looked at the meaning of παρθένος “virgin” (OG Isa 7:14) for ‫המלע‬, “young woman,” the NT writer (in Matt 1:23) applied the Isaianic text in Greek to Jesus being begotten by the Holy Spirit.47 2. Through OG Isa 53:7’s use of ἀμνός in the phrase ὡς ἀμνὸς ἐναντίον τοῦ κείροντος αὐτὸν “as a lamb before the one shearing him,” the NT writers (John 1:29; Acts 8:32–33; cf. John 1:36; 1 Pet 1:19; Rev 5:6–10) identified Jesus as the “Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” 3. With reference to παραδίδωμι (OG Isa 53), Jesus, in the so-called passion predictions, is appropriately described as being “delivered over”—see the phrase ὁ υἰὸς τοῦ ἁνθρώπου παραδίδοται εἰς χεῖρας ἀνθρώπων “The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men” (cf. Mark 9:31; 10:33; 14:21, 41; Matt 26:2; Luke 24:7; Acts 3:13). A similar reference to OG Isa 53 can also be seen in the Last Supper tradition discourse (cf. Mark 14:22, 24; Luke 22:19–22; 1 Cor 11:24–25). Here, while it is difficult to tell whether the Markan “bread saying” was formulated with reference to OG Isa 53,48 it is certain that the Lukan use of τὸ ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν διδόμενον “which is given for you” (Luke 22:19) clearly recalls a few texts belonging to OG Isa 53 that are linked through the verb δίδωμι, “if you give (δῶτε) your life for sin” (OG Isa 53:10), “and the LORD has handed (παρέδωκεν) him over for our sins” (OG Isa 53:6); “his soul handed over (παρεδόθη) to death” (OG Isa 53:12), which can be used with reference to sacrifice (cf. Exod 3:14; Lev 22:14) and to martyrdom (Isa 53:10).

All the foregoing examples seem to demonstrate the way readings in OG Isaiah provided NT writers with important windows of opportunity they would not have found in the Hebrew version alone. Their appropriation of these passages (and many more) had a significant impact on the messianic interpretation of the person of Jesus as one of the many more NT theological beliefs and confessions of early Christianity, formulated with the aid of the theological exegesis found in Isaiah in Greek. As can be seen in other books of the Greek Bible, OG Isaiah also provided proof-texts to back up arguments. In many instances, it is reinterpreted to fit its new Christian usage. And being a prophetic book, its contents were applied to the Christian story. More may be learned by patiently examining the details of quotation(s) of OG Isaiah in each corpus of the NT, for example, OG Isaiah as quoted in Matthew,49 Mark, Luke-Acts, the

47  Ngunga and Schaper, “Isaiah,” 465. 48  Stuhlmacher, “Isaiah 53,” 152. 49  Menken, “Quotations,” and his other contributions on the subject.

462   Abi T. Ngunga Johannine corpus, the Pauline literature,50 and so on. Such painstaking work may help us to see the ways in which the texts of OG Isaiah may have been used in various communities. It could also shed some light on the hermeneutics employed by the NT writers, particularly when they follow the Greek text rather than the Hebrew form of the passages before them. Although, as noted, a few contributions to this subject already exist, it is still unworked field in most of the corpora. Exegetical use of OG Isaiah continued beyond the NT. As Christianity grew and spread, the explanation of the key texts of Scripture became an issue both within Christianity and in its encounters with Judaism. OG Isaiah played a crucial part in a significant number of polemical and apologetical writings and was employed for strong pastoral and homiletical purposes. The extent of this usage is expected: the ecclesiastic Fathers were the first to practice catechism, besides performing their roles as teachers, preachers, articulators of the Christian faith, and vigorous fighters against heresies. They did so using the Greek text alone (OG Isaiah being a major part of it) as the “OT.” For this text furnished them, without doubt, with the Word of God. The nature and scope of patristic use of OG Isaiah has been treated in several stand­ ard works that reveal the effect of the text on the development of Christian thought during the early stages of Christianity. Patristic writings have a serious contribution to make both textually and for the history of interpretation, provided we understand their hermeneutical and exegetical principles and methods. In his partial investigation of the quotations from the LXX used by the ecclesiastical writers during the golden age of patristic literature, Swete provides a helpful list of passages from OG Isaiah that were cited in early Christian writings prior to Origen.51 In a rearranged overview, with some comments on each group (except in item 5, which corresponds to number 6 in Swete’s list since his list there can easily be followed without being regrouped), they include:



1. OG Isa as quoted in Clement’s epistle to the Corinthians (Clem. R. Ad Cor.): OG Isa 1:16–17 (viii. 4); 6:3 (xxxiv. 6); OG Isa 13:22 (xxiii. 5); OG Isa 29:13 (xv. 2); OG Isa 53:1–6 (xvi. 3–5); OG Isa 60:17 (xlii. 5); OG Isa 66:2 (xiii. 3). Any discussion of these passages would reveal that Clement’s use of Isaiah shows an occasional tendency to agree with the Greek Bible of Theodotion and of Aquila against the OG, revealing to some degree both the reception and the interpretive transformation of Isaiah in Greek by Clement’s targeted community. Special interest should be taken in the quotations that are also cited in the NT—namely, OG Isa 29:13 (Matt 15:8; Mark 7:6) = Clem. xv. 1; OG Isa 53:1–12 (cf. John 12:38; Rom 10:16; Matt 8:17; Acts 8:32–33; 1 Pet 2:22; Mark 15:28) = Clem xvi. 3–14—in order to detect his hermetical and exegetical principles.52 2. OG Isaiah as quoted by Clement in his Second Epistle to the Corinthians (II Clem): Isa 29:13 (iii. 5); 34:4 (xvi. 3); 52:5 (xiii. 2, as quoted by Polycarp x.3); 54:1 (ii.1); 58:9 (xv. 3); 66:18 (xvii. 4–5); 66:24 (vii. 6, xvii. 24). 50  See, e.g., Wilk, Die Bedeutung. 52 Swete, Introduction, 409–410.

51 Swete, Introduction, 406–432.

Isaiah in Greek   463



3. OG Isaiah as quoted in the Epistle of Barnabas (of Alexandria): (a) quoted exactly—Isa 1:2, 10–11 (ii. 5, ix. 3, xv. 8); 3:9–10 (vi. 7); 5:21 (iv. 11); 28:16 (vi. 2–3); 33:13 (ix. 1); 33:16 (xi. 4–5); 40:12 (xvi. 2); 42:6–8 (xiv. 7); 45:2–3 (xi. 4); 49:6–7 (xiv. 8); 53:5, 7 (v. 2); 61:1–2 (xiv. 9); 66:1–2 (xvi. 2); (b) quoted partly—Isa 28:16 (vi. 2); 58:4–6 (iii. 1–3.); (c) quoted freely—Isa 1:6–7 (v. 14, vi. 1); 65:2 (xii. 4); and (d) free summary—Isa 49:17 (xvi). 4. OG Isaiah as quoted by Ignatius (of Antioch): Isa 5:26 (Smyrn i. 2); Isa 52:5 (Trall viii. 2). 5. OG Isaiah quotations used by Ireanaeus (a theologian and controversialist) are found in Adversus haereses iii. iv., where he quotes sixty-five passages.53 6. OG Isaiah as quoted by Justin Martyr (apologist and controversialist) in the Dialogue with Trypho the Jew—namely, Apologia I and Dialogus cum Tryphone.54 There are twenty-four texts cited in his Apologia I (Apol.): Isa 1:3 (Apol. 63); Isa 1:7 (Apol. 47); Isa 1:9 (Apol. 53); Isa 1:11–12 (Apol. 37); Isa 1:16–17 (Apol. 44, 61); Isa 2:3–4 (Apol. 39); Isa 3:20 (Apol. 49); Isa 7:14 (Apol. 33); Isa 9:6 (Apol. 35); Isa 35:4–7 (Apol. 48); Isa 45:23 (Apol. 52); Isa 50:6–8 (Apol. 38); Isa 52:12–53:8 (Apol. 50); Isa 53:8–12 (Apol. 51); Isa 54:1 (Apol. 53); Isa 57:1–3 (Apol. 48); Isa 58:2 (Apol. 35); Isa 58:6–7 (Apol. 37); Isa 63:17 (Apol. 52); Isa 64:10–12 (Apol. 47, 52); Isa 65:1–2. (Apol. 49); Isa 65:2 (Apol. 35, 38); Isa 66:1 (Apol. 37); Isa 66:24 (Apol. 52).

In his Dialogus cum Tryphone (Dial.), Justin quotes fifty-eight texts: Isa 1:9 (Dial. 140); Isa 1:23–26 (Dial. 27, 82); Isa 2:5–7 (Dial. 24, 135); Isa 3:9 (Dial. 136); Isa 3:9–11 (Dial. 17); Isa 3:9–15 (Dial. 133); Isa 3:16 (Dial. 27); Isa 5:18–25 (Dial. 17, 133); Isa 6:10 (Dial. 12); Isa 7:10–16 (Dial. 42, 66); Isa 8:4 (Dial. 77); Isa 11:1–3 (Dial. 87); Isa 14:1 (Dial. 123); Isa 16:1 (Dial. 114); Isa 29:24–25 (Dial. 123); Isa 26:2–6 (Dial. 24); Isa 29:13–14 (Dial. 27, 32, 78, 123); Isa 30:1–5 (Dial. 79); Isa 33:13–19 (Dial. 70); Isa 35:1–7 (Dial. 69); Isa 39:3 (Dial. 50); Isa 40:1–17 (Dial. 50); Isa 42:1–4 (Dial. 123, 135); Isa 42:5–13 (Dial. 65); Isa 42:6–7 (Dial. 26); Isa 42:16 (Dial. 122); Isa 42:19–20 (Dial. 123); Isa 43:10 (Dial. 122); Isa 43:15 (Dial. 135); Isa 49:6 (Dial. 121); Isa 49:8 (Dial. 122); Isa 50:4 (Dial. 102); Isa 51:4–5 (Dial. 11); Isa 52:10–11 (Dial. 13); Isa 52:15–53:1 (Dial. 118); Isa 53:1–6 (Dial. 42); Isa 53:9 (Dial. 97); Isa 55:3–4 (Dial. 12); Isa 55:3–13 (Dial. 14); Isa 57:1–4 (Dial. 16); Isa 57:1 (Dial. 110); Isa 57:2 (Dial. 97, 118); Isa 57:5–6 (Dial. 27); Isa 58:1–11 (Dial. 15); Isa 58:13–14 (Dial. 27); Isa 62:10–63:6 (Dial. 26); Isa 62:12 (Dial. 119); Isa 63:15–64:12 (Dial. 25); Isa 65:1–5 (Dial. 24); Isa 65:1 (Dial. 119); Isa 65:2 (Dial. 97); Isa 65:8–12 (Dial. 136); Isa 65:9–12 (Dial. 135); Isa 65:17–25 (Dial. 81); Isa 66:1 (Dial. 22); Isa 66:5–11 (Dial. 85); Isa 66:23–24 (Dial. 44); Isa 66:24 (Dial. 140).

53  Swete, 415–416.

54  Swete, 418–419.

464   Abi T. Ngunga



7. OG Isaiah as quoted by Hippolytus of Portus (an author of a large number of biblical commentaries, including his exegetical work on Isaiah, of which only fragments remain). A few samples of the texts of OG Isaiah that are exhibited in those fragments include Isa 10:12–19; 14:4–21; 45:11–14; 66:24. For more detail on his writings, see Daley.55 8. OG Isaiah as quoted by Clement of Alexandria (a didactic figure, hence his Paedagogus): Isa 9:6 (paed. i. 24); 11:1–9 (paed. i. 61); 29:13 (paed. i. 76); and 66:13 (paed. i. 21), to mention only a few. His broken references to the Scriptural texts make it possible for any student to catch glimpses of the text that lay before him.

Looking at this panorama of rearranged quotations from OG Isaiah as they appear in all these early Christian writings, one cannot fail to note the extent to which this ancient version of the book was used and, ultimately, the patristic reception of this text. An exploration pertinent to the manner in which these Church Fathers used this text could shed some light on the origins of diverse understanding of the atonement, for instance, and other doctrines that have influenced the history of theology. For OG Isaiah is “un livre de la Bible qui, plus que tout autre, a servi d’assise à la doctrine des continuateurs du mouvement de Jésus.”56 The long-awaited official volume commentary on OG Isaiah in French (from Le Boulluec and Le Moigne) to be published in the well-known series La Bible d’Alexandrie57 will be an invaluable resource in signposting not only some philological issues contained in this text of OG Isaiah, but perhaps also some of the ways (from the rich data of its reception history) in which early Christian writers received and interpreted it. In their preliminary work for this volume, Le Boulluec and Le Moigne made some connection between the philological information needed and the patristic use of OG Isaiah when they said: “Nous ne nous sommes pas interdit . . . de recourir aux commentaires patristiques pour y chercher les informations philologiques qui pouvaient être utiles.”58 The chapter’s list of early ecclesiastical writers who used OG Isaiah, as noted, is not exhaustive. There is other literature of the time in which it might also be possible to find evidence of the use of this text, as a stimulating investigation by Le Boulluec of a few of these works has revealed.59 This literature includes writings by Aristides, Tatian, Athenagoras, and Theophilus; the anonymous Teaching and Epistle to Diognetus; works by Latin Christian writers (e.g., Cyprian, Lucifer, Vigilius of Thapsus, the Donatist Tyconius, and the author of the Speculum); Origen (see Fragments [2] of the Commentaries in Latin, and Homilies [9] in Latin, translated by Jerome); the writings of some of the key Greek Fathers, including Basil of Caesarea, Homilies on Isa 1–16;60 Cyril of Alexandria, in his commentary on Isaiah; Eusebius of Caesarea, in his notes on Isaiah; John Chrysostom, his commentary on Isa 1–8:11; Procopius of Gaza, commentary on Isaiah; Theodore of Heraclea, Fragments of Commentary on Isaiah; Theodore of Cyrrhus, Commentary on Isaiah; and many more. 55 Daley, Hope of the Early Church, 38–41. 56  Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, Vision que vit Isaïe, 171. 57  See, Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, Isaïe. 58  Le Boulluec and Le Moigne, 171. 59  Le Boulluec, “Lexique d’Isaïe LXX,” 49–69. 60  See Migne, Patrologia Graeca, xxix–xxxii.

Isaiah in Greek   465 More studies on these early Christian writers on their use of the OG Isaiah would be welcome, as many important areas are still unexploited. Such studies could reveal some of the principles or doctrinal motives that governed their exegesis and interpretation, as well as how this text of OG Isaiah was appropriate in diverse cultural contexts for many distinct yet somehow interrelated groups and communities, beginning with the Alexandrian community from which Isaiah in Greek first emerged.

Bibliography Editions Fernández Marcos, Natalio. “Libro de Isaías.” In La Biblia Griega Septuaginta. Vol. 2, Libros Proféticos, edited by Natalio Fernández Marcos and María Victoria Spottorno Díaz-Caro, 125–222. Salamanca, Spain: Ediciones Sígueme, 2015. Kabiersch, Jürgen, Arie van der Kooij, Klaus Koenen, and Florian Wilk. “Esaias/Das Buch Jesaja.” With Klaus Baltzer. In Septuaginta Deutsch: Das griechische Alte Testament in deutscher Übersetzung, edited by Wolfgang Kraus and Martin Karrer, 1230–1286. Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2009. Lanier, Greg R., and William A. Ross. Septuaginta: A Reader’s Edition. Vol. 2. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2018. Le Boulluec, Alain, and Philippe Le Moigne. Vision que vit Isaïe. La Bible d’Alexandrie. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 2014. Ottley, Richard R. The Book of Isaiah according to the LXX (Codex Alexandrinus). 2 vols. London: Cambridge University Press, 1904. Rahlfs, Alfred. Septuaginta: Id est Vetus Testamentum graece iuxta LXX interpretes. (1935). Reprint, Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1979. Silva, Moisés. “Esaias.” In A New English Translation of the Septuagint, edited by Albert Pietersma and Benjamin G. Wright, 823–875. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007. Swete, Henry B. The Old Testament according to the Septuagint. Vol 3. Cambridge: University Press Cambridge, 1894. Tischendorf, Constantin von. Vetus Testamentum graece iuxta LXX Interpretes (1835). Vol. 2. Reprint, Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus, 1880. Ziegler, Joseph, ed. Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum Graecum (1939). Vol. 14, Isaias. Reprint, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1967.

Secondary Literature Bacher, Wilhelm. Die exegetische Terminologie der jüdischen Traditionsliteratur (1899). Leipzig: Erster Teil. Reprint, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1965. Baer, David A. When We All Go Home: Translation and Theology in LXX Isaiah 56–66. JSOTS 318. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 2001. Botte, B., and Pierre-Maurice Bogaert. “Septante et versions grecques.” SDB 12 (1993): 536–692. Byun, Seulgi L. The Influence of Post-Biblical Hebrew and Aramaic on the Translator of Septuagint Isaiah. LHBOTS 635. London: T&T Clark, 2017.

466   Abi T. Ngunga Coste, J. “Le texte Grec d’Isaïe xxv, 1–5.” RB 61 (1954): 33–66. Daley, Brian E. The Hope of the Early Church: A Handbook of Patristic Eschatology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. De Montfaucon, Bernard. Hexaplorum Originis quae supersunt (1713). Paris. Reprinted in Jacques Paul Migne, Patrologia Graeca 15, 1857. Dines, Jennifer M. The Septuagint. London: T&T Clark, 2004. Dorival, Gilles, Marguerite Harl, and Olivier Munnich. La Bible Grecque des Septante: Du judaïsme hellénistique du Christianisme ancient. Paris: Cerf, 2011. Ekblad, Eugene Robert. Isaiah’s Servant Poems according to the Septuagint: An Exegetical and Theological Study. CBET 23. Leuven: Peeters, 1999. Euler, Karl Friedrich. Die Verkündigung vom leidenden Gottesknecht aus Jes 53 in der griechischen Bibel. BWANT 66. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1934. Fischer, Johann. In welcher Schrift lag das Buch Isaias den LXX vor? BZAW 56. Giessen: Alfred Töpelmann, 1930. González Luis, José. “La versión de Símaco o los Profetas Mayores.” PhD diss., University of Madrid, 1981. Hanhart, Robert. “Die Septuaginta als Interpretation und Aktualisierung: Jesaja 9:1(8:23)– 7(6).” In Isaac Leo Seeligmann Volume, edited by Alexander Rofé and Yair Zakovitch, 331–346. Essays on the Bible and the Ancient World 3. Jerusalem: E. Rubinstein, 1983. Horbury, William. Jewish Messianism and the Cult of Christ. London: SCM Press, 1998. Jellicoe, Sidney. The Septuagint and Modern Study. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1993. Jobes, Karen H., and Moisés Silva. Invitation to the Septuagint. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2000. Koenig, Jean. L’Herméneutique analogique du Judaïsme antique d’après les témoins textuels d’Isaïe. VTS 33. Leiden: Brill, 1982. Kooij, Arie van der. “Accident or Method? On ‘Analogical’ Interpretation in the Old Greek of Isaiah and in 1QIsa.” Bibliotheca Orientalis 43 (1986): 366–375. Kooij, Arie van der. Die alten Textzeugen des Jesajabuches: Ein Beitrag zur Textgeschite des Alten Testaments. OBO 35. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1981. Kooij, Arie van der. “Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Septuagint and in Other Ancient Versions.” In “As Those Who Are Taught”: The Interpretation of Isaiah from the LXX to the SBL, edited by Claire Matthews McGinnis and Patricia K. Tull, 49–68. SBLSymS 27. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Kooij, Arie van der. “Isaiah in the Septuagint.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretive Tradition, vol. 2, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 2:513–530. VTS 70.2 / FIOTL 1.2. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Kooij, Arie van der. The Oracle of Tyre: The Septuagint of Isaiah XXII as Version and Vision. VTS 71. Leiden: Brill, 1998. Kooij, Arie van der. “The Septuagint of Isaiah and the Mode of Reading Prophecies in Early Judaism: Some Comments on LXX Isaiah 8–9.” In Die Septuaginta: Texte, Kontexte, Lebenswelten, edited by Martin Karrer and Wolfgang Kraus, 597–611. WUNT 219. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Kooij, Arie van der. “The Septuagint of Isaiah: Translation and Interpretation.” In The Book of Isaiah/Le livre d’Isaïe: Les oracles et leurs relectures. Unité et complexité de l’ouvrage, edited by Jacques Vermeylen, 127–133. BETL 131. Leuven: Peeters, 1989. Kooij, Arie van der. “Zur Theologie des Jesajabuches in der Septuaginta.” In Theologische Probleme der Septuaginta und der hellenistischen Hermeneutik, edited by Henning Graf Reventlow, 9–25. Gütersloh: Christian Kaiser, 1997.

Isaiah in Greek   467 Kraus, Wolfgang, and Martin Karrer. Septuaginta Deutsch. Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2009. Laberge, Léo. La Septante d’Isaïe 28–33: Etude de Traduction Textuelle. Ottawa: Centre de Recherche de l’Université Saint-Paul, 1978. Le Boulluec, Alain. “Le Recours aux Commentaires Patristiques pour l’Étude du Lexique d’Isaïe LXX.” In The Old Greek of Isaiah: Issues and Perspectives, edited by Arie van der Kooij and Michaël N. van der Meer, 49–69. CBET 55. Leuven: Peeters, 2010. Le Moigne, Philippe. “οὐχ ὡς dans Ésaïe-LXX.” In L’apport de la Septante aux études sur l’Antiquité, edited by Jan Joosten and Philippe Le Moigne, 71–104. Lectio Divina 203. Paris: Cerf, 2005. Le Moigne, Philippe. “Le Livre d’Ésaïe dans la Septante: Ecdotique, stylistique, linguistique ou esquisse d’une poetique de la Septante.” PhD diss., École pratique des Hautes Études, 2001. Léonas, Alexis. L’Aube des traducteurs: De l’hébreu au grec; traducteurs et lecteurs de la Bible des Septante IIIe S. av. J.-C.-IVe S. apr. J.-C. Paris: Cerf, 2007. Liebmann, Ernst. “Der Text zu Jesaja 24– 27.” ZAW 22 (1902): 1–56. Louw, Theodorus Anthonie Willem van der. Transformations in the Septuagint: Towards an Interaction of Septuagint Studies and Translation Studies. CBET 47. Leuven: Peeters, 2007. Meer, Michaël N. van der. “Papyrological Perspective on the Septuagint of Isaiah.” In The Old Greek of Isaiah: Issues and Perspectives, edited by Arie van der Kooij and Michaël N. van der Meer, 107–133. CBET 55. Leuven: Peeters, 2010. Meer, Michaël N. van der. “Trendy Translations in the Septuagint of Isaiah: A Study of the Vocabulary of the Greek Isaiah 3, 18–23 in the Light of Contemporary Sources.” In Die Septuaginta: Texte, Kontexte, Lebenswelten, edited by Martin Karrer and Wolfgang Kraus, 581–596. WUNT 219. Tübingen: Mohr, 2008. Menken, Maarten J. J. “Quotations from the Book of Isaiah in the Gospel of Matthew.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 261–282. BETL 280. Paris: Peeters, 2016. Moyise, Steve, and Maarten J. J. Menken, Isaiah in the New Testament. New Testament and the Scriptures of Israel. London: T&T Clark International, 2005. Munnich, Oliver. “La traduction grecque d’Isaïe 8–9 et ses liens avec l’exégèse rabbinique.” Adamantius 13 (2007): 8–19. Munnich, Oliver. “Le texte lucianique d’Isaïe-Septante.” In Interpreting Translation: Studies on the LXX and Ezekiel, edited by Johan Lust, Florentino García Martínez, and Marc Vervenne, 269–299. Festschrift J. Lust. BETL 192. Leuven: Peeters, 2005. Neves, Joaquím Carreira das. A Teologia da Tradução Greca dos Setenta no Livro de Isaías (Cap. 24 de Isaáis). Lisbon: Universidade Católica Portuguesa, 1973. Ngunga, Abi T. Messianism in the Old Greek of Isaiah: An Intertextual Analysis. FRLANT 245. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013. Ngunga, Abi T., and Joachim Schaper. “Isaiah.” In T&T Clark Companion to the Septuagint, edited by James K. Aitken, 456–468. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015. Olley, John W. “Righteousness” in the Septuagint of Isaiah: A Contextual Study. SBLSCS 8. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1979. Ottley, Richard R. A Handbook to the Septuagint. London: Methuen, 1920. Porter, Stanley E., and Brook W. R. Pearson. “Isaiah through Greek Eyes: The Septuagint of Isaiah.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretive Tradition, vol. 1, edited by Craig. C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 531–546. VTS 70.1 / FIOTL 1.1. Leiden: Brill, 1997.

468   Abi T. Ngunga Rösel, Martin. “Die Jungfrauengeburt des endzeitlichen Immanuel.” JBTh 6 (1991): 135–151. Salvesen, Alison. “Messianism in Ancient Bible Translation in Greek and Latin.” In Redemption and Resistance: The Messianic Hopes of Jews and Christians in Antiquity, edited by Markus N. A. Bockmuehl and James Carleton Paget, 245–261. London: T&T Clark International, 2007. Schaper, Joachim. “God and the Gods: Pagan Deities and Religious Concepts in the Greek Isaiah.” In Genesis, Isaiah and Psalms, edited by Katharine J. Dell, Graham I. Davies, and Yee-Von Koh, 135–152. Festschrift John A. Emerton. VTS 135. Leiden: Brill, 2010. Scholz, Anton. Die alexandrinische Übersetzung des Buches Jesaias. Würzburg: L. Woerl, 1880. Seeligmann, Isaac L. The Septuagint Version of Isaiah: A Discussion of Its Problems. Ex Oriente Lux. Leiden: Brill, 1948. Reprinted in The Septuagint Version of Isaiah and Cognate Studies, edited by Robert Hanhart and Hermann Spieckermann, 119–294. FAT 40. Tübingen: Mohr, 2004. Sousa, Rodrigo Franklin de. Eschatology and Messianism in LXX Isaiah 1–12. LHBOTS 516. New York: T&T Clark International, 2010. Stuhlmacher, Peter. “Isaiah 53 in the Gospels and Acts.” In The Suffering Servant: Isaiah 53 in Jewish and Christian Sources, edited by Bernd Janowski and Peter Stuhlmacher, 147–162. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004. Swete, Henry B. The Introduction to the Old Testament. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1914. Tov, Emmanuel. The Text-Critical Use of the Septuagint in Biblical Research. Rev. and enlarged 2nd ed. JBS 8. Jerusalem: Simor, 1997. Troxel, Ronald L. LXX-Isaiah as Translation and Interpretation: The Strategies of the Translator of the Septuagint of Isaiah. SJSJ 124. Leiden: Brill, 2008. Vorm-Croughs, Mirjam van der. The Old Greek of Isaiah: An Analysis of Its Pluses and Minuses. SBLSCS 61. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2014. Wagner, J. Ross. Reading the Sealed Book: Old Greek Isaiah and the Problem of Septuagint Hermeneutics. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2013. Weber, Simon. Des heiligen Irenäus Schrift zum Erweis der Apostolischen Verkündigung. Des heiligen Irenäus ausgewählte Schriften ins Deutsche übersetzt. 2 vols. München: Kösel, 1912. Wilk, Florian. Die Bedeutung des Jesajabuches für Paulus. FRLANT 179. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998. Wilk, Florian, and Peter Gemeinhardt, eds. Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates. BETL 280. Paris: Peeters, 2016. Wutz, Franz. Die Transkriptionen von der Septuaginta bis zu Hieronymus. Texte und Untersuchungen zur vormasoretischen Grammatik des Hebräischen 2. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1927. Ziegler, Joseph. Untersuchungen zur Septuaginta des Buches Isaias. Alttestamentliche Abhandlungen 12.3. Munich: AschedorffschenVerlagsbuchhandlung, 1934. Zillesen, Alfred. “Bemerkungen zur alexandrinischen Übersetzung des Jesaja (c. 40–66).” ZAW 22 (1902): 238–263.

In Preparation Le Boulluec, Alain, and Philippe Le Moigne. Isaïe. La Bible d’Alexandrie. Vol. 24. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, in preparation.

chapter 25

Isa i a h i n A r a m a ic William A. Tooman

25.1.  Sources, Provenance, Purpose Translations of the Hebrew Bible are ancient. The earliest translations into Greek and Aramaic were produced in the third century before the Common Era, if not earlier. An ancient Aramaic translation is called a Targum, from the Aramaic ‫תרגם‬, “to translate, interpret, render” (pl. Targumim). There is at least one Targum for each book of the Hebrew Bible, excepting only Daniel, Ezra, and Nehemiah. However, a Targum is not a translation in the traditional sense. A targum is a “dedicated exegetical rewording of Scripture on the basis of rabbinic reading assumptions, by way of synonymous or nonsynonymous substitution or addition, with the help of the lexicon of a second language, Aramaic, and in conformity with the genre of the biblical original(s).”1 A Targum, then, is not a replica of a Hebrew original in Aramaic. It is bound neither to the volume of words in the source text nor to its literal sense.2 The only complete translation of the book of Isaiah into Aramaic is found in Targum Jonathan. Targum Jonathan (TJ)3 is the “official” Jewish Aramaic translation of the corpus of books that make up the ‫נביאים‬, the Prophets portion of the Rabbinic canon— Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Book of the Twelve (the

1  Samely, “Targumic Aramaic,” 98–99 (italics mine). 2  The exception is the Targum of Job from Qumran (11Q10), which is principally a translation rather than a rewriting of Hebrew Job. 3  Throughout the chapter, I will refer to the Targum of Isaiah as “TJ Isaiah” (Targum Jonathan Isaiah) and the Hebrew source from which it was translated as “Isaiah” or “MT Isaiah” (Masoretic text of Isaiah).

470   William A. Tooman Minor Prophets)—pair to Targum Onkolos, the “official” translation of the Torah. They are “official” in the sense that they came to be treated as authoritative in the Babylonian academies,4 a status that was progressively acknowledged across much of the Jewish world.5 According to the Babylonian Talmud, “the Targum of the Prophets was composed by Jonathan ben Uzziel from the mouths of Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi.”6 The attribution is fallacious,7 and modern scholarship uses three principal tools to attempt to date the Targum Jonathan: citations and references to the Targum in Jewish sources, the linguistic profile of the Targum’s Aramaic, and historical allusions within the Targum. Modern diagnostic tools notwithstanding, dating Targum Jonathan is not a straightforward matter. It can be said that the evidence from all three makes it clear that Targum Jonathan evolved over several centuries. It manifests features from multiple periods and places. It is difficult to be much more specific than this, though, because the very evidence that undergirds this conclusion does not allow for specificity. For example, the historical allusions that occasionally surface in the Targum Jonathan reflect perspectives from different times and places. Restricting our focus to Isaiah, some historical allusions appear to refer to events in Palestine before the destruction of the Second Temple. The most prominent example is TJ Isa 65:4. Its criticism of those “who sit in the houses that they build from the dust of tombs, and they dwell with the corpses of people, eating the flesh of swine” is understood by some as a reference to the construction of Tiberius by Herod Antipas.8 Tiberius was allegedly erected on a burial site. It was considered unclean by observant Jews of the period, a bias that persisted for several generations.9 Other allusions seem to betray a Babylonian point of view. MT Isa 18:1, for example, declares woe against a land “beyond the rivers of Ethiopia,” but TJ Isaiah reads “rivers of India.” Similarly, a small change in Isa 21:9 implies a Babylonian provenance. The Masoretic Text’s “fallen, fallen is Babylon” becomes “fallen, indeed about to fall is Babylon” in TJ Isaiah. The scribe appears to expect God to act against Babylon in the immediate future. Pinkhos Churgin, Bruce Chilton, and others have detected in this a response to the persecution of Jewish communities under the Sassanids, but this conclusion is little more than guesswork.10 This expansion (and indeed all the examples here) could have arisen under any number of circumstances.11 Not even the century in which they were penned is always clear. This is certainly the case for the two explicit references to Rome in TJ Isaiah (34:9; 54:1), and the proposed allusions to the Emperor (TJ Isa 25:7; 27:1) and to Nabatean Arabs (TJ Isa 15:6–7). Even if historical allusions are seldom as specific as historians would prefer, they do indicate that multiple scribes had a hand in 4  B. T. Sanhedrin 94b; B. T. Moed Ḳatan 28b. 5  See Neusner, Rabbinic Traditions, 1:198–207, 393. 6  B. T. Megilla 3a. 7  Barthélemy, Les devanciers, 90. 8  See Gordon, “Eschatologists,” 25; van der Kooij, Textzeugen, 170. 9 Josephus, Antiquities, 18:36–38. According to B. T. Shabbat 34a, Tiberias was purified in the second century. 10 Churgin, Targum Jonathan, 28–29; Chilton, Glory, 5. 11  Fraade, “Studies on Targum Jonathan,” 393.

Isaiah in Aramaic   471 the Targum’s formation, and that while some were located in Palestine, others worked in Babylon. Because of these considerations, whole TJ does not have a “date” or “historical context” as such. Scholarly consensus holds that TJ originated in Palestine around the turn of the Common Era. It was not finished there, though. It was taken to Babylon, where it was redacted and, eventually, received its “official” status.12 (A debate remains about how sustained the redaction of TJ might have been and how systematic.13) Despite achieving its notional “official” imprint in Babylon, TJ did not remain there either, nor did the imprint arrest its evolution. TJ came to be used in Jewish communities across the Levant and, eventually, the Mediterranean and European worlds. Wherever TJ was adopted, its text was revised to accommodate local linguistic features and to include local traditions and historical allusions. Nowhere was TJ’s revision more extensive or profound than in Palestine. Having returned to Palestine in the fifth or sixth century, the Targum began to be supplemented with the Toseftot, “additions” (sing.: Tosefta).14 The Toseftot comprise an assortment of materials: glosses, alternative translations, substitutions, and expansions.15 The relationship of these “additions” to TJ is not entirely clear. They are not any more homogeneous in origin, purpose, content, or language than TJ itself. Although many of the Toseftot seem to be rooted in Palestine,16 some reflect knowledge of the Babylonian Talmud, and many Toseftot have been influenced by Babylonian Aramaic.17 In addition to TJ itself and the Toseftot, there is a third source for Aramaic translations of the prophets: quotations in Rabbinic and Medieval Jewish literature. Many quotations have no parallel in TJ, and they may reflect alternative Targum traditions or precursors to TJ.18 Quotations represent some of the clearest evidence of the importance of the Targumim for ancient Jewish exegetes, as well as providing clear evidence that TJ is a survivor of what must once have been a larger body of targumic literature.19 If the historical and geographical origins of the Aramaic translations remain obscure, so, too, do their social origins and purposes. It was once widely believed that the Targumim and Toseftot originated in the oral practice of translating Hebrew into Aramaic in the synagogue, and that this practice was necessitated by the loss of 12 Smelik, Judges, 41–74; Wesselius, “Completness and Closure,” 237–247; van Staalduine-Sulman, Samuel, 701–718. 13  Kutscher, “Genesis Apocryphon,” 1–35; Smoler and Aberbach, Studies, xiii–xix; Kaufmann, “Dating,” 118–141; Díez Merino, “La Masora,” 309; Chilton, Glory, 54–55; Smelik, Judges, 1–75; Flesher and Chilton, Introduction, 179–180; Kasher, “‫האם יש מקור אחד‬,” 1–21. 14  Kasher, “‫האם יש מקור אחד‬,” 1–21. 15  See Houtman and Sysling, Targum Traditions, 25–27, 134–136. 16  The eighty or so Toseftot in Codex Reuchlinianus appear (mostly) under the titles “Targum Yerushalmi” or “Targum Aḥer.” This suggests that at least some of them derive from a Palestinian Targum of the Prophets, only extracts of which have been preserved. See Bacher, “Prophetentargum,” 1–72; Tal, ‫לשון התרגום לנביאים‬, 200–191, esp. 192–97; and most importantly, Kasher, ‫התוספתות‬ ‫התרגומיות‬, 27–45, esp. 19–21. 17 Tal, ‫לשון התרגום לנביאים‬, 191–200; Smelik, Judges, 1–23, 163–165, 643–645; Kasher, ‫התוספתות‬ ‫התרגומיות‬, 14–16. 18 Goshen-Gottstein, ‫שקיעים‬, 137–234. 19 Kahle, Cairo Geniza, 191–208; Houtman and Sysling, Alternative, 238–250.

472   William A. Tooman s­ poken Hebrew among Jewish populations. This position, which continues to be widely proclaimed,20 is far too simplistic. Regarding the loss of Hebrew competency, it is well attested that Hebrew and Aramaic continued to be spoken side-by-side well into the Common Era, at least in some geographical regions.21 Certain professions and socioeconomic groups were also more likely to speak both languages.22 More to the point, the character of TJ militates against the notion that Aramaic translation served as a substitute for the Hebrew scriptures, as Rabin observes: “A translation of the type of the Targum of the Prophets makes little sense unless the listener also understood the source text without its help, otherwise all the ingenious allusions would be so much wasted effort.”23 Regarding the purpose of the Targumim, there is evidence that the Targumim were used not only in synagogue reading but in education and private study.24 There is insufficient proof to claim that the Targumim arose in any one of these contexts. Considering the long evolution of TJ, it is far more likely that all three had a role to play in its development.25 In the following pages, I do not focus on the variety of Aramaic sources, their histories, or their purposes. I focus specifically on TJ, which represents the greater part of the Aramaic material on Isaiah. I provide summaries of some of its major foci: God, Israel, Zion and Temple, Messiah, and the afterlife. The artificiality of these summaries is important to stress. Since TJ did not originate in one time or place or community, these synthetic summaries do not represent the ideas of any one person or group in any one time or place. Also, by organizing the information thematically, I have forced a synthesis on the literature that is alien to it. Neither TJ, nor the targumic tradition more broadly, nor the Rabbinic literature generally provide systematic treatment of the themes and categories described below. So, while all the ideas expressed here are TJ’s, they are not unfolded in the same way that they were by its scribes. Nonetheless, for biblicists who are interested in the character of the targum, in Early Jewish interpretation, or in reception history, a topical discussion can be advantageous. Most simply, it can assist in identifying portions of the Targum that have something interesting or unique to say on a particular topic. It can also reveal certain tolerances in the Targum: gaps that remain unfilled, contradictions permitted or created.26 Perhaps most importantly, though, once 20  E.g., Würthwein and Fischer, Text of the Old Testament, 130–131. 21 Cook, Rewriting, 19–29; “Qumran Aramaic,” 1–21; Le Déaut, “Current State,” 3–32; Díez Macho, El Targum, 31–73; Rabin, “Hebrew and Aramaic,” 1007–1039; Barr, “Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek,” 144–161. 22  Barr, “Which Language,” 9–29. 23  Rabin, “Translation Processes,” 17. 24  B. T. Shabbat 115a; B.T. Berashit 8a–b (implied); Alexander, “Rabbinic Rules,” 14–28; Fraade, “Rabbinic Views,” 253–286; Safrai, “Education,” 945–970; York, “Targum in the Synagogue,” 74–86; Tal, “Raison d’Être,” 357–378. 25  All the issues raised to this point are rehearsed in more detail in Alexander, “Jewish Aramaic,” 14–28; Bernstein, “Targumim,” 133–165; Fraade, “Locating,” 69–91; “Targum Jonathan,” 392–401; Grossfeld and Sperling, “Bible: Translations,” 588–595; Houtman and Sysling, Alternative, 247–249; Schäfer, “Targumim,” 216–228; Smelik, Judges, 1–75; and Tal, “Raison d’Être,” 357–378. 26  Zhakovich, “Contradictions and Coherence,” 2016.

Isaiah in Aramaic   473 the Targum was more or less complete and accepted, it served as the “commentary” on Isaiah for a great part of the practicing Jewish community. It thus encodes a particular “understanding” of Isaiah that inhabited many communities across many centuries, an understanding that is kept alive as it is rehearsed again and again even today.

25.2. God Although the Targumim are seldom univocal on any subjects, regarding the deity TJ Isaiah is remarkably consistent. Of course, a proper understanding of God is central to Rabbinic theology, especially as the landscape of West Asia was increasingly populated by other monotheisms. As a result, when it touches on the subject of God himself TJ Isaiah is replete with what P. S. Alexander calls “pre-emptive exegesis.” Pre-emptive exegesis is “implicitly polemical,” “intended to elbow out certain unacceptable readings.”27 On the topic of Israel’s God, no theological divergence could be tolerated, particularly with respect to his uniqueness and the contours of his relationship with Israel. On these subjects, the Targumic scribes did not just have their eye on the unacceptable beliefs of other groups. They also had to overcome statements in the Hebrew Bible itself, statements that could appear to be in tension with Rabbinic doctrine or sensibility. The Hebrew Bible, including Isaiah, does not rule out the existence of other gods (Exod 15:11; Deut 10:17; Isa 24:21–22; 27:1; 40:1–8, 25–26). They are lesser beings, to be sure, and their worship is unacceptable for the children of Israel. TJ Isaiah, though, “elbows out” any implication of the existence of competing gods. The interrogative in MT Isa 14:27 could be understood as acknowledging other gods, even if they are powerless to thwart the God of Israel: “For Yhwh of hosts has decided, and who will thwart him? His hand is stretch out, and who will turn it back?” In TJ, though, there is no ambiguity: “For Yhwh of hosts has decided, and who will object? His power is highest, and there is none to oppose it.”28 Similarly, in MT Isa 40:26 God creates and names a host of celestial beings. The Targum is careful to qualify that it is the host of heaven, God’s own celestial minions, who are in view not competitors for his prestige. In keeping with its high monotheism, the Targum has been described as aggressively aniconic, diligent to root out any anthropomorphism.29 In MT Isa 8:17, for example, the prophet vows to wait on God “who hides his face from the house of Jacob.” This line is substituted in TJ: “who spoke in order to take his Shekhinah from the house of Jacob.” Likewise, the description of the divine warrior in MT Isa 42:13a is reworded in TJ. “Yhwh goes forth like a soldier / like a warrior he stirs up fury” has become “Yhwh is revealed to act powerfully / to act in power he is revealed in anger.” In point of fact, though, TJ preserves many anthropomorphisms. The image of God sitting on his 27  Alexander, “Pre-emptive Exegesis,” 243. 28  Translations of TJ are lightly adapted from Chilton, Isaiah Targum, 1987. 29  See, e.g., Stenning, Isaiah, xii.

474   William A. Tooman c­ elestial throne in MT Isa 6:1 was maintained in TJ. Likewise, TJ Isa 45:8 retained the portrait of God wiping away the tears of his people. Even the vivid depiction of God as a potter who fashioned humans out of clay was preserved in the Targum (45:7). If the Targum is not averse to associating God with human activities or imagery, how should we account for these changes? TJ Isaiah routinely revises any text that might suggest that God has limitations.30 In Isa 49:14, for example, God is accused of forgetfulness: “But Zion said, ‘Yhwh has forsaken me,’ and ‘my Lord has forgotten me.’ ” The Targum eliminates any suggestion that God’s memory could be faulty and interprets the accusation as a reference to the Shekhinah’s departure from Jerusalem: “Because Zion has said, “The Shekhinah of Yhwh has gone up from me, and Yhwh has rejected me.” Likewise, God’s pledge to remember becomes a pledge that the Memra, unlike the Shekhina, will not abandon Zion: “My word will not reject you” (v. 15). This same habit can be observed across TO and TJ alike.31 These examples demonstrate the Targum’s habit of employing alternatives for God. The Targum makes extensive use of substitutes like the “Memra,” ‫מימרא‬, the “Shekhinah,” ‫שׁכינא‬, the “Glory,” ‫יקרא‬, or the “Holy Spirit,” ‫ רוח הקודשׁ‬in the place of a divine title or the divine name. The deployment of circumlocutions like these for divine activity is not unique to the Targumim. It is evident within the HB too. The “messenger of Yhwh,” ‫מלאך יהוה‬, for example, enters the world to enact the divine will on many occasions. It is so closely associated with God himself that it speaks in the divine voice (Gen 16:9–13; 18:9–15; 22:15–18 [contrast 21:17–18]) and humans who see it assume that they should die in keeping with the adage that “no one can see God and live” (Gen 32:30; Judg 6:21–22; 13:20–22). The divine “spirit,” ‫רוח‬, is similar. It animates humans (Gen 6:3), endows them with special powers or skills (Exod 35:31; Judg 14:6), inspires humans to prophesy (Num 11:25; 1 Sam 10:10), and translocates people (1 Kgs 18:12; Ezek 8:3). The spirit is not just a force, though. Its relationship to the deity is at least as confused as that of the messenger. In Ezek 8:2–4, the spirit appears in the same humanoid form adopted by God himself (Ezek 1:26–29) and is called the “glory of the God of Israel.” The Targumim have a wider repertoire of substitutes for the divine, and they use them more frequently. Their use of circumlocutions is a continuation and extension of the biblical tradition, though, not an initiative of the targumic scribes. Although one can readily observe the kinds of activities attributed to the messenger or the spirit, neither their natures nor the relationships to the deity are clarified. From the HB alone, one cannot articulate a metaphysic for such beings (nor even establish if they are independent beings). The same can be said of the various alternatives for the divine in the Targum. The activities attributed to them can be listed, but their natures remain elusive. Their ontology is obscure. However, the regular employment of divine circumlocutions in the Targum does have an effect on its projection of God. Substituting circumlocutions for the divine being and attributing divine actions to them veils God from the Targum’s readers. In particular, the targumic

30 Levine, Aramaic Version, 52–53.

31  E.g., Gen 4:14; Exod 15:3; Hos 4:6; 8:4; Ob 1:13.

Isaiah in Aramaic   475 scribes have protected divine incomparability and inscrutability, making God himself less imminent and more transcendent. Few issues touch more closely on the Targum’s anxiety to gild the divine portrait than those oracles of Isaiah’s that portray God as wrathful and unjust with his own people. In MT Isa 1:24–26, having accused Jerusalem of being a harlot, God names her his enemy and vows to avenge himself against the city. Only after she has been purified and authorities have been appointed to hold her to account will she be named “righteous”: Therefore (an utterance of Lord Yhwh of hosts, the Mighty One of Israel): Woe. I will be relieved of my enemies, and avenge myself on my foes. 25 and I will turn my hand against you; and I will smelt out your dross like lye, and remove all your dross. 26 And I will restore your judges like former times, and your counsellors as at the beginning. Afterward you shall be called “city of the righteous one, faithful city.”

24

The Targum rewords the oracle, fracturing the poetic lineation in the process. Divine wrath is applied only against the wicked within Jerusalem not to Jerusalem as a whole, protecting God from the charge of injustice. God also expresses his compassion for the people, softening the original oracle in which God might appear intemperate with and hostile to his own people. Therefore the Lord of the World says, Yhwh of Hosts, the strong one of Israel, says: “I am about to comfort the city of Jerusalem, but woe to the wicked when I am revealed to take just retribution from the enemies of the people, and I will return vengeance to the adversary.25 And I will turn the stroke of my might on you, and I will separate out, as those who purify with lye, all your wicked, and I will remove all your sinners.26 And I will appoint in you true judges, steadfast as at the first, and your counsellors as at the beginning. Afterwards you will be called ‘The City of Truth, the Faithful City.’ ” 24

One of the most telling illustrations of the Targum’s rendering of God is found in Isa 63:15–64:11 [Eng. 12]. In this passage, a human voice pleads with God to alter his patterns of behavior regarding Israel. The speaker’s argument is remarkable. (S)he admits that Israel is flawed (64:7 [Eng. 8]), but that God’s responses to Israel have exacerbated her ills. The speaker claims that God has been slow to respond when Israel has been in distress (63:15, 18–19; 64:10 [Eng. 11]). He has allowed his chastening blows to fall on the righteous and the wicked alike (64:3 [Eng. 4]), and he has treated his people like any other nation rather than as a treasured possession (63:19). The consequence has been that Israel has lost hope in God. She feels abandoned and neglected (64:6–7 [Eng. 7–8]). Even more, God himself has hardened Israel, driving the fear of God from them

476   William A. Tooman through neglect (63:15, 17; 64:4 [Eng. 5]). God must, therefore, take some responsibility for Israel’s sin (63:17; 64:4 [Eng. 5]). Despite all this, the speaker still petitions God for aid. The land is a desolation; the temple has been destroyed, and Israel continues to endure punishment and neglect. She has, though, no one else to whom she can turn. God, who was Israel’s creator, has become her destroyer. Israel’s only hope is that God will relax his anger and play the role of creator and father to Israel again (64:7–11 [Eng. 8–12). For the targumic scribes, this passage poses several problems. It questions God’s justice, his mercy for Israel, his loyalty, and the sensibility of his practices. In the Targum, the passage was extensively rewritten, to address all these issues. This is not to say that it eliminates them. The opening and closing verses of the pericope are allowed to retain their accusations without softening them: “Where are your retribution and your might? The multitude of your benefits and the abundance of your compassion on us are hardened” (63:15b); “You have given respite to the wicked, even those who subjugate us sorely” (64:11b). The accusations that punctuate the body of the monologue, though, are often altered, softened, or eliminated. Where the MT accuses God of hardening Israel’s heart (63:17a), TJ rewrites: “Let not our heart be turned from the fear of you.” When, in the MT, the speaker contends that God has treated Israel no differently than he has the gentiles, TJ reverses the sentiment: “Behold we are your people who are from old. You did not give your Torah to the gentiles; your name is not called upon them. Not for them did you lower the heavens and reveal yourself ” (63:19). TJ also adds an affirmation, a statement of trust that God will act on Israel’s behalf: “For there is none beside you, who will act for your servants, the righteous, who hope for your deliverance” (64:3b). With respect to Israel’s guilt, TJ Isaiah, like MT Isaiah, concedes that Israel has often sinned and been deserving of God’s punishment (esp. 64:5–6). What has preserved Israel through the ages was the merit of the ancestors, credited to their descendants: “Behold, in every time that there was anger from you against us because we sinned, by them, by the deeds of our righteous fathers who were from of old, we were saved” (64:4b). Because this has characterized God’s past dealings with Israel, the speaker has confidence that God ultimately will be merciful in the present age. The targumic rendition of Isa 63:15–64:11, like the MT, culminates in a plea. The speaker reminds God that he chose Israel, not vice versa. The relationship between God and Israel was established by God, therefore (the speaker implies) he has a duty to preserve it: “Let there not be anger before you, O Yhwh, against us exceedingly, and do not remember sins forever. Behold, it is disclosed before you that we are your people, all of us” (64:8). The Targum does not deny the disappointments and pains of the exilic and diaspora generations, which are expressed bluntly in the MT. It is less sanguine about the MT’s expressions of lost trust, exhausted patience, and divine culpability. In TJ Isaiah, the speaker not only retains his hope that divine deliverance will eventually arrive, (s)he reminds God of the mech­an­ ism by which it can be triggered (64:4b), prompting the deity to act rather than merely accusing him of failing to do so. TJ thus realigns Isa 63:15–64:11, divesting it of some of its more problematic statements and disparaging accusations and reasserting the speaker’s fundamental trust in the deity.

Isaiah in Aramaic   477

25.3.  Israel: Election and History The relationship between God and Israel is matter of some concern to the Targum. The past, present, and future of this relationship are explained by a complex set of analogies between events in Israel’s past and future: Abraham is the model of future Israel; the fates of Israel’s present oppressors are analogous to those of her past enemies; and God’s promises to Israel are as sure as his promise to Noah. Israel’s election through the promise to Abraham is a central feature of the relationship between Israel and God for TJ Isaiah as much as for the Torah. Although Abraham only appears four times in MT Isaiah (29:22; 41:8; 51:2; 63:16), he appears in the Targum ten times (Isa 5:1; 10:32; 29:22; 41:2, 8; 43:12; 46:11; 48:15; 51:2; 63:16), God’s patronage and care of Abraham is paradigmatic. TJ Isa 41:2–4: Who brought Abraham openly from the east, the chosen one of righteousness in truth? He brought him to his place, handed over peoples before him, and shattered kings. He cast the slain like dust before his sword; he pursued them like chaff before his bow. 3He pursued them and passed on safely. A forced march did not tire his feet. 4 Who says these things? One who lives, speaks, and acts, the one ordering the generations from the beginning. I, Yhwh, created the world from the beginning. Even the ages of the ages are mine, and apart from me there is no God. 2

Abraham’s career is described in martial terms, as one of conquest and victory in war. (The influence of Gen 22:17b; 24:60; 48:22; and especially 14:13–20 is clear in this description.) Abraham was not a victorious warrior because of his own soldierly virtues, though. His victories were granted by God’s command. The God who granted victory to Abraham is also the creator God, who owns and shapes eternity (ǁ Gen 14:19–20). In view of this logic, the chapter addresses both the “islands,” identified as the gentiles (vv. 11, 25), and the house of Jacob. Gentiles should be fearful, for their fate is fixed (v. 5). Jacob, on the other hand, can be cautiously hopeful. “Cautious” because his vindication is not automatic. When Jacob responds to afflictions like the exile and diaspora by becoming teachable (v. 17), God will answer his prayers and fashion him into a “strong threshing sledge, new, full of points” that will “kill the gentiles” (v. 15; ǁ Gen 14:1). In keeping with the emphasis on God’s command over eternity, this promise is not applied to the return from Babylonian exile or to the Roman era diaspora. Jacob will be warrior, like Abraham, in “the end” (v. 23), when God brings the king of the North to destroy the gentile nations (v. 25; ǁ Dan 11:40–45). Thus, Israel’s future will be like her past; Jacob will be like Abraham; and the nations who afflict Israel will be like the kings who succumbed to Abraham. Targum Jonathan Isaiah, like MT Isaiah, is profoundly concerned with the national and religious crises presented by the exile and diaspora. This crisis is addressed in two additional analogies: between Israel’s enemies in the past and those in the present, and between the exile and the flood. MT Isa 27 predicts the destruction of the force of chaos,

478   William A. Tooman Leviathan the dragon in the sea. The dragon’s defeat will culminate in the regathering of Israel, whom the deity will “pick up one by one” and permit to worship on the holy mount. In TJ Isa 27, the diverse strophes of MT Isa 27 are tightly unified into an eschatological vision of the vindication of Israel. Isa 27:1 is completely reworked, replacing Leviathan with his true referent (as understood by the scribes): MT:  On that day, Yhwh will visit judgment with his sword, cruel, great, and strong upon Leviathan the fleeing serpent upon Leviathan the twisting serpent He will kill the dragon in the sea. TJ:  In that time Yhwh with his great and strong, and hard sword will punish the king who exalts himself like Pharaoh the first king, and the king who prides himself like Sennacherib the second king, and he will slay the king who is strong as the dragon that is in the sea.

Some scholars understand TJ Isaiah 27:1 as a reference to the maritime power of Rome and the emperor.32 Whether or not Rome is in view, specifically, the chapter has been systematically rewritten to describe the return of Israel from diaspora and the fate of the nations who ruled her at home and abroad. Those nations will be like Egypt and Assyria whom God destroyed in the past (27:1, 12–14). The requirement of Israel’s restoration is obedience to the law (vv. 4, 5), which will trigger both her vindication and restoration. “Indeed, if the House of Israel set their face to keep the Torah, would I not send my anger and my wrath against the gentiles?” (v. 4). “Or if they laid hold of the words of my Torah, peace will be granted to them, from then on peace will be granted to them” (v. 5). The benefits granted to Israel in that day will be profound: regathering, world dominance, and forgiveness of sin. “They shall be gathered together from among their exiles, and they shall return to their land . . . and fill the face of the world” (v. 6). “[B]y this the sins of the House of Jacob will be forgiven, and this will be the act of removing of his sins: when he makes all the stones of the altar like chalk stones, crushed to pieces; no Asherahs or sun pillars will be [left] standing” (v. 9). Perhaps most remarkably, verse 12 contains a reference to the resurrection of the dead, who will join the return from diaspora: “And it will come to pass in that time that the slain will be cast before Yhwh from the shore of the river Euphrates to the river of Egypt, and you will be brought near, one by one, O children of Israel.”33 In this chapter, Israel’s enemies from the past are paradigmatic of her oppressors in the present, and the fates of those enemies past ultimately will be shared by her present foes. Israel’s future will be like her past in one other respect as well. In TJ Isa 54, God’s promises to Israel are equated with the promises that he made to Noah following the great flood. Isa 54 is a direct address to Jerusalem. Jerusalem compared to a ­barren 32  E.g., Chilton, Isaiah Targum, 52–53. 33 Compare B. T. Sanhedrin 90b, where Rabbi Gamliel cites Isa 26:19 as one of the proofs that God will revive the dead.

Isaiah in Aramaic   479 woman who has, at long last, become pregnant (54:1), then to a reproached widow who finds a husband only after her youth has been squandered (54:4–5), and finally to a divorced wife who has been reconciled to her former husband (54:6–8). The promise that God’s anger will abate and that Israel will be restored one day to God’s good graces is equated with the promise to Noah following the flood: “like the days of Noah before me: as I swore by my Memra that the waters of the flood which were in the days of Noah would never again go over the earth, so have I sworn that my anger will not turn on you, and I will not rebuke you” (54:9). Just as God kept his promise never again to drown the world in a great flood, so too he will keep his promises to comfort, restore, and protect Israel in the future. In fact, the restored Jerusalem will usurp Rome’s position as the world’s paramount city. Rome’s population, wealth, power, and opulence will be dwarfed by Jerusalem’s. In contrast to Rome, though, the Targum stresses the innocence of the future Israel. “In innocence you will be established” (v. 14) and “their innocence” will be “before me, says Yhwh” (v. 17). MT Isa 54, then, has been shaped around two analogies: an analogy between God’s promises in the past and present, and an analogy between the present dominance of Rome and the future dominance of Jerusalem.

25.4.  Zion and Temple The history and fate of Jerusalem is a topic of great interest in TJ Isaiah. The Targum maintains the MT’s themes and arguments about Jerusalem, particularly with regard to Jerusalem’s crimes that lead to her destruction: injustice, idolatry, violence, and exploitation (1:21–31; 2:6–22; 3:8–4:1; 5:6–15; 28:9; 46:11; 48:15, 16, etc.). It does not just repeat MT Isaiah, though. It also offers unique details regarding her sins which resulted in the departure of the Shekinah and the city’s destruction. Like MT Isaiah, it remains ambiguous about the time of Jerusalem’s vindication and glory. In addition to the crimes with which the city is charged in MT––bloodshed, injustice, and idolatry––the Targum charges her again and again with a failure to obey the Torah, the Memra, and the prophets (e.g., 1:28; 5:24; 22:12–14; 24:1). One class of infraction merited special mention: cultic failings. In the woes of chapter 5, the people of Judah are charged with many crimes, including land-greed (5:8–10): “Woe, you who connect house to house / who add field to field, // until there is no place [left] / and you are left to live alone in the midst of the land! . . . For ten acres of vineyard / will yield only one bath // and a homer of seed / will yield only an ephah” (MT). In this punishment, the Targum detects an implied cultic sin: failure to tithe the produce of the vineyards. “For because of the sin that they did not give the tithes, a place of ten lots of vineyard will yield one bath, and a place of a cor of seed will yield three seahs” (5:10). The Targum also accuses the Jerusalemites of altering the stipulations of the covenant as recorded in the Torah, in particular, by annulling the stipulations regarding sacred festivals. “For they have transgressed the Torah, annulled the festivals, changed the covenant that was from eternity” (24:5). This act was so calamitous that it resulted in the devastation of the city and

480   William A. Tooman depopulation of the land. “The land mourns, is desolate, the land is devastated, desolate; the strength of the people of the land comes to an end . . . Therefore from oaths of deceit the land is desolate and those who inhabit it are devastated; therefore the inhabitants of the land come to an end, and few men are left” (24:4, 6). The “princes” of Israel are particularly to blame for this disaster. Who, precisely, might be included in this group is not specified (24:1).34 It is not evident whether the translator had in mind the priesthood or political leaders who tampered in the management of the temple, or others. It is clear that they were city residents. A third charge of cult corruption in TJ Isa 28:1, though, does something to clarify: “Woe to the one who gives the crown to the proud, stupid, chief of Israel, and who puts the priest’s turban on the wicked ones of the temple.” Here, the Targum singles out the person who sets an unacceptable king on the throne or an unacceptable priest over the temple (presumably one who was not from Aaron’s line).35 This pericope culminates with the most sweeping accusation of cult corruption of all: “They hoped that the worship of idols would be established for them, but they did not hope for the worship of the sanctuary. My sanctuary was a little thing in their eyes—to worship there. My Shekhinah was a little thing in their eyes there” (28:10). The Targum’s strong words regarding the corruption of cult practices reflect its anxiety to protect and preserve temple practices, an anxiety not shared to the same degree by MT Isaiah. In the MT, God is quoted as follows (1:13–14): Do it no more! bringing offerings is futile incense is an abomination to me New moon and Sabbath and calling a sacred assembly I cannot tolerate sin and assembly Your new moons and your festivals, I hate they are a burden on me I am weary of bearing [them].

The Targum revises, such that offerings are only rejected if they were secured though unjust means. Likewise, the Targum stresses that forgiveness is always available to the people. The people’s sin in 1:13–14 is assembling at the festivals without previously having atoned for their sins: Do not continue to bring an offering which is stolen; it is a despised oblation to me. At new moons and Sabbaths you gather in assembly, without forsaking your sins, so that your prayers might be accepted at the time of your festivals. Your new moons and your festivals, my Memra despises. They are before me like something despicable; I have forgiven much. 34  In 6:1, the Targum implicates King Uzziah in cultic crimes by way of an allusion to 2 Chron 26:16–19. 35  Some see an allusion to Agrippa II in this verse. Cf. Josephus, Antiquities 20:7–8; Levine, Aramaic Version, 121–122.

Isaiah in Aramaic   481 The city’s corruption, cultic and moral, required its purgation. MT condemns Jerusalem in the strongest terms and predicts its resulting destruction. The destruction of Jerusalem created ethical and theological questions for the Aramaic scribes. Why were the righteous judged alongside the wicked, the pious alongside the impious? To answer this question, TJ depicts the destruction as a cleansing, a purgation (4:3–4). It is careful to clarify that the whole city was not wicked. It contained a wicked element (1:21–23, 25; 24:1–12), and the removal of this element opened the way for a new, righteous people to thrive and a better Jerusalem to rise from the ashes (1:24–31; 4:5–6; 24:13–16). In a sense, then, the destruction was not just necessary but healthy. How could an enemy destroy the city in which Yhwh resides? Scripture teaches that God protects his city (e.g., 2 Kgs 19:8–37; Isa 36:1–37:38; Pss 46; 48; 76), so why, in this case, did he not? The Targum has a two-part answer to this question. In the first instance, the divine protective presence, the Shekhinah, was no longer in Jerusalem. It was withdrawn because of the sins of the people and the corruption of temple rituals (1:15; 5:5; 8:17; 49:14; 53:3; 54:8; 57:17; 59:2; 64:6). This was an extraordinary act on God’s part, because according to the Targum, Israel is the “land of the Shekhina.” It is its proper residence, which Israel was permitted to share (14:2; 17:11; 48:15; 56:5).36 Without the Shekhina, the city was vulnerable. Despite this vulnerability, it was not the enemies of Israel who destroyed Jerusalem. It was God himself, acting to excise the corrupting influences from his people (e.g., 3:13; 42:14). Just as God created the world and Israel by speaking (Gen 1; 12), so he will destroy the city with a word (4:4).37 The Targum has as much to say about Zion’s restoration as its destruction. The Targum’s hopes for Zion are bound up with its claims about the king Messiah and the afterlife. Israel’s rebellion, though it compromised her safety and position on earth, does not compromise the reality of her institutions: Torah, future Temple, and Messiah are all safely in God’s care, awaiting the moment when they will be realized on earth.

25.5.  The Messiah, the Servant, and the Servants Like early Christianity, Early and Rabbinic Judaism speculated extensively on the messiah: his identity, actions, and the circumstances of his appearance. The official Targumim are more sparing on the topic of the messiah than the Fragment Targumim, for ­example, but they still provide much more detail about him than does the MT. With respect to TJ Isaiah, many of the expected features of Early Jewish messianic expectation are 36  This is not to suggest that the Shekhina is restricted to the land of Israel. It also dwells on high with God himself in the heavenly temple (6:3; 32:15; 33:5; 37:16; 40:22). 37  TJ does not appear to observe any difference between the destruction of the city by the Babylonians and the Romans. The causes were the same. The purpose was the same. The destroyer was the same.

482   William A. Tooman apparent but others (the priesthood of the messiah, for example) are not. What makes the ­messianism of TJ Isaiah most distinctive is its effort to coordinate the figure of the king messiah with that of the suffering servant. Two notions underpin the Targum’s messianism. God will not allow Israel to remain under foreign rule perpetually, and Israel will not be unrepentant forever. The two notions are coextensive in the sense that national liberation and repentance will occur at once, when the messiah appears.38 It is unclear whether Israel’s repentance and renewed piety instigate the messiah’s appearance or vice versa. Most of what TJ Isaiah has to say about the messiah, though, is congruent with these two notions. The messiah is a royal figure from the line of David (9:5; 10:27; 11:1, 6; 14:29; 16:5; 28:5). He is a warrior who will liberate Israel from foreign rule and oppression (10:27; 11:6; 14:29; 16:1–5), and he is a judge who will adjudicate for his own people and for the nations (16:5; 28:5). He will usher in a utopian age of peace for Israel (11:6) in which Jerusalem will be rebuilt, the people regathered to the land, and Israel will be Torah pious (4:2; 51:14; 52:13). All this is typical of Early Jewish messianic expectation. As in the MT, the identity of the servant is variable in TJ Isaiah. The “servant” (or “servants”) is usually identified with Israel (44:1–2, 21; 45:4) or, more typically, with the right­eous among Israel (44:26; 65:13–15).39 An important turn occurs in the Targum at 42:18–19. The MT of 42:18-19 announces that the servant Israel is too blind to accomplish her tasks. The Targum revises this assertion to specify that it is the wicked among Israel who are so flawed, not the righteous. Should they choose repentance, though, even the wicked could be counted among Israel’s servants (44:19). Following the MT, it is not only righteous Jews who are counted as servants in TJ. The category is widened to includes gentile proselytes (56:5–6), god-fearers (44:5), and righteous eunuchs (56:3–4). We first encounter an individual servant in TJ Isa 42:1. “Behold my servant, I will bring him near, my chosen one in whom my Memra is pleased. I will put my holy spirit on him. He will reveal my judgment to the peoples.” That this is an individual and not Israel or the righteous become clear in verses 6–7. This servant will bring enlightenment to all nations, including Israel, and will regather the diaspora, tasks typically associated with the Messiah. The servant’s identity is made explicit in 43:10a: “You are witnesses before me, says Yhwh, and my servant the Messiah with whom I am pleased.” When we turn to the character and tasks of the messianic servant, the Targum’s rewriting is profound. In the verses following the introduction of the messianic servant in TJ Isa 42:1, the MT presents him as a suffering figure. He is “bruised” and “dimmed,” though neither “broken” nor “quenched” (42:3–4). In TJ Isaiah, though, the servant is 38  This does not preclude other historical moments of liberation and repentance, like the days of Judah Maccabee. See, e.g., TJ Sam 2:4, Victor Aptowitzer, Hasmonaerzeit, and Philip Alexander, “From Story to Historiography,” 103–128. 39  In MT Isaiah, there is an important distinction between the “servant” and the “servants,” those who follow and emulate the servant. In TJ Isaiah, the singular and plural are more porous. Where MT has the singular “servant,” TJ often has the plural “servants,” reflecting their interpretation of their character, in those cases, as a group: either Israel or the righteous among Israel (e.g., 42:19; 44:26; 48:20).

Isaiah in Aramaic   483 a triumphant figure. It is not the servant who is “bruised,” rather, he brings justice for those who are, the weak and poor: “The humble, who are like a bruised reed, he will not break, and the poor, who are like dimly burning wick, he shall not quench. He will bring forth judgment for his truth.” The servant is transformed similarly in TJ Isa ­52:13–53:12. The MT describes the servant as “marred” and “startling” (52:14–15), lacking “majesty” and “desirability” (53:2), “despised,” “infirm,” and “diseased” (53:3–4). In TJ Isaiah, though, those kingdoms of the earth that have oppressed Israel will be weak and sick, while the messianic servant intercedes on behalf of sinful Israel, who will be forgiven for his sake: Then the glory of all the kingdoms will be contemptuous and cease; they will be faint and sick, behold, as a man of sorrows and appointed for sicknesses. And as when the face of the Shekhinah was taken up from us, they are despised and not esteemed. 4Then he will beseech concerning our guilt, and our iniquities will be forgiven for his sake, yet we are esteemed as wounded, smitten before the Yhwh and afflicted. (53:3–4)40 3

TJ Isa 52:13–53:12 reworks the image of the suffering servant in two profound ways. In MT Isaiah, the relationship between the suffering servant and the royal messiah is not clarified.41 In TJ Isaiah, the two are identified. Also, in TJ Isaiah, the servant does not suffer. He is champion of the suffering.

25.6.  The Afterlife The Hebrew Bible has little to say on the subject of the afterlife or resurrection. One of the clearer statements is found in MT Isa 26:19. Speaking of God’s justice for the right­ eous, it provides this assurance: “Your dead shall live, their corpses shall rise. O dwellers in the dust, awake and sing for joy! For your dew is a radiant dew, and the earth will give birth to those long dead.” Apart from this one verse, Isaiah offers nothing clear or decisive on the subject. TJ Isaiah, though, has a more robust description of the afterlife and resurrection. According to the Targum, the destiny of humans was revealed to the prophet Isaiah. “The prophet said, ‘The mystery of the reward for the righteous is visible to me, the mystery of retribution for the wicked is revealed to me’ ” (24:16). This revelation included the destiny of humans after death. The first explicit account of what awaits humans after death appears in 26:18b–20a:

40  This is not to say that Early Jewish tradition knew nothing of a suffering messiah. See, for example, B. T. Sanhedrin 98b, where the messiah is a leper. 41  The use of Davidic imagery in Isa 53:2, 6, and 12 raises the question of their relationship.

484   William A. Tooman Those who reside in the world have not brought salvation to the earth, they also have not performed miracles, neither will they be able to do so. 19You are he who revives the dead, you raise the bones of their bodies. All who were thrown into the dust will live and sing before you. For your dew is dew of light for those who perform your Torah. But the wicked to whom you have given might (though they transgressed your Memra), you will hand over to Gehenna. 20Go, my people, make for yourself good deeds which will protect you in a time of distress.

This brief excerpt introduces all of TJ’s major emphases on this theme: God alone has power over life, death, and resurrection; the Torah pious will be resurrected to bodily life; they are resurrected to “live and praise” before God; and the wicked will be condemned to an afterlife in Gehenna (cf. TJ Isa 42:11; 45:8). Other parts of TJ Isaiah offer additional details on the subject, but they do not alter these core elements. Most essentially, the resurrected do not return to the present world but to the new creation. The new creation does not entail the destruction of the present universe but its renewal. The current age and the current state of affairs will come to an end with the coming of the messiah. Humanity, including those living when the new order appears and those already dead, will inhabit this new world. They will dwell either in the new Eden (paradise) or in Gehenna. There is no absolute separation between the two, for the residents of paradise can see what is happening to the wicked in Gehenna: For as the new heavens and the new earth that I will make are established before me, says Yhwh, so your seed and your name will be established. 23From new moon to new moon and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all the children of flesh will come to worship before me, says Yhwh. 24And they will go out and look on the bodies of the sinful men who rebelled against my Memra, for their breaths will not die, and their fire will not be quenched, and the wicked will be judged in Gehenna until the right­ eous say concerning them, ‘We have seen enough.’ ” (TJ Isa 66:22–24; cf. 65:17)

In this enigmatic passage, it appears that there are two states after death. Some are given bodies again, they are resurrected (the “children of flesh”) to inhabit the new heavens and new earth and to worship in Jerusalem. Others, the “sinful,” are not permitted an absolute death. The “breath” that animates them (Gen 2:7; Isa 42:5; Job 33:4) is trapped in their dead bodies, so that they can feel the pain inflicted in them in Gehenna. As we can see from this passage, TJ Isaiah provides more details about Gehenna than about paradise. TJ Isa 30:33 is another salient example. In God’s prescience, he prepared Gehenna even before the creation of the world to receive the wicked among humanity. What he prepared was a pit of fire, fueled by the Memra: “For Gehenna has been prepared from eternity in view of their sins; indeed, the eternal king has make it ready, deepening and widening its dwelling. The fire burns in it as in abundant wood. The memra of Yhwh, like a mighty river of brimstone, burns in it” (cf. TJ Isa 33:13–14; 66:24). Here and in TJ Isa 66:22–24 we can see that the Targum does not shy away from describing God as actively torturing the human dead, nor does it raise any issue with the fact that God, though he knew this would be necessary, chose to create humans. TJ Isaiah

Isaiah in Aramaic   485 does not address the implications of the verse, though it is the subject of discussion in other Rabbinic sources.42 Curiously, although the Targum is clear that Gehenna belongs to the wicked (26:15, 19; 33:14; 53:9; 66:24) the Targum is not as clear about those who merit resurrection. In some cases, it appears that the righteous will be resurrected (26:19; 33:15–18) to inhabit the new heavens and new earth. In others, it appears to be limited to the servants, the followers of the suffering servant (66:21–22). (These groups may not have been understood as mutually exclusive.) What is clear is that Torah piety provides the only path of escape from divine retribution: Lift up your eyes to the heavens and consider the earth beneath, for the heavens will pass like the smoke that pass, and the earth, will wear out, like a garment wears out, and those who dwell in it, even they, will also die in like manner. But my salvation shall be forever, and my benefits will never be checked. 7Attend to my Memra, you who know the truth, people in whose heart is the teaching of my Torah. Do not fear the reproaches of the children of men, and do not be shattered by their self-exaltation. 8 For [they are] like the garment which the moth eats, and like wool which rot attacks, but my benefits will be forever, and my salvation to all generations. (TJ Isa 51:6–9)43 6

Humans, then, share the fate of all of creation. The present creation will wear out just as humans wear out. Those who enjoy God’s benefits, though, will be restored, resurrected to inhabit the new creation, a creation that will last forever.

Bibliography: Tooman Alexander, Philip S. “From Story to Historiography: The Image of the Hasmoneans in Targum Canticles and the Question of the Targum’s Provenance and Date.” JSP 19 (1999): 103–128. Alexander, Philip S. “Jewish Aramaic Translations of Hebrew Scriptures.” In Mikra: Text, Translation, Reading and Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity, edited by Martin J. Mulder and Harry Sysling, 217–253. Compendia rerum iudaicarum ad Novum Testamentum II/1. Minneapolis, MN, and Assen, Netherlands: Fortress and Van Gorcum, 1988. Alexander, Philip S. “Pre-emptive Exegesis: Genesis Rabba’s Reading of the Story of Creation.” JJS 43, no. 2 (1992): 230–245. Alexander, Philip S. “The Targumim and the Rabbinic Rules for the Delivery of the Targum.” In Congress Volume, Salamanca, 1983, edited by John A. Emerton, 14–28. VTS 36. Leiden: Brill, 1983. 42 E.g., B. T. Ḥagiga 15a; B. T. Baba Batra 16a. Baba Batra 16a is particularly clarifying. Though God created both Eden and Gehenna and both righteous humans and wicked humans, the person who has been created wicked can be perfected by the Torah and escape his or her fate, for the Torah is the “antidote” to a wicked nature. There are indications that some sages thought Gehenna was temporary or escapable (e.g., M. ʿEduyot 2:10). 43  See also TJ Isa 1:27; 4:2–3; 5:24; 9:5–6; 31:9; 33:13–15; 57:19.

486   William A. Tooman Aptowitzer, Victor. Parteipolitik der Hasmonaerzeit im rabbinischen und pseudepigraphischen Schrifttum. Veröffentlichungen der Alexander Kohut Memorial Foundation 5. Vienna: Kohut-Foundation, 1927. Bacher, Wilhelm. “Kritische Untersuchungen zum Prophetentargum.” ZDMG 28 (1874): 1–71. Barr, James. “Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek in the Hellenistic Age.” In The Cambridge History of Judaism. vol. 2, edited by William D. Davies and Louis Finkelstein, 79–114. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. Barr, James. “Which Language did Jesus Speak? Some Remarks of a Semiticist.” BJRULM 53 (1970): 9–29. Barthélemy, Dominique. Les devanciers d’Aquila: Première publication intégrale du texte des fragments du Dodécaprophéton trouvés dans le désert de Juda, précédée d’une étude sur les traductions et recensions grecques de la Bible réalisées au premier siècle de notre ère sous l’influence du rabbinat palestinien. VTS 10. Leiden: Brill, 1963. Bernstein, Moshe J. “The Aramaic Targumim: The Many Faces of the Jewish Biblical Experience.” In Jewish Ways of Reading the Bible, edited by George J. Brooke, 133–165. JSSS 11. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. Chilton, Bruce D. The Glory of Israel: The Theology and Provenance of the Isaiah Targum. JSOTS 23. Sheffield, UK: JSOT, 1982. Chilton, Bruce D. The Isaiah Targum: Introduction, Translation, Apparatus, and Notes. Aramaic Bible 11. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1990. Churgin, Pinkhos. Targum Jonathan to the Prophets. Yale Oriental Series 14. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1927. Cook, Edward M. “Qumran Aramaic and Aramaic Dialectology.” In Studies in Qumran Aramaic, edited by Takamitsu Muraoka, 1–21. AbrN Supp 3. Louvain: Peeters, 1992. Cook, Edward M. “Rewriting the Bible: The Text and the Language of the Pseudo-Jonathan Targum.” PhD diss., University of California, Los Angeles, 1986. Díez Macho, Alejandro. El Targum: Introducción a las traducciones aramaicas de la Biblia. Textos y estudios Cardenal Cisneros 21. Madrid: Consejo superior de investigaciones cientificas, 1979. Díez Merino, Luis. “La Masora Targumica.” Estudios Bíblicos 44 (1986): 305–318. Flesher, Paul, and Bruce Chilton. The Targums: A Critical Introduction. SAIS 12. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Fraade, Steven D. “Locating Targum in the Textual Polysystem of Rabbinic Pedagogy.” BIOSCS 39 (2006): 69–91. Fraade, Steven D. “Rabbinic Views on the Practice of Targum, and Multilingualism in the Jewish Galilee of the Third-Sixth Centuries.” The Galilee in Late Antiquity, edited by Lee I. Levine, 253–286. New York and Jerusalem: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992. Fraade, Steven D. “Scripture, Targum, and Talmud as Instruction: A Complex Textual Story from the Sifra.” In Hesed ve-Emet: Studies in Honor of Ernest S. Frerichs, edited by Jodi Magness and Seymour Gitin, 109–121. BJS 320. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1998. Fraade, Steven D. “Studies on Targum Jonathan to the Prophets by Leivy Smolar and Moses Aberbach: Targum Jonathan to the Prophets by Pinkhos Churgin.” JQR 75 (1985): 392–401. Gordon, Robert. “The Targumists as Eschatologists.” In Congress Volume: Göttingen, 1977, edited by John A. Emerton, 113–130. VTS 29. Leiden: Brill, 1978. Reprinted in Hebrew Bible and Ancient Versions: Selected Essays of Robert P. Gordon, 303–316. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2016.

Isaiah in Aramaic   487 Goshen-Gottstein, Moshe. ‫שקיעים מתרגומי המקרא הארמיים‬. With Rimon Kasher. Ramat-Gan, Israel: Bar Ilan University Press, 1983. Grossfeld, Bernard, and S. David Sperling. “Bible: Translations: Ancient Versions: Aramaic: The Targumim.” In EJ 3:588–595. Houtman, Alberdina, and Harry Sysling. Alternative Targum Traditions: The Use of Variant Readings for the Study in Origin and History of Targum Jonathan. SAIS 9. Leiden: Brill, 2009. Kahle, Paul E. The Cairo Geniza: Schweich Lectures of the British Academy 1941. London: British Academy, 19472. Kasher, Rimon. “‫האם יש מקור אחד לתוספתות התרגום לנביאים‬.” AJS Review 21, no. 2 (1996): 1–21. Kasher, Rimon. “The Aramaic Targumim and Their Sitz im Leben.” In Proceedings of the Ninth World Congress of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, August 4–12, 1985. Panel Sessions: Bible Studies and Ancient Near East, 75–85. Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies, 1988. Kasher, Rimon. “‫התוספתות התרגומיות להפטרת שבת־חנוכה‬.” Tarbiz 45 (1975): 27–45. Kaufman, Stephen A. “Dating the Language of the Palestinian Targums and Their Use in the Study of First Century ce Texts.” In The Aramaic Bible: Targums in Their Historical Context, edited by Derek R. G. Beattie and Martin J. MacNamara, 118–141. JSOTS 166. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1994. Kooij, Arie van der. “Nehemiah 8:8 and the Question of the ‘Targum’ Tradition.” In Tradition of the Text: Studies Offered to Dominique Barthélemy in Celebration of his 70th Birthday, edited by Gerard J. Norton, and Stephen Pisano, 79–90. OBO 109. Göttingen and Freiburg, Switzerland: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht and Universitätsverlag, 1991. Kooij, Arie van der. Die alten Textzeugen des Jesajabuches: Ein Beitrag zur Textgeschichte des Alten Testaments. OBO 35. Göttingen and Freiburg, Switzerland: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht and Universitätsverlag, 1981. Kutscher, Edward Y. “The Language of Genesis Apocryphon: A Preliminary Study.” Scripta Hierosolymitana 4 (1958): 1–31. Le Déaut, Roger. “The Current State of Targumic Studies.” BTB 4, no. 1 (1974): 3–32. Levin, Étan. The Aramaic Version of the Bible: Contents and Context. BZAW 174. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1988. Neusner, Jacob. Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees Before 70. Part 1, The Masters. Leiden: Brill, 1971. Rabin, Chiam. “Hebrew and Aramaic in the First Century.” In The Jewish People in the First Century: Historical Geography, Political History, Social, Cultural, and Religious Life and Institutions, edited by Shemuel Safrai and Menahem Stern, 1007–1039. Compendia rerum iudaicarum ad Novum Testamentum I/2. Assen, Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 1976. Rabin, Chiam . “The Translation Process and the Character of the Septuagint.” Textus 6 (1968): 1–26. Ribera Florit, J. La Biblia Babilonica: Profetas Posteriores (Targum). Barcelona: Varona, 1977. Ribera Florit, J. Targum Jonatán de los profetas posteriores en tradición Babilónica: Isaias. Madrid: CSIC, 1988. Safrai, Shemuel. “Education and the Study of the Torah.” In The Jewish People in the First Century: Historical Geography, Political History, Social, Cultural, and Religious Life and Institutions, edited by Shemuel Safrai and Menahem Stern, 945–970. Compendia rerum iudaicarum ad Novum Testamentum I/2. Assen, Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 1976. Samely, Alexander. “Is Targumic Aramaic Rabbinic Hebrew?” JJS 45 (1994): 92–100. Schäfer, Peter. “Bibelübersetzungen II: Targumim.” TRE 6:216–228.

488   William A. Tooman Smelik, Willem F. “Translation and Commentary in One: The Interplay of Plusses and Substitutions in the Targum of the Prophets.” JSJ 29 (1998): 245–260. Smelik, Willem F. The Targum of Judges. OtSt 36. Leiden: Brill, 1995. Smolar, Leivy, and Moses Aberbach. Studies in Targum Jonathan to the Prophets. New York: Ktav, 1983. Sperber, Alexander. The Bible in Aramaic: Based on Old Manuscripts and Printed Texts. Leiden: Brill, 1959–1973. Staalduine-Sulman, Evaline. The Targum of Samuel. SAIS 1. Leiden: Brill, 2002. Stenning, John Frederick. Targum of Isaiah. London: Oxford University Press, 1949. Tal, Abraham. “Is There a Raison d’Être for an Aramaic Targum in a Hebrew-Speaking Society?” Revue des etudes juives 160 (2001): 357–378. Tal, Abraham. ‫לשון התרגום לנביאים ראשונים ומעמדה בכלל ניבי הארמית‬. Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University, 1975. Wesselius, Jan. “Completeness and Closure in Targumic Literature: The Emulation of Biblical Hebrew Poetry in Targum Jonathan to the Former Prophets.” JAB 3 (2001): 237–247. Würthwein, Ernst, and Alexander Fischer. The Text of the Old Testament: An Introduction to Biblia Hebraica. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 20143. York, Anthony D. “The Targum in the Synagogue and School.” JSJ 10 (1979): 74–86. Zhakovich, Iosif. “Contradictions and Coherence in Targum Pseudo-Jonathan.” PhD diss., Harvard University, 2016. Zunz, Leopold. Die gottesdienstlichen Vorträge der Juden, historisch entwickelt: Ein Beitrag zur Alterthumskunde und biblischen Kritik, zur Literatur- und Religionsgeschichte. Edited by Nehemiah Brüll. Frankfurt: Kauffmann, 18922.

chapter 26

Isa i a h i n L ati n Anni Maria Laato

26.1. Introduction The book of Isaiah, mainly in Latin translations, has been used and studied in the West for over a thousand years, and by many of the most important theologians there. The importance of these translations for Christian theology and praxis, therefore, cannot be overestimated.1 Christianity spread to the West in the first century, especially through merchants and other travelers to the Mediterranean coasts. The Latinization of the West at that time meant that Latin was commonly understood and used even by those who did not speak it as their mother tongue; however in many areas, other languages remained the first language. In the church in the city of Rome, for example, mainly Greek was spoken up until the turn of the third century. In other areas, however, many Christians had no or only limited knowledge of Greek, and thus a need for Latin translations of biblical texts and the liturgy arose. This was the case particularly in North Africa, and consequently, the first evidence of Latin translations of biblical texts is found in this area. The first Latin translations emerged in the second century, first orally and then in written form. The Latin West adopted the Old Testament in its Greek form, the Septuagint, which for centuries was regarded as authoritative, and which, prior to Jerome’s Vulgate, served as the basis of all Latin translations. Eventually, however, the use of Latin translations based on Greek translations became problematic. The Latin versions were sometimes observed to be inaccurate and unreliable—this became apparent especially in discussions with the Jews—and their language and syntax were thought to be of poor quality, which irritated well-educated people, in particular. This led to a need to produce a reliable high-quality translation, a task that Jerome, at the end of the fourth century, undertook. Despite its apparent merits, the Vulgate, however, was not immediately adopted 1  These translations are published in Vetus Latina, die Reste der altlateinischen Bibel, and Biblia Sacra iuxta Latinam Vulgatam versionem.

490   Anni Maria Laato by the church, and older traditions lived on for a long time alongside it, especially in liturgical use and in hymns. As in the Christian East, the book of Isaiah was regarded as one of the most important books of the Old Testament, even in the West.2 It was read first and foremost Christologically—that is, as containing promises, prophecies, and types of Christ and the church. Jerome summarizes this view in the Prologue to his translation of Isaiah in the Vulgate, characterizing the prophet Isaiah as follows: [H]e should be called an evangelist rather than a prophet because he describes all the mysteries of Christ and the Church so clearly that you would think he is composing a history of what has already happened rather than prophesying about what is to come

Another example of the centrality of the book of Isaiah in Christian teaching in the Latin West is given by Augustine, who in Conf. 9.5.13 thinks back to his youth and recollects how, in the autumn of 386, before his baptism, he asked Ambrose’s advice about which book of the Scripture he should read to prepare himself to “understand and receive God’s grace.” Ambrose told him to read Isaiah, but Augustine found the book difficult and soon put it down. Later, however, when Augustine was considering why Ambrose had only recommended Isaiah, he concluded that it must have been because Isaiah “predicts the truth of the Gospel and liberation of the nations” more clearly than other Old Testament writers.

26.2.  Vetus Latina In this chapter, the Latin translations of the texts of Isaiah before Jerome’s Vulgate will be presented. First, an overview is given, and then the history of Vetus Latina, with special focus on the Book of Isaiah, is offered.

26.2.1. Overview Vetus Latina (the Old Latin version, sometimes also called pre-Vulgate) is a collective name used to refer to all the Latin translations of biblical texts that preceded Jerome’s Vulgate.3 During the first centuries, no single authorized version of the Latin Scripture existed; instead, there were several different translations, none of which was better regarded than the others. According to current view, however, these translations were 2 Childs, Struggle, 5, 92; Sawyer, Fifth Gospel, 1–2, 21, 48–50. 3  For the history of Vetus Latina texts, see Schultz-Flügel, Latin Old Testament Tradition; Stummer, Einführung; and Houghton, Latin New Testament.

Isaiah in Latin   491 originally probably not independent from each other, but emerged from a single version of each book. Because of their deficits and problems, these early translations were revised and updated from time to time, which led to the emergence of several different text-types. At the beginning of the fifth century, there thus existed several versions of Latin translations, as Augustine and Jerome witness. The terms Afra and Itala, earlier thought to denote the African or Italian origins of these translations, cannot—in the light of recent scholarship—be connected to certain geographical areas with respect to their origins. Vetus Latina text-types can, however, be classified under two main groups, the African and the European, according to their occurrence in texts of the Church Fathers. An example of the complexity is given by Augustine, who in Doct. chr. 2.15.22 gives preference to what he calls the “Italian” translation (which he calls Itala). It has, however, been impossible to identify any specific “Italian” version in his texts, and in fact, he often uses the African version. The Vetus Latina texts of Isaiah are published in Vetus Latina 12/1–12/2 (1987–1997, edited by Roger Gryson).4 In these volumes, the text-types and sources are presented. The texts of Vetus Latina translations are preserved in the writings of the Church Fathers: treatises, sermons, letters, and commentaries. The Vetus Latina edition also includes the so-called Hexapla of Jerome (385 onward). With respect to commentaries of Isaiah, Jerome mentions a commentary on Isaiah by Victorinus of Pettau, but it is lost, as is most of Ambrose’s commentary, of which only a few fragments have been preserved. Jerome’s Commentary on Isaiah (written ca. 408–410), however, gives important information on Vetus Latina. The first Latin translations of the texts of Isaiah were presumably made orally ad hoc, when needed for the purposes of teaching, preaching, and the liturgy. Soon, however, written translations emerged. The relation between the oral and written versions can be discussed: the oral translations were probably stylized before being written down. The translators of Vetus Latina versions remain anonymous. It is clear that they were not highly educated and trained in translation, and were probably preachers and theologians who knew every-day Greek as well as Latin, and who needed Latin translations for practical purposes. Their translations contain vernacular words and stylistic features. Contrary to what in antiquity was the common ad sensum principle, one of the principles of the translators was to give a word-to-word translation, when possible, which means that the Greek word order is sometimes discernible. In the process of translating the Christian message and texts into Latin, new words based on Greek words were sometimes created, and old Greek words were given new meanings. Sometimes these translations took certain liberties with the original text, and errors were even made. Their early age makes these early Latin translations important witnesses not only for the Greek textual traditions that served as a basis for the translations, which partly no longer exist, but also for Latin patristic exegesis and the development of the Latin language. They further provide help in identifying and locating anonymous early texts.

4  Vetus Latina 12.

492   Anni Maria Laato The history of these texts even provides information on the early Christian communities in which they were produced and used.

26.2.2.  History of Vetus Latina The earliest mention of Latin translations of some New Testament texts is probably in Acta Scillitanorum (180 ce). It witnesses a group of Latin-speaking martyrs carrying Paul’s letters and some other holy texts. The first evidence of translations of the Old Testament in Latin are, however, found in the works of Tertullian (those written from 196 ce onward). His writings contain numerous quotations from or allusions to biblical texts, among them many of the texts in Isaiah. In Adversus Marcionem alone, there are more than three hundred quotations from Isaiah. Tertullian was bilingual and occasionally translated ad hoc from Greek. His writings, however, also witness earlier archaic forms of Latin translations, and therefore his quotations form the earliest main textual type of Vetus Latina versions. These quotations are not identical with the later so-called African text found in, for example, Cyprian’s texts. From the same time, the texts of Novatian testify to another text-type, which differs from Tertullian’s. The Passion of Perpetua and Felicitas, which contains one important passage that may refer to the book of Isaiah and which shall be discussed later in the chapter, comes from the time of Tertullian. An example of the problems with the early translations is the question of how to translate the Christian theologically important word logos, which in Latin could be translated as verbum (word), sermo (speech), or even ratio (sense, intellect). Tertullian constantly uses the word sermo, for example, when he quotes Isa 2:3. He explains his translation in Prax. 5.2–4, and points to the praxis of older Christian translations, usus nostrorum (cf. Or. 1.1). Later translations, such as the African text in Cyprian, most often use verbum, which was easier to interpret as pointing to Christ as the Word. From the third century, the most important witness of the Latin text of Isaiah is Cyprian of Carthage (d. 258). His Testimoniorum libri III ad Quirinum (249/250) is an important source for an ancient African text-form of the Scripture. It contains many lengthy quotations of an existing translation of Isaiah. A very similar text-form is found in other African treatises, for example, the Pseudo-Cyprianic text De montibus Sina et Sion, which also contains quotations from Isaiah and is probably earlier than Cyprian.5 Later revisions of this translation can be found in the writings of the Donatists. From the fourth century, the most important evidence comes from Hilary of Poitiers and Ambrose. Their version, the so-called European text, differs from the African when it comes to the vocabulary used and the Greek original upon which it is based. Ambrose knew Greek, used several Latin and Greek versions, and sometimes even corrected the biblical text, but he never argued that a new Latin translation would be necessary.

5 Laato, Jews and Christians, 21.

Isaiah in Latin   493 Contemporaneously with Jerome, Augustine was interested in the problems of the Latin text. During different periods of his life, he used different versions, compared them with each other and commented on the translations critically. In De doctrina Christiana, written in 396–397, Augustine discusses the Latin translations of the Old Testament at length, their advantages, problems, and sources. For him, the Septuagint was authoritative and inspired by the Holy Spirit, and the existence of several Latin translations was not problematic (Doct. chr. 2.11–16). He was, however, aware of the necessity of knowing Greek and Hebrew to gain a correct understanding of the Scripture, even if he himself mainly operated on the basis of the Latin translations (Doct. chr. 2.11). His description of the number and origins of the Latin versions, however, is not to be taken quite literally: For the translations of the Scriptures from Hebrew into Greek can be counted, but the Latin translators are out of all number. For in the early days of the faith every man who happened to get his hands upon a Greek manuscript, and who thought he had any knowledge, were it ever so little, of the two languages, ventured upon the work of translation.  (Doct. chr. 2.11)

Augustine gives Isa 58:7 as an example of the benefit of using two Latin translations of the same verse, and despite his criticism, he considers Jerome’s translation a good one. One of the two translations follows the Septuagint, “you shall not neglect any of the relatives of your seed” (et domesticos seminis tui ne despexeris); the other is found in the Vulgate “you shall not neglect your flesh” (et carnem tuam ne despexeris). Together, these translations produce, according to him, a correct understanding of about whom Isaiah is speaking: a relative (consanguis). Augustine’s second example is Isa 7:9, which in the European version of Vetus Latina is “if you will not believe, you shall not understand” (nisi credideritis, non intellegetis), and in the Vulgate is “if you will not believe, you shall not abide” (nisi credideritis, non permanebitis). Jerome’s translation is based on the original Hebrew word play; the Vetus Latina translation is based on the Septuagint, which has combined this verse with Isa 6:9. According to Augustine, both translations are true and can be combined. He says, “Now which of these is the literal translation cannot be ascertained without reference to the text in the original tongue. And yet to those who read with knowledge, a great truth is to be found in each. For it is difficult for interpreters to differ so widely as not to touch at some point.” The Vetus Latina translation of this verse expresses Augustine’s understanding of the relation between faith and reason; it was therefore very popular in Latin Christian literature in both the early Church and the Middle Ages. Anselm of Canterbury famously expressed the same thought in Proslogion, 1: “I believe so that I may understand” (credo ut intelligam). He quotes Isa 7:9 in the form: “Unless I first believe, I shall not understand” (nisi credidero non intelligam). Augustine saw no need for a single standardized translation; he was especially doubtful about Jerome’s project of translating from the Hebrew. This hesitation becomes evident in his correspondence with Jerome, dated 395–405 (Aug. letters 28, 40, 67, 68, 71–75,

494   Anni Maria Laato 81, 82), concerning, among other topics, biblical text-forms and translations. First, he was suspicious of the fact that no one could linguistically control Jerome’s translation; he even doubted Jerome’s competence in Hebrew. Second, for Augustine the Septuagint was authoritative. In these letters, the text of Isaiah is not discussed.

26.3.  Jerome’s Vulgate and His Commentary of Isaiah In this chapter, the focus is on the work of Jerome. His new Latin translation of the Book of Isaiah, based on the Hebrew text, was more reliable than the earlier Vetus Latina – translations and eventually replaced them. Moreover, his impressive and learned Commentary on Isaiah transmitted to the Latin readers knowledge that up till then was available only in Hebrew or Greek.

26.3.1. Vulgate During the fourth century and at the beginning of the fifth, many Latin translations, which were even sometimes contradictory, were in circulation. The poor quality of the Latin language and syntax in these translations, however, was a problem for Latin theologians. Jerome formulated the issue thus: verum non esse quod variat (where there is so much variation, that cannot be true; Praef. Ev.). Initially, an attempt was made to correct the apparent mistakes with the help of Greek manuscripts. At the same time, however, a growing awareness of the differences between the Septuagint and the Hebrew text, mainly through the work of Jerome, threw the status of the Septuagint into question. Jerome started his work, which he said was on the request of Pope Damasus, in 383, by revising existing translations of the Gospels against the best Greek manuscripts.6 His versions became widely accepted, but also received criticism (letter 27.1 to Marcella). When it comes to the Old Testament, Jerome started his revision around 387, but with the help of Origen’s Hexapla and the works of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. It is not clear whether he revised the whole Old Testament in this so-called Hexaplaric Recension; only Psalms, Job, Song of Songs, fragments of Proverbs, and the prologues to these books are preserved, as well as (in his commentaries) some parts of the prophets. This Psalter is preserved under the name “Psalterium Gallicanum” (because it became popular in Gaul) in the Vulgate. It was the standard psalter in liturgical hours until 1986 and is the basis of Gregorian chant.

6  For Jerome and his methods in translation, see Jay, L’Exégèse de saint Jérome; Brown, Vir Trilinguis, 87–111; Kieffer, Jerome: His Exegesis, 663–681.

Isaiah in Latin   495 Working with Origen’s Hexapla, however, made Jerome critical of not only Latin translations but also the Greek texts behind them. He thus realized the importance of the Hebraica veritas—that is, the Hebrew original. Beginning in about 390, he translated the whole of the Old Testament from the Hebrew. The deuterocanonical books were not included in this version. The importance of the Hebrew text was not understood in the Latin West before Jerome and was not easily accepted even when his arguments for its use became known.7 With his translation from the Hebrew, Jerome did not intend to produce a text for liturgical use but a scholarly work instead. He used his new translations mainly in his scientific works, but in other texts, he used the Septuagint too.8 Jerome intended to give a high-quality translation of the Old Testament in order to reach a better theological understanding of the Holy Scripture. Instead of doing a word-for-word-translation, he sought to translate “sense-for-sense” (letter 57.5). His knowledge of Hebrew was, for his time, extraordinary and sufficient to produce good-quality translations, and he often refers to veritas (“truth”; even terminus technicus for original text); however, he also used older Greek and sometimes even Latin translations in preparing his translation. Jerome called himself vir trilinguis—that is, fluent in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew (Ruf. 3.6)—and certainly his capacity to work in these languages was far better than any of his Christian contemporaries. But if Jerome did not intend to displace the Septuagint, others thought that he did, and his new translation was received with suspicion and criticism. Augustine, Rufinus, and others reacted critically and defended the authority of the Septuagint. Later, Augustine accepted the Hebrew text as inspired, but he still emphasized the importance of the Septuagint. Over time, Jerome’s translation gained increasing acceptance, perhaps more because of its superior language than because it was based on the Hebrew text. Cassiodorus (d. 585) still used it mainly as a tool (Inst. 1.15.11); Gregory the Great (d. 604) allowed the use of both old translations and the Vulgate (Mor.), but in the writings of Isidore of Seville (d. 636), the Vulgate was preferred (Eccl. off. 1.12.8). In the eighth century, at the time of Charlemagne, the Vulgate was finally incorporated in the Alcuin’s Bible (except for the Psalms). It was, however, first the Tridentinum (1546) that declared the Vulgate to be the authoritative version. Since then, the text of the Vulgate has been corrected and updated, most recently in Nova Vulgata, a new critical edition published in 1969.

26.3.2.  Jerome’s Translation of Isaiah Jerome calls the book of Isaiah for grande volumen because of its size—although he uses the word volumen we cannot be sure that he had it in the form of a scroll; he is in­con­sist­ ent in his use of codex and volumen (Comm. Isa. 8.1–4). He translated Isaiah in 393–394,

7 Brown, Vir Trilinguis, 55.

8 Brown, Vir Trilinguis, 61–62.

496   Anni Maria Laato together with the other prophets. In a letter to Pammachius (letter 49.4), he urges him to read his new translation and to compare it with old translations.

26.3.3.  Jerome’s Commentary on Isaiah Jerome first translated Origen’s nine homilies on Isaiah. In 397, Jerome had written a commentary on the ten visions in Isa 13–23 and dedicated this work to Bishop Amabilis. This work was later included in the Commentary on Isaiah, which Jerome wrote in 404–410 and dedicated to Eustochium, a noblewoman who, with her mother Paula, had followed Jerome from Rome to Bethlehem and established a convent there.9 Paula had died 404. This commentary consists of eighteen books, all of which begin with an introduction. In the commentary, Jerome explains his new translation and comments on the text mainly from a historical, but often also from a theological point of view.10 Quite often, he discusses the texts of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. In his work, Jerome used interpretations from Origen, Eusebius, Apollinaris, and Didymus, and thus brought their thoughts to Latin- speaking readers.

26.4.  Some Central Topics in the Reception History of Isaiah in Latin Traditions In this chapter, some important topics, such as the person of Isaiah, Messianic promises and Christology, ecclesiology and the polemics against the Jews, pilgrimage, and liturgy, are presented as examples of how the Latin translations of Isaiah were used.

26.4.1.  The Person of Isaiah in Latin Texts In Latin traditions, the author of the book of Isaiah is regarded as one person, the prophet who lived in the eighth century bce. Even if the book of Isaiah does not reveal the fate of the prophet, later traditions about it were known even in the West. Early on, Isaiah was identified as the prophet in Heb 11:37 who was sawed in half. This tradition is known, for example, in Tertullian, Scorpiace 8, and in the Latin translation of the Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah, and is called by Jerome the “most reliable tradition of the Jews” (Comm. Isa. 15.57.1–2). Even in Vitae prophetarum, Isaiah is named among the six so-called Martyr-Prophets, most of them presented together with references to 9 Childs, Struggle, 94–99; Laato, What Makes, 172.

10 Childs, Struggle, 96–99.

Isaiah in Latin   497 the way they died, those responsible for their death, and their burial place (this work was translated into Latin, possibly in the seventh century). The martyrdom of Isaiah became a popular theme, even in western Christian art. The prophet Isaiah is also seen as an example of patience (Tert., Pat. 14.1) and courage (Hilary of Poitiers, Contra Contantium imperatorem 4; Ambrose, Exp. Luc. 9.25). Isidore of Seville (ca. 560–636) quotes Jerome and calls Isaiah “an evangelist rather than a prophet” (evangelista potius quam propheta). Isidore adds that Isaiah’s prose in his book is good (Isidore, Etym. 6.2).

26.4.2.  Messianic Promises and Christology One of the main reasons there was a need for a reliable Latin translation of the Old Testament was its use in discussions with the Jews. Problems in early translations became apparent, especially when prophecies of the Messiah were discussed. The main topics concerning the Messianic promises and Christology in the book of Isaiah were the virgin birth (Isa 7:14) and the idea of Christ as the suffering servant (Isa 42:1–7; 49:1–9; 50:4–9; 52:13–53:12). The Latin authors inherited their Christological reading of these passages from the New Testament and from Christian Greek theologians. A rich collection of Christological proof-texts from the book of Isaiah is found in Cyprian’s Testimonia, book 2. Because Isa 7:14 was understood early as a prophecy of the virgin birth, it is no wonder that several translations had already been produced before the Vulgate. In the Vetus Latina edition, the presentation of these texts and their use spans several pages. In these translations, the Latin word for “virgin” is not problematic; all of them follow the LXX and use the word virgo. Jewish interlocutors, however, could and did claim that this passage does not prove virgin birth. Therefore, Jerome lengthily explains this translation in his Commentary on Isaiah.11 He admits that earlier Christian commentators had not been able to defend the Christian interpretation against the Jews, and then takes up the task. He studies all Old Testament passages that contain the word almah (‫ )עלמה‬and notes that Jewish translators regularly translate it as “young woman”—except in the Septuagint. Then he shows, even using Punic language to help, that in Hebrew almah does not mean only “young woman” or “virgin” but has a double meaning—both “hidden” and “marriageable”—and thus, a “hidden-away-virgin” of marriage age. Another central topic in the Christological interpretation of the book of Isaiah is the suffering servant, above all, Isa 53. The existence of multiform translations of this passage points to its importance in early Christian use of the Old Testament, and at such an early stage that certain central concepts did not yet have a fixed translation. The translators chose, for example, different words for doxa (Isa 53:2, ‫)הדר‬: gloria, claritas, honor, decor, and for hamartia (Isa 53:4–5, ‫)חלי‬: imbecillitas, peccatum, infirmitas, languor, scelus. Isa 53 has also had a great impact on Christian liturgy and hymns. For example, Agnus 11  See Childs, Struggle, 95, 99.

498   Anni Maria Laato Dei qui tollis peccata mundi is based both on John 1:29 and Isa 53:4. The verb tollere, meaning both “take away” and “carry,” is not found in African texts of this Isaian verse, but it appears in the Latin translations in European texts and Jerome’s Vulgate.

26.4.3.  Ecclesiology and the Polemics against the Jews The book of Isaiah was often used in texts dealing with ecclesiology and polemics against the Jews. Most notably, prophecies about Zion were employed for these purposes. The Church was identified with Zion and the people of God, whereas the Jewish people were seen as rejected. Another common use of the text of Isaiah was to locate adjectives the prophet used that were critical of the Jewish people, and to apply them in anti-Jewish rhetoric. One of the passages often quoted by the Latin-speaking theologians to clarify the relation between the old covenant and the new, between old Jews and Christians, is the end of Isa 2:3 (Mic 4:2): “The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” Its variants in Vetus Latina manuscripts are many, and even Jerome has several versions of it. The differences do not affect the content and use of this half-verse, only the ­language; they deal with the translation of logos and the tempus and the choice of the verb meaning “to go out.” The translations of Tertullian, Pseudo-Cyprian, Cyprian, and Jerome may serve as examples; the existence of so many alternatives shows the centrality of this passage. Tertullian quotes or alludes to it several times, and never precisely in the same translation (Marc. 3.21; 3.22; 4.1; 5.4; Iud. 3.8). It is apparent that he did not feel himself to be bound to any existing translation but either translated himself, quoted freely, or used different translations—the last option being unlikely at the time. About the same time, or a little later, another North African, Pseudo-Cyprian (Mont. 1.1; 10.1.3–4), uses the same translation as Tertullian had used in his Adversus Iudaeos. Subsequently, Cyprian in Test. 10 testifies to what later came to be called the African version. Even Jerome has several variants of this verse, where both the word “to go out” and the word for “word” differ (Vulgate Isa 2:3; Comm. Isa. 2:3; 42; 49.9; 60.4). Another example of the fact that common verses in anti-Jewish argumentation were used in many different translations is Isa 6:9, “Listen with your ears, and not hear/­ understand, see with your eyes and not see,” as quoted by St. Paul in Acts 28:25–26 (cf. Mark 4:12; Matt 13:13; Luke 8:10). This verse is reminiscent of Isa 7:9. Tertullian has it, “aure audietis et non audietis, et oculis videbitis et non videbitis” (Marc. 3.6), Cyprian quotes the same verse in his Isaian quotations about the blindness and hardness of the Jews (Test. 3), as follows: “aure audietis, et non intelligetis, et videntes videbitis, et non videbitis” (“Listen with your ears and not understand, see and see, and yet not see”). Jerome quotes and explains this passage in letter 18 to Pope Damasus and combines it with John 12:40–41: “aure audietis, et non intelligetis: et cernentes aspicietis, et non videbitis” (“Listen with your ears and not understand, perceive as you see, but yet not see”). In the Vulgate, he formulated it more elegantly: “audite audientes et nolite intellegere et

Isaiah in Latin   499 videte visionem et nolite cognoscere” (“Listen and listen but not understand, see a vision and know it not”). It is not always clear whether early Christian authors are quoting Isaiah, or Isaiah through Acts. In the polemics against the Jews, the Christian authors used vilification as a method. Words originally used in inner-Jewish criticism and exhortation to return to God were now twisted to characterize Jews in a negative way.12 Several of these words were taken from the book of Isaiah. Examples are derelictus, desolatus (abandoned) Isa 3:26; durus (hard) Isa 48:4; caecus (blind), possibly based on Isa 29:10; 6:9; and Acts 28:27; and incredulus (unfaithful) Isa 65:2. This way of using Isaiah influenced even western Christian art: the Jewish people are often pictured as a blindfolded lady.

26.4.4.  Pilgrimage and the Holy Land In 388 ce, Jerome published De situ et nominibus locorum Hebraicorum (“Book on the Sites and Names of Hebrew Places”) a revised translation of Eusebios’s Onomasticon. In this work, he offered the Latin translations of many Hebrew names, both of individuals and places. Jerome’s interest in biblical topography is visible in his translations.13 In Jerome’s time, and very much with his support, pilgrimages to the Holy Land increased. Not only did Jerome present holy places in his book, but in several letters, he and his disciples also promoted the idea of the holiness of the Land. The noblewomen Paula and Eustochium, friends of Jerome, settled in Bethlehem in 386 ce. Soon after their arrival, they wrote to their friend Marcella in Rome, and urged her to travel there. This letter, preserved among the letters of Jerome (letter 46), is one of the most important documents of early theology of pilgrimage.14 An important passage in their argumentation for the holiness of Jerusalem was Isa 11:10, which in Vetus Latina versions was translated following the LXX, et erit requies eius honor, “and his resting-place shall be glorious.” In the above-mentioned letter and in the Vulgate, however, Jerome’s new translation is found: “et erit sepulchrum eius gloriosum,” (and his tomb shall be glorious). Jerome comments on the same passage in Comm. Isa. 4.11.10. He explains that the Hebrew word menuhato can denote any resting place, not necessarily a tomb, but claims that requies and dormitio can be used as synonyms for sepulchrum, and, interpreted in the light of John 17:15, he understands this verse as a prophecy of the Lord’s Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Therefore, it functions as a motivation for universal veneration of this place and an exhortation of Christians to visit there.

12 Laato, Jews and Christians, 148–154; Laato, “Killing,” 8–9. 13 Brown, Vir Trilinguis, 134–135. 14  Laato, “What Makes,” 172–173.

500   Anni Maria Laato

26.4.5.  Liturgy and Hymns The earliest notes of the use of Isaiah in the Christian liturgy relate to the Trishagion or sanctus, based on Isa 6:3 and Rev 4:8.15 Both in the Vetus Latina and in the Vulgate, the Greek hagios and the Hebrew qadosh (‫ )קדוש‬in this passage are translated sanctus, sanctus, sanctus. In Passio Perpetuae et Felicitatis 12 (about 203 ce), however, sanctus is not sung in Latin. Instead, in the middle of the Latin text describing a vision of a heavenly court, we find the words in Greek. The most probable explanation for this is that the Carthaginian Church used these words in their liturgy in Greek. This Isaian text was used also in Jewish liturgy and also appears in Greek in Ignatios (Ign. Ef. 4.2) and Clemens Alexandrinus (Strom. 7.12) but is in Latin in Tertullian (Or. 3). Tertullian was bilingual, however, and could have translated these words ad hoc. Common to these texts is the reference to one unison and heavenly voice. Origen and Jerome interpreted sanctus in a Trinitarian way. Jerome, in letters 18A and 18B, interprets the call of Isaiah in Isa 6:1–9, including Trishagion. The passage is explained thoroughly, both historically and spiritually, and both Hebrew and several Greek versions are quoted. He discusses the interpretation of Origen and other Greeks about the identity of those sitting on the throne, and rejects it—it was understood as God the Father, Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Jerome claims that it denotes Christ instead, because it says so in John 12:41, and says that “whatever we read in the Old Testament we find also in the Gospel; and what we read in the Gospel is deduced from the Old Testament. There is no discord between them, no disagreement. In both Testaments the Trinity is preached.” The seraphim stand for the Old and New Testaments. The Trinity is proclaimed in both testaments. The book of Isaiah is richly present in early Latin lectionaries. The sermons of Augustine, for example, give evidence for certain texts of Isaiah (such as Isa 1:10–17; 2:2; 7:14 and 57:13) as belonging to regularly recurring passages.16 Texts from Isaiah have also influenced many Latin hymns, such as “O radix Jesse,” “O clavis David,” and “O Emmanuel.”17

26.5. Summary In early Christianity and in medieval times, the book of Isaiah was considered one of the most important Old Testament books. Latin translations of the passages that were central for Christians emerged as soon as the Christian message was presented in the Latin language. The existence of many parallel translations of these passages, presented in Vetus Latina, suggests that these were first translated ad hoc, for the purposes of preaching 15 Werner, Genesis, 19–32; Sawyer, Fifth Gospel, 51, 60–61. 16 Margoni-Kögler, Die Perikopen, 56; 105; 109; 243; 432. 17 Sawyer, Fifth Gospel, 56–57.

Isaiah in Latin   501 and liturgy. These early translations survived in ecclesial use in hymns and liturgy long after the general acceptance of Jerome’s high-quality translation, the Vulgate.

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Vetus Latina, die Reste der altlateinischen Bibel. Nach Petrus Sabatier neu gesammelt und in Verbindung mit der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften herausgegeben von der Erzabtei Beuron. Freiburg: Herder 1949–. Esaias. In Vetus Latina 12, edited by Roger Gryson. Pars I, Freiburg: Herder 1987; pars II, Freiburg: Herder 1993–1997. Cassiodorus Inst.

Institutiones divinarum et saecularium litterarum [lateinisch-deutsch]. Übers. und eingel. von Wolfgang Bürsgens. Freiburg: Herder, 2003.

Clemens Alexandrinus Strom.

Stromata VI. Sources Chrétiennes 446. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1999.

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Testimoniorum libri III ad Quirinum. Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum 3.1. Vindobonae, 1868.

Eusebios Onomasticon

The Place Names of Divine Scripture: Including the Latin Edition of Jerome/Eusebius. Translated by R. Steven Notley and Ze’ev Safrai. Boston: Brill, 2005.

502   Anni Maria Laato Gregory the Great Mor.

Prologue to Moralia in Job Grégoire le Grand: Morales sur Job, Livres I–II, Sources chrétiennes 32 bis. Paris: Les Editions du Cerf, 1952.

Ignatios Ef. To the Ephesians. In The Apostolic Fathers: Greek texts and English translations by Michael William Holmes. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1999.

Isidore of Seville Eccl. off. De ecclesiasticis officiis. Corpus Christianorum Series Latina 113. Edited by C. M. Lawson. Turnhout: Brepols, 1989. Etym. Etymologiae. Isidori Hispalensis episcopi etymologiarum sive originum libri XX. Edited by Wallace M. Lindsay. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1957.

Jerome Comm. Isa. Hieronymus Stridonensis, Commentariorum in Esaiam libri 18. Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 73–73A. English translation: St. Jerome Commentary on Isaiah: Homilies 1–9 on Isaiah. Translated by Thomas P. Scheck. Ancient Christian Writers: The Works of the Fathers in Translation 68. New York: Newman Press, 2015. De situ

De situ et nominibus locorum Hebraicorum. Patrologia Latina 23.

Praef. Ev.

Praefatio in quattuor Euangelia. Préfaces aux livres de la Bible. Textes latins des éditions de R. Weber et R. Gryson et de l’Abbaye Saint-Jérôme (Rome), revus et corrigés; introduction, traduction et notes. Edited by Canellis, Aline. Sources chretiennes 592. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 2017.   Apologia adversus libros Rufini. Apologie contre Rufin. Introd., texte critique, trad. et index par Pierre Lardet. Sources chrétiennes 303. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1983.

Ruf.

Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah. In The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, vol. 2, Expansions of the Old Testament and Legends, Wisdom and Philosophical Literature, Prayers, Psalms, and Odes, Fragments of Lost Judeo-Hellenistic Works, edited by James H. Charlesworth. New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1985. Passio Perpetuae et Felicitatis. In The Acts of Christian Martyrs: Introduction, Texts and Translations, edited by Herbert Musurillo. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972. Pseudo-Cyprian Mont.

Pseudo Cipriano I due monti Sinai et Sion. De montibus, edited by Clara Burini. Fiesole: Biblioteca Patristica, 1994.

Tertullian Iud.

Adversus Iudaeos. Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina,.Pars II. Edited by A. Kroymann. Turnholt: Brepols, 1954.

Marc.

Adversus Marcionem. Contre Marcion. Livres 1–5. Sources chrétiennes 365, 368, 399, 456, 483. Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1990–2004.

Isaiah in Latin   503 Or.

De oratione. Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina 1, 2–40. Edited by Diercks. Turnholt: Brepols, 1947.

Pat.

De patientia. De la patience. Introd., texte critique, traduction et commentaire par Jean-Claude Fredouille. Sources chrétiennes 310. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1984. Adversus Praxean. Übers. und eingeleitet von Hermann-Josef Sieben. Fontes Christiani 2; Bd. 34. Freiburg: Herder, 2001.

Prax.

Secondary Literature Brown, Dennis. Vir Trilinguis: A Study in the Biblical Exegesis of Saint Jerome. Kampen, Netherlands: Kok Pharos, 1992. Childs, Brevard S. The Struggle to Understand Isaiah as Christian Scripture. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004. Houghton, H.  A.  G. The Latin New Testament: A Guide to Its Early History, Texts, and Manuscripts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Jay, Pierre. L’Exégèse de saint Jérome d’après son Commentaire sur Isaie. Paris: Etudes Augustiniennes, 1985. Kieffer, René. “Jerome: His Exegesis and Hermeneutics.” In Hebrew Bible/Old Testament: The History of Its Interpretation, vol. 1, From the Beginning to the Middle Ages, pt. 1. Antiquity, edited by Magne Saebø, 663–681. HBOT I/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996. Laato, Anni Maria. Jews and Christians in De montibus Sina et Sion: An Approach to Early Latin Adversus Iudaeos Literature. Turku: Åbo Akademi University Press, 1998. Laato, Anni Maria. “Tertullian, Adversus Iudaeos Literature, and the ‘Killing of the Prophets’— Argument.” In Studia Patristica XCII From Tertullian to Tyconius, 1–9. Peeters: Leuven, 2017. Laato, Anni Maria. “What Makes the Holy Land Holy? A Debate between Paula, Eustochium, and Marcella (Jerome, Ep. 46).” In Holy Places and Cult, edited by Erkki Koskenniemi and Cornelis de Vos, 169–199. SRB 5. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2014. Margoni-Kögler, Michael. Die Perikopen im Gottesdienst bei Augustinus: Ein Beitrag zur Erforschung der liturgischen Schriftlesung in der frühen Kirche. Vienna: Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2010. O’Malley, Thomas  P. Tertullian and the Bible: Language, Imagery, Exegesis. Nijmegen, and Utrecht, Netherlands: Dekker & Van de Vegt, 1967. Sawyer, John F. A. The Fifth Gospel: Isaiah in the History of Christianity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Schulz-Flügel, Eva. “The Latin Old Testament Tradition.” In Hebrew Bible/Old Testament: The History of Its Interpretation, vol. 1, From the Beginning to the Middle Ages, pt. 1, Antiquity, edited by Magne Saebø, 642–662. HBOT I/1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996. Stummer, Friedrich. Einführung in die lateinische Bibel: Ein Handbuch für Vorlesungen und Selbstunterricht. Paderborn, Germany: F. Schöningh, 1928. Werner, Eric. “The Genesis of the Liturgical Sanctus.” In Essays Presented to Egon Wellesz, edited by Jack Westrup, 19–32. Oxford: Clarendon, 1966.

PA RT V I I

ISA I A H IS SE L E C T R E L IGIOUS T R A DI T IONS

chapter 27

Isa i a h i n A ncien t, M edieva l , a n d Moder n J ew ish Tr a ditions Antti Laato

27.1. Introduction In this chapter I shall concentrate on some important topics in the book of Isaiah and deal with their reception history mainly in ancient and Medieval Jewish tradition with some references to modern Judaism. There are good tools available to those who are interested in finding more examples of the Jewish reception of the book of Isaiah. Armin Lange and Matthias Weigold have edited useful lists of quotations, as well as allusions to biblical texts in early Jewish writings.1 A. M. Hyman’s reference book can be used to search for quotations of the book of Isaiah in rabbinical literature.2 Another good source is Jacob Neusner’s two-volume study on Isaiah in the Talmud and Midrash, though it also lacks some important sources such as Pesiqta Rabbati.3 An easy collection of the early Jewish and rabbinical writings is available in Louis Ginsberg’s Legends of the Jews, where references to Isaiah-related material concerning the Judean kings Hezekiah and Manasseh in Jewish sources are presented in the notes of Ginzberg’s paraphrases.4 Medieval Jewish commentators’ comments have been collected in the rabbinical Bible Miqraot Gedolot, which gives easy access to Rashi, Abraham ibn Ezra, David Kimhi, and Abarbanel’s interpretations, among others.5 In addition to these studies that 1  Lange and Weigold, Biblical Quotations, 126–140, 356–359. 2 Hyman, Torah Hakethubah Vehammesurah. 3 Neusner, Isaiah. 4 Ginzberg, Legends, vol. 2, 1045–1058. 5  See, e.g., Hebrew-English edition Mikraoth Gedoloth: Isaiah, vols. 1–2.

508   Antti Laato introduce their readers to the primary sources, there are also some good recent surveys worthy of mention.6

27.2.  Historical and Biographical Perspectives The book of Isaiah contains several dates relating to the regnal years of the kings of Judah (Isa 6:1; 7:1; 14:28; 36:1). The book also refers to Isaiah’s encounters with the kings of Judah (Ahaz in Isa 7 and Hezekiah in Isa 36–39). It is therefore no wonder that the biographical details of Isaiah were dealt with in later reception history.

27.2.1.  Bipartite Book In modern scholarly literature, the book of Isaiah is divided between Isa 1–39, which contains the message of the historical prophet, and Isa 40–66, which in its totality is from a period later than Isaiah. It is interesting that this bipartite division was already known in early Jewish understanding of the book of Isaiah, even though not in such a way as to think that the latter part of the book would not have been written by Isaiah. The earliest postbiblical Jewish description of the message of Isaiah is given in Sirach 48:17–25, where Ben Sira recounts the events that took place in the reign of Hezekiah.7 According to Ben Sira, Isaiah prophesied that Jerusalem would be delivered in the time of Hezekiah (Isa 36–37). Through the prophet’s words, Hezekiah’s life was also lengthened and the sun moved backward as a sign (Isa 38–39). Ben Sira also states that Isaiah prophesied about the future (Sir 48:24–25): “By the spirit of might he saw the last things, and comforted those who mourned in Zion. He revealed what was to occur to the end of time and the hidden things before they came to pass.” The formulation “the hidden things before they came to pass” is reminiscent of similar expressions in Isa 41:22; 42:9; 43:18–19; 46:10; 48:6. The expression “comforted those who mourned in Zion” is taken from Isa 61:2–3, indicating that Isaiah was seen as the mighty prophet who predicted the coming salvation plan of God, which would take place in Zion.8 Ben Sira is not alone in emphasizing the centrality of Isa 61:1–3. Even in the eschatological expectations of the Qumran community, Isa 61:1–3 plays an important role (11QMelchizedek and 4Q521). This indicates that Ben Sira understood the book of Isaiah as containing a bipartite message. The first part dealt with the time of Isaiah (as the historical details in Isa 1–39

6  See the recent articles on “Isaiah” and “Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah” published in the EBR. See further, Wilk and Gemeinhardt, Transmission. 7  For Sir 48:17–25 in the context of the Book of Sirach, see Wieringen, “Sirach 48:17–25,” 191–210. 8  Beentjes, “Hezekiah,” 77–88.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   509 strongly indicate), and the last part of the book was particularly concerned with Isaiah’s (eschatological) visions of the Jewish people. As Ben Sira so, too, does Josephus interpret the prophecies of Isaiah as concerning both the prophet’s own time and the future.9 In Ant. 9.276 Josephus writes that during the Assyrian siege Hezekiah “gave no thought to” Assyrian threats, “for he had confidence in his piety toward God and in the prophet Isaiah, by whom he was accurately informed of future events.” The prophet also warned Hezekiah of the coming Babylonian captivity (Ant. 10.33–34) as accounted for in 2 Kgs 20 and Isa 39. According to Ant. 10.35, Isaiah “was acknowledged to be a man of God and marvellously possessed of truth, and, as he was confident of never having spoken what was false, he wrote down in books all that he had prophesied and left them to be recognized as true from the event by men of future ages.” This portrait explicitly states that the book of Isaiah contains prophecies pertaining to the future, from the viewpoint of Isaiah (and perhaps even of Josephus). According to Ant. 11.5–6, Isaiah prophesied that the Persian king would allow the Jews to return home and rebuild the Temple 210 years before the time of Cyrus and 140 years before the destruction of the First Temple. Josephus’s text here is reminiscent of the Septuagint translation of Isa 44:28, and it is probably a free quotation. According to Josephus, Cyrus read this prophecy in the book of Isaiah, but this statement was part of Josephus’s argument that the biblical prophets were able to predict future events (see, e.g., Contra Apion 1.37; cf. also Contra Apion 1.15–27). An interesting fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecies is mentioned in War 7.432 and Ant. 13.64, 68, 71, according to which the statement in Isa 19:19 (about an altar for the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt) was fulfilled when the Temple of Onias was erected in Leontopolis. Josephus states that this prophecy of Isaiah was made about six hundred years before the actual event (170 bce). This temple was in use until the Jewish revolt in 70 ce. This idea of the bipartite book was also followed later in medieval Judaism. A good example is Abraham ibn Ezra who, in his commentary, made a clear-cut division of the book of Isaiah into two parts. The first, Isa 1–39, contained the prophet’s message to his contemporaries; in the latter, Isa 40–66, the prophet formulated his message related to the rebuilding of the Temple in the time of Zerubbabel to future generations.10

27.2.2.  Midrashic Development of Isaiah’s Encounters with Kings According to Isa 1:1, Isaiah was active during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. However, only dialogues between the last two and Isaiah are extant in the biblical tradition. This apparently explains why the rabbinical exegesis is not concerned with the contacts between Uzziah and Isaiah and Jotham and Isaiah but concentrates on 9  See Feldman, “Josephus’ Portrait,” 583–608; Begg, “Isaiah in Josephus,” 233–243. 10 Friedländer, Commentary of Ibn Ezra, 169–171. See further, Simon, “Ibn Ezra between Medievalism and Modernism,” 257–271; “Abraham Ibn Ezra,” 377–387.

510   Antti Laato the relations between the prophet and the two kings, Ahaz and Hezekiah. In addition, there are traditions concerning the martyrdom of Isaiah during the reign of Manasseh (see sec. 27.2.3). These contacts were developed in the rabbinical interpretations so that the biblical accounts were set “into an imaginary context or by specifying the actual dialogue between Isaiah and the kings.”11 According to the rabbinical exegesis Isaiah was descended from the House of David. Amoz, the father of Isaiah, was regarded as the brother of Amaziah, the king of Judah (Seder cOlam 10; bMegillah 10b; bSotah 10b). This explains why the prophet participated in the discussions with the Judean kings. Rabbinical midrashim were often based on rabbis’ sophisticated interpretive rules. A good example of this is how rabbis consider Ahaz. From the books of Kings they learned that Ahaz was described as a contrast to his righteous father Jotham and grandfather Uzziah. The name Ahaz is interpreted in GenR 42:3 as deriving from the verb with same root meaning “seize”: “R. Huna in the name of R. Eleazar: why was he called Ahaz? Because he seized synagogues and Schools.” This led the prophet Isaiah to utter the words in Isa 8:17: “R. Jacob in the name of R. Aha: ‘Isaiah said, I will wait for the Lord, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob, and I  will hope in him.’ ”12 A similar tradition concerning Ahaz’s seizure of synagogues and schoolhouses is transmitted in ySanh 10:2. In bSanh 103b, reference is made to Isa 8:16 and there it is argued that “Ahaz annulled the sacrificial service and sealed the Torah.” However, in bSanh 104a it is argued that Ahaz will nevertheless receive an inheritance in the World to Come.13 The dialogue between Isaiah and Hezekiah is focused on the Assyrian invasion of Judah as narrated in Isa 36–39 and 2 Kgs 18–20. An important detail in the rabbinical discourses is the question of whether Hezekiah fulfills the status of the Messiah. The relevant rabbinical texts have been discussed in detail earlier, both in Kronholm’s and Laato’s studies, and therefore only a summary is given here.14 Hezekiah is given the name Immanuel (Isa 7:14)15 by Isaiah after Sennacherib’s army has been destroyed in front of Jerusalem (ExR 18:5; cf. 2 Chron 32:7–8; LXX of Isa 7:14; Justin, Dialogue with Tryphon a Jew, secs. 43, 68, 71, and 77). Even the messianic prophecy of Isa 9:1–6 has been interpreted as referring to Hezekiah (bSanh 94a; RuthR 7:2; GenR 97). The interpretation of Isa 9 as referring to Hezekiah led, however, to a new problem: what was the connection between Hezekiah and the Messiah? Verse 6 clearly describes a messianic 11  Porton, “Isaiah,” 693–716. 12  Translation is taken from Neusner, Genesis Rabbah, 102–103. 13  See further, LevR 36:3. 14 Kronholm, Der kommende Hiskia; “Den kommende Hiskia,” 109–117; Laato, Who Is Immanuel; About Zion; “Hezekiah,” 111–138; “Understanding Zion Theology,” 22–46. 15  It is possible to detect a long Jewish-Christian confrontation concerning the translation of the word calmâ in Isa 7:14 as to whether it should be rendered as “virgin” (parthenos, so Septuagint) or “young girl” (neanis, so Symmachos, Aquila, and Theodotion). Concerning the univocal interpretation of parthenos as “virgin,” see the discussion in Kamesar, “Virgin of Isaiah 7:14,” 51–75; Weren, “Quotations from Isaiah,” 447–465; Troxel, “Isaiah 7,14–16,” 1–22; Oswalt, Holy One of Israel, 121–133. Concerning the Jewish-Christian confrontation on the interpretation of Isa 7:14, see Skarsaune, “Jewish and Christian Interpretations,” 25–45.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   511 period: unbroken peace, a reign wherein judgment and righteousness would prevail, and so on. Such hopes befit only the messianic period. Discussion in the rabbinical literature indicates how seriously the Jews came to regard the question, Was Hezekiah the Messiah after all? An interesting discussion is found in bSanh 94, where God wished to appoint Hezekiah as the Messiah, and Sennacherib as Gog and Magog. The problem, however, was that Hezekiah did not utter hymns to God even though God had saved him from the Assyrian army. Therefore, it is argued in bSanh 94 that the closed letter mem was written in the middle of the word ‫( לםרבה‬Isa 9:6) even though the open form would have been expected (cf. also RuthR 7:2). This indicates that God had intended to name Hezekiah as the Messiah but that this title was not granted because he did not sing a psalm of praise to the Lord. It is important to note that Hezekiah’s messianic character is abrogated precisely on the basis of verses 5–6, which most clearly refer to a messianic period. However, some rabbis, such as Hillel (brother of Juda II), seem to have believed that Hezekiah was the Messiah, but such a view is refuted (see bSanh 99a; see further CantR 4:8,3). One might indeed speak of the Messiah as a kind of Hezekiah Redivivus in the rabbinical literature. This idea also seems to be present in R. Johanan b. Zakkai’s last words in bBer 28b: “At the moment of his departure he said to them: Remove the vessels so that they shall not become unclean, and prepare a throne for Hezekiah the king of Judah who is coming.”16 The issue of Hezekiah’s messianic status seems to have been solved in the rabbinical literature by regarding him as a kind of model for the coming Messiah. One interesting problem is the way in which the interpretations of the Immanuel prophecy and Isa 9:1–6 as referring to Hezekiah date back to the historical prophet.17 The Christian counterargument to the Jewish interpretation that Isa 7:14–16 refers to Hezekiah was a chronological problem that can be derived from the Second Book of Kings. Hezekiah was twenty-five years old when he became king (2 Kgs 18:2), but Ahaz ruled for only sixteen years (2 Kgs 16:2). Therefore, Hezekiah was born before Ahaz became king, and because Isa 7 presupposes that Ahaz was king when Isaiah delivered his Immanuel prophecy, Hezekiah cannot be identified with Immanuel.18 This counterargument, which Jews themselves might also have found, was so convincing that the Medieval Jewish interpreters Rashi and Ibn Ezra did not follow the rabbinical exegesis by identifying Hezekiah with Immanuel.19 Instead, both of them refer to the chronological problem and regard Immanuel as being Isaiah’s own son (Isa 8:3). On the other hand, Rashi and ibn Ezra follow the rabbinical exegesis by identifying the king of Isa 16  The same statement is also preserved in the name of R. Jacob b. Idi and R. Joshua b. Levi (ySot IX, 16). It is also found in Abot de Rabbi Nathan XXV. 17  For this, see two different possibilities. According to Antti Laato, Who Is Immanuel; About Zion; and “Understanding Zion theology,” the Hezekiah-interpretation is secondary as a consequence of failed prophecy, though according to Young, Hezekiah, Isaiah regarded Hezekiah as an ideal king. 18  This Christian counterexegesis can be found in Justin Martyr’s Dialogue and in Cyril’s of Jerusalem Catechesis sermon number 12. 19  It is, however, worth noting that Joseph Kimhi, in Book of the Covenant, 54–58, still maintained the early rabbinical view that Immanuel should be identified with Hezekiah.

512   Antti Laato 9:5–6 with Hezekiah because that Isaianic passage contains no chronological problem that would nullify the interpretation in terms of Hezekiah. This does not mean that these medieval interpreters would not have been enthusiastic opponents of Christian exegesis. Rashi, ibn Ezra, and David Kimhi refuted the Christian interpretation by noting that the birth of Immanuel is linked with the promise in Isa 7:16, according to which Ahaz’s enemies would be destroyed, and that it made no sense if the prophecy referred to events that would take place many hundred years after Ahaz.

27.2.3.  Isaiah’s Martyrdom The Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah (MAI) is a Christian text that contains older Jewish legends about Isaiah, as well as Christian reinterpretations based on them.20 Scholars seem to agree that the MAI contains an older Jewish core, mainly in 1:1–3:13a + 5:1–16, concerning Isaiah’s martyrdom in the reign of Manasseh (also mentioned in Heb 11:37).21 For example, Origen (Comm. Matthaei 10,18) refers to Isaiah’s martyrdom by noting that it is a part of the Apocryphon of Isaiah, and in this context, Origen mentions that this story is “dishonoured in their own country among the Jews,” which probably indicates that Origen regarded the story as being of Jewish origin. The conclusion that Isaiah’s martyrdom was originally of Jewish origin is supported by the rabbinical traditions that contain similar descriptions of Isaiah’s death to that attested in the MAI. According to Isa 1:1, Isaiah did not prophesy during the reign of Manasseh. Nevertheless, there are some Isaianic texts that have been used in the MAI to indicate that some prophecies were uttered de facto or, at least, became actualized in the reign of Manasseh. The contrast between Hezekiah and Manasseh, so obvious in the MAI, is apparently based on 2 Kgs 18–21 (cf., MAI 2:6, which refers to “the book of the Kings of Judah and Israel”). At the beginning of the MAI Hezekiah gives “words of righteousness” to his son. This explains why Manasseh, after rejecting his father’s instructions, later came into conflict with Isaiah, who represented the “words of righteousness.” In MAI 3:6–10, the accusation of Isaiah by Belkira, the evil prophet of Manasseh (and of Samaritan origin), contains references to various prophecies that are preserved in the book of Isaiah (Isa 1:7; Isa 6; Isa 1:10 respectively): Isaiah and the prophets who (are) with him prophesy against Jerusalem and against the cities of Judah, that they will be laid waste . . . And Isaiah himself has said, “I see more than Moses the prophet.” Moses said, “There is no man who can see the Lord and live.” But Isaiah has said, “I have seen the Lord, and behold I am alive.” Know therefore, O king, that they (are) false prophets. And he has called Jerusalem Sodom, and the princes of Judah and Jerusalem he has declared (to be) the people of Gomorrah. (MAI 3:6–10) 20  See Knight, Ascension; Disciples. 21  Hall, “Ascension of Isaiah,” 289–306; Knibb, “Isaianic Traditions,” 633–650, esp. 636–645.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   513 The quotations from Isa 1:7 and Isa 1:10 suit well in the development of the midrashic motif concerning Isaiah’s martyrdom in the reign of Manasseh because an early Jewish interpreter (who regarded Hezekiah as an ideal king; see sec. 27.2.2) may have related them to the period after the invasion of Sennacherib—that is, the period of Manasseh. These wordings of Isaiah are interpreted in such a way that the prophet attacked the king and his elite in Jerusalem. Isa 6, in turn, seems to contain a typical motif on how the righteous man is falsely accused of having delivered arrogant speech against God (cf. 1 Kgs 21:9–10, where the central motif is that Naboth “has cursed both God and the king”). Isaiah was executed by being sawn in half with a wooden saw. This torture is reflected in slightly different versions in the rabbinical traditions, in ySanh 28c, bYeb 49b, and Pesiqta Rabbati 4.3, and all provide parallels to MAI.22 It is worth noting that the chronological framework of 2 Kings indicates that Manasseh was not yet born when Hezekiah fell ill in his fourteenth regnal year. Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king and Hezekiah received fifteen extra years of life after his recovery from illness. The passage of ySanh 28c is preceded by an account of the illness of Hezekiah, which is explained as a punishment because he had not been willing to beget children (ySanh 28bc).23 Hezekiah excused himself by saying to Isaiah that “I saw that I would produce an evil son.” Finally, Hezekiah married the daughter of Isaiah, thereby hoping that he would beget a righteous son, but instead he received an evil one. The point of the story is that Manasseh killed his own grandfather, Isaiah. The second tradition about Isaiah’s martyrdom in bYeb 49b contains an interesting parallel to MAI 3:9, which combines Moses’s sayings with those by Isaiah, and relates Moses’s seeing of God in particular to Isaiah’s vision in Isa 6.24

27.3.  Isaiah’s Eschatological Message The future expectation and eschatological expectations have been used quite flexibly in the biblical studies. When exactly in the post-exilic period the future expectations were interpreted in terms of end-time eschatology is not easy to evaluate. The book of 22  Porton, “Isaiah,” 702–716. 23  For further, discussion of this topic, see Rothstein, “Hezekiah’s Prayer,” 267–283. 24  Said Raba, He brought him [= Isaiah] to trial and then killed him. He said to him, Your lord, Moses, said, For men shall not see me and live (Exod 33:20), but you have said I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up (Isa 6:1). Your lord, Moses, said, For what great nation is there that has God so near to them, as the Lord our God is whenever we call upon him (Deut 4:7), and you have said, Seek [only] the Lord when he may be found [which is not always] (Isa 55:6). Your lord, Moses, said, The number of your days I will fulfil (Ex 23:26), but you said, And I will add to your days fifteen years (2 Kgs 20:6 = Isa 38:5). Isaiah said, I know that he will not accept anything I say to him, and if I reply, I will turn him into a deliberate murderer. He therefore pronounced the Divine Name and was swallowed up by a cedar. So they brought the cedar and sawed it in half. When the saw reached his mouth he died, for having said, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips (Isa 6:5). (translation from Porton, “Isaiah,” 704)

514   Antti Laato Ezra–Nehemiah contains some interesting references to the themes of the book of Isaiah, indicating that the adherents of Ezra and Nehemiah apparently belonged to religious groups who studied the Isaiah material and interpreted it.25 Chronicles contains references to Isaianic themes which apparently were understood as future expectations.26 A more difficult case is the Septuagint translation of the book of Isaiah.27 Sirach 48:17–25 (already referred to) seems to contain some eschatological aspects even though it may be safest to speak about Isaiah’s future message. The future scenario of the book of Isaiah was interpreted in the terms of Jewish eschatology and apocalyptic in a clearer way in the book of Daniel,28 in the Dead Sea scrolls,29 and in the Animal Apocalypse in 1 Enoch 85–90.30 Therefore, it is understandable that the book of Isaiah became an important resource for Jewish eschatological speculation—one branch being visible in the New Testament through which a Christian reception history was developed.31 Some significant examples illustrate what potentiality the book of Isaiah gave for Jewish reception history.

27.3.1.  The Messiah As noted in section 27.2.2 above, the Immanuel prophecy, as well as Isa 9:1–6, was interpreted as referring to Hezekiah in the rabbinical writings, and there is much evidence that this interpretation was already established in the redaction of the book of Isaiah. It is therefore no wonder that there is no clear evidence in early Jewish reception history that these texts would have been interpreted in terms of the Messiah.32 The situation is different regarding Isa 11. There are many examples from the Second Temple period that this Isaianic text inspired Jewish interpreters in their messianic speculations.33 This same interpretive tendency continued in rabbinical writings in which Isa 11 was regarded as a messianic text and Hezekiah (the figure of Isa 7:14 and 9:5–6) was one of

25  For this, see Laato, “Isaianic Texts.” Note also the articles published in Häusl, Denkt nich mehr an das Frühere! 26  Beentjes, “Isaiah,” 15–24, and the literature referred to in the chapter. 27  For general discussion of the Septuagint translation, see Seeligman, Septuagint Version, 119–294; van der Kooij, Textzeugen. The eschatological message of the Septuagint Isaiah is discussed in de Sousa, Eschatology, where he cannot find any clear-cut eschatological translation tendency. 28  See, e.g., Blenkinsopp, Opening, 14–27; Lester, Daniel Evokes Isaiah. 29  See, e.g., Blenkinsopp, Opening, 89–128; Mezenthin, Jesaja-Auslegung; Tzoref, “Textuality and Identity,” 133–165. See further chapter 23 in this volume. 30  Laato, “Rewriting,” 28–51. In this article, I argued that the author of the Animal Apocalypse used many texts of the Book of Isaiah when he rewrote Israel’s history. 31  The book of Isaiah was called as “fifth gospel” in the early church—a term that illustrates its centrality. 32  Cf. Feldman, “Josephus’ Portrait,” 582–608, esp. 602–603. Feldman argues that bSanh 94a shows that Isa 9:5–6 was interpreted in terms of the Messiah. However, the rabbinic text states that God intended to make Hezekiah the Messiah, not that Hezekiah was the Messiah. 33  See, e.g., Collins, Scepter, 49–73.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   515 his type, as was David (see, e.g., GenR 97; RuthR 7.2).34 Medieval Jewish commentators regarded Isa 11 as a messianic text. Rashi notes expressis verbis that this text was uttered to Hezekiah as consolation and that the Messiah would be one of Hezekiah’s offspring. Ibn Ezra discusses, with two alternatives, the Messianic interpretation and Rabbi Moshe Hakkohen’s interpretation that the Shoot is Hezekiah himself.35 Hezekiah as the Shoot of Isa 11 was provided as the right interpretation in the medieval anti-Christian text Nizzahon Vetus.36 In his commentary on Lev 26:6, Nachmanides maintains that Isa 11:6–9 was to have been fulfilled during the reign of Hezekiah, but because the Jewish people had not merited the Messianic age, the fulfillment of the prophecy was moved into the future.37 The messianic peace in Isa 11:6–9 became one of the most characteristic signs of the messianic time in Judaism and even today is still one of the most central biblical texts considered to illustrate the messianic era.38

27.3.2.  Inclusive Universalism “Universalism” and the opposite term “particularism” have been used in problematic ways, especially because the universalism is often related to Christianity and contrasted with “particularistic” Judaism.39 In Jewish tradition both aspects—universalism and particularism—have existed.40 Universalism was an important reception historical theme already in the Second Temple Jewish texts where it was related to the book of Isaiah. The book of Isaiah contains many texts that have been stamped with the pattern “eschatological pilgrimage of the nations” (e.g., Isa 2:2–4; 60:1–22; 66:18–21) in scholarly discussion. This pattern is present in several second Temple Jewish writings, and scholars discuss the ways in which the idea of proselytism and the concept of “righteous Gentiles”41 are relevant in them.42 It seems clear that the strong criticism of mixed marriages in the book of Ezra-Nehemiah led to discussions concerning the ways in 34  Concerning rabbinical Messianic exegesis, note esp. Neusner, Messiah in Context. 35  Concerning ibn Ezra’s interpretation, see in Friedländer, Commentary of Ibn Ezra, 59–63 (the Hebrew text in 24*–25*). 36  See Berger, Jewish-Christian Debate, 60–62, 106–109. 37  Rabbi Chavel, Ramban Nachmanides, Leviticus, 456–457. The possibility of Hezekiah becoming the Messiah Nachmanides apparently relates his statement to bSanh 94a. 38  See, e.g., Ravitzky, Messianism, Zionism, 1; Anderssén-Löf, May He Speedily Come, 237–276. 39  Runesson, “Particularistic Judaism,” 55–75. 40  There is a long discussion pertaining to the ways in which, for example, the Deutero-Isaianic material should be read in terms of universalism or Jewish internationalism supporting particularistic thinking. This discussion has continued in different ways in Jewish tradition until modern times. For this, see Lundgren, Particularism. 41  In later rabbinical writings, the concept of “righteous gentiles” became important when the relations of Jews to pagans were discussed (earliest reference is t.Sanh 13.2). Beside this concept of “righteous gentiles,” reference is made also to “seven precepts,” which are binding for all the sons of Noah (t.Abod.Zar. 8.4). 42  See discussion and the texts in Jeremias, Jesus’ Promise, 55–62; Donaldson, “Proselytes,” 3–27.

516   Antti Laato which marriages to foreign women were possible. These discussions, in turn, raised the question of proselytism, as indicated in the book of Ruth and in the story of Joseph and Aseneth. There are texts in the book of Isaiah which were possible to use in argumentation for proselytism. Isa 56:1–8, for example, refers to the inclusion of foreigners into the people of God,43 and the Septuagint translation of Isa 54:15 uses the word “proselytes.” Aspects of universalism have also been related to the title of the Servant, “a light for the Gentiles” (Isa 42:6; 49:6).

27.3.3.  Torah Studies for Gentiles in Jerusalem Isa 2:2–4 is a programmatic passage in the book of Isaiah. It contains a utopian vision that one day all nations would come to Jerusalem to learn to know the Torah of Yhwh. Many texts in Isa 40–66 relate to this programmatic text. The Hebrew word tôrâ in Isa 2:3 is open to multiple interpretations (e.g., the prophetic instruction), but in Jewish reception history Isa 2:2–4 was understood as the nations being willing to learn the Mosaic Torah. This becomes apparent in rabbinical exegesis. For example, in b.AvodahZarah 24a Eliezer ben Hyrcanus refers to Isa 60 and interprets it as referring to those gentiles who would become proselytes in times to come. In Medieval Jewish exegesis, Isa 2:2-4 was self-evidently related to the Messianic era. Ibn Ezra, who often seeks historical interpretations on Isaiah’s texts, argues that this text cannot refer to any known historical period in the past because there have always been wars. Isa 2:2–4, in turn, presupposes that nations would destroy their weapons and come to learn Torah. Both Rashi and ibn Ezra argued that the Temple Mount would not become physically higher than other mounts. The expression “it shall be raised above the hills” had to be understood metaphorically. Rashi compares the events in Isa 2:2–4 with the miracles that took place on other mounts: in Sinai (giving of the Torah), in Carmel (fire from God), and in Tabor (victory over Sisera), and regards the coming eschatological event in Zion as being even more wonderful than these.

27.3.4.  New Exodus A new exodus to the Land of Israel from foreign lands is one significant event in the Messianic era. It is attested already in the Second Temple Jewish texts (e.g., PsSol 17:26–28; cf. also 4 Ezra 13:39–50), and then also in rabbinical writings (e.g., mSanh 10:3; bMeg 29a). The new exodus is also a central theme in Jewish liturgical tradition. It appears in the tenth prayer of Amidah, formulated with the aid of two Isaiah-passages, Isa 11:12 (the signal to be raised for nations), and 27:13 (the sounding of shofar that summoned all dispersed Jews). The prayer is rendered as follows: “Sound a great horn for our freedom

43  Gosse, “Sabbath,” 359–370.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   517 and quickly raise a signal to gather us. Blessed are you, Lord, who gathers the outcasts of your people Israel.”

27.3.5.  Longevity and Paradise Isa 65:17–25 is an interesting text that refers to the longevity of human beings in the new eschatological period in Jerusalem and the Holy Land. Echoes of longevity in the eschatological future are visible in many Jewish texts from the Second Temple period onwards (1 Enoch 25:5–7; Jubilees 23; Josephus: Ant. 1.107; 2 Bar 73:2–4) and all these texts are related in some way to this Isaianic text.44 The author of the book of Jubilees argues that when the Jewish people learn to live according to the Torah of Yhwh once more, they will begin to live longer. In Medieval Jewish commentaries Isa 65:17–25 was related to the Messianic era even though there was a lack of agreement as to whether the new heavens and the new earth that would be created should be taken figuratively or literally. According to ibn Ezra, they are figurative expressions, while Rashi regards them as literal expressions because another passage in Isa 66:22 refers to this same promise.

27.4.  Isaiah 53 in Jewish Tradition The interpretation of Isa 53 has played an important role in Jewish-Christian confrontation and dialogue for centuries, and both sides have also presented the other’s viewpoints to Isa 53 in problematic ways.45 There are different misunderstandings that have developed in Christian exegesis and theology, and that—in different variants—still prevail today in scholarly discourses.

27.4.1.  Isaiah 53 and Haftarah The first misunderstanding based on which reading Isa 53 was avoided in the synagogue liturgy because it was not part of Haftarah texts is often repeated among nonexperts in theology. During the time of the formation of rabbinical Judaism, it was established that the whole Torah was to have been read in synagogues in an annual (Babylonian) or triennial (Palestinian) cycle. At this time the prophetic Haftarot had not yet been established, but it was possible, nonetheless, to read different texts from Nebi’im that 44  See Koskenniemi, “When the Sin Is Gone,” 111–130. 45  I have discussed these different interpretations in Laato, Servant of the Lord. A good source for Jewish interpretation of Isa 53 can be found in the text book of Neubauer, Fifty-Third Chapter, and their translations can be found in Neubauer and Driver, Suffering Servant.

518   Antti Laato illustrated the Torah text of the Sabbath (see, e.g., Megillah 4:4). There were also some early traditions that certain prophetic texts (e.g., Ezek 1; 10; 16) were not to be used as Haftarah texts (Megillah 4:10). Nevertheless, Isa 53 was never mentioned as a text that could not be read as Haftarah. In the centuries that followed the formation of the Talmud, the Haftarot were established.46 In the light of the Haftarot lists, it becomes clear that many other texts from the book of Isaiah were not read. Because Isa 53 is not among these Haftarot texts, this indicates convincingly that it is impossible to conclude that it was intentionally avoided.47

27.4.2.  The Servant as Israel The second misunderstanding is that the famous medieval Jewish exegete Rashi was the first to establish the collective interpretation (i.e., Israel) in Isa 53.48 Before Rashi, Jewish exegetes would have interpreted Isa 53 mainly as referring to the Messiah. However, the Talmud and Midrashim contain different ways of identifying the Servant: he could be a righteous man (bBer 5a), an ill person (GenR 20:10), Rabbi Akiba (yShek 5:1), the Messiah (bSanh 98b; RuthR 5:6), or Moses (bSot 14a). Saadiah Gaon interpreted the Servant as referring to the prophet Jeremiah.49 Saadiah’s interpretation of Isa 53 is not restricted merely to Jeremiah. He writes that the suffering servant could, in a general way, be seen as reflecting the fates of the prophets, and then argues that the text fit the life of Jeremiah. Saadiah’s interpretation is reminiscent of modern interpretations in which the suffering servant is identified with the prophet. In these interpretations the Servant of Isa 53 is often compared to the picture given of Jeremiah in the Hebrew Bible. It is also impossible to claim that Rashi was the first to interpret Isa 53 as referring to Israel. His interpretation became popular in the Middle Ages and can be seen in many Jewish commentaries on the book of Isaiah; nonetheless, this “collective” interpretation is of ancient origin. In his work Contra Celsum 1.54–55, Origen notes that his Jewish opponent interpreted Isa 53 as “reference to the whole people, regarded as one individual, and as being in a state of dispersion and suffering, in order that many proselytes might be gained, on account of the dispersion of the Jews among numerous heathen nations.” This being the case, we have solid evidence that already in the beginning of the third century ce some Jews interpreted Isa 53 as referring to the whole people of Israel. 46  See Mann, Bible as Read. 47  See further, Langer, “Frieden,” 293–314, esp. 295–298. 48  Rashi’s famous interpretation was connected with the massacre of Jews at the time of the First Crusade. See Chazan, European Jewry; God; “Anti-Jewish Violence,” 21–43. 49 Alobaidi, Messiah, 12–17. A much stronger argument, which Alobaidi has overlooked, is that Abraham Ibn Ezra presents five details for Saadiah’s Jeremiah interpretation. All these five details mentioned by Ibn Ezra can be found in the text edited by Alobaidi, which is regarded as having been written by Saadiah. See Friedländer, Commentary of Ibn Ezra, 240–241 (the Hebrew text pp. 90–91). See further, Laato, Servant of the Lord, 309–315.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   519 That such collective interpretation received support even from Second Temple texts is clear from Dan 12:3–4. Moreover, that Dan 12:3–4 may be connected with Isa 53 receives support from the Second Maccabean books, which contain Jewish martyr theology according to which the sufferings of the Jewish martyrs are of benefit to the whole people (2 Macc 7:32–38).50

27.4.3.  Avoiding Vicarious Interpretation in Isaiah 53 The third kind of misunderstanding is the way of characterizing Targum Jonathan’s translation of Isa 53 in simple lines as anti-Christian. Scholars have emphasized that the Targumic translation has consequently downplayed all expressions that refer to the Servant having died vicariously. This tendency has been interpreted as a consequence of anti-Christian efforts. Even though I do regard it as possible that the translation of Isa 53 may have been made with an eye to Christian interpretation, it is nevertheless difficult to say that the vicarious suffering and death of the servant was avoided for this reason. Indeed, the Wisdom of Solomon is a pre-Christian Jewish text and contains a reception of Isa 53 where the vicarious suffering of the Servant was avoided. Many words and expressions in Wisd 2–5 parallel words and expressions found in Isa 52–54 (the Septuagint). At the final judgment sinners would finally realize what they had done. “They shall come, when their sins are reckoned up, with cowardly fear; and their lawless deeds shall convict them to their face” (Wisd 4:20). There is no mention of the righteous one atoning for the sins of the sinners by his innocent suffering. This being the case, Wisd 2–5 indicates that the vicarious dimension of Isa 53 could be avoided in Jewish interpretations without any anti-Christian polemics. It is also worth noting that the way in which Wisd 2–5 interprets Isa 53 is open to collective interpretation (cf. 27.4.2).

27.4.4.  Jewish Messianic Interpretation of Isaiah 53 Finally, in Christian circles it is often emphasized that the presence of the messianic interpretation of Isa 53 in the Jewish texts implies that even Jews believed in the suffering and dying Messiah who had to atone for the sins of the people by his own death. This misunderstanding is based on a problematic reading of the rabbinical sources, and such a misunderstanding is well documented in the medieval sources as, for example, in the

50  In this connection it can also be mentioned that the collective dimension is also an important aspect in Christian martyr theology and in the New Testament parenetic texts: Phil 2:6–11 and 1 Pet 2:18–25. The Christ is the typos for Christians who, too, should follow the way of suffering described in Isa 53. In Christian martyr theology, however, the vicarious aspect was not dominant.

520   Antti Laato Barcelona disputation of 1263.51 Pablo Christiani, a Jewish converter, had chosen a new aggressive mission strategy against the Jews. He attempted to convince Jews that the rabbinical literature in fact supported all elementary Christian doctrines about the Messiah.52 In particular, Pablo Christiani wanted to show that the rabbinical sources gave support to the Christian view that Isa 53 referred to the Messiah who had to suffer and die for the people of Israel. Pablo Christiani provided typical examples of eisegesis where some ideas in the rabbinical documents were taken out of their context and compared with Christian ideas. He managed to cause confusion among Jews that later forced Nahmanides to present his own account of this disputation to the Jews. In particular, the messianic interpretation of Isa 53 was regarded as actual. After the disputation, Nahmanides dealt with how Jews could interpret Isa 53 in the terms of the Messiah, even though he regarded the identification between Israel and the Servant as assured.53 Pablo and Nahmanides’s discussion in Barcelona provides a clear illustration that the messianic interpretation of Isa 53 does not imply that the Messiah would suffer and die vicariously. In Pesikta Rabbati, and later also in the Zohar, the preexistence of the Messiah is presupposed, and he is described as waiting in the presence of God and asking when he can appear in the world and save his people from all their struggles. God’s time, however, has not yet come. This waiting for the time to appear is the Messiah’s suffering for his people, and it is this time that has been interpreted vicariously: the delay of the Messiah’s appearance atones for the sins of the people. It is, however, clear that this interpretation radically differs from the Christian way of reading Isa 53.

27.4.5.  Isaiah 53 and Chabad-Lubavitch The treatment of Isa 53 in the Jewish interpretive tradition would be incomplete without mentioning the Chabad-Lubavitch movement. Rabbi Menachem Schneerson was regarded as a messianic figure in the movement based on the expectations of the Hasidic work Tanya, and these expectations did not founder after he died in 1994.54 Schneerson’s 51  There are two accounts of the Barcelona disputation: the shorter Christian version (in Latin, the author of which is unknown) and Nahmanides’s (1194–1270) own account in Hebrew. See Nahmanides’s Vichuah in Chavel, Kitvei Moses ben Nahman, 1:302–320. A good English translation can be found in Maccoby, Judaism on Trial. Quotations below are from Maccoby’s translation. A good introduction to the Barcelona disputation is Chazan, Barcelona and Beyond. 52  We know from Raymundus Martini’s Pugio fidei that Nahmanides gives a reliable picture of the Christian attempt to argue that rabbinical documents supported Christian doctrines. See Cohen, Friars, 103–169; Chazan, Daggers of Faith, 67–158. 53  See this interpretation of Nahmanides in Chavel, Kitvei Moses ben Nahman, 1:321–326. The text is also given in Neubauer, Fifty-third Chapter of Isaiah, 75–81; its translation is in Neubauer and Driver, Suffering Servant, 78–85. 54  To understand Chabad-Lubavitch messianic expectations, one has to read the Hasidic work the Tanya, written by Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, the founder of Chabad Hasidism, published in 1797. See, e.g., Likkutei Amarim; Lessons in Tanya, vols. 1–5. For this analysis of Chabad-Lubavitch messianism and the Tanya, see Rosengård, We Want Moshiach Now!

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   521 illness and death actualized Isa 53 in Jewish reception history in a new way, which had not been seen since the rise of Christianity.55 Isa 53 provided a biblical background for understanding why Schneerson had to die before his messianic status was publicly demonstrated. This treatment of Jewish messianic expectations has received harsh criticism among Jewish circles.56

27.5.  Some Individual Topics and Themes At the end of this survey some important individual topics and themes will be discussed. They indicate how the Book of Isaiah has always been an important biblical source for theological reflection and reasoning in Jewish thinking. In some cases it is also important to note how Jewish reception history interprets some Isaianic keytexts otherwise than Christian reception.

27.5.1.  Fallen Morning Star There is a long interpretive tradition, particularly in the Christian texts, that the fallen Morning Star in Isa 14:12–17, as well as in Ezek 28, depicts Satan (see Luke 10:17). When one attempts to find early examples of such “Satanic” interpretation of Isa 14 and Ezek 28 in Jewish tradition, however, the results are surprisingly scanty. For example, the rabbinic exegesis insisted that both passages should be interpreted as referring to human beings: Isa 14 to the Babylonian king and Ezek 28 to Hiram or to Adam.57 This same tendency to interpret Isa 14 as referring to the Babylonian king (Nebuchadnezzar) is presented in the Medieval Jewish commentaries (Rashi, ibn Ezra, David Kimhi following his father Joseph Kimhi). As far as I know, the earliest interpretations of Isa 14 as referring to Satan can be found in the Life of Adam and Eve58 and in the Slavonic Enoch (29:4–5; 31:4).59 It is difficult to argue in which ways these texts originated from the time before Christ, however, and whether the theme of fallen (Satan) angel is of Jewish origin or a Christian innovation.

55  Marcus, “Once and Future Messiah,” 381–401. 56  See, e.g., Berger, The Rebbe. 57  See references in Hyman, Torah Hakethubah Vehammesurah. Concerning Isa 14, see further, Halperin, “Ascension or Invasion,” 47–67; and concerning Ezek 28, see Patmore, Adam, 16–40. 58  It is worth noting that the Greek version of the Life of Adam and Eve does not contain this reference, it is attested only in later non-Greek versions of the Life of Adam and Eve. See the evidence in Anderson and Stone, Synopsis. 59  It is difficult to prove that the mythological rebellion in the heaven according to 1 Enoch 6–11 would contain an interpretation of Isa 14. Cf. Hanson, “Rebellion in Heaven,” 195–223. See further, Youngblood, “Fallen Star,” 22–31, 47.

522   Antti Laato An inner-biblical link, even though quite sophisticated, exists between Isa 14 and Gen 6:1–4. Gen 6:4 refers to Nephilim, which are related to Anakim (Num 13:33). Anakim, in turn, are related to Rephaim, which are mentioned in Isa 14:9 as the ones who wait the fallen morning star to join to their group (Isa 14:12; n.b. the use of the verb ‫)נפל‬. Even though this link may be regarded as too sophisticated, it is worth noting that Ugaritic material may provide evidence that Nephilim and Rephaim were both related to the Netherworld.60 Therefore, the myth of cosmic rebellion attested in the book of Jubilees and 1 Enoch with reference to Gen 6:1–4 may have received inspiration from Isa 14.61 The problem is that such an influence is difficult to prove in early Jewish writings.62

27.5.2.  Solid Stone Foundation Isa 28:16 contains an enigmatic expression ’eben bōḥan which, in the context, has been characterized by means of several Hebrew expressions.63 The verse has inspired Jewish interpreters to understand this expression as reference to ’eben šĕtīyya the solid rock foundation in the Temple of Solomon on which the Ark of Covenant was once placed (mYoma 5:2). The expression has also inspired many Jewish authors to call their writings ’eben bōḥan. Many examples of writings with this name can be found with the aid of the electronic version of the Encyclopaedia Judaica. For example, Kalonymus ben Kalonymus (Ben Meir ha-Nasi; 1286–after 1328) wrote a rhymed satire of the moral and religious abuses of his contemporaries, which he called ’eben bōḥan. Shem-Tob ben Isaac Shaprut of Tudela wrote his ’eben bōḥan sometime between 1380 and 1385. The work was a polemic tractate against baptized Jews, followed the literary form of the first known polemical anti-Christian tractate Sefer Milhamot HaShem (by Jacob ben Reuben), and was written in the form of a dialogue. It contained fourteen chapters (or Gates) and was much broader in its treatment of anti-Christian themes than was Jacob ben Reuben’s work.

27.5.3. Lilith Isa 34:14 contains an unclear reference to Lilith (‫)לילית‬. The word is apparently a loan from the Akkadian lilitu, a demon-like figure associated with stormy winds.64 Lilith was developed in the Jewish interpretive tradition. Earliest evidence refers to her as a female 60  See Kvanvig, Primeval History, 274–310. 61  See, e.g., Rowland Page, Myth. 62  There is no proof that Isa 14:12–15 would be behind Sir 16:7 and 17:32, an idea argued for in Argall, 1 Enoch, 137; Jensen, “Helel Ben Shaḥar,” 339–356, esp. 346–347. 63 Dekker, Zion’s Rock-Solid Foundations. 64  Hutter, “Lilith,” 520–521.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   523 demon (4Q510; the Testament of Solomon under the name Obizoth) and Talmudic passages continue to describe her as a demon with wings and long hair (Erubin 100b; Nidda 24b). The most interesting passage in the Babylonian Talmud is Shabbat 151b, where man is warned not to sleep alone because Lilith may visit him. The precise meaning of this is not clear, but in later Jewish writings Lilith was regarded as Adam’s first wife, with whom he copulated and from whom many demons were born (Alphabet of Ben Sira 23, 33). Their unhappy “marriage” ended with desperate hate and Lilith became a demonic opponent to Adam and Eve, as well as to their children. In later Kabbalah literature Lilith was a well-known female demon who threatened to kill children and seduce men.65

27.6.  Jewish Liturgy The Book of Isaiah has always been important to Jewish liturgy. In the following some examples will be given. They show that the texts of Isaiah have been used in various ways in Jewish liturgical contexts.

27.6.1. Trishagion Isa 6:3 has been an important liturgical text not only in Christian tradition but also especially in Jewish reception history.66 The reference to Trishagion is visible already in Jewish apocryphal and pseudepigraphic literature (Apocalypse of Abraham 17:7; 1 Enoch 39:12; 2 Enoch 20; Testament of Adam 1:4; Testament of Isaac 8:3); and Qumran writings support the conclusion that angelic liturgy was already fully developed in pre-Christian Judaism.67 In the Jewish Morning Prayer, the angelic liturgy can be found in the third prayer of ‘Amida (The Eighteen) which is called Qedushah, the “sanctification” of God’s great Name. In this prayer both Isa 6:3 and Ezek 3:12 are quoted. When the precentor repeats ‘Amida, he says: “We will sanctify Your Name in the world even as they sanctify it in the highest heavens, as it is written by the hand of Your prophet: and they called one unto the other and said . . . .” The congregation responds by quoting the saying of the seraphim in Isa 6:3 verbatim: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.”68 The same two biblical texts also appear in the passage where God’s Great Name is praised (before Ahavo rabo prayer).

65  Krebs, “Lilith—Adams erste Frau,” 141–152; Scholem, “Lilith,” 17–19. 66  Concerning the background of the Trishagion in the Hebrew Bible and its appearance in early Jewish writings, see esp. Werner, “Genesis,” 19–32; Williamson, Holy. 67 Frennesson, Common Rejoicing. 68  See more closely Heinemann, Jewish Liturgy, 54–62.

524   Antti Laato

27.6.2.  The Festival of Sukkot In the Mishnah tractate Sukkah 4:9–10, a Jewish water ritual during the Festival of Sukkot is described. The Gemara in the Babylonian Talmud 48b explains this Simchat Beit HaSho’evah (“Rejoicing at the Place of the Water-Drawing”) with a reference to Isa 12:3: “And you will joyfully (běśāśôn) draw (ûšě’abtem) water from the wells of salvation.” The connection of this water ritual in the Festival of Sukkot to Isa 12:3 was made early on. In mSukkah 5:1, it is argued that “anyone who has not seen the rejoicing (śimḥat) of bêt haššô’ăbâ in his life has never seen rejoicing.” The name of the ritual in mSukkah 5:1 is given as bêt haššô’ăbâ, which is apparently an allusion to the verb šā’ab in Isa 12:3. In addition, rejoicing (śimḥâ) is an essential part of the ritual corresponding to the content of Isa 12:3.69

27.6.3.  Jewish Qaddish Prayer According to Isa 29:23, the people of Israel will sanctify the Name of God in the coming time of salvation: yaqdîšû šěmî wěhiqdîšû ’et qědôš Yacăqōb, ‘they will sanctify my name and they will sanctify the Holy One of Jacob.’ This promise is echoed in the Jewish prayer book Siddur, where the sanctification of the Name of God is an essential prayer. The Jewish Qaddish prayer in Aramaic begins yitgaddal wĕyitqaddaš šĕmēh rabbā’ (“exalted and sanctified is the Great Name”) and its essential nucleus is “May His great Name be blessed forever and ever,” which is an echo from Dan 2:20 (and the Hebrew equivalent in Ps 113:2).

27.6.4.  Pilgrimage to Zion In the Temple area of Jerusalem, many graffitis left behind by Jewish pilgrims have been found. One of the most famous is the text of Isa 66:14 written on the Western Wall: “And when you see this, your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall flourish like an herb.” Scholars have discussed the time period in which this particular inscription might have been made, and opinions vary between the reign of the Emperor Julian (361–363), when the hopes were running high that the Temple could be rebuilt, and the Umayyad period, when the Jews had the possibility of settling in the city of Jerusalem again. The third proposal has been the reign of the Empress Eudocia in the middle of the fifth century, since it was she who permitted Jews to make pilgrimage to Jerusalem.70

69  See Bornhäuser, Mischna: Sukka, 139–140. Bornhäuser also argues that the bêt in the name of the water ritual should be understood as “place,” not as “temple.” 70  For these alternatives, see Bahat, Illustrated Atlas, 75.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   525

27.6.5.  Haftarah Texts Liturgical readings of weekly Haftarot consist of several Isaiah passages.71 The texts were chosen to support the Torah reading, or alternatively were related to the themes in the Jewish festivals. Tisha b’Av, in particular when Jews mourn the destruction of the temple, contains an interesting selection of Isaianic passages. This liturgical election probably goes back to the period when the sermons were compiled in Pesiqta de Rab Kahana. In these sermons ten Isaiah passages are used as Haftarot for the Sabbats around Tisha b’Av.72 Isa 1:1–27 begins the cycle of eight Haftarah passages that parallel the readings from Devarim. The Isaianic passage was read on the Shabbat immediately preceding Tisha b’Av. The theme of Isa 1:1–27 is related to the criticism of the inhabitants of Zion. The city had once been the city of righteousness but was now full of sin, and in need of purification. On the other hand, Isa 40:1–26 opened the seven comforting passages selected from Isa 40–66 and was read on the Shabbat immediately after Tisha b’Av. The content of the text is a comforting message for those who live in exile and hope to be able to return to Zion. Other texts in this cycle are Isa 49:14–51:2; 54:11–55:5; 51:12–52:12; 54:1–10; 60:1–22, and 61:10–63:9.73

Bibliography Alobaidi, Joseph. The Messiah in Isaiah 53: The Commentaries of Saadia Gaon, Salmon ben Yeruham and Yefet ben Eli on Is 52:13–53:12; Edition and Translation. Bern: Peter Lang, 1998. Anderson, Gary A., and Michael E. Stone. A Synopsis of the Books of Adam and Eve. SBLEJL 17. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 19992. Anderssén-Löf, Mia. May He Speedily Come: A Comparative Study on Hardal and Haredi Understandings of Exile and Redemption. Turku: Åbo Akademi University Press, 2017. Argall, Randall A. 1 Enoch and Sirach: A Comparative and Conceptual Analysis of the Themes of Revelation, Creation and Judgment. SBLEJL 8. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1995. Bahat, Dan. The Illustrated Atlas of Jerusalem. Israel: Israel Map and Publishing Company, 1996. Beentjes, Pancratius  C. “Hezekiah and Isaiah: A Study on Ben Sira xlviii, 15–25.” In New Avenues in the Study of the Old Testament, edited by Adam S. van der Woude, 77–88. OtSt 25. Leiden: Brill, 1989. Beentjes, Pancratius  C. “Isaiah in the Book of Chronicles.” In Isaiah in Context: Studies in Honour of Arie van der Kooij on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday, edited by Michaël N. van der Meer, Percy van Keulen, Wido van Peursen, and Bas ter Haar Romney, 15–24. VTS 138. Leiden: Brill, 2010. Begg, Christopher. “Isaiah in Josephus.” In Josephus und das Neue Testament, edited by Christfried Böttrich and Jens Herzer, 233–243. WUNT 209. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007. Berger, David. The Jewish-Christian Debate in the High Middle Ages: A Critical Edition of the Nizzahon Vetus with an Introduction, Translation, and Commentary. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1979. 71  See these texts in Fishbane, Haftarot, vii–xii. 72  Teugels, “Rabbinic Homily,” 433–446. 73  See Neusner, Beyond Catastrophe.

526   Antti Laato Berger, David. The Rebbe, the Messiah, and the Scandal of Orthodox Indifference. Oxford: Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2001. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. Opening the Sealed Book: Interpretations of the Book of Isaiah in Late Antiquity. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2006. Bornhäuser, Hans. Die Mischna: Sukka (Laubhüttenfest) Text, Übersetzung und Erklärung. Berlin: Alfred Töpelmann, 1935. Chavel, Rabbi Charles. Kitvei Moses ben Nahman. Vol. 1. Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook, 1971. Chavel, Rabbi Charles. Ramban Nachmanides Commentary on the Torah: Leviticus. New York: Shilo, 1974. Chazan, Robert. “The Anti-Jewish Violence of 1096: Perpetrators and Dynamics.” In Religious Violence between Christians and Jews: Medieval Roots, Modern Perspectives, edited by Anna Sapir Abulafia, 21–43. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave, 2002. Chazan, Robert. Barcelona and Beyond: The Disputation of 1263 and Its Aftermath. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992. Chazan, Robert. Daggers of Faith: Thirteenth-Century Christian Missionizing and Jewish Response. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989. Chazan, Robert. European Jewry and the First Crusade. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. Chazan, Robert. God, Humanity, and History: The Hebrew First Crusade Narratives. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. Cohen, Jeremy. The Friars and the Jews: The Evolution of Medieval Anti-Judaism. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982. Collins, John J. The Scepter and the Star: The Messiahs of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Ancient Literature. Anchor Bible Reference Library. New York: Doubleday, 1995. Dekker, Jaap. Zion’s Rock-Solid Foundations: An Exegetical Study of the Zion Text in Isaiah 28:16. OtSt 54. Leiden: Brill, 2007. Donaldson, Terence  L. “Proselytes or ‘Righteous Gentiles’? The Status of Gentiles in Eschatological Pilgrimage Patterns of Thought.” JSP 7 (1990): 3–27. Elbogen, Ismar. Jewish Liturgy: A Comprehensive History. Translated by Raymond P. Scheindlin. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1993. Feldman, Louis H. “Josephus’ Portrait of Isaiah.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah, vol. 2, edited by Craig  C.  Broyles and Craig  A.  Evans, 583–608. VTS 70.2 / FIOTL 1.2. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Fishbane, Michael. The JPS Bible Commentary: Haftarot. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2002. Frennesson, Björn. “In a Common Rejoicing”: Liturgical Communion with Angels in Qumran. SSU 14. Uppsala: Uppsala University Library, 1999. Friedländer, Michael. The Commentary of Ibn Ezra on Isaiah. New York: Philipp Feldheim, 1873. Ginzberg, Louis. Legends of the Jews. Vol. 2, Bible Times and Characters from Moses in the Wilderness to Esther. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2003. Gosse, Bernhard. “Sabbath, Identity and Universalism Go Together after the Return from Exile.” JSOT 29 (2005): 359–370. Hall, Robert  G. “The Ascension of Isaiah: Community Situation, Date, and Place in Early Christianity.” JBL 109 (1990): 289–306. Halperin, David J. “Ascension or Invasion: Implications of the Heavenly Journey in Ancient Judaism.” Religion 18 (1988): 47–67.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   527 Hanson, Paul. “Rebellion in Heaven, Azazel, and Euhemeristic Heroes in 1 Enoch 6–11.” JBL 96 (1977): 195–223. Häusl, Maria, ed. Denkt nicht mehr an das Frühere! Begründungsressourcen in Esra/Nehemia und Jes 40–66 im Vergleich. BBB 184. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht and Bonn University Press, 2018. Hutter, Manfred. “Lilith.” DDD, 520–521. Hyman, A. Torah Hakethubah Vehammesurah: A Reference Book of Scriptural Passages Quoted in Talmudic, Midrashic and Early Rabbinic Literature. 3 vols. Tel Aviv: Dvir, 1979. Jensen, Joseph. “Helel Ben Shaḥar (Isaiah 14:12–15) in Bible and Tradition.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretive Tradition, vol. 1, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 339–356. VTS 70.1 / FIOTL 1.1. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Jeremias, Joachim. Jesus’ Promise to the Nations. Translated by Samuel  H.  Hooke. Franz Delitzsch-Vorlesungen. SBT 24. London: SCM Press, 1958. Kamesar, Adam. “The Virgin of Isaiah 7:14: Philological Argument from the Second to the Fifth Century.” JTS 41 (1990): 51–75. Kimḥi, Joseph. The Book of the Covenant of Joseph Kimḥi. Translated by Frank Talmage. Mediaeval Sources in Translation 12. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1972. Knibb, Michael A. “Isaianic Traditions in the Apocryphra and Pseudepigrapha.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah, vol. 2, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 633–650. VTS 70.2 / FIOTL 1.2. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Knight, Jonathan. The Ascension of Isaiah. Guides to the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1995. Knight, Jonathan. Disciples of the Beloved One: The Christology, Setting and Theological Context of the Ascension of Isaiah. JSPS 18. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Kooij, Arie van der. Die alten Textzeugen des Jesajabuches: Ein Beitrag zur Textgeschichte des Alten Testaments. OBO 35. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1981. Koskenniemi, Erkki. “When the Sin Is Gone: Longevity of Men in Early Judaism.” In Life of Adam and Eve: Using Jewish Traditions and Confronting Gnostic Reversed Exegesis, edited by Antti Laato and Lotta Valve, 111–130. SRB 9. Åbo Akademi University and Network for the Study of the Reception History of the Bible, 2019. Krebs, Walter. “Lilith: Adams erste Frau.” ZRGG 27 (1975): 141–152. Kronholm, Tryggve. “Der kommende Hiskia: Erwägungen zur zeitgeschichtlichen bzw. messianischen (christologischen) Interpretation der Immanuelweissagung Jes 7,14 im Licht der altjüdischen Haggada.” Unpublished manuscript, 1982. Kronholm, Tryggve. “Den kommende Hiskia: Ett försök att förstå den messianska interpretationen (Matt 1,18–25) av Immanuelsprofetian (Jes 7,14) i ljuset av några rabbinska texter.” SEÅ 54 (1989): 109–117. Kvanvig, Helge S. Primeval History: Babylonian, Biblical, and Enochic: An Intertextual Reading. SJSJ 149. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Laato, Antti. About Zion I Will Not Be Silent: The Book of Isaiah as an Ideological Unity. ConBOT 44. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1998. Laato, Antti. “Hezekiah in the Rewritten Version of the Book of Isaiah, Targum Isaiah.” In Take Another Scroll and Write: Studies in the Interpretive Afterlife of Prophets and Prophecy in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, edited by Pekka Lindqvist and Sven Grebenstein, 111–138. SRB 6. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2016.

528   Antti Laato Laato, Antti. “Isaianic Texts, the Book of Ezra and Nehemiah, and the Restoration of Jerusalem.” Forthcoming. Laato, Antti. “Rewriting Israel’s History in the Apocalyptic Context: Animal Apocalypse in First Enoch.” SEÅ 82 (2017): 28–51. Laato, Antti. “Understanding Zion Theology in the Book of Isaiah.” In Studies in Isaiah: History, Theology, and Reception, edited by Greger Andersson, Tommy Wasserman, and David Willgren, 22–46. LHBOTS 654. Edinburgh: T&T Clark Bloomsbury, 2017. Laato, Antti. “Who Is Immanuel? The Rise and the Foundering of Isaiah’s Messianic Expectations.” PhD diss., University of Åbo, 1988. Laato, Antti. Who Is the Servant of the Lord? Jewish and Christian Interpretations on Isaiah 53 from Antiquity to the Middle Ages. SRB 4. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2012. Lange, Armin, and Matthias Weigold, eds. Biblical Quotations and Allusions in Second Temple Jewish Literature. JAJS 5. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2011. Langer, Gerhard. “Frieden, Gerechtigkeit und Tora: Ausgewählte Jesajazitate in der rabbinischen Literatur.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 293–314. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Lessons in Tanya: The Tanya of R. Schneur Zalman of Liadi. 5 vols. Compact edition. Brooklyn, NY: Kehot Publication Society, 2004. Lester, G.  Brooke. Daniel Evokes Isaiah: Allusive Characterization of Foreign Rule in the Hebrew-Aramaic Book of Daniel. LHBOTS 606. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015. Likkutei Amarim—Tanya by Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi. Bilingual edition. Brooklyn, NY: Kehot Publication Society, 1993. Lundgren, Svante. Particularism and Universalism in Modern Jewish Thought. Academic Studies in the History of Judaism. Binghamton, NY: Global Publications, 2001. Maccoby, Hyam. Judaism on Trial: Jewish-Christian Disputations in the Middle Ages. London: Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 1993. Mann, Jacob. The Bible as Read and Preached in the Old Synagogue. New York: Ktav, 1971. Marcus, Joel. “The Once and Future Messiah in Early Christianity and Chabad.” NTS 46 (2000): 381–401. Mezenthin, Christian. Jesaja-Auslegung in Qumran. AThANT 98. Zurich: TVZ, 2010. Mikraoth Gedoloth: Isaiah Volume 1. Translated by Rabbi  A.  J.  Rosenberg. Brooklyn, NY: Judaica Press, 2007. Mikraoth Gedoloth: Isaiah Volume 2. Translated by Rabbi  A.  J.  Rosenberg. Brooklyn, NY: Judaica Press, 2012. Neubauer, Adolf. The Fifty-Third Chapter of Isaiah according to the Jewish Interpreters. Vol. 1, Texts (1876–1877). Reprinted by Varda Books, 2005. Neubauer, Adolf, and Samuel Driver. The “Suffering Servant” of Isaiah according to the Jewish Interpreters. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 1999. Neusner, Jacob. Beyond Catastrophe: The Rabbi’s Reading of Isaiah’s Vision; Israelite MessiahProphecies in Formative Judaism; An Anthology of Pesiqta deRab Kahana for the Seven Sabbaths after the Ninth of Ab. South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 131. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1996. Neusner, Jacob. Genesis Rabbah: The Judaic Commentary to the Book of Genesis. A New American Translation. Vol. 2, Parashiyyot Thirty-Four through Sixty-Seven on Genesis 8:15 to 18:9. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1985.

Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Jewish Traditions   529 Neusner, Jacob. Isaiah in Talmud and Midrash: A Source Book Part A; Mishnah, Tosefta, Tanaaite Midrash-Compilations, Yerushalmi and Associated Midrash Compilations. Studies in Judaism. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2007. Neusner, Jacob. Isaiah in Talmud and Midrash: A Source Book Part B; the Later MidrashCompilations and the Bavli. Studies in Judaism. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2007. Neusner, Jacob. Messiah in Context: Israel’s History and Destiny in Formative Judaism. Foundations of Judaism: Method, Teleology, Doctrine 2. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984. Oswalt, John N. The Holy One of Israel: Studies in the Book of Isaiah. Cambridge, UK: James Clarke, 2014. Page, Hugh Rowland, Jr. The Myth of Cosmic Rebellion: A Study of Its Reflexes in Ugaritic and Biblical Literature. VTS 65. Leiden: Brill, 1996. Patmore, Hector M. Adam, Satan, and the King of Tyre: The Interpretation of Ezekiel 28:11–19 in Late Antiquity. JCP 20. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Porton, Gary  G. “Isaiah and the Kings: The Rabbis on the Prophet Isaiah.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah, vol. 2, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 2:693–716. VTS 70.2 / FIOTL 1.2. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Ravitzky, Aviezer. Messianism, Zionism, and Jewish Religious Radicalism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993. Rosengård, Nanna. We Want Moshiach Now! Understanding the Messianic Message in the Jewish Chabad-Lubavitch Movement. Turku: Åbo Akademi University Press, 2009. Rothstein, David. “Hezekiah’s Prayer and Childlessness: Variant Forms of a Tradition, as Reflected in LXX, Josephus, and Rabbinic Sources.” ZAW 128 (2016): 267–283. Runesson, Anders. “Particularistic Judaism and Universalistic Christianity? Some Critical Remarks on Terminology and Theology.” Studia Theologica 53 (1999): 55–75. Scholem, Gershom. “Lilith.” In Encyclopaedia Judaica, vol. 13, edited by Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik, 17–19. Detroit, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 20072. Seeligman, Isaac L. “The Septuagint Version of Isaiah: A Discussion of Its Problems.” PhD diss., University of Leiden, 1948. Reprinted in The Septuagint Version of Isaiah and Cognate Studies, edited by Robert Hanhart and Hermann Spieckermann, 119–294. FAT 40. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004. Simon, Uriel. “Abraham Ibn Ezra.” In Hebrew Bible/Old Testament: The History of Its Interpretation, vol. 1, From the Beginning to the Middle Ages (until 1300), part 2, The Middle Ages, edited by Magne Saebø, 377–387. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000. Simon, Uriel. “Ibn Ezra between Medievalism and Modernism: The Case of Isaiah XL–LXVI.” In Congress Volume: Salamanca 1983, edited by John A. Emerton, 257–271. VTS 36. Leiden: Brill, 1985. Skarsaune, Oskar. “Jewish and Christian Interpretations of Messianic Texts in the Book of Isaiah as Jewish/Christian Dialogue: From Matthew to the Rabbis.” SEÅ 77 (2012): 25–45. Sousa, Rodrigo F. de. Eschatology and Messianism in LXX Isaiah 1–12. LHBOT 516. New York: T&T Clark, 2010. Teugels, Lieve. “Consolation and Composition in a Rabbinic Homily on Isaiah 40: Pesiqta’ de Rav Kahana’ 16.” In Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Festschrift Willem  A.  M.  Beuken, edited by Jacques van Ruiten and Marc Vervenne, 433–446. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1997. Troxel, Ronald L. “Isaiah 7,14–16 through the Eyes of the Septuagint.” EThL 79 (2003): 1–22.

530   Antti Laato Tzoref, Shani. “Textuality and Identity in the Qumran Pesharim on Isaiah.” In Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates, edited by Florian Wilk and Peter Gemeinhardt, 133–165. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Weren, Wilhelm J. C. “Quotations from Isaiah and Matthew’s Christology (Mt 1,23 and 4,15–16).” In Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Festschrift Willem  A.  M.  Beuken, edited by Jacques van Ruiten and Marc Vervenne, 447–465. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1997. Werner, Eric. “The Genesis of Liturgical Sanctus.” In Essays Presented to Egon Wellesz, edited by Jack Westrup, 19–32. Oxford: Clarendon, 1966. Wieringen, Archibald, L.  H.  M.  van. “Sirach 48:17–25 and the Isaiah-Book: Hezekiah and Isaiah in the Book of Sirach and the Reader-Oriented Perspective of the Isaiah-Book.” In Rewriting Biblical History: Essays on Chronicles and Ben Sira in Honor of Pancratius C. Beentjes, edited by Jeremy Corley and Harm van Grol, 191–210. DCLS 7. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2011. Wilk, Florian, and Peter Gemeinhardt, eds. Transmission and Interpretation of the Book of Isaiah in the Context of Intra- and Interreligious Debates. BETL 280. Leuven: Peeters, 2016. Williamson, H. G. M. Holy, Holy, Holy: The Story of a Liturgical Formula. Julius-WellhausenVorlesung, CORO 1. Berlin: de Guyter, 2009. Young, Robb A. Hezekiah in History and Tradition. VTS 155. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Youngblood, Ronald. “Fallen Star: The Evolution of Lucifer.” BibRev 14 (1998): 22–31, 47.

chapter 28

Isa i a h i n th e N ew Testa m en t Steve Moyise

28.1. Introduction According to the Evangelists, early Christian interest in the book of Isaiah began with John the Baptist, whose call to repentance in the wilderness reminded them of Isa 40:3. Indeed, in John’s Gospel, an abbreviated form of the words is put into his mouth: “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord.’ ” (John 1:23) Luke’s quotation also includes the words of Isa 40:4–5, perhaps because the last line (“and all flesh shall see the salvation of God”) matched his interest in a universal mission (cf. Acts 1:8). Paul extends this interest in Isa 40 by quoting verse 13 on the unfathomability of God’s purposes in Rom 11:34 (“For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counsellor?”) and 1 Cor 2:16 (“For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?”), while the author of 1 Peter uses verses 7–8 to speak of the permanence of the “word of our Lord,” which he identifies as the “good news that was announced to you” (1 Pet 1:25). Jesus was attracted to John’s reform movement and was duly baptized, though the Gospels omit any mention of repentance on his part. It is perhaps because Jesus’s ministry was in the towns and villages of Galilee rather than the wilderness that he makes no use of Isa 40 himself. Instead, the Gospels portray him as identifying with the servant of Isa 42:1–4 (Matt 12:18–21), the suffering servant of Isa 52:13–53:12 (Matt 8:17; Luke 22:37; cf. Mark 10:45), and the anointed prophet of Isa 61:1–2 (Luke 4:18–19; cf. Matt 5:3–4). The uncanny resemblance between the figure in the fourth servant song and the passion of Jesus led to seven of its verses being explicitly quoted in the New Testament (52:15; 53:1, 4,

532   Steve Moyise 7–8, 9, 12).1 The exhortation to accept suffering just as Christ accepted suffering in 1 Pet 2:21–25 is virtually a gloss on Isa 53:4–12: For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps. “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” [53:9] When he was abused, he did not return abuse; when he suffered, he did not threaten [53:7]; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross [53:4, 12], so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed [53:5]. For you were going astray like sheep [53:6], but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls.

Once this identification had been made, it was natural that verses such as Isa 52:14 (“so marred was his appearance, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of mortals”) was seen as a description of the flogging and crucifixion, while 52:13 (“he shall be exalted and lifted up, and shall be very high”) spoke of the resurrection and ascension (Acts 3:13). It has been the custom in the Church to read the fourth servant song on Good Friday (along with Ps 22). Jesus is reported to have quoted Isa 6:9–10 as an explanation for why his parables are being misunderstood. It is the same as in Isaiah’s day, when God commissioned him to go to the people and say: “Keep listening, but do not comprehend; keep looking, but do not understand” (Isa 6:9), followed by the command: “Make the mind of this people dull (‫שמן‬/παχύνω), and stop (‫כבד‬/βαρέως ἤκουσαν) their ears, and shut (‫שעע‬/καμμύω) their eyes, so that (‫פן‬/μήποτε) they may not look with their eyes, and listen with their ears, and comprehend with their minds, and turn and be healed” (Isa 6:10). According to Mark 4:11–12, Jesus offered this as an explanation for why he speaks to the crowds in parables but explains things privately to his disciples: To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables; in order that (ἵνα) “they may indeed look, but not perceive, and may indeed listen, but not understand; so that they may not (μήποτε) turn again and be forgiven (ἀφεθῇ αὐτοῖς).”

Christians have always found this difficult to reconcile with the view that using parables was a masterstroke of communication and it is possible that Matthew thought likewise, for he says that Jesus told parables “because” (ὅτι) “seeing they do not perceive, and hearing they do not listen, nor do they understand” (Matt 13:13).2 Continuing the theme of Israel’s stubbornness, Matthew and Mark both present Jesus as quoting Isa 29:13 in the form: “This people honours me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines” (Matt 15:8–9/Mark 7:6–7). This reading follows the LXX, which differs significantly 1  52:15 (Rom 15:21); 53:1 (John 12:38, Rom 10:16); 53:4 (Matt 8:17); 53:7–8 (Acts 8:32–33); 53:9 (1 Pet 2:22); 53:12 (Luke 22:37). 2  Though this is somewhat mitigated by the fact that he preserves the μήποτε in the last clause.

Isaiah in the New Testament   533 from the MT in the second half of the verse (“their worship of me is a human commandment learned by rote”), and Roger Booth concludes that this reading reflects the later conflict between church and synagogue.3 Richard France argues, however, that it is just as likely that the Evangelists substituted the LXX text for their source text for the benefit of their Greek-speaking readers/hearers.4 In a discourse that only appears in Matthew and Luke, messengers from John are sent to ask Jesus: “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” (Matt 11:3/ Luke 7:19) The reply is almost identical in the two Gospels and may derive from a source customarily known as Q. It lists six ailments (blind, lame, leper, deaf, dead, poor) followed by verbs of recovery (see, walk, cleansed, hear, resurrected, hear good news). With the exception of leprosy, the ailments and cures are most likely drawn from Isaiah (e.g., 29:18­–19; 35:5–6; 61:1) with the purpose of showing that Jesus is fulfilling Isaiah’s promised restoration. Jesus’s symbolic act of overturning the tables in the temple is accompanied by words from Isa 56:7 (“for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples”), which are then contrasted (“but you have made it”) with a phrase from Jer 7:11 (“den of robbers”). Much of the debate has concerned the nature of the accusation “den of robbers” (corrupt hierarchy, haven for brigands, false security), with the Isaiah text taken more or less at face value (inclusion of the Gentiles). However, it is by no means clear that this was central to Jesus’s vision, and Matthew and Luke both omit the key phrase “for all peoples” (Matt 21:13; Luke 19:46), leaving the emphasis on the word “prayer.” In the so-called apocalyptic discourse, Jesus is said to predict that the “sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken” (Mark 13:24–25). All four elements are found in Joel 2:10, but Mark’s Greek is closer to Isa 13:10 (σκοτισθήσεται τοῦ ἡλίου, σελήνη οὐ δώσει τὸ φῶς αὐτῆς) and Isa 34:4 (τὰ ἄστρα πεσεῖται). The language also appears in Rev 6:12–13, with the added detail of the sky being rolled up like a scroll, as in Isa 34:4. There has been much debate in Jesus scholarship as to whether this language refers to the end of the world (in which case Jesus was wrong; it did not happen within a generation, as Mark 13:30 predicts) or whether it refers to the destruction of the Temple (which did happen within a generation and is also how the discourse began, Mark 13:2). Critical to this debate has been whether the context of Isaiah (judgment on Babylon/the nations) is significant or whether the words have received new meaning in the changed context.

28.2.  The Apostle Paul The Apostle Paul quotes around twenty-eight verses of Isaiah, twenty of them coming in his letter to the Romans.5 It is no wonder that Ross Wagner subtitled his monograph, 3 Booth, Jesus, 90–94. 4 France, Mark, 284. 5  Rom 2:24; 3:15–17; 9:27–28; 9:29; 9:33; 10:11; 10:15; 10:16; 10:20; 10:21; 11:8; 11:26–27; 11:27; 11:34; 14:11; 15:12; 15:21. The others are found in 1 Cor 1:19; 2:9; 2:16; 14:21; 15:32; 15:54; 2 Cor 6:2; 6:17; Gal 4:27.

534   Steve Moyise “Isaiah and Paul ‘in Concert’ in the Letter to the Romans.” Paul finds himself in the position where Gentiles have embraced his message about Jesus but many of his fellow Jews have rejected it (Rom 9:30–31). He thus looks to Isaiah for support (and understanding) in three main areas: (a) the inclusion of the Gentiles, (b) the stubbornness of Israel; and (c) the ultimate fate of Israel.

28.2.1.  The Inclusion of the Gentiles In Rom 15:9–12, Paul quotes a number of texts (Deut 32:43; Pss 18:49; 117:1) that mention “Gentiles” (ἔθνη), ending with a quotation of Isa 11:10 in the form: “The root of Jesse shall come, the one who rises (ἀνιστάμενος) to rule (ἄρχειν) the Gentiles; in him the Gentiles shall hope (ἐλπιοῦσιν).” This follows the LXX exactly, though it differs considerably from the MT, notably in its rendering of ‫“( נס‬signal/banner”) with a verb (ἄρχω) and ‫דרש‬ (“search/inquire”) with ἐλπίζω. This could be because the LXX translator was using a different Vorlage to that represented by the MT, although Wagner thinks that it more likely represents an interpretative translation, facilitated by the presence of “Gentiles hoping” (ἔθνη ἐλπιοῦσιν) elsewhere in Isaiah (42:4; 51:5) and the similarity between ‫ נס‬and ‫נסיך‬, which is sometimes rendered by forms of ἄρχω (e.g., Josh 13:21; Ezek 32:30).6 Isa 65:1 does not specifically mentions Gentiles, but Paul’s citation in Rom 10:20 (“I have been found by those who did not seek me: I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me”) refers it to Gentiles. This is clear because he draws a contrast (“But of Israel”) before he continues the quotation to include the words of Isa 65:2 in the form “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people.” Paul constructs a similar contrast in Rom 9:33, where the “precious stone” of Isa 28:16 is identified as the stone that causes Israel to stumble in Isa 8:14, while the positive promise (“One who trusts will not panic”) is being fulfilled by all those who trust in the gospel. Paul is aided in this endeavor by the LXX’s translation of Isa 8:14, which introduced a contrast by rendering “both houses of Israel” by “the house of Jacob” and describing another group of people who do not stumble, because they trust in him (καὶ ἐὰν ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ πεποιθὼς— missing from the MT).

28.2.2.  The Stubbornness/Rebelliousness of Israel As well as using the negative picture of Israel found in Isa 65:2 (Rom 10:21) and Isa 8:14 (Rom 9:33), Paul claims that “Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking” because “God gave them a sluggish spirit, eyes that would not see and ears that would not hear, down to this very day” (Rom 11:8). This depiction draws on Deut 29:4, but the unusual expression πνεῦμα κατανύξεως (“spirit of stupor,” RSV) is unique to Isa 29:10, where it renders ‫רוח תרדמה‬. According to Wagner, “Moses’ lament that God has not intervened to cure 6 Wagner, Heralds, 322.

Isaiah in the New Testament   535 Israel’s obtuse rebelliousness . . . is transmuted into the much stronger claim that Israel’s insensibility has been directly caused by God.”7 This idea first appears in Isaiah in his call vision (6:9–10), and it reappears at 29:10 (cf. 43:8; 56:10; 59:10), along with the rare word for “closing (καμμύω) the eyes.” Earlier in Romans, Paul turned his rhetoric to one who claims to be a Jew (2:17) and preaches against theft, adultery, and idolatry, yet does the very same things (2:21–23). Such hypocrisy is, of course, condemned in Scripture (cf. Jer 7:9–11), but Paul quotes Isa 52:5 in the form: “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you” (2:24). The MT lacks the phrases “among the Gentiles” and “because of you” and appears to be a more general statement that Israel’s piteous state has led to God’s name being despised (Isa 52:3–5). The LXX clarifies that God’s name is being despised/blasphemed “among the Gentiles,” but it is the addition of δι᾽ ὑμᾶς (“because of you”) that helps Paul to take this statement as an accusation, despite the fact that the overall context is to do with salvation (Isa 52:6–10). Some commentators have criticized Paul for this, but Richards Hays notes that Paul quotes Isa 52:7 in Rom 10:15 (“How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news”) and so clearly understands the context as ultimately salvific. Just as judgment comes before salvation in Isaiah, so the (apparent) condemnation of Rom 2:24 comes before the revelation of salvation in Rom 9–11: The letter’s rhetorical structure lures the reader into expecting Israel’s final condemnation, but the later chapters undercut such an expectation, requiring the reader in subsequent encounters with the text to understand the Isaiah quotation more deeply in relation to its original prophetic context.8

28.2.3.  The Ultimate Fate of Israel In Rom 11:13–22, Paul has to rebuke the Gentile Christians for assuming that they have replaced Israel in God’s plans. He tells them to remember that “it is not you that support the root, but the root that supports you” (Rom 11:18). He then goes on to reiterate a point that he has made several times, namely, that “the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” (Rom 11:29). He has earlier drawn on Isaiah’s idea of a faithful remnant: And Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, “Though the number of the children of Israel were like the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved; for the Lord will execute his sentence on the earth quickly and decisively.” And as Isaiah predicted, “If the Lord of hosts had not left survivors (σπέρμα) to us, we would have fared like Sodom and been made like Gomorrah.”  (Rom 9:27–29)

7 Wagner, Heralds, 243–244. 8 Hays, Echoes, 46. It should also be noted that the text of Isa 52:4–5 is difficult, and it is unclear who is doing the wailing or its precise nature.

536   Steve Moyise There is some debate as to whether the word “only” found in most English versions removes the dual function of the original. Wagner notes that Isa 10:22–23 occurs after the turning point of Isa 10:5 (“Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger”), and thus, while Israel’s unfaithfulness is the backdrop of the passage, the reference to a “remnant” is positive. That this is Paul’s understanding is shown by the quotation from Isa 1:9 that follows, agreeing with the LXX’s rendering of ‫“( שריר‬survivor”) with σπέρμα (“seed”). Citing a number of such “seed” texts in Isaiah (41:8–10; 43:5; 44:2–3; 45:25; 65:9; 66:22), Wagner concludes: “When Paul appropriates Isaiah’s oracle, then, it is with full knowledge of this widely used metaphor of ‘seed’ as the pledge of a future for Israel.”9 Thus Paul’s conclusion in Rom 11:25–27 is not contrary to this remnant theology but its natural conclusion: So that you may not claim to be wiser than you are, brothers and sisters, I want you to understand this mystery: a hardening has come upon part of Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved; as it is written, “Out of Zion will come the Deliverer; he will banish ungodliness from Jacob.” “And this is my covenant with them, when I take away their sins.”  (Rom 11:25–27)

The first part of the quotation is taken from the LXX10 of Isa 59:20–21a, but instead of following “And this is my covenant with them” with “my spirit that is upon you,” Paul ends the sentence with a phrase from Isa 27:9a (ὅταν ἀφέλωμαι αὐτοῦ τὴν ἁμαρτίαν). Since the reference to the spirit would have suited Paul’s argument (cf. Rom 8:1–17), Christopher Stanley argues that Paul was not responsible for the conflated quotation.11 However, all scholars agree that Paul has made one significant change to the quotation, namely, that the redeemer will come “from Zion” (ἐκ Σιων) not “to Zion” (ἕνεκεν Σιων). Given this deliberate change, Wagner thinks that it is more likely that Paul is responsible for the conflation, prompted not by any significant verbal parallels but by the “remarkable correspondence . . . in theme and in syntactical structure.”12 Although this change is dictated by Paul’s theology, Wagner further suggests that it might have been facilitated by the presence of ἐκ Σιων in such texts as Isa 2:3–4; Joel 3:16; and Pss 13:7; 109:2.

28.2.4.  Other Themes It is perhaps surprising that Paul does not draw on Isa 9:6 (“Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace”) to support his divine Christology but he does cite Isa 45:23 (“To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear”) in Rom 9 Wagner, Heralds, 115. 10  The LXX of Isa 59:20–21 differs considerably from the MT, as can be seen by a comparison of NETS and the NRSV: “And the one who delivers will come for Sion’s sake” / “And he will come to Zion as Redeemer”; “and he will turn impiety away from Iakob” / “to those in Jacob who turn from transgression”; “And this is the covenant to them from me” / “And as for me, this is my covenant with them.” 11 Stanley, Paul, 166–171. 12 Wagner, Heralds, 280.

Isaiah in the New Testament   537 14:11 and Phil 2:11. In Romans, the citation is directed to God, as in Isaiah, but in Philippians, it is specifically addressed to Jesus (“at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father”). Despite the exalted status, many scholars think that Paul is still preserving the absolute priority of God (“to the glory of God the Father”), but Tom Wright has argued that given the exclamation of Isa 45:22b (“For I am God, and there is no other”), there can be no doubt that Paul understands Jesus as somehow belonging to the “divine identity.”13 One further example of Paul’s use of Isaiah concerns the resurrection of the dead. In 1 Cor 15:54, Paul says: “When this perishable body puts on imperishability, and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’ ” Most scholars identify the citation as Isa 25:8, where the “Lord of hosts” (v. 6) will “swallow up death for ever.” The LXX strangely makes death the victor (κατέπιεν ὁ θάνατος ἰσχύσας) and is clearly not the source of Paul’s quotation (κατεπόθη ὁ θάνατος εἰς νῖκος). Either he is translating the Hebrew for himself or more likely, he is using a revised LXX text that has been brought closer to the text underlying the MT.

28.3. Luke-Acts It has been observed that as well as launching the ministry of Jesus with a quotation of Isa 40:3–5 (Luke 3:4–6), Luke ends his double work with a quotation of Isa 6:9–10 in Acts 28:26–27. That this is deliberate is indicated by the fact that he only cites Isa 6:9 as an explanation for Jesus’s parables (Luke 8:10), saving the full quotation for the end of his double work. It is also to be noted that the other quotations of Isaiah in Luke-Acts come at important junctures in the Gospel (4:18–19/Isa 61:1–2; 8:10/Isa 6:9; 19:46/Isa 56:7; 22:37/Isa 53:12) and Acts (7:49–50/Isa 66:1–2; 8:32–33/Isa 53:7–8; 13:34/Isa 55:3; 13:47/Isa 49:6; 28:26–27/Isa 6:9–10). Although these do not occur in the canonical order, David Pau has argued that Luke is influenced by an overarching new exodus narrative derived from Deutero-Isaiah. Joel Marcus had previously argued this for Mark’s Gospel, noting the popularity of Isa 40 in the Dead Sea Scrolls, but the evidence is clearly stronger if the book of Acts is taken into account. The significance of this (if correct) is that it strengthens the case for identifying allusions to Isaiah. For example, it has often been noted that there are no quotations from Isa 53 in the early speeches of Peter (Acts 2–5), but the second speech begins with the words: “The God of Abraham [. . .] the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant (ἐδόξασεν τὸν παῖδα αὐτοῦ) Jesus” (Acts 3:13). Of course, there are many “servants” mentioned in Scripture but Isa 52:13 is the only one to speak of a servant of God being glorified (ὁ παῖς μου καὶ ὑψωθήσεται καὶ δοξασθήσεται σφόδρα).

13 Wright, Faithfulness, 688.

538   Steve Moyise Stephen’s summary of Israel’s infidelity comes to a climax with the reminder that “the Most High does not dwell in houses made by human hands” (Acts 7:48), which is then supported by a quotation of Isa 66:1–2: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord, or what is the place of my rest? Did not my hand make all these things?” In the context of the speech, this looks like a total repudiation of the temple (perhaps even the very idea, according to one reading of Acts 7:45–47), but Peter Mallen notes that Isa 66:2b recognizes another group of people who are “humble and contrite in spirit.” The guardians of the temple would of course think that this applied to them, but according to Mallen, Stephen is reversing this and casting them as those who take delight in their abominations (Isa 66:3).14

28.4. Revelation Although there are no explicit quotations in the book of Revelation, it contains more allusions to Scripture than any other New Testament book (and more to Isaiah than any other book). Jan Fekkes categorizes the Isaiah allusions into four main themes: (a) visionary experience, (b) Christological titles and descriptions, (c) eschatological judgment, and (d) eschatological salvation.15

28.4.1.  Visionary Experience In the inaugural vision (Rev 1:12–18), John draws mainly on Daniel and Ezekiel but the description of his speech (“from his mouth came a sharp, two-edged sword”) points to the description of the servant in Isa 49:2 (“He made my mouth like a sharp sword”). In the throne vision that follows (Rev 4:1–11), John sees four living creatures, each having six wings, who sing “Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God the Almighty, who was and is and is to come” (4:8). This depiction draws on Isaiah’s call vision, where the six-winged seraphim call to one another, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory” (Isa 6:3). John replaces the second clause with his favorite temporal affirmation, “who was and is and is to come” (cf. Rev 1:4; 4:8; 11:17; 16:5).

28.4.2.  Christological Titles In words that resemble Dan 10:10–12, John says: “When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he placed his right hand on me, saying, ‘Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last (ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ πρῶτος καὶ ὁ ἔσχατος)’ ” (Rev 1:17). The epithet “first and last” derives from either Isa 44:6 (‫ )אני ראשון ואני אחרון‬or 48:12 (which adds an ‫)אף‬. The LXX 14 Mallen, Acts, 116.

15 Fekkes, Isaiah, 279–290.

Isaiah in the New Testament   539 renders ‫ אחרון‬with μετὰ ταῦτα (“after these things”) in 44:6 and εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα (“for ever”) in 48:12 and is thus unlikely to be John’s source. It could be that he knows the Hebrew text or, as some have argued, a revised LXX text that has certain affinities with the later version of Theodotion, which here reads ἐγώ πρῶτος καὶ ἐγώ ἔσχατος.16

28.4.3.  Eschatological Judgment Isaiah’s image of treading the wine press (63:2–3) has influenced both the harvest vision of Rev 14:19–20 (“So the angel swung his sickle over the earth and gathered the vintage of the earth, and he threw it into the great wine press of the wrath of God”) and the rider on the white horse in Rev 19:11–16, who is “clothed in a robe dipped in blood” (19:13) and “will tread the wine press of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty” (19:15). There is debate as to whether to take a “Christian” interpretation of the blood, namely, that it is his own, or allow the context of Isaiah to suggest that it is the blood of his enemies. The image of a sharp sword coming from his mouth in Rev 19:15 (Isa 49:2) is now said to “strike down the nations” (πατάξῃ τὰ ἔθνη), a phrase taken from Isa 11:4, which also speaks of “mouth” (πατάξει γῆν τῷ λόγῳ τοῦ στόματος αὐτοῦ).

28.4.4.  Eschatological Salvation John begins his description of the New Jerusalem in Rev 21 by saying, “I saw a new heaven and a new earth” (21:1/Isa 65:17). He calls it “the holy city” (21:2/Isa 52.1) and it is a place where there are no more tears (21:4/Isa 25.8) and the thirsty will drink from the water of life (21:6/Isa 55.1). It is adorned with every precious jewel (21:19/Isa 54:11–12), its gates are left open (21:25/Isa 60.11) and the nations will bring their glory into it (21:24/Isa 60:3, 5). David Mathewson also notes the influence of the pilgrimage theme from Isa 2:2–5.17

28.5.  The Text of Isaiah in the First Century The agreements with some of the more idiosyncratic renderings found in the major uncial manuscripts, makes it clear that the New Testament authors generally drew their quotations from the LXX (e.g., Isa 11:10). However, it is also clear that on a number of occasions, they differ from this text, and several explanations have been offered for this. Thus it may be that the author has modified the quotation to suit the argument. 16  This has been particularly argued for the allusions to Daniel. For example, John’s figure comes “with” (μετά) the clouds as in Theodotion, not “on” (ἐπί) the clouds as in the LXX. 17 Mathewson, Heaven, 158–185.

540   Steve Moyise Or it may be that the author is dependent on a Christian version of the text, perhaps part of a “testimony collection.” The best example of this is the composite quotation of Isa 28:16 and Isa 8:14 in Rom 9:33 and 1 Pet 2:6–8, where both use τίθημι (“put/place”) and σκάνδαλον (“stumbling”) instead of the LXX’s ἐμβαλῶ and πτῶμα. However, some examples do not appear to be motivated by either the author’s rhetoric or a testimony source. Maarten Menken has argued that “Matthew’s Bible” was a revision of the LXX, aimed at bringing it closer to the (known) Hebrew text. For example, Matthew does not follow the LXX’s spiritualizing tendency to turn the phrase “borne our infirmities” (Isa 53:4) into “bears our sins” (ἁμαρτίας ἡμῶν φέρει), even though this would have been standard Christina doctrine by this time (cf. 1 Pet 2:24). Menken argues similarly for the “Zebulun and Naphtali” (Isa 9:1–2) quotation in Matt 4:15–16.18 A different question can be asked of the Gospels: Do the Greek translations of Jesus’s quotations give any indication that Jesus knew an Aramaic version of Isaiah? Bruce Chilton has argued in the affirmative. Thus contrary to the versions of Isa 6:10 quoted in Matt 13:14 and Acts 28:27 (καὶ ἰάσομαι αὐτούς), Mark uses a passive construction (καὶ ἀφεθῇ αὐτοῖς), as in the Targum, though it should be noted that there are also a number of differences.19 What is clear from the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament is that a number of texts of Isaiah were in circulation and that they were extremely popular. Indeed, it would be hard to imagine a New Testament without the existence of the book of Isaiah. It is with good reason that is has been called the “Fifth Gospel.”

Bibliography Booth, Roger P. Jesus and the Laws of Purity: Tradition History and Legal History in Mark 7. JSNTS 13. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1986. Chilton, Bruce. A Galilean Rabbi and His Bible: Jesus’ Use of Interpreted Scripture of His Time. Wilmington, DE: Glazier, 1984. Fekkes, Jan. Isaiah and Prophetic Traditions in the Book of Revelation. JSNTS 93. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1994. France, Richard T. The Gospel of Mark. NIGTC. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2002. Hays, Richard B. Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989. Mallen, Peter. The Reading and Transformation of Isaiah in Luke-Acts. LNTS 367. London: T&T Clark, 2008. Mathewson, David. A New Heaven and a New Earth: The Meaning and Function of the Old Testament in Revelation 21.1–22.5. JSNTS 238. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 2003. Moyise, Steve, and Maarten  J.  J.  Menken, eds. Isaiah in the New Testament. London: T&T Clark, 2005. Pau, David W. Acts and the Isaianic New Exodus. WUNT II/130. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000.

18 Menken, Matthew’s Bible, 35–50, 15–34.

19 Chilton, Galilean Rabbi, 91.

Isaiah in the New Testament   541 Stanley, Christopher D. Paul and the Language of Scripture: Citation Technique in the Pauline Epistles and Contemporary Literature. SNTSMS 74. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Wagner, J. Ross. Heralds of the Good News: Isaiah and Paul “in Concert” in the Letter to the Romans. NovTSup 101. Leiden: Brill, 2002. Wright, N. T. Paul and the Faithfulness of God. London: SPCK, 2013.

chapter 29

Post-Shoa h R ea di ngs of Isa i a h Marvin A. Sweeney

29.1. Introduction The book of Isaiah is easily the best known and most widely read of the books of the Prophets in the Hebrew Bible.1 It is read more frequently as a Haftarah or Prophetic reading during Jewish worship services than any other book of the Former Prophets or the Latter Prophets.2 Isaiah is also cited more frequently in the New Testament than any other book of the Hebrew Bible, other than the book of Psalms. Isaiah is especially wellknown for its ideals. The oracle in Isa 2:1–4 concerning the streaming of the nations to Zion to learn Yhwh’s Torah, so that nations would turn their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks, and so that nations would learn that war is no more considered one of the most important statements in the Bible of the ideals of world peace and recognition of G-d in the world. The Isaiah Wall, a monument that quotes Isa 2:4, stands in Ralph Bunche Park across from United Nations headquarters in New York City. It celebrates the ideals on which the UN was created.3 Isaiah’s portrayals of the ideal king in Isa 9:1–6 and 11:1–9 are some of the Bible’s best known statements concerning the ideals of messianism, the Prince of Peace, and the restoration of human life in the Garden of Eden; indeed, Isa 9:1–6 and other texts from Isaiah play major roles in Handel’s Messiah, which is so widely performed at Christmastime. The work of the anonymous prophet of the Babylonian exile known simply as Second Isaiah portrays the ideals of the restoration of the Jewish people to the land of Israel as an event that would demonstrate the power and presence of G-d to all the nations of the world.

1  For commentary on Isaiah, see Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39; Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66. 2 Fishbane, Haftarot. 3  Sweeney, “Isaiah 1–39,” 678.

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   543 But the book of Isaiah takes on new meaning when it is read in the aftermath of the Shoah in which some six million Jews were deliberately murdered, along with six million Gentiles, by Nazi Germany and its European sympathizers during World War II.4 Isaiah attempts to interpret the period from the late eighth century bce through the early fourth century bce, when both Israel and Judah were destroyed respectively by the Assyrian and Babylonian Empires and Judah was ultimately restored as a subject province of the Persian Empire. In the aftermath of this experience, the ideals articulated in the book of Isaiah are not realized by the time readers come to the end of the book. The vision of world peace is not realized, and instead the book concludes with the portrayal of the bodies of the dead who are identified as wicked as blamed for the failure to realize Yhwh’s plans for worldwide sovereignty. Likewise, the ideal of eternal Davidic kingship is not realized in the book insofar as the Second Isaiah identifies King Cyrus of Persia as Yhwh’s Temple builder and Messiah in Isa 44:28 and 45:1, and reassigns the eternal Davidic covenant to the people of Israel at large rather than to the House of David. By Isa 66:1, the so-called Trito-Isaiah identifies only Yhwh as the true king. By the end of the book, it is clear that all Israel has not yet been restored and that Yhwh is not yet recognized throughout the world, which raises questions concerning the portrayal of Yhwh’s worldwide sovereignty in the book. All these factors raise questions concerning Yhwh’s power, presence, and righteousness in the book of Isaiah in relation to Yhwh’s failure to protect Jerusalem, Judah, and Israel from invasion and destruction by foreign empires. Insofar as such questions arise in relation to the more modern experience of the Shoah, it is appropriate to raise critical questions about Yhwh’s fidelity to the covenant with Israel that are analogous to those raised in relation to the Shoah.5 Is Yhwh’s failure to protect Jerusalem, Judah, Israel, and the House of David in antiquity analogous to G-d’s failure to protect the Jewish people during the Shoah? This chapter argues that it is.6 It therefore proceeds by examining several key features of the book, including Isaiah’s commission account in Isa 6; the portrayal of King Ahaz of Judah in relation to the Syro-Ephraimitic War and the hiddenness of Yhwh in Isa 7–12; the identification of Yhwh with the Persian Empire in Isa 13–27 and 40–55; and the attempts to blame the people of Jerusalem, Judah, and Israel in Trito-Isaiah, and elsewhere in the book, rather than Yhwh for the failure to ensure national security. Overall, the study argues that Isaiah demonstrates that humans cannot depend upon G-d for protection. Instead, humans must take responsibility for ensuring the righteousness, holiness, and integrity of the world in partnership with G-d. 4  For discussion of the use of the term “Shoah” in place of “Holocaust,” see Garber and Zuckerman, “Why Do We Call.” For discussion of reading Isaiah after the Shoah, see Sweeney, Reading, 84–103; “Isaiah and Theodicy”; Tull, “Isaiah ’Twas Foretold It”; Landy, “Covenant with Death.” For discussion of reading the Bible after the Shoah, see esp. these volumes and Fackenheim, Jewish Bible. 5  For critical theological discussion of the Shoah, see esp. Raphael, Female Face of G-d; Morgan, Beyond Auschwitz; Braiterman, (G-d) after Auschwitz; Blumenthal, Facing the Abusing G-d; Katz, Post-Holocaust Dialogues; Williamson, Guest in Israel’s House; Rubenstein, After Auschwitz; Fackenheim, G-d’s Presence in History; Berkowits, Faith after the Holocaust; Buber, Eclipse of G-d. 6  Cf. Rubenstein, After Auschwitz; Fackenheim, G-d‘s Presence in History.

544   Marvin A. Sweeney The study presupposes Elie Wiesel’s view that one may say anything to G-d from within one’s own tradition.7

29.2.  Isaiah 6: Isaiah’s Commission Account Most interpreters maintain that the prophets portrayed in the book of Isaiah, including Isaiah ben Amoz, the Second Isaiah, and the prophets collectively known as TritoIsaiah, were concerned with motivating the people of Jerusalem and Judah to adhere to the will of Yhwh. But when readers turn to Isaiah’s commissioning narrative in Isa 6, they are surprised and disturbed to read an autobiographical narrative in which Yhwh commissions the prophet to render the people blind, deaf, and ignorant so that they will not repent. and thereby will not avoid the punishment that Yhwh has devised against them. Many maintain that Yhwh cannot be wrong and that one must obey Yhwh regardless of any misgivings concerning Yhwh’s instructions. But history is replete with examples of immoral commands given by authority figures that people obeyed without question, such as the Nazi plan to exterminate the Jews. Although the text includes some rather incredible imagery concerning Isaiah’s vision of the divine presence, analysis of the passages demonstrates the immorality of both Yhwh’s commands and Isaiah’s response. Prior analysis of Isa 6:1–13 demonstrates its formal character as Isaiah’s commission account.8 The passage begins in verses 1–2 with a presence vision report, which is set in the year of King Uzziah’s death in circa 742 bce, and presents portrayals of Yhwh in verse 1 and of the Seraphim attending Yhwh in verse 2. The date is prescient insofar as it marks the end of Uzziah’s forty-year reign of peace and points to the onset of a fortyone-year period that will see some three Assyrian invasions during the Syro-Ephraimitic War of 735–732 bce, the revolt of Israel against Assyria in 724–721 bce, and the revolt of Judah in 705–701 bce. The invasions resulted in the complete destruction and exile of Israel in 722–721 bce and the near-complete destruction and subjugation of Judah in 701 bce. The portrayal of Yhwh focuses on Yhwh’s high and lofty enthronement, Yhwh’s garment filling the Temple, and the six-winged Seraphim in attendance on Yhwh. Although this imagery may seem bizarre, it is actually dependent upon the imagery of the structure and furnishings of the Jerusalem Temple. As an adviser to the Davidic kings, Isaiah’s perspective in this text presupposes a place beside the columns at the east entrance to the Temple where the king would normally stand (2 Kgs 11:14; 23:3). Such a position provides a full view into the interior of the Temple from the Ulam, or entry chamber; the Heikhal, or Great Hall; and the D’vir, the elevated inner chamber where Yhwh was understood to be enthroned above the cherubim that guarded the Ark of the Covenant (see 1 Sam 4:4; 2 Sam 6:2; 2 Kgs 19:15; Isa 37:16; Ps 99:1; 1 Chr 13:6). The imagery 7 Wiesel, Souls on Fire, 111.

8 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 132–142.

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   545 of Yhwh’s garment filling the Temple is based on the imagery of the smoke emitted by the ten incense altars placed in the Heikhal to portray the presence of Yhwh metaphorically with smoke, which is simultaneously tangible and intangible. Likewise, the im­agery of the seraphim, a Hebrew term based on the root, śrp, “to burn,” which depicts the fiery, six-winged angels that attend Yhwh, is based on the imagery of the ten Menorot, or Lampstands, placed in the Heikhal, each of which has seven lights, one in the middle and three on either side, again to portray the divine presence with flame and light im­agery that is both tangible and intangible. The audition report in verses 3–4 portrays the doxology “Holy, holy, holy, is Yhwh Sebaoth, whose glory fills all the earth,” sung by the seraphim, apparently based on the singing of the priests in the Temple choir, and the effects of that singing in the opening of the Temple doors. The opening of the doors permits the light of the sunrise to illumine the interior of the Temple at the outset of the morning worship service. The report of Isaiah’s reaction in verse 5 conveys Isaiah’s dismay at standing before Yhwh with impure lips, and the account of the seraph’s response in verses 6–7 presents the mouth purification ceremony, a necessary procedure in ancient Near Eastern prophecy, to purify Isaiah’s lips with a coal and thereby prepare him to speak with and on behalf of Yhwh. The report of Yhwh’s question, “Whom shall I send? Who shall go for us?” followed by Isaiah’s response, “Send me!” sets the stage for the following commission account in verses 9–10. This segment presents Yhwh’s questionable commission to the prophet to instruct them to “hear continuously, but do not understand, and see continuously, but do not know; stop up the heart of this people, and block its ears, and close its eyes, lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and repent and heal themselves.” The report of Isaiah’s response to Yhwh’s instruction, and Yhwh’s further response in verses 11–13, exacerbates the problem. When Isaiah’s asks, “How long?” Yhwh responds that the prophet’s task will continue until the whole land lies desolate without inhabitants, as a tree that is cut down and burned until not even one-tenth of it remains. From those few that remain, the holy seed will emerge, like the roots of a cut-down tree, to ensure the restoration of the people. The end result—that is, the destruction of over 90 percent of the population of Jerusalem and Judah—is actually close to historically accurate. The Assyrian invasion of Judah destroyed most of the Judean countryside, and resulted in the death or flight of the bulk of Judah’s population, as only Jerusalem survived the Assyrian assault. Even then, Jerusalem was left like a small sukkah, or farmer’s hut, in the middle of a vineyard or a cucumber field, as Isa 1:8 indicates. Yhwh’s commission is disturbing in that it presents a fundamental moral problem, namely, that Isaiah’s task is to prevent the repentance of the people by making sure that they are blind, deaf, and ignorant. The instruction calls upon Isaiah to prevent the repentance of the people so that Yhwh’s purposes might be achieved. In other words, the people are to be sacrificed deliberately for the greater glory of Yhwh. The problem resides in the moral ambiguity of the instruction. If it is considered on teleological moral grounds—that is, on the grounds that the end result of the action determines its

546   Marvin A. Sweeney morality—it might be considered moral. In this respect, the ultimate revelation of divine purpose might be considered a worthwhile and moral goal, but it deliberately sacrifices one or more generations of human life to achieve the goal. In terms of moral theory, Yhwh’s command is immoral on ontological grounds insofar as it is an act that in its fundamental being is morally wrong because it constitutes an act of murder of one or more entire generations. When considered in relation to Yhwh’s various promises of protection and sustenance to Israel, Judah, Jerusalem, and the House of David, Yhwh’s command to Isaiah undermines any credibility as a covenant partner that Yhwh might hold as the G-d of Israel, Judah, Jerusalem, and David. None can rely on Yhwh’s eternal covenant, as Yhwh in Isa 6 emerges as a G-d willing to sacrifice all of them for Yhwh’s own purposes. But interpreters must also consider Isaiah’s response to Yhwh’s instruction—namely, a simple, “How long?” Isaiah does not challenge Yhwh to tell Yhwh that such an act is wrong and completely unacceptable. There are plenty of other instances in the Bible when a human being stands up to Yhwh to tell Yhwh that a proposed action is wrong and must be changed. Abraham in Gen 18 questions whether Yhwh will destroy Sodom and Gomorrah if there are fifty, or even as few as ten, righteous people in the cities. At each challenge, Yhwh promises not to destroy the city. On two occasions, at the Golden Calf episode in Exod 32–34 and the Spy narrative in Num 13–14, Yhwh in frustration tells Moses that Yhwh will destroy the people and make a great people out of Moses. Moses stops Yhwh from taking such action by informing Yhwh that such action is immoral, that it violates Yhwh’s covenant with Israel, and that the nations will see that Yhwh is an immoral and undependable G-d. Yhwh relents in each case. In Amos 7, Amos asks Yhwh, “How can Jacob stand? He is so small?” when Yhwh proposes to bring locusts and fire to destroy the land, and Yhwh relents. Even in Job 42, Job informs Yhwh that he rejects Yhwh’s contentions, and Yhwh responds by informing Job that he is right about Yhwh. Although there are exceptions, such as Jer 20, Yhwh generally gives in when challenged by humans on moral grounds. Isaiah never challenges Yhwh. In this respect, Isaiah becomes a collaborator with Yhwh who might be considered just as guilty as the perpetrator for failing to attempt to stop evil when he sees it. Although it is never clear that any of the Isaiah’s oracles or actions in the book carried out Yhwh’s instruction, readers of the book must acknowledge that the book fails to achieve Yhwh’s ideals insofar as Isa 66:24 closes the book with a portrayal of the bodies of the wicked strewn about. The image is so disturbing that Rabbinic tradition demands that Isa 66:24 not be read as the conclusion of the Haftarah reading of the chapter, but that instead it should be shifted forward so that a more con­gen­ial verse might close the passage.9 But based on the examples of those who challenged Yhwh and won their point, one must ask what would have happened had Isaiah told Yhwh that the command was immoral and could not be carried out? Perhaps Yhwh would have conceded, and the book would have ended differently so that its ideals might have been achieved, but readers will never know. Likewise, what would have 9 Fishbane, Haftarot, 325–332, esp. 326, 331.

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   547 happened in Germany during World War II if enough Germans had stood up and said, “No!” to Adolf Hitler? But it didn’t happen.10

29.3.  The Hidden Face of God It seems clear throughout the book that Isaiah ben Amoz never followed the commission given him in Isa 6. Instead, the book presents him as a prophet who called upon his people to observe the will of Yhwh. Nevertheless, the account of Isaiah’s commission is not the only problematic theological issue in the book when considered in relation to the Shoah. Although Isaiah is rooted in the Davidic-Zion tradition, which maintained that Yhwh would protect the House of David and the city of Jerusalem forever (see, e.g., 2 Sam 7), the book presents Yhwh as constantly ready to punish the Davidic kings and the city of Jerusalem for failure to trust in Yhwh’s promises of protection. It further identifies Yhwh with the oppressors of Jerusalem and Judah, particularly Assyria and Babylonia, even when it posits punishment for the oppressors following the judgment against Jerusalem and Judah. To a certain degree, these issues point to the difficulties encountered in trying to explain Yhwh’s actions in relation to the historical realities of the Assyrian and Babylonian invasions of Judah in the eighth and late seventh through early sixth centuries bce, but it nevertheless presents theological problems insofar as it shows Yhwh ready to violate the basic principles of the eternal Davidic covenant. Key examples appear in the literary context in which Isa 6 is placed, namely, Isa 5–12, which constitutes prophetic instruction concerning Yhwh’s judgment against Israel. Although the unit ultimately posits that Yhwh will restore the Davidic empire following judgment, which suggests a setting in the late-seventh Josian edition of the book, the identification of Yhwh with Assyrian oppression functions as a necessary element of Yhwh’s actions in relation to Jerusalem and Judah.11 The account of Yhwh’s judgment against Judah in Isa 7:1–8:15 is especially instructive.12 It begins in Isa 7:1–25 with a narrative account of Isaiah’s encounter with King Ahaz of Judah as he prepares to defend Jerusalem from assault by Israel and Aram during the Syro-Ephraimitic War. The Syro-Ephraimitic War was prompted by a new alliance between Israel, led by King Pekah ben Remaliah, and Aram, led by King Rezin of Damascus, which intended to oppose the Assyrian Empire. In the case of Israel, such a move called for breaking Israel’s treaty with Assyria, which had been initiated by King Jehu ben Nimshi of Israel in the late ninth century bce and which led ultimately to a 10  Although many maintain that the German people were largely unaware of the Shoah, Goldhagen, Hitler’s Willing Executioners, demonstrated that many Germans did know based on photographs and letters sent home by sons who were serving as soldiers and often participating in the genocide. For a readable discussion of the ramifications of complicity in a devastating crime and a call to criminalize the failure to act by those who witness violent crime, including the Shoah and rape, see Guiora, Crime of Complicity. 11 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 112–121. 12  Sweeney, 143–175.

548   Marvin A. Sweeney lengthy period of peace during the reigns of his descendants, Kings Jehoash ben Jehoahaz and Jeroboam ben Jehoash.13 The Israelite-Assyrian alliance kept Aram in check and prevented the Arameans from invading and subjugating Israel as they had done during the rule of the Omride dynasty of King Ahab ben Omri and his sons, Ahaziah and Jehoram. The motivation for the new Syro-Ephramitic alliance was the mistaken view that Assyria had weakened and that it would then be possible for Aram to restore its dominance in the region. The Syro-Ephramitic alliance required the allegiance of the smaller kingdoms in western Asia, such as the Phoenician cities, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Edomites, the Philistines, and the Judeans. It appears that all these kingdoms joined the alliance, except for Judah, under the rule of King Jotham ben Uzziah. We do not know Jotham’s motivations, but it is evident that an earlier Syro-Ephraimitic coalition designed to oppose King Shalmaneser III of Assyria collapsed under Assyrian pressure and led to an Aramean assault against Israel in an effort to force Israel back into the coalition. Presumably, Jotham would have feared the collapse of the renewed Syro-Ephramitic coalition once it was again compelled to face the Assyrian retaliation. King Jotham of Judah died, however, before he ever had to take action to defend Jerusalem, leaving his twenty-year-old son, Ahaz, the new king of Judah. The young and inexperienced Ahaz found himself in a difficult position. Isa 7 begins with a notice of the Syro-Ephraimitic assault against Jerusalem, but it also notes the fear experienced by the House of David, in this case the young King Ahaz, as he prepared to face an invasion that was intended to remove him from the throne, replace him with a Trans-Jordanian puppet named ben Tabeel, and force Judah back into the coalition. Like his father, the young Ahaz was not about to join the coalition. Perhaps he knew the instability of a SyroEphraimitic alliance and perhaps he expected rewards from Assyrian suzerain for his loyalty, but we will never know his motivations. Isa 7 presents him inspecting the city’s defenses at the end of the conduit of the upper pool by the road of the fuller’s field—that is, the place where the waters of Gihon Spring were channeled into an underground tunnel complex designed to supply Jerusalem with water inside its walls. Of course, water chooses lower ground, such as that of the Kidron Valley to the east of the city, beyond Jerusalem’s walls, and Ahaz would have understood that the tunnel rendered Jerusalem vulnerable. Indeed, 2 Sam 5:6–8 reports that David had captured Jerusalem by using the water tunnel to enter the city despite its defenses at the outset of Davidic rule in Jerusalem. When Isaiah confronted Ahaz while he inspecting his water system, he brought along his son, here named Shear Yahuv, “a remnant shall return,” to symbolize his view that only a remnant of Jerusalem and Judah would ultimately survive, in keeping with his commission in Isa 6:10–13. Isaiah advises Ahaz to trust in Yhwh in verses 7–9, which culminate in his punned statement, “if you do not believe (Hebrew, ‘im lō’ ta’ămînû), indeed, you will not be established (Hebrew, kî lō’ tē’āmēnû).” Although many 13  For discussion of Israel’s treaty relationship with Assyria during the reign of the House of Jehu, see esp. my commentary on Hosea in Twelve Prophets, 1–144.

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   549 Jerusalemites and Judeans might perish in the Syro-Ephraimitic siege of the city, ultimately, Yhwh would protect Jerusalem. Although such advice might seem unrealistic, it recognizes that Israel and Aram could not leave the Arameans’ defenses along its border with Assyria weakened as the Arameans joined Israel in an adventure to subjugate Judah. The longer Aramean forces were preoccupied in Judah, the greater the opportunity for the Assyrians to exploit the situation and invade Aram. The Assyrians did not need an invitation to invade Aram; they were always on the lookout for such an opportunity, and the Syro-Ephraimitic invasion of Judah would provide precisely that opportunity. Ahaz’s response in verses 10–12 to Isaiah’s proposal that he ask for a sign from Yhwh, “I will not ask, I will not test Yhwh,” is usually interpreted as Ahaz’s arrogant refusal to accept Isaiah’s advice. This view is buttressed by the account of Ahaz’s reign in 2 Kgs 16, which reports that Ahaz sent to Assyria for assistance rather than rely on Isaiah’s promise of Yhwh’s aid. But such a view is problematic. When Ahaz’s statement is taken at face value, it is a statement of piety on behalf of the king; as one who does not trust in Yhwh, Ahaz will not put Yhwh to the test. The narrative interprets Ahaz’s statement as proof of his unwillingness to trust in Yhwh, and then proceeds to describe the consequences for Jerusalem and Judah when Yhwh calls upon Assyria and its Egyptian allies to invade Judah and carry its people off as captives. This statement indicates Yhwh’s willingness to ignore the eternal covenant made with the House of David, as presented in 2 Sam 7, to punish Jerusalem and Judah with invasion, leaving the country a desolate site of thistles and thorns, akin to the threats made in Isa 6. According to Isa 7, Yhwh will side with Assyria and Egypt to bring punishment against Jerusalem and Judah even though the eternal covenant with the House of David calls upon Yhwh to protect them forever. The theological problem of Yhwh’s stance becomes even more egregious when one considers the narrative that follows concerning Yhwh’s sign to Judah in Isa 8:1–15. Here, Isaiah names another son, “Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz, the Spoil Speeds, the Prey Hastens,” to symbolize Yhwh’s intention to punish Jerusalem and Judah in the aftermath of Ahaz’s failure to take Isaiah’s advice. Although the Assyrians will take down both Israel and Aram, they will also subjugate Jerusalem and Judah. Indeed, the prophet’s describing the consequences of Ahaz’s refusal to take Isaiah’s advice applies the water metaphor from the previous scene to depict the punishment of the land. The Assyrian invasion is portrayed as a flood, when the waters of Shiloah overflow their channels to inundate the entire land of Judah. Most interpreters miss the significance of the rape imagery when the king of Assyria spreads his wings over the land as he overflows it with his waters. The metaphor of spreading wings over a person depends on the imagery of spreading the wings or edges of one’s garment over a woman when having sexual intercourse with her. Such a metaphor is applied in Ruth 3:9 when Boaz spreads his wing—that is, his garment—over Ruth as she lies at his feet as an act of espousal enacted as a Levirite marriage. The waters that will inundate Judah in Isa 8:7–8, then, refer to the semen that will fill the land as the king of Assyria undertakes an act of rape against Jerusalem and Judah at the behest of Yhwh.14 14  For discussion of rape narratives in the Bible and the issue of divine absence, see Rediger Schulte, Absence of G-d.

550   Marvin A. Sweeney Although Yhwh punishes Assyria and the Assyrian king in Isa 10:5–34 for blasphemy and overstepping bounds in punishing Jerusalem and Judah, the fact remains that Yhwh brings the Assyrians to punish Judah—even with rape, as well as death—and thereby violates the eternal covenant of protection with the House of David. As Isaiah puts it in Isa 8:17, Yhwh is hiding his face from the House of Jacob. This statement is foundational to the Rabbinic notion of Hester Panim, “Hiding the Face,” to express times when G-d punishes Jews.15

29.4.  Yhwh and the Persian Empire Yhwh’s identification with nations that punish and subjugate Jerusalem and Judah is evident in both the oracles concerning the nations in Isa 13–23 and the prophecies of Second Isaiah concerning the revelation of Yhwh’s worldwide sovereignty in Isa 40–55. Although Yhwh also pledges to punish those nations that oppress Jerusalem and Judah, the fact remains that Yhwh’s identification with those nations results in the dissolution of the House of David with which Yhwh had an eternal covenant. It is striking that Yhwh’s punishment of Assyria and Babylon in the book of Isaiah is consistent with Yhwh’s promise in 2 Sam 7 to punish the Davidic monarchs should they act in ways contrary to Yhwh’s expectations. But the designation of Cyrus as Yhwh’s messiah and Temple builder in Isa 44:28 and 45:1, together with the shift of the promise to the people of Israel in Isa 55, constitutes abandonment of Yhwh’s promise to ensure that a de­scend­ ant of David would sit on the throne in Jerusalem forever. Yhwh’s promises to bring punishment against Assyria for overstepping its bounds in punishing Jerusalem and Judah and in blaspheming against Yhwh in Isa 10:5–35 and 14:24–27, followed by the oracle concerning the restoration of the righteous Davidic monarch in Isa 11:1–16, are entirely consistent with the understanding of the eternal covenant with the House of David in 2 Sam 7 and elsewhere.16 Likewise, Yhwh’s promises to bring punishment against Babylon in Isa 13:1–14:23, apparently a redactionally rewritten text from the sixth century edition of the book of Isaiah; the second oracle against Babylon in Isa 21; and the oracle concerning the realization of that punishment in the portrayal of a defeated and destitute Babylon in Isa 47 are also consistent with the Davidic promise. But the identification of Yhwh with the Persian Empire in the oracles concerning the nations in Isa 13–27 suggests Yhwh’s interest in leaving Jerusalem and Judah to the mercy of Assyria’s and Babylon’s successors. The oracles concerning the nations in Isa 13–27 contain no explicit reference to the Persian Empire, either in the oracles per se in Isa 13–23 or in the appended announcement concerning Yhwh’s new world order in Isa 24–27.17 The oracle concerning the Desert of the Sea in Isa 21, widely recognized as an oracle concerning Babylon, includes 15  See esp. Berkowits, Faith after the Holocaust. 17  Sweeney, 212–353.

16 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 196–211.

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   551 reference in Isa 21:2 to Elam and Medea as the nations that are advancing against Babylon and besieging it. Insofar as Elam and Medea were part of the forces of the Persian Empire that forced Babylon’s capitulation in 539 bce, the reference to these nations in Isa 21:2 confirms Yhwh’s identification with the Persian Empire as the agent that carries out Yhwh’s plans to defeat Babylon.18 Nevertheless, this identification does not run contrary to the eternal covenant with the House of David because there is no suggestion that the Davidic monarchy would collapse as a result of Babylon’s fall. Similar considerations pertain to the oracle concerning the Valley of Vision in Isa 22, widely recognized to be an oracle concerning Jerusalem.19 The threat posed against Jerusalem by Yhwh in this passage would be consistent with Yhwh’s pledge to bring punishment against the House of David if David’s descendants commit wrongdoing, even though Yhwh continues to abide by the eternal promise to ensure that a Davidic descendant would rule Israel in Jerusalem. The threat to the eternal covenant with the House of David posed by Yhwh’s identification with the nations that oppress and subjugate Jerusalem and Judah appears when the oracles concerning the nations in Isa 13–27 are considered in relation to the prophecies of Second Isaiah in Isa 40–55. Considered diachronically, Isa 40–55 constitutes the work of an anonymous prophet of the Babylonian exile from the latter sixth century bce when King Cyrus of Persia took control of Babylon and announced that Jewish exiles would be able to return to Jerusalem and Judah to rebuild their homeland.20 The Second Isaiah would have been located in Babylon at this time, although it is possible that the prophet later returned to Jerusalem.21 When considered synchronically, Isa 40–54 constitute a part of the prophetic instruction concerning Yhwh’s worldwide sovereignty in Isa 34–54. Although authored by the Second Isaiah, Isa 55 constitutes an introduction to the prophetic exhortation to the people to adhere to Yhwh’s covenant in Isa 55–66, which includes the material attributed diachronically to the Third Isaiah in Isa 56–66. Yhwh’s punishment of Jerusalem is clear from the outset of this material in Isa 40:1–2.22 Here, the prophet announces comfort to Jerusalem and the need to speak tenderly to Jerusalem, literally “upon the heart of Jerusalem,” as a husband would speak to a wife. Indeed, Jerusalem in Second Isaiah is characterized as Yhwh’s wife in keeping with the prophetic traditions that Jerusalem or Israel serve as Yhwh’s bride. The punishment becomes clear in verse 2 when the prophet mentions that Jerusalem has completed her term of service, that her iniquity is now expiated, and that she has received double punishment for all of her sins as a basis for the instruction to comfort Jerusalem and to speak tenderly to her. The reference to the twofold term of service for her sins is a known principle in ancient Israelite jurisprudence, as Exod 21:37–22:3 indicates that a thief who stole cattle or sheep had to repay the owner of the stolen animals double when they were found alive in his possession. One might debate Second Isaiah’s contention that Jerusalem had sinned; after all, Jerusalem was attacked and destroyed by the Babylonians 18 Sweeney, Isaiah 1–39, 276–284. 20 Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 1–40. 22 Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 41–51.

19  Sweeney, 288–302. 21  Cf. Tiemeyer, Comfort.

552   Marvin A. Sweeney in 588–586 bce for breaking its treaty with Babylon in a failed bid for independence. Although such an act was a violation of Judah’s treaty with Babylon, Second Isaiah implicitly charges that Jerusalem’s actions constituted a violation of its covenant with Yhwh. Nevertheless, such a punishment would again come under the stipulation that Yhwh might bring punishment against the House of David while maintaining Davidic rule, as promised. A more serious scenario emerges in Isa 54 when the prophet announces to Jerusalem, here characterized as Yhwh’s barren bride, that Jerusalem’s children—that is, the exiled people of Israel—and her husband, Yhwh, are now about to return to her in the aftermath of her exile.23 The announcement is clearly intended as grounds for joy at the restoration of the once beleaguered city and nation, but references to Yhwh’s absence during the period of abandonment or exile raise questions about Yhwh’s integrity. Isa 54:7–8 presents Yhwh’s comments concerning the abandonment of the bride, “For a brief moment, I abandoned you; but with great compassion I gather you. With slight anger I hid my face momentarily from you, but with eternal fidelity, I show you mercy.” The assertion of “eternal fidelity” appears to be overstated considering that Yhwh’s absence resulted in Jerusalem’s abandonment and even rape as Isa 52:1 suggests that the uncircumcised and unclean would no longer enter her, employing language that is often understood as pertaining to sexual intercourse. Yhwh’s following oath in Isa 54:9–10, “For like the waters of Noah is this to me when I swore that the waters of Noah would not again pass over the earth. For mountains may move, and hills may shake, but my fidelity will not move from you and my covenant of peace will not waver, says the one who shows you mercy, Yhwh.” Such language indicates Yhwh’s negligence of covenant responsibility in the abandonment of the bride Jerusalem, who suffered violence and even rape in Yhwh’s absence. If the bride Jerusalem is subject to such violence and rape, of what value is an eternal covenant if Yhwh can hide the divine face to allow such abuse to take place? The most telling material, however, appears with Yhwh’s choice to rewrite the Davidic covenant by abandoning the House of David and choosing King Cyrus of Persia as the Messiah and Temple builder. Isa 44:28 states very clearly to Cyrus, “He is my shepherd who will accomplish all my will,” and to Jerusalem, “she shall be built and the Temple shall be established.” Isa 45:1 makes Yhwh’s intentions even more clear as the prophet introduces Yhwh oracles with the statement, “Thus says Yhwh to His Messiah, to Cyrus,” indicating that Cyrus is Yhwh’s chosen anointed King. The final element of the rewritten eternal covenant with the house of David appears in Yhwh’s address to the people of Israel in Isa 55:3–5, “Incline your ear and come to Me; listen, and your life will be saved, as I make with you an eternal covenant, the secure fidelities of David! Behold, a witness to the nations I appointed him, a leader and a commander of nations! Behold, a nation that you do not know you will summon, and a nation that does not know you, they will run to you, on behalf of Yhwh your G-d

23  Sweeney, 218–231.

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   553 and the Holy One of Israel who has glorified you!”24 Here we see the revised Davidic covenant that no longer applies to the descendants of the House of David. Instead, it is applied to the people of Israel at large. Diachronically, such a move might be justified by the fact that a Davidic monarch never again ruled over Israel from Jerusalem, and the eternal covenant of the House of David had to be reconfigured as an eternal covenant made with the people of Israel. But such a move indicates that the eternal covenant is actually a very limited move, and an eternal covenant with all Israel is only as secure as the prior eternal covenant with the House of David that seems to be not so eternal after all.

29.5.  Yhwh’s Failure to Ensure National Security The final set of considerations appears in Isa 56–66, commonly identified as the early Persian-period work of a number of anonymous prophets collectively identified as Trito- or Third Isaiah. Within the synchronic literary presentation of the book, Isa 55–66 constitute a prophetic exhortation to adhere to Yhwh’s covenant. Isa 55, with its reformulation of the Davidic covenant, introduces the oracles in Isa 56–66, which are configured as prophetic instruction concerning the restored covenant community in Zion. Indeed, the question of the restoration of the Jewish people in aftermath of exile is a key question for reading Isaiah in the aftermath of the Shoah. Following the Shoah, Jews found themselves largely unable to return to their homes in Europe due a combination of hostility on the part of their Gentile European neighbors and their own hesitance to return to cultures in which they had suffered centuries of oppression and attempted genocide. Many Jewish refugees chose to go to the land of Israel, then established as Mandate Palestine under British rule, but even in the aftermath of the Shoah, Great Britain chose to restrict Jewish immigration to Mandate Palestine in the face of opposition by a hostile Arab population that had largely sided with Nazi Germany during World War II.25 Isa 55–66 indicates that there were questions about the future status of the Jewish people in the aftermath of the Babylonian exile. We have already seen that the book of Isaiah calls for submission to the rule of the Persian Empire insofar as it identifies King Cyrus of Persia as Yhwh’s Temple builder and reformulates the eternal Davidic covenant in relation to the Jewish people at large rather than in relation to the House of David. Indeed, there were efforts to restore the Davidic monarchy, but the book of Isaiah rejects such efforts. There were also questions concerning the character of the Jewish people, particularly because so many had intermarried with Gentiles or suffered injuries that 24  Sweeney, 235–248. 25  See Sachar, History of Israel, 245–278; Shapira, Israel, 67–118. For histories of the Shoah, see Dawidowicz, War against the Jews; Gilbert, Holocaust.

554   Marvin A. Sweeney might call their status as Jews into question. And finally, there is the issue of the failure to realize the ideals articulated at the outset of the book. Each of these issues is treated here. Although the book of Isaiah calls for submission to Persian rule and a redefinition of the eternal Davidic covenant in relation to the Jewish people as a whole, there were efforts to re-establish the Davidic monarchy in the aftermath of Cyrus’s decree to allow Jewish exiles to return to Jerusalem to restore the Temple and Jewish life in the land of Israel. When the Temple was rebuilt in 520–515 bce, in the early years of the reign of King Darius I of Persia, the prophet Haggai announced that the rebuilding of the Temple would signal Yhwh’s efforts to overthrow the Persian Empire and to restore the Davidic monarchy. The prophet Zechariah suggests similar interests, although the book of Zechariah has been heavily edited, so that the eighth vision of the prophet in Zech 6:1–15 presents a vision of the high priest, Joshua ben Jehozadak, as the enthroned figure with a crown on his head and a priest by his side, rather than an image of Zerubbabel ben Shealtiel, the grandson of King Jehoiachin of Judah, as the figure featured in his vision.26 A likely explanation is that Darius took action to remove Zerubbabel from the scene after he had learned of Judean sentiment to restore the House of David, and took action to see that the House of David would not be restored. The book of Isaiah apparently sides with those who would eschew the restoration of the Davidic monarchy and call instead for submission to Persian rule as the will of Yhwh. Zerubbabel disappeared from the scene and no one knows what ever happened to him, but it is striking that he bears a Babylonian name—that is, Zerubbabel means “seed of Babylon”—even though he is the grandson of King Jehoiachin and the presumed heir to the Davidic throne. Many Jewish exiles had assimilated into Babylonian culture, both by intermarrying with Babylonian spouses and by changing their names, just as many Jews had assimilated into German and other European cultures in the centuries prior to the Shoah. Such assimilation did not keep Jews safe because anyone with at least one Jewish grandparent was considered Jewish by the German government and therefore subject to execution. A somewhat different yet similar situation emerged in post-exilic Jewish society concerning one’s identity as a Jew. Although many Jews assimilated into Babylonian culture, others sought to be a part of Jewish culture even if they had taken Gentile names and spouses. Under Persian rule, Judea could not function fully as a nation, but instead functioned as a religious tradition with which one could identify either in exile or in the land of Israel. Isa 56:1–7 takes up this issue in the early Persian period.27 It envisions the cases of Jews who were foreigners, which would especially include those who were born to foreign or intermarried parents, as well as those who had suffered physical injury, such as castration, when placed in Babylonian service. Isa 56:1–7 is very clear that one is a Jew if one observes Yhwh’s covenant, regardless of one’s potentially foreign identity. Observance of the Shabbat, which was propounded during the periods of Nehemiah and Ezra, became the key criterion of Jewish identity insofar as Shabbat is generally considered to 26  For discussion of Haggai and Zechariah, see Sweeney, The Twelve Prophets, 527–557, 559–709. 27 Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 248–257.

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   555 be the most important Jewish observance. Those who suffered physical injury, such as castration, so that they might render service to the Babylonian Empire, were excused in Isa 56:1–7, likely because they had no choice in the matter but nevertheless expressed their desire to identify as Jews. Although such men would normally not be permitted to enter the Temple (see Deut 23:2–9) or father children, Isa 56:5 specifies that Yhwh will grant them Yad ve-Shem, “a monument and a name” among the Jewish people. The modern Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem adopted Yad ve-Shem as its name to acknowledge the millions of Jews who perished in the Shoah without descendants to remember them. Finally, we may note that the ideals of the book of Isaiah, the vision of world peace in Isa 2:2–5, in which the nations will stream to Zion to learn divine Torah so that human beings will learn war no more as well as the restored ideal Davidic monarch, in Isa 9:1–6 and 11:1–16, are not realized. Isa 56–66 attempts to address these problems in part by declaring that Yhwh is the true King of Israel in Isa 66:1, where Yhwh states, “Heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool,” so that it does not matter if there is no Davidic monarch or if Israel must submit to Persian rule. The other means by which to address this issue is through the long list of accusations of wrongdoing on the part of the wicked among the Jewish people in Isa 65–66 in an effort to charge that the Jewish people and not Yhwh are responsible for the failure to realize these ideals. Although Isa 65–66 depict the joy of the returning exiles and the role of the Gentiles in returning exiled Jews to Jerusalem, the chapter, and thus the book, ends with the depiction of the bodies of the wicked who had rebelled against Yhwh scattered about.28 Insofar as this image appears in Isa 66:24, the last chapter of the passage and the book of Isaiah as a whole, Rabbinic practice calls for transposing verse 23 after verse 24 so that the passage will not conclude with such a disturbing image when the chapter is read as a Haftarah or Prophetic Reading during Jewish worship services.29 Nevertheless, the concluding image of Isaiah cannot be ignored. Many scholars posit that there was a division within the Jewish community in Judea in the early Persian period and that the book of Isaiah condemns those it views as having abandoned Yhwh. Most supporters of this view think of the issue in religious terms—that is, Jews had abandoned the worship of Yhwh to pursue other gods—but the fact of the matter is that the book of Isaiah does not specify what the wicked may have done to deserve such a fate. But we have already seen that the question of the restoration of the House of David and the independence of the restored Judean territory were key issues in early Persianperiod Judah. Given the book of Isaiah’s political stance calling for submission to the Persian Empire and the redefinition of the Davidic covenant to apply to the people of Israel at large, it may well be that the wicked envisioned by the book of Isaiah might be those who called for the restoration of the Davidic monarchy, the overthrow of the Persian Empire, and the restoration of an independent Jewish state. Indeed, the book of Zechariah concludes in Zech 14 with a portrayal of Yhwh’s apocalyptic war against the nations of the earth that have oppressed Judah. The war will be led by the Davidic 28 Sweeney, Isaiah 40–66, 357–385.

29 Fishbane, Haftarot, 325–332, esp. 326, 331.

556   Marvin A. Sweeney monarch and will ultimately result in the nations’ recognition of Yhwh at Zion during the Jewish festival of Sukkot. We do not know the circumstances of Zerubbabel, but it is not inconceivable that his moves were understood as a revolt, and so it is possible that the dead bodies in Isa 66 were in fact the bodies of those who had supported Zerubbabel and who had been killed by the Persians in putting down any possibility of revolt. We must recognize that Haggai and Zechariah were part of the larger Book of the Twelve Prophets, which many think was designed to offer a counterargument to some of Isaiah’s ideas. Just as Isaiah includes the vision of the nations streaming to Zion so that they will ultimately learn war no more, the Book of the Twelve includes three instances in which this vision is employed to call for the overthrow of nations that oppress Jerusalem and Judah. Joel 4:9–17 calls for beating ploughshares into swords and pruning hooks into spears in preparation for a battle to defend Jerusalem against foreign assault in the Valley of Jehoshaphat. Mic 4–5 begins by quoting a slightly different version of Isa 2:4, but it proceeds to portray the rise of a future Davidic monarch who will deliver the nation from the nations that make war on Jerusalem. And the idyllic vision of the nations clinging to Jews in keeping with Isaiah’s idyllic vision plays a role in introducing Zech 9–14 in which a Davidic monarch leads a war against the nations that oppress Jerusalem and Judah. These instances indicate that the Book of the Twelve challenges Isaiah’s visions of world peace and the demise of an ideal Davidic monarch. Indeed, the proponents of the ideas articulated in the Book of the Twelve might well be those whose bodies are scattered about in Isa 66:24. Even in the aftermath of the Shoah, Jews are divided concerning whether the Jewish people constitutes a nation, a religion, or both, and so there is a major Jewish community in the land of Israel as well as a major Diaspora community located especially in the United States, but also elsewhere throughout the world.

29.6. Conclusion Reading Isaiah after the Shoah presents us with a fundamental truth, Yhwh commanded Isaiah to undertake an immoral task—namely, to render the people blind, deaf, and dumb, so that they would not repent and therefore would suffer the punishment that Yhwh had in mind for them. Readers are frequently disposed to consider Yhwh as an agent for good and love in the world, but as a true monotheistic deity, Yhwh must stand as the source for both good and evil. Certainly, the Shoah and the disasters faced by Israel and Judah in the times of Isaiah reinforce this point. Human beings must be prepared to respond and act when confronted with such evil. Isaiah did not stand up to Yhwh and demand that righteousness must be done—as did Abraham, Moses, Amos, and Job when presented with immorality from G-d. Although Isaiah and his anonymous successors never followed Yhwh’s instruction, they instead reformulated fundamental postulates, such as the eternal covenant with the House of David and Jerusalem, when confronted with the realities of their times. The ideals articulated in Isaiah, particularly

Post-Shoah Readings of Isaiah   557 the famous swords into ploughshares vision and the visions of a righteous Davidic monarch, are never achieved by the end of the book. When confronted with the face of evil in the world—even when it comes from Yhwh—human beings consequently must ask what they might do to bring about holiness and justice in the world—and they must be prepared to act upon those ideals, even when placed under threat.

Bibliography Berkowits, Eliezer. Faith after the Holocaust. New York: Ktav, 1973. Blumenthal, David  R. Facing the Abusing G-d: A Theology of Protest. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1993. Braiterman, Zachary. (G-d) After Auschwitz: Tradition and Change in Post-Holocaust Jewish Thought. Princeton,NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998. Buber, Martin. The Eclipse of G-d: Studies in the Relation Between Religion and Philosophy. New York: Harper and Row, 1952. Dawidowicz, Lucy  S. The War against the Jews, 1933–1945. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston/Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1975. Fackenheim, Emil. G-d’s Presence in History: Jewish Affirmations and Philosophical Reflections. New York: New York University Press, 1970. Fackenheim, Emil. The Jewish Bible after the Holocaust: A Rereading. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990. Fishbane, Michael. Haftarot. JPS Bible Commentary. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2002. Garber, Zev, and Bruce Zuckerman. “Why Do We Call the Holocaust ‘the Holocaust’? An Inquiry into the Psychology of Labels.” Modern Judaism 9 (1989): 197–211. Gilbert, Martin. The Holocaust: A History of the Jews of Europe during the Second World War. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1987. Goldhagen, Daniel. Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996. Guiora, Amos  N. The Crime of Complicity: The Bystander in the Holocaust. Chicago: Ankerwycke, 2017. Katz, Steven  T. Post-Holocaust Dialogues: Critical Studies in Modern Jewish Thought. New York: New York University Press, 1985. Landy, Francis. “The Covenant with Death.” In Strange Fire: Reading the Bible after the Holocaust, edited by Tod Linafelt, 220–232. New York: New York University Press/Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000. Linafelt, Tod, ed. Strange Fire: Reading the Bible after the Holocaust. New York: New York University Press/Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000. Morgan, Michael L. Beyond Auschwitz: Post-Holocaust Jewish Thought in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001. Raphael, Melissa. The Female Face of G-d after Auschwitz: A Jewish Feminist Theology of the Holocaust. London: Routledge, 2003. Rediger Schulte, Leah. The Absence of G-d in Biblical Rape Narratives. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2017. Rubenstein, Richard. After Auschwitz: Radical Theology and Contemporary Judaism. Indianapolis, IN: Bobs-Merrill, 1966.

558   Marvin A. Sweeney Sachar, Howard M. A History of Israel from the Rise of Zionism to Our Time. New York: Knopf, 20032. Shapira, Anita. Israel: A History. Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2012. Sweeney, Marvin A. “Isaiah 1–39.” In Fortress Commentary on the Old Testament and Apocrypha, edited by Gale A. Yee, Hugh R. Page Jr, and Matthew J. M. Coomber, 673–697. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2014. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 1–39, with an Introduction to Prophetic Literature. FOTL 16; Grand Rapids, MI and Cambridge, UK: Eerdmans, 1996. Sweeney, Marvin A. Isaiah 40–66. FOTL 16. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2016. Sweeney, Marvin A. “Isaiah and Theodicy.” In Strange Fire: Reading the Bible after the Holocaust, edited by Tod Linafelt, 208–219. New York: New York University Press/Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000. Sweeney, Marvin A. Reading the Hebrew Bible after the Shoah: Engaging Holocaust Theology. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2008. Sweeney, Marvin A. The Twelve Prophets. Berit Olam. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2000. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Tull, Patricia. “Isaiah ’Twas Foretold It”: Helping the Church Interpret the Prophets. In Strange Fire: Reading the Bible after the Holocaust, edited by Tod Linafelt, 192–207. New York: New York University Press/Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000. Wiesel, Elie. Souls on Fire: Portraits and Legends of Hasidic Masters. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1972. Williamson, Clark. A Guest in Israel’s House: Post-Holocaust Church Theology. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1993.

chapter 30

Ca non ica l R ea di ng of Isa i a h John Goldingay

30.1. Introduction Interest in canonical interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures emerged in the late twentieth century as one alternative or complement to the historical-critical interpretation that had dominated scholarly study for the previous century. The adjective “historical” points to interpretation that focuses on historical questions, and the adjective “critical” points to a critique of traditional approaches to interpretation and of the results of such approaches, if not a critique of the contents of the text itself. Regarding the scroll of Isaiah, historical-critical study established that Isa 40–66 came from a period much later than the time of Isaiah ben Amoz. In connection with Isa 1–39, historical-critical study was especially interested in identifying the elements that actually derived from Isaiah ben Amoz himself, viewing it as the “authentic” material within the scroll and thus more important than later material that did not come from Isaiah. The historical-critical conclusion that Isa 40–66 derived from a prophet or prophets who worked during the Babylonian period or afterward contrasted with the prima facie impression conveyed by the scroll (and for Christians, by the New Testament) that the whole scroll came from Isaiah ben Amoz. Further, historical-critical study concluded that passages that Jews and Christians had taken as messianic (and that the New Testament interpreted in this way) did not refer to the Messiah. For Christians, the idea that Isa 52:13–53:12 referred to the Jewish people or to some individual in the prophet’s day was especially troublesome. In most Jewish and Christian circles that viewed these writings as their Scriptures and were interested in them for the insight they offered on an understanding of God and of life, historical-critical interpretation seemed,

560   John Goldingay at best, irrelevant. Most scriptural study thus continued through that century as if historical-critical study had never happened. But in scholarly circles in the late twentieth century there developed renewed interest in the Isaiah Scroll in the form in which it appears in the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings. This renewed scholarly interest in the text itself reflected movements in the wider Western cultural context of the late twentieth century.1 Methods of biblical interpretation have consistently mirrored approaches to the interpretation of other texts; it was so with allegory in the first millennium and with the approaches characteristic of the Renaissance and then of modernity, including historical-critical methods themselves. Ironically, whereas historical-critical study saw itself as committed to an objective understanding of the text, unhindered by the tradition of ecclesial and devotional interpretation of the Scriptures, it replaced that tradition with another culture-relative set of concerns that differed from those of the text itself. The subsequent application of feminist and postcolonial approaches to scriptural interpretation (for instance) followed the development of such approaches in connection with literary interpretation generally. In this context, a useful distinction came to be made between a focus on what lies behind the text that we have (what it refers to or where it came from), what lies within the text (what the text itself says), and what lies in front of the text (what its readers bring to the text or what it points to).2 Although reading regularly combines all three foci, whether or not it is aware of doing so, the distinction is a heuristically useful one. There were thus two backgrounds to the emergence of canonical readings of Isaiah. On the one hand, some scholarly work in the humanities in general was reacting against historical-critical or “behind the text” readings, and on the other, within Christian scholarship there was a desire for an “in front of the text” reading that enabled scholars to interpret the Scriptures as Scriptures. In both connections, an “in the text” reading such as canonical interpretation seemed a step forward. The dual parentage of canonical reading, in the secular Western cultural context and in the religious concerns of some readers, is one factor that has generated confusion over the nature of canonical interpretation, though much of this confusion is more a matter of language than of substance. In this chapter, we consider some examples of the way canonical readings are preserved within the Isaiah Scroll, the sense in which the scroll itself is a canonical document, and some of the ways that the scroll itself has been read as a canonical document.

30.2.  Canonical Readings within the Isaiah Scroll Isa 40–66 has its historical background in the Babylonian and Persian periods, and it addresses those contexts. It is the work of prophets, preachers, pastors, theologians, and/ 1  See Barton, Reading the OT; Brett, Biblical Criticism. 2  See, e.g., Ricoeur, Essays on Biblical Interpretation; Interpretation Theory.

Canonical Reading of Isaiah   561 or scholars living in those contexts; for convenience, I will refer to them simply as theologians. Sometimes they work by saying things that seem novel: their describing Israel as Yhwh’s servant is an example, as is their designating a foreign king as Yhwh’s anointed and their bringing an encouraging message for eunuchs (41:8–9; 45:1; 56:1–8). Sometimes they work by using terminology and images that would be quite broadly familiar to their audience, such as the idea of turning to Yhwh or of the need not to be afraid. But sometimes they work by taking up phrases that have a distinctive link with passages that are earlier in the Isaiah Scroll or elsewhere in the Hebrew Scriptures. Isa 40–66 begins with an example, in its declaration “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God” (40:1). This exhortation recalls the ending of the first sequence of chapters in the Isaiah Scroll, Isa 1–12, with their promise of a time when people would be able to proclaim that Yhwh’s anger has turned away and that he has comforted his people (12:1). In 40:1 the promise becomes reality; the motif of comfort recurs in 49:13; 51:3, 12; 52:9.3 But the protests and prayers in Lamentations have also grieved over the fact that Jerusalem has no comforter (1:2, 9, 16, 17, 21; 2:13), and in Isa 40:1 Yhwh also takes up that remonstration and responds to it.4 Yet further, through Hosea Yhwh had declared that “you are not my people and I am not your God,” but had also promised a time when he would “say to Not-my-people, ‘You are my people,’ and it would say, ‘My God’ ” (Hos 1:9; 2:23 [25]). Yhwh is also fulfilling this promise. As Isa 40–55 then unfolds, it incorporates a series of declarations and exhortations that take up further declarations and exhortations from within Isa 1–39 and elsewhere. Isa 40:1–11 more broadly recalls Isa 6,5 and when 42:18–25 speaks of Israel as deaf and blind, it recalls 6:9–10 (cf. also 29:18; 35:5).6 It both recognizes the truth in Yhwh’s earlier words and also declares that they do not mean that Yhwh has nothing more to say to his people. Passages such as 41:22 and 42:9 take up proclamations such as 8:23 [9:1], declare that they have been fulfilled, and, on that basis, challenge people to believe in some new proclamations.7 Nor does such canonical reading start only with Isa 40–66. Within Isa 7–11, for example, a canonical process has been discerned as Isa 7 speaks of the birth of a son whose name will testify to God being with Judah, Isa 9 declares that a son has been born who will embody God, and Isa 11 speaks of a Davidic Messiah.8 In turn, 60:1–2 also subsequently takes up 8:23–9:2 [9:1–3] and 65:25 takes up 11:6, 9.9 The process of canonical reading thus continues in Isa 56–66, which relates to Isa 1–55 in a way analogous to the relationship of Isa 40–55 to what precedes.10 Isa 58 takes up 1:16–17,11 and a voice speaks in 61:1–3 in a way that utilizes wording from 40:9–10; 42:1; 45:1; 48:16.12 More broadly, Isa 65 has suggested a “canonical-agrarian reading” of a theme running through 3  Cf. Rendtorff, Canon and Theology, 149–151. 4  Cf. Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, 497. 5  See, e.g., Albertz, Geschichte und Theologie, 239–256. 6  See Clements, “Beyond Tradition-History.” 7  See, e.g., Williamson, Book Called Isaiah, 113. 8  See Janowski, “Canon.” 9  See Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, 497; and further the comments on the study of these passages by Barth and by Childs in Gignilliat, Karl Barth, 79–95, and in Sheppard, “Book of Isaiah,” 277–280. 10  See Stromberg, Isaiah after Exile. 11  See Gray, Rhetoric. 12  See Goldingay, Isaiah 56–66, 293.

562   John Goldingay the scroll as a whole.13 The Isaiah scroll thus includes a number of passages where theologians pick up earlier prophecies and rework them in canonical readings that reformulate the prophecies in a new context. In each case there is an interaction between the meaning of a text and the approach or question or convictions that a theologian brings to it. In the reworking one can perceive the influence of text, context, inspiration, and experience. The theologians who speak in these passages thus work in a different way from Isaiah ben Amoz or Hosea. One background factor would be simply chronological: Isaiah and Hosea could not have referred to earlier prophetic texts (at least, to any that are known to us), whereas Isa 40–66 could do so. And these theologians might have felt that they were glad to or needed to, or were obliged to, or a combination of all these feelings. These examples suggest several further observations. First, they point to the usefulness of making a distinction within canonical interpretation between canonical exegesis and canonical reading. Modern interpreters engage in canonical exegesis of passages within Isa 40–66 when they seek to analyze the work of these theologians. The theologians themselves were engaged in canonical readings of the earlier texts when they were reworking them; they were not simply exegeting them. Modern interpreters engage in a further canonical reading if they ask how the new text impacts their own beliefs and lives. The examples also illustrate several aspects of the ambiguity of words such as “canon” and “canonical.” Etymologically, these words suggest something that has the authority to determine belief and behavior, but within Isaiah, the authority of the passages that the later texts take up is not of a quasi-legal kind. The character of the Torah would give it a natural role in determining proper behavior in a quasi-legal way; however, most prophetic messages do not take a form that would imply their assuming this kind of canonical function. Their focus is not on laying the law down; prophets were not in a position to do so. They have instead that other dynamic kind of authority that some people attributed to Jesus (Matt 7:28–29). The kind of authority that attaches to a prophetic message expects a person of insight and moral commitment to respond with acceptance and submission on the basis of the content of the message rather than on the basis of the position of the person who proclaims it. Further, it is an authority that nevertheless leaves the later theologian free to say, “You have heard it said, but I say to you” (e.g., Matt 5:21–22). To put it another way, the canonical reading within the Isaiah Scroll illustrates the overlap and the distinction between the notions of Scripture and of canon. In a classic formulation in the New Testament, 2 Tim 3:16–17 speaks of the “sacred writings” or “Scriptures” (roughly, the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings) as theopneustos, “God-breathed”; this is what makes them instructive. Other New Testament references to the link between the pneuma of God and the Scriptures also imply the assumption that this link underlies the Scriptures’ extraordinary capacity to speak beyond the context in which they were originally given. In this connection the term “Scriptures” is more 13  See Stulac, “Rethinking Suspicion.”

Canonical Reading of Isaiah   563 open-ended than the term “canon.” But 2 Tim 3:16–17 goes on to refer to the consequent usefulness of these Scriptures for reproof, correction, and training in doing right, which suggests that they not only inspire insight but also make mandatory demands. For the theologians whose work appears in Isa 40–66, the messages that appear in earlier prophecy thus inspire further insight and can hardly be ignored. Yet they need to be understood in a new way, in a new context and need not be assumed to have said the last word. In the text from which we began, 40:1, a common feature of canonical reading appears. It takes up earlier “texts” from Isa 1–39, Hosea, and Lamentations in order to say, “It might have been true then but it’s not true now.” There is thus something paradoxical about the canonical status of these earlier texts. One could almost say that the canonical reading of them is anticanonical. Simply to repeat the canonical text would have amounted to indulging in false prophecy in that a true prophet is someone who can “distinguish whether a historical hour stands under the wrath or the love of God.”14 The theologians whose work appears in Isa 40–55 know that comfort has replaced wrath. Making a distinction of this kind between Scripture and canon helps to illumine a disagreement between the two chief advocates of canonical reading in the United States, James Sanders and Brevard Childs—though they do not make the distinction in this way. Sanders thinks of canonical reading as being designed to facilitate the community’s identity formation, and the canonical reading incorporated in Isa 40–66 does function to that end in the context of the crises and questions of the Babylonian and Persian periods. Sanders speaks in terms of canonical criticism in order to draw attention both to a similarity and to a difference over against speaking of tradition criticism; both terms describe a human process.15 For Childs, one of the points about using the word “canon” is to emphasize that this canonical reading, which takes up God’s earlier words, brings new words from God based on the earlier words. The Isaiah Scroll is not merely an expression of the faith of Israel; it is a message from the God of Israel.16 Whereas redaction-focused study can, for example, analyze the material in Isa 56–66 as the result of a human author’s exegetical work on material in Isa 40–55 and earlier in the scroll,17 canon-focused study has in mind the results of God’s speaking to his people. So Sanders is interested in the canonical process, in the activity of interpretation, which can help subsequent interpreters with their practice of interpretation. Childs is interested in the normative theological results of the canonical process. Yet the difference in focus between Sanders and Childs does not actually imply a need to postulate a disjunction between the Scriptures as humanly formulated and as divinely given. Isa 36–39 illustrates the point. These narratives present themselves as human formulations giving an account of events in Hezekiah’s day. While they include words dictated by Yhwh to Isaiah, the narratives as a whole are human compositions devised by someone other than Isaiah. If the version in 2 Kings is the original on which they are 14 Osswald, Falsche Prophetie, 22; cf. Sanders, Sacred Story, 84. 15  See, e.g., Sanders, “Canonical Context.” 16  See Childs, Isaiah, e.g., in his comments on Isa 1:2–31 and 40:12–31. 17  E.g., Steck, Tritojesaja.

564   John Goldingay based, presumably they themselves become an exercise in canonical reading. But either way, within the Isaiah Scroll they have the same canonical status as words dictated by Yhwh. As it is regularly the case that messages presenting themselves as dictated by God come via the personality of the prophet, so (conversely) narratives presenting themselves as composed by a human author come to be recognized as having a divine imprimatur. Outside Isaiah, the Nehemiah narrative is a useful example, while in the New Testament Luke’s Gospel provides a spectacularly explicit one. Canonical reading can be both Israel witnessing to its own self-understanding before God and God enabling it to hear from him and about him. It can issue both from Israel’s seeking and from divine coercion. The examples that we have noted illustrate how canonical reading in Isa 40–66 is not confined to a reading of material in Isa 1–39. As well as Hosea and Lamentations, Isa  40–66 takes up texts in Jeremiah, which Second Isaiah “reversed, confirmed, repredicted, and recontextualized.”18 This fact draws attention not only to the existence of overlap but also to the difference between an interest in articulating the nature of the unity of the Isaiah Scroll (and the redactional process that issued in it) and the process of canonical reading, which has no reason to focus exclusively or especially on links within the scroll. It is to be desired that future study will see more work on the dynamics of the canonical reading within the Isaiah Scroll.

30.3.  Canonical Reading of the Isaiah Scroll Canonical reading is thus a process within the Isaiah Scroll; the scroll incorporates canonical readings of earlier material that now appears within the scroll and elsewhere in the Hebrew Scriptures. It is (among other things) the deposit of a process whereby theologians in Israel came to ask what the proclamation of Isaiah ben Amoz and other texts had to say after Isaiah’s day and after Jerusalem had been devastated and then during the Second Temple period. Its process of growth over several centuries issued in slightly varying forms, in the Masoretic version, the version in 1QIsa, the version in the Septuagint, and so on. Determining which should be seen as the canonical version is thus a tricky theoretical question.19 Yet it is less tricky as a practical problem compared with the equivalent question about (say) Jeremiah or Esther or Daniel, because the different versions of Isaiah vary only on small points. They compare with differences between modern translations

18  Sommer, “Allusions and Illusions,” 172; cf. Sommer, Prophet Reads Scripture. 19  See Sanders, “Canonical Context,” 186–187.

Canonical Reading of Isaiah   565 of the Scriptures, which also make it problematic in theory to say which Bible is the really canonical one but are not very problematic in practice. By a process we cannot trace, the Isaiah Scroll that issued from this process of growth came to be part of the Torah and the Prophets, part of the canon of the Scriptures. And as a work having this canonical status, the scroll itself came to be subject to canonical interpretation—to canonical exegesis and to canonical reading. Was the final form of the Isaiah Scroll shaped in such a way as to mark it as having been designed to have a canonical function, so that becoming part of a canon was also the last stage of a process rather than a move alien to it?20 The final form of some scrolls was perceptibly designed to claim for them something like a canonical function. The Psalter has a five-part structure analogous to that of the Torah. Ecclesiastes has a double framework that both affirms its questioning and safeguards against readers giving too unequivocal affirmation to this questioning thrust. Are there indications of such canonical shaping in the Isaiah Scroll? The scroll is clearly structured; its arrangement is more evidently deliberate than that of Jeremiah though not than that of Ezekiel. Isa 1–12 was the subject of an early exercise in explicitly canonical reading,21 Isa 13–23 is then an organized collection of material that rhetorically addresses individual peoples, Isa 24–27 expands the horizon to the world as whole, Isa 28–33 reverts the focus to Jerusalem and Judah, and so on; one can argue about some of the details of the scroll’s structure, but in general, the outline is clear. Yet possessing a careful structure is no indication of having canonical aspirations. Studying the structured form of the Isaiah Scroll can be considered a canonical exegesis of it in the sense that such study works with the text in the form that became canonical; it aims to understand the text’s shape and its function for the community. It does not presuppose the conviction that the scroll was shaped to function as canon, or that it is a canonical text for the person studying it in its canonical form. This kind of analysis of it is descriptive; it is not designed to imply that anyone must submit to the scroll’s theological or behavioral implications. In this sense, it is not a canonical “reading.” An extreme version of the reaction against the dominant focus in scholarship on going behind the final form of the text to get to the history it references and the stages of its growth could imply that studying the scroll’s final form is not merely one proper focus for study but the most important such focus. The question would then be, “Important for what?” If readers want to investigate the history of Israel and of Israelite religion or to know what God was doing with Judah in (say) the eighth century, they need to go behind the final form of the scroll. Neither the latest nor the earliest version of the proclamation in Isaiah is necessarily the most interesting or the most authoritative. But (to be tautological), discovering the implications of the scroll for the community that accepted it as part of their canon requires a focus on the form of it that they accepted. Brevard Childs makes an explicit claim about canonical shaping in connection with Isa 40–55. First, these chapters are set in the context of 1:1, which one can indeed see has a canonical significance in the sense that it provides instruction on how readers should 20  Cf. Childs, Introduction, 59.

21  Ackroyd, “Isaiah i–xii.”

566   John Goldingay approach the scroll, instruction analogous to those opening and closing notes in Ecclesiastes. In an exercise in a “new canonical criticism,” Edgar Conrad notes the designation of the Isaiah Scroll as a “vision” in its opening verse, which he sees as inviting readers to understand the scroll eschatologically, and links this with the paucity of references to the prophet himself in the scroll, compared with the Jeremiah and Ezekiel scrolls.22 But it seems a big jump to suggest that 1:1 either designates the entire scroll as “eschatological” or instructs readers to derive the entire scroll from Isaiah ben Amoz— especially when Isa 40–55 gives a contrary impression. Childs links his inference with what he describes as the removal of historical references from Isa 40–55, and draws a contrast between these chapters and Amos or Jeremiah in that (he suggests) they have no real historical context once they are removed from their present canonical setting in the Isaiah Scroll.23 Rolf Rendtorff similarly declares that “the text of the book itself gives no indications that the various parts come from different periods . . . The composers of the final canonical version were not interested in making the reader aware of this.”24 Such statements seem exaggerated. Isa 40–55 makes clear that it addresses people in the Babylonian period who need a message of comfort and an assurance that Yhwh has not abandoned them. The chapters’ form differs from that of Isa 12, where the prospect of comfort lies in the future. Further, these chapters do include several explicit historical references, to Babylon and to Cyrus. Although Isa 40–55 does relate to the “redemptive plan of God for all of history,”25 it does so because the events of which it speaks relate to that purpose, not because the message does not relate to those events (in his commentary Childs gives surprising prominence to noting the significance of Isa 40–55 in the community’s sixth-century context).26 In one sense, the final form of the Isaiah Scroll is simply the result of a last level of redactional activity, and “it seems highly improbable that the process of ‘canonization’ had anything at all to do with the reasons why the book of Isaiah acquired its present shape.”27 Might the purpose behind that redaction have been (for instance) simply a desire to preserve the traditions of the Judahite people, akin to some modern Jewish and Christian desire to preserve a religious heritage even when the preservers do not personally identify with the material they wish to preserve? Yet the scroll’s talk about God and its offer of a perspective on life cohere better with a desire that its readers will trust it and adhere to what it says. Its lack of indications that it was designed to be a canonical text does not rule out its having been designed to demand the trust and submission of its readers. If one asks why prophets (and people who heard them and believed in the importance of what they had to say) wrote down their messages, the reasons surely included the conviction that people would need to take notice of these messages in the future, whether or not they did so in the prophet’s time. The same assumption would apply to the theologians whose insights also appear in the Isaiah Scroll. The scroll was 22  See Conrad, Reading the Latter Prophets, 182–242. 23 Childs, Introduction, 325. 24 Rendtorff, Canonical Hebrew Bible, 737. 25 Childs, Introduction, 326. 26  See, e.g., the discussion of Isa 40 in Childs, Isaiah. 27  Clements, “Beyond Tradition-History,” 97; cf. Clements, “Who Is Blind.”

Canonical Reading of Isaiah   567 designed to be a synthesis of Judahite traditions that were associated in some way with Isaiah ben Amoz, a synthesis whose compilers likely hoped would shape the thinking of the Judahite community. Yet such features need not imply a universal claim or an aspiration to canonical status. Within the New Testament, statements about the aims of the Gospels in Luke 1:1–4 and John 20:30–31 and statements in some of Paul’s letters indicate that these documents aim to be prescriptive, but it was when the Church made them part of its Scriptures that they became canonical in a transhistorical sense—or, one might prefer to speak in terms of the Church coming to recognize that God was requiring it to treat them as part of its canon. There are no parallel statements within the Hebrew Scriptures, but the same assumption makes sense in connection with most or all of its writings. Their authors were composing something prescriptive, but they did not know or hope that they were writing something that would become canonical. So there is a distinction between the shaping of the text to fulfill a canonical function and the use of the text to fulfill a canonical function. In the former case, the study of canonical shaping is an aspect of the study of genre or form; in the latter case, the study of the text amounts to a canonical reading. To put it another way, a canonical reading could be an exegetical attempt to understand the scroll’s dynamics, or it could be a reading with a background in an acceptance of the scroll as within the Scriptures and an openness and commitment to shaping one’s thinking by it. People with power in the Judahite community during the Persian or Hellenistic period may have used their power to encourage the influence of the scroll on people; there might have been political motivations for the acceptance of Isaiah within the community. Canonical readings of the scroll presuppose that this possibility need not rule out the idea that the scroll deserves to be normative independently of that consideration. The reading of the Isaiah scroll as a canonical document is, indeed, an act of reading rather than an act of exegesis. In this connection, the comments by Childs, Conrad, and Rendtorff point to a different insight from the one they themselves suggest. The shaping of the Isaiah Scroll into its final form was a historical process undertaken as part of the life of the Judahite community, and it would be nice to know the nature of the process and the nature of the community. But the scroll gives us no direct information on these matters, and any suggestions as to the community’s nature and the aims of the scroll’s production can be only guesses. For good reasons or bad, the shapers apparently wanted to point away from themselves to their work, and the community that accepted the scroll into its Scriptures apparently assumed that it could do so without knowing what the aims of the shapers were. Even if it is possible to uncover aspects of the process that lay behind the production of the Isaiah scroll, interpreting the canonical significance of the scroll in its final form is more a literary than a historical investigation. Given the careful arrangement of the scroll on the macro scale, one might have expected that its careful arrangement would have issued in a document that lacked rough edges of a literary or theological kind. And one might have expected that such order and coherence would be even more characteristic of the Isaiah Scroll if it were

568   John Goldingay designed to fulfill a canonical function. In fact, it is not such a document.28 Nevertheless, an aspect of its distinctive nature is the comprehensiveness of its theological perspective, which relates to the comprehensiveness of its historical background in the Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian periods—or, rather, its theologico-historical background in the time of the first temple, the devastated temple, and the restored temple, or the time when the Davidic monarchy ruled, when the Davidic monarchy had been removed, and when the Davidic monarchy was in limbo. “There is no canonical Amos, and no other canonical prophet either, who speaks a radical ‘No’ over Israel.”29 Isaiah ben Amoz did come close to such a declaration from time to time (see 5:1–7; 6:1–13). But generally, the canonical Isaiah ben Amoz held back from such finality, as even 6:1–13 likely implies by incorporating its enigmatic final phrase, “its stump [is] a holy seed.” Certainly, the Isaiah Scroll in its final form sets the “No” that appears in its first part in the context of a longer-term “Yes.” In such connections, a canonical reading of Isaiah as a whole corresponds to “the canon’s intention,”30 an intention that it should be read as a theological whole in which the various parts cohere and function meaningfully. The canonical text does not “intend” that the message of divine judgment found in the first part should be read by itself; it should instead be read in connection with, and from the standpoint of, the message of divine grace and forgiveness that appears in the latter part. But the converse is also true. And one aspect of the challenge of a canonical reading of Isaiah involves perceiving whether a certain moment is one when one especially has to hear the no or the yes. There are other aspects to the scroll’s holding together themes or attitudes that stand in tension. Isa 1–39 affirms Yhwh’s commitment to “the household of David,” and in light of the prospect of its demise, promises its revival. Isa 40–66 refers to no such commitment except in the context of seeing it as shared with Israel as a whole, which becomes Yhwh’s servant, and it transfers the description of royal shepherd and anointed to the Persian king. More broadly, the three main parts of the scroll suggest a comprehensive perspective on the key prophetic concern with mišpāṭ ûṣᵉdāqāh, the exercise of authority in a way that implements what is right. Isa 1–39 protests at the community’s failure in this connection and implicitly explains that the collapse of Judah issued from this failure; Isa 40–55 promises that Yhwh will take action to implement mišpāṭ ûṣᵉdāqāh; Isa 56–66 renews that promise and renews the challenge to the community to implement the principle in its life.31 Isa 56–66 lays before its readers passages that envisage the humiliation of Gentiles and passages that envisage Gentiles joining in the worship of Yhwh; and perhaps the latter kind were designed to correct the former, but the chapters do not indicate a gradual movement toward a more inclusive position, and the result in the canonical form of Isa 56–66 is to place before Gentile readers the choice of humiliation/death or conversion.32 28  As Rendtorff notes in Canonical Hebrew Bible. 29 Rendtorff, Canon and Theology, 64. 30 Childs, Introduction, 78. 31  See Goldingay, Isaiah 56–66, 47–49, following Rendtorff, Canon and Theology, 146–169. 32  See Tiemeyer, “Death or Conversion.”

Canonical Reading of Isaiah   569 A canonical reading of the scroll as a single theological whole does not mean a simple reading that gives the impression that there are no antimonies or tensions. Rather, the scroll preserves them. It is to be desired that future study will see more work on the theological significance of the scroll as a whole, with its broad horizon and diversity.

30.4.  Canonical Reading from the Isaiah Scroll We have noted that etymologically, the word “canon” suggests something with quasi-legal authority. The Greek word kanōn denotes a rule in the sense of a standard—something by which one measures things, literally or metaphorically. It comes with this meaning in Gal 6:16, and Phil 3:16. It is likely related to the word kanna meaning a reed, which in turn is likely related to the Hebrew word qāneh meaning a reed. In Christian circles, the word “canon” came to be used, in the context of theological debate in the church, to describe the Scriptures as the documents that define what counts as legitimate or proper within Christian faith, and in this context, the word also came to suggest a list. As a canon, the list would need to be defined and delimited, though it need not necessarily be closed and unalterable; in the modern world, churches have “canons” or church rules that can be revised and supplemented. “Canon,” then, suggests an officially recognized delimited collection of scrolls that have normative status for a religious community. In several ways, these connotations confuse discussion of “canonical” interpretation of the Isaiah Scroll or of the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures. Judaism did not refer to its Scriptures as a canon and it is not clear that there was ever some authoritative body that decided which scrolls counted as a defined, delimited, and closed canon; this way of thinking presupposes a back-projection from later Christian deliberations and history. Indeed, at earlier stages, the accumulation of the scrolls that came to make up the New Testament may have simply happened rather than been organized by anyone. The definition and delimitation to which Athanasius in the fourth century refers when he uses the word “canon” (in his Festal Letter of 367) is a late phenomenon associated with a desire to tidy up edges. For the most part, likewise, the collection of scrolls that make up the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings may simply have happened. Although it is likely that at some stages questions of power again entered into the process, we know of no body that authoritatively decided on the list of works that count as the Hebrew Scriptures. Specifically, we know of no body that decided to put Isaiah on the list. The development of scriptural canons can be illumined by comparison with the development of the Western Canon of great literature. Questions of power entered into the process, but hardly in such a way as to give a place to Homer, Aeschylus, Virgil, Chaucer, and Shakespeare, for example, when they did not deserve it.

570   John Goldingay In a Second Temple or New Testament context, then, the application to Isaiah of the word “canonical” should not suggest inclusion as opposed to exclusion, nor is it a quasilegal term. It does suggest that the scroll has a kind of moral authority, but one that is more like the authority of the Archbishop of Canterbury or the Chief Rabbi than the authority of the Pope speaking ex cathedra. And the dynamics of a canonical reading of the Isaiah Scroll then need not have been very different from the dynamics of the canonical reading of Isaiah ben Amoz by the theologians whose work appears in Isa 40–55. It is in this sense that the combination of stability and adaptability is of the essence of canon,33 even if the form of the text itself is now less malleable. The first readings of Isaiah in each of the Gospels illustrate how Isaiah functions canonically in this way. Isa 7:14 helps an understanding of how Jesus was born of a virgin girl and how he embodied the presence of God (Matt 1:23). Isa 40:3 helps an understanding of the role that John the Baptizer plays in preparing for the appearance of Jesus (Mark 1:3; John 1:23). Isa 61:1–2 and 58:6 help Jesus understand his own role (Luke 4:18–19). The moral authority of the Isaiah Scroll does give it the capacity to imply normative expectations regarding how people should think or live if they wish to belong to the community of people who believe in Jesus; see, for example, 1 Pet 2:18–25; 3:14. But more often, the Isaiah Scroll is seeking to encourage and to inspire, and the New Testament reads Isaiah in a way that enables it to articulate insights and answer questions; see, for example, 1 Pet 1:23–25; 2:4–8. In the context of its general use of the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings as a key resource for understanding Jesus, the Gospel, and the Church, the New Testament made more use of Isaiah than of any other book in the Hebrew Scriptures.34 Isaiah is close to being a canon within the canon for the New Testament. The implication is not that the function of the Scriptures, and of Isaiah among them, was simply to provide backing for already held convictions—to provide proof-texts. It was rather to provide insight on questions. Like the canonical reading within Isaiah, such canonical readings of Isaiah issue from an interaction between text, new context, inspiration, and experience. They are not polemical in the manner of (say) Isa 40:1 in its relationship to the texts it takes up. They do characteristically ignore the Isaianic context of the passages they take up. “Jews don’t read books”: traditional Jewish interpretation reads a verse in light of the Scriptures as a whole, but not in light of the book in which it comes, as the use of Isaiah in Pesiqta deRab Kahana illustrates.35 The same applies to the Jews who came to believe in Jesus, and it continues to apply to the equivalent Christian liturgical reading of Isaiah in a season such as Advent. In due course, Christians and Jews did come to read books. In the fourth and fifth centuries, Eusebius of Caesarea wrote the first commentary on Isaiah known to us. Jerome made use of it in writing his commentary, and so did Cyril of Alexandria. In the eleventh to thirteenth centuries, Rashi, Ibn Ezra, and Kimhi read Isaiah as a book. But the earlier canonical readings of the Isaiah Scroll did not work in light of the scroll’s own structure or even in light of its own overall perspective. 33 Sanders, Sacred Story, 9–39. 35  Sommer, “Scroll of Isaiah,” 225.

34  Sanders, “Isaiah in Luke,” 144.

Canonical Reading of Isaiah   571 It is thus confusing to speak (for instance) of the New Testament’s “exegesis” of Isaiah; to speak of the New Testament’s “reading” of Isaiah keeps things clearer. In this connection, the account in Acts 8 of Philip reading Isa 53 uses a fortuitous formulation. A Sudanese diplomat asks to whom the passage refers, and Acts reports, not that Philip told him it referred to Jesus, but that Philip started from this passage and told him about Jesus. The formulation leaves a space between the text and the reading. It compares with the favorite New Testament formula, which speaks of events “filling out” or “filling up” texts such as 7:14, 9:1–2, 42:1–4; 53:4 (Matt 1:22–23; 4:14–16; 8:17; 12:17–21); the conventional English translation of the verb plēro-ō as “fulfill” gives a misleadingly precise, narrow, and technical impression of the verb’s meaning. In general, the thesis that a canonical reading of the Scriptures as a whole will focus on the one story that they tell and will use typology as a key to interpretation36 works less well with Isaiah than it might with Exodus. But if Isa 52:13–53:12 describes a servant within the contemporary community, then typology provides a plausible approach to a canonical reading of the passage.37 Making a distinction between exegesis and reading also clarifies the way that scholarly work may speak of the “interpretation” of passages such as Isa 62 or 63:1–6 or 66:24, with their focus on Jerusalem or with their violence, when this “interpretation” is essentially critical of the substance of the text; it is a scholarly “reading” rather than a scholarly “exegesis.” In his chapter discussing “The Book of Isaiah and the Construction of Meaning,” Roy Melugin has argued that “meaning which we see in texts is always in large measure the result of what interpreters do.”38 The existence of different scholarly “readings” of Isaiah illustrates his point. Yet scholars seek to convince one another about their readings, which suggests the need to note Melugin’s qualifying expression, “in large measure.”39 It is possible and important to preserve the difference between, on the one hand, the inherent meaning of a text as an act of communication on the part of an author with would-be readers and, on the other hand, both the new significance of the text when it is read in another context and the limited grasp of that meaning on the part of someone reading it in a different context. “Canonical interpretation of Isaiah” implies a reading of the scroll in its final form. But this reading might or might not proceed by taking the redactional process whereby it reached this final form into account. It might assume that this final form is canonically shaped, or it might assume that its becoming canonical was a later development, and not something built into the aspirations of the text. Considering the scroll’s theological emphases, it might focus on its understanding of God and of God’s relationship with his people, or it might focus (for instance) on its sociological implications. It might imply reading the scroll in its final form in isolation, or it might imply reading it in the context of the Scriptures as a whole. It might be a purely exegetical operation, or it might imply the aim of seeing how its canonical authority impinges on the reader. It might imply 36  So Lindbeck, “Postcritical,” 28–31. 37  See Goldingay, Message, on the passage; also “Isaiah 53.” 38  Melugin, “Book of Isaiah,” 50; cf. Conrad, Reading the Latter Prophets, 5–30; and the papers in Melugin and Sweeney, New Visions. 39  Cf. Sheppard, “Book of Isaiah,” 558–561.

572   John Goldingay t­ aking the structure of the scroll as a whole into account, or it might imply focusing on the illumination or obligation that emerges from particular passages read independently of their context. It might imply a theological reading that uses Isaiah (for instance) to provide answers within the framework of systematic theology (“Childs’ theology is dogmatic rather than biblical”),40 or it might seek to develop a theology whose framework reflects that of the Scriptures themselves.41 It is to be desired that future study will see more work done by way of canonical reading of the Isaiah Scroll that articulates its significance for the twenty-first-century world.

Bibliography Ackroyd, Peter R. “Isaiah I–xii.” In Congress Volume: Göttingen 1977, edited by John A. Emerton et al., 16–48. VTS 29. Leiden: Brill, 1978. Albertz, Rainer. Geschichte und Theologie. BZAW 326. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2003. Barr, James. The Concept of Biblical Theology. London: SCM, 1999. Barton, John. Reading the Old Testament: Method in Biblical Study. (1984). Rev. ed. London: Darton, Longman, and Todd, 1996. Brett, Mark  G. Biblical Criticism in Crisis? The Impact of the Canonical Approach on Old Testament Studies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. Childs, Brevard S. Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture. London: SCM, 1979. Childs, Brevard S. Isaiah. OTL. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Clements, Ronald E. “Beyond Tradition-History.” JSOT 31 (1985): 95–113. Clements, Ronald E. “Who Is Blind but My Servant?” In God in the Fray: A Tribute to Walter Brueggemann, edited by Tod Linafelt and Timothy  K.  Beal, 143–156. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1998. Conrad, Edgar W. Reading the Latter Prophets: Towards a New Canonical Criticism. JSOTS 376. London: T&T Clark, 2003. Fishbane, Michael A. Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel. Oxford: Clarendon, 1985. Gignilliat, Mark S. Karl Barth and the Fifth Gospel: Barth’s Theological Exegesis of Isaiah. Barth Studies. Farnham, UK: Ashgate, 2009. Goldingay, John. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 56–66. ICC. London: Bloomsbury, 2014. Goldingay, John. “Isaiah 53 in the Pulpit.” PRSt 35 (2008): 147–153. Goldingay, John. The Message of Isaiah 40–55: A Literary-Theological Commentary. London: T&T Clark, 2005. Gray, Mark. Rhetoric and Social Justice in Isaiah. LHBOTS 432. London: T&T Clark, 2006. Janowski, Bernd. “Canon et construction de sens perspectives vétérotestamentaires.” ETR 81 (2006): 517–541. Lindbeck, George A. “Postcritical Canonical Interpretation.” In Theological Exegesis: Essays in Honor of Brevard S. Childs, edited by Christopher R. Seitz and Kathryn Greene-McCreight, 26–51. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1999.

40 Barr, Biblical Theology, 415.

41  See Rendtorff, Canonical Hebrew Bible, 415–715.

Canonical Reading of Isaiah   573 Melugin, Roy  F. “The Book of Isaiah and the Construction of Meaning.” In Writing and Reading the Scroll of Isaiah: Studies of an Interpretative Tradition, vol. 1, edited by Craig C. Broyles and Craig A. Evans, 1:39–55. VTS 70.1 / FIOTL 1. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Melugin, Roy F., and Marvin A. Sweeney, eds. New Visions of Isaiah. JSOTS 214. Sheffield. UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Osswald, Eva. Falsche Prophetie im Alten Testanent. Sammlung gemeinverständlicher Vorträge und Schriften aus dem Gebiet der Theologie und Religionsgeschichte 237. Tübingen: Mohr, 1962. Rendtorff, Rolf. Canon and Theology: Overtures to an Old Testament Theology. Translated by Margaret Kohl. OBT. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1993. Rendtorff, Rolf. The Canonical Hebrew Bible: A Theology of the Old Testament. Translated by David E. Orton. Tools for Biblical Study 7. Leiden: Deo, 2005. Ricoeur, Paul. Essays on Biblical Interpretation. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980. Ricoeur, Paul. Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning. Fort Worth: Texas Christian University, 1976. Sanders, James A. “Canonical Context and Canonical Criticism.” HBT 2 (1980): 173–197. Sanders, James A. From Sacred Story to Sacred Text: Canon as Paradigm. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987. Sanders, James A. “Isaiah in Luke.” Int 36 (1982): 144–155. Sheppard, Gerald T. “The Book of Isaiah as a Human Witness to Revelation.” In SBLSP 1993, 274–280. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1993. Sheppard, Gerald T. “The Book of Isaiah: Competing Structures According to a Late Modern Description of Its Shape and Scope.” In SBLSP 1992, 549–582. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1992. Sommer, Benjamin. “Allusions and Illusions.” In New Visions of Isaiah, edited by Roy F. Melugin and Marvin A. Sweeney, 156–186. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Sommer, Benjamin. A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusions in Isaiah 40–66. Contraversions. Stanford, CA: Stanford University, 1998. Sommer, Benjamin. “The Scroll of Isaiah as Jewish Scripture.” In SBLSP 1996, 225–241. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1996. Steck, Odil Hannes. Studien zu Tritojesaja. BZAW 203. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1991. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Stulac, Daniel  J. “Rethinking Suspicion: A Canonical-Agrarian Reading of lsaiah 65.” JTI 9 (2015): 185–200. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Death or Conversion: The Gentiles in the Concluding Chapters of the Book of Isaiah and the Book of the Twelve.” JTS 68 (2017): 1–22. Williamson, H.  G.  M. The Book Called Isaiah: Deutero-Isaiah’s Role in Composition and Redaction. Oxford: Clarendon, 1994.

chapter 31

Isa i a h i n A rt a n d M usic John F. A. Sawyer

31.1. Introduction The extraordinary role of Isaiah in Christian tradition, from the ox and the ass on ancient catacombs to the music of Handel and Brahms, is well known. But there are some significant portrayals of him and his prophecies in Jewish art and music as well, and a few striking illustrations of episodes in his life in Islamic art. In this short chapter on a very large subject we shall look first at some examples of how the call of the prophet and other scenes from his life have been depicted in the art of all three religious traditions and, in particular, at his special role in Christian art and architecture. We shall then consider how some of the language and imagery in the book of Isaiah has been interpreted by Jewish and Christian artists and composers.

31.2.  Prophet and Martyr The book of Isaiah does not contain much biographical information about the prophet, but several scenes in the book have inspired religious artists and composers down the centuries. Isaiah’s role in Christian art, however, is unique. “More evangelist than prophet,” as Jerome described him, he is portrayed beside more scenes from the Gospels than any other prophet.

31.2.1.  Scenes from the Life of Isaiah The most frequent is his vision “in the year that King Uzziah died,” when he answered the call to be God’s messenger (Isa 6). The brief biblical narrative describes a terrifying

Isaiah in Art and Music   575 experience in which Isaiah “saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up” with six-winged seraphim in attendance, one of whom flew and touched his lips with a burning coal. The text does not tell us where Isaiah was when this happened: in a fresco on the ceiling of the Palazzo Patriarcale in Udine, Tiepolo, has him sitting on his own in the open country with the angel on a cloud above him (1726–1729), while in Benjamin West’s painting Isaiah’s Lips Anointed with Fire (1782), the prophet is sitting on a chair and has a scroll in his hand, perhaps suggesting that he was at home in his study when the angel came to him (figure 31,1). In an illustration of the scene in the Wittenberg Bible (1534), attributed to Lukas Cranach the Elder, Isaiah is standing in a field within sight of the Temple, and scenes of Gethsemane, the carrying of the Cross, and the Crucifixion are in the background, examples of how Isaiah’s prophecies would be fulfilled. Chagall’s famous painting (1968) of the six-winged seraph touching the prophet’s lips also has haunting background scenes, including a crucifixion, a Madonna and child, and a vision of the peaceable kingdom. The seraphim have six wings in Isa 6:2, and this is how they are usually depicted, but the number of seraphim, whether “two or many thousand” (Luther), is not given. Many assume that Isa 6:2 is a vision of the Lord surrounded by the multitude of a heavenly host. This is how they are portrayed in Cranach’s illustration. This is also how the passage is used in the liturgy when worshippers join together with “angels, archangels, thrones, dominions, principalities, authorities, dread powers, cherubim with many eyes

Figure 31.1 “Isaiah’s lips anointed with fire” (Isa 6:6). Painting by Benjamin West (1738–1820), in Bob Jones University Museum and Gallery, Greenville, South Carolina.

576   John F. A. Sawyer and the six-winged seraph” in singing the Sanctus (Liturgy of Saint James).1 The words “calling to one another” (v. 3) suggest that they were divided into two choirs singing antiphonally,2 and this is how the scene is portrayed in the setting for two choirs in the Verdi Requiem (1874). Mendelssohn, in his oratorio Elijah (1846), also envisages a dialogue between a heavenly quartet and a chorus, as does Britten in his eerie setting of the Sanctus in the War Requiem (1962). For some there are only two seraphim, the word duo “two” having been inserted into the text of the Vulgate; this interpretation of the story was immortalized in Monteverdi’s “Duo seraphim clamabant” (The two seraphs were calling) in the Vespers of the Blessed Virgin (1610). In Bach’s B Minor Mass (1748), the Sanctus is a majestic chorus for six voices (SSAATB) recalling the six wings of the seraphim. Another scene from the prophet’s life that has inspired both artists and musicians “comes from the desert, from a terrible land” (Isa 21:1). A copper engraving from Johann Jacob Scheuchzer’s Physica Sacra (Augsburg and Ulm, 1735, plate 609) shows the prophet standing alone in the wilderness, visibly shaken and shielding his eyes as he beholds a chariot drawn by camels and asses approaching in the clouds (Isa 21:7). An illustration in a fourteenth-century Arabic manuscript in the Edinburgh University Library shows the prophet in a watchtower, watching “a pair of riders, a rider on an ass and a rider on a camel” (Isa 21:7 LXX Vg) approach across the desert, with a comment by the eleventh-century Iranian historian Al-Biruni that the rider on the ass, dressed in blue, is the Messiah and the rider on the camel, dressed in green, is the prophet Muhammad.3 A medieval Christian messianic interpretation of verse 12 is perhaps to be seen in the tenth-century Paris Psalter in which an illustration shows the prophet standing between a grey-clad woman representing “Night” and a small child labeled “Dawn” beside a flourishing tree, perhaps the tree of Jesse (Isa 11:1; figure 31.2).4 Musical readings of the vision include the Christmas carol “Watchman, Tell Us of the Night” (1825) by John Bowring, in which the watchman explains to a traveler the events of Christmas Eve, and one of Bob Dylan’s best known lyrics, “All Along the Watchtower” (1967), which alludes to the watchtower (v. 8), the princes (v. 5), the two riders (vv. 7, 9), the growling wild cat (v. 8), and the howling wind (v. 1).5 Another scene from the prophet’s life that is portrayed both in Christian and Islamic art is the destruction of Sennacherib’s army (Isa 36–37). Rubens’s dramatic painting The Destruction of Sennacherib (1616) depicts “a wild and raging tumult of flight caused by heavenly apparitions, with men, mostly mounted, fighting against an unearthly enemy,”6 but a modern reconstruction of a thirteenth-century illustration of the story from the Painted Chamber in the Palace of Westminster, which was destroyed by fire in 1834, keeps much closer to the text (Isa 37:36). It shows the sleeping army at the mercy of the angel of death in the center, and Isaiah on his knees before God on one side and Sennacherib about to be slain by his son Adramelech (Isa 37:38) on the other. 1 Wilken, Church’s Bible, 77.

2 Lowth, Isaiah, 181.

3  Biruni, Chronology of Ancient Nations, 22. 5  Gill, Classic Bob Dylan, 130–131.

4 Berges, Isaiah, 122.

6 Burckhardt, Recollections of Rubens, 84.

Isaiah in Art and Music   577

Figure 31.2  Isaiah praying between Night and Dawn (Isa 21:12). Illustration from the tenthcentury Paris Psalter, in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.

A ­sixteenth-century Islamic portrayal of the destruction of Sennacherib’s army, with Isaiah looking on from a safe distance, can be seen in a Turkish manuscript of Zubdat al-tawarikh (The Cream of Histories) by Luqman-i ‘Ashuri, in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin (CBL T414, folio 91b). George Arnold’s cantata Sennacherib, first performed at the Three Choirs Festival in Gloucester in 1883, opens with an orchestral introduction depicting the “Besieged City” and the “March of the Assyrians,” and ends with an eerie choral setting of verse 36 for tenors and basses, “Then the angel,” to the accompaniment of orchestral semiquavers and demisemiquavers. The miraculous cure of Hezekiah’s illness follows (Isa 38). Like Ahaz (Isa 7:10–14), Hezekiah is given a sign (vv. 7–8); the scene of the prophet standing over Hezekiah’s sickbed, with a sundial and a red sun overhead, is beautifully portrayed in a small medieval stained glass window in the Canterbury Cathedral.7 The most prominent part of the story, known as “Hezekiah’s Canticle” (vv. 10–21),8 features in many illustrated medieval manuscripts, such as the tenth-century Paris Psalter and the twelfth-century St. Alban’s Psalter, where Hezekiah is shown standing at the jaws of hell (v. 10) and pointing to his 7 Caviness, Stained Glass of Canterbury Cathedral, 120–121. 8 Mearns, Canticles of the Christian Church, 14.

578   John F. A. Sawyer failing eyesight (v. 14). In the Office for the Dead section of the beautiful fifteenth-century Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (folio 103f.), Hezekiah is shown standing naked in a dark scene of black rocks and huge red flames at the entrance to hell. The story is set to music in a dialogue motet for five soloists, strings, and continuo by Carissimi, in which the change from despair to joy is dramatically portrayed; and the fourth of Kuhnau’s Biblical Sonatas for harpsichord (1700) is a musical interpretation, marked agonizzante e risanato. The English composer Philip Armes’s Hezekiah (1878) ends with Hezekiah’s prayer (Isa 38:3), set as a moving tenor solo, and God’s reply (vv. 4–8), sung by a bass, followed by a joyful choral setting of verses from the Isaiah Canticle (Isa 12:5–6). Finally, Isaiah is the subject of a popular martyrdom tradition, according to which he was “sawn asunder” on the orders of Hezekiah’s wicked son, Manasseh. This event is not referred to in the Bible, unless indirectly in Heb 11:37, but it is well-known to the Church Fathers and the ancient rabbis, and features in the first-century ce Lives of the Prophets.9 It became a familiar motif in medieval Christian iconography in conventional representations of Isaiah carrying a saw, but the gruesome scene is frequently depicted as well. A pre-Norman example on a stone cross in Winwick Parish Church, Lancashire, shows the prophet suspended upside down while he is being sawed in half horizontally. He is also upside down in the Speculum Humanae Salvationis (ca.1360), being sawed vertically from the crotch down, although in many cases he is upright, and the sawyers are working from his head down. In the illuminated initial of the Isaiah Canticle (Isa 12) in the thirteenth-century Arundel Psalter, Isaiah is seated, barefooted, his hands behind his back, while two young men draw a two-hand saw backward and forward through his skull. A tree figures prominently in some of the portrayals of Isaiah’s martyrdom, going back to a tradition that Isaiah was first swallowed by a tree and then sawed in half. The tree, then, echoes the wood of the Cross, and Isaiah’s martyrdom is used, like the Jesse Tree (Isa 11:1) and the winepress (Isa 63:3), as an Old Testament prefiguration of the Crucifixion.10

31.2.2.  More Evangelist Than Prophet in Christian Art and Architecture The earliest Christian portrayal of Isaiah is probably found on a second-century ce fresco in the catacomb of Saint Priscilla in Rome. It appears to show the prophet standing beside the Madonna and Child, pointing to a star, in fulfillment of a prophecy cited by Justin Martyr, who died in Rome, circa 165: “Isaiah said, A star shall arise out of Jacob and a flower shall spring out of the root of Jesse and in his arm shall the nations trust” (1 Apol. 32:12–13). Like Justin, the fresco appears to combine two popular messianic prophecies (Num 24:17; Isa 11:1, cf. v. 10) and attributes them to Isaiah.11 9  Knibb, “Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah,” 380–399. 10 Sawyer, Fifth Gospel, 98–99. 11 Spier, Picturing the Bible, 177–178.

Isaiah in Art and Music   579 From the sixth century on, Isaiah can be clearly identified, along with Moses, David, Jeremiah, and others, commenting on events in the Gospels, for example, in the illuminated Sinope manuscript in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, where his comment on a healing miracle (Matt 20:30–34) is “then shall the eyes of the blind be opened” (Isa 35:5).12 His comments also accompany scenes from the Passion as in the Carrying of the Cross by Matthias Grünewald (1526; Isa 53:5) and the Entombment (Isa 11:10 Vg) in a triptych by the Dutch artist Maarten van Heemskerck (1559–1560; figure 32.3). In the magnificent twelfth-century mosaic in the apse of the Church of San Clemente, Rome, celebrating Christ crucified, Isaiah holds a scroll with the words “I saw the Lord sitting on a throne” (Isa 6:1), and the words “Heaven is my throne and the earth my footstool” (Isa 66:1) appear on Isaiah’s scroll in early medieval representations of Christus Pantocrator.13 In Fra Bartolommeo’s portrait (ca. 1516) in the Galleria dell’Accademia, Florence, he carries a tablet with the words Ecce Deus salvator meus (Isa 12:2 Vg). But by far the commonest text on Isaiah’s scroll is Ecce virgo concipiet . . . “Behold a virgin shall conceive . . . ” (Isa 7:14), and Isaiah, as are other prophets, is frequently shown standing passively beside paintings of the Annunciation, allowing the words to speak for themselves. With this text he stands opposite Ezekiel (Ezek 44:2), for example, in a painting by Duccio di Buoninsegna (1308–1311) in the National Gallery in Washington, DC, and with Jeremiah (31:22), Ezekiel (44:2), and Daniel (2:34) above Simone Martini’s Annunciation (1333) in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence. Occasionally, the artist depicts him pointing excitedly at the Virgin Mary (Isa 7:14) as in Rafaellino del Garbo’s Annunciation (ca. 1510) in the Convent of St. Francis, Fiesole. In Matthias Grünewald’s painting on the Isenheim Altar (1512–1515), a book the Virgin is reading when the angel Gabriel arrives is open at Isa 7:14 in Latin, while above the scene the prophet holds open a book with the suggestion of Hebrew characters on it. In Cima di Conigliano’s Annunciation (1495) in the Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, the verse is carved in beautiful Hebrew letters on a wooden canopy above her head (figure 31.4). A striking feature of some portrayals of Isaiah, such as Michelangelo’s on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1509), and Bartolommeo’s, just referred to, is that, unlike the vast majority of prophets, he is relatively young and clean-shaven in them. Raphael’s Isaiah in the Church of Sant’Agostino in Rome (1511–1512) has a beard, but is also very young.14 The youthful energy and flowing beard in a sculpture of the prophet that guards the west door of the Church of Notre Dame in Souillac (1120–1135) is an earlier example, as is the portrayal of Isaiah, alone of all the prophets, as young and beardless in some manu­ scripts of the Biblia Pauperum. The question arises whether some artists noticed the contrast between the joyful expectancy of the earlier chapters of Isaiah, especially Isa 1:3, 7:14, 9:6; and 11:1, and the grim solemnity of later chapters, such as 50:4–9, 53; and 63:1–3. Carl Sluter’s famous sculpture of six prophets on a fountain in Dijon (1380–1400), each holding a scroll inscribed with a verse about Christ’s suffering, suggests that some did: 12 Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 1:171; Spier, Picturing the Bible, 271. 13 Kirschbaum, Lexikon der christlichen Ikonographie, col. 358. 14 Ettlinger, Raphael, 121–123.

580   John F. A. Sawyer

Figure 31.3  “Him shall the nations seek, and his sepulchre shall be glorious” (Isa 11:10 Vg). Part of the “Entombment” triptych by Maarten van Heemskerck (1560), in the Royal Museums of Fine Arts, Brussels.

Isaiah with the text “Like a lamb to the slaughter” (Isa 53:7) is old and thoughtful, bareheaded, and has a striking contemplative, tight-lipped expression on his face, in dramatic contrast to the jubilant confidence on the faces of many of the younger Isaiahs.15 Like other characters in Christian iconography, David with a harp, Peter with a key, Catherine with a wheel, and the like, Isaiah is sometimes portrayed with a flowering branch of the Jesse Tree (Isa 11:1) or a flower bulb in his hand, as in a thirteenth-century

15 Sawyer, Fifth Gospel, 87–88.

Isaiah in Art and Music   581

Figure 31.4  “Behold the young woman shall conceive and bring forth a son” (Isa 7:14). The Annunciation by Cima da Conegliano (1495), in the Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg.

illuminated Psalter from Lower Saxony.16 In Grünewald’s Annunciation, he is actually standing on a much larger branch of the Jesse Tree. He is also sometimes represented carrying a saw, a reference to his martyrdom, as in the triptych by Heemskeerck mentioned earlier (Réau II.i, 369). Other examples include a woodcut by Christoffel van Sichem in a Dutch Bible (Amsterdam: P. J. Paets, 1657) and an illustration in Christoph Weigel’s widely copied picture Bible, Biblia Ectypa (Augsburg, 1695). One final context in which Isaiah is depicted in stained-glass windows, notably in Chartres Cathedral and Notre Dame in Paris, is with St. Matthew on his shoulders, alongside Daniel with St. Mark, Jeremiah with St. Luke, and Ezekiel with St. John.17 The four evangelists “on the shoulders of giants” have a spiritual vantage point from which they have a wider view of events in the life of Christ. Matthew sits on Isaiah’s shoulders because it is only in his Gospel that the key verse foretelling the Virgin Birth appears (Isa 7:14; cf. Matt 1:23), as well as the one allusion in the Gospels to a “branch” (Heb. ‫ )נצר‬from the Jesse Tree (Isa 11:1; cf. Matt 2:23).

16 Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 1:1, 15. 17 Cowan, Rose Windows, 14–15.

582   John F. A. Sawyer

31.3.  The Prophecies and Teaching of Isaiah Texts from almost every one of the sixty-six chapters that make up the book of Isaiah as it appears in the canon of Jewish and Christian scripture, have played a significant role in art and music. Some of the best-known visions and images in the Bible are in Isaiah, and they have inspired painters, stained-glass artists, and sculptors. And some of the most familiar pieces of religious music, both Jewish and Christian, are settings of texts from the book of Isaiah, especially in Hebrew, Latin, German, and English. It would be impossible to mention them all in the space of a short chapter, let alone discuss their origin, influence, and artistry. The following is intended to be a representative selection.

31.3.1.  The Visions in Jewish and Christian Art “The vision of Isaiah, the son of Amos,” begins with the comment that “the ox knows its owner, and the ass its master’s crib” (Isa 1:3) and provides one of the most familiar images in Christian tradition. The ox and the ass beside the manger in the nativity scene, though they are not mentioned in the Gospels, figure regularly in Christian iconography from the fourth century on, sometimes standing alone by the manger without any human figures in the scene (figure 31.5).18 Some identify the ox as the Jews, bearing the burden of the law, and the ass as the gentiles tainted by idolatry (Jerome): thus all humanity, both Jews and gentiles, “came to the one manger and found the fodder of the Word” (Augustine, Sermon 375.1). Sometimes the ox represents Christian faith and obedience, and stubbornness, disobedience, and materialism, usually Jewish, are represented by the ass: Botticelli’s Mystic Nativity (ca. 1500) in the National Gallery, London, is a good example, where the quiet obedience of the kneeling ox is contrasted with the behavior of the ass, who is standing up and disrespectfully chewing a mouthful of straw. No less prominent are the camels in the story of the coming of the Magi from the east. Images of the Magi coming from afar with camels and gifts of gold and frankincense (Matt 2:11) go back to Isaiah (Isa 60:6). The tradition that the three wise men were kings also comes from this passage (v. 3; cf. Ps 72:10–11), and early Christian portrayals of the Adoration of the Magi show the camels, in fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy.19 A fourthcentury Roman sarcophagus in the Vatican Museums is a beautiful example. In music, a well-known setting is Bach’s cantata Sie werden aus Saba alle kommen (They will all come from Sheba; BWV 65), composed for Epiphany in 1724. The opening chorus is a setting of verse 6b, with horn signals and oboes, perhaps to give an oriental sound, and a fugue suggesting the gathering of a great crowd.

18 Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 1:59.

19  Schiller, 1:101, plate 147.

Isaiah in Art and Music   583

Figure 31.5  “The ox knows its owner and the ass its master’s crib” (Isa 1:3). Fourth- to fi ­ fth-century marble slab from Naxos, now in the Byzantine and Christian Museum, Athens.

The shaking of the idols, which is the climax and “final miracle” in the story of the flight into Egypt as told in the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew 17–25, is based on a verse from Isaiah: “and the idols of Egypt will tremble at his presence” (Isa 19:1; cf. Ezek 30:13). This is frequently depicted in Christian art.20 In a magnificent twelfth-century stone carving on the south portal of the abbey of St. Pierre, Moissac, the Holy Family is shown approaching an Egyptian city, where two contorted figures can be seen falling from the roof tops. Other examples include the fifteenth-century Bedford Master, which shows a stone pillar with an idol on top of it collapsing as the Holy Family draws near (figure 31.6), and the fifteenth-century Stüttgart Missal where an idol has fallen off the top of a pillar inside a temple, beside a crowd of distraught Egyptians, while the Holy Family sits safely on the grass outside (BSL). One of the most prominent Isaianic images associated with the nativity in Christian iconography is the Jesse Tree (Isa 11:1; cf. Matt 1:1–17; Luke 3:23–38). It typically shows Jesse, David’s father, lying on his side with a tree emerging from his body, recalling Eve coming out of Adam’s side (Gen 2:22).21 In the branches are the ancestors of Christ with the Virgin Mary at the top and, above her, Christ enthroned with seven doves s­ ymbolizing the seven gifts of the spirit (Isa 11:2–3). No doubt influenced by the medieval preoccupation with ancestry, royal lineages, and heredity, it appears most frequently in stained 20  Schiller, 1:117–122; O’Kane, Painting the Text, 73–79. 21 Watson, Early Iconography; Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 1:14–22.

584   John F. A. Sawyer

Figure 31.6  “The idols of Egypt will be moved at his presence” (Isa 19:1). Painting from the Bedford Master’s Book of Hours (1423), in the British Museum.

glass windows and illuminated manuscripts from the eleventh to the sixteenth centuries. Among the earliest examples are the illuminated initial letter of the book of Isaiah in the twelfth-century Lambeth Bible, where the Virgin Mary takes up most of the tree and the “ancestors” include four prophets; four ladies representing the four virtues, Mercy, Truth, Justice, and Peace (Ps 85:10); and the contrasting female figures of Ecclesia (Church), on one side, crowned and supported by two apostles, and Synagoga, on the other, supported by Moses and Isaiah, her head covered in a veil held in place by the hand of God (2 Cor 3:12–16). One of the most famous Jesse Trees is the magnificent lancet window in Chartres Cathedral, where the “melody of the branches ascends in beautiful arabesques to explode in the seven gifts of the spirit.”22 Several of the great medieval French cathedrals, including Chartres, Rheims, and Amiens, have a Jesse Tree built into the architecture of their facades, showing various heralds of Christ, including Isaiah, each clutching a branch of the tree, on either side of the West Door, and the Virgin Mary, to whom the building is dedicated, is enthroned above them. A striking ivory panel from thirteenth-century Germany, now in the Louvre, shows only the Virgin Mary in the tree

22  Lee, Sedden, and Stephen, Stained Glass, 37.

Isaiah in Art and Music   585 and the child Jesus seated at the top (Isa 11:1) with seven doves above his head (Isa 11:2–3) and the world in his hand (Isa 9:6–7; figure 31.7). A very significant variation portrays Christ crucified at the top instead of the Virgin Mary or Christ enthroned, the wood of the tree of Jesse becoming the wood of the Cross.23 An impressive example of this imagery is the Brougham Triptych, a sixteenthcentury Belgian carved-wooden altarpiece, now in Carlisle Cathedral. At the bottom, the tree emerges from the side of the standing figure of Jesse, around whom stand several prophets carrying scrolls, one of them obviously Isaiah, although the texts are no longer legible. Branches with Jesus’s ancestors in them come out of the trunk to the right and left, but in the center the tree turns into the wood of the Cross, seen emerging from Calvary with Christ crucified on it, between the two other crosses on which hang the two robbers. In a stained-glass window in Troyes Cathedral, the Jesse Tree undergoes an even more bizarre transformation. Christ lies at the bottom, like Jesse, and from his

Figure 31.7.  “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse” (Isa 11:1). Twelfthcentury ivory panel, probably from Bamberg, now in the Louvre. 23 Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 2:135–136.

586   John F. A. Sawyer breast rises a new family tree, the True Vine with his “family” of the Twelve Apostles in the branches (John 15:5), related to each other by the wine of the Holy Sacrament, that is, the Holy Blood of the Crucified Christ, rather than the blood of Jesse.24 The extraordinary account of the return of the divine warrior after battle, covered in blood (Isa 63:1–6), inspired another powerful image that has had a colorful afterlife in Christian iconography: the winepress. The Church Fathers identified the warrior with Christ, who is at first unrecognizable in bloodstained garments (Cyril; Tertullian, Against Marcion 4.40), and then, when he returns to glory, is greeted by the angels with a question (v. 2), recalling the Psalm (Ps 24:7–10). His answer, “I have trodden the winepress alone” (torcular calcavi solus; v. 3 Vg) was applied to the loneliness of Christ’s Passion, when all the disciples forsook him and fled (Matt 26:56; cf. Jerome, Henry), but also to Judgment Day, when he will “tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty” (Rev 19:15). Augustine cites the passage in his commentary on Ps 56:1–2 (“my enemies trample on me all day long”) to explain that Christ was the “first cluster of grapes,” trodden on and pressed down by the violence of the passion, like grapes in a winepress (Exposition of Psalm 56.4). The scene is depicted very frequently in Christian iconography. In many cases, from fifteenth-century illuminated manuscripts to Mexican paintings, Christ is shown carrying the cross, which is attached to the giant wooden screw of a winepress, and his bleeding feet are trampling on a great wooden vat of grapes. In many cases, including a painting from about 1500 that is in the Bavarian National Museum in Munich, a team of laborers in the foreground are collecting and processing the fruit of the grapes in a variety of wooden containers.25 Another early sixteenth-century example, by the French artist Jean Bellegambe, shows a fairly conventional crucifixion scene, except that at the top, above Christ’s head, is the inscription torcular calcavi solus (“I trod the winepress alone”).26 A sixteenth-century window in the Church of Sainte-Foi in Conches, shows a winepress with Christ standing alone inside it, the wine being gathered in a tub beneath his feet, but the overall effect is to depict a crucifixion rather than a scene of wine-pressing (figure 31.8).27 Very different in style and conception, reflecting Victorian attitudes to blood and violence, is The Wine Press (1864), a painting in the Tate Gallery, London, by the English painter John Roddam Spencer-Stanhope, showing Christ in royal garments with a crown on his head, holding on to a wooden bar above his head with a clean white arm, his bare feet hardly soiled by the grapes he is trampling on. The image of a “lamb led to the slaughter” (Isa 53:7) reminds Christians that the subject of the famous “Suffering Servant” poem is the “lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world” (John 1:29; Origen, Comm. on John 6.273–81; Ambrose, Letter 69). In art the verse accompanies representations of Agnus Dei “the lamb of God” (John 1:29),28 and Francisco Zurbarán’s painting in the San Diego Museum of Art, inscribed tamquam 24 Marrow, Passion Iconography, 83–94. 25 Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 2:229, fig. 810. 26 Marrow, Passion Iconography Art, 84, plate v. 27  Lee, Seddon, and Stephen, Stained Glass, 140. 28 Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art, 2:117–118.

Isaiah in Art and Music   587

Figure 31.8  “I trod the winepress alone” (Isa 63:3). Sixteenth-century stained-glass window in the Church of Sainte-Foi, Conches.

ovis . . . (Acts 8:32; cf. Isa 53:7), is a particularly striking example.29 The graphic Imago Pietatis showing Christ soon after the crucifixion, usually still alive, his wounded hands crossed in front of him, is known as the “Man of Sorrows” (Isa 53:3 AV), although the term seems inappropriate for such a physical scene and is nowadays translated “a man of suffering and acquainted with infirmity” (NRSV), or the like (figure 31.9).30 The vision of world peace in Isa 2:4, with the famous image of beating “swords into ploughshares” (cf. Mic 4) is, nowadays, after two world wars and the subsequent East-West arms race, among the most universally familiar biblical images. In 1959 the Soviet Union presented a huge bronze sculpture entitled Let Us Beat Our Swords into Ploughshares to the United Nations for its building in New York City, where it stands to this day. It is just under ten feet tall and, true to the violence of the original image, shows a man about to strike a huge sword with a hammer. The sword is already buckling in the grip of his left hand, and beneath it, the sharp end of a ploughshare can be seen already cutting the soil. In Israel the “swords into ploughshares” text (Isa 2:1–4) is inscribed in Hebrew and Arabic on a “monument of Peace” erected in Jerusalem after the Six Day War in 1967, showing an ugly tangle of metal suggesting weapons of war 29 Baticle, Zurbarán, 269.

30  Sawyer, “A Man of Sorrows,” 14–16.

588   John F. A. Sawyer

Figure 31.9 “A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief ” (Isa 53:3). Painting by Petrus Christus (1425–1476), in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.

transforming into agricultural implements. The passage is also the inspiration for a huge stained-glass window by the Israeli artist Mordecai Ardon that is in the National and University Library in Jerusalem (1980–1984). The left panel shows an intricate pattern of roads to Jerusalem, each with the words “Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord” (Isa 2:3), written in different languages. The center panel shows the Isaiah Scroll from Qumran across the foreground, suggesting the walls of Jerusalem, with kabbalistic symbols floating above them and texts from Isaiah (Isa 2:4–5), and in the right panel a display of spades in soft green and white rises above the dark red glow of a pile of guns and shells. Ardon’s window is a summons to God’s people to go up to the heavenly Jerusalem, where the divine presence takes the place of human violence. A beautiful Christian version of this aspect of the vision can be seen in a thirteenth-century stained-glass window in Sainte-Chapelle, Paris, where the prophet is shown carrying a light for his people (Isa 2:5). Some Christian interpreters argued that Isa 2:4 is a messianic prophecy fulfilled in Christ, by interpreting the “swords into ploughshares” image spiritually as a metaphor. This is how it is portrayed in the thirteenth-century Bible Moralisée, for example, which shows two blacksmiths working at their anvils as an assistant keeps them supplied with swords, and is about the Church’s mission to break through the hardness of human hearts by preaching the Word of God. Jan Breughel the Elder’s little-known painting

Isaiah in Art and Music   589 The Prophecy of Isaiah (ca. 1609), also has a lively scene of blacksmiths working at their anvils in the background, but again, there seems to be little emphasis on the actual issues of war and peace.31 Another image from Isaiah that has become very popular is the “peaceable kingdom” (Isa 11:6–9). Pictures showing beasts of prey consorting happily with their vulnerable victims are nowadays very familiar, but this was not the case before modern times. An interesting exception is a series of mosaics from Late Antiquity, derived from pagan themes relating to the Golden Age, especially Orpheus. Fifth-century Christian examples have been found in Jordan, Asia Minor, and Corsica, including a leopard grazing peacefully beside a kid (v. 6),32 and an ox and a lion facing each other over a table piled high with straw (v. 7).33 Medieval examples include the thirteenth-century Bible Moralisée, which illustrates verses 6–9 in some detail but is strictly limited to Jerome’s interpretation and portrays none of the global or political aspects of the scene so familiar to us today, and a sixteenth-century woodcut by the French Calvinist artist Georgette de Monteney entitled foedere perfecto, “the covenant complete,” showing a lion, a lamb, and a wolf eating together. It is not until the early nineteenth century that the passage gains its popularity, thanks to the paintings of the Quaker artist Edward Hicks ­(figure 31.10). Over a period of about twenty years, he painted nearly a hundred versions of The Peaceable Kingdom, of which about twenty-five have survived. The title was derived from a Bible illustration by the English artist Richard Westall.34 Westall’s was as much an illustration of verse 1 as of verses 6–9, and the focus is on the little child holding a grapevine in his hand as a symbol of the Eucharist. In Hicks’s paintings, the emphasis gradually switched away from the child and Christian theology to the animals, seen as the warring elements in human nature coming together in perfect harmony. In some versions, for example, the child is a little girl holding an olive branch instead of the sacramental vine, and the title becomes The Peaceable Kingdom with Liberty. Another group, entitled The Peaceable Kingdom of the Lion makes this interpretation even clearer, while in the background of several explicitly political versions William Penn is shown signing the peace treaty with the Native Americans in 1681. The American Randall Thompson composed a cycle of eight sacred choruses for a cappella choir entitled The Peaceable Kingdom (1936), inspired by the Edward Hicks’s paintings (Isa 11:6–9). A Chagall tapestry, hanging in the Knesset building in Jerusalem (1963), shows a glowing vision of lions, cattle, a snake, a child, and other creatures from Isaiah’s vision of peace, surrounded by a crowd of onlookers, human and nonhuman; and the bronze menorah presented by Britain to the young State of Israel in 1948, now standing opposite the Knesset, has a panel portraying Isaiah presiding over a scene of wild beasts grazing peacefully with lambs, gazelles, and other small animals. It is the work of the Jewish artist of German origin Benno Elkan (1877–1960).

31 Ertz, Jan Brueghel der Ältere, 383–384.

32 Russell, Mosaic Inscriptions, 70–74.

33  Moracchini-Mazel, Les Monuments paléochrétiens, 24–29. 34  Westall and Martin, Illustrations of the Bible, 141.

590   John F. A. Sawyer

Figure 31.10  The Peaceable Kingdom. Painting by Edward Hicks (1790–1849), in the American Folk Art Museum, New York City.

Another popular image from Isaiah is the “well of the Savior” (Isa 12:3 Vg), elaborately illustrated, for example, in the ninth-century Utrecht Psalter. Applied to the Transfiguration (Matt 17:1–9; Mark 9:2–8; Luke 9:28–36; cf. 2 Pet 1:16–18), it shows Christ in a mandorla at the top, flanked by Moses and Elijah, with Peter standing at the foot of the mountain looking up and James and John lying prostrate. Beneath is the well from which streams flow out through the gate of a city wall, and people are bringing cups and jars to drink from it and singing praises (v. 3 Vg).35 Verse 3 also accompanies the Baptism of Christ in the Biblia Pauperum (BP 66; cf. Ps 68:26 [Vg]; Ezek 36:25; Zech 13:1), and the Crucifixion in the eleventh-century Saint Alban’s Psalter which shows the prophet looking up to God, who is enthroned above him (Isa 6), and pointing to a well at the foot of the Cross, which has branches sprouting out of it (Isa 11:1) and a lamb on the crosspiece (Isa 16:1; 53:7).36 For Christians, Isaiah’s famous image of a shepherd (Isa 40:11) was fulfilled in Christ (John 10:14–15), and the Good Shepherd became one of Christianity’s most famil35 DeWald, Illustrations of the Utrecht Psalter, 65–66.

36 Dodwell, St Alban’s Psalter, 268.

Isaiah in Art and Music   591 iar symbols, already appearing in a third-century catacomb fresco.37 Other examples include the fifth-century mosaic in the mausoleum of Galla Placidia in Ravenna, and a painting by the Spanish artist Murillo in the Prado, Madrid (ca. 1660). There is also the famous alto aria “He Shall Feed His Flock” at the end of Part 1 of Handel’s Messiah (1742), where it is linked to “Come unto him” and “His yoke is easy” (Matt 11:28–30). The phrases “gather with his arm,” “carry in his bosom,” and “gently lead” appealed particularly to nineteenth-century hymn writers, such as Fanny Crosby (1820–1915), whose “Safe in the Arms of Jesus, Safe on His Gentle Breast” became very popular. Another nineteenth-century example is a stained-glass window by Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris in St Martin’s Church, Brampton (1878), where the Good Shepherd is accompanied by an angel carrying a scroll with Isa 40:11 on it. Immediately after the image of God as a shepherd, the prophet urges his people to “raise their minds to heaven and . . . fix their whole heart on the power of God” (Isa 40:12–26), and portrays God as an architect measuring the world’s volume, length, and weight, using a compass, scales and other tools (cf. Prov 8:22–31). This image appears in the early twelfth-century Tiberius Psalter (folio 7v), where he is equipped with dividers, a compass, and scales as he looks down on the face of the deep, his spirit moving like a bird over the waters (Gen 1:2), and also in William Blake’s famous painting The Ancient of Days (1794), which shows him reaching down from heaven with a compass in his left hand, stretching out like rays of light into the darkness below. In contrast to God’s power, the behavior of craftsmen making idols out of wood and metal is described in great detail in Isaiah, in places almost comically (Isa 44:9–20; cf. 44:18–20). The thirteenth-century Bible Moralisée shows Isaiah watching with scorn as one of the craftsmen, with an axe in his hand, kneels in awe before a statue of a young man carrying a huge sword (Isa 44:12–13). The Flemish painter Jakob Jordaens (1593–1678), who converted to Calvinism in later life, puts a great deal of Isaianic detail into his painting of the scene, but the centerpiece, a nude female idol with what appears to be a crown on her head, surrounded by a crowd of men, women, and children with outstretched hands praying desperately to her, looks very like a statue of the Virgin Mary, despite arguments to the contrary.38

31.3.2.  Musical Settings of Texts from Isaiah The exceptional role of texts from Isaiah in hymns, oratorios, spirituals, and contemporary popular music is well known.39 There are a few musical compositions devoted explicitly to the life and teaching of the prophet, such as Le profezie d’Isaia (1729), an oratorio by Handel’s Italian contemporary Antonio Caldara (1729), and the American Willard Patten’s Isaiah (1897). Willy Burkhard’s oratorio The Face of Isaiah (1936) was 37 Spier, Picturing the Bible, 6, 12–13.

38  Benisovitch, “Un dessin de Jacob Jordaens,” 56–57.

39  Dowling Long and Sawyer, Bible in Music.

592   John F. A. Sawyer composed in Switzerland on the eve of the Second World War, and contains many powerful settings of texts from Isaiah. At the beginning of Part III, for example, very effective use is made of bird imagery in a choral setting of Isa 31:5, immediately following the soprano solo “They will mount up with wings like eagles” (Isa 40:31). Verses from chapter 24 (vv. 1, 5, 8, 16b, 19) feature in a dramatic section on the threat of global judgement, while the work concludes with “Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river” (Isa 66:12) and a promise of “new heavens and a new earth” (Isa 65:17–18a).40 Two Motets in Diem Pacis for mixed chorus and brass, composed by the Englishman Wilfrid Mellers soon after the Second World War, with the City of London in mind, are settings of Isa 24:4–14 (“The City of Desolation”) and selected verses from Isa 61–62 (“The City not Forsaken”). The establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 inspired several works highlighting Isaiah’s visions of hope for Zion, including Alexandre Tansman’s oratorio Isaïe le prophète, (1950) and Bohuslav Martinu’s cantata The Prophecy of Isaiah, completed shortly before his death in 1959, which premiered in Jerusalem in 1963. Robert Starer’s cantata Ariel. Visions of Isaiah (1959) begins with prophecies of judgement on sinful Jerusalem (“Woe to Ariel” Isa 29:1–4; 1:4, 7), with a flighty scherzo on the wantonness of “The Daughters of Zion” (Isa 3:16–24), and contains a striking meditative chorus a cappella “The Lord shall give thee rest” (Isa 14:3), ending in unison “The Lord will wipe away tears from all faces” (Isa 25:8). The work ends with the chorus “Break forth into singing” (Isa 52:9), celebrating the restoration of Jerusalem (Isa 52:1), and the words “Let us walk in the light of the Lord” (Isa 2:5). The Fourth Movement of Penderecki’s choral Symphony no.7 (The Seven Gates of Jerusalem) 1996) is another choral setting of 52:1, combined with “Open the gates” (Isa 26:2). The prominent role of Isaiah in the Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany lectionaries is reflected in well-known works by many composers. The Advent hymn “O come, O come, Immanuel” originates in Isaiah (Isa 7:14; 59:20; cf. 11:10; 22:22), and the plainchant provided the inspiration for James MacMillan’s percussion concerto Veni Veni Emmanuel (1992). The Rorate (Isa 45:8) used to be sung as an introit during Advent and is still one of the “Alleluia verses” sung on weekdays in Advent: “Send victory like a dew, you heavens” (Lectionary, 1980, 35). In addition to motets by Byrd and Palestrina, and Haydn’s early Rorate Mass (c.1750), Liszt’s oratorio Christus (1873) opens with an orchestral arrangement of the plainchant melody, and there are modern settings of Rorate Coeli by John Joubert (1985) and Thea Musgrave (1999). Musical settings of Isa 9:6 include the Christmas mass Puer nobis natus esti, “A boy is born to us,” by Thomas Tallis (1554), a William Byrd motet (1607), and a Bach Cantata composed for Christmas Day in 1712 or 1713 (BWV 142). Bach’s cantata for Epiphany has already been mentioned (Isa 60:6). Isa 52:8–10 inspired a tenor solo in his cantata Wachet Auf (1599), and his cantata Brich dem Hungrigen dein Brod (BWV 39; Isa 58:7–8) was first performed in June 1726 on behalf of Protestant refugees from Salzburg who

40 Berges, Isaiah, 125–127.

Isaiah in Art and Music   593 were seeking asylum in Leipzig.41 His motet from 1726, Fürchte dich nicht, ich bin bei dir (BWV 228) is a setting of Isa 41:10, taken with Isa 43:1. In Handel’s oratorio Messiah (1742) the first two parts are mostly settings of texts from Isaiah in the AV, brilliantly selected and arranged by the librettist Charles Jennens.42 After a truly original orchestral introduction, which moves from a mournful dirge to an allegro suggesting the violent upward striving of the oppressed, three texts from Isa 40:1–5 promise a miraculous transformation: the tenor recitative “Comfort ye my people . . . prepare ye the way of the Lord,” the tenor aria “Every valley shall be exalted,” and the first chorus “And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.” Later, “Behold a virgin shall conceive” (Isa 7:14), is followed by an alto solo and chorus on another text from chapter 40: “O thou that tellest good tidings to Zion” (Isa 40:9–10), combined with “Arise shine for thy light is come” (Isa 60:1). After a celebration of the birth of Christ with the chorus “For unto us a child is born” (Isa 9:6), a Pastoral Symphony, and texts from Luke and Zechariah, we return once more to chapter 40 for one of the most beautiful arias: “He shall feed his flock” (Isa 40:11). Part 2 begins with the chorus “Behold the Lamb of God” (John 1:29) and then applies the language of Isaiah to Christ’s Passion in the alto aria “He was despised and rejected” and three choruses, all settings of verses from the “Servant Songs” (Isa 53:3–6, 8; 50:6). The resurrection is then celebrated in a soprano aria “How beautiful are the feet” (Isa 52:7) and the Hallelujah Chorus (Rev 19:6, 16).43 Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah (1846) contains some striking texts from Isaiah. The final chorus (andante maestoso), for example, after Elijah is taken up by a whirlwind to heaven, begins with the dignified, triumphant words of Isa 58:8: “And then shall your light break forth as the light of morning breaketh,” immediately followed by a lively fugue on the first verse of Psalm 8 (“Lord, our Creator, how excellent thy name is in all the earth”), which provides a kind of doxology to Mendelssohn’s musical interpretation of the Elijah story. Brahms’ setting of Isa 40:6–8 in his German Requiem (1869) beautifully expresses the contrast between the grim inevitability of death (vv. 6–7), sung twice slowly and rhythmically, with James 5:7 inserted between, and the statement of faith in the Word of God so dear to Luther (v. 8; poco sostenuto). There is a joyful fugue on another Isaiah passage familiar to Christians both as an Advent reading and from funeral liturgies (Isa 35:10), and a particularly beautiful chorus, “I will comfort you as one whom a mother comforts” (Isa 66:13), sung in dialogue with the soprano solo “You who now have sorrow” (John 6:22). Many passages have been set to music in hymns and spirituals. Of the sixty-seven songs in Scottish Paraphrases (1781), more come from the book of Isaiah than from any other book of scripture, and some of the best-known eighteenth- and nineteenthcentury hymn writers were inspired by Isaiah, including John Newton (“Glorious things of thee are spoken,” originally entitled “Zion or City of God. Isaiah xxxiii. 20, 21”),44 William Cowper (“Can a woman’s tender care / Cease towards the child she 41 Whittaker, Cantatas of Johann Sebastian Bach, 688. 42  Butt, “George Friedric Handel and the Messiah,” 294–306. 43  Davies, “Oratorio as Exegesis,” 114–134. 44 Moffatt, Handbook to the Church Hymnary, 75.

594   John F. A. Sawyer bare?” Isa 49:15), Reginald Heber (“Holy, holy, holy” Isa 6:3) and Edward Bickersteth (“Peace, ­perfect peace” Isa 26:3). Isaiah has also played a significant role in contemporary Christian worship. There is a very popular setting of Isa 43:1–4 by Gerald Markland that begins with “When you walk through the waters” (1978), and “Here I am, Lord” (Isa 6:8) is the refrain of the hymn beginning “I the Lord of sea and sky” by the American Jesuit Dan Schutte (1981). “Prepare ye the way of the Lord” (Isa 40:3; Matt 3:3), sung by John the Baptist and company, is one of the best-known numbers in the rock musical Godspell (1971), and “Isaiah 6” is a popular song on the album Smash (2005) by the Christian band “One Bad Pig,” with the chorus: Here am I—send me Here am I—take me Here am I—use me Here am I—spend me Send me, take me, use me, spend me, I am not my own.

Sinead O’Connor’s hauntingly beautiful song “If You Had a Vineyard,” based on Isaiah 5, highlights the depth of God’s sorrow over the wicked behavior of his people. African American versions of Isaiah include the spiritual “Go tell it on the mountain” (Isa 40:9; cf. 52:7), applied to the Christmas story, and “I ain’t gonna study war no more” (Isa 2:4) is the chorus of “Down by the Riverside.” The image of sinners trying to hide from the wrath of God in “the caves of the rocks and the holes in the ground” (Isa 2:19; Rev 6:15–16) appears in another spiritual, immortalized by Nina Simone on her album Pastel Blues (1965): “Sinnerman, where you gonna run to? I run to the Rock, please hide me, Lord, All on that day.” Popular Jewish settings of the Hebrew text include the liturgical song Lekhah dodi (“Come my beloved”), sung on Friday evenings to welcome the Sabbath. Composed in sixteenth-century Safed by the kabbalist Shlomo Halevi Alkabetz, it contains clear allusions to Isaiah: “Shake yourself free, rise from the dust . . . your light is coming, arise shine” (Isa 52:1–2; cf. 60:1; 62:5). The popular Israeli folk dance Mayim be-sason (“Water with rejoicing,” Isa 12:3) was composed in 1937 to celebrate the discovery of water in the desert, and Yerushalayim shel zahab (“Jerusalem of gold,” Isa 60:17; 6:6–7) was written by the Israeli musician Naomi Shemer (1930–2004) in 1967, on the eve of the Six-Day War, and features near the end of the film Schindler’s List (1993).

Bibliography Editions Bible Moralisée. Edited by A. de Laborde. Paris: 1911–27. (see Websites) Biblia Pauperum: A Facsimile and Edition, edited by Avril Henry. Aldershot, UK: Scholar Press 1987. (see Websites) Lectionary: Order of Readings for Use at Mass according to the Cycle of Readings Promulgated by Pope Paul VI, Using the Jerusalem Bible Version of Scripture. Reader’s ed. London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1970. Luther’s Works. Vol. 16, Lectures on Isaiah Chapters 1–39. Edited by Jaroslav Pelikan. St. Louis, MO: Concordia, 1969.

Isaiah in Art and Music   595 Luther’s Works. Vol. 17, Lectures on Isaiah Chapters 40–66. Edited by Hilton C. Oswald. St. Louis, MO: Concordia, 1969.

Secondary Literature Baticle, Jeannine, ed. Zurbarán. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987. Benisovitch, M. N. “Un dessin de Jacob Jordaens à la E.B. Crocker Gallery (Sacramento).” Oudholland 68 (1953): 56–57. Berges, Ulrich F. Isaiah: The Prophet and His Book. Translated by Philip Sumpter. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012. Biruni, Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad. The Chronology of Ancient Nations: An English Version of the Arabic Text of the Athâr-ul-bâkiya of Albîrûnî, or “Vestiges of the Past.” London: W. H. Allen for Oriental Translation Fund, 1879. Burckhardt, Jacob. Recollections of Rubens. London: Phaidon Press, 1950. Butt, John. “George Friedric Handel and the Messiah.” In Oxford Handbook of the Reception History of the Bible, edited by Michael Lieb, Emma Mason, and Jonathan Roberts, with Christopher Rowland, 294–306. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Calvin, John. Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Isaiah. Translated by William Pringle. Calvin Translation Society. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1979. Caviness, Madeline Harrison. The Early Stained Glass of Canterbury Cathedral, circa 1175–1220. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977. Cowan, J. Rose Windows. London: Thames and Hudson, 1979. Davies, Andrew. “Oratorio as Exegesis: The Use of the Book of Isaiah in Handel’s Messiah.” In Retellings: The Bible in Literature, Music, Art and Film, edited by J. Cheryl Exum, 114–134. Leiden: Brill, 2007. DeWald, Ernest T., ed. The Illustrations of the Utrecht Psalter. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1933. Dodwell, C. R., ed. St Alban’s Psalter. London: Warburg Institute, 1960. Dowling Long, Siobhan, and John F. A. Sawyer. The Bible in Music: A Dictionary of Songs, Works and More. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2015. Ertz, Klaus. Jan Brueghel der Ältere (1568–1625): Die Gemälde: Mit krit. Oeuvrekatalog. Cologne: DuMont, 1979. Ettlinger, Leopold D., and Helen S. Ettlinger. Raphael. Oxford: Phaidon, 1987. Gill, Andy. Classic Bob Dylan (1962–69): My Back Pages. London: Carlton, 1998. Kirschbaum, Engelbert, ed. Lexikon der christlichen Ikonographie. Vol. 2. Freiburg: Herder, 1970. Knibb, Michael A. “Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah.” In Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, vol. 1, edited by James H. Charlesworth, 143–176. New York: Doubleday, 1985. Lee, Lawrence, George Seddon, and Francis Stephen. Stained Glass. New York: Crown, 1976. Lowth, Robert. Isaiah: A New Translation with a Preliminary Dissertation and Notes, Critical, Philological and Explanatory. London, 185715. Marrow, James H. Passion Iconography in Northern European Art in the Late Middle Ages and Early Renaissance: A Study of the Transformation of Sacred Metaphor into Descriptive Narrative. Ars neerlandica 1. Kortrijk, Belgium: van Ghemmert, 1979. Mearns, James. The Canticles of the Christian Church: Eastern and Western, in Early and Medieval Times. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1914.

596   John F. A. Sawyer Moffatt, James. Handbook to the Church Hymnary. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1927. Moracchini-Mazel, Geneviève. Les Monuments paléochrétiens de la Corse. Paris: Klincksieck, 1967. O’Kane, Martin. Painting the Text: The Artist as Biblical Interpreter. Bible in the Modern World 8. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2007. O’Kane, Martin, and John Morgan-Guy, eds. Biblical Art from Wales. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2010. Russell, James. The Mosaic Inscriptions of Anemurium. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1987. Sawyer, John F. A. The Fifth Gospel: Isaiah in the History of Christianity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Sawyer, John F. A. “Interpreting Hebrew Writing in Christian Art.” In A Critical Engagement: Essays on the Hebrew Bible in Honour of J. Cheryl Exum, edited by Ellen van Wolde and David J. A. Clines, 372–390. HBM 38. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2011. Sawyer, John F. A. “ ‘A Man of Sorrows and Acquainted with Grief ’: The Biblical Text and Its Afterlife in Christian Tradition.” In New Perspectives on the Man of Sorrows, edited by Catherine R. Puglisi and William L. Barcham, 7–18. Studies in Iconography: Themes and Variations. Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, Western Michigan University, 2013. Sawyer, John F. A. Isaiah through the Centuries. Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2018. Schiller, Gertrud. Iconography of Christian Art. Vol. 1, Christ’s Incarnation: Childhood, Baptism, Temptation, Transfiguration, Works and Miracles. Translated by Janet Seligman. London: Lund Humphries, 1971. Schiller, Gertrud. Iconography of Christian Art. Vol. 2, The Passion of Jesus Christ. Translated by Janet Seligman. London: Lund Humphries, 1972. Spier, Jeffrey. Picturing the Bible: The Earliest Christian Art. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2008. Watson, Arthur. The Early Iconography of the Tree of Jesse. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1934. Westall, Richard, and John Martin. Illustrations of the Bible. Vol. 2. London: F. Warne and Co., 1835. Whittaker, William Gillies. The Cantatas of Johann Sebastian Bach: Sacred and Secular. London: Oxford University Press, 1959. Wilken, Robert Loui, ed. The Church’s Bible: Isaiah Interpreted by Early Christian and Medieval Commentators. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2007.

Websites Pitts Theology Library Digital Image Archive: A huge collection of biblical illustrations, portraits of religious leaders, and so on. http://pitts.emory.edu/dia/. Web Gallery of Art: A searchable database of European fine arts and architecture (eighth to nineteenth centuries). http://www.wga.hu/index.html. Bridgeman Images. A huge searchable collection. http://www.bridgemanimages.com/en-GB/. IMSLP Petrucci Music Library: Scores and recordings searchable by composer, title, and so on. http://imslp.org/wiki/Category:Composers. Hymnary.org: A comprehensive index of hymns and hymnals. http://www.hymnary.org.

Isaiah in Art and Music   597 HebrewSongs.com: Hebrew songs inspired by texts from Isaiah. http://hebrewsongs.com/ search.asp?PageNo=&KW=isaiah&SF=All&OrderBy=New&TLT=ALL. The Bible & The Arts. A website dedicated to the promotion, enjoyment, and understanding of the Bible in literature, painting, sculpture, film, music and opera, theatre and performance, publishing, translation, and digital and mass media. http://www.thebibleandthearts.com.

PA RT V I I I

SE L E C T I DE OL O GIC A L R E A DI NG S OF ISA I A H

chapter 32

Femi n ist/Wom a n ist R ea di ngs of Isa i a h Sharon Moughtin-Mumby

32.1. Introduction The intricately woven book of Isaiah has provided fertile ground for womanist and feminist approaches. Interest in Isaiah took time to gather. Feminist attention to prophetic books generally came late1 and initially focused on Hosea,2 followed by the “pornoprophetics” of Ezekiel and Jeremiah. In recent years, however, there has been an explosion of interest in the multiple issues that Isaiah raises for both feminist and womanist approaches. We will pick out these six main threads from the discussions, which are best viewed as intertwined strands rather than separate areas.

1. Isaiah’s female personification of cities 2. Isaiah’s use of women as a synecdoche for the (guilty) nation 3. Isaiah’s nonsymbolic depictions of women 4. Female voices and authorship in Isaiah 5. Isaiah’s use of female language to describe God 6. Distinct womanist contributions

A significant challenge is to pick out womanist and feminist scholarship from other “feminist-friendly” approaches.3 A lively range of theories and methodologies have been caught up in feminist and womanist conversations, and it has become increasingly hard to detect where a literary approach, for example, ends and feminist/womanist

1  Gravett, “Metaphors For Women.” 3 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion.

2  Setel, “Prophets and Pornography.”

602   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby criticism starts. For our purposes, we will maintain a focus on the above issues, drawing on feminist friendly as well as feminist and womanist approaches as relevant.

32.2.  Isaiah’s Female Personification of Cities The personification of cities as females is widespread in the prophetic texts. Isaiah’s use of this emotive device is unparalleled, however, in diversity and intensity and has been the standout subject of debate within feminist approaches. The female personification of Jerusalem/Zion and other cities is a golden thread weaving through the book— one of the few elements binding Isaiah together—and is even more visible in Hebrew, where the use of feminine verbs for cities is ubiquitous. There has been some interest among feminist approaches in the influences behind this use of female personification. Suggestions include goddess imagery;4 an Assyrian tendency to use gendered metaphors in texts on warfare;5 a widespread ancient Near Eastern literary tradition;6 the Hellenistic tendency to present cities as daughters of a god;7 the “plausibility” of the metaphors of city as daughter (vulnerable to assault) and mother (provider of sustenance/shelter) in their sociohistoric context;8 and the female role in defense and nurture in ancient Israel.9 The main focus, however, has been the ways in which these personifications function in Isaiah. Their distinct use in Isa 1–39; 40–55; and 56–66 has led most feminist and womanist approaches to distinguish between the three parts of Isaiah as they are traditionally conceived within scholarship, and so we will discuss them separately here. Zion appears as a personified female just five times in Isa 1–39. All are cameo roles, as if presupposing her fame. Twice, she is referred to in passing as “Mount Daughter Zion” (10:32; 16:1) with these undeveloped appearances gaining little attention from feminist or womanist readers. Briefly, she appears named “whore” (1:21) in language resonant of Hosea, Ezekiel, and Jeremiah, but still attracting little interest, perhaps again due to the lack of development.10 Zion’s other two appearances, however, are iconic. Her entrance in 1:8 as “Daughter Zion,” is fleeting, yet immediately evokes the memorable figure of Daughter Zion from Lamentations.11 Indeed, it is almost certainly the powerful impact of her silent presence in this first chapter (which many consider an overture to Isaiah)

4  Tull Willey, “Servant,” 279; Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 134, following Dobbs-Allsopp, Weep; cf. Day, “Personification.” 5 Chapman, Gendered Language, 68. 6 Frymer-Kensky, Wake; Abma, Bonds, 107; O’Brien, Challenging, 126; cf. Biddle, “Figure,” 173–194. 7  Follis, “Holy City.” 8 Maier, Daughter Zion. 9  Gravett, “Metaphors For Women.” 10 Maier, Daughter Zion, 102; cf. Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital, 118–120, for a discussion of an often-overlooked wordplay. 11  This translation is ubiquitous among feminist and womanist approaches.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   603 that has led to Zion being called “Daughter Zion” by most feminist scholars throughout the book, even though the title is only used once, in Isa 40–55 (52:2). Daughter Zion’s memorable reappearance in 37:22 could not contrast more with the fragile, emotive figure we encounter in 1:8. Zion appears almost as her own alter ego: vocal, spirited, confrontational. If in 1:8, Daughter Zion fulfills the stereotypical associations we might expect for a daughter in ancient Israel—“The vulnerability of daughters within Israel’s social hierarchy is a commonplace”12—feminist approaches have been delighted to discover that in 37:22, Daughter Zion succeeds in turning many such expected associations on their head with her “boastful pride.”13 Chapman calls our attention to the series of active verbs: Zion is subject, not object.14 For Berges, her appearance as a “fearless and strong warrior” evokes Anat the warrior goddess.15 Following Goitein,16 van Dijk-Hemmes goes as far as to see in this taunt song an example of “F-voices.”17 Yet this feisty portrayal of Zion is not wholly uncomplicated. McKinlay notes associations of weakness beneath the surface: “the Assyrian king is especially humiliated if even a weak young woman can taunt him,”18 and Chapman presents her as a mere “pawn” in a battle between men.19 Many note how the unusual title, “Virgin Daughter,” calls stark attention to her vulnerability to rape. Some suggest Zion only has the “chutzpa”20 to mock Sennacherib because she is Yhwh’s daughter.21 It is perhaps for this reason that O’Brien is hesitant to assume that Yhwh is Zion’s father here, celebrating her portrayal as “headstrong, flip, and haughty.”22 Zion/Jerusalem does not feature again in Isa 1–39, but the strength of her personification in Isa 40–55, combined with 1:8’s powerful evocation of the figure from Lamentations, has led interpreters to perceive her elsewhere, even when she is not explicitly named. Darr speaks movingly of Zion whispering from the dust in 29:4, in an image she finds recalled in 40:9, where “Messenger Zion” is summoned to “lift up your voice with strength.”23 Chapman sees her sitting on the ground, “ravaged” in 3:25–26,24 and FrymerKensky perceives her as Zion-the-dweller in Isa 12:5–6.25 Berges similarly identifies the presence of Zion in 12:5–6 as well as in 21:1–10 and 22:1–4.26 In these passages, however, Zion remains a shadowy figure, if she is present at all. More striking, is Isa 1–39’s female personification of other cities. Two of these appearances are passing (Daughter Gallim in 10:30, Daughter Tarshish in 23:10), attracting little interest from feminist scholars. There are possible hints of sexual violence surrounding the appearance of Daughter Sidon in the use of 23:12( ‫)עשק‬.27 Most remarkable, however, is 23:15–18, where Yhwh

12 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 96; Maier, Daughter Zion, 74–77. 13 Maier, Daughter Zion, 81. 14 Chapman, Gendered, 96. 15  Berges, “Personification,” 64. 16  Goitein, “Women,” 1–33. 17  Van Dijk-Hemmes, “Traces,” 44, 109. 18  McKinlay, “Usefulness,” 136. 19 Chapman, Gendered, 93. 20  Chapman, 7. 21  Cf. Lapsley, “Look,” 93; Maier, Daughter Zion, 81. 22 O’Brien, Challenging, 136. 23 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 168; cf. Tiemeyer, Comfort, 284. 24 Chapman, Gendered, 92. 25 Frymer-Kensky, Wake, 172–173. 26  Berges, “Personification,” 62. 27 Baumann, Love, 192.

604   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby takes a song about a prostitute to taunt Tyre to return to her own “prostitution,” leaving many feminist readers reeling at the disorienting image of God as pimp.28 It is the extraordinarily rich personification of Zion/Jerusalem in Isa 40–55 that has really caught the attention of feminist approaches in recent years, however. Following the work of Sawyer29 and Korpel,30 many have celebrated the prominence of the female Zion next to the Servant and called attention to the way in which her status was downplayed for years.31 Many have rejoiced in the startling range of metaphors that have been used to describe Zion, which explore almost all possible status indicators for an adult woman.32 Zion is no longer vulnerable daughter or vilified whore, but widow, wife, queen, mother, divorcee, battered and raped woman, bride, and mourning ­mother.33 Maier and McKinlay give particular attention to the way in which her designation as (vulnerable) daughter is left behind and her role as mother (provider/protector) is emphasized.34 Darr even suggests here that we encounter the “family of God.”35 Held up against the portrayal of the personified city in Ezekiel, Jeremiah, or Hosea, the contrast is remarkable. The idea that a female might provide a positive role model alone is striking.36 For many, Isa 40–55 is a direct critique of those other presentations of Jerusalem/ Israel.37 Particular interest has been shown in the way Isa 40–55 portrays Zion as blameless, in stark contrast to her treatment in other prophetic texts and even Lamentations.38 There has been some disagreement over who is to be held responsible for the exile in these chapters: Zion’s rebellious children,39 the men holding power in that patriarchal society,40 or the people?41 Some even raise the possibility that it is Yhwh himself, with Zion as the “beloved, yet wronged, wife of God”42 and Yhwh “sleeping on the job.”43 Nevertheless, Isa 40–55 presents feminist readers with challenging issues. The metaphorical range may be wide, but it still represents an androcentric perspective, with Zion limited to uxorial and maternal roles.44 Questions have also been raised as to 28 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 157; Seifert, Tochter, 309–310; Fischer, “Isaiah,” 310. 29  Sawyer, “Daughter of Zion.” 30  Korpel, “Female Servant.” 31  Tull Willey, “Servant,” 267–303; O’Connor, “Speak Tenderly,” 281, 294; Maier, Daughter Zion, 174; “Zion’s Body,” 312. For a discussion of the complex relationship between Zion and the Servant, compare Tiemeyer, Comfort, 312–317. 32  Brenner, “Identifying,” 144; Frymer-Kensky, Wake, 168; Fischer, “Isaiah,” 313. 33 Baumann, Love and Violence, 185; Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital, 126–142. 34 Maier, Daughter Zion; McKinlay, “Usefulness.” 35 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 177–182. 36  O’Connor, “Speak Tenderly,” 294; Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital, 155. 37  Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 115–118; O’Connor, “Speak Tenderly,” 290; Chapman, Gendered, 134; Low, Mother Zion. 38 Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 162; Low, Mother Zion; Chapman, Gendered, 136; Frymer-Kensky, Wake, 176; Stone, “Second Isaiah,” 223–224; Tiemeyer, Comfort, 327. 39 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 66; Abma, Bonds, 73; Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 106; cf. Tull Willey, Remember, 203. 40  Stone, “Second Isaiah,” 225–226. 41 Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 162; Mandolfo, Daughter Zion. 42  Ackerman, “Azubah,” 514; cf. O’Connor, “Speak Tenderly,” 292–294; Tiemeyer, “Isaiah 40–55,” 72–73. 43 Chapman, Gendered, 171. 44  Brenner, “Identifying,” 145; Maier, Daughter Zion, 216–217; Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 117–118.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   605 how far Zion flourishes, with a growing appreciation that simply being present is not the same as playing an active role. Zion’s role is prominent but entirely passive. Only Yhwh has agency and remains entirely in control.45 Zion is held blameless, yet is cast as powerless victim: “Though told to put on strength, she actually displays less strength than in Lamentations, where she challenged the devastating God.”46 Many also take issue with the troubling echoes of cycles of domestic violence that come with Yhwh’s promises of a blissful future.47 As Turner puts it: “Our contemporary minds are left thinking that Yahweh’s words are too facile; they come too quickly.”48 Zion’s state in these chapters is disquieting and the naming of her experience has been crucial for many, with widespread agreement that 51:1–52:12 describes the aftermath of rape.49 Maier also sees the “bruised and raped body of the female city” in 49:14–21.50 While there is an awareness that Zion may not be the only figure suffering in Isaiah—there is also the (male) “Suffering Servant”51 or “Slave”52—this sharing of suffering has not alleviated the challenge for most feminist readers. Moreover, readers are encouraged to identify with the Servant, not Zion.53 Daughter Zion’s near silence in Isa 40–55 has been a major source of consternation, not only among feminist readers, but for its resonances with womanist experiences of being silenced, misrepresented, and portrayed negatively.54 Compared to the Servant’s words in 49:1–6, Zion’s words—just six words in Hebrew—are marginal:55 “Yhwh has forsaken me! My Lord has forgotten me!” (49:14). The echoes with Lamentations are striking, bringing “the spirit of the lamenting Zion” into Isaiah.56 For Turner, these brief words are vital, as they signal Zion’s return to the “world of agency”: no longer is she the accused, but the accuser.57 Yet, her voice remains undeveloped. Zion returns to silence and we are left longing for more.58 Numerous attempts have been made to hear more from Zion. Dille hears her voice continuing in 49:15, paralleling the protests of city-goddesses and presenting a strident challenge to God: “Can a woman forget her nursing-child / or show no compassion for the child of her womb?”59 Brenner attributes to Zion/Jerusalem words usually assigned to the male Servant in 50:4–5 (albeit recognizing that her words remain bracketed by at least one male voice).60 Paganini presents Zion uttering the famous words: “Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters” (55:1–3).61 Tiemeyer hears her asking three questions

45  Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 106. 46  Tull Willey, “Servant,” 303. 47  Cf. Berges, “Personification,” 66. 48  Turner, “Daughter Zion,” 204. 49  Stone, “Second Isaiah,” 219; Maier, Daughter Zion, 168; McKinlay, “Usefulness,” 101. 50 Maier, Daughter Zion, 187. 51  Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 115. 52  Brenner, “Identifying.” 53  Tull Willey, “Servant,” 302. 54  Nzimande, “Isaiah.” 55  Flesher, “Daughter Zion,” 299; Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 107–108 56  Turner, “Daughter Zion,” 203; cf. Tull Willey, “Servant,” 281; Remember, 190; McKinlay, “Usefulness,” 95; Maier, Daughter Zion, 164–165. 57  Cf. Kirk-Duggan, “Demonized Children,” 267. 58  Cf. Tull Willey, “Servant,” 302–303. 59 Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 141, following Merendino, “Jes 49:14–26.” 60  Brenner, “Identifying.” 61  Paganini, “Who Speaks”; cf. Berges, “Personification,” 72.

606   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby (49:14, 21, 24), each of which precipitates a response from Yhwh.62 Even if we are to accept these additional contributions, however, Zion’s voice remains troublingly absent in Isa 40–55. For Mandolfo, Daughter Zion’s silence in Isa 40–55 is acutely problematic: “She is spoken about, spoken to, and alluded to, but not allowed a voice of her own, except once.”63 Thus Zion is always the object.64 Mandolfo is concerned with creating countervoice for Daughter Zion. A powerful, protesting figure arises in Lam 1–2, presenting her own story as subject, uninterrupted by God. Mandolfo demonstrates how even the “didactic voice” (the voice that can be heard mediating between God and the lamenter in laments such as Ps 22) takes the side of Zion here, presenting her case to Yhwh. Reading Isa 40–55 as a response to this furious lament, Mandolfo lays bare the contrast between the texts. In Isa 40–55, Daughter Zion is given just one sentence, in words that Mandolfo judges “pathetic, in every sense.”65 The “didactic voice” at times supports Zion, but its ultimate aim is to defend God’s position and privilege. Yhwh is compassionate, but ultimately, he fails to listen to Zion. Zion’s previous children remain dead, while she, crucially, refuses to be comforted.66 Compounding the problem, Boda observes that, though there are multiple “summons to joy” in the corpus, at no point is Zion invited to voice her lament.67 In sum, there is no genuine dialogue in Isa 40–55, only a “controlling discourse” that allows for no other perspectives. While recognizing its psychological astuteness, Mandolfo judges Isa 40–55’s response to Daughter Zion insufficient.68 Mandolfo’s provocative work has proved important. There is nothing new in seeing Isa 40–55 as a response to Lamentations as well as other prophetic texts such as Jeremiah.69 Prior to Mandolfo’s work, however, these chapters were generally seen as a positive response (albeit with some challenges), with the focus on Yhwh’s gentle words rather than the seething, silent, dissident presence of Zion. Once we’ve have been alerted to Zion’s refusal to be comforted, however, it is hard to ignore, especially given the awesome rage with which Lam 2 ends.70 For some, however, it is precisely Zion’s silence—as a symbol of her continuing defiance—that holds potential. Tiemeyer rejects Paganini’s inventive suggestion that Zion calls out in 55:1–3 primarily due to grammatical arguments.71 At the same time, she shows relief that Zion’s refusal to say more means her voice cannot be hijacked by the golah (exilic) community. Zion remains “the outspoken spokeswoman for the people of Judah.”72 For Flesher, Zion’s resolute silence becomes the voice of the other: “the voice of the powerless, the voice of the population that refuses to 62 Tiemeyer, Comfort, 307; cf. Merendino, “Jes 49:14–26,” 341–342. 63 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 114. 64  Cf. Tull Willey, Remember, 228. 65 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 108; cf. Tull Willey, “Servant,” 303; Remember, 224. 66 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 105, 113, 117, though cf. Tull Willey, “Servant,” 291, 295–296. 67  Boda, “Daughter’s Joy.” 68 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 117. 69  Among feminist-friendly approaches alone, see Newsom, “Response”; Tull Willey, “Servant”; Remember; Abma, Bonds, 108; O’Connor, “Speak Tenderly,” 281, 294; Turner, “Daughter Zion,” 193–204; Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 135–136. 70  Boda, “Daughter’s Joy”; Flesher, “Daughter Zion.” 71 Tiemeyer, Comfort, 307–309; “Isaiah 40–55”; cf. Paganini, “Who Speaks.” 72  Tiemeyer, “Isaiah 40–55,” 75, cf. 55–56.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   607 remain colonized.”73 Indeed, we might feel relieved that the next voice we hear styled as female is not Zion’s—whose silent protest continues—but Yhwh’s own, crying inarticulately out “like a woman in labour,” with no easy answers. If the treatment of Zion in Isa 40–55 has raised issues, a note of deep disquiet has been sounded about the treatment of her nemesis, Daughter Babylon, in Isa 47. Most are acutely alert to the irony that in this passage of “restoration,” Yhwh treats Babylon exactly as he treated Zion elsewhere, with strong overtones of rape.74 Babylon’s violent treatment may be cast as part of Yhwh’s “comforting” of Zion, responding to her demand for revenge in Lamentations.75 However, as Baumann observes, “Yhwh as ‘a warrior-rapist’ is a very frightening image of God, and by no means more positive than Yhwh as a battering and raping husband.”76 The command for Babylon to “sit in silently and go in darkness” is chilling for its echoes not only with the silence of the female elsewhere in the prophetic texts, but also with the responses of abuse survivors today.77 The personification of Zion fades in Isa 56–66, but there are moments of prominence that have drawn attention. Picking up the themes of Isa 40–55, Zion is a figure of glorious restoration in chapters 60, 62, and 66, once again contrasting with her appearance in other prophetic texts.78 Scholars have particularly delighted in the physicality of Zion’s description in chapter 66—“the womb, breasts full of milk, as well as a bosom, hips, and knees as places where newborns are carried or caressed”—and shown fascination with the portrayal of a painless labor induced by Yhwh the midwife (see 32.6).79 Darr highlights the unusual concentration of feminine language in Isa 66, with its evocation of the home.80 Maier celebrates the attention given to the life-giving power of women’s bodies.81 Nevertheless, problems remain. Most are alert to the way in which Isa 56–66 remains androcentric, limiting women to maternal and marital roles.82 Isa 60:4 may celebrate the sons and daughters that are “on their way,” but can this really “undo” the deaths of Zion’s other children?83 For Flesher,the description of Yhwh the warrior in 63:1–6 disturbingly evokes the dreadful punishment wreaked on Zion elsewhere.84 She urges readers to maintain an interest in the perspective that Daughter Zion represents, challenging us to ask which historical community she represents.85 The renaming of Zion in chapter 62 may be moving, but it is glaringly problematic that she does not get to name herself.86 Chapter 57 does not tend to feature prominently within feminist and womanist approaches, but it raises a host of challenges with its negative and sexualized

73  Flesher, “Daughter Zion,” 302. 74  Tull Willey, “Servant,” 292; Remember; Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 100; Magdalene, “Ancient Near-Eastern”; Gordon and Washington, “Rape”; Tiemeyer, Comfort, 125. 75 Baumann, Love and Violence, 183; Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 107. 76  Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 101; Franzmann, “City.” 77 Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital, 139; Seifert, Tochter, 298. 78  Flesher, “Daughter Zion,” 303. 79  Maier, “Zion’s Body,” 231. 80 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 176. 81  Maier, “Zion’s Body,” 235, 240–242. 82  Cf. Maier, 241–242. 83 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 105, 109. 84  Flesher, “Daughter Zion,” 303–304. 85  Flesher, 319. 86  Cf. Gafney, “Reading,” for its resonances with colonization.

608   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby portrayal of the unnamed female personification.87 Perhaps most troublingly, Gordon and Washington are not alone in resisting the “facile” move in Isa 55–66 from rape victim to virginal bride (62:4–5).88 In their view, we should follow the example of Zion from Isa 40–55: in the face of these texts we should all “observe an honest silence.”89

32.3.  Isaiah’s Use of Women as a Synecdoche for the (Guilty) Nation So far, we have focused on Isaiah’s female personifications of cities. However, these are not the only female figures in the book. The “Daughters of Zion” also appear in chapter 3: their echoes with “Daughter Zion” signaling the symbolic role they will take. Although some maintain that Isa 3 provides a glimpse of women’s treatment in war, this text is disturbingly less concerned with real women and more interested in the female as symbolic of all that is wrong with the nation. These daughters are acting as a kind of synecdoche, or representation, of the people as a whole.90 Multiple feminist approaches have called attention to the androcentric nature of the mockery of these women,91 whose apparent crime is to wear the finery provided by men92 with “exaggerated obedience” to the standards set for them in femininity by a patriarchal culture.93 From a womanist perspective, Nzimande also takes issue with the sexualized nature of the description, with its uncomfortable resonances with colonial representations of black women as “oversexed.”94 The unsettling combination of violence and sexually explicit language of 3:16–17 has been a particular focus. Although many Bibles tend to shy away from the graphic nature of the language, feminist and womanist readers have insisted on explicit translations, such as “expose their vulvas,”95 “bare their cunts,”96 “vaginas exposed.”97 These readings remain alert to the potential wordplay around ‫פת‬, which elsewhere refers to the “door socket” of the Temple/city. However, exposing the text’s violence has taken precedence,98 with resistance to the ease with which Isaiah slips from flesh and blood women (“Daughters of Zion”) to the purely symbolic female (“Daughter Zion”).99

87 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 190; Moughtin-Mumby, Sexual and Marital, 142–149; Maier, Daughter Zion, 183–186. 88  Gordon and Washington, “Rape,” 316. 89  Gordon and Washington, 324. 90  Some might say a metonym, but in this setting, I prefer to emphasize that these women as intrinsically part of the nation, not simply closely associated with it via their fathers/husbands. This is the key distinction between the two tropes. 91  Cf. Sherwood, “Prophetic Scatology,” 193; Miles, “Re-reading”; Scholtz, Introducing, 100–104. 92  Exum, “Ethics,” 252. 93 Scholtz, Introducing, 100. 94  Nzimande, “Isaiah.” 95  Brenner, “Introduction,” 3; Chapman, Gendered, 92. 96  Exum, “Ethics,” 105. 97  Sherwood, “Prophetic Scatology,” 193. 98  Miles, “Re-reading,” 202. 99  Cf. Ackerman, “Isaiah,” 162.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   609 Naming the experience as “rape” has been a priority, with numerous voices insisting that God be identified as the perpetrator100 in this text that Miles identifies as a “poetics of rape.”101 Nor does the stark change of tone in chapter 4 do anything to alleviate these challenges. Zion appears glorious, but no longer female; the “ungendered mountain” has been defeminized;102 women are depicted as desperate for a single man;103 and their natural menstruation is described as “filth.”104 Isa 3:14–16 is not the only text to use flesh and blood women as a synecdoche for the nation. The rape of women is used as a synecdoche of the devastation that will come upon the nation in 13:1 and 32:9–15. Given this troubling use of women as trope, it is not surprising that women similarly do not fare well when they are used as metaphors in Isaiah, typically becoming “scapegoats.”105 In 3:12, the ruling men are mocked as “women,” with language designed to infantilize and create associations of “incompetence, ignorance, and irresponsibility.”106 In 19:16, the Egyptians are threatened with becoming like trembling women in a “crass devaluing of the female.”107 In chapter 57, the leaders are insulted using language redolent of “son of a bitch.”108 In sum, Isaiah’s exploitation of women—whether as metaphor or synecdoche—is troubling.

32.4.  Isaiah’s Nonsymbolic Depictions of Women Feminist and womanist approaches have been acutely aware of the disparity between Isaiah’s fascination with symbolic women and lack of interest in real women. As Fischer observes, “The few women mentioned in the book have no names and are wives of men who do.”109 Nzimande sees parallels with the silence surrounding black women’s struggles for economic independence in South Africa.110 Feminist historians have been determined to find glimpses of the lives of real women. Women in Scripture painstakingly lists the unnamed women in Isaiah, calling attention, for instance, to the anonymous women making a fire in 27:11,111 while Ackerman notes how 32:9–14 and 3:16–4:1 provide evidence for the importance of female music making in the cult.112 References to real women, however, are sparse. The unnamed nebiah in Isa 8:3–4 has therefore attracted particular attention. On the whole, feminist approaches have baulked at the 100  Magdalene, “Ancient Near-Eastern,” 327; Scholtz, Introducing, 100–101. 101  Miles, “Re-reading,” 209. 102 O’Brien, Challenging, 138. 103  Miles, “Re-reading,” 213. 104 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 114. 105  Kirk-Duggan and Bridgeman, “Introduction.” 106 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 48, 92; cf. Bridgeman, “I Will Make Boys.” 107  Fischer, “Isaiah,” 303. 108 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 69; Bridgeman, “I Will Make Boys.” 109  Fischer, “Isaiah,” 304. 110  Nzimande, “Isaiah,” 136–146. 111  Meyers, Craven, and Kraemer, Women in Scripture, 315–323, esp. 320. 112  Ackerman, “Isaiah,” 163.

610   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby translation “prophet’s wife,” but some have been dismissive of the title “prophetess,” counting it as honorific only.113 In recent years, however, interest has recently rekindled in this anonymous female prophet in part because of the growing appreciation that there is every indication that there were women prophets in ancient Israel. Feminist readers have become increasingly alert to the possibility that this nebiah may have been a prophetess in her own right, even if her role has been “hidden or misrepresented” by tradition.114

32.5.  Female Voices and Authorship in Isaiah Lee goes so far to search out passages in Isaiah to attribute to “Hannevi’ah,” although she is clear that this is not about identifying “an historical woman prophet.” Choosing to adopt a “hermeneutic of trust” alongside a hermeneutic of suspicion, Lee uses the reference to the nebiah as a springboard to search for potential “female voices” in Isaiah. Particularly striking is her singling out of a triplet sound pattern, which she identifies as the “signature feature of a women’s lyrical tradition” that found its place in literary tradition at a time of social upset, but has since been forgotten. Lee identifies multiple female voices in Isaiah, including in some surprising places: in chapter 40, she hears a dialogue between at least two female prophets, one encouraging the other.115 Lee is just one example of attempts to listen out for female voices in Isaiah. Van Dijk-Hemmes sees the taunt song of 37:22 as an example of “F-voices.”116 Berges hears Zion cry out as a prophetess in Isa 61.117 Darr identifies Zion as the herald of 40:9,118 while others perceive an independent female voice as herald here.119 Indeed, in recent years, there has been a gathering call that we should not assume the anonymous poet of Isa 40–55 was male. The combination of the unusual metaphorical language comparing God to a woman, the wide range of female metaphors, and the interest in rape and childbirth have led some to raise the possibility of female authorship. Brenner asks why we assume the anonymous prophet was a “him” when we know virtually nothing about “him,”120 while Darr refers to the poet as “he or she.”121 Stone presents us with the striking figure of Second Isaiah as a female prophet (or prophets), who, in response to experiencing rape, directed her voice against the institutionalized 113  Hackett, “Women’s Studies”; Ackerman, “Isaiah,” 165; “Prophetess,” 317; Brenner, Israelite Woman, 58. 114  Maier, “Feminist Interpretation,” 470; cf. Fuchs, “Prophecy,” 54–69. 115 Lee, Hannevi’ah. 116  Van Dijk-Hemmes, “Traces,” 44, 109. 117  Berges, “Personification,” 68–69; cf. Sawyer, “Daughter of Zion,” 103. 118 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 167–168; cf. Sawyer, “Daughter of Zion,” 103; O’Connor, “Speak Tenderly,” 287. 119  McEvenue, “Second Isaiah,” 218–221; Landy, “Spectrality,” 153–155. Tiemeyer, Comfort, 282–285, provides a thorough discussion. 120  Brenner, “Identifying,” 147. 121  Darr, “Like Warrior,” 71.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   611 patriarchy during this time of social upheaval.122 Drawing on Stone’s work, Goldingay and Payne consider the possibility that the anonymity of the poet may precisely be due to the fact that she is a woman.123 McEvenue calls our attention to the pervasive language of childhood, birth, and home, arguing that the anonymous female herald of 40:9 was the author (“compiler, editor, and commentator”) of Isa 40–55, calling for a rereading of the whole book looking for signs of this female writer (for instance, in chapter 12).124 Tiemeyer is keen to recognize the possibility that “any hypothetic Isaianic School might have included female prophets.”125 Although it is unlikely that female authorship can be proved, it seems premature to assume male authorship of the whole corpus, given the unusual prominence of language and imagery associated with female experience in Isa 40–55.

32.6.  Isaiah’s Use of Female Language to Describe God Beyond attention to symbolic and literal women in the text, Isaiah’s striking use of feminine imagery to describe God continues to be the source of lively debate. Isaiah was not the primary source for Trible’s insistence that we recognize the “womb-love” ‫ רחם‬lying behind references to God’s “compassion” (there is a single instance in 27:11).126 Nevertheless, this work, plus Trible’s attention to Isaiah’s maternal imagery, sparked interest in what has become one of the most flourishing areas of feminist/womanist approaches to Isaiah. Many dispute Trible’s claim that etymology can maintain such a hold over meaning, but once a dormant metaphor has been roused (regardless of authorial intention), the associations created are likely to remain alive for some, who continue to refer to the “divine womb”127 and “uteral imagery” for God.128 Indeed Trible’s impact has spilled out beyond the bounds of biblical scholarship into feminist theologies more generally.129 Within Hebrew Bible studies, Gruber’s close attention to 42:13; 45:10; 49:15; and 66:3 as referring to the “motherhood of God” continues to provide the starting point for most feminist and womanist discussions.130 However, most attention continues to focus on the motherhood similes of Isa 49 and 66 and the remarkable description of God crying out “like a woman in labour” in chapter 42. 122  Stone, “Second Isaiah.” 123  Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 48. 124  McEvenue, “Second Isaiah,” 216–218, 221. 125 Tiemeyer, Comfort, 26–30. 126 Trible, Rhetoric. 127  Gafney, “Reading.” 128  Meyers, “Female Images,” 526; cf. Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 139; Stone, “Second Isaiah,” 230. 129  Sawyer, “Daughter of Zion,” 89–107, provides examples. 130  Gruber, “Motherhood.” Further possible passages have emerged. Ackerman, “Isaiah,” 167–168, suggests 45:9–10 and 46:3–4. Landy, “Spectrality,” perceives maternal language in Isa 40. And Løland, Silent, 129–160, and Baumann, Love and Violence, 200, suggest 46:3–4.

612   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby For many, Isa 49:15 is a clear description of “God the Mother,”131 providing welcome respite from the masculine language for God we generally find in the prophetic texts. Yet there are a growing number of feminist and womanist readers, who are more hesitant, calling attention to the passage’s careful use of simile rather than metaphor and the statement that God “acts better than a mother.”132 While this comparison could be taken as a denigration of human mothers,133 most do not interpret the passage in this way. For Claassens, the evocation of mothers who have forgotten their children in the trauma of the war offers “a means of acknowledging these horrors and pain before moving on, and so allowing this important phase in the grieving process.”134 Even Dille, who suggests that the language of motherhood comes from Zion’s mouth rather than Yhwh’s own lips, and calls attention to the way in which God’s motherhood is contrasted with “Zion’s own shortcomings as the mother,” continues to celebrate “the compassionate and powerful motherhood of God.”135 On the whole, womanist and feminist scholars continue to celebrate the image of God as mother, or “super-mother” in Isa 49.136 Most are relieved to find that in this passage (unlike in Hosea or Ezekiel) Zion’s future with God does not come in the form of a husband taking his wife back, but in the image of a mother who will not forget her child.137 Feminist and womanist scholars have also celebrated Isa 66, where God is depicted first as midwife in 66:9 and then as acting like a mother in 66:13.138 Lapsley applauds the remarkable depiction of God as a mother playing intimately with her child, calling attention to the relational nature of ‫( שעע‬dandled).139 Fischer sees a reversal of Gen 3:16 in the painless birth induced by Yhwh and absence of male domination,140 and Maier goes as far as suggesting that “the empathetic and loving Mother Zion offers a role model for Yhwh.”141 The slippage between the image of Jerusalem as mother and God as mother in 66:13 is remarkable.142 This is language being stretched to its limits. Few feminist or womanist scholars have found major points of contention with this final chapter of Isa,143 although Bridgeman warns against colluding with the patriarchal assumptions behind the movement from “angry father to protective and doting mother (66:13).”144 Perhaps the standout text using female language to speak of God, however, is 42:13–14, whose remarkable description of God crying out like a warrior in battle, then like a woman in labor continues to act as a magnet to feminist and womanist readers. Many feminist approaches are struck by the realism of this depiction of a laboring woman, 131  Bronner, “Invisible Relationship”; “Gynomorphic Imagery”; Lapsley, “Look,” 94; Meyers, “Female Images,” 527. 132  Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 113; Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 138–151; Day, “Deity,” although compare Løland, Silent, 161–192. 133 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion, 108. 134 Claassens, Mourner, 53. 135 Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 129. 136  Landy, “Spectrality,” 137. 137  Fischer, “Isaiah,” 311; Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 113. 138  Fischer, “Isaiah,” 306; Maier, “Zion’s Body,” 232. 139  Lapsley, “Look,” 101. 140  Fischer, “Isaiah,” 306. 141  Maier, “Zion’s Body,” 234–235. 142  Cf. Berges, “Personification,” 68; Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 129; Floyd, “Welcome Back,” 500; Claassens, Mourner, 52. 143  Cf. Brenner, “Identifying,” 139; Maier, “Zion’s Body,” 225–242. 144  Bridgeman, “I Will Make Boys,” 323.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   613 which for many represents a female perspective on birth.145 As Frymer-Kensky puts it, God “births the new order in good Lamaze fashion.”146 Following Gruber, almost all agree that these similes should be considered together as complementary not contradictory descriptions of God.147 However, there has been considerable disagreement over the significance of this remarkable juxtaposition. From the perspective of metaphor theory, this is only to be expected. Metaphorical language always presents readers with a challenge to connect two unconnected subjects (“God” / “a woman in labor”). Here, the challenge is doubled, with two contradictory metaphorical words jostling for attention. Readers are presented with the challenge of creating connections between three apparently unconnected subjects: God and the competing similes, “a woman in labor” and a “warrior.”148 Feminist and womanist scholars have risen to the challenge. Gruber stresses the active nature of both similes,149 while Fischer emphasizes their shared potency150 and van Dijk-Hemmes151 the sense of victory. Darr accentuates the “pronounced auditory quality” and intensity of the warrior and laboring woman,152 and Claassens calls our attention to the shared aspect of danger.153 For her, this is “a markedly different way of thinking about power, which can remain vulnerable while active.” Løland emphasizes the “pain and anguish”;154 while Bergmann highlights the common sense of “crisis,” stressing the radical nature of the imagery: “Can Yhwh even have a crisis?”155 Dille provides a thorough discussion, alerting us to an extraordinary range of associations: “ ‘crying out,’ anguish, courage, danger, inevitability, the hope of deliverance from death, life, and the literary convention of one facing a siege reacting ‘like a woman in labor.’ ”156 In short, feminist and womanist approaches have contributed a rich discussion of these verses. It is likely that a fascination with the unusual female metaphorical language of Isaiah will continue, as well as discussions surrounding its implications for the gendering of God-language.157

32.7.  Distinct Womanist Contributions Besides contributing new perspectives on many of the discussions we have examined here, womanist interpretations have opened up entirely new areas of enquiry. The 145  Fischer, “Isaiah,” 306, contra Philip, “Women.” 146 Frymer-Kensky, Wake, 164. 147  Gruber, “Motherhood.” 148  Compare the insight of Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 8–20, on “metaphoric coherence,” drawing on Lakoff and Johnson, Metaphors. 150  Fischer, “Isaiah,” 306, contra Philip, “Women.” 149  Gruber, “Motherhood.”

151  Van Dijk-Hemmes, “Traces,” 94–95. 152  Darr, “Like Warrior,” 560–571. 153 Claassens, Mourner, 55–56. 154 Løland, Silent, 124–128. 155  Bergmann, “We Have Seen,” 651–672.    156 Dille, Mixing Metaphors, 2, 41–72. 157  Baumann, “Prophetic Objections,” 88–120; Sawyer, “Gender”; Løland, Silent; Claassens, Mourner; Fischer, “Isaiah”; Day, “Deity.”

614   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby foregrounding of those who face the triple oppression of race, gender, and economic deprivation common to most womanist approaches158 has, for instance, called attention to the role of poor children in the biblical texts, who represent those “furthest from the seat and centre of power.”159 While feminist and feminist-friendly scholars such as Darr, Dille, Lapsley, Tiemeyer have explored the use of child imagery in Isaiah more broadly,160 womanist scholarship has sharpened the focus on the implications of this language for contemporary society, with Weems’s insistence that we take seriously the cognitive impact of the Bible’s language exerting a strong influence.161 Bridgeman observes that children are frequently treated similarly as women in Isaiah: “metaphorically to denigrate and berate men in power and to accuse said men of being fickle or erratic.”162 Elsewhere, she alerts us to Isaiah’s mostly negative language about children (for instance, in Isa 4), its references to the violent punishment of children, and the troubling echoes with the treatment of black children in the US: “Just because someone has transgressed does not mean he or she should be brutalized or shamed.”163 Also noteworthy has been interest among womanist scholars in the (male) Servant figure, who has been largely neglected by feminist readers due to their intense focus on Zion.164 Kirk-Duggan reminds us how the Suffering Servant has been invoked to control black women and men, with the inference that God intends them to suffer.165 She reads Isa 50 experimentally, playing with the gender identities of the Servant/ Israel/Yhwh and exploring the implications. For Kirk-Duggan, Isa 50 has strong echoes with black women’s experience, presenting an important opportunity to uncover “the often-silenced, public suffering of wife and servant/slave.”166 Debate over whether to translate ‫ עבד‬as “servant”/”slave” and the implications for contemporary readings, given the legacy of slavery, has been a focus of interest.167 As Kirk-Duggan puts it: “How can a woman employed as a maid, nanny or cook experience servanthood minus servitude?”168 The continuing echoes between the Servant and the legacy of slavery in the United States also lead Gafney to offer a poignant womanist targum of Isa 53: “We are despised and rejected by others, a people of suffering and acquainted with grief.”169 Tiemeyer has challenged feminist approaches to venture beyond the now predictable interest in Isaiah’s female personifications of cities, sexual and marital metaphorical language, and (we might add) use of feminine language for God. These areas are 158  Sawyer, “Gender,” 475; Gafney, “Reading,” 51; Womanist Midrash, 6–9; Junior, Introduction; Weems, “Re-reading”; Bridgeman, “I Will Make Boys”; “Womanist Approaches,” 486–487. 159  Bridgeman, “Womanist Approaches,” 486; Kirk-Duggan, “Demonized Children.” 160 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision; Dille, Mixing Metaphors; Lapsley, “Look”; Tiemeyer, Comfort, 356–357. 161 Weems, Battered Love. 162  Bridgeman, “Womanist Approaches,” 486. 163  Bridgeman, “I Will Make Boys,” 321; “Womanist Approaches.” 164  Though cf. Brenner, “Identifying,” 136–150. 165 Kirk-Duggan, Exorcizing, 141; Misbegotten, 14. 166  Kirk-Duggan, “Difference,” 274. 167  Kirk-Duggan, “Difference,” 269–270; compare Smith’s discussion of the New Testament doulos “texts of terror” in I Found God in Me, 23–29, and Brenner, “Identifying,” 136–150. 168  Kirk-Duggan, “Difference,” 273–274. 169  Gafney, “Reflection,” 207; cf. Nzimande, “Isaiah,” 136–146. For Claassens, Mourner, writing from a white South African perspective, the Suffering Servant presents us with an important opportunity to “decode” power as we are presented with “profound power in the midst of vulnerability” (p. 57).

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   615 flourishing.170 Few feminist approaches venture far from here, however.171 The emergence of womanist scholarship has exposed new areas of interest, challenging us all to venture beyond the well-worn paths of Isaiah’s troubling texts to explore and “trouble” the rest of the rich, multifaceted, and complex book of Isaiah.

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171  Exceptions, such as Carvahlo, “Beauty,” exist.

616   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby Bridgeman, Valerie. “Womanist Approaches.” In The Oxford Handbook of the Prophets, edited by Carolyn J. Sharp, 483–490. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Bronner, Leila L. “The Invisible Relationship Made Visible: Biblical Mothers and Daughters.” In Ruth and Esther: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series), edited by Athalya Brenner, 172–191. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1999. Bronner, Leila L. “Gynomorphic Imagery in Exilic Isaiah (40–66).” Dor le Dor 12, no. 2 (1983–84): 71–83. Carvahlo, Corrine. “The Beauty of the Bloody God: The Divine Warrior in Prophetic Literature.” In The Aesthetics of Violence in the Prophets, edited by Julia M. O’Brien and Chris Franke, 131–152. LHBOTS 517. New York: T & T Clark, 2010. Chapman, Cynthia R. The Gendered Language of Warfare in the Israelite-Assyrian Encounter. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2004. Claassens, L. Juliana M. Mourner, Mother, Midwife: God’s Liberating Presence. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2012. Darr, Katheryn Pfisterer. Isaiah’s Vision and the Family of God. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994. Darr, Katheryn Pfisterer. “Like Warrior, Like Woman: Destruction and Deliverance in Isaiah 42:10–17.” CBQ 49 (1987): 560–571. Darr, Katheryn Pfisterer. “The Personification of Cities as Female in the Hebrew Bible.” In Reading from This Place, vol. 2, Social Location and Biblical Interpretation in Global Perspective, edited by Fernando F. Segovia and Mary Ann Tolbert, 283–302. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1995. Day, Peggy L. “Deity: Hebrew Bible.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Gender Studies, vol. 1, edited by Julia M. O’Brien, 74–80. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. Dijk-Hemmes, Fokkelein van. “Traces of Women’s Texts in the Hebrew Bible.” In On Gendering Texts: Female and Male Voices in the Hebrew Bible, edited by Athalya Brenner and Fokkelein van Dijk-Hemmes, 17–112. BIS. Leiden: Brill, 1993. Dille, Sarah J. Mixing Metaphors: God as Mother and Father in Deutero-Isaiah. JSOTS 398 / Gender, Culture, Theory 13. New York: T&T Clark, 2004. Dobbs-Allsopp, Fred W. Weep, O Daughter Zion: A Study of the City-Lament Genre in the Hebrew Bible. Biblica et Orientalia 44. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1993. Exum, J. Cheryl. “The Ethics of Biblical Violence against Women.” In The Bible in Ethics: The Second Sheffield Colloquium, edited by John W. Rogerson, Margaret Davies, and M. Daniel Carroll R. JSOTS 207, 248–271. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Fischer, Irmtraud. “Isaiah: The Book of Female Metaphors.” In Feminist Biblical Interpretation: A Compendium of Critical Commentary on the Books of the Bible and Related Literature, edited by Luise Schottroff and Marie-Therese Wacker, 303–318. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2012. Flesher, LeAnn Snow. “Daughter Zion: Codependent No More.” In Daughter Zion: Her Portrait, Her Response, edited by Mark J. Boda, Carol J. Dempsey, and LeAnn Snow Flesher, 293–320. SBLAIL 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Floyd, Michael H. “The Daughter of Zion Goes Fishing in Heaven.” In Daughter Zion: Her Portrait, Her Response, edited by Mark J. Boda, Carol J. Dempsey, and LeAnn Snow Flesher, 177–200. SBLAIL 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Floyd, Michael H. “Welcome Back, Daughter of Zion!” CBQ 70 (2008): 484–504. Follis, Elaine R. “The Holy City as Daughter.” In Directions in Biblical Poetry, 173–184. JSOTS 40. Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1987.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   617 Franzmann, Majella. “The City as Woman: The Case of Babylon in Isaiah 47.” ABR 43 (1995):1–19. Frymer-Kensky, Tikva. In the Wake of the Goddesses: Women, Culture, and the Biblical Transformation of Pagan Myth. New York: Free Press, 1992. Fuchs, Esther. “Prophecy and the Construction of Women: Inscription and Erasure.” In Prophets and Daniel: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series), edited by Athalya Brenner, 54–69. Sheffield, UK: Continuum, 2001. Gafney, Wilda C. “Reading the Hebrew Bible Responsibly.” In The Africana Bible: Reading Israel’s Scriptures from African and the African Diaspora, edited by Hugh R. Page and Randall C. Bailey, 45–51. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2009. Gafney, Wilda C. “A Reflection on the Black Lives Matter Movement and Its Impact on My Scholarship.” JBL 136 (2017): 204–207. Gafney, Wilda C. Womanist Midrash: A Reintroduction to the Women of the Torah and the Throne. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2017. Goitein, S. D. “Women as Creators of Biblical Genres.” Prooftexts 8 (1988): 1–33. Goldingay, John, and David F. Payne. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 40–55. ICC. London / New York: T&T Clark, 2006. Gordon, Pamela, and Harold C. Washington. “Rape as Military Metaphor in the Hebrew Bible.” In A Feminist Companion to the Latter Prophets, edited by Athalya Brenner, 308–325. Feminist Companion to the Bible 8. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Gravett, Sandie. “Metaphors for Women and God That Hurt and Liberate: Feminist Approaches to the Books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel.” In Feminist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Retrospect, vol. 1, Biblical Books, edited by Susanne Scholz, 150–169. RRBS 5. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2013. Gruber, Mayer. “The Motherhood of God in Second Isaiah.” RB 90 (1986): 351–359. Hackett, Jo Ann. “Women’s Studies and the Hebrew Bible.” In The Future of Biblical Studies: The Hebrew Scriptures, edited by Richard E. Friedman and H. G. M. Williamson, 141–164. Semeia Studies. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1987. Junior, Nyasha. An Introduction to Womanist Biblical Interpretation. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2015. Kirk-Duggan, Cheryl. “Demonized Children and Traumatized, Battered Wives: Daughter Zion as Biblical Metaphor of Domestic and Sexual Violence.” In Daughter Zion: Her Portrait, Her Response, edited by Mark J. Boda, Carol J. Dempsey, and LeAnn Snow Flesher, 243–268. SBLAIL 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Kirk-Duggan, Cheryl. Exorcizing Evil: A Womanist Perspective on the Spirituals. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1997. Kirk-Duggan, Cheryl. Misbegotten Anguish: A Theology and Ethics of Violence. St. Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2001. Kirk-Duggan, Cheryl. “What Difference Does Difference Make?” In Escaping Eden: New Feminist Perspectives on the Bible, edited by Harold C. Washington, Susan Lochrie Graham, and Pamela Thimmes, 266–278. New York: New York University Press, 1999. Kirk-Duggan, Cheryl, and Valerie Bridgeman. “Introduction to the Prophets.” In The Africana Bible: Reading Israel’s Scriptures from African and the African Diaspora, edited by Hugh R. Page and Randall C. Bailey, 163–167. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2009. Korpel, Marjo C. A. “The Female Servant of the Lord in Isaiah 54.” In On Reading Prophetic Texts; Gender-Specific and Related Studies in Memory of Fokkelien van Dijk-Hemmes, edited by Bob Becking and Meindert Dijkstra, 153–167. BIS 18. Leiden: Brill, 1996.

618   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby Lakoff, George, and Mark Johnson. Metaphors We Live By. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980. Landy, Francis. “Spectrality in the Prologue to Deutero-Isaiah.” In The Desert Will Bloom: Poetic Visions in Isaiah, edited by A. Joseph Everson and Hyum Chul Paul Kim, 131–158. SBLAIL 4. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2009. Lapsley, Jacqueline E. “ ‘Look! The Children and I Are as Signs and Portents in Israel’: Children in Israel.” In The Child in the Bible, edited by Marcia J. Bunge, 82–102. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2008. Lee, Nancy C. Hannevi’ah and Hannah: Hearing Women Biblical Prophets in a Women’s Lyrical Tradition. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2015. Løland, Hanne. Silent or Salient Gender: The Interpretation of Gendered God-Language in the Hebrew Bible, Exemplified in Isaiah 42, 46, and 49. FAT II/32. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Low, Maggie. Mother Zion in Deutero-Isaiah: A Metaphor for Zion Theology. StBibLit 155. New York: Peter Lang, 2013. McEvenue, Sean E. “Who Was Second Isaiah?” In Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Festschrift Willem A. M. Beuken, edited by Jacques van Ruiten and Marc Vervenne, 213–222. BETL 132. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1997. McKinlay, Judith E. “The Usefulness of a Daughter.” In Isaiah and Imperial Context: The Book of Isaiah in the Times of Empire, edited by Andrew T. Abernethy, Mark G. Brett, Tim Bulkeley, and Tim Meadowcroft, 85–106. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2013. Magdalene, F. Rachel. “Ancient Near-Eastern Treaty Curses and the Ultimate Texts of Terror: A Study of the Language of Divine Sexual Abuse in the Prophetic Corpus.” In A Feminist Companion to the Latter Prophets, edited by Athalya Brenner, 326–352. Feminist Companion to the Bible 8. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1995. Maier, Christl M. Daughter Zion, Mother Zion: Gender, Space, and the Sacred in Ancient Israel. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2008. Maier, Christl M. “Feminist Interpretation.” In The Oxford Handbook of the Prophets, edited by Carolyn J. Sharp, 467–482. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Maier, Christl M. “Zion’s Body as a Site of God’s Motherhood in Isaiah 66:7–14.” In Daughter Zion: Her Portrait, Her Response, edited by Mark J. Boda, Carol J. Dempsey, and LeAnn Snow Flesher, 225–242. SBLAIL 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Mandolfo, Carleen R. Daughter Zion Talks Back to the Prophets: A Dialogic Theology of the Book of Lamentations. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2007. Merendino, Rosario P. “Jes 49:14–26: Jahwes bekenntinis zu Sion und die neue Heilszeit.” RB (1982): 321–330. Meyers, Carol. “Female Images for God in the Hebrew Bible.” In Women in Scripture: A Dictionary of Named and Unnamed Women in the Bible, edited by Ross Kraemer and Carol Meyers, 525–528. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2000. Meyers, Carol L., Toni Craven, and Ross Shepard Kraemer. Women in Scripture: A Dictionary of Named and Unnamed Women in the Hebrew Bible, the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books, and the New Testament. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 2000. Miles, Johnny. “Re-reading the Power of Satire: Isaiah’s ‘Daughters of Zion’, Pope’s ‘Belinda’, and the Rhetoric of Rape.” JSOT 31 (2006): 193–219. Moughtin-Mumby, Sharon. Sexual and Marital Metaphors in Hosea, Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Ezekiel. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.

Feminist/Womanist Readings of Isaiah   619 Newsom, Carol. “Response to Norman K. Gottwald, ‘Social Class and Ideology in Isaiah 40–55.’ ” Semeia 59 (1992): 73–78. Nzimande, Makhosazana K. “Isaiah.” In The Africana Bible: Reading Israel’s Scriptures from African and the African Diaspora, edited by Hugh R. Page and Randall C. Bailey, 136–146. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2009. O’Brien, Julia. Challenging Prophetic Metaphor: Theology and Ideology in the Prophets. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox. 2008. O’Connor, Kathleen M. “ ‘Speak Tenderly to Jerusalem’: Second Isaiah’s Reception and Use of Daughter Zion.” PSB 20 (1999): 281–294. Paganini, Simone. “Who Speaks in Isaiah 55.1? Notes on the Communicative Structure in Isaiah 55.” JSOT 30 (2002): 83–92. Philip, Tarja. “Woman in Travail as a Simile to Men in Distress in the Hebrew Bible.” In Sex and Gender in the Ancient Near East: Proceedings of the 47th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Helsinki, July 2–6, 2001, edited by Simo Parpola and Robert M. Whiting, 499–505. Helsinki, Finland: Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, 2002. Sawyer, Deborah. “Gender.” In The Blackwell Companion to the Bible and Culture, edited by John F. A. Sawyer, 464–479. Blackwell Companions to Religion. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2006. Sawyer, John F. A. “Daughter of Zion and Servant of the Lord in Isaiah: A Comparison.” JSOT 4 (1989): 89–107. Scholtz, Susanne. Introducing the Women’s Hebrew Bible: Feminism, Gender Justice, and the Study of the Old Testament. Introductions in Feminist Theology. New York: T&T Clark, 2017. Seifert, Elke. Tochter und Vater im Alten Testament: Eine ideologiekritische Untersuchung zur Verfügungsgewalt von Vätern über ihre Töchter. Neukirchener Theologische Dissertationen und Habilitationen 9. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1997. Setel, Drorah T. “Prophets and Pornography: Female Sexual Imagery in Hosea.” In Feminist Interpretation of the Bible, edited by Letty M. Russell, 86–95. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1985. Sherwood, Yvonne. “Prophetic Scatology: Prophecy and the Art of Sensation.” Semeia Studies 82 (2000): 183–224. Smith, Mitzi, ed. I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2015. Stone, Bebb Wheeler. “Second Isaiah: Prophet to Patriarchy.” In The Prophets: A Sheffield Reader, edited by Philip R. Davies, 219–232. Biblical Seminar 42. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1996. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden: Brill, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Isaiah 40–55: A Judahite Reading Drama.” In Daughter Zion: Her Portrait, Her Response, edited by Mark J. Boda, Carol J. Dempsey, and LeAnn Snow Flesher, 55–76. SBLAIL 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “The Prophets: Looking Forward.” In The Oxford Handbook of the Prophets, edited by Carolyn J. Sharp, 666–672. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Trible, Phyllis. God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality. OBT 2. London: SCM Press, 1978. Tull Willey, Patricia K. Remember the Former Things: The Recollection of Previous Texts in Second Isaiah. SBLDS 161. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997.

620   Sharon Moughtin-Mumby Tull Willey, Patricia K. “The Servant of Yhwh and Daughter Zion: Alternating Visions of Yhwh’s Community.” In SBLSP 1995 (34), edited by Eugene H. Lovering Jr., 267–303. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1995. Turner, Mary Donovan. “Daughter Zion: Giving Birth to Redemption.” In Pregnant Passion: Gender, Sex, and Violence in the Bible, edited by Cheryl Kirk-Duggan, 193–204. SBLSymS 44. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2003. Weems, Renita J. Battered Love: Marriage, Sex, and Violence in the Hebrew Prophets. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1995. Weems, Renita J. “Re-reading for Liberation.” In I Found God in Me: A Womanist Bible Hermeneutics Reader, edited by Mitzi J. Smith, 42–55. Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2015. Originally published in Feminist Interpretation of the Bible and the Hermeneutics of Liberation, edited by Silvia Schroer and Sophia Bietenhard, 19–32. London: Sheffield Academic, 2003. Wilshire, Leland E. “The Servant-City: A New Interpretation of the ‘Servant of the Lord’ in the Servant Songs of Deutero-Isaiah.” JBL 94 (1975): 356–367.

chapter 33

Postcol on i a l R ea di ngs of Isa i a h Mark G. Brett

33.1. Introduction The scroll of Isaiah was formed in the tides of successive empires—Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, and Hellenistic. The superscript suggests that the reader will encounter in the text a merely local vision for “Judah and Jerusalem during the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah” (Isa 1:1), but this is a much narrower focus in time and space than the scroll in fact contemplates. Chapters 36–39 close the first part of the book with a narrative about Hezekiah, but Judean kings are missing entirely from chapters 40–66, and instead, we find explicit endorsements of the Persian king Cyrus (44:28–45:4), along with a few other passages that may refer implicitly to Darius as well.1 The elliptical poetry of Isaiah is a pastiche of texts formed over centuries, spoken in many voices, and responding to local and international political crises, but the predominant concern in this complex drama is Jerusalem’s own story, located at the center of Yhwh’s imperial jurisdiction. Little wonder, then, that the book of Isaiah has attracted the attention of postcolonial critics. Postcolonial criticism is neither a method nor a doctrine, although it does provide a number of conceptual tools that have been applied in three spheres of research: (a) historical questions about the effects of imperialism in the formation of biblical texts; (b) the reception of biblical literature in colonial and anticolonial contexts; and (c) contemporary concerns about the ethics and practice of biblical scholarship today. This chapter will focus on the first domain, covering selected texts in the book of Isaiah, but it will also touch on a few examples of reception history and scholarly arguments that tread the intersections of descriptive and normative claims.

1 Kratz, Kyros, 175–191; Albertz, “Darius.”

622   Mark G. Brett Although the hyphen in “post-colonial” usually implies an historical reference to ­modern nations, there is no such presumption in “postcolonial studies,” which instead refers to a repertoire of critical strategies, and not to a historical period. Beyond the narrower focus on questions of historical setting and influence, postcolonial criticism engages with a wide range of intercultural dynamics in social contexts of asymmetrical power, provoking readers to consider the complex interfaces between cultural imposition and resistance, emulation, and dissimulation. There are, of course, considerable differences between ancient imperialisms and modern settler colonialism, and there is no virtue in generalizations that pay no attention to the nuances of historical differences.2 To begin with, we may distinguish broadly between anti-imperial rhetoric and postcolonial analyses of “cultural hybridity” and mimicry. Many passages in Isaiah contain anti-imperial rhetoric, particularly within chapters 1–39. In chapter 10, for example, the hubris of the king of Assyria is unmasked with poetic imagination placed on his own lips: My hand has found, like a nest, the wealth of the peoples, As one gathers abandoned eggs, so I gathered all the earth. Not one flapped a wing, or opened its mouth to chirp. (10:14)

To this the prophet responds, “Shall the ax vaunt itself over the one who wields it?” (10:15). The imperial ideology of Assyria is swept aside as a fantasy that obscures the divine foundation of authentic sovereignty.3 Similarly, in 14:4–23, the critique of an imperial king’s designs on the sacred mountain of Zaphon are poetically undermined, perhaps because the divine symbolism of Zaphon has been assimilated to Zion.4 Especially in the later chapters of Isaiah, however, we find more ambivalent examples of the mimicry of empires. Characterizing these texts as “anti-imperial” would oversimplify matters, and postcolonial criticism becomes more relevant insofar as it does not presume a binary contrast between the colonizer and the colonized.5 It is difficult to overlook the fact, for example, that the “wealth of the peoples” returns as a motif in the description of Yhwh’s own regime in Isa 45:14; 60:5, 11; 61:6; 66:12. This emulation or mimicry of empire invites consideration through a more ambivalent postcolonial lens. Historians have cautiously embraced the discourse of postcolonial studies,6 bearing in mind a proper exclusion of anachronism, and recognizing the complexities that arise from politicizing historical research. There is no doubt that the reception of Isaiah has often been accommodated within the history of colonial discourse, and this history is of particular interest within some branches of postcolonial research. Christopher Columbus’s Book of Prophecies (1501–1502), for example, found inspiration in Isa 40–66.

2 Veracini, Settler Colonialism. 3  Chan, “Rhetorical Reversal”; Weinfeld, “Protest.” 4  Kofoed, “Zion, Eden”; Hays, Death, 203­–­­222. 5 Ashcroft, Postcolonial Transformation; Lee, “Returning to China.” 6  E.g., Hagedorn, “Local Law”; Liebmann and Rizvi, Archaeology; Lemos, “They Have Become Women.”

Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah   623 Despoiling Indian resources in newly discovered territories could, on Columbus’s account, finance a Catholic king’s conquest of Jerusalem.7 There is a great irony in this kind of example, however, since the composition of the Isaiah scroll between the eighth and fifth centuries bce was evidently shaped over against the claims of ancient empires, and not—with the possible exception of Persian administration—in support of them. As with much of the biblical literature, the idiom of this resistance sometimes borrowed from imperial language and ideas, and when the completed Bible took its place in Christendom in later centuries, it could easily be turned into a source of sanctions for colonial political power. On the other hand, biblical imagery was also invoked in modern campaigns for decolonization. For example, the image of a “peaceable kingdom” in Isa 11 was often invoked as a model for engaging with indigenous people, particularly in North America and Australia.8 Why, then, would a Persian king be presented as a kind of “messiah” in Isa 44:28–45:4, and why is there is no overt critique of his empire in Isa 40–66? Have the biblical editors assimilated themselves to imperial interests at the time?9 In the Persian context, even the anti-imperial attacks on Assyria and Babylon could be reinterpreted as entirely con­gen­ ial to Achaemenid administrators; the memories of numerous cruel regimes in the past could merely point up the superiority of Persian administration.10 The bulk of the Isaiah scroll was probably finalized about the same time as the Torah of Moses, and it is possible to interpret both the prophetic and the legal collections in relation to the Persian imperial context. The book of Ezra certainly lays claim to an Achaemenid authorization for Israel’s law, even if Ezra 7 does not actually contain an official edict.11 Marvin Sweeney has made the case that reinterpretation of prophetic tôrāh in the final form of the Isaiah scroll was “designed to support the reforms of Ezra in the late fifth century bce.”12 On his account, the Torah of Moses and the prophetic teaching of Isaiah are complimentary, and, at least from the point of view of late editing, quite compatible with the interests of Achaemenid administration. The arguments presented in this chapter will, by contrast, find more ambivalence in relation to Persian power, if not resistance. The merely verbal parallel that Sweeney and others have drawn between “ḥrd” in Isa 66:2, 5 and Ezra 9:4 is not evidence for Isaiah’s endorsement of an Ezra party, but only for a shared metaphor—“the one who trembles (ḥrd)” at the word.13 Strikingly, there is no explicit reference to tôrāh in Isa 56–66, the chapters most commonly dated to the Persian period. Indeed, as Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer has argued, it is possible to find criticism in these later chapters of an alliance with Persian overlords: “You journeyed to the king, with oil, and multiplied your perfumes; you sent your envoys to a distant place, even to Sheol” (57:9 MT).14 The stinging rhetoric in chapter 57 takes up the prophet’s 7  West and Kling, Libro de las Profecías, 68–71; Ruiz, Readings, 123–135. 8 Attwood, Possession, 109–113. 9 Blenkinsopp, David Remembered, 54–70. 10  Berquist, “Postcolonialism,” 24–25; Yee, “Postcolonial,” 215–219. 11  Brett, “Imperial Context.” 12  Sweeney, “Book of Isaiah,” 56. 13  Berges, “Trito-Isaiah,” 179. 14  See Tiemeyer, Priestly Rites, 199–206.

624   Mark G. Brett earlier opposition to foreign political alliances (e.g., Isa 30:1–5; 31:1­3) as well as the theme of the underworld in earlier texts.15 Another verbal parallel mentioned by Sweeney is that between Isa 6:13 and Ezra 9:2, two texts that share the phrase “holy seed.” But this parallel could readily be turned to make the opposite case. The “holy seed” in Isa 6:13 grows from the stump that is left after the tree is felled, and the metaphor most obviously refers to those who never went into exile and who instead remained in the land, who are holy in Yhwh’s eyes after they have been purified.16 This possibility may imply that the editors of Isaiah disagreed with Ezra’s conception of an exclusive holiness that belonged only to the exiles. The discussion here will suggest that the later editing of Isaiah seeks to reconcile the exiled and the Remainee groups within Yhwh’s empire, rather than set them apart. By implication, this reconciling purpose resists the politics of identity promoted in Ezra-Nehemiah. In particular, Ezra endows the “children of the gōlāh” with an exclusive holiness, but this is not the case in the Isaiah scroll. Instead, Yhwh’s faithful servants in Isaiah are exhorted to lift their eyes beyond the tôrāh that constitutes Israel’s unique identity and acknowledge as well a tôrāh that could embrace the gôyim.

33.2.  A Torah with Imperial Reach The vision of peace in Isa 2:2–4 promotes a centralized administration that resonates in some respects with the national vision in Deut 17:8–11.17 The duplication of some key words between these two texts suggests evidence of some textual interaction—“go up” (‘lh), “instruct” (yrh), “instruction” (trh), “ruling” (dbr), and “decide” (špt)—although the significance of the comparison is debatable. For our present purposes, the comparison between Isa 2:2­–4 and Deut 17:8–11 is striking for at least three reasons. First, the shared theme is jurisprudence rather than statutory law. In Deut 17:8–11, the difficult cases are to be brought from the villages to “the Levitical priests and the judge” in the central place, whereas in Isaiah the judge of international cases is simply said to be Yhwh. Secondly, by implication, the national vision of Deuteronomy is dramatically expanded with an international jurisdiction in Isa 2:2–4. Thirdly, the indirectness of Deuteronomy’s central place (“the place that Yhwh your God will choose”) is replaced by an unambiguously named Zion. Instead of Sinai–Horeb, the tôrāh issues from Zion in Isa 2:2–4, a sacred mountain which is mentioned never in the Pentateuch but regularly in Isaiah. The center of Yhwh’s jurisdiction is clearly named Zion in Isa 2, but in Isa 42 the tôrāh belongs to a “servant” who exercises judicial power away from the centralized location.

15 Hays, Death; Hays, “Isaiah as Colonized Poet.” 17  Schwartz, “Torah from Zion.”

16  Japhet, “People and Land,” 114.

Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah   625 He will not grow faint or be crushed until he has established justice (mišpāt) in the earth; and the coastlands wait for his teaching (tôrāh). (42:4)

The conception of tôrāh shared between Isa 2:2–4 and 42:4 is imperial in its scope; this is an administration that can be exercised from a “dominating metropolitan center” or from a “distant territory.”18 Isa 2 establishes the center, and the servant’s distant mission illustrates a globalized jurisdiction. The global scope might be seen as a logical implication that flows from Isaiah’s assertion of monotheism, although we will need to leave to one side a closer investigation of the varieties of monotheism in Israel’s later literature.19 In addition to the servant’s empire-wide administration in Isa 42:1–4, we find a similar picture in Isa 51:3–7, but this time without a mediator figure. In this latter case, only a divine agency is needed to restore Zion to an Eden-like state, and this peaceable condition is seen as the fruit of a globalized rule: For instruction (tôrāh) will go out from me, and my justice (mišpātî) for a light to the peoples. (51:4)

Once again, Yhwh’s tôrāh is not restricted to Israel, but is a gift to the nations. The imperial scope of the jurisdiction is comparable to what we find in Isa 42:1–4,20 but in 51:3–7 there is no servant figure and the focus is on Zion. In this respect, the administration in chapter 51 is more like the picture of reconciliation in Zion in Isa 2:1–4, where swords are beaten into ploughshares following a divine judgment. Wherever Yhwh’s jurisdiction is accepted, the fruit of mišpāt is peace. This legal imagination seems to mimic the rule of Darius, especially as it is depicted in the Behistun inscription.21 Within the Persian legal ideology, the great king mediated Ahuramazda’s creation of world order, holding all the countries in their place. Saith Darius the King: Within these countries, the man who was loyal, him I rewarded well; (him) who was evil, him I punished well; by the favor of Ahuramazda these countries showed respect toward my law; as was said to them by me, thus was it done.22

Margaret Root demonstrated long ago that the Achaemenid royal ideology goes beyond the older imperial convention of celebrating the subjection of foreign nations to imagine the grateful participation of the many countries that acknowledged the benefits of the Pax Persiana.23 The nations are held in place for their own good. The idea that some foreign kings might need to be subdued in chains (e.g., Isa 45:14; 49:23) is

18  Cf. Said, Culture and Imperialism, 9. 19  E.g., Bolin, “Temple”; Achenbach, “Monotheistischer Universalismus.” 20  Grätz, “Rechtsordnung,” 276–277. 21  Albertz, “Darius,” 382–283; Berges, Jesaja 40–48, 213. 22 Kent, Old Persian, 119. 23 Root, King and Kingship.

626   Mark G. Brett a­ nalogous to the acknowledgment in the Behistun inscription that punishment is sometimes necessary in order to keep world order. According to the book of Isaiah as a whole, the well-being of Zion cannot be assured until the other nations are brought into a peaceful alignment with Israel’s interests. Initially, Yhwh brings other nations against Jerusalem in judgement—a theological idea that endows Israel with agency, even in self-blame, and ultimately denies agency to other nations and their gods.24 But the denouement of Zion’s drama is itself unmistakably imperial. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that it is shaped within a “counterimperial” imaginary, since we also find a distinctive theme of renouncing violence in the exercise of tôrāh, notably in Isa 2:1–4 and 42:1–4 (cf. the portrait of the servant’s justice in 53:9–12).

33.3.  Zion’s Shalom in Isaiah 11:1–9 and 65:17–25 The corresponding visions of shalom in Isa 11 and 65 also share a number of motifs that reflect the theme of peaceable rule. In the case of Isa 11:1–9, we find a vision of justice exercised by a Davidic figure that also includes a utopian rule over nature, for example, “the wolf will sojourn (gur) with the lamb” and no violence will be done on Yhwh’s holy mountain. Essentially the same Edenic imagery returns in chapter 65, with some slight changes of wording (e.g., “the wolf and the lamb will graze (r’h) together”), and the messenger formula is added to the end of the oracle: “They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain,” says Yhwh.

More striking in the later reiteration, however, is the fact that this peaceful image of ecological redemption does not include a Davidic messiah’s mediation. Even the reference to a child in 11:8 is missing from chapter 65, most likely because the messianic connotations are being avoided.25 In the later visions, the former distress and trauma will not “go up to the heart” (Isa 65:17), and the cry of distress will no longer be heard in Zion (65:19, inverting 5:7). In contrast with the curses of Deut 28:30, 39–41, the threats of not living in one’s own house, or not eating one’s own produce, are removed.26 Infant mortality will disappear and old people will die “full of days” (65:20), although there is no affirmation here of resurrection as such. Yhwh is “creating new heavens and a new earth,” but the vision is still this-worldly. It qualifies as eschatology only in the sense that it is an enduring transformation of ordinary life. The return to Eden restores peaceable relations between animals, and even the serpent who will eat “earth as bread” appears as just one more animal who now offers no threat. Isa 65:25 apparently alludes to Gen 3:14 while implying that the nāḥāš is harmless, just 24  Cf. Alexander, Trauma, 6. 25  Schmid, “New Creation,” 187. 26 Stromberg, Isaiah after Exile, 94.

Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah   627 as the asp and adder are no threat to the child in Isa 11:8. Similarly superseded is the covenant curse of Lev 26:2: “Then I will turn the beasts of the field loose against you so that they rob you of your children and wipe out your animals” (cf. the threat of devouring beasts in Isa 56:9).27 In the renewed earth, there will once again be peace among all God’s creatures, human and nonhuman. In Hulisani Ramantswana’s reading of these texts, the return to Eden is not just seen as a reversal of covenantal curses, but also as a rejection of the violent imagery of monarchic power over animals. He agrees with those scholars who see the vision of peace in 11:6–9 as a post-exilic addition to the older messianic text in chapter 11, but on Ramantswana’s “decolonial” reading, there is also a critical voice in this later utopian addition: the return to Eden rejects the violent imagery of monarchic power over animals, exercised notably in the Persian royal gardens, where wild animals could be hunted for sport.28 Isa 65:17–25 apparently alludes to these “paradise” gardens that symbolized the benefits of Achaemenid order, but the invocation of Eden implicitly rejects imperial exploitation. This hint of resistance is certainly muted, for example, when the last mention of David’s covenant transfers it to a community, rather than to the descendants of David (55:1–5). Ramantswana draws attention to the messianic symbol in the late composition of Isa 11:6, but this symbol has noticeably disappeared from the reiterated vision of shalom in Isa 65:25. Admittedly, the term yônēq, used for “nursing child” in 11:8, appears again in the “sapling” image of the suffering servant in 53:2, and the Great Isaiah Scroll from Qumran (1QIsaa) introduces its own messianic connotation by describing the suffering servant as “anointed” in 52:14. But the expectation of a Davidic messiah is eventually lost as Zion’s drama unfolds, and the representation of just rule becomes more consistently theocratic. The last anointed figure (mšḥ) mentioned in the book is the unidentified speaker of Isa 61:1–3 who brings good news to the lowly and proclaims liberty (deror) to Zion. The voice in Isa 61 seems to possess a royal power, without being directly identified as a Persian monarch. The dissimulation at this point is subtle, but there is no doubt that the vision of wealth being brought to Jerusalem in 61:6 makes Zion the center of God’s empire, rather than Persepolis (cf. 60:5, 11; 66:12).29 The redemption of creation in 65:17–25 then affirms Zion as the center of an imperial shalom.

33.4.  Return Migration and Reconciliation Isa 56–66 provide clear evidence of internal social divisions during the period of Persia’s administration of Judah, but there is no scholarly consensus on how to describe the 27  Steck, “Beobachtungen,” 112. 28  Ramantswana, “Not Free,” 820–822; cf. Tuplin, Achaemenid Studies, 80–131. 29  Strawn, “World.”

628   Mark G. Brett social history of the time. One intriguing model suggested by John Kessler finds an analogy between the returning exiles and modern colonial settlers in North America. In his sociological model, the modern “charter group” is an ethnic elite who imposes political, economic, and religious institutions in the territory of settlement, often displacing indigenous institutions. Similarly, the gōlāh group who returned from Babylon (the “Repatriates”) claimed an elite status, imposed their own social vision, and continued to develop a distinctive self-identity as the “children of the gōlāh.” This, at least, is a picture that may be derived from the development of the Ezra-Nehemiah traditions in the late fifth century and beyond.30 Kessler recognizes a significant limitation in his analogy in that the Repatriates in the Persian period had an ancestral connection to Judean territory, so they were in fact reclaiming their heritage as a charter group. But, at the same time, the settlement group claimed a special relationship with the Persian authorities, which led to conflicts with the Judeans who had never gone into exile. In effect, the Judean Remainees were configured as indigenous in Kessler’s model, while the Repatriate leadership shaped a “charter group” supported by the Achaemenid administration. The suggestion that the Isaiah scroll might somehow be aligned with Persian interests also appears in Francesca Stavrakopoulou’s argument that the aspirations of the settler groups in the Persian period could be described as “colonial.”31 For example, she argues that the oracle in Isa 56:1–8 serves to displace indigenous land claims by affirming eunuchs and foreigners who have no connection with the ancestral dead in Judah. In particular, the mortuary cult discourse in 56:3 functions to legitimate settlers in a way that potentially supplants ancestral connections to the dead.32 Although it is not explicitly identified as postcolonial, this proposal illustrates a characteristically postcolonial “hermeneutic of suspicion” directed against claims to cultural or religious superiority. However, the “eunuch” embraced in 56:3–4 invites comparison with the only other reference to eunuchs in the scroll of Isaiah: “Some of your own sons who are born to you shall be taken away; they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon” (39:7). The eunuchs mentioned in Isa 56:3­–4 could well include some of Zion’s exiled children, returning from Babylon’s court. Their loyalty is transferred back to Yhwh, and by implication, the Jerusalem temple supersedes the foreign king’s palace as the center of sovereignty.33 Such a subtle expression of resistance to a foreign imperial power could have been asserted either by a gōlāh group or by those who never went into exile, so on what basis can we infer that a text solely represents the interests of Repatriates? It is difficult to assign texts to particular social groups if there is no consensus on the social history behind the text. Dalit Rom-Shiloni, for example, argues that Isa 40–66 presents “an exclusive preference for the Babylonian Exiles and Repatriates,”34 whereas Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer has argued quite the reverse, that almost all of Isa 40­–66 reflects 30  Kessler, “Persia’s Loyal Yahwists.” Cf. Southwood, “Ethnic Affair”; Fitzpatrick-McKinley, Empire, 255–276. 31 Stavrakopoulou, Land, 17, 73, 140. 32 Stavrakopoulou, Land, 124; cf. Loretz, “Stelen und Sohnespflicht.” 33  Wright and Chan, “King and Eunuch.” 34 Rom-Shiloni, Exclusive Inclusivity, 135.

Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah   629 the perspective of indigenous Judahites.35 In part, the arguments for these opposed positions are linked to theories about the primary location of authorship, whether in Babylon or in Judah. However, many of the interpretations of particular texts do not finally turn on the location of authorship, but rather on the question of how those texts represent social interests—whether the interests of Repatriates or Remainees, or indeed of other groups with no particular stake in the legacies of Israelite or Judean identity. Responding to Carleen Mandolfo’s proposal that the figure of Zion has been overwhelmed in Second Isaiah by voices representing the gōlāh community,36 Tiemeyer finds this scenario unlikely if one can conclude that the bulk of Isa 40–66 was actually written in Judah.37 The evidence for a Babylonian authorship of Isa 40–55 may indeed be less substantial than has often been assumed, but it does not follow that the location of authorship will resolve the question of how social groups are represented in the scroll of Isaiah. I will respond to the various proposals for seeing the gōlāh identity in “colonial” terms by focusing instead on the possibilities of reconciliation that are presented in Isaiah. There seem to be two main social groups sitting behind the personification of “Zion” and “servant” in Isa 40–55: both have suffered disproportionately (40:2; 53:5–8), and both express a brief lament in first-person discourse in 49:4 and 49:14 (cf. 40:27 and the response in 40:28–31). The divine response to the servant’s lament in 49:4 emphasizes that his mission is not only to restore Jacob’s tribes, but also to offer light to the nations (49:5–6), a theme to which we will return. The whole of Isa 49–55 can be read antiphonally in the sense that the focus of attention alternates between the servant (49:1–13; 50:4–11; 52:13–53:12) and Zion/Jerusalem (49:14–50:3; 51:1–52:12; 54:1–55:5). Isa 55:1–5 is usually set apart from the Zion-focused texts, but it is clear that the center of this social vision is Zion/Jerusalem, and the divine invitation to join a nonmonetary economy in 55:1–3 makes good sense on traditional land. Accordingly, we can conclude that Isa 55:1–5 continues with the focus on Zion that is found in chapter 54. Within the speech to Zion in 49:14–50:3, the reference to the theme of exile in 49:21 is confusing at first glance. And you will say to yourself, “Who bore these [children] for me, when I was bereaved and barren, exiled (gōlāh) and put away, so who has reared these? I was left alone—so where have these been?”

The motif is missing from the LXX, and it may therefore be a late gloss in Hebrew texts,38 but gōlāh may also be taken in a metaphorical sense that is well known in postcolonial studies, where indigenous people speak of being in exile in their own country.39 We hear in this text from Mother Zion, who says that she felt “exiled” and “left alone,” yet when she lifts her eyes is overwhelmed to see the number of her children return35 Tiemeyer, Comfort; Tiemeyer, “Hope and Disappointment.” 36 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion. 37  Tiemeyer, “Reading Drama.” 38  Tiemeyer, “Reading Drama,” 68–69. 39 Rosendale, Spirituality, 19.

630   Mark G. Brett ing, along with the foreigners who bring them (49:21–22). The foreigners are welcome on condition, of course, that they recognize Yhwh’s sovereignty, and hence this picture of hospitality includes the humility of kings (49:22; cf. 60:3–10; 61:5). King David’s own family lineage has faded from view, but the assertion of sovereignty in Zion has not. The “servant” is repeatedly identified as Jacob/Israel in Isa 40–55, but in chapter 53 the identity is less clear. Ulrich Berges sees 53:1–12 as a poetic proposal for reconciling the tensions between the Repatriates and the Remainees. On his account, the prophetic voice in 53:1–12 views the suffering of the gōlāh group as redemptive for the “many”—the whole people of God.40 This reading also helps to account for the otherwise puzzling suggestion in 53:12 that the servant could legitimately seek land allocations (ʾᵃḥalleq) as a reward for his service, and the theme of land allocations returns in Isa 56 and 60–62.41 As the drama unfolds in Isa 56–66, it seems that the return of the gōlāh group is a great disappointment and the community descends into division.42 The Repatriate leadership in Judah promoted narrower constructions of identity, such as we find in Ezra-Nehemiah, constructions that were pointedly opposed in Isa 56:1–8 with an inclusive vision of Sabbath observance.43 Instead of seeing Isa 56 as a colonial imposition, as Stavrakopoulou has it, the foreigner who could be “joined” to Yhwh in 56:3 was more likely seen as an offense to this Persian-sponsored leadership. Zion fully expects the arrival of foreigners along with the return of her exiled children (Isa 49:22; 55:4). A similar effort toward reconciliation may be found in Isa 61, where we find the declaration of a release (deror), most likely in dialogue with the Jubilee tradition in the Holiness Code (Lev 25). Isa 61:1 begins with ambiguous references to the poor and prisoners, but then the vision is focused in 61:3 on “those who mourn in Zion.” The primary addressees are the community in Zion, but the flow of pronouns in Isa 65:4–7 is puzzling. The reader is provoked to wonder who is included in the covenant described in 61:8b–9, and I have argued elsewhere that the audience would include Remainee groups who claimed descent from Abraham.44 As in the case of Isa 53, Isa 61 might well be envisaging reconciliation between different communities, held together by a renewal of covenant. I will cut an eternal covenant with them. And their seed will be known among the nations. (61:8b–9)

The substance of this promise had already been made to Abraham, who in the Priestly covenant theology is the father of “many nations” (Gen 17:4; 28:3). Some of the Remainee groups no doubt claimed descent from Abraham (cf. Ezek 33:24, echoing Isa 51:2), so any 40 Berges, Jesaja 49–54, 274–278; cf. Hägglund, Isaiah 53. 41  As we know from the experience of many settler colonial societies, debates around the legitimacy of landholdings do not arise from a scarcity of land resources, as modern economic theories would predict, but rather from challenges to traditional tenures and polities. See Brett, “Unequal Terms,” 245; Veracini, Settler Colonialism, 16–52. 42  Tiemeyer, “Hope and Disappointment.” 43  Brett, “Imperial Imagination,” 172–181. 44  Brett, “Unequal Terms.”

Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah   631 effort to include nonexiled descendants of Abraham would have been entirely fitting in Priestly theology.45 The effort on the part of Isaiah’s tradents to reconcile the different communities seems, however, to have failed in the long run. In Isa 56:1–8 and Isa 66:20­–21 we find an increasing dissatisfaction with the priesthood.46 There is a stark contrast between Isa 56:1–8 and the exclusion of foreigners in Ezek 44:6–12,47 but this suggests a conflict with particular leaders rather than any incompatibility with the Holiness editors who are responsible for more welcoming texts in Exodus and Leviticus. Most striking is the double assertion of a single law for citizens and strangers alike in Exod 12:49 and Lev 24:22. Against the grain of the Ezra tradition, which claims an exclusive identity for the children of the gōlāh, this Holiness material proposes that natives and immigrants might live together in harmony, without destroying the fabric of the Yhwh cult. In sum, Isa 40–66 envisages divine justice for a restored Zion, reconciliation with gōlāh families within their ancestral country, and an invitation to the nations to be part of a recreated earth, all on condition that Yhwh’s sovereignty is duly recognized. There is no final submission to the Persian Empire, but there is no need to decide whether the biblical texts are either anti-imperial or assimilationist; they are both, simultaneously, engaged in the dynamic of mimicry.

33.5.  Postcolonial Hermeneutics Criticisms of postcolonialism are not difficult to find in recent literature. It is said to be anachronistic, faddish, ridden with jargon, or bewitched by literary epiphenomena rather than with the deeper dynamics of social history and economy.48 Such criticisms may well be justified in relation to particular studies, but sweeping dismissals of the entire paradigm are invalid. In this concluding section, we will disentangle a number of separate hermeneutical issues and offer some brief comments for consideration in future research. Postcolonial studies maintain a characteristic emphasis on the significance of texts for subaltern audiences—groups who are socially and economically outside the dominant structures of power. This emphasis applies both to historical studies of subaltern groups and to contemporary concerns. However, in her classic essay “Can the Subaltern Speak?” Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak expressed her doubts that literary elites can ever accurately represent dispossessed groups; even when “native informants” provide data for ethnographic analysis, they are regularly effaced.49 45  See Wöhrle, “Un-Empty Land,” 204. Isaiah does not promote an “empty land” ideology in the late Persian period. Cf. Blenkinsopp, “Bible, Archaeology and Politics,” and Ben Zvi, “Total Exile.” 46 Tiemeyer, Priestly Rites, 281–286. 47  Berges, “Trito-Isaiah.” 48  E.g., Moore and Segovia, Postcolonial. 49  Davidson, “Prophets Postcolonially,” 8, citing Spivak, Critique, 6, 18.

632   Mark G. Brett This kind of suspicion provokes a key question for the postcolonial study of Isaiah since it is likely that the very concept of a prophetic “book” was produced by a small group of literati in Persian-period Jerusalem.50 Bearing in mind Spivak’s suspicion, how can we know whether the scroll of Isaiah accurately represents any subaltern groups in Israel? For example, can the depiction of Zion’s complaint in 49:14 be attributed to an oppressed group in Jerusalem, who were in effect the informants of the scribes? Even the proposal for reconciliation between the gōlāh and Remainee groups might itself be seen as a dream constructed solely by an elite literati. For a practitioner of subaltern history, the value of the Isaiah scroll may then be thrown into question. I have emphasized, however, another strand of postcolonial thought that refuses the binary distinction between colonizer and colonized, and potentially provides a more fruitful starting point in biblical scholarship. One must always consider the multiple layers of power in a colonial situation, and the inevitable complexities of cultural hybridity. Ehud Ben Zvi’s argument about the production of prophetic “books” is relevant here, since he suggests that these were “generated by a small group of literati who held no real political power.”51 We may not ever know the identity of their informants, but this literati’s vision of Yhwh’s empire sustained the hope of Israel in subsequent generations. Their cultural and religious influence apparently outstripped their political power during the Persian period.52 In both ancient and modern times, the sheer complexity of intergroup conflict is not often reducible to binary contrasts between elites and subalterns, or imperialists and nativists. To criticize the scroll of Isaiah as the seedbed of Christopher Columbus’s globalized ideology is certainly justified as a commentary on the history of reception, but it is less valid as an interpretation of the imperial politics of the Persian period. The ideologies associated with biblical texts are constantly mutating in light of the social contexts within which they are interpreted. The more persuasive postcolonial readings of Isaiah will attend to the layers and ironies of the biblical texts, both in their composition and their reception.53 The scroll of Isaiah, itself a kind of resistance literature, sits within an historically extended debate about the shape of a divinely constituted future. Subaltern histories may consign this book to a footnote, but communities of faith will continue to engage with its imagination of justice and redemption.

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Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah   633 Albertz, Rainer. “Darius in Place of Cyrus.” JSOT 27 (2003): 371–383. Alexander, Jeffrey C. Trauma: A Social Theory. Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2012. Ashcroft, Bill. Postcolonial Transformation. London: Routledge, 2001. Attwood, Bain. Possession: Batman’s Treaty and the Matter of History. Melbourne, AUS: Miegunyah Press, 2009. Ben Zvi, Ehud. “The Concept of Prophetic Books and Its Historical Setting.” In The Production of Prophecy: Constructing Prophecy and Prophets in Yehud, edited by Diana V. Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi, 73–95. London: Equinox, 2009. Ben Zvi, Ehud. “Total Exile, Empty Land and the General Intellectual Discourse in Yehud.” In The Concept of Exile in Ancient Israel and Its Historical Contexts, edited by Ehud Ben Zvi and Christoph Levin, 155–168. BZAW 404. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010, Berges, Ulrich. Jesaja 40–48. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2008. Berges, Ulrich. Jesaja 49–54. HThKAT. Freiburg: Herder, 2015. Berges, Ulrich. “Trito-Isaiah and the Reforms of Ezra/Nehemiah: Consent or Conflict?” Biblica 98 (2017): 173–190. Berquist, Jon L. “Postcolonialism and Imperial Motives for Canonization.” Semeia 75 (1996): 15–35. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. “The Bible, Archaeology and Politics; or, the Empty Land Revisited.” JSOT 27 (2002): 169–187. Blenkinsopp, Joseph. David Remembered: Kingship and National Identity in Ancient Israel. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2013. Bolin, Thomas M. “The Temple of ‫ יהו‬at Elephantine and Persian Religious Policy.” In The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms, edited by Diana V. Edelman, 127–142. Kampen, Netherlands: Kok Pharos, 1996. Brett, Mark G. Forthcoming. “The Imperial Context of the Pentateuch.” In The Oxford Handbook of the Pentateuch, edited by Joel Baden and Jeffrey Stackert. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Brett, Mark G. “Imperial Imagination in Isaiah 56–66.” In Isaiah and imperial Context: The Book of Isaiah in the Times of Empire, edited by Andrew T. Abernethy, Mark G. Brett, Tim Bulkeley, and Tim J. Meadowcroft, 167–181. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2013. Brett, Mark G. “Unequal Terms: A Postcolonial Approach to Isaiah 61.” In Biblical Interpretation and Method: Essays in Honour of Professor John Barton, edited by Katharine J. Dell and Paul M. Joyce, 243–256. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Chan, Michael. “Rhetorical Reversal and Usurpation: Isaiah 10:5–34 and the Use of Neo-Assyrian Royal Idiom in the Construction of an Anti-Assyrian Theology.” JBL 128 (2009): 717–733. Davidson, Steed Vernyl. “Prophets Postcolonially: Initial Insights for a Postcolonial Reading of Prophetic Literature.” Bible and Critical Theory 6 (2010): 1–13. Fitzpatrick-McKinley, Anne. Empire, Power and Indigenous Elites: A Case Study of the Nehemiah Memoir. SJSJ 169. Leiden: Brill, 2015. Grätz, Sebastian. “Die universelle Rechtsordnung des Gottesknechts: Zum Verständnis von mišpaṭ im ersten Lied vom Gottesknecht (Jes 42,1–4).” ZABR 10 (2004): 264–277. Hagedorn, Anselm C. “Local Law in an Imperial Context: The Role of Torah in the (Imagined) Persian Period.” In The Pentateuch as Torah: New Models for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance, edited by Gary N. Knoppers and Bernard M. Levinson, 57–76. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2007. Hägglund, Fredrik. Isaiah 53 in the Light of Homecoming After Exile. FAT II/31. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008.

634   Mark G. Brett Hays, Christopher B. Death in the Iron Age II and in First Isaiah. FAT 79. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011. Hays, Christopher B. “Isaiah as Colonized Poet: His Rhetoric of Death in Conversation with African Postcolonial Writers.” In Isaiah and Imperial Context: The Book of Isaiah in the Times of Empire, edited by Andrew T. Abernethy, Mark G. Brett, Tim Bulkeley, and Tim J. Meadowcroft, 51–70. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2013. Japhet, Sara. “People and Land in the Restoration Period.” In Das Land Israel in biblischer Zeit: Jerusalem-Symposium 1981 der Hebräischen Universität und der Georg-AugustUniversität, edited by Georg Strecker, 103–125. Göttinger theologische Arbeiten 25. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1983. Kent, Roland G. Old Persian: Grammar, Texts, Lexicon. AOS 33. New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society, 1953. Kessler, John. “Persia’s Loyal Yahwists: Power, Identity and Ethnicity in Achaemenid Yehud.” In Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, edited by Oded Lipschits and Manfred Oeming, 91–121. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006. Kofoed, Jens Bruun. “Zion, Eden and the Temple in the Book of Isaiah.” In New Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Essay in Honor of Hallvard Hagelia, edited by Markus Zehnder, 149–168. Perspectives on Hebrew Scriptures and Its Contexts 21. Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias, 2014. Kratz, Reinhard G. Kyros im Deuterojesaja-Buch: Redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu Entstehung und Theologie von Jes 40–55. FAT 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991. Lee, Archie C. C. “Returning to China: Biblical Interpretation in Postcolonial Hong Kong.” Biblical Interpretation 7 (1999): 156–173. Lemos, Tracy M. “ ‘They Have Become Women’: Judean Diaspora and Postcolonial Theories of Gender and Migration.” In Social Theory and the Study of Israelite Religion: Essays in Retrospect and Prospect, edited by Saul M. Olyan, 81–109. Resources for Biblical Study 71. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Liebmann, Matthew, and Uzma Rizvi, eds. Archaeology and the Postcolonial Critique. Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press, 2008. Loretz, Oswald. “Stelen und Sohnespflicht im Totenkult Kanaans und Israels: skn (KTU 1.17 I 26) und jd (Jes 56,5).” UF 21 (1989): 241–246. Mamdani, Mahmood. “Beyond Settler and Native as Political Identities: Overcoming the Political Legacy of Colonialism.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 43 (2001): 651–664. Mandolfo, Carleen. Daughter Zion Talks Back to the Prophets: A Dialogic Theology of the Book of Lamentations. Semeia Studies 58. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2007. Moore, Stephen D., and Fernando F. Segovia, eds. Postcolonial Biblical Criticism: Interdisciplinary Intersections. London: T&T Clark, 2005. Paradies, Yin C. “Beyond Black and White: Essentialism, Hybridity and Indigeneity.” Journal of Sociology 42 (2006): 355–367. Ramantswana, Hulisani. “Not Free While Nature Remains Colonised: A Decolonial Reading of Isaiah 11:6–9.” OTE 28 (2015): 807–831. Rom-Shiloni, Dalit. Exclusive Inclusivity: Identity Conflicts between the Exiles and the People Who Remained (6th–5th Centuries bce). LHBOTS 543. New York: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013. Root, Margaret Cool. The King and Kingship in Achaemenid Art: Essays on the Creation of an Iconography of Empire. Acta Iranica 19. Leiden: Brill, 1979. Rosendale, George. Spirituality for Aboriginal Christians. Darwin: Nungalinya College, 1993.

Postcolonial Readings of Isaiah   635 Ruiz, Jean-Pierre. Readings from the Edges: The Bible and People on the Move. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2011. Said, Edward W. Culture and Imperialism. New York: Vintage Books, 1993. Schmid, Konrad. “New Creation Instead of New Exodus: The Innerbiblical Exegesis and Theological Transformations of Isaiah 65:17–25.” In Continuity and Discontinuity: Chronological and Thematic Development in Isaiah 40–66, edited by Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer and Hans M. Barstad, 180–198. FRLANT 255. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Schwartz, Baruch J. “Torah from Zion: Isaiah’s Temple Vision (Isaiah 2.1–4).” In Sanctity of Time and Space in Tradition and Modernity, edited by Alberdina Houtman, Marcel Poorthuis, and Joshua Schwartz, 12–26. Jewish and Christian Perspectives Series 1. Leiden: Brill, 1998. Southwood, Katherine E. “An Ethnic Affair? Ezra’s Intermarriage Crisis against a Context of ‘Self-Ascription’ and ‘Ascription of Others.’ ” In Mixed Marriages: Intermarriage and Group Identity in the Second Temple Period, edited by Christian Frevel, 46–59. LHBOTS 547. London: T&T Clark, 2011. Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. Stavrakopolou, Francesca. Land of Our Fathers: The Roles of Ancestor Veneration in Biblical Land Claims. LHBOTS 504. New York: T&T Clark, 2010. Steck, Odil Hannes. “ ‘ . . . ein kleiner Knabe kann sie leiten’: Beobachtungen zum Tierfrieden in Jes 11,6–8 und 65,25.” In Alttestamentlicher Glaube und biblische Theologie: Festschrift für Horst Dietrich Preuss zum 65, edited by Jutta Hausmann and Hans-Jürgen Zobel, 104–109. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1992. Strawn, Brent A. “ ‘A World under Control’: Isaiah 60 and the Apadana Reliefs from Persepolis.” In Approaching Yehud, edited by Jon L. Berquist, 85–116. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2006. Stromberg, Jacob. Isaiah after Exile: The Author of Third Isaiah as Reader and Redactor of the Book. OTM. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Sweeney, Marvin. “The Book of Isaiah as Prophetic Torah.” In New Visions of Isaiah, edited by Roy F. Melugin and Marvin A. Sweeney, 50–66. JSOTS 214. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55. VTS 139. Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2011. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Hope and Disappointment: The Judahite Critique of the Exilic Leadership in Isaiah 56–66.” In New Perspectives on Old Testament Prophecy and History: Essays in Honour of Hans M. Barstad, edited by Rannfrid I. Thelle, Terje Stordalen, and Mervyn E. J. Richardson, 57–73. VTS 168. Leiden: Brill, 2015. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. “Isaiah 40–55: A Judahite Reading Drama.” In Daughter Zion: Her Portrait, Her Response, edited by Mark J. Boda, Carol J. Dempsey, and LeAnn Snow Flesher, 55–75. Ancient Israel and Its Literature 13. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2012. Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia. Priestly Rites and Prophetic Rage: Postexilic Prophetic Critique of the Priesthood. FAT II/19. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. Tuplin, Christopher. Achaemenid Studies. Historia Einzelschriften 99. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1996. Veracini, Lorenzo. Settler Colonialism: A Theoretical Overview. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. Weinfeld, Moshe. “Protest against Imperialism in Ancient Israelite Prophecy.” In The Origins and Diversity of Axial Age Civilizations, edited by Shmuel Noah Eisenstadt 169–182. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986.

636   Mark G. Brett West, Delno C., and August Kling, eds. The “Libro de las Profecías” of Christopher Columbus. Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1991. Wöhrle, Jakob. “The Un-empty Land: The Concept of Exile and Land in P.” In The Concept of Exile in Ancient Israel and Its Historical Contexts, edited by Ehud Ben Zvi and Christoph Levin, 189–206. BZAW 404. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010. Wright, Jacob L., and Michael J. Chan. “King and Eunuch: Isaiah 56:1–8 in Light of Honorific Royal Burial Practices.” JBL 131 (2012): 99–119. Yee, Gale A. “Postcolonial Biblical Criticism.” In Methods for Exodus, edited by T. Dozeman, 193–233. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.

chapter 34

Isa i a h i n Liber ation Theol ogy Carol J. Dempsey, OP

34.1. Introduction The book of Isaiah plays a prominent role in liberation theology, which uses the Bible as part of its hermeneutical circle. Liberation theologians past and present provide new understandings of the Isaiah text. These new understandings—new meanings—have helped to support and even advance the work of justice and liberation for all creation, especially when liberation theologians hear and read certain Isaian texts in relation to the globe’s and the Earth’s pressing issues today. Before we consider how liberation theologians have heard, read, and continue to hear and read certain Isaian texts today, the agenda of liberation theology must come to the fore to shed light on how the Bible in general, and the book of Isaiah in particular, is part of the “hermeneutical circle,” the methodology of liberation theology. Originally applied to a contextual theology, liberation theology originated in Latin America in the late 1960s. The preeminent Latin American liberation theologian, Gustavo Gutierrez1 of Peru, marks 1968 as the birth year of liberation theology, when he and other like-minded Catholic priests gathered in Lima and later at the episcopal conference in Medellin. These activist priests, together with other concerned nonordained persons, made a conscious choice to respond to increased poverty, failed promises of modernization, brutal military dictatorships, and other oppressive forces at work 1  In 1971 Gustavo Gutierrez wrote Teologia de la liberacion, Perspectivas, later published in English by Orbis as A Theology of Liberation: History, Politics and Salvation. This work discusses what he had learned firsthand from his encounters with his Latin American people during the 1960s. For Gutierrez, the primary task of theology is to free the oppressed from their inhumane living conditions. This view of theology’s task is different from a more classical one that emphasizes convincing nonbelievers of the truths of Christian faith.

638   Carol J. Dempsey, OP in Latin America. Liberation theology focuses on the social, economic, and political dimensions of the oppression of the poor and underscores a preferential option for them. This preferential option for the poor provides a prophetic quality to liberation ethics insofar as liberation theologians analyze and then judge whether certain social structures and policies assist or exploit the poor. Liberation theology is issue based and starts its reflection from the realities of human life. Chronic poverty, social injustice, and political dependency provide the locus for theological reflection. Liberation theology seeks to know and understand not only the actual circumstances in which people are living but also the historical causes of those circumstances. Hence, liberation theology reflects, first and foremost, on the world—the socioeconomic and political situation of people—and then on how the Divine Presence manifests itself in the actual historical events of humankind’s liberation. Brazilian liberation theologian Leonardo Boff rightly asserts: “Liberation Theology is born from the efforts to listen to the cry of the oppressed . . . there is an immediate relationship between God, oppression, liberation: God is in the poor who cry out.”2 Furthermore, because it stresses the nonneutrality of theology, liberation theology tries to discern which theological actions either support or challenge oppressive structures. Hence, liberation theology concentrates on the structural aspects of sin that perpetuate global injustice, poverty, and violence. Concerned with praxis, liberation theology’s eschatology understands that the saving event is not in some future reality or in the next world; salvation occurs in the present moment, in the here and now. Human beings, then, have a distinct role to play in the divine work of constructing a new, free, just, and peaceable world in which the integrity of all creation is not only valued and respected but also freed from the shackles of exploitation and injustice. The unnecessary pain, suffering, devastation, and extinction of myriad life forms caused by the current severe ecological crisis the entire planet is experiencing have pushed liberation theology’s focus beyond social justice and the social, economic, and political dimensions of the oppression of the poor. Liberation theologians now recognize the link between the destruction of the earth and the oppression of the poor. Hence, the liberation of the poor becomes impossible without the liberation of the natural world from its pain and destruction. For example, Tony Brun writes, “As opposed to the North, where the environmental crisis is felt in a context of material well-being, in the South it is closely related to poverty. In Latin America, the dramatic situation of its natural ecosystems is related to the profound social problems.”3 Nonetheless, much of the concern is still anthropocentrically oriented. Liberate the natural world and begin healing the fragile, suffering, dying ecosphere so that human beings can thrive and the poor can be liberated from the poverty now being caused by global climate change. Global climate change has a direct correlation to severe droughts, hurricanes, increased p ­ estilence, and

2  Leonardo Boff interview, in Puelo, Struggle Is One.

3  Brun, “Social Ecology,” 82.

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   639 raging fires, all of which cause food shortages, water scarcity,4 and forced migration, to name just three of climate change’s dire effects. As ecotheology developed in Latin America, liberation theologians such as Ivone Gebara and Leonardo Boff departed from the social ecological perspective to embrace a more ecocentric perspective. In his work, Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor, Boff writes, “The Earth is also crying out. The logic that exploits classes and subjects peoples to the interests of a few rich and powerful countries is the same as the logic that devastates the Earth and plunders its wealth, showing no solidarity with the rest of humankind and future generations.”5 Boff even expands liberation theology’s preferential option for the poor and their liberation by stating, “It is not only the poor and oppressed that must be liberated; today all humans must be liberated. We are hostages to a paradigm that places us—against the thrust of the universe—over things instead of being with them in the great cosmic community.”6 Hence human beings and the natural world are oppressed, enchained, and in need of liberation from the attitudes, structures, social evils, and various oppressive theologies that are keeping every single dimension of the planet and all its life forms imprisoned, with the new “poor” being the natural world itself and its nonhuman communities of life. As a theological discipline, liberation theology has a distinct methodology known as “the hermeneutical circle,” which was originally developed by Juan Luis Segundo, Jose Severino Croatto, and Clodovis Boff, among others. This methodology develops from the thought of Paul Ricoeur and Paulo Freire. It stresses reading reality from the community’s experience. The community is both the interpreter and the interpreted. The initial perspective is materialist, specifically, issue based and an interpretation of the community’s reality. Using Freire’s method of conscientization, liberation theology tries to decode oppressive structures that have been both internalized and unchallenged. With regard to biblical texts, reading and understanding them in the context of the lives of the poor and oppressed and the historical experience of the communities is an important element of the hermeneutical circle. Poor communities often identify themselves with the voices of the biblical prophets who denounce structural sin. Furthermore, for

4  The World Wildlife Fund reports that about 1.1 billion people worldwide lack access to water, and a total of 2.7 billion find water scarce for at least one month of the year. Inadequate sanitation is also a problem for 2.4 billion people—they are exposed to diseases, such as cholera and typhoid fever, and other water-borne illnesses. Two million people, mostly children, die each year from diarrheal diseases alone. Many of the water systems that keep ecosystems thriving and feed a growing human population are stressed. Rivers, lakes, and aquifers are drying up or becoming too polluted to use. More than half the world’s wetlands have disappeared. Agriculture consumes more water than any other source and wastes much of that through inefficiencies. Climate change is altering patterns of weather and water around the world, causing shortages and droughts in some areas and floods in others. At the current consumption rate, this situation will only get worse. By 2025, two-thirds of the world’s population may face water shortages. And ecosystems around the world will suffer even more. (World Wildlife Fund website, “Water Scarcity,” n.d., https://www.worldwildlife.org/threats/water-scarcity) 5 Boff, Cry, xi. 6  Boff, xii.

640   Carol J. Dempsey, OP liberation theology, the biblical text remains dynamic, and not static. Segundo makes the point that the continuing change in our interpretation of the Bible is dictated by the continuing change in our present-day reality, both individual and societal . . . The circular nature of this interpretation stems from the fact that each new reality obliges us to interpret the word of God afresh, to change reality accordingly, and then to go back and reinterpret the word of God again, and so on.7

Liberation theology lets the Bible and the global world intersect continually while allowing them to challenge each other. Interpretation of the Bible, then, is a dialectical process that involves reading with the biblical text in one hand and the newspaper in the other hand. Additionally, liberation theologians often use the social sciences and political theory in their study of biblical texts. Exegesis done in the context of liberation theology therefore aims at producing a change at the consciousness level of the community who interprets the text. The goal, then, is to bring the community to a point of discernment and inspiration about what new actions it needs to take to advance the work of transformation that has as its goal the justice, peace, liberation, and the healing of all creation.8 Understanding the biblical text in community opens the door to the ongoing critical assessment of the actions of liberation portrayed in the scriptures. Liberation theologians challenge traditional readings of the Bible9 and also ideological constructions. This critical engagement that extends beyond the understanding of biblical texts heard and read in present contexts has led liberation theology into new areas of praxis, such as feminist theology, Maya and Andean theology, womanist theology, ecotheology, and mestizo theology, among others. With this understanding of liberation theology, its methodology, and how it reads and uses scripture, we are now ready to look closely at the book of Isaiah in liberation theology. The first section explores how recent and contemporary theologians use various texts from Isaiah in relation to liberation theology. The second section examines how biblical scholars’ use of Isaian texts speaks to a theology of liberation. The third section focuses on ecological theology and how the use of Isaiah in this context intersects with and advances liberation theology. A conclusion summarizes what has been done in the area of Isaiah and liberation theology and also suggests new avenues of pursuit for liberation theologians, biblical scholars, and ecological theologians who view and do their work through the lens of liberation theology.

7 Segundo, Liberation, 8. 8  See, e.g., the works of Scholz and Andinach, La Violencia; Scholz, Sacred Witness; Rape Plots. 9  See, e.g., Scholz, “Exodus,” 33–50. Scholz deals with the androcentrism in the book of Exodus and challenges the idea that the Exodus is a story of liberation. Her observations “show that the narrative serves the creation and stabilization of manifold social hierarchies and forms of oppression” (p. 47).

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   641

34.2.  Isaiah and Liberation Theologians Three prominent liberation theologians who draw on the book of Isaiah to shape their thought and praxis are Gustavo Gutierrez, James H. Cone, and Jon Sobrino. Sobrino also engages the thought of Ignacio Ellacuria, another leading liberation theologian whose vision of reality includes two aspects: “the crucified people” and “the civilization of poverty.”10 In the work, of each of these theologians, the Isaian character of the serv­ant, and especially the suffering servant of Isa 52:13–53:12, takes center stage in the discussions on suffering. In his seminal work, A Theology of Liberation, Gutierrez uses various texts from Isaiah to support several topics that he develops within his theological schema. In outlining his thought on creation as the first salvific act, Gutierrez appeals to Isa 42:5–6; 43:1; 44:24, and 54:5. For Gutierrez, creation is part of the salvific process, and he asserts that on this particular topic, “the [Isaian] texts are frequently cited as one of the richest and clearest expressions of the faith of Israel in creation.” He sees “Yahweh at one and the same time Creator and Redeemer.” Creation itself is “a saving action” and “the work of the Redeemer” (Isa 44:24).11 On the topic of political liberation, Gutierrez links the creative act to the act of liberating Israel from Egyptian oppression. To support his point, he cites Isa 51:9–10 and then expounds on the symbols in this passage. He argues that “the words and images refer simultaneously to two events: creation and liberation from Egypt” and that these two events are “one salvific act.”12 He notes that the verb ‫( ברא‬to create) used in the creation story appears for the first time in Isa 43:1, 15 where it refers to the creation of Israel. This Creator of the world is also the Creator and Liberator of Israel, who has entrusted to the Jewish people the mission of establishing justice. To bolster his argument on this point, Gutierrez cites Isa 42:5–7.13 Gutierrez also makes the case that eschatological promises are historical promises being fulfilled throughout history, with liberating effects that extend beyond what can be perceived in the present or the foreseeable future. These promises open up “new and unsuspected possibilities.”14 Here Isa 29:18–20; 32:17; and 65:21–22 come into play. These texts envision a time of justice and righteousness that leads to peace in the realm of God, where all misery and exploitation are eliminated, the rights of the poor are defended, oppressors endure consequences, and the fear of being enslaved by others is put to rest. Gutierrez also redefines humanity and the temple, and in doing so, he shifts the locus of God’s dwelling away from physical structures and locates it within humanity. For 10  See Sobrino, “Crucified People,” 1. 11 Gutierrez, Theology of Liberation, 154–155. 12  Gutierrez, 155. 13  Gutierrez, 156. Gutierrez also states, “Yahweh is the Liberator, the goel of Israel (Isa 43:14; 47:4)” (p. 157). 14  Gutierrez, 168.

642   Carol J. Dempsey, OP Gutierrez, humanity—and not just one who is Christian—is a temple of God (Isa 2:2; 41:1–7; 45:20–25; 51:4; 66:1–2).15 Drawing on Isa 3:14; 10:1–2; and 66:2, Gutierrez draws attention to poverty, which he sees as a scandalous condition; it is “inimical to human dignity and therefore contrary to the will of God.”16 He makes clear that [t]he prophets condemn every kind of abuse, every form of keeping the poor in poverty or of creating a new poor people. They are not mere allusions to situations; the finger is pointed at those who are to blame. Fraudulent commerce and exploitation are condemned . . . (Isa 3:14), as well as the hoarding of lands, . . . dishonest courts (Isa 5:23; 10:1–2), . . . the violence of ruling classes, slavery, . . . unjust taxes, . . . and unjust functionaries . . . .17

Gutierrez shines a light on the biblical world to show that what occurred in past times continues to occur in present times and demands a prophetic response. For Gutierrez, this response is the purview of one such as the Isaian servant of Isa 42:1–5, whose life and work, which are dedicated to justice, need to be embodied in and among people today if suffering and poverty are to be alleviated. Gutierrez reflects on the image of the Suffering Servant in Isa 53:2–3 to remind people that this servant represents the marginalized, those who suffer because of injustice.18 Finally, Gutierrez is quick to offer a reminder: the practice of justice and solidarity with the poor must never become a self-serving deed. These acts have value and meaning only within “the horizon of God’s gratuitous love.”19 Like Gutierrez, James H. Cone uses various texts from the book of Isaiah to develop and support his theology of liberation, and like Gutierrez, Cone focuses on the servant songs. He also uses other Isaian texts concerned with poverty. Citing Isa 1:16–17; 3:13–15; 33:22; and 37:35, Cone advocates for justice for the poor, whom Cone sees as God’s special possession, not only in the world today, but also in the biblical world. Cone shakes theologians out of their silos and ivory towers when he makes the comment that “God is a political God, the Protector of the poor and the Establisher of the right for those who are oppressed,” and “for theologians to speak about this God, they too must become interested in politics and economics, recognizing that there is no truth about Yahweh unless bit is the truth of freedom as that event in revealed in the oppressed people’s struggle for justice in this world.”20 With his eye on the texts that speak of and to the plight of the oppressed, Cone asserts that the Bible is the best place for one to begin the examination of the problem of suf15  Gutierrez, 190–193. 16  Gutierrez, 291. 17  Gutierrez, 293. 18  Gutierrez, 202–203. 19  See Gutierrez, Spiritual Writings, 138 (“Believing,” 134–159). Other topics that Gutierrez explores in relation to liberation theology and the book of Isaiah include the conversion of one’s neighbor—Isa 1; 58:6–7, 9–11; a spirituality of liberation—Isa 65; and spiritual poverty—Isa 66:2. See Gutierrez, Theology of Liberation, 194–196, 17–21, 296. 20 Cone, God of the Oppressed, 57.

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   643 fering. Cone’s concern is not so much why suffering exists but why it afflicts some people and not other people. He unpacks the Deuteronomic notion that one suffers because one has disobeyed God.21 He then shifts his focus to redemptive suffering in Second Isaiah.22 Cone sees redemptive suffering as a new departure from biblical theodicy. Before presenting his ideas on redemptive suffering, Cone considers the idea of retributive justice. He reflects on Isa 47:6 and raises a series of questions that address the actions and justice of God who used unjust persons to accomplish a divine task that had human consequences: devastation of the land, a temple, a monarchy, and a people’s exile from their homeland that caused additional suffering (Isa 41:17). Next, Cone comments on Isa 40:2, which refers to Israel receiving double for all her sin, and he cites Isa 40:27–28 and 49:14 as texts that offer a plausible response to Israel’s pain. Cone then considers the Isaian texts that present the image of the servant—that is, Isaiah 42, 49, and 52–53. These texts become the bedrock of Cone’s understanding of the servant as one whose mission is “to bring forth justice to the nations (Isa 42:1), by enduring the transgressions and sins of others (Isaiah 53).”23 Cone explains that the sins of others are placed upon the servant whenever the servant remains faithful to God. Thus, the servant’s mission is to be God’s liberating presence, and the suffering that is endured because of the mission is not only redemptive but also vicarious. For Cone, the image of the Suffering Servant of Isaiah, which he later sees being embraced by Jesus, offers hope for all people who work for justice, struggle against oppressive political powers, and suffer because of this work of liberation. The image of Isaiah’s Suffering Servant that figures so prominently in the work of Gutierrez and Cone also becomes central to Jon Sobrino’s analysis of Ignacio Ellacuria’s vision of reality, part of which focuses on “the crucified people.”24 By engaging Ellacuria’s understanding of the Suffering Servant, Sobrino points out how Ellacuria took hold of the reality of the Third World peoples as a “crucified people” who, like the servant, embody a salvific dimension and the hope of liberation. For Sobrino, Ellacuria’s vision and work leads to his own conviction that no salvation is possible unless it includes the poor. The confrontation of the civilization of wealth by the civilization of poverty is indispensable for the full flourishing of hope made possible only through the exercise of justice for all. Besides Gutierrez, Cone, and Sobrino, other theologians employ texts from Isaiah in their work to develop further a theology of liberation. For example, Pablo Richard uses Isa 1:11–16 to discuss the common points between a prophetical critique and a Marxist critique of religion in relation to the knowledge and worship of God. For Richard, without the practice of justice, no knowledge of God exists, and no worship of God is 21  See the blessings and curses in Deut 28, which attributes blessings to obedience and curses to disobedience. 22 Cone, God of the Oppressed, 158. 23  See Cone’s full discussion on the servant in God of the Oppressed, 157–161. 24  See Sobrino, “Crucified People,” 1.

644   Carol J. Dempsey, OP legitimate.25 Richard also cites Isa 65:17–25 as a text that defeats oppression and proclaims the divine intention for all peoples.26 In his reading of Isa 3:13–15, Juan Antonio Estrada sees that “being the people of God is incompatible with injustice and oppression, and the prophets who defend the poor are thus intervening on behalf of the very people of God.”27 Maria Clara L. Bingemer explores Isa 10:1–4 and concludes that divine judgment will be the lot of those who oppress the poor.28 Vitor Westhelle uses various Isaiah texts to develop an emerging Latin American theology of creation which affirms God’s strength and redemptive power.29 Lastly, Dorothee Soelle refers to Isa 32:10–18 to make the point that after a national disaster, a time of peace and blessing follows. She focuses on the renewed images of nature, land, harvest, and fruit to give people who are suffering in contemporary times a word of hope.30 In sum, liberation theologians use the book of Isaiah generously to develop a theology of liberation that focuses on justice for the poor and offers them a hopeful word as well. Although liberation theologians like Gutierrez, Cone, and Sobino make significant contributions to liberation theology, their work has a significant shortcoming: they are talking to a Latin American audience using a Eurocentric philosophical lens—that is, a Marxist lens. Additionally, many liberation theologians who cite Bible verses and passages read “with” the text to support their points, and their methodological use of biblical texts is often “proof-texting.” They fall short on providing a substantial critique of their selected verses and texts in contexts, inclusive of the biblical world and the world of the glocal North and glocal South, where injustices abounded in the past and still do in the present times. Additionally, the most celebrated liberation theologians of the twentieth century have primarily been male. Attention now needs to focus on the twenty-first century, which is giving voice to prominent female liberation theologians writing from intercultural, international, interreligious, and interracial perspectives.31 It should be noted that feminist scholars in Latin America found their voices through the Western feminist movement, and then Latin American women started articulating their own theology. Lastly, the theologians mentioned in this section of the chapter are not the only theologians who use Isaiah to expose injustices and to advocate for the disenfranchised. Certain Bible scholars read various Isaian texts from a liberationist perspective to put forth a theology of liberation, which we turn to now.

25  Richard, “Theology of Liberation,” 157–158. 26  Richard, “Theology of Liberation,” 160–162. See also Victor Codina’s comments on Isa 65 in “Sacraments,” 665. 27  Estrada, “People of God,” 605. 28  Bingemer, “Poor,” 37–67. 29  Westhelle, “Creation Motifs.” Westhelle appeals to Isa 40:29; 41:14; 42:10; 43:1–19; 44:2; 62:10; 65:17; 66:23. 30  Soelle, “Vision.” 31  See, e.g., the edited volume by Kwok Pui-Lan, Hope Abundant. This volume showcases the contributions of leading feminist theologians and Bible scholars working in liberation theology from multiple perspectives.

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   645

34.3.  Isaiah and Liberationist Bible Scholars Several Bible scholars read the book of Isaiah in relationship to theirs and others’ social locations. George Koonthanam explores Isa 3:12–15 in relation to the Dalit community in India. For Koonthanan, this text celebrates a God who is the defender of the poor, and accuser and judge of oppressors. He points out that the ancient elders and rulers have abdicated their duty of protecting the defenseless and have become themselves oppressors who crush the poor. After looking at the text in its ancient context, Koothanam next reads Isa 3:12–15 in the context of the Dalit experience today. For Koonthanam, the Dalits take the place of the widows, orphans, and needy. The injustices against women and children portrayed in the Isaian passage are now the injustices done against the Harijan women. These injustices include wage discrimination, rape, wifebeating, and bride-burning, among hundreds of other forms of abuse, physical attack, and molestation. As child-laborers, orphans suffer oppression in factories, hotels, and estates. Koonthanam’s focus on Isa 3:12–15 allows him to illumine the injustices of biblical times that continue to occur in contemporary times. Like the prophet-character, Isaiah, Koonthanam becomes a prophetic voice for India’s most disenfranchised people, and through his work, he begins the liberating process for the Dalits by exposing to the world the injustices being done to them and the need for praxis to alleviate their pain and suffering altogether. India’s whole caste system now comes into focus and question.32 Two Bible scholars who focus on Isa 40–55 are Gilbert Lozano and Gregory Lee Cuellar. For Gilbert, Isa 40–55 is a text that addresses a downtrodden people who had witnessed terrible violence committed by a powerful empire. He reflects on these past events in light of the experience of the people in Latin America and the violence they now suffer. This violence is the cause of internal and external displacement, especially in Columbia, a nation that ranks second in the world for internal displacement. Thus, in the context of the biblical and contemporary worlds, Gilbert sees violence as a horrific and systemic problem that has spanned millennia. He also recognizes a message of hope in Isa 40–55 for the Latin American situation. To those experiencing exile, Isa 40–55 speaks of a God who sees the plight of the exiles and offers words of encouragement. Those who cause injustices, whether individuals or other nations, will be judged. To those who stand defenseless against imperial powers, Isa 40–55 offers reassurance. God sides with the defenseless. Hence, Isa 40–55 becomes a word of hope for the many million exiles in South and Central America today.33 Along the same line of thought as Lozano, Gregory Lee Cuellar also explores Isa 40–55 to make a comparative analysis of the Babylonian exile and the Mexican immi32  See Koonthanam, “Yahweh the Defender.” See also the work of Johnson, “Myth,” 113–115, for further discussion on the Isaian servant figure in an Indian context. 33  See Lozano, “Words of Hope,” 107–109.

646   Carol J. Dempsey, OP grant experience.34 In his study, he uses the theoretical framework of diaspora theology to discuss issues of exile and empire in both the biblical context and the Mexican immigrant experience. His reading context then moves to broader points of intersection between a selection of corridos (musical folk ballads) and Isa 40–55. Cuellar explains that the images of suffering and pain used to convey exilic life in Isa 40–55 have striking similarity to the immigration themes expressed in the corridos. Cuellar contends that “when the corridos are seen in the light of the poetry of Second Isaiah, the biblical text lends an authoritative voice to the exploited and anguished experiences presented in the Mexican immigrant corridos.”35 Finally, Cuellar concludes that by coordinating the interaction between Isa 40–55, alternative understandings between exile and return come to light. These understandings, he argues, are critically aimed at liberation, and the interaction between texts allows for multiple voices to interact in a redemptive way. For Cuellar, Isa 40–55 and the corridos serve as a reminder that these texts are from the margins. The servant texts of Isaiah play a major role not only in the work of liberation theologians but also in the work of Bible scholars who study these texts from a liberationist perspective and in a contemporary global context. In The Bible, the Church, and the Poor,36 theologian Clodovis Boff teams up with Bible scholar George V. Pixley to examine poverty, define who the poor are, and locate the poor in Latin America who make up 80 percent of the population of this geographic region. Boff and Pixley target capitalism as one of the root causes of poverty. Following their discussion of poverty and the poor, they turn to the Isaian servant songs and read them from the perspective of the poor. Viewing them as a whole, Boff and Pixley find good news in them for the “ ‘peoples of the earth’ excluded by the Gola from full participation in the new Jerusalem they were building. [They] confirm what has already been established: that the hope of the gospel is primarily for the poor.”37 Pixley develops these thoughts further in “Isaiah 52:13–53:12: A Latin American Perspective.”38 He opens his study with a story about his teaching experience in Immanuel Baptist Church in San Salvador. Two people who were part of this church community were Cristina Gomez and Javier Barahona, whose horrific experiences Pixley relates graphically. Both Gomez and Barahona were killed while working for justice. He then links their experiences to the violence suffered by the servant in Isa 52:13–53:12. Pixley also hears strains of resurrection in this Suffering Servant Song and compares it to the situation in Nicaragua where “the experience of national death and resurrection is a vivid reality related to the Sandinista revolution.”39 Just as the kings and nations experienced some sort of conversion in the Suffering Servant Song (Isa 53:5), the Sandinista revolution evokes hope for and among the world’s people. Just as the ­servant was seemingly defeated, so, too, was the Sandinista revolution a seeming defeat, but 34  See Cuellar, Voices of Marginality. 35  Cuellar, 96. 36  Boff and Pixley, Bible. The specific Isaian texts they use in their study include Isa 40:1–2, 27–31; 41:8–11; 42:1–4; 44:1–9; 49:16; 50:4–9; 52:13–53:12; 56:1–7; 57:15; 58:1–12; 61:1–3; and 66:1–2. 37  Boff and Pixley, Bible, 103. 38  Pixley, “Isaiah 52:12–53:12,” 95–100. 39  Pixley, 98.

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   647 both defeats were the beginning of something new. For Nicaragua, the “something new” meant building a nation from below and not from above, with martyrdom becoming a powerful life-giving force.40 Francois Kabasele Lumbala and Cyris Heesuk Moon also reflect on Isa 52:13–53:12, and each scholar brings the text into conversation with different perspectives from the global South. Lumbala, a professor of liturgy and catechesis who deals with biblical texts in contexts, looks at the Suffering Servant Song from an African perspective.41 He opens his essay with two heart-wrenching reflections that capture the Bantu people’s suffering. One tells the story of a widowed mother who offered herself up to serve the prison time for her daughter, who was accused of an alleged crime. The mother endured horrific abuse while she was incarcerated. The second reflection recounts the unjust suffering of an old woman, Ciyamba, who was accused of witchcraft, dragged from her home, dowsed with gas, and set ablaze. Lumbala then links these two stories to the Suffering Servant. For Lumbala, the women’s experiences and the servant’s experience embody the suffering of the righteous and the innocent, and the bearing of others’ sins. He makes the striking point that, given his social location and the suffering of presentday Africans, “It is inadequate to apply the characteristic of the servant Jesus in order to grasp the entire meaning of the text, or to create a resonance between him and us. Rather, even without interposing the figure of Jesus, this text raises questions for and about our [African] context.”42 Thus Lumbala brings Isa 52:13–53:12 into the globalized world, and, in this case, to Africa, to show that unjust suffering caused by the unjust actions and attitudes of others did not end with the Suffering Servant; it continues today. Finally, he also sees embedded in the text a word of hope for present-day African victims (Isa 53:11–12). Moon discusses the Suffering Servant Song in relation to the outrageous abuse that many Koreans—the minjung of the city of Kwangju—had to endure during the Korean War: junior-high-age girls were stripped and had their breasts cut off; the fetuses of pregnant women were ripped out of their wombs; taxi drivers were brutally slaughtered; and dead bodies were buried in mass graves, among other atrocities. Just as Lumbala connected the Suffering Servant to the African context, so, too, Moon links the servant’s suffering to the Korean context. Because the minjung in Korea challenged both those responsible for unjust actions and the social structures that maintain and sustain evil governments, they were made to suffer and even die. The experience of the Suffering Servant is the experience of the minjung. Moon draws on Isa 52:12 to make the further point that God lives among and in solidarity with those who endure pain, agony, and despair. Like Lumbala in Africa, Moon also sees suffering and hope coming together in the servant and in the minjung.43 40  In addition to Pixley, see the work of two other Bible scholars and voices who reflect on Isaiah from a liberationist perspective: Rivera-Pagan, “Emancipatory Palestinian Theology,” and Ateek, “Palestinian Perspective.” 41  Lumbala, “Isaiah 52:13–53:12.” 42  Lumbala, “Isaiah 52:13–53:12,” 104. 43  See Moon, “Isaiah 52:13–53:12.”

648   Carol J. Dempsey, OP In sum, several Bible scholars read the book of Isaiah from a liberationist perspective and in the context of contemporary diverse social locations to shed light on the suffering that continues to prevail in our world today. Injustice, pain, and suffering, however, are not their only focus. They also see hope in various Isaian texts. This hope, found pri­ma­ rily in the servant texts, serves as a word of encouragement for all marginalized, disenfranchised, and persecuted peoples on the entire planet, which itself is suffering under the weight of human oppression. We look at suffering of nonhuman life and liberation theology from an ecological perspective next.

34.4.  Isaiah, Ecology, and Liberation Theology The suffering of nonhuman communities of life caused by human oppression is demonstrable primarily through climate change, rising sea levels, warming ocean temperatures, droughts, and related collapses of biospheres resulting in species and habitat loss are a few signs of a planet in grave ecological distress. Human and nonhuman life forms are now on the same path to becoming climate refugees in the twenty-first century. Furthermore, the suffering that has already begun because of ecological disasters is already affecting the poorest people in the poorest nations on the globe. Poverty, suffering, pain, exile, injustice, and environmental crises now all intersect and interact, and liberation theologians and Bible scholars are just waking up to the sound of the cries of the “new” poor, as the death knell rings in the distance. Leonardo Boff is one of the foremost liberation theologians to integrate a theology of liberation with environmental concerns. Boff has redefined his starting point for liberation theology. While his focus for liberation theology is still the option for the poor, the option for the poor is now, first and foremost, the planet Earth. The suffering of human and nonhuman communities of life intersect, and Boff breaks new ground for liberation theologians and Bible scholars alike, moving them from an anthropocentric perspective to a cosmological one.44 Sharing the same focus and concerns as Boff is James A. Nash who critiques certain passages from Isaiah to show the ecological disasters (Isa 24:1–7) and benefices (Isa 11:9; 35:1–2) that occur in relation to one’s disobedience or obedience to God. He also finds hope for cosmic redemption rooted in texts from Isaiah, specifically, in Isa 11:6–9 and 65:17, 25.45 Although Nash uncovers texts that have ecological implications, his read44  See Boff, Cry; and Bergmann, Creation Set Free. 45  See Nash, Loving Nature. Theologian Elizabeth A. Johnson, Ask the Beasts, also sees hope in the prophets, and specifically in Isa 35:1–2, which announces a future redemption that will “revivify the people and the natural world together” (p. 279). Bible scholar Dermot Nestor, “If Not Now,” argues that Isa 40–55 presents an image of both human and nonhuman life anticipating an end to suffering (p. 56).

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   649 ing of the Isaian passages falls short on critiquing the portrait and theology of God that emerges from these texts. Other theologians and Bible scholars also examine Isaiah from an ecological perspective. Like Boff, Celia Deane-Drummond makes connections between the suffering of the poor and the suffering of the earth. She, too, draws on Isa 24:4–5 to substantiate her claim,46 as does Norman J. Charles, who explores the ecological implications of Isa 24:6.47 John Barton alludes to various texts from Isaiah to argue the point that the prophets do offer some constructive ideas for an environmental concern.48 Finally, Hilary Marlow explores selected texts from Isa 1–39 to show the interrelatedness of human and nonhuman creation and the impact that environmental degradation has on all creation. Marlow boldly calls for a new environmental ethic, one what will sustain all life.49 In sum, Leonardo Boff has moved liberation theologians and liberationist Bible scholars beyond their comfort zone, viewing texts from Isaiah only in relation to the poor, the suffering, and the oppressed within the human community. Isaiah must also be viewed from an ecological perspective. As Boff so hauntingly writes: Liberation theology and ecological discourse have something in common: they start from two bleeding wounds. The wound of poverty breaks the social fabric of millions and millions of poor people around the world. The other wound, systemic assault on the Earth, breaks down the balance of the planet, which is under threat from the plundering of development as practiced by contemporary global societies. Both lines of reflection and practice have as their starting point a cry: the cry of the poor for life, freedom, and beauty . . . and the cry of the Earth groaning under oppression . . . Both seek liberation.50

Work in the areas of ecotheology and ecofeminism, with their intersections with liberation theology, has emerged, but not in the quantity, breadth, and depth needed to educate, challenge, and counter, not only those theologians whose theological treatises fail to engage the suffering of all creation in a globalized world, but also those text fetish Bible scholars whose methodology remain in an anthropocentric nineteenth-century German world. Much more work needs to be done in the area of Isaiah, ecology, and liberation theology to transform not only the theological and biblical disciplines but also the social, political, and economic dimensions of our world. Ethics and policy need to address all the world’s poor, from the fracked earth to the struggling polar bears, from the dying coral reef to the starving child, from the raped land to the trafficked and raped women. The needs and abuses are persistent, and so must our work be persistent for justice and liberation of all. All life now hangs in the balance, and time is no longer a friend.

46  Deane-Drummond, “Biblical Eco-Theology,” 81–98. 47  See Charles, “Prophetic (Fore)Word.” 48  See Barton, “Reading.” 49  See Marlow, Biblical Prophets. See also Kureethadam, Creation in Crisis; and Murray, Cosmic Covenant. 50 Boff, Cry, 104.

650   Carol J. Dempsey, OP

34.5.  Liberating Isaiah and Concluding Remarks Liberation theology is now more than fifty years old, and its appeal to the Bible’s prophetic texts, especially the book of Isaiah, has left an indelible mark on the fields of theology and biblical studies. Liberation theology and its use of various passages from Isaiah, especially the servant texts, have helped suffering communities make sense of their plight and have helped people working for justice on behalf of the poor to establish needed praxis. Oftentimes, liberation theologians have used verses and short passages from Isaiah to ground their theological points in Scripture. Other times, they have retrieved passages to call people to justice for the poor and suffering and make the option for them indispensable. Their work, with the exception of the work of Leonard Boff, has remained largely anthropocentric. Some Bible scholars, working from a liberationist perspective, have advanced the thought of liberation theologians and have engaged cultural studies, specific individuals, and communities from around the globe to expose the plight of poor and suffering peoples and to advance the work of justice on their behalf. Instead of using individual verses and passages in a proof-texting manner, some Bible scholars read texts from Isaiah in relation to case studies, thereby linking the text of life to the biblical text to expose the inequities that have plagued humanity for millennia. Following Boff ’s lead, still other theologians and Bible scholars shift their focus to a cosmological one to speak to the suffering of all creation. Texts from Isaiah factor into these discussions.51 One area of research that has been emerging and developing among other Bible scholars is reading certain Isaian texts from a feminist and womanist perspectives. For example, Irmtraud Fischer looks at all the female metaphors in the book of Isaiah to show how female sexuality is dehumanized, especially within the framework of patriarchal marriage.52 Gerlinde Baumann deals with the violent marriage metaphor in Second Isaiah.53 Valerie Bridgeman focuses on how children and the metaphorical use of children in Isaiah communicate a message of denigration and abuse.54 Using a womanist hermeneutics of liberation, Renita Weems incorporates texts from Isaiah in her discussion to make clear that the “female half of a race of people . . . live a threatened existence within the North American borders.”55 All of these scholars read against the grain of the biblical text to show how the book of Isaiah continues to contribute to the injustices that exist in the world today, from which those suffering such injustices and abuse need to be liberated. More work needs to be done in this area to liberate the book of Isaiah from its own shackles and to keep people who read this text out of shackles. My own work in this

51  See also the work of Dempsey, Hope, 74–88, 119–126; Prophets, 161–181; “Hope Amidst the Ruins.” 52  See Fischer, “Isaiah”; Graybill, “Yahweh.” 53  See Baumann, “Prophetic Objections.” 54  See Bridgeman, “ ‘I Will Make Boys.’ ” 55  See Weems, “Re-reading,” 24.

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   651 area is a forthcoming commentary volume on Isaiah from a feminist and liberationist perspective.56 Finally and in conclusion, we live in a time of interlocking oppressions and injustices. All creation is suffering; the poor dwell in the midst of human and non-human communities of life. Because of our global situation, and because the biblical text shapes culture and culture shapes the biblical text, the book of Isaiah can no longer and must not be read purely as a literary work, a theological treatise, a source for spiritual enrichment, or a history book of ancient times. Liberation theologians and Bible scholars now have the professional task to advance the hearing and reading of the book of Isaiah within the context of the globalized world so that the myriad of issues such as kyriarchy, patriarchy, hierarchy, the abuse of power, imperialistic leadership, a violent deity, economic inequity, and gendered, derogatory imagery and language present in biblical times, in the biblical text, and still present today can be addressed, and injustice and violence ended once and for all. Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the throngs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? (Isa 58:6)

Bibliography Ateek, Naim S. “A Palestinian Perspective: Biblical Perspectives on the Land.” In Voices from the Margins: Interpreting the Bible in the Third World, ed. Rasiah S. Sugirtharajah, 267–276. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1995. Barton, John. “Reading the Prophets from an Environmental Perspective.” In Ecological Hermeneutics: Biblical, Historical and Theological Perspectives, ed. David G. Horrell, Cheryl Hunt, Christopher Southgate, and Francesca Stavrakopoulou, 46–55. New York: T&T Clark, 2010. Baumann, Gerlinde. “Prophetic Objections to Yhwh as the Violent Husband of Israel: Reinterpretations of the Prophetic Marriage Metaphor in Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40–55).” In Prophets and Daniel: The Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series), ed. Athalya Brenner, 88–120. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 2001. Bergmann, Sigurd. Creation Set Free: The Spirit as Liberator of Nature. Translated by Douglas Stott. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2005. Bingemer, Maria Clara L. “The Poor as Subject and as Method.” In Latin American Theology: Roots and Branches, 37–67. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2016. Boff, Clodovis, and George  V.  Pixley. The Bible, the Church, and the Poor. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1989. Boff, Leonardo. Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor. Translated by Phillip Berryman. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1997. 56  See Dempsey, Isaiah.

652   Carol J. Dempsey, OP Boff, Leonardo. Ecology and Liberation: A New Paradigm. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1995. Bridgeman, Valerie. “ ‘I Will Make Boys Their Princes’: A Womanist Reading of Children in the Book of Isaiah.” In Womanist Interpretations of the Bible: Expanding the Discourse, edited by Gay L. Byron and Vanessa Lovelace, 311–327. Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2016. Brun, Tony. “Social Ecology: A Timely Paradigm for Reflection and Praxis for Life in Latin America.” In Ecotheology: Voices from the North and South, ed. David G. Hallman, 79–91. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1994. Charles, Norman J. “A Prophetic (Fore)Word: ‘A Curse Is Devouring Earth’ (Isaiah 24:6).” In The Earth Story in the Psalms and the Prophets, ed. Norman C. Habel, 123–128. Earth Bible 4. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 2001. Codina, Victor. “Sacraments.” In Mysterium Liberationis: Fundamental Concepts of Liberation Theology, edited by Ignacio Ellacuria, SJ, and Jon Sobrino, SJ, 218–219. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1993. Cone, James H. God of the Oppressed. Rev. ed. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999. Cuellar, Gregory Lee. Voices of Marginality: Exile and Return in Second Isaiah 40–55 and the Mexican Immigrant Experience. Theology and Religion 271. New York: Peter Lang, 2008. Deane-Drummond, Celia. Eco-Theology. Winona, MN: St. Mary’s Press, 2008. Dempsey, Carol J. “Hope Amidst the Ruins: A Prophetic Vision of Cosmic Redemption.” In All Creation Is Groaning: An Interdisciplinary Vision for Life in a Sacred Universe, edited by Carol J. Dempsey and Russell A. Butkus, 269–284. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1999. Dempsey, Carol J. Hope Amid the Ruins: The Ethics of Israel’s Prophets. St Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2000. Dempsey, Carol  J. Isaiah. Wisdom Commentary Series. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, forthcoming. Dempsey, Carol  J. The Prophets: A Liberation-Critical Reading. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2000. Estrada, Juan Antonio. “People of God.” In Mysterium Liberationis: Fundamental Concepts of Liberation Theology, edited by Ignacio Ellacuria and Jon Sobrino, 604–614. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1993. Fischer, Irmtraud. “Isaiah: The Book of Female Metaphors.” In Feminist Biblical Interpretation, edited by Luise Schottrof and Marie-Theres Wacker, 303–318. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2012. Graybill, Rhiannon, with Luce Irigaray. “Yahweh as Material Vampire in Second Isaiah: Reading from Violence to Fluid Possibility.” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 33, no. 1 (2017): 9–25. Gutierrez, Gustavo. Spiritual Writings. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2011. Gutierrez, Gustavo. A Theology of Liberation: History, Politics and Salvation. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1973. Johnson, Elizabeth A. Ask the Beasts: Darwin and the God of Love. London: Bloomsbury, 2014. Johnson, Rajkumar Boaz. “The Myth of Baliraja Compared to the Servant Figure of Isaiah.” In Global Perspectives on the Bible, edited by Mark Roncace and Joseph Weaver, 113–115. New York: Pearson, 2014. Koonthanam, George. “Yahweh the Defender of the Dalits: A Reflection on Isaiah 3:12–15.” In Voices from the Margins: Interpreting the Bible in the Third World, edited by Rasiah S. Sugirtharajah, 105–116. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1995.

Isaiah in Liberation Theology   653 Kureethadam, Joshtrom Isaac. Creation in Crisis: Science, Ethics, Theology. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2014. Lozano, Gilbert. “Words of Hope for Contemporary Exiles in South and Central America in Isaiah 40–55.” In Global Perspectives on the Bible, edited by Mark Roncace and Joseph Weaver, 107–109. New York: Pearson, 2014. Lumbala, Francois Kabasele. “Isaiah 52:13–53:12: An African Perspective.” In Global Perspectives on the Bible, edited by Mark Roncace and Joseph Weaver, 101–106. New York: Pearson, 2014. Marlow, Hilary. Biblical Prophets and Contemporary Environmental Ethics. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. Moon, Cyris Heesuk. “Isaiah 52:13–53:12: An Asian Perspective.” In Global Perspectives on the Bible, edited by Mark Roncace and Joseph Weaver, 107–113. New York: Pearson, 2014. Murray, Robert. The Cosmic Covenant: Biblical Themes of Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation. Heythrop Monographs. London: Sheed & Ward, 1992. Nash, James A. Loving Nature: Ecological Integrity and Christian Responsibility. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1991. Nestor, Dermot. “If Not Now, When? The Ecological Potential of Isaiah’s ‘New Things.’ ” In Creation Is Groaning: Biblical and Theological Perspectives, ed. Mary L. Coloe, PBVM, 33–56. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2013. Pixley, Jorge. “Isaiah 52:12–53:12: A Latin American Perspective.” In Return to Babel: Global Perspectives on the Bible, edited by John  R.  Levison and Priscilla Pope-Levison, 95–100. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1999. Puelo, Mev. The Struggle Is One: Voices and Visions of Liberation. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994. Pui-Lan, Kwok. Hope Abundant: Third World and Indigenous Theology. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2010. Richard, Pablo. “Theology in the Theology of Liberation.” In Mysterium Liberationis: Fundamental Concepts of Liberation Theology, edited by Ignacio Ellacuria and Jon Sobrino. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1993. Rivera-Pagan, Luis  N. “Toward an Emancipatory Palestinian Theology: Hermeneutical Paradigms and Horizons.” In The Biblical Text in the Context of Occupation: Towards a Hermeneutics of Liberation, edited by Mitri Raheb, 89–117. Contextual Theology Series. Bethlehem: Diyar Publisher, 2012. Segundo, Juan Luis. The Liberation of Theology. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1976. Scholz, Susanne. “Exodus: The Meaning of Liberation from ‘His’ Perspective.” In Feminist Biblical Interpretation, edited by Luise Schottroff and Marie-Theres Wacker, 33–50. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2012. Scholz, Susanne. Rape Plots: A Feminist Cultural Study of Genesis 34. Studies in Biblical Literature 13. New York: Peter Lang, 2000. Scholz, Susanne. Sacred Witness: Rape in the Hebrew Bible. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2014. Scholz, Susanne, and Pablo R. Andinach, eds. La Violencia and the Hebrew Bible: The Politics and Histories of Biblical Hermeneutics on the American Continent. Atlanta, GA: SBL, 2016. Sobrino, Jon. “The Crucified People and the Civilization of Poverty: Ignacio Ellacuria’s ‘Taking Hold of Reality.’ ” In No Salvation Outside the Poor: Prophetic-Utopian Essays. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2008. Soelle, Dorothee. “Vision.” In On Earth as in Heaven: A Liberation Spirituality of Sharing, 31–64. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1993.

654   Carol J. Dempsey, OP Taylor, Rubertha. “Isaiah as Resistance Literature.” In Global Perspectives on the Bible, edited by Mark Roncace and Joseph Weaver, 111–113. New York: Pearson, 2014. Weems, Renita. “Re-reading for Liberation: African American Women and the Bible.” In Feminist Interpretation of the Bible and the Hermeneutics of Liberation, edited by Silvia Schroer and Sophia Bietenhard. JSOTS 374. New York: Sheffield Academic, 2003. Westhelle, Vitor. “Creation Motifs in the Search for a Vital Space: A Latin American Perspective.” In Lift Every Voice: Constructing Christian Theologies from the Underside, Rev. and exp. ed., edited by Susan Brooks Thistlethwait and Mary Potter Engel, 146–158. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1998.

chapter 35

I n ter pr eti v e Con text M at ters: Isa i a h a n d the A fr ica n Con text i n A fr ica n St u dy Bibl e s Knut Holter

35.1. Introduction In the process of interpreting a text, the interpretive context matters. This is also is the case, of course, when the text is the book of Isaiah and the interpretive context is Africa. Consider Isa 6:1, for example, where the Hebrew text depicts the Lord as a king whose “robe” filled the temple. The Septuagint—that is, the first African translation of the Hebrew Bible—renders the Hebrew ‫ׁשוליו‬, “the train of his robe,” with δόξης αὐτο, “his glory.” This rendering of the Septuagint does not mean that its Alexandrian translators did not understand the Hebrew ‫ׁשוליו‬. On the contrary, they understood it very well, but—in their interpretive context, that of the second century bce Hellenism of Ptolemaic Egypt—they wanted to avoid this flagrant anthropomorphism, instead anticipating the reference to the Lord’s “glory” in verse 3.1 Or, consider Isa 19:24–25, the radical envisioning of a time when Israel “will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth.” The conclusion of the oracle is that the Lord will bless the three, saying: “Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance.” Again, however, the Septuagint translators 1  Few modern translations follow the Septuagint here. An exception, perhaps reflecting a correspondingly negative concept of anthropomorphism, is the paraphrasing version Living Bible, which renders the end of Isa 6:1 as “the Temple was filled with his glory.”

656   Knut Holter make a contextually sensitized rendering of the text. The Hebrew ‫ברוך עמי מצרים‬, “blessed be Egypt my people,” is rendered εὐλογημένος ὁ λαός μου ὁ ἐν Αἰγύπτῳ, “Blessed be my people that are in Egypt,” and the ‫ומעׂשה ידי אׁשור‬, “and Assyria my handiwork,” is rendered καὶ ὁ ἐν ᾿Ασσυρίοις, “and among the Assyrians.” In other words, the radical vision of the Hebrew text—that of Israel being a blessing together with Egypt and Assyria— is rendered in a way that speaks into the more immediate interpretive context of the Septuagint, that of the Jewish diaspora of the second century bce: “Blessed be my people that are in Egypt, and among the Assyrians, even Israel my heritage.” Now, the reader of this chapter will probably agree regarding the contextuality of the Septuagint and my more general claim that the interpretive context matters. However, she might think that I stretch the Africanness of the Septuagint a bit too far. And she is, of course, correct. Diaspora Judaism in the second century bce—even the one located in Alexandra, at the northern tip of the African continent—can hardly be said to be “African” in any qualified sense of the term. Actually, “Africa” is younger than the Septuagint, and presupposes cartographic, cultural, and political concepts that were not available for the translators of the Septuagint. Nevertheless, when African biblical scholars now and then refer to the Septuagint as an African translation or, for that matter, to the North African biblical scholars of the first centuries of the Christian era as African biblical scholars,2 it is more than a wordplay. It reflects a deliberate will to create a history behind today’s African encounter with the Bible, an encounter where both popular and professional reading communities search to develop strategies that are conscious about and sensitive to the African interpretive context. The academic discipline of biblical studies has in recent decades realized that it is not enough to contextualize the biblical text; the reader has to be contextualized as well. The Septuagint examples just mentioned demonstrate that this is an important perspective when we study classical texts that were translated from Hebrew to Greek at the northern tip of the African continent. However, the same is the case even when we study how various versions of the same texts are read throughout the continent today. Interpretive context still matters.3 The chapter, therefore, will ask in what ways contextual concerns are expressed in African interpretations of Isaiah. This object of investigation—African interpretations of Isaiah—has to be delimited. It could have referred to historical interpretations, such as the Septuagint version of Isaiah,4 or the Coptic or Ethiopian Orthodox interpretive traditions vis-à-vis Isaiah.5 Or, it could have referred to the role of Isaiah in 2  For an example, cf. Abogunrin, “Biblical Research,” 7. For a more detailed study of the relationship between the theology of ancient North African theologians and modern African theology, cf. Bediako, Theology and Identity. 3  For a survey of contextual Old Testament studies in Africa, see Holter, Contextualized. 4  Cf. van der Kooij, Textzeugen, 22–73. 5  Isaiah plays important roles in both traditions. In the Coptic tradition, Isa 19 is a key text, with the reference to “an altar to the Lord in the land of Egypt” (v. 19), read as a reference to the church. Likewise, in the Ethiopian Orthodox tradition, Isa 18 is a key text, not least due to its reference to the Cushites’ worshipping the Lord at Mount Zion (v. 7).

Isaiah and the African Context   657 today’s African biblical studies,6 or in church life, for that matter. Instead, I have chosen to delimit my focus and material to a quite small example of African interpretations of Isaiah—namely, Isaiah in the genre Study Bible in Africa. I investigate this genre for two reasons. First, it is interesting as an interface between the experiences of the two major reading communities of the Bible, the “popular” reading of ordinary readers, those who have not been exposed to a systematic training in biblical interpretation, and the “professional” reading of those who have been exposed to such a systematic training. Second, it is influential. Not only in the sense that Study Bibles tend to be best-sellers, but even more, because the genre is read and used by evangelists and catechists—that is, the large group of church employees responsible for much of the grassroots activity in the churches. Within the genre Study Bible in Africa, I have chosen three examples: the Roman Catholic The African Bible (1999), the Pentecostal Prayer and Deliverance Bible (2007), and the more mainstream Protestant Africa Study Bible (2016). The three represent three major wings of African Christianity, all characterized by a strong focus on the Bible.7 During the analysis of the three, we will see that they also represent quite different approaches—practically and professionally—to the task of creating a Study Bible. In other words, the material covered here is the three examples of the genre Study Bible in Africa, and the question is how they express contextual concerns in their respective interpretations of Isaiah. The bulk of the chapter will be a close reading of the three, with a more critical discussion of the findings toward the end.

35.2.  The African Bible(1999) The African Bible (AB) was published in 1999 by the Daughters of St. Paul, an international Roman Catholic congregation with a strong focus on serving church and society with Christian literature, and with publishing houses and bookstores in various parts of Africa. The AB is a typically Catholic representative of the genre Study Bible, using a Catholic translation from the United States as a textual base, and then adding introductions and interpretive notes from exegetical and theological, as well as pastoral and catechetical perspectives. 6  I have previously published two essays on “Isaiah and Africa.” The first was “Isaiah and Africa,” which is an overview of “Africa in Isaiah” (Isaiah text about Egypt and Cush), and “Isaiah in Africa” (some lines in popular and professional interpretation of Isaiah in contemporary Africa). The other was “Some Interpretive Experiences with Isaiah in Africa,” which goes deeper into the interpretive context and contemporary African interpretations of Isaiah. The present chapter is the third of these essays, and it concludes my analysis of “Isaiah and Africa” with a focus on the genre Study Bible in Africa. 7  The fourth major wing of African Christianity, African Initiated Churches (AIC), is left out, simply because—as far as I know—there is no example of the genre Study Bible from an AIC background. For a general study, cf. Adamo, Reading; and for a case study, cf. Holter, “Pregnancy and Psalms.” For a general introduction to the role of the Bible in Africa and the Global South, cf. Jenkins, New Faces.

658   Knut Holter The AB is edited by Victor Zinkuratire (Uganda) and Angelo Colacrai (Italy), and they had a team of thirty-nine additional contributors, mainly African biblical scholars. In the general introduction, the two editors refer to the interpretive context, though very briefly: By paying attention to the context of life in Africa today and seeking to identify themes particularly relevant to African societies of the twenty-first century, the African Bible aims to be a source of inspiration and nourishment for the people of Africa.8

In an article written during the time of the book was being edited, however, Zinkuratire elaborates more on the African context of the intended audience, arguing that the contributors will make use of African cultural and religious traditions to clarify the meaning of the text: This can in many cases be done, particularly for the Old Testament, where many family and social customs of semi-nomadic peoples have their close equivalents in most traditional African societies today.9

Zinkuratire—an Old Testament scholar, now retired from the Catholic University of East Africa, Nairobi—warns against the kind of misinterpretations that can easily be the result of shallow comparisons between the ancient text and the interpretive context. Consequently, he emphasizes that comparisons must be based on a sound knowledge of African social anthropology. When this is the case, however, he is quite optimistic about the potential of using African comparative material in the interpretation of biblical texts, relating it to the role that Ancient Near Eastern sources have had in critical biblical studies: Western biblical scholarship has been making use of the languages, cultures and religions of the Ancient Near East, particularly Canaan and Mesopotamia, to comment on and explain many biblical texts. In the same way traditional African religions and cultures can profitably be used for the same purpose.10

The Isaiah chapter of the AB starts with a general introduction to the book and continues with chapter-by-chapter interpretive notes. The first half of the general introduction deals with the historical setting and message of the book. The traditional division of the book in three is taken for granted. First Isaiah, whose prophecies we find in chapters 1–39, is located between 740 and 700 bce, responding to the threat to Israel and Judah from Assyria. Then, Second Isaiah, said to be “a remote disciple of Isaiah,” is responsible for chapters 40–55, being active toward the end of the Babylonian captivity and offering a message of “consolation for an oppressed people languishing in exile.” Finally, Third 8  African Bible, 16. 10  Zinkuratire, 8.

9  Zinkuratire, “African Bible Project,” 8.

Isaiah and the African Context   659 Isaiah, said to be a disciple of Second Isaiah, attempts to reinterpret his message into a post-exilic community, and is responsible for chapters 56–66.11 The second half of the general introduction deals with the question of relevance of Isaiah in Africa, noticing some key theological accents of the book that are supposed to have parallels in Africa or argued to have the potential to challenge Africa. One is the concept of God as holy and transcendent. A parallel is drawn between Isaiah’s vision in the temple and African Traditional Religions, where God is usually not approached directly, but through ancestors and other mediators.12 Another parallel is found in Second Isaiah’s monotheistic accent. Here it is argued that “Africans also conceive God as the all-powerful Being who controls nature as well as the destinies of nations, tribes, and individual beings.” The potential to challenge Africa is found in Second Isaiah’s universalism, which is said to be “a call to Africans to correct the failure of ethnic rivalry.”13 Second Isaiah’s focus on God as creator might also have challenging potential in Africa, in the sense that God’s creative power is not limited to the original acts of creation, but is able to recreate and transform our contemporary world for the better. Finally, Third Isaiah is also said to have a message that is of contemporary relevance. He is portrayed as addressing those who had returned from Babylon to Jerusalem with great hope built on the preaching of Second Isaiah, only to be disappointed. African countries have experienced the same, it is argued, turning from great optimism at the time they gained independence from the colonial powers to disappointment today. The message of Third Isaiah is therefore an encouragement to not lose hope in a better future, a better future that “must include moral and spiritual values and not merely material prosperity.”14 Turning to the textual notes, I would like to highlight three examples that demonstrate how the texts are read from contextually conscious perspectives. The first is that the AB speaks with a clearly pastoral voice. The contributors are biblical scholars who share their historical understanding of the texts with the readers of the AB. But at the same time, they aim at strengthening the Catholic faith of the readers; see, for example, the comments to 18:1, 41:8–16, and 58:1–12. An illustrative example is the comment to the sorceries of Babylon in 47:9: Babylon was known for its practices of sorcery and astrology. Sorcery in one form or another is still practiced in Africa. Christians who resort to it from time to time need to deepen their faith in the power of Christ.15

Second, the sociocritical concerns that were voiced in the introduction are followed up in the comments to the individual texts; see, for example, the comments to 9:20 and 10:1–4. An illustrative example is the comment to the Vineyard Song in 5:1–7: Applied to the situation in Black Africa we can see that the church in Africa is like a tree that has been planted by the Lord. After many years of Christianity[,] how is it 11  African Bible, 1187–1189. 12  African Bible, 1188. 14  African Bible, 1189. 15  African Bible, 1269.

13  African Bible, 1189.

660   Knut Holter possible that in “Christian” countries many kinds of injustices are practiced by Christians and even by clergy and religious? The words of Isaiah need to be meditated upon thoroughly.16

Third, a typical characteristic of Roman Catholic theology is its focus on the in­cul­tu­ra­ tion of church and faith in—for example, African—culture and society. This perspective is repeatedly expressed in the Isaiah chapter, see the comments to 5:14, 41:8–16, 49:14–16, 55:10–11, and 62:4. The Isaiah chapter even makes explicit use of the term “inculturation”; see the introduction to Isaiah, and the comments to 45:1–13, and 60:1–22. An illustrative example is the comment about King Cyrus in 41:2: People outside the Christian churches practice virtue and goodness. This needs to be “emphasized” especially in the context of inculturation. Africa can receive the message of Christ and transform it in an African way. The message of Christ has to  be incarnated in the customs, mentality and culture of the African, because ­the customs, mentality and culture of Africa are already a natural proclamation of the Gospel.17

35.3.  Prayer and Deliverance Bible(2007) I include the Prayer and Deliverance Bible (PDB) in this survey and discussion of African Study Bibles, though it is not a typical example of the genre. Actually, it differs from most others in two ways. First, the PBD was not a collaborative project involving many churches and organizations; rather, it is a one-man project, initiated by the Nigerian Pentecostal leader Daniel K. Olukoya. Second, the PDB is not organized with introductions to each biblical book, and then interpretive chapter-by-chapter notes throughout the biblical books; rather, all the study notes are found at the beginning and end of the volume, and content-wise, they do not pay particular attention to the main theological lines in the text. The PDB can nevertheless be considered a Study Bible; it includes “study notes,” intended to open the biblical texts to the reader, and besides it is an illustrative example not only of the theology of certain streams within African Pentecostalism, but also of its organizing in strong but independent churches and ministries. Daniel K. Olukoya is quite typical of Nigerian and African Pentecostal leaders, in the sense that he had a professional career outside the church (he has a PhD in molecular genetics), but then experienced a call from God to start a church ministry. Olukoya serves as General Overseer of the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministry in Lagos, claimed to be one of the largest congregations in Africa, with an attendance of over 100,000 members in single meetings. The ministry is characterized by a strong focus on 16  African Bible, 1197.

17  African Bible, 1257.

Isaiah and the African Context   661 prosperity and spiritual warfare—that is, on promoting what they frequently refer to as “apostolic signs, wonders and miracles.” In one of his books, Olukoya summarizes the task of spiritual warfare by referring to a team of “aggressive prayer warriors” who entered forbidden forests, silenced demons that demanded worship and “paralyzed” deep-rooted, anti-gospel activities. Sometimes, beginning from the highest places, they openly disgraced satanic agents, emptied hospitals by the healing power of the Lord Jesus Christ, rendered witchdoctors jobless.18

The publishing of the PDB is part of this ministry of spiritual warfare, and its purpose is presented in a message from the editor: When you have the whole Bible in your hands and you are also privileged to have in addition certain lessons which will make you victorious in life, you have the greatest treasure on earth. . . . The purpose of placing this Bible in your hands is to enable you to say goodbye to bondage, satanic harassment, evil attacks and certain demonic hindrances in the area of fulfilling your destiny.19

The core of the PDB is the biblical text of the King James Version. Then, additional study notes are found in front of and after the King James text. In front of the biblical text is a 160-page introduction; a first section teaches about prayer, deliverance, defeating satanic wickedness, witchcraft, and similar topics (pp. 1–112), and then a second section offers introductory notes to some selected biblical texts (pp. 113–160). These notes are not concerned with literary or historical questions, as one would normally expect from the genre Study Bible. Instead, the PDB notes use biblical texts to express and elaborate on the overall concept of prosperity gospel and spiritual warfare. For example, only two texts in Genesis are highlighted; one is Gen 15:16, read in relation to “ancestral problems,” the other is Gen 49:1–7, read in relation to “spiritual warfare and your past.”20 After the King James text, there is a corresponding 160-page conclusion, which contains no fewer than 4,557 prayers, organized by topic, such as “praying for a new beginning,” “praying to possess wealth and prosperity,” and “victory over sexual perversion.” Isaiah is referred to in two parts of the 160-page introduction, and nowhere in the 160page conclusion. The first mention is in the teaching part, where a reference to 49:24–25 is used in a lesson about witchcraft and prostitution, and argues that “nobody can be a prostitute without being initiated into witchcraft” and, further, that “it is a pity that some men are foolishly initiated into witchcraft by committing immorality with prostitutes.” Another set of references to Isaiah is found in a lesson about weapons that can be used against satanic intermediaries; these include a “broom of destruction” (14:23) and “ravenous birds” (46:11 and 54:16).21

18 Olukoya, Prayer, 3. 19  Prayer and Deliverance Bible, 4. 20  Prayer and Deliverance Bible, 114–117. 21  Prayer and Deliverance Bible, 97.

662   Knut Holter Second, in the section with introductory notes to biblical texts, five Isaiah texts are focused.22 The first is Isa 1:2, with an exposition about “spiritual warfare and inanimate objects.” The study note links the textual addressees “heaven and earth” to inanimate objects, telling a narrative about a tree—according to traditional religion, a sacred tree—that was cut down by Christian school children. Their experience is then used to illustrate that even inanimate objects like this tree, or the “earth” of the text, can be addressed and end up being obedient in the overall concept of spiritual warfare. The second text that is focused is Isa 15:1, with an exposition about “the powers of the night.” The study note links the text’s nightly destruction of Moab to spiritual powers that carry out their activities in the night, such as marine powers, witchcraft powers, forest demons, and so on. The marine powers of the night are then seen as being incarnated as prostitutes: They carry out their activities in the night. Many of them are found in the streets at night. They roam the streets as ladies looking for men who will give them a lift. Unfortunately, some foolish men enter their traps, not knowing that they are carrying strange entities to their homes. When a single lady who is below 25 decides to stand alone under a dark bridge at about 1:00 a.m., she cannot be an ordinary person. . . . She must be a creature of the night herself.23

The third text that is focused is 49:22, with an exposition about “the ministry of deliverance.” The study note links the Isaiah text to the “ignorance among the general populace” about deliverance from known and unknown bondage. Deliverance is then defined in terms of “the expulsion of evil spirits from a person or a thing, binding the strongman and spoiling his goods, expelling bad spirits that torment or possess people.” Moreover, the methods that can be used for deliverance include “commanding them in Jesus name [sic] to surface (this may take some time), songs of the blood of Jesus, . . . deal with ancestral aspects if necessary, Lev 26; Deut 28; Dan 9; Deut 5:9.”24 The fourth and fifth texts that are focused in the PDB introduction are Isa 61:1 and 64:1, and both continue the exposition on deliverance. The former focuses on “setting the captives free,” describing captivity hooks like sex, food, speak, money, fame, ancestors, and lack of prayer. The latter focuses on prayer as a weapon of holy disturbance, referring to 62:6–7 and 40:28–29.

35.4.  Africa Study Bible The Africa Study Bible (ASB) was published in 2016 by Oasis International, a Christian publishing ministry serving the African market. The ASB is a typically Protestant 22  Prayer and Deliverance Bible, 134–144. 24  Prayer and Deliverance Bible, 138–139.

23  Prayer and Deliverance Bible, 136.

Isaiah and the African Context   663 representative of the genre Study Bible; it includes a detailed discussion of the project as such, and then it provides introductions to each biblical book and interpretive notes to some biblical texts and topics. Like the AB and PDB, the ASB does not offer a new translation of the biblical texts into English; rather, an already existing translation, the New Living Translation, is used. The African perspective is then expressed through the introductions and interpretive notes, the latter differentiating between four types: “learn” (focus: key historical and doctrinal understandings of God’s Word), “proverbs and stories” (focus: the connection between uniquely African sayings and the wisdom of Scripture), “African touch points” (focus: features where Scripture and the African way of life are considered and reconciled), and “application” (focus: tools needed to “act righteously and fight for God’s glory”)25 The overall vision of the project is, then, that the ASB “will help people make a link between biblical truth and life transformation.”26 The ASB was a collaborative project, for which the Sierra Leonean educationalist John Jusu (of Africa International University in Nairobi, Kenya) was supervising editor. Its contributors—no fewer than 316 scholars and church leaders from 50 (mainly African) countries—are listed in the introduction. Also, the ASB is an ecumenical project, in the sense that the whole spectrum of Protestant (and some Pentecostal) churches is represented in the list of contributors. At the same time, it should be noted that the ASB is characterized by typically evangelical perspectives, emphasizing that “all Scripture is inspired by God,”27 and frequently expressing conservative or even precritical points of view, for example, with regard to questions of authorship of the biblical books.28 The Isaiah chapter of the ASB includes a general introduction to the book and then the four types of textual notes referred to above. The introduction is very brief, and hardly touches on critical questions. Isaiah of Jerusalem is assumed to have written the whole book, chapters 1–39 between 740 and 701, and then chapters 40–66 were “probably written toward the end of Isaiah’s life, perhaps in 681 bc.”29 An overview of the book emphasizes that Isaiah wrote “some of the most remarkable prophecies of Christ in the Old Testament,” arguing that the Messiah of 9:1–7 and 11:1–16 is the same as the Servant in 42:1–9, 49:1–13, 50:4–11, and 52:13–53:12. There is no particular section for the role of Isaiah in Africa, but a section called “What Isaiah teaches us” refers to Africa twice30: first, when it is noticed that “restauration is widely preached in Africa” and then claimed that, according to Isaiah, restauration is first and foremost spiritual; and second, when the African experience of slavery is compared to the Jewish exile in Babylon, and it is claimed that it is only through a restored relationship with God that people can experience true freedom. As has been noted, the textual notes are grouped in four. All four have a pastoral or contextual focus or both, but none of them pays attention to more literary and historical questions. The result therefore is an overall reading of Isaiah where some of the classic 25  Africa Study Bible, A24. 26  Africa Study Bible, A28. 27  Africa Study Bible, A26. 28  An example is the dating of Genesis: “Many sections were probably recorded directly by Moses during the Exodus. Some scholars date the Exodus around 1445 bc; other scholars date it in the 1200s bc.” Africa Study Bible, 3. 29  Africa Study Bible, 980. 30  Africa Study Bible, 981.

664   Knut Holter characteristics of the genre Study Bible—such as textual surveys, explanations of key terminology, and some indications about original context—are more or less absent, whereas it offers a lot of comparative material from African folklore and contemporary experience. Going through this comparative material, I find—at least to some extent— the same three perspectives that I noticed above in my analysis of the contextual concerns in the AB introduction and study notes: a pastoral voice, a sociocritical concern, and an inculturation hermeneutical awareness. First, the pastoral voice is clearly present throughout the Isaiah chapter of the ASB. The trust in a God who gives power to the weak and strength to the powerless (40:29), is explained by a Burundian proverb saying that “even in the dark, a cow knows her calf,” meaning that “God knows us, even when our circumstances seem dark as night.”31 Likewise, the theological concept that people are cut off from God when they sin (59:2) is explained by Baoulé (Côte d’Ivoire) proverbs saying that “you do not throw stones where the oil pots are,” and that “the sheep does not go to the market with the hyena;” meaning that bad choices have bad consequences.32 The pastoral voice is the dominating perspective in the Isaiah chapter, and as such, this chapter exemplifies a key perspective of the introduction to this volume: the ASB “will teach us how to apply the Word of God to our lives. Each day, we must open the Bible and let it be God’s bread for us through the power of the Holy Spirit.”33 Second, sociocritical concerns are also expressed in the Isaiah chapter of the ASB. One illustrative example is a comment on a text about the ideal king (11:1–9). Referring to a Cameroonian proverb saying that “the worst disgrace the trees will experience is when they make an umbrella tree the chief of the forest,” it is argued that Africa needs leaders who draw attention not to themselves but to the challenges of society.34 Another example is a comment to Isaiah’s criticism of alliances with Egypt (31:1): Today many African countries enter into alliances with more powerful nations of the world, like the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia and China. They expect to gain economic benefits and military protection. The powerful nations often profit from these alliances more than we do by exploiting our resources and preventing our nations from becoming self-sustaining, politically stable countries.35

Third, as inculturation hermeneutical reflection is generally stronger in Catholic circles than in Protestant ones, so it is not surprising that an explicit awareness is less visible in the ASB than in the AB. Nevertheless, there is hardly a clear-cut line between a pastoral application of a text and a reflection about its inculturation potential, as is demonstrated, for example, in a comment on the text about the mother who cannot forget her nursing child (49:14–15). Referring to a Haya (Tanzania) proverb saying that “a child may withhold good from a mother, but a mother cannot withhold good from her child,” the study note argues: 31  Africa Study Bible, 1030. 34  Africa Study Bible, 998.

32  Africa Study Bible, 1055. 35  Africa Study Bible, 1019.

33  Africa Study Bible, A25.

Isaiah and the African Context   665 The proverb illustrates the depths of a mother’s commitment to her child. God’s commitment to his people goes beyond that of a mother.36

The use of the Haya proverb here is more than a pastoral application, it lets the African interpretive voice criticize the mother/child analogy and confirm the conclusion of the Isaiah passage. Finally, the contextual perspective of the Isaiah chapter is also expressed by its choice of topics for the five “learn notes” (emphasizing doctrinal perspectives) linked to Isaiah. The first learn note is linked to chapter 2 and deals with prophecy. Here it is noticed that the prophets of the Old Testament were not only concerned with the future; they also spoke against idolatry and preached social justice. This perspective is then related to the African context, where many churches use the title “prophet.” These prophets, too, are therefore called to speak out against sin “whether in individuals, the church, or the society at large.”37 The second learn note uses the reference to the seraphs in 6:1–4 as an invitation to discuss angels and demons, arguing that African Traditional Religion­shares with Christianity a belief in the spirit world: “We Africans understand instinctively the stories of angelic visitations, spiritual warfare, and demonic oppression that occur in the Bible.”38 However, there are differences between the two, and African Christians should therefore not read traditional African concepts of spirits into the Bible. The third learn note uses the critique of idol fabrication in 44:9–20 to criticize African uses of fetishes and charms: Why does a pregnant woman put a Bible under her pillow? She feels confident that God will never allow anything bad to happen to her or her baby during the vulnerable night. When the Bible is used in this way, it has become a fetish.39

The fourth learn note uses 61:1 to teach about the Holy Spirit, said to have been working through leaders like Isaiah. Finally, each biblical book has one “article” that pinpoints an important aspect of that particular book, and the article in the Isaiah chapter deals with justice as a foundation for biblical peace.40 It is here pointed out that Africa has seen a number of tragedies resulting from a lack of justice, for example the child soldiers in the Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda, the apartheid of South Africa, the schoolgirls kidnapped in Nigeria by Boko Haram, and the genocide in Rwanda. Against this, it is argued that Isaiah frequently links justice with peace (9:7; 59:8), and that the Hebrew shalom has a parallel in the Zulu ubuntu, reflecting a state where the human beings are in right relationships with God, other humans, and nature (cf. 11:6–8), and that a society promoting justice will experience peace (cf. 32:17).

36  Africa Study Bible, 1043. 39  Africa Study Bible, 1036.

37  Africa Study Bible, 986. 38  Africa Study Bible, 992. 40  Africa Study Bible, 1066–1067.

666   Knut Holter

35.5.  Critical Perspectives In Africa, as everywhere else, the genre Study Bible covers a need in the market. Translating and interpreting old texts like those of the Bible is challenging work, and Bible readers need tools for approaching those texts. A couple of decades ago, Ernst Wendland and Salimo Hachibamba did a case study of how a group of Bible readers among the Batonga of Zambia comprehended the text about the suffering servant in 52:13–53:12. In their discussion of the findings of the case study, Wendland and Hachibamba start from the observation that the Bible in most African countries is an “open book,” meaning that is freely and widely used. However, “what people actually comprehend from their Bibles in terms of sufficiency and accuracy of information is at times open to serious question.”41 Going through the Batonga reading of—or, in many cases listening to—this traditionally highly focused Isaiah text, verse by verse, Wendland and Hachibamba are able to list and discuss a large number of linguistic and cultural examples where the two current Bible translations into Chitonga create a need for additional information. The Batonga readers themselves therefore point to the need for a more heavily annotated translated version, or “study Bible,” [that] may be able to provide an appreciable measure of assistance by opening up, as it were, the original sense and contemporary significance of the passage under consideration.42

So, there is a need for the genre Study Bible, in Africa. The question is then whether and in what ways the three examples of the genre that have been analyzed here are able to meet this need. This is to some extent a normative question, and as a non-African I am hesitant about going into what John S. Mbiti—one of the founding fathers of African biblical studies—once referred to as the role of Western theological engineers: to give advice on “how African theology should be done, where it should be done, who should do it, what it should say, ad infinitum.”43 Let me nevertheless point out three topics— context, comparison, and content—that in my view deserve further attention when we discuss the genre Study Bible in Africa. First, context. Two of the three Study Bibles are labeled “African,” and all three—together with very much of what is attested elsewhere of biblical interpretation in Africa—can be labeled “contextual.” There are, however, challenges attached to these concepts, and a major one is the problem of generalization. The African context can hardly be referred to in the singular. In biblical studies we used to see this in the pre-1994 (before the abolishing of apartheid) tension between the liberation theology of South Africa and the inculturation theology of Africa north of the Limpopo river; both were “contextual”

41  Wendland and Hachibamba, “Do You Understand.” 42  Wendland and Hachibamba, 555. 43 Mbiti, Bible and Theology, 61.

Isaiah and the African Context   667 and both were “African,” still they were not speaking the same language.44 The terms, in other words, have to be defined more closely.45 The three Study Bibles offer vivid illustrations of the problems of “context” and “Africa.” The AB is for obvious reasons—being an official Roman Catholic text, with several rounds of imprimaturs—heavily influenced by Catholic inculturation theology.46 Its “context,” therefore, is more than a geographically and culturally defined “Africa;” it includes traditional Catholic concepts of culture, and also more modern Catholic concepts of critical biblical studies. Likewise, the ASB is influenced by its constituencies. Its decision totally to avoid insights of critical biblical studies reflects the conservative and evangelical context of the project. The same probably also explains its insistence that restoration—said to be widely preached in Africa, but often without being properly defined—is seen as being “about healing our broken relationship with God. Genuine repentance must come first.”47 Likewise, again, the PDB offers a contextualization where African (and typically Nigerian) experiences are reflected, also with some examples of influence from churches that would be labeled African Instituted Churches rather than Pentecostal ones. The overall interpretive perspective is nevertheless the ministry of prosperity gospel and spiritual warfare of the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministry in Lagos. Second, comparison: All biblical interpretation is comparative, in the sense that the texts are read from certain perspectives. Nevertheless, the guild of biblical scholars in Africa has developed an explicit comparative approach to the Bible to be its major interpretive characteristics.48 One reason for this is the role of comparative readings on a popular level; ordinary readers of the Bible find parallels between biblical—and, not least, Old Testament—texts and traditional African cultural experiences. Another reason is the colonial past, where African culture was oppressed; African biblical scholars have therefore wanted to demonstrate the existence of parallels between this oppressed culture and that of the Bible. However, a comparison between a text (such as Isaiah) and a more closely defined interpretive context (such as Africa) can be turned in at least two quite opposite directions.49 One has a pastoral profile and uses the text as an interpretive key into the context; that is, it uses Isaiah texts comparatively to investigate supposedly parallel experiences and concerns in contemporary Africa. Another has an exegetical profile and uses the context as an interpretive key into the text; that is, it uses African experiences and concerns comparatively to investigate supposedly parallel expressions within the Isaiah text. The pastoral approach is frequently found in all three Study Bibles. Here, the text is used to say something about supposedly parallel situations in the interpretive context. The exegetical” approach is not that frequently found, and 44  Cf. Martey, African Theology. 45  For more contextually defined studies, see from the Ghanaian context: Kahl, Jesus als Lebensretter, and from the Kenyan context: Kinyua, Introducing Ordinary. 46  Cf. Ukpong, “Developments.” 47  Africa Study Bible, 981. I see this as an indirect criticism of Mugambi’s “theology of reconstruction,” cf. Mugambi, Christian Theology. 48  Cf. Anum, “Comparative Readings.” 49 Holter, Old Testament Research, 88–100.

668   Knut Holter then mainly in the AB.50 This is where the African context is used to develop an understanding of the text. An example from the AB could be a comment to 49:14–16, using examples from the Bahema of Congo-Kinshasa to elaborate on the idea that “God as both male and female.”51 An example from the ASB could perhaps be a comment to the same text, using a proverb from the Haya in Tanzania to stress the text’s focus on the mother’s commitment to her child.52 Third, content: Normally, a typical characteristic of the genre Study Bible is that of providing the reader with explanatory notes about literary and historical questions emerging from the text. Such notes are obviously never neutral, they reflect the ideological and scholarly position of the editor. Nevertheless, they are most useful; as the Batonga readers referred to above pointed out, there is not only a need for study notes on the “contemporary significance” of the text, but also on its “original sense.” In the three Study Bibles that have been analyzed here, it is probably not surprising that the PDB ignores this kind of questions, it is simply outside the horizon of its variant of using the Bible. But it is surprising and unfortunate (here is my normativity explicit) that the ASB, too, avoids this kind of questions. The only one that does provide its readers with a combination of contextual and historical and literary questions is the AB. In a sum, the three Study Bibles that have been discussed here demonstrate an explicit desire to relate Isaiah to Africa. However, the Isaiah texts are read in ways that are in constant negotiation with an “Africa” that is colored by a variety of different interpretive strategies. As such, the Study Bibles follow up what the Septuagint readings of 6:1 and 19:25 referred to in the beginning of this essay initiated. Readers of Isaiah—in Alexandria more than two thousand years ago and throughout the African continent today—expect biblical text like Isaiah to make sense into their specific contexts. It is then up to translators, interpreters, and Study Bible editors to create this sense.

Bibliography Editions Africa Study Bible. Wheaton, IL: Oasis International, 2016. The African Bible. Nairobi, Kenya: Paulines Publications Africa, 1999. The Prayer and Deliverance Bible. Lagos, Nigeria: Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries, 2007.

Secondary Literature Abogunrin, Samuel Oyin. “Biblical Research in Africa: The Task Ahead.” AJBS 1 (1986): 7–24. Adamo, David Tuesday. Reading and Interpreting the Bible in African Indigenous Churches. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2001. 50  Cf. above, the reference to Zinkuratire, “Africa Bible Project,” where he sees a parallel with the Bible between African and ancient Near Eastern comparative material. 51  African Bible, 1273. 52  Africa Study Bible, 1043.

Isaiah and the African Context   669 Anum, Eric. “Comparative Readings of the Bible in Africa: Some Concerns.” In The Bible in Africa: Transactions, Trajectories and Trends, edited by Gerald O. West and Musa W. Dube, 457–473. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Bediako, Kwame. Theology and Identity: The Impact of Culture upon Christian Thought in the Second Century and in Modern Africa. Regnum Studies in Mission. Oxford: Regnum, 1999. Holter, Knut. Contextualized Old Testament Scholarship in Africa. Nairobi, Kenya: Acton, 2008. Holter, Knut. “Isaiah and Africa.” In New Studies in the Book of Isaiah: Essays in Honor of Hallvard Hagelia, edited by Markus Zehnder, 69–90. Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2014. Holter, Knut. Old Testament Research for Africa: A Critical Analysis and Annotated Bibliography of African Old Testament Dissertations, 1967–2000. BTA 3. New York: Peter Lang, 2002. Holter, Knut. “Pregnancy and Psalms: Aspects of the Healing Ministry of a Nigerian Prophet.” OTE 27 (2014): 428–443. Holter, Knut. “Some Interpretive Experiences with Isaiah in Africa.” In Studies in Isaiah: History, Theology and Reception, edited by Tommy Wasserman, Greger Andersson, and David Willgren, 181–199. LHBOTS 654. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2017. Jenkins, Philip. The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. Kahl, Werner. Jesus als Lebensretter: Westafrikanische Bibelinterpretationen und ihre Relevanz für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft. Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 2007. Kinyua, Johnson Kiriaku. Introducing Ordinary African Readers’ Hermeneutics: A Case of the Agikuyu Encounter with the Bible. Oxford: Peter Lang, 2011. Kooij, Arie van der. Die alten Textzeugen des Jesajabuches: Ein Beitrag zur Textgeschichte des Alten Testaments. OBO 35. Freiburg, Switzerland, and Göttingen: Universitätsverlag Freiburg and Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1981. Martey, Emmanuel. African Theology: Inculturation and Liberation. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1995. Mbiti, John S. Bible and Theology in African Christianity. Nairobi, Kenya: Oxford University Press, 1986. Mugambi, Jesse N. K. Christian Theology and Social Reconstruction. Nairobi, Kenya: Acton, 2003. Olukoya, Daniel K. Prayer Passport to Crush Oppression. Lagos, Nigeria: Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries, 2006. Ukpong, Justin S. “Developments in Biblical Interpretation in Modern Africa.” Missionalia 27 (1999): 313–329. Wendland, Ernst, and Salimo Hachibamba. “ ‘Do You Understand What You Are Reading [Hearing]?’ (Acts 8:30): The Translation and Contextualization of Isaiah 52:13–53:12 in Chitonga.” In The Bible in Africa: Transactions, Trajectories and Trends, edited by Gerald O. West and Musa W. Dube, 538–556. Leiden: Brill, 2000. Zinkuratire, Victor. “The African Bible Project.” Newsletter on African Old Testament Scholarship 4 (1998): 7–9.

chapter 36

R ea di ng Isa i a h i n Asi a Maggie Low

36.1. Introduction “Reading Isaiah in Asia”1 is far too broad a topic to cover in just one chapter, given the  plethora of ethnicities and religions in this region, so I write only as a Chinese Singaporean Christian living in a city-state where there is a confluence of Eastern and Western values. Although Singapore is a pluralistic society, made up of Malays, Indians, and other minorities, Chinese make up almost three-quarters of the population. Among the Chinese, about one-third are Buddhist and one-tenth are Taoist. Confucianism is not identified as a religion in our census, and even though we do not study Confucianism in a formal way, we imbibe its ethics through our upbringings in Chinese households. Charlene Tan writes that together with other Asian countries, such as Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, Singapore shares a number of Confucian values, including group identity, duty consciousness, personal discipline, consensus formation, the priority of collective interests, emphasis on education and pragmatism.2 Regarding a cultural reading of the Bible, Cheryl Exum and Steven Moore state that “Biblical Studies/Cultural Studies is not just the Bible influencing culture or culture reappropriating the Bible, but a process of unceasing mutual redefinition in which cultural appropriations constantly reinvent the Bible, which in turn constantly impels new appropriations.”3 Although I agree that there is a two-way influence between the Bible and culture, the question is, Which has priority? Simon Chan argues that because culture is part of fallen humanity, privileging context blinds one to its faults. So, on the one hand, I read with my cultural lens to identify facets of the text that resonate with my context and that might uncover meanings that would be overlooked from a Western or 1  Thanks are due to my Old Testament students in Trinity Theological College, Singapore, who contributed their research and ideas: Tan Kay Kheng, Evangeline Khoo, Kjelti Koh, Jane Yong May Yuen, and Achsah Ang Xiaohui. 2 Saw, Population, 42; Tan, “Our Shared Values,” 459. 3  Exum and Moore, “Biblical Studies/Cultural Studies,” 35.

Reading Isaiah in Asia   671 androcentric perspective, and, on the other hand, I use the biblical lens to evaluate my culture so that we can better reflect the image of God in our own context.4 As a Chinese Singaporean woman, I see four aspects of the message of Isaiah that can be both enriched by and enriching for my background. First, the Asian emphasis on the family helps us to appreciate the fatherhood of God, and Isaiah’s depiction of God’s fatherliness is a model for the Asian family. Secondly, Isaiah’s maternal imagery of God provides a corrective to Confucian patriarchy, and the prophet’s juxtaposition of female and male metaphors points toward a complementary feminism rather than a combative feminism, which makes it more acceptable in Asia. Thirdly, Isaiah’s favorite title for God, “the Holy One,” is at home in Asia’s religious context, though the relational aspect of the Holy One “of Israel” helps to tame our authoritarian tendency. Fourthly, the universal sovereignty of this Holy One challenges the pluralistic context of Singapore, but at the same time, Isaiah’s universalism crosses boundaries through the model of the Suffering Servant.5

36.2.  God as Father The first words God spoke through the prophet Isaiah were: Children I have reared and I have brought up, and they, they rebelled against me. (1:2)6

This anguished expostulation by a father resonates with Chinese Asians. Confucianism is ordered by five relationships: ruler and minister, father and son, husband and wife, elder brother and younger brother, and friend and friend. Julia Ching points out that three of these are family relationships and that the other two are conceived in terms of the family. Confucian morality is based on the belief that the family is the basic unit of human community and that harmonious family relationships will inevitably lead to a peaceful society and state.7 Regarding relationship with the Divine, Xinzhong Yao writes that the religious aspect of Confucian humanism can be seen in its faith in heaven (tian) and the Mandate of Heaven (tian ming). One must fulfill the mandate of heaven by the self-cultivation of virtues.8 Besides being understood as Nature or a set of moral principles, “Heaven” is

4 Chan, Grassroots, 20–22. Chan points out that Bishop K. H. Ting’s “Reconstruction of Theological Thinking” in China and C. S. Song’s approach tended to promote the church’s compliance with state policy. 5  The book of Isaiah is relevant to Singapore in other ways, especially regarding our affluence and pride, but here I focus on uniquely Asian concerns rather than universal ones. 6  All biblical citations are from the NRSV. 7  Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 68–69; Yao, Introduction, 33. 8 Yao, Introduction, 46.

672   Maggie Low also regarded as a supreme divine being who is creator and ancestor, the great-grandfather of all humans.9 Hence, when Yhwh the Father indicts his rebellious children for abandoning him, a Chinese parent can identify with God’s lament that such children are worse than animals: An ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib; but Israel does not know, my people do not understand. (Isa 1:3)

To prevent the erosion of such familial duty, the Maintenance of Parents Act was enacted in Singapore in 1996 to make it a legal duty (under certain conditions) to support one’s aged parent.10 Chan writes, “Within the family context, sin is . . . an act that dishonors the family name.”11 The Hebrew root for rebel or transgress is pasha‘, which occurs most frequently in the book of Isaiah (20 of a total of 134 times in the Hebrew Bible). This primal act of rebellion against God leads to social injustice, for example, the oppression of the fatherless and the widow in 1:17. God’s threats and punishment are therefore abundantly justified. Katherine Pfisterer Darr traces the imagery of rebellious children through the book of Isaiah (1:4; 30:9). Paradoxically, however, familial metaphors also hold out the hope of reconciliation.12 This hope is announced in Deutero-Isaiah when God declares: I, I am He who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins. (Isa 43:25)

Darr notes that expiation is offered, not because the transgressors have repented or because they can justify their actions, but simply because of God’s initiative. Trito-Isaiah develops this hope, with Yhwh’s children addressing God as Father. You, O LORD, are our father; our Redeemer from of old is your name. (Isa 63:16)

Appealing to paternal intimacy, says Darr, is a rhetorical strategy to evoke parental compassion, and so God responds in 64:1­–2, saying, “Here I am, Here I am,” for he is a God who has always taken the initiative to reunite with his stubborn children.13 This Isaianic portrayal of a God who takes the first step toward reconciliation ­challenges the Asian worldview. Ching admits that “in the Confucian social order, human relationships tended to become hierarchically fixed and rigid—with the superior partners, the fathers, husbands, rulers, exercising more right and privilege, and the 9 Yao, Introduction, 46, 145. 10  Tan, “Our Shared Values,” 453, adds that China and Japan also make it a legal requirement for children to provide financial support for their elderly parents. 11 Chan, Grassroots, 44. 12 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 59. 13 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 79–80.

Reading Isaiah in Asia   673 i­ nferior partners performing more duty and submission.” Similarly, Yao writes, “it is the children’s responsibility to seek reconciliation by apology and self-criticism.” Although Confucian teaching stresses unconditional reciprocity in relationships, the reality in many Chinese families is that elders cannot “lose face” (honor) by being the first to reach out. What is it that makes the Confucian and Isaianic concepts of fatherhood so different? 14 The answer lies in the anthropocentric worldview of Confucianism compared to theocentric biblical faith. As noted, Confucianism is built on the family, and so the human father and his natural paternal feelings determine the father/children relationship. Although Confucians believe that Heaven sets up the moral pattern and generates the moral power in human beings, it “relies on self-cultivation to enhance personal virtues to resolve all kinds of conflicts, [and] this renders the Confucian Way of Harmony quite weak in creating peace and harmony out of conflict and disorder.” Yao admits that the emphasis on harmony was thus frequently used to strengthen hierarchically fixed and rigid human relationships and to maintain the status quo.15 In Isaiah’s theocentric framework however, Yhwh is a father who both disciplines and accepts unconditionally. God’s initiative in seeking out his people is especially emphasized in the word “redeem.” The Hebrew root, ga’al, occurs again most frequently in the book of Isaiah (25 out of 115 times in the Hebrew Bible). Yhwh declares ten times in Deutero-Isaiah that he is Israel’s Redeemer (41:14; 43:14; 44:6, 24; 47:4; 48:17; 49:7, 26; 54:5, 8), who will save his helpless people from exile. Thus Isaiah’s model for fatherhood is not one of an imperfect human but one of the perfect divine father. This is a model that is needed by Chinese parents, who usually demand that children live up to high expectations of academic success and good behavior but often fail to attend to their children’s emotional needs with unconditional affirmation.

36.3.  God as Mother God is perceived not only as a father but also as a mother in Isaiah: As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you; you shall be comforted in Jerusalem. (Isa 66:13)

Despite the Asian belief in goddesses, to portray the Supreme as a female jolts our patriarchal conditioning. Confucius held a low opinion of women, saying, “In one’s household, it is the women and morally inferior men (xiao ren) that are difficult to deal with.”16 Certainly, there are women in Chinese history who are held up as paragons. The mother of Mengzi (Confucius’s successor) moved her home three times for the sake of getting 14  Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 82; Yao, Introduction, 181. 15  Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 109–110, 118; Yao, Introduction, 146, 148, 188. 16 Yao, Introduction, 183, citing the Analects, 17:25.

674   Maggie Low her son a better education. Hua Mulan dressed up as a male warrior to take the place of her aged father during a conscription. And Mu Guiying, of the Yang Family Generals, saved her country in a war. However, all these heroic acts centered on a male figure—a son, a father, or a husband. The Taoist yin-yang, or female-male, understanding of human relationship offers more hope of a complementary model. The yin element is feminine and yielding, whereas the yang element is masculine and strong. However, as Nam-Soon Kang laments, this cosmology was soon arranged into hierarchical relationships of superiority and inferiority, goodness and evil: “In time, yin elements came to stand for all that was negative and inferior in the universe.” Further, Lee Young Jung points out that in our modern society, masculine characteristics are seen as more desirable, even by women themselves.17 In Buddhism, the Pure Land Buddhist School has a female bodhisattva, Kuan-yin, the Goddess of Mercy, who is especially popular with the masses. Originally a male, she responds to people’s needs, especially to women who are praying to conceive. Nonetheless, she is a bodhisattva (a human being who has achieved enlightenment but not yet entered into Nirvana), who assists the male Buddha Amitabha in paradise. This latter God figure (Omitofo in Chinese) was originally a king and then became a monk, and then by his merit, called the Pure Land paradise into being.18 Even progressive Asians are wary of the term “feminist” because of its “Western, bourgeois connotations.” It is seen as an aggressive battle of the sexes: “a politicallybased oppositional feminism, a battle for women’s rights.”19 In Asia, communal harmony is highly valued, and so ecclesial feminist leaders have advocated for this quality/ virtue. Cao Shengjie from China, for example, writes that women and men should cooperate and complement each other; and Henriette Hutabarat Lebang, from Indonesia, encourages men and women to labor together for “a paradigm shift from patriarchy to partnership.”20 The greater goal is not just women’s rights but the communal good of church and society. Chinese patriarchy parallels that of ancient Israel, which makes Deutero-Isaiah’s repeated use of feminine imagery for God highly unusual (42:14; 46:3–4; 49:14–26). The prophet juxtaposes maternal metaphors with those of a male warrior in a yin-yang way. In Isa 42:14, Yhwh says, I have kept silent for a long time, keeping still, restraining myself. Like a woman in labor I will cry out, I will gasp and pant all at once.

This laboring mother metaphor, usually used in contexts of fear and pain, needs to be read in the light of the preceding verse 13: 17  Kang, “Creating,” 25; Lee, Trinity, 203–204. 18  Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 213–214; Küng et al., Christianity, 426. 19  Shaffer and Xianlin, “Unruly Spaces,” 20. 20  Cao, “My Reflections,” 17; Lebang, “Living Together,” 31.

Reading Isaiah in Asia   675 Yhwh like a mighty man will go forth, like a man of wars he will rouse his zeal; He will yell a battle cry, yea he will roar, upon his enemies he will show himself mighty.

Darr points out that the laboring mother’s “gasp” and “pant” are Hebrew puns for “destroy” and “crush” respectively, thus subverting the travailing woman metaphor from one of frailty into one of potency like that of a delivering warrior. The element of power highlights the strength that a woman in labor must exert to safely birth her child; and at the same time, the compassion of a travailing mother underscores the warrior’s sacrificial zeal. A similar juxtaposition recurs in 49:14–26.21 No one metaphor will do justice in representing Yhwh, but a multiplicity of metaphors, both masculine and feminine, are needed to portray the Divine.22 The maternal efforts of pregnancy, labor, and nursing demonstrate divine compassion to a degree greater than other creation metaphors, even of that of a father. It is the maternal metaphor that gives Israel the assurance it desperately needs in the face of its divine abandonment in the exile.23 Therefore, God, who is spirit and not human, and neither male nor female, is best represented by metaphors of both genders. Chan emphasizes that this precludes blurring the distinction between men and women, for equality does not abrogate the differences in roles and functions in the church or the family. While Chan argues for a vertically ordered hierarchical relationship that is mutually supportive rather than oppressive, Gen 1 and 2 present an egalitarian creation of man and woman.24 The image of God is multidimensional, as is seen in the use of the imago dei for both the complementary man-woman (Gen 1:27) and hierarchical father-son relationships (Gen 5:3). Asian feminists therefore seek to collaborate with men in order to present God’s image holistically to the world, whether in the family, church, or public square.25 God is beyond gender. We will now turn to consider the holy and transcendent nature of God.

36.4.  God as the Holy One of Israel The most common term for God in the book of Isaiah is “the Holy One of Israel.” Out of thirty occurrences in the Hebrew Bible, it is used twenty-four times in the book of 21 Darr, Isaiah’s Vision, 105; Low, Mother Zion, 128–132. 22 Low, Mother Zion, 186. Scholars have proposed a variety of reasons for Deutero-Isaiah’s emphasis on feminine imagery for God. I argue that this is influenced by Zion theology, which assures the people that God will redeem them based on a prior and unconditional relationship with Yhwh through creation. 23 Low, Mother Zion, 186. 24 Chan, Grassroots, 58, 78. Chan based his argument on a functional hierarchy within the Trinity, which may be valid from the perspective of a father-son rather than a husband-wife relationship. For Gen 1 and 2, see Low, “Women in Ministry.” 25  Low, “Introduction,” 9.

676   Maggie Low Isaiah, half of them in Proto-Isaiah. Scholars agree that Isaiah’s inaugural vision of Yhwh in Isa 6 lies behind this epithet. Goldingay explains that “holiness” is not a moral category but a metaphysical one, and the angelic thrice-holy calls exult Yhwh as the “ultimate in the supernatural, extraordinary, uncreated, heavenly.” In other words, Yhwh alone is God.26 At the same time, the holiness of Yhwh manifests itself in justice and righteousness: “The Holy God shows himself holy by righteousness” (Isa 5:16). Isa 1:10–17 makes it clear that rites of sacrifices, offerings, and festivals will be rejected if justice is not done for the oppressed. J. J. M. Roberts traces the development of the idea of “the Holy One of Israel” throughout the three parts of Isaiah. He points out that Deutero-Isaiah expands on Yhwh’s sole exaltation through the doctrine of creation: To whom then will you compare me, or who is my equal? says the Holy One. Lift high your eyes and see: Who created these? (Isa 40:25–26)

Trito-Isaiah also describes Yhwh as the “high and lofty One” (Isa 57:15) and, like Proto-Isaiah, denounces cultic performances that neglect righteousness for the needy (Isa 58).27 For the Asian readers, the idea of God and his holiness can almost be taken for granted among common folks. Chinese religions are rich in rituals and sacrifices and, not uncommonly, associated with divination and the consultation of mediums. Gods and spirits are worshipped and sought after for general protection and prosperity. Chan states that in most religious traditions, God’s existence is presupposed, although there may be differences regarding God’s identity and nature.28 A belief in the transcendent is also integral to morality. While Confucianism is largely perceived today as an ethical rather than a religious system, modern Confucian scholars, such as Tu Wei-Ming, recognize that if Confucian ethics is to be effective, it needs to be a “response to the tran­ scendent.”29 As for Taoism, Hans Küng sees a parallel between the Tao and God as the ultimate transcendent reality.30 Buddhism is more complex, but Küng proposes that God can be identified with “the primal Buddha, insofar as he is the origin of everything that exists.” Küng challenges the West to learn from the Eastern attitude of “more respect in the face of the Ineffable, more reverence toward the Mystery, in brief more awe in the presence of that Absolute.”31 With the pervasive Western influence in our English-speaking, youth-oriented congregations, Singapore churches also need to hallow the Holy One of Isaiah’s vision, lest spiritual intimacy is hollowed into mere sentimentalism. 26 Goldingay, Theology, 97–99. 27  Roberts, “Isaiah,” 134, 136. 28  See Clammer, Studies; Chan, Grassroots, 48. 29 Chan, Grassroots, 56–57, citing Tu, Centrality, 94. 30  Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 174; see also Chan, Grassroots, 57. 31  Küng et al., Christianity, 393, 397.

Reading Isaiah in Asia   677 Rituals (li) are important to the Confucianist as part of the spiritual and moral order.32 Jiang Haijun demonstrates that Confucius’s concept of yi (righteousness) is a manifestation of both the inner moral thoughts of ren (humaneness) and the external practices of li (rituals).33 My student Achsah Ang notes the parallel in Isaiah, especially in Isa 56: foreigners and eunuchs will be accepted if they perform the rituals (li) of keeping the Sabbath and fasting, and this is counted as righteousness (yi). However li must go together with ren—that is, concern for the weak—so that it will result in social justice as is demanded in Isa 2 and 58. This is the ideal in Chinese religions and Isaiah, but just as the Israelites failed God, so, too, the Chinese system can degenerate into a ritualistic bargaining for blessings. In Singapore, people often offer prayers at temples to help them win lotteries, and even gangsters burn joss sticks for protection when embarking on crimes! One reason for the disconnect between spirituality and ethics among the Chinese has to do with an impersonal concept of the transcendent. Küng challenges the East to consider that the Absolute is not separate from the world and humanity. It is the prophetic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), he says, that tell of a people addressed and claimed by its God who can be heard and spoken to. Being addressed by the divine “Thou” allows human beings to “experience their own ‘I’ and be raised to a dignity that is hardly ever seen in the East and that no Western secular humanism, no technological progress, and no cosmic piety can guarantee.”34 Such a dignity implies that one is held accountable by the divine Thou for how one treat another person. In comparison, Isaiah’s God is both transcendent and immanently personal; the latter quality is expounded in the second part of the title “the Holy One of Israel.” Roberts explains that this title reflects an indissoluble relationship between God and his chosen people, based on the Zion tradition. In an oracle of salvation, God says, Do not fear, you worm Jacob, you insect Israel! I will help you, says the Lord; your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel. (Isa 41:14, emphasis mine)

Further, Deutero-Isaiah buttresses the relationship by appealing to the creation, exodus, and patriarchal traditions (especially in Isa 51), all of which explicate God’s direct, personal, and historical involvement with the people.35 In the face of such a holy and personal God, there can be no place for arrogance; instead, there must be an awareness of accountability. Although the Confucian goal is to become a sage through self-cultivation,36 such humanist confidence contributes to the “aristocratic tendency and the authoritarian character rooted in the tradition.” To counteract these tendencies, Ching sees the need to also emphasize human freedom, 32 Yao, Introduction, 193–196. 33  Jian, “Textual Interpretation.” 34  Küng et al., Christianity and the World Religions, 398. 35  Roberts, “Isaiah,” 140. 36 Yao, Introduction, 159; Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 89.

678   Maggie Low equality, and responsibility. However, even with these democratic and meritocratic values, elitism raises its ugly head in Singapore, as achievers acquire the resources to bolster their children’s success, thus widening the gap between the “haves” and the “have-nots.”37 Humanism finds its proper place only in a relationship with the divine Thou, so that one is elevated without exalting oneself, which is what we see in the book of Isaiah. Isaiah’s vision of God as “high and lifted up” (6:1) counters everything else that is falsely “high and lifted up” (2:12–17).38 Such a relationship with the Divine will have ethical implications, for paradoxically, humaneness (ren) needs to be rooted not in humanity but in God. When discussing righteousness (yi) and rituals (li) in Isa 56, Yhwh’s followers are not called to be humanitarians but to be worshippers first. God says to the eunuchs that they are to “choose the things that please me and hold fast my covenant” (56:4), and foreigners who join themselves to God are “to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants” (56:6). It is knowing God’s character that enables God’s servants to reflect the same likeness. As Chan states, “In the Confucian context, the main challenge is to show that the ethical ultimate must ultimately be grounded in divine personality.”39 In fact, it is this aspect of a divine personality that draws people to Pure Land Buddhism. The adherent simply needs to invoke the name of the Buddha Amitabha to obtain salvation into paradise. Ching writes that Pure Land Buddhism appealed especially to masses seeking not only ultimate salvation but also a power that responds to their ordinary needs.40 Chan writes that, similarly, Chinese pragmatism draws many to the Pentecostal belief that finds practical expression in healing, exorcism, and material provisions.41 What is the assurance that God hears these prayers? According to Isaiah, he is the Holy God of Israel— that is, a God who has acted in history for a people. (Küng points out that the historical aspect is what makes biblical faith different from faith in Amitabha.42) And what is to prevent these personal requests from degenerating into selfish materialistic pursuits? It is because Yhwh is the Holy God of Israel who refined and restored them. Isaiah also presents the Holy God as the only deity (especially in Isa 40), which raises the question of what this means for a pluralistic society like Singapore.

36.5.  God as the Universal Sovereign The book of Isaiah contains paradoxical universalistic and nationalistic texts. Those who argue for a universalistic message point to the Servant in Isaiah as a light to the nations (Isa 42:6; 49:6), to peoples waiting for salvation through God’s teaching and justice (Isa 42:4, 23; 49:6; 51:4–6), and to nations running voluntarily to Israel (Isa 55:4, 5). 37 Yao, Introduction, 273; Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 87; Nosco, “Confucian Perspectives,” 34; Goh, “Meritocracy.” 38 McConville, Exploring, 13–14. 39 Chan, Grassroots, 65. 40  Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 214. 41 Chan, Grassroots, 61. 42  Küng et al., Christianity, 432.

Reading Isaiah in Asia   679 Nationalists, on the other hand, argue that these others are but a ransom for Israel (Isa 43:3–4), that they come to Zion in chains (45:14), licking the dust of her feet and even eating their own flesh (49:23, 26). There is, however, a crucial distinction between these two groups of texts: the nationalistic texts revolve around Zion, whereas the universalistic texts are related to the Servant. I have argued elsewhere that Zion the city is a cognitive metaphor for Zion theology that presents God as the creator of the cosmos and the victorious defender of his people. Thus, the nations come in submission to Zion the city, not to Israel the people; that is, they come in obeisance to the sovereignty of Yhwh, not the superiority of Israel. While the Servant extends Yhwh’s salvation to the nations, Zion affirms Yhwh’s sovereignty over the nations.43 Though this removes the nationalistic issue, Yhwh’s sovereignty still poses problems in a multiracial and multireligious society. In Singapore, there is much emphasis on interreligious dialogue. The goal is not to uncover theological commonalities and downplay the distinctive teachings of each religion but to work together in areas of overlapping concerns for the good of the society.44 How does Isaiah contribute to a universal ethics and to a communication of a biblical monotheistic faith? The Isaianic Servant, representing God’s faithful people, is to establish justice among the nations (Isa 42:1). Such universalism actually goes beyond the Confucian value of familial relationships: Küng notes that Confucius had no reservations about the domination of the Chinese over the barbarian tribes, and Martin Lu writes, more critically, that many Chinese restrict their love only to family and, possibly, friends. Küng contrasts this with the Christian teaching that every human being can become my neighbor, thus overcoming social, religious, and racial boundaries. This love is extended even to the enemy, and he attributes this to the theocentric biblical faith as opposed to Confucian anthropocentrism.45 My student Evangeline Khoo points out that within the Oracles Against the Nations in Isa 13–27, former enemies, such as Egypt and Assyria, are blessed (Isa 19:18–25), showing that both Israel and foreign nations are accepted by grace. The grand eschatological vision in Isa 2:2­–4 is of nations streaming eagerly to Zion to learn God’s way and to abandon war. Nonetheless, Zion still stands out like a sore thumb with the claim that Yhwh is the only cosmic king. How can this exclusive claim be communicated universally? Deutero-Isaiah asserts his message, not by military might, triumphalistic behavior, or even loud insistence, but through the model of the Suffering Servant in Isa 52:13–53:12. The Servant’s message of judgment on Babylon at the hands of the Persian would be political treason, while his critique of his own Israelites would be socially offensive.46 However, the Suffering One was willing to pay the price for ministering to “many”—a group that includes his own people (53:8) as well as other nations (52:15). The Servant preached an unpopular message humbly and sacrificially for the good of the community, whether composed of the same or different peoples and faiths. It is not a 43 Low, Mother Zion, 149. 44  Leow, “Inter-Religious Dialogue,” 4­–5. 45  Küng and Ching, Christianity and Chinese Religions, 118–119; Lu, Confucianism, 92. 46 Goldingay, Theology, 70–71.

680   Maggie Low way of weakness, because he has been empowered by the Spirit to carry out his mission (Isa 61:1). In the New Testament, this mission was fulfilled by Christ and continued by his church. So, while we are to preach respectfully and boldly (as opposed to arrogantly), the Singaporean church also needs to serve our diverse communities sacrificially. New converts who face parental opposition are exhorted to be even more filial sons or daughters, and many family members have been won by such testimonies. Küng compares the icon of the crucified Christ with that of the smiling Buddha. If the Buddha sought to transcend suffering, Christ, as the fulfillment of the Suffering Servant, embraced it instead.47 Thus the universal God is one who offers his immanent embrace to all, especially to those who suffer. Likewise, Asian and Singaporean servants of the holy God are to serve all peoples in humility and righteousness, both men and women in equal partnership, as children of a gracious Father.

Bibliography Cao, Shengjie. “My Reflections as a Senior Woman Church Minister.” In Courage, Collaboration, and the Common Good: Reflections by Asian Women Theologians, edited by Maggie Low, 12–20. CSCA Occasional Paper Series 11. Singapore: Trinity Theological College, 2014. Chan, Simon. Grassroots Asian Theology: Thinking the Faith from the Ground Up. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2014. Clammer, John R., ed. Studies in Chinese Folk Religion in Singapore and Malaysia. Singapore: Institute for the Study of Religions and Society, 1983. Darr, Katherine Pfisterer. Isaiah’s Vision and the Family of God. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1994. Exum, J. Cheryl, and Stephen D. Moore. “Biblical Studies/Cultural Studies.” In Biblical Studies/ Cultural Studies: The Third Sheffield Colloquium, edited by J.  Cheryl Exum and Stephen D. Moore, 19–45. JSOTS 266 / Gender, Culture, Theory 7. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1998. Goldingay, John. The Theology of the Book of Isaiah. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2014. Goh, Chin Lian. “Meritocracy Works but Beware of Elitism: ESM Goh.” Straits Times, July 27, 2013. Accessed June 25, 2017. http://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/meritocracy-worksbut-beware-of-elitism-esm-goh. Jian, Haijun. “A Textual Interpretation of the Word ‘Yi’ in The Analects.” JLH 3 (2011). http:// www.ica.org.cn/nlb.content_304_4426.html. Accessed May 11, 2017. Kang, Nam-Soon. “Creating ‘Dangerous Memory.’ ” Ecumenical Review 47, no. 1 (1995): 21–31. Küng, Hans, and Julia Ching. Christianity and Chinese Religions. New York: Doubleday, 1989. Küng, Hans, Josef van Ess, Heinrich von Stietencron, and Heinz Bechert. Christianity and the World Religions: Paths of Dialogue with Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. London: SCM, 19932. Lebang, Henriette Hutabarat. “Living Together in the Household of God.” In Courage, Collaboration, and the Common Good: Reflections by Asian Women Theologians, CSCA Occasional Paper Series 11, edited by Maggie Low, 25–36. Singapore: Trinity Theological College, 2014. Lee, Young Jung. The Trinity in Asian Perspective. Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1996. 47  Küng et al., Christianity, 435–437.

Reading Isaiah in Asia   681 Leow, Theng Huat. “Inter-Religious Dialogue: Compromise of Faith or Expression of Conviction?” Trumpet: Views and News from Trinity Theological College, December 2016, 4–5. Low, Maggie. “Introduction: Courage and Collaboration for the Common Good.” In Courage, Collaboration, and the Common Good: Reflections by Asian Women Theologians. CSCA Occasional Paper Series 11, edited by Maggie Low, 1–9. Singapore: Trinity Theological College, 2014. Low, Maggie. Mother Zion in Deutero-Isaiah: A Metaphor for Zion Theology. StBibLit 155. New York: Peter Lang, 2013. Low, Maggie . “Women in Ministry: An Interview with Theological and Sociological Perspectives.” Church and Society in Asia Today 15 (2012): 45–58. Lu, Martin. Confucianism: Its Relevance to Modern Society. Singapore: Federal Publications, 1982. McConville, Gordon. Exploring the Old Testament. Vol. 4, The Prophets. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2002. Nosco, Peter. “Confucian Perspectives on Civil Society and Government.” In Confucian Political Ethics, edited by Daniel A. Bell, 20–45. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008. Roberts, J. J. M. “Isaiah in Old Testament Theology.” Int 36 (1982): 130–143. Shaffer, Kay, and Song Xianlin. “Unruly Spaces: Gender, Women’s Writing and Indigenous Feminism in China.” JGS 16 (2007): 17–30. Saw, Swee-Hock. The Population of Singapore. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2012. Tu, Wei-Ming. Centrality and Commonality: An Essay on Confucian Religiousness. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989. Tan, Charlene. “ ‘Our Shared Values’ in Singapore: A Confucian Perspective.” Educational Theory 62 (2012): 449–463. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1741-5446.2012.00456.x. Accessed December 26, 2017. Yao, Xinzhong. An Introduction to Confucianism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

Author Index

Abalodo, S.  134, 139 Abegg, M. G.  439, 445 Aberbach, M.  471, 488 Abernethy, A. T.  73, 74, 295, 313, 338, 340, 345, 349 Abma, R.  602, 604, 606, 615 Abogunrin, S. O.  656, 668 Abraham, K.  295, 313 Achenbach, R.  625, 632 Ackerman, S.  256, 262, 604, 608–11, 615 Ackroyd, P. R.  24, 25, 27, 33, 35, 42, 51, 95, 100, 104, 108, 313, 395, 405, 565, 572 Adamo, D. T.  657, 668 Ahn, J.  69, 74, 219, 220, 244, 245 Albani, M.  226, 229–31, 235–39, 243, 245 Albertz, R.  38, 44, 52, 67, 75, 111, 114, 125, 178, 179, 194, 226, 245, 302, 314, 561, 572, 621, 625, 633 Albrektson, B.  229, 245 Alexander, J. C.  626, 633 Alexander, P. S.  444, 445, 472, 473, 482, 485 Alobaidi, J.  518, 525 Alonso Schökel, L.  386, 389, 391 Alter, R.  41, 52, 217, 218, 378, 383, 391, 394, 405 Amzallag, N.  68, 75 Anderson, G. A.  259, 260, 262, 521, 525 Anderson, J. E.  95, 100, 108 Anderson, R. T.  335, 349 Anderssén-Löf, M.  515, 525 Andinach, P. R.  640, 652 Anum, E.  666, 669 Aptowitzer, V.  482, 486 Argall, R. A.  522, 525 Arnold, B. T.  354, 355, 365, 371 Arubas, B.  158 Ashcroft, B.  622, 633 Assmann, J.  219, 245 Aster, S. Z.  155, 157, 295, 314

Ateek, N. S.  647, 651 Attwood, B.  623, 633 Auerbach, E.  217, 218 Avrahami, Y.  260, 262 Avriel, M.  68, 75 Bacher, W.  454, 465, 471, 486 Bachmann-Medic, D.  194 Bäckersten, O.  252, 260, 262 Baer, D. A.  458, 465 Bahat, D.  524, 525 Balentine, S.  135, 140 Balogh, C.  69, 75 Baltzer, K.  116, 121, 125, 177, 194, 225, 245 Barker, W. D.  80, 83, 92 Barr, J.  472, 486, 572 Barstad, H.  45, 48, 52, 132, 140, 173, 174, 310, 314 Barth, H.  26, 30, 31, 35, 49, 52, 146, 157 Barthel, J.  23, 24, 35, 50, 52 Barthélemy, D.  436, 445, 470, 486 Barton, J.  20, 35, 41, 52, 71, 75, 90, 92, 259, 260, 262, 336, 349, 560, 572, 649, 651 Basson, A.  415, 416, 422 Baticle, B.  587, 595 Baumann, G.  603–605, 607, 611–13, 615, 650, 651 Bautch, R.  133, 135–37, 140 Beale, G. K.  253, 262 Beaulieu, P.-A.  164, 174, 232–34, 240–42, 245 Bechert, H.  674, 680 Becker, J.  40, 52 Becker, U.  24, 27, 30, 31, 35, 38, 41, 43, 49, 50, 52 Becking, B.  101, 106, 108, 296, 302, 314 Bedford, P. R.  304, 314 Bediako, K.  656, 669 Beek, M. A.  83, 92

684   author index Beentjes, P. C.  508, 514, 525 Begg, C. T.  64, 75, 509, 525 Begrich, J.  338, 349 Behr, J. W.  308, 314 Ben Zvi, E.  177, 178, 185, 194, 195, 356, 371, 395, 399, 405, 631–33 Benisovitch, M. N.  591, 595 Benjamin, D. C.  361, 374 Berger, D.  515, 521, 525, 526 Berger, P.-R.  242, 243, 245 Berges, U.  26, 28, 31, 32, 35, 38, 42, 43, 48, 52, 60, 61, 63, 69, 72, 75, 81, 92, 111, 113, 116, 125, 169, 174, 178, 225, 226, 229, 231, 238, 241, 243, 245, 267, 272, 278, 318, 321, 324, 331, 344, 347, 349, 365, 371, 397, 405, 419, 422, 576, 592, 595, 603, 605, 610, 612, 615, 623, 625, 630, 631, 633 Bergmann, C.  420, 422 Bergmann, S.  648, 651 Berkowits, E.  543, 550, 557 Berlejung, A.  151, 157, 245, 249, 262, 300, 314 Berlin, A.  68, 75, 217, 218, 380, 381, 391, 394, 405 Bernstein, M. J.  472, 486 Berquist, J. L.  182, 186, 195, 623, 633 Bertholet, A.  219, 234, 245 Beuken, W. A. M.  24, 30, 35, 44, 48, 52, 53, 60–63, 65, 68, 71, 75, 82, 84, 91, 93, 121, 125, 342, 344, 349, 360, 367, 371, 405 Bhabha, H. K.  185, 186, 195 Bickerman, E.  163, 174 Biddle, M. E.  89, 93, 421, 423, 602, 615 Bingemer, M. C. L.  644, 651 Biruni, M. i. A.  576, 595 Black, J.  228, 229, 240, 245, 361, 371 Blakely, J. A.  149, 157 Blanchot, M.  398, 405 Blank, S. H.  331 Blasing, M. K.  394, 405 Blenkinsopp, J.  63, 75, 81, 84, 86, 88, 89, 93, 112, 121, 125, 138, 140, 162, 168, 170, 173, 174, 177, 179, 182, 184, 187, 189, 191, 192, 195, 205, 212, 218, 256, 262, 301, 302, 309, 310, 314, 323, 324, 326, 327, 331, 338, 349, 361, 362, 371, 379, 391, 435, 445, 446, 514, 526, 623, 631, 633 Blum, E.  332 Blumenthal, D. R.  543, 557

Boadt, L.  63, 75 Böckler, A.  136, 140 Boda, M. J.  135, 136, 140, 250, 260, 262, 606, 615 Boer, R.  74, 75 Boff, C.  646, 651 Boff, L.  639, 648, 649, 651 Bogaert, P.-M.  457, 465 Bolin, T. M.  625, 633 Bonnard, P. E.  205, 218 Booth, R. P.  533, 540 Booth, W. C.  355, 371 Bordjadze, K. V.  359, 371 Borger, R.  230, 245 Bornhäuser, H.  524, 526 Bosman, H. J.  87, 93 Bostock, D.  104, 108 Botte, B.  457, 465 Boyce, M.  187, 195 Braiterman, Z.  543, 557 Breed, B. W.  192, 195 Brenner, A.  399, 405, 604, 605, 608, 610, 612, 614, 615 Brett, M. G.  560, 572, 623, 630, 633 Brettler, M. Z.  414, 418–20, 423 Briant, P.  164, 170, 174 Bridgeman, V.  609, 612, 614–16, 650, 651 Brinkman, J. A.  150, 157 Bronner, L. L.  612, 616 Brooke, G. J.  429, 432, 437, 441, 443, 445, 446 Brosius, M.  184, 195 Brown, D.  494, 495, 499, 503 Brown, W. P.  217, 218 Brownlee, W. H.  433, 436, 438, 446, 447 Brueggemann, W.  202, 218, 358, 367, 371 Brun, T.  638, 651 Buber, M.  543, 557 Budde, K.  332 Burckhardt, J.  576, 595 Burrows, M.  432, 447 Butt, J.  593, 595 Byron, G. G.  157 Byun, S. L.  452, 458, 465 Calvin, J.  595 Cao, S.  674, 680 Carr, D. M.  100, 396–98, 405

author index   685 Carroll, R. P.  393, 399, 404–406 Carvahlo, C.  616 Caviness, M. H.  577, 595 Chae, M. K.  65, 75 Chan, M.  622, 633, 636 Chan, S.  671, 672, 675, 676, 678, 680 Chapman, C. R.  602–604, 608, 616 Charles, N. J.  649, 651 Chavel, C.  515, 520, 526 Chazan, R.  518, 520, 526 Childs, B. S.  41, 53, 60, 76, 97, 101, 108, 111, 112, 114, 125, 168, 174, 277, 278, 339, 340, 349, 490, 496, 497, 503, 563, 565, 566, 568, 572 Chilton, B. D.  470, 471, 473, 478, 486, 540 Ching, J.  671, 673, 674, 676–80 Cho Kang-Pul, P.  80, 93 Christensen, D. L.  66, 76 Churgin, P.  470, 486 Claassens, L. J. M.  612–14, 616 Clammer, J. R.  676, 680 Clark, E. A.  179, 195 Clements, R. E.  42, 49, 53, 60, 76, 86, 89, 90, 93, 97, 101, 104, 108, 165, 168, 174, 294, 314, 332, 340, 349, 363, 365, 367, 369, 371, 395, 397, 406, 561, 566, 572 Clifford, C. J.  116, 122, 123, 125 Clines, D. J. A.  332 Codina, V.  644, 651 Cogan, M.  303, 314 Cohen, M. E.  237, 245 Cohen, J.  520, 526 Cohen, S. J. D.  72, 76 Colacrai, A.  658–60, 663–67 Collins, J. J.  61, 76, 82, 90, 93, 191, 195, 514, 526 Collins, T.  379, 382, 391 Cone, J. H.  642, 643, 651 Conrad, E. W.  24, 33, 35, 43, 53, 70, 76, 353, 371, 566, 571, 572 Conroy, C.  332 Cook, E. M.  472, 486 Cook, G.  355, 371 Cook, J.  439, 447 Cook, P. M.  60, 61, 76 Coste, J.  458, 466 Couey, J. B.  114, 115, 119, 120, 125, 378–81, 383, 385, 387, 391, 394, 406 Cowan, J.  581, 595

Craffert, P. F.  395, 406 Crenshaw, J. L.  249, 262 Croatto, J. S.  72, 76, 210, 218, 397, 406 Crosman, I.  355, 373 Cross, F.  225, 245 Crouch, C. L.  68, 76, 149, 150, 153–55, 157, 189, 195 Cuellar, G. L.  646, 651 Culler, J.  355, 371 Cunningham, G.  371 Daley, B. E.  464, 466 Dalley, S.  149, 157 Dandamaev, M. A.  170, 174 Darr, K. P.  250, 262, 340, 349, 399, 406, 412, 419–23, 603, 604, 607–10, 613, 614, 616, 672, 675, 680 Davidson, S. V.  69, 70, 76, 631–33 Davies, A.  252, 262, 593, 595 Davies, G.  66, 67, 76, 182 Davies, P. R.  187, 190, 195 Dawidowicz, L. S.  553, 557 Day, J.  92, 93 Day, P. L.  602, 612, 616 De Montfaucon, B.  454, 466 De Souza, R. F.  458 De Vries, S. J.  360, 371 Deane-Drummond, C.  649, 651 Dekker, J.  266, 267, 278, 522, 526 Dempsey, C. J.  650, 651 DeRoche, M.  170, 174 Detweiler, R.  355, 371 DeWald, E. T.  590, 595 Dick, M. B.  170, 171, 174 Diez Macho, A.  472, 486 Diez Merino, L.  471, 486 DiFransico, L. R.  259, 260, 262 Dijkdtra, M.  338, 349 Dijk-Hemmes, F. van  603, 610, 613, 616 Dille, S. J.  414, 419–21, 423, 602, 604, 606, 611–14, 616 Dines, J. M.  460, 466 Dion, P. E.  97, 108 Dobbs-Allsopp, F. W.  115, 117, 120, 122, 125, 378–83, 385, 389, 391, 394, 396, 406, 602, 616 Dodwell, C. R.  590, 595 Donaldson, T. L.  515, 526

686   author index Donner, H.  241 Dorival, G.  457, 466 Dow, L. K. D.  268, 278 Dowling Long, S.  591, 595 Doyle, B.  89, 93, 412, 418, 421–23 Driver, S.  517, 520, 528 Duhm, B.  39, 40, 53, 85, 86, 93, 112, 125, 128, 130, 140, 162, 174, 314, 319, 320, 331 Durkheim, E.  356, 371 Dykesteen Nilsen, T.  170, 174 Dykstra, N. N.  433 Eck, J.  51, 53 Edelman, D. V.  178, 195 Ehring, C.  229, 230, 239, 245 Eichhorn, J. G.  39, 53 Eichrodt, W.  249, 260, 262 Eidevall, G.  185, 186, 195, 251, 262, 314, 410, 412–14, 418, 421, 423 Ekblad, E. R.  458, 466 Elbogen, I.  526 Elliger, K.  225, 227, 245 Emmerson, G. I.  121, 126 Eph’al, I.  300, 308, 314 Erlandsson, S.  63, 65, 76 Ertz, K.  589, 595 Ess, J. van  674, 676–78, 680 Estrada, J. A.  644, 651 Ettlinger, H. S.  579, 595 Ettlinger, L. D.  579, 595 Euler, K. F.  466 Evans, J.  236 Evans, P. S.  97, 100, 108, 109, 236, 396, 406 Exum, J. C.  252, 262, 414, 423, 608, 616, 670, 680 Fackenheim, E.  543, 557 Fales, F. M.  295, 296, 300, 315 Faust, A.  149, 157 Fekkes, J.  352, 371, 538, 540 Feldman, L. H.  509, 514, 526 Fensham, F. C.  251, 262 Fernández Marcos, N.  453 Ferry, J.  395, 397, 406 Fichtner, J.  335, 337, 339, 343, 349 Fields, W. W.  433, 447 Finkelstein, I.  303, 315

Fisch, H.  397, 406 Fischer, A.  472, 488 Fischer, I.  604, 609, 612, 613, 616, 650 Fischer, J.  457, 466 Fishbane, M.  33, 35, 525, 526, 542, 546, 555, 557, 561, 572 Fitzpatrick-McKinley, A.  183, 193, 196, 217, 633 Flesher, L. S.  605–607, 616 Flesher, P.  471, 486 Flint, P.  433–35, 437, 439, 445, 447, 449 Floyd, M. H.  400, 406, 612, 616 Flusser, D.  441, 447 Föhrer, G.  397, 406 Follis, E. R.  602, 616 Forster, E. M.  217, 218 Foster, B. R.  229, 237, 245 Fowler, R. M.  355, 372 Fraade, S. D.  470, 472, 486 Frahm, E.  240, 245 France, R. T.  533, 540 Franke, C.  412–14, 417, 422, 423 Franzmann, M.  607, 617 Frennesson, B.  523, 526 Fretheim, T.  202, 218 Fried, L. S.  181, 196 Friedländer, M.  509, 515, 518, 526 Froehlich, K.  218 Frye, N.  395, 406 Frymer-Kensky, T.  415–17, 423, 602–604, 613, 617 Fu, J.  80, 93 Fuchs, A.  297, 315 Fuchs, E.  610, 617 Gadd, C. J.  297, 315 Gadot, Y.  158 Gafney, W. C.  607, 611, 614, 617 Garber, Z.  543, 557 García Martínez, F.  245, 443, 447 Gärtner, J.  136, 137, 140, 261, 262 Gates-Foster, J.  180, 196 Geller, S. A.  378, 379, 391 Gemeinhardt, P.  455, 468, 508, 530 Gershevitch, I.  170, 174 Gesenius, W.  100, 109 Geyer, J. B.  66, 69, 71, 76

author index   687 Gignilliat, M. S.  561, 572 Gilbert, M.  553, 557 Gill, A.  576, 595 Ginsberg, H. I.  166, 174 Ginzberg, L.  507, 526 Gitay, Y.  411, 423 Goh, C. L.  680 Goitein, S. D.  603, 617 Goldhagen, D.  547, 557 Goldingay, J.  71, 76, 114–16, 119, 122, 126, 265, 269, 273, 276, 278, 327, 331, 346, 349, 561, 568, 571, 572, 611, 676, 679, 680 Gonçalves, F. J.  97, 109 González Luis, J.  454, 466 Gordon, P.  607, 608, 617 Gordon, R.  470, 486 Goshen-Gottstein, M.  471, 487 Gosse, B.  33, 35, 516, 526 Gowan, D. E.  354, 363, 365, 367, 368, 372 Grabbe, L. L.  184, 196 Gratz, H.  83, 93 Grätz, S.  322, 331, 625, 633 Gravett, S.  601, 602, 617 Gray, J.  361, 372 Gray, M.  561, 572 Graybill, R.  650, 651 Green, D.  434, 437, 447 Grenet, F.  187, 195 Gressmann, H.  352, 372 Grimes, R. L.  402, 406 Grol, H. W. M. van  87, 93 Grosse, B.  344, 349 Grossfeld, B.  472, 487 Gruber, M. I.  121, 126, 414, 423, 611, 613, 617 Gruen, E.  184, 185, 196 Guiora, A. N.  547, 557 Gutierrez, G.  637, 641, 642, 651 Haag, H.  170, 174, 332 Hachibamba, S.  666, 669 Hackett, J. A.  610, 617 Hagedorn, A. C.  66, 76, 622, 633 Hägglund, F.  255, 262, 333, 630, 633 Halbwachs, M.  356, 372 Hall, R. G.  512, 526 Halperin, D. J.  521, 526 Halvorson-Taylor, M.  302, 311, 312, 315, 398, 406

Hamborg, G. R.  60, 68, 70, 76, 258, 263, 342, 349 Hanhart, R.  466 Hanson, P.  89, 93, 126, 139, 140, 521, 527 Haran, M.  310, 315 Hardin, J. W.  149, 157 Harding, J. E.  436, 447 Hardmeier, C.  97, 109 Harl, M.  457, 466 Hartmann, B.  219, 235, 246 Hasan-Rokem, G.  402, 406 Hasel, G. F.  367, 372 Häusl, M.  514, 527 Hayes, E. R.  415, 423 Hayes, J.  66, 76, 83, 93, 165, 175, 267, 269, 278 Hayes, K. M.  253, 263 Hays, C. B.  70, 76, 83, 93, 118, 120, 126, 149, 151, 156–58, 361, 372, 622, 624, 634 Hays, R. B.  535, 540 Heaton, E. W.  298, 315 Heffelfinger, K. M.  115, 116, 119, 122, 123, 126, 389–91 Heidel, A.  171, 175 Heinemann, J.  523 Heiser, M. S.  361, 372 Hendel, R. S.  90, 93 Henry, M.-I.  83, 86, 88, 93 Hermisson, H.-J.  40, 47, 53, 112, 114, 126, 229, 243, 246, 336, 349 Heschel, A.  215, 218 Heskett, R.  292 Hess, R. S.  97, 109 Hibbard, J. T.  90, 92, 94 Hiers, R. H.  358, 372 Høgenhaven, J.  434, 439, 447 Höffken, P.  41, 53, 129, 140 Holladay, J. S., Jr.  149, 158 Holt, E. K.  264 Holter, K.  656, 657, 666, 669 Horbury, W.  460, 466 Horgan, M. P.  441, 442, 447 Hornung, E.  219 Horowitz, W.  236, 246 Hossfeld, F. L.  239 Houghton, H. A. G.  490, 503 Houston, W.  156, 158 Houtman, A.  471, 472, 487

688   author index Howells, R.  359, 372 Hugenberger, G. P.  327, 331 Hughes, J. A.  441, 442, 447 Hunger, H.  246 Hutter, M.  229, 235, 246, 522, 527 Hyman, A.  507, 521, 527 Irudayaraj, D. S.  359, 372 Irvine, S. A.  83, 93, 165 Iser, W.  340, 349, 355, 372 Jang, S.  104, 109 Janowski, B.  255, 263, 264, 561, 572 Japhet, S.  106, 107, 624, 634 Jassen, A. P.  440, 447 Jay, P.  494, 503 Jellicoe, S.  457, 466 Jenkins, A. K.  61, 76 Jenkins, P.  657, 669 Jenner, K. D.  367, 372 Jenni, E.  353, 367, 372 Jensen, J.  336, 341, 342, 349, 522, 527 Jeremias, J.  319, 331, 515, 527 Jian, H.  677, 680 Joachimsen, K.  333 Jobes, K. H.  456, 457, 466 Johnson, D. G.  84, 87, 89, 94 Johnson, E. A.  648, 651 Johnson, M.  613, 617 Johnson, R. B.  645, 651 Johnston, P. S.  72, 77, 361, 372 Jong, M. J. de  49, 50, 53, 146, 158, 295, 315 Junior, N.  614, 617 Jursa, M.  295, 315 Justnes, Å.  192, 196 Kahl, W.  666, 669 Kahle, P.  438, 447, 471, 487 Kaiser, O.  39, 43, 53, 72, 77, 85, 94, 246, 324, 327, 331, 362, 372 Kamesar, A.  510, 527 Kang, N.-S.  674, 680 Kapelrud, A. S.  122, 124, 126 Karrer, M.  453, 467 Kasher, R.  471, 487 Katz, S. T.  543, 557 Kaufman, S. A.  471, 487

Keel, O.  221, 238, 246 Kent, R. G.  625, 634 Kermode, F.  41, 52 Kessler, J.  628, 634 Kessler, R.  320, 323, 331 Kessler, W.  89, 94 Kieffer, R.  494, 503 Kim, H. C. P.  62–66, 69, 77, 94, 264, 367, 372, 404, 406 Kinyua, J. K.  666, 669 Kirk-Duggan, C.  605, 609, 614, 617 Kirschbaum, E.  579, 595, 605 Kittel, R.  231, 246, 308, 315 Klawans, J.  264 Kleger, R.  91, 94 Klein, A.  48, 53, 106, 227 Klein, R. W.  109 Kling, A.  623, 636 Knibb, M. A.  512, 527, 578, 595 Knierim, R.  250, 258, 263 Knight, J.  441, 447, 512, 527 Körting, C.  268, 278 Koch, K.  224, 225, 227, 239, 246, 260, 263 Koenen, K.  367, 372 Koenig, J.  458, 466 Kofoed, J. B.  622, 634 Kooij, A. van der  88, 94, 430, 447, 458, 466, 470, 487, 514, 527, 656, 669 Koole, J. L.  308, 309, 315, 344, 349 Koonthanam, G.  645, 651 Korpel, M. C. A.  338, 349, 424, 439, 447, 604, 617 Koskenniemi, E.  517, 527 Kövecses, Z.  410, 424 Kozuh, M.  184, 196 Kraemer, R. S.  609 Krašovec, J.  260, 263, 264 Kratz, R. G.  20, 35, 46, 47, 49, 50, 53, 184, 187, 188, 190, 196, 223, 227, 241, 246, 435, 447, 621, 634 Kraus, W.  453, 467 Krebs, W.  523, 527 Kreuch, J.  222, 246 Kristeva, J.  400, 406 Kronholm, T.  510, 527 Kugel, J. L.  394, 407 Kuhrt, A.  164, 175, 182–84, 196

author index   689 Küng, H.  671, 673, 674, 676–80 Kureethadam, J. I.  649, 652 Kustár, Z.  324, 331 Kutscher, E. Y.  433, 438, 448, 471, 487 Kvanvig, H. S.  522, 527 Kynes, W.  337, 339, 340, 349, 350 Laato, A.  267, 278, 322, 331, 333, 492, 499, 503, 510, 511, 514, 517, 518, 527, 528 Laberge, L.  467 Labouvie, S.  333 Labuschagne, C. J.  223, 246 LaCapra, D.  398, 407 Lack, R.  395, 407, 411, 424 Lakoff, G.  415, 424, 613, 617 Lam, J.  259, 263 Lambert, W. G.  234–36, 246 Lambert-Zielinski, H.  239 Landsberger, B.  219, 246 Landy, F.  302, 312, 315, 333, 362, 372, 399, 407, 411, 424, 543, 557, 610–12, 618 Lange, A.  431, 437, 448, 507, 528 Langer, G.  518, 528 Lanier, G.  453 Lapsley, J. E.  419, 424, 603, 612, 614, 618 Lawson, J. N.  228–30, 246 Le Boulluec, A.  453, 457, 458, 464, 467 Le Déaut, R.  472, 487 Le Moigne, P.  453, 457, 458, 464, 467 Lebang, H. H.  674, 680 Leclerc, T. L.  292 Lee, A. C. C.  622, 633, 634 Lee, J.  61, 66, 68, 77 Lee, L.  584, 586, 595, 610 Lee, L.  77 Lee, N. C.  618 Lee, Y. L.  680 Leene, H.  320, 331, 333 Leichty, E.  148, 158 Lemos, T. M.  622, 634 Léonas, A.  467 Leow, T. H.  679, 681 Lessing, R. R.  59, 60, 77 Lester, G.  514, 528 Levenson, J. D.  359, 372 Levin, E.  487 Levine, B.  155, 158, 474, 480

Levtow, N. B.  254, 263 Lewis, T. J.  361, 362, 364, 372 Lewy, J.  232, 246 Liebmann, E.  467, 622, 634 Liebrich, L.  395, 407 Lim, T. H.  436, 448 Linafelt, T.  124, 126, 557 Lindbeck, G. A.  571, 572 Lindblom, J.  83, 86, 88, 94, 335, 350, 353, 355, 372 Lindström, F.  264 Linville, J. R.  177–79, 194, 196, 315 Lipschits, O.  149, 158, 303, 315 Liss, H.  395, 398, 407 Livingstone, A.  230, 247 Løland, H.  402, 407, 413, 420, 424, 611–13, 618 Longman, T., III  247 Loretz, O.  628, 634 Louw, T. A. W. van der  467 Low, M.  267, 275, 278, 422, 424, 604, 618, 675, 679, 681 Lowth, R.  39, 53, 576, 595 Lozano, G.  645, 652 Lu, M.  679, 681 Luckenbill, D. D.  165, 168, 175 Lumbala, F. K.  647, 652 Lund, Ø.  370, 372, 411, 424 Lundgren, S.  515, 528 Lux, R.  132, 140 Maccoby, H.  520, 528 MacDonald, N.  190, 196 Machinist, P.  152, 155, 158, 196, 295, 315 Magdalene, F. R.  607, 609, 618 Magness, J.  444, 448 Maier, C. M.  279, 421, 424, 602–605, 607, 608, 610, 612, 618 Mailloux, S.  355, 373 Mallen, P.  540 Mamdani, M.  632, 634 Mandolfo, C. R.  601, 604–607, 612, 618, 629, 634 Mann, J.  518, 528 Marcus, J.  521, 528 Margoni-Kögler, M.  500, 503 Marlow, H.  649, 652 Marrow, J. H.  586, 595

690   author index Martey, E.  666, 669 Martin, J.  589, 596 Martin-Achard, R.  335, 350 Marzouk, S.  68, 77 Mathews McGinnis, C.  54, 114, 126 Mathewson, D.  352, 373, 539, 540 Matthews, V. H.  361 Matty, N. K.  96, 109 Mbiti, J. S.  666, 669 McConville, G.  678, 681 McEntire, M.  117, 126 McEvenue, S. E.  610, 611, 618 McFague, S.  202, 218 McGinnis, C. M.  318, 332 McGrath, A. E.  353, 373 McKane, W.  107, 109, 335, 340, 343, 350 McKinlay, J. E.  414, 421, 424, 603–605, 618 McLaughlin, J. L.  261, 263 Mearns, J.  577, 595 Meer, M. N. van der  458, 459, 467 Mein, A.  264 Melugin, R. F.  41, 42, 54, 59, 77, 104, 109, 111, 115, 116, 119–21, 126, 409, 412, 424, 571, 573 Melville, S. C.  150, 158 Menken, M. J. J.  461, 467, 540 Merendino, R. P.  605, 606, 618 Metso, S.  444, 448 Mettinger, T. N. D.  111–13, 126, 204, 218, 320, 332, 419, 420, 424 Meyer, I.  325, 332 Meyers, C.  609, 611, 612, 618 Mezenthin, C.  514, 528 Middleton, R. J.  364, 366, 369, 373 Migne, J.-P.  464 Miles, J.  214, 215, 218, 608, 609, 618 Milik, J. T.  434, 448 Millar, W. R.  84, 87, 89, 94 Miller, J. H.  393, 407 Miller, M. P.  444, 448 Miller, P. D.  261, 263 Miscall, P. D.  43, 54 Mizrahi, N.  434, 435, 448 Moffatt, J.  593, 596 Moon, C. H.  647, 652 Moore, A.  418, 419, 424 Moore, S. D.  631, 634, 670, 680 Moracchini-Mazel, G.  589, 596

More, T.  356, 373 Morgan, D. F.  336–41, 350 Morgan, M. L.  543, 557 Morgan-Guy, J.  596 Moser, C.  39, 54, 128, 140 Moughtin-Mumby, S.  123, 126, 399, 402, 407, 602, 604, 607, 608, 618 Mouw, R. J.  352, 373 Mowinckel, S.  310, 316, 352, 354, 373 Moyise, S.  467, 540 Mugambi, J. N. K.  666, 669 Muilenburg, J.  122, 126, 338, 350, 364, 373, 411 Müller, R.  223, 247 Munnich, O.  457, 466, 467 Murphy-O’Connor, J.  444, 448 Murray, R.  649, 652 Na’aman, N.  71, 77 Nash, J. A.  648, 652 Nestor, D.  648, 652 Neubauer, A.  517, 520, 528 Neusner, J.  470, 487, 507, 510, 515, 525, 528, 529 Neves, J. C. das  458, 467 Newsom, C.  606, 618 Ngunga, A. T.  451–53, 460, 461, 467 Nickelsburg, G. W. E.  91, 94, 354, 358, 373 Nielsen, K.  412, 415, 418, 424 Nilsen, T. D.  187, 189, 197 Niskanen, P.  420, 424 Nogalski, J. D.  359, 373, 399, 405, 407 Nosco, P.  678, 681 Nzimande, M. K.  605, 608, 609, 614, 618 O’Brien, J. M.  204, 215, 217, 602, 603, 609, 619 O’Connell, R. H.  395, 407 O’Connor, K. M.  604, 606, 610, 619 O’Connor, M. P.  122, 126, 378, 379, 384 Oded, B.  153, 154, 156, 158, 295, 298, 300, 316 Oeming, M.  41, 54, 158 Oesch, J. M.  439, 447 Oh, A. S.-h.  364, 366, 368, 373 O’Kane, M.  583, 596 Olley, J. W.  250, 263, 451, 467 Olukoya, D. K.  661, 662, 669 Olyan, S. M.  190, 197 O’Malley, T. P.  503 Oorschodt, J. van  47, 54

author index   691 Oppenheim, A. L.  154, 158, 228, 241, 242, 247 Ortlund, E.  339, 346, 350 Osswald, E.  563, 573 Oswalt, J. N.  83, 94, 344, 350, 510, 529 Ottley, J. W.  452–54, 457, 467 Otto, E.  267, 278, 324, 332 Otzen, B.  88, 94 Paganini, S.  605, 606, 619 Page, H. R.  522, 529 Pantoja, J. M.  418, 425 Paradies, Y. C.  632, 634 Park, S.-M. S.  104, 107, 109 Parpola, S.  235, 242, 247 Parry, D. W.  433, 448 Patmore, H. M.  521, 529 Paton-Williams, D.  368, 374 Patrick, D.  202, 218 Pau, D. W.  538, 540 Paul, S. M.  308–10, 316 Payne, D.  114–16, 119, 122, 126, 327, 611 Pearce, L. E.  295, 300, 316 Pearson, B. W. R.  467 Peels, H. G. L.  63, 71, 77 Perdue, L. G.  181, 197 Perrot, C.  444, 448 Person, R. F., Jr.  101, 109 Petersen, D. L.  353–55, 368, 373 Petersen, N. R.  355, 373 Pfeiffer, R. H.  337, 350 Philip, T.  613, 619 Philonenko, M.  441, 448 Pingree, D.  228, 246, 247 Pixley, G. V.  646, 651, 652 Plöger, O.  84–86, 89, 94 Polaski, D.  84, 90, 92, 94 Pongratz-Leisten, B.  228, 229, 247 Popović, M.  430 Porter, S. E.  467 Porton, G. G.  510, 513, 529 Postgate, J. N.  295, 296, 300, 315 Poulsen, F.  266, 268, 272, 273, 276, 278, 302, 311, 313, 316 Pregla, A.-R.  41, 54 Preuß, H. D.  226, 227, 229, 247 Procksch, O.  85, 94 Puech, É.  91, 94

Puelo, M.  638, 652 Pui-Lan, K.  644, 652 Qimron, E.  433, 448 Quinn-Miscall, P. D.  177, 197 Raabe, P. R.  72, 77 Rabin, C.  472, 487 Rad, G. von  266, 278, 340, 350 Rahlfs, A.  452 Ramantswana, H.  627, 634 Raphael, M.  543, 557 Ravitzky, A.  515, 529 Redditt, P. L.  89, 94 Rediger Schulte, L.  549, 557 Rendtorff, R.  42, 54, 118, 125, 126, 210, 218, 395, 407, 561, 566, 568, 572, 573 Resseguie, J. L.  355, 373 Reventlow, H. G.  40, 54 Ribera Florit, J.  487 Richard, P.  644, 652 Ricoeur, P.  560, 573 Rivera-Pagan, L. N.  647, 652 Rizvi, U.  622, 634 Roberts, J. J. M.  20, 23, 35, 40, 54, 83, 94, 101, 109, 250, 260, 263, 388, 391, 676, 677, 681 Robson, E.  371 Rochberg-Halton, F.  228, 237, 247 Rofé, A.  305, 316 Rohland, E.  266, 278 Rom-Shiloni, D.  137, 140, 296, 298, 304–306, 309–11, 316, 628, 634 Root, B.  101, 109 Root, M. C.  625, 634 Rösel, M.  468 Rosendale, G.  629, 634 Rosengård, N.  520, 529 Ross, W. A.  453 Rothstein, D.  513, 529 Rubenstein, R.  543, 557 Rudolph, W.  83, 88, 94 Rüterswörden, U.  425 Ruiz, J.-P.  623, 635 Runesson, A.  515, 529 Ruppert, L.  333 Russell, J.  589, 596 Ruszkowski, L.  326, 332

692   author index Sachar, H. M. A.  553, 558 Safrai, S.  472, 487 Saggs, H. W. F.  153, 158, 171, 173, 175 Said, E. W.  625, 635 Salvesen, A.  468 Samely, A.  20, 21, 35, 469, 487 Sancisi-Weerdenburg, H.  184, 197 Sanders, J. A.  74, 77, 444, 448, 563, 564, 570, 573 Saw, S.-H.  670, 681 Sawyer, D.  613, 614, 619 Sawyer, J. F. A.  1, 113, 127, 333, 490, 500, 503, 578, 580, 587, 591, 595, 596, 604, 610, 611, 619 Scanlin, H.  434, 448 Schäfer, P.  472, 487 Schaper, J.  451–53, 461, 468 Scheuer, B.  254, 258, 261, 263, 367, 373 Schiller, G.  579, 581–83, 585, 586, 596 Schipper, J.  333 Schmid, K.  40, 54, 220, 247, 292, 626, 635 Schmidt, U.  113, 127, 225 Schmidt, W. H.  247 Schmitt, J. J.  413, 421, 425 Scholem, G.  523, 529 Scholl, R.  89, 94 Scholtz, S.  608, 609, 619 Scholz, A.  468 Scholz, S.  640, 652 Schramm, B.  117, 120, 121, 127, 138, 140, 305, 316 Schüle, A.  129, 130, 139–41 Schuele, A.  390, 391 Schultz, R. I.  72, 77, 339, 350 Schulz-Flügel, E.  490, 503 Schwartz, B. J.  624, 635 Schwartz, E.  23, 35 Scott, J. C.  185, 197 Seddon, G.  584, 586, 595 Seeligman, I. L.  452, 454, 457, 458, 468, 514, 529 Segal, J. M.  204, 218 Segovia, F. F.  634 Segundo, J. L.  640, 652 Seifert, E.  604, 607, 619 Seitz, C. R.  22, 35, 42, 45, 62, 63, 65, 77, 97, 100–102, 104, 109, 116, 127, 149, 158, 225, 247, 279, 310, 313, 316, 333, 342, 350

Setel, D. T.  399, 407, 601, 619 Shaffer, K.  674, 681 Shapira, A.  553, 558 Sheppard, G. T.  146, 147, 158, 348, 350, 561, 571, 573 Sherwood, Y.  608, 619 Silva, M.  452, 453, 456, 457 Simon, U.  509, 529 Skarsaune, O.  510, 529 Skehan, P. W.  434, 448 Skinner, J.  163, 175 Smelik, K. A. D.  97, 100, 101, 104, 109 Smelik, W. F.  471, 472, 488 Smith, Mitzi  614, 619 Smith, Morton  240, 241, 248 Smith, M. S.  190, 197, 266, 278, 361, 373 Smith, P. A.  130, 141 Smith, S.  240, 248 Smolar, L.  471, 488 Sneed, M. R.  340, 350 Sobrino, J.  641, 643, 652 Soden, W. von  240, 248 Soelle, D.  644, 652 Sommer, B. D.  121, 124, 127, 395, 405, 407, 564, 570, 573, Soskice, J. M.  409, 410, 425 Sousa, R. F. de  468, 514, 529 Southwood, K. E.  628, 635 Spans, A.  134, 141 Sperber, A.  488 Sperling, S. D.  472, 487 Spieckermann, H.  255, 263 Spier, J.  578, 579, 591, 596 Spivak, G. C.  631, 635 Staalduine-Sulman, E.  471, 488 Stade, B.  97, 109 Stanley, C. D.  536, 541 Stansell, G.  425 Stausberg, M.  187, 197 Stavrakopolou, F.  628, 635 Steck, O. H.  27, 31, 36, 41, 43, 44, 46, 47, 51, 54, 129, 130, 141, 169, 175, 191, 197, 226, 227, 248, 318, 319, 332, 340, 350, 395, 407, 435, 449, 563, 573, 627, 635 Stenning, J. F.  473, 488 Stephen, F.  584, 586, 595 Stern, E.  150, 158

author index   693 Sternberg, M.  19, 36, 202, 217, 218 Stewart, A. C.  362, 373 Stiebert, J.  251, 263 Stienstra, N.  410, 421, 425 Stietencron, H. von  674, 676–78, 680 Stinespring, W. F.  400, 407 Stökl Ben Ezra, D.  430 Stolz, F.  219, 220, 223, 227, 235, 248 Stone, B. W.  619 Stone, M. E.  521, 525, 604, 605, 611 Strawn, B. A.  627, 635 Stromberg, J.  20, 23, 24, 29, 32, 33, 36, 46, 55, 61, 77, 129, 130, 141, 177, 265, 278, 348, 350, 357, 373, 395, 407, 561, 573, 626, 635 Strong, J. T.  252, 259, 263 Stuhlmacher, P.  255, 263, 461, 468 Stulac, D. J.  562, 573 Stummer, F.  503 Sukenik, E. L.  433, 449 Suleiman, S. R.  355, 373 Sweeney, M. A.  26, 27, 30, 36, 41, 42, 54, 55, 60, 70, 77, 89, 92, 94, 97, 98, 101, 104, 109, 158, 250, 255, 263, 316, 325, 326, 332, 342, 350, 358, 359, 362–68, 373, 418, 425, 542–44, 547, 548, 550–55, 558, 571, 573, 623, 635 Swete, H. B.  452, 457, 460, 462, 463, 468 Sysling, H.  471, 472, 487 Tadmor, H.  153, 158 Tal, A.  471, 472, 488 Talmon, S.  449 Tan, C.  670, 672, 681 Tate, M. E.  111, 127 Taylor, R.  653 Teeter, A.  23, 26, 30, 36 Terrien, S. I.  337, 346, 350 Teugels, L.  525, 529 Thielecke, H.  354, 373 Throntveit, M. A.  106, 107, 109 Tiemeyer, L.-S.  45, 55, 123, 127, 129, 141, 173, 175, 177, 191, 192, 197, 215, 218, 220, 222, 248, 274, 278, 305, 310, 316, 364, 367, 373, 374, 397, 407, 412, 425, 551, 558, 568, 573, 603, 604, 606, 607, 610, 611, 614, 615, 619, 623, 629, 635 Tigchelaar, E. J. C.  433, 443, 447, 449 Tischendorf, K. von  452

Tompkins, J. P.  355, 374 Toorn, K. van der  116, 127, 235, 248, 249, 259, 263 Torrey, C. C.  169, 317, 438, 449 Tov, E.  378, 392, 432, 439, 449, 468 Tremblay, H.  67, 77 Trible, P.  402, 407, 611, 619 Troxel, R. L.  458, 468, 510, 529 Tu, W.-M.  676, 681 Tuan, Y.-F.  361, 374 Tull, P. K.  54, 63, 77, 118, 119, 122, 124, 127, 212, 218, 318, 332, 366, 374, 392, 411, 415, 416, 425, 543, 558 Tull Willey, P.  115, 124, 127, 205, 274, 278, 395, 407, 602, 604–607, 619 Tuplin, C.  627, 635 Turner, M.  415, 424 Turner, M. D.  605, 606, 619 Tzoref, S.  438, 449, 514, 529 Uehlinger, C.  237, 238, 248 Ukpong, J. S.  666, 669 Ulrich, E. C.  433–36, 439, 445, 448, 449 Unterman, J.  367, 374 Van Leeuwen, R. C.  336, 339, 340, 342, 351 Van Seters, J.  38, 55 Vanderhooft, D. S.  175, 226, 229, 240, 295, 317 VanderKam, J. C.  434, 449 Vasholz, R.  352, 374 Venter, P. M.  100, 101, 108 Veracini, L.  622, 630, 635 Vermeylen, J.  41, 43, 55, 84, 89, 94, 336, 337, 351, 359, 374, 395, 407 Victor, M.  374 Vorländer, H.  248 Vorm-Croughs, M. van der  458, 468 Vos, G.  353, 374 Vriezen, T. C.  354, 374 Waerden, B. L. van der  228, 236, 248 Wagner, J. R.  197, 450, 468, 534–36, 541 Wagner, T.  104, 109, 192, 430 Walls, J. L.  353, 374 Ward, J. M.  338, 351 Washington, H. C.  607, 608, 617

694   author index Watson, A.  583, 596 Watson, W. G. E.  381–83, 385, 386, 392 Watts, J. D. W.  83, 94, 177, 197 Wazana, N.  73, 77 Webb, B. G.  265, 267, 270, 277, 278, 363, 368, 374 Weber, M.  159, 175 Weber, S.  456, 468 Weeks, S.  340, 351 Weems, R. J.  614, 620, 650, 653 Wegner, P.  292 Weidner, A.  45, 47, 48, 55 Weigold, M.  507, 528 Weinfeld, M.  635 Weiss, E.  149, 157 Wellhausen, J.  220, 248, 323, 332 Wendland, E.  666, 669 Weren, W. J. C.  510, 530 Werlitz, J.  226, 229, 241, 248, 320, 332 Werner, E.  500, 503, 523, 530 Wesselius, J.  471, 488 West, D. C.  623, 636 Westall, R.  589, 596 Westermann, C.  112, 122, 127, 248, 277, 279, 368, 374 Westhelle, V.  644, 653 Whedbee, J. W.  335–37, 341, 343, 351 Whittaker, W. G.  593 Whybray, R. G.  333, 336, 340, 351 Wieringen, A. L. H. M. van  104, 110, 508, 530 Wiesel, E.  544, 558 Wieserhöfer, J.  180, 197 Wilcox, P.  368, 374 Wildberger, H.  49, 55, 72, 78, 88, 89, 92, 94, 161, 166, 169, 175, 221–25, 248, 266, 279, 358, 361, 374, 389, 392, 397, 407 Wilk, F.  430, 450, 455, 462, 468, 508, 530 Wilken, J. L.  576, 596 Williamson, C.  543, 558 Williamson, H. G. M.  22, 24, 27, 33, 36, 39, 43, 47, 49, 51, 55, 56, 61, 78, 114, 117–21, 124, 127,

131, 141, 250, 252, 263, 273, 279, 292, 294, 308–10, 317, 336, 342, 343, 351, 378, 383, 387, 388, 392, 395, 397, 408, 433, 450, 523, 530, 561, 573 Willis, J. T.  384, 392 Wilshire, L. E.  620 Wilson, I. D.  395, 408 Wilson, L.  338, 351 Winton Thomas, D.  350 Wiseman, D. J.  240 Witherington, Ben, III  352, 374 Wöhrle, J.  631, 636 Wolff, H. W.  335, 351 Wolfson, E. R.  396, 408 Wright, J. L.  73, 78, 628, 636 Wright, N. T.  537, 541 Wunsch, C.  295, 300, 316 Würthwein, E.  472, 488 Wutz, F.  468 Wyschogrod, E.  398, 408 Xella, P.  152, 158 Xianlin, S.  674, 681 Yao, X.  671–73, 677, 678, 681 Yee, G. A.  623, 636 York, A. D.  472, 488 Young, R. A.  511, 530 Youngblood, R.  521, 530 Zadok, R.  295, 300, 317 Zapff, B. M.  26, 36, 46, 56, 405, 408 Zenger, E.  220, 222, 248 Zhakovich, I.  472, 488 Ziegler, J.  452, 457–59, 468 Zillesen, A.  468 Zimmerli, W.  45, 56, 361, 374 Zinkuratire, V.  658–60, 663–67, 669 Zólyomi, G.  371 Zuckerman, B.  543, 557 Zunz, L.  488 Zyl, A. H. van  94

R eference Index

Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Genesis 1–9 89 1  69, 481, 675 1:1–2:4 170 1:2  69, 170, 591 1:4 133 1:6 133 1:7 133 1:14 133 1:18 133 1:27 675 2 675 2:7  170, 484 2:8 170 2:10–14 276 2:19 170 2:22 583 3 277 3:14 626 3:16 612 4:14 474 5:3 675 6:1–4 522 6:3 474 6:4 522 9 360 9:16 89 10 68 10:6–20 68 10:8–12 161 11:1–9  160, 227 12 481 12:1–3 72 14:1 477 14:13–20 477 14:19–20 477 15:16 661

16:9–13 474 17:4 630 17:7 89 17:13 89 17:19 89 18 546 18:9–15 474 19 269 19:24–25 360 21:17–18 474 22:15–18 474 22:17 477 24:60 477 28:3 630 32:30 474 48:22 477 49:1–7 661 Exodus 1–2 23 3–4 23 3 23 3:14–15 204 3:14 461 4:21 23 4:22 328 5–6 23 6–14 23 7–15 23 12:49 631 13:21–22 23 14:19–20 23 15 23 15:1 23 15:2 23 15:11  223, 473 15:17 23 19 365 21:37–22:3 551

696   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 23:2 324 23:26 513 31:16 89 32–34 546 33:20 513 35:31 474 Leviticus 19:35 454 20:25–26 133 22:14 461 24:8 89 24:22 631 25 630 25:13 443 25:24–25 206 25:47–49 206 26 662 26:2 627 26:6 515 26:13 23 26:33 300 26:36–39 300 Numbers 10 365 11:14–15 325 11:25–26 285 11:25 474 13–14 546 13:33 522 18:20–21 326 18:23–24 326 18:26 326 24:17 578 26:62 326 35:10–27 206 Deuteronomy 4:1 323 4:5 323 4:7 513 4:10 323 4:14 323 4:19 238 4:25–28 298 4:27–28 300 5:9 662 5:26 205

9:26 138 10:9 326 10:17 473 12:12 326 14:27 326 14:29 326 15:2 443 17:3 238 17:8–11 624 18:2 326 18:18 323 22:6–7 311 22:27 206 23:2–9 555 25:5–10 206 25:15 454 28  329, 643, 662 28:29 206 28:30–33 309 28:30  364, 626 28:36 296 28:39–41 626 28:39 364 28:47–48 329 28:49–51 309 29:4 534 30:3–5 303 31 23 32  23, 297 32:1 397 32:6 136 32:7 172 32:11 414 32:14 404 32:18 404 32:43 534 33:8–10 328 Joshua 3:10 205 13:14 326 13:21 534 13:33 326 14:3 326 18:7 326 Judges 3:9 206 3:15 206

reference index   697 6:21–22 474 12:3 206 13:20–22 474 14:6 474 16:21 172 Ruth 3:9 549 1 Samuel 4:4 544 8:3 256 10:10 474 13:14 327 25:30 327 2 Samuel 5:2 327 5:6–10 286 5:6–8 548 6:2 544 6:21 327 7  271, 327, 547, 549, 550 7:8 327 7:14 328 7:16 282 12:1–15 103 23:5 89 1 Kings 8:11 169 12:25–13:10 103 13:33–14:16 103 18:12 474 19:4–8 325 21:1–29 103 21:9–10 513 21:20–29 103 22:19–22 221 22:19 225 2 Kings 2:15 285 5:1–14 103 6:24–7:20 103 11:14 544 15:14 102 15:16 102 15:19–20  102, 156 15:29  296, 297 16 549 16:2 511

16:5–9 147 16:7–9 102 16:10–16 149 17:4 102 17:5–6 296 17:6  297, 299 17:18 296 17:23  296, 297 17:24–40 297 17:24 163 17:27 297 18–21 512 18–20  3, 46, 95, 96, 100, 101, 106, 282, 510 18–19  151, 270 18  102, 104 18:1–19:38 167 18:1–8 101 18:2  168, 511 18:9–12 101 18:12 101 18:13–20:19  101, 104 18:13  96–99, 101, 168 18:14–16  96, 99, 101 18:14 99 18:16 99 18:17–19:37 96 18:17–19:8 167 18:17–36 98 18:19 98 18:23 98 18:26–27 98 18:28 98 18:37–19:7 98 18:37–19:2 98 19:1–7 102 19:4 205 19:7 98 19:8–37 481 19:8 98 19:9–37  102, 167 19:9–19 97 19:9 98 19:10–19 98 19:14 98 19:15 544 19:16  97, 205

698   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 19:20–34 98 19:20 98 19:30–31 297 19:35–37 102 19:36–37  97, 148 19:36  97, 165 19:37 98 20  97, 509 20:1–11  99, 102, 167 20:6  168, 513 20:12–19  99, 102, 167 20:12 167 20:16–18 168 20:20 96 21:3 238 21:23–24 160 22:8–20 103 23:3 544 23:5 238 23:11 238 23:30 160 23:33–34 102 24–25  160, 272 24:12 288 24:14 297 24:15  288, 299 25 100 25:7 288 25:11–12 296 25:12 297 25:19–21 160 25:20 296 25:21 297 25:22–26  160, 298 25:26 297 25:27–30 288 1 Chronicles 11:4–9 286 13:6 544 16:13 329 16:17 89 17 107 2 Chronicles 6 107 18:17–19:9 97 19:9–35 97

19:9 342 19:36–37 97 26:16–19 480 28:1 106 28:15 300 28:20 107 28:21 107 29–31 106 30:5–6 298 30:10 298 30:18–20 106 30:26 106 32  3, 95 32:1–6 106 32:7–8  106, 510 32:20 106 32:24 106 32:25 107 32:30–31 107 32:31 167 32:32 96 33:2 106 33:4 484 33:11 107 33:12–13 107 35:17–18 298 36:22–23 303 Ezra 1 306 1:1–4 303 1:2–4 184 6:3–5 184 7 623 7:6 287 7:10 287 9–10 304 9  135, 136 9:2  138, 624 9:4  138, 623 10:3 138 Nehemiah 5  304, 328 7:5 304 7:8–10 304 7:13 304 9  136, 137 10 137

reference index   699 Job 1:1 346 1:8 346 2:3 346 5:12–13 339 6:5 341 9:12 339 12:24 346 21:10 341 24:3 341 28:28 346 31:10 172 38:1–42:6 338 40:11–12 341 42 546 42:3 342 Psalms 1 363 2  269, 271 2:1–2 66 2:7 328 3:3 324 4:7 324 8  339, 593 7:8–9 443 13:7 536 15 271 18:49 534 19:10 342 19:12 329 19:14 329 22  532, 606 24 271 24:7–10 586 24:12 342 27:9 329 31:14 324 31:17 329 34:23 329 46  266, 269, 270, 481 46:2–8 266 46:3–4 277 46:3 275 46:5 276 46:6–7 275 46:7 277 46:8 270

46:12 270 48  266, 481 48:5–7 277 56:1–2 586 68:26 590 69:37 329 71:7 324 72:10–11 582 74:13–14 81 76  266, 481 76:4 277 76:6–7 277 79:2 329 79:10 329 80:8–16 Eng:  417 80:9–17 417 82:1–2 444 85:10 584 88:6 222 89  289, 327 89:3 289 89:4 329 89:7–9 223 89:20 289 89:39 289 90:16 329 93 221 94:19 442 95 221 97 221 98 221 99 221 99:1 544 103:1–2 66 103:13 328 105:6 329 105:10 89 137 64 105:43 329 106:5 329 106:23 329 109:2 536 113:2 524 117:1 534 111:10 342 125:1 275 132  271, 327

700   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 132:13 266 135:1 329 135:9 329 135:14 329 Proverbs 1:16 346 1:19 346 2:5 342 2:20 346 3:7  341, 346 7:22 341 7:27 402 8 344 8:13 342 8:14 342 8:15–16 283 8:22–31 591 9:1–6  8, 338 9:10 342 9:11  8, 338 9:18 402 12:15 341 12:26 346 14:4 341 14:16 346 15:25 341 15:27 346 16:6 346 16:17 346 16:18 342 16:19 341 16:29 346 19:21 342 21:16 346 23:17 346 26:5 341 26:12 341 26:16 341 28:11 341 29:3 342 29:23 346 Song of Songs 2:3 400 Isaiah 1–66  38, 41, 44, 409, 412, 431 1–55  47, 118, 561

1–39  3, 4, 6–8, 14, 21, 22, 32–34, 37, 40, 42–45, 47–49, 51, 65, 116, 118–21, 145, 146, 161, 169, 203–205, 209, 211, 220, 221, 250, 253, 254, 256, 267–69, 281, 286, 293–300, 302, 304, 306, 307, 327, 335, 336, 341, 342, 344, 347, 348, 382, 384, 395, 415, 508, 509, 559, 561, 563, 564, 568, 602, 603, 622, 649, 658, 663 1–35  100, 167 1–33  10, 104, 432, 438, 439 1–32  51, 344 1–24 65 1–23 294 1–19 204 1–16 464 1–12  2, 22–26, 28, 31, 37, 42, 60, 62–65, 67, 72, 74, 82, 213, 267, 341–43, 561, 565 1–5  26, 27, 438 1–4 42 1–2 65 1  9, 23, 46, 65, 118, 146, 207, 210, 249, 267, 341, 363, 369, 390, 397, 411, 642 1:1–66:24 431 1:1–33:17 431 1:1–8:11 464 1:1–27 525 1:1–6 431 1:1–3 203 1:1  2, 20, 21, 37, 62, 116, 265, 269, 393, 509, 512, 565, 621 1:2–31 563 1:2–20  385, 387 1:2–9  268, 387 1:2–4  205, 370 1:2–3  335, 388 1:2  204, 211, 250, 330, 363, 387, 394, 397, 399, 463, 662, 671 1:3–4  250, 341 1:3  23, 253, 260, 337, 341, 348, 381, 388, 399, 463, 579, 582, 672 1:4–14 431 1:4–9 267 1:4–8 388 1:4  27, 119, 204, 212, 258, 259, 388, 416, 592, 672 1:5–9 23 1:6–7 463

reference index   701 1:6 388 1:7–9  271, 412 1:7–8  296, 298, 388 1:7  12, 361, 388, 463, 512, 513, 592 1:8–10 360 1:8–9  27, 70, 273 1:8  148, 265, 388, 400, 421, 545, 603 1:9–10 388 1:9  204, 271, 385, 388, 463 1:10–29:8 431 1:10–20  23, 387 1:10–17  6, 251, 500, 676 1:10–15 400 1:10–11 463 1:10  12, 67, 204, 207, 336, 370, 387, 388, 512, 513 1:11–12 463 1:11  204, 382, 388 1:13–14 MT  480 1:13  251, 256, 386 1:14 259 1:15–17 259 1:15  121, 217 1:16–17  73, 251, 388, 462, 463, 561, 642 1:17  23, 208, 283, 401, 672 1:18–20  259, 384, 388 1:18 382 1:19–20  73, 208, 296, 388 1:20  204, 258, 388 1:21–28 271 1:21–26  259, 260, 283, 344, 385 1:21–23  251, 283, 399 1:21  251, 273, 399, 400, 402, 602 1:23–26 463 1:23  23, 208, 250, 251, 258 1:24–26 386 1:24–26 MT  475 1:24 204 1:25  253, 259 1:26–27 363 1:26  208, 215, 221, 328, 342, 344, 347 1:27–31 46 1:27–28  271, 277, 347 1:27  265, 366 1:28  204, 251, 253, 330 1:29–31  296, 400 1:29  251, 382, 400

1:30 361 1:31 330 2–4 363 2  16, 65, 70, 146, 208, 209, 363, 397, 624, 665, 677 2:1–14:24 431 2:1–5  62, 397 2:1–4  26, 72, 542, 587, 625, 626 2:1  21, 62, 116 2:2–5  62, 179, 539, 555 2:2–4  7, 12, 14, 27, 45, 61, 119, 207, 276, 277, 342, 347, 356, 363, 401, 515, 516, 624, 625, 679 2:2  500, 642 2:3–4  463, 536 2:3  11, 67, 72, 80, 265, 336, 363, 370, 401, 492, 498, 516, 588 2:4–5 588 2:4  13, 277, 363, 369, 418, 542, 556, 587, 588, 594 2:5–4:1 359 2:5–7 463 2:5  45, 348, 364, 368, 588, 592 2:6–22  62, 297 2:6–8 251 2:8 31 2:10  31, 206 2:10–17  5, 213 2:11–21 358 2:11–17 31 2:11  252, 253, 259, 341, 344 2:12–17  70, 386, 678 2:12  63, 64, 341, 383 2:17  119, 227, 341, 344 2:19–21 460 2:19  206, 360, 594 2:21  206, 360 2:22  348, 383 3–23 146 3  363, 608 3:1–15  296, 385 3:1–7 213 3:1–3  8, 335 3:2–3 380 3:2 208 3:3  342, 344, 347 3:8  258, 385

702   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 3:9–15 463 3:9–11  384, 463 3:9–10 463 3:9  303, 463 3:10–11  337, 367 3:10  283, 416, 460 3:11 258 3:12–15  15, 645 3:12  250, 609 3:13–15  251, 642, 644 3:13–14 208 3:13 453 3:14–16 609 3:14 642 3:15 205 3:16–4:1  14, 273, 609 3:16–24  251, 401, 592 3:16–17 608 3:16  253, 259, 303, 400, 401, 463 3:17–24 213 3:18–23 380 3:20 463 3:24 251 3:25–4:1 296 3:25–26  401, 603 3:25 253 3:26  273, 274, 499 4  363, 614 4:2 298 4:2–6  23, 46, 215, 261, 271, 298, 359 4:2–4  363, 367 4:4 259 4:3  265, 298, 366, 401 4:4  400, 401 4:5–6 365 4:5 401 4:16–21 291 5–12  50, 547 5  138, 441, 594 5:1–7  81, 86, 138, 206, 213, 296, 335, 399, 412, 418, 442, 568, 659 5:1–6 260 5:1 23 5:2  23, 382, 415 5:3 385 5:5 385

5:6–7 366 5:7  209, 221, 283, 380, 418, 626 5:8–30 390 5:8–25 390 5:8–23  209, 402 5:8–10  296, 341 5:8–10 MT  479 5:8  156, 213, 251, 326 5:9 211 5:11–17 296 5:11–13 251 5:11  326, 341 5:12  253, 342 5:13–14 385 5:13  295, 296, 342, 370 5:14  206, 361, 364, 402, 443, 660 5:15–16 251 5:15 252 5:16  283, 676 5:17 347 5:18–25 463 5:18–19 253 5:18 326 5:19  119, 209, 341, 344 5:20  251, 326 5:21  8, 335, 341, 463 5:22 341 5:23  250, 251, 283, 381, 642 5:24–30 361 5:24  207, 258, 336, 370, 443 5:25–11:16 411 5:25–30  268, 276, 296, 356 5:25–29  45, 387 5:25–26 24 5:25  23, 27, 60, 63, 154, 251, 253, 360, 387 5:26–30  24, 27, 213, 253, 412, 431 5:26–28 152 5:26  24, 27, 276, 463 5:29 453 5:30  24, 45, 268, 360, 366 6–18 9 6–12 27 6–8  48, 50, 377, 391, 438 6  13, 21, 27, 33, 42, 44, 50, 206, 211–13, 225, 253, 261, 272, 324, 335, 341, 395, 397, 512, 513, 543, 544, 546, 547, 549, 561, 574, 590, 594

reference index   703 6:1–9:7  23, 24 6:1–9:6 390 6:1–13  544, 561, 568 6:1–8 50 6:1–4 665 6:1–2 544 6:1  4, 59, 62, 116, 145, 293, 322, 418, 508, 513, 544, 579, 655, 668, 678 6:1 MT  474 6:2–7 221 6:2  544, 575 6:3–4 545 6:3  1, 221, 222, 462, 500, 523, 538, 576, 594 6:5  23, 119, 253, 259, 395, 513, 545 6:6–7  545, 594 6:6 575 6:7–9 548 6:7 259 6:8 594 6:9–11 50 6:9–10  12, 253, 341, 404, 532, 535, 537, 545, 561 6:9  11, 211, 348, 493, 498, 499, 532, 537 6:10–13 548 6:10–12 549 6:10–11 253 6:10  23, 324, 463, 532, 540 6:11–17 300 6:11–13  7, 260, 272–74, 295, 296, 298, 545 6:11 253 6:12 296 6:13  46, 208, 300, 400, 416, 624 7–12 543 7–11  64, 561 7–8  27, 34 7–9 105 7  4, 50, 62, 145, 147, 151, 156, 270, 281, 282, 508, 511, 548, 549, 561 7:1–8:15 547 7:1–25  13, 547 7:1–17  21, 27, 28, 270, 281 7:1–9  49, 296 7:1  24, 116, 270, 508 7:2  24, 281, 327 7:3  24, 64, 105, 270, 271 7:4–9  212, 288 7:4 24

7:5 34 7:6 281 7:7  34, 382 7:8 106 7:9–17 24 7:9  24, 25, 34, 267, 270, 271, 335, 493, 498 7:10–17 251 7:10–16  296, 298, 463 7:10–14 577 7:11 24 7:12–13 250 7:13  24, 259, 281, 327 7:14–8:14 431 7:14–16 511 7:14  1, 11, 461, 463, 497, 500, 510, 514, 570, 571, 579, 581, 592, 593 7:14 LXX  510 7:16  298, 512 7:17–25 270 7:17–20 24 7:17  24, 25, 296 7:18–25 296 7:18  24, 151, 268 7:19 151 7:20–66:24 431 7:20  296, 311 7:22 271 7:23–25 151 8  23, 285, 367 8:1–9:7 24 8:1–15 549 8:1–4  21, 49, 50, 296 8:1  146, 211 8:3–4 609 8:3  211, 511 8:4  296, 463 8:5–8  270, 296, 50 8:6–8 33 8:6–7  151, 155 8:7–8 549 8:8 151 8:9–10  49, 297, 379 8:10  34, 343, 344 8:11–15 296 8:11  435, 453 8:12 155 8:14–15 370

704   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 8:14  208, 534, 540 8:16–18 325 8:16–17 44 8:16  50, 146, 336, 367, 370, 396 8:17–9:1 34 8:17  217, 329, 510, 550 8:17 MT  473 8:18  266, 402 8:19–23 296 8:19–20 285 8:20  336, 370 8:21–9:1 285 8:21–23 45 8:22–9:2 24 8:23–9:6  49, 380 8:23–9:2 561 8:23–9:1 13 8:23 561 9–12 438 9  206, 284, 285, 367, 368, 510, 561 9:1–7  1, 24–26, 30, 31, 33, 286, 663 9:1–7 Eng:  380 9:1–6  296, 337, 510, 511, 514, 542, 555 9:1–4 296 9:1–3 561 Heb: 9:1–2  540, 571 9:1–2 Eng  13 9:1  23, 34, 285 9:1 561 Heb: 9:3–66:24 431 9:3  25, 383 9:4  24, 30, 33 9:4 Eng:  383 9:5–6  209, 454, 511, 512, 514 9:5  8, 13, 336, 342–44, 347 9:6–7  7, 209, 284, 585 9:6–7 Eng:  454 9:6  296, 327, 342, 380, 463, 464, 510, 536, 579, 592, 593 9:6 Eng:  13 9:7–10:4  387, 390 9:7–20 296 9:7–11 296 9:7  24–26, 34, 287, 665 9:7 Eng:  380, 390 9:8–10:4 209

9:8–21  5, 213 9:8  23, 119, 259, 341 9:8 Eng:  387, 390 9:10–11 296 9:11  24, 60, 63, 387 9:12–10:4 23 9:12 60 9:12 Eng:  387 9:12 MT  63 9:15–16 250 9:16  60, 63, 253, 259, 387 9:17–18 413 9:17 Eng:  387 9:17 MT  60, 63 9:18–19 Eng:  413 9:19–21 253 9:19 208 9:20  60, 63, 387, 659 9:21 Eng:  387 9:21 MT  60, 63 10–12 62 10  4, 31, 145, 622 10:1–4  296, 644, 659 10:1–2  250, 283, 385, 642 10:1 326 10:4  63, 387 10:4 MT  60 10:5–11:16 24 10:5–35 550 10:5–34 550 10:5–19  62, 221, 270 10:5–15  155, 413 10:5–11 119 10:5–6  68, 154, 267 10:5–7 296 10:5  63, 213, 413, 536 10:6  259, 296 10:7 154 10:8–11 70 10:8–10 296 10:12–19 464 10:12  70, 227, 253, 258, 265, 269, 297, 359 10:13–14  70, 95 10:13 341 10:14–15 14 10:14 311 10:15–19 297

reference index   705 10:15  68, 155, 207, 335, 413 10:16–19 413 10:16–17 208 10:16 257 10:17 31 10:18  257, 413 10:19–21 62 10:20–27 168 10:20–23  271, 296–98 10:20–22 443 10:20–21 443 10:20 298 10:21 296 10:22–23 443 10:22 443 10:24–27  270, 443 10:24–26  296, 297 10:24  23, 296, 443 10:25  213, 359 10:26–27 33 10:26  23, 257, 296 10:27–32  297, 387 10:27  23–25, 30 10:28–32 443 10:30  421, 603 10:32  62, 421, 602 10:33–34  31, 62, 285, 416 10:34 206 11  12, 23, 26, 31, 82, 206, 209, 344, 514, 515, 561, 623, 626 11:1–16  550, 555, 663 11:1–10 309 11:1–9  7, 72, 209, 285, 398, 464, 542, 626, 664 11:1–5  285, 286, 337, 338, 342 11:1–3  13, 463 11:1  62, 63, 418, 576, 578–81, 583, 585, 590 11:2–3 583 11:2  23, 31, 62, 290, 335, 336, 342, 344, 347, 386, 405 11:3–4 208 11:3  337, 342, 393 11:4–5  31, 342 11:4  23, 62, 63, 286, 539 11:6–9  13, 31–33, 277, 286, 330, 356, 515, 589, 627, 648 11:6–8  121, 286, 387, 665

11:6  13, 370, 561, 589, 627 11:7 589 11:8  416, 561, 626, 627 11:9–16 27 11:9  13, 23, 62, 337, 342, 366, 401, 648 11:10–12:6 24 11:10–12 23 11:10  24, 62, 276, 539, 578–80, 592 11:11–16  44, 45, 62, 81, 274, 298, 299, 302, 304, 306, 307 11:11–12 295 11:11 298 11:12–16  62, 209 11:12  12, 181, 276, 298, 312, 516 11:14 31 11:15–16  23, 32 11:16  31, 298 12  23, 82, 118, 566, 578, 611 12:1–6  45, 161 12:1  5, 215, 561 12:2  23, 344, 579 12:3  524, 590, 594 12:4 62 12:5–6  578, 603 12:6 62 12:9 366 13–27  2, 22, 26, 28, 30, 31, 267, 342, 543, 550, 551, 679 13–23  2, 26, 30, 60, 62, 63, 65, 66, 69, 74, 79, 81, 82, 84, 160, 161, 222, 272, 342, 343, 380, 412, 438, 550, 565 13–14  22, 45, 60, 62, 64, 65, 70, 164, 191 13  23, 89, 163, 213, 381 13:1–14:32 300 13:1–14:27 26–28 13:1–14:23  30, 60, 63, 550 13:1–22  4, 161–64, 359 13:1–4 26 13:1  21, 22, 45, 62, 69, 116, 179, 609 13:2–22 61 13:2–16 360 13:2–5  27, 163 13:2–3 62 13:2  61, 62 13:3–6 70 13:3 62 13:4–5 61

706   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 13:4 62 13:5  62, 163, 213 13:6–16 60 13:6–8 163 13:6  63, 64, 358 13:9–15 163 13:9–13 61 13:9  61, 63, 64, 161, 213, 300, 358 13:10–13 359 13:10 381 13:11  61, 62, 70, 300, 342, 206, 213, 253 13:12  360, 381, 13:13  63, 300, 360, 385 13:14–16  297, 300 13:14  300, 311 13:15–16 300 13:15 73 13:16–22 163 13:16 252 13:17–22 60 13:17  28, 213 13:18 416 13:19–22  257, 297, 360 13:19–20 62 13:19  27, 62, 70, 179, 206, 213, 342 13:20  27, 62 13:22 462 14–20 62 14  63, 89, 148, 156, 213, 521, 522, 342, 343, 359 14:1–23 161 14:1–5 30 14:1–4  22, 45 14:1–3  70, 306 14:1–2  7, 61, 276, 302, 307, 359 14:1  62, 70, 304, 463 14:3–23  4, 162, 164, 362 14:3–22 258 14:3–4  60, 164 14:3  62, 360, 592 14:4–23  14, 622 14:4–21  61, 70, 382, 464 14:4  164, 179 14:5–21 60 14:5–6 62 14:5 61

14:6 165 14:7 362 14:8 443 14:9–11 156 14:9  360–62, 522 14:11  206, 342, 361, 362 14:12–21 165 14:12–20 227 14:12–15 522 14:12–14 362 14:12  65, 164, 165, 522 14:13 62 14:14 362 14:15–20 362 14:15  361, 362 14:16 360 14:17 165 14:18–20 165 14:18 362 14:19  62, 73 14:20–21 61 14:20  62, 258 14:21–22 221 14:22–23  45, 60, 164 14:22  62, 179 14:23 661 14:24–32 267 14:24–27  30, 33, 49, 60, 70, 119, 155, 162, 209, 269, 297, 550 14:24–25 30 14:24  342, 343 14:25  24, 25, 30, 214, 221, 253, 257 14:26–27  27, 30, 60, 61, 63, 253, 343, 348 14:26  62, 221, 335, 344, 380, 443 14:27  337, 344, 347 14:27 MT  473 14:28–27:13 27 14:28–15:2 431 14:28–31 162 14:28–32  27, 28, 60, 61, 297 14:28  21, 60, 62, 69, 508 14:29–30 63 14:29 380 14:30  61, 269 14:32  28, 61, 62, 71, 207, 266, 269, 383 14:38–32 60 15–23 214

reference index   707 15–20 60 15–16  28, 39, 60, 386 15:1–16:12 382 15:1–16:11 162 15:1–9 297 15:1  69, 116, 662 15:5–6 73 16:1–5  61, 72 16:1–4  61, 297 16:1  61, 62, 71, 421, 463, 590, 602 16:2–3 28 16:2  297, 311 16:3–5 61 16:3 343 16:4–6 287 16:4–5  71, 72 16:4 65 16:5  208, 327 16:6–12 297 16:6–7 258 16:6  70, 342 16:8–10 73 16:8 64 16:9 385 16:11 385 16:12 258 16:13–14  28, 61 16:13 297 16:14 70 17–20 60 17–18  28, 30, 62, 63 17  60, 65 17:1–6 297 17:1–3  70, 162 17:1  69, 116, 297 17:2 61 17:3–8 28 17:4  70, 161, 413 17:5–8 30 17:5–6  73, 297, 311 17:7  71, 161, 207, 216 17:9–11 296 17:9 161 17:10–11 251 17:10 208 17:12–14  6, 61, 267, 269, 276, 297 17:12 384

17:13 62 17:14  335, 337, 380 18–25 191 18–23 176 18–20 61 18–19 60 18 656 18:1–6 297 18:1  326, 659 18:1 MT  470 18:2 383 18:3  30, 61, 62 18:4–6 73 18:4 211 18:5–6 297 18:5  206, 415 18:6 62 18:7  61, 62, 70, 266, 656 18:17 161 19–20 28 19  60, 343, 386, 656 19:1–17 258 19:1–15  40, 162 19:1–4 297 19:1  69, 116, 222, 583 19:2–4 214 19:3  28, 222, 343 19:4 382 19:5–10 297 19:5–6  32, 361 19:7 383 19:11–15 297 19:11–12 335 19:11  28, 343, 344, 347 19:12  209, 222, 343, 344 19:14 214 19:15–16 439 19:16–25  61, 297 19:16–17 61 19:16  161, 609 19:17  28, 209, 343, 344, 347 19:18–25  72, 679 19:18 161 19:19  69, 161, 656 19:20–25 70 19:20–21 215 19:20  206, 214

708   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 19:22 216 19:23–25 359 19:23–24 149 19:23 161 19:23–25 359 19:24–25 655 19:24 161 19:24–25 655 19:25 668 20  4, 21, 27, 29, 30, 145, 152 20:1–6 300 20:1  60, 62, 71 20:4  152, 300 20:5–6 29 20:6 300 21–22 64 21  60, 65, 70, 550 21:1–10  4, 28, 60, 63, 161, 162, 166, 603 21:1–4 166 21:1  64, 69, 116, 166, 576 21:2  28, 61, 65, 551 21:3 403 21:5  73, 166, 576 21:6–7 167 21:6 211 21:7 576 21:8–9 166–68 21:8 576 21:9  61, 65, 172, 179, 576 21:10 61 21:11–12 28 21:11  28, 69, 116 21:12 576 21:13–17 28 21:13–15 300 21:13  64, 69, 116 21:16–17  28, 61 21:16 211 22  28–30, 60, 65, 67, 70, 71, 156, 551 22:1–14  7, 60, 272, 296, 299 22:1–4 603 22:1  29, 64, 69, 116, 393 22:2–4 299 22:3 296 22:4  64, 272, 299 22:5  64, 161

22:8–14 30 22:8–12 29 22:8–11  4, 28, 145, 156 22:8  161, 296, 299 22:9  64, 327 22:10–11 29 22:11–13 73 22:11 64 22:12  73, 161, 299 22:13–14 299 22:14  63, 211, 383 22:15–25 29 22:15–22 301 22:15 64 22:17–19 301 22:18 361 22:19–23 61 22:20  64, 161 22:22  282, 327, 592 22:25 161 23  28, 60, 65, 67, 385, 400 23:1–16 382 23:1–14 40 23:1–2 439 23:1  69, 385 23:3 73 23:7–9 382 23:8–17 251 23:8–9  28, 61, 209, 214, 258, 343 23:9  70, 342 23:10  421, 603 23:11  61, 63, 360 23:12  172, 421, 603 23:13  61, 70 23:14 385 23:15–18 603 23:15–16  61, 172 23:17–18  61, 70, 73 24–66 63 24–27  2–5, 26, 40, 48, 63, 66, 71, 72, 79, 81, 82, 84–88, 90–92, 151, 161, 162, 176, 191, 221, 222, 293, 294, 301, 302, 304–308, 310, 342, 343, 359, 363, 421, 438, 550, 565 24–26 82 24  82, 83, 86, 89, 214, 343, 360, 388, 592 24:1–23 85

reference index   709 24:1–20  87, 301 24:1–16 86 24:1–13 84 24:1–7 648 24:1–6 301 24:1–4 360 24:1–3 79 24:1 592 24:2 388 24:3  86, 119, 301, 388, 389 24:4–13 79 24:4–5 649 24:4  79, 301, 388, 389 24:4–5 649 24:5  3, 89, 259, 370, 388, 592 24:6  86, 301, 360, 649 24:7–11 389 24:7  301, 382, 388, 24:7–11 389 24:8–11 301 24:8  388, 389, 592 24:10  3, 69, 82, 88, 301 24:10–12  63, 389 24:11–12 301 24:11 388 24:12–17 301 24:12  3, 88, 301, 389 24:13 301 24:14–18 84 24:14–16 79 24:14 388 24:15 385 24:16–25:9  86, 87 24:16–20 86 24:16  79, 84, 205, 388, 592 24:17–20 80 24:17 389 24:18–20  84, 301 24:19  388, 389, 592 24:20  86, 388, 389 24:21–27:1 87 24:21–23  80, 84, 91, 221, 301 24:21–22 473 24:21  82, 161, 238, 253, 301, 360, 388 24:22  357, 388 24:23  80, 206, 266, 277, 388 25–32 65

25–27 389 25 69 25:1–5  80, 84–86, 301, 458 25:1–3 151 25:1  209, 337, 343, 344, 347, 380, 25:2  3, 63, 80, 82, 88, 301, 343 25:4 208 25:5 80 25:6–12 301 25:6–11 85 25:6–10  80, 277 25:6–9 209 25:6–8  84–86, 91, 151 25:6 537 25:7  402, 455 25:8  82, 84, 85, 222, 362, 364, 537, 539, 592 25:9–12  84, 86 25:9–11 85 25:9–10 80 25:9  86, 161, 277 25:10–26:8 86 25:10–11  162, 400 25:10  80, 82, 151 25:11 342 25:12 85 26–66 627 26–45 65 26  86, 386 26:1–19 85 26:1–14 86 26:1–6  80, 84, 86, 305 26:1  3, 82, 86, 88, 89, 151, 161, 366 26:2–6 463 26:2  305, 592 26:3  386, 594 26:4–6 86 26:4  208, 304 26:5  3, 82, 88, 386 26:6  80, 386 26:7–19 80 26:7–18 84 26:7  205, 381, 386 26:7–21 86 26:8–9 84 26:8 370 26:9 79 26:11–13 84

710   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 26:11 386 26:13–15 86 26:14  86, 91 26:15–19 87 26:16–27:6  86, 87 26:16–18  84, 91 26:18 79 26:19  80, 84–86, 91, 222 26:19 MT  483 26:20–27:1 85 26:20–21  80, 84 27  80, 82, 138, 366 27 MT  478 27:1  81, 84–86, 91, 161, 360, 473 27:1 MT  478 27:2–13 87 27:2–6  81, 84, 138, 209, 366, 412 27:2–5  85, 86, 206 27:2 86 27:4 208 27:5 151 27:6  79, 161 27:7–11  81, 86, 87, 301, 363 27:7  84, 359 27:8 84 27:9–11 84 27:9  30, 63, 536 27:10  3, 82, 88, 301 27:11  14, 609, 611 27:12–13  27, 72, 81, 82, 84, 86, 274, 302, 363 27:12  85, 86, 161, 304, 306 27:13  12, 85, 86, 161, 306, 516 28–35  22, 30, 31, 63, 267 28–33  66, 565 28–32  79, 81, 343, 414 28–31  48, 50, 68, 146, 438 28–32  79, 81, 343, 414 28  2, 26, 385 28:1–31:9 390 28:1–14 251 28:1–13 296 28:1–4  81, 147, 363 28:1  30, 259 28:2 412 28:5–6 363

28:5 298 28:6 283 28:7–8  250, 363 28:7 402 28:8 400 28:9 343 28:11 451 28:12 50 28:13 379 28:14–22 362 28:14–18 364 28:14 30 28:15  152, 361, 385 28:16–17  207, 286, 385 28:16  270, 271, 382, 463, 522, 540 28:17–18 385 28:17 283 28:18  152, 361, 385 28:19 386 28:21  209, 360 28:23–29  296, 335, 337, 343 28:23–28  206, 343 28:26–29:9 431 28:26 343 28:29  335, 343, 344, 347 29–32 69 29:1–12 296 29:1–10 296 29:1–8  6, 267, 269, 276, 286 29:1–4  81, 592 29:1  30, 327 29:3 286 29:4  384, 603 29:5–8 297 29:5 412 29:6  207, 208, 216 29:10  499, 534, 535 29:11–12  296, 396 29:13–17 463 29:13–14 296 29:13  383, 400, 462, 464 29:14  8, 335, 343, 344, 347 29:15–16  81, 335 29:15 30 29:16 207 29:17 386 29:18–20 641

reference index   711 29:18–19 533 29:18 561 29:19–21  251, 261 29:22 MT  477 29:23 524 29:24–25 463 29:24 207 30–31  2, 63 30  4, 155, 156 30:1–27 39 30:1–7 251 30:1–5  50, 81, 463, 624 30:1–3  105, 413 30:1–2 343 30:1  30, 205, 258, 383 30:3 290 30:6–7 387 30:6 380 30:7  31, 105, 413 30:8 44 30:9  31, 205, 370, 672 30:10 290 30:11  119, 253, 290 30:12–14 251 30:12  119, 251 30:13 253 30:15  119, 267, 270, 271 30:16 290 30:18–26 296 30:18  251, 261, 329 30:19 265 30:20–21 207 30:20–21 207 30:20  217, 343, 442 30:23–25 209 30:23 431 30:27–33 155 30:27–30 387 30:27–28 208 30:29 208 30:30 208 30:33  155, 208, 361 31  31, 81, 156 31:1–32:20 31 31:1–3  31, 50, 81, 105, 251, 296, 413 31:1  30, 251, 664 31:2  258, 337, 343, 344

31:3 31 31:4–9  31, 267, 269 31:4–5 414 31:4  208, 211, 296, 385, 414 31:5  297, 366, 414, 592 31:6  267, 271 31:7  31, 251 31:8–9 297 31:8  31, 296 31:9  265, 366 31:13 624 32–33  31, 438 32  31, 146, 206, 397 32:1–8  209, 338 32:1  7, 31, 283 32:6–7 251 32:6 259 32:9–20 251 32:9–15 609 32:9–14  14, 298, 609 32:9 402 32:10–18 644 32:10 360 32:11  360, 402 32:12 402 32:13–14 402 32:15 455 32:16–17 283 32:16 209 32:17  641, 665 33–52 65 33–48 65 33–35 222 33  31, 32, 44, 45, 51, 65, 81, 146, 344, 397, 432, 438 33:1  30, 65 33:2  344, 418 33:5  119, 283, 344 33:6  31, 337, 342, 344 33:8 382 33:10 261 33:12–14 208 33:13–19 463 33:13 463 33:14–24 271 33:14 259 33:15  251, 256

712   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 33:16 463 33:19–20 366 33:19 32 33:20 146 33:22–24 31 33:22  206, 208, 271, 642 34–66  10, 432, 438, 439 34–54 551 34–35  64, 66, 169, 191, 293, 294, 301, 302, 305–308, 310, 344, 438 34  2, 31, 34, 44, 64, 146, 214, 359, 438, 439 34:1–17 163 34:4–5 222 34:4  383, 462, 533 34:5–17 164 34:5–6 360 34:5 383 34:6–17  359, 361 34:7–8 34 34:8 359 34:9–10  301, 439 34:9 163 34:11–15 301 34:13–15 387 34:14 522 34:16 396 34:17 439 35  2, 31, 32, 34, 43–46, 81, 118, 146, 169, 304, 306, 312, 359, 363, 397 35:1–10  274, 365 35:1–9 312 35:1–7 463 35:1–6 366 35:1–2  304, 648 35:1 64 35:2 34 35:3–6 304 35:4  32, 303–305, 309 35:4–7 463 35:5–6  306, 533 35:5  404, 561, 579 35:5–9 306 35:6–8 304 35:6 64 35:7 306 35:8–10  32, 34, 370

35:8–9 306 35:8 386 35:9–10  32, 304 35:9  31, 306 35:10  304, 306, 593 36–40 438 36–39  2, 3, 9, 12, 13, 21, 22, 28, 40, 42, 46, 64, 66, 95, 96, 100, 101, 104, 106, 146, 167–69, 267, 282, 294, 299, 344, 377, 391, 438, 508, 510, 563, 621 36–38  28, 29, 34 36–37  4, 6, 29, 49, 50, 62, 64, 66, 145, 151, 156, 162, 167, 168, 214, 215, 270, 295, 508, 576 36 152 36:1–37:38 481 36:1–37:9 97 36:1–37:7 167 36:1–9 29 36:1–2  32, 296 36:1  24, 97, 98, 270, 296, 508 36:2–21 98 36:2  24, 64, 105, 270 36:3  29, 64 36:4 98 36:5–10 31 36:6–9 24 36:6–7 22 36:6  105, 413 36:8 98 36:10 34 36:11–12 98 36:12  152, 400 36:13 98 36:16–20  296, 299, 301 36:17  296, 299, 300 36:22–37:7 98 36:22 29 37–38 104 37  34, 156, 293 37:1–2 29 37:1 24 37:2–4 105 37:2 29 37:3  33, 268 37:4  205, 298 37:6  24, 32, 288

reference index   713 37:7 98 37:8 98 37:9–38 167 37:9–20 97 37:9 98 37:10–36 97 37:10–20 98 37:11–35 31 37:12–20 299 37:14–20 24 37:14 98 37:15–20 105 37:16  205, 544 37:17  97, 299 37:19 31 37:20  31, 34 37:21–35 98 37:21–29 273 37:21  97, 98 37:22–35 29 37:22–29  32, 70, 258 37:22  265, 421, 603, 610 37:23–29 70 37:24 32 37:26–27  29, 30 37:30–35 32 37:30–32 271 37:30  24, 33 37:31–32 34 37:31  168, 298, 417 37:32  25, 34, 105, 298 37:33–34 271 37:35  24, 25, 32, 34, 168, 271, 282, 327, 642 37:36–38  31, 168 37:36–37 97 37:36  34, 105, 576, 577 37:37–38  97, 148, 165 37:37 97 37:38  98, 576 38–39  97, 156, 508 38  25, 32, 216, 577 38:1–22 167 38:1–6 99 38:2–3 105 38:3  25, 578 38:4–8 578 38:5  24, 168, 282, 327, 513

38:6 31 38:7–8  99, 577 38:9–20  99, 100, 105 38:10–21 577 38:10 577 38:11 32 38:12 208 38:14 578 38:18 222 38:19–20 105 38:21–22 99 39  4, 6, 23, 64, 66, 120, 272, 273, 397, 438, 509 39:1–8  99, 167, 299 39:1–2  105, 106 39:1  25, 167, 179 39:2 105 39:3–8 161 39:3  179, 463 39:5–8 168 39:5–7  105, 168, 169 39:6–7  25, 296, 299 39:6  179, 272 39:7  179, 628 39:8  25, 32, 106 40–66  2, 7, 10, 14, 21, 23, 32–34, 37, 39, 47, 51, 64, 72, 121, 267, 272, 293, 301–303, 305, 307, 308, 310, 312, 320, 326, 327, 344, 369, 380, 390, 411, 413–16, 419–21, 442, 508, 509, 516, 525 40–66  559–64, 568, 621, 622, 631, 628, 629, 663 40–60 169 40–55  4–8, 14, 22, 32–34, 37, 40, 43–48, 61, 84, 104, 111–21, 125, 129, 146, 176, 181, 185, 189, 190, 210, 212, 220, 221, 226, 228, 240, 244, 253–55, 268, 290, 302, 304–307, 310, 312, 320, 337–39, 344–48, 382, 384, 386, 389, 391, 395, 412, 414, 419, 420, 422, 543, 550, 551, 561, 563, 565, 566, 568, 570, 602–608, 610, 611, 629, 630, 645, 646, 648, 658 40–54 551 40–49 169 40–48  3, 4–6, 32, 47, 51, 66, 84, 113, 168, 170, 171, 176, 188–90, 220, 223–28, 294, 302, 306, 308–10, 322, 330, 382

714   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 40–46  47, 48, 51 40  6, 12, 13, 33, 39, 44, 118, 120, 169, 212, 253, 272, 273, 280, 344, 438, 439, 445, 531, 537, 566, 593, 610, 611, 678 40:1–52:12 178 40:1–51:11 267 40:1–26 525 40:1–17 463 40:1–11  45, 225, 561 40:1–8 473 40:1–5  45, 47, 113, 364, 593 40:1–2  64, 306, 551, 646 40:1  5, 212, 216, 379, 561, 563, 570 40:2–6 168 40:2  214, 273, 385, 397, 551, 629, 643 40:3–5  1, 306, 537 40:3–4 64 40:3  12, 34, 169, 225, 370, 444, 445, 531, 594 40:4–5 531 40:5 304 40:6–8  32, 45, 47, 113, 303, 326, 416, 593 40:6–7  417, 593 40:6  225, 416 40:7–8  456, 531 40:7  181, 416, 417 40:8  34, 119, 390, 416, 417, 593 40:9–11  45, 113, 304, 306, 312 40:9–10  303, 561, 593 40:9  169, 265, 273, 291, 304, 328, 369, 594, 603, 610, 611 40:10–11  303, 305, 402 40:10  33, 206 40:11  5, 181, 207, 210, 216, 419, 590, 591, 593 40:12–31  224, 226, 239, 337, 563 40:12–26  119, 226, 238, 591 40:12–17 170 40:12  207, 384, 463 40:13–14  172, 344 40:13  12, 344, 531 40:14 344 40:15  181, 225 40:16–19 431 40:17–24 225 40:17 181

40:18–26 260 40:18–20  183, 210, 254, 320 40:18  171, 201, 223, 224 40:19–20  48, 308 40:20–26 379 40:20 309 40:21–26 238 40:21–22 170 40:21  254, 344, 345 40:22  207, 225, 238 40:23–24  5, 214, 238 40:23  181, 417 40:24  239, 381, 382, 417 40:25–26  6, 183, 222, 237, 473, 676 40:25  171, 223, 224 40:26  216, 237–39 40:26 MT  473 40:27–31  124, 225, 303, 304, 306, 307, 646 40:27–28 643 40:27  217, 254, 320, 344, 629 40:28–31 629 40:28–29 662 40:28  216, 339 40:29–31  216, 306 40:29  644, 664 40:31 592 41–48  5, 177, 181, 186 41–45  320, 438 41  212, 239, 289 41:1  212, 383 41:1–7 642 41:1–5 186 41:1–4 181 41:2–5 179 41:2–3  181, 210, 322 41:2  181, 214, 238, 239, 412, 660 41:4  22, 183 41:5–7  181, 183 41:6–7  308, 320 41:8–16  659, 660 41:8–13  34, 288, 303–305, 307 41:8–11 646 41:8–10 536 41:8  289, 304, 320 41:8 MT  477 41:8–9  210, 216, 289, 319, 561 41:9–16 379

reference index   715 41:9  181, 289, 303, 320, 380 41:10  25, 123, 216, 320, 382, 593 41:11–12  214, 384 41:13–14 216 41:13 123 41:14–16  289, 307 41:14  123, 206, 303, 644, 673, 677 41:15–16 214 41:15 330 41:17–20  216, 303, 306, 312 41:17–19 442 41:17  258, 303, 643 41:18–20 366 41:18–19 210 41:18  306, 330 41:19  306, 380 41:20  33, 216, 303, 312, 345, 348, 366 41:21–29  181, 183, 208, 210, 224, 226, 231 41:21  7, 33, 206, 287, 382, 418 41:22–29  6, 223, 241, 244 41:22  330, 508, 561 41:23–24 225 41:23 227 41:24  225, 254 41:25–29  186, 226, 238 41:25  181, 210, 214, 239, 303 41:26–27 227 41:26  382, 419 41:27  265, 273, 291, 321, 328 41:29–42:1 386 41:29  69, 181, 225 42  289, 611, 624, 643 42:1–9  276, 321, 663 42:1–7 497 42:1–6 305 42:1–5 642 42:1–4  7, 40, 47, 289, 319, 368, 463, 531, 571, 625, 626, 646 42:1  5, 181, 216, 241, 290, 320, 328, 329, 368, 561, 679 42:2–3 322 42:3–4 MT  482 42:4–11 431 42:4  14, 207, 216, 322, 348, 370, 534, 625, 678 42:5–13 463 42:5–9 181

42:5–7  179, 319, 641 42:5–6 641 42:5  181, 188, 207, 216, 382, 384, 484 42:6–8 463 42:6–7 463 42:6  181, 188, 216, 239, 322, 325, 404, 516, 678 42:7–10 305 42:7  288, 291, 328 42:8–9  119, 226 42:9  44, 321, 330, 508, 561 42:10–11 463 42:10 644 42:13–14  14, 403, 420, 612 42:13  34, 420, 611, 674 42:13 MT  473 42:14–44:23 320 42:14–43:24 431 42:14–25 122 42:14–17  303, 306 42:14  205, 403, 413, 420, 674 42:15–53:1 463 42:15–16 403 42:15 386 42:16  216, 312, 463 42:17  210, 254, 255 42:18–25 561 42:18–22 368 42:18–19 321 42:18–19 MT  482 42:19–21 321 42:19–20 463 42:19 404 42:20  6, 254 42:21  209, 216, 370 42:22–25 301 42:22  134, 301, 383 42:23 678 42:24–25  210, 214 42:24  370, 383 42:25  208, 254 43:1–19 644 43:1–7  289, 303, 307 43:1–4 594 43:1–2 216 43:1  123, 206, 210, 216, 304, 382, 385, 593, 641

716   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 43:2 460 43:3–4  179, 679 43:3  206, 216, 385 43:4 320 43:5–7  210, 254, 274 43:5–6  181, 216, 303 43:5  123, 416, 536 43:7  210, 216 43:8–13  226, 307 43:8  33, 535 43:9–13 183 43:9–12 208 43:9  181, 227, 330 43:10–13 225 43:10–11  183, 223 43:10  33, 170, 171, 210, 216, 224, 289, 307, 321, 345, 463 43:11–13 183 43:11  171, 206, 216, 303, 380 43:12 216 43:13  183, 339, 380 43:14–15 304 43:14  119, 168, 179, 186, 214, 303, 309, 310, 382, 383, 641, 673 43:15  33, 206, 210, 216, 288, 303, 348, 380, 419, 463, 641 43:16–21  181, 305, 307 43:16–20  303, 306 43:16–17 244 43:16 382 43:18–19  119, 508 43:18  122, 330 43:19–21 366 43:19–20 210 43:19  216, 330 43:20  307, 329, 383 43:22–28  48, 122, 254, 301 43:24–25  210, 291 43:24 259 43:25  216, 259, 672 43:26 208 43:28  214, 383 44 345 44:1–5  181, 307 44:1–2  210, 216 44:1  289, 319, 385

44:2–5 289 44:2–3 536 44:2  123, 216, 289, 319, 320, 382, 644 44:3–4 207 44:3  210, 216, 320, 328 44:5  210, 384 44:6–20 183 44:6–11 224 44:6–8  119, 183, 221, 224, 226 44:6  7, 22, 33, 183, 206, 223, 227, 287, 303, 382, 419, 538, 539, 673 44:7  223, 227 44:8–9 208 44:8  123, 183, 208, 223, 321 44:9–20  181, 308, 591, 665 44:9–11 254 44:9  69, 254, 255 44:10–17 320 44:12–13 591 44:12 345 44:14 210 44:17 216 44:18–20 591 44:18–19 345 44:19 348 44:20 460 44:21–23 312 44:21–22 255 44:21  289, 319, 320, 380 44:22–25 183 44:22–24 206 44:22–23 216 44:22  210, 216 44:23  312, 320 44:24–45:8 182 44:24–45:7 189 44:24–28  181, 210, 303, 306, 386 44:24–25 243 44:24  22, 170, 188, 207, 224, 303, 320, 347, 382, 641, 673 44:25  227, 241, 308, 339, 345, 436 44:26  7, 181, 185, 216, 272, 273, 321, 344, 345, 347, 348 44:27 170 44:28–45:4  621, 623 44:28  7, 37, 121, 176, 181, 209, 216, 273, 280, 303, 322, 509, 543, 550, 552

reference index   717 44:48 272 45  231, 244 45:1–13 660 45:1–8  303, 312 45:1–7  181, 186, 188, 231, 238, 386 45:1–3 214 45:1–2  179, 308, 322 45:1  37, 176, 179, 181, 188, 258, 280, 290, 322, 327, 368, 382, 386, 405, 543, 550, 552, 561 45:2–5 303 45:2–3 463 45:2  188, 381, 386 45:3–4  239, 322, 386 45:3  188, 239, 308, 345 45:4  181, 188, 190, 216, 239, 289, 319, 322, 329 45:5–6  224, 231, 380 45:5–7  221, 223, 226, 382 45:6–7 187 45:6  188, 238, 239, 345 45:7  5, 170, 172, 187, 188, 190, 216, 224, 364, 383 45:8  181, 216, 312, 592 45:9–25 122 45:9–13  181, 186, 226, 303, 419 45:9–12 170 45:9–11 210 45:9–10  254, 326, 611 45:9  170, 207, 339, 419 45:10–11 205 45:10  328, 403, 413, 419, 420, 611 45:11–14 464 45:11–13  179, 239, 254 45:11  119, 207, 382 45:12–13  238, 244 45:12  188, 207, 216, 238, 239 45:13  181, 186, 210, 239 45:14  179, 181, 210, 223, 301, 622, 625, 679 45:15  204, 206, 216, 217, 303 45:16 181 45:17  216, 301 45:18  170, 216, 223, 224, 226, 238, 382 45:20–58:7 431 45:20–25 642 45:20  181, 216, 254, 379 45:21–22  223, 224, 226

45:21  171, 206, 216, 227, 382 45:22–25 276 45:22–23 210 45:22  216, 380, 537 45:23–24 261 45:23  206, 463, 536 45:24 255 45:25  382, 536 46–55 168 46–52 65 46–49 65 46–48  65, 438 46–47  64, 70, 322 46–52 65 46 68 46:1–9 210 46:1–7 386 46:1–3 301 46:1–2  169, 179, 183, 184, 190, 214, 229, 230 46:1  65, 226, 308, 386 46:2 386 46:3–4  403, 420, 611, 674 46:3  216, 386 46:4–8 379 46:4  216, 386 46:5–11 226 46:5–9 183 46:5–8 308 46:5  181, 254 46:6–7  320, 345 46:7  216, 386 46:8–13 306 46:8–11 119 46:8 379 46:9–13 224 46:9–11  181, 209 46:9–10  223, 226 46:9  119, 122, 223, 227, 330 46:10–11 386 46:10  22, 34, 185, 344, 347, 508 46:11  181, 186, 322, 344, 345, 347, 348, 661 46:13  273, 306 47  4, 10, 164, 179, 222, 227, 239, 254, 273, 413, 422, 550, 607 47:1–15  172, 214, 382 47:1–7 413

718   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 47:1–5 379 47:1  168, 172, 308, 379, 421 47:2 309 47:4  119, 206, 303, 641, 673 47:5  172, 227, 243 47:6–7 301 47:6  261, 359, 383, 643 47:7–8 257 47:8–15 308 47:8–9  173, 274, 413 47:8  172, 257, 308 47:9  308, 359, 659 47:10  173, 224, 227, 243 47:11–15  241, 243 47:11 384 47:12–13 308 47:12 172 47:13  243, 345, 347 47:14–15 243 47:14 208 47:15 168 48–55 308 48 48 48:1–11  48, 122, 226 48:1  254, 322 48:3–5 183 48:3  44, 330 48:4  380, 383, 499 48:5  210, 254 48:6  321, 330, 365, 508 48:7 216 48:9  123, 214 48:10–11 214 48:10  214, 261, 322 48:11–12 224 48:11 252 48:12–15  179, 181 48:12  382, 538, 539 48:13  170, 188, 207 48:14–16  183, 186 48:14–15 179 48:14  168, 181, 185, 209, 214, 227, 322 48:15  239, 322 48:16  181, 321, 328, 561 48:17–19 207 48:17  206, 216, 303, 382, 673

48:18–19 385 48:18  254, 383 48:20–22  303, 306 48:20  65, 123, 168, 179, 206, 210, 216, 289, 306, 308, 310, 319 48:21 22 48:22  258, 380, 390, 630 49–66  176, 273, 306, 308, 310 49–57 66 49–55  32, 113, 170, 288, 305–307, 309, 310, 629 49–54  8, 267, 274, 323, 326, 438 49–52  3, 113 49–50 22 49  47, 294, 302, 308, 310, 422, 611, 612, 643 49:1–52:12 325 49:1–13  325, 629, 663 49:1–12 113 49:1–9 497 49:1–6  7, 40, 47, 114, 276, 303, 304, 319, 321, 605 49:1  322, 403 49:2–21 173 49:2  325, 384, 538, 539 49:3  319, 320, 322 49:4  320, 629 49:5–6 629 49:5  181, 303, 320 49:6–7  210, 463 49:6  179, 181, 188, 216, 224, 303, 322, 325, 404, 463, 516, 537, 678 49:7  181, 206, 210, 216, 303, 322, 382, 673 49:8–13  303, 304, 306 49:8  181, 216, 272, 326, 463 49:9–10 207 49:9  216, 328, 380 49:9–12  274, 419 49:10  216, 382 49:12  181, 383 49:13–15 442 49:13  64, 216, 312, 561 49:14–54:17 47 49:14–51:2 525 49:14–50:3  124, 629 49:14–26  123, 421, 674, 675 49:14–21  273–75, 303–307, 309, 605

reference index   719 49:14–20 123 49:14–16  660, 668 49:14–15  420, 421, 664 49:14  265, 304, 422, 474, 605, 606, 629, 632, 643 49:15–21 123 49:15–16 123 49:15  14, 123, 205, 403, 413, 594, 605, 611, 612 49:16  123, 401, 646 49:17–26 134 49:17–21 181 49:17 463 49:18–23 216 49:18–21  304, 413, 422 49:18–20 303 49:18 275 49:19 272 49:20–21 413 49:20  275, 401 49:21–22 630 49:21  123, 384, 401, 403, 404, 421, 606, 629 49:22–26  303, 305 49:22–23  7, 181, 210, 276, 277 49:22  181, 276, 330, 630, 662 49:23  345, 625, 679 49:24–25 661 49:24 606 49:25–26  214, 216 49:26  204, 206, 303, 380, 673, 679 50–51  34, 65, 68 50  39, 325, 614 50:1–3  122, 273, 421 50:1  205, 254, 274, 301, 311, 382, 384, 413, 422, 50:2  210, 312 50:4–11  325, 629, 663 50:4–9  7, 40, 319, 325, 442, 497, 579, 646 50:4–6 47 50:4–5  325, 605 50:4  207, 216, 321, 323, 326, 442, 463 50:5 207 50:6–8 463 50:6–7 322 50:6  13, 169, 593 50:7 216

50:8  326, 384 50:9 216 50:10–11 319 50:10 34 51–52 379 51  216, 625, 677 51:1–52:12  605, 629 51:1–3  305–307, 309 51:1–2 305 51:1 208 51:2  324, 404, 630 51:2 MT  477 51:3–7 625 51:3  64, 216, 272, 306, 309, 330, 561 51:4–8  303, 304 51:4–6  276, 678 51:4–5  181, 463 51:4  207, 210, 216, 370, 625, 642 51:5 534 51:6–8 364 51:6  383, 384 51:7  123, 305, 370 51:8 214 51:9–11  274, 303, 305–307, 312 51:9–10  170, 403, 641 51:9 379 51:10–11 32 51:10  206, 404, 453 51:11 306 51:12–55:13 267 51:12–52:12 525 51:12  216, 416, 561 51:13  207, 383 51:16  207, 265, 312, 323 51:17–23  169, 421 51:17–21 273 51:17–20  214, 305, 422 51:17  379, 382 51:21 385 51:21–23  305, 422 51:22–23 214 52–54 519 52–53 643 52 324 52:1–12 367 52:1–11 384 52:1–6  273, 304, 307

720   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 52:1–4 210 52:1–2  274, 369, 413, 421, 422, 594 52:1  173, 265, 379, 539, 552, 592, 643 52:2  173, 265, 291, 309, 421, 603 52:3–6 173 52:3–5 535 52:3–4 304 52:3  206, 216 52:4–6 252 52:4–5 535 52:5  258, 304, 462, 463, 535 52:6–10 535 52:7–12 123 52:7–10  47, 303, 304, 307, 419 52:7  7, 13, 33, 206, 291, 321, 328, 419, 443, 535, 593, 594 52:8–12 210 52:8–10 592 52:8  166, 169, 304 52:9–10 113 52:9  64, 206, 216, 272, 303, 561, 592 52:10 181 52:11–12  113, 303, 304, 306, 308 52:11  309, 310, 379 52:12–53:8 463 52:12  304, 397, 647 52:13–53:12  1, 7, 11, 15, 40, 47, 255, 319, 322, 323, 325, 455, 497, 531, 559, 571, 629, 641, 646, 647, 663, 666, 679 52:13  322, 324, 338, 348, 532, 537 52:14–15 385 52:14–15 MT  483 52:14  324, 436, 532, 627 52:15  16, 181, 210, 216, 322, 324, 345, 455, 531, 532, 679 53–54 325 53–66 64 53  12, 255, 259, 323, 461, 497, 517–21, 537, 571, 579, 614, 630, 643 53:1–12  462, 630 53:1–6  462, 463 53:1–4 442 53:1  531, 532 53:2–3 642 53:2  416, 456, 483, 497, 627 53:2 MT  483

53:3–6  13, 593 53:3–4 MT  483 53:3  324, 587, 588 53:4–12 532 53:4–5 497 53:4  324, 454, 498, 531, 532, 540, 571 53:5–8 629 53:5–6 255 53:5  324, 463, 532, 579, 646 53:6  259, 461, 483, 532 53:7–8  532, 537 53:7  11, 13, 461, 463, 532, 580, 586, 590 53:8–12 463 53:8  13, 16, 593, 679 53:9–12 626 53:9  463, 532 53:10  209, 255, 322–24, 326, 330, 461 53:11–12  324, 647 53:11  8, 338, 436 53:12  461, 483, 532, 537, 630 54  48, 121, 123, 324, 326, 478, 629 54 MT  479 54:1–55:5 629 54:1–17 123 54:1–10  273–75, 304, 305, 307, 525 54:1–6  421, 422 54:1–4 173 54:1–3 422 54:1–2 413 54:1  275, 304, 324, 462, 463, 479 54:2–4 304 54:2–3 181 54:3  181, 272, 324, 326 54:4–5 479 54:4  123, 173 54:5–8 205 54:5–6 422 54:5  123, 206, 207, 303, 422, 641, 673 54:6–8 479 54:6 274 54:7–10  13, 275 54:7–8  123, 552 54:7  181, 304 54:8–9 123 54:8  206, 217, 303, 673 54:9–10 552

reference index   721 54:9  214, 479 54:10–13 431 54:10–11 326 54:10 275 54:11–55:5 525 54:11–17  304, 305, 307, 309 54:11–14 181 54:11–12  274, 304, 539 54:11  207, 383 54:13  321, 326 54:14  326, 479 54:15 516 54:16  216, 383, 661 54:17  8, 305, 326, 327, 479 54:18 181 55–66  325, 551, 608 55  48, 294, 302, 308, 326, 345, 397, 550, 551, 553 55:1–66:24 325 55:1–13 389 55:1–11 47 55:1–5  181, 304, 327, 627, 629 55:1–3  345, 389, 605, 606, 629 55:1–2  338, 389 55:1  326, 379, 390, 539 55:3–13 463 55:3–11 32 55:3–5 552 55:3–4  386, 463 55:3  25, 32, 34, 89, 288, 289, 326, 327, 368, 397, 537 55:4–5  7, 288, 389 55:4  630, 678 55:5  181, 210, 216, 327, 678 55:6–13 303 55:6–11 304 55:6–7  254, 255 55:6  389, 513 55:7  210, 258 55:8  217, 382, 389 55:9 389 55:10–11  389, 390, 660 55:10 389 55:11  5, 119, 209, 212, 389 55:12–13  32, 303, 306, 326, 390 55:12  113, 210, 308, 389, 390 55:13 326

56–66  2–4, 6, 22, 32, 33, 37, 42, 43, 45, 46, 92, 118–21, 128, 129, 146, 168, 170, 176, 177, 191, 192, 203, 212, 220, 222, 255–57, 267, 268, 290, 293, 294, 302, 305, 307–10, 346–48, 382, 395, 412, 551, 553, 555, 561, 563, 568, 602, 607, 623, 630, 659 56–60 128 56–59  46, 438 56–58 222 56  16, 210, 212, 390, 630, 677, 678 56:1–8  7, 33, 46, 129, 139, 210, 256, 276, 277, 305, 307, 516, 561, 628, 630, 631 56:1–7  554, 555, 646 56:1  32, 118, 130, 210, 257 56:3–4 628 56:3  121, 326, 367, 628, 630 56:4 678 56:5  326, 555 56:6–8 223 56:6  8, 326, 678 56:7–57:8 431 56:7  533, 537 56:8  121, 181, 216, 305, 307, 309 56:9–59:21 347 56:9–57:2 380 56:9–12  139, 256, 307 56:9  383, 627 56:10–11 346 56:10  166, 535 56:11  346, 348 56:12 121 57–59  33, 128 57–58 303 57  210, 212, 256, 607, 609 57:1–13 139 57:1–4 463 57:1–3 463 57:1 463 57:2 463 57:3–14  305, 307 57:3–13 131 57:3  256, 383 57:5–10 177 57:5–6 463 57:5 256 57:7–13 386

722   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 57:9  256, 290 57:9 MT  623 57:12–13 257 57:11 212 57:13  257, 329, 500 57:14–62:12 139 57:14–19  303, 306, 308 57:14  306, 308, 390 57:14–62:12 139 57:15–19 214 57:15–18 216 57:15  119, 204, 346, 347, 646, 676 57:16 381 57:17  214, 217, 256, 261, 379 57:18 303 57:21  380, 390 58–66 66 58–62  4, 130, 134 58–60 34 58–59  4, 130, 131, 133, 134 58  16, 33, 133, 136, 210, 307, 328, 561, 676, 677 58:1–62:12 131 58:1–59:21 129 58:1–59:14 33 58:1–14 256 58:1–12  646, 659 58:1–11 463 58:1–8 400 58:1  131, 212 58:2  132, 463 58:3–4 386 58:3  121, 217 58:4–7 131 58:4–6 463 58:6–7  463, 642 58:6 570 58:7–8 592 58:8  130, 593 58:9–12  132, 216 58:9–11 642 58:9–10 385 58:9 462 58:10–12 366 58:10 380 58:11  257, 330, 418

58:12  131, 134, 257 58:13–14  132, 256, 385, 431, 463 58:13  10, 132, 440 58:14  121, 132, 326 59  34, 133, 136, 214, 307, 346, 386 59:1–9 257 59:1–8 256 59:1–2 133 59:1 121 59:2  217, 256, 387, 664 59:3  121, 259, 387 59:4  208, 387 59:6  386, 387 59:7–8 386 59:7  346, 387 59:8–17 386 59:8  386, 665 59:9–15  307, 328 59:9–10  33, 130 59:9  34, 133, 385, 386 59:10 535 59:11 386 59:12  259, 387 59:13–14 256 59:13  382, 387 59:14 386 59:15–21  222, 303 59:15–20  33, 168 59:15  346, 386 59:16–17 133 59:16 386 59:17  5, 34, 214, 386 59:18 253 59:19–20 304 59:20–21 536 59:20  206, 257, 303, 329, 367, 453, 592 59:21  121, 323, 396 60–66 438 60–62  4, 33, 34, 46, 47, 129–31, 133, 134, 210, 212, 214, 216, 222, 305–307, 310, 327, 347, 390, 630 60  33, 34, 128, 134, 204, 213, 214, 222, 276, 347, 363, 607 60:1–62:12 129 60:1–22  12, 365, 515, 525, 660 60:1–16 179 60:1–14 48

reference index   723 60:1–5 421 60:1–4  307, 365 60:1–3  177, 276, 404 60:1–2  13, 130, 216, 364, 561 60:1  13, 121, 593, 594 60:2  34, 134 60:3–16 134 60:3–10 630 60:3–7 216 60:3  539, 582 60:4–7 119 60:4  173, 181, 216, 330, 422, 607 60:5–17 307 60:5–7 210 60:5  177, 539, 622, 627 60:6  582, 592 60:7 216 60:8–9  173, 308, 311 60:8 213 60:10  210, 303 60:11  177, 210, 539, 622, 627 60:12  210, 214, 290 60:13–61:3 442 60:13–15 177 60:13 34 60:14  210, 277 60:15  206, 274 60:16–17 309 60:16  204, 206, 210, 303, 330 60:17  384, 462, 594 60:18 366 60:19–20 276 60:19 134 60:20–61:6 431 60:21  134, 305, 328, 329 61–65 128 61–62 592 61  22, 134, 213, 290, 291, 327, 328, 610, 627, 630 61:1–9  306, 307 61:1–4 7 61:1–3  128, 384, 508, 627, 646 61:1–2  443, 444, 463, 531, 537, 570 61:1  12, 134, 308, 311, 404, 533, 630, 662, 665, 680 61:2–3 508 61:2 134

61:3–7 309 61:3  306, 328, 401, 441 61:4  134, 272 61:5  210, 365, 630 61:6  177, 216, 328, 365, 622, 627 61:7  328, 385 61:8–9 630 61:8 89 61:9  329, 365 61:10–63:9 525 61:10–62:9 378 61:10 385 61:11  216, 385 62  212, 216, 363, 365, 397, 571, 607 62:1–9  134, 304–306, 309 62:1–5  168, 273, 421 62:1 265 62:2–4  304, 329 62:2  212, 290, 330, 365, 378 62:3 290 62:4–5  121, 205, 275, 304, 422, 608 62:4  274, 306, 309, 366, 660 62:5  378, 594 62:6–7 662 62:6  213, 304, 378 62:8–9 134 62:8  309, 378 62:10–63:6 463 62:10–12  34, 46, 303, 304, 306, 308, 363 62:10  276, 390, 644 62:11  265, 303, 421 62:12  121, 205, 206, 275, 304, 329, 463 63–66  4, 5, 46 63–64  131, 133, 136, 137, 396 63  34, 64 63:1–6  13, 33, 46, 138, 139, 163, 214, 222, 359, 402, 419, 571, 586 63:1–3  206, 579 63:1 121 63:2–3 539 63:2 586 63:3–4 34 63:3  329, 578, 586, 587 63:6 383 63:7–65:25 139 63:7–64:12 217

724   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 63:7–64:11  4, 6, 33, 34, 46, 128, 129, 135, 192, 273, 307, 328, 403, 420 63:7–14 135 63:7  328, 346 63:8–14 328 63:8–9 135 63:8 206 63:9  8, 206 63:10  135, 253, 261 63:11  119, 475 63:12 192 63:13 8 63:14  8, 135 63:15–64:12  463, 475 63:15–64:11  135, 328 63:15–19 261 63:15–16  261, 442 63:15  8, 34, 328, 442 63:16  205, 206, 255, 328, 403, 420, 672 63:16 MT  477 63:17  8, 22, 34, 133, 135, 136, 215, 326, 329, 346, 463 63:18–19 261 63:19  136, 476 64:1–2 672 64:1 662 64:2 208 64:4–6 329 64:4 475 64:5  170, 215, 259, 416 64:5 Eng:  476 64:6 34 64:6 Eng:  416 64:7–12 136 64:7–11 22 64:7–10 382 64:7–8 475 64:7  136, 215, 328, 403, 420 64:8–12 Eng:  476 64:8–11 Eng:  382 64:8–10 307 64:8  205, 207, 475 64:8 Eng:  420 64:9 265 64:10–12 463 64:10–11 356

64:10  7, 273, 383 64:11 Eng:  383 64:12 Eng:  420 64:15 136 65–66  4, 9, 33, 34, 46, 128, 139, 192, 210, 222, 249, 255, 267, 329, 390, 397, 411, 555 65  129, 130, 137, 139, 210, 325, 330, 561, 626, 642 65:1–25  129, 135 65:1–7  177, 305, 307, 367 65:1–5 463 65:1–2  137, 463 65:1  212, 346, 463, 534 65:2  259, 346, 463, 499, 534 65:4–7 630 65:4 256 65:5–6 261 65:5 208 65:6–7  253, 259 65:8–12 463 65:8  138, 260, 326, 329, 385 65:8–9  34, 326 65:9–12 463 65:9–10 329 65:9  138, 217, 326, 329, 536 65:10 383 65:11–16 256 65:11–12 305 65:11  329, 360 65:12–16 257 65:12–15 215 65:13–25 217 65:13–15  217, 326 65:13–14  305, 329 65:13  326, 329 65:14  326, 329 65:15–16  305, 329 65:15  326, 329 65:16–25  329, 330 65:17–25  12, 210, 356, 463, 517, 626, 627, 644 65:17–20 222 65:17–18  222, 592 65:17  119, 170, 216, 223, 364, 365, 397, 539, 626, 644, 648 65:19–25 306 65:19 626

reference index   725 65:20–23 364 65:20 626 65:21–22  306, 309, 641 65:21 33 65:22–23 305 65:22  329, 417 65:23 329 65:24 330 65:25  13, 33, 121, 306, 382, 561, 626, 627, 648 66  33, 128, 129, 139, 215, 369, 397, 412, 422, 556, 607, 611 66:1–24 129 66:1–6 177 66:1–4  223, 256, 305 66:1–2  204, 222, 537, 538, 642, 646 66:1  206, 463, 543, 555, 579 66:2–5 138 66:2  347, 367, 462, 538, 623, 642 66:3–6 367 66:3  256, 538, 611 66:4 257 66:5–11 463 66:5–9 305 66:5  119, 210, 256, 257, 326, 382, 623 66:6  330, 360 66:7–14  330, 413, 421, 422 66:7–13  273, 275 66:7–12  412, 421 66:7–9 173 66:7–8 422 66:7  121, 330 66:8–9 403 66:8 330 66:9  14, 33, 422, 612 66:10–12  33, 422 66:11  330, 422 66:12–14 217 66:12  177, 330, 382, 592, 622, 627 66:13  14, 64, 121, 205, 421, 422, 464, 593, 612, 673 66:14  8, 217, 261, 326, 330, 417, 524 66:15–17 330 66:15–16 208 66:16  208, 330 66:17 256 66:18–24  7, 34, 222, 277, 303

66:18–23  179, 330 66:18–21  12, 515 66:18  216, 462 66:20–21 631 66:20  216, 276, 303 66:22–23 363 66:22  179, 363, 364, 397, 517, 536 66:23–24  215, 463 66:23  330, 555, 644 66:24  179, 208, 250, 330, 363, 367, 462–64, 546, 555, 556, 571 Jeremiah 2–3 273 2:21 417 3 136 3:1 205 3:8 205 4:11 136 4:19 166 6:9 417 6:17 166 7:1 116 7:9–11 535 7:11 533 8:10 256 9:16 402 10:2 238 10:10 205 11:1 116 15:10–11 325 18:18 340 20 546 20:7–10 325 20:10 324 22:17 256 22:30 282 23:5–6 282 23:5 327 23:36 205 25:9 322 25:11–12 230 27:6 322 28 160 29:1–7 300 29:8–9 160 29:10 230 29:21–23 160

726   reference index Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (Continued) 31:19 136 31:22 579 32:40 89 33:10 297 37–45 100 37–44 160 40:5–6 160 46–51  63, 160 48:1 116 49:1 116 49:23 116 49:28 116 49:32 299 49:36 299 50–51  65, 164 50:2 65 50:5 89 50:8  65, 306 51:11 164 51:45 306 51:53 227 51:64 65 52 100 Lamentations 1–2  124, 606 1 274 1:1 273 1:2 561 1:9 561 1:16 561 1:17 561 1:21 561 2 606 2:13 561 3  8, 124 Ezekiel 1 518 1:4–28 169 1:26–29 474 3:12 523 3:17 166 5:2 300 5:10 300 5:12 300 6:1 116 7:1 116

8:2–4 474 8:3 474 9:3 169 10 518 10:4 169 10:18–19 169 11:22–23 169 12:1 116 14:12–17 521 15:3 474 16  273, 518 16:60 89 23 273 25–32 160 28 521 28:11–19 164 30:13 583 32:17–32 164 32:30 534 33:1–9 166 33:21 299 33:24  324, 630 34:23–24 327 36:25 590 37  323, 330 37:1–14  80, 91 37:24–26 327 37:26 89 43:1–5 169 44:2 579 44:6–12 631 44:28 326 47:1–12 276 Daniel 2:20 524 2:34 579 9 662 10:10–12 538 11:40–45 477 12:2  85, 91 12:3–4 519 Hosea 1:9 561 2:4–15 401 2:23 561 2:25 561 Heb: 3:5 280

reference index   727 4:6 474 6:6 400 8:4 474 11:1 328 10:1 417 Joel 1:1 116 2:10 533 3:16 536 4:9–17 556 4:18 276 Amos 1–2  64–67, 160 1:1 116 1:2 83 2:16 300 4:1–3 401 5:3 260 5:25 400 6:4–8 300 6:9–10 260 7 546 7:1 116 7:4 116 8:1 116 9:11–12 280 Obadiah 1:13 474 Jonah 4:10–11 71 Micah 4–5 556 4 587 4:2 498 5:2 286 6:6–7 400 6:10 454 Nahum 3:4–7 172 3:4–5 172 3:8–9 148 Habakkuk 2:16 436 3:16 166 Zephaniah 2–3 64 3:1–8 68

Haggai 1:3–11 307 Zechariah 1–8 184 1:7–17 306 1:16 454 2:10–11 326 6:1–15 554 8:18–19 132 9–14 556 12–14 85 14 555 14:5 83 14:8 276 NEW TESTAMENT Matthew 1:1–17 583 1:22–23 571 1:23  461, 581 2:11 582 2:23 581 3:3 594 4:14–16 571 4:15–16 540 5:3–4 531 5:21–22 562 7:28–29 562 8:17  462, 531, 532, 571 11:3 533 11:28–30 591 12:17–21 571 12:18–21 531 13:13  498, 532 13:14 540 15:8–9 532 15:8 462 17:1–9 590 20:30–34 579 21:13 533 24 163 26:56 586 Mark 1:3 570 4:11–12  12, 532 4:12 498 7:6–7 532

728   reference index NEW TESTAMENT (Continued) 7:6 462 9:2–8 590 9:24 461 9:31 461 10:45 531 13:2 533 13:24–25 533 13:30 533 15:28 462 Luke 1:1–4 567 3:4–6  12, 537 3:23–38 583 4 444 4:16–21 7 4:18–19  12, 531, 537, 570 7:19 533 8:10  498, 537 9:28–36 590 10:17 521 19:46  533, 537 22:19–22 461 22:19 461 22:37  531, 532, 537 John 1:23  12, 531, 570 1:29  498, 586, 593 1:36 461 6:22 593 10:14–15 590 12:38  462, 532 12:40–41 498 12:41 500 15:5 586 17:15 499 20:30–31 567 Acts 1:8 531 2–5 537 3:13  532, 537 3:20 455 7:45–47 538 7:48 538 7:49–50 537 8:32–33  462, 532, 537 8:32 587

13:1 590 13:34 537 13:47 537 28:25–26 498 28:26–27 537 28:27  499, 540 Romans 2:17 535 2:21–23 535 2:24  533, 535 3:15–17 533 8:1–7 536 9–11 535 9:27–29 535 9:27–28 533 9:29 533 9:30–31 534 9:33  533, 534, 540 10:11 533 10:15  533, 535 10:16  462, 533 10:20  533, 534 10:21  533, 534 11:8  533, 534 11:13–22 535 11:18 535 11:25–27 536 11:26–27 533 11:27 533 11:29 535 11:34  12, 531, 533 12:38 532 14:11  533, 537 15:9–12 534 15:12 533 15:21  532, 533 1 Corinthians 1:19 533 2:9 533 2:16  531, 533 11:24–25 461 14:21 533 15:32 533 15:54  533, 537 2 Corinthians 3:12–16 584 6:2 533 6:17 533

reference index   729 Galatians 4:27 533 6:16 569 Philippians 2:6–11 519 2:11 537 3:16 569 2 Timothy 3:16–17  562, 563 Hebrews 11:37  496, 512, 578 James 5:7 593 1 Peter 1:19 461 1:23–25 570 1:25  12, 531 1:25 531 2:4–8 570 2:6–8 540 2:18–25  519, 570 2:21–25 532 2:22  462, 532 2:24 540 3:14 570 2 Peter 1:16–18 590 Revelation 1:4 538 1:12–18 538 1:17 538 4:1–11 538 4:8  500, 538 5:6–10 461 6:12–13 533 6:15–16 594 11:17 538 14:8 172 14:19–20 539 16:5 538 17–18 164 18:1–24 172 19:6 593 19:11–16 539 19:13 539 19:15 539:  586 19:16 593

21 539 21:1 539 21:2 539 21:4 539 21:6 539 21:19 539 21:24 539 21:25 539 APOCRYPHA 2 Esdras 3–14 61 Tobit 1 61 13:4 328 Wisdom of Solomon 2–5 519 ii:12 460 4:20 519 xv:10 460 Ecclesiasticus 16:7 522 17:32 522 24:19–22 338 46:1 329 48:17–25  508, 514 48:24–25 508 2 Maccabees 7:32–38 519 Judith 1 61 PSEUDEPIGRAPHA 1 Enoch 6–11 521 25:5–7 517 29:4–5 521 31:4 521 39:12 523 85–90 514 2 Baruch 73:2–4 517 2 Enoch 20 523 4 Ezra 13:13–50 516 4 Maccabees 18:14 460

730   reference index PSEUDEPIGRAPHA (Continued) Apocalypse of Abraham 17:7 523 Jubilees 23 517 Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah 1:1–3:13 512 2:6 512 3:6–10 512 3:9 513 5:1–16 512 Psalms of Solomon 17:26–28 516 Sibylline Oracles 3 460 3:606 460 3:708 460 5 460 Testament of Adam 1:4 523 Testament of Isaac 8:3 523 DEAD SEA SCROLLS 1QHa 16:5–17:36  10, 441 16:5–27 441 16:27–17:6 442 17:6–36 442 1QIsaa 41:22 437   col: 27  432 1QIsaa L 8–22 378 1QS 8:15–16  444, 445 9:20 445 1QpHab 11:8–14 436 4QpIsa A Frag: 1 col 1  443 frags 2–6 col 2  443   4QpIsa C frags 8–10  443

CD 10:17–19  10, 440 JOSEPHUS Jewish Antiquities 1:107 517 9:276 509 10:33–34 509 10:35  439, 509 11:5–6 509 13:64 509 13:68 509 13:71 509 20:7–8 480 Against Apion 1:15–27 509 1:37 509 1:150 164 Jewish War 7:432 509 TARGUMS Targum Jonathan Samuel 2:4 482 Targum Jonathan Isaiah 1:13–14 480 1:15 481 1:21–31 479 1:21–23 481 1:24–31 481 1:25 481 1:27 485 1:28 479 2:6–22 479 3:8–4:1 479 3:13 481 4:2–3 485 4:2 482 4:3–4 481 4:4 481 4:5–6 481 5 479 5:1 4775:5  481 5:6–15 479 5:10 479 5:24  479, 485

reference index   731 6:1 480 6:3 481 8:17 481 9:5–6 485 9:5 482 10:27 482 10:32 477 11:1 482 11:6 482 14:2 481 14:29 482 15:6–7 470 16:1–5 482 16:5 482 17:11 481 22:12–14 479 24:1–12 481 24:1  479, 480 24:4 480 24:5 479 24:6 480 24:13–16 481 24:16 483 25:7 470 26:15 485 26:18–20 483 26:19 485 27 478 27:1  470, 478 27:4 478 27:5 478 27:6 478 27:9 478 27:12–14 478 27:12 478 28:1 480 28:5 482 28:9 479 28:10 480 29:22 477 30:33 484 31:9 485 32:15 481 33:5 481 33:13–15 485 33:13–14 484 33:14 485

33:15–18 485 34:9 470 37:16 481 40:22 481 41:2–4 477 41:2 477 41:5 477 41:8 477 41:11 477 41:15 477 41:17 477 41:23 477 41:25 477 42:1 482 42:6–7 482 42:11 484 42:14 481 42:18–19 482 42:19 482 43:12 477 44:1–2 482 44:5 482 44:21 482 44:26 482 45:4 482 45:7 474 45:8  474, 484 46:11  477, 479 48:15  477, 479, 481 48:16 479 48:20 482 49:14 481 49:15 474 51:2 477 51:6–9 485 51:14 482 52:13–53:12 483 52:13 482 53:3–4 483 53:3 481 53:9 485 54 478 54:1 470 54:8 481 56:3–4 482 56:5–6 482 56:5 481

732   reference index TARGUMS (Continued) 57:17 481 57:19 485 59:2 481 63:15–64:11  475, 476 63:15  475, 476 63:16 477 63:17 476 63:18–19 475 63:19  475, 476 64:3  475, 476 64:4 476 64:5–6 476 64:6–7 475 64:6 481 64:7–11 476 64:7 475 64:8 476 64:11 476 65:4 470 65:13–15 482 65:17 484 66:21–22 485 66:22–24 484 66:24  484, 485 Targum Isaiah 18:1 11 29:9 11 65:4 11 MISHNAH Eduyot 2:10 485 Erubim 100b 523 Megillah 4:4 518 4:10 518 Niddah 24b 523 Sanhedrin 10:3 516 Sukkah 4:9–10 524 5:1 524 Yoma 5:2 522

BABYLONIAN TALMUD Baba Batra 16a 485 Berakot 5a 518 8a–b 472 28b 511 Hagigah 5a 485 Mo’ed Qatan 28b 470 Megillah 3a 470 10b 510 29a 516 Shabbat 34a 470 115a 472 151b 523 Sanhedrin 90b 478 94 511 94a  510, 514 94b 470 98b  483, 518 99a 511 103b 510 104a 510 Sotah 10b 510 14a 518 Yebamot 49b 513 JERUSALEM TALMUD Sheqalim 5:1 518 Sanhedrin 10:2 510 28bc 513 28c 513 Sotah IX, 16  511 TOSEFTA TALMUD Avodah Zarah 8:4 515

reference index   733 Sanhedrin 13:2 515 OTHER RABBINIC WORKS Alphabet of Ben Sira 23 523 33 523 Avot of Rabbi Nathan XXV 511 Canticles Rabbah 4:3 511 4:8 511 Exodus Rabbah 18:5 510 Genesis Rabbah 20:10 518 42:3 510 97  510, 515 Leviticus Rabbah 36:3 510 Pesiqta Rabbati 4:3 513 Ruth Rabbah 5:6 518 7:2  510, 511, 515 Seder Olam Rabbah 10 510 APOSTOLIC FATHERS Barnabas ii. 5  463 iii. 1–3  463 iv. 11  463 v. 14  463 vi. 1  463 vi. 2–3  463 vi. 2  463 vi. 7  463 ix. 1  463 ix. 3  463 xi. 4–5  463 xii. 4  463 xiv. 2  463 xv. 8  463 xvi 463 xvi. 2  463

I Clement vii. 4  462 xiii. 3  462 xlii. 5  462 xv. 1  462 xv. 2  462 xvi. 3–5  462 xvi. 3–14  462 xxiii. 5  462 xxiv. 6  462 II Clement ii. 1  462 iii. 5  462 vii. 6  462 xiii. 2  462 xv. 3  462 xvi. 3  462 xvii. 24  462 xvii. 4–5  462 Ignatius Ephesians 4.2 500 Polycarp x.3 462 Smyrnaeans i. 2  463 Trallians viii. 2  463 NEW TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA AND PSEUDEPIGRAPHA Gospel of Pseudo Matthew 17–25 583 CLASSICAL AND ANCIENT CHRISTIAN LITERATURE Ambrose Expositio Evangelii secundum Lucam 9.25 497 Letter 69 586 Anselm Proslogion 1 493 Augustine Confessionum 9.5.13 490

734   reference index CLASSICAL AND ANCIENT CHRISTIAN LITERATURE (Continued) Enarrationes in Psalmos 56.4 586 De doctrina christiana 2.11–16 493 2.11 493 2.15.22 491 Letters 28 493 40 493 67 493 68 493 71–75 493 81 494 82 494 Sermon 375.1 582 Cassiodorus Institutes 1.15.11 495 Clement of Alexandria Paedagogus i. 21  464 i. 24  464 i. 61  464 i. 76  464 Stromateis 7.12 500 Cyprian Testimonia 2 497 3 498 10 498 Cyril Sermon 12 511 Herodotus Histories 1:190–191 164 1:191 167 Hilary of Poitiers Contra Contantium imperatorem 4 497 Isidore of Seville Ecclesiasticis officiis 1.12.8 495

Etymologiae 6.2 497 Jerome Commentariorum in Isaiam 2.3 498 4.11.10 499 8.1–4 495 15.57.1–2 496 42 498 49.9 498 60.4 498 Letters 18 498 18A 500 18B 500 27.1 494 49.4 496 57.5 495 Jerome Adversus Rufinum 3.6 495 Justin 1 Apology 32.12–13 578 33 463 35 463 37 463 38 463 39 463 44 463 47 463 48 463 49 463 50 463 51 463 52 463 53 463 61 463 63 463 Dialogue with Trypho 11 463 12 463 13 463 14 463 15 463 16 463 17 463

reference index   735 22 463 24 463 25 463 26 463 27 463 32 463 42 463 43 510 44 463 50 463 65 463 66 463 68 510 69 463 70 463 71 510 77  463, 510 78 463 79 463 81 463 82 463 85 463 87 463 97 463 102 463 110 463 114 463 118 463 119 463 121 463 122 463 123 463 133 463 135 463 136 463 140 463 Origen Commentarium in evangelium Matthaei 10,18 512 Commentarii in evangelium Joannis 6.273–81 586 Contra Celsum 1.54–55 518 Passio Perpetuae et Felicitatis 12 500

Ps. Cyprian De Montibus 1.1 498 10.1.3–4 498 Tertullian Adversus Iudaeos 3.8 498 Adversus Marcionem 3.6 498 3.21 498 3.22 498 4.1 498 4.40 586 5.4 498 De oratione 1.1 492 3 500 De patientia 14.1 497 Adversus Praxean 5.2–4 492 Scorpiace 8 496 Xenophon Cyropaedia VII 5  164 VII, 20–30  164 INSCRIPTIONS Biblia Pauperum 66 590 CT 24 50  234 Cyrus Cylinder ll. 5–10  182 ll. 11–12  183 ll. 20–21  183 ll. 32–33  183 DB 6–8 188 DNa 1–5 188 Enuma Eliš III, 120–122  229 IV, 17–28  235 IV, 120–122  229 V, 1–25  239

736   reference index INSCRIPTIONS (Continued) V.1 236 V, 3–4  237 V.7 236 V, 12–22  237 V, 13  237 VI 38  172 VI 60–62  160 VI, 121–VII, 137 236 VI, 127  235

VI 131  172 VII 14, 8  173 VII 14, 88  171 VII, 130–132  236 Marduk Prophecy obv. ll. 7–12  231 Tiberius Psalter folio 7v  591 Yasna 44 187