The Lord speaks to Deutero-Isaiah about the lot of the righteous in a world filled with evil and lies; this subject arises in the context of the promise that not only Israelites but foreigners too will turn to God. The logic of divine revelation is this: in chapter 56 He calls...
The Lord speaks to Deutero-Isaiah about the lot of the righteous in a world filled with evil and lies; this subject arises in the context of the promise that not only Israelites but foreigners too will turn to God. The logic of divine revelation is this: in chapter 56 He calls all nations to turn to Him, and the chapter ends with the exceptionally important statement that God calls the nations to Himself, not to Israel. Israel's leaders are blind, and their hearts and deeds are full of iniquity. The Lord calls us not to the way of life or religion of particular people, but only to Himself, because none of us can be a worthy witness to His holiness. This thought remains just as relevant to the Church of the New Testament. Then, in chapter 57, which we read today, the Lord speaks of the lot of the righteous person.
These words differ strikingly from everything we are accustomed to reading in the Old Testament, and from most people's conventional ideas. The Lord warns that the lot of the righteous is sorrowful, because in a fallen world righteousness inevitably brings suffering. We, on the contrary, like most Old Testament Jews, think it should be the other way round: the righteous should prosper and the wicked perish. And indeed the righteous ought to have prospered, and there ought to have been no wickedness at all, had it not been for humanity's fall, which distorted the Creator's original design. Thus, for the righteous person, only death brings the long-awaited peace found in God, and death also becomes deliverance from the malice reigning in this world. Here Deutero-Isaiah's words resonate with what the apostle Paul writes at the beginning of the Letter to the Philippians: ‘For me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.’
Continuing, the Lord says that idolatry nevertheless brings good to no one, ever, because the idolater's path consists in serving falsehood. In essence, He thereby puts Israel and all the other nations on the same footing, calling everyone alike to turn to Him. This is a thoroughly New Testament thought: John the Baptist expresses precisely this in other words when he calls on the Jews to wash themselves (‘be baptised’ in our translation), as pagans coming to faith wash themselves. For everyone, repentance and hope in God alone prove to be the path to life, to ‘inheriting the land’, as the prophet puts it here. It is more than likely that this is the very passage the Lord Jesus Christ quotes in the Sermon on the Mount when speaking of the meek inheriting the earth.
In the concluding part of the chapter, the Lord says that no one can stand against His righteousness. He speaks these words not with anger and reproach, as we would, but with pain and compassion. ‘Why should you die?’ the prophet Ezekiel had exclaimed on behalf of the Most High several decades earlier. And through Deutero-Isaiah the Lord calls all people to come to Him, removing every obstacle on the way to the Redeemer. This ‘dispute’—the confrontation between God and people striving towards sin and death—will not last for ever, the Lord says, because none of us could survive it. And in the final verses, as through the other prophets, the Lord again promises to grant forgiveness and salvation to those who repent.
It is here, in these final verses, that we find extraordinary words, a true pearl of prophetic revelation. Calling everyone to turn to Him, the Lord says that His will and purpose lie in our turning to Him and being saved, in our being healed of sin and death. He says, ‘I dwell in the heights of heaven and in the sanctuary, and also with those who are contrite and humble in spirit.’ The Almighty dwells not only in heaven, not only in the sanctuary, but beside the humble in spirit. Here we begin to glimpse what Christ's great words express: ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven; blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.’ Deutero-Isaiah is called the Old Testament evangelist because much was revealed to him that would later be spoken by Christ and fulfilled in His earthly life.
But the word of the Lord does not stop there. He continues: ‘I dwell... to revive the spirit of the humble and the hearts of the contrite.’ He lives in order to bring us, the humble and contrite, to life! In this gift of mercy, the Lord Himself places the meaning of His own life, incomprehensible and inexpressible in words. The eternal mystery of divine Life is revealed here as God's gift to those who come to Him.
57 The blessed death of the righteous, not duly lamented by the Jews, who also commit idolatry, and trust in man: they are threatened, Isa 57:1-12.
Evangelical promises to the penitent, Isa 57:13-19.
No peace to the wicked, Isa 57:20-21.
57:1 The righteous - Just and holy men. No man - Few or none.Layeth it to heart - Is duly affected with this sad sign of God's displeasure.
57:2 He - This just and merciful man shall enter into a state of rest, where he shall be out of the reach of the approaching miseries.They - just men. Here is a sudden change of the number, which is very frequent in the prophets. Beds - In their graves, which are not unfitly called their beds, as their death is commonly called sleep in scripture.
57:3 Hither - To God's tribunal, to receive your sentence. Sons - Not by propagation, but by imitation. And the whore - Not the genuine children of Abraham, their dispositions were far more suitable to a bastardly brood, than to Abraham's seed.
57:4 Against whom - Consider whom it is that you mock and scoff, when you deride God's prophets. A seed - A generation of liars, whose practices contradict your professions, who deal deceitfully both with God and men.
57:5 Enflaming - Lusting after them, and mad upon them. Slaying - In way of sacrifice to their idols. Valleys - He seems to allude to the valley of Hinnom in which these cruelties were practised.Clifts - Which they chuse either for shade, or for those dark vaults, in rocks, which were convenient for idolatrous uses.
57:6 Portion - Thou hast chosen for thy portion those idols, which were worshipped by the sides of brooks or rivers where such smooth stones commonly lie. They - Thou hast forsaken me and chosen idols.Offered - For the devil is God's ape, and idolaters used the same rites and offerings in the worship of idols which God had prescribed in his own.Comfort - Should I be pleased with such a people and such actions?
57:7 Mountain - In high places, which were much used for religious worship, both by Israelites and by Heathens. Thy bed - Thine altar, in which thou didst commit spiritual whoredom with idols.
57:8 The posts - Behind the posts of the doors of thine house: where the Heathens placed their tutelar gods to whose protection they committed their houses, that so they might have their eyes and minds upon them, whensoever they went out or came in. Set up - Those monuments which thou didst set up there as remembrances of those idol - gods whom they represented.Discovered - Thou hast uncovered thy nakedness; to others beside me thine husband. Gone up - Into the adulterous bed. Enlarged - That it might receive many adulterers together. Thou hast multiplied thine idols and altars. A covenant - Thou hast covenanted to serve them.
57:9 The King - The king of Assyria, called the king by way of eminency, to whom the Israelites in the days of Isaiah were very prone to trust, and send presents. And so the prophet passes from their idolatry to another sin, even their confidence in Heathen princes.Increase - Didst send great quantities. Far off - Into Assyria, which was far from Judea. Debase - Thou wast willing to submit to the basest terms to procure their aid.
57:10 Wearied - Thou hast not eased, but tired thyself with thy tedious journey. Yet - And yet thou didst not perceive that thy labour was lost.Hast found - Thou hast sometimes found success in these ways.Not grieved - Therefore thou didst not repent of thy sin herein.
57:11 Feared - And who are they, the fear of whom drives thee to these wicked courses? Lied - That thou hast dealt thus perfidiously with me.Not remembered - Hast thou forgotten all those great things which I have done for thee. Held my peace - Have not I forbore to punish thee from time to time, that by this goodness I might oblige thee to love me.And thou - Or, therefore thou dost not fear or regard me. Thou abusest my long - suffering.
57:13 But - But they shall be carried away suddenly and violently by the blast of mine anger. Vanity - A vapour which quickly vanishes away.Inherit - Shall enjoy my favour and presence in my temple.
57:14 And he - God will raise up a man who shall say with authority and efficacy. Cast up - Make causeways, where it is needful, for their safe and easy passage, and remove all things which may hinder them in their return.
57:16 For - I will not proceed to the utmost severity with sinful men.
57:17 Covetousness - Of which sin the Jews were eminently guilty.But this comprehends all those sins for which God contended with them.He went - Yet he was not reformed, but trespassed more and more.
57:18 Mourners - To those who are humbled under God's hand, that mourn in Zion for their own and others sins.
57:19 I create - I will by my almighty power produce. Peace - That peace which is not wrought by mens hands, but only by God's lips or word.The doubling of the word signifies the certainty and abundance this peace.Far off - To the Gentiles who are far from God, as well as to the Jews, who are called a people near unto God, Psa 148:14.
57:20 Cast up - Their minds are restless, being perpetually hurried with their own lusts and passions, and with guilt, and the dread of the divine vengeance.
57:21 No peace - Though they may have a great share of prosperity, yet they have no share in this inward, and spiritual, and everlasting peace.