Companion to the Bible

by E. P. Barrows

"The first of these sections (chaps. 40-48) portrays the relation of Israel to the heathen nations; and from the redemption of Israel effected through Cyrus, the servant of God, it unfolds the certain victory of the Theocracy over the gods and powers of the heathen world. The second section (chaps. 49-57) exhibits Israel as the seat of salvation for the world. This it does by carrying out the thought that, just as Cyrus is to redeem Israel from the Babylonish captivity, so must the true servant of Jehovah, by his vicarious suffering and death, make expiation for sin, raise the covenant people to true glory, and make them, through the establishment of 'the sure mercies of David' (55:3), the centre of salvation for the whole world. Finally in the third section (chaps. 58-66), after an exhortation in which the sins of the people are acknowledged and rebuked (chaps. 58, 59), the prophet foretells, in a series of majestic images, how the Theocracy shall be glorified when it shall become, in connection with the creation of a new heaven and a new earth, the perfected kingdom of God." Introduction to the Old Testament, § 65. This view of the glorification of the Theocracy in the latter days is preëminently just, provided only that we do not understand the Theocracy in a gross literal sense. It is the true kingdom of God, once embodied in the old Theocracy, but now existing under the freer forms of Christianity, that is heir to all this glory.

7. As Isaiah holds the first place among the Hebrew prophets in the canon, in the extent of his writings, and in the fulness of his prophecies concerning the Messiah and his kingdom, so has he been first also in receiving the assaults of those who deny the supernatural character of revelation. Since the last quarter of the last century persistent attempts have been made to show that the whole of the second part (chaps. 40-66) and various sections of the first part, particularly all those that relate to the overthrow of Babylon, belong not to Isaiah, but to an unknown prophet who lived about the close of the exile. In support of this view many arguments have been adduced; but the real argument which lies at the foundation of the whole is the belief that no such insight into the future is possible as that which this part of the book manifests, upon the supposition that Isaiah was himself the author of it. The denial of the genuineness of the chapters in question began and has always gone hand in hand with the denial of the reality of prophetic inspiration. In the view of rationalists prophecy is no revelation of the future through the illumination of the Holy Spirit. It is only anticipation and shrewd conjecture of the future from the course of the present. The possibility of prophecy, therefore, is limited by the possibility of human foresight. Reasoning from this false position, the critic first assumes that Isaiah cannot have been the author of the last part of the book which bears his name, and then proceeds to find arguments against its genuineness. To meet him we must plant our feet firmly on the great historic truth that God has made to men a supernatural revelation, of which prophecy in the proper sense of the word—the revelation of the future by his Spirit—constitutes an important part. We do indeed find that in the matter of prophecy, as in all other parts of God's operations, the great law is: "First the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear." The way for the fuller revelations is prepared by previous intimations of a more general character. Precisely so was it in the present case. Moses himself had more than once predicted the captivity of the covenant people and the desolation of their land as the punishment of their foreseen apostacy from God's service, and also the preservation of a remnant and its restoration upon repentance. Lev., chap. 26; Deut., chaps. 28-32. When Solomon had dedicated the temple, and his kingdom was at the zenith of its glory, he received from the mouth of God himself the solemn warning: "If ye shall at all turn from following me, ye or your children, and will not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them; then will I cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and this house, which I have hallowed for my name, will I cast out of my sight; and Israel shall be a proverb and a by-word among all people." 1 Kings 9:6, 7. When the prophet wrote, these awful threatenings had been fulfilled upon the kingdom of the ten tribes, and he had been commissioned to announce their approaching fulfilment upon Judah also, and that in the form of a captivity in Babylon: "Behold, the days come, that all that is in thy house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the Lord. And of thy sons which shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon" (39:6, 7). Micah also had foretold, in express terms, both the Babylonish captivity, and the subsequent delivery of God's people (4:10). We see, then, what a full preparation had been made for the revelations vouchsafed to Isaiah in the chapters now under consideration. They relate not to something new and unheard of, but to a captivity which he had himself foretold in accordance with the threatenings of God by former prophets. Under the illumination of the Holy Spirit he is carried into the future of Zion. In prophetic vision he sees her land wasted, her temple burned, and her children groaning in captivity. As the nearest interposition of God in her behalf, he foretells her liberation by Cyrus, the anointed of the Lord, and her restoration to the promised land. But this is only the earnest and pledge of a higher redemption through the Messiah, the true servant of Jehovah, under whom she shall be glorified with a perpetual salvation, and her dominion extended over all the earth. To limit the prophet's vision to the deliverance from Babylon would be to make him a messenger of glad tidings which mocked the hopes of the covenant people; for this deliverance did not fulfil the just expectations which his lofty promises awakened in the bosoms of the pious remnant of Israel. No; it is in Christ's redemption alone, of which that of Cyrus was only a shadow, that Zion receives in full measure the glorious promises which shine forth in this part of Isaiah.

If now we consider the form of these promises, we find that they bear throughout the stamp of true prophecy, as distinguished from history. They have neither the dress of prose history, with its dates and circumstantial details, such as we find in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, nor of historic poetry, like the song of Deborah and Barak; like the seventy-eighth hundred and fifth, and hundred and sixth psalms. They are expressed in a series of poetic images, in which, with the exception of the name of Cyrus, all is general; images, moreover, drawn for the most part, not from the great events connected with the conquests of Cyrus, but from the earlier history of Israel. Let any one read, for example, the forty-sixth and forty-seventh chapters of Isaiah, and ask himself whether a writer who lived in Cyrus' day could have described the fall of Babylon without specific allusions to the agencies by which it was brought to pass. As to the historic references which some find to the march of the Jewish caravans of returning captives through the desert that lay between Babylon and Palestine, whoever reads the passages in question without a previously formed conclusion, must be satisfied that they are poetic descriptions of the redemption and restoration of God's people borrowed mainly from the primitive journey of Israel from Egypt to Canaan through the wilderness of Arabia. God, as then, goes before his people, opening for them in their extremity "rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys;" making "the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water." Even Cyrus is mentioned not as the king of Persia, but as a man raised up from the east to execute God's vengeance on the oppressors of his people.

According to Ctesias and Plutarch, the name Cyrus signifies sun. Strabo says that his name, before ascending the throne of Persia, was Agradales. Some are of opinion that the word Cyrus (Heb. Koresh) was an appellation common to the kings of Persia. We do not need, however, the help of this hypothesis. God himself explains the ground on which he is mentioned by name: "For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, have I even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me" (45:4). According to Josephus (Antiq. 11. 1, 2), Cyrus was moved to issue his decree for the liberation of the Jews by a knowledge of the prophecies of Isaiah in which he is mentioned by name. With this agree the terms of the edict: "The Lord God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he hath charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah." Ezra 1:2, compared with Isa. 44:28. If this view be correct, the mention of Cyrus by name was a part of God's plan for the restoration of the covenant people.

It is not true, as has been asserted, that the prophet follows Cyrus in the details of his conquests. On the contrary, his notices of him are few and general. As to the sins of the people which he rebukes, they may be all naturally referred to the times of Isaiah, while some of them, as the neglect of the established sacrifices and oblations (43:23, 24), and the offering of sacrifices in connection with an impure heart and life (66:3), presuppose the existence of the temple and altar at Jerusalem, where alone sacrifices could be lawfully offered. The sin of seeking heathen alliances (57:9) points also unmistakably to the same period. Although the prophet is carried forward in vision to the future of the covenant people, he does not wholly forget the men of his own generation, but occasionally administers to them severe rebukes, thus mingling the present with the future, after the manner of all the prophets.

The other arguments which have been urged against the genuineness of this part of Isaiah are only of secondary importance, and can readily be answered. It is said that the style is more diffuse and flowing than in the first part. The answer is that this agrees well with both the altered circumstances of the prophet and the altered character of his theme. Most of his earlier prophecies were delivered under the pressure and excitement of public life, when he went before rulers and people charged with specific messages from Jehovah, and these, too, mostly of a denunciatory character. But the part now under consideration was written in the serenity of retirement, with the general purpose of comforting God's people by a view of the future glory in reserve for them. It is entirely natural, then, that the style of the first part should be more concise and abrupt, that of the latter more diffuse and flowing; even if we do not make allowance for the influence of age. But notwithstanding this difference between the two parts, both have the same general costume, and the same peculiar expressions and turns of thought, by which they are sufficiently marked as the productions of the same pen. It should be added that the Hebrew of this second part of Isaiah is in general as pure as that of the first part. The few Chaldaisms which it exhibits may be explained as belonging to the poetic diction. Such Chaldaisms exist, moreover, in the earlier books. "Some words, as seganim (princes, 41:25), may be explained by the intercourse of the Jews with the Assyrians in the days of Isaiah." Davidson's Introduction to the Old Testament, p. 857.

8. It has been shown that the arguments against the genuineness of this part of Isaiah (and by parity of reason against certain sections of the first part) have their ground in the denial of prophetic inspiration, and cannot endure the test of sober criticism. The evidence, then, for the genuineness of these chapters remains in its full force, and it is of the most weighty character. If we look to external testimony, there is the undeniable fact that, as far back as we can trace the history of the book of Isaiah, they have constituted an integral part of it. They are recognized as such by Josephus (Antiq. 11. 1, 2); by Jesus the son of Sirach, in the book called Ecclesiasticus (48:24, 25); and always in the New Testament when quotations are made from them—Matt. 3:3; 8:17; 12:17-21; Luke 3:4; 4:17-19; John 1:23; 12:38-41, where a quotation from the last part of Isaiah is joined with one from the first part; Acts 8:28-33; Rom. 10:16, 20, 21. That they were appended by fraud and forgery no one pretends to affirm. The character of this part of the book, not less than the character of those who had the Jewish canon in custody, is a sufficient protection against such a supposition. That they should have been appended through ignorance is inconceivable. How can the name of so great a prophet have remained unknown? According to the hypothesis in question, he lived about the close of the Babylonish captivity. He was contemporary, therefore, with Daniel; with Zerubbabel also, Jeshua, and the other chiefs of the restoration. Did no one of these know who was the man that prophesied so abundantly of the work which they had so much at heart? And did his name indeed escape the knowledge of the learned scribe Ezra? And if they did not know his name, why did they append his writings to those of the true Isaiah, thus tacitly ascribing to him their authorship? Why did they not leave them without a name, as they did the books of Judges, Ruth, Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles? That these chapters have always constituted a part of the book of Isaiah, and been acknowledged as such, is a fact which admits of but one explanation; that, namely, of their genuineness. The Great Unknown, as he is called, is no other than Isaiah himself, whom the principles of certain critics do not allow them to acknowledge as Isaiah.

The internal evidence for the genuineness of these chapters has already been partly considered in an incidental way. It is found in the purity of the Hebrew, which belongs to the age of Isaiah, not of Cyrus; in the undeniable allusions to the temple sacrifices and oblations as then existing (43:23, 24), and to the sin of seeking heathen alliances (57:9); and especially in the fact that a writer living near the close of the exile must have referred in a more particular and historic way to the great events connected with Cyrus' conquests. It may be added that there are in the later prophets some clear allusions to this part of Isaiah. Jeremiah, who undeniably made use of prophecies contained in the first part of Isaiah, was acquainted with the second part also. Compare Jer. 10:3,4, with Isa. 40:19, 20; 41:7; Jer. 31:35, with Isa. 51:15, where a whole clause is repeated from Isaiah, which agrees in the Hebrew to every letter; Jer. 50:2, with Isa. 46:1, 2. Compare also Zeph. 2:15, with Isa. 47:8; Nah. 1:15, with Isa. 52:7.

9. The arguments urged against the genuineness of certain sections of the first part of Isaiah are for substance the same as these that have now been examined, and need not a separate consideration. We come on solid grounds to the conclusion that Isaiah was the author of the whole collection of prophecies which bear his name, and that the arrangement of these prophecies in their present form also proceeded from him.

II. JEREMIAH AND THE BOOK OF LAMENTATIONS.

10. In passing from Isaiah to Jeremiah, the contrast is as great as it can well be; and yet it is a contrast necessary to the completeness of divine revelation, which employs men of all characters and temperaments, and living in every variety of outward circumstances. Isaiah, like the apostle John, seems to have lived above his personal relations in the sphere of divine truth. He never alludes to his private history, except where the nature of a given narrative requires it. It is not probable that he was subjected to such an ordeal of persecution as that through which Jeremiah passed. However this may be, we gain almost no knowledge of his private life from the book of his prophecies. But Jeremiah, like the apostle Paul, unfolds to us very fully the history of his inward and outward life. With his peculiarly tender and sensitive mind it could not have been otherwise. If he had not woven into his prophecies his own inner and outer life, he would not have written naturally, and therefore truthfully. Through this interweaving of biography with revelation, God has given in the case of Jeremiah, as in that of the great apostle to the Gentiles, a rich storehouse of truth for the instruction and comfort of his persecuted and suffering servants in all ages. With the simplicity of truth, the prophet informs us how the men of Anathoth, his native place, conspired to take away his life (11:18-23; 12:6); how Pashur, the son of Immer, smote him and put him in the stocks (20:1-6); how in the beginning of Jehoiakim's reign he was accused before the princes by the priests and false prophets as a man worthy of death, but acquitted by them (chap. 26); how afterwards he and Baruch were hidden by Jehovah (chap 36); how under Zedekiah he was repeatedly imprisoned (chaps. 32:2; 33:1), and thrust into dungeons (chaps. 37, 38); how upon the conquest of the city by the Chaldeans he was released from his fetters and honorably treated (chs. 39:11-14; 40:1-4); and how afterwards he was forced to go into Egypt with the fugitive Jews (chaps. 42, 43).