Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions. Vol. 2

by Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg

In ver. 6 and 7, after having pointed to His Omnipotence as affording a guarantee for the fulfilment of a prophecy so great that it might appear almost incredible, the Lord turns to His Servant and addresses Him. He announces to Him that it should be His glorious destination, partly to bring, in His person, the covenant with Israel to its full truth, partly to be the light for the Gentile world,--to be, in general, the Saviour of the whole human race.

In the closing verses, 8, 9, the Lord addresses the Church, and directs its attention to the object which the announcement of the mission of His Servant, declared in the preceding context, serves: God, because He is God, is anxious for the promotion of His glory. In order, therefore, that it may be known that He alone is God, He grants to His people disclosures as regards the distant Future, as yet fully wrapped up in obscurity.

There is no doubt, and it is now generally admitted, that the Servant of the Lord, here described, is the same as He who is brought before us in chap. xlix. 4; liii., lxi. It is, hence, not sufficient to point out an individual to whom, apparently, the attributes contained in this prophecy belong; but we must add and combine all the signs and attributes which are contained in the parallel passages.

The Chaldean Paraphrast who, in so many instances, has faithfully preserved the exegetical tradition, understands the Messiah by the Servant of God; and so, from among the later Jewish expositors, do Dav. Kimchi and Abarbanel, the latter of whom says of the non-Messianic interpretation, שכל אלה החכמים הכו בסנורים "that all these expositors were struck with blindness." That this exposition was the current one among the Jews at the time of Christ, appears from Luke ii. 32, where Simeon designates the Saviour as the light to be revealed to the Gentiles φῶς εἰς ἀποκάλυψιν ἐθνῶν, with a reference to Is xlii. 6; xlix. 6. It is especially the latter passage which Simeon has in view, as also St. Paul in Acts xiii. 46, 47, as appears from the words immediately preceding ὅτι εἶδον οἱ ὀφθαλμοί μου τὸ σωτήριον σου ὃ ἡτοίμασας κατὰ πρόσωπον πάντων τῶν λαῶν, which evidently refer to chap. xlix. But chap. xlix. is, as regards the point which here comes into consideration, a mere repetition and confirmation of chap. xlii.

By the New Testament, this exposition has been introduced and established in the Church of Christ. The words which, at the baptism of Christ, resounded from heaven: οὗτος ἐστιν ὁ υἱός μου ὁ ἀγαπητός, ἐν ᾧ εὐδόκησα, Matt. iii. 17 (comp. Mark i. 11) evidently refer to ver. 1 of the chapter before us, and point out that He who had now appeared was none other than He who had, centuries ago, been predicted by the prophets. And so do likewise the words which, according to Matt. xvii. 5 (compare Mark ix. 7; Luke ix. 35; 2 Pet. i. 17), at the transfiguration of Christ, towards the close of His ministry, resounded from heaven in order to strengthen the Apostles: οὗτος ἐστιν ὁ υἱός μου ὁ ἀγαπητός, ἐν ᾧ εὐδόκησα· αὐτοῦ ἀκούετε These voices at the beginning and the close of Christ's ministry have not been sufficiently attended to by those who have raised doubts against the Messianic interpretation; for a doubt in this must necessarily shake also the belief in the reality of those voices. In both of the passages, the place of the Servant of God in chap. xlii. 1 (which passage is indeed not so much quoted, as only, in a free treatment, referred to) is taken by the Son of God, from Ps. ii. 7, just as, at the transfiguration, the words αὐτοῦ ἀκούετε are at once added from Deut. xviii. 15. The name of the Servant of God was not high enough fur the sublime moment; the Son formed, in the second passage, the contrast to the mere servants of God, Moses and Elijah.--In Matt. xii. 17-21, ver. 1-3 are quoted, and referred to Christ. The Messianic explanation of chap. xlii., xlix. lies at the foundation of all the other passages also, where Christ is spoken of as the παῖς Θεοῦ. In Acts iii. 13: ἐδόξασε τὸν παῖδα αὐτοῦ Ἰησοῦν, we shall be obliged to follow Bengel in explaining it by: ministrum suum, partly on account of Matt. xii. 18, and because the LXX. often render עבד by παῖς; partly on account of the obvious reference to the Old Testament passages which treat of the Servant of God, and on account of the special allusion to chap. xlix. 3 in the ἐδόξασε (LXX. δοῦλός μου εἶ σὺ [Ἰσραήλ] καὶ ἐν σοὶ εὐδοξασθήσομαι). And so likewise in Acts iii. 26; iv. 27: ἐπὶ τὸν ἅγιον παῖδά σου Ἰησοῦν, ὃν ἔχρισας, where the last words refer to chap. lxi. 1; farther, in Acts iv. 30. In all these passages it is not the more obvious δοῦλος, but παῖς which is put, in order to remove the low notions which, in Greek, attach to the word δοῦλος.

Taking her stand partly on these authorities, partly on the natural sense of the passage, the Christian Church has all along referred the passage to Christ; and even expositors such as Clericus, who, everywhere else, whensoever it is possible, seek to set aside the Messianic interpretation, are here found among its most decided defenders. In our century, with the awakening faith, this explanation has again obtained general dominion; and wherever expositors of evangelical disposition do not yet profess it, this is to be accounted for from the still continuing influence of rationalistic tradition.

We are led to the Messianic interpretation by the circumstance that the servant of God appears here as the antitype of Cyrus. A real person can be contrasted with a real person only, but not with a personification, as is assumed by the other explanations. We are compelled to explain it of Christ by this circumstance also, that it is in Him only that the signs of the Servant of God are to be found,--that in Him only the covenant of God with Israel has become a truth,--that He only is the light of the Gentiles,--that He only, without external force, by His gentleness, meekness, and love, has founded a Kingdom, the boundaries of which are conterminous with those of the earth. The connection, also, with the other Messianic announcements, especially those of the first part, compels us to refer it to Christ.

The reasons against the Messianic interpretation are of little weight. The assertion that nowhere in the New Testament does Jesus appear as the Servant of Jehovah (Hendewerk), is at once overthrown by Matt. xii. 18, as well as by the other passages already quoted, in which Christ appears as παῖς Θεοῦ. Phil. ii. 7, μορφὴν δούλου λαβών comes as near the עבד יהוה, as it was possible, considering the low notion attached to the Greek δοῦλος. The passages which treat of the obedience of Christ, such as Rom, v. 19; Phil. ii. 8; Heb. v. 8; John xvii. 4: τὸν ἔργον ἐτελειώσα, ὃ δέδωκάς μοι ἵνα ποιήσω, give only a paraphrase of the notion of the Servant of the Lord. With perfect soundness Dr Nitzsch has remarked, that it was required by the typical connection of the two Testaments, that Christ should somehow, according to His ὑπακοὴ, ὑποταγή, be represented as the perfect manifestation of the עבד--The assertion: "The Messiah is excluded by the circumstance that the subject is not only to be a teacher of the Gentiles, who is endowed with the Spirit of God, but is also to announce deliverance to Israel" (Gesenius), rests only on an erroneous, falsely literal interpretation of ver. 7, which is not a whit better than if, in ver. 3, we were to think of a natural bruised reed, a natural wick dimly burning.--The objection that this Servant of the Lord is not foretold as a future person, but is spoken of as one present, forgets that we are here on the territory of prophetic vision, that the prophets had not in vain the name of seers, and puts the real, in place of the ideal Present,--a mistake which is here the less pardonable that the Prophet pre-eminently uses the Future, and, in this way, himself explains the ideal character of the inserted Preterites.--In order to refute the assertion, that the doctrine of the Messiah is foreign to the second part of Isaiah, that (as Ewald held) in it the former Messianic hopes are connected with the person of a heathen king, viz., Cyrus (how very little have they who advance such opinions any idea of the nature of Holy Writ!), it is only necessary to refer to chap. lv. 3, 4, where the second David, the Messiah, appears, at the same time, as Teacher, and as the Prince and Lawgiver of the nations, who is to extend the Kingdom of God far over all heathen nations. That which, in that passage, is declared of the Messiah, and that which, in those passages which treat of the Servant of God, is declared of Him, exclude one another, as soon as, by the Servant of God, any other subject than the Messiah is understood.

Even this circumstance must raise an unfavourable prejudice against the non-Messianic interpretation, that its defenders are at one in the negative only, but differ in the positive determination of the subject, and that, hitherto, no one view has succeeded in overthrowing the other; and farther, that ever anon new subtleties are advanced, by means of which it is attempted to patch up and conceal the inadmissibilities of every individual exposition.

Passing over those expositions which have now become obsolete,--such as of Cyrus, the Prophet Isaiah himself--we shall give attention to those expositions only which even now have their representatives, and which have some foundation in the matter itself.