[235] There is no exegete but agrees to this. There may be differences of opinion about the syntax,—whether the verse should run, though Thou makest his soul guilt, or a guilt-offering; or, though his soul make a guilt-offering; or (reading ישים for תשים), while he makes his soul a guilt-offering,—but all agree to the fact that by himself or by God the Servant's life is offered an expiation for sin, a satisfaction to the law of God.
[236] Cf. Baldensperger (Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu, p. 119 ff.) on the genuineness of Christ's predictions and explanations of His sufferings.
[239] The question whether this is the land of China is still an open one. The possibility of intercourse between China and Babylon is more than proved. But that there were Jews in China by this time (though they seem to have found their way there by the beginning of the Christian era) is extremely unlikely. Moreover, the possibility of such a name as Sinim for the inhabitants of China at that date has not been proved. No other claimants for the name, however, have made good their case. But we need not enter further into the question. The whole matter is fully discussed in Canon Cheyne's excursus, and by him and Terrien de Lacouperie in the Babylonian and Oriental Record for 1886-87. See especially the number for September 1887.
[240] His humbled, His poor in the exilic sense of the word. See Isaiah i.-xxxix., pp. [432] ff.
[241] On the "Motherhood of God" cf. Isaiah i.-xxxix., p. 245 ff.
[242] For צדיק, the righteous or just, which is in the text, the Syr., Vulg., Ewald, and others read עריץ, as in the following verse, terrible or terribly strong. Dillmann, however (5th ed., 1890, p. 438), retains צדיק takes the terms mighty and just as used of God, and reads the question, not as a question of despair uttered by the people, but as a triumphant challenge of the prophet or of God Himself. He would then make the next verse run thus: Nay, for the captives of the mighty may be taken, and the prey of the delivered, but with him who strives with thee I will strive.
[243] The English version, Where is the bill, is incorrect. The phrase is the same as in lxvi. ver. 1, What is this house that ye build for Me? what is this place for My rest? It implies a house already built; and so in the text above What is this bill of divorce implies one already thought of by the minds of the persons addressed by the question.
[244] Cf. p. [221]. Dillmann's view that righteousness means here personal character is contradicted by the whole context, which makes it plain that it is something external, the realisation of which those addressed are doubting. What troubles them is not that they are personally unrighteous, but that they are so few and insignificant. And what God promises them in answer is something external, the establishment of Zion. Cf. also the external meaning of righteousness in vv. 5, 6.