Reflection on the Word for the Sunday of January 8, 2023
LIGHT A CANDLE IN YOUR HEART – Book of Isaiah 42:1-7
“Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; (…) He will not grow faint or be crushed until he has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands wait for his teaching. (…) I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.”
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The book of Isaiah sounds like one book, however it is actually at least three books like a compilation of books not only from different authors but even from different centuries. The usual compartmentalization of the book of Isaiah is that the first book ends with the chapter thirty-nine. The second book begins with chapter 40 and it ends with chapter 55. The remnant is the third book. There are other possible partitioning of the Book of Isaiah, this is the most accepted one by the scholars, although almost everybody agrees on the multiple and multi-generational authorship.
The first book of Isaiah is mostly considered to have been written before the Babylonian Captivity, the second book is mostly considered to have been written during the Babylonian Captivity, the third book is after the Babylonian Captivity. This calculation is oversimplified, the authorship of the books are more complex, the time-frame can differ from chapter to chapter, but to have a general picture it can be used with its own limitations.
The unified Book of Isaiah was considered by the Church as the Fifth Gospel, as it is deemed to contain major prophecies regarding the coming and the deeds of the Messiah or in English the Christ. However, some misrepresentations of the prophecies in the Book of Isaiah can be found in the Christian tradition and in the Gospels themselves. These issues are highly debated, though they are still issues.
Among them there is the famous quote in the very first page of the New Testament, where the Gospel of Matthew says that “ Now all this has happened that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and shall give birth to a son. They shall call his name Immanuel,” which is, being interpreted, “God with us.” (Isaiah 7:14)
Although the Greek translation of Isaiah indeed says parthenos which means virgin, the Hebrew original did not say virgin with the Hebrew word betulah, for it is using the word “almah” which does not mean virgin, but a young woman. The misquote was easy to occur, because the Gospel of Matthew as we know it today is hardly the original one, but a Greek translation from the lost Hebrew or Aramaic original.
The Greek translator of the Matthew, more likely used the general Greek translation of the Bible, called the Septuaginta, widely available at that time, and the Greek text says virgin, though it is an error in translation of the original Hebrew term of a young woman.
An other famous text, where the Christian tradition assumes an explicit and straightforward Messianic prophecy, can be found in the chapter nine, which says that “ For a child is born to us. A son is given to us; and the government will be on his shoulders. His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there shall be no end, on David’s throne, and on his kingdom, to establish it, and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from that time on, even forever.”
However, from the biblical context, it should be clear that by that child Isaiah meant King Hezekiah, the heir and next king of Judah at Isaiah’s time. Even the Messianic titles hereby given to this child, they were always considered by the old tradition, that they belonged to King Hezekiah, as it is written in the Book of the Sanhedrin, section 94 that “ Let Hezekiah, who has eight names, come and extract retribution from Senacherib (the attacking Syrian King), who has eight names. (…) The eight names of Hezekiah, as it is written, “ A son is given to us; and the government will be on his shoulders. His name will be called (in Hebrew) Pele Joez El Gibbor Abi Ad Sar Shalom. ” (Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.)
The Christian tradition consider the text as an explicit prophecy about the birth of Jesus 700 years later, but the biblical context shows that it is just a wishful thinking from Christianity to appropriate the prophecies of Isaiah for Jesus.
The authors of the Gospels frequently used the Old Testament texts and prophecies to prove a point, and we should not judge this practice harshly by today standards of journalism and literacy, because at that time it was, so to speak, normal, to take any literary narratives from anywhere, to take any archetype or any particular story from anywhere to build a new story, by what I mean, relating to the Gospel, to create a message.
Thus, even Isaiah wrote about Hezekiah and not about Jesus, the author of Matthew was still able to rightfully tell the people, that listen, as it happened in the time of King Hezekiah, in order that the people take heart and have faith that God will repel the Syrian threat, God gave them a sign, that a child was born in special circumstances, so God gave you a sign quite recently that a child was born to save the people from their sin.
The Gospel message was strengthened and not weakened by quoting Isaiah, because it is also written in the Second Book of the Kings, chapter 18 that Hezekiah “trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel; so that after him was no one like him among all the kings of Judah, nor among them that were before him. For he joined with the Lord. He didn’t depart from following the Lord, but kept his commandments, which The Lord commanded Moses. The Lord was with him. Thus the message from the Gospel says, that yoy must listen, because the promised King of Israel was just born, to fulfill the promises.
Our actual Isaiah text is from chapter 42, which is considered the second book of Isaiah, where God calls somebody his servant. The text is a part of a series of the so called servant songs, and the Christian scholarship ascribes it to Jesus as the suffering servant of God.
Nonetheless, the old tradition holds that the Suffering Servant of God is the entire nation of Israel, as it is written just a chapter before in the same book that “But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham my friend, You whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth,and called from its corners, and said to you, ‘You are my servant, I have chosen you and have not cast you away.’ Don’t you be afraid, for I am with you.”
As Israel was commissioned by God to embody the Law of Moses, to embody and safeguard the Ten Commandments, and by so doing becoming the light of all nations on Earth, in the same way Matthew was powerfully able to quote Isaiah again, that “The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, toward the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who sat in darkness saw a great light; to those who sat in the region and shadow of death, to them light has dawned."
The Gospel message is again the same, a King was born, sent by God, to become the light of the nations. King Jesus appointed his disciples, and the disciples appointed all generations, to light a kindle, to help the light overcome the darkness, to help the Kingdom come. May we allow the Lord to light a candle in our hearts, that the light never faint,
AMEN.
