(12 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)
Loading...Here is another post on the Hebrew Bible from the blog in 2012, written while I was working on the first edition of my Bible Introduction. It is an excerpt from my first rough draft of a discussion of an unusually important passage in the book of Isaiah.
Brief context: at this point I was discussing Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40-55), almost universally thought by scholars to be written by a different author from chapters 1-39 (themselves written by Isaiah of Jerusalem in the 8th c. BCE). Second Isaiah was writing after the destruction of Judah and Jerusalem (including the temple) in 586 BCE, while the leaders of the people and many of the elite had been taken into exile in Babylon, in what is known as the Babylonian Captivity.
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Pastors regularly cite the suffering servant passages as prophecy about Jesus. I wonder how they refute the facts that the suffering servant is never described as the messiah, his suffering is portrayed as past instead of future, and he is explicitly identified on several occasions as “Israel.”
Ah, I have a podcast on that showing up in two weeks on Misquoting Jesus podcast!
Sadly, pastors seem to misquote/misinterpret much of the Bible to fit their narrative.
They might argue for a double prophecy
Dear Bart. Re your points:
1. “The prophets of the Hebrew Bible are not predicting things that are to happen hundreds of years in advance.” This is not true. Isaiah predicts a messianic age far in the future.
2. Your contention that because Isaiah 53 was written in the past tense, it must be talking about the past, does not stand. If you were to have a mystic vision of some event in the future, say, the fall of America, you would describe it in the past tense: ‘New York was in ruins. All the cities were destroyed etc
3. You say Isaiah 53 is not about the Messiah citing that the term Messiah never occurs in the passage. Isaiah is the most messianic book in the Hebrew Bible, yet it only uses the term Messiah once in Isaiah 45:1 referring to Cyrus. Isaiah used the term my servant, the branch, wonderful counsellor and prince of peace for the concept of the Messiah.
Isa. 53 is not a mystic vision; it’s a statement of reassurance to a people who have suffered. Put another way: Can you point to a passage in Scripture where a future event is described in the past tense?
There is no connection between the messiah in Isa. 45 and the suffering servant in Isa. 53. Isaiah calls Cyrus the messiah because Cyrus let the Israelites return from exile (standard Persian policy regarding the peoples that the Assyrians had conquered). The details of what messiah meant changed over time, but it always meant someone who led or otherwise helped the Israelites. (See the Psalms of Solomon for a later example.)
There are numerous passages in Ezekiel that refer to future events that are described in the past tense for example the dry bones prophecy. There is the prophecy of doom against Babylon in Isaiah 21:9. There is the whole book of Revelation. You say Isaiah 53 is not a Mystic vision, but you give no evidence to support that assertion.. The fact that Cyrus had nothing to do with the suffering servant is the point I was making!
Ezekiel was speaking to the Israelites in exile, describing a vision that God had given him, so of course he used the past tense; it’s a literary device. When he explains the vision to his listeners or readers, he puts God’s words in the future tense (Ezek. 37:12-14). Similarly, Isa. 21:9 puts the quote in the past tense because when it happens, that is what the messenger will say. In any case, tense in Biblical Hebrew does not precisely correlate to tense in English. Revelation is not Scripture, but New Testament.
When a prophet claims to have had a mystic vision, he says so (Isa. 1:1, Ezek 37:1). In Isa. 53, the prophet does not claim to be reporting a vision; rather, he is using poetic and metaphorical language to describe a person (or, more likely, the people of Israel), what has happened to him in the past (despised, rejected), and what will become of him in the future (he will prosper, have children and long life). (Alter, in translating this passage, notes that “the Hebrew is crabbed and the translation conjectural.”)
It is much more likely that Isaiah’s use of the term ‘My servant’ refers to the Messiah as King and representative of the nation (as all Kings are) and the nation of Israel and the nation of Judah all at once.
There is also evidence, as we previously discussed, that Isaiah 53 may well have been a passage regarded as Messianic prior to Christianity. Although this is not indisputable evidence, paucity or absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
So, although you can rightly take lots Christian beliefs on the basis of biblical scholarship, the belief that Isaiah 53 may have been a prophecy of Jesus is not a belief you can justify taking away from Christians purely on scholarship grounds
I suppose if one reads the bible forward instead of backwards in timelines, it is much harder to see any Jesus ties. Looking backwards, those ties can be constructed fairly easily. I still tend to agree with the Jewish Study Bible take of Isaiah. In my personal reading and understanding, my imagery of Jesus derived from the NT sources clearly does NOT accurately match up with many of the servant descriptors found in Isaiah 52-53 (sold for no price? so marred was his appearance, unlike that of man? no form or beauty? no charm? That makes it that much more difficult to accept a suffering servant ==> Jesus instead of a metaphor for the nation of Israel. It seems reasonable that Jesus, and some of his disciples, likely sensed that he was paralleling Isaiah at some point after his trial and that this relationship to Isaiah 53 was noticed and kept alive in various sermons over the centuries.
Well said, Rezubler, and these passages from Is. 53 also support your point.
v. 9a: Jesus’s grave was among the wicked, his burial place with evildoers? Not according to the NT (see Mt. 27:57-60, Mk. 15:42-46, Lk. 23:50-53, and Jn. 38-41.
v. 10c: Jesus had offspring? Nothing in the NT supports that and Catholic tradition at least emphatically asserts he was a celibate.
Also, in connection with v. 9a, as a practicing Roman Catholic, I want to note that the Catechism passages that deal most directly with Jesus’ burial (para. 624-630) say nothing about his being buried among the wicked and evildoers.
I find it curious that you seem to insist on a (supposedly) implied meaning of “the servant” and disregard the explicit identification of it in multiple passages.
I’m afraid you’ve lost me. As I pointed out, the “servant” is indeed explicitly identified in three passages, each one calling him “Israel.”
I intended to respond directly to a comment above by neurotheologian, but as I’m a new member it took a bit of time for my comment to be moderated/approved. So now it’s out of order and thus the referent was unclear.
Sorry: my bad. I just can’t get to all teh comments immediately. (Usually when someone is commenting on a comment, rather than to my post, it tells me; I don’t think it did so in that case.)
Could a lot of the passion narrative come from the belief that Isaiah was predicting the suffering messiah?
Yup, a lot of details seem to be drawn from there, and other passages of the Hebrew Bible (Ps. 22:1, e.g.)
Dear Rezubier,
Yes, hindsight is a wonderful thing and in medicine, we joke about the ‘retrospect-oscope’ being a very accurate diagnostic instrument. Retrospective attribution of Isaiah 53 to Jesus clearly happened. However, there are 2 lines of evidence for a pre–Christian Jewish interpretation of Isaiah 53 as referring to the Messiah.
https://www.jewishawareness.org/the-suffering-servant-of-isaiah-a-rabbinic-antholo/
https://a.co/d/2TzVh5B
‘You will be sold for nothing, and without money, you will be redeemed’ occurs at the beginning of Isaiah 52 (Isaiah 52:3) and very specifically refers to the city of Jerusalem, rather than the servant of Yahweh.
‘Just as there were many who were appalled at him – his appearance was disfigured beyond that of any human being and his form marred beyond human likeness’ (Isaiah 52:14), was clearly referring to the same suffering servant in Isaiah 53. I think that this could easily be taken to apply to the state of Jesus after he was tortured, before being crucified. Have you seen ‘The Passion of the Christ’ film?.
I have seen lots of films that are not accurate! (I suspect that some people think a film is historical truth. )
‘He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him… ‘(Isaiah 53:2). The word translated charm or beauty is ‘Hadar’, often taken to mean majesty, honour, or glory certainly applies, to Jesus, in the sense that he didn’t come as a messianic king in robes, but as a humble Messiah, “riding on a donkey”.
I think that Isaiah 53 probably did indeed apply to Israel and Judah, but also, bearing in mind this very messianic prophecy book Isaiah, I think it also applied even more specifically to the Messiah, as the vicarious representative of the nation. The analogy of a man becomes so precise and specific, particularly when one gets to verse 3-7. ”He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces, he was despised, and we held him in low esteem (as indeed did the Jewish nation, echoing Jesus’ use of the quote ‘a prophet is not without honour except in his own country, among his own people’)….. yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him and afflicted. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth…’
Thank you for the clear response. Yes, the Isaiah passages, with their flowing between territorial, historical, futuristic and humanistic references allow for creative ways to manage all the imagery. The nation-personification mode of writing can be found throughout the Hebrew Bible (Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Leviticus, etc.) It is quite a challenge to stay in alignment with the writer’s focus at times (especially with the lack of punctuation in Hebrew/Aramaic.) The emotions surrounding the relatively recent destruction of the 1st Temple are clearly felt along with a vision of hope. Jesus certainly aligns with Isaiah’s vision in many significant ways.
There are numerous things in 52 and 53 that don’t apply to the idea of Jesus crucifixion as an atonement. For example, in the resurrection appearances of Jesus, he is not disfigured beyond recognition (contrary to 52:14). Contrary to 53:3, according to the gospel accounts and the book of Acts, before his crucifixion Jesus was hugely popular with masses of people coming to him from as far away as Syria and, after his resurrection, thousands of people immediately became followers around the day of Pentecost. So, in no way was Jesus despised or rejected by humanity. Contrary to 53:3-4, Jesus didn’t go through life carrying any infirmities nor did he carry anyone’s diseases during his ministry (even on his way to Golgotha). Contrary to 53:7, the gospels say Jesus did open his mouth and speak during his trial, on his way to Golgotha, and during his execution. Similar problems like these appear in the other alleged prophecies about Jesus.
If Israel understands etself as God’s suffering servant, why wouldn’t/couldn’t they be okay with the Messiah being a suffering servant as well?
Interesting topic. So the consensus here is that Isaiah is prophesying about a Messiah and also that the ‘suffering servant’ is Judah? I certainly used to believe this passage was strictly about Jesus but not anymore. As with many Christian tenants, if you dig a little deeper, even modestly, you’ll find them wanting. This passage looks more like a lamentation than anything else.
What would be the purpose of this author describing a hideous event (crucifixion, which had not been invented yet) 800 years hence as an encouragement to a dispossessed people?
As in the case of Isaiah and King Ahaz, the purpose of prophecy was to address the urgency of the ‘here and now’. I doubt Ahaz, in his distress, would be comforted by a prophecy of a Messiah 800 years in the future who would die for their sins.
The Jews certainly do not believe that Isaiah or any prophet prophesied about Jesus anywhere in the OT.
Despite the textural errors, the scribal insertions & deletions, the author biases, the mythologisations, the deification, the exaggerations, the harmonisations, the Pauline atoning theologiisations and anything else in the biblical narratives that may add to or take away from the historical truth, nevertheless the person of Jesus of Nazareth, shines through as a humble, suffering, loving, servant of YHWH, perfectly encapsulated by the predictive words of Isaiah 52 – 53. Even in the words of John’s gospel, for which we have to accept a lot of retrospective interpolation, he was lifted up in his weakness and suffering to the point of such unbearable agony and humiliation that we turn our faces from, like the serpent on the pole that Moses lifted up in the wilderness, and has brought to all humanity since he lived, the very model of how to bear the sufferings of human life and how to serve the father of all, the consciousness in which the universe was formed. So in one way, he does bear the transgressions and the sufferings of all and sets the greatest example of all.
We often try so hard to see Jesus in the Torah that we use circular reasoning and confirmation bias to fit a narrative. Just as we did with Isaiah 7:14 and the book of Daniel. This causes us to read between the lines with a great deal of inference. So the Christian analysis is heavily opinionated at best. Right or wrong, what difference does it make? Perhaps we should read the Hebrew Bible through the lens of Judaism.
What does ‘waiting for moderation’ mean?
Thanks for this post. I grew up hearing Isaiah 53 taught as a crystal-clear prophecy about Jesus, and it’s only recently that I’ve come to see how much of that was shaped by later Christian interpretation. Your work has helped me look at these texts with fresh eyes.
My brother and I co-host a podcast called Exodus Brothers, where we talk about faith, doubt, and the experience of growing up in evangelical churches as pastor’s kids. We’d love to have you on the podcast to talk about common misconceptions around passages like this, the Gospels, and how early Christian theology developed. It’s a topic we think a lot of our listeners would really benefit from exploring with someone who brings both scholarly depth and clarity.
If you’d be open to it, I’d be happy to follow up by email or whatever’s easiest. Thanks again for all you do to make scholarship accessible.
Response to Neurotheologian: 5-Point Calvinists assure me that if I misinterpret Isaiah 53, it is because God predestined me to, so infallibly that I could not possibly have adopted the “correct” interpretation. Is this the part where you pretend to seriously expect a spiritually dead unbeliever to view Calvinism as heresy, even though you will charitably assume many Calvinists are spiritually alive?
Sure, you think Calvinism is heresy, but how is that supposed to be anything that authoritatively “obligates” me to take the same view? Does god expect from spiritually dead unbelievers the same level of discernment he expects from spiritually alive Christians? I think your bible gives us unbelievers an excuse for misinterpreting Isaiah 53, and you’d rather burn to death than to admit such an ego-deflating truth.
I actually think there are about 8 times in Isaiah that the servant is described as either “Israel” or “Jacob” i.e. the same thing, both before AND after Isaiah 53…..yet we are somehow expected to switch it to the a Messiah figure for just that verse, then arbitrarily switch back?
That just seems like the NT authors trying to rationalise Jesus’s death by looking back at scripture and seeing if anything can be made to fly to me.
Neurotheologian, you can always find a fringe group of Messianic Jews who will believe the whole 66 books are 100% inerrant. They are very fringe, and they are forced to even deny facts like evolution such is there slavish devotion to that inerrancy.
Most jews and biblical scholars look at the text in Isaiah and clearly see the 9 verses before and after 53 where the servant is unambiguously called either “Israel” or “Jacob”
Again I ask you, other than it suits a narrative, why should anyone think it pertains to a Messiah and the word doesnt actually appear in the text does it?
Bart, if one who is a free-thinking seeker of the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth as I am and cannot find in Isaiah or any other book in the Old Testament one single, clear, complete, definitive prophecy of the Jews’ Messiah which is measurable in time and manner then who can deny that the Messiah figure idea grew up and existed only in the imagination just as the Santa figure did? You wrote that claiming to be the Messiah was like claiming to be the President. I cannot believe you wrote such a thing as we have statutes written about the President but you cannot show me even one stand alone Messiah prophecy and all you have are fragments like Isaiah which you even refute as being Messianic in nature. So I simply ask you to educate me by showing me where I can find in the Old Testament evidence which tells me the Messiah figure is as identifiable and tangible a personage as is the President. Can you do that? Even if there was a prophecy concerning our President or the Messiah, who says it had to come to pass?
Many people in our country are hoping for a new Abraham Lincoln figure, or a new FDR, or a new Ronald Reagan to appear to be elected as president. That doesn’t make the hope a myth.
The term messiah is indeed applied to specific “saviors of Israel” in the Old Testament. “Cyrus” is called the future “messiah” (Isaiah 45:1). He, as one might note (!) was the king of Persia (!!). But he was the one God would use to deliver Judah from its captivity in Babylon. Later thinkers who were hoping for a deliverer from their current foreign oppressor (Rome, after 63 BCE), looked for a similar warrior / king, but usually, of course, a Judean rather than a foreigner. It’s not a myth but an expectation. For a clear indication of what one group of Jews thought about that figure, read the Psalms of Solomon chapter 17 (it’s a non-canonical Jewish book from after the OT and before teh NT; you should be able to find it fairly easily online).
Thanks. According to Chetan Batra “Expectation is nothing but a Myth” but you seem to say the two are different. I submit the Santa personage is a mythical figure (a product of the human imagination) as it is based on an expectation; likewise I claim the Messiah personage is a mythical figure (a product of the religious imagination of the Jews) as it is also based on an expectation. Moreover, I argue the Messiah figure has no more basis in fact and reality than does the Santa personage. In the case of the Cinderella story there was this one glass slipper that only the foot of the real, one-and-only Cinderella would fit into to provide the way to prove she was this one-and-only person. But when we come to the Messiah we have little to go on inasmuch as the term Messiah is not even found until we come to the Book of Daniel and a good case can be made this prophecy was supposed to have been fulfilled long ago. Surely no one has the power to raise an expired (unfulfillable) prophecy from the dead. Even Malachi does not use the word Messiah.
2 Samuel chapter 7 is the earliest reference to the idea of the Messiah. King David is specifically referred to as ‘’my servant’’ multiple times. God, speaking through the prophet Nathan, promises descendants to David and an everlasting Kingdom. Isaiah 53 specifically mirrors these promises as well the suffering to be endured by David as the representative of his people Israel. This is I think one of the reasons why there is good, but not indisputable evidence (see my previous two links) that Isaiah 53 was considered to refer to Messiah before the crucifixion of Jesus. Isaiah unlike the psalms, does not use the term Messiah except once as a figure of speech applying to Cyrus (Isaiah 45:1), but Isaiah uses the concept of the Messiah arguably more than any other book in the old Testament. In other books, King David is explicitly called “my servant David” by God on multiple occasions (e.g., 2 Samuel 3:18, 7:5, 7:8; 1 Kings 11:13, 11:34; Psalm 89:3, 89:20). The King of Israel is the representative of the nation and this is why the servant song passages in Isaiah, most particularly Isaiah 53, refer to the Messiah
So are you saying there was more than one Jewish Messiah? There was only one Cinderella and only her foot would fit into the glass slipper. But we cannot find even one stand-alone Messiah prophecy which is clear, definitive, complete and measurable as to both manner and time as to its fulfillment. Even with regard to Jesus if Elijah was supposed to have come first then Jesus could not have been the Messiah inasmuch Elijah only came as far as the Mount of Transfiguration along with Moses to meet Jesus and failed to keep on coming down. John the Baptist flatly denied he was Elijah and rightly so as there is not one word in the Hebrew Bible saying Elijah would come in spirit. Furthermore, how could Jesus have been the Messiah if he made eschatological prophecies which not only failed to come to pass they also became unfulfillable nearly 2k years ago? Such expired prophecies cannot be raised from the dead just as no failed prophet would be resurrected. I submit the whole Messiah idea and figure is a figment of the Jews’ religious imagination and is a myth (mere expectation) much like the Santa idea.
“Messiah” (moshiach) originally meant “anointed” and was applied to kings, high priests on occasion, and least once to a non-Jew (Cyrus). In the late Second Temple period, the concept shifted to a powerful (or superpowerful) person sent by God to rescue the Jews from the Romans and restore the kingdom of David. There were a number of ideas in the first century CE about who and what the messiah would be; in the Qumran scrolls we find descriptions of two and possibly three messiahs – messiah of the house of Aaron, messiah of the house of David, and perhaps a prophet messiah.
During the period (ie, the life of Jesus and after) there were a number of individuals who claimed to be the messiah. In the second century, Rabbi Akiva hailed Bar kochba as the messiah. In the late Middle Ages, Sabbati Tzvi claimed to be the messiah (and may have believed it), while Jacob Frank claimed to be the messiah as a way to defraud people.
Current Orthodox thinking tends more toward a “messianic age” than a personal messiah, though many Lubavitcher Chasidism believed (and some still do) that Rebbe Schnerson was/is the messiah.
It’s complicated.
Thanks dankoh. I do appreciate your insights especially since I am a neophyte and self-taught. Being legally trained, I research and study relying on the best evidence I can find before arriving at my conclusions. What I have found is that the gospels impeach (discredit) each other because they are replete with inconsistencies, contradictions and irreconcilable differences to such an extent I concluded they were the tendentious work products of anonymous authors who were writing sua sponte (at their own volition) and not under the inspiration of some Divine Being. In other words, no Omnipotent, Supreme Being would ever leave itself “holding the bag” to answer for the impeached writings” of fallible humans. So when I was trying to figure out how a Jew (Jesus) could be transformed into being the Messiah of the Gentiles as a result of most Jews not believing he was their Messiah (“Expected One”), I was faced with finding out all I could about who this Messianic figure was and if, like Cinderella in the story of the glass slipper” there was some sort of “Messianic glass slipper” in the evidence which there isn’t. You are right, it is complicated. Much obliged.
What kirbinator5000 said
I agree with Dankoh 100% and the other expectations which we’ve hardly mentioned are the Bar Enash (son of man) in Daniel chapter 7 and a large part of the second half of 1 Enoch; the prophet like Moses, prophesied by Moses himself and the return of Elijah, clearly expected by at least some of the apocalyptic first century groups and mentioned by Mukerider in the above thread. Christians have conflated all of these expectations into the one notion of Messiah, the final King of Israel who would bring peace to the whole world and redeem Israel. But as I say, there is good but not in disputable evidence that the suffering servant of Isaiah 53, was interpreted pre-Christianity by at least some groups as a messianic prophecy. That’s all I’m arguing and I’ve argued it from Isaiah, 2 Samuel chapter 7 and the evidence from Judaism itself and the dead Sea scrolls, for which I’ve provided two links.
Neurotheologian: Thanks for your input. So are you saying the Messiah was an “expectation”? I found that Chetan Batra contended an “expectation” was a “myth”. I look at a myth as being something which exists in the imagination such as the Santa figure who is a fabricated being with no basis in fact and reality; as such, I now look at the Messiah figure as being a myth (a mythical personage which is the product of the religious imagination [hope, expectation] of the Jews). But Paul convinced the Gentiles that this imaginary figure was their Messiah as well and he was real and tangible. The way I now see it, the Messiah is as “illusive” as is the “Kingdom God” (which Samuel Reimarus contended was actually the Kingdom of the Messiah on earth with the Messiah being God’s regent) or the “Holy Spirit” (Ghost). In other words, the odds that a real, true, one-and-only Messiah would come riding on the clouds are the same as a real, true, one-and-only Santa will come riding in his sleigh pulled by a team of reindeer. Many Messiahs, many Santas. BTW, I rode a “mule” not a “muke”.
Neurotheologian – can you cite any text pre Christianity where the messiah would have to die for our sins which is pretty fundamental?
As I, and others have pointed out, there are many instances in Isaiah where the suffering servant is clearly and unambiguously identified as “Israel” or “Jacob” before and after Isaiah 53 and the Messiah is actually cited for us all to understand, as being Cyrus in Isaiah 45:1 and not some future person called Jesus?
So are you not looking at the text and saying, hey that looks a lot like Jesus whilst seemingly ignoring all the other elements that others have pointed out to you like him not being disfigured, him actually having big followings, not carrying anyones infirmities etc and so its probably more just your post hoc rationalisation in play, plus a desire to support your theological narrative? Is that unfair?
Yes, the concept of a Messiah was an expectation, a hope. It may have been a false hope, but it existed as a hope, so you can’t really call it a myth. A myth is a story about something that happened in the past, that historically did not happen and it usually serves a religious or political goal. I presume you believe that Jesus existed and you’re not a mythicist in that sense? The other questions are whether the suffering servant was a messianic expectation and if it was a messianic expectation, did Jesus fulfil that expectation? They are all different questions.
Much obliged for your post. I believe in the historical Jesus who was crucified for sedition against Rome for claiming to be a usurper King of the Jews but unlike King Herod the Great before him had not been legally awarded such a kingly title by Rome. If the Messiah idea (expectation) turns out to be based on a false hope then I am having trouble with not calling it a myth. In other words Santa is a mythical figure who exists only in the imagination and it is also a story about something in the past. But does not the Messiah figure and its story also deal with the past? I simply contend that just as a jolly, fat person with a white beard who dresses up in a red suit and rubber boots can never make himself into a real, true, one-and-only Santa (because such a figure is mythical and imaginary) the same holds true for any Jew who came forth claiming to be a Messiah figure who is also mythical (imaginary). In other words a myth is not limited to a story but can pertain to an unsupported idea or belief. What say ye?
Sorry that didn’t make sense. The first expectation was of a Davidic dynastic everlasting kingdom. 2 Sam 7:12-16. In the psalms and the prophets that morphed into the expectation a kind of final deliverer anointed king who would also bring peace to the nations and lead them to worship YHVH – The Messiah with a capital M. The anointed King, always represented the nation of Israel and the suffering of the nation were linked with the sufferings of the King (Messiah) who was considered from the beginning of the expectations to be the servant of YHWH, as was Israel. You can see that the suffering servant motif was baked into this right from the beginning. There is no doubt in my mind that the suffering servant of Isaiah was a messianic prophecy as well as referring to the nation of Israel. The question is were these false hopes based on false prophecies? And if they weren’t false, how well does Jesus fit the expectation or at least the prophecies? That’s a matter of judgement, but I would say well.
Another really interesting question is did Jesus know that his purpose was to be a suffering servant. I think he did at some point and my evidence for this is as follows. 1. He knew Isaiah very well. 2. There is evidence from the dead sea scrolls & the Targum of Jonathan that the suffering servant of 53 was considered to be a messianic prophecy before Christianity. 3. The evidence in the gospels that Jesus did consider himself as the Messiah. 4. The particular passage in Mark 8 (one of the so-called ‘messianic secret’ motifs) where, after Peter rebukes Jesus for saying that he would be handed over to be killed, Jesus reacts rather shockingly by calling Peter Satan! It’s not the sort of thing that the later gospel writer, Mark, would’ve invented because it rather jars with our perception of Jesus. Indeed, Luke and Matthew chose to leave it out, even though they relied on Mark. So I think it really happened (the criterion of embarrassment) and therefore I really do think Jesus predicted his suffering and death at the hands of the Jewish authorities. Mark 8: 31-33
Assuming Jesus predicted (prophesied about) his suffering and death (and his resurrection as these verses make clear) it is hard to understand why not one disciple or close associate was at his tomb on that third day. Even stranger is that the Sanhedrin Jews had Pilate post guards at the tomb. Also we find that when the tomb was empty of Jesus’ corpse no one thought Jesus had been resurrected. Even if Jesus honestly and sincerely (and with every fiber of his being) believed he was the Jews’ Messiah, such belief can never transform him into being that figure if it turns out the whole Messiah idea is merely an expectation with no more basis in fact and reality than the Santa idea. In other words, both the Messiah and the Santa figure are mythical figures and the product (figment) of the imagination of humans. However, if Jesus had made a speedy return on the clouds of heaven as he prophesied he would then I would be eating crow for this would have proven beyond any doubt he was the Messiah and the Messiah figure turned out to be real and not imaginary (mythical).
It would not take much of a prophet to predict he would be killed if he went into Jerusalem allowing himself to be hailed as the usurper King of the Jews. I could call it “suicide by Governor” for Pilate would have been beheaded for allowing such treason to go unpunished. Furthermore, if the Sanhedrin Jews did not believe Jesus met the Messianic requirements they would have also had reason to hold Jesus to task for he could have sparked an insurrection. But what about the words Jesus reportedly spoke about being raised on the third day? He spoke them over and over again yet, as I said before, not one soul was there at his tomb on that third day and such failure makes one suspect these words were added decades after Jesus’ death when Mark was written. But think on this: The very words of Jesus’ dying declaration found only in Mark and Matthew tell me Jesus was expecting the same Tribal God who had assisted Moses in liberating the Israelites from their Egyptian slavery would be there for him to accomplish his mission set forth in Luke 1:67-80: delivering the lost sheep from their Roman bondage.
I don’t see why it can’t be both. Both the Jewish people and Jesus who are the “suffering servant”. I get it why some people see it as one way or another. But at the same time I don’t quite see how or why it can’t be both.
In a certain way, they kind of go hand in hand. The Jews are the Jewish people, and Christ is/was Jewish. There’s kind of an integral, integrated, whole relationship here.
Well, first of all, other than the followers of Jesus themselves, no Jews accepted the idea that Isaiah’s suffering servant was a prophecy about Jesus. But the main point of discussion here is that, prior to the first century CE, there is no evidence that Jews anywhere thought that the suffering servant was a prediction and/or description of a messiah of any kind.
The reason this argument is significant is that, throughout history, many Christians have used Isa. 53 as a major weapon in the battle to persuade Jews to convert to Christianity. That we don’t buy it is a continual source of frustration to them.
The evidence that the suffering servant passage of Isaiah 53 was both about the Messiah, as the representative of Israel, and about Israel itself, I think, is a slam dunk convincing argument. In 2 Samuel chapter 7 (the first messianic prophecy) God refers to David as ‘my servant’ and David’s messianic son as suffering along with subsequent generations of the Davidic everlasting dynastic anointed kings. This along with the evidence that Isaiah 53 was considered messianic before Jesus (Dead Sea Scrolls and Targum of Jonathan) and Jesus’s knowledge of Isaiah, his likely Essene connections and own messianic aspirations, makes an almost unassailable case that the suffering servant was considered by Jews pre-Christianity as well as by Jesus himself, to refer to both Israel and the Messiah as representative of Israel. If one then combines this with the argument from the criterion of embarrassment about the Mark 8:31-33 ‘messianic secret’ passage and the fact that Jesus was well-versed in messianic eschatology (attested by all 4 gospels), we can be pretty sure that Jesus saw himself as the suffering servant of Isaiah 53 and probably predicted his own death as a fulfilment of this passage. Case closed!
As it turned out there was no mention of this suffering servant being raised on the third day, ascending to heaven and returning on the clouds of heaven. The fact Jesus may have believed with every fiber of his being he was this suffering servant (who also could have merely been God’s servant Israel) does not prove he was such a person in the end especially since his eschatological prophecies failed to come to pass and became unfulfillable (expired). Neither does it refute the idea that these two figures (Messiah v. Israel’s servant) are, in the end, imaginary, a mere expectation with no basis in fact or reality and figments of the Jews’ religious imagination. The case which is closed is this one: Jesus may have honestly believed he was this suffering servant but that does not prove he was. He must have realized he would be executed if he came riding in on an ass allowing himself to be hailed as the usurper King of Israel so it did not take much of a prophet to forecast this happening. So what was the ultimate aim of this suffering servant: forgiveness of sins and no eternal life? Thanks. Shalom.
I agree Mulerider. Whether Jesus of Nazareth was actually the suffering servant is not a historical question, but instead a matter of faith. I choose to believe he was and is.
Hello Dr. Ehrman,
We have all heard of the prophecies in the Hebrew Bible that have been attributed to Jesus. Although scholars state that Isaiah 7:14 actually reads ” a young woman has conceived”, apologists argue that the Hebrew word for young woman can also mean virgin, and some have referred to other verses outside of this example in which the same “young woman” word in Hebrew is used when referring to a virgin. One example i believe was used was Sarah possibly. Anyway, are there other examples where that term is used and was actually referring to someone understood to be a virgin?
Yes, it depends what you mean by “can also mean.” There is a Hebrew word for “woman who has never had sex” (BETHULAH) and that is not the word used in Isa 7:14; the word used normally means “young woman” (ALMAH) and applies to a young woman independently of whether she has had sex yet or not. If she is very young and not married yet, the normally assumption is that she has not had sex (hence it *can* refer to a woman who has not had sex). If she’s a young woman who *has* had sex she still is a young woman (ALMAH).
The other big issue is what verse *says* about the woman in relation to her being pregnant. It does not say she *will* become pregnant but that she already is. It uses the “perfect tense” for “conceived.” Hebrew doesn’t have verbal tenses like English (past, present, future; perfect; past perfect; future perfect; etc.) It’s main tenses are “perfect” for actions that are already completed and “imperfect” for those that are not completed yet (whether in the past, present, or future). By using the Perfect tense here it indicates that the woman is already pregnant (a completed action) not that she is going to be.
And when you read the entire chapter, that’s the point. She’s pregnant (perfect tense). She will give birth (imperfect tense). And before the child is very old, the problems confronting the king Ahaz (to whom Isaiah is speaking) will have disappeared.