lii. 15, that the Servant of God should sprinkle many nations; in liii. 4, that He bore our diseases and took upon Him our pains; in ver. 5, that He was pierced for our transgressions; in ver. 8, that He bore the punishment which the people ought to have borne; in ver. 10, that He offered His soul as a sin-offering; in ver. 11, that by His righteousness many should be justified; in ver. 12, that He bore the sins of many, and poured out His soul unto death, and that He could make intercession for transgressors, because He was numbered with them. To this it may still be added that in chap. lii. 15 (), liii. 10 (DUN), and ver. 12 "He bears the sin of many," (compare Levit. xvi. 21, 22; Michaelis: "Ut typice hircus pro Israëlitis") the Servant of God appears as the antitype of the Old Testament sinofferings in which, as has been proved (compare my pamphlet: Die Opfer der heil. Schrift, S. 12 ff.), the idea of substitution in the doctrine of the Old Testament, finds its foundation. There cannot be the least doubt, that the Prophet could not express himself more clearly, strongly, and distinctly, if his intention was to state the doctrine of substitution; and those who undertake to explain it away, would not, by so doing, leave any thing firm and certain in Scripture. Rosenmüller (Gabler's Journal ii. S. 365), Gesenius, Hitzig have indeed candidly confessed that the passage contained the doctrine of vicarious satisfaction, after Alshech had, among the Jews, given the honour to truth. IV. EXAMINATION OF THE NON-MESSIANIC Passing over mere whims, three explanations present themselves which require a closer examination, viz.-(1), that which makes the whole Jewish people the subject; (2), that which refers it to the godly portion of the Jewish people; and (3), that which refers it to the collective body of the Prophets. The following reasons militate against all the three interpretations simultaneously. 1. According to them, the contents of the section in question present themselves as a mere fancy; and its principal thought, the vicarious suffering of the Servant of God, is an absurdity. According to them, the prophets can no longer be considered as godly men who spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit; and their name, by which they claimed divine inspiration, is a mere pretence. And this reflection is, at the same time, cast upon the Lord, who, throughout, treats these visionaries as organs of immediate divine communications. 2. According to all the three explanations, the subject is not a real person, but an ideal one, a personified collective. But not one sure analogous instance can be quoted in favour of a personification carried on through a whole section, without the slightest intimation, that it is not a single individual who is spoken of. In ver. 3, the subject is called; in vers. 10 and 12 a soul is ascribed to Him; grave and death are used so as to imply a subject in the Singular. Scripture never leaves any thing to be guessed. If we had an allegory before us, distinct hints as to the interpretation would certainly not be wanting. It is, e.g., quite different in those passages where the Prophet designates Israel by the name of the Servant of the Lord. In them, all uncertainty is prevented by the addition of the names of Jacob and Israel, xli. 8, 9, xliv. 1, 2, 21, xlv. 4, xlviii. 20; and in them, moreover, the Prophet uses the Plural by the side of the Singular, to intimate that the Servant of the Lord is an ideal person, a collective, e. g., xlii. 24, 25, xlviii. 20, 21, xliii. 10—14. 3. The first condition of the vicarious satisfaction which, according to our prophecy, is to be performed by the Servant of God, is, according to ver. 9 ("Because He had done no violence, neither was any deceit in His mouth"), but more especially still, according to ver. 11 ("He, the righteous one, my Servant, shall justify the many") the absolute righteousness of the suffering subject. He who is himself sinful cannot undergo punishment for the sins of others. He is, on the contrary, visited for his own sins, both as a righteous retribution, and for sanctification. Of such an one that would indeed be true which, according to the second clause of ver. 4, was only erroneously supposed in reference to the Servant of God. All the three interpretations, however, are unable to prove that this condition existed. All the three interpretations move on the purely human territory; but on that, absolute righteousness is not to be found. At the very threshold of Holy Writ, in Gen. ii. and iii. compare v.-3, the doctrine of the universal sinfulness of mankind meets us; and how deep a knowledge of sin pervades the Old Testament, is proved by passages such as Gen. vi. 5, viii. 21; Job xiv. 4, xv. 14-16; Ps. xiv. li. 7; Prov. xx. 9. That is not a soil on which ideas of substitution could thrive.-The doctrine of a substitution by men is indeed nowhere else found in the Old Testament; and Gesenius, who (1.c., S. 189) endeavoured to prove that "it is very general" has not adduced any arguments which are tenable or even plausible. The guilt of the fathers is visited upon the children, only when the latter walk in the steps of their fathers, and the latter are first punished; comp. Genuineness and Authenticity of the Pentateuch, Vol. ii. p. 446 ff. The same holds true in reference to 2 Sam. xxi. 1-14. The evil spirit which filled Saul, pervaded his family, at the same time, as we here see in the instance of Michal. It was probably in the interest of his family, and with their concurrence, that the wicked deed had been perpetrated. (Michaelis says: "In order that he might appropiate their goods to himself and to his family, under the pretext of a pious zeal for Judah and Israel.") As Saul himself was already overtaken by the divine judgment, the crime was punished in the family who were accomplices. In 2 Sam. xxiv. the people do not suffer as substitutes for the sin, which David had committed in numbering the people; but the spirit of pride, which had incited the king to number the people, was widely spread among them. But the fact, that the king himself was punished in his subjects, is brought out by his beseeching the Lord, in 2 Sam. xxiv. 17, that He might rather visit the sin directly upon himself. The sin of David and Bathsheba is not atoned for by the death of the child (2 Sam. xii. 15-18), for David had already obtained pardon, ver. 13. It is not the child which suffers, but David, whose repentance was to be deepened by this visitation. In the fact, that the whole army must suffer for what Achan has committed (Josh. vii. 1), a distinct intimation is implied, that the criminal does not stand alone, but that, to a certain degree, the whole community was implicated in his guilt. Substitution is quite out of the question, inasmuch as Achan himself, with his whole family and posterity, was burnt. Least of all, finally, can Dan. xi. 35, come into consideration. According to Gesenius, it is there said: "And they of understanding shall fall, in order to purge, purify, and make white those (the others)." But refers rather to the themselves. Thus, nowhere in the Old Testament, is even the slightest trace found of a satisfaction to be accomplished by man for man; nor can it be found there, because, from its very commencement, Scripture most emphatically declares : πάντας ὑφ ̓ ἁμαρτίαν εἶναι, Rom. iii. 9. The explanation, which makes the Jewish people the subject, has already been overthrown by the parallel passages, before arriving at the section under consideration. "Even so far back as chap. xlii. 1, difficulties are met with," remarks Beck. "How is it possible that the people who, in ver. 19 of that chapter, are described as blind and deaf, should here appear as being altogether penetrated by the Spirit, so as to become the teachers of the Gentiles?" "Chap. xlix. is a true cross for the interpreters." "Finally, the section, chap. 1., Hitzig himself is obliged to explain as referring to the Prophet; and thus this interpretation forfeits the boast of most strictly holding fast the unity of this notion." But still more decisively is the interpretation overthrown by the contents of the section under discussion. The Servant of God has, according to it, voluntarily taken upon himself His sufferings (according to ver. 10, He offers himself as a sacrifice for sin; according to ver. 12, He is crowned with glory because He has poured out His soul unto death). Himself sinless, He bears the sins of others, vers. 4-6, 9. His sufferings are the means by which the justification of many is effected. He suffers quietly and patiently, ver. 7. Not one of these four signs can be vindicated for the people of Israel. (a). The Jews did not go voluntarily into the Babylonish exiles, but were dragged into it by force. (b). The Jewish people were not without sin in suffering; but they suffered, in the captivity, the punishment of their own sins. Their being carried away had been foretold by Moses as a punitive judgment, Lev. xxvi. 14 ff.; Deut. xxviii. 15 ff., xxix. 19 ff., and as such it is announced by all the prophets also. In the second part, Isaiah frequently reminds Judah, that they shall be cast into captivity by divine justice, and be delivered from it by divine mercy only; comp. chaps. lvi.—lix., especially chap. lix. 2: "Your iniquities separate between you and your God, and your sins hide His face from you that He doth not hear. For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity, your lips speak lies, and your tongue meditates perverseness. Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood, their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity, wasting and destruction are in their paths. The way of peace they know not, and there is no right in their paths; they pervert their paths; whosoever goeth therein doth not know peace. Apostacy and denying the Lord, and departing away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood." Comp. chap. xlii. 24: "Who gave Jacob for a spoil, and Israel to the robbers? Did not the Lord, He against whom we have sinned, and in whose ways they would not walk, neither were they obedient unto His law." Farther, chap. xliii. 26, 27, where the detailed proof that Israel's merits could not be the cause of their deliverance, inasmuch as they did not exist at all, is, by the Prophet, wound up by the words: "Put me in remembrance, let us plead together, declare then that thou mayest be justified. Thy first father hath sinned, and thy mediators have transgressed against me. Therefore I profane the princes of the sanctuary, and give Jacob to the destruction, and Israel to reproaches." It is solely to the mercy of God that, according to chap. xlviii. 11, Israel owes deliverance from the severe suffering into which they fell in the way of their sins. One may confidently assert that there is not a single page in the whole book, which does not offer a striking refutation of this view. And most miserable are the expedients to which, in the face of such facts, the defenders of this view betake themselves. Rosenmüller was of opinion, that the Prophet introduced those Gentiles only as speaking, who, by this flattery, wished to gain the favour of the Jews, without considering that it is just in the words of the Lord, in ver. 11, that the absolute righteousness of the Servant of God is most strongly expressed. Hitzig is of opinion, that the people had indeed suffered for their sins; but that the punishment had been greater than their sins, and that by this surplus the Gentiles were benefitted. But the Prophet expressly contradicts such a gross view. He repeatedly declares that the punishment was still VOL. II. y |