reversed; at the end of the days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be exalted above all the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it, chap. ii. 2.

This great change shall be accomplished by the Messiah, chaps. iv., ix., xi., xxxiii. 17, who proceeds from the house of David, chap. ix. 6 (7), lv. 3, but only after it has sunk down to the utmost lowliness, chap. xi. 1. With the human, He combines the divine nature. This appears not only from the names which are given to Him in chap. ix. 5 (6), but also from the works which are assigned to Him,-works by far exceeding human power. He rules over the whole earth, according to chap. xi.; He slays, according to xi. 4, the wicked with the breath of His mouth (compare chap. 1. 11, where likewise He appears as a partaker of the omnipotent punitive power of God); He removes the consequences of sin even from the irrational creation chap. xi. 6-9; by His absolute righteousness He is enabled to become the substitute of the whole human race, and thereby to accomplish their salvation resting on this substitution, chap. liii.

The Messiah appears at first in the form of a servant, low and humble, chap. xi. 1, liii. 2. His ministry is quiet and concealed, chap. xlii. 2, as that of a Saviour who with tender love applies himself to the miserable, chap. xlii. 3, lxi. 1. At first it is limited to Israel, chap. xlix. 1-6, where it is enjoyed especially by the most degraded of all the parts of the country, viz., that, around the sea of Galilee, chap. viii. 23 (ix. 1.) Severe sufferings will be inflicted upon Him in carrying out His ministry. These proceed from the same people whom He has come to raise up, and to endow (according to chap. xlii. 6, xlix. 8), with the full truth of the covenant into which the Lord has entered with them. The Servant of God bears these sufferings with unbroken courage. They bring about, through His mediation, the punishment of God upon those from whom they proceeded, and become the reason why the salvation passes over to the Gentiles, by whose deferential homage the Servant of God is indemnified for what He has lost in the Jews, chap. xlix. 1-9, l. 4—11. (The foundation for the detailed announcement in these passages is given already in the sketch in chap. vi.,—according to which an election only of the people attain to salvation, while the mass becomes a prey to destruction.) But it is just by these sufferings,

which issue at last in a violent death, that the Servant of God reaches the full height of His destination. They possess a vicarious character, and effect the reconciliation of a whole sinful world, chap. lii. 13-liii. 12. Subsequently to the suffering, and on the ground of it, begins the exercise of the Kingly office of Christ, chap. liii. 12. He brings law and righteousness to the Gentile world, chap. xlii. 1; light into their darkness, chap. xlii. 6. He becomes the centre around which the whole Gentile world gathers, chap. xi. 10: "And it shall come to pass in that day, the root of Jesse which shall stand for an ensign of the people, to it shall the Gentiles seek, and His rest shall be glory;" comp. chap. Ix., where the delighted eye of the Prophet beholds how the crowds of the nations from the whole earth turn to Zion; chap. xviii., where the future reception of the Ethiopians into the Kingdom of God is specially prophecied; chap. xix., according to which Egypt turns to the God of Israel, and by the tie of a common love to Him, is united with Asshur, his rival in the time of the Prophet, and so likewise with Israel, which has so much to suffer from him; chap, xxiii., according to which, in the time of salvation, Tyre also does homage to the God of Israel. The Servant of God becomes, at the same time, the Witness, and the Prince and Lawgiver of the nations, chap. lv. 4. Just as the Spirit of the Lord rests upon Him, chap. xi. 2, xlii. 1, lxi. 1, so there takes place in His days an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, chap. xxxii. 15, xliv. 3, comp. with chap. liv. 13. Sin is put an end to by Him, chap. xi. 9, and an end is put especially to war, chap. ii. 4. The Gentiles gathered to the Lord become at last the medium of His salvation for the covenant-people, who at first had rejected it, chap. xi. 12, lx, 9, lxvi. 20, 21. The end is the restoration of the paradisaic condition, chap. xi. 6-9, lxv. 25; the new heavens and the new earth, chap. lxv. 17, lxvi. 22; but the wicked shall inherit eternal condemnation, chap. lxvi. 24.

THE PROPHECY-CHAP. II-IV.

THE SPROUT OF THE LORD.

It has been already proved, in Vol. i., p. 416 ff., that this discourse belongs to the first period of the Prophet's ministry. It consists of three parts. In the first, chap. ii. 2—4, the Prophet draws a picture of the Messianic time, at which the Kingdom of God, now despised, should be elevated above all the kingdoms of the world, should exercise an attractive power over the Gentiles, and should cause peace to dwell among them; comp. Vol. i., p. 437 ff. In the second part, from chap. ii. 5-iv. 1, the Prophet describes the prevailing corruption, exhorts to repentance, threatens divine judgments. This part is introduced, and is connected with the preceding, by the admonition in ii. 5, addressed to the people, to prepare, by true godliness, for a participation in that blessedness, to beware lest they should be excluded through their own fault. In the third part, chap. iv. 2-6, the Prophet returns to the proclamation of salvation, so that the whole is, as it were, surrounded by the promise. It was necessary that this should be prominently brought out, in order that sinners might not only be terrified by fear, but also allured by hope, to repentance, and in order that the elect might not imagine that the sin of the masses, and the judgment inflicted in consequence of it, did away with the mercy of the Lord towards His people, and with His faithfulness to His promises. Salvation does not come without judgment. This feature, by which true prophetism is distinguished from false, which, divesting God of His righteousness, announced salvation to unreformed sinners, to the whole rude mass of the people,-this feature is once more prominently brought out in ver. 4. But salvation for the elect comes as necessarily, as judgment does upon the sinners. In the midst of the deepest abasement of the people of God, God raises from out of the midst of them the Saviour by whom they are raised to the highest glory, chap. iv. 2. They are installed into the dignity of

2

the saints of God, after the penitent ones have been renewed by His Spirit, and the obstinate sinners have been exterminated by His judgment, vers. 3, 4. God's gracious presence affords them protection from their enemies, and from all tribulation and danger, vers. 5, 6.

The first part, in which Isaiah follows Micah (comp. the arguments in proof of originality in Micah, Vol. i., p. 413 ff.), has already been expounded on a former occasion. We have here only to answer the question, why it is that the Prophet opens his discourse with a proclamation of salvation borrowed from Micah. His object certainly was to render the minds of the people susceptible of the subsequent admonition and reproof, by placing at the head a promise which had already become familiar and precious to the people. The position which the Messianic proclamation occupies in Isaiah is altogether misunderstood if, with Kleinert and Ewald, we assume that the passage does not, in Isaiah, belong to the real substance of the prophecy; that it is merely placed in front as a kind of text, the abuse and misinterpretation of which the Prophet meets in that which follows, so that the sense would be: the blessed time promised by former prophets will come indeed, but only after severe, rigorous judgments upon all who had forsaken Jehovah. It is especially ver. 5 which militates against this interpretation, where, in the words: "Come ye and let us walk in the light of the Lord,"

1 Light is the image of salvation; to walk in the light is to enjoy a participation in it. Israel is not wantonly to wander away from the path of light which the Lord has opened up to them, into the dark desolation of misery. In the words there is a clear reference to of the Gentile nations in ver. 3. If the Gentiles apply with such zeal for a participation in the blessings of the Kingdom of God, how disgraceful would it be if you, the people of the covenant, the children of the Kingdom, should lose your glorious possession by your ungodly walk. In vers. 6-11 the Prophet states the grounds of his admonition to the people to walk in the light of the Lord which he had expressed in the preceding verse. This admonition implies that there existed a danger of losing a participation in the light; and it is this danger which the Prophet here more particularly details. It is not without reason, so the words may be paraphrased, that I say: "Walk ye in the light of the Lord," for at present the Lord has forsaken the people on account of their sins, and with that, a participation in His light is incompatible. By being full of heathenish superstition, of false confidence in earthly things, yea, even of the most

the Prophet gives an express declaration as to the object of the description which he has placed in front, and expresses himself in regard to it in perfect harmony with Heb. iv. 1: Poßn0wμev οὖν μήποτε καταλειπομένης ἐπαγγελίας δοκῇ τις ἐξ ὑμῶν ὑστερηκέναι. This shows, that after the manner of an evangelical preacher, and in conformity with his name, he wishes to allure to repentance by pointing to the great salvation of the future ; that the ἤγγικε ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν of the first part serves as a foundation to the peтavоeîтe ovv of the second.

The threatening of punishment contained in the second part is destitute of any particular reference. It bears a general character, comprehending the whole of the mischief with which the Lord is to visit the unfaithfulness of His people. Most thoroughly was the animating idea realized in the Roman catastrophe, the consequence of which is the helplessness which still presses upon the people. The preparatory steps were the decay of the people at the time of Ahaz-especially the Chaldean overthrow—and, generally, everything which the people had to suffer in the time of the dominion of the Assyrian, Chaldean, Medo-Persian, and Greek kingdoms. As none of these kingdoms were as yet on the stage, or in sight, it is quite natural that the threatening here keeps altogether within general terms; it was given to Isaiah himself afterwards to individualize it much more.

It is with the third part only that we have here more particularly to employ ourselves.

Ver. 2. "In that day the Sprout of the Lord becomes for beauty and glory, and the fruit of the land for exaltation and ornament, to the escaped of Israel."

Ver. 3. "And it shall come to pass, he that was left in Zion, and was spared in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, every one that is written to life in Jerusalem."

Ver. 4. "When the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall remove the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof by the spirit of right and the spirit of destruction."

Ver. 5. "And the Lord creates over the place of Mount Zion,

disgraceful that can be imagined for Israel, viz., gross idolatry, they rather become more and more ripe for the divine judgment which will break in irresistibly upon them.