The suffering servant in Isaiah 53

[3abd Arahman]

How can Jews say that the suffering servant of Isaiah 53 refers to the Jewish people when not every aspect of this passage has been fulfilled by any individual Jew, including Jesus?


Answer: God deals with Israel in two ways. Singularly, with every individual and collectively, with the nation as a whole. Isaiah 53 is an overview of the historical encounter of collective national Israel with the nations of the world and God's rewards to the collective remnant of Israel for its faithfulness to His Torah. A day is coming when the nations of the world will, by virtue of the Israelite triumphs, become aware of God's special relationship to Israel. This will have the effect of causing, first, shock and disbelief, and then, an acknowledgment of the special rewards that God will grant Israel, as is described in the latter part of Isaiah 53.

What the prophet in this chapter describes refers to Israel as a whole, not every individual Israelite. Not every Jew will have to undergo every aspect of suffering to be worthy of eventually partaking in the rewards God promises. Indeed, not every Israelite has to be faultless because the suffering servant, Israel, as a people is innocent. If one is to insist, however, that Isaiah 53 refers to a specific person, that individual would personally have to accomplish all that is required of the suffering servant of the Lord. Failure to do so is automatic disqualification.

It should be clear to everyone that even if Isaiah 53 referred solely to the Messiah this would still not infer any support for the claim that it refers to Jesus. The fundamental theological Questions raised by the missionaries are "Who is the Messiah?" and "If not Jesus, who then is the Messiah and when will he come?" Jews are not obligated to identify who the Messiah will be or give a timetable for his arrival. One can only discuss the case presented for past claimants to the title. On this basis, Jews can confidently say that Jesus is not the Messiah of Israel prophesied in the Hebrew Scriptures. Jesus could not be the Messiah by virtue of any one of a number of disqualifications. They range from not having the biblical genealogical criteria for that office (one would have to be a biological descendant of David through the male line of Solomon) to bringing about the very fundamentals of the messianic age as delineated in Isaiah, chapter 11.

[3abd Arahman]

Did Jesus fulfill Isaiah 53:7 that describes the suffering servant "as a lamb that is led to the slaughter" and as someone who "opened not his mouth"?
Answer: According to the Gospels, both the Jewish officials and Pilate, when

Questioning Jesus, directed their inquiry to his messianic pretensions. Far from showing the humility and silence with which Isaiah describes the servant in verse 7, the encounter between the high priest, the elders, and Jesus is highlighted by a vigorous verbal exchange. In addition, Jesus did not show humility and silence during his confrontation with Pilate. At their meeting, Jesus is depicted as skillfully defending himself. Jesus at no time humbled himself, but, on the contrary, presented a clever verbal defense before Pilate (the one man who could condemn him to death), pleading shrewdly that his messianic teaching was a nonviolent, "not of this world" movement, one which the Romans need not fear. Since Pilate was concerned with messianic movements, which posed a political and military threat to the Roman Empire, he would not be interested in a movement which was not of "this world" and which would not be in conflict with the Empire. Jesus was obviously defending himself by presenting a shrewd verbal response when he tried to convince Pilate that he was not the head of a seditious movement but that his intentions were peaceful. Thus, contrary to what many Christian missionary theologians would have us believe, Jesus presented a strong defense before the Jewish officials and Pilate. Jesus was not "dumb" before his accusers, Jewish or Gentile, and it is simply not true to say of Jesus that "he humbled himself and did not open his mouth."

On the contrary, Jesus declared himself to be a king. "You say that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth. Every one who is of the truth hears my voice" (John 18:37). After having heard Jesus admit that he is a king the author of John would have his audience believe that Pilate goes out to the Jews and declares that he does not find him guilty of anything. "Behold, I am bringing him out to you, that you may know that I find no guilt in him" (John 19:4; see also Mark 15:2, Luke 23:3).

Earlier, the Gospels claim, Jesus acknowledged before the Sanhedrin that he was the Messiah. When the high priest asks him whether he is the Messiah he

Answers in the affirmative. "I am, and you will see the son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven" (Mark 14:62; see also Matthew 26:64, Luke 22:69). Matthew and Luke have Jesus Answer the high priest in the affirmative, with a statement similar to that which John uses for Jesus' Answer to Pilate, "you say that I am." It is quite obvious that Isaiah 53:7 makes no reference to Jesus.

[3abd Arahman]

Is it true that Jews interpreted Isaiah 53 as referring to the Messiah until the medieval commentator Rashi explained it as referring to the people of Israel?

Answer: Christian missionaries claim that it is only with the commentary of Rashi (1040-1105), seeking to refute the Christian interpretation, that the Jews began to refer Isaiah 52:13-53:12 to the entire nation of Israel. This misconception perhaps owes its origin to Edward Pusey, who wrote in his 1876 introduction to The "Suffering Servant" of Isaiah According to the Jewish Interpretations (trans. Driver and Neubauer, [reprinted] New York: Hermon Press, 1969) that "The new interpretation began with Rashi" (p. XLIV). The interpretation was neither new, nor began with Rashi. This missionary allegation is refuted even by a Christian source. In Contra Celsum, written in 248 C.E. (some 800 years before Rashi), the Church Father Origen records that Jews contemporary with him interpreted this passage as referring to the entire nation of Israel. He wrote:

I remember that once in a discussion with some whom the Jews regard as learned I used these prophecies [Isaiah 52:13-53:8]. At this the Jew said that these prophecies referred to the whole people as though of a single individual, since they were scattered in the dispersion and smitten, that as a result of the scattering of the Jews among the other nations many might become proselytes. In this way he explained the text: "Thy form shall be inglorious among men"; and "those to whom he was not proclaimed shall see him"; "being a man in calamity." (Origen, Contra Celsum, trans. Henry Chadwick, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, Book 1.55, 1965, p. 50)

This shows that Jewish biblical exegesis subscribing to the belief that the people of Israel was the suffering servant spoken of throughout the entire passage pre-dates Rashi by many centuries.

[3abd Arahman]

As a human being, Jesus certainly had very little. Yet, because he was allegedly God, he could expect, on reassuming his heavenly role, to exercise his power as God. So what did he, in the final accounting, give up in dying a human death?


Answer: Christian theology is saying that Jesus gave up a temporary earthly life as a god-man to return to his role in heaven, where, as part of the Trinity, he reigns as God. In Isaiah 53:12, God speaks of the suffering servant of the Lord, who, as a result of his selflessness, is willing to give up all that he possesses in the service of God. Clearly, it is unreasonable to say that Jesus sacrificed himself for the redemption of mankind when, by his actions, he knowingly gained more than he lost. Paul writes: ". . .

Jesus Christ, who, although he existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a bondservant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore also God highly exalted him, and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those who are in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the Glory of God the Father" (Philippians 2:5-11). There is a gross misuse of the concept of "sacrifice" where one who is alleged to be divine knows that by giving up a flesh-and-blood existence, something essentially unimportant to him, he will receive in return a position of eternal exaltation and power.

This cannot be called sacrifice. On leaving his transitory human lifespan behind him, Jesus, it is alleged, returned to heaven to once more become part of the eternal Godhead.

Why should Jesus be rewarded for his alleged sacrifice, for doing what he himself, as God, wanted done? There is no point for God, of whom Jesus is allegedly a part, to say: "I will divide him a portion with the great" as an actual reward to Himself. Such reward can be properly given to one who is all human and not one who is at the same time divine. The suffering servant is promised "a portion with the great" and that "he shall divide the spoil with the mighty," but if Jesus is God, who can be great enough to share the spoil with him? Is it conceivable that one who is God could possibly have only "a portion" comparable to that of mere earthly rulers, or that "he shall divide the spoil" with anyone? Even if this could be rationalized, it would then run counter to what is stated in Psalm 2, which Christians claim refers to Jesus.

In that psalm, God offers, to the person in Question, the entire earth for a possession (verse 8), and all rulers are told to give homage to that person (verse 10-12). Christian commentators will often try to explain away these irreconcilable contradictions with arguments that have no basis even in their own New Testament. It is for the reader to be vigilant and to be wary of such vain attempts that are based on distortions.