Key Themes in Isaiah

Outline

A message of present judgment and future glory

1:1-31              Judah’s rebellion against the Lord

2:1-5                A future Jerusalem will be a place of pilgrimage for all people

2:6-22              Judgment against human pride

3:1–4:1            The disintegration of an unjust society

4:2-6                The vision of a future Jerusalem, purged and holy

5:1-7                Judah as a vineyard yielding sour grapes

5:8-30              Woes and judgments

6:1-13              Isaiah’s calling as a prophet

The Aramean and Israelite threat against Judah

7:1-16              The child Immanuel as a sign of deliverance

7:17–8:15       Assyria will attack Judah on account of her sin

8:16–9:7          A future king will be born for salvation

9:8–10:34       A remnant of Judah will be delivered from the Assyrians

11:1–12:6       The messianic king will rule in Jerusalem

Prophetic messages of judgment against the nations

13:1–14:23     Judgment against Babylon

14:24-32         Judgment against Assyria and Philistia

15:1–16:14     Judgment against Moab

17:1-14            Judgment against Syria and Israel

18:1–20:6       Judgment against Ethiopia and Egypt

21:1-17            Judgment against Babylon, Edom
and Arabia

22:1-25            Judgment against Judah and some
of her officials

23:1-18            Judgment against Tyre

The Lord’s final victory over all evil

24:1-23            Judgment against all evil in heaven and earth

25:1-12            The banquet on the mountain
of the Lord

26:1-21            The hope of resurrection

27:1-13            The exiles of Israel will be gathered together

Prophetic messages of judgment

28:1–29:24     The Lord will punish unbelief among his people

30:1-33            Condemnation of Israel

31:1-9              Israel is to trust in the Lord, not
in Egypt

32:1–33:24     The promise of a king reigning with peace and righteousness in Jerusalem

34:1-17            Judgment against Edom

35:1-10            Salvation for those restored to Jerusalem

Jerusalem and the siege of Sennacherib

36:1–37:13     The Assyrians lay siege to Jerusalem

37:14-20         Hezekiah prays for deliverance from the siege

37:21-35         Isaiah prophesies deliverance of
the city

37:36-38         The death of Sennacherib; lifting of the siege

38:1-22            Hezekiah’s illness and recovery

39:1-8              Isaiah warns of future exile in Babylon

The release of the Babylonian exiles and their restoration to Jerusalem

40:1-31            The exiles’ punishment has ended

41:1-29            The Lord will bring an enemy to defeat Babylon

42:1-25            The servant of the Lord will bring salvation

43:1–44:8       The exiles will join in a new exodus and new creation

44:9-20            The futility of the worship of idols

44:21–45:25   God’s means of restoring the exiles will be Cyrus, king of Persia

46:1–48:22     Babylon and her gods will be brought low and the exiles released

49:1-26            The servant of the Lord will bring salvation to the nations

50:1-11            The faithfulness of the servant

51:1-23            The Lord calls the exiles out of Babylon

52:1-12            There will be rejoicing at this deliverance

52:13–53:12   The innocent servant will be afflicted and suffer for the sins of others

54:1-17            The blessings of the redeemed people

55:1-13            The call to accept the salvation offered

The vision of the restored community

56:1-12            The call to keep the Sabbath

57:1-21            The salvation of the righteous

58:1-14            The importance of fasting

59:1-21            Injustice will bring God’s judgment

60:1-22            The glorious return of the exiles

61:1-11            The servant of the Lord proclaims liberty and justice

62:1-12            Jerusalem will be the place of the Lord’s delight

63:1–64:12     The Lord’s day of vengeance

65:1-16            A remnant shall be saved

65:17-25         The creation of new heavens and a new earth

66:1-24            The glory of the Lord shall be declared among the nations

Background and setting

In 740 bc, the year that King Uzziah died (6:1), Isaiah stood in the Jerusalem temple and heard God calling him to be a prophet. This was a period of significant change: Tiglath-Pileser III had recently come to power in Assyria and was imposing his authority on the surrounding nations, and under Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah (1:1) Judah was to lurch from crisis to crisis as Assyrian pressure built relentlessly.

In 734 bc Israel and Damascus formed a defensive alliance and tried to persuade Ahaz to join them. When he refused, they invaded Judah; Ahaz (against Isaiah’s advice) appealed to Tiglath-Pileser for help and effectively subjected Judah to Assyrian domination (7:1-12; 2Ki 16:5-9), which involved acknowledgment of the imperial gods. Hezekiah nailed his colours to the mast by implementing major reforms, and eventually withheld tribute.

In 701 bc Sennacherib, Assyria’s new ruler, placed Jerusalem under siege. Hezekiah’s last hope, humanly speaking, was Egypt, but Egypt proved to be completely ineffective. It looked like the end, but Jerusalem survived. The truth behind appearances was that the Lord himself was the supreme ruler, and would determine the fate of Assyria and Judah alike.

Tradition has it that Isaiah was martyred during the reign of Manasseh, who reversed many of his father Hezekiah’s policies. There is clear evidence of editorial activity in the production of the book, and it makes good sense to attribute this to Isaiah’s disciples (8:16-17). There are varying views as to how long this activity went on, and how close the editors stood to the prophet himself.

The book is predominantly verse, but at the centre, in chapters 36–39, stands an extended block of material which is predominantly prose. This block describes Sennacherib’s invasion and its outcome and then deals with Hezekiah’s final illness.

The Babylonian exile casts its shadow over the second main section of the book (chapters 40–55). This is much lighter on historical specifics compared with chapters 1–39. An explanation for this is that Isaiah is addressing a future situation which is clear to him in outline only, except for the notable prediction of the rise of Cyrus (44:28–45:1) as the unlikely shepherd and liberator of God’s people.

In chapters 56–66 Babylon is no longer directly in view, but the legacy of the exile lives on and contributes significantly to the hopes and challenges of the restoration period.

Isaiah is known as the first of the Major Prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel), who are classified as such on account of the longer extent of the prophetic books that bear their names (compare the twelve Minor Prophets, Hosea–Malachi).

Themes and relevance

A key aspect of the book’s message is the size of the vision it presents. It begins with heaven and earth being summoned to listen (1:2), and it ends with their being transformed into the new heavens and the new earth (66:22). It also deals with God’s dealings with his people from the eighth century bc (1:1) right to the things that will bring history to a close and usher in eternity (66:22-24).

Secondly, it tells us to keep our eyes firmly fixed on Judah and Jerusalem (1:1); and as we do so, a figure appears before our eyes. He has royal titles which link him in the most intimate way with God himself (9:6). He is an ideal king from the line of David (11:1). He is endowed with the Spirit and rules with perfect justice, and under him all that God has purposed for his people and his world is fully realised (11:2-9). But at the heart of Isaiah’s vision is the startling revelation that this figure must suffer.

Of key significance here are the two passages, in chapters 6 and 40, in which Isaiah finds himself summoned into the presence of God to receive a specific commission. The first commits Isaiah to a ministry of judgment, the second to a ministry of comfort; and these become the dominant notes of the first and second halves of the book respectively: judgment and salvation. The two themes are developed on at least three different levels:

1. The people of Judah and Jerusalem are laden with guilt and have turned their backs on the Lord, but through a scourging process there emerges a group of people who are truly repentant.

2. It is the Holy One of Israel (an expression which occurs twenty-five times in Isaiah and only six times in the rest of the Old Testament) who has been spurned, and how can he forgive his people without compromising his holiness? The issue surfaces pointedly in chapter 6: forgiveness is possible only when atonement is provided by God himself.

3. It was always God’s intention that his people should be the channel through which his blessing would flow out to the world at large (Ge 12:1-3). The key is the work of the Servant, who is a covenant for the people and a light for the Gentiles (42:6). His sacrifice is sufficient for all and provides the rich food of pardon and forgiveness in which all who are hungry and thirsty may share, if only they will come (55:1-7). Now we see that the inward flow of the nations to share in the gospel banquet presupposes and requires another movement which is directed outwards – a great missionary movement of gospel proclamation and invitation. It begins with the repeated statement ‘You are my witnesses’ (43:10, 12; 44:8). It gains further impetus by the final appearance of the Servant as a Spirit-anointed preacher (61:1-3), and it climaxes in the sending out of messengers far and wide to proclaim God’s glory among the nations (66:19).

This blog post is extracted from the study notes of the NIV BST Bible, ahead of the publication of Isaiah, the new Tyndale Old Testament Commentary by Paul D. Wegner.