# Isaiah 53



## baron (Dec 25, 2009)

Can anyone recommend a good web site that explains Is.53 from Jewish thought? Trying to find how or what the Rabbi's interpretation of that chapter. I keep finding Messianic Jews and I just want to read how a Jewish person today would understand this chapter.

Thanks.


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## Claudiu (Dec 25, 2009)

My impression that I got looking this up is that some believe it is not the Messiah the text is talking about but rather Israel. Thats what this commentary sounds like http://anti-missionary.com/files/isaiah.html
This is Rashi' commentary: http://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/15984/showrashi/true

-----Added 12/25/2009 at 11:41:47 EST-----

Here is a more in-depth article from the Jewish perspective: http://www.judaismsanswer.com/IS53PART1.pdf


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## baron (Dec 25, 2009)

That was what a couple of Jewish people I know said. That this refers to Israel only. They also told me you crazy christains do not know how to read. We always put our own views into the O.T. Thanks for the links.


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## T.A.G. (Dec 26, 2009)

baron said:


> That was what a couple of Jewish people I know said. That this refers to Israel only. They also told me you crazy christains do not know how to read. We always put our own views into the O.T. Thanks for the links.



what they do not understand is that if they take that belief they contradicting a major fundamental part of Torah, even their Talmud.
Isa 52:13-Isa 53:12

Topic: Is Isaiah 53 a Messianic verse or is it the gentile Kings speaking of Israel?

Give background

Context of the chapter is the redemption out of exile and Babylonian captivity. How interesting to see that this out of all passages is taking place with redemption surrounding the Jews.

An Interesting note:

We can't even find Isa 52:13-53-12 interpreted as Israel until …

second-century Christian source recounting a discussion between a Gentile follower of Jesus and some Jewish teachers who did not believe in him. But, aside from one passing reference in Midrash Rabbah (where part of one verse is interpreted with reference to the righteous), a specific identification of Isaiah 53 with Israel is not found in any Rabbinic literature until almost one thousand years after Jesus.

Isa 52:13-Isa 53:12

13 See, my servant will act wisely
he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted.

Already we see that the servant will be highly exalted. The Hebrew word that's used for exalted means something like 'to rise' or 'to be lifted up'. By implication it means 'to triumph'. So in a sense we can say the servant will be highly triumph. The Hebrew word is from the word ga'a. When ever we see highly exalted in the Bible we see one of two things. Either God is highly exalted or he will highly exalt someone or something. An example of this is 1 Chronicles 29:25
The LORD highly exalted Solomon in the sight of all Israel and bestowed on him royal splendor such as no king over Israel ever had before. We also see in Exodus 15:21 Miriam sang to them: "Sing to the LORD, for he is highly exalted. The horse and its rider he has hurled into the sea."

Just food for thought.

14 Just as there were many who were appalled at him
his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man
and his form marred beyond human likeness—

15 so will he sprinkle many nations, [c]
and kings will shut their mouths because of him.
For what they were not told, they will see,
and what they have not heard, they will understand.

If this verse were the gentile kings speaking of Israel, why would they not be talking in 1st person? Why are they talking in 3rd person?

Isaiah 53

1 Who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

Common Objection: This cant be Yeshua because He had great crowds following him, this servant had nothing to attract us to him or anything in his appearance that we would desire.

Answer(s)

1. The Bible never describes Yeshua in a physical description in highly terms. Example in 1st Samuel it talks about how Saul was head and shoulders taller and we know in the Bible it talks about how David was good looking and with out blemish etc. The new testament never talks about Jesus being great looking or anything of that nature. The only reason people flocked around Jesus was because of the power of God. To think people brought dead and diseased men to him, I doubt people were going to him because of his good looks. No! The people were going to him because of the power of God. Why else would they be bringing dead and sick people to him? What a servant life Jesus must have had. When he should have been worshiped he was out with the lame and sick, healing them. Can you imagine all the different smells?

2. Another note here: Is there is actually a record of rabbis telling the Jews not to go associate and pray with believers in Yeshua, even if they are healing you. That goes for even further support of healing coming from the messianic believers.

3 He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4 Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.

5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.

6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

7 He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before her shearers is silent,


8 By oppression [d] and judgment he was taken away.
And who can speak of his descendants?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was stricken.

1. We see that the servant was stricken for my people. Always when someone in the Bible says my people, it's always Israel. How can the servant be suffering for my people if the servant is Israel.

Israel in the Bible never suffered for other people's sin, it suffered for its own sin. Read Laminations. Israel suffering for other peoples sins isn't simply Torah. Israel always suffered for its own sin. We look in 2 Chronicles 36:15-16. The LORD, the God of their fathers, sent word to them through his messengers again and again, because he had pity on his people and on his dwelling place. 16 But they mocked God's messengers, despised his words and scoffed at his prophets until the wrath of the LORD was aroused against his people and there was no remedy.

2. That's the reason why Israel suffered not because of other nations sins. Some may object and say psalms 44 shows a person of Israel suffering because of others sins, how do we respond to that? How else would you respond to that? It's simply a plea from a man who has followed the covenant crying out to the other people. It just as if we pleaded with our country on abortion saying please God don't bring this nation down because others are causing evil etc.
3. To sum it up: This cant be the gentile kings because we see in the beginning, that the verse begins with my people and we know that my people is always Israel which would contradict the gentile kings being the people of Israel. And we see through Torah that never has Israel ever ever suffered for other peoples sins and we see the reasons for the sufferings of the Jewish people is sin.

There's another objection to this chapter in verse 8. The objection is in chapter 8 when the verse is in its Hebrew to English translation it says "he is caught off from the land of the living, because of the transgression of my people, a stroke for them." The literal word in Hebrew that is used in place of for them is lamo. And we see that lamo in the bible is always used plural. The objection that people give to this verse is that lamo is always used plural so it must be speaking that Isa 53 isn't talking about the messiah because is plural.

This is wrong for 2 reasons.

1. We see lamo used in Isa 44 in reference to talking about a single idol.

2. Lamo for them is talking about for the transgression of my people, he was smitten for them. Them being the people, he being the servant.

9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.

Objection: Hebrew has deaths not death

Answer: Ezekiel 28 says to the godless king, the deaths of the wicked. Basically a horrible death in Hebrew is often used plural. So often plurality describes greatness in the language of Hebrew and example is even God's deity and name. Deity being a plural one or echad as we see God is echad in det. 6:4. Echad is a plural one. An example of what is echad is a grape vine. We see very early on that the God echad, from the Father figure, to the Word of God figure, to the Spirit of God figure.

Commentary: how many times were the Pharisees looking for Yeshua to slip up? How many times did they set traps for Yeshua so they could find something wrong with him, so they could find deceit in his mouth? But they never did. And to top it off, he even expressed his deity through that. We see in Luke 6 where the Pharisees saw the disciples picking grain and eating on the Sabbath and they watched and then criticized them in saying it wasn't lawful. But Jesus then defended him self with a story of what David did on the Sabbath and then told them He was the Lord of Sabbath. Yeshua was found with out fault even with the most criticizing eyes watching.

10 Yet it was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the LORD makes [f] his life a guilt offering,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.

Commentary: One of the offerings that were institutionalized for Guilt offering was called asham. And here it says his life will be a guilt offering. His life will be asham.

Objections: But wait. How did he prolong his days? And It says he has offspring so this cant be Jesus.

1st off, this whole verse describes him being crucified, and the only way to prolong your life after you are crucified is to be resurrected. And we all know that Jesus was resurrected. In fact there were over 500 eye witnesses of his resurrection. Scholars even talked about his resurrection such as Josephus. I mean, after he is crushed and bruised for our iniquity, and it says after his death, I mean the only way possible for him to prolong his life is to be resurrected. Another note: Actually, there is such a direct different, and striking difference of the Messiah suffering and yet ruling that many rabbis have come up with a double messiah theory in that there will be two messiahs, one that purifies us and the other in the place of the ruler.

For the second objection: The word used for offspring is Zara. It is often used for offspring or seed but it can often be used metaphorically. We see this used metaphorically in the book of Isaiah as well. You don't have to go any farther to see the word zara used metaphorically then the 1st chapter of Isaiah. So Zara is used metaphorically in Isaiah 1.

11 After the suffering of his soul,
he will see the light of life [g] and be satisfied [h] ;
by his knowledge _ my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.

12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great, [j]
and he will divide the spoils with the strong, [k]
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors._


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## Claudiu (Dec 26, 2009)

This just goes to show how if you have the wrong presuppositions you can make the Bible say whatever you want it to say, even though it will have major contradictions. It can get annoying talking with a Jewish person because they tend to have the mentality thats its them against everybody, against the whole world, they like to play the victim. Worst of all, when you start looking at passages like these with them they usually use the attack that we Gentiles misread the OT, and only they can read it right.

-----Added 12/26/2009 at 11:28:38 EST-----



T.A.G. said:


> baron said:
> 
> 
> > Isa 52:13-Isa 53:12
> ...


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## T.A.G. (Dec 26, 2009)

cecat90 said:


> This just goes to show how if you have the wrong presuppositions you can make the Bible say whatever you want it to say, even though it will have major contradictions. It can get annoying talking with a Jewish person because they tend to have the mentality thats its them against everybody, against the whole world, they like to play the victim. Worst of all, when you start looking at passages like these with them they usually use the attack that we Gentiles misread the OT, and only they can read it right.
> 
> -----Added 12/26/2009 at 11:28:38 EST-----
> 
> ...


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## Claudiu (Dec 26, 2009)

I wasn't disagreeing with you Tyler. I know they are wrong and that there are many contradictions in what they are saying. I was just pointing out that often times the only attack a Jew usually gives when you talk with them is that we cannot possibly have any knowledge of the OT (so they say) because we are interpreting it wrong (through the NT). Getting their trust is a biggie if the discussion is going to go anywhere in my opinion. 

But I do appreciate those passages and input as I am still learning as well.

-----Added 12/26/2009 at 03:53:01 EST-----

Another thing I was told one time was that in the OT there was no concept of Heaven or Hell. There was only Hades (as a resting place for the dead). 

When Enoch (who didn't die, and he didn't go to a resting place) was brought up in the discussion they went around and ended up talking about something else.


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## au5t1n (Dec 26, 2009)

This is one of my favorite passages in Scripture. You've got to be crazy not to see Christ in this passage. It is chock full of prophecy about Christ, down to his silence before Pilate and his burial in a rich man's tomb. The Jewish explanation falls woefully short. Even the Pharisees of Christ's time interpreted Is. 53 as messianic, contradicting the modern Jewish interpretation that it is only talking about Israel in general.


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## Claudiu (Dec 26, 2009)

austinww said:


> This is one of my favorite passages in Scripture. You've got to be crazy not to see Christ in this passage. It is chock full of prophecy about Christ, down to his silence before Pilate and his burial in a rich man's tomb. The Jewish explanation falls woefully short. Even the Pharisees of Christ's time interpreted Is. 53 as messianic, contradicting the modern Jewish interpretation that it is only talking about Israel in general.




Exactly!

It says (v. 4-5): "He"..."borne our griefs and carried our sorrows"..."wounded for our transgressions."
This obviously can't be a nation, or a people, but rather a person, and that being Jesus.


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## VilnaGaon (Jan 11, 2010)

Amazon.com: The Suffering Servant of Isaiah (9781579102555): Samuel R. Driver, Adolf Neubauer: Bookshttp://http://www.amazon.com/Suffering-Servant-Isaiah-Samuel-Driver/dp/1579102557/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1263246012&sr=1-3
The book ---- The suffering Servant by Samuel Driver(of the Hebrew Lexicon fame) is truely worth its weight in gold! It is an anthology of excerpts from the Classical Rabbinical commentaries through the centuries which demonstrate that some of the greatest Rabbis through Jewish history regarded the suffering Servant in Isa 53 as the Messiah. Buy this book, you will not regret it! It will provide you with the ammo you need to confront today's Orthodox Jewish lies which miscast the Suffering Servant as Israel.


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