The suffering Servant: bearing the sin of many

Isaiah 52 and 53 come from the section of the book (chapters 40 to 55) addressed to Judah in exile in Babylon, in the sixth century BC. The authorship debate described in the class on chapter 40 applies here as well: some hold that an anonymous prophet among the exiles wrote these chapters, others that Isaiah of Jerusalem did. The song is not dated by the text, and the interpretation does not depend on this.

The passage stands at the climax of a thread. Four poems about 'the Servant of the LORD' have been picked out since the German scholar Bernhard Duhm in 1892: Isaiah 42:1-4, 49:1-6, 50:4-9 and 52:13 to 53:12.

• The first speaks of the Servant bringing justice to the nations.
• The second has the Servant speak of being called from the womb, and the LORD say that he will restore Israel and be a light to the nations.
• The third shows him taking blows without turning away.
• The fourth explains why. Elsewhere in the same section the Servant is explicitly named as Israel (41:8; 44:1; 49:3), which is the main reason the identity question has been disputed. In the Servant songs the Servant also has a mission to Israel (49:5-6), so he is somehow both Israel and for Israel.

The first hearers were in exile, which their own prophets had said was a punishment for sin. The question for them was how sin could be put away and how the nation could be restored. Chapter 52:1-12 announces that the LORD will return to Zion, and the song that follows explains the means by which the pardon is secured.

Isaiah 52:13 to 53:12 is Hebrew poetry in five stanzas of three verses each: 52:13-15; 53:1-3; 53:4-6; 53:7-9; 53:10-12. The first and last are spoken by the LORD, who introduces his Servant and then declares his reward. The middle three stanzas are spoken by a group who say 'we' and speak with the surprise of people who realize they misread what they saw. The structure rises from the Servant's exaltation, through his rejection and death, to his vindication.

The song uses the language of sacrifice and law throughout: 'bear' (carry sin), 'guilt offering', 'justify', 'transgressors', 'iniquity'. The key to the passage is that these terms describe one person suffering in the place of others. The song also separates two groups: the 'we' who confess, and the 'many' who benefit.

The song has been read in several ways. In Jewish interpretation, the Servant has most often been understood as Israel, either the whole people suffering among the nations or its faithful part; this is the common reading among medieval commentators. The Aramaic Targum of Isaiah (Targum Jonathan) names the Messiah at 52:13, though it assigns much of the suffering to others, and some rabbinic texts also apply the passage to the Messiah. Critical scholarship has proposed Moses, Jeremiah, a king in exile such as Jehoiachin, the prophet himself, or the exiles. The New Testament reads it as pointing to Jesus. This class follows the New Testament reading and observes that it fits most naturally the features of the song: a righteous individual who dies, whose death is a guilt offering for others, and who afterwards lives and is exalted.

52:1-6. Zion is told to wake up, put on strength and shake off the dust. The reason is that the unclean will no longer enter her. 'You were sold for nothing, and without money you will be redeemed.' Israel went down to Egypt, was oppressed by Assyria without cause, and now is taken captive while the LORD's name is mocked. The purpose is that the people will know the LORD's name. The theme is redemption without payment.

52:7-12. The famous line, 'How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news', is spoken to the city: the message is 'Your God reigns!' The watchmen on the walls see the LORD return to Zion with their own eyes. The LORD has bared his holy arm in the sight of all the nations, a figure of a warrior rolling up his sleeve. The exiles are told to leave Babylon and take care with the sacred vessels. Unlike the hasty flight from Egypt, they will not flee in a hurry, because the LORD goes before them and is their rear guard (compare Exodus 14).

52:13-15. 'Behold, My Servant will prosper.' The verb can mean to act wisely and so to succeed. He will be 'raised and lifted up and highly exalted', the language of the vision in 6:1. Yet many were appalled at his appearance, which was marred beyond that of any man. The result is that 'He will sprinkle many nations' (some translations read 'startle'; the verb is rare, and the translation is debated), and kings will shut their mouths, for they will see what they had never been told. The pattern of the song is already given: humiliation, then exaltation.

53:1-3. 'Who has believed our message?' The arm of the LORD, bared in 52:10, is revealed in the very person that people despised. He grew up as a tender shoot, a root from dry ground. The words recall 11:1 but without the royal glory. He had no form or majesty that would draw people. He was despised and rejected, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, someone from whom people hide their faces.

53:4-6. This is the centre. The 'we' who saw him as stricken by God now say the opposite. He took on our infirmities and carried our sorrows. 'He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities.' The Hebrew verbs for 'bore' and 'carried' (nasa, sabal) are those used for carrying a burden or bearing guilt. 'The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him' and by his stripes we are healed. All like sheep have gone astray, and 'the LORD has laid upon Him the iniquity of us all.' The prophet makes God the one who places the burden.

53:7-9. He was oppressed and afflicted yet did not open his mouth, led like a lamb to slaughter, silent like a sheep before its shearers. By oppression and judgment he was taken away, cut off from the land of the living for the transgression of 'My people'. He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence and no deceit was in his mouth. The death was unjust, and it was also the means of the people's pardon.

53:10-12. The final stanza begins with a startling line: it was the LORD's will to crush him. His soul is made a 'guilt offering' (asham), the offering of Leviticus 5 and 6 for making amends for sin. After that the stanza turns: he will see offspring, prolong his days, see the light of life and be satisfied. Read plainly, a man who has been cut off from the land of the living and then sees offspring and long life is a man who lives beyond death. The text does not say how, and many readers take this as the song's hint of resurrection. By his knowledge the righteous Servant will 'justify many' and bear their iniquities. He is given a portion with the great, because he poured out his life to death, was numbered with the transgressors, bore the sin of many, and 'made intercession for the transgressors'.

This song is the Old Testament's most developed account of substitution. A righteous person bears the sin of others, the LORD himself places it on him, and as a result others are healed and counted righteous. It draws on the sacrificial system of Leviticus, in which an offering stands in the place of the offerer, and on the scapegoat of Leviticus 16, which carries sin away. At the same time, the song goes beyond the sacrificial system by making the offering a person.

It also teaches that atonement is the work of God's own will. The LORD laid on him the iniquity of us all, and it was the LORD's will to crush him. God is not a third party to the transaction. As the New Testament understands the cross, God himself provides the offering, which is why Paul speaks of God reconciling the world to himself in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:19).

The song teaches the pattern of suffering followed by glory: humiliation, death, vindication. It joins the themes of the Davidic king in chapter 11 and the suffering servant in this chapter, an alliance the New Testament makes in Jesus. And the 'many' who benefit include nations (52:15), setting the ground for the Gospel to Gentiles.

Few Old Testament chapters are applied to Christ in the New Testament as directly as this one. In Acts 8:26-35 the Ethiopian official is reading Isaiah 53:7-8 and asks whom the prophet means, and Philip begins with this Scripture and tells him the good news about Jesus. In 1 Peter 2:21-25, Christ is the one who bore our sins in his body on the tree, the passage borrowing the language of Isaiah 53:4-12 (he committed no sin, no deceit was found in his mouth, by his wounds you were healed). Matthew 8:17 applies verse 4 to Jesus' healing ministry. Luke 22:37 quotes the line about being numbered with the transgressors as something that must be fulfilled in Jesus, and John 12:38 and Romans 10:16 use verse 1 of the unbelief that met Jesus and the gospel. Romans 4:25 (delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification) is widely seen as echoing verse 12 and the justification of the many. Matthew 27:57-60 narrates a burial in a rich man's tomb, which fits 53:9.

The type of connection is therefore direct application, in which the New Testament treats the song as a promise fulfilled in Jesus. In Mark 10:45, Jesus says the Son of Man came to give his life as a ransom for many; many scholars see here an echo of Isaiah 53:10-12, although the passage does not quote it. John the Baptist's words in John 1:29 may carry a similar echo. Each of these is a connection made by the New Testament, not by later allegory.