Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

Dear Liz,

I said:

>> The text of Isaiah distinguishes the Servant of the Lord from Cyrus, who
>> also is a servant of the Lord. It takes work to distinguish the two, but
>> the material devoted to each of them differs in style and substance.

You replied:

>Ok, would you care to elaborate?

Isaiah blends the Babylonian and eschatological eras in his prophecies.

Interpreters are familiar with the interplay between Cyrus and the Servant
in Isaiah 40-66. Both are God's servants, His anointed, sent to redeem and
restore Israel. God causes both to prosper, to divide spoil, to subdue
kings. Discussion can move quickly from one to the other (cf. Isa 41:25
with 42:1; 48:14-15 with 48:16 and 49:1). Yet the two figures are
distinguishable, for Cyrus is from a far country (41:1-3; 45:1-3, 13;
46:11) while the Servant is identified with Israel (49:1-5). Cyrus is
ignorant of God (45:4-5), but the Servant is exceptionally close to God
(50:4). Cyrus appears as a warrior (41:2-3, 25; 45:1-2), but the Servant is
meek and bears suffering (43:2; 49:4, 7; 50:5-6; 52:14; 53:1-12). Isaiah
used Cyrus to point ahead to the Servant, whose glory comes at the final
restoration of Israel from Babylonian enslavement (52:4-54:10).

There are two redeemers because there are two captivities, and the latter
redemption Isaiah associates with the new heavens and earth. Yet Isaiah
never speaks explicitly of two Babylonian exiles, but only of two key
persons, and even these he almost fuses on occasion. Isaiah does not
sharply distinguish the time of Cyrus from the time of the Servant. The
times of miracles and re-creation did not take place with Cyrus's
redemption and so must point to another exile and redemption. The Book of
Revelation has employed Isaiah's structure in vivid portrayal of the age's
end in terms of a new Babylon, another redemption of Israel, and a new
heavens and earth.

Conservatives have called Isaiah's viewpoint a "mountain-peak perspective";
one peak seems just behind the next, when in fact a large valley
intervenes. Walter Kaiser prefers the term "generic prophecy" to cover a
complex of events that occur in more than one time. But actually Isaiah had
blended together two events which he realized were distinct. He names Cyrus
in connection with a return from exile (44:27-45:7), but it is the Servant
that he links with Israel's worldwide glory (e.g., 42:1-7; 49:6-7;
52:13-15). Because of the distinction that he makes between Cyrus and the
Servant, he evidently did not confuse the nearer and farther scenes,
although he often wrote as though they were one set of events. For
simplicity's sake he pictures one mountain peak but gives sufficient detail
so that recognition of two similar peaks is possible. Events of 538 B.C.
were significant in themselves but also outlined more distant and dramatic
ones. Isaiah amalgamated the two similar times at points, just as the
destructions of A.D. 70 and the great Tribulation coalesce in the Olivet
discourse.

                                Yours,
                                Harold Holmyard
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Harold R. Holmyard III [mailto:hholmyard AT ont.com]
>> Sent: Friday, January 19, 2001 7:43 PM
>> To: Biblical Hebrew
>> Subject: RE: singular and plural for Isaiah's servant
>>
>>
>> The text of Isaiah distinguishes the Servant of the Lord from Cyrus, who
>> also is a servant of the Lord. It takes work to distinguish the two, but
>> the material devoted to each of them differs in style and substance.
>>
>>                              Yours,
>>                              Harold Holmyard
>>
>>
>>
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