Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Liz Fried" <lizfried AT umich.edu>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Harold R. Holmyard III [mailto:hholmyard AT ont.com]
>
>
> Dear Liz,
>
> You wrote:
>
> >Thank you Harold, I appreciate the work and effort you
> >put into this. I respond below.
>
> Thank you, but it was just a bit more than a page from my dissertation
> (finished in 1992).

What is it on, did you publish it?

Liz, by the way, it is good to separate you comments
> from the person to whom you are responding by a line. A little blank space
> sets your words off. Otherwise they may seem to be part of what you are
> responding to, and someone may pass over them as part of the old material.

OK But it makes these posts too long,
I stop reading after two screens.

>
> >>>Cyrus is
> >> ignorant of God (45:4-5), but the Servant is exceptionally close to God
> >> (50:4).
>
> >50:4-9 refer to the prophet himself.
>
> It is possible, Liz, for tradition states that Isaiah was
> persecuted in his
> later years, perhaps sawn in two as is mentioned in Hebrews 11.

How did that tradition arise, from these poems???

 But there
> is reason to think that Isa 50:4-9 refers to the Servant. First, the first
> person description fits other Servant songs.

The only so-called servant song it fits is Is. 52:14ff, also about the
prophet.
It's the continuation of Isa. 50:4fff.
I think Williamson did an excellent job of demonstrating that Isa. 50:4
is the prophet. A superb job, imo.
And 52:14 is the continuation of the story.


 Second, the servant is
> mentioned in verse 10.
>
> >These verses are in the first person, they then go on to refer to the
> >servant in the third person (vs. 10,11). Two different people are
> >talked about here, one 1st person, one 3rd.
>
> God often refers to Himself in the third person. It would not be odd for
> the Servant to do likewise.

God does not speak of himself in the third person.
Where does that occur?


>Or the prophet could speak about him.

The prophet does speak about him. Yup.

>
> >Cyrus is the servant refered to in 50:10.
>
> I disagree because the issue of Israelites obeying Cyrus does not really
> come up. It is conceivable but does not seem in harmony with the book as a
> whole and especially the Servant songs.
>
I mean, obeying by leaving Babylon.

> >The others are those who will not listen, and will not return.
>
> Right. This is what I thought you meant by your interpretation of Isa
> 50:10. It is not unreasonable; in fact, it is attractive.

Thks.

>
> >Cyrus appears as a warrior (41:2-3, 25; 45:1-2), but the
> >> Servant is
> >> meek and bears suffering (43:2;
> >Where is the servant? the I is God.
>
> Thank you, Liz; you just caught a typo that escaped me and my dissertation
> reviewers. I meant 42:3.
>
> >Perhaps you refer to 42:1-3.
>
> Yes. My apologies.
>
> >Cyrus judge the nations, since he conquered them all (42:1).
>
> This prophecy seems to go beyond Cyrus, though I can see why you might
> apply it to him. The same imagery of opening blind eyes and releasing from
> prison occurs in Isa 61:1-3. In the whole structure of Isaiah the words
> seem to transcend Cyrus.

Not to me. Isa. 61:1ff is Cyrus talking. He is the only one anointed
in the book of Isaiah (Isa 45:1).
This is what put me on to the fact that Cyrus is the servant in 49 and
42 (receives the spirit). Besides, compare Isa 61 to the Cyrus cylinder.
Williamson says that here Trito-Isaiah is taking on roles that have
been left unfulfilled by Cyrus. There were no roles unfulfilled by Cyrus.
Cyrus fulfilled  *all* of God's purposes (44:28).


>
> >He also had a reputation for being meek. I quote Herodotus.
>
> >…The Persians have a saying that Darius was a shopkeeper,
> Cambyses a master
> >of slaves, and Cyrus a father.  What they mean is that Darius kept petty
> >accounts for everything, that Cambyses was hard and
> contemptuous, and that
> >Cyrus was gentle and contrived everything for their good. (III: 89).
>
> I was impressed during my dissertation work how many laudable things I
> found about Cyrus, a fact which shows the divine wisdom in using him as a
> type of the Christ.

Oh, blechy, give me a break.

>
> > 49:4,
> >This does not show weakness;
>
> I said, "but the Servant is meek and bears suffering," and cited 49:4 for
> that reason, not because it showed weakness. It suggests the bearing of
> suffering to me.

Just the bearing of responsibility.

>
> > 7;
> >The word servant is not mentioned here.
> >This may be the prophet or the Jews held captive in Babylon.
>
> The servant is mentioned in 49:6, and 49:7 continues 49:6.

Right, I missed it. My mistake. But it's the servant of rulers
not God's servant. Not the same person at all.

 I do not think
> that 49:7 refers to the prophet or the Jews in Babylon.

 Simeon applied the
> words to the Messianic child (Luke 2:32). The collocation of first
> suffering and then glory does not seem to fit Isaiah, who had glory first
> and then suffering, according to tradition. And it does not suit the Jews
> in Babyon as it speaks of an individual. I agree with Dan Wagner about the
> plurality and singularity of the image of the servant. Yes,
> Israel is God's
> servant. But in some passages plurality does not fit, and this is one of
> them. I can see how you might disagree. It is not easy.

Forgive me, but I don't see the relevance of later Christian interpretation,
or later Talmudic interpretation even.
>
> > 50:5-6;
> >This is the prophet.
>
> We talked about this passage above. I just do not see that type of
> autobiographical material in Isaiah 40-66. But again, I can understand why
> someone would take that view.
>
> >52:14; 53:1-12).
> >The suffering servant so-called.
> >Where is the word servant used?
> >The word servant is only in 52:13.
>
> The servant appears in 53:11. Furthermore, you answered your own question.
> Verse 14 describes the person in verse 13. And 53:1-12 expands on 52:14.
>
> >I put it with 52:1-12. It describes Cyrus' exaltation when the
> Jews return
> >to their promised land.
>
> Then what is the antecedent for the third person pronouns in 52:14? They
> describe someone who is suffering.

There is no antecedent third person pronoun in 52:14, that is only in the
Greek,
the Hebrew has *you*. The person standing before the speaker, ie., the
prophet.
The speaker must be Trito-isaiah or someone else.
The "you" suggests it does not refer to the person spoken of in 52:13,
else it would have been "him." And as Dan said, the more difficult reading
is to be preferred.


>
> >The rest of the verses 52:14ff do not mention the word servant.
> >They are only assigned to the servant because of Jesus.
>
> Isaiah 53:11 mentions the servant.

right, sorry.
>
> >If there had been no Jesus no one would have ever thought these vs talk
> >about a servant.

I still think it refers to the prophet since it continues 50:4-9. Prophets
can
also be referred to as God's servant, obviously. I did a search on servant
in the tanak, and a great many people are called it, even Caleb.


> This experience goes beyond what Isaiah could accomplish, in my view.
>
> >> used Cyrus to point ahead to the Servant, whose glory comes at
> the final
> >> restoration of Israel from Babylonian enslavement (52:4-54:10).
>
> >Yes, this is described in 52:1-13.
>
> I can see how you can apply 52:13 to Cyrus, but I think that verse 13 is
> connected to verse 14. So the ultimate fulfillment relates to someone who
> suffered for sin.

Ultimate fulfillment only from a christological view, not from the view
of 539-8. That ultimate fulfillment comes from the release from Babylon
and the return, the rebuilding of the temple, that is the ultimate
fulfillment.
It is the new Exodus, the redemption, the promised land.


>
> >> There are two redeemers because there are two captivities,
>
> >There is one redeemer and one captivity.
> >What is the other?
>
> It is the captivity that ends in a worldwide deliverance along with a new
> heavens and earth. It is the redeemer that goes with this more
> glorious and
> final deliverance. Much of Isaiah has yet to be fulfilled. It describes
> conditions that have never existed, a glory for Israel that has never
> occurred. I understand how someone could relate all of Isaiah 40-66's
> prophecies to the time of the Babylonian captivity as hyperbolic language,
> but the wording seems too specific to be mere poetic extravagance.
>
> >>and the latter
> >> redemption Isaiah associates with the new heavens and earth.
>
> >This appears only in Trito-Isaiah (65:17ff), who doesn't have an
> individual
> >servant,
> >but servants, plural.
>
> I do not accept the division of Isaiah into parts separated in authorship
> by one or more centuries. I spent a portion of my doctoral research
> verifying for myself that the grounds for this division are linguistically
> weak. Rather, they depend on the supposition that Isaiah could not predict
> the future, a view that is contrary to Scripture.

In fact, the opposite is true. It is because Proto-Isaiah had said that a
remnant
would return that second Isaiah was able to incorporate first isaiah's work
in his own.

We have two entirely dfiferent world views then. I hadn't realized from your
previous
posts you were so conservative.
The reason why linguisically speaking there are few differences is because
of the heavy redaction of first Deutero-Isaiah on Proto-isaiah, and then
the heavy redaction of Trito on them both.


>
> >> Yet Isaiah
> >> never speaks explicitly of two Babylonian exiles, but only of two key
> >> persons, and even these he almost fuses on occasion.
>
> >There are two people, Cyrus and the prophet himself.
>
> The view that the suffering servant is the prophet Isaiah is well known. I
> can see why it would be adopted, but both the vicarious suffering and the
> glory of the servant seem to surpass what Isaiah accomplished or received.

Only from a christological viewpoint.

>
> >> 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.
>
> >There is no time of miracle in Deutero-Isaiah, you find it in
> various places
> >but these are all Trito-Isaiah, it seems to me, and have nothing to do
> >with the servant (11:6-8).
>
> The book is all of a piece. It is invalid to separate, for example, Isa
> 35:7 from 41:17-18. They both point to the same ultimate
> fulfillment in the
> same terms. The miraculous transformation of the desert seen in
> 35:1-2 also
> appears in 41:18-19. The same image of the eyes of the blind being opened
> that occurs in 35:5 stands in 42:7.

Yes, read Williamson's book, The Book Called Isaiah. You will understand
how the book came to be witten, it is an excellent book. Duhm's old theory
of three separate writers, three separate blocks of material just appended
to
each other is out the window. The book is a whole, but has been written over
many centuries, from the 8th through the 6th or 5th.

>
> The Servant par excellence is the Davidic king, not the foreign king, who
> is only a type. And you are right that Isa 11:6-8 associates the
> miraculous
> transformation of nature with the Davidic king Messiah, who is the Servant
> of Isaiah 40-66.

The Servant par excellence is the Messiah, Yes! To Isaiah that Messiah
is Cyrus (45:1), that is the basic data that you are not grappling with.
That is the basic crux which has sent me on this  quest.
You can't just push that aside as if it doesn't mean anything.
(as most do).

>
> >Chapter 11 is put to the restoration period
> >by recent scholars (e.g., Blenkinsopp) and that is my thinking as well.
>
> Jesus has more authority than Blenkinsopp, and He attributed the book to
> the prophet Isaiah.

Um, to whom has Jesus more authority than Blenkinsopp?
Not to me.

>
> >42:1-8; 49:1-6 refer to Cyrus, the redemption of the Jews to
> their homeland.
>
> I can see how you would apply the verses to Cyrus The purpose of God for
> the ages, the canon of Scripture, the larger structure of Isaiah, and some
> of the textual details suggest they have their ultimate fulfillment in the
> Lord Jesus. In 49:3 the word "Israel" does not suit Cyrus. There are other
> points.
>
> >49:6 is the Jewish people or the prophet; first despised, then exalted by
> >the
> >marvelous thing God has done by redeeming them in a new Exodus.
>
> I do not understand you here, for if 49:1-6 refers to Cyrus as you say,
> then should not the servant in 49:6 be Cyrus? Also, verse 6 simply
> continues verse 5. If it is Cyrus who brings back Israel to God,
> then he is
> the servant in verse 6, it seems.

Oops, I meant 49:7. Right, 49:6 is Cyrus, it just continues the rest.

>
> >52:1-13 -Cyrus,
> >52:14-53ff the prophet.
>
> Again, I do not think that you can separate the figure in 52:13 from the
> one in 52:14-53:12. The term "servant" in 53:11 binds the figure in this
> section with the "servant" in 52:12. It is "My servant" in both places.

There are lots of servants here. There is not just one. Everyone who
does God's work is his servant.

>
> >>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.
>
> >No, only for those who write from the vantage point of Christianity.
>
> Let us say, for argument's sake, that Christianity is true. If
> so, it gives
> those who accept it a favorable vantage point for looking at Isaiah. That
> vantage point may facilitate interpretation.

Fine, but I don't accept that presupposition. Further, I think it clouds and
distorts interpretation. That is my whole point in fact. It clouds and
distorts interpretation of the entire Tanak.

>
> >> 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
>
> >Yes, that's what I mean.
>
> I do not understand why you say that what I write above is what you mean.
> How so?

I mean that it is an example of Christianity clouding and distorting the
words of the Tanak.

>
> >But if you give up for a moment a Christo-centric view, and read
> Isaiah from
> >the vantage point of the sitz im leben of Deutero-Isaiah himself
> in 539-8,
> >you will read it
> >the way I do.
>
> One of the purposes of my dissertation work was to understand how Isaiah
> looked at things. I am convinced that he did not write only about his own
> times. Look at this word of Peter:

What was the title of your diss, where did you do it? Is it published?
Whom did you do it under?

>
> 1Pet. 1:10-12 Concerning which salvation the prophets sought and searched
> diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you:
> searching what time or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was
> in them did point unto, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of
> Christ, and the glories that should follow them. To whom it was revealed,
> that not unto themselves, but unto you, did they minister these things,
> which now have been announced unto you through them that preached the
> gospel unto you by the Holy Spirit sent forth from heaven; which things
> angel desire to look into.

Why should I look at this word of Peter????

>
> Isaiah wrote about his own times, times in the coming centuries, and the
> time when the age ends. His own setting was important, but there
> is no need
> to limit him to that setting. God is the God of Israel, and eschatological
> prophecy still concerns Israel. So it was of interest to Isaiah for that
> reason among others. His prophecies speak of interests pertinent to all
> mankind of all eras, such as resurrection. So they were relevant for
> Isaiah, even if they transcended his own time.
>
> You admirably see the way that the passages can relate to Cyrus. But you
> would find reward, I think, in attempting to see how they can look beyond
> Cyrus to someone greater.

Jesus, you mean? Salvation? Heaven?
No thank you, we Jews have experienced enough of Christian love and charity
to last
millennia.


Best,
Liz
>
>                               Yours,
>                               Harold Holmyard
>
>
>
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