Isaiah 40–66 (Part 1)

Richard Belcher focuses on the comforting messages of hope and redemption in Isaiah 40–66. He highlights how these prophetic texts reveal the character of God and His promises to restore and renew His people.

The following unedited transcript is provided by Beluga AI.

This audio lecture is brought to you by RTS on iTunesU at the virtual campus of Reformed Theological Seminary. To listen to other lectures and to access additional resources, please visit us at itunes.rts.edu. For additional information on how to take distance education courses for credit towards a fully accredited Master of Arts in Religion degree, please visit our website at virtual.rts.edu.

Chapters 40 through 66 of Isaiah; now, we have to deal with the issue related to the unity of Isaiah. So let’s give a brief historical development related to the question of the unity of Isaiah, and then see some more recent developments and then try to draw some conclusions. But you have chapters one through 66. In the late 1700s, chapters 40 through 66 were separated from chapters one through 39. So one through 39, 40 to 66, 40 through 66 were denied as originating from Isaiah the prophet. Why that is, we’ll mention briefly in a minute.

Then in the late 1800s, there was a division of 40 through 66, 40 to 55, and 56 through 66. So a further division of the Book of Isaiah. Now, many even went further than this and denied that certain parts of chapters one through 39 were a part of Isaiah; they didn’t really come from the prophet Isaiah, but came from later editors or redactors. Many of those parts in one through 39 that were denied to Isaiah related to Babylon.

Now, a critical analysis of the book, or those who divided the book up in this way, gave the following analysis of the book. Chapters one through 39, except for those chapters that may not have originated from Isaiah, but basically chapters one through 39 are 8th century oracles uttered by Isaiah. So most of one through 39, a few chapters perhaps omitted, come from Isaiah the prophet about 700; we’ll just say 700 is around. Figure 701 was a snack of crisis. 700 is a good figure to use. Chapters 40 through 55 were called Deutero Isaiah, second Isaiah.

These chapters arose during the period of exile. Some would place them around 545, just before the decree of Cyrus that Israel could go back to her land. Deutero Isaiah is written by a great unknown disciple of Isaiah. We don’t know his name, but an unknown disciple of Isaiah. Then you have 56 through 66, which was called Trito Isaiah or third Isaiah. This is after the exile. Third Isaiah takes the message of second Isaiah and gives the meaning of second Isaiah to that post-exilic generation. So you have three Isaiahs.

You have the Isaiah that goes back to one through 39, which would be first Isaiah, goes back to Isaiah, most of it to Isaiah himself. Deutero Isaiah 54:5, a great unknown disciple wrote this. And then third Isaiah 52:0 is a. The message of two Isaiah applied to the post-exilic community. Now, why did they divide Isaiah up? Well, several reasons. The main reason is the historical background of chapters 40 through 66 is Babylon in the exile. Jerusalem is ruined. The Babylonians are afflicting God’s people. Cyrus, king of Persia, is even mentioned by name.

The prospect of return from exile is imminent. And so, coming out of the enlightenment, where the divine authorship of scripture was denied, it made sense that chapters 40 through 55 could not come from 700 BC because the events described in 40 through 55 come from 587 and beyond BC, and about a 200-year, 150-year difference. Isaiah himself wrote in 700, and the events described in 40 through 66 are mid 500. So, it’s pretty obvious Isaiah could not have written 40 through 66 from a critical standpoint.

They did not believe in prophecy in the way that we do, with that as your foundation. They then began to find. Critical scholars began to find differences between chapters one through 39 and chapters 40 through 66. They used these differences as sort of a wedge between the two sections. For example, chapters one through 39 is serious. Chapters 40 through 66 is flowing and warm. Well, you can guess why chapters one through 39 is serious and why 40 through 66 is flowing and warm. One’s primarily judgment, the other one’s hope, comfort.

And, you know, the remnant is mentioned in one through 39. It’s not explicitly mentioned. At least the remnant word itself is not mentioned in 40 through 66. One through 39 focuses on the king, 40 through 66, the servants. So they began to drive sort of wedges between the sections of Isaiah to support their division. So if we were to chart this, we’ll call this older critics. Older critics, argued, many authors and no unity. Many authors, at least three, probably more, and no real unity in the book. Three separate. At least three separate books.

Now, there’s been a shift in scholarship, in critical scholarship, since the seventies or so. Brevard Childs, canonical criticism, you’ve probably heard that term, has done a lot to bring about this shift. Now, Childs himself is a critical scholar. He operates with critical assumptions, but he wants to look at the final form of the text, and he wants to ask, what can we learn from looking at the final form of the text? How does the text function theologically in the community?

How is the text authoritative in the community? And so he may agree with some of the historical critical analysis of the book, but didn’t want to talk about it. Let’s look at the final form of the text. What can we learn from the final form, the canonical form? And so in his, he does have a commentary on Isaiah in the Old Testament Library series, and one volume commentary. He’s actually quite good, quite interesting.

First paragraph or first couple paragraphs of a pericope, he’ll sort of give lip service to the historical critical, and he’ll say, that doesn’t get you anywhere. We’re going to do this other thing, this canonical critical stuff, which from our standpoint is more beneficial. But Childs and others, Christopher Seitz would be another one. S e I t Z, looks at chapters one through 66 as a unity. It didn’t all come from Isaiah. No, Isaiah didn’t write the whole thing.

But there is a unity to chapters one through 66, so that chapters 40 through 66 is written in light of the message and the concepts of chapters one through 39. This unity is the result of the disciples of Isaiah. So chapters one through 39 were handed down, and then someone among the disciples of Isaiah produced the other sections of Isaiah, but they built on the message of chapters one through 39.

In fact, Childs argues that those who were responsible for the final shape of the book consciously suppressed the historical settings of the latter part of the book to strengthen the theological unity of the composition. Child talks about the theological unity of Isaiah, chapters one through 66, not a single author, but theological and conceptual unity in the book of Isaiah. And so, he wants to look at the meaning of the book in light of this redactional unity.

And what these scholars have done is they have shown that this critical analysis that divides the sections of Isaiah, separates them, is wrong, because there’s much in the different parts of Isaiah that connect to each other and build on each other. So they have really stressed the unity of the whole book, and they thought theologically, in light of that unity. So newer critics, we’ll call them literary critics or canonical critics, or whatever you want to call them, still argue for many authors, but what we might call a redactional unity, many authors, but a redactional unity.

Now, we can compare this to the conservative position, whatever better way to call it, one author compositional unity. One author unity of composition. Now, let me say a few comments about this. Some of this may not be in your notes directly. We will eventually get to the arguments for the unity of the book. We’ll get to the arguments for the unity of that third position, unity of authorship, that Isaiah himself wrote the whole work. But let me say a few words. Some have responded to this canonical criticism.

Child’s view, one author who has responded to canonical criticism is Blenkinsop. He has the Anchor Bible Commentary AB on Isaiah, and I think he’s done it in three volumes. This is chapters one through 39. He would fit more in the category of the older critics, and he has responded to some of the newer critics, like Childs. He argues that the canonical approach cannot solve these issues. It’s not just a predictive prophecy issue, Blenkinsop says. That’s part of our conservative response, which we’ll get to predictive prophecy. The issue is not just that.

The issue is the historical situation. The historical situation of the distant future means that Isaiah would be comforting a people in light of a disaster that is many years away. So when we talk about Blenkinsop, there are two things going on. He argues, one against the canonical approach because he doesn’t believe that the author of chapters 40 through 55 suppresses the historical context. That’s his argument against Childs. Childs says that the author of the latter sections of Isaiah suppressed the historical context. Blickensop says, no, that’s not true. Then his argument against the conservative position.

So he argues against childs, a canonical critical position, that the authors are not suppressing the historical context. Then he argues against the conservative position that it’s not just an issue of predictive prophecy, but it’s an issue of historical context. How could Isaiah writing in the 7th century, what relevance would that have to the people of his day if he’s writing about something that takes place 200 years later? So that’s Blenkinsop, who’s arguing both against childs and then the conservatives. Under the newer critic category, some might place your introduction.

I’m not sure your introduction goes that far, but your introduction, Dillard Longman, leaves open the possibility that someone other than Isaiah wrote chapters 40 through 66, a recent book by O. Palmer Robertson, the Christ of the prophets, you could have probably guessed Christ of the covenants. Now it’s Christ of the prophets. And this book has an extensive introduction to the prophets. His, you know, dealing with the, with the books themselves is very brief, but his introduction is quite extensive.

In his chapter on Isaiah, he interacts quite extensively with Dillard Longman and the fact that they leave the door open to someone other than Isaiah writing chapters 40 through 66. He also deals with the question that Blenkinsop has raised: if Isaiah wrote 40 through 66, what relevance would that have to his own historical context? So, this is a very useful book, and there are a couple of places in your introduction that I don’t agree with; one is Jonah being a parable.

The other is sort of cracking the door open to another author or disciples writing chapters 40 through 66. Robertson deals with both that issue from the Dillard Longman’s perspective, and then he deals with the historical context issue that Blenkinsop raises. And so it’s very useful. And part of what he argues on the historical context angle is that this message in chapters 40-66 would also have relevance to the exiles of the northern kingdom. He argues that there’s twice as many references to Babylon in chapters 1-39 as 40-66.

So if you’re going to just use the Babylonian context as your guide, you’ve got a lot to deal with in chapters one through 39 already. And he argues that the perspective of chapters 40 through 66, even though it’s looking forward to the return from exile, it really has a pre-exilic perspective in terms of how the sins of God’s people are described. And you see that in chapters 56 and 57, idolatry. It’s more of a pre-exilic perspective. So Robertson is good on dealing with that historical context question.

How could Isaiah have written 40 through 66? What relevance would that have to his own context? He’s helpful there, and he interacts with the Dillard Longman, opening the door, so to speak, to Isaiah not having written the whole book. Now we get probably more. Yes. Can you help me understand a little bit of the newer critics and how this suppresses and sorts of contexts? Well, the focus there is on the unity of the theology of the book, and not as much. Now you can’t completely suppress it, but not as much on the historical setting.

And that’s been suppressed so that you have these different parts of the book that come from different eras, time periods. You have this unity because the separate historical contexts have not been highlighted as they could be. Now, you still have, Cyrus has mentioned you still have historical stuff, but that’s not highlighted as much, much as it could be in order to give the book a more theological unity. Well, both canonical criticism is a literary approach, looking at the final form of the text from a literary perspective. So you’re looking at terminology that’s used. There’s unity.

You’re looking at literary things, concepts. There’s unity. So theology, there’s unity. God’s description matches in both sides. So those kinds of things he emphasizes. Well, he believes that 40 through 55 or 40 through 66 came, was not written by Isaiah, and that whoever put it together, put it together in such a way so that there would be this unity. So whoever wrote 40 through 66 or put the book together did it in such a way that they were very conversant with chapters one through 39.

And because they knew chapters one through 39 so well, they just added 40 through 66. And it does really flow. I mean, there is unity of concepts and theology and stuff between it either. Yeah. Post Exilic editor, maybe a couple of authors, depending on the nuance of it, perhaps a part of a school or disciples of Isaiah, which there’s no real evidence of. Alright, let’s get back now, probably more close to your notes, and come and argue for this third position.

Arguments for not only the unity of the book, which Childs would recognize, but for unity of authorship. Just a couple of things mentioned here: There’s lack of supporting evidence for the critical view. In other words, there’s no concrete evidence that any part of the book existed without the other part. You don’t have a scroll of one through 39 and a scroll of 40 through 66. In fact, where the division takes place among some of the scrolls is between 33 and 34. There’s space or gap there.

There’s no evidence of a school of disciples that lasted for 200 years. No other prophet had a school of disciples. So that whole issue is suspect. You have the New Testament evidence of unity. Robertson also deals with this in his Christ of the prophets. Isaiah is quoted in the New Testament by name more than 200 times, and you have citations from both sections. The book of the prophet Isaiah was given to Jesus in Luke 4. He read from Isaiah 61. The Ethiopian eunuch is reading from Isaiah in Acts 8:30. He’s reading from chapter 53.

Robertson points out Luke 3:4, the book of the words of Isaiah, the prophet is mentioned. So those would be important New Testament evidence of the unity of Isaiah. Robertson deals with the historical context problem. There’s also the issue, and I do think this is an important issue, of the nature of prophecy. Part of the original reason that 40 through 66 was denied as coming from Isaiah the prophet is because 40 through 66 describe events that took place 150 years after Isaiah lived. And so it’s fairly obvious, isn’t it? It is from a critical approach.

It’s fairly obvious that Isaiah himself, who lived in 700, could not write about Cyrus, who was prominent in the mid 500s. So Isaiah could not have written 40 through 66. Well, here we come to the nature of prophecy. And I would argue that Isaiah himself sets forth the evidence and sets the case for chapters 40 through 66 coming from his own hand. This evidence comes where Isaiah talks about the difference between Yahweh and the idols.

And we’re going to go through several passages when we begin to go through chapter 40 through 48, related to the difference between Yahweh and the idols. But at this point, just turn over to chapter 48:5, actually, beginning with verse 3.

³ “The former things I declared of old; they went out from my mouth, and I announced them; then suddenly I did them, and they came to pass. ⁴ Because I know that you are obstinate, and your neck is an iron sinew and your forehead brass, ⁵ I declared them to you from of old, before they came to pass I announced them to you, lest you should say, ‘My idol did them, my carved image and my metal image commanded them.’ (Isaiah 48:3-5, ESV)

And you read through several passages in chapters 40 through 48, and it lays out the difference between Yahweh and the idols, and it’s related to what we sang in Psalm 115. The idols do nothing. They can do nothing. They know nothing. And there are challenges.

Do something, proclaim something. Show us that you have some knowledge and how different it is with God. God knows the end from the beginning. God declares the end from the beginning. God says, “I declared to you before things happened, that they would happen so that you would not say, my idol did it.” The very character of God is at stake. God says, “This is the kind of God I am. I tell you before it happens, I’m different than the idols.”

¹⁰ declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,’ (Isaiah 46:10, ESV)

Now, if you come along and you basically say Isaiah could not have written chapters 40 through 66 because he lived 150 years before the events, what are you basically saying about God? He’s no different than the idols. You see the theological point. God declares his difference from the idols because he is able to declare something before it happens. The idols can’t do that.

If you now come along and say that Isaiah could not have written chapters 40 through 66 because he lived 150 years before the events, then you are, in essence, saying that God could not have revealed this to Isaiah, that God is, in essence, no different than the idols. Childs comes this close to recognizing the force of this argument, this close, not far from the kingdom of God. Now, I don’t know where. I don’t know where he is in terms of his standing with the Lord. So I’m not making a comment related to that.

But, boy, he comes this close to understanding the force of this argument. This relates to the character of God. So I do think the whole issue of the nature of prophecy and the character of God is involved in this issue. So we don’t have a problem, I don’t have a problem with affirming that Isaiah wrote chapters 40 through 66 because God is able to reveal to his servants the prophets the future, as he himself declares in these chapters. Any comments or questions on that before we move on?

All right, well, one of the issues in chapters 40 through 66 is the servant, the servant songs, and there are four of them. I have them listed in your notes. Chapter 42, verses one through four, chapter 49, verses one through six, chapter 50, verses four through nine, and chapter 50, 213 through 50, 312. Now, there are questions related to the servant. Who is the servant? What’s the relationship of the servant songs to each other? And what’s the relationship of the servant songs to their context?

What we’re basically going to do is we are going to give an overview of the basic sections of Isaiah 40 through 66, and then we’re going to set the servant songs in the context of those sections. And along the way, we will hopefully come to some conclusion on the identity of the servant and some things that are important surrounding the servant. So chapters 40 to 48 stress the impending fall of Babylon. It reaches its climax in chapter 47 with an oracle addressed against Babylon. So, Babylon is going to fall.

This section begins with a statement that Israel’s sufferings are going to come to an end. Comfort ye. Comfort ye, my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem. The punishment of exile is going to end. God is going to restore his people. That is stated and argued in chapters 40 through 48.

¹ Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. ² Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord ‘s hand double for all her sins. (Isaiah 40:1-2, ESV)

Chapter 40:27, however, expresses Israel’s complaint. You want to put it that way? Chapter 40:27.

²⁷ Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the Lord , and my right is disregarded by my God”? (Isaiah 40:27, ESV)

This may reflect the despair of the exiles. This may reflect the despair of God’s people in wondering why God has not paid any attention to them. My way is hidden from the Lord. They don’t understand exactly what is going on with God. And so God begins to answer this complaint in terms of his character, in terms of his power and his ability, in terms of his restoring God’s people.

He tells his people that he’s going to raise up Cyrus. Cyrus is mentioned several times by name, raised up by God, Cyrus, king of Persia, who will conquer Babylon and who will issue the decree that God’s people can return to their land. God raises up Cyrus. He’s able to do this. God is able to raise up Cyrus because he’s not like the idols.

And here we have several passages in chapters 40 through 48 that deal with the contrast between Yahweh and the idols to substantiate the argument that God is able to do what he says he’s going to do, that he’s able to raise up Cyrus, that he’s able to bring his people back from exile, that he’s able to bring restoration to them. And so we want to go through these passages very briefly, just to point them out. And, well, let’s see. Let’s at least get it.

Do at least one of these, because it’s about time to break for chapel. You have, we’ll just look at 4018 through 20. Very briefly. You have the independence of God contrasted with the dependence of the idols. The idols are dependent on those who make them. You need a craftsman to take the gold or to take the wood and to carve out and form that idol and to set up that idol so that it will not move. God is independent of his creation. God is not dependent on anything in his creation.

God is not dependent on human beings. And so you have the independence of God contrasted with the dependence of the idols on those who make them. This leads to the folly of idolatry. In chapter 41:21, this is where they are challenged to set forth their case, to bring proofs. Tell us what is to happen. Tell us the former things, what they are, that we may consider them, that we may know their outcome. Declare to us things to come. Now tell us something that we may know that you are gods.

²¹ Set forth your case, says the Lord ; bring your proofs, says the King of Jacob. ²² Let them bring them, and tell us what is to happen. Tell us the former things, what they are, that we may consider them, that we may know their outcome; or declare to us the things to come. ²³ Tell us what is to come hereafter, that we may know that you are gods; do good, or do harm, that we may be dismayed and terrified. ²⁴ Behold, you are nothing, and your work is less than nothing; an abomination is he who chooses you. (Isaiah 41:21-24, ESV)

Verse 24 says you’re nothing. Your work is less than nothing. You’re an abomination to he who chooses you. The futility and the folly. Idols, they can’t do anything, contrasted with God, who is powerful and is able to accomplish his purposes. Well, we’ll stop with that break for chapel, and then there’s a couple other of these passages that we’ll pick up on after chapel.

This audio lecture is brought to you by RTS on iTunesU at the virtual campus of Reformed Theological Seminary. To listen to other lectures and to access additional resources, please visit us at itunes.rts.edu.

For additional information on how to take distance education courses for credit towards a fully accredited Master of Arts in Religion degree, please visit our website at virtual rts.edu.