שָׂרָף מְעוֹפֵף read not possibly be an historic and therefore. For it is said there; make thee a, serpent, that it must be declared to nreal. At the and set it on a pole. And then ver. 9, it proceeds: same time one must resolve to p. ounce what the and Moses made a л and set it on a pole. Prophet professes to do a pious ilaud. For that he would only give a poem is neither inti- Again Deut. viii. 157 are found joined. In mated in the narrative itself, nor does the charac- both places in Isaiah, we ter of the entire book suggest it. The Prophets Therefore, evidently means the serpent, but are historians, even where they write poetry, only by an originally predicate description beThe Prophet speaks here as an historian. Did coming the designation of the chief concephe represent as an outward calling what was only tion. For originally means "the burner," inward, he would have arrogated an honor that did not become him, and this very arrogance from "to burn, burn up." The burning would have deprived him of all claim to credi- smart of a wound occasioned this designation. bility. For countless ones have received an in- It is, moreover, not impossible that the burning ward call. But precisely this outward call, just fire is designated by the word because it that which Isaiah here beheld, heard and spoke, moves itself serpent fashion. And in so far the is so extraordinary, that only privileged men can roots prew, serpere and may agree; and boast that they have experienced the like. Of an original connection between 7 and serpens Jeremiah (chap. i.) and Ezekiel (chaps. i. -iii.) similar things are told. These men, as Isaiah might exist, only the meaning "to crawl," would himself, would be guilty of wicked presumption not be the medium of this connection. For only did they invent a glorious, outward call. We the burning fire is thought of as crawling; but the must therefore hold the narrative of Isaiah to be serpent is called, not because it creeps, but historical. because it burns. On these grounds I do not beBut if real, was it a physical or spiritual reali-lieve that the angel name has anything to ty? That is to say, did Isaiah behold all this with the eyes of the body or the eyes of the spirit (ivavebuari)? With the eyes of the body these things are not to be seen. Spiritual corporality can only be taken notice of by the opened inward Bense (2 Kings vi. 17). Therefore something, real of course, but only inward, can be meant here, a spiritual beholding of spiritual reality (1 Kings xxii. 17 sqq.; Ezek. viii. sqq.; Dan. vii. 13 sqq.; Rev. i. 10 sqq., etc.). To this is joined the inquiry: In which temple did Isaiah see the Lord? In the earthly, at Jerusalem, or in the heavenly, the pattern of the former? It is no reason against the former, that Isaiah was no priest, and therefore dared not go into the temple. Amos, also, was no priest, and yet saw the Lord in the temple (chap. ix. 1). The Prophet did not need to be in the temple bodily in order to see what was present in the temple. Comp. Ezek. viii. 3.-But in the earthly temple the throne of the Lord was the ark of the covenant. On this account it is expressly called “dwelling between the cherubim " (2 Sam. vi. 2; 2 Kings xix. 15; Isa. xxxvii. 16; Ps. lxxx. 2; xcix. 1; 1 Chr. xiii. 16). Why should Isaiah, if he saw the Lord in the earthly temple, not have named the ark of the covenant? The expression "throne high and elevated" does not appear to point to the ark of the covenant. For it cannot be said that it is high and lifted up. We shall therefore have to place the vision in the upper, heavenly sanctuary (the original of the Tabernacle in the first place, Exod. xxv. 9, 40; xxvi. 30; xxvii. 8, and afterwards of the temple). Thither Isaiah was transferred in spirit. The Seraphin are not mentioned anywhere else in the whole Old and New Testaments except here. The word D' is found Numbers xxi. 6, but as qualifying D' (God sent among the people burning, fiery serpents). The singular occurs, too, Num. xxi. 8; Deut. viii. 15; Isa. xiv. 29; xxx. 6, but always in the sense of "serpent." In Num. xxi. 8, it is synonym of do with the serpent. According to our passage .(6 .iii מורה הנבוכים of Ezekiel, (i. and x.), and on the other the six Seraphim. It appears to me that the forms of wings and the Trishagion (thrice holy) of the John combine in themselves the traits of the Cherubim and Seraphim, and if it is said that the Seraphim of Isaiah differ from the Cherubim of Ezekiel so, too, do the Johannic Cherubim differ from those of Ezekiel, and the Scraphim the question is an open one. If it is asked; why of Isaiah are the mediating member. After all are the Seraphim called "the burning ones?" PHILO answers: "because they devour the unformedness of matter, bring it into form and order, and thereby render it a Cosmos." BOEHMER, among others, calls them "fire beings, that burn Seraph burns away the sin of the Prophet. How The Seraphim stood hyp, "above him. By a very frequent usage is joined with that serves to fi e picture. We cannot suppose that the cr ut continued while the Prophet, and the aph and the LORD talked. TARG. JONATHAN happily translates ver. 2 b., "duabus velabat," etc. With two (wings) each one veiled his face that he might not see, and with two he veiled his body, that he might not be seen." It must not be concluded from 8 that there were only two Seraphim, but that there were two choirs, say one on either side. Alternative song is founded in the essence of communion. It is the musical expression of the diakoɣioμoi that move the congregation. Therefore it is found in the heavenly congregation as well as in the earthly. But the Seraphim sing 'Holy, holy, holy is Jehovah Sabaoth; fullness of the whole earth is His glory." Thus they praise Him here as the Holy One, because in what follows (ver. 9 sq.), He makes known in what degree His holiness shall react against unholy Israel. DELITZSCH calls attention to the fact that Isaiah cherished his whole life through, a deep, indelible impression of that holiness of the LORD that confronted him here so mightily in word and aspect. Fourteen times in the first part does he use the expression w np, “Holy One of Israel," which is, as it were, the concentrated expression of that impression; fifteen times in the second (comp. at i. 4), whereas the expres sion occurs beside only thrice in the Psalms, xxi. 22; lxxviii. 41; İxxxix. 19), twice in Jer. (1:29; li. 5), and once in 2 Kings xix. 22 parallel with Isa. xxxvii. 23. But why this thrice repeated ? There are, to be sure, examples of such repetition that only aim at rhetorical emphasis (Jer. vii. 4; VITRINGA construe the thrice holy in this sense, Ezek. xxi. 32; Nah. i. 2). In fact CALVIN and while, yet, they expressly say that they would not exclude a deeper significance. HERM. SCHULTZ, (Alttest. Theol. I. p. 345) says: “the choir rests on a song and counter song, combined so that by this preposition the one standing in the double choir, therefore the threeness of the is represented, so to speak, as covering up the Holy." But here we stand before the holiest of one before whom he stands, from the eyes of the all of the Godhead, that is opened up for a mospectator standing opposite; Gen. xviii. 8; xxiv.ment, and receive a glimpse into the Bảoŋ Tov Oɛov 30; Exod. xviii. 13; Jud. iii. 19; vi. 31; 2 (1 Cor. ii. 10, "the deep things of God"). The King3 xxiii. 3; Jer. xxxvi. 21; 2 Chr. xxiii. 13. Christian consciousness, from the remotest period, Even standing before Jehovah is designated by has not been able to resist the impression that this this preposition Job i. 6; 1 Kings xxii. 19; thrice-holy is a reflex of the triune being of the Zech. iv. 14; vi. 5.-But in our passage it is not Godhead. And in the New Testament sphere merely said, but hy. This expression evangelist John (xii. 41) says expressly Isaiah this impression is the more justified because the is so strong that we can do nothing else than saw the glory of Jesus when he heard the words represent the Seraphim to ourselves as hovering of ver. 10. In that John says nothing extraorabout the LORD, "and with two he flew," so that dinary. Rather he quite accords with Peter who they stood, not indeed above his head, but rela- says (1 Pet. i. 11) that the Spirit that swayed in tively above him. Each Seraph had six wings. the Prophets of the Old Testament was the Spirit The imperfects manifestly serve to indicate a of Christ; and with Paul, who says (1 Cor. x. 4) continuous circumstance that is an essential part it was Christ that as a spiritual rock led Israel of the scene, whereas the perfects p and, through the wilderness. This is only the con"and cried and said," express an incident that firmation of what we have long known as the forms part of the transaction. For what the Sera-significance of the Son, viz.: that He is the phim did with their wings went on continuously medium, and therefore also the mediator of all and does not belong to the transaction. But the crying out belongs to the transaction, yet does not go on continuously, but is only an incident and every revelation. In regard to the second clause of ver. 3, the question arises, first of all, what is subject? Is then earth is the principal notion, id here what fills it. Is subject, glory of God is the principal notion and clared here how comprehensive it is. The alone corresponds with the context. But further inquiry arises: whether 7, "glory," to be taken in an active or a passive sense, i. e., praise, or as majesty, glory. The two cannot e essentially disconnected. For as God's glory everywhere, so in a certain sense also it is very where praised. For its very enemies even must involuntarily do it honor (Ps. viii. 2, 3). And I do not see why in our passage one should parate the two. Does it not then become those ho sing unceasingly the praise of God in His mmediate presence to declare that, not only they, ut the entire creation continually proclaims the raise of the Lord? But it says only "all the arth." Of course: for this song of praise sounds ere primarily for one man and for men. It is just n respect to these that the truth is declared, on he one hand comforting, on the other appalling, that the glory of the LORD is everywhere, and everywhere it makes itself known and felt. Comp. xl. 5; Hab. iii. 3; Num. xiv. 21; Ps. xxii. 19. זיז 8; | Isaiah saw the Lord. It has been said, the smoke came from the altar of incense (ver. 6) and symbolized the seraphic praise. There may appear some truth in that from a comparison of Rev. v. viii. 3 sq. But it seems to me that the smoke has still another meaning. In so far as it constitutes an antithesis to the light in which the Lord dwells, it seems to me, wherever it occurs in connection with the appearance of the divine glory, to signify the reverse side of the same, the severity, the wrath of God. Thus here, too, the smoke, with whose appearance is connected immediately in ver. 5 the Prophet's confession of sin and mortal fear, introduces the words of condemnation which the Lord afterward speaks to the Prophet as the manifestation of His holy indignation. Comp. iv. 5 ; ix. 17; xiv. 31; xxxiv. 10; li. 6; lxv. 5. Ver. 4. 7 signifies in Hebrew primarily the elbow-socket (Armgelenk-Mutter), i. e., the depression resembling the box screw (Schraubenmutter), in which the arm turns itself, the elbow. The word has this meaning, too, in the noted passage 2 Sam. viii. 1, where it is said that David took from the Philistines. The bridle of the elbow is the contrast of 'ne and Isa. xxxvii. 29, “the bridle of the lips," a bridle attached to the elbows. The meaning of 2 Sam. viii. 1 is that the Israelites had the bridle of the Philistines, no longer in their mouths indeed, yet still on their arms, so that they were hindered from the free use of them. Therefore is the elbow, from which the meaning "ell" is derived. Accordingly D'ON ID are the elbows of the sills. The sills are compared to the arms and the joints in the angle are the arm joints or elbows. Because the sills, and in fact both the upper and lower, and as well as the side beams, are joined together in these, therefore they are the centre of motion, and every shock felt in such a centre must be communicated to all the radii. 79 occurs only here in this meaning. D' (only here in Isaiah) are the sills, and primarily the under sills. For the upper sill is called and the side posts (Exod. xii. 7, 22, 23). But in our passage D'D as denominatio a potiori stands for all parts of the door-way. The verb y occurs only in the first part of Isa. vii. 2; xix. 1; xxiv. 20; xxix. 9; xxxvii. 22.xup hip (comp. xl. 3) is primarily "the voice of the caller." But in what precedes it speaks, not of one, but of many criers. Thus we know that p is to be taken collectively and as concr. pro abst. The house filled with smoke.-It was then not full of smoke from the commencement, and still less did a cloud of smoke conceal the Lord as Exod. xl. 34; 1 Kings viii. 10. For (ver. 1) 3. Then said I is purged.-Vers. 5-7. After the Prophet had heard the Seraphim praise the holiness of the Lord, after he had beheld them themselves in the splendor of their holiness, and also had seen its consequence, the wrath, imaged in the smoke, he is seized with the feeling of his own sinfulness. Every creature that beholds or comes in contact with an immediate trace of the divine Being, has a sense of not being able to exist under the burden of the absolute majesty (Gen. xvi. 13; xxxii. 31; Exod. xxxiii. 20; Jud. vi. 22 sq.; xiii. 22; 1 Sam. vi. 19 sq.; 2 Sam. vi. 7). This sense must have made itself felt in the Prophet in the highest degree, seeing he beheld the divine Being in a greater proximity and clearness, than, since Moses at least, ever a man did. He cries, therefore: woe is me (comp. i. 4), I am lost (xv. 1; Hos. iv. 6; x. 7, 15), for a man of unclean lips am I. and among a people of unclean lips do I dwell! That he emphasizes just the unclean lips comes from the fact that he had just heard the Seraphim bring an offer of praise with clean lips. In contrast with these circumcised lips he becomes conscious how his are uncircumcised (Exod. vi. 12); in contrast with these calves of the lips (Hos. xiv. 3) and with this fruit of the lips (Prov. xviii. 20; Isa. lvii. 19; Heb. xiii. 15) he feels that he is quite unfit for such an offering, both in respect to his own person, and in respect to that totality to which he belongs; in fact that this unfitness, when he has gone with it into the jurisdiction of the highest King (xxxiii. 22; xli. 21; xliii. 15; xliv. 6) must bring upon Such is the confeshim the sentence of death. confession follows the forgiveness of sins, which sion which the contrite Prophet makes; on this is confirmed by a heavenly sacrament, and is extended to him by a seraphic absolution.”—DE LITZSCH. "hot The altar, which is mentioned, we must think of as an altar of incense, since any other kind of offering than incense in the heavenly sanctuary is inconceivable, and the glowing coals also indicate an altar of incense. From this altar one of the Seraphim took with the tongs a coal." That he took it with the tongs, not only corresponds to the usage of the earthly sanctuary (Exod. xxv. 38; Num. iv. 9; 1 Kings vii. 49), but has in any case also its internal reasons, as that even in the sphere of heavenly corporal existence such distinctions occur. or that the touching with the tongs has a symbolical meaning. (comp. Hab. iii. 5; Song of Solo- of too tender stuff. Ezekiel, too, mon viii. 6) is something aglow, whether coal or wardly at least to have had no relish stone. The word occurs only here [in Isaiah.- taking the commission. For he is ex TR.] In the earthly sanctuary the burning of to be disobedient (Ezek. ii. 8), and, the incense was performed by taking coals from the does not express them, his doubts and fea altar of burnt-offering and pouring them on the disarmed (Ezek. ii. 6-iii. 9). Jonah, the altar of incense, and then upon these was scattered rebellious and self-willed of all Prophets, actua the incense (Lev. xvi. 12; comp. x. 1). In the flees from the Lord. All these, who would not, ar heavenly sanctuary there was no altar of burnt- not even asked if they will, but they must. Isaiah, offering. At all events designates the glow-who will, is asked. It appears, therefore, that ing body on which the incense was cast in order to the individuals. Where the Lord in His the manner of the calling is regulated according to burn it. With such a glowing body, therefore, chosen and prepared instruments (Jer. i. 5) obthe Seraph touched the lips of the Prophet in serves also the subjective readiness of mind, He order to reconcile him. The Prophet's lips are affords it the opportunity to manifest itself by the touched with fire therefore, and that with the same holy fire out of which procee is the cloud of question: "who will." That the Lord, by this smoke. Thus from the place that occasioned in from Himself is manifest. For how can a thing question, would not draw out something concealed him before the painful feeling of his uncleanness, be unknown to the Lord? There was, in fact, no must the holy fire penetrate and burn out the enone there but Isaiah that could have replied to tire man. It must burn up all uncleanness. The His question. For, it could only be a man that Seraph shows himself here right properly as could be in question for the undertaking of the 779, as burner. As water has primarily gener- prophetic office in Israel. No such person exating and fructifying power, but secondarily also cept Isaiah was present. The question is therea judging and destroying power (comp. creation, fore a form by which the Lord honors the the flood, and Baptism), so fire has primarily de-, "free spirit" (Ps. li. 14 (12)), that vouring, and thereby judging, purifying, and secondarily warming and illuminating power. Omnia purgat edax ignis, vitiumque metallis excoquit, says OVID Fast. iv. 785. Tò пup кavaiρεt, To vdwp dyvizet (PLUT. quæst. rom. 1). Comp. Num. xxxi. 23; HERZOG'S R. Encycl. IX. p. 717 sq.--As here the touching takes place for the purpose of atonement, so Jer. i. 9 it is for the purpose of inspiration; in Dan. viii. 17 sq.; x. 8 sqq.; Rev. i. 17, it is for the purpose of imparting strength. 4. Also I heard-and be healed.-Vers. 8-10. The Lord Himself now begins to speak. Having seen Him (ver. 1), Isaiah now hears Him. "I heard" corresponds to the " and I saw" (ver. 1). It is worthy of notice that the Lord asks: whom shall I send? that He, therefore, as it were, calls for volunteers. So we read, too, 1 Kings xxii. 20, that the Lord in an assembly of heaven, portrayed very much as the one here, asks: "Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-Gilead?" There it appears, ver. 23 (from the circumstance that Micaiah would have been a deceiver, if a real transaction were reported in vers. 19-22) that this prophet only narrates a fictitious vision. But anyway the representation remains that the Lord not only gives His servants and messengers command and commission according to His own election, but also proposes the undertaking of a commission to the voluntary determination. Now when the Lord in our passage, as was said, calls for volunteers, as it were, this is not to be explained by the greater difficulty or danger of the mission. For Isaiah's mission was not as difficult and dangerous as that of Moses or Jeremiah. Now Moses resists the commission all he can (Exod. iii.), though he was an , "able man," as few were. LUTHER says of him (on the call of Moses, Exod. iii.): Moses begins, as it were, a wrangling and disputing with God, and will not accept this office." Jeremiah refuses because he feels himself really too young and made He knew was present in the Prophet, in that He gave it opportunity to manifest itself. This Who are the many for whom the service is to be done? The plural is here as little as Gen. i. 26; iii. 22; xi. 7 mere form (Plur.-majest). It is rather, as DELITZSCH expresses it, communicatively intended. Jehovah includes the whole assembly. He honors thereby the assembled ones, by taking for granted that His interest is theirs and their interest His. Isaiah at once replies: "Behold, here am I; send me." prompt offer quite corresponds with the strong and bold spirit of Isaiah. There is no need of assuming that he had already been called, and had already been in office for a time. He, the mighty man, is at once conscious that this is his affair. He feels that he can do it, and he will do it, too. We find here not a trace of fear or other consideration. It was, however, no proud selfsufficiency that led the Prophet. He has just been reconciled in fact as a sinner. The flame that blazes in him and impels him must have been a pure flame. He feels himself strong in Him that makes him mighty (Phil. iv. 13; Isa xl. 29 sq.). This "here am I; send me" is, however, so grand, in fact, when one reflects on the examples of other prophets mentioned already, it is so unique in its way, that one understands wherefore Isaiah would not put this history of his calling quite in the beginning of his book, but rather makes it the third portal of his prophetic building. He feared this intrepid ready-mindedness would be found incomprehensible. He puts in advance of it therefore two other entrances, that the reader may learn thereby to know him and thus come prepared to this scene of his calling. And, in fact, he that has read chapters i.v. must confess that here "is a Prophet" (Ezek. ii. 5; xxxiii. 33), a man that had the stuff in him, and the right to say, "Here am I; send me.' In vers. 9, 10 follows out of the mouth of the Lord Himself the commission that the Prophet must discharge. The manner of imparting this commission is directly the opposite of what is usual among men in like circumstances. One seeks, namely, in giving a servant or messenger a hard commission, to represent it, at least, at first, in the most advantageous light. This the Lord does not do. On the contrary, He plainly emphasizes just the hardest part. He acts as if the Prophet were to have nothing joyous to announce, but only judgment and hopeless hardening. Isaiah is called the evangelist of the Old Testament. But there is not a trace of it found here. It is not once said even that he shall warn, exhort, threaten. But, overleaping all intermediate members, only the sorrowful effect is emphasized, and that with such pointedness, that, what in truth can be only an unintended effect. appears as directly designed. It is as if the Lord would give the intrepid man that had said "here am I, send me," to understand at once, that he would require all his boldness in order to carry through the commission he undertook. Grammatically the words offer almost no difficulty. The inff. absol. in ver. 9 cannot have an intensive meaning, as though the Lord had said: hear and see well, with effort, zeal and diligence. For then must they even attain to understanding. But the Lord would say: spite of the much, and ceaseless hearing they shall still understand nothing. This ceaseless but still fruitless hearing is only the correlative of that ceaseless but fruitless preaching, of which especially Jeremiah so often speaks (Jer. vii. 13, 25; xi. 7, etc.). Let it be noticed, too, that Jeremiah every where points, as the cause of this fruitless hearing, to the 7, "the hardness of heart," and the stiffening of the neck ( p Jer. vii. 26). The Prophet never spoke to the people such words as we read in ver. 9. Therefore it cannot be the meaning of the Lord that He should so speak. But the Lord would say: Whatever thou mayest say to this people, say it not in the hope of being under-. stood and regarded, but say it with the consciousness that thy words shall remain not understood and not regarded, although they might be understood and regarded, and that consequently they must serve to bring out the complete unfolding of that hardness of heart that exists in this people, and thereby be a testimony against this people and a basis of judgment. Thus ver. 10 it is not meant that the Prophet shall do what is the devil's affair, that is, positively and directly lead men off to badness and godlessness. Rather the Lord can ever want only the reverse of this. If, then, it says: "harden the heart, deafen the ear, plaster up the eyes, that they may not see, nor hear, nor take notice and be converted to their salvation," still this form of speech seems to me to be chosen for the sake of the Prophet. There is, namely, a great comfort for him in it. For what is sadder for a man of God than to see day after day and year after year pass away without any fruit of his labor, in fact with evidence that things grow rather worse than better? Is it not for such a case a mighty comfort to be able to say: that is precisely what the Lord predicted, yea, expressly indicated as His relative and previous intention. Thus one sees that He has not labored in vain, but that He has performed his task. And inasmuch as that judgment is still only a transition point, and by the wonderful wisdom of the Lord, shall become a forerunner of higher development of salvation, so the servant of God can say this for comfort, that even out of the judgment of hardening, that it is His part to provoke, salvation shall grow. God's wrath, in fact, is never without love. The preliminary earthly judgments, as is well recognized, are to be regarded as chastenings, that have a becoming-better as their aim. And if a people like Israel suffers one judgment after another through thousands of years, and still never becomes better, until at last the Lord breaks in pieces the economy of the Old Testament, like one shivers an earthen vessel by throwing it on the ground, so just this destroying of the old covenant is the previous condition to the arising of a new one, that attains to what the old one could not. But the individuals themselves whose hardening and judgment is an example and beacon for the afterworld? Here we touch on a difficult point. Will those whose fall was the riches of the world (Rom. xi. 12) be eternally damned, or will their fall here below also for them become some time a means to their conversion and raising them up again? The answer to this appears to me to lie in Rom. ix.-xi But here is not the place to go into it more particularly.-Heart, ear, eye (comp. xxxii. 3, 4) are named as the representatives of the inward sense; the heart represents the will, eye and ear the knowing. The heart shall become fat and covered with grease, and thereby be made incapable of emotion. the three organs, it is said what shall be guarded After it is said what shall be done in regard to against by such doing; and here a reversed order is observed in respect to the positive phrases. What must be guarded against is something immediate and something mediate. Immediately must seeing, hearing and observing be hindered; mediately the penitent conversion and being saved. In the N. T. our passage is cited five times. In Matth. xiii. 14; Mark iv. 12; Luke viii. 10 it is applied to the fact that Jesus always spoke to the people in parables. Thereby was the prophecy of our passage fulfilled. Jesus would manifestly say: Were I not to speak in parables, then they would understand nothing at all; my discourse would outwardly rebound, and not penetrate at all, and consequently effect no condition of responsibility on their part. But as I speak by parables, my discourse at least penetrates so far that a certain relative understanding, and consequently, too, a responsibility, is possible. But in as much as they oppose themselves to the realization of this possibility of understanding, they let it be known that evil has the upper hand in them: thus they pronounce in a measure their own judgment. Our passage is cited in John xii. 40 as explaining why the Jews could not believe in Jesus spite of the signs He did. To this end our passage is construed in the same sense in which the Synoptists take it: even the signs of Jesus, no matter how near they come, still do not bring about faith, because the susceptibility is wanting. Finally in Acts xxviii. 25 sqq. Paul makes use of our passage in order to prove generally the unsusceptibility of the Jewish nation to the preaching of the gospel. |