Autor: Voegelin, Eric

Buch: Israel and Revelation

Titel: Israel and Revelation

Stichwort: Deutero-Jesaia, 4. Lied vom Gottesknecht; Linie zu Lukas u d Apostelgeschichte

Kurzinhalt: God presents the Servant as their representative sufferer to the kings and the nations; about the effectiveness of the prophet's vision in the history of Judaism almost nothing is known for the next five centuries

Textausschnitt: 151/13 In the Second and Third Songs the prophet is the speaker; in the First and Fourth Songs it is God. The Exodus that is now to be undertaken leads into the future, beyond the time of the prophet and his work. The time of salvation which entered the time of the prophet runs beyond it toward fulfillment. In the First Song, God presented the Servant to the heavenly audience and revealed his intention of salvation; in the Fourth Song, God presents the Servant as their representative sufferer to the kings and the nations, so that all can accept him and be saved. The God who is first and last has the first and last words in the drama of salvation that reaches from heaven to earth. (513; Fs)
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152/13 In the first part of the Song, God presents the Servant as the exalted ruler over mankind (Isa. 52:1;-15; the second and third lines of 52:14 are placed after 53:2):
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The presentation is answered by a chorus which consists of the kings and the nations, and perhaps also of the prophet's own people. We can speak of it as a chorus of mankind. They at last believe what they have been told about the Servant and his representative suffering (53:1-9): (513; Fs)
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153/13 The unbelievable tale that now is believed, the mystery of representative suffering, is handed over from marveling mankind to heavenly voices which reflect (53:10): (514; Fs)
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And from the heavenly voices the theme is finally taken over by God himself (53:11-12): (514; Fs)
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154/13 The Exodus from the cosmic-divine order of empire is completed. The Servant who suffers many a death to live, who is humiliated to be exalted, who bears the guilt of the many to see them saved as his offspring, is the King above the kings, the representative of divine above imperial order. And the history of Israel as the people under God is consummated in the vision of the unknown genius, for as the representative sufferer Israel has gone beyond itself and become the light of salvation to mankind. (515; Fs)
155/13 About the effectiveness of the prophet's vision in the history of Judaism almost nothing is known for the next five centuries. A trace here and there in the apocalyptic literature reveals that there are "wise among the people who bring understanding to the many" (Dan. 11:33) in the tradition of Deutero-Isaiah. And such discoveries as the Zadokite fragment and the Dead Sea scrolls prove that movements related to this tradition must have been much stronger than the canonical and rabbinical literature would let us suspect. These movements break to the historical surface again in Christianity. A prayer of such intenseness as the Nunc dimittis of Luke 2:29-34 cannot be explained as a literary reminiscence; it belongs to a living tradition of Deutero-Isaiah. And the preoccupation with the problem of the Suffering Servant is attested by the story of Acts 8: The Ethiopian eunuch of the queen, sitting on his cart and reading Isaiah, ponders on the passage: "Like a sheep he was led away to the slaughter." He inquires of Philip: "Tell me, of whom is the prophet speaking? of himself, or of someone else?" Then Philip began, reports the historian of the Apostles, and starting from this passage he told him the good news about Jesus." (515; E03, 28.05.2003)