2For he grew up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no good looks or majesty. When we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.
3He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering and acquainted with disease. He was despised as one from whom men hide their face; and we didn’t respect him.
4Surely he has borne our sickness and carried our suffering; yet we considered him plagued, struck by God, and afflicted.
5But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought our peace was on him; and by his wounds we are healed.
2 For he grew up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no good looks or majesty. When we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.
3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering and acquainted with disease. He was despised as one from whom men hide their face; and we didn’t respect him.
4 Surely he has borne our sickness and carried our suffering; yet we considered him plagued, struck by God, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought our peace was on him; and by his wounds we are healed.
KJVKing James Version
2 For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.
3 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.
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JPSJPS Tanakh (1917)
2 For he shot up right forth as a sapling, and as a root out of a dry ground; he had no form nor comeliness, that we should look upon him, nor beauty that we should delight in him.
3 He was despised, and forsaken of men, a man of pains, and acquainted with disease, and as one from whom men hide their face: he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
4 Surely our diseases he did bear, and our pains he carried; whereas we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
5 But he was wounded because of our transgressions, he was crushed because of our iniquities: the chastisement of our welfare was upon him, and with his stripes we were healed.
1 Peter 2:24-25(v5)He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live to righteousness. You were healed by his wounds.…
1 Peter 3:18(vv4–5)Because Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring you to God, being put to death in the…
Matthew 20:28(v5)even as the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
2 Corinthians 5:21(v5)For him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf; so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
1 Peter 2:24(v4)He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live to righteousness. You were healed by his wounds.
Show all 79 cross-references
Matthew 8:17(v4)that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through Isaiah the prophet, saying, “He took our infirmities, and bore our diseases.”
Romans 5:6-10(v5)For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a…
Isaiah 53:10-12(v5)Yet it pleased Yahweh to bruise him. He has caused him to suffer. When you make his soul an offering for sin, he will see his offspring. He…
Hebrews 10:14(v5)For by one offering he has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.
Romans 4:25(v5)who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification.
Hebrews 9:12-15(v5)nor yet through the blood of goats and calves, but through his own blood, entered in once for all into the Holy Place, having obtained…
Hebrews 10:10(v5)by which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
Galatians 3:13(v4)Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us. For it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree,”
1 Corinthians 15:3(v5)For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,
1 John 2:2(v4)And he is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the whole world.
Isaiah 53:6-8(v5)All we like sheep have gone astray. Everyone has turned to his own way; and Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was…
Hebrews 9:28(vv4–5)so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, without sin, to those who are eagerly waiting…
Philippians 2:6-7(v2)who, existing in the form of God, didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a…
John 1:10-11(v3)He was in the world, and the world was made through him, and the world didn’t recognize him. He came to his own, and those who were his own…
Romans 3:24-26(v5)being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God sent to be an atoning sacrifice, through faith…
Matthew 26:67(v3)Then they spat in his face and beat him with their fists, and some slapped him,
Romans 5:15-21(v5)But the free gift isn’t like the trespass. For if by the trespass of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God, and the gift by…
Ephesians 5:2(v5)Walk in love, even as Christ also loved us and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling fragrance.
Daniel 9:24(v5)“Seventy weeks are decreed on your people and on your holy city, to finish disobedience, and to make an end of sins, and to make…
Genesis 3:15(v5)I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will bruise your head, and you will bruise…
Isaiah 53:5-6(v4)But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought our peace was on him; and by his…
Isaiah 53:10(v3)Yet it pleased Yahweh to bruise him. He has caused him to suffer. When you make his soul an offering for sin, he will see his offspring. He…
Hebrews 12:2-3(v3)looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising its shame, and…
Isaiah 53:11-12(v4)After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light and be satisfied. My righteous servant will justify many by the knowledge of…
Isaiah 52:14(v2)Just as many were astonished at you— his appearance was marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men—
Isaiah 49:7(v3)Yahweh, the Redeemer of Israel, and his Holy One, says to him whom man despises, to him whom the nation abhors, to a servant of rulers:…
Psalms 22:6-8(v3)But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and despised by the people. All those who see me mock me. They insult me with their lips.…
Isaiah 53:4(v3)Surely he has borne our sickness and carried our suffering; yet we considered him plagued, struck by God, and afflicted.
Mark 14:34(v3)He said to them, “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here, and watch.”
Isaiah 11:1(v2)A shoot will come out of the stock of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots will bear fruit.
John 1:10-14(v2)He was in the world, and the world was made through him, and the world didn’t recognize him. He came to his own, and those who were his own…
Hebrews 5:7(v3)He, in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and petitions with strong crying and tears to him who was able to save him from…
Luke 9:22(v3)saying, “The Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and the third…
Isaiah 50:6(v3)I gave my back to those who beat me, and my cheeks to those who plucked off the hair. I didn’t hide my face from shame and spitting.
Mark 6:3(v2)Isn’t this the carpenter, the son of Mary, and brother of James, Joses, Judah, and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us?” They were…
John 19:7(v4)The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.”
Hebrews 4:15(v3)For we don’t have a high priest who can’t be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but one who has been in all points tempted like…
Jeremiah 23:5(v2)“Behold, the days come,” says Yahweh, “that I will raise to David a righteous Branch, and he will reign as king and deal wisely, and will…
Ezekiel 17:22-24(v2)“The Lord Yahweh says: ‘I will also take some of the lofty top of the cedar, and will plant it. I will crop off from the topmost of its…
Psalms 69:19-20(v3)You know my reproach, my shame, and my dishonor. My adversaries are all before you. Reproach has broken my heart, and I am full of…
Psalms 69:26(v4)For they persecute him whom you have wounded. They tell of the sorrow of those whom you have hurt.
Zechariah 11:12-13(v3)I said to them, “If you think it best, give me my wages; and if not, keep them.” So they weighed for my wages thirty pieces of silver.…
Luke 16:14(v3)The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, also heard all these things, and they scoffed at him.
Matthew 27:39-44(v3)Those who passed by blasphemed him, wagging their heads, and saying, “You who destroy the temple, and build it in three days, save…
Luke 8:53(v3)They were ridiculing him, knowing that she was dead.
Luke 18:31-33(v3)He took the twelve aside, and said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all the things that are written through the prophets…
John 19:14-15(v2)Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, at about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, “Behold, your King!” They cried out, “Away…
Mark 9:12(vv2–3)He said to them, “Elijah indeed comes first, and restores all things. How is it written about the Son of Man, that he should suffer many…
Psalms 69:10-12(v3)When I wept and I fasted, that was to my reproach. When I made sackcloth my clothing, I became a byword to them. Those who sit in the gate…
Zechariah 13:7(v5)“Awake, sword, against my shepherd, and against the man who is close to me,” says Yahweh of Armies. “Strike the shepherd, and the sheep…
Mark 15:19(v3)They struck his head with a reed, and spat on him, and bowing their knees, did homage to him.
Hebrews 2:15-18(v3)and might deliver all of them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For most certainly, he doesn’t give…
Psalms 69:29(v3)But I am in pain and distress. Let your salvation, God, protect me.
Micah 5:1(v3)Now you shall gather yourself in troops, daughter of troops. He has laid siege against us. They will strike the judge of Israel with a rod…
Matthew 27:63(v3)saying, “Sir, we remember what that deceiver said while he was still alive: ‘After three days I will rise again.’
John 8:48(v3)Then the Jews answered him, “Don’t we say well that you are a Samaritan, and have a demon?”
Acts 3:13-15(v3)The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up, and denied in the…
Deuteronomy 32:15(v3)But Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked. You have grown fat. You have grown thick. You have become sleek. Then he abandoned God who made him, and…
Zechariah 11:8(v3)I cut off the three shepherds in one month; for my soul was weary of them, and their soul also loathed me.
Romans 8:3(v2)For what the law couldn’t do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for…
Matthew 26:37-38(v3)He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and severely troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is…
Matthew 27:9-10(v3)Then that which was spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled, saying, “They took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of him…
Luke 23:18-25(v3)But they all cried out together, saying, “Away with this man! Release to us Barabbas!”— one who was thrown into prison for a certain revolt…
John 9:28-29(v2)They insulted him and said, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses. But as for this…
John 18:40(v2)Then they all shouted again, saying, “Not this man, but Barabbas!” Now Barabbas was a robber.
John 19:5(v2)Jesus therefore came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment. Pilate said to them, “Behold, the man!”
1 Peter 2:14(v2)or to governors, as sent by him for vengeance on evildoers and for praise to those who do well.
Zechariah 6:12(v2)and speak to him, saying, ‘Yahweh of Armies says, “Behold, the man whose name is the Branch: and he shall grow up out of his place; and he…
Luke 2:39-40(v2)When they had accomplished all things that were according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own city, Nazareth.…
Luke 2:51-52(v2)And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth. He was subject to them, and his mother kept all these sayings in her heart. And Jesus…
Luke 9:58(v2)Jesus said to him, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”
Luke 19:41(v3)When he came near, he saw the city and wept over it,
Luke 2:7(v2)She gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a feeding trough, because there was no room for…
79 distinct cross-references across this passage (82 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (20 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv2–5The beginning of Christ’s kingdom shall be small and…
The beginning of Christ’s kingdom shall be small and contemptible in the sight of man, but it shall grow wonderfully, and flourish before God.
Read Isa. 11:1.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv2–5Isa 53:2 For he shall grow up before him…
Isa 53:2 For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, [there is] no beauty that we should desire him.
Ver. 2. For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant.] His beginning shall be mean and despicable. See Isa 11:1, with the notes. God hid his Son under the carpenter’s son; this the Jews much stumbled at, {Mat 13:55; Mat 13:57; Luk 24:1; Joh 7:27; Joh 7:41; Joh 7:52; 1Co 1:23} that Christ should come without sightly show or state. {a} But they should have known that his kingdom is not of this world. Some of their Rabbis can say, In regno Messiae nihil mundanum. In the reign of the Messiah, nothing is worldly.
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He hath no form or comeliness.] How could he? say, when his fair face was covered, sanguine, sputo, spinis, lachrymis, with blood black and blue, swelths, spittle, tears, scratches, so that Pilate, wondering at it, said, "Behold the man," q.d., he is not dealt with as a man; but being in greatest misery, he deserveth to be pitied.
And when we shall see him.] Here the prophet taketh upon him the person of a carnal Jew, who judged of Christ according to his outward appearance. {Joh 7:14} But what saith the Chaldee proverb? Ne spectes cantharum vel urceum, sed id quod in eo est. Look not on the pitcher, but on the liquor that is contained in it.
And when we shall see him there is no beauty.] Heb., And we shall see him, and no sight or sightliness.
That we should desire him.] And yet he was a man of desires, yea, the "desire of all nations," {Hag 2:7} all over desirable: {Son 5:16} but so he is only to such as have their "senses exercised to discern good and evil." {Heb 5:14}
{a} Humilis Christi prosapia notatur.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv2–5For he shall grow up before him as a…
For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground; and the reason or occasion why the Jews will so generally reject their Messiah, is because he shall not come into the world with secular pomp and power, like an earthly monarch, as they carnally and groundlessly imagined; but
he shall grow up (or, spring up, Heb. ascend, to wit, out of the ground, as it follows, brought forth, and brought up)
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before him (before the unbelieving Jews, of whom he spake Isa 53:1, and that in the singular number, as here, who were witnesses of his mean original; and therefore despised him, according to Christ’s observation, Joh 4:44; or, as others, according to his face, or outward appearance, as he was man; whereby he sufficiently implies that he had another, a far higher, and a Divine nature in him)
as a tender plant, ( or, as this very word is translated, Eze 17:4, a young twig, which is a small and inconsiderable thing,)
and as a root (as Christ is called, Rom 15:12, and elsewhere; or, as a branch; the root being put metonymically for the branch growing out of the root, as it is apparently used, where Christ is called the root of Jesse, and of David, Isa 11:10; Rev 5:5, and in other places, as 2Ch 22:10)
out of a dry ground; out of a mean and barren soil, whose productions are generally poor and contemptible: either,
1. Out of the womb of a virgin; but that was no ground of contempt; or,
2. Of the Jewish nation, which was then poor, and despised, and enslaved; or,
3. Out of the poor, and decayed, and contemptible family, such as the royal family of David was at that time.
He hath no form nor comeliness; his bodily presence and condition in the world shall be mean and contemptible.
When we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him; when we shall look upon him, expecting to find incomparable beauty and majesty in his countenance, and carriage, and condition, we shall be altogether disappointed, and shall meet with nothing amiable or desirable in him. This the prophet speaketh in the person of the carnal and unbelieving Jews, we, i.e. our people, the Jewish nation.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry1710 · Public DomainOn v4In these verses we have,
In these verses we have,
I. A further account of the sufferings of Christ. Much was said before, but more is said here, of the very low condition to which he abased and humbled himself, to which he became obedient even to the death of the cross. 1. He had griefs and sorrows; being acquainted with them, he kept up the acquaintance, and did not grow shy, no, not of such melancholy acquaintance. Were griefs and sorrows allotted him? He bore them, and blamed not his lot; he carried them, and did neither shrink from them, nor sink under them. The load was heavy and the way long, and yet he did not tire, but persevered to the end, till he said, It is finished. 2. He had blows and bruises; he was stricken, smitten, and afflicted. His sorrows bruised him; he felt pain and smart from them; they touched him in the most tender part, especially when God was dishonoured, and when he forsook him upon the cross. All along he was smitten with the tongue, when he was cavilled at and contradicted, put under the worst of characters, and had all manner of evil said against him. At last he was smitten with the hand, with blow after blow. 3. He had wounds and stripes. He was scourged, not under the merciful restriction of the Jewish law, which allowed not above forty stripes to be given to the worst of male factors, but according to the usage of the Romans. And his scourging, doubtless, was the more severe because Pilate intended it as an equivalent for his crucifixion, and yet it proved a preface to it. He was wounded in his hands, and feet, and side. Though it was so ordered that not a bone of him should be broken, yet he had scarcely in any part a whole skin (how fond soever we are to sleep in one, even when we are called out to suffer for him), but from the crown of his head, which was crowned with thorns, to the soles of his feet, which were nailed to the cross, nothing appeared but wounds and bruises. 4. He was wronged and abused (Isa 53:7): He was oppressed, injuriously treated and hardly dealt with. That was laid to his charge which he was perfectly innocent of, that laid upon him which he did not deserve, and in both he was oppressed and injured. He was afflicted both in mind and body; being oppressed, he laid it to heart, and, though, he was patient, was not stupid under it, but mingled his tears with those of the oppressed, that have no comforter, because on the side of the oppressors there is power, Ecc 4:1. Oppression is a sore affliction; it has made many a wise man mad (Ecc 7:7); but our Lord Jesus, though, when he was oppressed, he was afflicted, kept possession of his own soul. 5. he was judged and imprisoned, as is implied in his being taken from prison and judgment, Isa 53:8. God having made him sin for us, he was proceeded against as a malefactor; he was apprehended and taken into custody, and made a prisoner; he was judge, accused, tried, and condemned, according to the usual forms of law: God filed a process against him, judged him in pursuance of that process, and confined him in the prison of the grave, at the door of which a stone was rolled and sealed. 6. He was cut off by an untimely death from the land of the living, though he lived a most useful life, did so many good works, and they were all such that one would be apt to think it was for some of them that they stoned him. He was stricken to death, to the grave which he made with the wicked (for he was crucified between two thieves, as if he had been the worst of the three) and yet with the rich, for he was buried in a sepulchre that belonged to Joseph, an honourable counsellor. Though he died with the wicked, and according to the common course of dealing with criminals should have been buried with them in the place where he was crucified, yet God here foretold, and Providence so ordered it, that he should make his grave with the innocent, with the rich, as a mark of distinction put between him and those that really deserved to die, even in his sufferings.
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II. A full account of the meaning of his sufferings. It was a very great mystery that so excellent a person should suffer such hard things; and it is natural to ask with amazement, "How came it about? What evil had he done?" His enemies indeed looked upon him as suffering justly for his crimes; and, though they could lay nothing to his charge, they esteemed him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted, Isa 53:4. Because they hated him, and persecuted him, they thought that God did, that he was his enemy and fought against him; and therefore they were the more enraged against him, saying, God has forsaken him; persecute and take him, Psa 71:11. Those that are justly smitten are smitten of God, for by him princes decree justice; and so they looked upon him to be smitten, justly put to death as a blasphemer, a deceiver, and an enemy to Caesar. Those that saw him hanging on the cross enquired not into the merits of his cause, but took it for granted that he was guilty of every thing laid to his charge and that therefore vengeance suffered him not to live. Thus Job's friends esteemed him smitten of God, because there was something uncommon in his sufferings. It is true he was smitten of God, Isa 53:10 (or, as some read it, he was God's smitten and afflicted, the Son of God, though smitten and afflicted), but not in the sense in which they meant it; for, though he suffered all these things,
1. He never did any thing in the least to deserve this hard usage. Whereas he was charged with perverting the nation, and sowing sedition, it was utterly false; he had done no violence, but went about doing good. And, whereas he was called that deceiver, he never deserved that character; for there was no deceit in his mouth (Isa 53:9), to which the apostle refers, Pe1 2:22. He did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. He never offended either in word or deed, nor could any of his enemies take up that challenge of his, Which of you convinceth me of sin? The judge that condemned owned he found no fault in him, and the centurion that executed him professed that certainly he was a righteous man.
2. He conducted himself under his sufferings so as to make it appear that he did not suffer as an evil-doer; for, though he was oppressed and afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth (Isa 53:7), no, not so much as to plead his own innocency, but freely offered himself to suffer and die for us, and objected nothing against it. This takes away the scandal of the cross, that he voluntarily submitted to it, for great and holy ends. By his wisdom he could have evaded the sentence, and by his power have resisted the execution; but thus it was written, and thus it behoved him to suffer. This commandment he received from his Father, and therefore he was led as a lamb to the slaughter, without any difficulty or reluctance (he is the Lamb of God); and as a sheep is dumb before the shearers, nay, before the butchers, so he opened not his mouth, which denotes not only his exemplary patience under affliction (Psa 39:9), and his meekness under reproach (Psa 38:13), but his cheerful compliance with his Father's will. Not my will, but thine be done. Lo, I come. By this will we are sanctified, his making his own soul, his own life, an offering for our sin.
3. It was for our good, and in our stead, that Jesus Christ suffered. This is asserted here plainly and fully, and in a very great variety of emphatical expressions.
(1.) It is certain that we are all guilty before God. We have all sinned, and have come short of the glory of God (Isa 53:6): All we like sheep have gone astray, one as well as another. The whole race of mankind lies under the stain of original corruption, and every particular person stands charged with many actual transgressions. We have all gone astray from God our rightful owner, alienated ourselves from him, from the ends he designed us to move towards and the way he appointed us to move in. We have gone astray like sheep, which are apt to wander, and are unapt, when they have gone astray, to find the way home again. That is our true character; we are bent to backslide from God, but altogether unable of ourselves to return to him. This is mentioned not only as our infelicity (that we go astray from the green pastures and expose ourselves to the beasts of prey), but as our iniquity. We affront God in going astray from him, for we turn aside every one to his own way, and thereby set up ourselves, and our own will, in competition with God and his will, which is the malignity of sin. Instead of walking obediently in God's way, we have turned wilfully and stubbornly to our own way, the way of our own heart, the way that our own corrupt appetites and passions lead us to. We have set up for ourselves, to be our own masters, our own carvers, to do what we will and have what we will. Some think it intimates our own evil way, in distinction from the evil way of others. Sinners have their own iniquity, their beloved sin, which does most easily beset them, their own evil way, that they are particularly fond of and bless themselves in.
(2.) Our sins are our sorrows and our griefs (Isa 53:4), or, as it may be read, our sicknesses and our wounds: the Septuagint reads it, our sins; and so the apostle, Pe1 2:24. Our original corruptions are the sickness and disease of the soul, an habitual indisposition; our actual transgressions are the wounds of the soul, which put conscience to pain, if it be not seared and senseless. Or our sins are called our griefs and sorrows because all our griefs and sorrows are owing to our sins and our sins deserve all our griefs and sorrows, even those that are most extreme and everlasting.
(3.) Our Lord Jesus was appointed and did undertake to make satisfaction for our sins and so to save us from the penal consequences of them. [1.] He was appointed to do it, by the will of his Father; for the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. God chose him to be the Saviour of poor sinners and would have him to save them in this way, by bearing their sins and the punishment of them; not the idem - the same that we should have suffered, but the tantundem - that which was more than equivalent for the maintaining of the honour of the holiness and justice of God in the government of the world. Observe here, First, In what way we are saved from the ruin to which by sin we had become liable - by laying our sins on Christ, as the sins of the offerer were laid upon the sacrifice and those of all Israel upon the head of the scape-goat. Our sins were made to meet upon him (so the margin reads it); the sins of all that he was to save, from every place and every age, met upon him, and he was met with for them. They were made to fall upon him (so some read it) as those rushed upon him that came with swords and staves to take him. The laying of our sins upon Christ implies the taking of them off from us; we shall not fall under the curse of the law if we submit to the grace of the gospel. They were laid upon Christ when he was made sin (that is, a sin-offering) for us, and redeemed us from the curse of the law by being made a curse for us; thus he put himself into a capacity to make those easy that come to him heavily laden under the burden of sin. See Psa 40:6-12. Secondly, By whom this was appointed. It was the Lord that laid our iniquities on Christ; he contrived this way of reconciliation and salvation, and he accepted of the vicarious satisfaction Christ was to make. Christ was delivered to death by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. None but God had power to lay our sins upon Christ, both because the sin was committed against him and to him the satisfaction was to be made, and because Christ, on whom the iniquity was to be laid, was his own Son, the Son of his love, and his holy child Jesus, who himself knew no sin. Thirdly, For whom this atonement was to be made. It was the iniquity of us all that was laid on Christ; for in Christ there is a sufficiency of merit for the salvation of all, and a serious offer made of that salvation to all, which excludes none that do not exclude themselves. It intimates that this is the one only way of salvation. All that are justified are justified by having their sins laid on Jesus Christ, and, though they were ever so many, he is able to bear the weight of them all. [2.] He undertook to do it. God laid upon him our iniquity; but did he consent to it? Yes, he did; for some think that the true reading of the next words (Isa 53:7) is, It was exacted, and he answered; divine justice demanded satisfaction for our sins, and he engaged to make the satisfaction. He became our surety, not as originally bound with us, but as bail to the action: "Upon me be the curse, my Father." And therefore, when he was seized, he stipulated with those into whose hands he surrendered himself that that should be his disciples' discharge: If you seek me, let these go their way, Joh 18:8. By his own voluntary undertaking he made himself responsible for our debt, and it is well for us that he was responsible. Thus he restored that which he took not away.
(4.) Having undertaken our debt, he underwent the penalty. Solomon says: He that is surety for a stranger shall smart for it. Christ, being surety for us, did smart for it. [1.] He bore our griefs and carried our sorrows, Isa 53:4. He not only submitted to the common infirmities of human nature, and the common calamities of human life, which sin had introduced, but he underwent the extremities of grief, when he said, My soul is exceedingly sorrowful. He made the sorrows of this present time heavy to himself, that he might make them light and easy for us. Sin is the wormwood and the fall in the affliction and the misery. Christ bore our sins, and so bore our griefs, bore them off us, that we should never be pressed above measure. This is quoted (Mat 8:17) with application to the compassion Christ had for the sick that came to him to be cured and the power he put forth to cure them. [2.] He did this by suffering for our sins (Isa 53:5): He was wounded for our transgressions, to make atonement for them and to purchase for us the pardon of them. Our sins were the thorns in his head, the nails in his hands and feet, the spear in his side. Wounds and bruises were the consequences of sin, what we deserved and what we had brought upon ourselves, Isa 1:6. That these wounds and bruises, though they are painful, may not be mortal, Christ was wounded for our transgressions, was tormented or pained (the word is used for the pains of a woman in travail) for our revolts and rebellions. He was bruised, or crushed, for our iniquities; they were the procuring cause of his death. To the same purport is Isa 53:8, for the transgression of my people was he smitten, the stroke was upon him that should have been upon us; and so some read it, He was cut off for the iniquity of my people, unto whom the stroke belonged, or was due. He was delivered to death for our offences, Rom 4:25. Hence it is said to be according to the scriptures, according to this scripture, that Christ died for our sins, Co1 15:3. Some read this, by the transgressions of my people; that is, by the wicked hands of the Jews, who were, in profession, God's people, he was stricken, was crucified and slain, Act 2:23. But, doubtless, we are to take it in the former sense, which is abundantly confirmed by the angel's prediction of the Messiah's undertaking, solemnly delivered to Daniel, that he shall finish transgression, make an end of sin, and make reconciliation for iniquity, Dan 9:24.
(5.) The consequence of this to us is our peace and healing, Isa 53:5. [1.] Hereby we have peace: The chastisement of our peace was upon him; he, by submitting to these chastisements, slew the enmity, and settled an amity, between God and man; he made peace by the blood of his cross. Whereas by sin we had become odious to God's holiness and obnoxious to his justice, through Christ God is reconciled to us, and not only forgives our sins and saves us from ruin, but takes us into friendship and fellowship with himself, and thereby peace (that is, all good) comes unto us, Col 1:20. He is our peace, Eph 2:14. Christ was in pain that we might be at ease; he gave satisfaction to the justice of God that we might have satisfaction in our own minds, might be of good cheer, knowing that through him our sins are forgiven us. [2.] Hereby we have healing; for by his stripes we are healed. Sin is not only a crime, for which we were condemned to die and which Christ purchased for us the pardon of, but it is a disease, which tends directly to the death of our souls and which Christ provided for the cure of. By his stripes (that is, the sufferings he underwent) he purchased for us the Spirit and grace of God to mortify our corruptions, which are the distempers of our souls, and to put our souls in a good state of health, that they may be fit to serve God and prepared to enjoy him. And by the doctrine of Christ's cross, and the powerful arguments it furnishes us with against sin, the dominion of sin is broken in us and we are fortified against that which feeds the disease.
(6.) The consequence of this to Christ was his resurrection and advancement to perpetual honour. This makes the offence of the cross perfectly to cease; he yielded himself to die as a sacrifice, as a lamb, and, to make it evident that the sacrifice he offered of himself was accepted, we are told here, Isa 53:8, [1.] That he was discharged: He was taken from prison and from judgment; whereas he was imprisoned in the grave under a judicial process, lay there under an arrest for our debt, and judgment seemed to be given against him, he was by an express order from heaven taken out of the prison of the grave, an angel was sent on purpose to roll away the stone and set him at liberty, by which the judgment given against him was reversed and taken off; this redounds not only to his honour, but to our comfort; for, being delivered for our offences, he was raised again for our justification. That discharge of the bail amounted to a release of the debt. [2.] That he was preferred: Who shall declare his generation? his age, or continuance (so the word signifies), the time of his life? He rose to die no more; death had no more dominion over him. He that was dead is alive, and lives for evermore; and who can describe that immortality to which he rose, or number the years and ages of it? And he is advanced to this eternal life because for the transgression of his people he became obedient to death. We may take it as denoting the time of his usefulness, as David is said to serve his generation, and so to answer the end of living. Who can declare how great a blessing Christ by his death and resurrection will be to the world? Some by his generation understand his spiritual seed: Who can count the vast numbers of converts that shall by the gospel be begotten to him, like the dew of the morning?
When thus exalted he shall live to see
A numberless believing progeny
Of his adopted sons; the godlike race
Exceed the stars that heav'n's high arches grace.
- Sir R. Blackmore
Of this generation of his let us pray, as Moses did for Israel, The Lord God of our fathers make them a thousand times so many more as they are, and bless them as he has promised them, Deu 1:11.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv2–5For he shall grow up before him as a…
For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant,.... Which springs out of the earth without notice; low in its beginning, slow in its growth, liable to be crushed with the foot, or destroyed with the frost, and no great probability of its coming to any perfection; or rather as a little "sucker", as the word (b) signifies, which grows out of the root of a tree, at some little distance from it, of which no notice or care is taken, nor anything hoped for from it; and the figure denotes the mean and unpromising appearance of Christ at his incarnation; which is the reason given why the Jews in general disbelieved, rejected, and despised him; for this phrase of "growing up" does not design his exaltation, or rising up from a low to a high estate; but his mean entrance into the world, like that of the springing up of a low and insignificant plant or shrub out of the earth: and the phrase "before him" is to be understood either of God the Father, by whom he was taken notice of, though not by men; and in whose sight he was precious, though despised by men; or his growing up, and the manner of it, or his mean appearance, were all before the Lord, and according to his will: or else it may be understood of Christ himself, and be rendered "before himself", who was meek and lowly, and was mean and low in his own eyes; or rather it may be interpreted of the unbelieving Jew, of any or everyone of them that did not believe the report concerning him: because before him, in the sight of everyone of them, he sprung up in the manner described; unless it can be thought that it would be better rendered "to his face" (c); or "to his appearance"; that is, as to his outward appearance, in the external view of him, so he grew up:
and as a root out of a dry ground; or rather, "as a branch from a root out of a dry ground"; agreeably to Isa 11:1, meaning not so much the land of Judea, where he was born; or the country of Galilee, where he was brought up; as the family of David, from whence he sprung, which was reduced to a very low condition when he was born of it; his supposed father being a carpenter, and his real mother a poor virgin in Nazareth, though both of the lineage and house of David; from this passage the ancient Jews (d) are said to conclude that the Messiah would be born without a father, or the seed of man:
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he hath no form nor comeliness; like a poor plant or shrub just crept out of the ground, in a dry and barren soil, ready to wither away as soon as up; has no strength nor straightness, of body; without verdure, leaves, blossom, and fruit things which make plants comely and beautiful. This regards not the countenance of Christ, which probably was comely, as were his types Moses and David; since he is said to be "fairer than the children of men"; and since his human nature was the immediate produce of the Holy Ghost, and without sin: but his outward circumstances; there was no majesty in him, or signs of it; it did not look probable that he would be a tall cedar, or a prince in Israel, much less the Prince Messiah; he was born of mean parents; brought up in a contemptible part of the country; lived in a town out of which no good is said to come; dwelt in a mean cottage, and worked at a trade:
and when we shall see him: as he grows up, and comes into public life and service, declaring himself, or declared by others, to be the Messiah: here the prophet represents the Jews that would live in Christ's time, who would see his person, hear his doctrines, and be witnesses of his miracles, and yet say,
there is no beauty, that we should desire him; or "sightliness" (e) in him; nothing that looks grand and majestic, or like a king; they not beholding with an eye of faith his glory, as the glory of the only begotten of the Father; only viewing him in his outward circumstances, and so made their estimate of him; they expected the Messiah as a temporal prince, appearing in great pomp and state, to deliver them from the Roman yoke, and restore their nation to its former splendour and glory; and being disappointed herein was the true reason of their unbelief, before complained of, and why they did not desire him, who is the desire of all nations.
(b) , Sept.; , Theodotion, vox a "lac sugere, proprie lactantem significat", Rivet. Sanctius, "surculus tener, veluti laetens", Forerius. (c) "ad faciem suam, vel in facie, sua", Rivet.; "quoad conspectum, vel quoad faciem suam, seu faciem ejus", Sanctius. (d) R. Hadarson apud Galatia, de Arcan. Cathol. Ver. l. 8. c. 2. p. 549. (e) "non aspectus", Munster: Vatablus, Pagninus, Montanus; "nulla spectabilis forma", Vitringa.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv2–5As a root - And the reason why the…
As a root - And the reason why the Jews will generally reject their Messiah, is, because he shall not come into the world with secular pomp, but he shall grow up, (or spring up, out of the ground) before him, (before the unbelieving Jews, of whom he spake ver. 1, and that in the singular number, as here, who were witnesses of his mean original; and therefore despised him) as a tender plant (small and inconsiderable) and as a root, or branch, grows out of a dry, barren ground. No form - His bodily presence shall be mean and contemptible. No beauty - This the prophet speaks in the person of the unbelieving Jews. We - Our people, the Jewish nation.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn vv2–5Verse 2. See Clarke on Isa 53:1.
Verse 2. See Clarke on Isa 53:1.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv2, 4Isa 53:2-3. For he shall grow up, &c. —…
Isa 53:2-3. For he shall grow up, &c. — And the reason why the Jews will generally reject their Messiah is, because he shall not come into the world with secular pomp, but he shall grow up, (or, spring up, out of the ground,) before him, (before the unbelieving Jews, of whom he spake, Isa 53:1, and that in the singular number, as here, who were witnesses of his mean original; and therefore despised him,) as a tender plant, (small and inconsiderable,) and as a root, or branch, grows out of a dry, barren ground, whose productions are generally poor and contemptible. He hath no form, &c. — His bodily presence and condition in the world shall be mean and despicable. And when we see him, there is no beauty, &c. — When we, that is, our people, the Jewish nation, shall look upon him, expecting to find incomparable beauty and majesty in his countenance and demeanour, we shall be altogether disappointed, and shall meet with nothing desirable in him. This the prophet speaks in the persons of the carnal and unbelieving Jews. There was a great deal of true beauty in him, the beauty of holiness, and the beauty of goodness, enough to render him the desire of all nations; but the far greater part of those among whom he lived and conversed saw none of this beauty; for it was spiritually discerned. Observe, reader, carnal minds see no excellence in the Lord Jesus; nothing that should induce them to desire an acquaintance with, or interest in him. Nay, he is not only not desired, but he is despised and rejected — As one unworthy of the company and conversation of all men; despised as a mean man, rejected as a bad man, a deceiver of the people, an impostor, a blasphemer, an associate of Satan. He was the stone which the builders refused; they would not have him to reign over them. A man of sorrows — Whose whole life was filled with, and, in a manner, made up of, a succession of sorrows and sufferings; and acquainted with grief — Who had constant experience of, and familiar converse with, grievous afflictions. And we hid, &c. — We scorned to look upon him; or we looked another way, and his sufferings were nothing to us; though never sorrow was like unto his sorrows.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv2–5For he shall grow up before him - In…
For he shall grow up before him - In this verse, the prophet describes the humble appearance of the Messiah, and the fact that there was nothing in his personal aspect that corresponded to the expectations that bad been formed of him; nothing that should lead them to desire him as their expected deliverer, but everything that could induce them to reject him. He would be of so humble an origin, and with so little that was magnificent in his external appear ance, that the nation would despise him. The word rendered ‘he shall grow up’ (ויעל vaya‛al, from עלה ‛âlâh), means properly, “to go up, to ascend.” Here it evidently applies to the Redeemer as growing up in the manner of a shoot or sucker that springs out of the earth. It means that he would start, as it were, from a decayed stock or stump, as a shoot springs up from a root that is apparently dead. It does not refer to his manner of life before his entrance on the public work of the ministry; not to the mode and style of his education; but to his starting as it were out of a dry and sterile soil where any growth could not be expected, or from a stump or stock that was apparently dead (see the notes at Isa 11:1). The phrase ‘before him’ (לפניו lepânâyv), refers to Yahweh. He would be seen and observed by him, although unknown to the world. The eyes of people would not regard him as the Messiah while he was growing up, but Yahweh would, and his eye would be continually upon him.
As a tender plant - The word used here (יונק yônēq, from ינק yânaq, to suck, Job 3:12; Son 8:1; Joe 2:16), may be applied either to a suckling, a sucking child Deu 32:25; Psa 8:3, or to a sucker, a sprout, a shoot of a tree Job 8:16; Job 14:7; Job 15:30; Eze 17:22; Hos 14:7. Jerome here renders it, Virgultum. The Septuagint renders it, Ἀνηγγείλαμεν ὡς παιδίον ἐναντίον αὐτοῦ anēngeilamen hōs paidion enantion autou - ‘We have made proclamation as a child before him.’ But what idea they attached to it, it is impossible now to say; and equally so to determine how they came to make such a translation. The Chaldee also, leaving the idea that it refers to the Messiah, renders it, ‘And the righteous shall be magnified before him as branches which flourish, and as the tree which sends its roots by the fountains of water; thus shall the holy nation be increased in the land.’ The Syriac translates it, ‘He shall grow up before him as an infant.’ The idea in the passage is plain. It is, that the Messiah would spring up as from an ancient and decayed stock, like a tender shoot or sucker. He would be humble and unpretending in his origin, and would be such that they who had expected a splendid prince would be led to overlook and despise him.
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And as a root - (וכשׁרשׁ vekashoresh). The word ‘root’ here is evidently used by synecdoche for the sprout that starts up from a root (see the notes at Isa 11:10, where the word is used in the same sense).
Out of a dry ground - In a barren waste, or where there is no moisture. Such a sprout or shrub is small, puny, and withered up. Such shrubs spring up in deserts, where they are stinted for want of moisture, and they are most striking objects to represent that which is humble and unattractive in its personal appearance. The idea here is, that the Messiah would spring from an ancient family decayed, but in whose root, so to speak, there would be life, as there is remaining life in the stump of a tree that is fallen down; but that there would be nothing in his external appearance that would attract attention, or meet the expectations of the nation. Even then he would not be like a plant of vigorous growth supplied with abundant rains, and growing in a rich and fertile soil, but he would be like the stinted growth of the sands of the desert. Can anything be more strikingly expressive of the actual appearance of the Redeemer, as compared with the expectation of the Jews? Can there be found anywhere a more striking fulfillment of a prophecy than this? And how will the infidel answer the argument thus furnished for the fact that Isaiah was inspired, and that his record was true?
He hath no form - That is, no beauty. He has not the beautiful form which was anticipated; the external glory which it was supposed he would assume. On the meaning of the word ‘form,’ see the notes at Isa 52:14. It is several times used in the sense of beautiful form or figure (Gen 29:17; Gen 39:6; Gen 41:18; Deu 21:11; Est 2:17; compare 1Sa 16:18). Here it means the same as beautiful form or appearance, and refers to his state of abasement rather than to his own personal beauty. There is no evidence that in person he was in any way deformed, or otherwise than beautiful, except as excessive grief may have changed his natural aspect (see the note at Isa 52:14).
Nor comeliness - (הדר hâdâr). This word is translated honor, glory, majesty Deu 33:17; Psa 29:4; Psa 149:9; Dan 11:20; excellency Isa 35:2; beauty Pro 20:29; Psa 110:3; 2Ch 20:21. It may be applied to the countenance, to the general aspect, or to the ornaments or apparel of the person. Here it refers to the appearance of the Messiah, as having nothing that was answerable to their expectations. He had no robes of royalty; no diadem sparkling on his brow; no splendid retinue; no gorgeous array.
And when we shall see him - This should be connected with the previous words, and should be translated, ‘that we should regard him, or attentively look upon him.’ The idea is, that there was in his external appearance no such beauty as to lead them to look with interest and attention upon him; nothing that should attract them, as people are attracted by the dazzling and splendid objects of this world. If they saw him, they immediately looked away from him as if he were unworthy of their regard.
There is no beauty that we should desire him - He does not appear in the form which we had anticipated. He does not come with the regal pomp and splendor which it was supposed he would assmne. He is apparently of humble rank; has few attendants, and has disappointed wholly the expectation of the nation. In regard to the personal appearance of the Redeemer, it is remarkable that the New Testament has given us no information. Not a hint is dropped in reference to his height of stature, or his form; respecting the color of his hair, his eyes, or his complexion. In all this, on which biographers are usually so full and particular, the evangelists are wholly silent. There was evidently design in this; and the purpose was probably to prevent any painting, statuary, or figure of the Redeemer, that would have any claim to being regarded as correct or true. As it stands in the New Testament, there is lust the veil of obscurity thrown over this whole subject which is most favorable for the contemplation of the incarnate Deity. We are told flint he was a man; we are told also that he was God. The image to the mind’s eye is as obscure in the one case as the other; and in both, we are directed to his moral beauty, his holiness, and benevolence, as objects of contemplation, rather than to his external appearance or form.
It may be added that there is no authentic information in regard to his appearance that has come down to us by tradition. All the works of sculptors and painters in attempting to depict his form are the mere works of fancy, and are undoubtedly as unlike the glorious reality as they are contrary to the spirit and intention of the Bible. There is, indeed, a letter extant which is claimed by some to have been written by Publius Lentulus, to the Emperor Tiberius, in the time when the Saviour lived, and which gives a description of his personal appearance. As this is the only legend of antiquity which even claims to be a description of his person, and as it is often printed, and is regarded as a curiosity, it may not be improper here to present it in a note. This letter is pronounced by Calmer to be spurious, and it has been abundantly proved to be so by Prof. Robinson (see Bib. Rep. vol. ii. pp. 367-393). The main arguments against its anthenticity, and which entirely settle the question, are:
1. The discrepancies and contradictions which exist in the various copies.
2. The fact that in the time of the Saviour, when the epistle purports to have been written, it can be demonstrated that no such man as Publius Lentulus was governor of Judea, or had any such office there, as is claimed for him in the inscriptions to the epistle.
3. That for fifteen hundred years no such epistle is quoted or referred to by any writer - a fact which could not have occurred if any such epistle had been in existence.
4. That the style of the epistle is not such as an enlightened Roman would have used, but is such as an ecclesiastic would have employed.
5. That the contents of the epistle are such as a Roman would not have used of one who was a Jew.
See these arguments presented in detail in the place above referred to. It may be added, that this is the only pretended account which bas come down to us respecting the personal appearance of the Saviour, except the fable that Christ sent his portrait to Abgar, king of Edessa, in reply to a letter which he had sent requesting him to come and heal him; and the equally fabulous legend, that the impression of his countenance was left upon the handkerchief of the holy Veronica.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Plant. Hebrew also, "suckling child." (Septuagint, &c.) --- Ground. The blessed Virgin [Mary]. (Calmet) --- Was. Septuagint, "he had no appearance nor beauty. But his appearance was abject and deficient above all men; a," &c. --- That we. Literally, "and we have desired him." Notwithstanding his abject condition, He was the desired of all nations, and by his wounds we are healed. (Haydock) --- Some assert that the person of Christ was not beautiful, while others think that his wounds prevented it from being discerned. Salmeron would supply a negation from the first number: "We have not desired him."
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown1871 · Public DomainOn vv2–5tender plant--Messiah grew silently and insensibly, as a sucker…
tender plant--Messiah grew silently and insensibly, as a sucker from an ancient stock, seemingly dead (namely, the house of David, then in a decayed state) (see on Isa 11:1).
before him--before Jehovah. Though unknown to the world (Joh 1:11), Messiah was observed by God, who ordered the most minute circumstances attending His growth.
root--that is, sprout from a root.
form--beautiful form: sorrow had marred His once beautiful form.
and when we shall see--rather, joined with the previous words, "Nor comeliness (attractiveness) that we should look (with delight) on Him."
there is--rather, "was." The studied reticence of the New Testament as to His form, stature, color, &c., was designed to prevent our dwelling on the bodily, rather than on His moral beauty, holiness, love, &c., also a providential protest against the making and veneration of images of Him. The letter of P. LENTULUS to the emperor Tiberius, describing His person, is spurious; so also the story of His sending His portrait to Abgar, king of Edessa; and the alleged impression of His countenance on the handkerchief of Veronica. The former part of this verse refers to His birth and childhood; the latter to His first public appearance [VITRINGA].
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv2, 4, 52, 3. The point of view appears to be,…
2, 3. The point of view appears to be, when Messiah’s sufferings are over, and he about entering into his glory.
He shall grow up — The verb in Hebrew is, as usual, in the prophetic past. Growth has been from the first Messianic germ, (Gen_3:15,) till fully realized in Jesus Christ. Through all its history, the Messianic conception has been as a tender plant, nourished by Jehovah indeed, but very little by men. Its root, the root of Jesse, in itself was vigorous, advancing to the Davidic kingship, itself thus asserting herein its own type of ultimate royalty; then it retired long from view, yet still growing feebly as in a parched land — that of the impure soil of men’s hearts. Except a humble few, men look away from him. He is not of their sort, their character. He is not their ideal Messiah; they do not sympathize with his griefs; they abandon him.
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Rejected — Literally, ceased from men. He thoroughly knows the world’s sins, and its sicknesses, pains, calamities which come therefrom. But he finds few to feel with him. All repel him, turn away the face, despise him. But is this sufferer really the Messiah of the old prophets? So even the old Jews all interpreted till after the Christian era, when their interpretation was cited against them, and they were pressed in self-defense to change it. Even then some fair-minded Jews have continued to regard the passage as descriptive only of Messiah. More, however, apply the passage to the Jews as a body, now in a state of dispersion and affliction. Some hold Jeremiah, and others Isaiah, to be the person meant. These views are upheld by the weakest of arguments. Of course, also, all who deny supernatural prophecy refuse altogether to see any Messianic reference here. But this reference is sustained by the sound sense of all candid interpreters and disinterested sensible readers.
Esteemed him not — Undervalued him.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv2–52. The verse seems to take us back to…
2. The verse seems to take us back to the origin of the Servant’s career, in order to account for the powerful prejudices with which his contemporaries regarded him. From the first he had been mean and unprepossessing in appearance, like a stunted shrub struggling for existence in an arid soil. To this corresponded the first impressions of the people, which were mainly of a negative kind; they found in him nothing that was attractive or desirable. Beyond this the verse does not go.
For he shall grow up] Lit. And he grew up. It is not easy to make out such a connexion between this sentence and the last as would naturally be expressed by “and.” If what is here stated were the explanation of the unbelief confessed in Isa_53:1, the proper conjunction would be “for,” and so the word is by many rendered. Others take it as the “and” of consequence (= and so), but the clause is not a statement of what the people thought of the Servant in consequence of their unbelief, but of what he actually was. The phrase “before him” seems decisive on that point, unless with Ewald and others we change the reading to “before us.” With that alteration the whole verse speaks of the impressions men formed of the Servant, and these impressions might readily be regarded as the result of their want of spiritual insight. But if the received text be retained (and there is no sufficient reason for departing from it) the description begins with a statement of fact and then proceeds to the effect on the mind of the people. It is probable that no logical connexion with the preceding is intended. The conjunction may mark the commencement of the narrative, in accordance with a tendency to begin a speech with “and” (Jos_22:28; Jer_9:11; cf. ch. Isa_2:2).
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as a tender plant] a sapling. Cf. Eze_17:22; Job_14:7.
a root (cf. ch. Isa_11:10) out of a dry ground] The “dry ground” might, on some theories of what is meant by the Servant, symbolise the Exile with its political hardships and lack of religious advantages, but it is doubtful if the figure should be pressed so far. The Servant is compared to a plant springing up in such a soil, but whether the prophet thought of his lowly growth as due in any degree to unfavourable circumstances is uncertain.
In what follows hath should be had, and comeliness, majesty. The words for form and beauty are the same as those rendered “form” and “aspect” in Isa_52:14. Both are here used in the sense of “pleasing form” &c.; comp. “a man of form “in 1Sa_16:18, and the Latin formosus from forma, or “shapely” from “shape.”
and when we shall see him] Rather, when we saw him. The clause, however, might (disregarding the accents) be read with what precedes: “… and no majesty, that we should look upon him—and no aspect that we should desire him” (see R.V. marg.). This at least yields a more perfect parallelism in the last two lines.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers1878 · Public DomainOn vv2–5(2) For he shall grow up . . .—The…
(2) For he shall grow up . . .—The Hebrew tenses are in the perfect, the future being contemplated as already accomplished. The words present at once a parallel and a contrast to those of Isa_11:1. There the picture was that of a strong vigorous shoot coming out of the root of the house of David. Here the sapling is weak and frail, struggling out of the dry ground. For “before Him” (i.e., Jehovah) some critics have read “before us,” as agreeing better with the second clause; while others have referred the pronoun “him” to the Jewish people. Taking the received text and interpretation, the thought expressed is that Jehovah was watching this humble and lowly growth, as a mother watches over her weakest and most sickly child.
He hath no form nor comeliness.—See Note on Isa_3:14. The thought which has been constantly true of the followers of the Christ was to be true of the Christ Himself.
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“Hid are the saints of God,
Uncertified by high angelic sign;
Nor raiment soft, nor empire’s golden rod,
Marks them divine. “
J. H. NEWMAN (Lyra Apostolica.)
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv2–5For he shall grow up; rather, now he grew…
For he shall grow up; rather, now he grew up. The verbs are, all of them, in the past, or completed tense, until ver. 7, and are to be regarded as "perfects of prophetic certitude." As Mr. Cheyne remarks, "All has been finished before the foundations of the world in the Divine counsels." Before him; i.e. "before Jehovah under the fostering care of Jehovah. (comp. Luk_2:40, Luk_2:52) God the Father had his eye ever fixed upon the Son with watchfulness and tenderness and love. As a tender plant; literally, as a sapling, or as a sucker. (comp. Job_8:16 Job_14:7 Psa_80:12 Eze_17:4, 22 Hos_14:6) The "branch" of Isa_11:1, 10 a different word has nearly the same meaning. The Messiah will be a fresh sprout from the stump of a tree that has been felled; i.e. from the destroyed Davidic monarchy. As a root. (so Isa_11:10 Rev_5:5) The "sapling" from the house of David shall become the "root" out of which his Church will grow. (comp. Joh_15:1-6) Out of a dry ground. Either out of the "dry ground" of a corrupt age and nation, or out of the arid soil of humanity. In the East it is not unusual to see a tall succulent plant growing from a soft which seems utterly devoid of moisture. Such plants have roots that strike deep, and draw their nourishment from a hidden source. He hath no form nor comeliness; rather, he had no form nor majesty. It is scarcely the prophet"s intention to describe the personal appearance of our Lord. What he means is that "the Servant" would have no splendid surroundings, no regal pomp nor splendour nothing about him to attract men"s eyes, or make them think him anything extraordinary. It is impossible to suppose that there was not in his appearance something of winning grace and quiet majesty. but it was of a kind that was not adapted to draw the gaze of the multitude. And when we shall see him. Some connect this clause with the preceding, and translate, "He hath no form nor comeliness, that we should regard him; no beauty, that we should desire him" (Lowth, Vitringa, Gesenius, Ewald, Knobel, Henderson, Urwick. But Stier, Delitzsch, Kay, and Mr. Cheyne prefer the construction found in the Authorized Version). No beauty; literally, no sightliness; i.e. nothing to attract the eye or arrest it. The spiritual beauties of holy and sweet expression and majestic calm could only have been spiritually discerned.
Vers. 2-11. "The sufferings of Jesus.
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It is the great object of Isaiah, in this chapter, to declare to his countrymen
(1) that the Messiah would be a suffering Messiah;
(2) that his sufferings would be vicarious; and
(3) that they would have a propitiatory or atoning character.
I THE MESSIAH A SUFFERING MESSIAH. Hitherto Isaiah had looked upon the promised Redeemer on the side of his glories and his triumphs. His names were to be "Immanuel," or "God with us", (Isa_7:14) "Wonderful," "Counsellor," "The Mighty God," "The Everlasting Father," "The Prince of Peace". (Isa_9:6) "Of the increase of his government and peace there was to be no end, upon the throne of David, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever". (Isa_9:7) "The Spirit of the Lord was to be upon him... and with righteousness was he to judge the poor, and to reprove with equity for the meek of the earth, and to smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips to slay the wicked". (Isa_11:2-4) He was to "bring forth judgment to the Gentiles"; (Isa_42:1) he was not to "fail nor be discouraged"; (Isa_42:4) he was to be "upheld ever by God"s hand"; (Isa_42:6) "the isles were to wait for his Law". (Isa_42:4) But now the prophet has to speak in another strain. Psalms probably written before his time (as Ps 2,ps 22,ps 31,ps 40,ps 49, etc.) had partially drawn aside the veil, and given indications that the career of the Deliverer would not be all glory or all triumph. But it was difficult to determine how far they were historical, how far prophetic. It was a part of Isaiah"s mission to reveal, in language that could scarcely be mistaken, the darker aspect of Messiah"s coming, the "contradiction of sinners" which he would encounter, and its consequences. Messiah was to be "despised," "forsaken" (ver. 8), "pierced," "crushed," made sore with "stripes" (ver. 5), "oppressed" (ver. 7), "cut off" before his time, "stricken" (ver. 8), "dealt with grievously" (ver. 10). He was to be condemned by an iniquitous "judgment" (ver. 8), to be "brought as a lamb to the slaughter" (ver. 7), to be "assigned his grave with the wicked" (ver. 9), and "reckoned with transgressors" (ver. 12). His earthly life was to be such as would be best summed up in the brief phrase, "A Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief" (ver. 3).
II THE SUFFERINGS OF MESSIAH VICARIOUS. Men make a difficulty about vicarious suffering; but half the suffering in the world is of this nature. Who that watches by a sick-bed, and supports and props the sufferer, and stays unmoved in a cramped position not to disturb the sick one"s snatch of slumber, but suffers to assuage or remove another"s pain? Who that, hungry himself, passes on to another the food that he might eat himself, but does the same? What mother but bears a thousand discomforts to shield her child from them? What soldier but tries to take himself the blow which he sees must otherwise prostrate his chief? How are the young, who rush into ruinous extravagance which would cripple them for life, saved but by a father or a guardian taking on him the grievous trouble of paying the debts incurred? What do not refined ladies undergo to rescue and recover those among their sisters who have fallen? Men"s and women"s kindness of heart is continually leading them to undergo vicarious suffering; nor is there often any other way by which the sufferings of our fellow-creatures can be removed. If I take the load that is galling another"s back and put it on my own, I do it with the full knowledge that my back will soon ache. If I transfer my wraps to a sick fellow-traveller on a wintry day, I am quite aware that the cold will clutch me instead of him. The vicarious character of Messiah"s sufferings is the direct subject of seven distinct assertions:
(1) "He hath borne our griefs;
(2) "He hath "carried our sorrows;
(3) "He was wounded for our transgressions;
(4) "He was bruised for our iniquities;
(5) "The chastisement of our peace was upon him;
(6) "With his stripes we are healed" (vers. 4, 5);
(7) "For the transgression of my people was he stricken" (ver. 8).
It is indirectly implied in four others:
(1) "The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all;
(2) "Thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin;
(3) "He shall bear their iniquities;
(4) "He bare the sins of many" (vers. 6, 10-12).
III THE SUFFERINGS OF MESSIAH PROPITIATORY. The idea of propitiation is implied in the three passages where Messiah is said to have borne the sins of men. No otherwise can one man bear the sin of another than by doing something which propitiates him whom the sin has offended. But it is further distinctly asserted in ver. 10, when it is said that the soul of the Servant should be "made an offering for sin." As the whole notion of offering for sin was grounded on the idea of expiation, so it was now made plain that the real expiation, the real atonement, the real propitiation, to which the entire ritual system of the Israelitish nation pointed, was the offering up of that "righteous Servant" of the Lord, who, "having done no wrong," having been guilty of no "guile," nevertheless was made sin for man, and became a willing and meritorious Sacrifice. "It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin". (Hos_10:4) It is impossible for sinful man to redeem his fellow-man. (Psa_49:7, Psa_49:8) Only One who was without sin, "holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners", (Hos_7:2-6) could make atonement for others" sins; only One who was perfectly pure himself could purify them; only One who needed none to intercede for him could intercede for his brethren. It is strange how men dislike, and kick against, and endeavour to explain away, the doctrine of vicarious suffering and substitution, and of atonement made for man by the blood of Christ. Yet why should this be? "The doctrine," as Mr. Urwick says, "is in perfect keeping with all that the Jewish ceremonial embodied, and with the teaching alike of the Redeemer himself (Mat_20:28 Joh_10:11 Luk_22:20) and his apostles, St. Paul, (Rom_3:24-26) St. Peter, (1Pe_2:24, 1Pe_2:25) and St. John. (1Jn_2:2) It satisfies the Divine holiness, and the demands of the sinner"s own conscience. It fully recognizes the reality of sin and its exceeding sinfulness, whereas all other attempted explanations tend to make light of sin, or at least to represent it more or less as a matter of human weakness, which a good-natured God will readily pass over and forgive without a ransom. It presents the way of salvation as simple and straightforward; all can understand it; whereas other attempted explanations of the efficacy of Christ"s redemptive work are cloudy, indefinite, mystified, abstruse, and difficult of apprehension even by the learned" ("The Servant of Jehovah," pp. 129, 130).
HOMILIES BY W.M. STATHAM Ver. 2. The depraved eye.
"No beauty that we should desire him." In this prophetic picture of the Christ the question arises, "Who hath believed our report?" What wonderful attestation history gives to this! came unto his own, and his own received him not." Whether the words, "he hath no form nor comeliness," apply to the physical features of Christ, we cannot say; for the Jews had no "art." They interpreted the words, "Thou shalt not make to thyself... the likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath," not as an injunction against "idols" alone, but against all statuary and all art. So, though we have the likenesses of the emperors on the Roman coins, and the Greek statues of Socrates and their wise men, we have no likeness of Christ or his apostles. But we do know the meaning of this, "There is no beauty that we should desire him.
I THE EYE ADMIRES ONLY WHAT THE HEART LOVES. The beauty that eye desired was quite different. It was superficial and carnal, not inward and spiritual.
II THE WORLD DOES NOT ALTER ITS TASTE. The classic virtues of paganism pride, self-reliance, honour are more prized by men of the world than patience, gentleness, pity, forbearance, and charity. Christ is not beautiful to the proud, nor to the selfish, nor to the ambitions and the vain. Only the pure in heart admire and love him! W.M.S.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn vv2–5For He shall grow up before wire as a…
Isa_53:2
For He shall grow up before wire as a tender plant
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God accomplishes great things by unlikely means
1.
God prosecuteth and accomplisheth His greatest designs by the most unlikely and despised means. Jesus Christ, the great Saviour of the world, was but a tender plant, which a man would be more apt to tread upon and crush, than to cherish.
2. God cometh in for the deliverance of His people in times of greatest despair and unlikelihood. For when the branches of Jesse were dried up, and had no verdure, even then sprung up the greatest ornament of that stock, although a root out of a dry ground.
3. Mean beginnings may grow up to great matters and glorious successes. Christ, the tender plant, was to be a tall tree. (T. Manton, D. D.)
God to be trusted
You have no cause to distrust God; though He doth not find means, He can create them. The root of Jesse, though there be no branches, it can bear a sprig. God, that could make the world out of nothing, can preserve the Church by nothing. (T. Manton, D. D.)
Christ a tender plant
1. Christ in His humiliation appeared in great feebleness; born a helpless babe, He was in His infancy in great danger from the hand of Herod, and though preserved, it was not by a powerful army, but by flight into another land. His early days were not spent amid the martial music of camps, or in the grandeur of courts, but in the retirement of a carpenters shop--fit place for a tender plant. His life was gentleness, He was harmless as a lamb. At any time it seemed easy to destroy both Him and His system. When He was nailed to the Cross to die, did it not appear as if His whole work had utterly collapsed and His religion would be for ever stamped out? The Cross threatened to be the death of Christianity as well as of Christ; but it was not so, for in a few days the power of the Divine Spirit came upon the Church.
2. At its first setting up, how feeble was the kingdom of our Lord! When Herod stretched out His hand to vex certain of the Church, unbelief might have said, There will he an utter end ere long. When, in after years, the Roman emperors turned the whole imperial power against the Gospel, stretching forth an arm long enough to encompass the entire globe, and uplifting a hand more heavy than an iron hammer, how could it be supposed that the Christian Church would still live on? It bowed before the storm like a tender shoot, but it was not uprooted by the tempest; it survives to this day; and although we do not rejoice at this moment in all the success which we could desire, yet still that tender shoot is full of vitality, we perceive the blossoms of hope upon it, and expect soon to gather goodly clusters of success.
3. Christianity in our own hearts--the Christ within us--is also a tender plant. In its upspringing it is as the green blade of corn, which any beast that goeth by may tread upon or devour. Oftentimes, to our apprehension, it has seemed that our spiritual life would soon die: it was no better than a lily, with a stalk bruised and all but snapped in twain. The mower a scythe of temptation has cut down the outgrowth of our spiritual life, but He who cometh down like rain upon the mown grass has restored our verdure and maintained our vigour to this day. Tender as our religion is, it is beyond the power of Satan to destroy it. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Growth before God
There is one word which marks the difference between the work of God and the work of man. It is the word growth. No human work can grow. For though we speak of a picture growing under the brush of the painter, or of a statue growing under the chisel of the sculptor, this is only a figure of speech.
1. But there is no work of God that cannot grow. This world itself grew into being. It grew up before God as the wild flower does--grew out of chaos, into order and beauty, and we can read on the rocks the story of its growth. There is a greater world than this--the world of Divine truth. And this also has been a growth from the beginning.
2. No wonder, then, that the Son of God grew up before the Lord--that the Lord of nature conformed to the law of nature. The sacred historian is not to be found tripping here, like the medieval romancist. He does not outrage the order of nature by a single story of monstrous precocity. There is not a part of the being of Jesus which he excludes from the order of growth. In body, mind and spirit he declares the child grew up before the Lord.
3. What hope is there here for man! The Son of God had to grow, and the meanest child of man can grow. If we had no power of growth but that which we possess in common with the animal and the tree, then were we of all creatures the most miserable. Because we have in us the power of an endless growth in all that is great and good, we are creatures of the Most Blessed. And we must grow. That is our destiny. Our Christianity is not a piece of mechanism that was finished off at the date of conversion. It is a life that has been born within the soul. We are growing, either upwards or downwards, either better or worse, either to honour or to shame.
4. But how may a noble and Divine growth be ensured? It is a question that is not left unanswered in my text. For we are told that the plant of which it speaks grew up before the Lord. It was the fondest desire of the Hebrew mothers heart that her son should grow up before the Lord. She would rather have him grow up before the Lord in the temple than before the king in the palace. There can be no higher position or nobler prospect for a man than to grow up before his God. The child Samuel and the child Jesus grew up before the same God, but how differently. The former under the very shadow of the altar, under the wing of the old, blind priest, utterly secluded from the common ways of men; but Jesus, at His mother s knee in the village home, in the midst of His little relatives and playmates, among the workmen at the bench, and the old familiar faces in street and synagogue. And so it has become a Christian commonplace that you can grow up before the Lord anywhere.
5. But we are further informed of the special fashion in which Jesus grew up before the Lord. As a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground, we read. But the Hebrew contains a more explicit meaning. It is this: He grew up before God like a fresh sucker from a root springing out of a dry ground The old plant is the house of David, once so glorious in flower and fruitage, at last cut down and withered. The dry soil is the barren religious life of Israel. The fresh young sucker is the Son of Man. That it did grow to what we see is the supreme miracle of Christianity. Its principal evidence is in its own marvellous growth. This is the dilemma in which Christianity still keeps its foes, and to which all additional thought and investigation can only add strength. From such a root, in such a soil, how did Jesus grow to be the Christ of history? It must either be acknowledged to be the supreme miracle or the supreme mystery of time. And this is the one Christian miracle which keeps repeating itself century after century. From the withered plant, and out of the desert soft, God is evermore producing His plants of renown. How was it, for example, that Luther grew to be the man he was, and to wield the power he did? Was it from the withered root of the mediaeval Church or the desert soil of the monastery that he derived his power? Or was he right when he declared the conviction of his heart that it was all by the grace of God through faith? History discloses to us nothing so glorious as these Divine developments of the soul of man. The grace that has achieved these things is in the world as much as ever.
6. Why is it, then, that so many young men are excluding from their ambition in life that of growth in Christ? Why is it that so many of them murmur that the old creeds are dry, and the old Bible and the old familiar Church service, and that even the fountain of private devotion has ceased to water the wilderness? It is because they are not rooted in God and His truth, but are, many of them, like plants thrown out of a country nursery, which lie bleaching in the sun or are blown about by the wind. No wonder that religion seems dry to those who are not rooted in it. Young men! see to it that you go down into the truth which you profess to stand by, whether of creed, of catechism, or Bible, and you will find as much good in it as your fathers did. Thus settled and grounded, seek to grow in everything; put on nothing. All pretence is worse than waste of time and strength. And abjure all forced and unnatural growth, all ambition to fill rapidly a large space. Be content to occupy the ground that God has allotted to you, according to the nature that God has given. (P. J. Rollo.)
As a root out of a dry ground
The root out of a dry ground
Owing to their geographical position, the central and western regions of South Africa are almost constantly deprived of rain. They contain no flowing streams, and very little water in the wells. The soil is a soft and light-coloured sand, which reflects the sunlight with a glaring intensity. No fresh breeze cools the air; no passing cloud veils the scorching sky. We should naturally have supposed that regions so scantily supplied with one of the first necessaries of life, could be nothing else than waste and lifeless deserts: and yet, strange to say, they are distinguished for their comparatively abundant vegetation, and their immense development of animal life. The evil produced by want of rain has been counteracted by the admirable foresight of the Creator, in providing these arid lands with plants suited to their trying circumstances. The vegetation is eminently local and special. Nothing like it is seen elsewhere on the face of the earth. Nearly all the plants have tuberous roots, buried far beneath the ground, beyond the scorching effects of the sun, and are composed of succulent tissue, filled with a deliciously cool and refreshing fluid. They have also thick, fleshy leaves, with pores capable of imbibing and retaining moisture from a very dry atmosphere and soil; so that if a leaf be broken during the greatest drought, it shows abundant circulating sap. Nothing can look more unlike the situations in which they are found than these succulent roots, full of fluid when the surrounding soil is dry as dust, and the enveloping air seems utterly destitute of moisture; replete with nourishment and life when all within the horizon is desolation and death. They seem to have a special vitality in themselves; and, unlike all other plants, to be independent of circumstances. Such roots are also found in the deserts of Arabia; and it was doubtless one of them that suggested to the prophet the beautiful and expressive emblem of the text, He shall grow up before him as a root out of a dry ground. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Christs growth before God
Commentators usually connect these words with the next clause of the verse, and regard them as implying that the promised Messiah would have no form or comeliness in the estimation of men, no outward beauty, that they should desire Him. This, I think, is a wrong interpretation. The words of the text are complete and separate. They speak not of the appearance of Christ to men, but of His growth in the sight of God. They refer not to His attractiveness, but to His functions; and the point that seems to be most insisted upon is, that His relation to the circumstances in which He should be placed would be one of perfect independence and self-sufficiency. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
The root out of a dry ground
In the light of this explanation let us look at the three ideas which the subject suggests to us--
1. The living root.
2. The dry ground.
3. The effect of the living root upon the dry ground. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Christ the living root
1. This emblem is peculiarly appropriate when applied to Christ. He is called the Branch, to show that He is a member of the great organism of human life, in all things made like unto His brethren, yet without sin. He is a branch of the tree of humanity, nourished by its sap, pervaded by its life, blossoming with its affections, and yielding its fruits of usefulness. But He is more than the Branch. There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots, is the spiritual language of prophecy relative to the coming of the Messiah; but the figure is speedily changed, and the Branch is also called the Root of Jesse. This language is most strange and paradoxical. It reveals the mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh. Jesus is at one and the same time the Branch and the Root, the root of Jesse and the offspring of Jesse, Davids Lord and Davids son, because He is Emmanuel, God with us, God and man in two distinct natures and one person for ever; deriving His human life by natural descent from man, and possessing Divine life in Himself, and the author of spiritual life to others. The root of plants growing in a dry ground is the most important part of their structure. It lies at the basis of, and involves the whole plant. The whole growth of a lily, for instance, lies folded up within its bulb. And so Christ lies at the basis of, and involves the whole spiritual life.
2. It is assuredly the most precious, as it is the most distinguishing, feature of the Christian religion, that it places the foundation of eternal life in living relations with a living Person, rather than in the profession of a creed or the practice of a duty.
(1) One of the principal functions which the root performs in the economy of vegetation is to attach the plant to the soil, and prevent it from moving hither and thither at the mercy of the elements. So Christ is the living root of our spiritual life, connecting it with the whole system of grace, the whole economy of redemption. It is only when united to Christ by a living faith that the soul can lay hold on heaven and immortality.
(2) Another purpose which the root serves in the economy of vegetation is to feed the plant. Through the spongioles of the root, the plant imbibes from the soil in which it is placed the needful sap by which it is sustained; and in this simple way the whole important and complicated processes are carried on, by which crude soil is converted into the needful constituents of vegetable matter. For this purpose the root possesses certain structural peculiarities adapting it to its special functions. Just as there is provision made for the growth of the germ in the starchy contents of the seed, until it has attained an independent existence; so there is provision made in the nutritive tissue of the bulb or tuber for the support of the plant which it produces. This function also the Root of Jesse performs in the case of those who are rooted in Him. He is the mediator of the New Covenant; the only channel by which spiritual blessings can be communicated to us. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
The unfoldings of the Root of Jesse
All the individual life of the Christian, with its blossoms of holiness and its fruits of righteousness; all the Christian life of society, with its things that are pure, and honest, and lovely, and of good report, is but a development and a manifestation of the life of Christ in the heart and in the world; a growth and unfolding of the power, the beauty, and the sweetness that are hid in the Root of Jesse. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
The dry ground
There is usually a very intimate connection between a plant and the circumstances in which it grows. Modifications of specific character are produced by varieties of soil; and the wide difference between a wild flower or fruit, and a garden flower or fruit, is entirely owing to the difference between rich cultivated soil and the poor untilled soil of nature. The plants of a dry ground, however, are less dependent upon the nature of their soil than others; they receive from it, in most cases, mere mechanical support and room to expand in, while their means of growth are derived entirely from the atmosphere. Looking at the emblem of the text in this light, we may suppose the dry ground here to mean--
I. THAT HUMANITY OUT OF WHICH CHRIST SPRANG. There are many who regard Jesus as the natural product of humanity--the highest development of human nature, the blossom, so to speak, of mankind. But we look upon Him as a Divine germ planted in this wilderness, a Divine Being attaching Himself to men, wearing their nature, dwelling in their world, but still not of them--as distinct from humanity as the living root is distinct from the dry ground in which it grows. The soil of humanity is indeed dry ground. Sin has dried up its life, its fertility, turned its moisture into summers drought, and reduced it to perpetual barrenness. By the law of natural development, mankind could never have given birth to a character in every way so exceptional as that of Christ. It is true indeed that a few individuals have ever and anon emerged from the dark chaos of fallen humanity, and exhibited a high type of intellectual and moral worth; but such individuals have been completely identified with the human race, and have shared in its sins and infirmities. In Jesus, on the contrary, there was a remarkable remoteness and separateness from men his life ran parallel with mans, but it was never on the same low level. He was independent of worldly circumstances, and superior to worldly conventionalities. He had no joys on earth save those He brought with Him from heaven. He was alone, without sympathy, for no one could understand Him; without help, for no mortal aid could reach the necessities of His case. Like a desert well, He was for ever imparting what no one could give Him back.
II. THE EXPECTATIONS OF THE JEWS REGARDING THE MESSIAH. There are scientific men who believe in the doctrine of spontaneous or equivocal generation. And so there are theologians who assert that Christ was merely the natural product of the age and the circumstances in which He lived; the mere incarnation, so to speak, of the popular expectation of the time. In all their attempts to account for His life, without admitting Him to be a Divine person, they bring prominently into view whatever there was in Jewish history, belief, and literature, to prepare for and produce such a personality and character as those of Jesus; they endeavour to show that the condition of the Jewish world, when Christ appeared, was exactly that into which His appearing would fit; and that all these preparatory and formative conditions did of themselves, by a kind of natural spontaneous generation, produce Christ. In reply to these views, it may be admitted as an unquestionable historical fact, that the expectation of a Messiah ran like a golden thread throughout the whole complicated web of the Hebrew religion and polity. The expectations of the Jews did no more of themselves produce the Saviour, than the soil and climate produce, of their own accord, any particular plant. There was nothing in the age, nothing in the people, nothing in the influences by which he was surrounded, which could by any possibility have produced or developed such a remarkable character as He exhibited. There was no more relation between Him and His moral surroundings, than there is between a succulent life-full root and the arid sandy waste in which it grows. The counterfeit Messiahs were not roots out of a dry ground, but, on the contrary, mushrooms developed from the decaying life of the nation. There was a complete harmony between them and their moral surroundings. They were really and truly the products of the popular longing of the time; they agreed in every respect with their circumstances. The prevailing notions concerning the Messiah were worldly and carnal.
III. THE CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE. Nothing can be more marked and striking than the contrast between the character of Christ and the general character of the Jewish nation--between the excellences which He displayed and those which they held in most esteem. It is said that a man represents the spirit and character of the age and the race to which he belongs. He seldom rises above their general level. But here we have a man who not only rose high above the level of his age and nation, but stands out, in all that constitutes true moral manhood, in marked and decided contrast to them. He was descended from the Jewish people, but He was not of them. He was rooted in Jewish soil, but His life was a self-derived and heavenly life. This is a great and precious truth. Something has come into this world which is not of it. A supernatural power has descended into nature. A man has lived on our earth who cannot be ranked with mankind. A Divine Being has come from God, to be incarnate with us, and to lift us up to God. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Christ binds humanity into a brotherhood
The roots of the desert, by their extensive ramifications, fix the constantly shifting sands, and prevent them from being drifted about in blinding clouds by every wind that blows. So the Root of Jesse binds the dry ground of humanity by its endless fibres of benevolence and love. The despised and apparently feeble Jesus of Nazareth was lifted up on the Cross, and then followed--according to His own prophecy--the drawing of all men to Him and to one another. Sin is selfishness and isolation; the love of Christ is benevolence and attraction. Jesus unites us to the Father, and therefore to one another. The love of Christians is not to be confined to their own society and fraternity. In Christ they have received expansion, not limitation--universal benevolence, not mere party spirit. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
A root out of a dry ground
I. THE HISTORICAL MEANING OF THIS METAPHOR. It applies to the person of the Lord, and also to His cause and Kingdom: to Himself personally and to Himself mystically. A root which springs up in a fat and fertile field owes very much to the soil in which it grows. Our Saviour is a root that derives nothing from the soil in which it grows, but puts everything into the soil.
1. It is quite certain that our Lord derived nothing whatever from His natural descent. He was the Son of David, the lawful heir to the royal dignities of the tribe of Judah; but His family had fallen into obscurity, had lost position, wealth, and repute.
2. Nor did our Lord derive assistance from His nationality; it was no general recommendation to His teaching that He was of the seed of Abraham. To this day, to many minds, it is almost shameful to mention that our Saviour was a Jew. The Romans were peculiarly tolerant of religions and customs; by conquest their empire had absorbed men of all languages and creeds, and they usually left them undisturbed; but the Jewish faith was too peculiar and intolerant to escape derision and hatred. After the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, the Jews were hunted down, and the connection of Christianity with Judaism so far from being an advantage to it became a serious hindrance to its growth.
3. Nor did the Saviour owe anything to His followers. Shall a world-subduing religion be disseminated by peasants and mariners? So did He ordain it.
4. Our Saviour is a root out of a dry ground as to the means He chose for the propagation of His faith.
5. Neither did the Saviour owe anything to times in which He lived. Christianity was born at a period of history when the world by wisdom knew not God, and men were most effectually alienated from Him. The more thinking part of the worlds inhabitants were atheistic, and made ridicule of the gods, while the masses blindly worshipped whatever was set before them. The whole set and current of thought was in direct opposition to such a religion as He came to inculcate. It was an age of luxury.
6. Neither did the religion of Jesus owe anything to human nature. It is sometimes said that it commends itself to human nature. It is false: the religion of Jesus opposes unrenewed human nature.
II. OUR KNOWLEDGE OF ITS TRUTH EXPERIMENTALLY. You remember your own conversion. When Jesus Christ came to you to save you, did He find any fertile soil in your heart for the growth of His grace?
III. This whole subject affords much ENCOURAGEMENT to many.
1. Let me speak a word to those who are seeking the Saviour, but are very conscious of your own sinfulness. Christ is all--does that not cheer you?
2. The same thought ought also to encourage any Christian who has been making discoveries of his own barrenness. When at any time you are cast down by a sense of your nothingness, remember that your Lord is a root out of a dry ground.
3. The same comfort avails for every Christian worker. When you feel you are barren, do not fret or despair about it, but rather say, Lord, here is a dry tree, come and make it bear fruit, and then I shall joyfully confess, from Thee is my fruit found.
4. Ought not this to comfort us with regard to the times in which we live? Bad times are famous times for Christ.
5. And thus we may be encouraged concerning any particularly wicked place. Do not say, It is useless to preach down there, or to send missionaries to that uncivilized country. How do you know? Is it very dry ground? Well, that is hopeful soil; Christ is a root out a dry ground, and the more there is to discourage the more you should be encouraged.
6. The same is true of individual men; you should never say, Well, such a man as that will never be converted.
IV. THE GLORY WHICH ALL THIS DISPLAYS. Christs laurels at this day are none of them borrowed. When He shall come in His glory there will be none among its friends who will say, O King, Thou owest that jewel in Thy crown to me. Every one will own that He was the author and the finisher of the whole work, and therefore He must have all the glory of it, since we who were with Him were dry ground, and He gave life to us but borrowed nothing from us. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Christ not the product of Palestine
According to Renan, the excellence of Jesus was due to the climate and soil of Palestine! But he forgets to ask how it is that the climate and soil of Palestine have never produced such another! (C. Clemance, D.D.)
He hath no form nor comeliness
Christs humble appearance
While we see no necessity for the Saviour of the world appearing in pomp and splendour, we can point out many important ends that may be answered by His having been made humble and of no reputation.
1. In this state His all-perfect example was of the most extensive benefit. He could exhibit virtues more in number, more difficult to practise, and more generally necessary, than there could have been room for in a higher rank and in less trying circumstances. And the virtues which such a state required from Him, as they are the most difficult to practise, so are they those which are universally useful. The virtues which belong to sovereign power and regal dignity a few only have occasion to exercise. The virtues of that station which He assumed are useful for all to acquire.
2. By His appearing in the humble, suffering state He teaches us how very insignificant in the sight of God, and in the eyes of true wisdom, are all the possessions of this world and all the flattering distinctions of a present state.
3. By appearing in a humble, suffering state He shows us that earthly distress is no proof of a bad character; that suffering is no sure intimation of God s displeasure at the sufferer.
4. By appearing in this state He shows us that it was only the force of truth that engaged and influenced His followers. So strongly are men impressed by the circumstances of high birth, of eminent rank, of great power, the splendid acts of a monarch or a conqueror, that wherever these are found they are eager to show deference and respect. But Jesus had none of these worldly attractions. (R. Bogg, D.D.)
The real character of the Messiah
I. AS TO THE OBJECTION, that Jesus was not the true Messiah, because He did not answer the universal expectation which the Jews had of His being a mighty temporal prince. Considering the natural temper of mankind, and how strongly addicted they are to their worldly interests, and how jealous of everything that thwarts and opposes them, we must allow it to be a prejudice not easy to overcome. It requires a greater zeal for the honour of God and religion than most men are possessed of, to adhere to truth when we are likely to be losers by it. Few there are that have resolution enough to abide by a religion in which they have been educated, when once it comes to be opposed by the secular powers, and the profession of it to be attended with nothing but poverty and affliction: how much more courage then, and firmness of mind, is necessary to make men enter into a religion newly set up, and that is attended with the like disadvantages? But can any one seriously think this excuse of any force? Let him urge it in its true light, and thus must he plead when arraigned at the tribunal of God for unbelief: I would willingly have embraced the religion of Jesus Christ had it been made more suitable to my carnal inclinations and interests; had the rewards it promises been temporal instead of eternal, none should have more industriously and cheerfully sought after them; but when He told me that His kingdom was not of this world, and that I could not follow Him without taking up the cross; without losing, or being in danger of losing, everything that was valuable in life, nay, life itself, for His sake--my flesh trembled at the thought, and human nature, directed me to take care of myself, and to run no hazards for the sake of religion. What sentence can such an one expect but this: Thou hast preferred thy temporal to thy eternal interest, thou hast had thy reward on earth, and canst therefore expect no other in heaven? But the Jew perhaps thinks he has somewhat further to say in behalf of his unbelief--that he was persuaded, from the predictions of the prophets, that the Messiah would really be, what the Gentiles might only wish Him to be, a temporal prince; and, finding Jesus not to be so, they thought it a good reason for rejecting Him. But was this (supposing it true) the only mark by which the Messiah was to be known? How often do we read of His sufferings and ill-usage in the world? Did anybody appear that answered the character of the Messiah, in any one instance, so exactly as Jesus did? The Jews made another objection against Him of much the same kind: that He was brought up, and, as they supposed, born at Nazareth, in Galilee; a country much despised by the Jews, as if there was anything in the nature of the soil or air of the country that rendered the inhabitants of it less acceptable to God than they might otherwise be, and He could not, if He would, produce eminent and bright spirits out of the most obscure parts of the world. The Chaldees were an idolatrous people, and yet God made choice of Abraham, a man of that country, with whom to establish an everlasting covenant, and in whose seed to bless all the nations of the earth. The prophet Jonah, a type of Christ, was born at a place called Gath-hepher, a town of the tribe of Zebulon, in Galilee itself, though no prophet is said by the Jews to come from thence: and Isaiah moreover plainly declares to us, in the description he is giving of the universal joy and comfort that will be occasioned by the birth and kingdom of Christ, that in Galilee of the nations this shall be seen. The people (says he) that walked in darkness, have seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined. So that this objection is as groundless as it is weak and foolish.
II. APPLICATION to ourselves.
1. It greatly behoves us to take care that worldly interest and advantage be not the principal motive that engages us to perform our duty; lest, after the example of the Jews, we fall away from it, when that motive fails; lest, being disappointed of the hopes we had conceived from our attachment to religion and religious men, we become enemies instead of friends.
2. How hard it is for truth to prevail over the prejudices and settled notions of men. (C. Moore, M. A.)
Religion a weariness to the natural man
Putting aside for an instant the thought of the ingratitude and the sin which indifference to Christianity implies, let us, as far as we dare, view it merely as a matter of fact, after the manner of the text, and form a judgment on the probable consequences of it.
1. Religion is a weariness; alas! so feel even children before they can well express their meaning. Exceptions, of course, now and then occur. I am not forgetful of the peculiar character of childrens minds: sensible objects first meet their observation; it is not wonderful that they should at first be inclined to limit their thoughts to things of sense. A distinct profession of faith, and a conscious maintenance of principle, may imply a strength and consistency of thought to which they are as yet unequal. Again, childhood is capricious, ardent, light-hearted; it cannot think deeply or long on any subject. Yet all this is not enough to account for the fact in question--why they should feel this distaste for the very subject of religion.
2. Religion is a weariness I will next take the case of young persons when they first enter into life. Is not religion associated in their minds with gloom and weariness? This is the point that the feelings of our hearts on the subject of religion are different from the declared judgment of God; that we have a natural distaste for that which He has said is our chief good.
3. Let us pass to the more active occupations of life. The transactions of worldly business, speculations in trade, ambitious hopes, the pursuit of knowledge, the public occurrences of the day, these find a way directly to the heart; they rouse, they influence. The name of religion, on the other hand, is weak and impotent.
4. But this natural contrariety between man and his Maker is still more strikingly shown by the confessions of men of the world who have given some thought to the subject, and have viewed society with somewhat of a philosophical spirit. Such men treat the demands of religion with disrespect and negligence, on the ground of their being unnatural. The same remark may be made upon the notions which secretly prevail in certain quarters at the present day, concerning the unsuitableness of Christianity to an enlightened age. The literature of the day is weary of revealed religion.
5. That religion is in itself a weariness is seen even in the conduct of the better sort of persons, who really on the whole are under the influence of its spirit. So dull and uninviting is calm and practical religion, that religious persons are ever exposed to the temptation of looking out for excitements of one sort or other, to make it pleasurable to them.
6. Even the confirmed servants of Christ witness to the opposition which exists between their own nature and the demands of religion. Can we doubt that mans will runs contrary to Gods will--that the view which the inspired Word takes of our present life, and of our destiny, does not satisfy us, as it rightly ought to do? That Christ hath no form nor comeliness in our eyes; and though we see Him, we see no desirable beauty in Him? Light is come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light. If our hearts are by nature set on the world for its own sake, and the world is one day to pass away, what are they to be set on, what to delight in then? What are to be the pleasures of the soul in another life? Can they be the same as they are here? They cannot; Scripture tells us they cannot; the world passeth away--now what is there left to love and enjoy through a long eternity? It is then plain enough, though Scripture said not a word on the subject, that if we would be happy in the world to come, we must make us new hearts, and begin to love the things we naturally do not love. He hath no form nor comeliness, etc. It is not His loss that we love Him not, it is our loss. (J.H. Newman, B.D.)
The love of beauty (in art)
Let us fix our thoughts on one example of that contrast which inspired prophecy and the life of Christ have agreed to reconcile. It is decisively expressed in the contradictory words of Zechariah and Isaiah: the former heralding the King of Sion as one whose beauty should surpass the utmost praise of human words or thoughts Zec_9:7); the latter declaring that those who should see that self-same Christ should find in Him no beauty that they should desire Him. I would try to suggest something in regard to the actual fulfilment of both prophecies in the claims addressed to our sense of beauty, by the revelation of Christianity; believing that there is a deep meaning in that strange and blended force of stern restraint and irresistible charm which this sense has so often owned in the presence of the Crucified; and hoping to show that this too is an instinct of our human nature, which, if we suffer it to act in sincerity and truth, will find its rest for ever in the Person of its Redeemer. Let us, then, notice first that the prophecy of Isaiah is, if we take it alone and superficially, in accord with much that has been written or implied about the influence of Christianity upon the genius of Art. For we are sometimes told, and more often made to feel, that there is something irksome and hindering to the free appreciation and enjoyment of beauty, in those dogmas about the conditions and issues of human life, which are inseparable from the work of our Lord. In various ways it is suggested or proclaimed that Christianity has unduly and too long presumed to thrust its doctrines between the human soul and the beauty which is about it, and disturbed that free entrance into the pleasures of sight and sound, through which every energy might go out to find its satisfaction and its rapture. And so some have already returned feed and foster their sense of beauty by the works and thoughts of those who lived before this tyrannous restraint was preached; others are looking forward to a time when Art may avail itself of the triumph of scepticism, and renounce all hindering allegiance and regard to the discredited formulae of religion; while many more are conscious of a vague expectation that the life of passion henceforward will and should be fleer and fuller than it has been: that hitherto we have been unnecessarily cautious and sober in our pleasures, and timidly patient of undue restrictions; but that now all is going to be much more passionate and unfettered and absorbing, and that, by the pursuit of Art for Arts sake, we enter into an earthly paradise, which has at length been relieved from certain gloomy and old-fashioned regulations, and in which it may now be hoped that our sense of beauty will be a law unto itself. And in this temper very many who little know the consistent significance of their choice are falling in with a course of life and thought which has, as a whole, turned away from the Cross of Jesus Christ: turned away to seek elsewhere the full desire of their eyes, because He hath, as He dies for us, no form nor comeliness, and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. For in truth there is a challenge and a law with which Christianity must ever meet the lover of beauty as he goes out to seek by whatever way the gratification of this sense. The Church of Christ cannot, while she remembers His message, her Master, and her trust, consent to be dismissed from the sphere of taste, or let it be thought that she has no counsel for her sons, as they turn to those high and thrilling pleasures, no means or right of judging the tone and the ideals of contemporary Art. (J. H.Newman, B. D.)
Christianity and the sensuous
We were going to throw ourselves without reserve into this or that enthusiasm of beauty, to steep our souls in the excitement of music, or poetry, or art, to forget all else in the engrossing delight of their eager sympathy, to lay aside every hindering thought, to trust the strong desire of our heart, and measure our interests by their intensity: and Christianity recalls us to ourselves. It sets before us, in the compass of a single life, the full expression of that deep and marring discord which has broken up the harmony of this world, and it urges us to seek within ourselves for the secret of the disturbance and misery. It shows us the Perfect Love rejected, Perfect Purity reviled, Perfect Holiness blasphemed, Perfect Mercy scorned; God coming to His own and His own receiving Him not; the righteous Judge condemned; the Lord of Life obedient unto death; and it says that the cause of this anomaly, the condition which made this the earthly life of the Incarnate Son of God, is to be found within our own souls; and we know that them is something them which seems at times as though it would crucify the Son of God afresh: something which would distort our choice from the high and spiritual to the bestial and mean: something which has often made us cruel and unjust to other men, and contemptible to ourselves. And as before the Cross which mankind awarded to its Redeemer we feel the havoc and tumult which sin has brought upon the order and truthfulness of our inner life, we must surely hesitate before we say that no restraint shall rest upon our sense of beauty, that there is no need, whatever adversaries may be moving about us, to be sober and vigilant in the world of Art. But for those who humbly take the yoke upon them, who, as they turn to the manifold wealth of beauty, do not thrust away the knowledge of their own hearts and the thought of Him whose death alone has saved them, and whose strong grace alone sustains and shelters them--for those the best delights of Art and Nature appear in a new radiance of light and hope, and speak of such things as pass mans understanding. The moments of quickened and exalted life which music and painting stir within them, the controlling splendour of the sunset, the tender glory of the distant hills, the wonder of a pure and noble face--these no longer come as passing pleasures, flashing out of a dark background, which is only the gloomier when they are gone, half realized and little understood: for now all are linked and held together as consistent tokens of the same redeeming, sanctifying Love; they see the Hand, the pierced Hand, which holds the gift; they know the Love which fashioned and adorned it; they have read elsewhere the thought which is embodied in the outward beauty; for it is He who spared not His own Son who with Him freely gives them all things. And all that He gives them prophesy of Him. (J. H. Newman, B. D.)
Christs beauty
It was not a beauty of form, it was the beauty of expression. It was not the beauty of statuary, it was the beauty of life. It is the purpose of God to disappoint the senses. He has victimized the eyes, and the ears, and the hands of men. (J. Parker, D. D.)
No beauty in Christ
Look not on the pitcher, but on the liquor that is contained within. (J. Trapp.)
Christs meanness on earth no objection against, but confirmation of, Christianity
I. Show against unbelievers, that THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF THE PROPHECIES WHICH CONCERNED THE MESSIAH ARE A CONVINCING ARGUMENT OF THE TRUTH OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. It is agreed on all hands that there can be no human or natural reason assigned for such future and remote events as have no visible or natural cause to produce them; but are of a contingent nature, and many times depend on the free choice and will of man; and therefore the prediction of such events must be supposed to proceed from some supernatural revelation. It is the argument whereby God proves Himself to be the Lord, and that there is no other Saviour beside (Isa_43:11-12). By the same reason, he proves the gods of the nations to be idols, and no gods (Isa_41:21-22; Isa_41:29). The prophecies of Scripture, which referred to the Messiah, were of things at such a distance, and of such a nature, that there could not be any probable reason assigned, or tolerable conjecture made of them. And yet there was not one tittle of all the prophecies which relate to the manner or design of Christs appearance in the world that fell to the ground.
II. Show against the Jews, that THE MEAN APPEARANCE OF CHRIST IN THE WORLD IS NO GOOD ARGUMENT AGAINST THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, OR OF ANY FORCE TO PROVE THAT JESUS OF NAZARETH WAS NOT THE CHRIST; and that upon the two following accounts--
1. As the grounds upon which the Jews expected a temporal Messiah, were false and impracticable; false with respect to the spirituality of His kingdom; impracticable with respect to the extent and universality of its blessings and privileges.
2. As the state and condition of life which our Saviour chose in the world was most agreeable to the great ends and design of His coming into it.
(1) It gave a strong confirmation to the truth of that holy religion which He came to plant in the world. Had our Saviour been a victorious prince, that had given laws to the world, and backed the authority of them with the sword, the atheist might then have pretended, that the Christian, as well as other religions in the world, was the daughter of force, and a mere politic invention, contrived by its Author the better to settle and confirm His government to Him, if He should find a favourable juncture to possess Himself of it. But now the effects of the Christian religion on the minds of men, and the methods of propagating it, cannot be ascribed to any human power or authority. Instead of employing the secular arm to compel men to come into the Church, God put a sceptre of righteousness into the hands of Christ: He authorized Him to give such a body of holy and righteous laws to His Church as might be proper to work upon their minds by the gentle methods of reason and persuasion. He made choice of such for His companions and disciples as were men of mean occupations and law fortunes; men as to their natural capacities no ways qualified for so difficult and high an undertaking as the establishing a new religion against the settled laws and powers, the prejudices and passions, the vanities and vices of a corrupt world. The design of the holy Jesus in all this was to show that the excellency of the power which attended Himself and His apostles, in preaching the doctrine of salvation, might not be ascribed unto men, but unto God. He would make way for the reception and establishment of the Gospel in the world by no other means but by the evidence of its truth, the excellency of its morals, the number of the miracles wrought to confirm it, and the simplicity of those who were the first preachers and promoters of it. And, indeed, that the Christian religion, by such mean and unlikely instruments, should in so short a time extend itself so wide, and that they should reap such a harvest of triumphs over so many enemies, seems to have been the greatest miracle of all.
(2) The state and condition of life which our Saviour chose in the world was also a wise and excellent method to recommend the practice of religion to it. The holy Jesus did not think it enough to reveal the will of God to mankind; this He might have done, as God delivered the law in the Mount, by speaking to some extraordinary prophet, and committing what He spoke to a standing writing, without rendering Himself visible. But God gave Him a body, that men might from His own mouth hear the words of eternal life.
(3) The circumstances wherein our Saviour made His appearance in the world were most agreeable to His design of becoming a sacrifice and propitiation for the sins of the world: for though our redemption is attributed more especially to His sufferings and death upon the Cross, as His sacrifice was there finished, yet we ought to look upon it as begun as soon as he was born into the world.
III. PRACTICAL IMPROVEMENT.
1. If the accomplishment of the prophecies concerning our Saviour be an evident proof of His being the great Prophet that was to come into the world, then whatever doctrines He taught are, certainly true and Divinely revealed.
2. From the circumstances of our Saviour s appearance in the world let us learn the duties of patience, charity and humility.
3. In order to humble the pride of our hearts, when we are tempted to bear ourselves high upon any worldly advantages, which give us a superiority above our brethren, let us consider how Jesus Christ, the best and wisest, judged of these things. (R. Fiddes)
Christ uncomely and yet beautiful
How can it be said of Christ that He had neither comeliness nor beauty, since it is said (Psa_45:2), that He is fairer than the children of men, or than the sons of Adam? And in Son_5:10-16 He is described by the spouse to be well-coloured, and likewise well-featured, and she goeth on from part to part, from head to feet; and then concludeth, He is altogether lovely. To this I answer--
1. It is one thing what, Christ is to the spouse, another what He is to the unbelieving Jews Christs beauties are reward, seen of none but those that are inwardly acquainted with Him. The spouse speaketh of Him in a spiritual sense.
2. We must distinguish between Christs humiliation and exaltation, His Godhead and His manhood. In His Godhead He is the brightness of His Fathers glory, and the express image of His person, and consequently full of beauty. In His humiliation He is not only a man, but a mean man Php_2:9).
3. In Christs humiliation we must distinguish as to what He is in Himself and as to what He is in the eye of the world. (T. Manton, D.D.)
The mean not necessarily despicable
Do not despise things, for their meanness, for so thou mayest condemn the ways of God. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Gods use of the mean
As there was meanness in the outward habitude of Christs person, so there is now in the administration of His kingdom; as appears by considering--
1. That the ordinances are weak to appearance; there is nothing but plain words, plain bread and wine, in one ordinance, and only water in another. The simple plainness of the ordinances is an obstacle to mens believing; they would fain bring in pomp, but that will mar all.
2. These ordinances are administered by weak men. Our Saviour sent fishermen to conquer the world, and made use of a goose-quill to wound Antichrist. Moses, the stammering shepherd, was commissioned to deliver Israel; God makes use of Amos, who was a herdsman, to declare His will. So Elisha the great prophet was taken from the plough. And many times God made use of young men, such as Paul, whose very person causeth prejudice; young Samuel, young Timothy, men of mean descent, low parentage, and of no great appearance in the world.
3. The manner how it is by them managed, which is not in such a politic, insinuating way as to beguile and deceive, and as if they were to serve their own ends (2Co_1:12).,
4. The persons by whom it is entertained, the poor (Jam_2:5). Usually God s true people are the meanest, not being so noted for outward excellency as others. This has been always a great prejudice against Christs doctrine (Joh_7:48).
5. The general drift of it is to make men deny their pleasures, to overlook their concernments, to despise the world, to hinder unjust gain, to walk contrary to the ordinary customs and fashions of the world. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Christ assumed an appearance of meanness
This meanness of Christ was willingly taken up by Him.
1. In His birth.
(1) For the time of it. It was when the royal stock of David was come so low that Joseph was but a carpenter by profession. Therefore is the genealogy of Joseph and Mary so carefully sought out by the evangelist, because it was not commonly and publicly known that they were of that lineage. The throne of David was occupied by Herod, who was an Ascalonite.
(2) The place, Bethlehem, a small place. Then He was not born in any stately room, but in a manger in the stable.
(3) Consider how in everything He was found in shape like another child, being circumcised the eighth day.
(4) Consider the oblation that was made for Him, such as was made for poor people. Yet we may observe there was something Divine still mingled with Christs outward, meanness, as the appearing of the star, the trouble of the Jews, the wise mens report and offerings. By these things God would leave them without excuse, and under this poverty discover some glimpses of the Deity.
2. In His life and manner of appearance in the world. He was altogether found in fashion as a man; to outward appearance just as other men, for His growth was as other, mens, by degrees: And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man. His life was spent in much toil and labour, etc. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Poverty
1. Poverty and meanness are not disgraceful. Christ Himself was a carpenter, Paul a tent-maker, and the apostles fishermen. Christ, you see, scorned that glory, pomp and greatness which the world doteth upon.
2. Poverty should not he irksome to us. Christ underwent it before you; His apostles were base in the worlds eye (1Co_4:13). Poverty is a great burden, and layeth a man open to many a disadvantage--scorn, contempt and refusal. But consider, Christ hath honoured it in His own person, and He honoureth it to this very day. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Missing Christs beauty
There have been two traditions respecting Christs person. Some of the Fathers of the Church have declared that He was, Divinely beautiful, the fairest among ten thousand and the altogether lovely. Others have spoken of Him in the words of Isaiah, He hath no form nor comeliness. For my own part I like to think of Him as Divinely beautiful. If in all things He is to have the pre-eminence, why not here as well as there? Certain it is that there must have shone through Him some transfiguring splendour, that awed and fascinated. Men were conquered as much by His look as by His word. If, however, these descriptions of Isaiah refer to His person, and are to be taken literally, then they are very far from being attractive. As a root out of a dry ground. He hath no form nor comeliness. There is no beauty that we should desire Him. We esteemed Him not, or, as Luther translates, We thought Him nothing. The picture seems to be that of a mean and miserable life, tragic, unsettled, menaced, lined with grief, disfigured with wounds. I say seems. For, after all, the fault may not be so much in Him as in us. Beauty may be all about men, yet they may never perceive it, because their foolish hearts are darkened; because they are short-sighted, blind, impure. Ruskins dictum is that joy, affection, veneration are necessary to the beholding of beauty. If that be so, and men know nothing of the joy that rises in one like a summer s morn; if they have never experienced the love that greatens and glorifies all things; if they know nothing of that reverence which recognizes and bows before the highest, it is no wonder that they miss the spirit of the beautiful. Men may have missed Christs beauty from many causes, as men are missing it to-day. Let us seek to discover what these things are that blind us to the holiest, the highest, the loveliest.
I. THE SPIRIT OF CONTEMPT BLINDS TO BEAUTY. Jesus came into this world a Galilean peasant, poor, obscure, straitened in every way. And judging Him by the measure of the scale on which He appeared, men treated Him with disdain, contempt, scorn, remarking, Is not this the carpenter.? How many there are who live continually in the spirit of contempt. They continually look down. They seem to forget that some,of the choicest spirits of earth have dined on homely fare and worn hodden grey, and that the millionaires of ideas have frequently been bankrupts in pocket. How contemptuously the great spirits of the world have been treated by those who were not worthy to unloose their shoe-latchets! Think of Mozart being sent by an archbishop in whose retinue he was to dine with the servants in the kitchen. Think of that same Mozart occupying a nameless grave, for no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day. Odd world, is it not, that will send its Bunyans to prison and give its jockeys ten thousand a year? Aristotle paints his magnanimous man as not apt to admire, for to him there is nothing great. What number of these magnanimous men there must be; men so held in the grip of contempt that, standing in a world crammed full of the rich glories of creation, they see nothing to admire. Now contempt springs from two things: lack of understanding and lack of love. The wise man never despises. God is great, yet He despiseth not any, and those who are great after the greatness of God have ever felt their smallness beside the humblest and poorest of men. They see that behind the dullest life there may be angelic light. Where true wisdom is there contempt is not. Charles V was truly great when, picking up the brush of Titian which the painter had dropped, he remarked that he was proud to wait on so supreme a genius. Men see no beauty in Christ because they have been too ready to despise Him. Contempt springs from lack of love. They thought Him nothing because they never looked at Him with the heart. If you want to discover all that is brightest and best in men you must look at them with the look of love; then will God become aglow to the loving heart in what was mere earth before. Love is wonderful always. There is a magic power about it which can make plain faces shine as the faces of angels. It can fill with light and radiance a cottage home as no gold can do. It can convert worthless trifles into precious heirlooms. So if men would only look at Christ with the supreme look of the soul they would discover that He who seems to have no form nor comeliness will then be crowned with glory and honour.
II. MEN MISS THE BEAUTY, TOO, BY THE CRITICAL TEMPER. Some men there are who start out always with a disposition to criticize rather than to admire. When a young lady once expressed the wish to Hogarth that she might be able to draw caricature, the great satirist replied, It is not a faculty to be envied; take my advice and never draw caricature. By the long practice of it I have lost the enjoyment of beauty. I never see a face but distorted, and have never the satisfaction to behold the human face divine. The great caricaturist had so accustomed himself to look for faults that he could see nothing else. Criticism blinds to beauty. Was not that true with regard to Christ? Look for the beauty in Him and you will discover a loveliness that cannot be chiselled in marble or expressed in colour, but a beauty which, when the soul sees it is ravished for ever, and rapt into an ecstasy of admiration and love.
III. WE MAY MISS THE BEAUTY THROUGH ENVY. Did not men miss His beauty in that way in the days of His flesh? Pilate was keen enough to perceive that behind the seeming air of justice assumed by His traducers the fires of envy burned. He knew that for envy they had delivered Him. The artist who portrayed Envy as a man of mean and misshapen figure, with crouching shoulder, craning neck, distended ears, and serpent tongue, was endowed with a more than ordinary gift of insight. Where envy exists there can be no vision of the beautiful. For it blinds the mind and poisons the heart, and lifts not to a throne, but to a cross. How it blinded the eyes of those Scribes and Pharisees! They saw the beautiful deeds of the Man, how He succoured the weak, the suffering, the sad; they heard His words, flagrant, uplifting, strengthening; they beheld a life spent in doing good; yet so blinded were they by the spirit of envy that this supreme vision of loveliness did not dawn upon them. The penalty of envy is blindness, and until those scales fall from the eyes, all things true and beautiful and of good report, everything of worth in the character and conduct of our fellow-men, all the charm and sweetness of the Son of Man, will remain undiscovered by us.
IV. PREOCCUPATION MAY BLIND TO BEAUTY. Men are so feverishly busy in these days, they live at such express speed, that they often miss the angel at the door. When men are busy here and there they miss the charms of the Eternal. A little more quiet, a little abiding in ones own room, and it would be discovered that Christ is lovelier than painters sublimest dream, and that finding Him one finds a joy for ever. (Cecil H. Wright.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary1892 · Public DomainOn vv2–3Isa_53:2-12. For He shall grow up before Him, &c.
THE GREAT MESSIANIC PROPHECY
Isa_53:2-12. For He shall grow up before Him, &c.
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Among the prophecies of Isaiah, that which is contained in the chapter before us stands eminent and illustrious. Received and interpreted according to the sense attached to it by Christians, it involves in it a striking proof of the truth and divinity of our holy religion. It does this simply as a prophecy, irrespective of its dogmatic or theological character. It is a prediction of what was to come to pass. It is not merely capable of being turned into a prediction by a little fancy or a little ingenuity, but it was uttered as such; it was meant when uttered to be received as such. And it was unquestionably in being—it was written and read—seven centuries before the events which are supposed to have fulfilled it. It is found in a Jewish, as distinguished from a Christian writing—in a writing admitted, preserved, believed, by those who have every reason for wishing this passage altered or expunged. After the appearing of Jesus Christ, a passage like this could not be introduced into the writings of Isaiah by Christians; the jealousy of the Jews would prevent that. It would not be introduced by the Jews; that would be inconsistent with their unbelief. To be here at all, it must have formed an original part of the prophetical Scriptures. Such it is admitted to be—and admitted by the Jew; he preserved and perused it as such before the appearance of the “Man of sorrows;” and after he had seen Him—seen Him “grow up as a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground;” after he had looked upon Him and found in Him “nothing to desire,” “neither form nor comeliness,” nor verdure nor beauty; after he had “hid his face from Him” and “esteemed Him not,” “wounded” and “bruised,” and “imprisoned” and “oppressed” Him, “despised and rejected,” and “smitten Him to death;” after this it was impossible for them to recede. The book was in the hands of both parties, and the passage in the custody of both; the Jew could not have expunged it, for the Church would have detected and denounced the fraud; the Christian would not, for he exulted in its existence and import. It there stands an acknowledged portion of a writing strictly and intentionally prophetic, uttered and recorded as prophetical, hundreds of years before the occurrence of all that it so distinctly and graphically describes. Now, the thing to be observed in connection with these remarks is this—that the particulars of the prophecy are so many, so minute, so singular, previously so improbable, that they could never have been foreseen by human sagacity, and surely never thrown together by any lucky but hazardous guesses. They were all fulfilled, and fulfilled with minute and marvellous fidelity in Jesus Christ. They apply to no other person; to Him they do apply, and apply with an accuracy which would be admitted to be wonderful and which never would be doubted, did it not involve the admission of the truth of His pretensions. That it does this is seen by the simplest of all arguments:—none can foresee future events but God; a clear and indubitable prediction is produced, having long afterwards its fulfilment in the character and history of one claiming a Divine mission; therefore (it is impossible to hesitate) that mission was Divine; He must have sent Him, who foresaw His coming, and foreseeing, foretold it.
Such is the value and use of every prophecy whose character and meaning are clearly ascertained, and whose import can be proved to have met its accomplishment. But the prophecy before us does more than this; it not only proves, in relation to Christ, the truth of His pretensions, but it proves what some at least of these pretensions were; it not only demonstrates that He came from God, but it also demonstrates what He came for—what He came to accomplish for man. If words are to be permitted to have any meaning, if the language of the Bible was intended to be understood, the prophecy is a declaration, positive, unequivocal, distinct—that Messiah was to be made a propitiatory sacrifice. His innocence is asserted, His righteousness declared, His exquisite agony, bodily and mental, alike described; Jehovah is represented as crushing Him, “bruising Him,” and “putting Him to grief,” and “making His soul an offering for sin;” He is Himself depicted as suffering as a substitute, as “bearing the griefs and carrying the sorrows” of others, as “wounded for their transgressions, bruised for their iniquities,” on their account afflicted and stricken and smitten to death, and as having “laid upon Him the iniquity of them all.” Every variety of phrase is employed, as if purposely to render mistake impossible, and to mark the importance of the subject itself.
Many translations of the passage have been attempted, but none succeeds in getting rid of and excluding its pervading idea. The Jew who rejects. Christ, and who applies therefore the prophecy to his nation as a whole, and not to an individual, is endlessly embarrassed by its personal allusion; and the Christian (if Christian he be) who rejects the Redeemer’s sacrifice and atonement, may alter and attenuate the phraseology of the passage, may change and modify and emasculate it, but the great truth cannot be concealed; its existence is indicated and its presence is felt, whatever be the language in which it is conveyed—aye, even in that which is carefully selected, not for the purpose of expressing, but of hiding it. The nature of the work of Christ, the “decease which He accomplished at Jerusalem,” the efficacy of His sufferings, and the nature of His death, “His soul being made an offering for sin”—this truth is so abundantly borne out in the ample and illustrious prophecy before us, that it flames forth, however it may be clothed, just as the glory of Christ’s body, when transfigured upon the Mount, shone through and illumined the robes He wore. It rises up in spite of every effort to reduce and to subdue it, even as the mighty champion of. Israel snapped asunder the new ropes and the green withes by which he was attempted to be bound.—T. Binney: Sermons, Second Series, pp. 6–9.
That this chapter contains a direct prophecy of Jesus Christ is so plain, that I can scarcely conceive any serious objection to be made to it. The principal doubt which is likely to arise in the mind, is that it is so literal and particular as to seem to be rather a history foisted into the texts after the events had taken place, than a prophecy delivered seven hundred years before them. But this doubt is instantly removed, by considering that the Jews, the grand enemies of Christ, were the very persons to whom the preservation of this prophecy was intrusted; that they acknowledge it to be genuine; nor ever suggested a doubt as to its authenticity.
If, then, it is genuine, to whom can it relate? It would be a waste of time to attempt to confute the interpretations that have been given by the Jews of late years, by which it is made to apply to Hezekiah, to Jeremiah, &c. It will here be sufficient to observe, that as in a lock, consisting of numerous wards, that key alone is the true one which fits all the wards; so in prophecy, that only is the true interpretation of any prediction which fits every part of it; and the more numerous and uncommon such parts are, the more manifest is it, in the case of a perfect coincidence, that the true interpretation has been given. I say, the more uncommon; because if events are foretold which cannot possibly apply but to a few persons, the interpretation is then proportionably limited. If, for instance, a prophecy should relate to a king, this would narrow the range of interpretation to those who bore the kingly office; if to a king who had died a violent death, this would narrow it still more; if that death was inflicted by his own subjects, it would reduce still more considerably the number of persons to whom it could be applied. But in the present case there are circumstances so very peculiar that they can be applied to one person alone.
The person here spoken of was to be the servant of God, the arm of the Lord, the subject of prophecy. Yet when he came into the world, he was to be despised and rejected of men; he was not to be received as the Messiah; he was to be put into prison; he was to be brought as a lamb to the slaughter; many were to be astonished at him; his visage was to be marred more than any man’s; he was to be numbered with transgressors, and cut off by a judicial sentence out of the land of the living; his grave was to be appointed with the wicked, yet his tomb was to be with the rich man. And his sufferings were to be of no ordinary kind, and inflicted for no common cause. He was to be wounded for our transgressions, and smitten for our iniquities. Jehovah was pleased to put him to grief, and to make his soul an offering for sin, though “he had done no wrong, neither was any guile found in his mouth.” But after God had thus made his soul an offering for sin, then he was to revive again; to prolong his days; to erect a spiritual kingdom; to sprinkle many nations; to be advanced above kings, who should shut their mouths before him; to be exalted and extolled, and be very high; to see and be satisfied with the effect of the travail of his soul; to justify many by his knowledge; and to make intercession for transgressors.
Now, of those particulars, it is evident that most of them can be applied only to a few persons; some, from their very nature, to none but such a divine and extraordinary person as Jesus Christ; but that to Him all are applicable in the plainest and most literal sense. We may conclude, therefore, that if the real import of any prophecy is clear and indisputable, that of this chapter is so when it is made to refer to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.—Venn.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren1905 · Public DomainOn vv2, 4Isa 53:2 - Isa 53:3.
Isaiah
THE SUFFERING SERVANT-I
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Isa 53:2 - Isa 53:3.
To hold fast the fulfilment of this prophecy of the Suffering Servant in Jesus it is not necessary to deny its reference to Israel. Just as offices, institutions, and persons in it were prophetic, and by their failures to realise to the full their own role, no less than by their partial presentation of it, pointed onwards to Him, in whom their idea would finally take form and substance, so this great picture of God’s Servant, which was but imperfectly reproduced even by the Israel within Israel, stood on the prophet’s page a fair though sad dream, with nothing corresponding to it in the region of reality and history, till He came and lived and suffered.
If we venture to make it the theme of a short series of sermons, our object is simply to endeavour to bring out clearly the features of the wonderful portrait. If they are fully apprehended, it seems to us that the question of who is the original of the picture answers itself. We must note that the whole is introduced by a ‘For,’ that is to say, that it is all explanatory of the unbelief and blindness to the revealed arm of the Lord, which the prophet has just been lamenting. This close connection with the preceding words accounts for the striking way in which the description of the person of the Servant is here blended with, or interrupted by, that of the manner in which he was treated.
I. The Servant’s lowly origin and growth.
‘He grew,’-not ‘shall grow.’ The whole is cast into the form of history, and to begin the description with a future tense is not only an error in grammar but gratuitously introduces an incongruity. The word rendered ‘tender plant’ means a sucker, and ‘root’ probably would more properly be taken as a shoot from a root, the tree having been felled, and nothing left but the stump. There is here, then, at the outset, an unmistakable reference to the prophecy in Isa 11:1, which is Messianic prophecy, and therefore there is a presumption that this too has a Messianic reference. In the original passage the stump or ‘stock’ is explained as being the humiliated house of David, and it is only following the indications supplied by the fact of the second Isaiah’s quotation of the first, if we take the implication in his words to be the same. Royal descent, but from a royal house fallen on evil days, is the plain meaning here.
And the eclipse of its glory is further brought out in that not only does the shoot spring from a tree, all whose leafy honours have long been lopped away, but which is ‘in a dry ground.’ Surely we do not force a profounder meaning than is legitimate into this feature of the picture when we think of the Carpenter’s Son ‘of the house and lineage of David,’ of the Son of God ‘who was found in fashion as a man,’ of Him who was born in a stable, and grew up in a tiny village hidden away among the hills of Galilee, who, as it were, stole into the world ‘not with observation,’ and opened out, as He grew, the wondrous blossom of a perfect humanity such as had never before been evolved from any root, nor grown on the most sedulously cultured plant. Is this part of the prophet’s ideal realised in any of the other suggested realisations of it?
But there is still another point in regard to the origin and growth of the lowly shoot from the felled stump-it is ‘before Him.’ Then the unnoticed growth is noticed by Jehovah, and, though cared for by no others, is cared for, tended, and guarded, by Him.
II. The Servant’s unattractive form.
Naturally a shoot springing in a dry ground would show but little beauty of foliage or flower. It would be starved and colourless beside the gaudy growths in fertile, well-watered gardens. But that unattractiveness is not absolute or real; it is only ‘that we should desire Him.’ We are but poor judges of true ‘form or comeliness,’ and what is lustrous with perfect beauty in God’s eyes may be, and generally is, plain and dowdy in men’s. Our tastes are debased. Flaunting vulgarities and self-assertive ugliness captivate vulgar eyes, to which the serene beauties of mere goodness seem insipid. Cockatoos charm savages to whom the iridescent neck of a dove has no charms. Surely this part of the description fits Jesus as it does no other. The entire absence of outward show, or of all that pleases the spoiled tastes of sinful men, need not be dwelt on. No doubt the world has slowly come to recognise in Him the moral ideal, a perfect man, but He has been educating it for nineteen hundred years to get it up to that point, and the educational process is very far from complete. The real desire of most men is for something much more pungent and dashing than Jesus’ meek wisdom and stainless purity, which breed in them ennui rather than longing. ‘Not this man but Barabbas,’ was the approximate realisation of the Jewish ideal then; not this man but-some type or other of a less oppressive perfection, and that calls for less effort to imitate it, is the world’s real cry still. Pilate’s scornfully wondering question: Art Thou-such a poor-looking creature-the King of the Jews? is very much of a piece with the world’s question still: Art Thou the perfect instance of manhood? Art Thou the highest revelation of God?
III. The Servant’s reception by men.
The two preceding characteristics naturally result in this third. For lowliness of condition and lack of qualities appealing to men’s false ideals will certainly lead to being ‘despised and rejected.’ The latter expression is probably better taken, as in the margin of the Rev. Ver. as ‘forsaken.’ But whichever meaning is adopted, what an Iliad of woes is condensed into these two words! ‘The spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes,’ the loneliness of one who, in all the crowd descries none to trust-these are the wages that the world ever gives to its noblest, who live but to help it and be misunderstood by it, and as these are the wages of all who with self-devotion would serve God by serving the world for its good, they were paid in largest measure to ‘the Servant of the Lord.’ His claims were ridiculed, His words of wisdom thrown back on Himself; none were so poor but could afford to despise Him as lower than they, His love was repulsed, surely He drank the bitterest cup of contempt. All His life He walked in the solitude of uncomprehended aims, and at His hour of extremest need appealed in vain for a little solace of companionship, and was deserted by those whom He trusted most. His was a lifelong martyrdom inflicted by men. His was a lifelong solitude which was most utter at the last. And He brought it all on Himself because He would be God’s Servant in being men’s Saviour.
IV. The Servant’s sorrow of heart.
The remarkable expression ‘acquainted with grief’ seems to carry an allusion to the previous clause, in which men are spoken of as despising and rejecting the Servant. They left Him alone, and His only companion was ‘grief’-a grim associate to walk at a man’s side all his days! It is to be noted that the word rendered ‘grief’ is literally sickness. That description of mental or spiritual sorrows under the imagery of bodily sicknesses is intensified in the subsequent terrible picture of Him as one from whom men hide their faces with disgust at His hideous appearance, caused by disease. Possibly the meaning may rather be that He hides His face, as lepers had to do.
Now probably the ‘sorrows’ touched on at this point are to be distinguished from those which subsequently are spoken of in terms of such poignancy as laid on the Servant by God. Here the prophet is thinking rather of those which fell on Him by reason of men’s rejection and desertion. We shall not rightly estimate the sorrowfulness of Christ’s sorrows, unless we bring to our meditations on them the other thought of His joys. How great these were we can judge, when we remember that He told the disciples that by His joy remaining in them their joy would be full. As much joy then as human nature was capable of from perfect purity, filial obedience, trust, and unbroken communion with God, so much was Jesus’ permanent experience. The golden cup of His pure nature was ever full to the brim with the richest wine of joy. And that constant experience of gladness in the Father and in Himself made more painful the sorrows which He encountered, like a biting wind shrieking round Him, whenever He passed out from fellowship with God in the stillness of His soul into the contemptuous and hostile world. His spirit carrying with it the still atmosphere of the Holy Place, would feel more keenly than any other would have done the jarring tumult of the crowds, and would know a sharper pain when met with greetings in which was no kindness. Jesus was sinless, His sympathy with all sorrow was thereby rendered abnormally keen, and He made others’ griefs His own with an identification born of a sympathy which the most compassionate cannot attain. The greater the love, the greater the sorrow of the loving heart when its love is spurned. The intenser the yearning for companionship, the sharper the pang when it is repulsed. The more one longs to bless, the more one suffers when his blessings are flung off. Jesus was the most sensitive, the most sympathetic, the most loving soul that ever dwelt in flesh. He saw, as none other has ever seen, man’s miseries. He experienced, as none else has ever experienced, man’s ingratitude, and, therefore, though God, even His God, ‘anointed Him with the oil of gladness above His fellows,’ He was ‘a Man of Sorrows,’ and grief was His companion during all His life’s course.
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv3–5General Information:
This can be stated in active form. AT: "People considered him as nothing and rejected him" (See: Active or Passive)
a man of sorrows
"a man knowing all kinds of sadness"
from whom men hide their faces
"Face" represents a person's attention or fellowship. Hiding one's face means to turn away from someone. AT: "from whom people turn away" (See: Metonymy)
he was despised
This can be stated in active form. AT: "they considered him to be worthless" (See: Active or Passive)
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv2–553:2 a tender green shoot . . . in…
53:2 a tender green shoot . . . in dry ground: Such a plant is vulnerable to extinction (cp. 37:27). It can hardly stay alive for itself, let alone provide anything for anyone else. • nothing beautiful or majestic: The servant appeared to have no greatness or self-evident royal splendor (see 52:13-15). • nothing to attract us to him: People like their leaders to be physically attractive and personally charismatic. The servant would be neither.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv2–5 The beginning of Christ’s kingdom shall be small and…
The beginning of Christ’s kingdom shall be small and contemptible in the sight of man, but it shall grow wonderfully, and flourish before God.
Read Isa. 11:1.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv2–5 Isa 53:2 For he shall grow up before him…
Isa 53:2 For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, [there is] no beauty that we should desire him.
Ver. 2. For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant.] His beginning shall be mean and despicable. See Isa 11:1, with the notes. God hid his Son under the carpenter’s son; this the Jews much stumbled at, {Mat 13:55; Mat 13:57; Luk 24:1; Joh 7:27; Joh 7:41; Joh 7:52; 1Co 1:23} that Christ should come without sightly show or state. {a} But they should have known that his kingdom is not of this world. Some of their Rabbis can say, In regno Messiae nihil mundanum. In the reign of the Messiah, nothing is worldly.
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He hath no form or comeliness.] How could he? say, when his fair face was covered, sanguine, sputo, spinis, lachrymis, with blood black and blue, swelths, spittle, tears, scratches, so that Pilate, wondering at it, said, "Behold the man," q.d., he is not dealt with as a man; but being in greatest misery, he deserveth to be pitied.
And when we shall see him.] Here the prophet taketh upon him the person of a carnal Jew, who judged of Christ according to his outward appearance. {Joh 7:14} But what saith the Chaldee proverb? Ne spectes cantharum vel urceum, sed id quod in eo est. Look not on the pitcher, but on the liquor that is contained in it.
And when we shall see him there is no beauty.] Heb., And we shall see him, and no sight or sightliness.
That we should desire him.] And yet he was a man of desires, yea, the "desire of all nations," {Hag 2:7} all over desirable: {Son 5:16} but so he is only to such as have their "senses exercised to discern good and evil." {Heb 5:14}
{a} Humilis Christi prosapia notatur.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv2–5 For he shall grow up before him as a…
For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground; and the reason or occasion why the Jews will so generally reject their Messiah, is because he shall not come into the world with secular pomp and power, like an earthly monarch, as they carnally and groundlessly imagined; but
he shall grow up (or, spring up, Heb. ascend, to wit, out of the ground, as it follows, brought forth, and brought up)
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before him (before the unbelieving Jews, of whom he spake Isa 53:1, and that in the singular number, as here, who were witnesses of his mean original; and therefore despised him, according to Christ’s observation, Joh 4:44; or, as others, according to his face, or outward appearance, as he was man; whereby he sufficiently implies that he had another, a far higher, and a Divine nature in him)
as a tender plant, ( or, as this very word is translated, Eze 17:4, a young twig, which is a small and inconsiderable thing,)
and as a root (as Christ is called, Rom 15:12, and elsewhere; or, as a branch; the root being put metonymically for the branch growing out of the root, as it is apparently used, where Christ is called the root of Jesse, and of David, Isa 11:10; Rev 5:5, and in other places, as 2Ch 22:10)
out of a dry ground; out of a mean and barren soil, whose productions are generally poor and contemptible: either,
1. Out of the womb of a virgin; but that was no ground of contempt; or,
2. Of the Jewish nation, which was then poor, and despised, and enslaved; or,
3. Out of the poor, and decayed, and contemptible family, such as the royal family of David was at that time.
He hath no form nor comeliness; his bodily presence and condition in the world shall be mean and contemptible.
When we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him; when we shall look upon him, expecting to find incomparable beauty and majesty in his countenance, and carriage, and condition, we shall be altogether disappointed, and shall meet with nothing amiable or desirable in him. This the prophet speaketh in the person of the carnal and unbelieving Jews, we, i.e. our people, the Jewish nation.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v4 In these verses we have,
In these verses we have,
I. A further account of the sufferings of Christ. Much was said before, but more is said here, of the very low condition to which he abased and humbled himself, to which he became obedient even to the death of the cross. 1. He had griefs and sorrows; being acquainted with them, he kept up the acquaintance, and did not grow shy, no, not of such melancholy acquaintance. Were griefs and sorrows allotted him? He bore them, and blamed not his lot; he carried them, and did neither shrink from them, nor sink under them. The load was heavy and the way long, and yet he did not tire, but persevered to the end, till he said, It is finished. 2. He had blows and bruises; he was stricken, smitten, and afflicted. His sorrows bruised him; he felt pain and smart from them; they touched him in the most tender part, especially when God was dishonoured, and when he forsook him upon the cross. All along he was smitten with the tongue, when he was cavilled at and contradicted, put under the worst of characters, and had all manner of evil said against him. At last he was smitten with the hand, with blow after blow. 3. He had wounds and stripes. He was scourged, not under the merciful restriction of the Jewish law, which allowed not above forty stripes to be given to the worst of male factors, but according to the usage of the Romans. And his scourging, doubtless, was the more severe because Pilate intended it as an equivalent for his crucifixion, and yet it proved a preface to it. He was wounded in his hands, and feet, and side. Though it was so ordered that not a bone of him should be broken, yet he had scarcely in any part a whole skin (how fond soever we are to sleep in one, even when we are called out to suffer for him), but from the crown of his head, which was crowned with thorns, to the soles of his feet, which were nailed to the cross, nothing appeared but wounds and bruises. 4. He was wronged and abused (Isa 53:7): He was oppressed, injuriously treated and hardly dealt with. That was laid to his charge which he was perfectly innocent of, that laid upon him which he did not deserve, and in both he was oppressed and injured. He was afflicted both in mind and body; being oppressed, he laid it to heart, and, though, he was patient, was not stupid under it, but mingled his tears with those of the oppressed, that have no comforter, because on the side of the oppressors there is power, Ecc 4:1. Oppression is a sore affliction; it has made many a wise man mad (Ecc 7:7); but our Lord Jesus, though, when he was oppressed, he was afflicted, kept possession of his own soul. 5. he was judged and imprisoned, as is implied in his being taken from prison and judgment, Isa 53:8. God having made him sin for us, he was proceeded against as a malefactor; he was apprehended and taken into custody, and made a prisoner; he was judge, accused, tried, and condemned, according to the usual forms of law: God filed a process against him, judged him in pursuance of that process, and confined him in the prison of the grave, at the door of which a stone was rolled and sealed. 6. He was cut off by an untimely death from the land of the living, though he lived a most useful life, did so many good works, and they were all such that one would be apt to think it was for some of them that they stoned him. He was stricken to death, to the grave which he made with the wicked (for he was crucified between two thieves, as if he had been the worst of the three) and yet with the rich, for he was buried in a sepulchre that belonged to Joseph, an honourable counsellor. Though he died with the wicked, and according to the common course of dealing with criminals should have been buried with them in the place where he was crucified, yet God here foretold, and Providence so ordered it, that he should make his grave with the innocent, with the rich, as a mark of distinction put between him and those that really deserved to die, even in his sufferings.
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II. A full account of the meaning of his sufferings. It was a very great mystery that so excellent a person should suffer such hard things; and it is natural to ask with amazement, "How came it about? What evil had he done?" His enemies indeed looked upon him as suffering justly for his crimes; and, though they could lay nothing to his charge, they esteemed him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted, Isa 53:4. Because they hated him, and persecuted him, they thought that God did, that he was his enemy and fought against him; and therefore they were the more enraged against him, saying, God has forsaken him; persecute and take him, Psa 71:11. Those that are justly smitten are smitten of God, for by him princes decree justice; and so they looked upon him to be smitten, justly put to death as a blasphemer, a deceiver, and an enemy to Caesar. Those that saw him hanging on the cross enquired not into the merits of his cause, but took it for granted that he was guilty of every thing laid to his charge and that therefore vengeance suffered him not to live. Thus Job's friends esteemed him smitten of God, because there was something uncommon in his sufferings. It is true he was smitten of God, Isa 53:10 (or, as some read it, he was God's smitten and afflicted, the Son of God, though smitten and afflicted), but not in the sense in which they meant it; for, though he suffered all these things,
1. He never did any thing in the least to deserve this hard usage. Whereas he was charged with perverting the nation, and sowing sedition, it was utterly false; he had done no violence, but went about doing good. And, whereas he was called that deceiver, he never deserved that character; for there was no deceit in his mouth (Isa 53:9), to which the apostle refers, Pe1 2:22. He did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. He never offended either in word or deed, nor could any of his enemies take up that challenge of his, Which of you convinceth me of sin? The judge that condemned owned he found no fault in him, and the centurion that executed him professed that certainly he was a righteous man.
2. He conducted himself under his sufferings so as to make it appear that he did not suffer as an evil-doer; for, though he was oppressed and afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth (Isa 53:7), no, not so much as to plead his own innocency, but freely offered himself to suffer and die for us, and objected nothing against it. This takes away the scandal of the cross, that he voluntarily submitted to it, for great and holy ends. By his wisdom he could have evaded the sentence, and by his power have resisted the execution; but thus it was written, and thus it behoved him to suffer. This commandment he received from his Father, and therefore he was led as a lamb to the slaughter, without any difficulty or reluctance (he is the Lamb of God); and as a sheep is dumb before the shearers, nay, before the butchers, so he opened not his mouth, which denotes not only his exemplary patience under affliction (Psa 39:9), and his meekness under reproach (Psa 38:13), but his cheerful compliance with his Father's will. Not my will, but thine be done. Lo, I come. By this will we are sanctified, his making his own soul, his own life, an offering for our sin.
3. It was for our good, and in our stead, that Jesus Christ suffered. This is asserted here plainly and fully, and in a very great variety of emphatical expressions.
(1.) It is certain that we are all guilty before God. We have all sinned, and have come short of the glory of God (Isa 53:6): All we like sheep have gone astray, one as well as another. The whole race of mankind lies under the stain of original corruption, and every particular person stands charged with many actual transgressions. We have all gone astray from God our rightful owner, alienated ourselves from him, from the ends he designed us to move towards and the way he appointed us to move in. We have gone astray like sheep, which are apt to wander, and are unapt, when they have gone astray, to find the way home again. That is our true character; we are bent to backslide from God, but altogether unable of ourselves to return to him. This is mentioned not only as our infelicity (that we go astray from the green pastures and expose ourselves to the beasts of prey), but as our iniquity. We affront God in going astray from him, for we turn aside every one to his own way, and thereby set up ourselves, and our own will, in competition with God and his will, which is the malignity of sin. Instead of walking obediently in God's way, we have turned wilfully and stubbornly to our own way, the way of our own heart, the way that our own corrupt appetites and passions lead us to. We have set up for ourselves, to be our own masters, our own carvers, to do what we will and have what we will. Some think it intimates our own evil way, in distinction from the evil way of others. Sinners have their own iniquity, their beloved sin, which does most easily beset them, their own evil way, that they are particularly fond of and bless themselves in.
(2.) Our sins are our sorrows and our griefs (Isa 53:4), or, as it may be read, our sicknesses and our wounds: the Septuagint reads it, our sins; and so the apostle, Pe1 2:24. Our original corruptions are the sickness and disease of the soul, an habitual indisposition; our actual transgressions are the wounds of the soul, which put conscience to pain, if it be not seared and senseless. Or our sins are called our griefs and sorrows because all our griefs and sorrows are owing to our sins and our sins deserve all our griefs and sorrows, even those that are most extreme and everlasting.
(3.) Our Lord Jesus was appointed and did undertake to make satisfaction for our sins and so to save us from the penal consequences of them. [1.] He was appointed to do it, by the will of his Father; for the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. God chose him to be the Saviour of poor sinners and would have him to save them in this way, by bearing their sins and the punishment of them; not the idem - the same that we should have suffered, but the tantundem - that which was more than equivalent for the maintaining of the honour of the holiness and justice of God in the government of the world. Observe here, First, In what way we are saved from the ruin to which by sin we had become liable - by laying our sins on Christ, as the sins of the offerer were laid upon the sacrifice and those of all Israel upon the head of the scape-goat. Our sins were made to meet upon him (so the margin reads it); the sins of all that he was to save, from every place and every age, met upon him, and he was met with for them. They were made to fall upon him (so some read it) as those rushed upon him that came with swords and staves to take him. The laying of our sins upon Christ implies the taking of them off from us; we shall not fall under the curse of the law if we submit to the grace of the gospel. They were laid upon Christ when he was made sin (that is, a sin-offering) for us, and redeemed us from the curse of the law by being made a curse for us; thus he put himself into a capacity to make those easy that come to him heavily laden under the burden of sin. See Psa 40:6-12. Secondly, By whom this was appointed. It was the Lord that laid our iniquities on Christ; he contrived this way of reconciliation and salvation, and he accepted of the vicarious satisfaction Christ was to make. Christ was delivered to death by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. None but God had power to lay our sins upon Christ, both because the sin was committed against him and to him the satisfaction was to be made, and because Christ, on whom the iniquity was to be laid, was his own Son, the Son of his love, and his holy child Jesus, who himself knew no sin. Thirdly, For whom this atonement was to be made. It was the iniquity of us all that was laid on Christ; for in Christ there is a sufficiency of merit for the salvation of all, and a serious offer made of that salvation to all, which excludes none that do not exclude themselves. It intimates that this is the one only way of salvation. All that are justified are justified by having their sins laid on Jesus Christ, and, though they were ever so many, he is able to bear the weight of them all. [2.] He undertook to do it. God laid upon him our iniquity; but did he consent to it? Yes, he did; for some think that the true reading of the next words (Isa 53:7) is, It was exacted, and he answered; divine justice demanded satisfaction for our sins, and he engaged to make the satisfaction. He became our surety, not as originally bound with us, but as bail to the action: "Upon me be the curse, my Father." And therefore, when he was seized, he stipulated with those into whose hands he surrendered himself that that should be his disciples' discharge: If you seek me, let these go their way, Joh 18:8. By his own voluntary undertaking he made himself responsible for our debt, and it is well for us that he was responsible. Thus he restored that which he took not away.
(4.) Having undertaken our debt, he underwent the penalty. Solomon says: He that is surety for a stranger shall smart for it. Christ, being surety for us, did smart for it. [1.] He bore our griefs and carried our sorrows, Isa 53:4. He not only submitted to the common infirmities of human nature, and the common calamities of human life, which sin had introduced, but he underwent the extremities of grief, when he said, My soul is exceedingly sorrowful. He made the sorrows of this present time heavy to himself, that he might make them light and easy for us. Sin is the wormwood and the fall in the affliction and the misery. Christ bore our sins, and so bore our griefs, bore them off us, that we should never be pressed above measure. This is quoted (Mat 8:17) with application to the compassion Christ had for the sick that came to him to be cured and the power he put forth to cure them. [2.] He did this by suffering for our sins (Isa 53:5): He was wounded for our transgressions, to make atonement for them and to purchase for us the pardon of them. Our sins were the thorns in his head, the nails in his hands and feet, the spear in his side. Wounds and bruises were the consequences of sin, what we deserved and what we had brought upon ourselves, Isa 1:6. That these wounds and bruises, though they are painful, may not be mortal, Christ was wounded for our transgressions, was tormented or pained (the word is used for the pains of a woman in travail) for our revolts and rebellions. He was bruised, or crushed, for our iniquities; they were the procuring cause of his death. To the same purport is Isa 53:8, for the transgression of my people was he smitten, the stroke was upon him that should have been upon us; and so some read it, He was cut off for the iniquity of my people, unto whom the stroke belonged, or was due. He was delivered to death for our offences, Rom 4:25. Hence it is said to be according to the scriptures, according to this scripture, that Christ died for our sins, Co1 15:3. Some read this, by the transgressions of my people; that is, by the wicked hands of the Jews, who were, in profession, God's people, he was stricken, was crucified and slain, Act 2:23. But, doubtless, we are to take it in the former sense, which is abundantly confirmed by the angel's prediction of the Messiah's undertaking, solemnly delivered to Daniel, that he shall finish transgression, make an end of sin, and make reconciliation for iniquity, Dan 9:24.
(5.) The consequence of this to us is our peace and healing, Isa 53:5. [1.] Hereby we have peace: The chastisement of our peace was upon him; he, by submitting to these chastisements, slew the enmity, and settled an amity, between God and man; he made peace by the blood of his cross. Whereas by sin we had become odious to God's holiness and obnoxious to his justice, through Christ God is reconciled to us, and not only forgives our sins and saves us from ruin, but takes us into friendship and fellowship with himself, and thereby peace (that is, all good) comes unto us, Col 1:20. He is our peace, Eph 2:14. Christ was in pain that we might be at ease; he gave satisfaction to the justice of God that we might have satisfaction in our own minds, might be of good cheer, knowing that through him our sins are forgiven us. [2.] Hereby we have healing; for by his stripes we are healed. Sin is not only a crime, for which we were condemned to die and which Christ purchased for us the pardon of, but it is a disease, which tends directly to the death of our souls and which Christ provided for the cure of. By his stripes (that is, the sufferings he underwent) he purchased for us the Spirit and grace of God to mortify our corruptions, which are the distempers of our souls, and to put our souls in a good state of health, that they may be fit to serve God and prepared to enjoy him. And by the doctrine of Christ's cross, and the powerful arguments it furnishes us with against sin, the dominion of sin is broken in us and we are fortified against that which feeds the disease.
(6.) The consequence of this to Christ was his resurrection and advancement to perpetual honour. This makes the offence of the cross perfectly to cease; he yielded himself to die as a sacrifice, as a lamb, and, to make it evident that the sacrifice he offered of himself was accepted, we are told here, Isa 53:8, [1.] That he was discharged: He was taken from prison and from judgment; whereas he was imprisoned in the grave under a judicial process, lay there under an arrest for our debt, and judgment seemed to be given against him, he was by an express order from heaven taken out of the prison of the grave, an angel was sent on purpose to roll away the stone and set him at liberty, by which the judgment given against him was reversed and taken off; this redounds not only to his honour, but to our comfort; for, being delivered for our offences, he was raised again for our justification. That discharge of the bail amounted to a release of the debt. [2.] That he was preferred: Who shall declare his generation? his age, or continuance (so the word signifies), the time of his life? He rose to die no more; death had no more dominion over him. He that was dead is alive, and lives for evermore; and who can describe that immortality to which he rose, or number the years and ages of it? And he is advanced to this eternal life because for the transgression of his people he became obedient to death. We may take it as denoting the time of his usefulness, as David is said to serve his generation, and so to answer the end of living. Who can declare how great a blessing Christ by his death and resurrection will be to the world? Some by his generation understand his spiritual seed: Who can count the vast numbers of converts that shall by the gospel be begotten to him, like the dew of the morning?
When thus exalted he shall live to see
A numberless believing progeny
Of his adopted sons; the godlike race
Exceed the stars that heav'n's high arches grace.
- Sir R. Blackmore
Of this generation of his let us pray, as Moses did for Israel, The Lord God of our fathers make them a thousand times so many more as they are, and bless them as he has promised them, Deu 1:11.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv2–5 For he shall grow up before him as a…
For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant,.... Which springs out of the earth without notice; low in its beginning, slow in its growth, liable to be crushed with the foot, or destroyed with the frost, and no great probability of its coming to any perfection; or rather as a little "sucker", as the word (b) signifies, which grows out of the root of a tree, at some little distance from it, of which no notice or care is taken, nor anything hoped for from it; and the figure denotes the mean and unpromising appearance of Christ at his incarnation; which is the reason given why the Jews in general disbelieved, rejected, and despised him; for this phrase of "growing up" does not design his exaltation, or rising up from a low to a high estate; but his mean entrance into the world, like that of the springing up of a low and insignificant plant or shrub out of the earth: and the phrase "before him" is to be understood either of God the Father, by whom he was taken notice of, though not by men; and in whose sight he was precious, though despised by men; or his growing up, and the manner of it, or his mean appearance, were all before the Lord, and according to his will: or else it may be understood of Christ himself, and be rendered "before himself", who was meek and lowly, and was mean and low in his own eyes; or rather it may be interpreted of the unbelieving Jew, of any or everyone of them that did not believe the report concerning him: because before him, in the sight of everyone of them, he sprung up in the manner described; unless it can be thought that it would be better rendered "to his face" (c); or "to his appearance"; that is, as to his outward appearance, in the external view of him, so he grew up:
and as a root out of a dry ground; or rather, "as a branch from a root out of a dry ground"; agreeably to Isa 11:1, meaning not so much the land of Judea, where he was born; or the country of Galilee, where he was brought up; as the family of David, from whence he sprung, which was reduced to a very low condition when he was born of it; his supposed father being a carpenter, and his real mother a poor virgin in Nazareth, though both of the lineage and house of David; from this passage the ancient Jews (d) are said to conclude that the Messiah would be born without a father, or the seed of man:
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he hath no form nor comeliness; like a poor plant or shrub just crept out of the ground, in a dry and barren soil, ready to wither away as soon as up; has no strength nor straightness, of body; without verdure, leaves, blossom, and fruit things which make plants comely and beautiful. This regards not the countenance of Christ, which probably was comely, as were his types Moses and David; since he is said to be "fairer than the children of men"; and since his human nature was the immediate produce of the Holy Ghost, and without sin: but his outward circumstances; there was no majesty in him, or signs of it; it did not look probable that he would be a tall cedar, or a prince in Israel, much less the Prince Messiah; he was born of mean parents; brought up in a contemptible part of the country; lived in a town out of which no good is said to come; dwelt in a mean cottage, and worked at a trade:
and when we shall see him: as he grows up, and comes into public life and service, declaring himself, or declared by others, to be the Messiah: here the prophet represents the Jews that would live in Christ's time, who would see his person, hear his doctrines, and be witnesses of his miracles, and yet say,
there is no beauty, that we should desire him; or "sightliness" (e) in him; nothing that looks grand and majestic, or like a king; they not beholding with an eye of faith his glory, as the glory of the only begotten of the Father; only viewing him in his outward circumstances, and so made their estimate of him; they expected the Messiah as a temporal prince, appearing in great pomp and state, to deliver them from the Roman yoke, and restore their nation to its former splendour and glory; and being disappointed herein was the true reason of their unbelief, before complained of, and why they did not desire him, who is the desire of all nations.
(b) , Sept.; , Theodotion, vox a "lac sugere, proprie lactantem significat", Rivet. Sanctius, "surculus tener, veluti laetens", Forerius. (c) "ad faciem suam, vel in facie, sua", Rivet.; "quoad conspectum, vel quoad faciem suam, seu faciem ejus", Sanctius. (d) R. Hadarson apud Galatia, de Arcan. Cathol. Ver. l. 8. c. 2. p. 549. (e) "non aspectus", Munster: Vatablus, Pagninus, Montanus; "nulla spectabilis forma", Vitringa.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv2–5 As a root - And the reason why the…
As a root - And the reason why the Jews will generally reject their Messiah, is, because he shall not come into the world with secular pomp, but he shall grow up, (or spring up, out of the ground) before him, (before the unbelieving Jews, of whom he spake ver. 1, and that in the singular number, as here, who were witnesses of his mean original; and therefore despised him) as a tender plant (small and inconsiderable) and as a root, or branch, grows out of a dry, barren ground. No form - His bodily presence shall be mean and contemptible. No beauty - This the prophet speaks in the person of the unbelieving Jews. We - Our people, the Jewish nation.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv2–5 Verse 2. See Clarke on Isa 53:1.
Verse 2. See Clarke on Isa 53:1.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv2, 4 Isa 53:2-3. For he shall grow up, &c. —…
Isa 53:2-3. For he shall grow up, &c. — And the reason why the Jews will generally reject their Messiah is, because he shall not come into the world with secular pomp, but he shall grow up, (or, spring up, out of the ground,) before him, (before the unbelieving Jews, of whom he spake, Isa 53:1, and that in the singular number, as here, who were witnesses of his mean original; and therefore despised him,) as a tender plant, (small and inconsiderable,) and as a root, or branch, grows out of a dry, barren ground, whose productions are generally poor and contemptible. He hath no form, &c. — His bodily presence and condition in the world shall be mean and despicable. And when we see him, there is no beauty, &c. — When we, that is, our people, the Jewish nation, shall look upon him, expecting to find incomparable beauty and majesty in his countenance and demeanour, we shall be altogether disappointed, and shall meet with nothing desirable in him. This the prophet speaks in the persons of the carnal and unbelieving Jews. There was a great deal of true beauty in him, the beauty of holiness, and the beauty of goodness, enough to render him the desire of all nations; but the far greater part of those among whom he lived and conversed saw none of this beauty; for it was spiritually discerned. Observe, reader, carnal minds see no excellence in the Lord Jesus; nothing that should induce them to desire an acquaintance with, or interest in him. Nay, he is not only not desired, but he is despised and rejected — As one unworthy of the company and conversation of all men; despised as a mean man, rejected as a bad man, a deceiver of the people, an impostor, a blasphemer, an associate of Satan. He was the stone which the builders refused; they would not have him to reign over them. A man of sorrows — Whose whole life was filled with, and, in a manner, made up of, a succession of sorrows and sufferings; and acquainted with grief — Who had constant experience of, and familiar converse with, grievous afflictions. And we hid, &c. — We scorned to look upon him; or we looked another way, and his sufferings were nothing to us; though never sorrow was like unto his sorrows.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv2–5 For he shall grow up before him - In…
For he shall grow up before him - In this verse, the prophet describes the humble appearance of the Messiah, and the fact that there was nothing in his personal aspect that corresponded to the expectations that bad been formed of him; nothing that should lead them to desire him as their expected deliverer, but everything that could induce them to reject him. He would be of so humble an origin, and with so little that was magnificent in his external appear ance, that the nation would despise him. The word rendered ‘he shall grow up’ (ויעל vaya‛al, from עלה ‛âlâh), means properly, “to go up, to ascend.” Here it evidently applies to the Redeemer as growing up in the manner of a shoot or sucker that springs out of the earth. It means that he would start, as it were, from a decayed stock or stump, as a shoot springs up from a root that is apparently dead. It does not refer to his manner of life before his entrance on the public work of the ministry; not to the mode and style of his education; but to his starting as it were out of a dry and sterile soil where any growth could not be expected, or from a stump or stock that was apparently dead (see the notes at Isa 11:1). The phrase ‘before him’ (לפניו lepânâyv), refers to Yahweh. He would be seen and observed by him, although unknown to the world. The eyes of people would not regard him as the Messiah while he was growing up, but Yahweh would, and his eye would be continually upon him.
As a tender plant - The word used here (יונק yônēq, from ינק yânaq, to suck, Job 3:12; Son 8:1; Joe 2:16), may be applied either to a suckling, a sucking child Deu 32:25; Psa 8:3, or to a sucker, a sprout, a shoot of a tree Job 8:16; Job 14:7; Job 15:30; Eze 17:22; Hos 14:7. Jerome here renders it, Virgultum. The Septuagint renders it, Ἀνηγγείλαμεν ὡς παιδίον ἐναντίον αὐτοῦ anēngeilamen hōs paidion enantion autou - ‘We have made proclamation as a child before him.’ But what idea they attached to it, it is impossible now to say; and equally so to determine how they came to make such a translation. The Chaldee also, leaving the idea that it refers to the Messiah, renders it, ‘And the righteous shall be magnified before him as branches which flourish, and as the tree which sends its roots by the fountains of water; thus shall the holy nation be increased in the land.’ The Syriac translates it, ‘He shall grow up before him as an infant.’ The idea in the passage is plain. It is, that the Messiah would spring up as from an ancient and decayed stock, like a tender shoot or sucker. He would be humble and unpretending in his origin, and would be such that they who had expected a splendid prince would be led to overlook and despise him.
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And as a root - (וכשׁרשׁ vekashoresh). The word ‘root’ here is evidently used by synecdoche for the sprout that starts up from a root (see the notes at Isa 11:10, where the word is used in the same sense).
Out of a dry ground - In a barren waste, or where there is no moisture. Such a sprout or shrub is small, puny, and withered up. Such shrubs spring up in deserts, where they are stinted for want of moisture, and they are most striking objects to represent that which is humble and unattractive in its personal appearance. The idea here is, that the Messiah would spring from an ancient family decayed, but in whose root, so to speak, there would be life, as there is remaining life in the stump of a tree that is fallen down; but that there would be nothing in his external appearance that would attract attention, or meet the expectations of the nation. Even then he would not be like a plant of vigorous growth supplied with abundant rains, and growing in a rich and fertile soil, but he would be like the stinted growth of the sands of the desert. Can anything be more strikingly expressive of the actual appearance of the Redeemer, as compared with the expectation of the Jews? Can there be found anywhere a more striking fulfillment of a prophecy than this? And how will the infidel answer the argument thus furnished for the fact that Isaiah was inspired, and that his record was true?
He hath no form - That is, no beauty. He has not the beautiful form which was anticipated; the external glory which it was supposed he would assume. On the meaning of the word ‘form,’ see the notes at Isa 52:14. It is several times used in the sense of beautiful form or figure (Gen 29:17; Gen 39:6; Gen 41:18; Deu 21:11; Est 2:17; compare 1Sa 16:18). Here it means the same as beautiful form or appearance, and refers to his state of abasement rather than to his own personal beauty. There is no evidence that in person he was in any way deformed, or otherwise than beautiful, except as excessive grief may have changed his natural aspect (see the note at Isa 52:14).
Nor comeliness - (הדר hâdâr). This word is translated honor, glory, majesty Deu 33:17; Psa 29:4; Psa 149:9; Dan 11:20; excellency Isa 35:2; beauty Pro 20:29; Psa 110:3; 2Ch 20:21. It may be applied to the countenance, to the general aspect, or to the ornaments or apparel of the person. Here it refers to the appearance of the Messiah, as having nothing that was answerable to their expectations. He had no robes of royalty; no diadem sparkling on his brow; no splendid retinue; no gorgeous array.
And when we shall see him - This should be connected with the previous words, and should be translated, ‘that we should regard him, or attentively look upon him.’ The idea is, that there was in his external appearance no such beauty as to lead them to look with interest and attention upon him; nothing that should attract them, as people are attracted by the dazzling and splendid objects of this world. If they saw him, they immediately looked away from him as if he were unworthy of their regard.
There is no beauty that we should desire him - He does not appear in the form which we had anticipated. He does not come with the regal pomp and splendor which it was supposed he would assmne. He is apparently of humble rank; has few attendants, and has disappointed wholly the expectation of the nation. In regard to the personal appearance of the Redeemer, it is remarkable that the New Testament has given us no information. Not a hint is dropped in reference to his height of stature, or his form; respecting the color of his hair, his eyes, or his complexion. In all this, on which biographers are usually so full and particular, the evangelists are wholly silent. There was evidently design in this; and the purpose was probably to prevent any painting, statuary, or figure of the Redeemer, that would have any claim to being regarded as correct or true. As it stands in the New Testament, there is lust the veil of obscurity thrown over this whole subject which is most favorable for the contemplation of the incarnate Deity. We are told flint he was a man; we are told also that he was God. The image to the mind’s eye is as obscure in the one case as the other; and in both, we are directed to his moral beauty, his holiness, and benevolence, as objects of contemplation, rather than to his external appearance or form.
It may be added that there is no authentic information in regard to his appearance that has come down to us by tradition. All the works of sculptors and painters in attempting to depict his form are the mere works of fancy, and are undoubtedly as unlike the glorious reality as they are contrary to the spirit and intention of the Bible. There is, indeed, a letter extant which is claimed by some to have been written by Publius Lentulus, to the Emperor Tiberius, in the time when the Saviour lived, and which gives a description of his personal appearance. As this is the only legend of antiquity which even claims to be a description of his person, and as it is often printed, and is regarded as a curiosity, it may not be improper here to present it in a note. This letter is pronounced by Calmer to be spurious, and it has been abundantly proved to be so by Prof. Robinson (see Bib. Rep. vol. ii. pp. 367-393). The main arguments against its anthenticity, and which entirely settle the question, are:
1. The discrepancies and contradictions which exist in the various copies.
2. The fact that in the time of the Saviour, when the epistle purports to have been written, it can be demonstrated that no such man as Publius Lentulus was governor of Judea, or had any such office there, as is claimed for him in the inscriptions to the epistle.
3. That for fifteen hundred years no such epistle is quoted or referred to by any writer - a fact which could not have occurred if any such epistle had been in existence.
4. That the style of the epistle is not such as an enlightened Roman would have used, but is such as an ecclesiastic would have employed.
5. That the contents of the epistle are such as a Roman would not have used of one who was a Jew.
See these arguments presented in detail in the place above referred to. It may be added, that this is the only pretended account which bas come down to us respecting the personal appearance of the Saviour, except the fable that Christ sent his portrait to Abgar, king of Edessa, in reply to a letter which he had sent requesting him to come and heal him; and the equally fabulous legend, that the impression of his countenance was left upon the handkerchief of the holy Veronica.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv2–5 Plant. Hebrew also, "suckling child." (Septuagint, &c.) --- Ground.…
Plant. Hebrew also, "suckling child." (Septuagint, &c.) --- Ground. The blessed Virgin [Mary]. (Calmet) --- Was. Septuagint, "he had no appearance nor beauty. But his appearance was abject and deficient above all men; a," &c. --- That we. Literally, "and we have desired him." Notwithstanding his abject condition, He was the desired of all nations, and by his wounds we are healed. (Haydock) --- Some assert that the person of Christ was not beautiful, while others think that his wounds prevented it from being discerned. Salmeron would supply a negation from the first number: "We have not desired him."
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2–5 tender plant--Messiah grew silently and insensibly, as a sucker…
tender plant--Messiah grew silently and insensibly, as a sucker from an ancient stock, seemingly dead (namely, the house of David, then in a decayed state) (see on Isa 11:1).
shall grow . . . hath--rather, "grew up . . . had."
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before him--before Jehovah. Though unknown to the world (Joh 1:11), Messiah was observed by God, who ordered the most minute circumstances attending His growth.
root--that is, sprout from a root.
form--beautiful form: sorrow had marred His once beautiful form.
and when we shall see--rather, joined with the previous words, "Nor comeliness (attractiveness) that we should look (with delight) on Him."
there is--rather, "was." The studied reticence of the New Testament as to His form, stature, color, &c., was designed to prevent our dwelling on the bodily, rather than on His moral beauty, holiness, love, &c., also a providential protest against the making and veneration of images of Him. The letter of P. LENTULUS to the emperor Tiberius, describing His person, is spurious; so also the story of His sending His portrait to Abgar, king of Edessa; and the alleged impression of His countenance on the handkerchief of Veronica. The former part of this verse refers to His birth and childhood; the latter to His first public appearance [VITRINGA].
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv2, 4, 5 2, 3. The point of view appears to be,…
2, 3. The point of view appears to be, when Messiah’s sufferings are over, and he about entering into his glory.
He shall grow up — The verb in Hebrew is, as usual, in the prophetic past. Growth has been from the first Messianic germ, (Gen_3:15,) till fully realized in Jesus Christ. Through all its history, the Messianic conception has been as a tender plant, nourished by Jehovah indeed, but very little by men. Its root, the root of Jesse, in itself was vigorous, advancing to the Davidic kingship, itself thus asserting herein its own type of ultimate royalty; then it retired long from view, yet still growing feebly as in a parched land — that of the impure soil of men’s hearts. Except a humble few, men look away from him. He is not of their sort, their character. He is not their ideal Messiah; they do not sympathize with his griefs; they abandon him.
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Rejected — Literally, ceased from men. He thoroughly knows the world’s sins, and its sicknesses, pains, calamities which come therefrom. But he finds few to feel with him. All repel him, turn away the face, despise him. But is this sufferer really the Messiah of the old prophets? So even the old Jews all interpreted till after the Christian era, when their interpretation was cited against them, and they were pressed in self-defense to change it. Even then some fair-minded Jews have continued to regard the passage as descriptive only of Messiah. More, however, apply the passage to the Jews as a body, now in a state of dispersion and affliction. Some hold Jeremiah, and others Isaiah, to be the person meant. These views are upheld by the weakest of arguments. Of course, also, all who deny supernatural prophecy refuse altogether to see any Messianic reference here. But this reference is sustained by the sound sense of all candid interpreters and disinterested sensible readers.
Esteemed him not — Undervalued him.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv2–5 2. The verse seems to take us back to…
2. The verse seems to take us back to the origin of the Servant’s career, in order to account for the powerful prejudices with which his contemporaries regarded him. From the first he had been mean and unprepossessing in appearance, like a stunted shrub struggling for existence in an arid soil. To this corresponded the first impressions of the people, which were mainly of a negative kind; they found in him nothing that was attractive or desirable. Beyond this the verse does not go.
For he shall grow up] Lit. And he grew up. It is not easy to make out such a connexion between this sentence and the last as would naturally be expressed by “and.” If what is here stated were the explanation of the unbelief confessed in Isa_53:1, the proper conjunction would be “for,” and so the word is by many rendered. Others take it as the “and” of consequence (= and so), but the clause is not a statement of what the people thought of the Servant in consequence of their unbelief, but of what he actually was. The phrase “before him” seems decisive on that point, unless with Ewald and others we change the reading to “before us.” With that alteration the whole verse speaks of the impressions men formed of the Servant, and these impressions might readily be regarded as the result of their want of spiritual insight. But if the received text be retained (and there is no sufficient reason for departing from it) the description begins with a statement of fact and then proceeds to the effect on the mind of the people. It is probable that no logical connexion with the preceding is intended. The conjunction may mark the commencement of the narrative, in accordance with a tendency to begin a speech with “and” (Jos_22:28; Jer_9:11; cf. ch. Isa_2:2).
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as a tender plant] a sapling. Cf. Eze_17:22; Job_14:7.
a root (cf. ch. Isa_11:10) out of a dry ground] The “dry ground” might, on some theories of what is meant by the Servant, symbolise the Exile with its political hardships and lack of religious advantages, but it is doubtful if the figure should be pressed so far. The Servant is compared to a plant springing up in such a soil, but whether the prophet thought of his lowly growth as due in any degree to unfavourable circumstances is uncertain.
In what follows hath should be had, and comeliness, majesty. The words for form and beauty are the same as those rendered “form” and “aspect” in Isa_52:14. Both are here used in the sense of “pleasing form” &c.; comp. “a man of form “in 1Sa_16:18, and the Latin formosus from forma, or “shapely” from “shape.”
and when we shall see him] Rather, when we saw him. The clause, however, might (disregarding the accents) be read with what precedes: “… and no majesty, that we should look upon him—and no aspect that we should desire him” (see R.V. marg.). This at least yields a more perfect parallelism in the last two lines.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv2–5 (2) For he shall grow up . . .—The…
(2) For he shall grow up . . .—The Hebrew tenses are in the perfect, the future being contemplated as already accomplished. The words present at once a parallel and a contrast to those of Isa_11:1. There the picture was that of a strong vigorous shoot coming out of the root of the house of David. Here the sapling is weak and frail, struggling out of the dry ground. For “before Him” (i.e., Jehovah) some critics have read “before us,” as agreeing better with the second clause; while others have referred the pronoun “him” to the Jewish people. Taking the received text and interpretation, the thought expressed is that Jehovah was watching this humble and lowly growth, as a mother watches over her weakest and most sickly child.
He hath no form nor comeliness.—See Note on Isa_3:14. The thought which has been constantly true of the followers of the Christ was to be true of the Christ Himself.
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“Hid are the saints of God,
Uncertified by high angelic sign;
Nor raiment soft, nor empire’s golden rod,
Marks them divine. “
J. H. NEWMAN (Lyra Apostolica.)
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv2–5 For he shall grow up; rather, now he grew…
For he shall grow up; rather, now he grew up. The verbs are, all of them, in the past, or completed tense, until ver. 7, and are to be regarded as "perfects of prophetic certitude." As Mr. Cheyne remarks, "All has been finished before the foundations of the world in the Divine counsels." Before him; i.e. "before Jehovah under the fostering care of Jehovah. (comp. Luk_2:40, Luk_2:52) God the Father had his eye ever fixed upon the Son with watchfulness and tenderness and love. As a tender plant; literally, as a sapling, or as a sucker. (comp. Job_8:16 Job_14:7 Psa_80:12 Eze_17:4, 22 Hos_14:6) The "branch" of Isa_11:1, 10 a different word has nearly the same meaning. The Messiah will be a fresh sprout from the stump of a tree that has been felled; i.e. from the destroyed Davidic monarchy. As a root. (so Isa_11:10 Rev_5:5) The "sapling" from the house of David shall become the "root" out of which his Church will grow. (comp. Joh_15:1-6) Out of a dry ground. Either out of the "dry ground" of a corrupt age and nation, or out of the arid soil of humanity. In the East it is not unusual to see a tall succulent plant growing from a soft which seems utterly devoid of moisture. Such plants have roots that strike deep, and draw their nourishment from a hidden source. He hath no form nor comeliness; rather, he had no form nor majesty. It is scarcely the prophet"s intention to describe the personal appearance of our Lord. What he means is that "the Servant" would have no splendid surroundings, no regal pomp nor splendour nothing about him to attract men"s eyes, or make them think him anything extraordinary. It is impossible to suppose that there was not in his appearance something of winning grace and quiet majesty. but it was of a kind that was not adapted to draw the gaze of the multitude. And when we shall see him. Some connect this clause with the preceding, and translate, "He hath no form nor comeliness, that we should regard him; no beauty, that we should desire him" (Lowth, Vitringa, Gesenius, Ewald, Knobel, Henderson, Urwick. But Stier, Delitzsch, Kay, and Mr. Cheyne prefer the construction found in the Authorized Version). No beauty; literally, no sightliness; i.e. nothing to attract the eye or arrest it. The spiritual beauties of holy and sweet expression and majestic calm could only have been spiritually discerned.
Vers. 2-11. "The sufferings of Jesus.
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It is the great object of Isaiah, in this chapter, to declare to his countrymen
(1) that the Messiah would be a suffering Messiah;
(2) that his sufferings would be vicarious; and
(3) that they would have a propitiatory or atoning character.
I THE MESSIAH A SUFFERING MESSIAH. Hitherto Isaiah had looked upon the promised Redeemer on the side of his glories and his triumphs. His names were to be "Immanuel," or "God with us", (Isa_7:14) "Wonderful," "Counsellor," "The Mighty God," "The Everlasting Father," "The Prince of Peace". (Isa_9:6) "Of the increase of his government and peace there was to be no end, upon the throne of David, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever". (Isa_9:7) "The Spirit of the Lord was to be upon him... and with righteousness was he to judge the poor, and to reprove with equity for the meek of the earth, and to smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips to slay the wicked". (Isa_11:2-4) He was to "bring forth judgment to the Gentiles"; (Isa_42:1) he was not to "fail nor be discouraged"; (Isa_42:4) he was to be "upheld ever by God"s hand"; (Isa_42:6) "the isles were to wait for his Law". (Isa_42:4) But now the prophet has to speak in another strain. Psalms probably written before his time (as Ps 2,ps 22,ps 31,ps 40,ps 49, etc.) had partially drawn aside the veil, and given indications that the career of the Deliverer would not be all glory or all triumph. But it was difficult to determine how far they were historical, how far prophetic. It was a part of Isaiah"s mission to reveal, in language that could scarcely be mistaken, the darker aspect of Messiah"s coming, the "contradiction of sinners" which he would encounter, and its consequences. Messiah was to be "despised," "forsaken" (ver. 8), "pierced," "crushed," made sore with "stripes" (ver. 5), "oppressed" (ver. 7), "cut off" before his time, "stricken" (ver. 8), "dealt with grievously" (ver. 10). He was to be condemned by an iniquitous "judgment" (ver. 8), to be "brought as a lamb to the slaughter" (ver. 7), to be "assigned his grave with the wicked" (ver. 9), and "reckoned with transgressors" (ver. 12). His earthly life was to be such as would be best summed up in the brief phrase, "A Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief" (ver. 3).
II THE SUFFERINGS OF MESSIAH VICARIOUS. Men make a difficulty about vicarious suffering; but half the suffering in the world is of this nature. Who that watches by a sick-bed, and supports and props the sufferer, and stays unmoved in a cramped position not to disturb the sick one"s snatch of slumber, but suffers to assuage or remove another"s pain? Who that, hungry himself, passes on to another the food that he might eat himself, but does the same? What mother but bears a thousand discomforts to shield her child from them? What soldier but tries to take himself the blow which he sees must otherwise prostrate his chief? How are the young, who rush into ruinous extravagance which would cripple them for life, saved but by a father or a guardian taking on him the grievous trouble of paying the debts incurred? What do not refined ladies undergo to rescue and recover those among their sisters who have fallen? Men"s and women"s kindness of heart is continually leading them to undergo vicarious suffering; nor is there often any other way by which the sufferings of our fellow-creatures can be removed. If I take the load that is galling another"s back and put it on my own, I do it with the full knowledge that my back will soon ache. If I transfer my wraps to a sick fellow-traveller on a wintry day, I am quite aware that the cold will clutch me instead of him. The vicarious character of Messiah"s sufferings is the direct subject of seven distinct assertions:
(1) "He hath borne our griefs;
(2) "He hath "carried our sorrows;
(3) "He was wounded for our transgressions;
(4) "He was bruised for our iniquities;
(5) "The chastisement of our peace was upon him;
(6) "With his stripes we are healed" (vers. 4, 5);
(7) "For the transgression of my people was he stricken" (ver. 8).
It is indirectly implied in four others:
(1) "The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all;
(2) "Thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin;
(3) "He shall bear their iniquities;
(4) "He bare the sins of many" (vers. 6, 10-12).
III THE SUFFERINGS OF MESSIAH PROPITIATORY. The idea of propitiation is implied in the three passages where Messiah is said to have borne the sins of men. No otherwise can one man bear the sin of another than by doing something which propitiates him whom the sin has offended. But it is further distinctly asserted in ver. 10, when it is said that the soul of the Servant should be "made an offering for sin." As the whole notion of offering for sin was grounded on the idea of expiation, so it was now made plain that the real expiation, the real atonement, the real propitiation, to which the entire ritual system of the Israelitish nation pointed, was the offering up of that "righteous Servant" of the Lord, who, "having done no wrong," having been guilty of no "guile," nevertheless was made sin for man, and became a willing and meritorious Sacrifice. "It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin". (Hos_10:4) It is impossible for sinful man to redeem his fellow-man. (Psa_49:7, Psa_49:8) Only One who was without sin, "holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners", (Hos_7:2-6) could make atonement for others" sins; only One who was perfectly pure himself could purify them; only One who needed none to intercede for him could intercede for his brethren. It is strange how men dislike, and kick against, and endeavour to explain away, the doctrine of vicarious suffering and substitution, and of atonement made for man by the blood of Christ. Yet why should this be? "The doctrine," as Mr. Urwick says, "is in perfect keeping with all that the Jewish ceremonial embodied, and with the teaching alike of the Redeemer himself (Mat_20:28 Joh_10:11 Luk_22:20) and his apostles, St. Paul, (Rom_3:24-26) St. Peter, (1Pe_2:24, 1Pe_2:25) and St. John. (1Jn_2:2) It satisfies the Divine holiness, and the demands of the sinner"s own conscience. It fully recognizes the reality of sin and its exceeding sinfulness, whereas all other attempted explanations tend to make light of sin, or at least to represent it more or less as a matter of human weakness, which a good-natured God will readily pass over and forgive without a ransom. It presents the way of salvation as simple and straightforward; all can understand it; whereas other attempted explanations of the efficacy of Christ"s redemptive work are cloudy, indefinite, mystified, abstruse, and difficult of apprehension even by the learned" ("The Servant of Jehovah," pp. 129, 130).
HOMILIES BY W.M. STATHAM Ver. 2. The depraved eye.
"No beauty that we should desire him." In this prophetic picture of the Christ the question arises, "Who hath believed our report?" What wonderful attestation history gives to this! came unto his own, and his own received him not." Whether the words, "he hath no form nor comeliness," apply to the physical features of Christ, we cannot say; for the Jews had no "art." They interpreted the words, "Thou shalt not make to thyself... the likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath," not as an injunction against "idols" alone, but against all statuary and all art. So, though we have the likenesses of the emperors on the Roman coins, and the Greek statues of Socrates and their wise men, we have no likeness of Christ or his apostles. But we do know the meaning of this, "There is no beauty that we should desire him.
I THE EYE ADMIRES ONLY WHAT THE HEART LOVES. The beauty that eye desired was quite different. It was superficial and carnal, not inward and spiritual.
II THE WORLD DOES NOT ALTER ITS TASTE. The classic virtues of paganism pride, self-reliance, honour are more prized by men of the world than patience, gentleness, pity, forbearance, and charity. Christ is not beautiful to the proud, nor to the selfish, nor to the ambitions and the vain. Only the pure in heart admire and love him! W.M.S.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv2–5 For He shall grow up before wire as a…
Isa_53:2
For He shall grow up before wire as a tender plant
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God accomplishes great things by unlikely means
1.
God prosecuteth and accomplisheth His greatest designs by the most unlikely and despised means. Jesus Christ, the great Saviour of the world, was but a tender plant, which a man would be more apt to tread upon and crush, than to cherish.
2. God cometh in for the deliverance of His people in times of greatest despair and unlikelihood. For when the branches of Jesse were dried up, and had no verdure, even then sprung up the greatest ornament of that stock, although a root out of a dry ground.
3. Mean beginnings may grow up to great matters and glorious successes. Christ, the tender plant, was to be a tall tree. (T. Manton, D. D.)
God to be trusted
You have no cause to distrust God; though He doth not find means, He can create them. The root of Jesse, though there be no branches, it can bear a sprig. God, that could make the world out of nothing, can preserve the Church by nothing. (T. Manton, D. D.)
Christ a tender plant
1. Christ in His humiliation appeared in great feebleness; born a helpless babe, He was in His infancy in great danger from the hand of Herod, and though preserved, it was not by a powerful army, but by flight into another land. His early days were not spent amid the martial music of camps, or in the grandeur of courts, but in the retirement of a carpenters shop--fit place for a tender plant. His life was gentleness, He was harmless as a lamb. At any time it seemed easy to destroy both Him and His system. When He was nailed to the Cross to die, did it not appear as if His whole work had utterly collapsed and His religion would be for ever stamped out? The Cross threatened to be the death of Christianity as well as of Christ; but it was not so, for in a few days the power of the Divine Spirit came upon the Church.
2. At its first setting up, how feeble was the kingdom of our Lord! When Herod stretched out His hand to vex certain of the Church, unbelief might have said, There will he an utter end ere long. When, in after years, the Roman emperors turned the whole imperial power against the Gospel, stretching forth an arm long enough to encompass the entire globe, and uplifting a hand more heavy than an iron hammer, how could it be supposed that the Christian Church would still live on? It bowed before the storm like a tender shoot, but it was not uprooted by the tempest; it survives to this day; and although we do not rejoice at this moment in all the success which we could desire, yet still that tender shoot is full of vitality, we perceive the blossoms of hope upon it, and expect soon to gather goodly clusters of success.
3. Christianity in our own hearts--the Christ within us--is also a tender plant. In its upspringing it is as the green blade of corn, which any beast that goeth by may tread upon or devour. Oftentimes, to our apprehension, it has seemed that our spiritual life would soon die: it was no better than a lily, with a stalk bruised and all but snapped in twain. The mower a scythe of temptation has cut down the outgrowth of our spiritual life, but He who cometh down like rain upon the mown grass has restored our verdure and maintained our vigour to this day. Tender as our religion is, it is beyond the power of Satan to destroy it. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Growth before God
There is one word which marks the difference between the work of God and the work of man. It is the word growth. No human work can grow. For though we speak of a picture growing under the brush of the painter, or of a statue growing under the chisel of the sculptor, this is only a figure of speech.
1. But there is no work of God that cannot grow. This world itself grew into being. It grew up before God as the wild flower does--grew out of chaos, into order and beauty, and we can read on the rocks the story of its growth. There is a greater world than this--the world of Divine truth. And this also has been a growth from the beginning.
2. No wonder, then, that the Son of God grew up before the Lord--that the Lord of nature conformed to the law of nature. The sacred historian is not to be found tripping here, like the medieval romancist. He does not outrage the order of nature by a single story of monstrous precocity. There is not a part of the being of Jesus which he excludes from the order of growth. In body, mind and spirit he declares the child grew up before the Lord.
3. What hope is there here for man! The Son of God had to grow, and the meanest child of man can grow. If we had no power of growth but that which we possess in common with the animal and the tree, then were we of all creatures the most miserable. Because we have in us the power of an endless growth in all that is great and good, we are creatures of the Most Blessed. And we must grow. That is our destiny. Our Christianity is not a piece of mechanism that was finished off at the date of conversion. It is a life that has been born within the soul. We are growing, either upwards or downwards, either better or worse, either to honour or to shame.
4. But how may a noble and Divine growth be ensured? It is a question that is not left unanswered in my text. For we are told that the plant of which it speaks grew up before the Lord. It was the fondest desire of the Hebrew mothers heart that her son should grow up before the Lord. She would rather have him grow up before the Lord in the temple than before the king in the palace. There can be no higher position or nobler prospect for a man than to grow up before his God. The child Samuel and the child Jesus grew up before the same God, but how differently. The former under the very shadow of the altar, under the wing of the old, blind priest, utterly secluded from the common ways of men; but Jesus, at His mother s knee in the village home, in the midst of His little relatives and playmates, among the workmen at the bench, and the old familiar faces in street and synagogue. And so it has become a Christian commonplace that you can grow up before the Lord anywhere.
5. But we are further informed of the special fashion in which Jesus grew up before the Lord. As a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground, we read. But the Hebrew contains a more explicit meaning. It is this: He grew up before God like a fresh sucker from a root springing out of a dry ground The old plant is the house of David, once so glorious in flower and fruitage, at last cut down and withered. The dry soil is the barren religious life of Israel. The fresh young sucker is the Son of Man. That it did grow to what we see is the supreme miracle of Christianity. Its principal evidence is in its own marvellous growth. This is the dilemma in which Christianity still keeps its foes, and to which all additional thought and investigation can only add strength. From such a root, in such a soil, how did Jesus grow to be the Christ of history? It must either be acknowledged to be the supreme miracle or the supreme mystery of time. And this is the one Christian miracle which keeps repeating itself century after century. From the withered plant, and out of the desert soft, God is evermore producing His plants of renown. How was it, for example, that Luther grew to be the man he was, and to wield the power he did? Was it from the withered root of the mediaeval Church or the desert soil of the monastery that he derived his power? Or was he right when he declared the conviction of his heart that it was all by the grace of God through faith? History discloses to us nothing so glorious as these Divine developments of the soul of man. The grace that has achieved these things is in the world as much as ever.
6. Why is it, then, that so many young men are excluding from their ambition in life that of growth in Christ? Why is it that so many of them murmur that the old creeds are dry, and the old Bible and the old familiar Church service, and that even the fountain of private devotion has ceased to water the wilderness? It is because they are not rooted in God and His truth, but are, many of them, like plants thrown out of a country nursery, which lie bleaching in the sun or are blown about by the wind. No wonder that religion seems dry to those who are not rooted in it. Young men! see to it that you go down into the truth which you profess to stand by, whether of creed, of catechism, or Bible, and you will find as much good in it as your fathers did. Thus settled and grounded, seek to grow in everything; put on nothing. All pretence is worse than waste of time and strength. And abjure all forced and unnatural growth, all ambition to fill rapidly a large space. Be content to occupy the ground that God has allotted to you, according to the nature that God has given. (P. J. Rollo.)
As a root out of a dry ground
The root out of a dry ground
Owing to their geographical position, the central and western regions of South Africa are almost constantly deprived of rain. They contain no flowing streams, and very little water in the wells. The soil is a soft and light-coloured sand, which reflects the sunlight with a glaring intensity. No fresh breeze cools the air; no passing cloud veils the scorching sky. We should naturally have supposed that regions so scantily supplied with one of the first necessaries of life, could be nothing else than waste and lifeless deserts: and yet, strange to say, they are distinguished for their comparatively abundant vegetation, and their immense development of animal life. The evil produced by want of rain has been counteracted by the admirable foresight of the Creator, in providing these arid lands with plants suited to their trying circumstances. The vegetation is eminently local and special. Nothing like it is seen elsewhere on the face of the earth. Nearly all the plants have tuberous roots, buried far beneath the ground, beyond the scorching effects of the sun, and are composed of succulent tissue, filled with a deliciously cool and refreshing fluid. They have also thick, fleshy leaves, with pores capable of imbibing and retaining moisture from a very dry atmosphere and soil; so that if a leaf be broken during the greatest drought, it shows abundant circulating sap. Nothing can look more unlike the situations in which they are found than these succulent roots, full of fluid when the surrounding soil is dry as dust, and the enveloping air seems utterly destitute of moisture; replete with nourishment and life when all within the horizon is desolation and death. They seem to have a special vitality in themselves; and, unlike all other plants, to be independent of circumstances. Such roots are also found in the deserts of Arabia; and it was doubtless one of them that suggested to the prophet the beautiful and expressive emblem of the text, He shall grow up before him as a root out of a dry ground. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Christs growth before God
Commentators usually connect these words with the next clause of the verse, and regard them as implying that the promised Messiah would have no form or comeliness in the estimation of men, no outward beauty, that they should desire Him. This, I think, is a wrong interpretation. The words of the text are complete and separate. They speak not of the appearance of Christ to men, but of His growth in the sight of God. They refer not to His attractiveness, but to His functions; and the point that seems to be most insisted upon is, that His relation to the circumstances in which He should be placed would be one of perfect independence and self-sufficiency. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
The root out of a dry ground
In the light of this explanation let us look at the three ideas which the subject suggests to us--
1. The living root.
2. The dry ground.
3. The effect of the living root upon the dry ground. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Christ the living root
1. This emblem is peculiarly appropriate when applied to Christ. He is called the Branch, to show that He is a member of the great organism of human life, in all things made like unto His brethren, yet without sin. He is a branch of the tree of humanity, nourished by its sap, pervaded by its life, blossoming with its affections, and yielding its fruits of usefulness. But He is more than the Branch. There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots, is the spiritual language of prophecy relative to the coming of the Messiah; but the figure is speedily changed, and the Branch is also called the Root of Jesse. This language is most strange and paradoxical. It reveals the mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh. Jesus is at one and the same time the Branch and the Root, the root of Jesse and the offspring of Jesse, Davids Lord and Davids son, because He is Emmanuel, God with us, God and man in two distinct natures and one person for ever; deriving His human life by natural descent from man, and possessing Divine life in Himself, and the author of spiritual life to others. The root of plants growing in a dry ground is the most important part of their structure. It lies at the basis of, and involves the whole plant. The whole growth of a lily, for instance, lies folded up within its bulb. And so Christ lies at the basis of, and involves the whole spiritual life.
2. It is assuredly the most precious, as it is the most distinguishing, feature of the Christian religion, that it places the foundation of eternal life in living relations with a living Person, rather than in the profession of a creed or the practice of a duty.
(1) One of the principal functions which the root performs in the economy of vegetation is to attach the plant to the soil, and prevent it from moving hither and thither at the mercy of the elements. So Christ is the living root of our spiritual life, connecting it with the whole system of grace, the whole economy of redemption. It is only when united to Christ by a living faith that the soul can lay hold on heaven and immortality.
(2) Another purpose which the root serves in the economy of vegetation is to feed the plant. Through the spongioles of the root, the plant imbibes from the soil in which it is placed the needful sap by which it is sustained; and in this simple way the whole important and complicated processes are carried on, by which crude soil is converted into the needful constituents of vegetable matter. For this purpose the root possesses certain structural peculiarities adapting it to its special functions. Just as there is provision made for the growth of the germ in the starchy contents of the seed, until it has attained an independent existence; so there is provision made in the nutritive tissue of the bulb or tuber for the support of the plant which it produces. This function also the Root of Jesse performs in the case of those who are rooted in Him. He is the mediator of the New Covenant; the only channel by which spiritual blessings can be communicated to us. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
The unfoldings of the Root of Jesse
All the individual life of the Christian, with its blossoms of holiness and its fruits of righteousness; all the Christian life of society, with its things that are pure, and honest, and lovely, and of good report, is but a development and a manifestation of the life of Christ in the heart and in the world; a growth and unfolding of the power, the beauty, and the sweetness that are hid in the Root of Jesse. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
The dry ground
There is usually a very intimate connection between a plant and the circumstances in which it grows. Modifications of specific character are produced by varieties of soil; and the wide difference between a wild flower or fruit, and a garden flower or fruit, is entirely owing to the difference between rich cultivated soil and the poor untilled soil of nature. The plants of a dry ground, however, are less dependent upon the nature of their soil than others; they receive from it, in most cases, mere mechanical support and room to expand in, while their means of growth are derived entirely from the atmosphere. Looking at the emblem of the text in this light, we may suppose the dry ground here to mean--
I. THAT HUMANITY OUT OF WHICH CHRIST SPRANG. There are many who regard Jesus as the natural product of humanity--the highest development of human nature, the blossom, so to speak, of mankind. But we look upon Him as a Divine germ planted in this wilderness, a Divine Being attaching Himself to men, wearing their nature, dwelling in their world, but still not of them--as distinct from humanity as the living root is distinct from the dry ground in which it grows. The soil of humanity is indeed dry ground. Sin has dried up its life, its fertility, turned its moisture into summers drought, and reduced it to perpetual barrenness. By the law of natural development, mankind could never have given birth to a character in every way so exceptional as that of Christ. It is true indeed that a few individuals have ever and anon emerged from the dark chaos of fallen humanity, and exhibited a high type of intellectual and moral worth; but such individuals have been completely identified with the human race, and have shared in its sins and infirmities. In Jesus, on the contrary, there was a remarkable remoteness and separateness from men his life ran parallel with mans, but it was never on the same low level. He was independent of worldly circumstances, and superior to worldly conventionalities. He had no joys on earth save those He brought with Him from heaven. He was alone, without sympathy, for no one could understand Him; without help, for no mortal aid could reach the necessities of His case. Like a desert well, He was for ever imparting what no one could give Him back.
II. THE EXPECTATIONS OF THE JEWS REGARDING THE MESSIAH. There are scientific men who believe in the doctrine of spontaneous or equivocal generation. And so there are theologians who assert that Christ was merely the natural product of the age and the circumstances in which He lived; the mere incarnation, so to speak, of the popular expectation of the time. In all their attempts to account for His life, without admitting Him to be a Divine person, they bring prominently into view whatever there was in Jewish history, belief, and literature, to prepare for and produce such a personality and character as those of Jesus; they endeavour to show that the condition of the Jewish world, when Christ appeared, was exactly that into which His appearing would fit; and that all these preparatory and formative conditions did of themselves, by a kind of natural spontaneous generation, produce Christ. In reply to these views, it may be admitted as an unquestionable historical fact, that the expectation of a Messiah ran like a golden thread throughout the whole complicated web of the Hebrew religion and polity. The expectations of the Jews did no more of themselves produce the Saviour, than the soil and climate produce, of their own accord, any particular plant. There was nothing in the age, nothing in the people, nothing in the influences by which he was surrounded, which could by any possibility have produced or developed such a remarkable character as He exhibited. There was no more relation between Him and His moral surroundings, than there is between a succulent life-full root and the arid sandy waste in which it grows. The counterfeit Messiahs were not roots out of a dry ground, but, on the contrary, mushrooms developed from the decaying life of the nation. There was a complete harmony between them and their moral surroundings. They were really and truly the products of the popular longing of the time; they agreed in every respect with their circumstances. The prevailing notions concerning the Messiah were worldly and carnal.
III. THE CHARACTER OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE. Nothing can be more marked and striking than the contrast between the character of Christ and the general character of the Jewish nation--between the excellences which He displayed and those which they held in most esteem. It is said that a man represents the spirit and character of the age and the race to which he belongs. He seldom rises above their general level. But here we have a man who not only rose high above the level of his age and nation, but stands out, in all that constitutes true moral manhood, in marked and decided contrast to them. He was descended from the Jewish people, but He was not of them. He was rooted in Jewish soil, but His life was a self-derived and heavenly life. This is a great and precious truth. Something has come into this world which is not of it. A supernatural power has descended into nature. A man has lived on our earth who cannot be ranked with mankind. A Divine Being has come from God, to be incarnate with us, and to lift us up to God. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
Christ binds humanity into a brotherhood
The roots of the desert, by their extensive ramifications, fix the constantly shifting sands, and prevent them from being drifted about in blinding clouds by every wind that blows. So the Root of Jesse binds the dry ground of humanity by its endless fibres of benevolence and love. The despised and apparently feeble Jesus of Nazareth was lifted up on the Cross, and then followed--according to His own prophecy--the drawing of all men to Him and to one another. Sin is selfishness and isolation; the love of Christ is benevolence and attraction. Jesus unites us to the Father, and therefore to one another. The love of Christians is not to be confined to their own society and fraternity. In Christ they have received expansion, not limitation--universal benevolence, not mere party spirit. (H. Macmillan, LL. D.)
A root out of a dry ground
I. THE HISTORICAL MEANING OF THIS METAPHOR. It applies to the person of the Lord, and also to His cause and Kingdom: to Himself personally and to Himself mystically. A root which springs up in a fat and fertile field owes very much to the soil in which it grows. Our Saviour is a root that derives nothing from the soil in which it grows, but puts everything into the soil.
1. It is quite certain that our Lord derived nothing whatever from His natural descent. He was the Son of David, the lawful heir to the royal dignities of the tribe of Judah; but His family had fallen into obscurity, had lost position, wealth, and repute.
2. Nor did our Lord derive assistance from His nationality; it was no general recommendation to His teaching that He was of the seed of Abraham. To this day, to many minds, it is almost shameful to mention that our Saviour was a Jew. The Romans were peculiarly tolerant of religions and customs; by conquest their empire had absorbed men of all languages and creeds, and they usually left them undisturbed; but the Jewish faith was too peculiar and intolerant to escape derision and hatred. After the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, the Jews were hunted down, and the connection of Christianity with Judaism so far from being an advantage to it became a serious hindrance to its growth.
3. Nor did the Saviour owe anything to His followers. Shall a world-subduing religion be disseminated by peasants and mariners? So did He ordain it.
4. Our Saviour is a root out of a dry ground as to the means He chose for the propagation of His faith.
5. Neither did the Saviour owe anything to times in which He lived. Christianity was born at a period of history when the world by wisdom knew not God, and men were most effectually alienated from Him. The more thinking part of the worlds inhabitants were atheistic, and made ridicule of the gods, while the masses blindly worshipped whatever was set before them. The whole set and current of thought was in direct opposition to such a religion as He came to inculcate. It was an age of luxury.
6. Neither did the religion of Jesus owe anything to human nature. It is sometimes said that it commends itself to human nature. It is false: the religion of Jesus opposes unrenewed human nature.
II. OUR KNOWLEDGE OF ITS TRUTH EXPERIMENTALLY. You remember your own conversion. When Jesus Christ came to you to save you, did He find any fertile soil in your heart for the growth of His grace?
III. This whole subject affords much ENCOURAGEMENT to many.
1. Let me speak a word to those who are seeking the Saviour, but are very conscious of your own sinfulness. Christ is all--does that not cheer you?
2. The same thought ought also to encourage any Christian who has been making discoveries of his own barrenness. When at any time you are cast down by a sense of your nothingness, remember that your Lord is a root out of a dry ground.
3. The same comfort avails for every Christian worker. When you feel you are barren, do not fret or despair about it, but rather say, Lord, here is a dry tree, come and make it bear fruit, and then I shall joyfully confess, from Thee is my fruit found.
4. Ought not this to comfort us with regard to the times in which we live? Bad times are famous times for Christ.
5. And thus we may be encouraged concerning any particularly wicked place. Do not say, It is useless to preach down there, or to send missionaries to that uncivilized country. How do you know? Is it very dry ground? Well, that is hopeful soil; Christ is a root out a dry ground, and the more there is to discourage the more you should be encouraged.
6. The same is true of individual men; you should never say, Well, such a man as that will never be converted.
IV. THE GLORY WHICH ALL THIS DISPLAYS. Christs laurels at this day are none of them borrowed. When He shall come in His glory there will be none among its friends who will say, O King, Thou owest that jewel in Thy crown to me. Every one will own that He was the author and the finisher of the whole work, and therefore He must have all the glory of it, since we who were with Him were dry ground, and He gave life to us but borrowed nothing from us. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Christ not the product of Palestine
According to Renan, the excellence of Jesus was due to the climate and soil of Palestine! But he forgets to ask how it is that the climate and soil of Palestine have never produced such another! (C. Clemance, D.D.)
He hath no form nor comeliness
Christs humble appearance
While we see no necessity for the Saviour of the world appearing in pomp and splendour, we can point out many important ends that may be answered by His having been made humble and of no reputation.
1. In this state His all-perfect example was of the most extensive benefit. He could exhibit virtues more in number, more difficult to practise, and more generally necessary, than there could have been room for in a higher rank and in less trying circumstances. And the virtues which such a state required from Him, as they are the most difficult to practise, so are they those which are universally useful. The virtues which belong to sovereign power and regal dignity a few only have occasion to exercise. The virtues of that station which He assumed are useful for all to acquire.
2. By His appearing in the humble, suffering state He teaches us how very insignificant in the sight of God, and in the eyes of true wisdom, are all the possessions of this world and all the flattering distinctions of a present state.
3. By appearing in a humble, suffering state He shows us that earthly distress is no proof of a bad character; that suffering is no sure intimation of God s displeasure at the sufferer.
4. By appearing in this state He shows us that it was only the force of truth that engaged and influenced His followers. So strongly are men impressed by the circumstances of high birth, of eminent rank, of great power, the splendid acts of a monarch or a conqueror, that wherever these are found they are eager to show deference and respect. But Jesus had none of these worldly attractions. (R. Bogg, D.D.)
The real character of the Messiah
I. AS TO THE OBJECTION, that Jesus was not the true Messiah, because He did not answer the universal expectation which the Jews had of His being a mighty temporal prince. Considering the natural temper of mankind, and how strongly addicted they are to their worldly interests, and how jealous of everything that thwarts and opposes them, we must allow it to be a prejudice not easy to overcome. It requires a greater zeal for the honour of God and religion than most men are possessed of, to adhere to truth when we are likely to be losers by it. Few there are that have resolution enough to abide by a religion in which they have been educated, when once it comes to be opposed by the secular powers, and the profession of it to be attended with nothing but poverty and affliction: how much more courage then, and firmness of mind, is necessary to make men enter into a religion newly set up, and that is attended with the like disadvantages? But can any one seriously think this excuse of any force? Let him urge it in its true light, and thus must he plead when arraigned at the tribunal of God for unbelief: I would willingly have embraced the religion of Jesus Christ had it been made more suitable to my carnal inclinations and interests; had the rewards it promises been temporal instead of eternal, none should have more industriously and cheerfully sought after them; but when He told me that His kingdom was not of this world, and that I could not follow Him without taking up the cross; without losing, or being in danger of losing, everything that was valuable in life, nay, life itself, for His sake--my flesh trembled at the thought, and human nature, directed me to take care of myself, and to run no hazards for the sake of religion. What sentence can such an one expect but this: Thou hast preferred thy temporal to thy eternal interest, thou hast had thy reward on earth, and canst therefore expect no other in heaven? But the Jew perhaps thinks he has somewhat further to say in behalf of his unbelief--that he was persuaded, from the predictions of the prophets, that the Messiah would really be, what the Gentiles might only wish Him to be, a temporal prince; and, finding Jesus not to be so, they thought it a good reason for rejecting Him. But was this (supposing it true) the only mark by which the Messiah was to be known? How often do we read of His sufferings and ill-usage in the world? Did anybody appear that answered the character of the Messiah, in any one instance, so exactly as Jesus did? The Jews made another objection against Him of much the same kind: that He was brought up, and, as they supposed, born at Nazareth, in Galilee; a country much despised by the Jews, as if there was anything in the nature of the soil or air of the country that rendered the inhabitants of it less acceptable to God than they might otherwise be, and He could not, if He would, produce eminent and bright spirits out of the most obscure parts of the world. The Chaldees were an idolatrous people, and yet God made choice of Abraham, a man of that country, with whom to establish an everlasting covenant, and in whose seed to bless all the nations of the earth. The prophet Jonah, a type of Christ, was born at a place called Gath-hepher, a town of the tribe of Zebulon, in Galilee itself, though no prophet is said by the Jews to come from thence: and Isaiah moreover plainly declares to us, in the description he is giving of the universal joy and comfort that will be occasioned by the birth and kingdom of Christ, that in Galilee of the nations this shall be seen. The people (says he) that walked in darkness, have seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined. So that this objection is as groundless as it is weak and foolish.
II. APPLICATION to ourselves.
1. It greatly behoves us to take care that worldly interest and advantage be not the principal motive that engages us to perform our duty; lest, after the example of the Jews, we fall away from it, when that motive fails; lest, being disappointed of the hopes we had conceived from our attachment to religion and religious men, we become enemies instead of friends.
2. How hard it is for truth to prevail over the prejudices and settled notions of men. (C. Moore, M. A.)
Religion a weariness to the natural man
Putting aside for an instant the thought of the ingratitude and the sin which indifference to Christianity implies, let us, as far as we dare, view it merely as a matter of fact, after the manner of the text, and form a judgment on the probable consequences of it.
1. Religion is a weariness; alas! so feel even children before they can well express their meaning. Exceptions, of course, now and then occur. I am not forgetful of the peculiar character of childrens minds: sensible objects first meet their observation; it is not wonderful that they should at first be inclined to limit their thoughts to things of sense. A distinct profession of faith, and a conscious maintenance of principle, may imply a strength and consistency of thought to which they are as yet unequal. Again, childhood is capricious, ardent, light-hearted; it cannot think deeply or long on any subject. Yet all this is not enough to account for the fact in question--why they should feel this distaste for the very subject of religion.
2. Religion is a weariness I will next take the case of young persons when they first enter into life. Is not religion associated in their minds with gloom and weariness? This is the point that the feelings of our hearts on the subject of religion are different from the declared judgment of God; that we have a natural distaste for that which He has said is our chief good.
3. Let us pass to the more active occupations of life. The transactions of worldly business, speculations in trade, ambitious hopes, the pursuit of knowledge, the public occurrences of the day, these find a way directly to the heart; they rouse, they influence. The name of religion, on the other hand, is weak and impotent.
4. But this natural contrariety between man and his Maker is still more strikingly shown by the confessions of men of the world who have given some thought to the subject, and have viewed society with somewhat of a philosophical spirit. Such men treat the demands of religion with disrespect and negligence, on the ground of their being unnatural. The same remark may be made upon the notions which secretly prevail in certain quarters at the present day, concerning the unsuitableness of Christianity to an enlightened age. The literature of the day is weary of revealed religion.
5. That religion is in itself a weariness is seen even in the conduct of the better sort of persons, who really on the whole are under the influence of its spirit. So dull and uninviting is calm and practical religion, that religious persons are ever exposed to the temptation of looking out for excitements of one sort or other, to make it pleasurable to them.
6. Even the confirmed servants of Christ witness to the opposition which exists between their own nature and the demands of religion. Can we doubt that mans will runs contrary to Gods will--that the view which the inspired Word takes of our present life, and of our destiny, does not satisfy us, as it rightly ought to do? That Christ hath no form nor comeliness in our eyes; and though we see Him, we see no desirable beauty in Him? Light is come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light. If our hearts are by nature set on the world for its own sake, and the world is one day to pass away, what are they to be set on, what to delight in then? What are to be the pleasures of the soul in another life? Can they be the same as they are here? They cannot; Scripture tells us they cannot; the world passeth away--now what is there left to love and enjoy through a long eternity? It is then plain enough, though Scripture said not a word on the subject, that if we would be happy in the world to come, we must make us new hearts, and begin to love the things we naturally do not love. He hath no form nor comeliness, etc. It is not His loss that we love Him not, it is our loss. (J.H. Newman, B.D.)
The love of beauty (in art)
Let us fix our thoughts on one example of that contrast which inspired prophecy and the life of Christ have agreed to reconcile. It is decisively expressed in the contradictory words of Zechariah and Isaiah: the former heralding the King of Sion as one whose beauty should surpass the utmost praise of human words or thoughts Zec_9:7); the latter declaring that those who should see that self-same Christ should find in Him no beauty that they should desire Him. I would try to suggest something in regard to the actual fulfilment of both prophecies in the claims addressed to our sense of beauty, by the revelation of Christianity; believing that there is a deep meaning in that strange and blended force of stern restraint and irresistible charm which this sense has so often owned in the presence of the Crucified; and hoping to show that this too is an instinct of our human nature, which, if we suffer it to act in sincerity and truth, will find its rest for ever in the Person of its Redeemer. Let us, then, notice first that the prophecy of Isaiah is, if we take it alone and superficially, in accord with much that has been written or implied about the influence of Christianity upon the genius of Art. For we are sometimes told, and more often made to feel, that there is something irksome and hindering to the free appreciation and enjoyment of beauty, in those dogmas about the conditions and issues of human life, which are inseparable from the work of our Lord. In various ways it is suggested or proclaimed that Christianity has unduly and too long presumed to thrust its doctrines between the human soul and the beauty which is about it, and disturbed that free entrance into the pleasures of sight and sound, through which every energy might go out to find its satisfaction and its rapture. And so some have already returned feed and foster their sense of beauty by the works and thoughts of those who lived before this tyrannous restraint was preached; others are looking forward to a time when Art may avail itself of the triumph of scepticism, and renounce all hindering allegiance and regard to the discredited formulae of religion; while many more are conscious of a vague expectation that the life of passion henceforward will and should be fleer and fuller than it has been: that hitherto we have been unnecessarily cautious and sober in our pleasures, and timidly patient of undue restrictions; but that now all is going to be much more passionate and unfettered and absorbing, and that, by the pursuit of Art for Arts sake, we enter into an earthly paradise, which has at length been relieved from certain gloomy and old-fashioned regulations, and in which it may now be hoped that our sense of beauty will be a law unto itself. And in this temper very many who little know the consistent significance of their choice are falling in with a course of life and thought which has, as a whole, turned away from the Cross of Jesus Christ: turned away to seek elsewhere the full desire of their eyes, because He hath, as He dies for us, no form nor comeliness, and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. For in truth there is a challenge and a law with which Christianity must ever meet the lover of beauty as he goes out to seek by whatever way the gratification of this sense. The Church of Christ cannot, while she remembers His message, her Master, and her trust, consent to be dismissed from the sphere of taste, or let it be thought that she has no counsel for her sons, as they turn to those high and thrilling pleasures, no means or right of judging the tone and the ideals of contemporary Art. (J. H.Newman, B. D.)
Christianity and the sensuous
We were going to throw ourselves without reserve into this or that enthusiasm of beauty, to steep our souls in the excitement of music, or poetry, or art, to forget all else in the engrossing delight of their eager sympathy, to lay aside every hindering thought, to trust the strong desire of our heart, and measure our interests by their intensity: and Christianity recalls us to ourselves. It sets before us, in the compass of a single life, the full expression of that deep and marring discord which has broken up the harmony of this world, and it urges us to seek within ourselves for the secret of the disturbance and misery. It shows us the Perfect Love rejected, Perfect Purity reviled, Perfect Holiness blasphemed, Perfect Mercy scorned; God coming to His own and His own receiving Him not; the righteous Judge condemned; the Lord of Life obedient unto death; and it says that the cause of this anomaly, the condition which made this the earthly life of the Incarnate Son of God, is to be found within our own souls; and we know that them is something them which seems at times as though it would crucify the Son of God afresh: something which would distort our choice from the high and spiritual to the bestial and mean: something which has often made us cruel and unjust to other men, and contemptible to ourselves. And as before the Cross which mankind awarded to its Redeemer we feel the havoc and tumult which sin has brought upon the order and truthfulness of our inner life, we must surely hesitate before we say that no restraint shall rest upon our sense of beauty, that there is no need, whatever adversaries may be moving about us, to be sober and vigilant in the world of Art. But for those who humbly take the yoke upon them, who, as they turn to the manifold wealth of beauty, do not thrust away the knowledge of their own hearts and the thought of Him whose death alone has saved them, and whose strong grace alone sustains and shelters them--for those the best delights of Art and Nature appear in a new radiance of light and hope, and speak of such things as pass mans understanding. The moments of quickened and exalted life which music and painting stir within them, the controlling splendour of the sunset, the tender glory of the distant hills, the wonder of a pure and noble face--these no longer come as passing pleasures, flashing out of a dark background, which is only the gloomier when they are gone, half realized and little understood: for now all are linked and held together as consistent tokens of the same redeeming, sanctifying Love; they see the Hand, the pierced Hand, which holds the gift; they know the Love which fashioned and adorned it; they have read elsewhere the thought which is embodied in the outward beauty; for it is He who spared not His own Son who with Him freely gives them all things. And all that He gives them prophesy of Him. (J. H. Newman, B. D.)
Christs beauty
It was not a beauty of form, it was the beauty of expression. It was not the beauty of statuary, it was the beauty of life. It is the purpose of God to disappoint the senses. He has victimized the eyes, and the ears, and the hands of men. (J. Parker, D. D.)
No beauty in Christ
Look not on the pitcher, but on the liquor that is contained within. (J. Trapp.)
Christs meanness on earth no objection against, but confirmation of, Christianity
I. Show against unbelievers, that THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF THE PROPHECIES WHICH CONCERNED THE MESSIAH ARE A CONVINCING ARGUMENT OF THE TRUTH OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. It is agreed on all hands that there can be no human or natural reason assigned for such future and remote events as have no visible or natural cause to produce them; but are of a contingent nature, and many times depend on the free choice and will of man; and therefore the prediction of such events must be supposed to proceed from some supernatural revelation. It is the argument whereby God proves Himself to be the Lord, and that there is no other Saviour beside (Isa_43:11-12). By the same reason, he proves the gods of the nations to be idols, and no gods (Isa_41:21-22; Isa_41:29). The prophecies of Scripture, which referred to the Messiah, were of things at such a distance, and of such a nature, that there could not be any probable reason assigned, or tolerable conjecture made of them. And yet there was not one tittle of all the prophecies which relate to the manner or design of Christs appearance in the world that fell to the ground.
II. Show against the Jews, that THE MEAN APPEARANCE OF CHRIST IN THE WORLD IS NO GOOD ARGUMENT AGAINST THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, OR OF ANY FORCE TO PROVE THAT JESUS OF NAZARETH WAS NOT THE CHRIST; and that upon the two following accounts--
1. As the grounds upon which the Jews expected a temporal Messiah, were false and impracticable; false with respect to the spirituality of His kingdom; impracticable with respect to the extent and universality of its blessings and privileges.
2. As the state and condition of life which our Saviour chose in the world was most agreeable to the great ends and design of His coming into it.
(1) It gave a strong confirmation to the truth of that holy religion which He came to plant in the world. Had our Saviour been a victorious prince, that had given laws to the world, and backed the authority of them with the sword, the atheist might then have pretended, that the Christian, as well as other religions in the world, was the daughter of force, and a mere politic invention, contrived by its Author the better to settle and confirm His government to Him, if He should find a favourable juncture to possess Himself of it. But now the effects of the Christian religion on the minds of men, and the methods of propagating it, cannot be ascribed to any human power or authority. Instead of employing the secular arm to compel men to come into the Church, God put a sceptre of righteousness into the hands of Christ: He authorized Him to give such a body of holy and righteous laws to His Church as might be proper to work upon their minds by the gentle methods of reason and persuasion. He made choice of such for His companions and disciples as were men of mean occupations and law fortunes; men as to their natural capacities no ways qualified for so difficult and high an undertaking as the establishing a new religion against the settled laws and powers, the prejudices and passions, the vanities and vices of a corrupt world. The design of the holy Jesus in all this was to show that the excellency of the power which attended Himself and His apostles, in preaching the doctrine of salvation, might not be ascribed unto men, but unto God. He would make way for the reception and establishment of the Gospel in the world by no other means but by the evidence of its truth, the excellency of its morals, the number of the miracles wrought to confirm it, and the simplicity of those who were the first preachers and promoters of it. And, indeed, that the Christian religion, by such mean and unlikely instruments, should in so short a time extend itself so wide, and that they should reap such a harvest of triumphs over so many enemies, seems to have been the greatest miracle of all.
(2) The state and condition of life which our Saviour chose in the world was also a wise and excellent method to recommend the practice of religion to it. The holy Jesus did not think it enough to reveal the will of God to mankind; this He might have done, as God delivered the law in the Mount, by speaking to some extraordinary prophet, and committing what He spoke to a standing writing, without rendering Himself visible. But God gave Him a body, that men might from His own mouth hear the words of eternal life.
(3) The circumstances wherein our Saviour made His appearance in the world were most agreeable to His design of becoming a sacrifice and propitiation for the sins of the world: for though our redemption is attributed more especially to His sufferings and death upon the Cross, as His sacrifice was there finished, yet we ought to look upon it as begun as soon as he was born into the world.
III. PRACTICAL IMPROVEMENT.
1. If the accomplishment of the prophecies concerning our Saviour be an evident proof of His being the great Prophet that was to come into the world, then whatever doctrines He taught are, certainly true and Divinely revealed.
2. From the circumstances of our Saviour s appearance in the world let us learn the duties of patience, charity and humility.
3. In order to humble the pride of our hearts, when we are tempted to bear ourselves high upon any worldly advantages, which give us a superiority above our brethren, let us consider how Jesus Christ, the best and wisest, judged of these things. (R. Fiddes)
Christ uncomely and yet beautiful
How can it be said of Christ that He had neither comeliness nor beauty, since it is said (Psa_45:2), that He is fairer than the children of men, or than the sons of Adam? And in Son_5:10-16 He is described by the spouse to be well-coloured, and likewise well-featured, and she goeth on from part to part, from head to feet; and then concludeth, He is altogether lovely. To this I answer--
1. It is one thing what, Christ is to the spouse, another what He is to the unbelieving Jews Christs beauties are reward, seen of none but those that are inwardly acquainted with Him. The spouse speaketh of Him in a spiritual sense.
2. We must distinguish between Christs humiliation and exaltation, His Godhead and His manhood. In His Godhead He is the brightness of His Fathers glory, and the express image of His person, and consequently full of beauty. In His humiliation He is not only a man, but a mean man Php_2:9).
3. In Christs humiliation we must distinguish as to what He is in Himself and as to what He is in the eye of the world. (T. Manton, D.D.)
The mean not necessarily despicable
Do not despise things, for their meanness, for so thou mayest condemn the ways of God. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Gods use of the mean
As there was meanness in the outward habitude of Christs person, so there is now in the administration of His kingdom; as appears by considering--
1. That the ordinances are weak to appearance; there is nothing but plain words, plain bread and wine, in one ordinance, and only water in another. The simple plainness of the ordinances is an obstacle to mens believing; they would fain bring in pomp, but that will mar all.
2. These ordinances are administered by weak men. Our Saviour sent fishermen to conquer the world, and made use of a goose-quill to wound Antichrist. Moses, the stammering shepherd, was commissioned to deliver Israel; God makes use of Amos, who was a herdsman, to declare His will. So Elisha the great prophet was taken from the plough. And many times God made use of young men, such as Paul, whose very person causeth prejudice; young Samuel, young Timothy, men of mean descent, low parentage, and of no great appearance in the world.
3. The manner how it is by them managed, which is not in such a politic, insinuating way as to beguile and deceive, and as if they were to serve their own ends (2Co_1:12).,
4. The persons by whom it is entertained, the poor (Jam_2:5). Usually God s true people are the meanest, not being so noted for outward excellency as others. This has been always a great prejudice against Christs doctrine (Joh_7:48).
5. The general drift of it is to make men deny their pleasures, to overlook their concernments, to despise the world, to hinder unjust gain, to walk contrary to the ordinary customs and fashions of the world. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Christ assumed an appearance of meanness
This meanness of Christ was willingly taken up by Him.
1. In His birth.
(1) For the time of it. It was when the royal stock of David was come so low that Joseph was but a carpenter by profession. Therefore is the genealogy of Joseph and Mary so carefully sought out by the evangelist, because it was not commonly and publicly known that they were of that lineage. The throne of David was occupied by Herod, who was an Ascalonite.
(2) The place, Bethlehem, a small place. Then He was not born in any stately room, but in a manger in the stable.
(3) Consider how in everything He was found in shape like another child, being circumcised the eighth day.
(4) Consider the oblation that was made for Him, such as was made for poor people. Yet we may observe there was something Divine still mingled with Christs outward, meanness, as the appearing of the star, the trouble of the Jews, the wise mens report and offerings. By these things God would leave them without excuse, and under this poverty discover some glimpses of the Deity.
2. In His life and manner of appearance in the world. He was altogether found in fashion as a man; to outward appearance just as other men, for His growth was as other, mens, by degrees: And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man. His life was spent in much toil and labour, etc. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Poverty
1. Poverty and meanness are not disgraceful. Christ Himself was a carpenter, Paul a tent-maker, and the apostles fishermen. Christ, you see, scorned that glory, pomp and greatness which the world doteth upon.
2. Poverty should not he irksome to us. Christ underwent it before you; His apostles were base in the worlds eye (1Co_4:13). Poverty is a great burden, and layeth a man open to many a disadvantage--scorn, contempt and refusal. But consider, Christ hath honoured it in His own person, and He honoureth it to this very day. (T. Manton, D.D.)
Missing Christs beauty
There have been two traditions respecting Christs person. Some of the Fathers of the Church have declared that He was, Divinely beautiful, the fairest among ten thousand and the altogether lovely. Others have spoken of Him in the words of Isaiah, He hath no form nor comeliness. For my own part I like to think of Him as Divinely beautiful. If in all things He is to have the pre-eminence, why not here as well as there? Certain it is that there must have shone through Him some transfiguring splendour, that awed and fascinated. Men were conquered as much by His look as by His word. If, however, these descriptions of Isaiah refer to His person, and are to be taken literally, then they are very far from being attractive. As a root out of a dry ground. He hath no form nor comeliness. There is no beauty that we should desire Him. We esteemed Him not, or, as Luther translates, We thought Him nothing. The picture seems to be that of a mean and miserable life, tragic, unsettled, menaced, lined with grief, disfigured with wounds. I say seems. For, after all, the fault may not be so much in Him as in us. Beauty may be all about men, yet they may never perceive it, because their foolish hearts are darkened; because they are short-sighted, blind, impure. Ruskins dictum is that joy, affection, veneration are necessary to the beholding of beauty. If that be so, and men know nothing of the joy that rises in one like a summer s morn; if they have never experienced the love that greatens and glorifies all things; if they know nothing of that reverence which recognizes and bows before the highest, it is no wonder that they miss the spirit of the beautiful. Men may have missed Christs beauty from many causes, as men are missing it to-day. Let us seek to discover what these things are that blind us to the holiest, the highest, the loveliest.
I. THE SPIRIT OF CONTEMPT BLINDS TO BEAUTY. Jesus came into this world a Galilean peasant, poor, obscure, straitened in every way. And judging Him by the measure of the scale on which He appeared, men treated Him with disdain, contempt, scorn, remarking, Is not this the carpenter.? How many there are who live continually in the spirit of contempt. They continually look down. They seem to forget that some,of the choicest spirits of earth have dined on homely fare and worn hodden grey, and that the millionaires of ideas have frequently been bankrupts in pocket. How contemptuously the great spirits of the world have been treated by those who were not worthy to unloose their shoe-latchets! Think of Mozart being sent by an archbishop in whose retinue he was to dine with the servants in the kitchen. Think of that same Mozart occupying a nameless grave, for no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day. Odd world, is it not, that will send its Bunyans to prison and give its jockeys ten thousand a year? Aristotle paints his magnanimous man as not apt to admire, for to him there is nothing great. What number of these magnanimous men there must be; men so held in the grip of contempt that, standing in a world crammed full of the rich glories of creation, they see nothing to admire. Now contempt springs from two things: lack of understanding and lack of love. The wise man never despises. God is great, yet He despiseth not any, and those who are great after the greatness of God have ever felt their smallness beside the humblest and poorest of men. They see that behind the dullest life there may be angelic light. Where true wisdom is there contempt is not. Charles V was truly great when, picking up the brush of Titian which the painter had dropped, he remarked that he was proud to wait on so supreme a genius. Men see no beauty in Christ because they have been too ready to despise Him. Contempt springs from lack of love. They thought Him nothing because they never looked at Him with the heart. If you want to discover all that is brightest and best in men you must look at them with the look of love; then will God become aglow to the loving heart in what was mere earth before. Love is wonderful always. There is a magic power about it which can make plain faces shine as the faces of angels. It can fill with light and radiance a cottage home as no gold can do. It can convert worthless trifles into precious heirlooms. So if men would only look at Christ with the supreme look of the soul they would discover that He who seems to have no form nor comeliness will then be crowned with glory and honour.
II. MEN MISS THE BEAUTY, TOO, BY THE CRITICAL TEMPER. Some men there are who start out always with a disposition to criticize rather than to admire. When a young lady once expressed the wish to Hogarth that she might be able to draw caricature, the great satirist replied, It is not a faculty to be envied; take my advice and never draw caricature. By the long practice of it I have lost the enjoyment of beauty. I never see a face but distorted, and have never the satisfaction to behold the human face divine. The great caricaturist had so accustomed himself to look for faults that he could see nothing else. Criticism blinds to beauty. Was not that true with regard to Christ? Look for the beauty in Him and you will discover a loveliness that cannot be chiselled in marble or expressed in colour, but a beauty which, when the soul sees it is ravished for ever, and rapt into an ecstasy of admiration and love.
III. WE MAY MISS THE BEAUTY THROUGH ENVY. Did not men miss His beauty in that way in the days of His flesh? Pilate was keen enough to perceive that behind the seeming air of justice assumed by His traducers the fires of envy burned. He knew that for envy they had delivered Him. The artist who portrayed Envy as a man of mean and misshapen figure, with crouching shoulder, craning neck, distended ears, and serpent tongue, was endowed with a more than ordinary gift of insight. Where envy exists there can be no vision of the beautiful. For it blinds the mind and poisons the heart, and lifts not to a throne, but to a cross. How it blinded the eyes of those Scribes and Pharisees! They saw the beautiful deeds of the Man, how He succoured the weak, the suffering, the sad; they heard His words, flagrant, uplifting, strengthening; they beheld a life spent in doing good; yet so blinded were they by the spirit of envy that this supreme vision of loveliness did not dawn upon them. The penalty of envy is blindness, and until those scales fall from the eyes, all things true and beautiful and of good report, everything of worth in the character and conduct of our fellow-men, all the charm and sweetness of the Son of Man, will remain undiscovered by us.
IV. PREOCCUPATION MAY BLIND TO BEAUTY. Men are so feverishly busy in these days, they live at such express speed, that they often miss the angel at the door. When men are busy here and there they miss the charms of the Eternal. A little more quiet, a little abiding in ones own room, and it would be discovered that Christ is lovelier than painters sublimest dream, and that finding Him one finds a joy for ever. (Cecil H. Wright.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv2–3 Isa_53:2-12. For He shall grow up before Him, &c.
THE GREAT MESSIANIC PROPHECY
Isa_53:2-12. For He shall grow up before Him, &c.
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Among the prophecies of Isaiah, that which is contained in the chapter before us stands eminent and illustrious. Received and interpreted according to the sense attached to it by Christians, it involves in it a striking proof of the truth and divinity of our holy religion. It does this simply as a prophecy, irrespective of its dogmatic or theological character. It is a prediction of what was to come to pass. It is not merely capable of being turned into a prediction by a little fancy or a little ingenuity, but it was uttered as such; it was meant when uttered to be received as such. And it was unquestionably in being—it was written and read—seven centuries before the events which are supposed to have fulfilled it. It is found in a Jewish, as distinguished from a Christian writing—in a writing admitted, preserved, believed, by those who have every reason for wishing this passage altered or expunged. After the appearing of Jesus Christ, a passage like this could not be introduced into the writings of Isaiah by Christians; the jealousy of the Jews would prevent that. It would not be introduced by the Jews; that would be inconsistent with their unbelief. To be here at all, it must have formed an original part of the prophetical Scriptures. Such it is admitted to be—and admitted by the Jew; he preserved and perused it as such before the appearance of the “Man of sorrows;” and after he had seen Him—seen Him “grow up as a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground;” after he had looked upon Him and found in Him “nothing to desire,” “neither form nor comeliness,” nor verdure nor beauty; after he had “hid his face from Him” and “esteemed Him not,” “wounded” and “bruised,” and “imprisoned” and “oppressed” Him, “despised and rejected,” and “smitten Him to death;” after this it was impossible for them to recede. The book was in the hands of both parties, and the passage in the custody of both; the Jew could not have expunged it, for the Church would have detected and denounced the fraud; the Christian would not, for he exulted in its existence and import. It there stands an acknowledged portion of a writing strictly and intentionally prophetic, uttered and recorded as prophetical, hundreds of years before the occurrence of all that it so distinctly and graphically describes. Now, the thing to be observed in connection with these remarks is this—that the particulars of the prophecy are so many, so minute, so singular, previously so improbable, that they could never have been foreseen by human sagacity, and surely never thrown together by any lucky but hazardous guesses. They were all fulfilled, and fulfilled with minute and marvellous fidelity in Jesus Christ. They apply to no other person; to Him they do apply, and apply with an accuracy which would be admitted to be wonderful and which never would be doubted, did it not involve the admission of the truth of His pretensions. That it does this is seen by the simplest of all arguments:—none can foresee future events but God; a clear and indubitable prediction is produced, having long afterwards its fulfilment in the character and history of one claiming a Divine mission; therefore (it is impossible to hesitate) that mission was Divine; He must have sent Him, who foresaw His coming, and foreseeing, foretold it.
Such is the value and use of every prophecy whose character and meaning are clearly ascertained, and whose import can be proved to have met its accomplishment. But the prophecy before us does more than this; it not only proves, in relation to Christ, the truth of His pretensions, but it proves what some at least of these pretensions were; it not only demonstrates that He came from God, but it also demonstrates what He came for—what He came to accomplish for man. If words are to be permitted to have any meaning, if the language of the Bible was intended to be understood, the prophecy is a declaration, positive, unequivocal, distinct—that Messiah was to be made a propitiatory sacrifice. His innocence is asserted, His righteousness declared, His exquisite agony, bodily and mental, alike described; Jehovah is represented as crushing Him, “bruising Him,” and “putting Him to grief,” and “making His soul an offering for sin;” He is Himself depicted as suffering as a substitute, as “bearing the griefs and carrying the sorrows” of others, as “wounded for their transgressions, bruised for their iniquities,” on their account afflicted and stricken and smitten to death, and as having “laid upon Him the iniquity of them all.” Every variety of phrase is employed, as if purposely to render mistake impossible, and to mark the importance of the subject itself.
Many translations of the passage have been attempted, but none succeeds in getting rid of and excluding its pervading idea. The Jew who rejects. Christ, and who applies therefore the prophecy to his nation as a whole, and not to an individual, is endlessly embarrassed by its personal allusion; and the Christian (if Christian he be) who rejects the Redeemer’s sacrifice and atonement, may alter and attenuate the phraseology of the passage, may change and modify and emasculate it, but the great truth cannot be concealed; its existence is indicated and its presence is felt, whatever be the language in which it is conveyed—aye, even in that which is carefully selected, not for the purpose of expressing, but of hiding it. The nature of the work of Christ, the “decease which He accomplished at Jerusalem,” the efficacy of His sufferings, and the nature of His death, “His soul being made an offering for sin”—this truth is so abundantly borne out in the ample and illustrious prophecy before us, that it flames forth, however it may be clothed, just as the glory of Christ’s body, when transfigured upon the Mount, shone through and illumined the robes He wore. It rises up in spite of every effort to reduce and to subdue it, even as the mighty champion of. Israel snapped asunder the new ropes and the green withes by which he was attempted to be bound.—T. Binney: Sermons, Second Series, pp. 6–9.
That this chapter contains a direct prophecy of Jesus Christ is so plain, that I can scarcely conceive any serious objection to be made to it. The principal doubt which is likely to arise in the mind, is that it is so literal and particular as to seem to be rather a history foisted into the texts after the events had taken place, than a prophecy delivered seven hundred years before them. But this doubt is instantly removed, by considering that the Jews, the grand enemies of Christ, were the very persons to whom the preservation of this prophecy was intrusted; that they acknowledge it to be genuine; nor ever suggested a doubt as to its authenticity.
If, then, it is genuine, to whom can it relate? It would be a waste of time to attempt to confute the interpretations that have been given by the Jews of late years, by which it is made to apply to Hezekiah, to Jeremiah, &c. It will here be sufficient to observe, that as in a lock, consisting of numerous wards, that key alone is the true one which fits all the wards; so in prophecy, that only is the true interpretation of any prediction which fits every part of it; and the more numerous and uncommon such parts are, the more manifest is it, in the case of a perfect coincidence, that the true interpretation has been given. I say, the more uncommon; because if events are foretold which cannot possibly apply but to a few persons, the interpretation is then proportionably limited. If, for instance, a prophecy should relate to a king, this would narrow the range of interpretation to those who bore the kingly office; if to a king who had died a violent death, this would narrow it still more; if that death was inflicted by his own subjects, it would reduce still more considerably the number of persons to whom it could be applied. But in the present case there are circumstances so very peculiar that they can be applied to one person alone.
The person here spoken of was to be the servant of God, the arm of the Lord, the subject of prophecy. Yet when he came into the world, he was to be despised and rejected of men; he was not to be received as the Messiah; he was to be put into prison; he was to be brought as a lamb to the slaughter; many were to be astonished at him; his visage was to be marred more than any man’s; he was to be numbered with transgressors, and cut off by a judicial sentence out of the land of the living; his grave was to be appointed with the wicked, yet his tomb was to be with the rich man. And his sufferings were to be of no ordinary kind, and inflicted for no common cause. He was to be wounded for our transgressions, and smitten for our iniquities. Jehovah was pleased to put him to grief, and to make his soul an offering for sin, though “he had done no wrong, neither was any guile found in his mouth.” But after God had thus made his soul an offering for sin, then he was to revive again; to prolong his days; to erect a spiritual kingdom; to sprinkle many nations; to be advanced above kings, who should shut their mouths before him; to be exalted and extolled, and be very high; to see and be satisfied with the effect of the travail of his soul; to justify many by his knowledge; and to make intercession for transgressors.
Now, of those particulars, it is evident that most of them can be applied only to a few persons; some, from their very nature, to none but such a divine and extraordinary person as Jesus Christ; but that to Him all are applicable in the plainest and most literal sense. We may conclude, therefore, that if the real import of any prophecy is clear and indisputable, that of this chapter is so when it is made to refer to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.—Venn.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv2, 4 Isa 53:2 - Isa 53:3.
Isaiah
THE SUFFERING SERVANT-I
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Isa 53:2 - Isa 53:3.
To hold fast the fulfilment of this prophecy of the Suffering Servant in Jesus it is not necessary to deny its reference to Israel. Just as offices, institutions, and persons in it were prophetic, and by their failures to realise to the full their own role, no less than by their partial presentation of it, pointed onwards to Him, in whom their idea would finally take form and substance, so this great picture of God’s Servant, which was but imperfectly reproduced even by the Israel within Israel, stood on the prophet’s page a fair though sad dream, with nothing corresponding to it in the region of reality and history, till He came and lived and suffered.
If we venture to make it the theme of a short series of sermons, our object is simply to endeavour to bring out clearly the features of the wonderful portrait. If they are fully apprehended, it seems to us that the question of who is the original of the picture answers itself. We must note that the whole is introduced by a ‘For,’ that is to say, that it is all explanatory of the unbelief and blindness to the revealed arm of the Lord, which the prophet has just been lamenting. This close connection with the preceding words accounts for the striking way in which the description of the person of the Servant is here blended with, or interrupted by, that of the manner in which he was treated.
I. The Servant’s lowly origin and growth.
‘He grew,’-not ‘shall grow.’ The whole is cast into the form of history, and to begin the description with a future tense is not only an error in grammar but gratuitously introduces an incongruity. The word rendered ‘tender plant’ means a sucker, and ‘root’ probably would more properly be taken as a shoot from a root, the tree having been felled, and nothing left but the stump. There is here, then, at the outset, an unmistakable reference to the prophecy in Isa 11:1, which is Messianic prophecy, and therefore there is a presumption that this too has a Messianic reference. In the original passage the stump or ‘stock’ is explained as being the humiliated house of David, and it is only following the indications supplied by the fact of the second Isaiah’s quotation of the first, if we take the implication in his words to be the same. Royal descent, but from a royal house fallen on evil days, is the plain meaning here.
And the eclipse of its glory is further brought out in that not only does the shoot spring from a tree, all whose leafy honours have long been lopped away, but which is ‘in a dry ground.’ Surely we do not force a profounder meaning than is legitimate into this feature of the picture when we think of the Carpenter’s Son ‘of the house and lineage of David,’ of the Son of God ‘who was found in fashion as a man,’ of Him who was born in a stable, and grew up in a tiny village hidden away among the hills of Galilee, who, as it were, stole into the world ‘not with observation,’ and opened out, as He grew, the wondrous blossom of a perfect humanity such as had never before been evolved from any root, nor grown on the most sedulously cultured plant. Is this part of the prophet’s ideal realised in any of the other suggested realisations of it?
But there is still another point in regard to the origin and growth of the lowly shoot from the felled stump-it is ‘before Him.’ Then the unnoticed growth is noticed by Jehovah, and, though cared for by no others, is cared for, tended, and guarded, by Him.
II. The Servant’s unattractive form.
Naturally a shoot springing in a dry ground would show but little beauty of foliage or flower. It would be starved and colourless beside the gaudy growths in fertile, well-watered gardens. But that unattractiveness is not absolute or real; it is only ‘that we should desire Him.’ We are but poor judges of true ‘form or comeliness,’ and what is lustrous with perfect beauty in God’s eyes may be, and generally is, plain and dowdy in men’s. Our tastes are debased. Flaunting vulgarities and self-assertive ugliness captivate vulgar eyes, to which the serene beauties of mere goodness seem insipid. Cockatoos charm savages to whom the iridescent neck of a dove has no charms. Surely this part of the description fits Jesus as it does no other. The entire absence of outward show, or of all that pleases the spoiled tastes of sinful men, need not be dwelt on. No doubt the world has slowly come to recognise in Him the moral ideal, a perfect man, but He has been educating it for nineteen hundred years to get it up to that point, and the educational process is very far from complete. The real desire of most men is for something much more pungent and dashing than Jesus’ meek wisdom and stainless purity, which breed in them ennui rather than longing. ‘Not this man but Barabbas,’ was the approximate realisation of the Jewish ideal then; not this man but-some type or other of a less oppressive perfection, and that calls for less effort to imitate it, is the world’s real cry still. Pilate’s scornfully wondering question: Art Thou-such a poor-looking creature-the King of the Jews? is very much of a piece with the world’s question still: Art Thou the perfect instance of manhood? Art Thou the highest revelation of God?
III. The Servant’s reception by men.
The two preceding characteristics naturally result in this third. For lowliness of condition and lack of qualities appealing to men’s false ideals will certainly lead to being ‘despised and rejected.’ The latter expression is probably better taken, as in the margin of the Rev. Ver. as ‘forsaken.’ But whichever meaning is adopted, what an Iliad of woes is condensed into these two words! ‘The spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes,’ the loneliness of one who, in all the crowd descries none to trust-these are the wages that the world ever gives to its noblest, who live but to help it and be misunderstood by it, and as these are the wages of all who with self-devotion would serve God by serving the world for its good, they were paid in largest measure to ‘the Servant of the Lord.’ His claims were ridiculed, His words of wisdom thrown back on Himself; none were so poor but could afford to despise Him as lower than they, His love was repulsed, surely He drank the bitterest cup of contempt. All His life He walked in the solitude of uncomprehended aims, and at His hour of extremest need appealed in vain for a little solace of companionship, and was deserted by those whom He trusted most. His was a lifelong martyrdom inflicted by men. His was a lifelong solitude which was most utter at the last. And He brought it all on Himself because He would be God’s Servant in being men’s Saviour.
IV. The Servant’s sorrow of heart.
The remarkable expression ‘acquainted with grief’ seems to carry an allusion to the previous clause, in which men are spoken of as despising and rejecting the Servant. They left Him alone, and His only companion was ‘grief’-a grim associate to walk at a man’s side all his days! It is to be noted that the word rendered ‘grief’ is literally sickness. That description of mental or spiritual sorrows under the imagery of bodily sicknesses is intensified in the subsequent terrible picture of Him as one from whom men hide their faces with disgust at His hideous appearance, caused by disease. Possibly the meaning may rather be that He hides His face, as lepers had to do.
Now probably the ‘sorrows’ touched on at this point are to be distinguished from those which subsequently are spoken of in terms of such poignancy as laid on the Servant by God. Here the prophet is thinking rather of those which fell on Him by reason of men’s rejection and desertion. We shall not rightly estimate the sorrowfulness of Christ’s sorrows, unless we bring to our meditations on them the other thought of His joys. How great these were we can judge, when we remember that He told the disciples that by His joy remaining in them their joy would be full. As much joy then as human nature was capable of from perfect purity, filial obedience, trust, and unbroken communion with God, so much was Jesus’ permanent experience. The golden cup of His pure nature was ever full to the brim with the richest wine of joy. And that constant experience of gladness in the Father and in Himself made more painful the sorrows which He encountered, like a biting wind shrieking round Him, whenever He passed out from fellowship with God in the stillness of His soul into the contemptuous and hostile world. His spirit carrying with it the still atmosphere of the Holy Place, would feel more keenly than any other would have done the jarring tumult of the crowds, and would know a sharper pain when met with greetings in which was no kindness. Jesus was sinless, His sympathy with all sorrow was thereby rendered abnormally keen, and He made others’ griefs His own with an identification born of a sympathy which the most compassionate cannot attain. The greater the love, the greater the sorrow of the loving heart when its love is spurned. The intenser the yearning for companionship, the sharper the pang when it is repulsed. The more one longs to bless, the more one suffers when his blessings are flung off. Jesus was the most sensitive, the most sympathetic, the most loving soul that ever dwelt in flesh. He saw, as none other has ever seen, man’s miseries. He experienced, as none else has ever experienced, man’s ingratitude, and, therefore, though God, even His God, ‘anointed Him with the oil of gladness above His fellows,’ He was ‘a Man of Sorrows,’ and grief was His companion during all His life’s course.
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv3–5 General Information:
General Information:
Isaiah continues describing Yahweh's servant. (See: Isaiah 53:1-2)
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He was despised and rejected by people
This can be stated in active form. AT: "People considered him as nothing and rejected him" (See: Active or Passive)
a man of sorrows
"a man knowing all kinds of sadness"
from whom men hide their faces
"Face" represents a person's attention or fellowship. Hiding one's face means to turn away from someone. AT: "from whom people turn away" (See: Metonymy)
he was despised
This can be stated in active form. AT: "they considered him to be worthless" (See: Active or Passive)
translationWords
reject
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv2–5 53:2 a tender green shoot . . . in…
53:2 a tender green shoot . . . in dry ground: Such a plant is vulnerable to extinction (cp. 37:27). It can hardly stay alive for itself, let alone provide anything for anyone else. • nothing beautiful or majestic: The servant appeared to have no greatness or self-evident royal splendor (see 52:13-15). • nothing to attract us to him: People like their leaders to be physically attractive and personally charismatic. The servant would be neither.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.