The book of Isaiah—Theses and Hypotheses - Critical Essay

Biblical Theology Bulletin, Fall, 2003 by J. Clinton McCann, Jr.

2. The book of Isaiah affirms that God's people and God's place have a special role to play in the proclamation and embodiment of God's will in the world.

As suggested above, the Judean monarchy was entrusted with the earthly enactment of the justice and righteousness willed by God, the cosmic sovereign. But as the whole prophetic canon suggests, the monarchy was seldom faithful to God and God's purposes. As Edgar Conrad points out, the death of each king in the book of Isaiah--Uzziah, Ahaz, and Hezekiah--precipitates a crisis--the Syro-Ephraimite, the Assyrian, and the Babylonian crises respectively. As he concludes, "This structuring of Isaiah's vision indicates the failure of kingship to bring lasting peace and security" (144). Of course, the final form of the book of Isaiah knows of the disappearance of the monarchy following 587 BCE; and it also seems to offer a response to the question: Given the demise of the monarchy, what earthly agency will be responsible for the enactment of God's justice, righteousness, and peace? As Conrad puts it, the book of Isaiah envisions "the birth of a new kind of royalty" (148), as one of the "new things" (42:9; see 43:19) that God is doing in the world.

This proclamation of "new things" in 42:9 comes at the conclusion of the first of the servant songs. The identity of the servant has been and is being extensively debated, but the most likely possibility is that the servant is Israel/Judah--that is, the people of God as a whole (see 41:8-9; 43:10; 44:1-2, 21). The "everlasting covenant" formerly attached to the Davidic monarchy (see Ps 89:3-4, 28, 34) now belongs to "everyone" (Isa 55:1, 3). The whole people of God are to be God's earthly agent for the enactment of God's will.

While the people of God play a special role, it is not necessarily an exclusive role, as suggested by Isaiah 56:3-8 (see "servants" in v 6). Citing this passage, Quinn-Miscall concludes, "Anyone, even a foreigner, can be a servant of the Lord; anyone can perform divine tasks and worship God.... A servant can be an individual, a group, or an entire nation" (188). In any case, God's people--no matter how broadly defined or constituted (see Hypothesis 1 concerning God's claim on all nations)--have a role to play in the enactment of God's will in the world.

So, according to the book of Isaiah, does God's place, Zion/Jerusalem. So-called First Isaiah has long been described as a proponent of a Zion tradition, but the centrality of Zion is evident throughout the book of Isaiah. As is the case with the concept of the people of God in Isaiah, the boundaries of Zion are increasingly broadened. At the beginning (2:2-4) and at the end (66:23) of the book of Isaiah, the whole world flows to Zion (see also 56:3-8, especially v 7). From one perspective, the glorification of Zion as, in essence, the capital of the world (see also Isa 62:1-12; Pss 46, 48, 87), seems like a piece of ancient Judean propaganda, something best abandoned in our contemporary context of turmoil in the Middle East. Is it advisable even to attempt to follow this "direction of meaning" in the book of Isaiah? To be sure, caution and humility are again in order; but it seems possible to appropriate the Zion tradition as symbol. Zion represented the intersection of heaven and earth, God's "house," the place where God was palpably accessible. Is not the portrayal of the Temple as "a house of prayer for all peoples" (56:7) the book of Isaiah's way of affirming that God wills blessing and life for all the world? If so, then this affirmation is entirely congruent with the book's portrayal of a God who wills world-encompassing justice, righteousness, and peace (see Hypothesis 1).