I was excited to write about Isaiah 11 tonight, but in reading from chapter 9 (the last post) to 11, I decided that I had to mention three verses in chapter 10.  I am motivated to do this for four reasons: 1) This brief word of hope captures the essence of what I see throughout Isaiah 1-12. 2) The primary prophecy here is developed at length in the second half of the book, and its mention here supports the unity (and unified message) of Isaiah.  3) This passage confirms the traditional understanding of Isaiah 9:6. 4) I may finally be able to pull of a short post in this series.

In the midst of declarations of God’s judgment upon Israel, Isaiah inserts yet another glimmer of hope.  As it is brief and important, I quote it in full here.

Isaiah 10:20-22 (ESV) “In that day the remnant of Israel and the survivors of the house of Jacob will no more lean on him who struck them, but will lean on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. 21 A remnant will return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God. 22 For though your people Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will return. Destruction is decreed, overflowing with righteousness.”

The first thing to note is that, like the prophecies we looked at in chapters 1, 6, 7, and 9, the immediate expectation for Israel is judgment, but there is a glimmer of hope.  Isaiah reveals a long dark tunnel, but there is always a light at the end.  Though the nation is cut down like a tree, a stump remains (Isa 6:13).  Though the nation is overrun by Assyria, Immanuel is born (Isa 7:14).  Though the land be in thick darkness, a great light will shine (Isa 8:22-9:2).  Here, though most of the people are wiped out, a portion will survive.

Second, the major theme of Isaiah 40-66 is the return of Israel.  As I intend to show later, the prophet describes both a physical return to the land (under Cyrus) and a spiritual return to the Lord (under the Servant).  But as is Isaiah’s habit, he first introduces the idea briefly before later expanding it.  The glimmer of hope here is that not everyone will perish.  Four times in three verses the word “remnant” is used to foretell a return to the land.  Even though the “land” aspect is not stated explicitly, it is clear from the context (physical exile) and all of Israelite thought that restoration requires their presence in the land God promised to them.    More important to clarify, though, is that Israel will return to the Lord spiritually.  They will no longer trust the one who struck them – that is, Assyria.  Remember that Ahaz refused to trust the Lord, and instead sought out the Assyrians for deliverance.  In the future, Hezekiah will trust Babylon, only to learn that Judah will be carried off by them.  At this time in the future, however, Israel will rely completely on the Lord.  How this will be so is developed in chapters 49-55, as well as in Jeremiah.

Extra: this is the first time that the idea of a remnant returning is explicitly explained in Isaiah, but one like me who is so fascinated with the way that Isaiah references himself and builds upon ideas simply cannot avoid noting that Isaiah’s first son is named Shear-jashub, which means “the remnant will return” (Isa 7:1).  This exact phrase (“shear jashub”) is used in verse 21 and verse 22.  The idea of a “remnant” is good or bad depending upon how you are looking at it.  If you think that Assyria will save you and you ‘ll weather the storm, being told that only a remnant will survive is not encouraging.  But if you recognize the sin of the nation and realize destruction and exile is fair punishment (Isa 10:22b), the “remnant” idea is a blessed hope.

Third, the remnant will return to the “mighty God.”  This is the same phrase used to describe the royal child born in Isaiah 9:6.  In the context of Isaiah 10:20-21, it is clear that “mighty God” is the “Holy One of Israel.”  While I would not argue that the divine nature of the messianic king would have been widely recognized in Isaiah’s day, with the coming of Christ, it becomes quite easy to see that this is what the prophet intended.

I’m going to skip over chapter 8 with but one comment.  The sign of Maher-shalal-hash-baz (Isa 8:1-4) is the sign that is often wrongly understood as the sign of Immanuel.  That is to say, MSHB signals the timing of the destruction of Aram and Israel by Assyria.  Immanuel does not.  It doesn’t make much sense to me that God would need two different boys, with two very different names, to provide the same sign.  But if they are each revealing different parts of God’s plan, it makes more sense.  If you think that Immanuel = MSHB, I would point you back to my 7 reasons against this equation.  MSHB is a boy born by natural means with a very short-lived and non-glorious hope.

Chapter 9 begins with the darkness that descended in chapters 7 and 8.  I believe that it is important to see that the darkness (judgment) that has been mentioned throughout the book to this point, and which will be mentioned in the chapters following, is the same darkness.  God is not revealing multiple future judgments that will occur at various times.  Instead, he is describing the imminent (but not short-lived) results of Israel’s sin.  Out of the gloom emerges signs of hope.  In chapter 6, it is a stump.  In chapter 7, it is a boy born to an unmarried woman.  In chapter 9 it is a child who will rule on the throne of David.  The natural question that arises is whether these are multiple, different “hopes,” or rather multiple descriptions of a single hope. If you assume, for a moment, the former, then you can reconstruct the situation something like this: a boy named Immanuel comes, indicating “God is with us.”  Then there is judgment, and later a son is born who is a righteous ruler.  Later, after more judgment (9:8-10:34), a shoot comes from Jesse who judges the earth in righteousness (Isa 11:1-5).  That vanishes into the judgment and later a throne is established of a Davidic ruler who is quick to act righteously (Isa 16:5).

There are two reasons why I believe it is impossible that these descriptions are not all of a single hope.  First, the descriptions suggest an irreversible situation.  It does not seem that a world where the “wolf lies down with the lamb” and the earth is “full of the knowledge of the Lord” could revert to a state as it had been in the days of Isaiah.  It is hard to picture a reversal of Isaiah 12; exactly how the people would go from utter trust and lack of fear to idolatry is hard to fathom.  Furthermore, in at least one place, this one is explicitly said to be lasting.  Isaiah 9:7 says, “Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end.”  I think this needs to color our thinking, and we should be picturing this future hope as singular and unending.

Second, the multiple descriptions of this hope, while having some differences, also have remarkable similarities.  Thus, the boy born in 7:14 will “know how to refuse the evil and choose the good,” and the son given in 9:6 rules “with justice and with righteousness.”  The shoot of 11:1-5 does not judge by his eyes or ears but “with righteousness.”  In fact, in a metaphor I love, “Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins.”  That means that this guy is intrinsically righteous!  The one who is the “Prince of Peace” in 9:6 sounds like he must be the one presiding over a world where leopards lie down with goats (Isa 11:6) and where people beat their swords into plowshares (Isa 2:4).  There are more similarities, and I commend to you the exercise (not all that difficult or lengthy) of putting these together into a single, glorious picture of our (oops, I mean, Isaiah’s) future hope.

I’ve already made important connections between the individual in Isaiah 7:14-17 with the one in Isaiah 9:1-7, so if you missed that, go back to the middle of this post.  I simply want to state here that Isaiah 9 should be read as building on top of what the prophet has already established.  He expects you to have read it, and he expects you to have understood it, even though it was brief and vague.  You might wish that Isaiah had added yet one more title to the child in 9:6, namely “Immanuel,” as that would have ended all debate.  I, however, think that God does not necessarily feel the need to stoop so low as to spell everything out.  And, as I said before, I think that Isaiah is intentionally less direct because of the hardened hearts of unbelievers who are listening to him.  For those with ears to hear, however, the truth is readily obvious.

Now, I haven’t said a whole lot by way of explanation of Isaiah 9:1-7 itself.  Partly that is because I think it is relatively clear.  In essence, it is the same message as Isaiah 7:14-17: out of judgment/darkness God sends a child who is the hope of Israel.  If you read 7:14 as I think they did, you are alerted to a supernatural element: a virgin gives birth.  The formula announcing the child’s birth (“Behold, the virgin will conceive and bear a son”) is almost exactly the same as the angelic declaration that Samson’s barren mother would bear a child (Judg 13:5).  This miraculous nature of this birth of a boy named “God with us” is further developed by Isaiah as a child who will be called “Mighty God,” and “Everlasting Father.”  Though every Davidic king had failed to live according to God’s commands and thus was removed from the throne, this future Davidic child will “establish and uphold it with justice … forevermore.”

To sum up in a sentence, Isaiah 9:1-7 takes the kernel of hope introduced in 7:14-17 and starts to add beautiful detail.

Matthew, by the way, never quotes the all-familiar Isaiah 9:6-7.  Why not?  Two reasons.  First, he cites Isaiah 9:1-2 which immediately connects the (knowledgeable) reader to this passage.  So the reader knows that Jesus is this guy described by Isaiah.  But, second, Matthew also knows that Jesus did not sit on David’s throne and establish the kingdom, as this figure is predicted to do.  Matthew’s gospel is largely designed to explain precisely this point: how Jesus could be the light of Isaiah 9:2 and not be the one whose “increase of his government and of peace there will be no end.”  How does Matthew figure this out?  Isaiah told him.  Isaiah had all the pieces of the puzzle on the table, and Matthew merely had to put them together.  His gospel explains how the King (Isaiah 7-12 plus) could also be the dying Servant (Isaiah 42-53).  The rejection of Jesus by his own people allowed him to die first, but to come back to rule later.  Isaiah does not explain this clearly; in fact, I think it would have taken some of the force of Jesus’s demands upon the people if they all understood that when the king came they would have to kill him first. 

But returning to Matthew, I think that it is significant that he quotes Isaiah 9:1-2 but not verses 6-7.  It’s the equivalent of Matthew’s later quotation of Zech 9:9, where he breaks the passage in between the peaceful entrance of Jesus and the military conquest of the same one (Matt 21:5).  It is one person, but all of the activities of that individual are not fulfilled at one time.  You see the same thing when Jesus quotes Isaiah 61:1-2, stopping before the statement of vengeance (Luke 4:18-20).
  It is fascinating to see how the prophets wrote some of their prophecies so that you could read the first portion and it would describe Jesus’s first coming and the second portion would describe his return.  It almost makes you think that there was a divine Author behind all of this.

I want to answer a few issues that more advanced readers may be interested in with regard to the interpretation presented in the previous post in this series.  Other readers can skip this one without missing the flow of Isaiah.  I simply want to respond to what some might consider barriers to adopting my interpretation.

Is almah a virgin?  This is an unbelievably controversial issue.  It often is attended with heat that interferes with light.  Frankly, in my view, if Isaiah’s hearers thought Isaiah was talking about a “young woman” without regard to her virginity, it doesn’t bother me.  I agree that almah does not explicitly define the woman’s sexual status as the word “virgin” does in the English language.  But in that culture, when you talked about a young, unmarried woman, the assumption was that she had not been with a man.  Since nobody believes there were two virgin births, those who believe this prophecy was fulfilled in the 8th century have to understand almah as being a non-virgin.  I can’t rule this possibility out on the basis of this word alone.  But I can tell you that every time that almah is used in the Bible, it either is talking about a virgin or there’s not enough to prove otherwise.  It never clearly means a non-virgin.  And when the Jewish men in the 3rd century B.C. translated Isaiah, they used a Greek word with the more technical meaning of a virgin.  I am not saying that this is ironclad proof; I realize that maybe the LXX guys were “loose” in their translations, and that maybe there is a usage of parthenos that does not mean virgin.  But I am saying that I don’t have to work very hard to hold to almah meaning virgin, but the other side has to do somersaults to preclude it from meaning virgin.  Unfortunately, some of the somersaults that have been made are misleading or outright falsehoods.

Was the almah standing there in Isaiah’s presence?  The NET Bible translates Isa 7:14 as follows:

Isaiah 7:14 (NET) “For this reason the sovereign master himself will give you a confirming sign. Look, this young woman is about to conceive and will give birth to a son. You, young woman, will name him Immanuel.”

Besides the rendering of almah as virgin, there are two highly interpretive elements added to the NET translation (in bold).  You can see how the NET justifies these in the notes.  I ‘ll simply say that both of these are possibilities, but they are by no means certain.  The reason they put them in the text is to preclude a future fulfillment.  By making the young woman standing there that day, she can’t be Mary 700 years later.  But you don’t have to interpret either of these this way (and, in fact, out of a gazillion translations, no one else does, and that includes the Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh).  Concerning “this” young woman, the word here is “the.”  It could be demonstrative, but it certainly doesn’t have to be.  “You will name” is also possible, as the verb “to call” could be either “she” or “you.”  But since it seems strange for Isaiah to suddenly start talking to a woman, when a woman has not been mentioned to this point in the story, everyone has always taken this as “she will name.”  Understand, you cannot rule out a future-only fulfillment in 7:14 unless you make these arbitrary decisions. 

What exactly was “the sign”?  This is the main question that comes up in response to the future-only fulfillment view.  Essentially, it is asked, how can the birth of Jesus 700 years later be a sign to Ahaz?  First, I would note that this is a sign to the “house of David” (you plural; cf. Isa 7:13).  Thus, it may not be intended directly or primarily to Ahaz.  Second, the sign should be understood as the whole set of events described in Isaiah 7:14-17.  That is, the sign is a virgin giving birth to a (royal) child in a land of poverty which is the result of the Assyrian invasion.  Ahaz, of course, is eating scrambled eggs and (beef) sausage and living in a luxurious palace.  The sign is that 1) there will be an heir (and I confess this aspect is not so obvious from the passage to us today, but I think that Ahaz understood it and we can understand it clearly from chapter 9 and elsewhere) even though 2) Assyria devastates the land.  Ahaz does see the beginning of the sign’s fulfillment.  Though Aram and Israel don’t destroy Judah, Assyria does.  This was unexpected by Ahaz.  Now the royal house has the circumstances into which Immanuel will be born.  He could be born at any time.  He is their hope, the demonstration that “God is with us.”  Thus he is very relevant.

Did Assyria destroy the house of David?  This question may be provoked by the previous answer.  I believe that Isaiah’s prophecies of judgment here (and through chapter 35) begin to be fulfilled bv Assyria.  The Assyrians take away Judah’s sovereignty, carry many Judeans into exile, and otherwise begin the process that Babylon will continue. By the way, I intend to explain in future posts how the exile did not (fully) end with the return in 536 B.C.  Israel is still in exile when Jesus is born.

Why did you change the ESV translation of 7:15?: I changed it from “He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good” to “in order that he will know.”  This is a legitimate interpretive decision that understands ledaato as final rather than temporal.  Others render it this way because they believe it is more likely grammatically.  I prefer it because I think the point here is the contrast between the boy and the king rather than establishing a timeline.  That too explains the repetition of “to refuse the evil and choose the good.”  Making good moral decisions is precisely what Ahaz could not do.  The future ruler of Judah would be different.  I think the author of Hebrews may have had this idea in mind when he spoke about Jesus:

Hebrews 5:8 (ESV) “Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered.”

Why did you gloss over the destruction of the “land of the two kings” in Isaiah 7:16?  I don’t think this is the ultimate point.  Verse 17 must be read together with verse 16 (and grammatically I can show why this is so).  I think that when Isaiah spoke verse 16 to Ahaz, a thrill may have gone up the king’s spine.  But when Isaiah explained just how the “land of the two kings” would be destroyed (Isa 7:17), his hopes were dashed.  He was afraid of Israel and Aram, and so he decided to trust Assyria (2 Kings 16:7-9).  But in so doing, he jumped from the frying pan into the fire.

Doesn’t Isaiah give a timeline in verse 16?:  “But before the boy knows enough…”  I believe that Isaiah is deliberately being vague here.  (It is quite common for prophets to be vague about timing; note in this regard 1 Peter 1:10-11, “inquiring what person or time.”)  The
point to Ahaz is that this is relevant to him.  Before (and he doesn’t say how long before) a certain time, the land will be destroyed.  He doesn’t know when Aram, Israel, and Judah will be overrun by Assyria, but it could potentially be very soon.  But the fact that the child will grow up eating the food of poverty (curds and honey; see Isa 7:22) indicates that the land is destroyed before he is born or before he is very old.  In my opinion, this interpretation is the weakest part of my view.  It can seem strange, in hindsight, to think that 700 years went by before this child was born.  But they didn’t have that hindsight.  For them, the reality was that destruction was coming, but God would raise a ruler out of that.  Timing was less important than the promise.  Furthermore, if you emphasize “before,” you transform the sign into purely a timepiece.  The elements of a virgin/young woman giving birth, a boy who is named Immanuel, his learning to reject the wrong, all are not only secondary but, frankly, irrelevant.  By the way, this kills you when you get to the typology issue (see below).

Isn’t the birth of Maher-shalal-hash-baz the fulfillment of the Immanuel prophecy?  This is a popular view among scholars because of the similarities between the prophecies (cf. Isa 8:1-4).  But the differences are insurmountable.  (Quoting from my paper now because I can’t remember all of this:) 1) Though the Lord says that the child will be called Immanuel, and though it is in Isaiah’s power to do so, the prophet gives him a different name, without giving any indication that this is the same child; 2) The name that Isaiah gives the child has a symbolic meaning which is unrelated to Immanuel; 3) The mother of the child is not an עַלְמָה but a נְבִיאָה, the wife of Isaiah; attempts to suggest that the עַלְמָה was Isaiah’s second wife are without evidence; 4) Isaiah, not the mother, names the child; 5) The time frames given for the two sons are different; 6) The reference to a prophet’s son in 8:8 does not make good sense, even if one takes the lesser possibility that this construction here refers to a regular citizen; 7) Isaiah misses many opportunities to inform us of the identity of the two.  To sum up, I think the point here is that everyone is looking for Immanuel (following 7:14), but he never arrives.  They ‘re still waiting when Isaiah delivers chapter 9, and chapter 11, and the rest.

Why can’t Jesus be the “greater fulfillment” or anti-type of the Immanuel prophecy?  There is no warrant for it in the text.  It is just as reasonable for me to say that there will be three Immanuels (or two Princes of Peace) as it is for you to say there will be two.  If it’s not in the text, there is no basis for it.  If you change the meaning of the text, then you ‘re wasting my time.  If we ‘re not interpreting the text for what it says, then there are no controls and we can start reading all kinds of things into every text.  If you make Jesus the anti-type, you ‘re breaking all the rules of typology.  To be a valid type/anti-type, you have a heightening of the type in the anti-type.  But if the first Immanuel was merely a stopwatch, then how is Jesus a “greater stopwatch”?  If the first woman to give birth was a non-virgin, this is not “heightened” but changed when a virgin gives birth.  These are two different kinds of women.  Mary is not a “greater non-virgin.”  The first woman was not a “lesser virgin.”  The first child was a regular kid with a meaningful name.  The second child was God-incarnate, literally “God with us.”  That is not “heightening” but it is something altogether different.

If you’ve read this far and want more, you can email me and I ‘ll send you the paper.  All of the above (with the one exception noted) is off the top of my head, and the paper is more exhaustive, more technical, and includes sources.  I believe the paper is particularly better at answering the last question above, especially as I quote various conservative scholars who say some ridiculous things to try to have two Immanuels.  In my opinion, there are two legitimate options: the traditional Jewish view and the traditional Christian view.  Either Immanuel was already born in Isaiah’s day or he was born to a virgin named Mary.  When you try to have both, you end up supporting the Jewish view that there is no biblical basis for Jesus being Immanuel.  To my utter dismay, this appears to be the popular thing to do among Christian scholars today.

A personal note: my study of Isaiah, and particularly of 7:14, has been greatly improved by several friends who gave me counsel and correction.  Among them, I particularly want to thank Abner Chou for his valuable insights.

We have now arrived at the place where messianic prophecies start to come “fast and furious.”  It all begins with the prediction of a woman giving birth to a boy she calls “Immanuel.”  For this reason, some have called chapters 7-12 the “Book of Immanuel,” and I think this is an appropriate name. 

The “Immanuel” prophecy is highly controversial, and while I’m not going to be overly lengthy or technical here, I will spend more time on it than on other sections.  I think it’s particularly crucial to understand that this is a future prophecy that was not fulfilled in Isaiah’s day.

Chapter 7 is one of the few historical narratives in the book of Isaiah.  Judah is being attacked by Israel and Aram, and King Ahaz of Judah is terrified.  Isaiah visits him in order to encourage him.  He tells the king that his enemies will be destroyed, and then the Lord (presumably through Isaiah) tells Ahaz to ask God for a sign.  The sign, he says, can be anything Ahaz wants, without limit.  But Ahaz refuses to ask, attempting to mask his lack of faith as a pious act.  Probably Ahaz had already decided that he would seek deliverance from Assyria and not from God (see 2 Kings 16:5-9).

Note, now, what happens next.  Verse 13 reads:

Isaiah 7:13 (ESV) “And he said, “Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God also?”

In plain and simple terms, the Lord is exasperated with Ahaz.  The king had a perfect opportunity to put his faith in God and he refused.  Ahaz’s rejection of the Lord meets with the Lord’s rejection of Ahaz.  It is very important, I believe, to recognize that verse 14 is not a “second chance” that the Lord gives to Ahaz.  It is not God giving the sign even though Ahaz rejected it.  No.  Rather, the Lord gives a different sign.  If Ahaz had trusted, God would have delivered him (in whatever glorious way the king had desired).  But since Ahaz refused, he will be punished.  This point is very clear if you read all of verses 14-25.  If you just pull verse 14 out of context, you can understand it as being something else.  This you must not do.  Let’s look at verse 14.

Isaiah 7:14-17 (ESV) “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. 15 He shall eat curds and honey when [in order that] he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. 16 For before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you dread will be deserted. 17 The Lord will bring upon you and upon your people and upon your father’s house such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah—the king of Assyria.””

I’ve made one slight change to the ESV translation which I can support from the Hebrew.  In other words, I’m not doing anything wild and crazy with this passage.  Be suspicious when interpreters have to make lots of innovative changes to make their theory work.  I realize that there are debated elements in the ESV translation above, and I will address some of them in a separate post, but I don’t want to lose the momentum here.

Let me paraphrase the above verses as I understand them.  God is going to give a wonderful sign to the house of David (“you” is plural in v. 14; the sign is not directly to Ahaz).  A virgin will give birth, and the boy will be named “God with us.”  This child will grow up in poverty (eating food that’s available in a destroyed land).  This experience of suffering will help him to understand how to make good moral decisions, which Ahaz could not do.  The reason that he will have such a childhood is because Ahaz’s kingdom will be destroyed by Assyria.  This devastation of the land is described in verses 18-25.  It is continued in chapter 8 where the prophet laments the destruction “of your land, O Immanuel.”  This destruction plunges the land of Israel into darkness (8:21-9:2).  But “the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light…” (9:2).  I believe that it is very clear that the darkness caused by Assyria’s invasion in chapter 7 is the same darkness that the “Prince of Peace” emerges from in chapters 8-9.  The son in chapter 7 is born into poverty, and he is the same “son” who is born in darkness in chapter 9.  The sign to the “house of David” in chapter 7 is a son, and the child in chapter 9 is the king who sits on the “throne of David.”  The child of chapter 7 is “God with us,” and the child of chapter 9 is “Mighty God.”  The son who learns to “refuse the evil and choose the good” in chapter 7 is the same person who rules “with justice and with righteousness.”

Matthew thinks the individual prophesied in chapter 7 and the one in chapter 9 are the same person.  He says that the virgin conception of Mary “fulfilled” Isaiah 7:14 (see Matt 1:23).  When Jesus begins his earthly ministry, Matthew quotes Isaiah 9:1-2 to say that Jesus is the light who has come to a land in darkness (see Matt 4:12-16).  There is much more to say about Matthew’s understanding of Isaiah, but for now, I simply want you to see that Matthew’s interpretation is the same as mine. 

This does not work if you believe that there was an Immanuel born in Isaiah’s day.  If that prophecy was fulfilled already, it is fulfilled.  If you cash your paycheck at the bank, you can’t bring it back and cash it again tomorrow.  Fulfilled means fulfilled (unless the check says you can deposit it twice, or the prophecy says there will be two boys named Immanuel). 

But let me go one farther.  This a key point that I do not remember seeing addressed elsewhere (though I confess that the literature is vast and I touched only a smidgen of it).  Explain to me, you who believe otherwise, exactly how an Immanuel born in the time of Ahaz was a blessed prophecy.  The typical way it is understood is this: The woman gives birth, names the boy Immanuel.  Before he is 20 years old (the age of knowing right from wrong), Israel and Aram are destroyed.  Yippee!  We ‘re saved.  God was right.  God is “with us.”  Oh, wait, hold on, here comes Assyria – AHHHHHHH, we ‘re dead!  Assyria overruns us, the land is destroyed, those who remain are eating curds and honey.  Immanuel is dead too (or, if he somehow escaped, will be by about the age of 70).  And now there is no hope.  There is no reason to believe that Judah has a future.  There is no reason to believe that the “house of David” will live on.  In fact, given Ahaz’s wickedness, everybody expects that this really is the end; he (and the other wicked people of the house of David) deserved it.  So if Immanuel is born in the 8th century, the hope that he brings is very short-lived indeed.  God may be “with us,” but he is with us in judgment, not in deliverance. 

The thread, though, that runs throughout Isaiah (more coming on this) is that in judgment, there is a glimmer of hope.  God is going to severely punish his people for their sin, BUT he is not finished with them.  He will bring them back from exile.  He will forgive their sins.  He will fulfill the promises he has already made.  This Immanuel prophecy is entirely in line with this theme.  Because Ahaz has rejected God, he will be judged.  In fact, note the irony: Ahaz goes to Assyria for deliverance, but God uses Assyria to not only destroy Judahâ
€™s enemies, but Judah itself (this is especially graphic in Isa 8:7-8 – the floodwaters come and just keep coming).  But all is not lost.  The people’s sins will be forgiven (Isa 1:25-26), Jerusalem will be exalted (Isa 2:2), the world will be filled with peace (Isa 2:4), a branch will come forth (Isa 4:2-6).  How all of this ties together has not yet been explained.  Isaiah is putting the puzzle pieces on the table, and when he has done that, guys like Simeon and Matthew will show us that they were able to put the puzzle together.

Here’s a crucial point.  Absolutely crucial.  When Mary comes along in 5 B.C. and the angel tells her that she’s going to have a child, she cannot tell anyone (and they cannot tell her) that she is the “virgin who will conceive.”  If Immanuel was already born, the prophecy is fulfilled.  If it was fulfilled by a non-virgin woman who gave birth to a very ordinary son, the prophecy was talking about something else.  If Matthew or anyone else claims that this prophecy predicted a supernatural conception, all of their Jewish neighbors are just going to laugh at them.  They made it up.  They claimed the first one was a “type,” but there’s no evidence that the first one was a type.  They say it’s a “type,” because they have to get out of a tough spot.  They have to find some way to justify this woman’s story about getting pregnant before marriage.  Poor Mary.

But, since there was no record of an “Immanuel” being born in ancient times, and since the ancient people believed that this was a conception by a virgin (as translated by the Jews in the Greek Septuagint), and since the Jewish people were living in a land of darkness, and since the royal house of David (i.e., Mary and Joseph) was not living in a palace but were rather eating “curds and honey,” everyone was right to be waiting for the glorious fulfillment of this prophecy.

I think too that the future fulfillment of Immanuel explains why Isaiah recorded this event.  If the birth of Immanuel was simply a “stopwatch” to tell Ahaz how long he had until Israel and Aram were destroyed, that had already occurred by the time that Isaiah wrote the book, it wouldn’t seem to have any more relevance, and thus could be easily omitted.

I realize that I have skipped a lot of things.  In order not to get waylaid a dozen times along the way, I ignored some difficulties and objections for now so that I could present my interpretation as simply as possible.  I will address some of those details in the next post, and those who are not interested can skip it without missing the grand picture that I am trying to help you to see.

I want to show you something in Isaiah 6 that you may not have seen before, but I ‘ll just note in passing that the reason that I am skipping Isaiah 5 is not because it’s not good.  In fact, it fits my understanding of the book very well.  But since this is already my 5th post, and I haven’t yet arrived where I expected to start this series, I am trying to move it along.  Furthermore, the point made in chapter 5 is very similar to what we ‘ll see in chapters 7 and following.

If you know anything about Isaiah, you probably know that chapter 6 is about the vision of the holiness of God.  If you went to The Master’s College, you probably heard a (good) sermon on it about once a year.  But I want to move beyond the familiar part to the point of the commissioning service.  After Isaiah is devastated by the glory of the Lord, he is purified.  After that, God asks whom he will send.  Isaiah is willing, and this is what God calls Isaiah to do:

Isaiah 6:9-10 (ESV) “‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive. ‘ 10 Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.”

Now this is a very strange commission.  You almost have to ask, what’s the point?  Why bother?  If my message is only going to be rejected, then perhaps it’s better to not go at all.  But God insists; Isaiah’s deliverance of the message is critical.  It would not be the same if the people did not hear.  This is because the message itself will harden the people. 

Jesus, of course, will quote this same passage when the disciples ask him why he started speaking in parables (Matt 13:10-17).  Jesus told these “silly stories” so that those whose hearts were hard would not understand the great truths of the teacher.  But note, Jesus was able, with the same story, to reveal truth to some (believers) and hide truth from others.  Isaiah is doing the same thing, I believe, in the rest of his book.  That is to say, the reason why some things don’t just jump out at you was because Isaiah was deliberately using ambiguous language and difficult concepts so that guys like Ahaz, who rejected the truth, would not be reveling in wonderful truths that they did not deserve and would not receive.  But, it’s absolutely not true (here picture me jumping up and down yelling and screaming) that no one could understand prior to some magical (that is, unwarranted) New Testament interpretation.  One clear proof that people could and did understand is Simeon (Luke 2:25-35).  I ‘ll develop that later, after we look at the passages that were Simeon’s “glorious hope,” but for now I want to make the simple point that some people could understand and some people could not understand, and this was intentional.

The next question in the narrative is important.  Isaiah, realizing he is doomed to giving a message that will harden people asks, “How long, O Lord?”  The answer is:

Isaiah 6:11 (ESV) “Until cities lie waste without inhabitant, and houses without people, and the land is a desolate waste,”

In other words, Isaiah will preach a hardening message until judgment comes.  To say it another way, the next thing on the timetable is judgment.  Isaiah may be giving words of hope at point (and yes he is!), but those words of hope will be fulfilled after judgment has come.

This is very critical, in my opinion, for understanding the Immanuel prophecy of Isaiah 7:14.  (Ok, you can live without it in this passage because I think it’s evident in others, but I point it out here as yet another evidence that Isaiah was not prophesying Immanuel as some present-day solution to their problem.)

Now, two more points, as quickly as I can.  First, I believe, and maybe nobody else in the world does, I don’t know, that Isaiah 6:11-12 are an outline of the book.  That is to say, 6:11 predicts the devastation of the land, and this begins to be fulfilled by the Assyrians beginning in chapter 7 and going to chapter 38.  6:12 predicts the exile of the people and this is fulfilled in chapters 39 to the end.  This point is not critical to this series, but it’s something I picked up that seems to hold true.  To pull it together, the people’s hearts are indeed hardened such that there is no reprieve from judgment and the land is destroyed and the people carried off.

The second point is that even here, even in the commissioning message, Isaiah is given a word of hope.  Now, it’s a faint glimmer.  Very faint.

Isaiah 6:13 (ESV) “And though a tenth remain in it, it will be burned again, like a terebinth or an oak, whose stump remains when it is felled.” The holy seed is its stump.”

But a faint light at the end of a tunnel is light nonetheless.  Though the judgment will be massive, God will not completely destroy his people.  The “holy seed” will remain.  We will get a glimpse into this “holy seed” in the following chapters, where a child is born into an impoverished land but rises to become a righteous ruler.