Isaiah 50:6 Ulasan

In this chapter, I. Those to whom God sends are justly charged with bringing all the troubles they were in upon themselves, by their own wilfulness and obstinacy, it being made to appear that God was able and ready to help them if they had been fit for deliverance (Isa 50:1-3). II. He by whom God sends produces his commission (Isa 50:4), alleges his own readiness to submit to all the services and sufferings he was called to in the execution of it (Isa 50:5, Isa 50:6), and assures himself that God, who sent him, would stand by him and bear him out against all opposition (Isa 50:7-9). III. The message that is sent is life and death, good and evil, the blessing and the curse, comfort to desponding saints and terror to presuming sinners (Isa 50:10, Isa 50:11). Now all this seems to have a double reference, 1. To the unbelieving Jews in Babylon, who quarrelled with God for his dealings with them, and to the prophet Isaiah, who, though dead long before the captivity, yet, prophesying so plainly and fully of it, saw fit to produce his credentials, to justify what he had said. 2. To the unbelieving Jews in our Saviour's time, whose own fault it was that they were rejected, Christ having preached much to them, and suffered much from them, and being herein borne up by a divine power. The "contents" of this chapter, in our Bibles, give this sense of it, very concisely, thus: - "Christ shows that the dereliction of the Jews is not to be imputed to him, by his ability to save, by his obedience in that work, and by his confidence in divine assistance." The prophet concludes with an exhortation to trust in God and not in ourselves.

INTRODUCTION TO ISAIAH 50 This chapter is a prophecy of the rejection of the Jews, for their neglect and contempt of the Messiah; and of his discharge of his office as Mediator, and fitness for it. The rejection of the Jews is signified by the divorce of a woman from her husband, and by persons selling their children to their creditors; which is not to be charged upon the Lord, but was owing to their own iniquities, Isa 50:1, particularly their disregard of the Messiah, and inattention to him, as if he was an insufficient Saviour; whereas his power to redeem is evident, from his drying up the sea and rivers below, and clothing the heavens above with black clouds, and eclipsing the luminaries thereof, Isa 50:2, his fitness for his prophetic office is expressed in Isa 50:4. His obedience to his Father, and his patience in sufferings, while performing his priestly office, Isa 50:5, and his faith and confidence in the Lord, as man and Mediator, that he should be helped, carried through his work, and acquitted; and not be confounded, overcome, and condemned, Isa 50:7, and the chapter is closed with an exhortation to the saints to trust in the Lord in the darkest times; and a threatening to such who trust in themselves, and in their own doings, Isa 50:10.

I gave my back to the smiters,.... To Pontius Pilate, and those he ordered to scourge him, Mat 27:26. and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair; of the beard; which, is painful, so a great indignity and affront. The Septuagint renders it, "and my cheeks to blows"; , a word used by the evangelists when they speak of Christ being smitten and stricken with the palms of men's hands, and seem to refer to this passage, Mar 14:65, I hid not my face from shame and spitting; or from shameful spitting; they spit in his face, and exposed him to shame, and which was a shameful usage of him, and yet he took it patiently, Mat 26:67, these are all instances of great shame and reproach; as what is more reproachful among us, or more exposes a man, than to be stripped of his clothes, receive lashes on his bare back, and that in public? in which ignominious manner Christ was used: or what reckoned more scandalous, than for a man to have his beard plucked by a mob? which used to be done by rude and wanton boys, to such as were accounted idiots, and little better than brutes (x); and nothing is more affronting than to spit in a man's face. So Job was used, which he mentions as a great indignity done to him, Job 30:10. With some people, and in some countries, particular places, that were mean and despicable, were appointed for that use particularly to spit in. Hence Aristippus the philosopher, being shown a fine room in a house, beautifully and richly paved, spat in the face of the owner of it; at which he being angry, and resenting it, the philosopher replied, that he had not a fitter place to spit in (y). (x) "------------barbam tibi vellunt Lascivi pueri", Horace. "Idcirco stolidam praebet tibi vellere barbara Jupiter?" Persius, Satyr. 2. (y) Laertius in Vita Aristippi.

And being by nature intangible, the Word yet said, “I gave my back to the stripes, and my cheeks to blows, and I hid not my face from shame and spitting.” For what the human body of the Word suffered, this the Word, dwelling in the body, ascribed to himself, in order that we might be enabled to be partakers of God the Word. Truly it is a mystery that it was he who suffered, and yet suffered not. He suffered, because his own body suffered, and he was in it, which thus suffered. He suffered not, because the Word, being by nature God, is impassible. And while he, the incorporeal, was in the passible body, the Body had in it the impassible Word, which was destroying the infirmities inherent in the body.

Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ comes before us, when he would show [people] how to suffer, who when he was struck bore it patiently, being reviled he reviled not again, when he suffered he threatened not, but he gave his back to the smiters and his cheeks to buffetings, and he turned not his face from spitting; and at last, he was willingly led to death, that we might behold in him the image of all that is virtuous and immortal, and that we, conducting ourselves after these examples, might truly tread on serpents and scorpions and on all the power of the enemy.

If you remain unruffled, you silence your insolent assailant by giving him a practical illustration of self-control. Were you struck? So also was the Lord. Were you spat on? The Lord also suffered this, for “he did not turn his face from the shame of the spittle.” … You have not been condemned to death or crucified.

(Chapter 50—Verse 4 and following) The Lord has given me a learned tongue, so that I may sustain with words the weary. He awakens me morning by morning, awakens my ear as a master. The Lord God has opened my ear; I do not resist, I do not turn back. I offered my body to the ones striking me, and my cheeks to those plucking my beard. I did not turn my face away from those reproaching and spitting. The Lord God is ((added by the Vulgate)) my helper, therefore I am not ashamed; therefore I set my face like flint, and I know that I will not be put to shame. LXX: The Lord gives me the tongue of instruction, so that I may know when it is necessary for me to speak a word. He has set me in the morning, and added an ear to listen; and the instruction of the Lord opens my ears. But I do not refuse or contradict. I have given my back to the lashes, and my cheeks to the slaps. But I have not turned my face away from the shame of spitting. And the Lord is my helper, therefore I am not ashamed: but I have set my face like a mighty rock, and I know that I will not be put to shame. The Jews, separating this chapter from the previous ones, want to refer it to Isaiah, who says he received a word from the Lord about how to sustain and call back the weary and wandering people to salvation. And, in the manner of little children who are instructed in the morning hours, let him hear what the Holy Spirit says. And [let it be known] that he did not contradict His command, but when the Lord asked, 'Whom shall I send, and who will go to this people?' he answered, 'Here I am, send me' (Isaiah 6:8). And because it has been said: 'Listen to the word of the Lord, princes of Sodom: listen attentively to the law of our God, people of Gomorrah' (Isaiah 1:18), he endured so much hardship, not only the insults of words, but also the pains of wounds. However, he was not terrified by the conscience of the commanding God; but according to what is said in Ezekiel: 'Behold, I have made your face stronger than their faces, and your forehead harder than their foreheads, like adamant and flint I have made your face' (Ezekiel 3:8, 9), he crushed all their attacks. This they say, who by every means try to overturn the prophecies about Christ and distort them with a perverse interpretation, as if also these things were written about Isaiah, they could take away other testimonies about Christ that are so clear that they shed light on themselves for the eyes of everyone. Therefore, concerning the person of the Lord, in whom also the previous book ends, these things must also be mentioned: that, according to the arrangement of the assumed body, he was trained and acquired the language of learning, so that he would know when he should speak and when to be silent. Finally, he who was silent in his suffering now speaks through the Apostles and the men of the Apostolic age throughout the whole world. And it is a mark of great knowledge to give timely food to those under your care and to consider the individuality of your audience. Thus, the Apostle Paul, speaking by the testimony of his authorities, addresses those who do not accept the faith of the Prophets, saying: 'For we are indeed his offspring,' as some of your own poets have said, 'For we are indeed his offspring' (Acts 17:28), signifying Aratus. Again about the Comedian: Evil conversations corrupt good morals (1 Cor. XV, 33); and Epimenides' hexameter verse: Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons (Titus I, 12). If they do not maintain the order and measure of the meters in translation, it should be known that in Greek they run with feet. However, he did this because he had learned the language of discipline, so that he would know when to speak a word. To this was added an ear through grace, which he did not have by nature: so that we understand that ears should not be received from the body, but from the mind, about which the Lord also spoke in the Gospel: He who has ears to hear, let him hear (Luke VIII, 8). The discipline and education that opened his ears, so that he might transmit the knowledge of the Father to us; who did not contradict him, but became obedient even unto death, and death on a cross (Philippians 2). So that he would offer his body or back to the blows; and his chest, capable of receiving the scourges of God, would not turn away from the blows. It is clear that he endured this from the minister of the chief priests: so that both the Jewish people and the priests would mock him. He who was struck and spat upon did not blush, but was led to the victim like a lamb; and like a sheep before the shearer, he did not open his mouth. But what the Son heard from the Father regarding the mystery of his assumed body, we learn more fully in the Gospel, where he himself says: And he who sent me, the Father, has given me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak. And again: As I hear, I judge.

The Jews, separating this chapter from what has been said previously, wish to refer it to the person of Isaiah, in that he would say that he received the word from the Lord and how he put up with a lazy and wandering people and called them back to salvation, and in the manner of small children who are trained early in the morning, Isaiah recited what he heard from the Holy Spirit.… But these verses should be applied to the person of the Lord in which the older book is fulfilled, since according to the dispensation of the flesh that Christ assumed, he was trained and accepted the lash of discipline so that he would know when he ought to speak and when to keep quiet. And he who in his passion was silent, through the apostles and apostolic people speaks throughout the whole world.To Christ was added through the grace of the ear things that he did not have by nature, that we might understand that we ought to accept with the ears not of our body but of the mind.… The breast that contained God was beaten.… This discipline and training opened his ears that he was able to communicate the knowledge of the Father to us.… We learned more fully in the gospel that the Son, according to the flesh he took on, spoke the mystery that he had heard from the Father.

[This is] as though he were to say, “Though I knew beforehand that they would strike me, I did not even turn aside my cheek; for how could I have nerved my disciples to undergo death for the truth if I had been afraid?”

Now if God willed to accept and to lower Himself to such sufferings, dishonours, and humiliations, then no matter how much you humble yourself, you whose nature is mud and subject to death, you will never resemble your Lord [in this]. God for your sake humbled Himself, but you, for your own sake, do not humble yourself. You are proud and puffed up. God came and took up your burden to give you His rest, but you do not wish to endure labours and suffering. By your labours your wounds are healed.

This whole recital is taught by the holy Gospels. For the servant of the high priest gave [Christ] a blow on the cheek; some struck his face, saying, “Prophesy to us, Christ! Who is the one who struck you?” Others spat in his face; as for Pilate, he had him scourged and delivered him to be crucified. So, all this he predicts in the prophecy to teach of his own patience.

He also sets out the constancy of his obedience, that he did not abandon his obedience for any danger: I have given my body, that is, I exposed myself that I should suffer such things; or perhaps he literally suffered these things, but in Christ this was completely fulfilled (Matthew 26 and 27): I have given my dear soul into the hand of enemies (Jer 12:7).

This and the following chapter contain a prophecy relating to the fall of Babylon, interspersed with several predictions relative to the restoration of Israel and Judah, who were to survive their oppressors, and, on their repentance, to be pardoned and brought to their own land. This chapter opens with a prediction of the complete destruction of all the Babylonish idols, and the utter desolation of Chaldea, through the instrumentality of a great northern nation, Jer 50:1-3. Israel and Judah shall be reinstated in the land of their forefathers after the total overthrow of the great Babylonish empire, Jer 50:4, Jer 50:5. Very oppressive and cruel bondage of the Jewish people during the captivity, Jer 50:6, Jer 50:7. The people of God are commanded to remove speedily from Babylon, because an assembly of great nations are coming out of the north to desolate the whole land, Jer 50:8-10. Babylon, the hammer of the whole earth, the great desolator of nations, shall itself become a desolation on account of its intolerable pride, and because of the iron yoke it has rejoiced to put upon a people whom a mysterious Providence had placed under its domination, vv. 11-34. The judgments which shall fall upon Chaldea, a country addicted to the grossest idolatry, and to every species of superstition, shall be most awful and general, as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, Jer 50:35-40. Character of the people appointed to execute the Divine judgments upon the oppressors of Israel, Jer 50:41-45. Great sensation among the nations at the very terrible and sudden fall of Babylon, Jer 50:46.

And my cheeks to them that plunked off the hair - The greatest indignity that could possibly be offered. See the note on Isa 7:20 (note). I hid not my face from shame and spitting - Another instance of the utmost contempt and detestation. It was ordered by the law of Moses as a severe punishment, carrying with it a lasting disgrace; Deu 25:9. Among the Medes it was highly offensive to spit in any one's presence, Herod. 1:99; and so likewise among the Persians, Xenophon, Cyrop. Lib. i., p. 18. "They abhor me; they flee far from me; They forbear not to spit in my face." Job 30:10. "And Jehovah said unto Moses, If her father had but spit in her face, should she not be ashamed seven days?" Num 22:14. On which place Sir John Chardin remarks, that "spitting before any one, or spitting upon the ground in speaking of any one's actions, is through the east an expression of extreme detestation." - Harmer's Observ. 2:509. See also, of the same notions of the Arabs in this respect, Niebuhr, Description de l'Arabie, p. 26. It so evidently appears that in those countries spitting has ever been an expression of the utmost detestation, that the learned doubt whether in the passages of Scripture above quoted any thing more is meant than spitting, - not in the face, which perhaps the words do not necessarily imply, - but only in the presence of the person affronted. But in this place it certainly means spitting in the face; so it is understood in St. Luke, where our Lord plainly refers to this prophecy: "All things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished; for he shall be delivered to the Gentiles, and shall be mocked and spitefully entreated, and spitted on, εμπτυσθησεται, "Luk 18:31, Luk 18:32, which was in fact fulfilled; και ηρξεαντο τινες εμπτυειν αυτῳ, "and some began to spit on him," Mar 14:65, Mar 15:19. If spitting in a person's presence was such an indignity, how much more spitting in his face?

THE JUDGMENTS ON ISRAEL WERE PROVOKED BY THEIR CRIMES, YET THEY ARE NOT FINALLY CAST OFF BY GOD. (Isa 50:1-11) Where . . . mothers divorcement--Zion is "the mother"; the Jews are the children; and God the Husband and Father (Isa 54:5; Isa 62:5; Jer 3:14). GESENIUS thinks that God means by the question to deny that He had given "a bill of divorcement" to her, as was often done on slight pretexts by a husband (Deu 24:1), or that He had "sold" His and her "children," as a poor parent sometimes did (Exo 21:7; Kg2 4:1; Neh 5:5) under pressure of his "creditors"; that it was they who sold themselves through their own sins. MAURER explains, "Show the bill of your mother's divorcement, whom . . . ; produce the creditors to whom ye have been sold; so it will be seen that it was not from any caprice of Mine, but through your own fault, your mother has been put away, and you sold" (Isa 52:3). HORSLEY best explains (as the antithesis between "I" and "yourselves" shows, though LOWTH translates, "Ye are sold") I have never given your mother a regular bill of divorcement; I have merely "put her away" for a time, and can, therefore, by right as her husband still take her back on her submission; I have not made you, the children, over to any "creditor" to satisfy a debt; I therefore still have the right of a father over you, and can take you back on repentance, though as rebellious children you have sold yourselves to sin and its penalty (Kg1 21:25). bill . . . whom--rather, "the bill with which I have put her away" [MAURER].

smiters--with scourges and with the open hand (Isa 52:14; Mar 14:65). Literally fulfilled (Mat 27:26; Mat 26:27; Luk 18:33). To "pluck the hair" is the highest insult that can be offered an Oriental (Sa2 10:4; Lam 3:30). "I gave" implies the voluntary nature of His sufferings; His example corresponds to His precept (Mat 5:39). spitting--To spit in another's presence is an insult in the East, much more on one; most of all in the face (Job 30:10; Mat 27:30; Luk 18:32).

The words are no longer addressed to Zion, but to her children. "Thus saith Jehovah, Where is your mother's bill of divorce, with which I put her away? Or where is one of my creditors, to whom I sold you? Behold, for your iniquities are ye sold, and for your transgressions is your mother put away." It was not He who had broken off the relation in which He stood to Zion; for the mother of Israel, whom Jehovah had betrothed to Himself, had no bill of divorce to show, with which Jehovah had put her away and thus renounced for ever the possibility of receiving her again (according to Deu 24:1-4), provided she should in the meantime have married another. Moreover, He had not yielded to outward constraint, and therefore given her up to a foreign power; for where was there on of His creditors (there is not any one) to whom He would have been obliged to relinquish His sons, because unable to pay His debts, and in this way to discharge them? - a harsh demand, which was frequently made by unfelling creditors of insolvent debtors (Exo 21:7; Kg2 4:1; Mat 18:25). On nōsheh, a creditor, see at Isa 24:2. Their present condition was indeed that of being sold and put away; but this was not the effect of despotic caprice, or the result of compulsion on the part of Jehovah. It was Israel itself that had broken off the relation in which it stood to Jehovah; they had been sold through their own faults, and "for your transgressions is your mother put away." Instead of וּבפשׁעיה we have וּבפשׁעיכם. This may be because the church, although on the one hand standing higher and being older than her children (i.e., her members at any particular time), is yet, on the other hand, orally affected by those to whom she has given birth, who have been trained by her, and recognised by her as her own.