Expositor's Bible: The Book of Isaiah Part 8

CHAPTER IX.

_ATHEISM OF FORCE AND ATHEISM OF FEAR._

ISAIAH x. 5-34 (ABOUT 721 B.C.).

In chap. xxviii. Isaiah, speaking in the year 725 when Salmana.s.sar IV.

was marching on Samaria, had explained to the politicians of Jerusalem how entirely the a.s.syrian host was in the hand of Jehovah for the punishment of Samaria and the punishment and purification of Judah. The invasion which in that year loomed so awful was not unbridled force of destruction, implying the utter annihilation of G.o.d's people, as Damascus, Arpad and Hamath had been annihilated. It was Jehovah's instrument for purifying His people, with its appointed term and its glorious intentions of fruitfulness and peace.

In the tenth chapter Isaiah turns with this truth to defy the a.s.syrian himself. It is four years later. Samaria has fallen. The judgement, which the prophet spoke upon the luxurious capital, has been fulfilled.

All Ephraim is an a.s.syrian province. Judah stands for the first time face to face with a.s.syria. From Samaria to the borders of Judah is not quite two days' march, to the walls of Jerusalem a little over two. Now shall the Jews be able to put to the test their prophet's promise! What can possibly prevent Sargon from making Zion as Samaria, and carrying her people away in the track of the northern tribes to captivity?

There was a very fallacious human reason, and there was a very sound Divine one.

The fallacious human reason was the alliance which Ahaz had made with a.s.syria. In what state that alliance now was, does not clearly appear, but the most optimist of the a.s.syrian party at Jerusalem could not, after all that had happened, be feeling quite comfortable about it. The a.s.syrian was as unscrupulous as themselves. There was too much impetus in the rush of his northern floods to respect a tiny province like Judah, treaty or no treaty. Besides, Sargon had as good reason to suspect Jerusalem of intriguing with Egypt, as he had against Samaria or the Philistine cities; and the a.s.syrian kings had already shown their meaning of the covenant with Ahaz by stripping Judah of enormous tribute.

So Isaiah discounts in this prophecy Judah's treaty with a.s.syria. He speaks as if nothing was likely to prevent the a.s.syrian's immediate march upon Jerusalem. He puts into Sargon's mouth the intention of this, and makes him boast of the ease with which it can be accomplished (vv.

7-11). In the end of the prophecy he even describes the probable itinerary of the invader from the borders of Judah to his arrival on the heights, over against the Holy City (vv. 27 last clause to 32).[31]

[31] It will be noticed that in the above version a different reading is adopted from the meaningless clause at the end of verse 27 in the English version, out of which a proper heading for the subsequent itinerary has been obtained by Robertson Smith (_Journal of Philology_, 1884, p. 62).

_Cometh up from the North the Destroyer._

_He is come upon Ai; marcheth through Migron; at Michmash musters his baggage._

_They have pa.s.sed through the Pa.s.s; "Let Geba be our bivouac."_

_Terror-struck is Ramah; Gibeah of Saul hath fled._

_Make shrill thy voice, O daughter of Gallim! Listen, Laishah! Answer her, Anathoth!_

_In mad flight is Madmenah; the dwellers in Gebim gather their stuff to flee._

_This very day he halteth at n.o.b; he waveth his hand at the Mount of the Daughter of Zion, the Hill of Jerusalem._

This is not actual fact; but it is vision of what may take place to-day or to-morrow. For there is nothing--not even that miserable treaty--to prevent such a violation of Jewish territory, within which, it ought to be kept in mind, lie all the places named by the prophet.

But the invasion of Judah and the arrival of the a.s.syrian on the heights over against Jerusalem does not mean that the Holy City and the shrine of Jehovah of hosts are to be destroyed; does not mean that all the prophecies of Isaiah about the security of this rallying-place for the remnant of G.o.d's people are to be annulled, and Israel annihilated. For just at the moment of the a.s.syrian's triumph, when he brandishes his hand over Jerusalem, as if he would harry it like a bird's nest, Isaiah beholds him struck down, and crash like the fall of a whole Lebanon of cedars (vv. 33, 34).

_Behold the Lord, Jehovah of hosts, lopping the topmost boughs with a sudden crash,_

_And the high ones of stature hewn down, and the lofty are brought low!_

_Yea, He moweth down the thickets of the forest with iron, and Lebanon by a Mighty One falleth._

All this is poetry. We are not to suppose that the prophet actually expected the a.s.syrian to take the route, which he has laid down for him with so much detail. As a matter of fact, Sargon did not advance across the Jewish frontier, but turned away by the coast-land of Philistia to meet his enemy of Egypt, whom he defeated at Rafia, and then went home to Nineveh, leaving Judah alone. And, although some twenty years later the a.s.syrian did appear before Jerusalem, as threatening as Isaiah describes, and was cut down in as sudden and miraculous a manner, yet it was not by the itinerary Isaiah here marked for him that he came, but in quite another direction: from the south-west. What Isaiah merely insists upon is that there is nothing in that wretched treaty of Ahaz--that fallacious _human_ reason--to keep Sargon from overrunning Judah to the very walls of Jerusalem, but that, even though he does so, there is a most sure _Divine_ reason for the Holy City remaining inviolate.

The a.s.syrian expected to take Jerusalem. But he is not his own master.

Though he knows it not, and his only instinct is that of destruction (ver. 7), he is the rod in G.o.d's hand. And when G.o.d shall have used him for the needed punishment of Judah, then will G.o.d visit upon him his arrogance and brutality. This man, who says he will exploit the whole earth as he harries a bird's nest (ver. 14), who believes in nothing but himself, saying, _By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I am prudent_, is but the instrument of G.o.d, and all his boasting is that of _the axe against him that heweth therewith and of the saw against him that wieldeth it_. _As if_, says the prophet, with a scorn still fresh for those who make material force the ultimate power in the universe--_As if a rod should shake them that lift it up, or as if a staff should lift up him that is not wood_. By the way, Isaiah has a word for his countrymen. What folly is theirs, who now put all their trust in this world-force, and at another time cower in abject fear before it! Must he again bid them look higher, and see that a.s.syria is only the agent in G.o.d's work of first punis.h.i.+ng the whole land, but afterwards redeeming His people! In the midst of denunciation the prophet's stern voice breaks into the promise of this later hope (vv.

24-27_a_); and at last the crash of the fallen a.s.syrian is scarcely still, before Isaiah has begun to declare a most glorious future of grace for Israel. But this carries us over into the eleventh chapter, and we had better first of all gather up the lessons of the tenth.

This prophecy of Isaiah contains a great Gospel and two great Protests, which the prophet was enabled to make in the strength of it: one against the Atheism of Force, and one against the Atheism of Fear.

The Gospel of the chapter is just that which we have already emphasized as the gospel _par excellence_ of Isaiah: the Lord exalted in righteousness, G.o.d supreme over the supremest men and forces of the world. But we now see it carried to a height of daring not reached before. This was the first time that any man faced the sovereign force of the world in the full sweep of victory, and told himself and his fellow-men: "This is not travelling in the greatness of its own strength, but is simply a dead, unconscious instrument in the hand of G.o.d." Let us, at the cost of a little repet.i.tion, get at the heart of this. We shall find it wonderfully modern.

Belief in G.o.d had hitherto been local and circ.u.mscribed. Each nation, as Isaiah tells us, had walked in the name of its G.o.d, and limited his power and prevision to its own life and territory. We do not blame the peoples for this. Their conception of G.o.d was narrow, because their life was narrow, and they confined the power of their deity to their own borders because, in fact, their thoughts seldom strayed beyond. But now the barriers, that had so long enclosed mankind in narrow circles, were being broken down. Men's thoughts travelled through the breaches, and learned that outside their fatherland there lay the world. Their lives thereupon widened immensely, but their theologies stood still. They felt the great forces which shook the world, but their G.o.ds remained the same petty, provincial deities. Then came this great a.s.syrian power, hurtling through the nations, laughing at their G.o.ds as idols, boasting that it was by his own strength he overcame them, and to simple eyes making good his boast as he harried the whole earth like a bird's nest. No wonder that men's hearts were drawn from the unseen spiritualities to this very visible brutality! No wonder all real faith in the G.o.ds seemed to be dying out, and that men made it the business of their lives to seek peace with this world-force, that was carrying everything, including the G.o.ds themselves, before it! Mankind was in danger of practical atheism: of placing, as Isaiah tells us, the ultimate faith which belongs to a righteous G.o.d in this brute force: of subst.i.tuting emba.s.sies for prayers, tribute for sacrifice, and the tricks and compromises of diplomacy for the endeavour to live a holy and righteous life. Behold, what questions were at issue: questions that have come up again and again in the history of human thought, and that are tugging at us to-day harder than ever!--whether the visible, sensible forces of the universe, that break so rudely in upon our primitive theologies, are what we men have to make our peace with, or whether there is behind them a Being, who wields them for purposes, far transcending them, of justice and of love; whether, in short, we are to be materialists or believers in G.o.d. It is the same old, ever-new debate. The factors of it have only changed a little as we have become more learned. Where Isaiah felt the a.s.syrians, we are confronted by the evolution of nature and history, and the material forces into which it sometimes looks ominously like as if these could be a.n.a.lysed. Everything that has come forcibly and gloriously to the front of things, every drift that appears to dominate history, all that a.s.serts its claim on our wonder, and offers its own simple and strong solution of our life--is our a.s.syria. It is precisely now, as then, a rush of new powers across the horizon of our knowledge, which makes the G.o.d, who was sufficient for the narrower knowledge of yesterday, seem petty and old-fas.h.i.+oned to-day. This problem no generation can escape, whose vision of the world has become wider than that of its predecessors. But Isaiah's greatness lay in this: that it was given to him to attack the problem the first time it presented itself to humanity with any serious force, and that he applied to it the only sure solution--a more lofty and spiritual view of G.o.d than the one which it had found wanting. We may thus paraphrase his argument: "Give me a G.o.d who is more than a national patron, give me a G.o.d who cares only for righteousness, and I say that every material force the world exhibits is nothing but subordinate to Him. Brute force cannot be anything but an instrument, _an axe_, _a saw_, something essentially mechanical and in need of an arm to lift it. Postulate a supreme and righteous Ruler of the world, and you not only have all its movements explained, but may rest a.s.sured, that it shall only be permitted to execute justice and purify men. The world cannot prevent their salvation, if G.o.d have willed this."

Isaiah's problem was thus the fundamental one between faith and atheism; but we must notice that it did not arise theoretically, nor did he meet it by an abstract proposition. This fundamental religious question--whether men are to trust in the visible forces of the world or in the invisible G.o.d--came up as a bit of practical politics. It was not to Isaiah a philosophical or theological question. It was an affair in the foreign policy of Judah.

Except to a few thinkers, the question between materialism and faith never does present itself as one of abstract argument. To the ma.s.s of men it is always a question of practical life. Statesmen meet it in their policies, private persons in the conduct of their fortunes. Few of us trouble our heads about an intellectual atheism, but the temptations to practical atheism abound unto us all day by day. Materialism never presents itself as a mere _ism_; it always takes some concrete form. Our a.s.syria may be the world in Christ's sense, that flood of successful, heartless, unscrupulous, scornful forces which burst on our innocence, with their challenge to make terms and pay tribute, or go down straightway in the struggle for existence. Beside their frank and forceful demands, how commonplace and irrelevant do the simple precepts of religion often seem; and how the great brazen laugh of the world seems to bleach the beauty out of purity and honour! According to our temper, we either cower before its insolence, whining that character and energy of struggle and religious peace are impossible against it; and that is the Atheism of Fear, with which Isaiah charged the men of Jerusalem, when they were paralysed before a.s.syria. Or we seek to ensure ourselves against disaster by alliance with the world. We make ourselves one with it, its subjects and imitators. We absorb the world's temper, get to believe in nothing but success, regard men only as they can be useful to us, and think so exclusively of ourselves as to lose the faculty of imagining about us any other right or need or pity. And all that is the Atheism of Force, with which Isaiah charged the a.s.syrian. It is useless to think, that we common men cannot possibly sin after the grand manner of this imperial monster. In our measure we fatally can. In this commercial age private persons very easily rise to a position of influence, which gives almost as vast a stage for egotism to display itself as the a.s.syrian boasted. But after all the human Ego needs very little room to develop the possibilities of atheism that are in it. An idol is an idol, whether you put it on a small or a large pedestal. A little man with a little work may as easily stand between himself and G.o.d, as an emperor with the world at his feet. Forgetfulness that he is a servant, a trader on graciously entrusted capital--and then at the best an unprofitable one--is not less sinful in a small egoist than in a great one; it is only very much more ridiculous, than Isaiah, with his scorn, has made it to appear in the a.s.syrian.

Or our a.s.syria may be the forces of nature, which have swept upon the knowledge of this generation with the novelty and impetus, with which the northern hosts burst across the horizon of Israel. Men to-day, in the course of their education, become acquainted with laws and forces, which dwarf the simpler theologies of their boyhood, pretty much as the primitive beliefs of Israel dwindled before the arrogant face of a.s.syria. The alternative confronts them either to retain, with a narrowed and fearful heart, their old conceptions of G.o.d, or to find their enthusiasm in studying, and their duty in relating themselves to, the forces of nature alone. If this be the only alternative, there can be no doubt but that most men will take the latter course. We ought as little to wonder at men of to-day abandoning certain theologies and forms of religion for a downright naturalism--for the study of powers that appeal so much to the curiosity and reverence of man--as we wonder at the poor Jews of the eighth century before Christ forsaking their provincial conceptions of G.o.d as a tribal Deity for homage to this great a.s.syrian, who handled the nations and their G.o.ds as his playthings. But is such the only alternative? Is there no higher and sovereign conception of G.o.d, in which even these natural forces may find their explanation and term? Isaiah found such a conception for his problem, and his problem was very similar to ours. Beneath his idea of G.o.d, exalted and spiritual, even the imperial a.s.syrian, in all his arrogance, fell subordinate and serviceable. The prophet's faith never wavered, and in the end was vindicated by history. Shall we not at least attempt his method of solution? We could not do better than by taking his factors.

Isaiah got a G.o.d more powerful than a.s.syria, by simply _exalting_ the old G.o.d of his nation _in righteousness_. This Hebrew was saved from the terrible conclusion, that the selfish, cruel force which in his day carried all before it was the highest power in life, simply by believing righteousness to be more exalted still. But have twenty-five centuries made any change upon this power, by which Isaiah interpreted history and overcame the world? Is righteousness less sovereign now than then, or was conscience more imperative when it spoke in Hebrew than when it speaks in English? Among the decrees of nature, at last interpreted for us in all their scope and reiterated upon our imaginations by the ablest men of the age, truth, purity and civic justice as confidently a.s.sert their ultimate victory, as when they were threatened merely by the arrogance of a human despot. The discipline of science and the glories of the wors.h.i.+p of nature are indeed justly vaunted over the childish and narrow-minded ideas of G.o.d, that prevail in much of our average Christianity. But more glorious than anything in earth or heaven is character, and the adoration of a holy and loving will makes more for "victory and law" than the discipline or the enthusiasm of science.

Therefore, if our conceptions of G.o.d are overwhelmed by what we know of nature, let us seek to enlarge and spiritualize them. Let us insist, as Isaiah did, upon His righteousness, until our G.o.d once more appear indubitably supreme.

Otherwise we are left with the intolerable paradox, that truth and honesty, patience and the love of man to man, are after all but the playthings and victims of force; that, to adapt the words of Isaiah, the rod really shakes him who lifts it up, and the staff is wielding that which is not wood.

CHAPTER X.

_THE SPIRIT OF G.o.d IN MAN AND THE ANIMALS._

ISAIAH xi., xii. (ABOUT 720 B.C.?)

Beneath the crash of the a.s.syrian with which the tenth chapter closes, we pa.s.s out into the eleventh upon a glorious prospect of Israel's future. The a.s.syrian when he falls shall fall for ever like the cedars of Lebanon, that send no fresh sprout forth from their broken stumps.

But out of the trunk of the Judaean oak, also brought down by these terrible storms, Isaiah sees springing a fair and powerful Branch.

a.s.syria, he would tell us, has no future. Judah has a future, and at first the prophet sees it in a scion of her royal house. The nation shall be almost exterminated, the dynasty of David hewn to a stump; _yet there shall spring a shoot from the stock of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit_.

The picture of this future, which fills the eleventh chapter, is one of the most extensive that Isaiah has drawn. Three great prospects are unfolded in it: a prospect of mind, a prospect of nature and a prospect of history. To begin with, there is (vv. 2-5) the geography of a royal mind in its stretches of character, knowledge and achievement. We have next (vv. 5-9) a vision of the rest.i.tution of nature, Paradise regained.

And, thirdly (vv. 9-16), there is the geography of Israel's redemption, the coasts and highways along which the hosts of the dispersion sweep up from captivity to a station of supremacy over the world. To this third prospect chapter xii. forms a fitting conclusion, a hymn of praise in the mouth of returning exiles.[32] The human mind, nature and history are the three dimensions of life, and across them all the prophet tells us that the Spirit of the Lord will fill the future with His marvels of righteousness, wisdom and peace. He presents to us three great ideals: the perfect indwelling of our humanity by the Spirit of G.o.d; the peace and communion of all nature, covered with the knowledge of G.o.d; the traversing of all history by the Divine purposes of redemption.

[32] The authenticity of this hymn has been called in question.

I. THE MESSIAH AND THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD (xi. 1-5).

The first form, in which Isaiah sees Israel's longed-for future realised, is that which he so often exalts and makes glistering upon the threshold of the future--the form of a king. It is a peculiarity, which we cannot fail to remark about Isaiah's scattered representations of this brilliant figure, that they have no connecting link. They do not allude to one another, nor employ a common terminology, even the word _king_ dropping out of some of them. The earliest of the series bestows a name on the Messiah, which none of the others repeat, nor does Isaiah say in any of them, This is He of whom I have spoken before. Perhaps the disconnectedness of these oracles is as strong a proof as is necessary of the view we have formed that throughout his ministry our prophet had before him no distinct, identical individual, but rather an ideal of virtue and kinghood, whose features varied according to the conditions of the time. In this chapter Isaiah recalls nothing of Immanuel, or of the Prince-of-the-Four-Names. Nevertheless (besides for the first time deriving the Messiah from the house of David), he carries his description forward to a stage which lies beyond and to some extent implies his two previous portraits. Immanuel was only a Sufferer with His people in the day of their oppression. The Prince-of-the-Four-Names was the Redeemer of his people from their captivity, and stepped to his throne not only after victory, but with the promise of a long and just government s.h.i.+ning from the t.i.tles by which He was proclaimed. But now Isaiah not only speaks at length of this peaceful reign--a chronological advance--but describes his hero so inwardly that we also feel a certain spiritual advance. The Messiah is no more a mere experience, as Immanuel was, nor only outward deed and promise, like the Prince-of-the-Four-Names, but at last, and very strongly, _a character_. The second verse is the definition of this character; the third describes the atmosphere in which it lives. _And there shall rest upon him the Spirit of Jehovah, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of Jehovah; and he shall draw breath in the fear of Jehovah_--in other words, ripeness but also sharpness of mind; moral decision and heroic energy; piety in its two forms of knowing the will of G.o.d and feeling the constraint to perform it. We could not have a more concise summary of the strong elements of a ruling mind. But it is only as Judge and Ruler that Isaiah cares here to think of his hero. Nothing is said of the tender virtues, and we feel that the prophet still stands in the days of the need of inflexible government and purgation in Judah.

Dean Plumptre has plausibly suggested, that these verses may represent the programme which Isaiah set before his pupil Hezekiah on his accession to the charge of a nation, whom his weak predecessor had suffered to lapse into such abuse of justice and laxity of morals.[33]

The acts of government described are all of a punitive and repressive character. The hero speaks only to make the land tremble: _And He shall smite the land[34] with the rod of His mouth_ [what need, after the whispering, indecisive Ahaz!], _and with the breath of His lips shall He slay the wicked_.

[33] Dean Plumptre notes the ident.i.ty of the ethical terminology of this pa.s.sage with that of the book of Proverbs, and conjectures that the additions to the original nucleus, chaps. x.-xxiv., and therefore the whole form, of the book of Proverbs, may be due to the editors.h.i.+p of Isaiah, and perhaps was the manual of ethics, on which he sought to mould the character of Hezekiah (_Expositor_, series ii., v., p. 213).

[34] Perhaps for _land--'arets_--we ought, with Lagarde, to read _tyrant--'arits_.