Isaiah 53:8: the servant dies for Israel's sins

Strong

No good counter-argument has been published by the counter-missionary teachers — the Jewish speakers and writers whose work is answering Christians.

What this case is about

If the servant in Isaiah 53 is the nation of Israel, the Christian reading of the chapter collapses. So everything turns on one question.

Does the chapter treat the servant as the nation, or as someone separate from it?

The verse that does the work

Isaiah 53:8 says the servant was struck "for the transgression of my people." Read that slowly. The servant is punished for the people.

So he cannot be the people. A nation cannot be punished for its own sins on its own behalf.

A second detail

Isaiah 53:9 says he had "done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth." The prophets never say that about Israel. They say the opposite, over and over, at length.

Isaiah himself does it in chapter 1.

Where the other side has a point

Isaiah does call Israel God's servant elsewhere — in Isaiah 41:8, Isaiah 44:1 and Isaiah 49:3. That is true, and you should say so first.

The word "servant" alone proves nothing. The argument has to come from chapter 53 itself.

How strong is this argument?

Strong for you. No Jewish answer deals with this properly.

Counter-missionary writers — the Jewish teachers who answer Christian claims — usually move to Isaiah 41 and Isaiah 44 instead of facing verse 8 directly.

What to say

"Read me Isaiah 53:8. Who is the servant being struck for?"

Photographic reproduction of the Great Isaiah Scroll from Qumran, which carries the servant passage complete

A page of the tenth-century Aleppo Codex, the Masoretic standard behind printed Hebrew Bibles; Deuteronomy shown

How they answer this — at its strongest

Israel is God's servant all through the book, and the kings are the ones speaking.

The strongest reply comes from Rashi, Ibn Ezra and Tovia Singer. Isaiah has already named the servant. He is 'Israel, my servant' in Isaiah 41:8, Isaiah 44:1 and Isaiah 49:3. So the burden sits with anyone who claims a single man.

Who is speaking in chapter 53? On this reading, the gentile kings of Isaiah 52:15. They are stunned at Israel's rescue. Each king says 'my people' about his own nation. That takes the sting out of Isaiah 53:8.

They also read the Hebrew of 53:5 the other way. Israel suffered from the sins of the nations, not for them. A nation that dies and revives is standard prophetic imagery. Ezekiel 37's dry bones do the same thing. And this is not a medieval invention. Origen records Jewish opponents arguing it around 248 AD.

The verdict

Strong for you, but say out loud that Isaiah calls Israel his servant too.

This one is graded Strong. That means the counter-missionary answer does not deal with it properly.

To make the collective reading work, two things must hold. The gentile kings have to become the ones confessing. And 'my people' has to mean a different people in each king's mouth. Both readings strain the text. Isaiah 53:9 also describes one grave, with 'a rich man in his death.'

The grammar of 53:5 runs the other way too. He was wounded for our transgressions, and the LORD laid our iniquity on him. That is the language of one man bearing what belongs to others. Still, say plainly that Isaiah does call Israel his servant elsewhere. If you skip that, you look like you are hiding it.

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