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© 2013 John D. Brey.

Isaiah is a truly phenomenal prophet. He channeled the Gospel of Jesus of Nazareth more clearly than any other person in the OT, to include Moses. ----And yet notwithstanding all the phenomenal revelations Isaiah give us, many of them are clouded by the fact that whenever we go to Isaiah to discuss his unsurpassed revelation, someone inevitably claims that all (or most of) the passages speaking of the Suffering Servant are talking about the nation of Israel.

Nothing is so obvious, and exegetically clear, as the fact that the "nation" of Israel takes on the name of a singular Israel ("Israel" is a Name of the Lord, part and parcel of the Name "Shaddai"), and that the nation's very survival, despite its frequent stiff-neckedness, is based on the fact that they wear the Name of their personal God, who is restrained from destroying them by reason of the fact that to destroy the nation of Israel would mean to demean the Name they go by (Moses kept Israel from destroying the young nation called "Israel" by threatening Israel/Shaddai with the diminution of the Holy Name should the nation wearing that Name ever be destroyed) .

Listen to this, O house of Jacob, you who are called by the name of Israel . . . For my own name's sake I delay my wrath; for the sake of my praise I hold it back from you, so as not to cut you off.

Isaiah 48:1, 9.

You are among us O Lord, and we bear your name; do not forsake us.

Jeremiah 14:8, 9.

O Lord, hearken and do; defer not, for thine own sake, O my God: for thy city and thy people are called by thy name.

Daniel 9:19.

Before even the simplest correct exegesis of the book of Isaiah takes place, it must be understood that "Israel" is the nom de plume of Shaddai, while the "nation" of Israel is made up of God's national servants such that they bear the Name of their Lord.

None of this is to take the Name of the Lord away from his special servants in the nation of Israel. Nor is it to deny that in most cases, the suffering of the Suffering Servant suffers in no way from being thought of as the nation of Israel, since, without a doubt, they are created in His image and likeness, and are a universal picture of the singular Israel who saw fit to share His name with them------ and much of His suffering too.

The nation of Israel are literally flesh of His flesh, and bone of His bone. They came out of Him, share His Name, and then give birth to His Son. They are God's Eve; prone to some of the same lust for knowledge devoid of spiritual truth, deceived by that knowledge to the point of favoring God's illegitimate firstborn, the Elohim, who, even like Eve's firstborn, murders the legitimate firstborn Son of God, whose rights and privileges are stolen by a crime committed in the womb, against the womb, by the one who opens the womb from the outside in, rather than from the inside out.

Correct exegesis of Isaiah occurs, and justifies its correctness, when it's realized that the monicker "Israel," applies to three entities in the book of Isaiah. It applies to the Lord, to the Lord's wife (the nation Israel), and to the Son, who is most typically the one targeted in the Suffering Servant passages.

Even the greatest Jewish exegetes at times make a shambles of Isaiah when they're not familiar enough with the New Testament to know that Isaiah actually saw the glory of Israel as he hung on the cross: "Isaiah said this because he saw Jesus' glory and spoke about him" (John 12:41). ------John 12:41 makes the outrageous claim that Isaiah actually saw Jesus' glory as he hung on the cross. And so the enlightened exegete, who considers the Gospel of Jesus Christ first of all exegetical tools, should like to justify John's outburst, with a burst of Isaiah's own words, which is to say from Isaiah's own pen.

Psalm 91:5:

He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him.

Rashi invokes this verse to explain why the Lord is found in a thorn-bush rather than some other tree: "The angel appeared in a thornbush, and not any other tree, in order to reflect the idea conveyed by the verse, `I am with him in distress'" (Rashi's Commentary).

The same idea is found in Midrash Tanchuma, Shemos, 14:

Why from the midst of a "thorn bush" and not from the midst of a large tree, or from the midst of a date tree? The Holy One, Blessed Is He, said, "I wrote in the Torah, `I am with him in distress.' They were placed in [the thorns of] slavery, therefore I too [will reveal Myself to them] in the bush which is all thorny."

The idea is given its clearest expression in Midrash Rabbah, Shemos, II, 5:

R. Jannai said: Just as in the case of twins (te'omim), if one has a pain in his head the other feels it also, so God said, as it were: "I will be with him in trouble" (Ps. XCI, 15). Another explanation: What does "I will be with him in trouble" mean? When they are in trouble, they will call upon none but the Lord. . . It says: In all their afflictions He was afflicted (Isa. LXIII, 9). God said to Moses: `Do you not realise that I live in trouble just as Israel live in trouble? Know from the place whence I speak unto you---form a thorn-bush---that I am, as it were, a partner in their trouble.'

Far beyond the other accounts of God sharing in Israel's pain and suffering, Midrash Rabbah, Shemos, II, 5, goes so far as to connect the idea of twins suffering pain in their head, with God being revealed in a thorn-bush. If Israel, the singular, feels pain in his head, has his head placed in a thorn-bush, a crown of thorns, God Himself will feel the same pain, will wear the same thorny crown, will speak to Moses out of a crown of thorns, a thorny bush.

In stark contrast to the unity between the Suffering Servant and his God, Isaiah 49:14 speaks of the personification of Zion (the Suffering Servant) exclaiming " . . . the Lord has forsaken me." ------- "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me." . . And we know all about Isaiah 53, and it's striking resemblance to the Synoptic Gospels. . . . But something more amazing is revealed in Isaiah chapter 49, which is a precursor to Isaiah chapter 53.

After the acknowledgement that the Suffering Servant feels forsaken by God (Isaiah 49:14) we get the Father's Pieta-like response: "Can a mother forget the baby at her breast, and have no compassion on the child she has born" (49:15)? The Father's response seems like a direct reference to imagery of Jesus on the breast of his mother at birth and death (see Michaelangelo's Pieta). . . But the Father claims he will go further than the mother: "Though she might forget, I will not forget you" (Ibid.)!

The Father follows up His statement that even though the mother might forget, He will not, by explaining that He literally can't forget since He suffers precisely as the Son suffers. He's right there in the thorn-bush, being crowned with suffering and pain, glory too, with the Son: Father and Son as One, at the formative moment in human history.

Isaiah 49:15 is followed by some of the most incredible statements in the entire Tanakh:

See, I have the same engraving as you in the palm of my hands; the thorns that surround you like a fence [homah, a shamar] are ever before me too!

After comforting the Son that He, the Father, hangs there on the cross with Him, wears the same engraving in His hand that the Son wears, is made to peer through the same thorny crown . . . the Father confirms to the Son that His death is not in vain. The Gentiles will come running, as the Prophet exclaims throughout the book of Isaiah, and those doing the crucifying, will depart from Him, to their own demise.

So important is this confirmation of John 12:41, that the Prophet Isaiah is compelled to record words of the Father which in effect kasher the crucifix worn by those Jews who acknowledge the work of the Father and the Son in their suffering on the Cross of Christ:

Lift up your eyes and look around; all your sons gather and come to you. As surely as I live, declares the Lord, you will be worn by them all as ornaments; you will be worn by them as a bride wears jewelry around her neck.  (49:18).

In verse 16, the Father says that the Son's crucifixion will forever be before Him. He then explains how: Jesus' sons and daughters will wear the crucifix around their neck like a bride wears jewelry [the crucified one dangling between the breasts of the bride forever], therein explaining how the crucifixion will forever be before Him. The Father is looking at the Son worn around the neck of the Sons sons and daughters (who make up the Bride of Christ) as He observes billions of crucifixes dangling from the necks of the Bride of Christ, who wear the engravings in His hands, and the thorns that fence Him in, in gold and silver jewelry, as an eternal monument to the most momentous moment in the history of the world.

In complete indifference to the correct interpretation/translation of the text in question, the Jewish interpreation, from the MT, implies that it’s Zion, the architectural emblem of the Suffering Servant, who will wear the sons and daughters and not vice versa.

Isaiah 49:14 begins the narrative in question by quoting Zion, "The Lord has forsaken me." But this is drawn from 49:4 where the Servant of the Lord says, "I have labored to no purpose; I have spent my strength in vain and for nothing. Yet what is due me is in the Lord's hand." ----- Everything in the latter part of the chapter is explained earlier in the chapter (and for that matter throughout the book).

Verse 6 tells us that the Servant is to become a light for the Gentiles, to bring the Lord's salvation to the ends of the earth, even as the crucifix has been brought to the ends of the earth. It's a light for the Gentiles, it's a banner lifted up for the Gentiles. Verse 22 says "See I will beckon to the Gentiles, I will lift up my banner to the peoples." ---- And what is this "banner" that will be lifted up for the Gentiles? The very banner explained in verse 16-18, the crucifix, with engraved palms, and the same thorny wall ---used to protect sheep from the wolves--- wrapped around the head of the Lord.

We know its the crucifix since in verse 23, immediately after talking about lifting the banner for the Gentiles, it says "They will bow down before you with their faces to the ground; they will lick the dust at your feet. Then you will know that I am the Lord." ----- It's a common image in Christianity iconograpny to see genuflecting worshiper kneeling at the feet of the cross, licking (kissing) the dust at the Lord's feet. The verses in Isaiah are a clear picture of the crucifixion. A fence of thorns on the head, engraved palms, and people kissing the feet.

Isaiah 49:13-18:

Shout for joy, O heavens; rejoice, O earth; burst into song, O mountains! For the Lord comforts his people and will have compassion on his afflicted ones. But Zion said, "The Lord has forsaken me, the Lord has forgotten me." Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have the same engraved palms as you; and the fence around your head is ever before me. . . As surely as I live, declares the Lord, you will be worn like ornaments; they will put you on like a bride puts on her Jewelry.

A parallel passage in chapter 52 has all the same elements:

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation . . Burst into song of joy together you ruins of Jerusalem, for the Lord has comforted his people, he has redeemed Jerusalem. The Lord will lay bare his holy arm in the sight of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God. . . he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted. . .his appearance was disfigured in a manner such that he could no longer be called a man, his form marred beyond human likeness.

In the exact place where chapter 49 speaks of engraved hands, and a crown of thorns, 52 says, "The Lord will lay bare his holy arm in the sight of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God." In both passages it's the Gentiles . . . and the ends of the earth . . . who see the light of the Lord in the banner lifted up with a man marred beyond human likeness, with hands engraved, and a thornbush (a shamar) on his head.

Throughout Isaiah, the Servant of the Lords questions why there was no one to help him? Why did the nation he called specifically not come to his aid, not help him? --- So he worked his own salvation. Without help from the nation of Israel. ----And it's the nations of the earth, from one end to the other, who recognize the Lord lifted up on the cross. It's the nations of the world who wear the ornaments that were removed from Israel at Horeb. It's the nations of the world who are sprinkled with God's blood, so that they, rather than the nation of Israel, are to be known as "Adam": alef-dalet-mem (God's own blood, his flesh and blood, his kin). 

The patient Jewish reader says, “. . . this [is] backwards. Remember it is being addressed to Zion. It is Zion who will wear her returning children as ornaments.” ----- And the Masoretic Text does read Isaiah 49:14 differently: “Lift your eyes around and see, all of them have gathered, have come to you; as I live, says the Lord, that you shall wear all of them as jewelry, and you shall tie them as a bride.”

The Masoretic Text is a sham in many places ---- a pretext (so to say) to what the text is actually saying.

The wearing of ornaments spoken of in Isaiah 49:14 is a play on the ornaments worn at the Exodus. Here's what the Jewish commentator (Hananel ben Hushiel) from the eleventh century said about those ornaments:

The sprinkling of blood on them was in order that they should enter the covenant with God through blood. And they called the stain of blood on their clothing "ornament" [adi] since it was an ornament for them and a great honor. And it gave them testimony [edut] and a sign that they had entered the covenant with God. And therefore, when they sinned with the calf and transgressed the covenant, he said to them: "take off your ornaments," that is, take off from your garments that which has been ornaments for you . . . those clothes on which the blood of the covenant had been thrown that were the witness and sign between God and themselves. And why did God use blood to make a covenant with them? A hint [remez] to them that if they keep the Torah, it will be good, but if not I will allow your blood for karet and for death. (From David Biale's, Blood and Belief, p. 93.)

On the next page of Biale's book we read a quote from Isaac Magrisso, the compiler of the Ladino commentary on Exodus entitled Me-am Loez:

Moses separated the blood of the sacrifices into two parts, throwing one part on the altar and the other on the people, and hinted with this that they were united with God in heart and in soul. They had committed themselves not to separate from [God] and not to do anything that is not commanded, even if it should require them to undergo martyrdom. And for this reason, the Israelite nation is called by the name "Adam," as it is written: "You are Adam" (Ezekiel 34). You are called Adam and there is no other nation in the world called Adam, because they did not receive a covenant that was contracted with blood. But because Israel took upon themselves a covenant that was contracted in blood, they are called Adam. Of this, scripture says: "Live in your blood" (Ezekiel 16), since the two parts of the blood gave life to Israel and they became sons of God.

This is the context for the ornaments worn in Isaiah 49. They are ornaments dripping with the blood of the covenant, God's blood. Whoever wears these ornaments are "Adam," alef (the sacrifice) and dalet-mem (the blood of the sacrifice). That's what the crucifix is, the ornamentation of the covenant of blood: God's blood. Whomever wears the crucifix symbolically gets their cloths, and their own flesh and blood, all mingled up in the blood of God's sacrifice, the blood coming out of the engraving in the palm, and dripping from the thorn-bush on the head, and through the holes in the feet.

But the covenant is two-fold. If anyone marked with the blood breaks with the covenant, the blood becomes a tragedy in the making. Some of the things Isaiah says about these, are unmentionable. They are tragic comments.

Freed from the points used by the Masoretes to suffocate the text, Isaiah 49:14 speaks of the Suffering Servant's spiritual offspring wearing his blood and his image as ornamentation and beautification (as Israel once wore the blood of the covenant as glorification and beautification), as a bride wears ornamentation when she is about to meet her groom. ---- But the Masoretic Text claims that Zion (not her children) will wear her sons and daughters as ornaments and as jewelry (a completely backward and profane interpretation of the text).

Earlier in the verse we have the misinterpreted implication that the "walls" of Zion are ever before God, as though the walls of Zion are the place in view concerning the wearing of Jewish sons and daughters as Jewelry. I.e., Zion’s walls will be adorned with her sons and daughters, and there they will forever be before the Lord.

Mekhilta de Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai tells us that part of the nature of the suffering Israel endured in Egypt---at the hands of the Egyptian gods---- was the fact that their sons and daughters were drowned and embedded in the "walls" of the city. Egyptian cities were actually adorned with Jewish sons and daughters. When the Babylonians took Israel captive, they actually skinned many Jews alive and hung these skins on the wall of the city as ornamentation so that whomever passed by the city saw the sons and daughters of Israel hanging on the walls of the city like ornamentation.

The Roman's too ornamented Jerusalem with the crucified bodies of Israel's sons and daughters. They were crucified on the walls of the city, and in the siege of Jerusalem, the sons and daughters of Israel had their blood splashed on the city walls and the walls of the temple, mingled with the blood of pigs . . . as the ultimate desecration of the temple and the sons and daughter of Israel.

Isaiah 62:3-5 returns to the earlier word of the prophet:

And you shall be a crown of glory on the phallus [Heb. yad] of the Lord and a royal fountain of life flowing downward from the thorn [Heb. sanup as "fountain" and "thorn"] entwined/engraved in the palm of your God's hand. No longer shall "forsaken" be said of you, and "desolate" shall no longer be said of your land. For you shall be called "My desire is in her," [pregnancy] and your land "inhabited," for the Lord desires you, and your land shall be inhabited. As the chosen firstborn you lived in a virgin, so shall your children live in you, and like the rejoicing of a bridegroom over a virgin bride [Heb. kallah] shall your God rejoice over you.

Someone will suppose this interpretation takes gross liberty with the text when in fact it's truer to the text than any other interpretation or translation. Not only is it true to the actual meaning of the words, but it's true to the context found throughout Deutero-Isaiah. Every place this translation differs from the Jewish rendering it does so with the authority of the Hebrew words, and the authority of the repetition of ideas found throughout Deutero-Isaiah.

The Jewish mystics teach that you cannot have the crown of glory without the thorny crown. There are two crowns on the divine organ baptized in blood. The thorny crown (the necrotic scar that surrounds the Messianic organ) and the crown of glory, the corona God placed there to be revealed after the revelation associated with the thorny crown (bris milah).

Isaiah 62:3 speaks of a crown of glory on the yad of the Lord. The Hebrew word "yad" is used for the "hand" or the "phallus," and has no interpretive use as "hand" in the context of the passage. Redak says the figure of a crown in the hand [here] is peculiar. ------ Likewise, the Talmud, with most other Jewish midrashim, reveals to us that God is Himself circumcised. He wears the crown of thorns (the necrotic scar) like all other Jewish males.

According to Midrash Tanchuma, the phylacteries worn on the body of the Jewish male, adorn the head like a thorny crown (the thorn-bearing shin ש ---called a thorny–crown in the Zohar----is "engraved" in the head phylactery) [1]. The same shin is entwined (Heb. sanup) around the hand (when wearing the phylacteries), while the last letter in the phylacteries, and in the Name Shaddai (shin dalet yod שדי), is reserved for the Messianic organ. Midrash Tanchuma has the yod of the phylacteries (a thorn) on the male organ . . . completing the Name Shaddai written on the male Jew when he dons the phylacteries.

Isaiah 62:3 speaks of the yod as a crown down under, and of of the “hand” (this time Heb. kaf [palm of the hand] rather than yad) being "entwined" (sanup), or, in a parallel passage (49:16) "engraved."

The Hebrew word filling in all this unsolicited and untransliteratable (unadulterated) information, is the Hebrew word "sanup."------ According to Rabbi Sampson Hirsch, this word (and those words most closely associated with it) produce a plethora of meanings and nuances, to include: a flowing waterway, to fence in, pierce, entwine, and thorn. ----- He notes two words that have similar phonetics (but different spellings) mean to "weaken" or to "reject."

The KJ translates the word sanup "diadem" from the idea of entwining the head with a turban. While not particularly useful in the context of a passage about the hand, it's nevertheless ironic that the hand phylactery is "entwined" around the arm all the way down to the hand, where the fingers are "entwined" to form the letter shin from the manner in which the fingers are "entwined." ---- The hand phylactery is actually something like a turban wrapped around the hand, lending incredible weigh to the idea of the hand being "entwined" or pierced, engraved, with a thorn (the shin is the thorniest of letters outside of the yod itself), such that a fountain of life, flows from this so oft mentioned (in Deutero-Isaiah) piercing of the hand.

The latter part of the passage claims that God is the "bridegroom" and the Servant, Zion, is the virgin bride (Heb. kallah means a bride before she has had sex). In numerous places Isaiah speaks of Zion having children though having never been in labor (54:1; 66:7; 49:20), and here it says that just as Zion was the "chosen firstborn who lived in a virgin," so shall the offspring of Zion (the Suffering Servant) be born of virgin mechanics.

But the sons and daughters of Zion will do the chosen firstborn of the virgin one better. Mary had labor pains despite the virgin nature of her pregnancy. Zion will birth virgin children without even going into labor. Zion will birth offspring while in her bereavement. She will return from deathly exile to find billions of sons and daughters born during her bereavement. Born without her even going into labor.

As earlier in Deutero-Isaiah, where the Jewish interpreters ran roughshod over the clear meaning of Zion's sons and daughters wearing Zion like a bride wears jewelry, so too here, the Jewish interpreters cover up what is being said about a virgin firstborn. But in order to accomplish the change of meaning they must have the text say that the sons will live with the mother as a bridegroom lives with his bride (incest). JPS: "As a youth espouses a maiden, Your sons shall espouse you."

The Hebrew is far from the Jewish interpretation. The word translated "young man" is בחור, bahar. The word for "chosen one" is בהור, bahur. The former is a derrivative of the latter, and is often used to speak of the fact that the "young man" or "firstborn" of the nation will be destroyed. The word for "firstborn" is בכור, bekor. The three words are phonetically almost identical, such that with the context guiding the translator, nothing is so clear as the fact that the text is speaking of the "chosen firstborn" and not merely a young man. The fact that the Jewish translation makes the analogy speak of incest is apparently not as grave a crime as interpreting it in a manner that reveals the true identity of the Suffering Servant of the Lord.

Rashi refuses to make the text claim incest, so he interprets the second part differently than the first: "As a young man lives with a virgin, so shall your children live in you." But if the second clause is interpreted "in you" then the first should be as well. But that makes it say: "As a chosen firstborn lives in a virgin, so shall your children live in you" (Rashi amplified).

1. The Hebrew ש is a symbol of a "thorn-bush." And a picture of a “crown” ש. There are so many interpretations of scripture that play off this pictographic-symbolism that it's a foregone conclusion. In Jewish midrashim we read: “Why does the shin have three branches from above but it has no root from below? Because it is the first of the letters of [the word] sheqer, and sheqer has speech (dibbur) but no feet (raglayim); in the end it is not established. In the future the Holy One, blessed be He, will close the mouth of those who speak lies, as it says, `May the Lord cut off all flattering lips’ (Ps. 12:4), and it also says, `He who speaks untruth shall not stand before my eyes’ (ibid., 101:7). To what may this be compared? To a tree whose branches are many but its roots are few, and when the wind comes it uproots it and turns it on its face (Batte Midrashot, 2:409, from p. 77 of Wolfson, Along the Path). ------ The shin ש is constructed of three vav ווו with three yod ייי on top of the vav. In the Jewish midrashim above, we're told that the three vav represent three branches of a tree. But at the end of the branches we have three yod, which are pictures of a thorn (Rabbi Ginsburgh calls the yod a thorn) such that the shin is metaphorically, or symbolically, a thorn-bush. It’s emblematically, pictographically, idiomatically, and typologically, a “crown of thorns” ש.