Chapter Fifty-Six

The content of the present chapter is the further development and intensification of the thought of the preceding one about the revelation of the new covenant church and the conditions for entry into it.

1–2. The necessity of firmly maintaining the ideal of theocracy. 3–7. The bounds of the old covenant church are expanded by the inclusion in the kingdom of the Messiah of those who previously had no entry into it, on purely external grounds (“fellow countrymen and foreigners”). 8–12. About the fate of faithful and unfaithful Israel.

Isaiah 56:1. Thus says the Lord: maintain justice and do righteousness; for my salvation is about to come, and my righteousness to be revealed. “Maintain justice and do righteousness.” The terms “justice and... righteousness” (שפשמ and הקדצ), in the language of the Bible, have a technical meaning – they express the essence of the theocratic ideal. To practice “justice and... righteousness” – means to precisely fulfill the God-given law, which, as the revelation of the benevolent and all-perfect will of God, is itself absolute “righteousness.” Therefore, the fulfillment of such law, according to the impartial “judgment” of the Lord, gives “vindication” to man. Hence – the “judgment” of the Almighty and the “righteousness” of the Almighty are regarded as synonymous concepts. But since to bear on one’s shoulders all the yoke of the law was an impossible task for old covenant humanity (Rom 3:19), the vindication through this law was actually achieved by no one. Only in the person of the Messiah did the old covenant law find its ideal embodiment (Matt 3:15 and Matt 5:17). That is why the “appearance of the Messiah” is ordinarily also called the “revelation of God’s righteousness.”

Isaiah 56:2. Blessed is the man who does this, and the son of man who holds it fast, who keeps the Sabbath from being defiled and keeps his hand from doing any evil. “Blessed is the man... who keeps the Sabbath from being defiled.” A thought very close to the well-known words of the Psalmist: “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked... but his delight is in the law of the Lord” (Ps 1:1-2). Why is here from all the old covenant ritual especially emphasized only the keeping of the Sabbath? Historically – this can be explained by the fact that here the thought of the prophet is transferred to that post-captivity period when many other ritual actions were necessarily discontinued (due to the absence of a sanctuary and temple); and in its essential meaning, it should be noted that the “Sabbath,” in general, is the most important and most ancient theocratic institution, tracing its origin back to the time of creation and the first covenant of paradise, which is why it serves in many prophets as the preferred sign of the covenant of the Lord with Israel (Jer 17:21-24; Ezek 20:12; Ezek 22:8). One cannot fail to pay proper attention and to the very character of the observance of the Sabbath, as it is impressed upon the prophet Isaiah. “To keep the Sabbath from being defiled” – this means, as is evident from the subsequent context – “to keep your hand, that you do no evil.” Consequently, “Sabbath rest,” in the thought of the prophet Isaiah, bears not so much a physical as an ethical character. The latter will become even more evident and clear if we compare this passage with another parallel passage from the same prophet, where he in very definite expressions expounds the moral character of fasting (Isa 58:3-6).

Isaiah 56:3. Let not the foreigner who has joined himself to the Lord say, “The Lord will surely separate me from His people”; and let not the eunuch say, “Behold, I am a dry tree. Isaiah 56:4. For thus says the Lord: to the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths and choose what pleases me, and hold fast to my covenant, – Deuteronomy 23:1. Access to the old covenant church was closed to persons who did not belong to the Hebrew nation, or even to those who had only a physical deformity that deprived them of the possibility of having offspring (eunuchs or castrated persons, Deut. 23:1). For entry into the church renewed by the Messiah all these obstacles have lost their force: and the “foreigner” (proselyte) and the “eunuch” may, like everyone else, be full members of this church, if only they satisfy the fundamental inner condition – “hold fast to God’s covenant,” that is, the law of Moses, as its external symbolic expression. Isaiah 56:5. I will give them in my house and within my walls a monument and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off. “I will give them in my house... a monument and a name better than sons and daughters.” The idea of immortality in offspring the Jews understood too sensually and directly, only in the sense of physical continuation of the race. The prophet corrects this false view: he speaks of the moral self-worth of each individual person, determined by his personal virtues and merits; that is why it is not uncommon for a man deprived even of hope of offspring to be much more renowned and glorious than another morally worthless man, even if the latter has numerous offspring.

Isaiah 56:6. And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants, everyone who keeps the Sabbath from being defiled and holds fast to my covenant, – Isaiah 56:7. I will bring them to my holy mountain and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on my altar, for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples. “I will bring them to my holy mountain... my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.” The mention here of the “holy mountain” naturally leads our thought to the earlier special discourse of the same prophet about this holy mountain, under which he, generally, understands the fates of the new covenant, Christ’s church (chapter 2). Under the “house of prayer” spoken of here repeatedly, although many are inclined to understand the old covenant Jerusalem temple, this is scarcely fair, especially in view of the clear words of the Lord that “the hour is coming when those who worship the Father will worship in neither this place nor Jerusalem... in spirit and in truth” (John 4:21). “Therefore the prophecy of Isaiah, as Vlastov justly says, must have had the broadest meaning and encompass the whole Christian world, that is, the Church of Christ, as the eternal temple of the eternal God, in which each Christian soul, worshipping the Lord God “in spirit and truth,” will be heard by the merciful Father” (Vlastov, Sacred History, chapter V, page 332).

Isaiah 56:8. The Lord God, who gathers the scattered Israelites, says: I will gather still others to those already gathered. Isaiah 56:9. All you wild animals, all you wild beasts of the forest! come and eat. Isaiah 11:10. Again, for its greater emphasis, the very same thought is repeated – of the universal call of all peoples into the Church of Christ: into it will enter all who wish of the Israelites, however far they be scattered, and all pagan nations, however wild and rough they may seem from the old covenant perspective, like wild and forest beasts. All these thoughts and even the very images are well known to us from many other passages of the book of the prophet Isaiah. Thus about the gathering of scattered Israel and its providential calling in chapter 11, among other things, it is said: “in that day the root of Jesse, which stands as a sign for the peoples, the nations will inquire for, and his resting place will be glorious... and he will raise a signal for the nations and will assemble the banished of Israel, and gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth” (Isaiah 11:10, 12; cf. Isa 27:12; Isa 43:5-6 and others). The comparison of the pagan peoples, dwelling in religious ignorance and material coarseness, with wild beasts, is given, for example, in Isa 43:20: “The wild animals will praise me, jackals and ostriches, because I give water in the desert, streams in the wasteland.” Here, the well-known images of the “thirsty desert” and of its “water” that brings blessing, leave no doubt as to the proper understanding of the inhabitants of this desert, that is, the pagan peoples. Isaiah 56:10. His watchmen are blind, they all lack knowledge; they are all dumb dogs, not able to bark, dreaming, lying down, loving to slumber. Isaiah 56:11. These dogs have a mighty appetite, they are never satisfied. And they are shepherds who have no understanding: they have all turned to their own way, each to his own gain, one and all. Isaiah 56:12. “Come,” they say, “I will get wine, and we will drink our fill of strong drink; and tomorrow will be like this day, great beyond measure. The end of chapter 56 is not so much its conclusion as an introduction to the following prophetic denunciatory discourse (chapters 57–59). The connection of these two verses with what precedes is obviously based on an antithesis: if the better stock of Israel, through the grafting onto it of the wild olive of the pagan nations, will give strong and rich branches in the new covenant church, then the greater part of the sons of Israel, headed by their blind leaders, will remain outside the threshold of this church. And the main responsibility for such a sad fate of the spiritually darkened Israel must rest, of course, with its spiritual leaders, upon whom above all the prophet pours out all the force of his holy indignation, scourging them in the most vivid images, not unfamiliar to us from many other passages of his book (Isa 1:21-23; Isa 5:8; Isa 9:14-16; Isa 10:1-2; Isa 30:9-18; Isa 52:5 and others). Here in particular the images are forceful of the “watchman” who himself sees nothing, for he loves to sleep and doze, and the “dog” of the watch, who is mute, that is, cannot bark. These are the “senseless shepherds” – for they pursue only their personal pleasure and gain, not the care for public interests, and even less – for the general welfare of the people entrusted to them.