Commentary on Isaiah 5.1.9–5.1.15

“For the Lord will go before you, and the one who gathers you is the Lord God.”

The word seems to be addressed by God either to those who have been gathered through faith and have become children of the church, or perhaps to the holy initiators, that is, the apostles and evangelists, who became the light of the world under heaven by carrying the word of the gospel preaching to those in all the earth. These, then, he has commanded to depart and to go away from the unbelievers as from the defiled, because they not only did not choose to believe in Christ, but even made their own heads liable to the charges of the Lord-slaying. “Go out,” then, “and touch nothing unclean,” that is, be cut off from fellowship with them, so as not to wish to touch them even slightly. For “He who touches pitch,” it says, “will be defiled.” For it is necessary that those who have believed in Christ, and have been called through him to cleansing from sin and to participation in sanctification, should love to keep themselves outside the Jewish ignorance, be entirely of another mind than they, and be wholly separated; for there is no fellowship of light with darkness, nor a portion for a believer with an unbeliever. The all-wise Paul at any rate writes to those of Galatia who, after their justification in Christ, dared to run back to the worship in the law: “O foolish Galatians, … before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed crucified? This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” For they were foolishly having themselves circumcised, although they had received the circumcision in the Spirit, that is, through Christ. Necessarily, then, the God of all says here “Depart,” and “Go out from there,” and “Be separated, you who carry the vessels of the Lord.” For those who have honored Emmanuel wholly by faith, and have become partakers of his divine nature by sharing in the Holy Spirit and being filled with his sacred gifts, carry vessels for God. And in what manner, the all-wise Paul will teach, saying: “Put on the whole armor of God”; and this is the breastplate of righteousness, the helmet of salvation, the shield of faith, the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. For having this spiritual panoply, they march out against Satan and the powers with him, … shielding their own souls and the peoples under their hand; for this is the office of those who lead.

However, having commanded them to go out from her midst, he says: “You shall not go out with tumult, nor go in flight.” For he does not command them to depart from the Jewish ranks as fugitives, that is, as men afraid, but rather freely and as it were with authority, as men who refuse to share life with people so defiled and to be numbered with the profane and wicked. “You shall not go in flight,” then, he says; and that things will go easily for them, and that nothing at all hard or steep or rough will meet them, he assured them by saying: “The Lord will go before you, and the one who gathers you is God.” With God present and walking ahead, what will there be to harm the bearers of the sacred preaching?

or rather, how will everything not turn out for them as they pray, and they run preaching as on a bare road?

“Behold, my servant shall understand, and shall be exalted and glorified exceedingly. As many shall be astonished at you, so shall your appearance be without glory from men, and your glory from men. And so many nations shall marvel at him, and kings shall shut their mouth; for those to whom it was not announced concerning him shall see, and those who have not heard …”

Here God the Father openly speaks of Christ, the Savior of us all. “Behold,” he says, “my servant shall understand”; and by the servant you will understand the Son, that is, the slave. For the Word, being God, took the form of a slave, and being Lord of all, he entered the measures of humanity. “For he did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in form as a man, he humbled himself.” So when he became man, having brought himself down into humiliation, then he was also called slave without reproach, having taken the form of slavery. But “He shall understand,” he says, instead of “He will do and speak everything with understanding and with wisdom befitting God.” And a work of wisdom befitting God, before all else, is that the only-begotten Word of God became flesh, that is, man, and shared poverty with those on earth, so that we might become rich by his poverty; that by believing in him we might wash off the stains of sin, since the law given through Moses was powerless to take away sins; that by the death of his own flesh he might abolish death, overturn corruption, and reforge for incorruption those held fast by death; that he might make the man on earth a citizen of heaven, and through himself join to God the Father the one who had long been a runaway; that he might proclaim release to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, heal the brokenhearted, empty Hades, and remove Satan from his rule and his greed over all. “My servant, then, shall understand,” he says. For nothing at all in what was done for us is without understanding, that is, unwise; for he made all things in wisdom, according to the psalmist's word. For this reason, he says, he shall be exalted and glorified exceedingly. For God is glorified by us as Lord, and we call him Savior and Redeemer, and we have believed that he truly is this.

But so that the word from God the Father might be true and wholly beyond reproach, he necessarily added: “As many shall be astonished at you, so shall your appearance be without glory from men, and your glory from men.” For those who have recognized his appearing and have been able to see with the eyes of the mind the greatness of the God-befitting authority that is in him are struck with amazement at the economy, as was the prophet Habakkuk, who says: “Lord, I have heard the report of you and was afraid; I considered your works and was amazed.” But those who did not understand his glory, and remained unbelieving and without understanding, impiously voted him dishonor and disgrace, calling him a Samaritan, a glutton and a drunkard, born of sexual immorality, and besides this a sinner. So as many will be astonished at you, so too your appearance will be without glory among men, and your glory from men. But just as this will happen, so too “many nations shall marvel at you, and kings shall shut their mouth.” For the all-daring Jews, though they are worthy of no account, … Very many kings, however, fearing him as God and offering him glory as King of all, will shut their mouth, that is, will say nothing harsh, nor utter anything that outrages the glory of Christ. And that the divine, sacred, and saving preaching, that is, the gospel, will not come from those among whom his appearance was without glory

but rather from those who shut their mouth, he made clear by saying: “Those to whom it was not announced concerning him shall see, and those who have not heard shall understand.” For the things concerning Christ were announced to those of Israel through the law and the prophets, but to the nations not at all. But these, he says, will rather see the salvation that comes from him; and those who had never heard at all of his mysteries, these will understand them, by believing, of course. For faith is the root and nurse of understanding, and as it were an entrance that brings those who receive it into piety and life. At any rate the prophet Isaiah says: “If you do not believe, neither will you understand.”

“Lord, who has believed our report? And … before him as a plain, as a root in thirsty ground.”

Much has always been said by the holy prophets about the Savior of us all, and they never ceased admonishing, announcing very clearly that the Word, being God, would come in due time in human form, and that he would work wonders in a manner befitting God. And he does both the one and the other, calling the erring to the straight road and justifying the ungodly in faith. But the prophets profited very little those of Israel's blood, who looked hard toward disobedience; so that, although they ought to have seized the prediction, gathered life-giving knowledge, and stored it up in their own hearts, on the contrary they assailed those who initiated them, saying very bitterly: “You speak other things to us and announce to us another deception.” At any rate the prophet Jeremiah, as from an immeasurable … speaks somewhere thus: “Woe is me, mother! As what kind of man did you bear me, a man judged and disputed with in all the earth? I neither profited, nor did anyone profit me; my strength failed among those who curse me.” And in short, the whole choir of the saints, speaking of Jerusalem, say: “We treated Babylon, and she was not healed. Let us forsake her and go each to his own land; for her judgment has drawn near to heaven, it has lifted itself up to the stars.” For in these words they name Jerusalem Babylon, as one eager to imitate Babylon's ways and falling in nothing short of the land of the nations, as regards decay and refusing to honor the law, that is, the benefit of the prophetic training.

This is the sense and force of the verses before us also. For he accuses Israel and says: “Who has believed our report?” For we, O Master, he says, have been initiated by you into the word concerning the incarnation, and we have had this report; but no one has believed, and to no one has your arm, the arm of the Lord and God of all, become manifest. It is the custom of the inspired Scripture to name the Son the arm of God the Father, as has been shown in very many places. But as if someone objected and said: You, O prophets, have received the report through the Spirit and been enriched with the knowledge of the mystery; did you then proclaim the mystery to others? Yes, they say, we announced … that “We shall be before him as a plain,” that is, as a field rich in flowers and fruitful, or also “as a root in thirsty ground,” the Only-begotten, of course, watering us with divine and ineffable words, he in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge hidden.

For of old the whole earth was as it were dry and barren, like thirsty ground, bearing no cultivated fruits. But when it was enriched with the rain from Christ, spiritual rain of course, and the supply given through the Holy Spirit, we blossomed again like a root, that is, like a fine and flowering plant. At any rate one of the holy prophets said to us: “And all the nations shall call you blessed, because you shall be a desirable land, says the Lord Almighty”; for such land is welcome to farmers. And that the once thorn-bearing, dry, and waterless ground has changed into a most fertile one, able to grow rich in spiritual fruitfulness, the God of all will make clear, saying through the voice of Isaiah: “And there shall be, instead of the brushwood …” … and fleabane, and dry and waterless ground always nourishes them in some way; but myrtle and cypress grow in gardens. With the thorn removed, then, he says, the most fragrant of plants will sprout thereafter, when the thirsty ground becomes well watered, as God says: “I will make the desert into marshes, and the thirsty land into water channels. I will put in the waterless land cedar and box and myrtle and cypress and white poplar.” So we announced that by believing in Christ himself we shall be before him, that is, watched over by him, as a plain, as a root, that is, as a plant in ground once thirsty, but made well watered by him.

“He has no form or glory; and we saw him, and he had no form or beauty; his form was without honor, failing beyond all men.”

What, then, does the prophet say in these words, or what sense might one fit to what is said? Come, let us again examine it as well as we can. He has confessed that “We announced,” that is, we made the prediction without omission, that he will come in due time. But perhaps someone might say to this: What, then, if the Word, being God, had come down from heaven crowned with God-befitting glory, and had appeared to those on earth resplendent in unapproachable light, and could not be looked upon because of the excess of his glory? At any rate, when he came down in the form of fire upon Mount Sinai, there was darkness and gloom and storm, fire darting on high, and smoke, and very many other things besides that produce terror and extreme dread, so that the sight became unbearable to those who beheld it. At any rate those of Israel asked for a mediator, saying to the most excellent Moses: “You speak to us, and let not God speak to us, lest we die.” It would be no wonder, then, he says, if you foretold … glory, and he became bearable to no one. What, then, did the prophets …? “He has no form or glory.” For he was not, he says, in a form and glory befitting God. For he emptied himself, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in form as a man he humbled himself. And we say these things, having the tradition not from hearing alone, but having also seen with our very eyes the one who is preached. “We saw him, and he had no form or beauty” (beauty, that is, befitting God), “but his form was without honor.” For human things are small and cheap and wholly without honor compared with the divine and supreme preeminence and the surpassingly brilliant beauty of the nature that is above all. At any rate it is said: “Fair in beauty beyond the sons of men.” And

the still greater point he states: “failing beyond all men,” meaning plainly his form, as if they had said: Among men one may see some distinguished by the brilliance of rank, by the eminence of wealth, and in other ways among earthly honors. But Emmanuel was not among these, but in a small and despised station, so as to seem inferior to other men. And the word is true. For he was not born of a rich mother, the holy Virgin, but came through all that is lowly, that he might exalt what is humble and make what is without honor enviable. And by another reasoning: being God, Lord, and King of all, what brilliance among men would he have needed?

“A man in affliction and knowing how to bear weakness; for his face is turned away; he was dishonored and not esteemed.”

Having said, “We saw him, and he had no form or beauty,” they clearly report in what state of countenance they beheld the one who is preached. He was like a man, they say, who is in affliction but nobly bears weakness, that is, ill-treatment, or suffering evil. For perhaps they beheld the Savior's face downcast, as of one in turmoil and alarm, since he was already about to suffer death on the tree; when he also said at one time, “Now my soul is troubled,” and at another again, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death,” and “What shall I say? Father, save me from this hour; but for this purpose I came to this hour.” And one of the holy evangelists also said that when the time at which he was to suffer drew near, he began to be grieved and distressed. For although the only-begotten Word of the Father is God by nature, and incapable of sufferings, grief, and all such things whatever, he allowed the nature that is ours not to be without pain when temptation fell upon it, showing in all things that he had become like us, and was not, as some saw fit to think, a shadow and phantom seen on earth, but truly became man.

“His face is turned away,” he says. “Turned away” stands for “He was put to shame, dishonored, and not esteemed.” For Pilate sent Jesus to Herod; and Herod, it says, treated him with contempt and sent him back. For he did not esteem Jesus to be anything. His face too was dishonored, when the soldiers, of course, … and said: “Prophesy to us, Christ, who is it that struck you?” He was dishonored in another way too, enduring the torments of the scourges and the slaps of the attendants. At any rate he said through the voice of Isaiah: “I gave my back to scourges and my cheeks to slaps, and I did not turn away my face from shame” … As I said, the divine prophets seem to have seen the Son by a vision, that is, through the Holy Spirit, and his face not free of a dejection befitting a man, since the time had come at which he had to suffer, so that by the death of his own flesh he might abolish death, removing sin from the world.

“This one bears our sins and suffers pain for us; and we reckoned him to be in toil, and in affliction, and in ill-treatment. But he was wounded because of our sins, and made weak because of our lawless deeds. The chastisement of our peace was upon him; by his bruise we were healed. All we like sheep went astray; a man went astray in his way; and the Lord gave him up for our sins.”

Our Lord Jesus Christ endured the cross, despising the shame, and became obedient to the Father unto death, and bore with the impiety of the Jews, so that, as I said just now, he might take away the sin of the world, since the letter of the law, that is, the worship according to the law, could accomplish nothing toward this. For it was impossible for the blood of goats and bulls to take away sins. He suffered outside the gate, so that, as Paul says, he might sanctify the people through his own blood; for he suffered not for himself (far from it) but for the whole world under heaven. And the all-wise Paul will bear witness, writing about God the Father: “He did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all, that with him he might also freely give us all things.” And he himself says somewhere, through the psalmist's lyre, to the Father and God in heaven: “Sacrifice and offering you did not want, but a body you prepared for me; in whole burnt offerings and offerings for sin you took no pleasure. Then I said: Behold, I come; in the roll of the book it is written of me, to do your will, O God; I have desired it.” For since the worship according to the law was of no use to those on earth for taking away sin, since sacrifices of oxen and slaughters of sheep were not God's will, the true Lamb, who takes away the sin of the world, offered himself for us as a fragrant odor; then, having endured the … of the flesh, … of death and of sin. For one who was worth as much as all suffered for all, that he might hold sway and reign over all. And Paul again will confirm it, writing: “For this Christ died and lived, that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.” And again: “One died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised.” Rightly, then, the prophet says that “This one,” the one in affliction, who knows how to bear weakness, who has his face turned away, who was dishonored and not esteemed, “bears our sins and suffers pain for us; and we reckoned him to be in toil and in affliction and in ill-treatment.” See again, I pray, with what skill the prophetic … sin, gave him up, that he might free us … Christ himself said: “For God so loved … that everyone who believes in him should not perish.”

of those who did not know the mystery of Christ, but thought that he came into suffering as one who would pay for his own sins. “For we reckoned him to be in toil, and in affliction, and in ill-treatment,” he says; that is, we supposed that the suffering befell him as sent by God, on account of some sins, and that because of this sin he came into toil and affliction and ill-treatment. But that is not so at all; rather, he was wounded because of our sins and made weak because of our lawless deeds. Then he gives other reasons too, through which one may see that it was for our salvation and life that he who knew no sin came into suffering. For of old we had stood apart in enmity to God, fighting against his sacred laws, not bearing the yoke of obedience and refusing to serve him. But it was necessary, he says, that those who had slipped into such audacity be disciplined with the scourge, so that, departing from wicked things, we might put an end to the enmity and make peace with God, by bowing our neck to him and trying to accomplish what pleases him. But this discipline, he says, which ought rather to have been brought on those who had sinned, so that they might be reconciled when they were at war with God, came upon him. And this, I think, is “The chastisement of our peace was upon him.” He makes the sense of the passage clearer by adding at once: “By his bruise we were healed.” For he suffered, as I said, for us. “For all we like sheep went astray; a man went astray in his way, and the Lord gave him up for our sins.” We, then, went astray; we departed from the living God, following our own pleasures. But the Lord of all, that is, the God and Father, because of our … the penalty, and might save those who believe. And knowing this … the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son … but have eternal life. … to pay the penalty for his own offenses. That is why the Jews also nailed him between two criminals, wishing to fashion an evil reputation for him. But the Holy Spirit teaches through the prophet that he was wounded because of [our] sins …

“… his mouth. He was led like a sheep to slaughter, and like a lamb before the one who shears it is dumb, so he does not open his mouth. In his humiliation his judgment was taken away; who will describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth; because of the lawless deeds of my people he was led to death.”

The sense of the passage is very plain, but it will be explained by us part by part as follows, lest anything should perhaps seem unclear to some. Our Lord Jesus Christ was being judged before the leaders of the Jews. Then some came forward slandering him and affirming that something had been said by him against the glory of God. But Christ answered nothing to this … the defense, for he was being judged before enemies. And that … since God says that he is Savior and Redeemer of the world under heaven, he again did not ignore. He kept silent, then, when judged before them and before Pilate, except that he said a few words, and those barely, to leave their sin without excuse. For the harsh and unholy Caiaphas asked, saying: “I adjure you by the living God, tell us whether you are the Christ, the Son of God.” And he at once answered: “Hereafter you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven.” Pilate also asked whether he was king of Israel, and to this Christ said: “You have said it.” From then on Pilate went along with the madness of the Jews; and having scourged Jesus, he ordered the soldiers under him to lead him away, mixed in with robbers, to suffer death on the cross. It is true, then, as the prophet says, that because he was ill-treated he does not open his mouth.