Quote:
Originally Posted by Mason Malmuth
Quoting directly from Isaiah is not butchering Scripture.
And now for some questions:
1. Isaiah refers to the servant as Jacob and/or Israel. Do you know what these two names stand for?
2. Are you aware that the last part of the book of Isaiah is known as the Four Servant Songs and that Isaiah 53 is part of the Fourth Servant Song?
3. Do you know what these four servant songs are about?
4. Do you know who is speaking in Isaiah 53? (Yes Isaiah wrote the words but someone else is speaking.)
5. And do you know what the speaker's words in Isaiah 53 mean?
Once you can answer these questions, your question of whom Jews believe Isaiah is talking about in Isaiah 53 will be answered.
MM
The idea that Isaiah 53 doesn't refer to the Messiah was unheard of among Jewish thought for 1,000 years until after Christ. The unanimous view, and the only view for 1,000 years was that that passage was Messianic.
http://jewsforjesus.org/publications...3-n06/isaiah53
What do the early rabbis say?
Some of the first written interpretations or targums (ancient paraphrases on biblical texts) see this passage as referring to an individual servant, the Messiah, who would suffer. Messianic Jewish talmudist, Rachmiel Frydland, recounts those early views:3
"Our ancient commentators with one accord noted that the context clearly speaks of God's Anointed One, the Messiah. The Aramaic translation of this chapter, ascribed to Rabbi Jonathan ben Uzziel, a disciple of Hillel who lived early in the second century c.e., begins with the simple and worthy words:
'Behold my servant Messiah shall prosper; he shall be high, and increase, and be exceeding strong: as the house of Israel looked to him through many days, because their countenance was darkened among the peoples, and their complexion beyond the sons of men (Targum Jonathan on Isaiah 53, ad locum).'"
"We find the same interpretation in the Babylonian Talmud:
What is his [the Messiah's] name? The Rabbis said: His name is "the leper scholar," as it is written, "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him a leper, smitten of God, and afflicted." (Sanhedrin 98b)
"Similarly, in an explanation of Ruth 2:14 in the Midrash Rabbah it states:
He is speaking of the King Messiah: "Come hither" draw near to the throne "and dip thy morsel in the vinegar," this refers to the chastisements, as it is said, "But he was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities."
"The Zohar, in its interpretation of Isaiah 53, points to the Messiah as well:
There is in the Garden of Eden a palace named the Palace of the Sons of Sickness. This palace the Messiah enters, and He summons every pain and every chastisement of Israel. All of these come and rest upon Him. And had He not thus lightened them upon Himself, there had been no man able to bear Israel's chastisements for the trangression of the law; as it is written, "Surely our sicknesses he has carried." (Zohar II, 212a)
The early sages expected a personal Messiah to fulfill the Isaiah prophecy. No alternative interpretation was applied to this passage until the Middle Ages. And then, a completely different view was presented. This view was popularized by Jewish commentator Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Itzchaki), who lived one thousand years after Jesus.