Isaiah (second)

97:7.1The de­struc­tion of the He­brew na­tion and their cap­tiv­ity in Mes­o­po­ta­mia would have proved of great ben­e­fit to their ex­pand­ing the­ol­ogy had it not been for the de­ter­mined ac­tion of their priest­hood. Their na­tion had fallen be­fore the armies of Baby­lon, and their na­tion­al­is­tic Yah­weh had suf­fered from the in­ter­na­tional preach­ments of the spir­i­tual lead­ers. It was re­sent­ment of the loss of their na­tional god that led the Jew­ish priests to go to such lengths in the in­ven­tion of fa­bles and the mul­ti­pli­ca­tion of mirac­u­lous ap­pear­ing events in He­brew his­tory in an ef­fort to re­store the Jews as the cho­sen peo­ple of even the new and ex­panded idea of an in­ter­na­tion­al­ized God of all na­tions.

97:7.2Dur­ing the cap­tiv­ity the Jews were much in­flu­enced by Baby­lo­nian tra­di­tions and leg­ends, al­though it should be noted that they un­fail­ingly im­proved the moral tone and spir­i­tual sig­nif­i­cance of the Chaldean sto­ries which they adopted, not­with­stand­ing that they in­vari­ably dis­torted these leg­ends to re­flect honor and glory upon the an­ces­try and his­tory of Is­rael.

97:7.3These He­brew priests and scribes had a sin­gle idea in their minds, and that was the re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion of the Jew­ish na­tion, the glo­ri­fi­ca­tion of He­brew tra­di­tions, and the ex­al­ta­tion of their racial his­tory. If there is re­sent­ment of the fact that these priests have fas­tened their er­ro­neous ideas upon such a large part of the Oc­ci­den­tal world, it should be re­mem­bered that they did not in­ten­tion­ally do this; they did not claim to be writ­ing by in­spi­ra­tion; they made no pro­fes­sion to be writ­ing a sa­cred book. They were merely prepar­ing a text­book de­signed to bol­ster up the dwin­dling cour­age of their fel­lows in cap­tiv­ity. They were def­i­nitely aim­ing at im­prov­ing the na­tional spirit and morale of their com­pa­tri­ots. It re­mained for later-day men to as­sem­ble these and other writ­ings into a guide book of sup­pos­edly in­fal­li­ble teach­ings.

• wrote chapters 40-55 in Book of Isaiah

97:7.4The Jew­ish priest­hood made lib­eral use of these writ­ings sub­se­quent to the cap­tiv­ity, but they were greatly hin­dered in their in­flu­ence over their fel­low cap­tives by the pres­ence of a young and in­domitable prophet, Isa­iah the sec­ond, who was a full con­vert to the el­der Isa­iah’s God of jus­tice, love, righ­teous­ness, and mercy. He also be­lieved with Jeremiah that Yah­weh had be­come the God of all na­tions. He preached these the­o­ries of the na­ture of God with such telling ef­fect that he made con­verts equally among the Jews and their cap­tors. And this young preacher left on rec­ord his teach­ings, which the hos­tile and un­for­giv­ing priests sought to di­vorce from all as­so­ci­a­tion with him, al­though sheer re­spect for their beauty and grandeur led to their in­cor­po­ra­tion among the writ­ings of the ear­lier Isa­iah. And thus may be found the writ­ings of this sec­ond Isa­iah in the book of that name, em­brac­ing chap­ters forty to fifty-five in­clu­sive.

97:7.5No prophet or re­li­gious teacher from Ma­chi­venta to the time of Je­sus at­tained the high con­cept of God that Isa­iah the sec­ond pro­claimed dur­ing these days of the cap­tiv­ity. It was no small, an­thro­po­mor­phic, man-made God that this spir­i­tual leader pro­claimed. “Be­hold he takes up the isles as a very lit­tle thing.” “And as the heav­ens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.”

97:7.6At last Ma­chi­venta Mel­chiz­e­dek be­held hu­man teach­ers pro­claim­ing a real God to mor­tal man. Like Isa­iah the first, this leader preached a God of uni­ver­sal cre­ation and up­hold­ing. “I have made the earth and put man upon it. I have cre­ated it not in vain; I formed it to be in­hab­ited.” “I am the first and the last; there is no God be­side me.” Speak­ing for the Lord God of Is­rael, this new prophet said: “The heav­ens may van­ish and the earth wax old, but my righ­teous­ness shall en­dure for­ever and my sal­va­tion from gen­er­a­tion to gen­er­a­tion.” “Fear you not, for I am with you; be not dis­mayed, for I am your God.” “There is no God be­side me—a just God and a Sav­ior.”

97:7.7And it com­forted the Jew­ish cap­tives, as it has thou­sands upon thou­sands ever since, to hear such words as: “Thus says the Lord, ‘I have cre­ated you, I have re­deemed you, I have called you by your name; you are mine.’” “When you pass through the wa­ters, I will be with you since you are pre­cious in my sight.” “Can a woman for­get her suck­ling child that she should not have com­pas­sion on her son? Yes, she may for­get, yet will I not for­get my chil­dren, for be­hold I have graven them upon the palms of my hands; I have even cov­ered them with the shadow of my hands.” “Let the wicked for­sake his ways and the un­righ­teous man his thoughts, and let him re­turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for he will abun­dantly par­don.”

97:7.8Lis­ten again to the gospel of this new rev­e­la­tion of the God of Salem: “He shall feed his flock like a shep­herd; he shall gather the lambs in his arms and carry them in his bo­som. He gives power to the faint, and to those who have no might he in­creases strength. Those who wait upon the Lord shall re­new their strength; they shall mount up with wings as ea­gles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”

• most beautiful pronouncements about Father ever

97:7.9This Isa­iah con­ducted a far-flung pro­pa­ganda of the gospel of the en­larg­ing con­cept of a su­preme Yah­weh. He vied with Moses in the elo­quence with which he por­trayed the Lord God of Is­rael as the Uni­ver­sal Cre­ator. He was po­etic in his por­trayal of the in­fi­nite at­tri­butes of the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther. No more beau­ti­ful pro­nounce­ments about the heav­enly Fa­ther have ever been made. Like the Psalms, the writ­ings of Isa­iah are among the most sub­lime and true pre­sen­ta­tions of the spir­i­tual con­cept of God ever to greet the ears of mor­tal man prior to the ar­rival of Mi­chael on Uran­tia. Lis­ten to his por­trayal of De­ity: “I am the high and lofty one who in­hab­its eter­nity.” “I am the first and the last, and be­side me there is no other God.” “And the Lord’s hand is not short­ened that it can­not save, nei­ther his ear heavy that it can­not hear.” And it was a new doc­trine in Jewry when this be­nign but com­mand­ing prophet per­sisted in the preach­ment of di­vine con­stancy, God’s faith­ful­ness. He de­clared that “God would not for­get, would not for­sake.”

97:7.10This dar­ing teacher pro­claimed that man was very closely re­lated to God, say­ing: “Ev­ery one who is called by my name I have cre­ated for my glory, and they shall show forth my praise. I, even I, am he who blots out their trans­gres­sions for my own sake, and I will not re­mem­ber their sins.”

97:7.11Hear this great He­brew de­mol­ish the con­cept of a na­tional God while in glory he pro­claims the di­vin­ity of the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther, of whom he says, “The heav­ens are my throne, and the earth is my foot­stool.” And Isa­iah’s God was none the less holy, ma­jes­tic, just, and un­search­able. The con­cept of the an­gry, venge­ful, and jeal­ous Yah­weh of the desert Bed­ou­ins has al­most van­ished. A new con­cept of the su­preme and uni­ver­sal Yah­weh has ap­peared in the mind of mor­tal man, never to be lost to hu­man view. The re­al­iza­tion of di­vine jus­tice has be­gun the de­struc­tion of prim­i­tive magic and bi­o­logic fear. At last, man is in­tro­duced to a uni­verse of law and or­der and to a uni­ver­sal God of de­pend­able and fi­nal at­tri­butes.

97:7.12And this preacher of a su­per­nal God never ceased to pro­claim this God of love. “I dwell in the high and holy place, also with him who is of a con­trite and hum­ble spirit.” And still fur­ther words of com­fort did this great teacher speak to his con­tem­po­raries: “And the Lord will guide you con­tin­u­ally and sat­isfy your soul. You shall be like a wa­tered gar­den and like a spring whose wa­ters fail not. And if the en­emy shall come in like a flood, the spirit of the Lord will lift up a de­fense against him.” And once again did the fear-de­stroy­ing gospel of Mel­chiz­e­dek and the trust-breed­ing re­li­gion of Salem shine forth for the bless­ing of man­kind.

• counteracted racially egoistic Messiah concepts
• most beautiful pronouncements about Father ever

97:7.13The farsee­ing and coura­geous Isa­iah ef­fec­tively ec­lipsed the na­tion­al­is­tic Yah­weh by his sub­lime por­trai­ture of the majesty and uni­ver­sal om­nipo­tence of the su­preme Yah­weh, God of love, ruler of the uni­verse, and af­fec­tion­ate Fa­ther of all man­kind. Ever since those event­ful days the high­est God con­cept in the Oc­ci­dent has em­braced uni­ver­sal jus­tice, di­vine mercy, and eter­nal righ­teous­ness. In su­perb lan­guage and with match­less grace this great teacher por­trayed the all-pow­er­ful Cre­ator as the all-lov­ing Fa­ther.

• prophet of Babylonian captivity

97:7.14This prophet of the cap­tiv­ity preached to his peo­ple and to those of many na­tions as they lis­tened by the river in Baby­lon. And this sec­ond Isa­iah did much to coun­ter­act the many wrong and racially ego­is­tic con­cepts of the mis­sion of the prom­ised Mes­siah. But in this ef­fort he was not wholly suc­cess­ful. Had the priests not ded­i­cated them­selves to the work of build­ing up a mis­con­ceived na­tion­al­ism, the teach­ings of the two Isa­iahs would have pre­pared the way for the rec­og­ni­tion and re­cep­tion of the prom­ised Mes­siah.

• spoke of salvation by sacrifice and redemption

97:8.3But five hun­dred years of the over­lord­ship of alien rulers was too much for even the pa­tient and long-suf­fer­ing Jews. The proph­ets and priests be­gan to cry: “How long, O Lord, how long?” As the hon­est Jew searched the Scrip­tures, his con­fu­sion be­came worse con­founded. An olden seer prom­ised that God would pro­tect and de­liver his “cho­sen peo­ple.” Amos had threat­ened that God would aban­don Is­rael un­less they re-es­tab­lished their stan­dards of na­tional righ­teous­ness. The scribe of Deuteron­omy had por­trayed the Great Choice—as be­tween the good and the evil, the bless­ing and the curse. Isa­iah the first had preached a benef­i­cent king-de­liv­erer. Jeremiah had pro­claimed an era of in­ner righ­teous­ness—the covenant writ­ten on the tablets of the heart. The sec­ond Isa­iah talked about sal­va­tion by sac­ri­fice and re­demp­tion. Eze­kiel pro­claimed de­liv­er­ance through the ser­vice of de­vo­tion, and Ezra prom­ised pros­per­ity by ad­her­ence to the law. But in spite of all this they lin­gered on in bond­age, and de­liv­er­ance was de­ferred. Then Daniel pre­sented the drama of the im­pend­ing “cri­sis”—the smit­ing of the great im­age and the im­me­di­ate es­tab­lish­ment of the ev­er­last­ing reign of righ­teous­ness, the Mes­sianic king­dom.

• Isaiah (second)

126:4.6“To whom, then, will you liken God who sits upon the cir­cle of the earth? Lift up your eyes and be­hold who has cre­ated all these worlds, who brings forth their host by num­ber and calls them all by their names. He does all these things by the great­ness of his might, and be­cause he is strong in power, not one fails. He gives power to the weak, and to those who are weary he in­creases strength. Fear not, for I am with you; be not dis­mayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and I will help you; yes, I will up­hold you with the right hand of my righ­teous­ness, for I am the Lord your God. And I will hold your right hand, say­ing to you, fear not, for I will help you.

126:4.7“And you are my wit­ness, says the Lord, and my ser­vant whom I have cho­sen that all may know and be­lieve me and un­der­stand that I am the Eter­nal. I, even I, am the Lord, and be­side me there is no sav­ior.”

• John the Baptist impressed by

135:4.4Through­out this pe­riod John read much in the sa­cred writ­ings which he found at the En­gedi home of the Nazarites. He was es­pe­cially im­pressed by Isa­iah and by Malachi, the last of the proph­ets up to that time. He read and reread the last five chap­ters of Isa­iah, and he be­lieved these prophe­cies. Then he would read in Malachi: “Be­hold, I will send you Eli­jah the prophet be­fore the com­ing of the great and dread­ful day of the Lord; and he shall turn the hearts of the fa­thers to­ward the chil­dren and the hearts of the chil­dren to­ward their fa­thers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.” And it was only this prom­ise of Malachi that Eli­jah would re­turn that de­terred John from go­ing forth to preach about the com­ing king­dom and to ex­hort his fel­low Jews to flee from the wrath to come. John was ripe for the procla­ma­tion of the mes­sage of the com­ing king­dom, but this ex­pec­ta­tion of the com­ing of Eli­jah held him back for more than two years. He knew he was not Eli­jah. What did Malachi mean? Was the prophecy lit­eral or fig­u­ra­tive? How could he know the truth? He fi­nally dared to think that, since the first of the proph­ets was called Eli­jah, so the last should be known, even­tu­ally, by the same name. Nev­er­the­less, he had doubts, doubts suf­fi­cient to pre­vent his ever call­ing him­self Eli­jah.

• Isaiah (second)

142:3.22“And then will you re­mem­ber that once again—in the greater spir­i­tual en­light­en­ment of Isa­iah’s day—these ten neg­a­tive com­mand­ments were changed into the great and pos­i­tive law of love, the in­junc­tion to love God su­premely and your neigh­bor as your­self. And it is this su­preme law of love for God and for man that I also de­clare to you as con­sti­tut­ing the whole duty of man.”

• Father spoke through

155:6.2You have come out from among those of your fel­lows who choose to re­main sat­is­fied with a re­li­gion of mind, who crave se­cu­rity and pre­fer con­for­mity. You have elected to ex­change your feel­ings of au­thor­i­ta­tive cer­tainty for the as­sur­ances of the spirit of ad­ven­tur­ous and pro­gres­sive faith. You have dared to protest against the gru­el­ing bond­age of in­sti­tu­tional re­li­gion and to re­ject the au­thor­ity of the tra­di­tions of rec­ord which are now re­garded as the word of God. Our Fa­ther did in­deed speak through Moses, Eli­jah, Isa­iah, Amos, and Hosea, but he did not cease to min­is­ter words of truth to the world when these proph­ets of old made an end of their ut­ter­ances. My Fa­ther is no re­specter of races or gen­er­a­tions in that the word of truth is vouch­safed one age and with­held from an­other. Com­mit not the folly of call­ing that di­vine which is wholly hu­man, and fail not to dis­cern the words of truth which come not through the tra­di­tional or­a­cles of sup­posed in­spi­ra­tion.

• Isaiah (second)

174:5.3“My Fa­ther sent me to this world to re­veal his lov­ing-kind­ness to the chil­dren of men, but those to whom I first came have re­fused to re­ceive me. True, in­deed, many of you have be­lieved my gospel for your­selves, but the chil­dren of Abra­ham and their lead­ers are about to re­ject me, and in so do­ing they will re­ject Him who sent me. I have freely pro­claimed the gospel of sal­va­tion to this peo­ple; I have told them of son­ship with joy, lib­erty, and life more abun­dant in the spirit. My Fa­ther has done many won­der­ful works among these fear-rid­den sons of men. But truly did the Prophet Isa­iah re­fer to this peo­ple when he wrote: ‘Lord, who has be­lieved our teach­ings? And to whom has the Lord been re­vealed?’ Truly have the lead­ers of my peo­ple de­lib­er­ately blinded their eyes that they see not, and hard­ened their hearts lest they be­lieve and be saved. All these years have I sought to heal them of their un­be­lief that they might be re­cip­i­ents of the Fa­ther’s eter­nal sal­va­tion. I know that not all have failed me; some of you have in­deed be­lieved my mes­sage. In this room now are a full score of men who were once mem­bers of the San­hedrin, or who were high in the coun­cils of the na­tion, al­beit even some of you still shrink from open con­fes­sion of the truth lest they cast you out of the syn­a­gogue. Some of you are tempted to love the glory of men more than the glory of God. But I am con­strained to show for­bear­ance since I fear for the safety and loy­alty of even some of those who have been so long near me, and who have lived so close by my side.