The Suffering Servant

   "By his bruises we are healed” (Is.53 :5).  (NRSV)

In the Vatican II document on Revelation, Dei Verbum, we read: “The primary objective of the plan and lay-out of The Old Testament was that it should prepare for and declare in prophecy the coming of Christ, universal redeemer, and of the messianic kingdom….”  Amongst the Major Prophets this statement describes fully the prophet Isaiah enfleshing the Suffering Servant passages (p.108).

     We affirm that “servant” is a key relationship in scripture. Moses self-deprecating before an all-knowing Lord calls himself a servant (Ex. 4 10). Subsequently David, Elijah and Jerimiah have this honorary title, servant, which John Mackenzie S.J.  interprets as a “collective ideal figure….” (p.792).

Though the above figures suffered (Jeremiah was throne into a cistern to die (38: 6-13), only with the prophet Isaiah (738 BCE-539 BCE) do we find four seemingly disconnected Suffering Servant passages: Proto- Isaiah, Deutero-(second) Isaiah, and Trito (third) Isaiah. Textually they are as follows: 42:1-4; 49 :1-6; 50: 4-9; 52:13-53:12. The Songs revealed by the Holy Spirit are stepping stones to the fourth salvific passage. In this article we will establish how grace and hesed  God’s loving kindness, keep us steady on these stepping stones, ultimately leading us to Jesus, and the Paschal Mystery.

      The first revelation 42:1-4 in Deutero-Isaiah introduces the mysterious Servant whose identity scholars still debate. The common agreement is he is Israel. God is the speaker in this passage lined with foreshadowing Messianic imagery: “A bruised reed he shall not break, and a smoldering wick he shall not quench…He will faithfully bring forth justice (3).

    In the second Song 49:1-7, the speaker is the Servant. The imagery becomes lyrical, evoking the deepening hesed between Yahweh and the servant: ...While I was in my mother’s womb, he named me.” (1) The Spirit has transformed the Servant's suffering into a salvific act: “It is too little for you to be my servant…. I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth” (6).  As biblical scholar Carroll Stuhlmueller has written of this oracle: “Isaiah’s view of Israel’s religion slowly changed from self-centered attention to one of universal salvation” (p.228 Catholic Study Bible).  

    In the third Song the content is now salvation. Thus, God to refine the Chosen people through repentance rebukes the Chosen People: “It was for your sins that you were sold…. (50:1). The Suffering Servant responds to the purification: “Morning after morning/he opens my ear that I may hear…. (50:4). As Mary Ann Getty-Sullivan has written of this section that begins with third Song: “Jerusalem is comforted and moves from sorrow to hope and redemption” (p. 134). John Mackenzis agrees with the latter: “The revelation of the Servant is that salvation comes through suffering” (p.793).

   The fourth Song is the culmination of the above transformation. Yahweh is the speaker; only God can give us salvation of which the Servant is an instrument. ow paradox enters for only God’s grace could draw good from suffering. The Prophet gives a jaw dropping description of what will become hundreds of years later, The Crucifixion. Only paradox could convey this transformation from hesed into salvation: “… Upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his   bruises we are healed” (53:5).

    What then are the implications of the above for us today? Caroll Stuhlmueller gives us a lead: “Jesus turned frequently to the four songs of the Suffering Servant in the prophet Isaiah in order to absorb strength, and peace.” We too can pray first for understanding of the Song and second for a humble, silent, repentant heart to participate in the Paschal Mystery, the Suffering, Death and Resurrection. This attitude is more than sitting in a pew.

   During the Holy week Triduum in faith, we enter the tomb with Jesus, suffer with him on the Cross, and thereby rise with him. Moreover, each time we receive Eucharist we relive this salvific event. We experience The Paschal Mystery every reception of Eucharist. The temporal and divine merge.

In sum, Isaiah’s Suffering Servant passages are revelations of our salvation won for all people by the ultimate Suffering Servant, Jesus Christ.     

                                                                                                References

Brown E. Raymond ed. et alts.  The New Jerome Biblical Commentary. Englewood Cliffs: Simon Schuster, 1970 The Servant Poems, p.330  

Dei Verbum in Vatican Council II Austin Flannery, O.P. General Editor. Dublin: Dominican Publications, 2007

Dufour-Leon, Xavier. Dictionary of Biblical Theology. Gaithersburg: Harper

San Francisco Press :1988 See Servant of God

Getty-Sullivan, Mary Ann. The Quick Reference to the Catholic Bible. Frederick: The Word Among Us Press, 2014 p.34

Mackenzie, John L.  S.J. Dictionary of the Bible. New York: Simon Schuster.  p.791 “Servant of the Lord.”

Stuhlmueller, Caroll, C.P. In The Catholic Study Bible Senior, Donald, General Editor, et al., eds. Oxford University Press. pp.287-304

_____________   Biblical Meditations for Lent. New York:  Paulist Press, 1978

The Holy Bible (NRSV (Catholic Edition) Nashville: Catholic Bible Press  

                    Bernard J. Callaghan

                   bandscall@eastlink.ca