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Isaiah 66:1-24, Haftara for Par'shah Noach
Oct 18, 2015 13:20:51 GMT -8
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Post by alon on Oct 18, 2015 13:20:51 GMT -8
Isaiah 66:1-4 (CJB) 1 “Heaven is my throne,” says Adonai,“and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house could you build for me? What sort of place could you devise for my rest?
2 Didn’t I myself make all these things? This is how they all came to be,” says Adonai. “The kind of person on whom I look with favor is one with a poor and humble spirit, who trembles at my word.
3 Those others might as well kill a person as an ox, as well break a dog’s neck as sacrifice a lamb, as well offer pig’s blood as offer a grain offering, as well bless an idol as burn incense. Just as these have chosen their ways and enjoy their disgusting practices,
4 so I will enjoy making fools of them, and bring on them the very things they fear. For when I called, no one answered; when I spoke, they did not hear. Instead they did what was evil in my sight and chose what did not please me.”
God does not need the Temple, our sacrifices, or our worship. These things, while they are pleasing to Him, are really for our benefit. So God tells us the kind of worship that pleases Him: the man with “a poor and humble spirit, who trembles at [His] word.”
Those who think their cultic worship and sacrifices buys them grace to also dabble in idolatries and abominable acts may as well be sacrificing pigs.
Isaiah 66:5 (CJB) Hear the word of Adonai, you who tremble at his word: “Your brothers, who hate you and reject you because of my name, have said: ‘Let Adonai be glorified, so we can see your joy.’ But they will be put to
.”
The enemies among their own people who reject the Lord mock the faithful. They portray themselves as the faithful, but they will in the end be unmasked. This hasn’t changed, as Meshiachim are often reviled, and even those in Christian churches who refuse to keep sliding the mark for holiness farther from God every time the world pushes a bit are attacked, sometimes viciously by the self-righteous and the “peacemakers.”
Isaiah 66:7-8 (CJB) Before going into labor, she gave birth; before her pains came, she delivered a male child.
8 Who ever heard of such a thing? Who has ever seen such things? Is a country born in one day? Is a nation brought forth all at once? For as soon as Tziyon went into labor, she brought forth her children.
Many Christian commentators say this was fulfilled when Israel was reborn as a nation because they suddenly became a state in 1949 after the UN voted to make it so. I have to disagree, because the time leading up to this vote was extremely turbulent, with Arab violence and the British punishing the Jews for every defense of themselves and their homes. Add to this the Shoa, and we can see there was much travail. So I think this foretells some as yet to be fulfilled event.
Isaiah 66:11 (CJB) so that you nurse and are satisfied by her comforting breast, drinking deeply and delighting in the overflow of her glory.
The Israelites take comfort, consolation and sustenance from the breasts of Tzion. Then in vs 13 the metaphor suddenly changes and God becomes the mother of the nation.
Isaiah 66:13 (CJB) Like someone comforted by his mother, I will comfort you; in Yerushalayim you will be comforted.”
I don’t think this means God and Tzion are the same, or even have the same roles. Rather it is God who watches over both His people and His city always.
Isaiah 66:16-17 (CJB) 16 For Adonai will judge all humanity with fire and with the sword, and those slain by Adonai will be many.
17 “Those who consecrate and purify themselves in order to enter the gardens, then follow the one who was already there, eating pig meat, reptiles and mice, will all be destroyed together,” says Adonai.
Be careful who you follow; and where they lead you. God will judge harshly those who worship as they please instead of in humble obedience. Apostates even from within Israel will be punished.
Isaiah 66:18-21 (CJB) 18 “For I [know] their deeds and their thoughts. “[The time] is coming when I will gather together all nations and languages. They will come and see my glory,
19 and I will give them a sign. I will send some of their survivors to the nations of Tarshish, Pul, Lud (these are archers), Tuval, Greece and more distant coasts, where they have neither heard of my fame nor seen my glory. They will proclaim my glory in these nations;
20 and they will bring all your kinsmen out of all the nations as an offering to Adonai — on horses, in chariots, in wagons, on mules, on camels — to my holy mountain Yerushalayim,” says Adonai, “just as the people of Isra’el themselves bring their offerings in clean vessels to the house of Adonai.
21 I will also take cohanim and L’vi’im from them,” says Adonai.
All nations will acknowledge Adonai as God. They will come to Yerushalayim, to the Temple, bringing exiled Jews with them. There is no distinction here between the Israelites and the nations. All people who truly wish to worship Adonai are welcomed to the Temple, and the way this reads some among the goyim may even be made cohanim. Conversely, as we read on many of the Jews, those who worship idols or practice pagan rites, these are punished.
Isaiah 66:22-24 (CJB) 22 “For just as the new heavens and the new earth that I am making will continue in my presence,” says Adonai, “so will your descendants and your name continue.
23 “Every month on Rosh-Hodesh and every week on Shabbat, everyone living will come to worship in my presence,” says Adonai.
24 “As they leave, they will look on the corpses of the people who rebelled against me. For their worm will never die, and their fire will never be quenched; but they will be abhorrent to all humanity.”
So everyone still living will walk by and see those suffering the eternal flames, and will have these before themselves as a reminder.
This entire prophecy is obviously one of the Messianic Age, after Moshiach ben Dovid has revealed Himself and now rules the world. It in itself is also a vindication for us now as Messianic believers. We can take heart that our as well as faithful Israel’s final vindication will come at the hands of Yeshua Himself.
Dan C
Sources: JPS Study TNK, W.Wiersby and other Christian commentators, my father
2 Didn’t I myself make all these things? This is how they all came to be,” says Adonai. “The kind of person on whom I look with favor is one with a poor and humble spirit, who trembles at my word.
3 Those others might as well kill a person as an ox, as well break a dog’s neck as sacrifice a lamb, as well offer pig’s blood as offer a grain offering, as well bless an idol as burn incense. Just as these have chosen their ways and enjoy their disgusting practices,
4 so I will enjoy making fools of them, and bring on them the very things they fear. For when I called, no one answered; when I spoke, they did not hear. Instead they did what was evil in my sight and chose what did not please me.”
God does not need the Temple, our sacrifices, or our worship. These things, while they are pleasing to Him, are really for our benefit. So God tells us the kind of worship that pleases Him: the man with “a poor and humble spirit, who trembles at [His] word.”
Those who think their cultic worship and sacrifices buys them grace to also dabble in idolatries and abominable acts may as well be sacrificing pigs.
Isaiah 66:5 (CJB) Hear the word of Adonai, you who tremble at his word: “Your brothers, who hate you and reject you because of my name, have said: ‘Let Adonai be glorified, so we can see your joy.’ But they will be put to
.”The enemies among their own people who reject the Lord mock the faithful. They portray themselves as the faithful, but they will in the end be unmasked. This hasn’t changed, as Meshiachim are often reviled, and even those in Christian churches who refuse to keep sliding the mark for holiness farther from God every time the world pushes a bit are attacked, sometimes viciously by the self-righteous and the “peacemakers.”
Isaiah 66:7-8 (CJB) Before going into labor, she gave birth; before her pains came, she delivered a male child.
8 Who ever heard of such a thing? Who has ever seen such things? Is a country born in one day? Is a nation brought forth all at once? For as soon as Tziyon went into labor, she brought forth her children.
Many Christian commentators say this was fulfilled when Israel was reborn as a nation because they suddenly became a state in 1949 after the UN voted to make it so. I have to disagree, because the time leading up to this vote was extremely turbulent, with Arab violence and the British punishing the Jews for every defense of themselves and their homes. Add to this the Shoa, and we can see there was much travail. So I think this foretells some as yet to be fulfilled event.
Isaiah 66:11 (CJB) so that you nurse and are satisfied by her comforting breast, drinking deeply and delighting in the overflow of her glory.
The Israelites take comfort, consolation and sustenance from the breasts of Tzion. Then in vs 13 the metaphor suddenly changes and God becomes the mother of the nation.
Isaiah 66:13 (CJB) Like someone comforted by his mother, I will comfort you; in Yerushalayim you will be comforted.”
I don’t think this means God and Tzion are the same, or even have the same roles. Rather it is God who watches over both His people and His city always.
Isaiah 66:16-17 (CJB) 16 For Adonai will judge all humanity with fire and with the sword, and those slain by Adonai will be many.
17 “Those who consecrate and purify themselves in order to enter the gardens, then follow the one who was already there, eating pig meat, reptiles and mice, will all be destroyed together,” says Adonai.
Be careful who you follow; and where they lead you. God will judge harshly those who worship as they please instead of in humble obedience. Apostates even from within Israel will be punished.
Isaiah 66:18-21 (CJB) 18 “For I [know] their deeds and their thoughts. “[The time] is coming when I will gather together all nations and languages. They will come and see my glory,
19 and I will give them a sign. I will send some of their survivors to the nations of Tarshish, Pul, Lud (these are archers), Tuval, Greece and more distant coasts, where they have neither heard of my fame nor seen my glory. They will proclaim my glory in these nations;
20 and they will bring all your kinsmen out of all the nations as an offering to Adonai — on horses, in chariots, in wagons, on mules, on camels — to my holy mountain Yerushalayim,” says Adonai, “just as the people of Isra’el themselves bring their offerings in clean vessels to the house of Adonai.
21 I will also take cohanim and L’vi’im from them,” says Adonai.
All nations will acknowledge Adonai as God. They will come to Yerushalayim, to the Temple, bringing exiled Jews with them. There is no distinction here between the Israelites and the nations. All people who truly wish to worship Adonai are welcomed to the Temple, and the way this reads some among the goyim may even be made cohanim. Conversely, as we read on many of the Jews, those who worship idols or practice pagan rites, these are punished.
Isaiah 66:22-24 (CJB) 22 “For just as the new heavens and the new earth that I am making will continue in my presence,” says Adonai, “so will your descendants and your name continue.
23 “Every month on Rosh-Hodesh and every week on Shabbat, everyone living will come to worship in my presence,” says Adonai.
24 “As they leave, they will look on the corpses of the people who rebelled against me. For their worm will never die, and their fire will never be quenched; but they will be abhorrent to all humanity.”
So everyone still living will walk by and see those suffering the eternal flames, and will have these before themselves as a reminder.
This entire prophecy is obviously one of the Messianic Age, after Moshiach ben Dovid has revealed Himself and now rules the world. It in itself is also a vindication for us now as Messianic believers. We can take heart that our as well as faithful Israel’s final vindication will come at the hands of Yeshua Himself.
Dan C
Sources: JPS Study TNK, W.Wiersby and other Christian commentators, my father
