Isaiah 50 is the fiftieth chapter of the

Book of Isaiah The Book of Isaiah ( he, ספר ישעיהו, ) is the first of the Latter Prophets in the Hebrew Bible and the first of the Major Prophets in the Christian Old Testament. It is identified by a superscription as the words of the 8th-century BC ...

in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. Hebrew: ''Tān ...

or the

Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...

of the

Christian Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

. This book contains the prophecies attributed to the

prophet In religion, a prophet or prophetess is an individual who is regarded as being in contact with a divine being and is said to speak on behalf of that being, serving as an intermediary with humanity by delivering messages or teachings from the s ...

Isaiah Isaiah ( or ; he, , ''Yəšaʿyāhū'', "God is Salvation"), also known as Isaias, was the 8th-century BC Israelite prophet after whom the Book of Isaiah is named. Within the text of the Book of Isaiah, Isaiah himself is referred to as "the ...

, and is one of the

Books of the Prophets Nevi'im (; he, נְבִיאִים ''Nəvīʾīm'', Tiberian: ''Năḇīʾīm,'' "Prophets", literally "spokespersons") is the second major division of the Hebrew Bible (the ''Tanakh''), lying between the Torah (instruction) and Ketuvim (wri ...

. Chapters 40-55 are known as "Deutero-Isaiah" and date from the time of the

Israelites The Israelites (; , , ) were a group of Semitic-speaking tribes in the ancient Near East who, during the Iron Age, inhabited a part of Canaan. The earliest recorded evidence of a people by the name of Israel appears in the Merneptah Stele o ...

' exile in Babylon. This chapter includes the third of the

songs A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetition ...

of the "Suffering Servant".

Text

The original text was written in

Hebrew language Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

. This chapter is divided into 11 verses.

Textual witnesses

Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter in

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

are of the

Masoretic Text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; he, נֻסָּח הַמָּסוֹרָה, Nūssāḥ Hammāsōrā, lit. 'Text of the Tradition') is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) in Rabbinic Judaism. ...

tradition, which includes the

Codex Cairensis The Codex Cairensis (also: ''Codex Prophetarum Cairensis'', ''Cairo Codex of the Prophets'') is a Hebrew manuscript containing the complete text of the Hebrew Bible's Nevi'im (Prophets). It has traditionally been described as "the oldest dated He ...

(895), the Petersburg Codex of the Prophets (916),

Aleppo Codex The Aleppo Codex ( he, כֶּתֶר אֲרָם צוֹבָא, romanized: , lit. 'Crown of Aleppo') is a medieval bound manuscript of the Hebrew Bible. The codex was written in the city of Tiberias in the tenth century CE (circa 920) under the ...

(10th century),

Codex Leningradensis The Leningrad Codex ( la, Codex Leningradensis [Leningrad Book]; he, כתב יד לנינגרד) is the oldest complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible in Hebrew, using the Masoretic Text and Tiberian vocalization. According to its colopho ...

(1008). Fragments containing parts of this chapter were found among the

Dead Sea Scrolls The Dead Sea Scrolls (also the Qumran Caves Scrolls) are ancient Jewish and Hebrew religious manuscripts discovered between 1946 and 1956 at the Qumran Caves in what was then Mandatory Palestine, near Ein Feshkha in the West Bank, on the nor ...

(3rd century BC or later): * 1QIsa (2nd century BCE): all verses * 1QIsa (1st century BCE): extant: verses 8–11 * 4QIsa^c (4Q57): extant verses 7–11 There is also a translation into

Koine Greek Koine Greek (; Koine el, ἡ κοινὴ διάλεκτος, hē koinè diálektos, the common dialect; ), also known as Hellenistic Greek, common Attic, the Alexandrian dialect, Biblical Greek or New Testament Greek, was the common supra-reg ...

known as the

Septuagint The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond th ...

, made in the last few centuries BCE. Extant ancient manuscripts of the

version include

Codex Vaticanus The Codex Vaticanus ( The Vatican, Bibl. Vat., Vat. gr. 1209), designated by siglum B or 03 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), δ 1 ( von Soden), is a fourth-century Christian manuscript of a Greek Bible, containing the majority of the Greek Old ...

(B;

\mathfrak

^B; 4th century),

Codex Sinaiticus The Codex Sinaiticus (Shelfmark: London, British Library, Add MS 43725), designated by siglum [Aleph] or 01 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts), δ 2 (in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts) ...

(S; BHK:

\mathfrak

^S; 4th century),

Codex Alexandrinus The Codex Alexandrinus (London, British Library, Royal MS 1. D. V-VIII), designated by the siglum A or 02 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts), δ 4 (in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts), is a manu ...

(A;

\mathfrak

^A; 5th century), and

Codex Marchalianus Codex Marchalianus designated by siglum Q is a 6th-century Greek manuscript copy of the Greek version of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh or Old Testament) known as the Septuagint. The text was written on vellum in uncial letters. Palaeographically it ...

(Q;

\mathfrak

^Q; 6th century).

Parashot

The ''

parashah The term ''parashah'' ( he, פָּרָשָׁה ''Pārāšâ'', "portion", Tiberian , Sephardi , plural: ''parashot'' or ''parashiyot'', also called ''parsha'') formally means a section of a biblical book in the Masoretic Text of the Tanakh (Heb ...

'' sections listed here are based on the

. Isaiah 50 is a part of the ''Consolations (

Isaiah 40 Isaiah 40 is the fortieth chapter of the Book of Isaiah in the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament of the Christian Bible, and the first chapter of the section known as "Deutero-Isaiah" (Isaiah 40- 55), dating from the time of the Israelites' ex ...

–66)''. : open ''parashah''; : closed ''parashah''. : 50:1-3 50:4-9 50:10 50:11

Verse 3

:''I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.'' Similarly in : :''The sun became black as sackcloth of hair.''

Third servant song

The

servant songs The servant songs (also called the servant poems or the Songs of the Suffering Servant) are four songs in the Book of Isaiah in the Hebrew Bible, which include Isaiah 42:1– 4; Isaiah 49; ; and –. The songs are four poems written about a cert ...

were first identified by

Bernhard Duhm Bernhard Lauardus Duhm (October 10, 1847 – November 1, 1928) was a German Lutheran theologian, born in Bingum, today part of Leer, East Frisia. He was a member of the history of religions school. Early life and education Duhm studied theolo ...

in his 1892 Commentary on Isaiah. The songs are four

poem Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings in ...

s taken from the Book of Isaiah written about a certain "servant of

YHWH The Tetragrammaton (; ), or Tetragram, is the four-letter Hebrew theonym (transliterated as YHWH), the name of God in the Hebrew Bible. The four letters, written and read from right to left (in Hebrew), are ''yodh'', '' he'', ''waw'', and '' ...

". God calls the servant to lead the nations, but the servant is horribly repressed. In the end, he is rewarded. Those four poems are: # # # #

Isaiah 52 Isaiah 52 is the fifty-second Chapters and verses of the Bible, chapter of the Book of Isaiah in the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament of the Christianity, Christian Bible. This book contains the prophecies attributed to the Biblical prophet, pro ...

–53 The third of the "servant songs" begins at Isaiah 50:4, continuing through 50:11. The

Jerusalem Bible ''The Jerusalem Bible'' (JB or TJB) is an English translation of the Bible published in 1966 by Darton, Longman & Todd. As a Catholic Bible, it includes 73 books: the 39 books shared with the Hebrew Bible, along with the seven deuterocanonical ...

divides it into two sections: *Isaiah 50:4-9: The servant speaks *Isaiah 50:10-11: Exhortation to follow the servant. This song has a darker yet more confident tone than the others. Although the song gives a first-person description of how the Servant was beaten and abused, here the Servant is described both as teacher and learner who follows the path God places him on without pulling back. Echoing the words of the first song, "a bruised reed he will not break", he sustains the weary with a word. His vindication is left in God's hands. Almost all commentators agree that the language here is individual in nature. Maintaining the collective interpretation of the Servant became more difficult with the detailed allusions to rejection, physical abuse, disfigurement, and eventually death, in 50:4–9 and 52:13–53:12.Isaiah 40-55: a New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, by Joseph Blenkinsopp and Jesaja, Yale Univ. Press, 2008, pp. 82)

Uses

Music

The

King James Version The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version, is an Bible translations into English, English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and publis ...

of verse 6 from this chapter is cited as texts in the English-language

oratorio An oratorio () is a large musical composition for orchestra, choir, and soloists. Like most operas, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an instrumental ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias. However, opera is mus ...

Messiah In Abrahamic religions, a messiah or messias (; , ; , ; ) is a saviour or liberator of a group of people. The concepts of ''mashiach'', messianism, and of a Messianic Age originated in Judaism, and in the Hebrew Bible, in which a ''mashiach'' ...

" by

George Frideric Handel George Frideric (or Frederick) Handel (; baptised , ; 23 February 1685 – 14 April 1759) was a German-British Baroque music, Baroque composer well known for his opera#Baroque era, operas, oratorios, anthems, concerto grosso, concerti grossi, ...

(HWV 56).

References

Bibliography

External links

Jewish

Isaiah 50:Original Hebrew with Parallel English

* ttp://judaismsanswer.com/IS50PART1.pdf A complete analysis of Isaiah 50 by Rabbi Moshe Shulmanbr>Targum on Isaiah 50 by Rabbi Moshe Shulman

* ttp://www.judaismsanswer.com/crispin.htm Moshe Ibn Crispin and Isaiah 50 by Rabbi Moshe Shulman
Suffering Servant (24 Articles) from Jews for JudaismJewish Encyclopedia: Servant of God
* ttp://www.uhcg.org/suffering-servant/The-Servant-vs-jc.html A Jewish refutation of Christian interpretationbr>A Jewish explanation of the text from Rabbi Dov
->

Christian

Isaiah 50 English Translation with Parallel Latin VulgateA Christian examination of Isaiah 50Israel, the Suffering Servant
{{Book of Isaiah Old Testament theology 50 Christian messianism