Isaiah 33

Isaiah cannot keep eschatology just for his senior years or the end of the book, he continues in this chapter unrestrained. He starts addressing the originator of all evil, Lucifer, now understood to be Satan and he calls him “one who destroys” (šoded) (v. 1a) and explains “[emphasized] You who are not destroyed”. We know it is Satan and not like commentators and scholars thought, Assyria of Isaiah’s day, since Assyria was destroyed in 612 BCE. This Destroyer is not destroyed himself. Only Satan qualifies. While everything around him crumbles to pieces, he is untouched. Isaiah says, this has an end “as you shall finish destroying, you shall be destroyed” (v. 1d). Isaiah then describes the condition of the human in this environment waiting patiently for the Second Coming: “be gracious to us, we have waited for You” (v. 2a) and if the Lord delays, “be Thou their Arms [zeroah] every morning” (v. 2b). Arms is seen by the Targum as strength, by the Syriac as our help but because the Byzantine Greek corrupted LXX vocalized the mainframe consonants differently, they ended with seed. The times after Christ were difficult for a number of centuries and accuracy-scholarship shows it. Qumran after Antiochus Epiphanes had the same problems. During many years and millennia of the delay should the Lord be strength but Isaiah also anticipates the Time of Jacob’s Trouble when the Lord shall be “our salvation also in the time of distress” (v. 2c), also in Daniel 12:1, and we know it is the Second Coming because the next part says it: “at the sound of the tumult, peoples flee” (v. 3a) which is the trumpet that shall sound that Paul spoke of in the New Testament for the Resurrection time at the Second Coming event of Christ. Isaiah is not uninformed. Doctrines are not developmental. Understandings of doctrines are developmental. They knew more than we ascribe them to have known. The nations flee when Christ is uplifted as King (v. 3b). The spoil of the Lord is gathered (v. 4). It is harvest time and the seed of the Lord is taken while the weeds remain “as the  [locusts] rushing too and fro (off) the leafs[Egyptian loanword gabt also Coptic goobe], He rushes too and fro on it” (v. 4b). The Targum inserted an extra letter in leafs which led to word-confusion and misconstruction meaning men. and This Utopia is described by Isaiah when the Lord Christ is exalted as King after His Highpriestly work in the temple is completed (v. 5a). The New Jerusalem in Heaven [not the earthly Jerusalem as the Targum miscalculated] or heavenly Zion is the place that is filled with His justice and righteousness (v. 5b). With the saints gathered at the Second Coming (v. 4a) Christ shall be their stability of their times since they came out of the Time of Trouble (v. 6a). For the believer, Christ is the “wealth of salvation, wisdom and knowledge, the fear of the Lord is the treasure” at this time (v. 6b-c). Isaiah tells his own audience and people, that at that time, the Second Coming, all these famous “brave men” and “ambassadors” shall “weep bitterly” (v. 7b). The post-Christ versions had trouble with the word heroes in the verse. The Byzantine Greek translator disect a text very similar to the Syriac but not the Syriac understanding here for heroes and ended up with three separate words: behold, terrified and you. To differ with the Byzantine Septuagint, the Syriac translator took the Targum and read very similar. Some sees it as lion and God and others as heroes. The highways are desolate, Lebanon dry, Sharon a desert, Bashan [Galilee in the Byzantine Greek Septuagint and the Targum read Mathnan] and Carmel deserted (v. 8-9). “Her people[Assyrian word amêlu + LU + h] mourns” (v. 9a). The Byzantine Septuagint dropped the word people because they could not understand it and the Targum tried lies waste. Scholars have indicated that the Byzantine Greek Septuagint, the Targum and the Vulgate participated in harmonization practices with the Word of God. They took corners. This verse has nothing to do with the timeframe of Isaiah’s day as commentators repeatedly quoted each other for support. “Now” (atta`) in verse 10 is part of the Second Coming panel that Isaiah outlined a number of times higher up in the chapter. “Now” is not existential for Isaiah but future. It is not current history of Isaiah but eschatological events. “Now I will be exalted, now I will be lifted up” Christ says to Isaiah in the Second Coming panel (v. 10). The evil people will be consumed like stubble similar to fire (v. 11a-b; 12a-b). This is not the hell event. It is the appearance of the Lord that will be bright and “My breath [ruach] will consume you [evil ones] like a fire” [so also the Targum]. Targums reveal Christian influence like Targum Neofiti so one should not treat the Targum as if it influenced the New Testament. It may have originated in form in Byzantine times. Isaiah says that God wants the whole earth to hear about this event “you who are far away hear what I have done” (v. 13). Isaiah then addresses the remnant on earth as Zion. “Terrified are sinners in Zion” [be=zion] and this is evidence that at the Second Coming of Christ there will be in the remnant both the good and the bad together. The Second Coming is the final Shaking although a previous Shaking took place before the Latter Rain with scores leaving the remnant, as Isaiah outlined in the previous two chapters. The godless (v. 14b) of course are those who are not part of the remnant but who had an appearance of godliness all the time but inside empty and they cannot stay in Christ’s presence “who among us can live with burnings forever [mwqdy `wlm]?” (v. 14d). Hell is not forever. The Byzantine corrupt Greek Septuagint translated burnings forever as eternal place. What is the Word of God the result eternally is turned into a place for fire here. It is the Brightness of the Glory of Christ at the Second Coming that burns and he is asking whether they as sinners can live forever with that burning sensation in their eyes. It is not time but quality. Isaiah opened up then a panel of the Ideal Perfect One or Christ our Example from famous Psalms like Psalm 1, 15, 24 who allocates this kind of perfection to Christ, otherwise we did not need a Savior. Our perfection has shortcomings but it is not for us to evaluate, since our goal is Christ our Example. “He Who walks righteous” (v. 15a); Who speaks with sincerity (v. 15a); Who rejects unjust gain; and shakes His hands not to hold bribe (v. 15b); stops ears from hearing news or movies or games about bloodshed (v. 15d); shuts the eyes to see evil (v. 15e). Achieving this Example of Christ such a person will be blessed: dwell on the heights [of heaven] (v. 16a); his refuge is the Rock of Ages, who is Christ and not Peter (v. 16b); food, water will be sure (v. 16c-d). Such are the people of the remnant who will “see the King in His beauty” [Targum has the everlasting king] and they will see a “distant land” [heaven] (v. 17). During the difficult times of the Time of Trouble preceding the Second Coming the remnant in anguish will ask “where is He Who counts; where is He Who weighs; where is He Who counts the towers” meaning, when will God intervene and why is there a delay in His appearance? (v. 18). Because the remnant will see Christ the King with their own eyes (v. 16a) therefore in verse 19, they will no longer see a fierce people [as they did during the Time of Trouble which brought the three questions of the previous verse] (v. 19a). The Time of Trouble agents across the globe will be: a fierce people (v. 19a) unintelligible speech (v. 19b); no one can comprehend them (v. 19b); stammering tongue (v. 19c); no one can understands (v. 19d). At that time, after the Second Coming gathering of Christ of the earthly Zion, the people, these resurrected believers shall see the heavenly Zion “the city of our appointed feasts” (v. 20a). The origin of the Tabernacle service by Moses was from a real insight into the heavenly Zion and now the believers can also see what Moses saw (v. 20b). Isaiah addresses the nomadic cultures and says that their tents shall not [Phoenician language negative bal] fold, stakes pulled up, cords torn apart (v. 20c-e). It is at that place, heavenly Zion, that “the Majestic, the Lord [Christ] shall be for us a place of rivers, wide canals” (v. 21a-b). No boats, no ships of kings (v. 21c-d). “For the Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our King, He will save us” (v. 22). Isaiah secures also the nomadic cultures about the Utopia of the Righteous at Mount Zion. The marines will find that their navigation systems and powers are down since the cords cannot hold the sail and cannot use the mast (v. 23a-c). The resurrected and perfected “lame” will find his/her inheritance, the spoil that will be divided (v. 23d-e). Because of the miracle of newly created bodies, “no resident [of Zion] will say, ‘I am sick’” (v. 24a). The people who will dwell there, in heavenly Zion, says Isaiah “is forgiven of iniquity” for salvation worked for them who are willing to ask for it and Christ Heavenly Ministry has come to a halt when He took His Kingly robes (v. 24b).

Dear God

Grant that what we are unable to do with our own perfection following the Example of Christ will also for us individually be filled up with the Substitution of Christ so that our ‘iniquity is also forgiven’ and we join others into heavenly Zion at the Second Coming . Amen.

Koot van Wyk, (DLitt et Phil; ThD) Kyungpook National University, Department of Liberal Education, Sangju, South Korea; conjoint lecturer of Avondale College, Australia