Good Friday, April 15, 2022

Isaiah 52, 13—53, 12

See, my servant shall prosper, he shall be raised high and greatly exalted. Even as many were amazed at him— so marred was his look beyond human semblance and his appearance beyond that of the sons of man— so shall he startle many nations, because of him kings shall stand speechless; for those who have not been told shall see, those who have not heard shall ponder it. Who would believe what we have heard? To whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? He grew up like a sapling before him, like a shoot from the parched earth; there was in him no stately bearing to make us look at him, nor appearance that would attract us to him. He was spurned and avoided by people, a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity, one of those from whom people hide their faces, spurned, and we held him in no esteem. Yet it was our infirmities that he bore, our sufferings that he endured, while we thought of him as stricken, as one smitten by God and afflicted. But he was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our sins; upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole, by his stripes we were healed. We had all gone astray like sheep, each following his own way; but the LORD laid upon him the guilt of us all. Though he was harshly treated, he submitted and opened not his mouth; like a lamb led to the slaughter or a sheep before the shearers, he was silent and opened not his mouth. Oppressed and condemned, he was taken away, and who would have thought any more of his destiny? When he was cut off from the land of the living, and smitten for the sin of his people, a grave was assigned him among the wicked and a burial place with evildoers, though he had done no wrong nor spoken any falsehood. But the Lord was pleased to crush him in infirmity. If he gives his life as an offering for sin, he shall see his descendants in a long life, and the will of the Lord shall be accomplished through him. Because of his affliction he shall see the light in fullness of days; through his suffering, my servant shall justify many, and their guilt he shall bear. Therefore I will give him his portion among the great, and he shall divide the spoils with the mighty, because he surrendered himself to death and was counted among the wicked; and he shall take away the sins of many, and win pardon for their offenses.

The Jews of the time of Jesus did not know what to make of this prophecy.  Even today, scholars debate about the identity of the servant of whom Isaiah writes.  Some say that it was the Prophet himself or his son, or the people of Israel, or some figure whose existence is lost to history.  The Jews who lived two thousand years ago certainly did not apply these verses to the Messiah.  The Pharisees, setting this prophecy aside, taught a very different Messiah, one who would lead armies.  They derived their version of the Anointed One from passages in the Prophets that should have been understood as conquering sin and death, not the Romans.  They crammed the round peg of God’s revelation into the square hole of their own desires.  The Lord spent much time after his Resurrection explaining to his disciples the prophecies correctly: “Then he said to them: ‘O foolish and slow of heart to believe in all things which the Prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and so to enter into his glory?’ And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, he expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things that were concerning him” (Luke 24, 25-27). 

As we meditate on the Passion and Death our Lord suffered for our sake, let us endeavor to know him as he is through the Scriptures, the teachings of the Church, the lives of the saints, and through prayer before the Blessed Sacrament.