History of the Jews

by Paul Johnson

The Suffering Servant echoes Isaiah’s own voice and fate, and the two parts of the book have a unity even though as much as two centuries separate their written composition. What, as a whole, the Book of Isaiah does is to mark a notable maturing of the religion of Yahweh. It is now concerned with justice and with judgment: judgment of nations and judgment of the individual soul. In Deutero-Isaiah in particular, the stress is on the individual as the bearer of faith, outside the claims of tribe, race, nation. Not just Elijah, but each and all of us has the ‘still, small voice’ of conscience. It is all part of the discovery of the individual, a giant step forward in human self-knowledge. The Greeks would soon be pushing in the same direction, but the Israelites, or as we shall soon call them, the Jews, were the forerunners. Moreover, unlike the Greeks, the Israelites, under the inspiration of Isaiah, were moving towards a pure monotheism. There are many passages in the earlier parts of the Bible where Yahweh is seen not so much as the sole God but as the most powerful one, who can act in other gods’ territories.221 In Deutero-Isaiah, however, the existence of other gods is denied, not just in practice but in ideological theory: ‘I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God.’222 Moreover, it is now stated clearly that God is universal, ubiquitous and omnipotent. God is the motivating force, and the sole motivating force, throughout history. He created the ...