p. 734There is no break between Isaiah chapters lxiii. and lxiv. The prophet’s prayer runs through to the end of ch. lxiv. The Hebrew makes the division at ch. lxiv. verse 2; but the same remark applies. Some of the critics will have it that ch. lxiii., verses 17-19, must be post-exilic, as also ch. lxiv. 9-12, because they represent the sanctuary downtrodden and Zion a wilderness. They do not apparently give the spirit of God credit for being able to see the end from the beginning. They might as well argue that the beginning of ch. lxiii. was written after “the day of vengeance of our God.” There is no help in “the wise and prudent”; we must turn to the scriptures, and to enlightened “babes” to whom the Father has revealed the truth.
The prayer of ch. lxiii. 15: “Look down from heaven and behold” is continued in ch. lxiv. 1: “Oh that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at thy presence. As when the melting fire burneth, the fire causeth the waters to boil, to make thy name known to thine adversaries, that the nations may tremble at thy presence.” God had already frequently promised by the prophet that this great development should be revealed in the latter days; hence the prayer was most natural, as we might say. It was quite unlike the prayers of the religionists of our day that take hold of things that God has never promised at all, and that do not even recognise the coming revelation of God to the nations upon the basis of the “everlasting covenant” with the house of David. The prophet had respect to the covenant, and, like Abraham before him, rejoiced to see the day of Christ afar off. The revival of the truth in the latter days has revived this “hope of Israel.”
p. 735 It is noteworthy that the prophets, in their prayers and prophesyings, all take hold of the birth of the nation in the days of the Exodus from Egypt as the earnest of the greater deliverance to come, when “a nation shall be born in a day.” “The days of Moses,” and the making of God’s “everlasting name,” are the great precedent for what is to come upon earth in the day of Christ, and the revival of God’s work in the midst of the years. This cannot be too strongly insisted on. The following passages may be consulted in proof of the fact: Psa. lxviii. 7, 22, 31; Isa. xi. 10-16: xxvii. 12, 13; xliii. 3-6: lxiii. 11, 12: lxiv. 3; Jer. xvi. 14, 15: xxiii. 8; Ezek. xx. 36; Dan. ix. 15; Hos. xii. 9-13; Amos ix. 7, 11; Mic. vii. 14-20; Hab. iii.; Mal. iv. 4-6.
Connecting the past with the future deliverance, the prophet here prays:—“When thou didst terrible things which we looked not for, thou camest down, the mountains flowed down at thy presence. For since the beginning of the world (meolam, from of old), men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him. Thou meetest him that rejoiceth and worketh righteousness, those that remember thee in thy ways: behold thou art wroth; for we have sinned: in those is continuance (olam, the stability of the olam, or age to come), and we shall be saved.”
The Revised Version in the margin here hazards the conjecture that “the (Heb.) text is probably corrupt”; and, in the translation in the text, turns olam into this world instead of that which is to come; and questions the salvation thus:—“In them have we been of long time, and shall we be saved?” But this is not satisfactory. By the light of the truth, and of Paul’s quotation of the passage in 1 Cor. ii. 9, we are led greatly to prefer the Authorised Version, which, whether the text be corrupt or not, makes very good sense, and is in harmony with the gospel of the kingdom.
Paul, speaking of the revelation of the mystery of God by the apostolic preaching of the Kingdom of God in the name of Jesus Christ and him crucified, says, “None of the princes of this world p. 736 knew (it); for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard; neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But (adds the apostle) God hath revealed them unto us by his spirit: for the spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.” And he goes on to speak of the day of Christ, when God, in the person of Jesus, shall “rend the heavens and come down,” and institute that day of judgment and fiery trial for which Isaiah had prayed nearly 800 years before.
The spirit, in the revelation of the things prepared of God for them that love him, speaks of two olams or ages, this age and that which is to come. As illustrating Paul’s statement concerning the native emptiness of the human heart, apart from revelation, concerning things to come, we read that Solomon, by the spirit, says: “He hath set the world (ha olam, this age) in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end” (Ecc. iii. 11); a phenomenon with which we are only too painfully familiar. But the spirit, in “the deep things of God” revealed to the fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and to David, spoke of another olam, called by the Jews, who rejected and still reject Jesus, the Olam-ha-Ba, or Age to Come, and by the apostle, in the passage quoted, “the day of Christ.” It is this age to which Isaiah, in his prayer, looks forward—to “the day of vengeance of our God”—the time of the revelation of “the things prepared of God for them that love him.”
At that time God in Christ will “meet him that rejoiceth and worketh righteousness,” those that remember him in his ways. Isaiah had before said, “In the way of thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for thee; the desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee” (xxvi. 8). And again, “It shall be said in that day, Lo this is our God, we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation” (xxv. 9).
“The days of Moses” typically illustrate the nature of this “meeting.” Moses, having been rejected by his brethren, and p. 737 repudiated as prince and judge over them, was exiled for forty years in the land of Midian. Then God appeared to him at the bush, and sent him back to Egypt to deliver Israel, and reveal the name of Yahweh by miracles, signs, and wonders. And God told him that Aaron his brother was coming forth to meet him, and that when he saw him he would be “glad in his heart.” And to Aaron God said, “Go into the wilderness to meet Moses. And he went and met him in the mount of God and kissed him. And Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord who had sent him, and all the signs which he had commanded him” (Ex. iv. 14, 27).
So Jesus, who is the prophet like unto Moses, after his resurrection met his disciples, and told them of the salvation the Father had bestowed on him, and commissioned them to bear his name abroad in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and finally into all the habitable, with signs and wonders which God gave them by him. Of the future “meeting” he had before spoken in the parable of the ten virgins who went forth to meet the bridegroom (Matt. xxv.). This was his illustration of the nature of the affairs of “the kingdom of heaven” at his return. Then again, Paul, his “chosen vessel,” explained to the Thessalonian brethren (1 Thess. iv. 17), how at “the coming of the Lord” the disciples, living and dead, should be caught away in clouds “to meet the Lord.” Thus Moses and the prophets, Jesus and the apostles, all speak of a meeting of God with the righteous in a future age, when they “shall be saved.” It is the coming of Christ, who, in Isa. lxiii., is seen at a later stage of his work upon earth, coming from Edom, “with dyed garments from Bozrah.”
Then the prophet lapses into a lamentation that has been sadly misinterpreted: “But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags (literally, “as a menstruous garment”): and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.” Upon this arises a question concerning “righteousness” in relation to “fine linen clean and white” on the one hand, and “filthy rags,” “filthy garments” (Zech. iii. 3, 4), “garments spotted by the flesh” (Jude 23), on the other.
p. 738 Popular Christianity, which is a lie pure and simple, has propounded a demoralising doctrine concerning “righteousness” or “good works.” It declares that there is nothing at all to do but to “believe in the Lord Jesus Christ”; that “Jesus did it, did it all, long, long ago!” And it is fond of quoting this particular passage from Isaiah in support of this doctrine; and this in face of the explicit declaration of Christ himself in the end of the sermon on the mount:—“Whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock” . . . but “Every one that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them not shall be likened unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand” (Matt. vii. 24, 26). Are the righteous deeds of “a wise man” likened unto “filthy rags,” or “a garment spotted by the flesh”? Surely they ought to look again.
But, it will be said, there is the prophetic phrase—what, then, does it mean? The answer, in the very words of the context, is “our iniquities”: that is, the iniquities of the pious frauds of the nation who professed righteousness and practised iniquity. Of these Isaiah had already spoken, saying, by the Spirit: “Woe to the rebellious children, saith the Lord . . . that cover with a covering, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin” (xxx. 1). “Yet,” said the Lord, “they seek me daily and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God; they ask me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching God” (lviii. 2). The whole religious service of such a people was an unendurable abomination to God—it was “iniquity, even the solemn meeting” (i. 13). And Christ afterwards said to his disciples, “Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. v. 20). Such was the righteousness that was iniquity—a mere “filthy garment spotted by the flesh.” When the moderns apply this passage of Isaiah to themselves and their failure to do the commandments of Jesus, they do but unconsciously establish their brotherhood with the Scribes and Pharisees of old in the eyes of all who can really see.
p. 739 The following beautiful comments on Rev. i. 13 will further elucidate this important subject:—
“While Daniel informs us that the Spirit-Man he beheld, was ‘clothed with linen,’ John states simply, that he was ‘clothed to the feet.’ Now, this clothing is significant of the character and office of the person represented by the symbol. The holy garments of Aaron and his sons were of linen, ‘to cover their nakedness,’ that when they ministered in the holy places, ‘they bear not iniquity, and die’ (Ex. xxviii. 42). ‘Nakedness’ and ‘iniquity’ are convertible terms in scripture; as it is written, ‘When Moses saw that the people were naked, for Aaron had made them naked to their shame,’—that is, they had transgressed in worshipping the golden calf. ‘Blessed is he that keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.’ Hence, to be ‘clothed,’ and to keep the clothing white and clean, is to be ‘righteous,’ or holy. When Adam sinned, ‘he knew that he was naked,’ and he was ashamed and afraid; but the Spirit appointed for clothing skins of sacrifices, and his sin was covered. Hence, ‘Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered,’ or clothed. Joshua, son of Josedec, a type of Jesus in the flesh, is first introduced as clothed with filthy garments, representative of the flesh with its propensities and lusts; but when the type is changed to represent Jesus in pneuma hagiosunes,—that is, in Holy Spirit Nature, such as he acquired after resurrection, Joshua’s raiment is represented as being changed—‘Take away,’ says the Spirit, ‘the filthy garments from him.’ When this was done, then the Spirit addresses him, and says, ‘I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment.’ And when the time came to do it—to clothe Jesus, and all in him, symbolised by Joshua and ‘his fellows,’ ‘they set a fair mitre (or priestly crown) upon his head, and clothed him with garments.’ These are indicated in the visions of Daniel and John (Zech. iii. 3-10).
“‘I put on righteousness,’ says Job, ‘and it clothed me;’ and in Psa. cxxxii. 9, ‘Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness.’ In Rev. xix. 8 it is said of the community styled p. 740 ‘the Lamb’s Wife,’ that ‘to her it was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen clean and white,’ which is declared to be ‘the Righteousness of the Saints.’”—Eureka, vol. i. p. 169.
From all this it is very evident that “the righteousness of the saints” is not the thing symbolised by the “filthy rags”; but rather the outward righteousness of disobedient professors so sternly rebuked by the apostles (Jude 3, 4, 8, 10, 23). Such was the character of Israel’s righteousness in Isaiah’s days. He was in the midst of it, but he was not of it. He contended earnestly for the faith in his day against the ungodly men who “defiled the flesh.” He was like the “few names in Sardis” who had “not defiled their garments” (Rev. iii. 4), and of whom it was written by the Lord, “They shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy.” The worthiness consists of faith and obedience. “To him that overcometh,” is Christ’s invariable formula of promise to all the seven churches. Christendom’s righteousnesses are truly “filthy rags.”
“But there is forgiveness with God that he may be feared.” The prophet pleads this in his beautiful entreaty for himself and the nation: “But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand. Be not wroth very sore, O Lord, neither remember iniquity for ever. Behold, see, we beseech thee, we are all thy people. Thy holy cities are a wilderness, Zion is a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation. Our holy and our beautiful house, where our fathers praised thee, is burned up with fire; and all our pleasant things are laid waste. Wilt thou refrain thyself for these things, O Lord, Wilt thou hold thy peace and afflict us very sore?”
The answer, as concerning that generation, was a terrible one; but, as concerning the truly righteous remnant in all generations, a glorious one, opening up a prospect which is now all our salvation and all our desire.