Isaiah 53:12

As the reward of his unmerited sufferings and his mediatorial work, the Servant shall attain an influence equal to that of the great potentates of the world. To "divide spoil" is a figurative and proverbial expression for victory or success; Proverbs 16:19 ("It is better to be of lowly spirit with the meek than to divide spoil with the proud"). It is therefore not necessarily implied that the Servant's future greatness will be political, although that is certainly suggested.

Instead of will I divide, the LXX. reads "he shall inherit" (which is perhaps preferable as avoiding the recurrence of the same verb in two consecutive lines), but it is a mistake of some authorities to follow this version in treating the "many" as direct obj. of the verb; the sense must be either "he shall inherit," or "I will give him a share" amongst the many.

The latter part of the verse returns to the great contrast that runs through the passage, between the true meaning of the Servant's afflictions and the false construction put on them.

because he poured out(omit "hath" with R.V.) his soul his blood, which is the seat of life; Leviticus 17:11. For the expression cf. Psalms 141:8.

was numbered with the rebels] See Isaiah 53:9. Cited Mark 15:28; Luke 22:37.

and he bare &c. whereas he bare, the true view of his death as opposed to the false judgement of men, a circumstantial clause.

for the transgressors for the rebellious, the class to which he was himself reckoned.

Although several things in this marvellous description of the innocent suffering for the guilty be obscure, the salient features of the picture stand out with great clearness. Whether the portrait be that of an individual or of a personified community is a question that need not here be discussed (See Appendix, Note I.). If there be personification it is as consistently maintained as it is vividly conceived, and we are hardly entitled to assume that the writer has anywhere allowed the collective reality to peer through the veil of allegory. The figure brought on the scene is that of a man, so marred and deformed by revolting sickness as to be universally shunned and despised and maltreated as one bearing the manifest tokens of the divine displeasure; yet the dignity and patience of his demeanour profoundly impresses his contemporaries, so that after his death their thoughts are irresistibly drawn back to the tragedy of his fate, and they come to the conviction that he was indeed what he professed to be, the Servant of Jehovah, that he was the one innocent person in his generation, and that his sufferings were due not to his personal guilt, but to the guilt of a whole nation, which is by them atoned for and taken away. And finally it is prophesied concerning him that he shall rise again, to the astonishment of the whole world, and that his career shall be crowned with success even more conspicuous than his humiliation had been. It has already been pointed out that this conception of the Servant has certain affinities with the figure of Job, and it may be partly moulded on the story of that patriarch's trial. But the religious teaching of this passage moves on a different plane from that of the Book of Job. The problem of individual retribution, of how it can be that the righteous suffer, does not seem to have been present to the mind of the writer, although he no doubt furnishes an important contribution to the solution of that mystery. This is found in the idea of vicarious suffering, which is so emphatically expressed throughout the passage. Now the principle that the individual bears the guilt of the community to which he belongs was perfectly familiar to the ancient world, and many startling applications of it occur in the O.T. (Joshua 7:24; 2 Samuel 21:6 &c.). It is true that it had begun to excite protest towards the time of the Exile (Deu 24:16; 2 Kings 14:6; Jeremiah 31:29; Ezekiel 18:20); but this prophet accepts the principle and discerns in it a moral significance by which it is deprived of the appearance of arbitrariness or injustice. The essence of the Servant's sacrifice lies in the fact that whilst himself innocent he acquiesces in the divine judgement on sin, and willingly endures it for the sake of his people. And it is the perception of this truth on the part of the people that brings home to them the sense of their own guilt, and removes the obstacle which their impenitence had interposed to Jehovah's purpose of salvation. The suffering of the innocent on behalf of the guilty is thus seen to be a moral necessity, since it was only through such sufferings as the sinless Servant of the Lord was alone capable of, that punishment could reach its end in the taking away of sin and the bringing in of everlasting righteousness.