The call of Isaiah
1 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted; the train of his robe filled the Temple.
2 Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: two to cover the face, two to cover the feet, and two to fly with.
3 They were calling to one an other:
“Holy, holy, holy is Yahweh Saba oth.
All the earth is filled with his Glory!”
4 At the sound of their voices the foundations of the threshold shook and the Temple was filled with smoke.
5 I said, “Poor me! I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips living among a people of unclean lips, and yet I have seen the King, Yahweh Sabaoth.”
6 Then one of the seraphs flew to me; in his hands was a live coal which he had taken with tongs from the altar.
7 He touched my mouth with it and said,
“See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin is forgiven.”
8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” I answered, “Here I am. Send me!”
9 He said, “Go and tell this people: ‘Much as you hear, you will not understand; much as you see, you do not perceive.’
10 Let their hearts be hardened, make their ears deaf and their eyes blind; what a misfortune for them, should they hear and see! Yet if they understood and came back to me I would heal them.”
11 Then I said, “For how long, O Lord?” And he answered,
“Until towns have been laid waste and left without inhabitant; until the houses are deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged,
12 until Yahweh has sent away the people and the fields are left deserted.
13 Even though a tenth remain in it, it will be burned. Yet there a stump will remain like that of a fallen oak; this stump is a holy seed.”
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Comments Isaiah, Chapter 6
• 6.1 On that day, in the year 740, Isaiah is in the Temple, or rather, he sees himself in the Temple, in spirit. In the innermost room, where the Ark is kept, there is only the divine presence: Yahweh seated as king, the train of his cloak filling the ante room, as if to express the overflow of holiness and the power of God over the holy place and the city of Jeru salem.
During this brief moment, Isaiah encounters God in an intimate, authentic way, and this encounter will mark him for his entire life. This cannot be ex pressed, nor can he try to describe Yahweh who com municated with him in a spiritual way. The vision he has, the images he sees and the words that he hears are like flashes emerging from this mysterious and unspeakable encounter.
Isaiah speaks of the holy God, that is to say, totally other, infinitely different from any creature. At the very moment of becoming present, he is out of our reach. Holy God is a way of saying that God is mystery. Isaiah continues to hold on to the presence of God and at the same time he is invaded by a fear which is not frightening. In the presence of the Holy One we experience ourselves as sinners, not because of a particular sin, but because of our very nature; we feel incapable of placing ourselves in the hands of God who surrounds us with his presence.
Poor me! I am doomed! because God has said: “No one can see me and live” (Ex 33:20). God makes the first move and the Seraph purifies Isaiah through divine fire. Isaiah is forgiven in the very instant he responds by an act of faith and completely accepts his mission. From then on, Isaiah will know and will say that it is necessary to choose: either believe in the Lord or else be destroyed by contact with the Holy One.
Seraphim, that is, the burning ones. The Israelites always believed in good and evil spirits. From their time in the desert, they attribute to some of these spirits the form of burning serpents; read Num 21:4-9; 2 K 18:4 on the subject. These texts help us to under stand why Yahweh appears surrounded by fantastic Seraphim with human faces. Being superior to humans, these beings can live close to God, but they must shield themselves from the splendor of his glory.
The Glory of God is the radiance coming from God, who is present in the Jerusalem Temple, as in the center of the world, radiating his power from one end of the earth to the other.
Isaiah receives his mission:
– He will be God’s spokesperson.
– Instead of believing, the people will harden their hearts.
– This will be the cause of Judah’s ruin. All that will remain will be the root from which something new will spring forth.
Much as you hear… Here God speaks ironically. In vain will they listen to the message of the prophet. In vain will they see the events of which they are witnesses and through which God speaks to them. Many times Isaiah will denounce this double voluntary blindness (1:12; 28:9-12). The tense of the Hebrew verb could be translated in the present or the future: it is already true and yet will be worse.
Make their ears deaf. The text here uses a form that is difficult to translate and means: you are going to make them, or you will be the occasion of their hardening… The end of the phrase shows clearly that God speaks in an ironical way. What a misfortune for them should they be converted! It is only in this way that God will heal all the wounds of his people (1:5, 26-28).
It is evident that if this irony is not seen – it will be found in numerous texts of the prophets – or if the special mood of the Hebrew verb is not noted, a person could be scandalized in thinking that God sends the prophet for the sole purpose of not being listened to and consequently for the people to be lost.
These verses apply not only to Isaiah’s mission but to Jesus himself (Mt 13:14) and after him, to the apostles (Acts 28:26 and Jn 12:40). They will use these words to express the result of their own mission. Challenged by the word of God, many people and social groups close them selves and reject the message which might have saved them. The word of God is for our rising or our downfall, depending on how we welcome it (Lk 2:34).