The Book of Isaiah contains four passages of exceptional expressive beauty and great religious depth, which are known as the Four Servant Songs:
1. Isaiah 42:1-4 2. Isaiah 49:1-6 3. Isaiah 50:4-9 4. Isaiah 52:13-53:12
The Fourth Servant Song, commonly referred to as “Isaiah 53“, is one of the most important so-called “proof texts” in the Christian messianic vision, in which the “Suffering Servant” is identified as Jesus. The New Testament, with its many references to “Isaiah 53”, provides for believing Christians a record of the fulfillment of the prophecy of a suffering and dying Messiah and his eventual return, triumph, and glory. It is interesting to note that, while the majority of Christians subscribe to this view on “Isaiah 53“, not all adhere to it.
This article subjects the Fourth Servant Song to a rigorous analysis in which the Jewish interpretation of “Isaiah 53” is tested against a combination of the teachings of the Hebrew Bible and the historical record. The analysis employs a well-known and widely used methodology from the domain of research and discovery, the Scientific Method, which has been adapted and applied to the entire process of validation.
Several years ago I gave lessons online, for which I prepared lesson notes using Microsoft PowerPoint. Those lessons covered many, but not all, of the articles that are published on this blog.
These are the lesson notes for this article – they come in four parts.
Counter-Missionary University 