Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

§17.5 Crucifixus sub Pontio Pilato
When you make his life an offering for sin, he shall see his offspring, and
shall prolong his days; through him the will of the Lord shall prosper. 1 lOut
of his anguish he shall see light; he shall find satisfaction through his knowledge.
The righteous one, my servant, shall make many righteous, and he
shall bear their iniquities. ^Therefore I will allot him a portion with the
great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he poured out
himself to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the
sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
Its relevance at this point is obvious: it envisages one (Yahweh's servant) who
would suffer and be held of no account (53.2-3), whose sufferings would be vicarious,
on behalf of others (vv. 4-6), who would be killed (vv. 7-9), and whose
vicarious suffering would be willed and accepted by God (vv. 10-12). 221
There is little dispute that the passage became very influential in earliest
Christian reflection on Jesus' death. But what evidence is there that Jesus himself
was influenced by this passage? 222
(1) Luke 2231. The tradition of Jesus' teaching contains only one direct
quotation from Isaiah 53 223 — in Luke 2231, a tradition attested solely by Luke:
35 He said to them, 'When I sent you out without a purse, bag, or sandals, did
you lack anything?' They said, 'No, not a thing'. 36He said to them, 'But
now, the one who has a purse must take it, and likewise a bag. And the one
who has no sword must sell his cloak and buy one. 37 For I tell you, this
221. How the Servant was intended to be understood remains disputed, the two chief options
still being Israel or some particular individual. See discussion, e.g., in W. Zimmerli, pais
theou, TDNT 5.666-73; H. G. Reventlow, 'Basic Issues in the Interpretation of Isaiah 53', in
W. H. Bellinger and W. R. Farmer, eds., Jesus and the Suffering Servant: Isaiah 53 and Christian
Origins (Harrisburg: Trinity, 1998) 23-38. 'There is still no evidence for a Jewish interpretation
of Isaiah 53 in terms of a suffering messiah' (Collins, Scepter 123-26 [here 124]).
M. Hengel, 'Zur wirkungsgeschichte von Jes 53 in vorchristlicher Zeit', in B. Janowski and
P. Stuhlmacher, eds., Der leidende Gottesknecht. Jesaja 53 und seine Wirkungsgeschichte
(Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1996) 49-91, notes that 4Q491 and 4Q540-41 lack the motif of a
representative death for sin (69-75, 88-90), but nevertheless concludes that the supposition is
not altogether unfounded that 'there were already in pre-Christian time traditions of suffering
and atoning eschatological-messianic figures in Palestinian Judaism' which Jesus could have
known and been influenced by (91).
222. Especially noticeable are the quotations in Matt. 8.17 (Isa. 53.4); Acts 8.32-33 (Isa.
53.7-8); and the multiple allusions in 1 Pet. 2.22-25 (Isa. 53.4, 6, 9, 12); Hooker now accepts
that Rom. 4.25 contains a clear echo of Isaiah 53, but remains convinced that a negative answer
has to be given to the question, 'Did the Use of Isaiah 53 to Interpret His Mission Begin with
Jesus?' in Bellinger and Fanner, Jesus and the Suffering Servant 88-103.
223. John 12.38 (Isa. 53.1) and Matt. 8.17 (Isa. 53.4) are not presented as words of
Jesus.
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