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Isaiah 1–39: A New
Translation with Introduction and Commentary
by Joseph Blenkinsopp
Anchor Bible 19. Doubleday, New York, 2000.
548 pp. $50.00 (cloth). ISBN 0-385-49716-4.
Blenkinsopp’s commentary, the first of
a projected three-volume work, is written with full awareness of
the paradigm shift in recent study of Isaiah, as scholars have digested
the results of modern literary and historical analysis of the book
as a whole. Throughout the twentieth century, scholars have followed
the lead of Bernard Duhm, who posited the nearly universally recognized
tripartite division of the book. As scholars developed redaction-critical
tools to sift through the literary layers in each portion of the
book, new questions began to arise concerning the significance of
the later redactional material in the book and the tradents who
transmitted and often expanded or rewrote earlier material to meet
the needs of later times. To what extent did later redaction shape
the book of Isaiah in relation to the historical experience and
perspectives of later times, and to what extent does Isaiah form
a coherent literary work despite its roots in the work of writers
from at least three historically distinct periods?
Blenkinsopp provides a fresh translation with
textual notes and a literary-historical commentary that attempts
to account for both synchronic and diachronic dimensions of Isaiah
1–39. He notes the recent tendency of scholars to read Isaiah
as a Second Temple period composition, but sees no reason to disallow
a significant eighth-century substratum for these chapters even
though it may be “overlaid by the literary deposit of subsequent
readings before and after the disasters of the early sixth century
b.c.e.” (p. 74). While he recognizes the need to synthesize
both synchronic and diachronic exegesis in a comprehensive interpretation
of Isaiah, his analysis is rooted primarily in the diachronic, redaction-critical
perspectives of the 1970s and 1980s. To a certain extent, Blenkinsopp
falls into the trap of many contemporary scholars who demand a choice
between synchronic study of the book as a coherent literary work
and diachronic study of the book as a composite work that reflects
the viewpoints of its various writers. In fact the interpreter needs
to do both.
Consideration of Blenkinsopp’s treatment
of Isaiah 1–12 illustrates both the strengths and the weaknesses
of this volume. He identifies Isaiah 1–12 as a distinct section
that begins with a superscription attributing the following material
to Isaiah ben Amoz and concludes with a psalm that plays upon his
name and invokes the title “the Holy One of Israel,” which
recurs throughout these chapters. He observes that many interpreters,
both ancient and modern, have found that these chapters address
the Assyrian period as well as the subsequent realities of the Babylonian
exile. He notes the appearance of another superscription in 2:1,
which, along with the above considerations, points to chapters 1–12
as the product of redactional processes that have superimposed successive
structures as the text has been reapplied to later historical periods.
Blenkinsopp is aware that many studies view
chapter 1 as a thematic introduction to Isaiah that establishes
parallels especially with chapters 65–66 to form a literary
framework for the book as a whole. He does not pursue such study,
however, claiming that the material in these chapters derives largely
from an eighth-century context and that most of the parallels are
to be found in 1:27–31. He likewise misses the parallels between
chapter 1 and chapter 34, which most scholars agree is a much later
text. He misses the crucial methodological point that eighth-century
authorship does not prevent the individual oracles within chapter
1 from being assembled into their present framework and reread in
relation to later texts throughout the book. Similar perspectives
govern his exegesis of the woe series in 5:8–24 and the series
concerning divine anger in Isa 9:7–10:4, in which he places
10:1–4 at the head of the woe series in keeping with a now
commonly accepted redaction-critical view of these texts. Although
he is likely correct in this assessment, remarking that the “displacement”
of this oracle helps to provide an editorial framework for the autobiographical
and biographical material in 6:1–9:6, he does not examine how
10:1–4 functions in relation to its present context. His focus
on distinct, original oracles also causes him to miss the interrelationships
among 10:5–34; 11:1–9; 11:10–16; and 12:1–6.
With regard to 12:1–6, he appropriately asks how this oracle
might be read in relation to the following oracles concerning Babylon,
but one must also ask how its citation of the Song of the Sea in
Exodus 15 would be read in relation to Deutero-Isaiah, which constantly
draws upon the Exodus tradition to articulate its understanding
of events at the outset of the Persian period.
Similar questions apply to other portions of
chapters 1–39. For example, Blenkinsopp reads the historical
narratives in Isaiah 36–39 in relation to the preceding material,
but one must investigate how they function in relation to the following
material as well. It seems unlikely, once chapters 40–66 found
their way into the book, that ancient readers continued to read
Isaiah 1–12 or 1–39 as separate books of independent oracles
that originated in different historical periods. Instead, they read
the constituent elements of Isaiah as the coherent work of a single
prophet whose words not only stand forever (40:8), but must also
be read in relation to each other. Insofar as the redaction of the
book appears to be based upon this viewpoint (see 34:16–17),
it is necessary to pursue such questions.
Given Blenkinsopp’s interest in reading
texts in the light of the historical settings and concerns of their
authors, one may anticipate that later readings of earlier texts
in Isaiah may come increasingly to the forefront in his treatment
of Isaiah 40–55 and especially Isaiah 56–66. Perhaps his
work on the second part of Isaiah will prompt some rereading of
the first thirty-nine chapters. In any case, this is a worthwhile
study that will amply repay its contemporary readers.
Marvin A. Sweeney
Claremont School of Theology
Claremont, California
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With the Grain of the Universe:
The Church’s Witness and Natural Theology
Stanley Hauerwas
Brazos, Grand Rapids, 2001. 249 pp. $22.99
(cloth). ISBN 1-58743-016-9.
Is there a God? This question has haunted modernity
for over two centuries. At a time when modernity is in deep crisis,
it is not surprising that fresh questions about God are asked from
various perspectives, including an increasing number of voices from
the margins. In his Gifford Lectures, Hauerwas draws inspiration
primarily from Karl Barth, John Howard Yoder, and Pope John Paul
II.
Hauerwas formulates the challenge in this way: “The metaphysical
and existential projects to make a ‘place’ for such a
god [divorced from a full Christian doctrine of God] cannot help
but ‘prove’ the existence of a god that is not worthy
of worship” (p. 15). Attempts to prove God in terms of the
logic of modern discourse have led to an accommodation of God to
the various interests represented by these discourses. Here, God
is no longer God.
In his ongoing struggle against accommodation, Hauerwas
finds his main ally in the classic work of Karl Barth. Barth’s
critique of natural theology was to become a major factor in his
resistance against Hitler (pp. 169–70). In this context, liberal
Protestant theology failed for both political and theological reasons.
God was identified too closely with faith in the powers that be.
What is much less clear in Hauerwas’s account, however, is
that a more conservative position, such as the one embraced by Roman
Catholicism before Vatican II, is not necessarily safer. In Barth’s
account the theological reasons for this also have to do with natural
theology, yet with a twist. Here, God is accommodated to the ecclesial
powers. Barth’s radical critique challenges any easy accommodation
of God, whether to the experience of faith (the liberal Protestant
position), or to what is deposited as revelation in the church (the
Roman Catholic position; see Church Dogmatics I.1, pp. 41–47).
Barth would probably wonder whether Hauerwas’s own sympathies
with the latter position (e.g., p. 145) might also result in accommodation
to the powers that be.
Barth nevertheless becomes the “pivotal figure” in Hauerwas’s
narrative “because he was engaged in a massive attempt to overturn
the epistemological prejudices of modernity” (p. 190). Efforts
to prove God—responding to the question “How do we know
about God?”—now need to be seen in relation to the question
“Who is God?” Without addressing the latter question first,
we might miss the reality of God altogether. Resistance begins,
according to Hauerwas, when people question modern epistemology’s
obsession with proving God on its own terms. He finds such refusals
exemplified in the work of John Howard Yoder and Pope John Paul
II, who witness to a God who differs from the god of modernity in
significant ways. Steeped in Anabaptist understandings of God, Yoder
makes an argument for nonviolence that contradicts war and thus
goes against the grain of modernity (p. 225). Likewise, steeped
in the traditions of the Roman Catholic Church up to Vatican II,
Pope John Paul II makes arguments against abortion, suicide, and
capital punishment, also against the grain of modernity (p. 229).
Hauerwas’s narrative might be continued by observing that in
our time the question “Who is God?” is raised in ever
stronger forms at the margins of contemporary life. From Latin American
base communities to grassroots communities in inner cities in the
United States, many Christians are raising new questions about who
God is. What if these diverse witnesses began to listen to each
other? Such a move might not only strengthen resistance to the epistemological
powers, but also remind us that the “culture of death”
(p. 213) entails the death of more than 30,000 children every day.
A significant feature of Hauerwas’s presentation
of the main characters of the book—William James, Reinhold
Niebuhr (examples of what has gone wrong), and Karl Barth—is
that he considers not only their ideas but also their lives. This
is an important step beyond the kind of abstract history of ideas
that has long plagued theology. Hauerwas knows that “lives
matter” (p. 40). The two chapters on Barth may serve as an
example. Without at least a rudimentary understanding of Barth’s
resistance not only to the German Third Reich but also to earlier
efforts to subordinate the gospel to the interests of the status
quo, one might simply place Barth in the camp of neo-orthodox theology.
In dialogue with the work of Bruce McCormack, Timothy Gorringe,
and Friedrich-Wilhelm Marquardt, Hauerwas informs the reader of
a much more interesting Barth.
Nevertheless, Hauerwas neglects crucial concerns. Hauerwas reminds
us that Barth struggled against natural theology’s “domesticating
of revelation” and “making the gospel respectable.”
Yet the passages of the Church Dogmatics that Hauerwas quotes in
support (p. 198, n. 53) do not talk about making things respectable
in general. Barth’s concern is with the attempt to make the
gospel respectable to the middle class. This insight throws new
light on Barth’s claim that God is Wholly Other. God’s
Otherness does not mean that God is remote from the world (a frequent
misunderstanding) but that God is to be found in unexpected places,
where the representatives of the middle class never care to look.
God takes sides against the oppressors, and with the oppressed (e.g.,
Church Dogmatics II.1, p. 386).
While Hauerwas is concerned about the conflict between church and
world, Barth is primarily concerned about a “conflict of faith
with itself” (Church Dogmatics I.1, pp. 31–32)—about
what is wrong with the church, not what is wrong with the world.
The core of the problem is not that God does not matter, as Hauerwas
assumes (p. 231), but that we have adopted false images of God.
The Barthian perspective might broaden Hauerwas’s concern about
the conflict between church and world by introducing a new question:
How does the church keep itself honest in the ongoing battle against
accommodation?
Joerg Rieger
Perkins School of Theology
Dallas, Texas
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