Eopulation, though small, and when the temple ad been rebuilt, but needed expansion and orna- ment. These latter reflections of a historical situation are by no means certain ; there is no clear implication that the temple has been rebuilt ; on the contrary, the city itself appears to have been uninhabited for a time. It is not possible to fix a date. There is the same indefiniteness of circum- stance in the poem 61-62. Cheyne affirms that it implies the land of Judah to be in part repeopled and the temple rebuilt (62'), but this is not evident ; »ne migl t as well argue from 62' that the walls
have already been rebuilt. 61' proclaims liberty to the captives ; if, as Cheyne holds, this refers to the mass of Israel, the prophecy can hardly be referred, as he sug"ests, to a date after Cyrus, be- cause, thoun;h numoers of Jews remained in exile in spite of tiiat great Liberator's edict, they would not be described as in captivity. Probably, how- ever, the reference is too general for so particular an inference from it. Besides, even after Cyrus, there must have been in various parts of the world enslaved or captive Jews. 61' speaks of those who mourn in Zion, a i)hrase which appsars to imply that Jerusalem is inhabited, unless we are to take it metaphorically. The language, in sj)ite of resemblances to that of 40-55, allords a little more evidence of a later date. Nothing can be inferred from the person of the speaker of the first verses of 01 till we can conclude whether he is meant to be the Servant of the Lord, in which case we might take the passage as one of the series of oracles on that great figure, and (as some argue) from the same date as the others, or whether he is merely a representative of prophecy. But this is a question which has divided critics, and is very dilliiMilt, if not impos.sible, to answer (see Isaiah 40-61), 'Expositor's Bible,' 435 f.). On the whole, then, it is impossible to fix the date of 61. 62 ; most opinions vary between a date before the liberati<m under Cyrus and authorship by the writer of 40-55, and a later authorship by an imitator of that prophet.
The biilliaiil ])assage 63'"' stands by itself. Its description of the loneliness of J" in achieving the overthrow of Edom (the attempts to eliminate the name of Edom from the passage cannot be said to be justified) forbids a reference to some historical defeat of that bitter people by Israel. The vision is of a purely ideal conquest of Israel's chief enomy. In 42'^ we have a similar picture of J" travailing for the deliverance of His people ; this, however, is not enough on which to argue for identity of authorship, whUe the ferocity of the passage is somewhat against it. None of the other dates suggested are sufficiently probable.
The next section is 63'-<i4, a prayer of inter- cession for Israel. Here, again, there is great possibility for diversity of opinion as to the date. The passage cannot well be by the author of 40-45 ; as to that, ChejTie's analysis of the ideas and language [Introd. 352 ff.) is very convincing. Nor is it so clear as the present writer once thought it was, that because the author appeals (63"''*) only to the delivery from Egypt, ana not to that from Babylon, the latter is still future as he writes. For Haggai and Zechariah make no mention of Cyrus' decree, or the return from Babylon, though they wrote very soon after these events. (On the objections to Kosters' theory that their silence is a proof that no return had taken place, see the present writer's Twelve Prophets, vol. ii. ch. 16.). What is clear is that Jerusalem has sufiered desola- tion, that the temple has been defiled and burned by Israel's adversaries (63" 64""- Eng.). To what event does this refer ? Some say Nebuchadrezzar's destruction of the temple in 586, and date the passage from the early Babylonian exile. But if that were so it would be difficult to understand the Massoretic reading of 63" 'Thy holy people pos- sessed it but a little while ' ; though this reading is uncertain. The only other similar calamities are that alleged to have taken place in the in- vasions of Palestine by Artaxerxes Ochus (B.C. 36011'.) to which Cheyne refers the pa.ssage, and that by Antiochus Epiphanes in 169 to which Grotius referred it. The latter may be ruled out of consideration. Of the invasion oy Artaxerxes Ochus we know extremely little (for details see W. R. Smith, OTJC. note"D ; and Cheyne, Introd.
ISAIAH
ISAIAH
49J
858 ff.); and that he destroyoil tlie temple is only inferred from his cruel chiuacter, from liis desecra- tion of other shrines on that campaign, and frmn an ambiguous tradition in Josephus about the reign of the otlier Artaxurxes. Nevertheless, \V. K. Smith and Cheyne have assigned to the reign of Artaxerxes Ochus Pss 74 and 70, with their refer- ences to the destruction of the temple, which others assign to Maccabiean times. And arguing from the parallels between these Pss and Is G3'-04 Cheyne also assigns the hitter to the same date. The reasoning is strong, but not conclusive, and hampered by the uncertainty of a burning of the temple about 350. Hesides, I's 74 distinctly points to tlie conviction tliat prophecy has ceased in Israel. Not only does Is 6.'l'-64 betray no such conviction, which, if it had existed, could hardly have been omitted by a writer of the mood of Is 6.'{'-64, but the whole prophecy is itself an answer to tlie idea that the prophetic spirit hail faded from tlie nation. Moreover, if Is G3'-G4 has some parallels with I's 74. 79 it has also some very striking resemblances, both of thought and phrase- ology, to the prophecies of Haggai and Zecliariah, and its whole tone suits the years of disillusion and despair which elapsed between the return from exile in 537 and the beginning of the rebuild- ing of the temple in 520. The unique phra-ses, 'Thy holy cities' (64">), and *J'"8 spirit in the midst of Israel' (63"), find parallels in Zee 2" [Heb.] and Hag 2'' respectively. There is the same sense of the peojile s nncleanness as in Hag 2 and Zee 3 ; the same sense of J"'s excessive anger as in ZccharLah's lirst vision ; the same emphasis on the Spirit of J", and the same idea of J"'8 angel, interchangeable with J" Himself. The despair of Is C3'-G4 is exactly that which Haggai and Zechariah appear to coniliat in the people, and the oircumst.anees of the time fully explain, as already remarked, the sUence of the whole prayer about the liberation from IJabylon. On the whole, tlicn, it must be regarded as more rea.sonable to date 63'-(54 from about 525 than about 350.