_Who is this coming from Edom,_ _Raw-red_ his _garments from Bossrah!_ _This sweeping on in his raiment,_ _Swaying in the wealth of his strength?_
_I that do speak in righteousness,_ _Mighty to save!_
_Wherefore is red on thy raiment,_ _And thy garments like to a wine-treader's?_
_A trough I have trodden alone,_ _Of the peoples no man was with me. So I trod them down in my wrath,_ _And trampled them down in my fury;_ _Their life-blood sprinkled my garments,_ _And all my raiment I stained._ _For the day of revenge in my heart,_ _And the year of my redeemed has come._ _And I looked, and no helper;_ _I gazed, and none to uphold!_ _So my righteousness won me salvation;_ _And my fury, it hath upheld me._ _So I stamp on the peoples in my wrath,_ _And make them drunk with my fury,_ _And bring down to earth their life-blood._
[276] Literally, _on the side_ or _hip_, the Eastern method of carrying children.
[277] Or _coasts_. See pp. 109 ff.
[278] Isa. xiv.; _Isaiah i.-xxxix._, pp. 281 ff.
[279] Isa. xlviii. 18.
[280] See p. 210, note. Some points of the speaker's description of himself--for example, the gift of the Spirit and the anointing--suit equally well any prophet, or the unique Servant. The lofty mission and its great results are not too lofty or great for our prophet, for Jeremiah received his office in terms as large. That the prophet has not yet spoken at such length in his own person is no reason why he should not do so now, especially as this is an occasion on which he sums up and enforces the whole range of prophecy. It can, therefore, very well be the prophet who speaks. On the other hand, to say with Diestel that it cannot be the Servant because the personification of the Servant ceases with ch. liii. is to beg the question. A stronger argument against the case for the Servant is that the speaker does not call himself by that name, as he does in other passages when he is introduced; but this is not conclusive, for in l. 4-9 the Servant, though he speaks, does not name himself. To these may be added this (from Krüger), that the Servant's discourse never passes without transition into that of God, as this speaker's in ver. 8, but the prophet's discourse often so passes; and this, that בשׂר, קרא and נחם are often used of the prophet, and not at all of the Servant. These are all the points in the question, and it will be seen how inconclusive they are. If any further proof of this were required, it would be found in the fact that authorities are equally divided. There hold for the Servant Calvin, Delitzsch, Cheyne (who previously took the other view), Driver, Briggs, Nägelsbach and Orelli. But the Targums, Ewald, Hitzig, Diestel, Dillmann, Bredenkamp and Krüger hold by the prophet. Krüger's reasons, _Essai sur la Théologie d'Isaïe xl.-lxvi._, p. 76, are specially worthy of attention.
[281] Literally, _opening_; but the word is always used of opening of the eyes. Ewald renders _open air_, Dillmann _hellen Blick_.
[282] Any insignia or ornament for the head.
[283] The same word as in xlii. 3, _fading wick_.
[284] See _Isaiah i.-xxxix._, pp. 438-40.
[285] _Cf._ Krüger, _Essai sur la Théologie d'Isaïe xl.-lxvi._, pp. 154-55. Lagarde has proposed to read אָדָּםמְ, past participle, for מֵאֱדֹם and מִבּצֵר for מִבָּצְרָה. _Who is this that cometh dyed red, redder in his garments than a vinedresser?_