Episode 39: Isaiah and the Messiah Part 6: 44:1-23, Jer 10, Habbakuk 2–and Christmas Trees?

It’s crazy that this week just happened to be when this section of Scripture fell into place. Isaiah 44 contains the longest and most detailed idol polemic in all of Scripture and provides the context needed to understand Jeremiah 10:1-16 as well as Habbakuk 2 and even helps to understand Psalm 115. This week we are going to read Isaiah as well as portions of Jeremiah, Habbakuk, the Babylonian Erra Epic, Herodotus and Hittite writings in order to understand the ancient idolatrous mindset and why Yahweh was fighting so hard for the hearts and minds of His people in exile.

Transcript below, only moderately edited so please ignore the small stuff.

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Isaiah and the Messiah 6—Is 44:1-44:1-22

I hope you’ve been following this series from the beginning as we are now in part six of exploring Isaiah Chapters 40-55 in preparation for our Gospel of Mark studies that pull heavily from these chapters of Isaiah to explain and undergird the ministry of Yeshua/Jesus the Messiah. Isaiah isn’t easy to understand—very complex historically, very easily taken out of context with cherry-picked verses by anti-missionaries who want to undermine faith in the Savior, but we have been going through it verse by verse taking into consideration the literary, historical, contextual, the different voices speaking—all that jazz—in order to strip away the mystery of what Yahweh is saying through His prophet to the exiles in Babylon about their imminent freedom. Yahweh is fighting the mindsets of the grandchildren of those who were exiled for their gross idolatry, who were brought up in Babylon and know no other life, who have been living as a conquered people and who have been told by the world around them that they were conquered only because their God was conquered and that they will never go back to the Land because historically no nation has ever returned from exile. They are so deeply enmeshed in the polytheistic worldview that it has become their own worldview—especially since they were henotheists before the exile and not monotheists. As we see from the Scriptures, Israel never exclusively worshipped Yahweh until after the exile was over—before then He might have been at the top of their worship pile, but He was still one among many gods in direct violation of the first and second commandments.

Much of what we have covered so far has been Yahweh publicly challenging the nations and their gods in order to show that any other so-called are powerless and actually non-existent. It has played out with courtroom language with a summons to court, presentation of evidence and witnesses and several idol polemics delivered by the prophet in order to show how illogical idolatry truly is. The end message is—there is no hope for Israel other than Yahweh, and He is promising to deliver them, and no one will get in His way because no one can.

Hi, I am Tyler Dawn Rosenquist and welcome to Character in Context, where I teach the historical and ancient sociological context of Scripture with an eye to developing the character of the Messiah. If you prefer written material, I have five years worth of blog at theancientbridge.com as well as my six books available on amazon—including a four-volume curriculum series dedicated to teaching Scriptural context in a way that even kids can understand it, called Context for Kids—and I have two video channels on youtube with free Bible teachings for both adults and kids. You can find the link for those on my website. Past broadcasts of this program can be found at characterincontext.podbean.com and transcripts can be had for most broadcasts at theancientbridge.com.

All Scripture this week is taken from the ESV, the English Standard Version because that is what my interlinear is in. And unlike my usual MO, I will be saying Yahweh instead of God and Lord because there are so many different voices speaking back and forth in Isaiah 40-55 that it will help eliminate confusion. Otherwise, I always use titles because I don’t like to use His name carelessly or casually. Just a personal preference.

Last week we started with a “but now” which forced us to backtrack into chapter 42 and we have the exact same thing today, so we have to backtrack into chapter 43 briefly—remember that no “therefore” or “but now” or “yet” or any conjunction exists on its own and has to be evaluated within the context of what went directly before. Chapters are pesky but necessary—but we can’t be bound by them in our studies. We can’t even just study one chapter without taking what went before it and often what comes after, into context. And today is going to be heavy in simply reading Scripture—we are going to delve into Jeremiah 10 and also Habbakuk 2—plus I am going to read from the Babylonian Erra Epic.

²⁶ Put me in remembrance; let us argue together; set forth your case, that you may be proved right.
²⁷ Your first father sinned, and your mediators transgressed against me.
²⁸ Therefore I will profane the princes of the sanctuary, and deliver Jacob to utter destruction
and Israel to reviling.

To review, Israel, in this mock court case, has been telling Yahweh that they have been wronged, that He is blind to their cause and deaf to their complaints, and they haven’t accepted that their exile was their own fault. But right here Yahweh flat out tells them that the entire nation—even back to Abraham and Moses and Aaron—have been sinning against Him from the start and have only themselves to blame. That would chill anyone to the bone. And yet—we have another turnaround—their sin and God’s wrath isn’t the end of the story. Let’s move on into chapter 44:

44 “But now hear, O Jacob my servant,
Israel whom I have chosen!

Chosen for what? As Yahweh has said repeatedly, they were chosen, for His sake, to be witnesses of His mighty works and His glory. His faithfulness, grace and power—that He is unique and the gods of the nations are fictional. He says “Hear” and what does He want them to hear?

² Thus says the Lord who made you,
who formed you from the womb and will help you:
Fear not, O Jacob my servant,
Jeshurun whom I have chosen.

Fear not—what have we learned that means in Isaianic poetry? This is a salvation oracle. Let’s look at His promises of deliverance:

³ For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground;
I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.

Here we have two parallelisms in a row and remember that parallelism is where you have two phrases saying the exact same thing with different wording. Yahweh says He will pour “water on the thirsty land” and “water on the dry ground. He immediately follows it up with another parallelism, equating pouring out “my Spirit on your offspring” and “my blessing on your descendants.” Spirit is equated with blessing and offspring with descendants—but wait, there’s more—the two parallelisms also parallel one another and give us the key to translating some of the verses in the past chapters about pouring out water in the desert—things that never happened historically with the return from exile. The pouring out of water is equated with the outpouring of His spirit. But wait—this didn’t happen either—at least not during the return from Babylon. But Yahweh has spoken it and so it must happen—when did it end up happening? At Shavuot/Pentecost after the resurrection where the Holy Spirit was poured out on the Jewish believers in Yeshua who were gathered at the Temple to pray. We see this, of course, in Acts 2. If this was referring to the exiles, it would not say “your descendants”—it would say “you.” But as for now, the exiles are still “dry ground” spiritually, which we will see in painful detail in the writings of Nehemiah, Ezra, and Malachi. They needed the empowerment of the Spirit to truly change, but it wouldn’t be happening anytime soon.

⁴ They shall spring up among the grass like willows by flowing streams.
⁵ This one will say, ‘I am the Lord’s,’ another will call on the name of Jacob,
and another will write on his hand, ‘The Lord’s,’ and name himself by the name of Israel.”

These verses really solidify for me that this is something that didn’t happen until Yeshua’s time. We have people, obviously not native-born Israelites, claiming that they belong to the Lord, calling on the name of Jacob, writing the Lord’s Name on his hand (a mark of servitude in the ancient world), and naming HIMSELF by the name of Israel. These are things that no native-born would need to do. No, this is clearly speaking of the ingrafting of gentiles who freely chose to become part of Israel through belief in and association with the Messiah of Israel. Notice that these are all acts of individuals, and not of a nation as a whole.

⁶ Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts:
“I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god.
⁷ Who is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and set it before me,
since I appointed an ancient people. Let them declare what is to come, and what will happen.
⁸ Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses!
Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any.”

Last week we talked about Regnal names—kingly titles. Here we have Yahweh, His personal Name, Melek Y’Israel—which proclaims the allegiance they owe to Him, Redeemer—this is more intimate, as the go’al was close kin who would save a person from distress, Yahweh Tzva’ot—Yahweh of armies—proclaiming His might and ability to save. Of course, we have seen this proclamation over and over again—“I am the first and the last; besides me there is no god,” and the specific word is elohim here, a generic term meaning “mighty one” that often refers, in context to the gods of the nations—as it does here. Again—first and last is a reference to the ancient law of continuity where polytheistic gods do not exist apart from the system, they are not like Yahweh, outside of time and space and having created them. If the universe and time all dissolved, Yahweh would still exist because He is first and last—He alone can exist apart from what He has created. Pagans saw their gods as part of creation, dependent on it, working in cooperation with it and needing it even. They were trapped by the confines of space and time and history just like humans were. So when Yahweh says, “Who is like me?” He is literally pointing all this out—no one claims to have a god that is anything like Yahweh, He is utterly foreign to their way of thinking. That is what it means to be first and last—and He has been communicating this to His people from the beginning—they can witness that it is true! That is why they were created in the first place!

Funny quick story here. In the Septuagint, the third-century BCE Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, they didn’t include the last bit “There is no Rock; I know not any.” The reason why is because they had already begun becoming very sensitive to how Yahweh was portrayed in the Bible—and they didn’t like comparing Him to a rock—even if it was His own words.

The next bit I am going to just read straight through with only a few notes and then I am going to read Jeremiah 10:1-16 and not simply the few verses that are generally taken out of context, and Habakkuk 2. We’re going to talk about how they are very similar and how well they line up with the section of the Erra Epic which describes in detail how the idol of Marduk in Babylon was manufactured. All comments in brackets are my comments

⁹ All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses (their worshipers) neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame. (the Psalm 115 curse on those who worship false gods) ¹⁰ Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? ¹¹ Behold, all his companions shall be put to shame, and the craftsmen are only human (they are the created, not the Creator). Let them all assemble, let them stand forth. They shall be terrified; they shall be put to shame together.

¹² The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals. He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm. He becomes hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water and is faint. (because he is only human) ¹³ The carpenter stretches a line; he marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man, with the beauty of a man, to dwell in a house. ¹⁴ He cuts down cedars, or he chooses a cypress tree or an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest. He plants a cedar and the rain nourishes it. ¹⁵ Then it becomes fuel for a man. He takes a part of it and warms himself; he kindles a fire and bakes bread. Also, he makes a god and worships it; he makes it an idol and falls down before it. ¹⁶ Half of it he burns in the fire. Over the half he eats meat; he roasts it and is satisfied. Also, he warms himself and says, “Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire!” ¹⁷ And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god!” (He is worshiping and depending upon something that couldn’t even create itself)

¹⁸ They know not, nor do they discern, for he has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, and their hearts, so that they cannot understand. (Psalm 115 again) ¹⁹ No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, “Half of it I burned in the fire; I also baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and have eaten. And shall I make the rest of it an abomination? Shall I fall down before a block of wood?” ²⁰ He feeds on ashes (because that’s what was done with the rest of the same exact piece of wood); a deluded heart has led him astray, and he cannot deliver himself or say, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?”

Whoa, the right hand—remember what Isaiah said earlier, that Yahweh was holding on to Israel’s right hand, putting them at His left hand? Well, idolaters are standing at the left hand of idols. The contrast is very stark and very deliberate.

It looks silly to us because we get it now, how ridiculous this is. But to a polytheist, it was not so obvious. It was the context of their whole life—making idols and using them to placate, mollify, serve, and manipulate their gods. Now, I want to read from Jeremiah 10, and not just the few verses used out of context that people use in their zeal to discredit Christmas Trees, which I don’t like either but I am not going to use Scripture out of context in pursuit of an agenda—find another way, okay? I am going to read all of them and especially the ones that make it clear that this is referring to actual idols to whom people would go to seek wisdom and counsel and help.

10 Hear the word that the Lord speaks to you, O house of Israel. ² Thus says the Lord:

“Learn not the way of the nations, nor be dismayed at the signs of the heavens because the nations are dismayed at them, ³ for the customs of the peoples are vanity. A tree from the forest is cut down and worked with an axe by the hands of a craftsman. ⁴ They decorate it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so that it cannot move. ⁵ Their idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber field, and they cannot speak; they have to be carried, for they cannot walk Do not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil, neither is it in them to do good.” (no one would suggest that anyone would think it necessary to point out that a Christmas tree can’t walk or talk of do good or evil. They are compared to scarecrows for a reason—because they have been carved into the shape of a human being but people stop quoting this section once they get to the end of verse five because the context becomes clear).

(This language should sound familiar if you have listened to the whole series with Yahweh making demands that the gods of the nations do something, anything, good or bad to prove they are real)

⁶ There is none like you, O Lord; you are great, and your name is great in might.
⁷ Who would not fear you, O King of the nations? For this is your due; for among all the wise ones of the nations and in all their kingdoms there is none like you. ⁸ They are both stupid and foolish; the instruction of idols is but wood! (again, no one is seeking counsel from a Christmas tree) ⁹ Beaten silver is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz. They are the work of the craftsman and of the hands of the goldsmith; their clothing is violet and purple; they are all the work of skilled men. ¹⁰ But the Lord is the true God; he is the living God and the everlasting King. At his wrath the earthquakes, and the nations cannot endure his indignation. (the big national idols were carved from sacred wood, and covered from head to toe with beaten sheets of gold and silver and dressed up like kings and queens)

¹¹ Thus shall you say to them: “The gods who did not make the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from under the heavens.” ¹² It is he who made the earth by his power, who established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding stretched out the heavens. ¹³ When he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he makes the mist rise from the ends of the earth.
He makes lightning for the rain, and he brings forth the wind from his storehouses. ¹⁴ Every man is stupid and without knowledge; every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols, for his images are false, and there is no breath in them. ¹⁵ They are worthless, a work of delusion; at the time of their punishment they shall perish. ¹⁶ Not like these is he who is the portion of Jacob, for he is the one who formed all things,
and Israel is the tribe of his inheritance; the Lord of hosts is his name.

Habakkuk 2:18-19 has a short section as well that is useful:

“…when its maker has shaped it, a metal image, a teacher of lies? For its maker trusts in his own creation when he makes speechless idols! Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake; to a silent stone, Arise! Can this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in it.”

Now, let’s compare this to the Erra Epic. Tablet 1 contains the following imprints. In context, Erra, the warrior god, is challenging Marduk, the king of the gods, because the idol in Marduk’s temple had lost its luster. Marduk explains that he left his dwelling when he caused the great flood. Everything in () is my commentary.

(Marduk speaking)

“As to my precious image (aka idol), which has been struck by the deluge that its appearance was sullied
I commanded fire to make my features shine (because it is overlaid with gold) and cleanse my apparel (evidently it wears clothing)

When it had shined my precious image and completed the task
I donned my lordly diadem and returned…. (when his idol looked suitable again, he returned his essence to it)

…I sent those craftsmen down to the depths, I ordered them not to come up
I removed the wood and gemstone and showed no one where…..
Where is the wood, flesh of the gods, suitable for the lord of the universe, (every culture I have come across seemed to believe that only certain kinds of wood were suitable to be the “flesh” of an idol – in this case, the wood is from the “mesu” tree)
The sacred tree, splendid stripling, perfect for lordship,
Whose roots thrust down a hundred leagues through the waters of the vast ocean to the depths of hell,
Whose crown brushed Anu’s heaven on high?
Where is the gemstone that I reserved for {damaged}?
Where is Ninildum, great carpenter of my supreme divinity, (Ninildum is the idol maker)
Wielder of the glittering hatchet, who knows what tool, (although we would think of a hatchet only in the hands of a lumberman, in this case the hatchet is the tool of a crafsman – hatchets are way smaller than axes and oftentimes in ancient languages they had one word for tool and context determines which one is being referenced)
Who makes it shine like the day and puts it at subjection to my feet?
….
Where are the choice stones, created by the vast sea, to ornament my diadem?” (big city gods were crowned with real crowns just as they were dressed with real clothing)

I am also going to include a quote from Trevor Bryce’s excellent work, Life and Society in the Hittite World, p 157—He writes, ‘In the latter part of the New Kingdom, the statues of the gods set up on bases in the sanctuaries of their temples were life-sized or larger. They were made of precious and semi-precious metals – gold silver, iron, bronze – or else of wood plated with gold, silver, or tin and sometimes decorated with precious materials like lapis lazuli.’  We have actual information on the statuette of the goddess Iyaya, ‘The divine image is a female statuette of wood, seated and veiled, one cubit (in height). Her body is plated with gold, but the body and the throne are plated with tin.’

So, we see a lot of similarities between the Era Epic, which is taking this project absolutely seriously and the Bible, which is not. But both are describing the same exact phenomenon—the creation of an idol out of sacred wood, covered with hammered precious metals, clothed in the finest fabrics, ornamented with precious gemstones, and polished until it shines, etc. I understand that a lot of people hate Christmas trees and want to discredit them, but that isn’t what this is about. It just isn’t. And I think the people who originally taught this knew it because I don’t see any other reason for ignoring most of the text and the other prophetic passages that go with it. Also, a dead tree wasn’t a symbol of fertility—that’s what sacred groves were for. When good kings came to power, they cut down the sacred groves—not to bring the trees inside, but to burn them outside the city gates in order to defile them. The first rule of sacred tree club is don’t cut down the sacred tree—or it isn’t sacred anymore. A dead tree isn’t a fertility symbol unless you carved it into an Asherah or one of the other fertility goddesses. Throughout Assyrian and Babylonian and Egyptian art, we see carved representations of people around trees with what looks to the untrained eye like boxes and ornaments and some ministries have colorized them to enhance the effect—but I have seen one of these up close at the St Louis Museum and have verified what ancient Near Eastern Scholars and archaeologists say—they are people using pinecones (you can see that it is a pinecone from up close) to pollinate the Tree of Life and the “boxes” are actually baskets they are filling with the fruit of the Tree of Life. We know this because we have cuneiform tablets and other writings of the mythologies giving testimony to this. If we want to be against Christmas trees, we can point out the waste of resources involved and the gross commercialism of the holiday in general and the terrible debt racked up that cannot be said to be done in the Name of our Messiah. But Christmas trees really aren’t more than five hundred years old and Germanic, not ancient Near Eastern. Let’s not use the Bible out of context in order to serve agendas—it is dangerous business and, I believe, disrespectful to the precious Word we have been gifted with. We can’t criticize people for saying, “That’s not what that means to me” and then turn around and do it ourselves. Okay, lecture over. Back to the text:

²¹ Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for you are my servant; I formed you; you are my servant; O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me.
Remember what things? Well, the language isn’t entirely clear so we have a couple of choices. Either (1) He is telling them not to forget how ridiculous idols are. I am not extremely fond of that option, or (2) all the deliverances of the past that He has been reminding them of. Maybe that’s it. Or (3) what He tells them in His next breath—namely “you ARE my servant. I FORMED you.” Then he repeats “you are my servant” and then “you will not be forgotten by me.”

I think this is the right option because He tells them to remember and then He says they will not be forgotten. There is a definite chiastic structure here, which I can’t explain on the radio. I need charts and I could pretend to have a chart here but that would just be rude. So what is the result of not being forgotten by Yahweh?

²² I have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud and your sins like mist; return to me, for I have redeemed you.

I HAVE blotted out your transgressions, remember that is pescha, willful and rebellious high-handed offenses that are not covered by the sacrifices. That word translated as blotted out can also be translated swept away, which makes more sense when the process is being compared to dispersing a cloud. We also see included in all this that the chattat sins, the unintentional sins, being swept away like a mist. So we have Yahweh forgiving not only the greatest of their offenses but also the least—this is a total and complete forgiveness. Again, we keep coming across this radical grace that is being extended to the exiles, who certainly aren’t repentant before Him and most of them won’t even end up leaving exile—they will choose to stay, and those who do go back, a lot of these guys marry pagan women. Although we don’t see them engaging in idol worship again, Malachi has them doing plenty of other horrible things. And yet, God extends this amazing grace to them and forgives it all for His own sake, which He says repeatedly—not because they are deserving but because He created them to be His witnesses and unless He wipes the slate clean, He is not going to have any witnesses.

He says, “Return to me for I HAVE redeemed you.” Again, speaking of the future as though it is already a done deal. Although they cannot see their redemption, it is absolutely real. He is calling on them to acknowledge the reality of His salvation before they can even see it—while they are still wallowing in denial as to their culpability in this whole terrible mess.

And we just aren’t that much different today, are we! So often when something terrible happens to us we blame it on Satan, or on other people being jerks when really it is often the natural consequence of our own insufferable actions. We behave boorishly on social media, and they exile us from their wall by unfriending or blocking us, and we say “They can’t handle the truth!” Well, more likely they can’t handle our incessant caterwauling. No one wants to be preached at all the time in their own cyber living room and especially not by people who really don’t know as much as they think they do and aren’t as mature as they think they are. If we exhaust people, they are going to preserve their peace by giving us the boot. Nothing mysterious or mean-spirited and not necessarily an aversion to the truth—just an aversion to us. Well, that’s how the Israelites were treating Yahweh. They were sitting in a well-deserved exile, and first they called Yahweh blind and deaf to their rights, and then they feigned complete ignorance at having actually earned their exile—blaming in on His incompetence instead—and they didn’t worship Him in exile as they should have, but heaped their sins up in His face and yet He forgives because He is kinder, more patient, more everything good and grace-filled than we are. He is the God who remembers, and who forgives. He is just unreal.