Isaiah 53
"Who has believed our message?
And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot,
And like a root out of parched ground; [referring to another prophecy - Isaiah 11:1 "Then a shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse,"]
And a branch from his roots will bear fruit.
He has no stately form or majesty
That we should look upon Him,
Nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him. [Jesus was not born into a wealthy or politically connected family, rather, he was born to a young common woman and a lower class man. Nothing about His birth or appearance would have given Him advantage]
He was despised and forsaken of men,
A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
And like one from whom men hide their face
He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
Surely our griefs He Himself bore,
And our sorrows He carried;
Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken,
Smitten of God, and afflicted. [Roman crucifixion—a common punishment for rebels, slaves, and perceived threats—was equated with "hanging on a tree" in Jewish thought. The wooden crossbeam or stake was seen as the "tree" (xylon in Greek Septuagint translations), and crucified persons fell under the Deuteronomic curse. This made crucifixion not only physically torturous and humiliating (public naked exposure, slow death) but theologically damning: it signaled the victim was rejected by God; Deuteronomy 21:22–23:"If a man has committed a sin worthy of death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for he who is hanged is accursed of God, so that you do not defile your land."]
But He was pierced through for our transgressions, [Jesus was nailed to a cross and later a spear pierced His side to ensure that He was truly dead]
He was crushed for our iniquities;[Jesus was beaten severely in the time between his "trials" and his crucifixion]
The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him,
And by His scourging we are healed. [Jesus was whipped with a cat-of-9-tails 39 times]
All of us like sheep have gone astray,
Each of us has turned to his own way;
But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all
To fall on Him.
He was oppressed and He was afflicted,
Yet He did not open His mouth; [Jesus did not curse or condemn those who carried out His execution]
Like a lamb that is led to slaughter,
And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers,
So He did not open His mouth. [Jesus did not resist being taken and executed]
By oppression and judgment He was taken away;
And as for His generation, who considered
That He was cut off out of the land of the living
For the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due?
His grave was assigned with wicked men, [Jesus died a criminal's death and His body would have been disposed of as such]
Yet He was with a rich man in His death, [Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy follower of Jesus, gave up his own tomb for Jesus to be buried in]
Because He had done no violence,
Nor was there any deceit in His mouth. [Jesus was innocent in every way. He committed no crimes to be punished for]
But the Lord was pleased
To crush Him, putting Him to grief;
If He would render Himself as a guilt offering,
He will see His offspring,
He will prolong His days,
And the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in His hand.
As a result of the anguish of His soul,
He will see it and be satisfied; [The traditional Hebrew text doesn’t have “the light”. But both the oldest known Greek translation of the TeNaKh (The Septuagint) and the Isaiah scroll found among the Dead Sea Scrolls reads “he shall see the light and be satisfied (יראה אור ישביע) which is most likely the original text. To see the light means to live. So the servant will live again as a reward for his sacrifice and will have victory over death. Messiah himself will be satisfied with what he accomplished through his suffering.]
By His knowledge the Righteous One,
My Servant, will justify the many,
As He will bear their iniquities.
Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great,
And He will divide the booty with the strong;
Because He poured out Himself to death, [Jesus went through all the events leading to His death on the cross willingly, knowing in advance what was to happen]
And was numbered with the transgressors;
Yet He Himself bore the sin of many,
And interceded for the transgressors."