Journal: Southeastern Theological Review
Volume: STR 02:2 (Winter 2011)
Article: Isaiah 6 In Its Context
Author: Robert L. Cole

---

STR 2:2 (Winter 2011) p. 161

Isaiah 6 In Its Context

Robert L. Cole

Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary

Introduction

Scholars have long observed that between Isa 5 and 10 there appears to be an interpolation of diverse material into a previous whole and unbroken sequence. Indeed, a series of woes in Isa 5 (הוי) and the refrain so-called of Isa 5:25 cease at the end of the chapter, only to begin again in Isa 9:11, 16, 20 and 10:1, 5.1 The “woe” (הוי) oracles are repeated in Isa 5:8, 11, 18, 20, 21, 22, but cease until appearing twice more in 10:1, 5, leaving the impression that the intervening material of chapters 6 – 9 has been spliced into it. Isaiah 5:25 contains what turns out to be a refrain by its repetition in 9:11, 16, 20, and 10:4 בכל זאת לא שׁב אפו ועוד ידו נטויה׃.2 In addition, since Isaiah’s presumed call appeared not in chapter 1 but in chapter 6 (unlike Jeremiah and Ezekiel), the present arrangement has been considered secondary or “of accidental interpolation.”3

Consequently attempts have been made to reconstruct the “allegedly original literary sequence within a historical setting,”4 largely ignoring the canonical arrangement. Childs’ diagnosis of such a reconstruction is that,

it substitutes a different theological trajectory for these chapters and thus runs in the face of the canonical intent... a critically reconstructed redactional scheme that runs roughshod over the canonical shape of the biblical text itself... The obvious weakness in this older literary-critical approach as in failing adequately to deal with the present literary form of the text as a literary composition with its own integrity, which may well

STR 2:2 (Winter 2011) p. 162

have intended something of semantic significance in positioning Isaiah’s experience at chapter 6 rather than chapter 1.

visitor : : uid: ()