As promised in my previous post, I will now provide selections from modern-day commentators concerning the person Isaiah saw in his Isaiah 6:1ff. vision. The following list includes representatives from Anglican, Baptist, Catholic, Lutheran and Reformed denominations:
Andreas Kostenberger (2004) -
In the wake of the two Isaianic quotes in 12:38 and 12:40, the evangelist concludes that “Isaiah saw Jesus’ glory” (cf. 8:56). In light of the preceding quotation of Isa. 6:10, some say that the background for the present statement is the call narrative in Isaiah 6.8. Yet though αὐτοῦ (autou, his) probably refers to Jesus, John does not actually say that Isaiah saw Jesus, but that he saw Jesus’ glory. Hence, it is not necessary to conclude that the evangelist believed that Isaiah saw “the pre-existent Christ” (Schnackenburg 1990: 2.416; cf. Talbert 1992: 180; D. M. Smith p 392 1999: 244) or that he saw Jesus “in some pre-incarnate fashion” (Carson 1991: 449). Rather, Isaiah foresaw that God was pleased with a suffering Servant who would be “raised and lifted up and highly exalted” (52:13), yet who was “pierced for our transgressions” and “bore the sins of many” (53:5, 12) (see esp. Evans 1987). Hence, Isaiah knew that God’s glory would be revealed through a suffering Messiah—something deemed impossible by the crowds (John 12:34). Like Abraham, Isaiah saw Jesus’ “day” (cf. John 8:56, 58). (John - Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament, pp. 391, 392)
Herman Ridderbos (1997) -
...vs. 41: "This the prophet said because he
saw his glory and spoke of him." "His" refers to Christ—it is "his glory" —as the concluding words of vs. 41 confirm:
"spoke of him." The Evangelist does not mean that Isaiah already
foresaw Jesus' (later) glory, but that the glory of God as the prophet foresaw
it in his vision was no other than that which the Son of God had with the
Father before the world was and that was to be manifested before the eyes of
all in the incarnation of the Word (17:4; 1:14, 18). For that reason
("because") the prophetic judgment of hardening on account of the unbelief
of the people was fully applicable to the rejection of Jesus by Israel, and
even came to fulfillment therein. (The
Gospel of John: translated by John Vriend, p. 445)
George R. Beasley-Murray (1987) -
The glory of God that Isaiah saw in his vision (Isa
6:1-4) is identified with the glory of the Logos-Son, in accordance with 1:18
and 17:5. (Word Biblical Commentary - John, p. 217)
F. F. Bruce (1983) -
For verse 41 suggests that the one who 'has blinded
theie eyes and made their heart obtuse' is Jesus. It was of him, says John,
that Isaiah spoke on this occasion, 'because he saw his glory'. The reference
is to Isa. 6:1, where the prophet says 'I saw the Lord'. In the Aramaic Targum
to the Prophets (the 'Targum Jonathan') this is paraphrased 'I saw the glory of
the Lord'; and while the Targum as we have is much later than John's time, many
of the interpretations it preserves were traditional, going back for many
generations, 'The glory' or 'the glory of God' is a targumic circumlocution for
the name of God, but John gives the word its full force and says that the Lord
whose 'glory' Isaiah saw was Jesus: Isaiah, like Abraham before him, rejoiced
to see the day of Christ (John 8:56), for like John and his fellow-disciples in
the fulness of time, he too was permitted to behold his glory (cf. John 1:4). (The Gospel of John, p. 272)
Rudolf Schnackenburg (1979) -
12:41 In an explanatory commentary (cf. 7:39) the evangelist says how he intends the quotation, which comes from the vision in which Isaiah received his call, to be understood. Isaiah spoke as he did at the time because he saw Jesus' glory and spoke about him. Even if it were possible to regard the seeing of the glory as still a reference to God (as some manuscripts wrongly do), the second part makes it certain that John means Jesus; this is the evangelist's unique, Christological view. Judaism had a tendency to reduce the (earthly) vision of God to the vision of his glory, for example in the Targum on Is 6:1 and 6:5. In other places John attacks the idea of any direct vision of God (cf. on 1:18; 5:37; 6:46), but there is no note of polemic in our passage. All the emphasis is on the αὐτοῦ, as the speaking περὶ αὐτοῦ confirms. John is probably taking for granted the Jewish interpretation that Isaiah saw God's glory, but he connects the δόξα emphatically with the glory of Jesus, which he possessed with the Father, according to 17:5, before the foundation of the world. In this case the implication is that the evangelist thinks the prophet saw the pre-existent Christ. This idea is a natural development of his Logos Christology. (The Gospel According St. John -Volume 2: translated by Cecily Hastings, Francis McDonagh, David Smith and Richard Foley, p. 416)
Raymond E. Brown (1966) -
Verse 41: Isaiah's vision of lesus' glory
If vs. 40 was a citation of Isa vi 10, this next verse recalls Isaiah's initial vision of the Lord upon a throne in vi 1-5. There are two things to note in John's reference. First, John seems to presuppose a text where Isaiah sees God's glory, but in both the MT and LXX of Isaiah it is said that Isaiah saw the Lord Himself. This has led many commentators to suggest that John is following the tradition of the Targum (or Aramaic translation) of Isaiah where in vi 1 Isaiah sees ''the glory of the Lord" and in vi 5 "the glory of the shekinah of the Lord." The possibility of John's use of Targums has already been discussed in relation to i 51 (p. 90) and vii 38 (p. 322), and the Johannine citation of a Targum for the Isaiah text may have been determined by the frequent stress in this Gospel that no one has ever seen God.
Second, John supposes that it was the glory of Jesus that Isaiah saw. This is not unlike the supposition in viii 56 that Abraham saw Jesus' day (see NOTE there). There are several possible ways to interpret this. If we accept the suggestion of a citation of a Targum, then the statement that Isaiah saw the shekinah of God may be interpreted in light of the theology of i 14 where Jesus is the skekinah of God (p. 33). The belief that Jesus was active in the events of the OT is attested in I Cor x 4, where Jesus is pictured as the rock which gave water to the Israelites in the desert (also Justin Apol. I 63 [PG 6:424], where Jesus appears to Moses in the burning bush). In later patristic interpretation Isaiah was thought to have hailed the three divine persons with his "Holy, holy, holy" (Isa vi 3), and Jesus was identified as one of the seraphs who appeared with Yahweh. Another possible interpretation of John xii 41 is that Isaiah looked into the future and saw the life and glory of Jesus. This is certainly the thought found in the vision section of the Ascension of Isaiah (this part of the apocryphon is of 2nd-century Christian derivation). Sir xlviii 24-25 says that through his powerful spirit Isaiah foresaw the future and foretold what should be until the end of time. (Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John, I-XII: The Anchor Bible - Volume 29, 1966/1983, pp. 486, 487) [Note: this selection added 08-13-25]
William Hendricksen (1954) -
But because (ὅτι is the best reading here) Isaiah, in the glorious vision recorded in the same chapter from which the quotation was taken (chapter 6, verses 1-5 the vision; verses 9 and 10 the quoted words), saw the glordy, the transcendent majesty (not restricted to but certainly including the moral quality of holiness) of the Lord Jesus Christ (in whom the glory of Jehovah reflects itself) and was conscious of the fact that he was speaking of him, he did not criticize or protest, but recorded faithfully what he had seen and heard. Yes, Isaiah had seen not only the suffering of the Servant of Jehovah (Is. 53:1-10a) but also his glory (Is. 6:1-5; 9:6, 7; 52:13-15; 53:10b-12). (The Gospel According to John - Volume II, p. 213)
R. C. H. Lenski (1943) -
41) These things said Isaiah because he saw his glory and spoke concerning him. Some texts have: "when" he saw, etc. "These things" are the ones contained in the two quotations from Isaiah,. The prophet uttered them, not as applying only to the nation at his time, but as applying equally to the Jews of the time of Jesus. Isaiah "saw his glory," "I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and hi train filled the temple . . . Mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts," Isa 6.1-5, preceding by a little the last quotation. This is the glory of the exalted Son after his return to the Father, the glory referred in v. 28. Isaiah beheld it before the Incarnation, John after, Isaiah beheld it in a heavenly vision, John beheld it in the words and deeds of Jesus, in the person and the character of the God-man on earth: "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth," 1:14. And Isaiah knew that this glorious Son would in the fulness of the appear on earth, to be rejected by the Jews, even as they rejected the Lord in Isaiah's own time (compare Isa. 53). It is thus that the prophet "spoke concerning him,' namely Jesus. (The Interpretation of St. John's Gospel, p. 889, 890)
Grace and peace,
David
4 comments:
The glory of God seen by Isaiah and cited by The Apostle John in his Gospel, 12:41 reads in one translation:
"Isaiah said this because he saw his glory and spoke of him." (in reference to the vision in Is. 6)
It seems to me as a Nicene Christian, that the glory that Isaiah saw would be indistinguishable as to the persons of the Trinity. One may assume that a monotheist such as the prophet would understand whatever he saw as the one true God, or Yahweh. But Trinitarians believe that the Three all have the same divine glory. Trinitarians who are saying that John is applying this glory to the Son in Jn. 12, should probably qualify their position by denying that Isaiah saw the Incarnate Christ. For indeed, the Incarnate One's divine glory, is ordinarily sheathed and hidden in His humanity.
It seems difficult to miss that in context of Jn. 12, while admitting that what Isaiah saw must also be the glory of the Father, and of the Holy Spirit, that in this instance, it has to do with the One Person who had "done so many signs before them" (12:37), the second Person of the Blessed Trinity, now as then the Incarnate Son of God.
In verse 42, we can see that St. John is referencing unbelief in regards to Jesus, the one who was working miracles:
"Nevertheless many even of the authorities believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it."
Can we say that the Pharisees would have given any trouble to those who "believed in him" if the Apostle is applying the text to Yahweh alone? Unless we can make that argument, I would suggest that this text is a strong biblical argument for the plausibility of God the Son as being the ontological equal of his Father.
Hi Rory,
Thanks much for your informative thoughts. Your Trinitarian interpretation is certainly a viable option and has been adopted by a number of commentators; but, it is a minority position.
When you get the time, check out Raymond E. Brown's comments in the original post of this thread. I updated the initial post earlier today, after reading your post, with a selection from his commentary on the Gospel of John.
Hello again Rory,
I think you will find the following from the pen of Aquinas of interest, his commentary is quite close to yours:
>>1703. Then (v. 41), the Evangelist shows that these words of Isaiah apply here. He says, Isaiah said this because he saw his glory, the glory of God. For when he saw the glory of God he saw at the same time that the Jews would be blinded, as is clear from, “I saw the Lord seated on a high and lofty throne” (Is 6:1), followed by, “Blind the heart of his people and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and be converted, and I heal them” (v. 10). And because it is fitting that one should testify about what he has seen—as we read in 1 John (1:1)—he adds, and spoke of him, that is, of Christ, whose glory he saw: “To him all the prophets bear witness” (Acts 10:43); “Which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures, the gospel concerning his Son” (Rom 1:2).
1704. We read that Isaiah saw and said these things. As to the first, we should avoid the error of the Arians, who say that the Father alone is invisible to every creature, but that the Son was seen in the visions of the Old Testament. But since it is stated that “He who has seen me has seen the Father” (14:9), it is obvious that the Father and the Son are visible in one and the same way. And so Isaiah, seeing the glory of the Son, also saw the glory of the Father, and indeed of the entire Trinity, which is one God, seated upon a high throne before whom the seraphim cry out: Holy, Holy, Holy! This does not mean that Isaiah saw the essence of the Trinity; rather in an imaginary vision, with understanding, he expressed certain signs of this majesty, according to the saying in Numbers (12:6): “If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord make myself known to him in a vision, I speak with him in a dream.”>> (Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Gospel of John, Chapters 6-12: translated by Fabian Larcher, O.P., and James A. Weisheipl, O.P., p. 300)
Grace and peace,
David
Hey Dave!
I need to introduce you to this idea I learned from someone, it wasn't Aqunas, although I am certainly happy for his company. Anyway, this person called it "The Monarchy of God the Father". Perhaps you have heard of it too?
Rory
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