THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY G. W. WADE D.D. SENIOR TUTOR OF ST DAVID'S COLLEGE, LAMPETER METHUEN & CO. LTD. O 3-3-39 J.A. Thornton 2-27-39 39876 PREFATORY NOTE BY THE GENERAL EDITOR. THE HE primary object of these Commentaries is to be exegetical, to interpret the meaning of each book of the Bible in the light of modern knowledge to English readers. The Editors will not deal, except subordinately, with questions of textual criticism or philology; but taking the English text in the Revised Version as their basis, they will aim at combining a hearty acceptance of critical principles with loyalty to the Catholic Faith. The series will be less elementary than the Cambridge Bible for Schools, less critical than the International Critical Commentary, less didactic than the Expositor's Bible; and it is hoped that it may be of use both to theological students and to the clergy, as well as to the growing number of educated laymen and laywomen who wish to read the Bible intelligently and reverently. Each commentary will therefore have (i) An Introduction stating the bearing of modern criticism and research upon the historical character of the book, and drawing out the contribution which the book, as a whole, makes to the body of religious truth. (ii) A careful paraphrase of the text with notes on the more difficult passages and, if need be, excursuses on any points of special importance either for doctrine, or ecclesiastical organization, or spiritual life. But the books of the Bible are so varied in character that considerable latitude is needed, as to the proportion which the various parts should hold to each other. The General Editor will therefore only endeavour to secure a general uniformity in scope and character: but the exact method adopted in each case and the final responsibility for the statements made will rest with the individual contributors. By permission of the Delegates of the Oxford University Press and of the Syndics of the Cambridge University Press the Text used in this Series of Commentaries is the Revised Version of the Holy Scriptures. IT may be well for the General Editor of the Westminster Commentaries to add a special word of Introduction to this Commentary, for in it the modern principles of literary and historical criticism are applied to a new sphere, the sphere of prophecy, and to that book which has always seemed to come nearest to the New Testament and to contain a Gospel before the Gospels; and that with results for which the ordinary reader is scarcely prepared. (i) Criticism has now for many years prepared ordinary readers of the Bible to find two authors combined under the name of Isaiah, the prophet of Hezekiah's reign and the prophet of the Exile who encouraged the Jews in Babylon with hopes of their return. But here the principle is extended further; not only are three distinct prophets postulated, but it is assumed that the original prophecies of each have been subsequently re-edited, with additions intended to bring the teaching home to the needs of later generations. "The Prophecies of Isaiah" will then be parallel in title to the Laws of Moses or the Psalms of David; they will mean the prophecies of Isaiah himself and of later writers writing in his spirit and adapting his teaching. If this is so, the problem of exegesis is confessedly a very difficult one, almost as difficult as if the Psalms had come down to us in one continuous whole, unbroken by any divisions, and we had to decide where each new Psalm began and ended and what was its date and who its author. So here the commentator has to separate each chapter and each part of a chapter and |