Marring Of A Servant (part 1)

His form was so marred he no longer looked human---so now he will startle many nations. – Isaiah 52:15a (NET)

Looking again at the prophecy of Isaiah and the “suffering servant” of such tremendous significance to the understanding of Jesus’ crucifixion and Resurrection, we are met with some rather unsettling words. We hear that the servant will be “so marred” that he will not even be recognizable as a human. We can make time for a brief and useful analogy here, and say that even though we rightly apply these words to Jesus, due to that which He underwent through the ordeal of the crucifixion (including the scourging and the crown of thorns), we can also make words such as these, lifted from their immediate context of course, apply to the whole of humanity. Humanity was created in the divine image, but the fall marred that image, so much so that what we see in ourselves and others can and should be thought of as barely recognizable as human. It is only when Jesus works through us by the Spirit, as He represented and fulfilled God’s intention for His divine-image-bearing creation, that we can actually be recognized as human. Is it not ironic that, in order for this recognition of humanity to take place us in us, through our union with Christ by faith, that Jesus had to endure an infliction of suffering that would so mar Him that He would be unrecognizable as a human? He would be marred so as to provide the basis for the reversal of our marring.

So the suffering servant of Isaiah would be horribly marred. Prior to that, however, we read, “Look, My servant will succeed! He will be elevated, lifted high, and greatly exalted” (52:13). Words such as these create an expectation of something different than what is to come, so we can be justifiably confused by the next verse, which says, “(just as many were horrified by the sight of you) he was so disfigured he no longer looked like a man” (52:14). The same one that is to succeed, be elevated, lifted high, and exalted is the same one that will be disfigured and marred. It is quite the interesting contrast, but compares well with the first part of the fourteenth verse, and the horror experienced on the part of the nations at the sight of God’s people Israel. The suffering servant, as representative of Israel, is going to be marred and made unrecognizable, because as the embodiment and representative of Israel, he must share in their cursing.

To what is Isaiah referring when he writes “just as many were horrified by the sight of you”? He seems to be hearkening back to the ever-present comprehension and narrative-coloring of the Deuteronomic curses, and the statement therein, as Israel wantonly violates its covenant with God by going after idols, not reverencing His sanctuary, and dis-honoring His Sabbaths, that “You will become an occasion of horror, a proverb, and an object of ridicule to all the peoples to whom the Lord will drive you” (Deuteronomy 28:37). In this, we can see that Israel itself was disfigured, no longer resembling the nation that God had drawn out from Egypt and set forth as the representative of His glory and the light to all nations. As we consider the implications, we do well to bear in mind that God referred to Israel as His firstborn son, and can be thought of as a replacement for Adam, chosen out to be the means by which God would deal with the problem of evil in the world. Because they failed to act in the image of their covenant God, it would be the suffering servant, the messianic Son of God, that would be looked to as God’s firstborn son, that would completely fulfill the role that was rejected by Adam. The suffering servant becomes marred so as to share in the horror-inducing cursing of Israel, which is a part of his being their representative. It is the marring that allows him to stand in the place of all peoples, as representative of a marred humanity as well.

Thinking about these things in this way allows us to consider that not only was the messiah of Israel to be God’s servant, but Israel was to be God’s servant, and mankind was also supposed to be the servant of God. Mankind was the first to be marred (along with the whole of creation), and Israel followed in that marring, so it makes sense that the messiah had to undergo a marring as well, so as to be able to sympathize with the situation and ultimately redeem both Israel and mankind (and then all of creation by extension) from out of that state of cursed marring.