ISAIAH: PROPHET, SEER, AND POET

When I first studied Isaiah, one of the questions I asked with almost every verse: "Is he talking about his day? Is he talking about the Savior's day?" Is he talking about our day? Is he talking about the Millennium?"  Quite often, the answer to all those questions is "Yes." This is because the writings of Isaiah, like much Hebrew poetry can refer to more than one time period and more than one situation.

Isaiah uses many symbols and Hebrew poetic forms, such as parallelisms, including a complex form of parallelism known as chiasmus. There were very good reasons why God uses symbols to teach: Jesus taught by parable.  Isaiah taught by symbolic poetry. Both were done in an effort to teach many different people at many different levels of spiritual maturity.  Those who could handle meat got meat; those who could only handle milk got milk. It also causes men and women to study carefully and prayerfully to understand the lesson being taught.  

An example of antithetic parallelism (comparing opposites) in Isaiah

Another reason I have heard discussed is that ancient prophets like Isaiah didn't write to be read: they wrote to be spoken or read aloud.  Using symbols and parallels helps the listener remember the message. I can remember nursery rhymes my grandmother read to me when I was a child. There is no earthly reason for remembering "Georgie Porgie, pudding and pie" other than its cadence and rhyme.

One Isaiah scholar whom I greatly admire is Sister Ann Madsen, wife of Truman Madsen. She was pursuing a master's degree in Old Testament and Hebrew.  One of her favorite prophets was Isaiah, even though she found it difficult to understand in the beginning.   This is what she said about that experience: It's funny, I think about my youth and I think about the first time I tried to read the Book of Mormon from cover to cover and pray about it.  And I got to the Isaiah passages and I couldn't keep going . . . the more I taught the Old Testament at BYU, the more I wanted to learn more about Isaiah.  Isaiah seemed like a wonderful mystery that I could plunge the depths of if I would make the effort. 

Making the effort is the key idea here. One does not read Isaiah like a novel.  I need to feast and not simply snack on Isaiah. 

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So here we go - the Isaiah chapters.  Please join me at the feast!

©February 2020, Dr. Kathleen Rawlings Buntin Danielson