Chapter 42 in Yeshayahu continues the vision that opened in the previous chapter, where the Holy One, Blessed be He, summoned the nations to judgment: "Listen to Me in silence, O islands, and let the nations renew their strength; let them draw near, then let them speak; let us come together for judgment." Now, explains the Malbim, the prophet begins to elucidate that entire vision and make known who it is speaking about. The chapter opens with the figure of the "Servant of Hashem," continues with a proclamation of the Creator of heaven and earth, and culminates in the promise of the future redemption.
הֵן עַבְדִּי אֶתְמָךְ־בּוֹ, בְּחִירִי רָצְתָה נַפְשִׁי, נָתַתִּי רוּחִי עָלָיו, מִשְׁפָּט לַגּוֹיִם יוֹצִיא׃ - Behold My servant, whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights; I have placed My spirit upon him, he shall bring forth justice to the nations.
"My servant" - this refers to the King Mashiach. The Malbim teaches a profound principle here: in order for a person to attain prophecy, two conditions are required. The first is preparation by personal choice, meaning that through his own free will, a person prepares himself through purity, sanctification, and Torah study. Just as we discussed regarding the disciples of the prophets (Bnei HaNevi'im), who took shelter under the wings of the prophet, strengthened themselves in the service of Hashem in asceticism and holiness, and trained until they merited prophecy. This is the meaning of "Behold My servant": it refers to one who serves Me faithfully and prepared himself properly. Not like other servants who cannot be relied upon, but rather "whom I uphold" - I will rely on him, I lean upon him with certainty that he will not betray his faith.
The second condition is natural preparation: that already from the womb and from birth, the person was prepared and endowed with a capacity fit for prophecy. As the Moreh Nevuchim explains, there is a reality where the Holy One, Blessed be He, fashions a person who is naturally more primed for prophecy, more worthy of the divine word. This is the favor he found in the eyes of Hashem even before being born, as it is written: "Before I formed you in the belly I knew you... and before you came forth out of the womb I sanctified you."
And this is "My chosen one in whom My soul delights": why did I choose him? Because I prepared him even before he was born, before he arrived into the world, to be worthy of the role of being the Mashiach and redeeming Israel. Therefore, "I have placed My spirit upon him" - I have bestowed upon him an abundance of holy spirit, so that not only will he receive inspiration for himself, but he will also influence others. This is "he shall bring forth justice to the nations": he will bring forth justice to the entire world, judging and leading all humanity. Thus, he possesses two virtues: from the perspective of "My servant" - his servitude and toil in the service of Hashem, like the disciples of the prophets; and from the perspective of "My chosen one in whom My soul delights" - that I brought him into the world from the outset with the innate strengths and qualities to assist him in his mission.
לֹא יִצְעַק וְלֹא יִשָּׂא, וְלֹא־יַשְׁמִיעַ בַּחוּץ קוֹלוֹ׃ - He shall not cry out, nor raise his voice, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street.
The prophecy of Mashiach will be different from the prophecy of all other prophets. Other prophets needed to cry out and frighten the people with punishments - but he "shall not cry out." A prophet would lift up parables and allegories to penetrate the hearts of his listeners and bring the message close to them - but he "shall not raise" his parable. A prophet would raise his voice and gather the public so that they would hear his words - but he "shall not cause his voice to be heard in the street," having no need to assemble crowds in the public square for them to know what he has to say.
קָנֶה רָצוּץ לֹא יִשְׁבּוֹר, וּפִשְׁתָּה כֵהָה לֹא יְכַבֶּנָּה, לֶאֱמֶת יוֹצִיא מִשְׁפָּט׃ - A bruised reed he shall not break, and a dim flax wick he shall not quench; he shall bring forth justice according to truth.
Many of the prophets established their authority and upheld their words by punishing the wicked: Elisha, through whom forty-two youths were killed by bears; Eliyahu, who slaughtered the prophets of Baal. It was necessary to execute judgment upon the wicked to establish the authority of prophecy and make an impact on the people.
Now there are two types of wicked people. There are those who are wicked due to physical desires and corrupted character traits - these are the "bruised reed," a reed that has been broken and no longer retains the strength to grow. And there are those whose intellect was their downfall: by power of their intellect they leaned toward heresy and apostasy and abandoned the way of Hashem, not out of lust but out of intellect, which is far worse. They fabricated new ideologies explaining why there is no need to serve Hashem, or why one ought specifically to engage in idol worship. These are the "dimly burning wick": the wick made of flax used to kindle a lamp, representing the illuminating light of the intellect, whose brilliance here has been dimmed by corrupted philosophies.
Mashiach will not execute either of these two types of wicked people, nor will he judge them as did Elisha and Eliyahu. "A bruised reed he shall not break" - even though the reed is crushed, he will not proceed to break it, but will instead strengthen it. "And a dimly burning wick he shall not quench" - he will not extinguish the light of the lamp that was dimmed due to corrupted thought; on the contrary, "he shall bring forth justice in truth," bringing forth the true judgment in order to bring them back in repentance.
לֹא יִכְהֶה וְלֹא יָרוּץ עַד־יָשִׂים בָּאָרֶץ מִשְׁפָּט, וּלְתוֹרָתוֹ אִיִּים יְיַחֵלוּ׃ - He shall not fail nor be crushed, till he have set justice in the earth; and the isles shall wait for his law.
Here the prophet gives us additional signs by which to identify the true Mashiach. The Malbim explains: To our sorrow, we have already experienced several false messiahs, foremost among them Shabbetai Tzvi, may the name of the wicked rot, who is well known to all. There were many before him, and there is a book titled "The False Messiahs Throughout the Generations" which describes them all. The disillusionment with Shabbetai Tzvi was immense; almost all the Torah leaders of Israel were drawn after him and believed in him, and only a select few recognized his falsehood from the earliest stages, among them Rabbi Sasportas who waged a fierce war against him, and the damage inflicted upon the Jewish people was profound and immense.
With the true Mashiach, it will not be so. "He shall not fail" - in terms of his spirit and faith; "nor be crushed" - from the root meaning broken and shattered, he will not break down but will stand in his strength all along the way. Shabbetai Tzvi, by contrast, failed and was crushed: he converted his religion, and in the end the king executed him. You saw that he had the beginnings of a messiah, but in the end he broke. There were also individuals in whom there was a messianic potential that did not reach fruition, such as Shimshon: when Yaakov beheld him in his prophecy, he said that this one was fit to be Mashiach, but in the end he said, "I hope for Your salvation, Hashem" - there is no salvation other than His salvation, blessed be He, alone.
And what is the distinction between "till he have set justice in the earth" and "and the isles shall wait for his law"? The Malbim explains: justice (mishpat) refers to interpersonal conduct between man and fellow man, whereas Torah refers to philosophies and commandments, what is permitted and what is forbidden, what is obligatory and what is exempt. Thus we find in the verse: "according to the law which they shall teach thee" - between blood and blood, ritually impure blood and pure blood; "and according to the judgment which they shall tell thee, thou shalt do" - between plea and plea, a monetary dispute between two people. Here too: "till he have set justice in the earth" addresses matters between man and fellow man, while "and the isles shall wait for his law" addresses matters between man and the Omnipresent, such that even the most distant islands in the world will yearn for the Torah of Mashiach, to hear what he has to say and what the guidance will be. His justice and his Torah will spread across the entire world.
Now verse 2 becomes clear: why "he shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street"? Because he has no need for any of this. "And the isles shall wait for his law" - he does not need to assemble the people and has no need for parables to gather them, for everyone will already be yearning to hear the Torah of Mashiach.
כֹּה־אָמַר הָאֵל יְהֹוָה, בּוֹרֵא הַשָּׁמַיִם וְנוֹטֵיהֶם, רֹקַע הָאָרֶץ וְצֶאֱצָאֶיהָ, נֹתֵן נְשָׁמָה לָעָם עָלֶיהָ וְרוּחַ לַהֹלְכִים בָּהּ׃ - Thus saith God the LORD, He that created the heavens, and stretched them out, He that spread forth the earth and that which cometh out of it, He that giveth breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein.
The Radak explains: several times the people did not accept the word of the prophet, and why? Because they believed that the world was never created but was eternal (kadmon), and that it is an effect with a cause, meaning it came about from a preceding cause, and that preceding cause from a cause prior to it, and so forth. Look at a fruit before me: the fruit is an effect whose cause is the tree; the tree is an effect whose cause is the seed; and the seed is an effect whose cause is the fruit, in an endless cycle. Thus they believed the world was eternal, evolving through preceding stages and causes. Others believed the world came about purely by chance, possessing neither a Creator nor a cause, but rather a big bang: something exploded out there and here we are, how wonderful.
Therefore, the prophet had to contend with these distorted ideologies, repeatedly stressing that the Holy One, blessed be He, created the world, renewed it, and brought it into being ex nihilo in a single moment, and everything came to pass by His will. Thus: "Thus saith God the LORD, He that created the heavens" - do not imagine that the heavens have existed from all eternity; rather, the Holy One, blessed be He, created and renewed them. "And stretched them out" - He spread them out like a tent over the earth. "He that spread forth the earth and that which cometh out of it" - the entire world was originally water, and the Holy One, blessed be He, had to flatten the earth, much like beating upon a sheet of metal until it is spread thin and flattened, like beating out sheets of gold, establishing it as an inhabited dwelling. By virtue of this come "that which cometh out of it": the earth brings forth vegetation and yields human beings, animals, and everything that exists in the world. Had He not flattened the earth, all would have remained ocean, and existence here would have been impossible.
"He who gives a soul to the people upon it" - this took place on the sixth day, when the Holy One, blessed be He, created man and breathed a soul into him, as it is written, "and He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." "And a spirit to those who walk on it" - this corresponds to the rest of the animals, for they do not possess a soul (neshamah), but rather a basic vital spirit (ru'ach), which is the force of life. And if you should ask, is it not written, "all in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life"? There too, "breath" (nishmat) refers to man and "spirit" (ru'ach) to the other living creatures, for the neshamah always designates man. Thus, the entire verse comes to refute the flawed view of those who believe in the eternity of the world or in its accidental existence: Know that God is the Creator of the heavens; He stretched them out above, spread out the earth below, all its offspring come from Him, the soul within man is from Him, and the spirit within animals is likewise from Him, blessed be He.
The Malbim explains based on what he elucidated in Sefer Bereishit, that heaven and earth are two completely opposite and disparate realities: heaven is a spiritual reality, while earth is a physical reality; the heavens endure forever, whereas the inhabitants of the earth come and go, one generation departs and another arrives. Here is where the wisdom of the craftsman comes in: when a craftsman creates two opposite things, an onlooker might doubt and say that whoever made this did not make that, since one is made this way and the other is made of an entirely different material. Take a craftsman who works with metal - when someone sees a magnificent creation of glass, it would seem he has no expertise in glass, and that this is an ironworker while that is a glassblower. What does the craftsman do to make his craftsmanship known? He creates a unique vessel comprised of both metal and glass together, a wondrous composite bearing his distinct signature, and then everyone sees: the metalwork is his, and the glasswork is his as well.
In this manner, the Holy One, blessed be He, created the physical world, which might have led one to doubt whether the spiritual realm stems from Him; and He created the spiritual realm, which might have led one to doubt whether the physical realm, being utterly different, stems from Him. What did He do? He created a reality composed of the spiritual and the physical together, which is man. Man has a corporeal, material body like an animal, as the Gemara states that in several respects man is akin to animals and in several respects akin to the ministering angels: he eats like an animal, sleeps like an animal, and relieves himself like an animal. This demonstrates that everything created in the physical world is from Him, blessed be He. Yet into that very same man He breathed a soul of life, a portion of God from above, a supreme, boundless spiritual force, which serves as the seal: Behold, I made everything, both the physical and the spiritual.
This seems obvious to us, but one must realize that in ancient times, people divided the world among various deities and powers. Anyone familiar with the Greek pantheon knows: a god of the sea, a god of the land, a god of war, a god of love. They believed in many forces, and to them it was natural to believe that one god created the physical reality and another god created the spiritual. Therefore, the Holy One, blessed be He, created a composite reality to prove that everything comes from Him alone. This is the meaning of: "Creator of the heavens" - the spiritual realm; "who spreads out the earth" - the physical realm; and lest you think these are two separate powers, the verse immediately concludes, "who gives a soul to the people upon it, and spirit to those who walk on it," for He joined the soul with the body so that all may know that everything is from Him, blessed be He.
And once you understand this, you will also understand that the Holy One, blessed be He, will establish Mashiach for them. If He created the reality of man in the world, He will surely also provide him with the reality of redemption to bring him out of exile, for exile is not the ultimate purpose. The ultimate purpose is to attain redemption, that the glory of Hashem may be revealed in the world. However, the Holy One, blessed be He, wants man to work in order to earn eternal life, for otherwise he would receive bread of shame (nehama de-khisufa); therefore, He temporarily instituted a reality of toil here in this world. But a stage will arrive when the curtain falls and the Holy One, blessed be He, announces that the game is over: Mashiach will come, and whatever a person accomplished will be what he has, according to how much he toiled and laboured, and whatever he failed to do, he will no longer be able to do.
אֲנִי יְהֹוָה קְרָאתִיךָ בְצֶדֶק וְאַחְזֵק בְּיָדֶךָ, וְאֶצָּרְךָ וְאֶתֶּנְךָ לִבְרִית עָם לְאוֹר גּוֹיִם׃ - "I, Hashem, have called you in righteousness and will hold your hand; and I will preserve you and make you a covenant of the people, a light to the nations."
Radak explains that the address here is directed to the Jewish people. The Holy One, blessed be He, says: I, who made all of this, the earth and the heavens and man, rely on Me that I can also bring you out of exile. "I have called you in righteousness" - when the time arrives in accordance with righteousness and justice to bring you out of exile. "And will hold your hand" - I will take you by the hand to lead you out. And should you say, but the nations will never agree? "And I will preserve you" - I will guard you so that they do not harm you. "And make you a covenant of the people" - you will be the sustenance of all the nations, such that from one end of the world to the other, the nations will proclaim that the entire world exists solely by virtue of Am Yisrael.
"A light to the nations" implies two things. First, that Am Yisrael will rebuke many nations and serve as a light to them. Incidentally, this is the origin of the phrase "a light unto the nations": the goal was for Am Yisrael to be a beacon, for all to look upon them, follow their path, and be drawn to their ways. Unfortunately, this was not how things turned out; instead of being a light to the nations, Am Yisrael became like the lowliest of peoples, which was the subject of much of the prophets' rebuke: that they acted in ways that even the gentiles would not act. But when Mashiach arrives and the complete redemption comes, you will be a light to the nations. And second, by observing our deeds, the gentiles will begin to observe the Seven Noahide Laws, for gentiles are not required to convert; thus, through our deeds, we will be a light to the nations.
Metzudat David explains that this refers to Mashiach. "I have called you in righteousness" - already long ago I announced through My servants the prophets that there would be a Mashiach, and I spoke of you beforehand; this was done in righteousness and truth, and it will be fulfilled. "And will hold your hand" - that you may prevail over all the nations. "And I will preserve you" - I will guard you against the nations who refuse to accept you. "And make you a covenant of the people" - I will grant you the power to turn and direct the people toward the service of Hashem, so that you restore the people to their covenant. Israel shares a covenant with the Holy One, blessed be He: "This is My covenant with them, said Hashem." That covenant dictates that we observe His commandments and He protects and saves us, ensuring we will never be destroyed. The Holy One, blessed be He, has kept His covenant to this day, while we, unfortunately, have strayed from the path many times; Mashiach will come and turn Am Yisrael back to that original covenant. "And a light to the nations" - you will enlighten the eyes of the nations to recognize that Hashem is God.
The Malbim explains that this verse refers to Yeshayahu himself, and the Holy One, blessed be He, is addressing him personally. "I have called you" - like one who calls out to his fellow from afar, for calling is always done from a distance: I called you from afar to come and be the prophet who proclaims truth and righteousness to the people. "And will hold your hand" - I have given you the strength to manage this people, like someone managing a household. "And I will preserve you" - and within that household, I guard you from all harm.
And the meaning of the metaphor: "I have called you" corresponds to what was said earlier, "My chosen one in whom My soul delights," meaning that by your nature you were prepared and fit for prophecy, in the sense of "Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you." "And I will hold your hand" - that the Holy One, blessed be He, aided and assisted him in attaining prophecy; he exerted effort on his part, and the Holy One, blessed be He, held his hand. This corresponds to "Behold My servant," for on your own part you were a servant and served Hashem, and only then did you merit this. These are the two necessary elements: that a person must strive on his own, and that he must possess the natural predisposition.
And do not mistakenly think: if I have a natural predisposition, I can rest. There is no such thing. If you do not exert effort, you will not attain what your natural predisposition makes possible. To what can this be compared? To a person who prayed: Master of the Universe, grant me wealth, I want to win the lottery! And he pestered Heaven like this for a long time. The angels came and said: Master of the Universe, the man is praying so intensely, perhaps do something for him? The Holy One, blessed be He, replied: No problem, let him just buy a ticket! It may be decreed that you win, but what can you do without a ticket? So too says the Holy One, blessed be He: I formed you with the potential for prophecy, but had you not been "My servant" and exerted yourself, that predisposition would have been of no use to you. I act as an aid, but you must make the start, and that is "and I will hold your hand": you take action, and I grasp your hand. "And I will guard you" - I will preserve you so that no stumbling block arises through you, for who can discern his errors? "And give you as a covenant of the people" - the Jewish people, with whom I formed a covenant, and you will be the instrument through whom the covenant is upheld, because you draw Israel closer to their Father in Heaven. "For a light of nations" - so that the nations too will recognize that there is a Creator of the world, that there is none beside Him, and that the Jewish people are the chosen nation whom it is fitting to cleave to.
לִפְקֹחַ עֵינַיִם עִוְרוֹת, לְהוֹצִיא מִמַּסְגֵּר אַסִּיר, מִבֵּית כֶּלֶא יֹשְׁבֵי חֹשֶׁךְ׃ - To open blind eyes, to bring out a prisoner from a dungeon, those who dwell in darkness from a prison house.
According to the Malbim, Yeshayahu was destined to convey the light to the nations as well, and indeed we see many prophecies directed at the nations: the prophecy of Bavel, the prophecy of Edom, and others. Their purpose is that they too should acknowledge the light of Hashem. After all, the light of Hashem is constant and enduring; Yeshayahu does not generate it through his words. If so, the nations who have not seen it until now are blind, for the light exists, and if you have not seen it, it is a sign that you are blind. And this is "to open blind eyes": your mission is merely to open their eyes so that they can see the light that is already there.
And regarding Israel in exile, to whom you were sent to deliver prophecies of encouragement, it says: "to bring out a prisoner from a dungeon." There are two forms of exile, corresponding to two parts of the Jewish people that went into exile. There are the tribes of Yehudah and Binyamin, who were scattered to the four corners of the earth, and we all descend from them, since the Ten Tribes vanished, having been exiled to Chalach, Chavor, and the Gozan River. We know the names of these places, but where they are exactly and who they are - we do not know. Every so often someone is presented with remnants of some mitzvah - one person wears strings on his garments and people claim he is of Jewish descent, or some say that members of al-Qaeda resemble Jews with their beards and head coverings. Either way, it is clear that they are in a state where we cannot see them and do not know them.
The Malbim teaches us the distinction in Lashon HaKodesh between an assir (a prisoner) and a yoshev kele (one who dwells in a prison): one who is confined to prison is simply locked in and cannot leave, but he is not bound or tied up, as it is written, "and confined their calves at home," and like "from the sheepfolds (mikle'ot tzon)." However, if they also bound him inside the prison, he is called an assir, from the root of assur, bound and tied. There is a story of someone who boarded a train with a dog and asked the conductor: Is it permitted (muttar) to bring a dog? He replied: Assur muttar, muttar assur. That is, if he is tied up (assur), it is permitted (muttar); if he is untied and loose (muttar), it is forbidden (assur). Hence, an assir is one who is bound. A person placed in prison and also bound in chains for fear that he might escape is called assur, and therefore it says, "and bound him in a prison house," for he was not content merely to place him in prison, but bound him as well.
And this is "to bring out a prisoner from a dungeon": these are Yehudah and Binyamin, whose whereabouts are known, yet they are like prisoners bound in their scattered dwellings. As was seen behind the Iron Curtain for decades, where they were literally like bound prisoners whom no one could bring out. In contrast, "those who dwell in darkness from a prison house" refers to the Ten Tribes, who are not bound, but are in darkness - go try to bring them out, do you even know where they are? It is a dark place where one cannot see. It is impossible to see where they are, and for that reason, it is also impossible to redeem them from the reality in which they find themselves.
אֲנִי יְהֹוָה הוּא שְׁמִי, וּכְבוֹדִי לְאַחֵר לֹא־אֶתֵּן וּתְהִלָּתִי לַפְּסִילִים׃ - I am Hashem, that is My Name; and My glory I will not give to another, nor My praise to graven images.
"I am Hashem" - the Malbim explains: I Myself, in My very Essence. For when we speak of the Four-Letter Name (Havayah), we refer to His Essence, blessed be He - a Name transcending all human comprehension, and hidden even in its pronunciation, as we do not know at all how to pronounce it, and it is strictly forbidden to pronounce it according to its letters, which is why we refer to it with a kuf rather than a hei. The Holy One, blessed be He, is the Necessary Existent by His own Essence - He was, He is, and He will be, the letters of Havayah (existence) - and does not depend on anything else. To return to the analogy of the fruit and the seed: the seed depends on something else, on the fruit, and the fruit on the tree, and the tree on the seed that was planted, and so on. But "I am Hashem" means that He exists and brings all of reality into existence, completely independent of anything else. "That is My Name" - I am known to all My creations through the actions I perform, that I bring into being, create, and oversee everything through Divine Providence.
The philosophers, the Malbim explains, grasped that there is an existence of Hashem and that He is the Necessary Existent and an infinite reality. However, they argued that desire, will, and changes in knowledge cannot be attributed to Him, as they believed according to the discipline of "that which is beyond nature," namely metaphysics, which deals with realms beyond natural reality. From this premise, they denied the creation of the world out of nothing by the will of Hashem, asserting that He has no will, and therefore the universe is eternal (kadmon) with no change of will before Him. Yet the glory of Hashem is manifested precisely in the fact that He wills something and it comes to be, that something was brought into existence by His will: "For He spoke, and it came to be." Therefore, the Holy One, blessed be He, says: "and My glory I will not give to another." To claim that everything derives from Him but not by His deliberate will - that everything merely stems from cause and effect - is utterly unacceptable. Rather, know that everything was created by Hashem through a will that began at a specific moment, when it arose in the will of the Emanator to create the world. And this is the fundamental ABC of the wisdom of Kabbalah regarding the creation of the world: that the moment it arose in the will of the Emanator, the Holy One, blessed be He, constricted His light and brought forth a thin ray, and so on, as discussed previously at length.
In contrast to them, there were nations that acknowledged that the Holy One, blessed be He, created the world anew by His will, but believed He was corporeal and attributed physical qualities to Him. This led them into idolatry: for if Hashem were corporeal, one could easily fall into error with idols and other physical objects. Regarding this He says, "nor My praise to graven images" will I give: I possess will, and yet I am not a corporeal entity, but a spiritual reality transcendent of all material existence. I am not like one of the idols that were worshipped; rather, the essential will of the Creator, blessed be He, is distinct from all corporeality. No conceptual thought can grasp Him, and we possess no comprehension or perception of Him whatsoever, for any spiritual reality known to us is coarse and material in comparison to the existence of the Creator.
הָרִאשֹׁנוֹת הִנֵּה־בָאוּ, וַחֲדָשׁוֹת אֲנִי מַגִּיד, בְּטֶרֶם תִּצְמַחְנָה אַשְׁמִיעַ אֶתְכֶם׃ - Behold, the former things have come to pass, and new things do I declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them.
What are those "former things" that have already come to pass, and what are the "new things" that the Holy One, blessed be He, is declaring now? Rashi explains: The former things are what I promised Avraham regarding the Egyptian exile, when I told him, "And also that nation whom they shall serve will I judge." Behold, I kept My promise: Israel was exiled, and the Holy One, blessed be He, judged the nation that oppressed them. And now, "new things do I declare" - concerning the second exile - "before they spring forth, I tell you of them."
Radak explains that this does not refer to the prophecy of Egypt, but rather to the earlier prophecies that Yeshayahu prophesied concerning Sancheirev: Behold, you have seen in the days of Yeshayahu, I prophesied that Sancheirev would come to besiege Jerusalem and he came, and I prophesied that he would fall and he fell. "The former things have come to pass." "And new things do I declare" - I am announcing to you new prophecies that you have not heard, informing you of them before they arrive. And who is to say they will be fulfilled? Just as the former things came to pass and you saw that you are dealing with One who has the power to foretell and the power to fulfill, so know that the future prophecies as well - that Hashem will bring Israel out of exile and redeem them with an eternal redemption - will come to pass with absolute certainty. If the former things came to pass, why should we doubt the future ones? And the expression titzmachnah ("spring forth"), Radak explains, is akin to "I will cause a horn to sprout for the house of Israel" and "the sprout of David Your servant," referring to the renewal of something and causing it to sprout afresh.
The Malbim explains: When a person announces something that will happen in the future, we believe him for one of two reasons. Either he has a proven track record, having foretold the future until now with everything he said coming to pass; or that which he foretells has already begun to take place, and he is informing us how the story will end. But if someone comes to tell me what will happen fifty years from now, having no prior track record, and the matter has not even begun to unfold - I have no reason to believe him. However, if he possesses one of these two qualifications, there is ground to accept his words.
This is what He says: "The former things have come to pass" - you already have experience with Me, for I announced matters in advance, long beforehand, and they were fulfilled with exact precision. And since I possess this qualification, I have no need for the second qualification of a matter that has already begun. I possess a far greater qualification, and therefore "new things do I declare": I can tell you entirely new things that will take place many years from now, before they have begun at all, and you can believe in them with complete faith. One who has already stood the test does not need to be tested again.
The chapter opens with the figure of Hashem's servant - the King Messiah, who attained both preparations required for prophecy: the acquired preparation achieved through his own toil, and the innate preparation endowed to him from the womb. His prophecy will differ from that of all other prophets: without clamor, without allegory, without assembling the multitude, and without taking vengeance upon the wicked - a bruised reed he will not break, and dimly burning flax he will not quench, but rather he will bring all back in repentance. He will not falter nor be crushed like the false messiahs, until he sets justice in the earth, and the distant isles yearn for his Torah. From here the prophet turns to proclaim the Creator of the heavens and the One who spreads forth the earth, who joins soul and body in a single human being to prove that both the physical and the spiritual derive from Him, blessed be He, and that He therefore also has the power to redeem. Thus, "I, Hashem, have called you in righteousness" - whether addressed to Israel, the Messiah, or the prophet Yeshayahu - to open the blind eyes of the nations and to bring the prisoners and those sitting in darkness out of their exile. "I am Hashem, that is My Name" - He possesses will and creates the world anew, and yet He is transcendent of all materiality, giving His praise to no graven image. Finally, the straightforward proof: the former things have already arrived and been fulfilled, and He whose earlier words came to pass is trustworthy regarding the new things that have not yet sprouted.