Isaiah 53 Breakdown (Christ Prophecy Chapter)

1 Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?

The “arm” of YHWH is the physical manifestation of how YHWH reveals Himself to men. I believe throughout the Old Testament the arm of YHWH was one and the same as the one mentioned in this verse. Here are some of the times the Arm is mentioned.  

Exodus 15:6

Fear and dread will fall on them; By the greatness of Your arm They will be as still as a stone, Till Your people pass over, O Lord, Till the people pass over Whom You have purchased.

Psalm 98:1

Oh, sing to the Lord a new song! For He has done marvelous things; His right hand and His holy arm have gained Him the victory.

Isaiah 30:30

The Lord will cause His glorious voice to be heard, And show the descent (of judgment) of His arm, With the indignation of His anger And the flame of a devouring fire, With scattering, tempest, and hailstones.

Isaiah 48:14

“All of you, assemble yourselves, and hear! Who among them has declared these things? The Lord loves him; He shall do His pleasure on Babylon, And His arm shall be against the Chaldeans.

Isaiah 51:9

Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord! Awake as in the ancient days, In the generations of old. Are You not the arm that cut Rahab apart, And wounded the serpent?

Psalm 89:10

You have broken Rahab in pieces, as one who is slain; You have scattered Your enemies with Your mighty arm.

Isaiah 52:10

The Lord has made bare His holy arm In the eyes of all the nations; And all the ends of the earth shall see The salvation of our God.

Many of these verses from Isaiah refer to an end time event, and are aligned with prophecy referring to Yeshua found in the New Testament.

2 For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, And as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness; And when we see Him, There is no beauty that we should desire Him.

He will be full of life in a world of death. He will be the one light in darkness. He will have no beauty or honor. Basically, there would be no reason to give the man a second look. He comes as a poor man. Not one person would desire the man based on his appearance.

3 He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.

Men hate and dismiss him constantly. He is full of burdens and knows heartache. Believers would look away and pretend not to see Him be scorned. He was not approved, not even by the massed who had always believed. This is exactly the case we find with Yeshua in the New Testament. I see no mistranslations within this particular verse.

4 Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted.

He takes on the burdens bared the load of our pain. But still, he was wanted to be struck even from YHWH, and tormented and tortured. Taking on the burdens and sickness of others is what Christ is known for. He healed the sick, and forgave sins. Because He did this, men felt threatened and wanted to see Him killed and tortured.

5 But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed.

The word wounded here seems to be in dispute. The argument starts with the word also can be translated as profaned. However, this word chalal also has the definition of wound fatally. Taking this into consideration with the rest of the verse, it makes much more logical sense to use this word as wounds. Consider the word stripes at the end of the verse. This Hebrew word is chabbuwrah, and its meaning is bruise, stripe, wound, blow. Taking the whole verse into consideration together, we can conclude one being spoken of is being wounded, chastised, and beaten for sin, in order to bring peace and healing.

6 All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

This is my translation of this verse based on the Hebrew. The sheep have turned and gone astray toward man’s ways. YHWH made intersessions for their sin.

His sheep have become lost and turned away from His ways, YHWH stepped in to bring them back to His ways.

7 He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent, So He opened not His mouth.

This verse is just some reinforcement with what has already been translated. It needs to be taken in account with the rest of the chapter.

8 He was taken from prison and from judgment, And who will declare His generation? For He was cut off from the land of the living; For the transgressions of My people He was stricken.

This verse fits really well with Christ. I like the translation here is terms of the rest of the chapter’s meaning. I also have considered this verse being translated as the following.

Taken to restraints and judgment to speak to the generations who were cut off from the land due to their sin, the nation who was to be struck.

However, the Septuagint is translated similarly to the original here.

9 And they made His grave with the wicked— But with the rich at His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was any deceit in His mouth.

The Septuagint is very similar to this. The man was laid in the grave with the wicked. He had done no wicked thing nor said anything wicked. Definitely lines up with what we read in the New Testament.

10 Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, And the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.

YHWH is pleased to be bruised. Why would He be happy to inflict pain on a man? The answer is really simple, so long as you believe Yeshua was God in the flesh. He was pleased to stand in for the sin of men. He was pleased because with His death the covenant would be annulled. This annulment would then allow all men to come to YHWH, to return to His ways and have the chance to accept His Law as true.

11 He shall see the labor of His soul, and be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, For He shall bear their iniquities.

Again, we see this within the life of Yeshua. He labored to bring back the lost sheep. His knowledge of God’s word brought men back to His righteous law, which is how men are justified.

12 Therefore I will divide Him a portion with the great, And He shall divide the spoil with the strong, Because He poured out His soul unto death, And He was numbered with the transgressors, And He bore the sin of many, And made intercession for the transgressors.

More of how Yeshua’s life fit the prophecy of the Messiah, or promised one. This verse is a sum of the rest of the chapter.

Some other related verses that correlate with this chapter.

Psalm 22:16-18

For dogs have surrounded Me; The congregation of the wicked has enclosed Me. They pierced My hands and My feet; 17 I can count all My bones. They look and stare at Me. 18 They divide My garments among them, And for My clothing they cast lots.

“They pierced my hands and feet” this is a verse in which some claim is falsely translated to promote Christ as the Messiah. Basically, to force the prophecy to be about Christ. The Hebrew word is karah, and it means to dig. The definition for this word, however, is excavate or dig through. This simply means to create a hole which absolutely parallels itself with the translation to pierce. I find absolutely no issue with this translation. What is even more powerful, the prophecy also mentions both the hands and feet being pierced.

Next, we read about the division of His clothing by casting lots. We have both of these accounts directly related to Christ found in the New Testament.

Micha 5:2

“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Though you are little among the thousands of Judah, Yet out of you shall come forth to Me The One to be Ruler in Israel, Whose goings forth are from of old, From everlasting.”

This prophecy states the “Ruler in Israel” will come from Bethlehem, and will be of Jewish descent. No mistranslations found whatsoever.

Zechariah 12:10

“And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn.

The Spirit of Grace and favor will be poured out on those in Jerusalem. This brings great sadness on those who chose to kill YHWH in the flesh, the one they pierced. Again, I see no mistranslation associated with this verse.

Isaiah 7:14

Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.

This is the most crucial prophecy of all. It is literally stating outright that a virgin will bring forth a child which was conceived inside her. This is absolutely impossible, and is known as Immaculate Conception. There is no denying this by saying the Hebrew says something different. It states this outright. I do submit the fact there is another word in the Hebrew which specifically means virgin. However, almah is only used ten times throughout the entire OT and in each instance it refers to a young, unmarried woman. In Jewish culture, an unmarried woman is considered pure. Therefore, we can understand this as a young, unmarried virgin woman conceiving this child. This child will be known as “God with us”.

We have a man in history known for this very thing, and He just happens to be the very same man mentioned in the other prophecies above. Yeshua.