November 2024

A Commentary on Isaiah, Part 14: Lucifer, Son of the Morning

The Roman Catholic images of a fallen angel named Lucifer have permeated Christian society for at least fifteen hundred years, but they are related far more closely to the allegorical images which are found in ancient Mesopotamian carvings than they are to the truths of Scripture. The epithet Lucifer, which is known only from Isaiah chapter 14, does not actually exist in the original language of Scripture, and the words from which the epithets were formed were used in reference to a man, and not as an address for some mystical and supernatural demon or fallen angel. They were used to describe a certain and then-future king of Babylon, whom we would assert could represent any king of any world empire at any given time, a man standing in opposition to God, and not some other-worldly adversary with super-human powers.

The Roman Catholic visions of Lucifer actually detach the Biblical warnings from the realities of everyday life, and the context here in Isaiah concerns the punishment of the children of Israel for their sins. Lucifer does indeed exist, and has existed throughout all of history, but as a man, or as a long series of men, the nature of which the Roman Catholic fables have forever prevented Christians from understanding. The true meaning of the words requires an understanding of ancient history as well as the Biblical context which is found here in the surrounding text of Isaiah. Having obfuscated the meaning of the term Lucifer, the popes of the Roman Catholic Church have actually quite often fulfilled the role of Lucifer, through which they have pretended to be the light-bearers for Christian society while they have actually stood in opposition to Christ. But the people never noticed, because they saw Lucifer as some far-off and mystical, ethereal demon.

A Commentary on Isaiah, Part 13: Visions of Empires

Discussing Isaiah chapter 11, there is a prophecy of a rod which would come forth “out of the stem of Jesse,” and in an apparent Hebrew parallelism, also a branch which would “grow out of his roots.” Then where this phenomenon is described further, it becomes apparent that the branch is a man: “a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles [Nations] seek: and his rest shall be glorious.” It is even more evident that this rod is a man, for example where it says that “he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked” and then “righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins.” But the language indicates that the man is both the origin of Jesse, and a descendant of Jesse. Therefore this man can only be one and the same as the child who had been prophesied earlier in Isaiah, in chapter 9, who would be called the “mighty God”, the “everlasting Father” and the “Prince of Peace.”

No other man could fulfill the plain meanings of all of these statements unless the promised Messiah is God incarnate. So in language which further illustrates this assertion, here in Isaiah chapter 11 this Root of Jesse is also prophesied to “recover the remnant of his people” from all of the places to where they had gone in their captivity, and only Yahweh God would have the authority and the ability to do that. Furthermore, at this point in the time of Isaiah, the promise to regather His people comes even before most of them are taken into captivity. Then, accompanying that promised regathering, there is also a promise of great peace, and the child of Isaiah chapter 9 would be called the Prince of Peace.

A Commentary on Isaiah, Part 12: Root and Branch

As we had explained at length in our introduction to the later portion of Isaiah chapter 10 and The Promise in the Flames, or the promises which had been given to Israel as the twelve tribes were about to go into captivity, throughout these chapters of Isaiah, where both Israel and Judah are repeatedly condemned and destined to go into captivity, there are also many repeated promises of salvation, and that salvation would ostensibly be achieved through the birth of a child who would be called “the mighty God, the everlasting Father, [and] the Prince of Peace”, among other things which apparently could only describe Yahweh God Himself even if this child would be born of a woman just like any other ordinary man.

In Isaiah chapter 10 we had seen a prophecy warning that Assyria would be destroyed, and assuring the children of Israel that once in captivity, they would escape and even have a part in the destruction of their captors. From the time that Isaiah uttered this prophecy, it would be as many as a hundred and twenty years before Assyria was destroyed around 612 BC. But Jerusalem was also destined for captivity in the words of the prophet, and up to this point, explicit examples of such prophecies concerning Jerusalem are found in the parable of the vineyard of Isaiah chapter 4, and the parable of blindness in Isaiah chapter 6. So if it seems that Jerusalem had escaped its fated captivity once Assyria had fallen, Isaiah had also prophesied concerning Babylon, in chapters 13 and 14, and later, in the closing verses of chapter 39, Isaiah warned Hezekiah that his sons “shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.” So Jerusalem would indeed go into captivity, even it it did not fall to the Babylonians until about 586 BC.