Opening the Sealed Book: Interpretations of the Book of Isaiah in Late Antiquity (review)

In recent years, as debate has shifted from the question “What did the author mean?” to “How have readers understood what was written?,” there has been renewed interest in the history of the interpretation of texts. In this volume, Professor Blenkinsopp concentrates on the various ways in which Isaiah was interpreted in Late Antiquity, and since Isaiah was in fact used by various dissident groups to legitimize their movements, the result is a study that makes a notable contribution to our understanding of the development of sectarianism in late Second Temple Judaism.

Blenkinsopp begins by discussing the way in which the oral material was brought together and points out that the history of interpretation begins in the book itself. The earliest sayings were gathered together and combined with commentary and additions, the exegete apparently claiming the same authority to speak in the name of God as the original prophet. The metaphor of the “sealed book” in 29:11–12 (an image picked up in Daniel) indicates a later generation’s incomprehension of the written message: what had been written could now be understood only by those who read it “from an eschatologicalapocalyptic perspective” (p. 26).

After exploring the different prophetic profiles of Isaiah—as a critic of the establishment on the one hand, and as a man of God on the other—Blenkinsopp turns to the role of sectarianism in the final shaping of Isaiah. He argues that sectarianism first emerged in the century following the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BCE, and that this is reflected not only in Ezra-Nehemiah, but in the final chapters of Isaiah. In Isaiah 65–6, for example, we see the arguments of a minority group who believed themselves to be the true “Servants of Yahveh,” but who were shunned by their fellow Jews.

Blenkinsopp then turns to the ways in which Isaiah was read by two Jewish sects. The importance of the book for the group at Qumran is demonstrated by the number of Isaiah scrolls found there. In addition, there are allusions to and citations from Isaiah in non-biblical texts, indicating its role in the Qumran sectarians’ self-understanding. The pesharim offer direct evidence of the way in which the text was interpreted, and though these are unfortunately fragmentary, they nevertheless indicate that the members of the Qumran community believed that they were able to “decode” the message which God had delivered to the prophet, and that it applied to themselves. This assumption lies behind the citation of Isa. 40:3 in the Community Rule, since they found here the biblical warranty for their withdrawal to the Judean wilderness.

The important role played by Isaiah in shaping the identity of the early Christians is demonstrated by the large number of allusions and citations to that book in the New Testament. Concentrating on the Gospel of Matthew, Blenkinsopp argues that Jesus is presented as “the Servant of Isaiah 53” (p. 130), and that though the various Servant texts were of particular importance, the book of Isaiah as a whole “came to serve as a grid or cognitive map by means of which they could articulate their sense of . . . the direction in which their destiny was leading them” (p. 136).

Although the first Christians, like the group at Qumran, interpret scripture as a “sealed book” whose meaning is now clear to the group but hidden to outsiders—who, as Isaiah said, “look without seeing and listen without hearing” (p. 147)—and although their own teaching is esoteric, and so incomprehensible to those to whom “the mystery of the Kingdom” has not been given, this mystery is nevertheless not to be confined to the group, but is available for all who will receive it.

After looking at certain Isaianic “titles” for the community and considering the extent to which they were adopted by the Qumran sectarians and by the early Christians, Blenkinsopp turns to the topic of...