Who buried with whom? Isaiah 53:9

[ThomasDGW]

another translation to consider is
"And he shall deliver the wicked into hell, and the riches of treasures which they got by violence unto the death of Abaddon, that they who commit sin shall not remain, and that they should not speak folly with their mouth."

https://www.sefaria.org/Isaiah.53.9?lang...i&lang2=en
https://www.sefaria.org/Isaiah.53.9?lang...a&lang2=en

though the Radak has a more elegant explanation
https://www.sefaria.org/Isaiah.53.9?lang...k&lang2=en

What is that a translation of?

Rashi says that being buried with the wicked means being subject to being buried however the heathen wicked decree, such as being buried like a donkey. I see no explanation for how Israel was with the rich in his deaths.

Ibn Ezra says that Israel was so maltreated that he longed to die with the rich heathen nations that oppressed him.

Radak was all in Hebrew, so I pasted it into Google Translate and got this:
"They would have killed him in exile as the wicked kill for their wickedness and he did not do Hams or anything deceitful with his mouth and they would have killed him as if he had done evil and they would have numbered him with wicked people and taste and let him have put himself to death because they would have fired him if he had apostatized from his Torah and returned to their Torah and he would have put himself to death to death and will not be frostbitten in his Torah, and he also said that we have been killed for you all day long, and the rich man will taste his death, because the rich man is also killed for his tithe and he was killed not because of the evil that was in him but because of the wealth that he had, and he tasted his deaths, many people say that many deaths will be done to him some of them They are burned and some of them are killed and some of them are stoned and all of them give themselves to the Oneness of Hashem:"

Of course the translation is not very good, but it seems to make sense overall. I understand that Radak is saying that being buried with the wicked means that the wicked kill him as if he had done evil, and being with the rich in his death means that a lot of rich men in Israel were also killed for their money. The plural deaths refer to the many ways that people of Israel will be put to death.

this last idea was echoed by Michoel Drazin in his article https://www.drazin.com/index07b1.html?12...ng_Servant

Did I get the right idea of the explanations?

the general idea a a start. Now you only have miles and miles to go.

So, with this general idea, I have some observations:

(1) I don't see an explicit fulfillment of Isaiah 53:9 in the nation Israel, that is, Israelites are not sharing graves with wicked people. I'm not saying that a figurative meaning is impossible, where the wicked defining the death and method of burial of the Israelites is equivalent to them sharing a grave. But you did say that the explicit meaning is to be preferred. Also, when Christian apologists protested that it wasn't necessary for Jesus to actually share the same grave with the wicked, that being buried in the same neighborhood was close enough to fulfill the prophecy, the counter-missionaries countered that if they claim that Jesus fulfills the prophecy, it has to be all correct, no "close enough" stuff. I agreed with that, but here it looks like Judaism is resorting to even more figurative interpretations than Jesus being buried within walking distance of the wicked whom he died with.

(2) Couldn't these explanations of how Israel "gave his grave to the wicked" apply to other nations? I am not intending to belittle the mistreatment that Jews have received, but there are other people besides Jews that have been killed unjustly, given wicked burials, or have been killed for their money. By making the fulfillment spread out over many individuals, it seems to me to lose its impact. Really, what nation on earth has not had some of its individuals subjected to these wicked deaths? On the other hand, one man who fulfilled making his grave with the wicked AND with the rich in his deaths, would be very remarkable.

(3) I just noticed something else. If "deaths" is plural, to indicate that this singular servant is actually a composite of many individuals, why is "grave" singular?

1 -- you don't really understand what the "explicit" meaning is, you are forgetting who is talking, and you are missing that this is a future prophecy, not one that was fulfilled already, so complaining that you don't see a fulfillment is silly. No where in the verse is the word "with" -- that's a matter of interpretation. So already, you are working with interpretation and your further extension into "share a grave" is your interpretation of an interpretation (and "walking distance" would then be an even further distanced interpretation).

2 -- you want to apply it to someone else not listed in the text? Fine, have fun with that. It could refer to King Kong, I guess. I'll stick with what the text says -- it identifies its speakers and subject.

3 -- much of this is in the singular. Cf Hoshea 11:1. I'm not sure why you say the word is "deaths" in the plural (not everyone explains it to refer to death, actually). But those who see the plural "deaths" explain it as the proof that this is talking about a group (many different types of death) and not an individual.

1: The debate pushed by counter-missionaries is about who is talking about whom in Isaiah 53, and when and how it was/will be fulfilled, and I am examining evidence for the various claims.  They are challenging those of other faiths to defend their position. Do you expect me to just believe and remember a conclusion that I am not convinced of yet, just because rabbis know Hebrew better than I do?

In Isaiah 53:9, the Hebrew word Aleph-Thau is found twice and as far as I can see it always has the meaning of a close association. The closest association between the servant's grave and the wicked and the rich would appear to be to have the grave shared. That exactly was what the counter-missionaries were insisting that Jesus would have to do (among other things, of course) to qualify to be the servant of the passage. They, not I, were insisting on this, and I am saying that there is apparently a double standard being used in the counter-missionary movement.  THEY SAID that Jesus couldn't flex the interpretation of Aleph-Thau enough to be buried within walking distance, but YOU SAY that Aleph-Thau is so flexible that it can mean that some Israelites got killed in a robbery.

What do I say? I SAY that Jesus actually did share a grave with the wicked, and I can show why I say that. I hadn't gotten to that yet, but you were very quick to interpret my remarks as my own beliefs.

2: If you just stick with the text, it does not state who is speaking. The text mentions Isaiah, daughter of the Chaldeans, Jerusalem, Israel, kings shutting their mouth, "my servant", and God, and others. Which of those could be speaking regarding whom in which passages is what people have decided based on the content of each passage. How do you know that God is speaking in verse 11, for example? It isn't because the text says, "Thus says God..." but because the content says "my righteous servant" and we know that it is God's servant.  Why did you decide that the speakers in verse 3, for example, are the kings referring to Israel? Not because it says, "Thus say the kings..." but because you believe that you know that Israel is despised by the kings and no one else fits that content.

3: Hosea 11 is an interesting example, because after referring to Israel in the singular, it then begins to refer to Ephraim in the plural, then in verse 5, back to the singular.  I never have denied that the singular servant could refer to the nation Israel. I am just asking you to look at the content and see if that interpretation is justified. I used the spelling "deaths" because that is what the counter-missionaries used. It seems that you are saying that the counter-missionaries are cherry-picking interpretations that will give missionaries the hardest time and hiding the fact that there are other interpretations.

In fact, Jesus did die more than one death, and I can show this, too.