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Exodus Typology in Second Isaiah

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Exodus Typology in Second Isaiah Bernard W. Anderson Exodus Typology in Second Isaiah Chapter XII of B. Anderson & W. Harrelson, eds., Israel's Prophetic Heritage: Essays in Honor of James Muilenburg. Harper & Brothers, 1962. pp. 177-195 Recent discussions of Biblical hermeneutics have dis- frequently results in an overinterpretation of the Old played a new, although cautious, interest in typology Testament. as a means to express the Biblical understanding of 1 It may be helpful to take another look at this question history. Usually typology is regarded as a way to un- by turning away from the problem of the unity of the derstand the dramatic unity of the Scriptures, on the Bible. This fact deserves emphasis: typology is funda- supposition that events of the Old Testament, seen mentally a mode of historical understanding. It does from the angle of Christian faith, foreshadow and point not deal in the first instance with the relation between beyond to the decisive event of God’s revelation in the canons of the Old and the New Testaments. Jesus Christ. just as every stage of a drama moves to- Whether it is suitable to the New Testament depends ward the final denouement, so the events of the Old upon the prior question of the relevance of this mode Testament are held to be types or images which an- of interpretation to the Christian proclamation of ticipate the greater fulfillment in the time of the new God’s historical action in Jesus Christ. Therefore, I pro- covenant, when the sacred history of God’s dealings pose to reconsider typology as a mode of historical with men reaches its climax. From the early centuries interpretation by concentrating on a small area of of the Church typology has been used to ‘interpret the Scripture which has had a profound influence upon the Old Testament; and this kind of interpretation is New Testament, namely, the poems of Second Isaiah deeply rooted in the New Testament itself, as shown found in Isa. 40-55. by Leonhard Goppelt in his study Typos: die typolo- gische Deutung des Alten Testaments im Neuen (1939). I Whether this ancient interpretive method is relevant today, when historical criticism has thrown new light To begin with, it is necessary to draw a distinction be- on the original significance of Biblical passages, is a tween allegory and typology, particularly with regard moot question. Typology is regarded, even by those to the ontology which each presupposes. To be sure, who stress the unity of the Bible, as a neither of these terms is found in the Old Testament; but the possibilities of historical understanding for 178 which each term stands were available to Israel, as 2 “dangerous exercise.” When employed to show the evidenced by the long struggle between the prophetic Christocentric unity of the Bible, it may— and often (or “historical”) and pagan (or “mythological”) views of does— impose an artificial unity upon Scripture and existence. Allegory presupposes a view of existence which depreciates, if not abolishes, the meaningfulness of concrete, historical time. According to this view, 1 See the summary in H.J. Kraus, Geschichte der historisch-kritischen man encounters reality by freeing himself from time Enforschung des Alten Testaments von der Reformation bis zur Gegenwart (1956), pp. 432-440. For a perspicacious re-evaluation of and history and relating himself to that which is time- typology, see the article by Walther Eichrodt, “Ist die typologische less and eternal. Concrete history is not the realm of Exegese sachgemässe Exegese?” in Suppl. VT, IV (Volume du Con- reality; therefore, there is no remembrance of a past grès, Strasbourg, 1956), pp. 161-180. Also G.W.H. Lampe and K.J. which shapes the present or no hope for a future of Woollcombe, Essays in Typology, SBT, 22 (1952). 2 fulfillment. His- G.E. Wright, God Who Acts, SBT, 8 (1952), p. 66. In his Theologie des Alten Testaments, Vol. II (1960), Gerhard von Rad gives an excellent 179 discussion of the relations between the Testaments (pp. 329-424), including a fresh treatment of typological interpretation (pp. torical events move in a cycle of eternal recurrence 375-387). and, at best, are only temporal embodiments of time- less truths. This historical understanding is summed up or timeless principles but disclose in their concreteness in Goethe’s words: “Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein and temporality that which is ultimately real. Accord- Gleichnis.”3 It is not surprising that allegory flourished ing to this view, man’s concern is not to free himself in Greek culture, especially under the influence of from time and history, but rather to realize the mean- Plato, who provided philosophical sanction for the ing of history, through the remembrance of the past, ontology presupposed in the ancient mythological participation in history’s drama in the present, and view of existence.4 facing the future in hope. Specifically, man under- Under Hellenistic influence the Church has resorted to stands himself in relation to a “crucial event,” the sig- allegory from time to time in order to find scriptural nificance of which he shares and confesses as a mem- similitudes for the eternal meaning of Christian doc- ber of a community of faith (cf. Dt. 26.5-10). Viewed trines, held to be timelessly true even though revealed from this point of vantage, previous events are seen to at a point in time. Thus the allegorist moves away be an anticipation of the decisive event; and subse- quickly from the literal meaning of a passage to the quent events are understood as the consequences spiritual meaning that is articulated in the doctrines which flow from it, pointing toward an even greater guarded by the Church. By and large, the Reformers fulfillment. rejected allegory as a hermeneutical method and re- Typological thinking is not a peculiarity of the Biblical turned to typology, with its emphasis upon the histori- faith. It may be found in any historical community, cal pattern of God’s saving deeds. But since the En- such as the American, within which men remember a lightenment, allegory has returned through the back decisive event whose meaning was anticipated by a door, so to speak— disguised in the interpretation of previous history and is being fulfilled in the course of the Bible as the record of man’s discovery of “timeless subsequent history. This kind of thinking, however is truths” and “abiding values.” To be sure, this modern peculiarly intense in the Bible owing to the witness view is characterized by a greater historical realism and that the ultimate meaning of human life is bound up relativism than prevailed in Hellenistic times. It is im- with events in which God has revealed himself and has portant for the critic to recover the historical matrix of formed a special community for the realization of his ideas and to understand the social and personal dy- historical purpose. And such thinking is found namic which brought them to birth; but “the historical pre-eminently in Second Isaiah. For him, history was occasion, once it is past, is more or less irrelevant ex- not the matrix of ideas which the interpreter can sepa- cept for the purposes of illustration.”5 Here we find our- rate from their historical occasion, as the husk is re- selves on Goethe’s ground: Biblical teachings are moved from the pure grain; rather, Israel’s history, with similitudes of rational truths. From this standpoint, its center in crucial historical moments like the Exodus Second Isaiah may be regarded as “a thinker and a from Egypt, was the sphere of the action of God to poet, rather than a prophet,” who “formulated relig- inaugurate a new age which would include Israel and ious and theological principles of universal the nations. 180 181 validity” and thereby “endowed his words with perma- 6 II nent significance.” So regarded, his contribution was that he freed Israel’s religion from the particularities of In the development of Second Isaiah’s eschatological Israel’s history and set forth ideas and principles whose message, one of the dominant themes is that of the validity is independent of the historical circumstances new exodus. Previous prophets, to be sure, had ap- through which they were mediated. pealed to the memory of the Exodus.7 But it was Sec- Typology, on the other hand, is primarily concerned ond Isaiah who, more than any of his prophetic prede- with history. Events are not symbolic of eternal truths cessors, perceived the meaning of the Exodus in an eschatological dimension. “The conception of the new exodus,” writes Professor James Muilenburg in his su- perb commentary, “is the most profound and most 3 “Everything temporal is only a similitude.” The opening lines of the prominent of the motifs in the tradition which Second final ode of Faust (Part II, Act V). I am indebted to my colleague Will Isaiah employs to portray the eschatological finale.”8 In Herberg for this quotation and for helping to sharpen in my mind the distinction between allegory and typology, as set forth in these this respect he goes beyond Isaiah of Jerusalem [i.e., paragraphs. ‘First Isaiah’], with whom he shares the themes of the 4 See Mircea Eliade, Cosmos and History: The Myth of the Eternal Return (Harper Torchbook, 1954), pp. 34-35. 5 The quotation is from C. R. North, The Old Testament Interpretation of History (1946), pp. 153-154. North vigorously criticizes the pre- 7 Hos. 2.14-15 [H 2.16-17]; 11.1; 12.9, 13 [H 12.10.14]; 13.4-5; Am. 2.9- suppositions of this approach. Italics are mine.
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