The Hebrew Prophets after the Shoah. Hemchand Gossai

Чтение книги онлайн.

Читать онлайн книгу The Hebrew Prophets after the Shoah - Hemchand Gossai страница 5

Автор:
Серия:
Издательство:
The Hebrew Prophets after the Shoah - Hemchand Gossai

Скачать книгу

am I; send me!”

      And he said, “Go and say to this people:

      ‘Keep listening, but do not comprehend;

      keep looking, but do not understand.’

      Make the mind of this people dull,

      and stop their ears,

      and shut their eyes,

      so that they may not look with their eyes,

      and listen with their ears,

      and comprehend with their minds,

      and turn and be healed.”

      Then I said, “How long, O Lord?” And he said:

      “Until cities lie waste

      without inhabitant,

      and houses without people,

      and the land is utterly desolate;

      until the Lord sends everyone far away,

      and vast is the emptiness in the midst of the land.

      Even if a tenth part remains in it,

      it will be burned again,

      like a terebinth or an oak

      whose stump remains standing when it is felled.”

      While much has been written and spoken about the call of Isaiah, the details of the text beyond the well known and foundational “‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And I said, ‘Here am I; send me!’” lies a very problematic and challenging outline of what is at the forefront of the call. Indeed the call of Isaiah is not only a matter of sending the prophet to proclaim a message to the people that contains a quality of indictment because of injustices, and perchance a possibility of redemption. Rather, this message given to Isaiah to be pronounced to the people, and in so doing be effected, is one of utter devastation. The principal message is to destroy and sever the relationship. There is no point of restoration, but rather an utter annihilation of the present. If the message that is given to Isaiah is taken for what it is, and not even to imagine it to a logical conclusion, it would be of apocalyptic proportions. The prophet is to speak to the people and cause them to lose their relational quality: no intellect, no hearing, no sight, no capacity to comprehend, no healing. But beyond their personal incapacities, the people are scattered, and land, homes are destroyed. No longer is there a sense of home or belonging, even as communities and families will be separated and scattered. One is left to wonder what is God’s end plan. The vocabulary in this text itself tells the devastating story: no comprehension; no perception, dull; deaf; blind; no healing; wasteland; forsaken; desolation; burnt to the ground; displacement; emptiness! With such destruction, the prophet’s response is encapsulated in, “How long?” Just as well that the prophet is not given an inkling of the message before he accepts! One is reminded that the “How long, O Lord?” question has more to do with a lamentation than a quest for a timeline. Yet, surely this cannot be enough. Such devastation cannot only be met with a sigh that suggests a sense of resignation. If the prophet does not raise his voice under such circumstances, then what is the message to those who today face such devastation and genocide by those with power to destroy? Painful as it is to say and acknowledge, Isaiah at this point is complicit with God’s and this complicity underlines the destructive role of silence under these circumstances. What might have been the difference or consequence had he said, no?

      Posing the Difficult Questions

      In reading biblical texts interpreters must not only resist the temptation of navigating around the many challenging acts attributed to God, but resist the very tempting notion of seeking to justify divine acts of violence that by any measure under different circumstances might be extraordinarily difficult to justify.

Скачать книгу