Isaiah 63 Bible study: You are our Father

At 63:7 the chapter turns, and a voice that doesn't name itself says, "I will tell of the loving kindnesses of the LORD and the praises of the LORD, according to all that the LORD has given to us" (63:7). Here is what almost everyone misses: the verse begins and ends with the same word. It opens with "the loving kindnesses of the LORD" and closes with "according to the multitude of his loving kindnesses" (63:7), and in Hebrew both are chesed (tap loving kindnesses). Then the telling begins: "For he said, “Surely, they are my people, children who will not deal falsely;” so he became their Savior" (63:8). "In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them. In his love and in his pity he redeemed them. He bore them, and carried them all the days of old" (63:9). Saved and Savior are one verb, yasha, which the chapter has four times (63:1, 63:5, 63:8, 63:9) (tap saved). Pity is a word the Hebrew Bible has only twice (tap pity), and bore is a verb it has only four times (tap bore).

Isaiah 63:3→leads toRevelation 19:13-15

The one who comes from Edom (Isaiah 63:1) is asked why his clothing is red (Isaiah 63:2), and he answers, "I have trodden the wine press alone" (Isaiah 63:3); the same verse speaks of his garments sprinkled. In Revelation, John sees heaven opened and one on a white horse (Revelation 19:11): "He is clothed in a garment sprinkled with blood. His name is called “The Word of God.”" (Revelation 19:13), and "He treads the wine press of the fierceness of the wrath of God, the Almighty" (Revelation 19:15). On his garment is written "KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS" (Revelation 19:16). Revelation doesn't name Isaiah, and in these verses it names the rider only by these names, so the line's link to Jesus is itself a reading. Some read the rider called "The Word of God" as Jesus, and hear in his garment and his treading the picture of Isaiah 63:1-6, taken up for what Revelation 19 tells. Others read Isaiah 63:1-6 in its own chapter, of the one who comes from Edom and Bozrah (Isaiah 63:1), not as a word about Jesus, and read Revelation 19's garment and wine press on their own. These notes give neither reading a date or an order of events, apply neither to any people, nation or conflict today, and pick neither.

אָבavsay AHV

Brown-Driver-Briggs: "father", and among its uses, "of God as father of his people". Strong's: "father, in a literal and immediate, or figurative and remote application". "For you are our Father, though Abraham doesn’t know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us. You, LORD, are our Father" (63:16). In Hebrew our Father is avinu, and Isaiah has it three times: twice in this verse, and once more in the same prayer, "But now, LORD, you are our Father" (Isaiah 64:8). In the same verse Abraham "doesn’t know us" and Israel "does not acknowledge us" (63:16), and the verse says no more of them.