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Isaiah 61 · a question people ask

"The Lord GOD’s Spirit is on me" (61:1). Who is speaking?

In the text

The chapter doesn't name him. He says, "the LORD has anointed me" and "He has sent me" (61:1), and he says what he is sent to do (61:1-3). In 61:8-9 the LORD speaks, as the WEB's quotation marks show: "For I, the LORD, love justice" (61:8). Then someone says, "I will greatly rejoice in the LORD! My soul will be joyful in my God" (61:10), and that verse doesn't name the speaker either. The New Testament's words on 61:1-2 are Luke's. In the synagogue at Nazareth (Luke 4:16) "The book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. He opened the book, and found the place where it was written" (Luke 4:17), "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor" (Luke 4:18). Then he "sat down" (Luke 4:20) and said, "Today, this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing" (Luke 4:21). The thread on this chapter follows those verses. These notes say no more than Luke says.

The verses

“The Lord GOD’s Spirit is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to those who are bound, to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, to provide for those who mourn in Zion, to give to them a garland for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified.”
Isaiah 61:1-3 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Isaiah 61

Isaiah 61: Good news to the humble

When Jesus read Isaiah 61 in Nazareth, the words Luke gives end at "the acceptable year of the Lord" (Luke 4:19), before "the day of vengeance of our God" (Isaiah 61:2). And in Hebrew the bridegroom who "decks himself" (Isaiah 61:10) does it with a priest's verb, the verb of "minister to me in the priest’s office" (Exodus 28:1).

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions