Book Description

Violence disturbs. And violent depictions, when encountered in the biblical texts, are all the more disconcerting. Isaiah 63:1-6 is an illustrative instance. The prophetic text presents the Arriving One in glory details ("trampling down people"; "pouring out their lifeblood" cf. v.6). These descriptions sound particularly odd within the so-called "Trito-Isaiah" where appealing images of God occur (cf. "mother" in 66:13; "father" in 63:14; 64:8 ; "redeemer" in 59:20; 60:16; 63:16). Further, the introductory note that the Arriving One is "coming from Edom" (cf. v.1) adds to the arresting tone of the text. Whereas the expansive vision of "Trito-Isaiah" includes even the foreigners into house of the Lord (cf. 56:6-8), the unrelenting animosity towards Judah's nearest neighbor, Edom, takes a troubling story. The present project proposes that there is more to this text than mere violence and animosity. As the title of the thesis indicates, the inquiry engages two themes: the gory depiction and coming from Edom. A social identity reading begins by paying attention to the contested context of Third Isaiah, in which the chosen text resides. Building upon the growing scholarly consensus that dual relation (kindship and animosity) marks the Edom-Israel relationship, the proposed category-proximate "other"- is employed as a heuristic tool in order to highlight that Edom was Israel's persisting "other" which shared a permeable boundary with the former. As a result, ambivalence abounds in Israel's portrayal of Edom. The trajectory of the enquiry then moves from the larger Edom-Israel story to the three Isaian depictions of Edom (Isa 11;34;63). Finally, Isa 63:1-6 is read in the light of the delineated aspects (persisting category, permeable boundary, and ambivalence) of proximate "other." The proposed social identity reading not only grants the option of steering clear of an easily assumed decimation of Edom but also aids in reiterating the prophetic identity-reviving vision. An iconographic reading, on the other hand, engages the gory portrayals of the Coming One. Informed by the scholarly attestation that the Third Isaiah locus was a marginal context, the analysis pays particular attention to the descriptions of marginality in Isa 63:1-6. The setting, the two challenging questions, the depiction of the Trampling One, and the details of his action are all filled with such descriptions. As these details ("stooping," "without help," and "apalled [desolate]") can be correlated to the experiences of the exiles, the prophetic vision grants the scope of imagining the Arriving One as standing in solidarity with the once "stooped" exiles. Nonetheless, the descriptions of marginality make up only a part of the Isaian vision because the text also leaves behind other emphatic affirmations ("mighty" and "splendidly robed" cf. v.1; "alone" cf. v.3). And it is through these affirmations that the relegated voice of the divine reasserts itself and therein rests the hope of the margianl community's reclamation of its own correlated identity.