A Pool of Important Images

            I’d invite you to re-read this chapter.  “Why?” you ask.  Re-read it because this language forms the pool from which the prophets will draw imagery about God’s judgment.  Isaiah, in particular, will fish in this pool.

            So, here is specifically covenantal language.  It is addressed to Israel, as a nation, as she is about to enter the next stage of her national existence.  If she keeps her end of the covenant, the Lord will bless her; if she doesn’t, the Lord will punish her—as a nation—with exile.  Isaiah sees the disobedience piling, and he sees in the Assyrians (700 years later) the working out of those national curses.  Isaiah also sees the days coming when Judah will face similar consequences because of her idolatry.

            Now, here’s the thing.  Isaiah (and other prophets) often take blessings and curses specific to Israel and draw them into a larger eschatological framework.  That is, they see in the national fate of Israel an intimation, a foreshadowing, of the fate of God’s whole world.

            Christian reflection grabs that larger framework and runs it through Jesus, through Whom all of God’s plans and purpose of the world.  Then, Christian reflection uses that same language and imagery to describe the ultimate fate of God’s whole world.

            So re-read this chapter, because this is imagery that, while specific to the nation of OT Israel in this case, will find wider application in the reflection of what God ultimately has in mind for His creation, through Jesus.