Chapter 6
Isaiah 53 — The Suffering Servant as Substitutionary Sacrifice

Introduction: The Old Testament's Greatest Atonement Text

If you could only keep one Old Testament passage to build a theology of the atonement, which would you choose? For most Christians throughout history, the answer has been obvious: Isaiah 52:13–53:12. This passage, known as the Fourth Servant Song, is the single most important Old Testament text for understanding why Jesus died and what His death accomplished. It is, in the words of David Allen, "the capstone text in the OT with reference to the atonement."¹ And it stands as the primary Old Testament foundation for penal substitutionary atonement.

That is the thesis I want to defend in this chapter. Isaiah 52:13–53:12 depicts a figure who suffers and dies not for his own sins but as a substitute. He bears the sins and punishment of others. He takes upon himself what rightly belongs to them. And this passage, more than any other in the Hebrew Bible, lays the groundwork for what the New Testament authors would later proclaim about the cross of Jesus Christ.

We are going to walk through this passage verse by verse. I want us to feel the weight of each phrase, to examine the Hebrew vocabulary, and to understand why generation after generation of readers — Jewish and Christian — have recognized something extraordinary happening in these words. Along the way, we will engage with objections from scholars who read the passage differently, and we will see how the New Testament writers consistently understood Isaiah 53 as fulfilled in the substitutionary death of Christ.

A word of caution before we begin. Because this passage is so rich and so central, it would be easy to rush through it. I want to resist that temptation. If the argument of this book is right — that penal substitutionary atonement stands at the center of a multi-faceted understanding of the cross — then Isaiah 53 is one of the most important pieces of evidence in the entire case. It deserves our careful, patient attention.

This chapter builds on the groundwork laid in the two preceding chapters. In Chapter 4, we examined the Old Testament sacrificial system — the burnt offerings, sin offerings, guilt offerings, and fellowship offerings that formed the heart of Israel's worship. In Chapter 5, we studied the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), the annual ritual in which the sins of the entire nation were dealt with through blood sacrifice and the scapegoat. Both of those chapters revealed a consistent theological logic: sin creates a problem between God and His people, and God Himself provides the means to address that problem through the substitutionary death of a sacrificial victim. Isaiah 53 takes that logic and applies it not to an animal but to a person — a righteous Servant who willingly lays down his life as a guilt offering for the sins of others. The sacrificial threads we traced in Chapters 4 and 5 converge here in a portrait of breathtaking clarity.

The Text: Isaiah 52:13–53:12 (ESV)

Let me begin by presenting the full text. I encourage you to read it slowly, even if you know it well. Sometimes the most familiar passages surprise us when we slow down and really listen.

52:13 Behold, my servant shall act wisely; he shall be high and lifted up, and shall be exalted. 14 As many were astonished at you — his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the children of mankind — 15 so shall he sprinkle many nations. Kings shall shut their mouths because of him, for that which has not been told them they see, and that which they have not heard they understand.

53:1 Who has believed what he has heard from us? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? 2 For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. 3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4 Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned — every one — to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

7 He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. 8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? 9 And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.

10 Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. 11 Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore I will divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.

The Structure of the Song

Before diving into the details, it helps to see the big picture. The Fourth Servant Song is carefully structured in five stanzas or paragraph units: 52:13–15; 53:1–3; 53:4–6; 53:7–9; and 53:10–12.² The passage begins and ends with God speaking. In 52:13, the LORD introduces His Servant and promises that He will be "high and lifted up, and shall be exalted." In 53:11–12, God speaks again, declaring that the Servant "shall make many to be accounted righteous" and will be given a great reward. The middle sections (53:1–9) are spoken by a group of people — a "we" who confess their earlier misunderstanding of the Servant's suffering and now see it for what it truly was.

This structure matters because it means the entire passage is framed by God's perspective. The human speakers in the middle get their understanding of the Servant wrong at first. They think he is being punished for his own sins (53:4b). But then they come to realize the stunning truth: he was suffering for their sins all along (53:4a, 5–6). And God Himself, speaking at the beginning and end, confirms this understanding.

We should also appreciate the literary context within the book of Isaiah. Gathercole, drawing on Janowski's work, places Isaiah 53 within the wider framework of Isaiah 40–55. The people of Israel are hard-hearted and disobedient; they refuse to repent and be gathered by God. They are described as "deaf" and "blind" (Isaiah 42:18–20). Despite this, God undertakes to redeem them. He gives words of comfort (chapter 40) and promises he has not forgotten Israel (44:21). As these chapters unfold, it becomes clear that God is raising up a Servant who is distinct from the nation — an individual who will be instrumental in saving the people.⁴ This Servant suffers in chapter 53, cruelly forsaken by the nation, and yet later the people come to realize that he had accomplished their salvation. The passage is thus not a free-floating poem but the climax of a sustained theological argument about how God will save His people despite their persistent unfaithfulness.

The Identity of the Servant

Who is this Servant? Isaiah never tells us directly, and that very ambiguity has fueled centuries of debate. Allen notes that at least sixteen different individuals have been proposed as candidates, including the prophet Isaiah himself, a later prophet, or some other historical figure.³ Some Jewish interpreters have identified the Servant with the nation of Israel as a whole — suffering collectively in exile.

There are good reasons, however, to conclude that the Servant is an individual distinct from the nation. The Servant is distinguished from the people throughout the passage: "he" suffers for "our" sins (53:4–6). The emphatic Hebrew pronouns make this contrast unmistakable. As Bernd Janowski observes in his important study, the passage presents a "drama of delayed recognition" in which the people of Israel gradually come to realize that the Servant — whom they had wrongly assumed was suffering for his own guilt — was actually innocent and had accomplished their salvation through his suffering.⁴

Furthermore, Allen points out that the Servant cannot be identified with a corporate entity like the nation of Israel because the broader context requires the Servant to be the agent of Israel's salvation. In chapters 49–52, Isaiah speaks of the anticipation of salvation for the people. In chapters 54–55, God invites the people to participate in that salvation. Isaiah 53 is the key chapter linking these two sections, identifying the means of this salvation: the atoning work of the Suffering Servant. Since the Servant is identified with the "arm of the LORD" who brings about this salvation (53:1), it makes no sense to identify him with the prophet Isaiah or with the people who end up being saved.⁵

When we put on New Testament glasses, the identification becomes clear. The NT authors repeatedly quote and allude to Isaiah 53 and interpret it as referring to Jesus Christ. As we will see later in this chapter, the parallels between the Servant's experience and the life and death of Jesus are, in the words of John Oswalt, "so many and various that they cannot be coincidental."⁶

There is also an important detail in the passage's very first verse. In Isaiah 52:13, the Servant is said to be "high and lifted up, and shall be exalted." This threefold expression in Hebrew is used in only three other places in the entire Old Testament — Isaiah 6:1, 33:10, and 57:15 — and in every case, it refers to Yahweh Himself. As J. Alan Groves observes, "Yahweh's own lips declared that the Servant was to be identified with Yahweh himself."⁷ The Servant is somehow both distinct from God and identified with God. For Christians, this points unmistakably to the incarnate Son.

Verse-by-Verse Exegesis

The Prologue: The Servant Exalted and Disfigured (52:13–15)

God introduces His Servant with a paradox. On one hand, the Servant "shall act wisely" and "shall be high and lifted up, and shall be exalted" (52:13). On the other hand, "his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance" (52:14). The Servant's path to exaltation runs directly through horrifying suffering. This paradox — glory through agony — is the great mystery at the heart of the passage.

Yet the result of this suffering is breathtaking: the Servant "shall sprinkle many nations" (52:15). The verb "sprinkle" (nazah, נָזָה) is priestly language. It is used of the high priest sprinkling sacrificial blood on the Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16:14–15; cross-reference Chapter 5 for the full treatment of Yom Kippur). The Servant's suffering, then, is not meaningless. It has a priestly, purifying, atoning purpose — and it extends not just to Israel but to "many nations." Kings themselves will be left speechless before what God has done through His Servant.

The Servant Despised and Rejected (53:1–3)

"Who has believed what he has heard from us?" The speakers now shift. A group — most likely the people of Israel, though the indeterminacy may be intentional — begins to confess their earlier blindness. The Servant grew up "like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground" (53:2). There was nothing outwardly impressive about him. "He had no form or majesty that we should look at him." He was the opposite of what people expected in a deliverer.

Verse 3 intensifies: "He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." The word translated "grief" (choli, חֳלִי) can also mean "sickness" or "pain." The Servant's suffering was real, intense, and comprehensive. He was not a figure who floated above human agony. He entered into it fully. And the response of the people? "We esteemed him not." They turned away. They hid their faces. They assumed he was nobody worth paying attention to.

The Heart of the Matter: Substitutionary Suffering (53:4–6)

These three verses are the theological center of the entire passage. They are, I believe, among the most important verses in the Old Testament for understanding the atonement. Everything we have been building toward in the previous chapters — the sacrificial system (Chapter 4), the Day of Atonement (Chapter 5) — converges here.

Verse 4: "Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted."

Two Hebrew verbs demand our attention. The first is nasa (נָשָׂא), which means "to bear" or "to carry." The second is sabal (סָבַל), which means "to carry as a heavy burden." Both are loaded with substitutionary meaning. Allen explains that nasa is "reminiscent of sacrificial language found in Leviticus. On Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the scapegoat would 'bear' (nasa, 'carry away') the sins of the people."⁸ The use of sabal implies the bearing of a burden that belongs to someone else (cf. Isaiah 46:4, 7).⁹ These are not words for merely sharing in someone's troubles. They are words for taking on what belongs to another. The Servant carries what is ours.

Allen further notes a crucial grammatical detail. Isaiah's use of the active voice in verse 4 — in contrast to the passive voice in the surrounding context — makes it clear "that the Servant's choice to take the sins of the people upon Himself was his own decision and act."¹⁰ This is not something done to the Servant against his will. He actively takes our burdens upon himself.

Then comes the confession: "yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted." The speakers now admit their earlier mistake. When they saw the Servant suffering, they assumed God was punishing him for his own sins. They were spectacularly wrong. The Hebrew text makes this contrast between "he" and "we" emphatic by using independent pronouns that function as stressed subjects. Craig translates verse 4 following H.-J. Hermisson: "Surely our infirmities — he bore them / and our diseases — he carried them."¹¹ The emphasis could not be clearer. Our burdens. He bore them.

Verse 5: "But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed."

If verse 4 introduces the idea of substitutionary bearing, verse 5 makes it unmistakable and adds a penal dimension. Notice the structure: "He" ... "for our ...," "He" ... "for our ...," "upon Him ...," "by His ... we are ...." The pronouns alternate relentlessly between the Servant and the people, drawing an emphatic contrast between his suffering and their benefit.¹²

The language is not merely substitutionary; it is also penal. The Hebrew word translated "chastisement" is musar (מוּסָר). This word frequently carries the meaning of corrective punishment or discipline. It is not just suffering in general; it is punishment. And the phrase "chastisement that brought us peace" is rendered by J. Alec Motyer as "our peace — punishment," conveying the meaning "the punishment necessary to secure or restore our peace with God."¹³ The Servant endured a punishment — and that punishment accomplished something: it brought us shalom, wholeness, peace with God.

The Hebrew preposition translated "for" in the phrases "pierced for our transgressions" and "crushed for our iniquities" is min (מִן), which can indicate cause or source — "because of" our transgressions. Some scholars, like R. N. Whybray, have argued that this means the Servant merely suffered "because of" others' sins in the sense that their sins caused his suffering — not that he suffered as their substitute.¹⁴ Morna Hooker illustrates this point by noting that Jews who perished in the Holocaust could be said to have been "wounded because of Hitler's transgressions," but this does not mean they suffered instead of him.¹⁵

Jeffery, Ovey, and Sach provide a devastating response to this objection. They point out that even if min means "because of," this does not rule out substitution. Consider an analogy: if a child strays too close to a bonfire and his mother leaps forward to rescue him, suffering burns herself, she suffers "because of" his disobedience — and yet her suffering is clearly substitutionary. She suffered in his place, and the child was spared.¹⁶ Furthermore, they note that even if Whybray were right that a different Hebrew preposition (be) would be needed for substitution, Isaiah actually uses that very preposition in the second half of the same verse: "by [be] his wounds we are healed."¹⁷ Isaiah was apparently determined to leave no room for doubt.

But the most decisive evidence against Whybray's reading comes from the emphatic pronominal contrasts and the broader context. Jeffery, Ovey, and Sach identify seven features of the text that confirm its substitutionary character. The Servant is explicitly said to suffer "for" others, with the contrast between "he" and "we" underlined by emphatic Hebrew pronouns. His suffering brings great benefits to those for whom he suffers — specifically, their peace and healing — which makes no sense if he is merely suffering alongside them rather than instead of them.¹⁸

Verse 6: "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned — every one — to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all."

This verse is, as Allen observes, "probably the key verse in the Old Testament asserting the unlimited, universal nature of the atonement."¹⁹ The Hebrew word kullanu ("all of us") appears at both the beginning and the end of the verse, forming emphatic bookends. It begins with "All we" and ends with "us all." The scope is deliberately universal — all have gone astray, and the LORD has laid on the Servant the iniquity of all.

The critical verb here is paga (פָּגַע), translated "has laid on." Allen explains that the text says explicitly "that God is the initiator of this act of suffering and substitution."²⁰ The LORD is the active agent. God Himself places the sin on the Servant. This echoes the Day of Atonement ritual in which the high priest laid his hands on the scapegoat's head and confessed the sins of the people over it (Leviticus 16:21). The Servant is "the provision and plan of God, who himself superintends the priestly task of transferring the guilt of the guilty to the head of the Servant, giving notice that this is indeed his considered and acceptable satisfaction for sin."²¹

I should pause here to address an important theological question. If the LORD Himself lays the people's iniquity on the Servant, does this make God the author of injustice? Is God cruelly punishing an innocent victim? Not at all — and this is where the passage's own details protect us from a caricature. The Servant goes willingly (53:7, 12). The Father does not drag an unwilling victim to the slaughter. As we will argue at length in Chapter 20, the cross is not the Father pouring out rage on an innocent bystander. It is the Triune God — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — acting in unified, self-giving love to absorb the consequences of human sin. The Father sends; the Son goes willingly; the Spirit empowers. And the purpose is not cruelty but redemption.

We should also notice the universal scope implied in this verse. Allen observes that the Hebrew kullanu ("all of us") bookending the verse points to a universal intention. While those who hold to limited atonement have sometimes appealed to the word "many" elsewhere in the passage as a restricting term, Allen points out that the first-person plural pronouns ("we," "our," "us") are intentionally indeterminate in their scope. Though Isaiah likely refers to himself and the people of Israel in the first instance, the Servant's ministry extends beyond Israel. Isaiah 42:6 and 49:6 indicate that the Servant will be "a light for the nations," and the Servant's work in 52:15 extends to "many nations" whose kings are left speechless.⁶⁰ The scope of the Servant's atoning work, then, is not limited to one nation. It encompasses all peoples.

Allen further notes that the Jewish scholar Joachim Jeremias demonstrated that in pre-Christian Jewish interpretation, the "many" in Isaiah 53 was extended to include the Gentiles. The Hebrew word rabbim ("many") does not mean "many but not all." In Semitic usage, it is inclusive: "the totality, consisting of many." The Johannine tradition confirms this, paraphrasing "for many" as "for the life of the world" (John 6:51c).⁶¹ This has significant implications for the scope of the atonement, which we will treat at length in Chapter 30.

Fr. Joshua Schooping, an Eastern Orthodox priest who defends penal substitutionary atonement from within the Orthodox tradition, draws special attention to the use of paga in Isaiah 53:6. He notes that the logic of the Levitical scapegoat is clearly at work: iniquity is "laid" upon the Servant such that He bears it. Schooping argues that the language of Isaiah is "even more emphatic as regards imputation" than the Levitical sacrificial texts, because the iniquity is laid upon the Servant and He is said to bear it in a way that accomplishes intercession for others.²² The imputation of sin to the Servant — their guilt being placed on him — is, Schooping argues, "unambiguously established on Scriptural grounds, and cannot be said to be the product of 16th Century theorization."²³

The Servant's Silent Suffering and Judicial Death (53:7–9)

Verse 7: "He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth."

The Servant's silence is remarkable. He does not protest, argue, or resist. He goes willingly, "like a lamb that is led to the slaughter." This lamb imagery is deeply sacrificial. Every New Testament reference to Jesus as the "Lamb of God" traces back to this verse.²⁴ When John the Baptist sees Jesus and declares, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29), he is invoking the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53. When the book of Revelation portrays Christ as "a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain" (Revelation 5:6), it is drawing on the same image. The lamb led to the slaughter in Isaiah 53 becomes the interpretive key for the entire New Testament's understanding of Jesus' death.

The Servant's willingness is a crucial theological point. He is not an unwilling victim. His silence before his oppressors reflects not helplessness but voluntary, purposeful submission to the divine plan. As Jesus would later say, "No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord" (John 10:18). This willingness is essential for answering the "cosmic child abuse" charge that some level against penal substitutionary atonement. The Servant — and by extension, Christ — is not a passive victim of divine violence. He is an active participant in the redemptive plan, going to his death with full knowledge and deliberate intent.

Verse 8: "By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?"

Notice the judicial language: "oppression and judgment." The Servant undergoes a legal process. He is "taken away" — seized and condemned. And notice the critical phrase at the end: "stricken for the transgression of my people." Here, God Himself is speaking (through the prophet), and He confirms what the human speakers in verses 4–6 were confessing: the Servant was stricken not for his own sins but for the transgressions of God's people. Craig highlights this as clear confirmation of the punitive, substitutionary nature of the Servant's suffering.²⁵

Verse 9: "And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth."

The Servant dies and is buried. But the text emphasizes his innocence: he "had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth." This is not a sinner suffering the just consequences of his own wrongdoing. This is a righteous one suffering for the sins of others. The contrast could not be starker — and it demolishes any reading that tries to make the Servant merely a fellow-sufferer who shares in the people's deserved punishment.

The Servant as Guilt Offering: God's Redemptive Purpose (53:10–12)

Verse 10: "Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand."

This verse is perhaps the most theologically dense in the entire passage. Three things stand out.

First, the divine initiative: "it was the will of the LORD to crush him." The mistreatment of the Servant by human beings turns out to be part of God's redemptive plan. Allen emphasizes that the emphatic placement of the divine name, Yahweh, at the beginning of the clause underscores that "God Himself is behind both the salvation plan and the specific means by which it would be accomplished."²⁶ This creates a profound theological tension — God wills the Servant's suffering, yet this is not cruelty, because the purpose is redemptive and the Servant goes willingly.

Second, and crucially, the sacrificial terminology: the Servant's death is described as an asham (אָשָׁם) — an "offering for guilt" or "guilt offering." This is explicit sacrificial language drawn directly from the Levitical system (Leviticus 5–7; cross-reference Chapter 4 for the full treatment of the OT sacrificial system). The asham was the guilt offering or trespass offering, one of the primary expiatory offerings in the Levitical system.²⁷ Both the sin offering (chattat) and the guilt offering (asham) were accompanied by the recurrent priestly formula: "So the priest shall make atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them" (see Leviticus 4:20, 26, 31, 35; 5:6, 10, 13, 16, 18; 6:7). The concepts of atonement for sin and forgiveness of sin are constantly linked in the Levitical system. And standing behind the entire system is the foundational principle of Leviticus 17:11: "For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul."^27b By calling the Servant's death an asham, Isaiah is saying that the Servant's death functions as a genuine sacrifice for sin — not metaphorically, but in direct continuity with the sacrificial system that God Himself had instituted.

Craig engages at length with scholars who reject the cultic or sacrificial meaning of asham in this context, preferring instead "the means of wiping out guilt" from a purely legal rather than sacrificial background.²⁸ Craig finds these objections weak. While explicit atonement vocabulary (kpr) is not used in Isaiah 53, the concept is clearly present. The Servant "pours out himself to death" and gives "his life" as an offering — language strongly reminiscent of Leviticus 17:11's foundational principle that "it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul." And the comparison of the Servant to "a lamb that is led to the slaughter" (v. 7) can hardly be interpreted in any way other than sacrificial terms.²⁹

Third, and stunningly, the passage says that despite his death (v. 9), the Servant "shall see his offspring" and "shall prolong his days" (v. 10). How can a dead man have children and live long? Isaiah must be speaking of something beyond death — of resurrection. As Allen notes, "clearly Isaiah must be speaking of the Servant's resurrection since the dead do not have children."³⁰ The atonement and the resurrection are linked even here in the Old Testament, just as they are in the New Testament's foundational confession: "Christ died for our sins... He was buried... He was raised" (1 Corinthians 15:3–4).

Verse 11: "Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities."

The Servant is called "the righteous one" — further confirmation of his innocence. And the result of his suffering is that he will "make many to be accounted righteous." This is justification language. The righteous Servant takes on the iniquities of the many; the many are declared righteous on the basis of what the Servant has done. Oswalt draws attention to the emphatic positioning in the Hebrew: "'it is their iniquities that he carries.'"³¹ The substitutionary logic is unmistakable: his bearing their iniquities is the grounds on which many are made righteous.

The verb "bear" in verse 11 is sabal (סָבַל), the same word used in verse 4. It means to carry as a heavy load, to bear a burden that belongs to someone else. And the object of this bearing is "their iniquities" (avon, עָוֺן). Craig emphasizes that in the Old Testament, the expression "to bear sin" (nasa chet) when used of sinners typically means "to be held liable to punishment" or "to endure punishment."³² The Servant, however, bears not his own sins but the sins of others — and he does so not symbolically (like the scapegoat) but through genuine, punitive suffering.³³

Verse 12: "Therefore I will divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors."

The final verse functions as a summary and climax. God promises to exalt the Servant — and the reason is given: "because he poured out his soul to death." This is voluntary self-sacrifice. "He was numbered with the transgressors" — he was identified with sinners, counted among them, treated as one of them. Jesus Himself quoted this very phrase on the night before his crucifixion: "For I tell you that this Scripture must be fulfilled in me: 'And he was numbered with the transgressors'" (Luke 22:37). "He bore the sin of many" — again, substitutionary bearing of sin, using the verb nasa (נָשָׂא). And "he makes intercession for the transgressors" — priestly mediation on behalf of the guilty. On the cross, Jesus fulfilled this very role when he prayed, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34).

Notice too that verse 12 emphasizes the Servant's willingness yet again. Allen observes that "the Servant does not suffer as a passive or unwilling victim but rather willingly and with deliberate intent. God's promise to exalt the Servant in verse 12a is predicated upon the Servant's willingness to offer Himself up to die as a sacrifice on behalf of the people."³⁴ The entire pericope begins (52:13) and ends (53:11–12) with God's perspective, forming a frame that confirms the divine origin and divine approval of the Servant's saving work.

Allen observes a beautiful wordplay that ties the entire passage together. The same Hebrew word nasa is used in both 52:13 and 53:12 but with different meanings. In 52:13, the Servant will be "extolled" (nasa) — lifted up, exalted. In 53:12, the Servant "bore" (nasa) the sin of many. This creates what scholars call a lexical inclusio — a word that bookends a passage and ties it together. The Servant who carried (nasa) the sin of the people is the very one who will be exalted (nasa) by God Himself.³⁴

Motyer captures the priestly and mediatorial significance of the Servant's work: "In the former [v. 6] the Lord makes his Servant the sin-bearer, in the latter [v. 12] the Servant interposes himself on behalf of those whose sins he bears: he is thus the mediator between God and us (6) and us and God (12)."³⁵

Engaging the Objections

Objection 1: The Servant Suffers "Because Of" Others' Sins, Not "In Their Place"

We have already engaged this objection in our treatment of verse 5, but it deserves further attention because it is the most common scholarly challenge to a substitutionary reading. The argument, associated with Whybray and Hooker, claims that Isaiah 53 merely describes the Servant suffering as a result of others' sins — their sins caused his suffering — rather than as a substitute bearing the punishment due to others.

I believe this reading fails for multiple reasons. First, as we have seen, the emphatic pronoun contrasts throughout verses 4–6 make no sense on a merely causal reading. The whole point of the contrast between "he" and "we" is that what belongs to "us" — our griefs, sorrows, transgressions, iniquities — is transferred to "him." Second, the benefits that flow from his suffering — peace, healing, being made righteous — only make sense if the Servant is taking something away from the people, not just suffering alongside them. Jeffery, Ovey, and Sach make this point forcefully: "It is not just that the Servant shares in the people's fate, and experiences their suffering alongside them. Rather, he experiences the punishment due to them, and they do not. Indeed, the sufferings experienced by the Servant are not shared by Israel precisely because he experienced them in their place, as their substitute."³⁶

Third, and most critically, the phrase "bearing sin" (nasa + avon/chet) in the Old Testament consistently refers to bearing the consequences or punishment of sin, not merely experiencing suffering as a byproduct of someone else's wrongdoing. Allen notes that both nasa and sabal in verses 11–12 "speak of the bearing of both guilt and punishment." He further observes that "only in Isaiah 53 are these phrases used of a person and not of an animal in this fashion," concluding that "Isaiah affirms the Suffering Servant as offering a penal substitutionary sacrifice for the sins of the people."^36b The vocabulary itself, rooted in the Levitical sacrificial system, demands a substitutionary interpretation.

Craig drives this point home by noting that when sinners are said to "bear sin" in the OT, it typically means being held liable to punishment (Leviticus 5:1; 7:18; 19:8; 24:15; Numbers 5:31; 9:13; 14:34). The Servant, however, bears not his own sins but those of others. This distinguishes him from the Levitical scapegoat, which merely symbolically carried sin away, and from ordinary sinners, who bear their own guilt. The Servant uniquely bears the punishment for others' sins.³⁷

The German Old Testament scholar Otfried Hofius, who has studied the passage with extraordinary care, concludes that the Servant's substitutionary punishment is the "dominant and central theme" of Isaiah 53.³⁸ What makes Hofius's testimony so striking is that he personally finds the concept troubling. He writes that the ideas of substitution "are simply outrageous" and that "being freed up from sin and guilt through human substitution is theologically simply unthinkable!" And yet, as Jeffery, Ovey, and Sach observe, "It can hardly be said that Hofius has found penal substitution in Isaiah 53 because he likes the idea.... He is compelled by the sheer weight of evidence to admit that this teaching is there, even when he would rather it were not."³⁹

Objection 2: Hess's "Christus Victor" Reading of Isaiah 53

William Hess, writing from an Eastern-influenced, Christus Victor perspective, offers a sustained alternative reading of Isaiah 53 in his book Crushing the Great Serpent. Hess makes several arguments that deserve a fair hearing.

First, Hess emphasizes the original context of Isaiah 53 as referring to Israel in Babylonian exile. He argues that the passage was originally about the unjust suffering of God's people at the hands of foreign oppressors, and that the "we/us" language refers to the foreign nations who are the oppressors, not to "all of mankind."⁴⁰ Second, Hess appeals to Matthew 8:17, where Matthew quotes Isaiah 53:4 ("He took our illnesses and bore our diseases") in connection with Jesus' healing ministry — not his death. Hess argues that if "bearing" our griefs means healing rather than absorbing punishment, the substitutionary reading is undermined.⁴¹ Third, Hess argues that when the text says "we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God," it is describing a mistaken human perspective — the people wrongly thought God was punishing the Servant, when in fact the suffering was inflicted by human oppressors.⁴² Fourth, Hess compares the ESV with the Septuagint (LXX) translation and argues that the LXX often softens or redirects the language in ways that do not support penal substitution. For example, in verse 10, where the ESV says God willed to "crush" the Servant, the LXX says to "purge" him.⁴³

Hess raises some genuinely useful points. He is right that Hebrew poetry requires careful reading, that we should not divorce the passage from its original historical context, and that the LXX translation provides a helpful window into how ancient readers understood the text. He is also right that caricatures of PSA — depicting God as an angry deity who needs to vent his rage on someone — should be rejected. I agree with him on that point entirely (see Chapter 20 for my full treatment of the Trinitarian love of God in the atonement).

However, I believe Hess's reading ultimately falls short in several important ways.

First, regarding the original context: while it is true that Isaiah 53 may have an initial reference to Israel's suffering in exile, the passage itself moves beyond that context. The Servant is distinguished from the people (the "he"/"we" contrasts), his suffering brings benefits to others that mere shared suffering cannot explain, and his death is described as a guilt offering (asham) — sacrificial terminology that makes no sense as a description of Israel's exile. Furthermore, if the passage refers only to Israel's suffering at the hands of oppressors, how do we explain verse 10's statement that "it was the will of the LORD to crush him"? On Hess's reading, God would be willing the unjust oppression of His own people by foreign nations — a deeply problematic theological claim. Hess himself concedes that the word "crush" (daka) in the Hebrew cannot simply be dismissed, and the passage clearly says it is the LORD who does the crushing, not merely the human oppressors. The text is not describing mere human cruelty; it is describing divine action for a redemptive purpose.

Second, regarding Matthew 8:17: Matthew's application of Isaiah 53:4 to Jesus' healing ministry does not exhaust the passage's meaning. The New Testament applies Isaiah 53 in multiple ways, and Matthew's use of one verse for one application does not cancel out Peter's use of the passage for the atonement (1 Peter 2:22–25) or the broader NT pattern of reading Isaiah 53 as fulfilled in Christ's substitutionary death. Matthew is drawing out one dimension of the Servant's work — his compassionate identification with human suffering — without negating the other dimensions. This is actually strong evidence for the multi-faceted nature of the Servant's work. The same passage speaks to Christ's healing ministry and to his atoning death, because both flow from his willingness to enter into and bear human brokenness.

Third, regarding the "mistaken perspective" argument: Hess is right that the speakers in verse 4b initially misjudge the Servant's suffering. They think he is being punished for his own sins. But verses 5–6 are precisely the correction of that mistaken view. The speakers are not saying, "We were wrong to think God had anything to do with it." They are saying, "We were wrong about why he was suffering — he was suffering for our sins, not his own." And verse 10 explicitly confirms God's involvement: "it was the will of the LORD to crush him."

Fourth, regarding the LXX: while the Septuagint is an important witness, Hess himself acknowledges that the word "crush" (daka, דָּכָא) appears in both verse 5 and verse 10 of the Hebrew text, and that dismissing it entirely in favor of the LXX "would not be prudent or intellectually honest."⁴⁴ Moreover, the LXX of Isaiah 53:12 uses the verb anaphero (ἀναφέρω, "to bear up") for the Servant's bearing of sin — the same verb that 1 Peter 2:24 uses when it says Christ "bore our sins in his body on the tree."⁴⁵ So even the Septuagint, far from undermining substitutionary atonement, provides key vocabulary that the New Testament authors used to explain Christ's death in substitutionary terms.

The New Testament Use of Isaiah 53

The New Testament authors read Isaiah 53 as fulfilled in Christ's substitutionary death. This is not a matter of one or two proof-texts. It is a pervasive pattern across multiple NT writers and genres.

John Stott catalogs the extraordinary scope of NT usage: eight specific verses from Isaiah 53 are quoted as having been fulfilled in Jesus. Isaiah 53:1 is applied to Jesus by John (John 12:38). Matthew sees Isaiah 53:4 fulfilled in Jesus' healing ministry (Matthew 8:17). Peter echoes Isaiah 53:5–6 and 53:9, 11 (1 Peter 2:22–25). Philip explains Isaiah 53:7–8 to the Ethiopian eunuch as "the good news about Jesus" (Acts 8:30–35). Stott concludes that "every verse of the chapter except Isaiah 53:2 is applied to Jesus in the New Testament, some verses several times."⁴⁶

Let me highlight the most important NT texts that depend on Isaiah 53:

Acts 8:32–35: The Ethiopian eunuch is reading Isaiah 53:7–8 in his chariot. He asks Philip, "About whom, I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?" And Philip, "beginning with this Scripture, told him the good news about Jesus." This passage confirms that the earliest Christian proclamation identified Jesus as the Suffering Servant and understood his death as the fulfillment of Isaiah 53.

Romans 4:25: "Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification." This is widely acknowledged as a direct echo of Isaiah 53:12, where the Servant "was handed over for their sins." Gathercole notes that even Morna Hooker — who had famously argued against seeing Isaiah 53 behind every tree in Paul — acknowledged this verse as "a clear echo of Isaiah 53."⁴⁷

1 Peter 2:22–25: This passage constitutes, in Craig's words, "a brief meditation on Isaiah 53 in application to Christ."⁴⁸ Peter quotes Isaiah 53:9 ("He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth") and echoes Isaiah 53:4–5, 7, and 11–12 as he affirms that Christ "bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed." The verb Peter uses for "bore" is anaphero (ἀναφέρω), the same word the Septuagint uses in Isaiah 53:12. Schooping draws special attention to this connection: Peter is deliberately using Isaiah's sacrificial vocabulary to interpret Christ's death as substitutionary sin-bearing.⁴⁹

Hebrews 9:28: "Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him." The phrase "to bear the sins of many" directly echoes Isaiah 53:12. Craig observes that "Christ is described as a voluntary, expiatory sacrifice, offered, in the language of Isaiah 53, to bear the sins of many."⁵⁰ (For the full exegesis of Hebrews' atonement theology, cross-reference Chapter 10.)

Matthew 8:17: "This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah: 'He took our illnesses and bore our diseases.'" Matthew applies Isaiah 53:4 to Jesus' healing ministry. As I noted in responding to Hess, this does not negate the substitutionary atonement reading — it shows that the Servant's work encompasses multiple dimensions, including compassionate identification with human suffering and physical healing, alongside the deeper work of sin-bearing on the cross.

1 Corinthians 15:3: "Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures." Gathercole makes a compelling case that the "Scriptures" in view here almost certainly include Isaiah 53, since this is the Old Testament's primary text about someone dying for others' sins. He argues that this earliest Christian confession — pre-Pauline, going back to the very first Christian community — already enshrines a substitutionary understanding of Christ's death rooted in Isaiah 53.⁵¹ (For the full treatment of 1 Corinthians 15:3, cross-reference Chapter 9 on the broader Pauline witness.)

Beyond these direct quotations, Stott notes numerous allusions by Jesus Himself. Jesus said he would be "rejected" (Mark 9:12; cf. Isaiah 53:3), "taken away" (Mark 2:20; cf. Isaiah 53:8), and "numbered with the transgressors" (Luke 22:37; cf. Isaiah 53:12). He was "silent before his judges" (Mark 14:61; 15:5; cf. Isaiah 53:7) and made "intercession for the transgressors" on the cross: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34; cf. Isaiah 53:12).⁵² (For a full treatment of Jesus' self-understanding of His death, cross-reference Chapter 7.)

The Question of Human Sacrifice

Craig raises an important objection that some scholars bring against the passage: if Isaiah 53 really teaches substitutionary atonement, doesn't that amount to human sacrifice, which the Old Testament consistently condemns?⁵³

Craig's response is illuminating. He acknowledges that Yahweh consistently rejects human sacrifice in the OT, in contrast to pagan nations. But the idea of substitutionary self-offering is not entirely absent. Moses offered to have himself "blotted out" of God's book in order to make atonement for Israel's sin (Exodus 32:30–34). God declined Moses' offer but did not dismiss it as absurd or impossible. Similarly, God's command to Abraham to sacrifice Isaac (Genesis 22) — whom the NT treats as a type of Christ — shows that such a thing is not unthinkable, even if God ultimately provided a substitute.⁵⁴

J. Alan Groves puts it well: "The problem in Isaiah 53 is not the absence of the language of the cult. 'Bearing guilt' is itself the language of atonement, whether the cult is mentioned or not. The problem instead is the humanness of the one making atonement with his sacrifice and death."⁵⁵ The Old Testament sacrificial system used animals as substitutes. Isaiah 53 presents a human substitute — something extraordinary and unprecedented. For Christians, this points to the ultimate reality: only the God-man, fully divine and fully human, could serve as the true and final sacrifice for human sin.

The Unified Witness: Five Features of the Servant's Suffering

The German scholar Hermann Spieckermann, cited by Craig, identifies five features of the Servant's vicarious suffering that capture the theological logic of the passage:⁵⁶

First, one person suffers for the sins of others. Second, the one who intercedes is himself sinless and righteous (vv. 9, 11). Third, the vicarious act occurs once for all, with ramifications for the future (vv. 10–11). Fourth, the one who intercedes does so of his own will (vv. 4–5). Fifth, God intentionally brings about the vicarious suffering of the one for the sins of the others, which displays the unity of will between the LORD and His Servant (vv. 6–10).

On the basis of these five features, Spieckermann concludes that "the main idea behind [the Servant's] vicarious suffering is the close community of will between God and the Servant with the intention of wiping out guilt for the many."⁵⁷ I find this formulation deeply helpful. The atonement depicted in Isaiah 53 is not an act of divine violence against an unwilling victim. It is the result of a shared purpose, a unified will between God and His Servant, aimed at the redemption of the many. This is precisely the kind of Trinitarian, self-giving atonement that I believe the biblical text teaches and that I am defending throughout this book.

Isaiah 53 and the Multi-Faceted Atonement

Before closing, I want to note something important. Isaiah 53 does not only teach penal substitution. It contains multiple atonement motifs woven together. The Servant is a sacrifice (the guilt offering, v. 10). He is a substitute who bears others' sins (vv. 4–6, 11–12). He endures punishment (musar, v. 5). He brings healing (v. 5). He is a priest who makes intercession (v. 12). He achieves victory — he divides the spoil with the strong (v. 12). He is a conqueror who is exalted after suffering (52:13; 53:12). And he accomplishes justification — making many righteous (v. 11).

This is exactly what we would expect if the atonement is a multi-faceted reality with penal substitution at its center. Isaiah 53 does not present substitution and victory as competing models. It presents a single, magnificent work that includes substitutionary sin-bearing, sacrificial offering, priestly intercession, justification, healing, and triumphal exaltation — all in one seamless portrait. The different facets do not compete; they complement. But at the heart of the portrait stands the substitutionary, penal reality: "He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace" (53:5).

Conclusion

Isaiah 52:13–53:12 is, as Allen puts it, "the capstone text in the OT with reference to the atonement."⁵⁸ We have walked through the passage verse by verse and seen that the evidence for a substitutionary, penal understanding is overwhelming. The Servant bears what belongs to others (nasa, sabal). He endures punishment (musar) that produces their peace. God lays on him the iniquity of all (paga). His death is a guilt offering (asham). He is the righteous one who makes many righteous by bearing their iniquities. And the New Testament writers — every one of them — read this passage as fulfilled in the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ.

Scholars like Whybray, who try to soften the substitutionary language, and Hess, who reads the passage through a purely Christus Victor lens, raise questions worth considering. But the cumulative weight of the Hebrew vocabulary, the emphatic pronoun contrasts, the sacrificial terminology, the penal language, the innocent Servant suffering for guilty others, and the uniform New Testament interpretation all point in the same direction. Even Otfried Hofius — who personally finds substitutionary atonement "outrageous" and "theologically simply unthinkable" — is compelled by the text to acknowledge that this is precisely what Isaiah 53 teaches.⁵⁹

Let me close with a personal reflection. I have spent a long time studying this passage, and I continue to find it astonishing. Here, centuries before the incarnation, God revealed through the prophet Isaiah a portrait so detailed, so specific, so theologically rich that it reads almost like a commentary written after the cross rather than a prophecy composed before it. The Servant is innocent. He suffers willingly. He bears the sins of others. His death is a sacrifice — a guilt offering. God Himself initiates the plan. And through it all, healing, peace, and righteousness flow to those for whom the Servant died.

What makes this passage even more powerful is the way it holds together truths that some people want to pull apart. The Servant's suffering is both divinely willed (v. 10) and humanly inflicted (vv. 3, 7–8). It is both an act of substitution (vv. 4–6) and an act of victory (v. 12). It accomplishes both justification (v. 11) and healing (v. 5). It is both a sacrifice (v. 10) and an act of priestly intercession (v. 12). Those who insist we must choose between penal substitution and Christus Victor, between juridical categories and therapeutic ones, between the love of God and the justice of God, have not reckoned seriously enough with Isaiah 53. This passage refuses to let us make those false choices. It weaves together substitution, sacrifice, victory, healing, and intercession into a single, seamless tapestry — and at its heart stands a Servant who willingly takes our place.

I believe the evidence speaks clearly. Isaiah, writing centuries before the cross, painted a portrait of a Suffering Servant who would take upon himself the sins and punishment of others, offer himself as a sacrifice, and through his substitutionary death bring healing, peace, and righteousness to many. When Jesus of Nazareth walked to Calvary, willingly and in obedience to the Father's redemptive purpose, that portrait came to life. The Fourth Servant Song is not just an Old Testament curiosity. It is, as this chapter has argued, the primary Old Testament foundation for penal substitutionary atonement — and one of the most important passages in the entire Bible.