Sunday, July 25, 2021

Yehezkel Kaufmann on the Universalism on "Second Isaiah"

  

. . . there is no basis for efforts to attach the thought of Deutero-Isaiah to the spirit of the age, to the influence of the Babylonian civilization as it developed during the Persian period, that is, to the influence of Zarathustrian thought; or even to relate it to intellectual currents which appeared at that time in areas of Hellenistic culture. The universalism of Deutero-Isaiah is rooted in the universalism of Israel, which is ancient and prophetic and unrelated to intellectual currents of the pagan world. The God in whose name Deutero-Isaiah speaks is unknown to the gentiles. There is no reference in his prophecies to groups in the gentile world which are spiritually akin to him; and also, there is no polemic whatsoever against the concepts of pagan faith. (Yehezkel Kaufmann, The Babylonian Captivity and Deutero-Isaiah [History of the Religion of Israel Volume IV; New York: Union of American Hebrew Congregations, 1970], 99)