Isaiah 53:8-9 He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living… Meyer, Alford, and others understand this as equivalent to, "Who can describe the wickedness of the men of this time?" Hengstenberg interprets it, "Who shall declare His posterity?" i.e. His spiritual children, born of the travail of His soul. Delitzsch translates, "Of His contemporaries, who considered this: ' He was snatched out of the land of the living, seeing that, on account of the transgression of My people, vengeance fell on Him?'" "Who shall declare His generation?" A difficult clause. The Hebrew word for "generation" (dor) may mean — (1) The time in which He lived. (2) The circle of His contemporaries. (3) Those like-minded with Him (Psalm 41:7; Psalm 14:5; Proverbs 30:11, etc.); but is never used with any such significance as "length of life," or "life-history," or "posterity." We may take it in the sense (2), and render with R.V. "and as for His generation who (among them) considered," etc. (Prof. J. Skinner, D.D.) Parallel Verses KJV: He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken. |
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