Isaiah 6 and Mark 4, what do yee reckon?

JimiTime

Below are scriptures from Isaiah and Mark. It seems to indicate that God doesn't want certain people to actually understand the truth. What do ye reckon? I'd request that this be a Christian response thread. Thanks.


Isaiah 6.

9 He said, "Go and tell this people:
" 'Be ever hearing, but never understanding;
be ever seeing, but never perceiving.'

10 Make the heart of this people calloused;
make their ears dull
and close their eyes. [a]
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed."


Mark 4.
Jesus said, "You can know the secret about the kingdom of God. But to other people I tell everything by using stories 12 so that:
'They will look and look, but they will not learn.
They will listen and listen, but they will not understand.
If they did learn and understand,
they would come back to me and be forgiven

PDN

Hi Jimi.

Great question! Many Bible commentators see this as one of the most difficult passages to understand or to explain. Nevertheless, I am going to attempt to explain it!

The passage in Isaiah was referring to a people who were already under God's judgment because of their rejection of the Word of God. They had voluntarily chosen not to listen to God, so God gave them what they wanted! He allowed them to become deaf to His voice.

This is similar to the passage in Exodus where Pharaoh hardened his heart against God on several occasions. Then the Scripture slightly changes its wording. Instead of saying "Pharaoh hardened his heart" it becomes "God hardened Pharaoh's heart".

In Mark's Gospel Jesus is saying that the Pharisees had already rejected a very simple and unambiguous message from God, "Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand." Now, because of their continued rejection of the words of both John the Baptist and Jesus, God says, in effect, "OK! You want to be deaf to my word. So be it! I'll make it so you can't even understand simple illustrations and parables."

The apostle Paul said something similar about the things of the Cross being foolishness to those who are perishing (1 Corinthians 1:18) and indeed that it is veiled to those who are perishing (2 Corinthians 4:3). As the Old Testament puts it in Genesis - "My Spirit will not strive with man forever" (Genesis 6:3).

I think we see this when some otherwise very intelligent people seem to manage to totally misunderstand the point of Jesus' parables, reaching some amazing interpretations. At first I thought they were deliberately being obtuse, particularly since 5-year olds in a Sunday School class can grasp such parables with no difficulty, and I got quite annoyed with those people. However, I think now that my annoyance was misplaced. If these people have deliberately rejected the very clear message of salvation, and indeed have sneered at it at every opportunity, then maybe God really has prevented them from understanding some very simple illustrations and stories.

Fanny Cradock

Why, in your opinion, would God do this? I can't see the gain from such a position. Surely it would only serve to make them more entrenched in their opinion. Would this not entail God making fundamental changes to a person?

JimiTime

^^I'd second that question. I can understand God not helping those who harden their own hearts against him, but why would he actually reinforce this feeling. Why not just leave them to it?

Slav

Both these two passages, Mark and Isaiah, are about the free will that mankind enjoys, nothing else. No extra action required from God to harden Pharaoh's heart or making Judah's people in Isaiah's time not to understand as a) Pharaoh's heart was hard enough and Judah's people were ignorant enough already and b) indeed why would He do that?

I think it's clear that in Isaiah 6:10 God only acknowledges the will of His people rather then tells Isaiah His own will. Otherwise it would contradict with the whole Isaiah 5 and there would be no point in calling Isaiah for his mission as it's obvious that people's hearts had been already calloused, ears dull and eyes closed by the time Isaiah stood in front of Him in the Temple.

On the other hand I think it's worth mentioning that not every Bible translation uses the verb 'make' in Isaiah 6:10. For instance, if you check Young's Literal Translation (a good starting point BTW before trying to understand the Hebrew original for all of us who are not fluent in that beautiful language) you'll see 'declare' instead. Also the version of the Bible that I use even says something like "because their hearts are calloused… " and so on. That makes more sense for me as the Isaiah's mission was to reveal it to people how dull and blind there were and by no means to strengthen them in their fallacies.

Mark 4:11-12 is about the same. God gave them (us) abilities to see and to hear but they (we) choose not to use them: "that seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand". But this time Jesus by His sacrifice opened the Kingdom of Heaven for all and gave a message on how to get there. However what He cannot do is just simply to bring us there; it's now up to us, our free will and hard work: "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you" (Luke 11:9)

JimiTime

Slav wrote: »

Both these two passages, Mark and Isaiah, are about the free will that mankind enjoys, nothing else. No extra action required from God to harden Pharaoh's heart or making Judah's people in Isaiah's time not to understand as a) Pharaoh's heart was hard enough and Judah's people were ignorant enough already and b) indeed why would He do that?

I think it's clear that in Isaiah 6:10 God only acknowledges the will of His people rather then tells Isaiah His own will. Otherwise it would contradict with the whole Isaiah 5 and there would be no point in calling Isaiah for his mission as it's obvious that people's hearts had been already calloused, ears dull and eyes closed by the time Isaiah stood in front of Him in the Temple.

On the other hand I think it's worth mentioning that not every Bible translation uses the verb 'make' in Isaiah 6:10. For instance, if you check Young's Literal Translation (a good starting point BTW before trying to understand the Hebrew original for all of us who are not fluent in that beautiful language) you'll see 'declare' instead. Also the version of the Bible that I use even says something like "because their hearts are calloused… " and so on. That makes more sense for me as the Isaiah's mission was to reveal it to people how dull and blind there were and by no means to strengthen them in their fallacies.

Mark 4:11-12 is about the same. God gave them (us) abilities to see and to hear but they (we) choose not to use them: "that seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand". But this time Jesus by His sacrifice opened the Kingdom of Heaven for all and gave a message on how to get there. However what He cannot do is just simply to bring us there; it's now up to us, our free will and hard work: "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you" (Luke 11:9)

Thanks Slav, that would certainly make more sense to me at present. The language does seem to indicate God doing something though. In Mark, Jesus says, I speak in illustration so that they will listen but not hear. unless thats a bad translation, its saying that the message is being hidden from them.

PDN, you are proficient in Greek are you not? Any chance of you referencing the Greek? Is the Mark scripture I quoted an accurate translation to your knowledge?

philologos

It actually would appear to me, that the people do not will to know of God, and do not concern themselves with this. It is referring to the apathetic view to the search for God in society. No matter how much some people will hear they will turn down the message or they will refuse to understand it as it was intended to be understood.

wolfsbane

JimiTime wrote: »

^^I'd second that question. I can understand God not helping those who harden their own hearts against him, but why would he actually reinforce this feeling. Why not just leave them to it?

As a judgement against them. A shutting of the door, to mark their abandonment to their sin.

Matthew 11:25 At that time Jesus answered and said, “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes. 26 Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight. 27 All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.

Privileged sinners - in this case religiously learned Jews - who reject the light are left in darkness, with further light denied them. But to the foolish and ignorant, God reveals Himself in saving light.

All were sinners, but God has chosen to save whom He will - and He wills to save mostly the foolish, weak, base and despised rather than the wise, mighty, noble of this world.

Slav

JimiTime wrote: »

PDN, you are proficient in Greek are you not? Any chance of you referencing the Greek? Is the Mark scripture I quoted an accurate translation to your knowledge?

As far as I can see that sentence in Mark 4:12 is in conjunctive mood. With my very limited knowledge of Greek I would literally translate it as something like:

"So they seeing would see but would not perceive…" and so on.

I noticed that often Greek conjunctive mood is translated as indicative mood, probably for a reason. However I'm not so sure if it's correct to translate it as an indicative Future Simple as in the version you quoted (it's New Century, isn't it?); moreover in the majority of translations it's translated differently.