We come now, in the fourth section of this prophecy to see this same blessed Person tested in every possible way by all this through which He passed, and every fresh test only bringing out some fresh perfection.
"He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as to his generation, who considereth that he was cut off out of the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was stricken? And they gave him his grave with wicked men, and with a rich man when he was dead: because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth."
These are the two characters of fallen man- deceit and violence. So the Psalmist speaks of the "bloody and deceitful man." And so the Lord: "All that came before me were thieves and robbers;" the last, the man of violence- the thief, the man of deceit; and yet both one, for he who will take openly if he has the power, will use deception if he be weak. But how had He used the power which was undeniably His? The mockers at His cross declared it: "He saved others." And when power was used unrighteously against Him, "As a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth."
But "if any man offend not in word," says the apostle, "the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body." Such, then, was His perfection, from whom no pressure of evil could bring aught but good, that overcame it- who, "when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously."
Yet "He was oppressed, and he was afflicted." In Him was no callousness whatever. Look at that Psa. 22, in which, if anywhere, His innermost soul is told out; and mark how every feature of the scene is before Him. With us one sorrow swallows up another; we have not capacity as He, and can little realize even the more outward of His sorrows.
Isa. 53:88He 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. (Isaiah 53:8) has been variously translated. I do not doubt that, as to the first clause, the margin is the more correct: "He was taken away by distress"- better, ‘oppression'- "and judgment." The second clause I would read, as others have suggested: "As to his generation, who considereth that he was cut off out of the land of the living, for the transgression of my people was he stricken?" These are the ingredients of His cup of sorrow: cut off by ‘oppression’, perverting the forms of ‘judgment’, amid a careless and unbelieving ‘generation’, for whose sin He was stricken.'
At the end only is He separated from the malefactors with whom He had been associated, and with whom they had assigned Him a grave; but, his work accomplished, further humiliation was not permitted. We know how, in fact, the rich man interposed to fulfill this prophecy. What He really was began to come out, and to be owned of God. Burial with the rich man was the first only of a series of steps, the last of which placed Him "at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens."