What is marvellous about the verses today?
Note
"Too great a zeal for identifying New Testament events in Old Testament prophetic oracles can yield strange results. The reference in Is 49:23 to kings "who will bow down to you with their faces to the ground." has sounded just enough like the three Magi who visited the infant Jesus (Matt2:1-11) to encourage many to assume that Isaiah's words are messianic. Such an interpretation embarrassingly ignores the context (both kings and queens are mentioned: the issue of the passage is the restoration of Israel after its Babylonian exile), the intent (the language of the oracle intends to show how great Israel's respect will be when God restores Israel), the style (the poetry symbolizes the respect of the nations via images of their rulers as foster parents to Israel and licking the dust at the nation's feet), and the wording (Magi were wise men/ astrologers, not kings) We must be careful that we do not make prophetic oracles, or any part of Scripture, say what we should like it to say. We must try to hear what God intends it to say." (taken from How to Read the Bible for All its Worth by Gordon Fee)
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