Is.9:2-7 Ist Cut

1) REB has the last line of v. 2 read dwellers in a land as dark as death. I think of Mordor.

2) How is every birth a sign of hope. Note hope, not certainty, not optimism.

How does joy get increased (v.2)?

3) Not everyone is familiar with farming. In v. 3 what would be analogies to joy at the harvest.

4) v.6 The translation is has been born to us. This bothers folks who want this to be precisely predictive of the Messiah.

5) For Christians the royal titles get reformed in light of Christmas and Handel's Messiah.

6) I love v. 5's future sense that combat boots and bloody clothes will be used for a funeral pyre for oppression

7) Day of Midian I would assume refers to Gideon in  Jdg. 6-8

8) government is a tough translation, due to its rarity, so authority works well in NRSV. It has a sense of the burden of office, maybe some symbol is being referred to in royal regalia.

 

Is. 52:7-10

1) The angelic messenger brings word of peace. Publishes salvation, in an internet age, it acquires new potency.

2)Sing for joy 2x, like the stones of Jerusalem for Jesus, even the ruins will sing

3) Where do we wish to see the bared arm of God right now? How did the Incarnation change that expectation, if at all? Even here, the bared arm brings peace, comfort, and redemption.

4) The Zion watchmen are presaging the sight for everyone.

 

Ps. 96 Sing a new song to the Lord. Why would one sing a new song? Notice that at the end of this and 98, nature itself sings, a la Joy to the World. Ps. 148 continues the thme, with texcellent addition of sea monsters. If you wished, this would be a good place to introduce chaos v. creation motifs. Raising up a horn=raising up the standard of power, here it is reconfigured for us as the Messiah, Jesus.

 

I really don't knwo what to do with the piece about Hannah, other than to note that her prayer is almost a template for the Magnificat.