The Israelites cried out for God to act for them. He had done so in their past history, but they needed His help now. Probably the believing remnant was requesting help.
51:9 Israel's call for God to awake assumes that He had not been active in helping His people recently. Isaiah, speaking for the Israelites, described the Lord's delivering power in action for His people as His arm (cf. v. 5; 53:1). His arm had defeated the Egyptians and Pharaoh in the Exodus in the past, here described respectively as Rahab (cf. 30:7; Ps. 87:4) and the dragon (cf. Ezek. 29:3). Rahab and the dragon were also part of the mythological lore of the ancient Near East. By using these names, Isaiah was undoubtedly stressing Yahweh's ability to overcome all the pagan gods and every other power opposing their salvation.
51:10 The pagans credited their gods with drying up a sea of material chaos and creating the world in prehistory. Isaiah pointed to God drying up the Red Sea in the historical Exodus as evidence that He could redeem His people again.
". . . the Old Testament insists on setting the rock of history (actual event, actual testimony) under its theology."550
Isaiah frequently used the image of God making a way, pathway, or highway for His people so they could enter into the blessings that He had planned for them (cf. 9:1; 11:16; 19:23; 30:11, 21; 35:8; 40:3; 42:16; 43:16, 19; 48:17; 49:11; 57:14; 62:10). I wonder if this is the origin of the early Christian use of "the way"as a title for Christianity.
51:11 The consequence of the Lord's arm again providing redemption for His people was that the exiles would return to Zion from Babylon with great joy (cf. 35:10). The joy at this return was only a foretaste of the joy His people would experience as a result of His redemption through the Servant and their return to the Promised Land in the Millennium (cf. 55:12).
Verses 12-16 record the Lord's response to the cry just recorded.
51:12 The Lord described Himself again as the only true, self-existent God. Such an one as He would indeed comfort His people (cf. 40:1). The Israelites did not need to fear the Babylonians or any other human enemy because they were only mortals. The immortal God would defend them.
51:13 The Israelites had forgotten the type of person Yahweh their Maker, the Creator, was or they would not have been afraid.
". . . to live in fear of humans is to have effectively forgotten God. . . . It is easy to say certain theologically correct things, such as that he is both the world's and our maker, that he is the one who stretched out the heavens and founded the earth, while giving the lie to those fine words by our continually living as though he can do nothing to prevent humans from doing ultimate harm to us [cf. Rom. 8:39]. . . . Yes, oppressors may hurt us, even kill us, but they do not have the power to make us fear them or hate them."551
51:14 God promised to free the exiles soon and to supply their needs.552While this was true of the Babylonian exiles, the promises of salvation in this section of the book anticipate a larger spiritual redemption as well, as I have noted.553
51:15 The Israelites would not perish because of who their God was. He is Yahweh Almighty, who causes movements among nations just as surely as He causes the waves of the sea to move.
51:16 Though God spoke this verse to Israel, it is clear that only the ideal Israel, the Servant, could be the ultimate fulfillment of what He said. He had put His words in the mouth of the Israelites but would also do so uniquely for His Servant (cf. 49:2). He had provided compassionate care for the nation but would do so in a special way for His Servant (cf. 49:2). He would use the Israelites to create new heavens and a new earth in the spiritual sense of being His instruments of transformation in the Millennium. However, He would use His Servant to create new heavens and a new earth literally at the end of the Millennium (cf. v. 6: Rev. 21:1-22:5). And He would use the Servant to reaffirm His commitment to Israel in the future. How God would use the Servant to do all this becomes clearer in 52:13-53:12, the final Servant Song. This was a fitting culminating assurance to the Israelites.
