Isaiah 56:1

“Thus saith the LORD” marks what follows as God’s own word, carrying his full authority. The name is Yᵉhôvâh, the covenant name of God, connected with the verb “to be”. It names the God who lives for ever, does not change and keeps his promises, so both the command and the promise in this verse rest on who he is.

The command has two parts. To keep judgment is to guard and hold to what God has set down as right. The verb is shâmar, to guard or keep with care, and mishpâṭ (“judgment”) comes from the root meaning to judge. It can mean a verdict, a sentence or a legal decision, and more broadly justice and right order, what is fair and right in God’s sight and between people. To do justice is to carry that out in action. The word for “justice” here is tsᵉdâqâh, righteousness, and the verb is ʻâsâh, the everyday word for doing or making.

Keeping speaks of holding fast to God’s standards, and doing speaks of putting them into practice. Together they call for fair treatment of others, protection for the vulnerable, and life lived by God’s standards everywhere, in the courts, in the way society is ordered, in business and in ordinary dealings with neighbours. These were the foundational values of Israel’s life under the law of Moses, and the prophets call for them again and again. Amos asks for judgment to run down as waters (Amos 5:24), and Micah sums up what the LORD requires of us (Micah 6:8).

This verse opens the last part of the book, chapters 56 to 66. Here Isaiah looks ahead to the people who would return from captivity in Babylon, rebuilding Jerusalem and the temple amid disappointment and opposition, still waiting for the fullness of what God had promised. The chapters that follow deal with the people’s sins at home and with the question of who truly belongs to God’s people, and this verse sets their tone.

“For my salvation is near to come” gives the reason for the command. The word for salvation, yᵉshûwʻâh, comes from a verb meaning to save or deliver, and it covers deliverance, help, victory and welfare. Scripture can use it of a rescue that people carry out, as when Jonathan “hath wrought this great salvation in Israel”, but all salvation comes from the LORD in the end, and here he calls it “my salvation”. “Near”, qârôwb, speaks of time, and also of how certain and ready God’s deliverance is. It is about to break into the life of his people, and they are to be ready for it in the way they live.

The second line says the same thing in other words: “and my righteousness to be revealed.” The verb gâlâh means to uncover or lay bare, and so to reveal or make known. God’s righteousness is his own perfect rightness, his faithfulness to his covenant and his commitment to setting things right in the world. When it is revealed, everyone will see it in what he does, because his saving acts display who he is. Isaiah has already spoken of God bringing his righteousness near (Isaiah 46:13), and later he speaks again of the righteousness and salvation that God will bring to Zion (Isaiah 62:1–2).

“Blessed”, ʼesher, means happiness or blessedness, and it is used as an exclamation: “how happy!” It describes the person who is fortunate and blessed by God. This is the familiar form of a beatitude, which opens the first psalm and appears in Proverbs (Psalm 1:1–3, Proverbs 3:13), and which Jesus uses of those who hunger and thirst after righteousness (Matthew 5:6). The law had already set blessing before Israel for hearing the LORD and keeping his commandments (Deuteronomy 28:1–2).

“This” points back to the command of verse 1 and on to the two things this verse names. “The son of man” repeats “the man” in a parallel line. In Hebrew bên (“son”) with ʼâdâm (“man”) means simply a human being, and the blessing is given to any person who lives this way, with no mention of Israelite birth. The verses that follow make that reach plain. The LORD speaks to the foreigner who joins himself to him and to the eunuch who keeps his Sabbaths, promises to bring them to his holy mountain and make them joyful in his house, and calls that house “an house of prayer for all people” (Isaiah 56:3–7).

“Layeth hold”, châzaq, means to fasten upon or seize, and also to be strong. The blessed person has a firm grip on this way of life and keeps hold of it.

The blessed life is described by two things that person keeps. “Keepeth the sabbath” uses shâmar, the verb of “keep ye judgment” in verse 1: to guard and observe with care.

To pollute the Sabbath is châlal, to profane it, treating as common what God has set apart as holy. The same verb can mean to bore or wound, to break one’s word, or to begin something. Applied to the Sabbath, it covers anything that violates the day’s purpose as a day of rest, worship and remembrance of God’s work of creating and redeeming, such as ordinary labour or buying and selling. Profaning what God had made holy was a serious offence against his plain command. The Sabbath was a sign of the covenant and set Israel apart from the nations around them, which is why it is the one practice named here, and why the eunuchs of verse 4 are described as those who keep the LORD’s Sabbaths.

“And keepeth his hand from doing any evil” turns from the holy day to the whole of a person’s conduct. The hand, yâd, stands for what a person does, his power and his actions. “Doing any evil” joins ʻâsâh (“doing”) with raʻ (“evil”), and covers every kind of wrongdoing, injustice and harm. This is the moral teaching of the whole law, which told Israel to walk in all the ways the LORD commanded (Deuteronomy 5:32–33).

So the person God calls blessed honours him in worship and in daily conduct alike. The Sabbath stands for devotion to God and the hand kept from evil for integrity before people, and together they describe the whole of obedience.

The salvation that was “near to come” arrived in Jesus Christ, in his birth, his life, his death and his resurrection. He is God’s saving power in person, and in him God’s righteousness is revealed. Paul says that the righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel (Romans 1:17), and that it is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe (Romans 3:21–26). Jesus is the righteous Branch whom Jeremiah foretold (Jeremiah 23:5–6).

His first coming brought salvation and revealed righteousness to those who believe. His second coming will complete it, when he will judge the living and the dead (2 Timothy 4:1) and make all things new (Revelation 21:5). So the hope of this verse is fulfilled in what Jesus has done, what he is doing now, and what he will yet do.

Jesus is also the man who did all that verse 2 describes. He kept the Sabbath according to its true purpose, bringing healing, freedom and rest, and he is Lord of the Sabbath (Mark 2:27–28). He was tempted in every way and was without sin (Hebrews 4:15). Through him believers are counted righteous (2 Corinthians 5:21), and God himself works in them both the desire and the power to do his will (Philippians 2:13). That is how a believer lays hold of a life of obedience, as the fruit of union with Christ. He invites all who labour to come to him and find rest (Matthew 11:28–30).

These two verses give us a God whose salvation is certain and close at hand, and whose righteousness will one day be seen by all. His promise comes first, and the life he asks for answers it. Waiting for him is an active waiting, filled with fair dealing, care for the weak and lowly, and honesty in every part of life, and that kind of life is a witness to a faithful God who is setting all things right.

The verses also show that worship and conduct belong together. The day set apart for God and the hand kept from evil are one obedience, and God calls the person who lives this way happy. That blessing is offered to any son of man who takes hold of it, and in Christ the way to it stands open.