This time his father slapped him across the face.

28. Isaiah 53:6

We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the Lord has punished Him for the iniquity of us all. —
Isaiah 53:6

Solomon Ginsburg was born in Poland in 1867 to a Jewish rabbi who named him after the most glorious of the kings of Israel. Rabbi Ginsburg envisioned his son becoming a spiritual leader for Eastern European Jews. One night when Solomon was thirteen, he and his father were celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles in a small tent near their home. Solomon picked up a book of Hebrew prophets and turned randomly to Isaiah 53, which he read. His curiosity was stirred.

“To whom does the prophet refer in this chapter?” he asked his father. His question was greeted with silence, so he repeated it. This time his father slapped him across the face.

Years passed. Solomon moved to London and took a job in a dry goods store owned by his uncle, an orthodox Jew.

“One Sabbath afternoon while passing through Whitechapel Street,” Ginsburg recalled, “I met a missionary to the Jews—a converted Jew—who invited me to hear him preach at the Mildmay Mission to the Jews on the 53rd chapter of Isaiah. Now, I was particularly interested in this certain chapter of the Bible because... I could not but remember that scene in the tent and, of course, went, out of curiosity, to see if he had a better explanation to give than the one my father had given.
“That was the turning point. I went to hear him explain that marvelous prophetical chapter and though I could not understand it all at that time, it sank into my heart. He asked me to read the New Testament, and when he called my attention to the wonders of the life of the Messiah and how every prophecy was fulfilled in Jesus, I was soon convinced that the Son of Mary, the crucified One, was the Christ of God, the Messiah of Israel, the Rejected One of my people.”

Ginsburg was abandoned by his family, beaten and nearly killed by angry friends; but he became a powerful evangelist and missionary with enough adventures to fill an autobiography and whose lifelong message was the Messiah of Isaiah 53:6.

This verse begins with we all and ends with us all. It follows verse 5 naturally, and the two verses should be memorized side by side. Both are at the heart of the Old Testament’s greatest chapter on the atoning death of the coming Messiah. The details of Christ’s crucifixion as given predictively in Isaiah 53, coupled with its personal and universal application, have convinced multitudes of people to follow Jesus Christ. In the stories of Jewish converts to the Lord Jesus, this passage is frequently mentioned.

As trait after trait swings into focus and fulfillment, can we write any other name under Isaiah’s amazing portrait of the sublime Sufferer in chapter 53 than Jesus of Nazareth? —

J. Sidlow Baxter

* 100 Bible Verses Everyone Should Know by Heart.