Isaiah.
Isaiah.
§ 151. The prophetic books, so called because the prophets wrote them at God’s command, follow the Mosaic or legal books, the historical books, and the doctrinal or poetic books in the canon of the Old Testament. Four major and twelve minor prophets are counted.
Among the major prophets, Isaiah is set in the first position, and he is nineteenth in the order of the canonical books. He is set in the first rank, however, not because he is older than the rest, because chronology shows that Jonah, Hosea, and Amos were earlier in terms of time. Rather, he occupies the first place because of the dignity of his prophetic declarations and because his prophecy is longer than all the rest. Some add this reason: because he was related to the Messiah not only by faith but also by a kinship of blood. He is called 
, as if to say, “the Salvation of the Lord,” whose message Isaiah indeed included in his addresses. Isaiah is called “the son of Amoz” (Isa. 1:1), and the rabbinic scholars claim in this regard that he was the brother of Amaziah, king of Judah, and father-in-law of Manasseh. He began to prophesy in the 3,160th year of the world, seven hundred years before the birth of Christ, while King Uzziah of Judah was still ruling, and he lived to the last days of Hezekiah (Isa. 1:1; 39:3). Therefore he was nearly a contemporary of Hosea, Amos, and Micah and spent the course of his life under four kings of Judah: Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (as is evident from the aforementioned passages).
** Of all the prophets, Christ selected this one to expound publicly in the synagogue of His own country because Isaiah sets forth his prophecies about the Messiah so clearly that he seems to act as an evangelist rather than a prophet. **
Augustine writes about him (De civ. Dei, bk. 18, c. 29): “Isaiah, along with his rebukes of iniquities, his commands of righteousness, and his predictions of an evil future for a sinful people, also prophesied much more than the rest about Christ and the Church, that is, about the King and the city that He founded, so that there are some people who have called him an evangelist rather than a prophet.” Augustine means Jerome, who writes this about him (Epistle ad Paulin.): “To me, Isaiah does not seem to compose a prophecy but the Gospel.” In the introduction to his commentary on Isaiah, Jerome writes: “I shall explain Isaiah in such a way that I shall reveal him not only as a prophet but also as an evangelist and an apostle.” Also: “This present writing contains all the mysteries of the Lord.” Also: “Whatever there is of Holy Scripture, whatever human language can speak, whatever mortal senses can accept, these are contained in this book.” Jerome again writes (Epistle ad Paulum et Eustochium): “Isaiah was a noble man, clear in expression, of urbane eloquence, who admitted no uncouth speech.”
** Jerome also says that Isaiah included in this book whatever human language and the mortal senses are capable of accepting about physics, ethics, logic, and the mysteries of Holy Scripture and that he did this with greater charm and eloquence and urbane elegance of diction than did the rest of the prophets. **
Amphilochius calls him “an outspoken person” (Opera, p. 94). In Seder Olam the Hebrews say that Isaiah was born of royal blood and that his own kinsman, the idolatrous King Manasseh, sawed him in two with a wood saw after he had taught in his office for sixty years. Of the Christian theologians, Epiphanius (De vitis Patriarch., c. De Esaia) and Jerome (Ad Paulum et Eustochium) make the same claim. They try to confirm this from Heb. 11:37.
Isaiah’s prophecy covers sixty-six chapters and can be divided into introduction, narrative, and conclusion. The narrative contains things both legal and evangelical. The legal material can be recounted according to the series of the four kings under whom he taught. Athanasius says about Isaiah: “The majority of his prophecy is Gospel tidings with respect to the coming of the Word in the flesh and the sufferings that He took upon Himself for our sakes.” He concludes his prophecy with an address about the final judgment and the eternal punishments of the wicked, because of which Augustine writes: “This prophet ends his book at that point when time [seculum] will end” (De civ. Dei, bk. 20, c. 21).