The Scripture behind the Scripture

He Was Wounded for Our Transgressions

Isaiah 53:5 says the servant was wounded for our transgressions, and with his stripes we are healed. Peter weaves it into his words in 1 Peter 2:24, and Paul alludes to the chapter in Romans 4:25.

“But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.”Isaiah 53:5

“Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.”1 Peter 2:24

“Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.”Romans 4:25

In its own place

In its own place. Isaiah 53 is the climax of the servant songs in the latter part of Isaiah, describing a servant of the Lord who suffers not for his own sins but for those of others. The chapter portrays one despised and rejected, a man of sorrows acquainted with grief, who bore our griefs and carried our sorrows. Verse 5 declares that he was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities, that the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed. In its original setting the identity of the servant has been much discussed within Judaism, sometimes read as the faithful remnant of Israel, sometimes as the nation personified, sometimes as an individual prophet or coming figure. What is unmistakable is the shocking idea of vicarious suffering, that one bears the punishment due to many, and that through his affliction others are made whole and brought peace with God. The passage speaks of substitution, the innocent suffering for the guilty, and of the many being accounted righteous through the servant's sacrifice. It is one of the most searching descriptions in the whole Old Testament of redemptive suffering, of God accomplishing forgiveness through a servant who pours out his soul unto death.

Where the New Testament takes it up

This is best described as an allusion and echo woven into Peter's own words, with a related allusion in Paul. In 1 Peter 2:24 Peter writes that Christ his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, and that by whose stripes ye were healed, drawing directly on the language of Isaiah 53:5 and its surrounding verses. Peter does not introduce it with a formal citation formula, but he saturates the passage with Isaiah's phrasing, describing Christ who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth, echoing verse 9, and who bore our sins, echoing verses 4 to 6 and 11 to 12. The wording follows the Greek closely, especially by whose stripes ye were healed. Paul alludes to the same servant theology in Romans 4:25, saying Christ was delivered for our offences and raised again for our justification, language shaped by Isaiah 53's picture of the servant handed over for the transgressions of the people and afterward vindicated. Elsewhere in the New Testament the chapter is quoted more formally, but here in Peter and Paul the use is allusive, absorbing Isaiah's substitutionary language into the apostolic proclamation of the cross. The whole early church read Isaiah 53 as the clearest Old Testament portrait of the meaning of Christ's death.