Why is Reading Isaiah so Incredibly Tough?
This article covers the six most important things you need to know to read Isaiah and study it, especially if you are just digging into the book for the first time. This particular article is aimed at helping you read, it is not directed at explaining what the book is about (which is what interpretive commentaries do). In other words, the goal here is to hand you the fishing pole, and not a fish. With that purpose in mind, these are the six practical-reading-enabling things that are simple yet are profoundly important.
1) Isaiah is composed mostly of chiastic, or fold-over, or mirrored, or reflective poetry. This means that units (or passages) of poetry have a center at which the poetry could be folded over so that the top and bottom halves come together so to speak. Typically, there are similar words, or thoughts, occurring before and after the center verse or line of the chiastic unit. (There can also by antonymous words or antithetical parallelisms occurring above and below the center of the poem.) Understanding this structure is important because if you look for the topic sentence and then sequential logic which is typical in modern writing, you will be endlessly frustrated. Also, to read a chiastic unit of poetry, you must know where the unit starts and stops, bringing us to the next point.
2) The chapter numbers in Isaiah typically do not align with the chiastic units. Chapter numbers are not inspired and were added in the Middle Ages. This website and the materials suggested can help you find the beginning and end of the chiastic units. (In fact, and Bible readers know this, the chapter numbering has limited utility or relation to chapters as we might think of them in a text or a nonfiction novel. The utility of chapter and verse numbering are only as reference locations.)
3) It is helpful to have a rough idea of what the sections of the book are. This website has a page presenting sections. The exact number of sections is somewhat arbitrary, as it depends on the desired granularity of a text and theme line that have a high degree of continuity. In my framework, sections break down into major units, then units, then stanzas, then verses, and then finally into Hebrew words and letters. Sections are in no way an indication of more than one author. Multiple sections do not imply multiple authors, and any notion of a Deutero-Isaiah or Trito-Isaiah authorship or later authorial schools is completely rejected.
4) There are Menorah or tree structures (proposed) in Isaiah. That is, certain verses or stanzas of the text have correspondence to specific branches of structures which are more specifically branch-paired Menorah structures. There is information on this website to show you where these structures are, and where their individual branches are! These Menorahs deeply connect with the overall theme of the book.
5) The tone of Isaiah frequently jumps from judgement to restoration. One of the reasons for this is the structure. Some text corresponds to different Menorah branches, and other text is located in between Menorah branches (in Isaiah 28 – 33). Once the structure of the book is understood, the organizational flow makes a whole lot more sense! Continuity between stanzas occurs at a much deeper level. Finally, while it is true in an overall thematic sense, because of Isaiah’s inspired understanding in advance of what Christ has now wrought for us, it a great oversimplification to say that the book moves from judgement to restoration.
6) Very often, the New Testament writers are referring to verses of structural significance in Isaiah. Those authors deeply understood the context and structure of the entire book! This means that you will absolutely want to know the structure of Isaiah as well.
OK, so all of these above items are reading-enabling or practical hints about Isaiah. You should also know that Isaiah is the most quoted prophet in the New Testament, and that the Book of Isaiah forms the main linkage between the Torah and the New Testament. Isaiah is a profoundly beautiful and awesome book. Good reading!