The Suffering Servant: Pierced for Our Transgressions

Isaiah 53 describes a figure unlike any other in the Hebrew Bible: 'He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces.' His suffering is not punishment but substitution: 'Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering. He was pierced for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.' He 'did not open his mouth' — like a lamb led to slaughter. 'He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death.' Written 700 years before Christ.