In | Unique Emphases in Isaiah, Part 2

This passage from Isaiah 56:6-8 (ESV) might address a post-exilic situation. In this time, their main issue is not a military threat but God’s calling of foreigners, both outside their borders and those who had settled into their land.

This passage represents a compact summary of Isaiah’s message to the people focusing on peacetime relationships with foreigners once the region becomes stabilized under Persian rule.

Foreigners will settle in the exiles’ homeland during their absence. The people will return to a tense situation where we might think of these foreigners as having something like “squatter’s rights.” The people will face the threat of home not really being home anymore. God is promising that these immigrants will be “joined to the Lord” and that he “will gather yet other (foreigners) to him, besides those already gathered” in the land.

Chapters 1–39 anticipate the exile to come.
Chapters 40–55 are the centerpiece, highlighting promises for return and restoration from exile.
Chapters 56–66 address the impact the exile is having (and will have).

In the midpoint of the central section, chapters 40–55, we find a message of redemption that will come in the time of Cyrus’ decree:

Go out from Babylon, flee from Chaldea, declare this with a shout of joy, proclaim it, send it out to the end of the earth; say, “The Lord has redeemed his servant Jacob!”
Isaiah 49:20 ESV

This is the key moment in the exilic narrative where the people see clearly that YHWH is worthy of their hope—not only in this moment, but also in the trials to come. He will comfort them in loss and bring them through loss to victory. This victory has obvious connections to the Exodus and will become a hallmark in the people’s long and tested history with their God.