by
Damien F. Mackey
“Cyrus, I am sending for you by name.
I am doing it for the good of the family of Jacob.
They are my servant.
I am doing it for Israel.
They are my chosen people.
You do not know anything about me.
But I am giving you a title of honor”.
Isaiah 45:4
This text, and those related to it, have raised a lot of questions. For instance:
How did the prophet Isaiah know of Cyrus?
Or did he?
Or was this chapter of the Book of Isaiah (45) written by someone later than Isaiah, a Deutero-Isaiah”, for instance, as the modern exegetes might call him?
It seems that the Lord was going to use this Cyrus in a way similar to how he had used other pagan instruments who did not know Him, “You do not know anything about me”, to fulfil his mighty purposes. Sennacherib, for instance (Isaiah 10:5): “… the Assyrian, the rod of my anger, in whose hand is the club of my wrath!”
These instruments in the hand of God will complete his work without, however, having realised or intended it. Thus King Sennacherib, presumably far less benign than Cyrus, was fixated upon pursuing his own megalomaniacal agenda (10:6-7):
I send him against a godless nation,
I dispatch him against a people who anger me,
to seize loot and snatch plunder,
and to trample them down like mud in the streets.
But this is not what he intends,
this is not what he has in mind;
his purpose is to destroy,
to put an end to many nations.
It is the same with worldly potentates of today, whose minds are filled with their own plans of empire and conquest. They, too, are merely serving the purposes of God, without intending this. There is the danger that, once they have achieved what the Lord has required of them, they may be annihilated (10:15-17):
Does the axe raise itself above the person who swings it,
or the saw boast against the one who uses it?
As if a rod were to wield the person who lifts it up,
or a club brandish the one who is not wood!
Therefore, the Lord, the Lord Almighty,
will send a wasting disease upon his sturdy warriors;
under his pomp a fire will be kindled
like a blazing flame.
The Light of Israel will become a fire,
their Holy One a flame;
in a single day it will burn and consume
his thorns and his briers.
To answer the questions above: first of all I do not believe in multiple Isaiahs.
I accept that:
Dr. Chuck Missler refuted idea of a Deutero-Isaiah from John 12:39
(3) Dr. Chuck Missler refuted idea of a Deutero-Isaiah from John 12:39 | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
Secondly, I, according to my newly revised chronology that has Hezekiah king of Judah as Josiah king of Judah, and that has Jeremiah as a younger contemporary of Isaiah, as the literal “Suffering Servant” (Jesus Christ being the greater, archetypal one):
Identifying Isaiah 53’s ‘Suffering Servant’ may involve a major chronological review
(3) Identifying Isaiah 53’s ‘Suffering Servant’ may involve a major chronological review | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
believe that Cyrus, as a young official in the court of King Nebuchednezzar, was known to pious Jews such as Daniel and his friends, and, later, to Jeremiah (see below).
Isaiah, now as a much older contemporary of Cyrus, could at least have heard of him.
If, so, then Isaiah’s extraordinary remarks about Cyrus, as a Messiah (45:1), must no longer be regarded as being long-range (over a century) prophetical predictions.
Isaiah was writing about someone whom he knew to have been already alive!
Connections
Before I go any further, I need to recall here the connection that I have made previously between Cyrus and Darius the Mede of the Book of Daniel (5:31-6; 9).
See e.g. my articles:
King Cyrus favoured as ‘Darius the Mede’
(3) King Cyrus favoured as 'Darius the Mede' | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
and:
Cyrus as ‘Darius the Mede’ who succeeded Belshazzar
(3) Cyrus as ‘Darius the Mede’ who succeeded Belshazzar | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
And this Darius the Mede (who is Cyrus) was also King Neriglissar of Babylon.
See e.g. my articles on this:
Pierre Henri Larcher may have been the first to propose that King Neriglissar was the biblical monarch Darius the Mede
(3) Pierre Henri Larcher may have been the first to propose that King Neriglissar was the biblical monarch Darius the Mede | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
and:
A Median connection needed for Neriglissar as Darius the Mede
(3) A Median connection needed for Neriglissar as Darius the Mede | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
This would now mean that King Neriglissar, the Nergal-sharezer of Jeremiah (39:3), whose original Median name may have been Ashpenaz, was also Darius the Mede/ Cyrus.
The young official in the court of King Nebuchednezzar, by birth a Mede (Daniel 9:1), was the Ashpenaz of Daniel 1, whose Babylonian name was Nergal-sharezer, and who became king under that same name, Neriglissar, and also under the Medo-Persian name of Darius-Cyrus.
As a young official he was known to Daniel, and presumably to his three friends.
He would have been known to Jeremiah since it was with his assistance that Jeremiah was released and set free to return to the people (Jeremiah 39:13-14).
Thus it may be no surprise, now, that an aged Isaiah also knew about the future Cyrus.
Character of Darius the Mede/Cyrus
Two features of his personality stand out to me.
I have already written about this in my article:
Character of Darius the Mede/Cyrus
(3) Character of Darius the Mede/Cyrus | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
Cyrus was one who sought to make a gain out of everything, who was concerned about his bottom line, who was at pains not to “suffer a loss”.
And he, possibly a heavy drinker (Book of Esther), was liable to delegate and not to take on full responsibility. I previously wrote on this:
Although Cyrus comes across as being a fairly amiable king, at least in his friendship with Daniel, he suffered from a certain naïveté. This gullible king will sign off on a decree suggested to him by his subjects without any apparent consideration of its ramifications.
He will try to impel his friend, Daniel, to worship the ridiculous image of Bel, and also the Dragon, until Daniel manages to show the king that neither of these is a god.
He may have been very accountant-like.
For we read that, right at the beginning of his reign as Darius the Mede: “Now it pleased Darius to appoint 120 satraps to rule throughout the kingdom, and over them three administrators, including Daniel, to whom these satraps were accountable so that the king would not suffer loss” (Daniel 6:1-2).
Again, his officials in Trans-Euphrates were concerned to ensure that the king suffer no loss when urging for an end to the building of Jerusalem and its walls, suggesting to the king (Ezra 4:13): “Furthermore, the king should know that if this city is built and its walls are restored, no more taxes, tribute or duty will be paid, and eventually the royal revenues will suffer”. To which the king will respond in kind (4:21-22): “Now issue an order to these men to stop work, so that this city will not be rebuilt until I so order. Be careful not to neglect this matter. Why let this threat grow, to the detriment of the royal interests?”
Did Herodotus have Cyrus in mind (though he attributes the following to his successor, Darius the Persian), when he wrote: “… the Persians say that Darius was a huckster, Cambyses a master [or tyrant], and Cyrus a father; for Darius looked to making a gain in everything …” (Histories, 3.89, emphasis added).
The diabolical Haman will also be careful not to cause the king to suffer loss by providing “10,000 talents of silver … for the royal treasury” (Esther 3:9).
And later Queen Esther will refer to a potential “loss” for the king (Esther 7:4).
Cambyses II most certainly was, in his other guise as Haman, a “tyrant”, but, ironically, it was he whom the Persians had called “father” (Esther 13:6).
Yet this Cyrus is the very king who had, in the first place, decreed that the Jews return and build their city and Temple (Ezra 1:1-11).
But now he is being swayed in another direction by his forceful pagan officials.
And had he not, too, under pressure from the Babylonians who had urged him to issue one of those foolhardy decrees, felt compelled to consign Daniel to the den of lions, though filled with immense regret about it?
The king’s consternation is apparent from the following account (Daniel 6:14-28):
When the king heard this, he was greatly distressed; he was determined to rescue Daniel and made every effort until sundown to save him.
Then the men went as a group to King Darius and said to him, ‘Remember, Your Majesty, that according to the law of the Medes and Persians no decree or edict that the king issues can be changed’.
So the king gave the order, and they brought Daniel and threw him into the lions’ den. The king said to Daniel, ‘May your God, whom you serve continually, rescue you!’
A stone was brought and placed over the mouth of the den, and the king sealed it with his own signet ring and with the rings of his nobles, so that Daniel’s situation might not be changed. Then the king returned to his palace and spent the night without eating and without any entertainment being brought to him. And he could not sleep.
At the first light of dawn, the king got up and hurried to the lions’ den.
When he came near the den, he called to Daniel in an anguished voice, ‘Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God, whom you serve continually, been able to rescue you from the lions?’
Daniel answered, ‘May the king live forever! My God sent his angel, and he shut the mouths of the lions.
They have not hurt me, because I was found innocent in his sight. Nor have I ever done any wrong before you, Your Majesty’.
The king was overjoyed and gave orders to lift Daniel out of the den. And when Daniel was lifted from the den, no wound was found on him, because he had trusted in his God.
At the king’s command, the men who had falsely accused Daniel were brought in and thrown into the lions’ den, along with their wives and children. And before they reached the floor of the den, the lions overpowered them and crushed all their bones.
Then King Darius wrote to all the nations and peoples of every language in all the earth: “May you prosper greatly!
I issue a decree that in every part of my kingdom people must fear and reverence the God of Daniel.
For he is the living God
and he endures forever;
his kingdom will not be destroyed,
his dominion will never end.
He rescues and he saves;
he performs signs and wonders
in the heavens and on the earth.
He has rescued Daniel
from the power of the lions.”
Later, after he had succumbed to the machinations of the wily Haman, the Great King, now as Ahasuerus, will finally, with the full benefit of hindsight, issue a decree in which he vows to amend his foolish former modus operandi (Esther 16:8-9):
And we must take care for the time to come, that our kingdom may be quiet and peaceable for all men, both by changing our purposes, and always judging things that are evident, with more equal proceeding.
It needs to be noted also that King Ahasuerus, who perhaps was not literate, allowed Haman, while he was still in favour, to dictate his royal edict to the royal secretaries, whereas Mordecai drafted the last one after Haman had been executed. Presumably, the king would have had these edicts read back to him before he signed off on them.
Astyages
Daniel 9:1 names the father of Darius the Mede as Ahasuerus (Xerxes): “In the first year of Darius son of Ahasuerus (a Mede by descent) …”.
According to the narrative Bel and the Dragon (v. 1), Cyrus succeeded Astyages, who was a Median king, which could not refer to Belshazzar: “When King Astyages was laid to rest with his ancestors, Cyrus the Persian succeeded to his kingdom”.
Astyages was in alliance with Nebuchednezzar of Babylon, who married his daughter.
This must be the origin of Neriglissar/Darius the Mede.
In the Nabonidus Chronicle, Astyages is referred to as Ištumegu, and the Medes as Umman-Manda. It seems that they may have had control of the city of Harran at some stage during the reign of King Nabonidus (= Nebuchednezzar).
Perhaps Darius/Cyrus was the grandson, rather than the actual son, of the Median king, Astyages, who is a very remote character. Most of our information on Astyages comes from the Histories of the most unreliable Herodotus, who is virtually our only source on the Median king.
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