Up to this point, however, we could say that, in comparison with the books of the minor prophets already studied, we did not see anything fundamentally new. But this is just the beginning. You will agree that the first five chapters could have formed a separate prophetic book.

The sixth chapter describes the calling of the prophet Isaiah. It has been noted earlier that several prophets have a description of their calling, although this may not be the original calling at the time when he began his prophetic ministry. Moreover, then this calling would have been in the first chapter, but it is still placed in the 6th. It is possible that this happened at a time when he was already carrying out his ministry and was called to some even more intense activity, to receive higher and more mysterious revelations. If we look at the prophecies contained in the next five chapters, we will see that this is indeed the case.

"I saw the Lord sitting on a throne high and exalted, and the edges of His garments filled the whole temple. Around Him stood the Seraphim; each of them had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And they cried out to one another, saying, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts. the whole earth is full of His glory! And the tops of the gate were shaken at the voice of those who shouted, and the house was filled with incense" (Isaiah 6:6-4). Notice that God reveals Himself to the prophet in the temple.

We have seen that the Lord demands from people truth, mercy, and condescension to the widow and the orphan. For prophets like Amos and Hosea, this is the center of preaching. At some point, there is even a feeling that the Lord is a God of such social justice that He is only engaged in solving some human problems, sorting out untruths, and so on. From this sometimes follows the naïve (and theologically illiterate) question: "What did God do before He created the world?" And so the scale of the visions of the prophet Isaiah does not allow us to make such a mistake at all. The filling of heaven and earth with the glory of God, the service of the Seraphim and Cherubim to Him, the shock of all this doxology quite clearly shows us the divine omnipotence, the incomprehensibility and incomprehensibility of God by the world, the impossibility of even approaching Him. When Isaiah sees this, he exclaims: "Woe is me, I am lost! for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among the people also with unclean lips – and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts" (Isaiah 6:5) – it is impossible to be present at this, it is impossible to see it, it is impossible even to think of approaching this holiness, this glory.

And yet, the prophet Isaiah becomes a partaker of this glory when one of the Seraphim brings a burning coal and touches the prophet's mouth and says: "Behold, this has touched your mouth, and your iniquity is taken away from you, and your sin is cleansed" (Isaiah 6:7). When priests and deacons commune in the altar, then, having communed, they kiss the holy chalice and say: "Behold, he touched my lips, and he will take away my iniquities and cleanse my sins." These are the same words, they speak of the action of the power of God, which corrects and purifies a person who by his own will, by his own power, is not able to approach God. The tongs with which Seraphim takes the coal from the throne prefigure the Mother of God, to Whom the divine coal of the Body of Christ was brought.

"And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send? And who will go for us? And I said, Here am I, send me" (Isaiah 6:8). These words are often referred not only to the prophet Isaiah, but also to the Son of God, these words are referred to the Pre-eternal Council, when the question of man's salvation is decided, and the Son of God takes upon Himself the obligation, having accepted death on the Cross and Resurrection, to save the human race (cf. Gen. 1:27). These words also apply to the prophet Isaiah himself and his ministry: "Go and say to this people, 'With your ears you will hear, and you will not understand, and with your eyes you will see, and you will not see. For the heart of this people is hardened, and with their ears they can hardly hear, and their eyes are closed, lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn back, that I may heal them" (Isaiah 6:9-10). Again a prototype. The ministry of the prophet Isaiah precedes the appearance of God incarnate, because it is in His appearance that these words are fully fulfilled. God Himself stands and preaches to the people, and they close their eyes, and stop their ears, and don't want to hear Him, they don't want to hear Him, and they don't want to be healed. After all, this is what Christ said: "And the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled over them, who says, 'With your ears you will hear, and you will not understand... " (Matt. 13:14). And the holy Evangelist John, quoting this quote, adds: "These things Isaiah said, when he saw His glory, and spoke of Him" (John 12:40). Thus, he was vouchsafed this appearance before the mystery of the Incarnation of God was revealed to him.

3.7. Prophecies about the Nativity of Christ and Christ

We will not enumerate here all the sins of which the Lord convicts the Jews through the Prophet Isaiah, although this is very instructive. As St. John of Kronstadt said, it is surprising that the prophets spoke, as it were, about our time. If we look at all these sins, it turns out that they also surround us: false measure, drunkenness, bribery, and so on. Still, it will be much more useful and pleasant for us to pay attention to the various comforting prophecies concerning New Testament times.

After describing the calling of the prophet, chapter 7 begins a series of great prophecies. The first of them, showing how the fulfillment of the divine Council will begin, is the prophecy of the birth of Christ from a Virgin. It is given in connection with the fact that the Israeli king Pekah and the Syrian king Rezin are going to Jerusalem in order to destroy it. From the Book of Kings it is known that they inflicted a fairly significant defeat on the Judean troops at the very first meeting. And so the prophet Isaiah appeared to Ahaz ("And the Lord said to Isaiah, 'Go out to meet you, and your son Shearyasub, to meet Ahaz, to the end of the water supply of the upper pool, to the road to the bleaching field' (Isaiah 7:3)) and says: "Ask God for a sign", but Ahaz, who was an unbeliever, who was an idolater, does not even want this, does not even want to receive any sign from God, so that he would not inadvertently have to give up his idolatry. And then the prophet Isaiah says these words: "Hear, therefore, house of David! is it not enough for you to trouble men, that you want to trouble my God also? " (Isaiah 7:13). These words usually cause some bewilderment.

What does it mean to make people difficult and to make God difficult? The inhabitants of Jerusalem and Judea resist and do not allow the prophets to proclaim the will of God, do not allow the prophets to serve for the correction of the people. And now Ahaz is trying to hinder God Himself, Who is ready to give a sign of edification, trying to prevent God Himself from correcting himself, correcting the whole people. And then the prophet Isaiah announces to him: "Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and they shall call His name Immanuel. He will feed on milk and honey, until he understands to reject evil and choose good; for before this babe understands to reject evil and choose good, the land which you fear will be forsaken by both kings thereof" (Isaiah 7:14-16).

The word "virgin" in the Hebrew text is designated as "alma", an expression that can mean both a virgin and a young woman; although even in the Old Testament in the first sense it is used more often. But when translated into Greek, seventy interpreters translated this passage precisely as "parthenos", that is, virgin, without any variants, which confirms precisely this understanding of this place by the Old Testament Church. This is very important for us.

Here this birth is correlated with the desolation of the earth. Apparently, the point is that after a while the Assyrians will crush both Israel and Syria. This allowed and still allows some interpreters to assert that the prophet Isaiah informed Ahaz that a young woman would give birth to a child in Jerusalem, and while he was still small, significant events would take place related to deliverance from danger. The opposite opinion was expressed by the Holy Fathers. In the writings of St. Basil the Great we find the following: "Is it surprising that one of the many women living with her husband became the mother of a child? And how could that which was born "of the lust of the flesh" be called Immanuel? Therefore, if what is given is a sign, then let the birth also be extraordinary. And if the image of the birth of the Child is ordinary, then do not call it a sign, do not call it Immanuel" [8, part 2, p. 226].