Today’s question is from Jared, who asked the following:

What do Jews believe Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22 are referring to?

I am going to assume that you want to know the differences so you can compare them to the Christian opinion on these quotes, so I will compare them side by side.

Isaiah 53 isn’t about a single messianic figure such as Jesus dying for the sins of everyone else, but rather it is all about how Israel as a nation is a faithful servant that is suffering at the hands of all the other nations.

This flows on from the chapters around it (Isaiah 40-55) where the term “My servant” is used to refer to Israel multiple times and thus when in Isaiah 53 the term “servant” is used who is rejected, despised and vidicated by G’d the typical view is this is describing the history of Israel’s suffering and that of all of the Jewish people being misunderstood and presecuted but in the end we are exalted and redeemed.

The next part of the question refers to Psalm 22, and this is typically read as a personal opinion of King David, who ultimately feels persecuted and abandoned, but he believes in the faith of G’d deliverance. Within the Jewish faith (excluding Messianic Judaism), this isn’t seen as a direct prophecy of the Messiah but rather just an emotional expression of a human person who is suffering and about their trust in G’d.

To summarise the key difference between Judaism and Christianity, look at the table below.

Passage	Jewish Interpretation	Christian Interpretation
Isaiah 53	The “servant” is Israel, suffering for the world’s sins and ultimately redeemed.	The “servant” is Jesus, suffering and dying for humanity’s sins.
Psalm 22	A psalm of David expressing personal anguish and faith in God’s rescue.	A prophetic foreshadowing of Jesus’s crucifixion.