August Renoir S. Riparip Alvin S.

Molito, MDiv, General Editor

Plenary Speaker PMI Theological Forum 2016

PMI Theological Forum 2016

Theme: "The Church and Society"

PROPOSED PRESENATION/PAPER OUTLINE

Text: Isaiah 58:1-12
Theme of the Passage: False Religiosity/Insincerity in Religious Practices
Title: The Practice of Social Responsibility as God’s Challenge to False Religiosity: An Exegetical Reading and
Reflection of Isaiah 58:1-12
Propositional Statement/Thesis of the Paper: True religiosity is not measured by good performance of religious
rituals but by exercising social responsibilities as a form of service and worship to God
Interrogative Statement: What are the questions regarding the practice of social responsibility as God’s
challenge to Israel’s false religiosity?
Outline:
I. The Question of Description: Why God Do Not Accept Rigid Religious Practices? (vv.1-5)
A. Because it is pretentious (vv.1-3)
False assumptions about:
i. Correct habits
ii. Correct doctrines
iii. Correct practices
iv. Correct wishes
v. Correct liturgies
B. Because it is superficial (vv.3-5)
i. There is disorderliness of gathering on religious days
ii. There is irritability on religious days
iii. There is devising of oppressive tactics on religious days
iv. There is pretense at piety on religious days
II. The Question of Prescription: How God Wants His People to Practice True Religiosity? (vv.6-7)
A. Helping the enslaved to be free (v.6)
i. By losing the bonds of wickedness
ii. By undoing the bands of the yoke
iii. By letting the oppressed go free
iv. By breaking the yoke
B. Helping those who are in need (v.7)
i. By dividing the bread with the hungry
ii. By sheltering the homeless poor
iii. By clothing the naked
iv. By making one’s self available for help
III. The Question of Promise Consolation: What are the Promised Results of Exercising Social
Responsibility as Proper Religious Practices? (vv.8-12)
A. Promise of renewal and God’s presence (vv.8-9b)
B. Promise of restoration and God’s blessing (vv.9c-12)
PROPOSED PRESENTATION MANUSCRIPT

THE PRACTICE OF SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY AS GOD’S CHALLENGE TO FALSE RELIGIOSITY:

An Exegetical Reading and Reflection of Isaiah 58:1-12
Introduction (Video Presentation, “Bahay” by Gary Granada)
The song depicts the picture of the reality that is happening around us and the indifference of the
Government Institutions, Educational Institutions, the Media and even Religious Institutions to address the
problem. We know that our present society is a society in crisis. People are facing different problems that
threaten the value and integrity of life. And even though we do not want to see or feel it, the truth is, according
to Henry Bernardo, “anywhere we go, even inside the comforts of our own homes, as we read the newspaper,
listen to the radio or watch television, we can see different faces of these crises: protest rallies, cases of poverty,
injustice, war, pollution, soaring prices of basic commodities, transportation and fuel, maltreatment and abuses,
and graft and corruption, among others.”1
It is in these kinds of situations that it is impossible for someone not to care and be concerned, because
whether we like it or not, we live in the presence of one another. Human solidarity is such that all people suffer
together—we all experience those things that Bernardo had mentioned. One person’s deprivation is an
indication of the guilt and humiliation of all.2 There is something wrong with one’s moral aspect if he/she can
see what is happening around him/her and not be moved compassionately to do something. And it is much
worse if that person is a Christian. I remember hearing one time that the sole duty of the Christians is to pray, to
evangelize, and then go to heaven and not to concern themselves with other matter, such as social participation.
But this understanding is not faithful with the biblical text that always integrates faith with underlying societal
issues during the period of its writing or before its writing prompted by the issue.
The text that I will be dealing with is Isaiah 58:1-12. It is one of the examples of those biblical witnesses
of integrating religious practices with the issues that confronts the society. The theme of the passage is “False
Religiosity” or “Insincerity in Religious Practices.” And based on this theme, I entitled my presentation “The
Practice of Social Responsibility as God’s Challenge to False Religiosity: An Exegetical Reading and
Reflection of Isaiah 58:1-12”

Literary and Socio-Religious Context of Isaiah 58:1-12

In the chapters that surround Isaiah 58, we can see the dissonance between Yahweh’s promise and its
fulfilment because there are various conditions which must first be met. In 60:1, for example, God promised,
“Arise, shine; for your light has come.” But in 59:9, the people said, “We wait for light, and lo! There is
darkness.” Also, in 62:1, God said, “For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent.” But in 64:12, the people ask God,
“Will you keep silent, and punish us so severely?” These are but few examples of such echoes of as yet
unfulfilled promises.
But the question is, what are the reasons why God’s promises do not come into completion? Since the
author could not lay the blame for the delay to God, he began to look for the particular failings in conduct of the
people which might be the cause. Among the topics mentioned in this regard are: profaning the Sabbath (56:2-8;
58:13-14); illegal cult practices (57:3-13; 65:3-7); a wrong attitude to fasting (58:1-19); general forms of
iniquity, including injustice, violence, and deceit (59:1-15); dietary offences (65:4; 66:17); and an improper
understanding of sacrifice (66:3-4). In short, the author seems to point out that the reason why God’s promises
are not fulfilled is because of the false religiosity of the people, which is very evident in their insincere religious
practices. So how did he addressed the issue of false religiosity?
The author uses rhetorical questions to deal with the attitudes of his audience/readers and to
communicate God’s message to them. For example, in 58:3a-b, we will notice that the author used the very
questions of his audience and as a result, it makes it easier for him to answer them directly in vv.3c-4. Then in
vv.5-7 he uses God’s questions to imply to his audience that it is God himself who is asking them and

1
Henry L. Bernardo, Responding to the Call of Justice and Love, (National Bookstore, 2008), 1
2
Melba Maggay, Transforming Society, (Regnum Books, 1998), 11
commanding them to do the true practice of religiosity. Hence, the question of the people in v.3 and God’s
questions in vv.5-7 functions as a rhetorical device that portrays the futility of the people’s religious practices
on the one hand, and the kind of religious practices that is acceptable to God on the other hand. And vv.8-12
shows the possible results if these practices are done. Therefore, I will outline my paper according to these
rhetorical devices that the author uses which gives us the homiletical keyword of “Questions.”
Transition sentence: Thus, my interrogative statement is . . .
“What are the questions regarding the practice of social responsibility as God’s challenge to Israel’s false
religiosity?”

I
The Question of Description:
Why God Do Not Accept Rigid Religious Practices? (vv.1-5)

Because it is pretentious (vv.1-2)

In v.1, God commanded the prophet to raise his voice to warn the people of divine action against all
practitioners of false religiosity, who pridefully hoped to gain favour and regard from God because they assume
that they were so correct in their outward ritualistic forms of worships, to the disregard of matters of
neighbourly love and concern for the needy. For this reason, God directed the prophet to rebuke these
“religionists” as severely as possible with a loud voice that would sound like a trumpet signifying an act of
alarming the people or calling their attention that there is something wrong with them. The alarm must be
sounded strongly, for the consciences of these people had been calmed to sleep, and it seems that in order to
awaken them to action is to require more than usual kind of gentle talk. All bases of excuses must be removed
from these sorts of people who seemed to have a ready answer for any type of charge.
In their own eyes they had correct habits, because according to v.2a, they seek God “day by day.” They
also assumed that they had correct doctrines, for in v.2b, they “delight” or they were “eager to know (God’s)
ways.” Also, in v.2c-d, they also judged that they were “a nation that has done righteousness and has not
forsaken the ordinances of their God”—that is, they felt that they had correct practices. Add to that pretense the
fact that they felt that they had “asked (God) for just decisions” (v.2e); therefore, they felt they also had correct
wishes. Finally, they felt theirs were the correct liturgies, for “they delight in the nearness of God.” The term
“nearness” here is usually a liturgical term, “to draw near” or “to come closer”. Their assumption was that their
outward performance in their services had appeased God so that he had to show his favour toward them. They
appeared to be saying: “We just love the temple services. We would never miss an opportunity to hold another
fast (or meeting) before our God!” What else could God wish for them? But it was all for show. Moreover, it
was selective in its areas of service without involving evidence of any social ministries to those hurting
physically.
Surely, God had seen all the times when they denied themselves food and water; surely He had seen all
their expensive sacrifices, and without a doubt He had witnessed their long prayers. For all this, they felt
entirely self-satisfied. So they assumed that God must have been extremely proud to have worshippers such as
them.
The problem is, God had not viewed all of their efforts in the same light as these worshippers had. The
prophet was to remind Israel of its “transgression” and “the house of Jacob their sins” (v.1), that is why the
prophet had to sound out his message louder in his clarion call, to show them and to show us what was wrong
with outwardly seemed to be so commendable.

Because it is superficial (vv.3-5)

The question of Isaiah’s audience was twofold: (1) “Why have we fasted and You do not see?” and (2)
“Why have we humbled ourselves and You do not notice?” (v.3). God was supposed to be grateful and fully
impressed by such enthusiasm and devotions to Himself and the worship of His person. So what was wrong?
Their attitudes and the state of their hearts had exposed the motives of all hard work they had put into
their worship of God. Not only had they fasted in order (falsely) to atone for their sins, such as cheating and
robbing others (c.f. Jer.7:9-11), but even during the time of their fasting they were contriving ways to
improperly gain control of property that was not rightfully theirs. Instead of focusing on God and their need for
repentance and change, they were busy thinking about how they could pull off other business schemes that
would enrich their pockets to the disadvantage of the poor and the disenfranchised. It was necessary then, for
the prophet to bring up the injunctions of the second tablet of the law of God to help them see that what was
being done was more to show than it was real substance.
It is verses 3b-4 that exposed the shallowness of their liturgies in worship. According to v.3c, they find
their desire in the day of their fasting, that is, they do as they please. It was not a day for concentrating on God
and their sin, but one of having quiet times to reflect on how to be more aggressive in their businesses. Was that
not enough to expose the emptiness of their formalism? Did that not show that their hearts were not pure and
that they were not living rightly or abstaining from deceit and injustice? How could such double-standard living
be the basis for God’s acceptance of any or all of their proposed fast (v.5)? It was not, in fact, what God wanted,
and it is not what their neighbours needed either.
The only thing that happened on their fast days was that they grew irritable and quarrelsome. They were
contentious and ready to start a fight at the drop of a hat. So how could they expect their voices to be heard in
prayer with all that going on (v.4)? Of course God could see that they walked around with their heads bowed
down and their backs bent over in pretended humility. Sure, according to v.5, God could see that they were
“lying on sackcloth and ashes,” but the question still remained in v.5e-f: “is that what you call a fast, a day
acceptable to the Lord”?
Brothers and Sisters, this is the same with us today, our lack of purity from the heart and our lack of
concern for others polluted all our efforts at serving and worshiping God. The link between fasting and all acts
of helping was that both required doing without something; it meant restricting their lives, as we must also
restrict our rights and our desires for the sake of others. But, sometimes, it was easier to limit that restriction to
our ritualistic religious practices, even if they were self-imposed, than to reach out to others in need of help.
These are the reasons why God do not accept rigid religious practices. But what should be done to
address this problem? Is there a remedy for this kind of religious futility? If the people will ask God, what will
be His recommendations?

II
The Question of Prescription:
How God Wants His People to Practice True Religiosity? (vv.6-7)

To help the enslaved to be free (v.6)

If Isaiah’s audience was so hidebound on fasting, then here was another kind of fast that God was now
proposing. It was a type of “fast” that was accompanied by love for other mortals. These too were acts of self-
denial, but they called for positive actions: (1) “loose the bonds of wickedness” (which in its literal sense is
translated as “unjustly detained”3 or as the NIV rendered it, “injustice”), (2) “undo (or ‘untie’ NIV) the bands of
the yoke,” (3) “let the oppressed go free,” and (4) “break every yoke” (v.6).
Over against the people’s sole, but false, dependence on cultic or ritualistic behaviour, God calls for a
practical rearrangement of their priorities. All four verbs of v.6 call for some type of liberation from all sorts of
“hard bargains,” “perverted judgment,” and economic or political “treachery.” Any or all of these attempts to
render some form of liberation and release from the metaphorical “yoke”—a heavy wooden device that went
around an animal’s neck and could be attached to the tongue of an implement that the animal was to pull, such
as a plow or a wagon.4 The yoke was a metaphor for all improperly imposed burdens that had been put over the
needs of those who were poor, oppressed, widowed, or orphaned. In other words, they are to set free the people
who are victims of all kinds of social injustices, because liberation is the first and indispensable requisite.
These religious practices, I believe, are as applicable now as they were before. The yoke of injustices are
very evident in our present age. In our country, the saying “the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting
poorer” remains true. The problem of unequal distribution of wealth not only persists but even getting worse as

3
Joseph Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56-66: A New Translation With Introduction and Commentary, (New Haven : London; Yale
University Press, 2008), 174
4
Walter C. Kaiser Jr., What Does the Lord Require?, (CLC Publications, 2009), 25
it is exemplified by the corruption of some of our government officials. Yes, it is easy to blame the Government
with these kinds of injustices, but what about the Church? Can we say that we are not guilty and we have
nothing to do with these issues? Is it right for us to remain silent and leave everything to the hands of the
Government and just pray and sing praises to God? The problem with us, according to Ched Myers, is that we
always “talk about ‘power in the name of Jesus’ but are too timid to interrogate public addiction or high
corporate crimes. We speculate blithely about ‘last days’ while endorsing through passivity world-historic shifts
in consumerism and economic policies that are chewing up millions of the lives we say God loves . . .” 5 Like
Israel, God is also calling us to practice true religiosity by means of liberating those who are enslaved by
injustices.

To help those who are in need (v.7)

It is not enough to say that we have never injured our neighbour in any way. In the same way, letting the
oppressed go free without giving them the means to sustain a decent existence is also not enough. Neighbour-
love also calls for an active work on our part to meet the needs of the poor and the oppressed. For this reason,
v.7 presents the need to feed (literally, “break or divide bread with”) the hungry, to house or shelter the
homeless (literally, “the wanderers”), to clothed the naked, and not to hide oneself from one’s own flesh and
blood, that is, from one’s fellow human being. This is the same wording in the Deuteronomic law. In
Deuteronomy 22:1-4, “‘hiding oneself’ means pretending that these people are not there, persuading oneself that
someone else will take care of them, or just wishing they would go away.”6 Therefore, the phrase “not to hide
oneself” is a call to make oneself available for helping those who are in need, because it is an expression of true
religiosity and it has a spiritual significance. As Jonathan Sacks stated, “Someone else’s physical needs are my
spiritual obligation.”7
I remember a story of a religious man. He is a regular church attendee, and he has perfect attendance in
every church activities. He heads the Men’s ministry of their church, every Wednesday night he attends the
prayer meeting, every Saturday he is accompanying the Church’s mission team to do outreach ministries and
evangelism, and he is the biggest tither in the Church.
Every night, as he walks toward home, he always see a street family sleeping outside the gate of an
abandoned building without any blanket to cover them and to help them endure the coldness of the night. He
also sees a prostitute regularly negotiating with customers to get a good deal because her mother is sick and
needs a decent hospitalization. One night, his heart was moved with anger and compassion. And out of these
mixed feelings, he finally questioned God. He said, “God, can’t you see these people? Why are you allowing
them to live in that kind of life? We always pray for them in the church, but why you are not doing something?
We fasted a lot for them, but why You’re still not helping them? I always give my tithes together with my
wallet and ATM cards for the sake of them, but why you are not doing something for them?”
God answered the man. He said, “Oh, religious man, you are wrong. I know how you prayed for them in
your church. I know how you fasted for them a lot. I know how you faithfully give your tithes together with
your wallet and ATM cards. But you are wrong when you said that I’m not doing something for them.” The
man replied, “Well, what have You done for them?” God said, “I sent you. The reason why you are there, the
reason why you always see them, is because I sent you, to do something for them.”
Brothers and Sisters, it is very easy to focus on our church activities, it is easy to focus on God, it is easy
to pray for those who are in need, and it is easy to blame God for His unresponsiveness in our prayers in behalf
of the poor and needy. What is hard for us is to act and do something for them. Cardinal Antonio Tagle once
said, “Because of the special revelation of God through Jesus Christ, the church cannot choose God and at the
same time neglect human beings. It cannot also choose human beings and neglect God. The Church cannot be a
Church of Christ and be blind and insensitive to the needs of human beings.”8
These are the recommendations of God to His people then and now. And while God has prescriptions,
He also has promises as a result of doing His recommendations.

5
Ched Myers, Easter Faith and Empire: Recovering the Prophetic Tradition on the Road to Emmaus
6
Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56-66, 180
7
Jonathan Sacks, To Heal a Fractured World: The Ethics of Responsibility, (Continuum Publishing Company, 2007), 5
8
Antonio Tagle, Lecture on 50th Anniversary of Gaudium et Spes, Vatican II
 III
The Question of Promise Consolation:
What are the Promised Results of Exercising Social Responsibility as Proper Religious Practices? (8-12)

Promise of renewal and God’s presence (vv.8-9b)

With a surprising shift from the suggested duties for helping others in vv.6-7, there come God’s
promises in vv.8-12 (interrupted in vv.9c-10b once again with four more conditions). Instead of the earned
favour that the people were seeking through their cultic formalism, God promises favour only for those who
seek to follow God’s agenda for heeding His ways. He will give those religious practitioners an incredibly rich
assortment of blessings stated in v.8-9b: light, healing, guidance/protection, and God’s very presence.
The noun “light” in v.8 stands for the idea of consummation taken from later Isaianic passages, and in
Jewish end-time imagery. It is the fulfilment of the people’s aspirations.9 In 42:16, for example, God promised
the people that He will turn their darkness into light. But obviously, as we have mentioned earlier, this has not
been fulfilled and the prophet told the people why and we also know why. The same point of the light that “will
break out like the dawn” is made by a subtle use of language in the next statement that “your recovery will
speedily spring forth” or, more literally, “your new layer of skin (covering the wound) will quickly spring up.”
In the context, it speaks with reference to the “springing up” of new events predicted in the previous part of the
book (Isaiah 40-55; 42:9; 43:19). Thus, the promised healing and the promise light breaking out like the dawn is
the coming into existence of a new situation.
Furthermore, Gregory Polan has suggested that the “light breaking forth like the dawn in v.8a probably
symbolizes YHWH’s coming and His presence among His people”10 because these expressions refer more
likely to YHWH than to the people.11 And this explains the next two statements, “your righteousness will go
before you” and “the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.” Moreover, according to Koole, the term
“righteousness” in v.8 stands for the salvation promised by God “in the sense that God does ‘justice’ to his
people, as was petitioned in v.2e.”12 And Friesen interestingly interprets the healing in this verse as ‘social
healing’ as a result of ‘spiritual healing.’13 Being redirected by God to true religiosity by means of practicing
social responsibilities, their society will be transformed. Therefore, what was being promised in this verse is a
new situation, a renewal, a total reversal for the Israelites, where Yahweh’s presence will be with them, will
protect them, and will guard them.
And the assurance of this promise is God’s statement in v.9a-b, “Then you will call, and the Lord will
answer; you will cry, and He will say, ‘Here I am.’” That is, “the fellowship of the devotees and God becomes
stronger; they will now experience God’s presence. Instead of a one-directional call to God (as pictured in vv.2-
3), there is now a dialogue”14 between Him and the people, signified by God’s answer: ‘Here I am’—that is,
God will now “see” and “notice” them in contrast with the complaint of the people in vv.2-3. What a
marvellous promise! It is as if God responds to our prayers with something like: “Did you call out to me? I am
ready to act on your behalf right now.”

Promise of restoration and God’s blessing (vv.9c-12)

Before the other promises are announced, the prophet returns to remind the people of three more forms
of behaviour as an evidence of true religiosity. The first two conditions are negative and the third is positive.
First of all, they are to “remove the yoke” from their midst (v.9c). According to Kaiser, in addition to what was
already said about the metaphor of the “yoke” in v.6, “we can add that this word . . . points to all annoyances

9
Blenkinsopp, Isaiah 56-66, 180
10
Gregory Polan, In the Ways of Justice Toward Salvation: A Rhetorical Analysis of Isaiah 56-59, (American University
Studies. Series VII, Theology and Religion; vol. 13; Frangfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1986), 216; quoted in Bohdan Hrobon, Ethical
Dimension of Cult in the Book if Isaiah, (Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Gottingen, 2010), 181
11
Ibid., 181
12
John Leunis Koole, Isaiah III/3, translated by Anthony P. Runia. Vol. 3, (HSOT; Leuven: Peeters, 2001), 142
13
Ivan D. Friesen, Believers Church Bible Commentary: Isaiah, (Herald Press, Scottdale, 2009), 366
14
Kwesi A. Dickson. He Is God Because He Cares, (ATLAS), 7
and irritants directed toward the poor and the afflicted.”15 In the second case a new aspect is added: the people
must also remove “the pointing of the finger and speaking wickedness (or ‘malicious talk’ NIV [v.9d]). This is
no doubt “a reference to all forms of mockery, contempt, false accusation, spreading of vicious rumours and the
like. The poor and the oppressed must no longer be the objects of highbrow scorn or contempt, or be the
substance of our jokes or sarcastic contrasts between them and us”16 because they are our fellow human beings
and they too are made in the image of God and so deserving of our respect, love, and help.
The third condition is put in a positive form: the people must “give (literally, spend [out]) yourself to the
hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted” (v.10a-b). Instead of making themselves hungry at their self-
proclaimed spiritual fasts, what about alleviating the hunger of those who are starving? This verse calls once
again for action on behalf of all the oppressed, and again, the action is directed away from self and towards
others.
With these three further reminders of the conditions God sets as the proper prelude to all sincere and
devout worship, he returns to more promises. Once again their “light will rise in darkness” (v.10c). Their
present darkness and adversities will give way to the glorious light of God’s presence, as promised already in
v.8a. The next promise about the Lord’s guidance and satisfaction in v.11 describes more fully and emphatically
the promise made in v.8c-d. His guidance will rejuvenate and invigorate them just like a “watered garden”
(v.11d) and “spring of water whose waters do not fail” (v.11e), that even their bones, which is previously
trembled and shook because of the sorrow and guilt that were causing a wasting away their frames, will now be
strengthened (v.11c).
The final promise in v.12 assures rebuilding and restoration of the desecrated ruins. The once false
worshippers, thus transformed, will now be the means whereby their whole nation, as a whole, will be
transformed. The people will build on the physical foundations that had been neglected for so long, ever since
the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. They will act with such purpose and despatch as will make
them deserve to be called “the repairer of the breach” and the “restorer of the streets.” Thus, the practice of
social responsibility as the form of true religiosity is not only acceptable to God, it does not only do away cases
of poverty and injustices, but as v.12 has shown, it will also lead to nation building.

Conclusion
A religion that has self-gratification as its main purpose is a false and vain religion. It just will not fit the
task of bringing glory to God nor will it meet the needs of the poor and the oppressed. The church of the Lord
Jesus Christ dare not remain silent on the issues of the poor, the widowed, the orphaned, or the oppressed. Nor
dare we to imagine that the government must now carry this responsibility alone. If we have taken this route,
perhaps it is the reason why we do not seem to bask in the love and light of God and why we have little or no
influence and impact in our hurting society. Yes, our social responsibilities are large, but the same Lord who
called us to announce the gospel will be with us to help the hurting as well and He promised us that if we call on
Him, He will answer: “Here I am.” Thus, I want to end with my propositional statement/thesis of the paper:
“True religiosity is not measured by good performance of religious rituals but by exercising social
responsibilities as a form of service and worship to God.”

15
Kaiser, What Does the Lord Require?, 27
16
Ibid., 27