LXX Isaiah 6:10

Septuagint

5 And I said: “O wretched that I am! I am stunned; for being a man and having unclean lips, I live among a people having unclean lips, and I have seen the King, the Lord Sabaoth, with my eyes!” 6 Then one of the seraphin was sent to me, and he had in his hand a live coal that he had taken from the altar with the tongs. 7 And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips, and it will take away your lawlessness and purify your sins.” 8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom should I send, and who will go to this people?” And I said, “Here am I; send me!” 9 And he said, “Go, and say to this people: ‘You will listen by listening, but you will not understand, and looking you will look, but you will not perceive.’ 10 For this people’s heart has grown fat, and with their ears they have heard heavily, and they have shut their eyes so that they might not see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn—and I would heal them.” 11 Then I said, “How long, O Lord?” And he said: “Until cities become desolate, because they are not inhabited, and houses, because there are no people, and the land will be left desolate.

John 12:37

New Testament

37 Although Jesus had performed so many miraculous signs before them, they still refused to believe in him, 38 so that the word of the prophet Isaiah would be fulfilled. He said, “Lord, who has believed our message, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” 39 For this reason they could not believe because again Isaiah said, 40 “He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, so that they would not see with their eyes and understand with their heart, and turn to me, and I would heal them.” 41 Isaiah said these things because he saw Christ’s glory and spoke about him.

 Notes and References

"... Who is it that blinded people’s eyes and their hardened their hearts? Commentators tend to assume that it is God that has hardened their hearts; this interpretation finds support in the Masoretic text for Isaiah 6:9–10 where God tells his prophet to dull the minds, stop the ears, and shut the eyes of the people, so that they do not believe. Their inability to believe appears to be in accordance with God’s will. In the Hebrew text, it is God who has willed that the eyes of the people be shut and their hearts hardened; this reading fits well with the use given the passage in Mark 4:11–12. John does not give a straight translation of the Hebrew, however. Rather he seems to combine expressions from the Septuagint and the Masoretic text, in addition to making other changes to the text ... In the Septuagint, God does not ask the prophet to make it impossible for the people to hear his word; here the people have closed their eyes all by themselves. In John’s version of the quote, someone else is responsible for the people not being able to see. The verbs “blinded” and “hardened” are in the third person singular, while the final verb “heal” is in the first person singular as in the Septuagint. I will argue that John is implying that the people’s blindness was caused by the “prince of this world,” i.e., the devil ..."

Löfstedt, T. Who is the Blinder of Eyes and Hardener of Hearts in John 12:40? (pp. 167-192) Svensk Exegetisk Årsbok, 84, 2019

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