The Revised Version's rendering of the first clause is preferable to
that of the Authorised Version. 'Afflicted' would be little better than
tautology, but 'humbled Himself' strikes the keynote of the verse,
which dwells not on the Servant's afflictions, but on His bearing under
them. Similarly, the pathetic imagery of the lamb led and the sheep
dumb gives the same double representation, first of the indignities,
and next of His demeanour in enduring them, as is conveyed in 'He was
oppressed, yet He humbled Himself.' Unremonstrating, unresisting
endurance, then, is the point emphasised in the lovely metaphor.
We recall the fact that this emphatically reduplicated phrase 'opened
not His mouth' was verbally fulfilled in our Lord's silence before each
of the three authorities to whom He was presented, before the Jewish
rulers, before Pilate, and before Herod. Only when adjured by the
living God and when silence would have been tantamount to withdrawal of
His claims, did He speak before the Sanhedrin. Only when silence would
have been taken as disowning His Kingship, did He speak before Pilate.
And Herod, who had no right to question Him, received no answer at all.
Jesus' lips were opened in witness but never in complaint or
remonstrance. No doubt, the prophecy would have been as really
fulfilled though there had been no such majestic silences, for its
substance is patient endurance, not mere abstinence from speech. Still,
as with other events in His life, the verbal correspondence with
prophetic details may help, and be meant to help, to bring out more
clearly, for purblind eyes, the true fulfilment. So we may meditate on
the wonder and the beauty of that picture which the evangelists draw,
and which the world has recognised, with whatever differences as to its
interpretation, as the most perfect, pathetic, and majestic picture of
meek endurance that has ever been painted.
But we gather only the most superficial of its lessons, if that is all
that we find to say about it. For the main point for us to lay to heart
is not merely the fact of that silent submission, but the motive which
led to it. He opened not His mouth, because He willingly embraced the
Cross, and He willingly embraced the Cross because He loved the Father
and would do His will, because He loved the world and would be its
Saviour,
That touching imagery of the dumb lamb has manifold felicities and
significances beyond serving to figure meekness. And we are not forcing
unintended meanings into a mere piece of poetic imagination when we
note how remarkably the metaphor links on to that of strayed sheep in
the preceding verse, or when we venture to recall John Baptist's first
proclamation of the Lamb of God, and Peter's quotation of this very
prophecy, and the continual recurrence in the Apocalypse of the name of
The Lamb as _the_ title of honour of 'Him who sitteth on the throne.' A
kind of nimbus or aureole shines round the humble figure as drawn by
the prophet.