Following on the mystery of the uncomprehended death comes the enigma
of the burial. The words are an enigma, but they seem meaningless on
any hypothesis but the Messianic one. As they stand, they assert that
unnamed persons gave Him a grave with the wicked, as they would do by
putting Him to death under strained forms of law, and that then,
somehow, the criminal destined to be buried with other criminals in a
dishonoured grave was laid in a tomb with the rich. It seems a
singularly minute trait to find place in such a prophecy. The remarks
already made as to similar minute correspondences in details of the
prophecy with purely external facts in Christ's life need not be
repeated now. One does not see that it is a self-evident axiom needing
only to be enunciated in order to be accepted, that such minute
prophecies are beneath the dignity of revelation. It might rather seem
that, as one element in prophecy, they are eminently valuable. The
smaller the detail, the more remarkable the prevision and the more
striking the fulfilment. For a keen-sighted man may forecast tendencies
and go far to anticipate events on the large scale, but only God can
foresee trifles. The difficulty in which this prediction of the
Servant's grave being 'with the rich' places those who reject the
Messianic reference of the prophecy to our Lord may be measured by the
desperate attempts to evade it by suggesting other readings, or by
making 'rich' to be synonymous with 'wicked.' The words as they stand
have a clear and worthy meaning on one interpretation, and we even
venture to say, on one interpretation only, namely, that they refer to
the reverent laying of the body of the Lord in the new tomb belonging
to 'a certain rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph.'
If in the latter clause of verse 9 we render 'Because' rather than
'Although,' we get the thought that the burial was a sign that the
Servant, slain as a criminal, yet was not a criminal. The criminals
were either left unburied or disgraced by promiscuous interment in an
unclean place. But that body reverently bedewed with tears, wrapped in
fine linen clean and white, softly laid down by loving hands, watched
by love stronger than death, lay in fitting repose as the corpse of a
King till He came forth as a Conqueror. So once more the dominant note
is struck, and this part of the prophecy closes with the emphatic
repetition of the sinlessness of the Suffering Servant, which makes His
sufferings a deep and bewildering mystery, unless they were endured
because of 'our transgressions.'