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FULL BACKGROUND
DEFINITION OF TERMS
THE CONCISE OXFORD DICTIONARY
SERVE: (Verb) Do service to, Be useful to, e.g. serve the Lord or God Be religious or virtuous, serve the devil Be wicked.
SERVANT: (Noun) Devoted follower, person willing to serve another.
SERVICE: (Verb) Use, Assistance.
MINISTER: (Verb) Render aid or assistance.
BIBLE DICTIONARIES
SERVANT OF THE LORD
I. The Old Testament
The term ‘servant’ (ebed) occurs as frequently outside Duhm’s selected passages as within them (e.g. Is. 41:8f.; 43:10; 44:1f., 21; 45:4; 48:20), with reference to the nation of Israel. It is also used in the OT for individuals in a close relationship with God, such as the Patriarchs, prophets and kings, and particularly Moses and David (e.g. Gn. 26:24; Ex. 14:31; Dt. 34:5; 2 Sa. 7:5; Is. 20:3; Am. 3:7). But in the ‘Servant Songs’ a distinctive conception of ‘servanthood’ comes into sharper focus, so that without divorcing these passages from their context most scholars continue to speak of a ‘Servant figure’ as a distinct element in the prophet’s message; and the most distinctive element in this figure is that of obedient, undeserved suffering, leading to death, as the means of taking away the sin of his people and ‘making many to be accounted righteous’.
The language about the Servant is often strongly individual, describing the birth, suffering, death and eventual triumph of what is apparently a person rather than a group. Various historical identifications have been proposed, such as Moses, Jeremiah, Cyrus, Zerubbabel or the prophet himself. But the traditional interpretation, Jewish and Christian, is that the Servant is an ideal individual figure of the future, God’s agent in redeeming his people, i.e. the *Messiah. In later Palestinian Judaism this was the dominant interpretation (Hellenistic Judaism was apparently more favourable to a collective interpretation), so that the *Targum of Jonathan on Is. 53, while clearly embarrassed by the idea of Messianic suffering to the extent of drastically reconstructing the text to eliminate this implication, still explicitly identifies the Servant as the Messiah (see text in Zimmerli and Jeremias, The Servant of God2, pp. 69-71; and for other early Jewish interpretations, ibid., pp. 37-79).
II. The New Testament
a. In the teaching of Jesus
Is. 53:12 is explicitly quoted in Lk. 22:37. There are further clear allusions to Is. 53:10-12 in Mk. 10:45 and 14:24. Mk. 9:12 probably echoes Is. 53:3, and other possible allusions have been found in Mt. 3:15 (cf. Is. 53:11), Lk. 11:22 (cf. Is. 53:12; not a very likely allusion) and in the use of paradidosthai (‘be delivered’) in Mk. 9:31; 10:33; 14:21 (cf. Is. 53:12). In addition the voice at Jesus’ baptism (Mk. 1:11), outlining his mission in terms of Is. 42:1, must have influenced Jesus’ thinking.
Note the concentration in these allusions on Is. 53, and particularly on vv. 10-12 where the redemptive role of the Servant is most explicit. In Mk. 10:45 and 14:24 in particular the vicarious and redemptive character of Jesus’ death is stressed, in terms drawn from Is. 53.
b. In the rest of the New Testament
The actual title ‘servant’ (pais) is confined to Peter’s speech in Acts 3:13, 26 and the prayer of the church in Acts 4:27, 30, but the influence of the Servant figure is clear also in 1 Pet. 2:21-25; 3:18, suggesting that it featured prominently in Peter’s understanding of Jesus’ mission. Paul’s explanations of Christ’s redemptive work often contain ideas, and sometimes verbal allusions, which suggest that he too saw Jesus’ work foreshadowed in Is. 53. (See e.g. Phil. 2:6-11; Rom. 4:25; 5:19; 8:3f., 32-34; 1 Cor. 15:3; 2 Cor. 5:21.) The use of ‘lamb of God’ by John (1:29, 36) also probably shows the influence of Is. 53:7. Heb. 9:28, ‘to bear the sins of many’, echoes Is. 53:12.
There are also a number of formal quotations from Servant passages, with reference to Jesus and the gospel, viz. Mt. 8:17; 12:18-21; Jn. 12:38; Acts 8:32f.; Rom. 10:16; 15:21. None of these is with specific reference to Jesus’ redemptive work, and some focus on other aspects of his mission, but all testify further to the early church’s conviction that the Servant figure, and particularly Is. 53, was a divinely ordained pattern for the Messianic mission of Jesus. 1
MINISTER. (Noun) The Heb. term 'saret' (LXX leitourgos) and its correlates normally refer to temple service, or else to the ministration of angels (Ps. 104:4); but in a more general sense Joshua is the 'maret' or ‘minister’ of Moses (Ex. 24:13; Jos. 1:1), and Solomon’s ministers (1 Ki. 10:5) are his domestic servants. In the NT the characteristic word is ' diakorios', at first in a non-technical sense, and then in Phil. 1:1 and in the Pastorals as the title of a subordinate church-officer. It refers to service in general, temporary or permanent, either by bond or free; but it has the special connotation of waiting at table (the corresponding verb is used in this sense, Lk. 12:37; 17:8, and Martha’s trouble was excess of diakonia, Lk. 10:40). Christ appears among the disciples as 'ho diakonon', ‘one who serves’ (Lk. 22:27), and he can be described as a ' diakonos' of the circumcision (Rom. 15:8); following the example of this lowly service, the greatest of Christians should be a minister to the rest (Mt. 20:26; Mk. 10:43)…...
In the Christian understanding of *ministry, whether official or otherwise, the minister renders a lowly but loving service to God or man. 1
MINISTER: (Noun) One who serves, as distinguished from the master. (1.) Heb. meshereth, applied to an attendant on one of superior rank, as to Joshua, the servant of Moses (Ex. 33:11), and to the servant of Elisha (2 Kings 4:43). This name is also given to attendants at court (2 Chr. 22:8), and to the priests and Levites (Jer. 33:21; Ezek. 44:11).
(2.) Heb. pelah (Ezra 7:24), a “minister†of religion. Here used of that class of sanctuary servants called “Solomon’s servants†in Ezra 2:55–58 and Neh. 7:57–60.
(3.) Greek leitourgos, a subordinate public administrator, and in this sense applied to magistrates (Rom. 13:6). It is applied also to our Lord (Heb. 8:2), and to Paul in relation to Christ (Rom. 15:16).
(4.) Greek hyperetes (literally, “under-rowerâ€), a personal attendant on a superior, thus of the person who waited on the officiating priest in the synagogue (Luke 4:20). It is applied also to John Mark, the attendant on Paul and Barnabas (Acts 13:5).
(5.) Greek diaconos, usually a subordinate officer or assistant employed in relation to the ministry of the gospel, as to Paul and Apollos (1 Cor. 3:5), Tychicus (Eph. 6:21), Epaphras (Col. 1:7), Timothy (1 Thess. 3:2), and also to Christ (Rom. 15:8). 2
TRANSLATION OF 'SERVANT' FROM HEBREW TO ENGLISH
As usual, the rich Hebrew language of many nuances has a number of words that are combined together to be translated as 'servant' in English.
EBED: A slave or a servant.
It applies to:
1. A person at the complete disposal of another. (Genesis 24:1-67)
2. One who works for a master. (Deuteronomy 15:12-18)
3. A slave who has given up all personal rights to serve his master.
4. A slave in the service of a king.
5. A person serving in attendance to the temple sanctuary (1 Samuel 3:9)
ABAD: To work and (in any sense) to serve.
It applies to:
1. A person who tills the ground.(Genesis 3:23)
2. A person who looks after or keeps a garden. (Genesis 2:15)
3. A priest who serves the people. (Numbers 18:7, 23)
SAKIYR: A person who works for wages.
It applies to:
1. A hired servant. (One who wasn't allowed to eat the Passover of their master's family.) (Exodus 12:3-5)
2. A temporary resident who is taken into a house as a slave. (Leviticus 25:6)
3. Not applicable to a 'love-slave'. (Leviticus 25:39-42)
SHARATH: One who is a doer of menial and insignificant tasks.
It applies to:
1. A priest ministering or serving in his priestly office." (Exodus 28:35-43)
2. A priest who ministers continually before the Ark of the Covenant." (1 Chronicles 16:37)
AN EXAMPLE: Joshua was a `sharath' to Moses." (Exodus24:13)
1 The New Bible Dictionary, (Wheaton, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.) 1962.
2 Easton, M. G., M. A. D. D., Easton’s Bible Dictionary, (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.) 1996.
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