The Transformation of the Wilderness and Supersessionist Interpretations of Second Isaiah

This paper will consider how discussions of the »new Exodus« motif in Isaiah scholarship reflect the lasting effects of typological and supersessionist interpretations of the book of Isaiah. Firstly, this essay addresses that the majority of scholars who suggested that there is a »new Exodus« in Second Isaiah (40-55) construct a typological and supersessionist relationship between the »new« and the »old« Exodus. Looking at Isa 40 and 43, I compare approaches that argue for a typological relationship with the Exodus traditions and compare them with approaches that do not overemphasize the Exodus traditions in Second Isaiah. I suggest that alternative approaches to Isaiah's poetics which allow the text's literary tensions to remain unresolved are inherently opposed to the way in which Isaiah has been interpreted from »new Exodus« approaches. Therefore, these alternative approaches to Isaiah's poetics present not only more careful readings of Isaiah, but also function heuristically as a corrective against the legacy of supersessionist readings of Isaiah.