Exile in the Book of Isaiah

This chapter recognizes that exile in Isaiah remains one of the great riddles of this prophetic collection. Although the book, in its various units and as a whole, “lived through” experiences of deportation and return, it leaves readers with only fragmentary information about one of the most influential phenomena of imperial policy to affect Israel, Judah, and the entire ancient Near East of the first millennium bce. The chapter brings together all the information we have on exile and possible exilic setting(s) in Isaiah, and discusses exile through two of its components-deportation and return. Each component is discussed under seven headings. This mapping of exile leads to additional discussion of the exilic setting(s), that is, the geography and sociology, of Isa 40-66, and of the use of metaphors of exile and of exile as metaphor.