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From: Isaiah 22:19-23

Oracle concerning Shebna

[19] I will thrust you from your office, and you will be cast down from your station.
[20] In that day I will call my servant Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, [21] and I will
clothe him with your robe, and will bind your girdle on him, and will commit your
authority to his hand; and he shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem
and to the house of Judah. [22] And I will place on his shoulder the key of the
house of David; he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none
shall open. [23] And I will fasten him like a peg in a sure place, and he will be
come a throne of honour to his father’s house.

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Commentary:

22:15-25. Shebna had a high position in the royal court, and he is mentioned in
other passages (36:3, 11, 22; 37:2; and 2 Kings 18:26, 37; 19:2). He may have
been a foreigner who, after occupying a senior position in Hezekiah’s palace, was
replaced by Eliakim. Isaiah reproaches Shebna for being ostentatious (v. 16) and
he tells him he will be dismissed from office (vv. 17-19. 25). His successor, Elia-
kim, son of Hilkiah (vv. 20-24), will be the official who, during the Assyrian siege
of Jerusalem, heads a royal embassy charged with negotiating peace (cf. 2 Kings
18:18-19:2).

Irrespective of the historical context in which the oracle was spoken, the words of
v. 22 find significant resonance in the New Testament. The first part of the verse is
reminiscent of what Jesus says to Peter when giving him the “keys of the kingdom”
(Mt 16:19). In this connexion it is no harm to remember that the king’s high stew-
ard, as his representative, opened and closed the official court business of the day.
The text of the second part of this same verse is applied in the book of Revelation
to the Messiah, “the holy one, the true, who has the key of David” (Rev 3:7), be-
cause Jesus, the Messiah, as the new David opens the doors of heaven. The
Church’s liturgy, in the famous “O” antiphons prior to Christmas, extols Christ, gi-
ving him this messianic title: “Key of David and sceptre of the house of Israel, you,
who reign over the whole world, come and free those who wait for you in darkness”
(Divine Office, Antiphon at Vespers, 20 December).

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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.