Комментарий к Йешайау 43:10

and My servant Jacob.

Ye are my witnesses, etc. Israel is addressed. And my servant. The prophet.

whom I chose. He, too, shall testify that I promised him when he went to Mesopotamia, and I kept My promise.

I am he. This is the sublimest expression of the unity of God; for every other being is different from its real form.¹⁴Every creature is, according to the theory of I.E., produced after and by its abstract form in the spiritual world above, but being subject to accidents, it deviates from its abstract original, from its true and perfect form, and is, as it were, not truly itself. To God alone this is not applicable; He is, therefore, said to be Himself in truth, to be always the same.

in order that you know I did all this in order that you put your heart to know Me.

Before me, after me. According to some, before me means before the revelation on Sinai, and after me, after the revelation.¹⁵This explanation is intended to oppose the inference, which might be made from the words before me, after me, that God is not without beginning and end. But it is not at all necessary to depart from the literal meaning of the words: No God was before me, and none will be after me, because God is the first and last. The expression formed (נוצר) is applied here to the word God, in order to imply that a god besides Him can only be one formed by man. Shortsighted people think, that the expression formed used in reference to the Creator, slipped out of the mouth of the prophet; but this is by no means the case ; such critics do not conceive the true meaning of the verse.^15aThat there is no God besides Him, not even one formed by Him.