Passage

Isaiah 6.1

Book: Isaiah · ASV / WEB / KJV / YLT

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV

1. In the year that king Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and his train filled the temple.

Above him stood the seraphim: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. 3. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is Jehovah of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. (Isaiah 6:1-3, ASV)

WEB

1. In the year that king Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up; and his train filled the temple.

Above him stood the seraphim. Each one had six wings. With two he covered his face. With two he covered his feet. With two he flew. 3. One called to another, and said, “Holy, holy, holy, is Yahweh of Armies! The whole earth is full of his glory!” (Isaiah 6:1-3, WEB)

KJV

1. In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. ^{his: or, the skirts thereof}

Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. 3. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. ^{one: Heb. this cried to this} ^{the whole: Heb. his glory is the fulness of the whole earth} (Isaiah 6:1-3, KJV)

YLT

1. In the year of the death of king Uzziah, I see the Lord, sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and His train is filling the temple.

Seraphs are standing above it: six wings hath each one; with two [each] covereth its face, and with two [each] covereth its feet, and with two [each] flieth. 3. And this one hath called unto that, and hath said: 'Holy, Holy, Holy, [is] Jehovah of Hosts, The fulness of all the earth [is] His glory.' (Isaiah 6:1-3, YLT)

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Setting

Speaker: Isaiah, narrating his commissioning vision
Audience: the reader of the prophetic book; the vision itself is private
Location: the temple in Jerusalem, or a heavenly temple the earthly one images
Time period: the year King Uzziah died, c. 740 BC

Theological reading

A dated throne vision, and the date is doing work. "In the year of King Uzziah's death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted."

Uzziah reigned roughly fifty-two years, the longest stable reign in living memory, and he died a leper after presuming on the priestly office (2 Chronicles 26). The throne of Judah has just emptied under a cloud. Isaiah's first word is that he saw a throne that was not empty. The chronological marker is a theological claim: the vacancy is local.

The seeing problem. Isaiah says he saw the Lord, which stands against Exodus 33:20. The text's own management of the tension is careful: what is described is the throne, the robe filling the temple, the seraphim, the smoke, the sound. The figure on the throne is not described. Isaiah reports the setting in detail and the seated one not at all. Whether this is reverent reticence or a signal that the vision is mediated is debated; either way the text does not describe what the Torah says cannot be seen.

The Johannine reading. John 12:41 says Isaiah "saw His glory and spoke about Him," referring to Christ, in a context that has just quoted Isaiah 6:10. The identification is direct and it is not incidental: the Fourth Gospel reads the throne vision as a vision of the pre-incarnate Son. Combined with John 1:18, the Johannine position appears to be that the theophanies were always mediated through the one who would later be seen in the flesh. This is a substantial Christological datum and not merely a devotional flourish.

Apologetic use. The passage anchors the codex's account of how the biblical writers handle the seeing-God tension: not by denying either side, but by locating unmediated sight beyond the creature's capacity while insisting that genuine encounter occurred. The pattern matters for the wider argument at Phenomenology of Perception, where perception of a transcendent object is precisely the case a representational account cannot handle without collapsing the object into the representation.

Key words

ra'ah (H7200), to see, the verb whose use here creates the tension with Exodus 33:20.
adonai (H0136), Lord, sovereign; the title rather than the Tetragrammaton, fitting a throne scene.
kavod (H3519), glory, the term John 12:41 uses of what Isaiah saw; see H3519 - kavod.
H4194 - mavet, mavet, Strong's H4194
H0136 - adonai, adonai, Strong's H0136

Cross-references

Isaiah 6:5, the prophet's response in the next verse
Exodus 33:20, the refusal this vision stands in tension with
John 1:18, the Johannine restatement and its resolution
Revelation 22:4, the promised unmediated sight
G3708 - horao, the Greek verb of seeing across this theme

Quoted in

Arguments and defeaters:

Concepts:

Angels, via Isaiah 6.1-8
Christ is God, via Isaiah 6.1-5
Christs Deity, via Isaiah 6.1-10
Old Testament Christology, via Isaiah 6.1-10
Old Testament Witness to the Deity of Christ, via Isaiah 6.1-10
Two Powers in Heaven, via Isaiah 6.1-10

People:

Isaiah the Prophet, via Isaiah 6.1-10

Lexicon:

Passages:

Isaiah 6.5

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.