For unto us a child is bornThis phrase emphasizes the humanity of the Messiah, highlighting His birth as a child. It connects to the prophecy of a virgin birth in
Isaiah 7:14, where a child named Immanuel is foretold. The birth of Jesus in Bethlehem fulfills this prophecy, as recorded in
Matthew 1:22-23. The phrase underscores the incarnation, where God takes on human flesh, a central tenet of Christian theology.
unto us a son is given
This part of the verse emphasizes the divine nature of the Messiah, as a "son" given by God. It reflects the concept of Jesus as the Son of God, a gift to humanity.John 3:16 echoes this sentiment, highlighting God's love in giving His only Son. The dual nature of Christ, both human and divine, is a cornerstone of Christian belief.
and the government will be upon His shoulders
This phrase indicates the Messiah's role as a ruler and king. It suggests a future time when He will establish His reign, bringing justice and peace. The imagery of bearing the government on His shoulders signifies authority and responsibility. This connects to the Davidic Covenant in2 Samuel 7:12-16, where God promises an everlasting kingdom through David's lineage, fulfilled in Jesus.
And He will be called Wonderful Counselor
The title "Wonderful Counselor" suggests wisdom and guidance beyond human understanding. It implies that the Messiah will provide divine counsel and direction. In the New Testament, Jesus is often depicted as a teacher and guide, offering wisdom through His parables and teachings. This title reflects His role in providing spiritual guidance and insight.
Mighty God
This title affirms the deity of the Messiah, identifying Him as God Himself. It aligns with the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, where Jesus is recognized as fully God. The term "Mighty" conveys strength and power, attributes of God seen throughout the Old Testament. This title underscores the belief in Jesus' divine authority and power.
Everlasting Father
This title can be understood as the Messiah's eternal nature and His role as a fatherly figure to His people. It does not imply that the Son is the Father in the Trinitarian sense but rather highlights His care, protection, and eternal existence. The concept of God as a father is prevalent in scripture, offering comfort and assurance of His unending presence.
Prince of Peace
The title "Prince of Peace" signifies the Messiah's role in bringing peace to the world. It reflects the peace that Jesus offers through reconciliation with God, as seen inRomans 5:1. This peace is both spiritual and eschatological, pointing to a future time when Christ will establish His kingdom of peace on earth, as prophesied inIsaiah 11:6-9.
Persons / Places / Events
1.
IsaiahA major prophet in the Old Testament, Isaiah's prophecies often pointed to the coming of the Messiah and the future hope for Israel.
2.
The Child/SonThis refers to the prophesied Messiah, Jesus Christ, who is both fully human ("a child is born") and fully divine ("a son is given").
3.
The GovernmentSymbolizes the authority and rule that the Messiah will have, indicating a kingdom characterized by justice and peace.
4.
Wonderful CounselorA title for the Messiah, emphasizing His wisdom and guidance.
5.
Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of PeaceTitles that reflect the divine nature and eternal reign of the Messiah, highlighting His power, care, and the peace He brings.
Teaching Points
The Dual Nature of ChristRecognize the significance of Jesus being both fully human and fully divine, which is essential for His role as Savior.
The Role of Jesus as CounselorSeek Jesus' wisdom and guidance in daily life, trusting in His perfect counsel.
Understanding Jesus' AuthorityAcknowledge Jesus' sovereign rule over all aspects of life and submit to His leadership.
Experiencing Peace through ChristEmbrace the peace that Jesus offers, which surpasses all understanding, especially in times of turmoil.
Eternal PerspectiveRemember that Jesus' reign is everlasting, providing hope and assurance for the future.
Bible Study Questions and Answers
1.What is the meaning of Isaiah 9:6?
2.How does Isaiah 9:6 reveal Jesus' divine nature and eternal kingship?
3.What do the titles in Isaiah 9:6 teach about Jesus' character?
4.How can we apply "Prince of Peace" to our daily conflicts?
5.Connect Isaiah 9:6 with New Testament references to Jesus' birth and mission.
6.How does "Wonderful Counselor" guide us in making godly decisions today?
7.How does Isaiah 9:6 predict the coming of Jesus as the Messiah?
8.Why is the child in Isaiah 9:6 called "Mighty God" and "Everlasting Father"?
9.What historical context surrounds the prophecy in Isaiah 9:6?
10.What are the top 10 Lessons from Isaiah 9?
11.Are you truly the Son of God?
12.What evidence exists that Isaiah 9 uniquely prophesies Jesus, given that the text never names him explicitly?
13.Is "Everlasting Father" a title for God?
14.Is Jesus considered equal to God?What Does Isaiah 9:6 Mean
For unto us a child is bornThe prophecy opens with the astonishing simplicity of a baby’s arrival. God steps into human history through real flesh and blood.
•Luke 2:11 affirms the fulfillment: “Today in the City of David a Savior has been born to you. He is Christ the Lord!”.
•Galatians 4:4 reminds us this happened “when the fullness of time had come,” showing divine precision.
• The birth of Jesus is no legend; it is the literal moment when heaven touched earth.
Unto us a son is givenThe wording shifts from birth to gift. This Son is heaven’s offering, extended to “us.”
•John 3:16 declares, “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son.”
•Romans 8:32 underscores the generosity: God “did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all.”
• The gift language stresses grace—our rescue is something received, not earned.
The government will be upon His shouldersThe Child carries authority that never rests on human polling or military strength.
• Jesus announces inMatthew 28:18, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.”
•Revelation 11:15 foretells the final outcome: “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He will reign forever and ever.”
• Because His shoulders hold the government, believers rest; the world is not spinning out of control.
Wonderful CounselorLiterally, “a wonder of a counselor.” He guides perfectly.
•Isaiah 28:29 celebrates the LORD’s wisdom: “He is wonderful in counsel and excellent in wisdom.”
•John 14:26 links Jesus and His Spirit: “The Advocate, the Holy Spirit… will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.”
• When decisions loom, we don’t guess; we ask our Wonderful Counselor.
Mighty GodThe title leaves no wiggle room—this Child is fully divine.
•John 1:1 states, “In the beginning was the Word… and the Word was God.”
•Colossians 2:9 confirms, “In Christ all the fullness of the Deity dwells bodily.”
• Because He is Mighty God, nothing—sin, death, Satan—can withstand His power (Hebrews 2:14-15).
Everlasting FatherNot a confusion of persons within the Trinity, but a description of Jesus’ timeless, father-like care.
•Hebrews 13:8 assures us, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”
•Psalm 103:13 pictures paternal compassion: “As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him.”
• Our Savior’s shepherding heart never expires; His promises outlast every calendar.
Prince of PeacePeace here is shalom—wholeness with God, others, and ourselves.
•Ephesians 2:14 proclaims, “For He Himself is our peace.”
•John 14:27 offers His personal pledge: “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give you.”
•Romans 5:1 shows the root: “Since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
• One day that peace will flood the earth (Isaiah 11:9); until then, it floods believing hearts.
summaryIsaiah 9:6 paints a single, stunning portrait: the promised Messiah is truly human and fully God, carrying eternal authority, perfect wisdom, unstoppable power, fatherly care, and reconciling peace. Every title answers a human need, and every need drives us back to Him. Trust the Child given, submit to the King enthroned, and walk in the peace only He supplies.
(6)
For unto us a child is born.--The picture of a kingdom of peace could not be complete without the manifestation of a king. In the description of that king Isaiah is led to use words which cannot find a complete fulfilment in any child of man. The loftiness of thought, rising here as to its highest point, is obviously connected with the words which told that Jehovah had spoken to the prophet "with a strong hand." His condition was one more ecstatic and therefore more apocalyptic than before, and there flashes on him, as it were, the thought that the future deliverer of Israel must bear a name that should be above every name that men had before honoured. And yet here also there was a law of continuity, and the form of the prediction was developed from the materials supplied by earlier prophets. In Psalms 110 he had found the thought of the king-priest after the order of Melchizedek, whom Jehovah addressed as Adonai. In Psalms 2, though it did not foretell an actual incarnation, the anointed King was addressed by Jehovah as His Son. The throne of that righteous king was as a throne of God (
Psalm 45:6). Nor had the prophet's personal experience been less fruitfully suggestive. He had given his own children mysterious names. That of the earthly Immanuel, as the prophet brooded over it, might well lead on to the thought of One who should, in a yet higher sense than as being the pledge of Divine protection, be as "God with us." Even the earthly surroundings of the prophet's life may not have been without their share of suggestiveness. The kings of Egypt and Assyria with whom his nation had been brought into contact delighted in long lists of epithetic names (
e.g.,"the great king, the king unrivalled, the protector of the just, the noble warrior." Inscription of, Sennacherib in
Records of the Past, i. p. 25), describing their greatness and their glory. It was natural that the prophet should see in the king of whom he thought as the future conqueror of all the world-powers that were founded on might and not on right, One who should bear a name formed, it might be, after that fashion, but full of a greater majesty and glory.
His name shall be called Wonderful.--It is noticeable that that which follows is given not as many names, but one. Consisting as it does of eight words, of which the last six obviously fall into three couplets, it is probable that the first two should also be taken together, and that we have four elements of the compound name: (1)Wonderful-Counsellor,(2)God-the-Mighty-One,(3)Father of Eternity,(4)Prince of Peace.Each element of the Name has its special significance. (1) The first embodies the thought of the wisdom of the future Messiah. Men should not simply praise it as they praise their fellows, but should adore and wonder at it as they wonder at the wisdom of God (Judges 13:18, where the Hebrew for the "secret" of the Authorised version is the same as that for "wonderful;"Exodus 15:11;Psalm 77:11;Psalm 78:11;Isaiah 28:29;Isaiah 29:14). The name contains the germ afterwards developed in the picture of the wisdom of the true king inIsaiah 11:2-4. The LXX. renders the Hebrew as "the angel of great counsel," and in the Vatican text the description ends there. (2) It is significant that the word for "God" is not Elohim, which may be used in a lower sense for those who are representatives of God, as inExodus 7:1;Exodus 22:28,1Samuel 28:13, butEl,which is never used by Isaiah, or any other Old Testament writer, in any lower sense than that of absolute Deity, and which, we may note, had been specially brought before the prophet's thoughts in the name Immanuel. The name appears again as applied directly to Jehovah inIsaiah 10:21;Deuteronomy 10:17;Jeremiah 32:18;Nehemiah 9:32;Psalm 24:8; and the adjective inIsaiah 42:13. (3) In "Father of Eternity," (LXX. Alex. and Vulg., "Father of the age to come ") we have a name which seems at first to clash with the formalised developments of Christian theology, which teach us, lest we should "confound the persons," not to deal with the names of the Father and the Son as interchangeable. Those developments, however, were obviously not within Isaiah's ken, and he uses the name of "Father" because none other expressed so well the true idea of loving and protecting government (Job 29:16,Isaiah 22:21). And if the kingdom was to be "for ever and ever," then in some very real sense he would be, in that attribute of Fatherly government, a sharer in the eternity of Jehovah. Another rendering of the name, adopted by some critics, "Father (i.e.,Giver) of booty," has little to recommend it, and is entirely out of harmony with the majesty of the context. (4) "Prince of Peace." The prophet clings, as all prophets before him had done, to the thought that peace, and not war, belonged to the ideal Kingdom of the Messiah. That hope had been embodied by David in the name of Absalom (" father of peace ") and Solomon. It had been uttered in the prayer ofPsalm 72:3, and by Isaiah's contemporary, Micah (Micah 5:5). Earth-powers, like Assyria and Egypt, might rest in war and conquest as an end, but the true king, though warfare might be needed to subdue his foes (Psalm 45:5), was to be a "Prince of Peace" (Zechariah 9:9-10). It must be noted as remarkable, looking to the grandeur of the prophecy, and its apparently direct testimony to the true nature of the Christ, that it is nowhere cited in the New Testament as fulfilled in Him; and this, thoughIsaiah 9:1 is, as we have seen, quoted by St. Matthew andIsaiah 9:7, finds at least an allusive reference inLuke 1:32-33. . . .
Verse 6. -
Unto us a child is born (comp.
Isaiah 7:14-16, where the promise of "a child," "a son," is first made - a child who was, like this Child, to be "God with us").
The government shall be upon his shoulder. The word translated "government" (
misrah) occurs only here and in ver. 7. It is probably to be connected with
sat, "prince," and Israel. Government was regarded as a burden, to be born on the back or shoulders, and was sometimes symbolized by a key laid upon the shoulder (
Isaiah 22:22). Vizier means "burdened." The Latin writers often speak of the civil power as borne on the shoulders of magistrates (Cic., 'Orat. pro Flacc,' § 95; Plin., 'Paneg.,' § 10). As God, our Lord governed all things from the beginning; as man, he set up a "kingdom" which he still governs - upon the earth.
His name shall be called. It is perhaps not very important whether we view what follows as one name or several. Isaiah does not really mean that the "Child" should bear
as a name, or names, any of the expressions, but only that they should be truly applicable to him.
Wonderful, Counselor. It has been proposed to unite these two expressions and translate, "Wondrous Counselor" (compare "wonderful in counsel,"
Isaiah 28:29). But Dr. Kay is probably right in saying that, if this had been the meaning, it would have been expressed differently. Gesenius, Rosenmüller, Delitzsch, and Vance Smith agree with Dr. Kay in taking the words separately.
Wonderful. The Messiah would be "wonderful" in his nature as God-Man; in his teaching, which "astonished" those who heard it (
Matthew 7:28); in his doings (
Isaiah 25:1); in the circumstances of his birth and death; in his resurrection, and in his ascension. "Wonder" would be the first sentiment which his manifestation would provoke, and hence this descriptive epithet is placed first. As the Word, as Wisdom itself, as he who says, "Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom: I am Understanding" (
Proverbs 8:14), he is well named "Counselor." None will ever seek his counsel in vain, much less repent of following it.
The mighty God; rather, perhaps,
Mighty God; but the difference is not great, since
El, God, contains within itself the notion of singularity, which is given to ordinary nouns by the article. The term
El, God, had been previously applied to the Messiah only in
Psalm 45:6. It denotes in Isaiah always (as Mr. Cheyne observes) "divinity in an absolute sense; it is never used hyperbolically or metaphorically."
The Everlasting Father; rather,
Everlasting or
Eternal Father. But here, again, there is a singularity in the idea, which makes the omission of the article unimportant; for how could there be more than one Everlasting Father, one Creator, Preserver, Protector of mankind who was absolutely eternal? If the term "Father," applied to our Lord, grates on our ears, we must remember that the distinction of Persons in the Godhead had not yet been revealed.
The Prince of Peace; literally,
Prince of Peace. A "Prince of Peace" had been long shadowed forth, as in Melchizedek, "King of Salem,"
i.e. "of Peace;" and again in Solomon, "the peaceful one;" and Isaiah himself had already prophesied the peacefulness of the Messiah's kingdom (
Isaiah 2:4). Compare the song of the angels at our Lord's birth (
Luke 2:14). If the peacefulness has not vet very clearly shown itself, the reason would seem to be that our Lord's kingdom has yet to come into the hearts of most men.
Parallel Commentaries ...
Hebrew
Forכִּי־(kî-)Conjunction
Strong's 3588:A relative conjunctionunto usלָ֗נוּ(lā·nū)Preposition | first person common plural
Strong's Hebrewa childיֶ֣לֶד(ye·leḏ)Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 3206:Something born, a lad, offspringis born,יֻלַּד־(yul·laḏ-)Verb - Pual - Perfect - third person masculine singular
Strong's 3205:To bear young, to beget, medically, to act as midwife, to show lineageunto usלָ֔נוּ(lā·nū)Preposition | first person common plural
Strong's Hebrewa sonבֵּ֚ן(bên)Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 1121:A sonis given,נִתַּן־(nit·tan-)Verb - Nifal - Perfect - third person masculine singular
Strong's 5414:To give, put, setand the governmentהַמִּשְׂרָ֖ה(ham·miś·rāh)Article | Noun - feminine singular
Strong's 4951:Rule, dominionwill beוַתְּהִ֥י(wat·tə·hî)Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Consecutive imperfect - third person feminine singular
Strong's 1961:To fall out, come to pass, become, beuponעַל־(‘al-)Preposition
Strong's 5921:Above, over, upon, againstHis shoulders.שִׁכְמ֑וֹ(šiḵ·mōw)Noun - masculine singular construct | third person masculine singular
Strong's 7926:The neck, as the place of burdens, the spur of a, hillAnd He will be calledוַיִּקְרָ֨א(way·yiq·rā)Conjunctive waw | Verb - Qal - Consecutive imperfect - third person masculine singular
Strong's 7121:To call, proclaim, readWonderfulפֶּ֠לֶא(pe·le)Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 6382:A miracleCounselor,יוֹעֵץ֙(yō·w·‘êṣ)Verb - Qal - Participle - masculine singular
Strong's 3289:To advise, to deliberate, resolveMightyגִּבּ֔וֹר(gib·bō·wr)Adjective - masculine singular
Strong's 1368:Powerful, warrior, tyrantGod,אֵ֣ל(’êl)Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 410:Strength -- as adjective, mighty, the AlmightyEverlasting Father,אֲבִיעַ֖ד(’ă·ḇî·‘aḏ)Noun - proper - masculine singular
Strong's 5703:A, terminus, duration, advance, perpetuityPrinceשַׂר־(śar-)Noun - masculine singular construct
Strong's 8269:Chieftain, chief, ruler, official, captain, princeof Peace.שָׁלֽוֹם׃(šā·lō·wm)Noun - masculine singular
Strong's 7965:Safe, well, happy, friendly, welfare, health, prosperity, peace
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OT Prophets: Isaiah 9:6 For to us a child is born (Isa Isi Is) 
