Isaiah writes, For My own sake, for My own sake will I do it (Isaiah 48:11). Why the repetition? Why does God say for My own sake twice?
The midrash on this verse, preserved in Midrash Shocher Tov on Psalm 107, hears the doubled phrase as the signature of two redemptions. As I redeemed you from Egypt for My name's sake, says the Holy One, citing Psalm 106:8, He saved them for His name's sake, so too will I redeem you from Edom for My own name's sake. One for My own sake is the Exodus. The other for My own sake is the final redemption, the one still to come.
And then the midrash reaches for Ecclesiastes to close the circle. The thing that has been is that which shall be (Ecclesiastes 1:9). The pattern of the first redemption will be the pattern of the last. Back to Isaiah. The redeemed of the Lord shall return (Isaiah 51:11). The sages notice a curious absence in that verse. It does not say the redeemed of Elijah, the great prophet who will herald the end of days. It does not say the redeemed of the Messiah, who will come in that age. It says, plainly and only, the redeemed of the Lord.
This is the midrash's sharpest point, preserved in Harris's 1901 Hebraic Literature. Elijah will come. The Messiah will come. Great human and prophetic figures will play their roles. But the redemption itself, in its deepest layer, is never the work of any agent. It is the Holy One's own act, for His own sake, twice spoken in Isaiah so that no one forgets who actually saves.