DO THE PROPHETS SPEAK OF JESUS

DO THE PROPHETS SPEAK OF JESUS?

Shmuel Golding

Part 2

The purpose of these polemics is threefold: to arm with logical refutations those who are pestered by fundamental Christian evangelists who come knocking at the door, to examine the claims of the evangelists by comparing the New Testament with its ancient base, the Hebrew Bible and to enlighten the fundamentalists who are ignorant or unwilling to submit to the findings and intensive research of scholars and theologians over the past 200 years - and rightly so. Their "christological proofs" would disintegrate.

Christianity is said to be founded on Judaism and the New Testament upon the Old. Jesus of Nazareth is claimed by the New Testament to be the promised messiah of the Old Testament. These polemics examine those claims.

Matt 4.12.16, "Now when Jesus had heard that John was cast into prison, he departed into Galilee; And leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is upon the sea coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim: That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, The land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles; The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up."

REFUTATION

For Matthew to assume that Jesus fulfilled this prophecy only shows his ignorance of the Jewish Bible and of Jewish history. The words come from Isaiah 8.22 and Isaiah 9.1.

These verses are speaking about the king of Assyria who did not become weary of oppressing Israel. The first time he came against Israel he dealt mildly with the land of Zebulun and Naphtali. He carried them away into exile and then he returned and dealt harshly by the way of the sea, and the other side of the Jordan. In this second conquest the Assyrians took all 20 cities in Galilee and those dwelling by the sea (Sea of Galilee). Note that Isaiah is stating facts, he is telling what had already happened, and the kingdom of Judea was to learn a lesson from this. Jerusalem had not yet fallen, it and the interior of the land of Judea were still left.

The inhabitants of Jerusalem were afraid of falling into Sennacherib's hands, thus the people walked in darkness but as they sat in the shadow of death, light shone upon them, Isa 9.1. Not the light of Jesus as Matthew claims, but the great light was the news of Sennacherib's defeat. This all happened in the 15th year of Hezekiah's reign, as seen in 2 Kings ch 15-17.

Matt. 11.10: "This is the one about whom it was written,* Behold I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way before you." (*Mal. 3.1)

Christianity believes that John the Baptist was Elijah, who had come to usher in Jesus as the messiah.

REFUTATION

The Hebrew Bible states, "Behold I send my messenger and he shall clear the way before ME." (Mal. 3.1)

Let the observant reader examine the text from Malachi together with that of Matthew and he will note that the pronoun has been changed by the writers of the New Testament. This gives the impression that "I" (God) is speaking to "you" (Jesus) about a messenger, whereas this cannot be substantiated from the Hebrew text.

In fact, an equally correct translation would be "Behold I send Malachi and he shall clear the way before Me", since the name Malachi means "my messenger.”

Matt. 12.14ff: "The Pharisees went out and held a council against him on how they might destroy him but when Jesus knew it, he withdrew himself from thence and great multitudes followed him and he healed them all and charged them that they should not make him known, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet* saying..." (then Jesus quotes the following verses from Isaiah but changes the last verse) verse 21 to read: "and in his name shall the gentiles trust" (*Isa. 42.1-4).

The fundamentalists claim that the servant mentioned by Matthew is Jesus. When Jesus was baptized by John, the holy spirit is said to have rested upon him in the form of a dove (John 1.32). The writer of Matthew says that the prophecy "He will not call out or lift up his voice or make himself heard in the open street." (Isa. 42.2) was fulfilled when the Pharisees held a council against Jesus, forcing him to go into hiding and to tell his disciples not to reveal his whereabouts.

REFUTATION

When we read the whole of chapters 42-44 of Isaiah, it becomes clear that the servant mentioned is Israel, as seen in 41.8-10; 43.1,4,10,21;, 44.1. In fact, the passage begins with Isaiah 40.1 and continues to Isaiah 44.28.

Incidentally, we can learn from the Book of Isaiah, which declares, "My glory will I not give to another" as meaning not to Jesus: "Neither my praise to carved idols"; hence, no praise for an image on a wooden cross.

For those who insist that the servant (Isa. 42.1) is Jesus, Isaiah gives a further description, which is not very flattering: "Who is blind but my servant or deaf as the messenger that I sent?" (Isaiah 42.19). If Jesus is the servant, then this blindness must apply to him.

The servant "shall bring forth justice to the Gentiles" (Isa. 42.2); yet, under the reign of Christ's spirit, the gentiles received the sword, the inquisitor's fire and a perverted law. They received a gospel that kept them in darkness until the reformation - and as for "His voice not being heard in the open street" (Isa. 42.2), Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to great crowds, which followed him (Luke 4.14-15) (Matt. 4.24) and his words are still being echoed in revival meetings around the world.

Compare Matthew's erroneous rendering of Isa. 42.4 with the original. Matthew reads, "and in his name shall the gentiles trust" (Matt. 12.21) but the Hebrew text reads, "and the isles shall wait for his Torah.” God's servant, Israel, sometimes wandered away from the Law but the justice and the ethics of the Law became the golden rule for most of the civilized world. The Jews gave the world a code of moral law and the knowledge of God. God's servant, Israel, can thus be seen as a light to the nations; therefore, Israel and not Jesus has fulfilled this prophecy.

Matt. 13.14-15: "and in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah* which saith, By hearing ye shall hear and shall not understanding and seeing, ye shall see and shall not perceive, for the people's heart is waxed gross and their ears are dull of hearing and their eyes, they have closed, lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and should understand with their heart and should be converted and I should heal them." (*Isa. 6.9)

The fundamentalists believe that this prophecy is referring to Jesus, whom they claim was sent to speak to the people. The Jews were and still are blind to the truth and refuse to hear the gospel.

REFUTATION

The prophecy is translated correctly but used completely out of context.

The prophecy is dated internally by the fact that it is a message Isaiah himself brought to his own generation, for he says, "Here am I, send me" (Isa. 6.9). The person who said, "Here am I, send me" also said "Woe is me, for I am ruined because I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips." (Isa. 6.5). If this is speaking about Jesus, then he must have been a man of unclean lips.

Matt. 17.10-12: "and his disciples asked him, saying, why then do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?* And he answered and said, Elijah is coming and will restore all things; but I say to you that Elijah already came and they did not recognize him but did to him whatever they wished. So also the son of man is going to suffer at their hands." (*Mal. 3.23-24) (K.J.V. Mal. 4.5-6)

Aware of this prophecy which the scribes taught, Jesus's disciples asked him about the matter (Matt. 17.10). Jesus replied that Elijah had already come (Matt. 17.12). According to the writer of Mark, "They did to him what was written of him" (Mark 9.13). The disciples understood that he spoke to them of John the Baptist (Matt. 17.13).

REFUTATION

The best refutation comes from John the Baptist himself. He disagreed with Jesus, for when they asked John if he was Elijah, he said, "No, I am not" (John 1.21). So, according to Malachi, Elijah must come before the messiah and since John was not Elijah, Jesus cannot have been the messiah.

Some fundamentalists teach that John represented Elijah in respect of his power or that he had the spirit of Elijah but that does not fulfill this prophecy of Malachi, where, in Hebrew, no terms such as "one like unto Elijah" or "one with Elijah's spirit" are used. The prophet says (Mal. 3.23): "Behold I will send you Elijah the prophet"; he says that the individual who is to appear will be Elijah himself. Moreover, nowhere is it written of Elijah that when he comes, he is to be beheaded, as was done to John the Baptist - Mark 6.24-27. "They did to him as was written." (Matt. 17.12).

Another aspect of Malachi's prophecy that has not been fulfilled is the fact that children are still disobedient to their parents, parents are still weeping over their wayward children and fundamentalists still play their role in separating families, sowing the seeds of hatred and discord in many homes. Elijah's first task will have to be to undo what Jesus did and reconcile broken homes.

Fundamentalists thump on Hebrews 8/6 and enlighten us that the Law was replaced (as to Paul's private dictum) by a better covenant.

However, Malachi's prophecy calls for the adherence to the Law of Moses, together with the statutes and judgments (Mal. 3.22).

Matt 21.1-10 tells of a story of Jesus instructing his disciples to go into a village where they would find an ass and a colt that they should loose them and bring both animals to him (Jesus).

Verses 4 and 5 state, "All this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, Tell ye the daughter of Sion, Behold thy King cometh unto thee, meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass.”

REFUTATION

The writers of the New Testament who wanted to make Jesus fulfill prophecy, have in this case gone to absurd extremes. Jesus rode into Jerusalem on two animals, therefore he must be the Messiah.

The Hebrew text which is found in Zech 9.9, simply implies that this king will ride into Jerusalem upon a donkey and that it would be a young one, a foal, in Hebrew 'Ben Atnot' meaning son of a donkey. There is no indication of two animals. The prophet describes the donkey: one donkey which will be a young one, a male.

The New Testament portrays Jesus performing a rodeo act when the disciples harness up two animals for him to ride into Jerusalem.

The Hebrew language often uses parallelism such as this. The second half of the verse merely serves to emphasize the first half of the verse.

Jesus was never anointed king of Israel, yet the prophet states the rider would be a king. Since the time of this prophecy thousands of Jews have ridden into Jerusalem on donkeys, are we to proclaim them all kings?

This prophecy could not have been fulfilled by Jesus because the next verse reads, "He shall speak to the Gentiles and his dominion shall be from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth" (Zech 9.10). Jesus did not wish to speak to the Gentiles, the gospel quotes him as saying, "I am not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" (Matt 15.24). He likened Gentiles to dogs (Matt 15.26) though he later repudiated his racist attitude (v 28).

Where is the dominion (Zech 9.10) of Jesus? He said, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18.36). In fact Jesus was against having dominion over men. He said, .”..the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion" (Matt 20.25) (implying he did not). Jesus did not see himself as an earthly king.

Maybe there are those who object to our refutation when we say that only one donkey is mentioned in the text. No doubt their objection will be that the Hebrew employs a 'vav' before the words 'al-aier ben-atnot' meaning 'and upon a male colt of an ass.’ In many cases the Hebrew Bible places a 'vav' before a word where it is not always given its literal English translation which is normally 'and' but can also mean 'but', 'or', 'so', 'then', 'with', 'when', 'who', 'that', and much more. In this particular text it is employed as a comma, thus making the text read 'riding upon a donkey ('vav' for a comma) a colt the foal of an ass.'

Note: Mark 11.2 and Luke 19.30 only mention one animal, a colt. Matthew was a writer with a squint, he saw double all the time. In the account of the demoniac in Gadara unlike the other gospel writers who only tell of one, Matthew tells of two demoniacs. In the story of the blind man by the wayside, as described by Mark and Luke, Matthew sees two blind men and now again in this incident of a colt for Jesus to ride upon, Matthew sees a colt and an ass.

Continued in Part 3

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