Rex Banks
Introduction
In the eighth century B.C. the God of Israel issued a challenge to the lifeless idols that have lead His people astray. "Declare the things that are going to come afterward" He says, "That we may know that you are gods." (Isa 41:23) The challenge is quite straightforward: let the idols prove
that they are more than simply "molten images" (41:29) by demonstrating that they possess the ability to foretell the future. Now the "gods" being nothing more than "wind and emptiness" (41:29) can do no such thing. The future is a closed book to idols just as it is a closed book to the men who made them. It's different with God of course, and so the Lord goes on to speak of His plans for Cyrus, who is to become ruler of Persia about a century and a half in the future. (44:28 ff) The point is clear: the one true God knows the future, but pretenders do not. (Deut 18:15-22) As Bernard Ramm put it in his Protestant Christian Evidences, "Prophecy (meaning here foreknowledge [Rex]) is thus by its nature a manifestation of the supernatural light of God."
Now in light of the fact that genuine foreknowledge is proof positive of supernatural knowledge, it is not surprising that Christian apologists have traditionally made good use of predictive prophecy in defending the doctrine of Biblical inspiration. Herbert Lockyer makes the point well in his book All The Messianic Prophecies of The Bible:
"When we realize that about one-fourth of the Bible is related to predictive prophecy, or predictions which, at the time of their utterance, were still future, we see that negligence of such an element of scripture is inexcusable."
It would indeed be inexcusable for the apologist to ignore the multitude of predictive prophecies in the Bible. As we study scripture we read of the rise and fall of kingdoms, cities, rulers and nations long before they occurred. Again and again events are recorded in the pages of scripture decades, centuries and millennia before they unfold upon the stage of history, making it impossible to dismiss the Bible as a product of human genius. In his Evidence That Demands a Verdict Josh McDowell gives details of the fulfilment of eleven Old Testament prophecies relating to various cities and nations and makes the following comment:
"The probability of these 11 prophecies coming true, if written in human wisdom, is now found by multiplying all of these probabilities together, and the result is 1 in 5.76 x 1059." (1 followed by 59 zeroes [Rex])
Such a figure is of course unimaginable, but we also need to keep in mind that these 11
predictive prophecies represent only a fraction of the number contained in scripture.
Messianic Prophecy
a) The Expected One
As the focal point of scripture, Jesus Christ is the subject and goal of prophecy, and so it comes as no surprise that the New Testament writers repeatedly explain the events and circumstances of His life as the fulfilment of many oracles uttered by their counterparts in the Old Testament. Again Lockyer puts it well in his Messianic Prophecies:
"As we are to find, all messianic prophecies concerning Christ's life and work were accurately verified in history. Forecasts and fulfilments answer as perfectly to one another as the fingers of one hand do to the fingers of the other hand. Prophecy and performance are set over against one another in such a way as to leave all but the willfully blind, convinced and worshipful."
Well said. From Genesis to Malachi an air of expectancy lies over the thirty nine books of the
Old Testament as one inspired writer after another uses different figures to speak of a wonderful
future era to be enjoyed by the people of God. Often this blessed era is ushered in by a glorious
envoy of Jehovah who again is described under various figures (e.g. Branch, Shoot, Son of
David) and who is pictured (among other things) as God's special and beloved vessel. Then from
Matthew to Revelation the inspired writers point to Jesus and say "The promised One has come
in fulfilment of prophecy and He's coming again just as scripture has foretold."
b) Messiah
In the Gospel of John we are told that, having become convinced that Jesus was the Promised One, Andrew refers to Him as "the Messiah," (Jn 1:41) and we are also told that the Samaritan woman identifies the coming one as "Messiah." Under the heading Messiah in The International Standard Bible Encyclopaedia James Crichton has the following:
"It is to be noted that "Messiah" as a special title is never applied in the O.T. to the unique king of the future, unless perhaps in Dan 9:25 ff....It was the later Jews of the post-prophetic period who guided by a true instinct, first used the term in a technical sense." (There is no doubt that Dan 9:26 applies to the Messiah [Rex])."
Certainly the use of this term to speak of God's prepared vessel was very appropriate. According to the Theological Wordbook of The Old Testament edited by Harris, Archer and Waltke, when used in connection with religious ritual, the verbal form of the word translated Messiah "involved a ceremonial application of oil to items such as the tabernacle, altar or laver (Ex 40:9-11) or even the sin offering." We are told that "More frequently (the word)...is used for the ceremonial induction into leadership offices," and that although it is used in connection with the high priest, (Ex 29:7) ordinary priests (Ex 30:30) and prophets, (1 Kg 19:16; Isa 61:1) "easily the most frequent mention (of the verbal form) is with kings such as Saul and David of Israel." (2 Sam 12:7) We are told that in this context such an anointing spoke of separation to God's service, divine selection and divine enablement. In his Synonyms of the Old Testament Robert Baker Girdlestone poses the question "What then, is the idea that we ought to connect with the name Christ or Messiah ?" and he goes on to offer the following suggestion:
"It points to One who is king by Divine authority, and signifies that God would set His mark on him by giving Him the Holy Ghost without measure. Perhaps also it teaches that the ministrations of the prophet, priest, altar and tabernacle with all its vessels were foreshadowings of the work that He was to accomplish."
c) Anti-supernatural bias
In the following paragraphs we are going to consider just a few of the more than 300 prophecies relating to Christ which are to be found in the Old Testament and which provide convincing proof that Jesus is indeed the Messiah of Jewish scripture. Now unfortunately not everyone wants to let the evidence speak for itself and some have gone to great lengths to invalidate the evidence of predictive prophecy. In his book If God Came Near, Jim McGuiggan discusses the question of how a sceptic might respond to the prophecy argument. McGuiggan says:
"1/. He might question the integrity of the text and claim that the text held no prophecy in the first place. 2/. He might claim that the text containing the 'prophecy' was written after the event 'prophesied ' of. 3/. He might claim that the exegesis of the text is incorrect and that the correct explanation would exclude a predictive prophecy."
Clearly there can be no doubt that the Old Testament was in existence long before the birth of Christ, and thus we need not consider objection number two in our present discussion. On the other hand it is not uncommon for unbelievers to charge that Christians are guilty of finding messianic prophecies in the Old Testament where no such prophecies are to be found. Allegedly the believer is so intent upon finding allusions to Jesus in the Old Testament that he sifts the Jewish writings through the grid of the New Testament, and then, blinded by his presuppositions, he treats many Old Testament passages as Messianic when in fact they are nothing of the kind. What the Christian calls "predictive prophecy" the unbeliever regards as simply "wish fulfilment." However such a peremptory dismissal of the believer's position is unwarranted, and there are good grounds for arguing that many of the Old Testament verses which the Christian apologist cites as examples of messianic prophecy are indeed exactly that. The question is: "What is the best way of proving this to the sceptic? How can we demonstrate that the messianic passages are genuine examples of predictive prophecy rather than simply instances of scripture-twisting by biased Christians?"
It is in this connection that Jewish messianic expectations and non-scriptural Jewish writings prove to be of great value. Now the Jewish writings are important (among other things) because they tell us something about the interpretations which certain Jewish scholars placed upon the relevant Old Testament Messianic passages, and of course these interpretations were free from the influence of the New Testament writings. The significance of this is obvious. For example it is clear that if certain non-Christian Jewish writers in the pre-Christian period spoke of the Messiah's vicarious suffering, they cannot be accused of having manipulated the Jewish scriptures so as to accommodate the crucifixion account. Again, if there is evidence that many first century
Jews, based upon their study of the Old Testament anticipated the imminent arrival of the Messiah this cannot be dismissed as some kind of Christian retrojection."
In this context consider the following from Alfred Edersheim's classic, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah:
"But still, as the Rabbinic ideas were at least based on the Old Testament, we need not wonder that they also embodied the chief features of the Messianic history. Accordingly, a careful perusal of their Scripture quotations shows, that the main postulates of the New Testament concerning the Messiah are fully supported by Rabbinic statements. Thus, such doctrines as the pre-mundane existence of the Messiah; His representative character; His cruel sufferings and derision; His violent death, and that for His people; His work on behalf of the living and of the dead; His redemption, and restoration of Israel; the opposition of the gentiles; their partial judgment and conversion; the prevalence of His law; the universal blessings of the latter days; and His Kingdom - can be clearly deduced from unquestioned passages in ancient Rabbinic writings. Only as we might expect, all is there indistinct, incoherent, unexplained and from a much lower standpoint."
So according to Edersheim, the writings of the Rabbis reveal that, on the basis of their study of the Old Testament, these Jewish scholars were looking for a Messiah who possessed many characteristics in common with the Jesus of the New Testament. Clearly if this is the case then it is a very effective answer to those who cry "bias!" whenever Christians find these Messianic elements in the Old Testament and point to Jesus as the fulfilment of prophecy.
Of course we are not arguing that there was a single view of the coming Messiah(s) among the Jews, and we are not denying that some fantastic tales were woven around the Messiah(s). In part this is due to what has been called "the prophetic paradox," which simply means that seeming contradictions surrounded the Messiah event. For example He was a glorious conquering figure on the one hand, but a suffering victim on the other; He was expected at a particular time, yet He was also pre-existent; He was a figure of peace yet also a figure of war. Attempts by the Jewish commentators to harmonize these elements did indeed produce a great deal of fanciful speculation, but this does not alter the fact that they did identify these elements as Messianic.
In the following paragraphs I will argue that certain details of Christ's genealogy, place of birth,
time of birth, manner of life etc. were all set forth so clearly in the Old Testament that perceptive
Jewish students found them there without benefit of the New Testament record. This will take
the form of a work in progress which will be added to from time to time.
Jesus the Messiah of the Old Testament
1) Genealogy
Christians have traditionally affirmed that Christ is:
the "seed of woman" mentioned in Genesis 3:15 who would crush the head of Satan,
the descendant of Abraham through whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed, (Gen 12:1-3)
"Shiloh" of the tribe of Judah to whom the peoples would render obedience (Gen 49:10)
the royal seed of David who would occupy His Father's/father's throne (2 Sam 7:12ff)
The New Testament writers repeatedly emphasise Christ's genealogy, as if having the right
credentials in this area was important, (e.g. Matt 1; 22:42; Lk 3; Jn 7:42; Rom1:3; Heb 7:14; Rev
5:5) but the question which we are considering is this: "Does the Old Testament really associate
Gen 3:15 et.al. with a coming Davidic Messiah, or is all this simply an example of scripture-
twisting by Christians who have their own agenda?" Consider the following:
a) Gen 3:15 and the seed of woman
In his book Toward an Old Testament Theology, Walter C. Kaiser Jnr discusses the question of whether Gen 3:15 includes a reference to "a personal unity in a single person who was to obtain victory for the whole group he represented". (emphasis mine) Kaiser comments:
"That such an interpretation is not a Christian retrojection from a NT pesher or midrash can be seen in the pre-Christian Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. The Greek boldly used the masculine independent pronoun autos which failed to agree with the Greek neuter antecedent "seed" (sperma)."
Now the Septuagint was a translation of the Hebrew Old Testament into Greek which was produced by Jewish scholars in the third century before Christ and it is valuable (among other things) because it frequently reveals a great deal about the translators' understanding of a particular text. Kaiser's point is that their rendering of Genesis 3:15 shows that these Jewish scribes found in Genesis 3:15 a reference to a victorious individual who would obtain some kind of blessing for others with whom he was identified. Keep in mind that these translators were familiar with the traditional Jewish understanding of this passage, and it is not difficult to show that a Messianic connection had been made. In this context it is useful to say a word about a body of writing known as the Targum.
The Targum is the "Aramaic translation of scriptural books...as delivered orally during the period of the second temple and later" (Interpreters Dictionary of the Bible). Although written Targums (or Targamim) date from the second century A.D. and later, they typically reflect very ancient understandings of the scripture and besides they cannot be accused of Christian bias. It is significant then to find the following on Genesis 3:15 in the Targums:
"(Pseudo-Jonathan): They are destined to make peace at the end, in the days of King Messiah.
(Frg.): They will make peace with one another in the end, in the very end of days, in the days of King Messiah."
The point is that the Jewish association of the seed of woman in Genesis 3:15 with the Messiah
and with an individual who would in some way obtain victory for the group which he
represented, harmonizes well with the Christian view that the passage speaks of Christ's victory
over Satan on behalf of His brethren.
b) The Abrahamic Connection
Christian apologists argue that the Lord's words to Abraham, ("in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed" [Gen 12:1-3]) signal that the "seed promise" of Genesis 3:15 is about to go a stage further in preparing the world for the coming of the Messiah. Later on, Isaac, Abraham's "only begotten son" (Heb 11:17; cf.Gen 22:2) takes his place in the seed line of the Messiah, (Gen 21:12) and then in turn his son Jacob is recipient of the blessing. (Gen 28:12-15) As the book of Genesis comes to an end, Jacob pronounces the following blessing upon Judah, one of his twelve sons:
"The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet until Shiloh comes, and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples." (Gen 49:10)
Christians find a reference to Jesus' Abrahamic descent through Judah here, and it is significant that many Jews made this same Messianic connection without recourse to the New Testament documents. Under the heading Targum in the International Standard Bible Encyclopaedia J.E.H. Thompson has the following:
"The main benefit received from the Targums is the knowledge of the views of the Jewish rabbis as to the meaning of certain passages. Thus in Gen 49:10 there is no doubt in the mind of the targumist that "Shiloh" refers to the Messiah." (emphasis mine)
Consider the following from the Targums:
"Gen 49.10-12 (Onq.): The transmission of dominion shall not cease from the house of Judah, nor the scribe from his children's children, forever, until the Messiah comes, to whom the Kingdom belongs, and whom nations will obey."
"Gen 49.10-12 (Ps.-J): Kings and rulers shall not cease from the house of Judah, nor scribes who teach the Torah from his seed, until the time when the King Messiah shall come, the youngest of his sons, and because of him nations shall melt away."
So according to the targumist Genesis 49:10 speaks of the Messiah, who is described as a King
from the royal tribe of Judah, One to whom all nations will render obedience. This royal
connection is developed later when the promise passes to one particular family in Judah, the
family of David.
c) The Davidic Connection
Nine generations separate Judah from David, son of Jesse, the first in a succession of kings from the royal tribe. (Ruth 4:18-22) (Saul of course was from Benjamin). David's throne was God's throne (1 Chron. 29:23), and the Lord's promise to David of a royal dynasty, an eternal kingdom and (eventually) a universal rule, takes the "seed promise" a stage further. (2 Sam 7:12ff; Psa 89; 132:11-18) Jesus' Davidic descent is firmly established by the New Testament writers, (e.g. Matt 1; Lk.3 ) and once again it is worth reminding ourselves that that had the Jewish religious leaders been able to do so, they would have been very quick to deny His lineage.
Many passages from non-inspired Jewish writings (free from Christian bias!) show that many students of the Old Testament expected a Davidic Messiah. A good example is provided by the so-called Psalms of Solomon which were written sometime after Pompey's death in 48 B.C. (not to be confused with the inspired book of Psalms in the Old Testament) In the so called Psalms of Solomon certain non-Davidic rulers (meaning the Hasmoneans) are described as those who "despoiled the throne of David". (17:5-6) In contrast with the usurpers we are told of Israel's coming king " the son of David" (17:21) who is "Lord Messiah". (17:32) The heartfelt prayer of the Psalmist is:
"See, Lord, and raise up for them their king, the son of David, to rule over your servant Israel in the time known to you, O God. Undergird him with strength to destroy the unrighteous rulers, to purge Jerusalem from gentiles who trample her to destruction....."
The Gospel of Matthew is the most "Jewish" in its focus and significantly it begins: "The book of
the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham." When the people cried out
"Hosanna to the Son of David," (Matt 21:9) the chief priests and scribes, knowing the messianic
implications "became indignant" (21:15) - but they could not deny His Messianic lineage.
2) Place of birth
According to Matthew, when king Herod hears news of one "who has been born king of the Jews," (Matt. 2:2) he begins to inquire about where "the Christ" was to be born. (Matt.2:4) Evidently then Herod understood that Israel's King is also Israel's Messiah. He is told by the priests and scribes that Micah 5:2 identifies "Bethlehem of Judea" as the Christ's birthplace (Matt 2:5, 6; cf Jn 7:42) and of course in Matthew's account the birth of Jesus in the city of David is explained as the fulfilment of the Micah passage. Again it is easy to show that this is not some Christian invention.
In his classic work The Life And Times of Jesus the Messiah, Alfred Edersheim says: "To Bethlehem as the birthplace of Messiah, not only Old Testament prediction (Mic 5:2) but the testimony of Rabbinic teaching, unhesitatingly pointed". (my emphasis) In his Christology of the Old Testament, E. W. Hengstenberg makes a similar comment upon this passage:
"All the Jewish interpreters adhere to the Messianic interpretation, and in this they are headed by the Chaldee who paraphrases the words (of the Hebrew text) in this way:.....from thee Messiah shall go out before me". (emphasis mine)
Listen to the following on Micah 5:1-3 from the Jewish Targum:
"And you, O Bethlehem Ephrath, you who were too small to be numbered among the thousands of the house of Judah, from you shall come forth before Me the Messiah, to exercise dominion over Israel, he whose name was mentioned from before, from the days of creation." (emphasis mine)
Keep in mind that this is not a quotation from some biased Christian writer who is attempting to prove Jesus' Messianic qualifications by scratching around in the Old Testament to find some reference to Bethlehem because it was the town in which Jesus was born. Micah 5:2 was regarded by the Jews as Messianic long before Jesus was born in this little village.
Also of interest is a legend recorded in the so-called Lamentations Rabbah. In 1:16 there is mention of a certain Menahem, son of Hezekiah who is identified as the Messiah and is said to have been born in Bethlehem at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem. Likely this work was composed after 400 A.D. but the point is that like the Targum above this is a Jewish document which makes the Bethlehem - Messiah connection.
In John 7 we meet certain Jews who are unaware of Jesus' birthplace, and who deny that He
could be the Messiah on the grounds that He did not come from Bethlehem. (7:42) Clearly if the
religious leaders of the day had been able to deny that Jesus came from David's town, or that the
town itself had any Messianic associations, they would have jumped at the chance. They could do
neither!
3) Time of birth
Peter tells us that the Old Testament prophets carefully examined their own utterances concerning the Christ, seeking to know (among other things) the "time" (N.A.S.V) or "manner of time" (K.J.V) of His coming, and believers maintain that the Jewish scriptures do indeed stipulate that the Messiah would appear at a designated period in history. In discussing this matter we can only touch the hem of the garment by mentioning two points from the book of Daniel (and hopefully looking at this amazing book in more detail some other time).
First, using different colourful figures at different times, the Lord grants this sixth century prophet a vision of the future in which four successive kingdoms (Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome) dominate the stage of history. Daniel is told that during the days of the last-mentioned kingdom (Rome) a kingdom of a different kind would appear, an eternal kingdom, a divinely-established kingdom, (Dan 2:44) and that in conjunction with its appearance "a stone..cut out without hands" (Dan 2:34 [ meaning of divine origin]) would crush the rebellious nations. In fulfilment of this prophecy Jesus established His spiritual kingdom, (Jn 18:36) the church (Matt 16:18, 19) on the day of Pentecost in Acts chpt 2 (cf. Col 1:13; Heb 2:28 [and see our Salvation in One Body]). The point is that according to Daniel these events had to occur during the days of Roman hegemony. History tells us that in 63 B.C. the Roman general Pompey took Jerusalem and deported Aristobulus 2nd to Rome, and in the words of Charles Pfeiffer: "Rome became the force which was to determine the future of Palestine". (Between the Testaments)
Second, there is the fascinating "seventy weeks" (or seventy heptads) prophecy of Daniel 9:23-27. This is not the place to discuss such details as the date of the "decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem" and our main interest is in the fact that according to this prophecy, "Messiah" had to appear and carry out His atoning work shortly before the destruction of Jerusalem. Not long before the crucifixion, Jesus alludes to Daniel's prophecy when He warns of the impending destruction of Jerusalem (Matt 24:15; Mk 13:11; Lk 21:15) and of course we know that the city was destroyed in 70 A.D. just about four decades after the events of Calvary. Jesus, then, is the kingdom-building, atoning Messiah whom Daniel said would appear (1) during the days of the Roman period and (2) just prior to the destruction of the second temple.
Now clearly Jesus' birth some 60 years after the Roman Pompey took Jerusalem and some 70 years prior to the destruction of the temple is a thorn in the side of the sceptics, and so it is not surprising that the book of Daniel has received a great deal of attention from many who deny Biblical inspiration. Briefly, the opponents of inspiration argue that the book of Daniel was written, not in the sixth century B.C. but instead between 168-165 B.C. during the Maccabean period. Allegedly Daniel 9:23-27 deals, not with destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman Titus in 70 A.D. but rather with the activities of the Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes, ("the madman") who came into violent conflict with the Jews during his reign between 175-164/3 B.C. According to this scenario, the Messiah who is "cut off" (Dan 9:26) is not Jesus but a certain Onias 3rd who was deposed as high priest in 175 B.C. All this of course is designed to remove the predictive elements from the Daniel passage.
Now in light of the fact that Daniel's prophecy speaks of events which involve making an end to sin, making atonement for iniquity and bringing in everlasting righteousness (v. 24) this position is completely untenable. What's more the arguments for a second century date simply will not stand. (Josh McDowell has a useful and brief discussion of this in his Daniel in the Critics Den). However, we want to say a word about the "late date" position in light of what we know about Jewish expectations in the first century, expectations which arose from their understanding of their own sacred oracles. How do the critics explain the fact that generations of Jews who lived after the time of Onias 3rd and who accepted the book of Daniel as canonical continued to expect the Messiah?
Josephus the first century Jewish historian (A.D 37- 100c) helps us here. This one-time Pharisee provided a lengthy account of the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in his Wars of the Jews, in which he makes the following comment concerning the Jewish rebellion against Rome:
"But now, what did most elevate them in undertaking this war was an ambitious oracle that was also found in their sacred writings, how, 'about that time one from their country should become governor of the habitable earth.' The Jews took this prediction to belong to themselves in particular; and many of their wise men were thereby deceived in their determination" (Bk 6 chpt 5 [4])
So according to Josephus the first century Jews were encouraged in their uprising by their belief in the imminent appearance of a universal ruler from their own country - a belief arising from their understanding of their own "sacred scriptures." In similar vein the Roman historian Tacitus writing just a generation after the destruction of Jerusalem says concerning the Jews :
"The majority firmly believed that their ancient priestly writings contained the prophecy that this was the very time when the East should grow strong and that men starting from Judea should possess the world.... There were arms for all those who could use them.... Men and women showed the same determination; and if they were to be forced to change their home, they feared life more than death."
Another Roman historian Suetonius (born 69 A.D.) has said:
"There had spread over all the Orient and old and established belief, that it was fated at that time for men coming from Judea to rule the world. This prediction, referring to the emperor of Rome, as afterwards appeared from the event, the people of Judaea took to themselves; accordingly they revolted and after killing their governor, they routed the consular ruler of Syria as well, when he came to the rescue, and took one of his eagles."
Augustus H. Strong sums up the situation well in his Systematic Theology:
"Virgil's prophecy, in His fourth Ecologue, of a coming virgin and of the reign of Saturn and of the return of the golden age was only the echo of the Sibylline books and of the hope of a Redeemer with which the Jews had leavened the whole Roman world."
In Bk 4.chpt 2 we have the following account by Josephus of his attempt to persuade the Jews in the city of Jerusalem to surrender to the Romans:
"And who is there who does not know what the writings of the ancient prophets contained in them,- and particularly that oracle which is just now going to be fulfilled upon this miserable city? - for they foretold that this city should be taken when somebody shall begin the slaughter of his own countrymen! and are not now the city and the entire temple now full of the dead bodies of your countrymen! It is God therefore, it is God himself who is bringing on this fire to purge that city and temple by means of the Romans, and it is going to pluck up the city, which is full of your pollutions." (emphasis mine)
Josephus has Dan 9 in view when he speaks of "that oracle which is going to be fulfilled upon this miserable city" and he makes his appeal on the basis of what was commonly believed by first century Jews about this oracle ("who is there who does not know...").
Strong evidence of Messianic expectations are also to be found in the writings of peripheral religious groups of the time. For example, speaking of the Qumram community, (of Dead Sea Scrolls fame) R.K. Harrison tells us in an article in Zonderan's Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible, that members of this group which flourished in the 1st cent. B.C. and the 1st century A.D., "withdrew to the Judean wilderness in protest against the 'epoch of wickedness' and organized themselves as a covenant group to prepare the way for the divine coming in the New Age." Elsewhere Harrison says in the same article that "Philo recorded that the essenes studied their sacred writings with a view to finding out their symbolic meaning, in the belief that the divine promises to the prophets of Israel were being fulfilled in their own day."
Messianic expectations are also evident in the appearance of several charismatic figures among the Jews in the first century and the early part of the second century, and in the fact that these individuals attracted enthusiastic support. Josephus tells us of
a certain Theudas who "persuaded most of the common people to take their possessions and follow him to the Jordan River," (Antiquities 20:97 [cf Acts 5:36]) promising his followers that he would divide the river. (shades of Moses and Joshua)
"the Egyptian" who led "thirty thousand dupes" into the wilderness of Judea and who intended to overpower the Roman garrison in Jerusalem. (War 2.261-2)
a Samaritan during the days of Pilate who led a crowd to Mt Gerizim with the promise that he would show them 'the holy vessels buried at the spot where Moses had put them (Antiquities 18. 85-87)
another "prophet" who promised "signs of deliverance" towards the end of the war with Rome. (70 A.D.) (War 6:283-87)
Menahem who raided an arsenal at Masada and "returned to Jerusalem as a king," (War 2. 433-34)
We can add to the list another "king" who led a Jewish revolt in the Dispersion during the time of Trajan and finally the great Jewish revolt led by Simon Bar Kosiba (132-35).
The point is that Messianic expectations were high among Jews around the time of Jesus and
these expectations grew out of their study of Old Testament prophecies, not out of any desire to
make Jesus fit the Messianic mould.
4) A Suffering Messiah
The apostle Paul opens his Corinthian correspondence with a reminder to his brethren that the theme of his gospel is "Christ crucified," a message which was a "stumbling block" to the Jews". (1 Cor 1:23) Indeed a crucified Messiah was a paradox for many Jews because as Gordon Fee points out "Messiah meant power, splendour, triumph; crucifixion meant weakness, humiliation, defeat". (New Int. Com. on the N.T: The First Epistle to the Corinthians) Clearly in light of this, it would take compelling evidence to convince the Jew that the Old Testament spoke of a Messianic figure who would make atonement for sin through His suffering - yet many diligent Jewish scholars found just such a suffering Messiah in some of those same Old Testament passages which Christians cite in connection with the Lord's crucifixion.
Hengstenberg points out in his Christology that although many Jews were compelled by the evidence to accept a suffering Messiah, it was difficult for them to know just how to harmonize such a depiction of the Messiah with the picture of the glorious, conquering Messianic figure who appears elsewhere in the Old Testament. He shows that some of these Jewish expositors attempted to resolve the difficult by resorting to "remarkable and unfounded hypotheses," three of which he mentions:
first, some suggested that scripture speaks of two Messiahs, Messiah ben Joseph and Messiah ben David. The former was held by some to be the lower Messiah and the suffering dying figure of the Old Testament Messianic prophecies. (He was denominated Messiah ben Joseph because the Joseph of the Genesis was unjustly treated and rejected).
second, some suggested that there was but one Messiah who would come to earth in glory, but only after having suffered terribly in Paradise for the sins of mankind.
third, some proposed that the Messiah had already been born and that He would be engaged in the work of making atonement for Israel's sins up until the time of His manifestation.
The point of course is that these awkward and fanciful theories would never had arisen among the Jews except for the need to explain an un-get-around-able fact - the fact that Messianic passages speak, not merely of Messiah's glory, but also of His vicarious suffering and death. Let's take a look at some Old Testament passages relating to the suffering Messiah in light of the Jewish writings.
a) Isaiah 52:13 - 53:12
In discussing the history of the interpretation of Isaiah 52:13 - 53:12 among the Jews Hengstenberg comments in his Christology:
"There cannot be any doubt that, in those earlier times when the Jews were still more firmly attached to the tradition of their fathers.......and when controversy with the Christians had not made them so narrow minded in their exegesis, the Messianic explanation (of the suffering Servant in Isaiah - [Rex]) was pretty generally received, at least by the better portion of the people....Gesenius also says: 'It was only later interpreters who abandon this interpretation, - no doubt, in consequence of their controversies with the Christians.' "
Now the New Testament writers find clear reference in Isaiah 53 to Jesus' crucifixion and of course because of this the very last thing that the unbelieving Jewish teachers want to find here is a picture of a suffering Messianic figure. Despite this consider the following:
"The fourth century Targum Jonathan has on Isa. 52:13: "Behold, my servant the Messiah...."
We find this in Talmud Sanhedrin (98b):
"Messiah ...what is his name? The Rabbis say,'The leprous one'; those of the house of the Rabbi say: 'Cholaja' (The sickly), for it says, 'Surely he has borne our sicknesses' etc.' " (Isa.53:4)
The sixteenth century Rabbi Moses Alschech made this comment on Isaiah 53: "Our Rabbis with one voice accept and affirm the opinion that the prophet is speaking of the Messiah, and we shall ourselves also adhere to the same view."
Now the Christian has what the unbelieving Jews did not have - a divine explanation concerning the suffering Messiah pictured in Isaiah 53. Isaiah's tortured figure was "despised and forsaken of men," and of course this is graphically fulfilled in Jesus centuries later when His own people
cry out "Away with Him, crucify Him". (Jn 15:14) Isaiah speaks of one who bears our griefs,
carries our sorrows, and who was pierced and crushed for us (Isa 53:4-6) but the prophet has no
clear understanding of his own words. Centuries later from the other side of Calvary Peter
explains that Christ "bore our sins in His body on the cross" and healed us by His wounds. (1 Pet
2:24) In quiet dignity, Isaiah's bleeding Hero "did not open His mouth" and endured His shame
"like a sheep that is silent before its shearers"; (Isa 53:7) Matthew's Hero "did not answer
...(Pilate) with regard to even a single charge". (Matt 27:14) Crucified between two thieves (Matt
27:38) Jesus was indeed "numbered with the transgressors". (Isa 53:12) In death "He was with a
rich man," (Isa 53:9) identified centuries later by the gospel writers as Joseph of Arimathea.
(Matt 27:58-60)
b) Zechariah 12:10-14 and Psalm 22
In similar vein many Jewish students of the Old Testament found evidence for a suffering Messiah in these well-known passages. Consider the following from Sukkah 51b, 52a:
"What is the cause of the mourning (mentioned in Zech 12:12 [Rex]) ? - R Dosa and the Rabbis differ on this point. One explained, 'The cause is the slaying of Messiah the son of Joseph' and the other explained, 'The cause is the slaying of the Evil Inclination'. It is well according to him who explains that the cause is the slaying of Messiah the son of Joseph, since that well agrees with the scriptural verse, 'And they shall look upon me because they have thrust him through and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son.' " (Zech 12:10 [Rex])
Thus at least some Jewish scholars identified the "pierced" and lamented figure of Zechariah 12:10-13 as the Messiah. Similarly Edersheim has the following on Psalm 22:
"On Psalm 22:7 (8 in the Hebrew) a remarkable comment appears in Yalkut on Isa 60, applying this passage to the Messiah (the second or son of Ephraim), and using almost the same words in which the Evangelists describe the mocking behaviour of the Jews at the Cross. Psalm 22:15 (16 in the Hebrew) There is a similarly remarkable application to the Messiah of this verse in Yalkut."
So we can see that some Jewish scholars could not avoid finding a reference to the Messiah in Zechariah 12 and Psalm 22, but once again without the illumination provided by the gospel account they viewed these passages through a glass darkly. The Christian has no such handicap. He knows that the opening words of Psa 22, "My God my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" were among the last uttered by Jesus from the cross. (Matt 27:46) The Christian simply cannot miss the crucifixion in the words of the Psalmist: "I am poured out like water and all my bones are out of joint...They pierced my hands and my feet...They divide my garments among them, And for my clothing they cast lots". (Psa. 22:14, 16, 17, 18) In Zechariah chapter 12 the believer finds an equally unmistakable reference to Calvary ("they will look on me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him ...and they will weep bitterly over Him...").
Not only do the Jewish writings provide proof positive that the idea of a suffering Messiah is not a Christian retrojection, but these same writings, which are of course hostile to Christianity, unwittingly provide evidence that Jesus was indeed cruelly executed. The following is from the Talmudic tractate Sanhedrin:
"Jesus was hanged on Passover Eve. Forty days previously the herald had cried, 'He is being led out for stoning, because he has practised sorcery and led Israel astray and enticed them into apostasy. Whosoever has anything to say in his defence, let him come and declare it.' As nothing was brought forward in his defence he was hanged on the Passover Eve.' "
It is fitting that once again Christianity's bitterest enemies provide proof positive that the central
theme of the New Testament is prefigured in the Jewish scriptures.
5) Messiah, more than human
On one occasion Jesus challenges the Pharisees to think deeply about the nature of the expected Davidic Messiah by citing Psa 110 and asking these implacable adversaries "how does David (in this Psalm) in the Spirit call ...(His own descendant) 'Lord.' " Of course Jesus' point is that although the Messiah is indeed David's son (descendant) this Psalm makes it clear that He is much more than this.
What we learn from this exchange (among other things) is that the doctrine of Christ's divinity which is set forth so clearly in the New Testament (e.g. Jn 1:1ff; Phil 2:6 ff; Col 2:9) is also contained in the Old Testament. Now this idea that the Old Testament pictures the Messiah as a superhuman being is the last thing that many rationalists want to hear because many are wedded to the belief that the Jewish scriptures speak of a glorious but human deliverer for Israel. According to these critics of scripture, the Messiah expected by the Jews was to be nothing more than a glorious human deliverer, and these critics assure us that the doctrine of Christ's divinity is a creation of the later Christian community and represents a break with the Jewish tradition. Allegedly it is only Christians blinded by presuppositions who find a superhuman Messianic figure in the Old Testament. But is this a fair conclusion on the basis of the available evidence?
In his Life and Times, Edersheim says a word about the "expectation of the ancient Synagogue...(regarding) the Nature, Person, and qualifications of the Messiah" and in doing so he makes the following comment:
"First, the idea of a Divine Personality, and of the union of the two Natures in the Messiah, seems to have been foreign to the Jewish auditory of Jesus of Nazareth, and even at first to his disciples. Secondly, they appear to have regarded the Messiah as far above the ordinary human, royal, prophetic, and even Angelic type, to such an extent, that the boundary line separating it from Divine Personality is of the narrowest, so that, when the conviction of the reality of the Messianic manifestation in Jesus burst on their minds, this boundary-line was easily, almost naturally, overstepped, and those who would have shrunk from framing their belief in such dogmatic form, readily owned and worshipped Him as the son of God."
The Encyclopedia Judaica, (Vol. 11) has:
"One talmudic source does apparently atribute immortality to Messiah (Suk. 52a), and the Midrash (mostly later) singles him out among the immortals of Paradise." (emphasis mine)
In his Secrets Of The Dead Sea Scrolls, Dr Randall Price quotes Hebrew university professor David Flusser who tells us something about the Jewish view of the figure of the "Son of Man" in Daniel 7:13:
"The Son of man has a superhuman, heavenly sublimity. He is the cosmic judge at the end of time; seated upon the throne of God, he will judge the whole human race with the aid of the heavenly hosts, consigning the just to blessedness and sinners to the pit of hell; and he will execute the sentence he passes. Frequently he is identified with the Messiah..." (emphasis mine)
In this context consider the following from the Pseudepigraphical book of 1 Enoch:
"At that hour, that Son of Man was given a name, in the presence of the Lord of the Spirits, the Before-Time; even before the creation of the sun and the moon, before the creation of the stars, he was given a name in the presence of the Lord of the Spirits....
All those who dwell upon the earth shall fall and worship before him; they shall glorify, bless, and sing the name of the Lord of the Spirits. For this purpose he became the Chosen One; he was concealed in the presence of (the Lord of the Spirits) prior to the creation of the world, and for eternity." (48:2 ff)
In a discussion of a section of 1 Enoch known as the Similitudes Randall Price has:
"(W)e should note that scholars have found in the Similitudes four features for this figure (i.e. the Son of Man)...3) the Messiah is preexistent and associated with prerogatives traditionally reserved for God..." (emphasis mine)
Elsewhere Randall Price makes the following general comment about the impact of the Dead Sea Scrolls:
"In previous decades, critical scholars challenged the idea of a personal Messiah, which they said was a later invention by church theologians. They assert that the expectation seen in the New Testament period was actually a Jewish nationalism that had messianic character.
That all changed with the Dead Sea Scrolls. Suddenly we had documents written by people of the Old Testament who shared the same messianic hope sounded in the New Testament. Here were Jews that looked into the Old Testament for answers about the future and found a personal Messiah". (emphasis mine)
As we have seen, at least some Jewish scholars viewed the Messiah of the Old Testament as a
superhuman being far above the angels and "narrowly separated from the Divine personality"
(Edersheim) - this does not please the critics of course but it does not surprise those who believe
in the inspiration of scripture.