CJD

Let me try to clear this first point up:

1) The Syrian-Israelite coalition circa 734-722. Yes, that is the source for the story. The North had yet to fall.
2) Sennacherib invades, circa 701-681.
3) Isaiah writes a response to this Assyrian judgment to get the people of Judah to act accordingly before Babylon comes, circa 680.

* Ah, I think I know the hang-up: I believe the rest of Isaiah was written at this same time.

I am willing to concede on the sociological-linguistical issues of the 1st century of which I know little. I am coming from the 'conservative' position that the writer is Saint Matthew the evangelist. Forgive me, if you must. As such, the purposes of his writing I delineated in the previous post make more sense.

One major point we agreed upon was that Isa. 7:14, in its original meaning, was not a messianic prophecy. The prophet entertained no such thoughts about this being messianic. Then Saint Matthew comes along, writing the story about this guy Jesus who he believes is the promised Messiah, and cannot help but see how, given that the Messiah had come in way entirely unanticipated, Jesus 'fits' the bill. Remember, I wrote that it was a fulfillment of typology, which is how the rest of Saint Matthew's "fulfillments" take shape, as well. To reiterate what I think was an important point: "Male' is not to be understood in such a binary fashion. Not all prophecies are singular, specific prognostications. Some are non-predictive statements; some are predictive, but historically fulfilled; some are predictive, begun and continuing; and some are predictive, unfulfilled statements." Let's look at these four categories in relation to the gospel of St. Matthew.

1) Non-predictive statements (made by a prophet and used by Matt):
Hosea 11:1--"When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son."
Matt. 2:15--"This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, 'Out of Egypt I called my son.'"
* bad theology suggests that even though we know that Hosea was not uttering prediction (for he was merely promulgating Exodus typology), Matthew uses it thus, and we must therefore swallow it. No, the gospel writer did no such thing. Matthew is saying that this coming of Jesus the Messiah is—typologically speaking—the Exodus. As such, Christ Jesus identifies with his people through his own exodus from Egypt.

2) Predictive, but historically fulfilled: the text we have been discussing falls into this category. God says he will destroy the Syro-Israelite coalition, Ahaz the hypocrite does not ask for a sign, Isaiah speaks of a sign, his sons are the sign, which sign becomes a typology that Matthew merely connects the dots to. That is, in the same way Isaiah's son was a sign of blessing or curse, so, too, is this Jesus (except he is the ultimate sign).

3) Predictive, begun and continuing:
Jer. 31:15--"Thus says the LORD: A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are not more."
Matt. 2:18--"[Basically the same thing.]"
* Why was Rachel originally weeping for her children? Because the Babylonians had her children in exile. But had the exile ever ended? No, it continued through the Medes, Persians, Greeks, and, at the time of Jesus, the Romans. Who was Herod working for? In other words, the 'Babylonian' exile was still on and Rachel was still weeping for her children. The original prediction, which had no sight of the Messiah whatsoever, began and continued up through the time of the Messiah, which Matthew rightly saw and applied. Prophecy never articulates every historical contingency.

4) Predictive, unfulfilled statements:
Isaiah 8:1–2--"But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.
The people who walked in darkness
___have seen a great light;
those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,
___on them has light shined."

Matt.4:14--"[again, pretty much the same thing.]"
* Isaiah is predicting a time when the North will be restored. At precisely what time does Matthew conjoin this prediction to the life of Jesus? When Jesus ministers in the North. This obvious but important point must not be overlooked. Restoration of Israel must needs include both the North and the South, only then will true restoration from exile take place. Jesus, at the outset of his ministry, goes to the North. Why? To preach restoration, for the kingdom of God was at hand. In other words, the return from exile and the restoration of God's people had begun. Did Isaiah foresee some kind of messianic reference here? Of course not. He was predicting a restoration of the North that was supposed to come after the Assyrian judgment. but it did not come, because the people did not repent. Zerubbabel's attempt ultimately petered out. But did that other son of David, you know, that one born in Bethlehem?

I have taken the time to go through this for a real simple reason: to show that predictive statements found in the Tanak cannot be treated the way they usually are in modern western culture. Saint Matthew, I believe, knew this well, and shows it in his use of the Tanak and its typological promises of the coming royal son of David. It can only be considered a "stretch" if you are demanding from him things he did not intend as an author. Nor do I think such demands do justice to the actual text. That is to say, it's seemingly not even given a chance.

Sorry for the length,

Jayhawker Soule

Including, no doubt, the virgin birth. One wonders why Mark was so much less insightful. :banghead:

CJD

ConsequentAtheist: "One wonders why Mark was so much less insightful."

I am not sure how any attempt to answer this question avoids speculation, pure and simple.

Jayhawker Soule

That's OK. I would never ask a theist to engage in speculation.

Clarice O'C

Hi All,

Since I think (so far) that Isaiah was not talking about an individual person in 7:14 I checked _Interpreter's Bible_ where the exegetor R.B.Y. Scott writes something a little different about the verse:

"... Who, then, was the maiden referred to? 'The maiden' may be general--'a certain maiden'--but since the sign would have to be one which would come to the attention of Ahaz, either this means that young women will be bearing children and calling them 'Immanuel,' or it refers to a young woman well known to both king and prophet, the wife of either (perhaps a new wife of Ahaz, since the LXX, Aq., Symm., and Theod. read here 'thou shalt call his name'). 'Immanuel' or 'God is with us': For the naming of a child by its mother in token of deliverance, cf. Ishmael, 'God hears' (Gen. 16:11)."

As well, note that Amos 5:2 speaks of "the virgin Israel":

5:1 "Hear this word which I take up over you in lamentation, O house of Israel:

5:2 "'Fallen, no more to rise,
is the virgin Israel;
forsaken on her land,
with none to raise her up.'"
(RSV)

I'm trying to catch up on where we are in this thread on evidence for or against messianic prophecy in the Hebrew writings.

Best,
Clarice

CJD

Hello, Clarice. You wrote in a previous post: "Roberts-Donaldson help us out by using the word "foretold" which I think accurately depicts what the prophets were doing rather than predicting the future which I think is what most people mean by 'prophecy.'"

I think this is wise to point out. The prophets seem to me to be the hardest to grasp in the entire Tanak. Most people today, athiests and theists, simply assume that the prophets are uttering singular, specific prognostications (while atheists deny them wildly and theists are forced to do the 'pretzel-twist'). This is not the case at all. I have posted something in regard to this already in this thread. How can we even begin to understand a 'prophecy' if we do not know how to read prophetic literature? That's the difficulty. It's my understanding that latent in every single prophetic utterance there are implicit conditions, not to mention the openness to 'intervening historical contingencies.'

As far as this thread is concerned, we all seem to agree that this was not a messianic prophecy for Isaiah, but an actual 'prediction' regarding his son, Maher-shalal-hashbaz. That is, Isa. 7:14 reads: "See that young woman over there (who is now a virgin), she will give birth to a son (not, of course, as a virgin)." In other words, Isa. 8 fulfills the prophecy of Isa. 7. To be sure, others in this thread might not word it this way. I, of course, believe this saying of Isaiah becomes a typological sign of judgment or blessing for the nation of Israel.

As far as the Amos passage is concerned, this kind of personification was used for both Israel (Jer. 18:13; 2 Kigs. 19:21) and other nations (Isa. 47:1; Jer. 46:11). Amos is lamenting for Israel and calls them to repentance, which is the necessary condition for restoration. It seems the evidence for an immediate fulfillment of Isa. 7:14 in Isaiah's son is the most probable.

Regards,

Clarice O'C

Thanks a lot, CJD. I'm glad that Isaiah is cleared up. Now are there any other parts of Jewish scripture that Christians use to try and provide evidence of Jesus' messiahship or anything else regarding Jesus?

Best,
Clarice

Haran

CJD, I'm still not sure I'm clear on what you are trying to say.

Are you saying that Isaiah 7:14 was fulfilled in Isaiah 8 and that Matthew somehow saw a parallel to that in what he knew of Jesus birth? I don't think I'm reading you right...

chimaira

Excuse me but even if in Esaie it is says "virgin" that not wants at all to mean that it is a matter Jésus for virgin does not want to say to have a child without reports, virgin wants simply to say "That never had not sexual reports. Therefore for that the prophecy ais a value for the Christians it would be necessary to try to understand the esaie context and not to stop has itself a word "virgin" and say.... virgin wants to say Marries

CJD

Greetings, all.

Clarice I am hesitant to even attempt to answer your question ("Now are there any other parts of Jewish scripture that Christians use to try and provide evidence of Jesus' messiahship or anything else regarding Jesus?"), because I am convinced that Tanak predictions/ fulfillment in Jesus is by far the biggest waste of time if trying to prove the authenticity of Jesus' messiahship. In so doing, many Xians rip the Tanak out of context, which in turn casts a very dim light upon the NT authors, as if they used the same lame hermeneutic many of us do today. I won't hesitate to state my trust in the NT authors' use of the Tanak, but their hermeneutic has been clouded by fundamentalists and many atheists alike.

This is the question I face: is it really that big of a deal if Jesus did not fulfill some prediction or another in the way specified by an Old Testament prophet? The point is this: that is the nature of prophecy in the Tanak. Every prediction is loaded with implicit conditions and an eye on intervening historical contingencies. In other words, only God is certain, all else is subject to change. All this to say, Clarice, that I am going to avoid your question for now.

Haran, I think you are catching what I am saying. The evidence that Isa. 8 fulfills Isa. 7:14 is conclusive, and we would be doing a disservice to our faith (and to the NT authors) if we just punted such sayings as these (Isa. 7:14) over the historical context and fulfillment, right onto Jesus' head. If we do this, we assume the NT authors treated the Tanak in the same way, and thus many atheists rightly criticized such methodology. I am contending that the NT authors' are not guilty of such lame exegesis, and we should do our best to emulate them—not what has passed for 'sound' exegesis in our Church's history (though I fully believe that my contention has historical merit).

Now, as you say, Saint Matthew did recognize parallels to the life of Jesus and certain sayings in the Tanak. It would help us to better understand the word "fulfill" (Hebrew=male'; Greek=play-ro'-o) with all of its various connotations. The word literally means, "to fill something with physical material." Figuratively (e.g., "sins fill the land" -- Ezra 9:11), it means simply "to fill as if empty." Finally, when regarding words (e.g., in 1 Kgs. 8:15, 24 and 2 Chron. 6:4, 15, where God shows his promise was not empty), it means "to show that words are not empty." Our current discussion regarding Saint Matthew's use of prediction/fulfillment obviously centers on this last phrase: "to show that words are not empy" (e.g., Matt. 2:15-- "This was to [show that words of the Lord spoken by the prophet are not empty], 'Out of Egypt I called my son.'"

In the gospel of Matthew, there are four main categories of fulfillment, hinging on OT predictions, which I have already mentioned in this thread. But for the record, they are:1) non-predictive statements; 2) predictive, but historically fulfilled; 3) predictive, begun and continuing; and 4) predictive, unfulfilled statements.

Remember, I placed Isaiah 7:14 in category #2: predictive, but historically fulfilled.

Quite simply, Haran, I am saying that Saint Matthew did draw the parallels between this saying of Isaiah's and the birth of Jesus, but he also did more than that, for the very saying itself, I believe, was a loaded typology of blessings and cursings depending on what side of the predicted son you landed on. I do hope this clears it up a bit.

Chimaira, forgive me, but I am not sure I understand you. Are you saying that in order for the Isaiah prediction to be useful for Christians, it must needs mention Mary by name?


Regards,