Draft:
Nov/2000
I
received this question about how people can believe Jesus was the promised
Messiah:
I am very
non-denominational due to the fact that most religions have so much contradictory information. I
would have to say my beliefs are that
of Judaism, but my mother is always trying to convince me that the only way to
God is through Jesus. The problem is that she cannot give me any explanation as
to why I should believe Jesus was the Messiah when in fact he never fulfilled
the prophecy that God stated in the Old Testament.
I truly want to follow the
right path and could be easily persuaded to believe another religion but no one
has been able to answer this for me: If God said that his Messiah would be a
great political leader, would bring
peace to the world, would rebuild the temple and reunite the Jews, then why do
Christians believe Jesus was that Messiah? The only answer I have been given is
that I guess Jesus promised to fulfill the prophecy in his 2nd coming. But if God said, "this is how
you will know the messiah" then am I obligated to accept Christ until he
completes what God said he would? God
said this is how I will know him right? So if he hasn’t done it, then how can I
go against Gods word to beware of false prophets. Jesus didn’t fulfill the prophecy and yet millions of people
follow him anyway.
Please make me
understand. Is there simply more I am missing? I am skeptical, but don’t want
to be. I only seek the truth.
Thanks for your obviously sincere
question, friend! Your attitude of ‘open-minded and seeking skepticism’ is
commendable, and will no doubt serve you well in your search for truth.
The way I would like to approach your
question is to look at the messianic “options” available to first century Jews,
in interpreting the messianic prophecies. There were
many, many strands of messianic teaching in the OT/Tanaach (and even more in
later rabbinic theology!), and it is in the various attempts at integrating and
harmonizing these strands that this issue actually arises.
So, let’s dig in…
A.
The first
thing to note is that the OT/Tanaach teaching about the messiah ‘assigned’ Him
a very large number of roles!
[Note: all of the above roles and titles are ascribed to one or more messianic figures in the ancient Jewish literature—NONE of these are ‘Christian-only’ roles.]
B.
Next, note
that some of these seem to contradict one another.
C.
Let’s look
at possible ways to ‘resolve’ some these tensions/contradictions:
Assuming we
believe the Scriptures, which the first century Jews did, we have essentially
three live options in resolving such contradictions:
1.
The two contrasting descriptions/roles apply to TWO DIFFERENT “messiahs”
2.
The two contrasting descriptions/roles are each CONDITIONAL,
meaning that only one will actually occur (the other being precluded by the
circumstances)
3.
The two contrasting descriptions/roles apply to the same messianic
figure, but will be fulfilled in DIFFERENT times (or circumstances)
D.
Let’s see
these in action:
Option 1 (two different messiahs, at least) is
most visible in the situation of dealing with the
death of the messiah. Later Judaism came up with TWO Messiahs—a
Messiah, son of David and Messiah,
son of Joseph. A good summary of this is found in MTJL:165ff:
“Messiah ben Joseph, also called Messiah ben Ephraim, referring to his ancestor Ephraim, the son of Joseph, is imagined as the first commander of the army of Israel in the Messianic wars. He will achieve many signal victories, but his fate is to die at the hands of Armilus in a great battle in which Israel is defeated by Gog and Magog. His corpse is left unburied in the streets of Jerusalem for forty days, but neither beast nor bird of prey dares to touch it. Then, Messiah ben David comes, and his first act is to bring about the resurrection of his tragic forerunner.
“Scholars
have repeatedly speculated about the origin of the Messiah ben Joseph legend
and the curious fact that the Messiah figure
has thus been split in two. It would seem that in the early legend, the death of the Messiah was envisaged, perhaps as a
development of the Suffering Servant motif. A prophecy of Daniel, written about 164
B.C.E., is the earliest source speaking of
the death of a Mashiah
("Anointed") sixty-two (prophetic) weeks after his coming
and after the return and the rebuilding of Jerusalem (Dan. 9:24-26). While it
appears that Daniel had a temporal ruler in mind, whom he calls Mashiah Nagid ("Anointed
Prince"), some two centuries later, the author of 4 Ezra unmistakably
refers to the Messiah, belief in whom had developed in the meantime, when he
puts words in the mouth of God to the effect that after four hundred years
(counted from when?), MY son the Messiah
shall die (4 Ezra 7:27-30).
“When the death of the Messiah became an established
tenet in Talmudic times, this was felt to be irreconcilable with the belief in
the Messiah as the Redeemer who would usher in the blissful
millennium of the Messianic age. The dilemma
was solved by splitting the person of the Messiah in two: one of
them, called Messiah ben Joseph, was to raise the armies of Israel against
their enemies, and, after many victories and miracles, would fall victim to Gog
and Magog. The other, Messiah ben David, will come after him (in some legends
will bring him back to life, which psychologically hints at the identity of the
two), and will lead Israel to the ultimate victory, the triumph, and the
Messianic era of bliss.
“This splitting of the Messiah in two persons, which took place in the Talmudic period, achieved another purpose besides resolving the dilemma of the slain Messiah. According to an old tradition, the Messiah was perfectly prefigured in Moses. But Moses died before he could lead the Children of Israel into the Land of Promise. Consequently, for the parallel to be complete, the Messiah, too, had to die before accomplishing his great task of ultimate Redemption. Since however, the Messiah would not be the True Redeemer of God if he did not fulfill that ultimate task, the only solution was to let one Messiah, like Moses, die, and then assign the completion of the work of Redemption to a second Messiah.”
[Also, the Dead Sea Scrolls testify to the Qumran Community’s belief in TWO messiahs: one priestly, and one royal—to resolve a different ‘tension’ within the messianic strands in the OT.]
Option
2 (complimentary and conditional
descriptions) can be illustrated from the donkey-versus-clouds tension. The
Talmud has this interesting passage at b. Sanh 98a:
“R.
Joshua ben Levi cited two verses that seemed mutually contradictory. One verse
says, ‘And behold, one like the son of man came with the clouds of heaven’
(Dan. 7:13), while the others says, ‘[Behold, they king cometh unto
thee]…lowly, and riding upon an ass’ (Zech. 9:9). However, the two verses
declare: If Israel are meritorious,
Messiah will come ‘with the clouds of heaven’;
if not, he will be ‘lowly, and riding upon an ass.’”
Notice that this option (although not present or suggested in the biblical text), makes the prophecies conditional—depending on Israel’s righteousness at the time of Messiah’s approach—and therefore the conflict is resolved by one side NOT being ‘fulfilled’ at all.
Option 3 (two different comings of the same messianic individual) can be seen in the understandings of the earliest Jewish believers in Jesus.
· The death of the Messiah was reconciled with the victory/eternal life of the messiah via the resurrection of the Messiah (preserving both prophecies, without having to “split” the messiah in two).
· The donkey-versus-clouds tension is resolved by having the ‘donkey’ one happening at a different time than the ‘on clouds’ one. But again, notice both are preserved and both are fulfilled by the same person.
E.
Before we
assess these different options, notice that all three approaches would create
the same problem for you/us: why would you accept ANY messianic figure that
DIDN’T fulfill ALL the prophecies.
·
In Option 1, why
would you/we believe in Messiah ben Joseph (who came much earlier than Messiah
ben David), since he obviously didn’t fulfill the promises of military victory
over the Gentiles (instead he was killed and defeated!)? And, why would you/we
accept Messiah ben David, since he obviously didn’t fulfill the promise of
being killed?
·
In Option 2, why
would you/we believe in a messiah who came ‘on clouds’, since he DIDN’T fulfill
the prophecies of coming ‘on a donkey’, or vice versa—indeed, he wasn’t even
supposed to do them both, since they were conditional and mutually-exclusive
(in this option)?
·
In Option 3, why
would you/we believe in a messiah who fulfilled only the first-appearance
prophecies, since He wasn’t even supposed to complete the others until later?
So, if you
are going to accept the premise of early Judaism that the Scripture is
trustworthy in its recording of God’s messianic promises, then you are going to
be faced with the same problem no matter what
approach you take. What this means, friend, is that the Messiahship
of Jesus cannot be thrown out on the basis of currently unfulfilled messianic
prophecies—this situation exists within Judaism as well.
F.
Notice, though, that the problem is basically
about two different sets of messianic
prophecies: one set describes a Rejected/Brutalized Messiah, and the other set
describes a Victorious/Acclaimed Messiah.
Most of us are aware of the prophecies about the Victorious/Acclaimed Messiah
(some of the items you mentioned in your question would be members of this
set), but some people are less aware of the Rejected/Brutalized Messiah strain
in the OT/Tanaach. So, before we get into evaluating the different options of
harmonizing the Rejected Messiah strain with the Acclaimed Messiah strain, let
me point out a few of the more well-known passages, and indicate from ancient
Jewish literature that those passages were understood by THEM as being
messianic as well.
·
The ‘stone of
stumbling’ in Isaiah 8.14 (and he
will be a sanctuary; but for both houses of Israel he will be a stone that
causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall. And for the people of
Jerusalem he will be a trap and a snare. 15 Many of them will stumble; they
will fall and be broken, they will be snared and captured.), closely
related to Ps 118.22 (The stone which the
builders rejected Has become the chief corner stone) was applied by Jesus to Himself (Mr 21.42) and by the leaders of the
early Jewish believers, Peter (Acts 4.11 and 1 Pet 2.7,8) and Paul (Eph 2.20).
This passage is understood in the same way in b.
Sanh 38a (Soncino):
”Judah and Hezekiah, the sons of R. Hiyya, once sat at table with Rabbi and
uttered not a word. Whereupon he said: Give the young men plenty of strong
wine, so that they may say something.
When the wine took effect, they began by saying: The son of David cannot appear
ere the two ruling houses in Israel shall have come to an end, viz.,
the Exilarchate, in Babylon and the Patriarchate in Palestine, for it is written,
And he shall be for a Sanctuary, for a stone
of stumbling and for a rock of offence to both houses of Israel.
Thereupon he [Rabbi] exclaimed: You throw thorns in my eyes, my children! At this, R. Hiyya [his disciple] remarked:
Master, be not angered, for the numerical value of the letters of yayin is
seventy, and likewise the letters of sod: When yayin [wine] goes in, sod
[secrets] comes out.
·
Psalm 16 has the
famous ‘resurrection of David’
passage (because you will not abandon me to
the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. V.10) which
is applied to Jesus’ death-and-resurrection by Peter in Acts 2.27 and Paul in
Acts 13.35. The Midrash treats a couple of phrases in this Psalm as being
messianic; here is one comment on verse 5 (from Midrash Rabbah, Gen. 88,5):
…
Corresponding to these the Holy One, blessed be He, will give Israel to drink
four cups of salvation in the Messianic future, as it says, O Lord, the portion of mine inheritance and of my
cup, Thou maintainest my lot (Ps. XVI, 5);.
·
The Servant
passages in Isaiah (esp. 52-53) depict a
suffering, dying, rejected, and scorned (by Israel) Messiah. I have demonstrated elsewhere that this was a common Jewish
understanding of this passage from very early on, but messianic interpretations
of this passage persisted in Judaism for centuries and centuries. Compare this
passage from Midrash Konen (no
earlier than the 11th century AD, cited in MTJL:114f):
“The fifth house [in the heavenly
Paradise] is built of onyx and jasper stones, and inlaid stones, and silver and
gold, and good pure gold. And around it are rivers of balsam, and before its
door flows the River Gihon. And [it has] a canopy of all trees of incense and
good scent. And [in it are] beds of gold and silver, and embroidered garments.
And there sit Messiah ben David
and Elijah and Messiah ben Ephraim.
And there is a canopy of incense trees as in the Sanctuary which Moses made in
the desert. And all its vessels and pillars are of silver, its covering is
gold, its seat is purple. And in it is
Messiah ben David who loves Jerusalem. Elijah of blessed memory takes
hold of his head, places it in his lap and holds it, and says to him:
"Endure the sufferings and the sentence of your Master who makes you
suffer because of the sin of Israel." And thus it is written: He was wounded because of our
transgressions, he was crushed because of our iniquities (Isa. 53:5)-until the
time when the end comes….And every Monday and Thursday, and every
Sabbath and holiday, the Fathers of the World [i.e. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob]
and Moses and Aaron, David and Solomon, and the prophets, and the pious come and visit him, and weep with him. And
he weeps with them. And they give him thanks and say to him: "Endure the sentence of your Master, for the end is
near to come, and the chains which are on your neck will be broken, and you
will go out into freedom."…And even Korah and all his company
entreat him every Wednesday and say to him: "How long until the miraculous end? When will you bring us back
to life and bring us up again from the depths of the earth (Ps. 71:20)?"
And he says to them: "Go and ask the Fathers of the World." And they
are ashamed and return to their place. [Notice here, by the way, that (a) the
suffering messiah is the Son of David figure(!); and (b) even with two
messiahs, they STILL have a ‘wait time’—the Messiah suffers for a long time before his ultimate, miraculous
victory…remind you of Someone? (smile)]
·
Zech 11.4-14 refers to the Rejected
Good Shepherd, which was understood to refer to the betrayal/conspiracy
against Jesus by the religious elite and Judas. Verse 12—the famous ’30 pieces
of silver’ passage is explicitly ascribed to the messiah (but with a very odd
meaning for the passage!) by late Judaism in Midrash
Rabbah, Gen. 98,9f:
“R. Hanin
said: Israel will not require the teaching of the royal Messiah in the future,
for it says, Unto him shall the nations seek
(Isa. XI, 10), but not Israel. If so, for what purpose will the royal Messiah
come, and what will he do? He will Come to assemble the exiles of Israel and to
give them [the Gentiles] thirty precepts, as it says, And I said unto them: ye think good, give me my hire;
and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my hire thirty pieces of silver’
(Zech. XI, 12)” [note: Israel doesn’t even need the Messiah to teach
them…(smile)]
·
The Pierced Messiah
of Zech 12.10ff is specifically discussed in the Talmud in at least two places:
“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; …[b. Sukkah 52a]
“They
found a Scriptural verse and expounded it: [52a] And the land shall mourn, every family apart; the family of the house
of David apart, and their wives apart … What is the cause of the
mourning [mentioned in the last cited verse]?—R. Dosa and the Rabbis differ on
the point. One explained, The cause is
the slaying of Messiah the son of Joseph, … [b.
Sukkah 51b-52a]
So,
we can see that there is a very definite (and traditional) set of passages that
speak of a messianic figure that suffers, dies, is rejected, is reviled, is
scorned, is ‘sacrificed’. So, whatever understanding of the messiah we come up
with, it will have to do justice
to this set of messianic descriptions.
G.
Now, what
are the strengths and weakness of the three options? How might we assess their
relative credibility, in terms of their fidelity to the scripture?
Option 1 (multiple messianic figures) has the advantage of allowing every single messianic prophecy be
completely true (by ascribing dissonant ones to different messianic figures,
e.g. David, Elijah, Aaron, various prophets, Ezra, or even the entire nation of
Israel). The obvious difficulty
with this view is that there is generally no textual warrant for it, or textual
evidence to support it. The texts never seem
to distinguish between a Messiah, Son of David and a Messiah, Son of
Joseph at all. And there are major complications of having two messiahs (for
example): after Messiah ben David raises Messiah ben Joseph from the dead,
which one fulfills the rest of the messianic functions? How do the two interact
in the Messianic kingdom on the earth? But the main problem with it, of course,
is that it is without biblical support.
There is the
additional difficulty of how the “abused” messiah is to be recompensed. OT
theology strongly asserts that the Righteous Sufferer not only is recompensed,
but recompensed ‘wildly’ by the Covenant God. If the Acclaimed Messiah “gets
all the glory and reward”, what is the suffering messiah supposed to get?
[Notice that if the two figures are the same, and a resurrection is the
‘bridge’ between the two, then the problem is wonderfully solved—the Suffering
One is rewarded for his suffering, with exaltation, dominion, and glory.]
Option 2 (conditional and/or complimentary fulfillments) has the advantage of recognizing that many
prophecies ARE conditional, as taught in Jeremiah 18 and illustrated in the
preaching of Jonah against Ninevah. This, in a messianic context, is sometimes
appropriate as well, as can be seen both in the rabbinics and in the words of
Jesus.
·
From the rabbinics:
“R. Joshua
b. Levi met Elijah standing by the entrance of R. Simeon b. Yohai's tomb. He
asked him: ‘Have I a portion in the world to come?’ He replied, ‘if this Master
desires it.’ R. Joshua b. Levi said, ‘I saw two, but heard the voice of a
third.’ He then asked him, ‘When will the
Messiah come?’ — ‘Go and ask him
himself,’ was his reply. ‘Where is he sitting?’ — ‘At the entrance.’
And by what sign may I recognise him?’ — ‘He is sitting among the poor lepers:
all of them untie [them] all at once, and rebandage them together, whereas he
unties and rebandages each separately, [before treating the next], thinking,
should I be wanted, [it being time for my appearance as the Messiah] I must not
be delayed [through having to bandage a number of sores].’ So he went to him
and greeted him, saying, ‘peace upon thee, Master and Teacher.’ ‘peace upon
thee, O son of Levi,’ he replied. ‘When wilt
thou come Master?’ asked he, ‘To-day’, was his answer. On his
returning to Elijah, the latter enquired, ‘What did he say to thee?’ — ‘peace
Upon thee, O son of Levi,’ he answered. Thereupon he [Elijah] observed, ‘He
thereby assured thee and thy father of [a portion in] the world to come.’ ‘He spoke falsely to me,’ he rejoined, ‘stating that
he would come to-day, but has not.’ He [Elijah] answered him, ‘This
is what he said to thee, Today--if ye will hear his voice.’ [B. Sanh 98a. The Soncino version gives the
footnote: “Ps. XCV, 7, thus he made his
coming conditional-the condition was unfulfilled.”]
Note that
the messiah’s coming, in this passage, was conditional upon the receptivity of
Israel (or of its representative, in this case).
·
From the words of Jesus:
“And
His disciples asked Him, saying, “Why then do the scribes say that Elijah must
come first?” 11 And He answered and said, “Elijah
is coming and will restore all things; 12 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.” 13 Then the disciples understood that He had spoken to
them about John the Baptist.” (Matt 17.10)
Note that Elijah had
come (in the person of John the Baptist), but because Israel had failed to
recognize/chosen not to receive him, he would have to come AGAIN later, to fulfill the rest of the forerunner ministry.
Notice Jesus also likens Israel’s response to Himself, to this same behavior of
Israel.
So,
this option can be legitimate, but unfortunately,
it won’t solve our problem at all—for the promises of world
leadership, world peace, etc. could be conditional as well, and without textual
clues as to this being the case in any specific passage (although many of the
passages of promise DO require a righteous Israel), it would be entirely
unwarranted, as with Option 1.
Option 3 (different comings/occurrences/events, but the same messiah) has a big advantage in not “needlessly
multiplying messiahs” (thank you Ockham) and yet still allowing all/most the
prophecies to be taken as to-be-fulfilled. So, it has the greatest likelihood
of being faithful to the biblical text, as it stands and as it is naturally
interpreted, but it has the disadvantage of
requiring the difficult task of sketching out a vision of the Messianic career,
in which ALL of these at-tension elements fit naturally and logically together.
The
chronological approach (i.e., the events occur in a sequence, perhaps separated
by periods of time, and these events are somehow logically related to occur in
this sequence) is how the early Jewish Jesus movement understood the data, as
taught to them by Jesus. [Of course, the chronological approach is ALSO used in
Option 1, as should be obvious from the fact that M.b.Joseph was killed BEFORE
M.b.David ‘saved the day’…so a chronological approach is not at all
illegitimate, or even a Christian-only approach.]
Jesus consistently taught His disciples (or TRIED to teach them!) that His ministry required suffering/obedience to God before he would be enthroned and exalted. It was a fundamental framework in His self-understanding as the messiah:
“He asked them, “What are you
discussing with each other as you’re walking along?” They stood still and
looked gloomy. 18 The one whose name was Cleopas answered him, “Are you the
only visitor to Jerusalem who doesn’t know what happened there these days?” 19
He asked them, “What things?” They answered him, “The things about Jesus of
Nazareth, who was a prophet, mighty in the things that he did and said before
God and all the people, 20 and how our high priests and leaders handed him over
to be condemned to death and had him crucified. 21 But we kept hoping that he would be the one to redeem Israel.
What is more, this is now the third day since these things occurred. 22 Even
some of our women have startled us! They were at the tomb early this morning 23
and didn’t find his body there, so they came back and told us that they had
actually seen a vision of angels who said he was alive. 24 Then some of those
who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but
they didn’t see him.” 25 Then Jesus said to
them, “O how foolish you are and how slow of heart to believe
everything the prophets said! 26 The Christ
had to suffer these things and then enter his glory, didn’t he?” [Luke 24.17ff. Notice that
He specifically repudiates the theology that the ‘good part’ was supposed to
come first!]
From that time Jesus
Christ began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests
and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day. 22
And Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord!
This shall never happen to You.” 23 But He turned and said to Peter,“Get behind
Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; for you are not setting your mind
on God’s interests, but man’s.” (Matt 16.21f)
He said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ was to suffer and to rise from the dead on the
third day, 47 and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be
proclaimed in his name to all the nations, beginning at Jerusalem. [Luke 24.46f]
And the early Jewish believers in Jesus
finally understood, that the messianic glory was supposed to FOLLOW the messianic
obedience/suffering:
But the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth
of all the prophets, that His Christ should
suffer, He has thus fulfilled. 19 “Repent therefore and return, that
your sins may be wiped away, in order that
times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord; 20 and that He may send Jesus, the Christ appointed for you,
21 whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about
which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time.
22 “Moses said, ‘The Lord God shall raise
up for you a prophet like me from your brethren; to Him you shall give heed in everything He says to you. [Peter, in
Acts 3.18ff…notice how the first coming of Jesus procured the availability of forgiveness
of sins for Israel, and that once Israel would have accepted that forgiveness,
the Lord Jesus would return a second time to ‘restore all things’. This is a
perfectly logical progression, of course: provide basis for forgiveness, Israel
changes her mind and is cleansed from sins, and then God sends the Royal
Messiah to deliver the covenant blessings.]
Even the prophets, who prophesied about the grace that was
to be yours, carefully researched and investigated this salvation. 11 They
tried to find out what era or specific time the Spirit of Christ in them kept
referring to when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. [Peter, in 1
Peter 1.10ff…suffering first, glory second—as earned by the obedience and trust
of the sufferer.]
They traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia and came to
Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue. 2 As usual, Paul went in and
on three Sabbaths discussed the Scriptures with them. 3 He explained and showed them that the Christ had to suffer and rise
from the dead. He said, “This very Jesus whom I proclaim to you is
the Christ.” [Paul, in Acts 17.1ff]
I have had help from God to this day, and so I stand here to
testify to high and low alike, stating only
what the prophets and Moses said would happen— 23 that the Christ would suffer and be the first to rise
from the dead and would announce light to our people and the Gentiles.” [Paul, in Acts
26.22ff...Paul saw this progression in the OT: Christ would suffer, then be the
first to receive (through actual merit of obedience and law-righteousness) the
blessing of resurrection, and then, on the basis of that covenant-based New
Life, would proclaim truth to the world—to usher in the victorious end-times.]
Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ
Jesus, 6 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality
with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a
bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in appearance
as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even
death on a cross. 9 Therefore also God highly
exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee
should bow, of those who are in heaven, and on earth, and under the
earth, 11 and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to
the glory of God the Father. [Phil. 2.5ff…Paul here
argues that the exaltation of Jesus by God was based on Jesus’ obedience and
submission under the Law to the Father. Obedience—even to death, the ultimate
test of faith/loyalty—before Exaltation.]
But we do see Him who has been made for a little while lower
than the angels, namely, Jesus, because of
the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor [Author of Heb
2.9, the coronation/exaltation of Jesus was ‘earned’ through Jesus’ fulfillment
of God’s will in His sacrificial death. Obedience/Completion of mission, then
honor…”before honor comes humility” (Proverbs 18.12; 22.4)]
H.
Now, it should be somewhat obvious at this
point that Option 3 would seem to do a better job at tying the two
‘sets’ of messianic descriptions together (and in the process seems to have
fewer problems). But what order of the events should we expect—suffering first,
or leadership first?
There are several reasons to believe that the humble/rejected/suffering events should precede the exaltation/coronation events:
First
is the obvious cultural/political reason: it wouldn’t make much sense for the
Messiah to first be acclaimed, bring in the Future Kingdom and world peace,
reestablish the Davidic throne, and THEN be rejected, abused, and killed by
Israel and the Gentiles! It makes much more sense to expect the reverse: an
initial rejection of a humble, common-folk messiah, followed by a later
recognition, acceptance, and national exaltation—leading to the Davidic
Kingdom-Future.
Second,
we have actual textual data to support this order (unlike, remember, the other
options)—some of the very ‘suffering’ passages suggest a reversal-of-fortune
for the Rejected Sufferer, and often are explicit in their statements of future
exaltation. Two particularly vivid ones would be:
·
The Davidic
‘death and resurrection’ passage is very clear on this—the dead messianic figure
would literally be raised from the dead before corruption occurred (e.g., 72+
hours in the grave, according the Jewish tradition at the time)
·
The Isaiah 53
passage is also explicit—after the sacrificial death of the Messianic Servant,
He is raised to the ‘light of life’ and given “victor’s spoils”:
After the suffering
of his soul, he will see the light of life
and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and
he will bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore I
will give him a portion among the great, and he will divide the
spoils with the strong, because he poured out
his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made
intercession for the transgressors.
Third, there are theological reasons why it makes sense to have the
Messiah ‘start with’ humility and suffering, BEFORE proceeding to glory and
abundance:
·
To prepare the
Messiah for an effective High Priestly
ministry, who can succor/sympathize those who are suffering (a la the argument in Hebrews 2.14ff and
4.15):
Since then the children
share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that
through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is,
the devil; 15 and might deliver those who through fear of death were subject to
slavery all their lives. 16 For assuredly He does not give help to angels, but
He gives help to the descendant of Abraham. 17 Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things,
that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things
pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. 18 For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has
suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted.
(Heb 2.14f)
For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize
with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are,
yet without sin. (Heb 4.15)
Someone who started out ‘born with a silver spoon in his mouth’ might not be as adept at this…(smile)
·
To demonstrate
to the leadership of Israel what a TRUE Shepard of the people was to be
like—one that didn’t ‘lord it over the people’, nor live in religious elitism
and arrogance (Cf. Lk 18.9; Jn 7.47)
·
To actually BE
the ordination sacrifice (New Passover) for the New Covenant—as Jesus himself
understood His death as (e.g. 1 Cor 11.25). The problem that Israel had in the
OT/Tanaach (according the Prophets) was that they needed ‘new hearts’—the old
ones were stiff, hardened, and rebellious. The New Covenant (Jer 31) promised
them ‘new hearts for old’ and would insure that Israel could bring in the New
World. But the New Covenant needed a basis for the ‘their sins and iniquities I will
remember no more’, and that was what the death of Jesus (as Is 53-type
sacrifice) was all about. Once the TRUE sacrifice (not animals!) was made, then
God would be “free” to offer non-merit-based forgiveness and righteousness to any Israelite, and
the blessings of all the covenants (including those with benefit streams for
the gentiles) would begin to flow! Accordingly, we would NEED the death of the
messiah (as sacrifice) before any major New Covenant blessings (including the
pure and godly Kingdom of Israel) could accrue. This would make the initial
suffering role to be catalytic, in a big way, and therefore PRIOR TO the ‘big
blessings’ and glories.
Fourth, it fits the overall thrust of OT day-to-day ethics—‘testing
before blessing’ and ‘humility before honor’ and ‘obedience before reward’ and
‘loyalty before deliverance’.
Fifth,
it would fit the historical patterns of OT prophets/heroes better. Suffering
‘first’ had always been the “Jewish way” in the OT/Tanaach, from pre-King David
who was persecuted by the current Israelite king Saul, to the constant stream
of OT prophets, who were consistently rejected at their first appearance in
history (only to be ‘acclaimed’ much later in Israel’s history). Jesus refers
to this reality in Luke 6.22ff (“How
blessed are you whenever people hate you, avoid you, insult you, and slander
you because of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for your
reward in heaven is great! For that’s the way
their ancestors used to treat the prophets”) and in Luke 13.34ff (O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones to death
those who have been sent to her!
How often I wanted to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks
under her wings, but you didn’t want to! 35Look! Your house is left to you
deserted. I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘How blessed is
the one who comes in the name of the Lord!’). And Stephen, in Acts
7, points out the same truth: “Which of the prophets did your ancestors fail to persecute? They killed those who predicted the coming of the
Righteous One, and now you have become his betrayers and murderers”.
Stephen’s speech, of course, points out that the Jewish leaders of Moses’ time
rejected him at first, and yet God
had established Moses’ as their leader, and later Israel ‘acclaimed’ him fully.
What this means is that there is good support for Option 3--the Suffering experiences of Messiah occurring PRIOR TO the Exaltation experiences—from a broad class of arguments (i.e. cultural/political, biblical text, OT/Tanaach theology, OT exemplary ethics, historical patterns).
I.
So, if Option 3 is a better way of resolving
the tension between the Suffering Messiah data and the Triumphant Messiah data,
how was a first century Jew
supposed to know that Jesus was the Messiah? If
the miracle/glorious stuff was “scheduled for later”, then what reason would a first-century Jew have
for accepting Jesus on this first appearance in history?
There
was a background timing reason that would help ‘restrict our search’ to this time
period, and there were basically two reasons that were available to
the Jewish generation of Jesus, and one additional reason for both that
generation and for the wider world:
The first was a timing
one—current expectations about the
messiah (from prophecies of Daniel and others) placed the coming of the messiah
in this period (although they were said to refer to the Roman Emperor
Vespasian, as opposed to a Jewish messianic figure!!!!). The ancient world was
well acquainted with the expectations of the Jewish people of the day, and this
shows up in several ancient historians:
·
"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 Judaea should possess the world. This
mysterious prophecy had in reality pointed to Vespasian and Titus, but the
common people, as is the way of human ambition, interpreted these great
destinies in their own favour, and could not be turned to the truth even by
adversity"; trans. C. H. Moore, Tacitus
III (LCL 249; London: Heinemann; Cambridge: Harvard University,
1931) 199.
·
"There had spread over all the Orient an old
and established belief, that it was fated at
that time for men coming from Judaea 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 . .
."; trans. J. C. Rolfe, Suetonius 11 (LCL
38; London: Heinemann; Cambridge: Harvard University, 1914) 289.
·
"Now portents and dreams had come to Vespasian
pointing to the sovereignty long beforehand ... and Nero himself in his dreams
once thought that he had brought the car of Jupiter to Vespasian's house. These
portents needed interpretation; but not so the saying of a Jew named Josephus; he, having earlier
been captured by Vespasian and imprisoned, laughed and said: 'You may imprison
me now, but a year from now, when you have become emperor, you will release me
... ; trans. E. Cary, Dio's Roman History VIII (LCL 176; London:
Heinemann; Cambridge: Harvard University, 1925) 259-6 1. Cf. Josephus, J. W. 3.8.9 §399-408. [This was said to be
a prophecy by Josephus, in correspondence with public Jewish expectation.]
And the
ancient rabbinic writings of the second through fourth centuries AD indicated
that they KNEW that the expected time for the
Messiah had come and gone…
·
"Rav said: All times set
for redemption have passed, and the matter now depends only on repentance
and good deeds" (All time calculations had been fulfilled). B. San 97b