Dear Father Angelo

In this period of Lent I would like to know why the Jews still do not recognize Jesus as the Messiah.

On the internet one of the reasons given is that they believe the Evangelists extrapolated some phrases from the Scriptures and gave them new meanings which have then been attributed to Jesus in order to confirm Him as the Messiah.  Furthermore, they believe that none of the prophecies found in the Old Testament concerning the Messiah have been actually fulfilled through Jesus.

I am attaching the link of what I’ve read, which quotes some verses of the Old and New Testament in support of  this theory.

(…)

Cordially wishing you a Happy Easter (2018), I send you my best greetings.

Dear friend,

Only now can I answer the first part of your questions.

1. First and foremost it must be clearly stated that the fundamental reason the Jews refute Christ is His affirmation of being God.

This, and only this, has been the reason that allowed them to deliver Him to Pilate for crucifixion. 

This is what we can read in the Gospel of Luke: “When day came the council of elders of the people met, both chief priests and scribes, and they brought him before their Sanhedrin”. They said, “If you are the Messiah, tell us,” but he replied to them, “If I tell you, you will not believe, and if I question, you will not respond. But from this time on, the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God.” They all asked, “Are you then the Son of God?” He replied to them, “You say that I am.” Then they said, “What further need have we for testimony? We have heard it from his own mouth.” (Lk 22,66-71).

Likewise, in the Gospel of Matthew: “Then the high priest said to him, “I order you to tell us under oath before the living God whether you are the Messiah, the Son of God.”  Jesus said to him in reply, “You have said so. But I tell you: From now on you will see ‘the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power’ and ‘coming on the clouds of heaven.‘” Then the high priest tore his robes and said, “He has blasphemed! What further need have we of witnesses? You have now heard the blasphemy; what is your opinion?” They said in reply, “He deserves to die!” (Mt 26,63-66).

2. Therefore the premises found on the site you quoted are misleading.

As a starting point you must use what I have just said above: you must demonstrate that His words and works are not finalized to His saying or proving that He is God.

In His conversations with the Jews “Jesus answered them, “I told you and you do not believe. The works I do in my Father’s name testify to me” (Jn 10,25).

And even more:

“If I do not perform my Father’s works, do not believe me; but if I perform them, even if you do not believe me, believe the works, so that you may realize (and understand) that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” (Jn 10,37-38).

3. In other questions published on this site you can find more reasons that lead us to believe in the Divinity of Christ.  If we don’t believe in this there’s the risk of Him being the most monstrous character in history; someone who pretended to be God asking people who lived millenia after His death to sacrifice their lives for Him!

4. Now I am going to answer to the three objections whose purpose is to prove that the Gospels in fact do not match the Hebrew texts which should have been fulfilled by Christ. 

The fulfillment of the Scriptures would be just a misleading interpretation of the words of the Bible operated by the Christians.

Actually, I will retort with what the Jerusalem Bible states, whose declarations are concise but full of significance.

5. This is what the first objection states:

1) “The Gospels insist on the fact that Jesus fulfilled, throughout His life, the Bible prophecies already known by the people of Israel: “Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them what referred to him in all the scriptures” (Lk 24:25); He said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled” (Lk 25:44).

However, if we carefully analyze all the prophecies cited in the Gospels, it is easy to understand that none were actually fulfilled by Jesus.  What the authors of the New Testament achieve is a distortion of the words of the Prophets, particularly by extrapolating single sentences from the Jewish Bible and removing them from their context in order to force a new meaning onto them.  A very clear example we can find in the Gospel of Matthew, with reference to the birth of Jesus which states;  “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet:  “Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son” (Mt 1:22-23).

The prophecy here mentioned comes from the book of Isaiah, where we read: Therefore the Lord himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14).

Did the Prophet really announce the birth of Jesus of Nazareth from the Virgin Mary?  We can get an answer only if we look at the context in which the phrase was pronounced by Isaiah and quoted by Mathew.  The seventh chapter of Isaiah concerns the war between King Ahaz and his enemies; the King of Assyria and the King of Israel.  According to the story, God revealed to Ahaz that the war would have been won, and as a result, he should not fear anything (see Isaiah 7:1-7).  As evidence to this promise, the prophet Isaiah gave the King a sign, represented by a child named Immanuel: Therefore the Lord himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.  He shall be living on curds and honey by the time he learns to reject the bad and choose the good.  For before the child learns to reject the bad and choose the good, the land of those two kings whom you dread shall be deserted.

In light of all this, it is obvious that the quoted text has nothing to do with Jesus or with the Messiah.  Furthermore, the word that the Gospel uses for “virgin” (parthenos in Greek, how the Old Testament  was translated in the  LXX Bible), but in the original Jewish text was really almah, which simply means “young lady”.  In the attempt to connect the prophecy to the birth of Jesus to a Virgin, Christians use a wrong translation”.

6. Here instead is what the Jerusalem Bible writes in a note that was not created to retort to the objection of the Jews, but as a comment to the text:

“Is 7,14: Therefore the Lord himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.

It is through a King, successor of David, that God will give salvation to his people; it is upon the continuation of the lineage of David that the faithful to Jahweh place their faith.

Even if Isaiah had in mind the birth of a son to Ahaz, for example Hezekiah, as it seems probable even though the timeline does not coincide, and apart from how he understood the greek reading (v14): «and shall name him», we can infer from the importance of the prophecy and from the highly symbolic name given to the child that Isaiah was referring to a Royal birth, beyond that of the present circumstances, due to an act by God in sight of the final Mesianic Kingdom.

The prophecy of the Immanuel surpasses its immediate realization and thus the evangelists (Mt 1,23 quoting Is 7,14; Mt 4,15-17 quoting Is 8,23-9,1) and all of Christian tradition legitimately recognize the birth of Christ.  

The Virgin: the Greek translation is «the virgin», thus giving further meaning to the word almah that describes both a young woman and a woman who was just married. 

The text of the LXX (in Greek: parthenos, virgin) is a powerful witness to the meaning of the word almah with reference to the  ancient Jewish language, and it will be consecrated by the Gospel Mt 1,23 where we find the annunciation of «the virgin» about Christ.

What was translated into Greek in the Septuagint by the Seventy is exactly what the Hebrew thought and considered as the antique Jewish interpretation of the Bible. It was translated 150 years before the birth of Christ.

Therefore it is incorrect to state in the objection that “In the attempt to connect the prophecy to the birth of Jesus to a Virgin, Christians use a wrong translation” because the translation is precise.

7. The second objection states: “A case which is even more resounding can be found in  the following Gospel chapter that describes the fleeing to Egypt of Jesus and His parents: 

When they had departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him.” Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt. He stayed there until the death of Herod, that what the Lord had said through the prophet might be fulfilled, “Out of Egypt I called my son” (Mt 2:13-15).

According to Matthew, this important event in the life of Jesus was foretold by the Prophet Hosea about five hundred years before the birth of Jesus. Even nowadays in many Christian papers this prophecy is given as “proof” of Jesus the Nazarene being the Christ. In reality, all that needs to be done is to look at Hosea’s texts (here quoted out of context) to understand that Osea was absolutely not talking about Jesus or his family.

When Israel was a child I loved him, out of Egypt I called my son. The more I called them, the farther they went from me, Sacrificing to the Baals and burning incense to idols. […] His people are in suspense about returning to him; and God, though in unison they cry out to him, shall not raise them up (Hosea 11:1-7).

The son called out of Egypt is not Jesus, but the people of Israel, which is compared to a child. In these verses Hosea scolds the people who are unfaithful to God, and he condemns the rampant use of idolatry.  Such a comparison cannot be in any way referring to the Messiah or the escape out of Egypt of a persecuted family”.

8. The Jerusalem Bible not only refers to Hosea, but also to Exodus 4,22 which is much older, that states “Thus says the LORD: Israel is my son, my first-born. Hence I tell you: Let my son go, that he may serve me” (Ex 4, 22-23).

As a comment to the writings of Matthew: “that what the Lord had said through the prophet might be fulfilled, “Out of Egypt I called my son.” (Mt. 2,15) the Jerusalem Bible states “Israel, the son of which the prophetic text speaks about, was referring to the person of the Messiah”.

9. The third objection states: “from the Gospel of Matthew we can extract a final example of how the Biblical prophecies were distorted, referring to the triumphant entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem riding a donkey: When they drew near Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, “Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find an ass tethered, and a colt with her.  Untie them and bring them here to me. […] This happened so that what had been spoken through the prophet [Zechariah] might be fulfilled: “Say to daughter Zion, ‘Behold, your king comes to you, meek and riding on an ass, and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden. (Mt 21:1-5)

Once again it is vital to consider the prophecy within the text from which it was extrapolated, in order to understand if it can actually be referring to Jesus: Rejoice heartily, O daughter Zion, shout for joy, O daughter Jerusalem! See, your king shall come to you; a just savior is he, Meek, and riding on an ass, on a colt, the foal of an ass.  He shall banish the chariot from Ephraim, and the horse from Jerusalem; The warrior’s bow shall be banished, and he shall proclaim peace to the nations. His dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth. […] For I will bend Judah as my bow, I will arm myself with Ephraim; I will arouse your sons, O Zion, (against your sons, O Yavan,) and I will use you as a warrior’s sword. (Zechariah 9).

The context speaks clearly of a war that involves the tribes of Yehudah and Ephraim people that were close to Greece. The prophet announces a King that will liberate and bring freedom, victory, and will instill a reign of peace.  None of these elements are compatible with the story told in the Gospels.  To solve all these mismatches, many Christians defer to the theory of “double meanings” or “double fulfilment of the prophecy”. According to such concepts, Christians think that some prophecies have a double meaning; a “historical” one and a “spiritual” one, with regards to Jesus. It is however clear that following such conjectures, Biblical prophecies can explain anything. The proof of Jesus being the Christ cannot be based on theories such as the “double fulfilment”, but instead should be based on context that is at least coherent with the true meaning of the Bible verses in which it is placed”.

10. This is the Jerusalem Bible’s lapidary comment; “in the Prophet’s thought, such modest apparatus revealed the humble and pacific character of the Reign of Christ. Matthew applies this prophecy to Jesus; the Messiah is humble”.

11. Otherwise, how can one be a Prophet if while describing the story he is not also prophesying the future?

If the prophecy concerns the tribes of Yehudah and Ephraim, of the people close to Greece, how would this be relevant to the Jews nowadays? Maybe this is the reason why many of them are currently atheists.

It appears that Jewishness for many is just an ethnic, cultural and sociological formation but has no faith in a future coming of Christ.

12. I avoid answering the rest of your questions so that this letter remains within the limits of a normal reply. If I did reply to everything, it would be an interesting paper that compares how Jews and Christians  interpret some important passages of the Scriptures. It is possible that in the future such a feat might occur, even within this very site.

I also gladly wish you a Happy Easter, but because of the late date it will refer to the one of 2019.

I wish you all the best and remind you to the Lord, and bless you.

Father Angelo

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