Jesus in the Old Testament - Research Paper Example

?Jesus in the Old Testament: Prophesy or Chronology? There is a popular assumption that Jesus belongs only to the New Testament, and not to the Old Testament. This understanding is largely based on the gospels, which recount the teachings and miracles of Jesus, from the perspective of Mathew, Mark, Luke and John, his disciples, called directly by Jesus to follow him. They present what they saw and what they experienced as they accompanied Jesus and assisted him in his ministry. In the Old Testament, however, are also passages that refer to Jesus. This paper will provide a few examples of these passages, and will present three interpretive positions, justifying the argument that Jesus was indeed in the Old Testament. This paper will not pretend to argue these positions thoroughly, but is written with the intention of presenting these three positions for the reader’s information and consideration. The first position is that as God was in the Old Testament, therefore Jesus was also there, since God the Father and Jesus, the Son, are both one God, along with the Holy Spirit, together comprising the Trinity. The second position is that Jesus is in the Old Testament, as his coming was foretold by the prophets. The third position is that Jesus was in the Old Testament and that the standard chronology of the historical Christ is inaccurate, and that the New Testament, with disciple accounts, refer to spiritual relationship with Jesus and not to physical co-existence. The foundation for the Gospel positioning of Jesus is that He became both God and human to live and die for our salvation (Luke 24:44), and this happened because God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16). This was made possible because the God of the Old Testament, Jesus of the New Testament, and the Holy Spirit are all one, three manifestations of one God. Jesus is god in the human form and we are made in his image. Jesus is lord and the lord is and was with us always, in the Old Testament times, in the New Testament time, and today, in these times. When the Old Testament speaks of God, it is primarily God the Father that is being spoken of. When the Old Testament speaks of God being manifest in physical form for our salvation, then that is Jesus the Son being spoken of. Both of these presentations of God are revealed in the Old Testament, quite clearly. God did not suddenly spin off a new aspect, just in time for the New Testament to be inspired. In fact, in the first chapter of John, we are told: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men (John 1, KJV). In the Old Testament, the book of Genesis, we are told, “In the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth” (Genesis 1:1, KJV). From these passages, we understand that Jesus was present in the very beginning. He was the Logos. He was the creative Word which gave life. He was not there as an assistant to God, or a relative of God’s, but rather He was in fact God. The Old Testament starts with the story of the beginning, creation, a time in which everything was void. Clearly Jesus was there and active as God, from the very first verse of the very first book of the Old Testament. The second position about the presence of Jesus in the Old Testament is that the prophets knew of him and spoke of him. The coming of Jesus was foretold by the prophets, in the Old Testament. God spoke through Nathan and told David: And when thy days be fulfilled and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever (II Samuel 7:12,13, KJV). Jesus’ birth was foretold: Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. (Isaiah 7:14, KJV). The name Immanuel, in Hebrew, means “God with us”. This was a very specific foretelling of the birth of Jesus, in that Jesus, literally, was God with us, and no other child could be that. Jesus’ coming and crucifixion were told all throughout the Old Testament. For days have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet (Psalms 22:16-17, KJV). In the 53rd chapter of Isaiah, the crucifixion of Jesus is foretold: Surely He has borne our grief and carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement of our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. He was taken from prison and from judgment, And who will declare His generation? For He was cut off from the land of the living; For the transgressions of My people He was stricken. And they made His grave with the wicked— But with the rich at His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was any deceit in His mouth. (Isaiah 53:4-8, NKJV). The crucifixion is prophesied in precise detail in the 22nd Psalm, which is thought to have been written about 1000 BC. Jesus’s words on the cross were foretold: My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? (Psalms 22:1, KJV). His agony is foretold: I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. (22:14, KJV). The piercing of his flesh was foretold: they pierced my hands and my feet. (22:16, KJV). Even gambling for his clothing was foretold: They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture. (22:18, KJV). There are many other passages of prophesy, foretelling the birth, death and resurrection of Christ, but this is sufficient to conclude that Jesus was indeed present in Old Testament prophesy. Concurrent with this conclusion is the assumption of the literalness of Jesus’ presence with his disciples, that they personally witnessed and walked with Jesus, as the gospels indicate. Furthermore, they correctly recorded what they witnessed, including the fulfillment of Old Testament Prophesy. Challenging this portion of the argument, however, is the conclusion of Biblical scholars that the gospels were not written in the time of the disciples, but quite a lot of years afterward. Exact dates are controversial. The Gospel of Matthew is speculated to have been written somewhere between 40AD and 140AD (gotQuestions.org, nd). The majority of scholars believe Mark was written around 70 AD; Matthew and Luke were written around 80 AD; and John was written around 90 AD (ichthus.info, nd). One might suspect less accuracy, on that account, except that the oral tradition was well-exercised in those days and thus far more reliable than it would be today, and the scriptures are divinely inspired (2 Timothy 3:16). The third position, to be presented, is that Jesus was the son of Moses, and must then be historically positioned in the Old Testament. The disciples, in this case, had a spiritual relationship but not a corporeal one, with Jesus. This is certainly a most startling position, to almost anyone, Christian or not. It is a position apparently well-documented, however, by Ahmed Osman, an Egyptian historian who researched the Bible, the Koran, the Talmud, the Torah, and the Essene Scriptures, fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls, as well as all available historical texts and lots of scholarly discussions. His argument and the evidence are complex but highly intriguing. He points out that there are no reliable historical records that mention Jesus even a single time, during the time period that we generally accept as when Jesus lived (Osman, 1992). He argues that the Prophesies are not exactly prophesies, but are reports of the life and death of Jesus, who was the son of Moses (Osman, 1992). He claims that Tiye, daughter of Joseph (who became a minister of Tuthmosis IV and his son Amenhotep III) and granddaughter of Jacob, and sister of Aye (who was Ephraim and Joseph of Arimathaea) was married to Amenhotep III (Solomon) and was the mother of Moses (Osman, 1992). He claims that Moses (who was Amenhotep IV, also called Akhenaten) married Nefertiti (who was Miriam, sister of Moses and was Mary, Mother of Jesus) (Osman, 1992). He claims that Moses and Mary (Amenhotep IV and Nefertiti) had two children, one of whom was Jesus (also called Joshua, who was Tutankhamun and lived in 1361-1352 B.C.) and that he married his sister, Mary Magdalene (also know as Ankhsenpa-aten) (Osman, 1992). Moses and Jesus were legitimate Pharaohs, in this account of history, but both lived in exile, most of the time, due to their monotheistic beliefs and enemies in the Egyptian court, who resented their stance on idolatry (Osman, 1992). Osman presents a breath-taking case of the murder of Jesus by Phineas, in the Tabernacle, after descending with Moses from Mount Sinai with the tablets of the Ten Commandments (Osman, 1992). He claims the murder was covered up by the Jews, and covered with such convolution that the facts are not easily noticed. He furthermore claims that both Christianity and Judaism are potentially threatened by the truth of what happened and its distortion and cover-up (Osman, 1992). I will not presume to present the entire case here, nor shall I presume to argue for or against it. I leave that to scholars with far more experience than I have, and to the leading of the Holy Spirit. I present a bare sketch of this position in this paper only because it is a unique and intriguing alternative theory about the presence of Jesus in the Old Testament, however bizarre. I must conclude that, without a doubt, Jesus is present in the Old Testament because he is God, because he is the Christ, the Messiah, the center of prophesy, and, at least according to Ahmed Osman’s research, perhaps he was the son of Moses and lived and died and was resurrected in Old Testament times, revealing himself to a long lineage of followers afterward, including the disciples and apostles of the New Testament. References gotQuestions.org. (nd). When Were the Gospels Written? Retrieved August 11, 2011, from gotQuestions.org: http://www.gotquestions.org/when-Gospels-written.html ichthus.info. (nd). Who Wrote the Gospels and When Are the Gospels Written? Retrieved August 11, 2011, from ICHTHUS.info: http://www.ichthus.info/CaseForChrist/01/intro.html Osman, A. (1992). Jesus in the house of the pharaohs. Rochester: Bear & Company. Read More