How Does Old Testament Talk About Jesus ?

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Truth light

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I am asking that question because some christians told me strange things

they say a song in Psalms !

Ishiah 53- nearly- apparently it was ok but when reading carefully it was found that not all those descriptions are of Jesus

another one said that 3 angels came to Abraham one of them was God !

I felt they are trying to deceive me !

so I hope you here give me the "accurate" and "confirmed" informations :)
 

aspen

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You have to view the OT through the light of the NT to see Jesus in the OT. Your friends are not lying to you - this is exactly what Christians see in the OT.

Peace
 

Truth light

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I think I have to re-formulate my question. it's about real:
1- prophecies about the coming Jesus or Messiach
2- evidence that Jesus is god

Thanks :)
 

SaberTruth

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I think I have to re-formulate my question. it's about real:
1- prophecies about the coming Jesus or Messiach
2- evidence that Jesus is god

Thanks :)
The best prophecy IMHO is Isaiah 53, which some scholars call a "mini new testament". Other references include death by "piercing" (crucifixion was unknown in the OT), promises to Abraham and David, etc. But understand that the OT we have today only dates to the post-NT era. We have no manuscripts of the original Hebrew OT. And there is evidence to suggest that the Hebrew rabbis that put together the one we have (Masoretic) deliberately downplayed any Messianic scriptures to prevent Christians from using them to convert Jews. Consider also that when Jesus walked with the two disciples to Emmaus after his resurrection, he used their scriptures (the LXX, which was in Greek) to prove that the Messiah had to suffer and die before coming in his kingdom.

As for Jesus being God, there are some who doubt he claimed to be such, but his enemies were convinced he said so. In fact, that was what motivated them to kill him. But he also performed miracles such as raising others from the dead (his raising of Lazarus was the clincher for the Pharisees to look for an excuse to kill him) and fulfilled many prophecies which he could not have controlled, such as the date and place of his birth, his lineage, the bribing of the guards at the tomb, etc. His rising from the dead is the bedrock of the Christian faith because it was the single biggest miracle and prophecy fulfillment.

But when people ask for evidence they have to first say what evidence they'd accept. Many skeptics pretend to ask this, but only want to entertain themselves by continuing to move the line in the sand after Christians answer their first question. They keep changing the definitions and narrowing the range of evidence to the point of absurdity, then laugh and mock at our faith. So please tell us what you personally would accept of proof of divinity, that rising from the dead etc. aren't as good as.

 

brionne

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I am asking that question because some christians told me strange things

they say a song in Psalms !

Ishiah 53- nearly- apparently it was ok but when reading carefully it was found that not all those descriptions are of Jesus

another one said that 3 angels came to Abraham one of them was God !

I felt they are trying to deceive me !

so I hope you here give me the "accurate" and "confirmed" informations :)


Hi Truthlight

The Hebrew scriptures do indeed lead us to Christ...the Messiah. It is through the prophets and leaders of the Isrealite nation that Gods word came to them to inform them of Gods plan to send the messiah. And within the Hebrew scriptures they recorded the events of their dealings with God...how God interacted with them, how he fought for them and how he protected them as a nation.


Regarding Abraham. He was visited by 3 angels/messengers to tell him his wife Sarah would give birth to a son.
In the account, Gen 18:22 says: “At this point the men turned from there and got on their way to Sodom; but as for Jehovah, he was still standing before Abraham.”
Some conclude that this means God was standing before Abraham. But we know that cant be true because the bible says that 'No man has seen God at any time' and God says "No man may see me and yet live" so we cannot conclude that the verse means God stood before Abraham. No, if we read the context we find that while it was 3 angels who visited, only two of them left to go to Sodom because in Gen19:1 it shows only two of the angels arriving in Sodom “Now the two angels arrived at Sodom by evening.”
So only two angels left the presence of Abraham to go to Sodom, not three.
The logical answer, then, must be that one angel remained behind, standing before Abraham, and this angel represented Jehovah which is why the account says "Jehovah was still standing before Abraham"



Now with regard to Jesus in the Hebrew scriptures... the name Jesus is not in there because no one knew who the Messiah would be until he had arrived. All the prophecies pointed to the Messiah and what that Messiah would do, what he would accomplish...even the exact timing of his arrival was prophesied by the prophet Daniel. But with regard to his identity, no one knew who it would be until he surfaced.

Here are some of the prophetic scriptures relating to the Messiah:


God promises to destroy the serpent in Eden who led the first man and woman into sin
Genesis 3:15 And I shall put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will bruise you in the head and you will bruise him in the heel.

God makes promise to the man Abraham that the seed will come from his family
Genesis 22:15-18 And Jehovah’s angel proceeded to call to Abraham...17 I shall surely bless you and I shall surely multiply your seed like the stars of the heavens ...18 And by means of your seed all nations of the earth will certainly bless themselves due to the fact that you have listened to my voice.’”

Prophecy to show which of the 12 tribes the Messiah would be born into:
Genesis 49:10 "The scepter will not turn aside from Judah, neither the commander’s staff from between his feet, until Shi′loh comes; and to him the obedience of the peoples will belong

He will be like Moses and lead the people to follow God:
Deuteronomy 18:18 "A prophet I shall raise up for them from the midst of their brothers, like you (Moses); and I shall indeed put my words in his mouth, and he will certainly speak to them all that I shall command him"

The Messiah will be given great authority and be called Gods Son.
Psalm 2:7 Let me refer to the decree of Jehovah; He has said to me: “You are my son;I, today, I have become your father. 8 Ask of me, that I may give nations as your inheritance
And the ends of the earth as your own possession


His people will come to be from every nation on earth
Psalm 72:8 And he will have subjects from sea to sea And from the River to the ends of the earth.
9 Before him the inhabitants of waterless regions will bow down


Messiah to come through one of the sons of Jesse.
Isaiah 11:10 "And it must occur in that day that there will be the root of Jes′se (King Davids father) that will be standing up as a signal for the peoples. To him even the nations will turn inquiringly, and his resting-place must become glorious"

Jesse's youngest son David is chosen as the one whom the Messiah would come through.
Psalm 132:11 11 Jehovah has sworn to David, Truly he will not draw back from it:
“Of the fruitage of your belly I shall set on your throne"


He would be born out of Bethleham...the same city King David was born at.
Micah 5:2 “And you, O Beth′le‧hem Eph′ra‧thah, the one too little to get to be among the thousands of Judah, from you there will come out to me the one who is to become ruler in Israel, whose origin is from early times, from the days of time indefinite

Messiah was prophesied to appear in the year 29CE and be killed/cut off- a total of 483yrs were to elapse between the time that the order was given to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem and the Messiah appearing.
Daniel 9:25 And you should know and have the insight [that] from the going forth of [the] word to restore and to rebuild Jerusalem(455bce) until Mes‧si′ah [the] Leader, there will be seven weeks (of years=49yrs), also sixty-two weeks (of years=434yrs) She will return and be actually rebuilt, with a public square and moat, but in the straits of the times. 26 “And after the sixty-two weeks Mes‧si′ah will be cut off (killed), with nothing for himself

So from 455bce take away 483 years = 29ce the year Jesus was baptized by John.

these are not all the Messianic prophecies, but as you can see, each of them provided clues for the jews to be able to identify the Messiah when he finally did arrive. There are roughly almost 500 messianic prophecies in the Hebrew scriptures... i've given you only a few, but if you want to do some research you could find many more and compare them with the accounts of Jesus life of what he did and of what he will do in the future.
 

Truth light

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Oct 20, 2010
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Thanks Pegg for the best responce I got.

I have some few Q:

Here are some of the prophetic scriptures relating to the Messiah:
God promises to destroy the serpent in Eden who led the first man and woman into sin
Genesis 3:15 And I shall put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will bruise you in the head and you will bruise him in the heel.
God makes promise to the man Abraham that the seed will come from his family
Genesis 22:15-18 And Jehovah’s angel proceeded to call to Abraham...17 I shall surely bless you and I shall surely multiply your seed like the stars of the heavens ...18 And by means of your seed all nations of the earth will certainly bless themselves due to the fact that you have listened to my voice.’”
How those are prophecy ?

Prophecy to show which of the 12 tribes the Messiah would be born into:
Genesis 49:10 "The scepter will not turn aside from Judah, neither the commander’s staff from between his feet, until Shi′loh comes; and to him the obedience of the peoples will belong

Who is Judah and what is his relation to Jesus ?


The Messiah will be given great authority and be called Gods Son.
Psalm 2:7 Let me refer to the decree of Jehovah; He has said to me: “You are my son;I, today, I have become your father. 8 Ask of me, that I may give nations as your inheritance
And the ends of the earth as your own possession
Is this about David ?

His people will come to be from every nation on earth
Psalm 72:8 And he will have subjects from sea to sea And from the River to the ends of the earth.
9 Before him the inhabitants of waterless regions will bow down
Is this about Solomon ?


Messiah to come through one of the sons of Jesse.
Isaiah 11:10 "And it must occur in that day that there will be the root of Jes′se (King Davids father) that will be standing up as a signal for the peoples. To him even the nations will turn inquiringly, and his resting-place must become glorious"

Jesse's youngest son David is chosen as the one whom the Messiah would come through.
Psalm 132:11 11 Jehovah has sworn to David, Truly he will not draw back from it:
“Of the fruitage of your belly I shall set on your throne"
could you explain this relation

Messiah was prophesied to appear in the year 29CE and be killed/cut off- a total of 483yrs were to elapse between the time that the order was given to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem and the Messiah appearing.
Daniel 9:25 And you should know and have the insight [that] from the going forth of [the] word to restore and to rebuild Jerusalem(455bce) until Mes‧si′ah [the] Leader, there will be seven weeks (of years=49yrs), also sixty-two weeks (of years=434yrs) She will return and be actually rebuilt, with a public square and moat, but in the straits of the times. 26 “And after the sixty-two weeks Mes‧si′ah will be cut off (killed), with nothing for himself

So from 455bce take away 483 years = 29ce the year Jesus was baptized by John.
Why do you said week=year

Thanks.
 

brionne

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Truth light said:
Thanks Pegg for the best responce I got.

I have some few Q:

How those are prophecy ?
These are prophecies because they are events about the future that God revealed in advance.
God promised that a 'seed' (this is a descendant/person) would cause injury to the serpent in the future. And to Abraham God revealed that it would be through his future descendants that the 'seed' would come. When God first spoke to Abraham he did not even have 1 child... so Gods prophecy to Abraham was that he would have children and they would become the nation that the Seed would come to be born through.

The first prophecy from the garden of Eden was spoken some 6,000 years ago.
The next prophecy to Abraham was around 2,000 years later
The descendents of Abraham were then contacted by Moses around 500 years after that. Thats when the nation of isreal left Egypt and travelled to the promised land.

So you see, these prophecies in the bible were not all given at one time. The writing in Genesis is the culmination of over 2,000 years of history. Moses was not in the garden of Eden, nor did he live in the time of Noah and the great flood... he is relating all these things and all the promises of God that had been handed down through the people who were worshipers of the God of the bible.


Truth light said:
Who is Judah and what is his relation to Jesus ?[/quote]

Judah is one of the great grandsons of Abraham.
According to Gods promise, Abraham had 2 sons, Ismael and Isaac. God told Abraham that the blessing for the seed would be through Isaac.
Isaac had 2 sons, Esau and Jacob. Jacob (who God renamed Isreal) came to have 12 sons who were the Patriarchal heads of the 12 tribes of Isreal and one of them was Judah. God revealed that the seed would come through the tribe of Judah.

If you look at the genealogy of Jesus given in the gospels, we see that he is descended through the tribe of Judah as God foretold he would be.



Is this about David ?
No. Psalm 2:7 is about the Messiah/Christ. No earthly ruler could hold such dominion over all the earth purely because of the geography of the earth. Isolated nations would not benefit from having an earthly king.
The kingdom of God is how all the nations will benefit from having one king because a king who rules from the heavenly location can have dominion over the entire earth...he is not bound by geographic locations.

Some christians teach that Jesus will come back to earth in the flesh and sit himself on Mount Zion in Jerusalem and rule the earth... but this is just not logical nor is it possible.
Jesus told us his kingdom is 'not of this world' and he called it a 'heavenly' kingdom, not an earthly kingdom.

So this scripture is about Jesus who is the Son of God who will rule the nations from heaven.


Is this about Solomon ?
No. Psalm 72:8 is a prophecy about the Messiah/Seed. The Messiah, Jesus Christ, is the one who will free the world of sin and death. Jesus is the one God has used to teach mankind about himself and to lead all the nations back to God. Solomon never had subjects from all over the earth. The earth was ruled by numerous different kings so it cannot be said that all the earth came under Solomons rulership.
This is why the prophecy says that the Messiah will 'come to have subjects from sea to sea' because people of all the nations will follow the Messiah as he leads them back to God. Those people will come under his authority by subjecting themselves willingly to his rule.


could you explain this relation
Jesse and David are of the tribe of Judah. David was chosen to become King David of Isreal.
The prophecies of God continued to narrowed down the line of descent who the promised Messiah would come from. It started with Abraham - Isaac - Jacob - Judah - Jesse - King David. Jesus adoptive father Joseph was of family line of King David. Matthew gives the geneaology to offer proof that Jesus is the Messiah because the Jews knew that the Messiah must come through the tribe of Judah of the family line of King David.

We see in Jesus geneaology that Jesus comes from this line of men:
Matthew 1:1 The book of the history of Jesus Christ, son of David, son of Abraham:

2 Abraham became father to Isaac;
Isaac became father to Jacob;
Jacob became father to Judah and his brothers;
3 Judah became father to ... Jes′se;
6 Jes′se became father to David the king....
Mat′than became father to Jacob;
16 Jacob became father to Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ


Why do you said week=year
In the bible, time is shown to be different for God then it is for us. If you can imagine that God is timeless, then its easy to understand why that is the case. We use the rotation of the sun and moon as a way to measure time for us... but God does not see time from our perspective. In the bible it says that 1,000 years are equal to one day for God.

In prophecy a year is occasionally the length of 1 “day.”—Ezek. 4:5, 6. "And I myself must give to you the years of their error ... A day for a year, a day for a year, is what I have given you"

There is also the account where the 12 spies went into the land for 40 days and brought back a bad report. God punished their lack of faith by making them walk in the wilderness for '40 years' ... 1 year for every day they spied the land.
Numbers 14:34 By the number of the days that YOU spied out the land, forty days, a day for a year, a day for a year, YOU will answer for YOUR errors forty years

So it is with this prophecy about the length of time before the arrival of the Messiah. The 'weeks of years' is in harmony with how God recons time 'a day for a year'
so each week has 7 days and in 7 weeks there are 49 days. (7x7=49)
And in 69 weeks there are 483 days (7x69=483)

So the prophecy says that from the going forth of the word to restore and rebuild jerusalem, there will be 7 weeks plus 69 weeks
When we follow the prophetic rule of 'day for a year' we are given the length of time before the Messiahs arrival as 532 years from the time that the order was given to restore Jerusalem after it had been destroyed by the Babylonians under King Nebuchadnezzar.




 

michaelvpardo

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I'm not sure if I missed an explanation in the previous posts as I scanned over them, but although the name "Jesus" isn't mentioned in the Old Testament, Jesus' real name was mentioned in a number of prophetic books and in the books of the Law. "Jesus" is the Greek translation of the Hebrew name Joshua (sometimes pronounced Yah-shoo-ah). God, through His Holy Spirit, used the words of the prophets (including King David and Daniel) to gradually reveal the person of His Son, His name, His place of birth, His ministry in His earthly life, His purposes in the redemption of man from sin, His role as our legal advocate before the father and as our high priest. God, through providence, or His Sovereign control over all creation, even used History, as it is recorded in scripture, to reveal the person of His Son. The assistant of Moses, called Joshua by Moses, was a "type" of Jesus Christ, a man of war who led his people through the Jordan river to take possession of the land of Canaan. I can say this because the scripture tells us that Joshua's real name was Oshea, son of Nun, but Moses called him Joshua. In the book of Deuteronomy you'll find a passage in which Moses tells the tribes of Israel that he will not cross over Jordan with them, but that Joshua will go before them, and Moses also tells them that the Lord Himself will go before them. Moses picked Joshua to lead Israel after his death, but he could've picked others, such as Caleb, the man also found faithful from the generation that perished in the wilderness, but the Lord chose Joshua as a "type" of the messiah to come and revealed this in many ways, though none of them would be at all obvious without first reading and believing the New Testament scripture, which gives us our only reliable description of the person of Jesus of Nazareth. The prophet Zechariah also revealed the name of the Messiah in a passage talking about a High Priest, also of the name Joshua, "whose name is the branch." This is a fairly cryptic statement taken by itself, but in earlier books of scripture, we find descriptions of the messiah as the "branch of David". The same priest, Joshua, was given a special crown and all this to represent the fact that the "Joshua" to come would be both High priest and King. Another example of a "type" of Jesus in the old testament is the man named Samson, who was a judge of Israel and is written about in the book of Judges. The birth of Samson was announced beforehand by an angel (as was the birth of Jesus). Samson was declared by God to be a Nazirite from birth. The law of the Nazirite is explained in the book of Leviticus, but a Nazirite was one who took a special oath before God and placed himself in a position of societal humility until the oath was fulfilled. Jesus, as the lamb of God, was also born a Nazirite in the sense that He was born for the cross to fulfill the oath of God, satisfying the righteous requirements of the covenant of law, and at the same time establishing a new covenant of peace between God and all people that would enter into His covenant by faith in His Son. Samson fought against the enemies of Israel, but killed more in his death than he did in his life. Jesus waged war upon the enemies of God, and won the greatest victory in His death, even conquering death in His resurrection, and delivering all that would believe Him from its power. These are just two examples of "types" of Jesus found in the Old testament, but neither would be obvious without first being familiar with the New Testament and believing those things which Jesus taught us, first from His own mouth, and later through His Apostles and disciples.
John MacArthur has just begun a study on the Old Testament scripture specifically about seeing Jesus as He is presented in them. While I don't agree with everything that John MacArthur teaches, he is a very thorough scholar, and I'm sure that his study will be worth reviewing. If you're not familiar with him, he's a well known Pastor with a worldwide radio ministry, and his messages can be retrieved in the form of pod casts through the internet. His radio program is called "Grace to You" locally, but is broadcast in other languages and with other variants of the english name.
I pray that the Lord reveals Himself to you throughout the scripture (He wants to do this but you must be willing to receive it.) If you approach the Lord with a sincere desire to know Him and to do His will, He has promised that you will know whether His teaching is from heaven and He will by no means turn you away. In the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ, we find Him standing at the door and knocking and promising to enter in and dine with whomever opens the door to Him (the door of faith, the door of the heart.) While that was written to the Church, it is also written to anyone who has an ear to hear, which means that if you do hear Him and believe, you are a part of His church, but just didn't know it yet.