Sometimes, when an atheist or an agnostic is talking to a Christian about God, they will say something like, "If God is real, then why doesn't he show himself to us?" The idea here is that If God exists and if he is concerned that we know him and worship him, then why doesn’t he do more to reveal himself to us? Why, for example, does he seem to refuse to show himself to someone that asks for evidence of his existence? Christians have a variety of answers to these questions. One such answer is that God requires faith and proving his existence to someone would not require faith. Another answer given is that there is evidence for God all around us. For example, Psalm chapter nineteen verse one states:
The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.
And Romans 1:19-20 says:
Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
The first answer, faith, requires something valid to place your faith in. For example, if there are two chairs before me, one of which is perfectly sound and the other about to fall apart, I can state my faith in the second rickety chair all I want, but when I sit in it the chair will utterly collapse. Faith is only as good as the object that receives it. A person can place their faith in God with all of their might, but if it turns out that that god is not real, what then? They can believe as sincerely as they want, but the end result would be disastrous.
The second answer states that the creation, the very universe in which we live, is evidence for God. However, there are problems with this as well. For example, which god is the creation pointing to? And, if this evidence is so clear, then why isn't everyone convinced?
But there is, in my opinion, an even better question that needs to be asked. Did men ever ask for God to reveal himself to unbelievers in order to convince them that he was real? And, if so, why doesn't God respond to such requests today? The Bible tells us that God is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8) and that God does not change. Therefore, if God has revealed himself to unbelievers in the past at the request of believers, we should expect him to do the same today.
Let's look at one such instance.
In the book of First Kings, chapter eighteen, we read of the famous story where the prophet Elijah confronts the pagan prophets of Baal. The story is quite amazing. The chapter takes place during an interesting period of Israel's history. The kingdom of Israel had been divided in two with the northern kingdom becoming known as Israel and the southern kingdom as Judah. The kings of Israel are recorded as always being ungodly and pagan. The king during Elijah's time, Ahab, was especially so. He had married a foreign woman who had brought her pagan priests and priestesses with her and caused the people to fall away from worshiping the God of Israel.
As the story goes, God had caused it to cease raining in Israel for three years. However, as chapter eighteen opens we learn that God is sending Elijah to tell king Ahab that he was going to allow it to rain again. Along the way, Elijah demands that the people of Israel, the prophets of Baal and the prophets of the grove come to Mt. Carmel . Basically Elijah is gathering together a nation of unbelievers. His purpose is to convince them that the God is Israel is the one true God and that no other should be worshiped. Elijah says as much in verse twenty-one:
And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word.
Here we see that Elijah confronts them with their lack of belief in God. Despite his challenge, the people refused to express faith in the God of Israel. As a result, Elijah demands a challenge (verses 23-24):
Let them therefore give us two bullocks; and let them choose one bullock for themselves, and cut it in pieces, and lay it on wood, and put no fire under: and I will dress the other bullock, and lay it on wood, and put no fire under: And call ye on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the LORD: and the God that answereth by fire, let him be God. And all the people answered and said, It is well spoken.
This challenge was to be done in the presence of the unbelievers as a means of convincing them to believe and follow the God of Israel. Nowhere in the chapter do we find God telling Elijah to do this. His only instructions are to go to Ahab and tell him that it is about to rain again. However, the challenge is presented and accepted.
As we read the story we see that the prophets of Baal do all they can to cause their god to respond. Elijah, in the mean time, mocks and ridicules them. When Elijah's turn comes he ups the ante. He soaks the sacrifice, thus making the possibility of a spontaneous fire virtually non-existent. He prays a simple public prayer and then, to everyone's surprise, the God of Israel answers and the sacrifice is utterly consumed by the fire! The end result is that the people of Israel, at least for a time, believed in the God of Israel. They then turned and killed the false priests in their midst.
The above example from the Bible shows that a believer in the God of Israel has, in times past, made a demonstration of the power of God to convince unbelievers that God is real. If the Bible is to be believed and if God never changes, then he should not be opposed to doing the same thing today. Believers should be lining the streets and praying prayers like Elijah, fully expecting their god to answer and show forth his power in the midst of an unbelieving world. However, this simply does not happen and Christians know it. Because they know it, they come up with other answers such as you need faith or the evidence of creation should be enough to convince you.
The example of Elijah is not the only one in the Bible. God revealed himself in mighty ways to unbelievers in both the Old and New Testaments. Does anyone remember the pagan leper, Naaman (Second Kings chapter five)? What about the way the Apostles lived as recorded in the book of Acts? They did miracles everywhere they went in order to prove that their god was the one true god. They did not just rely on reason alone. And even Jesus himself, as we see recorded in the Gospels, did acts of miracles from god in order to convince people that his message was true. Where are these miracles today?
If the god of the Bible is real and true and if he is at all concerned with people actually believing in him, then it would stand to reason that he would do something to demonstrate his reality. According to the Bible, he did just this at various times. But in reality, we just don't see it. The Christian excuse that the unbeliever will not see god without faith just does not hold up in the face of biblical evidence. Elijah prayed for god to reveal himself to the masses of unbelievers in his day and the Bible records that he did just that. What about today? The concept that the creation is enough evidence is also not valid. The same creation existed in the days of Elijah, but it was not enough. The people of Israel needed more evidence and Elijah got god to provide it.
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Sunday, December 14, 2008
Saturday, December 6, 2008
The Problem of Judges 1:19 - God Defeated by Iron Chariots
The vast majority of those claiming to be Christian believe the God of the Bible to be omnipotent or all-powerful. By definition, there is nothing that God cannot do. But while many Christians believe this to be true about God, does the Bible support this concept? Does the Bible teach that the God of the Bible is all-powerful and, thus, is capable of accomplishing all of his will here upon planet earth?
There are a few interesting verses that we can consider. For example, in Genesis chapter eighteen, we find Sarah laughing at the prospect of her having a child in her old age ... something that was impossible for her and her husband Abraham. God, who was visiting Abraham, knew of Sarah's thoughts and why she laughed and countered them by stating, "Is any thing too hard for the LORD?" (Genesis 18:13). The implication was that Sarah should not have laughed ... that God can do anything and, as a result, providing a baby for Sarah in her old age was a relatively simple task.
Jesus himself bears witness to the omnipotence of God in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter nineteen and verse twenty-six:
"But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."
The word of the Christ is that there is nothing that God cannot do. If it is impossible with men, then it is not impossible with God.
The prophet, Daniel, would agree with Christ. In the Book of Daniel (chapter four, verse thirty-five) we read:
"And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?"
The Apostle Paul also concurs:
"In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:" - Ephesians 1:11
God, according to the Bible, is all-powerful and nothing impedes the enforcement of his will on planet earth. If this is the case, then what do we do if we find an example where the will of God is indeed thwarted? What if there is a situation in which God's desire is overturned? Such a case is found in the Book of Judges.
Let's look at the verse. It is found in Judges, chapter one and verse nineteen:
"And the LORD was with Judah; and he drave out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron."
The first few verses of the Book of Judges tell us that Joshua, the son of Nun, had died and that Israel was looking among its tribes to determine who would carry on the fight with the Canaanites that still dwelt in the land. As they were looking, the Lord himself declared that it would be the tribe of Judah (Joshuah 1:2) and the all-powerful God declared that he had delivered the land into Judah's hand. After several great victories, Judah continues his battle against the Canaanites that dwelt in the mountains and in the valleys (verse 9). Victory after victory is described. It certainly appeared that God was with the children of Judah and that his will was being enforced among men. But then we come to verse nineteen.
In this verse we are first reminded that God was with Judah. God's intention (his will) as stated earlier in the chapter (verse 2), was to deliver the land into his (Judah's) hand. All seemed to be going well until they ran into those that inhabited the valley. Why? Because they had chariots of iron.
According to verse nineteen, the chariots of iron possessed by the Canaanites of the valley were too powerful for Judah. But did not God state that his intention, his will, was to deliver the land into Judah's hand? Was God not with Judah? If nothing is impossible with God, then should iron chariots pose a problem to him?
In fairness, some English renditions of this verse will translate it a bit differently. For example, the NASB (New American Standard Bible) renders the verse this way:
Now the LORD was with Judah, and they took possession of the hill country; but they could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley because they had iron chariots."
The idea behind translations like this is to place the emphasis of the failure on Judah and not on God. It was Judah who could not prevail against the iron chariots. However, this fails. Again, according to verse two of the same chapter, it was God's intention, God's will, that the inhabitants of the land be delivered into the hand of Judah, whom God himself had selected and enabled for the task. Remember what the prophet Daniel had said about God and the affairs of men:
"And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?"
No one should be able to thwart the will of God on earth, not according to Daniel. Even so, the inhabitants of the valley did just that with their iron chariots. They were able to prevail against Judah, God's selected and empowered champion. God's will of driving out the inhabitants of the land was not accomplished. Some may speculate that there was sin in the camp and, thus, God allowed defeat to teach the children of Judah, and of Israel, a lesson. This seems to be the main thrust of the book of Judges ... that disobedience turns away the favor of God. However, there is no indication in the first chapter that this is the case. Verse nineteen just comes out and states that, despite all of Judah's victories and despite the fact that God was determined to drive out the inhabitants of the land through his chosen vessel, they failed in the valley because of the technological advantage of the inhabitants.
What do we do with such a verse? Do we simply ignore it? Or do we consider it and factor it into the equation. And if we consider it, what does this say about the God of the Bible? Is he or is he not all-powerful?
The conclusion of Judges 1:19 is clear: God was not able to drive out all the inhabitants of the land, despite this being his will. Daniel was not correct and neither was Jesus. The technical superiority of the inhabitants of the valley proved too much for the children of Judah and for the God that enabled them.
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There are a few interesting verses that we can consider. For example, in Genesis chapter eighteen, we find Sarah laughing at the prospect of her having a child in her old age ... something that was impossible for her and her husband Abraham. God, who was visiting Abraham, knew of Sarah's thoughts and why she laughed and countered them by stating, "Is any thing too hard for the LORD?" (Genesis 18:13). The implication was that Sarah should not have laughed ... that God can do anything and, as a result, providing a baby for Sarah in her old age was a relatively simple task.
Jesus himself bears witness to the omnipotence of God in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter nineteen and verse twenty-six:
"But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."
The word of the Christ is that there is nothing that God cannot do. If it is impossible with men, then it is not impossible with God.
The prophet, Daniel, would agree with Christ. In the Book of Daniel (chapter four, verse thirty-five) we read:
"And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?"
The Apostle Paul also concurs:
"In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:" - Ephesians 1:11
God, according to the Bible, is all-powerful and nothing impedes the enforcement of his will on planet earth. If this is the case, then what do we do if we find an example where the will of God is indeed thwarted? What if there is a situation in which God's desire is overturned? Such a case is found in the Book of Judges.
Let's look at the verse. It is found in Judges, chapter one and verse nineteen:
"And the LORD was with Judah; and he drave out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron."
The first few verses of the Book of Judges tell us that Joshua, the son of Nun, had died and that Israel was looking among its tribes to determine who would carry on the fight with the Canaanites that still dwelt in the land. As they were looking, the Lord himself declared that it would be the tribe of Judah (Joshuah 1:2) and the all-powerful God declared that he had delivered the land into Judah's hand. After several great victories, Judah continues his battle against the Canaanites that dwelt in the mountains and in the valleys (verse 9). Victory after victory is described. It certainly appeared that God was with the children of Judah and that his will was being enforced among men. But then we come to verse nineteen.
In this verse we are first reminded that God was with Judah. God's intention (his will) as stated earlier in the chapter (verse 2), was to deliver the land into his (Judah's) hand. All seemed to be going well until they ran into those that inhabited the valley. Why? Because they had chariots of iron.
According to verse nineteen, the chariots of iron possessed by the Canaanites of the valley were too powerful for Judah. But did not God state that his intention, his will, was to deliver the land into Judah's hand? Was God not with Judah? If nothing is impossible with God, then should iron chariots pose a problem to him?
In fairness, some English renditions of this verse will translate it a bit differently. For example, the NASB (New American Standard Bible) renders the verse this way:
Now the LORD was with Judah, and they took possession of the hill country; but they could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley because they had iron chariots."
The idea behind translations like this is to place the emphasis of the failure on Judah and not on God. It was Judah who could not prevail against the iron chariots. However, this fails. Again, according to verse two of the same chapter, it was God's intention, God's will, that the inhabitants of the land be delivered into the hand of Judah, whom God himself had selected and enabled for the task. Remember what the prophet Daniel had said about God and the affairs of men:
"And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?"
No one should be able to thwart the will of God on earth, not according to Daniel. Even so, the inhabitants of the valley did just that with their iron chariots. They were able to prevail against Judah, God's selected and empowered champion. God's will of driving out the inhabitants of the land was not accomplished. Some may speculate that there was sin in the camp and, thus, God allowed defeat to teach the children of Judah, and of Israel, a lesson. This seems to be the main thrust of the book of Judges ... that disobedience turns away the favor of God. However, there is no indication in the first chapter that this is the case. Verse nineteen just comes out and states that, despite all of Judah's victories and despite the fact that God was determined to drive out the inhabitants of the land through his chosen vessel, they failed in the valley because of the technological advantage of the inhabitants.
What do we do with such a verse? Do we simply ignore it? Or do we consider it and factor it into the equation. And if we consider it, what does this say about the God of the Bible? Is he or is he not all-powerful?
The conclusion of Judges 1:19 is clear: God was not able to drive out all the inhabitants of the land, despite this being his will. Daniel was not correct and neither was Jesus. The technical superiority of the inhabitants of the valley proved too much for the children of Judah and for the God that enabled them.
Click to read the rest of the article and comments!
Monday, December 1, 2008
The Problem of Isaiah 7:14: The Virgin Birth Prophecy
For the Christian, the Bible is the book that tells them all that they need to know about God, life, the afterlife and the hows and whys of it all. This is why it is so important for so many Christian denominations to establish that the Bible is without error, was preserved by God and inspired by the very Spirit of God as he breathed upon the very authors of the sacred text. For most Protestants and Baptists, for example, the Bible and God are so closely linked that belief in the one is linked to belief in the other. This can be established biblically.
For example, the Bible says that God created the heavens and the earth and all that is in them and that he did so by his spoken word (… and God said, let there be light). Later in the book of Genesis, Abraham had a question of doubt. God gave an answer and Abraham believed the word of God. As a result, the Bible records that God counted it to him for righteousness and Abraham was made righteous before God by his faith in God's word. As we approach the New Testament, we find that the word of God becomes forever linked with the person of Jesus of Nazareth. In John chapter one, for example, we are told:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. - John 1:1
And in verse 14 of the same chapter we read:
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
And thus the Bible presents Jesus as the word of God in human flesh. Just as righteousness before God was achieved by Abraham by his faith in God's word, in like manner, according to the New Testament, a man is made righteous by his faith in Jesus, the word of God.
From this we can see that both Testaments teach the way to God (through righteousness) is the same: faith in the word of God.
The Bible is proclaimed to be the very word of God. Because God is declared to be perfect and without error, then it would stand to reason that his word would also be perfect and without error. Jesus, the word of God, is declared to be without sin and to be perfect and without error (after all, he is the truth, according to the Bible). God, Jesus and the written word are so closely linked together that it is difficult to talk about the one without talking about the other. It would stand to reason that the Bible, if it is the very word of God, would, in like manner, be perfect, spotless and without error. If the pages of the holy writ could be proven to contain error then what would that say about God himself?
There are those that believe that they do not need to accept all of the Bible. For example, some people accept the moral code of the Bible, but reject the miracles recorded therein. On what grounds do they do this? Human reasoning? Because they do not believe in miracles? What criteria do they use to make such assumptions? How can a mere man weed through what is proposed to be the very words of God and determine what he did and did not say? How can a mere mortal determine, with certainty, what is the word of God and what is not? Wouldn't the one that says a certain passage in the Bible is not from God have to be God (or at least claim to be) in order for them to know for certain that the particular passage was not of God? Or could it be that they have a source outside of the Bible itself that helps them to determine what is and is not from the mouth of God? And if a source, how can it be known if this source is divine or simply another imagination of man?
While I don't claim to know the answers to all of that, I do want to examine the concept of the veracity of the Bible. Whether a person believes in the inerrancy of the Bible or not, all who claim to be Christian rely , to some degree, on the pages of this book to determine what they know about God and how he functions in the affairs of men. This is why it is so important to examine the Scriptures to see if there is any error within. If God is perfect and his word is perfect and Jesus and the word are so closely linked together, then you would expect perfection in his word. If there is error within, then what does that say about God? About Jesus? What does it say about the trust-worthiness of what we read in the pages of the Scriptures themselves?
I would like to begin this study with a common prophecy that most Christians know. We will begin by looking at Isaiah's prophecy of the virgin birth as found in Isaiah 7:14:
Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
When one reads this verse it seems obvious that this is speaking of Jesus. And the Apostle Matthew would agree:
Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us. -Matthew 1:22-23
For most people, this is the end of the line. If the Bible says it, that settles it! However, what if Matthew is in error? What if Isaiah 7:14 is not speaking about Jesus at all? Let's go back and examine the verse in Isaiah to see what it is all about.
It would help to put it in a bit of context. If we begin reading in the very first verse of Isaiah chapter seven, then we can find out what is going on.
And it came to pass in the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, [that] Rezin the king of Syria, and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up toward Jerusalem to war against it, but could not prevail against it. And it was told the house of David, saying, Syria is confederate with Ephraim. And his heart was moved, and the heart of his people, as the trees of the wood are moved with the wind. - Isaiah 7:1-2
As can be seen from the verses above, Rezin, king of Syria and Pekah, king of Israel, were planning to go to war against Jerusalem. In those days, the nation of Israel had split into two kingdoms. The northern kingdom was called Israel and the southern, Judah. Jerusalem was the capital city of Judah. As we can see from these verses, the two northern kings had banded together with the purpose of setting out to destroy the capital city of Judah. Ahaz, the current king of Judah, was afraid as he was very much outnumbered. Because God, according to the verses that follow, wanted to calm the fears of Ahaz and let him know that God was with Judah, he sent to Ahaz the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah was to tell Ahaz not to fear:
And say unto him, Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither be fainthearted for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin with Syria, and of the son of Remaliah. - Isaiah 7:4
God went even further and told Isaiah to ask Ahaz to declare a sign that God would perform in order to further help Ahaz know that God was with him (verse 11). Ahaz refused and God, a bit angry, determines to give him a sign of his own choosing:
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
This is the context of the passage ... or most of it. We will examine what comes after verse 14 a bit further on. Before getting too deeply into the passage, it might be helpful to know when this was all taking place. According to Bible commentaries, Ahaz ruled in Judah in the early 700's B.C. (about 720 +/-). So the events that we are reading about take place about 700 years before Jesus was born. This is important to keep in mind.
This brings up an immediate question: How does Isaiah 7:14 apply to Ahaz if the promise is not to be fulfilled until some 700 years later? In other words, if the sending of Isaiah and the sign given were to comfort the heart of Ahaz because of the enemy that was about to attack him, how could a prophecy about someone that would be born 700 years later accomplish this? Please keep this in mind as we examine the passage in context a bit further.
One thing that is interesting is that many will stop at verse 14 and do not even think about the verses that follow. However, verse 14 is not in a vacuum. In fact, one vital rule of interpreting Scripture is context. It is imperative that the student of the Bible examine any passage within the context in which it was written. And, yet, many seem to violate this principle when it comes to Isaiah 7:14. Could this be because an honest evaluation of the passage would show that Matthew was wrong and the passage does not apply to Jesus of Nazareth? We shall see.
Let's begin by adding verses 15 and 16 onto verse 14:
Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose the good. For before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.
A simple and common reading of the passage would lead one to believe that the "he" and "the child" of verses 15 and 16 would be the same child that was said to be born of a virgin in verse 14. To put the verse in my own words, it could read like this:
Therefore the Lord will give you a sign: Pay attention! A virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and will call his name Immanuel. This child will eat butter and honey in order that he will be able to refuse evil and choose good. Before this child is old enough to know to refuse evil and choose good, the two kings that threaten you, Pekah and Rezin, will no longer be a problem.
Yes, I took liberty with the wording and, no, this is not a translation from the Hebrew in which Isaiah was originally written. The point here is that the virgin born child of verse 14 is the child that is spoken of in verses 15 and 16. Now you may be asking yourself, "Who cares?" Here is the reason we should care: According to this verse, the sign that God gave to Ahaz was to be fulfilled in Ahaz's lifetime. The child would still be an infant, not able to discern either good from evil, when the two kings that threatened Ahaz were removed from their thrones. In fact, according to historians, these two kings were no longer a threat within two years. Therefore, this baby had to have been born in that time frame ... not 700+ years later. This passage could not be talking about Jesus. And that is not the only proof.
Before moving on to some other points about Isaiah 7:14, let's examine how some Christians get around this theological knot. Some believe in what is called a double or dual fulfillment of prophecy. The idea here is that in order to prove a prophet true there must be an immediate fulfillment of the prophecy, but that the final fulfillment would be in the future at some point. Therefore, there would have been a child born in Ahaz's day as a sign to him, but the ultimate fulfillment would be found when Jesus of Nazareth was born. For people that adhere to this there are a multitude of problems.
Verse 14 is states that the child would be born of a virgin. If double fulfillment is true, then Jesus would not have been the only virgin born child and that would throw some of his credentials out the window, wouldn't it? If double fulfillment were true, then the child born in Ahaz's day would also have been named Immanuel, God with us. Therefore, there would have been another besides Jesus that shared this title. In other words, if double fulfillment were the solution, then Jesus is not a unique entity because there was another just like him born 700 years earlier.
Many reject double fulfillment for this verse and try to tackle this another way. They say that verses 15 and 16 do not apply to the child of verse 14 at all ... that another child is in view. As if the prophet had said:
Behold, a virgin will conceive and bear a son and call his name Immanuel. But this child that you see here (and not the virgin born one that I had just mentioned earlier) will still be an infant when those two kings are gone from their thrones!
While this is an interesting theory, there is no evidence within the text itself that another child is in view. The original language in which the passage was written, Hebrew, also makes it clear that the "he" and "child" of verses 15 and 16 are in fact the same child of verse 14. So this theory goes down in flames as well.
Others try to tackle this problem in another way. They say that the sign was not to Ahaz at all. After all, the king had rejected the sign (see verse 12). They say that the sign was for the house of David (verse 13). According to this theory, the sign would occur to someone in the lineage of David and therefore it was not a sign particularly to Ahaz himself. Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Joseph, his adoptive father, were both of the house of David (according to some Bible scholars) and, therefore, the virgin birth of Jesus would have been a sign to them. While this may be the most logical way to attempt to resolve the problems of Isaiah 7:14 being a prophecy about Jesus, it fails in several places. The first place that it fails is that, once again, the child was to still be an infant before the two kings that threatened Ahaz were taken care of. Since these events predate Jesus' birth by 700+ years, then this sign could not have been to some distant descendent of David's lineage. Again, the main reason that God had sent Isaiah to Ahaz was to comfort his heart concerning the two kings that were coming against him. But the best evidence against this passage being about the birth of Jesus is in verse 14 itself. Let's take a look at it.
The passage says that a virgin will conceive and bear a son. The Hebrew word used for virgin here is almah. However, the common Hebrew word for virgin is betullah. A study of the word almah will reveal that this word can refer to both a virgin and one that is not a virgin. But it always refers to a young woman or a maiden. This is why the Revised Standard Version of the Bible (1909) translated Isaiah 7:14 and replaced the word virgin with the word young woman. In fact, all of the Hebrew (or Jewish) translations use the term young women (or something similar) and none use virgin. Even many of the Christian translations use young woman. If this is the case, then this passage is not talking about a virgin birth at all, but that a young lady would bring forth a child.
The next point to consider is where it says that the mother would name her child Immanuel. When Mary, the mother of Jesus, gave birth to her child, she name him Jesus and not Immanuel. What is up with that? The prophecy seems pretty explicit that the child's name would be Immanuel. Some hold that the Hebrew concept of name is more in line with a title. As such, the term Immanuel would be a title and not the name by which Jesus would be called. However, it is interesting that Jesus is never called Immanuel at all within the New Testament.
Let's sum this up:
1 - The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be born of a young woman (an almah)
2 - The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be named Immanuel (not Jesus)
3 - The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be born and still be an infant before the two kings, Pekah and Rezin, were removed from being a threat to Ahaz, king of Judah
Jesus was born of a young woman, but then again, so are most people on planet earth. Nothing special there. However, the New Testament (and Matthew in particular) says he was born of a virgin. The New Testament was written in Greek and the Greek word used in Matthew is unmistakably the word for virgin. Therefore the New Testament insists on the virgin birth. However, as we have seen from the Hebrew Old Testament, it does not. Where did Matthew get the idea? Possibly from the Septuagint, which was the Greek translation of the Old Testament written about 200 years before the birth of Christ. Now some may say that the fact that the Septuagint used the Greek word for virgin in Isaiah 7:14 is proof enough. Fine. If the Septuagint becomes the standard then let's accept the rest of what it says as well. It is well known among scholars that the Septuagint is a poor translation that takes many liberties in its translations. Would it not be easy to assume that they did the same with Isaiah 7:14? In other words, if your proof is from the Septuagint, then you are on shaky ground.
Another point is that Jesus was not named Immanuel by his mother, Mary, though the Bible did claim him to be God with us (which is the meaning of Immanuel). But was not the Isaiah 7:14 passage explicit? Was not the child to be called Immanuel? Do we ever see anyone calling Jesus Immanuel in the New Testament? How then does Jesus fulfill the Isaiah prophecy then?
The main problem is that Jesus was born some 700+ years too late to fulfill the prophecy of Isaiah 7:14. Again, verses 15 and 16 state that the child would still be an infant when the two kings would be done away with. This occurred within two years or so from when Isaiah came to Ahaz the king. Therefore the child spoken of by Isaiah would have to have been born within that two year time frame some 700 years before Jesus.
My conclusion:
Matthew got it wrong. And therefore, there was no virgin birth. Thus, Jesus is nothing special as his birth was no different than any other man who is born into this world. His mother named him Jesus and not Immanuel. Therefore Jesus could not be the one spoken of in Isaiah 7:14. The sign was both to the house of David and to Ahaz. The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be born before the two kings that threatened Ahaz were no more. Therefore, Jesus came 700 years too late! But that doesn't surprise me. The Bible says that Jesus is coming again soon and devout Christians have been waiting for almost 2000 years. Click to read the rest of the article and comments!
For example, the Bible says that God created the heavens and the earth and all that is in them and that he did so by his spoken word (… and God said, let there be light). Later in the book of Genesis, Abraham had a question of doubt. God gave an answer and Abraham believed the word of God. As a result, the Bible records that God counted it to him for righteousness and Abraham was made righteous before God by his faith in God's word. As we approach the New Testament, we find that the word of God becomes forever linked with the person of Jesus of Nazareth. In John chapter one, for example, we are told:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. - John 1:1
And in verse 14 of the same chapter we read:
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
And thus the Bible presents Jesus as the word of God in human flesh. Just as righteousness before God was achieved by Abraham by his faith in God's word, in like manner, according to the New Testament, a man is made righteous by his faith in Jesus, the word of God.
From this we can see that both Testaments teach the way to God (through righteousness) is the same: faith in the word of God.
The Bible is proclaimed to be the very word of God. Because God is declared to be perfect and without error, then it would stand to reason that his word would also be perfect and without error. Jesus, the word of God, is declared to be without sin and to be perfect and without error (after all, he is the truth, according to the Bible). God, Jesus and the written word are so closely linked together that it is difficult to talk about the one without talking about the other. It would stand to reason that the Bible, if it is the very word of God, would, in like manner, be perfect, spotless and without error. If the pages of the holy writ could be proven to contain error then what would that say about God himself?
There are those that believe that they do not need to accept all of the Bible. For example, some people accept the moral code of the Bible, but reject the miracles recorded therein. On what grounds do they do this? Human reasoning? Because they do not believe in miracles? What criteria do they use to make such assumptions? How can a mere man weed through what is proposed to be the very words of God and determine what he did and did not say? How can a mere mortal determine, with certainty, what is the word of God and what is not? Wouldn't the one that says a certain passage in the Bible is not from God have to be God (or at least claim to be) in order for them to know for certain that the particular passage was not of God? Or could it be that they have a source outside of the Bible itself that helps them to determine what is and is not from the mouth of God? And if a source, how can it be known if this source is divine or simply another imagination of man?
While I don't claim to know the answers to all of that, I do want to examine the concept of the veracity of the Bible. Whether a person believes in the inerrancy of the Bible or not, all who claim to be Christian rely , to some degree, on the pages of this book to determine what they know about God and how he functions in the affairs of men. This is why it is so important to examine the Scriptures to see if there is any error within. If God is perfect and his word is perfect and Jesus and the word are so closely linked together, then you would expect perfection in his word. If there is error within, then what does that say about God? About Jesus? What does it say about the trust-worthiness of what we read in the pages of the Scriptures themselves?
I would like to begin this study with a common prophecy that most Christians know. We will begin by looking at Isaiah's prophecy of the virgin birth as found in Isaiah 7:14:
Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
When one reads this verse it seems obvious that this is speaking of Jesus. And the Apostle Matthew would agree:
Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us. -Matthew 1:22-23
For most people, this is the end of the line. If the Bible says it, that settles it! However, what if Matthew is in error? What if Isaiah 7:14 is not speaking about Jesus at all? Let's go back and examine the verse in Isaiah to see what it is all about.
It would help to put it in a bit of context. If we begin reading in the very first verse of Isaiah chapter seven, then we can find out what is going on.
And it came to pass in the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, [that] Rezin the king of Syria, and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up toward Jerusalem to war against it, but could not prevail against it. And it was told the house of David, saying, Syria is confederate with Ephraim. And his heart was moved, and the heart of his people, as the trees of the wood are moved with the wind. - Isaiah 7:1-2
As can be seen from the verses above, Rezin, king of Syria and Pekah, king of Israel, were planning to go to war against Jerusalem. In those days, the nation of Israel had split into two kingdoms. The northern kingdom was called Israel and the southern, Judah. Jerusalem was the capital city of Judah. As we can see from these verses, the two northern kings had banded together with the purpose of setting out to destroy the capital city of Judah. Ahaz, the current king of Judah, was afraid as he was very much outnumbered. Because God, according to the verses that follow, wanted to calm the fears of Ahaz and let him know that God was with Judah, he sent to Ahaz the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah was to tell Ahaz not to fear:
And say unto him, Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither be fainthearted for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin with Syria, and of the son of Remaliah. - Isaiah 7:4
God went even further and told Isaiah to ask Ahaz to declare a sign that God would perform in order to further help Ahaz know that God was with him (verse 11). Ahaz refused and God, a bit angry, determines to give him a sign of his own choosing:
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
This is the context of the passage ... or most of it. We will examine what comes after verse 14 a bit further on. Before getting too deeply into the passage, it might be helpful to know when this was all taking place. According to Bible commentaries, Ahaz ruled in Judah in the early 700's B.C. (about 720 +/-). So the events that we are reading about take place about 700 years before Jesus was born. This is important to keep in mind.
This brings up an immediate question: How does Isaiah 7:14 apply to Ahaz if the promise is not to be fulfilled until some 700 years later? In other words, if the sending of Isaiah and the sign given were to comfort the heart of Ahaz because of the enemy that was about to attack him, how could a prophecy about someone that would be born 700 years later accomplish this? Please keep this in mind as we examine the passage in context a bit further.
One thing that is interesting is that many will stop at verse 14 and do not even think about the verses that follow. However, verse 14 is not in a vacuum. In fact, one vital rule of interpreting Scripture is context. It is imperative that the student of the Bible examine any passage within the context in which it was written. And, yet, many seem to violate this principle when it comes to Isaiah 7:14. Could this be because an honest evaluation of the passage would show that Matthew was wrong and the passage does not apply to Jesus of Nazareth? We shall see.
Let's begin by adding verses 15 and 16 onto verse 14:
Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose the good. For before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.
A simple and common reading of the passage would lead one to believe that the "he" and "the child" of verses 15 and 16 would be the same child that was said to be born of a virgin in verse 14. To put the verse in my own words, it could read like this:
Therefore the Lord will give you a sign: Pay attention! A virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and will call his name Immanuel. This child will eat butter and honey in order that he will be able to refuse evil and choose good. Before this child is old enough to know to refuse evil and choose good, the two kings that threaten you, Pekah and Rezin, will no longer be a problem.
Yes, I took liberty with the wording and, no, this is not a translation from the Hebrew in which Isaiah was originally written. The point here is that the virgin born child of verse 14 is the child that is spoken of in verses 15 and 16. Now you may be asking yourself, "Who cares?" Here is the reason we should care: According to this verse, the sign that God gave to Ahaz was to be fulfilled in Ahaz's lifetime. The child would still be an infant, not able to discern either good from evil, when the two kings that threatened Ahaz were removed from their thrones. In fact, according to historians, these two kings were no longer a threat within two years. Therefore, this baby had to have been born in that time frame ... not 700+ years later. This passage could not be talking about Jesus. And that is not the only proof.
Before moving on to some other points about Isaiah 7:14, let's examine how some Christians get around this theological knot. Some believe in what is called a double or dual fulfillment of prophecy. The idea here is that in order to prove a prophet true there must be an immediate fulfillment of the prophecy, but that the final fulfillment would be in the future at some point. Therefore, there would have been a child born in Ahaz's day as a sign to him, but the ultimate fulfillment would be found when Jesus of Nazareth was born. For people that adhere to this there are a multitude of problems.
Verse 14 is states that the child would be born of a virgin. If double fulfillment is true, then Jesus would not have been the only virgin born child and that would throw some of his credentials out the window, wouldn't it? If double fulfillment were true, then the child born in Ahaz's day would also have been named Immanuel, God with us. Therefore, there would have been another besides Jesus that shared this title. In other words, if double fulfillment were the solution, then Jesus is not a unique entity because there was another just like him born 700 years earlier.
Many reject double fulfillment for this verse and try to tackle this another way. They say that verses 15 and 16 do not apply to the child of verse 14 at all ... that another child is in view. As if the prophet had said:
Behold, a virgin will conceive and bear a son and call his name Immanuel. But this child that you see here (and not the virgin born one that I had just mentioned earlier) will still be an infant when those two kings are gone from their thrones!
While this is an interesting theory, there is no evidence within the text itself that another child is in view. The original language in which the passage was written, Hebrew, also makes it clear that the "he" and "child" of verses 15 and 16 are in fact the same child of verse 14. So this theory goes down in flames as well.
Others try to tackle this problem in another way. They say that the sign was not to Ahaz at all. After all, the king had rejected the sign (see verse 12). They say that the sign was for the house of David (verse 13). According to this theory, the sign would occur to someone in the lineage of David and therefore it was not a sign particularly to Ahaz himself. Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Joseph, his adoptive father, were both of the house of David (according to some Bible scholars) and, therefore, the virgin birth of Jesus would have been a sign to them. While this may be the most logical way to attempt to resolve the problems of Isaiah 7:14 being a prophecy about Jesus, it fails in several places. The first place that it fails is that, once again, the child was to still be an infant before the two kings that threatened Ahaz were taken care of. Since these events predate Jesus' birth by 700+ years, then this sign could not have been to some distant descendent of David's lineage. Again, the main reason that God had sent Isaiah to Ahaz was to comfort his heart concerning the two kings that were coming against him. But the best evidence against this passage being about the birth of Jesus is in verse 14 itself. Let's take a look at it.
The passage says that a virgin will conceive and bear a son. The Hebrew word used for virgin here is almah. However, the common Hebrew word for virgin is betullah. A study of the word almah will reveal that this word can refer to both a virgin and one that is not a virgin. But it always refers to a young woman or a maiden. This is why the Revised Standard Version of the Bible (1909) translated Isaiah 7:14 and replaced the word virgin with the word young woman. In fact, all of the Hebrew (or Jewish) translations use the term young women (or something similar) and none use virgin. Even many of the Christian translations use young woman. If this is the case, then this passage is not talking about a virgin birth at all, but that a young lady would bring forth a child.
The next point to consider is where it says that the mother would name her child Immanuel. When Mary, the mother of Jesus, gave birth to her child, she name him Jesus and not Immanuel. What is up with that? The prophecy seems pretty explicit that the child's name would be Immanuel. Some hold that the Hebrew concept of name is more in line with a title. As such, the term Immanuel would be a title and not the name by which Jesus would be called. However, it is interesting that Jesus is never called Immanuel at all within the New Testament.
Let's sum this up:
1 - The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be born of a young woman (an almah)
2 - The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be named Immanuel (not Jesus)
3 - The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be born and still be an infant before the two kings, Pekah and Rezin, were removed from being a threat to Ahaz, king of Judah
Jesus was born of a young woman, but then again, so are most people on planet earth. Nothing special there. However, the New Testament (and Matthew in particular) says he was born of a virgin. The New Testament was written in Greek and the Greek word used in Matthew is unmistakably the word for virgin. Therefore the New Testament insists on the virgin birth. However, as we have seen from the Hebrew Old Testament, it does not. Where did Matthew get the idea? Possibly from the Septuagint, which was the Greek translation of the Old Testament written about 200 years before the birth of Christ. Now some may say that the fact that the Septuagint used the Greek word for virgin in Isaiah 7:14 is proof enough. Fine. If the Septuagint becomes the standard then let's accept the rest of what it says as well. It is well known among scholars that the Septuagint is a poor translation that takes many liberties in its translations. Would it not be easy to assume that they did the same with Isaiah 7:14? In other words, if your proof is from the Septuagint, then you are on shaky ground.
Another point is that Jesus was not named Immanuel by his mother, Mary, though the Bible did claim him to be God with us (which is the meaning of Immanuel). But was not the Isaiah 7:14 passage explicit? Was not the child to be called Immanuel? Do we ever see anyone calling Jesus Immanuel in the New Testament? How then does Jesus fulfill the Isaiah prophecy then?
The main problem is that Jesus was born some 700+ years too late to fulfill the prophecy of Isaiah 7:14. Again, verses 15 and 16 state that the child would still be an infant when the two kings would be done away with. This occurred within two years or so from when Isaiah came to Ahaz the king. Therefore the child spoken of by Isaiah would have to have been born within that two year time frame some 700 years before Jesus.
My conclusion:
Matthew got it wrong. And therefore, there was no virgin birth. Thus, Jesus is nothing special as his birth was no different than any other man who is born into this world. His mother named him Jesus and not Immanuel. Therefore Jesus could not be the one spoken of in Isaiah 7:14. The sign was both to the house of David and to Ahaz. The child of Isaiah 7:14 was to be born before the two kings that threatened Ahaz were no more. Therefore, Jesus came 700 years too late! But that doesn't surprise me. The Bible says that Jesus is coming again soon and devout Christians have been waiting for almost 2000 years. Click to read the rest of the article and comments!
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