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In the New Testament
the writers claim that Jesus fulfilled a number of prophecies.
What prophecies are they talking about?
Jewish Rabbi Michael Skobac makes it clear.
"Whenever the Christian bible, the New Testament
says that something was fulfilled
the only book that the Christian bible quotes from
is the Jewish bible, the Old Testament."
The gospel of Matthew claims that Jesus fulfilled
a number of such prophecies.
Let's have a look at a few.
In Matthew chapter two, an angel tells Joseph
to flee with Mary and the baby Jesus to Egypt
to escape from King Herod.
"Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night
and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod.
This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord
through the prophet
"Out of Egypt I have called my son."
Where is this prophecy that Matthew speaks of?
It's in the Old Testament book of Hosea.
"When Israel was a child, I loved him
and out of Egypt I called my son."
Wait a minute.
Matthew missed part of the verse.
This is talking about the people of Israel, not Jesus.
Occasionally in the Bible
the people of Israel are referred to as a single person.
God is talking here about his relationship with his people
and how he set them free from Egypt
where they were slaves hundreds of years earlier.
God then laments how Israel kept making sacrifices
to other gods and idols.
Now if this is talking about Jesus
does that mean Jesus used to make sacrifices to other gods?
I don't think any Christians would agree with that.
This scripture is not a prophecy at all.
It has nothing to do with Jesus.
Let's move on.
"So the family went and lived in a town called Nazareth.
This fulfilled what the prophets had said,
He, Jesus, will be called a Nazarene."
The phrase "He will be called a Nazarene"
cannot be found in the Old Testament.
It's just not there.
Christians have scrambled to explain this one.
Two apologetics are often raised.
One is a reference to the book of Judges.
"For you shall conceive and bear a son.
No razor is to come on his head
for the boy shall be a nazirite to God from birth.
It is he who shall begin to deliver Israel
from the hand of the Philistines."
Wow, that sounds a bit like Jesus, right?
No, this is talking about Samson.
According to the bible
a nazirite is a person that takes a vow to live a life
according to certain rules.
For example, he cannot drink wine or grape juice
he cannot cut his hair
or go near a dead body.
Being a nazirite has nothing to do with what town you live in
or who your ancestors are.
It's simply a vow you take.
Jesus was not a nazirite.
He drank wine and came near Lazarus' body
when raising him from the dead.
So Jesus broke two of the nazirite rules.
There's no evidence he ever took such a vow.
The second apologetic is that Matthew is referring to a "netzer"
meaning a branch or shoot in Hebrew.
The connection is then made to this verse in Isaiah.
"A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse
and a branch shall grow out of his roots."
Now this verse is actually talking about the messiah
although that doesn't automatically mean the messiah is Jesus.
It's simply saying that whoever this messiah is
they will be a descendant, a shoot or a branch, of Jesse.
So what does this have to do with the town of Nazareth?
The argument is that because the root word for Nazareth
sounds similar to the root word used for branch
then it might have been derived from the same word.
Basically the idea is that Jesus lived in a town
whose name might mean branch.
Prophecy fulfilled, right?
Well, remember, that's not the prophecy.
The prophecy states that the messiah will be a descendant
a branch, of Jesse.
It's got nothing to do with the name of the town.
This argument is a bit like saying
"A descendant shall come from Jesse
and thus the prophecy was fulfilled
since Jesus lived in a town called Descendant".
It's nonsense.
Here's the next prophecy we'll look at.
"When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men
he was infuriated
and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem
who were two years old or under
according to the time that he had learned from the wise men.
Then was fulfilled
what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah.
"A voice was heard in Ramah
wailing and loud lamentation
Rachel weeping for her children
she refused to be consoled, because they are no more."
Let's jump over to Jeremiah
and have a look at the original scripture.
All we have to do is read the next two verses
to find out what's going on.
"Thus says the Lord
Keep your voice from weeping
and your eyes from tears
for there is a reward for your work
says the Lord
they shall come back from the land of the enemy
there is hope for your future
says the Lord
your children shall come back to their own country.
So Rachel's children are not dead.
They've been taken captive and God promises that they will return.
This has nothing to do with King Herod's massacre
hundreds of years later.
Let's have a look at the next prophecy.
"Throwing down the pieces of silver in the temple
he, Judas, departed; and he went and hanged himself.
But the chief priests, taking the pieces of silver, said
"It is not lawful to put them into the treasury
since they are blood money."
After conferring together
they used them to buy the potter’s field
as a place to bury foreigners.
For this reason that field has been called
the Field of Blood to this day.
Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah
"And they took the thirty pieces of silver
the price of the one on whom a price had been set
on whom some of the people of Israel had set a price
and they gave them for the potter’s field
as the Lord commanded me."
This supposed prophecy is not entirely found in Jeremiah.
It's a conflation of verses found in both Jeremiah and Zechariah.
Zechariah mentions 30 shekels of silver
and Jeremiah mentions buying a field.
Matthew just mixed the two together to create this prophecy.
Let's compare this prophecy to the story of Judas.
Zechariah was told by God to throw thirty shekels of silver
into the Temple.
But did God tell Judas to throw his pieces?
There's no evidence of this.
Judas seemingly did it out of guilt.
The payment of silver in the original verse was for wages
it wasn't a reward for killing someone.
And there's no mention in Zechariah of buying a field.
In Jeremiah, the prophet Jeremiah is told by God to buy a field
which he does for 17 shekels of silver.
He then gives the deed to this field to a guy named Baruch.
The end.
No thirty pieces of silver, no throwing, no temple.
This prophecy is a blurry mish-mash
that doesn't really add up when you examine it.
And once again
the Old Testament verses quoted by Matthew
have nothing to do with the coming messiah.
Next on the list is one of my favourites.
Let's go straight to the original prophecy
as it appears in the Old Testament.
"Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
Lo, your king comes to you
triumphant and victorious is he
humble and riding on a donkey
on a colt, the foal of a donkey."
This verse is about a triumphant king
often interpreted as the messiah
riding into Jerusalem on a donkey.
Before we jump back to Matthew
to see how Jesus fulfills this prophecy
let's take a quick look at how it appears in the gospel of Mark.
"When they were approaching Jerusalem
at Bethphage and Bethany
near the Mount of Olives
he, Jesus, sent two of his disciples and said to them
"Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it,
you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden
untie it and bring it.
They went away and found a colt tied near a door
outside in the street.
As they were untying it, some of the bystanders said to them
"What are you doing, untying the colt?"
They told them what Jesus had said
and they allowed them to take it.
Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it
and he sat on it."
Now let's compare that to Matthew's account.
"Go into the village ahead of you
and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her
untie them and bring them to me.
This took place to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet
saying
"Tell the daughter of Zion
Look, your king is coming to you
humble, and mounted on a donkey
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey."
The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them
they brought the donkey and the colt
and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them."
Matthew misinterprets the original prophecy
and has Jesus riding on two donkeys.
Both Mark and Luke also present the same story
but instead they have Jesus riding on only one donkey.
The notes in the New American Bible state
"The *** and the colt are the same animal in the prophecy
mentioned twice in different ways
the common Hebrew literary device of poetic parallelism.
That Matthew takes them as two
is one of the reasons why some scholars think he was a Gentile
rather than a Jewish Christian
who would presumably not make that mistake"
The notes continue
"an awkward picture resulting from Matthew's
misunderstanding of the prophecy."
Essentially, this appears to be direct evidence
of Matthew fabricating parts of his gospel.
He misunderstands the original prophecy
thinking it was talking about two donkeys
so, he has Jesus ride on two donkeys.
You may have noticed that I haven't yet talked
about the *** birth prophecy.
I'll discuss that one in another video.
Thanks for watching.