The Messiah in the Old Testament

Ignorance concerning Old Testament prophecy, it seems, is a hallmark of modern Christendom (especially evangelicalism). I've often heard certain misguided uber-literalists claim, for example, that there are several hundred direct, specific prophecies about Jesus Christ in the OT, and then go on to argue that, given the odds--which usually involves some great number, such as 10^17 (which makes you wonder how they might calculate such a thing)--against a single man fulfilling all the messianic prophecies, and given that Jesus did fulfill all the prophecies, Jesus must, mathematically, be God. Such claims are misleading. And so, I have been reading The Messiah in the Old Testament by Walter Kaiser, Jr.

Kaiser makes two general points about prophecy that I think are especially important. First, he says that prophecies must be understood primarily and first in light of their original, natural meaning. Prophecies do not have "dual senses," so that they are partly fulfilled at one time and then partly fulfilled at a later time. Second, Kaiser emphasizes that the Bible is to be read with an appreciation for its amazing, perfect unity and wholeness. For one, Christians are to understand and appreciate the coherence in the unfolding of redemption-history. For example, God's plan to redeem his people through Christ is clearly foreshadowed in Gen 3:15, when God pronounces, "I will put enmity between you [the serpent (Satan)] and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel."

However, Kaiser observes, "Modernity has placed far too much weight on the particularity and the details of the text and has devoted hardly any time to the unity of the Bible" (26). Kaiser then quotes James Orr at length on the Bible's unity especially when compared to other religions' holy books:

The Koran, for instance, is a miscellany of disjointed pieces, out of which it is impossible to extract any order, progress, or arrangement. The 114 Suras or chapters of which it is composed are arranged chiefly according to length--the longer in general preceding the shorter. It is not otherwise with the Zoroastrian and Buddhist Scriptures. These are equally destitute of beginning, middle or end. They are, for the most part, collections of heterogeneous materials, loosely placed together. How different everyone must acknowledge it to be with the Bible! From Genesis to Revelation we feel that this book is in a real sense a unity. It is not a collection of fragments, but has, as we say, an organic character. It has one connected story to tell from beginning to end; we see something growing before our eyes: there is plan, purpose, progress; the end folds back on the beginning, and, when the whole is finished, we feel that here again, as in primal creation, God has finished all his works, and behold, they are very good. (26)

Over the next few days, I intend to examine and reflect on some of the individual messianic prophecies. Today, however, I will only discuss prophecy in general terms.

Old Testament prophecy quotations in the NT are of three general kinds:

1. Direct prophecies
2. Typical prophecies
3. Applications

Direct Prophecies are those which look directly to the messianic age and which the original readers of the prophecy would have understood to be about the Messiah. Micah 5:2, for example, declared that the Messiah would be Born in Bethlehem (and was cited by Matthew [2:6]). Similarly, Zechariah 9:9 foresaw that Zion's king would enter the city riding on a donkey.

Typical prophecies are not direct predictions of future events but "persons, institutions, or events that were divinely designated in the OT text to be models, previews, or pictures of something that was to come in the days of Messiah" (Kaiser 34). In other words, they are OT persons, institutions, or events that constituted the ways in which God reaveled himself to his covenant people Israel. Or, one could say that a typology was any OT, God-instituted thing for which there was/is analogy in some aspect of Christ's person or work. Examples of typical prophecies include the parts, services, and attendants of the tabernacle. Consider Exodus 25:8-9, 40:

And let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell in their midst. Exactly as I show you concerning the pattern of the tabernacle, and of all its furniture, so you shall make it. . . . And see that you make them after the pattern for them, which is being shown you on the mountain.

The tabernacle is a "pattern." What is a pattern? Something that represents an original--a copy of the real. "Thus," Kaiser explains, "God suggests that the copy will be replaced as soon as the actual shows up in space and time" (34).

The third type of prophecies quoted in the NT are applications. These are prophecies in which no specific prediction was intended by the OT or claimed by the NT writer.