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The Argument From Forced Fulfilled Prophecy
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- Опубліковано 13 сер 2024
- There are numerous arguments for the historical reliability of the Gospels based upon their contents. These include the accuracy of the Gospel authors with respect to geographical locations and names, as well as local customs, and cultural references. Then there are undesigned coincidences, unnecessary details, unexplained allusions, and unified personalities throughout the Gospels. All of these arguments have in common the idea that certain details within the Gospels are unlikely to have been fabricated because they are difficult to engineer, and correspond to the known characteristics of reliable testimony. Together, they form a powerful abductive argument for the historical reliability of the Gospels. Most of these arguments have already received attention both in writing and in videos. However, there is a further argument which I would add to this repertoire of arguments which has not hitherto been developed in any detail, at least not to my knowledge. I call this the argument from forced-fulfilled prophecy.
Chapters:
00:00 - Introduction
01:29 - The Reality of Forced-Fulfillment
06:05 - A Distinctive Feature of Matthew's Gospel
07:10 - Midrash
09:38 - An Argument For Historical Reliability
13:33 - New Moses Typology?
16:27 - Historicity: The Best Explanation
17:18 - Conclusion
Sources:
Jesus and the Gospels - Craig L. Blomberg
NICNT: The Gospel of Matthew - R. T. France
New Testament Criticism and Interpretation - David Alan Black and David S. Dockery (eds.)
Scripture and Truth - D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge (eds.)
Matthew: Evangelist & Teacher - R. T. France
Historical Tradition in the Fourth Gospel - C. H. Dodd
Crucifixion of the Warrior God, Volume 1 - Gregory Boyd
The Setting of the Sermon on the Mount - W. D. Davies
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Interesting stuff!
Just read this after watching your video. Similar ideas as what Lewis was thinking.
“If Christianity was something we were making up, of course we could make it easier. But it is not. We cannot compete in simplicity, with people who are inventing religions. How could we? We are dealing with Fact. Of course anyone can be simple if he has no facts to bother about.”
-C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity.
I cannot stop cheering in this video. Nailed it.
Thanks 😊
I also really liked that this video was shorter. It makes it easier to engage with.
I like (most of) this video! I maintain that the Gospels's (and especially Matthew's) creative handling of Hebrew scriptures is in line with what I would consider a form of early Jewish historiography. We see the same thing occurring in the Dead Sea Scrolls.
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Wow, super fascinating. This was quite the uno reverse card. How do you think this impacts the argument from fulfilled prophecy for Christianity, if in fact you think there is such an argument?
Well not all prophetic fulfillments are forced. So there may be a separate argument for Christianity from legitimate prophetic fulfillments (although I'm not sure that argument can be made apart from independent reasons for affirming the historical reliability of the Gospels). If so, then we would simply recognize two different classes of arguments for Christianity on the basis of two different classes of prophetic fulfillments.
This is fantastic, I was expecting this video to be a critique on the argument from fulfilled prophecy but I was wrong. This is a huge sleeper of an argument for the reliability of the gospels. DP is the man!
I would say this is not such a great argument for the "reliability" of the Gospels, but rather shows pretty clearly that they were grappling with real events. Those are really two separate questions.
@@DrKippDavis Well I guess it would be more so reliable in the sense that they were concerned with historical facts and made sure to try and stay within those facts rather than not. The authors can be considered more trustworthy with this argument in mind. Great to hear from you Dr. Davis! Love to hear your thoughts on this in detail if you have already written or made a video about it.
@@truthovertea Thanks for your reply.
"...more so reliable in the sense that they were concerned with historical facts and made sure to try and stay within those facts rather than not."
I am not sure I agree, and the reason being that within what I would identify as "Jewish historiography" the concern is much more focused on meaning than it is on what we would call "accuracy." Some of the closest comparisons to what the Gospel writers are doing come from the Qumran pesharim, and even within these texts scholars are hesitant to take them at face value as straight-forward presentations of "historical facts."
I think that as readers we can set a higher historical confidence in aspects of the Jesus story where these "clunky" hermeneutics appear-i.e., yes, Jesus was from Nazareth; yes, Jesus was crucified, and was given sour wine on the cross. Where I think it breaks down is the extensions beyond this, where the individual Gospels are also constructing a Jesus to fit with pre-existing scripture templates-i.e., Matthew's obvious interest in Jesus as a Moses redivivus, and where Luke aligns Jesus's ministry to the Northern prophets, Elijah and Elisha.
So, all of that is to say that what David is pointing out in this video is useful in terms of reconstructing history, but then also has limits.
Looking forward to checking this one out. Keep up the work David!
Thanks! Would love to hear your thoughts on this argument. As the quotations indicate, there are hints of it elsewhere. But this video is the first full-fledged argument based upon this phenomenon so far as I'm aware.
Never thought of it that way. Very interesting!
Very interesting and thoughtful video. Keep up the good work!
Thanks Susan!
Excellent insight! I don't recall thinking of this argument or hearing it before. Good work!
Thanks!
I noticed these when I translated Matthew. Ever since even, I wondered if someone had developed thoughts along those lines to bolster Gospel reliability. Thanks for this.
Did you take New Testament use of the Old Testament at Trinity? I’m still sort of agnostic as to the authors intentions in certain cases but I think the midrash explanation seems most plausible. Whatever is going on, I do think it’s fair to point out that we should not impose (necessarily) 21st century hermeneutics on the New Testament authors. Good video!
I did not. It wasn't one of my required courses. Fascinating subject though.
@@faithbecauseofreason8381ah, yeah I took it as an elective but it was very eye opening and was essentially dedicated entirely to this topic. I hadn’t been aware of the supposed problem prior to the class but I did always think some of the so called fulfilled prophecies did seem “forced” as you put it.
@@thoughtfultheology449 hopefully this video has convinced you that this fact is a virtue rather than a vice 🙂
@@faithbecauseofreason8381yeah, I was already on board but I did appreciate the point you made regarding the fact that these references seeming clunky actually supports the authors pursuit for historicity as they could have modified them to make them more tidy.
Correction "I will open my mouth in parables" is pointing at the exodus theme. It's not easy explaining why and how it's conveyed. The point can be seen by Matthews use of oT texts when he uses one squeezes a narrative then squeezes another verse of the same theme. The point he was pointing at is the Babylonian exodus in contrast to the Egyptian Exodus. The verse in question in Psalms is linked by Pesher with the previous text used from Isaiah. Both OT texts are linked in each chapter by "their hearts are calloused" The verse is meant to point you at the chapter to then link the keywords of the repeating themes found in both Psalm and Isaiah. It's doing the same thing as in Matthew 2 & 3 when he uses the themes of the Exiles. What he's pointing at is that Jesus is the Messiah who was to come after both exiles.
I would just modify this to say that the authors had data points and fit prophecy to them. Whether those data points were made up for other reasons and got into the minds of the authors, or were historical is something to suss out. And its not to say that none of it is historical or anything, just that it doesnt have to be historical, it just has to be some data point that got to the author through either history or legendary development and then thats what theyre working with
Like the awkward fuflillment of speaking in parables, it could be that Mark invented that as part of the messianic secret theme and tied it to the "hearing they will not hear" in Isaiah 6, and then Matthew had that datapoint, they thought it was true that Jesus actually spoke in parables, and then awkwardly fit that on to another OT text. So it would be a "historical datapoint" in the view of the author but doesnt need to be forreal real. Just an example for proof of concept. I will definitely grant some stuff is historical, like of course Jesus getting crucified and then they put Psalm 22 on top of that and tell the passion narrative with features of that one.
So tldr this seems legit to show that the authors were working with stuff they thought happened, which is a step in the right direction for your case, but youd have to look deeper to see if they were right about it being historical or not.
I agree. Its a good step towards "The authors believed this really happened."
And next we should evaluate "Did they have access to what happened, whether directly or through reliable witnesses?"
I think a good case can be made here also, but yes - this argument does not automatically imply historical, but comes closer to implying " the authors were honest and had some data suggesting these things happened."
Hi David! I haven't seen this video yet (I intend to watch it soon because I've been very impressed with other videos of yours) but I was hoping to ask you an unrelated question:
How do you justify confidence in our intuition? I understand that, drawing from internalism, the fact that we experience intuition is an incorrigible belief. However, I'm wondering how we can justify confidence that our intuition is reliable. It seems to me that this is very important, since so much of our reasoning depends on intuition.
Oh I may have a very disappointing answer for you. I am an intuition skeptic. I don't think that intuitions are justificatory. I also don't think that we really need them. We are able to get to most of the beliefs that we want without depending upon them. Sorry, I know that's not the answer you were wanting.
@faithbecauseofreason8381 Hey, I'd rather have the truth, so I definitely want to hear why you think that. It seems to me that even basic truths (like 2+2=4) are only obvious due to intuition. How would you respond to this?
@faithnreason446 I'd say they are obvious based on our acquaintance with the constituent concepts of that proposition and the relations among them. It's an analytic truth. I don't think I need to appeal to an intuition at any point.
@faithbecauseofreason8381 So, would you say that often, what we describe as "intuition" is actually just our subconscious drawing conclusions based on known facts without the need for conscious thought ("automatic reasoning," if you will)? To use a common example, someone might "intuit" that there is a painter upon seeing the painting, but his "intuition" in this case is really just his subconscious arrival at the conclusion that, based on the qualities he sees in the painting, it must have been made intentionally?
@faithnreason446 well I think that intuitions are real things and I think that they often really do accompany rational beliefs and inferences. But I just wouldn't point to them as doing any justificatory work.
Excellent work as always 👏
Thank you!
Interesting. So Matthew's gospel may have made some arguments which the Jews would have found a little weak in demonstrating the Messiah-ship of Jesus, but ironically now serves us well as an argument for the historicity of Jesus
And not just Matthew. All of the Gospels and even Acts do this too. But it is Matthew who does this most.
@@faithbecauseofreason8381 I do wonder about what Jesus himself said on the road to Emmaus, it’s a shame Luke didn’t quote some of the examples of fulfilled scripture he gave, although maybe he incorporated some of these in his gospel itself
@@joesretrostuff Well, nothing. Because this is a story that Luke made up.
@@DrKippDavis Care to support that claim?
@@joesretrostuff Sure. It is singly attested within a text that was written decades after the events described, and which clearly presents a heavily theologized version of the purported events.
Awesome! I worked through this idea a bit and thought of unexpected fulfillment as a term for what you're talking about. The issue i couldn't figure out was the Moses narrative motivation. I like your proposal that our breaks down when reviewing all the examples(if i understood you right). It would be helpful to hear an argument against that more fully developed. Also the motivation to have Christ born in Bethlehem.
I've been feeling that there isn't a simple and effective method to analyze prophecy to help distinguish between good and bad examples of prophecy fulfillment. I know your goal here was more on historicity, which is really the first question of fulfillment. The first question is whether it happened. Here are the issues i would be interested in addressing.
1. Did it happen? Force fulfillment/ unexpected fulfillment increases historicity
2. How improbable under human control? Does that increase the likelihood of divine origin?
3. Is it due to cherry picking out of a large scripture to find something to fit? Does the prophecy narrow itself? And also, how likely was Jesus?
4. Did it fulfill some things but not others? This is an issue brought up by Judaism, that Jesus didn't fulfill bringing peace to the earth as an earthly ruler. In terms of fulfilled prophecy, does a partial fulfillment theoretically disprove a genuine prophecy? It increases the historicity. But how do we think of the prophecy itself? With Jesus, with Joseph Smith, with Muhammed, or Judaism's claims about fulfilled prophecy vs Christianity? What method to weigh the differences?
Another thing that im thinking is that while this is a step in the right direction for you (see the qualifiers in my other comment) i have to wonder how much of a theological L youre taking by throwing prophecies under the bus like that. Fulfilled prophecy and the resurrection are the two hot arguments for Christianity that I hear about, and it seems to be an argument of the apostles.
Irenaeus also uses the "rock cut not from human hands" from Daniel 2 to say that this was specifically a prophecy of the virgin birth, and this was one of his debunks of Ebionite human Christology, but this prophecy is a lot more general and about divine intervention breaking down the 4 kingdoms of man, not saying that the messiah wont have a birth father. But this is a prophecy that the fathers seemed to like, Jerome also mentioned it in his Daniel commentary. But if we are conceding that people are taking data point they think are real and putting them on vaguer OT texts that probably didnt mean that, it seems like youre throwing a lot of the early church under the bus. Not that this prophecy is in the gospels, but it would be the same type of phenomenon and I just had that in the back of my head for other reasons so I'm drawing it here as an example.
Could be that the historical evidence for the resurrection is so good that you can take the prophecy L, but im not sure.
This does neutralize the objection of "haha Matthew is so stoopid" that skeptics pull, since its a legit human practice and not him being dumb enough to think it was predicting the future. But it's a _human_ thing that people coming up with, while theres this whole argument about Jesus being supernaturally revealed through scripture.
Great video! Interesting concept I haven’t heard of before.
It’s almost as if God knew that we would question too precise historical events. Fantastic video, you have helped me a lot
Great video, David. Good to use this as support for historical reliability, but would you agree with me that Christians should avoid using a Midrash hermeneutical method the way the likes of rabbi Jonathan Cahn do.
Yeah, I wouldn't use this method of biblical interpretation myself.
@@faithbecauseofreason8381 And here is where things get interesting. Since this is a hermeneutic that was part of Jewish tradition out of which Christianity emerged for centuries, and since the New Testament is absolutely grounded in it and was inherited by the early Church, then what reason do you have to reject it? Is this your intuition, or is there actual scriptural and historical bases to do so?
I actually think that in view of what our modern world has become that Midrashic approaches to Scripture can actually continue to be highly beneficial and useful to those who still hold the Bible as an authoritative text.
@DrKippDavis well I reject it in my own research because it's just not conducive to answering the sort of questions which interest me. I'm interested in knowing what the original authors of Scripture were attempting to communicate. Allegorical methods of interpretation simply aren't concerned with that.
No. If they had been, the Pharisees-cum-Rabbis of Jamnia wouldn't have "selected" OT streams that were distinct from the LXX for the Masoretic Tradition and their own Greek OT translation.
It's not a coincidence the Masoretic Text stream has a distinctly different view of the Messiah, and a complete eradication of the inclusion of Gentiles in the Kingdom. Both of which were features of the (older) text stream that the LXX preserves and the NT authors used as their Bible.
I like the background music.
Great video.
So would you say that the Moses connections are simply less clunky pieces of Jesus' life which were Mishrah'd so to speak, but that the more clunky examples of prophetic connection with the OT are just the best they had to work with given their commitment to historical restraint?
Yes, I don't think that a Moses typology necessarily has to come into conflict with the idea that the events recorded in the Gospels are historical. I was simply pointing out that if such a hypothesis is being posited to explain the phenomenon of forced-fulfilled prophecy as a rival to the historicity hypothesis, then it will lose on explanatory scope and explanatory power.
Awkward or not, as eyewitnesses they may have received these specific interpretations from Jesus, if not all, certainly the pattern: Luke 24:25-27, 44-46. "And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself." Otherwise as you point out so profoundly, they could have done a much less awkward job with fiction.
Many prophecies had multiple fulfillments, as if God marked a foreshadowing in the immediate fulfillment of something more profound later.
Some of the prophetic connections are sensible, if they are not 1:1 accurate, they were written down by human hands after all.
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So assuming this line of argument does something to help the historical reliability of the gospels...
Doesn’t it also say that the "NT" authors would misuse the Hebrew Bible and so were bad at theology? Surely in a religious text, we need authors that are good at theology?
As for seeing this as "Midrash", the Jewish response I have seen is that you can't use that kind of interpretation to violate the plain meaning of the Hebrew Bible, which Christianity as a religion has done.
I think we just need the Gospel authors to be good at history
@@faithbecauseofreason8381Maybe you are then looking at the statements of Jesus as recorded, or the works of Paul, for your theology.
I think consistency with the Hebrew Bible is essential, as Jesus / Christianity claims to be in that tradition; so I think Christianity should then be assessed against the standard of the Hebrew Bible. Or that's one important dimension anyway.
I love seeing democracy in action. Best 👏 cover 👏 used .... 👏
I'm a few days late on this one, but I see this as a "both / and" situation. I think that your riddle point is a good one - I think that this counts as evidence that the historical Jesus probably did really preach in parables! And, probably not in riddles! I think that the poison omission is a good indicator that they really did give Jesus vinegar on the cross! But then my mind goes to the whole two-donkey situation in Matthew 21. Zechariah 9 says that the Messiah will ride "on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey". Matthew quotes Zechariah word for word in Matthew 21, and so, the disciples get both a donkey and a foal and set their cloaks on both and Jesus rides... both? The text is a little unclear on this one. But this appears to be a misunderstanding on Matthew's part, sinc Zechariah was repeating for emphasis, something that was apparently common in OT texts. So, I do think that this counts as evidence that Matthew is more committed to the task of fulfilling OT prophesies than the average Trad Catholic is comfortable admitting. I'm wondering if you agree, or if you'd to push back at all on my point here? Thanks as always for the video! Great stuff as always!
Well I am pleased that you are willing to grant this as evidence for the historicity of these events. I think that for you and me, this is going to go back to a more fundamental disagreement regarding whether or not we can assess the reliability of texts as wholes or whether or not we have to assess each individual pericope and saying on a case-by-case basis. Since I think it is legitimate to assess the reliability of a text as a whole (not including interpolations obviously), I take this to support the reliability of the whole.
i would like to respond to the “two donkeys argument”, this has been debunked many times even by the worst of apologists: the word αὐτῶν (them) can be referring both to the cloaks on the donkeys both to the donkeys: any charitable reading can point you to the first option: him sitting on the cloaks over the donkeys.
In any case if the case was that Matthew was talking about him sitting on two donkeys that doesn’t suggest that matthew was writing jesus into it: maybe Jesus rode on two donkeys and matthew miss interpreting the scripture made a parallel about this. The fact that in other places Matthew most likely uses Midrash like in 13:34-35 suggests us that the most likely option in this case is that he was using this too.
Then i would also like to say that it is very unlikely he was talking about two donkeys here: because if he was miss interpreting the scriptures he wouldn’t have been the only one: in ancient times the writers wrote trough scribes (for example: "Dictation was recommended over writing in one's own hand by Dio Chrysostom (Discourse 18 18)) that weren’t only transcribing but helped the author in the composition and reviewed it all together:
"Your services to me are past counting at home, in the forum, at Rome, in my province: in private and public business, in my literary studies and compositions."
- Cicero, Letters to His Friends, 16.4.3
(Letter to Tiro]
"You set up to be a standard of correctness in my writings how came you to use such an unauthorized expression as 'by faithfully devoting myself to my health!"
- Cicero, Letters to His Friends, 16.17.1
(Letter to Tiro)
so
- Scribes could operate merely as a stenographer and just copy verbatim what they hear.
- Scribes could also function as an editor and make improvements or
re-word something.
and probably matthew used more than one scribe during the writing of the gospels: dictating maximum to two at the same time: just for example of ancient authors writing with multiple scribes: of the fifteen surviving Bar Kokhba letters not two share the same handwriting suggesting that they were written by different scribes.
another example:
"The fourth of the Gospels is that of John, [one] of the disciples. To his fellow disciples and bishops, who had
been urging him [to write], he said, 'Fast with me from
today to three days, and what will be revealed to each one let us tell it to one another.' In the same night it was revealed to Andrew, [one] of the apostles, that John should write down all things in his own name
while all of them should review it."
- Muratorian Fragment
the muratorian fragment isn’t necessarily a historical document but it gives us insights on how documents were written in the ancient world.
So it would’ve been unlikely that both matthew and the scribes all miss interpreted the text and what they were meaning was that Jesus rode two donkeys.
Here’s one last video i want to quote about this:
ua-cam.com/video/zYNg4e43S5A/v-deo.htmlsi=VubdRZ_kqbUHYc9-
@@faithbecauseofreason8381 Sorry for all the delayed responses here. But I think I actually agree with you mostly. As in, I agree that there is a historical bedrock to the Gospels, for the exact reasons you state. If there wasn't, and the only concern was to write a novel with a character that fulfills prophecy, why not have Jesus preach in riddles too, like you said! But unless you want to say that the disciples really did make Jesus ride on two donkeys at once, it seems to me like this is the "both / and" situation, where the author of Matthew is clearly going out of his way to fulfill prophecies, though he does have a line that he isn't willing to cross (such and making Jesus preach in riddles). So I guess my only question remaining is, do you think that Jesus really did ride on two donkeys at once? Or do you think that there is some other explanation that is more likely? Thanks again!
@NontraditionalCatholic yeah, I just don't think that you are interpreting this text correctly. From what I understand, the Greek here can be interpreted as Jesus sitting on "them" in reference to either the two donkeys or to the coats which Matthew has just said were laid upon these donkeys. And as Tim McGrew would say, "Grammar cannot decide between them, but common sense can." It seems to me far more reasonable to just say that Jesus was riding upon "them" in reference to the coats. If we have two possible interpretations of a text, I don't know why we would prefer the more ludicrous of the two in the absence of very strong contextual reasons for doing so.
@@danielesorbello619 I mostly don't disagree about that word in Matthew 21 verse 7 being ambiguous. That is why I added the part about how the text is unclear in my top comment. But what is clear is that in verse 2, it is written: "you will find a donkey tied there and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to Me". The greek uses the words for a donkey and for a colt, "ὄνον...καὶ πῶλον". So, regardless of whether or not Jesus physically rode them, the author of Matthew is clearly having the disciples bring Jesus two animals, when the prophecy in Zechariah is only referring to one animal. I think that this is a good illustration that the author of Matthew is doing purposefully trying to fulfill prophecy in his writing.
I've always seen the Psalms as a prophetic poetic book.....even the words Jesus spoke on the cross are from the Psalms...
The passage in Psalms of speaking in parables to reveal things hidden since the foundation of the world is to connect it using pesher to Micah 5:2, what Matthew was conveying was the preexistence of Jesus. Until you study the midrash the same way I've done and pesherim you will never understand this.
Let’s just say the apostles and the evangelists wouldn’t have passed a modern hermeneutics class
Well there's a better case that Paul might have (although this is controversial). But yes, the others don't strictly employ the grammatical-historical method as taught in most seminaries.
@@faithbecauseofreason8381 there is a passage in Ephesians 4:8 where he speaks of God giving gifts to the people, but if you read the relevant text from the Hebrew OT, it’s the people giving gifts to God. I’m not sure if it’s the Septuagint that makes the change or Paul.
I’m also thinking of Paul’s allegory in Galatians about Hagar and Sarah to make his main point to the Galatians.
Eating poison is referencing that his death was due to lying lips. In other words, eating poison is the same as saying being killed because of lies. To understand it we need Pesher: Job 21:16, to Romans 3:13 This is reinforced by John the Baptist when he said "Brood of Viper".
Matthew 23:33 ESV
[33] You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?
that’s a flawed argument from my point of view. First in this case Pesher and Midrash are indistinguishable, second Job 21:16 has nothing to do with poison.
Romans 3:13 is quoting (using Midrash/Pesher) psalm 5:9 and 140:3 but that’s not in any way related to messianic prophecies or the crucifixion. Lastly and most importantly i don’t understand how you would want to resolve this even if you were right: John 19:28-29 is clearly doing a midrash here of psalm 69, and it does by talking of Jesus being served sour wine this would simply mean that they were doing this in a literal and physical way: if poison in other passage is associated with poisonous tongues and so poison you can’t presume every time poison is mentioned it talks about lies. Because in the ancient world Parallels (Midrash is a type of parallel) were seen as the mark of a Good author (see Life of Sertorius 1.1-3) if they were making this up the most likely thing they would’ve done is fulfilling all this prophecy and not just s part, like for example Cesar does when talking about a real event he witnessed in battle in his commentary of the spanish war paralleling it to the encounter between Achilles and Memnon. These verses united in a cumulative case can make an extremely good case for Christianity, far better than the argument from fulfilled prophecies.
@@danielesorbello619 Midrash, Talmud, and Mishna were created as a response to pre talmudic Pesher. My argument is not flawed, the bible shows us the meaning of phrases and their associations with it. Your analysis of my post is flawed all for the sake of argument rather than letting the Bible interpret the Bible.
@@danielesorbello619 This is why we Messianic Jews look from a far at Christians and see the enormous errors they make on scriptures. Can you possibly teach us our own language? Can you tell us how our culture developed? If you say yes, I'll say you are arrogant!
@@eternalgospels i would like to respond to you copy-pasting the response of an Old testament bible Scholar specialized in the dead sea scrolls, Dr. Kipp davis responded to your same claim:
“Well, no. "Midrash" is NOT a book of the Talmud. It is a collection of many books, written over centuries by Jewish writers as a means to draw contemporary insights out of their scriptures. These books are reflective of a mindset that is common throughout Jewish literature.
As for "pesher," this is less a "methodology" and more just a reflection of the same mindset that informed the Midrashim, the Gospels, and numerous of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The word
"pesher" was suggested by modern scholars on the basis of the repeated interpretive formula that appears within a handful of the Scrolls, but there is nothing really t9o distinguish these texts methodologically from what is taking place in the Midrashim. They are all basically doing the same things, but in differently nuanced ways.”
now,
“My argument is not flawed, the bible shows us the meaning of phrases and their associations with it. Your analysis of my post is flawed all for the sake of argument rather than letting the Bible interpret the Bible.”
the problem with your interpretation is that you are associating any mention of “poison” with the “poison of vipers in their tongue”. You are armonizating the narrative: and that’s an error when you are doing exegesis: because you are not counting the real meaning the narratives tried to give. In the midrash used by John in chapter 19:28-29 when quoting psalm 69 he is taking it in a literal way: of Jesus being literally being served sour wine: if he was making this kind of parallelism and he was inventing the story he would’ve most likely also added him being served poisonous food.
Now you haven’t really responded to my points so just saying i am wrong isn’t really helping your case.
“This is why we Messianic
Jews look from a far at Christians and see the enormous errors they make on scriptures. Can you possibly teach us our own language? Can you tell us how our culture developed? If you say yes, I'II say you are arrogant!”
ok, in this message i quoted a renowned OT scholar that agrees with him and i take my scholarship by what scholars say. You are appealing to authority but if you want to do this even if you are a messianic jew you have much less authority than an actual scholar: if you think the opposite i would say you are arrogant, especially because he is specifically specialized in the dead sea scrolls.
@@eternalgospels i would like to respond to you copy-pasting the response of an Old testament bible Scholar specialized in the dead sea scrolls, Dr. Kipp davis responded to your same claim:
“Well, no. "Midrash" is NOT a book of the Talmud. It is a collection of many books, written over centuries by Jewish writers as a means to draw contemporary insights out of their scriptures. These books are reflective of a mindset that is common throughout Jewish literature.
As for "pesher," this is less a "methodology" and more just a reflection of the same mindset that informed the Midrashim, the Gospels, and numerous of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The word
"pesher" was suggested by modern scholars on the basis of the repeated interpretive formula that appears within a handful of the Scrolls, but there is nothing really t9o distinguish these texts methodologically from what is taking place in the Midrashim. They are all basically doing the same things, but in differently nuanced ways.”
now,
“My argument is not flawed, the bible shows us the meaning of phrases and their associations with it. Your analysis of my post is flawed all for the sake of argument rather than letting the Bible interpret the Bible.”
the problem with your interpretation is that you are associating any mention of “poison” with the “poison of vipers in their tongue”. You are armonizating the narrative: and that’s an error when you are doing exegesis: because you are not counting the real meaning the narratives tried to give. In the midrash used by John in chapter 19:28-29 when quoting psalm 69 he is taking it in a literal way: of Jesus being literally being served sour wine: if he was making this kind of parallelism and he was inventing the story he would’ve most likely also added him being served poisonous food.
Now you haven’t really responded to my points so just saying i am wrong isn’t really helping your case.
“This is why we Messianic
Jews look from a far at Christians and see the enormous errors they make on scriptures. Can you possibly teach us our own language? Can you tell us how our culture developed? If you say yes, I'II say you are arrogant!”
ok, in this message i quoted a renowned OT scholar that agrees with him and i take my scholarship by what scholars say. You are appealing to authority but if you want to do this even if you are a messianic jew you have much less authority than an actual scholar: if you think the opposite i would say you are arrogant, especially because he is specifically specialized in the dead sea scrolls.
You believe in inerrancy right?
Tentatively
I find the argument interesting, though I don't understand your use of Isaiah 9. Considering that Jesus was born in Nazereth and most of His ministry was in Galilee, Isaiah 9 seems to fit in with Christ's life like a hand in glove
The point is that it is not a Messianic prophecy in context.
@@faithbecauseofreason8381 you don't think 9:6 is messianic?
@jcfreak73 I don't see anything in the context which suggests that it is
@@faithbecauseofreason8381 "the government shall be on his shoulders" That's clearly a future king
@jcfreak73 yes, later on in the chapter there is Messianic prophecy. But the first two verses don't seem Messianic.
John 19 prophecy seems quite direct and natural
Why? The Psalm is neither prophetic nor is the part about poisoning fulfilled in John 19.
Cleaver
What ancient Jews discovered was the hidden meaning behind the texts that each prophet seemed to anchor to themes that showed a greater picture. Isaiah 9 speak of a child being born after two exiles happened. Each exile is denoted by a symbol of the rod and the yoke. Each symbol represents Assyria and Babylon. Therefore Matthew needed to convey each exile by misquoting each passage. That's why the Isaiah passage of "A great light" in the land of Zebulon helps further connect the two exiles and the events thereafter. Isaiah gave a timeline by using symbols that Matthew then conveys said timeline by using passages that represents each exile. Since Isaiah said that the light was a result of the child being born and after war would be over after both the rod and the yoke would be destroyed.
Are you saying the gospel authors were just showing similarities between Jesus and the old testament instead of literal messiah prophecies?
@@nothingnothing7958 no.
I applaud you for even acknowledging the lack of clear prophetic claims being referenced by the gospel writer especially Mathew as you pointed out. So few apologists even want to touch the subject.
I will say that Midrash just appears to be a rebranding of the term confirmation bias though.
You suggest that the gospel writers took the events of Jesus life and tried to tie them to the OT. I think this the less probable option, especially when we only see certain authors really attempting to do this I.e. Matthew and John. If events like the dead rising, Jesus really being from Nazareth and Bethlehem, or Jesus openly claiming to be God really happened it would be very likely that all the gospel authors would find it privy to divulge these things. Matthew clearly wants to prove Jesus is the Jewish messiah so he tries to make the shoe fit wherever he can. Mathew is so focused on every detail lining up that he even says Jesus rode in on a colt and a donkey in unlike the other gospels in Matthew 21. This appears to be a mistranslation of Zachariah 9:9, showing that Mathew was starting with scripture and the writing Jesus into it.
The simplest explanation for forced prophecy is embellishment just as in all legends. The clunkiness of the “Prophecies” can be easily be attributed to prior oral storytelling and to Greek authors who are known to mistranslate like Matthew with the incorrect virgin birth reference to Isaiah 7 or the donkey debacle in Zachariah 9.
Even the ones that could have quite probably happened like Jesus and the wine are just as you say “forced prophecy” AKA confirmation bias, placing meaning onto something that it was never claimed to be for.
Yet he's wrong. He doesn't come close to know the real methodology employed which is not midrash. Midrash is simply one book of the Talmud, a commentary. The methodology used by Matthew, Paul, Luke and John is called Pesher. He's extremely far from understanding how it's used and why it really does unlock these passages as prophetic.
@@eternalgospels Well, no. "Midrash" is NOT a book of the Talmud. It is a collection of many books, written over centuries by Jewish writers as a means to draw contemporary insights out of their scriptures. These books are reflective of a mindset that is common throughout Jewish literature.
As for "pesher," this is less a "methodology" and more just a reflection of the same mindset that informed the Midrashim, the Gospels, and numerous of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The word "pesher" was suggested by modern scholars on the basis of the repeated interpretive formula that appears within a handful of the Scrolls, but there is nothing really t9o distinguish these texts methodologically from what is taking place in the Midrashim. They are all basically doing the same things, but in differently nuanced ways.
@alexbleyker5816 “1 applaud you for even acknowledging the lack of clear prophetic claims being referenced by the gospel writer especially Mathew as you pointed out. So few apologists even want to touch the subject.”
that’s not what he was saying: if he argues the gospels are historical but the authors utilized Midrash to make a parallel between Jesus and the Old Testament: this doesn’t imply some other prophecies aren’t actual prophecies.
“1 will say that Midrash just appears to be a rebranding of the term confirmation bias though.”
i’d say that’s a very bad way of reading this without it’s historical context.
“ If events like the dead rising, Jesus really being from Nazareth and Bethlehem, or Jesus openly claiming to be God really happened it would be very likely that all the gospel authors would find it privy to divulge these things.”
if i understood it right your argument is that they would just divulge it without making parallels to the old testament? I think that probably happened: the apostles and the disciples evangelized: but when they wrote a book they attended to the customs of making parallels:
Plutarch tells us in the Life of Sertorius 1.1-3 that writers would make parallels with previous historical events and myths: to make a better narrative.
For example Cesar uses this same literary tool when talking about a real event he witnessed in battle in his commentary of the spanish war paralleling it to the encounter between Achilles and Memnon.
And Mark for example makes use of this tool to parallel Jesus to Yahweh many times: for example in the successive narrative when he compares him to verses about Yahweh walking on water like Isaiah 43:2. He does this many other times in his Gospel: but this doesn’t necessitate in any way he was making things up: parallelisms were the mark of a good writer: so it is seems likely that that’s what mark is doing here: a parallelism in his narrative.
All the gosples have this kinds of parallels that are assimilable to the literary tool of Midrash.
“Matthew clearly wants to prove Jesus is the Jewish messiah so he tries to make the shoe fit wherever he can. Mathew is so focused on every detail lining up that he even says Jesus rode in on a colt and a donkey in unlike the other gospels in Matthew 21. This appears to be a mistranslation of Zachariah 9:9, showing that Mathew was starting with scripture and the writing Jesus into it.”
your points has a lot of problems here and it contradicts with the point you made later: firstly i would like to respond to the “two donkeys argument”, this has been debunked many times even by the worst of apologists: the word αὐτῶν (them) can be referring both to the cloaks on the donkeys both to the donkeys: any charitable reading can point you to the first option: him sitting on the cloaks over the donkeys.
In any case if the case was that Matthew was talking about him sitting on two donkeys that doesn’t suggest that matthew was writing jesus into it: maybe Jesus rode on two donkeys and matthew miss interpreting the scripture made a parallel about this. The fact that in other places Matthew most likely uses Midrash like in 13:34-35 suggests us that the most likely option in this case is that he was using this too.
Then i would also like to say that it is very unlikely he was talking about two donkeys here: because if he was miss interpreting the scriptures he wouldn’t have been the only one: in ancient times the writers wrote trough scribes (for example: "Dictation was recommended over writing in one's own hand by Dio Chrysostom (Discourse 18 18)) that weren’t only transcribing but helped the author in the composition and reviewed it all together:
"Your services to me are past counting at home, in the forum, at Rome, in my province: in private and public business, in my literary studies and compositions."
- Cicero, Letters to His Friends, 16.4.3
(Letter to Tiro]
"You set up to be a standard of correctness in my writings how came you to use such an unauthorized expression as 'by faithfully devoting myself to my health!"
- Cicero, Letters to His Friends, 16.17.1
(Letter to Tiro)
so
- Scribes could operate merely as a stenographer and just copy verbatim what they hear.
- Scribes could also function as an editor and make improvements or
re-word something.
and probably matthew used more than one scribe during the writing of the gospels: dictating maximum to two at the same time: just for example of ancient authors writing with multiple scribes: of the fifteen surviving Bar Kokhba letters not two share the same handwriting suggesting that they were written by different scribes.
another example:
"The fourth of the Gospels is that of John, [one] of the disciples. To his fellow disciples and bishops, who had
been urging him [to write], he said, 'Fast with me from
today to three days, and what will be revealed to each one let us tell it to one another.' In the same night it was revealed to Andrew, [one] of the apostles, that John should write down all things in his own name
while all of them should review it."
- Muratorian Fragment
the muratorian fragment isn’t necessarily a historical document but it gives us insights on how documents were written in the ancient world.
So it would’ve been unlikely that both matthew and the scribes all miss interpreted the text and what they were meaning was that Jesus rode two donkeys.
Here’s one last video i want to quote about this:
ua-cam.com/video/zYNg4e43S5A/v-deo.htmlsi=VubdRZ_kqbUHYc9-
“The simplest explanation for forced prophecy is embellishment just as in all legends.”
this argument doesn’t try to argue the Gospels are historical but the authors tought that they were: and then someone has to argue they were written by eyewitness (and a case can be made for these) and that they are early documents: then someone can argue the gospels are historical with these two combined.
“ The clunkiness of the "Prophecies" can be easily be attributed to prior oral storytelling and to Greek authors who are known to mistranslate like Matthew with the incorrect virgin birth reference to Isaiah 7 or the donkey debacle in Zachariah 9.”
1. i would like to point out these aren’t mistakes by the author: i already addressed the donkey one, regarding the Word Alma: 1) the awkwardness of that parallel isn’t given by the fact that Alma means young girl but instead by the fact that Isaiah 7 wasn’t a prophecy at all: what i said about the scribes also works here: it is still plausible Matthew and his scribes miss interpreted a word: but a whole verse they were analyzing for it to be paralleled? It is very unlikely. 2) the word alma can mean Virgin: watch this video for reference: ua-cam.com/video/Z5aQkUPoK1U/v-deo.htmlsi=0euGMDiICGu3PChD
2. how does this affect all the other forced prophecies? This isn’t a literary argument: this are errors: counting everything i said about scribes: it is extremely unlikely that every time matthew was making a forced prophecy he was instead making an error: and it is even more unlikely that every of these forced prophecy from every part of the NT are fruit of error of interpretation.
3. if these stories were instead the result of previous oral storytelling it wouldn’t affect the argument: the argument states that the authors firmly believed what they were writing was historical: so if these earliest accounts of the life of Jesus were contained in the Gospels: the authors of the various Gospels and their scribes were firmly convinced that they were historical.
4. decide yourself: are the writers of the NT like Matthew extremely delicate into perfectly matching scriptures or are they clunky in making this parallels?
“Even the ones that could have quite probably happened like Jesus and the wine are just as you say
"forced prophecy" AKA confirmation bias, placing meaning onto something that it was never claimed to be for.”
you are simply miss interpreting what Midrash is and how parallels were seen in the ancient world: as i said before:
“”“Plutarch tells us in the Life of Sertorius 1.1-3 that writers would make parallels with previous historical events and myths: to make a better narrative.
For example Cesar uses this same literary tool when talking about a real event he witnessed in battle in his commentary of the spanish war paralleling it to the encounter between Achilles and Memnon.
And Mark for example makes use of this tool to parallel Jesus to Yahweh many times: for example in the successive narrative when he compares him to verses about Yahweh walking on water like Isaiah 43:2. He does this many other times in his Gospel: but this doesn’t necessitate in any way he was making things up: parallelisms were the mark of a good writer: so it is seems likely that that’s what mark is doing here: a parallelism in his narrative.”””
parallelism wasn’t seen as making an account un-historical in the ancient world.
Now, Midrash in this case simply means: allegorically paralleling two accounts: that don’t have any real correlation between each other: the fact that you see this with modern lens as confermation bias doesn’t in any way affect the ancient meaning it had. It wasn’t begging for confermation: it was only making the text better and more intriguing for an ancient reader.
@@danielesorbello619 And so it begins. The path into atheism!
@@eternalgospelswhat? How am i entering the path into atheism? I simply don’t have an highest view of scripture and i am honest with myself
Really? Pathetic attempt to salvage the NT.
Acts 7 15-16 seal the fate of the NT being "historically accurate."
The truth flied by you. Pesher is the only true way to understand this awkwardness. Is about connecting strings of keywords. Hosea quote and Jeremiah's quote out of context is to string the keywords to Isaiah 9 to demonstrate the messiah was supposed to come after the two exiles. Each passage is referencing each exile. Then the poison and parables passages are strung to convey the same principle once you follow the keywords.
they are doing the same exact result in this case: there’s no way to distinguish one procedure from the other in this case. It’s just a thing about what name you want to use.
@@danielesorbello619 Talmud Mishna and Midrash are post 70 AD. Pesher methods are pre 70 AD, I use the word Pesher to differentiate Qumran styles from that of the Talmud, midrash, mishna. In fact the Talmud, midrash and Mishna were made as a reaction to pre 70 AD Pesher style that was introduced in 200 BCE and its various methods except Peshat disappeared with the extermination of the essence in 65 AD even though it survived mainly in Matthew which alluded most readers as misquotes.
@@eternalgospels “Talmud Mishna and Midrash are post 70 AD. Pesher methods are pre 70 AD, I use the word Pesher to differentiate Qumran styles from that of the Talmud, midrash, mishna. In fact the Talmud, midrash and Mishna were made as a reaction to pre 70 AD Pesher style that was introduced in 200 BCE and its various methods except Peshat disappeared with the extermination of the essence in 65 AD even though it survived mainly in Matthew which alluded most readers as misquotes”
Scholars today seem to agree that a form that can be identified as Midrash was present before 70 AD. and that the metod has his roots in the dead sea scrolls, see this article:
Mandel, Paul. “Midrashic Exegesis and Its Precedents in the Dead Sea Scrolls.” Dead Sea Discoveries, vol. 8, no. 2, 2001, pp. 149-68. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/4193187. Accessed 18 Nov. 2023.
in this precise case they mean exactly the same thing, calling it Midrash isn’t wrong. Nonetheless passages in the NT are slightly more similar to the metod of Midrash utilized in the dead sea scrolls and the Talmud than the Pesher utilized in previous works. But in the end they carry the exact same meaning so if you want to call it Pesher you can but it’s just an etymological matter and you shouldn’t have started your first comment with: “The truth flied by you.”
@@eternalgospels “Talmud Mishna and Midrash are post 70 AD. Pesher methods are pre 70 AD, I use the word Pesher to differentiate Qumran styles from that of the Talmud, midrash, mishna. In fact the Talmud, midrash and Mishna were made as a reaction to pre 70 AD Pesher style that was introduced in 200 BCE and its various methods except Peshat disappeared with the extermination of the essence in 65 AD even though it survived mainly in Matthew which alluded most readers as misquotes”
Scholars today seem to agree that a form that can be identified as Midrash was present before 70 AD. and that the metod has his roots in the dead sea scrolls, see this article:
Mandel, Paul. “Midrashic Exegesis and Its Precedents in the Dead Sea Scrolls.” Dead Sea Discoveries, vol. 8, no. 2, 2001, pp. 149-68.
i can’t link the JSTOR link because it won’t let me comment.
in this precise case they mean exactly the same thing, calling it Midrash isn’t wrong. Nonetheless passages in the NT are slightly more similar to the metod of Midrash utilized in the dead sea scrolls and the Talmud than the Pesher utilized in previous works. But in the end they carry the exact same meaning so if you want to call it Pesher you can but it’s just an etymological matter and you shouldn’t have started your first comment with: “The truth flied by you.”
@@eternalgospels “Talmud Mishna and Midrash are post 70 AD. Pesher methods are pre 70 AD, I use the word Pesher to differentiate Qumran styles from that of the Talmud, midrash, mishna. In fact the Talmud, midrash and Mishna were made as a reaction to pre 70 AD Pesher style that was introduced in 200 BCE and its various methods except Peshat disappeared with the extermination of the essence in 65 AD even though it survived mainly in Matthew which alluded most readers as misquotes”
Scholars today seem to agree that a form that can be identified as Midrash was present before 70 AD. and that the metod has his roots in the dead sea scrolls, see this article:
Mandel, Paul. “Midrashic Exegesis and Its Precedents in the Dead Sea Scrolls.” Dead Sea Discoveries, vol. 8, no. 2, 2001, pp. 149-68.
i can’t link the article because it won’t let me comment but if you google it you should find it.
in this precise case they mean exactly the same thing, calling it Midrash isn’t wrong. Nonetheless passages in the NT are slightly more similar to the metod of Midrash utilized in the dead sea scrolls and the Talmud than the Pesher utilized in previous works. But in the end they carry the exact same meaning so if you want to call it Pesher you can but it’s just an etymological matter and you shouldn’t have started your first comment with: “The truth flied by you.”