In Him all things were fulfilled

The Messiah will be a descendant of Abraham and will inherit the throne of King David. He will be born in Bethlehem, His Mother will be a virgin and he will flee to Egypt. These are just some of the prophecies about the birth of the Messiah. They were all fulfilled in Jesus.

When the Israelites lost their state independence after the Babylonian invasion in 586 B.C., a period of 26 centuries began in which they had virtually no independent state of their own, except for the relatively short reign of the Hasmoneans. Either they lived in what the Romans called Palestine as subjects of foreign rule, or they had to live in the Diaspora. We need to realize that Jews cherished the longing for freedom for almost 26 centuries!

Dreams of freedom
National liberation tendencies were especially strong in Jesus' day, when the Jews were under Roman occupation. They were already clearly visible in the second century B.C., when apocalyptic literature began to flourish, the origins of which can be traced back to the time of the writing of the Book of Daniel (third century B.C.). The Apocalypse (as well as other apocryphal writings) was permeated with hopes for the creation of an independent kingdom, governed by the perfect Law of God, according to the idea of a theocratic state. These hopes were to be realized by the awaited Messiah.

The faith of the Jews in Jesus' day was a colorful mosaic of beliefs. There was also a great variety of understanding of the mission of the Messiah. The differences resulted from the nature of the religious environment in which messianic ideas functioned. The Pharisees saw his role differently, the Sadducees saw his role differently, the Zealots or the inhabitants of Qumran saw his role differently. The messianic idea in Jesus' time began to take on three features: universalism, individualism, and politicization. Universalism allowed us to think about the consequences of the Messiah's activity not only in the history of the chosen nation, but also for the fate of the entire world. Individualism drew perspective not only the Jewish people as a whole, but the fate of individuals who would accept or reject the Messiah. The political dimension was linked to the longing for the liberation of the land once given to Abraham and his descendants from foreign domination. They overlapped with messianic notions, which essentially included beliefs about the final cataclysms, the second coming of Elijah, which would foreshadow the appearance of the Messiah himself, the defeat of Satanic forces, the gathering of the scattered Israelites in the Diaspora, the establishment of the kingdom of God, the universal resurrection, and the final judgment.

From the Tribe of David

The Evangelists Luke and Matthew recount the birth of Jesus in such a way that the idea behind them is immediately apparent: the coming into the world of Mary's Son is the fulfillment of prophetic messianic announcements.

According to Isaiah's prophecy, the Messiah should inherit the throne of King David (Is 9:7). It was from this royal tribe that Jesus came. The genealogy of Christ recorded by Matthew is more subordinated to the theological assumptions he adopted than to a faithful reflection of historical truth. Matthew arranges it in three sections of fourteen generations each. They reflect three unequal time intervals: Abraham is separated from David by about 750 years; David from the Babylonian captivity – 400 years; Jesus, on the other hand, was born about 600 years after the destruction of Jerusalem. Matthew consciously omits many names from before and from the monarchy period, while he groups others. While such omission may seem like a lack of accuracy or fidelity to the facts, it is perfectly acceptable in ancient genealogies and even in modern tribal genealogies.

How should Matthew's formula "three times fourteen" be interpreted? The answer is to be found in two numbers considered perfect by the Jews: three and a double seven. Gematria is one of the Judaic methods of interpreting the Bible, consisting in assigning numbers and numbers to individual letters of the alphabet. Biblical scholars note that in Hebrew orthography, the number 14 corresponded to David's name. They were written with three consonants: d – v – d. The letter "d" in gematria corresponds to four, the letter "v" – six. David's name is four plus six plus four (David -Hebrew: דָּוִד‎). In this way the evangelist proves that Jesus is a descendant of King David.

How can Peter be so sure?

In Judaism, the Messiah was called the son of God, but by this term was understood a man anointed by God for the mission assigned to him. Meanwhile, the Christian understanding of the title "Son of God" was marked by divine prerogatives. This is a fundamental difference, which can be seen already at the beginning of the Church, on the day of Pentecost. Peter interprets the Old Testament in messianic terms, applying to Jesus the psalmist's predictions about the Son of God. At the end of his discourse, the first of the Apostles makes a solemn declaration: " Therefore let the whole house of Israel know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus whom you crucified." (Acts 2:36). Why does he state this with such certainty?

In addition to believing that the Messiah would inherit David's throne, the Jews expected the Messiah to be a descendant of Abraham. Jesus was just such a person, hence Matthew begins Christ's genealogy with Abraham. In addition, the Jews believed that the Messiah would come from the tribe of Judah. When the patriarch Jacob blessed his descendants, he prophesied that the scepter would not be taken from Judah (Gen 49:10). Jesus was descended from Jude, which in turn is emphasized by St. Luke in his Gospel. Finally, the birthplace of God's chosen one was to be Bethlehem, as Micah prophesied (Micah 5:2). It was in Bethlehem that Mary's Son was born. These are just some of the prophecies concerning the birth of the Messiah. Let us look at three more in more detail.

Young woman or virgin?

The mother of the Messiah was to be a virgin, according to the famous prophecy recorded in Isaiah: "Behold, a virgin [the young woman]shall conceive and bear a son, whom they shall call Emmanuel" (cf. Is 7:14).

This passage became a bone of contention between the Jews who accepted Jesus and those who rejected Him. Now the Hebrew word almah used here can be translated as "young woman" or "virgin." The Jews themselves translated their Bible into Greek in the third century B.C., and here the word Parthenos appeared, unequivocally indicating a virgin. The Israelites waited for the Messiah, whose Mother would be the Virgin, as they themselves expressed in the Greek translation of the Hebrew text. However, when the followers of Jesus began to proclaim that Mary was the Virgin, the Jews did not agree to this interpretation of the prophecy. At the rabbinical academy in Jamnia on the Mediterranean Sea, founded in 90 A.D., they rejected their own tradition, abandoning the term "virgin" (Parthenos) in the Greek text, replacing it with a word meaning young woman (Gr. neanis). And the previous Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible (Septuagint), accepted by Christians, was rejected by the Jews as a heretical translation.

He called the Son from Egypt

Christians, homage before the newborn Jesus by mysterious wanderers from the East, saw the fulfillment of the prophecy recorded in the psalms that the kings of foreign nations would offer gifts to the Messiah (Ps 72:10-11). This means that the Gentiles recognize Jesus as king not only of Israel, but of the whole world. The whole story is marked by symbolism depicting the royal dignity of the Newborn. Many of these symbols, such as prostration to the ground or the offering of gold, are no longer clearly understood, but in the societies of the ancient Middle East they were certainly alive and easy to grasp.

Through the prophet Hosea, God announced that he had called his son from Egypt (Hos 11:1). There is a clear reference to the flight and return of the Holy Family to Egypt because of the massacre of the innocents organized by Herod the Great. Moreover, the very slaughter of the innocents was foretold by Jeremiah, who spoke of mothers weeping for the death of their children in the town of Ramah (Jeremiah 31:15). Ramah lies right next to Bethlehem.

There is no doubt that the Old Testament predictions of the birth of the Messiah found their fulfillment in the coming of Jesus Christ into the world. And may we all be able to see this!

Until Tomorrow

fr. george