Minnesota Apologetics Project
Major Messianic Prophecies
By,
Gannon Murphy
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Old
Testament Prophecy |
New
Testament Fulfillment |
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The
Messiah will come from the seed of Isaac Genesis 17:19 Then God
said, "Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call
him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant
for his descendants after him. |
See
record of Jesus' genealogy in Matthew 1 and Luke 3 |
|
The
Messiah will come from the seed of Jacob Numbers 24:17 "I
see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near. A star will come out of
Jacob; a scepter will rise out of Israel. |
See
record of Jesus' genealogy in Matthew 1 and Luke 3 |
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The
Messiah will be the heir to the throne of David. Psalm 132:11 The LORD
swore an oath to David, a sure oath that he will not revoke: "One of
your own descendants I will place on your throne." |
See
record of Jesus' genealogy in Matthew
1 |
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The
Messiah will be born in Bethlehem. Micah 5:2 "But
you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one
who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient
times" |
Luke 2:4-7 So
Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to
Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of
David. 5 He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married
to him and was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for
the baby to be born… |
The time
in which the Messiah will be born. Daniel 9:25 "Know
and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild
Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven
`sevens,' and sixty-two `sevens.' It will be rebuilt with streets and a
trench, but in times of trouble." |
The “sevens” spoken of here were a common, Hebraic way of
communicating timeframes. The
“sevens” are seven years. Thus,
“seven sevens and sixty two sevens” total 483 years. In 445 BC, the Persian King, Artaxerxes, ordered Nehemiah
to begin rebuilding Jerusalem. Jesus
made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem some 483 years after this decree. |
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The
Messiah's entry into Jerusalem. Zechariah 9:9 "Rejoice
greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king
comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey." |
John 12:12-14 The next
day the great crowd that had come for the Feast heard that Jesus was on his
way to Jerusalem. 13 They took palm branches and went out to meet him,
shouting, "Hosanna! " "Blessed is he who comes in the name of
the Lord!" "Blessed is the King of Israel!" 14 Jesus found a
young donkey and sat upon it, as it is written, 15 "Do not be afraid, O
Daughter of Zion; see, your king is coming, seated on a donkey's colt. |
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The
Messiah will be rejected. Psalm 2:2 "The
kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against
the LORD and against his Anointed One." Isaiah 53:3 "He
was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with
suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we
esteemed him not." |
John 1:11 "He
came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him." |
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The
Messiah will be betrayed by someone close to Him. Psalm. 41:9 "Even my close friend, whom I trusted, he who shared my bread,
has lifted up his heel against me." |
Mark 14:10 "And
Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went unto the chief priests, to betray him
unto them." |
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The
Messiah will be betrayed for thirty pieces of silver. Zechariah 11:12-13 "I
told them, "If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep
it." So they paid me thirty pieces of silver. 13 And the LORD said to
me, "Throw it to the potter"--the handsome price at which they
priced me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the
house of the LORD to the potter." |
Matthew. 26:14-16 14 Then
one of the Twelve--the one called Judas Iscariot--went to the chief priests
15 and asked, "What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to
you?" So they counted out for him thirty silver coins. 16 From then on
Judas watched for an opportunity to hand him over. |
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The
thirty pieces of silver will be returned and a potter's field will be
purchased. Zechariah 11:13 13 And
the LORD said to me, "Throw it to the potter"--the handsome price
at which they priced me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them
into the house of the LORD to the potter." |
Matthew 27:5-7 5 So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away
and hanged himself. 6 The chief priests picked up the coins and said,
"It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood
money." 7 So they decided to use the money to buy the potter's field as
a burial place for foreigners. |
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Judas
the Betrayer replaced by another. Psalm. 109:7-8 When he is tried, let him be found guilty, and may his prayers condemn
him. 8 May his days be few; may another take his place of leadership. |
Acts 1:15-20 …Peter
stood up…and said, "Brothers, the Scripture had to be fulfilled which
the Holy Spirit spoke long ago through the mouth of David concerning Judas,
who served as guide for those who arrested Jesus-- 17 he was one of our
number and shared in this ministry." 18(With
the reward he got for his wickedness, Judas bought a field; there he fell
headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines spilled out. 19Everyone
in Jerusalem heard about this, so they called that field in their language
Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood.) 20"For," said Peter, "it
is written in the book of Psalms, "`May his place be deserted; let there
be no one to dwell in it,'and, "`May another take his place of
leadership.' |
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When
accused, the Messiah will be silent. Isaiah 53:7 He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led
like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth. |
Matthew 26:62-63 Then the high priest stood up and said to Jesus, "Are you not
going to answer? What is this testimony that these men are bringing against
you?" 63 But Jesus remained silent. |
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The
Messiah will be crucified with sinners. Isaiah. 53:12 Therefore
I will give him a portion among the great, and he will divide the spoils with
the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with
the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the
transgressors. |
Luke 23:33 When
they came to the place called the Skull, there they crucified him, along with
the criminals. |
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The
Messiah's hands and feet will be pierced. Psalm. 22:16 Dogs
have surrounded me; a band of evil men has encircled me, they have pierced my
hands and my feet. |
See
crucifixion narratives in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. |
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The
Messiah will be mocked. Psalm. 22:6-8 But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the
people. 7 All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads: 8 "He
trusts in the LORD; let the LORD rescue him. Let him deliver him, since he
delights in him." |
Matthew. 27:39-44 39Those
who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads 40and saying,
"You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days,
save yourself! Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God!"
41In the same way the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders
mocked him. 42"He saved others," they said, "but he can't save
himself! He's the King of Israel! Let him come down now from the cross, and
we will believe in him. 43He trusts in God. Let God rescue him now if he
wants him, for he said, `I am the Son of God.'" 44In the same way the
robbers who were crucified with him also heaped insults on him. |
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The Messiah
will be given vinegar to drink. Psalm.69:21 "They
put gall in my food and gave me vinegar for my thirst." |
John 19:29 "A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a
sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to
Jesus' lips." |
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The
Messiah will be pierced. Zechariah. 12:10 "And
I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a
spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have
pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and
grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son" |
John 19:34 Instead,
one of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow
of blood and water. |
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The Messiah's
persecutors will cast lots for his garments. Psalm. 22:17b,18 …people
stare and gloat over me. They divide
my garments among them and cast lots for my clothing. |
Mark. 15:24 And they
crucified him. Dividing up his clothes, they cast lots to see what each would
get. |
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None of
the Messiah's bones will be broken. Psalm 22:17 Dogs have surrounded me; a band of evil men has encircled me, they
have pierced my hands and my feet. 17 I
can count all my bones; people stare and gloat over me. |
John 19:33 But when
they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his
legs. |
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The
Messiah will be buried among the rich. Isaiah. 53:8,9 By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And who can speak of his
descendants? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the
transgression of my people he was stricken. 9 He was assigned a grave with
the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth. |
Matthew. 27:57-60 As evening approached, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named
Joseph, who had himself become a disciple of Jesus. 58 Going to Pilate, he
asked for Jesus' body, and Pilate ordered that it be given to him. 59 Joseph
took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, 60 and placed it in his own
new tomb that he had cut out of the rock. He rolled a big stone in front of
the entrance to the tomb and went away. |
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The
Messiah will rise from the dead. Psalm. 16:10 …because
you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see
decay. |
Matthew. 28:7 Then go
quickly and tell his disciples: `He has risen from the dead and is going
ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.' Now I have told
you." |
In the table
above, I have delineated approximately twenty major messianic prophecies all of
which have been fulfilled in the life of the man, Jesus. Taken one-by-one, I have often observed
skeptics attempting to “poke holes” in the plain force and clarity of these
prophecies in an attempt to discredit either the Bible or Jesus Himself. I offer no doubt that creative arguments can
be invented that militate against these prophetic statements. But, when taken in full, as a composite
sketch of the life and ministry of Jesus, I believe the skeptic is hard-pressed
to simply explain away the fact that He is the only person in the history of
the world to have brought fulfillment to every single one of these statements
right down to the last minutia. These Old
Testament prophecies, most of which were written hundreds of years before
Christ, offer the criteria for how the faithful could identify God’s promised Messiah (Hebrew: “Anointed One”). They offer what some scholars have called
“an address in history.” This address
includes specific information regarding Jesus’ genetic lineage, geographical
location, personality, circumstances, and destiny.
Throughout
history there are been roughly forty major cases of individuals claiming to be
the fulfillment of this promised Messiah.
Only one of these individuals, however, has had a complete advocate in
Scripture, has used those Scriptures to prove His claims, and has fulfilled
every single prophecy and ramification in meticulous detail. That person is the man Jesus Christ.
Professor
of Mathematics, Peter W. Stoner, once applied what is known as “the law of
compound probability” to a handful of these prophecies. He did this in an attempt to gage the
statistical probability of mere “chance occurrence” as being the best way to
account for them. Dr. Stoner begins by
calculating the odds of just eight of the prophecies being fulfilled in any one
person. The answer? Just one chance in 1017. That's a 1 with 17 zeros behind it! To give us a better appreciation of the
sheer magnitude of this number, Dr. Stoner suggests we compare it to the
probability of a blind man picking out a marked silver dollar from a sea of
them scattered over the state of Texas at a depth of two feet, each one stacked
on top of the other! Stoner goes on to
calculate the probability of 48 of these prophecies occurring in any one person
(there are about 60 major messianic prophecies). The answer? 1 in 10157. That is a number so remote as to not even be
within the realm of intelligible probability.
Suffice it to say that its value is greater than the number of atoms in
the universe!
Perhaps it is
worth mentioning that there has been a particular fringe element that has
argued that Jesus merely forced the fulfillment of these prophecies onto
Himself in order to falsely position Himself as “the Christ.” In fact, the Scriptures even state in
several places that Jesus did do certain things in order to fulfill Old
Testament prophecies. For example, John
19:28 tells us that “Later, knowing that all was now completed, and so that
the Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, 'I am thirsty.'” Jesus did this to fulfill a prophecy from
Psalm 69 that says “They…gave me vinegar for my thirst.”
Despite a few
other passages like this one, however, several points make the objection
completely untenable. For one thing,
let’s be clear about what is really being said if it is argued that Jesus was
simply using Old Testament prophecies to make wild, unsubstantiated claims for
Himself. The charge says Jesus is not
only a fraud and a liar, but a horribly disillusioned egoist. In fact, if the objection were true, and
Jesus was simply trying to pull the wool over everybody’s eyes about His
identity, He would perhaps be the most wicked and detestable person who has
ever walked the earth! For, in this
schema, He is not the perpetrator of some innocuous, playful hoax but is an
arch-deceiver who fooled and connived his devotees into believing patently
false things about him.
Secondly, while
it may be within the realm of possibility for Jesus to have fulfilled select
prophecies like the one cited above, how, pray tell, could the multitudinous
other prophecies pertaining to external
circumstances possibly have been orchestrated by Him? For instance, Psalm 22 says, "Dogs have surrounded me; a
band of evil men has encircled me, they have pierced my hands and my feet…they
divide my garments among them and cast lots for my clothing." This is a virtual Polaroid snap shot of
Jesus’ gruesome death on the cross at Calvary.
Did He somehow organize these events from the cross while He was
suffering the pains of death? Could
Jesus have been behind the negotiated monetary amount for which He was betrayed
as told by the prophet Zechariah and fulfilled by the actions of Judas his
betrayer? Clearly not.
The evidence
made manifest in the manifold fulfilled messianic prophecies of the Old
Testament make abundantly clear the truth of the man Jesus, the One and Only
Christ who lived and walked among us, and died for us that we may have life
eternal.