Yes, and that was part of God's providential plan. Paul states in Romans that the Jews have collectively been partially blinded, partly so that all men might begin in unbelief. Though he also says that a remnant will be saved even now in this dispensation of grace, eg Messianic Torah Judaism.
Overall most Jews would look at a passage like Isaiah 53 and not consider it to be in reference to the cruxifixion of Jesus. But that is--as I said--part of God's providential plan. The Jews will collectively embrace Christ as the Messiah at the end of the Great Tribulation.
First, no one knows what God's plan is as you keep saying. All we have are interpretations and efforts to understand His plan, but there is no sure way to know which understanding is right. In order to even begin to understand His plan, one has to be fair to the source. That means understanding the words in context and being honest with what it is saying. Now, no matter what one might try to argue, the conscience knows how honest it is being to itself. That said, understanding Isaiah 53 as referring to Jesus is a Christian understanding, one that has always been debated even in the Christian world. When read in context, it is very obviously speaking about the nation of Israel. Israel is often referred to as “God's Servant” even with Isaiah as it says “You are My servant, O Israel” (41:8, 49:3, etc.)
In order to believe that this passage is really referring to Jesus, one really has to look the other way and just ignore the context, ignore the underlying Hebrew, and ignore the fact that it isn't referring to a single person. The Hebrew text here, like in the much of these poetic passages in the Jewish Bible, is full of imagery and allegory. To read it literally and project completely foreign beliefs of a very different religion more than a thousand years after its writing is doing it gross injustice.
You have to rightly divide the Word. That passage is in reference to this in Ezekiel 18: 20:
'The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.'
Why are you cutting and pasting in the first place? That passage from Jeremiah is a complete passage on its own. Second, Ezekiel was written
after Jeremiah. Speaking of Ezekiel though,
passage 18 completely contradicts modern Christian understanding of one dying for another.
The passage in Jeremiah is talking about a time when the Jews collectively will be converted to Messiah Jesus. When God says that he will write his laws and commandments on their hearts and minds and that they will keep his statutes he is referring to them being holy. No unsaved person (whether Jew or Gentile) can keep God's moral laws without coming to Christ.
Again, this isn't what the text says. This is projecting Christian theology on Jeremiah. Jeremiah doesn't speak of atonement of sin, any kind of messiah, a trinity, a begotten son of God, or anything of the sort. Instead of jumping through mental hoops, it would make more sense to read it for what it is: Jewish theology.
There are so many things wrong with that article I'm not sure where to begin. First of all, that logic is very flawed. I could use it to say that since polytheism is found all over the world for thousands of years, there really must be hundreds of gods. Second, animal sacrifices in these cultures weren't done as substitutionary sacrifices; it was not about an animal suffering and dying instead of a human being. Animal sacrifices have held varying meanings for different culture. Some do it to feed the gods, some to gain strength of life (example: bull represented power to Romans), some as a symbolic representation of killing inside them what the animal represents, some to give up something precious as meat is a precious food, so on. Thirdly, not all animal sacrifices are blood sacrifices. For example in Hinduism, which out dates even Judaism, animals are strangled or bludgeoned to death.
Also, he states Noah living around the ice age as a matter of fact even though we have no idea when he lived or if he was before or after the ice age. I remember that being debated by the professor and some of his devout Christian students back in my NT class in college. They discussed it for two days. Anyways, we have no evidence of animal sacrifices being done during the ice age. Meat was extremely hard to come by back then, so it's hard to imagine people throwing it away on a sacrifice, but who knows. We certainly don't have any evidence of it.
The innocent blood was probably a reference to child sacrifice:
'We shall observe the following chapter divisions. First, there is a statement of the case against Judah, coupled with a reiteration of the Law of God and a ringing command for the people of God to repent of their apostasy (Jeremiah 7:1-7). Then there is a further description of the people's apostasy and of their rejection of God's Word (Jeremiah 7:8-12). This is followed by the announcement of God's judgment against them (Jeremiah 7:13-15). There follows an attack against the false worship of the Queen of Heaven (Jeremiah 7:16-20). The prophet denounced their supposition that sacrifices could be substituted for true obedience to God's Word (Jeremiah 7:21-28). The chapter concludes with a vehement condemnation of the sacrifice of children to Molech in the Valley of Hinnom, and other evil practices (Jeremiah 7:29-34). '
The child sacrifices were happening in Hinnom, not the Temple. The only blood being shed at the temple was the blood of the animals. Speaking of child sacrifices, it is pretty clear here that God finds the idea vulgar.
Jesus, in that passage, was not referring to the ceremonial laws of which the Gentiles are not subject, but to the moral law.
What does Jesus mean when He says, “Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20)?
'To be righteous, in biblical language, is to be right or pleasing to God. Pleasing God involves keeping His Law. Many Christians today insist that the righteousness which this verse refers to is the righteousness of Christ which clothes every believer by imputation.
…..
You are right in that the Laws of God aren't just about the rituals, they encompass all of Jewish life. To be clear, he was certainly referring to the Jewish laws ie: God's commandments. That's why he continues in that passage to talk about fasting, adultry, prayer, the golden rule, charity, divorce, etc.. Those things he spoke of, he was reminding his people to do. Instead of “shedding innocent blood” and thereby making it a “den of robbers”, he preached these important actions one must take to be called in the kingdom of heaven. He never told them to abandon those laws. Also, John is quoted to support grace through faith, but that not only contradicts this passage in Mathew, but also all of the Letter of James which emphasizes faith by works or as he says “You believe there is one God. Good! Even the demon's believe that.” John has a very different theology than the synoptics, some of the letters, and even Paul. It is the latest of the gospels, the most fluently Greek, and the most removed from Jesus' Jewish world and views.
Again, that was an expression of his humanity. There were times when he marveled at the centurion's faith. There were times when he was grieved over the hardness of the Pharisees and Saducees hearts. Paul says that Jesus emptied himself in his incarnation. He humbled himself, he had to trust God while on this earth, as the perfect example for the Church and the captain of our salvation.
This is the one thing I will never understand about Christian theology and something Christians don't really understand themselves which is why they call it the “divine mystery.” If Jesus was God, then he was not human. If he was human, he was not God. Yet Jesus was God, and God was Jesus, and God is One. Yet here, you are referring to him and God as two separate beings. You say he had to trust God, yet he was God, that he marveled at the centurion's faith yet believe God is all knowing. That God is eternal, yet he died. I don't see a mystery here, rather two different theologies which are trying to be merged. One is of monotheism, and another of dualism or polytheism. One is authentically Jewish, and the other authentically pagan. Combine them and they make no sense. I would understand why you would treat them as separate if you're Mormon though because they
do believe that the father and son are seperate.
Fair enough, it could be understood as both ways, but that's not really the problem. The main issue is concerning the context. You say “And it can also be understood as a dual fulfillment,” but the problem is that the passage is most definitely talking about
one prophecy that already
”came to pass in the days of Ahaz”. Second, the birth in the prophecy is not what is significant, as it is only a sign to Ahaz. Third, it would only be significant if it happened
during the reign of Ahaz. Fourth, he would eat “curds and honey when he knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right.” Now I don't recall any reference to Jesus eating those to figure out what's right and wrong, but why would God need to eat honey and curd in order to know right and wrong???
This is not according to what the Jews understood of what Jesus meant when he called himself the Son of God:
33 "We are not stoning you for any of these," replied the Jews, "but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God."34 Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your Law, 'I have said you are gods' ?35If he called them 'gods,' to whom the word of God came--and the Scripture cannot be broken--36what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, 'I am God's Son'?
A couple things here. The OT is full of references to sons of God as I already said. To be a son of God was to be a chosen one of God. Even the Psalm Jesus is quoting there has the same meaning. “you are all sons of the Most High. But you will die like mere men; you will fall like every other ruler”. To put it in modern English, you are all chosen ones of God, but you will die like any other man. Jesus actually never claims to be the actual physical son of God here. He merely points out to them that them that the phrase “son of God” is not blasphemous, which it wasn't.
There are two reasons why these Jews might have stoned him for saying this phrase. One, they didn't realize that the phrase is very Biblical. Just like many Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, etc, are unacquainted with their holy books today, so were many people back then if not more so. Even today many Jews probably don't know that there are many sons of God in their book. Many Jews haven't even read their book, same with Christians or any other group. If I went into a Jewish gathering and said God had sons, they'd probably say I was uttering blasphemy. If they did, I would recite the same thing Jesus did. Nothing wrong with that or with that verse.
Many Christians don't know that Jesus had siblings. The point is, people have always been uneducated about their holy books. 1st century Palestine was even worse considering the vast majority of people were illiterate and also didn't speak Hebrew or Greek which were the only two languages the Tenakh was available in.
The second scenario is that the author of John didn't realize this phrase was a very Jewish phrase since he obviously had a pagan understanding of it so he figured such an event would have occurred. This event is only found in John which is the least Jewish gospel of them all and the latest one to come around. It's true that the Pharisees challenged Jesus in all other accounts, but he wasn't attacked for blasphemy. Afterall, that isn't what he was killed for. He was killed for claiming to be the Messiah, ie a ruler apart from Caesar, which was a Roman crime. Since the High Temple was a puppet to the Roman governorship and was required by them to prevent rebellion, they turned him over to the Romans.
The disciples with the exception of John all gave their lives for the belief that Jesus was the incarnate Son of God who died for the sins of the world.
This might be what is taught in Sunday school, but it's bad history. Incarnate Son of God theology is a later development. There isn't a serious scholar of Christian history that argues this. It is even taught in seminary schools. You could go ask your pastor if you want to hear it from him.
And God left clues and hints throughout the Old Testament even before he fully revealed to man his Triune nature . For instance, we have this passage in Psalms 110: 1:
The LORD says to my Lord: "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet." A passage of which Jesus referenced to the Pharisees and applied to himself:
42"What do you think about the Christ ? Whose son is he?" "The son of David," they replied. 43 He said to them, "How is it then that David, speaking by the Spirit, calls him 'Lord'? For he says,44" 'The Lord said to my Lord: "Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet." '45If then David calls him 'Lord,' how can he be his son?"46 No one could say a word in reply, and from that day on no one dared to ask him any more questions. Matthew 22: 42-46.
Lord in the ancient world, both Jewish and Roman, is just a title. It is a sign of respect for any significant superior. The Lord is God, my Lord is David. Again, this is projecting 4th century Christian thought onto 8th century BCE Jewish writings.
Then there are passsages in the Old Testament the point to the Holy Spirit:
'Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.'Genesis 1: 2 This passage shows that the Holy Spirit was present and active during creation.
'Then the LORD said, "My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; nevertheless his days shall be one hundred and twenty years." Genesis 6: 3. This passage reveals the convicting nature of the Holy Spirit, which Jesus himself also affirms in the Gospel of John, showing him to be a person of the Godhead.
'But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. 8 When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 about sin, because people do not believe in me; 10 about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; 11 and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.
The Spirit was understood to be an attribute of God in Jewish tradition, not a separate entity. It became a separate entity not by the authors of the Gospel, but by later Christian theologians of the 3rd and 4th century. That's just history.
“The Confession of the Council of Nicaea said little about the Holy Spirit. The doctrine of the divinity and personality of the Holy Spirit was developed by Athanasius(living in 4th century) in the last decades of his life.[76] He defended and refined the Nicene formula. By the end of the 4th century, under the leadership of Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus (the Cappadocian Fathers), the doctrine had reached substantially its current form. “
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity#History_2
It is not 'a very late innovation' when it is detailed in the Word of God.
Again, this is just history. The modern Christian understanding of the atonement of sins
“is less than a thousand years old. It first appeared in 1097 in a theological treatise by Anselm of Canterbury.
…
In the centuries after Anselm, this understanding of the cross became part of 'common Christianity'
…
eeing the cross of Jesus as a substitutionary sacrifice for sin is bad history, bad anthropology, and bad theology.” (The First Paul p.128-129)
Also, this theory wasn't even completely accepted in his time:
“Only a generation later, theologian Pierre Abelard(French, 1079-1142, Roman Catholic) challenged Anselm’s view. Resistance—nay, revulsion—over the substitutionary atonement theory is almost as old as the theory itself!
In his Exposition on the Epistle to the Romans, [Abelard] questioned [the substitutionary atonement theology of Anselm of Canterbury]. “Who will forgive God for the sin of killing his own child?” he asked. “How cruel and wicked it seems that anyone should demand the blood of an innocent person as the price for anything, or that it should in any way please him that an innocent man should be slain—still less that God should consider the death of his son so agreeable that by it he should be reconciled to the whole world!””
