Jewish New Testament Commentary

By David H. Stern

Drawing on years of research, Dr. Stern relates the New Testament text to the Tanakh (Old Testament), to the historical setting, to rabbinic materials and Christian theology. He answers questions Jewish people have about Yeshua, the New Testament, and Christianity; questions Christians have about Judaism and the Jewish roots of their faith; and questions Messianic Jews have about being both Jewish and Messianic.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Messianic Jewish Communications
• Release date: Oct 1, 1992
• ISBN: 9781936716586

David H. Stern

David H. Stern, born in Los Angeles in 1935, is the great-grandson of two of the city's first twenty Jews. He earned a Ph.D. in economics at Princeton University and was a professor at UCLA. In 1972 he came to faith in Yeshua the Messiah. He then received a Master of Divinity degree at Fuller Theological Seminary, did graduate work at the University of Judaism, and was active in the Messianic Jewish movement. In 1979 the Stern family made aliyah (immigrated to Israel); they now live in Jerusalem, and are active in Israel's Messianic Jewish community

Book preview

JEWISH

NEW TESTAMENT

COMMENTARY

Other books by David H. Stern also available from Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc.

* Jewish New Testament

(available in softcover, hardcover, leatherette, and on audio cassette)

§ Messianic Judaism: A Modern Movement With An Ancient Past

(formerly Messianic Jewish Manifesto)

◊ Restoring the Jewishness of the Gospel

Complete Jewish Bible

* German edition available through Haenssler-Verlag, Friedrich Haenssler KG, Postfach 1220, W–7303 Neuhasen, Germany

§ Portuguese edition available through Comunidade Emanuel, Caixa Postal 941, 2001 Rio De Janeiro, Brazil

◊ Japanese edition available through Malkoushu Publications, 1821-31 Ogawa-higashimachi, Kodaira-city, Tokyo 187, Japan

◊ Spanish edition published by Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc., P. O. Box 615, Clarksville, MD 21029, USA. Distributed by Messianic Jewish Resources International.

JEWISH

NEW TESTAMENT

COMMENTARY

A companion volume to the

Jewish New Testament

by

David H. Stern

JEWISH NEW TESTAMENT PUBLICATIONS

Copyright © 1992 by David H. Stern

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission of the publisher, except for brief reviews in magazines, or as quotations in another work when full attribution is given.

The Jewish New Testament, copyright © 1989 by David H. Stern, is published by Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc.

Cover illustration by Mickie Klugman-Caspi

Interior design by Now You See it! graphics

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN 13 978-965-359-008-3

ISBN 13 978-965-359-011-3

eISBN 978-1-936716-58-6

Library of Congress Catalog Control Number: 92097129

Published by

JEWISH NEW TESTAMENT PUBLICATIONS, INC.

6120 Daylong Lane

Clarksville, Maryland 21029

[phone]

Distributed by

Messianic Jewish Resources International

Order Line: [phone]

E-mail: [e-mail]

Website: www.messianicjewish.net

For the glory of God,

the salvation of Israel

and the edification of the Messianic Community

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

COMMENTARY ON BOOKS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT

The Good News of Yeshua (Jesus) the Messiah, as Reported by

Mattityahu (Matthew)

Mark

Luke

Yochanan (John)

The Acts of the Emissaries of Yeshua the Messiah

The Letters from Yeshua’s Emissary Sha’ul (Paul) to the Messianic Communities

Romans

1 Corinthians

2 Corinthians

Galatians

Ephesians

Philippians

Colossians

1 Thessalonians

2 Thessalonians

The Letters from Yeshua’s Emissary Sha’ul (Paul) to Individuals

1 Timothy

2 Timothy

Titus

Philemon

The General Letters

Messianic Jews (Hebrews)

Ya’akov (James)

1 Kefa (1 Peter)

2 Kefa (2 Peter)

1 Yochanan (1 John)

2 Yochanan (2 John)

3 Yochanan (3 John)

Y’hudah (Jude)

The Revelation of Yeshua the Messiah to Yochanan (John)

INDEX

About the Author

INTRODUCTION

I   WHAT IS THE JEWISH NEW TESTAMENT COMMENTARY?

The Jewish New Testament Commentary (JNTC) deals with Jewish issues that confront readers of the New Testament — questions Jews have about Yeshua (Jesus), the New Testament and Christianity; questions Christians have about Judaism and the Jewish roots of their faith; and questions Messianic Jews have about being both Jewish and Messianic. It is a companion volume to the Jewish New Testament (JNT), my translation of the New Testament from the original Greek into English in a way that brings out its essential Jewishness.

A Consciousness-Raising Commentary. Nearly everyone approaches the New Testament with preconceived opinions about its Jewish issues. Sometimes this is the consequence of not having examined them, sometimes it is because of prejudice or childhood training. In any case, my object in the Jewish New Testament Commentary is to make people more aware of the New Testament’s Jewish issues and thus able to reach new conclusions about them.

For this reason I call the JNTC a consciousness-raising commentary. It presents information that offers new options. A reader should come away understanding that the New Testament is a Jewish book — written by Jews, largely about Jews, and meant for both Jews and Gentiles. Jews should know that the New Testament presents Yeshua from Natzeret (Nazareth) as the Son of David, Israel’s long-awaited Messiah, essential for Jewish individual and corporate salvation. Christians should be certain that they are forever one with the Jewish people, and that the New Testament gives no ground for antisemitism in any form.

II   THE COMBINED JNT—JNTC PROJECT

This consciousness-raising task is carried out partly by the Jewish New Testament and partly by this book. Actually, my original idea, in 1977, was only to write a commentary on the New Testament dealing with Jewish issues. But after drafting notes to a few chapters of the book of Acts I realized that much of what I was writing consisted of objections to the English version I was using: The translation says ‘X,’ but the Greek original really means ‘Y.’ Rather than waste the reader’s time castigating third parties (translators), I decided to try translating the Greek text myself and discovered that I liked the result. Thus the Jewish New Testament was born — as an afterthought. From then on I keyed my comments to the JNT and dealt with what I considered mistaken renderings in other versions as being distinct from what the New Testament itself says (that is, from what I understand it to be saying).

I intended to publish both translation and commentary in a single volume, not only because they complement each other, but because I believed that some of the more controversial renderings in the JNT needed my JNTC notes to defend them. Unfortunately the rhythm of my life made it hard for me to finish this project quickly. When the translation was essentially done but I was still working on the commentary, a friend said, Publish the Jewish New Testament by itself. Both Jews and Christians need to see what a Jewish book the New Testament is. Don’t worry about defending it — the Word of God can stand by itself. Later your commentary will serve its purpose. He convinced me, so I published the first edition of the JNT in 1989; there have been three subsequent printings.

While the JNT was greeted with joy by most Messianic Jews, many Christians, some non-Messianic Jews and a number of reviewers, there were, of course, critics. Whenever I read a negative comment I considered unjustified, I felt frustrated that the commentary was not there to provide a defense. Now it is, and I hope it will stimulate intelligent discussion of the Jewish issues surrounding the New Testament.

The Jewish New Testament. Since the JNTC is based on the JNT, a few words about it seem in order. The JNT expresses the New Testament’s essential Jewishness in three ways, which I call cosmetic (or superficial), cultural-religious, and theological.

• Cosmetic elements — such as using execution-stake instead of cross, Ya‘akov instead of James, and, of course, Yeshua the Messiah instead of Jesus Christ — are the most obvious; and their frequency has a collective effect.

• Cultural-religious elements embed the Gospel more securely in its Jewish setting; two examples are my use of the word " tzitzit instead of fringe at Mattityahu (Matthew) 9:20 to describe what the woman with a hemorrhage touched, and Chanukkah instead of the feast of dedication" at Yochanan (John) 10:22.

• Theological elements include translating Messianic Jews (Hebrews) 8:6 so as to show that the New Covenant has been not merely established but "given as Torah , and rendering Romans 10:4 …the goal at which the Torah aims is the Messiah, not …Christ is the end of the law."

For a fuller discussion of the character of the JNT, see Section V below.

Messianic Jewish Commentaries on the New Testament. The JNTC is, so far as I know, only the second commentary on the entire New Testament ever written by a Messianic Jew. The first was by Jehiel Zvi Lichtenstein (1827-1912), whose Commentary to the New Testament, written in Hebrew, was published in installments by the Institutum Delitzschianum in Leipzig, Germany, between 1891 and 1904, with the text in the traditional Hebrew block print and the comments in Rashi script (I have cited portions of it in my own notes to the General Letters and the first part of Revelation.) He followed in the footsteps of Joiachim Heinrich Biesenthal (1800-1886), who wrote commentaries on the Gospels, Romans and Hebrews, as well as on Psalms and Isaiah. In this century Victor Buksbazen, Charles Lee Feinberg, Moshe Immanuel Ben-Maeir, Louis Goldberg and Arnold Fruchtenbaum are among the Jewish believers who have produced commentaries to one or more books of the Bible. The Netivyah organization in Jerusalem, under the direction of Joseph Shulam, is preparing a Hebrew commentary on the New Testament which, like this one, draws on Jewish sources and tries to recover Jewish understandings; the first product of this effort will be a substantial commentary on Romans. There remains a need for additional Messianic Jewish commentaries on all the books of the Bible, both Tanakh (Old Testament) and New Testament.

The Complete Jewish Bible. I produced the Jewish New Testament in order to show how Jewish the New Testament is. I never intended to translate the Tanakh from Hebrew into English because no one questions its Jewishness. Nevertheless, in response to an expressed demand, I am now preparing the Complete Jewish Bible, consisting of the Jewish New Testament bound together with a stylistically adapted existing translation of the Tanakh. Readers will then have the entire Bible in a single volume, with the JNT as its New Testament portion.

III   WHAT KINDS OF COMMENTS ARE IN THE JNTC?

The JNTC draws on a number of approaches, some familiar, some less so, in order to accomplish its purposes. These include:

Historical Notes explaining the situation of the writer, original readers and subjects of the passage, often with particular focus on the Jewish background.

Linguistic Notes explaining points of Greek grammar or the sense of Greek words, and frequently explaining similar points of the Hebrew language, grammar and thoughtforms underlying the Greek text.

Exegetical Notes explaining what a passage means. These are sometimes provided because the text is not clear to a modern reader lacking the original context. But often I write them because the text has typically been misunderstood by Christians or by Jews or by both; in such cases I must demonstrate that the traditional misunderstanding is wrong, as well as explain why my translation and/or interpretation is right.

Notes Pointing Out the Writers’ Jewish Ways of Thinking. Since the writers of the New Testament were all Jewish (Luke is thought to have been a proselyte to Judaism), I often point out their rabbinic patterns of discussion and argument.

Parallels in Jewish Literature. I quote New Testament parallels from ancient, medieval and modern Jewish sources, including the following:

• The Apocrypha. A collection of 15 Jewish books written in the 3rd to 1st centuries B.C.E. They are excluded from the Tanakh , although Roman Catholics include them in the biblical canon. Among them are Tobit, Judith, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Baruch, Prayer of Manasseh and 1 & 2 Maccabees. All Catholic English editions and a few Protestant ones include the Apocrypha. There is also a critical edition by R. H. Charles.

• The Pseudepigrapha. More than 60 books written between the 3rd century B.C.E. and the 1st century C.E. and usually attributed to Tanakh figures by their actual authors. Most either elaborate on Tanakh themes or are apocalyptic in character (see my note to Revelation 1:1). There is an older English edition by R. H. Charles and a more recent, more complete one edited by James H. Charlesworth.

• The Talmud. Part I is the Mishna , a topical presentation of the Jewish Oral Torah with rabbinic discussion of it; it was compiled around 220 C.E. by Y’hudah HaNasi (Judah the Prince) and consists of six sections divided into 63 tractates. Hillel, Shammai, Gamli’el and Akiva are among the well-known rabbis whose contributions are included.

Part II is the Gemara, consisting of wide-ranging commentary on Mishna tractates by rabbis who lived in the 3rd to 5th centuries C.E. The Jerusalem Talmud, with Gemara by rabbis mostly from the Land of Israel, is older, smaller and less widely known than the Babylonian Talmud, with its Gemara written largely by Diaspora rabbis living in or near Babylon.

Blackman’s Mishna is a Hebrew-English diglot edition. The Soncino English edition of the Talmud is well known. Adin Steinsaltz’s Hebrew edition of the Talmud is now being published volume by volume in English.

• The Halakhic Midrashim. The first term means law-related, the second discussions, homilies, allegories. These compilations from the 4th century C.E. report much older material and consist of the Mekhilta (on Exodus), Sifra (on Leviticus), and Sifre (on Numbers and Deuteronomy). The Mekhilta has been published in English by the Jewish Publication Society and Sifre on Deuteronomy by Yale University.

• The Midrash Rabbah. The final editing was done in the 6th to 10th centuries but most of the material is much older. It includes midrashim related to the Pentateuch and the Five Scrolls. Soncino has published an English edition.

Among medieval sources I cite are Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki, 1040-1105), the most famous Jewish commentator on the Bible and the Talmud, and the Rambam (Rabbi Moshe Ben-Maimon, also known as Maimonides, 1135-1204).

There are historical and conceptual connections between what the rabbis wrote and nearly every line of the New Testament. However, I have avoided rabbinic overload in the JNTC — since there is no need for it to duplicate what Hermann Strack and Paul Billerbeck did rather exhaustively in their six-volume Kommentär Zum Neuen Testament Aus Talmud Und Midrasch (Munich: C. H. Beck’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1926, reprinted 1978), although not all of their references are equally relevant. My own purpose in these notes that draw on Jewish writings is neither to prove that the New Testament copied rabbinic Judaism nor the opposite, but simply to present a sampling of the many parallels; see my note to Mattityahu (Matthew) 6:7.

Modern Jewish Issues. In the Western tradition a scholarly commentary does not discuss modern issues that have no obvious direct relationship to the biblical text. By contrast, I seek them out — first, because Jewish commentators tend to do exactly that, since they see life as a seamless whole; and second, because people’s views on modern ethical, political, social and psychological subjects may be presenting symptoms of deeper-lying objections to aspects of the New Testament.

For example, I have a note on when, how and to whom the Gospel should be proclaimed — with specific reference to evangelism of Jewish people — at 1 Kefa (1 Peter) 3:15–16 ([Be] ready to give a reasoned answer to anyone who asks you to explain the hope you have in you — yet with humility and fear). At 1 Corinthians 4:1–2 (We do not use the word of God deceitfully) is a related note on whether Jewish evangelism is inherently a deceitful enterprise; many Jews and not a few Christians have already concluded that it is; while my note, as you might expect, defends Jewish evangelism. Similarly, discussions of Jewish-Gentile intermarriage and Jewish assimilation to Gentile culture are anchored to appropriate verses.

Other Jewish issues arise in Christian settings. Many Christians think that the Church has replaced the Jews as God’s people and that the Land of Israel is no longer promised to them. Not a few verses provide opportunities to counter these mistaken views, as well as to show that the New Testament gives no ground for any form of antisemitism and is certainly not antisemitic itself.

Theological Issues Arising in Jewish-Christian Dialogue. The best example is the lengthy note on Romans 5:12–21, which I make the occasion for a theological discussion of original sin, a notion which, as the average person understands it, is unacceptable in any form to non-Messianic Jews, and seems peculiar to a significant number of Christians. My object is to make sense of an offputting concept and show how it can be useful.

At a number of places I address such questions as, Is Yeshua God? and Is God a Trinity? With these too I try to push past the reflex responses of Absolutely (Christian) and Absolutely not (Jewish) in order to discuss the substance of the matter — what positive and negative answers might mean, and whether both Christian and Jewish contexts might admit of less confrontational formulations without compromising the Scriptural data.

Devotional Elements. This is not a devotional commentary, but I feel free to introduce devotional material, partly to give an added dimension to the commentary and partly to enhance spiritual content.

Homiletical Elements. Likewise, while this commentary is neither a collection of sermons nor a guide for preachers writing them, I think its interest and usefulness is increased by containing some material of this kind.

Advocacy and Apologetics. Much of the commentary is intended to promulgate a Messianic Jewish approach to the Scriptures and defend it, sometimes against non-Messianic Jewish viewpoints, sometimes against various Christian theological positions and sometimes against secular attitudes.

God exists. Yeshua is Israel’s Messiah. The Bible is God’s Word to humanity. Yeshua’s atoning death is necessary for everyone’s salvation. The Church has not replaced the Jews as God’s people. These are propositions that can be defended, and in this commentary I do not hesitate to do so. I have not obligated myself to take a neutral stand on all issues, although I do on some — especially those I do not perceive as closely tied to Jewish questions.

Challenges and Exhortations. Sometimes, taking the role of preacher, I go beyond advocacy and apologetics to challenging and exhorting the reader to take responsible action.

Personal Anecdotes and Illustrations. On occasion I introduce personal anecdotes and information that would be out of place in a more formal type of commentary.

Bible Helps. There are on the market study-Bibles, Bible dictionaries, Bible encyclopedias, introductions to the Bible and many other kinds of reader’s helps. They explain how the Bible and its individual books are organized, by and for whom they were written, the general historical context, and details necessary for understanding that the modern reader might lack. The Introduction to the JNT includes some elements of this kind; but, for the most part, the JNTC does not duplicate what these works do; although it does take on itself this kind of task in relation to Jewish issues. For example, I don’t outline every book of the New Testament, but I do outline Romans, because knowing its structure is important for understanding the Jewishness of its message.

Redundancy for Convenience and for Education. I have built a considerable amount of redundancy into the JNTC. A reader with the patience to read straight through it might be distressed to see how often I repeat myself. Most of this is purposeful, intended to serve the more typical reader, who looks up a passage and does not know that I may have made the same point elsewhere. I could eliminate the redundancy by referring to other notes, and I have done a great deal of this. Still, I have left some of the repetitious material, partly to save the reader from having to flip through the book overly much, and partly to emphasize ideas I especially hope the reader will embrace and make his own.

Some Things Are Left Out. I don’t try to explain everything. For example, at Galatians 3:4 I note that other interpretations are possible but don’t say what they are. The interested reader should consult a critical commentary.

Also, you will probably be able to identify topics not addressed which you think should have been. If you realize that volumes this size and larger have been written on a single verse of the New Testament and even on a single word, it must be clear that much that might be said has not been said. For example, I have written very little about textual issues. Generally, I accept the United Bible Societies critical text; but, apart from a few remarks in the JNT Introduction and footnotes in the JNT itself, lower criticism (analysis of textual problems with a view to determining which version of a text is authentic) is rarely what the JNTC does. Some will spot Jewish issues that I missed or dealt with in a way they consider incomplete or otherwise unsatisfactory. A few issues that have Jewish ramifications I dealt with briefly, even though others have written on them at length — such as on which day of the week Yeshua was executed and whether Communion should be offered daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, or whenever one wishes. I am only one person, and this is only one book. I hope others will till in my gaps and explore new territory.

Correcting JNT Mistakes. The JNTC points out errors in early printings of the JNT (other than typos) and corrects them in the appropriate note. See also numbered paragraph 7 of Section V below.

IV   THE JNTC AND MESSIANIC JUDAISM

Messianic Judaism: 100% Jewish and 100% Messianic. Messianic Judaism defines its aim as being 100% Jewish and 100% faithful to the Bible (which consists of the Tanakh plus the New Testament). It thus refuses to conform itself to other people’s categories.

Christianity’s Main Objection: You Are Rebuilding the ‘Middle Wall of Partition.’ The Christian’s main problem with Messianic Judaism is often expressed in these words: You’re rebuilding the ‘middle wall of partition’ which the Messiah has broken down (Ephesians 2:11–16). Your emphasis on Jewishness will erode the unity of Jews and Gentiles in the Messianic Community (the Church). I deny that we are doing any such thing. Many of the notes in the JNTC are devoted to refuting this mis-impression of Messianic Jewish aims.

Judaism’s Main Objection: You Can’t Be Jewish and Believe in Jesus. The most common Jewish problem with Messianic Judaism can be stated as follows: You are attempting the impossible — you can’t accept Yeshua as the Messiah and still be Jewish. The objection assumes what requires proof — whereas the JNTC shows that the opposite is true: not only were Yeshua and his first followers all Jewish, but throughout the last two thousand years there have been Jewish people who honored Yeshua as Messiah, Savior and Lord, while remaining as much part of and loyal to the Jewish people as the Jewish community would allow.

The Challenge: Creating a Viable Messianic Judaism. Nevertheless, the task of creating a viable Messianic Judaism that relates seriously to the history and evolution of both Judaism and Christianity during the last twenty centuries remains a largely unaccomplished task. I have written two books that deal with this goal systematically (something the JNTC cannot do, because of its verse-by-verse format). My book Messianic Jewish Manifesto is meant to help Messianic Jews organize thinking and action as they pursue the exciting challenges facing the Messianic Jewish movement. An abridgement entitled Restoring the Jewishness of the Gospel: A Message for Christians is addressed to Christians for whom the Jewishness of the Gospel is an unfamiliar idea. Someday I hope to complete the trilogy with a book explaining Messianic Judaism to non-Messianic Jews.

V   GETTING THE MOST OUT OF THE JNTC

Use the JNT. Since the Jewish New Testament Commentary is a companion volume to the Jewish New Testament, one of its functions is to explain the JNT’s departures from more usual renderings. The JNTC can be read with other versions, but the flow of interaction between text and commentary will necessarily be impaired, since the commentary takes the JNT renderings as given and frequently explains why other renderings are wrong. Moreover, the footnotes and Scripture Index of the JNT give references for all 695 Tanakh verses cited in the New Testament, and its glossaries give English equivalents for over 400 Hebrew names and terms found in the JNT; the JNTC assumes the reader has this information and rarely duplicates it. Therefore, to get the most out of the JNTC, use the JNT.

Read the Introduction to the JNTC Index on page 859 to make best use of this very extensive but non-intensive tool for finding names, topics and words in this book.

Read the JNT Introduction. It is an essential part of this Introduction to the JNTC. I do not repeat here what I wrote there. However, to stimulate interest and refresh memories I am listing its eight sections with brief annotated contents. The reader can see that it discusses a number of general issues that are inseparable from the subject matter of the JNTC.

1. Why the Jewish New Testament? The JNT is needed to show Jews and Christians alike that the New Testament is a Jewish book, to combat Christian antisemitism, to deal with Jewish misgivings about the Gospel, and to help heal history’s greatest schism — the separation between the Jewish Community and the Church.

2. The Bible. Its central message is that man, both individually and corporately, has sinned and needs salvation; and that God graciously has provided it through Yeshua the Messiah to those who trust and obey him. The Tanakh (Old Testament) and the New Testament are interdependent: two testaments, one Bible — given to God’s people Israel, the Jews, to whom Gentiles are added without converting to Judaism when they trust in the God of Israel and his Messiah.

3. The New Testament. It contains the four Gospels, the Book of Acts, the thirteen letters of Sha’ul (Paul), the eight General Letters, and the Book of Revelation; there are paragraphs on each of these five divisions. There are discussions of the language of the New Testament, dating the New Testament, the canon of the New Testament, and whether tradition and scholarship are in agreement or at odds.

4. How the Jewish New Testament Expresses the New Testament’s Jewishness. Three ways, as explained above (cosmetically, culturally/religiously, and theologically); also by using Jewish English, defined as including Hebrew and Yiddish expressions which at least some English-speakers who are Jewish incorporate into everyday speech.

5. Translation Issues. Two main issues: (1) literal versus dynamic translations (known to some by the negative-valence term paraphrases, and (2) the degree to which the translator’s own interpretations should affect his translation (my view is that they do anyway, so he should admit it; not only that, but where there is more than one possible meaning he should not translate ambiguously but choose the best meaning and express that meaning well). The Greek text used for the JNT is the United Bible Societies’ critical text, 1975 edition, which is the same as Nestle-Aland.

6. Reasons For Certain Renderings. Here I gave a preview of the kinds of things I intended to do in the JNTC. I chose seven passages and explained why I translated as I did. Three examples: Did Yeshua fill full or fulfill the Torah? (Mattityahu 5:17). Does binding and loosing (Mattityahu 18:18) refer to controlling demons or determining Messianic halakhah (law, communal practice)? Do Sha’ul’s phrases, works of the law and under the law, refer to the Torah or to legalism? There I wrote a paragraph on each question; in the JNTC I have answered far more extensively.

7. Tanakh Prophecies Fulfilled by Yeshua the Messiah. A list of 54 Tanakh prophecies about the Messiah’s first coming, with New Testament passages showing how Yeshua fulfilled them. Of some 50 false Messiahs known to Jewish history, none has fulfilled more than a few; he fulfilled them all. Unfortunately the list contains errors in the first three paperback printings and the first hardcover printing; please correct them as follows:

8. Using the Jewish New Testament. The JNT text has Tanakh quotations in boldface, with book, chapter and verse in footnotes at the bottom of each column. An index of the 695 Tanakh citations is found at the end. Two maps show Eretz-Israel (the Land of Israel) in the time of Yeshua, and the Eastern Mediterranean and Near East in the Second Temple Period; there is a key to place-names. Glossaries define Hebrew and Aramaic names and terms used in place of the usual English ones; a reverse glossary supplies Hebrew and Aramaic equivalents of traditional English words and names.

VI   CONVENTIONS USED IN THE JNTC

General Abbreviations. Standard abbreviations include v. and vv. (verse and verses), f. and ff. (and the following verse/verses) and ad loc (Latin ad locum, at the place where the same passage is discussed). The Jewish New Testament is abbreviated "JNT and the King James Version of the Bible, also known as the Authorized Version, is often referred to as KJV. Other versions are not abbreviated. The abbreviations C.E. and B.C.E. stand for Common Era (A.D.) and Before the Common Era" (B.C.); on these conventions see note at Mattityahu (Matthew) 2:1.

Names and Abbreviations of New Testament Books. Some of the names of New Testament books used in the JNT and JNTC are the Hebrew names, listed in the following table with their more usual English equivalents. These names are spelled out in full at the beginning of a sentence or when the reference is to a whole chapter (without verse references). When there is a verse reference, the following abbreviations are used:

Examples:

Names, Order and Versification of Tanakh (Old Testament) Books. The traditional English names of Tanakh books are used, and they are spelled out in full, never abbreviated. When several are listed, the order is that of the Hebrew Bible, which is as follows:

PENTATEUCH (TORAH or CHUMASH)

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

FORMER PROPHETS (N’VI’IM)

Joshua

Judges

1 Samuel

2 Samuel

1 Kings

2 Kings

LATTER PROPHETS (N’VI’IM)

Isaiah

Jeremiah

Ezekiel

(The Twelve Prophets)

Hosea

Joel

Amos

Obadiah

Jonah

Micah

Nahum

Habakkuk

Zephaniah

Haggai

Zechariah

Malachi

WRITINGS (K’TUVIM)

Psalms

Proverbs

Job

(The Five Scrolls)

Song of Songs

Ruth

Lamentations

Ecclesiastes

Esther

Daniel

Ezra

Nehemiah

1 Chronicles

2 Chronicles

Chapter and verse references are as in the Hebrew Bible; where the Christian Bible chapter and verse numbers differ, these are shown in parentheses immediately after.

Examples:

See Exodus 20:12–17(12–14), Joel 3:2(2:29), Malachi 3:23–24(4:5–6), Psalm 51:17(15), Ecclesiastes 5:1–2(2–3), Nehemiah 3:38(4:6).

Sequence of Notes in the JNTC. Notes to a large group of verses precede notes to a smaller group of verses, which in turn precede notes to individual verses and portions thereof.

Hypothetical example:

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

References to JNT Text and JNTC Notes. References to the text of the JNT are by book, chapter and verse; JNTC notes are referred to by these four abbreviations:

Examples:

Use of Boldface Type in the Notes. A citation from the verse(s) being commented on is printed in boldface type. At the start of a paragraph it usually indicates that the commentary is on only that portion of the verse(s). Quotations from other parts of the Bible appear in ordinary Roman type.

Pronunciation of Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek Names and Terms. Hebrew and Aramaic names and terms are transliterated in a way that facilitates Israeli pronunciation. Vowels sound like those italicized in the following words: father, aisle, bed, neigh, whey, invest (usually not accented) or marine (usually accented), obey, rule. As for consonants, ch is pronounced as in Johann Sebastian Bach, and so is kh; g is always hard (give); other consonants are more or less as in English. The guttural stop aleph is often represented by an apostrophe (’) before a vowel (example: Natan’el, pronounced Na-tan-’el and not Na-ta-nel). The stronger guttural stop ‘ayin (deeper in the throat, closer to a hard g sound) is usually represented by a reverse apostrophe (‘) before or after a vowel.

In transliterating Greek names and terms I have made little effort toward helping the reader pronounce the words correctly — by which I mean as they would be pronounced in modern Athens, not as they would be mispronounced in Christian seminaries. I use "e to signify the Greek letter epsilon and ê to signify êta, o to signify omicron and ô to signify ômega. I use both u and v for upsilon; this is my one attempt to assist the reader toward correct pronunciation. (However, where u is written, the correct pronunciation is not oo but ee, as it is also for i, ê, ei, and oi. Also e and ai are pronounced eh, and ou is oo. The consonant b has a v sound, d sounds like th in then, th is as in thin, and g is either a y as in kayak or a softened hard g (a gh sound; try voicing the ch in Bach"). For further information consult any modern Greek language text or phrasebook.)

Hebrew and English Names. While in the text of the JNT itself I use only the Hebraized forms of personal and place names, in the commentary I allow myself to use both these and the names more familiar to readers of English. Thus I switch between Avraham and Abraham, Yitzchak and Isaac, Ya‘akov and Jacob (Tanakh) or James (New Testament), etc. See the JNT Glossary and Reverse Glossary for clarifications.

VII   ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The word acknowledgment pales against the debt of gratitude I owe my parents of blessed memory, Harold Melrose Stern (1892–1981) and Marion Levi Stern (1899–1976) for the love, ethical orientation, upbringing in the Jewish community and other blessings they gave me.

The term also fails to express what I owe to my wife, Martha Frances (Frankel) Stern, who has been not only an eshet-chayil (woman of valor, Proverbs 31:10–31) and an ezer k’negdi (helper standing by me, Genesis 2:18), but who also read through the entire manuscript and offered wise advice; I take full responsibility for any deficiencies due to my stubbornly failing to heed it.

Dr. Paul Ellingworth, translation consultant for the United Bible Societies and editor of its publication The Bible Translator, spent three full weeks with me reviewing every word of an earlier version of the Jewish New Testament. His advice improved my translation, and if the reader disagrees with some of my renderings even after reading my defense in this commentary, don’t blame him.

Joseph Shulam, a Messianic Jew who is very knowledgeable of both Judaism and the New Testament and unique in his manner of relating them to each other, is my close friend and frequent consultant. I am sure this commentary is the better for our conversations.

Martha and I have known Barry and Steffi Rubin since the mid 1970’s. Since 1989, Barry, who is the President of Messianic Jewish Communications, has also managed Jewish New Testament Publications. Steffi, a wonderful artist, typeset the JNTC. We are grateful for their work and happy in our friendship.

Besides expressing special appreciation to each of these people, I want to add that I have learned and benefited from many others in the Messianic Jewish community of Israel, the United States and the rest of the world. I have also gained knowledge from teachers and friends who are Gentile Christians, non-Messianic Jews, and persons neither Jewish nor Christian. Without my naming them, I hope they will recognize my intention to thank them.

Finally — words can only point — thanks to my God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and to his Messiah Yeshua, my and the Jewish people’s savior and Lord. Barukh attah, Adonai, Eloheynu, Melekh-ha‘olam, shehecheyanu v’kimanu v’higi‘anu lazman hazeh! (Praised be you, Lord our God, King of the universe, who has kept us alive, preserved us and enabled us to arrive at this point in time!)

David H. Stern

78 Manahat, 96901 Jerusalem, Israel

Rosh-HaShanah 5753 (September 1992)

ADDENDUM TO THIRD EDITION (1994)

With this edition I am inaugurating a system for adding new information to the commentary without disturbing the original layout and Index. Where I have something new to say (more than a few words long) I am putting it in an appendix rather than in the original notes. The appendix begins on page 929, immediately following the Index.

David H. Stern

Yom HaAtzma’ut 5754 (April 1994)

ADDENDUM TO SIXTH EDITION (1998)

This is the first edition to appear after the publication of my Complete Jewish Bible, my version of the Tanakh plus the JNT. For stylistic reasons, the JNT as it appears in the CJB is slightly different from previous published editions of the JNT. I have made those cintro5es as few as possible, so that users of the JNTC will not have difficulties using it with the CJB’s JNT.

David H. Stern

Chanukkah 5759 (December 1998)

THE GOOD NEWS OF YESHUA THE MESSIAH, AS REPORTED BY

MATTITYAHU (MATTHEW)

CHAPTER 1

1–16 The New Testament begins with the genealogy of Yeshua in order to show that he meets the requirements set by the Tanakh for who the Messiah must be — a descendant of Avraham (Genesis 22:18), Ya‘akov (Numbers 24:17), Y’hudah (Genesis 49:10), Yishai (Isaiah 11:1), David (2 Samuel 7:13; see below on Son of David) and Z’rubavel (Haggai 2:22–23). All these names appear in vv. 1–16. This genealogy recalls the pattern of those in the Tanakh (Genesis 5, 10; 1 Chronicles 1–9, etc.).

The genealogy of the Messiah as reported by Luke is different from the one here; see Lk 3:23–38&N.

1 Yeshua the Messiah is rendered Jesus Christ in other English versions, as if the man’s first name were Jesus and his last name Christ. Neither is the case. " Yeshua ‘ is Jesus’ name in Hebrew and Aramaic, the languages he spoke; in his thirty-some years on earth people called him Yeshua. The word Jesus represents the efforts of English-speakers to pronounce the name of the Messiah as it appears in the Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, Iêsous " — yee -soos in modern Greek, perhaps yay -soos in ancient Koinê Greek, which began to displace Aramaic as the lingua franca of the Near East after Alexander’s conquests (331–323 B.C.E.). In turn the word " Iêsous represents the ancient Greek-speakers’ attempts at pronouncing Yeshua ‘. By using Hebrew Yeshua" throughout, the JNT calls attention to the Jewishness of the Messiah. On the name Yeshua itself see v. 21&N.

The Messiah. The Greek word here is "christos which means the same thing as Hebrew mashiach namely, anointed or poured on. The significance of being known as The Anointed One" is that both kings and cohanim (priests) were invested with their authority in a ceremony of anointing with olive oil. Thus, inherent in the concept of Messiah is the idea of being given God’s priestly and kingly authority.

The Greek word "Christos is usually brought over into English as Christ. In two verses of the New Testament (Yn 1:41, 4:25) the Greek text has Messias, obviously, like English Messiah," a transliteration of the Hebrew word; there the JNT uses "Mashiach" (see Yn 1:41N).

The JNT also renders "Christos as Mashiach in two narratives where its specifically Jewish significance stands out in bold relief: at 16:15 and at 26:63 (and equivalently at Mk 8:29, 14:61; Lk 9:20, 22:67). Others might have used this criterion to introduce Mashiach in other passages, for example, at Ac 2:31, 36, 38. A translator’s decision to use Christ, Messiah or Mashiach" depends on the purpose of his translation; in the end it may come down to his intuition or personal preference.

But usually in the text of the JNT Greek Christos is rendered by Messiah; Christ does not appear even once. This is because Messiah has meaning in Jewish religion, tradition and culture; whereas the word Christ has an alien ring and a negative connotation because of the persecutions Jews have suffered from those claiming to be his followers. Further, the use of the word Messiah more than 380 times in the text of the JNT is a continual reminder that the New Testament claims Yeshua to be none other than the promised Mashiach for whom the Jewish people have yearned. The English word Christ does not point to Yeshua’s fulfillment of Jewish hopes and biblical prophecy.

Son of. The Hebrew word "ben (son, son of") is commonly used in three distinctive ways in the Bible and in Judaism:

(1) In both the Bible and in Judaism a man is normally identified as the son of his father. For example, if Sam Levine’s son Joe is called up to read from the Torah scroll in the synagogue, he will be announced not as Joseph Levine but as Yosefben-Shmu’el (Joseph, son of Samuel).

(2) " Ben " can also mean not the actual son but a more distant descendant, as is the case in this verse: David and Avraham were distant ancestors of Yeshua (also v. 8: Yoram was not the father but the great-great-grandfather of Uziyahu).

(3) Thirdly, " ben can be used more broadly to mean having the characteristics of," and this too applies here: Yeshua had qualities found both in Avraham and in King David.

Son of David. Avraham and David are singled out because they have unique importance in the Messiah’s lineage. The term Son of David is actually one of the titles of the Messiah, based on the Tanakh’s prophecies that the Messiah will be a descendent of David and will sit on David’s throne forever (for the Tanakh references see Ac 13:23&N). While Son of David does not appear as a Messianic title in the Tanakh and is first seen as such in the pseudepigraphic Psalms of Solomon 17:23, 36, written in the first century B.C.E., the New Testament records the use of this term some 15–20 times, and it has been used continuously in Judaism till the present.

Son of Avraham. This term is significant in at least four ways:

(1) Both King David and King Yeshua trace their ancestry back to the individual chosen by God as the father of the Jewish people (Genesis 12:1–3).

(2) Yeshua is the promised seed of Avraham (Genesis 13:15, explained by Ga 3:16).

(3) The Messiah’s mystical identity with the Jewish people (see 2:15N) is hinted at, since every Jew is a son of Avraham (3:9).

(4) Yeshua also has a mystical identity with everyone who believes in him, whether Jewish or Gentile (Ro 4:1, 11, 17–20; Ga 3:29).

3, 5, 6, 16 Tamar… Rachav… Rut… the wife of Uriyah (Bat-sheva)… Miryam. Women, especially those born Gentiles, were rarely included in biblical genealogies. The first four were Gentile women whom God honored by including them among the recorded ancestors of Yeshua the Jewish Messiah — through whom Gentiles, women and slaves are saved equally with Jews, men and free (Ga 3:28&N). On whether these women became Jews or continued to be Gentiles see Ac 16:1&N.

16 Yosef, the husband of Miryam, from whom was born… Yeshua. The change in language from the litany, X was the father of Y, signals that Yeshua was not conceived in the usual way; other passages state that the Holy Spirit of God overshadowed Miryam, causing her to become pregnant without sexual union (vv. 18, 20; Lk 1:27, 31, 34–38; also see vv. 18–25&NN, Lk 3:23–38&N).

The Yeshua who was called the Messiah. This somewhat awkward phrase calls attention to the fact that the genealogy leads up to this particular person named Yeshua, the particular Yeshua who was known as the Messiah. There is no implication that he was not the Messiah; he was called the Messiah because he was and is.

18–25 On the conception and birth of Yeshua compare Lk 1:26–38, 2:1–7; Yn 1:1–2, 14.

18 Engaged. The Hebrew/Aramaic word for betrothal is " kiddushin which signifies sanctification, separation," i.e., the setting aside and separating of a particular woman for a particular man. According to the Mishna, adultery during the betrothal period is a more serious sin than adultery after marriage.

The Mishna specifies four kinds of death penalty in descending order of gravity: stoning, burning, beheading and strangling (Sanhedrin 7:1). A man who has intercourse with a betrothed girl is subject to the same penalty as one who has intercourse with his mother, namely, stoning (Sanhedrin 7:4). Someone who has intercourse with another man’s wife is liable to death by strangling (Sanhedrin 11:1).

Today, partly in order to eliminate the possibility of committing this grave sin, formal Jewish betrothal (kiddushin or ’erusiri) and marriage (nisu’in) are generally combined in a single ceremony.

Ruach HaKodesh, Hebrew for Holy Spirit. The term appears in the Tanakh (Isaiah 51:13(11), 63:10–11) and is equivalent to the Spirit of God (Ruach-Elohim), first seen in Genesis 1:2 as having moved on the face of the waters before God said, Let there be light. From this verse, Isaiah 48:16 and other places in the Bible it can be learned that the Holy Spirit is divine, not less or other than God. Under the terms of the New Covenant, Yeshua sends the Holy Spirit to dwell in any person who trusts God through the Messiah. The Holy Spirit gives such a person power for service, guidance into God’s truth, gifts to facilitate holy living, and fruits of righteous behavior. (The King James Version of the English Bible uses the term holy ghost, which has nothing to do with spooks but is seventeenth-century English for Holy Spirit.)

Miryam. In English this Hebrew name is usually rendered by the spelling Miriam in the Tanakh and Mary in the New Testament. This unfounded and artificial distinction produced by translators subtly drives a wedge between Yeshua’s mother and her own Jewishness. The original Miriam was the sister of Moshe Rabbenu (Moses, our teacher; Exodus 2:4–8) and a prophet (Exodus 15:20); in some respects she is seen as a role-model for the Jewish woman leader of today. But the name Mary evokes in the reader’s thinking an otherworldly image of Madonna and Child, complete with haloes, beatific smiles and angels in array, instead of the New Testament’s portrayal of a down-to-earth Jewish lady in an Israel village managing her wifely, maternal and other social responsibilities with care, love and faith.

Yeshua’s mother was discovered to be pregnant by the Ruach HaKodesh. Sooner or later everyone discovered she was pregnant. But not everyone discovered that her pregnancy had resulted not from sexual relations but from the Holy Spirit’s supernatural activity. The virgin birth was a supernatural event (see Section (1) of v. 23N). The God who made heaven and earth is quite capable of causing a woman to become pregnant in a way not possible in nature.

Mattityahu informs his readers of Yeshua’s supernatural conception in order to counter the obvious and natural inference that Miryam had misbehaved. The early rabbis developed a tradition that Yeshua was the illegitimate son of Miryam and a Roman soldier named Pantera (in the second-century Tosefta, a collection similar to the Mishna, see Chullin 2:23; in the fifth-century Babylonian Talmud see Sanhedrin 43a, 67a). This calumny, invented, of course, to counter the claims of the Gospel, was worked up further in the sixth-century anti-gospel, Toledot-Yeshu (see v. 21N).

20 Adonai , literally, my lords; but grammarians consider it the plural of majesty; so a slightly less literal translation would be my Lord. Long before Yeshua’s day, however, the word " Adonai " had, out of respect, been substituted in speaking and in reading aloud for God’s personal name, the four Hebrew letters yud-heh-vav-heh , variously written in English as " YHVH , Yahweh and Jehovah. The Talmud (Pesachim 50a) made it a requirement not to pronounce the Tetragrammaton (the word means the four-letter name" of God), and this remains the rule in most modern Jewish settings. In deference to this tradition (which, in my view, is unnecessary but harmless) the JNT uses " Adonai where YHVH is meant. (Incidentally, the name Jehovah is a modern invention, an English hybrid based on the four Hebrew letters as transliterated into German, J-H-V-H, with the individually transliterated Hebrew vowel-points of Adonai ," e-o-a.)

The Greek word here is "kurios which can mean (1) sir, (2) lord in the human sense, as in lord of the manor, (3) Lord" in the divine sense, or (4) God’s personal name YHVH. The JNT uses "Adonai only when one can be certain that YHVH" is meant; it is not used if there is doubt. So far, editions of the JNT are conservative on this score; there are probably additional places in the text where "Adonai could safely be substituted for Lord. For more on kurios" see 7:21&N.

21 This verse is an example of a semitism (an allusion to Hebrew or Aramaic) brought over literally into the Greek text. It provides strong evidence in favor of the theory that there was a Hebrew or Aramaic oral or written tradition behind the extant Greek manuscripts, for only in Hebrew or Aramaic does the explanation here of Yeshua’s name make any sense; in Greek (or English) it explains nothing.

The Hebrew word for "he will save is yoshia‘," which has the same Hebrew root (yud-shin-’ayin) as the name Yeshua (yud-shin-vav-’ayin). Thus the Messiah’s name is explained on the basis of what he will do. Etymologically the name Yeshua‘ is a contraction of the Hebrew name Y’hoshua‘ (English Joshua), which means "YHVH saves. It is also the masculine form of the Hebrew word yeshu‘ah which means salvation."

The KJV renders this verse, …and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins. But in English, saving people from sins is no more reason for calling someone Jesus than for calling him Bill or Frank. The Greek is no better; only in Hebrew or Aramaic does the explanation explain.

In modern Hebrew Yeshua is usually called Yeshu (yud-shin-vav, without an ‘ayin) by nonbelievers. This verse also shows why the name "Yeshu" cannot possibly be correct — it does not include all three letters of the Hebrew root of yoshia‘. However, the matter bears further scrutiny.

According to Professors David Flusser and Shmuel Safrai, Orthodox Jews, "Yeshu was how the name Yeshua‘" was pronounced by Galilean Jews in the first century. We know from 26:73 below that Jews of the Galil had a different dialect than those of Judea. According to Flusser (Jewish Sources in Early Christianity, p. 15) Galileans did not pronounce the Hebrew letter ‘ayin at the end of a word, much as Cockneys drop h at the beginning. That is, instead of saying "Ye-shoo-ah they said Yeh-shoo." Undoubtedly some people began spelling the name according to this pronunciation.

However, that is not the end of the story. In Jewish anti-Christian polemic it became customary not to use Yeshua’s correct name but intentionally and consciously to use the distortion "Yeshu, because at some point someone realized that Yeshu is also an acronym consisting of the first letters of the Hebrew insult, Yimach sh’mo v’zikhro (May his name and memory be blotted out; the words adapt and expand the last phrase of Psalm 109:13). Thus Yeshu" was a kind of coded incantation against Christian evangelism. Moreover, since Yeshua came to be regarded in non-Messianic Judaism as a false prophet, blasphemer and idolater wrongly being worshipped as God, and since the Torah says, You shall not even pronounce the names of their gods (Exodus 3:13), the Messiah’s name was purposely mispronounced. Today most Israelis saying "Yeshu" suppose this is the man’s correct name and intend no disparagement. The JNT avoids "Yeshu because of its history and also because in Hebrew it, like Jesus in English, carries the valence of the god the Gentiles worship."

But Yosef Vaktor (see 10:37N) reinterprets the acronym to praise Yeshua, "Yitgadal sh’mo umalkhutol (May his name and kingdom be magnified!")

22 To fulfill what Adonai had said through the prophet. The New Covenant consistently presents itself as fulfilling prophecies and promises made by God in the Tanakh. Such conformity to statements and predictions made hundreds of years earlier, in defiance of all reasonable probabilities, proves beyond reasonable doubt that God knows the end from the beginning. Moreover, in this case, it proves beyond reasonable doubt that Yeshua is the Messiah. Prophecy fulfillment is the chief rational reason, based on empirical observation of historical events — that is, based on facts — for Jews and others to accept Yeshua as the Messiah.

There have been more than fifty messianic pretenders in the last two thousand years of Jewish history, starting with Todah (Theudas) and Judah HaG’lili (Ac 5:36–37&NN), continuing with Shim’on Bar-Kosiba (died 135 C.E.), whom Rabbi Akiva recognized as the Messiah by changing his name to Bar-Kochva (son of a star; see 2 Ke 1:19N on the Morning Star), and culminating in Shabtai Tzvi (1626–1676), who became a Moslem, and Jacob Frank (1726–1791), who became a Roman Catholic. But none of them met the criteria laid down in the Tanakh concerning the identity of the Messiah; whereas Yeshua met all of them that are applicable to his first coming (these fulfilled prophecies are listed in 26:24N and in Section VII of the Introduction to the JNT). Of the four gospel writers Mattityahu especially concerns himself with pointing out these fulfillments (see 2:5, 15, 17; 3:3; 4:14; 8:17; 11:10; 12:17; 13:14, 35; 21:4; 22:43; 26:31; 27:9). His object is to demonstrate that Yeshua should be recognized as the Messiah because he fulfilled what Adonai said about the Messiah through the prophets of the Tanakh.

What Adonai had said through the prophet. On this phrase see 2:15N, third-from-last paragraph.

23 The virgin will conceive and bear a son. This verse introduces a major controversy concerning the use of the Hebrew Bible in the New Testament. Following are three objections which non-Messianic Jews and other skeptics often make to Mattityahu’s quoting Isaiah 7:14b in this verse, along with Messianic Jewish replies.

(1) Objection: A virgin birth is impossible.

Reply: In liberal scholarship miracles are characteristically explained away as natural phenomena in disguise. One might pursue this line here by pointing to observed instances of parthenogenesis in the animal kingdom or modern cloning experiments. But there is no instance of human parthenogenesis. Therefore one must regard a virgin birth as supernatural.

Usually objection to a virgin birth as impossible follows as a logical consequence of objecting to any and all supernaturalism. But the God of the Bible is literally supernatural, above nature, since he created nature and its laws. Therefore, if it suits his purpose he can suspend those laws. The Bible in both the Tanakh and the New Testament teaches repeatedly that God does intervene in human history and does sometimes overrule the natural course of events for his own reasons.

Frequently his reason, as in this instance, is to give humanity a sign of his sovereignty, presence and concern. In fact, Isaiah 7:14a, immediately preceding the portion quoted, reads, Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. The Hebrew word for sign ("’ot) means an extraordinary event that demonstrates and calls attention to God’s direct involvement in human affairs. The God" of Deism, pictured as starting the universe like a man winding a watch and leaving it to run by itself, is not the God of the Bible.

(2) Objection: Isaiah, in using the Hebrew word "‘ almah was referring to a young woman; had he meant virgin he would have written b’tulah. "

Reply: "‘Almah is used seven times in the Hebrew Bible, and in each instance it either explicitly means a virgin or implies it, because in the Bible ‘almah" always refers to an unmarried woman of good reputation. In Genesis 24:43 it applies to Rebecca, Isaac’s future bride, already spoken of in Genesis 24:16 as a b’tulah. In Exodus 2:8 it describes the infant Moshe’s older sister Miryam, a nine-year-old girl and surely a virgin. (Thus the name of Yeshua’s mother recalls this earlier virgin.) The other references are to young maidens playing on timbrels (Psalm 68:25), maidens being courted (Proverbs 30:19) and virgins of the royal court (Song of Songs 1:3, 6:8). In each case the context requires a young unmarried woman of good reputation, i.e., a virgin.

Moreover, Mattityahu here is quoting from the Septuagint, the first translation of the Tanakh into Greek. More than two centuries before Yeshua was born, the Jewish translators of the Septuagint chose the Greek word "parthenos to render ‘almah. Parthenos unequivocally means virgin." This was long before the New Testament made the matter controversial.

The most famous medieval Jewish Bible commentator, Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (Rashi, 1040–1105), who determinedly opposed Christological interpretation of the Tanakh, nevertheless explained that in Song of Songs 1:3 "‘alamot (plural of ‘almah) means b ‘tulot (virgins") and refers metaphorically to the nations.

Victor Buksbazen, a Hebrew Christian, in his commentary The Prophet Isaiah, quoted Rashi as writing that in Isaiah 7:14 "‘almah means virgin." In the first four editions of the Jewish New Testament Commentary I cited this Rashi. It has been pointed out to me that Rashi did not write what I represented him as having written, so I have removed the citation from the main body of the JNTC and herewith apologize for not checking the original source. For more details, see Appendix, p. 929.

Also, in earlier editions, I referred to a 1953 article in the Journal of Bible and Religion, in which the Jewish scholar Cyrus Gordon held that cognate languages support translating "‘almah in Isaiah 7:14 as virgin." However, Michael Brown, a Messianic Jewish scholar with a Ph.D. in Semitics, informs me that Gordon’s observations were based on an early incorrect reading of a key Ugaritic text. In this case, my error stemmed from unfamiliarity with recent scholarship.

However, the Bible itself shows us how we can know when an ‘almah is a virgin. Rivkah is called an ‘almah at Genesis 24:43, but it can be deduced from Genesis 24:16 (Neither had any man known her) that she was a virgin. In the same way, we know that the ‘almah Miryam was a virgin from Lk 1:34, where she asks the angel how she can be pregnant, since I am a virgin?

A possible reason for Isaiah’s using the word "‘almah" instead of b’tulah is that in