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Isaiah 7 gave terrified King Ahaz a sign: a child named Immanuel would be born in his own day. So how can Matthew apply that same text to Jesus’ virgin birth? Jimmy walks through the original crisis, the meaning of almah versus parthenos, and the difference between a prophecy’s literal sense and its God-intended spiritual sense. Then he turns to the later prophets—Jeremiah’s righteous Branch, Ezekiel’s everlasting “servant David,” and Zechariah’s humble king on a donkey—and shows why those texts do meet the marks of a clear messianic prophecy.
TRANSCRIPT:
Coming Up
Isaiah 7 contains a prophecy of a child named Immanuel.
And, in the New Testament, Matthew applies that passage to the virgin birth of Jesus.
But in its original setting, it was a sign given to a king of Judah centuries before Jesus was born.
So . . . how can it be about Jesus?
Let’s get into it!
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Howdy, folks!
We’re in our third year of the podcast now, and you can help me keep making this podcast for years to come—and get early access to new episodes—by going to Patreon.com/JimmyAkinPodcast
Messianic Prophecies
In Episode 104, we looked at three conditions that need to be fulfilled for a passage to be a clear messianic prophecy. The passage needs to:
- It speaks of a future ruler.
- It identifies that ruler as a descendant of David.
- It portrays him as ideal, or as ruling in an ideal age.
Without those three marks, the passage can still contain a messianic prophecy, but it isn’t as clear.
We also saw that some messianic prophecies are in the literal sense of the text, while others are in its spiritual sense.
Ancient Jews recognized that God could put additional meanings into the texts of Scripture—including meanings the human author was unaware of.
God knows more than any human author does, and he can inspire an author in a way that includes those additional meanings, if he chooses.
The only way to settle whether he has done so is to examine the texts, and when ancient Jews—both Christian and non-Christian—did that, they recognized that he had.
So that means there are at least 2 kinds of prophecy in the Jewish Scriptures.
- Prophecies found in the literal sense of a text
- Prophecies found in the spiritual sense of a text
Prophecies in the literal sense—what the human author meant to communicate—are clearer and easier to identify. They’re the ones that are most likely to meet the three conditions we named.
While prophecies in the spiritual sense—the additional meanings God intended—are less clear, and sometimes they can be identified only in hindsight.
If you want to point to an example of fulfilled prophecy, one found in the literal sense of a text is ideal, since its meaning is more obvious.
But prophecies found in the spiritual sense can also contribute, and they shouldn’t be ignored.
They have evidential value, too.
A Sign for King Ahaz
A good example is a prophecy in Isaiah 7.
The chapter begins this way:
Isaiah 7:1–2
In the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, Rezin the king of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah the king of Israel came up to Jerusalem to wage war against it, but they could not conquer it. When the house of David was told, “Syria is in league with Ephraim,” his heart and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.
So there are 2 kings—the king of Syria, Rezin, and the king of Israel, Pekah—making war against the southern kingdom of Judah.
They could not conquer Jerusalem, but they’re causing the house of David to shake with fear.
So God sends the prophet Isaiah to meet the king of Judah—a man named Ahaz—and tell him not to be afraid, because the 2 kings won’t succeed.
Isaiah 7 then continues:
Isaiah 7:10–16
Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz, “Ask a sign of the Lord your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.” But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test.” And he said, “Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a young woman shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his name Immanuel. He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the child knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land before whose two kings you are in dread will be deserted.”
King Ahaz lived in the 700s B.C., and that’s when the kings of Syria and Israel were threatening him.
The promised birth of a son is meant to reassure him that the 2 kings won’t conquer him.
In fact, before the child knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good—that is, before he’s old enough to reach the age of discretion—the kingdoms of Syria and Israel will be deserted, so they’ll be no threat to Judah.
Who Was Immanuel?
In context, the literal sense of this sign clearly refers to a child born in King Ahaz’s own day.
Scholars have debated who that child might have been.
Some have suggested that Immanuel was Ahaz’s own son, who would become King Hezekiah.
In that case, Immanuel may have been another name for Hezekiah, because the kings of Judah could have more than one name.
For example, 2 Samuel 12 says this about King Solomon:
2 Samuel 12:24–25
Then David comforted his wife, Bathsheba, and went in to her, and lay with her; and she bore a son, and he called his name Solomon. And the Lord loved him and sent a message by Nathan the prophet; so he called his name Jedidiah, because of the Lord.
So David named his son Solomon, which means Peace—from the same root as the word Shalom—because David hoped that Solomon would bring peace or reign in a time of peace.
But God gave the child another name through the prophet Nathan. God called him Jedidiah, which means Beloved of Yahweh. And—despite the sinful way David became Solomon’s father—the Lord loved him.
Now, in the prophecy to Ahaz, the Hebrew name Immanuel means God with us, God is with us
And the child’s birth signified that God was with the Jewish people and wouldn’t let the kings of Syria and Israel defeat them.
Others have suggested that Immanuel might be one of the prophet Isaiah’s own sons.
And there have been other suggestions as well.
But the context requires a child born in the 700s B.C.
Otherwise, the child couldn’t serve as a sign to King Ahaz that his 2 enemies would fail.
So that’s the literal sense of the prophecy.
God with Us
But that doesn’t stop the prophecy from also having a spiritual sense that points forward to the Messiah.
And Jesus—as the Son of God incarnate—was indeed “God with us.”
There’s also another aspect of the text that echoes Jesus’ experience.
When Isaiah says that a young woman shall conceive and bear a son, the Hebrew word he uses for “young woman” is almah.
The Hebrew word Almah roughly means Young woman
It refers to a young woman of marriageable age, and such women were expected to be virgins before marriage.
As a result, the term can be translated either “young woman” or “virgin.”
Some later Greek translations of the Old Testament used the word neanis.
The Greek word Neanis means Young woman
But the Septuagint—the main Greek translation of the Old Testament that existed in Jesus’ day—used the word parthenos.
The Greek word Parthenos means Virgin
Unlike almah, parthenos refers specifically to a virgin.
Matthew quotes the prophecy in Matthew 1, right after describing how Jesus was conceived:
Matthew 1:22–23
All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel” (which means, God with us).
So early Christians like Matthew read this passage about the birth of a son who would be God with us and who would be born of a virgin, and they recognized that it referred to Jesus in the spiritual sense of the text.
This prophecy doesn’t depend on the Septuagint.
It’s also there in the Hebrew, but the Hebrew is more ambiguous, and the Septuagint makes its messianic sense clearer.
So Isaiah 7, like Hosea 11:1, which we discussed in Episode 104, contains a messianic prophecy in the spiritual sense of the text.
A Righteous Branch
So that’s a messianic prophecy in the spiritual sense, but there are also clear messianic prophecies in the literal sense.
Some of the later prophets—the ones who lived during or after the Babylonian exile—illustrate this.
For example, the prophet Jeremiah—who lived at the beginning of the exile—says:
Jeremiah 23:5–6
Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: “The Lord is our righteousness.”
So Jeremiah predicts the arrival of a future, ideal Davidic king, whom he calls a righteous Branch for David.
That echoes a prophecy we covered in Episode 95, from Isaiah 11:1:
Isaiah 11:1
There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.
Jesse was the father of David, so both prophets use the image of a branch for a coming descendant of David.
Jeremiah also says the Messiah shall reign as king and deal wisely and execute justice.
His reign will be one of peace, since “Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely.”
And the king is given a name that means “The Lord is our righteousness,” which suggests God using Jesus’ death on the Cross to provide righteousness—or justification—for his people.
My Servant David
Jeremiah’s younger contemporary Ezekiel was both a priest and a prophet during the Babylonian exile.
In Ezekiel 34, God denounces the leaders who have been shepherding his flock, the people of Israel, and then he says:
Ezekiel 34:23–25
I will set up over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he shall feed them: he shall feed them and be their shepherd. And I, the Lord, will be their God, and my servant David shall be prince among them; I, the Lord, have spoken. I will make with them a covenant of peace and banish wild beasts from the land, so that they may dwell securely in the wilderness and sleep in the woods.
So Ezekiel also prophesies a coming, ideal Davidic king.
God calls him “my servant David,” which indicates his Davidic ancestry.
In contrast to the bad shepherds Israel has had in recent times, he will be a good shepherd.
And he will have a reign of peace, because God will make “a covenant of peace” with his people and banish the threats to them.
In Ezekiel 37, God promises to gather his scattered people and reunite them, and he says:
Ezekiel 37:24–26
My servant David shall be king over them; and they shall all have one shepherd. They shall follow my ordinances and be careful to observe my statutes. They shall dwell in the land where your fathers dwelt that I gave to my servant Jacob; they and their children and their children’s children shall dwell there forever; and David my servant shall be their prince forever. I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them.
Under this future David, God’s people will follow his ordinances and carefully observe his statutes.
The future David will “be their prince forever,” which indicates an everlasting reign.
And God will make “an everlasting covenant” of peace with his people, which points to the coming of a new covenant.
Riding on a Donkey
Another of the later prophets is Zechariah, who lived after the Babylonian exile, while the temple was being rebuilt.
In Zechariah 9, the prophet says:
Zechariah 9:9–10
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem!
Behold, your king comes to you;
triumphant and victorious is he,
humble and riding on a donkey,
on a colt the foal of a donkey.
I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem;
and the battle bow shall be cut off,
and he shall command peace to the nations;
his dominion shall be from sea to sea,
and from the River to the ends of the earth.
So Zechariah prophesies that a future, ideal king will come, even though Israel had no king at the time.
The full significance of this may not be obvious to us, because we aren’t familiar with the way animals were used in the ancient Near East.
Horses were used as animals of war, but donkeys were ridden for peaceful purposes.
So the fact that the king comes “humble and riding on a donkey” means that he is coming in peace.
That’s why God says he will “cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem.”
He also says that the coming king “shall command peace to the nations.”
And the king will have a universal reign, for “his dominion shall be from sea to sea” and “to the ends of the earth.”
Conclusion
So, to sum up, in its literal sense, the Immanuel prophecy of Isaiah 7 was a sign to King Ahaz about a child born in his own day.
But in its spiritual sense, it points forward to Jesus, the son born of a virgin who was God with us.
And the later prophets—Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Zechariah—give clear, literal-sense prophecies of an ideal king to come.
Jeremiah calls him a righteous Branch for David who would rule wisely and justly, Ezekiel describes a future David whose reign would last forever, and Zechariah describes a humble king coming in peace whose dominion would reach the ends of the earth.
In a future episode, we’ll take up another prophet who has a lot to say about the Messiah—Daniel.
If you’d like the full case for Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, be sure to get a copy of my book Evidence for Christ: How We Know That Jesus Is the Messiah.
And be sure and let me know in the comments what you think.
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God bless you always!