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Page 31
�At a certain time, (says he,) a certain learned man of the wise men
of the Christians said unto me:--�Wherefore are you Jews
unwilling to believe Jesus of Nazareth to be the Messiah, when yet
your veritable prophets testified of him, whose words you profess
to have faith in.�
�I gave him this answer. �How, I require, could we believe him to
be the Messiah, when you can produce no genuine proof from the
prophets in his favour, since all those things adduced by the
evangelists from them, to prove Jesus the Messiah, are nothing to
the purpose? And we have many and evident reasons to prove that
he was not the Messiah. And of these, I will bring forward a few,
arising, 1, From his genealogy. 2. From his works. 3. From the time
of his appearing. 4. From the prophecies of the things to take place
in the time of the Messiah not having seen fulfilled in his age. And
in these things are contained the genuine marks characteristic of
our Messiah.�
�1. As to what concerns his genealogy; it does not prove this
necessary thing, that Jesus was the son of David, because he was
not begotten by Joseph, as the Gospel of Matthew testifies; for in
the first chapter of it, it is written, that Jesus was born of Mary
when she was yet a virgin, and had not been known by Joseph;
which things being so, the genealogy of Joseph has nothing to do
with Jesus. The descent and origin of Mary, is still less known, but
it seems from Luke�s calling Elizabeth, who was of Levi, her
cousin, that Mary was of the tribe of Levi, and not of Judah, and,
consequently, not of David; and, if she were, still Jesus is not the
more the son of David; descents being reckoned from the males
only. Neither is the genealogy of Joseph rightly deduced from
David, but labours under great difficulties. Matthew, and Luke
also, not only disagree, but irreconcilably and flatly contradict
each other, in their genealogies of Joseph. Now, it cannot be that
the testimony of two witnesses, who directly contradict each other
in the matter to be proved by them, can be received as true. But the
prophets have directed us to expect no Messiah but one born of the
seed of David.
�2. As to the works of Jesus, we object to what he said concerning
himself:--�Do not consider me as come to establish peace on
earth, for I have come to send a sword, and to separate the son
from the father, and the daughter from her mother, and the
daughter-in-law from her mother-in-law,� which words are written
in Mat. ch. x. But we find the prophecies concerning the Messiah
to attribute to him very different works from these; nay, the very
opposite. For, whereas Jesus testifies concerning himself, that he
did not come to establish peace in the earth, but �division,� �fire�
and �sword,� Zechariah says, concerning the expected Messiah, ch.
ix.:--�He shall speak peace to the nations.� Jesus says he came to
send �fire and sword� upon the earth, but Micah says, ch. ii., that in
the times of the true Messiah they shall beat their swords into
ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks, nation shall not
lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.�
Jesus says that he came �to put division between the father and the
son,� &c. But in the time of the true Messiah, Elias, the prophet,
shall come, of whom Malachi prophecied �that he shall convert the
heart of the fathers unto the children, and the heart of the children
to the fathers.� Jesus says �that he came to serve others, not to be
served by them� � Mat. xx. 29. But of the true Messiah it is said,
Psalm lxxii.:--�All kings shall bow themselves before him, all
nations shall serve him.� The same also is said by Zechariah, ch. ix.:--
�His dominion shall be, from one sea to the other, and from the
river unto the ends of the earth;� and so Dan., ch. vii.:--�All
dominions shall serve and obey him.�
�3. As to the time, we object to the Christians, that Jesus did not
come at the time designated by the prophets; for the prophets
testify, that the coming of the Messiah should be �in the end of
days� or, in the latter days, (which, surely, have not yet arrived) as
it is in Isaiah ch. ii.:--�It shall come to pass in the latter days, that
the mountain of the Lord�s house shall be established in the top of
the mountains, and all nations shall flow unto it;� and it
immediately follows, concerning the king Messiah, �that he shall
judge among the nations, and rebuke many peoples, and they shall
beat their words into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning
hooks.� See also Hosea, ch. iii, and also Dan., ch. ii., where it is
written:--�God hath made known unto king Nebuchadnezzar
what shall come to pass in the latter days,� (or, in the end of days.)
And this pertains to what follows, viz., to this:--�In the days of
those kings, (i. e., of the kingdoms that arose out of the ruins of the
Roman Empire) the God of heaven will raise up a kingdom, which
shall never be destroyed.� Thus you see, that the prophets
predicted, that the kingdom of the Messiah should be after the
destruction of the Roman Empire, not while it was in its vigour;
when Jesus came; in �the latter days,� and not before.*
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