THE DIVINE MESSIAH Donald MacLeod ‘The deity of Christ was the first doctrine on which the Church carefully adjusted her confession and ever since she has regarded loyalty to it as the ‘very mirimam which she has the right to expect from her adherents. It is important, then, that we should have a clear understanding of our faith at this point so as to expound it with authority and conviction. THE DIVINE MESSIAH IN THE OLD TESTAMENT ‘The advent of @ divine Messiah was clearly anticipated in the Old ‘Testament. No doubt theologians of other generations were too adept at reading references to Christ into passages of the earlier revelation, and in this, of course, they were wrong. In the long run the interests of Christian doctrine cannot be served by violating the canons of scientific exegesis. But it is possible to react too violently to the excesses of typological and allegorical interpretation, ‘The writers of the New ‘Testament clearly discerned the doctrine of a divine Messiah in the Old, The argument of the first chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews is sufficient to prove this. ‘Moreover, theze seems to have existed in the minds of the first disciples @ pre-dispostion to submit to the absolute claims of our Lord. We are so accustomed today to hearing Peter’s confession at Caesarea Philippi characterised as the critical moment when faith in Jesus’ Messiahship first broke into the consciousness of the Twelve, that we tend to forget that Nathanael, on his very first encounter with Jesus, and at the very beginning of His ministry, exclaimed, ‘Rabbi, thou art the Son of God, thou art the King of Israel [Jn. 1:49]. This is in marked contrast to the credibilty-gap which had to be bridged in relation to the Passion. Nationa! Messianic expectation, informed by the Old ‘Testament, had conditiozed the disciples to expect a divine Deliverer. It should be noted, also, that our Lordi Himself interpreted the Old Testament in terms of a high Christology, as is indicated, for example, in His understanding of Psalm 110:1, ‘If David then call him Lord, how is he his son ? [Mt. 22:45]. rt is doubtless significant that indications of a plurality within the Godhead occur in the Old Testament from the very beginning . . . : In the plural form of the most commonly used divine neme [Blohin] in such utterances as, ‘Let us make man in our image after out likeness’ [Gen, 1:26]; and in the mysterious figure of the Angcl of the Lord, somehow lentical with Jehovah, and yet atthe same time somehow distinct, These seem at least to indicate that ‘God's unity is not monolithic’. Equally, it Kinet, Genesis, An Introduction and Commentary (Tyndale, 1967], p. 33. ‘The Divine Messiah 25icant that in the Book of Proverbs the divine Wisdom is so far personified as to appear at last as a distinct personal subsistence. Christian theologians have not hesitated to use these facts in» Christo- fogical interest. But the New ‘Testament does nots and on the whole it is better that we, following ts lead, should concentrate upon what is undoubtedly the richest vein of Old Testament Chrstology ~ Messianic prophecy, ‘To Israel, in the sin and sorrow which increasingly filled her consciousness after the eclipse ofthe glory of the Davidic monarchy there ‘came the promise of a Great Deliveret. Her whole religion became one of hope. Eschatology was of its essence, and thit eschatology was Messianic, The eschaton (last thing] was the Messiat. ‘The last day was the day of the Lord, when there would appear a King greater than David, to bring peace and salvation; a Prophet greater than Moses to bring a final revelation; and a Priest greater than Aaron to effect a perfect atonement. ‘That the great Deliverer was to be divine seems indisputable, ‘The Lord's anointed of Psalm 2:2 [whence the designation Messial is the Son ‘of God, whose wrath, if kindled but a littl, will destroy all His enemies, and whose dominion is to be universal. In Psalm 45 He is described as fairer than the children of men [v. 2}, is explicitly addressed as God [v. 6} and commended to the people as an object of adcration and worship {v. 11}. In Poalm 72 there is ascribed to Him not merely a world-wide {v. 8} but an everlasting dominion (v. 5]. In Psalm 9¢:11-13 i is Jehovah Himself whose coming is expected: ‘Then shall all the trees of the wood sing for joy before the Lord, for he comes, for he comes to judge the carth’, [v. 12-13, RSV]. The same sentiments are expressed in Psalm 98:7-5, ‘Let the floods clap their hands; let the hills sing for joy together before the Lord, for he comes to rule the earth, [RSV] And in Psalm 110, as Jesus Himself pointed out, the Messiah appears not as David's descendant but as His pre-evistent Lord, exalted to the right hand of Jehovah, exercising an eternal priesthood, and judging the heathen. ‘We find the same doctrine in the great Messianic passages of the writing Prophets. In Isaiah 9:6 f, the child gifted to the nation and entrusted with universal sovereignty is denominated by the divine names Wonderful, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father and the Prince of Peace; and His tenure of office, exercise of government and maintenance of peace are to be without end, In Jeremiah 23:5-6, it is declared of the King whom Jehovah is to raise up to save Judah that His name shall be, “The Lord is our righteousness’. In Micah 5:2 i is said of the promised SCompare Judges 13.18, RSV. =MPCheyne's “Jehovah ‘Tsidkenu’. 26 ‘The Bannar of TruthRuler that, ‘His goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting? In Zecharia 13:7, where our Lord saw a clear allusion to Himself" the Good Shepherd is depicted as the ‘fellow’ of Jehovah (‘the man who stands next to me,’ RSV], And in Malachi 3:1 the coming one is again specifically identified as the Lord Himself: ‘Behold, I will send my messenger and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seck, shall suddenly come to His temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in? ‘THE DEITY OF CHRIST IN THE NEW TESTAMENT In the New Testament the deity of Christ is asserted specifically and in terms. In the majestic opening words of his Gospel, for example, the Apostle John affirms, ‘the Word was God.’ It is sometimes suggested that in view of the omission of the article before theos the correct trans- Jation is either, ‘the Word was a god’ or ‘the Word was divine,” But no ‘New Testament monotheist could ever have penned the proposition, ‘the Word wes a god The objection proceeds on a misunderstanding of the grammatical principles involved, With the definite article the correct rendering would be either, “The Word was the Father,’ or ‘the Word was the Godhead.’ Both these statements are heretical since they are inconsistent with the distinct, personal subsistence of the Father and the Son. The only way open to John to express the conviction, ‘The Word ‘was God) was to vite, as he did write, theos en ho logos. ‘Theos as the predicate must be anarthrous. Deity is again explicitly predicated of the Son in Romans 9:5, ‘Whose are the fithers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is ‘over all, God blessed for ever.” This translation has also. been challenged, ‘The Revised Standard Version renders the passage, ‘to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ. God who is over all be blessed for ever.” The New English Bible takes a similar view: “Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them in natural descent, sprang the Messish. May God, supreme above all, be blessed for ever. There were, of course, no punctuetion marks in the original manuscripts and the correct translation must be determined by less objective considerations. 1. Grammatical considerations, on balance, favour the Authorised Version. ‘There is no evidence within the passage, or in the context, of any intention of a change of subject; the phrase ‘according to the flesh’ Jeads us to expect an antithesis which is in fact completed in ‘God over all = the Messiah, on the human level, was of Jewish descent, but on the Compare Mark 14.27 The Di ye Messiah 27divine level was ‘God over all;’ and, finally, before we allow the words ‘God over all be blessed for ever” to stand as an independent sentence we should note that in the original they contain no finite verb. 2. The context favours the Authorised Version. Paul is enumerating the advantages of the Jew, and the climax is reached in his declaration regarding the Messiah, But that the Messiah was a Jew was no more than a truism, The realy significant thing was that the Jewish Messiah was “God over all, blessed for ever.” 3. The specific ascription of deity to Jesus Christ does not go beyond. ‘what we know of Pauls Christology. For example, in Philippians 2:6 he declares that the Son, before His humiliation, ‘existed in the form of God.’ Whether we understand this as ‘possessed the divine essence’ or as ‘possessed the Divine glory” is immaterial. The import is the same. ‘The divine glory is inseparable from the divine essence. Again, if our understanding of John 1:1 is correct the A.V. of Romans 9:5 does not go beyond the Christology of the rest of the New Testament. And if the interpretation of Psalm 45:6-7 which we have in Hebrews 1:8 is correct [which is not open to question] then the Authorised Version of Romans 9:5 does not, even in explicitness, go beyond the Christology of the Old Testament. Finally, the New Testament is by no means averse to the practice of ascribing doxologies to Jesus Christ. There is @ cleat instance of this in Revelation 5:13, ‘And every creature which is in heaven, end on the earth, and under the earth, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing and hhonour and glory and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.” A third passage which explicitly predicates deity of Jesus Christ is ‘Titus 2:13, which in the Authorised Version reads, ‘Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us.” ‘The RSV is slightly more accurate: ‘Awaiting our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our ‘great God and Saviour Jesus Christ’ The New English Bible reads, ‘the splendour of our great God and Saviour Christ Jesus will appear” The context is decisive in favour of identifying ‘the great God’ Saviour.’ Christians are not awaiting any appearance of God the Fathers nor was it He who gave Himself for us, ‘THE DESIGNATION ‘LORD’ Scarcely less significant than these passages are those which speak of Christ as Lord (hurios]. It may indeed, on occasion, mean nothing more than ‘sir,’ ~this is certainly its import in some passages of the Synoptic Gospels where it occurs in the form of address [Aurie]. But when we 28 Thi ynnor of Truthconsider the title against its background it becomes clear that in the higher reaches of is meaning i is almost as emphatic an assertion of deity a8 the designation ‘God? itself. It was used, for example, of the pagan deities ~ as appears in Paul's affirmation, ‘there are gods many and lords many’ {1 Cor. 8:5]. Again, throughout the Roman Empire it was applied to Caesar, not as Head of State, but as an object of religious worship. By refusing to confess ‘kurios Caesar? Christians were protesting that it was illegtinate to eccord divine honour to a mans and 2y con fessing Christ as farios they were insisting that Hee was the lawfil object of worship ~that He was even Caesar's Lord. Yet again, the New ‘Testament clearly intimates that Lord was a cule title, applied te Christ when He was consciously apprehended as an object of worship and adoration. In 1 Corinthians 1:2, for example, Christians are idensified as those who call upon the name of the Lord; and when Paul was troubled by the thorn in the flesh it was tothe Lord he made application, in prayer, for its removal (2 Cor. 12:8} ‘The most important consideration, however, for our understanding of the title Auris isthe fact that it was used in the Septuagint to translate the divine names Adonai and Jehovah. To the Jew none was kurios but the God of Abrabam, of Isaac and of Jacob; and it was as loaded with this significance that the early Church, deliberately and consciously, applied the ttle to Jesus Christ. That the Church acted consciously ~ aad that she meant nothing less than to identify Jesus with Jehovah ~ is clear from the fact chat she apotied to Him passages of the Old Testament which in the first instance clerly referred to Jehovah. Pethaps the most significant of these is in Philippians 2:9-11. Here the whole intelligent universe is represented as confessing, ‘Jesus Christ is Lord,’ and the meaning s clear from the earlier affmation, ‘God hnas given him the name which is above every name.” The name is Lord; it is above every names and in the light ‘of these statements :t can be none other than the ineffable name, Jehovah. Jesus Christ is Jehovah ~that is the confession. And as if to leave n0 possibility whatever of doubt Paul applies to Jesus the words of Isaiah 45:23, which in the first instance referred to Jehovah: ‘Look unto me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I au God, wn there is none else, Thave sworn by myeelf the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousness and shall not return, That unto me every knee shal bot, every tongue shall In several other passages there is an equally unambiguous application to Jesus of Old Testament passages referring to Jehovah, In Mack 1:3, for instance, the Fore-runner is described as, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths stright {2 quotation from Mal. 3:1]. In John 12:41, Isaiah's vision of the glory ‘The Divino Messiah 29of Jehovah, as recorded in the sixth chapter of his prophecy, is specifically applied to Christ: ‘Esaias saw His glory and spake of him,’ In Hebrews 1:10 ff, the words of Psalm 102:25 ff, are referred to the Son: “Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundations of the earth and the heavens are the work of thine hands.” And in 1 Peter 2:3 the Apostle sees in the words, “O taste and sce that the Lord is good,’ an allusion to the graciousness of Christ. These facts make it clear that the Apostolic Church hed no hesitation in applying to Jesus the unsurpessable designation, Jehovah, ‘The absolute significance of the titles God and Lord as applied to Jesus Christ is confirmed by the fact that in numerous passages of the New Testament attributes, functions and prerogatives peculiar to deity are credited to Him. His pre-existence, for example, is clearly affirmed, ‘In the beginning (the absolute beginning, when other existences were called {nto being] the Word was already in being,’ writes John (Jr. 1:1]. And according to Paul, before our Lord humbled himseff by appearing in the form of a servant He already existed in the form of God, [Phil 2:6]. ‘Again, the work of creation is ascribed to Him. ‘All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything mad, [Jn. 1:3] ~"by him ‘were all things created, that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions or principalities or ‘powers: all things were created by him and for him,’ (Col. 1:16] - ‘Thou ‘art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honout and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they ate and were created,’ (Rev. 4:11]. Similarly, the functions of providence ate His: He upholds all things by the Word of His power, (Heb. 1:3], and in him all things consist, [Col 17}. Finally, He is associated with God the Father in doxology and benediction in terms which suggest perfect equality and which, if applied to any creature, would be blasphemous. In so typical a Pauline salutation, for example, as ‘Grace to you end peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ Jesus, no less than the Father, is regarded as the source of grace and peace, and there is none of the sense of incongruity which would be inevitable if the name of any creature were associated with that of God in terms implying community of being and glory. We find the same thing in the concluding benediction of Second Corinthians: ‘The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion ‘of the Holy Ghost be with you all’ In this enumeration not only is the ‘grace of Jesus Christ placed on a level with the love of God, but the name of the Son takes precedence over that of the Father. 30 ‘The Banner of TruthTHE DESIGNATION ‘SON OF MAN’ ‘The titles sheos and kurios as applied to Christ reflect the conviction of the Apostolic Church, But this conviction itself rests upon the self-disclosure of Jesus, which in turn rests upon His own self-consciousness. Obviously the content of this self-consciousness must in lange measure remain for ‘ever hidden. “For what man Kknoweth the things of a man save the spirit ‘of man which is in him? Certainly we are not in @ position to trace the development of the self-consciousness of our Lord. But from His words and actions enough can be learned of His estimate of Himself to lend massive support to the affirmation of His absolute deity. Jesus? characteristic selfdesignation was ‘the Son of Man.’ But we ‘must not infer that this reflects a purely human self-consciousness. The simplistic interpretation whereby ‘Son of Man’ designates His human nature and ‘Son of God” designates His divine, must be dismissed. Certainly the title does point to the humiliation of our Lord. ‘The Son of ‘Man has not where to lay His head, (Mt. 8:20]; the Son of Man must suffer many things, [Mf 8:31]; the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners, (Mr. 26:45]. But it is, nonetheless, the designation of « supernatural person, ‘The indications of this are numerous. For instance, a certain prestige immediately occrues to the title from the circumstance that while it is our Lord’s characteristic self-designation no other New ‘Testament figure, with the sole exception of Stephen [Acts 7:56], refers to our Lord by this name, Again, itis generally agreed that the background to our Lord’s usage is to be found in Daniel’s vision of the Son of Men (Dan. 7:13 ff] This passage does not afford material for an exhaustive understanding of the designation. The question, for example, whether the Son of Man is an individual, representative ot collective figure, cannot be ascertained from Daniel’s vision alone, Every title or concept which the New Testament borrows, even from the Old Testament, is transformed and clevated, more ot less, But Danicl is undoubtedly the background to our Lord’s usage, and we should note the following features of the vision First, in the description of the Son of Man there is no mention of ‘human traits. Secondly, in Jewish apocalyptic literature the Son of Man was a ‘Messianic, eschatological figure, ‘who will appear only at he end of time on the clouds of heaven to judge and to establish the ‘nation of the saints.” We find this exclusively eschatological figure in Daniel, the Book of Enoch and IV Ezra ‘Thirdly, the clouds of heaven, which accompany the Son of Man, are ‘Culmann, The Christology of she New Tertament [SCM], p. 150. ‘The Divine Messiah ainsignia of the divine majesty. This appears from such passages as Iseiah 19:1, ‘Behold, the Lord rideth upon 2 swift coud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it? Similarly Deuteronomy 33:26, “There is none like unto the God of Jeshurun, who tideth upon the hheaven in thy help, and in his excellency on the sky.” ‘Fourth, there is given to the Son of Man a kingdom which is world-wide and everlasting: ‘There was given him dominion, andglory and a kingdom, that all people, nations and languages should serve him: his dominion is ‘an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that ‘which shall not be destroyed.’ (Dan, 7:14]. We should note further that even as referring to the earthly ministry of our Lotd the title is not always related to His lowliness. The Son of Man, even on earth, has authority to forgive sins, (Mk, 2:10]. And there are surely nuances other than those of manhood ané humiliation in the implicit majesty of the statement, ‘whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of Man it shall be forgiven him,’ [Mt. 12:32) ‘There is aso a striking peculiarity in the relation of the Son of Man to the Kingdom of God. This is clearly seen if we compare the parallel statements with which Matthew and Mark preface their narratives of the “Transfiguration, ‘The latter writes, “There be some of them that stand hhete which shall not taste of death till they have seen the kingdom of God ‘come with power,’ [Mk. 9:1]. ‘The corresponding statement in Matthew, however, reads, “There be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom,’ [Mt. 16:28]. ‘We may conclude, then, that the kingdom of God is identical with the kingdom of the Son of Man. ‘Again, the ttle ‘Son of Man’ is not restricted ro tie humiliated Christ. Itis applied also to the exalted Lord. “Hereafter ye shall sce the Son of ‘Man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven,’ [Mr. 26:64]. And in the instance of Stephen’s usage of the title [Aats 7:56] the reference is clearly to the glorified Redeemer, ‘I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God.” ‘Finally, uibute is often paid to the remarkable synthesis effected by our Lord between the concept of the Son of Man and the concept of the Suffering Servant, ‘This appears in such statement as ‘the Son of Man ‘came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life @ ransom for many,’ [M&. 10:45]. Here there is a clear allusion to the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, But it should be remembered that the Suffering Servant is himself, in Isaiah’s portrayal, not a merely forlorn and tragic figure, If we allow, as we must, that Isaiah 52:13-15 is integral to the fifty-third chapter, then the theme, arguably, is not the suffering of 2 The or of Truththe Servant, but His exaltasion ~ or, more precisely, His exaltation through suffering. ‘Behold, my servant shall prosper, he shall be exalted and lifted up, and shall be very high? [Us. 52:13, RSV]. And the fifty-third chapter itself concludes on a note of tragedy but of triumph: ‘Therefore will T divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death,’ (Js, 53:12}. The best commentary on these verses is Philippians 2:8-9, ‘He became obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross. Wherefore, God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name.” Tis clear, then, that the title Son of Man, even when synthesised with the concept of the Suffering Servant, does not designate a purely earthly, ‘human and created figure, It points to @ pre-existent person, intimate ‘with the Ancient of Days, a partaker of His sovereignty, exercising divine prerogatives even during His earthly ministry, representing in His person the kingdom of God, seated now at the right hand of the Father, and appointed to return in divine majesty, and for the purposes of judgment, at the end of the age. [To be continued) THE WAR IN NIGERIA ‘We've been praying for Nigeria for months now, but still that terrible ‘war goes on, It seems as if God is doing nothing.” This is what one woman said to me recently, and though perhaps we might not put it so bluntly, it doubtless sums up what many Christians are thinking. ‘Why isn’t God answering our prayers ?” ‘But the truth is that in the midst of all the suffering and bloodshed, God is answering prayer — marvellously, though perhaps not in quite the way people have been expecting. "When the troubles broke out, many magazines folded up. The Reader’s Digest, despite its mighty resources, closed down its Nigerian edition People then said, “The Challenge will be the next to go.’ True, circulation did drop, but many prayed, and today it has risen higher than any of us dared to hope. And every day the mail van delivers to the Challenge office two sacks of letters from readers seeking spiritual help and counsel, Many of these are from soldiers, Some of thee soldiers are from pagan or merely nominal Christian backgrounds, Going into bettle, they believed that the magic ring on theit finger, the talisman around theit waist, or the juju in their pocker, would keep them from being injared or killed, But they have seen their com- ppanfons, who also trusted in these things, lying dead on the ground beside them, killed by enemy bullets, and their ‘faith’ has been rudely shattered. ‘The harsh facts of war have spoken more eloquently than any sermon from fa church pulpit, And so these men, in their hundreds, have been writing to the Challange Conntelling Department, wanting to know about Jesus Christ, and if there really is hope beyond the grave. DONALD BANKS The Sudan Witness, October 1969