Lesson 6 - Matthew 2 & 3

[Music] as we drink in and deeply reflect on the the beauty and the salt and the light I think that the book of Matthew has been providing us let us also be reminded of something about the author himself our Jewish Matthew was not an eyewitness to anything he was reporting he doesn't claim to be the disciple Matthew was a tax collector while writers of the gospel were usually literary experts often making a living from it as a profession even if it wasn't their only occupation so all indications are this is not the same Matthew that was an original disciple of Christ so Matthew the Gospel writer had to do extensive research of documents for information about Yeshua's life in his ministry and also would have conducted interviews with some folks who may have been I witnesses to it he would have had to familiarize himself with some matters of which he didn't personally have any expertise so he would have sought out those who were knowledgeable in that field and before I say another word I would be remiss if I didn't credit the Holy Spirit and divine inspiration for leading and directing Matthews writing and as an aside he probably mostly if not completely was unaware of God's hand upon him and this was an order to provide us with the truthful with the invaluable information that we have before us today now because he was a Jewish leaver who probably lived in the holy land near to the temple near to synagogue leadership a man who we will soon see had considerable depth of Torah knowledge as well as a solid grasp of Jewish tradition he would have had little to do with pagan astrology because such a thing was shunned especially with the more strict segments of Jewish society thus in his birth story of Jesus wherein he placed considerable relevance on the visitation of the Magi the other Gospel writers never mention it he would have had to seek out those who practiced astrology for their knowledge on the subject now I point this out because I perhaps you two were quite struck with Matthews use of technical astrological terms and phrases that only a few experts would have known terms and phrases to help describe the Magi discovery of the the heavenly portent of a new king of the Jews being born in Judea a portent known in Christianity as the Star of Bethlehem now I suspect that Matthew might not have been all that surprised that pagan stargazers from a distant land had received knowledge of Christ's birth and while it's true that the Magi didn't in any way think of this child is divine or as a messiah but rather as an earthly king nonetheless it was not mere coincidence than in using the celestial zodiac an astrological reckoning they were by Matthews account the fir - no of christ's advent even before the jews did well that might seem odd to us the biblical pattern may just reveal that for his own good reasons this is how god has always intended it when I look at a listing of Old Testament prophecies put together by the classic Christian scholars that predict the coming of a messiah I have yet to run across one that includes the story of Balaam and Balak in the Book of Numbers it probably is one but I've never found it and yet Jewish sages and scholars have for millennia emphasized this story and especially Balaam speech in numbers 24 as they clear as a powerful prophecy about a messiah for Israel that's going to come from the tribe of Judah that seems to even include a celestial portent listen to numbers 24 15 through 17 so he is Balaam made his pronouncement this is the speech of Balaam son of Beor the speech of a man whose eyes have been opened the speech of him who hears God's words who knows what elio knows who sees what should I seize who has fallen yet has open eyes I see him now but not now behold him but not soon a star will step forth from Jacob a scepter will arise from Israel to crush the corners of Moab and destroy all the descendants of shet see Balaam was a pagan Magi just as where the Magi who visited the Christ child in numbers we have Balaam making this incredible prognostic occasion that one would think would only come from the lips of a great sage of Israel or perhaps a venerable Hebrew prophet but know this comes from the mouth of a pagan Magi so why does Matthew give so much attention to the Magi when none of the other Gospel writers even mention them and why doesn't Matthew wonder out loud about the seemingly ironic reality that pagan astrologers were the first to learn of messiahs coming and this was due to some confluence of stars and planets in the sky I could only speculate that because of the Jews belief that the Balaam speech was prophetic of a messiah which included even the mention of a star a Torah account that the learner Jew Matthew was no doubt quite familiar with that it was Matthew then the gospel writer Matthew who put two and two together and he saw the relationship between the Magi visiting the Christ child and Bethlehem and the Balaam story later on to Matthew chapter 2 Matthew again exposes his Jewish mindset and Bible knowledge by connecting a prophecy found in Hosea 11:1 with Yeshua because there we read when Israel was a child I loved him and out of Egypt I called my son so one must ask how does Matthew legitimately transfer the meaning of Hosea's words which clearly has Israel in mind to Yeshua now we discussed last week that the Jews used and continued to use four different methods for interpreting Holy Scripture and one of those standard methods is called Ramez meaning hint hint not only an educated Jew like Matthew would even be aware of these kinds of interpretation techniques and be able to deftly apply them to the situation Joseph Mary and Jesus fleeing to Egypt to avoid being murdered by King Herod so here is early evidence in the book of Matthew that Matthew was determined in his gospel to show his readers something of supreme importance something that has been all but lost within Christianity it is the proper relationship between Christ and the Torah and the prophets and at the same time as we're going to see later questioning if not rejecting many of the views and teachings of the synagogue authorities of that era the scribes and the Pharisees why because so many of those views were based on man-made traditions and customs that were not founded on actual biblical truth so taking Matthew's lead we will continue today to do our best to put on a Jewish mindset in order to best understand what the Jewish Matthew is telling us but also to take the Bible for what it says and avoid filtering those words through long-held Christian tradition now we end in our study last time with the death of King Herod in 4 BC about two years after you she was birth and with Herod's unconscionable slaying of those children in Bethlehem and nearby areas because of his paranoia that the Magi were right a new King of the Jews had been born so that meant Herod's hold on power might be challenged open your Bibles to Matthew chapter 2 Matthew chapter 2 we're gonna start reading at verse 16 go on to the end if you have a complete Jewish Bible that's on page 1225 one two to five so Matthew chapter two verse 16 meanwhile when Herod realized that the Magi had tricked him he was furious and he gave orders to kill all the boys in and around bate let them who were two years old or less calculating from the time that the Magi had told him in this way were fulfilled the words spoken through the Prophet hear me al that's Jeremiah a voice was heard in Ramah sobbing and lamenting loudly it was Rachel sobbing for her children refusing to be comforted because they're no longer alive after Herod's death an angel of ad and I appeared in a dream to Joseph Joseph in Egypt and said get up take the child and his mother go to Eretz Israel the Land of Israel for those who wanted to kill the child are dead so he got up and he took the child and his mother and went back to Ararat sis Royale however when he heard that Ark Elias had succeeded his father Herod as king of Judah he was afraid to go there warned in a dream he was drew to the Galil to the Galilee settled in a town called nuts Sarat Nazareth so that what had been spoken by the prophets might be fulfilled that he would be called an ox Rati now before we move on it's important that we notice something else about Matthew's Gospel that supplies an important backdrop for his presentation it is that there's this strong connection present in Matthew between Moses's life and Yeshua's I don't think it's too strong to say that Matthew makes Jesus a kind of second Moses and while that thought might at first unsettle us when we look at it from the 30,000 foot view it makes sense to begin with in the Torah we hear these words from Moses in Deuteronomy 18 14 through 19 for these nations which you are about to dis possess listen to soothsayers and diviners but you I don't know your God does not allow you to do this I don't I will raise it for you a prophet like me from among yourselves from your own kinsmen you're to pay attention to him just as when you were assembled at Horeb and requested Adonai your God don't let me hear the voice of a deny my god anymore or let me see the great fire ever again if I do all died on that occasion out of and I said to me they are right in what they are saying I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their kinsmen I will put my words in his mouth he will tell them everything I order him whoever doesn't listen to my words which he'll speak and my name he will have to account for himself to me the biggest error that the Hebrews of old and I think believers today make regarding understanding prophecy is that they and we don't take it literally enough when we look back at the prophecies that have already been fulfilled invariably they have hit the nail on the head including details that may have seemed improbable or not comprehensible until these fulfillments finally occurred the near-universal tendency in christian academic circles of teaching prophecy allegorically because the scholar just can't see how the event can happen literally as the Bible predicts takes believers on wild goose chases or builds false expectations and it's completely unnecessary some of this is due to our impatience we want to know the outcome of a prophecy in advance rather than waiting for it to actually happen and the result is that rampant speculation is substituted for fact and then it's adopted by the eager student or congregation as just a settled matter when Moses said that he would raise up a prophet like me like him from among Israel it happened exactly as he said so it should be no surprise to anyone that the Messiah would be that prophet and that the similarities between he and Moses would be extensive I mean one of the reasons I addressed this with you is because many modern Bible scholars and the commentaries right is from commentators who are usually skeptical of the ancient biblical record takes the many similarities do we find here between Jesus and Moses as an indication that the entire story of Christ is suspect and contrived because it bears such a resemblance to Moses and his experiences but they're completely ignoring that such resemblance is exactly what was prophesied by Moses in the Torah and I've explained in previous lessons that perhaps Christ's overriding an underlying theological purpose is to inaugurate a recreate in' genesis opens with the first heavens and earth and the book of revelation ends with the recreation of a new heavens and new earth and Yeshua's at the center of it all therefore it should not be surprising that while Moses was God's first mediator and brought God's Word in stone to God's people Yeshua was God's second and better mediator and was himself God's Word in the flesh brought to God's people Moses was the father's agent of redemption for God's people in one capacity Jesus was also the father's agent of redemption for God's people but in another and even greater capacity I mean I could go on and on with the many similarities but I'm just doesn't permit so just be acutely aware of the issue a Moses connection that Matthew has in mind as we study his gospel now verse 17 explains that with this mass homicide the King hared perpetrated upon helpless children simply because any Jewish boy under two might have been the new king that the Magi came to find it was itself a fulfillment of prophecy according to Matthew he quotes from Jeremiah 31 14 maybe 15 it depends on your Bible version this is what out of nice says a voice is heard in Ramah lamenting and bitter weeping it's Rachel weeping for her children refusing to be comforted for her children because they're no longer alive now Matthew connects Rachel weeping and refusing to be comforted because their children are no longer live with the mass slaughter of Jewish children by Herod that would have devastated the entire Jewish community however contexts everything and so as good students of God's Word we need to continue reading in Jeremiah so now we're gonna go on after 14 this is what Adonai says a voice is heard in Ramah lamenting bitter weeping it's Rachel weeping for her children refusing to be comforted for her children because they are no longer alive this is what ad and I says stop your weeping dry your eyes for your work will be rewarded says odda and I they will return from the enemy's land so there is hope for your future your church your children will return to their own territory when we add in more context we see that although rachel is weeping uncontrollably at the moment god tells her to stop because there's hope be aware that when Jeremiah mentions mentions Rachel who was one of Jacob's wives it is using her name as representative of some or perhaps all of Israel many Christian scholars scratched their heads over Matthew two verse eighteen because the connection between Rachel weeping and the murder of small children in Bethlehem shortly after Jesus birth is week if not close to irrelevant so what's Matthew's intent seems to me that once again we see Matthew's Jewish mindset at work because again he's employing one of the four Jewish methods of Bible interpretation perhaps Ramez although in this case I think it would be the drache method and he does this in order to connect the Jeremiah prophecy to the horrific murdering of Jewish children by Herod in other words Matthew sees a firm relationship between the two events that occurred far apart in history now on the surface Jeremiah's prophecy is not a messianic prophecy but rather it's about return from exile for Israel Jeremiah lived at the time of the Babylonian conquest of Judea that included the destruction of Solomon's Temple and the exile of most of judea's population Genesis 35 19 explains that Rachel died on the way to Efrat interestingly Efrat was an early name for Bethlehem yet Jeremiah's prophecy can't be primarily about the Babylonian exile because Rachel's children follow me Rachel's children are Joseph and Benjamin plus Dan and Naphtali through her handmaiden Bilhah so while in Egypt Rachel's son Joseph fathered two sons of his own Ephraim and monisha ephraim and manasseh together represent the bulk of the ten northern tribes of israel that were conquered by Assyria around 720 BC and then scattered all over their empire the territory of Benjamin was like a buffer state between the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah so there were mixed loyalties among the Benjamites that part of Benjamin that was loyal to the Northern Kingdom when IND exile with them that part that was loyal to the southern kingdom remained in the land but would themselves be exiled upon the Babylonian conquest that occurred 130 years later so God seems to be telling Rachel to stop weeping because all of the exiles of Israel both the northern and southern kingdoms perhaps even the dead ones will eventually return to the Holy Land now notice the common elements of Matthew's narrative that include Egypt Bethlehem and the murder of Israelite children all of these apply both to Rachel's children and to Christ's birth story in the end despite the gut-wrenching disasters associated with the two exiles in the murder of the innocents God says there's hope so hope is actually the theme the underlying connection seems to be that there is hope for Israel's return from exile and there is also a hope that it is the Messiah that will manifest that return the good news is the Messiah has been born a Jewish reader in the first century might catch on to all this that I've just told you about but a Gentile reader oh he would have found a most difficult to understand what Matthew is getting at but now you know starting in Matt and verse 19 we're told that once Herod died an angel came in a dream to Joseph as he and his family were still in Egypt and then they all clear was given to him to return home however when Joseph heard that it was Herod's son Ark alias that replaced his father Joseph decided to go to the Galilee instead of returning to Judea seems that Ark Elias assumed control over Judea Samaria and I timaya Joseph's decision to avoid Judea was a wise one because our Kahless turned out to be at least as brutal as his father in fact his cruelty so alarmed Rome that they finally stepped in and replaced him with a Roman governor in 6 ad and from that point forward only Roman governors ruled Judea in the region Galilee where Joseph took his family and neighbouring Perea they were put under the control of another of Herod's sons Antipas he was somewhat a more reasonable ruler so the area was generally peaceful and secure now for verse 23 and frankly this verse is problematic and there's not much way around it the first half of the verse is simple enough because it identifies Nazareth as the town that Joseph and his family settled in now Nazareth like almost all of Galilee was agricultural it was small it was an insignificant place perhaps Joseph chose it just for that reason so that they could be inconspicuous as a protection for his son Yeshua the problem part of this versus the second half Matthew claims the fulfillment of yet another prophecy and supposedly quotes scripture from some unnamed prophet that says that the Messiah will be called a Nazarene or in Hebrew a not sruthi no known scripture or combination in the scriptures does that several possibilities to solve this to limit have been suggest that I'm just going to briefly go over them first is that the intention was to say that Christ became a Nazarite nothing in the New Testament nothing in his actions imply that he ever took the vows of a Nazarite second is that the meaning is that a Nazarene is what a resident of Nazareth is called and third is that the word comes from the Hebrew term Nazaire which means branch so that connects issue at Isaiah 11:1 but a branch will emerge from the trunk of Jesse a chute will grow from his roots now I'm a simple guy so I favor simple solutions in John's Gospel chapter 1 verses 44 through 46 we read Philip was from Bethsaida I'd miss Ida the town where Andrew and caifa Peter lived Philip found not to nil and told him we found the one that Moses wrote about in the Torah also the prophets it's yeshua ben yosef of from not Sarat in the tang Nathanael answered him that Sarat can anything good come from there come and see Philip said to him see the point is this that's Aaron Nazareth was apparently a town there was often the brunt of jokes for some reason can anything good come from that town so people who live there were considered to be living in just a worthless place therefore any resident of Nazareth took on that same worthless character as the town don't we all make a junk about some place called podunk you want to be at podunk Ian's so to be called a Nazarene and not swati identified a person who lives in a place that was just unworthy of mention to me that fits very well with the characterization of Yeshua as a humble man from a humble place a messiah and a king who was anything but prominent aristocratic charismatic and appearance all things that humans tend to value but God doesn't let's move on to Matthew chapter 3 Matthew chapter 3 if you have a complete Jewish Bible it's at the bottom of page 1225 1225 it was during those days that Johanna and John the immerser arrived in the desert of Judah and began proclaiming the message turn from your sins to God for the kingdom of heaven is near this is the man Yeshua Isaiah was talking about when he said the voice of someone crying out in the desert prepare the way about on I make strata straight paths for him Jochen on John wore clothes of camels hair with a leather belt around his waist and his food was locusts and wild honey people went out to him from yerushalaim from all of Judah from the whole region around the Jordan confessing their sins they were immersed by him in the Jordan River but when Yohan saw many of the parish Eamon suit came Pharisees and Sadducees coming to be immersed by him he said to them you snakes who warned you to escape the coming punishment if you have really turned from your sins to God produce fruit that will prove it and don't suppose you can comfort yourselves by saying Avraham is our Father for I tell you that God can raise up for our Ahom sons from these stones already the axe is at the root of the trees ready to strike every tree that doesn't produce good fruit is going to be chopped down throwing in that fire it's true that I am immersing you in water so that you might turn from sin to God but the one coming after me he's more powerful than I I'm not even worthy to carry his sandals he will immerse you in the rug ha'qodesh the Holy Spirit and in fire he has with him is winnowing for it and he will clear out his threshing for gathering his wheat into the barn but burning up the straw with unquenchable fire then you shoe akane from the galilee to the jordan to be immersed by johan be open and tried to stop him you are coming to me i had to be immersed by you however yushua answered him let it be this way now because we should do everything righteousness requires then Johan John let him and as soon as Yeshua had been immersed he came up out of the water and at that moment heaven was opened and he saw the Spirit of God coming down upon him like a dove had a voice from heaven said this is my son whom I love I am well pleased with him in this chapter Matthew quickly turns from the birth of Messiah and then all the circumstances that surrounded that to John the Baptist in fact Matthew suddenly jumps over about 30 years that is Christ entire childhood is not discussed the Gospel of Mark does the same thing only Luke's Gospel spends any time which issue his youth and if you'd like to know more about it just read Luke 2:21 through 52 now most scholars attribute this curiosity to Matthew essentially copying marks interests and style that we've already discussed that the historical record provided by the earliest church fathers is that whatever copying was done was done by mark since Matthews was the first gospel account written according to the same early church fathers but I think that what we need to be focusing on is that Matthew was certainly a Jew and near as certainly so was Mark Luke on the other hand was just as certainly and Gentile he was dr. Luke the one who accompanied Paul on some of his journeys so for the Jews Matthew and Mark Yeshua's youth was relatively unimportant it's his adult life that mattered but for the Gentile Luke who thought and and wrote as a Gentile and for Gentiles we now remember how he constructed Christ genealogy not as Hebrews did but rather as Gentile Romans did in his era while Yeshua's youth was an important part of Luke's story and his mostly Gentile readers and probably his patron would have wanted to know about verse 1 begins in those days or during those days see this is just an indefinite term that simply means some amount of time has passed and entirely new circumstances are about to be discussed in this case the time that has passed from the end of chapter 2 is three decades plus or minus a couple years this new circumstance involves a very strange yet passionate man called John the Baptist now John of course was not his birth name it's just an English sized version of young men and Hebrew Yochanan means you Jose shows favor not God Jose favor Matthew characterizes John as a preacher and his starting point of preaching is said to be in the wilderness of Judea now for anyone who's been to Israel Jerusalem and south of it it quickly becomes apparent that the wilderness wilderness does not mean densely forested hills and valleys rather is a stark and mysterious desert matthew also always refers to john interestingly as John the Baptist not just John mark tends to do that by the way he tends to just called John John now an interesting feature in this chapter is that just as Matthew jumped completely over Yeshua's youth he does the same thing with John the Baptist it's often stated in Christian commentaries that this omission assumes that John and Yahshua were already well known within the Jewish community as were their birth circumstances though was so there was just no need to mention it perhaps however my view is that in Jewish thought in writing unless the point of a biblical narrative is about a person's time as a youth like when David was as a teenager faced down the menacing Goliath partly is a humiliation of the adult Israelites who were too scared to do it themselves then the Hebrew cultural value system of placing more value on mature adults than on infants and children that's what was at play here further since all the Gospels are about a religious matter and since in Jewish society at that time a man had to be thirty years old to be considered eligible to be a religious authority then for Matthew what those two men did is youth just wasn't relevant now when we consider that Yeshua grew up and distant and tiny Nazareth and John was this strange man who lived the later part of his youth in a desolate desert then whatever encounters the Jewish public may have had with these two as youth must have been few and far between so it's difficult to imagine the local Jewish society being familiar with Yeshua's and Johan ins infancy and youth now it is significant for us to gain what the term baptized meant to Jews in the first century because whenever whatever we find in the New Testament about baptize and baptizing is meant to be taken in that context we're gonna discuss this at length to begin our next lesson what I can tell you for the moment is that Christian tradition has altered the meaning of the term and the means of performing it now John the Baptist brings two critical messages to the Jewish public repent for your sins and the kingdom of God is near they are at once two different things and yet they are intimately related as david stern's aptly says in his New Testament commentary the idea of repenting because the kingdom of God is at hand mostly conjures up a picture of some weirdly dressed guy standing on a makeshift box at a busy street corner shouting at nobody in particular and people of waiting and looking at it so even in the church the idea of repenting because the kingdom of God is near can bring a communal winds upon congregation members so much so that the most popular of TV evangelists tries to avoid using those terms John really doesn't say to repent he says turn from your sins now the English term repent is an excellent word to abbreviate John's words see the Hebrew word teshuva embodies this concept literally it means to turn or to return in its Jewish religious sense it means to turn from one sins and return to God so it doesn't only mean to quit your bad behavior it also includes sincerely and personally re committing one's life to the Lord and to his ways you know an atheist can notice his or her bad behaviors and stop them but that's not biblical repentance reforming one's relationship with the God of the by is the other necessary ingredient further Jews rightly acknowledge that even this act of the human will is set into motion by God we can only repent by God's grace all else is just a short-lived emotional response to our conscience the second part of John the Baptist message is that the kingdom of God is near what exactly is the kingdom of God what does he mean it's near and further what relationship does that have to repentance we're gonna discuss that and more next time [Music] yes you [Music] you

Channel: Torah Class

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Keywords: Matthew, New Testament, Tom Bradford, Torah Class, Seed of Abraham, Christ, God, Jesus, Yeshua, Son of God, Bible, Hebrew Roots, Christianity, Bible Study, Christian, Sermon on the Mount, Jews, Beatitudes

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Length: 46min 48sec (2808 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 02 2020