Moses, the most prominent Jewish prophet, never says a word about a messiah supposed to re-establish the Israelites as a nation under God. And yet this messianic king is the most anticipated religious figure of the entire Jewish scriptures? Moses predicts the Israelites' future disobedience and destructions, as well as rehabilitation, but never speaks in that context of the royal messiah supposed to achieve what they would later claim will be precisely his role Deut31-32. Simply put, this end times savior is a post-mosaic development meant at consoling the exiled Jews. There is no notion of a messianic salvific figure anywhere in the 5 books of Moses. There is no notion of a messianic salvific figure anywhere in the 5 books of Moses. This is significant because the Torah, in terms of authority ranks higher than other parts of the Hebrew scriptures. In orthodox judaism, the books that comprise the bible are arranged in descending order of inspiration. First the Torah considered word for word divinely inspired, then the books of the various prophets which God motivated the prophets to write without telling them exactly what to write, then lastly the ketuvim or writings in which God had no direct influence. Given the cosmic importance of the messiah, we should expect a mention of the person, or even the concept in the Books of Moses, but nothing.
The fact is that by Jesus' time and their successive humiliations at the hands of their enemies, the prophecy of Deut18, predicting the coming of a legislating and governing figure that is to to establish a new nation under a new law, which they will be bound to follow and support, became garbled with a davidic royal, supposed to bring back their own former glory above the nations, as well as re-introduce their own law that became obsolete with the loss of their right to exercize it. This is seen by their vague allusion to "the prophet" on one side and "the messiah" on the other, when they came questionning John the Baptist as to his identity, as reported in the NT. They knew this prophet was still awaited but lost the purpose of the prophecy related to him, as well as the indicators that would lead them to recognize him. However, the evidence was not blotted out entirely hence some among the most learned Jews in the prophet Muhammad's time claiming to
"recognize him as they know their own sons".
In the Septuagint, the Greek in Exod3:14, has God telling Moses
"i am/ego eimi the existing one/o on. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: 'O ON (mistranslated as "I am") has sent me to you".
"o on" means "the being or the existing one", it is never used for Jesus. The word used in Jn8:58 for "I am" is "ego eimi". In the Greek rendition of Exod3:14, God identifies himself as o on -The Being- not ego eimi as in John's Gospel Jn8:58. The expression ego eimi(i am) is used all over the NT for Jesus and others.
The Torah in Ex3:14 was not first expressed in Greek anyway, neither was Greek Jesus' language. The original Hebrew of exodus states "Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh" meaning "I will be what I will be". In "Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh" Ehyeh is a first person future tense conjugation of the verb "to be". Interestingly, Christian bibles themselves correctly translate Ehyeh as "I will be" just 2 verses earlier. The phrase conveys the sense of eternity, because God is unchanging, as stated in
Mal3:6"I the Lord do not change".
The Christian concept of incarnation obviously implies change.
When Jesus answers, as the Greek translators reported
Jn8:58"before Abraham was born, I am"
he is portrayed, at most, as referring to his prophetic role among the Israelites. Nowhere does it hint to eternity and neither does it indicate how long Jesus supposedly lived before Abraham. 2 verses up it says
"Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day"
(the Midrash on Gen15:18 say Abraham saw a vision of the entire history of his descendants).
So Just like Jesus preexisted in God's plan prior to Abraham's physical existence and Abraham saw this plan that would later unfold, Heb11:10 describes Abraham seeing a future city that is yet to be built. In 1Pet1:20 Jesus was "chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times". Chosenness in God's foreknowledge doesnt entail pre-incarnate existence, or existence before birth as in Jer1:5 or Isa49:1 or Judges16:17 where Jeremiah and Isaiah and Samson are chosen before being born to fulfill specific functions. Rev13:8 says Jesus is slain before the creation of the world and in the Jewish apocryphal "Testament of Moses" 1:14 Moses "was prepared from the beginning of the world to be the mediator of the covenant". The NAS translation of Acts 2:23 understands that principle when it says Jesus is a man
"delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God".
Jesus saying I AM HE simply means he is the planned prophet to the Jews, before Abraham was born "before Abraham was born, ego eimi". Previously in Jn4:25-26 a woman asked Jesus when is the annointed one coming. He answers ego eimi = I am he, rendered
"I who speak to you AM HE".The trinitarian bias of bible translators is exposed if one looks at the same Greek that is rendered "I am he" in Jn8:24 (or the one i claim to be) while in v58 its only "I am". When Paul answered "I am" in Acts 26:29 he wasnt claiming divinity and neither was the blind whom Jesus healed. I AM/EGO EIMI simply draws strong attention to the person in question.
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