Prophecy In Reverse

[HoustonHorn]

I'm reading Lost Christianities right now and have a couple of Bart Ehrman's other books waiting in line to be read. One of the points that he keeps bringing up is that the people that copied the Bible, and he's referring to the New Testament, made changes; some subtle, some not; some innocent, some not. This got me thinking that maybe the same thing happened with the Old Testament. It seems possible, even likely, that the early Christians could have edited the Old Testament so that the "thousands of prophecies that Jesus fulfilled" were actually in the OT. With the high percentage of illiterate people, which would lead to very few actually having read the books, it seems like a pretty safe play to try and convince people that the so-called prophecies were fulfilled.

 

Any thoughts?

[Antlerman]

I'm reading Lost Christianities right now and have a couple of Bart Ehrman's other books waiting in line to be read. One of the points that he keeps bringing up is that the people that copied the Bible, and he's referring to the New Testament, made changes; some subtle, some not; some innocent, some not. This got me thinking that maybe the same thing happened with the Old Testament. It seems possible, even likely, that the early Christians could have edited the Old Testament so that the "thousands of prophecies that Jesus fulfilled" were actually in the OT. With the high percentage of illiterate people, which would lead to very few actually having read the books, it seems like a pretty safe play to try and convince people that the so-called prophecies were fulfilled.

 

Any thoughts?

I'm not an expert on this by any means, but I don't think that would fit what we have. The Septuagint (LXX) was around before Christianity and is the Greek translation of the OT. This is where the error of the Virgin birth by Matthew comes from, in his "understanding" that verse from Isaiah as prophesy of the Christ, and using the mistranslated word in the Greek LXX from the original Hebrew to mean a virgin. He then runs with it with the whole Mary and Bethlhem supporting story line. The passage actually refers to Isaiah’s wife.

 

The Massoretic text which the OT is translated from was edited and copied by a group of Jews from the 7th to 10th century CE. My understanding is that the discovery of the Dead Sea scrolls which predates Christianity confirms much of the accuracy to the Massoretic texts? There are many similarities and also some differences from the Massoretic text and the earlier LXX.

 

What you really have with the "fulfilled" prophecies of the OT in the NT, is really nothing more than poor scholarship in language and hermeneutics by the founders of the Christian faith, trying to connect it to Judaism in a story of their hero of their mystery religion. It's not much different IMO, than what you see with any one of the 30,000 different sects of Christianity today that each have a different interpretation of various sacred texts. The only difference is these particual interpretations were the ones that got canonized into a book that became sacred to the religious institution, the rest were tossed out and branded as "heresy" by the political machine of the religion. What better way to win out over your competition than to demonize them?

[diggin]

I'm reading Lost Christianities right now and have a couple of Bart Ehrman's other books waiting in line to be read. One of the points that he keeps bringing up is that the people that copied the Bible, and he's referring to the New Testament, made changes; some subtle, some not; some innocent, some not. This got me thinking that maybe the same thing happened with the Old Testament. It seems possible, even likely, that the early Christians could have edited the Old Testament so that the "thousands of prophecies that Jesus fulfilled" were actually in the OT. With the high percentage of illiterate people, which would lead to very few actually having read the books, it seems like a pretty safe play to try and convince people that the so-called prophecies were fulfilled.

 

Any thoughts?

I'm not an expert on this by any means, but I don't think that would fit what we have. The Septuagint (LXX) was around before Christianity and is the Greek translation of the OT. This is where the error of the Virgin birth by Matthew comes from, in his "understanding" that verse from Isaiah as prophesy of the Christ, and using the mistranslated word in the Greek LXX from the original Hebrew to mean a virgin. He then runs with it with the whole Mary and Bethlhem supporting story line. The passage actually refers to Isaiah’s wife.

 

The Massoretic text which the OT is translated from was edited and copied by a group of Jews from the 7th to 10th century CE. My understanding is that the discovery of the Dead Sea scrolls which predates Christianity confirms much of the accuracy to the Massoretic texts? There are many similarities and also some differences from the Massoretic text and the earlier LXX.

 

Good job, Antlerman, I agree. Here is a report on what the C.E. scribes did to insure the integrity of the Hebrew text: http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/bib-docu.html

 

 

What you really have with the "fulfilled" prophecies of the OT in the NT, is really nothing more than poor scholarship in language and hermeneutics by the founders of the Christian faith, trying to connect it to Judaism in a story of their hero of their mystery religion. It's not much different IMO, than what you see with any one of the 30,000 different sects of Christianity today that each have a different interpretation of various sacred texts. The only difference is these particual interpretations were the ones that got canonized into a book that became sacred to the religious institution, the rest were tossed out and branded as "heresy" by the political machine of the religion. What better way to win out over your competition than to demonize them?

 

Here, I disagree in part. I am hoping to get Ehrman's book "The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture" soon to verify what I've been hearing, that many liberties were taken with the text to bolster non-Biblical, "mystery religion" concepts as you state. Many of the Gnostic and neo-Platonic ideas came to the front and gained control of the church. Believers in simpler concepts, such as Jesus being a man who was the son of God, not God the son, were systematically hunted down and exterminated.

 

There was an interesting story about the settlement of Rakow in Poland -- which flourished for a time and then was destroyed by "orthodox" Christians. http://www.socinian.org/polish_socinians.html

 

Take a look at info on the Chester Beatty papyri, though -- I think they would tend to indicate an early date for the NT writings -- around 200 C.E. http://www.kchanson.com/papyri.html#NTP Notice that it includes the standard 4 gospels, John 2nd, and a scroll called "The epistles of Paul" which includes Hebrews 2nd, after Romans. And the Revelation (middle chapters) all before 250 C.E.

[trashy]

Analysis of OT writing, specifically prophetic text, indicates that prophecies were less accurate in the short term and more accurate in the long term. For example, lists of kings were typically less accurate at the time the text indicated to have been written, but were most accurate at a point in time far into the future. This causes many scholars to conclude that the texts were, in fact, written at the end of the supposedly predicted period which would explain why the writers were most familiar with recent names but not so familiar with ancient ones.

[Fweethawt]

I think you guys are missing Houstonhorns point.

 

What he means by reverse prophecy is this.

 

Example -

*Today I write*

 

And there shall come a time when He who is known throughout all ages, shall come into the temple and perform miracles the likes of which have not been seen unto this day.

 

*over time, people get tired of hearing about it and begin to lose "faith" in it*

 

*So, 2,000 years later I write a story that "confirms" the prophecy took place*

 

And so, in the latter days, He who has been known throughout all of the ages went into the temples and spoke with the men of God. He did many great things in that time. Such great works did He, that none shall ever be likened unto him.

 

 

And there you have it. A prophecy written to give "hope", hope eventually wanes, the people grow restless and a conclusive passage is written to make it seem as though the prophecy did happen.

 

The ignorant people go, "Oh! Okay! So it did happen already! " And they go about their merry little ways thinking that they have some sort of "truth".

 

And since the final "prophecy" was written in such a way to make them believe that something like that will never happen again (since it never happened in the first place), the ignorant people never realize that stuff like that (magic and "prophesy") doesn't occur in the first place.

 

So I wouldn't call it "prophecy in reverse".

 

The term 'reverse prophecy' fits much better.

[Young Mother Atheist]

I think it is most accurate to realize that the Old Testament prophecies had nothing to do with the New Testament. In all the reading I have done, the prophecies were made for more short term purposes and just never happened. It was convenient, then, for the writer of Matthew to go back and pick up some of the Old Testament prophecies to strengthen the Christ story (regardless of if his motivation was pure or not). Because the prophecies are so vague, as in fortune telling, it is very likely that some person will come along and be a revolutionary figure if given enough time. Then, the prophecy can all of a sudden apply to that person, even though it was never intended to. The people that heard the prophecy in the Old Testament thought it was going to happen soon...not hundreds of years down the road.

 

I found Asimov's Guide to the Bible very helpful on this issue (specifically, his analysis of Matthew).

 

Also, for those who are very interested, I have a very lengthly and scholarly writing from an Atheist website on Bible Errancy (I think mostly prophecy). I have read a little of it, and it put the whole Bible prophecy thing into perspective for me. Just email me if you'd like a copy.

 

So those are my thoughts.