In the previous chapter I dealt with the identification of the Jews in Bible history. In what follows I examine the close connection which exists between the ultimate destiny of the Jewish people, and the establishment of the Kingdom of God in Bible prophecy. This aspect of the Bible is not widely understood by gentile Christianity or conveyed in Christian teaching. It was however, one of the underlying assumptions of Jesus’ followers that the triumph of the Kingdom was to coincide with the redemption of the people of Israel, and the return of the exiles to the promised land (Acts 1:6). Christ never said anything to disabuse them of this notion. (On this point it is important to understand that whereas modern Christians think in terms of "the second coming of Christ", the disciples pictured Christ as setting up the Kingdom in their time, ie. at his "first coming".)

Christianity is by definition a Messianic religion (the word "Christ" is simply the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew Mashiach, or "Messiah", meaning "the anointed one"). The whole nature of Christianity has been profoundly shaped by Old Testament prophecies of a future individual appointed by God to redeem Israel and establish God’s reign on earth.

This is not to say that most Christians in the world today are Messianic in outlook, insofar as they eagerly await the return of Christ to set up the kingdom of God on earth, strictly in accordance with those prophecies. However, it is still true that Jesus’ authority was founded largely upon the validity of his claims to Messiahship, and the acceptance of these claims by his Jewish disciples. For example, throughout the New Testament he is called the "son of David", a reference to the expectation that God would re-establish the Davidic line of rulership in the future kingdom. The coming of the Messianic age occupied a crucial place in the thinking of the Christians of the New Testament period - however much of a side issue it may have become to Christians in the modern era.

The prophecies concerning the "latter days" were central to Christianity, as it was originally understood by Christ’s followers. In their turn, the Jews themselves are the main participants in Bible prophecy. It is the redemption of the Jewish people by the God of Israel, and the final destruction of the nations which have persecuted them, which provides the setting for the working out of God’s plan and the establishment of his rule on earth in the coming millennium. Even the false religious system which leads the world astray in the last days is called "Babylon" in the book of Revelation - a reference to the nation which took the Jews captive in the Old Testament. The prophecies speak of the salvation of the people of Israel by being brought back into their own land (hence the significance of the re-establishment of the state of Israel). They speak literally of the rise and fall of nations and powerful world leaders, and political and religious systems, preceding the establishment of the Messianic kingdom. Many Christians see these prophecies in purely symbolic terms, but the Bible unequivocally places these events in the realm of world history. If we disbelieve the Bible in this respect why should we believe any of it? The prophecies also picture the Jewish people undergoing a spiritual renewal which leads to many of them accepting Jesus as the Messiah. The name of Jesus in Hebrew - Joshua or Jeshua - after all means "Yahweh is salvation". Arguably this conversion must happen before the Messiah actually reappears on the earth.

A commonly expressed attitude among Christians today is that while they accept the validity of Bible prophecy, they regard Old Testament prophecies about Israel as now applying to the Christian church. They cite passages such as Mat.21:43:

The problem with this view is simply that it amounts to God breaking his promises. Many Christians are happy to accept that God really meant what he said to the ancient Israelites when he promised to resettle them in their own land, under a Messianic ruler, but now, because of the advent of Christ, these promises are transferred to the Christians. Let’s say I promise to give you a million dollars next year, and then when the time comes around I say to you "About that million dollars I owe you, I have decided to give it to someone else, but I’ve still kept my promise about giving a million dollars haven’t I?" This is cold comfort for the intended recipient, but this kind of reasoning is routinely employed in order to deprive the people of Israel of promises that were solemnly attested to by God, and not a mere human being as in the above analogy.

The passage from Matthew quoted above was not a reference to the Jewish people as a whole, but to those parts of it which refused to see the truth of Christ, such as the scribes and Pharisees, and other unbelieving Jews. Note that the believing "multitudes" mentioned in this episode (Mat.21:46) were themselves Jews - not gentiles!

It is also argued that the promises made to Israel in the Old Testament were merely conditional upon observance of the covenant, and because the Israelites have not been a righteous nation, this covenant has been revoked at some unspecified time, and the promises withdrawn.

No-one disputes that God promises to raise his people to the status of a holy nation and a kingdom of priests should they turn to him in heart-rent repentance and begin to walk before him as a righteous nation. On this basis Israel would have been a greatly blessed and exalted nation over the centuries and millenia down to the present day. They did not do this and have been especially punished and cursed for their iniquity. But there is no suggestion that God gave his people only so much time to change their ways - or else! Jer.31 and Ezek.36 attest to the fact that God himself will cleanse, purify and convert Israel into a righteous and holy nation! They will be made worthy of God’s salvation in the fullness of time. If they had chosen the correct path they would have avoided having to learn things the hard way! In all of this there is the overriding principle that for the sake of God’s holy name, and for no other reason, will God himself bring Israel to repentance. It will not be to Israel’s glory - but to the glory of God himself - that Israel will be turned into a righteous nation. In Ezek.36:22-27 God declares:

The "condition" that Israel become a righteous nation is in fact fulfilled by such passages as that quoted above, but there are further aspects of the whole covenant relationship between God and his people which are not generally acknowledged by Christians who take the "conditional only" view.

There exists in the Old Testament a whole array of promises which were not actually made to the people of Israel, but instead to their forebears - primarily Abraham, because of his faith and righteous conduct, and subsequently reaffirmed to his descendants, Isaac and Jacob. The people of Israel were not themselves promised anything as such, they were merely to be the beneficiaries of promises which were made to the patriarchs. Once made, these promises were irrevocable, and the Israelites were destined to benefit through the righteousness of their ancestors - not their own. In this sense they were entirely unconditional. These promises may be found in Gen.17:2-5, 28:3-4, 35:11-12, and 48:19.

In passages such as Gen.12:7, 13:14-17, and 26:3, it is further promised that the descendants of Abraham will possess the land of Canaan in perpetuity. When read together with the Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament, it appears that the Israelites will finally be settled in the land for all time in the Messianic age. Accordingly, it follows that the claims of other nations (such as the Palestinian Arabs) to this land are rendered null and void. The opposition of the Arab nations to the state of Israel is curious when one considers that the Islamic religion, which they all nominally adhere to, is founded upon a belief in the God of the Old Testament, and possesses a deep reverence for such personalities as Moses and Abraham. Moslems accept Abraham as the father of the Arab people (through his son Ishmael), and therefore presumably must accept that he is the father of the Jews as well, and yet they refuse to accept the promises of the Bible as a relevant factor in the debate!

The Palestinians have about as much right to the land of Israel today as the Canaanites, Amalekites, Hittites, and Philistines had at the time of Joshua. As far as the Bible is concerned, they simply have no right to this land at all! It is fitting that the people who have been displaced by Israel in modern times should be called Palestinians, because this word is derived from the name of the ancient enemies of Israel, the Philistines.

Any claims to a right of co-occupation of the land with the people of Israel through shared descent from Abraham is inapplicable, since the promises to the patriarchs eventually settled on the sons of Jacob (note Ex.6:8 "And I will bring you into the land which I swore to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; I will give it to you [the Twelve Tribes] for a possession."). This is epitomised by the great drama of Israel’s conquest of Canaan an the displacement of the Canaanites, which involved only Jacob’s descendants. The ultimate destiny of the promised land is prophetically linked to the historical events associated with the conquest of the land by Israel alone, unconnected with any other people.

What about passages, such as Ezek.47:21-23, which commanded the Israelites to allot portions of the land to "the aliens" which dwell among them, as if they were Israelites by inheritance? Surely this applies to the modern Palestinians. But this passage, and those concerning hospitality to "strangers", clearly refer to isolated individuals and families, not entire national entities like the present day Palestinians. If this were not so it would conflict with the divine command to evict foreign nations given at the time of the conquest of Canaan. Any other interpretation makes a mockery of the biblical principle of inheritance regarding occupation of the land of Israel, particularly the division of the land between the tribes set out in Ezek.47. If the gift is not one of exclusive occupation of the land, and contemplates co-occupation by all and sundry nations, it constitutes a rather empty gesture on the part of God. If the land is not intended exclusively for Israel, it is difficult to see the value of the Old Testament promises, and is certainly contrary to the exultant spirit in which they were made.

What should be the Christian attitude to political Zionism and the Arab-Israeli conflict? After all many Arabs affected by the dispute are Christians by religion. Should not their interests take precedence over those of people who are not even Christians? This question cannot be divorced from the picture of Israel as the fulfilment of biblical prophecy. Of course modern secular Israel is not the righteous, holy society envisaged by the prophets (neither was ancient Israel!). Nor is it inevitable that everything Israel does in the political sphere is perfectly right and just. Nevertheless, Bible believing Christians should have a heightened awareness of just how desperate evil men have been down through the ages to completely destroy the Jews - from Haman to Hitler. In this sense ideas of compromise on the part of the Israelis should be treated with the utmost scepticism. Moreover, whilst you may oppose any aspect of the Israeli state politically, as soon as you adopt a position which mitigates against exclusive occupation of the land of Israel by the Jews, you are putting yourself at odds with the Bible - the Jewish Bible - and thereby the religion of Jesus Christ.

The major promises regarding the return of the Jews to the land of Israel are set out as follows:

The prophet Isaiah preached in the Northern Kingdom of Israel in the 8^th Century B.C. It is in the writings of Isaiah that we find the following passage of scripture:

The very setting of this triumphant and moving prophecy of the millennial age is the ancient capital of Israel, Jerusalem, also known in the Bible as "Zion".

In Isa.9:6-7 we find an equally well known prophecy:

This is one of the foundational Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament and yet many people take it for granted. To start with it is an affirmation that the coming Messiah would rule on the throne of David, which constituted the royal line of the House of Israel (see also Ezek.37:24-25).

An even more significant aspect of this prophecy is that the Messiah would possess divine characteristics. Looking back over the millennia from the perspective of two thousand years of Christian culture, it seems obvious to us that this was a prediction of Jesus Christ. But let us view this passage from a Jewish perspective of two thousand years ago. If we had never heard of Jesus Christ but believed the words of this prophecy literally, we would be living in expectation of the appearance of a human being ("...a child is born"), who in some mysterious way would come to be recognised as God himself ("his name will be called ... mighty God"). With these words we see that the appearance in history of a human being who comes to be seen as God in the flesh is an essentially Jewish kind of idea, not simply a retrospective validation of gentile Christianity! Such a man should have arisen in Jewish history, or should be expected by the Jews. If he hasn’t yet come, he should be expected to come. If this man has come and was not Jesus, then who was he? The point is however that the whole concept of the Christian Messiah rightfully belongs to the Jewish religion, and this underscores the essential Jewishness of the whole Christian phenomenon. Of course the theological objection to accepting Jesus, for religious Jews, is the first commandment ("You shall have no gods before me"). For Jewish people, Jesus is simply another false God competing for their devotion. Nevertheless, the words of Isaiah illustrate that the life of Jesus and his claims to divine status are firmly grounded in Judaism, and do not simply represent some entirely alien religious teaching.

The dual nature of the Messiah arises elsewhere in Judaism. This has a bearing on the problem Christians face in demonstrating from the Bible that the Messiah must come in two stages. This idea is nowhere stated in the scriptures explicitly. It should be noted however that the Jewish religion itself speaks of a Messianic figure who is slain according to the prophecy in Zech.12:10. Amazingly this Messiah is described in the Talmud (Sukkah 52a) as the son of Joseph! A second Messiah is referred to as the "King Messiah" - the son of David. Jesus of Nazareth was known by both names.

The suffering servant aspect of Christ in the Bible, as well as the Joseph Messiah of the Talmud, is borne out by Christ’s dying words on the cross. It is commonly thought that when Jesus says "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" he is expressing religious doubt. People take these words literally, on face value, and fail to discern an underlying meaning of profound importance. They miss the wood for the trees. Jesus was not so much saying "Father, why have you done this to me?" He was reciting the words of the 22^nd Psalm, written hundreds of years before the time of Jesus, which is arguably a prophecy of the Messiah in his sacrificial role.

The reference to this Psalm by Christ is important because the followers of Jesus were convinced that Christ was going to establish the kingdom of God in their time. These words place the whole life of Christ at his first appearance in its proper perspective, and identify him as a substitutionary sacrifice for man’s sins prior to the coming of the triumphant kingly Messiah.

Christian teaching is replete with references to God’s "grace". To many people, untutored in theology, this is just one more obscure Christian doctrine. What grace really amounts to is this. Human history proceeds according of God’s purposes. We cannot get around the simple fact that God allows sin and evil. Whilst God is not the author of sin, he is nevertheless responsible for its existence. In the form of Christ, God himself comes to earth and experiences evil and suffering (as well as temptation), and thereby takes upon himself full responsibility for his own creation. The element of "grace" is now the reconciliation of God with an evil world which he has permitted, and accordingly the reconciliation between sinful man and God.

The suffering Messiah theme is repeated in Isa.53:3-9:

There is a sense in which these words apply to all of God’s people. The sufferings endured are in the service of God, who perfects his power in the weakness and vulnerability of his human servants (2 Cor.12:9). This is especially true of the Jews.

The main purpose of Isaiah’s prophecies is to convey a picture of a restored and glorified Zion, exalted above the nations:

The prophet Jeremiah wrote around about the time of the Babylonian captivity (c.625-565 B.C.) and thus from the perspective of the destruction and exile of both Israel and Judah. In chapter 3 we read about how these disasters have resulted from the people’s apostasy, and in verse 18, how the Israelites will be brought back into the promised land in the Messianic age ("Jerusalem shall be called the throne of the LORD" Jer.3:17). As with Isaiah the second exodus is referred to in 16:14-15:

In 23:5-6 the prophet states: