The Case for the Real Jesus

by Lee Strobel

  With facts, logic, and clarity, he counters the “careless language,” “massive amounts of oversimplification and attention to detail,” and “flights of fancy” found in so many “greatly overstated” works on the topic.93

  “It is clear that the liberal arguments exhibit astoundingly bad scholarship. Indeed, this conclusion may be too generous,” he said with characteristic candor.94 His passion bleeds through the pages:

  Which mystery gods actually experienced a resurrection from the dead? Certainly no early texts refer to any resurrection of Attis. Attempts to link the worship of Adonis to a resurrection are equally weak. Nor is the case for a resurrection of Osiris any stronger…. And of course no claim can be made that Mithras was a dying and rising god. French scholar André Boulanger concluded: “The conception that the god dies and is resurrected in order to lead his faithful to eternal life is represented in no Hellenistic mystery religion.”95

  Nash summarized seven succinct arguments against Christian dependence on the mystery religions.96 First, “copycat” proponents often illogically assume that just because two things exist side by side, one of them must have caused the other. Second, many alleged similarities are exaggerated or fabricated. Writers frequently use language borrowed from Christianity to describe pagan rituals, then marvel at the “parallels” they’ve discovered. Third, the chronology is wrong. Writers cite beliefs and practices that postdate the first century in an attempt to argue that they influenced the first-century formation of Christianity. Just because a cult had a belief or practice in the third or fourth century AD doesn’t mean it had the same belief or practice in the first century.

  Fourth, Paul would never have consciously borrowed from pagan religions; in fact, he warned against this very thing.97 Fifth, early Christianity was exclusivistic; any hint of syncretism in the New Testament would have caused immediate controversy. Sixth, unlike the mystery religions, Christianity is grounded in actual historical events. And seventh, what few parallels remain could reflect a Christian influence on pagan beliefs and practices. Pagan attempts to counter the growing influence of Christianity by imitating it are clearly apparent.98

  One thing was for sure. “The tide of scholarly opinion has turned dramatically against attempts to make early Christianity dependent on the so-called dying and rising gods of Hellenistic paganism,” said Nash.99

  Two millennia ago, the apostle Peter was equally unambiguous: The accounts about Jesus in the pages of the New Testament weren’t distilled from fanciful stories about mythological deities. Peter wasn’t reporting rumors or speculation, and he certainly wasn’t trusting his future to the likes of Zeus or Osiris. He was only interested in the real Jesus.

  “We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ,” he declared, “but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.”100

  FOR FURTHER INVESTIGATION

  More Resources on This Topic

  Komoszewski, J. Ed, M. James Sawyer, and Daniel B. Wallace. Reinventing Jesus. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Kregel, 2006.

  Machen, J. Gresham. The Virgin Birth of Christ. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 1965, reprint of Harper & Row edition, 1930.

  Mettinger, Tryggve N. D. The Riddle of Resurrection. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2001.

  Metzger, Bruce. Historical and Literary Studies: Pagan, Jewish and Christian. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1968.

  Nash, Ronald H. The Gospel and the Greeks. Phillipsburg, N.J.: second edition, 2003.

  Wagner, Günter. Pauline Baptism and the Pagan Mysteries. Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1967.

  Yamauchi, Edwin M. Persia and the Bible. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 1996.

  CHALLENGE #5

  “JESUS WAS AN IMPOSTER WHO FAILED TO FULFILL THE MESSIANIC PROPHECIES”

  There’s no such thing as a Jew for Jesus. It’s like saying a black man is for the KKK. You can’t be a table and a chair. You’re either a Jew or a Gentile.

  Comedian and rabbi Jackie Mason1

  I have a special love for Jesus because he is the fulfillment of the prophecies to my people, the Jews.

  Christian scholar Paul Feinberg2

  The response has been volcanic.”

  For the leader of an organization with such an incendiary name, David Brickner of Jews for Jesus is soft-spoken and mild-mannered—and if anything, his assessment of what occurred in New York City during the summer of 2006 might actually be an understatement.

  In a month-long evangelistic campaign, Brickner led two hundred missionaries through all five boroughs of the city that has the largest Jewish population outside of Israel. They mailed 80,000 Yiddish copies of the Jesus film to Hasidic homes, distributed a million tracts, and plastered advertisements in subway stations and newspapers.

  “We’re saying Jesus is the Messiah of Israel,” said Brickner. “What could be more Jewish?”3

  Volcanic? To say the least, the reaction was emotional for many. “Jews for Jesus Hit Town and Find a Tough Crowd,” said a headline in the New York Times.4 Letters to newspapers decried the group’s “insidiousness” and “invitation to betrayal.”5 Though much of the response came in the form of quiet indignation, one incensed commuter did punch an evangelist in the mouth, and copies of the Jesus film were publicly burned.6 Jewish comedian Jackie Mason sued over his image being used in a pamphlet.7 In opposing the campaign, a “counter-missionary” organization called Jews for Judaism stationed its own volunteers close to Brickner’s evangelists and even staffed a toll-free hotline for family members wanting to bring back a relative who decided to follow Jesus.

  “Someone is trying to get you to betray not just your religion, but your parents and your grandparents,” warned David Berger, professor of religion at Brooklyn College.8 Scott Hillman, head of Jews for Judaism’s countereffort, said, “Judaism has been around for 3,500 years. Surely we have an answer for any question they could raise.”9

  In his own understatement, Rabbi Joshua Waxman wrote: “Jews for Jesus push a lot of people’s buttons.” For him, the issues are straightforward: “Couldn’t you be Jewish and believe in Jesus? The answer is no.”10

  One conviction that unites many Jewish and Christian scholars is that the Tanakh, known by Christians as the Old Testament, does foretell the coming of the Messiah. “Belief in the coming of the Messiah has always been a fundamental part of Judaism,” said Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan. “Thus, for example, [Jewish philosopher] Maimonides counts the belief in the Messiah as one of the thirteen cardinal principles of Judaism. It is a concept that is repeated again and again throughout the length and breadth of Jewish literature.”11

  Maimonides, whose writings are foundational to Orthodox Judaism, said in the twelfth century, “I firmly believe, in complete faith, in the coming of the Messiah, and although he may tarry, I daily wait for his coming.”12 Today, Orthodox Jews, and among them especially Hasidic Jews, particularly emphasize messianism.13

  The big controversy is whether Jesus of Nazareth is the one who fulfilled the ancient prophecies and thus fits the fingerprint of this much-anticipated Messiah, a word that means “anointed one.” The Greek word for Messiah is christos, or Christ, the term that has been firmly affixed to Jesus’ name throughout history. “To call Jesus the Christ, therefore, is to make a theological claim—that he is the Messiah long expected by the Jews,” said Stephen Prothero, chair of the religion department at Boston University.14

  Since the Bible doesn’t explicitly label verses as being messianic, scholars must pore over the context of various passages to determine which ones deal with the coming of the Messiah. In his Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy, J. Barton Payne digs out 127 personal messianic predictions in 3,348 verses of the Old Testament.15 In addition, there are 456 Old Testament passages cited in some 558 rabbinic writings that refer to the Messiah and the messianic times.16

  If these predictions really did come true in Jesus of Nazareth, the implications are enormous for everyone, not just those with a Jewish backgr
ound. First, this would confirm the supernatural nature of the Bible, since the odds of fulfilling so many ancient prophecies by mere chance would be mathematically prohibitive. “The Bible is the only book in the world that has precise, specific predictions that were made hundreds of years in advance and that were literally fulfilled,” said eminent Christian apologist Norman Geisler.17 That would mean that the Bible has credentials that are absent from the Qur’an of Islam, the Upanishads and Bhagavad-Gita of Vedanta Hinduism, the Book of Mormon, and all other religious texts.

  Second, if Jesus—and only Jesus—fulfilled these ancient forecasts, then this would be a definitive affirmation of his identity as the one sent by God to be the Savior of Israel and the world. Of course, the reverse is equally significant. Jesus said in Luke 24:44: “Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.” When a Samaritan woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming,” Jesus replied: “I who speak to you am he.”18 Having made these unambiguous claims, if he then fails to match the prophetic portrait, Jesus would be an imposter worthy of rejection and disdain—a false prophet who should be rejected by Jews and Gentiles alike.

  Obviously, these matters are critical to all spiritual seekers, regardless of their religious background. Nothing less than the trustworthiness of the Bible and the identity and credibility of Jesus are at issue. So it’s not surprising that disputes over the prophecies have raged for centuries from university classrooms to scholarly books—and to the sweltering subways of New York City, where dueling ads clashed over whether Jesus should be embraced by Jews searching for their Messiah.

  Few religious topics engender as much passion. I once moderated a debate in which a respected rabbi angrily denounced Brickner as being “a spiritual Nazi” for trying to convince Jews to follow Jesus. And as the number of messianic Jews increases in both the U.S. and Israel—with estimates ranging from 120,000 to twice that figure and higher—the dispute continues to grow.19 Indeed, both sides seem to have become more adamant in the last few years.

  Could Jesus really have been the Christ? What happens when emotions subside and the evidence is systematically examined? How strong is the case for Jesus the Messiah—and can it withstand the most potent objections of those who deny that he was described in prophecies dating back hundreds of years before his birth in Bethlehem?

  “EVERYTHING CHRISTIANS CLAIM…IS FALSE”

  Attacks on the idea that the messianic prophecies culminated in Jesus have proliferated over the last three hundred years. By 1793 the German biblical scholar J. G. Eichhorn, considered the father of modern higher criticism, felt the confidence to declare: “The last three decades have erased the Messiah from the Old Testament.”20 Thus, said Old Testament professor Walter C. Kaiser Jr. of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, “the eighteenth century began the long debate, which has continued to this very hour, about the apologetic ‘argument from prophecy’ for the Messiah.”21

  The debate has been most vociferous on the popular level, particularly the Internet, often in response to evangelistic initiatives from Jewish followers of Jesus. “Everything Christians claim for Jesus as the Jewish Messiah is false,” insisted prominent Orthodox Rabbi Pinchas Stolper in a book subtitled A Jewish Response to Missionaries.22

  A “counter-missionary survival guide,” published by Jews for Judaism, said Christians “may claim that there are over three hundred biblical ‘proofs’ for their position. A careful examination of these passages—in context—will immediately refute their presentation.”23 As for the “proof texts” used by Christians to argue for Jesus’ messianic credentials, they are “based on circular reasoning, quoting verses out of context, and mistranslation.”24

  Kaplan, another Orthodox rabbi, was especially blunt. “What can a Jew lose by embracing Christianity?” he asked. “The answer is: Everything.” He added:

  The Jews had one major objection to the Christian Messiah, and that was the fact that he had been unsuccessful. Judaism had always taught that the Messiah would redeem Israel in a political sense, and Jesus had failed to accomplish this. Instead, he had been scourged and humiliated like a common rebel, and finally crucified along with two ordinary thieves. How could the career of Jesus be reconciled with the glorious picture of the Messiah as taught by the Prophets of Israel? The early Christians faced this dilemma, and, in justifying Jesus as the Messiah, radically altered the entire concept.25

  Amy-Jill Levine, a Jewish expert in Jesus and the New Testament at Vanderbilt Divinity School and author of The Misunderstood Jew, said there’s no “messianic checklist” that establishes Jesus as the one who was foretold. “The Messiah is someone who establishes justice throughout the world, and I look out my window and I know that hasn’t happened,” she said. “The Messiah is someone who conquers death, conquers disease. And I know that hasn’t happened. One might even say, for example, the death of the Messiah—his torture, his crucifixion—is predicted in the Old Testament. Well, in fact, it’s not.”26

  Christians, of course, offer a radically different perspective. “Not all the prophecies in the Old Testament about the Messiah were fulfilled in Jesus’ lifetime,” said Edwin Yamauchi, now-retired professor of ancient history at Miami University of Ohio. “The Christians’ answer is that those prophecies will be fulfilled when Christ comes again.”27

  Comes again? Jewish scholars point out that the terms “first coming” and “second coming” aren’t even mentioned in the Old Testament. They contend that Christians invented the idea of Jesus coming again out of embarrassment that he failed to usher in the universal peace that the Messiah is predicted to bring. In fact, they argue, anyone could claim to be the Messiah—and when someone points out he hasn’t brought peace to the world, he can merely use the excuse that this will be fulfilled at some unspecified future date. In short, they say, the second coming is nothing more than an escape clause for charlatans.

  One thing’s for sure: history and logic either support the conclusion that Jesus is the Messiah or they don’t. How convincing is the affirmative case, and how deflating are the latest counterarguments raised by Jesus’ detractors? Those are the issues that prompted me to fly to North Carolina and to seek out one of the world’s leading authorities on the messianic prophecies. On a brisk morning, with the sun shining through fiery autumn leaves, I found his office in a nondescript white office building in a northern suburb of Charlotte.

  INTERVIEW #4: MICHAEL L. BROWN, PH.D.

  As a teenager growing up on Long Island, Michael Brown’s insatiable appetite for illicit drugs earned him the nicknames “Iron Man” and “Drug Bear.” By the age of fifteen, the aspiring rock and roll drummer was shooting heroin and had burglarized some homes and even a doctor’s office for amusement—an incongruous lifestyle for the son of the senior lawyer of the New York Supreme Court.

  He grew up in a Jewish family but was uninterested in spiritual matters. When he was bar mitzvahed at the age of thirteen, he was given a Hebrew passage to memorize—but nobody ever translated it for him, and he never bothered to ask anyone what the words meant. For him, it was a meaningless ritual.

  In 1971 the two other members of his band began attending a local church in pursuit of two girls related to the pastor. Little by little, they began to be influenced by the gospel. Upset at the changes in their lives, Brown decided to visit the church in an effort to extricate them. One of the girls, aware of his reputation, wrote in her diary that night: “Anti-Christ comes to church.”

  Unexpectedly, in the months that followed, Brown discovered a new emotion: a gnawing sense of regret and conviction over his rebellious and drug-saturated behavior. He ended up in many discussions with Christians about spirituality. On November 12, 1971, when the pastor asked if anyone wanted to receive Jesus as their Savior, Brown walked the aisle—not because he really wanted to become a Christian, but so that he could give the congregation a thrill. After all, he was sure they regarded him as the worst of sinners.


  Then something even more unexpected happened: as he repeated the words of the pastor in a prayer of repentance and faith, he found himself suddenly believing the message of Christ. “It was like a light went on,” he said. Instantly, he believed Jesus had died for his sins and had risen from the dead. “I knew it was real,” Brown said. “Now the challenge was: what was I going to do with it—because I wasn’t ready to change my lifestyle.” It wasn’t until five weeks later that he permanently abandoned drugs and yielded his life to Jesus.

  His father liked the subsequent reform of Brown’s behavior, but he didn’t like the Jesus part. He brought his son to talk to the local rabbi, who eventually took him to a community of ultra-Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn. None of them, however, was able to dislodge his belief, now confirmed by his own deep study, that Jesus is the Messiah of Israel.

  But they did raise some serious questions, challenging him on his lack of a working knowledge of Hebrew. To better understand and test the messianic promises, Brown then pursued years of education that ultimately led to a master’s degree as well as a doctorate in Near Eastern Languages and Literatures from New York University. His practice of tackling the most powerful arguments of critics has helped him develop into one of America’s best-known defenders of Jesus the Messiah. Over the past thirty years, he has debated and dialogued with rabbis and leaders of the Jewish community on radio, television, college campuses, and even in synagogues.

  Brown has taught at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Fuller Theological Seminary, Regent University, and in twenty-five countries. He has authored eighteen books, including the widely acclaimed, multivolume series, Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus, which contains in-depth responses to the most common historical and theological issues regarding the messianic prophecies. His book Our Hands Are Stained with Blood examines anti-Semitism in church history.