203. Leithart, 1 and 2 Kings, 32.
204. Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament, 1:130–49.
205. Kraus, Psalms 1–59, 131.
206. Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament, 1:448.
207. Mowinckel, He That Cometh, 172; von Rad, Old Testament Theology, 1:320.
208. Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament, 606–7.
209. Kraus, Psalms 1-59, 131–32.
210. Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament, 1:130–52.
211. Ibid., 1:57–98; Leupold, Genesis, 2:1176–85.
212. Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary, 1:220–23.
213. Leupold, Isaiah, 2:179–80. Leupold concludes that the Servant must be divine, in that he serves as a light to the nations in a way that only God could.
214. Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament, 1:89–90. Also see Leupold, Isaiah, 1:185–86.
215. Daniélou, History of Early Christian Doctrine, 333.
216. Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament, 2:37.
217. Hummel, Ezekiel, 2:1003–7. Dr. Hummel sees this as a prediction of the Davidic Messiah unification of the Church. Nevertheless, he also sees an ultimate fulfillment in Christ’s theandric nature, in that he is a ruler who unifies divine and human rule.
218. A. Pieper, Exposition of Isaiah 40–66, 436. Also see argument in Block, “My Servant David, 17–56. Block makes the argument that the Servant is clearly a Davidic king.
219. See A. Pieper, Exposition of Isaiah, 436. Pieper disagrees and claims that “dry ground” refers to the political situation.
220. See a defense of this interpretation of Isaiah and its application to Christ in Gibbs, Matthew 1–11, 99–104; Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament, 2:44–50; Leupold, Isaiah, 1:155–57; Niessen, “Virginity of the ‘Almah,” 133–50; Rydelnik, Messianic Hope, 152–54; E. Young, “Immanuel Prophecy,” 97–124. Also see a Jewish defense of the word “almah” (virgin) in C. Gordon, “Almah in Isaiah,” 106.
Chapter 3: Christology and Atonement in the New Testament, Part 1
The Christology of the Gospels
Introduction
Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the entire Old Testament. He is the true mediator between God and humanity (1 Tim 2:5). He is the one who finally brought an end to universal exile brought by the fall of our first parents. This theme of exile and return, which we have traced throughout the Old Testament, will be important in our treatment of how the New Testament authors understood Jesus’s atoning work as the final end to the universal exile of creation from its creator God. This would take the form of the return of divine presence, renewal of creation, and fulfillment of the law through eschatological judgment. In order to reverse the state of universal exile, we will observe that Jesus is God’s own self-donation and entry into the story of Israel and humanity. As we saw in the previous chapters, God in his faithfulness elected mediators in the Old Testament period in order to fulfill the law and thereby represent himself in faithfulness to Israel. Mediators also served as an embodiment of Israel remaining faithful to him. Jesus is the true prophet, priest, and king, who fulfills God’s own faithfulness by coming in the flesh. As an ultimate fulfillment of his faithfulness, God literally gives himself to Israel by donating his person to them. From within our nature, God finally wins a victory over sin, death, the devil, and the law, thereby enacting a true and everlasting testament of his love.
The Synoptic Gospels: Mark
In discussing the Synoptic Gospels, we will begin first with the shortest gospel, Mark.221 Mark’s gospel works from an alternating pattern of humiliation and exaltation. It is a book of glory and of the hiddenness of glory sub contrario. In it, Jesus is the divine Son of God, the Son of Man, and the divine kavod come in the flesh to fulfill the pattern of exile and return prefigured in the history of Israel. He thereby forgives sins, renews creation, and overcomes demonic forces.
Mark begins his gospel with glory, by announcing his intention of informing his audience of the “Gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Mark 1:1). In that Jesus brings a “gospel,” he must necessarily be divine, for as Ben Witherington III comments:
Only a god is really able to bring world-changing and lasting good news and benefaction and hope. Mark, then, from the outset, is announcing not merely a coming of a teacher or even just a human messianic figure (though that is part of the truth), but the epiphany or advent of a deity who will reveal himself in various and sundry ways during his time on earth.222
There are other indications of Jesus’s divine glory throughout the gospel. Simon Gathercole has pointed to Jesus’s citation of Psalm 110 in his question concerning whether the Messiah is David’s Son or David’s Lord (Mark 12:35–37). Though the Hebrew of Psalm 110:3 is notoriously difficult to translate, the LXX version of the text reads: “With you is the rule on the day of your power, in the radiance of your holy ones; From the womb, before the morning star, I gave you birth.”223 Read in light of the rest of the gospel, this definitely points to the divinity and preexistence of Jesus. Doubtless Mark’s original readers would have read it this way, since they were probably most familiar with the LXX.
Martin Hengel has also suggested that Mark’s use of Isaiah in 1:2–3 (“I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way”) is highly suggestive of an inter-Trinitarian conversation before Jesus’s earthly advent.224 It should be noted that read against the background of Second Temple Jewish expectations of YHWH’s return to Zion, Mark’s use of the verse, “a voice of one calling in the desert, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight paths for him,’” seems to suggest that he is indicating Jesus has come to fulfill that expectation.225
As a book of glory, Mark also emphasizes Jesus’s role as the “Son of Man.”226