The Messianic Telescope

“Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited us and accomplished redemption for His people,” Luke 1:68 NASB

Visited us – When John the Baptist is named, Zacharias regains his ability to speak. According to the text, Zacharias was “filled with the holy spirit” and prophesied. We know the Sunday School story, but we may not have paid attention to the details or the actual history. Unfortunately, that usually means we miss what is actually happening here.

First, let’s clear up some of the translation issues. The Greek text does not include the pronoun following the verb episkeptomai (“visited”). It simply says, “he visited and made redemption,” applying both verbs to the same subject (YHVH) and the same object (to lao – his people). This might seem trivial, but it isn’t. Zacharias is not distinguishing two separate actors or two separate acts. In concert with all the prophets of the Tanakh, Zacharias views YHVH as the redeemer, demonstrated in the appearance of the Messiah.

Now let’s look at the verb episkeptomai. Notice it is constructed from two Greek words,

epi and skopos. Literally it is the imposition of direction over something that is no longer hidden. In other words, the verb is akin to looking through a telescope and seeing what was once far off as if it is now close at hand. This verb is the Greek equivalent of an entirely Hebraic concept of the Messiah. Let me explain.

Joseph Klausner’s seminal work on Messianic expectation in Hebrew thought[1] identifies several key components of the Messianic idea found throughout the prophets. They are: 1) sin results in divine punishment, sometimes including exile, which is followed by 2) repentance producing 3) redemption in both the political-social world and the spiritual-moral world, not only for Jews but for the whole world. 4) Nationalism is replaced by universalism. 5) Israel will assume its intended role as leader in God’s final kingdom over all the earth. 6) The world itself will change. Nature will be altered and the earth will become a place of material and spiritual bliss. 7) The final outcome of this process is found in the distant future.

Originally these stages were not associated with a human figure but rather with the collective Israel, the nation. Over time, and especially in light of the failure of various kings and eras to produce these changes, the idea developed that a supreme human figure would arise to initiate this process and the final result would no longer be found in the distant future but would be nearly immediate. In fact, the more desperate the conditions for life as a Jew became, the more Jewish sages and prophets shortened the separation between the initial stages and the final outcome. By the time of Yeshua, the Messianic expectation included a human king who was both warrior and priest, accomplishing both the social-political change and the spiritual-moral restoration, initiating all the other supernatural changes in the expected process.

With this in mind, notice the use of episkeptomai. What has been hidden because it was a long way off is now brought near and, consequently, revealed for what it truly is. The arrival of the Messiah means that the process has begun. The sin of the people will generate punishment. Just as God used Assyria and Babylon, He will now use Rome to bring the people to repentance. John emerges calling for moral correction. Yeshua’s miracles mean that YHVH is breaking into the natural world in extraordinary ways. All that remains is the overthrow of the wicked, the establishment of the Kingdom and peace on earth. Zacharias’ telescope “sees” this stage in his child, John. The arrival of the Messiah means the YHVH has chosen this time to bring about the Messianic Age.

But, of course, Zacharias was mistaken. The Kingdom didn’t arrive. Rome was not overthrown. Israel did not rise to ascendance. In fact, everything got worse. Does this mean Yeshua was not the Messiah? No, it means that the human perception of the process of Messianic expectations was incorrect. It is God’s timing, not ours. What happened is that those Jews who adopted the paradigm of the prophets understood within their own time, who thought that the sequence was active at that moment, rejected Yeshua because he did not fit the paradigm. But those Jews who accepted him as Messiah moved to a different paradigm, a different way of “seeing” through the telescope. From this new perspective, the “events” were interpreted in another way. Nevertheless, both paradigms are operating in the first century which may be why Paul often writes as if he expects the return immediately. As the delay continued, the paradigm was adjusted. So it is today.

We can’t understand Zacharias’ prophecy apart from his cultural expectations. Nor can we understand any of the prophetic utterances of the men in the Tanakh apart from their own times. Hebrew prophecy is not history in advance. It is the deliverance of a divine message to the people who are hearing it when they are hearing it. It is couched in the milieu of the prophet, spoken in words of that day. Those words might be applied to another time and another place, but that isn’t prophecy. It is paradigm interpretation.

Perhaps the glass in our telescopes is still too dark to see clearly.

Topical Index: Messiah, Klausner, Zacharias, prophecy, Luke 1:68

[1] Joseph Klausner, The Messianic Idea In Israel From Its Beginning To The Completion Of The Mishnab (Macmillan, 1955).