A JW and a
Trinitarian on Zech 12:10?
In discussion with
a Trinitarian from the BBC Christian message board forum!
Trinitarian = >>
<<
>>We interpret it by
scripture. Let scripture interpret scripture. I call on Revelation 1.
The key to this is in Rev 1:7-8 together. (The point John is making does not start in v. 8 but in v.7.)
John is working from Zechariah 12:10, which prophesied that they will mourn for the one WHOM they have pierced. That little Hebrew word for WHOM is John's key. That WHOM in the Hebrew consists of two Hebrew letters, namely the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet, Aleph and Tal. The Jewish writers loved things like this.
What does John make of Zecharaiah's WHOM? He goes directly to it twice, both in his gospel and in Revelation. Let's see.
Firstly in his gospel John explicitly identifies the one WHOM they pierced as Jesus (John 19:37).
Secondly in Revelation 1:7-8, John returns to the theme of the pierced one, and then reveals God's identity in terms of the first and last letter of the alphabet, this time the Greek Alphabet: Alpha & Omega. See what John did there?
John's Alpha and Omega take the informed reader back to Aleph and Tal (first and last of the Hebrew alphabet), which spelled WHOM. The Alpha & Omega = the Aleph and Tal = the WHOM = the one they pierced, Jesus. The Alpha and Omega is Jesus.
John's thought about Zech 12:10 conveyed in two distinct halves, first about 'pierced' (v.7) and then about 'whom' (v.8). Verse 7 is the reason why the content of verse 8 follows on where it does. And the significance of that, I hope, will not escape you...
The Jews loved these wordplays.
Rev 1:7-8 means that Jesus will be seen by those who crucified/pierced him. Otherwise, did John write John 19:37 but then change his mind when he wrote Revelation 1:7-8? No, of course not, and John is explicit that Jesus is the one they pierced. <<
Reply,
As regards, the expression "The Alpha and Omega", I have dealt with this extensively and in detail elsewhere in my papers here on thoughts.com, so I will not cover it here!
>> We interpret it by scripture. Let scripture interpret scripture. I call on Revelation <<
If you follow the link below xxxxx, you will see, that you are making the same basic mistake as yyyyy..and like him, Trinitarian translations get the grammar right in Rev 1:7, but confuse the pronouns [Please see, “pronouns and the holy spirit" 'thoughts.com'] in Zech 12:10 and you are doing exactly the same! In Zech 12:10
Trinitarians and others apply the personal pronoun “me” to “asher” [which is in the dative case] rather than the proper relative pronoun “whom”, which the NWT and several others correctly have, “the One” or “to him” and not the unintelligible ‘to me whom’ [which even shows the dative influence, though wrong].
“And again another Scripture says, "THEY SHALL LOOK ON HIM WHOM THEY PIERCED." NASB
Trinitarian bibles seem to get the grammar right in John but confuse the pronouns in the Hebrew of Zech 12:10
Rev 1:7 NIV
“Look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of him. So shall it be! Amen.”
Rev 1:7, 8 NWT
“Look! He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, and those who pierced him; and all the tribes of the earth will beat themselves in grief because of him. Yes, Amen. 8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says Jehovah God, “the One who is and who was and who is coming, the Almighty.””
The key to this is in Rev 1:7-8 together. (The point John is making does not start in v. 8 but in v.7.)
John is working from Zechariah 12:10, which prophesied that they will mourn for the one WHOM they have pierced. That little Hebrew word for WHOM is John's key. That WHOM in the Hebrew consists of two Hebrew letters, namely the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet, Aleph and Tal. The Jewish writers loved things like this.
What does John make of Zecharaiah's WHOM? He goes directly to it twice, both in his gospel and in Revelation. Let's see.
Firstly in his gospel John explicitly identifies the one WHOM they pierced as Jesus (John 19:37).
Secondly in Revelation 1:7-8, John returns to the theme of the pierced one, and then reveals God's identity in terms of the first and last letter of the alphabet, this time the Greek Alphabet: Alpha & Omega. See what John did there?
John's Alpha and Omega take the informed reader back to Aleph and Tal (first and last of the Hebrew alphabet), which spelled WHOM. The Alpha & Omega = the Aleph and Tal = the WHOM = the one they pierced, Jesus. The Alpha and Omega is Jesus.
John's thought about Zech 12:10 conveyed in two distinct halves, first about 'pierced' (v.7) and then about 'whom' (v.8). Verse 7 is the reason why the content of verse 8 follows on where it does. And the significance of that, I hope, will not escape you...
The Jews loved these wordplays.
Rev 1:7-8 means that Jesus will be seen by those who crucified/pierced him. Otherwise, did John write John 19:37 but then change his mind when he wrote Revelation 1:7-8? No, of course not, and John is explicit that Jesus is the one they pierced. <<
Reply,
As regards, the expression "The Alpha and Omega", I have dealt with this extensively and in detail elsewhere in my papers here on thoughts.com, so I will not cover it here!
>> We interpret it by scripture. Let scripture interpret scripture. I call on Revelation <<
If you follow the link below xxxxx, you will see, that you are making the same basic mistake as yyyyy..and like him, Trinitarian translations get the grammar right in Rev 1:7, but confuse the pronouns [Please see, “pronouns and the holy spirit" 'thoughts.com'] in Zech 12:10 and you are doing exactly the same! In Zech 12:10
Trinitarians and others apply the personal pronoun “me” to “asher” [which is in the dative case] rather than the proper relative pronoun “whom”, which the NWT and several others correctly have, “the One” or “to him” and not the unintelligible ‘to me whom’ [which even shows the dative influence, though wrong].
“And again another Scripture says, "THEY SHALL LOOK ON HIM WHOM THEY PIERCED." NASB
Trinitarian bibles seem to get the grammar right in John but confuse the pronouns in the Hebrew of Zech 12:10
Rev 1:7 NIV
“Look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of him. So shall it be! Amen.”
Rev 1:7, 8 NWT
“Look! He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, and those who pierced him; and all the tribes of the earth will beat themselves in grief because of him. Yes, Amen. 8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says Jehovah God, “the One who is and who was and who is coming, the Almighty.””
Pulling “out of context”! Let’s see! [Accusation of supposedly twisting
the text by JW's]
[Discussion between myself and a JW opposer]
[Discussion between myself and a JW opposer]
You said,
>>What the Hebrew actually says is:
"And it shall come to pass on that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come upon Jerusalem.
And I will pour out upon the house of David and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplications.
And they shall look to me because of those who have been thrust through [with swords], and they shall mourn over it as one mourns over an only son ..."
www.chabad.org/libra...
The reference is to those Israelites whom the nations will slay when they invade Jerusalem. The surviving inhabitants of Jerusalem will eventually get to mourn over that slaughter.
If you bother to read the entire chapter you see that the subject is the imminent invasion of Jerusalem. <<
The part I will challenge you on is,
>> And they shall look to me because of those who have been thrust through [with swords], and they shall mourn over it as one mourns over an only son ..." <<
…because I will show how liberties for the sake of theology are taken and that grammar and context has suffered a blow at the hands of those who wish to paint a different picture for the reader!
The original Hebrew language Hebrew Scriptures [OT] I will use will be the ‘Jerusalem Bible’ [Koren Tanakh] and Gesenius’s Hebrew Grammar [considered one of the best Hebrew Grammars to date] As you have written the way you have written, I expect you to be fully conversant with such original Hebrew and its grammar, syntax, semantics and so on, I will also expect you to be reasonably conversant, not only with biblical Hebrew and manuscript studies, but also Koine Greek, because of the LXX… if not, that is your problem Roshi and you will not be taken seriously!
The main point I will focus on in Zech 12:10 is a specific relative pronoun, which suggests substantival thought and there are some 50 Hebrew manuscripts that treat this relative pronoun differently to the way the Masora [the accepted Hebrew (Masoretic) text] treats it; those in Christendom [Trinitarians] seem to be guided, not with any of the [some] 50 extant manuscripts, but with the Masora text, which allow Trinitarians to add a Trinitarian twist to the English Trinitarian translations and in the process, make their translations [though not all] say what they want them to say and thus give the reader a mis-leading impression, that the bible supports Trinitarianism, but I will clearly demonstrate, that the original Hebrew doesn’t…!
Your source says, translating from the original Hebrew,
“And they shall look to me because of those who have been thrust through [with swords]”
What does the original Hebrew actually say?
The BBC does not permit Hebraic character, so the will be transliterated English characters!
Zech 12:10
Transliteration of Zech 12:10
“on Me whom they have pierced”
Asher dakaru
From the above, Rashi gets from [or interprets] *“Vehibbitu asher dakaru”
* as,
“…because of those who have been thrust through [with swords]”
…whereas in,
The Jerusalem Bible, the Hebrew [Koran Tanakh] reads,
“…and they shall look towards me, regarding those whom the nations have thrust through”
NB,
A note of caution here! Most translators translate “asher” as […Me…] using the wrong pronoun, just as Trinitarian translators use the wrong pronoun when referring to the 'holy spirit' [See my post on pronouns and the 'holy spirit, elsewhere]. What they do here [Trinitarians for theological reasons] is translate the Hebrew *relative pronoun* ‘asher’ “who, whom, which, that” with the *personal pronoun* “Me” when it should be,
“…and they will certainly look to the One whom they pierced through…” NWT [See also, The Bible in living English, GNB, RSV, TNAB, Cath. JB and others, which read, either “the One” or “him whom”
Both Hebrew translations get the pronoun wrong, but the Koran Tanakh [JB] is closer to accuracy, “…and they shall look towards me…” even though they render “asher” with the wrong pronoun i.e. “me”, as it is pointing to an individual, which Zechariah is prophesying about…!
When translators translate ‘asher’ as “me” [whom] is should technically, grammatically at least, be translated, “to me whom” [elai eth asher] which is really unintelligible nonsense, not to mention very bad English and the reason for the term “to” is to remind readers that we are dealing with the “dative” *to* case, which the ‘relative pronoun’ “whom” reflects!
>>You have to start with what the Hebrew ACTUALLY says…<<
So Roshi, what does the actual “Hebrew” say? “The Complete Jewish bible”, which is merely an English translation from the original Hebrew, just as Trinitarians say, their bibles are English translations from the original Greek, but it has been clearly demonstrated elsewhere, that their bibles have additions and deletions, not reflecting the original Greek, so too we must scrutinize your “The Complete Jewish bible”, to see if it reasonably adheres to the original Hebrew…!
The English in the “The Complete Jewish Bible” reminds me of obsolete words or words that are not understood [like the Old KJV Bible] in that it uses ‘transliterated’ English and in many parts would be incomprehensible to the average native modern English speaker/reader, as it continuously uses terms [transliterated, not translated English] that would not mean much to the average bible reader and not only that, “The Complete Jewish Bible” is not faithful to the original extant language manuscripts, as it many times replaces the Tetragrammaton with a surrogate, such as “Adonai”, thus following in the centuries old superstitious man made tradition of removing the Divine Name and replacing it with a substitute, thus hiding Jehovah’s Name [the historical English name for God] from the people and they end up being taught about a nameless God, being illegally told that His name should not be spoken, thus God’s word is made invalid because of the tradition of men, which are almost as doctrine! Christendom’s Trinitarian translators do the same, when it comes to the treatment of God’s name in their translations and in the Trinitarian NIV of the bible, they openly admitted that money was preferable to the placing of Jehovah’s name in their translation and recently the Roman Catholic Church has forbidden the use or mention of God’s name in its religious services, basically they are all the same when it comes to the respect and use of God’s!
Here is an example from Ex 9:16 and then people need to ask themselves if they are making known God’s name, in order that people may know it, fear it and glorify it!
Ex 9:16 The Complete Jewish Bible
“But it is for this very reason that I have kept you alive -to show you my power, and so that my name may resound throughout the whole earth.”
“…so that my name may resound throughout the whole earth.”
And does that name “resound throughout the whole earth” by those who would thus hide it and mask it using surrogates? So any translation that violates the sentiments of Ex 9:16 and removes the divine name from its translation has to be suspect from the beginning…!
One thing that needs to be pointed out in your link to the, “The Complete Jewish bible” is that, what is written is a “commentary”, basically a personal ‘opinion’! Many of Christendom’s Trinitarian translators have commentaries on many books of the bible and all they are, are personal interpretations, opinions of the individual that reflect his theology, what he thinks is true! At this point, I’m not really interested in theology etc, just what the original Hebrew words say and mean, along with grammar, semantics, scope of meaning etc and harmony with surrounding verses, as I believe God’s word is completely harmonious and non contradictory!
Since the CJB [The Complete Jewish bible] seems to be a mixture of translated/ transliterated English and your source link [as far as I can tell] gives no Hebrew, I can only go on what I see, so I will use the pertinent Hebrew term(s) written with/in English letters!
In the above text, there is something that isn’t quite right! What we are dealing with here is an independent relative clause and the pronoun that will be dealt with is the ‘relative Hebrew pronoun’ – “asher” [whom]! From the Hebrew, “asher” is usually rendered into modern English as, “he who” or “he whom” instead of the incomprehensible, “elai eth asher” i.e. “to me whom” and it really should properly be read, “el asher” i.e. to him whom” and some 50# Hebrew manuscripts have “on him” and it is this text “on him” that the apostle John looks to, when he quotes Zech 12:10!
# See, Edwin D. Freed, Old Testament in the Gospel of John (NovTSup 11; Leiden: Brill, 1965), pages, 109-111.
Now here is the technical part Roshi and the problem. Trinitarian translators and the translators of the CJB seem to look to the Masoretic text when it comes to Zech 12:10! Those 50 Hebrew manuscripts over the Masoretic text read, “on him” and not, “on me”, which is seen by translators in the Masora, but the reason for this, is in the difference of just one single Hebrew letter and that letter is “waw” and the omission of that one letter changes the context from “on him” to “on me” and the context and grammar better agrees with “on him” rather than “on me”, especially seen in the light of “alav” and “alav” in the same verse and can be rendered [“alav”] ‘for (over) him’, this is also seen in the English pronoun “whom”, which is pointing to a person
Zech 12:10 and the Messiah
A tradition arose among the rabbis, that the Messiah of the line of David could not suffer such indignities [pierced through etc]…and so shifted the goal posts to merely say that is was, “the Messiah, son of Joseph, who was slain.”, not the foretold Messiah the Son of David, the Christ, the seed of David, according to the flesh, who was slain…! By the time of Christ, the Jews were expecting a Messiah who would rid them of Roman domination, but this kind of Messiah was not the biblical Messiah and to most, Jesus didn’t fit the bill!
The text in Zech 12:10 is a prophetic text and is in harmony with other such texts in that it was pointing to the promised Messiah Jesus Christ, Son of Jehovah!
John 19:37 Orthodox Jewish Bible
“And again the Kitvei Hakodesh says, V'HIBITU on him ES ASHER DAKARU (And they will look on him whom they pierced.) [ZECHARYAH 12:10]”
John makes a direct quote of Zech 12:10 and notice that John does *not* say, “And they will look *on me* whom they pierced, “And they will look *on him* whom they pierced See also the sentiments contained in Isa 53:5!
letusreason
Or,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/mbreligion/F2213235?thread=7752392&skip=0&show=20#p100945497
(Please, Copy&Paste the above to your browser)
letusreason
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