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Messiah in the Old Testament: From the Son of David to the Son of God

  • Korean Journal of Old Testament Studies
  • Abbr : KJOTS
  • 2024, 30(1), pp.166-208
  • Publisher : Korean Society of Old Testament Studies
  • Research Area : Humanities > Christian Theology

Keun Jo Ahn 1

1호서대

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This paper aim to claim that the Messiah as the Son of God derives from the Old Testament. Scholars have discussed that “the anointed one” of the Davidic dynasty was just a political leader, not like Pharaoh in Egypt as the godly son of prime god. They presuppose that there is a radical gap between the messiah(son of David) and the Messiah(Son of God). However, this study argues that the Israelites expected divine rule of God whenever they installed new kings on the throne of David. The oracle of Nathan in 2 Sam 7:1-17 promises eternal rule of the sons of David by Yahweh’s presence with them. The royal psalms 2, 89 and 110 proclaim Yahweh’s sonship in unison: “You are my son, today I have begotten you”(2:7b); “And I will make him the first-born”(89:27a[28a]); “From the womb of the morning like dew I begot you”(110:3aβ-3b). The messianic hope of Davidic kings furthermore develops eschatologically in the book of Daniel indicating the messiah as “one like a son of man”(7:13). The authors of the Old Testament utilized the motif of the “heavenly council” in which the divine beings(sons of God) participate in Yahweh‘s reign. They opened the way of divine sonship of the human kings by theological imagination of “the Lord of hosts” who sits on the throne surrounded by a multitude of divine beings and discuss about the governance of the world. The contribution of this paper is to prove that the origin of the divine character of messiah does not stem from Hellenistic Judaism but the Old Testament.

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