The Gospel of Mark is believed to be the oldest gospel, written around 70 CE. The author set a trend that the other gospel writers followed when they expanded on his original story. They all scoured the Old Testament, and particularly the books of the prophets, to find passages they could place into the story of Jesus.
They were also all following in the footsteps of Paul, who makes it clear in his letters that his major source of knowledge about Jesus was studying the Old Testament for ‘prophecy’ (Romans 16.25-6). Paul claimed that he was ‘called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God. This gospel he announced beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures’ (Romans 1.1-2).
In particular the New Testament writers looked for any passage that related to the concept of the messiah, or christos (Christ) in the Greek version of the Old Testament they used. Originally the passages referred to a particular king or priest – literally ‘the anointed’ of Yahweh – but the early Christians viewed all mentions of christos as coded prophecy of Jesus.
The gospel writers blatantly allude to this practice when they state that Jesus did something to fulfil a prophecy in Isaiah or Malachi or another book of the Jewish Bible. The gospel of John alludes to this when it has Jesus say, ‘You study the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very scriptures that testify about me’ (John 5.39). Likewise the author of Luke had Jesus tell his disciples, ‘Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms’ (Luke 24.44). The Gospel of Matthew has Jesus fulfil Old Testament ‘prophecy’ twelve times – twelve being a highly symbolic number in mythology.
Isaiah was probably the most important Old Testament source of ‘prophecy’ that the gospel writers plundered. Augustine wrote that, ‘Isaiah prophesied much more than the rest about Christ and the Church…so that some say he should be called an evangelist rather than a prophet’ (City of God 18.29). Even the basic idea of a son of Yahweh may have derived from a passage of Isaiah,
‘For a boy has been born for us,
the government will be on his shoulders.
And he shall be called
wonderful counsellor, in battle god like,
everlasting father, prince of peace.’ (Isaiah 9.6)
This ‘prophecy’ originally related to king Hezekiah, but was later reinterpreted by Christians as referring to Jesus.
The virgin birth is another case of the gospel writers creating mythology around Jesus to fit sayings of the Jewish prophets. Isaiah 7.14 states, ‘The Lord himself will send you a sign: A young woman will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.’ That might not sound like the original template for Jesus’ birth story, but we must remember that the gospels were written in Greek by Greek speakers. They used the Greek version of the Jewish scriptures, and in that the word for ‘young woman’ had been translated as ‘virgin’, hence the virgin birth.
The gospel writers were completely ignorant of the fact that Isaiah’s ‘prophecy’ originally referred to the Judaean king Hezekiah’s birth. The Christian apologist Justin Martyr (100 – 165 CE) claimed that this ‘prophecy’ referred to Jesus, but noted that Jews of his time stated it actually referred to Hezekiah,
‘And Isaiah said…Behold, the virgin shall conceive, and shall bear a son, and his name shall be called Immanuel…Now it is evident to all, that in the race of Abraham according to the flesh no one has been born of a virgin…save this our Christ. But since you and your teachers venture to affirm that in the prophecy of Isaiah it is not said “Behold, the virgin can conceive,” but, “Behold, the young woman shall conceive, and bear a son,” and you explain the prophecy as if [it referred] to Hezekiah, who was your king.’ (Dialogue with Trypho 63)
John the Baptist is a legendary figure who was probably placed into the gospel narrative to correspond to lines in Malachi and Second Isaiah. Malachi 3.1 reads, ‘I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me.’ Isaiah 40.3 states,
‘A voice cries out,
“Prepare a way for Yahweh in the wilderness,
construct a road in the desert for our god.’
This passage from Isaiah is quoted verbatim at the beginning of the oldest gospel Mark (1.2-4), making clear the link between it and John the Baptist. The Gospel of Matthew (11.14) quotes Malachi 3.1 in exactly the same way. The Book of Malachi also claimed that the prophet Elijah would return before the day of judgement of Yahweh, ‘Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of Yahweh arrives’ (Malachi 4.5). Throughout the New Testament, we see evidence that the early Christians believed the end times were at hand.
Matthew 3.4 has John the Baptist wear clothes made of camel hair, Elijah is described as wearing a ‘garment made of hair’ in the Old Testament (2 Kings 1.8). The baptism of Jesus in the river Jordan by John may have also been added to the story to mirror the story of the parting of the sea in the Exodus. The forty day temptation of Jesus in the wilderness that followed his baptism by John mirrors the forty years the Israelites spent wandering in the desert after passing through the sea.
The book of Isaiah was also probably a source for some of the miracle stories in the gospels. The original writings were partly metaphorical, and maybe some of the miracles ascribed to Jesus also had that dimension. Good examples of the possible influence of Isaiah on the gospel writers’ accounts of Jesus’ miracles are,
‘Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
And the ears of the deaf will hear;
Then shall the lame man will leap like a deer,
And the tongue of the dumb will sing for joy.’ (Isaiah 35.5-6)
and,
‘Your dead will come back to life, your corpses will rise up.’ (Isaiah 26.19)
Isaiah was a particularly important prophet for the writer of the gospel of Matthew. Matthew 13.35 even attributes a quote to Isaiah regarding the parables of Jesus that’s actually from Psalms, ‘I will open my mouth with parables; I will utter things kept secret since the world was made.’ This may be the reason why the writer of Matthew added lots of new parables to his story that weren’t in Mark.
Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40 – 55) was also an important source of ‘prophecy’ for the idea of a suffering saviour. Isaiah 53 is particularly important as it portrays Israel as a suffering servant who is despised and rejected by the masses. This was later reworked into the figure of Jesus and is central to the gospels’ passion story and Christian theology. The basics are all there in Isaiah 53. We are told of this suffering servant,
‘He was despised and rejected by the people.
A man of suffering, familiar with pain…
…Yet on himself he took our pain,
and bore our sufferings…
…He was pierced for our transgressions,
crushed for our iniquities…
…Yahweh has laid upon him
the guilt of us all.
He was oppressed and afflicted,
but he didn’t open his mouth.
He was led like a lamb to the slaughter…
…By oppression and judgement he was taken away.
Who of his generation protested?
He was cut off from the land of the living,
punished for the transgressions of my people.
He was assigned a grave with the wicked…
…Though he had done no violence
and spoken no deceit.
Yet it was Yahweh’s will to crush him and make him suffer,
and Yahweh makes his life an offering for sin…
..After he has suffered he will be bathed in light and vindicated,
My righteous servant will vindicate many,
bearing the penalty of their guilt…
…He poured out his life unto death,
he was numbered with the transgressors,
he bore the sin of many
and interceded for the transgressors.’ (Isaiah 53)
1 Clement is a first century Christian letter and probably the earliest non-canonical Christian writing. In the letter the author talks of Jesus’ suffering and quotes the whole passage from Isaiah above (1 Clement 16), while not mentioning anything from the gospel passion narrative. The author appears completely unaware of the gospels. Like Paul’s letters, 1 Clement may even predate the creation of the gospels. It’s worth remembering that this passage was actually a later sixth century BCE addition to Isaiah, and wasn’t written by Isaiah himself (if he ever existed).
The Psalms may have been the original source for the specific idea of the crucifixion. Psalm 22.16 reads, ‘Dogs surround me, a pack of villains surrounds me. They pierce my hands and my feet.’ Another line in Isaiah may also have backed up the setting of the passion story in Jerusalem, ‘How the faithful city has played the whore, once it was full of justice where righteousness dwelt – but now murderers’ (Isaiah 1.21).
Even unnecessary insignificant parts of the gospel narrative were added to the story to mirror lines in the Old Testament. According to the writer of Matthew, the baby Jesus and his family escape Herod’s mythical ‘massacre of the innocents’ by fleeing to Egypt (Matthew 1.13). The gospel author openly states this happened to ‘fulfil’ a line of Hosea that reads, ‘Out of Egypt I called my son’ (Hosea 11.1).
It also obviously linked Jesus to the main myth of the Jewish Bible – the Exodus, which was what this ‘prophecy’ originally referred to. The ‘massacre of the innocents’ itself never happened. It appears in the gospel story to link Jesus to Moses, by mirroring Pharaoh’s order to kill every male Hebrew child in the Old Testament.
We are told that Jesus ascends a high mountain to have Yahweh proclaim that he’s his son (Mark 9.2-7). This is to mirror a line in Psalms about a king of Israel, ‘“I have installed my king on Zion, my holy mountain.” I will proclaim Yahweh’s decree. He said to me, “You are my son”’ (Psalm 2.6-7).
When Jesus is given vinegar to drink on the cross, it mirrors a line in Psalms, ‘They…gave me vinegar for my thirst’ (Psalms 69.21). The same thing is true for the casting of lots for his clothes, another line in Psalms reads, ‘They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garments’ (Psalms 22.18). John 19.24 specifically quotes this Old Testament passage when mentioning this event. Jesus’ last words are also directly lifted from the Psalms. Psalm 22.1 reads, ‘My god, my god, why have you forsaken me?’ and Mark 15.33 has Jesus repeat this exact formula.
The gospel of John adds a detail of Jesus being pierced by a lance while on the cross, and that detail was probably inspired by Zechariah 12.10, ‘They shall look on me, the one who they have pierced,’ as well as the passage in Isaiah 53 mentioned above which states, ‘he was pierced for our transgressions’ (Isaiah 53.5).
The Gospel of Mark has Jesus entering Jerusalem on a colt (Mark 11.2-7). That detail was added to mirror Zechariah 9.9 that states, ‘Rejoice greatly daughter of Zion, shout daughter of Jerusalem. See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’
The later Gospel of Matthew felt the need to correct Mark, its original source material. Matthew 21.2-7 has Jesus entering Jerusalem riding both a colt and a donkey simultaneously! Matthew also quotes the original line in Zechariah to make the relationship to the passage in Jewish scripture completely obvious to the reader.
Jesus’ twelve disciples mirrored the twelve tribes of Israel in the Old Testament. Matthew 19.28 makes this link clear when it has Jesus address his disciples, ‘When the Son of Man is seated on his glorious throne, you my followers will have thrones of your own, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.’
Jesus’ forty days of temptation in the desert mirrored the forty year wanderings of the Israelites in the Exodus story. The story of Jesus knocking over the tables of the money-lenders and merchants in the temple of Jerusalem probably derives from Zechariah 14.21, ‘So when that time comes, no merchant shall again be seen in the house of Yahweh of hosts.’
The thirty pieces of silver that Judas receives for betraying Jesus may be another interesting case of Old Testament prophecy being used to create the gospel narrative. Matthew 27.9 states that, ‘Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled, “They took the thirty pieces of silver, the price set on him by the people of Israel.”’ The strange thing about this ‘prophecy’ is that it doesn’t appear in Jeremiah, it’s actually from Zechariah 11.12. The passage mentions thirty pieces of silver as payment for fattened sheep and is actually hard to read as any genuine attempt at prophecy. It just looks like an attempt to squeeze yet another piece of Old Testament ‘prophecy’ into the gospel narrative.
Later Christian works used to the same method to add to the Jesus story. The animals in the Christmas manger aren’t mentioned in the New Testament, but their addition to the story also derives from a line in Isaiah. They’re first mentioned in the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, dating to the 8th or 9th century CE, which states that Mary, ‘put her child in a manger, and an ox and ass worshipped him. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken through the prophet Isaiah, “The ox knows his owner and the ass his master’s crib.”’
Jewish works that are no longer canonical may also have been used by the gospel writers to create their story of Jesus. Judaism didn’t establish a canon until the second century CE, so no set Jewish Bible existed at the dawn of Christianity. There are around 400 references to non-canonical Jewish literature in the New Testament.
The Book of Wisdom was part of the Septuagint used by Paul and the gospel writers, but no longer appears in modern Bibles. It was written in Greek, most probably in the 2nd century BCE, but was falsely ascribed to Solomon and believed to be far older than it was. Augustine considered it canonical and stated that, ‘in the one…called the Wisdom of Solomon, the passion of Christ is most openly prophesied’ (City of God 17.20). Augustine quotes the following from the Book of Wisdom,
‘Let us lie in wait for the righteous, for he is unpleasant to us, and contrary to our works. He upbraids us with our transgressions of the law…He professes to have the knowledge of God, and calls himself the Son of God…Let us put him to the question with contumely and torture, that we may know his reverence, and prove his patience. Let us condemn him to the most shameful death.’ (City of God 17.20)
The Bible and Mythology 