Isaiah's Wonderful Councellor And Christian's Pathetic Delimma

“For a child has been born to us, a son has been given to us, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and he shall be called  – wonderful counselor, mighty God, father unto (eternity), prince of peace.”

                                                                                                                                    -ISAIAH 9:5 

 Quite often we come across Evengalists & Missioneries who often quote the above verse as a proof of their preposterous claim that it prophecies about Jesus Christ .And often asserts the same verse to claim the Divine origin for their Jesus Christ.

Folks, Kindly do understand, a verse has to be read in a context and together with full chapter only. It is only then that Verse makes any sense .You cannot  take one verse out of no where and deliberately apply it to someone out of thin air ; more so if that verse is pertaining to Prophecy.

As a “Text Without A Context Is Only A Pretext” . Let us  systematically understand and investigate the truth behind above verse .So fasten your seat belts Ladies and Gentlemen, here we go :

1.     Time -Frame –:  A prophecy is a prophecy only if it pertains to a future event .Quickly notice the tense its talking about a child  been born, in the past tense .  Obviously ,it then cannot refer to the time frame in which Jesus was present .

2.     Hint To A Future King-: By far we had already established that the time frame mentioned here is not of Jesus as its in Past tense,but how come its talking about a King? Well see, a son already in existence and about to be conferred Government has to be only about a King ,as Priests and Levites were very Sacred Positions meant only to serve God’s Temple & not kingdom. Also Did Jesus “govern” in any sense of the word”?

3.     Context – : As already pointed out , It is only by disregarding the context of the verse, and with no respect for the spirit of scripture that the missionary can wrench the words out of context and use them as a reference to a pagan concept with no foundation in scripture. Lets see the context:

Verse 9:3 “Thou hast multiplied the nation, and not increased the joy: they joy before thee according to the joy in the harvest and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil”.

9:4-“ For thou hast broken the yoke of his burden , and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian”.

9:5-“For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise , and the garments rolled in blood ; and this shall be with burning and fuel of fire”.

The passage in which this verse appears talks of a military threat being miraculously eliminated, namely the threat of the Assyrian king Sennacherib. Verse 4 of the passage talks of the yoke of his (the nation’s) burden and the rod of her oppressor being broken as on the day of Midian. The “day of Midian” was when God miraculously put an army of multitudes to flight before Gideon’s small band of 300 (Judges 6 and 7). This is a clear parallel to the miraculous annihilation of Sennacherib’s troops (as described in chapters 37 of Isaiah, 19 of second Kings, and 32 of second Chronicles). Lets look at the literal fulfillment of above passages systematically:

a)“Yoke” and “Burden” (9:3): Are used in 14:25 with a direct reference to Assyria’ army being broken.

b) “Staff” and “Rod” (9:3): Can be found in 10:5,24,27, and 30:31, clearly talking of this same event. 

c)” Midian” (9:3) : Reference to Midian is repeated in 10:26 in relation to Sennacherib’s destruction.

d) “Burning”: As a description of this miracle (9:5), is mentioned in 10:16,17 and again in 30:31 and 31:9 as a description of the death of Sennacherib’s soldiers. 

e) “ Reference To Counsel” (9:5): Is used in 14:26,27 to speak of this miracle. 

There are several Jewish interpretations offered to explain this verse, but they all recognize that the verse is speaking of Hezekiah’s salvation from the threat of Sennacherib. People will associate the child with the good memories  due to the former’s deliverance from their enemies. All of these interpretations conform with the grammatical structure of the verse. In fact keeping a name denoting circumstance under which a child came out of Womb was a very common tradition.  Example- Bilhah Rachel’s Maid bore a son for Jacob and Rachel named the Child as “Naph-ta-li” citing the reason that “ With great wrestling with my sister I have prevailed”( Gen 30:8), Her Sister named her son “ Reuben” giving reasons that “Surely Lord hath looked upon my affliction, now therefore my husband will love me”( Gen 29:32).

Again when Leah felt left out she took her Maid and gave it to her Husband Jacob and the child was called “ Gad”  cause” Leah thought a Troop cometh”( read Gen 30:11)also she called another son “Asher” reason being” Happy am I, for the daughters will call me Blessed”. Also Another son of Rachel was called Benoni cause that labour pain ended up taking life of Rachel so she gave him that name but his father changed it to Benjamin( Gen35:18).

 So you see associating the name to a child citing a specific reason of significance was a traditional practice.

The spirit of the verse, is that the child will somehow be a cause for the salvation of the Jewish people from the oppression of Sennacherib. Indeed, Hezekiah’s prayer was the catalyst for God’s intervention on behalf of His people (Isaiah 37:21, 2Kings 19:20). Isaiah is comforting his people. Although Achaz (Hezekiah’s father) was evil, but his child was holy and righteous. In the merit of this holy child, who bore upon his shoulders the government of his people, the nation could hope to survive the onslaught of Sennacherib and his hordes.

The simple fact is that it is quite common in the Bible for human beings to be given names that have the purpose of declaring or reflecting a particular attribute of God, e.g. Elihu, "My God is He," similarly other names are Eliab, Eliada, Elzaphan, Eliakim, Elisha, Eleazar, Tavel, Gedaliah.

About Fallacy of Fullfillment  By Jesus:

1.     A wonderful counselor -Does not advise his followers that if they have faith they can be agents of destruction (Matthew 21:19-21; Mark 11:14, 20-23).

2.     A mighty God- Does not take orders from anyone (Luke2:51, Hebrews 5:8)

3.     He who is called the Son of God the Father (John 1:18, 3:16) cannot himself be called everlasting Father.

4.     A ruler of peace-He who advocates family strife (Matthew 10:34-35, Luke 12:49-53) and killing enemies (Luke 19:27) cannot be he.