Page:Visions and Prophecies of Zechariah (Baron, David).djvu/455



FINAL CONFLICT AND DELIVERANCE 439

beginning of a fall and defeat before their enemies, as Joshua did. When the men of Ai smote thirty-six of Israel, he said : Alas! O Lord God, why didst Thou cause this people to pass the Jordan ? And again : What shall I say when Israel turn their backs before their enemies ? (Josh. vii.). So will it be at that time if they should see any of them pierced, they will be astonished, and look on Me on account of Him whom they pierced."

This translation, however, to which English-speaking Jews have, as we have seen, officially committed themselves, only shows the length which modern Judaism will go in misinterpreting the plainest scriptures so as to evade the Christian argument drawn from them in support of the claims of Jesus of Nazareth. 1

It is a rendering which is contrary to grammar and to the natural sense, for, first, the word "i^K JIN (eth asher) cannot possibly mean " because of Him whom," but simply " whom," emphatically and definitely expressed. And, secondly, the modern Jewish rendering or paraphrase implies that the subject of the second verb of the first verse, VIJTI, daqaru " pierced," is a different one from that of the first verb, i^ani, v hibitu " shall look" in the same short sen tence. But it is altogether unnatural to suppose that two

1 An instance of departure not only from the plain sense and grammar, but from the more ancient Jewish traditional interpretations of Messianic passages for controversial reasons, is found in Rashi (Rabbi Solomon Bar Isaac), the most popular commentator on the Bible and Talmud born at Troys in 1040, died in 1 105. In his commentary on this passage in the Bible he says : " They shall look back to mourn because the Gentiles had pierced some amongst them, and killed some of them."

But in his commentary on the Talmud he says : "The words, the land shall mourn, are found in the prophecy of Zechariah, and he prophesies of the future that they shall mourn on account of Messiah, the son of Joseph, who shall be slain in the war of Gog and Magog" (Sukkah, fol. 52, col. l). That this mani fest contradiction is not accidental, but intentional, appears from the fact that this writer has dealt similarly by other controverted passages ; for instance, Isa. liii., which, in his commentary on the Bible, he expounds of the Jewish people ; but in his commentary on the Talmud he explains of Messiah. Indeed, his determination to get rid of any explanation that could favour Christianity is plainly avowed in his commentary on Ps. xxi., where he says: "Our Rabbis have expounded JE it of the King Messiah, but it is better to expound it further of David himself, in | order to answer heretics."