In starting this installment let me be clear about the purpose of this series. It is not to deny that the NT writers cite the OT, or that they augment OT revelation. The issue here is about whether NT writers interpret OT passages as types and shadows of Jesus and the Church. It’s about whether they believed most of the OT covenants and prophecies were fulfilled at the first coming in some spiritualized way, and if so, where is the proof for it in their writings? Merely citing verses like Luke 24:27, 46-47; John 5:39; Acts 10:43, and 1 Peter 1:11 will not suffice as they do not say that the apostolic writers interpreted the Prophets typologically.
Mistaking Opinion For Proof
I am continuing to deal with arguments presented by those who believe the NT must reinterpret the OT; that the OT language is symbolic and in need of deciphering (hence “reinterpretation is the correct term). I did go on X and ask the following question:
“Question for those who believe the NT must interpret the OT: What are your best proofs for that belief? Thanks.”
These are the types of answers I got back:
“Probably the fact that the New Testament constantly explains the Old Testament.”
and,
“My proof is that I read it, and it does.”
and,
“Jesus is God. Scripture is God’s word. The OT is Scripture. Therefore Jesus can interpret the OT. QED.”
I know, I had it coming for going on X. There were lots of comments like these. Mind-expanding opinions from those who doubtless are the ones, and wisdom will die with them!
Then there was this, from a doctoral student:
“It’s not that the “NT must interpret the OT” it’s that Jesus said the OT was all about him. Therefore, we read the OT christologically.”
Of course, nowhere does Jesus say that the OT is all about Him. Jesus had more sense than to say that. The OT is about lots of things, as anyone who reads it can attest. You don’t even have to be saved to know that.
Now, this individual has Luke 24:27 and Jesus’ teaching on the Road to Emmaus in his sights, but his sights are not very focused. The text says,
And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.
The OT contains many prophecies about Christ: Gen. 3:15; 49:8-12; Num. 24:7-9; Deut. 18:15-19; Josh. 5:14-15; Job 19:25-27; Psa. 22; 24; 69:8-9; 110:1-4; Isa. 2:3-4; 7:14; 9:6-7; 11:1-10; 42:1-6; 49:1-8; 52:13-53:12; Jer. 23:5-6; 33:14-26; Mic. 5:2; Dan. 7:13-14; 9:24-26; Zech. 6:12-13; 9:9-10; 11:12-13; 12:10; Mal. 3:1-3 and many others, plus the appearances of the Angel of the Lord throughout the OT (e.g., Gen. 19:24).
That’s a lot of Scripture to expound! It would take hours to get through all that. The 7.5 miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus would take 4 hours at a slow pace. That sounds about right. But not even 4 days would suffice if Jesus was expounding the whole Hebrew Bible and applying it to Himself. Obviously, Jesus was explaining the prophecies about Himself (cf. Jn. 5:39-40; Acts 10:43). It is frankly ridiculous to claim that He was going verse by verse through the entire OT. Our doctoral student was misreading Luke 24 because his assumptions got in the way. And he was by no means alone in doing so. One person left this comment:
Everything written in the Old Testament is christological and had to be fully accomplished during the transition from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant era.
Well, that is their opinion. But just asserting something, however pious it sounds, does not magically make it true. I am all for Christological understanding of the OT. But it must be regulated by the text in context, not read into the text via outside assumptions or lazy readings of NT passages. To repeat, nowhere does the NT say that the OT is filled with types and shadows which have to be explicated by the NT.
More Thoughtful Responses
But a few respondents gave thoughtful replies.
Jesus Himself explicitly defined the Old Testament (the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms) as a giant prophetic arrow pointing strictly to Him and His ultimate fulfillment.
Matthew 5:17–18 – “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.” This frame, his “jot and tittle” argument notes that not one minor detail of the Law or Prophets could pass away until all of it was fulfilled. Since the Law of Moses did pass away (replaced by the New Covenant), all Old Testament prophecy must have already met its complete fulfillment.
Can you spot the fallacy? This person thinks that Matthew 5:17-18 says that everything in the OT had to be fulfilled at the first coming. I refer to this error as “first coming hermeneutics.” Again, prior assumptions get in the way of right comprehension. Jesus says,
till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. – Matthew 5:18.
Okay, heaven and earth have not passed away yet so there is plenty of time for the law to be fulfilled. The “law” here is shorthand for “the Law and the Prophets” or the OT. It didn’t have to be fulfilled in the first century A.D. Furthermore, there is not a word in the passage about the OT being a book full of types and shadows. He follows this with an equivocation:
Since the Law of Moses did pass away (replaced by the New Covenant), all Old Testament prophecy must have already met its complete fulfillment.
He is reading Hebrews 8:13 into Matthew 5:18. But Matthew 5:18 concerns the Hebrew Bible. Hebrews 8:13 refers to the “old covenant,” which is the Mosaic covenant. The Mosaic covenant is not the same thing as the OT which contains it (this is another common equivocation I encounter all the time).
It is true that Christians are in the New covenant, and not under the Law. But that does not mean the Hebrew Bible has no authority over us. Much Bible doctrine comes from the OT; is it now obsolete? You see how a sloppy reading of the NT affects one’s reading of the OT?
Let’s keep going…
Acts 3:21–24 – “Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days.” This highlights Peter’s words to show that the generic phrase “all the prophets” pointed precisely to the first-century generation (“these days”) and to Christ.
Now, you have to be careful with the first chapters of Acts. You can’t just blunder in and read it isolated from its historical context. Eschatology was in the air, and Peter’s mind is filled with it. In the verses preceeding this proof-text Jesus claims that Jesus will return and set up “the times of refreshing…restoration” if Israel will believe (Acts 3:19, 21). Set against this background of the second advent Peter refers to “all the prophets.” They predicted the coming of Jesus and they predicted the second coming and the physical Kingdom set up after it. Peter probably knows the Jews will reject Christ, but he is presenting what is in effect a counterfactual – that Jesus will return upon their repentance. That is what he means by the phrase “these days.” He is not saying that everything the prophets predicted had been fulfilled. Some of it had, but quite a lot of it awaits Christ’s second coming – which was being presented. Read carefully,
“Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that the times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.” – Acts 3:19-21.
Peter has the second coming in mind, not the first.
Metalepsis is the idea that NT writers quote small pieces of the Old Testament to bring the entire original context to mind. Through this lens it shows how specific segments of the Law and Prophets spoke of Christ… Consider how the inspired author of Hebrews clarifies the meaning of Haggai 2:6-9 and Haggai 2:21-22 in Hebrews 12:25-29, in a way that clearly suggests that there is no Millennial Kingdom when read in conjunction with other eschatological texts.
It is abundantly clear that the author of Hebrews understands God’s shaking of the heavens and the earth to usher in the kingdom of the eternal state, in which nothing that can be shaken will remain. Dispensationalists must admit that many people will be shaken out of their postulated Millennial Kingdom. (My emphasis).
If we look at Hebrews 12:25-29 we see that another “shaking of the heavens and earth” is to come. When this occurs there will be a lot of “removal of those things that are being shaken,” but there are also those things which remain, which continue into the Kingdom. According to this commenter this clearly shows that there can be no Millennium, presumably because if there were that Millennial Kingdom would be shaken when God made “the earth and the heaven fled away” in Revelation 20:11.
But my reading of Revelation 20:11; 21:1 and the “dissolving” of the elemnts described in 2 Peter 3:10-12 is not a “shaking” but a complete dissolution. In Hebrews 12:27 things remain after the shaking. Not so in Revelation 20:11 and 2 Peter 3. Now I know that not everyone shares that view. Michael Vlach is one of those who believe the heavens and earth will undergo a thorough purification by fire. But he sees no reason to equate Haggai 2 or Hebrews 12 with the New Heavens and New Earth. So this attempt at removing the Millennium by means of metalepsis fails.
Another respondent, a lecturer in NT no less, had this to say:
If (1) you are a Christian who believes that the New Testament is a divinely inspired, infallible part of the Bible, and (2) the New Testament makes totalizing interpretive claims about what the Old Testament was always about and where it was always intended to lead (e.g., Luke 24:27, 46-47; John 5:39; Acts 10:43; 1 Pet 1:11), and (3) you care about non-contradiction and hold this summary of the Old Testament to be true (including Jesus’s claim that salvation through Christ and the ingathering of the gentiles was the central import of the Old Testament), and (4) you then find yourself able to go back and see precisely these trajectories, promises, types, shadows, etc. that the first Christian interpreters were picking up on, then you will automatically find yourself “interpreting the Old Testament” in light of the New, while of course always affirming that this is not an alien meaning being foisted on the text, but was always the divine intention beginning with Adam (My emphasis).
Can you see the governing assumption that will introduce “trajectories, promises, types, shadows, etc”? It is “Jesus’s claim that salvation through Christ and the ingathering of the gentiles was the central import of the Old Testament.” But is he right? We certainly see OT passages that refer to the future salvation of the Gentiles (e.g., Gen. 12:3; 22:18; Isa. 2:1-4; 11:10; Mic. 4:1-2; Zech. 14:16-19 cf. Rom. 15:9-12). But we see a great deal more about the salvation of Israel (e.g., Deut. 30:1-6; Isa. 54; 59:16-21; Jer. 31:31-37; 32:26-44; 33:16-26; Ezek. 36:16-38; 37:1-28; Zeph. 3:14-20; Zech. 8:1-13 and so many more). The OT is an Israelcentric Book. How could he miss that? I believe it is because running in the background is the assumption that the Church in Christ is the New Israel, and therefore the OT has to be converted into types and shadows of that assumed reality. That is to say, it is not the NT itself that is forcing this interpretation, it is the assumptions being brought to the NT that drive the need to discover the types required if you’re going to claim most OT prophecy was fulfilled at the first coming.
