Dwain Northey (Gen X)

One of the arguments I hear over and over from some Christians is, “You can’t deny Jesus was the Messiah because He fulfilled every Old Testament prophecy.”

Really?

That’s presented as though it’s the end of the conversation, when in reality it’s the beginning of one.

As someone who enjoys writing, I know one simple truth about storytelling: you don’t start writing without knowing where you’re going. Every good author writes toward a conclusion. Characters are introduced because they’ll matter later. Details are planted because they’ll pay off in the final act. Foreshadowing only works because the author already knows the ending.

So when someone tells me the New Testament proves Jesus was the Messiah because it quotes prophecy after prophecy, I can’t help but ask a simple historical question: who chose those prophecies, and when?

The books that eventually became the Christian Bible were not bound together during Jesus’ lifetime. The canon developed over centuries through debates, disagreements, and church councils. The New Testament itself was written decades after Jesus’ death by authors who believed He was the Messiah and were writing to convince others of that conclusion. They naturally interpreted the Hebrew Scriptures through that lens.

That isn’t an insult. It’s simply how literature and theology work.

The Hebrew Bible itself is also the product of centuries of writing, editing, and compilation. Christians refer to it as the Old Testament, but Judaism understands those same texts as part of the Tanakh, interpreted within a much broader tradition that includes centuries of rabbinic scholarship. Christians and Jews often read the very same passages and arrive at very different conclusions—not because one side is stupid, but because they begin with different assumptions and different interpretive traditions.

Which raises another obvious question.

If the prophecies are supposedly so overwhelming and so undeniable, why are there millions of deeply religious Jews—people who have spent their entire lives studying these scriptures in their original languages—who do not accept Jesus as the Messiah?

It’s not because they’ve never heard the argument.

It’s because they read the same texts differently. Many point to messianic expectations that they believe were not fulfilled, such as universal peace, the gathering of all exiles, and a transformed world. They don’t simply ignore Christian claims; they evaluate them through a different theological framework.

That doesn’t automatically make Christianity false, nor does it make Judaism false.

It simply means the issue is far more complex than a bumper sticker apologetic.

Yet some Christians act as though anyone who disagrees must either be ignorant or deliberately rejecting obvious truth. That’s an astonishing level of confidence considering most of them have never read the Hebrew Bible outside the passages selected for Sunday sermons, let alone explored Jewish commentaries or the broader body of ancient Jewish literature.

Many Christians proudly proclaim, “The Old Testament proves the New Testament.”

Of course it does—if you’re reading it through the interpretive framework established by the New Testament.

That’s circular reasoning.

It’s like reading the final chapter of a mystery novel first and then declaring every clue in the earlier chapters obviously points to the killer. Well, yes. The author knew the ending before writing the beginning.

Faith doesn’t require pretending history is simpler than it is.

Belief doesn’t require dismissing centuries of Jewish scholarship.

And intellectual honesty certainly doesn’t require claiming that every question has already been answered.

If your faith is true, it should be able to withstand historical inquiry, textual criticism, and difficult questions. It shouldn’t depend on pretending there is only one way to read ancient texts or that every scholar who disagrees simply hasn’t “accepted the truth.”

Perhaps the greatest irony is that the same Christians who tell everyone else to “read the Bible” often have little curiosity about the scriptures, traditions, and historical context from which their own Bible emerged. They are content with the verses that support the conclusion they already believe, while dismissing the broader conversation that has existed for more than two thousand years.

Faith is a choice.

History is an investigation.

Confusing one for the other doesn’t strengthen either.