KindiakMath

Having taken great pains to establish the historicity of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, as well as the historical reliability of the synoptic gospels Matthew, Mark, and Luke regarding the sayings of Jesus, what’s the overall main point? Christians claim that Jesus is God, but how do we know for sure?

If Jesus never called himself God, then there really is not much discussion to be had. However, Christians claim that Jesus did call himself God, which is a massive claim, to say the least. How do we know that is the case?

The Gospel of Mark records for us an exchange between Jesus and the Pharisees in the midnight leading up to his death.

But he remained silent and made no answer. Again the high priest asked him, “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” And Jesus said, “I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.” And the high priest tore his garments and said, “What further witnesses do we need? You have heard his blasphemy. What is your decision?” And they all condemned him as deserving death. [Mark 14:61–64]

The Pharisees understood Jesus’ claim to be a claim to divinity, since they charged him with the religious crime of blasphemy. However, did they just misunderstand Jesus? Or was what they interpreted really what Jesus said?

To make sense of this question, we need to answer a few questions. Who is “the Christ” mentioned by the high priest, and who is “the Blessed”, and “the Son of the Blessed”? Jesus uses the phrase “Son of Man”, “seated at the right hand of Power”, and “coming with the clouds of heaven”—what do these phrases mean?

Before we unpack these phrases, and do a little bit of exegesis (i.e. a fancy word for Bible study), we first need to do a sanity check that the Old Testament we currently have genuinely corresponds to the Tanakh in Jesus’ day, so that by reading our Old Testament, we can sufficiently accurately understand the high priestly interrogation.

Theorem 1. The Old Testament was continuously transmitted from the Tanakh in Jesus’ day.

Proof. The tripartite structure of Torah, Prophets, and Writings that Jesus names in Luke 24:44 matches the organization preserved in Second Temple sources such as the Dead Sea Scrolls and Josephus, showing continuity of the canonical corpus (Sources: 4QMMT; Josephus).

Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses (i.e. the Torah) and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” [Luke 24:44]

Manuscripts from Qumran (third century B.C. to first century A.D.) contain every Old Testament book except Esther and align closely with the later Masoretic Text, demonstrating that the Hebrew consonantal text in circulation during Jesus’ ministry is substantially the same as that transmitted by Jewish scribes in the early Middle Ages (Source: Dead Sea Scrolls).

In particular, the scroll of Isaiah that Jesus used and is now recorded for our reference has been largely well-preserved barring superficial damaged portions (Source: Isaiah Scroll).

Greek-speaking Jews likewise circulated the Septuagint, a translation begun in the third century B.C., which quotes the same narratives and laws that appear in our present Old Testament (Source: Septuagint Pentateuch).

Taken together, manuscript continuity, cross-linguistic translations, and consistent canonical references establish that the Old Testament in modern Bibles was continuously transmitted from the Tanakh known in Jesus’ day.

In what follows, we will trace the Jewish understanding of the Tanakh, since that understanding would correspond to what Jesus means in his words.

Lemma 1. In the Tanakh, “the Christ” refers to the individual that God will send to save Israel.

Proof. “Christ” is the Greek rendering of the Hebrew mashiach (“anointed one”), usually translated as “Messiah”, a title applied in the Old Testament to kings consecrated for Israel’s deliverance:

• The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples. [Genesis 49:10]
• “…he says: It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” [Isaiah 49:6]
• “…the LORD and against his Anointed…As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.” [Psalm 2:2; 6]

The Torah describes this Messiah as the snake-crushing offspring from Eve, refined into the offspring of Abraham through whom all nations are blessed, filtered further into the king that comes from the line of Judah, and finally proclaimed by Moses as a Prophet who speaks the words of God to God’s people:

• “…her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” [Genesis 3:15]
• Now the LORD said to Abram, “…in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” [Genesis 12:1; 3]
• The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples. [Genesis 49:10]
• “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers—it is to him you shall listen…” [Deuteronomy 18:15–18]

The Prophets extends the title to a future figure who will restore David’s kingdom, shepherd God’s people, and inaugurate the age of salvation:

• “The LORD…will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed.” [1 Samuel 2:10]
• When your (i.e. David’s) days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body…and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. [2 Samuel 7:12–13]
• In that day the Lord will extend his hand yet a second time to recover the remnant that remains of his people, from Assyria, from Egypt, from Pathros, from Cush, from Elam, from Shinar, from Hamath, and from the coastlands of the sea. [Isaiah 11:11]
• Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: The LORD is our righteousness.’ [Jeremiah 23:5–6]
• And he shall stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God. And they shall dwell secure, for now he shall be great to the ends of the earth. And he shall be their peace. [Micah 5:4–5]

Finally the Wisdom writings (i.e. Psalms, Daniel, etc) describe a coming, God-sent ruler/deliverer (i.e., “the Christ,” the anointed one):

• The LORD says to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.” The LORD sends forth from Zion your mighty sceptre. Rule in the midst of your enemies! [Psalm 110:1–2]
• “…and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom…” [Daniel 7:13–14]

Consequently, when the high priest asks Jesus if he is “the Christ,” he is invoking the well-established hope that God will send a specific anointed deliverer for Israel.

Lemma 2. In the Old Testament, God is the unique being that will reign forever and be the ultimate judge of all humanity.

Proof. Foundational texts assert the exclusive kingship and judicial prerogative of Israel’s God:

• Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; for the day of their calamity is at hand, and their doom comes swiftly.’ [Deuteronomy 32:36]

Prophets reinforce this theme by equating the universal judgment of the nations with the self-revelation of God alone:

• The adversaries of the LORD shall be broken to pieces; against them he will thunder in heaven. The LORD will judge the ends of the earth; he will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed.” [1 Samuel 2:10]
• For the LORD is our judge; the LORD is our lawgiver; the LORD is our king; he will save us. [Isaiah 33:22]
• Let the nations stir themselves up and come up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat; for there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. [Joel 3:12]

Wisdom writings likewise proclaim that God will judge every deed, bringing total accountability under His reign:

• The LORD is king forever and ever; the nations perish from his land. [Psalm 10:16]
• Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures throughout all generations. [Psalm 145:13]
• “…before the LORD, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with equity.” [Psalm 98:8–9]
• For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil. [Ecclesiastes 12:14]

Therefore, Jewish theology attributes eternal kingship and final judgment exclusively to God.

Theorem 2. In Jewish thought, the “Son of Man” title that Jesus uses refers to God.

Proof. Jesus’ self-description echoes Daniel 7:13–14, where “one like a son of man” comes with the clouds of heaven—imagery reserved for divine appearances:

• “…and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom…” [Daniel 7:13–14]
• And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night. [Exodus 13:21]

Furthermore, this son of man receives from the Ancient of Days an everlasting dominion and worship (“service,” Aramaic pelach) that elsewhere in Daniel is rendered only to God:

• These men, O king, pay no attention to you; they do not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up. [Daniel 3:12]
• “…his dominion is an everlasting dominion…and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, “What have you done?”” [Daniel 4:34–35]

Later Jewish exegesis preserves this exalted view:

• The Lord is at your right hand; he will shatter kings on the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses; he will shatter chiefs over the wide earth. [Psalm 110:5–6]

Because eternal rule and universal judgment belong solely to God, the Danielic “Son of Man”—enthroned on the clouds and receiving divine honors—participates in God’s unique identity. Thus, in the Jewish interpretive framework familiar to the Sanhedrin, the “Son of Man” title invokes a figure who shares in God’s authority and status.

Theorem 3. Jesus claims to be God.

Proof. It suffices to show that Jesus identifies himself with the “Son of Man” in Theorem 2. In response to the high priest’s question, Jesus declares,

“I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming with the clouds of heaven” [Mark 14:62]

The citation fuses Psalm 110:1—where God invites His co-regent to share the divine throne—with Daniel 7:13–14’s cloud-riding Son of Man. By affirming “I am” and predicting that His interrogators will witness Him occupying the divine throne and administering eschatological judgment, Jesus applies the Son of Man identity as described in Theorem 2 directly to Himself.

Since Theorem 2 establishes that this title belongs uniquely to the divine sphere, Jesus’ self-identification constitutes a claim to God’s authority and status. Therefore, Jesus openly claims to be God.

By Theorem 3, Jesus claims to be God. Did Jesus blaspheme? If Jesus is not God, then claiming to be God, he has blasphemed. But how do we know that Jesus is not God? To be sure, no sinner can be God. The evidence we garner is that every human we know of has sinned, and therefore, cannot be God. That is true. But did Jesus sin? If he did, then he cannot be God. Therefore, we must be sure that he has not sinned.

The only place where Jesus may have sinned is in claiming divinity when he is, in fact, not divine. Therefore, we return to the question: is Jesus God or not? If Jesus is not God, then he did blaspheme. If Jesus is God, then he did not blaspheme. One thing is for sure: Jesus definitely claimed to be God. Is this claim a justified one?

The answer lies in whether Jesus actually resurrected or not. We will investigate this paradigm-shattering event next time—the pivot point of all of Christianity, and I’m convinced, for all of the world.

—Joel Kindiak, 17 Oct 25, 2205H