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From: smb@ulysses.UUCP (Steven Bellovin)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: Acceptance of Isaiah
Message-ID: <804@ulysses.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 21-Mar-84 20:21:04 EST
Article-I.D.: ulysses.804
Posted: Wed Mar 21 20:21:04 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 22-Mar-84 04:01:22 EST
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	From: russ@dadla-b.UUCP
	Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
	Subject: Acceptance of Isaiah
	Message-ID: <559@dadla-b.UUCP>
	Date: Mon, 5-Mar-84 20:00:41 EST

	I would like someone in the Jewish community to confirm something
	about the Jewish acceptance of the Old Testament.  I have heard
	that the Jews do not accept the Book of Isaiah because it is too
	difficult to explain the many references to Christ.  Is this true?
	Is it just a portion of the Jews?

	Russell Anderson
	tektronix!dadla-a!russ

No, this is not true at all.  Isaiah is indeed Messianic in tone,
but to describe it as Christological is to overassume.  For many passages,
it's simply the interpretation that differs; the text is unclear.  In
some other cases, it's a question of translation.  For example, the most
famous reference (Isaiah 7:14) refers to either a "virgin" bearing a child
(the Christian interpretation) or to a "young woman" (the Jewish translation).
Choosing between variant translations is a task few are competent to perform;
even to experts, the meaning of some phrases is at best unclear.

One other point:  if -- as Jews believe -- Jesus was not the Messiah, the
possibility exists that the stories told of him were deliberately cast in
the mold of (more or less) vague Biblical prophecies; anyone who did not match
those descriptions would not be accepted by the Jews of that time.  For
example, the Messiah, according to tradition, must be of the House of David --
and Jesus' ancestry is so described (but through Joseph, not Mary....).