The Age of Reason - Thomas Paine (read aloud books TXT) 📗

called the kingdom of Judah, the capital of which was Jerusalem; the other the kingdom of Israel, the capital of which was Samaria. The kingdom of Judah followed the line of David, and the kingdom of Israel that of Saul; and these two rival monarchies frequently carried on fierce wars with each other.

At the time Ahaz was king of Judah, which was in the time of Isaiah, Pekah was king of Israel: and Pekah joined himself to Resin, king of Syria, to make war against Ahaz, king of Judah; and these two kings marched a confederated and powerful army against Jerusalem. Ahaz and his people became alarmed at the danger, and “their hearts were moved, as the trees of the wood are moved with the wind.”⁠—Isaiah 7:2.

In this perilous situation of things, Isaiah addresses himself to Ahaz, and assures him in the name of the Lord (the cant phrase of all the prophets), that these two kings should not succeed against him; and, to assure him that this should be the case (the case, however, was directly contrary86), tells Ahaz to ask a sign of the Lord. This Ahaz declined doing, giving as a reason, that he would not tempt the Lord: upon which Isaiah, who pretends to be sent from God, says (verse 14): “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that thou abhorest shall be forsaken of both her kings”⁠—meaning the king of Israel and the king of Syria, who were marching against him.

Here then is the sign, which was to be the birth of a child, and that child a son; and here also is the time limited for the accomplishment of the sign⁠—namely, before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good.

The thing, therefore, to be a sign of success to Ahaz, must be something that would take place before the event of the battle then pending between him and the two kings could be known. A thing to be a sign must precede the thing signified. The sign of rain must be before the rain.

It would have been mockery and insulting nonsense for Isaiah to have assured Ahaz, as a sign that these two kings should not prevail against him, that a child should be born seven hundred years after he was dead; and that before the child so born should know to refuse the evil and choose the good, he Ahaz, should be delivered from the danger he was then immediately threatened with.

But the case is, that the child of which Isaiah speaks, was his own child, with which his wife or his mistress was then pregnant; for he says in the next chapter, verses 2, 3: “And I took unto me faithful witnesses to record, Uriah the priest, and Zechariah the son of Jeberechiah. And I went unto the prophetess; and she conceived, and bare a son.” And he says at verse 18 of the same chapter: “Behold, I and the children whom the Lord hath given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel.”

It may not be improper here to observe, that the word translated “a virgin” in Isaiah, does not signify a virgin in Hebrew, but merely a young woman. The tense also is falsified in the translation. Levi gives the Hebrew text of the 14th verse of the 7th chapter of Isaiah, and the translation in English with it⁠—“Behold a young woman is with child and beareth a son.” The expression, says he, is in the present tense. The translation agrees with the other circumstances related of the birth of this child, which was to be a sign to Ahaz. But as the true translation could not have been imposed upon the world as the prophecy of a child to be born seven hundred years afterwards, the Christian translators have falsified the original; and instead of making Isaiah to say, Behold, a young woman is with child and beareth a son⁠—they have made him to say, Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son. It is, however, only necessary for a person to read the 7th and 8th chapters of Isaiah and he will be convinced that the passage in question is no prophecy of the person called Jesus Christ. I pass on to the second passage quoted from the Old Testament by the New as a prophecy of Jesus Christ.

Matthew, 2:1. “Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is born king of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him. When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born. And they said unto him, In Bethlehem of Judea; for thus it is written by the prophet. And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Judea, art not the least among the princes of Judea: for out of thee shall come a Governor that shall rule my people Israel.” This passage is in Micah 5:2.

I pass over the absurdity of seeing and following a star in the daytime, as a man would with a Well-with-the-wisp, or a candle or lantern, at night; and also that of seeing it in the east when themselves came from the east; for could such a thing be seen at all to serve them for a guide, it must be in the west to them. I confine myself solely to the passage called a prophecy of Jesus Christ.

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