Is Isaiah 9:6 a prophecy about the Messiah?
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6).
And the objector says: Christians quoted this verse from the text and attributed it to the Messiah, and this is not correct because the text says in the past tense “a child is born to us”, since a child has been born to us. Also, Jewish commentators refuse to attribute this text to the Messiah.
Response:
First: Targum Jonathan
Targum Jonathan (Targum Jonathan) is an ancient Aramaic translation and interpretation of the books of the prophets in the Bible from Hebrew into the Aramaic language, which was the language spoken by the Jews after the Babylonian exile.
Targum Jonathan is traditionally attributed to Rabbi Yonatan ben Uzziel, who was one of the students of Hillel the Elder.
Yonatan ben Uzziel lived approximately from the late first century BC to the early first century AD.
In the Aramaic Targum Jonathan interpretation of the prophecy of Isaiah 9:6 or 9:5:
The prophet said to the house of David, For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and he has taken the law upon himself to keep it. His name is called from before Him who is wonderful in counsel, the mighty God who liveth to eternity — the Messiah whose peace shall be great upon us in his days.
Source: https://www.sefaria.org/Targum_Jonathan_on_Isaiah.9.5?lang=bi
This is one of the earliest interpretations of this prophecy showing that it is about the Messiah.
Second: Prophetic past The prophetic past
Many future prophecies are referred to in the past tense because the promises of the Lord are true, and the prophet is certain of the fulfillment of the prophecy through divine revelation, so he portrays it as if it has already happened.
1- Jonah:
Although he was still in the belly of the fish, he prayed prophetically saying that the Lord brought him up from it in the past tense:
“I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with its bars closed behind me forever; then You brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God.” (Jonah 2:6)
And it is mentioned on the Sefaria website:
About Jonah’s prayer, where Jonah says: “I cried to God in my distress and He answered me.” But the problem is that Jonah spoke these words while he was still in the fish, and God had not yet answered him!
Rabbi Ibn Ezra answered that:
Ibn Ezra, in turn, explains that Yonah is speaking in “prophetic past”. Since Yonah knows through prophecy that he will be released from the fish, he can speak of his release as if it already occurred. The Ibn Ezra cites many other examples in Tanach where a prophesied future event is written in past tense to signify that since it is prophesied it is as if the event already occurred. One example he provides is “Darach Kochav MiYaakov,” “a star has issued from Yaakov” (Bemidbar 24:17) which refers to the Mashiach’s (Messaiah) arrival, an event that to this day we continue to wait for anxiously.
Source: https://www.sefaria.org/Depths_of_Yonah.2.5.5?lang=bi
Third: The Hebrew text
כִּֽי־יֶ֣לֶד יֻלַּד־לָ֗נוּ
Ki-yeled yullad-lanu
For a child has been born to us
1- Jesuit (Catholic) translation “A child has been born to us”
2- Arabic common translation “A child has been born to us”
Conclusion:
The text in Isaiah 9:6 is not understood only through the tense, because Hebrew uses the “prophetic past” to express future events that are certain to occur, as is common in Old Testament texts.
Also, the ancient Jewish Targum Jonathan interprets the passage in a clearly Messianic way, which indicates that linking it to the Messiah has roots in Jewish interpretation itself and is not merely a later Christian reading.
And glory be to God, Lord of lords and King of kings
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