Claim ID: HIS-IS29

Claim: Jesus' Fulfillment of All Messianic Prophecies Authenticates His Divinity

Summary: Jesus authenticated his claims of being the Messiah by fulfilling all 46 prophecies in the Old Testament concerning himself. The odds of any person fulfilling all 46 prophecies was estimated by Peter Stoner as 1 in 10157. These odds are so astronomically high that they are considered impossible to meet by chance. It is only because of the divine intervention of God that these events were fulfilled with pinpoint accuracy.

Description: Because Jesus fulfilled all 46 messianic prophecies of the Old Testament (OT), this authenticates his claim of being the Messiah. He singularly fit the profile of the Messiah as portrayed in the Old Testament.

Many of the prophecies are attested by Jesus' disciples and other witnesses [HIS-EV46]. And, many are corroborated by extra-biblical sources [HIS-IS24]. Many of the prophecies are attested by historical and archaeological records.

According to Peter Stoner [REF-STO01], the odds of Jesus fulfilling just six Messianic prophecies in the Old Testament are 1 in 1017. This is 1 in 100,000,000,000,000,000. These six prophecies correspond to prophecies #2, #16, #23, #26, #28 and #33 from the prophecy table in [HIS-EV31]. These odds are equivalent to finding one silver dollar out of a 2-foot depth of silver dollars covering the state of Texas.

Stoner further estimated that the odds of fulfilling all 46 prophecies in the prophecy table are 1 in 10157. This number is so astronomically large that finding a silver dollar in this much larger pool as impossible.

Despite all the evidence presented, some skeptics have alleged that Jesus orchestrated the events of his life to fulfill these prophecies. However, approximately half of the prophecies in the prophecy table were completely outside the control of Jesus. If we were to adjust Stoner's estimates to account for the prophecies Jesus had control over, we would still be left with the astronomical odds of 1 in 1077 (157/2=77).

Other skeptics have alleged that many of these prophecies have been added to the Jewish scriptures by Christians after Jesus' death. With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the mid-1900's, many of the prophecies found in the Old Testament were written well before the writings of the New Testament. The Dead Sea Scrolls included fragment from every book of the Old Testament (except the Book of Esther) and mostly notably, included the entire book of Isaiah from which one-third of the prophecies are found. Many of the fragments discovered were dated using a variety of techniques around BC 300-100 [HIS-EV49].

In summary, we conclude that the likelihood of any one person fulfilling the 46 prophecies with the accuracy of Jesus is next to impossible unless for the divine intervention of God.

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