Magister Matt
November 13th 2007, 01:35 AM
Greetings. This is my first post here.
This may be a very strawman argument, but I'd like you to consider my observation nonetheless and respond with any criticisms/comments you may have.
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How Important Are the 30 Pieces of Silver to Prophecy and Eschatology?
by Matt Martinez (Gospel Neurose)
According to OT prophecy, the messiah would be betrayed for 30 pieces of silver (supposedly 30 sheqels), and christians believe that Jesus fulfilled this.
Considering we live in an era where credit cards and digital cash (i.e. PayPal) are taking over, if Jews reject Jesus as fulfillment of these prophecies but still await a future messiah it would be interesting to see how they expect this specific prophecy is supposed to be fulfilled in the modern world.
To add to that, silver is rarely used widely in coin currencies today.
Most coins produced in the world are not true silver coins as their color would suggest but rather comprised of copper-nickle, since it is more affluent and silver is generally more expensive, thus this approach is more economically friendly.
The US stopped producing real silver in its primary coins a several decades ago in favor of copper-nickle and many coins in Europe are also copper-nickle, including the modern Israeli sheqel.
Also, most coins that are in fact produced in real silver are commemorative coins and many times are used for display and collecting and not as actual currency.
The question now is how this relates to eschatology, as we already see it's relation to when this prophecy would have had to come to pass.
That is because futurist christians believe that the antichrist comes in the future, claiming to be the messiah and some allege that he will try to fulfill prophecies such as these to further his agenda.
However, the issue in question might give more merit to preterist (and maybe historicist) eschatology since for an antichrist to do this, it is more likely to have occured during a time when silver was a more common currency, though this is simply my conjecture.
This may be a very strawman argument, but I'd like you to consider my observation nonetheless and respond with any criticisms/comments you may have.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How Important Are the 30 Pieces of Silver to Prophecy and Eschatology?
by Matt Martinez (Gospel Neurose)
According to OT prophecy, the messiah would be betrayed for 30 pieces of silver (supposedly 30 sheqels), and christians believe that Jesus fulfilled this.
Considering we live in an era where credit cards and digital cash (i.e. PayPal) are taking over, if Jews reject Jesus as fulfillment of these prophecies but still await a future messiah it would be interesting to see how they expect this specific prophecy is supposed to be fulfilled in the modern world.
To add to that, silver is rarely used widely in coin currencies today.
Most coins produced in the world are not true silver coins as their color would suggest but rather comprised of copper-nickle, since it is more affluent and silver is generally more expensive, thus this approach is more economically friendly.
The US stopped producing real silver in its primary coins a several decades ago in favor of copper-nickle and many coins in Europe are also copper-nickle, including the modern Israeli sheqel.
Also, most coins that are in fact produced in real silver are commemorative coins and many times are used for display and collecting and not as actual currency.
The question now is how this relates to eschatology, as we already see it's relation to when this prophecy would have had to come to pass.
That is because futurist christians believe that the antichrist comes in the future, claiming to be the messiah and some allege that he will try to fulfill prophecies such as these to further his agenda.
However, the issue in question might give more merit to preterist (and maybe historicist) eschatology since for an antichrist to do this, it is more likely to have occured during a time when silver was a more common currency, though this is simply my conjecture.