Religious Research

Religious Research

The New Testament and the Problem of References to the Old Testament

Document Type : Research Paper

Author
mohamad sahaf kashani
Post-Doctoral Fellow, Comparative Theology, Islamic Sciences and Culture Academy, Qom, Iran
10.22034/jrr.2024.388499.2098
Abstract
In their sermons, Jesus Christ and the apostles often cited material from the Old Testament, aiming to convince the Jews that Jesus was the fulfillment of its prophecies. References to the Old Testament are numerous in the Gospels and other New Testament texts, but identifying their exact sources can be challenging. Some citations do not appear in the Old Testament at all, while others are cited differently, showing no clear match between the citation and the source. This discrepancy has sparked a significant debate between Christian exegetes and Bible critics. Critics argue that these differences indicate distortions within the Two Testaments, while Christian scholars seek to explain these discrepancies and defend the accuracy of the New Testament’s references to the Old Testament. However, critics often reject these explanations. This article scrutinizes these references and examines the responses from Christian theologians. The central question of this research is whether all of the New Testament’s references to the Old Testament can be found in the current version of the Old Testament. The research method is library-descriptive.
Keywords
New Testament
Old Testament
references
prophesies
Subjects
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Religious Research
Volume 12, Issue 23 - Serial Number 23
September 2024
Pages 31-54