**Libertarian **
I understand that Jesus’ exclamation was a quote from David. It still doesn’t answer the question of to whom he was saying it.
In any event, we don’t see Psalm 22 as referring to Jesus either. Specifically, the word pierced does not appear in the original Hebrew.
Zev Steinhardt
Well, Keeve, in view of the fact that it was Jesus’s chosen metaphor, I don’t think that any Christian is going to find the use of “Father” as not being P.C. 
This business of “well, Christians don’t know what they think about the Trinity” is a bit supercilious. It’d be my assumption that, while not everyone has bothered acquainting himself or herself with the details of his or her church’s teachings, virtually everyone who claims to be a Christian would, in fact, subscribe to what his or her denomination has to say (“loner” Christians who don’t maintain a church affiliation to one side; I believe Lib would so classify himself, and don’t mean to exclude him and others who think as he does).
Now, with the exception of a very few very small splinter Eastern groups, every single Christian, of whatever denomination, subscribes to the decisions of the first four Ecumenical Councils, in particular those of Nicaea and Chalcedon that came up with the definitions used above. This includes all Orthodox, all Catholics, and nearly all Protestants – I think that there are a couple of fringey Pentecostal groups that use a different definition.
Finally, it would be my understanding that Judaism draws a sharp line between God on the one hand and all created things on the other – and a Messiah, however righteous and holy he might be, would be a man, part of creation, not a part of God. Is this accurate?
You are far from simpleminded, Sparculees. Welcome to Straight Dope Great Debates.
To us, I believe. To you and me.
It is a translation, not a transliteration. Strongs gives karah, number 03738, meaning dug or excavated. Is that acceptable?
I am the eggman . . .
:d&r:
Correct, Polycarp. The messiah will be a man, just like you and me, born of two human parents just as you and I were.
Zev Steinhardt
I’m afraid I’ll have to ask your forgiveness. I’m not familiar with Strongs numbers.
The word in Hebrew is ka-ari, meaning “like a lion.” The verse in question says “like a lion they are at my hands and feet.”
Zev Steinhardt
You’re forgiven. 
Now I hope you will forgive me when I say that I’m confused. Is it not the same word (or root) that appears in 15 other places? For example,
“…and there Isaac’s servants dug a well.” (Genesis 26:25)
“…I die in my grave, which I have dug for me…” (Genesis 50:5)
“…or if a man shall dig a pit and not cover it…” (Exodus 21:33)
etc. Are you sure you aren’t speaking of its etymology perhaps?
Strongs gives it as translated as “dig 12, make 2, pierce 1, open 1”. For your convenience, here is Strongs. When you select a passage, you can call up the Hebrew text of each verse.
I would appreciate your examining it to see whether it agrees with your Hebrew text, despite whether the translation and commentary does or not.
Unfortuantely, I don’t have a Hebrew Tanach here in the office. To make matters worse, I can’t use the on-line one I usually use because I got a new computer at work and have not had the chance to install the Hebrew language pack yet.
What I posted until now I posted from memory. Until I can check exactly how the words in the verses you quoted are spelled, I’m afraid I can’t answer you. So it’s going to have to wait until I get home.
Zev Steinhardt
Okay, Zev, thanks. You won’t need the Hebrew pack for Strongs, as they use tiny little GIF files for each character. I meant to tell you (though you would likely figure it out) that once you have the Hebrew transliteration and its itemization, you click the Strongs number to get the etymology, usage, and frequency of the word. I must say that it would be quite a shock to my system to discover some sort of glaring error, ommission, or conspiracy among Christian scholars.
The word there is karah kaph, resh, he, which means to dig in soil. Psalm 22 contains the word ka-ari, kaph, 'aleph, resh, yod.
Thanks for the info. I wasn’t planning on using Strong’s however. I was planning on going to the original text.
In any event, as it appears from Captain Amazing’s post, we’re dealing with two different words. However, I will check the other examples you gave and give a full report later.
Zev Steinhardt
Sorry…forgot to add…the Hebrew for lion is 'airy 'aleph, resh, yod. If you look at the Strongs, it gives ka-ari both roots…while it prefers karah (which, as a Christian source, I’d expect), it also notes as the kethev reading that the root could be 'airy,
Ah, you are right, Captain Amazing. Excellent work. Thank you!
As Captian Amazing suggested, we are dealing with different words.
The word in the first verse is vi-yich-ru. In the second case, the word is ka-ris-i. The third word is yich-re. In each case, the root of the verb is chaf-raish-tav.
If one wanted to say “I was dug” the word would be nichrati. There is no way that I can see where the letter alef would show up in the middle of the word (as it does in the verse in Psalms).
Zev Steinhardt
These are both fascinating theologies.
Is there room for a theology hand-fabricated half a millennium or thereabouts after the days of Moses, or a couple millennia after the days of Jesus?
I would theorize that to whatever extent it is meaningful to state that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God, it is meaningful to state that I am the Son of God also, based on my understanding of the statements that he made and the more ancient books of the Law that he cited in explaining and defending his claim.
Given that, not every Child (Son or Daughter) is a Messiah and/or Prophet, even as much as they might wish to be, or as much as there might be need for a Messiah and/or Prophet at any given time. I would suggest that insofar as the principal role of a Messiah and/or Prophet is that of adequately and efficiently conveying the Word of God, (duly translated in human-fragile-fallible terms from the spiritual to the verbal with the exquisite artistry we expect of our Messiahs and/or Prophets), some recognition, traditional or retroactive as the case may be, is probably due to be accorded unto the individual Jesus of Nazareth, whether after such accordance you do or do not call him “Lord” or “Prophet” or “Messiah” ultimately being beside the point.
To those of you who are Jewish or Islamic, I challenge: Is this not, above and beyond being your brother’s voice, a voice that speaks such wisdom and insight and spiritual leadership that it is due your formal recognition as authentic prophet, quite aside from and irrespective of claims that are made by others pertaining to his nature and divinity?
To those of you who are Christian, I challenge: Is the message of Jesus of Nazareth, in and of itself as message, not sufficient unto itself that its wisdom and insight and spiritual leadership should be allowed to stand on its own, stripped of any additional authority that might come from being understood to have been spoken by the Messian himself? If, for you, being a Messiah does most centrally mean being God Incarnate, would this incarnation itself not be sufficiently present in the teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ that your exhortations and exclamations pertaining to the divinity of the speaker are akin to gilding the lily?
Well, just as a point of fact, Muslims ALREADY regard Jesus as a legitimate Prophet, of equal status to Muhammed. Muhammed just tends to gets top billing because he was the last, according to Islamic orthodoxy.
I’ll leave the rest of your post to people of greater faith and the rest of this very interesting thread to folks with a deeper understanding of theology than I :).
Don’t know if this will help at all, but here’s the story that they used to explain the Trinity to me back in my Catholic schoolgirl days:
I didn’t find this a very satisfying parable as a kid, but I actually do now. Obviously God is going to be a very, very different kind of being than any we ever encounter; it seems reasonable that there are some things about Him that just won’t make sense to us. I can see the doctrine of the Trinity, then, as a very clumsy way of communicating an idea that we can’t really grasp properly, because we simply don’t have any frame of reference for it. Kind of, “No, it doesn’t make sense, but it’s closer to the truth than anything else you’d understand at all.”
[sub]NB: I am not quite a Christian - I have other problems with Christian theology. The Trinity just isn’t one of them.[/sub]
Indeed, “Accept the truth wherever it comes from” is sound Jewish thought. The trouble lies in figuring out what was said, and whether or not it counts as truth.
Jesus did certainly say a lot of admirable things. Unfortunately, the Gospels also quote him as saying and doing things which seem (to me) quite against Jewish tradition. So much so that even (or especially) if one wants to give him the status of being a prophet, he (or more accurately: he as portrayed in the Gospels) seems (to me) to meet the criteria for a false prophet, as set out in Deuteronomy 13.
Now, I do realize that Christian thinkers have ways of resolving these problems. That’s okay with me, I just don’t see much practical benefit which would result to me from pursuing those questions.
(PS to Polycarp: I did not mean to say that “Christians don’t know what they think about the Trinity”. What I meant was the varying denominations have different understandings. If I was wrong, and they are more monolithic than I thought, then I apologize.)
interesting iconography moment: when the trinity is depicted on an icon in an orthodox church, you will see three angels under an olive tree, telling a certain couple they will have a child, and getting laughed at. i can’t remember ever seeing an icon of god the father, son, and holy spirit together as separate beings.
you do see them separately around the church building but not together. that is why there was a bit of a tussle over a one word addition to the nicean creed. the holy spirit is the spirit of god, and only god can send his spirit out to do what he wills. by adding “and the son” to the creed “one god in three person” argument was blow apart. jesus could not send the holy spirit out to do jesus’ will.
now you will say “oh yeah, what about pentecost?” remember when pentecost occured and the holy spirit decended on the gathering, jesus was no where around. he had returned to heaven and was reunited with the father. one being. god sends his spirit down to the gathering to help the assembled do his will. in the icons picturing this event flames of fire depict the spirit decending on the gathering. god and jesus are not pictured.
in iconography you will only see jesus and a representation of the holy spirit together. the one that i can think of is the baptism. john, jesus, a few angels, and a dove in a sunbeam (representing the holy spirit) are pictured.
now that i’m writing this it makes me think of those “you never see them together” are they the same person things. like latoya and michael jackson.
That’s the story of Sarah and Abraham and the 3 angels, from Genesis. In the West that is most definitely held to NOT be the Trinity but 3 ordinary angels. YMMV in the East, I guess.
And there ARE representations of the Trinity as 3 distinct beings in Western iconography: Father (an old Guy like the one in Michaelangelo’s Creation, Son (Jesus), HS (dove). See for instance http://www.christusrex.org/www2/berry/f44v.html