born in Bethlehem
Born in Bethlehem
Micah 5:2 But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.
Matthew 2:1 Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem,
2 Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.
3 When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.
4 And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born.
5 And they said unto him, In Bethlehem of Judaea: for thus it is written by the prophet,
6 And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes of Juda: for out of thee shall come a Governor, that shall rule my people Israel.
Types and Shadows
In considering the prophecies regarding Jesus’s first coming, it is such an immense topic that it takes a while to wrap your mind around the immensity of it. Not only are there specific prophecies, such as the prophecy of Micah 5:2 that Jesus would be born in Bethlehem, but there are other indicators regarding the coming of the Messiah.
One type of indicator are types and shadows. These are stories within stories, stories with a hidden message. They come in many ways. Some are stories where the events that happen to the individual parallel events in the life of Christ. Other stories are found hidden in the meanings of words. Since the indicators of Jesus are found in varied ways from Genesis to Revelation, there is no one way to start in Genesis and end in Revelation using only one kind of indicator. Clues are sprinkled about the Old Testament in numerous ways.
“It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.” Proverbs 25:2
Beyond this, it is important to realize that language has degenerated over the years. Now people text without even fully spelling out words. YCLIU (You can look it up) here for examples.
But life was not always like this. There was a time when scholars knew several languages such as Greek, Aramaic, and Hebrew. They dug into the root words of meanings. Nowadays, you would not know that languages have roots, but the fact is, their meaning and spelling usage evolved over time, and to correctly understand the meaning you need to understand how it was used at a particular time in history. Do you remember recently when there was a phase when people said “that’s bad” when it really meant that they liked it or thought it was good? That is why you cannot go by current understanding, but have to dig into historical meanings of words and even customs. That’s what Bible Dictionaries, Concordances, Maps, Atlases, Dictionaries and other study aids are all about.