When I was young, I thought it was neat that in Matthew 23:35, when Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for their hypocrisy, He said, “upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.” Jesus is saying that all the prophets were killed by people just like the Pharisees. He uses “Abel” and “Zechariah” to denote “completeness.” That works out really nice in English – “From A to Z.”
Except Jesus wasn’t speaking English. The “Z” in “Zechariah” is a zeta in Greek, the 6th out of 24 letters. Of course, Zechariah in the Old Testament is in Hebrew and his name begins with a zayin, the 7th out of 22 letters. So the “from A to Z” doesn’t work in the original languages.
However, the “A to Z” concept still works in the text of Matthew 23! Abel is the first martyr, recorded in Genesis, the first book of the Bible. In the Hebrew/Jewish arrangement of the books of the Old Testament, 2 Chronicles is the last book, which is where the martyrdom of Zechariah is recorded. So, Jesus is still using the idea of completeness. We might say “From Genesis to 2 Chronicles” or “From Genesis to Malachi.”
The idea of “completeness” or “totality” is portrayed by God in the writings of Isaiah. Through the prophet, God speaks to Israel: “Who has performed and accomplished it, Calling forth the generations from the beginning? ‘I, the Lord, am the first, and with the last. I am He’” (41:4). God speaks the same way three more times in Isaiah: 44:6 and 48:12.
Isaiah is the only writer in the Old Testament who speaks of God as “the first and the last.” God was to be Israel’s “everything.”
It is Isaiah, then, who provides the background for Jesus to speak to the churches of Asia Minor, saying, “Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades” (Revelation 1:17). Jesus does the same thing twice more in Revelation: 2:8; 22:13.
levitra best price So, what is the solution? Getting rid of an erectile dysfunction is not an easy task, and it relies on upon different elements. Mainly aged people suffer from this levitra tablets problem is certainly not due to aging. ErectoMax has the active ingredient of Trigonella foenum graecum (Testofen) seed, Urtica dioica (Stinging Nettle) root, and many viagra order shop others but it contains no heavy metals or contaminants and it’s packed with vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients, fiber and amino acids. The periods between acute episodes may last months or even years in the early viagra online no prescriptions course of the disease, but after the symptom-free periods tend to decrease.
In the latter passage, Jesus says: “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” “Alpha” and “Omega” (also found three times in Revelation: 1:8; 21:6; 22:13) – now those are the beginning and end of the Greek alphabet! The “A to Z.” Jesus is to be the church’s “everything.” For Jesus to use this expression of Himself which was used of God in the Old Testament is yet another proof that Jesus is divine, God in the flesh.
One more thought on this “A to Z” concept… Several psalms are written in an acrostic format where each verse begins with a letter of the Hebrew alphabet: Psalm 25, 34, 145, 37. You should notice in your Bibles at Psalm 119 that there is a Hebrew letter above every eight verses. You can’t translate this into English but each group of eight verses begins with that respective letter of the alphabet. Twenty-two letters times eight verses equals 176 verses! It’s a wondrous sight to see in Hebrew.
Why did the inspired author do it that way? The reasonable suggestion is: totality or completeness. The beauty of the law of God is seen in its completeness. Because it is complete, it makes us complete. That’s what Paul will write explicitly in 2 Timothy 3:16-17.
Jesus and His word (for you cannot separate the two) are our “everything!”
Paul Holland
