ON my way home I passed a bookstall, and seeing a New Testament, I bought it, to confirm me in greater enmity against Jesus. I was determined to read it carefully, and to discover the falsehood of the Christian religion in all its parts, so that I might be fully prepared to meet my opponent on his own ground, and to whip him with his own cords. But as I proceeded to read the New Testament, which I was taught from my very childhood was full of falsehood, my surprise increased, and a sacred awe pervaded me; and I could scarcely refrain from exclaiming, when I read some impressive passages, “Oh, that this Jesus were my Saviour!” It was nothing like the blasphemous book I read when a youth.
Saturday came, but I could not go to Mile End Road. I was already afraid to speak against Jesus. I went on reading the New Testament, and when I had finished it I was greatly astonished at myself, and exceedingly perplexed in spite of my earnest desire to find fuel in the gospel for the increase of my burning enmity against Jesus. I had discovered nothing deserving of hatred, but on the contrary much that was great, sublime, heavenly, and divine. I became very wretched, and at last I told my wife the unhappy state of my mind, who at first thought I was jesting, but when I assured her that I meant what I said, she laughed at me most heartily, and called me the most foolish man in the world, adding, “You, who thought of stopping the mouth of every Christian, are you going to be so silly as to believe in that crucified One yourself? I did not think you such a simpleton,” and she earnestly advised me not to read that book anymore. “Put it in the fire,” she said, “and have done with it. You know many Jews have lost their senses through reading it. Be persuaded by me and have nothing to do with it,” and she entreated me to take her advice. I told her had she known the anguish of my soul she would not have talked to me like that. I could not express my feelings to her as to how and what I felt, at the same time I promised her that I would think about it, and after a severe struggle I resolved to leave off reading the New Testament, but did not commit it to the flames as my wife advised me to do. I trembled at the very thought of doing such a wrong.
The appointment at the Mile End Road was almost forgotten by me, when one morning I was accosted by a young man, who asked me how it was that I had not been at Mile End Road according to promise. I did not know what to say, and I was about to stammer out something, when he interrupted me by saying, “You need not trouble yourself about that gentleman. You cannot touch him; he knows what he is about.”
“Are you a Christian?” I asked.
“I cannot say that I am, but I believe I am not far from being one. If Jesus is not the promised Messiah, who and what is He? He was no imposter, that is certain. Imposters are selfish, money hunters, money graspers; this was not the case with Jesus. Trace His history,” he said, “as given in the New Testament; follow it from His birth to His cross on which He died; see His mocking, His reproaches, His insults, and all the complicated miseries which made His sufferings the most affecting that ever earth beheld; and then ask yourself the question, Was this a deceiver? Look,” he said, “at His calm, meek, and lowly behavior, His open and severe treatment of hypocrites, His great and numerous miracles! Is all this compatible and reconcilable with the pretensions of a deceiver? Many false Messiahs appeared before Jesus, and thousands of our people believed in them; but no sooner were they put into prison or to death than their disciples were dispersed; and at the present day you cannot find a single Jew who can or will say that his forefathers believed in any such as the Messiah. Not so with Jesus. His very death is life to those who believe in Him, and millions have, and still are hearing testimony that He is the Messiah of God, a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of his people Israel.”
“But,” I remarked (more for information than anything else), “the Christians believe their Messiah to be God, while you know we Jews look for a Messiah who is to be man.”
“Yes,” he replied, “that is what I once believed, but since I have read the Bible for myself I am inclined to think differently. Take, for instance, Isaiah 9:66For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6), where it says, ‘Unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.’ This is the same child whose name was to be ‘Immanuel, God with us,’ according to Isaiah 7:1414Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. (Isaiah 7:14).”
“So did I,” he said, “before I read the Bible, but now I cannot see how it can apply to Hezekiah without distorting the sense of the prophecy by false interpretations, but the truth of it cannot be altered. I admit,” he said, “that Hezekiah was indeed a king of eminent piety, and he might well be the subject of joy to the people who were so lately ruled by an idolatrous and oppressive monarch; but how, with all his piety, he may reverently be called. ‘THE MIGHTY GOD,’ I know not. Unless he was divine, I know not with what propriety it can be said of him, that he shall fill the throne of David from henceforth even forever (Isaiah ix. 7). This prophecy can apply to no mere man, and I think we learn from it, first, that the Messiah was to be man, for ‘a virgin was to conceive Him,’ and then He is also God, for His names are ‘Immanuel, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.’ Besides,” he said, taking a small Hebrew Bible from his pocket, “to whom does the me refer in Zechariah 12:1010And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn. (Zechariah 12:10), ‘They shall look upon ME whom they have pierced,’ etc.”
I must confess that I was quite at a loss who could be meant, but when he showed me from the connection that it was (and I could see that it could be no other than) the speaker who declared at the beginning of the verse, “I will pour upon the house of David,” etc., and from verses first and fourth that speaker was Jehovah, all this made me feel very uneasy, and I told him that I must leave him now, but hoped to meet him again some other day. And in wishing me good-bye, he said, “ From what I have seen of you this morning, and the conversation we have had together, I am quite convinced that you are a true inquirer after the truth as it is in Jesus..
You are only one of the many hundreds of our brethren who, at the present day, are tired of groping in Rabbinical darkness; their souls are panting after that satisfaction which they know cannot be found in Judaism. They are not ignorant of the fact that life and immortality are to be found in the gospel, but the fear of man very often predominates over the fear of God, and they try to stifle their convictions; but the work which the Lord commenced in their souls He will not leave unfinished, and sooner or later they are bound to acknowledge Jesus as their Messiah and Redeemer.”
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