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Was Christ’s suffering foretold by the prophets?
Peter: “But those things, which God before had showed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath so fulfilled” ([Acts iii, 18]).
God had not showed by the mouth of all his prophets, nor by the mouth of even one of his prophets, that Christ should suffer. The prophets know nothing of a suffering Messiah. There is not a text in the Old Testament referring to such a Messiah. The passages relating to suffering cited by the Evangelists and applied to Christ have no reference whatever to a Messiah. The Encyclopedia Britannica says: “That the Jews in the time of Christ believed in a suffering and atoning Messiah is, to say the least, unproved and highly improbable.”