As we previously learned from the Hebrew Scriptures, there is nothing bizarre or outrageous about God having a son. It does not imply or necessitate any kind of natural childbirth or other-worldly conception, but instead speaks to the characteristics of a special relationship with God. Israel’s sonship, for example, is defined by being called God’s firstborn and heir of His promises and purposes—God’s instrument for blessing all the nations. God also declared both David and David’s heir to be His son, as He brought forth a line of kings that He promised would reign in Israel forever. Israel and David, then, are God’s sons in the sense that He is the progenitor of a people through whom He would disseminate and propagate His message and glory to the world.

Paul encapsulates this sonship brilliantly when he explains to his Jewish listeners that through Yeshua’s resurrection from the dead—and the salvation that comes with it—Yeshua brings both the promise of Israel and the kingship of the messianic line of David to their culmination.

“And we proclaim Good News to you: that the promise made to the fathers—this, God has completed to us (their children) in full, having raised up Yeshua, as also it has been written in the second Melody [‘Psalm’], ‘You are My Son; today I have brought you forth.’” (Acts 13:32-33, mjlt)

Paul acknowledges that Yeshua’s resurrection not only fulfills God’s promise to the people of Israel—putting him squarely in the kingly line of David’s eternal throne—but that Yeshua is the culmination of Israel’s sonship with God. By attributing what God said to David as being spoken of Yeshua, Paul is saying that David was a prototype or pattern for Israel’s Messiah, and that David’s kingship is fulfilled in Yeshua. Yeshua is the heir to David’s throne, and through His resurrection, as God’s son, He restores and continues God’s promised kingdom forever. Since David’s line had been broken, only through its restoration by the Messiah—the Son of David—could God’s promise of an everlasting throne be fulfilled.

This attribution to Yeshua from Psalm 2 is actually repeated twice more in the book of Hebrews. First, speaking of Yeshua’s inheritance as God’s Son, the writer says,

“For to which of the Messengers did [God] ever say, ‘You are My Son—today, I have brought you forth’? And again, ‘I will be to him for a father, and he will be to Me for a son’?” (Iv’riym 1:5, mjlt)

Again, Yeshua’s connection to David as king is reinforced. In addition, the writer also repeats what God said of Solomon in 2 Samuel 7, extending the covenant with David throughout his line—a line that reaches its goal in Israel’s eternal King, Yeshua.

Second, speaking of Israel’s high priest, the writer also says,

“So also the Messiah did not glorify Himself to become Kohen Gadol, but rather He who spoke to Him, ‘You are My Son; today I have brought You forth’; as also in another passage He says, ‘You are a kohen [priest] forever, according to the order of Mal’kiy-Tzedeq…’” (Iv’riym 5:5-6, mjlt)

Once again, the writer invokes Psalm 2, but then makes a new connection to Yeshua by citing Psalm 110, also written by David. In it, he says that God calls him “a priest forever,” despite not having descended from the priestly tribe. Nevertheless, God accepts David as a priest, meaning that he had access to God and could approach Him in the same way as the descendants of Levi. The writer of Hebrews, then, is also drawing this priestly equivalence between David and Yeshua. Just as the pattern of eternal priest is established in David, so it is fulfilled in God’s Son, Yeshua—HaKohen HaMashiyach… the anointed priest, the messianic priest.

The sonship and kingship of the coming anointed one—the Messiah—were clearly understood by Yeshua’s contemporaries. For example, when Nathanael meets Yeshua for the first time, he exclaims, “Rabiy, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Yis’rael!” (Yochanan 1:49, mjlt). In Yochanan 11:27, Martha confesses to Yeshua, “Yes, Master, I have believed that You are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is coming to the world.” When Yeshua appeared before the Sanhedrin, they asked Him, “If you are the Messiah, tell us… Are you, then, the Son of God?” (Luke 22:67,70). And while He was being executed, the Jewish leaders were mocking Yeshua, calling Him sarcastically—yet truthfully—“The Messiah! the king of Yis’rael!” (Mark 15:32).

In Yeshua’s day, the idea that God had a son was hardly unheard of. The Jewish people’s expectation of their Messiah was not only that He would be of the line of David and would restore the true kingship of Israel, but some even recognized that He would also be the Son of God. While the full meaning of that sonship would not be entirely grasped for some time, it was nonetheless a known Jewish concept that the Messiah—the son of David—would sit on the throne of God’s quintessential Son.

What do you think? Share your thoughts in the comments below!