There was nothing then but the revelation of the spirit-of God that could make any of the Israelites understand and believe that he was their proper Messiah.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
It was of the greatest moment, and consequence, that they should believe in him when he came, for they could receive no benefit from him without believing him to be their Messiah.
There were dozens of people who walked through the Holy Land claiming to be the Messiah, curing the sick, exorcising demons, challenging Rome, gathering followers. In a way, there's nothing unique about what Jesus did. In fact, many of these so-called false Messiahs we know by name.
And yet you see the weakness of external evidence-and outward miracles; they were not sufficient to make true believers, or to make the Israelites believe that Jesus was their promised Messiah.
As I read, my suspicion that Jesus might really be the Messiah was confirmed.
The supposed revelations of God to humanity through Christ, or the word of God to Mohammed through the angel Gabriel, had the power they did because they indicated new truths, new directions for followers.
To see how Christ was prophesied and described therein, consider and mark, how that the kid or lamb must be with out spot or blemish; and so was Christ only of all mankind, in the sight of God and of his law.
If all things were made through Him, clearly so must the splendid revelations have been which were made to the fathers and prophets, and became to them the symbols of the sacred mysteries of religion.
The gods did not reveal, from the beginning, all things to us.
The most that one of Jewish faith can do - and some have gladly done it - is to say that Jesus was the greatest in the long succession of Jewish prophets. None can acknowledge that Jesus was the Messiah without becoming a Christian.
I was not a messiah, but an ordinary man who had become a leader because of extraordinary circumstances.