*Did the messianic prophecies foretell of the “second coming?”

*Does God explicitly reveal to Moses the 8 day circumcision decision
procedure or is it more like it was a “best practices” act that was handed
down over generations and then was written down by Moses?

*Do we know how long Jesus was in Egypt?

There are far more prophecies in the Old Testament of Jesus’ first
coming than specific prophecies of his coming again. Those prophecies in
the Old Testament which reference the second coming of Jesus, do not
necessarily point to it being a “second” coming. For example, Daniel
12:1-4 seems to be a clear reference to the time of the end of
days–Judgment Day–with fairly obvious parallels to Matthew 24: Daniel
prophesies the first of Jesus in 9:24-27 and his second coming in 12:1-4,
but does not call the latter a second coming. It is my opinion that Daniel
12:1-4 is the most clear-cut prophecy of the final Judgment Day. Many OT
prophecies about the coming of the Lord are actually about God coming in
judgment against nations which have attacked his people. It is pretty
common to incorrectly assume that the command to circumcise male children
was given to Moses. In fact, it was given to Abraham about five hundred
years earlier. The covenant of circumcision is found in Genesis 17:11-14.
Because this passage unquestionably mentions circumcision on the eighth
day, I assume that this was the practice from the very beginning. I
believe that Moses did not write the book of Genesis, so he was probably
not the first to write down this command.

We do not know exactly how long Joseph remained in Egypt with his
family. Matthew 2:15 says that Joseph remained in Egypt until he had heard
that Herod was dead. To calculate how long Jesus was in Egypt, one would
have to know when he was born, which is uncertain. A likely date is 6 BC,
based on the timing of the universal census which we know was called for
by Augustus Caesar. Internal evidence in the gospels leans toward Fall of
6BC, but one should take that date with a grain of salt, applying a plus
or minus one year to it.

The date of the death of Herod is known with more certainty, as
Josephus records his death as occurring just before the Passover in a year
in which an eclipse of the Moon occurred (Antiquities 17:6:4). Given the
known dates of lunar eclipses, this most likely puts his death in March 4
BC.

Complicating the calculations is the fact that we do not know how
old Jesus was when the Magi came from the east. Contrary to popular
opinion, the Magi did not come to the stable where Jesus was born, but to
the house his parents had moved to. Jesus could have been a few days old
or he could have been more than a year old by the time the Magi came to
visit.

We can assume that Joseph did not return the exact day he heard
about the death of Herod, but the information above would lead one to
conclude that Jesus was in Egypt for very approximately one and one-half
years. The time was almost certainly more than a year and less than three
years.

John Oakes