Fulfillment Formulas

Definition

The Greek formula hina plerothe to rhethen dia tou prophetou legontos (“that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying”), or one of its variations, used about ten times in the Gospel of Matthew to introduce a Hebrew Bible citation that the gospel claims is being fulfilled in Jesus’s life. The formulas are distinctive to Matthew (Mark, Luke, and John use Hebrew Bible citations differently), and they signal a specific kind of typological reading. Matthew is not arguing that Jesus’s life is matching point-by-point predictions made by Hebrew Bible prophets; he is arguing that the deepest patterns of the Hebrew Bible find their convergence in Jesus, and that the prophet’s words can be read forward into the gospel because the same divine pattern is recurring at a new and decisive level.

Key proponents

Modern

Richard B. Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels (Baylor, 2016) and Reading Backwards (Baylor, 2014), the major modern treatment of typological reading in the gospels. Hays argues that the gospel writers are doing figural reading, hearing the Hebrew Bible’s resonances in Jesus’s life, not picking proof-texts.
N.T. Wright, throughout his Christian Origins and the Question of God series, argues that the New Testament’s use of the Hebrew Bible is grounded in a coherent reading of Israel’s whole story reaching its head in Jesus.
Tim Mackie, BibleProject classroom courses (especially How to Read the Bible) develop the figural-reading and typological-pattern approach with deep Hebrew Bible literacy.
F. Dale Bruner, Matthew: A Commentary, treats each fulfillment-formula citation in detail and explains the typological logic verse by verse.
Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative and his Hebrew Bible translations, models the kind of close-pattern reading that the gospel writers had already been doing.
D.A. Carson, Commentary on Matthew, treats the fulfillment-formulas with attention to both typological and predictive elements.

Premodern witnesses

The patristic tradition broadly developed the fourfold sense of scripture (literal, allegorical, moral, anagogical) precisely to handle the kind of figural-typological reading the gospels are doing. Origen, Augustine, John Cassian, and Gregory the Great all participate in this tradition.
Origen of Alexandria (c. 184 to 253), in On First Principles (book 4) and his commentaries, articulates the most thorough patristic-era theory of typological reading.
The Eastern Christian tradition through Maximus the Confessor and the Byzantine fathers maintains the figural-reading discipline continuously through the medieval period.
Jewish midrashic tradition is the deeper background. First-century Jewish interpreters (the Qumran community, the Targumists, the early Tannaim) practiced exactly the kind of pattern-hearing reading Matthew is using; the gospel’s fulfillment-formulas are first-century Jewish midrash applied to Jesus.

See How We Read for the longer lineage of this and the other frameworks on this site.

Core insights

Typological, not predictive. The most common modern misreading is to treat each fulfillment-formula citation as if Matthew is saying this prophet predicted this exact event. That is rarely what is happening. Matthew is doing typological reading: the deep pattern of the Hebrew Bible recurs in Jesus, and the prophet’s words can be heard speaking into the new event because the pattern is the same. The clearest example is Hosea 11:1: out of Egypt I called my son. In Hosea, the son is corporate Israel; the verse is not a prediction of a future Messiah, it is a backward-looking statement about the exodus. Matthew applies the verse to Jesus’s flight to Egypt and return (Matthew 2:15) not because Hosea predicted Jesus would go to Egypt, but because Jesus is recapitulating Israel’s whole story, including the exodus. The pattern is the same; therefore the verse fits.

Figural reading is first-century Jewish hermeneutic. The kind of reading Matthew is doing was the standard practice of first-century Jewish interpreters. The Qumran pesharim (the commentaries from the Dead Sea Scrolls community) read the Hebrew prophets as speaking directly into the Qumran community’s life. The Targums (Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible used in synagogue) frequently expanded the text to bring out figural-Messianic readings. The early rabbinic midrash tradition applied prophetic verses creatively to current events. Matthew is not inventing a new reading-method; he is doing what every first-century Jewish interpreter did, with Jesus as the focal point.

The formula uses pleroo, “to fill up to its intended meaning.” The Greek verb pleroo (translated “fulfill”) does not mean to complete and therefore replace. It means to fill up to its intended meaning, to bring to its full purpose, to make full. When Matthew says a Hebrew Bible verse is fulfilled, he means the verse’s deepest pattern has reached its decisive instance. The Torah is not abolished by being fulfilled (5:17); the prophet’s words are not silenced by being fulfilled.

The fulfillment claim is layered. Some Matthew fulfillment-citations are nearer to predictive (Micah 5:2’s prediction of Bethlehem as the Messiah’s birthplace, Matthew 2:6). Some are clearly typological (Hosea 11:1, Matthew 2:15). Some are blended (Isaiah 7:14’s almah in its original Isaian context referred to a sign in the days of Ahaz; the Septuagint’s parthenos renders the term in a way that Matthew applies definitively to Mary). The framework recognizes that Matthew is using the formula flexibly, with different kinds of fulfillment in view in different cases. The reader is being invited into the figural-reading practice, not handed a list of one-to-one predictions.

The formula structures Matthew’s gospel. The fulfillment-citations cluster especially in chapters 1-2 (the infancy narrative, four citations) and the passion narrative (chapters 26-28, several citations). The pattern signals to the reader that the gospel is making a sustained argument: from beginning to end, the deepest patterns of the Hebrew Bible are converging in this person.

The framework presupposes Hebrew Bible literacy. Matthew is writing for an audience that knows the Hebrew Bible deeply. Each fulfillment-citation is meant to send the reader back to the cited passage to read its whole context. Hosea 11:1 brings with it the rest of Hosea (the prophet’s lament for Israel’s faithlessness, the promise of restoration). Isaiah 7:14 brings with it the immediate context (a sign to Ahaz) and the larger Isaian arc (the new exodus, the suffering servant). The reader who treats the citations as isolated proof-texts misses what Matthew is doing.

Implications. This framework changes how the New Testament uses of the Old Testament should be read. The apostolic citations in Acts and the epistles use the same figural-typological method. Hebrews 1-10 reads the Hebrew Bible’s priestly-temple system as figural anticipation of Christ’s priesthood. Paul reads Adam as a type of the one who was to come (Romans 5:14). The whole New Testament is built on figural reading; Matthew’s fulfillment-formulas are the most explicit instance.

Where it shows up in Matthew

The Matthean fulfillment-citations (the major ones, with the Hebrew Bible source):

Matthew 1:22-23 citing Isaiah 7:14, the virgin / parthenos / Immanuel prophecy
Matthew 2:5-6 citing Micah 5:2 (with 2 Samuel 5:2 blended), the Bethlehem prophecy
Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1, out of Egypt I called my son
Matthew 2:17-18 citing Jeremiah 31:15, Rachel weeping for her children
Matthew 2:23, the Nazarene citation (paraphrastic, possibly drawing on Isaiah 11:1’s netzer and the Nazirite tradition)
Matthew 4:14-16 citing Isaiah 9:1-2, Galilee of the nations / a great light
Matthew 8:17 citing Isaiah 53:4, the suffering servant taking our infirmities
Matthew 12:17-21 citing Isaiah 42:1-4, the servant of the LORD
Matthew 13:35 citing Psalm 78:2, I will open my mouth in parables
Matthew 21:4-5 citing Zechariah 9:9 (with Isaiah 62:11 blended), the king coming on a donkey
Matthew 27:9-10 citing Zechariah 11:12-13 (attributed to Jeremiah, possibly drawing on Jeremiah 19), the thirty pieces of silver

The framework beyond Matthew

John’s gospel, especially chapters 12 and 19, uses the same fulfillment-pattern
Acts 1-13 uses Hebrew Bible citations heavily in the apostolic preaching
Hebrews 1-10 is sustained figural reading of the Hebrew Bible
Paul’s letters, especially Romans 9-11 and Galatians 3-4, use the same figural method
Revelation is dense with Hebrew Bible imagery being read forward into the apocalyptic vision

Common misreadings to avoid

Don’t read the formulas as proof-text predictions. Matthew is not arguing that Hosea predicted Jesus would go to Egypt. He is arguing that the pattern of God-calling-his-son-out-of-Egypt has reached its decisive instance.
Don’t dismiss the formulas as Matthew’s bad exegesis. Matthew is not misreading Hosea or Isaiah; he is doing first-century Jewish figural reading, which is a legitimate (and central) part of how the Hebrew Bible was read in his world. The reader who measures Matthew by modern grammatical-historical exegetical standards is using the wrong yardstick.
Don’t expect each citation to work the same way. Some citations are predictive, some typological, some blended. Matthew uses the formula flexibly, and the reader has to read each case on its own terms.
Don’t ignore the surrounding Hebrew Bible context. A citation is meant to bring the whole context with it. Hosea 11:1 brings Hosea’s whole prophecy; Isaiah 7:14 brings the Immanuel-section of Isaiah 7-12.
Don’t use figural reading to invent connections that aren’t there. The framework respects the original meaning of the cited passage even as it reads it forward. Figural reading is disciplined by the actual patterns of the text, not free association.