It is an exercise that needs to be done and which we can only outline here. We should begin with the Emmaus scene (Lk 24:13-35). There the Lord, to those disciples who were saddened and bewildered by his humiliating death in Jerusalem, rebukes them: "You fools and dull of heart to believe all that the Prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ [the Messiah] should suffer these things and so enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself". 

Unfortunately, the text does not pick up the Lord's references. The accredited specialization to the Law and the Prophets is a traditional Jewish resource , but it also recalls the mysterious scene of the transfiguration, where Jesus appeared gloriously before his disciples, with Moses and Elijah. And, according to Luke, "they spoke of his departure, which was to be fulfilled in Jerusalem" (Lk 9:31). The most important aspect of this exegesis is that Christ unites the figure, in principle glorious and triumphant, of the Messiah, prophet and King, with the need to suffer, which is expressed in the songs of Isaiah's Servant of the LORD and in the psalms of the persecuted righteous, such as Psalm 22, which the Evangelists apply at length to the Lord. 

The disciples had recognised him as the Messiah by John the Baptist's testimony of the anointing with the Holy Spirit and by signs and miracles, especially the casting out of demons. Israel retained, as the case may be, a strong messianic tradition, linked to the restoration of Israel and illustrated by a multitude of biblical texts. Above all, with the expectation of a new prophet on a par with Moses; "God will raise up from among your brethren a prophet like me" (Dt 18:15); capable of "speaking with God face to face", the nostalgia and final longing of Deuteronomy (34:10); and with the tradition of the Son of David, which the Lord, for example, explicitly assumes when he enters Jerusalem on a colt, deliberately fulfilling the prophecy of Zechariah (9:9), amidst the enthusiasm of his disciples (Mt 21:4-5; Jn 12:14-15).  

As the Messiah figure was linked to the restoration of Israel, a strong and liberating solution was expected. A Messiah capable of defeating the enemies. They certainly did not expect a Messiah who would be defeated by the enemies. It is striking that the Gospels record three announcements of the Lord about his passion (Mk 8, 31-32; 9, 30-32; 10, 32-34), which disconcert the disciples and provoke Peter's reproach (Mt 16, 22-24). 

However many variants the Messiah figure might have, a triumph was expected. If not, how could he restore Israel? The Acts of the Apostles records the anxiety of the disciples before the Risen One: "Those who were gathered there asked him this question. Lord, is it now that you are going to restore the kingdom of Israel? Evidently the notion of that Kingdom had to be expanded and transcended. How else could he eschatologically gather all nations? In fact, Jesus prefers to use "Kingdom of God". 

To those disciples anxious for the restoration of Israel he has explained for almost three years with parables that the Kingdom is already in them as a leaven, and that it will grow little by little until the end of time. He knew that they could not yet understand Him. Moreover, "after his passion, he appeared to them with many proofs: he appeared to them for forty days and spoke to them about the Kingdom of God" (Acts 1:3).

Most puzzling for the disciples was the shift from a political liberation, within the history of the world, to a liberation from sin, the plot of cosmic history, of a fallen creation. Christ's exegesis unites and counterbalances the two main figures, Messiah and Servant of God, and thus changes the time and nature of the liberation. It will not be within human history, though it will spread as a leaven in human history. Nor will it be done in the human way, with economic, political and military means. So how will it be done?

Let us go back to St Luke, at the end of the Emmaus scene, when the disciples discover the Lord, he disappears, and they return to Jerusalem with enthusiasm. And there Jesus Christ appears again. After showing them "the hands and feet" with the nail prints (which the Risen One will keep forever) he says to them: "This is what I was telling you while I was still with you: everything written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled. Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures: 'Thus it is written, that the Christ must suffer and rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins must be preached in his name'" (Lk 24:44-45). 

Let us look at Christ's exegesis: "That which is written in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms". In which passages? They are not recorded by the evangelists. But it is possible to know indirectly, by looking at those used by the first Christian tradition. Not so much the messianic passages, for those could already be expected to apply to Christ, but precisely those that refer to "Christ having to suffer and rise again" and to "the forgiveness of sins" being preached. We can only give a few glimpses into an enormous topic which comprises the relationship of Jesus Christ to the Servant Songs and to the Psalms and the question of the "fulfilment" of the Scriptures in Him. 

The scene of the eunuch of the Ethiopian queen Candace, whom Philip encounters on the road, is a sympathetic and significant one. The eunuch is sitting in the chariot reading: "He was led like a sheep to the slaughter..." (Is 53:7-8). And he asks Philip: "Please tell me of whom the prophet says this". And Philip "beginning with this passage, proclaimed to him the gospel of Jesus" (Acts 8:26-40). He applies to Jesus Christ one of the songs of the Servant of the LORD.

The five great "discourses" in the first part of Acts are very significant. There the disciples are forced to explain the meaning of the death of Jesus Christ. Peter, on the day of Pentecost, applies verses from Psalm 16 (15): "You will not abandon my soul to hell, nor will you let your Holy One see corruption" (Acts 2:17). Furthermore, from Psalm 110: "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool", which the Lord himself had used (Mk 12:36) and which Christians relate from the beginning to the prophecy of Daniel (7:13) and the ascension of Christ to glory (to the right hand of the Father).

In the temple, Peter preaches: "God has fulfilled what he foretold by the prophets, that his Christ would suffer. Repent therefore and be converted so that your sins may be blotted out" (Acts 3:18). And, indeed, he then recalls the prophet promised by Moses. And before the Sanhedrin, who called them to ask for explanations, he uses Psalm 118: "The stone rejected by the architects is now the cornerstone", which the Lord himself had used (cf. Lk 20:17). And, on being released, he recalls Psalm 2: "The princes are allied against the Lord and against his Christ" (Acts 4:26). Again before the Sanhedrin, he declares: "God has exalted him to his right hand as Prince and Saviour, to grant forgiveness of sins to Israel" (Acts 5:31). Being led to martyrdom, Stephen recalls the prophecy of Moses ("a prophet like me") and sees Christ "standing at the right hand of God" (Acts 7:55). 

Here, on the other hand, the words of the Baptist at the beginning of John's Gospel come together. "He saw Jesus coming towards him and said, 'Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world'". And after testifying to the manifestation of the Holy Spirit upon Jesus at the moment of the Baptism, the text continues: "The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. He looked at Jesus as he passed by and said, 'Behold the Lamb of God'. The two disciples heard him say this and followed Jesus" (1:35-37). They were John and Andrew, who then sought out his brother Peter and said to him, "We have found the Messiah" (1:41).

It is interesting to note that John links from the beginning the figure of Jesus of Nazareth as Messiah with that of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Twice he attributes to Jesus being the "Lamb of God", an image which, apart from the Apocalypse (where it is used 24 times), does not appear explicitly in other texts. Although St. John assimilates Christ to the Passover Lamb, when he is already dead, they do not break his legs "so that the Scripture might be fulfilled which says that none of his bones shall be broken" (Jn 19:36; Ps 34:21, Ex 12:46; Num 9:12). It was forbidden to break the bones of the Passover lamb. And the evangelists emphasise that Christ dies "at the hour of the ninth hour", on Friday, when the paschal lambs were sacrificed, after exclaiming: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me", the beginning of Psalm 22 (23) and the expression of the persecuted righteous. 

We owe to the Protestant exegete Joachim Jeremiah the observation which Ratzinger takes up in his Jesus of Nazareth (Volume II, Chapter 1): "Jeremiah draws attention to the fact that the Hebrew word talcha means both lamb and lad or servant" (in ThWNT I, 343), thus linking the two things we have been talking about. 

The meaning of Christ's death synthesises the figure of the persecuted and suffering Servant for his fidelity to God with the paschal and sacrificial aspect linked to the lamb. And it has a magnificent liturgical expansion, both in the Letter to the Hebrews and in the Apocalypse. In the Letter to the Hebrews, the sacrificial meaning of Christ's death, the sacrifice of the New Covenant, made with the Holy Spirit, is magnificently explained; while the Apocalypse underlines the cosmic dimension of this offering of Christ the Lamb celebrated in Heaven. 

The Letter to the Hebrews reasons "biblically" with these elements. In it, the memory of Melchizedek, priest of the Most High God, but not a Levite or of the house of Aaron, like the Jewish priests of the Old Testament, is very important. Hence the importance of Psalm 110 (109), applied to Christ: "Thou art an everlasting priest after the rite of Melchizedek", with the proviso that Christ's offering is himself. What is the great sin of the rejection of God becomes, through Christ's faithfulness, the Christian sacrifice. Thus, Christ's death is the Christian offering and sacrifice that is the founder of the New Covenant. All that the sacrifices could mean of recognition, offering and covenant with God receives its ultimate fulfilment in the sacrifice of Christ. "He did it once for all by offering himself" (7:27). " This is the main point of what we have been saying, that we have such a high priest, who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty of heaven" (8:1-2).

And in the Apocalypse: "You were slain and purchased for God with your blood men of every race, language, people and nation; and you have made of them for our God a kingdom of priests" (Rev 5:10); "These follow the lamb wherever it goes and have been ransomed from among men as first fruits for God" (Rev 14:4). 

This gives a new dimension to salvation, to God's forgiveness and to the establishment of the Kingdom. The Kingdom of God will not be established politically or militarily, but through the sacrifice of Christ who implores and obtains God's forgiveness ("forgive them, for they know not what they do") and through the mystical application, first moral and then physical, of Christ's resurrection. In this way the Kingdom of God grows in this world, awaiting the final resurrection. It is a path of real renewal of persons, which allows us to pass from the old man, the inheritance of Adam, to the new man, in Christ, as Saint Paul summarises for his part.