Isaiah 9 - That’s what Christmas is all About Charlie Brown
 6 For to us a child is born,
      to us a son is given,
      and the government will be on his shoulders.
      And he will be called
      Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
      Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 Of the increase of his government and peace
      there will be no end.
      He will reign on David’s throne
      and over his kingdom,
      establishing and upholding it
      with justice and righteousness
      from that time on and forever.
      The zeal of the LORD Almighty
      will accomplish this.
You can read a pretty decent article about this Messianic verse at truthnet.org. It is not a perfect article, but it is well worth the read. The article discusses Isaiah 9:6 together with Isaiah 7:14:
14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.Â
One point they leave out about Isaiah 7:14 is that when the Almah was translated from Hebrew to Greek as “virgin” originally, there were political reasons for doing so (a protest of sorts), and so studies about how often Almah is translated “virgin” fail to take much of the history into account. On the other hand, one should notice that God is aware of human fallibility, and frequently uses them to further His own cause. For example, on Passover, the Jewish celebration of deliverance form slavery in Egypt, there are three matzohs. Over the years, a tradition was born, where the middle matzoh was broken, and part is hidden… the Afikomen. Later on in the service, the Afikomen is found, a symbol of God’s delivery of the Jews from slavery. As a Jewish Christian, I see this as wonderful illustration of Jesus, my Messiah. Like the Afikomen, Jesus is the middle of a Triad (Father-SON-Holy Spirit). Like the middle matzoh, Jesus had stripes (from being whipped), holes (from a crown of thorns), was broken for our sins, and hidden a tomb for 3 days before being found alive… and now we use Matzoh to symbolize His body during communion. The thing about the Afikomen however is that it is not a Biblically-based tradition. Somehow Jewish tradition developed this practice independent of scripture telling them what to do… and yet their tradition mirrors exactly what God did with Jesus. I believe God similarly uses the “mistake” in translation of Almah for virgin in Isaiah 7:14… almah refers to a young woman, not necessarily virgin, but most likely one. Young woman would have been more accurate for what Isaiah was trying to say… and in fact someone was born (Hezekiah) who indeed fulfills much of the prophecy above in Isaiah 9:6-7, a fulfillment of the verse if almah is rendered “young maiden”. However, Mary fulfilled these verses again when she bore Jesus. She was also young maiden, but happened also to be virgin. God knew this, in fact planned this, and used the political statement that mistranslated almah to virgin to foretell Jesus’ birth.
But back to Isaiah 9:6-7.
Jesus is foretold to rule in righteousness. Notice how many elements of righteousness are actually mentioned. Usually, it is only justice, and in fact you see it mentioned above. Belief is implied, as is obedience, but look at what else is mentioned… zeal. Recall that zeal for the purity of God’s name is an element of righteousness, and notice that this king in verse 6 will be called Might God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, and Wonderful Counselor. Clearly, Jesus would be God, as these verses illustrate aspects of God’s Trinitarian nature, and we know of God’s zeal for His name. Therefore, we can assume He will be zealous for all of His title in verse 6, and Jesus will rule in the righteousness from which this zealousness will flow.
Jesus is seen by many non-Christians as one of the greatest teachers who ever lived… He just wasn’t God. Naturally, I disagree with the latter point, but even an atheist can be impacted by Jesus’ zealousness for the title Wonderful Counselor. We see His zealousness for the title Might God, as the church obediently teaches Trinitarian doctrine against the interpretation of the Jews who do not see how such a doctrine reconciles with God being 1. Similarly, this zealousness is seen as whenever a Christian prays to God the father, and finally when Messianic Jews look forward to their Messiah, the Prince of Peace, who will come and rescue the world from its sin, right when all hope will seem lost. God is zealous to keep to His name pure, and somehow, through our sin, He does this… these titles being an aspect of doctrine that the severely splintered capital ‘C’ Church agrees on throughout Christendom, and across history.