 Determining whether or not the messiah to whom Hebrew sources refer has already come, as Christians maintain, could not be demonstrated through philosophical investigation. It could only be demonstrated by interpreting scriptural verses and rabbinic texts well known to both Abner and Polqar, and by examining how the picture of the messiah and the messianic era that emerges from that interpretation coheres or does not cohere with past empirical events. In other words, Polqar chose prophetic verses that show that Jesus did not bring about the messianic era described by the prophets. On the other hand, Abner, who sought to prove just the opposite, used the same verses, as well as others, to demonstrate that Jesus and the messianic era he inaugurated did in fact correspond precisely to what the prophets had described.