"While the Jewish tradition affirms that Israel is the son of God, the divine filiation of Jesus does not contradict this first filiation. Jesus is not the Son of God without being, at the same time, the 'son of David, son of Abraham' (Mt 1:1). In him, the two filiations are as indissociable as his two natures. Or, better: the second is taken up into the first without confusion or separation, just as his humanity is not abolished but brought to fulfillment when the Person of the Word appropriates it forever."Consequently, when Jesus prays, it is the prayer of Israel throughout the centuries that is brought to fulfillment. He takes up again the prayer of his people, through the cycle of feasts and the rhythm of goings-up to Jerusalem. He prays the psalms, and his last prayer in the gospel of Luke is a citation of a psalm, with the addition of the word, 'Father': 'Father, into your hands I commend my spirit' (Lk 23:26; cf. Ps 31:6). Thus we can say truly that it is precisely as the Son of the Father that Jesus is capable of bringing to fulfillment the entire prayer of Israel, in some sense revealing it to itself as the expression of the filial destiny of the people of God."
Jean-Pierre Batut, "Praying to the Father through the Son in the Spirit: reflections on the specificity of Christian prayer," trans. Michelle K. Borras, Communio: the international Catholic review 36, no. 4 (Winter 2009): 629 (623-642).
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