Rhetoric: Jacob obviously assumes that his hearers are knowledgeable about this topic. This is his first explicit mention of the Messiah. His only clue by which his hearers can interpret “ye know that in the body he shall show himself” is verse 4: “For I know that ye have searched much, many of you, to know of things to come; wherefore I know that ye know that our flesh must waste away and die; nevertheless, in our bodies we shall see God.” The fact that Jacob considers the reference to bodily renewal sufficient context to understand that he is speaking of the Messiah is what we would expect for an ancient “high-context” culture. (See Behind the Text: Chapter 1, “Text and Context.”) Certainly Nephi had preached to this same audience of his own vision, which even named the Messiah: “For according to the words of the prophets, the Messiah cometh in six hundred years from the time that my father left Jerusalem; and according to the words of the prophets, and also the word of the angel of God, his name shall be Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (2 Ne. 25:19).
Translation: “Christ” is a title, not a name. Nephi understood that distinction, for he later used the title correctly: “And as I spake concerning the convincing of the Jews, that Jesus is the very Christ, it must needs be that the Gentiles be convinced also that Jesus is the Christ, the Eternal God.” Nevertheless, 2 Nephi 25:19 still somewhat awkwardly uses “Christ” as a name and also uses “Messiah” as a title in the same verse. It is hard to understand what underlying text would have yielded both the anglicized form of the Hebrew word and the Anglicization of the Greek form of the Hebrew word in the same sentence. A simpler explanation is that Joseph Smith added the phrase “his name shall be Jesus Christ,” rather than making an exact translation of the text. (See commentary accompanying 2 Nephi 25:19.)
Scripture: In this single verse, Jacob demonstrates a detailed knowledge of the mission of the Messiah, undoubtedly learned, at least initially, from Nephi’s vision. The Messiah will be born in Jerusalem; his body will become a man’s in its form, and he will die for human beings.
The reference to the Creator is to Yahweh in that role. It should not be confused with the Father (the “most high God”). In the Book of Mormon, Yahweh is God’s name. Yahweh will become the mortal Messiah. In ancient Israel before the Josian reforms, the Father is understood but remains in the background. It is the same in the Book of Mormon. (See1 Nephi, Part 1: Context, Chapter 1, “The Historical Setting of 1 Nephi” and “Excursus: The Nephite Understanding of God,” following 1 Nephi 11.)
Literature:Jacob creates an opposed parallel emphasizing the Messiah’s role. The literary phrase turns on the idea of subjection, and death/implied resurrection: The Creator becomes subject to man; he dies; man becomes subject to him. This phrasing works better as literature than as theology, because of its intense compression, but Jacob obviously assumed that his hearers were sufficiently sophisticated to understand both the poetry and the underlying theology.