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M essiah There
are two very distinct lines of prophecy in the Scriptures concerning the Messiah. One line portrays him as a
humble suffering-savior. The other line of prophecy depicts
him as a conquering king-redeemer.
These two competing functions of the Messiah are recognized in Talmudic' and
other Jewish sources. (2) One explanation invoked to resolve this dilemma was
that there would be two Messiahs: one who would suffer and be
humbled and one who would rule and be exalted. The suffering
Messiah was referred to as Messiah Ben Yoseph.
Zechariah was said to have prophesied concerning "Messiah Ben Yoseph": Rejoice
greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout O daughter
of Jerusalem; behold, thy King cometh unto thee; He is just and having
salvation; lowly and riding upon a colt ... . (3)
Perhaps no other prophet has summarized in such a succinct manner the
humility of the coming Messiah. He is King of Zion yet He is lowly and riding
on a humble donkey. There is little doubt that the Talmud interprets
the verse to refer to the Messiah. It is quoted three times in the Babylonian
Talmud, and always with a messianic connotation. The first occurrence in the
Talmud is a passage dealing with dreams: He that sees a donkey in his
dream should expect salvation because it says, 'Behold thy King cometh unto
thee; He is just and having salvation; lowly and riding upon an ass.' (4)
Another Talmudic reference was referred to in Chapter Ten. In response
to Rabbi Hillel's statement that "Israel can expect no Messiah because
they consumed him in the days of Hezekiah," a retort is given by citing
the Zechariah scripture, and noting that it prophesied a coming Messiah after
the days of Hezekiah; hence, the Messiah had not yet come (5) Finally, Rabbi Yehoshua Bar Levi, referring to the Zechariah scripture,
said that if Israel is not worthy, then the Messiah will come in
humility riding upon an ass (6). This is Messiah Ben Yoseph - the Suffering Messiah. A rabbinic commentary
interprets the verse to mean that Messiah is not only humble but is oppressed
as well. (7) Zechariah is not the only prophet who spoke of Messiah's
humiliation. As concerning him, Isaiah wrote: All we like sheep have
gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord hath laid
on him the iniquity of us all. [Y]et he opened not his mouth. (8)
We are all unworthy, & hence there was no other way for the Messiah
to come but by humiliation, suffering & sacrifice. Isaiah refers to this
suffering Messiah as "servant." In one passage he says: Behold my
servant, whom I uphold ...I have put my Spirit
upon Him .(9) Many Jewish commentators agree that this passage refers
to the Messiah. (10) One Targum paraphrases it: Behold my Servant, the Messiah, I will
draw Him near, my chosen one in whom my Memra [Logos] is well pleased.
Rashi, however, refers the "servant" to
Israel, as he does all the servant passages in the Tanakh. Ibn Ezra
disagrees with both of the positions and, instead, refers the passages to
Isaiah himself. A very similar passage by Isaiah with a servant bent
is: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me
to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captive, & the
opening of the prison to those who are bound... (11) The
Midrashim support the view that Isaiah speaks of the Redeemer in this
passage. (12) However, most Jewish commentators on this passage relate
it to Isaiah himself. This is very unusual, since both Isaiah passages are so
similar. In the first passage the Lord upholds him; in the second passage the
Lord anoints him. In both passages the Spirit is upon him. In both passages
the one of whom the prophet speaks is meek and brings justice to the
oppressed, vindicates the persecuted and brings righteousness to the poor and
needy. It makes more sense to relate both passages to the same Person. (13)
These two passages do not exhaust Isaiah's prophecies concerning the
servant of the Lord. There is a fuller description of him in the last three
verses of the 52nd chapter and in the 53rd chapter of Isaiah. Although these
scriptures are not part of the Haftora (prophetic)
readings in the synagogue, they are none-the-less important canon and
discussed at length in Jewish religious literature. Concerning those
chapters, Rabbi Moshe Alshekh, a famous rabbinic
scholar who lived in Sfat in the 16th century
remarked: [Our] Rabbis with one voice, accept and affirm the opinion
that the prophet is speaking of king Messiah. (14)
Rabbi Alshekh's claim is true where it pertains to
the last three verses of chapter 52. The Targum begins its paraphrase with:
Behold my Servant the Messiah shall prosper. (15) The Targum
continues into the 53rd chapter of Isaiah: And He will build the Temple
that was polluted because of our sins. (16) This must be the Messiah, for no
one else was to build the Temple according to Jewish religious tradition, but
the Messiah. Additionally, several Midrashim take the threefold
expressions contained within those scriptures, "exalted, and extolled
and be very high," (17) as an indication that "Messiah shall be
more exalted than Abraham ... more extolled than Moses ... and be very high;
that is, higher than the Ministering Angels. ..." (18) As
concerning Isaiah 53, there is no unanimity of interpretation. A Targum clearly paraphrases the early
verses as consistent with a reference to the Messiah. (19) A later verse, however, is not as explicit;
and it is paraphrased as follows: It was the Lord's will to purge &
to purify the remnant of His people in order to cleanse their soul from
guilt; they will see the Messiah's Kingdom ... & those that do God's
Torah shall prosper in His will. (20) Even here, however, there is no
inconsistency. There is silence as to how the remnant was to be
cleansed. Since, however, they should
see Messiah's Kingdom, it is logical that the Messiah, who should reign in
the Messianic Kingdom, was responsible for their cleansing. In the
Talmud, too, we have a diversity of opinion regarding Isaiah 53. Some verses are assigned to general matters
(21); other portions are assigned to faithful Jews in general (22) or to Moses
in particular. (23) However, the
Talmudic tractate Sanhedrin relates the chapter to the sufferings of the
Messiah. According to it: The Rabanan (rabbis) say that Messiah's name is The suffering
Scholar of Rabbi's House [or The Leper Scholar] for it is written Surely
He hath borne our grief and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him
stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. (24) What
seems to be clear from the sources is that rabbinical authorities have been
aware of the clear teaching of Scripture concerning the suffering Messiah who
would die. There was, in addition to this concept of a Messiah Ben Yoseph, a Messiah
Ben David who would be exalted as King Eternal. Though some rabbinic sources
identified these as two Messiahs, REFERENCES
:
(1) Sukkah 52. (2) Raphael Patai, The Messiah
Texts, p. 166; Meyer Waxman, Galut U'ge'valh Be' Sifrut Yibsra'el (Hotsa'at Oten 1952) chap. 7.(Wayne State Univ. Press
'79) (3) Zechariah 9:9 (4) Berachot
56b (5) Sanhedrin 99a (6) Sanhedrin
98b (7) " 'He is humble riding upon an ass.' This refers to
Messiah and He is called anee [poor, humble and
oppressed] because He was oppressed all these years in prison, and the
sinners of Israel derided Him ..For the merits of
Messiah, The Holy One, blessed be He, will protect and redeem you." (Pesikta Rabbati, Piska 35.) (8) Isaiah 53:6-7. (9)
Isaiah 42:11; see also verses 2-7. (10) Rabbi David Kimchi exposits the
scripture as follows: "Behold my servant. ... This is King Messiah ... . I have put my Spirit ... refers to what is
said of Him, 'And the Spirit of the Lord will rest on Him'
(Isaiah 11:2)." The commentaries Metsudat
David and Metsudat Zion,
also refer the chapter to Messiah. (11) Isaiah 61:1; see
also verse 2-3. (12) Midrash Rabbah,
Lamentations 3:49-50, 59 (13) Accord, Matthew 12:15-18; Luke
4:16-18, 21 (14) Driver & Neubauer,
Isaiah 53 According to Jewish Interpreters (Oxford 1899) [reprinted,
KTAV] (15) Targum on Isaiah 52:13 (16) Targum on Isaiah 53:5. The Targum continues:
"We all have been scattered like sheep, each was dispatched into
captivity to his own way, but it was the will from before the Lord to forgive
all our sins for His sake. ... He removed the rulership
of the Gentile nations from the land of Israel." Targum on
Isaiah 53:6,8 (17) Isaiah
52:13 (18) See Midrash Tanhuma
(KTAV Publishing 1989) & Yalkut, vol. ii, para.
338, cited in Alfred Edersheim, The Life and Times
of Jesus the Messiah (Eerdmans 1977) p. 727. (19) "The
Righteous One shall grow up before him. ... He will build the Temple ... ." The Targum of Isaiah
53:2,5 (20) J.F. Stenning,
The Targum of Isaiah (Oxford 1953) p.
180 (21) For example, "shall see his seed" is connected
with blessing. Berakhot 57b (22) Berakhot 5a (23) Sotah 14a (24) Sanhedrin 98a. Within this chapter
of the tractate there is also the story of Elijah revealing to Rabbi Yehoshua Bar Levy that Messiah sits at the
gates of Rome among the poor and sick ones and removes one bandage at a ime, because he wants to be
ready when called to the redemption of Israel. (25) See e.g.,
Midrash Rabbah, Ruth (v.6) (26) Pesikta Rabbati, Piska 36:142 (27) "There is in the
Garden of Eden a palace named the Palace of the Sons of Sickness. This palace
the Messiah enters, and He summons every pain and every chastisement of
Israel. All of these come and rest upon Him. And had He not thus lightened
them upon Himself, there had been no man able to bear Israel's chastisements
for the transgressions of the law; as it is written, 'Surely our sicknesses
he has carried.' " (Zohar 11, 212a) What The Rabbis Know About The Messiah by Rachmiel Frydland.
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