The Messiah in Jewish Thought [7] – The Name of the Messiah

We are still reading on page 98b in the tractate Sanhedrin, beginning with the words of R. Giddal. But before we enter the text, I would like to do some review and some general thinking about the Messiah.

Two Opposite Errors

We have a tendency to do two opposite things: one, to oversimplify, and the other, to overcomplicate. And sometimes, strange as it may seem, these tendencies work together. When I speak to Christians about the Jewish view of the Messiah, they often oversimplify and say, "The Jews are still waiting for the Messiah" — and at the same time, almost in the same breath, "Would they really believe that the Messiah will come?" or some statement to that effect. The view of what Jews believe or don't believe is not really based on facts, but on impressions.

And the Jews do the same thing with Yeshua and with Christianity. They look at Christians and say, "Why do they believe the Messiah has already come, when not much has changed? Therefore it can't be that Yeshua is the Messiah." Most Jews don't even know that Christians are waiting for the return of the Messiah — and that there are many things Christians are waiting to happen that will repair, fix, and redeem the creation, the world we live in, launching it into an era of peace and blessing for the children of God, and judgment for the children of this world.

So the study of this ancient Jewish literature about the Messiah should give us a historical perspective on what the Jewish people believed about the Messiah: how deep their concern and interest were, and how much time and energy they spent trying to work out, from the biblical perspective and from tradition, who the Messiah is, what his name is, how he will come, when he will come, and what will happen when he does. And we have to look at this material as a backdrop to the New Testament. Chronologically, this material is younger than the New Testament — the New Testament is older than it — but it is still the backdrop, because this was the Jewish thinking, the Jewish ideas, that fed the rabbis and had earlier fed the apostles and the disciples.

R. Giddal and R. Joseph: Will Israel Yet Eat Their Fill?

So let's return to page 98b of tractate Sanhedrin.

Meaning that when the Messiah comes there will be plenty, and Israel will enjoy that plenty in the days of the Messiah. The Hebrew literally says that in the future Israel will "eat the years of the Messiah," the Messianic era — that they will eat the plenty present when the Messiah comes.

("Demurred" means he answered, he raised a question.) R. Joseph's question is: why do we have to affirm this so-evident truth, that when the Messiah comes there will be plenty and blessing and prosperity in the Land? Why emphasize that Israel will eat in the days of the Messiah — who else should eat, "Hilek and Bilek"? Hilek and Bilek in Aramaic is like "Tom and Jerry," or "Tom, Dick, and Harry" in American slang. In other words, if not Israel, who else will eat?

The Talmud explains that this was said in opposition to R. Hillel. R. Hillel maintained there would be no Messiah for Israel, since they had already enjoyed him during the reign of King Hezekiah. Let me spend some time explaining Hillel's statement.

What Hillel Meant

What did Hillel really mean? Hillel looked at the prophet Isaiah and saw the messianic prophecies — beginning with Isaiah 7:14, and then Isaiah 9: "For unto us a child is born… unto us a son is given… and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace… and the government shall be upon his shoulder." Hillel took these prophecies as referring to the birth of Hezekiah. Hezekiah was a righteous king at the beginning, beloved of God, though later problems developed between God and Hezekiah. So Hillel's position was that the Messiah was supposed to come in the days of Hezekiah, but did not — and therefore he is not coming. According to Hillel, the messianic prophecies dealt with the time of the prophet Isaiah; they were not prophecies for some distant future, but for Isaiah's own time and situation in the Land. So since they did not materialize in Hezekiah's day, they will not materialize in the future either.

R. Giddal's statement is the opposite: that in the future a day will come when Israel will eat its fill and enjoy the presence, the plenty, the bounty of the days of the Messiah. It contradicts Hillel, who says the Messiah was supposed to come in the past and did not, and therefore is not coming. R. Giddal says: No — this is something that is going to happen in the future.

These are two very important views, constantly in tension. Some said the messianic prophecies were ad hoc — dealing with the historical circumstances and the condition of the people in the days they were given. Others said: No, these prophecies deal with the future; there are things that have not yet come to pass, and therefore they will come to pass in the future — sometimes at the end of times, in the last days. As we know, so many of these messianic prophecies begin with the phrase "And in the last days…" — ve-acharit ha-yamim. So R. Giddal's statement in Rav's name is that there are still promises for Israel to enjoy the plenty and blessing of God in the future. Hillel's view is: No — these were promises for the past that did not materialize, and never will. "We had a chance, we missed it, finished." That was Hillel's view.

Modern Judaism, of course, is split by these two views. The Reform Jews have largely stopped believing that the Messiah is a literal person; they believe in a messianic era, spiritualizing the messianic promises, but the Messiah is not a person. The Orthodox, of course, still very much believe he is a person and that he will come in the future. But these views were already batted back and forth in the Talmudic era.

Why Was the World Created?

We continue with Rav's statement:

Rashi comments: so that David might sing hymns and psalms to God. In other words, why did God create the world? So that there would be King David, and David could make God's time pleasant with praises, hymns, and songs. That is Rav's view — an interesting one, because in the New Testament we have statements such as these. In Colossians chapter 1 verse 15 we read of the Messiah:

And we find the same idea in Hebrews chapter 1 verse 2, again speaking of the Messiah:

From these, and from John chapter 1 verse 1 onward, we see that the world was created by the Messiah and for the Messiah. So Rav's statement, "the world was created only on David's account," basically indicates that all of creation was for the purpose of the Messiah — not King David as an individual king at a point in history, but King David as the representative of the messianic seed, the messianic person of the Bible. (Rashi's interpretation takes it in the extremely literal sense, that God wanted to hear songs and praises from the mouth of King David.)

on account of Moses, so that he might receive the Torah and bring its light to the world. For the sake of the Torah, in other words, the world was created. But that is not the end of the discussion.

Here is the clear statement — not the literal reading of "on David's account," but, according to R. Johanan, for the sake of the Messiah.

The Cycle the Rabbis Could Not Escape

This refers back again to the same New Testament reading: that God created the world for the sake of the Messiah, so that the world might be saved. And the issue goes deeper still, because why would the world need to be saved? The Messiah is a Savior, a Redeemer; he came to restore men from the separation that sin had caused between men and God. If there were no sin, there would be no need for the Messiah; if no need for the Messiah, no need for the world, and God would have rested for ever and ever. So it is a cycle. They said God created the world for the sake of the Messiah, and the Messiah is a Savior. That means that in order for the Messiah to have a task, the world had to be sinful. If the world were not sinful, there would be no need for the Messiah; and if no need for the Messiah, no need to create the world.

This cycle is complicated, and the rabbis feel the complication. But they cannot escape it, because they must deal with the reality that the word of God presents to them: that the Messiah is a Savior, that the world is lost, that mankind is sinning and therefore needs atonement, and therefore needs a Savior. If they were not sinning, there would be no need for the Torah; if no need for the Torah, no need for the Messiah and for atonement. This is a cycle the rabbis constantly strain against. And now R. Johanan says clearly: the world was created for the sake of the Messiah.

The Name of the Messiah

So the rabbis begin to argue: if it is for the sake of the Messiah, then we must know who he is — what is his name? And each school offers the name of its own rabbi as the name of the Messiah. Let us read it through and then discuss it.

Each school envisions its own teacher, the head of that yeshiva, as the Messiah. Let us try to understand this discussion a little more deeply.

After the discussion of why the world was created, and after R. Johanan says it was created for the sake of the Messiah, the editors of the Talmud bring this discussion — from the Tannaitic period, a Baraita — in which the rabbis debate the name of the Messiah. Each one is obviously thinking that the head of his own school is the Messiah, which is interesting in itself: these teachers were so admired, so respected, so looked up to, that their disciples each thought their master was the Savior, the Messiah.

A similar process has happened a number of times in Judaism. Recently we saw the same thing with R. Schneerson, the rebbe of Chabad, of the Lubavitch movement: when he grew old and sick and his disciples saw there would be no continuation of that Hasidic line from within, they pointed to him — I think at first even without his knowledge — as the Messiah. And now, though he has died, many still claim he is the Messiah, and a good number believe he will rise from the dead. Something similar happened here, where the disciples of each school looked to their teacher as a possible candidate for the Messiahship.

Shiloh

The school of R. Shila looked for a verse indicating that R. Shila was the Messiah. It is a very messianic verse, from Jacob's testament — his prophecy of what would happen in the history of his children — in Genesis chapter 49. Let us read from verse 9:

The nations will gather to Judah, who holds the sceptre of kingship and is a lawgiver — and within this is a condition: "until Shiloh come." The rabbis affirm this is a messianic promise, but very few know what "Shiloh" means. There are many interpretations; one of the most common is that it means "his own" (shelo); others read it differently. It is very interesting that in the Hebrew text, the phrase "until Shiloh come" contains an acronym of the name of Yeshua — but we will not enter into that numerological calculation now. The rabbis knew from very early that this passage is a messianic promise, and dealt with it in a messianic way; and here the school of R. Shila brings this verse and says, "Until Shiloh come — obviously, then, the name of the Messiah is Shiloh," like their own rabbi.

Yinnon

Then the school of R. Yannai brings a very interesting psalm, containing the word Yinnon. This is a strange Hebrew word, very difficult to translate; it occurs only once in the Bible, so its exact meaning is unclear. Whatever the meaning, its context is fairly clear: it speaks of Someone who existed before the creation of the world, whose name is Yinnon. Let me read the context, from verse 11 of Psalm 72:

In verse 17, "His name shall endure for ever" translates the Hebrew yinnon as yikkon, "shall endure"; but literally the Hebrew says, "Before the sun, Yinnon is his name." The school of R. Yannai heard the closeness between "Yannai" and "Yinnon" — they are not identical, but they sound alike — and said, "His name shall be Yinnon." And this is indeed a messianic prophecy: in the prayer book of the High Holidays, Yinnon is used as one of the names of the Messiah, meaning that before the sun was, he already existed — however one translates it.

Haninah, Menahem, and the Leper Scholar

Then the disciples of R. Haninah bring a verse pointing to R. Haninah, from Jeremiah 16:13. Thus each school puts forward its own rabbi. After that comes the unnamed opinion that his name will be Menahem, "the Comforter" — as the son of King Hezekiah was called Menahem, and as Lamentations chapter 1 verse 16 says that the one who would menahem, "comfort," would relieve the soul.

Then comes the collective, official opinion of the rabbis: that his name will be called the "leper scholar" (chivra in Hebrew), and to prove it they bring Isaiah chapter 53 verse 4:

This is an important place, because it shows several things that were later denied and cast aside in Judaism. First, it shows that the rabbis knew and used Isaiah 53 as a messianic text — they knew it speaks of the Messiah. Second, they knew that the Messiah is a Suffering Servant: not only the royal Messiah of the seed of David who will come and reign over the nations, but at the same time a suffering Messiah. And they interpreted Isaiah 53:4 as describing one who is a leper, because the passage reads:

They read "stricken" as "stricken with leprosy" — leprosy being the worst and most contagious disease, one that caused people even to abandon their own families for fear of contracting it. So all this despising and rejection — that he is ugly, that we did not regard him, that we left him alone, that he bore our grief, and that by his stripes we are healed — is taken here as a messianic description. The rabbis say his name is the "leper scholar," from this smitten and stricken man of Isaiah 53. This is the official rabbinical position.

The Servant They Later Denied

Over the centuries, Jews denied that Isaiah 53 refers to the Messiah. Whenever Christians argued with Jews and brought Isaiah 53, the Jews would say, "No, no — this is about the whole nation of Israel, not about an individual." That question was already raised in the first century. In Acts chapter 8 we meet Philip the evangelist, commanded by the Holy Spirit to join himself to a chariot leaving Jerusalem on the road toward Gaza. In the chariot was an official of the Queen of Ethiopia, who had just bought a scroll of Isaiah and was reading from Isaiah 53, and his question was: of whom is the prophet speaking — himself, or someone else? There was no consideration, as traditional Judaism later held, that the prophet spoke of the nation of Israel; the assumption was that he spoke of an individual. And in our Talmudic passage the rabbis hold the same: this is about the Messiah, and one of the names of the Messiah is the "leper scholar," the scholar with leprosy.

We saw this passage already when we discussed R. Joshua ben Levi, who at the cave met the Messiah — a leper, outside the city. Here again we read that the rabbis consider the Messiah a leper who suffers for our transgressions, by whose stripes we are healed, carrying our disease of sinfulness, which is like leprosy, upon himself. It is important, in my opinion, to realize this: that when we, and the New Testament, quote Isaiah 53 as referring to the Suffering Servant of God — Yeshua of Nazareth, who died on the cross for our transgressions to redeem us from our sin — we stand on ground the rabbis themselves once held.

And it is very important to recognize that this is found not only in the ancient Talmud, but also, consistently, in the prayer books of Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur and in other literature — even though the official position of the Jewish people is that Isaiah 53 speaks of the people of Israel as a nation that has suffered through the years in the diaspora. Logically and historically, that reading does not hold water, because the passage deals with a person suffering for our transgressions, whom we did not esteem, whom we considered smitten and afflicted of God.