|
See also: John i
.
41; iv
.
25), transcriptions (the first
See also: form modified by reference to the etymology) of the See also: Greek M€QUias, (Mevias, Meveias), which in
i The transcription is as in retstsoup reaalp for -an, Onomastica, ed
.
Lag., pp
.
247, 281, Bats. ii
.
3: For the termination -as for am, see See also: Lagarde, Psalt
.
Memph., p. vii
.
2 The plural is found in Ps. cv
.
15, of the patriarchs as consecrated persons
.
3 In Ps. lxxxiv
.
9 [to] it is disputed whether the anointed one is the See also: king, the
See also: priest, or the nation as a whole
.
The second view is perhaps the best
.
turn represents the Aramaic H?'*'7 (me'shihd), answering to the See also: Hebrew TM!, " the anointed." There can be no doubt that a magical power was ascribed to the See also: anointing oil (cf.Frazer, See also: Golden Bough, 2nd ed., ii
.
364 sqq.)
.
The. king was thereby rendered sacrosanct (I Sam. See also: xxiv
.
6 sqq.; 2 Sam. i
.
14 sqq.; iv
.
9 sqq.), and he was considered to be endowed with a See also: special virtue
.
Thus whosoever curses the king is stoned as though See also: God Himself had been cursed (2 Sam. xix
.
22)
.
In See also: ancient See also: Egyptian cultus the priest, after he has solemnly saluted the gods, begins the daily See also: toilet of the god, which consists in sprinkling his image, clothing it with coloured cloths, and anointing it with oil (See also: Erman, Die aegyptische See also: Religion, p
.
49)
.
In the magical texts of Babylonia a similar virtue was attached to oil: "bright' oil, pure oil, resplendent oil that bestows magnificence on the Gods ... the oil for the conjuration (siptu) of See also: Marduk" (Tallquist, Makla series, tablet vii. col
.
1, 31 sqq.; cf
.
Gressmann, Der Ursprung der israelitisch-iidischen Eschatologie, p . 258, sqq.) . We have, in See also: Schrader's K.I.B. v. letter 37 (p
.
98), evidence from the Tell el-Amarna tablets that the anointing of See also: kings was practised in See also: Egypt or See also: Syria in 1450 B.G
.
(c.) in a'letter addressed to the Egyptian king by Ramman-nirari of Nubassi
.
On the intimate relation which in See also: primitive times subsisted between the sorcerer and the king see the See also: citation from Frazer's Early See also: History of Kingship, p: 127, in the article PRIEST, and cf. p
.
29: " Classical evidence points to the conclusion that in prehistoric ages
.
. . the various tribes or cities were ruled by kings who discharged priestly duties " (p.31)
.
Thus the early kings of See also: Assyria were priests of See also: Assur (Asur), the tutelary deity of Assyria
.
Tiglath-Pileser I
.
(c
.
ItooB.C.) calls his predecessors, Samsi-Ramman and Ismi-Dagan, issakku (pa-to-si) of the God Assur (Prism-insc. col. vii
.
62, 63) . Later kings, e.g . Slialmaneser II . (Nimrud- obelisk,See also: line 15, monolith, line II) and Assur-bani-See also: pal (See also: Rassam cyl. col. vii
.
94) See also: call themselves by the more definite title of .angu of Assur
.
The Hebrew word with the article prefixed occurs in the Old Testament only in the phrase " the anointed priest " (Lev. iv
.
3, 5, 16; vi
.
22 [151), but " Yahweh's anointed " is a See also: common title of the king of Israel, applied in the See also: historical books to See also: Saul and See also: David, in Lam. iv
.
20 to Zedekiah, and in Isa. xlv
.
I extended to Cyrus
.
In the Psalms corresponding phrases (My, Thy, His anointed)2 occur nine times, to which may be added the lyrical passages s Sam. ii
.
10, Hab. iii
.
13 . In the See also: present attitude of See also: literary See also: criticism it would be most difficult to assert, as See also: Robertson See also: Smith did in the 9th edition'of this
See also: work, that " in the intention of the writers it [i.e. the See also: term See also: messiah or " anointed "] refers to the king then on the See also: throne." Nor would most See also: recent critics agree with Professor See also: Driver (L.O.T., 8th ed. p
.
385) in considering Pss. ii. and lxxii. as " presumably pre-exilic." G
.
See also: Buchanan See also: Gray (J.Q.R.,
See also: July 1895, p
.
658 sqq.) draws a parallel between the " king " in the Psalms and the " servant " in Deutero-See also: Isaiah or Yahweh's " Son " (in Hos. xi
.
1, &c.) which is applied to Israel either actual or idealized
.
It would be possible so to interpret " king " or " anointed " in some Psalms, e.g. lxi., lxiii. and lxxxiv., but hardly in Pss. ii., lxxii. and lxxxix., where the Messianic reference is strongly See also: personal.3 In the Psalms the ideal aspect of the kingship, its religious importance as the expression and See also: organ of Yahweh's See also: sovereignty, is prominent
.
When the Psalter became a liturgical See also: book the historical kingship had gone by, and the idea alone remained, no longer as the interpretation of a present See also: political fact but as See also: part of Israel's religious inh
ance
.
It was impossible, however, to think that a true idea ha become obsolete merely because it found no expression on See also: earth for the See also: time being; Israel looked again for an anointed king to whom the words of the sacred See also: hymns should apply with a force
never realized in the imperfect kingship of the past
.
Thus the Psalms were necessarily viewed as prophetic; and meantime, in accordance with the common Hebrew See also: representation of ideal things as existing in heaven, the true king remains hidden with God
.
The steps by which this result was reached must, however, be considered. in detail
.
The hope of the advent: of an ideal king was only one feature of that larger hope of the salvation of Israel from all .evils, which was constantly held forth by all the prophets, from the time when the seers of the 8th century B.C. proclaimed that the true conception of Yahweh's relation to His See also: people could become a See also: practical reality only through a See also: great deliverance following a sifting See also: judgment of the most terrible kind
.
The idea of a judgment so severe as to render possible an entire breach with the guilty past is common to all the prophets, but is expressed. in a great variety of forms and images . As aSee also: rule the prophets directly connect the final restoration with the removal of the sins of their own age; to Isaiah the last troubles are those of See also: Assyrian invasion,, to See also: Jeremiah the restoration follows on the exile to See also: Babylon, to Daniel on the overthrow of the Greek, See also: monarchy
.
But, all agree in giving the central place to the realization of a real effective kingship of Yahweh; in fact the conception of the religious subject as the nation of Israel, with a See also: national organization under Yahweh as king, is common to the whole Old Testament, and connects prophecy, proper with the so-called Messianic psalms and similar passages which speak of the religious relations of the Hebrew See also: commonwealth, the religious meaning of national institutions; and so necessarily contain ideal elements reaching beyond the empirical present
.
All such passages are frequently called Messianic; but the term is more properly reserved as the specific designation of one particular branch of the Hebrew hope of salvation, which, becoming prominent in See also: post-canonical Judaism, used the name of the Messiah as a technical term (which it never is in the Old Testament), and exercised a great influence oh New Testament thought—the term " the Christ " (d xp>'.aros) being itself nothing more than the See also: translation of " the Messiah."
In the See also: period of the Hebrew monarchy the thought that Yahweh is the divine king of Israel was associated with the conception that the human king reigns by right only if he reigns by commission or " unction " from Him
.
Such was the theory of the kingship in See also: Ephraim as well as in See also: Judah (Dent. xxxiii.; 2 Kings ix
.
6), till in the decadence of the See also: northern See also: state See also: Amos (ix
.
11) foretold' the redintegration of the Davidic See also: kingdom, and See also: Hosea (iii
.
5; viii
.
4) expressly associated a similar prediction with the condemnation of the kingship of, Ephraim as illegitimate
.
So the great Judaean prophets of the 8th century connect the salvation of Israel with the rise of a Davidic king, full of Yahweh's Spirit, in whom all the energies of Yahweh's transcendental kingship are as it were incarnate (Isa.ix
.
6 seq.; xi
.
1 seq
.
; See also: Micah v.)
.
This conception, however, ,is not one of the See also: constant elements of prophecy; other prophecies of Isaiah look for the decisive interposition of Yahweh in the crisis of history without a kingly deliverer
.
Jeremiah again speaks of the future David or righteous sprout of David's See also: stem (See also: xxiii
.
5 seq.; See also: xxx..9) and Ezekiel uses similar language (xxxiv., See also: xxxvii); but that such passages do not necessarily mean more than that the Davidic dynasty shall be continued in the time of restoration under worthy princes seems clear from the way in which Ezekiel speaks of the See also: prince in chs. xlv., xlvi
.
As yet we have no fixed See also: doctrine of a personal Messiah, but only material from which such a doctrine might be See also: drawn
.
The religious view of the kingship is still essentially the same as in 2 Sam. vii., where
' Most recent critics regard Amos ix.9-15 as a later addition, and the same view is held by Nowack, Harper and others respecting Hos. iii
.
5, though on grounds which seem questionable
.
Isa. ix
.
1-7, xi. t sqq. are held by Hackmann, See also: Cheyne, See also: Marti, and other critics to be post-exilian
.
Duhm and others hold that they are genuine
.
It may be admitted that Isa. xi
.
1 seq. might be held to be contemporary with Isa. lv
.
3, 4, and to refer to Zerubbabel . Cf . See also: Haggai n
.
21-23, composed seventeen years afterwards
.
Mic. v
.
1–8 can with difficulty be regarded as genuine.the endless duration of the Davidic dynasty is set forth as part of
.
Yahweh's See also: plan.•
There are other, parts of the Old Testament—notably r Sam viii., xii
.
(belonging to the later stratum)—in which the very existence of a human kingship is represented as a departure from the theocratic ideal, and after the exile, ,when the monarchy had come to an end, we find pictures of the latter days in which its restoration has no place
.
Such is the great prophecy of Isa. xl.-xlviii., in which Cyrus is the anointed of Yahweh
.
So too there is no allusion to a human kingship in See also: Joel or in See also: Malachi; the old forms of the Hebrew state were broken, and. religious hopes expressed themselves in other shapes
?
In the book of Daniel it is collective Israel that, under the See also: symbol of a"son of See also: man," receives the kingdom (vii
.
13, 18, 22, 27)
.
Meantime, however, the decay and ultimate silence of the living prophetic word concurred with prolonged political servitude to produce an important change in Hebrew religion . To the prophets the kingship of Yahweh was not aSee also: mere ideal, but an actual reality
.
Its full manifestation indeed, to the See also: eye of sense and to. the, unbelieving: See also: world, See also: lay in the future;. but true. faith found a present stay in the sovereignty of Yahweh, daily exhibited in See also: providence and interpreted to each generation by the See also: voice of the prophets
.
And, • while Yahweh's kingship was a living and present fact, it refused to• be. formulated in fixed invariable shape
.
But when the prophets were succeeded by the See also: scribes, the interpreters of the written word, and the yoke of See also: foreign oppressors rested on the See also: land, Yahweh's kingship, which presupposed a living nation, found not even the most inadequate expression in daily political See also: life
.
Yahweh was still the lawgiver of Israel, but His See also: law was written in a book, and He was not present to administer it
.
He was still the hope of Israel, but the hope too was only to be read in books, and these were interpreted of a future which was no longer the ideal development of forces already at work, but wholly new and supernatural
.
The present was a See also: blank, in which religious duty was summed up in patient obedience to the law and penitent submission to the Divine chastisements
.
The scribes were mainly busied with the law; but no religion can subsist on mere law; and the systematization of the prophetic hopes, and of those more ideal parts of the other sacred literature which, because ideal and dissevered from the present, were now set on one line with .the prophecies, went on See also: side by side with the systematization of the law, by means,of a harmonistic exegesis, which sought to gather up every prophetic image in one See also: grand panorama of the issue of Israel's and the world's history.' The beginnings of this See also: process can probably be traced within the See also: canon itself, in the book of Joel and the last chapters of See also: Zechariah;' and, if this be so, we see from Zech. ix. that the picture of the ideal king claimed a. place in such constructions
.
The full development of the method belongs, however, to the post-canonical literature, and was naturally much less See also: regular and rapid than the growth of the legal traditions of the scribes
.
It was in crises of national anguish that men turned most eagerly to the . prophecies, and sought to construe their teachings as a promise of speedy deliverance (see APOCALYPTIC LITERATURE)., But these books, however influential, had no public authority, and when the yoke of oppression was lightened but a little their See also: enthusiasm lost much of its contagious power
.
It is not therefore safe to measure the general growth of eschatological doctrine by the apocalyptic books, of which Daniel alone attained a canonical position
.
the Apocrypha See also: eschatology has a relatively small place; but there° is enough to show that the hope of Israel was never forgotten, and that the imagery of the prophets was accepted with a literalness not contemplated by the prophets themselves
.
It was, however, only very gradually that the figure and name of the Messiah acquired the prominence which they have in
2 The hopes which Haggai. and Zechariah connect with the name of Zerubbabel, a descendant of David, hardly form an exception to this statement
.
There may even be a reference to him in Isa. lv
.
3, +l»
3 See See also: Stade's articles " Deuterozacharja," Z. f
.
A.-T.-lithe W'its., 1881-1882
.
Cf
.
See also: Dan. ix
.
2 for the use of the older prophecies in the solution of new problems of faith
.
later Jewish doctrine of the last things and in the official exegesis See also: inheritance; to break the See also: pride of sinners and all their strength
of the Targums
.
In the very See also: developed eschatology of Daniel as pgtter's vessels with a See also: rod of iron (Ps. ii
.
9) ; to destroy the law-
less nations with the word of his mouth (Isa. xi
.
4) ; to gather a
they are, as we have seen, altogether wanting, and in the See also: holy nation' and See also: lead them in righteousness
.
. . He shall See also: divide
Apocrypha, both before and after the Maccabean revival, the them by tribes in the land, and no stranger and foreigner shall dwell See also: everlasting throne of David's See also: house is a mere historicalreininis- with their; he shall See also: judge the nations in wisdom and righteousness. cence (Ecclus. xlvii. xr; r Mace
.
H
.
57)
.
So long as the See also: wars The See also: heathen nations shall serve under his yoke; he. shall glorify
the
.
Palestinian and the Hasmo- the See also: Lord before all the earth, and cleanse Jerusalem n holiness, as
of independence occupied Jews, an in the beginning
.
From the ends of the earth all nations shall
naean sovereignty promised a measure of independence and come to see his See also: glory and bring the weary sons of Zion as gifts felicity under the law, the hope that connected itself with the (Isa. x;'3 seq.); to see the, glory of the Lord with which God See also: bath
House of David was not likely to rise to fresh life, especially as a crowned him, for he is over them a righteous king taught of God
.
In his days there shall be no unrighteousness in their midst; for
considerable proportion of the not very numerous passages of they are all holy and their king the anointed of the Lord(xpiorbs
Scripture which speak of the ideal king might with a little Kbpwr, mistranslation of mm rrmn); Psalt
.
Sol. xvii
.
straining be applied to the rising See also: star of the new dynasty (cf
.
This 'conception is traced in lines too See also: firm to be those of a 1 Mace. xiv
.
4-15)
.
It is only in Alexandria, where the Jews first essay; it had doubtless grown up as an integral paft of the were still subject to the yoke of theSee also: Gentile, that at this time religious protest against the Hasmonaeans
.
And while the (c
.
14o Inc.) we find the See also: oldest Sibylline verses (iii
.
652 seq.) polemical See also: motive is obvious, and the See also: argument from- prophecy proclaiming the approach of the righteous king whom God shall against the See also: legitimacy of a non-Davidic dynasty is quite in the raise up from the See also: East (Isa. xli
.
2.) The name Messiah is still manner of the scribes, the spirit of theocratic fervour which lacking, and the central point of the prophecy is not the reign of inspires the picture of the messiah is broader and deeper than the deliverer but the subjection of all nations to the law and the their narrow legalism
.
In a word, the Jewish doctrine of the
See also: temple.' Messiah marks the See also: fusion of Pharisaism with the national
With the growing weakness and corruption of the Hasmonaean religious feeling of the Maccabean revival
.
This national feeling, princes, and the alienation of a large part of the nation from claiming a See also: leader against the See also: Romans as well as deliverance from their cause, the hope of a better kingship begins to appear in the Saddueee aristocracy, again sets the idea of the kingship See also: Judaea also; at first darkly shadowed forth in the Book of See also: Enoch rather than that of resurrection and individual retribution in (See also: chap. xc.), where the See also: white
See also: steer, the future leader of God's the central place
.
Henceforward the doctrine of the Messiah herdafter the deliverance from the heathen, stands in -a certain is the centre of popular hope and the See also: object of theological contrast to the actual dynasty (the horned See also: lambs) ; and then much culture
.
The New Testament is the best evidence of its influence more clearly, and for the first time with use of the name Messiah, on the masses (see ,especially Matt. xxi. g); and the exegesis in the Psalter of See also: Solomon, the chief document of the protest of of the Targums, which' in its beginnings doubtless reaches back Pharisaism against its enemies the later Hasmonaeans
.
The before the time of Christ, shows how it was fostered by the struggle between the See also: Pharisees and See also: Sadducees, between the party Rabbins and preached. in the synagogues' Its diffusion far of the scribes and the aristocracy, was a struggle for mastery beyond See also: Palestine, and in circles least accessible to such ideas, is between a secularized hierarchy whose whole interests were proved by the fact that Phil() himself (De praem. et poen
..
§ 16) those of their own selfish politics, and a party to which God gives a Messianic interpretation of Num. xxiv
.
27 (LXX)
.
It and the exact fulfilment of the law according to the scribes must not indeed be 'supposed that the doctrine was as yet the were all in all . This doctrine had grown up under Persian and undisputed part of Hebrew faith which it became when the fall Grecian rule, and noSee also: government that possessed or aimed at of the state and the antithesis to See also: Christianity threw all Jewish political independence could possibly show constant deference thought into the lines of the pharisees
.
It has,- for example, to the punctilios of the schoolmen
.
The Pharisees no place in the See also: Assumption of Moses or the Book of See also: jubilees. could not but see that their principles were politically impotent; But, as the fatal struggle with See also: Rome became more and more the most scrupulous observance of the See also: Sabbath, for example imminent, the eschatological hopes which increasingly absorbed —and this was the culminating point of legality—could not the Hebrew mind all See also: group themselves round the See also: person of thrust back the heathen
.
Thus the party of the scribes, when the messiah
.
In the, later parts of the Book of Enoch (the
they came into conflict with an active political power, which at symbols" of chap. xlv. seq.) the judgment See also: day of the messiah the same time claimed to represent the theocratic interests of (identified with Daniel's " Son of Man ") stands in the fore-Israel, were compelled to lay fresh stress on the doctrine that the front of the eschatological picture
.
See also: Josephus (B
.
J. vi
.
5, § 4)
true deliverance of Israel must come from God. testifies that the belief in the immediate appearance of the
But now the Jews were a nation once more, and national ideas Messianic king gave the chief impulse to the war that ended in came to the front
.
In the Hasmonaean sovereignty these ideas the destruction of the Jewish state; after the fall of the, temple took a political form, and the result was the secularization the last apocalypses (See also: Baruch, 4 See also: Ezra) still loudly proclaim the of the kingdom of God for the See also: sake of a harsh and rapacious near victory oft, e God-sent king; and See also: Bar Cochebas; the leader aristocracy
.
The nation threw itself on the side of the Pharisees; of the revolt against See also: Hadrian, was actually greeted as the not in the spirit of punctilious legalism, but with the ardour of Messiah by See also: Rabbi Aqiba (cf
.
See also: Luke xxi
.
S) .. These hopes were a national enthusiasm deceived in its dearest hopes, and turning again quenched in See also: blood; the political idea of the Messiah, the for help from the delusive kingship of the Hasmonaeans to the restorer of the Jewish state, still finds utterance in the daily true kingship of Yahweh, and to His vicegerent the king of prayer of every See also: Jew (the Shemone Esre), and is enshrined in David's house
.
It is in this connexion that the doctrine and - the See also: system of Rabbinical See also: theology; but its historical significance name of the Messiah appear in the Psalter of Solomon
.
The was buried in the ruins of Jerusalem .3
eternal kingship of the House of David, so long forgotten, is 2 The Targuanic passages that speak of the Messiah are registered
" Thou, Lord, See also: art our king for ever and ever
.
.
.
Thou didst s False Messiahs have continued from time to time to app~ar choose David as king over Israel, and swarest unto him concerning among the Jews
.
Such was See also: Serenus of Syria (c
.
720 A.D.)
.
Soon his seed for ever that his kingship should never fail before Thee. after, Messianic hopes were active at the time of the fall of the And for our sins sinners (the Hasmonaeans) have risen up over us, Onlayyads, and led to a serious rising under See also: Abu `Isa of Ispahan, taking with force the kingdom which Thou didst not promise' to who called himself forerunner of the Messiah:, The false Messiah them, profaning the throne of David in their pride
.
But Thou, 0 David Alrui (Alroy) appeared among the warlike Jews in Azerbijan Lord, will cast them down and See also: root out their seed from the land, in the See also: middle of the 12th century
.
The Messianic claims of Abraham
when a man not of our See also: race (See also: Pompey) rises up against them Abulafia of Saragossa (See also: born 1240) had a cabalistic basis, and the
Behold, 0 Lord, and raise up their king the Son of David at the time same studies encouraged the wildest hopes at a later time
.
Thus that Thou hast appointed, to reign over Israel Thy servant; and gird Abarbanel calculated the coming of the Messiah for 1503 A.D
.
; the him with strength to crush unjust rulers; to cleanse Jerusalem from See also: year 1500 was in many places observed as a preparatory season of the heathen that tread it under See also: foot, to cast out sinners from Thy penance; and throughout the 16th century the Jews were much stirred •and~.t more than one false Messiah appeared
.
See also SABBATAI, SERI
.
seized on as the proof that the Hasmonaeans have no divine right. by Buxtorf, Lex
.
Chald s v
' In Sibyll. iii
.
775, v+~bv must undoubtedly be read for vibe
.
xI
But this proof that the true kingdom of God could not be realized in an earthly state, under the limitations of national particularism, was not the final refutation of the Old Testament hope
.
Amidst the last See also: convulsions of political Judaism a new spiritual conception of the kingdom of God, of salvation, and of the Saviour of God's anointing, had shaped itself through the preaching, the See also: death, and the resurrection of Jesus of See also: Nazareth
.
As applied to Jesus the name of Messiah lost all its political and national significance
.
Between the Messiah of the Jews and the Son of Man who came to give His life a ransom for many there was on the See also: surface little resemblance; and from their standpoint the Pharisees reasoned that the marks of the Messiah were conspicuously absent from this Christ
.
But when we look. at the deeper side of the Messianic conception in the Psalter of Solomon, at the heartfelt longing for a leader in the way of righteousness and acceptance with God which underlies the aspirations after political deliverance, we see that it was in no mere spirit of accommodation to prevailing language that Jesus did not disdain the name in which all the hopes of the Old Testament were gathered up
.
Messianic See also: Parallels.—Within the limits of this article it is impossible to attempt any extended survey of parallels to Hebrew Messianic conceptions drawn from other religions
.
One interesting See also: analogy communicated by Professor Rapson, may, however, be cited from the Bhagavad-gitd, iv
.
5–8, in which See also: Krishna says:
5 " Many are the births that have passed of me and of thee
See also: Arjuna
.
All these I know: thou knowest them not, 0 conqueror of thy foes
.
6 Unborn, of imperishable soul, the Lord of all creatures,
Taking upon me mine own nature, I arise by my own power
.
7 For whensoever, 0 son of Bharata, there is decay of righteous-
ness
And a rising up of unrighteousness, then I create myself,
8 For the protecting of the See also: good and for the destroying of evil-doers,
.
And for the establishing of righteousness I arise from age to age."
" Somewhat similar are the avatars of Vishnu, who becomes incarnate in a portion of his essence on ten occasions to deliver. mankind from certain great dangers
.
Krishna himself is usually regarded as one 'of these avatars." This we may consider as one of the striking parallels which meet us in other religions to that " hope of the advent of an ideal king which was one of the features of that larger hope of the salvation of Israel from all evils, the realization of perfect reconciliation with See also: Jehovah and the felicity of the righteous in Him," to which reference was made in an early portion of this article and which constitutes the essential meaning of Messiah-See also: ship
.
The form in which the See also: Indian conception presents itself in the above quoted lines is more closely analogous amid many differences to the later and apocalyptic type of the Messianic idea as it appears in Judaism
.
The interesting parallels between the Babylonian Marduk (Merodach) god of See also: light and Christ as a world saviour are ingeniously set forth by Zimmern in K.A.T.: 3rd ed., pp
.
376-391, but the See also: total impression which they leave is vague
.
It would carry us too far to consider in this place the details of the Jewish conception of the Messiah and the Messianic times as they appear in the later apocalypses or in Talmudic theology
.
See for the former the excellent See also: summary of Scharer, Geschichte See also: des judischen Volkes See also: im Zeitalter Jesu Christi, 3rd ed., vol. ii. pp
.
497–556
.
See also Weber, Judische Theologie, ch. xxiii . For the whole subject see alsoSee also: Drummond, The Jewish Messiah, and See also: Kuenen, Religion of Israel, ch. xii
.
For the Messianic hopes of the Pharisees and the Psalter of Solomon see especially See also: Wellhausen, Phariseer and Sadducaer (Greifswald, 187.4)
.
In its ultimate form the Messianic hope of the Jews is the centre of the whole eschatology, embracing the doctrine of the last troubles of Israel (called by the Rabbins the " See also: birth pangs of the Messiah "), the appearing of the anointed king, the annihilation of the hostile enemy, the return of the dispersed of Israel, the glory and world-sovereignty of the elect, the new world, the resurrection of the dead and the last judgment
.
But even the final form of Jewish theology shows much vacillation as to these details, especially as regards their sequence and mutual relation, thus betraying the inadequacy of the harmonistic method by which they were derived from the Old Testament and the stormy excitement in which the Messianic idea was developed
.
It is, for example, an open question among the Rabbins whether the days of the Messiah belong to the old or to the new world (im 4iyt or cps o;iyp), whether the resurrection embraces all men or only the righteous, whether it precedes or follows the Messianic age
.
Compare MILLENNIUM
.
We must also pass over the very important questions that arise as to the gradual extrication of the New Testament idea of the
Christ from the elements of Jewish political doctrine which had so strong a hold of many of the first disciples—the relation, for example, of the New Testament Apocalypse to contemporary Jewish thought
.
A word, however, is necessary as to the Rabbinical doctrine of the Messiah who suffers and See also: dies for Israel, the Messiah son of See also: Joseph or son of Ephraim, who in Jewish theology is distinguished from and subordinate to the victorious son of David
.
The developed form of this idea is almost certainly a product of the polemic with Christianity, in which the Rabbins were hard pressed by arguments from passages (especially Isa. liii.) which their own exegesis admitted to be Messianic, though it did not accept the Christian inferences as to the atoning death of the Messianic king
.
That the Jews in the time of Christ believed in a suffering and atoning Messiah is, to say the least, unproved and highly improbable
.
See, besides the books above cited, De Wette, Opuscula; Wansche, Die See also: Leiden des Messias (187o)
.
See the articles on " Messiah " in Hastings's D . B . (together with Fairweather's art., " Development of Doctrine," in extra vol., lip . 295–302) in Ency . Bibl . Also P.R.E . 3rd ed., as well as Hastings's Dict. off Christ and the Gospels, should be consulted . Comp . Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, 2nd ed., i . 160–179, ii• 434 sqq., 710–741; Stanton, The Jewish and the Christian Messiah (1886);See also: Wendt, Teaching of Jesus, i
.
6o–84, 176–181, ii
.
122–139; Boltzmann, N.'T
.
Theologie (1897), pp . 81-85, 234–304; Baldensperger, Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu; Wellhausen, Israel. u. jad . Geschichte (1895), pp . 198–204; See also: Charles's Book of Enoch and Apocalypse of Baruch (especially the introductions) ; Bousset, Religion des Judentums, 2nd ed., pp
.
245–277; Volz, Judische Eschatologie von Daniel bis Akita, pp
.
55-68, 213–237: Dalman, Der leidende u. sterbende Messias; Gressmann, Ursprung der israelitisch ji dischen Eschatologie, pp
.
250-345
.
A
See also: fuller survey of literature will be found in Scharer. op. cit., p
.
496 sqq
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