That was a supercilious response Doc.
Maimonides as a cite, 1000 years after Jesus, really doesn’t get at where I was.
Does anyone have a reasonable response? I am asking who has a cite that shows that mainstream Judaism in 50AD (Reread my post Doc) Had Messianic beliefs at their center?
To break it down, Josephus describes the four “schools of thought” (that is, social groups or movements) into which the Jews were divided in the 1st century CE. The Pharisees, the Essenes, revolutionaries, and the Sadducees.
The Essenes were apolitical __ did they actually believe in a Messiah as described in this thread?
The revolutionaries, such as the Sicarii and the Zealots, emerged specifically to resist the Roman Empire… certainly they were by and large Messianic
The Pharisees can be seen as certainly vaguely in some way Messianic although Wiki notes that
“Rabbis were not especially concerned with the messiah or claims about the messiah.”
How about the Sadducees?
Other sects not mentioned by Josephus emerged at this time, such as the Christians in Judea (obviously Messianic) – but what about the Therapeutae in Egypt. Where they Messianic?
So, I ask again: wouldn’t the answer to the OP would be that the “Old Testament” doesn’t clearly talk about a single Messiah and that pointing to X or Y as pertaining or not pertaining to “the messiah” - or to/not to Jesus - is a bogus exercise?
I suspect there may be no GQ answer, despite Doc’s handwave response, but I thought I’d re-ask.
Of course there are Messianic prophecies left unfulfilled by Jesus (except in the Full Preterist view, which really stretches things), which is why we C’tians are relying on the Second Coming OR the Progressing Presence* (that Jesus as present by His Spirit in His people will transform the world).
All the Christian explanations I’ve heard for the Nazareth ID for Jesus has nothing to do with being a Nazarite, but with him being “The Branch” of Jesse- Isaiah 11:1.
And of course, as I always have to point out- the only real prophecy of Messiah is Daniel 9:26-27- 483 years after the decree to rebuild Jerusalem will come Messiah to be cut off, after which the city will be destroyed & the Temple desolated. Everything about Israel being restored, the Temple rebuilt, the dead raised & God’s Kingdom established is attributed to the King of Righteousness or to YHWH Himself. The actual word “Messiah” is seldom, actually I think never, used in these Scriptures. Anyway, the rules/qualifications for “Messiah” which exclude JC from
consideration were made official after his time- probably to reinforce why the Sanhedrin rejected him.
I read a great book in college, from I think a Jewish author, entitled something like Messianic Expectations in First-Century Israel, showing that yeah, it was a
hot time for Messainic claimants, people knew that the Daniel timetable was
running down (interestingly, the Talmud lays an imprecation upon those who use that prophecy to calculate the time for Messiah). The DSS writers were definitely
Messianics and speak of several Messiahs- a Davidic Kingly one, a Levitical priestly one & a Josephic one to be slain in battle.
In building on ideas by N.T. Wright, I think Messiah actually is a one-man recapitulation of Israel as a whole- and that Israel’s exile & restoration is replicated in JC’s crucifixion & resurrection. That JC took the Tribulation/Birth Pangs of the coming Kingdom upon himself but since that was rejected by Israel over the next generation, Israel then had to endure them, while the Messianic Kingdom took on a more spiritual form which is to more gradually by manifest in history (I believe in an evolving Christian Society which will attract the focused opposition of various AntiChrist powers until the Final Conflict at which JC personally returns to manifest His Kingdom in all Its fulness).
I don’t know about ‘at their center.’ While belief in a Messiah is required of observant Jews today, I certainly wouldn’t say that it’s the major tenet of the religion, at least not in the same way that it is in Christianity, and I doubt that it ever was.
On the other hand, while I’m certainly no authority on the period, I know that Jesus wasn’t the only Messianic figure of the time, and he wasn’t the one with the most support from the (Pharisee) rabbis. R’ Akiva, along with other Tannaim, was a major supporter of Bar Kochba (c. 132) , for example. (Eventually, he fell from favor, after he began violating Jewish law.)
Saw this thread yesterday but didn’t have a chance to write. Here’s my two cents.
The topic presupposes that one believes in the existance of Jesus. As such it is logical to take the NT as authoritive in matters related to who Jesus was (is) and what he did.
The next question to consider is what exactly qualifies as a messianic prophesy. This is not a straightforward question and depends largely on your start-point. If we take the NT as authoritive on the matter (see above paragraph) then it is sensible to also use the NT definition of messianic prophesy. Which necessarily puts us in the position of accepting the dual prophesy thesis as mentioned by Diogenes. A classic example of this is Hebrews 1:5 where it says “You are my Son, Today I have begotton you”, quoting from 2Samuel 7:14. This is used by the writer of Hebrews as a proof text that Jesus is indeed the Messiah, but in the OT context it appears at first glance to be referring to Solomon.
So the answer to the question is Jesus fulfilled all the Messianic prophesies (What Bookkeeper said.) The NT is taken as the authority as what qualifies as a messianic prophesy (and employs considerable latitude in doing so). The NT also affirms that Jesus is the longed-for Messiah and has fulfilled all relevant prophesies. The ones not yet fulfilled the NT quotes as referring to when he comes again. A bit of a circular argument, but there it stands.
It is interesting to break down the prophesies into a few categories. There are those that attest to the identy of the Messiah. There are those that announce what he will do when he comes. And there are those that announce what he is yet to do or will do on his second coming. Of course they were not originally prophesied in three columns like this and we again rely on the NT and the history of how things unfolded to make this distinction. Many of the messianic prophesies that particularly appealed to the Jews, ie, those that promised deliverance, everlasting peace and judgement on enemies, belong to the third category.
Luke chapter 4 relates the beginning of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee. He enters a synagogue and reads from Isaiah 61. (Bear in mind that “Messiah” means “anointed one” and refers to the empowerment of the Spirit of the LORD.)
Then he stopped reading and announced to everyone that this particular (and very explicit) messianic prophesy was being fulfilled right in front of them.
At this, the Jews became very angry at the “words of grace” that proceeded out of his mouth. He was applying this prophesy to himself but had left out the final part of the passage “the day of vengence of our God”. The bit about the judgement (rather than the bit demonstrating grace) was what the audience was longing for. They were not prepared to accept Jesus application of part of teh prophesy to himself. I don’t think that their reaction would have been the same if he had quoted the whole thing and had put emphasis on the vengence theme.
Standard interpretation is that Jesus was deliberately reserving the vengence bit for his second coming.
Anyway, there (Isaiah 2, second clause) is a clear example of an OT messianic prophesy that Jesus did not fulfill.