11/01/2023
Better Candidate for Jewish Māšīaḥ. Part I of II.
By Nobody Essays
1. ‘Elizabeth’s‘ Story (The Opening).
Remembering most conspicuously, her expression…
It resides now in a clouded mirror of one of my preterite memories; an impression encased within what, in hindsight, seems an amorphous personal period. Because, callow. Viz., er, meaning, in other words, that I guess we might refer to this nebulous recollection–that of her muteness; her silent, calculating face–as part of some life. My life, that is to say. And this spliced-frame of a memory fragment–extant in some mean or mode…
Anyways though; Elizabeth: A Jewish woman I once knew (continue to know). In my mind, she’s still a young girl (owing to the fact that I haven’t seen her in person in about a decade); nubile, and by all accounts, brilliant. Eventually our friendship transmogrified into something more intense, briefly; a relationship of innominate and indeterminate designation. Platonic, of course–but on the periphery of something more potent, let’s say. Here owing to life’s ambiguities, which force me to cloak the nature of our association in obscure phraseology. The pageantry of existence, or, the unfolding of our personal narratives, tends to tow along lines that are many hues of gray. Much less black than one might expect, in other words–and, in our youth, at least, we search in vain for the sheafs of snowy white. Scarcely, the most ephemeral tones of alabaster are un-earthed, post-bairnhood, but that’s only with desperate grasps, most times. So I’ve found it.
(Elizabeth not being her real name, of course. Just… FYI).
Thus it hangs there still, in the ether of my mind: her countenance on that day. Many moons ago, heretofore referenced, and being essentially what I’d categorize as reflective. She’d fallen into an introspective state, say. And that because, moments before, I’d happened to apprise her (perfunctorily) that we Muslims also believed, similar to Christians, that Jesus was in fact her Māšīaḥ. The expected Jewish Messiah, that is. Once the quote informing was done, I could tell instantaneously, just by how those formerly symmetrical lineaments of her Persian* map morphed from a state of engagement w/ me, to total, quiet flat-lining instead– …yeah. I could see by that facial rearrangement, let’s put it, that the news re: Islamic Messianism broke apart some prior assumption of hers. Mental gears long oxidized to the point of immobility were churning once more behind the pewter roundels of her eyes, I saw.
Mark it that I knew she had been at some prior point made aware that Muslims maintained that Jesus was a Prophet. Perhaps she’d even been informed re: our belief that he was one of the greatest of those prevenient apostles. But this Māšīaḥ business was news of a different sort. The notion that she must now include Muslims, along with the world’s abiding Christians, into the category of those who believed (contrary to the Jewish position) that, not only had the Messiah already made an appearance in the world, but also, that this same multitude all agreed in toto about who, *precisely,* the Messiah was / is–and that this in nuce further meant that roughly 4 billion human beings out of earth’s 7 billion total (i.e., more than half of the global population at the time) all concurred on the point–I can see how that might be shocking. Probably it was a lot to process.
Still though. I sometimes wonder what the mental products were at that precise moment whence she’d withdrawn into her reflective stupor (I’ve never asked her about it, as of the time of writing this). Was she perhaps going over everything she knew up to that point, apropos Jesus according to Islamic teachings? Namely, what she could remember of the Muslim’s beliefs about Christ, as if trying to calculate.. something? Or, was she peradventure processing the differences between the ‘Islamic’ Jesus vs. the Christian one? As if to query me at some hypothetical future point, asking something along the lines of (paraphrasing): So, what about Jesus, as he’s presented in your tradition, could possibly convince me, as a Jew, that he’s the Māšīaḥ? Because I know the “Christian Jesus” doesn’t foot the bill. –And, so, okay… to be fair to the Jewish people here, “not-her-real-name Elizabeth” is totally correct to frame it that way, insomuch as Jesus, as presented in the normative Christian narrative, doesn’t really make a good candidate for the Messiah imo.
Which… all of that^ makes for a decent segue into what I really want to discuss w/ this post… Videlicit: what the Jews are really expecting from their Messiah (whether they realize they’re expecting these things or not)–and why the Islamic (er, in my view, historical–[if a bit ‘woo,’ –in some respects]) Jesus is a much better fit. As for the denouement of ‘Elizabeth’s’ story… we’ll come back to it a bit later, God willing. Bear with me.
Withal…
2. Rū’ẖ-Allāh.
Here’s what got all this started.
In brief, there’s this Rabbi to whom I’m subscribed on Youtube, name of Tovia Singer. As a Jewish thought-leader of some erudition, he seems to have a [perhaps understandable] ax to grind when it comes to Christian Messianism, although that’s not why I follow him. Personally, I like his much rarer (yet still somewhat ubiquitous) Judaism-Islam interfaith stuff. A sort of quasi-benign and seemingly extemporaneous Zionism aside, Rabbi Singer appears to maintain a sweet spot for Islam and Muslims–perhaps he is a modern instantiation of the old Rabbi Mukhayriq archetype–pardon the digression. At any rate, a lot of what Mr. Singer has to say on the latter subject (Judeao-Islamic similarities), is what I find myself sort of tepidly interested in. Thus the Youtube subscription. Which, not-incidentally, brings us to the present. Because recently (as of the time of writing this) he posted a video aimed, per usual, at Christian ideologues, the title being: WHO IS THE REAL MESSIAH? When it popped up in my Youtube suggestions, the first thing I noted was that it was short (just a hair over 10 minutes), so I went ahead and clicked on it, sort of faute de mieux. Note here: the Rabbi starts off by stating that, however counterintuitive it may seem, there are in fact very few verses in the Tānāḵh which describe the expected Jewish Māšīaḥ. Most of the passages on the subject are actually about the Messiah’s effects on the world (so Rabbi Singer avers), less about him as a person. However, that said, there are a few key references that talk about the man himself. Of those few, the most important are found in Isaiah, he says. Specifically, the Rabbi refers to chapter 11 (which he calls “the most famous chapter in the book of Isaiah”). More specifically, the opening verses of said chapter, which are as follows:
And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots:
And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord;
And [it] shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears:
But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth: with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.
[ISAIAH 11:1-4; KJV]
Now, I’ve highlighted the word “spirit” in the afore-cited verses, because to start with, the repetition is pretty striking. In a single sentence (v. 2), which is itself within “the most famous chapter of the Book of Isaiah” (per Rabbi Singer) the Hebrew term for ‘spirit,’ ר֣וּחַ, or “rū’aẖ,” appears a total of 4 times. Again, this is in a single sentence, pertaining to the forthcoming (–forthcoming, that is, from the author of Isaiah’s perspective) Messiah. Which, if you accept even the remote possibility of any sort of Divine, Guiding Hand / intent breathing beneath the substrate of these verses, as Jews presumably do, then you’d have to acquiesce to the point that such a conspicuous reiteration is meaningful. God is no author of wasted (or arbitrary) words.
Granted, a Christian will see the repetition of “spirit” in V. 2, and hastily conclude therefrom that this is an allusion to the Holy Spirit. From my perspective, this is problematic. Insofar as the Holy Spirit as conceptualized by the normative Christian tradition is a distinct “person” of the Trinity, i.e., the Holy Spirit and Jesus are not entirely one and the same in attributes, only in their (ill-defined) essence. The degree to which we might say the H. Spirit and Christ are even similar per Christian doctrine is unclear. The Catechism has these two–H. Spirit and Christ–as separate “persons,” with different functions. Overall point being, there would remain significant validity to the question of why a verse purported to tell us something about the Messiah, in lieu of informing us about him specifically, references instead an at least partially peripheral entity (or, “person,” to use Catechismal terminology).
In short, it would be a much better fit if the word ר֣וּחַ, or “rū’aẖ,” (spirit) could apply to the Messiah himself, as opposed to some nebulous, loosely-related figure, person, or being. Which, if you’re an even half-way Qu’ran-literate Muslim reading this, a metaphorical lightbulb likely just illumed within your occipital regions, because as any studied fakeer knows, Islamic scripture emphasizes the very point, explicitly: that one of the [many] acceptable hagionymns for Jesus is “Rū’ẖ-Allāh,” or “spirit from God.” To wit, a Q.V., here, because, were you (the hypothetical reader) to ask any lay Muslim in any randomly chosen Muslim-majority country who the “Rū’ẖ-Allāh” is, they would all exclaim without hesitation that it was Isa ibn Maryam to whom you’ve just referred, i.e., Jesus, son of Mary. Put differently: Rū’ẖ-Allāh is a Christic honorific extrapolated by Muslims from two rather definite Qu’ranic allusions, which I here quote from Pickthall’s translation, below:
“The Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, was only a messenger of God, and His word which He conveyed unto Mary, and a spirit [رُوحࣱ –rū’ẖun] from Him.”
[QU’RAN 4:171]
And:
“…Mary… whose body was chaste, therefore We [God] breathed therein something of Our Spirit [رُّوحِنَا —rū’ẖunnā]…”
[QU’RAN 66:12]
So. In both of the above excerpts, it’s Christ himself who is referred to as spirit, or rū’ẖ (روح), in Arabic (that is, if we remove the conjugational suffixes, leaving only the word itself). From these verses (and at least one well-attested eschatological hadith / statement of the Prophet Muhammad, which states that, on the Final Day of Reckoning, people will identify Christ as the “Spirit of God“1)–so, from these references and others, Muslims of past times and present all assigned the ‘Spirit-of-God’ sobriquet to Christ, and thus it remains til today. Now, phonetically, the Arabic word heretofore referenced is almost identical to its Hebrew counterpart, ר֣וּחַ, or “rū’aẖ, which is what is used (four times in one sentence, recall) in Isaiah chapter 11. To my knowledge, there is no reference within any of the four canonical Christian gospels to Christ *himself* as “spirit of God.” It’s not a title given to him in Christian scripture, and it’s not a common hagionym used by modern Christians. The reference to Christ as Rū’ẖ (Arabic) or Rū’aẖ (Hebrew) is exclusively in the Qu’ran. Which, this connection between Isaiah 11:2 and the Qu’ranic Christ is made all the more phantastical, owing to Muhammad’s status as an Arab (not Hebrew) illiterate who, per historical sources, had to rely on others to indite Hebrew documents whenever he wished to conduct agreements / trade with the Jewish citizens in Medina2. To the skeptic, Muhammad’s claim (presuming, for argument’s sake that you’re one of those who refuse to ascribe to the Qu’ran any Divine Authorship)–so, “Muhammad’s claim” that Jesus is in fact the Jewish Messiah, would seem to be an assertion that is uncommonly fortunate, insomuch as it has the support of these other two apparently ad hoc Qu’ranic references to Christ as Rū’ẖ, which are peppered perfunctorily within its (–>The Qu’ran’s) leaves. Because now Muslims can cite one of the few verses of Hebrew scripture which refer to the Messiah himself (per Jewish Rabbis)–that is, Isaiah 11:2–and tie that selfsame verse–using the Qu’ran–to Jesus, in a fairly convincing way. Furthermore, Muslims can do this in a mode that Christians emphatically cannot–or, at least, not as convincingly. To wit: If Muhammad is not a Prophet, then this Rū’ẖ-reference is luck of a kind that is more difficult to swallow than any alternative theory, imo.
As to the (admittedly, relevant) question regarding what, specifically, is being emphasized re: Christ as ‘Spirit-of-God,’–it certainly isn’t his alleged Divinity. And that because, unlike normative Christians, Muslims reject both Trinitarianism and incarnation wholesale and emphatically–we are what is referred to among some academicians as ‘radical monotheists.’. So, it would instead appear that the title ‘Spirit-of-God’ has something to do with Christ’s essential nature, on the one hand, plus his unique abiogenesis on the other. There further seems to be tentative thematic ties to the Qu’ranic account of God’s creation of Adam, the first man (Q.V., Qu’ran 38:71-72, & Qu’ran 15: 29-30). The specifics on this front are beyond the scope of this blog entry, however–but for those interested, I suggest this article.
That said, something else lurks in Isaiah chapter 11 though, which is worth examining. And it’s to that which we now turn.
Bismillah.
3. The Taqwa of the Messiah
…in which I remind you, the reader, that ‘spirit’ isn’t the only bit from Isaiah 11:1-4, cited above, which I rendered in bold font. There’s also the phrase, “…fear of the Lord.” And similar to the word ‘spirit,’ the antecedent phrase is repeated more than once, albeit only twice, this time. Still, repetition implies emphasis, and emphasis implies significance.
The term thus translated as ‘fear’ in Hebrew is, יראת, or yīṛ’â. Any concordance will define yīṛ’â as meaning fear, firstly, and then awe / reverence, sort of implicitly. Phonetically and etymologically, it’s related to the Arabic وَرَع, or waṛâ’–a word generally implying piety, or, perhaps more precisely, scrupulousness (esp. scrupulousness regarding the commands and prohibitions of God). However essential of a concept وَرَع, or waṛâ’ is to Islamic thought (and it is), it’s clear that the Biblical term יראת / yīṛ’â, has more to do with general awe and fear before God’s Power and Transcendence, as opposed to having to do with obeisance to rules (however much the latter may stem from the former). It also must needs be addressed that yīṛ’â / waṛâ is, while certainly part of the Islamic ethos, nevertheless it’s not as salient of a concept as, say, the notion of taqwā.
And here we arrive at the tie that truly binds, because the Qu’ranic term تقوى, or taqwā, is a much better fit, meaning-wise, and thus more analogous to the Hebrew יראת, / yīṛ’â which we find mentioned in Isaiah 11. I mention this because the definition of تقوى / taqwā is well-nigh identical to the definition of יראת, / yīṛ’â. To wit, consider that taqwā, like yīṛ’â, means both fear and awe / reverence, and infers that the subject–the متقي / muṭṭaq̇i, or, ‘the-one-possessed-of-taqwā‘–is just that individual who has discerned something about God Himself (e.g., His Power / Transcendence), and that as opposed to implying mere servile obedience to ritual / Law, perhaps only for obedience’s sake. When we further realize that Muslim intelligentsia generally came to accept that وَرَع / waṛâ’ was but a natural conclusion of having تقوى / taqwā, the two terms generally became synonymous, esp. among the laity.
It’s owing to the aforementioned reasons that I find taqwā to be the absolute and indisputably best translation for the word יראת, / yīṛ’â as found in Isaiah 11:2-3. There is simply no better lexemic analogue from Hebrew to Arabic for that specific word. With that in mind, you’ll note that, after the concept of Monotheism (Tawhīd) itself, taqwā is the most emphasized theme in the Qu’ran. It is at once the foundation as well as the apogee of Islamic ethics. Consider, according to the Oxford Dictionary of the Qu’ran, that the word taqwā, or an Arabic cognate of it, appears “more than 250 times” in the text3. This is made even more surprising when we remember that the Qu’ran is roughly the size of the Christian New Testament. Even so, taqwā is literally its defining theme. Which is relevant, considering that one salient feature of Islamic eschatology is that when Christ returns (from occultation; not heaven–more on that, later), he will rule by the Laws and ethical weltanschauungen of Islam4. Put differently: no Muslim would accept a Messianic claimant who wasn’t متقي / muṭṭaq̇i, / ‘possessed-of-taqwā‘. It’s a foregone conclusion that the Islamic Christ possesses this virtue, suprēmus. He possessed it in the past; he will when he returns.
Thus we glean from the passages in Isaiah 11–which is to say: from the most famous chapter of the Book of Isaiah (according to Rabbi Singer), an excerpt indubitably and unequivocally predicting the characteristics of the Jewish Messiah–so, within these selfsame verses we find yet another striking congruence with the Islamic Christ: That he will be the supreme example, the apex of the most conspicuous of Qu’ranic virtues: Taqwā. The author of Isaiah even reiterated it, twice (once in vs. 2, and again in vs. 3), presumably for emphasis.
Now, while we might certainly infer from normative Christian beliefs that Christ would’ve likely maintained–according to them–something comparable to taqwā / yīṛ’â, nevertheless, it’s not emphasized by them in a way that is comparable to the Islamic scripture in this regard. Rather, the Christian stresses that their Messiah is a redeemer / sacrificial figure instead, and one who, qua God, is more an object of fear / awe, than an example of it. Once again, this places the ‘Islamic’ Christ on significantly better footing than the Christian one, at least when it comes to Jewish prerequisites and scriptural expectations for the Messiah.
4. Forthcoming, + Footnotes…
Alright, so… okay. Looking back over everything just now, this very moment; plus going over my notes for the material that will constitute the trajectory of this essay, it has dawned on me of a sudden that this monograph is spiraling out of control. In terms of length, I mean. All of which is further exacerbated by the fact that I still have the terminus of ‘Elizabeth’s’ spiritual trajectory to cover. It seems that the best course of action at this juncture is to turn this piece into something of a duology, with Part II pending a future release. So, that’s what I’m going to do, I guess.
Still, I don’t want to leave you, my audience, dangling off too keen of a cliff(-hanger) here, however… so, the following is a brief précis of what I intend to cover in Part II. Just, you know, intending here to both assuage some curiosity and whet the encephalitic appetite a bit, metaphorically speaking. Withal, a terse adumbration of Part II will (iA) include the following: █ A discussion on Jesus as mortal / human Prophet (Islam) vs., as God / Divine (Christianity), and which works better re: Jewish Messianic prophesy. █ Examining Christ’s Resurrection (Christianity) vs. Occultation (Islam). █ Continuation of my thoughts on Isaiah 11:1-4. █ Addressing Jewish objections to 1) the Virgin Birth, and 2) the possibility of amendments to the mitzvah. █ Original Sin / Atonement. █ and finally, the terminus of ‘Elizabeth’s’ narrative + concluding thoughts.
Now, if that sounds like a lot of material, keep in mind that portions of it will be addressed somewhat brusquely.
FOOTNOTES:
1) Referring to a hadith / recorded statement of the Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) who, per the report in question, produced a lengthy description of the [forthcoming] events to occur on the final Day of Judgment, the goings on, etc., esp. regarding the Prophets. In this selfsame hadith, the Muhammad makes explicit reference to Christ as ‘the word of God and His Spirit.’ [Sahih Muslim, Book 001, Number 0380].
2) Sayyidina Muhammad’s (ﷺ) illiteracy in his native tongue is well known; allusions both explicit and implicit to this fact are replete in Islamic historical sources. As to the reference to amanuenses drawing up / translating Hebrew documents for him, I’m referring here to the testimony of his scribe, Zayd ibn Thabit, who self-reported, in a tradition in Abu Dawud, that the Prophet secured his penmanship / lingual acumen for this very purpose. [Abu Dawud, Book 26, Hadith 5, Ar. edition]. Online reference, here.
3) John L. Esposito, ed. (2003). The Oxford Dictionary of Islam. Oxford University Press. p. 314.
4) A reference to the hadith in Sahih Muslim, in which the Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) is reported to have asked his disciples, “What would you do when the son of Mary descends among you, and leads as one among you?” One of Muhammad’s companions–a man named Ibn Abu Theeb–asked the narrator of this report (Abu Hurayrah), what was meant by, ‘lead as one among you?‘ to which the latter replied, “[It means that] he will lead you according to the Book of your Lord [i.e., the Qu’ran], exalted and praised is He, and the Way [Sunnah] of your Messenger [Muhammad].‘” From this and other inferences / sources, Muslims have deduced that Christ, upon his return, will rule according to Islamic Law as elucidated within the Qu’ran, and as expounded upon / clarified via established Muhammadan precedent.
* Note: I refer to Elizabeth as Persian, because at least one of her parents is a Persian Jew. She also has Persian-Muslim relatives, which would explain her foreknowledge of some aspects of Islam.
