RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Messiah
gards human instruments, he thinks only of an " Elias," who will prepare the way for him. Finally, in the book of Daniel, the kingdom of God appears and is to triumph over the successive empires through the " people of the saints," i.e., Israel, which has remained faithful. But this people is to have a human chief who is designated as the " son of Man," vii., 13. Here the Messiah acquires a universal designation which Jesus assumes in the New Testament.
When, however, the figure of the great future king had become rooted in the hope of the community, prophecies concerning him were found not only in such utterances as expressly 5. Indi- mentioned him, but passages which revidualiza- ferred in the first place to the living tion of the and ruling kings of Israel and Judah Messianic were also brought into relationship Idea. with him. His figure was embellished from Psalms such as ii., xlv., lxxii., ex., and, indeed, from the royal psalms in general, and words which were used in regard to the rise or glorification of royalty in Israel were referred to the Messiah personally, (as Num. xxiv. 15-19). Even such passages as Gen. ix. 25-27, xii. 1-3, and the analagous sayings of the patriarchs Were interpreted in the same way; more especially Gen. xlix. 10 and similar texts were conceived in a directly Messianic sense. Later the Church placed Gen. iii. 14-15 at the head as the protevangelium, since it announced the victory of the seed of the woman (which was taken in an individual sense) over the power of evil. The words of Deut. xviii. 15, also, were interpreted to signify an individual prophet, and he was partially identified with the Messiah. The tendency to interpret many passages as Messianic had become habitual in the Jewish community before Christ. In the so-called apocryphal writings of the Old Testament the Messianic hope is not prominent. The reason for this is to be sought partly in the historical and didactic character of the class of writings to which these books belong, partly in the fact that expectations regarding the future were not so much in the foreground in the circles in which these writings originated. On the other hand, the Pseudepigrapha (q.v.) prove that after the Maccabean period the Messianic hope, both in a wider and in a narrower sense, awakened to new life. As long as it seemed that the honored Hasmontans (q.v.) would be able to lead the people to a new and happy future, the parties attached to them had no longing for the dynasty of David. It was rather a subject of satisfaction that the theocratic offices were united in them, as when John Hyrcanus, in addition to his princely dignity, was also endowed with that of high priest and was even regarded as a prophet with whom God communicated (Josephus, Ant. XIII., x. 7; War I., ii. 8). Prophecies such as Ob. 19 sqq. and Amos ix. 11-12, seemed to be fulfilled by him when he conquered Samaria and Idumeea, destroyed the temple on Gerizim, and forced circumcision upon the Edomites. The narrow and formal spirit which reigned among the devotees of the law was as little favorable to the comprehension of the prophecies regard-
ing the future salvation of the people as was Phi- Ionic Hellenism.
II. In the Pseudepigrapha: In the mean time eschatology, which had been neglected by the teachers of the law and by the philosophers, found all the more zealous adherents in certain 1. Influence circles and was brought into connecof Escha- tion with the general historical intertology. ests of the time, resulting in the production of apocalyptic writings. The newly won and often quite modern conceptions were put in the mouth of some seer or sage of primitive times, Enoch, Abraham, Moses, Elias, Ezra, Baruch, or Solomon. Whether this was understood by contemporaries as being only a disguise, or whether it was taken in earnest, the trivial origin and character of these apocalyptic books, as compared with those of former times, was well understood in the higher circles of Judaism, and the pseudepigrapha were not read in the synagogue. Nevertheless, in a more private way they were widely circulated, and exercised a potent influence upon the religious conceptions of the people and upon their hopes. These aspirations regarding the future were even placed in the mouths of the heathen Sibyls by Hellenistic Jews. The mystic tendencies of Greek civilization were appealed to by Jews who were in touch with the Greeks, and they presented these mysterious prophetesses, in whom the old heathen oracles were personified, as the bearers of Jewish ideas, above all of the belief in one God in contrast with idolatry. This was done in such a way, however, that the general history of the peoples as well as heathen mythology, which was treated in a euhemeristic manner, were freely interwoven with these sayings. The Sibylline Books (q.v.) arose in this way, and their beginnings should be placed not long after the time of the Maccabees. Of the collection of Sibylline Books extant, the larger part of book iii. comes from the period of Ptolemy VII. Physkon (145-117), probably from the time after 140 B.C. In this writing, the history of the world is passed in review from the building of the tower of Babel until the period of the author; then the end of the world is predicted as imminent, coming to pass through the manifestation of the God of Israel and of his Messiah (verse 652 sqq. : " Then will God send a king from where the sun rises " in agreement with the passage Isa. xli. 25, which was used in a Messianic sense) who will make an end of wicked war over the whole earth, by killing some and making binding treaties with the others " (cf. Isa. xi. 4 with ii. 2 sqq.), etc.
The eschatological hope was, however, even more frequently and exhaustively treated in an esoteric form, as is shown above all in the Book of Enoch (see Pseudepigrapha), the original version of which, chaps, i.-xxxvi., lxxii. -cv., may 2. Messia- probably be referred to about 110 B.C. nism of The Messiah appears in chaps, lxxxv.- Earlier xc. For the period between the de- Part of struction of Jerusalem and the erection Enoch. of the Messianic kingdom, Israel will be placed by God under seventy shepherds (lxxxix. 59). The seventy years of servitude of Jeremiah become seventy heathen rulers, who
Messiah