THE MESSIAH Developments in Earliest Judaism and Christianity

 PREFACE Over the last two decades, and especially the last five years, the data available for studying Judaism and the origins of Christianity have risen phenomenally. VVe scholars used to talk about 7 Dead Sea Scrolls; now we struggle to comprehend over 170 Dead Sea Scrolls.' We began teaching advanced courses on the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha by referring to 17 writings; now we must ponder at least 65 documents,- sifting for early Jewish writings and the traditions in them, and, at the same time, considering the inclusion among the Pseudepigrapha documents such as the Apocalypse of Pseudo­Methodius, and the Revelation of Elchasai.^ In addition, the vast advances in the field of archaeology and the study of ancient iconography now need to be included. Specialists throughout the United States, Germany, Great Britain, and Israel urged me to organize an international Symposium designed to answer this primary question; why and in what ways are these early Jewish and early Christian writings important for the study of Judaism and the origins of Christianity? Obviously the data are too amorphous, complex, and span too many centuries and Hellenistic cultures to be discussed fruitfully without some subquestions upon which to focus. Also, the steering committee deemed it wise not to exclude, as do the academies, the faith commitments of Potential members of the Symposium, so that a füll discussion of the cen­tral questions can be heard by all in attendance—Jews, Christians, and oth-ers. It was decided, therefore, to provide time both for a füll, honest, and nonconfessional debate, and for a discussion of the impact the results of such debates might have upon personal beliefs.  

 

1. See the new and comprehensive edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls, organized by Princeton Theological Seminary, edited by the editor of this volume. 2. See J. H. Charlesworth, ed., The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, 2 vols. (Garden Citv. N.Y., 1983-85). 3. See the forthcoming articles in Journal for the Study of the Pseudepiarapha by Stephen Gero and Gerard P. Luttikhuizen. 

 

Professor David Dungan and I met several times and began to focus atten­tion on a specific theological issue in one Century in particular, with the rec­ognition that contiguous centuries would also be scanned. The Symposium would examine from all perspectives—including iconographic and literary evidence—the concept of the Messiah and related figures in first-century Judaism and earliest Christianity, with concentration especially on Palestin-ian phenomena. He and I traveled to Washington, D.C., to seek advice about funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities. A grant from the Foundation for the Renewal of Gospel Studies covered our ex-penses for this initial planning. Dr. Thomas Gillespie, President of Princeton Theological Seminary, heard our request for support and further guidance. He listened, asked some hard questions, and finally endorsed our plans and committed a significant amount of institutional support. As a result, govern-ment funding possibilities were increased, and the success of the Symposium was enhanced. The steering committee consisted of J. H. Charlesworth (chair), D. Dun­gan, J. J. M. Roberts, A. Segal, and J. Christiaan Beker The committee set the agenda, chose the participants, and planned the physical arrangements. I am grateful to many for the phenomenal success of the Symposium, which was held in October 1987 at Princeton Theological Seminary. The steering committee constantly went beyond the usual responsibilities to en-sure an enjoyable as well as productive Symposium. Additional grants were received from the Foundation on Christian Origins, and especially the Na­tional Foundation for the Humanities. The Center of Theological Inquiry, and its chancellor, the late James I. McCord, opened its doors and welcomed US in arelaxed environment each evening. James Brownson, Steve Kraftchick, and Alan Segal helped me edit these papers for publication. Professor Roberts and Dn Jin Hee Han provided significant assistance and Michelle Charles­worth helped me with the final editing. Most importantly I am indebted to President Gillespie for his support of pure scholarly research, and to the specialists who participated in the Symposium and came from far away, in­cluding Israel, Norway, France, Germany, Scotland, and England. On the final day of the Symposium a plenary Session was arranged to dis-cern if major agreements had been reached. The consensus of the members of the Symposium was obtained by public vote and discussion. Major disagreements. What do terms like "messianology," "eschatology," "apocalypticism," and "theocracy" mean, and which groups should be de-scribed by them? Scholars expressed a variety of views, many of which were complementary. They agreed that more discussion on these terms was needed, but that more extended discussion would probably not resolve all the disagreements. They expressed divergent opinions about these terms, which will require further examination and Joint study. For example, the term "son of man" (or "Son of Man") aroused considerable debate. While there was agreement that this term was pre-Christian, there was disagree-

PREFACE XV ment over the influence of this term (or title) both on the Gospels and on Jesus of Nazareth. Experts on many sources presented fruitful papers on specific issues. They agreed that it is now necessary to discuss hovv these analytic studies contribute to the overall reconstruction of the period. It is time to aim at a more rehable understanding of Jews and "Christians" at the beginning of the era, and to explore those concerns, commitments, and dreams that united or separated them. Agreements. Scholars came together from dilferent countries and tradi­tions to look at a common period in which streams diverge in order to gain better understandings of how they diverge and to foster understanding and overcome prejudice. They agreed that the time is propitious for sensitive and fruitful Cooperation among Jews and Christians. Christos is the title or term most frequently applied to Jesus in the New Testament. Scholars agreed that the crucial question is the following; How did this happen, since "the Messiah" is rarely found, and the functions or attributes of "the Messiah" are even less explained, in extant pre-70 Jewish documents? The term and the title "Messiah" in the Hebrew Bible refers to a present, political and religious leader who is appointed by Cod. It was applied pre-dominantly to a king, but also to a priest, and occasionally to a prophet. This carefuUy crafted Statement was passed unanimously. Scholars concurred that there was no Single, discernible role description for a "Messiah" into which a historical figure like Jesus could be fit. Rather, each group which entertained a messianic hope interpreted "Messiah" in light of its historical experiences and reinterpreted Scripture accordingly. This Position was unanimously endorsed. It is inappropriate to speak of a Single normative stream of Judaism in the postexilic period or throughout the period of the Second Temple. Diverse interpretations of common traditions were entertained by different groups. This insight was unanimously endorsed. After this book was completed some scholars claimed that two unpub-Hshed texts among the Dead Sea Scrolls contained important references to the Messiah. One text ostensibly referred to the Messiah who will come and die for the sins of the world. The other text allegedly mentioned the Messiah will come and resurrect the dead. These claims appeared in major news-papers, like the New York Times, during the period from September 1991 to April 1992. In fact, in the news release by the University of Chicago of April 8, 1992, we are told that in 4Q521 "a Hebrew writer says of the Coming Messiah, 'He shall heal the wounded, resurrect the dead, and proclaim glad tidings to the poor."' The first text is 4Q285 (photograph number 41.282). It does not contain the noun "the Messiah." And no line has the words that a person has died or will die for the sins of the world. The text seems to be an exegetical expan-xvi PREFACE sion on Isaiah (especially chapters 10-11); it may be messianic. My response to these claims appeared in "Sense or Sensationalism? The Dead Sea Scrolls Controversy" The Christian Century 109.4 (January 29, 1992) 92-98. The second text is 4Q521 (photograph number 43.604). S. A. Reed cata-logued it as a text on "the resurrection."' There are 13 Fragments. The first line of the largest fragment has the noun Imshyhw, dative or accusative for "his (i.e. God's) Messiah." On another fragment, we see wk mshyhij, which means "all the Messiahs of." The document thus does not consistently refer to one messiah; hence R. H. Eisenmans claim that this text refers to "a Single Davidic-style messiah" is misleading.^ We need to allow for the possi-bility that in one place one Messiah is mentioned and in another two Mes­siahs as in IQS are designated. Most importantly, the claim that the Messiah "resurrects the dead" is inaccurate. The Lord, adny,^ becomes the ruling noun in fragment 1, line 3, and continues through line 13 in which we do find wmtym yhyh, "and he will give life (to) the dead ones." As in many early Jewish texts, including the Amidah, God is perceived as the one who resur­rects the dead."*  

 

1. S. A. Reed, Dead Sea Scross Inventonj Project (Claremont: Ancient Biblical Manuscript Center, 1992) fascicle 8, p. 10. 2. R. H. Eisenman, "A Messianic Vision," ß^fi 17(1991)65. 2. "Lord" is written defectively at least eight times in this document. This is the onlv one of the Dead Sea Scrolls in which admj is always written defectively. 4. I am grateful to Loren Stutkeiibruck. James \anderKam, and Larry Schiffman for discus-sions rcHardinü ihc •unpiiblishcd mcssiaiiie" pas.sacics in the Dead Sea Scrolls. 

 

PART ONE  

INTRODUCTION

J. H. CHARLESWORTH FROM MESSIANOLOGY TO CHRISTOLOGY: Problems and Prospects what is a "Christian"? Most people would answer: one who believes that Jesus of Nazareth was "the Christ" Jews were expecting. Many Christians, Jews, and most Citizens of the modern world would tend to agree on this definition. It is, however, misleading and, indeed, inaccurate.' It assumes three things: (1) that the title "Christ" fully categorizes Jesus, (2) that Chris­tians are clear and in agreement on what this title, "Christ," denotes, and (3) that all, or virtually all, Jews during the time of Jesus were looking for the Coming of the Messiah or Christ. This paper reports on an examination of the sources of Jewish thought before 70 C.E., when the Temple was destroyed; the result produces a serious challenge to the third assumption and probably undermines the other two. DEFINITION It is helpful to define what I mean by "Messiah," "messianic," "messianol­ogy," and "christology." Scholarly publications on messianology and christol­ogy are frequently garbled by the different definitions which are used; many of which are never clarified.^ For the most part, I am convinced, Jewish mes­sianology developed out of the crisis and hope of the nonmessianic Macca-bean wars of the second Century B.C.E.^ Palestinian Jews yearned for salvation from their pagan oppressors. For an undeterminable number of Jews the yearning centered on the future saving acts by a divinely appointed, and anointed, supernatural man: the Messiah. This eschatological figure will in-augurate the end of all normal time and history. I, therefore, use the term "Messiah" in its etymological sense, to denote God's eschatological Anointed One, the Messiah.'' The adjective "messianic" refers to images, Symbols, or concepts either explicitly or implicitly linked to ideas about the Messiah. The noun "messianology" denotes Jewish ideas or beliefs in the Messiah. The noun "christology" is used here in a narrow sense; it is reserved for refiec­tions on Jesus as the Christ. My concern now is to discern how and why refiections about a Palestinian Jew, namely Jesus of Nazareth, could move from messianology to christology. By exploring this issue I am not implying that christology did somehow flow from the messianology. INTRODUCTIONS Introductions to the New Testament often imply that there was a recog-nizable definition of what the Messiah was to do, that there was a set concept of the Messiah, and that Jews were looking for the Coming of the Messiah who would save God's people. Let me illustrate this point by quoting from three major introductions. The most influential and celebrated Roman Catholic New Testament In­troduction is by Professor Alfred Wikenhauser He describes the dominant theme of Matthew as foUows: Jesus is the Messias or Son of David who was promised in the Old Testament and earnestly awaited by the Jews; but through the fault of his people, and particularly of their leaders, he was prevented from fulfiUing his mission.' The Paragraph ends at this point. Should not the Student have been warned that Matthew does not represent a putative Jewish viewpoint, and that the Old Testament does not contain a programmed mission for "the Messiah"? The Statement would also be dubbed anti-Jewish and anti-Semitic by many scholars, both Jewish and Christian, because it perpetuates the concept that Jesus was the Messiah, or Christ, who was "prevented from fulfiUing his mis­sion," or put to death, by "the Jews." Furthermore, the next paragraph begins with these words: "The main thesis of the Gospel is proved by showing that the Messianic prophecies are fulfilled in him; . . ." The student may erroneously assume that Matthew preserves a valid record of Jewish mes­sianic ideas, and that Jesus should be heralded as "the Messiah" because he clearly fulfilled all messianic prophecies.

 1. See Charlesworth, "From Jewish Messianology to Christian Christology: Some Caveats and Perspectives," in Judaisms and Their Messiahs, ed. J. Xeusner, W S. Green, and E. Frer-ichs (Cambridge, 1988), pp, 225-64. 2. The term "messianic" has been used loosely and incorrectly, causing confusion and distort-ing ancient ideologies, as S. Mowinckel stressed many decades ago in his He That Cometh: The Messiah Concept in the Old Testament and Later Judaism, trans. G. W. Anderson (New York, Nashville, 1954), p. 451. 3. See the important observations along this line by A. Caquot in his "Le messianisme-qum-ränien," in Qumran: Sa piete. sa thcologie et son milieu. ed. M. Delcor (Bibliotheca Ephemeri­dum Theologicarum Lovaniensium 46; Paris, Leuven, 1978), pp. 231-47.

4 THE MESSIAH 4. See Charlesworth, "Messiah," in lllustrated Dictionary ir Concordance of the Bible, eds. G. Wigoder, S. M. Paul, B. T. Viviano, and E. Stern (New York, London, 1986), pp. 682-84 (the last fifteen lines are not by me; I am more impressed by the redactional nature of the New Testament). 5. A Wikenhauser, A'eti; Testament Introduction, trans. J. Cunningham (Dublin, 1958, with many reprints), p. 186.  

 

Decades ago Professor Rudolf Bultmann cogently and perceptively warned against the imposition of a messianic message onto the sayings of Jesus: No saying of Jesus mentions the Messiah-king who is to crush the enemies of the People . . . Jesus' message is connected with the hope of other circles. . . . ^ Bultmann's insight is profound and needs to be stressed. The sayings of Je­sus, both those which are authentic and those which were attributed to him, do not contain speculations on or prophecies concerning the coming of a Messiah who will conquer the Gentiles, namely the Romans. Hence we must ponder two possibilities: either such a messianic dimension was de-leted from the teachings of Jesus, which seems improbable, or Jesus' Jewish foUowers refused to portray him as a teacher who was concerned with mes­sianic predictions. Jesus' message was certainly apocalyptic and eschatologi­cal; but it was not messianic. What are the implications of this discovery? No member of the Princeton Symposium on the Messiah holds that a crit­ical historian can refer to a common Jewish messianic hope during the time of Jesus or in the sayings of Jesus." It may not even be easy to demonstrate a common messianic hope among his earliest followers. The most recent and erudite Introduction to the New Testament is by Pro­fessor Helmut Koester. Frequently he seems to assume the myth that Jews expected a Messiah and knew what functions he would perform. In describ-ing the beliefs of the Samaritans, he states "that just like the Jews the Samar-itans expected the coming of the Messiah."* No discussion is focused on the problem of dating the Samaritan ideas,^ and no proof is offered to support the claim that "Jews expected the coming of a Messiah." 

 

. R. Bukmann, Theology of theNewTestatnent,2voh., trans. K. Grobel (New York, 1951-55) vol. 1, p. 4. I have quoted Bultmann in such a way as to eliminate his invalid assumption that these "other circles" were apocalyptic—as if the concept of the Messiah does not appear in the apocalypses (see 4Ezra and 2Bar)—and the belief in a "miraculous change in historical (i.e. poHtical and social) conditions. . . a cosmic catastrophe" cannot be messianic. 7. After the papers for the Symposium were delivered and discussed, a plenary Session was devoted to a discussion of a possible consensus on such issues. See "Preface" at the beginning of this volume. 8. H. Koester, Introduction to the New Testament (Hermeneia; Philadelphia, Berlin, 1982), vol. 1, p. 249. 9. See the following discussion on the Samaritans, Talmon's excellent paper in this coUection, and Talmon's "Types of Messianic Expectation at the Tum of the Era," King, Cult and Calendar in Ancient Israel: Collected Studies (Jerusalem, 1986) see esp. pp. 207-9. Professor liümon knows the Samaritan writings and has spent considerable time with Samaritans who live today on Mt. Gerizim.

Later in the same volume, Koester describes the first great Jewish revolt against Rome in these terms: the Romans "were confronted with a move­ment that was inspired by revolutionary messianic ideas and that had the allegiance of large parts of the whole population" (p. 402). The next sentence also seems misleading: "Characteristic for the political messianism of the re-bellion was the appearance of a group which Josephus calls the 'Zealots.'" Can we be so certain that the Jewish rebellion of 66-74 C.E. and the group called the "Zealots" were both messianic? Surely the catalyst of the rebellion, as Josephus and Koester claim, was not Jewish messianism but "the incredible stupidity and brutality of the Ro­man procurator" (p. 401), who was Gessius Florus (64 - 66 C.E.). He robbed the Temple, desecrated Jerusalem, and wantonly offended all religious Jews. What observations allow us then to describe the revolt as "messianic"? Given Josephus' penchant to attribute apologetically the revolt of 66-74 C.E. to messianic extremists should caution us against describing it as "messianic." In contrast to the revolt of 132-135 C.E., it was not led by a heralded Mes­siah. These excerpts from two of the best available introductions to the New Testament reveal a glaring problem in the study of Early Judaism and Chris­tian Origins. There is a deeply seated and widely assumed contention that the Jews during the time of Jesus were expecting a Messiah, and that they had some agreement on the basic functions he would perform. Yet this con­tention is assumed; it is not researched. CHRISTOLOGIES Many books on christology and New Testament theology perpetuate with­out demonstration the following invalid assumptions: (1) One can move smoothly from Jewish messianology to Christian christology (2) What the Jews expected was fulfilled in the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, who is then transparently the Messiah, Jesus Christ. (3) Jesus' followers were con­vinced of his messiahship because they saw how he fiUed the portrait of the Messiah. Early Jewish literature, however, cannot be mined to produce anything like a checklist of what the Messiah shall do. The proclamations and teach­ings in the earliest Jesus communities in Palestine may reflect the use of something like a list of testimonies about the Messiah; but these do not prove that Jews had a common messianology. They are evidence of what the earli­est "Christians" created. A checklist is an objective coUection of what is ob-vious; a testimony is one individual's or group's subjective coUection of Old Testament prophecies. Jesus' earliest followers were obviously pressed to prove their claim that he was the expected Messiah. Their efforts are evident in the remnants of the old tradition that Jesus would fulfill the messianic prophecies in the future, when he returns as the Christ (see Acts 2:36 and Rom 1:4), in the pneumatic exegesis of originally nonmessianic prophecies and psalms (viz. Pss 22 and 110),'° and in the addition of messianic episodes to the Story of Jesus. Before proceeding further, it is necessary once again to illustrate the ex-tent to which gifted and well-trained scholars have perpetuated the conten­tion, perhaps unwittingly, that Jesus is best understood as the Messiah awaited by the Jews. Note these excerpts: In his highly acclaimed and widely circulated New Testament Theology^^ Professor Ethelbert Stauffer concluded as follows:  

The first title he (namely Jesus) did accept as a valid and accurate description of his saving mission was that of "Christ" (Mark 8:29). This gives a special au-thenticity to the title of Messiah as a predicate to describe Jesus Christ. The early Church laid claim to all the honors that this title involved. Particularly did she stress the Messiah's vocation to suffer (Acts 17:3).

 After an impressive review of the pertinent data, Professor George Eldon Ladd, in A Theology of the New Testament, comes to the following conclu-sion: 

 Jesus in some way acted like the Messiah; yet a Messiah very different from contemporary Jewish hopes. It is difficult to believe that Jesus filled a role of which he was unconscious. He must have known himself to be the Messiah.  

I find it difficult to comprehend how the Jewish man Jesus could have thought he was the Messiah and yet one who was "very dilferent" from the Messiah expected by the Jews. Despite knowledge of the primary and sec-ondary sources, Ladd perpetuates two fallacies: Jesus "must have known" he was the Messiah, and there was a coherent idea of the Messiah among his fellow Jews. Also, what is meant by the statement that "Jesus in some way acted like the Messiah"? Did he or did he not? VVe have numerous early Jewish sources that portray the Messiah, vari-ously, as one who will serve as the eschatological high priest (the Dead Sea Scrolls, the T12P), or as the consummate benevolent and all-powerful king (PssSol 17). Numerous functions are sometimes attributed to the Messiah: He will judge the wicked (PssSol 17, 4Ezra 12, 2Bar 40), destroy them (PssSol 17, 18; 4Ezra 12, 2Bar 72; cf Isa 11), deliver God's people (PssSol 17, 4Ezra 12; cf Zech 9), and/or reign in a blessed kingdom (PssSol 17, 18; 2Bar 40; cf Ps 2).  

 

10. See D. Juel's demonstration tliat earliest Christian thought began as biblical exegesis and "that what Stands at the beginning of that reflection and provides a focus and a direction for Scriptural exegesis is the confession of Jesus as Messiah" (p. 1). D. Juel, Messianic Exegesis: Christological Interpretation of the Old Testament in Early Christianity (Philadelphia, 1988). 11. E. Stauffer, New Testament Theology, trans. J. Marsh (London, 1955), p. 112. 12. G. E. Ladd, A Theology of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1974), p. 144. 

 

Jesus is acknowledged by Paul and the Evangelists to have performed none of these functions attributed to the Messiah. The author of Jude could not simply shift from God to Jesus a prediction about the accomplishments of the Coming one in the endtime (eschaton), as described in the Books of Enoch (lEn 1:9). He had to change the prophecy in order to have Jesus fulfill the prediction.'^ Jesus' actions were decidedly not those often associated with the Messiah. He certainly performed miracles, as we know assuredly from studying the Evangehsts' sources, Josephus, and Rabbinics; but the Messiah is not por-trayed in Early Judaism as a miracle worker (even though he does perform wonders in 4Ezra 13). Jesus suffered and was crucified; and despite attempts from scholars for over one hundred years to prove otherwise from our vastly increased störe of primary sources, we still have no evidence that Jews dur­ing the time of Jesus considered that God's Messiah would come and suffer " The rabbinic references to two Messiahs, one of whom will die, postdate the second Century C.E., and, therefore, are too late to be used to portray the messianology of the early Jews.'^ The reference to the death of the Messiah in 4 Ezra 7:29 is not a Christian interpolation into this Jewish apocalypse. But the death of the Messiah here is not efficacious and is clearly distinct fi-om the Christian affirmation about Jesus. According to 4 Ezra 7, the Mes­siah's death serves to mark the end of a set period of time and history. In his An Introduction to the Theology of the New Testament the former Dean of York, Alan Richardson, presents an insight that is worth quoting: It is truly astonishing, in view of the weight of OT prophecy concerning the Davidic Messiah, how little the NT makes of the matter. The evangelists rep­resent Jesus as the new Moses, the new Joshua, the new Elijah, and so on; but there is perhaps only one pericope in the tradition which sets forth Jesus as the new David, viz. the Walking through the Cornfields on the Sabbath (Mark 2.23-28).'^ The OT passages that Richardson has in mind as referring both to David and the Messiah refer clearly only to David. The interest in David was impressively high during the time of Jesus, as we know more clearly now than when Richardson wrote, thanks to the recovery of compositions in the name of David—like the More Psalms of David—and writings which celebrate him, both among the Dead Sea Scrolls and elsewhere.'' We now know also that there were descendants of David living in Palestine during the time of Jesus.'' The "truly astonishing" reaction is the key for us; the NT writings do not elevate Jesus as a type of David. Jesus was not celebrated by his earliest followers as "a" or "the" new David. And despite the movement of "Christ" from title to proper name, the confessions preserved in the NT writings cel­ebrate Jesus as "Lord," or "Son." Conspicuously absent among the kerygmata and creeds is the confession that Jesus is the long-awaited Christ. The only true exception is Marks account of Peters confession. Even if Mark accurately records Peters words, we have no way of discern-ing what Peter meant by "Christ." Even if we knew exactly what he meant, we still would not be able to perceive what Jesus was thinking, since scholars throughout the world have come to agree that according to Mark Jesus did not simply accept Peters claim that he was the Messiah (contrary to Mat­thews Version). If Jesus had accepted the declaration he was the Messiah, then we would be able to explain how his earliest followers came to this startling conclusion. If he did not accept the claim, as now seems obvious after years of scholars' sensitive and historical study of Mark and the Jewish literature contemporaneous with him, then we are faced with the problem of why and how his followers concluded that the title "the Messiah" was ap-propriate for him.'' Research on such issues leads not to easy answers but to perplexing questions. There was reason to be optimistic that some resolutions might be ob­tained by the Princeton Symposium.-" First the problems were clarified and put into sharp focus. The two major questions seem to have been the follow­ing: I. How and in what ways, if at all, did the Jews, in Palestine and before 70 C.E. especially, express their ideas concerning the Hebrew (and Ar­amaic) word "Messiah." Related to this question are others, notably these: a. How widespread were these concerns? b. Were references to "the Messiah" clustered in discernible groups, whether economic, cultic, social, synagogal, or so-called sec-tarian? 

 

13. See mv discussion in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha and the New Testament {SNTS MS 54; Cambridge, 1985, repr. 1987), pp. 72-74. 14. Hengel correctly states that "in the light of all our present knowledge, the suffering and dying Messiah was not yet a familiär traditional figure in the Judaism of the first Century AD" (p. 40). Hengel, The Atonement: The Origins of the Doctrine in the New Testament, trans. J. Bow-den (Philadelphia, 1981). 15. See Charlesworth, "The Concept of the Messiah in the Pseudepigrapha," AN/JW II. 19.1, pp. 188-218; see esp. pp. 198-200; and P. Schäfer, "Die messianischen Hoffnungen des rabbin-ischen Judentums zwischen Naherwartung und religiösem Pragmatismus," in Studien zur Ge­schichte und Theologie des Rahbinischen Judentums (AGAJU 15; Leiden, 1978), pp. 214-43; and J. Neusner, Messiah in Context: Israel's History and Destiny in Formative Judaism (The Foundations of Judaism; Philadelphia, 1984), see esp. pp. 18-19. 16. A Richardson, An Introduction to the Theolosy of the New Testament (London, 1958), p. 126.

17. See "More Psalms of David" in OTP, vol. 2, pp. 609-24. 18. See D. Flusser's discussion (of the ossuary with the inscription which clarified that the bones inside belonged to a descendant of David) in Jesus Jewishness, ed. Charlesworth (New York, 1991), pp. 153-76. 19. See Dahls paper in the present coUection. 20. See the resolutions of the members of the Symposium; these are presented at the begin­ning of this volume, p. xiii.  

 

c. How can we be convinced we have translated n''U?a or %QIOX6C, correctly as "the Messiah," rather than as "a messiah," or "the Anointed One," rather than "an anointed one"?-' d. How can we discern that references to "the son of David" or "Da­vid" are messianic, and how should we then define the adjective "mes­sianic." Granted that to delimit this term only to references to "Mes­siah" seems myopic, but how can we avoid eisegesis and an imprecise use of this term? e. When do nouns like bar and phrases like bar nasha move from nouns to terms, and from terms to titles, and what criteria aid us in discerning that such titles are messianic? f Was the title "the Messiah" an amorphous and fluid concept among the early Jews, or was it confusingly contradictory, at least to many intellectual and devout Jews? g. Can we discern any coherence in the title "the Messiah" or are we confronted only with divisive contingencies? The second major question is as follows: 2. If most Jews were not looking for the coming of "the Messiah," and if Jesus' life and teachings were not parallel to those often or sometimes attributed to the coming of "the Messiah" or "the Christ," then why, how, and when did Jesus' earliest followers contend that he was so clearly the promised Messiah that the title "Christ" became his proper name by at least 40 C.E., or ten years after the crucifixion? Some re­lated questions are the following: a. What is the relation between the post-Easter claim that Jesus is the Christ and Jesus' life before the cross? b. What is the relation between the early kerygmatic claim that Je­sus is "the Christ" and the traditions about Jesus' trial before the San­hedrin, when according to Mk 14:61-62 he reputedly claimed to be "the Christ"? c. What is the relation between the confession that Jesus is the Christ and Jesus' death? d. What is the relation between the proclamation of Jesus' messiah­ship and either the affirmation that the resurrected Jesus had been Seen or the belief that God had raised him from the dead?

 

21. The form n'!?!? may not even derive from the well-known root for "messiah." It may well be another noun (or form) with a prefixed mem. For example, E. M. Schuller wisely translates w'ny mSyhkin 4Q381 15 not as "and I your Messiah," but as "from Your discourse." The root is syh, "meditation," or "discourse." See her valuable Non-Canonical Psalms from Qumran: A Pseudepigraphic CoUection (Harvard Semitic Studies 18; Atlanta, 186), pp. 94-97. 

 

e. What fluidity was there in the early Palestinian Jesus Movement between the terms "Messiah" or "Christ" and its messianic content? f. Was the author of 1 Enoch 37-71, or Jesus, or one of his followers the first Jew to link the terms "Messiah" and "Son of Man"? g. Did the prophecy of Isaiah 53, and the concept of the suffering servant, become associated with Jesus' life in Jesus' teachings or was it a post eventum thought shaped only by Jesus' death on the cross? h. At what stage did "servant" become wed with "Messiah" or ob-tain messianic overtones? 

These two series of questions may well give the impression that I have read none of the primary or secondary literature on messianology (the term which represents the Jewish concept[s] of the Messiah), or christology (the term which specifies the Christian argument that Jesus is the Christ). Yet even after refining our nomenclature, it is frustrating to see that "Jewish" is sepa­rated from "Christian" as if Jesus and his earliest followers were not Jews and did not fit solidly and firmly within pre-70 Palestinian Judaism (or better, Judaisms). These questions arise for the following reasons: the advance beyond ahis-torical confessionalism by Jews and Christians alike, the ever increasing abundance of primary texts, a refined perception of the complexities of pre-70 Judaism(s) and earliest Christianity, and the development of a self-critical and sophisticated historical methodology. The phenomenal—somewhat unparalleled—advancement in biblical re­search can be summarized by the following list of conclusions which is rep-resented in a wide ränge of publications: 1. The term "the Messiah" simply does not appear in the Hebrew Scrip­tures (or Old Testament).The last group of scholars to acknowledge this fact were the conservative Christians, and now the very conserva-tive New Testament specialist [the late] Professor George Eldon Ladd states, without qualification, that "the simple term 'the Messiah' does not occur in the Old Testament at all."^ Of course, the title "the Anointed One" denotes in the Hebrew Scriptures (or Old Testament) a prophet, a priest, and especially a king. 2. The Hebrew Scriptures (or Old Testament) certainly do contain some extremely important passages that were implicitly messianic, such as Psalm 2, 2 Samuel 7, Isaiah 7, 9 and 11, Zechariah 9, and Dan 9:26. These passages may be defined as "messianic" so long as this adjective is not used to denote the prediction of an apocalyptic, eschatological "Messiah." 3. These scriptures were interpreted with precisely this messianic con-notation by Jews during the two centuries before the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 C.E. 4. The noun, term, or title "the Messiah" appears rarely in the literature of Early Judaism or from roughly 250 B.C.E. to 200 C.E. But it is also true that in the whole history of Israel and Pre-Rabbinic Judaism "the Messiah" appears with unusual frequency and urgency only during this period, especially from the first Century B.C.E. to 135 C.E.^^ 5. Jesus' sayings reveal that his message was not about the coming of the Messiah. His preaching focused on the coming of God's Kingdom, not the kingdom of the Messiah. 6. Jesus never proclaimed himself to be the Messiah. He apparently re-jected Peter's confession, that he (Jesus) was the Christ, as satanic, because he did not wish for his mission and message to be judged ac­cording to human concepts of the Messiah.-' 7. The disciples are never portrayed as asking Jesus for his views about the Messiah. Before his crucifixion in 30 C.E. they were apparently not preoccupied with speculations about the coming of a Messiah. It is far from clear what term they would have chosen to categorize him. 8. In the early Palestinian Jesus Movement, according to Acts 3:20, and in Paul's letters, "Christ" is a proper name for Jesus of Nazareth. In the gospels it is a proper name or tide (Mt 1:1, Mk 1:1, Lk 2:11, Jn 1:17). As I perceive the work of the leading specialists, these eight points reflect a broad consensus among Jewish and Christian scholars today, and present an enormous advance in understanding Early Judaism and Christian Ori­gins.

 

22. See the resolutions of the members of the Symposium; these can be found at the beginning of the present work. Also, see Roberts's paper in the present coUection, and W. Harrelson, "The Messianic Hope," in Judaism. 200 B.C.-A.D. 200. ed. J. H. Charlesworth (Evanston, III., 1983 [this slide series is distributed by the Religion und Ethics Institute, Inc., P.O. Box 664, Evans­ton, III. 60204]). 23. Ladd, A Theology of the New Testament, p. 136

24. The scope of this paper does not alJow for a discussion of the messianic movement related to Simon Bar Kokhba; for sources and discussion see the following: P. Schäfer, Der Bar Kokhba-Aufstand (Texte und Studien zum Judentum 1; Tübingen, 1981), see esp. pp. 55-67; P. Schäfer, Geschichte der Juden in der Antike (Stuttgart, 1983), see esp. pp. 163-65. 25. R. H. Füller points out that Mk 8:27-33 is composed of Marean redaction and early tradi­tion. He concludes that Jesus' rebuke to Peter—"Get behind me, Satan"—originally foUowed Peter's confession, "You are the Christ." Füller concludes: "Jesus rejects Messiahship as a merely human and even diabolical temptation." See Füller, The Foundation ofNew Testament Christol­ogy (New York, 1965), p. 109. FuUer's insights are impressive, but it is not possible to continue to assume, as does Füller, that "Messiah" meant "the Davidic Messiah of a religious-national kind" (p. 109). If Jesus rejected Peter's confession, it is quite possible that he did so for numerous reasons, and one of them could well be that no human or angel was empowered to make such a divine declaration. According to some Jewish documents (viz. PssSol 17, 4Ezra 13;52), only God can disclose who is the Messiah. 26. For a good bibliography on Jewish messianology, see "Messianism" in E. Schürer's The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, ed. G. Vermes, F. Miller, M. Black, and P Vermes (Edinburgh, 1979), vol. 2, pp. 488-92. 

Many New Testament scholars used to think the essential question was the following one: Why did the earliest followers of Jesus take the Jewish concept of the Messiah and contend that he was the one expected by the Jews? This is an incorrect question. It assumes that Jews advocated a set and coherent concept of the Messiah. It assumes that Jesus' followers were pri-marily interested in describing Jesus as the Messiah, and not, for example, as "the son of God," or the "Lord." The question also falls to Force the thinker to ponder about what Jesus' followers may have meant by such words and whether they were terms or titles. Another pivotal question seems to be: Why did the Jews not recognize that Jesus was the Messiah? Again this is a false question, because it assumes that there was a coherent concept of the Messiah among Jews. It also as­sumes that Jesus' followers had no difficulty with this acclamation, and that his life and thought were unmistakably messianic and in line with prophecy and a checklist description of the task of "the Messiah." A major question continues to be raised but answered unsatisfactorily: If Jesus thought he was the Messiah, would he not have made that claim ex-phcit? The common and mistaken answer is yes. In reality the answer is probably no. Jesus probably would not have proclaimed himself to be the Messiah if he had conceived himself to be the Messiah. According to some early Jewish texts, like the Psalms of Solomon 17 (and perhaps 18), only God knows the time and identity of the Messiah, and according to many other texts God is keeping the Messiah in a secret place (see 4Ezra 7:28-29, 12:31-34, 13:26; 2Bar 30:1-2; cf OdesSol 41:15). Another question has been disclosed to be misleading: How did Jews dis-tinguish between the concept of "the Messiah" and other concepts, such as "the Son of Man," "the Righteous One," and "the Elect One"? It will come as a shock to many scholars that this is a very poor question. It is inappropriate because it assumes that all Jews made such a distinction. In fact, according to the Book of the Parables of Enoch (= lEn 37-71), which was composed by a Palestinian Jew before 70 C.E., these four concepts were related and at times identical.^^ There was considerable fluidity among the various titles that could be or become messianic titles.

27. See my comments in Judaisms and Their Messiahs, see esp. pp. 236-38; and the impor­tant and convincing paper in this coUection by VanderKam. 

 

THE LITERATURE OF EARU JUDAISM  

What shaped first-century Jewish thought? The only sources we possess for ascertaining the ideas of the Jews in Palestine before the burning of the Temple in 70 C.E. are their writings. Hence we must turn to texts, acknowl-edging that we have only a portion of the influential literature produced by the early Jews, We are not able to demonstrate how influential are the writ­ings which have survived; and we should recognize that perhaps the most influential thoughts came through oral traditions connected with the Temple cult or with socially influential groups. The numerous Jewish writings that antedate the defeat of Bar Kokhba in 135 C.E. and the end of the period in which the New Testament documents were composed, roughly 150 C.E., cumulatively clarify three observations: 

1. Most of the Jewish texts contain no reference to "a" or "the" Messiah or to "a" or "the" Christ. 

 2. The texts that do contain references to "the Messiah," "Christ," or "Anointed One" do not reveal a coherent picture.  

3. Hence we have no evidence for the assertion that the Jews during Jesus' time were looking for the coming of "the" or "a" Messiah, and there was no paradigm, or checklist, by which to discern if a man was the Messiah, In such an ideological and social setting it was not pos­sible for a group to point to objective proofs for its own idiosyncratic belief  The Samaritans. The Samaritans were a splinter group with Palestinian Judaism. We have learned lately that their break with other Jews did not occur before or shortly after the Babylonian Exile; it occurred during the last few decades of the second Century B.C.E. They shared with other Jews the sanctity of the Pentateuch. They heralded a very ancient Israelite holy area, namely Mount Gerizim, as the only true place for worship. They longed for the Coming of the Taheb, apparently their term for "the Messiah"; but it means "restorer" and was perceived not as a new David but as a new Moses (a Moses redivivus). The passages in which this title appears are very late, postdating the second Century O.E., and cannot be used with any reliability for assessing early Jewish messianology.^* Josephus. In the received Greek texts Josephus does use the noun "Christos," but the passages are suspect, prompting many scholars to con-clude that they were added by a Christian scribe. I am convinced that Jose­phus did refer to Jesus, using the phrase "tou legomenou Christou" (Ant 20. 200); but it is far from clear what he means by these words.He could be denoting "the so-calied Christ," or "the proclaimed Christ." Earlier in the Antiquities, the Greek ho christos houtos en (Ant 18.63) clearly means "he was the Christ." This affirmation cannot be attributed to Josephus. The tenth-century Agabius Arabic text has "he was perhaps the Messiah." Surely neither the Greek nor the Arabic is appropriate for a Jew who was as learned and experienced as Josephus, and who had disdain for apocalyptic and mes­sianic movements.^" We should allow for Christian redaction in both the Greek and Arabic recensions. If Josephus did use the noun "Christ," we are far removed from what he meant by it, and even more distanced from his pre-70 fellow Palestinian Jews.^' 

The Targums. In the Targums we find a considerable number of mes­sianic passages. One of the most militant portraits of the Messiah, for example, is found in the Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan. Note the following excerpt: How noble is the king. Messiah, who is going to rise from the house of Judah. He has girded his loins and come down, setting in order the order of battle with his enemies and killing kings with their rulers (and there is not a king or a ruler who shall stand before him), reddening the mountains with the blood of their slain. With his garments dipped in blood, he is like one who treads grapes inthepress. (Targum to Gen 49:11)^-Such passages in the Targums are too late for us to consider at the present time. In their present form they postdate 200 C.E. and often tend to reflect the historical setting of these later centuries.^ The Mishnah. While the Targums reflect the reintroduction of messianol­ogy into Jewish thology, the Mishnah, as compiled by Judah the Prince, re-fiects the discussions at Yavneh (Jamnia) and Usha, and the anatiapocalyptic and antimessianic reactions to the horrilying revolt of 66 - 63/4 C.E., and the clearly messianic but abortive revolt of 132-135 C.E. led by Simon Bar Kokhba, whom the greatest Rabbi of the time, Akiba, hailed as the Mes­siah.«  

 

28. See the definitive study of Samaritan messianism by the Professor für jüdische ReUgions-geschichte am Institut für Judaistik der Universität Wien, namely F. Dexinger, Der Taheb: Ein "messianischer" Heilsbringer der Samaritaner (Salzburg, 1986) and Dexinger, "Die Taheb-Vorstellung als politische Utopie," Niimen 37 (1990), 1-21. 29. See Charlesworth, Jesus Within Judaism (Anchor Bible Reference Librarv; Garden Citv, N.Y., 1988). 

30. See the translations and discussions in Charlesworth, Jesus Within Judaism, esp. pp. 90-102. 31. Long ago A. Schlatter in Die Theologie des Judentums nach dem Bericht des Josefus (Gü­tersloh, 1932; repr. with a Stellenregister by H. Lindner: Hildesheim, New York, 1979) argued that the collapse of the Jewish revolt was for Josephus "nicht das Ende des Messianismus. . . . Aber ihre Hoffnung richtet sich nicht mehr auf den Davidssohn und Menschensohn, nicht mehr auf ein verklärtes Jerusalem und einen glänzenden Tempel, sondern flüchtet sich ins Jenseits und schaut zum Himmel empor. Die Hoffnung beschäftigt sich nur noch mit dem Schicksal des Einzelnen, mit der Erlösung seiner Seele" (p. 259). 32. J. Bowker, The Targums and Rabbinic Literature (Cambridge, 1969), p. 278. 33. See S. H. Levey, The Messiah: An Aramaic Interpretation: The Messianic Exegesis oßthe Targum (Monographs of the Hebrew Union College 2; New York. 1974). 34. See Schäfer, Der Bar Kokhba-Aufstand. 

Rabbinic Judaism has no clear anti-Christian polemic, but it could not develop in ignorance of the growing strength of Christianity, which claimed to be the true religion of Israel because it was empowered by God's Messiah, Jesus Christ. Hence I have no doubt that the dearth of messianology in the Mishnah should be seen also in the context of the struggle for survival of rabbinic Judaism alongside of, and sometimes against, a messianic move­ment heavily indebted to Judaism, called Christianity Professor Jacob Neusner in Messiah in Context argues insightfully that "the Messiah as an eschatological figure makes no appearance in the System of the Mishnah," because the Mishnah is "a law code or a school book for philosophical jurists."^^ According to Neusner, the Mishnah falls to treat the issue of salvation, and thereby "omits all reference to its own point of origin, and thus lacks a historical account or a mythic base."^^ Old Testament Apocrypha. The noun "Messiah" or "Christ" does not ap­pear in the thirteen books in the Old Testament Apocrypha.^'' That fact is remarkable. It means that the Maccabean revolt, according to 1 and 2 Mac­cabees, was not a messianic movement, and that the revolt was organized around faithfulness to Yahweh and the Torah, and not around allegiance to some Messiah, as in the Second Great Revolt of 132-135 C.E. It also reveals that the expansions to the Hebrew scriptures, such as the Epistle of Jere­miah, the Additions to Daniel, and the Additions to Esther, were not pro­duced by some messianic interpretation.^* We come now to the two main bodies of early Jewish texts that contain the most numerous and most significant messianic passages. The first is the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. The second is the Dead Sea Scrolls. Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. Today we know at least fifty-two docu­ments under the category of the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. In this col-lection we do indeed find some of the most impressive and significant rec­ords of Jewish messianism. As the informed Jewish scholar Joseph Klausner stated long ago, "the Messianic expectations in the Apocrypha and Pseud­epigrapha are preciousjewels in the crown of Judaism. . . ."^^ Before turning to a discussion of the four documents that antedate 200 C.E. and that contain Jewish refiections on the coming of the Messiah, let me clarily why only these works will be examined. The discussion of Jewish mes­sianology over the past one hundred years has been vitiated by loose criteria and the inclusion of passages that are now widely recognized as nonmes­sianic. To avoid this dilemma, only documents that actually contain the noun "Messiah" or "Christ" will be included. Each of these four documents is non-composite, hence passages linked with clearly messianic sections will also be included for examination. Restricting the following examination only to pas­sages in which the term "Messiah" or "Christ" appears should serve for the present to clarify the complex mass of data. Hence the alleged messianic sections of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs will not be examined here*; it is often forgotten that this document does not contain the term "Messiah" or "Christ."-" A more perplexing problem is confronted in the Dream Visions of Enoch (lEn 83-90). This is a separate book and should not be read in light of a later work titled the Parables of Enoch (lEn 37-71). Extremely important for our discussion are two alleged references to the "Messiah" in the Dream Visions of Enoch. Numerous specialists are convinced that a passage in the Dream Visions refers to the Messiah. Here are some recent translations of that pas­sage (lEn 90:38): 

 

35. Neusner, Messiah in Context, pp. 18-19. 36. Neusner, Messiah in Context, p. 19. Neusner contends that "the Mishnah presents us with a kind of Judaism that has an eschatology without the Messiah, a teleology beyond time" (p. 20). Also see Neusner, "One Theme, Two Settings: The Messiah in the Literature of the Svnagogue and in the Rabbi's Canon of Late Antiquity," Biblical Theology Bulletin 14 (1984) 110-21. 37. See the discussion in Charlesworth, The Pseudepigrapha and Modem Research with a Supplement (SBL SCS 7S; Chico, Calif., 1981), p. 19. 38. J. Klausner in The Messianic Idea in Israel does have a section on "The Messianic Idea in the Apocrypha," but he defines "messianic idea" too broadly, including, for example, Sirach 35 as messianic, when there is no mention of the Messiah or even David. The same is true of Sirach 36, yet Klausner judged it to be "completely filled with messianic expectations . . ." (p. 253). See Klausner, The Messianic Idea in Israel, trans. W. F. Stinespring (London, 1956), Klausner correctly wrote, "it is proper to pay attention to one important item: the personality of the Messiah is not mentioned in any book of the Apocrypha (p. 250, italics his; see also pp. 254, 271). 

39. J. Klausner, The Messianic Idea in Israel, p. 386. Klausner erred in judging many of "the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha" as "products of the spirit of the Zealots and Sicarii in those warlike times" (p, 386, n. 1). None were probably written by the Zealots or the Sicarii. We must not attempt to align all the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha that were written before 70 with what we know about the groups (or sects) prior to 70. We simply are too ill-informed. The quotations from Klausner may be misleading; he incorrectly read passages in the OT Apocrypha which referred to God's future acts as a warrior as if they were not distinguishable from the Messiah's future acts. 40. TReu 6:8 has mechri teleiöseös chronön archiereös christou; and this phrase should be translated as "until the consummation of times; he (Levi) is the anointed high priest" (or "until the consummation of times of an [the] anointed high priest") and not "until the consummation of times of Christ the high priest." The phrase is translated correctly by H. C. Kee in OTP, vol. 1, and by H. M. de Jonge in The Apocryphal Old Testament ed. H. R D. Sparks (Oxford, 1984). Also see the following excellent translations: ". . . jusqu'ä l'achevement des temps du grand pretre oint dont a parle le Seigneur" (M. Philonenko, in La Bible: Escrits intertestamentaires, Paris, 1987); "sommo sacerdote unto indicato dal Signore" (P, Sacchi in Apocrifi dell'Antico Tes-tamento [Turin, 1981]). Contrast the opinion of M. de Jonge, who defends (despite his published translation) the rendering which refers this phrase to "Christ" and explains it as a Christian Statement. See M. de Jonge, ed., Studies on the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (SVTP 3: Leiden, 1975), p. 22. 41. The two major so-called messianic passages in the T12P are TSim 7:1-2 and TJud 21:1-3. The term or title "Messiah," "the Anointed One," or "the Christ" does not appear in these verses. See Charles worth, "The Concept of the Messiah in the Pseudepigrapha," in ANRW, II. 19.1,. pp. 188-218; See esp. p. 208. .Mso see M. de Jonge. Studies on the Testaments of the Twelve Patri­archs, pp. 223-25, 219-20.

. . . and that something became a great beast with huge black homs on its head,-'2

 . . . and that buffalo became a great animal with great black horns on its head. . . . -»^  

. . . and that wild-ox was (or became) a large animal and had big black horns on its head/''  

. . . und dieser Stier war ein grosses Tier, und (es hatte) an seinem Kopf grosse schwarze Horner.^' 

 ... et cette Parole devint la bete magnifique portant de grandes comes noires."**  

. . . e questa cosa era un grande animale con, sulla testa, grandi corna nere

. . . . un örix (que es un animal grande) con grandes cuernos negros en la cabeza, ....48

This passage is located in the famous animal allegory. Most of the translators quoted above contend that here we have a reference to the Messiah or a least a messianic passage (Uhlig, Caquot, F. Corriente and A. Pifiero, and L. Fu-sella). I am impressed, however, by the ambiguity of the allegory, and by the absence of the noun "Messiah" in this passage and in the Dream Visions. If the beast mentioned in lEn 90:38 is to be identified as the Messiah, then who is the white bull or cow with huge horns described in 90:37? Is not the author being intentionally vague? Are there not numerous other divine mediators besides the Messiah who could possibly be considered as the "great beast with huge black horns"? Professor Matthew Black has suggested that since the "white bull" is "here clearly parallel to the white bull at 85.3 Symbolising Adam, the Image seems to refer to the birth of a new or second Adam, more glorious than the first, for 'bis horns are large.'"^® The image in lEn 85:3 does not necessarily represent "the Messiah." It may refer to Adam. Black's Suggestion deserves serious consideration. In my judgment lEn 90:38 is not clearly messianic, and it certainly does not contain a "description of the Messiah," as one learned scholar claimed.^ I am impressed by the allegory and its kaleidoscopio symbolism. Since the Enlightenment, we Western scholars have sought focused and pre-cise language; yet phenomena are usually ambiguous. The beauty of the al-legorical animal apocalypse is in its openness and comprehensiveness. As the authors of some pre-100 C.E. Jewish writings stressed, specifically the au­thors of the Psalms of Solomon and 4 Ezra, no sage can describe, clarify, or identify the Messiah. God has preserved the Messiah in a secret place, will reveal him at the proper time, and he alone knows the identity of the Mes­siah. To understand early Jewish theology our terms must be as representa-tive as possible; we simply cannot continue to use the adjective "messianic" as if it is synonymous with "eschatological," even though an influential scholar, Professor Oscar Cullmann, encouraged us to continue such a method.^' We must not claim as clear what is intentionally imprecise. We must heed the words of the discerning philosophical mathematician, F. P. Ramsey, when he wams that the "chief danger" of the scholar is to treat "what is vague as if it were precise. . . ."'^ A revered New Testament scholar, Krister Sten-dahl, formerly Professor of New Testament at Harvard and Bishop of Stock­holm, recently cautioned against the ancient and modern "authority figures . . . who claim more precision in their definitions than is good for theol­ogy."^ In summation, the allegory in the Dream Visions may at best be alleg­edly messianic; but it will not influence the following synthesis of messianic ideas in the Pseudepigrapha. We turn now to the four early Jewish documents in the Pseudepigrapha that contain the word "Messiah." In chronological order they are the Psalms of Solomon, the Parables of Enoch, 4 Ezra, and 2 Baruch. These four docu­ments date from 50 B.C.E. to 100 C.E.,'^ were composed by Palestinian Jews in a Semitic language, and are preserved in a Semitic language. The last three are apocalypses. Let us address eleven questions to these documents. Can the ancestry of the Messiah be discerned? The PssSol 17:21-34 and 4Ezra 12:31-34 are the only two that State he will be descended from David.^ It is surprising that this part of the tradition, which we would have expected to be a set part of the lore, is found in only two of the pre-135 C.E. Jewish pseudepigrapha. It is also conceivable that the emphasis in 4 Ezra 13:22 that the Messiah is God's son is a reaction, perhaps within the Ezra cycle or group, against the claim that the Messiah must be "David's son." Messianic ideas were not necessarily Davidic. For example, the Enoch group tended to link the Messiah with Enoch, and the Samaritans believed the Taheb was to be seen in terms of Moses. Psalm 2 preserves another re­cord of the tradition that the Lord's anointed (2:2), obviously seen in some early Jewish circles as the Messiah, is to be the son of God (2:7); but the connection of this future ideal king (2:6) with David is not made explicit. We are left with uncertain, and perhaps fluid, traditions. 

Did not most Jews assume the Messiah was to be a militant warrior? This conclusion is assumed by many perhaps most, New Testament speciahsts. They frequently argue that Jesus did not declare himself to be the Messiah, because he would have been mistaken as a political and military leader Ex­plicit support for this bewitching view that Jews were expecting a militant Messiah is found among the early Jewish Pseudepigrapha only in 2 Baruch 72. According to this section of 2 Baruch, the Messiah will slay Israel's ene­mies with the sword (Syr hrb\ 2Bar 72:6). In many other passages the stress is on the nonmilitary means of the Messiah. Both PssSol 17:21-33'« and 4 Ezra 13:4-11 emphasize that the Messiah will not rely on a sword, horse, or other military weapons. He will conquer not with a weapon in his hand but with what streams forth from his mouth, the word'': "Undergird him with the strength . . . to destroy the unlawful nations with the word of his mouth" (PssSol 17:22-24)'*; "and whenever his voice issued from his mouth, all who heard his voice melted as wax melts when it feels the fire" (4 Ezra 13:4).'^ The Messiah's bloody confrontation—implied in 2 Baruch 72 and described in gory details in the late Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan (Gen 49:11)—is re­jected by the authors of the Psalms of Solomon and 4 Ezra. Why does the Messiah slay or defeat the nations? There is more than one documented answer According to the Parables of Enoch, it is probably because they are füll of sinners who deny the Lord of the Spirits (e.g., lEn 45:2). According to PssSol 17:21 and 24, it is perhaps because they are "un­lawful nations" with "unrighteous rulers." According to the PssSol 17:22 and 2 Baruch 72, it is because they rule Jerusalem or ruled over Israel. This latter concept demands the possibility that some of the nations will not be de­stroyed, as stated in 2Bar 72:2. Will the Messiah not purge Jerusalem? The author and Community be­hind the Psalms of Solomon (see PssSol 17:21-33)^ were convinced of an affirmative answer, but most of the documents that mention the Messiah do not describe him acting on behalf of Jerusalem.«' According to 4 Ezra 7:28-29, the Messiah will appear, inaugurate the messianic period, and then die. No active functions are given to him. He does not die in battle or in the attempt to purge Jerusalem, even though the author of 4 Ezra had lived through such a dream. He appears in history only after the eschatological city and land are disclosed (4Ezra 7:26). Will the Messiah condemn sinners? This concept is found in the PssSol 17 and in 4Ezra 12:32 (cf lEn 48, 2Bar 72). In many other texts, notably 4 Ezra 7:28-29, the ungodly are not even mentioned in connection with the Mes­siah. Is he not always portrayed as a king? According to PssSol 17:21-33, he will be a king. Note this excerpt:

See, Lord, and raise up for them their king, the son of David, to rule over your servant Israel in the time known to you, O God. 

There could have been some dissension in the group which used these psalms liturgically in Jerusalem, because Psalm 17 is framed at the beginning and end with the affirmation that God, and not the Messiah, is the eternal king.«^ Note the beginning and end of Psalm 17:

Lord, you are our king forevermore, . . . (17:1) May God dispatch his mercy to Israel; may he deliver us from the pollution of profane enemies; The Lord himself is our king forevermore. (17:45, 46)"   

 

 42. Translated by E. Isaac in OTP, vol. 1, p. 71. 43. Translated by M. Black in The Book of Enoch or l Enoch: A New English Edition with Commentary and fextual Notes (SVTP 7; Leiden, 1983), p. 83. 44. Trans. M. Knibb in The Apocryphal Old Testament, p. 291. 45. Trans. S. Uhlig in Apokalypsen: Das äthiopische Henochbuch (JSHRZ 5.6; Gütersloh, 1984), p. 704. 46. Trans. A. Caquot in La Bible: Ecrits intertestamentaires, edited by A. Dupont-Sommer and M. Philonenko (Paris, 1987), p. 596. 47. Trans. L. Fusella in Apocrifi dell'Antico Testamento, edited by P. Saachi (Turin, 1981), pp. 629-30. 48. Trans. F. Corriente and A. Pifiero in Apocrifos del Antiguo Testamento, edited bv A. Diez Macho (Madrid, 1984), vol. 4, p. 123. 49. M. Black in The Books of Enoch, p. 280.

50. The Quotation is from P. G. R. de Vilhers' "The Messiah and Messiahs in Jewish Apocalyp­tic," in Neotestamentica 12 (1978) 75-110; see p. 81. P. de Villiers is a gifted scholar; his research is usually outstanding and precise. 51. O. Cullmann, "Jesus the Messiah," The Christology of the New Testament, trans. S. C. Guthrie and C. A. M. Hall (The New Testament Library; London, 1959, 1963) pp. 111-36. 52. I have only slightly altered the quotation; Ramsey writes about the "chief danger to our philosophy. . . ," The motto is quoted from F. P. Ramsey, The Foundations of Mathematics (New York, 1931), p. 269. I am indebted to K. R. Popper for drawing my attention to this motto; see K. R. Popper, Popper Selections, ed. D. Miller (Princeton, 1985) p. 87. 53. K. Stendahl, "Foreword," in Jakob Jönsson, Humour and Irony in the New Testament (BZRG 28; Leiden, 1985). 54. For a discussion of the date of the Parables of Enoch, which probably are pre-70-and perhaps from the late first Century B.C.E., see Charlesworth, The Old Testament Pseudepigra­pha and the New Testament, esp. pp. 88-90, 102-10.

60. For further discussion see Charlesworth, Judaisms and Their Messiahs, pp. 235-36. 6L The Parables of Enoch contain numerous ideas. lEn 56:7 does not mention the Messiah, but it does refer to the attempt of the Parthians to conquer Jerusalem. 62. TReu 6:5-12 states that the Lord will reign through Levi. It is not necessarily a contradic-tion to say that the Lord is King and the Messiah is King. As we know from the early traditions dating from the time of the monarchy, one stream of thought was that Yahweh is king and David and his descendants are representing God as king; hence they are kings. Likewise the early Jew saw no problem in hailing God and the Messiah as "Lord." See Ps HO and its Interpretation in the first Century; most recently now see Juel, Messianic Exegesis. 63. See Wrighfs translation'in OTP, vol. 2, pp. 665, 669.  

 

Psalms of Solomon 17 seems to contain a polemic against the Hasmonean dynasty, which in its final years became decadent and in which the rulers, beginning with Aristobulus I (104-103) claimed the title of "king" (see PssSol 17:5-6). Hence the corruption of the Hasmonean "kings" apparently stimu-lated a messianology that portrayed a Messiah who was not a king.'^ We also observe a retransference back to God of the functions shifted in the second and first centuries B.C.E. from God to the Messiah (I shall tum to that di­mension of our work at the conclusion of this paper). For now it is pertinent to point out once again the lack of a set function or Status for the future Mes­siah. Will the Messiah not be the eschatological judge? Leaving aside the Prob­lems with associating the messianic age with the eschatological age, which are sometimes distinguished, as in 4 Ezra, let me point out that no coher-ency exists here either. He shall be a judge according to most of the texts, namely PssSol 17:21-33, 4Ezra 12:31-34, and 2Bar 40:1-2. But according to 4 Ezra 7:31-44 and 7:113-14, judgment commences only after the Messiah dies, and after the period of primeval silence. Did the Jews not agree that the Messiah will gather a holy people? This function is assuredly affirmed in PssSol 17:21-23, and he does "protect" them according to 2 Bar 40. According to the thrust of 4 Ezra, esp. 7:140 and 8:3, the new age will have "only a very few" in it. Moreover there are many passages, notably 4 Ezra 7:28-29 and 2 Bar 30:1-4, in which the Messiah simply performs no functions at all. Obviously it is impossible to compile a checklist of functions that the Messiah is to fulfill; some of the most signifi­cant passages that contain the word "Messiah" do not ascribe to him any function.«' Shall the Messiah not inaugurate a new age?«« This dimension seems clear from Psalms of Solomon 17. But according to 4 Ezra 7, the Messiah does not begin a new age, he simply seems sandwiched between two eras, following one and dying before the next begins. His death has no efficacious dimen-sions.®' What has just been said about an apparently "functionless" Messiah applies here as well. We must rid our minds of the presupposition that the Messiah simply cannot be mentioned and left functionless. He will obviously perform some function, but some Jews certainly refused to usurp God's pre-rogative and define those ante eventum. Is the Messiah to assist in the resurrection of the dead? According to lEn 51:1, Sheol and Hell "will give back" all the dead; but there is no mention of acts performed by the Messiah. The tradition in 1 Enoch is complex and probably intentionally ambiguous; the one who chooses the righteous ones among the dead is "he," which is an example of the ambiguous relative pro-noun in Semitics. "He" may refer back to "the Lord of the Spirits." But it is conceivable that some members of the Enoch Community would have as­sumed that "he" may be the Messiah, since Enoch is told, "All these things which you have seen happen by the authority of his Messiah so he may give Orders and be praised upon the earth" (1 En 52:4; itahcs mine). The Messiah is "his"—that is, he belongs to the Lord of the Spirits. Moreover, "all these things" may well refer back only to the events described in lEn 52:1-3, in which neither the Messiah nor resurrection is mentioned explicitly. Both the Messiah and resurrection, however, may have been interpreted by members of the Enoch group to be included among "all these things." It is pertinent to remember that all the passages discussed above are from the same book of Enoch, which was probably composed before the turn of the era. It does contain explicit references to the Messiah, as we have seen. According to 2 Baruch 30, the righteous alone will arise with the advent of the Messiah.«* According to 4 Ezra 7:28-29, however, both the righteous and the unrighteous will be resurrected only after the Messiah dies, and the interlude of primeval silence begins and ends. These Baruch and Ezra tra­ditions are very different, yet the Messiah is not the one who raises the dead. Will the Messiah not establish a permanent and peaceful kingdom? This idea may have been once connected with early Jewish interpretations of Isaiah 7, 9, and 11, and Isaiah 42-45;«^ it seems to be found in PssSol 17:21-32. In contrast to this idea, the apocalypses present us with two mutually exclusive ideas. According to 2 Baruch 36-40 and 4 Ezra 7, the kingdom of the Messiah will be finite; his kingdom will be part of the limited messianic age that precedes the eschaton. According to 1 Enoch 38 and 48-52, and 2 Baruch 73 and 74, however, his kingdom will be eschatological and eternal. Is the Messiah going to be a human? According to 2 Baruch, the Messiah seems to be a terrestrial king who shall embody all the dreams attributed to the kings of ancient Israel. According to 4 Ezra 12:31-34, the Messiah "will arise from the posterity of David." But according to 4 Ezra 13:3-14:9, he is depicted as a man who ascends out of the sea: hominem qui ascenderat de mari.'" Obviously we have seen contradictory traditions preserved by the authors of 4 Ezra and 2 Baruch; and this is only one reason to affirm that although these apocalypses were composed after the burning of the Temple in 70 C.E., they preserve traditions that antedate that catastrophic event. What we observe is not chaotic thought. Instead, through literature we witness tangible indications of the creativity and liveliness of pre-70 Jewish thought, and the nonsystematic phenomenological expressions of real and enslaved people struggling with the impossibility of describing the future. One should not dismiss these passages as ideological; they are sociological deposits of a time of crisis. The apparent chaotic thought is actually the nec­essarily unsystematic expressions of Jews subjugated to the experienced evil-ness of a conquering nation. It is necessary to stress emphatically that such texts should not be read as if we were in a proverbial ivory tower They must be studied as if we were within the ambience of the Burnt House, the high priests home burned by the Romans in 70 C.E., and now unearthed with the charred beams of wood virtually still smoldering. According to the texts collected into the Pseudepigrapha, the earliest ex­plicit use of the terminus technicus—"Messiah" or "Christ"—is the first Cen­tury B.C.E. in the Psalms of Solomon and in the book of the Parables of En­och. Prior to that time, the Jews had not experienced the horrifying corruption by Hasmonean "kings" and did not fear the Romans, with their massive, well-organized, and technically advanced armies under a seem-ingly invincible emperor or king. In the second Century B.C.E. most Jews considered the Hasmoneans the agents of God and the Romans their allies and friends."' The successes of the early Hasmoneans or Maccabees left no vacuum in which to yearn for the coming of a Messiah. THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS The other body of early Jewish literature that contains explicit references to "Messiah" or "Christ" is the Dead Sea Scrolls. The discussions of this as-pect in the Scrolls is so well published and known that some refer to a con-sensus:^^ At Qumran the belief in the Davidic Messiah was joined with, and
made subordinate to, the behef in an Aaronic Messiah. The excesses and failures of the Hasmonean ruler (later called "king") in Jerusalem led the Qumranites to yearn for the coming of a priestly messiah. This thought seems a natural development, since the earliest Qumran Essenes were priests who had been expelled from the Temple and lived in exile in the Judean desert near the Dead Sea. At the present time I intend to modily this consensus in five significant ways. First, we now have well over 170 documents that probably were cre­ated, written, or redacted at Qumran. Most of them do not contain the noun "Messiah." Often this Omission is startling, if the Qumran Community was a messianic group. In addition to the Psalters 150 Psalms of David, other Davidic psalms were found, and some of these were intentionally written as Davidic Pseudepigrapha. Not one of them is messianic. None of the Pesh-arim contains messianic exegesis.'"" The Isaiah Pesher 1 (4Q161) makes only a frustratingly brief reference to the Branch of David which shall arise at the end of days. The Temple Scroll, which may have been brought to Qumran from elsewhere and edited in a final form in the scriptorium, does not con­tain one reference to the "Messiah." The fact seems Strange in a document that is characterized by a tendency to subordinate the king to the priest. Since a reference to the "Messiah" is found in the psalmbook attributed to Solomon, why is there no mention of "Messiah" in the Qumran Psalter, namely the Hodayoth or Hymns Scroll?'' Statistically we must admit that messianology was not a major concern of this Community, at least not in its early history. The terminus technicus for the eschatological Messiah, n''M, except for the obscure reference in the fragment of the Patriarchal Blessings (4QPBless), occurs in only three docu­ments: IQS, IQSa,™ and CD (which probably was brought to Qumran and redacted there). It seems that less than 3 percent of the Qumran documents contain the word n'tt^a.

 

22 THE MESSIAH 64. For a discussion of kingship and the Hasmoneans, see M. Hengel, J. H. Charlesworth, D. Mendels, "The Polemical Character of'On Kingship' in the Temple Scroll: An Attempt at Dating UQTemple,"7;S 37.1 (1986) 28-38. 65. I have tried to choose my words carefully I have not insinuated that because no functions are described the Messiah is to be functionless. That exegesis is patently absurd. The Jew knew that God alone could explain the functions of the Messiah or of other mediators. 66. See E. Fruenwald's article on the concept of eschatology and messianology in Judaism, published in The Messianic Idea in Jewish Thought (Pubhcations of the Israel Academy of Sci­ences and Humanities; Jerusalem, 1982) [in Hebrew]. 67. See the excellent study by M. E. Stone: "The Concept of the Messiah in IV Ezra," in Religions in Antiquity: Essays in Memory of Erwin Ramsdell Coodenough, ed. J. Neusner (Stud­ies in the History of Religions: Supplements to Sumen 14: Leiden, 1970), pp. 295-312,  

68. In the following pages I will attempt to show that "advent" is meant here and not as­cension. 69. Potentially misleading is the following comment by R. J. Werblowsky; "One may, perhaps, commit a technical anachronism and describe as "messianic' those scriptural passages that prophesy a future golden age, the ingathering of the exiles, the restoration of the Davidic dy­nasty, the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the Temple, the era of peace when the wolf will lie down with the lamb, and so on." See Werblowsky "Messianism; Jewish Messianism" in The Encijcl -pedia of Religion, ed. M. Eliade (New York, 1987), vol. 9, p. 472. 

70. Why this "man" should be identified with the Messiah is because 4 Ezra was compiled or composed by one person, "man" corresponds with the perception of the "Messiah" in 4Ezra 11 and 12, and what is said about him links up with the other passages in which the noun "Messiah" appears. See Charlesworth, "The MessisJi in the Pseudepigrapha," in ANRW 11.19.1, p. 205. The Latin text of 4Ezra is from A. F. J. Klijn, ed.. Der Lateinische Text der Apokalypse des Esra (Texte und Untersuchungen 131; Berlin, 1983). 71. See Charlesworth, "The Triumphant Majority as Seen by a Dwindled Minority: The Out­sider According to the Insider of the Jewish Apocalypses, 70-130," in To See Ourselves As Oth­ers See Us, cd. J. Neusner, et al. (Chico, Calif, 19S5), pp. 285-315. 

72. See the paper presented in the Symposium by L. Schiffman. We both are critical of the so-called consensus, emphasize the diversity of thought at Qumran and the minimal role given to the Messiah in the few passages in which he is mentioned. These conclusions were obviously derived independently. We had access to each other's paper only after our own work was com­pleted. Also, see the important earlier publication by A. S. van der Woude, Die messianischen Vorstellungen der Gemeinde von Qumran (Assen, 1957). Good bibliographical data for Qumran messianology are found in G. Kittel's TDNT vol. 9 under chriö and in E.-M Laperrousaz, L'at-tente du messie en Palestine ä la veille et au dihut de l'ere chretienne (CoUection Empreinte Dirigee par Henry Hierche; Paris, 1982). 

 73. See Charlesworth, "The Origin and Subsequent History of the Authors of the Dead Sea ScroUs: Four Transitional Phases Among the Qumran Essenes," 38 (1980) 213-33.  

74. See the similar comments by Schiffman in this volume. 

 75. D. Dimant correctly reports that the role of the messianic figures in the Dead Sea Scrolls "is not always clear, and some of the texts, like the Hodayot, lack reference to the Messiah altogether, even though they contain elaborate eschatological depictions." D. Dimant, "Qumran Sectarian Literature," in Jewish Writings of the Second Temple Period, ed. M. E. Stone (Com­pendia Rerum ludaicarum ad Novum Testamentum 2.2; Assen, Philadelphia, 1984), p. 539. 76. IQSb states that the Prince of the Congregation wiU disperse justice on behalf of the afflictcd. The exegesis of this statement is f;ir from clear.

 

Second, all work on the theology of the Dead Sea Scrolls is confused if it does not allow for diversity and development in the Community" We must acknowledge these two factors because of the increased variety in the Com­munity as attested by the successive archaeological expansions or alterations, and the discovery of a Pharisaic-type of phylactery in the caves, beginning with the first Century B.C.E. Diversity and development is also reflected in the redactions and additions to texts, in the sheer length of time the Qumran Essenes hved at or near Qumran (from c. 150 B.C.E. to 68 C.E.), and by the variety of thought among the Scrolls.™ Third, at Qumran some fragments raise interesting questions. What is the original meaning of 4Q Florilegium? According to this fragment, the Qum­ran Essenes interpreted the prophecy of Nathan to David, so that the refer­ence is transferred to David's descendant, and probably to the Messiah. Na­than told David that God had said, "1 will be his father, he shall be my son" (see 2Sam 7:14). The Interpretation of this fragment is not clear; but it may preserve the concept, well known from Psalm 2 and 4 Ezra, that the future king will be God's son. According to this fragment, the future "branch of David" shall Interpret the Law, save Israel, and rule in Zion at the endtime. V/hat is highly significant for us now is the recognition of a possibly messianic passage in which the king is not subordinated to the priest. According to 4Q Florilegium there are not two messiahs. Likewise, in the Patriarchal Blessings (4QPBless) the "Messiah of Righ-teousness" will be of the branch of David. He apparently will renew the covenant through something like kingship. Fourth, perhaps the most excitement for our discussion comes from the discovery of a fragmentary copy of what seems to be the earliest version of the Rule of the Community. The renowned Qumran expert J. T. MiHk claims that he has identified the earliest copy of the Rule, and that it does not con­tain the famous passage in which the hvo messiahs are mentioned."' The earliest form of the Rule of the Community ostensibly does not contain a reference to one or two messiahs.*" This conclusion, however, is not possible. Larry Schiffman has found and examined the fragment that Mihk claimed was the earliest copy of the rule and which did not contain the locus classicus for the "Messiah." The fragment is in fact two fragments of the Rule of the Community; and they were incor­rectly stuck together in the fifties. VVe should seriously contemplate the possibihty that the earliest phases of the Qumran Community were not messianic." In fact, that is precisely what I wish to suggest. The Righteous Teacher, who led the priests from the Temple into the wilderness, may not have beheved in a future Messiah. The recently published portions of 4QMVIT disclose a letter dating from around 150 B.C.E. The letter may not necessarily have been composed by the Righ­teous Teacher, as J. Strugnell and E. Qimron have argued, but it certainly was written either by him or by one of his gifted cohorts."^ What is important for US is the recognition that it was written to discuss halakoth, religious rules, and not messianology. Likewise, the Hodayoth probably contains psalms composed by the Righteous Teacher, but none of them is messianic. This new perception is in line with my contention that the earliest explicit reference to "the Messiah," according to the documents collected into the Pseudepigrapha, was in the first Century B.C.E. IQS, the only füll copy of the Rule of the Community, was copied in the early decades of the first Cen­tury B.C.E. IQSa and CD also date from the first Century B.C.E. If we are seeking to discern the first use of "Messiah" to designate an eschatological figure in Jewish theology, these documents point us only to the first Century B.C.E., and probably to the period 100-50. In seeking to learn the functions of the Anointed One or Ones, Messiah or Messiahs, we shall unfortunately learn very little from IQS or CD. Each only refers to "the Anointed Ones (or Messiahs) of Aaron and Israel" or "the Anointed (or Messiah) of Aaron and Israel." The reference is to the future appearance of one, or two, who is (are) the Anointed One(s). No descriptions or functions are presented to us. While some passages in CD do seem to associate future actions with the appearance of the Anointed One(s), no func­tions are portrayed as being performed by the Anointed One(s) or the Mes­siah. Only two passages seem significant. CD 14.19 states that when the Anointed of Aaron and Israel arises he will (probably) expiate the iniquity of the Covenanters (= Essenes). CD 19.10 (= Bl) records the idea that those who do not belong to the members of the Covenant (= Essenes) will be put to the sword when "the Anointed of Aaron and Israel comes." We can only ask, does that mean that the Anointed One will use the sword? According to IQSa 2.12, there is a reference to the seating arrangements in the Council of the Community and the Instructions for beginning a meal when the Messiah of Aaron and the Messiah of Israel are present. Again we are left without answers to our questions. Is it possible that the ambiguity is intentional? I think the answer is probably yes. Fifth, in discussing the Qumran Scrolls we now should not refer to the thoughts of one insignificant group of monks living in the desert. The con­sensus is that this Community is related to a much larger group, the Essenes, most of whom, if we can trust the reports of Josephus and Philo, lived some-where besides Qumran, The archaeological work on the southwest corner of present Old Jerusalem has unearthed ancient, probably first-century, mikvaoth (small, carefully constructed cisterns for ritualistic purification) and a first-century small gate. Many fine scholars have become convinced that Essenes lived in the southwestern section of Jerusalem, and that the tiny gate unearthed is the Essene gate mentioned in Josephus and in the Temple Scroll.« Evidence of Essenes living elswhere in Palestine, or at least similar groups, is disclosed by the most recent work on the texts, especially the biblical scrolls found at Qumran. These represent more than six text-types and are divided into two major groups by Professor Emanuel Tov, one of the leading experts on the Qumran biblical texts.*'' One category has scribal characteristics identified with the scrolls known to be composed at Qumran. The other category does not possess these scribal features, and the biblical scrolls in it were probably composed elsewhere, but certainly not necessar­ily in "Essene" groups. All these observations prompt me to think about Essenes living in various places in Palestine; after approximately 63 B.C.E., when the Romans entered Jerusalem, and some of them probably held some type of messianology. The complexity of messianic ideas, the lack of a coherent messianology among the documents in the Pseudepigrapha and among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the frequently contradictory messianic predictions prohibit any­thing approximating coherency in early Jewish messianology.*' If we were statisticians, we might conclude that we should ignore Jewish messianic ref­erences because they are so meager, and when present so vague or contra­dictory. There is no smooth transition from messianology to christology. ADDED COMPLEXITY To this insight let me add four suggestions. First, two passages in the Pseudepigrapha refer to the return of the Messiah. The distinguished pio-neer in the study of the Pseudepigrapha, R. H. Charles, argued that 2Bar 30:1 referred to the return of the Messiah into heaven after the end of his responsibilities on earth. Here is his translation: And it shall come to pass after these things, when the time of the advent of the Messiah is fulfilled, that He shall return in glory.*"* Charles added this footnote: "This seems to mean that after His reign the Messiah will return in glory to heaven." I am convinced that Charles has misunderstood this verse. A better translation seems to be the following:

And it will happen after these things when the time of the appearance of the Messiah has been fulfilled and he returns with glory. . . .  87

 

77. The nouns msyhw in CD 1.12 and bmsyhv; in CD 6.12 refer to "his anointed," and "by his anointed," but both of these comments denote God's prophets. In IQSa 2.12 the context centers on the Instructions for beginning a meal and the seating arrangements in the Council of the Community with the arrival of the Messiah of Israel—there is no clear reference to "the Messiah of Aaron." 78. An excellent monograph on the theology of Qumran, which does indeed incorporate di­versity at Qumran, is H. Lichtenberger's Studien zum Menschenbild in Texten der Qumrange-meinde SUNT 15; Göttingen, 1980). 79. J. T. Mihk, in his review of P. Wernberg-M0ller's The Manual of Discipline Translated and Annotated, with an Introduction, in RB 67 (1960) 411. Also, see Charlesworth, Judaisms and Their Messiahs, pp. 232-33. 80. It is distressing that this fact was announced in a book review many years ago, but that the fragment is still not available to scholars. See the comments on this fragment by Schiffman. 

8L Caquot astutely observes that the early Maccabean crisis did not cause Jews to iook for the Coming of the Messiah. I am in füll agreement with Caquot that messianology developed in the Qumran Community after John Hyrcanus. Note his keen insights: "A l'epoque meme de Jean Hyrcan, si l'on se fie ä la datation maintenant proposee pour le plus ancien rouleau de la Regle (4QSe), le messianisme essenien est encore dans les limbes puisque la phrase du rouleau de la grotte I (IQS 9, II) '. . . jusqua la venue du prophete et des messies d'Aaron et d'Israel' n'y figure pas." See his "Le messianisme qumränien," in Qumrön, p. 237. Laperrousaz is criti­cal of basing so much on paleographical dating of a fragment. See his Lattente du messie en Pal­estin, p. 82. 82. For bibliography and a photograph see Charlesworth, Jesus Within Judaism. 

83. See the chapter by R. Riesner in Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls, ed. Charlesworth, forth-coming. 84. E. Tov shared these insights in Jerusalem during a celebration of the fortieth anniversary of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in July 1977. 85. Werblowsky contends that "Messiah" ultimately in Early Judaism "acquired the connota-tion of a savior or redeemer who would appear at the end of days and usher in the kingdom of God, the restoration of Israel, or whatever dispensation was considered to be the ideal State of the world." See his "Messianism: Jewish Messianism," in The Encyclopedia of Religion, vol. 9, p. 472. The caution in referring to a description of the "ideal State of the world" in the future is J. H. CHARLESWORTH 29 admirable, but it is not balanced by a similar circumspection in referring to the functions of the Messiah to "usher in the kingdom of God," and to "the end of days." The too systematic definition falls to note that in many texts no functions are attributed to the Messiah, and that his appear­ance is not always clearly eschatological. 86. R. H. Charles in The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English (Oxford, 1913), vol. 2, p. 498. 87. For further discussion, see Charlesworth, Judaisms and Their Messiahs, pp. 246-47. 88. "Dass die Rückkehr des Messias in Herrlichkeit 30:1 wahrscheinlich ein christHcher Ge­danke ist. . . ." P. Volz, Die Eschatologie der jüdischen Gemeinde im neutestamentlichen Zei­talter (Tübingen, 1934), p. 179; see also his comments on pp. 43 and 44. 89. If the (or that) Son of Man is identified with the Messiah, in some passages in lEn 37-71, then these references to the preexistence of the Son of Man need to be mentioned. In his paper in this coUection, VanderKam rightly argues that the Son of Man is identified with the Messiah by the Enoch group, and that the statement that the Messiah is hidden does not necessarily mean that he is preexistent. Sometimes, however, the preexistence of the Son of Man, Messiah, seems clear in lEn 37-71: "At that hour, that Son of Man was given a name, in the presence of the Lord of the Spirits, the Before-Time, even before the creation of the sun and the moon, before the creation of the star, he was given a name in the presence of the Lord of the Spirits" (lEn 48:2-3, trans. by Isaac in OTP).     

 2 Baruch 30:1 seems to refer to the preexistence of the Messiah, and it is not a Christian passage, as P. Volz contended.«* As we have already seen, many early Jews thought that the Messiah, like Melchisedek according to the end of 2 Enoch, was preserved by God in a secret place (see esp. lEn 46:1-2, 48:2-3, 62:7; 4Ezra 7:28-29,'l2:31-34, 13:26).«' Notice the excellent trans­lation of 4 Ezra 13:25-26 by Professor Bruce M. Metzger: 

As for your seeing a man come up from the heart of the sea, this is he whom the Most High has been keeping for many ages. This passage seems parallel to the Jewish idea that the Messiah was taken from paradise, after the fall of Adam and Eve, and is protected by God until the end of time. VVe have ample documentary evidence for this Jewish be­lief" and it is similar to the preservation of other biblical heroes, most no­tably Melchisedek, Enoch, and Elijah. In 1 Enoch 48 we are told that the Son of Man "was concealed" with the Lord of the Spirits before the creation of the world (lEn 48:6). If the Messiah had been in Paradise, here on the earth, he can be said to return to the earth with glory, as in 2Bar 30:1. This idea also seems to be found in the Greek text of the Psalms of Sol­omon:  

May God cleanse Israel in the day of mercy and blessing. In the day of election when he brings back his Messiah. (PssSol 18:5)

The Greek verb (avd|Ei) can mean "lift up," but here it probably means "to bring back." The author was referring either to the return of an anointed one like David or, as seems more probable, to the return of the Messiah, who is like the wonderful King David. If some Jews held a belief in the return of the Messiah, then we have an important foundation for the Christian belief in the parousia of Jesus. At this point messianology flows into christology. My first Suggestion is that we consider that some early Jews contemplated the return of the Messiah. The second Suggestion pertains to the transfer-ence of messianic functions from God to the Messiah and then back again to God. In the theologies of ancient Israel much attention was given to God as the actor or savior of Israel. During the late exilic period many of the activi-ties reserved for God were transferred to his messengers and angels. By the first Century B.C.E. the Messiah was thought by some Jews to perform the actions formerly attributed to God. He would save Israel. He would judge the nations and Israel. Now, I wish to suggest that in some segments of early Jewish theology there seems to be a reaction against messianology. What some Jews had at­tributed to the Messiah was now retransferred by others back to God. This retransference would be demanded under the force of a thoroughgoing monotheism. We saw an example of this phenomenon in the Psalms of Solo­mon 17 and 18, with the final stress put upon the belief that God, not the Messiah, is the king; "The Lord himself is our king forevermore." God is the Lord of the Messiah. The Messiah is God's; he belongs to God. He is the Lord's Messiah (christou autou). 

My third Suggestion is that we no longer hold fervently to the contention that messianic titles were not related to each other by some early Jews. We Professors have been taught and have taught that "the Son of Man" is a term or title that is to be distinguished from the term or title Messiah. Now, with the recognition that the Parables of Enoch are clearly Jewish, Palestinian, and probably pre-70, we should rethink this assumption. Is it possible "that Son of Man" (lEn 48), who is concealed before the Lord of the Spirits (48:6), is implicitly identified with the Lord of the Spirits' Messiah (48:10)? I am now impressed with the similar functions attributed in the Parables of Enoch to three eschatological figures, namely the "Messiah," "that Son of Man," "The Elect One," and "the Righteous One."'^ My fourth and final Suggestion is that we now contemplate the ways Jews debated, even argued, vwth each other over messianology. Some believed in the Coming of the Messiah, others did not. Some feit the need to attribute certain functions to the Messiah, others preferred to leave such guidelines up to the sovereignty of God. There was probably a backlash against exces-sive messianology; perhaps some Jews believed the monotheism of Judaism was undermined, or that the integrity and future of Judaism was threatened by the excessive ideology of the militantly zealous messianic Jews (some of whom were offensive in numerous ways to many Jews). Perhaps this factor explains why there is no mention of the Messiah in Pseudo-Philo, as we would expect in light of the celebration of David, and in the Testament of Moses, in light of the conquest theme. Each of these pseudepigrapha were composed in the first half of the first Century C.E. Earlier we asked if Jewish messianism could be isolated in or attributed to known groups in Early Judaism. We have seen that messianology crossed numerous social and economic boundaries. CONCLUSION We have seen why it is impossible to define, and difficult to describe the messianology of the early Jews.'^ There is no discernible development in messianic beliefs from the first Century B.C.E. to the first Century C.E. Some Jewish writings in the first Century C.E. before 70—namely Pseudo-Philo and the Testament of Moses—show little interest in messianology and seem even to be antimessianic. The traditions in 4 Ezra, 2 Baruch, and the New Testament documents preserve a totally different picture. The simplest ex-planation of the reason for this significant difiference is to appeal to Josephus' antimessianism and to the effects of the Great War against Rome of 66-73/74 placing the alleged antimessianic documents after it and the promes-sianic documents before it. That Solution is at once simplistic and unthink-able. Fortunately the documents are collected in precisely the opposite way from what historiography would expect, waming us against a too facile and positivistic relation between documents and history. These comments put into perspective some of the limitations of the pres­ent study. At the outset I admitted that virtually our only vehicle for learning about the messianism of the early Jews is their own literature; but the docu­ments do not lead us back to the mind of all early Jews, are only a portion of the writings circulating at that time, and may not adequately represent the swirling and living dimensions of oral traditions, not all of which were sacred or torah she-be^al peh. While, for example, we find virtually no literary evidence for the Jewish belief in a militant Messiah in Philo** or other pre-70 authors, it is neverthe-less conceivable that numerous and influential Jews, not necessarily scribes, rabbis, and Temple authorities, believed that God would free his enslaved elect ones by means of a warrior-Messiah.'' Perhaps the possible polemic against militant messianism in the Psalms of Solomon, mentioned earlier, is a Window through which to see some of these "populär" beliefs. Similarly Schäfer does not find any numismatic or literary evidence that Bar Kokhba desired or planned to rebuild the Temple and restore the cult;'« but some Jews probably expected the revolt to be successful and to culmi-nate in the restoration of the Temple cult, It is conceivable that such ideas are confronted in the Apocalypse of Abraham,'^ and that 2 Baruch, which is contemporaneous with that apocalypse and was probably written a few dec­ades prior to the revolt of 132-135 C.E., polemizes against such restoration by stressing the centrahty of Torah.'* Both apocalypses in different ways, therefore, may provide evidence of Jewish expectations that the cult will be restored. Polemics may reveal a possible grass roots expectation of a restored Temple.

 

90. B. M. Metzger in OTP, vol. 1, p. 552. 91. See L. Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, 7 vols. (Philadelphia, 1909-28; repr. more than once). See vol. 1, p. 22; vol. 5, p. 33 ("On the whole, the Messiah plays an important part in this description of the life of the pious in paradise.") vol. 6, p. 351 ("The "Messiah, the son of David' likewise entered paradise alive, and awaits there 'his time.'"). The textua! evidence for this concept is admittedly post-70 c. li.; but it is conceivaljle that the tradition is pre-70. 

92. It is important to note that this idea is not novel. Virtually the same conclusion was ob­tained by J. Theisohn, Der auserwählte Richter: Untersuchungen zum traditionsgeschichtlichen Ort des Menschensohngestalt der Bilderreder des Äthiopischen Henoch (SUNT 12; Göttingen, 1975). Also, see Charlesworth, Judaisms and Their Messiahs, pp. 237-41; VanderKam's paper in this coUection; G. W. E. Nickelsburg's insightful comments in Jewish Literature Between the Bible and the Mishnah: A Historical and Literary Introduction (Philadelphia, 1981) p. 223; and A. Pinero, "Libro 1 de Henoc [et y gr)," in Apocrifos del Antiquo Testamento, ed. A. Diez Macho, etal. (Madrid, 1984) vol. 4, p. 23. 93. There is no Script that the .\Iessiah is to act out. There is no clear, widely accepted Jewish description of the Messiah. The references to him are often frustratingly vague and imprecise; they are the opposite of the post eventum messianic pseudepigraphon composed by N'athan, the "prophet' (if the false .Messiah Sabbati Sevi: "BehokI u son will be born to Mordecai Sevi in the year 5386 [1626 C.E.] and he will be called Sabbatai Sevi. He will. . . be the true messiah." See G. Scholem, Sabbati Sevi: The Mystical Messiah 1626-1676, trans. R. J. Zwi Werblowsky (Bol­lingen Series 93; Princeton, 1973,1975), p, 225. 94. See the learned and careful study in this coUection by Borgen. 95. The War Scroll (IQM) comes to mind, but it is not a messianic document. 96. R Schäfer, Der Bar Kokhba-Aufstand, p. 100. 97. See J. R. Mueller, "The Apocalypse of Abraham and the Destruction of the Second Jew­ish Temple," in Society of Biblical Literature: 1982 Seminar Papers, ed. K. H. Richards (Chico, Calif., 1982) pp. 341-49; see esp. p. 347; The author of the ApAb, as "seen from the quotation of 25:4-6" puts "heavy emphasis" on the cult; "future redemption will bring about a renewal of proper cultic practices (19:18)." 

 

Messianology and One Dimension ofNew Testament Study New Testament scholars have spent this Century struggling with the prob­lem of the so-called messianic secret in Mark." Mark, and surely Matthew, believed that Jesus should be recognized as the Messiah.'"" The problem arises with the recognition that Jesus, according to Mark, does not proclaim that he is the Messiah, does not accept Peter's confession at Caesarea Phi-lippi, and repeatedly Orders those who comprehend who he is to keep this understanding secret. The problem was caused, of course, by Mark's own social setting and theology; but certainly more must be said to comprehend the complexities involved. To a certain extent the problem appeared because Mark was work-ing with some nonmessianic Jesus traditions. The problem, however, arose primarily because the Jesus traditions were swept forward by Jews who fer­vently claimed that he was the Messiah but had to struggle against a Jewish background that did not specify what such a declaration meant, and also— and more importantly—did not allow for a crucified "Messiah" and cau­tioned against any human declaration that a man was, or had been, the Mes­siah. The polemical setting of the debate among Jews rejecting Jesus and Jews affirming Jesus is, moreover, an essential sociological perspective to be stressed. Maybe the claim that Jesus was the Messiah was offensive because of the fact that he had been crucified. Perhaps the proclamation that Jesus was the Messiah was not so offensive as the excessive, unsupported, and preposterous claim that one who had been crucified was still alive and res­urrected. Maybe the offense came at the obsession Jesus' followers had with their very own teacher, whom they exalted as both Messiah and Lord, and their apparent rejection of or shockingly peculiar interpretation of scrip­ture. Perhaps the offense came from the social strains caused by the mission-ary zeal of Jesus' aggressive followers. These are complex issues; they help us grasp that messianology does not easily flow into christology. Paul knew this and referred to the stumbling block of faith. Why did Jesus' earliest followers hail him as "the Messiah"? No other title would have been so difficult to align with the life and thought of Jesus of Nazareth. What prompted them to articulate their unique faith in Jesus with this title? These observations and questions lead us to William Wrede's The Mes­sianic Secret. In light of our research it is seen to be füll of numerous errors. First he assumed incorrectly that the Jews of Jesus' time held one idea con­cerning the Coming of the Messiah. He wrote that Jesus had trouble with his disciples, because "the people and the disciples, it is said, did not have his idea of the Messiah but the Jewish, that is a political, one."'°' For Wrede the Jews held to the belief that the Messiah would be "political, patriotic and revolutionary" (p. 221). Second, Wrede was amazingly ignorant of Jewish sources, referring to the concept of a hidden Messiah by citing only Justin Martyr and the Gospel of John, and bypassing the classic references to this idea in such works as 4 Ezra. Nowhere does he refer to the messianology found in the Psalms of Solomon, 1 Enoch, 4 Ezra, and 2 Baruch. It was unfortunately typical of his time for a New Testament scholar to study Greek thought and religion, and to ignore the detailed and fruitful research of such contemporaries as Kautzsch and Charles. Third, he assumed that almost all Jews were looking for the coming of a Messiah. He claimed that the "expectation of a Messiah was in the air. Men's minds were everywhere füll of it" (p. 30). We have seen the fallacy in that assumption. Fourth, his sources for Jewish beliefs were the New Testament records. After writing the words just quoted, he stated the following: "This is cer­tainly the impression created by the Gospels, and they are given credence for it in this matter" (p. 30). Likewise, much later, he claims, "Thus Luke attributes to the disciples as Jews an expectation of the Messiah which we may when all is said describe as national and political" (p. 171). Fifth, his work is sadly anti-Semitic or better anti-Jewish. Note these words: ". . . Jesus is hinting at his passion in order to cleanse the disciples' messianic belief from Jewish Sediment" (p. 15). We confront in these words the perennial attempt to remove Jesus and his followers from their Jewish­ness and from Judaism. To turn to Wrede's work to illustrate some of the problems in New Testa­ment research is not to pick on some scholar recognized as dated. Wrede's work is hailed as a classic and many New Testament theologians affirm that he wrote a masterpiece. For example, Professor Norman Perrin, in one of his last plenary addresses before the Society of Biblical Literature prophesied that the Wredestrasse had become the Hauptstrasse (the Wrede-street had become the main-highway).'"-Summanj. The major conclusions of this study may be summarized as follows: (1) Jewish messianology e.xploded into the history of ideas in the early first Century B.C.E., and not earlier, because of the degeneration in the Hasmonean dynasty and the claim of the final ruling Hasmoneans, especially Alexander Jannaeus, to be "the king," and because of the loss of the land promised as Israels inheritance to the gentile and idolatrous nation Rome. (2) Jews did not profess a coherent and normative messianology. (3) New Testament scholars must read and attempt to master all the early Jewish writ­ings; there is much to admire about the genius of early Jewish theology. The Jewish social and ideological contexts of Christian origins are not the back­ground for, but the foreground of Jesus and his earliest followers. (4) One can no longer claim that most Jews were looking for the Coming of the Mes­siah. (5) The gospels and Paul must not be read as if they are reliable sources for pre-70 Jewish beliefs in the Messiah. VVe have seen that it is not easy to describe the messianology of pre-70 Jews. VVe have been left with numerous questions, most notably this one: Why did Jesus' followers claim above all that he was the Messiah?

 

101. Wrede, The Messianic Secret (the preface to the original German work is dated 1901). This is not a recent book, as some might assume from the English translation of 19TI

102. N. Perrin, "The Wredestrasse Becomes the Hauptstrasse: Refiections on the Preprinting of the Dodd Festschrift," Journal of Religion 46 (1966) 297-98. Also see C. R. .Mercer. Nonnan Perrin's Interpretation of the New Testament (Studies in American Biblical Hermeneutics 2; Macon, Ca.. 1986), see esp. pp. 23-24.