The Messiah Conundrum

"...[T]he doctrine of the Messiah means that human history will find its fulfillment, on this earth, that there is 'an end of days' in which injustice will be abolished and wrongs put right for all humanity here on earth. If it be asked, why this should be necessary since the individual soul will enjoy its bliss of nearness to God in the Hereafter, the traditional Jewish answer, is that God has His plan for the whole of human society here on earth, and that every good deed will be rewarded not in Heaven but by paving the way toward the messianic future of total goodness." Louis Jacobs, The Book of Jewish Belief


I have always struggled with the concept of Messiah, this idea that somehow all of creation is elevated out of despair and suffering by divine intervention in the form of a human being. I'm not speaking here of the Christian concept of divine incarnation; I surrendered that belief years ago, long before I began to realize that Christianity unravels without a Jesus-mask fixed firmly on the face of God. But, even what I am reading of the different Jewish traditions about the Messiah would have left me feeling a bit cold if not for the encouragement to ask questions and explore doubts.


What I have kept from my explorations of Buddhism is the idea that enlightenment/spiritual evolution/metamorphosis on the macro-level (out in the world) occurs and is fully represented on the micro-level (in the heart of the individual). That idea isn't unique to Buddhism. Gandhi - a practicing Vaishnava Hindu - perhaps summed it up best when he encouraged his followers to "be the change you want to see in the world." But, we can see this sentiment echoed in many different mystical religious traditions, including (from what I have seen thus far) the different strands of Judaism. But without a link between belief and practice, there seems to me a danger of anticipating the Messianic Age at the cost of committing oneself fully to engagement with the here and now. This does not mean that I shy away from hoping in a future world scrubbed clean of violence, injustice, hatred, and fear. But, I do maintain that balancing our spiritual practice between prayer and action is an essential step in clearing the path for world renewal that begins with personal transformation.


Let's pull back a little a bring this down into more tangible elements. Rabbi David A. Cooper (God is a Verb) adds valuable nuance to the conversation: "The Lurianic approach is that the messiah comes through the continuous preparation of humans who constantly raise holy sparks until the world ultimately attains a higher consciousness. At that time the appearance of a being who embodies all of the characteristics of a messiah will be the result of this new awareness rather than its herald. ...The old model of the messiah suggests that a savior will come in one of two ways: the world will be primed, or the world will be so debased that it will be on the edge of total collapse. In either instance, the messiah is the hope for the future." This is a beautiful vision of the future restoration of peace and the healing of creation, something to give us hope in the promise of a better tomorrow. It is very easy to be lulled into a blissful slumber while meditating on this sublime vision. 


This, in my opinion, has been the single greatest failure of the vast majority of Christian churches: the investment of energies into longing for the New Heaven and the New Earth at the cost of acting in the present to ease suffering, combat injustice, and live peacefully. At the heart of the future-centered spirituality is a denial of responsibility for the present circumstances that threaten the survival of not only massive portions of the human population, but of the whole of entire species of animal life. Both the human being and animal alike are dependent upon resources and ecological balance that have suffered or could soon suffer total ruin because of a refusal of some societies to live into the B'reishit commandment to care for the land. Of course, this is just one of many examples of how some religious peoples (of every tradition) have neglected observance of commandments to maintain a focus on acting upon wrongs in the present because of an imbalanced hope placed in the promise of a divine future rescue.


Cooper continues, "When we imagine the presence of the messiah, typically we think about things like more lovingkindness, great gentleness, pure calmness, extraordinary peacefulness, deep understanding, infinite caring, enormous sympathy, and so forth. The presence of the messiah is a dream hidden in all of our hearts. The question we must ask ourselves, however, is this: 'What are we waiting for?' The new paradigm suggests that while waiting for something to happen, we are unbalanced, constantly 'leaning into the future.' Whenever we dwell on the future, we miss what is happening right now. As Rabbi Zera indicated, whenever we conjecture about the coming of the messiah, we are drawn away from the essential element required for messianic consciousness, which is to be fully present in the here and now."


I certainly do not want to discourage hopefulness in the promise of a better reality that each of us longs for amidst the turmoil and instability that inevitably creeps into our lives. It is an undeniable truth that we live in troubling times: national economic woes erupt into our psyches as generalized anxiety; the crumbling of family life in our society causes us to question investments in relationships; random violence and the spewing of hatred over broadcast airwaves feeds our fears and threatens to overwhelm us with hopelessness. It is easy to run toward the very welcoming refuge of a messianic figure who will cast aside these traumas. But perhaps, instead of investing so much into hoping for the divine rescue, we are to be engaged in preparing the path for a messianic age through our own acts of benevolence in the world. 


I don't claim to have any answers. Maybe the promise of Zionism as the gateway of human redemption is the best hope for humanity. Maybe the dawning of a Messianic Age is what we should anticipate rather than the emergence of a single figure who will cast away the shadows of despair. Then again, maybe the orthodox view of a reestablished Davidic kingdom is the once and future anchor of creation's renewal. One thing, however, is certain: we live in the only time in which we can have an impact on our own reality and on that of those who share the planet with us; we live in the present. It is in the present where our deeds can be planted as seeds to yield a future fruit. It is in the present where our commitments to peace and justice lay the foundations for a future of greater civility in the world. It is in the present where our prayers and meditations are uttered and practiced, loosening the blinders from our eyes to see hope amidst despair and the spark of new life in the ashes of death.