Aaronic v. Davidic Messiah
Offline I don't know if this is the right place for this but...
In BenfromCanada's thread, "I disprove Christianity in 3 words" (http://www.rationalresponders.com/forum/sapient/atheist_vs_theist/6814#new)
the topic has wandered into messianic prophecy and how Jesus does/doesn't fulfill it.
This reminded me of something that I remembered seeing a while back about the Jews looking for two Messiahs, Aaronic and Davidic. The Aaronic Messiah was to be the high priest and the Davidic Messiah was to be the political leader. the explanation I was given for why the Jews refused Jesus was because they were looking for him to be the Davidic Messiah and he was the AAronic Messiah.
Paul then confused the issue by fusing both Messiah's into his Christ-concept. Since Paul's work was accepted into the canon with the gospels, it wasn't hard for the Christians to posit a connection between Paul's Christ and Jesus.
Any thoughts (from either side of the aisle)?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
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I ASSUME that by Davidic you mean a political savior, and by Aaronic you mean a metaphysical savior.
The Jews were actively looking for a messiah. The prophesy from Daniel with 70 weeks of years predicted the messiah's birth to the year. As that Israel was under Roman rule when the weeks of years closed, they took their history of the bondage-freedom cycle and assumed that the messiah would save them from Rome. It is important to point out that, given the history of Israel, this was a reasonable assumption. Also, the messiah was prophesied to be from Judah (the line of David, to be specific) whereas a metaphysical savior would have been expected to be a Levite (Aaron)
BUT this view of the messiah neglected the prophesies in Isahiah that said the messiah would suffer to redeem His people. Ignoring this is also understandable because Roman rule wasn't popular.
As that Jesus was from Judah and not a Levite, he both fulfilled the prophesies and ended the Old Testament Preisthood succession in one move.
There never was any confusion on what was going on by the part of the sender. The reciever got confused by trying to fix the passages to stir insurrection against Rome.
NOTE: As that the messiah was expected to come at the time Jesus showed up, there were many "false messiahs" leading zealots around. Barrabas (in the crucifiction) is suspected to have been one of these and there are several others listed (both with and without names) in the Gospels. This also explains why the people wanted Barrabas released and Jesus Crucified. Jesus had come as the messiah and had not thrown Roman rule, Barrabas had tried and failed.
PS: I know this is going to be called a "fairy tale" by someone. Please be so kind as to realize that my position does not need to be consistant with anyone else's, it just has to be internally consistant.
"Truth is the cry of all, but the game of the few." George Berkeley
"Truth is always strange — stranger than fiction." Lord Byron
Fixing the world, one dumb idea at a time.
As far as I understood, there was even suspicion of three messiahs, a priest, a king, and a warrior. I'm not sure where the assertion that Paul wrongly combined them is rooted, though. Could you explain your reasoning, jcgadfly?
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence
I was trying to say that Paul combined the Aaronic and Davidic messiah beliefs into his Christ concept to sell it as the "real" Messiah. And yes, I think that Paul's Christ is a different one than the Jesus of Nazareth of the Gospels (I don't have any fancy proof of it - just my reading of the Scripture.
I didn't mean to imply it was wrongly or rightly done.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
My understanding was that both messiahs were understood as physical beings. The Aaronic (priestly) messiah concerned himself with the spiritual health of the nation and the Davidic (princely) Messiah was to handle the political.military ends.
No metaphysics involved from my understanding.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin