War Will Usher in Israel's Redemption? Messianic Fervor Is Gaining Popularity Beyond Religious Fanatics
Disasters are a fertile ground for purveyors of apocalyptic prophecies
Israel's national missions minister isn't alone in thinking that we are living in a miraculous time. Increasing numbers in right-wing circles have lately joined Orit Strock in identifying the war in the Gaza Strip with the War of Gog and Magog, and the ongoing disaster of October 7 with the birth pangs of the Messiah and the advent of redemption. Some, like Rabbi Eliezer Kashtiel, from the Bnei David yeshiva in the Eli settlement in the West Bank, draw on the words of the founder of religious Zionism, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935), who said, "When there is a great war in the world, the power of the Messiah awakens." War has a purifying power, Rabbi Kook maintains, because it arouses the divine in humanity and helps overcome the selfish instinct. "The greater the destruction and the more systems that have fallen part… the greater the anticipation of the Messiah's footsteps."
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29
ConnieCA
15:50 05.08.2024All of this Messianic nonsense is only of use if Israelis put themselves in the place of the "righteous". But ... 76 years of brutal dispossession and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, dehumanizing them, disproportionately violent massacres of civilians in response to any uprising of the Occupied Palestinians ... EVERYTHING Israelis have done to Palestinians in 76 years is outrageously heinous for any people to do to another people.
Democracy is always a balance of progressive (liberal, left) and authoritarian (conservative, right) voices. Israel is currently unbalanced, its democracy dysfunctional, captured by a reckless and vengeful far-right PM and his violent fascist coalition.
Israelis claiming the "righteous" position need to give their heads a shake and look over the wall at the utter horror that they have inflicted on other human beings.
There is no "righteous" and no "victory" in GENOCIDE.
28
Hmarouf
11:43 05.08.2024What this author has done is unwittingly identify the root of the problem. It's not Hamas, the PLO, the Palestinians, Hezbollah, Iran, etc. It's Zionism and its high jacking of messianism and the subsequent backfireing into its face of this exploitaion of Judaism and betrayal of Jews. And the answer is not a secular counter-myth to the lies of Zionism, but simply the truth, which again the author unwittingly reveals. Zionism is a death-ideology that, to justify itself, feeds on apocalypse and demonisation and the myth of redemption through overcoming the "diabolus". But Zionism is the diabolus.
27
Maggie
11:27 05.08.2024If good comes from suffering surely the Gazans will be front of the queue.
26
The Duke
10:06 05.08.2024We have to ask why, after archaeology has shown us that so much of the Tanakh was never true - and parts are clearly just copies of Egyptian religion, such as the 'Ark', that these facts are not taught more widely? Why are secular Jews - and for that matter secularists in Christian and Muslim countries - not teaching the facts that would undermine these silly beliefs? It must happen.
25
Margaret
03:05 05.08.2024The imaginary Jewish Messiah is a concept derived from a state of denial of actual historical events versus mythical ones. The devil is the great deceiver. He whispers sweet nonsense in the ears of the most feeble-minded of people, who refuse to accept the truth. A people who look at their enemies and say they are the Gog and Magog are looking in a trick mirror. They are projecting themselves onto others. The End of Days happened long ago in history, and the Messiah Jews and evangelicals are waiting for came long ago, but he wasn't a Jew. The state of denial followed. Prophets were called "suffering servants" of God for a reason. They all came to their people with the truth. But their messages were inconvenient, and the people preferred distortions, hearsay, and false prophets. In the end, those who rejected the messages of the Prophets were doomed for destruction. When it comes, will they understand?
24
Danny
14:13 04.08.2024The mistake, in the very beginning, was to make Israel a Jewish state, rather than a state for Jews.
23
Mark
11:18 04.08.2024Isn't religion great! Historically the cause of so much evil.
22
Andrea
03:13 04.08.2024"For their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed blood."
21
Lorraine Part 2 of 2
01:15 04.08.2024But in fact, there is a great deal of vagueness among believing Jews not only about the Messiah and redemption, but regarding the building of the Third Temple. I recently saw a video in which believing Jews were asked about all these matters and what would happen to Palestinians after the coming of the Messiah. Most could not come up with a clear answer, or a single answer if they had one. Some reckoned that the Palestinians (non-Jews) would become the slaves of the Jews after the Great Coming and Redemption (some redemption!). But the question before us is why settler or Haredi crackpottery, confusion, and obscurantism has to govern so much of what happens. Why does settler interpretation of all this--or of the Bible--have to be the Gold Standard. They are human beings, just like the rest of us--not God. Their interpretation is not more "real" than any one else's. Their interpretation is themselves, disguised as God. We need to stop kowtowing to it.
20
Lorraine Part 1 of 2
01:15 04.08.2024It is worth noting that the particular concept of redemption held by the settler movement is only one concept of redemption held in Judaism or among Jews. The settler version maintains that they can hasten the coming of the Messiah by doing something--that is grabbing ever more land and now pushing for total victory in the current war (with all the supposed good that comes from suffering and apocalypse). But for centuries, ideas about the coming of the Messiah were vague. It was generally reckoned as something that was supposed to happen, more or less, on its own--about which no one could do anything (except be good Jews in the usual way of keeping Shabbat, etc). Redemption of land and the Ingathering of the Exiles was supposed to happen AFTER the Messiah came, not before. This is a big part of the reason why so many Haredim have been opposed to the state of Israel--because it was erected (by secular Jews yet!) before the Messiah came.
