For thousands of years the Jewish people have longed for messianic deliverance; sustained by this belief the community has endured persecution and suffering, confident that they will ultimately be rescued from earthly travail. Such expectations began with the Hebrew Bible. Scripture foretells of a future redemption of the Jewish people that will be accomplished by the Messiah, an anointed agent of the Lord. For the prophets, such a figure will be a descendant of David who will restore the nation to its former glory. In explaining God’s purposes the prophets linked the punishment of the nation with the promise of a future redemption—continually they reassured the people that they would undergo future glory.
The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha amplify these Scriptural themes, bearing witness to the longing of the Jewish people for deliverance and redemption. Once the Jews were exiled from the ancient homeland, they were bereft of a country of their own. In their despair they longed for a divinely appointed deliverer who would reunite them in Zion. In early Rabbinic literature the messianic ideas found in the Hebrew Bible and the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha were further developed into a chain of eschatological events including: the birth pangs of the Messiah, the emergence of Messiah ben Joseph, the coming of the King Messiah, the Messianic Age, final judgment, and the world to come.
During the Second Temple period and the years of unrest following Herod’s death in 4 BCE (Before the Common Era) Jewish followers of Jesus emerged. In consonance with messianic hopes, these believers expected Jesus as the Messiah to bring about the fulfillment of human history.   According to the New Testament, Jesus spent most of his life in Galilee where he acted as a healer, exorcist and itinerant preacher who proclaimed the imminent arrival of the Kingdom of God. After he was put to death during the time of Pontius Pilate, his followers believed he had risen from the dead, appeared to them, and promised to return to usher in the period of messianic rule. The majority of the Jewish population, however, refused to accept Jesus as the Messiah; in their view he failed to fulfill the messianic role as portrayed in Scripture and post-exilic sources.
As the years passed and the Temple had been destroyed, messianic longing intensified. There has been much speculation and many disappointments for the faithful Jews awaiting their Messiah. Perhaps the beginning was in l32 CE  when the military leader Simeon bar Kochba was viewed by many Jews as the long-awaited Messiah. However, when his rebellion against Rome was crushed, Jews moved forward the year of redemption. In the middle of the fifth century another messianic figure, Moses from Crete, stated that he would lead Jewish inhabitants of the island back to the Holy Land. After his plan failed, Jews continued to long for a future messianic return. These aspirations are recorded in various midrashic collections. Subsequently, in anxious anticipation of the Messiah, Jewish scholars attempted to ascertain the date of the final redemption on the basis of biblical texts. In addition, during this period various pseudo-Messiahs appeared, and the traveler Eldad Ha-Dani brought news of the Ten Lost Tribes.
 Later, during the time of the Crusades, messianic expectation increased as Jews faced persecution and death. In the following two centuries, various Jewish writers attempted to predict the date of final redemption on the basis of the Book of Daniel. Also, during these years a number of false Messiahs appeared on the Jewish scene. As time passed, other writers began to speculate about the coming of the Messiah. Prominent among the mystical works of this period was the Zohar, which contains numerous calculations about the coming of the messianic age. Again, in the thirteenth century, another messianic figure- Abraham Abulafia, attracted a wide following from Jews who longed for a return to Zion. These medieval Jews, like their ancestors, yearned for a release from the bondage of exile and looked to the advent of the Messiah as a means of deliverance.
The early modern period witnessed this same aspiration for redemption. During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries various messianic tracts were written, and in the sixteenth century various Jewish sages continued the tradition of messianic calculation. There were also a number of pseudo-Messiahs who  appeared and claimed to bring about a new era. Undaunted by past failures, messianic calculators of the seventeenth century persisted in their computations. Prominent among these messianic speculators was Manasseh ben Israel, who believed that the hour of deliverance was near.
The Cossack Rebellion that began in l648 and devastated Polish Jewry heightened the belief that the coming of the messianic age was near at hand. In this milieu his disciple Nathan of Gaza announced the arrival of the self-proclaimed messianic king, Shabbetai Tzevi.  Throughout the world, Jews were persuaded that the Messiah had come and flocked to his court. Yet, when Shabbetai converted to Islam rather than face death, his apostasy evoked dismay among his followers. Nonetheless, a number of disciples, including Nathan of Gaza, continued to believe in his messiahship. Subsequently a
schismatic group of his disciples broke away from mainstream Judaism, and later this Shabbatean movement was led by Jacob Frank whose followers subscribed to a heretical version of the Shabbatean tradition.
With the conversion of Shabbetai Tzevi, the Jewish hope of messianic deliverance ceased to preoccupy the nation. Nonetheless, a number of religious Zionists maintained that it was necessary to rebuild the Holy Land in anticipation of the advent of the Messiah. Opposed to such a reinterpretation of Jewish messianism, Orthodox critics argued that the quest to create a Jewish settlement in Palestine is a usurpation of God’s will. Distancing themselves form such religious preoccupations, secular Zionists maintained that the creation of a Jewish homeland is the only solution to the problem of anti-Semitism. Unconvinced by this argument, liberal Jews maintained that Jewish prejudice could be overcome if the Jewish population assimilated into the countries in which they lived.
In modern society, most Jews have found it increasingly difficult to accept the traditional scheme of messianic redemption. Supernatural ideas about the advent of the Messiah and the unfolding of a divine providential plan have seemed increasingly implausible in the light of scientific knowledge and the growth of secularism. The strictly orthodox as well as the Hasidim, however, continue to remain firmly committed to the traditional doctrine of messianic redemption.
A dramatic illustration of the enduring character of this messianic hope has recently been manifest within one of the major sects of Hasidim.  Over the last few years a significant number of Lubavicher Hasidim have proclaimed that their Rebbe—Menachem Mendel Schneerson—is the long-awaited Messiah even though he died in l994.
During his lifetime the Rebbe established a worldwide empire of disciples, spread Torah Judaism to places where it had never been known, energized Jewish education, and led numerous irreligious Jews to observance of Jewish law. On this basis, a growing number of Hasidim became convinced that the period of messianic deliverance was imminent.
When the Rebbe suffered a stroke, his followers were not deterred; indeed, the Rebbe’s incapacity fueled the flames of messianic enthusiasm. His illness was invested with redemptive significance: the suffering servant in Isaiah 53 was perceived as being a reference to the Rebbe’s debilitated state. According to a number of his disciples, the Rebbe would not die, despite his stroke; and they prayed for his recovery daily.
Even the Rebbe’s death did not daunt those who were convinced of his Messiahship. He would return! In the view of one Israeli newspaper, those who had lost faith in the Rebbe were like the worshippers of the golden calf who had given up hope of Moses’ return from Mount Sinai. Eventually a number of messianists became convinced that the Rebbe had not in fact died; in their view he remains alive but concealed. Hence what happened on 3 Tammuz 5754 was an illusion. The Rebbe’s corpse, they argued, was a test for carnal eyes; but in truth there was no passing away or leave-taking. Some followers of the Rebbe have even gone so far as to use incarnational terminology in describing his mission.
This then is the most recent manifestation of the continuation of the heart-felt longing of the Jewish nation. Menahem Mendel Schneerson is the last link in a long chain of messianic pretenders stretching back over twenty centuries of Jewish history. From ancient times to the present, believers have prayed for the coming of messianic deliverance, a hope that has sustained the Jewish people through centuries of suffering and destruction.
 

Editor’s note:
It is indeed an honor to have Dr. Cohn-Sherbok contribute to Messianic Jewish LIFE.  Professor Dan Cohn-Sherbok, was born in Denver, Colorado, educated at Williams College, and ordained a Reform rabbi at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion. He has received a Doctorate in Divinity from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, and a Doctorate in philosophy from Cambridge University in England. From l975 he taught Jewish theology at the University of Kent at Canterbury, England. He is currently the first Professor
of Judaism in the University of Wales. He is the author and editor of over 50 books including The Jewish Faith, Atlas of Jewish History, Modern Judaism, and Understanding the Holocaust.