Wednesday 11 December 2019

Lubavitcher Rebbe - Messiah or Anti-Messiah?

The late Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson was widely praised as being a Tzaddik (righteous man), a mystic and miracle maker by his followers, and friends. Many people from all over the world sought advice from him, including Israeli Prime Ministers and military leaders.

At some point in his career, his followoers openly starting claiming he was the Messiah of the TeNaKh, the King who will redeem Israel.  Even non-Lubavitch rabbis were making such implications, saying he was the best qualified to be Messiah. I even heard from one of my favourite  rabbis that he was the reincarnation of Moses!   By the late 1980s,  there was a split in Orthodox Rabbinic Judaism, between his supporters and his opponents. Of course, after his death, in Brooklyn, having never even visited Israel,  it was clear to all that this was a false Messianism, based on lies and distortions.

Even within the rabbinic halakhah, the famous codifier Maimonides writes a number of qualifications and conditions that need to be fulfilled by someone claiming to be Messiah.  Below are some excerpts from Ch. 1 and 12 of  the Laws of Kings and Wars:



"In the future, the Messianic king will arise and renew the Davidic dynasty, restoring it to its initial sovereignty. He will build the Temple and gather the dispersed of Israel...

The main thrust of the matter is: This Torah, its statutes and its laws, are everlasting. We may not add to them or detract from them....

If a king will arise from the House of David who diligently contemplates the Torah and observes its mitzvot as prescribed by the Written Law and the Oral Law as David, his ancestor, will compel all of Israel to walk in (the way of the Torah) and rectify the breaches in its observance, and fight the wars of God, we may, with assurance, consider him Mashiach.
If he succeeds in the above, builds the Temple in its place, and gathers the dispersed of Israel, he is definitely the Mashiach....
When the true Messianic king will arise and prove successful, his position becoming exalted and uplifted, they will all return and realize that their ancestors endowed them with a false heritage and their prophets and ancestors caused them to err...

In that era, there will be neither famine or war, envy or competition for good will flow in abundance and all the delights will be freely available as dust. The occupation of the entire world will be solely to know God...."


There is very little difference, I would argue , between the Tenakh version and the Maimonidean version - the main point of contention is obviously the "oral law" he mentions. Nevertheless, it is important to note that the Lubavitcher rebbe opposed Zionism, and the  establishment of the State of Israel. He opposed migration to Israel.  He told his followers to stay put in exile, until the Moshaich arrives!   Thus the key events that did occur in the Zionist era - return to the Land of Israel, winning wars and Israeli territory, liberation of Jerusalem and Temple Mount - were all achieved outside of the Lubavitch framework.   In fact, the very man who did fight to liberate jerusalem, Rabbi Shlomo Goren, was told by the Rebbe of Lubavitch to resign from the post of Chief rabbi (althouogh it wa said more respectfully than by other hareidi leaders). 

The "believers" claimed that the Rebbe had single handedly brought back millions of Jews to Orthodox observance - even though in his own time there were only approximately 1 million Ultra-Orthodox Jews who were that way from birth.  He never fired a single shot in any war, and did not enlist himself or his followers into the Israeli army.  They claimed that the "wars" were spiritual wars, such as convincing people to wear tefillin (even though the Book of Wars by Maimonides focuses on military warfare).

IN sum, it is clear that Rabbi Schneerson was not the Messiah of the TeNakh, or of Maimonides. 
The victories in Israel's wars were won by largely secular soldiers and generals, whose State and Army were opposoed by Lubavitch Hassidim in previous generations, and also by Schneerson himself.   His instructions were the opposite of the requirements of messiah - i.e. to gather the exiles into Israel. he wanted to keep them in exile. This not only makes him a false messiah, but also an Anti-Messiah!



 
 






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