A Question for Agricola

[zeek]

So, then, do I interpret your words correctly that most modern Jews don't expect the temple to be rebuilt until after the messiah comes? Or is it the belief that rebuilding the temple will trigger the messiah's appearing? Are there Jews left who can reliably trace their genealogy back to Aaron so that the Aaronic priesthood could be restored? Forgive me for asking endless questions; I find all this extremely interesting.

[zeek]

While I am picking your brain, I'll ask about an unrelated question. I've been reading again about Kabbalah. In your opinion, would it be fair to say that Chochmah is the equivalent of a priori knowledge while Da'at is equivalent to a posteriori knowledge? Most of Kabbalah is way too deep or perhaps to foreign for me to wrap my mind around. I'm pretty well-versed concerning a priori and a posteriori knowledge from reading Plato, Aristotle and Kant.

[agricola]

So, then, do I interpret your words correctly that most modern Jews don't expect the temple to be rebuilt until after the messiah comes? Or is it the belief that rebuilding the temple will trigger the messiah's appearing? Are there Jews left who can reliably trace their genealogy back to Aaron so that the Aaronic priesthood could be restored? Forgive me for asking endless questions; I find all this extremely interesting.

The messiah will rebuild the Temple. The very religious (orthodox) hold to that, and the non-ortbodox mostly don't care one way or the other, but certainly have no particular interest in interfering with the Islamic sites on Temple mount.
Only (thank goodness) a rare few VERY religious fanatics think they can precipitate this by destroying the Islamic shrine and the mosque currently occupying the space! The last time was back in the 1980s:

h**ps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Underground
Plot to blow up the Dome of the Rock
The purpose of obliterating the Muslim shrine on the Temple Mount, considered together with the Al-Aqsa Mosque to be an "abomination", was to "awaken" Jews, and lay the groundwork for the creation of the Third Temple. The Jewish underground had two different ideas about how to destroy the Dome of the Rock. One proposal was to crash a plane packed with explosives into the building.[16] One member of the group was an IDF expert in explosives who had access to sufficient ammunition and material stolen from the Israeli army to carry out the plan.



Mostly - so far at least - they have all been intercepted by Israeli security.

[agricola]

Re Kabbalah

Well, I'm not any kind of expert on Greek ideas!

Kabbalah meaning 'received' (tradition) is Judaism's Mystical branch - like Islam has Sufism and Christianity has Christian Mysticism (like St Teresa of Avila, etc).

Chochmah is - as I understand it - 'ordinary' wisdom: education, things you can learn.
Da'at is wisdom as applied to correct judgement - a wise man may not be 'educated', just as a well educated man may not be 'wise'.

Chochmah - you hire the engineer to build the bridge.
Da'at - you consult the wisdom of scholars of sociology, geology, ecology, economics etc, to determine WHETHER the bridge should be built.

Maimondes (the Rambam) says God is both the knowledge and the knower.
But he wasn't 'mystical', but Aristotelian (sort of).

However, Kabbalistic thought - like any mystical tradition - has the unique quality of meaning two or more contradictory things AT ONCE. ALSO, if you are attempting to learn by reading, PLEASE understand that most WRITTEN works of Kabbalah are written to be DELIBERATELY misleading.

Beliefnet published a very nice short intro to kabbalah some years ago, and there are some other works ABOUT Kabbalah which are decent, or works by modern thinkers in that tradition that aren't trying to hide everything -

h**ps://www.amazon.com/Beliefnet-Guide-Kabbalah-Guides-Book-ebook/dp/B000XU4THM/ref=sr_1_1?crid=21M8F9L43QWQL&keywords=the+beliefnet+kabbalah&qid=1707166106&sprefix=the+beliefnet+kabbalah%2Caps%2C117&sr=8-1

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Kabbalah is actually decent.

Anything by Michael Berg should be valid -
h**ps://www.amazon.com/stores/Michael-Berg/author/B0045A50N8?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_2&qid=1707166171&sr=8-2&isDramIntegrated=true&shoppingPortalEnabled=true

If any source wants you to pay THEM, run away fast.

[B.H.]

I've read that the Jews believe that the latest the Messiah can come is like 2400 CE? Is that true?

[agricola]

Quite honestly, taken overall, we do not care.
We do not care.

Thinking about 'Judgment day and the afterlife' is SO NOT IMPORTANT - plenty of Jews - PLENTY of them - don't even KNOW that Judaism - as a faith - even HAS an afterlife idea (even though, if you know what you are looking at, it is all over the standard prayerbook from orthodoxy to Reform).

It is not important. We don't care.

Pin a random Jew down (except for the Hasids, maybe) and ask, and maybe you'll get kind of 'oh yeah, I kind of vaguely remember something about that in Hebrew school'.

It is not taught, much (or at all) because it is NOT IMPORTANT.

Judaism does not work from a basis where humans are BORN lacking something, or inevitably doomed. Getting 'sent to hell' is simply not a concern. Jewish 'hell' is - for one thing - TEMPORARY.
Christianity thinks they have to work to go to heaven. Jews think you have to work to NOT go to heaven, so why worry? Just don't be evil.

Everybody goes to heaven. Some people go sooner than others. Some people have to wait a bit and do the hell torment etc thing - it is a 'purging' process, and THEN you go to heaven.

Everybody.
Except truly EVIL people. You have to work HARD to be truly evil. Truly evil people don't go to heaven, and they also don't go to hell. They don't go anywhere. They get that one life, and die, and that's it. They don't get resurrected.

Judaism has no soul storage problem, because in Judaism, souls are not immortal unless God positively DECIDES to resurrect a person.
Evil person? God forgets that person. Dead is dead. No Afterlife.

But mostly, this is not much taught, or thought of - because IT ISN'T IMPORTANT.

[agricola]

That said, sure, some Jews think the world will end in - let me think - 6000 - 3760 = 2240, So they think the max age of creation is 6000 years, which means the world should end in 2240 or about that.

Or maybe that's the start of a 1000 year messianic age of perfection, and THEN it ends. I forget, because it is really a niche hypothesis, and also quite a ways off.
Maybe when that date is closer, there will be more interest.

[agricola]

Christianity focuses a lot on 'the afterlife'. Judaism simply doesn't. It's a 'shrug'. Isn't God trustworthy, just and merciful? then why worry?

Two thousand years ago, when Pharisaism was forming, ideas about the end of time and the afterlife were a lot more 'alive'. But then, all other branches of Judaism were destroyed and Pharisaic ideas were the only ones, and the ACTIVE concerns were surviving in the 'now', and the whole 'afterlife/end times/judgement' stuff kind of faded into the background.

ALL branches of modern Judaism (called 'rabbinic Judaism') are out of Pharisaism. ALL branches of modern Judaism 'believe in' an end of days/judgment/afterlife'. But it is not a FOCUS.

The focus of Jewish teaching is WHAT DO YOU DO TODAY? Everyday? Tomorrow? How do you act in your LIFE?
The 'world of action' - the world of the living - is the world where we can actually DO. Action - what you do - defines who you are, what kind of person. Be a mensch, we say. Do a mitzvah. The reward of a mitzvah is the opportunity to do another one. One rabbi said - his days were spent mostly LOOKING FOR THE OPPORTUNITY to perform a mitzvah.

Obey the mitzvot - BUT to save a life (even if the danger is not certain) EVERY commandment can be set aside but a very few (three or four). Idolatry, murder, sexual immorality. You can drive on the Sabbath, eat ham, whatever. Lie cheat steal - to save a life. Violate one Sabbath, so you/others can LIVE to celebrate another one, later.

Not only 'allowed', but REQUIRED. It is REQUIRED to break Jewish law, if it will save a life.

[agricola]

Another teacher taught - our lives (actions) are our prayers. Our actions define us as people. Not 'what do you believe', but 'what did you DO/what WILL you do'.

You NEVER hear a Jewish leader sending 'thoughts and prayers'. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, free the prisoner - DO something. Also pray, but prayer is no substitute for action.

Talmud - learn in order to teach, learn in order to DO.

And 'an ignorant man cannot be pious'. Education - religious primarily, but secular knowledge too - is a Jewish value (secular knowledge is often termed - dismissively - as 'secondary stuff' (like math and physics, for instance)- but even the non-religious Jews typically have internalized the primacy of an education.

[ACUAlumnus]

Thank you so much for this, Agricola. The topic is extremely interesting to me, and I’m learning a lot.