[Avodah] Moshiach Ben Yosef

[Zev Sero via Avodah]

On 03/03/2016 09:12 PM, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> Pet peeve: Capitalized "M" in "Moshiach". Would you write, "...does not
> even have to know that he's a King?" with a capital "K"? To my jaundiced
> eye, it smells too much of Notzrim thinking it's a term for deity.

Titles are capitalised when they are used to identify a specific person.
Thus, "the president's term is four years", but "the President's term
will expire on 20-Jan-2017". The first example refers to any president,
the second refers to the current incumbent.


On 03/03/2016 09:10 PM, Isaac Balbin wrote:
> You are mixing chezkas and real.

I don't understand what you mean by that. Also, I don't know exactly
which text you're replying to. Please in future quote what you're
replying to, and put it *before* your reply, so people can follow the
thread of argument.

> Why bother even telling us about chezkas!
> Waste of time. Chazoko goes when dead

Yes, it does, since a dead person is incapable of doing the things
Moshiach is meant to do. That's precisely his point. But it doesn't
change the fact that there *was* a valid chazaka.

On reflection I no longer agree 100% with what RMB wrote, because he's
assuming that whether a person is or isn't the Moshiach is already
determined and known to Heaven, just as whether a piece of meat is
kosher or treif. But whether someone will end up being the moshiach
isn't determined. It depends on future events. Bar Kochva was meant
to be the one, and was derailed by sins (the Rambam is ambiguous about
whose sins). So the chazaka isn't just a description of the state of
our knowledge, but also refers to the metzius.

-- 
Zev Sero               All around myself I will wave the green willow
zev at sero.name          The myrtle and the palm and the citron for a week
                And if anyone should ask me the reason why I'm doing that
                I'll say "It's a Jewish thing; if you have a few minutes
                I'll explain it to you".