#tanach

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Okay so I'm looking through some of Tanach (mostly David and Shlomo stuff) for a family thing, and like, holy innuendos dudes.

And like okay, maybe it's just the translation, but whoever translated these must either have been horny af or so ace they didn't know what they were saying.

(And these aren't even the outright, intentional nsfw things! (See Shir Hashirim for that.))

I may be am definitely reading this way too creatively, and some of it is taken entirely out of context, but I'm enjoying myself, so.

(nsfw below)

(I don't want to ramble about it too much, but "judge" might be a misleading translation. The Shoftim were a type of leaders, and similar roles existed across Canaanite culture as well. Qart-Hadast/Carthage was led by Suffetes during their war with Rome - or, in their language, 𐤔𐤐𐤈𐤌, Shoftim.)

First, we have the language. A bit of an obvious one, but I'd like to dive a bit more into that. Danie’l isn't the only book in the Tanach that is partially in Aramaic. A couple of the Nevi’im have some verses in Aramaic, and ‘Ezra has a couple of chapters in it. However, the verses in the Nevi’im are just that: verses. And in ‘Ezra it's mostly letters to and from the Achaemenid kings, since Aramaic was the official language of their empire. Some portions in and around this area don't seem to be part of the letters and are still in Aramaic, but it's not a lot and it might be from the administrative records. Danie’l, on the other hand, goes into Aramaic for nearly half the book and does so in the middle of a story. It is kind of similar to ‘Ezra in that both are marked at the beginning by mentioning that the text following was originally in Aramaic which is why it's Aramaic there, but in Danie’l it's a short, direct quote and not a letter. And the Aramaic isn't kept to the dialogue or to this particular story, instead spanning a major part of the book.

My second point will be something I mentioned a couple of times already, mostly while reblogging posts about angels. And that is that Daniel is the only book in the Tanach to name angels. This is significant, because in two occasions where angels are asked for their names they evade the question. Sometimes they are identified by their role, like Satan (prosecutor/opposer) or Sar Tzeva [HaShem] (G-d's general). But Daniel gives us Micha’el and Gavri’el. And it's not that this is the only book with repeated angel appearances - Zechariah has an angel constantly referred to as HaMal’ach HaDover Bi, literally translated as "the angel that speaks to/in me", and he's never given a name. Of course, angels do get names in the Midrashim, the Talmud and the apocrypha, but the canonised Tanach limits it all to precisely one book.

Another fascinating thing is that Danie’l is the only prophet to speak about Greece-Yavan. I mean, it is mentioned by other prophets, but for them it's just another nation from the area. In Danie’l it's clearly referring to an empire that'll conquer and defeat the Persians. Which leads me to another point: most prophets actually start with the shorter term in mind. And before you ask about Messianic prophecies, ypu have to understand that those were initially understood to be coming soon. Emanuel in Yish‘ayah is probably Ḥizkiyah, who was expected to be the promised Mashiach - as Rabbi Hillel said. Most all the prophecies made by the Nevi’im were intended to be fulfilled in at most 70 years time. Not necessarily all, and some certainly didn't come true in the expected time, but that was the original understanding. Danie’l explicitly talks about things that are clearly reflecting the Wars of the Diadochi and the Hellenist reign in EY. Even looking at the prophecy mentioning Cyrus in Yish‘ayah, I think this is way too much in advance.

All of these, plus a couple more things, have led researchers to believe this book is pseudoepigraphical - meaning, it was retroactively attributed to Daniel as an author, though it was written centuries after his time. To be absolutely fair, this is a claim that exists about numerous books in the Tanach. However, this is a claim I heard from a rabbi that taught in my (rather Orthodox) Yeshivah, so I think it's somewhat accepted in religious circles, which is interesting. It's consider to belong to the Apocalyptic book genre, similarly to the non-canonical book of Enoch. Probably because it has some end of days prophecies, though I think the angelology part of the comparison shouldn't be discarded either.

The thing is, Greek mythology has a story about how they got writing from the Phoenicians. I believe Egypt has a myth about how they got writing from the gods, and maybe Sumer has one as well. But us? Moshe Rabbenu, our first leader, already comes with the ability to read and write. He's casually told to write the story of the fight with Amalek right after it occured.

King David

Now, I know. It's not fair giving David this title, considering he predates all the prophecies about the Mashiach. Plus, he was only called Mashiach once. Sha’ul, on the other hand, was called "Meshiach [Hashem]" nine times, by David himself. But Sha’ul failed on some other metrics. David reunited the kingdom after the collapse of Sha’ul's house, if we conveniently ignore how he created the schism technically. He was anointed by a prophet on G-d's command to be king - the last of his house to be anointed this way, since the only other people to get this honor are Sha’ul and Yehu. David brought the Ark of Covenant to Jerusalem and prepared the ground for his son building the Temple, fought the enemies of Israel and brought about an age of prosperity. He checks a lot of the boxes we'd require of the Mashiach, which is probably why some Midrashim claim that the Mashiach will be David himself, not just one of his descendants.

King Ḥizkiyah

All right. Here, we get to the first guy who comes after a couple of prophecies. He's a king of the Davidic line, he's righteous, and some of Isaiah's prophecies can be interpreted about him. Like Isaiah 9, 5: "for a child has been born to us...", is commonly interpreted in Judaism to be about Ḥizkiyah. Now, Yehudah wasn't as prosperous as one might hope during his reign, but they were miraculously saved from a foreign army. According to some sources he attempted to gather the remnants of the Kingdom of Yisra’el, which was just exiled in his time, to celebrate Pesach with Yehudah in Jerusalem! An Amora in the Talmud even openly claims: Yisra’el don't have a Mashiach anymore; they had him during the days of Ḥizkiyah (Sanhedrin 99A). However, some of the prophecies are later even than that. Plus, Ḥizkiyah did not song G-d's praises after being saved, so he's a bit iffy.

King Yo’shiyahu

Now there you have a proper Mashiach! Foreign altars-removing, idol-banishing, pagan priests' bones-burning, kingdom-uniting Mashiach! Megido isn't even a part of Yehudah and he went to fight there! And before that, he did his best to clear Yisra’el and Yehudah from idol worship and altars outside the Temple, made a Pesach that was greater than anything before him... Legend. He's the third one in the Tanach to be called "Meshiach [Hashem]"! ...That is, after his death, assuming this particular lament in Lamentations is about him. Every king after his is pretty disappointing. Sadly, he died while fighting Pharaoh Necho in a completely unnecessary battle. You see, the Pharaoh was headed to help his old rivals the Assyrians against the rising middle eastern star - the Neo-Babylonian empire. None of this had anything to do with Yoshiyahu. But he either got it into his mind that no armed forces may go through his land (including grounds that used to belong to the Kingdom of Yisra’el), or thought he could help Babylon by delaying Pharaoh. In the end it didn't matter - Yoshiyahu lost in Megido and died there, while Pharaoh lost in Carchemish, bitterly returned to Egypt, instated a new king in Yehudah on his way - only to be attacked by Nebuchadnezzar later, and not sending armies outside of Egypt for the next few generations. So, Nebuchadnezzar was the ultimate winner of it all, subjugating Yehudah and humiliating Egypt.

Zerubavel ben Sha’alti’el

Yes, it's the first person in this list to not be a king, but hear me out. Firstly, he's a direct descendants of all the previous people: Sha’alti’el is (according to Chronicles) the son of Yechonyah, son of Yehoyakim, son of Yoshiyahu. And sure, I can go on to Ḥizkiyah and David, but it would be exhausting and you should already know they're all descended from each other. Ḥizkiyah is Yoshiyahu's great-grandfather, if you must know.

Zerubavel was appointed by Coresh (Cyrus the Great) to be responsible for the return from Exile. Depending how you read things, he may even have been appointed local ruler. He wasn't a king, though. Yahud Medinta was a province of the Achaemenid Empire, not a client kingdom. It also did not include the entirety of the old Kingdom of Yehudah. But it was what Zerubavel and the people coming with him got. Zerubavel brought Jews back from the Exile to their ancestral land; he rebuilt the Temple; he's directly mentioned by prophets talking about the Mashiach... But he wasn't independent. He wasn't a king. And thus, some of the prophecies didn't actually get fulfilled in him - though some of them were fulfilled in one of his aforementioned ancestors.

Yeshua‘ ben Yosef, in the meantime, was none of those. He wasn't king, since Herod was king at the time. He was no leader either, as he only had a very specific group of followers. He didn't build or renovate the Temple - just attempted to make some changes, the necessarily of which is arguable and the success of which is nonexistent. And don't start pulling the whole "man without sin" on me, please. It has literally no source in the Tanach.

This is a tag by @spot-the-antisemitism, definitely a typo from "Prev true". However, since we're both Jewish I'm going to take it as them confirming that a raven/crow is correct about something. Or possibly that ‘Orev, the Midianite prince, was correct about something - heaven knows what, though.