Wait, didn’t we go through this before?
Just to comment: the idea of a “Messiah ben-Joseph” (or as he’s more commonly known, “Messiah ben-Ephraim”) is a rather late concept developed only in the Talmud - where he’s only mentioned once! (
Sukkot 52a-b) - and in midrashic literature.
Besides, the only thing that Jesus and the Messiah ben-Ephraim have in common is that they both die. However, the Ephraimite messiah is a militant figure who is fated to die in battle with the enemies of Israel after he had gathered the tribes of Israel under his banner and reconquered Jerusalem. Plus, his death isn’t meant to be atoning in any sense; Isaiah 53 isn’t considered to apply to this figure. (In fact, there isn’t even any agreement as to what will happen to his corpse: will it lie unburied or hidden by the angels first?) And while he participates in the general resurrection, he isn’t the one who inaugurates it: it is the Messiah ben-David who will raise the Messiah ben-Ephraim back to life. And he’s known as “son of Joseph” or “son of Ephraim” for a reason: he is thought to hail from that tribe.
Technically speaking, the idea of a dying messiah properly appears only for the first time in Jewish literature (excluding the NT books) in an apocryphal work known as 4 Ezra, aka
2 Esdras, written somewhere around the late 1st to the early 2nd century. (7:26-34)
For behold, the time will come, when the signs which I have foretold to you will come to pass, that the city which now is not seen shall appear, and the land which now is hidden shall be disclosed. And every one who has been delivered from the evils that I have foretold shall see my wonders. For my son the Messiah shall be revealed with those who are with him, and those who remain shall rejoice four hundred years. And after these years my son the Messiah shall die, and all who draw human breath. And the world shall be turned back to primeval silence for seven days, as it was at the first beginnings; so that no one shall be left. And after seven days the world, which is not yet awake, shall be roused, and that which is corruptible shall perish. And the earth shall give up those who are asleep in it, and the dust those who dwell silently in it; and the chambers shall give up the souls which have been committed to them. And the Most High shall be revealed upon the seat of judgment, and compassion shall pass away, and patience shall be withdrawn; but only judgment shall remain, truth shall stand, and faithfulness shall grow strong.
Again, the only real similarity with Jesus and this messiah is that they died. But 4 Ezra’s messiah - here a transcendent figure who will remain hidden with God (who calls him his “son”) until the time comes for his revelation - will die along with the rest of mankind at the end of the world and the conclusion of his four-hundred year reign. After seven days of “primeval silence” the resurrection will occur, but what will happen to the messiah isn’t mentioned. He just does his thing and drops out of the picture quickly. Come to think of it, he isn’t even that important to the sequence of events.
In fact, it would seem that the dying Messiah concept in 4 Ezra is a Jewish attempt to answer Christian claims about Jesus: note for instance that the appearance of the messiah in the work is claimed to be still in the distant future. Perhaps his minor, incidental role in the work can also be attributed to this.
It’s just my hunch, but maybe even the idea of the Ephraimite warrior messiah arose because of this thinking: a messiah who dies (= fails) can’t be the ‘real’ one. At best, he might be a subordinate messiah to the Davidic one. And which messianic claimant died in battle?
Simon bar-Kokhba. Basically the dilemma is: what would happen if the messiah came, but the deliverance of Israel did not follow? A second one who’ll do the job will come, of course. Bar-Kokhba’s failure to live up to his promise perhaps prompted later rabbis to speculate, which resulted in the development of this scenario.
AFAIK, the sect at Qumran did hold to a concept of two messiahs, but that’s where the similarity with the later idea of a “son of David” and a “son of Joseph\Ephraim” ends. The Qumran sectarians expected a ‘Messiah of Israel’ (aka the ‘Messiah of Aaron’) and a ‘Messiah of David’ to come; one of them will be a king and military leader, the other a priest and sage. At least one text also adds a third figure known as “the prophet.” If he’s also a messianic figure then the sectarians apparently expected
three messiahs to come in total, which kinds of makes sense: the ones who were ‘anointed’ were kings, priests and prophets.
I’m deliberately avoiding posting series of long posts right now (which is what I used to do), so I’ll just say this for the moment: at the time of Jesus, there wasn’t a hard-and-fast concept of what the messiah exactly is and what he will do, or even how many will be there or even whether if there is a ‘messiah’ at all. I mentioned the sect at Qumran above: keep in mind however that there is not one, single, consistent messianology to be found in the Dead Sea Scrolls.
in Christ,