Q&A: I Don’t Want the Messiah to Come
I Don’t Want the Messiah to Come
Question
According to all the descriptions in the sources, the coming of the Messiah and the building of the Temple sound to me like events that are not especially uplifting…
Wars, birth pangs from which those who are not righteous will fall away… And even if not all the sources are precise, the whole schedule of offering sacrifices, the laws of ritual impurity and purity, etc., doesn’t sound to me like something that could fit into our way of life in 2020.
My question is whether I’m making some mistake in my approach, or whether my opinion is legitimate? And if it is legitimate, is there any point in my praying the Amidah blessings that speak about longing for redemption if I don’t actually desire it?
Answer
To look forward to redemption is always a good thing. Trust the Holy One, blessed be He, that the redemption will probably be a good thing, and perhaps not exactly as it is described to us.
As for the wars, it is possible that this is a condition for the coming of redemption. Good things sometimes require struggle. As for the sacrifices, some have written that they will be only from plant life, and perhaps when we live it and experience it we will understand the spiritual meaning of the matter (I too, at present, am really not yearning for that).