What
if Jesus Had Been Accepted as the Messiah?
Jesus was crying for the people of Jerusalem. He had come to save them, but most were not willing to be saved. Even though they had rejected him and his salvation, he had compassion on them.
Various Scriptural passages indicate that Jesus, before his trial and
execution, had hoped for a very different outcome of his sojourn on earth:
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
you who kill the prophets, and stone those sent to you, how many times I
yearned to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her young under her
wings, but you were unwilling!” (MT 23:37).
St. John Chrystostom
paraphrases the Lord’s lament: “Even these murders of yours would not have
alienated Me from you, but I would have taken you to Me, not once or twice, but
many times.” This passage, and a passage from Luke, “If only you had known, in
this day, the things that are to your peace; but now they are hidden from your
eyes” (LK 19:42 ) – indicate that there was a “Plan A,” which turned out to be
unworkable, because of contingencies, and due to the ignorance of the Jewish
leaders (Act 7: 51-53) and now had to be replaced by “Plan B.”
Plan A, of course,
would have involved acceptance by the Jews of Jesus’ messiahship. One can
imagine this taking place, in spite of the distrust and rumblings of the
powers-that-be in Jerusalem at that time. Jesus had secret disciples like
Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, and no doubt a substantial minority of the
scribes and Pharisees (probably including the Pharisees who warned Jesus about
dangers from Herod (Lk. 13:33) or the ones mentioned in Acts 15:5 as converted
after the Resurrection) were seriously considering the claims of this carpenter
from Nazareth. It could have happened that one or more of these interested but
timid persons may have “gone public” suggesting to their confreres that Jesus might
be the Anointed One, and that the authorities should avoid moving precipitously
to hostile measures.
Eventually a growing
majority in the Sanhedrin, heartened by the fact that Jesus was incredibly meek
like Moses, who was the “meekest man on earth” (Num. 12:3), and had promised
not to abrogate the Mosaic law, but to fulfill it, might have been able to
temper the opposition. They might also have taken to heart his
admonitions about misunderstanding the Sabbath, and about the subordination of
cleansing rituals, etc. and became attentive to the more substantial elements
of the law.
The prophecies of
Isaiah 9, 11, 60 and the revelation of the angel Gabriel in Lk 1: 31-33 were
for “Plan A” and
Isaiah 53 for “Plan B” and other prophets indicating that the
Messiah would be a “suffering servant” and spurned were not irrevocable.
As in the case of the predictions of the prophet Jonah about the destruction of
Nineveh, God is always hopeful that a change of heart will take place, so that
impending punishments will be called off. Free will, both for the
individual and for peoples, is always of the essence. It was not fated that so
many Jews should fail to recognize their Messiah.
So, what would have
happened if Plan A were implemented, and Jesus was able to gather the children
of Jerusalem “under his wings?” St. Cyril of Alexandria interprets “under his
wings” as meaning “under the shelter of his power.” The Messianic expectations
at the time were well expressed by the crowd that came together at Jesus’
Ascension: They asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the
kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6). Israel at that time was under the
hegemony of the Roman Empire, with only a puppet king. Would Jesus somehow
bring about the culmination of the Davidic kingship in such an unlikely
context?
What would have been the “things that are to your peace” (Lk. 19:42),
that Jesus regretfully wishes would have been implemented? St.
Theophilus of Antioch interprets Jesus as telling the Jews that he would have
freed the Jews from oppression by the Romans: “I came to visit and to save you,
which if you had known and believed on Me, you might have been reconciled to
the Romans.” How would such a reconciliation take place? If Jesus, son of
David, were honored as king of the Jews, rather than Herod Antipas, appointed
by the Romans as Jewish king, certainly a different mode of “kingship” would
start to prevail in Israel.
Would the “Star of David” become the prevailing symbol of Christianity?
Certainly the religion
that would worship God “in spirit and truth” (Jn. 23-24) would be much more
Jewish in appearance than present-day Christianity – not just the candles, the
tabernacle, priestly vestments, liturgical borrowings, etc.
Presumably, if peace
with the Romans had ensued, the Temple in Jerusalem would have been protected
under the power of the Messiah from destruction in 70 A.D. In the Temple
unbloody sacrifices might still be offered, after the pattern of the sacrifice
of fruits, grain and wine already offered by Jews in addition to the sacrifice
of animals.
Most important, however, we should consider the fact that there was a Plan A as
well as a Plan
B. This offers us evidence of the continuing sort of dialogue that God carries
out with the world – God is desirous of pouring out all manner of benefits, but
depends almost rigidly on free-will cooperation and making adaptations in
response to both individual and group decisions.
http://www.crisismagazine.com/2012/what-if-jesus-had-been-accepted-as-the-messiah
