Soloveitchik’s “Maimonidean Jesus”
One of the more vexing dimensions of the synoptic Gospels (Mark, Matthew, and Luke) is the question of Jesus’ claims to be the Messiah or whether others considered him to be so. In addition, one of the dominant themes in Jewish criticism of the Gospels is that such a claim is, within Jewish thinking, impossible for a variety of reasons. On this question, the legal code of Maimonides is often invoked where, in his “Laws of Kings,” Maimonides delineates the criteria of the messianic vocation.112 On Maimonides’ criteria, Jesus as the true messiah is simply impossible. What, then, do Jews make of this claim of Christianity? One common trope was that Jesus was a false messiah, a category with precedent in Jewish literature before and after Jesus. Contemporary Jews interested in fostering ecumenical dialogue offer less severe rejections of Jesus’ messiahship. Irving (Yitz) Greenberg, for example, made the distinction between the “false messiah” and the “failed messiah,” the latter being more applicable to Jesus than the former.113 Others, such as Byron Sherwin, suggest that Jesus represented the Joseph messiah (as opposed to the Davidic one), an idea whose roots lie in the rabbinic tradition. The Joseph messiah will appear before the Davidic one, and will die and prepare the ground for the final redemption.114
Soloveitchik takes a different tack in his assessment of Jesus’ messianic vocation. Rather than denying Jesus as messiah, something difficult to do, given the plethora of references to his messianic vocation, or making a distinction between a “false” or “failed” messiah, or the Joseph or Davidic messiah, Soloveitchik claims that the central vocation of the Messiah is to teach people the fundamental lesson of Judaism; the unity of the Creator. Thus in almost every reference to the Messiah in Mark and Matthew, Soloveitchik comments on Jesus’ success in spreading the true Gospel, the unity of God. From Soloveitchik’s perspective, this is accomplished by Jesus in a particularly successful way, to his Jewish compatriots and later to the Gentiles through Paul. This notion of divine unity is the centerpiece of Maimonides’ depiction of Judaic monotheism.
In at least one place, Soloveitchik openly denies that Jesus is the Messiah and claims that most people have misread Matthew 24:5, which states: For many will come in my name, saying, “I am the mashiaḥ,” and they will mislead many. Soloveitchik states:
Many will come in my name—there are those who say that Yeshua cautioned them not to be mistaken if a man comes in his name and says that he is the Messiah, that he may not mislead them. However, the meaning of this verse is difficult, for how is it possible that a man would come in the name of Yeshua and make himself out to be the Messiah? Who would believe that Yeshua sent him? And what does he mean by saying, “many will come in my name”? This is the meaning: Yeshua told them that many would come in his name claiming that he was the Messiah, and by this they will mislead many. Therefore, what he is really saying is, “I am giving you distinct signs of when the Messiah comes.”
Rather than being the Messiah, for Soloveitchik Jesus is the one who spreads the necessary condition of belief in divine unity as the prelude to the Messiah (a kind of spiritual, as opposed to political or militaristic, Joseph messiah). The extent of his success makes him a messianic figure but not the final one who comes to redeem Israel.
Elsewhere in his commentary, he is less definitive in terms of Jesus’ messianic vocation. In his comment to Matthew 10:7, And as you go, call out, saying, “The Kingdom of Heaven is on the brink of arrival,” Soloveitchik comments: “The main principle that he commanded to his disciples, first of all, to allow the faith in the unity of the Creator to be instilled in their hearts.” Commenting on the “son of man,” a common trope drawn from Daniel 7:13–14 and other places to refer to a messianic figure, Soloveitchik comments on Matthew 10:23: “Before the son of man comes—which is to say, I promise you that even if they persecute you from city to city, you will not complete your travels to all of the cities of Israel until the son of man comes, that is, until one of the men who is persecuting you realizes your righteousness in that you came to instill in the heart of every single man the knowledge of the unity of the Creator.” But even here, Soloveitchik seems to distinguish between Jesus’ messianic vocation (to instill in the heart of every single man the knowledge of the unity of the Creator), which he accomplishes with tremendous success, and his status as the Messiah. On Matthew 14:14, Soloveitchik comments: “Good news of the kingdom—a distinct sign of when the Messiah will come, when all the nations will know the good news of the kingdom, which is the unity of the Creator. Jews and Christians together believe only in one God and that the Messiah will surely come, just as Yeshua promised; and when the good news of the kingdom—being the unity of God—is proclaimed to all the nations, then the end will come.” Soloveitchik uses the unity doctrine as that which unites Judaism and Christianity and Jesus’ teaching as exemplifying this idea. His literal messianic vocation thus becomes, for him, beside the point.
In Mark 11:10, we read: Blessed is the coming kingdom of David our father [in the name of YHWH]! Hoshana in the heights! Soloveitchik uses the opportunity to render the kingdom of David outside its purely historical setting to suggest “whose goal is the triumph of divine unity.” In Mark 14:9, Amen, I say to you that wherever this good news is proclaimed throughout the world, what she has done will also be told as a memorial to her, Soloveitchik comments: “As a memorial to her—meaning: Everywhere that my name is mentioned with honor, for having proclaimed and spread the Gospel—the good news—of the unity of God in the world, the name of this woman will also be cited for praise.” The “good news” is never about Jesus as the Messiah but about the unity of the Creator that he preaches. In Matthew 4:23, Soloveitchik renders the good news of the kingdom as “the unity of the Creator.”
Passages that have sometimes been viewed as Jesus’ call for his followers to abandon their families to follow him have been rendered by Soloveitchik as teaching belief in divine unity as the ultimate sacrifice. For example, in Matthew 10:35, we read: For I have come to separate a man from his father and a daughter from her mother and a bride from her mother-in-law. Soloveitchik reads it to say: “I have come to separate—my goal is to teach you that every man must give up his life for the sake of the unity of the Creator. And this faith will cause separation between a son and his father, if the father does not believe in the unity of the Creator, for he will think his son a foreigner and an enemy.” Similarly, in Matthew 16:24: Yeshua said to his disciples, “A man who desires to follow me will disown himself, pick up his cross, and follow me”; Soloveitchik writes: “To follow me—he who wants to follow my teaching. The main principle of my teaching is that man should be prepared to give up his life for the sake of the faith in the unity of the Creator.” Soloveitchik situates Jesus’ main message as in accord with rabbinic teaching refracted through a Maimonidean lens. Spreading the belief in the unity of God is a prerequisite for the final redemption. Jesus, at times better than the rabbinic sages, fulfills that teaching. As such, his messianic role is Judaized.
On the resurrection of Jesus, Soloveitchik mirrors Maimonides in eliding resurrection with the immortality of the soul. Maimonides does this in his famous “Epistle on Resurrection” in a way that is intended to deflect the criticisms that he does not believe in resurrection from comments elsewhere in his writings (even as he lists resurrection as one of his Thirteen Principles of Faith).115 Because the resurrection of Jesus is such a contentious dimension of the New Testament for Jews