Yad Rama (Sanhedrin 93b): “The Messiah-as it is written (Yeshaya 11:2), And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge of the fear of the Lord. And shall make him of quick understanding [wa-hariho] in the fear of the Lord. … Rava said that means that Moshiach will have the ability to smell a man and determine whether he is guilty or innocent.” That means that Moshiach will understand through ruach hakodesh the truth of the matter. He will not judge based on the claims of the litigants nor will he judge based on witnesses but will simply know through ruach hakodesh who is innocent and who is guilty… The gemora states, “Bar Kosiba (Bar Kochva) ruled for two years and then told the Rabbis that he was Moshiach. The Rabbis replied to him that it is foretold that Moshiach will judge guilt or innocence by means of smell – therefore they asked him to judge a case purely on the basis of smell to demonstrate that he was truly Moshiach. When the Rabbis saw that he was not able to judge by smell alone they killed him.” This can be explained by saying that Bar Kochva was liable to capital punishment because he was a false prophet since he claimed to be Moshiach who has ruach hakodesh which enables him to judge by smell. Thus falsely claiming to have ruach hakodesh makes a person a false prophet.
Rarely will anyone claim to have Ruach Hakodesh, truthfully or whatever. Even those that are claimed to have Ruach Haskodesh, the claim is generally advanced by others; they don't advance it themselves. So this Yad Rama on Sanherdrin would be inapplicable in such a case, even if it were untrue.
ReplyDeleteWhy doesn't the Rambam codify this as one of the tell tale signs of Moshiach?
ReplyDeleteTo Daas Yochid,
ReplyDeleteMany times, I've had the experience when speaking to a person, and I ask them, for example, how they know a certain fact...
They will jokingly say "I have Ruach Hakodesh"!
Based on the Yad Rama, this would be the equivalent of jokingly commenting that you had committed a capital offense...
Daas Hedyot:
ReplyDeleteYes, I've heard that too many times from plain guys on the street. Never from Talmidei Chachomim though.
I don't know that the Yad Rama is referring to these jokers on the street though.
Raavad (Hilchos Lulav 8:5): Ruach HaKodesh has already manifested itself in our yeshiva for a number of years…
ReplyDeleteMahri Ben Lev (3:116):…If a person will cite the gemora in Bava Mietzia (59b) where R’ Eleazar brings support for himself from a bas kol and yet R’ Yehoshua announced that we don’t pasked halacha from Heaven. Yet we see that the Raavad asserts that he had ruach hakodesh in his yeshiva.. The Magid Mishna says that despite all the praise that the Ravad gave his reason and saying that it was based on ruach hakodesh, nevertheless the Ramban did not posken in agreement with the Raavad. Now there is no doubt that the Ramban agreed with the Ravad’s assertion that he had ruach hakodesh. It seems that the Ravad meant them to be understood literally and he wanted his rulings accepted because of this. Despite this the Ramban rejected the views of the Ravad. … apparently because the Torah itself says that the halacha is not in Heaven…
ReplyDeleteVery interesting. Where was R Akiva in all this? Presumably his claim that bar kuziva Was Moshiach Was not through ruach hakodesh.
ReplyDelete