The Ultimate Appropriation
From Bar-Ilan University's Weekly Page on the weekly parsha, #764, parashat Balaq 5768, by Dr. ‘Amos Bar-Deia‘ of the Life Sciences faculty:
In discussing the figure of Bil‘am and his legacy in Jewish literature, Prof. Bar-Deia‘ says...
The character of Balaam turned into the Israelite Antichrist, identified with Jesus and even with Muḥammad.
Whoa.
Talk about appropriating someone else's terminology and using it against them!
In discussing the figure of Bil‘am and his legacy in Jewish literature, Prof. Bar-Deia‘ says...
דמותו של בלעם נהפכת לאנטיכריסט הישראלי ומזוהה עם ישו ואף עם מוחמד.
The character of Balaam turned into the Israelite Antichrist, identified with Jesus and even with Muḥammad.
Whoa.
Talk about appropriating someone else's terminology and using it against them!
carved on the walls of the caverns by Steg (dos iz nit der šteg) at 7/09/2008 04:00:00 PM
6 Comments:
Yeshaya Leibowitz also said the same thing in his book on the weekly parasha. He cites some midrashim, but doesn't footnote. Raises some questions on what they think on authorship of the sefer ;).
My comment was slightly not clear--Y. Leibowitz said that the midrashic construction of Balak was created from Jesus and/or Muhammad.
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You mean that the midrashic construction of *Bil'am* (a non-Jewish prophet) was used as a polemic against Islam. (Both Muhammad and Jesus are prophets according to Islam). If this was indeed the motivation of the midrashic authors, then the use of the term "Antichrist" is misapplied and confusing because Jesus/Bil'am -> Antichrist would be a reading of the midrash as a polemic against Christianity.
rivkayael:
ah, interesting!
aharon:
i don't think it was meant particularly against Islam. i think it's the idea of Bil‘am as a Non-Jewish Prophet which got associated independently with each of Jesus and Muhammad, as the founders of other religions. Bil‘am then gets demonized and seen as some kind of ultimate adversarial evil, i.e. an Antichrist figure, in representation of the founders of the religions whose followers at various times persecuted Jews.
And yet, interestingly, you yourself adopt the demonic view of Bil‘åm, in your more recent post.
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