The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXXII) Isaiah

The Prophet continues describing the qualities of the Jewish king, as God commands him to do so. As we said in our previous commentaries, these qualities also belong to every Jew by our Pact with the Creator. The Torah commands every Jew to be connected to God through Torah study and observing His Commandments. This is the Pact we accepted unconditionally when God gave the Torah to the Jewish people. Let's be always aware that it is an eternal Pact.

Our ancestors wanted to have a king like the other nations, and God in the Torah gave specific Commandments for the king of Israel. These include being a guardian of the Pact, and a wise learner and teacher of the Torah, among other duties and restrictions.

The kings of Israel are inheritors of these Commandments, as the focal points of Israel's commitments with the Creator. Hence we all share the qualities, duties and obligations derived from our permanent connection with God. We must understand the Messianic Consciousness as a Jewish collective awareness of God's Plan for the Final Redemption. This awareness does not belong only to a single person but to all Israel. We depend only on God's will, and not relying on one individual. The Torah and the Hebrew Scriptures repeat time and again that God is our One and only Redeemer, and we must understand the Jewish king messiah as the focal point of our collective Final Redemption. The paradigm and reference of what the Messianic Consciousness is and will eternally be for all.

"And there shall come forth a shoot out of the stock of Jesse, and a twig shall grow forth out of his roots. 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 and of the reverence of the Lord." (11:1-2)

The Prophet reminds us that king David is the main reference of the Jewish king messiah, as an extension of the Psalmist, son of the righteous Jesse. Righteousness is the stock, the trait and the quality from where we all are redeemed. Hence the foundation of the Messianic Consciousness is the will power and determination to always choose goodness over wickedness. This is what a righteous person does all the time. This is the premise of our connection with God in order to be the vessel of His spirit in us. As we choose goodness every moment the spirit of God rests upon us. Thus the qualities of goodness rest on us as wisdom, understanding, guidance and might, knowledge and reverence of God's will.

"And his delight shall be in the reverence of the Lord, and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither decide after the hearing of his ears." (11:3)

The reverence of the Creator -- what our Sages refer as the "fear" of God -- is what we experience in our Love of God, as awesome and impressive before our inability to conceive Him. The more we know about His ways and attributes, the more we love Him and revere Him as our most sublime delight. In this awareness of reverence to Him we can only discern through His Torah. Our will becomes the vessel and the chariot of His will. In this permanent connection with the Creator there is no room for personal agendas or ego's fantasies and illusions. These are the sight of our eyes and the hearing of our ears.

"But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the land; and he shall smite the land with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked." (11:4)

Again God reminds us through the Prophet that choosing and pursuing goodness is the foundation of His Torah and His will. This is the righteousness we must plant in the land as our life, as individuals and as the Nation God commands us to have and to be. In practical terms we have to care for each other as the main purpose of goodness by doing what is right. We have to integrate all Israel as an united Nation, bringing together the rich and poor, the meek and the rebel, the passionate and the passive, the water bearers and the warriors, the wise and the ignorant, and all diverse and multifaceted Jews.

The voice of righteousness, the rod that comes out of our mouths -- as the outcome of goodness and expressions of Love's ways and attributes -- is the guide and conductor of all aspects of life, and will prevail over the negative trends in human consciousness. This voice is the language and expression of goodness as the Light that turns darkness into Light.

"And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins." (11:5)

This voice is the expression of goodness as the guide and conductor of every aspect of life. This voice comes from righteousness -- as the expression of the goodness of Love's ways and attributes -- that integrates and encompasses all levels and dimensions of consciousness.

"And the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them." (11:6)

As we integrate and unify all aspects and levels of consciousness, harmony prevails in all dimensions of life. The Prophet makes reflect the Messianic Consciousness in the material world as also the place where meek and wild animals dwell together in harmony. We can understand this ideal state of consciousness as righteousness guiding and directing our discernment, thought, mind, feelings, emotions, passions and instincts through Love's ways and attributes.

The Messianic Consciousness is the stage when the negative trends and tendencies are turned into positive expressions. Hence evil in all its manifestations are removed from what we are, have and do. Envy will become cooperation, wrath will be turned into joy, greed will be generosity, indifference will become compassion, indolence will be solidarity, cruelty will turn into care. The regency of Love's ways and attributes will rule every life in this world, as the premise to enter the Messianic Era. This is the final stage in which our sole interest will the knowledge of our Creator.

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXXI) Isaiah

In his three following chapters (7-10) the Prophet refers to the situation of Israel in his times, divided in two kingdoms fighting each other. Idolatry leads to animosity and war with their devastating results. The kings of Judah in the south, and the kings of Israel in the north found their destruction, fall and captivity. We see the nefarious effects of ego's fantasies and illusions as the idols that separate, divide, corrupt and subjugate all aspects and dimensions of life. Yet our Creator pursues peace and brotherhood for all Israel, to be united by and for the Torah, as the all encompassing and harmonizing means to fulfill God's will. Through the Prophet, God speaks to the wicked kings in order to make righteousness and justice the guidelines and common bond with Him.

"And the Lord spoke again unto [the king] Ahaz, saying: 'Ask yourself a sign of the Lord your God: ask it in the depth, or in the high above'. But Ahaz said: 'I will not ask, neither will I try the Lord'. And he [Isaiah] said: 'Hear you now, O house of David: Is it not enough for you that you scorn human [Prophets], that you scorn also my God'?" (Isaiah 7:10-13)

God delivers His message for Ahaz through the Prophet, to whom the king replies with contempt. Isaiah responds to his insolence. Though these verses refer to a specific situation regarding a wicked Jewish king, we can understand them in the context of the Messianic Consciousness. The Jewish messiah comes from the Davidic lineage, therefore all references to it are linked to the coming Messianic times. God wants Israel, as the encompassing consciousness that heralds the Final Redemption, to be permanently connected to Him. Even in the case of Ahaz, an idolatrous king of Judah, God wants to mend this connection with the ruling aspect of Israel.

God knows His entire Creation. He gave us free will, and knows what we are capable of. He lets us experience the choices we make and their consequences. He gave us discernment to learn from experience. In negative circumstances He expects us to learn, to find the way out and return to goodness. God also expects the same from Ahaz, who refuses to return to the Creator. The Prophet in this case represents the voice of Redemption, which calls on our discernment and common sense. At some point we hear its voice, but we rather ignore it or reject it. The same contempt we show to our Creator. In His infinite compassion He reminds us the traits and qualities of the connection He has with us, and expects from us.

"Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign: behold, the young woman shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." (7:14)

Our Sages refer to this particular woman, the young woman, as the mother of the future king Hezekiah, the righteous son of Ahaz. The sign includes the name as the identity of a righteous Jewish king who is with God (Immanuel). Israel and its king are distinguished by their connection with God, therefore every Jew's name is Immanuel, which means God is with me. Israel is destined by the Torah to be a righteous Nation with a righteous king. Hence Isaiah will later refer to Israel and its king as one single entity, he calls "the lamb".

"Cream and honey shall he eat, when he knows to refuse the evil, and choose the good. Yea, before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land of the two kings whom you fear shall be abandoned." (7:15-16)

Again, as we said before, these verses refer no only to the righteous traits of the future king Hezekiah but also the royal Davidic lineage. Cream and honey are the qualities of the land of Israel, the Promise Land flowing with milk and honey. These are allegories of the nurturing goodness of life, along with the happiness and contentment of it. The good qualities of the land as the goodness of life are also part of the people of Israel, and highlighted by their king. As we realize that the goodness of Love's ways and attributes is our Essence and true identity, we consequently refuse and reject evil in all its ways. Referring to the divided land of Israel in those times, it would later be abandoned after falling under their neighboring enemies.

"For a child is born unto us, a son is given unto us; and the government is upon his shoulder. The Wondrous Adviser, Mighty God, Eternal Father, called [Hezekiah's name] Prince of Peace. Upon the one with the greatness in dominion and the boundless peace that will prevail in the throne of David, and on his kingdom, to establish and sustain it through justice and righteousness from now to eternity. The zeal of the Lord of hosts accomplishes this." (9:5-6)

Two chapters later, the Prophet continues describing the qualities of the Davidic lineage in his times, and also in Messianic times. During most of Hezekiah's rule, abundance and prosperity returned to his kingdom, as a sign of the same way also expected in the Final Redemption. The main trait of the Messianic Consciousness is peace, which is intended to be its own cause and effect. As we do with Love, we approach peace as something intended to prevail.

We are peaceful in order to make peacefulness reign. God in His Torah commands Israel to be a peaceful people: "and you -- you are to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (Exodus 19:6). Israel is the prince of peace as also Israel's kings are princes of peace, as the result of justice and righteousness. There is no peace without these, and the Creator wants us to pursue them and love them He does: "He loves righteousness and justice, the Earth is full of the loving kindness of the Lord." (Psalms 33:5)

We must assimilate this in our consciousness. Our peace depends on how just and righteous we are as our Jewish identity requires from us, individually and collectively. These two qualities are the ways we implement Love's ways and attributes. It is not enough to proclaim Love as the tangible material manifestation of God's Love. We realize this by being and doing justice and righteousness as the ethical and moral expressions of Love's ways and attributes. The Final Redemption and the Messianic Era begin with this, and will remain from now until eternity as we establish and sustain peace through justice and righteousness. As the Prophet says, the zeal of God -- which is His Love -- accomplishes this, as long as we embrace His zeal as our zeal.

"And it shall come to pass in that day, that the remnant of Israel, and the survivors of the house of Jacob, will no longer rely on him [their oppressor] that smote them; but will rely on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, in truth." (10:20)

We can identify ego in its negative ways as our oppressor. The source of all our idols. In our consciousness these idols are ego's fantasies and illusions. Once we survive the oppressor of the goodness we are as the house of Jacob, we become the remnant of Israel who embraces the truth of God's Love in what we truly are, and are destined to do in the Messianic Era. This is the eternal time and space in our consciousness and in life, when we rely solely on God's ways and attributes, which are the truth. Thus we live in His truth, and realize that God is the Holy One of Israel.

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXX) Isaiah

The vision of Isaiah in Heaven is one of the transcendent messages we have in Judaism. Transcendent in many ways. It happened in a place and time where indeed there is no place and time, and this can't be grasped by our consciousness. In this sense paradox is one of the premises of transcendence. In Judaism the impossibility of conceiving our Creator is also a paradox, because the fact that we can't conceive Him does not imply that He does not exist.

Our Jewish conception of God transcends the limitations of human understanding. Hence our Sages teach that the Torah has seventy faces, that actually are endless because the Torah is infinite as its Creator. Yet He gave it in the language of humans as the door to know His Plan for the material world. This means that we must understand His messages within the frame of time and space, and the limitations of human consciousness.

The Prophet has the difficult task to communicate a vision and experience out of the context of human understanding. The dynamics between thought and language is as complex as consciousness itself. Since we are born we are forced to frame thought within the boundaries of language in order to be able to express something potentially indescribable into something describable. Our Sages make an analogy of this situation, comparing it to a blind person who has never seen something ever before and suddenly can see. He has no previous references to describe a starry night or a sunrise, so he begins to describe it with the shapes he used to touch in order to know them. The result of his description of what he "saw" is totally beyond comprehension for those who were not blind in his midst. In other words, our human thought and language lack the references needed to assimilate a heavenly vision or experience.

The Prophet has no choice but to describe his vision and experience in Heaven the way He does it to convey his message. In this paradox of describing what is indescribable we must try to perceive what Isaiah wants to tell us. For this he uses words and situations we can relate to, as an invitation to open our consciousness to a higher level of understanding. Once we enter greater dimensions beyond human comprehension, we must learn to live in them, to relate to them, and to communicate them.

We have said in other commentaries that the World to Come as well as the Messianic Era have different references than those we have in this current world. Our Prophets give us a glimpse, telling us that evil and negativity do not exist in those times and places, and are replaced by new references we only know when we get there. This is also a way to understand that heavenly visions or experiences belong to Heaven and make sense there, not here. We must take this as an invitation to remove the negative references we have in consciousness, and turn them positive in order to experience new dimensions and expressions of life. The result of this will be an entire new approach to what we conceive, perceive, think and feel, and its effect in what we speak and do.

"(...) I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and His train filled the Temple." (Isaiah 6:1)

In this sentence our Sages identify two situations and two places. The Creator in Heaven and the Temple in Earth. The Prophet describes God in our human language as someone sitting on a throne not only high but also elevated. In Judaism we can understand our undefinable and indescribable Creator as One who is indeed beyond our reach in every way. High and elevated are words to illustrate this principle. This fact doesn't imply that God does not relate to His Creation, for the rest of the sentence points this out. The edges of His mantle filled the Temple.

Mantle as well as any other garments represent two conditions. One is to cover and the other is to identify. In the sentence the Prophet is referring to a Divine attribute (a mantle) that extends down to a place, the Temple of Jerusalem. It is also the connection between the Creator and us. This attribute completely fills the Temple as the endless time and place where we are permanently connected to Him. We call this mantle His Loving kindness, for it also covers His Creation: "He loves righteousness and justice, the Earth is full of the loving kindness of the Lord." (Psalms 33:5), "Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His loving kindness endures forever." (136:1, 100:5, I Chronicles 16:34).

"Above Him stood the seraphim; each one had six wings: with twain he covered his face and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one called unto another, and said: Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts; the whole Earth is full of His glory." (Isaiah 6:2-3)

Angels are also creatures that belong to this higher realm we call Heaven. Our Sages refer to them as messengers that perform specific tasks or missions to fulfill God's will. These missions represent ethical and moral lessons that reflect God's ways and attributes, with which He relates to His Creation. These messengers proclaim and reiterate the sacredness of the Creator as something that is also beyond conception. In this sense we understand that sacred means separated, as unreachable for our discernment. Yet the paradox persists, for His glory fills His Creation, which encompasses all we see and all we don't see.

We realize in these verses that His glory is His loving kindness, of which we must be aware. If His Love fills His Creation, we are also filled by His Love; therefore we are an emanation and extension of His Love. Hence we realize the sacredness of God and His Love.

This triple proclamation must resound in all levels of consciousness, for our Essence and identity are formed and defined by God's Love. This awareness impacts the Prophet. After hearing this proclamation, Isaiah questions his own identity. He contrasts his ways with the ways of the Essence from which God created us.

"Then said I: Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." (6:5)

As we reach this awareness, we realize what is real and unreal, true and false, right and wrong. We make a clear distinction between ego's fantasies and illusions, and Love's ways and attributes. We become aware of the traps we have made to submit our consciousness to the opposite of who we truly are. Once we see and experience God's ways and attributes, we realize that these are our Essence and identity. This is how we return to where we belong. This is the turning point when repentance becomes the realization of who we really are: How could I have been being, having and doing something I am not? This is our first step to return to the Creator.

The Prophet recognizes himself as an undone person, someone incomplete, as long as he dwells in the fantasies, illusions and mirages of the material world. He mentions the lips as the bearers of impurity. As we indicated above, thought precedes language as the expression of what we conceive, believe or feel. What we feel is the outcome of what we think or believe, hence we must be aware of what we entertain in our mind. Lips in this sense are not only what we speak but also what we do.

"Then flew unto me one of the seraphim, with a glowing stone in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar; and he touched my mouth with it, and said: Lo, this has touched your lips; and your iniquity is taken away, and your sin expiated." (6:6-7)

Before the Divine Presence the Prophet has the privilege to be cleansed by the heavenly fire we call here God's Love. This fire not only cleanses our negative actions but also what generates them. As long as we live in, by, from and for this fire, we live before God's Presence. This is the fire that transforms our lives, removing the negative aspects and trends in our consciousness, heralding the beginning of the Final Redemption and the Messianic Era.

"And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: 'Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?' Then I said: 'Here am I, send me'." (6:8)

As we allow Love's ways and attributes to lead and direct all dimensions and facets of life, and to unite and harmonize the diversity and creative potentials of human consciousness towards God's ways and attributes, we are ready to be full partners in God's Plan.

"And He said: 'Go, and tell this people: you hear indeed, but understand not; and you see indeed, but perceive not. Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they, seeing with their eyes, and hearing with their ears, and understanding with their heart, return, and be healed'." (6:9-10)

Here the Prophet is commanded to make us aware of our stubbornness to reject the goodness of God's ways and attributes, and rather embrace ego's fantasies and illusions. We rather desire power instead of Love, control over freedom, addiction over detachment, anger over joy, lack over abundance, cruelty over compassion, indifference over solidarity. These negative states of consciousness are our own punishments, from which we have no other choice but learning from them. Here God tells the Prophet that these negative traits make our hearts heavy and hard ("fat"), our understanding (the "ears") blocked, and our knowledge (the "eyes") useless. By coming to this dead end, sooner or later we become aware that living in a negative predicament is futile. Then we return to where we really are and belong as a healing transition.

"Then said I: 'Lord, how long?' And He answered: 'Until cities be wasted without inhabitant, and houses without man, and the land become utterly waste." (6:11)

The returning process is always up to us, but there is a point when we are fed up of living in the opposite side of Love's ways and attributes. That side is where the wasted cities and desolated lands are located. We have said that cities, land, mountains and hills represent beliefs, ideologies, lifestyles, customs, habits and behavioral patterns. These can become desolated and wasted places, bad enough to compel ourselves to transform them into positive aspects and trends in our consciousness, and in our lives.

"And the Lord have removed men far away, and the forsaken places be many in the midst of the land." (6:12)

Stubbornness makes us give up our free will. We lose our higher awareness to ego's fantasies and illusions. As we put aside the awareness of our permanent connection with the Creator, we remove our consciousness far from Him to enter the many forsaken places of our negative trends and choices.

"And if there be yet a tenth in it, it shall again be eaten up; as an elm, and as an oak, whose stock remains, when they burn their leaves, so the sacred seed shall be the stock thereof'." (6:13)

Our Sages refer to this verse as the minority of Israel that remains in spite of the wickedness in their midst. The minority that is swallowed by the enemies of goodness and real freedom in humankind, yet the few whose stock remains. Their seed will blossom and fructify in the end. This is the stock and the sacred seed that will prevail forever in the Messianic Era.

This verse may sound ambiguous, but it doesn't. On the one hand God reminds us of our negative predicament as the cause of our destruction. On the other hand He tells us that in spite of that, our goodness will prevail. God wants us to be aware of what our stock and seed are about. We are also those who proclaim His sacredness from which He created us.

We are good because we come from the goodness of God, hence goodness will always prevail. This goodness endows us with free will to make choices of freedom, not control or captivity. We must not allow consciousness to lose our free will. Thus we realize that our freedom lies on Love's ways and attributes, the holy stock and seed that always prevail.

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXIX) Isaiah

We indicated in the beginning of these commentaries on the Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy that the messages of our Prophets are divided in three parts. These are our separation from God and its consequences, the process of our return to Him -- usually called repentance --, and the Final Redemption as our permanent connection to Him. These are also prophesied the last book of the Torah, and the Creator sent His Prophets to remind us about them. Hence we see the same messages delivered repeatedly through their writings. They are stated in different ways, ranging from a direct and severe language to allegoric and sometimes poetic expressions.

These repetitions are aimed to awaken all levels of consciousness regarding our relationship with God, for these are destined to be united and harmonized towards His Plan called the Messianic Era. Hence the Torah and the Hebrew Scriptures speak to us in many levels and dimensions in order to guide our intellect, discernment, thoughts, mind, feelings, emotions, passions and instincts. Thus we understand why God's messages to us are stated and delivered in many ways and forms. We must grasp God's words to become fully aware that our choices -- not Him -- have taken us where we are here and now.

We have to open our entire consciousness to become aware of who we truly are before the Creator. Thus we realize our way back to Him, His ways and attributes. The fifth chapter of Isaiah's messages focuses again in our bond with God, followed by our separation from Him after choosing ego's fantasies and illusions instead of Love's ways and attributes.

"Let me sing for my well-beloved a song, of my beloved about his vineyard. My beloved has a vineyard in a fruitful hill, my well-beloved had a vineyard in a very fertile hill." (Isaiah 5:1)

It begins praising our beloved Creator for His bond with us, His vineyard. He exalts us in a fruitful hill, which means the awareness of our permanent connection with Him. This fertile hill is Zion, Jerusalem and the Temple. The point here is to realize what we are, have and do in this special place God has exalted. Our connection with Him is something we can't grasp with our discernment or understanding, for being with Him is beyond conception. Hence we only have the references the Creator showed us in His Torah as His attributes. These are the guidelines as the fertile land to fructify in the material world. The fertile hill as the goodness we harvest out of Love's ways and attributes. Hence it is our choice to make the vineyard of our consciousness fructify in the goodness of God's guidance.   

"And he dug it, and cleared it of stones, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also hewed out a vat therein; and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth bad grapes." (5:2)

God gave us His Commandments to remove the negative traits and tendencies in consciousness for us to allow only goodness in all facets of life. As we chose we harvest, as we sow we reap. Goodness voices its fair complaint.

"And now, oh inhabitant of Jerusalem and man of Judah, please judge between me and my vineyard." (5:3)

The Prophet addresses us individually as one who dwells in Jerusalem, in the awareness of our permanent connection with God. Also as the individual Jew who has an eternal Covenant with Him. Our consciousness is summoned to discern, to judge from cause and effect. We already know that Love is its own cause and effect, and that Love does not coexist with anything different from its ways and attributes. Then if Love is not the effect, what is the cause? God calls us to reflect and use our judgement as discernment. He speaks to our common sense at the basic level of cause and effect. Then we have to respond for that we think, believe, feel, speak and do.

We have said often that our Chassidic sages call "vessels" all levels and dimensions of consciousness. They wisely describe discernment, mind, emotions, feelings and passions as empty vessels waiting to be filled with what we choose to pour into them. We also know that thought precedes action, though some of us act without thinking first. The idea is to be aware of the traits and qualities about beliefs or ideologies we entertain in our mind, the kind of trends we impose in our emotions, the sensations we imprint in our feelings, and the expressions we give to our passions. All becomes a matter of choice. 

"What could I have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? Why, when I looked for it to yield grapes, did it yield bad ones?" (5:4)

The Creator makes us accountable for our choices because we indeed are a matter of cause and effect. The lesson is about choosing Love as the cause, for we know that Love is the effect. Love removes what is different, opposite or against its ways and attributes. In order to make Love rule and prevail in all levels of consciousness, first we must return to God's Love. We must yearn for His Love hard enough to make us return to Him, His ways and attributes. He tells us through the Prophet that He fulfills His promise of Final Redemption, as long as we begin allowing our Love to remove what is not necessary in our consciousness. Making Love's ways and attributes prevail over ego's fantasies and illusions.  

"Now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will take away its hedge, and it will be eaten up. I will break down its wall of it, and it will be trampled down. And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor dug; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they don't rain upon it." (5:5-6)

The Final Redemption in Judaism is about the complete removal of the negative trends in human consciousness, and also in the material world. We must understand it as an individual and collective process we have to initiate. As we say "let there be peace and let it begin with me", we also let Love and the goodness of its ways and attributes begin to manifest in all levels of consciousness. Historically we have not allowed this total Redemption for a reason of choice. The Creator gave us free will to choose what is right and good, not the opposite. The Torah invites us to understand evil as a reference and not a choice, hence we are commanded to choose goodness as the blessing, as life.

"For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah the plant of His delight. And He looked for justice, but behold violence; for righteousness, but behold a cry." (5:7)

As we said above, the fertile and fruitful hill is our connection with God, and we as Israel are planted by Him. We are the other end of this bond in the material world, His delight on Earth, for we are commanded by Him and destined to make prevail His righteousness and justice. These two summarize His Torah as the entire instruction to eliminate violence and suffering from the world. God has honored Israel to make righteousness and justice prevail out of the goodness of His Love. Once more we must understand our moral and ethical imperatives not only as the outcome of fairness to do what is right, but the outcome of Love. God loves and delights in justice and righteousness, for these come from His Love, hence we honor Him by making our Love the motivation and the cause of justice and righteousness.

In this context we the Chosen People are accountable to Love as the material manifestation of God's Love. The rest of this chapter reiterates that we are accountable for our permanent connection with the Creator. Through the Prophet, He points out the negative trends in our consciousness that dispossess and oppress the weak among our people. Selfishness, greed, indifference, cruelty and indolence devastate the goodness of Love, leaving behind misery and suffering. The vanity and futility of ego's fantasies and illusions that call good evil and evil good. God reaffirms time and again that evil and wickedness are wiped as He fulfills His promise to redeem us from them.

God's anger is recalled. Again we understand it as the anger we experience as the result of frustration in the emptiness left by ego's fantasies and illusions. Anger is what we feel out of our separation from God's Love. There is no wrath in God but what He tells us about our wrath, to make us return to His ways and attributes. Our anger and frustration become the trigger to our way back to God. The pain and misery we suffer with the outcome of our negative choices hit our feelings and emotions, filling them with anger, rage, frustration, depression, indolence and indifference. These are the enemies that threaten our consciousness and repel our Essence and true identity.

The message in this chapter can be summarize saying that when we don't care for our vineyard -- the goodness God has planted in us --, and embrace the negative trends in consciousness, these turn into the enemies that seek our destruction. This happened to us in the times of our Prophets, and we assimilate it now in our current times as well. Our enemies increase against us as we allow negative trends to take over our consciousness.

"And they shall roar against them in that day like the roaring of the sea; and if one look unto the land, behold darkness and distress, and the light is darkened in the skies thereof." (5:30)

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXVIII) Isaiah

Our consciousness faces devastation with ego's fantasies and illusions. As we let them control our thoughts, emotions, feelings, passions and instincts we are doomed to live under their terms, conditions and whims. This sounds like living under the dictatorship of addictions, attachments and obsessions out of an either false or fabricated feeling or belief of lack. Then we reflect on what is relevant beyond our immediate needs as the first step to free ourselves from the modern slavery of Consumer Society. The point is to make a clear difference between what is truly relevant in life and what is not. Thus we realize that from the moment we are born all we need is Love, and Love is what is necessary and relevant.

Empirically we realize that we can't live or survive without Love. Hence Love's ways and attributes must be the purpose of life in all its extension. Also, based on experience, we learn to put aside all that oppose Love's ways. But we don't. The so called "establishment" we also call "the system", "lifestyle", "modus vivendi" or "way of life" is what usually determines the values and principles from and for which we live. We live according to what others around us are, have and do. When we are fed up with it, we usually look for "better" or "higher" values and move to where they are. At some point (unfortunately not everyone gets there) we wonder about what our individual and collective consciousness is about.

The unavoidable questions arise. What we are, where we came from, and what is the meaning and purpose of life. The Torah gives us all the answers. Then we learn and regain what we thought we never had. Love comes as the answer for all the questions. As we reflect on the Creator's ways and attributes we realize that these are also ours, for we came from Him. The Prophet refers to devastation in our consciousness after we allow our enemies to take over our Essence and identity. Devastation is all that doesn't belong to who we truly are.

"And seven women shall take hold of one man in that day, saying: 'We will eat our own bread, and wear our own apparel; only let us be called by your name, you take away our reproach'." (Isaiah 4:1)

Though our Sages teach that in those days of devastation thousands of widows were willing to become wives of the remaining men, after their wars against the invaders, let's understand it in other way. The fact that the verse precedes another one full of redeeming meanings invites us to take a different approach. We become aware of our basic needs and forget about ego's desires and pretensions when we become destitute. After our consciousness is depleted by the claims and demands of materialistic fantasies, addictions, attachments and illusions, we are forced to return to what it is truly real. The seven women also represent the seven Canaanite nations as negative tendencies in consciousness (greed, envy, lust, wrath, indifference, indolence and cruelty) that instead of depleting Love as the vital force that sustains and nurtures life for the sake of their predicament, begin to provide for themselves under the guidance of one man.

This man represents human consciousness under the guidance of the unifying power of Love. The negative trends in consciousness are transformed into cooperative and productive qualities when we realize that the goodness of Love is the natural conductor of all facets and dimensions of life. Love integrates and harmonizes all aspects and trends in consciousness for the purpose of Love's ways and attributes. In this sense we understand that Love is its own cause and effect. We can also understand the sentence, "only let us be called by your name, [and] you take away our reproach" as a plea from our negative tendencies to be redeemed and transformed by the Creator, who placed them in our consciousness for us to have free will. We ask Him to let us be called by His Name, so He may take away our reproach and disgrace. In His compassion we are redeemed from the outcome of the wrong choices we make, and their negative consequences.

As we said above, the man mentioned in the verse represents human consciousness under the guidance of the unifying power of Love. This is the Messianic Consciousness, the premise for the Final Redemption. We are not completely redeemed if we still allow in our consciousness beliefs, thoughts, feelings, emotions, passions and instincts opposite to Love's ways, qualities, means and attributes. We have said before that the approach to Redemption is radical. Thus we understand the Commandment to wipe out the memory of Amalek from below the Heavens.

Love does not cohabit with anything different from its ways and attributes. It is an imperative to remove all traces of evil, its ways and traits, in order to have the life the Creator commands us to live. The Torah is the instruction to make goodness prevail, by all means. Our Jewish identity is stated in the Torah. We act accordingly to make goodness prevail. Our individual and collective Redemption begins as we embrace the goodness that we are, and the goodness we must have as our eternal destiny. Goodness is the moral and ethical imperative of Love as the material manifestation of God's Love. As He redeems our consciousness we realize the greatness and beauty of His Love. 

"In that day shall the sprout of the Lord be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land excellent and comely for the survivors of Israel." (4:2)

We have referred to "the day of the Lord" and "in the end of times" as the time when His Presence is fully revealed as announced by our Prophets. We understand this prophecy as the time when we return to the identity God has given us in His Torah. This means when He joins us in the removal of all that is unnecessary and obstructing in our consciousness. This is the rebirth of our Essence and true identity, the beautiful and glorious sprout that blossoms in the land as the restored true meaning of life as created by God. Those who remain loyal to His ways and attributes, and to Love as the means to live them are the ones who harvest the fruits of their individual and collective Redemption. We have said that the land of Israel, the Promised Land, is the goodness of life and life in its goodness. This is the land where we become aware of our permanent connection with the Creator, where our Love meets His Love.  

"And it shall come to pass, that he that is left in Zion, and he that remained in Jerusalem shall be called holy, even every one that is written unto life in Jerusalem;" (4:3)

Those who maintain their Love permanently connected to God's Love are the holy ones, for this connection is the meaning of Zion and Jerusalem. Both represent our bond with the Creator, which is the real meaning of life and what makes us be written in its book. We rebuild Jerusalem and its Temple as the eternal time and space that keep us united with the Creator, and makes us sacred as the life He has given us.

"when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof, by the spirit of judgment, and by the spirit of destruction." (4:4)

The Prophet reminds us again that as we unite our Love with God's Love by being and doing His ways, Commandments and attributes, He washes away the negative trends in our consciousness. His Love cleans from all impurity the driving force of our life that yearns to bond with Him, by removing the destructive and demeaning traits of the negative choices we make out of ego's false beliefs or feelings of lack.

"And the Lord will create over the whole habitation of mount Zion, and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night; for over all the glory shall be a canopy." (4:5)

After this cleansing process, the Creator promises us to completely renew our consciousness and connection with Him. This includes all their aspects and dimensions in intellect, discernment, mind, thought, emotions, feelings, passions and instincts ("the assemblies"). All these will be protected and guided by God's will, as He did with our ancestors in the desert after their Exodus from Egypt. His cloud and fire as the canopy of His glory, which are signs of His Love.

The Prophet announces a new habitation for Zion as another dimension of our connection with God. We can't grasp it with our current divided consciousness in which goodness and wickedness, true and false, right and wrong, positive and negative coexist in constant confrontation and conflict. This new awareness belongs to the Messianic Consciousness with which God's Love and our Love bond, for us to fulfill the Creator's Plan for the material world. A new consciousness without barriers against Love's ways and attributes.

"And there shall be a pavilion for a shadow in the day time [to protect] from the heat, and for a refuge and for a covert [to protect] from storm and from rain." (4:6)

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXVII) Isaiah

We must always be aware that we are an emanation of God's Love. We are His creatures. We belong to Him. We have an unbreakable connection with our Creator. Judaism proclaims in its fundamentals that He created all that exists, and also sustains and directs His Creation. These principles seem to rebound on a wall in our consciousness called ego. As long as we live believing that we are our own creators and our own gods, we live an illusion. There is no separation from God until we come with the idea or feeling that we are far from Him.

We have said in this blog that being individuals doesn't make us individualists. We obviously are separate entities as individual humans, but this fact doesn't entitle us to separate from each other. By separating from each other we mean being indifferent, indolent, cruel or against each other. We are meant to live close to each other since the moment we are born. We need each other and this makes us responsible and accountable to each other. Free will is empowered by righteousness to make positive choices. Without knowledge of what is right and good we will never be able to execute free will. We learn from experience in order to act accordingly, and we are supposed to act for the sake of our individual and collective well being. This implies that what is good to us individually must also be good for each other. This is the purpose of the entire Torah.

If we act against this fundamental principle, we are living against God's will. This is the seminal message of the Torah, and our Jewish Prophets remind us that the Final Redemption comes when we begin to truly love each other. It means that, in other to do that, we must remove everything that is against God's will. We are talking about the negative trends and tendencies in our consciousness, derived from ego's fantasies and illusions. The Messianic Era is about living in Love's ways and attributes, and our Prophets tell us that it is only up to us. Once we realize that we are an extension of God's Love, we become accountable to His ways and attributes.

We owe our life to goodness, hence we have to respond to it by being and doing goodness. This is our Essence and true identity, from which we were created, for God is good. The Prophet tells us that God asks us to be accountable for the Love He bestows on us.

"The Lord has stood up to plead, and He is standing to judge the peoples. The Lord will enter into judgment with the elders of His people, and the princes thereof: 'It is ye that have consumed the vineyard; the spoil of the poor is in your houses'." (Isaiah 3:13-14)

The Creator pleads for those we afflict and oppress with indifference, indolence, negligence and baseless rejection. We belong to each other as we belong to God. Hence He pleads on behalf of them to remind us to be good as He is with us. This reminder is His judgment for the peoples. In a deeper meaning these are the lower aspects of consciousness we neglect. Emotions and feelings that make us feel lack, abandoned, rejected or humiliated. These are the poor of the land, the weak aspects of consciousness that we must protect, nurture, straighten and empower in order to be strong parts of our consciousness.

Our higher levels in consciousness, the elders and the princes, are accountable to the lower ones which are the poor, the orphans and the widows. We must love ourselves enough to take us from depression, frustration, discouragement, dejection, anger, greed or envy, and transform our negative feelings and emotions into positive and enhancing qualities. We owe to ourselves our complete well being by returning to Love as our true identity. We can only achieve this by loving and helping each other.

We mustn't allow our good judgment and positive qualities fall to ego's fantasies and illusions that consume the goodness of life. This is the vineyard they consume, and the spoils they devour from our emotions and feelings as the poor we dispossess from the goodness of life. The houses where we store the spoils are our egos.

"What do you mean that you crush My people, and grind the face of the poor?' says the Lord of hosts. Because that daughters of Zion have been haughty, and they walk stretching out the neck, and deceiving with the eyes, walking and mincing they go, and making a tinkling with their feet." (3:15-16)

The Creator holds us responsible for the well being of our individual and collective lives. Ego's fantasies and illusions are the daughters of what we have turned into vanity and futility. Zion is the awareness of our permanent connection with God. The Prophet denounces what we have made of our Essence and true identity. He claims that we have prostituted our higher consciousness by letting her go behind ego's fantasies and illusions, and follow their negative outcomes. 

"And the Lord will fray the crown of the head of daughters of Zion, and the Lord exposes their secret parts. In that day the Lord will take away the beauty of their tinkling anklets, and of the embroidered works, and of the crescent-shaped ornaments." (3:17-18)

Once again God's Love redeems us from the consequences of our negative choices. He promises to remove the negative traits that undermine the awareness of our permanent connection with Him, represented here by the crown of the head. This removal will make us know the inner beliefs, thoughts, emotions and instincts we kept secret, which also kept us naked from the true garments God chothed us since the moment He created us. Thus we will realize that there was nothing beautiful in the fantasies and illusions for which we traded our Essence and true identity.

"Of the pendants, and the bracelets, and the veils. Of the turbans, and the ornaments of the legs, and of the head bands, and of the perfume boxes, and the amulets, (...)" (3:19-23)

All we have been creating -- to reaffirm our alleged separation from the Creator -- since we left the Garden of Eden, God's Love will remove from our consciousness. All we have invented to cover and dress our consciousness instead of the garments of God's attributes and Commandments will disappear. These garments, fragrances, ornaments and amulets are the ideas, beliefs, ideologies, whims, desires, fantasies and illusions that attract our oppressors and turn them into our punishments.

"And it shall come to pass, that instead fragrance there shall be stench; and instead of a girdle rags; and instead of curled hair baldness; and instead of a rich robe a skirt of sackcloth; branding instead of beauty." (3:24)

What we create out of ego's fantasies and illusions sooner or later become our oppressors and punishments. "His own iniquities do capture the wicked, and with the ropes of his sin he is held." (Proverbs 5:22) Life is the land where goodness must prevail. It is also the field where we wage wars against what denies goodness. Ego's fantasies and illusions consume the goodness of life. They are the sword by which we fall, including all that makes us strong.

"Your men shall fall by the sword, and you mighty ones in the war. And her gates shall lament and mourn. Yea, she has been emptied, on the ground she shall sit upon." (Isaiah 3:25-26)

Once we surrender to ego's fantasies and illusions, the awareness of our permanent connection with God mourns and laments. We surrender to emptiness and fall down bellow, waiting for God's Love to awaken our Love once again. This is the Final Redemption we yearn for, in which we will be aware the our Love and God's Love are united forever.

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXVI) Isaiah

We have said that in the Messianic Consciousness goodness prevails in all levels and dimensions of life. As long as we live in Love's ways and attributes in what we are and do, we manifest the Final Redemption. This means than in this full awareness there is no room for ego's fantasies and illusions. When Love occupies everything, there is no room for anything but Love.

"And the idols shall utterly pass away." (Isaiah 2:18)

The Prophet reiterates God's words regarding the day when He will not hide anymore His Presence from our consciousness. This is the time when the purpose of His Creation will be totally revealed to us, and we will finally know and embrace our Essence and true identity, from which God created us. The Torah is the purpose of Creation and as we learn from it we realize God's will for us. This is how we know His ways and attributes in order to emulate them in who we are and do. Indeed God's will is our Redemption. We are redeemed by living in His ways and attributes. In the final chapters of the Torah the Creator warns us about the consequences of living in the ways the nations, and serving their idols. 

Our exile and dispersion among the nations are direct consequences of our separation from God's ways to serve their idols, which are ego's fantasies and illusions. We have known over centuries of separation from our Essence and true identity, that our deep sleep in the fantasies we ourselves have created won't last forever. The day of God is the time of our awakening. He knows our nature, for He created us. He knows that we rather make wickedness a choice and not a reference. He knows the suffering from our wrong choices, and also expects us to learn from them. Yet, He won't allow evil and wickedness to rule our consciousness if our endeavors to make goodness prevail fail, for the latter is His will. He will reveal it in the day we return to His ways, to walk with Him.

"And men shall go into the caves of the rocks, and into the holes of the earth, from before the terror of the Lord, and from the glory of His majesty, when He arises to shake mightily the earth." (2:19)

The Prophet twice again (see also 2:21) brings up ego's stubbornness to make our consciousness remain captive in its fantasies and illusions, the darkness of the caves into the hardness of narrow mindedness. The holes of the earth as the depths of materialism. In this darkness we hide from the reverence ("terror") of God and the glory of His majesty, which are His Love that shakes mightily every level and dimension of life. We must understand that before God's Love there is nothing in between. There is only room for His Love and our Love bonding as one. Our discernment, intellect, mind, thoughts, feelings, emotions, passions and instincts are not shaken from anything different from Love's ways and attributes. As we allow Love to rule all levels of consciousness, we also allow God's Love to be revealed to us.

"In that day a man shall cast away his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which they made for themselves to worship, to the moles and to the bats." (2:20)

The Prophet reiterates time and again that we are the makers of our own materialistic fantasies and illusions. As we allow Love to reign in all aspects of life, we begin to live in the day God promised to reveal His Presence to us. All we gave arbitrary value as silver and gold in life will disappear into the nothingness they came from, the darkness where the moles and bats live.

"Cease ye from man, Whose [God's] breath is in his nostrils; for wherein is he to be accounted of?" (2:22)

Ego's fantasies and illusions are the works of human hands. We create them with the living Spirit with which God sustains us, the breath He exhales in our nostrils. Then, what are we accounted for but for His Love from where we are made? We must cease to depend on the fantasies and illusions we have created throughout our history, and begin to live in Love's ways and attributes in order to know God's will and His Plan for us.

"All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils." (Job 27:3)

The Psalmist also invites us to return to our Creator and His ways.

"Trust not in princes, [or] in a son of man, for he has no deliverance." (Psalms 146:3) "Better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man." (118:8)

Our choices have consequences. The Prophet anticipates in the third chapter of his messages the outcome of living under the rule of the lower aspects of consciousness. By despising God's Love and His ways, we embrace the idols we create as ego's fantasies and illusions. As we forsake Love's ways and attributes, they also abandon our consciousness. Once again we remark that God's separation from us is the result of our separation from Him.

"For, lo, God, the Lord of multitudes, turns aside from Jerusalem, and from Judah, stay and staff. Every stay of bread, and every stay of water." (Isaiah 3:1)

Jerusalem is the awareness of our permanent connection with the Creator, and Judah is the empowerment to manifest this awareness in the material world. As we choose the bread and water of fantasies and illusions, we lose the bread and water of God's ways and attributes.

"The mighty man, and the man of war; the judge, and the prophet, and the diviner, and the elder. The captain of fifty, and the man of rank, and the counselor, and the cunning charmer, and the skillful enchanter. And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them." (2:4)

These verses make no difference between judge, prophet, elder (wise men), warrior and adviser, and diviner, cunning charmer and skillful enchanter. Both positive and negative trends in consciousness become subjugated by the childishness and recklessness of youngsters. This is the way the Prophet refers to ego's fantasies and illusions, childish wreckers, immature imagination.

"And the people shall oppress one another, every man his fellow, and every man his neighbor; the child shall behave insolently against the aged, and the base against the honorable." (3:5, 6-7)

Ego's fantasies and illusions lead us to exploit one another for the sake of our individual materialistic desires. These undermine and humiliate the goodness of Love. Our obsessions, attachments and additions insult our discernment, intellect and common sense; and debase the honor of principles and values that respect, protect and dignify life.

"For Jerusalem is ruined, and Judah is fallen; because their tongue and their doings are against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of His glory. The show of their countenance does witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have wrought evil unto themselves." (3:8-9)

As we debase ourselves, we debase God's Love in us. The lesson is to return to Love in order to return to God's Love.

"Say ye of the righteous, that it shall be well with him; for they shall eat the fruit of their doings. Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him; for the work of his hands shall be done to him." (3:10-11)

As we choose goodness, so we harvest goodness. As we choose ego's fantasies and illusions, so we harvest their futility and emptiness.

"As for My people, a babe is their master, and women rule over them. O My people, they that lead you cause you to err, and destroy the way of your paths." (3:12)

God laments our separation from His ways, and the outcome of straying away from His Love. Immaturity leads to err, and weakness makes us fall. Babes and women are more vulnerable to danger and harm, thus they warns us about falling down to weakness, through which we divert from Love's paths of righteousness. Love is our Essence and strength that lead us to be, have and manifest what we truly are. In this awareness we achieve our Final Redemption, and enter in the Messianic Era. Love is the destined regent, the natural ruler and the conductor of all aspects, levels and dimensions of consciousness to make goodness prevail in life.