The Criteria

The previous chapter gave Rambam’s test in one breath. This chapter takes it apart clause by clause, and sets beside it everything else Rambam writes that bears on recognising Moshiach: Hilchos Melachim chapters 1, 11 and 12, Hilchos Teshuvah 9, the Twelfth of the Thirteen Principles, and Iggeres Teiman. Nothing is added to his list, and nothing on it is left out.

This is the job description, before any candidate is named. Moshiach restores the kingship of David to its first dominion, builds the Mikdash and gathers the dispersed of Israel, and in his days the whole Torah returns to force as it was: korbanos are brought, and shemitah and yovel are kept in full (11:1). The three additional cities of refuge the Torah promised for an enlarged land are added (11:2, on Devarim 19:8–9). Rambam also sets the stakes: whoever does not believe in him, or does not await his coming, denies not only the prophets but the Torah and Moshe Rabbeinu — citing Devarim 30:3–5 and Bilam’s prophecy in Bamidbar 24:17–18.

Who can be Moshiach at all

Before any deed there is a question of eligibility, and it is answered by the laws of kings, because Moshiach is first of all a king — Rambam calls him HaMelech HaMoshiach throughout. A king of Israel is a man (Hilchos Melachim 1:5), and one born of Israel rather than a convert (1:4).

He is from the house of David, in the male line. Once David was anointed, the crown became his and his male descendants’ forever (1:7). Rambam narrows it further: in the Twelfth Principle (Commentary on the Mishnah, Sanhedrin chapter 10) he writes that there is no king for Israel except from the house of David and the seed of Shlomo alone, and that whoever disputes this family denies Hashem and His prophets; the same appears in Sefer HaMitzvos, Lo Sa’aseh 362. Descent is necessary and never sufficient. The house of David has had many sons.

The first stage: presumed Moshiach

One. He is a king who arises from the house of David — the eligibility above, now standing in a real person who leads.

Two. He is hogeh baTorah, immersed in Torah as a constant occupation, and Rambam specifies both the Written and the Oral Torah. Scholarship in the Written Torah alone does not meet the test.

Three. He is occupied with mitzvos as David his ancestor was. Not a teacher of observance only, but an observer; the measure is David, the king who was also the sweet singer of Israel.

Four. He compels all Israel to walk in the way of Torah and to strengthen its breaches. This is not private piety; it is a public effect on the whole people, and the word Rambam uses is the language of authority — yachof, he prevails upon them.

Five. He fights the wars of Hashem. In Rambam’s laws of kings that phrase has a defined meaning: the wars the Torah commands, and the war to deliver Israel from an enemy that has risen against it (Hilchos Melachim 5:1).

Whoever meets these five is bechezkas Moshiach — presumed to be Moshiach. Chazakah is the halachic term for a status that may be relied on until evidence overturns it. It is not certainty, and by definition it is a status that can be lost.

The second stage: certain Moshiach

Six. He succeeds. The wars are won and the effort does not stall. Rambam writes the condition as a pair of verbs — he did, and he succeeded — so that intention and effort are not counted in place of result.

Seven. He builds the Mikdash in its place. Not a sanctuary anywhere, but on its site, which Rambam fixes elsewhere as a place that can never be moved (Hilchos Beis HaBechirah 2:1–2). In Rambam’s sentence the building comes before the gathering.

Eight. He gathers the dispersed of Israel — the ingathering the prophets promised, visible to anyone and claimed by no one on another’s behalf.

When all eight are fulfilled he is Moshiach bevadai, Moshiach with certainty. And Rambam names what follows, as consequence rather than as a further test: he will perfect the whole world to serve Hashem together, as it is said —

What accompanies him

Hilchos Teshuvah 9:2 describes the man himself. He will be wiser than Shlomo, and a great prophet, close to Moshe Rabbeinu. Therefore he will teach the whole people and instruct them in the way of Hashem, and all the nations will come to hear him, as Yeshayahu 2:2 foresees. These are not listed among the tests in Hilchos Melachim; they are what the tests will turn out to have found.

Ruach HaKodesh will rest on him. Once his kingdom is settled and all Israel has gathered to him, he will establish their lineage by it — first the Kohanim and Levi’im, and Israelites by tribe only, never declaring anyone of flawed descent (Hilchos Melachim 12:3, on Malachi 3:3). In Iggeres Teiman, a letter rather than a code, Rambam adds two further details: he will first be revealed in Eretz Yisrael, and before he is revealed he will not be known for what he is.

What is not a criterion

No miracle. Do not imagine, Rambam writes, that Moshiach must perform signs and wonders, bring new things into the world, or revive the dead. Rabbi Akiva, among the greatest sages of the Mishnah, carried the arms of Bar Koziba and said of him that he was the king Moshiach; he and all the sages of his generation thought so until he was killed for sins, and once he was killed they knew he was not. The sages asked of him neither sign nor wonder (11:3). Miracles are not ruled out. They are simply not the test.

No change to Torah. The same halachah continues: the essence of the matter is that this Torah, its statutes and its laws, stands forever, and nothing is added to it or taken from it (11:3). Rambam rules that one who claims prophecy in order to add or remove a mitzvah is a false prophet even if he performs signs (Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah 9:1). A candidate who revises halachah has disqualified himself by that act alone, whatever else is true of him.

No suspension of nature. The world continues in its custom; the wolf with the lamb of Yeshayahu 11:6 is a parable for Israel living securely among nations that were once predatory (12:1). Nothing in the test waits on the laws of nature changing.

No fixed order of events. Some sages say Eliyahu comes first (Malachi 3:23); there is the war of Gog and Magog. But no one will know how these things will unfold until they do, because the words of the prophets on them are sealed and the sages themselves hold no tradition on them. Their sequence is not a principle of faith, one should not dwell on the aggados about them, and one should not calculate the end (12:2).

When the presumption fails

Hilchos Melachim 11:4 continues: if he did not succeed to this extent, or was killed, it is known that he is not the one the Torah promised. He is like all the complete and worthy kings of the house of David who died, and Hashem set him up only to test the many, as Daniel 11:35 says. These lines stand in the part of the halachah that censors removed from most printed editions; they are restored from manuscripts, and they belong to Rambam’s text.

What the criteria are for

Rambam closes the Mishneh Torah by saying why any of this is wanted. The sages and prophets did not long for the days of Moshiach so that Israel would rule the world, or be exalted by the nations, or eat and drink and rejoice, but to be free for Torah and its wisdom with no one to oppress or distract them. In that time there will be no famine and no war, no envy and no rivalry, and the occupation of the whole world will be only to know Hashem (12:4–5, on Yeshayahu 11:9).

And the Twelfth Principle states the obligation that runs alongside the test: to believe that he will come and not think him late — if he tarries, wait for him (Chavakuk 2:3); to set him no date and draw no dates from verses; and to believe that he will have more standing and honour than any king before him, as all the prophets foretold.