Searching For A Messiah Essay, Research Paper

By Definition, the Messiah is a leader who is regarded as or professes to be a savior or liberator. A savior is a person who rescues another from harm, danger or loss. Theologically Messiah means the Anointed One, the Christ. It is the Hebrew name for the promised deliverer of humankind. Christians accept Jesus Christ as the Messiah. The Jewish religion asserts that the Messiah is yet to come. The concept of the Messiah combines the Hebrew ideal of a king from the line of David with the priestly tradition exemplified by Moses. Certain Old Testament passages also characterize the Messiah as a suffering servant. In Christian theology, Jesus fulfills all three concepts. In modern times, the term applies loosely to any anticipated liberator or to an expected savior in any non-Christian religion.

Krishna, in Hinduism and Indian mythology, the eighth avatar, or incarnation, of the god Vishnu. According to tradition, Vishnu appeared as Krishna to rid the world of a tyrannical king named Kamsa, the son of a demon. Numerous legends describe Krishna’s miracles and heroic exploits. He appears prominently, sometimes as a deity, in the epic poem Mahabharata, in which he sides with the Pandavas, one of two contending families, and acts as the charioteer of the hero Arjuna. It is to Arjuna, troubled on the eve of the decisive battle, that Krishna delivers the celebrated discourse on duty and life known as the Bhagavad-Gita.

According to John 4:24, “God is spirit.” Luke 24:39 tells us “a spirit has no flesh or bone.” All scripture confirms that God, in the Old Testament, was invisible. “No man has seen God” (John 1:18); but Jesus is described as the “exact representation of God, the image of God, and the image of the invisible God.” The spirit of God that never permanently occupied a body or form before, took on the form of a man by becoming the person of Jesus Christ. He was no longer invisible, untouchable, without form, now he dwelt among us. Both God Almighty and man: born in Bethlehem as Jesus Christ.

Prometheus, in Greek mythology, a Titan, known as the friend and benefactor of humanity. Prometheus and his brother Epimetheus were given the task of creating humans and animals and providing them with the endowments they would need to survive. Epimetheus gave the various animals gifts of courage, strength, swiftness, and feathers, fur, and other protective coverings. When it came time to create a being superior to all other creatures, Epimetheus had nothing left to bestow. Prometheus then fashioned humans in a nobler form and enabled them to walk upright. After he went to heaven and stole fire from the gods to give to humanity, he incurred the wrath of Zeus, who had Prometheus chained to a rock. There he was constantly preyed upon by an eagle until he was freed by the hero Hercules.