Many points to be made here:
a. Jesus did not have leprosy.
b. In the same passage in Sanhedrin, multiple names are given for the Mashiach. None of them are "Jesus" or anything remotely similar. They are: Yinon, Menachem ben Chizkiyah, Shiloh and/or Chaninah.
c. At the end of the list, the sages give him the title "חיוורא דבי רבי". It has been pointed out that this חיוורא of the house of Rebbe was a real person. In the
Jerusalem Talmud Chagigah 2:1, it says: "תלמיד וותיק היה לו לרבי ודרש פרק אחד במעשה המרכבה ולא הסכימה דעתו של רבי ולקה בשחין". Now I'll explain. "חיוורא דבי רבי" means "the stricken of the house of
Rabbi Yehudah the Prince". The Yerushalmi relates who this person was: He was a student of Rabbi Yehudah the Prince who studied advanced mystical teachings improperly, and for this was struck with a form of boils (as in "the plague of boils"). Yes, one could call this leprosy, if one so chooses. Some think that this addition by the sages was a joke, after a chain of guesses of what the Mashiach's name is. This is open to discussion. But in any case, "leper scholar" is not the full story. It's missionary deceit and twisting of the Talmud. It's quite a pathetic way to attempt to prove one's religion is true. But hey, Paul did it, right?
d. As we've explained, the real term is "the stricken/afflicted/leper of the house of Rabbi Yehudah the Prince". This is not Jesus at all: 1. Jesus was born long before Rabbi Yehudah. 2. Rabbi Yehudah the Prince, while a descendant of David, this was from one of his female ancestors.
From his father's side, he was of the tribe of Benjamin, and as we all know, Christians claim Jesus was a "direct" descendant of David. 3. Jesus had no known connection to the house of the prince of his time. 4. Jesus was not stricken by any sort of sickness (except, possibly, a mental one).
e. Most importantly, with regards to your claim, going back to the teaching of the sages, calling the Mashiach "the stricken of the house of Rabbi Yehudah the Prince", and basing it off of the verse in Isaiah 53, as I already pointed out in
post #533:
Yes, the sages purposely took the verse out of context. I suppose it's exceedingly ironic that missionaries then proceeded to take
their words out of context. Funny how that happens sometimes.
f. What are your thought about the previous portion of the Talmudic text, in which Rabbi Hillel (not the same as Hillel the Elder) says: "Rabbi Hillel, who says: There is no Messiah coming for the Jewish people, as they already ate from him, as all the prophecies relating to the Messiah were already fulfilled during the days of Hezekiah"?
