I was reading the Zohar some today and it reminded me of an idea I had back when I was doing some Tanakh studies some time ago. Is King David going to return and be the messiah? The Tanakh seems to suggest so, and even calls David lord in a minor sense. It also says that they will serve the Lord and David their king who he will raise up to them. I had this idea way awhile back. Is David the messiah?
It is a common euphemism in Rabbinic literature of all kinds-- Talmud, midrash, commentary, Kabbalah, poetry and philosophy-- to use the name David or the term
ben Yishai ("son of Jesse") as a metonymy for the messiah to come. They don't mean that David himself will return-- Jews have never believed in the return of a dead savior in that sense-- but that his House will be re-established by a descendant as the sovereign of the People Israel, and that person will be
mashiach Hashem ("God's anointed [leader]"), and will fulfill all the prophecies of the messianic age.
While early Rabbinic Judaism-- and some ultra-Orthodox sects today-- believe that there will be a literal resurrection of the dead come the End of Time, even in those worlds, that is understood to be a relatively simultaneous resurrection of everyone, not a single leader. And in any case, most Jews today and for the past several hundred years have interpreted
techiyat hametim ("resurrection of the dead") as being euphemistic for the eternality of the soul, and the continuance of the soul into the World to Come, rather than a literal resurrection of the dead back into this world.
