{"id":75092,"date":"2020-05-23T09:41:02","date_gmt":"2020-05-23T06:41:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=75092"},"modified":"2020-05-23T09:41:02","modified_gmt":"2020-05-23T06:41:02","slug":"nasi-prince-king-president","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/nasi-prince-king-president\/","title":{"rendered":"Nasi: Prince, King, President"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"75092","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":64450,"related_cahpter":"486","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"A ruler by any other name\r\n\r\n","content":"

In chapter 34, Ezekiel describes the future redemption. Among the predictions, God says:\u00a0<\/span>\u201cI the LORD will be their God, and My servant David shall be a ruler among them\u2014I the LORD have spoken.\u201d (34:24).<\/span><\/p>\n

While David lived centuries before Ezekiel, the general understanding (as explained by Rashi, for example) is that the reference is to the Messiah, who will be a descendant from the House of David.\u00a0 But what is curious in the verse, is that the word to describe this leader is \u201cruler\u201d \u2013 <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0in Hebrew. Why not use the word \u201cking\u201d (<\/span>melech<\/span><\/em>)?<\/span><\/p>\n

The word <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>is an interesting one in Biblical Hebrew. It appears 129 times in the Bible but is not distributed evenly among them. It shows up in the first four books of the Torah, the book of Joshua and then frequently in our book of Ezekiel. It is not found in Deuteronomy, Samuel and all the other prophets.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the Torah, it usually refers to the head of a tribe or a clan. This can be a ruler of the Canaanites, like Hamor in Genesis 34:2, or the heads of the tribes of Israel in the Sinai desert. It meant different things in different circumstances (sometimes chieftains, sometimes princes) \u2013 but the one thing it didn\u2019t mean was king. The nomadic Ishmaelites (Genesis 17:20, 25:16) didn\u2019t have a king, and the Israelites in the time of Moses and Joshua did not have a king either \u2013 so the term <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0was used.<\/span><\/p>\n

This may explain why Ezekiel used it so frequently as well, and particularly in our verse about the Messiah. In Ezekiel\u2019s time, the kings of Judah were often morally corrupt and did not listen to the warnings of the prophets. They were blamed for the exile and destruction that came upon the Judeans. With such negative connotations, Ezekiel preferred to use an alternate word, and so he described the Messiah as a <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>instead of a <\/span>melech<\/span><\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n

This distinction continued in later generations. The head of the Sanhedrin was not a king, but was a very important leader \u2013 and so was known as a <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0(for example, Rabbi Yehuda Ha-Nasi.) Other future leaders of the Jewish people also bore that title.<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, the word <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>means \u201cpresident.\u201d It\u2019s not entirely clear who was the first president to be called <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>, but the term began to be used in the 19<\/span>th<\/span> century, when countries like France and the United States did not have a king as the head of government, but rather a civilian president. <\/span>Nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0was certainly the most appropriate (and available) term. And so the State of Israel also has a <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>. However, since the <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>\u00a0is mostly a ceremonial head of state, he\u2019s actually more similar to the kings in most constitutional monarchies.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Will the Messiah therefore be a king or a <\/span>nasi<\/span><\/em>? We\u2019ll have to wait and see\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":75093,"id":75093,"title":"ez34-frog prince","filename":"ez34-frog-prince.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/ez34-frog-prince.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/nasi-prince-king-president\/ez34-frog-prince\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"ez34-frog-prince","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":75092,"date":"2020-05-23 06:38:37","modified":"2020-05-23 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