Do the Hebrew Scriptures Mention a Second Return of the Messiah

 

A rabbi on a Facebook page - Why Jews don't accept Jesu as the Meshiach -challenged me to provide evidence that the Messiah will return for a second time. Here’s my response:

You asked me if I could produce a verse from the Hebrew Scriptures that mentioned a second coming. There are many verses that hint at a second coming, although Scripture is purposely cryptic about the grace of God. Here is one:

•  “He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray,    each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. For he was cut off from the land of the living… for the transgression of my people he was punished… Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, HE WILL SEE HIS OFFSPRING AND PROLONG HIS DAYS, AND THE WILL OF THE LORD WILL PROSPER IN HIS HAND. After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.” (Isaiah 53:3-11)

Here is the description of a sinless man who died for the sins of Israel. Nevertheless, it seems that He will live again, and the LORD’s plan “will prosper in His hand.” Evidently, He must RETURN in order to accomplish this.