The Vilna Gaon's messianic role

An interesting article in Jewish Action contains this:  

According to the Gra’s thinking, the Geulah is not a one-time event but rather a gradual process. In his view, we are currently experiencing the ikvata d’Meshicha, the pre-Messianic period, and, on the historical timeline, we are standing on the threshold of the “Mashiach ben Yosef” period. According to the Gra’s approach, Redemption begins by natural means—as in the days of Coresh and the Second Temple—via aliyah to Eretz Yisrael, settling the Land, bringing it out of its desolate state and, most importantly, rebuilding Jerusalem. (The Gra’s work Aderet Eliyahu states, “for the main thrust of the mitzvot is dependent on the Land.”) It was the Gra who, through his charismatic authority, dismissed the traditional passive approach of waiting for heavenly miracles to initiate the Geulah, which was based on the prohibitions known as the “three vows.” These vows are to not “go up as a wall” (referring to mass immigration to Eretz Yisrael), to not attempt to hasten the Redemption and to not rebel against the ruling nations while in exile. In his commentary on Shir HaShirim, the Gra states that these three vows apply only to the building of the Beit Hamikdash: “They are sworn not to, of their own volition, go out to build the Temple, until [the Mashiach] comes.”

The Gra’s authority, according to his talmidim, stems from a Divine mission placed upon him to discover secrets of the Torah and to accelerate the Redemption. This idea is based on a verse in Devarim, “Even sheleimah vetzedek yihyieh lach… [A perfect and honest weight you shall have]” (25:15). The verse, found in the sixth parashah of Sefer Devarim, includes the words “even sheleimah,” which are understood to allude to Eliyahu ben Shlomo (the Gra). According to this kabbalistic interpretation, the books of the Torah represent human history: The story of Creation in Sefer Bereishit represents the first millennium of the world’s existence; the rest of Bereishit refers to the second millennium; Sefer Shemot tells of the third; Sefer Vayikra, the fourth; Sefer Bamidbar, the fifth and Sefer Devarim, the sixth. Each of the ten parshiyot in Devarim (with Netzavim and Vayelech counted as one) represents one century of the sixth millennium. On this timeline, the words “even shleimah vetzedek,” towards the end of the sixth parashah of Devarim, fall just at the point in history when the Gra, made his appearance on earth to carry out his Divine mission. The following parashah, corresponding to the seventh century of the sixth millennium, is that of “Ki tavo el haAretz [When you shall come to the Land].” According to this interpretation, this clearly means that from the year 5600 (1840) the process of kibbutz hagaluyot, the ingathering of the exiles, begins, and the process of Redemption on the deterministic path of “beitah,” in its appointed time, starts to unfold. The Gra himself, in the view of his disciples, was “a spark of Mashiach ben Yosef.”

The French Revolution of 1789 and Napoleon’s expedition to Eretz Yisrael in 1799 were interpreted by the Gra’s followers as historical proofs of the dramatic changes taking place in the world. As a result of these changes, the belief that the Gra indeed had a Divine mission to advance the Redemption was strengthened, and his disciples began organizing groups for aliyah. Arriving in three waves, 511 followers of the Gra and their family members settled first in the Galilee region and, later on, in Jerusalem. These olim were not fleeing from war, economic hardship or persecution, and they included some of Lithuania’s wealthiest and most respected and learned Jews. In fact, their aliyah was part of a Messianic revival that took place among the Jewish people in the early nineteenth century. But unlike the thousands of other Jews who had left the lands of the Ottoman Empire for Eretz Yisrael at that time to await the coming of Mashiach, whom they expected to arrive suddenly and by miraculous means in 1840, the Gra’s disciples clung to the view that the Geulah was a historical process that should be advanced by human action.
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Having finally obtained the long-awaited permit and begun the building project, the Gra’s disciples viewed these events as nothing less than the etchalta deGeulah, the beginning of the Redemption, heralded by this symbolic “rebuilding of Jerusalem.” Accordingly, in 1837 some of the Perushim discontinued certain customs associated with mourning the destruction of the Temple, such as the midnight recitation of Tikkun Chatzot and the stanza beginning “Hitna’ari, meafar kumi” from the liturgical poem “Lecha Dodi,” traditionally sung at the onset of Shabbat, on the assumption that the Redemption was already underway [see Hastening Redemption, by Arie Morgenstern (New York, 2006) pp. 130-131].

While these activities were being directed towards the rebuilding of Jerusalem as an expression of the kabbalistic concept of “et’aruta deletata [awakening from below],” a group of the Gra’s disciples in Tzfat was attempting to re-establish authentic rabbinical semichah and to re-institute the Sanhedrin, both of which are necessary steps in the Redemption process and are prerequisites to the coming of the Mashiach.

Comment: English translation of the Gaon's  "Kol Hator", here

 

Comments

[steve mcqueen]

There is a whole book on this, as you probably know

http://www.amazon.com/Hastening-Redemption-Messianism-Resettlement-Israel/dp/0195305787

One thing he says in a footnote, that I have not seen anywhere else, and would be really interested in knowing if others suggest the same, is that the Kotzker's withdrawal was connected to the failure of Moshiach to arrive in 1840