The Jewish idea of messianism is, in its very essence, an aporia: messianism can only affirm itself by realising itself, but no sooner does it realise itself than it negates itself. Whence its tragic quality: the messianic tension of the Jewish people has always had it live in the expectation of a radical upheaval of life on earth, which, each time it seemed as though it was in the offing, very quickly appeared illusory. Whence, too, in Jewish mysticism, the constant cautioning against the temptation of impatience, of premature intervention into history. Whence also, in Jewish religious consciousness, it strange and distinctive experience of time, which is lived, in its very nature as expectation; neither as a kind of pagan enjoyment of the present moment nor as a kind of spiritual escape transcending time, but an ever renewed aspiration, from the very heart of time itself, to the coming of the absolutely new, conceived as capable of emerging at any moment: Redemption is always imminent, but if it were to come, it would be immediately put into question, in the very name of the absolute demand it claims to meet.

from Stéphane Mosès, The Angel of History (passage omitted in translation)