History of the Jews, Vol. 5 (of 6). Graetz Heinrich

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СКАЧАТЬ himself, and whoever was touched with it was sure of the kingdom of heaven. The delirious joy of his followers knew no bounds. Every word of his was repeated a thousand times as the word of God, expounded, exaggerated, and intensified. All that he did was held as miraculous, published, and believed. The madness went so far that his adherents in Smyrna and elsewhere, as at Salonica, that Kabbalist hot-bed of old, married their children of twelve, ten, and even younger, to one another – seven hundred couples in all – that, according to Kabbalistic ideas, they might cause the souls not yet born to enter into life, and thereby remove the last obstacle to the commencement of the time of grace.

      The activity of Sabbataï Zevi in electrifying the minds of simple believers, now by public pomp and pageantry, now by silent retirement, was supplemented by Sarah, his wife, who by her loose conduct worked on the passions of the male population. The bonds of chastity, drawn much tighter among Eastern Jews than in Europe, were broken. The assembling of persons of both sexes in great multitudes, hitherto unheard of, was a slight innovation. In Messianic transports of delight men and women danced with one another as if mad, and in mystical fervor many excesses are said to have been committed. The voice of censure and caution was gradually silenced; all were drawn into the vortex, and the unbelievers were rendered harmless. The rabbi Aaron de la Papa (died 1674), an aged and respectable man, who at first spoke against this Messianic madness, and pronounced the ban against its originator, together with other rabbis, was publicly reviled in a sermon by Sabbataï, removed from office, and obliged to leave Smyrna.

      Most unworthy was the behavior of the rabbi Chayim Benvenisti (1603–1673), a very considerable authority on the Talmud, and of astonishing learning, who, because he was a literary opponent of De la Papa, not only suffered the latter's removal from office, but allowed himself to be appointed in his place by Sabbataï. Though at first harshly disposed towards the new Messiah, he became a believer, and led the multitude by his authority. The latter were instigated by Sabbataï to bloodthirsty fanaticism. Because a noble, rich, and respected man in Smyrna, Chayim Penya, who had liberally supported Chayim Benvenisti, opposed the widespread delusion with obstinate incredulity, he was suddenly attacked in the synagogue, persecuted, and nearly torn to pieces by the raging multitude. Sabbataï Zevi, the pretended incarnation of piety, commanded the synagogue to be broken open and the vile heretic to be seized. But when Penya's daughters, likewise attacked by the madness, fell into raptures, and prophesied, the father had no choice but to put a good face upon the wretched business. He also assumed the air of a zealous adherent. After Penya's subjugation Sabbataï Zevi became sole ruler in the community, and could lead the Jewish population at will for good or for evil. In this humor which lasted for some months, the Jews of Smyrna feared their tyrants, the Turkish cadis, very little; if they offered to check the prevailing tendency, they were induced by rich presents to remain inactive.

      These events in the Jews' quarter at Smyrna made a great sensation in ever-widening circles. The neighboring communities of Asia Minor, many members of which had betaken themselves to Smyrna, and witnessing the scenes enacted in that town, brought home exaggerated accounts of the Messiah's power of attraction and of working miracles, were swept into the same vortex. Sabbataï's private secretary, Samuel Primo, took care that reports of the fame and doings of the Messiah should reach Jews abroad. Nathan Ghazati sent circulars from Palestine, while the itinerant prophets, Sabbataï Raphael and Matathias Bloch, filled the ears of their auditors with the most marvelous accounts of the new redeemer. Christians also helped to spread the story. The residents, the clerks of English and Dutch mercantile houses, and the evangelical ministers, reported the extraordinary occurrences in Smyrna, and though they scoffed at the folly of the Jews, could not withhold half-credulous sympathy. Did they not see with their own eyes the ecstasies, and hear with their own ears the predictions, of the prophets and prophetesses of Sabbataï Zevi, the true redeemer? On the exchanges in Europe men spoke of him as a remarkable personage, and eagerly awaited news from Smyrna or Constantinople. At first the Jews were dazed by the reports that suddenly burst upon them. Was the long cherished hope, that one day the oppression and shame of Israel would be removed, and that he would return in glory to his home, at length to be realized? No wonder that nearly everywhere scenes similar to those in Smyrna were repeating themselves, that men's minds were filled with credulity, accepting mere rumors as accredited facts, or that wild excitement, ascetic living, and almsgiving to the needy, by way of preparation for the time of the Messiah, were followed here and there by prophetic ecstasies. Not only the senseless multitude, but nearly all the rabbis, and even men of culture and philosophical judgment, fell a prey to this credulity.

      At that time not a single man of weight and importance recognized that the primary source of all these phenomena lay in the Kabbala and the Zohar. Jacob Sasportas, originally from Africa, had lived in Amsterdam and London and, at this time, was in Hamburg. He was born about 1620, and died 1698. A man of courage and keen penetration, whose word had weight through his Talmudical learning, Sasportas from the first combated this Messianic rage with passionate warmth. He was unwearied in sending letter after letter to the various communities and their guides in Europe, Asia, and Africa, to unmask the gross deceptions practiced, and to warn against the sad consequences. But even he was entangled in the snares of the Kabbala, and adopted its principles. On the ground of this spurious philosophy, thoroughgoing enthusiasts were more in the right than half-hearted adherents. Spinoza, who might have scattered this thick mist with his luminous ideas, was not only estranged from Judaism and his race, but even hostile to them, and regarded the prevailing perplexities with indifference or malice.

      The accounts of Sabbataï Zevi and the Messianic excitement either came direct, or in a roundabout way by Alexandria, to Venice, Leghorn, and other Italian cities.

      Venice was led by the bigoted Kabbalist Moses Zacut, Spinoza's very uncongenial fellow-student, who had formed the design of migrating from Amsterdam through Poland to Palestine, but stopped short in Venice. Far from opposing the delusion of the multitude, he encouraged it, as did the rabbinate of Venice. The news from Smyrna had most striking effect upon the great and the lesser Jerusalem of the North. The prophet of Gaza, who was not devoid of sober calculation, had directed his propagandist circulars to the most considerable and the richest communities – Amsterdam and Hamburg. These entered into close relationship with the new Messianic movement. The Jews of Amsterdam and Hamburg received confirmation of the extraordinary events at Smyrna from trustworthy Christians, many of whom were sincerely rejoiced thereat. Even Heinrich Oldenburg, a distinguished German savant in London, wrote to his friend Spinoza (December, 1665): —

      "All the world here is talking of a rumor of the return of the Israelites, dispersed for more than two thousand years, to their own country. Few believe it, but many wish it… Should the news be confirmed, it may bring about a revolution in all things."

      The number of believers in Amsterdam increased daily among the Portuguese no less than among the Germans, and numbers of educated people set the example; the rabbis Isaac Aboab and Raphael Moses D'Aguilar, Spinoza's fellow-student Isaac Naar, and Abraham Pereira, one of the capitalists of Amsterdam and a writer on morals in Spanish, all became believers. Even the semi-Spinozist Dionysius Musaphia became a zealous adherent of the new Messiah. In Amsterdam devotion to the new faith expressed itself in contradictory ways – by noisy music and dancing in the houses of prayer, and by gloomy, monkish self-mortification. The printing presses could not supply enough copies of special prayer-books in Hebrew, Portuguese and Spanish, for the multitude of believers. In these books penances and formulas were given by which men hoped to become partakers in the kingdom of the Messiah. Many Sabbatian prayer-books (Tikkunim) printed Sabbataï's likeness together with that of King David, also the emblems of his dominion, and select sentences from the Bible. In confident expectation of speedy return to the Holy Land, the elders of one synagogue introduced the custom of pronouncing the priestly blessing every Sabbath.

      At Hamburg, the Jews went to still greater lengths of folly, because they wished to make a demonstration against the bigoted Christians, who in many ways tormented them with vexatious restrictions, and when possible compelled them to listen to Christian sermons. Whoever entered the synagogue, and saw the Jewish worshipers hop, jump, and dance about with the roll of the Law in their arms, serious, respectable men withal, СКАЧАТЬ