The two most famous
Kabbalistic traditions were the Spanish Kabbalah, such as the books Zohar and Kanah, and the Lurianic Kabbalah of the sixteenth century
that also influenced Sabbateanism.
But the history of
the Kabbalah is also closely tied in with Jewish messianism in the early modern
period, its hopes, pretensions, and writings. It was also, however, equally
integrated into the contemporary existential situation of the Jews within the
early modern world. While that world seemed increasingly hostile toward Jews,
it was paradoxically drawing closer in the matter of messianic expectations and
calculations. It is thus important to constantly observe for example the
unfolding of Sabbateanism and others from both within and without the Jewish
context.
Jesus of Nazareth,
apparently a first-century resident of the West Bank established what is
now considered the most successful Jewish messianic movement. But a generation
after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E., another important
Jewish messiah arose, in the person of Simon Bar-Kosiba
(Bar-Kokhba), who led an unsuccessful rebellion in
1321-35 c.E.
Other important
Jewish messianic figures included Moses of Crete in the fifth century, AbuIsa of Isfahan in the eighth, the Kurd David Alroy in the twelfth, and the Spanish kabbalist Abraham
Abulafia in the thirteenth century.
The rise of early
modern prophetic messianism was associated with the expulsion of the Jews
from Spain in 1492 and their forced conversion in Portugal in 1497.
Furthermore, this was the period when exiled Spanish Jews were invited by
Sultan Bayezit II to settle in the Ottoman Empire
alongside the established Jewish community there, and even more Jews came to
live under Ottoman rule after Palestine fell to the Turks in 1516/7. Thus
contact with other cultures and their messianic traditions was widespread.
A significant
focus of prophetic and messianic thought existed among a certain particularly
secretive group of Spanish kabbalists in the decades before the expulsion of
the Jews in 1492. They produced the works Sefer ha-Meshiv (The Book of the Responder; or ha-Mal'akh ha-Meshiv, The Responding
Angel), and Kaf ha-Ketoret (Ladle of incense), books
bristling with prophecy and messianic expectation. While little was left of the
Sefer ha-Meshiv circle
after the expulsion, Rabbi Joseph Taytatzak of
Salonika appears to have been associated with this group, and it is probable
that certain interesting prophetic phenomena connected with him had roots in
the Spanish Sefer ha-Meshiv
thought.9 What is certain is that Taytatzak had close
contact with Solomon Molkho, an important messianic
prophet, and with many of the great Safed kabbalists.
Rabbi Abraham ben
Eliezer ha-Levi, a Spanish kabbalist, wandered in Europe and the Ottoman Empire
after the expulsion, writing tracts full of acute messianic prophecy. Ha-Levi
expected messianic times to begin in 1524 and be fully manifested in 1530-31.
This was also the
period of such mystical messianic works as Galya Raza
(Exposition of Secrets) and Mishreh Kittrin (Loosening of Knots), whose titles indicate their
relation to the belief in the increase of knowledge on the cusp of the messianic
age.
Following the
expulsion of the Jews from Spain, Kabbalah began to overtake philosophy and talmudic scholarship as the dominant mode of Jewish
spiritual thought. Kabbalah slowly shifted from being the province of tiny,
secret circles of adepts to a body of public ideas. In the sixteenth century,
several developments facilitated this process. One was the printing of the
Zohar in Italy, which put it in the hands of any scholar with the money to buy
a copy. The purchasers included Christian savants, some of whom had become
interested in Jewish esotericism and the possibilities of its christological interpretation. Another, more profound
development was the explosion of kabbalistic thought centered in Safed in the
latter part of the century, mediated through a number of organized circles or
fellowships.
While Kabbalah
permeated the air of Safed in the sixteenth century in general, and few could
have been left untouched by the powerful currents around them, some chose to
devote themselves to a more disciplined style of spiritual life than others.
Most of the individuals whose names appear with any frequency in the
kabbalistic literature are likely to have been associated with one or another
of the several groups of which we know. These fellowships served to
institutionalize kabbalistic life to a certain degree, helping to define the
direction that piety ought to take and to channel religious energy in a
disciplined manner. They constituted a vehicle through which the notion of
collective obligation could find expression. From a psychological point of
view, they must have served as both a means of support and a source of peer
pressure to live the proper life.
Some of these circles
were under the spiritual guidance of particular personalities, such as Moses Cordovero and Eleazar Azikri
(I53316oo). The latter, a disciple of Cordovero's in
kabbalistic studies, organized two different fellowships in Safed, one under
the name Haverim Maqshivim
(The Hearkening Companions), the, other Sukkat Shalom
(The Tent of Peace). Others appear to have been more loosely structured,
organized around some specialized ggal. Thus, the
Fellowship of Penitents that Abraham Berukhim informs
us about sought to achieve atonement through certain especially severe ascetic
practices. Berukhim also tells us about a group whose
dedicated purpose seems to have been rejoicing at the conclusion of every
Sabbath.
Rabbi Isaac Luria,
who arrived in Safed (in Palestine) around 1570, was venerated in his
kabbalistic circle not only as author of the famous Lurianic doctrines of exile
and redemption, but also as a messiah himself. His teachings in Safed included
man's role in the restoration of a pristine world, with related conceptions of
exile, redemption, and the revolutions of the human soul. While the general
outlines of this mystical philosophy undoubtedly found their way to the
attention of many Jews, far more famous were legends about the supernatural
wisdom of Luria and his students-a collection that was among the eaciest bodies of hagiography in Judaism. In these tales
Luria is represented as both prophet and messiah. The prestige accorded to
Kabbalah and its adepts through this mystical flowering helped fuel an already
emerging crisis in the traditional authority structure of Judaism. In the
seventeenth century the cracks in the foundation of rabbinic authority would
widen to the limits of its viability, under the impact of Sabbateanism on the
one hand, and rationalist skepticism on the other.
When Luria died in
1572, having failed to manifest himself as messiah, his student, R. Hayyim Vital, inherited at least part of this mantle. Vital's messianic identity was quite complex, and it
remained unresolved upon his death in 1620.
Two important collections
of such traditions, one most commonly known as Shivhei
ha Ari (In Praise of the Ari) and Toldot ha Ari (The
Life of the Ari), reflect Lthe degree to which
Luria's personality continued to capture the imagination of subsequent
generations. Shivhei ha Ari, based upon a series of
letters written from Safed by Solomon Shlomiel of Dresnitz at the beginning of the seventeenth century, is
among the first works of its kind in Hebrew literature, a full-fledged set of
hagiographical narratives organized around the life of a single individual. It
is certainly the most influential such collection. The stories in these two
books reverberated over the course of time in a broad range of adaptations and
translations. Even today, stories about Isaac Luria based upon these earlier
works are preserved and widely transmitted, especially in Jewish communities
whose roots are in the Near East.
Along completely
different lines, Isaac Luria's highly imaginative mythic teachings gave birth
to a literature ofunusually complex kabbalistic
theosophy among certain elite thinkers. Despite the fact that his immediate
disciples-particularly Hayyim Vital
(1543-162o)-sought to conceal their master's teachings altogether, or at least
severely to restrict dissemination of them, following his death, they
eventually had a powerful impact on various circles throughout the Jewish world.
This is one of the great ironies of the history of Lurianic Kabbalah. The intense
concern on Luria's own part that his teachings be restricted to a small circle
of initiates eventually gave way to the production of a very extensive number
of manuscripts and printed publications, the socalled
(and misnamed) "Lurianic Writings" (Kitvei
ha Ari). For, in addition to the elaborate array of editions and recensions of
Luria's teachings produced by certain of his disciples, Lurianic Kabbalah
inspired the composition of numerous other treatises of diverse types by people
who had not personally studied with him.
For example also
the teachings of western Esotericism for example Luria regarded the
members of the first group, as belonging to a fourth category of souls ,
so-called "old souls" that fell directly into the qelippot
at the time of Adam's transgressions, requiring them to undergo a series ofgilgulim. Such souls normally spend a period of forty
days of purification within the Female Waters after they ascend from the qelippot.
Thus Luria and his
disciples regarded their fellowship as a microcosm in a literal sense. They
believed themselves not only to reflect the essential structures of the cosmos
but also to eni3ody those structures individually and, more crucially,
collectively. The theurgical impulses so fundamental to theosophical Kabbalah
that is, the conviction that human gestures of every type exert influences upon
the cosmos as a whole -reach what is perhaps their most intense and radical
form in the ritual practices of Lurianic mysticism.
Vital suggests that
his soul was bound up with these other disciples in such a way that made it
possible for their souls as well to remain within Malkhut
for this longer (and preferable) period of seven months.' A portion of Vital's ruah was invested in each
of these individuals, and thus "all of them are nourished [yonqim, literally, suckled] by me, and therefore I have to
try to mend them, for my own restitution depends upon the healing of their
souls. Vital claimed, then, that because part of his own soul-structure was
bound up with these individuals, the perfection of his soul was contingent upon
the spiritual maturation of their souls.
The belief in
"impregnation" (`ibbur) occupied a
prominent place in Luria's thinking. Whereasgilgul,
or metempsychosis, refers to the entrance of a past soul into an individual at
the time of one's birth, `ibbur denotes the entrance
of a past soul at some later point during one's life. In the case of `ibbur, the impregnated soul seeks to rectify itself by
atoning for a past transgression or fulfilling a precept that has been left
unfulfilled. At times, however, cibbur is for the
benefit of the host individual, enabling him to accomplish something he is
otherwise unable to do. Indeed, this was the case with Vital's
impregnations. Typically, `ibbur takes place by a
past soul investing itself in an individual with whom it shares the same
soul-root. Unlikegilgul, in which the soul is present
throughout one's entire life, `ibbur occurs for a
temporary period of time, until the impregnated soul accomplishes its goal. As
many as three impregnations can take place at one time. In his dream diary,
Vital specifies a number of individuals whose souls became impregnated within
him or who were potential candidates for impregnation, including Rabbi Akiva, as we see here; Abbaye; Eleazar ben Arakh; Eleazar ben Shamua; Yeiva Sabba; Yohanan ben Zakkai; the prophet Samuel; and King Hezekiah. Vital was
intensely preoccupied with behaving in such a way as to have these souls continue
to impregnate themselves into his body.
Israel Sarug (or Saruq) taught his
version of Lurianic Kabbalah in Italy between approximately 1592 and 1599. The
appearance of Lurianic manuscripts in Italy even prior to Israel Sarug's activities there was demonstrated by Joseph Avivi, "Lurianic Writings in Italy Prior to
1620" (in Hebrew), cAlei Sefer
11 (1984): 91-134. Sarug's version of Lurianic
teachings was published for the first time as Limmudei
Atsilut in Lemberg (Lvov) in 1850, ironically enough,
under Hayyim Vital's name,
a fate that befell certain other writers as well. The question of whether
Israel Sarug was actually a personal disciple of
Isaac Luria's or instead learned Lurianic Kabbalah indirectly has animated
kabbalistic scholarship for some time. Gershom Scholem
argued, among other things, that insofar as Sarug's
name is never mentioned in the sources associated with Luria's known disciples,
especially in the most important lists of these individuals recorded by Hayyim Vital, Sarug's contention
that he was Luria's disciple is unfounded. Ronit Meroz,
on the other hand, has written a series of articles on this subject in which
she argues, persuasively in my view, that Sarug had
indeed known Luria personally. Meroz counters Scholem's view in various ways, including the argument that
the lists contained in Vital's writing derive from a
relatively late date, insofar as we know that Vital did not begin to study with
Luria until some time, perhaps nine months, after the
latter arrived in Safed. This leaves open the possibility that Sarug had indeed been a personal disciple during Luria's
early period in Safed, in the months before Vital took up with him.
The period between
the death of R. Hayyim Vital and the rise of the Sabbatean movement was marked by two seemingly paradoxical
trends regarding messianism. On the one hand, there was an almost complete
dearth of messianic pretenders; but on the other hand, there was also a furious
production of literature concerning the messianic advent in the Jewish world.
Various rabbis were occupied with messianic calculations and thought;
outstanding among them was R. Manasseh ben Israel, whose attitudes were deeply
connected to his converso background.
Looking at the map of
Sabbatean propagation it is immediately clear that
most of the cities that were centers of Sabbatean
activism before the apostasy were converse centers as well, such as Izmir,
Istanbul, Salonika, Livorno, Amsterdam, and Venice. It is thus particularly
worthwhile exploring the background and messianic proclivities of this group.
A sizeable percentage
of the important Jewish population of Spain converted to Catholicism
voluntarily or by force between the years 1391, when pressure to convert
started to become very heavy, and 1492, when Jews who held on to their faith
were expelled. Among those spiritually stout Jews who left, a large proportion
went to neighboring Portugal, where they had been promised asylum. But in 1497
the king decreed their expulsion from Portugal as well. When the hapless Jews
came to the harbor to embark for more tolerant shores, they were incarcerated
and forcibly converted. At the time of their expulsion from Spain, there was
already a national Inquisition at work rooting out converses alleged to
continue "Judaizing" in secret. The Portuguese Inquisition was not
established until decades later, but converses were forbidden to leave either
country, and they were in constant fear. Converses and Moriscos (descendants of
Spanish Muslims) were systematically excluded from many important institutions
and professions by a series of "purity of blood" statutes.
Nevertheless, many converses did quite well for themselves in the Iberian
peninsula, studying in universities, achieving considerable wealth, and rising
to important offices in the government and even the church.
The Sabbatean prophets at the beginning and height of the
movement in 1665-66 had been a heterogeneous group of scholars and lay people,
the vast majority of whom were active in the Ottoman Empire. After the apostasy,
however, this picture changed dramatically. A disproportionate number of those
who carried on the faith in secret were rabbis and scholars. The venue too had
changed: over the later decades of the seventeenth century both the believers
in general and the prophets among them were found increasingly in
Europe-eastern as well as western. Maggidim continued to appear, but their
mode of expression had altered during the post-apostasy events. In addition to maggidism similar to that of Karo and Nathan, new types of
prophecy arose whose physical manifestations were entirely different. Dreams
became very central in certain circles, and divinatory techniques intended to
predict the future of Shabbatai and the movement became
widespread. These had been much less important at the height of the movement,
when the future looked relatively clear. The increased importance of Kabbalah
in post-apostasy prophecy was obviously related both to the higher level of
education among many participants, and to the augury trend. The variety and
content of Sabbatean prophecy in this later phase of
the movement are of great interest; a few general descriptions of the persons
and groups involved will serve as examples.
Was Gershom Scholem the best known historian of Kabballism
correct in his claim that Sabbateanism fed directly into the rise of Jewish
Enlightenment (Haskalah) and Reform Judaism at the turn of the nineteenth
century?
Aspects of Scholem's thesis about the impact of Sabbateanism on Jewish
modernity can be upheld, but only if they are modified to fit the model of the
anthropologists' Cargo Cult." As societies become modern, a desired
outcome that had been wished for because of a religious (especially a
messianic) reason sometimes continues to be a desired outcome for more secular
reasons. In other words, there is a genuine continuity in the goal (for Scholem this would be the abandonment of strict ritual
observance), while at the same time there is a definite break concerning the
impetus for that end (from Sabbatean heresy to
religious reform). In adopting the Cargo Cult model or others like it, however,
one essentially loses any relationship between the causes or impetus of the
original Sabbatean movement and the cause of the rise
of Haskalah and Reform.
From the perspective
of a global picture, the Sabbatean movement and its
impact actually look somewhat different. The authority structure of Ottoman and
European Jewish communities on both the communal and individual levels was already
shifting before Shabbatai came on the scene. Few
really powerful voices remained in the rabbinate; the Kabbalah had eroded the
traditional sense of what constitutes an authoritative text in Judaism; and the
conversos had formed a living conduit between the Jewish and Christian worlds.
Nathan of Gaza, Abraham Miguel Cardoso, and Shabbatai
Zvi, all rabbis, were in the throes of powerful
ideological crises concerning the Torah, God's relationship to man, the nature
of salvation and other issues. Even the Ashkenazi milieu, considered a bastion
of traditionalism, was undergoing an upheaval.
It may be more valid
to say, however, that the Sabbatean movement was a
result of the forces of change that already existed in the Jewish community,
rather than their cause. It was one more manifestation of the Jews' yearning to
escape the exigencies of exilic life and forge a new and happier future under a
new and happier conception of God's will. The structure of Jewish authority
already showed cracks in the pillars, and it was not only radical philosophers
like Spinoza who pushed to topple them. The new order promised by the messiah
and observed by prophets had its source in the same aspiration-the difference
was that kabbalists and ascetics pursued it differently than did the
rationalists. Ultimately their descendants sought a better future starting
where the seventeenth-century Jews left off-in both moderate and radical Sabbatean sectarianism, Hasidism, Haskalah, Enlightenment,
Reform, Socialism, Zionism and assimilation.
The impetus for
Sabbateanism was in a complex ideology, Lurianic Kabbalah, than to suggest that
it was the result of ill-advised belief in latter-day prophecy. Scholem, the last of the German Jewish thinkers, naturally
gravitated toward a meaningful ideological understanding of the Jews'
attraction to Shabbatai. It was a noble heresy, a
gnostic experiment, an epochal crisis of exile and redemption played out alone
on the cosmic stage.
The more prosaic view
of a people involved in a changing authority structure, who were prepared to
believe in prophecy because important rabbis and non-Jews did so, whose beliefs
about the messiah and the prophetic future were heavily shaped by Christian and
Muslim influences, is not the stuff of an epic narrative. The Jews then look
like fools instead of heroic mystical heretics.
Yet this was the
period when the prosaic became the profound, the pedestrian became signal. In
the very days of Shabbatai, alchemists were becoming
chemists, lowly mathematics was proving to be the cornerstone of a new cosmtogy, astrology was turning into astronomy, and
blood-letting quacks were learning to be effective physicians. Sabbateans and their prophecies were an organic part of
this scene.
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