Yeshiva University - Masmid Yearbook (New York, NY)

Page 13 text:

M A S M I D 11 In the hurly burly rush of modern times we cannot sense the mystic in Hfe, we cannot feel that contact with some divine spirit, that ecstatic liberation of the soul from earthly bonds and its soaring aloft in the realms of heaven. We are too preoccupied with mater- ial pursuits and mercenary efforts. To under- stand, then, the motives, the feelings of these men, the representatives of a race oppressed on all sides, we must remove them from the spot- light of modern times, and take ou rselves back to the slow-moving world of yesterday. And in so doing we can better understand the next phase of our subject — the Pseudo-Mes- siahs — and the readiness of great masses of Jews to follow a leader to the Promised Land and freedom. One of the earliest of this long list, a man named Moses, appeared in Crete about the middle of the 5th century and won a large following among the Jews. He indicated a date for general departure to Jerusalem, and on the assigned day he led them to a cliff overlooking the sea and ordered them to hurl themselves into the waves, with the hope of God ' s parting the waters. It is said that many perished in consequence of this misplaced faith. One of the most spectacular of the Pseudo- Messiahs was David Alroy who appeared about 1147 during the Second Crusade. He was an adventurer, a magician, and a war- rior, and gained a large following. Most of the stories told of him are legendary. The movement he set in motion resulted in his own death, and considerable persecution to the Jewish community of Bagdad. David Reubeni was a most extraordinary man, and combined within himself the at- tributes of patience, faith, and diplomacy. He came out of the East with a message of hope for all Jewry. He travelled over Europe and Asia recounting wonderful tales of a Jew- ish king who had under his command 300.000 men ready to march on Jerusalem. Although at first he made no pretensions to Messiahship, he gradually donned the cloak and gamed a great army of followers. Among these supporters was a young Maranno. Diogo Pires, elevated in the higher strata of society, who gave up his life and future, adopted Judaism as his religion, took the name of Solomon Molcho, plunged into the myste- ries of the Kabbala, travelled about preach- ing the advent of the Messiah, and designat- ing Reubeni as the Chosen One of the Lord. Reubeni himself treated him coldly, in the beginning, but the youth, unrestrained, con- tinued his studies and preachments. After many setbacks in their effort to gain support in capturing Palestine, Moicho and Reubeni pleaded their case together before Charles V. However they were imprisoned, the proselyte Molcho being burned by the Inquisition, and Reubeni incarcerated and later, it is thought, he was poisoned. What Reubeni lacked in enthusiasm. Molcho supplemented in fervor and faith in his mission. Reubeni was pa- tient and practical, and though steeped in mysticism, yet acclaimed in his time by many non-Kabbalists. The best-known of all the Pseudo-Mes- siahs is Sabbatai Zevi. While still a youth, he began to gain the attention of the Jews of Smyrna by his pleasing appearance, his secluded mode of life, and his ascetic habits. He delved into the mysteries of the Kabbala and gained admiration from many for his erudition and proficiency, a circumstance which turned his head. At the age of 22 in the year 1648, that epic year forecast in the Zohar as the Messianic year, Sabbatai revealed himself to his disciples as the redeemer of Israel. For violating the Talmudic dictum against pronouncing the ineffable name of God, he and his followers were excommuni- cated, and later banished from Smyrna. This persecution merely helped to strengthen his belief in his mission, and he assumed the at- titude that he had to undergo certain hard- ships before attaining recognition. After several years of wandering he came to Salo- nica. one of the centres of Kabbala. Here he continued his operations, and by means of several publicity stunts, seemingly leaguing himself with divine powers, he gained great support from many Jews. He took up his residence in Jerusalem where he awaited heavenly confirmation of his Messiahship. Such recognition not being forthcoming, he returned to Smyrna where he was accepted with open arms, the ban of excommunication being entirely forgotten, and with great fest- ivity and blowing of the shofar he announced himself Messiah, son of David. The excite- ment caused by this event spread through all

Page 12 text:

10 M A SM I D opposed, but as Arabic culture made its grad- ual impress on Jewish culture, astrology with its intricate and complicated means of divin- ing the future gained considerable credence among Jews of the Middle Ages. All of the vast number of calculators since the early centuries of the Common Era can- not enter so short a discussion. Let us rather review some of the most outstanding with a view to their methods and conclusions. One of the earliest of the long group is Judah Ha-Nasi (135-220 C. E.), the redactor of the Mishna. His calculation is comparative- ly simple alongside of some of the compli- cated efforts of later men. He believed that the Messiah would come 365 years after the destruction, (which was in 70 C. E.,) that is in the year 435 C. E. He bases his conclu- sion on the passage in Isiah 63.4: For the day of vengeance that was in my heart and my year of redemption are come. He assigned one year to every day in the solar year and in this fashion obtained his figures. The computations of the Gaon Saadia (d. 942) are much more involved. He uses the passage in Dan: 12.6.7: How long shall it be to the end of won- ders? And I heard the man clothed in linen who was above the waters of the river where he lifted up his right hand and his left hand unto heaven and swore by him that liveth forever that it shall be for a time, times, and a half. In verse 12 of the same chapter this is de- fined as 1335 days, the days to be considered as years. Times refers to the two periods of the existence of the Kingdom of Israel, the first being the 480 years up to the building of the First Temple, and the second period of 410 years until the destruction of this temple. This gives a sum of 890 years. One half of this sum is 445, thus times and a half would be 1335 years. By deft arrangement of the figures in Dan. 12:11 and 8:14 he makes this figure appear again and again. The ques- tion of a terminus a quo would then arise. He takes as a starting point the third year of the reign of Cyrus when the Jews were given permission to return to Palestine, and which according to old Jewish chronology took place in 367 B. C. E. According to Saadia. 1335 years after this date or 968 C. E., the Messiah was supposed to have come. This effort would seem to be complicated enough but that of Rashi (1045-1105) the Great Commentator, is even the more so, and involves a great variety of methods and chronological subtleties. He bases his results on Dan. 8:14. And he said unto me, unto evening and morning 2300 years, then shall the sanctuary be victorious. The value in Gematria of the words erev 2 V (evening) and boker 1P3 (morning) is 574. Add the 2300 mentioned in the text and you have 2874. In this case the starting point is the begin- ning of the Egyptian captivity. To trace the chronology from this point: the Jews were in Egypt 210 years: 480 years passed from the exodus to the First Temple; the Temple stood for 410 years; the Babylonian captivity lasted 70 years and the Second Temple stood for 420 years. Hence, from Egypt to the second destruction is 1590 years. Now in Dan. 12:11,12 we are told that 1 290 years must elapse from the time that the continual burnt offering shall be taken away until the time of redemption. Since the offer- ing ceased six years before the destruction, i. e. in the 1584th year from the Egyptian captivity as computed above, the addition of 1584 and 1290 gives us the figure 2874 of Dan. 8:14 spoken of before. According to Rashi the Second Temple was destroyed in 68 C. E. Therefore the burnt offering ceased in 62 C. E. Since the Messiah was to come 1290 years after, his destined arrival was scheduled for 1352 C. E. The preceding calculations give us an idea of the methods of attack and the line of thought and supposition followed. There were a great many others who tried their hand at this type of divination including such men as Maimonides, Judah Halevi, Nahmanides. Isaac Abarbanel and Isaac Luria. In general, we notice several outstanding characteristics running through all the com- putations. The first is their basis in scriptur- al passages, thus making the results the hidden expression of divine will. We notice, too, the constant recourse to mystic methods for the attainment of reasonable conclusions. We sec the frantic effort to garner something spe- cific, and assign a definite date to something intangible and beyond the pale of the capa- city of the human mind.

Page 14 text:

12 M ASMID Jewry. His former opponents did penance for their sins. Jews flocked from all lands to see the new Messiah. Women and chil- dren, men and boys recited the Zohar in the streets. The Christian world looked on with silent amazement and hushed expectation. Jewish business was neglected and every- where people were selling their lands and pro- perty in preparation for the awaited trip to Palestine. The printing presses of Amster- dam could not keep pace with the demands for the new prayer books which were adorned with cuts of Sabbatai and King David. The frenzy gripped the most sceptical. All over, Jews went wild with the joy of the antici- pated redemption. Comet-like this great burst of flame de- scended below the horizon, and disillusion- ment took the place of former ecstasy. Yield- ing to force, Sabbatai turned to Mohammed- anism, married a Turkish wife and took many of his followers with him into the folds of Islam. Many continued to adhere to the fiction and others, still under the in- fluence of the furor of the times, were easy prey for the several imposters who followed in his path. The question now arises, what has become of the Messianic idea in our own day? All those forces which resulted in speculation yes- terday, have almost ceased to exist today. Those same factors which subordinated the spirit of our people, and magnified the degree of their gullibility have also gradually faded. The hope for a supernatural emancipation has almost disappeared, and in its place has arisen a destructive scepticism which denies even the likelihood of a miraculous redemp- tion. Very few Jews of today would put faith in a date forecast on the basis of Ge- matria. The drift from the supernatural is peculiar to all religions in our modern age and is not confined to our own. Yet release from these supposed bonds of supernatural- ism by modernistic tendencies has not de- stroyed the innate human belief in a higher power beyond the extremes of human reach. There always remains in the most material of beings that natural attraction toward the supernatural, which is the source of all reli- gion and all faith. No industrial, economic, or political revolution can alter the charac- teristics of the human heart and though cer- tain feelings may be relegated to the field of superstition, and as such supposedly discard- ed, nevertheless their roots are never de- stroyed, and only the proper iformula is needed for their resurrection. The Messianic hope still lives, deep down in the hearts of the Jewish people. Its mani- festations have gradually receded into the past... It lives in that halo of legend and story bound up with every struggle and every outcry of our people. It still lives in the hearts of our oppressed, and it lives in the memory of those who were witness to the horrible massacres of our people on the other side of the water. It lives as an ever- lasting monument to the highest ideal of pa- tience and faith, ever exhibited in the annals of history. It lives as the beginning and as the ending, the root and essence, the apotheosis and epitome of the spiritual idealism of the Jew.