In many religions there is a tradition of revelation in which supernatural entities communicate with an individual, revealing new elements of the religion. Looking at these individuals via modern psychiatry, they might be considered schizophrenic or bipolar. In Judaism, there is a long history of people claiming to have been chosen as a messiah, the savior or liberator of the people. This messiah is seen as bringing in a new religious age. One Jewish messiah who became prominent in the seventeenth century was Shabbetai Zevi.
Shabbetai Zevi was born in Smyrna, a city founded by the ancient Greeks in Anatolia (now modern Turkey) in 1626. He was born into a wealthy Sephardic Jewish family. Growing up, he developed behaviors that today would be considered bipolar: he would have manic, high-energy periods which would be followed by periods of depression. In her book A History of God: The 4,000-year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Karen Armstrong writes:
“During these ‘manic’ periods, he would sometimes deliberately and spectacularly break the Law of Moses: he would publicly eat forbidden foods, utter the sacred Name of God and claim that he had been inspired to do so by a special revelation. He believed that he was the long-awaited Messiah.”
His manic episodes and messianic claims annoyed the local rabbis and in 1656 he was expelled from Smyrna. Following his expulsion, he wandered among the Jewish communities in the Ottoman Empire.
During a depressive phase in 1662, Shabbatai Zevi became convinced that he was possessed by demons and he set out for Jerusalem to find Nathan, a rabbi who had a reputation as a skilled exorcist. Karen Armstrong reports:
“Like Shabbatai, Nathan had studied the Kabbalah of Isaac Luria. When he met the troubled Jew from Smyrna, he told him that he was not possessed: his dark despair proved that he was indeed the Messiah.”
Encouraged by Nathan, and in a manic phase, on May 31, 1665 Shabbatai announced to the Jewish world that he was the Messiah. Most rabbis dismissed his announcement as nonsense, but many Jews flocked to him. He selected twelve disciples to be the judges of the tribes of Israel. Karen Armstrong writes:
“Throughout Jewish history, there had been many Messianic claimants, but none had ever attracted such massive support.”
In his book God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, Christopher Hitchens reports it this way:
“In the late mid-seventeenth century, he galvanized whole Jewish communities across the Mediterranean and the Levant (and as far afield as Poland, Hamburg, and even Amsterdam, repudiator of Spinoza) with his claim to be the chosen one who would lead the exiles back to the Holy Land and begin the era of universal peace.”
To spread his revelations, which were based in part on the study of the Kabbalah, Shabbatai Levi travelled to Istanbul where he was arrested by officials from the Ottoman Empire and imprisoned in Gallipoli. Karen Armstrong writes:
“The eyes of the whole Jewish world were fixed on Gallipoli, where Shabbetai had even made an impression on his captors. The Turkish vizier housed him in considerable comfort.”
While in prison, he signed his letters: “I am the Lord your God, Shabbetai Zevi.”
For the Ottoman Empire, what to do with Shabbetai was a bit of a problem. Many Jews believed him to be the Messiah and to simply release him might cause problems. The solution was to have Shabbetai submit to a trial by ordeal. The trial was simple: the court archers would fire their arrows at him and if he was, as he claimed, the true Messiah, then God would deflect the arrows. If his claim was false, then he would be killed. If he refused to submit, then he would be impaled. There was, however, yet another choice: since the Ottoman Empire was an Islamic state, he could simply declare himself to be a Muslim, thus renouncing any claims to being a Jewish messiah, and he would be allowed to live. Christopher Hitchens reports:
“Sabbatai Zevi did what almost any ordinary mammal would have done: made the standard profession of belief in the one god and his messenger and was awarded a sinecure.”
It should be noted that at the time of his trial, he was once again in a depressed state. He was released from prison, given an imperial pension, and died as a true Muslim on September 17, 1676. There is no record as to where he was buried and his grave has never been identified.
Christopher Hitchens writes:
“There were those who refused to believe his conversion or apostasy. There were those who argued that he had only become a Muslim in order to become an even greater Messiah. There were those who felt that he had only adopted a disguise. And of course there were those who claimed he had risen into heaven.”
According to Karen Armstrong:
“The Rabbis attempted to erase his memory from the earth: they destroyed all the letters, pamphlets and tracts about Shabbetai they could find. To this day, many Jews are embarrassed by this Messianic debacle and find it hard to deal with.”
The religious doctrine espoused by Shabbetai Zevi did not die with him. The new movement, known now as Sabbatarianism continued. Nehemiah Hayim, Samuel Primo, and Jonathan Eibeschutz came to believe that the mystery had not been fully revealed in 1666. Karen Armstrong writes:
“Redemption would be a gradual process, and during this time of transition it was permissible to continue to practice the Old Law and worship in the synagogue, while adhering secretly to the Messianic doctrine. This revised Sabbatarianism explained how many Rabbis who believed that Shabbetai Zevi had been the Messiah were able to stay in the pulpits during the eighteenth century.”
Karen Armstrong also writes:
“The extremists who did apostasize adopted a theology of Incarnation, thus breaking another Jewish taboo. They came to believe that Shabbetai Zevi had not only been the Messiah but an incarnation of God. As in Christianity, this belief evolved gradually.”