Sabbatai Zevi

Sabbatai Zevi was a Jewish mystic and ordained rabbi who claimed to be the long-awaited Jewish Messiah. He was the founder of the Sabbatean movement, which attracted a large number of followers in the seventeenth century, but also caused controversy and opposition from the rabbinical establishment. Sabbatai Zevi was influenced by the Kabbalah of Isaac Luria and practiced asceticism and mystical exercises. He had a charismatic personality and a tendency to experience ecstatic states and mood swings. He proclaimed himself as the Messiah in 1648, and gained recognition from several prominent rabbis and Kabbalists, especially Nathan of Gaza, who became his prophet and chief disciple. Sabbatai Zevi traveled to various places in the Ottoman Empire and the Middle East, gathering supporters and performing symbolic acts that he believed would hasten the redemption. He also married Sarah, a woman who claimed to be a reincarnated soul and a prophetess. In 1665, he returned to his hometown of Smyrna, where he was welcomed as the Messiah by the Jewish community. He announced that he would overthrow the Ottoman Sultan and lead the Jews to the Holy Land. However, his plans were thwarted when he was arrested by the Ottoman authorities and brought to Istanbul. There, he was given the choice of death or conversion to Islam. He chose the latter, adopting the name Aziz Mehmed Efendi and receiving a pension from the Sultan. His conversion shocked and disappointed many of his followers, but some of them rationalized it as a part of his messianic mission. They believed that he had descended into the realm of evil in order to redeem the sparks of holiness trapped there. They also hoped that he would eventually reveal his true identity and accomplish the final redemption. Some of his followers also converted to Islam, but secretly maintained their Jewish and Sabbatean beliefs. They became known as the Dönme (Turkish for "converts"), and formed a crypto-Jewish sect that survived for centuries in Turkey and the Balkans. Sabbatai Zevi continued to live a double life, sometimes acting as a pious Muslim and sometimes as a Jewish messiah. He was banished twice by the Ottoman authorities, first to Constantinople and then to Ulcinj, a small town in Montenegro, where he died in isolation in 1676. His death did not end his movement, which persisted in various forms and branches, and influenced other messianic and mystical movements in Jewish history.