The Baal Shem Tov and the Heretic: A Sabbatean Tale by Bassman Barak A

Author:Bassman, Barak A.
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Telemachus Press, LLC
Published: 2022-12-02T00:00:00+00:00

V. The Messiah Is Revealed

And Reb Yankel continued speaking to the Baal Shem Tov: This is the tale that the old innkeeper told to me. He was born in a shtetl in Podolia, son of a prosperous wine merchant. His father was a sad man who kept to himself and shunned the company of his fellow Jews. But sometimes the innkeeper’s father would receive letters that made him radiant with happiness, which he would burn immediately after reading them. And also, every so often, a stranger would come to town and disappear with the innkeeper’s father into the woods for at least the night and sometimes for days.

When he was a young man, the innkeeper busied himself outside of this strange, melancholy home. He became a devoted scholar, studying all the time, first in cheder and then in the town’s bet midrash. He assumed that he would devote his days to learning Talmud and looked forward someday to marrying the modest and pious daughter of a fine learned Jew.

But then, one night, everything changed for the innkeeper. The innkeeper’s father said that he needed to speak with his son about important matters and led him deep into the nearby woods. When they reached a remote clearing, the innkeeper’s father pushed away the piles of wet leaves on the ground, revealing a metal door that had been hidden underneath them. They opened the door and went down the steps into an underground chamber.

The innkeeper told me that in this room he beheld a light as bright as the midday sun. He saw many handwritten manuscripts on the shelves there and benches and tables for study.

The innkeeper asked his father what this place was.

The innkeeper’s father then asked him if he knew of Sabbatai Zevi.

The innkeeper replied that, like every Jew, he knew that Sabbatai Zevi was a fraud and a traitor—the false Messiah who had converted to Islam to save his head from being chopped off by the Sultan of Turkey.

But the innkeeper’s father insisted that these were lies, and that Sabbatai Zevi was the true Messiah who had begun the Redemption, which was still unfolding. He told his son that, before the conversion to Islam, almost every Jew in the world had acknowledged that Sabbatai Zevi was the Messiah. Rabbi Nathan of Gaza of blessed memory had prophetic visions in which Sabbatai’s role as the Messiah was clearly revealed. Countless other Jews were seized in the middle of the street with visions from Heaven proclaiming that Sabbatai Zevi was the Messiah.

In their own shtetl, the innkeeper’s father said that he had personally witnessed many such prophecies. Everyday Jews, women, children, artisans, laborers, would be going about their business as usual when suddenly they would fall to the ground in a fit, their limbs thrashing madly about, their eyes turning white, thick white pus oozing from the sides of their mouths. Afterwards, when they had recovered, they all said the same thing: They had seen an angel who loudly proclaimed that

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.