Messianism – Rabbi Michael Abraham – Lesson 6

Table of Contents

• Analogies to a technician, a physicist, and a mathematician
• An attempt to define a messianic movement and a false messianic movement
• Alroy in the 12th century
• Smallness of faith, sobriety, and the tension between faith and probabilistic weight
• Immediate perception versus theoretical criteria
• Lammlein in 16th-century Italy
• David Reuveni and Shlomo Molcho
• Shabbetai Tzvi, Nathan of Gaza, and the scope of Sabbateanism
• Rabbi Yaakov Emden, mysticism, and practical Kabbalah as a criterion
• Accepting ideas from problematic sources
• A scale of criteria instead of a sharp line
• The example of Pinchas and Zimri and the critique of the test of results
• Chabad messianism, Rabbi Shach, and the difficulty of deciding
• A planned transition to Zionism and considerations of public decision-making

Summary

General overview

The speaker tries to distill from historical examples criteria that would make it possible to identify a false messianic movement while it is still taking shape, and he emphasizes that the test of failure in hindsight is not enough, because failure can also stem from the people’s lack of readiness and not from any internal flaw in the candidate or the movement. He sketches a scale rather than a sharp line: the more traits accumulate—such as political forcefulness, royal airs, the use of practical Kabbalah and unusual mysticism, and detailed prophecies—the stronger the suspicion of false messianism becomes. On the other hand, there are figures who acted within Jewish law and with good intentions, yet are regarded in tradition as false messiahs mainly because they did not succeed. Along the way he weaves in comments about human tendencies toward simple technical solutions, about economic bubbles as an image for processes of enthusiasm and disillusionment, and about the distinction between theoretical knowledge and immediate perception, in order to explain why it is hard to formulate rigid criteria for messianic phenomena. He then points to the complexity of attitudes toward figures like Shlomo Molcho, to the relative certainty regarding Shabbetai Tzvi, and to a contemporary question about Chabad messianism and Rabbi Shach’s sharp ruling, setting up a transition to a discussion of Zionism in the next chapter.

Analogies to a technician, a physicist, and a mathematician

The speaker describes himself as an engineer who left the field because he saw that technicians solved problems better than he did through trial and error, replacing components, and copying solutions that worked. He presents the physicist as someone who tries to understand “why and how” when a computer stops working, and the technician as someone who first checks whether the plug is in, disconnects and reconnects, gives it a smack, and if that doesn’t work replaces a component. He adds that the “best” approach is that of a mathematician, who assumes everything works, and he compares this to solving malfunctions in tanks and in Windows by taking things apart and putting them back together, or by turning it off and on again.

An attempt to define a messianic movement and a false messianic movement

The speaker returns to historical phenomena in order to clarify a definition of a messianic movement in general, and in contrast a messianic movement “in the negative sense,” and he looks for criteria that do not depend only on the outcome. He argues that there is no clear halakhic prohibition against being a “false messiah” in the way there is a prohibition against being a “false prophet,” and that some of the figures are not lying at all but genuinely believe in their role, which makes them hard to judge with halakhic tools. He stresses that the term is mainly sociological, that the methodology is “problematic” because there are no sharp standards, and that one has to feel one’s way through the attitude of history and of the sages toward these phenomena.

Alroy in the 12th century

The speaker describes Alroy as a student of Rabbi Ali, head of the academy of Gaon Yaakov in Babylonia, within a succession of Geonim, and emphasizes that the period of the “Geonim of Babylonia” continued beyond what is usually assigned to the Geonic era. He says that Alroy, who was very gifted, declared himself the messiah, operated among the Khazars in the Caucasus and had ties with them, and changed his name from Menachem to David in order to strengthen his redemptive status. He describes propaganda by Ephraim ben Azariah of Jerusalem and letters sent to Jewish communities calling on them to go up to Jerusalem, along with miracle stories, prayers, acts of asceticism, and mockery from gentiles that harmed some of the followers.

The speaker presents Alroy’s activity as including ties with Muslim leadership and political intercession, and argues that political activity generally accompanies messianic movements, and that rulers tend to fear and persecute them when the movement gathers strength. He says that funds for redemption were deposited with Alroy, that he observed the commandments and did not abandon the path, and that because of this he is counted by Rabbi Yaakov Emden among “those who did not break traditions.” He says that the leading sages of the generation sent emissaries so that he would refrain from these actions, while he mocked them as “those who delay redemption” and “small in faith.” He describes a dynamic in which at first the sages are reserved, then as the movement strengthens some join it, and when it declines they withdraw, comparing this to the dynamics of economic “bubbles.”

The speaker emphasizes that Alroy did not take forceful or bizarre actions; he sought to bring Israel back to repentance in keeping with the idea that “Israel is redeemed only through repentance,” and therefore it is hard to point to what is negative about this messianism apart from the fact that the movement did not come to fruition. He argues that failure does not prove that he was not the messiah, and raises the possibility that “it could be that he really was the messiah but we did not merit it,” while warning against reversing the burden of proof—demanding “problematic behavior” in order to disqualify someone as messiah, instead of demanding a positive reason to believe he is the messiah.

Smallness of faith, sobriety, and the tension between faith and probabilistic weight

The speaker argues that the ability to remain sober in the face of a messianic phenomenon is not always rationality; sometimes it is “smallness of faith,” because there are people whom nothing will convince even if it appears right before their eyes. He says that faith in redemption and the messiah sustained the Jewish idea for two thousand years, even if many of those who actually built things did not believe in it, and he presents a dispute with a student who challenges that “fact.” He sharpens the point that the discussion is about when one can say of a figure or a movement that it is false messianism, and what the point in time is when one can indicate that while events are still unfolding.

Immediate perception versus theoretical criteria

The speaker uses the example of “Mary’s room” to argue that there is a difference between perfect theoretical knowledge and direct experience of a thing’s essence, and he compares this to a dentist who has never experienced pain and therefore does not know what pain is, even though he knows how to treat it. He says that criteria are needed mainly when there is no immediate acquaintance, and that it may be that when one stands in front of a false messiah, “you simply see” that he is delusional even without criteria. He brings an analogy from the return of a lost object to a Torah scholar based on visual recognition—identification without the ability to specify distinguishing marks.

Lammlein in 16th-century Italy

The speaker presents Lammlein as someone who came from “the exact opposite direction” from Alroy, as a less gifted and frustrated person whose frustration pushed him toward mystical and redemptive directions in order to find a place for expression. He says that Lammlein was one of the “awakeners,” brought the people back to repentance, did not deviate from Jewish law, and in that sense met all the criteria except for the result, which did not work out. He quotes the Sefer Haredim, which recounts that his father smashed the oven for baking matzah because it was clear to him that the next year they would be in Jerusalem because of Lammlein, and concludes that this was perceived as a phenomenon with real drawing power even among Torah scholars.

The speaker says that after Lammlein there were quite a few who converted to Christianity out of heartbreak and disappointment, including “waves” around his death, though not within an organized movement like that of Shabbetai Tzvi. He concludes that Alroy and Lammlein are classified in various lists as messianic movements, but not as deeply corrupt in the way Sabbateanism was, because they were not mass movements and were not accompanied by halakhic deviations or extreme forcefulness.

David Reuveni and Shlomo Molcho

The speaker describes David Reuveni as someone who appeared at the beginning of the 16th century after the expulsion from Spain and presented himself as a traveler from the Ten Lost Tribes and as the “prince of the tribe of Reuven,” with a brother named Yosef who ruled over tens of thousands from Reuven, Gad, and half of Menasheh. He describes a journey through Italy, Germany, Egypt, and the surrounding region, an honorable reception by the pope and rulers, and negotiations with kings and nobles, all while creating enormous hopes among Jews, especially conversos. He says that Reuveni planned to conquer the Arab lands, including Mecca, with the help of Jewish fighters “from the desert of Habor,” and that unlike Alroy and Lammlein he tried to take forceful steps, incite between empires, and push for a Christian war against Muslims.

The speaker recounts that the king’s secretary in Spain, the son of a converso family named Diego, followed Reuveni, changed his name to Shlomo Molcho, became his emissary, begged to be circumcised, and eventually circumcised himself. He presents Molcho as a gifted and charismatic man who became a Torah scholar, and notes that the Maharshalbach, the head of the sages of Jerusalem, came out sharply against him, while many great rabbis did not rule out the possibility that this was connected to redemption. He describes stories of warnings about disasters and wonders, and emphasizes that “legends” around charisma are not unique to false messiahs; they were created even around Herzl.

The speaker says that Reuveni tried to persuade the German emperor to convert to Judaism, that both of them were imprisoned, and that Shlomo Molcho was burned at the stake by the Inquisition, refused to convert, and died sanctifying God’s name. He states that Molcho remained admired among sages, and notes that Rabbi Yosef Karo praises him in Maggid Meisharim and that Tosafot Yom Tov also refers to him. He explains that dying sanctifying God’s name affects the attitude toward him even if the conduct itself was problematic. He concludes that Reuveni and Molcho display more negative characteristics than Alroy and Lammlein because they involved royal airs, forceful moves, and unrealistic international politics.

Shabbetai Tzvi, Nathan of Gaza, and the scope of Sabbateanism

The speaker says that there is no need to elaborate on Shabbetai Tzvi because he is a “false messiah in the fullest sense,” fulfilling all the criteria: forcefulness, violation of Jewish law, royal airs, personal disintegration, an unusual kabbalistic system, and in the end conversion to another religion. He says that Shabbetai Tzvi began like others with repentance, asceticism, and righteousness, then moved to a combination of asceticism and feasting, and eventually went mad with ideas of redemption and wars. He describes Nathan of Gaza as Shabbetai Tzvi’s prophet, a great Torah scholar and a student of Rabbi Moshe Hagiz, and as someone who wrote letters in a prophetic style with absurd descriptions such as taking the crown of the king of Ishmael, crossing the Sambatyon River, and marrying the daughter of Moses our teacher, named Rivka.

The speaker describes Sabbateanism as a movement that swept broad segments of the Jewish people in Europe and in Islamic lands, with an attempt to reach Constantinople in order to remove the sultan’s crown, and with sages who came to examine the matter, some of whom did not initially disqualify it. He mentions the book Tzitzat Novel Tzvi as a sharp polemic against Shabbetai Tzvi that drew attacks because many believed in him, and adds that in Izmir alone there were “one hundred and fifty prophets.” He emphasizes that fear of Sabbateanism lasted for generations because of the continuation of movements such as the Frankists, and suggests that the suspicion toward early Hasidism may be connected to the Sabbatean background, though he does not present this as certain knowledge but as a reasonable hypothesis.

Rabbi Yaakov Emden, mysticism, and practical Kabbalah as a criterion

The speaker quotes Rabbi Yaakov Emden, who distinguishes between “misleading fools” such as Bar Kokhba, David Almosnino, Rabbi Shlomo Molcho, Rabbi Asher Lammlein, and others, and “the vile madmen” such as Shabbetai Tzvi, Berakhiah, Cardozo, Chayon, and the Frankists, quoting his language, “may their names be blotted out.” He emphasizes that for the Yaavetz, the use of incantations, divine names, and practical Kabbalah is seen as an indication of a problematic messianic movement, while recognizing that there is legitimate mysticism and that this is not agreed upon by everyone. He says that even without violating Jewish law, the very adoption of Sabbatean nuances within a kabbalistic framework—as Rabbi Yaakov Emden claimed regarding Rabbi Yonatan Eybeschutz—was, in his eyes, reason for a fierce struggle because of the depth of the trauma and the fear of a recurrence.

Accepting ideas from problematic sources

The speaker argues that the problematic source of an idea does not necessarily invalidate it, and brings the principle “accept the truth from whoever says it,” in the name of Rabbi Avraham ben HaRambam, who cites Maimonides on the Talmudic passage in tractate Pesachim where the sages of Israel accepted the view of the sages of the nations of the world. He says that the history of ideas does not always allow one to point to a single source, that there are indirect influences and a spirit of the times, and that even if there are similarities or Christian influences in Hasidism, that does not in itself invalidate Hasidism. He adds the example of Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, who introduced four-part choral singing into the synagogue in Frankfurt even though its origin lay in a foreign harmonic structure, and argues that there is a tendency to reject proposals simply because their source is “Reform,” even if they can be grounded halakhically.

A scale of criteria instead of a sharp line

The speaker concludes that the examples do not allow for a clear-cut criterion, but they do create a scale in which the accumulation of criteria makes the judgment more severe. He notes that forcefulness, practical Kabbalah, royal airs, and mystical prophecies push in the direction of “a false messiah in the fullest sense,” whereas figures such as Alroy and Lammlein receive a more lenient attitude because they did not deviate from Jewish law and the danger was limited.

The example of Pinchas and Zimri and the critique of the test of results

The speaker rejects comparing this to a test of results based on the act of Pinchas, and argues that in the rule “when one has relations with an Aramean woman, zealots may strike him,” the act is permitted even without a guarantee of success, and Zimri is even entitled to defend himself, so Pinchas could have been killed. He suggests that the permission to defend oneself creates a barrier that distinguishes a true zealot from someone unwilling to pay a price, and therefore success should not be seen as a condition for legitimacy.

Chabad messianism, Rabbi Shach, and the difficulty of deciding

The speaker raises the question of Chabad messianism in the last generation and emphasizes that Chabad “basically kept Jewish law,” worked to bring people back to repentance, performed a great deal of kindness, and that the Rebbe was a Torah scholar and a man of great deeds. He places the difficulty in the fact that declaring someone to be the messiah without sufficient justification is itself problematic, and suggests that Rabbi Shach identified a problem already during the Rebbe’s lifetime because the messianic determination preceded any significant political-redemptive acts, and because of phenomena of attributing powers to the Rebbe to the point of blurring the line between praying “to him” and praying “through him,” which Maimonides defines as idolatry. He adds that many Torah scholars outside Chabad were not as decisive as Rabbi Shach and were prepared to say, “Let’s wait and see,” and he presents the principled difficulty: if every candidate is disqualified on probabilistic grounds, one may also disqualify the true messiah.

A planned transition to Zionism and considerations of public decision-making

The speaker says that the next chapter is supposed to lead into a discussion of Zionism, and that in Berger’s book, The Rebbe, the Messiah, and the Scandal of Orthodox Indifference, there is a drive in that direction as well. He adds that Rabbi Shach’s sharp decision may also be connected to public responsibility and the need not to hesitate in order to prevent confusion, and he refuses to determine that this necessarily stemmed from political motives, even though he understands the possibility. He concludes by saying that the discussion of messianism brings the phenomenon closer to the present, shows that many did not adopt Rabbi Shach’s line, and prepares the ground for the claim that comparisons to Zionism are not nonsense simply by virtue of being comparisons, but rather require examination within the same attempt to map messianism and its consequences.

I was a technician, so that’s more. No, no, no—engineer, forget it. If he was a technician, then… that’s why I quit. I was at Tadiran, and I saw that every technician did everything much better than I did. You calculated integrals, and he does the calculations and all the mathematics. The guys there try this, throw in a capacitor, put in a coil, a transistor, I don’t know what. Bang on it a little if it doesn’t work, and in the end they figure out how to copy it from the Japanese the way they’re supposed to, and everything’s fine. That’s it. I’m doing calculations, and he… A physicist—if the computer stops working, what does the physicist do? He starts thinking: why, how. What does a technician do? First checks whether the plug is in. Give it a smack, or unplug it and plug it back in. It works. Best of all is a mathematician. If that’s not enough, then replace it. A mathematician says: assume it works, and then everything works. In tanks, when there’s a malfunction, they take it apart and put it back together. Because usually that solves it. Same with Windows. Same with Windows. There I don’t know. Just turn it off and on again. Okay.

We were in the middle of describing the historical phenomena from which one might perhaps try to distill what the definition of a messianic movement is, among the possibilities I laid out. So we talked a bit about the Christians, we talked about Bar Kokhba, and now I want to speak a little about somewhat more modern movements. So there are two that have similar characteristics: Alroy and Lemlein.

Alroy was basically in the 12th century, a student of one of the great figures of that generation, Rabbi Ali, head of the Gaon Yaakov academy in Babylonia. After that there was Rabbi Hofni ben Ali—it was a kind of dynasty of geonim in Babylonia. They were called geonim, by the way, meaning that the period of the geonim in Babylonia lasted longer than what we usually associate with the Geonic period. The geonim of Babylonia, not the geniuses of Bnei Brak. The geniuses of Bnei Brak continue until today. In any case, Alroy at some point was apparently a very, very talented person. At some stage he declared himself the messiah, traveled among the Khazars in the Caucasus, had ties with the Khazars. Were the Khazars Jews, those people? Apparently yes, that’s how I understand it. Meaning, the 12th century is around the time of Rabbi Yehuda HaLevi speaking about the Khazars, roughly the same period.

And then basically he says that the time of the messiah has arrived, and one has to take all kinds of practical steps to bring him and to bring the redemption. He changed his name—his original name was Menachem, and he changed it to David. Yes, David of course is connected to redemption, to strengthen his status. He had some propagandist who operated on his behalf, some Ephraim—Ephraim ben Azariah the Jerusalemite. They wrote letters to all the Diaspora communities and said the time has come to ascend to Jerusalem, the messiah is coming, and so on.

He performed many miracles—at least that’s what the stories say—and his students did various prayers and mortifications and all kinds of things like that. The gentiles mocked them as weird cranks, and some of them really broke under that whole issue of being mocked. Alroy left Khazar, went to Kurdistan, passed through various places, forged ties with the Muslim leadership—meaning the political activity that usually accompanies a messianic movement. Messianic movements generally also engaged in political activity, in lobbying before gentile rulers.

At some point they were persecuted, because people began to fear them. By the way, that characterizes almost all of them. They started to fear them once they amassed power and began to pose some kind of threat to the local kingdom. He explained that everyone would fly with the wind to Jerusalem; he had all kinds of theories. They entrusted him with a lot of money too, by the way, for the needs of redemption. I don’t know exactly—I didn’t fully understand from what I read, at least. Apparently this was a man with good intentions; he kept the commandments all the time, meaning he did not abandon the path. He belongs to those who did not break traditions, as we read in Rabbi Yaakov Emden—right? So he too is counted among them.

Several of the great rabbis of the generation sent messengers to him asking him to refrain from these actions because they were starting to worry, and he began mocking them: they’re delaying the redemption; if not, then they are small in faith, all kinds of things of that sort. Weren’t there great rabbis who were drawn after him? There were, there were. I don’t remember the details exactly—I wrote down things here that I read a long time ago, so I can’t tell you details right now—but yes, there were those who were, and those who weren’t, and that was probably also the difference between the beginning and later on.

You know, many times when something like this begins, you don’t cooperate, but suddenly when the movement starts awakening, you suddenly say, wait a second, maybe this really is the real thing. But afterward it’s like a parabola, right? In the end, later on, when the business doesn’t work and starts looking a little problematic and a little off the rails, people pull back. Meaning there are fairly complex processes in the way sages relate to various false messiahs. A bit parallel to bubbles. What? A bit parallel to bubbles. To bubbles? Yes, financial bubbles, bitcoin. Bubbles. Ah, economic bubbles. Could be, yes. Right, really any process that departs from what we know—at first people suspect it, when it succeeds they join it, and then once it starts nevertheless raising some concerns and still doesn’t really take off, some people retreat.

By the way, I don’t know—I mean, maybe bitcoin, for now bitcoin is still with us. Not specifically against bitcoin—things that in the end really burst. Today a hundred billion was wiped out. Really? From bitcoin. What, it dropped? It dropped, yes, apparently. If it was wiped out, then it dropped. I don’t follow the process; I don’t really understand this process at all—why it gets wiped out, I didn’t understand that part. Fine, I don’t know, in any case that stuff is beyond me.

In any event, Alroy also didn’t even take—earlier we spoke about the possibilities for defining a messianic movement—Alroy also did not take excessively violent actions. He engaged in advocacy, gathered the Jews, tried to get them to ascend to Jerusalem, but he did not go out to wars, unlike other false messiahs. Meaning this was a phenomenon where it’s quite hard to put your finger on in what sense it is a messianic movement in the negative sense of the word. I said one should distinguish between a “messianic movement” in quotation marks and a messianic movement. A messianic movement is a movement that wants to bring the messiah, which ostensibly ought to be fine. But a “messianic movement” in the negative sense—we tried to look for criteria. And here it’s not entirely clear by what criterion. He didn’t take violent actions, he didn’t do bizarre actions, he simply wanted to bring the Jewish people back in repentance so that the messiah would come, which fits with “the Jewish people are redeemed only through repentance.” Belief in the messiah is of course flesh of the flesh of our tradition. So what exactly is the problem?

He claimed he was the messiah? What? He claimed he himself was the messiah? Yes, yes. So right, in the end, result-wise it turned out he wasn’t. But I’ve already come back to this more than once—I’ve said more than once that I don’t think the result-based test is good enough. As we said with Hezekiah, that we did not merit it, and things like that. It could be that he was a real messiah but we did not merit it. Meaning the fact that in the end it didn’t succeed is not a one-way indication that there wasn’t a real messiah here or real messianic potential. And conversely, there are those who attribute it to smallness of faith: because of smallness of faith, that’s why it didn’t work. If people had really rallied and really believed in it, then maybe he would also have succeeded.

Yes, many times this points in a direction that seems problematic to me. Why is the assumption that in order for us to see that he is not the messiah, there has to be something problematic visible in his behavior that shows he is not the messiah? It seems to me the assumption should be the reverse: in order for us to see that he is the messiah, aside from there not being problematic things, we need some reason to believe he really is the messiah. Yes, but there are reasons here. He stirred the Jewish people toward repentance, he attained significant standing, he started bringing all the people to the Land of Israel. Now let’s say we’re at that stage, before it failed and collapsed. But what does it mean, he started bringing them? Was there really mass settlement? There wasn’t mass settlement, but people rallied, people sold their property, people gave him funds—meaning the thing started getting organized. Now at that stage—why is it so far-fetched to assume this man is the messiah? Unless you don’t believe at all.

Yes, like all the jokes—we talked about this—that many times this levelheadedness with which we say, okay, this is a messianic movement, stems from the fact that we’re not really prepared to put our money on this belief. Meaning we don’t really believe in the messianic idea at all. Why? I think overall the critical mass does believe in it, and the fact is there are Jews here. If not for this belief—fine, the belief of people who believed that they would eventually be redeemed, that they would reach the land promised to them, and so on—if they had not transmitted that with this simple faith from generation to generation, it’s unlikely people would be here today. No, what? But on the other hand, most of those who came here and built this and all that didn’t believe in it at all. That doesn’t matter in the slightest. They didn’t believe in it at all, true, but that’s not my claim. That’s what sustained the idea for two thousand years. Right—what? But you thought that sustaining the idea is nice, but you’re going back again to Leibowitz’s point, you know—that you sustain the idea in order to promote processes. The question is whether it really is supposed to be true or it’s only useful, because without it things wouldn’t have endured. It is supposed to be true—the fact is that it does endure. What fact? I don’t see any fact here. I see that certain people came here, that’s true. Very many of those people had no connection whatsoever to faith and messiah; they didn’t come because of… No, but that’s not the point. They didn’t believe in the messiah, not because… I’m not saying everyone who came here counts as a believer. Most do not.

I’m not—first of all, on the face of it there is the impression that there was more than one messiah. Meaning King David was himself a messiah. Saul was called “the Lord’s anointed.” “The Lord’s anointed” is because he was anointed; it’s not connected to the messiah in the redemptive sense. So what is the meaning of messiah in the sense of redemption? A messiah who has the anointing oil. No, and in redemption? That a king will return who has the anointing oil. That’s what I’m saying. No, but there it is not messiah in the redemptive sense. It’s someone who exists. The one who redeemed them was exactly like Moses our teacher—same thing. He redeemed them from where they were. So they believed him; they could have chosen not to believe. There’s a problem in belief in the future messiah—leave me now with processes… Future, but this is it. No, it isn’t. Moses our teacher did not claim that he was the final messiah, the one who is supposed to come at the end. You know, I don’t know what was there. There’s no source for it—we already said there’s no other source for this—so I don’t know if anyone claimed that at all. But this belief that they would indeed be redeemed, that this… that’s what sustained this idea, otherwise what? How do you have people for two thousand years believing in what? In someone who will redeem them and they come here…

When I say there is smallness of faith—no, then from one point of view, no, more than that. When I say there is smallness of faith, that means there are some people who probably don’t really believe in this seriously. Meaning even if it appeared before their eyes, they wouldn’t join—not because it didn’t convince them, but because nothing would convince them. Okay? Now you say maybe such people—or there are those who say yes, fine, I didn’t say everyone is like that—but I said the ability to remain sober in the face of such a phenomenon does not always mean you are simply a rational person, period. Sometimes it means you are small in faith.

Because Rabbi, we keep starting from the assumption that there is some specific person who is the messiah, as if there really aren’t many Jewish laws about that besides Maimonides. The law in Maimonides—it starts in the Talmud, and Maimonides brings it as Jewish law, what it will be like. Yes, but it’s also not a matter of Jewish law; it’s whether you believe or do not believe—it’s a matter of what literary weight you assign. Fine, but I’m saying: until today, I believe in the coming of the messiah, but up till now, from the examples—there have been zero successes. Okay, the question is whether these examples—that’s part of what I’m trying to clarify now—whether in these examples, at the beginning of the process, I could have pointed to why this isn’t right; then it isn’t part of the sample. I’m asking what happens if someone comes along who does meet all the standards, with nothing connected to these examples—would we then follow him? I wouldn’t put my head on the block that everyone would follow him, all those who declare that they believe in the coming of the messiah, right?

If I can ask regarding the essence of the point at which you can say the messiah is false—meaning is it only after the fact? At what stage is it already… Ah, so that’s our topic. We’re talking about this all the time. Yes, the question is whether there is some moment in time… That’s what I’m talking about. I’m trying to define the concept of a messianic movement—that’s all I’m trying to… Not a messianic movement. No, a false messianic movement. What is the point at which you say, okay, from here we understand that this is a false messiah? I have no idea. Don’t know. That’s what I’m trying to clarify. We’re trying to clarify exactly this issue: what is he supposed to do? Is he supposed to violate Jewish law? Is he supposed to take actions that are irrational, not reasonable, use unreasonable force? That’s the whole point. Meaning all the options that, through these historical descriptions, I’m trying to refine: which of these options actually defines false messianism, or the point in time at which I can identify a false messiah.

I already said that this is a more sociological concept and less a halakhic one. There is no halakhic prohibition against being a false messiah. We haven’t found such a prohibition anywhere. There is a prohibition against being a false prophet. There is no prohibition against being a false messiah. There is a prohibition against lying. Yes, there is a prohibition against lying, that’s true. But the person didn’t even lie—some of them truly, sincerely believe that they are such. They are not lying. They are just mistaken perhaps, but there is no prohibition against making a mistake. Therefore it is also hard to examine this question by halakhic standards, from halakhic sources. And therefore I say: there’s no choice; one has to look at historical phenomena and see what the attitude was toward those historical phenomena, and from that try to understand what we are talking about. I said the methodology here is very problematic for this subject, because it isn’t halakhic and there are no clear standards, so one has to feel one’s way.

The cousin of Alroy—not cousin, but someone somehow connected to the same phenomenon—is Lemlein. That’s in the 16th century in Italy, much later than Alroy, 400 years. What happened to Alroy in the end? In the end, I think he was killed. No, did he violate Jewish law? No, no, no, I said—he didn’t violate Jewish law. He has none of the characteristics: not forcefulness, not violating Jewish law. It ended with the fact that it didn’t succeed. What happened afterward—was there some… no, he just disappeared? I don’t know. It isn’t even written here in my notes whether he died in the end—obviously he died in the end. Maybe he didn’t die. No, because if he’s the messiah—the messiah dies too? The messiah won’t die? There will be resurrection of the dead. No, it’s not written; I didn’t write that down in my bullet points, I didn’t even write that. But in short, none of the clear-cut characteristics I tried to propose in previous classes seem to be here, except for the outcome. That the outcome was that it didn’t work—meaning in the end it didn’t materialize. So how do you characterize him? He’s a messiah who is… I know? That’s what I’m asking. In the tradition he is accepted as one of the false messiahs. False? Yes, yes. And I’m saying: in this case, that’s only result-based. So when I look for criteria, if a false messiah is standing before my eyes, I don’t want to wait until the end and then discover that I was mistaken. I want to be able to point now and say he’s a false messiah, meaning during the process. I’m saying: here is an example that makes this very difficult. There is someone here for whom apparently there were no clear indications, except perhaps that if someone had looked at him soberly, he would have understood that we are dealing with someone fantasizing wildly. Because when you see someone like that, maybe you can… He is ostensibly in Hezekiah’s position, no? What? Hezekiah. Hezekiah. I said maybe, ostensibly yes. But I say again: many times when you encounter something directly—after all, whenever we look for criteria, it’s only because we do not know the thing directly. We need criteria. Sometimes when you see something, you simply see it. You don’t need to look for criteria.

Now true, we didn’t see, so we are engaged in… It’s like—yes, there’s an example, and this came up now on the site too, with singing. There is a famous example they bring: Mary’s room. There’s a Wikipedia entry on it. Mary’s room is an example, like John Searle’s Chinese room—they are examples with the same idea. Mary was a physicist, right, dealing with optics, a genius. She knows the entire field of optics inside out, with all the equations and applications, everything. Fine? But she lives and works inside a room that is entirely black and white. And physiologically as well she sees in black and white. Fine? And the paper is white—or the computer—everything is black and white, there are no colors and nothing, and she is a world-renowned expert in optics.

Now she goes out of the room and sees the color red. The question is: did she learn something new? That’s not in her paradigm. What do you mean? Because she was in black and white. Yes, but I’m asking whether she learned something new. The answer is yes, obviously yes. Because before that she did not know what the color red is; she only knew that its wavelength is such-and-such, and what happens when it encounters a grating of such-and-such a structure—she knew all the optics and everything. But what is the color red? The assumption is that she could not imagine it, but… Yes, you can’t imagine it from the equations. From the equations you cannot imagine it. In fact, from reading about people who… Can you imagine the color red? Obviously not. How can you describe to someone what the color red is? Obviously she hadn’t seen it before, maybe not as a good description. There are people who can see a bit into the infrared, and they describe it as a very dark red. There are people who can see into infrared? That’s what they show. An infrared spotlight turns on—it doesn’t blind them, but they know where it turned on. So they see. So they see, so they have… Okay, so now you ask them: what did you see? So they say “I see…” No, because they know what red is and they know what dark is. Exactly. He can explain to me that it’s dark red. But someone who doesn’t know what colors are, or has never seen red in his life—what will you tell him? How will you convey this idea of red to him? So clearly she learned something new, but this something—nothing was missing from her physics. Her physics was perfect; nothing was lacking in it. There is a difference between grasping something directly and describing it within some theoretical framework.

Let’s compare it to a dentist who is first-rate professionally, but in his life never had a filling, nor a cavity, nor anything—his teeth never hurt. Yes, exactly. Any doctor who has never experienced pain—then a patient comes and complains of pain, he has no idea what pain is. But he knows that if someone says it hurts, you have to give such-and-such a medication. And it’s the same thing. There is a difference between grasping… Now this is true in many, many areas. Often when you know something directly, you need criteria less. Criteria have theoretical value, they’re interesting, but they are not something you need for daily functioning. When do you need a criterion? When you do not know the thing.

Okay, so here too, we’re dealing with various false messiahs we didn’t meet. Okay, so I’m looking for a criterion by which to judge them. But the possibility always remains: listen, when you stand before someone like that, you understand that this man is delusional. You just see it directly. I don’t know whether it’s these criteria or others. Like returning a lost object to a Torah scholar by visual recognition. A Torah scholar, by visual recognition, identifies that this lost object is his. He can’t tell me exactly what the identifying marks are, but when he sees it, he recognizes it. That’s a parable for this point.

Now Rabbi, regarding the issue of messianism: could it be, as you said from the other side of the paradigm, that maybe circumstantially the generation wasn’t worthy, and therefore it didn’t come to fruition, and therefore he is not necessarily a false messiah even if it did not materialize—so the falsehood is not in him but in the lack of readiness? We see something interesting in this week’s Torah portion regarding the Holy One, blessed be He, turning to Moses our teacher: “And I also heard their groaning.” After all, in the Covenant Between the Pieces it says, “and they shall enslave them and afflict them four hundred years.” So it may be that the stopwatch started running when “their cry rose up to God.” Meaning, before they actually—how shall we say—“today, if you will hear His voice,” because the gates of tears are not locked, and so on. Once the children of Israel cried out in their groaning, then it says, “And I also heard their groaning.” Meaning, the matter of “they shall enslave them and afflict them” was fulfilled. And you’re saying that if they had not reached the point of pain… If they had not cried out, then the potential would not have come out, and basically they would not have been redeemed. Beautiful. So the same thing here: if the people were not ready, then it doesn’t matter who is standing there. That is exactly the problem with the result-based test. The result-based test does not necessarily indicate that there was a problem in the process, because it may be that it failed to materialize for side reasons, and not because there was no real messianism there.

Okay, in any event, this Lemlein came from the complete opposite direction of Alroy. He was not a particularly talented man. He was frustrated by that, and part of the issue is that afterward he vented it at all the dialecticians and all the rest, because apparently—as they write—he was simply less successful in that realm. And that frustration took him in mystical directions, redemption and all that, and he wanted to find expression in a place where he could find expression. In the world of the study hall he was apparently less successful. There are many like that today. What? There are many like that today. Yes, among the inspirational preachers. So he was one of the inspirational preachers. Yes, so he went and brought the people back in repentance so that they would… and again, he did everything properly, he did not deviate from Jewish law, and he brought the whole people back to repentance, everything was fine. So with Alroy it was super-talent, and with him it was under-talent. But what difference does that make? It’s allowed to be talented and allowed to be untalented. In the end, what they did met all the criteria I described except for the outcome. The outcome just didn’t work.

More than that: a hundred years later… And what happened to him? Again, here I don’t… No, I think the facts are known from Josephus, so therefore I don’t… Isn’t knowledge of Torah one of the required criteria? What? Isn’t knowledge of Torah one of the required criteria in this context? Look, Alroy certainly knew Torah. Lemlein was less talented. What does “knew Torah” mean? And if he was less talented but knew. What, does he have to be the leading sage of the generation specifically? I don’t know where that is written. Is it written in Maimonides? What, that he should be the leading sage of the generation? I don’t know if the leading sage, but that he should be a great sage. Fine, okay, not sure how far one can really fix categories here, but maybe. Fine.

At what level—what psychometric score is needed so that… I… Look, Sefer Charedim, who lived a hundred years after Lemlein, tells that his father smashed his matzah oven because it was perfectly clear to him that next year they would already be in Jerusalem and he wouldn’t need his matzah oven. What, because of the awakening? Because of Lemlein. Meaning now I’m talking about—I assume, I don’t know—a Torah scholar; at least the author of Charedim was a Torah scholar, I don’t know what his father was. And he didn’t dismiss it out of hand. He saw that this really was a phenomenon that could sway people. Meaning there isn’t something unambiguous here. He didn’t say, okay, but he wasn’t—he was an ignoramus, so what connection could there be to thinking he would be the messiah? It seems he didn’t dismiss him. From Charedim it sounds like he also treated him with respect; he didn’t see this as something necessarily negative. It didn’t succeed, but still.

Also, regarding both Alroy and Lemlein—even if one sees this as false messianism, usually those who relate to it as a phenomenon of false messianism do not see it in the same sense as Shabbetai Tzvi. Meaning they do not see it as a phenomenon as deeply flawed as Shabbetai Tzvi. And therefore it really may be that this is simply a statement that, result-wise, it did not succeed, that’s all. And perhaps it really isn’t correct to place these phenomena under the category of a messianic movement in the negative sense—in the sense that it is forbidden to join it, in the dangerous sense. Dangerous—again, I also don’t know, but I can only assume, it’s not written in my notes that it was massive, but surely here and there there were people who, when they were disappointed, abandoned things. Meaning that happens after almost every such movement. Now there wasn’t something massive here, and therefore I really think that’s why Lemlein and Alroy are not classified in an unequivocally negative way. But disappointments like these always lead to all kinds of places.

Yes, I brought the example of Like Broken Clay, by Shulamit Lapid, about Jerusalem at the beginning of the twentieth century. Is there an example of something that caused a mass crisis even though it wasn’t initially involved in violating Jewish law or something like that? I think in Jerusalem that was the story. But that wasn’t a mass crisis—Jerusalem is something very local. How many Jews were there in Jerusalem? No, okay, “mass” not in the worldwide sense. How many worldwide examples were there of messianic movements that really spread broadly like that? There were a few, but not that many. The two the Rabbi mentioned—those aren’t, I know… I don’t know, I don’t know. Again, I don’t have numerical data about how many exactly followed them. There was some in Khazar, some in Kurdistan, so yes, it made some noise on the world stage, but I don’t know how truly mass the movement of Alroy really was. I don’t know. Several books were written about it; there is a book by Hyman, I think, on Alroy. Yes, Hyman also treats him in a way that—on the contrary—he says it’s part of Jewish history; he doesn’t come to condemn him. Therefore I say, the attitude toward them—true, they are always counted on the lists of messianic movements—but it is quite possible that these are messianic movements in the sense that there was a messiah who failed, but not in the negative sense like Shabbetai Tzvi, like Christianity, like all sorts of things—not even like Bar Kokhba, okay? About Bar Kokhba I said he acted very forcefully, “Do not help and do not hinder” toward the Holy One, blessed be He. There are rabbinic descriptions with problematic statements there. With Alroy and Lemlein such things are apparently not documented, as far as I read.

Yes, by the way, following Lemlein there were indeed—this is in my notes—quite a few who actually converted their religion, but unlike Shabbetai Tzvi this did not happen together with him. Meaning, it was simply the break that followed from the fact that the thing did not work. By the way, when he died there was another wave of conversion. Meaning there were several waves of conversion there. They converted to Christianity, yes, I think. In any case, once again, people with good intentions, who did not violate Jewish law, did not do overly forceful things, but did stir things up. It is clear that if someone knows about himself that he is not the messiah and does this deliberately, knowing perfectly well he will fail, that is a problematic thing—he is a fraud. Yes, exactly, just a fraud. But usually that is not the case. Usually we are dealing with people who probably truly and sincerely believe that they are messianic.

Okay, the next pair is David Reubeni and Solomon Molkho. David Reubeni also appeared at the beginning of the sixteenth century. By the way, at the beginning of the sixteenth century there were several like that, as with what I said earlier—Alroy, there were others, not Alroy, Lemlein—there were several. The beginning of the sixteenth century is of course after the expulsion from Spain. Messianism—what? Where is this information from? What is it based on? History books. Where did I read it? I don’t even remember. It’s summarized in my notes from various places I read. It exists in all kinds of places. It’s part of history. Where is your information about Napoleon from? No, I’m asking what the source is. That too is from history books. Fine, if it’s Google then that’s… In any case, Reubeni also appeared at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Again? What? Yes, so just a second.

He presented himself as a traveler from the Ten Tribes. He was in Italy or Europe, passed through Italy, Germany, Egypt, and afterward came to the Land of Israel, came to the area here. But he presented himself as someone from the Ten Tribes, which is very exotic, very much seeming to be part of some process in which the whole thing is coming back. Someone who comes from the Ten Tribes—that already works in his favor, because it basically says that this is… But here it has to be either intentional falsehood or truth. What? Here it has to be either deliberate falsehood or truth. I don’t know. By the way, I found no statement that this was false. He claimed that he came from the desert of Habor there, from the Arabian deserts, and that there are Jewish tribes there, Jewish tribes that are the Ten Tribes. And there were such things; meaning apparently there are such tribes. What, that they are from the Ten Tribes? Apparently yes—some remote Jews wandering around there in the Arabian deserts, and the accepted assumption is that they are from the Ten Tribes, yes. By the way there is Eldad the Danite, there are all kinds of ancient travelers who also report such things, and people treat this as fairly reliable reporting. There are Jewish tribes there, after all, in those regions, and those tribes apparently are not connected to the two and a half tribes known to us. These are probably indeed remnants of the Ten Tribes. I don’t know, like for example the Ethiopian phenomenon—people who went into exile even before the First Temple’s exile, or during the First Temple exile. Okay?

What, doesn’t he need to be from the house of David? Yes, so he can say he’s from the house of David, or think that he really is from the house of David. After all, you can also imagine that you are from the house of David. Didn’t I tell you that my grandmother told me we’re from the house of David too? But how did he come from the Ten Tribes? Just—how did he come? He crossed the Sambatyon in a kayak. I don’t know. No, I mean the family source there? No, no—he himself came from the Ten Tribes, that’s what he claimed. Why did he call himself Reubeni? He claimed to be the prince of the tribe of Reuben. No, but if he’s the prince of the tribe of Reuben then he is not messiah son of David. True. So perhaps he indeed did not present himself that way. Right—Alroy said he was David; this one said he was prince of the tribe of Reuben. And he indeed said he had a brother—he had a brother… Wait, a brother from the house of David also counts. Could be. A brother from the mother’s side. Could be. His brother Joseph rules tens of thousands of people from the two and a half tribes, meaning Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh. No, that’s not King David. Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh, okay? And he claims he is, I don’t know, maybe the aide-de-camp of the Ten Tribes within the framework of the redemption process. It may be that he didn’t present himself as messiah from the house of David but as the deputy, right, or his assistant regarding the two and a half tribes east of the Jordan. Fine, doesn’t matter. But I’m saying the messianic process—he was received by the pope, negotiated with kings and nobles, meaning David Reubeni had status, significant status. Many Jews followed him and pinned great hopes on him because he told all these stories about the Jewish fighters from the desert of Habor, the tribe of Kheiber. There’s even a story by Eliezer Smoly, you know, those stories from early Zionism? He tells there about someone who came from there and said he would bring his whole tribe to join here in the Land to help us in the war. All the people here who had come from Europe didn’t know how to fight, so they were very happy that someone was coming who also knew how to ride horses like all the people here and would help them, so that we too would have such people who know what to do with force.

In any case, he had plans to conquer the Arab lands, including Mecca, with his heroic fighters from Habor. He, unlike Alroy and Lemlein, did take forceful and unreasonable actions. He tried to. Tried to, yes. Meaning he did try to call for war, he even stirred up conflict between kings. Meaning he tried to persuade the pope and Christian kings to go to war against the Muslims and all kinds of—to stir up conflict between kings. Wasn’t there an attempt to persuade Christians to sell him cannons so he could conquer the Land of Israel from the Ottomans? Could be. It sounds like him. I don’t remember that specific story right now, but it suits him. Meaning he did all kinds of things like that. If not that, then he did things of that kind in any event, okay?

Now at that time the Church was waging war against the conversos. The man arrived there as leader of the Jews, was received with honor, also in Spain, meaning also in places of the Inquisition. And all the Jews pinned enormous hopes on him, meaning they thought he would save them from all the persecutions. We are speaking about the century immediately after the expulsion, the expulsion from Spain. There were many great Jewish sages who treated him with great respect—great respect meaning apparently someone with a really good chance of being the messiah. Among them, by the way, Rabbi Ovadia Sforno, for example. Right? He didn’t say he was the messiah; he was only supposed to be the messiah. Okay, doesn’t matter. Part of a messianic movement, you know—maybe from the house of David—but he is part of the movement, a real movement. Okay.

And there were fears among the authorities and they began to persecute him, not important, all kinds of things of that sort. In the end, the king’s secretary in Spain, who himself was from a family of conversos—his name was Diego—himself followed Reubeni when he came to Spain and was received there and so on. Think what conversos thought in such a situation: a Jew arrives and is received by this establishment that has been murdering them and persecuting them for decades, received with royal honor and making ties with them and organizing redemption for the Jews. I don’t even understand how this fit Christian theology—to cooperate with such a thing. Redemption of the Jews contradicts the theology. He just managed to work on them too, perhaps. In any case, I really don’t know. Again, that’s another question—I didn’t research it, I don’t know the details, I’m trying to give some general description.

In short, this Diego, who was assistant to the king, Hebraized his name and called himself Solomon Molkho. Then he became the secretary of the emissary of Reubeni. Yes, exactly, emissary of… exactly. By the way, maybe indeed some descendant of his, I don’t know. And yes, Reubeni went around with entourages, with horses and chariots, of course—meaning he behaved with royal customs. That too is a common phenomenon among false messiahs. Molkho begged Reubeni to circumcise him. He didn’t circumcise him, no matter—in the end he circumcised himself. Incidentally this Molkho too was apparently a talented man and became a Torah scholar; he studied, meaning he became a Torah scholar, and apparently was indeed charismatic too.

Maharalbach, the chief sage of Jerusalem in that period—those who remember him from the ordination controversy, the one who stood at the head of the movement opposing renewed ordination—he also opposed this. Meaning he’s just an opponent of everything all the time? Yes, maybe he was among the opponents. But he also really came out sharply against this matter. Yet it was very much not clear, and among the great Torah scholars of that period it was very unclear. Many of them thought, or at least leaned toward the possibility, that this man was really going to bring the redemption.

Molkho began to travel around and became his prophet—of Alroy, meaning he acted in his name, preached, had very great influence on both Christians and Jews. Meaning somehow they all… again I’m not sure how this works with Christian theology, but the fact is that it really worked. He warned of disasters and floods and apparently succeeded—at least according to the stories. Again, I don’t know how much of this is myth. There are many legends of miracles and wonders they performed, which is also very characteristic of these people. But again, these legends must be understood—there were such legends about Herzl too. What, that he performed miracles and wonders? Yes, of course. There were legends about all kinds of people, because common folk create legends around any charismatic person who leads and is exalted and lofty. So it’s not certain that this in itself is problematic, because it is the way of common folk to create all kinds of legends around charismatic people. It happens a lot. Meaning—not—the question is to what extent he himself really promoted it. I was reminded of the Lubavitcher Rebbe with the balcony, when he told him to tell it to his Hasidim, not to him.

In short, he fled here and there, and in the end Reubeni tried to persuade the German emperor to convert to Judaism. He tried to convert the German emperor. You know, a totally kind of megalomaniacal man, but apparently it worked—meaning he had influence. But they persecuted him too, in short. Eventually Solomon Molkho—they separated, then tried to return to him, didn’t try—in the end the emperor put them both in prison. The Inquisition burned Solomon Molkho at the stake. They offered him to convert to Christianity and he refused. In the end Solomon Molkho died sanctifying God’s name. Therefore in practice Solomon Molkho is an admired figure for many of the sages of Israel to this day, meaning he does not receive the attitude of a false messiah, despite Molkho and Reubeni.

They were more false prophets than the two previous ones, than Lemlein and Alroy, because they did do—yes—the royal mannerisms, the forceful actions, the attempt to stir up politics on the international stage between powers—they did things a bit unrealistic. You said before that Molkho was a prophet. No, I don’t think—“his prophet,” I’m not sure that means he literally presented himself as a prophet, I don’t know. Rather it means, you know, just as Elijah heralds the coming of the messiah, he heralded the coming of Reubeni.

Rabbi Yoselman—yes, also a book by Hyman. Hyman wrote on many such figures. So Rabbi Yoselman too was one of the activists there in the court of the German emperor in that period. Meaning he actually helped him. Rabbi Yosef Karo brings extravagant words of praise about him in Maggid Meisharim, about Solomon Molkho. Understand—and the Tosafot Yom Tov, same thing. Meaning we are speaking of a person who not only during his activity, but also afterward, once he had already failed and died sanctifying God’s name, in the end still receives a certain attitude. Of course here the fact that he died sanctifying God’s name also plays a role. Meaning once he died sanctifying God’s name—it paid the price, exactly—it can somewhat atone for things. Maybe we can say, for example, that clearly Solomon Molkho receives more admiration than Reubeni, although both of them, in terms of conduct, behaved similarly. Okay? So if this is a false messiah, that’s also a false messiah. Yes, but in the end he died sanctifying God’s name. Meaning somehow…

So you see again, I’m illustrating for you how hard it is to derive from these phenomena any sharp criterion for what a false messiah is or what false messianism is. It’s some combination of many factors, from which in the end it’s not clear that one can build some orderly, unequivocal doctrine.

Okay, on Shabbetai Tzvi there is no need to elaborate. Shabbetai Tzvi was also forceful, also converted his religion in the end, also caused destruction—but he also began differently. He began as they all begin, and I talked about this also in previous times—he began through the idea that one must repent, and he began with mortifications and he was righteous. But there was something genuine there, no? There has to be something genuine, otherwise you don’t get started. Yes—no, but again I mean genuine not in the cynical sense. No, no, he probably really did go in a genuine direction. He really believed in it, and he repented, and he mortified himself and all that. Yet at some point, suddenly, wild revelries began there alongside all the mortifications. One day he did a mortification, another day all kinds of feasts. And then, yes, as they say, it went to his head. Then came all kinds of royal pretensions, and again world wars and redemptions and all that. He really completely lost his mind. And eventually he also developed a system that departs from Jewish law, and of course mystical problems were also found in him.

The whole controversy of Rabbi Yaakov Emden against Rabbi Yonatan Eybeschutz over Sabbateanism did not come through violation of Jewish law. Rabbi Yonatan Eybeschutz did not violate Jewish law. Rather, Rabbi Yaakov Emden identified in Rabbi Yonatan Eybeschutz’s mystical teaching Sabbatean characteristics. And that, by the way, could be true. Meaning there could be such characteristics there. I don’t understand enough to judge it, but it is certainly possible there were such things. Why? Because Rabbi Yonatan Eybeschutz became convinced that this really was the correct interpretation of Kabbalah. He did not violate Jewish law. Meaning he was not… Rabbi Yonatan Eybeschutz was indeed one of the great halakhic decisors; he was not… He was a God-fearing, upright Jew. But his mystical doctrine was… it had Sabbatean shades. Maybe. I don’t know. Even if that is true, for Rabbi Yaakov Emden it was enough to come out against him furiously. But in fact it may be that he accepted Shabbetai Tzvi’s mystical interpretation and that’s perfectly fine. So what happened? “Accept the truth from whoever says it.” If he believes it and that is the interpretation he proposes, then what is the problem? But the fear was so great and the rupture was so great that anyone who had any Sabbatean nuance in him—world war. Because they were terribly afraid of it.

That remained. Afterward there were the Frankists and all kinds of continuers of Shabbetai Tzvi who basically created messianic movements, because the business did not calm down. Meaning Shabbetai Tzvi did not really die in the essential sense. This is something that continued for a long time afterward, a long time. Therefore the fear was a very great fear that it would return and awaken. Is there a connection between these movements, Shabbetai Tzvi and the Frankists, and the way the Baal Shem Tov’s Hasidism was initially received? As for the suspicion there? I didn’t understand. Is there a connection between those messianic movements… Ah, why they opposed the Baal Shem Tov because maybe that was there? I can guess yes. I don’t know, don’t know. There are some historians who point out… What? I think there are some historians who point out that yes. Ah, could be. I’m not familiar, but it sounds very plausible. Because the period is not so much later—meaning a hundred and fifty years later, or less, a hundred years later. Meaning obviously there was still Sabbateanism. There still was Sabbateanism at that period, and therefore obviously when you suddenly see some new movement beginning with various things, who knows now what’s happening there. Obviously I have no doubt they suspected them of that too.

The Baal Shem Tov, who kept his distance all the way, didn’t support him as messiah? What? The Baal Shem Tov, who kept his distance all the way, didn’t support him as messiah, but only took from him all kinds of things? The Baal Shem Tov came after him; he wasn’t in his period. But there were in the characteristics of his doctrine characteristics of Sabbatean Kabbalah. And Gershom Scholem wrote about this, and others—what exactly characterized Sabbatean Kabbalah, meaning what his innovations in Kabbalah were, those of Shabbetai Tzvi. And apparently those innovations somehow entered, I assume—again, I don’t understand enough to know—but those innovations probably entered even among genuine kabbalists. They adopted that interpretation and it entered their teaching. Meaning, interpretations can come from all kinds of places.

We once talked about the problematic nature of the history of ideas. I once spoke at Bar-Ilan at a conference on Pnei Yehoshua. So I spoke about Brisker characteristics in the teaching of Pnei Yehoshua—which is an anachronistic discussion, because Brisk is of course the beginning of the twentieth century, say, and Pnei Yehoshua is the eighteenth century. So what’s the point? That there are characteristics one can see, even though he did not learn in that way as his normal style. But there are places where you really see completely Brisker statements, with “two laws,” actual Rav Chaim-style moves here and there. And before I showed a few examples of this, I prefaced it with a kind of introduction that in the history of ideas it is really very hard to put your finger on where an idea comes from. Sources of influence are indeed many. There is, of course, Zeitgeist—the spirit of the age affects things, and various things like that. There are influences in all sorts of forms. Therefore the fact that someone is influenced by something—first, it is not at all certain he is aware of it, not certain he knew it. Influences come in all sorts of forms. And second, it also doesn’t necessarily disqualify him if the source is problematic—even if the source is problematic.

Fine, so you take something from a problematic source but adopt it. For example, I think there are significant Christian influences in Hasidism. There are things there that, in my opinion, bear very significant similarities to Christianity. So what—does that disqualify Hasidism? Certainly not. Meaning, one can disqualify it for other reasons, but that in itself does not disqualify them. Meaning, you can adopt all kinds of things and absorb them into your own system, and that’s fine, because that is what you think.

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch consciously adopted four-part harmony? Again? Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch agreed to introduce into his synagogue in Frankfurt—not the organ, of course; he did not agree to introduce the organ—but he did agree to introduce four-part choral singing. A four-part choir is basically that harmony, the very same structure, harmonic, vocal? Yes, and that is basically the structure—what you sometimes hear in performances of… yes, so that is the structure, yes, right. And that is less significant, obviously; it’s not really in a mystical interpretation. But true, there are all kinds of influences that come in, and as long as it was direct they would wage a world war against it. But if it is indirect and somehow comes in here and there, fine, it enters and that’s it. The source of an idea does not necessarily testify to its quality. Meaning one has to accept the truth from whoever says it, as Rabbi Abraham son of Maimonides says. He brings in the article printed at the beginning of Ein Yaakov the Talmudic passage from tractate Pesachim. The Talmud says there was a dispute between the sages of Israel and the sages of the nations of the world whether the sphere stands still and the constellations revolve, or the sphere revolves and the constellations stand still. Then the sages of Israel reversed themselves and accepted the opinion of the sages of the nations of the world. There’s also the bit about the sun going down at night, and I don’t know, whether it heats the waters—they have all kinds of proofs there, one way or another, which are of course highly dubious. But fine, they had a proof and they accepted the view of the sages of the nations of the world.

Maimonides says: do you really think they came there to teach us astronomy? They came to teach us that one must accept the truth from whoever says it. That is the lesson the Talmud is teaching. Meaning that even if the sages of the nations of the world argue with the sages of Israel, if the sages of Israel are convinced that the sages of the nations are right, then they accept it—what’s the problem, why not? So the fact that a certain source is problematic does not mean the idea is problematic.

Exactly as all kinds of proposals come up, I don’t know, for changes in Jewish law, and immediately they win the label “Reform,” invalid, because it’s Reform. Even if I drew the idea from the Reform movement, if I propose an argument that holds water, meaning I can ground it halakhically, so what? Why? There are legitimate changes within Jewish law. The fact that—even if I drew inspiration from the Reform movement—does not disqualify the idea as such. We have a tendency to disqualify things because of their source. And I don’t think that is the right thing to do.

You can understand it, Rabbi. I can understand it psychologically, not essentially. You know, I don’t accept it essentially, I understand psychologically why it happens. So I brought the classification of Rabbi Yaakov Emden regarding those who did not break traditions and so on. I’ll keep reading another passage from his book where he refers to Shabbetai Tzvi. “The vile madmen”—that’s the next category. Yes, those who did not break traditions—we read what he called them. What did he call them? “Misleading fools, like Ben Koziva, like David Almoser, Rabbi Solomon Molkho, Rabbi Asher Lemlein and the like, who make use of incantations and practical Kabbalah, suddenly transgressed and were punished,” yes, all kinds of things like that. That is the seventh type.

But the next type is “the vile madmen.” “The vile madmen, like the apostates, like Shabbetai Tzvi, Berechiah, Cardozo, Chayun, the Frankists, and Chayun includes the continuers of Shabbetai Tzvi and their sect—may their names be blotted out—craftsmen of destruction, companions of Jeroboam, who led Israel astray with their many sorceries and ruined their dish in public.” For him it is quite clear that one of the criteria is the mystical dimension of the matter. Now there is legitimate mysticism—you know he wrote a book on the Zohar, a book over which there are always major disputes as to how he related to Kabbalah, Rabbi Yaakov Emden. How did he relate to Kabbalah? In the end he dealt with the Zohar, he brings things from the Zohar. He only said that not all of the Zohar is ancient. He was basically the sage—one of the first among the later authorities to put on the table, I don’t know if the first but one of the most prominent among the later authorities who put on the table what researchers today say more sharply. But clearly he had all kinds of limits. There are mystical practices one may do, and mystical practices one may not do. Fine. And here the use of divine names and practical Kabbalah and all kinds of things of that kind, in his eyes, is also an indication of a messianic movement.

Okay, here there is no doubt there will be those who disagree with him, those who are willing to accept such uses. One can understand—can one read Rabbi Akiva as basically… Yes, we talked about that in previous classes, when I spoke about Bar Kokhba. But ostensibly the question is whether this rests more on the person carrying out the so-called upheaval, or the attempt to achieve messianism, or on the great spiritual leader of the generation who supports him. The great leader doesn’t interest me. I’m asking myself now who the person is. The fact that Rabbi Akiva judged him that way can lead others to judge him that way too, but the question is who he really was. In the end that’s what determines it. So if Rabbi Akiva made a mistake, he was still a false messiah. Meaning it doesn’t matter. The question is whether Rabbi Akiva was mistaken or correct, not what Rabbi Akiva said.

So with him it appears that the use of mysticism and practical Kabbalah and all kinds of things of that sort is also one of the criteria of messianic movements. But of course with Shabbetai Tzvi it wasn’t only that. There are many… Shabbetai Tzvi is a false messiah par excellence. Meaning all the characteristics of all the kinds we brought, all the proposals I suggested—all three, or five, proposals I suggested—all of them are present in Shabbetai Tzvi. Here there is no doubt at all.

And this matter of multiplying mortifications—is that supposed to be accepted? What? That he basically advocated multiplying mortifications. Many Jewish sages advocated mortifications, yes. The German Pietists, certainly. They said that’s how one atones for sins: eighty-one fasts, I don’t know, eighty-four fasts, all kinds of things like that. Yes, of course—rolling in snow. The Noda B’Yehuda, greatest of the rationalists, against the “for the sake of the unification” formula and against all sorts of things—on everything he came out strongly. He has a responsum about what snow-rollings one should do as repentance for such-and-such sins. Orach Chaim, section 35, there is an interesting responsum there. There’s someone there who committed adultery with his mother-in-law, and the question is whether he has to tell his father-in-law, because if he committed adultery with her then she is forbidden to both husband and paramour. On the other hand, the father-in-law might not believe him; one witness is not believed; the father-in-law might not believe him. So the question is whether he is obligated to reveal it or not. An interesting responsum.

Among other things, in the end he also arranges repentance for him, meaning what he is supposed to do in order to… He was a penitent, that person, meaning he wanted the Noda B’Yehuda to arrange for him… He brings the Rokeach and others among the medieval authorities who really arranged such repentance processes, all kinds of things of that sort. Why don’t we say one witness is believed in matters of prohibition? Because yes, in matters of prohibition, but not in sexual prohibitions. “A matter of sexual prohibition” is learned by verbal analogy from monetary law. But regarding a menstruant woman, the woman is believed. What? The woman is believed to say… A matter of sexual prohibition. Isn’t a menstruant woman a sexual prohibition? A menstruant woman is… a menstruant woman is not “sexual prohibition” in that category; it’s a matter of prohibition. “Sexual prohibition” is… It appears in the Torah section of forbidden relations. What? Yes, it is forbidden to have relations with her, but it is not that category. Okay. A menstruant woman is forbidden to everyone. Forbidden relations, basically, are always women who are permitted to someone and forbidden to someone else. Even a married woman is forbidden to almost everyone, except to her husband, to whom she is permitted. Meaning forbidden relations are usually—or not usually, all of them—a partial prohibition. A menstruant woman is simply a state.

We once talked about this when we discussed holiness and the profane, if you remember. We talked about Tosafot in Bava Kamma 14, where he explains there why the prohibition of a menstruant woman is not connected to holiness. Right? Because it is not a prohibition specifically to her husband. Meaning the prohibition to the husband and the paramour of a woman who committed adultery is called impurity in the Torah, because she became impure. Why? Because it is a violation of holiness, because the prohibition is a prohibition to her husband. And if the prohibition is universal, then it is not connected to a violation of holiness. A menstruant woman is forbidden to everyone, not only to her husband.

In short, yes, with Shabbetai Tzvi there was Nathan of Gaza, of course, also a prophet of his. Nathan of Gaza really did present himself as a prophet. Meaning it wasn’t like Solomon Molkho, I think. And he was the prophet of Shabbetai Tzvi, who basically promoted the Sabbatean idea and the Sabbatean movement. By the way, he was a very great Torah scholar, a student of Maharich Hagiz. And it is told that he knew three orders of the Talmud by heart. Meaning the man was apparently truly a heavyweight Torah scholar. At some stage he moved to Gaza—that was apparently before the disengagement. And there he began engaging in Kabbalah and various visionary experiences and such things. Then he writes:

“Our brothers, the house of Israel, it is known to all of you that our messiah was born in the holy community of Smyrna”—that’s Izmir—“and his name is Shabbetai Tzvi, whose kingdom will soon be revealed, and he will take the royal crown from the head of the king of Ishmael and place it upon his own head.” You already understand—writing such a thing in a letter to all the Jewish people, that Shabbetai Tzvi is going to take the crown from the head of the Muslim caliph, yes? “And the king will go after him like a Canaanite slave. For sovereignty is his.” You understand these are insane fantasies. “And after that our messiah will disappear from the sight of all Israel,” because he is a prophet, so he tells us what will happen next. Yes, that is Nathan of Gaza. “And no one will know where he has gone, whether he lives or has died. And our messiah will go beyond the Sambatyon River, and Moses our teacher, peace be upon him, also had born to him a daughter named Rebecca, whom our messiah will take as wife”—the daughter of Moses our teacher, no less—“and Moses our teacher awaits the coming of our messiah, and when our messiah comes to him, then the descendants of the Rechabites or the children of Moses and the Ten Tribes will cross the Sambatyon River, of which it is known that no man ever crossed there.” In short, he has whole visions, a full prophetic book of how this whole thing is going to happen.

By the way, I once saw in some Breslov book—I was bored enough to open it during the repetition of the Amidah at mincha, somewhere in Netanya on a Sabbath, I remember—there it tells how Rabbi Nachman sits up there in a great field and watches over all the flock grazing there. And who is the flock? Abraham our patriarch, Moses our teacher, King David. Meaning that is the flock over which Rabbi Nachman of Breslov watches. Fine, okay, so this is more or less the same thing. And that’s what he writes? Maybe. Either yes or no—I told you, I’m not sure, like with the Lubavitcher Rebbe I’m not sure. I’m pretty sure not.

Okay, in any case, a very, very large messianic movement arose. Sabbateanism really swept up broad segments of the Jewish people, both in Europe and in Islamic lands, in various places. He set out toward Constantinople with the goal of removing the sultan’s crown, meaning here there are truly actions satisfying all the criteria I proposed, in their various kinds. Here there’s no need to deliberate. By the way, there were sages who came to examine whether he was the messiah. There too, sages came to examine his messiahship. Some were convinced, some were not convinced. In the end of course they understood that no, but at the beginning of the process—again—he brought all Israel back to repentance, he did mortifications, he succeeded in arousing this messianic movement, and it really gained momentum. It looked like the business was heading in a serious direction. Again, notice how hard it is to distinguish this.

There is the book Tzitzat Novel Tzvi by some German sage who wrote very sharply against Shabbetai Tzvi. He got attacked by many of the great Torah scholars over that book, because people did believe in him. Meaning, the Taz even visited him—I think visited him in prison—the Taz, and was impressed. I don’t remember if he actually determined that this was it, but he did not dismiss him. In short, in Izmir itself at that period, where he was born, there were a hundred and fifty prophets. People who presented themselves as prophets as part of the messianic movement. In one city. You have to understand the scale of the phenomenon. How many Jews were there? A hundred and fifty-two? I don’t know. No, no. It was a major Jewish city. Izmir. Rabbi Yosef Karo? In general, in that period of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries—what giants there were there! The Turks. Really—from Rabbi Chaim Palaggi and the Mishneh LaMelekh, Rabbi Yehuda Rosanes, and the Machaneh Ephraim, Alfandari, Michtav MeEliyahu, and all of Sephardic Jewry. Enormous lions. Michtav MeEliyahu—isn’t that the book of Rabbi Dessler? Of Rabbi Dessler. There is an earlier Michtav MeEliyahu, by Rabbi Alfandari, the holy elder Alfandari.

Okay, in any event, those are the points. What do we actually learn from these examples? As I said, it is hard to derive unequivocal criteria, but we see that if all the criteria are fulfilled, then it’s obvious. If some of the criteria are fulfilled, then I no longer know how to determine which criteria are necessary and which are not. And the fact is that someone who in the end is killed sanctifying God’s name is then treated differently from someone for whom that did not happen. One was forceful—that already makes him more suspect; you see that this matters. Someone who starts using practical Kabbalah too. Someone who does nothing, like Alroy and Lemlein—fine, they are treated overall leniently, even though result-wise it didn’t work.

But then, I think, the suggestions I offered earlier—I don’t know how to derive from these examples what the final criterion is. What I do know, though, is that there is a ranking. Meaning one can take the suggestions I offered earlier, all of them, and say: the more these suggestions are present, the more it is a messianic movement. I don’t know where to draw the line, I don’t know how to set a criterion, but it does establish some sort of gradation. Someone in whom everything is present is a false messiah par excellence. Someone in whom most is present, less so. And someone who is only at the beginning there, with the first or second criterion, then apparently less so. It’s more of an understanding? Yes, exactly.

If now we take an example that has nothing to do with whether someone is a false messiah or not—the matter of Pinchas son of Eleazar the priest with Zimri son of Salu—meaning, if he had not succeeded in doing it, then that would imply it was not supposed to be. What does that mean, Zimri? Yes, ostensibly. What does it mean? After all, there it says: one who has relations with an Aramean woman, zealots may strike him. Right, but that doesn’t mean they will succeed. Meaning, those things are stated by a test of result. No, they are not stated by a test of result. Either he succeeds or he doesn’t, and in both cases he is allowed to try. And it may be that he won’t succeed. The Talmud says that if Zimri had turned around and killed Pinchas, he would not be liable for him, because Pinchas has the status of a pursuer. And Zimri is allowed to defend himself.

But I mean the things are interpreted by the result. No, that’s exactly what I’m saying—they are not interpreted by the result. On the contrary, with Pinchas this is precisely an example that is not interpreted by the result. Whether he would have succeeded or not, he would have merited praise. The fact that he did succeed—fine, what can you do, he succeeded—but the act he did was a positive act. Not that only because he succeeded in the end did it become clear retroactively that this was a positive act. No, one who has relations with an Aramean woman—zealots may strike him. With zealots no one promises them they will succeed. On the contrary, I think the right of the offender to defend himself comes to ensure that the one who rises to kill him is a genuine zealot. Meaning, it’s not for nothing that he was given the right to defend himself. I think because it places some barrier before the Pinchases, before the zealots, so they know that they themselves can die here too. Meaning only if it is important enough to you, and you are ready to take risks, will we allow you to do it. It seems to me that’s a criterion that helps sort genuine zealots from the rest—the fact that the victim is allowed to defend himself.

Okay. Now this involvement in mysticism and practical Kabbalah and all these things really raises questions that come up in other contexts too. For example, kabbalists who perform various rites to bring the messiah. For example, Hasidic rebbes who did various actions of that kind. There too there was hesitation over how to relate to these things. But clearly there were also those who saw this as entirely legitimate activity. Okay? I have no doubt that the Yaavetz, regarding them, would say the same thing he said about these. Clearly, if someone performs various mystical tricks like these for the purpose of setting things in motion in the world, in his eyes that already crosses the legitimate line. But that is not agreed upon. The fact is that there were important Jews who did this and did not lose their status because of it. They truly believed that this…

Yes. Now this also brings me further on—to what is going on with the Chabad messianism of the last generation? A very interesting question. Because overall they more or less kept Jewish law. There are Chabad’s own peculiar rules, of course—they have their issues—but overall they keep Jewish law. On the contrary, they promote Jewish law, they want to bring the Jewish people back in repentance, they do an enormous amount of kindness. Meaning there are phenomena there for which one cannot take away the credit they deserve. Not to mention that the Rebbe, of course, was a great Torah scholar and was a Jew who accomplished wondrously great things. No one disputes that; whoever disputes it is simply ignoring facts.

Does it matter if he is no longer alive? No, so that’s already the result-based question. But before the result, when he was still alive. Now the question is—what to do? Rav Shach did say that this is already the sect closest to Judaism. Meaning he diagnosed it that way already while he was still alive. On what basis? Again, the same question—on what basis? Even someone who was in my class couldn’t explain it. On the basis of probabilistic weights that he probably assigned to it. Why? What probability? What? He estimated that probably… Why? According to what? But that’s what I’m asking—according to what? When the true messiah son of David comes, why won’t he estimate the same thing? Up to now all the attempts… According to that logic, then with every messiah we will react that way. Even the true messiah we’ll say: probabilistically, you’re not the messiah; we won’t cooperate with you. Okay, so in truth, whoever goes out against the phenomenon—the chances are in his favor. I didn’t understand. Obviously. But why are you opposing it? You’re telling me after he opposed the phenomenon that the odds are he was right. I’m asking why he opposed it. You can’t oppose it by virtue of that probabilistic calculation, because otherwise you’ll also oppose the true messiah. And that cannot be.

He took the risk. What risk? But you are not allowed to take that risk. Hypothetically. You are not allowed to take that risk, even if there is a 99 percent chance you’re right. Why? Because if you oppose without signs that justify it, then you will also oppose the messiah. Meaning it’s unreasonable. It’s unreasonable. But Rabbi, didn’t even Moses our teacher raise these very questions to the Holy One, blessed be He? He said, I go to them and I tell them what? So? Meaning, fine, he knew—that is what would happen—but it does not say that that’s okay. I imagine that Rav Shach, when people came to him and said this is it, said forget it, this isn’t it. Why? Because it was still Lubavitch. True, but we are speaking about the true messiah. I’m talking about when the messiah comes. I’m talking about the Lubavitcher Rebbe, just saying what will happen when the messiah comes. So I’m saying when the true messiah comes, it will probably look like what he said about the one in the meantime. Maybe. But I think more than that. Meaning probably what was developing around him was problematic in two ways.

First, they decided he was the messiah even before anything significant happened. The fact that a person is charismatic, and helps, and does a great deal of kindness—that does not yet make him the messiah. The messiah is also supposed to make some political move, supposed to advance something. That wasn’t there. Meaning those characteristics—so on what basis did you decide he was the messiah? And once you decide someone is the messiah without justification, that itself means there is some kind of false messianism here, although again, I cannot determine that he isn’t. But if you determine that he is without justification, then that itself is a problematic movement. Okay? That’s one thing.

And second, it may be that he really saw various things awakening there that truly were problematic. Meaning there were phenomena there—not marginal, not entirely marginal, again, I didn’t do statistics—of identifying him with the Holy One, blessed be He, unequivocally. But that’s really very extreme fringe people. Fine, but I’m saying it depends on the level of identification. Understand? Sometimes they pray to him, and sometimes they pray through him to the Holy One, blessed be He, which Maimonides also defines as idolatry—to pray through an intermediary. And sometimes the boundary is not clear whether you are doing this or that. Therefore I think the phenomenon was not as marginal as people think. There is something there—meaning they attribute to him certain powers that do not come from the Holy One, blessed be He. They see him at the center, not the Holy One. It is hard to distinguish it, but I think that was a very strong feeling that accompanied this process. And I think that is also one of the reasons why Rav Shach understood that apparently something here is not kosher, not logical, no—it can’t work like that. Okay? But really, it’s not a simple question.

Meaning I believe there are many God-fearing Jews, Torah scholars—what do you mean “I believe,” I know—many God-fearing Jews and Torah scholars, not Chabadniks, who did not relate to it that way. Meaning they certainly saw him as legitimate, that’s obvious, most of them I think, but it may be that some were even ready to accept the possibility that he was the messiah. Let’s wait and see; I can’t rule it out. Did he perform miracles? Obviously miracle stories exist there too. But fine, people heard—he did miracles. Yes, exactly. Herzl did miracles, and Alroy did miracles, and everybody has someone who did miracles. Worldwide reach. Worldwide reach is something else, but miracles… But miracle stories exist about every such figure. And bringing the Jewish people back in repentance—they all did that. You have to understand: every messianic movement begins that way, including the greatest false messiahs, including Shabbetai Tzvi himself. Right. They all began by saying one must repent, sanctify God’s name, and keep the commandments, because that is a required criterion. What? No, obviously. Therefore I say, the fact that the Lubavitcher Rebbe did that does not clear him of all suspicion; it proves nothing in favor of his being the messiah. True, it doesn’t indicate—after all, not everyone who brings the Jewish people back in repentance is a false messiah, that’s absurd of course—but the fact that he brings the Jewish people back in repentance still says nothing on the question whether he is the messiah or not. And they all did the same thing.

So one has to understand that today, when we see a phenomenon—it somehow seems distant to us, these false messianic phenomena—it is not that simple. There is some book by someone named Berger, Rabbi Berger, I don’t know what. Rabbi Berg? Berger, not Berg. Berg is the Kabbalah one. No, no, that’s something else, I mean that’s nonsense. I’m talking about Berger—some American one, an American rabbi, who wrote The Rebbe, the Messiah, and the Scandal of Orthodox Indifference. A very extreme book, I think somewhat tendentious, but still. From what university? I don’t know where he’s from. Some American rabbi, I don’t know exactly from where. There he brings very problematic characteristics. There are problematic characteristics, and still it is hard to determine unequivocally. Rav Shach was decisive enough; many others were less decisive. It is hard to determine. Understand, these phenomena are very complicated phenomena.

Okay, I’m basically getting to—I see I won’t get there today—but the last chapter basically brings us to Zionism, which Hamburger was also really trying to get to in his book. I’ll want to deal with that issue a bit, and from there move on to additional issues that branch off from the topic of messianism. But I wanted to say that politically speaking, in terms of his standing at the time and in the place he was, Rav Shach actually had no other choice. What do you mean? Several years earlier, before the story of Chabad messianism came out, there was the split in Agudat Israel between the two factions, Degel HaTorah, and basically he is conducting his war, his struggle, against the central Hasidic stream, which is somewhat larger than him quantitatively. Now, here he has to take a very, very clear stance, because otherwise he really has no… Look, I don’t—look, these are motives I don’t know. I don’t know indications as to whether that really was a motive or not. Maybe yes, maybe no. I don’t read minds. Maybe he wanted to present the results one can arrive at with Hasidism, namely this extreme result, so that people would understand there is basically a problem in the whole thing. Then you fight them, but really you… maybe. I don’t know. But that’s speculation. Meaning maybe yes, maybe no.

In the end, this thing brings the concept of messianism a bit closer to us, because we see that we too stood before such a movement. And it seems to me that most of us did not hold Rav Shach’s view. Meaning we could not determine categorically that we are truly dealing with a messianic movement in that sense, along the lines of all the examples I brought earlier. And therefore this is not a simple question. And I say that in both directions. Because now when I come to the Zionist movement, it will seem as though this is nonsense, just projection—it is not at all similar to everything we have done until now. And that is not at all clear. I’ll speak about it a bit and we’ll see.

Many great Lithuanian Torah scholars also do not hold Rav Shach’s opinion. They do not relate to Chabad rabbis, for example, the way they would have related to them if they held Rav Shach’s view. Therefore I think it is very possible that considerations not… I don’t agree. Again—not that I disagree, I don’t know. But the fact that there is a disagreement does not mean there is politics behind it. There may also be a real disagreement. Meaning he thought this way and they think differently.

And beyond that, the responsibility was on him. Meaning he was number one, so he had to take a step because the responsibility was on him. Others can say yes or no, can hesitate. He felt he was not allowed to hesitate, because otherwise people here would get confused. There really are many sides to this. Politics more than I, after the book Ikveta DeMeshicha on…