SHABBETAI TSEVI [FIRST EDITION] (1626–1676), Jewish messianic pretender (in the definition of those who did not believe in him) and founder of the messianic movement known as Shabbateanism. The Shabbatean movement is in many ways unique, yet it is also representative of the forces at work in Jewish history and of the interaction of external and internal factors.

Background

With the expulsion of the Jews at the end of the fifteenth century from Spain and Portugal, a new phase began in Jewish history. The magnitude of the disaster and sufferings seemed to indicate the "birth pangs" of the messianic age as foretold by tradition. Messianic expectations and speculations were rife, and false messiahs arose and disappeared, but still salvation tarried, and new and greater afflictions followed instead, reaching a climax in the Cossack massacres led by Bogdan Khmel'nitskii. Tens of thousands of Jews...