The Sabbatean Prophets

38 The Sabbatean Prophets
For Muslims, the role of Christians in the messianic process is a bit more
complex. Jesus is mentioned in the hadiths as Mahdi, as the killer of the
dajjal and thus precursor of the Mahdi, and as a more negative image. This
did not necessarily imply that the Christians would recognize the truth of Islam,
for they were as much the arch-enemy in the eyes of Muslims as Muslims
were in the eyes of Christians. It is, in any case, quite noteworthy that
the most holy figure of Christendom plays a major part in the Islamic apocalypse.
Jews, for their part, are often identified with the dajjal or his followers,
but overall Judaism did not seem to inspire the messianic interest of
Muslims the way Christianity did.
By the early modern period Jews had a long tradition of messianic
thought that incorporated Christians and Muslims. Christianity is identified
in rabbinic literature with Edom, one of the desert nations with whom
the Children of Israel constantly fought. Islam is identified with Ishmael,
brother of Isaac, another traditional enemy, but one born of the same Abrahamic
stock. The Midrash says the city of Rome was founded on the day Jerusalem
fell, implying a cosmic opposition of forces. There is no antichrist
in Jewish lore, but the pope, representing Christianity, figures in numerous
messianic scenarios as the one who will give up Christendom to the
messiah. The Jewish messianic pretenders Abraham Abulafia, David ha-
Reubeni, and Solomon Molkho, as well as Nathan of Gaza himself, all went
to Rome on messianic missions. Although some Jews enjoyed a relatively
good existence in Western Europe, those farther east were heavily oppressed
and welcomed the prophesied downfall of European Christendom,
particularly after the harrowing Chmielnicki massacres in Poland during the
mid-seventeenth century. The attitudes toward the Ottoman Empire were
even more complex. Sultan Bayezit II was viewed by many Jews as a savior
of Spanish Jewry, having welcomed the Jews (or at least admitted them)
when the Christians were trying to destroy and extirpate them. Jews felt
they enjoyed relative peace under Islam, so the role of the Muslims in early
modern Jewish apocalyptic, represented by the Ottoman sultan, varied. 173
The sultan might simply turn his turban of rulership over to the messiah
when he came, or there might be a war. The way these questions played out
in the Sabbatean movement is quite instructive.
Another aspect of Islamic life with a profound impact on Sabbateanism
came out of the larger doctrinal context of Shiite Muslim thought. 174 Many
Sabbateans lived among Shiites, and there is no question about how mutual
influences might have occurred. These ideas could have entered Jewish