Dispersion and the Longing for Zion, 1240-1840 (continued)
reprinted with the permission of The Shalem Center ©

Arie Morgenstern

II

The key to understanding the recurrence of pre-Zionist aliyot is to be found in the intense messianic ferment that began to grip the Jewish people in the first half of the thirteenth century. This was expressed not only in spiritual revivals in many communities, but also, on a deeper level, in changes in the theological and mystical doctrines upon which Jewish messianism was based. These were to have a decisive influence on messianic awakenings throughout the sixth millennium of the Jewish calendar (beginning in 1240 c.e.), charging this period with hopes of imminent redemption, and prompting regular movements of immigration aimed at bringing it about.

These powerful drives were largely a product of the traditional Jewish view of human history, which is based on an analogy from the story of creation as presented in the book of Genesis. In this view, each "day" of creation is seen as corresponding to one thousand years of human history, a parallel which the rabbis of the Talmud derived from a verse in Psalms: "For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past."(7) Since God created the world in six days, they concluded, human history will span six thousand years. This period was divided into three ages, each lasting two thousand years.(8) During the first two thousand years, described in the first eleven chapters of Genesis, man had no knowledge of God, and corruption and licentiousness reigned. During the second period, the "age of Tora" that is likewise described in the Bible, the Israelites received the divine revelation and took upon themselves the belief in God and the yoke of his laws. This period came to an end when the chosen people, who had not been true to their faith and had not carried out God’s commandments, suffered the destruction of their Temple and were exiled from their land.(9)

Since shortly after the beginning of the exile, human history has been in its third age, whose characteristics are discussed extensively in the Talmud, midrash, and kabalistic literature. According to this tradition, this is the "age of the Messiah," during which all that was damaged during the second age will be "repaired" in preparation for the final redemption of the world. It is during this period that God will fulfill his promise of ending the exile, allowing the Jewish people to return to the land of their fathers and rebuild the independent Jewish kingdom "as in days of old."(10)

However, at the time when this "third age" was actually dawning (it formally began in the year 240 c.e.),(11) it was difficult to identify the signs of the "age of the Messiah" in the real world—a difficulty that did not go unnoticed by the talmudic sages. They were also well aware of the vagueness of the date when redemption was supposed to take place, as the Bible had provided only hints. The rabbis’ difficulty with these problems was exemplified in their effort to interpret the prophet Isaiah’s ambiguous statement regarding the time of redemption: "I am the Eternal; in its time I will hasten it."(12) In considering this verse, the rabbis asked whether the redemption would come at a fixed time, or would depend on the repentance of the Jewish people.(13) "R. Alexander, son of R. Yehoshua ben Levi, said: It is written, ‘in its time,’ but it is also written, ‘I will hasten it.’ [How so?] If they are worthy, ‘I will hasten it.’ If not, [the redemption will come] ‘in its time.’" According to this interpretation, the date of the redemption is fixed and predetermined; yet if Israel repents, God will hasten its realization.(14) In other words, even in the third age, the Messiah would not come automatically; rather, the time of his coming would depend on the behavior of the Jewish people. The same talmudic discussion quotes the opinion of R. Dosa, that the delay may extend well into the sixth millennium, up to four hundred years before the end of history (that is, until the year 1840).(15) R. Eliezer’s view is even more pessimistic, suggesting that it may last until forty years before the end (2200).(16)

With the passage of centuries, the idea of a two-thousand-year-long "age of the Messiah" disappeared from the Jewish sources. Instead, the medieval rabbis tended to divide the third age into two smaller periods: A thousand years of "exile" in the fifth millennium (240-1240) and a thousand years of "redemption" in the sixth millennium (1240-2240).(17) As the fifth millennium drew to a close, expectations grew throughout the Jewish world, sharpened by the difficulties of exile in the medieval period. The longing for redemption became a powerful motivating force—overcoming, for example, the belief in the talmudic parable stating that God had imposed "three oaths," of which one was a commitment not to retake the land of Israel by force.(18) One of the first thinkers who rejected the strictures of the "three oaths" was R. Judah Halevi (1075-1141), who asserted that mass immigration to the land of Israel was the necessary first step towards redemption. This attitude is found both in his poems of exile and redemption and in his major philosophical treatise, The Kuzari. In the latter, for example, he offers his interpretation of a passage from Psalms: "You will surely arise and take pity on Zion, for it is time to be gracious to her; the appointed time has come. Your servants take delight in its stones, and cherish its dust."(19) According to Halevi, the first verse relates to the ultimate goal, while the second adds a precondition: "This means that Jerusalem can only be rebuilt when Israel yearns for it to such an extent that they embrace her stones and dust."(20) Halevi’s words present a kind of messianic activism, one which resurfaced in Jewish thought throughout the sixth millennium, according to which Jews must be prepared to take action to rebuild Zion. Passive yearning for redemption must give way to action, and in particular aliya.

The sense that the coming sixth millennium would bring with it the messianic era prompted many kabalists to intensify their efforts at "calculating the end." The mystical literature composed during this period is filled with eschatological calculations of one sort or another, many of which are based on astrology, the alphanumerical system of gematria, or acrostic interpretations of apocalyptic verses in the Bible such as those in the book of Daniel.(21) Even a rationalist like Maimonides, whose approach towards the redemption was largely naturalistic, took part in these efforts. In his Epistle to Yemen, written in 1169, he cites approvingly what was probably his own messianic calculation with regard to the end of the fifth millennium, which, in his opinion, would witness the return of prophecy to Israel: "But I have a wondrous tradition...," he wrote, "that prophecy will return to Israel in the year 4972 [1212]. And there is no doubt that the restoration of prophecy in Israel is one of the signs of the Messiah... and this is the truest of the ‘ends’ that have been told to us."(22)

Such "certified" predictions seemed to legitimize abrogation of the "three oaths," and to give sanction to practices aimed at bringing the Messiah, which were collectively referred to as "forcing the end." While these efforts became a constant feature of Jewish life, dramatic events such as wars, revolutions, expulsions, religious persecutions, and natural disasters intensified them. Jews tended to view such upheavals through an eschatological lens, as manifestations of divine providence that would bring about the cosmic "repair," a change in the nature of the world, and ultimately the redemption of Israel.

Most of these apocalyptic speculations had little impact on Jewish history, and their memory is preserved only in recondite manuscripts. However, those calculations which pointed to the turn of each century of the sixth millennium had a more lasting effect.(23) The Zohar, a book that was widely believed to have been written with divine inspiration, mentions several of these dates explicitly. Six dates in particular receive the most widespread attention in the mystical and homiletic literature of the medieval period—and it was these dates which resulted in intense messianic activity as they approached, including waves of aliya:

The political, social, and economic conditions in and around Palestine had an important role in determining the scope and success of each aliya; however, in almost every century its occurrence correlates directly with a messianic awakening. In these movements, as we shall see in the coming sections, the central motivation was both spiritual and nationalistic in nature: The longing of the Jewish people to return to the land of their fathers, and in so doing to hasten the coming of the Messiah.

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Notes

7. Psalms 90:4.

8. "It was taught in the school of Eliyahu: The world will exist for six thousand years: Two thousand years of chaos; two thousand years of Tora; two thousand years of the age of the Messiah." Sanhedrin 97a.

9. The destruction of the Temple took place around the year 68 c.e., which was close to the end of the fourth millennium of Creation, in the year 3828.

10. See Joseph Dan, Apocalypse Then and Now (Tel Aviv: Yedi’ot Aharonot, 2000), pp. 49-68. [Hebrew]

11. The Jewish year begins in the fall; therefore every Jewish year overlaps two years of the Christian calendar, and vice versa. For simplicity’s sake, however, Christian years in this article are identified with the Jewish year with which they overlap for nine out of twelve months, that is, from January through September.

12. Isaiah 60:22.

13. Reference is made in the book of Daniel to three enigmatic dates for the end of days, which are not conditional upon repentance. Even Daniel himself, according to his own words, did not understand what they were. The three periods are expressed in obscure language: "Time, times, and half a time," "1,090 days," and "1,335 days." Daniel 12:1-13. The assumption throughout is that the end of days will come at a fixed time, without room for human influence.

14. Sanhedrin 97a. We will not enter here into the details of the debate cited in the Talmud, but it is worth noting that according to the rabbis, when the patriarch Jacob wished to reveal to his sons the time of the end of days, this referred to the end that would come about "in its time."

15. Sanhedrin 97a. This approach also appears in Zohar, Bereshit 117.

16. Sanhedrin 97a.

17. Genesis Rabbati, a midrashic collection compiled at the beginning of the sixth century, states: "The entire subjugation is during the fifth millennium, and during its course, morning will come for Israel, when they shall be redeemed." Hanoch Albeck, ed., Genesis Rabbati (Jerusalem: Mekitzei Nirdamim, 1940), p. 16. [Hebrew] R. Judah Barceloni likewise states that "we are to be speedily redeemed at the end of the fifth millennium; thus has it been conveyed at all times to Israel." See his commentary in J.Z. Halberstamm, ed., Sefer Yetzira (Berlin, 1895), p. 239. [Hebrew] Among the earlier practitioners of messianic calculations, some placed the time of the redemption well before the sixth millennium; they argued that since the destruction of the land and of the Temple occurred in the year 3828 [68 c.e.], the current era would end one thousand years later, in 4828 [1068 c.e.], at which time the age of redemption would commence. But generally speaking, practitioners of messianic calculation identified the sixth millennium as the time of the redemption.

18. The source of these prohibitions is found in the Song of Songs, where the formula "I adjure you, O maidens of Jerusalem…" is repeated with minor variations. Cf. Ketubot 111a.

19. Psalms 102:14-15.

20. Judah Halevi, The Kuzari: An Argument for the Faith of Israel, trans. Hartwig Hirschfeld (New York: Schocken, 1964), 5:27, p. 295.

21. The book of Daniel posits the dates for the end of days in relation to some unidentified starting point. In every generation there were attempts to decipher the apocalyptic dates with reference to various events in Jewish history, such as the Exodus, the entrance into the land of Israel, the building of the First and Second Temples, and the Babylonian exile.

22. Maimonides, Epistles of Maimonides, ed. Yitzhak Shilat (Jerusalem: Ma’aliyot, 1987), vol. i, p. 153. [Hebrew] The Epistle to Yemen was composed about 1172.

23. Arie Morgenstern, Mysticism and Messianism (Jerusalem: Ma’or, 1999), p. 305. [Hebrew]

Copyright © 2002 The Shalem Center. All rights reserved. Opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Shalem Center or Azure.

Azure • WINTER 5762 / 2002