Shai Alleson-Gerberg
Department of Jewish History
Supervisor: Dr. Paweł Maciejko
Abstract: For inveterate eighteenth century opponent of Sabbateanism Rabbi Jacob Emden, skeptical, rationalist worldviews on the one hand and Sabbateanism on the other, constituted the opposite faces of theological heresy that threatened to undermine religious foundations and topple traditional Jewish society. Emden was right. While the God of the philosophers was fettered to the rationalist mechanism of the universe, hidden from the world and indifferent to its fate, ‘the God of Sabbatai Zvi’ was very personal, capricious and unpredictable. He cancelled his Law at a sweep and commanded his messiah to convert. In any case, the old world was crumbling away. Jacob Frank (1726-1791) who is considered to be the most radical Sabbatean representative in the eighteenth century, tried to bring ‘a new thing to the world’ by crushing all the laws and religions including the Sabbatean tradition from which he emerged and Christianity into which he disappeared with his followers. The Book of the Words of the Lord (Zbiór Słów Pańskich), a collection of Frank’s sayings, is a unique reflection of the rupture in Jewish society at turn of the modern era, and a fascinating attempt at religious renewal.
Words of the Lord is the main Frankist source and of the utmost importance for the movement’s history after the Frankists converted to Christianity in 1759, and detailed documentation of their doctrine at its climax. A manuscript in three recensions, it is no ordinary work. Lacking a distinct plot and with no consistent rationale, it is a mixture of fables, dreams, tirades and memories from different times. It is also a stew of different traditions: Be they, rabbinical and Zoharic exegesis or elements of Catholic rite, Polish Kabbalah or Turkish Sabbateanism, Sufi narratives or Slavic folklore. The syncretistic nature of Words of the Lord and the ethos of novelty that echoes constantly throughout, is also expressed in its language. The source is written in Polish inlaid with Hebrew, Yiddish, German, Ladino and Turkish. Its 'iconoclastic' content, use of ‘liminal’ linguistic means, such as multi-lingual puns, and finally, its rejection of the holy tongue in favour of the ‘seventy tongues’ of the nations – all this comprises the new language that Frankists sought to adopt on their twisted path towards the secret gnosis of Edom and the true God. In Frank’s words: ‘When you come to the sun, you must talk like the sun and dress in the same robes as the sun, and when you come to the moon, wear the same robes as the moon and talk in moon language.
While research on Words of the Lord has mainly focused on the Kabbalistic and Sabbatian roots of Frankist doctrine, my research will analyse its philological, literary and theological aspects, while taking the wider historical context of the early modern period into account. Baroque phenomena such as the tension between external façade and hermetic internal content, positioning personal religion based on non-traditional reading of the scriptures, abandonment of God and God’s abandonment of the world, the obsession with dreams, etc. – all these are important features of Words of the Lord which need to be considered. In this way, for the first time, a detailed and inclusive picture of the source will emerge. I aim to shed new light on the creation of the anthology, its contacts with various literary and religious traditions, its hermeneutics and finally, also on the inner world of Jacob Frank and his disciples at the turn of the modern era.
Presidential Stipend 2014/15
