Zikaron li-vene Yisra’el (Memorial of the Children of Israel)

21. The Messiah as Muslim

We return now to the narrative of our Lord’s doings.

After he had put the pure turban on his head, he made love to his Ashkenazi wife. She conceived; she bore him a son. On the eighth day he circumcised the infant with his own hands, with wine and blessings recited in a loud voice. He did this in full view of the Turks. He gave the baby the name “Ishmael Mordecai.”

His wife later bore him a daughter, whom he named ———.

From Izmir he summoned his elder brother Rabbi Elijah Zevi, who, as we have earlier related, once tried to kill him. [Elijah] appeared before him in Adrianople, his eldest son with him. He ordered them to set the pure turban on their heads, in the manner of the Turks, and they obeyed at once. So he did with many of the rabbis who were with him.

Nearly every day he would go to the mosque—their prayer-house—where he would pray before the Lord his God and perform great acts of mending. While he was there he was approached by envoys from very distant parts, a sixteen-month journey from Constantinople. They came from the territory of the Uzbeks, near the kingdom of China and Great Tartary. They told the following story.

In Elul 5425 [12 August–9 September 1665], people arrived in Maragheh from Pamos, claiming there were prophets and prophetesses among them. One prophetess, Rebecca by name, had offered many predictions to prove her claims, all of which had come true. She told how she had seen Elijah and Rabbi Nissim in the company of the messiah son of David. Both men said to her: “This is the messiah, son of David.” She told, further, that on the Sabbath before Passover [28 March 1665] she had been shown the messiah son of David wearing black clothing. The messiah, she said, must remain isolated from all his friends, and he must dress himself in Muslim garb.

They sent five emissaries throughout the world, and more prophets and prophetesses began to appear in various places. All conveyed the prophetic message: There is a messiah in the world.

From Ethiopia came four other envoys, seeking an audience with our Lord. When they realized how our Lord was dressing himself, they donned that same [Muslim] clothing and went to him in the mosque. They wanted to kiss his hands, as one does with great princes, but he would not let them. In their land as well, they said, there were prophets and prophetesses. The envoys bore letters from the Jewish community of Baghdad, recommending them and attesting to the truth of their report.

Yet our Lord did not want to make any response to them, for he was at the time in a state of eclipse. Nevertheless, in order to please the envoys, he gave them a sealed letter to the effect that they had found the man of whom the prophets in their homeland had prophesied, and that they had found him in his present condition.

Certain vicious and dishonest people slandered two rabbis in our Lord’s presence, claiming that they entertained doubts about his faith. [The rabbis] wrote to him in their own defence, and our Lord responded as follows, in the manner of a father to his dear child: