Abraham Miguel Cardozo: Selected Writings (review)

T H E J E W I S H QUA R T E R LY RE V I E W, Vol. 94, No. 2 (Spring 2004) 410–413 DAVID J. HALPERIN, trans. and ed. Abraham Miguel Cardozo: Selected Writings . New York: Paulist Press, 2001. Pp. xxxi Ⳮ 411. The Sabbatian messianic movement of the seventeenth century has attracted the interest of many scholars, particularly since Gershom Scholem began his research.1 Since then his followers and disciples have contributed important works filling in gaps in this dramatic chapter of Jewish theology and thought. In fact, after some generations of polemics against the Sabbatian theology, it was Carlo Bernheimer who opened the modern phase of Sabbatian scholarship with his article on Abraham Cardoso. (I prefer this spelling of his name as Yerushalmi did in his book on Isaac Cardoso to Scholem’s and Halperin’s use of the form Cardozo. Cardoso spelled his name in Hebrew with the letter sin, not zayin!)2 Scholem, however, drew attention to the strong relationship of Sabbatianism to Lurianic kabbalah, the reverse gnostic roots of its doctrine of divinity,3 the relatively passive role of Sabbatai Zevi and the relatively active one of Nathan of Gaza in leading the Sabbatian movement, and its impact on the Hasidic and Haskalah movements in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. However, some scholars have expressed differing attitudes toward these issues. Isaiah Tishbi evaluated differently the relative roles of the leading persons of Sabbatianism.4 Moshe Idel rejected Scholem’s claim that Sabbatianism stemmed from Lurianic kabbalah,5 and this reviewer found that Neoplatonic philosophy influenced Cardoso’s doctrine of divinity. In fact, the various grades of the divine—all adored by Cardoso —are to be found in the Zoharic literature as well.6 The recent works 1. Scholem wrote many articles on Sabbatianism. Most of them appeared in G. Scholem, Studies and Texts Concerning the History of Sabbatianism and its Metamorphoses (Hebrew; Jerusalem, 1974), and recently in G. Scholem, Researches in Sabbateanism (Hebrew; Tel Aviv, 1991). His opus magnum in this field is to be considered G. Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi: The Mystical Messiah (Princeton, 1973). 2. C. Bernheimer, ‘‘Some New Contributions to Abraham Cardoso’s Biography ,’’ Jewish Quarterly Review, n.s. 18 (1927–28): 97–129. 3. Whereas the gnostics in the ancient era adored the Deus abscondicus and disparaged the God of Israel, the creator, Scholem taught, wrongly, that the Sabbatians adored the God of Israel (Tiferet) and disparaged the First Cause. 4. I. Tishby, Paths of Faith and Heresy: Essays in Kabbalah and Sabbatianism (Hebrew ; Jerusalem, 1982), 235–76. 5. M. Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, (New Haven, 1988), 258–60. 6. N. Yosha, ‘‘The Philosophical Background of Sabbatian Theology— Guidelines towards an Understanding of Abraham Michael Cardoso’s Theory of the Divine,’’ Exile and Diaspora: Studies Presented to Haim Beinart on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday, ed. A. Mirsky et al (Hebrew; Jerusalem, 1988), 541–72. HALPERIN, ABRAHAM MIGUEL CARDOZO—YOSHA 411 of Elliot Wolfson regarding Cardoso’s doctrine of divinity, particularly the role of the Shekhina, are of considerable value in this context.7 Nevertheless , the comprehensive work regarding Cardoso’s theology that Scholem intended to produce remains a desideratum. Now we are enriched with a new study in this field. Halperin’s recent work about Cardoso is a very significant contribution toward deciphering this enigmatic and complicated person. Abraham Miguel Cardoso (1627– 1706) was one of the three main figures of the Sabbatian leadership in the seventeenth century in addition to Sabbatai Zevi and Nathan of Gaza. Cardoso, who survived them, had never met the other two and yet had been conducting bitter polemics against Nathan and other Sabbatians as he did against Christianity—easily understood on the background of his converso youth—and the Deistic contemporary philosophers who denied of course the hegemonic role of the God of Israel. His theology differed from that of Nathan mainly on the following issues.8 While Cardoso vehemently opposed the trend of many Sabbatians to follow Sabbatai Zevi and convert to Islam as a necessary step to hasten the redemption process , Nathan, who also refrained from any such move, did not actively fight its occurrence. Cardoso opposed...