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Article: Shabbetai Tzevi (also Sabbatai Sevi, Zevi, or Zebi, 1626–1676)
- Article from:
- Europe, 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World
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SHABBETAI TZEVI (also Sabbatai Sevi, Zevi, or Zebi, 1626
–
1676)
SHABBETAI TZEVI
(also Sabbatai Sevi, Zevi, or Zebi, 1626
–
1676), Jewish rabbi of the Ottoman Empire whose messianic claims and abrupt conversion to Islam in 1665
–
1666 convulsed Jewish communities in Europe and the Near East. The widespread appeal of his messiahship establishes the movement as the most significant millenarian outpouring in modern Jewish history. The crypto-Jewish sect known in Turkish as
D
ö
nme,
'convert (to Islam)', refers to a minority of devotees who clung to belief in Tzevi as messiah and followed his lead in converting. Although "Shabbetean" principally denotes believers in ...