Satan in Goray

search into the roots of the thing--but who can gird his loins against a people that consumes alive all who dare cast the slightest doubt on their depraved belief--this multitude that would not sift pearls from sand? Who knows, perhaps Sabbatai Zevi intends to become the idol of an idolatry, like Mahomet and all the others who have forged the word of God and contaminated the world? If we, the wise men of Poland, the shepherds of our generation, had ourselves but known what he has done and his doings, we might have been able to go forth to meet him, armed with the shafts of the Torah, and we might have waged war upon him, the war of God, until he were utterly destroyed. But, to our sorrow, we know not the man and cannot, until we do, confront him with proof positive; we must in the meantime wait to see what the day will reveal. And though many and great men do err about him, I swear by the living God that Sabbatai Zevi is not our Messiah, for whom our eyes have yearned these nigh two thousand years. For falsehood and deceit drip from his lips. An inciter and a seducer is he, one that hath said: 'I shall devour Jacob and lay waste his habitation,' and of certain he shall meet his downfall. For who then has ever risen against the Eternal One of Israel and prospered? Bitter will be his end, and all the execrations of God in the twenty-sixth chapter of Leviticus and the twenty-eighth chapter of Deuteronomy, and all' the curses which Joshua visited on Jericho will certainly fall on his head, Amen, so be His will.
    "Nor would I have written all these things, for the time is not yet ripe and we must in the meantime lean upon forgers of letters and spinners of moonbeams (as mentioned above). But by chance the news reached me that there has come to your holy com-munity a man, one Itche Mates by name (as his name is, so is he--Folly his name is, and folly is with him). And this forger and seducer doth give himself out to be a great man, as is the way of all who practice to deceive. He hath made a pit and digged it for young and old, to take them captive through his hypocritical piety and alien ways, the like of which no eye hath ever seen before. From what he says, one is to believe that he fasts from Sabbath to Sabbath, immerses himself many times in the ritual bath (with a rat in his hand!), mortifies his body with all manner of mortifications--all this he says and does to lead proper people into error and to seduce them from the path of righteousness, and to cast them into the lowest pit of heresy. Of such men King Solomon, the wisest of all men, hath justly said: 'None that go unto her return, neither do they attain unto the paths of life.' For this man works not through the power of God, but rather through that of the Evil One. He doth work magic. He doth consult with ghosts and his staff declareth unto him, and he hath made a covenant with demons. This has been revealed by the great ones, the kings of the world--and who, say, are the true kings of the world? They are our masters, the rabbis. Every place where the sole of his foot treads, he gives out cures and amulets to heal the sick and drive out evil spirits, like those masters who were able to venture into the vineyards of cabala and emerge unharmed. But those who know cabala truly, those who under-stand its allusions and mysteries, have searched his amulets closely and have found that he makes use of the names of demons and demonesses, of hobgoblins and brazen hounds (God help and shield us!). And not only have his amulets been of no avail, they have instead brought innocent children, that had not before tasted of sin, as well as pure-hearted men, to die from extraordinary causes, after lingering illnesses. The hair of my flesh doth stand up, for the devils take dominion over those who make use of them, wreaking their vengeance on them both in this world and in the world-to-come. For they attach themselves to the soul and do it all manner of filth. The rabbis, God- fearing and perfect souls, have often warned Itche Mates to cease his practices--for one must warn the culprit before punishing him. But he mocks in his heart the utterances of the righteous. He howls like a hound with his mouth, and finds a hundred and fifty arguments with which to declare the unclean clean; but in secret he clings to Satan and to Lilith, and offers up sacrifices to them. To demons he doth sacrifice, not to the living God. His pocket is full of forged letters from the greatest men of the