Alan Verskin

Diary of a Black Jewish Messiah

The Sixteenth-Century Journey of David Reubeni Through Africa, The Middle East, and Europe

Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2023: ISBN: 978-1-503-63443-5

Reviewed by Mark Verman¹

David Reubeni/Reuveni was one of the most exotic and intriguing characters in Jewish history. He left a record of some of his travels through the Middle East and Europe in the early 1500’s, including interactions with Pope Clement VII. For the first time, this important historical document has been skillfully translated and introduced by Alan Verskin in his Diary of a Black Jewish Messiah.

Although Verskin presents this text as a diary, it is more accurately a memoir, as only occasionally does Reubeni offer a precise date as to when an event occurred. Moreover, the impression he gives the reader is that most of his entries were written retrospectively and lack the immediacy of a true diary. Perhaps Moti Benmelekh is correct in his assessment that what has been preserved was a later reworking by Reubeni of contemporaneous notes.² Reubeni’s work is commonly referred to in Hebrew sources as Sippur David ha-Reuveni, i.e. The Story of David, the Reubenite.

As Verskin notes in his consistently informative, twenty-nine page Introduction, he based his translation upon the scholarly edition of the text that was initially published by Aaron Aescoly in 1940 and reprinted in 1993.³ As Aaron Aescoly noted, he prepared his edition from two transcriptions of a unique manuscript that had been housed in the Bodleian library at Oxford Univesity, but has long since been missing.⁴ It is unclear if certain lacunae in the transcriptions were owing to scribal omissions or from the manuscript itself.

Verskin, by formulating the title of his translation as Diary of a Black Jewish Messiah, is certainly tantalizing the reader. It is therefore ironic that he opened his Introduction with a purported quote from Reubeni: “I am not the Messiah,” said David Reubeni, “I am a greater sinner before God than any one of you” (1). Within the text we find that this statement is part of a conversation between Reubeni and an Islamic judge and is slightly different. In response to the judge’s assertion that some Jews and even Muslims think that Reubeni is either a prophet or the Messiah, Reubeni responded: “God forbid!” I exclaimed, “I am a greater sinner before God than any one of them” (103).

While Reubeni never explicitly referred to himself as the Messiah, it is clear that he was on a mission, which had eschatological implications. He frequently described himself as coming from “the desert of Habor, where three hundred thousand Jews flourish under the rule of my brother, King Joseph…and I am the commander of the army” (101-102). He went on to contend that his father was King Solomon and “our fathers have been from royalty in the desert of Habor since the Temple was destroyed. We rule over the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh” (102). There are several significant problems with this assertion. As Verskin indicates in note 1, the biblical Habor was located in the ancient Assyrian empire, i.e. northern Mesopotamia, while Reubeni situated his home in the Arabian peninsula (177). Additionally, the dispersion of the ten tribes of the Northern Kingdom of Israel occurred one hundred and fifty years prior to destruction of the Temple.

Verskin uses numerous Italian Jewish sources, initially compiled by Aescoly, in which Reubeni was described as being shahor/black in appearance (5). Prior to arriving in Italy and immersing himself in the Jewish community, Reubeni presented himself as an Islamic dignitary and a direct descendant of Muhammed. According to R. Daniel da Pisa, the unofficial head of the Jewish community in Rome and Reubeni’s most important supporter, when indoors Reubeni dressed in black “and when he went out he wore variegated silk, like the custom of the Ishmaelites. And on his head was a white shawl with which he wrapped himself and his head, such that all who saw him derided him and thought he was a woman.”⁵

Prior to arriving in Italy, he sojourned in Holy Land. His first stop was Gaza, where he interacted with a Jewish merchant. The latter informed him that the Muslim Gazans displayed extreme antipathy towards its Jewish residents. “They like dogs better than they like Israelites” (48). Reubeni spoke Arabic as well as Hebrew, and his claims to Muslims that he was an Islamic dignitary were generally accepted. Reubeni next visited Hebron and the Tomb of the Patriarchs. He was greeted effusively by the Islamic guards of the site. “The guardians of the cave approached me and kissed my hands and feet, declaring, ‘Come oh blessed one of God, our master and descendant of our master’” (48). What follows in his account is that he was taken to various popular sites, whereupon he insisted that there were other secret places that the guardians gradually acquiesced to show him. At the entrance next to a well he engaged in an intense prayer vigil that lasted from the eve of the Sabbath until Sunday morning (50). This was in anticipation of a sign that the elders of Habor had promised him. Just before dawn the guardians informed him that the cistern at the mosque was flowing with water for the first time in four years. “I went with them to see the water and it was beautiful and pure, flowing to the cistern from a far-off land” (50). Perhaps Reubeni was implying that the “far-off land” was in fact his distant homeland.

Reuben then travelled to Jerusalem and the Temple mount. Once again “all the Ishmaelite guardians came to kiss my feet. “Come oh blessed one of God,” they called out, “our master and descendant of our Prophet” (51). They then showed him the special cave under the Foundation Stone, beneath the Dome of the Rock. The next day, upon his return to the Temple Mount owing to his special status, he arranged to stay overnight there. “I fasted in the Holy of Holies for five weeks. I ate no bread or water except on the Sabbath. I prayed both below and above the Foundation Stone” (52). Although this is the most extreme assertion that Reubeni made concerning his ascetic practices, he claimed that he regularly engaged in fasting for six days and nights (94).

While on the Temple Mount he received another heavenly sign encouraging him on his mission. On top of the Dome of the Rock there was a crescent moon originally facing westward. Reubeni observed that on the first day of Shavuot, May 30, 1523 “it turned east,” which greatly distressed the local Muslims who perceived this as a bad omen (52). Even though they reoriented it westward, it turned east again. Reubeni saw this as another fulfillment of instructions that he had originally received from his elders in Habor. Verskin notes that it is quite likely that Reubeni was in fact influenced by the leading Jerusalem kabbalist of the time, R. Abraham b. Eliezer ha-Levi, known for his apocalyptic writings (24).⁶ Reubeni, however, did not mention this kabbalist.

Reubeni’s mission was to convince both the Pope and the King of Portugal to support his idea to send arms to Jeddah on the Arabian Peninsula (10). This would then precipitate a war to conquer the Holy Land. “After that, the army commanders will go to the East and to the West to gather the dispersed people of Israel (Ps. 147:2) (103). Da Pisa arranged for a meeting with the Pope who agreed to write letters of recommendation to both the King of Portugal, as well as Prester John (75). The latter was a mythical Christian king in either Asia or Africa, “who would play a decisive role in an apocalyptic battle in which Islam would be vanquished” (6). The Pope also gave Reubeni “a sign and a shield” to present to his brother King Joseph, as well as one hundred gold ducats for Reubeni’s expenses (75). Verskin comments that “The pope was the first of several world leaders who were willing to grant Reubeni status as a diplomat” (11). According to da Pisa’s account of the meeting, Reubeni informed the Pope that “his name was David from the tribe of Judah and he displayed a genealogical book, which he read before the Pope and three cardinals who were there, and it, i.e. Reubeni’s geneaology, was organized until David, King of Israel.”⁷ This would certainly have Messianic implications for those who were aware of this Davidic lineage.

Much of Reubeni’s account focused on the petty squabbles and betrayals within his entourage. His chief nemesis, however, was Don Miguel da Silva, the bishop of Viseu and the King of Portugal’s ambassador to the Pope. Don Miquel did not share the Pope’s positive reaction to Reubeni and delayed Reubeni’s trip to Portugal. More importantly, Don Miguel was present at Reubeni’s initial meeting with the Portuguese king. Reubeni commented, “Dom Miguel, my enemy from Rome whom I wanted to kill with a sword” (91). Dom Miguel tried to undermine Reubeni by informing the king, “Did I not tell you that he came to destroy your kingdom and to make the conversos Jews again?” (91).

Reubeni was certainly aware at how fraught was his relationship to the Portuguese conversos, those Jews that chose to remain in Portugal after the expulsion in 1498, by at least overtly converting to Christianity. In one of Reubeni’s entries he noted, “The king summoned me four times in two days on account of the conversos. ‘Be wise about what you do with them,’ he warned me. ‘And what is this I have heard, have you circumcised my scribe?’ he added” (120). The king’s scribe was Diego Pires, who adopted the Hebrew name Shlomo Molkho, after he had circumcised himself. Reubeni emphatically denied this allegation. Later that night Pires visited Reubeni. Reubeni was infuriated by Pires’ actions, which jeopardized his mission. He then instructed Pires to hide from the king and travel to Jerusalem, lest he be burned at the stake (121).

Although initially the king had promised to give Reubeni “eight ships … with four thousand arms both large and small” (120), this never materialized. Prior to leaving Portugal, the queen informed Reubeni that the reason the king reneged on his promise was that he had heard that Reubeni had circumcised his scribe and was conspiring with the conversos against the king (122). En route back to Rome, Reubeni stopped at several ports in Spain, last being Cartagena. There, in early 1527, he was briefly detained by the Inquisition and then released when he provided letters from the pope and emperor. This is where Reubeni’s memoir ends. There is, however, an Addendum by Reubeni’s assistant, Solomon Cohen, who listed expenses that Reubeni incurred until the summer of 1527 (163-165). This is then followed by a brief entry related to Reuveni’s redemption of captivity by Jews from southern France.

Although Reubeni had castigated Molkho when they met in Portugal, it is somewhat ironic that in 1532 they joined forces in an attempt to convince Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, to support their scheme of raising a Jewish-Christian army to liberate the Holy Land. Instead, the emperor handed them over to the Inquisition and their eventual death (24).

In conclusion, Alan Verskin has provided anyone interested in the renaissance period a fascinating window into the aspirations and tribulations of Jews after the Spanish and Portugese expulsions. Through his skillful translation and illuminating notes he has made accessible to a general audience the extraordinary life and travels of David Reubeni.

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1 Mark Verman is a Professor of Religion and Zusman Chair of Judaic Studies at Wright State University, Dayton, OH.

2 Moti Benmelekh, “History, Politics and Messianism: David Ha-Reuveni’s Origin and Mission,” AJS Review 35:1 (April 2011): 35-60.

3 Aaron Aescoly, Sippur David ha-Reuveni, 2^nd ed. (Jerusalem: Mosad Bialik, 1993). This second edition also includes additional introductions by Moshe Idel and Eliahu Lipiner. Idel offered an overview of the two major trends in scholarship on Reuveni and whether his primary intention was militaristic or messianic. Lipiner focussed on Reuveni’s relationship to the Portugese converso, Shlomoh Molcho.

4 Aescoly, pp. 210-11 of his Introduction.

5 Aescoly, p. 151.

6 On the apparent influence of Reubeni’s sojourn on the Temple Mount on the eschatological speculations of the kabbalists of Safed and especially R. Hayyim Vital, see Moshe Idel in Asescoly, Sippur pp. xxxvi-xxxix.

7 Aescoly, p. 151.