Still Running Off at the Keyboard

MESSIANISM AND ADAM MICKIEWICZ

James Webb in THE OCCULT UNDERGROUND links Adam Mickiewicz in the line of Sabbatai Zevi and Jacob Frank. He writes:

...in addition to the presence of large numbers of converted Frankists, Polish mysticism was augmented by a popular Cabalistic revival, which may well have rendered the often abstruse doctrines of the Jewish mystical philosophers more intelligible to a Gentile. Judaeo-Christian sects sprang up throughout Poland and Russia, with rituals based on esoteric doctrine--and, most significantly, worshipping a Napoleon-Messiah. There can be no doubt that this turn in the affairs of Polish Jewry was to a large extent responsible for the theories of Polish Messianism.

The impetus given to the comparison of the Polish nation with the Jews which formed the backbone of Messianic theory is confirmed by the continued emphasis placed by the Poles upon Israel itself. The radical group among the Polish exiles in 1832 addressed an appeal to the Jews containing a promise to help them found their own nation in Palestine. The careers of Mickiewicz and Towianski add further weight to this point. The national poet of Poland, ran the rumor among the exiles, had a Jewish mother who was converted just before her marriage. It seems that Mickiewicz's maternal grandparents may actually have been followers of Jacob Frank; and it is fairly certain that his wife, Celina, whom he met in Moscow while in exile, was the daughter of converted Frankist parents. Towianski had several Jewish friends while at Wilno University, and at least one of his circle was involved in the Bible Society of Wilno, which exerted itself to convert the Polish Jews. Among the mystical group established by himself and Mickiewicz in Paris, one of the most active members was the Jewish Xaviere Deybel, whom Towianski called "the Jewish Princess." Mickiewicz and Towianski exerted themselves in the cause of the Jewish national home: an undertaking which, in view of the equally hopeless situation of the Poles, might seem to indicate a curious order of priorities....Examples from the teaching of Mickiewicz and Towianski could be multiplied to show their exaltation of the role of Israel even above that of Poland... (pp. 253-254)

Adam Mickiewicz was Poland's national poet and an exiled revolutionary. He was so much the national hero that he is buried near Juliusz Slowacki and Cyprian Kamil Norwid in Wawel Cathedral.

Not only was Mickiewicz a revolutionary, according to "The Warsaw Voice", he was something of a philanderer. According to that source his wife Celina, who gave him six children, "suffered...not only from the strain of poverty, but also Mickiewicz's extramarital activities--a taste for the occult and an insatiable passion for other women."

Can strains of a Frankist maternal inheritance be seen here? In any case Abraham G. Duker, in an essay published in the book ADAM MICKIEWICZ - POET OF POLAND, edited by Manfred Kridl, Columbia University Press, 1951, in an essay titled "Mickiewicz and the Jewish Problem", indicates that Mickiewicz wrote poems about Jan Czynski and Tadeusz Krepowiecki, "radicals of Frankist descent." (p. 114) He also indicates that

In the Towianist period Mickiewicz accepted Towianski's teachings concerning the position of the "Israel nations" chosen for historical greatness: the Jews, the French, and the Slavs, especially the Poles. According to this scheme Israel, the Jew, was destined for greatness, following his choice of the Towianist path to Christianity. Whether or not the theory of the poet's partial Jewish descent is accepted, his marriage to the Frankist Celina Szymanowska served to stimulate his interest in the question of Polish-Jewish coexistence. Towianski's view of the solution of the Jewish problem in Poland through baptism and participation in the Towianist "Cause" added to his concern with the Jews, as testified by his contemporaries....Mickiewicz viewed the conversions of Jews to Catholicism as proof of the arrival of the new epoch. (pp. 115-116)

Mickiewicz took his interest so far as to attend services in the synagogue. Duker writes:

On the Sabbath (September 5, 1855), Mickiewicz and Levy attended the services at the Smyrna synagogue. The poet was greatly impressed with the mood of the worshipers, just as he had been ten years earlier when he brought his Towianist circle to the Tisha Bafav rites in the Paris synagogue....Following the services in Smyrna Mickiewicz told Levy that "God will eventually hearken to the prayers of this nation, whose sons know how to pray with such religious fervor and strong faith." (p. 109)

Who was Towianski? In short, a mystic who captivates Mickiewicz by curing his wife of mental illness. Harvard University's Wiktor Weintraub describes him in THE POETRY OF ADAM MICKIEWICZ, Mouton & Co., 1954:

In the summer of 1841, there came another turning point in Mickiewicz's life, his meeting with a strange mystic from Lithuania, Andrzej Towianski. This short, stocky, bespectacled man hid behind the countenance of a provincial notary an immense self-confidence, a firm belief in his mission, and a diabolical craving for power, for 'the government of souls.' At the time of the meeting, Mickiewicz was afflicted because his wife had suffered a relapse. During one short session the Magus from Lithuania cured the poet's wife and took the poet's soul into his avid possession.

Under the immediate impression of this meeting, Mickiewicz, full of burning enthusiasm and proselytic faith, sent a short poetic missive to his friend, the poet J. B. Zaleski, urging him to join the group of the followers of 'the Master,' an ecstatic poem which announced the coming of 'the Miracle.'

'Since the voice has been heard, and destiny has been settled, and the occult burden of the womb of years has brought forth fruit, and the Miracle has come, and will fill the world with joy.'...

The short poem is the only poetic fruit of the infusion of enthusiasm which Mickiewicz owed to Towianski. The poet found outlet for his enthusiasm elsewhere. He changed his chair of Slavic studies into a pulpit from which he preached Towianski's ideas (which led eventually, in 1844, to his dismissal from the College de France disguised politely as a leave of absence). (pp. 278-279)

James Webb also documents Towianski's cure of Celina in THE OCCULT UNDERGROUND:

...Towianski seems to have arrested the mental illness of Celina Mickiewwicz with a form of mesmerism; and, either by the effect of this cure or by the impact of his personality, converted the great Polish poet with remarkable suddenness to a belief in his divine mission. In September, Towianski was introduced to the [Polish] exiles at a service in Notre Dame where his preaching so alarmed the Archbishop of Paris that he informed the Prefect of Police and alerted his clergy against the Polish prophet. (p. 254)

While the wheels of government were set in motion against Towianski, he and Mickiewicz organized the circle of the Oeuvre de Dieu which at one point included another famous Polish poet named Slowacki. Ultimately Towianski was expelled from France and Mickiewicz took over the running of the organization on Towianski's behalf. This organization had close connections with the Oeuvre de Misericorde of Eugene Vintras, an heretical offshoot of the Catholic Church. Webb writes:

While the wheels of officialdom turned slowly to effect the expulsion of Towianski, he organized with Mickiewicz the circle of the Oeuvre de Dieu, which met daily and for some time included the poet Julius Slowacki. But in July, 1842, the Master of the Oeuvre de Dieu was finally expelled from France, and Towianski had subsequently to content himself with directing the circle through Mickiewicz from afar. The prophet led a troubled life after his departure from France. He was expelled from Rome by the papal police, expelled from Lausanne and Spoletto, and eventually he made his home in Zurich. His sole attempt to re-enter France was during the revolution of 1848, when he was denounced as a public agitator after scarcely a week in Paris and was sentenced to be deported to Cayenne. From this terrible fate the influence of Mickiewicz saved him and he was allowed to return to Switzerland where he resumed his function of a director of souls.

It was through the Oeuvre de Dieu, directed by Mickiewicz, and through the personal influence of the poet while occupying the Chair of Slavonic Literature in Paris, that Towianski's brand of Messiansim became known in the West. It comes as something of a shock after this journey into Central Europe to discover the close connection which established itself between the Oeuvre de Dieu and the Oeuvre de Misericorde, between the Poles and the Normans, between Towianski and Vintras. At the period of the prophet's expulsion from France, a dual approach was made to the Poles by the Oeuvre de Misericorde. The Abbe Charvoz came to Mickiewicz in Paris, and three Vintrasians tracked Towianski down in Brussels which he had made his first stopping-place in exile. Mickiewicz wrote to Towianski expressing qualified approval of what he had been told of Eugene Vintras, and advising his Master that a union might be fruitful. Towianski so impressed his Vintrasian deputation that their report caused the Norman prophet to hail the Pole as the Messiah. Towianski certified the French sect as of good provenance and accepted Vintras as a "brother." The followers of the two cults exchanged visits, Poles journeying to Tilly and the Vintrasian Charvoz spreading the doctrines of Towianski. From the Oeuvre de Misericorde Mickiewicz borrowed the idea of establishing his own group in sections of seven. The two cults had by coincidence adopted the same white cross without the figure of Christ Crucified....

But the connection between the Poles and the Ouevre de Misericorde did not end with Vintras's death. The Abbe Boullan, Vintras's self-proclaimed successor, numbered among his small following some Polish believers. After his death...in 1893, these followers returned to Poland where they were influential in the early days of the successful Mariavite Church....the Mariavite Order preached a Polish Messianism very like that of Mickiewicz and Towianski; but it was condemned for practicing sexual rites in the manner of Boullan.... (Webb, p. 254-56)

Were these sexual rites in any way associated with the earlier Sabbatian/Frankist activities? I have not yet found confirmation, but the possibility seems logical.

In any case, Messianism seems to be the common link in the chain of all of these various heretical groups, and Messianism relies on a visionary who becomes the center of the cult's movement. Webb speaks of Mickiewicz's and Towianski's ideas as they affected the underground Paris occult revivalists:

...its impact on the Underground was very noticeable. It was from Polish sources that Alphonse Louis Constant, the famous "Eliphas Levi," derived his knowledge of the Cabala; and Constant himself is responsible for almost single-handedly turning the Secret Traditions into a romantic mixture suitable for popular consumption. (Webb, p. 257)

Levi was the source of Aleister Crowley's and, to a lesser extent, H. P. Blavatsky's doctrines. Did Crowley preach the heretical Sabbatian beliefs based on Kabbalah? I think it is a distinct possibility.