Awaiting the Messiah: Christians,
Jews, and Muslims in the
Late Work of Rembrandt
Shelley Perlove
Fig. 1. Rembrandt van Rijn, Portrait
of Menasseh ben Israel (?), 1636.
Etching. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
Rembrandt's religious works of the last two decades of his life
are the most powerfully expressive and richly inventive of his
career. Beginning around 1650, he became less concerned
with dramatic narrative, incidental detail, and stunning theatrical effects and began to produce quieter, more unified compositions, often focusing upon the interior life of only a few
figures. More universal and complex in meaning than his
earlier work, Rembrandt's religious subjects of the 1650s
and '60s probed the cosmic implications of God's interventions in human history. The study of selected works by the
artist in relation to two Protestant movements, Millenarianism
and Pansophism, reveals that Rembrandt was deeply inspired by the irenic and eschatological ideals of these
visionary doctrines.1
Pansophism and Millenarianism were pervasive in both
England and the United Provinces, especially in the years from
around 1650, which correspond to Rembrandt's late period.2
The Millenarians, both Christians and Jews, were united in the
belief that the Messiah's coming was imminent. More specifically, they hoped to hasten his advent and one-thousand-year
reign by preparing the world for his arrival. As viewed by the
Christian Millennialists, this hoped-for event could only occur
after the unification of Christians into one, universal Christian
faith and the conversion of the Jews. The Pansophists, whose
ideals intersected with those of the Millenarians, believed they
could formulate a universal doctrine that would unite all
Protestants-and eventually Catholics, Jews, and Muslimsinto a single world faith.3 Like the Millenarians, they envisioned a world of universal peace and harmony, a utopia that
was a far cry from the bloody religious controversies and bitter
warfare ravaging Europe at that time.
In Amsterdam such Millenarians as Jan Amos Comenius
(1592-1670) assiduously devoted themselves to the task of
converting Jews who had come to the United Provinces to
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