Emden was on the list of candidates for the appointment of rabbi to the "three communities." His few friends worked for him, and urged him to exert himself to try and obtain the post. He, however, resisted all their solicitations, and declared decidedly, that he would not accept the election even if the choice fell on him, but he was none the less aggrieved that he obtained only a few votes, and entertained an unfriendly feeling towards Eibeschütz, because he was preferred. There was another peculiarity in Emden's character: his antipathy to heretics. His father Chacham Zevi had undauntedly pursued Nehemiah Chayon and the other Sabbatians, and had brought himself into painful positions by so doing. Emden desired nothing more ardently than to follow his father, and would not have shunned martyrdom in the cause. Since the return of Moses Chages to Palestine, he considered himself the watchman on behalf of orthodoxy among his fellow-believers. He was a Jewish grand inquisitor, and was in readiness to hurl the thunders of excommunication whenever heresy, particularly the Sabbatian, should show itself. The opportunity of exercising his unpaid office of inquisitor, of proving his zeal for orthodoxy, and even of suffering in its behalf, was granted him by Jonathan Eibeschütz.
At the time when Eibeschütz entered on his duties as rabbi a painful agitation was prevalent among the Jews of the "three communities." Within the year several young women had died in childbirth. Every wife in expectation of becoming a mother awaited the approaching hour with increasing anxiety. The coming of the new rabbi, who should drive away the destroying angel by whom young women had been selected as victims, was awaited with eager longing. At that time a rabbi was regarded as a protector against every species of evil (Megîn), a sort of magician, and the wives of Hamburg and Altona expected still greater things from Jonathan Eibeschütz, who had been heralded by his admirers as the most gifted of rabbis and a worker of miracles. How would he respond to these exaggerated expectations? Even if he had been honest, Eibeschütz would have been forced to resort to some mystification to assert his authority in his new office. Therefore, immediately after his arrival, he prepared talismans--writings for exorcising spirits (Cameos, Kameoth)--for the terrified women, and indulged in other forms of magic to impose upon the credulous. He had distributed similar amulets in Metz, Frankfort-on-the-Main, and other places. From Frankfort a rumor had reached Altona that the talismans of Eibeschütz were of an altogether different nature to what they usually were, and that they were heretical in character. Out of curiosity one of the amulets distributed by the chief rabbi Jonathan Eibeschütz, was opened in Altona, and was found to contain the following invocation: