Week 3 Quiz Lecture Readings I will like the same Expert ANURAG Thank you
Lecture: Judaism A History of the Jewish People The Jewish sense of history begins with Tanakh or the Hebrew Bible. The Hebrew Bible begins with a supreme deity’s creation of the world, and details the experiences of the patriarchs, matriarchs, and Moses, who brought commandments from God to his people. This portion of Jewish history ended roughly at the end of the second century BCE. Jewish history continued with the temples in Jerusalem; after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, the Jewish people dispersed, finding unity through their teachings and traditional practices, which were eventually compiled into the Talmud. Biblical stories It is difficult to ascertain the historical accuracy of events detailed in the Tanakh. The Pentateuch, or “five books of Moses,” is held to be the most sacred portion of the Tanakh. The traditionalist view is that these books were divinely revealed to Moses; contemporary biblical researchers hypothesize that the books are reworked oral traditions later set down by different sources. Some stories, such as the Great Flood, resemble earlier Mesopotamian legends. Whatever approach one takes to the origin of these stories, they are spiritually significant for both Judaism and Christianity. The theme of exile recurs throughout the Hebrew Bible. Also central is the concept of covenant, a contract between God and the people. The stories of Noah and Abraham illustrate covenants, each with its own sign. Scholarly debate continues on whether the early patriarchs, and presumably matriarchs, were strictly monotheistic. The neighboring Canaanites, who influenced the Israelites, were polytheists. In time, the Israelites rejected the traditions of the people surrounding them, and saw themselves as having been chosen by a single divinity. This divinity may have initially been understood as a private god, and then later became known as the sole, supreme universal deity. The Israelites were likely of mixed ethnic stock; scholars debate the origins of the term “Hebrew.” The word Semite is a modern linguistic term applied to Jews, Arabs, and others whose languages are classified as Semitic. It is inaccurate to use “Semite” as an ethnic designation. The genealogies of the Pentateuch explain that the people called Israelites were the descendants of the offspring of Jacob (and his wives). Jacob, with his wives and his wives’ maidservants, had one daughter and twelve sons. The twelve sons became the heads of the twelve tribes of Israel. The whole group left for Egypt during a famine; the book of Exodus opens there about four centuries later. The pharaoh persecuted the Israelites. Moses escaped the pharaoh’s order that all male boys born to Israeli women be killed. The book of Exodus relates that Moses was chosen by God to lead the Israelites out of Israel. God then led the Israelites to Mt. Sinai in order to re-establish the covenant. There, according to Exodus, God gave Moses a set of rules for the people which included the Ten Commandments, as well as instructions for a portable tabernacle with a holy ark, the Ark of the Covenant, in which to keep the stone tablets on which the commandments were inscribed. While Moses was receiving these instructions, the people reverted to idolatry; upon discovering this, Moses smashed the original stone tablets, and then got a new set after another forty-day meeting with God. Accepting the new laws brought a new dimension to the covenantal relationship. God freed the Israelites from slavery in Egypt; now they were to accept the Torah, or five books of Moses. The Hebrew Bible explains that the Israelites wandered through the desert for forty years before being able to re-enter the land earlier promised to them. Archeological evidence indicates that between the thirteenth and eleventh centuries BCE, every Canaanite town was destroyed one to four times, although the identity of those who destroyed them is not known. Under the reign of King David’s son Solomon, a Temple was built in Jerusalem to house the Ark of the Covenant and serve as a place for making burned offerings of animals, grains, and oil to God. After a long period of wandering, Judaism had a central location. But Solomon became very wealthy and built altars to the gods of his wives. After Solomon’s death, the kingdom was divided into Israel and Judah. Under these circumstances, prophets—men and women who underwent transformational ordeals that made them instruments for the word of God—began to exhort the people. The early prophets warned against idolatry; the later prophets cautioned that social injustice and moral corruption would signal the end of the Jewish state. During the eighth century, the northern kingdom of Israel was conquered by Assyria and the Israelites were taken into exile among the Gentiles or non-Jewish people. Most of the Israelites lost their distinct identity and came to be known as the “Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.” In 586 BCE, the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple. Many Judaeans were taken into exile in Babylonia, where they were called “Jews” because they were from Judah. The prophets interpreted these events as God’s retribution for the people’s wicked ways. Nonetheless, the Jewish people sought to maintain their faith, and prophets prophesied that God would bring a new era of justice and peace. Only a small number of Jews returned to Jerusalem; the remaining Jewish people were said to be living in the diaspora. The Persian king Cyrus authorized the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem, and it was completed in 515 BCE. A hereditary priesthood focused on temple rituals and the redaction of the stories of the Jewish people. The Torah now became the spiritual and secular foundation of the dispersed Jewish people. In the diaspora, Jews may have adopted concepts from other traditions such as that of Satan, the hierarchy of angels, resurrection and an afterlife (perhaps from the Zoroastrianism of the Persian Empire). Not all Jews accepted these beliefs. Ideas from rationalistic, humanistic Hellenism also affected some Jews. In the second century BCE, a Hellenistic ruler of Syria sought to impose Hellenistic practices on all his subjects, including the Jews, which led to the Maccabean rebellion. The successful rebellion led by the Hasmon family of priests established an independent kingdom called Israel, centered around Jerusalem, which lasted until 63 BCE when it was conquered by a Roman general. It was the last independent Jewish nation until the twentieth century. Three sects formed under the Hasmonean king: Sadducees (who were priests and wealthy business people, intent on the letter of the law), the Pharisees (who sought to study applications of Torah to everyday life), and the Essenes (who considered the priesthood corrupt; a similar or related group retreated to Qumran and developed library now known as Dead Sea Scrolls). Scholars are still studying the Dead Sea Scrolls for information about the period between biblical and rabbinic Judaism. It may be helpful to note that this period in Jewish history will also be relevant for the rise of Christianity. After the Romans took over in 63 BCE, Jews began to express belief in a messianic age in which the Jews would be able to return to their homeland. This belief was bolstered by the words of some of the earlier prophets. Prior to this, apocalyptic literature, which views the world in stark terms of good and evil and foresees God’s victory over evil, became popular. Some Jews concluded that a Messiah would come to bring evil to an end and establish peace. In 66 CE, led by the anti-Roman Zealots, Jews rebelled against Rome. In 70 CE, the Roman legions destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem. The Western Wall remains to this day. A second ill-fated revolt in 132-135 CE lead to the destruction of all Judean towns, and remaining Jews were forbidden to engage in their traditional practices such as reading the Torah, observing the Sabbath, and circumcising their sons. Rabbinic Judaism The Jewish people scattered throughout the Mediterranean and western Asia. The inheritors of the Pharisee tradition, the rabbis, established new Jewish traditions. Liturgical prayer and ethical behavior substituted for temple rituals. People met in synagogues (meeting places) to worship and read the Torah. A minyan, or quorum of ten adult, males was required for community worship. Torah study became increasingly important for many men; women were excluded from such study, their responsibilities understood to be in the home. The interpretation of the Torah gave unity to the Jewish people. The rabbis’ study, called Midrash, brought about two types of interpretation: halakhah (proper conduct) and haggadah (folklore, historical/sociological knowledge, etc.). Rabbinic Judaism and institutional Christianity were developing in the same period. The literature of the Midrash process came to be known as the oral Torah. In 200 CE, Judah the Prince produced an edition of the legal teaching of the oral Torah called Mishnah. The Mishnah includes directives about the role of women. Later, the Mishnah and commentaries on it were organized into the Talmud (of which there were two authorized versions, each with the same Mishnah but differing Gamara or additional commentaries). The Talmud preserves multiple, sometimes varying interpretations of religious questions. The ongoing process of exegesis provides a means of introducing new ideas into Judaism—e.g. the concept of the soul and the concept of Shekhinah (a feminine noun), God’s presence in the world. Judaism in the Middle Ages Rabbinic study continued throughout the diaspora (the dispersion of Israelites and later Jews out of what is considered their ancestral homeland [the Land of Israel] and the communities built by them across the world) even after the Talmud was complete. Responsa literature records rabbinic answers to legal questions. Jews typically fared well under Islamic rule, with some exceptions. Maimonides