History of the Jews, Vol. 2 (of 6)

by Heinrich Graetz

175–219 C. E.

The last generation of the Tanaites had come back to the same point from which they first had started, thus completing the whole circle. In the same way as the first had found complete expression in a single personality, Jochanan ben Zaccai, so also the last culminated in one standard-bearer, who formed the central point of his times. The former had been followed by several disciples, each possessing his peculiar school, tendency, and system; and thus the material of tradition was divided into a multiplicity of fractional parts. It was the Patriarch Judah, the son of Simon II., who reunited them, and thus brought the activity of the Tanaites to a conclusion. He was the chief authority of the last generation, compared with whom the other teachers of the Law were of no importance; he abandoned the old tendencies and prepared the way for a new departure. In spite of the important position which he occupies in Jewish history but little is known of Judah's life. It was during a time of great affliction, when the calamitous consequences of the Bar-Cochba war were still being felt, that his superior talents and great parts developed themselves. He so distinguished himself by mature questions and striking answers that his father and the college advanced him to the foremost rank of the disciples while he was still in his first youth. As though he felt that his vocation was to be the collecting and arranging of the most dissimilar opinions, Judah did not confine himself to any one school, but sought the society of several teachers of the Law. This it was that saved him from that one-sidedness and narrowness of mind which is given to upholding, with more fidelity than love of truth, the words of one teacher against all other doctrines. The most important of his teachers were Simon ben Jochai and Eleazar ben Shamua, whose school was so crowded with students that six of them were obliged to content themselves with one seat.

Judah was elevated to the dignity of Patriarch upon his father's decease, and the cessation of the persecutions after Verus's death. He was blessed with such extraordinary gifts of fortune that it used to be said proverbially, "Judah's cattle-stalls are worth more than the treasure-chambers of the King of Persia." Living very simply himself, he made but small use of this wealth for his personal gratification, but employed it in the maintenance of the disciples who during his Patriarchate gathered around him in numbers from at home and abroad, and were supported entirely at his cost. At the time of the awful famine, which, together with the plague, raged for several years during the reign of Marcus Aurelius throughout the whole extent of the Roman empire, the Jewish prince threw open his storehouses and distributed corn to the needy. At first he decided that those only should be succored who were occupied in some way with the study of the Law, thus excluding from his charity the rude and uneducated populace. It was only when his over-conscientious disciple, Jonathan ben Amram, refused to derive any material benefit from his knowledge of the Law, exclaiming, "Succor me not because I am learned in the Law, but as you would feed a hungry raven," that Judah perceived the mistake of trying to set bounds to his charity, and he thenceforth distributed his gifts without distinction. On another occasion Judah also yielded to his better convictions and overcame his nature, which seems not to have been entirely free from a touch of harshness. The daughters of Acher, a man who had held the Law in contempt, having fallen into distress, came to Judah for help. At first he repulsed them uncharitably, remarking that the orphans of such a father deserved no pity. But when they reminded him of their father's profound knowledge of the Law, he immediately altered his mind.

Distinguished by his wealth and his intimate knowledge of the subject-matter of the Halachas, he succeeded without trouble in doing that which his predecessors had striven in vain to accomplish, namely, to invest the Patriarchate with autocratic power, unfettered by the presence of any rival authority, and to transfer the powers of the Synhedrion to the person of the Patriarch. The seat of the principal school and of the Synhedrion during the time of Judah, and after Usha had lost its importance (a short time previously it seems to have been the neighboring town of Shefaram), was first at Beth-Shearim, northeast of Sepphoris, and later on at Sepphoris itself. Judah chose this latter town for his residence, on account of its elevated and healthy situation, in the hopes of recovering from a complaint from which he had suffered for several years. In Sepphoris there seems to have existed a complete council of seventy members, which was entrusted with the decision of religious questions according to the adopted routine. Judah's reputation was so great, however, that the college itself transferred to him the sovereign power which up till then had belonged to the whole body or to individual members. It was rightly observed of Judah that since the time of Moses, knowledge of the Law and possession of authority had not been united in any one person as in him. A most important function which was conferred upon this Patriarch, or rather which he got conferred on him, was that of appointing the disciples as judges and teachers of the Law. He was allowed to exercise this power without consulting the College, but on the other hand the nominations of the high Council were invalid without the Patriarch's confirmation. The nomination of spiritual guides of the communities, the appointments to the judicial offices, the filling up of vacancies in the Synhedrion, in a word, all Judæa and the communities abroad, fell in this manner into dependence on the Patriarch. That which his father and grandfather had striven in vain to accomplish, came about, so to speak, at his touch. In his time there was no longer a deputy (Ab-Beth-Din), nor a public speaker (Chacham). Judah, the Prince (ha-Nassi), alone was all in all. Even the Synhedrion itself had resigned its authority, and continued to exist henceforward only in name; the Patriarch decided everything. By reason of his great importance he was called simply Rabbi, as if, when compared with him, no teacher of the Law were of any consequence, and he himself were the personification of the Law.

He soon further increased his powers by deciding that even the most capable were not competent to pronounce on any religious question without having first been expressly authorized by him. How great was the importance of this act may be seen from the circumstance that the foreign communities, as well as those of Judæa, were obliged to put themselves in direct communication with the Patriarch in order to obtain their officials, judges, and teachers. The community of Simonias, which lay to the south of Sepphoris, begged the Patriarch to send them a man who should give public lectures, decide questions of law, superintend the Synagogue, prepare copies of authentic writings, teach their sons, and generally supply all the wants of the community. He recommended to them for this purpose his best pupil, Levi bar Sissi. It may be seen from this example how great were the requirements demanded of the instructors of the people. Another disciple of Judah, Rabba bar Chana by name, a native of Cafri in Babylon, was obliged to obtain the authorization of the Patriarch before being able to decide any questions of religion and law in his native land. In the same manner a third of his disciples, Abba Areka, also a native of Babylon, who later on became a great authority with the Babylonian communities, obtained this influence solely by Judah's nomination. One dignity alone, that of the Prince of the Captivity in Babylon, was on an equal footing with the Patriarchate, and Judah was all the more jealous thereof on account of its being conferred and upheld by the Parthian authorities, while his office was at most merely tolerated by the Roman rulers.

Invested with this autocratic power, Judah manifested unusual severity towards his disciples, and displayed so great an irritability with them that he never pardoned the least offense offered, even in jest, to his dignity. The course of conduct which he enjoined upon his son from his death-bed, namely, to treat his scholars with strict severity, was the one which he himself had pursued all through the Patriarchate. Among the numerous Babylonians who crowded to the Academy at Sepphoris was a distinguished disciple, by name Chiya (an abbreviation of Achiya), whom his contemporaries could hardly praise enough for his natural gifts, his pious conduct, and his untiring endeavors to spread the teachings of religion among the people. Judah himself valued him very highly, and said of him: "From a land far off there came to me the man of good counsel." But even him the Patriarch could not pardon an insignificant jest. Judah had once said to him, "If Huna, the Prince of the Captivity, were to come to Judæa, I should certainly not carry my self-denial so far as to abdicate my office to him, but I would honor him as a descendant in the male line from David." When Huna died and his body was taken to Judæa, Chiya observed to the Patriarch, "Huna is coming." Judah grew pale at the news, and when he found that Chiya was referring to the corpse of Huna, he punished the joke by excluding Chiya from his presence for thirty days. Judah showed himself equally sensitive in his conduct towards Simon Bar-Kappara, one of his disciples, who, with his knowledge of the Law, combined at the same time poetical talent and a vein of delicate satire; as far as is known, he was the only Hebrew poet of that period. The little that remains of the productions of Bar-Kappara's muse indicates ready manipulation of the Hebrew tongue in a regenerated form, and in all its pristine purity and vigor; he composed fables, of which, however, no trace now remains. On the occasion of a merry meeting, the witty Bar-Kappara indulged in a jest at the expense of a certain Bar-Eleaza, the rich but proud and ignorant son-in-law of the Patriarch. All the guests had put questions to Judah, except the simple-minded Bar-Eleaza. Bar-Kappara incited him to ask one as well, and in a whisper suggested one to him in the form of a riddle. This riddle, to which no answer has been found to the present day, contained in all likelihood allusions to certain persons closely connected with Judah. It ran somewhat as follows:—

She looks from heaven on high,
And ceaseless is her cry,
Whom wingéd beings shun;
Youth doth she fright away.
And men with old age gray,
And loud shriek they who run.
But whom her net hath lured
Can ne'er of the sin be cured.

In all simplicity, Bar-Eleaza propounded this riddle. Judah must have seen, however, by the satirical smile on Bar-Kappara's lips that it was intended to banter him, and he therefore exclaimed angrily to Bar-Kappara: "I refuse to recognize you as an appointed teacher." It was not till later on, when Bar-Kappara failed to obtain his appointment as an independent teacher of the Law, that he realized to the full the meaning of these words.

One of the most celebrated of the Babylonian disciples, Samuel by name, by whose medical treatment Judah had been cured of his long illness, was unable to obtain the nomination necessary in order to become a teacher of the Law. Judah was once desirous of excusing himself for this slight to Samuel, to whom he owed the restoration of his health, whereupon the latter answered him pleasantly, that it was so decreed in the book of Adam, "that Samuel would be a wise man, but not appointed Rabbi, and that thy illness should be cured by me." Chanina bar Chama, another disciple, who, later on, was also regarded as an authority, once remarked that a word which occurred in the Prophets ought to be pronounced otherwise than Judah read it. Offended thereat, Judah asked him where he had heard this; to which Chanina answered, "At the house of Hamnuna, in Babylon." "Well, then," retorted Judah, "when you go again to Hamnuna, tell him that I recognize you as a sage"; which was equivalent to telling Chanina that Judah would never authorize him to be a teacher. This irritability of the Patriarch, who was in all other respects a noble character, was his one weak point. It is possible, indeed, that this susceptibility was the result of his ill-health. However that may be, it did not fail to arouse a certain dissatisfaction and discontent, which never found public expression on account of the deep reverence in which the Patriarch was held.