5. Mahomedan Causes for Karaism.—In their objection to tradition the Sadducees and the Karaites were alike, and so far it seems probable that the one sect was a survival of the other. But there were other influences at work, which may account for the appearance or the reappearance, as it may be, at this period of the later sect of separatists. The Arabs, by whom the impressionable Jews were surrounded, had enthusiastically accepted a most simple form of faith, a faith which had no priesthood and but one prophet. No sooner did tradition gather about Islam than a sect arose among the Mahomedans to throw it off. There had come quickly a Sunnah to the Koran, as there had grown slowly a Talmud to the Law. A party in Islam rejected the stricter traditions of the Sunnah, and a party among the Jews, about the same date, grew openly impatient of the Rabbinical ruling of the Talmud. Rebellion of any sort is catching, and there can be little doubt that each set of grumblers helped the other.
6. The Leader of the Karaite Movement.—The man who first gave expression to the Jewish discontent with tradition was a certain Anan, son of David, a native of Babylon. Anan had a personal grievance of his own, a position which gives a certain point and eloquence to any general sense of injury. He had wished to be made [a]רֵישׁ נְּלוּתָא]. But the election had come and gone, and he had been passed over; and, worst slight of all, a younger brother ofhis own had been appointed to the office. So Anan, disappointed of being patriarch of his people, and of leading them on the old and orthodox road, determined to become their spokesman and advocate in the new direction.
7. What became of the Sect.—Their tenets never made much way. They were, in fact, impossible. The Karaite said he would obey ‘the Law’—the strict and literal text, but would have nothing to do with tradition. Now let us see his difficulty. Take, as an instance, the command, ‘Ye shall kindle no fire in your habitations on the Sabbath’ (Exod. xxxv. 3). A ‘literal,’ consistent Karaite, living in a cold climate, would have to freeze for twenty-four hours regularly every seventh day, for he could not accept traditional observance, which lightens the yoke of the Law by limiting the meaning of the ‘ye’ to Jews, and permitting fire to be kindled in Jewish dwellings by the friendly hands of outsiders. Commentary—that is, explanation of some sort—is necessary to every law, and personal and off-hand interpretation is no more likely to be right than traditional ruling. It is somewhat conceited to think our own wisdom is all-sufficient, and that of our ancestors must be wrong; and it is just a little mean, perhaps, to be over-eager to throw off burdens which good men have deliberately borne.As our English poetess[11] wisely says,—
‘If we tried
To sink the past beneath our feet, be sure
The future would not stand.’
The Karaites never grew very numerous nor very powerful, though they were occasionally very troublesome. At the present day, stray remnants of the sect are discoverable in Jerusalem, and in parts of Turkey, Egypt, Galicia, and the Crimea.
8. Good out of Evil.—Sects never do prosper among Jews. The ideal of the nation, like the ideal of the religion, is Unity. The Karaites made but little impression in the way they wanted, which was a separate and a harmful way, but the means they employed brought about another and a very useful end. Rejecting all commentary, and relying entirely on the text of Scripture, they were forced to examine the text very closely. The Rabbis, to refute them, had to be equally particular about their interpretations. No arbitrary renderings could be given where both parties were inclined to be so positive. Each would examine, and re-examine, every phrase and word and letter for himself. This contest between Karaites and Talmudists brought about a very exact sort of scholarship; and accuracy is, we know, one of the conditions of truth. The Scriptures were exhaustively studied; the language was treated grammatically and scientifically; punctuation was added to the text, and the Pentateuch, after being divided into portions and paragraphs ([a]פַרְשִׁיוֹת] and [a]סְדָרִים]), was thus, as it were, put under the microscope.This work was mostly done by the Karaite scholars, and it was called the Massora[12] text. Thus the chief effect of the Karaite movement was to bring about a religious-literary revival. Historians who are fond of tracingback big events to a small original germ tell us that among the causes which led to the English Reformation (1525) may certainly be counted the spirit of earnest and profound inquiry into Scriptural renderings which Anan, son of David, aroused among the Jews. In this sense the Karaites are sometimes called the Protestants of Judaism.