Lecture 26. Morais, Sabato. Philadelphia, PA. Undated · Sabato Morais Digital Repository · Legacy Projects from Judaica DH at Penn Libraries

Title

Lecture 26. Morais, Sabato. Philadelphia, PA. Undated

Author

Morais, Sabato

Location(s)

United States -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia

United States -- Pennsylvania

Format

11 pages on 5 sheets

Rights

http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?

Language(s)

English

Source

Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies

Sabato Morais Collection, Box 12, Folder 4

Has Format

https://colenda.library.upenn.edu/items/ark:/81431/p30c4t41h/manifest.json

Link to Colenda

https://colenda.library.upenn.edu/catalog/81431-p30c4t41h

Provenance

Transfer of Custody from the Hebrew Education Society, 10 March 1913.

Is Format Of

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/judaicadh/morais/main/TEI/SMBx12FF4_6.xml

content

Post-Biblical
26

The portion of the Torah, which we have read this Sabbath, demands that half a shekel be given by each person for the use of the Sanctuary, as an atonement, whenever the Hebrew population was is numbered. This ordinance found in the books of Moses made our people, at all times, averse to having a census unnecessarily taken. But their dislike of such a measure turned into perfect consternation, when the proconsul sent by Rome to govern Judea, after the banishment of King Archelaus, compelled every Jew to hand in to him the not alone his name and age, but a full account of his property to be taxed accord--ingly. Such an act, aside from the opposition it raised on religious ground, was hateful for political reasons. It was a wound sore and deep into the hearts of our people. It meant that they had last every vestige of independence, that they were chained to the will of a foreign heathen power. At that trying time, the influence of the offi--ciating high-priest fortunately succeeded in prevent-ing a general outbreak and bloodshed.

Still a Galilean called Judah, put himself then at the head of a party that were sworn to resist taxation, and to acknowledge no ruler save God and kill Romans and their adherents who favored peace at any price. The new sect took the name of "Zealots" and, if contempt of dangers and a willing sacrifice of one's life for a cause, is bravery, the Zealots--though fierce and fanatical--deserve the appellation of heros. But Judea lay at the feet of Rome. All attempts to keep off from it the crushing blow were in vain. Greedy governors came from the seven hilled city to the city of David and were replaced in turn by others more or less rapacious, but among all of them none gained the unenviable notoriety of Pontius Pilate. If christians remember him with abhorrence, Jews have rea--sons to recall his memory with a feeling of detest--ation. The first indication of that wicked man's wish to insult our people and our religion was the cowardly way in which he introduced unto Je--rusalem banners and shields bearing images hated by Jews.

Under the shades of night he planted those en--signs conspicuously in the capital, as to inti--mate that Judaism had died by the blows g which Paganism had dealt against it. At the sight of such emblems, our fathers hastened to the Governor's residence and insisted upon their removal. Pilate ordered the deputation to leave his presence, or prepare to die. The representatives of our people then bared their breasts, ready to be pierced by the sword rather than yeild. Their earnestness conquered the vile Roman official, and the objection--able bucklers and standards were taken away.
But it was not long after before another act of Pontius Pilate outraged our people. On the plea of repairing and extending waterworks, he seized upon the treasury of the temple, and used it as he chose. The Jews enraged at such an arbitrary conduct tried to stop the laborers, but Pilate sent stealthily among the crowd soldiers dressed in oriental costumes, with daggers con--cealed in their clothes, and wherever our people collected together, they were stabbed by the Romans in disguised Romans

A large number were thus dastardly set upon and murdered. It can scarcely be a matter of surprise that amidst such constant sufferings, the hope of a Divine interposition was fondly entertained by the majority of our people. The belief in the restoration of a kingdom of David at some distant future was founded upon Scrip--tural authority. How it should take place, no one could definitely tell, but that it would happen and bring to Israel independence and honor, was a doctrine permeating all classes. They would have welcomed the daring scion of the Judean race, who assumed the championship and struck for liberty. Jeshua, or, as better known, Jesus of Nazareth was not the first, and we know well from history that he was not the last, to imagine himself inspired to accomplish a deliverance. He came from that district of Palestine, where Judah and many of the zealots were born. Like them, he was a Galiliean enthusiast, but unlike them, he held out ideas, which could satisfy only a few disposed tamely to submit to the inevitable, and turn their thoughts from surrounding

evils, to the contemplation of promised pleasures beyond this life. He could not possibly call bring to his side the masses who expected freedom from a galling yoke, by asking them to give Caesar what belonged to Caesar that is tributes and taxes from among the most humbly stationed in society. Them he taught high morality, as inculcated by our prophets, and he illustrated his instruction by parables well taken chosen and adopted adapted from the innumerable sayings of our sages. His preaching if correctly reported--reveals a mind nobly elevated but full of exaggerated notions, carrying charity and purity to impracticable extremes; but that he was allowed to preach in the Synagogues, is an evidence of the tolerance of Judaism, even in those revolutionary times. The man of Nazareth would not have run any risk, if he had limited himself to reproaching pretenders and hypocrites--though he used very strong language, naturally irritating to men against whom it was directed. Nor would the account of his miraculous cures have exposed him to a public accusation before a Jewish tribunal

It was because he proclaimed himself the expected "Messiah," without any act to warrant the claim; because he took the title of "the son of God," not in a figurative but in a positive material sense, and that of the "king of the Jews," inciting thereby a Roman soldiery to brutal excesses; it was by reason of these circumstances that he met the fate which he ap--parently courted, in order to be remembered by his adher--ents as a martyr and a saint. I refer to this even in post-biblical history with a great mistrust in my capacity to furnish an adequate idea of the causes that brought it about, and I would have let it go unnoticed, if it were not closely connected with the governorship of Pontius Pilate in Judea. We, as Jews, cannot accept as facts all which the New Testament--not un--frequently self-contradictory--states. The Talmud has a few passing allusions to the crucifixion hanging of a son of Miriam, supposed to have been executed before the Passover festival. But as Christianity really took its start under the reign of Constantine at the end of the third century after the birth of its founders, the early Talmudists took no pains to leave extensive records, of a comparatively

obscure and small sect branched out of Judaism. Some modern authors have denied altogether the existence of the teacher of the new religion; others, have made him a mere myth typical of human meekness and innocence. What may now be readily admitted is that he lived in troublous times, when Judea was a prey to contending parties; that he was fired into a state of extravagant self-reliance, which led to blasphemy, in accordance with the Jew- as interpreted by the Hebrew-ish code; that he was, accordingly, declared guilty by the high-priest Joseph Caiaphas, President of the San--hedrin, and as the latter had been deprived by the Ro--mans of the power of carrying out the sentence of death, Pontius Pilate, then governor, had him executed at the instance of Jewish authorities. It has also been asserted that Pilate, on hearing that Jesus was from Galilee, referred the case to Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great, who was then the acknowledged ruler of that part of the country, but that Herod refused to condemn sentence the accused, out of conscientious scruples. This story is hardly credible, for Antipas was both irreligious and cruel. If we consider a passage in Josephus authentic, Herod Antipas beheaded Zechariah, afterwards called Johanan or Jon the Baptist,

out of simply from fear that the influence of that bold preacher might be too great, and if we accpet the [?] statement of the New Testament, he committed that crime in consequence of having per--petrated another. Herod Antipas was a worthy child of his profligate father. For being on a visit at Rome, where a step-brother of his lived in retirement, he induced his wife Herodias to desert her husband and follow him to Galilee. This impious act was denounced condemned by John, who suf--fered imprisonment for his denunciation, and finally, at the instigation of Herodias' daughter, was killed by order of the same unprincipled Herod Antipas. But while the ruler of Galilee cared little for the ordinances of his faith and the code of morals, he took good heed to ingratiate himself with the Roman emperor. At the death of Au--gustus, Tiberius ascended the throne. To do the new Caesar a great honor, Antipas built a city which he called Tiberias, a name which it retains to this day--though nothing is left

to remind the visitor of its primitive splendor. The history of Tiberias is interesting. To raise that city on its foundations, Herod Antipas was obliged to level down many old graves and likely and also tamper with the remains. Orthodox Jews refused to go and live where the dead lay and where their place of rest had been wantonly made to disappear. Antipas despairing to draw conscientious Hebrews to his new capital, invited the poorest classes to whom he granted many privileges, and heathens who naturally were not deterred by religious scruples. Still Tiberias, with all the advantages it offered, would have remained for ever sparsely populated, had not the great authority of Rabbi Simeon Ben Jochai, a century later, unexpectedly removed all objections to taking up one's residence there. That sage who had hidden himself for years in a cave, on account of of Roman persecutions, and who had suffered severely in his health, found a restorative in the hot springs of Tiberias. Grateful for his cure, he went about and by some appliance, inexplicable to us, discovered the spots where graves had existed, and declared the

the rest of the city free from impurity, and and equal in sanctity to any part of the Holy Land.
Tiberias did in truth become sacred, not espe--cially because its thermal waters affected the cure of Simeon Ben Jochai, but because the fountain of our literature was made to flow from thence copiously. After the destruction of the Temple and the extinction of famous Hebrew Academies seminaries is the capital and its vicinity, of learning, some of our ancient teachers who would not quit the paternal soil, opened there academies. In Tiberias the immortal Judah the Prince collected the oral traditions; in Tiberias Rabbi Johanan, who gave a strong impulse to the composition redaction of the Palestenian Talmud had his flourishing school; in Tiberias it is believed, were the authors of the vowel points, so indispensable to the understanding of Holy Writ, disseminated know--ledge, and in Tiberias the Massorites tried to give posterity an accurate text of the Hebrew Scriptures. These glorious reminscences surrounds the ancient capital of Galilee built by Herod Antipas with a halo of sanctity, which entitled it yet to the name of "a holy city."

Identifier

p30c4t41h

identifier

SMBx12FF4_6