Bumbling henchman used “hot” (operation-specific) cell phone to call girlfriend!
Got a hat? — Better hang onto it!
The roles and significance of the Sadducees, Pharisees and Essenes in Jewish religious history has been much discussed and – more often than not – hotly debated. From whence did these three influential sects arise?
Here’s a brief article on the origin of their respective names.
The Sadducees were the Hasmonean priests of the Second Temple period (516 BCE to 70 CE) in Jerusalem. The name comes from the Hebrew name Tzadok, the high priest who anointed King Solomon and who was selected by the him to oversee the affairs of worship. The name in Hebrew (צדוק) means “righteous”. In the Greek histories, since there is no single Greek letter that makes the sound “tz” (the letter tzadi צ in Hebrew), the word gradually became more Hellenic.
That’s the easy one that everybody knows.
The Essenes, whose name we also obtain from the Greeks, is a case of language evolving in the opposite direction. The moniker began as the Greek term xénos (ξένος – stranger) and became incorporated into the local parlance between the time of Alexander’s Middle Eastern campaigns until the Roman occupation of the region. Koine Greek was widely spoken in the area, especially in commercial and cultural centres. Because there is no single letter in Hebrew to represent the sound “x“, a common “s” sound (samech: ס) was substituted with a placeholder vowel (aleph: א) standing at the head of the word – resulting in the Aramaic-Hebrew word Esseni (אסני). Transliterated back into Greek, this resulted in the word Εσσηνοι (Essenoi), as recorded in the histories of Josephus.
Neither Josephus, nor Philo, nor Pliny the Elder recognised how the term came into being; never suspecting that it originally came from Greek! The question would seem to be why the Essenes, a sect of religious ascetics who studied almost exclusively in Hebrew would choose to call themselves by a Greek word. And the short answer is that they didn’t; they were called that by the rest of the population. Often living and studying in caves or other rough shelters, they ventured out only to attend select discussions and ceremonies at the Temple in Jerusalem. No wonder everyone called them ‘strangers’. They lived most of their lives below the radar since the time when the armies of Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II destroyed the Temple of Solomon in 586 BCE, when they fled to the desert regions with as many scrolls as they could carry and sought shelter in caves. Ironically, they also considered themselves Tzadokites (Sadducees) since they were largely descended from the line of Tzadok – unlike the Hasmonean high priests who later came to hold that name themselves.
The Pharisees were generally composed of those returning from the Babylonian exile after Cyrus the Great, King of Persia and Media, conqueror of Babylon, granted them leave to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their Temple – as prophesied by the prophets Jeremiah and Daniel. During the time that they were separated from the activities in Jerusalem and the Holy Land, they resurrected the oral traditions to a degree not seen among the Israelites since the time of Moses. They had little choice. They had but fragments of their sacred texts that they were able to smuggle with them into captivity; a situation that eventually led to the creation of the Babylonian Talmud and the development of the Rabbinic tradition. Without an acknowledged central authority, religious instruction quickly devolved into a new, more distributed format. The term Pharisee comes from the Hebrew word פרושים (perushim), meaning ‘separated ones’.
Upon their return to Jerusalem and environs (having lived for almost 50 years in exile under a combination of Babylonian, Median and Persian rulers) they found that they didn’t immediately fit in. The Sadducees initially rejected their new teaching methods and the mostly Aramaic-speaking population wasn’t quite sure what to do with so many now-Farsi-speaking immigrants. This makes a double entendre of the name, since it can refer to their time of ‘separation’ and to the language (Parsi/Pharsi/Farsi) that they predominantly spoke.
In the end, it would take the efforts of all three sects to keep their common faith alive through many years of repression and persecution by Rome; the period during which the Second Holy Temple would be defiled and destroyed.
Once again, courtesy of VizReport, we take a fresh look at a prophetic excerpt from Zechariah, composed by the prophet in Persian exile during the reign of King Darius.
Startling stuff.
Flying Books and Wicked Women
A Study of Zechariah 5
February 21, 2006
(VizReport) A few years ago, I found a web page that contained an interesting interpretation of Chapter 5 of the Book of Zechariah. I was already familiar with the passages being discussed and had always encountered some difficulty in reconciling any of the existing translations with practical logic.
I’ve read some disparaging comments about the author of that page (Michael Rood) by a few other scholars of prophecy. Some accuse him of playing fast and loose with G-d’s word, implying that the prophetical works of the Hebrew religion are sacrosanct. Some say that he’s less than meticulous in his research, and though I do agree to an extent with this charge, I do appreciate his enthusiasm for finding the spirit of these mystical words. So, after some personal soul-searching on the matter, I find myself inclined to dismiss most of the negative press for the following reasons:
With all of this in mind, let’s proceed to examine Zechariah through new eyes.
Zechariah – Chapter 5
5:1. Then I turned, and lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and behold a flying roll (book).
When we think of books, we think of cut pages of paper bound in some type of firm cover. In Zechariah’s day (more than 2,500 years ago), books didn’t have pages, but were written on scrolls made of animal skin or papyrus. So, when he says that he sees a flying book (in some translations) or a flying roll, we know that he means a scroll.
Sacred Hebrew writings are still stored on scrolls (megillot) today, just as they were in Zechariah’s time.
So, he looks up and sees a scroll flying through the air. Some people interpret this as the ascendency of the word of G-d in the latter days, and that may very well be true…or you might not be reading this right now. But it’s possible that this flying scroll has multiple meanings…one of which might be quite literal.
Geometrically, a scroll is a cylinder.
5:2. And he said unto me, What seest thou? And I answered, I see a flying roll; the length thereof is twenty cubits, and the breadth thereof ten cubits.
Zechariah and an angel are conversing. The vision begins to be revealed and the angel asks him what he sees. Zechariah describes the dimensions of the object.
The cubit has been variously defined as being between 18 and 36 inches, depending upon your space-time reference. Context is everything. The most reasonable conversions in this case would be based on either the Royal Egyptian cubit or the Sumerian Nippur cubit.
Jacob’s tribe spent hundreds of years in Egypt and were pressed into the service of the Pharaonic building trades, in an increasingly subserviant capacity. They would have been intimately familiar with the nature of a cubit. This was a portable type of knowledge and it can certainly be expected that it would have travelled with them during the exodus from Egypt.
The construction of Israel’s early cities were based upon use of the Egyptian Royal cubit, as well as a large number of other Egyptian measures. Solomon’s Temple would have been constructed using the same cubit as there was no other practical or precise cubit definition that could have rivaled it amongst the tribes they encountered in Canaan.
Following the destruction of the Temple by the forces of king Nebuchadnezzar, many people were taken away as captives to Babylon. They remained in exile during the remainder of the Babylonian empire’s influence, and through the subsequent Median and Persian kingdoms that came to control the region. During this time, until they were officially released by the edict of Cyrus the Great, they would have become very familiar with the Nippur cubit.
Zechariah recorded most of his visions during the reign of Darius the Mede, so that is a point in favour of the Nippur measure over the Egyptian. But we may simply be splitting hairs by trying to determine the “exact” size of the cubit involved here; the difference between the smallest and largest versions of the two regional standards is less than 2%. In either case, the result is a cubit between 20.38 and 20.63 inches in length.
In all of the existing translations, the size of the flying scroll is said to be twice as tall as it is wide. That would make for a rather stubby-looking scroll having the same relative proportions as a giant sodapop can. That’s one fat megillah!
Is the word used to express the breadth of the scroll specific to the measurement of width? Actually, when the discussion pertains to scrolls, the most important defaults are height (or length) and circumference (not diameter) — also called the “girth”. This is because scrolls are sealed with cord — and in order to obtain the correct cord length, one must think of the scroll’s circumference. This is also very important when considering how many scrolls can fit into an ark, because they must fit in the depth as well as the width. And, furthermore, knowing the circumference of the object allows one to optimise the use of space owing to the rounded nature of the scrolls.
So, if we look at the cubit as being roughly 20.5″ and measure its height and circumference, we are left with a scroll that stands at just over 34 feet tall and a little more than 17 feet around. That gives it a width (or diameter) of less than 5.5 feet.
5:3. Then said he unto me, This is the curse that goeth forth over the face of the whole earth: for every one that stealeth shall be cut off as on this side according to it; and every one that sweareth shall be cut off as on that side according to it.
Obviously, these menacing scrolls are going to be everywhere at a certain point in time. Nations will accuse each other of cheating and lying. They will threaten each other with these accursed “scrolls”.
5:4. I will bring it forth, saith the LORD of hosts, and it shall enter into the house of the thief, and into the house of him that sweareth falsely by my name: and it shall remain in the midst of his house, and shall consume it with the timber thereof and the stones thereof.
The power of these flying scrolls is beyond what the prophet could ever have imagined. Here are weapons that not only kill people but can completely ‘consume’ even the stone and wood of houses. The word “house”, as an aggregate term, can also mean a city.
5:5. Then the angel that talked with me went forth, and said unto me, Lift up now thine eyes, and see what is this that goeth forth.
The angel says that Zechariah should note the next item to proliferate upon the earth.
5:6. And I said, What is it? And he said, This is an ephah that goeth forth. He said moreover, This is their resemblance through all the earth.
An “ephah” is a basket or a measurement, and was used in very much the same way that a contemporary farmer might say that he has fifty bushel-baskets of potatoes. The word itself is not originally Hebrew, but Egyptian, and is another example of both a term and a functional mechanism (like the Royal cubit) that was taken out of Egypt when Jacob’s tribe departed.
Although the word “ephah” had a very specific volume measurement under Egyptian industrial and agricultural standards, in the common parlance of the post-exodus period the word came to be synonymous with containers in general, rather than a specific standard unit.
The angel tells Zechariah that these containers are going to be in widespread use and that the same basic type of container will be used all over the globe. While this draws our attention to the notion of shipping containers, we’ll soon see that these containers, though widely distributed, are highly specialised.
5:7. And, behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead: and this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah.
In the container, we are told, there sits a woman. However, we must lift up a leaden cover in order to see her. How bizarre, one might think, unless we look at the terms used in this sentence.
The concept of lead, aside from its particular uses that might vary from one culture to another, hasn’t changed. We’ve already negotiated our way toward an understanding of what constitutes an “ephah”. So, the only other word that needs to be explored is “woman”. It’s also the only thing that doesn’t really “fit” on a logical basis.
In Michael Rood’s analysis, he realises, in a great leap of insight, that there are a number of words in Hebrew that are similar to “ishah”, meaning woman. Two of these words are concerned with the concept of fire: aish (or aisha) and isheh. The former (in masculine and feminine form) is used to describe a flame, while the latter means an “offering” by fire. In either case, these words can have a holy aspect, but such power can also have a darker side.
5:8. And he said, This is wickedness. And he cast it into the midst of the ephah; and he cast the weight of lead upon the mouth thereof.
While it would certainly be wicked to keep a woman in a bushel and cover her up with lead, it’s much more likely that a powerful form of “fire” could be described as wicked. The angel makes no delay in sealing the container up with lead once again.
Some translations portray the angel as pushing the woman into the basket and shoving lead into her mouth! Not nice at all.
Properly, the lead is cast into the mouth/opening of the ephah, and not the mouth of the woman. Also, the text says that he casts “it” into the ephah, not “her”. Errors with the personification of objects can be common in translation of unfamiliar material, especially if there is a poetic twist to the wording, if it is antiquated, or if the concepts are completely foreign to the translator.
Our simple container/ephah now sounds more like a warhead than anything else. In fact, the payload is so wicked that it needs to be encased in lead.
5:9. Then lifted I up mine eyes, and looked, and, behold, there came out two women, and the wind was in their wings; for they had wings like the wings of a stork: and they lifted up the ephah between the earth and the heaven.
When the prophet looks up again, he sees two “women” (read “fires”) with long wings, like a stork. This isn’t the “flying scroll” because it is not described as having wings at all. A missile usually only has small fins near its base. The container with the wicked fire is carried away into the sky by something with two flaming engines and broad wings. The passage seems to say that the engines were mounted on–or in–the wings and that air blew through them. He makes it clear that it is the combination of fire and wings that allows the vessel to fly.
5:10. Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah?
And where does this jet take the warhead…?
5:11. And he said unto me, To build it an house in the land of Shinar: and it shall be established, and set there upon her own base.
They are taking it to a specially-customised facility in Sumeria (an area that formerly comprised most of southern Iraq and southwestern Iran) where it will be set up on its own platform.
Only the “ephah” needed to be flown there as the “scrolls” (missiles) were already quite abundant, in Shinar and elsewhere.
This week’s visit by Pope Benedict XVI to the Middle East has been controversial, but only partly due to the fact that he was once enrolled in the Hitler Youth movement as a young boy in World War II Germany.
Some in Israel felt that he should have undertaken a more personal mea culpa during his visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Remembrance Centre. Others were more inclined to let that slide given his solemnly remorseful comments on the subject in the recent past.
During an interfaith dialogue at the Notre Dame Jerusalem Centre, the Pope exited the room after the Chief Islamic Judge of the Palestinian Authority, Sheikh Tamimi, launched into an anti-Israeli rant and called for Christians and Muslims to rise up together against the ‘murderous Israelis’.
In the West Bank today, Pope Benedict made it clear that he stood behind the establishment of a sovereign, independent Palestinian state. This was actually one of the least controversial moments of his trip because a majority of Israelis and Palestinians happen to feel the same way – as do most other people in the world.
But having the Pope advocate for a Palestinian state is not the same thing as Palestinians declaring their own state. And therein lies the rub. No one can declare independence on someone else’s behalf. It must be self-declared.
The main problem seems to be that the Palestinian Authority, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, et al, cannot decide exactly where that state will be. A solid majority of these organisations appear to believe that a Palestinian state should be established not only in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but right across the entire UN-member state called Israel. And that simply won’t work.
Today is the 28th anniversary of the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II by Mehmet Ali Agca.
Agca was forgiven, in person, by John Paul II in 1983 and has since completed serving his term for the attempted murder of the Pope. He is, however, still in jail for the 1979 murder of Turkish journalist, editor and human rights activist Abdi İpekçi and is scheduled to be released on January 18, 2010.
During the years of his incarceration, Agca has several times publicly stated that he would like to convert to Catholicism. Most recently, he has said that he would like to be baptised in a ceremony at the Vatican. He has also claimed at various times that he is the Messiah. Mental health issues notwithstanding, Agca will be freed in eight months’ time.
He is known to have written a letter to Pope Benedict XVI, warning him against his planned November 2006 trip to Turkey. Happily, the excursion transpired without incident.
imahd.ca 