Читать книгу A Class-Book of New Testament History - G. F. Maclear - Страница 26

ARRIVED at the threshold of the Gospel History, it may not be amiss to survey some of the more prominent features of the period we have traversed, and to notice some of the changes which it had produced on the Jewish nation.

The influences under which the Jews had been brought since the Captivity were, as we have seen, of a very varied character. For two centuries after that event, they were subject to the dominion of Persia; for nearly a century and a half they were under Greek rulers; for a century they enjoyed independence under their native Asmonean princes; and for more than half a century, while nominally ruled by the family of Herod, were really in subjection to the power of Rome136.

In the present Chapter we shall notice, (a)The Wide Dispersion of the Jews, (b)The Change in their Vernacular Language, and (c)The rise of Synagogues.

(a) The Wide Dispersion of the Jews.

About the time of the building of Rome the ten tribes were carried away by the Assyrian monarchs, and 130 years after, this event was followed by the removal of their brethren of Judah and Benjamin to Babylon. The influential results of this earliest migration, it has been observed, “may be inferred from the fact, that about the time of the battles of Marathon (B.C.490) and Salamis (B.C.480), a Jew was the minister, another Jew the cupbearer, and a Jewess the consort, of a Persian monarch137.” Once settled under the shadow of the Babylonian and Persian kings, the Jews were very loth to quit the country of their adoption, and comparatively few availed themselves of the permission of Cyrus to return to their native land. The important colony in Babylonia which afterwards exerted a very remarkable influence, threw off shoots which extended to the borders of the Caspian Sea and the confines of China.

Important, however, as were the results of this earliest dispersion, they were exceeded by those which attended the policy of Alexander and his successors. That great conqueror, as we have seen, removed a great number of Jews to his new city of Alexandria138, and there conferred upon them many and important privileges, setting an example, which Ptolemy Soter and Philadelphus were alike not slow to follow139. To such an extent did the Egyptian Jews increase, that Philo estimates them in his time at little less than 1,000,000, and declares that two of the five districts of Alexandria derived their names from them. From Egypt they quickly spread along the coast of Africa to Cyrene (Acts ii.10), and the towns of the Pentapolis, and inland to the realms of Candace, queen of Ethiopia (Acts viii.27).

The Seleucidæ, in their turn, were equally anxious to locate colonies of Jews in the cities which they founded. Seleucus Nicator invited them to his new capital at Antioch140; Antiochus the Great removed 2000 Jewish families from Babylon to Lydia and Phrygia141. Led on by that love of trade which now began to distinguish them, they soon became numerous in the commercial cities of Western Asia, Ephesus and Pergamus, Miletus and Sardis. The Archipelago furnished a natural bridge whereby to cross over into the countries of Europe and to settle at Philippi (Acts xvi.12), Berœa (Acts xvii.10), and Thessalonica (Acts xvii.1); Athens (Acts xvii.17); and Corinth (Acts xviii.4); and the decree of Lucius142, the consul during the reign of Simon Maccabæus, gives us a vivid idea of the extent to which they spread themselves in every direction, and no less of the power of the Sanhedrin143 at Jerusalem, to which all Jews, wherever located, were amenable.

At Rome itself they first appeared in the train of captives led up by Pompeius to the Capitol, but their captivity was of no long duration, and under the protection of Julius Cæsar, who reproduced in the West the privileges they had enjoyed under the Ptolemies and Seleucidæ in the East, they quickly multiplied, and not only appropriated a whole quarter in the capital144, but spread into other towns of Italy. Thus the Nation, whose native land had for centuries been in the centre of the world’s power, civilization, and commerce, now, under the superintending Hand of Providence, was scattered everywhere, East and West, North and South, bearing about with them their peculiar customs and institutions, and diffusing a knowledge of the Law and the Prophets.

(b) Corresponding to this wide diffusion of the Elect Nation was the change which gradually grew up in their vernacular language.

i. The earliest dispersion in Babylonia produced a change in the older Hebrew of Judæa. The language spoken in the days of David and Solomon was gradually exchanged for the Chaldee or “Syrian tongue.” (Comp. 2 K. xviii.26; Isai. xxxvi.11; Dan. ii.4.) And those who returned from the Captivity and settled in Palestine and Syria, used Chaldee Targums or paraphrases for the interpretation of the Old Hebrew Scriptures, and spake kindred Aramæan dialects, and hence were known as the Aramæan Jews.

ii. After the conquests of Alexander, Greek became the language almost of the whole world145. It was a Greek speech that Pompeius was reading, preparatory to delivery, when he received his deathblow off the port of Alexandria. It was in Greek that Brutus conversed with his friends on the evening of the battle of Philippi. The mass of the poorer population at Rome were Greek either in descent or speech. The Jews, therefore, dispersed by the Ptolemies and the Seleucidæ over the shores of the Mediterranean, were forced to adopt the Grecian language, and to use the Septuagint translation made at Alexandria, hence their name of Hellenists146, or “Jews of the Grecian speech,” which we shall find recurring so often in the Acts of the Apostles.

(c) The Rise of Synagogues.

During the captivity, when of course the Temple ritual was suspended, we gather that the devouter Jews were wont to assemble round the prophet Ezekiel and listen to his words and counsel147 (Ezek. viii.1; xiv.1; xxiii.31). Such meetings Ezra reproduced in Palestine amongst those who returned from Babylon (Ezra viii.15; Neh. viii.2; ix.i, &c.), and after the Maccabæan period they spread through every town and village, and in course of time gave rise to buildings called Synagogues, in which they might be held.

i. These Houses of Meeting varied in size according to the town or village in which they were built148. They were usually erected on the highest ground available, and so constructed, that a worshipper, when entering, or kneeling in prayer, might have his face towards Jerusalem. Like the ancient Tabernacle, they were divided into two parts by a hanging veil, behind which, at the upper end or that facing Jerusalem, was the ark containing the Book of the Law. Before this veil were the “chief seats,” for which the Pharisees strove so eagerly (Matt. xxiii.6); a silver lamp always kept burning; and an eight-branched candlestick, only lighted on the greater festivals. About the centre of the building was a raised platform, on which was a desk, where the reader stood to read the lesson or sat down to teach (Acts xiii.16; Lk. iv.20). All round were seats, where the men sat on one side, and the women on the other, separated by a low partition149.

ii. The chief officers of each synagogue were (a)a kind of Chapter or college of elders, presided over by the ruler of the Synagogue (Lk. viii. 41,49; Acts xviii. 8,17), who superintended the services, and had the power of excommunication150; (b)the Sheliach, or officiating minister, who read the prayers and the Law; (c) the Chazzan, ὑπηρέτης (Lk. iv.20), a sort of deacon, whose office it was to open the doors, prepare the room for service, maintain order, scourge the condemned; (d)ten men called Batlanim (men of leisure), who attended the week-day as well as sabbath services, and were at once representatives of the congregation, and collectors of alms151.

iii. The worship of the Synagogues was on the model of the Temple Services, and at the same hours, the third, sixth, and ninth152 (Acts iii.1; x. 3,9). On entering, the people bowed towards the ark, and took their places in the body of the building; the elders ranged themselves on the raised platform; the rich went up to the “chief seats” near the ark. A prayer was said, and a psalm was sung. Then the Chazzan walked towards the veil, drew it aside with reverence, took out the Book of the Law from the ark; and as he carried it to the platform, on which the Sheliach stood, every one pressed forward to kiss or touch it with his hand.

Taking the roll, the Sheliach rose, and commenced reading a portion according to a fixed cycle, the interpreter rendering the sacred verses from the Hebrew into the vulgar tongue153. The writings of the Prophets formed a second lesson, and were also read according to a fixed order. Then followed the delivery by one of the Elders sitting, of the word of exhortation (Lk. iv.; Acts xiii.15), at the close of which the roll of the Law was carried back towards the ark, while as before, men and women stretched out their hands and tried to touch or kiss it. The Law replaced in the ark, the Prayers began and were carried on till the close of the service.

Such were the Synagogues, one of which was at this time to be found in every town, and almost in every village throughout Palestine, as also in every city in Syria, Asia Minor, and Greece, where was a Jewish settlement. In Jerusalem itself there are said to have been upwards of 480154, some of which were built specially for the use of the foreign Jews of Cilicia, Alexandria, and other countries, resident in or visiting the capital. Comp. Acts vi.9. Where the Jews did not exist in sufficient numbers to found or fill a synagogue, a Proseucha155 or ‘Place of Prayer’ was built, sometimes open, sometimes covered in, usually outside towns and near running water, for the ablutions before prayer (Acts xvi.13).

It is easy to see how the synagogues thus scattered through wellnigh every town or city in the countries bordering on the Mediterranean, and in which not “Moses” only but “the Prophets” were read every sabbath-day (Acts xv.21), tended to keep alive Israel’s hopes of the Advent of the Messiah, and to diffuse the expectation of the kingdom of Heaven.