Читать книгу Judaism I - Группа авторов - Страница 64

The Pharisees, who came into being in the context of the Maccabean Revolt, were a lay movement who were not, like the priests, tied to the Temple by regular service. They set their focus on fulfillment of the commandments and prohibitions of the Torah, and transferred ideas of purity and holiness from the priestly Temple service to everyday life.

The Pharisees argued (...) that one should observe the laws of ritual purity even outside the temple, at home, precisely at the place where they were applicable, namely at the table. (…) The table in the house of any Jew is like the table of the Lord in the temple of Jerusalem. The commandment, ›You shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation‹ was taken literally. The whole land was considered sacred.¹⁰²

In transferring ideas of the holiness of the Temple to everyday life, the Pharisees laid a foundation on which rabbinic Judaism could build following the destruction of the Temple in the year 70 CE, in a time without a Temple. A late legend, about the teacher with whom the reorganization and reconstruction of post-70 Judaism is most closely associated, may illustrate this:

Once, when Rabban Yoḥanan ben Zakkai came from Jerusalem, Rabbi Joshua followed him and saw the temple in ruins. ›Woe to us,‹ cried Rabbi Joshua, ›that this, the place where the sins of Israel are atoned for, lies waste.‹—›My son,‹ replied Rabban Yoḥanan, ›do not be concerned. We have another atonement which is as effective as this one: That is deeds of mercy, as it says: ›I desire mercy, not sacrifice‹ (Hos 6:6).¹⁰³

The teacher solves the central problem: how can life go on after the destruction of the Temple? Without the daily sacrifices in the Temple, the world ought to perish because of the sins of the people. We note that in his answer to the student the teacher quotes the Scripture, which now becomes an all-determining entity in a still greater and more comprehensive way. It, and especially the Torah within it, were the only thing that remained after the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. And so, eighteen centuries later, Heinrich Heine could call the Torah the »portable fatherland« of the Jews.¹⁰⁴