Jeremy Rosen
Rashi and Meiri: Giants of French Jewry
Jeremy Rosen - Rashi and Meiri: Giants of French Jewry
- So ladies and gentlemen, today we are part of the France subject matter. And looking at it from a specific Jewish perspective. If we go back a thousand years, the countries of Europe were not like the countries we know nowadays defined national entities. France, for example, was divided between dukedoms, that were more or less independent. France was just a small area around Paris, relatively speaking, but there were Dukes and sections such as Champagne, Burgundy, Brittany, Gascony, Provence, Limousine, Alza, Languedoc in the South, which we’re going to talk about a bit more in . And the result was, that each zone and area, was controlled by its Duke on one hand, and by its bishops on the other. In fact, it was the bishops and the clergymen that were the only unifying factor, hence the idea of the Holy Roman empire, which as somebody once said, was neither holy, nor a Roman, nor an empire. But Germany was divided into these warring stakelets. France were divided into warring stakelets. Even Spain was divided into warring statements, warring stakelets, even though it was Muslim, predominantly, although not entirely. And the result was, that Jews basically were the property of the Dukes and the kings. And the Dukes and the kings had a vested interest in making use of Jewish expertise, use of language, contacts around the world, whereas the churchmen were pretty much always, although not necessarily always against the Jews, and saw them as heretics, challenges to Christian authority, and a serious danger.
This was an atmosphere in which I think it’s probably fair to say, Europe was rather like an area of drug, of Mexican drug bandits. They were attacking each other, killing each other, massacring each other. Wherever they would go, they would burn down villages, kill the innocent, and at the same time, the poor ordinary surfs and lower classes were totally subservient. Their masters could do whatever they wanted with them. They had power over them of life and death. It was, to quote a later English philosopher, nasty and brutish, and a horrible world to live in, unless you were a top dog. But if you were a top dog, you were just as likely to be attacked and find yourself one day burnt to death in your castle, or tortured to death with horrible, horrible ways of dying. The very common to hang, drawn, and quarter somebody. Men, first of all, they were hung or dragged behind a horse. then they were castrated, still alive, and then their body was chucked dot into four pieces. Witches were burnt. It was quite horrible. I mention all this, because when we look at life for the Jews during this period, it is a veil of tears. Now, it’s true. There are two different theories of Jewish history during this period. There’s a so-called oy vey version, which I’m going to recount a little bit of to you today, about what we suffered simply for being Jews. Then of course, there’s the other happier version, is they tried to kill us, we survived, and so we celebrate.
A thousand years ago, those of us educated in England, will know about 1066, when William the Conqueror came over from Normandy, and actually brought with him the first Jews that had been in Europe since the period of the Romans, when they came and were established with Romans in Britain. But of course, Normandy, established in England, the regime of what became known as England. And this problem of who you are loyal to above all, was something that was going to involve England and France in one form or another, in fights and battles for the next 300 years. But the years, three thousand years ago, are mainly known for their calls, the Holy Crusades, but from every objective point of view, they were horrific crusades and brutal crusades. The first crusade, 1096 to 1099, was initiated by a man known as Peter the Hermit. He was born in France in Ameon, and he was assisted by the count of Louvain, Godfrey de Bouillon, and their aim in theory, the request of the Pope, was that they should march on Jerusalem, to reconquer Jerusalem back from the crusade, from the Muslims, so it would be a Christian country instead of a Muslim country. But, the Crusades also played an important part in giving employment, and giving work, and giving a purpose, and a cause, both for the poor, and for the rich.
And it initiated in France itself, and then started spreading from France through to Rhineland, Germany, down through Europe. Some of them ended up down through Marseille, others went on across the Constantinople to Italy and other places where they could embark. Each one of them was a little group within itself, often competing with each other and hating each other. And the theory went that, since this is to capture Jerusalem from the heretics… There are heretics all around us. The Jews are all around us. So it’s a tremendous mitzvah, an obligation if we could either forcibly convert them, or if not, kill them. And this orgy of killing began at this particular moment in time. And this was the moment when our hero, or a first of our heroes today, Rashi. Rashi, this famous Rabbi Shlomo ben Itzhak, probably the most famous of all European Jews, he lived through this first crusade. He was born in Troyes, in France. And although Troyes itself was spared, the crusades passed by, they ravaged one town after another from Mayans to Cologne in the Rhineland, Trévou. They really burnt a path of destruction throughout their travels across Europe. Then, after the failure of the crusade to establish itself strongly with the first crusade, which did get hold of Jerusalem, there was a second crusade, a second crusade from 1145 to 1149, led by Louis VII of Île-de-France.
And this was spearheaded by two other characters, the religious character, the Cistercian, monk, known as Monk Radulphe who said, “We must kill all the Jews and purge this land of them.” And he was supported by a rather aggressive brute of count inimical, who just enjoyed killing and raping anything that fell in his way. They got and reinforced some of the settlements around the crusades. But the crusader kingdom was a very, if you like, unstable structure, dominated by different European counts. Then there was a third crusade, the third crusade, 1189 to 1192, is the one that English people will know, because of Richard the Lionheart, who spoke French practically all his life, hardly spent any time in England, but is regarded as a great English king, and happened to be very favourably disposed towards the Jews. And when the Jews came to welcome him at his coronation in Westminster bearing gifts, all the bishops outside wouldn’t let them in, and accused them of being heretics again, and massacred anybody who turned up. King Richard couldn’t do very much about it, or at least didn’t do very much about it. Then there was a fourth crusade, which ended up only capturing Constantinople. In between all this, there was another, the very famous children’s crusade, in which children were whipped up to go on this crusade through Europe to the holy land.
They didn’t get there. They were all captured and sold into slavery. And the final crusade between the fifth and the sixth, between 1217 and 1250, again, were led by this mad, evil rindfleisch who felt it was his duty again to kill Jews. But parallel with the Crusades, of course, but generated by them, was this famous concept of the blood libel. And the blood libel started, actually the first one took place in England, sorry to have to say. And this believed that Jews needed Christian blood for the four cups of wine at Passover, and the matzah was the wafer that was used in the Catholic mass to represent the body of Jesus, whereas the wine was the blood of Jesus. Under Catholic theology, this transubstantiation meant that a miracle took place, and the wine actually did turn to blood in the believer’s body, and the wafer did turn to flesh in the human body, which is why you can understand why the idea that Jews ate wafers, and drank wine, and they weren’t Christians.
So they must have been doing something problematic with it, maybe even evil with it. But it explains where this idea came from, that Jews were not allowed to drink blood, and certainly not allowed to eat human flesh, would get this idea from. And this idea was preached at Easter time, at the time of the crucifixion, when commemorating the crucifixion, and after these sermons that were given about how terrible the Jews were as the antichrist, people would pour out of the churches and they would attack the Jewish community, rob and steal, and unfortunately murder and rape as well. So, during this period, from roughly 1000, leading right through, I suppose one would say to about 1600, Jews were constantly being expelled and pushed on. The Jews from France were pushed out and expelled towards Germany, and the Jews from Germany were pushed out, expelled on the way to Poland, which was the only state at that stage, that actually welcomed them as a state. And they were given citizenship and status. It is during this incredible period of upheaval, that the character of Rashi emerges.
And the reason why Rashi is so important, is because he establishes a dynasty of great rabbis, who studied in the area between France and Germany, the Rhineland, one side of the river and the other. In little towns. And these were not big towns. Towns of a couple of thousand, 10,000 were the biggest ones, and Jewish communities were 500, 600, maximum a thousand. But these communities were forced to be together, because the only option to being a Jew, was to be a Christian. And if you didn’t want to be a Christian, it’s not as though there was a secular option, or a third option of getting out of it. You were stuck within the Jewish community, in which you are corralled into certain restricted areas. You are heavily taxed. You are totally at the mercy of your local Lord or your local bishop. It was not an easy time. And the amazing thing is, that despite this, Judaism survived brilliantly. The Jews of France came initially from the Mediterranean up through Italy, up through south of France, moved up into the north where they established themselves, and then eventually moved across, as I mentioned before, to Germany, and to Poland, and to Russia. And that was the origin of what we call the Ashkenazi Jews. Meanwhile, at the same time, down in Spain, you had the Sephardi Jews, who came from Babylon, North Africa, with the Muslims into Spain, and in Spain too, there were different regimes, different states, different rulers. Even amongst the Muslims, there were Muslims who were tolerant, and there Muslims who were intolerant.
You’ll have heard of The Golden Age of Spain, but at the same time, you should realise that at about 1000 minorities was driven out of Spain by the Berber Muslims, who gave the Jews the option of conversion or death. So wherever you looked, there were problems. But the two main centres in Europe were France and Spain. And within France, you also have a significant division and distinction between the northern part of what we call France, where Rashi lived, and the southern part of what we now call France, where my second hero, Meiri, Menachem ben Shlomo lived a hundred years or so after Rashi. And these were the two greatest minds that I hope to explain why it was that they were so great. Because both of them, both of them were the scholar of the era. Even though there were other scholars, Rashi was by far the most known, the most popular, the most universal, because what he did was two things. He wrote a fantastic commentary on the Torah, the first total commentary on the Torah. UP until Rashi, there’d been lots of interpretations.
We call them midrashim, people interpreting, but one rabbi here, one rabbi there, a comment here, a comment there, collected into collections of these midrashim, according to the chapters of the Torah, and according to the weekly readings, but they were never systematic. It is Rashim that goes through every, almost every sentence, systematically explaining. And he’s explaining the Torah on a lot of very different levels. He’s explaining it on the level of pshat. Basically, “What’s the meaning of this word?” And interestingly, he often uses mediaeval French words to illustrate what this word can mean to the audience of people looking at his commentary. And, in addition, there is what is called drash. Drash is when you’re telling a story. This is a story. It doesn’t seem to make sense, but there’s an important message. And I want to tell you what the message is. And then there’s something called “Sod,” secret, the mystical aspect. And this is the period, the beginning of the emergence of mysticism, both in southern France, particularly in southern France, and of course in Spain. And this mysticism is having an impact, both on the Jewish community, and on the Christian community. You may have heard of a group of Christians called the “Cathars,” who existed at this period down in Languedoc, in the .
And they were considered to be heretics by the church, because they had a different view of theology to the established Catholic authority, and they were hounded with a crusade that massacred them more than it massacred Jews. So Rashi’s commentary includes this new development of sod, as well as of mysticism, as well as the midrashic the explanation of the moral lesson, as well as the explanation. Actually, he initiated a famous dynasty of grandsons. He had three daughters. There are all kinds of stories about how he taught his daughter’s Torah, how they may have put on fillin, and may have led very religious lives, and two of them produced a dynasty of outstanding rabbis over the next couple of generations until Spanish, until French jury was more or less exterminated out, and driven out, and no longer there, one of them, a grandson by the name of, we call him Rashbam, as opposed to Rashi, Rashbam wrote a much more abbreviated commentary, in which he says, “My grandfather went a little bit off track and off message. I want to focus just on the simple meaning.” And he was not nearly as popular. Rashi became more popular, not only before the printing press, but when the printing press came out, because his commentary was the commentary that most printing presses used as a commentary on the Torah. But not only that, Rashi went further.
He went through almost the whole of the Talmud. And of the whole of the Talmud, his commentary was a fundamental commentary on meaning. But also, he went into the issue of what was Jewish law as well. He was followed by the next generation called the Tosafists, his grandchildren, and they expanded rather more on the legal side. So Rashi, although he was a great legal authority, is not known for his legal texts, so much as for his commentaries on the Torah, and more importantly, in many respects, on the Talmud. It’s almost impossible to study Talmud without Rashi. And on every page of the modern Talmud, no matter which version you take, that has a traditional page, you’ll find on the centre, a little bit of Mishna, then followed by a little bit of Gemara. And round the one side you’ll have Russia’s commentary, and on the other side you’ll have TAS laws commentary. Of course, on the back of the Talmud, you’re going to get a thousand years of other commentaries. But that’s another study altogether. So his great commentary was the masterly interpretation, which is a core text to this day, a fundamental core text, almost as much as the Torah, and the Mishna, and the Gamera are themselves. But what I find particularly remarkable about Rashi, is that despite the fact that all around him, his relatives were being murdered, he was fortunately spared.
He happened to live in a place which was spared. But within a hundred miles of where he was, Jewish communities were being destroyed, his families were being killed. Some of them actually were forcibly converted. He is insistent, insistent that we treat the non-Jews according to Jewish ethical law. You will find no text there which excoriates them, which attacks them, which calls them horrible names, which says that you can swindle them, and you can cheat them, ‘cause they’re swindling and cheating you, so swindle and cheek them back. He is incredibly ethical, and refuses to be drawn into this kind of tit for tat. Not only that, but the Talmud, as well as the Torah, is very firmly opposed to idolatry. And there are very strict rules about having anything to do with idol worship. Now, idol worship originally, was a form of worship that had no physical boundaries, that everything was allowed because you could use your body in the service of your God by giving of your body sexually to whoever was around or in the temple, using the temple prostitutes, male or female, whatever it was.
It was a system of worship that was predicated on doing whatever you enjoy doing, which was very, very attractive to a lot of people, as well, of course, as solving their natural uncertainties and insecurities about the world, and the life they lived within that world. The problem came, when you have the emergence of Catholicism, Christianity, and Islam. First of all, Christianity. Initially, Christianity did not treat Jesus as a God, just as a great teacher. Because 'round about the period when Jesus is supposed to have lived, there were hundreds of people like him, not only in the dead sea sex, but elsewhere, going round and preaching and teaching, and teaching the gospel, so to speak, of Hillel, who lived earlier. the gospel which said, “Love your neighbour as yourself.” And it was only much later, that first of all, the supernatural nature of Jesus, which was different to the non-supernatural nature of all the leaders of the biblical period before Jesus, became important, first of all, with the idea of coming back to the dead, resurrection, and then with the issue of, was Jesus the son of God, or God, or a prophet of God?
And this debate went on with the Christianity for some 200 years. And you had different sections of the Christian world, having different opinions. The question of church dogma became solidified when Emperor Constantine fourth century, made Christianity the, sorry, the third century, made Christianity the fundamental religion, the Council of Nicea, in 325, when he found himself in a position of defining Christian dogma. And there were two camps, those who said that Jesus was an inspirational great leader, and a prophet maybe, and those who said Jesus is God. And from that came the idea of the Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. But people were still arguing about, “Well, is the son of God really God? What is it? And in fact, the wars that went on between the different camps, and the different heresies within early Christianity, ended up with Christians killing more Christians, than they ended up killing Jews. But the triumph was, in Europe, that the Catholic church won its idea that Jesus was of God. And therefore, if you are worshipping Jesus as opposed to worshipping God, or if you are having an image of Jesus, or an image of Mary, this surely counts as idol worship. And to this day, there are some people who take that view. Rashi took another view.
His view was, that you cannot compare the religious idolatry of the Christian era to the religious idolatry of the Pagan era. And therefore those lower laws in the Talmud, that were directed to distancing yourself, not trading with, keeping apart from the pagan idol worshipers, did not now apply in the same way to the Christians. So his first step was already to modify the nature of how Jews understood Christianity, despite the fact that at this time, the Christians were burning the Talmud, as well as burning people, the blood libels were going on, the crusades were going on, and you’d expect him to want to protect himself, going inwards or attacking them. And in fact, he doesn’t. His position is much more open. It is interestingly enough, only with his grandson, the great Rabbi Otam, who was the greatest authority of his generation, that Rabbi Otam began to show the influence of Christianity on Judaism, and stopped doing anything that might offend Christian opinion. So for example, Christians didn’t accept divorce, and therefore he started restricting divorce in Judaism. Christians had a very different idea towards celibacy, marriage, sex, procreation. And he had, if you like, he was influenced by this Christian approach on issues like these. And they were at that stage, so concerned about offending Christian authority, because they were so subject to it, that they began to, in certain respects, make the Jewish attitude a little closer to the Christian attitude. But nevertheless, they managed to preserve their Jewish identity, and took it with them as they moved east.
Meanwhile, down in the south, you have a different atmosphere. First of all, the lower part, places we know now, like Avignon, Marseille, Perpignan, the areas of Northern Spain, were very often exchanging who the ruler was, and having different rulers. But they also had the influence of Spain. And in Spain, the Jewish community was a much more cultured community, whereas in Europe it was denied access to the universities. It was denied contact with the non-Jewish academic and cultural world. You couldn’t even have jobs if you weren’t a member of the church. You certainly couldn’t do so many things without being part of a guild. In Spain, Jews were allowed to do lots of different things. They were top politicians. It was considered the right thing to write poetry, to be cultured within a Muslim/Spanish tradition. And the result is, that the Spanish community absorbed a lot more of philosophy, and becoming more philosophical, which was more rational. It was also the cradle of Kabbalah and mysticism, because where you get a rational, you always get a non-rational point of view. And this was the mood of the south of France, influenced by northern Italy, northern Spain, and by some of the communities down in southern France. Isaac the Blind is regarded by many a French rabbi, as being the founder of this initial new cabalistic tradition. And it’s in this area of Perpignan, where this, Meir Menachem ben Shlomo, Meiri was born and moved around.
Almost a different world to the one of Rashi to the north. Even though this is a little bit later, remember also those of you who will know Christian history, will also know that the papacy moved there during one period when there was an anti pope as well as an alternative pope. So, this was a different atmosphere that Meiri lived in, even though it was one in which the Jews were not a hundred percent secure, and which heretics were hunted everywhere. But nevertheless, Meiri himself as between Montpelier, Perpignan, and Avignon, where he wandered around, and lectured, and taught, lived in a different atmosphere. Now, Meiri is hardly known in comparison to Rashi. Hardly known at all. So much so, that it wasn’t until 1929, 1929, that his great magnum opus was fully published. It’s not that people didn’t know about him beforehand, because lots of people referred to others, as he did to other rabbis at the time. But he wrote a magisterial, it’s not a commentary on the Talmud, but it’s a summary of all the main issues, with explanations and with background. And where the other commentaries go, literally according to the text, he gives a little bit of a background, he looks at the different ways of understanding it, and in a sense, his work is a way of mastering the Talmud, without actually looking in the Talmudic text. Although nowadays everybody would do that.
But that was what his approach was. And because so much of his writing, his famous book, "Beit Ha-Behira,” “House of Choice,” if you like, but there are different interpretations of what he meant by it. Whether it was the House of the Talmud, or the House of Torah, what it was. This was only known in parts. And it’s very interesting, that when Menachem Catala first started producing this volumes of the Meiri, and publishing them in the 1950s in Israel, when I was in Yeshiva, the main Yeshiva treated with a bit of suspicion. They said, “You know, look, this has been out of circulation for so long. How do we know it’s legitimate or not? How do we know it’s really his work or not?” You know, “Let’s stick to what we’re familiar with.” And it took a long time until Meiri became accepted as an absolutely crucial rabbinic figure of that era, and still a fundamental text when you study the Talmud nowadays. So this achievement of his was amazing. I mean, in both cases of Rashi and me Meiri, there are myths and stories, stories about how his magical stories that are told about all great figures, about how brilliant they were, or how their mother was saved from the crusade when a wall gave way, so that she could get out of the way of the charging enemy, how brilliant they were. Very few of these myths are supported by any documentation, but the texts are.
And it’s because these texts are so magnificent, that is why these guys are so important, because they still live with us every single day of our religious lives. But Meiri went one stage further than Rashi. And this is one of the most common issues that people mention the Meiri on nowadays, because when he looks at the Talmud, and he looks those laws of the Talmud, that are directed about idle worshipers, he goes much further than Rashi. He says, “Look, first of all,” Rashi says that, “The way they worship their gods, and the way they worship God, is not the same way that we worship God then, so don’t accuse them of idolatry. But, on the other hand, going into their churches, or being part of their religious community is obviously something that we don’t want to do.” Meiri comes up with this interesting formulation. It comes in various slightly different forms throughout the places in the Talmud where, his commentary in the Talmud where it’s mentioned. But basically it says that any religion, that is literally means, “Has a moral code.” It’s how they behave morally that matters. And whether the Christians, or the Muslims do, or they do not behave as we don’t sometimes properly, that’s not the issue. The issue is what counts as idolatry. Now it’s interesting, Maimonides, Maimonides lived about 1000. He said, “Look, Islam is definitely not idolatry, because Allah is God, and a Jew can take an oath by Allah in a Muslim court of law. And they don’t worship images.” “The Christians on the other hand,” he says, “do worship images. And, at the same time, in addition to that, they also believe in the trinity, which was called, "Shituf,” partnership.
And therefore for that reason, I consider them still to be idol worshipers.“ Says Maimonides. Ironically, he also said something else, that seems to be contradictory. He says, "You can teach a Christian Torah, but you can’t teach a Muslim Torah.” Why? Because the Muslims claim that the Jews falsified the Torah. They don’t accept our version of the Torah as the legitimate version, and therefore, we shouldn’t encourage them. The Christians on the other hand, although they believe that New Testament has superseded the Old Testament, they accept the very same Old Testament as we do. Their version of the Torah, and our version of the Torah is the same. And that’s an interesting divergence between the three of them. But where, what Meiri says is, Meiri goes further, and he says, “Because Christianity is a moral religion, we’re not concerned with how you worship your God. That’s your business.” And this of course is an argument that has been used in our times with regard to Hinduism, because there are many people who say Hinduism is idolatry because many Hindus do treat their gods as, if you like, different idols in different roles, even though an intelligent Muslim will interpret it differently, in the same way an intelligent Christian might well interpret the Trinity differently, or transubstantiation differently. There are all different ways within religions, and different sections that come up with their versions. So it’s for this reason, this great step forward of saying, “We’re not concerned with your religious ceremonial. You want to pray to an idol, or you want to pray to an image, that’s your business.
We are concerned with are you a good human being.” And this is a thousand years ago. And yet, as you know, as tension has proceeded, continued, and as the attacks on Jews continued, we thought they would end after the crusades, they didn’t. They went on through early modernity, and of course have gone on through modernity. The amazing thing is that we have survived. The amazing thing is you will not find in major rabbinic literature, anything that tries to suggest that you should not treat the non-Jew with respect. Although unfortunately, there are some people who do. And you have this tradition, despite everything else, of what I would call tolerance, of a tolerance that I only wish would’ve been extended to us. And this is why of the French rabbis, and of a community that then disappeared, and was replenished much later on. And now in many respects, the French community such as it is, and mainly North Africa, and the Sadi has come from there. That is why I regard these as my two heroes of French jury. So, here endeth my presentation. And let’s have a look at what questions we have.
Q&A and Comments:
So Joan, I like, glad you like the music.
Q: Mike, “Is blood libel Roman Catholic not Byzantine Christianity?”
A: That is correct, Byzantine, that is to say, the Christianity of the Eastern church, of the Church of Constantinople, until it was conquered by the Westerns of course, and then conquered by the Muslims, had a different approach to the nature, very much of Jesus.
“Justinian separated the Jews in confinement to the ghetto.” The ghetto came later. Justinian was very anti-Jewish, but it was Constantine who initially laid down the laws, which said, Jews are not allowed to own property, not allowed to own slaves. And if you convert, you do so at penalty of death. And this was part of the Council of Nicea 325. Justinian came later, and there were other Roman Emperors from Hadrian onwards who were very, very anti-Jewish. The question is, were they anti-Jewish for religious reasons, or were they anti-Jewish for political reasons, or were they anti-Jewish for commercial reasons?
“Turron is a tiny village next to champagne area, and Rashi was a vintner.” Yes, that’s quite right, Rose. Rashi made a living out of trading in wine, trading in non-kosher wines, it so happens. But providing kosher wine for those who wanted it. Asyuhowl, you French, you never knew any of this. I’m glad to be able to give you something.
“The cathars renounced rituals, which Rome couldn’t stand, as opposed to the very rich.” That happens to be true. But also, they had a combination of different ideas. The idea of the gnosticism, the the idea of evil verses good, which comes also originally back from Zoroastrianism.
Q: Why did Rashi develop a different Hebrew script?
A: This is a very good question. The question is, did he develop a different Hebrew script, or was it a script developed by the printer, because it was easier for the printer to produce it? There are many people who are experts who say it was the printer who produced the Rashi script, and not Rashi himself.
“Tents not facing each other. Imagine the confusion if Israelites faced in emergency. I’m not certain what you are referring to about tents not facing each other. Might perhaps you come back with that?
Abraham not condemning human sacrifice, I don’t know where you get this idea of not condemning human sacrifice from, not converting the kings of Saddam and Gomorrah, or succeeding in any conversions.” No, it’s true. There’s no evidence other than later evidence, which says that when it talks in the Torah about Abraham making Haran, the people he made in Haran, maybe that was the beginning of conversion. But, it’s true. Rashi versus Rambam, I think I’ve come to that, in earlier on, mentioned Rambam, not to be confused with RaMBaN Nachmanides, who lived in northern Spain, was also more mystical than philosophical.
Q: “Are Greek Orthodox returned to icons after being banned by the Romans?”
A: And yes, and indeed, iconography and iconoclasts were part of the Christian tradition. The Protestants were very much against imagery, but everybody did it. The Assyrians smashed the faces of stone emperors that they had conquered. Romans defined Greek, Greek statues were defaced by people who conquered them.
Q: “Please explain the difference between the Mishna, Talmud, and Gamera.”
A: Okay, I’m sorry I took that for granted. Basically, in a nutshell, the Torah period ended roundabout 500, before the common era. So from about 1002 to 300 before, to 500, and the return from Babylon, that is the biblical period. And that was the written scroll. Parallel with that, which I will go into greater detail at my next lecture about an eye for an eye, was what was called the ORA law. The law developed as all legal systems develop and advance over the years, but it was never written down. It was only written down in the second century by Rabbi Judah, the Prince, who decided that in view of the Roman destruction of Jewish life in Israel, we have to preserve this. And he wrote the ORA law down as the Mishna. The Mishna was a collection of all the laws and customs, and rules that had developed over the previous 500 years. But as soon as that document came out, the Jewish community in Persia, and the Jewish community in the Galilee, started arguing about it. “Oh, you messed this up, you missed that. This rabbi says this, Rabbi says that.” And so the debate on the Mishna became known as the Gamera. And it turned into the Babylonian one, much bigger than Jerusalem, a massive compilation of volumes. And it is the combination. And that was compiled round about 600. And the Talmud is another way of describing the combination of the Mishna and the Gamera together. That is the Talmud. And that is known as the period of Rabbinic Judaism, as opposed to Temple and Sanctuary Judaism, although there’s a lot of overlapping. Mike says, “Don’t go to a non-Jewish doctor, and other restrictions using non-Jewish services combed in Europe in the 16th century.” Well of course it was, because a lot of it was magic. A lot of it was hocus pocus, and you didn’t know who to trust. And if you have enemies around you all the time, you take great care to make sure that you go to somebody you trust.
Carla, “Very interesting lecture.” Thank you very much. Never heard of Meiri, go and look him up. He’s a great guy.
Leon Collins, “It’s not just the case, such moral behaviour we find in Christianity stems from its Jewish roots, rather than anything Christianity in itself, that’s what’s left of Christianity, can be regarded as idolatry. Not should I understand.
Q: Is it not the case that moral behaviour we find in Christianity stems from its Jewish roots?”
A: Yes, I think that’s true. After all, Christianity accepts the idea of the 10 Commandments. They just don’t like all the rabbinic additions, and all the rabbinic interpretations, but the fundamental Christianity, the morality of Christianity, and indeed Islam is to be found in Judaism. There’s very little difference.
“Troyes was a large, beautiful mediaeval centre of the Russian museum, made very well, every Shabbat service last year.” Yes indeed. But it wasn’t a large, that large mediaeval centre in the way we understand large mediaeval centres. When you talk about a large centre, you’re talking about what, a hundred thousand, 200,000, something like that. It was much smaller than that.
Thank you, Helen. Nice to see you here again.
Rashi states that tents were not facing each other for personal… Oh, I see what you’re saying there. So this is Rashi’s commentary. Rashi has lots of wonderful commentaries. I mean, this is a topic for another time, to go into what commentaries Rashi points out. Some of them make sense to us, some of them don’t, but there’s a lot there in Rashi, of interest.
“Do mention the source and development of Noahide laws with respect to Christianity.” The Noahide laws are not mentioned really until the Talmudic era. And I’m glad you asked me this. This is a very important idea. The Noahide laws, then, look backwards and try to derive their authority from the Torah itself, from a series of rules given to Noah after the flood. The rule, for example, not to kill, the rule, not to eat blood, and the rule that involves that of not being cruel to animals. The implication that has to be a legal system. So when you look at what the seven Noahide commands are, there’s some disagreement about them in the Talmud, but basically they’re like this. Number one, do not worship idols. Number two, do not curse God. Doesn’t say you must believe in God. It means do not reject the idea of God out of hand. Don’t murder, don’t steal, don’t commit adultery. Don’t be cruel to animals. Don’t take a limb off a living animal. In those days, they didn’t have fridges. They often chuck the leg off, and let the animal go on living until they wanted the other leg.
And finally, you must have courts of law. So these are the 10 principles, which according to the Talmud, a non-Jew who keeps them, has a path to heaven. He’s a good guy. You mistreat that guy with great respect. And of course, because it leaves the question of idolatry open, that’s why there had to be this qualification that Rashi and the Meiri had, to explain what we mean by idolatry. But this again shows, we have never insisted, people think you know, Jews and chosen people, et cetera, that’s hogwash. We have never insisted you have to be one of us to be saved, or to get to heaven. We’ve always said people have different cultures. We have been chosen for our particular culture. Like you know, a centre forward will be chosen for his role, and a goalie will be chosen for his. Doesn’t make him a better person, he’s just better at doing that specific task he was chosen to do.
Leia says, “Thank you very much.” Thank you.
And that ends the session for today everybody, and I hope to see you again soon. Bye.