Biblical Hebrew Blog by ClassicalHebrew.com

The Second Temple Period is one that extends from the return of the first of the exiles in 539 BCE following the declaration of Cyrus, or with the dedication of the Temple in 516 BCE, until the Temple’s destruction in 70 CE.

Throughout this period, the Jewish people were ruled by several different empires and underwent many religious and political changes. From the beginning of the era until Judea was conquered by Alexander the Great in 332 BCE, the Persian Empire ruled the region, enabling religious freedom. Although Judea, led by the High Priest, still enjoyed a relative religious autonomy until Antiochus IV’s decrees, Alexander’s occupation brought about a tremendous cultural change: Judea was now subject to Western influence which would last for the next thousand years, until the Arab conquest in the 7^th Century CE. Subsequent to Alexander’s death, Judea was under various Hellenistic rules: (Egyptian) Ptolemaic and later Seleucid. As a result of the Seleucid king Antiochus IV’s (Epiphanes) decrees against the Jewish religion, a rebellion led by the priestly Hasmonean family erupted in 167 BCE. Judea, led by the Hasmoneans, who also assumed the High Priesthood, gained full independence at around 140 BCE, which lasted until 63 BCE when Judea was conquered by the Roman general, Pompey.

Under Roman rule, Judea remained somewhat independent, as a vassal state, and finally became a Roman province in 4 CE. In 66 CE, the Great Revolt against the Romans broke out, which resulted in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 CE. Still, the Judeans remained the majority in Palestine at least until their next failed attempt at gaining independence in the Bar Kokhbah Revolt (132-135 CE).

There is not much historical and archaeological knowledge of the period prior to the Hasmonean Revolt, but from that point until 70 CE we have many sources. This was a period of major cultural and religious evolution, during which the later biblical books and many of the books of the Pseudepigrapha and Apocrypha were composed. The era was that of the flourishing of the Judean sects, among them the Qumran Sect and its’ writings – the Dead Sea Scrolls. Towards the end of this period Jesus came into action and early Christianity was born.

Interested in learning Biblical Hebrew? Sign up for a trial lesson at www.classicalhebrew.com

The oldest part of Israelite Jerusalem, known as the city of David, is located on a narrow ridge just south of the walls of the current old city of Jerusalem. After conquering Jerusalem from the Jebusites, David established the city as his capital and began to develop it. David’s Jerusalem was extremely small and was populated mainly by the king and his staff. David laid the groundwork for building a royal Acropolis, including a palace, administrative building, and naturally, the Jerusalem temple. It was his son, Solomon, who completed this building project, as well as the wall of the city, which was not completed by David: “Solomon built the Milo and closed the breaches [in the walls] of the city of his father David” (1 Kings 11:27).

The city of David has undergone massive excavations since the 19^th century, revealing public buildings, private houses, water systems and other archaeological findings. These excavations also reveal the slow expansion the city underwent and its extension towards the eastern hills of the area.

Of special importance among the archaeological finds is an ancient water system which enabled the inhabitants of Canaanite Jerusalem to reach a protected accumulation pool outside the city walls using an underground tunnel. This and the 8^th century water system built by king Hezekiah – the impressive Siloam tunnel – show that the need to channel the water from the sources outside the walls to the inhabitants living inside them was crucial to every-day life in Jerusalem.

In recent excavations, the archaeologist Aylat Mazar claims to have found the remnants of the palace of king David, an identification made with the aid of the biblical account.

Interested in learning Biblical Hebrew? Sign up for a trial lesson at www.classicalhebrew.com

The Era of the Judges (roughly 12^th-11^th centuries B.C.E.)

When practicing bible study, we learn that Following Joshua’s death, the Israelites were faced with many enemies surrounding them, from within the land of Canaan as well as the surrounding people. There was no one leader who could unify the people and the Book of Judges tell us of political, moral and religious deterioration at this time.

Confronting the various enemies, different figures took the role of leaders upon themselves as a result of the desperate state inflicted on the people, bringing peace and quiet for limited periods of time. They were called judges, a word denoting not only legal judges but also leaders. These judges were members of different tribes of Israel, ruling sequentially, according to the Book of Judges, although many scholars assume their rule was at parallel times and contained to their own tribes or regions. They were first and foremost military figures, such as Gideon, who beat the Midianites with military cleverness, and Samson, whose incredible personal strength defeated the philistines on many occasions.

At the conclusion of this era, the Israelites were involved in interior conflicts that led to inner-wars and bloodshed, due to the lack of leadership, as the book of Judges tells us (Judges 17:6): “In those days, there was no king in Israel. Every man did what was right in his eyes.” These were resolved by uniting Israel under the rule of King Saul, followed by King David.

Technorati Tags: Book of Judges,biblical history,Israelites,Midianites,Gideon,King Saul,King David

The Book of Psalms

The Psalms, traditionally attributed to King David, are a unique collection of 150 (or in the Septuagint, 151) different short poems, which vary in their genres and purposes. These include songs of praise and thanksgiving, laments, prayers, liturgies, reflections of wisdom concerning different aspects of life, and songs concerning the kingship of Israel and other national matters. There is evidence that some Psalms were used as prayers in the Jerusalem Temple, accompanied by musical instruments, and the varied works have been useful throughout the centuries as prayers expressing an abundance of situations which may come upon believers. The call “Praise the Lord! Give thanks to YHWH for he is good, for his mercy endures forever!” (Psalms 106:1) has probably been in constant use for over two millennia, and the entire Book of Psalms is central in the religious practices of the Bible-based religions: Judaism and Christianity.

In correspondence with the Pentateuch, the Psalms are divided into five books (Psalms 1-41; 42-72; 73-89; 90-106; 107-150), thus equating the five books of Moses and their importance to the five books of David. The end of each book is marked by a praise of “Amen” or “Hallelujah.”

While reading the Psalms, we can learn much about the religious beliefs and poetic conventions that were current when they were written. In terms of beliefs, they present a happy man as one who delights on the study of Scripture and the Lord’s teachings, they glorify the God of Israel and the world He created, and mention the belief in a chosen Messiah. As for the characteristics of poetry, they teach us about the way a poetic line is built, the customary rhythm, and parallelism: an ancient convention which was popular throughout the Ancient Near East, as for example in Psalm 33:10: “YHWH dismisses the counsel of the nations // frustrates the thoughts of the peoples.”

Technorati Tags: The Book of Psalms,King David,words of wisdom,praise,thanksgiving,prayers,Jerusalem Temple,Judaism,Christianity,scripture,Messiah,Ancient Near East