The Question of Exile
In 70 CE, the Romans succeeded in suppressing the Jerusalem’s revolt. The temple was destroyed, along with most of Jerusalem’s buildings. The fighters were executed, and many of the community leaders were captured and sold as slaves. Some of Jerusalem’s inhabitants were deported from the city, but the Romans definitely did not deport the entire population of Judea from the country. Nowhere in the Roman historical records is there any mention of deportation of Judea’s population. 160
The historic records, as well as extensive research conducted by historians over many centuries, especially in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, prove that the Romans did not deport the entire Palestinian population who believed in Judaism after recapturing Jerusalem in 70 CE. It is true that Titus’s soldiers plundered Jerusalem after they destroyed the temple; it is true that thousands of Palestinians lost their lives in that war; it is true that the Romans crucified the captive rebels; it is true that many Jewish Palestinians were enslaved; it is true that Jerusalem and its inhabitants were subjected to the worst merciless rules. However, the Romans did not deport the Palestinian Jews.
Jewish historian Heinrich Graetz published his book History of the Jews in 1853. He describes the fall of the Second Temple and compares the event with the destruction of the First Temple:
It would indeed be difficult to describe the suffering of those who were taken captive in the war . . . Youths under the age of sixteen and most of the female captives were sold into slavery at an incredibly low price, for the market was glutted. . . .All these calamities came with such crushing force on the remaining Jews that they felt utterly at a loss as to what they should do. 161
Then he describes the fate of the rebels of the Bar Kokhba revolt (132–135 CE):
Thus all the warriors were destroyed, all the towns and villages laid waste, and the land literally converted into a desert. The prisoners, mostly women and children, were dragged by the thousands to the slave markets of Hebron and Gaza, where they were sold . . . Many fugitives, however, fled to Arabia, whence that country obtained its Jewish population, which played so important a part in its history. 162
It is clear that Graetz does not speak of exiling the entire population of Judea. The Russian Jewish historian Simon Dubnow (1860–1941), makes no mention of deportation either. Dubnow, in his book The History of the World, does not create the image of the Jewish people going into exile after the destruction of the temple, and it is clear in his writings that the Jewish people were not forcibly uprooted from their country. 163 Joseph Klausner, professor of history at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, in his five-volume book The History of the Second Temple, describes the events of the Zealots’ revolt, praises the fighters’ courage and the tragic end of the siege of Masada, and closes with the following words:
Thus ended the great uprising and the most glorious war for liberty in antiquity. The fall of the Second Temple was complete. No self-rule, not even internal autonomy worthy of the name, remained in Judea. Enslavement, corpses, ruins—such were the sights wherein the second destruction was revealed in all its horror. 164
Klausner did not add expulsion to his description of the destruction of the temple, as it would have contradicted the fact that sixty years later another mass uprising (Bar Kokhba) broke out within the Judean population that had not been exiled.
The Roman historian Cassius Dio and Eusebius, the bishop of Caesarea and the author of Ecclesiastical History, wrote about the brutal suppression of the Bar Kokhba uprising, but clearly stated that Judean masses were not exiled in 135 CE. The name of Judea was changed to Provincia Palestina, but in the second century CE it remained predominantly populated by Judeans and Samaritans, and continued to flourish after the end of the revolt. 165
So what was the origin of the great story about the exiling of the Jewish people following the destruction of the temple? Chaim Milikowsky, a scholar at Bar-Ilan University, has found evidence in numerous contemporary rabbinical sources that the term galut (exile) was used in the second and third centuries CE to indicate political subjugation rather than deportation. Israel Jacob Yuval, a historian at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, suggests that the concept of exile came late and was based on the Christian belief that the Jews were exiled in punishment for their rejection and crucifixion of Jesus. Other Christian authors suggest that the presence of Jews outside Jerusalem was a punishment and proof of their sins. With the triumph of Christianity in the early fourth century CE, Jewish believers began to adopt the concept of exile as a divine punishment. 166
The concept of exile was essential to defining the concept of salvation in Judaism. Exile means that the existing suffering will continue until the coming of the true Messiah. Salvation will come when Messiah comes; and only then will the masses return to Jerusalem and the dead be resurrected. The devotees of the Old Testament rejected the Christian salvation concept: “Jesus brought salvation with his sacrifice when he was crucified.” The Jews did not seek to return to Jerusalem; the few who did so were denounced as false messiahs. A number of rabbinical prohibitions forbade trying to hasten salvation by migrating to Palestine. 167
The claim that the story of the Jews being dispersed throughout the world originated with the original Jerusalem deportees was essential for the concept of the exile and salvation, as well as for the concept of the “chosen people.” This concept is a continuation of the old tale about the origin of the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob being migrants to Palestine from Mesopotamia.
It is clear to all historians that there was no deportation of the Palestinian Jews from Palestine after the revolts of 67–70 CE and 132–135 CE. This fact raises an important question: what was the fate of the inhabitants? Over the centuries following the revolts, the population demographics of Palestine had changed; Jewish believers declined over time and became a minority. Zionist historians Yitzhak Baer and Ben-Zion Dinur invented a new exile theory, “exile without expulsion,” attributing this decline to an exile in the seventh century CE and assigning it to the Muslims who conquered the Romans six centuries after the Palestinian revolts against Rome. They claimed that the invasion of the country by the Arabs in the seventh century CE resulted in a seizure of Jewish-owned lands and the influx of a large Muslim population from Arabia, which changed the country’s demographic character. Emperor Hadrian’s decrees in the second century CE had expropriated lands, but the arrival of the Muslims accelerated the process and led to the emigration of the Jews and the creation of a new national majority in the country. Until that time, the Jews had constituted the majority of the population. “The arrival of the new settler-conquerors altered the country’s cultural morphology and put an end to the presence of the Jewish people in Palestine.” 168
This new concept of exile does not have any historical support. The army that conquered the region between 638 and 643 CE was a relatively small force, estimated at 46,000 troops, and the bulk was sent on to other fronts on the borders of the Byzantine Empire. 169 Only a small number of troops were stationed in Palestine and brought their families along; they probably seized land. This small number could hardly have made a serious change in the population of the country.
In 324 CE, the province of Palestine became a Christian protectorate, and a large part of the population became Christian. Many Jews converted to Christianity; however, the conversion did not eliminate the Jewish presence in the country. Palestine continued to have a diverse population made up of Christians, Jewish believers, Samaritans, and pagan peasantry.
Ben-Zion Dinur, in his book Israel in Exile, states that the Prophet Mohammad stressed in a famous letter to the army commanders: “Every person, whether a Jew or Christian, who becomes a Muslim is one of the Believers, with the same rights and duties. Anyone who clings to his Judaism or Christianity is not to be converted and must pay the poll tax incumbent upon every adult, male or female, free or bond.” 170 The Jews, who had suffered harsh persecution under the Byzantine Empire, welcomed the new conquerors. Jewish and Muslim records reported that some Jewish fugitives, who had escaped the oppression of the Byzantine Empire returned with the victorious Arab forces. Under Islam, Jews were allowed to enter Jerusalem. 171
It is believed by many researchers that a large percentage of the Palestine population converted to Islam. The similarity between Islam and the other two monotheistic religions encouraged Jewish, Christian, and Samaritan believers to convert to Islam. Muslims did not have to pay taxes, while the other monotheisms were paying poll taxes. It is believed that relief from taxes was an encouraging factor behind the Islamization of significant segments of the Palestinian population.
Abraham Polak, the founder of the department of Middle Eastern and African History at Tel Aviv University, wrote an essay about the origin of the Arabs of the land of Israel. Polak believed that the population of the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean mingled with its neighbors, its captives, and its conquerors: Greeks, Persians, Arabs, Egyptians, and Crusaders. Polak assumed that there was a considerable likelihood that Judeans did convert to Islam, meaning that there was a demographic continuity in the agrarian “people of the land.” 172
Israel Belkind, who settled in Palestine in 1882 as one of the first Zionists, believed in the close historical connection between the ancient inhabitants of Palestine and the Palestinian peasants of the nineteenth century. He wrote in his book The Arabs in Eretz Israel, “The historians are accustomed to say that after the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, the Jews were scattered all over the world. But this . . . is a historical error.” The subsequent uprisings demonstrated that most of the Judeans had continued to live in their country for a long time. Belkind continues, “The land was abandoned by the upper strata, the scholars, the Torah men, to whom the religion came before the country; perhaps, too, so did many of the mobile urban people. But the tillers of the soil remained attached to their land.” 173
Ber Borchow, the leader of the Zionist left, wrote in his essay “On the Issue of Zion and the Territory”:
The local population in Palestine is racially more closely related to the Jews than to any other people, even among the Semitic ones. It is quite probable that the fellahin in Palestine are direct descendants of the Jewish and Canaanite rural population, with a slight admixture of Arab blood. For it is known that the Arabs, being proud conquerors, mingled very little with the populations in the countries they conquered All the tourists and travelers confirm that, except for Arabic language, it is impossible to distinguish between a Sephardic porter and an Arab laborer or Fellah Hence, the racial difference between the diaspora Jews and the Palestinian fellahin is no more marked than between Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews. 174
Borchow founded the Poale Zion movement (Jewish Social Democratic Party), a Marxist Zionist movement, in the early twentieth century. David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s future prime minister, and Itzhak Ben-Zvi, Israel’s future president, joined this party. In 1918, when both were in New York, they wrote a book entitled Eretz Israel in the Past and in the Present. The second chapter of the book was composed by Ben-Gurion in full agreement with his coauthor, and dealt with the history and present situation of the fellahin (agricultural laborers) in Palestine:
The fellahin are not descendants of the Arab conquerors, who captured Eretz Israel and Syria in the seventh century CE. The Arab victors did not destroy the agricultural population they found in the country. They expelled only the alien Byzantine rulers, and did not touch the local population. Nor did the Arabs go in for settlement. Even in their former habitations, the Arabians did not engage in farming . . . They did not seek new lands on which to settle their peasantry, which hardly existed. Their whole interest in the new countries was political, religious and material: to rule, to propagate Islam and to collect taxes. . . .
To argue that after the conquest of Jerusalem by Titus and the failure of the Bar Kokhba revolt Jews altogether ceased to cultivate the land of Eretz Israel is to demonstrate complete ignorance The Jewish farmer, like any other farmer, was not easily torn from his soil, which had been watered with his sweat and the sweat of his forebears Despite the repression and suffering, the rural population remained unchanged. 175
In 1929 Ben-Zvi published a new booklet about the same subject. In the new publication he confirmed and emphasized the same ideas about the origin of the Palestinian fellahin. He stressed the mass conversion to Islam in the seventh century CE. In his opinion, it was not only the system of taxation that led many Jews to adopt the conquerors’ religion, but also the fear of being displaced from the soil. Ben-Zvi emphasized, “Obviously it would be mistaken to say that all the fellahin are descendants of the ancient Jews, but it can be said of most of them, or their core The great majority of the fellahin do not descend from the Arab conquerors but before that, from the Jewish fellahin, who were the foundation of this country before its conquest by Islam.” 176
The Arab uprising against the British mandate and the Zionist project in Palestine put an end to the Zionists thinkers’ ideas. Subsequently, the widespread Palestinian revolt of 1936–1939 completely abolished the views of the Zionist historians and leaders that the Palestinian fellahin were the descendants of Palestine’s ancient inhabitants. These ideas were replaced by new, baseless concepts that the rural Palestinians were Arabian immigrants who came in the nineteenth century CE to an almost empty country and continued to arrive in the twentieth century CE as the developing Zionist economy attracted thousands of non-Jewish laborers.
Shlomo Sand summarizes the Zionists’ thinking following the 1936–1939 revolt of the Palestinian masses:
From now on, early Islam did not convert the Jews but simply dispossessed them. The imaginary exile in the seventh century CE came to replace the baseless religious narrative about a mass expulsion after the fall of the Second Temple, as well as the thesis that the Palestinian fel-lahin were the descendants of the people of Judea. . . .
[The] mass conversion to Judaism that produced great Jewish communities around the Mediterranean left almost no trace in the national historiography . . . The honor of belonging to the deportees from Jerusalem fortified the spirit of the believers and reinforced their identity. . . .
Had the memory of the mass conversion to Judaism been preserved, it might have eroded the metanarrative about the biological unity of the Jewish people, whose genealogical roots were believed to trace back all the way to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob—not to a heterogenous mosaic of human populations.” 177
To summarize, within the Common Era, some Jews were physically removed from Palestine at various points in history, while others remained in Palestine and carried on with their lives. Some Jews outside of Palestine—in Europe, for example— are indeed descendants of a diaspora; others, however, are descended from native Europeans who converted to Judaism. Furthermore, modern Palestinians can trace part of their lineage to Jews who never left.
Proselytism and Conversion
Historical records tell us that long before 70 CE there were Jewish believers all over the Roman Empire, as well as in the Parthian territory in the east, exceeding the number of Jewish inhabitants in Palestine. According to the American historian Salo Baron, there were eight million Jews in the first century CE. Arthur Ruppin and Adolf von Harnack suggested the number to be around four million.
The origin of the Jewish community in Babylon was related to the exile of the Judean elites after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. The origin of the Jewish communities in Egypt and the Mediterranean was related to the invasion of Persian territories by Alexander the Great. According to Josephus, “Following the conquest of Judea and Samaria by Ptolemy I, one of Alexander’s successors, many captives were taken to Egypt, where they became settled as respected citizens with equal rights There were not a few other Jews who, of their own accord, went to Egypt, as invited by the goodness of its soil, and by the liberty of Ptolemy.” During the Macedonian rule, the boundaries of the empire disintegrated and trade and ideas spread over the entire region, creating a new and open culture. There were Jewish believers in Cyrenaica, west of Egypt, which was also ruled by Ptolemy. Jewish believers also lived in Antioch; the Seleucid king Antiochus III settled two thousand families of Jewish mercenaries from Babylonia in Asia Minor.
In his book on the history of the Israeli people, Israeli historian Menahem Stern states the various factors behind the spread of Jewish believers outside Palestine. He includes deportation, political and religious pressures in Judea, economic opportunities in new countries, and a proselytizing movement that began in the early days of the Second Temple and reached its climax in the first century CE.
Definitely there were enslaved Judean captives who were transported to Egypt, North Africa, Asia Minor, and Syria; and there were certainly merchants, mercenaries, and scholars who emigrated from Judea and Babylon; however, the large number of Jewish believers outside Palestine in the first century CE cannot be accounted for by these factors alone. In almost all the narratives produced by the proto-Zionists and even Zionist historians, conversion is mentioned as one reason for the vast presence of Jewish believers throughout the ancient world before the fall of the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 CE. 178
It is assumed that Judaism has always been an exclusive religion that harbored an extreme reluctance to accept Gentiles. This conduct prevailed during the period between Ezra in the fifth century BCE and the Maccabean revolt in the second century BCE. During the Persian period, most biblical texts promoted the principle of an exclusive “sacred seed”; however, some of the texts, such as the Second Isaiah, the book of Ruth, the book of Jonah, and the apocryphal book of Judith, call on Judaism to accept Gentiles.
The Palestinian exiles in Babylon developed their religious ideas under the influence of Persian culture and religious concepts, which led to monotheism. Those who returned to Jerusalem when Cyrus ended their exile established an exclusive cult that was intolerant of the other inhabitants of the country. The majority of the Babylonian exiles—the founders of Judaism—remained in Babylon and made it their permanent home. The intellectuals established rabbinical schools that refined Judaism and continued to provide the returnees with the material and spiritual logistics that helped transform religious belief in Palestine toward monotheism. “The Babylonian Talmud created there was esteemed more highly than the Jerusalem Talmud, because it had emerged from a more elevated cultural context.” 179
The Hasmonean revolt of 167–160 BCE was the turning point in the history of monotheism. This revolt succeeded in establishing an autonomous religious regime, which emerged into an independent kingdom that ruled over most of Palestine. The Hasmonean kingdom was the first state that unquestionably deserved to be described as monotheistic. At the same time, it was a Hellenistic one. What the Maccabees drove out of Judea was not Hellenism but polytheism. They did indeed rebel against unclean religious practices, and they were antagonistic toward idolatrous tendencies, but at the same time they adopted the Hellenistic culture. Hellenism was instrumental in injecting Judaism with anti-tribal universalism, which guided the Hasmoneans toward opening up the Jewish cult to all the inhabitants of Palestine. As such they abandoned the concept of exclusivity and adopted the policy of proselytism and propagating Judaism to neighboring regions. They converted the inhabitants of all of Palestine to Judaism, and they made it their mission to spread the new religion around the Mediterranean community. Jewish migrants began to leave Judea for all the centers of the Hellenistic world, spreading their Jewish faith to all people.
This was perhaps the first time in history that a clearly monotheistic religion combined with a political government: the sovereign became a priest. Like other single-deity religions that would hold power in the future, the Hasmonean theocracy used the sword to spread not only its territorial domain but also its religious following. And with the historical option of cultural Hellenization came the possibility of conversion to Judaism. The boundaries opened in both directions. 180
Forced Conversion Policy
When Yohanan Hyrcanus conquered Idumaea in 125 BCE, he Judaized its inhabitants by force. According to Josephus, “Hyrcanus took also Dora and Marissa, cities of the Idumaea, and subdued all the Idumaeans, and permitted them to stay in the country, if they would circumcise their genitals, and make the use of the laws of the Jews.” The Idumaeans probably were originally Phoenicians and Nabataeans; their territory was about half the size of Judea. The converted Jews of Idumaea intermarried with the Judeans, and some of them played important roles in the history of the Hasmonean kingdom. Herod the Great came from among them. The most extreme Zealots in the great revolt were of Idumaean descent.
In 104–103 BCE, Hyrcanus’s son Judas Aristobulus annexed Galilee and forced its Iturean inhabitants to convert to Judaism. Judeans had probably lived in Galilee earlier; at that time, however, it was populated and governed by the Itureans, who were Phoenicians and tribal Arabs by origin. Many of the Itureans became devout Jews. John of Gischala and Simon bar Giora, the Zealot leaders in the great revolt, were descended from converts.
Proselytization outside Palestine
Following the conquest of Judea and Samaria by Ptolemy, many captives were taken to Egypt, followed by waves of migrants who settled in Alexandria. The Alexandrian philosopher Philo Judaeus stated that the Jews in Egypt in the first century CE numbered one million.
Alexandria was one of the leading cultural centers of the Hellenistic world. The translation of the Babylonian Talmud to the Greek language started in Alexandria as early as the third century BCE. It is most likely that the entire Bible was translated over many years by a large group of scholars. The purpose of the translation was to spread monotheism among the Gentiles. The Hasmoneans sent missionaries to Alexandria for the same purpose. Proselytization was carried out through the proliferating synagogues, which were attractive houses of prayer that appealed to many Gentiles. The full conversion of many of the Gentiles accounted for the millions of Jews around the southeastern Mediterranean.
During Ptolemy’s rule, a large number of Jews lived in Cyrenaica (current east Libya), west of Egypt. The Jewish community expanded over time in this region and was very influential. The years 115 to 117 CE witnessed serious unrest in Cyrenaica. The Jewish believers declared war against the gods of the pagans, uprooting their shrines and attacking the worshippers. This uprising, which was led by a messianic figure called Loukuas, apparently extended to Alexandria and Cyprus. 181
The first mention of Judaism in Roman documents was in relationship to Jewish proselytizing activities. According to Valerius Maximus, Jews were deported to their places of origin in 139 BCE because they tried to convert Romans. The Roman historians Tacitus and Cassius Dio reported that in 19 CE, the emperor Tiberius exiled thousands of Jews and their followers to the island of Sardinia. In 49–50 CE, Claudius expelled Jews from Rome for their missionary activities. The polytheist Romans tolerated all beliefs, however, including Judaism and Christianity. The expulsion and deportation were not standard policy against Jewish or Christian preachers in general. Overall, Jews and Christians were allowed to spread their beliefs.
By the beginning of the first century CE, every Roman city had a large Jewish population ranging from 10 to 15 percent of the total population. Just before the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE, there were Jewish believers all over the Roman Empire. The Jews in each of the cities maintained an identity separate from the other inhabitants through their religious belief in one single God (monotheism), their dietary rules, circumcision, and their observance of the Sabbath. These customs and rules prevented them from assimilating with the rest of the population, so their communities survived around their synagogues. The concept of monotheism received more acceptance from the urban communities, compared to polytheist beliefs in many gods, each associated with a particular force of nature. Judaism became so attractive in the Greek and Roman cities that it was poised to become the universal religion of the urban masses of the empire. However, it faced two major obstacles: circumcision and dietary rules. To overcome this, a special category of believers emerged, the “God fearers” who attended synagogues. They were considered a separate class of Jews, as they were not prepared to undergo circumcision or abide by the dietary rules. 182
Damascus was a flourishing Hellenistic center second only to Alexandria, and conversion to Judaism there was even greater than in Egypt. Similar activity took place in Antioch. Josephus, in his book The Wars of the Jews, described the situation in Antioch: “[The Jews] multiplied to a great number and adorned their temple gloriously by fine ornaments, and with great magnificence, in the use of what had been given them. They also made proselytes of a great many of the Greeks perpetually, and thereby, after a sort, brought them to be a portion of their own body.” 183
The rulers of the kingdom of Adiabene converted to Judaism from Ashurism in the first century CE. Adiabene was located north of Mesopotamia, near what is known now as Kurdistan and Armenia. Queen Helena of Adiabene went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, where she helped the Judeans to survive a severe drought, and she was buried in the holy city. A military unit from Adiabene took part in the defense of Jerusalem against the Romans in 70 CE. 184
The biblical book of Esther was composed in the late Persian period, probably after the conquest of Alexander the Great. It tells the story of the triumph of Mordecai and Esther over Haman in faraway Persia: “And many of the people of the land became Jews: for the fear of the Jews fell upon them” (Esther 8:17).
In short, there were Jewish believers all over the Roman Empire, as well as in the Parthian territory in the northeastern region of Persia, that exceeded the number of inhabitants of Palestine. Uriel Rapaport wrote in his 1965 doctoral thesis: “Given its great scale, the expansion of Judaism in the ancient world cannot be accounted for by natural increase, such as migration; proselytization and conversion was a major factor.” 185
In the third century CE, the number of Jews throughout the Mediterranean region declined gradually as a result of the rise of Christianity. As mentioned above, circumcision and strict dietary rules were considered obstacles for many people who were attracted to monotheistic religions. Many people preferred to become Christians than to follow these practices or be treated as a different class (i.e., “god fearers”). The Jewish uprising in Cyrenaica in 115–117 CE and the Bar Kokhba revolt in Judaea in 132–135 began to weaken the forces of Judaism, reducing the numbers of people wishing to join the religion. When Christianity became the state religion in the early fourth century, conversion to Judaism almost stopped completely.
Proselytism after the Fourth Century CE
Judaism in North and South Arabia
In the fourth century CE and beyond, Judaism continued its proselytization efforts in the lands that had not yet been exposed to monotheism. Arabia was one target of the Jewish missionaries. At an earlier stage, the Judean merchants had established close relationships with the Nabataeans, and Jews settled in Taima, Khaybar, and Yathrib. Arab tribes in the region of Yathrib—the Qaynuqa, the Quriza, and the Nadir—converted to Judaism. The Arab tribes of Khaybar and Taima also converted to Judaism. However, the triumph of Islam in the early seventh century CE put an end to the spread of Judaism in northern Arabia.
Prior to the rise of Islam, Judaism reached southern Arabia. The kingdom of Himyar adopted monotheism toward the end of the fourth century when, in 378 CE, its king Malik Karib Yuhamin converted to Judaism. Himyar was the name of a large local tribe that dominated the region that is now Yemen; its capital was the city of Zafar, and it was also known as “the kingdom of Saba.” The Himyarites ruled from the last quarter of the fourth century CE to the first quarter of the fifth century CE, between 120 and 150 years. In the middle of the fourth century CE, Constantine II sent a mission to the Himyarites to convert them to Christianity. About the same time, the Ethiopian kingdom of Aksum became Christian.
Several Jewish historians who specialized in the history of the Jews in the Arab world published several books about the subject between the 1920s and the 1950s. However, the subject of Judaizing the Himyarites was abandoned by the education system in Israel, and today’s high school graduates know nothing about it. 186
During the reign of the Jewish Himyarite Surahb’il Yakkaf, a Christian missionary named Azqir was executed in Najran by the king. The conflict between the Ethiopians and the Himyarites continued over the next two centuries. The Ethiopians had the upper hand after the death of Surahb’il. In 525 CE, Christian armies crossed the Red Sea and defeated the Himyarites. In the 570s, the Persians controlled the region, which prevented the complete Christianization of the country. In the seventh century, however, many of the Jews and Christians converted to Islam. 187
The Falashas (Ethiopian Jews)
Ethiopian Jews represent a small percentage of the entire population of Ethiopia. A total of 55,000 Jews immigrated from that country to Israel between 1948 and 1991. The total population of Ethiopia was estimated by the United Nations at fifty million in 1991, while the total number of Jews in the country was less than thirty thousand. According to Ethiopian tradition, half of the population was Jewish before the country was converted to Christianity in the fourth century CE.188 Most Western scholars believe that the Ethiopian Jews are a segment of the indigenous Agau population that converted to Judaism. How and when they were converted is a problem for which historical evidence is lacking. It has been argued that the Jews of Egypt (from the Jewish community in Elephantine, who existed in this location in the fifth century BCE) or the Jews of Yemen may have sent missionaries who converted these African tribes to Judaism. David Kessler states in his book The Falashas that the spread of Judaism in Ethiopia, Yemen, and India was undoubtedly the result of proselytism. 189
Judaism reached many countries, especially around the Mediterranean Sea, long before the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans It is estimated that in the days of Philo of Alexandria, in the first century BCE, there were one million Jews in each of Syria, Egypt, Babylonia and Asia Minor, and that the Diaspora outnumbered the Jews of Palestine by three to one. 190
The word “Falasha” means emigrant or exile. The Ethiopian Jews adopted this term to indicate that they were exiles from the Holy Land into which, when the Messiah arrived, they would be gathered. A study of the Falasha culture presents a new meaning of exile (golah) and the return to Palestine which is religio-spiritual and not historico-political. 191
The Falashas’ faith is based on strict adherence to the teachings of the Torah, the five books of Moses. They do not follow the precepts of the Halachah, or oral law. The codification of the oral law, known as the Talmud, was not completed until about 500 CE, at a time when the Jews of Ethiopia were isolated from their co-religionists in the rest of the world. They had no knowledge of its contents; their position is different from that of the Samaritans, who positively rejected the Halachah and rabbinic authority as a matter of principle. 192
The Jews of India
The Jewish community in India is concentrated into three groups: the Cochin Jews of the Malabar coast, the Bene Israel Jews of greater Bombay, and the Baghdadi Jews of India’s port cities, especially Calcutta and Bombay. The origin of the Jews in these regions is not clear. There are legends in circulation about the origin of the Jews, Christians, and Muslims.
In Cochin the legends talk about the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 CE as the beginning of the Jewish presence on the Malabar coast. King Sthanu Ravi of Kollam granted a decree to Mar Sapir Iso, the founder of the Syrian Christian community in the city of Crananore, in 823 CE. Four Jews named Hassan, Ali, Isaac ben Michael, and Abraham witnessed the event. The king granted the Jews and Christians seventy-two royal privileges. Arabic travelers’ diaries refer to Jewish merchants who reached Kerala as early as the mid-ninth century. A record left by a Jewish traveler, Benjamin of Tudela, that goes back to 1159–1173 refers to the Jewish community of Kerala. He describes the Jews of the twelfth century in Malabar: “All the cities and countries inhabited by these people contain only about one hundred Jews, who are of black colour as well as the other inhabitants. The Jews are good men, observers of the law and possess the Pentateuch, the Prophets and some little knowledge of the Thalmud and its decisions.” The Jews of Cochin came as merchants who settled and preached Judaism. 193 The Jews of the other regions of India came as merchants over a period of several centuries. Through their contacts with local Indian population, they succeeded in spreading Judaism; however, the number of Indians who adopted the faith was limited.
Judaism in North Africa
After the uprising in Cyrenaica against Rome between 115 and 117 CE was put down, the proselytization process slowed down, but did not stop completely. Historians attribute the successful spread of Judaism in the Maghreb to the presence of Phoenicians who populated the coastline.
Although the rate of proselytization slowed down in the third and fourth centuries in Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor, Greece and Italy, it was highly successful along the coast of Magreb. However, most of the Judaizers were of the “God-fearers” class. Ibn Khaldoun, the Muslim historian, lists the Judaized Berber tribes in North Africa: The Jerawa, who inhabited the highlands of Aures; the Nefouca, who lived near today’s Tripoli; the Mediouna, who lived in modern-day western Algeria; and the Fendelaona, Behloula, and Fazaz in today’s Morocco. Proselytization in North Africa targeted the Phoenicians as well as the Berbers. Most historians believe that the great majority of Magreb Jews are of Berber stock.
Dihya al-Kahina, the queen of the Aures, led the resistance against the advancing Muslim armies in 689 CE; however, five years later her forces were defeated and she was killed on the battlefield. Her sons converted to Islam and joined the Muslim army, which conquered all of North Africa, all the way to the Atlantic Ocean. Only Ceuti, a small city on the extreme western end of North Africa, remained in Roman hands. Julian, the governor of the city, was an ambitious officer who defended the besieged city, and after he failed to get support from the Visigoths, he made peace with the Muslims.
Khazaria
Khazaria was a large geographical area that occupied a strategic position between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea (which was known as the Khazar Sea), where the great eastern powers of the period confronted each other. It acted as a buffer protecting Byzantium from the tribesmen of the northern steppes. Khazaria also played a vital role in blocking the Arab invasion of Eastern Europe in the seventh century CE. The Khazars were a “Turkic” tribe who moved to what became known as Khazaria from the Asian steppes in the fifth century CE. They were described by the Arabic historian Ibn-Said al-Maghribi as having blue eyes, light skin, and reddish hair. They were under the control and protection of the Huns; when Huns’ empire collapsed, they fell under the control and protection of another power known as the West Turkish Empire or the Turkut Kingdom. With the collapse of the Turkut Kingdom in the middle of the seventh century CE, Khazaria became an independent kingdom, controlling a large territory that stretched from Kiev in the northwest to the Crimean Peninsula in the south, and from the upper Volga to present-day Georgia. During the first decades of the seventh century and prior to the rise of Islam, the Middle East was dominated by a triangle of powers: Byzantium, Persia, and Khazaria.194 Khazaria preserved its political independence and economic interest through ever-shifting alliances with the powers surrounding them, as well as trade and marriage.
Persian records of the sixth century indicate that the Khazars invaded the Sassanid kingdom and got as far as Mosul in modern-day Iraq. In the early seventh century, during the reign of the Persian king Khosrau II, an alliance between Persia and Khazaria was established after the Persian king married the Khazar king’s daughter. This alliance allowed Persia to build fortifications in the passes of the Caucasus Mountains. Armenian and Byzantine records reveal that, in the seventh century, the Khazar kingdom formed an alliance with Byzantium. Justinian II married a Khazar princess, Theodora. In 732 CE, Emperor Leo III married the kagan’s daughter; their son became the emperor who was known as Leo the Khazar.
Arabic sources describe many battles between the Muslims and the Khazars. The last was in the 730s CE, when the Muslim commander Marwan II—who became the last Umayyid caliph—defeated the Khazars. In return for an end to the Muslim offense, the kagan (the Khazar king) agreed to convert to Islam. It was then agreed that the final boundary between Khazaria and the Muslim world would be the Caucasus Mountains. 195
The early Khazars were shamanists who worshiped spirits and the sky. The supreme ruler of the Khazars was a sacred religious figure. The kagan continued to be the supreme ruler until the 830s when a new position was created: the “bec,” who handled secular state affairs in the kingdom, including all military expeditions. 196
The twin city of Khazaran-Atil was the capital, located in eastern Khazaria, on the lower Volga near the Caspian Sea. It was the most important trading center of the Khazar Empire. The eastern half of the city, known as Khazaran, was populated by many Muslim merchants and crafters, who originated from Khwarizm and eastern Iran. The western half of the city, Atil, was where the kagan and the bek lived. Sarkel was an important fortress located on the left bank of the Don River. Built in the 830s, it served as a defensive fortification. 197
Khazaria was a major center for trade, especially in the eighth and ninth centuries. The Khazars controlled several trade routes that connected Asia and Europe, and required traders to pay customs duties on merchandise transported by both land and water routes. Khazaria held fertile land, especially in the south; however, its prosperity was dependent on trade income and the tributes paid by the Bulgars, Magyars, Burtas, and other vassals. 198
Religious Influence in Khazaria
At the beginning of the eighth century the world was divided into two superpowers: Christianity and Islam. The Khazar Empire represented a third force. It relied on its military strength and its control over several vassal tribes to preserve its position. The kings of Khazaria, through their contacts with Byzantium and Muslims, realized that their outdated and primitive shamanism did not give them the spiritual and legal authority which the Muslim caliph and the Byzantine emperor enjoyed. 199 Conversion to either Christianity or Islam would have meant submission and the end of independence. Embracing the third monotheistic religion, Judaism, represented the ideal solution.
The Khazarian kagans were familiar with all three religions. Judaism had had roots in the country for many centuries. Archaeological evidence indicates that Jews have lived in the Balkans, in the Caucasus (including Georgia), along the northern shores of the Black Sea, and in other areas of Eastern Europe since Roman times. Jewish settlements and synagogues existed in Pannonia (modern-day Hungary) as early as the third century CE. Jews also lived in northern Bulgaria. In the premedieval period, thousands of Jews from Egypt, Judea, Syria, and Asia Minor migrated to the Hellenistic kingdom of Bosporus.
The anti-Jewish policies of the Byzantine Empire forced many Jews to escape to safer territories, and Khazaria was an ideal refuge. Around 630–632 CE, the Byzantine emperor Heraclius decreed that all Jews in his empire must convert to Christianity. A similar policy was adopted by Emperor Leo III around 722–723 CE. By the end of the ninth century, Byzantine laws decreed that Jews could not hold public office, intermarry with Christians, or own Christian slaves. Jews were not allowed to construct new synagogues, and if a Jew tried to convert a Christian, he would be killed and his property would be confiscated. Many Jews escaped from Byzantium and migrated to Khazaria. 200
During the first half of the ninth century, King Bulan of Khazaria converted to Judaism. According to several medieval sources, a religious debate between an Arab mullah, a Christian priest, and a Jewish rabbi took place at Bulan’s palace prior to his decision to adopt Judaism. 201 Many historians believe that the presence of the migrant Jews and their active proselytizing activities influenced the decision of the Khazars to convert to Judaism. However many historians believe that the Khazars kings adopted Judaism as a conscious political decision designed to help preserve the political independence of Khazaria from the Christian and Muslim empires surrounding them. Adopting Islam would have made them subjects of the caliph. Adopting Christianity would have subordinated themselves to the Eastern Empire. 202 Conversion to Judaism allowed them to remain independent.
Many medieval documents indicate that the Jews had great influence over Khazarian affairs. According to these sources, many of the Khazar people became Jewish. At the beginning, Judaism was restricted to Khazaria’s royalty and nobility, but it started to spread widely in the second half of the ninth century. Many Jews immigrated from Byzantium after the Khazar royal family converted to Judaism. The refugees were of a superior culture, which led to a significant transformation of the Khazarians who adopted Judaism. The exiles brought with them arts and crafts, and new technology for agriculture and trade. They also introduced the Hebrew alphabet to Khazaria.
The Vikings in Khazaria
In the 830s, the Khazar kagan and bek asked the emperor of Byzantium Theophilus to assist them in building the Sarkel fortress. This project was one of many defensive moves to protect Khazaria from formidable newcomers from the north, whom the West called Vikings or Northmen and the East called the Rus or Varangians. The Rus originated from eastern Scandanavia, while the Vikings who raided Western Europe were Norwegians and Danes. After the Rus crossed the Baltic and the Gulf of Finland, they sailed up the River Volhov into Lake Ilmen, south of Leningrad, where they built the city of Novgorod in northern Russia.
The Varangian-Rus had the traits of pirates, robbers, and merchants. They bartered furs, swords, and amber in exchange for gold, but their principal merchandise consisted of slaves. They were constantly raiding the Slavs and taking them as prisoners to be sold as slaves to the Khazars and the Bulgars. Between 830–930 CE, the plundering raids of the Rus were mainly directed against Byzantium, whereas their relations with the Khazars were essentially on a trading basis. The Khazars were able to control the trade routes and collected 10 percent tax on all cargoes passing through their country to Byzantium and to the Muslim lands. They also exerted some cultural influence on the Northmen. 203
The Varangian-Rus activities expanded from their settlement of Novgorod to the entire Slavonic territory, including Kiev. At the beginning, the tribute from the Slavonic tribes was divided between the Khazars and the Varangians. In 862 CE, the Rus annexed the important town of Kiev on the Dnieper and made it their new capital, replacing Novgorod. This was an important and decisive event in Russian-Khazarian relations, although it happened without a war. The Khazars accepted this change in the town and province of Kiev. The influential Khazar-Jewish community continued to live in this region. 204
Armed conflict between Byzantium and the Rus continued intermittently over the next two centuries. However, with the help of the church, a diplomatic and friendly relationship eventually developed and grew over time to reach the level of an alliance. At the beginning of the tenth century, Rus and other Nordic mercenaries served as the elite “Varangian Guard” of the Byzantine emperor. The treaties of 945 and 971 stated the willingness of Kiev rulers to provide Byzantium with troops on request. Trade between the two parties was expanded and regulated. Rus visitors were allowed to enter Constantinople and their fleets were allowed to sail through the Bosphorus. 205 In 988 CE, Vladimir, Svyatoslav’s son, adopted the faith of the Greek Orthodox Church. A few years later, Greek Christianity became the official religion of the Rus people, and from 1037 onward the Russian church was governed by the patriarch of Constantinople. This event was a momentous triumph of Byzantine diplomacy, and a turning point in the history of the region. Vladimir’s decision was a political one, as the Russians at that time needed allies, and the Byzantine Empire was the most desirable ally in terms of power, culture, and trade. 206
The Muslim lands in the southern half of Khazaria, near the Caspian Sea— Azerbaijan, Jilan, Shirwan, Tabaristan, and Jurjan—were tempting targets for the Rus fleets, both for plunder and for conducting trade and commercial activities with the Muslims. The relationship between the Rus and the Khazars changed in the tenth century from intensive trading to hostility and war. Under the leadership of Svyatoslav, the Rus launched a vicious war campaign against Khazaria. In 965 CE, they destroyed Sarkel, and around 975–977 CE, attacked Atil. Some historians regard Svyatoslav’s victories in both battles as the end of Khazaria; most, however, including Toynbee, state that the Rus only succeeded in destroying the Khazar Steppe-empire in the second half of the tenth century. 207
Following the Russian attack on Atil, the Khazar state became weaker. Their capital was rebuilt, and they managed to survive inside their shrunken frontiers until the middle of the twelfth or even the thirteenth century when their territory became part of the Mongol Empire. The Khazars continued to be mentioned in the Arabic and Russian records going back to the twelfth century. The Russians referred to Khazaria at the time as the “Jewish country” or the “Kingdom of the Red Jews.” 208
It is accepted by most historians that the Khazars, after their defeat by the Rus in 965, lost their empire but retained their independence within narrower frontiers until the thirteenth century, when their lands became part of the Mongol Empire. According to the Jewish historian Baron, before and after the Mongol invasion, the Khazars sent many offshoots into the unsubdued Slavonic lands, helping to build up the great Jewish centers of Eastern Europe.
The first Jewish groups to move to Eastern Europe from Khazaria were the Magyars and the Kabars, who moved to what came to be known as Hungary in 896. In the tenth century, Duke Taksony of Hungary invited a second wave of Khazar emigrants to settle there. Around 962 CE, several Slavonic tribes formed an alliance under the leadership of their strongest tribes, the Polans, which became the nucleus of the Polish state. Jewish immigrants from Khazaria were welcomed in the new state as they were considered a valuable asset to the country’s economy. In the fourteenth century, the two nations—the Polish and the Lithuanians—formed a united commonwealth. In the new state the Jews were granted the right to maintain their own synagogues, schools and courts; to hold property, and to engage in any trade or occupation they chose. Over time the Jewish community in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth flourished; it is estimated that in the seventeenth century, the number of Jews in this kingdom grew to over 500,000. It is also estimated that, around that time, the total Jewish population of the world amounted to about one million, the majority of whom were Khazars, who had moved mainly to Poland, Lithuania, Hungary, and the Balkans after the Mongol invasions.
Many historians, whether Austrian, Israeli, or Polish, have argued independently from each other that the mainstream of Jewish migrations did not flow from the Mediterranean across France and Germany to the east and then back again; rather, it moved in a westerly direction from the Caucasus through the Ukraine into Poland and thence into Central Europe. The numerical ratio of the Khazar to the Semitic and other contributions is impossible to establish, but the cumulative evidence makes one inclined to agree with the consensus of Polish historians: “In early times, the main bulk originated from the Khazar country.” Of course, nobody can deny that Jews of different origin also contributed to the existing Jewish world community.
Proselytizing activities played a major role in spreading Judaism among many nations and people. It started as early as the second century BCE, and reached its peak between the fall of the Jewish state in Palestine and the rise of Christianity. Many upper-class families in Italy were converted, as well as the royal family which ruled the province of Adiabene. Philo of Alexandria speaks of numerous converts in Greece; Flavius Josephus relates that a large proportion of the population of Antioch was Judaized; St. Paul met with proselytes on his travels more or less everywhere from Athens to Asia Minor.
Maurice Fishberg, the early twentieth century anthropologist, said: “It is indeed the crucial point in anthropology of the Jews: are they of pure race, modified more or less by environmental influences, or are they a religious sect composed of racial elements acquired by proselytism and intermarriage during their migration in various parts of the world?” History shows that Judaism is a religion that was developed in the Near East, adopted by the inhabitants of what is now Palestine, and over centuries became the religion of other people. Jews are not an ethnic group, but many people of different racial backgrounds who adopted Judaism.
Judaism in Spain and the Inquisition
The beginning of the spread of Judaism in Spain goes back to the first century CE. Christian and Jewish missionaries were in almost every city around the Mediterranean. Paul was preaching to pagans and Jews in Asia Minor, Greece, Italy, North Africa, and the Iberian Peninsula. Jewish believers were in all these regions, and proselytism was successful, as monotheism was attractive to the citizens of the Roman Empire around the Mediterranean. As mentioned above, some historians estimated the number of Jewish believers outside Palestine at the beginning of the Common Era to be around eight million people. The records of the early Christian Church show that wherever a Christian missionary appeared, he found Jews already established. 209 Spain (Hispania) was one of the most prosperous provinces of the Roman Empire.
During the reign of Emperor Caracalla in 222 CE, Spain’s inhabitants were granted citizenship, and participated in flourishing commerce. Spain was known for its rich soil and mild climate; in addition, it was rich in ores such as gold and silver. The Spanish cities had an infrastructure similar to that of the Roman cities: aqueducts, bridges, amphitheaters, temples, arches, and great administrative buildings. 210
Jewish life in Spain flourished during this era. “Archeological remains all along the Spanish coast attest to the density of Jewish settlement in this period Jews mixed freely among their neighbors and were generally regarded with favor.” 211 They did not live as isolated individuals or families but as organized communities, that were cohesive and traditional, but at the same time remained connected with the surrounding society. The Jewish community had a substantial and influential presence, and some rabbis were held in high esteem by many Christians.
This favorable situation did not last for long. A historical ecclesiastical council convened in Elvira in the year 306 CE. The participants were concerned about the close relations between neighboring Christians and Jews. The council of Elvira issued instructions to the Christian community regarding this issue:
It seems appropriate to warn farmers not to permit that their fruits, which they receive from God as a gift of grace, be blessed by Jews so that our blessing should not appear as worthless and despised; if anyone continues to act in such a manner despite our prohibition, he will be driven away from the Church. . . .
If any of the priests or believers eats his meal with a Jew, we decide that he does not participate in the communion so that he atone. 212
After Constantine’s conversion to Christianity, the status of the Jews in Spain changed. The officials of the Spanish administration followed the hostile position of the Church.
In 409 CE, Spain was overrun by different German tribes: the Suevi, the Vandals, the Alani, and the Visigoths. The most powerful of these were the Visigoths, who established themselves as the rulers of Spain. They were a relatively small group of German-speaking warriors and herdsmen, numbering about 200,000. They ruled over eight million Latin-speaking Catholics. The arrival of the German tribes changed Spanish society and brought lawlessness and continuous destruction of the economy, which resulted in the decline of the cities and the end of Spain’s prosperity. Toledo was the capital of the Visigoths. During their entire rule they never established an orderly dynastic system, which resulted in a state of continuous political turmoil.
Initially the Jewish community under the Visigoth rule maintained their normal autonomous status that had been established in Roman times. The community leadership continued to play a strong role in regulating all aspects of life: it was empowered by tradition to supervise prices, wages, and the use of weights and measures. The synagogues continued to manage and support their schools, and organized welfare institutions that provided help for the needy. Under the Visigoths, the Jews were involved in government posts, including within the army or the garrisons; some continued to hold senatorial rank. Many Jews possessed extreme wealth. 213
A major event happened in 587 CE, when the Visigoth king Reccared I converted to Catholicism. This was the beginning of the persecution of the Jews. Immediately after his conversion, King Reccared convened the first Council of Toledo in order to regulate relations between Christians and Jews. He decreed that all slaves held by Jews should be handed over to Christian slaveholders. This measure guaranteed that Jews could no longer participate in agriculture. King Reccared also instituted the death penalty for any Jew found proselytizing. Jews were forbidden to intermarry or to hold public office. 214
In 613 CE, King Sisebut issued a decree at the third Toledo Council that called for the forced conversion of all Jews. Any Jew who refused baptism would be given one hundred lashes; if still resistant, they would be banished and deprived of all property. Some clerics, such as Isadore of Seville and Pope Gregory the Great, rejected these policies on the basis that forced conversions could not possibly produce genuine believers. King Sisebut’s decree was permitted to stand against these clerics’ opposition. As many as ninety thousand Jews were converted under the terms of Sisebut’s decree, while uncounted thousands more were able to escape. Many Jews continued to practice their religion in secret. 215
The policy of intolerance was not limited to Spain. Roman emperor Heraclius decreed a forced conversion of his empire’s Jews in 632 CE. Forced conversion was established in Merovingian France in 623 CE, and in Langobard, Italy in 661 CE.
The anti-Jewish laws of the Visigoths were repeated in the successive councils at Toledo, which indicates that such laws were implemented sporadically, and had to be enforced whenever a new persecutory king was crowned. In 680 CE, King Erwig issued twenty-eight laws confirming the previous decrees. In 694 CE, following the uprising of the Jewish population, all Jews were declared to be slaves; their properties and wealth were confiscated, and their children under the age of seven were turned over to Christian slave-masters to be raised as Catholics. 216
Summary
As the foregoing historical account shows, people of the Jewish faith have been oppressed since Roman times. It is important, however, to separate this history from the claims used to justify Jewish control of Palestine. In the broader historical context, there is a pattern of religion overlapping with politics, and religion being used as a tool by those seeking political power. Where, historically, this line was first crossed is difficult to say; it varies depending on the country, the religion, and the historian. For the purposes of this book, however, we will set aside the history of the Christian and Jewish religions at this point, around the seventh century CE. It was in this century that the third major religion of Palestine—Islam—emerged. This is the subject of the final part of part II. Part III of this history will focus on the political aspects of the religions of Palestine and how they came to influence the current situation in that land.