Hebrew, Loss and Idealization

Abstract

Hebrew literature of the tannaitic age and after expresses a degree of love and idealization of Israel as intense as the hatred and violence that the empire had turned on it. There is no liter- ary precedent for such idealization, except perhaps in Second Isaiah, itself a creation of exile and redemption. The rabbis of the tannaitic age and after taught that the Jews, far from being a band of superstitious lepers, enemies of humanity, hated by the gods, as was alleged in contemporary anti-Semitic literature, were favoured by God above all peoples, indeed above the angels (Hullin 89a, 91b). Far from being inferior, in the eyes of the halakhah all were equal before the law: ‘All Jews are princes’ (Mishna Shabbat XIV 4). The world was spared from destruction for their sake (Song of Songs Rabbah II 2,3). Consequently, the early third century CE rabbi, Hama ben Hanina, in a homiletic morale-booster which had no basis in political reality, quoted Deuteronomy 4: 7 to ‘prove’ that victory was the ultimate destiny of the Jews: ‘What other nation is so powerful as God has made this nation [Israel]?’ (Deuteronomy Rabbah II 15). As for ‘the nations’ — meaning the Roman empire — they are often denigrated and cursed as being unclean and backward, foolish and sinful.1