Rabbi Eli Kavon lectures on "The Synagogue, the Cantor, and the Music" for Grand Edventures

Topic: The Synagogue, the Cantor, and the Music"
Tuesday, May 21, 2013 at 11:15 am
Temple Torah
West Boynton Beach, Florida

This lecture is part of the "Grand Edventures" hostel. For more information, call (954) 354-1077.

Bar Kokhba--Religious Zionist

Yigael Yadin, the prominent Israeli archeologist and statesman, made an extraordinary discovery in the Judean desert, near Ein Gedi, in 1961. Yadin and his excavation team found in a canyon crevice letters signed by Simon Bar Kosiba.. In the letters, Bar Kosiba describes himself as the leader of an independent Jewish state that rebelled against the might of the Roman Empire for three years, flourishing from 132 to 135 CE. Yadin’s discovery shed light on the history of the rebellion led by Bar Kosiba, providing missing pieces of information on the insurrection led by the man who is better known today as “Bar Kokhba.” On the holiday of Lag Ba’Omer, Jews in Israel build bonfires and conduct student field days to celebrate the three-year revolt against Rome and the exploits of Bar Kokhba. Bar Kokhba is especially important in Israel today because he was the last leader of a sovereign Jewish State in Israel before the rise of Zionism in the modern epoch.

 

We know little of the origins of the rebellion led by Simon Bar Kosiba. This is a great loss for historians today—there was no chronicler of the caliber of Josephus to record the second great ancient rebellion against Rome. We know much of the Great Revolt in 66-70 because the Jewish historian wrote his eyewitness account of the events in The Jewish War. Alas, Josephus was already dead at the time of the second revolt led by Bar Kosiba. Ancient Roman historian Dio Cassius, one of the few sources we have on the second rebellion, states that the Jewish uprising against Rome was ignited by the provocative plan of Hadrian, the Roman emperor, to raise a temple to Jupiter in Jerusalem on the Temple Mount and convert the former Jewish capital into a Roman colony. According to other ancient sources, Hadrian’s plan to outlaw circumcision—in a general ban on any form of self-mutilation, as perceived by the emperor—was the cause for the revolt. The Jewish forces held out against the might of the Roman Empire for three years. The revolt was no minor skirmish—Hadrian summoned legions from Britain to crush the rebellion. Archeologists have discovered coins minted during the rebellion that indicate Jewish control of the holy city of Jerusalem during the years of war. The letters founded by Yadin more than 50 years ago reinforce the image of Bar Kokhba as an able military leader who demanded utmost obedience from his troops. But one letter, in particular, is fascinating in providing an insight into Bar Kokhba’s life as a religious Jew.

 

Bar Kokhba writes to one “Yehudah bar Menashe.” The military leader has sent two donkeys to Yehonatan bar Be’ayan and to Masabala in order that they shall pack and send to the camp “palm branches and citrons.” Bar Kokhba wants Yehudah to send others who will “bring you myrtles and willows.” His final words are an order to see that “they are tithed and send them to the camp…Be well.” Bar Kokhba is celebrating the waiving of the four species as part of the Sukkot holiday! The military leader is not just a military leader but a Jew of great faith. He takes time out from important strategic and political planning to celebrate the Jewish pilgrimage festival in his fortress at Beitar. Bar Kokhba is not a forerunner of Moshe Dayan and Ariel Sharon—although he does share his heroism with them. Bar Kokhba is, in fact, much more of a Religious Zionist, if one can actually call him a “Zionist.” Zionism is a modern movement—but its roots in Jewish history and in the Hebrew Bible is deep. Bar Kokhba is a harbinger of the modern phenomenon of Religious Zionism, especially as expressed by the genius of the movement, Abraham Isaac Kook.

 

This aspect of Bar Kohba’s career has been ignored by Zionists. One example is great Zionist founder Max Nordau’s letter of June 1903 to the Bar Kokhba Gymnastic Club in Berlin. Nordau applauded the young Jews in the club for their athletic prowess—they were not the meek Jews in “the dimness of sunless houses” who pored over Talmudic tractate from morning to night. These young men were “going back to a glorious past” in which “Bar Kokhba was a hero who refused to know defeat.” Nordau coined the term “Muskeljuden”—literally “muscle-Jews”—in praising the emphasis of their physical strength and their pride in defending themselves. No doubt, Nordau was right—but not totally accurate. Bar Kokhba did not just stand for a military prowess that was a forerunner of Political Zionism. Bar Kokhba was a Jew who performed Jewish rituals, prayed to the God of Israel, and fought to stop the Roman desecration of holiness.

 

On Lag Ba’Omer we celebrate Bar Kokhba—the military and political leader. But the man was much more than just the forerunner of the Israeli military heroes of today. He is the epitome of the Jew who could not imagine Judaism without the Torah of Israel, the Land of Israel, and the people of Israel.

 

 

 

 

Rabbi Eli Kavon is Scholar-in-Residence at Beth Ami Congregation

Rabbi Eli Kavon
Scholar-in Residence Weekend
January 25, 26, 27, 2013
Beth Ami Congregation
Boca Raton, Florida
Topic for Weekend: "New Perspectives on the Ancient History of Israel"

Friday evening service, January 25--"King David and the Politics of Israeli Archaeology"
Saturday morning service, January 26--"The Mysteries of the Dead Sea Scrolls"
Saturday lunch, January 26--"Yavneh and Masada: A Tale of Two Paradigms"
Sunday brunch, January 27--"Bar Kokhba: Zionist Hero or Failed Messiah?"

Please RSVP if you are attending