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ARTICLE VII.

A JUNE DAY IN JERUSALEM.1

TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF DR. FRANZ DELITZSCH, BY REV. SELAH MERRILL, ANDOVER, MASS.

In the last year, or the last but one, of the decade which immediately preceded our era, all Syria and Palestine were watching anxiously for the issue of a frightful tragedy. Mariamne, descended from the royal family of the Maccabees, the loveliest and most noble of the wives of Herod, had already fallen a victim to his dark suspicion. And now he had been led, by intrigue, to suspect also that his two sons by the murdered queen, Alexander and Aristobulus, who were the pride and joy of the people, were plotting against his life. By intimidation he had succeeded in having a tribunal in Berytus, without their being either seen or heard in the court, sentence them to death. And all the world was now asking if a father could possibly allow his own sons to be executed; and especially two so noble and, without doubt, innocent sons as these. At this moment of anxious suspense, let us place ourselves in Jerusalem, and unroll the panorama of the life of a single day there, as it then was.

It is a working-day of the month Sivan, corresponding to our June. The night, cloudless and starry, had given place to the early and long-continuing dawn. The two divisions of the temple-watch, bearing torches, have met near the apartment where the priestly oblation of unleavened cakes is baked, and exchanged signals that all is in order and readi

1 This Article forms chapter iv. of Dr. Delitzsch's little book entitled: "Handwerkerleben zur Zeit Jesu. Ein Beitrag zur neutestamentlichen Zeitgeschichte." Erlangen, 1868. The book is made up of five separate Essays, all of which are exceedingly interesting. This chapter, which is a picture of life in Judea from the times just previous to the birth of Christ, is published with the

Author's sanction. - TRANS.

ness.

Those priests who have passed the night in sleep, have arisen and bathed, and clothed themselves in the garments of their office. In that stone apartment, of which a half was occupied as a hall for the meetings of the Sanhedrin, the appointments for service for the approaching day have been assigned by lot. The brazen washbowl which has remained during the night submerged in water, has been .taken out, and the priests have washed therein their hands and feet. Now peals forth the first morning call for the city lying below; the priests blow with their trumpets, whose clang in the still morning air rings far out into the upper and lower, the old and new city. The Levites, at the command of the chief of the porters, open all the gates of the Temple. The preparations for the morning service, of which the principal ceremony was the daily sacrifice of a lamb, now begin. The altar of burnt offerings is cleansed; the bundles of wood, placed upon the glowing coals that have been raked together, kindle slowly; the musicians bring their instruments and take them from their cases; the guard is released, and the priests and Levites who served on the preceding day are dismissed. All this has taken place by torch-light. Meanwhile, however, the officer appointed to observe the hours notices the approach of day. Certain priests, at his command, go up to the pinnacle of the Temple. When the morning sky has become so light that Hebron, lying in the mountains to the southeast of Jerusalem, can be seen, these cry out from above, "Barkai ad Chebron, it is light as far as Hebron;"1 and at once there rings out the call: "Priests to your service! Levites to your pulpits! Israelites to your places"! This last call refers to those representatives of the whole people who, in weekly rotation, assist at the sacrifices, and also pass the night in the Temple.

Meantime the city with its surroundings has become alive with activity. Military signals are heard in the fortress of Antonia. Under the cedars of Olivet, the shops of BethHini are opened. In that street of the Temple which leads 1 Yoma iii. 1 (with the Gamara). 67

VOL. XXXI. No. 123.

from the fortress-area to the west wall of the Temple hill, are seen cattle merchants and money-changers hastening before those who would visit the Temple, to the bazar in the court of the Gentiles. Those also who intend to join in the morning service come from the upper city through the Xistus gate, from the new city through the market gate, and by other ways to the avenue or ascent of the Temple hill. The bridge connecting the Xistus-terrace with the region about. the Temple is especially thronged. Here and there one stops and looks up to the left upon the splendid theatre, or down on the other side towards the Tyropaeon, or Valley of Cheesemongers,1 in order to breathe the country air, which on that side blows over from the dairies there below.

Not all, however, go up into the Temple for morning prayer. Jerusalem had, indeed, hundreds of synagogues.2 Those two elegant gentlemen yonder, who are dressed in Greek costume, and who speak Greek with each other, are going to the synagogue of the Alexandrians. That respectable citizen there, carrying under his arm his prayer-robe in which are his tefillin,3 is going to the synagogue of the coppersmiths, where he has his hired place; while that lady, with hair tufted by the friseur, and a boquet of roses, will not conceal her exquisite morning toilette behind the railing of a synagogue (the place assigned to the women), but with tripping step she passes up the Temple-hill in order to display herself in the court of the women. Thus those going to morning prayer take different directions. Most of them 1 The cheesemakers were called megabbenîm.

2 Four hundred and eighty according to Jerusalem Talmud, Megilla, 73 b; 460 according to Jerusalem Talmud, Kethuboth, 35 b.

8 "Tefillin" is the modern Jewish name for phylacteries, Matt. xxiii. 5, the "frontlets" of the Old Testament.-TRANS.

The friseur was called

See Delitzsch's Commentary on Isa. iii. 16 sq. ; see Lightfoot's Horae Heb. on Matt. xxvii. 56. See on this matter of dressing the hair, Buxtorf's Lexicon under , but much fuller Levy's Chaldäisches Wörterbuch under the same word. The Talmuds mention several times a certain "Mary, the plaiter of women's hair." It was forbidden to do this on the Sabbath, etc.

מרים מגדלא שיער בשיא - The phrase just quoted

is so much like "Mary Magdalene," that the possible connection between the two has been discussed. - TRANS.

wear anxious faces; and where two are walking together they do not speak without first casting about them suspicious glances. A venerable old man with a long beard and two white front locks, murmurs to himself as he passes by the mortarplace [Mörserplatz] in front of the theatre, "I thank thee, O God, God of my fathers, that thou hast assigned me my portion among those who abide in the schools and synagogues, and not among those who take pleasure in the theatre and circus."1 His wife who walked by his side, or rather, followed a step behind him, said in a low voice, "Amen"! and, with tears in her eyes, glanced over to the left towards the tower of Mariamne and whispered, "Thou hast escaped this, O noble Mariamne; it is well that thou dost no longer live."

Meanwhile the sun has risen, and the appointed hour for morning prayer, accompanied with the sacrifice in the Temple, has arrived. That pharisee yonder, who has allowed himself to be overtaken on the street by the hour of prayer, stops suddenly, and arranges his tefillin with their immense cases upon his head and arm. That laborer, who at this moment finds himself in a fruit tree gathering fruit into his basket, stops his work and performs his morning worship in this nature-temple among the branches.2 Everywhere men are praying. Only in the palace of Herod is all yet quiet. The tyrant sleeps still, and his courtiers go about on tiptoe. The people pray; and wherever they pray they join with their audible prayer a silent petition for deliverance from the tyrant, and an intercession for Aristobulus and Alexander -the noble sons of the high-minded Maccabean princess Mariamne, already executed by her husband who, by

1 Babylonian Talmud, Berachoth, 28 b, and the parallel place in the Jerusalem Talmud.

NOTE. On the "Mortarplace," see Zeph. i. 11, where the word "Maktesh" occurs as the name of a place. "A place or quarter in Jerusalem where the shop-keepers, exchangers, and trading Phoenicians dwelt," Fürst's Lexicon under this word. It was probably a hollow place shaped somewhat perhaps like a mortar. - TRANS.

-

2 Babylonian Talmud, Berachoth, 16 a.

their father Herod, have been falsely accused and imprisoned, and whose fate is now suspended between life and death. Yet the government even of a Herod is not so base as to prevent its attracting to itself a multitude of mercenaries and partizans, parisites and sycophants; as, for instance, the court baker, the court perfumer, and the like.

After the morning service, and even before it is at an end in the Temple and synagogues, the great market-place in the lower, new city has assumed the greatest and most varied activity. This market-place must not, however, be thought of as a public square belonging to a city hall; the city hall or council house of Jerusalem, stood upon the Xistus-terrace, while the lower market-place was a long, wide street, corresponding to what, in our German cities, we should call the "Long Row," or the "Broadway." Here, on both sides, there is a succession of shops, stalls, and stands. Here is to be found bread and pastry made from Ephraim wheat,1 which retailers 2 bargain for, to sell again with profit in the more distant portions of the city; also cakes of figs and raisins which that poor little girl yonder, with pieces of wood in the points of her ears instead of earrings, looks at with great eagerness; also all sorts of fish from the sea of Tiberias which excite the curiosity of those young students on their way to the high school, founded by Simeon Ben Shetach; 3 and fancy articles, either of jewelry or for house decoration, of every variety; and even false teeth, with the gold and silver wire to fasten them with. Here one cries his "Dibs," or grape syrup; there another recommends his Egyptian lentils as of the finest quality; while a third has caraway seed to sell, and also runs a pepper-mill. In the open spaces

1 The Ephraim (7) mentioned in John xi. 54. Neubaur, Géographie du Talmud, p. 155, says: "The abundance of wheat at Ephraim was proverbial. 'To carry straw to Ephraim' was equivalent to our phrase 'to carry water to the river.'"- TRANS.

2 Retailers were called, which is equivalent to the Greek Tрarhp. 8 Graetz, Gesch. der Juden, 3. 145.

↑ Shabbath, vi. 5.

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