The Primacy of Torah Law

Actually, the title may be a bit misleading, since it is the name of a chapter written by someone I have previously featured in my “Great Rabbis” series – Rabbi Emanuel Rackman. http://tanakhemet.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/great-rabbis-series-prof-emanuel-rackman.html

However, this article makes a common rabbinic claim about various groups who have rejected Orthodox Judaism. He bunches together Christianity, Reform Judaism, Sadducees and Karaites. This is despite the fact that the sadducees rejected Christianity, and the Karaites reject Reform Judaism. Furthermore, the Pharisees rejected the Torah centred Sadduceees.

Alas, Rackman, who for many years was my mentor, writes that there is a simple reason why all these groups rejected Rabbinic Judaism, and that is because the Torah is a “yoke” i.e. a burden, and it is easier to reject than to accept a burden.

This argument is false for several reasons. As already mentioned, each of the different groups took on a different view to religion. It might be the case that Reform considered many rites outdated or too difficult, but they actually gave up believing altogether. Christianity, which I am not defending, did reject many laws, but they also adopted new ones. Whether or not the argument applies to these deviant groups, the charge made against the Sadducees and the Karaites are nonsensical.

The Sadducees, ie the priesthood from Zadok, rejected the Oral Testament of the rabbis, because they considered it alien and false. The Pharisees rejected the clear meaning of the Torah on many counts, as a way to create a new religion, and expel the Priesthood from the Temple. This is illustrated in Mishnah Sotah, where terrorist rabbis such as ben Zakkai abolish wholesale the Torah Law. This is in fact verified by the rabbi Akavya ben Mehalelel, who accused the alien convert rabbis, Shemaya and Avtalyon of falsifying Torah practice to suit their own personal needs. http://tanakhemet.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/talmudic-whistleblower-akavya-ben.html

It is rather ironic, since Emanuel Rackman was the Akavya of orthodoxy in his own time, and I once told him that he had revived the roll of his historic predecessor.

The actual claim that Torah is a burden, and rejection of the Torah is because of the burden is also a fallacious claim. The Torah puts limitations on the scope of religious restrictions, by clearly forbidding adding and subtracting. This was the self-justified practice of the Rabbis. The reason behind the rabbinical rejection of Torah law is complex, but part of it is their arrogance and competition with the Priesthood, whom they wished to destroy. Just as Korach tried to rebel against Moses and Aaron of the tribe of Levi, so the Pharisees did against the Zadokite descendants of Aaron.

It is interesting to note that Shemaya and Avtalyon, were students of Shimon ben Shetach, he was the brother in law of Alexander Janneus, the High priest and sadducee king. Thus, it appears that ben Shetach had begun his program of destroying the priesthood (and the temple) by appointing gentile converts to the head of the Pharisees Sanhedrin. It is also a true and telling irony, that by the Rabbis' own admission (Gittin 57b), Shemaya and Avtalyon were both descendants of Sennacherib, the Assyrian King who besieged Jerusalem, and exiled the Northern tribes of Israel.

We now see an alternative narrative of history. Sennacherib attempted to destroy Jerusalem, but was stopped by an angel. He did succeed, however, in destroying the Northern parts of Israel, and causing exile. His descendants, Shemaya and Avtalyon, as is explicitly stated by Akavya ben Mehalelel (who cited a tradition he had heard from his teachers) falsified Torah law to suit their Sennacheribean heritage. It should be noted that Shemaya and Avtalyon were major founders and creators of the oral law. Their project was completed by ben Zakkai, who abolished the priestly functions such as the Bitter water ceremony, and the breaking of the neck of Eglah Arufah ceremony.This spiritual destruction of the Temple by the line of Shemaya + Avtalyon through to ben Zakkai led to its physical destruction. Where Shemaya and Avtalyon's ancestor, Sennacherib, failed, they and their followers succeeded in destroying the Temple.

Before Rabbis start accusing Sadducees and Karaites, they should try to study the Torah itself, and to make it their primal focus. In this way, they may see how their ancestors have led to destruction of Judaism, and perhaps if they are bold enough, can rebuild it. The Torah does not impose a yoke that is as oppressive as the Talmud, so rejecting the Talmud is not about convenience, but about honour for the Torah.