NOTES for Ma1 1:13

Human logic can sometimes be quite peculiar. One such peculiarity is a kind of "mirror-like" thinking concerning spiritual life. In Jewish history it appeared, in particular, in relation to paganism and pagan cults. This began already in the period of the Judges, when the Hebrews had just begun to join settled life and first came into close contact with local Palestinian paganism, which of course did not disappear after the Hebrew conquest and continued to live alongside Yahwism. But even in later times, under Solomon, in the period of the divided kingdoms, and even after the Babylonian exile, when it would seem paganism no longer had a place in Jewish life, the situation changed only outwardly if it changed at all.

The issue is the desire to join pagan religious life and bring it into Jewish society. For the most part, the Hebrews were interested in paganism not in itself as a religious tradition, but as part of the culture they wanted to master and the civilization they wanted to join. Outwardly the logic of the preachers of such "culture-bearing" paganism seemed flawless: if we recognize the superiority of one civilization or another in technical, and sometimes cultural, terms, then its religion and spiritual life must necessarily be better than our own.

People either forgot, or did not think at all, that spiritual life is determined not by technical and cultural achievements, but by the depth and fullness of relationship with God, which has no direct relation to culture and still less to technology. Meanwhile refusal, sometimes formal and more often actual, of Yahwism in favor of paganism almost always turned for the people into serious problems, spiritual and moral, social, and often also military and political.

And then the same "mirror-like" logic began to work. Many began to think that the issue was not departure from God, not the rejection of Yahwism and the spiritual tradition connected with it, but insufficient zeal for the pagan gods. To resolve the problems that had arisen, these people proposed becoming still more consistent pagans: then, they said, when we finally part with Yahwism in all its manifestations, we will finally become a "normal" people, live "like everyone else," and then we will have no problems, or no more than "everyone else" has.

A conclusion in the spirit of "the wind blows because the trees sway," yet to many it seemed quite adequate. Such people existed in Judea in Hellenistic times as well, when it was under the rule of the Syrian kings. Antiochus Epiphanes, mentioned in the book, was of course glad to support those who opposed Jewish national and spiritual identity in favor of pagan unification.

But as soon became clear, the support was by no means selfless, and Antiochus acted not at all for the triumph of "universal human values" in Judea. This understanding came later, when open persecutions of the Synagogue began and the Temple was defiled by direct order of Antiochus himself. Did the zealots of pagan culture in Judea guess such an outcome? It is hard to say with certainty: there were very different people among them. But Jewish society learned the lesson and drew conclusions. Supporters of total Hellenization no longer appeared among the Jews. Never.