compile the Mishnah.--Jochanan, Akiba, Meir, Judah.--Aquila.
The story of Jewish literature, after the destruction of the Temple at
Jerusalem in the year 70 of the Christian era, centres round the city of
Jamnia. Jamnia, or Jabneh, lay near the sea, beautifully situated on the
slopes of a gentle hill in the lowlands, about twenty-eight miles from
the capital. When Vespasian was advancing to the siege of Jerusalem, he
occupied Jamnia, and thither the Jewish Synhedrion, or Great Council,
transferred itself when Jerusalem fell. A college existed there
already, but Jamnia then became the head-quarters of Jewish learning,
and retained that position till the year 135. At that date the learned
circle moved further north, to Galilee, and, besides the famous school
at Lydda in Judea, others were founded in Tiberias, Usha, and Sepphoris.
The real founder of the College at Jamnia was Jochanan, the son of
Zakkai, called "the father of wisdom." Like the Greek philosophers who
taught their pupils in the gardens of the "Academy" at Athens, the
Rabbis may have lectured to their students in a "Vineyard" at Jamnia.
Possibly the term "Vineyard" was only a metaphor applied to the
meeting-place of the Wise at Jamnia, but, at all events, the result of
these pleasant intellectual gatherings was the Rabbinical literature.
Jochanan himself was a typical Rabbi. For a great part of his life he
followed a mercantile pursuit, and earned his bread by manual labor. His
originality as a teacher lay in his perception that Judaism could
survive the loss of its national centre. He felt that "charity and the
love of men may replace the sacrifices." He would have preferred his
brethren to submit to Rome, and his political foresight was justified
when the war of independence closed in disaster. As Graetz has well
said, like Jeremiah Jochanan wept over the desolation of Zion, but like
Zerubbabel he created a new sanctuary. Jochanan's new sanctuary was the
school.
In the "Vineyard" at Jamnia, the Jewish tradition was the subject of
much animated inquiry. The religious, ethical, and practical literature
of the past was sifted and treasured, and fresh additions were made. But
not much was written, for until the close of the second century the new
literature of the Jews was _oral_. The Bible was written down, and read
from scrolls, but the Rabbinical literature was committed to memory
piecemeal, and handed down from teacher to pupil. Notes were perhaps
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