• It was Shimon who was shown the image of a holy man clothed in white every Yom Kippur as he left the holy of holies (on the fortieth year, the last of his life, the image wore black - TB Menachos 109b).
• It was Shimon who, throughout his term as High Priest Gadol, merited that the oil in the "western" cup of the Menora burned longer than any other (even though it was lit last) a clear, yet daily, miracle (TB Yoma 39a).
• It was a very young Shimon who, at the head of a procession of Jerusalem's sages, set out to greet the great emperor, Alexander. The Greek, as far as anyone knew, was planning to destroy Jerusalem. He wanted to end what he saw as an opposition to his rule. At the head of his huge army, astride his tall horse, Alexander was not likely to give the Jews much time to plead their case. But it was the face of Shimon that inspired the king to dismount and kneel on the ground before the Rabbi. "This face," explained Alexander, "appeared to me before every battle which I won..." (TB Yoma 69a).
• It was Shimon who strengthened the walls of the Holy City, and with them, the hearts of the dispirited Jews who had given up everything to live near the Temple.

Shimon Hatzadik built the foundation for Jewish life in Israel for the next four hundred years, and by extension, set the tone for Jewish life until this day. Yet he, too, endured a personal struggle.

Chonyo

The Talmud (Menachos 109b) leaves us with the story of Shimon, who, nearing death, instructed his younger son, Chonyo, to take over as High Priest. Chonyo, it seems, wished not to embarrass his older brother, Shimi, and gave up the position.

But as the day approached for Shimi to take on his new responsibilities, Chonyo regretted his generosity. He plotted to have his brother expelled from the position - and perhaps even killed!

How did he do it? Knowing that his brother knew little about the Temple service, Chonyo offered to instruct Shimi on the details of the induction service.

"Put on these clothes," he told his older brother, handing him women's clothing, "and meet me tomorrow morning in the Temple courtyard."

The next day, Chonyo waited with all the rest of the priests for his brother's arrival. When Shimi came, dressed as he was, Chonyo pointed and shouted,"Look at that man! He promised his wife that as a sign of his love for her, he would wear her clothes the day he became High Priest!"

The other priests chased Shimi away, intending to punish him for disgracing the Temple. But before they could do anything, Shimi managed to figure out what had happened and told the whole story. Now the priests' attention turned back to Chonyo, the real culprit...

By the time all the dust had settled, Shimon Hatzadik's brother, Eliezer, was Kohen Godol and Chonyo was in Alexandria, Egypt. Once there, Chonyo built an altar and began to attract a following among the local gentiles. His goal was to teach the people about the true worship of the One G-d. No Jew offered sacrifices on this altar as Jewish sacrifices outside of the Temple of Jerusalem were (and still are) strictly forbidden.

Eventually, Chonyo returned to Jerusalem and took up the position of High Priest he had lost so many years before.

Three generations later, another Chonyo (a direct descendent of Shimon Hatzadik's son) travelled to Egypt. He too built a altar - actually a replica from the alter of the Temple in Jerusalem - and there Jews offered their own (forbidden) sacrifices.

Such was the strange state of the Jewish community of Alexandria...

I chose to relate only one of two versions of the above story recorded by the Talmud. In addition, I have followed the historical opinion of the Rambam and of Rabbi S. Rothenberg (Toldos Am Olam) who worked to reconcile this passage with the writings of Josephus.

Yeb (Elephantine)

Around ninety years ago, archaeologists working near the present-day site of the Aswan Dam (on the Nile River) discovered a collection of perfectly preserved papyrus letters. The letters seemed to be the correspondence of the soldiers of a Persian garrison stationed in the area towards the beginning of the Second Temple period (see timeline). What is interesting to us, is that these paid soldiers - and their families who lived alongside them - were Jewish! They lived in the garrison town for generations, cut off from Jewish life.

Reading the letters (written originally in Aramaic) we can learn a great deal about the Jewish life of that period. For one thing, these Jews had a temple dedicated to idol worship. Apparently, some Egyptian vandals destroyed their temple and the Jews applied to the Persian governor in Alexandria for permission to rebuild it. They were unsuccessful. Later they wrote to the Jewish governor in Jerusalem from whom they received the permission to do what they wanted.

In another letter, the high priest in Jerusalem found it necessary to inform the people of Yeb that the festival of Passover was approaching and that it was forbidden to eat Chametz (leavened bread) for the whole week. It is hard to imagine the ignorance that plagued such Jews even while the Temple still stood.

The Lingering Exile

The Jewish world was much bigger than one might think.

• Babylonia (modern-day Iraq) was the main Torah community and was host to the greatest Jewish population in the world. Already at the time of the destruction of the first Temple, the Babylonian community was strong and ready to receive and support the new exiles. It was one of G-d's many kindnesses that He arranged for Torah leaders to be brought to Babylonia to prepare a home, decades before the mass of Jewish exiles would arrive.
• North Africa - To this day, the island of Djerba is home to an ancient Jewish community. Strangely enough, they are nearly all priests (Kohanim, a few Yisroelim and no Leviim at all. Legend has it that Ezra cursed the Leviim of Djerba for not going to Jerusalem when they were needed. There is also a legend that any levy who goes to Djerba, will die within a year. I don't personally know anyone who's put it to the test...
• France - France? In the time of the Temple? Wrong. France, four hundred years before the building of the first Temple. There is a tradition from the Sefer Meiros Einayim (quoted by She'eris Yisroel), that there were members of the tribe of Benjamin who escaped from the Jewish civil war - fought just one hundred years after the exodus from Egypt (see Judges, chapters 19 and 20) - and ran to France. One of the communities they founded was the famous city of Worms (Rashi's home). The Sefer Meiros Eynayim contends that one of the reasons the city of Worms suffered so badly at the hands of the medieval crusaders was because their ancestors had failed to answer Ezra's plea for immigrants to the fledgling Jewish community in Jerusalem.

The hand of the old sage, Ezra, reaches far indeed.

Kussim

Sancheriv (the king of Assyria) wished to subdue the diverse population of his vast empire. His method (much like that of the Russian dictator, Stalin, in our days) involved moving whole nations from their native lands to far-off places; each to a place as different as possible from what they were used to. This way, Sancheriv reasoned, his subjects would be less likely to rebel (being busy getting used to their new homes and lacking the "home turf advantage").

When Sancheriv conquered the ten tribes of northern Israel (135 years before the destruction of the first Temple - see timeline), he exiled them (and where they ended up is a whole different story...) and filled the empty land with, among other peoples, the Kussim (perhaps from Crete (an island off the southern coast of Greece).

Having been empty for some time before they got there, the Kussim found their part of the country somewhat overrun by wild animals. Many a Kussi found himself served up for supper in some Northern lion's den. The immigrants began thinking about their situation. They reasoned that the G-d of this land must not like the idols which they had brought with them from Crete.

Not being the closed minded type of people, the Kussim chose to give Judaism a try. However their conversion fell under a cloud of doubt in light of their motives (having only converted to escape the lions).

Over the centuries the question lost some of its urgency since the observance of the Kussim had anyway lapsed badly. Eventually they fell into some kind of Biblical (read denial of the Oral Torah) Judaism seasoned with a liberal dose of idol worship. The problem was made worse by their antagonism for Torah-Jews and their active efforts to subvert authentic Judaism.

Hence, their opposition to Ezra's efforts to build a Jewish community in Jerusalem.

Rabbi Boruch Clinton teaches at the Ottawa Torah Institute yeshiva high school and Machon Sarah high school for girls (both in Ottawa, Canada). You may reach him with comments and questions at bclinton@torah.org.

You can now read some of Rabbi Clinton's essays on Torah life at http://www.ncf.ca/~es625/essays

You can also buy his collection of essays on the Book of Shmuel (Samuel) in printed form at www.lulu.com/marbitzmedia

Copyright © 2000 by Rabbi Boruch Clinton and Project Genesis, Inc.