10:
Thanks to Josephus it is easy for us to piece together the events which led up to Yehoshu'a ben-Peraĥyah seeking asylum in Alexandria. As already mentioned, Yannai favoured the Sadducees; but he was also rabidly anti-Pharisee. His role was not only that of King but also of High Priest, and as such it was his duty to officiate in the Bet Mikdash. There was one ceremony that was very dear to the hearts of the Pharisees which the Sadducees virtually ignored. The festival of Sukkot, in the autumn, was closely connected with the hopes and fears of the people for a good rainy winter. One ceremony that was most important to the Pharisees in this regard was the offering on the second day of the festival of a libation of water. All other libations in the Bet Mikdash were of wine, and the wine was poured out by the officiating priest at the base of the altar from where it ran in ducts into a series of pipes underneath the Temple complex. According to the Pharisees this annual libation of water was to be poured out by the High Priest at the base of the altar, just as was done every day with the wine libations.
11:
About ten years into his reign Yannai decided to show the people that he was definitely Sadducee. The event which we are about to describe can be dated exactly to October 11th 94 BCE. We must imagine the Temple court crammed to capacity with crowds of the faithful who had come to witness the ceremonies. All of them, of course, were carrying the Arba Minim, the 'Four Species' which included a lulav (palm branch) and an etrog (citron). Knowing that Yannai was anxious to show them 'who was boss', the crowd – almost entirely Pharisee – was tense with expectation. The moment came when an attendant priest handed Yannai the silver ewer from which he was to offer the libation. With a gesture of utmost contempt the haughty king poured the water over his feet! There was a moment of sheer incredulity, and then, as one man, the crowd pelted the king with their citrons. Yannai escaped and in a fearful rage let his soldiers loose on the crowd; Josephus [Antiquities 13:13] says that about six thousand of the people were killed. Later, when he had calmed down, he ordered the arrest of all the leading Pharisees. Clearly, this was why Shim'on ben-Shataĥ went into hiding and why Yehoshu'a ben-Peraĥyah fled to Egypt. Those Pharisaic leaders who were not so quick off the mark were caught and crucified – Josephus says that there were 600 of them!
12:
A few years later Yannai found that, for reasons which need not detain us here, he had need of the support of the Pharisees. This is why 'peace broke out' and Shim'on ben-Shataĥ was able to advise Yehoshu'a ben-Peraĥyah that it was now safe for him to return.
To be continued.
I have received more than one message concerning patrism and matrism on the one hand and concerning my 'exculpation' of Rabbi Ovadya of Bertinoro on the other. A message from
Judith May covers both issues, so Judith's message can serve for the others as well. She writes:
The term patrist might be a reasonable substitute for the more common patriarchal, or the blunter male-chauvinist, but the term matrist seems to me totally inappropriate for the use you give it. The two terms look parallel – one would expect that matrist would be the mirror image of patrist, i.e., that in a matristic society women would dominate and subjugate men to the same degree that men dominate and subjugate women in a patristic society. This, however, is not the case. The society you define as matristic is somewhere between patriarchal and egalitarian.
I respond:
The terms patrist and matrist are not mine nor is the ascription of these terms to the various kinds of society. For a full understanding it is best to read Rattray Taylor's book. However, there is no connection whatsoever between matrism/patrism on the one hand and a matriarchal/patriarchal society on the other. In fact, Rattray Taylor has an appendix in his book that deals with such societies. Matrism (and its counterpart patrism) is a situation in which a person's psychological makeup is caused by the introjection of one parental figure rather than the other or both. (The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary explains that the term introjection is scientific vocabulary and means to incorporate attitudes or ideas into one's personality unconsciously.) This has nothing to do with whether a society is patriarchal or matriarchal. It is eminently possible that a society where men rule the roost will be a matrist society: that is to say that the men who rule have, by and large, introjected matrist tendencies rather than patrist ones. Matrism/patrism is purely about people's psychological 'preferences'; therefore all reference in this regard to patriarchal and matriarchal societies is irrelevant and misleading.
Judith continues:
In today's shiur, you wrote: "When the commentator comes from a matrist background he will try to find a less derogatory explanation. For example, Rabbi Ovadya of Bertinoro suggests that the objection to chatting with one's wife might only apply when she is menstruating." If that's a less derogatory comment, I'm not sure what a more derogatory comment would look like.
I respond:
I'm sorry I was misunderstood, and I can see that this was my fault. Because I am matrist and live in a matrist society I condemn all misogyny in any form. But, were I a patrist living in a patrist society I might have seen the situation differently. Rabbi Ovadya of Bertinoro was an Italian matrist who was faced with a decidedly patrist statement of the sages who preceded him by many centuries. It seems to me that he tried to find a way to 'mitigate' the abhorrent patrism of the statement upon which he was commenting by suggesting that the originating sage had only meant his statement to apply when one's wife was menstruating – since strict halakhah demands an almost complete separation of the spouses during this period anyway. Again and again in our studies over the years we have seen how the sages tried to negate untoward precedent by limiting its application – even as regards Torah law, and rabbinic law all the more so.
