Resultados para dimensiones de Vivencias culturales

There is yet another problem that needs to be addressed. How can we explain the fact that so many of the elements of the faith of early Israel loom so large in

1. Chaney (1986: 68ff.) has suggested that this struggle divided Israel along geographical and environmental lines as well as along more obvious class lines. Specifically, he suggested that the older system of values that developed when Israel was still a frontier society continued to enjoy their great- est support in the communities of small, freeholding farmers that survived for an extended period in the hill country. Once again, this is what a frontier society model would lead one to expect.

modern Judaism? If frontier conditions ceased to be decisive in Israel’s experience by the time of David and Solomon, how can we explain the continuing impor- tance of ethical and ritual norms that appear to have had their origin in the premonarchic period and in response to conditions that prevailed at that time?

Here, ecological-evolutionary theory invokes again Dubos’s (1968: 270) important principle that the past is not dead history but living material, much of which exercises an influence for extended periods. It is clear from the biblical account that, during the years of the monarchy, there was a continuing struggle between two segments of the population, as we have just seen. One invoked a newer ideology that reflected the more complex and more cosmopolitan social experience of Israel’s new political and religious elites and that served their inter- ests. The other invoked an older, egalitarian ideology that was rooted in Israel’s past—an ideology that had been dominant when Israel was still a society of fron- tiersmen scratching out a meager living in the hill country of Palestine. But this was an ideology that continued to serve the interests of the lower classes in society. This older ideology would almost certainly never have become the domi- nant element in Jewish culture except for a remarkable set of circumstances, which, in their totality, have rarely occurred in human history. The key to these develop- ments was the declining fortunes of the kingdom of Israel. Less than a hundred years after the establishment of the monarchy under David, Israel split into a northern and a southern kingdom. A century later, the powerful Assyrian Empire became increasingly active in the west and by 721 B.C. the northern kingdom was conquered. Not only was the kingdom destroyed, its elites were scattered through- out the Assyrian Empire and foreigners were settled in much of what had once been the land of Israel. As a result, ten of the original twelve tribes of Israel disap- peared forever from the stage of history.

And this was not the end of disasters. Less than 150 years later, the southern kingdom was conquered by the Babylonians and its leaders sent off into exile. Thus, in effect, the message of the prophets was fulfilled and they were vindi- cated. The people of Israel had broken the covenant their forebears had made with Yahweh and now Yahweh had wreaked vengeance on the nation. With much of the old leadership dead or discredited, a new and reconstituted religious elite emerged that took the teachings of the prophets more seriously. This meant, among other things, that an ethical code and a religious tradition that had evolved centu- ries earlier in response to the harsh and egalitarian conditions of frontier life gained new respect, but under a completely different set of circumstances.

During the period that has come to be known as the Babylonian Captivity, several critical institutional changes occurred. For example, the temple at Jerusa- lem, which had been the focal point of Jewish religious practice since David’s day, was destroyed. The religious system that was based on, and had developed around, the rituals of temple worship was no longer viable. To fill the institutional vacuum that had been created, new institutions began to take shape. The study of scrip- ture became increasingly important, as did a new class of religious leaders, men learned in scripture and in religious tradition. Thus, when the Captivity ended,

The Origins and Early Development of Ancient Israel 163 and the leaders of the Jewish people were allowed to return to Palestine, the priestly elite and their tradition no longer possessed the same degree of authority and influence it had enjoyed earlier. Even after the temple was rebuilt and the temple cultus reestablished, religious leadership had to be shared with a new class of lead- ers, the forerunners of what was to become the rabbinate.

For a number of centuries following the Babylonian Captivity, there seems to have been an ongoing struggle or competition for religious dominance within Judaism. Evidence of this can be seen in the period when Christianity got its start. The Gospels speak often of differences between the Pharisees and the Saducees, and modern scholarship has uncovered evidence of a more populist and radical group known as the Essenes. This diversity reflected not only the influence of class differences and the effects of increasing exposure to foreign (especially Greek) influences, but also the lack of an independent monarchy that could support, with both money and coercive authority, an official state cult.

The last major transformation of the Jewish religious system came with the second destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in 70 C.E.—an event that marked the end of priestly power and authority and led to the dominance of the rabbini- cal class. This meant that scriptures and their interpretation replaced the temple cultus at the center of Jewish religious life. And this, in turn, meant that those elements of the early frontier faith that had been preserved and transmitted by the prophets during the period of the monarchy and the divided kingdom became central in the Jewish religious tradition. For believing Jews, and for believing Chris- tians as well, the radical claims of the prophets had been vindicated by the un- happy fate of the religious and political elites who, in the days of the monarchy, had ignored the covenant that their forefathers had established with the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.