Masada - Bar Kokhba

BARKOKHBA

MASADA CHAMBER ENSEMBLES

		info	Bar	Zev	Isa	Gui	Voi	Jer	Tai	Mid	NYC	Sev	Ton	1st	Mas4	Cov
1.	Gevurah			11					1
2.	Nezikin
3.	Mahshav		two-9						3						7:3	FIX:2 FIX:11
4.	Rokhev						15
5.	Abidan		two-3			1	9	13							3:2
6.	Sheloshim		two - 10						11		10				3:8
7.	Hath-Arob									3					7:2
8.	Paran						6			9					5:1
9.	Mahlah														4:2
10.	Socoh
11.	Yechidah														10:7	FIX:3
12.	Bikkurim					4
13.	Idalah-Abal			10				16	6						1:10	FIX:5

info

Bar

Zev

Isa

Gui

Voi

Jer

Tai

Mid

NYC

Sev

Ton

1st

Mas4

Cov

Tannaim

3:10

Nefesh

Abidan

one-5

3:2

Mo'ed

Maskil

FIX:9

Mishpatim

Sansanah

2:7

Shear-Jashub

Mahshav

one-3

7:3

FIX:2
FIX:11

10.

Sheloshim

one-6

3:8

11.

Mochin

8:8

12.

Karaim

3:6

Recorded at Baby Monsters Studio, NYC on August 1994,
December 1995 and March 1996 (see chronology)

Although there are traditions in the Mishnah that claim to go back to the fifth century B.C.E. (the "Great Assembly"; cf. Nehemiah 8-10), as well as a few additions from as late as the mid-third century, the main body of the Mishnah consists of teachings attributed to authorites from about the middle of the first century, through to the second decade of the third century C.E. This time period witnessed some major historical turning-points for the Jewish nation, such as the destruction of the Second Jerusalem Temple in 70, and the catastrophic failure of the revolt against Rome under the leadership of Simeon bar Kokhba (or: bar Kuziba) in 135. Because the Mishnah is a technical work of religious law, these momentous historical events find almost no explicit mention in the Mishnah, even though the very composition of the Mishnah is often viewed as a response to those very events. [elsegal]

Bar Kokhba (BAHR KOHKH-buh) Aramaic : Son of a Star. Simeon ben Kosiba, the leader of the last and most successful Jewish rebellion against Rome in 132-135 C.E. He died in battle when the rebellion was defeated. Rabbi Akiba believed he was the Moshiach (Messiah). [Jewish101]

a Jew named Simon, to whom a leading rabbi of the day, Rabbi Aqiba, gave the title BarKokhba ("son of a star"), a name taken from the Old Testament: "A star shall come forth out of Jacob, and a sceptre shall rise out of Israel" (Num. 24:17). The messianic pretensions of the name are apparent, and the significance of the claim made by and for Simon was not lost on the Romans. The revolt was put down at great cost to both sides and not before 135. Simon's surname appears in recently discovered fragments from the Dead Sea area of Wadi Murabba'at, in which he is called Simon ben-Kosebah. [The biblical world]

Bows and Arrows

Obviously, bows and arrows are military symbols. In this context, they are doubtless a reminder of the Revolt of the Jewish People, led by Bar Kochba, against the Romans in 135 C.E. (some 1,865 years ago).

In this revolt, which took place some sixty-five years after the Destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans in 70 CE, the Jews initially succeeded greatly against the might of Rome. They succeeded physically and spiritually.

Physically, under the leadership of Shimon bar Kochba, they established an independent country, which lasted approximately five years, minted its own coins, and established a nearly impregnable stronghold in the city of Betar.

Spiritually, the revolt was led by Rabbi Akiva, who endorsed the Revolt and proclaimed Bar Kochba to be the Mashiach. If Rabbi Akiva believed that Bar Kochba was the Moshiach, it is nearly certain that Bar Kochba had at least the potential to be the "real thing."

Tragically, and mysteriously, Bar Kochba lost Divine favor when he erroneously accused Rabbi Elazar of betraying Betar and executed him, triggering the immediate withdrawal of support by Rabbi Akiva and the rest of the Rabbis.

"Bar Kochba," "The Son of the Star," the almost-Mashiach, was now reduced to the name of Bar Kosiva, which was either his real name or another symbolic name, meaning "the son of the lie." He attempted to "go it alone," without the support of the Rabbis and thus, so to speak, also without the support of G-d, against the most powerful of the Roman legions. In the end, his great army was defeated by the Romans, having lost the invincibility guaranteed only by the favor of Hashem, triggering a horrifying massacre of Jews, and the crushing of the last Independent Jewish State until our time. [http://www.ou.org/chagim/lagbaomer/arrows.htm]

GEVURAH

"Yom HaShoah VeHaGevurah" - Memorial Day for the Holocaust and for People who Acted at that Time with Bravery (27 Nisan)

[http://www.ou.org/chagim/lagbaomer/arrows.htm]

Giburah - The fifth sephirah on the Tree of Life.

English Translation: Strength, severity, force, mastery, might, mighty, (act, power), power.

NEZIKIN

= Neziqin ("Torts"): 10 tractates Covers the full range of civil and criminal laws, including the structure of the judiciary itself. This order also includes two tractates (Avot and 'Eduyyot) that trace the history of Rabbinic authority. 4th part of the Mishnah. see Zera'im, Mo'ed, Nashim, Neziqin, Qodashim, Tohorot. [elsegal]

ROKHEV

rider [Tauber]

SOCOH

Shocho - (2 Chr. 28:18) = Shochoh (1 Sam. 17:1) = Shoco (2 Chr. 11:7). See SOCOH.

Socoh -

[Easton's Bible dictionary]

BIKKURIM

VARIETIES OF GIVING How instructional it is to note the place of tithes in the whole concept of giving: Deut 12:6,11: (1) burnt offerings (olah); (2) sacrifices (zebach); (3) tithes (ma`aser); (4) heave offerings (terumah: contribution, offering; used over 70 times; Ex 12:2,3; 30:13,14,15; 2Chr 31:10,12,14); (5) vow offerings (neder); (6) freewill offerings (nedebach; Ezr 3:5); (7) firstlings, firstfruits (bekira, bikkurim; Num 18:12,13). Other kinds of offerings include: (8) all choice offerings which are vowed (minchah; Lev 23:16); (9) peace offerings (shelamim; Lev 3:1ff); (10) drink offerings (nesek; Gen 35:14; Num 28:7-10; Phil 2:17; 2Tim 4:6); (11) wave offerings (tenupah; Lev 23:11-17); (12) sin offerings for unintentional sins (chattat; Ex 29:14; Lev 4:3); (13) sin, trespass offerings (asham; Num 5:6-7; Lev 5:5-13); (14) [special] offerings (qorban; Num 7:12ff). And this listing is incomplete. There are also thank offerings, redemption of firstborn, .... these are all parts of the same system. [http://www.ozramp.net.au/~sanhub/tithing.htm]

FIRSTBORN and FIRSTLINGS to the Levites and the Feasts? It is worth noting that Num 18:8-24 includes firstborn (vv 15,17-18) as being given to the Levites. Deut 15:19-20 says that the firstborn animals are to be eaten at the place the LORD shall choose, i.e., at the festival site(s) during the festivals. Are there two sets of firstborn? Or is it one firstborn that is used in two different ways? The answer is self-evident. The Hebrew for firstborn, firstling, firstfruits, as used in the following Scriptures, is derived from bekor, or bikkurim, which is plural. [id]

There are, actually, two different terms in Classical Hebrew which are customarily rendered as "first-fruits" in English. In addition to re'shith there is also the plural bikkurim [BDB, 114b], which, indeed, as opposed to re'shith, is strictly a technical term. This bikkurim is, of course, a close cognate of the noun bkhor, which designates the "first-born" of men and animals [BDB, 114a]. The Hebrew and English Dictionary defines bikkurim as "the first of grain and fruit that ripened and was gathered and offered to God according to the ritual" of the first-fruits [BDB, 114b]. This ritual included the offering of the bread (the lechem-habbikkurim) made from the newly ripened grain on the Day of the First-Fruits (yom-habbikkurim), which is to say Pentecost [BDB, 114b]. The several forms of bikkurim are found some seventeen times in the Old Testament, as opposed to the nineteen occasions on which the more general vocable re'shith refers to the "first-fruits" of one's produce.

In the majority of instances, as we have seen, re'shith serves, as here in Deuteronomy 26, as the nomen regens in a construct chain, but the absolute in the first three instances cited above shows the use re'shith in a technical sense as a synonym of bikkurim. This same congruence of terms likewise appears, not only from those passages in which re'shith stands in a parallel position to bikkurim, but also the construct chains which actually incorporate both of these terms. In such chains bikkurim, evidently, modifies the preceding re'shith in the epexegetical manner of an explicative genitive of restrictive significance [listed as III.A.B.7.a in CHEL]. The reference, in other words, is to those initial products of the land which constituted the "first-fruits" (in the technical sense) which were to be offered to God.

R.O. Rigsby, to be sure, suggests that re'shith refers specifically to "processed produce rather than produce in the raw state" of nature [R.O. Rigsby, ABD, II, 797a, in 796b-797b]. This hypothesis, however, runs aground on the applications of the word, not only to honey and wool, but, above all, to the first sheaf of barley which the Israelites were to bring to the sanctuary each year to be presented on the sixteenth day of Nisan. Nor need we assume with J.E. Rosscup that a distinction may have been made between re'shith and bikkurim in some periods of history as opposed to others [J.E. Rosscup, ZPEB, II, 541a, in 541a-b].

The rationale of all the offerings of first-fruits in the Old Testament was the divine ownership of Israel. The land and everything and everyone who lived on it belonged to the One True God. The people of Israel were His stewards who were allowed the use of the majority of everything arising from the land or receiving its sustenance therefrom. As reminders, however, of this basic relationship between the Lord and His people (who were, indeed, metaphorically, His own first-fruits), the children of Israel were obliged to consecrate specifically to the Lord in one way or another the first-born of all His people and animals and the first-fruits of all the products of His land. The ordinances, therefore, of Nehemiah the Governor evince quite clearly the close relationship between the offering of the first-fruits of the land and the first-born of man and beast (Nehemiah 10: 36-40 MT [35-39 EV]).

Again, therefore, in addition to the instances of re'shith cited above, the word bikkurim is likewise applied to the production of the land in general in Exodus 23 (verses 16 and 19) and 34 (verse 26), Numbers 28 (verse 26), and Nehemiah 10 (verse 36 [MT, 35 EV]) and 13 (verse 31). The term is then applied more specifically to fruits in general (Numbers 18:13, Ezekiel 44:30, and Nehemiah 10:36 [MT, 35 EV]), grain in general (Leviticus 2:14), wheat in particular (Exodus 34:22), ground meal or dough (Ezekiel 44:30), loaves of bread (Leviticus 23 [17 and 20] and 2 Kings 4:42), grapes (Numbers 13:20), and figs (Nahum 3:12).

Some presentation of the first-fruits of the land was connected with each of the three great festivals of pilgrimage during the course of the liturgical year of the church of the Old Testament (Exodus 23: 14-19). Immediately following the Passover, on the sixteenth day of Nisan, the a sheaf of the first grain of the new year was presented to the Lord by being waved before His altar (Leviticus 23:10). No additional harvesting could be done before the observance of this ritual of the rededication of the land to the Lord. The "sheaf of the first-fruits" would have consisted in barley as the first grain to ripen in Palestine, in accordance with the Gezer Calendar in regard to harvests and in accord with Flavius Josephus in regard to the sheaf itself [R.O. Rigsby, ABD, II, 797a].

Fifty days later, on the day which therefore came to be called Pentecost, the Feast of Weeks began with the Day of First-Fruits (Numbers 28:26). This feast was connected with the first-fruits of the new wheat of the land (Exodus 34:22). On this occasion two loaves of bread made from the new crop were presented to the Lord to symbolize His ownership of the whole harvest (Leviticus 23:16-19). The offering of the first-fruits of the remaining products of the land would have been connected especially with the Feast of Ingathering in the autumn (Exodus 23: 14-19).

[http://www.ctsfw.edu/etext/judisch/lent1.htm]

BARKOKHBA - disc two

NEFESH

http://www.torah.org/learning/lifeline/5758/purim.html

The Gaon, Rabbi Eliyahu Kramer, explains that there are four elements to a person in Jewish thought: the basic life-force (Nefesh), spirit (Ruach), soul (Neshamah), and the body. [torah.org]

MO'ED

Mo'ed ("Festivals"): 12 tractates The weekly Sabbath and the cycle of annual festivals. 2nd order of the Mishnah. see Zera'im, Mo'ed, Nashim, Neziqin, Qodashim, Tohorot.

The Talmud covers almost all of the tractates in the Mishnah's orders "Mo'ed" (about Sabbath and festivals), "Nashim" (about family law) and "Qodashim" (about the Temple and its sacrificial worship)

[elsegal]

MASKIL

misprint for Maschil ? - instructing, occurs in the title of thirteen Psalms (32, 42, 44, etc.). It denotes a song enforcing some lesson of wisdom or piety, a didactic song. In Ps. 47:7 it is rendered, Authorized Version, "with understanding;" Revised Version, marg., "in a skilful psalm."

[Easton's Bible dictionary]

MISHPATIM

justice laws [Tauber]

SHEAR-JASHUB

a remnant shall escape or return (i.e., to God), a symbolical name which the prophet Isaiah gave to his son (Isa. 7:3), perhaps his eldest son.

[Easton's Bible dictionary]

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