The religion of the Hebrews and the birth of monotheism
In the biblical stories, Abraham is the first Hebrew (Ivri/Ivrim). He forged an alliance (symbolized by the circumcision) with God, the One creator and an omnipotent God, thus rejecting idolatrous practices. This text about the Genesis tells the story of the transmission of this alliance, which was continued by the other patriarchs, Isaac and Jacob. The beliefs and religious practices of the Hebrews were based on the centrality of the Law, which was revealed to God by Moses on Mount Sinai, during the biblical story of the exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt.
The Biblical exegesis, but mostly the archaeological discoveries that allow us to retrace part of the history of the Hebrews, which is different from the one told in the sacred text and dates back to the current state of knowledge until the 13th century BCE. While, according to the Jewish tradition, Abraham was the first man who espoused the idea of monotheism, in reality it seems that the emergence of monotheism was preceded by a longer period of henotheism. Thus, belief in one God did not prevail all at once and was most likely the result of a long process connected to the historical and political context of the Hebrew society. Although the biblical text mentions repeatedly the persistence of polytheist and syncretist practices, which were regularly rejected by the prophets, the religion of the Hebrews was definitely the first identified monotheist religion. Its essence was conveyed by the Sh’ma Israel, the declaration of faith of Israel (Deuteronomy, 6,4), in this way: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one”. God forged an alliance with the people that elected him and revealed the text of the Torah. Under different names, this God was the creator of the sky and earth, the master of history who intervened in the world of men who came from him. In addition to the idea of One God, monotheism also predicates the unity of humanity, faith in One God binding together all men.
The religious and political organisation of the Hebrews
According to the Hebrew Bible, Jacob, who took the name of Israel after his struggle with the Angel, was behind the creation of the 12 tribes of Israel. They were enslaved in Egypt before they received the Torah when they were led by Moses to the land of Canaan. Spread across this land, the tribes ended up electing King Saul. But his successor, David, from the tribe of Judah, was the true founder of the royal dynasty and made Jerusalem its capital (also called “ the city of David”). After the construction of a palace and the Ark of the Covenant, which housed the Tablets of the Law, Jerusalem became the political and religious capital of the Kingdom of David (the biblical text says that “in Jerusalem, he reigned over all Israel and Judah for thirty-three years”, II, Samuel, 5). The reign of his son Solomon, who succeeded David, corresponds to the height of the kingdom, which experienced a period of peace, but most importantly witnessed the construction of the Temple, which made Jerusalem the only religious centre of his people. Solomon’s Temple, together with the Royal Palace, was erected on Mount Moriah. Although we have no archaeological evidence, the texts describe it as an extremely refined structure. The most sacred site in the Temple is located in the Holy of Holies (dvir in Hebrew), which houses the Ark of the Covenant, can only be accessed by the High Priest of Israel once a year, on the day of Yom Kippur.
After the death of Solomon in the end of the 10th century BCE, a turbulent period followed. His kingdom, which was divided between the kingdom of North Israel and the kingdom of Judah in the South, suffered from merciless wars before being defeated by foreign powers: the kingdom of Israel was defeated by the Assyrians in 722 BCE and the kingdom of Judah by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the sanctuary in the capital of Judah, Jerusalem, and deported the aristocracy to Babylon. However, several decades later, the Persian king Cyrus, who conquered Babylon, proclaimed an edict that allowed the exiled Judeans to come back and rebuild their sanctuary, which was inaugurated in 516 BCE. This reconstruction was accompanied by a major religious revival, attributed, according to the tradition, to Ezra and Nehemia, who gave their names to the two books of the Bible retracing the events of this period.
The revival of religious beliefs and practices
These two figures eliminated all foreign influences that could have favoured the return of idolatrous practices and ensured the strict application of the prescriptions of the Torah, which became the core of religious life. This Persian period was characterized by considerable writing activity, with several biblical stories dating probably from the time when a number of religious changes that had begun during the Babylonian exile were implemented. During this period, the structure of the Torah was completed and considered a sacred text that could no longer be modified. For the Judeans, the Persian period was a time of intense religious and literary activity. Religion was focused on worship in the Temple, in which burnt offerings took place, and the sacerdotal current was established. The re-settlement of the Judeans around the Temple of Jerusalem did not stop the continuation of rivalries with the inhabitants of the kingdom of North Israel, who around the middle of the 4th century BCE ended up establishing their own sanctuary in Mount Garizim.
The religious revival of the period before the conquest by Alexander the Great and the domination of Hellenistic kings, sealed the birth of Judaism which soon faced other influences, notably Greek and then Roman. At the time, the Jewish world was very diverse geographically, since the diaspora communities existed outside Judah, but also in religious terms, since various movements, including the Essenes, the Sadducees and the Pharisees, flourished within the Judean world.
Judah fell under Roman domination in 63 BCE. It was then, under the kingdom of Herod, that a policy of great works was put into place for the enlargement and embellishment of the Temple of Jerusalem. The holy city reached the height of its splendour and glory. But Roman domination led to more trouble and sporadic revolts until the eruption of the “great Jewish revolt” in 66 BCE whose conclusion proved fatal to the Jews: on the 9th day of the month of Av (the same date as the destruction of the first sanctuary) in 70 BCE, Titus ordered the burning of the Temple of Jerusalem and the destruction of the entire city. According to accounts by the historian Flavius Josephus, the great revolt ended with the capture of the fortress of Masada and the group suicide of Sicarii Jews. The consequences of this terrible defeat by the Romans proved considerable and left a mark on Jewish history for at least 2,000 years.