Did Jesus Live 100 B.C.?
By G. R. S. Mead
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IX.—THE TALMUD MARY STORIES.
IT is in vain to seek for any historical element in the Talmud Mary stories,
for they revolve entirely round the accusation of her unfaithfulness to her
husband, and, therefore, in my opinion, owe their origin to, and cannot
possibly be of earlier date than, the promulgation of the popular Christian
dogma of the physical virginity of the mother of Jesus. 'When this miraculous
dogma was first mooted is exceedingly difficult to decide. We believe,
however, that even at the time of the compilation of the canonical Gospels
Joseph was still held to he the natural father of Jesus; as we have seen
above, and from this we deduce that even in the reign of Hadrian (117-138
A.D.) the dogma of the miraculous birth was not yet "catholicised."'
But how far back can we push the first circulation of this startling belief?
For instantly it was publicly mooted even by a restricted number of the
faithful, it was bound not only to have attracted the widest notice among the
Jews, but also to have called forth the most contemptuous retorts from those
who not only hated the Pagan idea of heroes born of the congress of divine and
mortal parents as a Heathen superstition and an idolatrous belief, but who
were especially jealous of the
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legitimacy of their line of descent as preserved in the public records of
their families. In this connection there is a passage in the Talmud which
deserves our careful attention. It is interesting in other respects, but
chiefly because it is found in the Mishna (iv. 3), and therefore puts entirely
out of court the contention of those who assert that what is generally
regarded as the oldest and most authoritative deposit of the Talmud contains
no reference whatever to Jesus; and not only is it found in the Mishna, but it
purports to base itself on a still older source, and that too a written one.
This remarkable passage runs as follows:
"Simeon ben Azzai has said: I found in Jerusalem a book of genealogies;
therein was written: That so and so is a bastard son of a married woman."[1]
This Simeon ben Azzai nourished somewhat earlier than Akiba, and may therefore
be placed at the end of the first and the beginning of the second century. He
was one of the famous four who, according to Talmudic tradition, "entered
Paradise"; that is to say, he was one of the most famous mystics of Israel. He
was a Chassid, most probably an Essene, and remained a celibate and rigid
ascetic till the day of his death. We might, therefore, expect him to be
specially fitted to give us some information as to Jesus, and yet what he is
recorded to have said is the very opposite of our expectation.
Ben Azzai, we are to believe, declared that he had found a book of genealogies
at Jerusalem—presumably then before the destruction of the city in 70 A.D.
This book of genealogies can be taken to mean nothing else
[1] "Jebamoth," 49a.
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than an official record; nevertheless we are told that it contained the proof
of Jeschu's bastardy, for "so and so” is one of the well-known substitutes for
Jesus and Jesus alone in the Talmud, as has been proved and admitted on either
side.
If we are right in ascribing the genesis of the Mamzer element of the Jesus
stories to doctrinal controversy, we can only conclude that the categorical
statement we are considering was originally either a deliberate invention, or
the confident assertion in the heat of controversy of some imperfect memory
that was only too eagerly believed to refer to Jesus. The Jewish apologist on
the contrary can argue that this ancient tradition fully justified his
forefathers of later generations for their belief in the bastardy of Jeschu as
a historic fact authenticated by the records; while if he be an out-and-out
rationalist he may even go so far as to claim that the "virgin birth "doctrine
was invented in answer to this record, and that there has been no
historicising of a mystic fact, as we have supposed, seeing that there are no
mystic "facts," but only the baseless imaginings of unbalanced enthusiasm.
This we cannot believe, and therefore conclude that the earliest Jewish Mary
legends came to birth somewhere towards the close of the first century.
It is exceedingly difficult to classify these Mamzer legends or to treat them
in any satisfactory chronological fashion, but it is remarkable that in them
there seem to be two deposits of tradition characterised by different names
for Jeschu—Ben Stada and Ben Pandera, names which have given rise to the
wildest philological speculation, but of which the current mean-
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ing was evidently simply "son of the harlot," whatever may have been their
line of descent.[1] Ben Stada occurs exclusively in the Talmud, where it is
the most frequent designation of Jeschu, though Ben Pandera is also found; Ben
Pandera is found in the Toldoth Jeschu, and as we have seen in the Church
Fathers, while Ben Stada is never met with in these sources.
The Ben Stada stories are mostly characterised by anachronisms which are as
startling as those of the Ben Perachiah date, but which are its exact
antipodes. They are further generally characterised by either distinct
references to Lud, or by the bringing in of the names of the most famous
Rabbis of this famous school of Talmud study. I would suggest, therefore, that
these legends might be conveniently called the Lud stories.
[1] See Krauss (S.), "Das Leben Jesu nach jüdischen Quellen" (Berlin; 1902),
p. 276, where full indications of the literature are appended. A probable
speculation is that of Bleek in Nitzsch's article, "Ueber eine Reihe
talmudischer und patristischer Täuschungen, welche sich an den
missverstandenen Spottnamen Ben Pandera geknüpft," in "Theologische Studien
und Kritiken" (Hamburg; 1840), pp. 115-120. Bleek supposes that Pandera is a
caricature-name to mimic the Greek parqenoV
(Parthenos), "Virgin." But there is also perhaps a connection with the Greek
panqhr (Panther), an animal that was
regarded as the symbol of lasciviousness. Whether or not there may have been
further some connection between this panther-idea and the Egyptian Pasht-cult,
it is impossible to say. But Pasht or Bast, the "cat" or "panther" goddess, is
supposed to have had rites resembling those of Aphrodite Pandemos, and the
girls of her temple were therefore presumably prostitutes. The derivation of
"bastard "is given as equivalent to the old French fils de bast, where
bast means a "pack saddle." The "son of Bast" in Egypt would have been a like
term of unequivocal meaning. Still we can hardly venture to connect these too
bast’s, and so must leave the matter as a curious freak of
coincidence.
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The Mishna School at Lud (Lydda) is said to have been founded by E. Eliezer
ben Hyrcanus, the teacher of E. Akiba,[1] and it was doubtless the great
reputation of Akiba as the most implacable foe of Christianity which, in
course of time, connected the name of Mary with stories of Akiba which
originally were perfectly innocent of any reference to the mother of Jesus.
Thus, in later times, we find tradition bringing Akiba and Miriam together in
personal conversation, we find it still later giving her one of Akiba's
contemporaries as a husband, and finally we meet with a curious legend in
which Miriam is made the contemporary of a Rabbi of the fourth century!
But to consider these fantastic developments of Talmudic tradition in greater
detail. The following is the famous academical discussion on the refinements
of bastardy, which in course of time supplied the Ben Pandera legend with some
of its most striking details, as we still find them in various forms of the
Toldoth Jeschu.
"A shameless person is, according to E. Eliezer, a bastard; according to E.
Joshua, a son of a woman in her separation; according to E. Akiba, a bastard
and son of a woman in her separation. Once there sat elders at the gate when
two boys passed by; one had his head covered, the other bare. Of him who had
his head uncovered, E. Eliezer said, 'A bastard!'
[1] But when we are told that the famous Jewish proselyte, Queen Helena of
Adiabene, passed fourteen years in Palestine (46-60 A.D.) in close communion
with the doctors of the Hillel school at Jerusalem and Lud, there was
presumably a school at Lud even prior to the time of Ben Hyrcanus.
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R. Joshua said, 'A son of a woman in her separation !' R. Akiba said, 'A
bastard and son of a woman in her separation !' They said to R. Akiba, 'How
has thine heart impelled thee to the audacity of contradicting the words of
thy colleagues?' He said to them, 'I am about to prove it.' Thereupon he went
to the boy's mother, and found her sitting in the market and selling pulse. He
said to her,' My daughter, if thou tellest me the thing which I ask thee, I
will bring thee to eternal life.' She said to him, 'Swear it to me!' Thereupon
E. Akiba took the oath with his lips, while he cancelled it in his heart. Then
said he to her, 'Of what sort is this thy son?' She said to him, 'When I
betook myself to the bridal chamber I was in my separation, and my husband
stayed away from me. But my paranymph[1] came to me, and by him I have this
son.' So the boy was discovered to be both a bastard and the son of a woman in
her separation. Thereupon said they,' Great is R. Akiba, in that he has put to
shame his teachers.' In the same hour they said, 'Blessed be the Lord God of
Israel, who has revealed His secret to R. Akiba ben Joseph,'"[2]
Eliezer, Joshua and Akiba were contemporaries, but Akiba was by far their
junior; for Eliezer ben Hyrcanus was Akiba's teacher, while Joshua ben
Chanania was a disciple of Jochanan ben Zakkai, who died about 70 A.D.; Akiba
was put to death in 135 A.D. The setting of the story, therefore, places us
somewhere about the end of the first century.
We may pass over the strange ascription of an act
[1] That is, the bridegroom's best man.
[2] "Kallah,” 18b.
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of heartless perjury to Akiba as the means whereby he extorted the confession
from the boy's mother, and the far more curious addition at the end of the
passage which blesses the God of Israel for revealing "His secret" after the
use of such questionable means, with the remark that it would be interesting
to know whether Talmud apologetics prefer to abandon the reputation of the
Talmud or of its great authority Akiba in this instance, for here there is no
third choice.
What is most striking in the story is that neither the name of the boy nor
that of his mother is given. Laible [l] supposes that the story originally
contained the names of Jeschu and Miriam, but that the compiler of the Gemara
struck them out, both because the mother is described as a pulse-seller, while
elsewhere in the .Talmud she is called Miriam the women's hair-dresser, and
also because of the startling anachronism of making Miriam and Akiba
contemporaries. He holds that the story itself is of early origin, and was
originally a Jesus story.
To this we cannot agree, for if it had been originally intended, as a Jesus
story its inventors could not possibly have been so foolish as to introduce
Rabbis of the beginning of the second century among the dramatis persona;.
This would have been really too inane even for the wildest controversialists
at any date even remotely approaching the time when Jews and Jewish Christians
were still in contact.
The main intention of the story is evidently to enhance the reputation of R.
Akiba, to display the
[1] Laible-Streane, op. cit., p. 35.
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depth of his penetration and his fine appreciation of the subtlest shades of
bastardy, a subject of great importance in Rabbinical law. It was then
presumably a tradition of the Lud school, and at first had no connection
whatever with the Jeschu stories. In course of time, when the Mamzer retort to
the virgin-birth dogma was popularised in legend and folk-tale, the details of
this other famous story of bastardy were added to the originally vague Mamzer
legends of Jeschu, and to this source we may conjecture, with high
probability, is to be traced the origin of the coarse details of Miriam's
unfaithfulness to her husband as found in the various forms of the Toldoth
Jeschu. The link was simply the word "bastard"; the rich gain to the legend
material finally entirely outweighed the inconvenience of the wild
anachronism.
The story is introduced by the commission of a shocking act of disrespect on
the part of one of the boys, for according to Rabbinical law and custom, a
teacher was to be treated as worthier of greater honour than all others, even
than one's parents. To go uncovered in the presence of a teacher was thus
thought to be an act of utter shamelessness; in the West, of course, the very
opposite would be the case. Disrespect to the Rabbis as shown in this and
other ways is one of the main burdens of accusation brought against Jesus in
the Toldoth Jeschu.
We are, then, justified in supposing that any folktale or legend of infidelity
or bastardy stood a good chance of being gradually worked into the Mamzer
patchwork. And indeed we find that this was actually the case. The following
story is a good instance of this method of conflation.
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"There is a tradition, Rabbi Meir used to say : Just as there are various
kinds of taste as regards eating, so there are also various dispositions as
regards women. There is a man into whose cup a fly falls and he casts it out,
but all the same he does not drink it (the cup). Such was the manner of Paphos
ben Jehudah, who used to lock the door upon his wife and go out. And there is
another who, when a fly falls into his tumbler, throws it out and drinks it,
and this is the way of men generally. When she is speaking with her brothers
and relatives, he does not hinder her. But there is also the man, who, when a
fly falls into a dish, sucks it (the fly) out and eats it (the dish). This is
the manner of a bad man, who sees his wife going out bareheaded and spinning
in the street and wearing clothes slit up on both sides and bathing together
with men." [1]
R. Meir was a pupil of Akiba and Paphos (or Pappos) ben Jehudah was Akiba's
contemporary. It is not necessary to enter into a consideration of the details
of Rabbinic metaphor with regard to the "various dispositions." All we learn
from this passage directly with regard to Paphos ben Jehudah is that he locked
up his wife; we are, however, led to conclude, indirectly, that she ultimately
proved unfaithful to her tyrannical spouse. What, then, more simple than for a
storyteller to connect this with the details of unfaithfulness found in his
Jeschu repertoire. The erring wife was just like Miriam; before long she
actually became Miriam, and finally Paphos ben Jehudah was confidently given
as Miriam's husband ! So they had it in later times, had it, we may suppose,
at Lud, that most uncritical of legend
[1] "Gittin," 90a.
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factories, and finally we find even so great a commentator as Rashi (b. 1105
A.D.) endorsing with all confidence this hopeless anachronism, when he says: "Paphos
ben Jehudah was the husband of Miriam, the women's hairdresser. Whenever he
went out of the house into the street, he locked the door upon her, that no
one might be able to speak to her. And that is a course which became him not;
for on this account there arose enmity between them, and she in wantonness
broke her faith with her husband."
But even eight or nine centuries before Rashi's time the Babylonian Rabbis had
found the Ben Stada Lud developments a highly inconvenient overgrowth of the
earlier Ben Perachiah date, as we shall see later on, and it is strange to
find Rashi so ignorant of what they hid to say on the subject.
Startling, however, as is the anachronism which we have been discussing, it is
but a mild surprise compared with the colossal absurdity of the following
legend, if we interpret it in the traditional fashion.
"When Rab Joseph came to this verse (Prov. xiii. 23), 'But there is that is
destroyed without judgment,' he wept. He said: Is there really someone who is
going (away), when it is not his time? Certainly (for) so has it happened with
Rab Bibi bar Abbai; the angel of death was found with him. The former said to
his attendant, Go, bring me Miriam the women's hairdresser. He went and
brought him Miriam the children's teacher. The angel of death said to him, I
said Miriam the women's hair-dresser. The messenger said to him, Then I will
bring her [the other] back. The angel of death said to him, Since thou
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hast brought her, let her be reckoned (among the dead)."
Rab Joseph bar Chia was born at Still, in Babylonia 259 AD; he was head of the
famous Babylonian Rabbinical School at Pumbeditha. The only R. Bibi we know of
flourished in the fourth century, and that this Bibi was believed to have been
the seer of the death-bed vision is quite evidemt from the following note of
the Tosaphoth on the passage:
"'The angel of death was found with him, who related what had happened to him
long ago, for this story as to Miriam the women's hair-dresser took place in
the time of the second temple, for she was mother of that so and so [i.e.,
Jeschu], as is related in (treatise) Shabbath [104b]."
It is by no means clear what the writer of the Tosaphoth meant precisely by "
the time of the second temple” He probably, however, meant the time before the
new and splendid edifice of Herod replaced the second temple proper, the
meagre building that had become gradually overlooked by the gorgeous Greek
palaces of the nobles of Herod's days.
It must be remarked, however, that this explanation does great violence to the
wording of the story as it is found in the Gemara. Can it be then that some
other Bibi was originally referred to, and that the story was subsequently
transferred by posterity to his far later but more famous namesake?
That the simple words "bastard" and "adulteress”were strong enough indications
of suitability for the match-makers of legend to unite in marriage stories
[1] "Chagiga," 4b.
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otherwise the strongest incompatibility of age and date, we have already seen;
that the very common name of Miriam should further expand this family circle
of cross-breeds is therefore quite to be expected.
And this will doubtless be held by most sufficiently to account for the
transference to the address of Miriam the mother of Jeschu of the following
two legends, but closer inspection warns us not too lightly to accept this
explanation. In one of the tractates of the Palestinian Talmud we are given
the story of a certain devout person who was privileged to see a vision of
some of the punishments in hell. Among other sights.
"He saw also Miriam, the daughter of Eli Betzalim, suspended, as B. Lazar ben
Jose says, by the paps of her breasts. E. Jose ben Chanina says: The hinge of
hell's gate was fastened in her ear. He said to them [? the angels of
punishment], Why is this done to her? The answer was, Because she fasted and
published the fact. Others said, Because she fasted one day, and counted two
days (of feasting) as a set-off'. He asked them, How long shall she be so?
They answered him, Until Simeon ben Shetach comes; then we shall take it out
of her ear and put it into his ear."[l]
As R. Jose ben Chanina was a contemporary of R. Akiba, E. Lazar ben Jose was
presumably a Rabbi of an earlier date, but I can discover nothing about him.
The main point of interest for us is the sentence, "until Simeon ben Shetach
comes." This can only mean that at the time of the vision Simeon ben Shetach
was not yet dead, and therefore this Miriam was at latest
[1] "Pal. Chagiga," 77d.
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contemporary with him and therefore can very well be placed in the days of his
older contemporary Joshua ben Perachiah. As to Eli Betzalim,[1] I can discover
nothing about him. It is true that a certain Eli is given as the father of
Joseph in the genealogy incorporated into the third Gospel, a genealogy which
would be quite useless if at the time of its compilation Jesus had not been
regarded as the natural son of Joseph, but in the very different genealogy
prefixed to the first Gospel, and also purporting to give the descent of
Joseph, a certain Jacob takes the place of Eli and the name Eli is not found.
But even had the two genealogies agreed, we should not have been helped at
all, for they are given as the genealogies of Joseph and not of Mary.
It would also be of interest to know in what Simeon ben Shetach had offended,
for he is otherwise known as the Rabbinic president of the golden age of
Pharisaean prestige in the days of Queen Salome, as we have seen above. In any
case the story is an ancient one, for already in the days of Rabbi Lazar and
Rabbi Jose there were variants of it.
The phrase "hinge of hell's gate" is curious, and argues an Egyptian (or
perhaps Chaldaean) setting; it may be compared with the "pivot of the gate of
Amenti" of the Khamuas folk-tales, where they relate the punishment of "Dives
in Hades." "It was commanded that he should be requited in Amenti, and he is
that
[1] Krauss ("Leben Jesu," p. 224) translates "Eli Betzalim" by "Zwiebelblatt"
(Onion-leaf) and (p. 225) refers to this Miriam as M. Zwiebelblatt, but does
not venture on any explanation. The onion, however, was a symbol of
lasciviousness, and may, therefore, perhaps be taken as a synonym of harlot.
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man whom thou didst see, in whose right eye the pivot (?) of the gate of
Amenti was fixed, shutting and opening upon it, arid whose mouth was open in
great lamentation."[1]
Finally, in these Talmud Mary-legends we come to the thrice-repeated Miriam
daughter of Bilga story, which runs as follows:
"Bilga always receives his part on the south side on account of Mirian,
daughter of Bilga, who turned apostate and went to marry a soldier belonging
to the government of Javan,[2] and went and beat upon the roof of the altar.
She said to him : 'Wolf, wolf, thou hast destroyed the property of the
Israelites and didst not help them in the hour of their distress!'"[3]
This Miriam of Bilga can hardly be supposed to mean the actual daughter of
Bilga of I. Chron. xxiv. 14, the head of one of the priestly courses of the
house of Aaron. It must mean simply that Miriam was the daughter of one of the
priests of the Bilga course or line of descent, for in the days of Bilga
himself we
[1]Griffith (F. Ll.), "Stories of the High Priests of Memphis" (Oxford; 1900),
p. 49. See also "The Gospels and the Gospel" (London; 1902), pp. 175-180,
where I have pointed out the importance of this episode in the new-found
demotic papyrus as a probable source of the Dives and Lazarus story. Was Lazar
the name of the seer in. some Jewish variant of these popular Egyptian
folk-tales? And has some alchemy of name-transmutation brought to birth the
name Lazarus of the Dives story of the third Gospel writer? The speculation is
a wild one, but not wilder than the transformations of legends with which
folk-lorists are on all hands well acquainted.
[2] That is, Greece (Ionia).
[3] "Pal. Sukka," 55d, also in substantially identical words, "Bab. Sukka,"
56b, and in "Tosephta Sukka," iv. 28.
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know of no attack on Jerusalem by the Greeks, as the story evidently
suggests.
In this case, however, it does not seem to be the Talmud or the Jews
themselves who connect this story with Miriam, mother of Jeschu, but Dalman,[1]
who leaves us to suppose that it is one of the censured passages of the
Talmud. What ground, however, Dalman has for bringing this story into relation
with the Mary-legends I cannot discover; he seems to depend on Laible,[2] who
refers to Origen quoting Celsus as making his Jew declare that "Mary gave
birth to Jesus by a certain soldier, Panthera."
If, because of this, we are to take the above as a Mary story, it should be
noticed that the "soldier "is of the" house of Greece," and therefore the date
of the incident must be placed prior to the first Roman occupation of
Jerusalem by Pompey in 63 B.C.; so that in it, in any case, we find a
confirmation of the Ben Perachiah date.
This brings us to the end of our Mary stories; our next chapter will deal with
the remaining Talmud Ben Stada Jesus stories.
[1] Dalman-Streane, op. cit., p. 20n.
[2] Ibid., p. 19.
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