4. Origin, Date, and Development of the Great Synagogue.—lt is supposed by many that Ezra was the founder of the Great Synagogue, and that he in fact was its president. Graetz, however, has adduced the following most conclusive arguments proving that Nehemiah originated it after the death of Ezra :—/. The very name of Ezra is not even mentioned in the register of the representatives, and it is inconceivable to suppose that the originator would have been omitted ; and ii. Nehemiah, as is well known, went twice from Shushan to Jerusalem to restore order—viz. in the 2oth year of Arta xerxes' reign (Lc. 446), and after the 32d year of his reign (n.c. 436-428). On his second arrival, he found Jerusalem in a most deplorable condition : the chiefs of the families had formed alliances with Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Am monite, enemies of the Jews, the Sabbath was desecrated, and the law of God and the sanctu ary were disregarded (Neh. xiii. 6-3z). Now the convention of the Great Synagogue was held ex pressly for the removal of these very evils ; and since the representatives distinctly bound them selves by a most solemn oath to abstain from mixed marriages, to keep the Sabbath holy, and to attend sacredly to the sanctuary and its require ments, there can be no doubt tbat the synod was convened by Nehemiah after his second visit to Jerusalem to devise means in order to meet these perplexing points, and that because these evils disturbed the order of the community, there fore they were made the principal and express objects of the first synod. It is the position of cap. x. recording the convention of the Great Synagogue which has caused this error. But it is well known that the book of Nehemiah is not put together in chronological order. Graetz has shown in a masterly manner the proper position of the different chapters (Frankel's Monalsehrif vi. 62).
As to its date, the convention of this Great Syna gogue was most probably one of Nehemiah's la.st acts, and it must have taken place after the death of Artaxerxes, else Nehemiah could not have re mained in Jerusalem, since even the second permis sion to visit Jerusalem was granted to him on con dition that he should return to Shushan. It could not therefore have taken place before 424 B.C. The Great Synagogue was most probably held 2o years after the restoration of the walls, or 35 years after Ezra's return. Ezra was then dead, and this is the reason why his name does not occur in the register of the representatives. The whole period of the great synagogue embraces about ro years (n.c. 410-3oo), or from the latter days of Nehemiah to the death of Simon the Just, who was the last link of the chain constituting the synod (ivntv n5rtan non ,i,v0 rrn pnvn, Aboth, i. 2). It then passed into the Sanhedrin), when the whole of its constitution was chang,ed [SANitEnntm].
It only remains to be added that the existence of the Great Synagogue, which is attested by the una nimous voice of Jevvish tradition, was first ques. tioned by Richard Simon (Hz:rt. Grit. du Vieux Test. lib. i. cap. viii.) Jacob Alting with more boldness rejected it altogether as one of the inven tions of tradition (Synagoga magna enim nee uno tempore nee uno loco vixit, eoque synagoga non fuit, rerum commentum est traditionariorum, qui nullum alioquin nexum rapaSoo-ccos reperire potu erunt—Opp. v. 332). He was followed by F. E
Rau (Diatribe de Synag. Magna, p. 66, etc., Utrecht 1726), and Anrivillius (DeSynag. vulgo dicta magna, ed. J. D. Michaelis, Gottingen 179o), in their elaborate monographs on this subject. De Wette (Einleitung das A. T. sect. 14) contemptuously dismisses it as a tradition which vanishes as soon as the passages are looked at whereon it is based, and as not even being a subject for refutation.' Those who condescend to argue the matter reject this tradition because it is not mentioned in the Apocrypha, Josephus, Philo, or the .Seder Olam, and because the earliest record of it is in the Tract of the Mishna entitled Aboth. But surely this argument from the silence of a few writers cannot set aside the express and positive testimony of the Mishna, the Talmud, and the earliest Jewish works. Besides, the Book of Ecclesiasticus in its catalogue of Jewish heroes (cap. I.) does not men tion Ezra ; Josephus never alludes to the tribunal of 23 members, and the earliest patristic literature of the Jews does not breathe a syllable about the Maccabman heroes. Would it be fair to conclude from this silence that Ezra, the tribunal, and the Maccabees, are a myth ? In confirmation of the records in the Talmudic literature about the Great Synagogue, the following circumstantial evidence is to be adduced :—The errors of the Samaritans became rampant after the death of Nehemiah, whilst of the high-priests between Eliashib and Onias I. some were insignificant men and others were reprobates. Judaism moreover has no record whatever of any distinguished persons during this period. We should therefore have expected the religion of the people to be at the lowest ebb. But instead of declining we find Judaism rapidly rising. No trace is to be found in the whole of this period of the disturbances, misconceptions, and errors which prevailed in the time of Ezra, Nehe miah, and Zerubbabel. The law and the precepts were preeminently revered. The ancient collection of Ben Sirach's sayings, which reflects the spirit of the people in the pre-Simonic age, breathes a fervent enthusiasm for the inspired law (comp. Ecclus.
; vii. 29 ; ix. ; x. 19 ; xv. ; xix. ; xxi ; xxiii. 27, and especially cap. xxiv.) Who then has kindled and sustained such an enthusiasm and religious spirit, if not an assembly similar to that convened by Nehemiah ?' (Graetz in Frankel's Monatsehrif t, vi. 63, etc.) 5. _Literature. —Wassermann in Jost's itische Am:aim, vol. ii. p. 163 ff., the-Maine 1840 ; Sachs in Frankel's Zeitsehr fiir die religiosen Interessen des 7udenthums, vol.
p. 3oz ff., Berlin 1845 ; Krochma.1, Afore Xe bee-he Ha-Seman, pp. 52 ff., 102 ff., 166 ff., Leo poli 1851 ; Herzfeld, Geschichte des Volkes Israel, vol. i. pp. 22 ff., 380 ff., vol. ii. 53, 244 ff., 264 ff., Nordhausen 1855-57 ; Jost, Geschichte des yudenthRms, vol. i. pp. 35 ff., 95 ff., 27o ff. ; Low, Ben Chananja, vol. i. pp. 102 ff., 193 ff., 292 ff., 333 ff., Szegedin 1858 ; and especially the elaborate Essay of Gractz, in Frankei's Afonatschrift Geschichte und Wissenschaft des yudenthums, vol. vi. pp. 31 ff., 61 ff., Leipiig 1857.—C. D. G.