direction, was considered a grievous sin. From every Synagogue in the Diaspora the annual
Temple-tribute went up to Jerusalem,24 no doubt often accompanied by rich votive offerings.
Few, who could undertake or afford the journey, but had at some time or other gone up to the
Holy City to attend one of the great feasts.25 Philo, who was held by the same spell as the most
bigoted Rabbinist, had himself been one of those deputed by his fellow-citizens to offer prayers
and sacrifices in the great Sanctuary.26 Views and feelings of this kind help us to understand,
how, on some great feast, as Josephus states on sufficient authority, the population of Jerusalem
- within its ecclesiastical boundaries - could have swelled to the enormous number of nearly
three millions.27
23. St. John iv. 20.
24. Comp. Jos. Ant. xiv. 7. 2; xvi. 6, passium; Philo, De Monarchia, ed. Mangey, ii. p. 224; Ad Caj. ii. p.
568; Contra Flacc. ii. p. 524.
25. Philo, De Monarchia, ii. p. 223.
26. Philo, in a fragment preserved in Euseb., Prępar. Ev. viii. 13. What the Temple was in the estimation
of Israel, and what its loss boded, not only to them, but to the whole world, will be shown in a later part
of this book.
27. War vi. 9. 3; comp. ii. 14. 3
And still, there was an even stronger bond in their common hope. That hope pointed them all,
wherever scattered, back to Palestine. To them the coming of the Messiah undoubtedly implied
the restoration of Israel's kingdom, and, as a first part in it, the return of `the dispersed.'28
Indeed, every devout Jew prayed, day by day: `Proclaim by Thy loud trumpet our deliverance,
and raise up a banner to gather our dispersed, and gather us together from the four ends of the
earth. Blessed be Thou, O Lord! Who gatherest the outcasts of Thy people Israel.'29 That
prayer included in its generality also the lost ten tribes. So, for example, the prophecy30 was
rendered: `They hasten hither, like a bird out of Egypt,' - referring to Israel of old; `and like a
dove out of the land of Assyria' - referring to the ten tribes.31 32 And thus even these wanderers,
so long lost, were to be reckoned in the field of the Good Shepherd.33
28. Even Maimonides, in spite of his desire to minimise the Messianic expectancy, admits this.
29. This is the tenth of the eighteen (or rather nineteen) benedictions in the daily prayers. Of these the
first and the last three are certainly the oldest. But this tenth also dates from before the destruction of
Jerusalem. Comp. Zunz, Gottesd. Vortr. d. Juden, p. 368.
30. Hos. xi. 11.
31. Midr. On Cant. i. 15, ed. Warshau, p. 11b.
32. Comp. Jer. Sanh. x. 6; Sanh. 110 b: Yalk. Shim.
33. The suggestion is made by Castelli, Il Messia, p. 253.
It is worth while to trace, how universally and warmly both Eastern and Western Judaism
cherished this hope of all Israel's return to their own land. The Targumim bear repeated