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The middle of the third century beheld all Isræl incorporated into their two communities, under their patriarch and their caliphate. The Resch-Glutha, or Prince of the Captivity, lived in all the state and splendour of an oriental potentate, far outshining in his pomp his rival sovereign in Tiberias. The most celebrated of the rabbinical sovereigns was Jehuda, sometimes called the nasi or patriarch. His life was of such spotless purity that he was named the Holy. He was the author of a new constitution for the Jewish people, for he embodied in the celebrated Mischna all the authorised traditions of the schools and courts, and all the authorised interpretations of the Mosaic law. Both in the East and the West the Jews maintained their seclusion from the rest of the world. The great work called the Talmud, formed of the Mischna and the Gemara (or compilation of comments), was composed during a period of thirty years of profound peace for the masters of the Babylonian schools, under Persian rule. This remains a monumental token of learning and industry of the eastern Jewish rabbins of the third and fourth centuries.

The formal establishment of Christianity by Constantine the Great, in the early part of the fourth century, might have led to Jewish apprehension lest the Synagogue should be eclipsed by the splendour of its triumphant rival, the Christian Church; but the Rabbinical authority had raised an insurmountable barrier around the Synagogue. And, unhappily, the Church had lost its most effective means of conversion--its miraculous powers, its simple doctrine, and the blameless lives of its believers. Constantine enacted severe laws against the Jews, which seem in great part to have been occasioned by their own fiery zeal. But, still earlier than these enactments, Spain had given the signal for hostility towards the Jews. A decree was passed at the Council of Elvira prohibiting Jewish and Christian farmers and peasants from mingling together at harvest home and other festivals.

In Egypt, during the reign of Constantius, who succeeded his father Constantine, the hot-headed Jews of Alexandria provoked the enactment by that emperor of yet severer laws, by mingling themselves in the factions of Arians and Athanasians, which distracted that restless city. They joined with the pagans on the side of the Arian bishop, and committed frightful excesses. An insurrection in Judea, which terminated in the destruction of Dio Cæsarea, gave further pretext for exaction and oppression. But the apostasy of the emperor for a time revived the hopes of the race, especially when he issued his memorable edict decreeing the rebuilding of the Temple on Mount Moriah, and the restoration of the Jewish worship in its original splendour.

The whole Jewish world was now in commotion. Julian entrusted the execution of the project to his favourite, Alypius, while he advanced with his ill-fated army to the East. The Jews crowded from the most distant quarters to assist in the work. But terrible disappointment ensued. Fire destroyed the work, and various catastrophes frustrated the enterprise, and the death of Julian rendered it hopeless.

The irruption of the Northern Barbarians during the latter half of the fourth to about the end of the fifth century so completely disorganised the whole frame of society that the condition of its humblest members could not but be powerfully influenced thereby. The Jews were widely dispersed in all those countries on which the storm fell--in Belgium, the Rhine districts, Germany, where it was civilised, Gaul, Italy, and Spain. Not only did the Jews in their scattered colonies engage actively in mercantile pursuits, but one great branch of commerce fell chiefly into their hands--the internal slave-trade of Europe.

The Church beheld this evil with grief and indignation, and popes issued rescripts and interdicts. Fierce hostility grew up between Church and Synagogue. The Church had not then the power--it may be hoped it had not the will--to persecute. It was fully occupied with the task of seeking to impart to the fierce conquerors--the Vandals; Goths, and other Barbarians--the humanising and civilising knowledge of Christianity.

A great enemy arose in the person of the Emperor Justinian, who was provoked by savage conflicts between the Jews and the Samaritans to issue severe enactments against both, which led to the fall of the patriarchate. In the East, under the rule during the same period of the Persian king, Chosroes the Just, or Nushirvan, who began his reign in 531 A.D., the position was not more favourable for the Jews of Babylonia.

III.--The Golden Age of Judaism

During the conflict between Persian and Roman emperors a power was rapidly growing up in the secret deserts of Arabia which was to erect its throne on the ruins of both. The Jews were the first opponents and the first victims of Mohammed. At least a hundred and twenty years before Christ, Jewish settlers had built castles in Sabæa and established an independent kingdom, known as Homeritis, which was subdued by an Arab chieftain and came to an end. But the Jews were still powerful in the Arabian peninsula. Mohammed designed to range all the tribes under his banner; but his overtures were scorned, and he ordered a massacre of all who refused to accept the Koran.