When the Zoroastrian Priests Came to Jewish Babylonia

b. Gittin 16b–17a

220–600

Rabbah bar Bar Ḥanah was sick. R. Judah and the rabbis entered to ask him [questions]. [ . . . ] At that moment, a Zoroastrian priest came and took the lamp from before them. [Rabbah bar Bar Ḥanah] said: “Oh Merciful, [let us live] either in Your shadow or in the shadow of the son of Esau [the Romans]—that is to say that the Romans are preferable to the Persians [i.e., Zoroastrians]?!” And there are those who teach that R. Ḥiyya taught, “What is the [meaning of the] verse God understood its path and knew its place (Job 28:23)? The Holy One knows that Israel is not able to withstand the decrees of the Romans, so He exiled them to Babylonia.” There is not a contradiction. The former [comment by R. Ḥiyya] refers to before the time when the Zoroastrian priests came to Babylonia; the latter [comment by Rabbah bar Bar Ḥanah] to after the Zoroastrian priests came to Babylonia.

Translated by Shai Secunda.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 2: Emerging Judaism.

In this talmudic passage, a Zoroastrian priest removes a lamp that has infringed on the sanctity of fire in his tradition. The rabbi reacts by comparing Zoroastrian rule to Roman rule, an odd comparison given the relative freedoms accorded to the Jewish communities under the Zoroastrians. Taken with the implications in Kartīr’s inscription, this episode suggests that Jews did face some harassment and persecution in this period. Given conflicting and vague talmudic references, however, scholars disagree about the threat to the Jewish communities under Zoroastrian priestly authority.

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When the Zoroastrian Priests Came to Jewish Babylonia

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