Along the Way…

Archive for the ‘Karaism’ Category

It is a common Rabbinic claim that the Torah is but a skeleton—the framework of the Jewish faith. Being a skeleton, they further claim, it needs blood and flesh to make it vibrant and living. The Rabbis have found this vibrancy in the form of their “Oral Law.” A careful investigation, however, demonstrates that the Rabbinic Oral Law is not the blood and flesh that the Torah is missing, but rather the by-product of a failure to search the Scriptures for their true meaning. In absence of such a search, the Oral Law often comes to erroneous conclusions about the Biblical text. It is a great tragedy most Jews are told that the Torah is an incomplete document and must be supplemented with this Oral accompaniment. This is contrary to the clear teaching in the Tanakh itself that “The Torah of YHWH is perfect” (Psalms 19:8[7]).[1] As a result, those students who are genuinely interested in reaching the true meaning of a passage become psychologically dependent on an “Oral Law.” They feel the answers are not contained within the Tanakh itself and therefore do not undertake the necessary steps to find them within the Tanakh. The need for an Oral Law to interpret the commandments thus becomes self-reinforcing, never allowing one to search the Bible itself for the answers. Be assured, however, that most of the meaning of the commandments and principles can be determined from an honest and thorough investigation of the text. That which cannot be determined is the result of our inability to recover the plain meaning of the text, which would have been available to the average Israelite receiving the Torah.[2]

[1] The word translated as “perfect” also has the meaning of “complete.”

[2] The loss of Biblical Hebrew is a contributing factor to this phenomenon. Oftentimes, one needs to reconstruct the meaning of a passage by looking at similar phrases throughout the rest of the Tanakh.

Karaism has been around since God gave His laws to the Jewish people. At first those who followed God’s laws were merely called “Righteous” and it was only in the 9th century CE that they came to be called Karaites. The question of why God’s followers are today called Karaites is really a question of the origin of other streams of Judaism. Initially, there was no reason to label the “Righteous” as a separate group because there was only the one form of Judaism, which consisted of the whole Nation of Israel. Throughout history, the “Righteous” took on such names as Sadducees, Boethusians, Ananites, and Karaites, so as to distinguish themselves from a variety of other non-biblical streams that appeared.

Biblical Period—The Righteous

In the Biblical Period people are described as falling into two categories: the sinners and the righteous. Very often false prophets who claimed to be relaying the message of God led the people into sin. In some periods the majority of Israel followed these false prophets and those who remained loyal to the Creator were but a small few (e.g., Elijah, see 1 Kings 19:10). God sent his prophets “from morning until evening” calling on the people to repent but all too often it was only by punishing the nation with a great calamity that God could get them to listen. Much of Biblical history is a repetition of the familiar cycle of sin, punishment, repentance and salvation.

Second Template Period—Sadducees and Boethusians

The first reference in the history of Israel to more than one stream within Judaism takes place about 200 years after the close of the Biblical period, in the first century BCE. Various sources tell us of two opposing movements, the Sadducees (Zadokites) and the Pharisees. The Sadducees followed the Torah as it was written while the Pharisees believed in a second “Oral” Torah, which they added to the written one. The Second Temple period saw the rise of several more streams, among them another movement which only followed the written Torah called the Boethusians and a movement that added several books to the Bible called the Essenes (usually identifies as the authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls).

Like the Karaites who were to follow them, the Sadducees and the Boethusians continued the tradition originated by Moses of keeping the Torah’s commandments with no addition (Deuteronomy 4:2; 12:32). We often hear in ancient literature that the Sadducees denied the doctrines of the resurrection of the dead and reward and punishment in the hereafter. Whether this is accurate or not is of little consequence since they arrived at these beliefs based on an honest interpretation of the Bible (even if most Karaites today disagree with them on these issues).[1] The Pharisees on the other hand believed that the interpretation of a particular teacher was divine and elevated these teachings to the level of the Torah itself. In time this doctrine got carried away and the Rabbis eventually claimed these teachings originated from God Himself in the form of a second, “Oral” Torah.[2] They even went so far as to claim that when two teachers taught diametrically opposite interpretations of the Bible that both interpretations were from God.[3] The third major movement, the Essenes, had a Bible that consisted of more than our 24 Books and as a result had practices, such as adherence to a solar calendar, that do not originate in our Bible.

How long these three streams continued to co-exist is unknown. It is often thought that the Essenes and Sadducees ceased to exist with the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. However this seems unlikely as writings of the Essenes appear as late as the 10th century, which seems to indicate that they survived well after the destruction of the Temple. References to the Sadducees and the Boethusians continue to appear in post-70 CE literature and they also seemed to have survived for some time.

Middle Ages—Ananites and Karaites

In the early middle-ages the Pharisees continued to thrive. They began to call themselves Rabbanites (i.e., adherents of the Rabbis) and only used the name Pharisees when remembering historical events from the Second Temple period. In the 7th century, the Islamic Empire swept the Middle East. The Muslims had no interest in imposing Islamic religious practice on the Jews and gave them a degree of autonomy under a system known as the Exilarchate. The Exilarchate had been founded hundreds of years earlier under Sassanian rule but until now only had influence in Babylonia and Persia. Backed by the Muslims, overnight the Rabbanites turned from a localized Babylonian phenomenon into a political power that stretched throughout much of the Middle East. The Babylonian Rabbanites now imposed upon every Jew in the Empire the Babylonian Talmud, a body of law that they had developed between the 3rd and the 5th centuries.

Resistance to the Rabbanites was fierce, especially in the Empire’s eastern provinces, where the local Jews had never heard of the Talmud or the Oral Law. The historians tell us of Jewish leaders whose resistance against the Talmud put them in direct conflict with the Islamic government, which had empowered the Rabbis by giving them authority over other Jews. One resistance leader who refused to accept the Talmud was named Abu Isa al-Isphahani and it is said that he led an army of Jews against the Muslim government. Other attempts to cast off the Talmud were also undertaken but all failed and the Rabbanites and their Talmud seemed unstoppable.

Then in the 8th century a last glimmer of hope appeared in the form of an astute leader named Anan ben David. Anan organized various pro-Tanakh elements and lobbied the Muslim Caliphate to establish a second Exilarchate for those Jews who rejected the Talmud. The Muslims granted Anan and his followers the religious freedom to practice Judaism in their own way. Anan gathered a large following around him and his followers became known as the Ananites. Other Tanakh-only groups united under the name “Followers of the Bible” or in Hebrew “Bnei Mikra” which was abbreviated into “Karaim” or in English “Karaites”.

[1] The doctrines of resurrection of the dead and reward and punishment in the hereafter are included in the “Ten Principles of Faith” professed by most Karaites today.

[2] Babylonian Talmud, Chagiga 3b; Jerusalem Talmud, Pe’ah 2:6 17a.

[3] “Rabbi Aba said in the name of Samuel: Three years were the House of Shammai and the House of Hillel divided. These said the law is according to us and those said the law is according to us. An angelic voice went out and said ‘Both these and those are the words of the living God.’” (Babylonian Talmud, Erubin 13b).

Karaism is the original form of Judaism commanded by God to the Jewish people in the Torah. Karaites accept the Tanakh (Jewish Bible) as the word of God and as the sole religious authority. At the same time, Karaites deny human additions to the Torah such as the Rabbinic Oral Law because Deuteronomy 4:2 states, “You shall not add to the word which I have commanded you, neither shall you diminish from it…” Karaite Judaism also rejects the Rabbinical principle that the Rabbis are the sole authorities for interpreting the Bible. Karaites believe that every Jew has the obligation to study the Torah and decide for him/herself the correct interpretation of God’s commandments, since in the end it is the individual, not the central authority, who is responsible for his own actions. This principle was expressed best in the Karaite Motto: “Search in the Scriptures well and do not rely on anyone’s opinion.”[1] Karaites do not reject all interpretation and do not take the Bible literally, since everything requires interpretation. Instead, Karaites hold every interpretation up to the same object scrutiny regardless of its source.

[1] The Karaite Motto does not say to reject the opinion of the learned. It simply warns against relying solely on an opinion without verifying its merits in light of the Tanakh.