The tireless efforts and persuasion put in by the Jewish thinkers like Judah Bibas, Zvi Hirsch Kalischer and Judah Alkalai (a student of Judah Bibas), to draw the Jews settled in the diaspora to Jerusalem bore the much desired fruit and many Jews returned to the Holy Land towards the end of the 18th century […]
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Things were gradually looking up for the Jews, who had suffered hardship, oppression and anguish for thousands of years. With the 19th century had dawned hope; for it was at this time that the seeds of Zionism were sown. ‘Judaism’ and ‘Zionism’ are not quite the same. Judaism guides about following the Jewish religious principles […]
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‘Next year in Jerusalem….’ Over the years and in fact for the last many centuries, these are the words with which the Jews (of the ‘Jewish diaspora’) in any corner of the world end the prayers that they say on the occasions of the ‘Passover’ and ‘Yom Kippur’. The Jews never tire of expressing these […]
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The Jews had once again stepped into the new millennium (the second millennium of the Common Era) in slavery. It was by then, about 4 hundred fifty years that Jerusalem was ruled by dynasties of various Muslim caliphs. Across the whole of Europe and also the Middle East, the Byzantine Empire was taking bad and […]
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Among the various Jewish sects that got created among the Jews viz., the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the Essenes, the Zealots, etc., the Sadducees, the Essenes and the Zealots were almost eradicated in the aftermath of the First Jewish-Roman War and only the Pharisees who were the moderates among them survived. Later, ‘Rabbinic Judaism’ (that recognized […]
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The first Jewish-Roman War began in 66 AD but its seeds were sown back in the year 6 AD. The oppression and the corruption by the local Roman officials and the policy of hindering the Jewish religious principles and tenets adopted by the Roman rulers were fomenting discontent among the Jews by every passing day. […]
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Jerusalem: A Red Heifer which means a flawless red calf, has been born in Israel after nearly 2,000 years. A Jewish group has claimed that this incident is in accordance with the prediction made in the Bible, which is a harbinger of the reincarnation of the Messiah. The Evangelical group in Christianity, who believe that […]
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Antiochus IV, who is believed to have been the cruelest and the most wicked of the foreign rulers to have ruled over the Jews, had crossed all the limits of repression and atrocities. He had barred the Jews from observing their religious customs and traditions including the Shabbath, even at the personal level while vigorously […]
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The untimely death of the Greek Emperor ‘Alexander the Great’ brought the issue of his successor to the fore as he had not selected any. The army generals, who had fought shoulder to shoulder with Alexander in all the battles, were now up against each other to gain control over the Greek Empire, especially over […]
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In the intervening period, the strong empire built by Cyrus II was further expanded by his son, Cambyses II. Egypt too was made part of the Persian Empire. Darius, the son of Cambyses II, expanded the boundaries of their empire even further. All the Persian emperors favoured the land of Judah. They had not only […]
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