A brief look at the rise and fall of the Jewish state in Palestine (2)

Jews in Mesopotamia

Until the Parthian time, most Jewish Iranian people were located in Mesopotamia, especially in Nisibisand Nehardea (Wiesehöfer: 1388, 183). The Jewish population of Babylon significantly rose at the time of the Parthian. Jews of Mesopotamia mostly had friendly relationships with the Parthian state, and one of the reasons of this intimacy was the practical independence that Parthian rule granted to them. However, there were clashes between members of this community and the Parthian government, for example, the Jewish revolt between years 20 and 35 C. can be mentioned (Yarshater and others: 1381, 349). The rise of Christianity and declaring it as the official religion of the empire by Constantine I in 313 C had important consequences for the Judaism. At that time, the religious center of the Jews was still in Jerusalem, but the position of this region as a part of the Rome and deep divisions between the followers of these religions made the Jewish position more unsteady every day. At this time the Jewish religious head was in hands of a council of Clergymen, which was called the Sanhedrin. The Council’s decisions were made under the Romans observance. Finally, the great Jewish leader and head of the Sanhedrin Gamaliel sixth died in 425 C. With his death, the Supreme Council of the Jewish did not choose any leader and Sanhedrin was dissolved by the order of the Roman Empire. This was the end of the centrality of Jerusalem to the Jewish world. It was an end to writing Palestinian Talmud book as well (Goldenberg: 2007, 183). In such way the center of the Jewish divinity was transferred from Jerusalem to other accommodation centers of Jews of the world, Babylon in Iraq. Babylon in this time was not under the control of Christianity and this was a big advantage. The transfer time is almost coincided with the beginning of the reign of Bahram Gur.
Despite dispersal existence of the Jews all over the Iran, these people did not exceed being minority in any of their places, only in Babylon, they were more focused and even in some villages around Babylon, all or the majority of the people were Jewish (Yarshater and others: 1381, 346).
Nehardea was one of the oldest and one of the most important Jewish cities in Mesopotamia. The city was located at the junction of the Euphrates River and a smaller river known as the Nahr al-mulk and a defensive wall reserved the city. According to the narrations, the Jews were driven of the kingdom of Judah to this place in the sixth century BC. Nehardea’s brightness was at the peak in the first half of the third century AD that a special university for Jewish seminary was founded here at this time. Avaentus (in Persian sources Azyneh and in Hebrew sources Baba Bar Nazar), Arab ruler of Tadmor in Syria that had attacked the Iran’s borders, destroyed Nehardea, which was the other Judaism center of Mesopotamia, in the years between 259 to 261 (Wiesehöfer: 1388, 264). Followed by that, the religious university of Nehardea was transferred to the city of Pumbedita (Gilat, Yitzhak Dov Gilat, Encyclopedia of Judaica, vol.15, NEHARDEA). Pumbedita was a city on the banks of the Euphrates River, and it was close to the Sassanid city, Pirouz Shapour.
The city had a good climate and rich water resources, and business was booming because the caravan way of Syria also passed from this city. Working and agriculture were productive there as well. The Jewish immigrants’ transfer to Pumbedita returned to the time of destruction of the Second Temple of Jerusalem. The city flourished as a religious city in the third century AD and the destruction of the city Nehardea returns to Azyneh who we were talking about him in above. Pumbedita maintained its religious reliability till the half of the fourth century AD, which its major credit transferred to the city of Mahuzeh. till the end of the fourth century AD, the Jewish seminary of Pumbedita was no longer valid as it was in the past (Encyclopedia of Judaica, vol.16, PUMBEDITA). Mahozah was also a city in Mesopotamia in the coast of Nahr al-Mulk. Mahozah was on the outskirts of the city Behardeshyr and near Ctesiphon, capital of Iran. This city was on the route of the Tigris and Euphrates which had a valuable business opportunity. The Jews of this city first had settled there since the first century AD, and they were successful in the field of agriculture and commerce. This city found religious authority when the religious Jewish University of Pombedita was transferred to the Mahozah in the fourth century AD, and a large number of Jews emigrated there. Mahozah was destroyed during the Roman invasion to Iran in 363 AD, but after the defeating Romans it was reconstructed once more. In the second half of the fifth century AD, by the spread of Nestorian Christianity, Mahozah did not have its former religious credit for the Jews anymore, and it was no longer known as Jewish majority (Beer, Moshe, Encyclopedia Judaica, vol.13, MAḤOZA).
Another Jewish settlement was in the town of Nisibis. The geographical location of the city was in the south Anatolia, and its control was in the hands of the Roman Empire in a part of ancient times. However, in the year 363 AD Sasanian added this city to the Iran, thus Nisibis remained one of the Iranian cities till the Muslims’ conquest. Nisibis was on the way to the trade way of Far East to Europe. Hence it retained its reputation for centuries. Until the fourteenth century by the Mongol invasion Nisibis was also destroyed. According to reports of Josephus Felavious this was a Jewish city in the first century AD and for the followers of this religion in Mesopotamia, it was very important one of the two cities besides Nehardea (Encyclopedia of Judaica, vol.15, NISIBIS).
Sura was another Jewish community center in Mesopotamia that was located in the south of Babylon. The city was a center of religious researches for Jews in Mesopotamia. The importance of the city increased in 219 AD and by the Romans, a Jewish rabbi went there from Palestine. Sura religious school was promoted by him and followed by him, hundreds of religious students noticed this place. Sura became one of the important centers of Jewish religion in Babylon. The effort to write a Jewish book called Babylonian Talmud began from here and from this time. By the death of Rowe, Sura had some troubles for a while and the city of Nehardea was replaced for some time, but the city's former importance was recycled later. In the late third century AD and by Pombideta becoming important as a vital religious center of Jews in Mesopotamia, Sura gradually lost its grandness. In the late fourth and early fifth century, Ashi, the Jewish spiritual and one of the authors of the Babylonian Talmud, returned the old religious significance of this city to it again. He built a synagogue in the city and attracted seekers of Jewish seminary to Seur. However, after the death of Ashi and especially during the Yazdgerd II and Sassanid Pirouz’s era that Jews were persecuted and tortured, Sura never found its previous position (Encyclopedia of Judaica, vol.19, SURA).
Naresh was another Jewish major city in Mesopotamia. Naresh was on the banks of the Euphrates River, in the south of the ancient city of Babylon and was located near the Sura. The peak of brilliance of this city was in the fourth century AD. Agriculture was the main occupation of its people, but even in the world of Jewish people, people had a very bad reputation in the field of fraud and theft (Beer, Moshe, Encyclopedia of Judaica, vol.14, NARESH).
In Ctesiphon, the Sassanian capital, also Jews were not the majority, but had a prominent role in the economy of the city and their numbers were plentiful (Schalit, Abraham, Encyclopedia of Judaica, vol.05, CTESIPHON).

Jews in Shiraz

During the Sassanian period, a small Jewish community was set up in Shiraz as well. They were as a minority living in this area of Iran till early Islamic period (Ibn Hawqal: 1366, 59; Estakhri: 1347, 121). Jews have been a small community around the tenth century AD in the city of Shiraz, which did not have the importance of today at the time. However, two centuries later, Benjamin Tatili, a Jewish traveler, estimated the city's Jews about ten thousand people, which was big and important at that time (Encyclopedia of Judaica, vol.18, SHIRAZ).

Jews in Isfahan

One of the important settlements of Jews was Isfahan in the Islamic period. During the campaign of Shapour to Georgia, 71 thousand Jews of the Caucasus were displaced to the cities of Isfahan and Susa. thus the Jewish population was added into plateau of Iran (Levi: 1339, 245). Shapour III (383-388 AD) was vicar of Artaxerxes II. In his time, based on a peace, Armenia was divided between the Roman and Iran. One of his actions was displacement and resettlement of Jews of Armenia within the borders of Iran (Yarshater, 1381, 353). In accordance with Islamic and Pahlavi texts, the Jews’ residency in the area of Jey of Isfahan was carried out by Shoshan-dukht, Yazdgerd’s wife (Cities of Iranshahr, paragraph 53, 41). Loeb recognizes these Jews as expelled ones from Armenia and knows time of their stay during the reign of Shapour II, Yazdgerd’s father, and off course by demand of Shoshan-dukht, Shapour’s bride (Loeb, 2011, 278). Levi also knows displacement of Jews of Armenia to Isfahan to prior years of 364-365 AD (Levi: 1339, 248 and 245). The authors of the third volume of Cambridge History of Iran, introduce Yazdgerd as incentive of Jews to migrate to other parts of the Central Plateau of Iran (Yarshater, 1381, 354). persecution of the Jews of Alexandria in 415 AD made a group of the Jews to come to Isfahan and join their co-religionists (Levi: 1339, 261), off course there has been a legend about the Jewish residency in Isfahan during the Islamic period, so that after the destruction of Jerusalem and the making Jewish refugees homeless by Nebuchadnezzar, the Jews took along some water and soil of their land to adapt the water and soil of any territory that they enter and adopt the most similar place to their home countries to live in there, and finally, the people found Judah region in Isfahan similar to their own water and soil, and they stayed there (Ibn Hawqal: 1366, 110). It is worth noting that the large population of Jews in Isfahan led to calling the city in where Jews lived as “Judea” since the Islamic period till the present day. The city is also sometimes called as Dar al-yahud in the Islamic period. These all caused this assumption to be created that Jews are the founder of the Isfahan city and even the name of the city is also the root of the Hebrew word “Span” which means refuge (Levi: 1339, 260).

Other Jewish settlements in Iran

In the early centuries AD, a significant population of Jews lived in the Kabul in East (Ibn Hawqal: 1366, 110 and 184). Maymana city near Balkh also had Jewish population till early Islamic periods, and it was known to have been the first place that the Jews went to after Nebuchadnezzar destroyed their land and expulsed its inhabitants. this story was narrated for the city of Isfahan as well (Lestrange: 1364, 450-451; Ibn Hawqal: 1366, 110). Other centers of Jewish settlements around Iran are Khorasan, Golestan, Mazandaran, Azerbaijan, Kurdistan and Damavand. A number of Jews lived in Khwarezm at least since the Sassanian (Levi: 1339, 218 and 262).
The peak of the immigration of Jews into plateau of Iran dates back to ancient times of the ancient history. During the intensification of the war between Iran and Roman in the first half of the Sassanid state’s era, since the wars located in the western Sassanid borders and Mesopotamia, and the area was the Jews’ settlement place, many Jews were forced to get rid of these conflicts and decided to migrate into the Iranian plateau (Levi: 1339, 234).

Conclusion
Twelve tribes of the Jews established a Royal Military in Palestine after residency in this land and the elimination of nations of the land. Internal discontents led to undermining and fraction of the system by the Babylonians, and many Jews were deported to other lands, especially Mesopotamia. Then, with the rise of the Achaemenid Empire, a group of the exiles returned to Palestine with the support of Achaemenid kings and started to rebuild the damages. During the Hellenistic period, Jewish state renewed again and became independent, but soon with the emergence of a new power of the Romans, it was first protected by the Romans and then completely lost its independence. in the future, the Jewish resistance against Romans destroyed Jerusalem and deported a majority of the Jewish population of Palestine to the corners of world.
Background of Jews’ deportation from Israel dates back to the eighth century BC and encroachments of the Assyrian empire to Palestine. since this date until the elimination of Solomon's Temple by the Romans in 70 AD, the policy of deportation of Jews to outside of Palestine was continually used to undermine their independence desire. also deportation of Jews in terms of the number of people who were banished from the Palestinian, had two major historical results; the first destruction of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem which was carried out by Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon in 587 or 586 BC leading to the deportation of seventy thousands Jews from Palestine. The second result was destruction of second Temple of Solomon (Peace be upon him) by Titus in 70 AD that the latter one was the biggest turning point in the history of the Jews, because then at least the remaining Jews in Jerusalem became a minority and the majority Palestinian Jews were driven out of the land.
In the case of Jews’ exile spots and their habitats, the most important and oldest places in which the Jewish exiles were sent to, are the different regions of Mesopotamia. With the rise of the Persian Empire Mesopotamia annexed to Iran, and for centuries in a row it was as a part of Iran's soil. In the future this land was the destination of most Jewish immigrants, by decline of the divinity center of Jews in Jerusalem in the year 425 AD, this center was transferred to the Mesopotamia, and soon Mesopotamia became one of the most populated Jewish settlements. At the height of the wars of Iran and Rome, many Jews migrated from Mesopotamia to the inside of the plateau of Iran to be safe of the extensive war damages.
But in the inner part of the plateau of Iran, the oldest Jewish settlement in the territories, which we have some information about it, is Medes. Medes was a part of the Assyrian empire before the establishment of independent state, and a group of this land’s Jews were moved to Medes by Assyrians during the Assyrians’ incursions into Palestinian territory. Today’s Hamadan’s people could be assumed as remained Jewish population of those days.
Isfahan is another city that is still the place of the Jewish minority today. The migration of Jews’ era returns to the middle of the Sassanids period. Regardless of the myths about how the Jews came to Isfahan, historical evidences suggest that Jews were transferred from the Caucasus region to this land during the war between the Rome and Iran. Caucasus’ Jews had been driven to Caucasus by Tigran, King of Armenia, during the wars between Israel and Armenia during the interregnum between the collapse of the Seleucid and creation of two powers of Parthian and Rome. However, the Shoshan dukht’s opinion, Jewish wife of Yazdgerd, was effective in the settlement of Jews in Isfahan. Isfahan in the future became one of the largest Iranian Jewish settlements, as in the Islamic period, it was known as Dar al-yahud and a part of the city was called Judea by its population. In Sassanid period, a small number of Jews lived in the Shiraz and till early Islamic period the Jewish community was moved to this part of Iran. But till the twelfth century AD, about 10 thousand Jews lived in the city.
The rest of the Jewish places in past times we can name Khorasan, Golestan, Mazandaran, Azerbaijan, Kurdistan, Damavand, Kabul, Maymana of Balkh and also Khorezm in which a small number of Jews lived.