Megillat Taanit

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Megillat Taanit (Hebrew: מגילת תענית, romanized: məḡillaṯ taʿaniṯ), lit. "the Scroll of Fasting," is an ancient text, in the form of a chronicle, which enumerates 35 eventful days on which Jews either performed glorious deeds or witnessed joyful events. Despite the scroll's name, these were celebrated as feast days. Public mourning was forbidden on fourteen of them and public fasting on all.

The work was probably written late in the Second Temple period, perhaps from 40–70 CE in the 1st century. The last event dated without dispute is Emperor Caligula's order to place a statue of himself in the Second Temple (c. 39 CE). A few scholars think it references events after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. References to it in other literature suggest it certainly existed by the 2nd century. The author is unknown, although various rabbinic works speculate on how it was composed.

History of the feast days

The events described therein date to several periods: the pre-Hasmonean period, the Hasmonean period, the early Roman period, and the period of the First Jewish–Roman War, with the majority of the entries relating to the Hasmonean period. Almost half of theses events cannot be conclusively identified. Nearly all commemorate victories in battle, especially those events centered around the Hasmonean period.

The days are enumerated, not in the chronological order of the events they commemorate, but in the sequence of the calendar. Megillat Taanit contains twelve chapters, each chapter contains the memorial days of a single month, beginning with Nisan (the first calendar month), and ending with Adar.

While J. Schmilg argued that these memorial days become festivals by being incorporated and recorded in Megillat Taanit, later scholarship has concluded that the days had been known and celebrated by the people long before that time (as Schmilg himself was forced to admit in the case of some of them). The celebration of these festivals or semi-festivals existed as early as the time of the Book of Judith. The compilers of Megillat Taanit merely listed the memorial days and, at the same time, determined that a mere suspension of fasting should celebrate the less important, while public mourning was to be forbidden on the more important ones.

Structure

In most editions, Megillat Taanit consists of two parts, which are distinct in language and in form, namely:

The text or Megillat Taanit proper, written in Jewish Palestinian Aramaic and containing merely brief outlines in a concise style. It dates to the Tannaitic period.
The scholium or commentary on the text, written in Hebrew. This was written much later - in the seventh century or later, as shown by its author having before him the text of both the Talmuds as well as that of Bereshit Rabbah.

The many quotations from Megillat Taanit in the Talmud are all taken from the Aramaic text and are introduced by the word "ketib" = "it is written". This text, which had been committed to writing and was generally known, was explained and interpreted in the same way as the Bible. The Talmud does not include a single quotation from the scholium. Although the comments in the scholium are mentioned in the Talmud, they are not credited to Megillat Taanit. They are quoted as independent baraitot, so the scholium took them from the Talmud, not vice versa. Schmilg provides references intended to prove an earlier origin for the scholium; However, these sources merely prove that the scholiast intended to make his work pass for a product of the tannaitic period.

As the text and the scholium of Megillat Taanit are distinct in form and language, they also differ in historical accuracy. The text is an actual historical source whose statements may be regarded as authentic, while its dates are reliable if interpreted independently of the scholium. On the other hand, the scholium is of very doubtful historical value and must be used with extreme caution. Although it contains some reliable baraitot, the compiler has mixed them with other ahistorical accounts and legends so that even those data whose legendary character has not been proved can be credited only when confirmed by internal and external evidence.

In some editions, a third section appears: the "final discourse" (Hebrew ma'amar aharon), which lists days on which one should fast (in contrast to the rest of Megillat Taanit, which lists days on which fasting is forbidden). This section dates to the period of the Geonim.

Authorship of the Aramaic text

The Talmud and the scholium to Megillat Taanit itself provide slightly different accounts of the authorship of Megillat Taanit:

According to a baraita in the Talmud, "Hananiah ben Hezekiah of the Garon family, together with a number of others who had assembled for a synod at his house, compiled Megillat Ta'anit." According to Halakhot Gedolot, "Hilkot Soferim", the members of this synod were elders of the Houses of Hillel and Shammai. Megillat Taanit must have been composed, therefore, about the year 7 CE, when Judea was made a Roman province, to the great indignation of the Jews. This calendar of victories was intended to fan the spark of liberty among the people and to fill them with confidence and courage by reminding them of the victories of the Maccabees and the divine aid granted to the Jewish nation against the heathen.
The scholium to Megillat Taanit says: "Eleazar ben Hanania of the family of Garon together with his followers compiled Megillat Taanit." This Eleazar took a noteworthy part in the beginning of the revolt against the Romans, vanquishing the garrison at Jerusalem, as well as Herod Agrippa II's troops, and Menahem's Sicarii. According to this account, therefore, Megillat Taanit was composed by the Zealots after the year 66 CE, during the revolution.

Modern scholarship rejects Schmilg's view that the scholium is incorrect since there is both internal and external evidence in favor of its authenticity.

The account in the Talmud and that in the scholium may both be accepted since not only Hananiah, the father but also Eleazar, the son, contributed to the compilation of the work. Eleazar, one of the central figures in the war against the Romans, endeavored to strengthen the national consciousness of his people by continuing his father's work and increased the number of memorial days in the collection to remind the people how God had always helped them and had given them the victory over external and internal enemies.

Interpolations

Eleazar did not, however, complete the work. Several days were subsequently added to the list, which was definitively closed in Usha, as is proved by the fact that the 12th of Adar is designated as "Trajan's Day," and the 29th of that month as "the day on which the persecutions of Hadrian ceased". Furthermore, Simeon ben Gamaliel II, who was nasi at Usha, says that "If we should turn all the days on which we have been saved from some danger into holidays, and list them in Megillat Ta'anit, we could not satisfy ourselves; for we should be obliged to turn nearly every day into a festival." This indicates that the work was completed at Usha at the time of Simeon ben Judah ha-Nasi, so no further memorial days might be added.

The scholion

The scholion is written in Mishnaic Hebrew combined with some more ancient terminology; there are also some influences from later Babylonian Aramaic. Some stories in the scholion are ancient and reliable, mentioning historical facts nowhere else in Tannaic literature, while others are midrashim taken from various sources.

Vered Noam has shown that the scholion currently printed is a medieval hybrid of two independently written commentaries, nicknamed "Scholion O" and "Scholion P", after the Oxford and Parma manuscripts in which they are found. Often these two commentaries contradict each other, offering entirely different stories for the origin of a holiday. In general, Scholion O has more overlap with Genesis Rabbah, the Talmud Yerushalmi, and other sources from Israel, while Scholion P is closer to Babylonian sources. The current Scholion, nicknamed the "Hybrid Version," was created in the 9th or 10th centuries by combining Scholia O and P.

Scholia O and P may be just two examples of a genre of commentaries on Megillat Taanit, with a partial scholion in the Babylonian Talmud being a third example, and the other examples not surviving.

Editions and commentaries

Megillat Taanit is extant in many editions and has had numerous commentaries. The best edition of the Aramaic and Hebrew text is that of Vered Noam, which has supplanted A. Neubauer's as the authoritative work in the field. In addition to meticulous philological scholarship, Noam's edition includes rich annotation and a groundbreaking interpretation of stemmatic history.

Of commentaries the following may be mentioned: Abraham ben Joseph ha-Levi, double commentary (Amsterdam, 1656); Judah ben Menahem, double commentary (Dyhernfurth, 1810); Johann Meyer, Latin language translation published in his Tractatus de Temporibus, etc. (Amsterdam, 1724). Derenbourg and Schwab have made French versions of the Aramaic text.

Selected entries

Among the dates penned in Megillat Taanit and which were all forbidden to fast thereon, and for others also forbidden to lament the dead thereon, are to be noted the following:

"And from the eighth day thereof (i.e. the lunar month of Nisan) until the end of the festival day , the Feast of Weeks (Shavu'ot) was restored, it is prohibited to mourn"

"On the twenty-third day of the same (i.e. the lunar month of Iyar), the inhabitants of the Citadel (Acra) departed from Jerusalem"

with thanksgiving, and branches of palm trees, and harps, and cymbals, and psalteries, and hymns, and canticles, because the great enemy was destroyed out of Israel."]

"On the seventeenth day of Sivan, possession of Migdal Ṣur"

"On the fifteenth day thereof and on the sixteenth day thereof (i.e. the lunar month] Sivan), the inhabitants of Beth-shean (Scythopolis) and the inhabitants of the valley were deported"

, and where Antioch is to be read as Antiochus), in the Jerusalem Talmud (Soṭah 9:13 ), in the Babylonian Talmud (Soṭah 33a), in Josephus (Antiquities 13.10.2–3.), as well as in Ishtori Haparchi's Kaftor ve-ferach (vol. 1, ch. 7), as referring to the sons of the high priest John Hyrcanus who waged war against the inhabitants of those places and against their protector Antiochus Cyzicenus and who eventually took from them their cities and expelled them. After laying siege to Scythopolis for one year, the city was taken and demolished. On the very same day on which John Hyrcanus's sons fought with Antiochus Cyzicenus, John Hyrcanus had gone into the Temple to offer incense, when he heard a divine voice discourse with him that his sons had just then overcome Antiochus.]

"On the twenty-fifth day of the same (i.e. the lunar month of Sivan), the farmers of public revenues were removed from Judea and from Jerusalem"

"On the fourteenth day of Tammuz, the book of decrees had been taken away, it is prohibited to mourn"

"On the twenty-fourth day thereof (i.e. the lunar month of Av) we returned to our former judgment"

There are variants in the textual transmission, some texts writing כ"ז‎= "twenty-seventh" of said month, instead of כ"ד‎= "twenty-fourth", the result of a similarity in the letters' shape.

"On the seventeenth day thereof (i.e. the lunar month Elul), the Romans were taken out of Judea and out of Jerusalem"

." The departure of the Romans from the city was received with great gladness and declared a day of rejoicing.]

"On the third day of Tishri, the attributes given to denote God's Name were taken out of the legal deeds"

"On the twenty-second day thereof (i.e. the lunar month of Shevat) there was cancelled the work that had been decreed by the enemy to be brought against the Temple Sanctuary, it is prohibited to mourn"

"On the twelfth day thereof (i.e. the lunar month of Adar) is the day of Trajan"

"On the thirteenth day thereof (i.e. the lunar month of Adar) is the day of Nicanor"

), the thirteenth day of the lunar month Adar marked the day in which revenge was meted out on Nicanor, the general of Demetrius' army, who had passed through Jerusalem while en route to Alexandria in Egypt, and when he saw the strongholds of Jerusalem he began to rail on the city, lifting up his hand in defiance and casting vehement affronts and reproaches at the city, vowing to raze her towers when he returned. When Nicanor returned as governor of Judea, he engaged the men of Israel in battle who were then put under the command of Judas Maccabeus, and when the two forces met on the battlefield, Nicanor was eventually smitten and died. Seeing that their governor had been killed, Nicanor's soldiers hastily retreated and threw down their arms while in flight. The advancing army under Judas Maccabeus, when they saw that Nicanor had been killed, cut-off Nicanor's right hand and severed his head, which were then put on a pole and carried to Jerusalem, where they were set up on display before the city for all to see. Beneath the severed limbs, a script was posted which read: " the mouth that spoke in accusation; the hand that was stretched out in arrogance." The event is also relayed in Josephus (Antiquities 12.10.4–5), whose account is a redaction of the account written in the Book of Maccabees (7:26–50). According to Josephus, "the Jews therein celebrate this victory every year, and esteem it as a festival day" (ibid.).]

"On the twenty-eighth day thereof (i.e. the lunar month of Adar) good tidings came unto the Jews that they are not to let the words of the Divine Law (Torah) pass from them, it is prohibited to mourn"

Scroll of Fasts

The Scroll of Fasting should not be confused with the similarly-named "Scroll of Fasts", an obscure work extant in a Babylonian version and a Palestinian one. It is a list of 22–26 days where fasting should be observed, generally due to the death of Biblical figures or sages. It does not appear to have been a very influential work.

References

^ Noam, Vered (2006). "Megillat Taanit – The Scroll of Fasting" (PDF). The Literature of the Sages: Second Part: Midrash and Targum Liturgy, Poetry, Mysticism Contracts, Inscriptions, Ancient Science and the Languages of Rabbinic Literature. CRIaNT. Royal Van Gorcum, Fortress Press. pp. 339–362. ISBN 90-232-4222-X.
^ Jewish Encyclopedia Article for Megillat Taanit, by Isidore Singer and Jacob Zallel Lauterbach.
^ Ueber die Entstehung und den Historischen Werth des Siegeskalenders Megillat Ta'anit, pp. 11–20
Compare Brann, l.c. pp. 410-418, 445-451
As in Hullin 129b; Megillah 5b; Ta'anit 12a and 18b
Eruvin 62
Yerushalmi Ta'anit 2 66a
In Ta'anit 12a, the single passage, "bi-Megillat Ta'anit," from which Schmilg tries to prove that the Talmud quotes the scholium as well as Megillat, is a later addition (compare Brann, l.c. pp. 457 et seq.), and is not found in the Munich manuscript (compare Rabbinowitz, Ha-Meassef, iii. 63).
l.c. pp. 36–41
"אנציקלופדיה יהודית דעת - מגילת תענית ;". www.daat.ac.il. Retrieved Jul 15, 2020.
"Megillat Taanit, Adar". www.sefaria.org. Retrieved Jul 15, 2020.
Shabbat 13b
ed. Vienna, p. 104; ed. Zolkiev, p. 82c
compare Schmilg, l.c. pp. 20–36
Megillat Ta'anit, 12, end, evidently quoting an old baraita
H. Grätz, Gesch. iii., note 26; although it is not necessary to correct the Talmudic account to agree with the scholium, and to read, as does Grätz, in Shabbat 13b, "Eleazar b. Hananiah," instead of "Hananiah."
Compare Brann in Monatsschrift, 1876, p. 379
Shabbat 13b; compare Rashi ad loc.
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. pp. 4–7. OCLC 233298491.
^ Derenbourg, J. (1970). The Oracle of the Land of Israel: Chronicles of the Country from the time of Cyrus to Hadrian, based on the Sages of the Mishnah and the Talmud (משא ארץ ישראל : דברי ימי הארץ מימי כרש ועד אדריאנוס על פי חכמי המשנה והתלמוד) (in Hebrew). Vol. 1–2. Translated by Menahem Mendel Braunstein. Jerusalem: Kedem. pp. 115–117. OCLC 233219980.
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. p. 8. OCLC 233298491.
Page 63 in: Levine, L.I. (1974). "The Hasmonean Conquest of Strato's Tower". Israel Exploration Journal. 24 (1). Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society: 62–69. JSTOR 27925442.
Schürer, E. (1891). Geschichte des jüdischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi [A History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ]. Geschichte de jüdischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi.English. Vol. 1. Translated by Miss Taylor. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. p. 84 (note 121).
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. p. 9. OCLC 233298491.
Zeitlin, S. (1922). Megillat Taanit as a source for Jewish chronology and history in the Hellenistic and Roman periods. Philadelphia. pp. 85–86. OCLC 977236073.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link), not as explained by Rashi in Soṭah 33.
Ishtori Haparchi (2004). Avraham Yosef Havatzelet (ed.). Kaftor wa-Ferach (in Hebrew). Vol. 1 (chapter 7) (3 ed.). Jerusalem: Bet ha-midrash la-halakhah ba-hityashvut. pp. 140-141 (note 68). OCLC 32307172.
The Hebrew word used here is actually demosionai, a loanword derived from the Greek δηημόσια, meaning, "public affairs," especially those associated with collecting the taxes from state property (Jastrow).
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. p. 10. OCLC 233298491.
Herzog College, s.v. The Scroll of Fasting (in Hebrew)
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. p. 11. OCLC 233298491.
Traditionally, in such cases, the deceased man's daughter is admonished to marry within her family or tribe so as to keep the property within her father's family.
Jerusalem Talmud (Baba Bathra 21b)
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. p. 14–16. OCLC 233298491.
Margalioth, Mordecai, ed. (1975). Midrash HaGadol (in Hebrew). Vol. 1. Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook. p. 610 (Genesis 36:24). OCLC 145432335.
Josephus, The Jewish War (2.17.8–10.)
Noam, V. (1994). "The Seventeenth of Elul in Megillat Ta'anit (שבעה-עשר באלול במגילת תענית)". Zion (in Hebrew). 59 (ד). Historical Society of Israel: 433–444. JSTOR 23562668.
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. p. 21. OCLC 233298491.
In the Babylonian Talmud (Sotah 33a), the name of this potentate is transcribed in the Hebrew script as קסגלגס‎ (Jastrow, M., ed. (2006), Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, p. 1395, OCLC 614562238, s.v. קסגלגס‎).
The name of this High Priest is not mentioned in the Scroll of Fasting, but is named in the Tosefta and in the Babylonian Talmud as being Simon the Just. Historians have pointed out that this could not have been the earlier Simon the Just (310–291 or 300–273 BCE), but may have been one of the high priests in later generations who was related to him, or one simply called Simeon.
Based on modern conversion table and the regnal years of the Caesars as brought down in Epiphanius' Syriac version of On Weights and Measures, and with the second year of Vespasian's reign being 68 CE, based on Jewish tradition.
Meyer, Johannes III (1724). Tractatus de temporibus sanctis et festis diebus Hebraeorum (in Hebrew and Latin). Amsterdam: Joannem Pauli.
A variant reading has: בתרין עשר ביה יום טוריון‎ (Cairo Geniza MS.).
Feliks, Jehuda; Margalioth, Mordecai (1973). Hilkhot Erets Yisra'el min ha-Genizah (in Hebrew). Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook. p. 142. OCLC 19497945., s.v. T-S N.S. 235/10
Jerusalem Talmud (Taanit 2:11 )
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. pp. 28-29. OCLC 233298491.
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. p. 29. OCLC 233298491.
Segal of Kraków, Avraham, ed. (1857). Megillat Taanit (in Hebrew). Cracow (?): Hemed. pp. 33. OCLC 233298491.
Safrai, Ze'ev (2006). "Appendix: The Scroll of Antiochos and the Scroll of Fasts". The Literature of the Sages: Second Part: Midrash and Targum Liturgy, Poetry, Mysticism Contracts, Inscriptions, Ancient Science and the Languages of Rabbinic Literature. CRIaNT. Royal Van Gorcum, Fortress Press. pp. 238–241. ISBN 90-232-4222-X.

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "MEGILLAT TA'ANIT ("Scroll of Fasting")". The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. Its bibliography:

Grätz, Gesch. iii., notes 1, 26;
J. Derenbourg, Hist. pp. 439–446;
J. Schmilg, Ueber Entstehung und Historischen Werth des Siegeskalenders Megillat Ta'anit, Leipsic, 1874;
J. Wellhausen, Die Pharisäer und die Sadducäer, pp. 56–63, Greifswald, 1874;
Joel Müller, Der Text der Fastenrolle, in Monatsschrift, 1875, pp. 43–48, 139-144;
M. Brann, Entstehung und Werth der Megillat Ta'anit, pp. 375–384, 410-418, 445-460, ib. 1876;
P. Cassel, Messianische Stellen des Alten Testaments, Appendix, Berlin, 1885;
Weiss, Dor, ii. 254-257;
B. Rattner, in Rabbinowitz, Ha-Meassef, 1902, pp. 91–105;
M. Schwab, La Megillath Taanith, in Actes du Onzième Congrès International des Orientalistes, Section 4, pp. 199–259, Paris, 1898.