The Babylonian Gap
The Assyrians impressed their culture on Israel … the Babylonians left no trace by Ephraim Stern in BAR Dec. 2000. The following paragraphs in italics are extracts with my bold and underlining to assist scanning.
715-640 B.C.E — The Assyrian period lasted 75 years—from about 715 B.C.E., when Samaria was occupied in the north, to 640 B.C.E., when the Assyrians retreated from their estates in Palestine. This is only slightly longer than the Babylonian period, which lasted about 65 years.
604 B.C.E. to 538 B.C.E — But the strange thing is that above the remains left by these destructions, we find no evidence of occupation until the Persian period, which began in about 538 B.C.E. For roughly half a century—from 604 B.C.E. to 538 B.C.E.—there is a complete gap in evidence suggesting occupation. In all that time, not a single town destroyed by the Babylonians was resettled.1 The Babylonian period is characterized by other notable absences as well. From the period between 604 and 538 B.C.E., for example, not a single document connected with the imperial Babylonian administration of Palestine has been found.
609–598 B.C.E — From Insert – During the reign of Judah’s King Jehoiakim (609–598 B.C.E.), Jerusalem found itself in the middle of a power struggle. Egypt, whose pharaoh had raised Jehoiakim to Judah’s throne, was seeking to maintain its foothold in Palestine, but in the east the region’s new superpower, Babylon, was rapidly building strength. When it appeared that Babylonian forces had gained the upper hand in Palestine, Jehoiakim abandoned his policy of appeasement toward Egypt and, in 604 B.C.E., became the vassal of Babylon’s new king, Nebuchadnezzar.
598/597 B.C.E — It wasn’t long, however, before Jehoiakim sensed the balance of power shifting back to Egypt. Reverting to his earlier, pro-Egyptian stance, he defied Babylon by withholding tribute. This provoked Nebuchadnezzar, who marched on Jerusalem in the winter of 598/597 B.C.E. Since Jehoiakim died before the Babylonians reached the city, it was his 18-year-old son, Jehoiachin, who bore the brunt of Nebuchadnezzar’s anger.
“He made Mattaniah, uncle of Jehoiachin, king in his place and changed his name to Zedekiah.” 2 Kings 24:11–13, 15–17
589-586 B.C.E. — Although he owed his position to Nebuchadnezzar, Judah’s new king, Zedekiah, seems to have begun conspiring against Babylon almost from the moment he ascended to the throne. Encouraged by Egypt, he openly rebelled in 589 B.C.E.—an act that once more brought Nebuchadnezzar’s troops to Jerusalem. This second Babylonian siege ended in reprisals far more savage than those that followed Jehoiachin’s surrender. After the Babylonians breached Jerusalem’s walls in 586 B.C.E., Nebuchadnezzar captured Zedekiah and, before putting out his eyes, forced the Judahite king to witness the execution of his sons. The Babylonian leader then ordered his troops to raze the city and its temple.
This is the end of extracts from The Assyrians impressed their culture on Israel … the Babylonians left no trace by Ephraim Stern.
The Bar Kokhba Revolt
See Ancient Jewish History: The Bar-Kokhba Revolt for a brief discussion of the Jewish and Christian positions leading up to the revolt.
See Lawrence H. Schiffman https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/ancient-cultures/daily-life-and-practice/the-jewish-christian-schism/ from which the following is extracted.
132 CE – During the Bar Kokhba Revolt, the Christians, unable to support the Messianic pretensions of Bar Kokhba, sided with the Romans. By the end of the Bar Kokhba revolt, the Rabbis regarded the entire Christian community as non-Jewish. Even the Bishop of Jerusalem was now gentile since Jews (even Jewish Christians) were prohibited from living in the Holy City. It no longer mattered that a few of the Christians were technically Jewish. The lack of Jewish status of the group as a whole led the Rabbis to disqualify them as a whole. Henceforth, from the Rabbinic perspective, the Christians were a separate religion and a separate people. Marriage with them was now prohibited.
It is also possible to follow this process of separation from the perspectives of the Romans and the Christians. The Romans were outsiders who concluded that the schism was permanent at the end of the first century and, accordingly, began to regard the Christians as a separate religious community, excused from paying the fiscus Judaicus, the Jewish poll tax.
