Text by Sophia Siedlberg and edited by Adrian Worsfold
| The Eliezar the Accuser narratives gain an immediacy from spending a lot of time discussing various events, some of which overlap with the New Testament Gospel narratives and some which are preoccupied with the politics of the time. |
| Jshua (Yehoshua/ Jesus) does not appear as the messianic figure the Gospels describe, but as one of about 20 or so preachers in the region. They annoy the narrator Eliezar (this may be a patriarch's title rather than the narrator's actual name - a leader for the Kanai at this time). Here, Eliezar is worried about his family, of whom a son has been taken by the Romans: "Do these preachers care? Do they know what we suffer? Do they die for the people that follow them?" This is about a year before Jshua was crucified, and at a time when this commentary, as within the Gospels, suggests that the Zealots were militant and bloodthirsty. |
| Jochannan/ John the Baptist seems rather elusive in the entire Eliezar the Accuser narrative, but there is "John the Essene" who fits his description quite well. Later narratives do link the two and maintain that John the Essene/ Baptist was Jshua's cousin. These later narratives are set at around 120 CE. |
| The style of the Chockma Mechazeh narratives do change after the Eliezars (they sign off in 79 CE while gloating over reports of Vesuvius). The problem is that between Jshua's death and the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE much of the narrative deals with Nero. Basically, The Book of Revelation summarises this period and marks the transition to Jshua: where Jochannan of Patmos takes up from the Eliezars. |
| The patriarch of this tradition simply known as "Eliezar" had his name used by other narrators. Thus it was difficult for the Roman occupiers to find the leader in order to arrest him. This narrator seems to be the third of them and is abbreviated as EA3. |
| Narrative 4 has three passages. |
| The reference below to Yshua (Jshua) is most probably Jesus of the Christians. Later narratives discussing the Ebionites identify the same man: "Jshua of our families from Canaa". |
Passage 1:
| They took him, Shimon; why did they take Shimon? They killed one family, they enslaved another in this small place (village) and they took my son, Shimon. At the temples the priests say that they take no one for slavery, when their own are paraded in front of them as slaves of Rome. |
| I sharpen the sichar again and wait for their (Roman soldiers to) return. Another will die, another will pay for oppressing our people. |
| In the temples they say Gd will protect us; they say that Gd will bring a prophet like Elijah to kill the puppet and his whores. Where is this Elijah? What of my son? Does this Elijah appear and free my son from the Romans and from that house of Ashkelon?. Will the family of (named or marked) leopards be struck down as this Elijah calls upon Gd to destroy them? No (instead) we worship in his father's temple in the place of the kittim. When we take these places we will dedicate them to Gd; we will take Rome and the soldiers of the sun from that place, and the Temple will be ours. |
| Where is this Elijah? There are many calling themselves by this name, many who claim to be from Gd but do tricks to please the people, but (the) Puppet, his whores and the Romans remain, still they remain: there are no tricks to remove them. |
| Yshua of our families from Canaa is such an Elijah: he stands amid the killing while saying nothing other than, "Gd is here" and "Where is Gd?" Where is the presence (Shekinah) slaying the oppressor? |
End of Passage 1
| Note the reference below to "the family of Leopards". When referring to the Herod dynasty the Christian book of Revelation uses the same reference: "A leopard with seven heads". |
| The Temple in Jerusalem was built by Herod the Great, the Father of Herod Antipas. When Pontius Pilate took over Judea one of his infamous acts was to march a legion of soldiers into the city and the temple. Historically this is referred to as the "Standards incident". The first passage does seem to make reference to the standards the Romans used: being "of the sun" this would need to be verified as no other reference to the specific standards and soldiers bearing them seem to exist. |
| "Kittim va Khurim" is a dialectic term referring to the Romans and the Hellenized Jews. It is also an insult. Kittim does appear in the Dead sea scrolls to describe the Romans. Khurim is unclear, but it serves the same insulting purpose as Mitnagdim does today (meaning opponent). Like Mitnagdim, it started life describing a specific group of people but ended up being used as a slur. "Va" is a dialectic term, and whilst suggesting "and" it can go deeper than this suggesting an impossible alliance or calling. There seems to be no concurrent word in Aramaic, or Hebrew. |
Passage 2:
| That family of leopards, the followers of snakes and the Kittim va Khurim, and of Ashkelon make a temple: it is not our temple, but a temple that looks like no temple. The Elijah prophets can be seen there, making the city priests angry, telling the city priests they are fools and liars. They are right when the city priests pay to Rome and the family of leopards that (which) the people toil for. They reward us by taking our children our sons to die and our daughters into the places of whores. The family of leopards and that son of Ashkelon accept this as they create this themselves. Seventy teachers of righteousness were killed at his hand, to make his new woman believe he has the power over life and death. |
| Will my son die in the same way, to show Herod's new whore who is the king? The latest Esther of death, the latest one in the bed of this king being shown how powerful he is? These men of Elijah, they suffer this fate, killed to make Herod appear almighty to his whores. |
| I fear, I fear for Shimon. While a new Elijah walks saying, "Let us pray and hope dreams strike Rome," my son may be killed to impress a whore. Or he may be sent to die in a Roman arena of slaughter [be made a gladiator]. I will take vengance for my son. One Roman must die, or one puppet ruler, one with the power of life and death (in authority). |
| Are not these like unto Elijah and Moshe and so on supposed to have this power over life and death? Where are they? Do they say, "This next innocent man dies and we will pray for Gd to strike the killer down?". No they say, "And Gd will deliver them while they die." I do not (wish for) Shimon to die such a shameful death and then be delivered by that which is plainly not seen or not heard. Where is my Gd, the Gd of Elijah himself, the Gd who did strike down the enemy? |
| They preach while all die around them! |
End of Passage 2
| The genesis of the Jochannan the Baptist narrative in the gospels appears to be as below. What cannot be verified is whether or not Herod Antipas actually had Jochannan the Baptist killed at the whim of a dancing girl. It is no coincidence that Antipas used to bump people of a religious disposition off in order to impress his latest girlfriends. Seventy Essene priests were killed, whose ritual practices involved bathing for spiritual cleansiness. This narrative may describe a broader theme about how Antipas behaved. However, the narrative continues with a plot to kill either Herod Antipas or Pontius Pilate. |
| It is unclear what "entertainment" the Romans used to lay on for the masses at the claimed time of this narrative. The Colusseum, for example (the ultimate slaughter house), was not built until much later. So this could involve a latter addition to the narrative. |
| Ashkelon was a city that was regarded by the Kanaim as the ultimate of sinful cities. It was where the Herod dynasty came from and there was the known practice of infanticide in Ashkelon. Whilst Christian narratives focus on Herod the Great's killing of the innocents, the Kanai rendering is curious, calling it "a habit of those people" in Ashkelon. |
| A sichar (in dialect sakhaya and sakkayin) is a small slightly curved knife used in assassinations. |
Passage 3:
| I sharpen, I sharpen again this Sichar and wait no more; I will seek a man with the power of life and death; I will seek such a man of the Kittim va Khurim and see that once he was also a child, helpless and weak, and see that he too bleeds, and see too that he is no more a man with the power of life and death than I am. |
| If Shimon is marked by the sword, so shall be the man of the Kittim va Khurim. If Shimon is marked by the flail, so shall the man of the Kittim va Khurim. If Shimon had died, so shall the man of the Kittim va Khurim. Four of us shall take this revenge: four from the four families that lead the other thirty six. Two from the south, two from the north. Each shall have his own revenge on the man of the Kittim va Khurim, and no priest or man (claiming to be) of Elijah will stop us. |
| I shall not beg or pray. I shall not fall before the man of the Kittim va Khurim. I shall have him pay measure for measure. If the Kittim va Khurim take vengeance, then so will I. My son, my son; they have taken my son, my family, our family: they have been broken. They (Romans and Hellenized Jews) will pay. |
| They, the Kittim va Khurim treat children as defeated soldiers. It is not (even) slavery it is worse; it is Aggagal: every living being suffers, for what? To give the Romans pleasure! They take pleasure in killing children; they take pleasure in tormenting the people they take and own. |
| You can tell them (where) the Kittim va Khurim have been; you see blood and hear laughter. Over the hills. Tell me, Priest, tell me, man of Elijah, tell me why you stay silent when the Kittim va Khurim kill? Do you utter the name of Aggagal, do you utter the promise that will be broken? Is this your Gd, the Gd of killing nations? |
| How do you pray to this Gd, this Gd of Job who is not all sufficient (not El Shaddai)? This Gd that says, "Do not wake me I am sleeping," when his children are slaughtered for the pleasure of the Kittim va Khurim. Do I call upon Aggagal, or the Ba'al of the prophets? How is this my Gd? |
| I would sooner die than follow a Gd that gives his children unto the Kittim and gives the children of his children unto the Kittim. |
| The city priests and men of Elijah speak for no Gd of mine. |
End of Passage 3
| The narrative then breaks from this to discuss a marriage, returning later where Eliezar the Accuser criticises Herod Antipas. The narrative on this plot ends when he sets off to do the deed, so it is safe to assume that this narrator died when trying to take revenge. The next narrator (also going under the same name) remains silent about this plot, but states that Shimon was killed during the initial attack. |
| The reference to "four men of the four families" refers to some model that later materializes in the Ha Shem Elohoy Elohim. This is where Gd has 144 names, and there are supposed to be 144 familes blessed by Gd (the 144,000 in the Christian Book of Revelation ties into this). Of these there are 72 families to the north, and 72 of the south (the north being Galilee, the Golan Heights and stretching as far north as Jbiel, the south being Hezekiah's Judah as under the Romans). |
| The Indian Kanai tradition also has something of this idea of 144 families claiming to be descendants of the "72 families of the south" They are said to procure genetic evidence to this effect. |
| The age of Shimon is unclear, but he was probably in his early teens. He was perhaps the youngest of a number of sons and "Eliezar" thought highly of him. Other sons of the same family die in the narrative before Shimon did and the narrator (the one here) seems less angry. Shimon was possibly the pride and joy of the narrator but his probable death was humiliating. This is never described, just that he was killed suggesting that this was the case. |
| In the Ha Shem Elohoy Elohim "Aggagal" (later Aggagiel) is the name of Gd meaning "Gd the genocidal maniac" and does have a precedent in 1 Samuel where the king of the Amalekites was named "Agag". He ruled when the Amalekites were annihilated. It is considered to be calling Gd unjust when using the name Aggagal, and only rarely appears in narrative when showing very real anger. |
| Wanting to get at Herod Antipas for the first time over the Teachers of Righteousness incident. A skirmish ensues where another son of Eliezar is killed. |
| Discussion about someone called Ibrahim and "Esther". Esther is seen as an adultress, hence her being called Esther, the name is derived from Ishtar. |
| Discussion about Bina - probably updated to a modern name meaning wisdom - who was raped by some people from Sephoris (a town west of Nazareth) and her getting her own back on them, before the men of the village could take vengeance on her behalf. |
| Ibrahim and Esther crop up again, and a rather lengthy diatribe ensues. |
| Shimon is mentioned as reading some scared texts at the local temple. It would not be the Torah scroll however (making him older than fourteen). A discussion about a Roman and a tax collector (it sounds rather biblical) appearing and demanding a considerable amount of money or good from one village. They are both killed. |
| Jochannan the Essene (Jochannan the baptist perhaps) annoys EA3 with tales of the Kittim being struck down by some mysterious storm, which actually turned out to be less spectacular, though one significant person is killed (with a cart falling on him). EA3 appears a little skeptical asking whether or not this one person's death will make any difference: it seems not. Jochannan the Essene compounds this annoyance by preaching about endless blessings, and EA3 quotes the book of Job at him. |
| Discussion about Jochannan the Essene and then on to Shimon's dissapearence (death) which is written out above. |
Sophia Siedlberg and Adrian Worsfold
Pluralist - Liberal and Thoughtful