The destruction of the Temple happened on the eve of the ninth of Av, on the outgoing of the Sabbath, in a Sabbatical year. According to the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, a 12th-century Hebrew chronicle translated by Moses Gaster in 1899, the Levites were standing on their platform with harps in hand, singing the psalm that begins, "He has brought upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them off in their own evil." They never finished the verse. The enemy burst in before the last words left their mouths.
The same horrifying symmetry occurred with Nebuchadnezzar's earlier destruction. Again it was the ninth of Av, again the outgoing of the Sabbath, again the Levites were mid-song. Sixty myriads of Levites, all descendants of Moses, stood with harps. The verse was the same. The interruption was the same. The exile to Babylon followed.
When they arrived in Babylon, their captors demanded entertainment. "Sing us a song of Zion," they said. The Levites answered: "How can we sing a song of Zion on foreign soil?" The captors threatened to force them. So the Levites bit off their own fingers with their teeth and threw the severed digits before their tormentors. "How can fingers that struck the strings of God's harps in the Holy Temple now play for idols?"
That night a cloud descended and covered the Levites and their families, and a pillar of fire led them through the darkness. By morning they had reached the shore, where God extended the river Sabbatyon around them as a barrier. This miraculous river rolls stones and sand with the noise of an earthquake six days a week, making it impossible to cross. On the Sabbath it rests, but then a wall of fire erupts on the western side, burning everything within thirty-four miles. Behind that river, the sons of Moses live in purity to this day, with no thieves, no unclean animals, and no one dying before the age of 120.
LXI. (1) The banishment brought about by Titus,
Vespasianus, and Hadrian, occurred on the eve of the
ninth of Ab, on the outgoing of the Sabbath and the
Sabbatical year. The Levites were then occupied with
their ministrations, and, with their harps in their hands,
were singing their hymns. But Scripture saith, ' He hath
brought upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them
off in their own evil.' The words ' He shall cut them off '
were not yet fully attered ere their enemies came upon
them, slaughtered man}^ of them, and sent the rest into
exile. Thus, also, when Nebuchadnezzar the wicked sent
them into exile it fell upon the eve of the ninth of Ab,
the outgoing of the Sabbatical year and the Sabbath,
when the Levites were standing on their 'Duchan,' being
sixty myriads in number, who were, moreover, of the seed
of Moses our instructor. While the harps were in their
hands, the verse ' He hath brought upon them their own
iniquity, and shall cut them off in their own evil,' was-
not yet fully uttered, ere the enemy came and exiled them
to Babylon. When they arrived in Babylon, their enemies-
and captors said to them, ' Sing us a song of Zion.' And
they replied, ' How can we sing a song of Zion upon strange
ground ?'
(2) ' Now,' retorted their captors, ' ye shall sing by force.'
But they at once cut off' their fingers with their teeth, and
cast them before them. And they replied, ' How can those
fingers which struck the strings of the harps in the temple
strike them here in a strange land ?' And God exclaimed,
*If I forget Jerusalem, My right hand shall be forgotten.'
(3) A cloud then descended, and lifting all the children
of Moses, with their sheep and cattle, brought them to the
east of Havila. In the night they were let down, and on
that same night they heard a great noise surrounding them,
like that of a river, without seeing a drop of water de-
scending, but heard only the rolling of stones and sand,
where there had never been a river. This river then rolled
great stones, and the sand, without any water, made a noise
as of a great earthquake, so that if anyone came near that
river, he was dashed to pieces. This continued until the
Sabbath. The river they called Sabbatyon or Sabbatianus.
In some part the river is less than sixty cubits in width;
there the people stand and speak with those of the other
side. On the Sabbath it ceases to flow, and on the eve of
Sabbath a cloud descends full of smoke. No one is able
to approach them, neither do they approach us. There
are no wild beasts, no unclean animals, nor any reptiles or
creeping things; nothing except their flocks and herds.
(4) They reap and sow, and they ask the others, and
thus they learned of the destruction of the second temple.
Behind the sons of Moses we do not know who may be
dwelling; but Naphtali, Gad, and Asher came to Dan after
the destruction of the second temple; for Isaachar, who lived
at the mountains of the deep, quarrelled with them and
188 [LXII. 1
called them ' the sons of the handmaids.' At length, bemg
afraid lest they be coming to battle, those three tribes went
away until they came to Dan, and these four tribes were
thus living in one place.
The Ten Banishments of the Sanhedkim.
