History Essay Sample about the Second Temple

Completed only seven years before its eventual destruction, the Second Temple was a pivotal and deeply revered location to the Jews, especially after the loss of the First Temple. The Jews were able to adapt relatively well after the first destruction, and they were forced to do the same after the second one. Following the Roman siege of Jerusalem, which led to the Second Temple being destroyed, the Jewish community, whether in Palestine or Diaspora, faced a number of challenges to its status quo. With the Second Temple gone, the Jews had to find ways to overcome new or worsening obstacles to their leadership, worship, and political dispensation that resulted from this devastating loss and affected nearly every aspect of Jewish life at the time.

Roman rule was not welcomed by the Jews, who always resented the heavy taxation forced upon them after they became a client kingdom of the Roman state. Taxes worsened for the Jews following the destruction of the Second Temple when Emperor Vespasian implemented a new tax on them for their “…privilege of religious freedom…” (Sicker 170). Following the initial Roman conquest of Judea, the allowance of Jewish religious autonomy served to placate the Jews, but only to the point of passivity. This changed after the Temple's destruction since the subsequent Roman enslavement of the Jews made their pacification unnecessary as they were no longer considered a legitimate threat. The Jew's religious autonomy was thus demoted, from an inevitable compromise for the sake of securing Roman authority, to an uncertain privilege that was merely preserved for the sole purpose of extorting the Jews under the guise of taxation.  Jewish funds that had formerly gone to the maintenance and support of the temple in Jerusalem were forced to be redirected toward the funding of Roman temples, which further humiliated and disheartened the already warry Jews (King 29).

After a Jewish revolt in the second century CE, Jerusalem, which had been a Roman city for about 70 years, was finally renamed by the Romans, who then forbade any Jews from entering (King 26). Jewish political practices of the periods before had centered around and emanated from Jerusalem. The barring of the Jew's access to the holy city, in the aftermath of the Second Temple's destruction, ensured the ensuing demise of existing Jewish political entities and practices that the Temple was necessary for. The enslavement of the Jews by the Romans further diminished their already limited political independence and power, only given by the Romans in the hopes of distracting the Jews from all transgressions of the empire. The Jews had only a modicum of status in Roman society before the fall of the Temple, and in the aftermath of this, the Roman’s position of tolerance toward the Jews, and their practices, quickly devolved into a position of persecution and subjugation.

In the absence of the Second Temple, the Jews were without national political organization, and were unable to maintain their previous system of temple-centric leadership. The Jewish priesthood was dislodged from its position of authority as it had lost the seat of its power in the loss of the Temple. The Jew’s inability to carry out certain traditional religious practices was exacerbated by the disappearance of their traditional leadership and led to the emergence of a new kind of Jewish leader. The rabbi was not a prophet, nor was he a reiteration of the priest. Instead, the rabbi was a unique type of teacher whose authority was derived from his study and resulting knowledge of the Torah and his piety (Efron 106). Just as the Jew’s had to adjust to face new challenges to their system of leadership, they also had to adjust to face the new challenges to the ways they worshipped. Jewish worship after the Second Temple was forced to move away from a dependence on sacrifice, much like after the First Temple’s destruction. Although the Jews always remained hopeful for the potential restoration of the Temple, they were able to refocus their worship on practices that did not require a temple. There was a burgeoning emphasis on other religious rites the Jews had always practiced. These were things like “…circumcision, the observance of the Sabbath, [and] the avoidance of forbidden foods…” because these practices were not dependent on access to the Temple (Efron 105). Customs like these had always been fundamental and well-established, however, they acquired a new importance post-Temple as an integral part of the difficult reconfiguration of the Jewish relationship with God.

Without the ability to use sacrifice as the primary method of communication with God, the Jews needed to construct a contemporary system that achieved divine appeasement, and provided opportunities for atonement, to the same extent that they believed sacrifice had in the Temple. The contemporary system, developed as the Jewish replacement for sacrifice, was based on two concepts already familiar to the Jews: study and prayer. Many key aspects of sacrifice were tangible, like the Temple or the animal being offered, though an aspect did not need to be a physical object, like a building or a being. It could be an activity that served as an obvious and outward display of religious devotion, like the ritual killing of an animal for a sacrifice. Acts of study and prayer were generally less tangible and sensational than that of sacrifice. The newly formed notion that these actions were central to proper worship in a post-Temple world marked an ostensible shift in the Jews’ perception of worship. Before this shift, worship was traditionally viewed as an activity performed outside of oneself, used to gain favor or avoid punishment. The result of the shift was a new view of worship as a practice that was internally motivated, that sought to further one’s understanding of Judaism, and that focused on the development of a more personal relationship with God that could furthered without elaborate rituals.

Throughout Jewish history, there are reoccurring themes of persecution and subjugation, but because of this, or maybe in spite of this, there are also themes of growth and innovative solutions. The Jew’s long-standing ability to adapt and to overcome adversity, and their strong conviction of faith, allowed them to survive the might and wraith of the legendary Roman empire. Their impressive resilience and religious reverence prompted political and religious changes that would allow for the continuance of Judaism and Jewish culture despite a rapid and constant evolution in the conditions of Jewish life.