More on the Justification for Jews Building a Rival Altar in Alexandria

I know it might sound strange to Gentiles who read this blog but the Jewish religion is sort of like mathematics. There are these basic 'rules' - like one and one is two - which can't be gotten around ... unless you develop clever reasoning.

So it is that my friend Harry Tzala's discovery of a massive rectangular object buried under the sea of what was, in the first century CE, the tradition Jewish quarter of Alexandria, made me start to think about all those ignored reports in the rabbinic tradition about a rival temple in Alexandria.

The rabbinic reports while mostly frowning on the sacrifices that went on at this rival site did not condemn its participants. They were still Jews, which is odd frankly owing to the fact that you'd think that Jerusalem would be seen as the ONLY place that was fit to hold sacrifices.

So how did Jews come to accept the idea that other Jews were carrying out what should only have been carried out at Jerusalem?

There really can be only one answer. Onias established the Alexandrian temple but also represented the last of the true line of high priests. The high priests in Judea soon came from the family of Judah Maccabeus and then Pharisees.

The Qumran literature testifies to a chorus of dissident voices who disapproved of the manner in which the traditional sacrifices were being carried out.

I suspect that the Alexandrian community must have argued that because the Jerusalem temple was not functioning properly, there was in effect no sanctity to the religious services there. As such Israel returned to the time before Jerusalem - i.e. the age where the ark moved from one place to another and wherever it was was the legitimate place for sacrifices.

This is the basic manner in which I believe the Alexandrian Jewish tradition justified carrying out sacrifices outside of Jerusalem. They must have originally been highly disgruntled Sadducees. They must have shared many similar traits with at least some sects who developed literature found at Qumran.

The basic idea is represented in Jesus' discussion with the Samaritan woman in front of Mount Gerizim the place Samaritans formerly offered sacrifices to God. Jesus says "the hour is coming, when neither in Jerusalem, nor in this mountain, shall ye worship the Father."

My guess again is that the original gospel, the Gospel according to Mark, originally argued that the proper place for worshiping God would soon only be found in the Church of St. Mark in Alexandria which was the former Holy Place of Jews in Egypt (see below).