Nehardea

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Nehardea

Nehardea or Nehardeah was a city

City

A city is an urban area with a high population density and a particular administrative, legal, or historical status.Large industrialized cities generally have advanced systems for sanitation, utilities, land usage, house, and transportation and more....
of Babylonia

Babylonia

Babylonia was a state in Lower Mesopotamia , Babylon as its franklin. Babylonia emerged when Hammurabi created an empire out of the territories of the former kingdoms of Sumer and Akkad....
, situated at or near the junction of the Euphrates

Euphrates

The Euphrates is the western of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia which flows from Anatolia....
with the Nahr Malka (also known as Nâr Sharri, Ar-Malcha, Nahr el-Malik , and King's Canal), one of the earliest centers of Babylonian Judaism

History of the Jews in Iraq

Iraqi Jews are Jews born in Iraq or of Iraqi heritage. The history of the Jews in Iraq is documented from the time of the Babylonian captivity c....
. As the seat of the exilarch

Exilarch

Exilarch refers to the leaders of the Diaspora Jewish community following the deportation of the population of Judah into Babylonian captivity after the destruction of the kingdom of Judah....
it traced its origin back to King Jehoiachin. According to Sherira Gaon

Sherira Gaon

Rav Sherira Gaon was the head of the yeshiva in Pumbeditha. He wrote the Iggeret Rav Sherira Gaon, a comprehensive history of the composition of the Talmud....
(Letter of Sherira Gaon, in Neubauer, M. J. C. i. 26), Jehoiachin and his coexilarchs built a synagogue

Synagogue

A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer.Synagogues usually have a large hall for prayer , smaller rooms for study and sometimes a social hall and offices....
at Nehardea, for the foundation of which they used earth and stones which they had brought, in accordance with the words of Psalms

Psalms

Psalms is a book of the Hebrew Bible , included in the collected works known as the "Writings" or Ketuvim....
cii.

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Encyclopedia

Nehardea or Nehardeah was a city

City

Babylonia

Euphrates

History of the Jews in Iraq

Iraqi Jews are Jews born in Iraq or of Iraqi heritage. The history of the Jews in Iraq is documented from the time of the Babylonian captivity c....
. As the seat of the exilarch

Exilarch

Sherira Gaon

Synagogue

Psalms

Psalms is a book of the Hebrew Bible , included in the collected works known as the "Writings" or Ketuvim....
cii. 17 (A. V. 16), from Jerusalem

Jerusalem

Jerusalem is the capital of Israel and its List of Israeli cities in both population and area, with a population of 747,600 residents over an area of if Positions on Jerusalem East Jerusalem is included....
(comp. a similar statement in regard to the founding of the Jewish city of Ispahan, in Monatsschrift, 1873, pp. 129, 181). This was the synagogue called "Shaf we-Yatib," to which there are several references dating from the third and fourth centuries (R. H. 24b; Avodah Zarah

Avodah Zarah

Avodah Zarah is the name of a tractate in the Talmud, located in Nezikin, the fourth Order of the Talmud dealing with legal damages. The main topic of the tractate is laws pertaining to Jews living amongst Gentiles, including regulations about the interaction between Jews and "idolaters" , both for distancing Jews from the act of id...
43b; Niddah

Niddah

Abaye

Abaye was a Rabbi of the Jewish Talmud who lived in Babylonia [???], known as an amora [?????] born about the close of the third century; died 339 ....
asserts (Meg. 29a) was the seat of the Shekhinah

Shekhinah

File:SpiritUponDavid.jpgShekhinah is the English spelling of a grammatically feminine Hebrew language word that means the dwelling or settling, and is used to denote the dwelling or settling presence of God, especially in the Temple in Jerusalem....
in Babylonia. The Aaronic

Kohen

A kohen is a Jew who is a direct male descendant of the Bible Aaron, brother of Moses, with a separate status in Judaism. Another term for the descendants of Aaron are the Aaronites or Aaronids....
portion of the Jewish population of Nehardea was said to be descended from the slaves of Pashur ben Immer, the contemporary of King Jehoiachin (Kiddushin 70b).

Mention by Josephus

There are also other allusions in the Talmud

Talmud

The Talmud is a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Halakha, Jewish ethics, customs, and history. It is a central text of mainstream Judaism....
(ib.) casting doubt upon the purity of blood

Genealogy

Genealogy is the study of families and the tracing of their lineages and history. Genealogists use oral traditions, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kinship and pedigree of its members....
of the Nehardean Jews. The fact that Hyrcanus II

Hyrcanus II

Hyrcanus II, a member of the Hasmonean dynasty, was the Jewish Kohen Gadol and King of Judea in the 1st century BCE....
, the high priest

Kohen Gadol

Kohen Gadol or Kohen ha-Gadol is the title of wiktionary:High Priest of early Israelite religion and of Classical Age Judaism from the rise of the Israelite nation until the destruction of the Second Temple of Jerusalem....
, lived for a time in that city as a captive of the Parthians (Josephus

Josephus

Josephus , also known as Yosef Ben Matityahu and, after he became a Roman citizenship, as Titus Flavius Josephus, was a first-century Jewish historian and apologist of priestly and royal ancestry who survived and recorded the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70....
, Ant. xv. 1, § 2) may explain the circumstance that as late as the third century certain of its inhabitants traced their descent back to the Hasmoneans. The importance of the city during the last century of the existence of the Second Temple

Second Temple

The Second Temple was the reconstructed Temple in Jerusalem which stood between 516 BCE and 70 CE. During this time, it was the center of Judaism worship, which focused on the sacrifices known as the korbanot....
appears from the following statement made by Josephus (ib. xviii. 9, § 1):

Reference to the extent of the territory of Nehardea is made in the Talmud also (Ket. 54a). In addition to the Euphrates, the "King's Canal" (Nehar Malka) formed one of the natural defenses of the city (?id. 70b; Shabbat

Shabbat (Talmud)

Shabbat is first tractate in the Order of Moed, of the Mishnah and Talmud. The tractate consists of 24 chapters.The tractate primarily deals with laws relating to the Shabbat, the weekly day of rest, and the activities prohibited on Shabbat and distinguishes between Biblical prohibitions and Rabbinic prohibitions....
108b); the ferry over the river (or perhaps over the canal) is likewise mentioned (?id. 70b; ?ul. 50b). "Nehardea and Nisibis

Nisibis

Nusaybin is a city in Mardin Province, southeastern Turkey populated by Kurdish people, Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac people, Arabs.It is the ancient Mesopotamian city, which Alexander's successors refounded as Antiochia Mygdonia and is mentioned for the first time in Polybius' description of the march of Antiochus I against the Molon...
," says Josephus further (ib.), "were the treasuries of the Eastern Jews

Mizrahi Jews

Mizrahi Jews or Mizrahim, , also referred to as Adot HaMizrach are Jews descended from the Jewish communities of the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia and the Caucasus....
, for the Temple taxes

Tithe

A tithe is a one-tenth part of something, paid as a voluntary contribution or as a tax or levy, usually to support a Christian religious organization....
were kept there until the stated days for forwarding them to Jerusalem." Nehardea was the native city of the two brothers Anilai and Asinai

Anilai and Asinai

Anilai and Asinai were two Babylonian-Jewish robber chieftains whose exploits were reported by Josephus.They were apprenticed by their widowed mother to a Weaver ....
, who in the first third of the 1st century C.E. founded a robber-state on the Euphrates, and caused much trouble to the Babylonian Jews. After the destruction of Jerusalem, Nehardea is first mentioned in connection with Rabbi Akiba's sojourn there (Yeb., end). From the post-Hadrian

Hadrian

Publius Aelius Hadrianus , as emperor Imperator Caesar Divi Traiani filius Traianus Hadrianus Augustus, and Divus Hadrianus after his apotheosis, known as Hadrian in English language, was Roman Emperor of Roman Empire from AD 117 to 138, as well as a Stoicism and Epicureanism philosopher....
ic tanna

Tannaim

The Tannaim were the Rabbinic sages whose views are recorded in the Mishnah, from approximately 70-200 CE. The period of the Tannaim, also referred to as the Mishnaic period, lasted about 130 years....
itic period there is the anecdote referring to the debt which A?ai ben Josiah had to collect at Nehardea (Gi?tin 14b; Bacher, Ag. Tan. ii. 385).

Nehardea at the end of the Tannaitic period

Nehardea emerges clearly into the light of history at the end of the tannaitic period. Shela's

Rav Shela

Shela was a Jews of Babylonia teacher of the latter part of the tannaitic and the beginning of the amoraic period, and head of the school at Nehardea ....
school was then prominent, and served to pave the way for the activity of the Babylonian academies

Yeshiva

Yeshiva or yeshivah , or metivta or mesivta ) also frequently referred to as a Beth midrash, Talmudical Academy, Rabbinical Academy or Rabbinical School is an institution unique to classical Judaism for Torah study, the study of Talmud, Rabbinic literature and History of responsa....
. Samuel ben Abba, whose father, Abba ben Abba, was an authority in Nehardea, established the reputation of its academy, while Abba Arika

Abba Arika

Abba Arika was a Jewish Talmudist who lived in Babylonia, known as an amora of the 3rd century who established at Sura the systematic study of the rabbinic traditions, which, using the Mishnah as text, led to the compilation of the Talmud....
, who likewise taught there for a time, made Sura

Sura

A Sura is a "chapter" of the Qur'an, each of which is traditionally ordered roughly in order of decreasing length. Each Sura is named for a word or name mentioned in an ayah , of that 'Sura'....
, situated on the Euphrates about twenty parasang

Parasang

The parasang is a historical Iranian peoples unit of itinerant distance comparable to the League .In antiquity, the term was used throughout much of the Middle East, and the Iranian languages from which it derives can no longer be determined ....
s from Nehardea, the seat of an academy destined to achieve a still greater reputation. The history of Nehardea is summed up in that of Samuel's activity. Soon after his death (254) it was destroyed by Papa ben Neser (Odenathus), in 259, and its place as seat of the second academy was taken by Pumbedita

Pumbedita

Pumbedita was the name of a city in ancient Babylonia that was a major center of Talmud scholarship that, together with the city of Sura , gave rise to the Babylonian Talmud....
.

Nahman ben Jacob

Nehardea, however, soon regained its importance, for the eminent Nahman ben Jacob dwelt there. There are several references to his activity (see ?id. 70a; B. B. 153a; Kettubot 97a; Meg. 27b). Raba

Rába

The R?ba is a river in southeastern Austria and western Hungary and a tributary of the Danube. Its source is in Austria, some kilometres east of Bruck an der Mur....
tells of a walk which he took with Na?man through the "Shoemaker street," or, according to another version, through the "Scholars' street" (?ul. 48b). Certain gates of Nehardea, which even in the time of Samuel were so far covered with earth that they could not be closed, were uncovered by Nahman (Er. 6b). Two sentences in which Nahman designates Nehardea as "Babel

Babel

Babel is the name used in the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an for the city of Babylon , notable in Book of Genesis as the location of the Tower of Babel....
" have been handed down (B. ?. 83a; B. B. 145a). Sheshet

Sheshet

Sheshet was a Babylonian Jews amora of the third generation and colleague of R. Na?man bar Jacob, with whom he had frequent arguments concerning questions of religious law....
also dwelt there temporarily (Ned. 78a). According to a statement dating from the 4th century, an amora

Amora

Amora , were renowned Jewish scholars who "said" or "told over" the teachings of the Oral law, from about 200 to 500 CE in Babylonia and the Land of Israel....
heard in Nehardea certain tannaitic sentences which had until then been unknown to scholars (Shab. 145b; Niddah

Niddah

Niddah is a Hebrew term which literally means separation, and generally refers to separation from tumah; The term niddah is overwhelmingly used in Judaism to refer to the Halakhah concerning menstruation....
21a). Nehardea always remained the residence of a certain number of learned men, some of whom belonged to the school of Mahuza

Mahuza

Mahuza is the name given to the metropolis formed by Ctesiphon and Seleucia on the Tigris on opposite sides of the Tigris River. It was one of the cites of an early Babylonian Talmudic yeshiva, founded by Rava , as well as the original seat of the Exilarch....
, which was of considerable prominence at that time, and some to that of Pumbedita

Pumbedita

Pumbedita was the name of a city in ancient Babylonia that was a major center of Talmud scholarship that, together with the city of Sura , gave rise to the Babylonian Talmud....
. About the middle of the 4th century the famous scholar ?ama was living at Nehardea; the maxim "By the 'amoraim of Nehardea' ?ama is meant" (Sanh. 17a) became a canon in the Babylonian schools.

Amemar

Toward the end of the 4th and at the beginning of the 5th century Nehardea again became a center of Babylonian Judaism through Amemar's activity, though this was overshadowed by that of Rav Ashi, the director of the Academy of Sura

Sura

Sherira Gaon

Rav Sherira Gaon was the head of the yeshiva in Pumbeditha. He wrote the Iggeret Rav Sherira Gaon, a comprehensive history of the composition of the Talmud....
, l.c. i. 32). Amemar attempted in Nehardea to introduce the recitation of the Decalogue

Decalogue

Decalogue may refer to:* Ethical Decalogue, or Ten Commandments, a list of religious and moral imperatives told to be written by the Abrahamic God and given to Moses on Mount Sinai in the form of two stone tablets...
into the daily prayer ritual, but was dissuaded from doing so by Ashi. Another of Amemar's liturgical innovations is mentioned in Sukkot

Sukkot

Sukkot , is a Hebrew Bible pilgrimage Jewish holiday that occurs in autumn on the 15th day of the month of Tishrei . The holiday lasts seven days, including Chol Hamoed....
55a (on the relation of Ashi to Amemar see Halevy, Dorot ha-Rishonim, ii. 515 et seq., iii. 68 et seq.).

Other scholars of the 4th and 5th centuries who are mentioned in the Talmud as natives of Nehardea are:

Dimi (?ul. 113a), who subsequently presided at Pumbedita as second successor to ?ama (Letter of Sherira Gaon, l.c.)
Zebid (M. ?. 27b)
Nahman (?ul. 95b)
?anan (?id. 81b; Niddah
Niddah

Niddah is a Hebrew term which literally means separation, and generally refers to separation from tumah; The term niddah is overwhelmingly used in Judaism to refer to the Halakhah concerning menstruation....
66b)
Simai (Sheb. 12b; Mak. 16a)
Adda b. Minyomi was called the "judge of Nehardea" (Sanh. 17b).
A?a of Be-?atim from the vicinity of Nehardea is mentioned by Sherira Gaon
Sherira Gaon

Rav Sherira Gaon was the head of the yeshiva in Pumbeditha. He wrote the Iggeret Rav Sherira Gaon, a comprehensive history of the composition of the Talmud....
(Halevy, l.c. i. 25) as one of the saboraic authorities of the 6th century.
Mar R. ?anina is mentioned, among the earliest geonim
Geonim

Geonim were the presidents of the two great Talmudic Academies in Babylonia of Sura and Pumbedita, in Babylonia, and were the generally accepted spiritual leaders of the Jewish community world wide in the early medieval era, in contrast to the Resh Galuta who wielded secular authority over the Jews in Islamic lands....
of Pumbedita, as residing at Nehardea at the time of Muhammad
Muhammad

Muhammad Patronymic#Arabic Abd Allah ibn Abd al Muttalib , is the founder of the Major religious groups of Islam and is regarded by Muslims as a Rasul and prophet of , the last and the greatest law-bearer in a series of prophets....
. This is the last reference in Jewish history to Nehardea. Benjamin of Tudela
Benjamin of Tudela

Benjamin of Tudela was a medieval Kingdom of Navarre, sometimes called "Rabbi", was a medieval explorer from Spain who traveled through Europe, Asia, and Africa in the 12th century....
, however, mentions the ruins of the synagogue Shaf-Yatib, two days' journey from Sura, and one and one-half from Pumbedita (Itinerary, ed. Grünhut, p. 64).

A few scattered data concerning Nehardea may be added. It was an ancient liturgical custom there to read pericopes from the Hagiographa on Sabbath

Shabbat

Shabbat or Shabbos , is the weekly day of rest in Judaism, symbolizing the seventh day in Genesis, after the six days of creation. Though it is commonly said to be the Saturday of each week, it is observed from sundown on Friday until the appearance of three stars in the sky on Saturday night....
afternoons (Shab. 116b). The surrounding country was said to be unsafe because of Bedouin

Bedouin

The Bedouin, , are predominantly Muslim, desert-dwelling Arab nomadic pastoralist, or previously nomadic group, found throughout most of the desert belt extending from the Atlantic coast of the Sahara via the Western Desert , Sinai Peninsula, and Negev to the Arabian Desert....
robbers (B. B. 36a). An ancient rule of procedure of the court of Nehardea is mentioned in Ket. 87a. Lydda in Palestine, and Nehardea are mentioned in the 3rd century as cities whose inhabitants were proud and ignorant (Yer. Pes. 32a; comp. Bab. Pes. 62b; see Bacher, Ag. Pal. Amor. i. 60). Nehardea is famous in the history of the Masorah

Masorah

Masorah or Mesora, refers either to the transmission of a tradition, or to the tradition itself.* In a broad sense the term can refer to the entire chain of Judaism tradition: see Oral Torah....
because of an ancient tradition relating to the number of verses in the Bible; it is here said that Hamnuna

Hamnuna

Hamnuna is the name of several rabbis in the Talmud.* Hamnuna Sabba . Mid third century of the common era. A pupil of Abba Arika . After Rav, he became the head of the Talmudic Academies in Babylonia at Sura ....
(Bacher, l.c. i. 2) brought this tradition from Nehardea, where he had received it from Na??ai (see M. J. C. i. 174; Strack, Di?du? ?e'amim, p. 56). Certain readings of the Biblical text are characterized by tradition—especially by the Masorah

Masorah

Targum

A targum is an Aramaic language translation of the Hebrew Bible written or compiled from the Second Temple period until the early Middle Ages ....
(Onkelos

Onkelos

Onkelos is the name of a famous convert to Judaism in Tannaim times . He is considered to be the author of the famous Targum Onkelos ....
)—as being those of Sura, and certain others as of Nehardea (see Berliner, Die Massorah zum Targum Onkelos, pp. xiii. et seq., 61-70, Leipsic, 1877).

Jewish Encyclopedia Bibliography

Neubauer, G. T. pp. 230, 350;
Hirschensohn, Sheba ?okmot, p. 164, Lemberg, 1885.