Human history shows us that any nation that played a significant role on the stage of world events will leave this stage after some time, go backstage and give way to another nation. 
Alternately, they may completely disappear or be merged with other nations. 
Most biblical nations and a large number of European nations experienced this similar fate.

There are also nations which, although steadfastly holding on to their territories, no longer were participants in world affairs. 
This category includes almost all of the Asian nations, which are going through the stage of historical decline.

Israel is the only exception to this general rule, and does not belong to any of the above mentioned groups of nations.
This vagabond, cut off and expelled from it's own homeland, has been wandering for two thousand years across the surface of the earth. 
It has been torn to shreds and forced to labour as slaves. 
Tens of thousands of it's sons were burned to death in the flames of the Inquisition's stakes. 
It has been persecuted until these days, but despite all this, I dare to say that this nation did not lose it's property, nor any of its unique characteristics.

Israel never lost it's spiritual power, and because it lives in the future, rather than the present, it implicitly believes and hopes for better times in a happy future. 
On the stage of world events, Israel considers it's own role to be temporarily interrupted, and does not worry that it will not play until the end. 
Everything that happened in the past gives Israel the strength to fight the adverse circumstances that surround it and this supports it's hopes.

Ancient Israel was appointed as a chosen people, in the role of mediator between God and humankind, by the Omniscient and Provident God. 
Israel is responsible for spreading the truth about the true God, and to enlighten the pagan world that is blurred by the dark cloud of idolatry.

The first fathers previously proclaimed the truth about God יהוה - the Creator of heaven and earth among the polytheists. 

Holy Scripture informs us:

And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Shechem, unto the terebinth of Moreh .... And he removed from thence unto the mountain on the east of Beth-el, and pitched his tent, having Beth-el on the west, and Ai on the east; and he built there an altar unto יהוה, and called upon the name of יהוה. *

​* 1M 12:6 and 8 (B'resheet/Gen 12:6 and 8)

The idolatrous view of the world that the Israelites adopted from the Egyptians had taken such deep roots that, even after receiving of their own religious rules, the Israelites repeatedly returned to this pagan world view and built pagan shrines and worshipped idols.

 

The prophets, who were endowed with revelation and inspired by God, strove to help with all possible devices, to keep the People of God within the borders of the true faith and away from all vices.
However the people would perceive the prophets only after they were punished by heavenly punishment, and this awareness was only temporary.

 

Even though People of Israel led the wicked life for a long time, the idolatry did not become their dominant faith, at least not until the ascension of two rulers.
It is known that after Rehoboam (רחבעם), the son of King Solomon, ascended on the throne, Israel mutinied and the ten tribes seceded from the house of King David. Israel was divided into two states.
The head of revolt was Yarabe’am, the son of Nebat, who became the ruler of the newly established Kingdom of Israel.

 

It is also known that each adult Israelite male used to attend the Temple in Jerusalem three times in year. 
Yarabe’am feared that during his subjects' visits to the kingdom of Judah, they could be captured or they could become loyal to their former king. 
He therefore legalized idolatry and appointed it as the state religion. 
He also decreed to place idols in two towns and instituted feasts in their honour. 
This despicable act led to the demise of the Kingdom of Israel.

 

The idolatrous cult, step by step, also took control over the inhabitants of Judah. 
It caused the destruction of the Temple and the seventy years of Babylonian captivity. 
Israel began to mend it's ways only after it was deprived of all that was holy and dear, and only when it realized the significance and importance of the Sanctuary that they had lost.

 

After the expiration of seventy years, the Temple was restored and this restoration unified and united the People of Israel. 
Israelites cherished, as a treasure, all of what remained after the destruction of the Temple. 
This was referring to the Holy Scriptures, the renewed Temple service and the remainder of the Temple vessels.

There was not a trace of idolatry at the start of the second Temple, but a blow came from the other side.
 
During the stay in Babylon, the exiled Judeans, mostly adaptable people, adopted ideas from the Chaldean teachings. 
After they came home they also adopted the ideas of the Greek philosophers.
 
These foreign points of view and ideas did not go with Judaism and it's religious points of view. 
The principles of Judaism were incompatible with these extraneous ideas, and it resulted in a conflict of ideas. 
It is here that we must look for the origin of mutual hate, hostility, ambiguity and the roots of many sects and apostasies.

During the time of the second Temple there arose more than seventy sects.
 
Among these sects we can count the Samaritans, the Sadducees and related to them, the Boethusians. 

 

At that time we can also see the beginnings of the Talmud. 
Judaism fell into serious trouble and needed a necessary refreshment and a life-giving power. 
Disagreements, discords, fragmentation of thought and sectarian fighting caused the destruction of the second Temple. 
Israel lost it's own spiritual centre and the source of it's own life-giving power when the Roman emperors Titus and Hadrian seized Palestine. 
At the end Israel was defeated, captured and dispersed to all corners of the world.

 

Now at that time the teaching of Talmud began to arise, gain strength and develop.
The sectarian fights outwardly seemed to be ended, but the inside of Israel still inconspicuously smouldered with the remains of the conflicts. 
The birth of Talmudism could not keep the Sadducees and the Boethusians calm.  In addition, part of the people, known as Bene Miqra (Sons of (written) Law) or sometimes also as the Shammaites, remained be loyal to the pure Mosaism.
They were known as Shammaites because their teachings were often identical with the teachings of the school of Shammai. *

 

* During the existence of the second Temple, there were two schools that were in opposition each other; the school of Hillel and the school of Shammai. The school of Hillel placed emphasis on the Talmudic methods of interpretation, while the school of Shammai placed emphasis on the literal interpretation of the Law. Shammai proclaimed that the biblical text does not extend beyond its plain and literal meaning.

 

The members of all these sects could not belong to one community, attending the same synagogues, and having the same religious schools and religious courts. 
Everyone had to have noticed that Judaism was in the crater of the volcano, which would sooner or later erupt and shortly conflict did burst out.

 

Each historical changeover is a logical consequence of the events that preceded this change. 
No conflict occurs unexpectedly, and this conflict caused the following events. 

After the destruction of the second Temple, the arena of Israel's spiritual and intellectual activities moved into the East; Alexandria, Safed, Tiberias, Yathrib, Baghdad, Sura, Pumpedita and Anbar.
At that time Israel had practically no literature other than Talmudic, or more correctly, all the intellectual and spiritual thoughts of Israel became part of the Talmud. 

 

The Talmud arose gradually and provided a wide space for the intellectual work of many authors. 
At the time, when the Talmud began to arise, any confrontation was unthinkable and absurd because there was nothing to respond and react against (since the work was not completed). 
Moreover, at that time there was complete freedom of intellectual work, and therefore a protest (that is the base of confrontation) made no sense. 
After Ravina and his co-workers completed Talmud, at the beginning of the sixth century, their intellectual work ceased.
Now it was necessary for them to apply, into everyday life, the huge amount of ideas that had become part of the Talmud, without any analysis, criticism and disputation as an undeniable truth, and regardless of their legitimacy or unjustification. 
Also many tractates became part of the Talmud which clearly contradicted the written Law, or which obviously changed the meaning of the Law. 

 

Furthermore, the Talmud contained a lot of myths and superstitions.

 

All of this had to provoke a critical reaction of any follower of the literal interpretation of the Law and became the source of conflict.
Thus conflict was sown and waited for a reaper.

 

For a long time the critics and opponents of the Talmud ran their activities underground because they did not have a vigorous leader at their head. 
This was the reason why their activities were not noticeable. 
However a brave and educated man, who was the descendant of the kings of Judah, then became their head. 
The man who raised the banner, in the Name of God, and gathered the like-minded individuals and communities, was named Anan ben David!