W. M. Flinders Petrie

“ How utterly diverse is the mark left on the world by the men of mind, by Isaiah or Aristotle, compared with the energies of patriots, like the Maccabees or Sulla. Mere existence matters nothing to the present or the future; it is the energizing influence of fresh thoughts or organization that alone gives value to any people. ”

“ Since in Egypt inherited property was held by women rather than by men, this was according to native law. In marriage contracts either party could stand up in the congregation and denounce the marriage at any time, on payment of a fixed penalty. This was likewise the case in Christian Coptic marriages, as stated by a contract. [19] Hence it must be regarded as the Egyptian law, to which the Jews conformed by necessity or habit.
Thus it appears that the status of the Jewish colonies in Egypt was at least equal to that of any other foreigners, and that they had assimilated native custom and law. ”

“ There was not yet the dogma that no temple could be legitimate outside of Jerusalem: that view seems to have been a development of the Babylonian party, probably in connection with their rebuilding of the temple at Jerusalem on the Return from Captivity. A rival temple would probably have been illegitimate at any time; but if the temple of Jerusalem was destroyed, or in the heretical hands of the Hellenic party, then it was looked on as more important to maintain the worship, rather than to abandon it because its true centre was unattainable. ”

“ Hellenizing party, and the High-Priesthood became entirely the prey of violence and bribery, it was more and more difficult to regard the Holy City as a religious home. This severance, and the distance across a long desert journey, would lead to an entire estrangement, and the practical cessation of all Temple worship. The loss of a religious centre, and the presence of an heir of the High-Priesthood, driven out of Jerusalem by the crimes of his relatives, would at last lead to the rise of a new national centre in the midst of the faithful who were thus living in exile. ”

“ The Status of the Jews in Egypt
In considering the history of any people, one of the main elements is that of their status. What were their abilities and how were they shown? What permanent mark did they make on their period? How did they stand in reference to their neighbours, in the same country and in other countries? There are now Jews in Lemberg and Jews in Paris; but how entirely differently we regard them, because of their status. ”

“ The great war in Palestine and destruction of Jerusalem immediately after Nero’s reign put an end to Jewish aspirations for a long time. At last a general conspiracy broke out when Trajan was engaged in Parthia, and the Jews in Cyrene, Egypt, Cyprus, Palestine and Mesopotamia broke out in revolt and massacre. [49] Nearly half a million Greeks were slaughtered in Cyrene and Cyprus. [50] In Egypt all Greeks about the country were [37] massacred, or driven into Alexandria for refuge, where they massacred all Jews left in that city. ”

“ Jews in Egypt for some centuries, they were by no means expelled. As traders, perhaps as cultivators, they kept a place in the country. A surprise has come in the last few weeks by the discovery at Oxyrhynkhos, in Middle Egypt, of fragments of four papyri written in Hebrew, as early as the third century. These are thus the oldest Hebrew writings known, apart from stone inscriptions. The age of them is given by another papyrus found with them dated under Severus, 193-211 A.C. One Hebrew writing is on part of a Greek document, which by the hand is probably of the third century. ”

“ We should have to go very far to find a more eminent Egyptologist. He is not limited to a discussion and criticism of other men’s discoveries; he is a most successful excavator himself. He has with his own hands unearthed many objects of the deepest interest to all students of the remote Egyptian past. ”

“ He was a man above the average, who taught the lesson to the average man of affairs that the delights of learning are open to all those who are able to make use of the opportunities they can find and create. Such men are an honour to any cultured community. ”

“ To throw up these great artificial hills, to face the temple hill with stone walling, up to 100 feet high, to lay out the new city and the fortifications covering six acres, must have needed a large body of supporters, and is the strongest evidence of the numbers and status of the Jews in this district, about twenty-eight miles north of Memphis.
The status of the Jewish settlers in Egypt was influential. ”

“ The Persian conquest in 525 B.C. threw open the whole country to influences from all quarters. The series of heads of foreigners found at Memphis shows how the Babylonian traders of the old Sumerian race flocked in, with Indians, Kurds, and a multitude of [23] Scythian Cossacks, besides the ruling race of Persia itself. [17] The picture of this age of Jewish settlement has been preserved in the papyri of Elephantine; [18] and what took place there was assuredly exceeded by the less remote settlements in the rest of Egypt. ”

“ Their personal names are preserved in some reigns on the great list of kings at Abydos, [1] and their status is recorded by a cylinder of one of these kings [2] —Khondy—bearing a figure of a flounced Syrian before him, and an Egyptian in the background. The king himself has his name in a cartouche and wears the crown of Upper [15] Egypt; so he did not rule only over the Delta, and his name being at Abydos points to control of the whole country. As to the language, the names of these kings appear to be Semitic, as Telulu the exalted, Shema the high, Neby the prophet. ”

“ He lived at Alexandria, and seems to have been powerful in the court. We also read of an adventurous Jew named Yosef, [33] [32] who outbid all the tax farmers and obtained great power, which was extortionately used in the Ptolemaic province of Palestine. Under Ptolemy VII also we find the Jews of Athribis, [34] the central city of the Delta, dedicating a synagogue. The spread of Jewish settlement was far beyond the city of Oniah, as in Caesar’s time the march of troops from Pelusium to Alexandria was dependent on the goodwill of the Jews of Onion. ”

“ The freedom which the Israelites undoubtedly had under the Hyksos makes it likely that many may have taken up different crafts, and have been scattered about in the country as demand and opportunity led them. ”

“ This status in Alexandria, though suspended by Caligula, was renewed by Claudius. The Jews had also other places assigned to them in Egypt, and were ruled by an ethnarch, who was chief judge and registrar of the whole of the settlers. [25]
In the Fayum they naturally found space, as the province was land reclaimed from the lake, in order to settle Greek troops as colonists. A village of Samareia is named, [26] also Jews in Psenuris. [27] At Thebes Simon son of Eleazar was tax collector. [28] Ptolemy Philopator tried to curb the power of the Jews in Egypt ”

“ The Lecture is to be given annually in the anniversary week of his death, and the lectureship is to be open to men or women of any race or creed, who are to have absolute liberty in the treatment of their subject. ”

“ There must have been a large support for the project before Oniah would venture to start so great an enterprise. The vast amount of work that was done in constructing the new city shows that there was a large and wealthy population involved. ”

“ Indian figures are found of this period at Memphis, and a multitude of modelled heads of foreigners also found there, [17] can only be paralleled by the modelled heads of foreigners made now for a Buddhist festival in Tibet, and thrown away as soon as the ceremony is over. ”