Thursday, September 12, 2024

The Jewish Sects in Judaea (The Holy Land) in the First Century AD (Excerpt from the book "UNBROKEN II: From Alexander the Great and Hellenization to the Hasmoneans, Herod the Great, and the Romans in the Holy Land")






...It was during those years of early Hasmonean dominance that Jewish sectarianism became highly magnified, with the three dominant Jewish sects being:

·       the Sadducees who got their name from Zadok and came mostly from the upper echelons of  Judean society; their leaders were required to be Kohanim (Kohen or Cohen — a family of priests descended from Zadok, otherwise called "Sons of Zadok"), meaning that they had to be of direct patrilineal descent from the Aaron, the brother of Moses, through Aaron’s son Eleazar, which inadvertently placed them with the Tribe of Levi. Most of the Sadducees were not opposed to Hellenization,  favored paying much emphasis to the Temple with its rites and services, and recognized only the Written Torah. They would become irrelevant, if not extinct, after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD (CE). Many historians see a direct connection between the practices of the modern Karaite Jews and the Sadducees

·       the Pharisees who, like the Essenes, were initially Hasideans (a group that formed the backbone of the Jewish rebellion against the Seleucids, ardently opposed Hellenization, and placed much importance to other Mosaic Laws. Like the Sadducees, they also recognized the Written Torah, however, unlike them they accepted the roles of the Prophets, other Jewish doctrines such as the Oral Torah and the resurrection of the dead, as well as the writings of their sages. The beliefs of the Pharisees would survive the destruction of the Second Temple and become the foundation, liturgy, and ritual upon which modern Rabbinic Judaism is built. Their traditionalism, expertism and leadership in the accurate exposition of Jewish Law earned them the respect of most religious Jews. They were more of the Middle class.

·       the third on the list were the Essenes who became a distinct group after Jonathan Apphus was made the High Priest, based on their conviction that his priesthood was illegitimate. They also saw themselves as the genuine upholders of the true covenant with God, based their interpretation of the Torah on that of their early leader known as the “Teacher of Righteousness” whom many of the people thought was a legitimate High Priest (suggesting their secession from the Zadokite priests). Their conservative approach to Jewish law, belief in communality, commitment to celibacy for the priestly class, as well as their altruism, and nonmaterialistic life explain their divorce from political life. A set of ancient Jewish manuscripts from the Second Temple period called the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered at the Qumran Caves in the Judaean Desert in the West Bank between 1946 and 1956, and proved to be a library of the Essenes, highlighting further the influence this Jewish group had on Early Christianity and other religious traditions.

 And group that Onias IV, the heir of the Zadokite line of High Priests, and the son of Onias III began. Onias IV made Ptolemaic Egypt his new sanctuary,  built a new Jewish temple in the city of Leontopolis, reigned there as a rival High Priest to the one in Jerusalem, and commanded a huge following in Egypt, especially in the heavily Jewish-populated area of the Nile Delta stretching between Memphis and Pelusium, and including Leontopolis. This area was called  “Land of Onias” in his honor. This group did not gain the position of dignity and importance its founder had anticipated and suffered the same fate as the Sadducees in the aftermath of the First Jewish-Roman War when the Roman ruler Vespasian ordered the closure of the Temple of Onias in 73 AD. 



UNBROKEN II: From Alexander the Great and Hellenization to the Hasmoneans, Herod the Great, and the Romans in the Holy Lan...

Tuesday, September 10, 2024

Disciples of Fortune (A multi-cultural historical fiction that cuts across five continents---Synopsis)

A Jew in the German colonial army in Kamerun adopts Josef Nana Njike and takes him to Germany. While in Germany, Josef studies Agronomy and flirts with political ideologies. When he returns to Kamerun after a failed attempt to marry his first love, and without their son, Hans, he is his benefactor's Disciple with a mission.

 

Josef is a man with unusual strengths and makes unprecedented sacrifices while building his business empire and shaping the political future of his people. He confronts the realities of colonial rule without the protection of his benefactor, grapples with the bizarre challenges of French rule, and loses the heir to his legacy without losing his vision for his people.

 

Hans escapes Nazi Germany to Kamerun where he joins his father and new family. He begins the third generation of the Njike family in a land with a mysterious way of transforming heroes into victims and villains into masters.

 

The zest for life, the search for its true meaning, and the unequivocal love for family weave the characters into this spellbinder.



Disciples of Fortune

Disciples of Fortune

by Janvier Chouteu-Chando Janvier Tchouteu, et al. | Dec 29, 2022
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Thursday, July 4, 2024

When so-called Revolutionists lose the plot

 It is counterproductive to the goals of any force that purports to be for the people when the so-called liberationists carry out operations or actions that hurt the people (individually or collectively) whether directly or indirectly. Over time, such a group becomes anti-people in its psyche, actions, and directions. That risks transforming the very people who initially looked up to the cause for salvation, to regretful advocates of peace as they seek a return to even the "normalcy" they initially abhorred, thus giving victory to the dysfunctional and discriminatory system in power that becomes viewed by some as less tyrannical than the so-called liberationists who have lost the plot. That psycho-social transformation often triggers a period of political lethargy that risks haunting the scarred population for generations, making them incapable of mustering the strength(unity and other socio-economic and financial resources) to effectively challenge the system, thus making it impossible to realize a revolution in that country. The struggling masses risk seeing the regressive system hang on to power much longer if the system carries out makeshift and more especially reformatory changes that act as a palliative, thus making the so-called liberationists irrelevant over time, especially if these so-called liberationists do not come up with a timeless ideal.



The Union Moujik



The Girl on the Trail

Thursday, June 27, 2024

THE DREAM WE SHALL FINALLY REALISE

 





For almost a century, Cameroonians have dreamt. Their dreams have not been the types of the fantasy world, but rather they have been dreams that give a dynamic people hope, inspiration, aspiration and purpose in life. Cameroonians have dreamed those dreams with their eyes open, being always aware of the visible link between dreams and reality. Those dreams are embodied in our union nationalism in its whole or partial form.

 

The basic tenet of Cameroonian union nationalism which is to have our destiny in our own hands did not start today. Our struggle against colonialism and imperialism is not even a post-World War One struggle. While jealously guarding our unity, while advocating for a Cameroon permeated by progressive Cameroonian concepts, our traditional rulers and nationalists have confronted the colonial masters to put their interests above those of the colonialists in the land. Martin Paul Samba (Mebenga Mebongo), Rudolf Duala Manga Bell and our other early nationalists were executed in 1914, not just because they opposed German colonial rule, but more because they had brought into existence Cameroon’s nationalism and had unleashed the nationalist forces which were going to ignite others that were to rock the African continent. Our early nationalists had discovered the key to the box that contained the ideas that were to liberate and guide the oppressed in Cameroon and Africa. Those ideas embody the framework of the Cameroonian dream being upheld for an eventual realization by our union nationalists.

 

Had Cameroonian nationalists not been temporarily defeated in 1914 with the execution of Martin Paul Samba and Rudolf Manga Bell by the Germans, our prospectively great land would not have suffered partition by France and Britain. Nevertheless, Cameroonian nationalist did not relent in their dream despite the pacifying actions of the two colonial powers. That dream of Cameroonian nationalism assumed a union form, which besides its original ideas of a Cameroon permeated by Cameroonian concepts with a highly developed pattern and a champion of African unity; it also advocated for a genuinely bilingual ethos of a reunited Cameroon, the bridging of the gap in the differential economic developments that had arisen after partition, and the harmonization of the styles of thought formulations and actions of its Anglophone and francophone children.

 

By an indiscernible work of destiny, the resurgence of Cameroon’s union nationalism realized reunification and independence hardly a decade and a half later, without the union nationalists in power to implement the original Cameroonian dream. They had been massacred, exiled, cowed and side-lined by the anti-nationalist French forces and the puppet regimes they put in place under Ahidjo Ahmadou and Biya Paul. Yes, thirty-seven years of Ahidjo-Biya rule whose idea to lead Cameroon was an unrealistic program by France has failed. It has failed because it was devoid of the advanced and all-embracing Cameroonian dream and was out of touch with the Cameroonian reality. Now, it is clear that our salvation and future rest only in a total return and commitment to our original dream of union nationalism. This time around, we should not allow detractors to lure or force us away from the only path that can save Cameroon and lead the country to the future. The advanced ideas of Cameroonian union nationalism are what we must realize in the struggle we are engaged in.

 

Some people claim that it is a shortcoming to dream. I hold strongly that there is nothing wrong with having a dream for a nation and people. There is a disadvantage only when you dream with your eyes closed and you fail to discern the chain connecting the dream and reality. The Union nationalists dead and alive did not fail to discern that chain.

 

Others hold that you should not work for the realization of a dream that you may not realize in your lifetime. That too is ridiculous. Not all realistic dreams are meant to be self-realizing. So, it is not pathetic for a man who engaged in a cause to realize a progressive dream and ends along the way, because posterity would always regard him as an impetus to the historical evolution that involved his dream.

 

Today, the forces fighting for authentic change and the realization of the original Cameroonian dream are poorly organized. That our dream can be realized now may look like stretching credulity to the utmost. However, despite the credulous nature of the look of things, that fervent hope that the Cameroonian dream will be realized eventually is what we must cling to. Perhaps the advantages of never relenting in the pursuit of a dream were observed best by Dmitry Ivanovich Pisarev who wrote:

·       My dream may run ahead of the natural march of events or may fly off at a tangent in a direction no natural march of events will ever follow it. In the first case, my dream will not have done any harm; it may even help and add fuel to the energy of the working classes...If a man were completely deprived of the ability to dream in this way, if he could never run ahead and mentally conceive in an entire and complete picture the results of the work which his hands are only just beginning to shape, then I cannot imagine what stimulus there would be to induce men to undertake extensive and exhausting work in the sphere of art, science and practical endeavor...The rift between dream and reality causes no harm if the dreamer believes seriously in his dream, if he attentively observes life, compares his observation with the castles in the air, and if in general, he works conscientiously towards achieving his fantasies. If there is some connection between dreams and life, then all is well.

 

Yes, the Cameroonian dream expounded by the forces of its union nationalism had been ahead of the natural match of events because of its advanced nature. For more than eight decades it has been the fuel to the energy of the struggling masses. The path to realize this dream has seen the Union-nationalists being continuously inspired by the heroes of our nationalism of the pre-World War One days, the post-World War Two days and those of contemporary times. Only, honestly, we are inadequately committed and shamefully divided. That makes the realization of our dream all the more difficult.

 

As the people the most responsible for our future, all real and potential union nationalists especially those of the post-independence generations, should join hands to strengthen that connection between the Cameroonian dream and reality. And with the fundamental change of the system and the implementation of the noble ideas of our union nationalism, Cameroon shall start on the long-delayed path to the future whose advanced dream would place us at the forefront of African and world progress.

 

JANVIER TCHOUTEU                                 DECEMBER 15, 1994