Priestly divisions

The priestly divisions or sacerdotal courses (Hebrew: מִשְׁמָר‎ mishmar) are the groups into which Jewish priests were divided for the purposes of their service in the Temple in Jerusalem.

Part of a series of articles on
Priesthood in Judaism
 
Kohen · Recognition of priestly descent
Priestly covenant

Role in the Temple

The Book of Chronicles refers to these priests as "descendants of Aaron."[1] In the biblical traditions upon which the Chronicler drew, Aaron had four sons: Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.[2] However, Nadab and Abihu died before Aaron and only Eleazar and Ithamar had sons. In Chronicles, one priest, Zadok, from Eleazar's descendants and another priest, Ahimelech, from Ithamar's descendants, were designated by King David to help create the various priestly work groups.[3] Sixteen of Eleazar's descendants were selected to head priestly orders, while only eight of Ithamar's descendants were so chosen. The passage states that this was done because of the greater number of leaders among Eleazar's descendants. Lots were drawn to designate the order of ministering for the heads of the priestly orders when they entered the Temple.

Each order was responsible for ministering during a different week and Shabbat (This week is turn of Immer[]) and were stationed at the Temple in Jerusalem. All of the orders were present during biblical festivals. Their duties involved offering the daily and holiday Temple sacrifices, and administering the Priestly Blessing to the people. The change between shifts took place on Shabbat at midday, with the outgoing shift performing the morning sacrifice, and the incoming shift the afternoon sacrifice.[4]

According to 1 Chronicles 24, the divisions were originally formed during the reign of King David. However, many modern scholars treat these priestly courses either as a reflection of practices after the Babylonian captivity, or as an idealized portrait of how the Chronicler (writing in c. 350–300 BCE) thought temple administration ought to occur, with the reference to David being a method for the Chronicler to legitimize his views about the priesthood.[5] At the end of the Second Temple period, it is clear that the divisions worked in the order specified.[6]

DivisionNameScriptural Reference should start working
FirstJehoiarib1 Chronicles 24:7 25/4/2020 10/10/2020 27/3/2021 11/9/2021 26/2/2022 13/8/2022
SecondJedaiah1 Chronicles 24:7 2/5/2020 17/10/2020 3/4/2021 18/9/2021 5/3/2022 20/8/2022
ThirdHarim1 Chronicles 24:8 9/5/2020 24/10/2020 10/4/2021 25/9/2021 12/3/2022 27/8/2022
FourthSeorim1 Chronicles 24:8 16/5/2020 31/10/2020 17/4/2021 2/10/2021 19/3/2022 3/9/2022
FifthMalchijah1 Chronicles 24:9 23/5/2020 7/11/2020 24/4/2021 9/10/2021 26/3/2022 10/9/2022
SixthMijamin1 Chronicles 24:9 30/5/2020 14/11/2020 1/5/2021 16/10/2021 2/4/2022 17/9/2022
SeventhHakkoz1 Chronicles 24:10 6/6/2020 21/11/2020 8/5/2021 23/10/2021 9/4/2022 24/9/2022
EighthAbijah1 Chronicles 24:10 13/6/2020 28/11/2020 15/5/2021 30/10/2021 16/4/2022 1/10/2022
NinthJeshua1 Chronicles 24:11 20/6/2020 5/12/2020 22/5/2021 6/11/2021 23/4/2022 8/10/2022
TenthShecaniah1 Chronicles 24:11 27/6/2020 12/12/2020 29/5/2021 13/11/2021 30/4/2022 15/10/2022
EleventhEliashib1 Chronicles 24:12 4/7/2020 19/12/2020 5/6/2021 20/11/2021 7/5/2022 22/10/2022
TwelfthJakim1 Chronicles 24:12 11/7/2020 26/12/2020 12/6/2021 27/11/2021 14/5/2022 29/10/2022
ThirteenthHuppah1 Chronicles 24:13 18/7/2020 2/1/2021 19/6/2021 4/12/2021 21/5/2022 5/11/2022
FourteenthJeshebeab1 Chronicles 24:13 25/7/2020 9/1/2021 26/6/2021 11/12/2021 28/5/2022 12/11/2022
FifteenthBilgah1 Chronicles 24:14 1/8/2020 16/1/2021 3/7/2021 18/12/2021 4/6/2022 19/11/2022
SixteenthImmer1 Chronicles 24:14 8/8/2020 23/1/2021 10/7/2021 25/12/2021 11/6/2022 26/11/2022
SeventeenthHezir1 Chronicles 24:15 15/8/2020 30/1/2021 17/7/2021 1/1/2022 18/6/2022 3/12/2022
EighteenthHappizzez1 Chronicles 24:15 22/8/2020 6/2/2021 24/7/2021 8/1/2022 25/6/2022 10/12/2022
NineteenthPethahiah1 Chronicles 24:16 29/8/2020 13/2/2021 31/7/2021 15/1/2022 2/7/2022 17/12/2022
TwentiethJehezkel1 Chronicles 24:16 5/9/2020 20/2/2021 7/8/2021 22/1/2022 9/7/2022 24/12/2022
Twenty-firstJachin1 Chronicles 24:17 12/9/2020 27/2/2021 14/8/2021 29/1/2022 16/7/2022 31/12/2022
Twenty-secondGamul1 Chronicles 24:17 19/9/2020 6/3/2021 21/8/2021 5/2/2022 23/7/2022 7/1/2023
Twenty-thirdDelaiah1 Chronicles 24:18 26/9/2020 13/3/2021 28/8/2021 12/2/2022 30/7/2022 14/1/2023
Twenty-fourthMaaziah1 Chronicles 24:18 3/10/2020 20/3/2021 4/9/2021 19/2/2022 6/8/2022 21/1/2023

Following the Temple's destruction

Following the Temple's destruction at the end of the First Jewish Revolt and the displacement to the Galilee of the bulk of the remaining Jewish population in Judea at the end of the Bar Kochva Revolt, Jewish tradition in the Talmud and poems from the period record that the descendants of each priestly watch established a separate residential seat in towns and villages of the Galilee, and maintained this residential pattern for at least several centuries in anticipation of the reconstruction of the Temple and reinstitution of the cycle of priestly courses. Specifically, this Kohanic settlement region stretched from the Beit Netofa Valley, through the Nazareth region to Arbel and the vicinity of Tiberias. In subsequent years, there was a custom of publicly recalling every Sabbath in the synagogues the courses of the priests, a practice that reinforced the prestige of the priests' lineage.[7] Such mention evoked the hope of return to Jerusalem and reconstruction of the Temple.

A manuscript discovered in the Cairo Geniza, dated 1034 CE, records a customary formula recited weekly in the synagogues, during the Sabbath day: "Today is the holy Sabbath, the holy Sabbath unto the Lord; this day, which is the course? [Appropriate name] is the course. May the Merciful One return the course to its place soon, in our days. Amen."[8] After which, they would recount the number of years that have passed since the destruction of Jerusalem, and conclude with the words: "May the Merciful One build his house and sanctuary, and let them say Amen."

Three stone inscriptions were discovered bearing the names of the priestly wards, their order and the name of the locality to which they had moved after the destruction of the Second Temple: In 1920, a stone inscription was found in Ashkelon showing a partial list of the priestly wards; in 1962 three small fragments of one Hebrew stone inscription bearing the partial names of places associated with the priestly courses (the rest of which had been reconstructed) were found in Caesarea Maritima, dated to the third-fourth centuries;[9][10] in 1970 a stone inscription was found on a partially buried column in a mosque, in the Yemeni village of Bayt al-Ḥaḍir, showing ten names of the priestly wards and their respective towns and villages. The Yemeni inscription is the longest roster of names of this sort ever discovered, unto this day, although the seventh-century poet, Eleazar ben Killir, also wrote a liturgical poem detailing the 24-priestly wards and their places of residence.[11] Historian and geographer, Samuel Klein (1886–1940), thinks that Killir's poem proves the prevalence of this custom of commemorating the courses in the synagogues of the Land of Israel.[12] The purpose of composing these lists was to keep in living memory the identities and traditions of each priestly family, in hopes that the Temple would be quickly rebuilt.[13]

The names legible on the stone column discovered by Walter W. Müller in 1970, in a mosque in Yemen, read as follows:[14]

English TranslationOriginal Hebrew
[Se‘orim ‘Ayṯoh-lo], fourth wardשְׂעוֹרִים עיתהלו משמר הרביעי
[Malkiah, Beṯ]-Lehem, the fif[th] wardמַלְכִּיָּה בית לחם משמר החמשי
Miyamin, Yudfaṯ (Jotapata), the sixth wardמִיָמִין יודפת משמר הששי
[Haqo]ṣ, ‘Ailebu, the seventh wardהַקּוֹץ עילבו משמר השביעי
Aviah ‘Iddo, Kefar ‘Uzziel, the (eighth) wardאֲבִיָּה עדו כפר עוזיאל משמר
the eighth (ward). Yešūa‘, Nišdaf-arbelהשמיני יֵשׁוּעַ נשדפארבל
the ninth wardמשמר התשיעי
Šekhaniyahu, ‘Avurah Cabūl, the t[enth] wardשְׁכַנְיָה עבורה כבול משמר העשירי
Eliašīv, Cohen Qanah, the elev[enth] wardאֶלְיָשִׁיב כהן קנה משמר אחד עשר
Yaqīm Pašḥūr, Ṣefaṯ (Safed), the twelf[th] wardיָקִים פַּשְׁחוּר צפת משמר שנים עשר
[Ḥū]ppah, Beṯ-Ma‘on, the (thirteenth) wardחוּפָּה בית מעון משמר שלשה
the thirteenth (ward). Yešav’av, Ḥuṣpiṯ Šuḥīnעשר יֶשֶׁבְאָב חוצפית שוחין
the fourteenth wa[rd]משמר ארבע עשר
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References
  1. 1 Chronicles 24:1
  2. Leviticus 10, Numbers 3, 1 Chronicles 24
  3. 1 Chronicles 24:3
  4. Tractate Sukkah 56b
  5. Steven Schweitzer (1 March 2009). Reading Utopia in Chronicles. A&C Black. pp. 29–30. ISBN 978-0-567-36317-6.
  6. See Qumran calendrical texts#Mishmarot, Luke 1.5-11; 23, and the end of the Sukkah (Talmud)
  7. Robert Bonfil, Jews in Byzantium: Dialectics of Minority and Majority Cultures, Brill: Leiden 2012, p. 42 ISBN 978-9-004-20355-6
  8. Bodleian Library, Oxford Ms. Heb. 2738/6, fol. 899 in Vardaman, E. Jerry and Garrett, J.L., The Teacher's Yoke, Waco TX 1964
  9. Avi-Yonah, Michael (1962). "A List of Priestly Courses from Caesarea". Israel Exploration Journal. 12 (2): 137–139. JSTOR 27924896.
  10. Avi-Yonah, Michael (1964). "The Caesarea Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses". Eretz-Israel: Archaeological, Historical and Geographical Studies. L.A. Mayer Memorial Volume (1895-1959): 24–28. JSTOR 23614642. (Hebrew)
  11. Poem entitled, Lamentation for the 9th of Ab, composed in twenty-four stanzas, and the last line of each stanza contains the name of the village where each priestly family lived.
  12. Samuel Klein, Barajta der vierundzwanzig Priester Abteilungen (Baraitta of the Twenty-Four Priestly Divisions), in: Beiträge zur Geographie und Geschichte Galiläas, Leipzig 1909; Enrico Tuccinardi, Nazareth, the Caesarea Inscription, and the hand of God, (translated from the French by René Salm), Academia, pp. 6–7
  13. Enrico Tuccinardi, Nazareth, the Caesarea Inscription, and the hand of God, (translated from the French by René Salm), Academia, p. 7
  14. Ephraim E. Urbach, Mishmarot u-maʻamadot, Tarbiz (A Quarterly for Jewish Studies) 42, Jerusalem 1973, pp. 304 – 327 (Hebrew); Rainer Degen, An Inscription of the Twenty-Four Priestly Courses from the Yemen, pub. in: Tarbiẕ - A Quarterly for Jewish Studies, Jerusalem 1973, pp. 302–303
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