Tanach Thoughts

A few days ago I was privileged enough to hear a fascinating short TED-sized lecture by one of the doctorate students in my department at university. This student, a rabbi in his profession, spoke about his doctoral thesis which just recently he handed in to the university's review board and was pending a verdict from them. The thesis, which I won't discuss at length here for a number of reasons, the main being that it's still pending a verdict from the board (and the others being that for the most part, it's not Tanach-related), focused on the Mishmarot Kehunah of the Second Temple Era and later. The Mishmarot Kehunah were the divisions of priests that served at set times year-round. Each division served for about two weeks every year and everyone served together on Chol Hamo'ed. Now, I came up to him after the lecture and asked him a question on one aspect of his theory: Per his theory, the four priestly families that came during Shivat Tzion and recreated the pr...

In Yechezkel it's stated a number of times that the only branch of kohanim that remained loyal to Hashem were the sons of Tzaddok. It has been interpreted by some to mean that from that point on, only the sons of Tzaddok can be Kohanim Gedolim (High Priests). The cult in the Dead Sea were big fans of the sons of Tzaddok, and apparently were very much against the House of Chashmonai for taking the High Priesthood for themselves, apparently stealing the sons of Tzaddok's right to the post. So who was Tzaddok? Most believe that Tzaddok refers to the KG in the time of Shlomo. After the KG Evyatar sided with Adoniyah, Shlomo fired him and sent him to Anatot ( Melachim 1:2:26-27 ), and Tzaddok stepped in his stead ( ibid. 35 ). Another option is Tzaddok II, a descendant of the first ( Divrei Hayamim 1:5:38 ). A third option was suggested by Rabbi Tanchum Hayerushalmi in his commentary on Chaggai 1:1: "עם אותו יהושע בן יהוצדק הכהן, מפני שהוא יורש הכהונה, שהרי יהוצדק אביו היה כהן ...