JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

sions of Lenin (1934); My Life as a Rebel (1938); and The Traitor:
Benito Mussolini and the “Conquest” of Power (1942–3);
she also wrote poetry in English, French, German, Italian,
and Russian.
Bibliography: R. Florence, Marx’s Daughters: Eleanor Marx,
Rosa Luxemburg, Angelica Balabanoff (1975; Obituary, New York Times
(Nov. 26, 1965); E. Wilson, “The Poetry of Angelica Balabanoff,” in:
The Nation (Nov. 27, 1943).
[Libby White (2nd ed.)]
BALAGUER, town in Aragon, northeastern Spain. At the
time of the Christian reconquest at the end of the 11th century,
several Jews already owned houses and land there. In
1280 Pedro III ordered an inquiry regarding violations of the
interest laws by the local Jews. Efforts by the counts of Urgel
to restore the community after the *Black Death and the
anti-Jewish disorders accompanying it in 1348–49 were apparently
successful. During the persecutions of 1391 the Jews
in Balaguer took refuge in the citadel but were forced to leave
by King John I. In 1416 Alfonso V, after suppressing a revolt,
imposed a fine of 45 pounds of silver upon the Jews of the
town, notwithstanding the fact that the community had become
impoverished through migration to the estates of the
nobility and the conversions to Christianity at the time of the
*Tortosa disputation. New settlers were not granted exemption
from taxes. The community existed until the expulsion
of the Jews from Spain in 1492.
Bibliography: J.M. Pou y Martí, Historia de la ciudad Balaguer
(1913), 47ff.; 62, 116, 330; Baer, Urkunden, 1 pt. 1 (1929), index;
Vendrell, in: Sefarad, 3 (1943), 137ff.; Piles, ibid., 10 (1950), 179; Baer,
Spain, 1 (1961), 115, 212.
[Haim Beinart]
BALAK (Heb. קָלָ ּב), son of Zippor; the first king of Moab
whose name is known. Balak’s memory survived only because
of his ill-fated association with *Balaam, whom he had
hired to curse Israel after the latter’s victories over the Amorites
(Num. 22–24; et al.). In Joshua 24:9 (cf. Judg. 11:25) he
is described as having fought Israel. Micah 6:5 refers to the
frustration of Balak’s design as exemplifying God’s kindness
to Israel. No satisfactory explanation of the name has so far
been advanced.
For bibliography, see *Balaam.
BALANCE (Heb. סֶלֶּ פ, peles; Isa. 40:12; Prov. 16:11; cf. pilles
“make straight, level,” Isa. 26:7; Ps. 78:50; synonomous by synecdoche
with pair of scales, moznayim – Lev. 19:36; Isa. 40:12;
Jer. 32:10; et al. – and with balance beam הֶנָ ק, kaneh; Isa. 46:6).
The equal arm balance of the ancient Near East (as distinguished
from the unequal arm balance with counterpoise introduced
by the Romans) consisted of a horizontal beam moving
freely on a central fulcrum, with the object to be weighed
and standard weights suspended at opposite ends in pans or
on hooks. In its earliest form the beam was suspended at its
center by a cord held in the hand, and equilibrium was esti-
balanjar
mated visually. Under the 18th dynasty in Egypt larger balances
were developed, supported by an upright frame resting on the
ground. From the frame was suspended a weighing plummet
(Heb. mishkolet, II Kings 21:13; Isa. 28:17) which could be compared
with a pointer extending downward at right angles from
the pivotal point of the beam.
The principle of the balance was probably derived from
the yoke of the burden bearer (Isa. 9:3), with its two equalized
loads. The earliest mechanical balances were small, and
were used only for objects of high value in relation to their
size, e.g., gold, silver, jewels, spices, etc. The oldest known
example is a stone balance beam from the pre-dynastic Gerzean
civilization in Egypt. Weights from the Sumerian and
Indus civilizations show that the balance was in use there in
the third millennium. Hand balances and large standing balances
are illustrated in many Egyptian reliefs and wall paintings,
the former also on a Hittite relief from Carchemish and
the latter on one from ninth century Assyria. From ancient
Israel a crude sketch of a man holding a pair of scales, incised
on the base of a scale-weight of the seventh-sixth centuries
B.C.E., is extant (unpublished). Biblical references to the balance
are both literal (Lev. 19:36; Jer. 32:10; Ezek. 45:10; et al.)
and figurative (Isa. 40:12; Ps. 62:10; Job 6:2; et al.). Fraudulent
weighing is repeatedly denounced in the Bible, i.e., substandard
weights (Amos 8:5), different sets of weights for buying
and selling (Deut. 25:13), and false balances (Hos. 12:8; Prov.
11:1). An effort to standardize weights by marking them with
an official shekel sign, attributable on archaeological grounds
to Josiah, may have been accompanied by regulations for the
construction and operation of balances. In later times the levites
were made custodians of “all measures of quantity and
size” (I Chron. 23:29).
Bibliography: A.B. Kisch, Seals and Weights (1965), 26–78;
F.G. Skinner, Weights and Measures (1967); EM, 4 (1962), 540–3 (incl.
bibl.).
[Robert B.Y. Scott]
BALANJAR, town of the *Khazars located between *Bāb al-
Abwāb and *Samandar in the north Caucasus region. It was
formerly identified by Artamonov (see bibliography) with the
ruins of Endere near Andreyeva, or as the site of present-day
Buinaksk, but is now placed by him south of Makhachkala,
where the remains of a town have been found (communication
of November 1964). Balanjar is mentioned in Arabic sources
as existing in the seventh and eighth centuries. Originally the
name appears to have been an ethnic designation. A Pehlevi
source cited by the historian al-Ṭabarī (vol. I, 895–6) states
that in the time of the Sassanid ruler Khusraw Anūshirwān
(531–79) a tribal group within the West Turkish empire was
called Balanjar. According to the historian al-Masʿūdī (al-
Tanbīh, 62), Balanjar was formerly the Khazar capital. It was
the principal objective of the Arabs after they reached the
Caucasus in 641 or 642. In 652 the Muslims attempted unsuccessfully
to besiege Balanjar, then a fortified town, and were
heavily defeated nearby. In 723, during the second Arab-Kha-
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