The Ashkenazi Revolution

63cultural one, of many peoples and religions, found a niche for the JewishPeople in it as a “people that shall dwell alone”, that has no interest in whateverybody else sees as the universal vision, that is to say dominion overspace. The politics of Yohanan Ben-Zakai in a sense severed the “militarycontact” between the Jews and the Romans and fixed each one in its owndepartment. The surprising success that we have always witnessed, incooperation between Jews and gentiles, came from the integration of twoopposite approaches: The approach of space and the approach of time.The blessing that the Jews brought to gentile peoples has its source in thealternate approach of the Jews in every concept and for every concept, inthat this approach strives for an entirely different goal than that of thegentiles. The Jew is a hero of time who fights for eternity. As long as hemaintains this identity, his value, as a great contributor to other peoples, isrealized. But as soon as he becomes estranged from his specific approach,he loses both his independent value and his general human value.8Even as the disciples of Yohanan Ben-Zakai were investigating all thevarious possibilities of ensuring control over time, the Roman emperorswere investigating all the hidden possibilities of control over space. Thesecond century was an era of stability and a golden age for the Romanworld. However already by the third century, it came to be consumed by acrisis that shook its foundations. The great collection of territories did notbring happiness to Man. On the contrary, it deprived Man of the harmonythat is found in the small and intimate realm of the city-state. The power ofthe empire to impose order and social stability was getting weaker. Themixing and the artificial combinations were increasingly showing theirmarks, and the organic wholeness, which had been weakened in the smalland provincial Rome, had disappeared. The increase in territories had, bynecessity, brought an increase in gods and caused chaos of ideas. TheRomans performed a self-assessment, and reached an unhappy conclusion.They ruled the world, but the Roman nation was lost, as if it had sacrificeditself on the alter of great empire. Instead of Rome ruling over the empire,the latter began to rule over it, and the legions from the frontier, that were