Shabbat 45 - Fire Worshipers!

"Surely Rab was asked: Is it permitted to move the Hanukkah lamp on account of the Guebres on the Sabbath? And he answered them, It is well."




This is according to the English translation. The Aramaic is more oblique -which is not unusual when dealing with other faiths, especially those which threated the community.

So who are these "Guebres"? This was a group of Fire-worshipers in ancient Persia. Part of the Zoroastrian tradition, for them Fire was a representation of the deity of light/good, the opposite of darkness/evil. The term "Guebres" is actually a much later term of insult, meaning "infidel" applied by the Islamic majority after their defeat. Following these persecutions, the majority emigrated to India where they were known as Parsees.

http://www.probertencyclopaedia.com/cgi-bin/res.pl?keyword=Guebres&offset=0

However, in our Talmud page, these fire-worshipers clearly did not like having the Jewish population display their Hanukah menorah's in public. Perhaps this was a time when Hannukah would overlap with their own festival, and the Jewish action might be seen as blasphemous. In this time of danger, the Hanukkiah could be moved on Shabbat, after the lights had burned down. But only such a time of danger.

One of the things I love about reading Talmud is this window into the life of a different age. Here a view of the oppressions, perhaps violence, of marauding enforcers of the Fire-Worshipers' tradition. It makes me think of the Taliban.

How little things change. Despite the shifting details, we see the eternal danger of religious fanaticism and enforcing of uniform religious observance, or intolerance of diversity. We Jews have been victims of its effects - we dare not repeat it on our own people!