Regardless of background or denomination, most Jews recognize the Star of David as a symbol of Judaism. Today, the symbol is practically ubiquitous in the Jewish world. The most iconic use of the star might be on the Israeli flag. But the Star of David wasn't always a universal symbol for Judaism. How did two overlapping triangles come to be the most universally recognizable symbol associated with Judaism?

In ancient times, the Star of David – or the Magen David – wasn't an exclusively Jewish symbol. It was a common geometric symbol, just like the five-point star and even the swastika.

The oldest record of the six-point star as a Jewish symbol was around the second or third century. Archeologists found Stars of David on the walls of the Synagogue of Capernaum near the Sea of Galilee. However, most experts think that these stars were used for decorative purposes and didn't hold any significant Jewish meaning.

Nearly a century later, the star appeared on the now famous Leningrad Codex, the oldest known manuscript of the Hebrew Bible dating from 1008 CE. However, it's unclear if it was used merely for decoration or had a deeper religious purpose.

Experts like German-Israeli academic and philosopher Gershom Scholem theorize that the star gained more meaning in Judaism in the mysterious teachings of the Kabbalah. The 13th and 14th centuries saw a growing movement of Jewish sages in Spain, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East writing kabbalistic texts that explored the foundations of Jewish mysticism.

These texts were the first sources to ascribe meaning to the six-point star. The Book of Boundary, written in Spain in the early 14th century, contains several depictions of the six-point star, which is identified as being on the Shield of David. According to the legend, King David's protective shield had magical powers and could ward off spirits and demons. Other works of the time make similar references to the king's magical amulet with a six-point star emblazoned on it.

But the earliest known particularly Jewish usage of the Star of David wasn't tied to a kabbalah scholar. In the mid-14th century, Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV gave Prague's Jews the right to bear a flag. Under the red flag, with a yellow Star of David on it, Prague was the world's first Jewish community to use the star as its official emblem.

The Star of David was on flags and books in Prague at the time and in surrounding Jewish communities, but it didn't go viral until the 18th century. It started in Europe, where everywhere Jews looked, they saw the symbol of Christianity: the cross. Seeking their own distinctly Jewish symbol, communities turned to the Star of David. This struck a chord with Diaspora Jews and spread to synagogues across the world.

The star was cemented as the Jewish symbol in 1897 at the first Zionist Congress in Basel, which was chaired by Theodor Herzl. There, the Star of David was chosen over icons like the menorah as the official Zionist symbol for two reasons. First, Jews everywhere already knew it, thanks to the widespread use of the star during the 19th century, when it became splashed on synagogues, prayer books, tombstones, and more. Second, it didn't carry the religious significance that other symbols did.

By the mid-20th century, no symbol was more tied to Judaism. Zionist leaders embraced the six-point star, arguing that it didn't evoke memories of the past and could represent a brighter future. But in Nazi Germany, hopes of a brighter future dimmed. To pervert the symbol of the Jewish people, Hitler decreed that all Jews under the Third Reich wear a yellow six-point star as a badge of shame. The yellow Star of David is one of the most enduring images of the Holocaust. But the Jews who survived would not let Hitler decide their symbol's legacy. On the heels of World War Two, they reclaimed their star with the establishment of the State of Israel.

In the debate over what emblem would be featured on the young nation's flag, the flag of the Zionist movement already had strong support, but Israeli politicians like Minister of Foreign Affairs Moshe Sharett had reservations. He and others feared that Jewish communities in the diaspora could face dual loyalty charges if the flags of the Zionist movement and the Israeli flag were the same.

Therefore, in June 1948, the Israeli government's designated committee announced a public competition calling for flag designs. Though it wasn't a requirement, entries were encouraged to include a menorah and seven gold stars – a design dreamed up by Herzl and sketched in his diary in the late 19th century. During the two-week-long competition, 164 people participated, submitting a total of 450 designs.

While deciding on the final design, Sharett wanted input from the diaspora. So, he reached out to Zionist leaders abroad. The response was clear. They and their constituents overwhelmingly preferred to have the Zionist flag become Israel's national flag. On October 28, 1948, the Provisional Council voted unanimously to adopt the Zionist flag as that of the State of Israel.

But the star can also be controversial. Is it a symbol for a people or a country? The Jewish people predate the modern State of Israel, and so does the symbol. The legacy of the star lives on almost everywhere in Jewish communities throughout the world.

Whether this symbol dates back thousands of years or a few hundred, it's an emblem woven deeply into the fabric of modern Jewish history and serves as a powerful image that binds the Jewish people together today.

The post The contested history of the Star of David appeared first on www.israelhayom.com.

Despite the impressive protest movement, the absence of any serious debate in the media, disinformation about the judicial reform that large sectors of the public are exposed to, refusal to serve, and the usual prophecies of doom, the legislation process for judicial reform is continuing full steam ahead.

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It appears that the doomsday weapon the judicial system plans to deploy against the reform is to strike down the basic laws to be passed within the framework of the reform. That will lead to a grave constitutional crisis, the likes of which we have not seen in Israel's 75-year history. This was evident in the reckless speech given by former police commissioner Roni Alsheikh, who has pitted the government against the "law," which he identifies with the Supreme Court. The court however is not the law, it is subject to the law. Other senior officials have followed in his footsteps. Their words imply a call to rebellion against the elected regime.

If a court were to strike down a Basic Law that has been lawfully legislated without being granted the powers to do so, this would be a patently illegal act, tantamount to a coup d'état that would openly set the Supreme Court against the elected government. Until now this has been done covertly under the fog of legal obscurantism.

It was the Supreme Court that ruled that Basic Laws are quasi-constitutional and therefore override regular laws. Judicial authority is granted by the sovereign, the people, through the Knesset, which legislated Basic Law: The Judiciary. There is no democracy in which a court can debate chapters of the constitution and strike them down. This Israeli invention is not democracy, but rather – as the late Supreme Court President Moshe Landau called it – a "judicial dictatorship." The Supreme Court is a legal oligarchy that – de facto – runs the country in place of the elected government. The judicial reform is an attempt after 40 years to restore the balance between the branches of power and thus to strengthen democracy.

2.

A situation whereby the justices of the Supreme Court dare to put themselves above the legislature and the executive, and ipso facto above their own source of authority – namely, above the sovereign that granted them their authority through the Basic Law – will lead to a clash, the outcome of which no one can foresee. Responsibility for this will fall primarily on Aharon Barak, Esther Hayut, and their ilk. It was they who opened this Pandora's box by signaling to their supporters that they should set the country alight against the elected government.

3.

Beginning in the 1980s following the initial political upheaval that made it clear to the old elites that its days of exclusive control over the legislature and the executive were over, the Supreme Court – sitting as the High Court of Justice – began to appropriate for itself (without any legal foundation) more and more unrestrained constitutional powers to judge anything brought before it. Thus, it began to supervise the Knesset's parliamentary decisions in all fields and determined through interpretive techniques that the Knesset does not possess the authority to restrict by law the scope of judicial review. Prof. Berachyahu Lifshitz, a former dean of the Faculty of Law at the Hebrew University, explained in a comprehensive article published recently that no remnant of the boundaries required between the judicial and legislative authorities exists today. Lifshitz says that the separation of authorities has been brutally ended and the judicial authority has taken over the other branches of power.

Prof. Yoav Dotan of the faculty of law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, in his recently published book on judicial review of administrative decisions, writes that this "violates the fundamentals of a democratic regime;" the review body becomes the deciding body. The High Court began to intervene in diplomatic negotiations and in hiring and firing "something that is unparalleled anywhere else in the world."

"There is nothing similar to the High Court of Justice in any other legal system. The High Court is a singular legal institution by any measure." It has increased its involvement in public life through comprehensive changes to principal legal doctrines and has become a central channel to promote political ideas and interests - among its spheres of influence: oversight of defense issues, the attorney general, foreign affairs, committees of inquiry, international agreements and prisoner exchanges.  With regard to "justiciability" too, the Israeli legal system has become the exception. From its perspective, everything has become justiciable. It has made itself the decisive authority on every issue, even in fields that belong to the legislative and executive authorities.

4.

The Knesset legislates law, and the courts have the authority to interpret them. The problem arises when a judge decides there is no such thing as a text that doesn't require interpretation, even when the text is clear and simple. The judge believes that it is his interpretation that decides and not the (straightforward) interpretation of the legislature. What I am talking about is Aharon Barak's "purposive interpretation" that is aimed at overriding the clear intent of the legislature and the explicit purpose of a law as presented in the law itself, in addresses to the Knesset plenum and in debates before Knesset committees. The courts operate according to the incredible maxim that the "legislature writes the text, and the purpose of the text is decided by its interpreter" as an independent judicial decision that makes law rather than look at its factual meaning. This is an intolerable situation because, as Prof. Lifshitz explains, by doing so, the interpreting judge takes upon himself the authority to add or subtract from what is stated in the law itself! I have already shown in a previous article how Barak's philosophy is similar to that of Chazal – Our Sages – who 2000 years ago saw their interpretation as determinative and that one does not study Halacha directly from Torah.

The main question that the reform's opponents should be asking themselves is who oversees the court and who restrains its power? After all, that is the central idea of having three branches of power and separating between them! In other words, who will guard the guards? How are we to trust the judges to restrain their power by themselves when we see how they intrude deeper and deeper into the other authorities? The saying that absolute power corrupts absolutely applies to judges as well.

5.

In a situation where the court acts in violation of the law, that it too is subject to. and decides to strike down Basic Laws that have been passed legally, the government should state unequivocally that the court's decision is null and void and has no legal standing. If the justices wish to spark a civil war, let the responsibility for that hang on their necks. They are not elected officials and they are certainly not the rulers of the country; they are emissaries authorized to modestly judge in accordance with the law.

This is perhaps the most important test of the past 100 years for the public affiliated with the current coalition. Does it understand what it means to rule and to lead? The judicial reform is not an issue for jurists alone; it is a plea by the masses of the House of Israel (including those who did not serve in elite IDF units) for their liberty to exercise their democratic rights through their elected officials in the legislature. In this battle to restore authority to the people, to give the citizens back their voice, this is the poor man's lamb, which for years has been stolen from him by juridical acrobatics. We can compromise, but we cannot withdraw. It is at the heart of our being.

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"King Solomon has made his carriage out of the timber of Lebanon. He has made its posts of silver, its base of gold, its seat of purple fabric. Its interior is inlaid with love by the daughters of Jerusalem," says the Song of Solomon (9-10).

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Now, for the first time in Israel or the entire southern Levant, rare evidence has surfaced of cloth dyed royal purple dating back to the time of kings David and Solomon.

Researchers from Israel Antiquities Authority, Tel Aviv University, and Bar-Ilan University spent years studying colored woven fibers excavated at Timna in the Negev Desert, the site of King Solomon's famed copper mines. Carbon-14 dating determined that they date from 1,000 BCE, the period in which David and Solomon reigned in Jerusalem. They published their findings on Thursday in the journal PLOS ONE.

The purple color, known as "argaman" in Hebrew and extracted from a type of Mediterranean sea snail at a distance of some 300 km (186 miles) from the Timna Valley in the southern Negev Desert, is mentioned in biblical sources a number of times. However, this is the first time that a Bronze Age woven fiber dyed royal purple has been found in Israel or anywhere else in the region.

The research was carried out by Dr. Naama Sukenik from the Israel Antiquities Authority and Prof. Erez Ben-Yosef, from the Jacob M. Alkow Department of Archaeology and Ancient Near Eastern Cultures at Tel Aviv University, in collaboration with Prof. Zohar Amar, Dr. David Iluz and Dr. Alexander Varvak from Bar-Ilan University and Dr. Orit Shamir from the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Sukenik, who curates organic finds at the IAA, described the discovery of the purple cloth fibers as "extremely exciting and important."

"This is the first time that woven material from the time of David and Solomon died in the precious 'argaman' has been discovered. In ancient times, purple clothing was associated with the nobility, the priestly class, and of course, kings. The beautiful color of the argaman, the fact that it does not fade, and the difficulty of producing the dye, which exists in very small quantities in the bodies of the snails, made it the most expensive dye, sometimes costing more than gold.

"Until the current discovery, we had only fragments of the snails and pottery shards with remnants of color to serve as evidence of the Bronze Age argaman industry, but this is the first time that we have direct evidence of fibers dyed with argaman, which have been preserved for 3,000 years," Sukenik said.

Ben-Yosef said that a TAU team has been digging at Timna since 2013. "Thanks to the extremely dry conditions there, we are able to find organic matter like cloth, rope, and leather from the Bronze Age, the time of David and Solomon – a collection that gives us a unique look into life in biblical times. The level of preservation at Timna is outstanding, rivalled only by much later sites such as Masada or the Bar Kochba caves."

The researchers wrote that true purple was produced primarily from three species of sea mollusks of the Muricidae family, which were common in the Mediterranean Sea: Hexaplex trunculus (Murex trunculus), Bolinus brandaris (Murex brandaris) and Stramonita haemastoma (Thais haemastoma), in contrast to the "imitation purple" dye that was manufactured using various techniques that were based on much cheaper materials than the dyes from the sea snail.

Shades of true purple ranged from purplish-red to violet blue. The source of the dye was extracted from the snail's hypobranchial gland (located under the mollusc's mantle, and the exact shade depends on different parameters, such as the chemical precursors compounds of each snail species, the dyeing process, and the levels of oxygen and light to which the dye was exposed.

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