JUDAEA JUDAS TREE 699 the surplus produce of the preceding years. Bondmen of Hebrew descent became free, and every one resumed possession of his inheritance, howsoever it had been alienated. Unlike the sabbatical year, however, the jubilee did not annul debts. The design of this institution was to check the rise of any great inequality of so- cial condition, and to prevent the rich from oppressing and enslaving the poor or appropri- ating their lands. It also strengthened the bonds of families, and bound the people to their country, by leading them to cherish an affection for estates derived from their ancestors and to be transmitted to their posterity. The jubilee did not continue to be observed after the Babylonish captivity. In the middle ages, the term was applied to the year in which all who visited the church of St. Peter at Rome for a certain number of days with pious offer- ings received plenary indulgence. A jubilee was first declared by Pope Boniface VIII. in 1300, and was to recur in every 100 years. The time was limited by Clement VI., Urban VI., and Paul II. respectively, to 50, 33, and 25 years, and the last period still remains the ordinance of the Roman Catholic church. The condition of visiting Rome is no longer in force, certain works of charity or devotion being substituted. .Ill) K . See JUDEA. JUDAH (Heb. Yeh-udah), the fourth of the sons of Jacob by Leah. The tribe named after him was the most numerous of the tribes of Israel. On the conquest of Palestine it re- ceived all the land hounded by Dan, Benja- min, the Dead sea, Idumsea, Simeon, and the Mediterranean. It became particularly power- ful under the dynasty of David, which origi- nated in one of its towns, Bethlehem, and, af- ter the division of the Hebrew state into two kingdoms, the principal member and repre- sentative of the southern, named from it the kingdom of Judah. After the destruction of the northern kingdom, Israel, by the Assyri- ans, Judah became the common name of the Hebrew nation in general, and the name Jews (Heb. Yehudim, Lat. Judcei) is derived from it. Jerusalem, the capital of the undivided Hebrew state, and afterward of the southern division, was situated on the confines of Ju- dah and Benjamin. The mountain of Judah was a range traversing its centre, and the desert of the same nanre near its southern boundary. .11 1) Ml. surnamed HAKKADOSH, "the Holy," a celebrated rabbi of the 2d century, of the house of Gamaliel, one of his successors as nasi (patriarch), and the principal author of the Mishnah. He was a friend of one of the Ro- man emperors, whom Rapoport, the most com- petent critic on the subject, identifies with Marcus Aurelius. .HIM II. surnamed HALLEVI, "the Levite," a Spanish rabbi of the 12th century, called as an Arabic writer ABCL HASSAN. He distin- guished himself as a physician, philosophical theologian, and poet, in the last capacity being unsurpassed, if not unequalled, by any post- Biblical writer in Hebrew. Shortly before the middle of the 12th century he made a pilgrim- age to the land of his fathers, a part of which he sings in glowing strains of pious devotion ; but before he reached the holy city every trace of him is lost. According to a tradition, he was killed by a Mussulman before entering its gate. His principal work is the Kuzari ("The Khazar"), a vindication of the truth and exposition of the principles of Judaism, in fictitious discourses on religion between a king of the- Khazars, who was converted to that faith about four centuries before the time of the author, and a rabbi. It was translated from the Arabic into Hebrew by Judah ben Tibbon, into Latin by Buxtorf, and also into Spanish and German. His songs, which among others contain the gems of Hebrew liturgical poetry, have found numerous translators and editors, among the most recent of whom are Luzzato, Sachs, Dukes, and Geiger (Der Divan des Castiliers Abu' I- Hassan Juda ha-Levi, Bres- lau, 1851). His elegy on Zion was translated into German by Mendelssohn. JIDAS ISCARIOT, one of the twelve apostles, and the betrayer of Christ. As to his sur- name Iscariot (Gr. 'lan.api&rrifj, there are many theories ; the most probable is, that it is merely the Greek form of writing the Hebrew ish Kerioth, "man of Kerioth," a town of Judah. He was the son of Simon, was appointed trea- surer of the apostles, covenanted with the chief priests to deliver Jesus up to them for 30 pieces of silver (at the highest computation about $22, but in comparative value probably equivalent to nearly $500), accomplished this purpose, repented when he saw his Lord con- demned and buffeted, offered to restore the money, confessed that he had betrayed inno- cent blood, and in despair committed suicide by hanging, according to Matthew, or fell and burst asunder, as related in Acts in the words of Peter. Some interpreters suppose that the motive of his betrayal was to oblige Jesus, in self-defence, to announce himself as the ex- pected king Messiah, to surmount the emer- gency by his miraculous powers, and to open to himself, the apostles, and the Jewish king- dom the anticipated career of aggrandizement. "The difference," says Archbishop Whately, " between Iscariot and his fellow apostles was, that though they all had the same expectations and conjectures, he dared to act on his conjec- tures, departing from the plain course of his known duty to follow the calculations of his worldly wisdom and the schemes of his worldly ambition." See Whately's " Discourse on the Treason of Judas Iscariot," in his " Essays on some of the Dangers to Christian Faith " (Lon- don, 1839). That he was simply a traitor is the impression generally made by the narrative. JUDAS MACCABEUS. See HEBREWS, vol. viii., p. 592. JUDAS TREE. The tradition that Judas hanged himself upon a species of cercis (the oriental name for the tree) has kept his name
