Annatar, have you ever read Philip R. Davies "In Search of Ancient Israel?"
In essence, his argument is that Judaism was created by the Persians when they sent a bunch of alleged "exiles" back to their new province of Yehud.
In effect, Persia did not conquer Judah (Yehud). Instead they took Babylon by coup d'main and woke up the following morning (after the victory party, I suppose!) with a whole new empire. A group of people presumably loyal to Persia was sent back under the guise of being the exiled former rulers from 50 years earlier. They needed a yarn to explain why they were there to take over.
The Persian army was needed to suppress revolts on their eastern border and Cyrus the Great was killed in battle doing so. In effect, this was a cheap way for Persia to assert control over the less important parts of their new empire (and Judah/Yehud) would have been little more than a shithole) without sending the army.
We have no actual evidence of "Jewish" religious practices prior to the Persian period.
BTW, Israeli archaeologist Israel Finkelstein recently wrote a paper which argued that the size of post-Persian Jerusalem was about 400 people...including children.
In essence, his argument is that Judaism was created by the Persians when they sent a bunch of alleged "exiles" back to their new province of Yehud.
In effect, Persia did not conquer Judah (Yehud). Instead they took Babylon by coup d'main and woke up the following morning (after the victory party, I suppose!) with a whole new empire. A group of people presumably loyal to Persia was sent back under the guise of being the exiled former rulers from 50 years earlier. They needed a yarn to explain why they were there to take over.
The Persian army was needed to suppress revolts on their eastern border and Cyrus the Great was killed in battle doing so. In effect, this was a cheap way for Persia to assert control over the less important parts of their new empire (and Judah/Yehud) would have been little more than a shithole) without sending the army.
We have no actual evidence of "Jewish" religious practices prior to the Persian period.
BTW, Israeli archaeologist Israel Finkelstein recently wrote a paper which argued that the size of post-Persian Jerusalem was about 400 people...including children.
