Fishing from the earliest times - Blog

422 FORBIDDEN FISH—NETTING—F/F^i?/^from a commentator, whose very lateness of date is betokenedby his employment of the Persian word, parasang.In deahng with the Talmud, we must always bear in mindthat a large part was written as late as between (say) 250 and550 A.D., and by men dwelUng mostly at a distance from theHoly Land, who not infrequently show themselves unfamiliarwith or ignoring the conditions of the earher days.In early times, possibly because of the small coast-hne andpoor harbours which Palestine possessed on the Mediterranean,little or no reference to fishing on the coast crops up. Later, aconsiderable trade in fish, salted or pickled, was carried on bythe Syrians (some writers even claim a monopoly in such fishfor the Phoenicians) at Jerusalem, 1 where undoubtedly in thenorthern part of the city a market gave its name to the neighbouringFish-Gate.Perhaps to avoid a similar monopoly, definite and strictlyenforced prices were periodically fixed by the authorities of thetown of Tiberias. By the time of Our Lord thriving fisherieshad grown up on the coast, especially in the neighbourhoodof Acre, so thriving indeed that the equivalent (in later Hebrew)for " carrying coals to Newcastle " or y\avK 'ABrivat^e, became" taking fish to Acco." On the Sea of Galilee in especial didthe industry prosper ; one town seems to have been built upby—it certainly derived its name, Taricheae—from the tradeof salting fish.Four ways of preparing fish were according to custom 2—pickled, roasted, baked, or boiled ;with the latter, eggs werepermissible.The absence of vivaria till a very late period presentsanother instance of the lack in the ancient of the alertness sotypical of the modern Jew. It is hard to deduce why Israelneglected to borrow from Egypt an institution yielding sovaluable and lucrative a supply of food. If the spirit of sport,which was one of the attractions of these ponds to the Egyptiangentry, did not appeal in Palestine, the advantages of a readystore, during the hot weather, of fresh fish would surely have' Nehemiah xiii. 13-16.2 Talmud, Ned. 20''.