Menachot 109

From the perspective of Deuteronomy, there is only one legitimate site for a Jewish Temple: Jerusalem. And yet, many others existed. For example, the eponymous Temple of Onias was erected in Leontopolis, Egypt, likely after Onias IV was ousted from the high priesthood and fled his enemies in Jerusalem (c. 145 BCE). The Temple of Onias, therefore, was one of the unauthorized Jewish temples situated in a foreign land. What then was its status? The mishnah teaches:

The priests who served in the Temple of Onias may not serve in the Temple in Jerusalem. And needless to say, if they served for something else (i.e., another god) they are disqualified from Temple service… 

The Gemara makes the following inference:

From the fact that it says: “Needless to say, if they served for something else,” we can infer that the Temple of Onias is not a temple of idol worship.

A priest who served in the Temple of Onias was not allowed to return to service in Jerusalem because he violated the prohibition against making offerings to God outside the Jerusalem Temple, but this does not mean he indulged in idolatry by doing so. Indeed, the mishnah makes clear that the Temple of Onias served the Jewish God.

But the Gemara is not so sure. On today’s daf, it provides us with two (contradictory) legends about the circumstances surrounding the Temple’s construction. In the first version, the high priest, Shimon Ha-Tzaddik, appoints his son Onias as the new high priest from his deathbed, passing over Onias’ older brother Shimi for the role. Jealous and rageful, Shimi humiliates Onias by dressing him for priestly service in women’s clothing. Onias’ fellow priests then attempt to kill him for disgracing the priestly service; therefore:

He (Onias) went to Alexandria in Egypt and built an altar there, and sacrificed offerings upon it for the sake of idol worship.

Contrary to the mishnah, in this first version of the legend, Onias’ unfortunate experience led him to forsake not only the Jerusalem Temple but also the Jewish God.

Rabbi Yehudah, however, tells the story differently. He says that Onias voluntarily bowed out of the high priesthood in deference to his older brother. But he did not do so gracefully: Out of jealousy, Onias humiliated Shimi by dressing him in women’s clothes (the reverse of what we read above). When the other priests learned what Onias had done, they pursued him:

Onias went to Alexandria in Egypt and built an altar there, and sacrificed offerings upon it for the sake of Heaven. As it is stated: “In that day shall there be an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar at its border, to the Lord” (Isaiah 19:19).

In this second version, Onias is the instigator of the cross-dressing prank that precipitates his flight. Although he establishes a new Temple, he does not forsake God. This version aligns better with the mishnah’s view that sacrifices in the Temple of Onias are not idolatrous.

Both versions of the story warn about the dangers of ambition-fueled jealousy. At a deeper level, however, they ask difficult questions about the spiritual status of divine service outside the land of Israel, particularly the precincts of the Jerusalem Temple. By the time these stories were edited, the Temple was long gone, but the question of how divine worship is conducted outside the land of Israel continued well beyond the Temple’s time. The mishnah made clear that priestly service in the Temple of Onias was invalid, but did not classify it as idolatry. The Gemara, however, thought that it might be. This is still a more tolerant view than the (admittedly hyperbolic) one we find on Ketubot 110b, which states that one who even leaves the land of Israel is like an idolater. While there is little we can say that is definitive, it is clear that the tension between commitment to life in the holy land and commitment to life in the diaspora was fraught for the rabbis, as it continues to be for many Jews today.

Read all of Menachot 109 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on April 30, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.