=6. The Leader of the Karaite Movement.=――The man who first gave expression to the Jewish discontent with tradition was a certain Anan, son of David, a native of Babylon. Anan had a personal grievance of his own, a position which gives a certain point and eloquence to any general sense of injury. He had wished to be made רֵישׁ נְּלוּתָא. But the election had come and gone, and he had been passed over; and, worst slight of all, a younger brother of his own had been appointed to the office. So Anan, disappointed of being patriarch of his people, and of leading them on the old and orthodox road, determined to become their spokesman and advocate in the new direction. =7. What became of the Sect.=――Their tenets never made much way. They were, in fact, impossible. The Karaite said he would obey ‘the Law’――the strict and literal text, but would have nothing to do with tradition. Now let us see his difficulty. Take, as an instance, the command, ‘Ye shall kindle no fire in your habitations on the Sabbath’ (Exod. xxxv. 3). A ‘literal,’ consistent Karaite, living in a cold climate, would have to freeze for twenty-four hours regularly every seventh day, for he could not accept traditional observance, which lightens the yoke of the Law by limiting the meaning of the ‘ye’ to Jews, and permitting fire to be kindled in Jewish dwellings by the friendly hands of outsiders. Commentary――that is, explanation of some sort――is necessary to every law, and personal and off-hand interpretation is no more likely to be right than traditional ruling. It is somewhat conceited to think our own wisdom is all-sufficient, and that of our ancestors must be wrong; and it is just a little mean, perhaps, to be over-eager to throw off burdens which good men have deliberately borne. As our English poetess[11] wisely says,―― ‘If we tried To sink the past beneath our feet, be sure The future would not stand.’ The Karaites never grew very numerous nor very powerful, though they were occasionally very troublesome. At the present day, stray remnants of the sect are discoverable in Jerusalem, and in parts of Turkey, Egypt, Galicia, and the Crimea.