Editing Kohen (section)

=== Twenty-four kohanic divisions ===
{{Main|Priestly divisions}}
According to {{bibleverse|1|Chronicles|24:3–5|HE}}, King [[David]] divided the priests into 24 [[priestly divisions]] (Heb. משמרות, ''mishmarot''). Each division would perform the Temple service for one week in a 24-week cycle, with all divisions eligible to serve on holidays. According to the [[Talmud]], this was an expansion of a previous division, by Moses, into 8 (or 16) divisions.<ref>Taanit 27a</ref>

Following the destruction of the [[Second Temple]], and the displacement to the [[Galilee]] of the bulk of the remaining Jewish population after the [[Bar Kokhba revolt]], Jewish tradition in the [[Talmud]] and poems from the period record that the descendants of each priestly watch established a separate residential seat in towns and villages of the Galilee, and maintained this residential pattern for at least several centuries in anticipation of the reconstruction of the Temple and reinstitution of the cycle of priestly courses. In subsequent years, there was a custom of publicly recalling every [[Shabbat]] in the synagogues the courses of the priests, a practice that reinforced the prestige of the priests' lineage.<ref>[[Robert Bonfil]], ''Jews in Byzantium: Dialectics of Minority and Majority Cultures'', Brill: Leiden 2012, p. 42 {{ISBN|9789004203556}}</ref> Following this destruction, it seems that most of them joined the [[Synagogal Judaism|Synagogal Jewish movement]] ; before being gradually converted towards [[Rabbinic Judaism]] and [[Christianity]].<ref name=":5" />