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Judea and Arabia before the Romans
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CA.1100 B.C.-136 A.D.
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Herod the Great and His
Successors
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Herod the Great conclusively did away with the rule of the
Maccabees and allied himself with Rome. Following rebellions by
the Jews, Judea was completely integrated into the Roman Empire.
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7
Herod the Great was from a family that was loyal to the Romans;
his father Antipater had been appointed procurator over Judea by
Julius Caesar.
Herod eliminated the last of the Maccabees and assumed the
throne in 37 B.C. Although he married the Maccabean princess
Mariamne, his rule was secularly oriented, following the Roman
model.
Herod suppressed the religious agitators in the land, as well as
intrigues in his palace, and was thus able to maintain peace.
Under him Judea's economy blossomed, as evidenced not least by
his monumental construction projects.
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7 The taking of Jerusalem
by Herod the Great, 36 BC, by Jean Fouquet.
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He had the
10 temple erected anew, yet his
attempts to culturally unify the Jews ultimately failed.
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10 Temple in Jerusalem
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The birth of Jesus Christ falls
within his reign, but the 11
murder of innocent children of which he was accused is probably
a Christian myth.
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Upon his death in 4 B.C.,
Herod's kingdom was divided among his three sons, the Tetrarchs.
One of them, Herod Antipas (ruled 4 в.с-39 a.d.), who received
Galilee and Peraea, is known to this day for his marriage to his
niece and sister-in-law Herodias and the dance of his
stepdaughter, 9 Salome,
performed for the head of John the Baptist.
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9 Salome dancing in
front of king Herod Antipas, by Benozzo Gozzoli
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see
also collection:
Salome
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Herod the Great
Herod, byname Herod the Great, Latin Herodes Magnus
(born 73 bc—died March/April, 4 bc, Jericho, Judaea),
Roman-appointed king of Judaea (37–4 bc), who built many
fortresses, aqueducts, theatres, and other public
buildings and generally raised the prosperity of his
land but who was the centre of political and family
intrigues in his later years. The New Testament portrays
him as a tyrant, into whose kingdom Jesus of Nazareth
was born.
Herod was born in southern Palestine;
his father, Antipater, was an Edomite (an Arab from the
region between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba).
Antipater was a man of great influence and wealth, who
increased both by marrying the daughter of a noble from
Petra (in southwestern Jordan), at that time the capital
of the rising Nabataean kingdom. Thus Herod was,
although a practicing Jew, of Arab origin on both sides.
When Pompey (106–48 bc) invaded
Palestine in 63 bc, Antipater supported his campaign and
began a long association with Rome, from which both he
and Herod were to benefit. Six years later Herod met
Mark Antony, whose lifelong friend he was to remain.
Julius Caesar also favoured the family; he appointed
Antipater procurator of Judaea in 47 bc and conferred on
him Roman citizenship, an honour that descended to Herod
and his children. Herod made his political debut in the
same year, when his father appointed him governor of
Galilee. Six years later Mark Antony made him tetrarch
of Galilee. In 40 bc the Parthians invaded Palestine,
civil war broke out, and Herod was forced to flee to
Rome. The senate there nominated him king of Judaea and
equipped him with an army to make good his claim. In the
year 37 bc, at the age of 36, Herod became unchallenged
ruler of Judaea, a position he was to maintain for 32
years. To further solidify his power, he divorced his
first wife, Doris, sent her and his son away from court,
and married Mariamne, a Hasmonean princess. Although the
union was directed at ending his feud with the
Hasmoneans, a priestly family of Jewish leaders, he was
deeply in love with Mariamne.
During the conflict between the two
triumvirs Octavian and Antony, the heirs to Caesar’s
power, Herod supported his friend Antony. He continued
to do so even when Antony’s mistress, Cleopatra, the
queen of Egypt, used her influence with Antony to gain
much of Herod’s best land. After Antony’s final defeat
at Actium in 31 bc, he frankly confessed to the
victorious Octavian which side he had taken. Octavian,
who had met Herod in Rome, knew that he was the one man
to rule Palestine as Rome wanted it ruled and confirmed
him king. He also restored to Herod the land Cleopatra
had taken. Herod became the close friend of Augustus’
great minister Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, after whom one
of his grandsons and one of his great-grandsons were
named. Both the emperor and the minister paid him state
visits, and Herod twice again visited Italy. Augustus
gave him the oversight of the Cyprus copper mines, with
a half share in the profits. He twice increased Herod’s
territory, in the years 22 and 20 bc, so that it came to
include not only Palestine but parts of what are now the
kingdom of Jordan to the east of the river and southern
Lebanon and Syria. He had intended to bestow the
Nabataean kingdom on Herod as well, but, by the time
that throne fell vacant, Herod’s mental and physical
deterioration made it impossible.
Herod endowed his realm with massive
fortresses and splendid cities, of which the two
greatest were new, and largely pagan, foundations: the
port of Caesarea Palaestinae on the coast between Joppa
(Jaffa) and Haifa, which was afterward to become the
capital of Roman Palestine; and Sebaste on the
long-desolate site of ancient Samaria. At Herodium in
the Judaean desert Herod built a great palace, which
archaeologists in 2007 tentatively identified as the
site of his tomb. In Jerusalem he built the fortress of
Antonia, portions of which may still be seen beneath the
convents on the Via Dolorosa, and a magnificent palace
(of which part survives in the citadel). His most
grandiose creation was the Temple, which he wholly
rebuilt. The great outer court, 35 acres (14 hectares)
in extent, is still visible as Al-Ḥaram ash-Sharīf. He
also embellished foreign cities—Beirut, Damascus,
Antioch, Rhodes—and many towns. Herod patronized the
Olympic Games, whose president he became. In his own
kingdom he could not give full rein to his love of
magnificence, for fear of offending the Pharisees, the
leading faction of Judaism, with whom he was always in
conflict because they regarded him as a foreigner. Herod
undoubtedly saw himself not merely as the patron of
grateful pagans but also as the protector of Jewry
outside of Palestine, whose Gentile hosts he did all in
his power to conciliate.
Unfortunately, there was a dark and
cruel streak in Herod’s character that showed itself
increasingly as he grew older. His mental instability,
moreover, was fed by the intrigue and deception that
went on within his own family. Despite his affection for
Mariamne, he was prone to violent attacks of jealousy;
his sister Salome (not to be confused with her
great-niece, Herodias’ daughter Salome) made good use of
his natural suspicions and poisoned his mind against his
wife in order to wreck the union. In the end Herod
murdered Mariamne, her two sons, her brother, her
grandfather, and her mother, a woman of the vilest stamp
who had often aided his sister Salome’s schemes. Besides
Doris and Mariamne, Herod had eight other wives and had
children by six of them. He had 14 children.
In his last years Herod suffered from
arteriosclerosis. He had to repress a revolt, became
involved in a quarrel with his Nabataean neighbours, and
finally lost the favour of Augustus. He was in great
pain and in mental and physical disorder. He altered his
will three times and finally disinherited and killed his
firstborn, Antipater. The slaying, shortly before his
death, of the infants of Bethlehem was wholly consistent
with the disarray into which he had fallen. After an
unsuccessful attempt at suicide, Herod died. His final
testament provided that, subject to Augustus’ sanction,
his realm would be divided among his sons: Archelaus
should be king of Judaea and Samaria, with Philip and
Antipas sharing the remainder as tetrarchs.
Stewart Henry Perowne
Encyclopædia Britannica
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12 Destruction of
the temple of Jerusalem
by the Romans under Titus, 70A.D.
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His nephew, Herod Agrippa I,
ruled once more over the reunited realm of Herod the Great with
great support of Judaism and as a friend of the Romans from 41
to 44.
In 66 a.d., Jewish religious zealots initiated a revolt against
Roman rule. The king, Agrippa II, who while of Jewish faith had
been raised in Rome, sided with the Romans against the zealots.
The revolt led the Roman emperor Titus to seize control of
Jerusalem and to order the 12
destruction of the temple in 70 a.d.
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Herod Agrippa I
Herod Agrippa I, original name Marcus Julius Agrippa
(born c. 10 bc—died ad 44), king of Judaea (ad 41–44), a
clever diplomat who through his friendship with the
Roman imperial family obtained the kingdom of his
grandfather, Herod I the Great. He displayed great
acumen in conciliating the Romans and Jews.
When Antipater, the son of Herod and
the father of Agrippa, was executed by the suspicious
Herod, Agrippa was sent to Rome for education and
safety. There he grew up in company with the emperor
Tiberius’s son Drusus. After his mother’s death he
quickly spent his family’s wealth and acquired serious
debts. When Drusus died in ad 23, Agrippa left Rome,
settling near Beersheba, in Palestine. An appeal to his
uncle Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee, won him a minor
official post but he soon vacated it.
In 36, having raised a sizable loan in
Alexandria, Agrippa returned to Rome, where the emperor
Tiberius received him but refused to allow him to stay
at the court until his debt was paid. A new loan covered
the obligation, and he secured a post as tutor to
Tiberius’s grandson. Agrippa also became a friend of
Caligula, Tiberius’s heir. An intemperate remark about
Tiberius, overheard by a servant, landed Agrippa in
prison, but Caligula remained his friend. Within a year
Tiberius was dead, and Agrippa’s fortunes were reversed.
In 37 Caligula made him king of the
former realm of his uncle Philip the Tetrarch and of an
adjoining region. Antipas attempted to stop his rise by
denouncing him to Caligula; Agrippa made
counteraccusations. The confrontation before Caligula
ended with Antipas’s banishment, and Agrippa acquired
his territory as well. About 41, Agrippa, on the advice
of the governor of Syria, dissuaded Caligula from
introducing emperor worship at Jerusalem. Later,
Caligula decided to restore Agrippa to his grandfather’s
throne but was assassinated before he could effect this
plan (41). In the delicate question of the imperial
succession, Agrippa supported Claudius, who emerged
successful and added Judaea and Samaria to Agrippa’s
kingdom.
In Judaea, Agrippa zealously pursued
orthodox Jewish policies, earning the friendship of the
Jews and vigorously repressing the Jewish Christians.
According to the New Testament of the Bible (Acts of the
Apostles, where he is called Herod), he imprisoned Peter
the Apostle and executed James, son of Zebedee.
Nonetheless, mindful of maintaining Roman friendship, he
contributed public buildings to Beirut in Lebanon,
struck coins in emulation of Rome, and in the spring of
44 was host at a spectacular series of games at Caesarea
to honour Claudius. There he died, prematurely
terminating the compromise he had striven to achieve
between Roman authority and Jewish autonomy. Because his
son was only 17 years old, Judaea once more returned to
provincial status.
Encyclopædia Britannica
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Titus
Titus, in full Titus Vespasianus Augustus, original name
Titus Flavius Vespasianus (born Dec. 30, 39 ce—died
Sept. 13, 81 ce), Roman emperor (79–81), and the
conqueror of Jerusalem in 70.
After service in Britain and Germany,
Titus commanded a legion under his father, Vespasian, in
Judaea (67). Following the emperor Nero’s death in June
68, Titus was energetic in promoting his father’s
candidacy for the imperial crown. Licinius Mucianus,
legate of Syria, whom he reconciled with Vespasian,
considered that one of Vespasian’s greatest assets was
to have so promising a son and heir. Immediately on
being proclaimed emperor in 69, Vespasian gave Titus
charge of the Jewish war, and a large-scale campaign in
70 culminated in the capture and destruction of
Jerusalem in September. (The Arch of Titus [81], still
standing at the entrance to the Roman Forum,
commemorated his victory.)
The victorious troops in Palestine
urged Titus to take them with him to Italy; it was
suspected that they acted on his prompting and that he
was considering some sort of challenge to his father.
But eventually he returned alone in summer 71, triumphed
jointly with Vespasian, and was made commander of the
Praetorian Guard. He also received tribunician power and
was his father’s colleague in the censorship of 73 and
in several consulships. Although Vespasian had in
various ways avoided making Titus his own equal, the son
became the military arm of the new principate and is
described by Suetonius as particeps atque etiam tutor
imperii (“sharer and even protector of the empire”). As
such he incurred unpopularity, worsened by his relations
with Berenice (sister of the Syrian Herod Agrippa II),
who lived with him for a time in the palace and hoped to
become his wife. But the Romans had memories of
Cleopatra, and marriage to an Eastern queen was
repugnant to public opinion. Twice he reluctantly had to
dismiss her, the second time just after Vespasian’s
death.
In 79 Titus suppressed a conspiracy,
doubtless concerned with the succession, but, when
Vespasian died on June 23, he succeeded promptly and
peacefully. His relations with his brother Domitian were
bad, but in other ways his short rule was unexpectedly
popular in Rome. He was outstandingly good-looking,
cultivated, and affable; Suetonius called him “the
darling of the human race.” His success was won largely
by lavish expenditure, some of it purely personal
largesse but some public bounty, like the assistance to
Campania after Vesuvius erupted in 79 and the rebuilding
of Rome after the fire in 80. He completed construction
of the Flavian Amphitheatre, better known as the
Colosseum, and opened it with ceremonies lasting more
than 100 days. His sudden death at age 41 was supposedly
hastened by Domitian, who became his successor as
emperor.
Titus married twice, but his first
wife died, and he divorced the second soon after the
birth (c. 65) of his only child, a daughter, Flavia
Julia, to whom he accorded the title Augusta. She
married her cousin Flavius Sabinus, but after his death
in 84 she lived openly as mistress of her uncle
Domitian.
Encyclopædia Britannica
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Destruction of the Temple of
Jerusalem by Francesco Hayez, 1867.
Depicting the destruction and looting of the Second Temple
by the Roman army.
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Titus' triumph after the First Jewish-Roman War was
celebrated with the Arch of Titus in Rome,
which shows the treasures taken from the Temple in
Jerusalem, including the Menorah.
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The last stronghold of the Jewish
zealots, 8 Masada, fell in
73 a.d. after the suicide of all the defenders.
Judea was made a Roman province with limited autonomy. But even
that was permanently lost after the revolt of Bar Kokhba in
132-135, led by the Jewish military commander Simon Bar Kokhba,
establishing the independent state of Israel. The Jewish people
were then driven out of Judea by the Romans three years later
into the Diaspora.
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Flavius Josephus
Flavius Josephus, original name Joseph Ben
Matthias (born ad 37/38, Jerusalem—died ad 100,
Rome), Jewish priest, scholar, and historian who
wrote valuable works on the Jewish revolt of
66–70 and on earlier Jewish history. His major
books are History of the Jewish War (75–79), The
Antiquities of the Jews (93), and Against Apion.
Early life.
Flavius Josephus was born of an aristocratic
priestly family in Jerusalem. According to his
own account, he was a precocious youth who by
the age of 14 was consulted by high priests in
matters of Jewish law. At age 16 he undertook a
three-year sojourn in the wilderness with the
hermit Bannus, a member of one of the ascetic
Jewish sects that flourished in Judaea around
the time of Christ.
Returning to Jerusalem, he
joined the Pharisees—a fact of crucial
importance in understanding his later
collaboration with the Romans. The Pharisees,
despite the unflattering portrayal of them in
the New Testament, were for the most part
intensely religious Jews and adhered to a strict
though nonliteral observance of the Torah.
Politically, however, the Pharisees had no
sympathy with the intense Jewish nationalism of
such sects as the military patriotic Zealots and
were willing to submit to Roman rule if only the
Jews could maintain their religious
independence.
In ad 64 Josephus was sent on
an embassy to Rome to secure the release of a
number of Jewish priests of his acquaintance who
were held prisoners in the capital. There, he
was introduced to Poppaea Sabina, Emperor Nero’s
second wife, whose generous favour enabled him
to complete his mission successfully. During his
visit, Josephus was deeply impressed with Rome’s
culture and sophistication—and especially its
military might.
Military career.
He returned to Jerusalem on the eve of a
general revolt against Roman rule. In ad 66 the
Jews of Judaea, urged on by the fanatical
Zealots, ousted the Roman procurator and set up
a revolutionary government in Jerusalem. Along
with many others of the priestly class, Josephus
counselled compromise but was drawn reluctantly
into the rebellion. Despite his moderate stance,
he was appointed military commander of Galilee,
where (if his own untrustworthy account may be
believed) he was obstructed in his efforts at
conciliation by the enmity of the local
partisans led by John of Giscala. Though
realizing the futility of armed resistance, he
nevertheless set about fortifying the towns of
the north against the forthcoming Roman
juggernaut.
The Romans, under the command
of the future emperor Vespasian, arrived in
Galilee in the spring of ad 67 and quickly broke
the Jewish resistance in the north. Josephus
managed to hold the fortress of Jotapata for 47
days, but after the fall of the city he took
refuge with 40 diehards in a nearby cave. There,
to Josephus’ consternation, the beleaguered
party voted to perish rather than surrender.
Josephus, arguing the immorality of suicide,
proposed that each man, in turn, should dispatch
his neighbour, the order to be determined by
casting lots. Josephus contrived to draw the
last lot, and, as one of the two surviving men
in the cave, he prevailed upon his intended
victim to surrender to the Romans.
Led in chains before
Vespasian, Josephus assumed the role of a
prophet and foretold that Vespasian would soon
be emperor—a prediction that gained in
credibility after the death of Nero in ad 68.
The stratagem saved his life, and for the next
two years he remained a prisoner in the Roman
camp. Late in ad 69 Vespasian was proclaimed
emperor by his troops: Josephus’ prophecy had
come true, and the agreeable Jewish prisoner was
given his freedom. From that time on, Josephus
attached himself to the Roman cause. He adopted
the name Flavius (Vespasian’s family name),
accompanied his patron to Alexandria, and there
married for the third time. (Josephus’ first
wife had been lost at the siege of Jotapata, and
his second had deserted him in Judaea.) Josephus
later joined the Roman forces under the command
of Vespasian’s son and later successor, Titus,
at the siege of Jerusalem in ad 70. He attempted
to act as mediator between the Romans and the
rebels, but, hated by the Jews for his apostasy
and distrusted by the Romans as a Jew, he was
able to accomplish little. Following the fall of
Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple,
Josephus took up residence in Rome, where he
devoted the remainder of his life to literary
pursuits under imperial patronage.
Josephus as historian.
Josephus’ first work, Bellum Judaicum
(History of the Jewish War), was written in
seven books between ad 75 and 79, toward the end
of Vespasian’s reign. The original Aramaic has
been lost, but the extant Greek version was
prepared under Josephus’ personal direction.
After briefly sketching Jewish history from the
mid-2nd century bc, Josephus presents a detailed
account of the great revolt of ad 66–70. He
stressed the invincibility of the Roman legions,
and apparently one of his purposes in the works
was to convince the Diasporan Jews in
Mesopotamia, who may have been contemplating
revolt, that resistance to Roman arms was pure
folly. The work has much narrative brilliance,
particularly the description of the siege of
Jerusalem; its fluent Greek contrasts sharply
with the clumsier idiom of Josephus’ later works
and attests the influence of his Greek
assistants. In this work, Josephus is extremely
hostile to the Jewish patriots and remarkably
callous to their fate. The Jewish War not only
is the principal source for the Jewish revolt
but is especially valuable for its description
of Roman military tactics and strategy.
In Rome, Josephus had been
granted citizenship and a pension. He was a
favourite at the courts of the emperors
Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian, and he enjoyed
the income from a tax-free estate in Judaea. He
had divorced his third wife, married an
aristocratic heiress from Crete, and given Roman
names to his children. He had written an
official history of the revolt and was loathed
by the Jews as a turncoat and traitor. Yet
despite all of this, Josephus had by no means
abandoned his Judaism. His greatest work,
Antiquitates Judaicae (The Antiquities of the
Jews), completed in 20 books in ad 93, traces
the history of the Jews from creation to just
before the outbreak of the revolt of ad 66–70.
It was an attempt to present Judaism to the
Hellenistic world in a favourable light. By
virtually ignoring the Prophets, by embellishing
biblical narratives, and by stressing the
rationality of Judaic laws and institutions, he
stripped Judaism of its fanaticism and made it
appealing to the cultivated and reasonable man.
Historically, the coverage is patchy and shows
the fatigue of the author, then in his middle
50s. But throughout, sources are preserved that
otherwise would have been lost, and, for Jewish
history during the period of the Second
Commonwealth, the work is invaluable.
The Antiquities contains two
famous references to Jesus Christ: the one in
Book XX calls him the “so-called Christ.” The
implication in the passage in Book XVIII of
Christ’s divinity could not have come from
Josephus and undoubtedly represents the
tampering (if not invention) of a later
Christian copyist.
Appended to the Antiquities
was a Vita (Life), which is less an
autobiography than an apology for Josephus’
conduct in Galilee during the revolt. It was
written to defend himself against the charges of
his enemy Justus of Tiberias, who claimed that
Josephus was responsible for the revolt. In his
defense, he contradicted the account given in
his more trustworthy Jewish War, presenting
himself as a consistent partisan of Rome and
thus a traitor to the rebellion from the start.
Josephus appears in a much better light in a
work generally known as Contra Apionem (Against
Apion, though the earlier titles Concerning the
Antiquity of the Jews and Against the Greeks are
more apposite). Of its two books, the first
answers various anti-Semitic charges leveled at
the Jews by Hellenistic writers, while the
second provides an argument for the ethical
superiority of Judaism over Hellenism and shows
Josephus’ commitment to his religion and his
culture.
Since Against Apion mentions
the death of Agrippa II, it is probable that
Josephus lived into the 2nd century; but
Agrippa’s death date is uncertain, and it is
possible that Josephus died earlier, in the
reign of Domitian, sometime after ad 93.
Assessment.
As a historian, Josephus shares the faults
of most ancient writers: his analyses are
superficial, his chronology faulty, his facts
exaggerated, his speeches contrived. He is
especially tendentious when his own reputation
is at stake. His Greek style, when it is truly
his, does not earn for him the epithet “the
Greek Livy” that often is attached to his name.
Yet he unites in his person the traditions of
Judaism and Hellenism, provides a connecting
link between the secular world of Rome and the
religious heritage of the Bible, and offers many
insights into the mentality of subject peoples
under the Roman Empire.
Personally, Josephus was vain,
callous, and self-seeking. There was not a shred
of heroism in his character, and for his
toadyism he well deserved the scorn heaped upon
him by his countrymen. But it may be said in his
defense that he remained true to his Pharisee
beliefs and, being no martyr, did what he could
for his people.
Gary William Poole
Encyclopædia Britannica
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First Jewish Revolt
First Jewish Revolt, (ad 66–70), Jewish rebellion
against Roman rule in Judaea. The First Jewish Revolt
was the result of a long series of clashes in which
small groups of Jews offered sporadic resistance to the
Romans, who in turn responded with severe
countermeasures. In the fall of ad 66 the Jews combined
in revolt, expelled the Romans from Jerusalem, and
overwhelmed in the pass of Beth-Horon a Roman punitive
force under Gallus, the imperial legate in Syria. A
revolutionary government was then set up and extended
its influence throughout the whole country. Vespasian
was dispatched by the Roman emperor Nero to crush the
rebellion. He was joined by Titus, and together the
Roman armies entered Galilee, where the historian
Josephus headed the Jewish forces. Josephus’ army was
confronted by that of Vespasian and fled. After the fall
of the fortress of Jatapata, Josephus gave himself up,
and the Roman forces swept the country. On the 9th of
the month of Av (August 29) in ad 70, Jerusalem fell;
the Temple was burned, and the Jewish state collapsed,
although the fortress of Masada was not conquered
by the Roman general Flavius Silva until April 73.
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The
Rebellion of Bar Kokhba
Simon Bar Kokhba ("the Son of the Star") led the last
revolt of the Jews against the Romans in 132 a.d. The
catalyst was the ban on circumcision and the Roman
attempt to construct a temple to Jupiter in Jerusalem.
Bar Kokhba captured Jerusalem and ruled as "prince of
Judea," with messianic traits as defined by ancient
Jewish laws, in 135 а.d. he was vanquished by superior
Roman strength at Bethar. Thereafter the Jews were
forbidden to enter Jerusalem.
Silver coins (tetra
drachmas), distributed by Bar Kokhba
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Second Jewish Revolt
Second Jewish Revolt, (ad 132–135), Jewish rebellion
against Roman rule in Judaea. The revolt was preceded by
years of clashes between Jews and Romans in the area.
Finally, in ad 132, the misrule of Tinnius Rufus, the
Roman governor of Judaea, combined with the emperor
Hadrian’s intention to found a Roman colony on the site
of Jerusalem and his restrictions on Jewish religious
freedom and observances (which included a ban on the
practice of male circumcision), roused the last remnants
of Palestinian Jewry to revolt. A bitter struggle
ensued. Bar Kokhba became the leader of this
Second Jewish Revolt; although at first successful, his
forces proved no match against the methodical and
ruthless tactics of the Roman general Julius Severus.
With the fall of Jerusalem and then Bethar, a fortress
on the seacoast south of Caesarea where Bar Kokhba was
slain, the rebellion was crushed in 135. According to
Christian sources, Jews were thenceforth forbidden to
enter Jerusalem.
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Bar Kokhba
Bar Kokhba, original name Simeon Bar Kosba, Kosba also
spelled Koseba, Kosiba, or Kochba, also called Bar
Koziba (died ad 135), Jewish leader who led a bitter but
unsuccessful revolt (ad 132–135) against Roman dominion
in Palestine.
During his tour of the Eastern Empire
in 131, the Roman emperor Hadrian decided upon a policy
of Hellenization to integrate the Jews into the empire.
Circumcision was proscribed, a Roman colony (Aelia) was
founded in Jerusalem, and a temple to Jupiter
Capitolinus was erected over the ruins of the Jewish
Temple.
Enraged by these measures, the Jews
rebelled in 132, the dominant and irascible figure of
Simeon bar Kosba at their head. Reputedly of Davidic
descent, he was hailed as the Messiah by the greatest
rabbi of the time, Akiva ben Yosef, who also gave him
the title Bar Kokhba (“Son of the Star”), a messianic
allusion. Bar Kokhba took the title nasi (“prince”) and
struck his own coins, with the legend “Year 1 of the
liberty of Jerusalem.”
The Roman historian Dion Cassius noted
that the Christian sect refused to join the revolt. The
Jews took Aelia by storm and badly mauled the Romans’
Egyptian Legion, XXII Deiotariana. The war became so
serious that in the summer of 134 Hadrian himself came
from Rome to visit the battlefield and summoned the
governor of Britain, Gaius Julius Severus, to his aid
with 35,000 men of the Xth Legion. Jerusalem was
retaken, and Severus gradually wore down and constricted
the rebels’ area of operation, until in 135 Bar Kokhba
was himself killed at Betar, his stronghold in southwest
Jerusalem. The remnant of the Jewish army was soon
crushed; Jewish war casualties are recorded as numbering
580,000, not including those who died of hunger and
disease. Judaea was desolated, the remnant of the Jewish
population annihilated or exiled, and Jerusalem barred
to Jews thereafter. But the victory had cost Hadrian
dear, and in his report to the Roman Senate on his
return, he omitted the customary salutation “I and the
Army are well” and refused a triumphal entry.
Bar Kokhba was derided by some as “Bar
Koziba” (a pun on the Hebrew word for liar).
In 1952 and 1960–61 a number of Bar
Kokhba’s letters to his lieutenants were discovered in
the Judaean desert.
Encyclopædia Britannica
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