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diff --git a/9793.txt b/9793.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fe50eef --- /dev/null +++ b/9793.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6823 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Josephus, by Norman Bentwich + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Josephus + +Author: Norman Bentwich + +Posting Date: November 17, 2011 [EBook #9793] +Release Date: January, 2006 +First Posted: October 17, 2003 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JOSEPHUS *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, David King +and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + + + + + +JOSEPHUS + + +BY NORMAN BENTWICH + +Author of "Philo-Judaeus of Alexandria" + + +PHILADELPHIA + +THE JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY OF AMERICA + +1914 + + + + +PREFACE + + +Josephus hardly merits a place on his own account in a series of Jewish +Worthies, since neither as man of action nor as man of letters did he +deserve particularly well of his nation. It is not his personal +worthiness, but the worth of his work, that recommends him to the +attention of the Jewish people. He was not a loyal general, and he was +not a faithful chronicler of the struggle with Rome; but he had the +merit of writing a number of books on the Jews and Judaism, which not +only met the desire for knowledge of his nation in his own day, but +which have been preserved through the ages and still remain one of the +chief authorities for Jewish history. He lived at the great crisis of +his people, when it stood at the parting of the ways. And while in his +life he was patronized by those who had destroyed the national center, +after his death he found favor with that larger religious community +which was beginning to carry part of the Jewish mission to the Gentiles. +For centuries Josephus was regarded by the Christians as the standard +historian of the Jews, and, though for long he was forgotten and +neglected by his own people, in modern times he has been carefully +studied also by them, and his merits and demerits both as patriot and as +writer have been critically examined. + +It has been my especial aim in this book to consider Josephus from the +Jewish point of view. I have made no attempt to extenuate his personal +conduct or his literary faults. My judgment may appear somewhat severe, +but it is when tried by the test of faithfulness to his nation that +Josephus is found most wanting; and I hope that while extenuating +nothing I have not set down aught in malice. + +Of the extensive literature bearing on the subject, the books to which I +am under the greatest obligation are Niese's text of the collected works +and Schuerer's _History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus_. I +have given in an Appendix a Bibliography, which contains the names of +most of the works I have referred to. I would mention in particular +Schlatter's _Zur Topographie und Geschichte Palaestinas_, which is a +remarkably stimulating and suggestive book, and which confirmed a view I +had formed independently, that in the _Wars_, as in the _Antiquities_, +Josephus is normally a compiler of other men's writings, and constantly +expresses opinions not his own. + +My greatest debt of thanks, however, is due to the spoken rather than +the written word. Doctor Buechler, the Principal of Jews' College, +London, has constantly assisted me with advice, directed me to sources +of information, and let me draw plentifully from his own large stores of +knowledge about Josephus; and Doctor Friedlaender, Sabato Morais +Professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, has done me the +brotherly service of reading my manuscript and making many valuable +suggestions on it. To their generous help this book owes more than I can +acknowledge. + +NORMAN BENTWICH. + +_Cairo, February, 1914_. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I. THE JEWS AND THE ROMANS + +II. THE LIFE OF JOSEPHUS TO THE FALL OF JOTAPATA + +III. THE LIFE OF JOSEPHUS FROM THE TIME OF HIS SURRENDER + +IV. THE WORKS OF JOSEPHUS AND HIS RELATION TO HIS PREDECESSORS + +V. THE JEWISH WARS + +VI. JOSEPHUS AND THE BIBLE + +VII. JOSEPHUS AND POST-BIBLICAL JEWISH HISTORY + +VIII. THE APOLOGY FOR JUDAISM + +IX. CONCLUSION + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + +ABBREVIATIONS USED IN REFERRING TO THE WORKS OF JOSEPHUS + +INDEX + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + +BAS-RELIEF FROM THE ARCH OF TITUS AT ROME _Frontispiece_ + +COINS CURRENT IN PALESTINE (34 B.C.E. to 98 C.E.) + +RUINS OF AN ANCIENT SYNAGOGUE AT KAFR BIR'IM, UPPER GALILEE + + + +JOSEPHUS + + + + +I + +THE JEWS AND THE ROMANS + + +The life and works of Flavius Josephus are bound up with the struggle of +the Jews against the Romans, and in order to appreciate them it is +necessary to summarize the relations of the two peoples that led up to +that struggle. + +It is related in the Midrash that the city of Rome was founded on the +day Solomon married an Egyptian princess. The Rabbis doubtless meant by +this legend that the power of Rome was created to be a scourge for +Israel's backslidings. They identified Rome with the Edom of the Bible, +representing thus that the struggle between Esau and Jacob was carried +on by their descendants, the Romans and the Jews, and would continue +throughout history.[1] Yet the earliest relations of the two peoples +were friendly and peaceful. They arose out of the war of independence +that the Maccabean brothers waged against the Syrian Empire in the +middle of the second century B.C.E., when the loyal among the people +were roused to stand up for their faith. Antiochus Epiphanes, anxious to +strengthen his tottering empire, which had been shaken by its struggles +with Rome, sought to force violently on the Jews a pagan Hellenism that +was already making its way among them. He succeeded only in evoking the +latent force of their national consciousness. Rome was already the +greatest power in the world: she had conquered the whole of Italy; she +had destroyed her chief rival in the West, the Phoenician colony of +Carthage; she had made her will supreme in Greece and Macedonia. Her +senate was the arbiter of the destinies of kingdoms, and though for the +time it refrained from extending Roman sway over Egypt and Asia, its +word there was law. Its policy was "divide and rule," to hold supreme +sway by encouraging small nationalities to maintain their independence +against the unwieldy empires which the Hellenistic successors of +Alexander had carved out for themselves in the Orient. + +[Footnote 1: Lev. R. xiii. (5), quoted in Schechter, Aspects of Rabbinic +Theology, p. 100.] + +At the bidding of the Roman envoy, Antiochus Epiphanes himself, +immediately before his incursion into Jerusalem, had slunk away from +Alexandria; and hence it was natural that Judas Maccabaeus, when he had +vindicated the liberty of his nation, should look to Rome for support in +maintaining that liberty. In the year 161 B.C.E. he sent Eupolemus the +son of Johanan and Jason the son of Eleazar, "to make a league of amity +and confederacy with the Romans"[1]: and the Jews were received as +friends, and enrolled in the class of Socii. His brother Jonathan +renewed the alliance in 146 B.C.E.; Simon renewed it again five years +later, and John Hyrcanus, when he succeeded to the high priesthood, made +a fresh treaty.[2] Supported by the friendship, and occasionally by the +diplomatic interference, of the Western Power, the Jews did not require +the intervention of her arms to uphold their independence against the +Seleucid monarchs, whose power was rapidly falling into ruin. At the +beginning of the first century B.C.E., however, Rome, having emerged +triumphant from a series of civil struggles in her own dominions, found +herself compelled to take an active part in the affairs of the East. +During her temporary eclipse there had been violent upheavals in Asia. +The semi-barbarous kings of Pontus and Armenia took advantage of the +opportunity to overrun the Hellenized provinces and put all the Greek +and Roman inhabitants to the sword. To avenge this outrage, Rome sent to +the East, in 73 B.C.E., her most distinguished soldier, Pompeius, or +Pompey, who, in two campaigns, laid the whole of Asia Minor and Syria at +his feet. + +[Footnote 1: I Macc. viii. 7. It is interesting to note that the sons +had Greek names, while their fathers had Hebrew names.] + +[Footnote 2: I Macc. xii. 3; xiv. 24.] + +Unfortunately civil strife was waging in Palestine between the two +Hasmonean brothers, Aristobulus and Hyrcanus, who fought for the throne +on the death of the queen Alexandra Salome. Both in turn appealed to +Pompey to come to their aid, on terms of becoming subject to the Roman +overlord. At the same time, a deputation from the Jewish nation appeared +before the general, to declare that they did not desire to be ruled by +kings: "for what was handed down to them from their fathers was that +they should obey the priests of God; but these two princes, though the +descendants of priests, sought to transfer the nation to another form of +government, that it might he enslaved." + +Pompey, who had resolved to establish a strong government immediately +subject to Rome over the whole of the near Orient, finally interfered on +behalf of Hyrcanus. Aristobulus resisted, at first somewhat +half-heartedly, but afterwards, when the Roman armies laid siege to +Jerusalem, with fierce determination. The struggle was in vain. On a +Sabbath, it is recorded, when the Jews desisted from their defense, the +Roman general forced his way into the city, and, regardless of Jewish +feeling, entered the Holy of Holies. The intrigues of the Jewish royal +house had brought about the subjection of the nation. As it is said in +the apocryphal Psalms of Solomon, which were written about this time: "A +powerful smiter has God brought from the ends of the earth. He decreed +war upon the Jews and the land. The princes of the land went out with +joy to meet him, and said to him, 'Blessed be thy way; draw near and +enter in peace.'" Yet Pompey did not venture, or did not care, to +destroy or rob the Temple, according to Cicero and Josephus,[1] because +of his innate moderation, but really, one may suspect, from less noble +motives. It was the custom of the Roman conquerors to demand the +surrender, not only of the earthly possessions of the conquered, but of +their gods, and to carry the vanquished images in the triumph which they +celebrated. But Pompey may have recognized the difference between the +Jewish religion and that of other peoples, or he realized the widespread +power of the Jewish people, which would rise as a single body in defense +of its religion; for he made no attempt to interfere either with Jewish +religious liberties, or with a worship that Cicero declared to be +"incompatible with the majesty of the Empire." + +[Footnote 1: Cicero, Pro Flacco, 69, and Ant. XVI. iv, 4.] + +The Jews, however, were henceforth the clients, instead of the allies, +of Rome. Though Hyrcanus was recognized by Pompey as the high priest and +ethnarch of Judea, and his wily counselor, the Idumean Antipater, was +given a general power of administering the country, they were alike +subject to the governor of Syria, which was now constituted a Roman +province. Moreover, the Hellenistic cities along the coast of Palestine +and on the other side of Jordan, which had been subjugated by John +Hyrcanus and Alexander Jannaeus, were restored to independence, and +placed under special Roman protection, and the Jewish territory itself +was shortly thereafter split by the Roman governor Gabinius into five +toparchies, or provinces, each with a separate administration. + +The guiding aim of the conqueror was to weaken the Oriental power (as +the Jews were regarded) and strengthen the Hellenistic element in the +country. The Jews were soon to feel the heavy hand and suffer the +insatiate greed of Rome. National risings were put down with merciless +cruelty, the Temple treasury was spoiled in 56 B.C.E. by the avaricious +Crassus, one of the triumvirate that divided the Roman Empire, when he +passed Jerusalem on his way to fight against the Parthians; even the +annual offering contributed voluntarily by the Jews of the Diaspora to +the Temple was seized by a profligate governor of Asia. The Roman +aristocrats during the last years of the Republic were a degenerate +body; they regarded a governorship as the opportunity of unlimited +extortion, the means of recouping themselves for all the gross expenses +incurred on attaining office, and of making themselves and their friends +affluent for the rest of their lives. And Judea was a fresh quarry. + +A happier era seemed to be dawning for the Jews when Julius Caesar +became dictator. At the beginning of the civil war between him and +Pompey, Hyrcanus, at the instance of Antipater, prepared to support the +man to whom he owed his position; but when Pompey was murdered, +Antipater led the Jewish forces to the help of Caesar, who was hard +pressed at Alexandria. His timely help and his influence over the +Egyptian Jews recommended him to Caesar's favor, and secured for him an +extension of his authority in Palestine, and for Hyrcanus the +confirmation of his ethnarchy. Joppa was restored to the Hasmonean +domain, Judea was granted freedom from all tribute and taxes to Rome, +and the independence of the internal administration was guaranteed. +Caesar, too, whatever may have been his motive, showed favor to the Jews +throughout his Empire. Mommsen thinks that he saw in them an effective +leaven of cosmopolitanism and national decomposition, and to that intent +gave them special privileges; but this seems a perverse reason to assign +for the grant of the right to maintain in all its thoroughness their +national life, and for their exemption from all Imperial or municipal +burdens that would conflict with it. It is more reasonable to suppose +that, taking in this as in many other things a broader view than that of +his countrymen, Caesar recognized the weakness of a world-state whose +members were so denationalized as to have no strong feeling for any +common purpose, no passion of loyalty to any community, and he favored +Judaism as a counteracting force to this peril. + +His various enactments constituted, as it were, a Magna Charta of the +Jews in the Empire; Judaism was a favored cult in the provinces, a +_licita religio_ in the capital. At Alexandria Caesar confirmed and +extended the religious and political privileges of the Jews, and ordered +his decree to be inscribed on pillars of brass and set up in a public +place. At Rome, though the devotees of Bacchus were forbidden to meet, +he permitted the Jews to hold their assemblies and celebrate their +ceremonials. At his instance the Hellenistic cities of Asia passed +similar favorable decrees for the benefit of the Jewish congregations in +their midst, which invested them with a kind of local autonomy. The +proclamation of the Sardians is typical. "This decree," it runs, "was +made by the senate and people, upon the representation of the praetors: + +"Whereas those Jews who are our fellow-citizens, and live with us in +this city, have ever had great benefits heaped upon them by the people, +and have come now into the senate, and desired of the people that, upon +the restitution of their law and their liberty by the senate and people +of Rome, they may assemble together according to their ancient legal +custom, and that we will not bring any suit against them about it; and +that a place may be given them where they may hold their congregations +with their wives and children, and may offer, as did their forefathers, +their prayers and sacrifices to God:--now the senate and people have +decreed to permit them to assemble together on the days formerly +appointed, and to act according to their own laws; and that such a place +be set apart for them by the praetors for the building and inhabiting +the same as they shall esteem fit for that purpose, and that those who +have control of the provisions of the city shall take care that such +sorts of food as they esteem fit for their eating may be imported into +the city."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIV. x. 24.] + +Caesar's decrees marked the culmination of Roman tolerance, and the Jews +enjoyed their privileges for but a short time. It is related by the +historian Suetonius that they lamented his death more bitterly than any +other class.[1] And they had good reason. The Republicans, who had +murdered him, and his ministers, who avenged him, vied with each other +for the support of the Jewish princes; but the people in Palestine +suffered from the burden that the rivals imposed on the provinces in +their efforts to raise armies. Antipater and his ambitious sons Herod +and Phasael contrived to maintain their tyranny amid the constant +shifting of power; and when the hardy mountaineers of Galilee strove +under the lead of one Hezekiah (Ezekias), the founder of the party of +the Zealots, to shake off the Roman yoke, Herod ruthlessly put down the +revolt. But when Antigonus, the son of that Aristobulus who had been +deprived of his kingdom by Hyrcanus and Pompey, roused the Parthians to +invade Syria and Palestine, the Jews eagerly rose in support of the +scion of the Maccabean house, and drove out the hated Idumeans with +their puppet Jewish king. The struggle between the people and the Romans +had begun in earnest, and though Antigonus, when placed on the throne by +the Parthians, proceeded to spoil and harry the Jews, rejoicing at the +restoration of the Hasmonean line, thought a new era of independence had +come. + +[Footnote 1: Suetonius, Caesar, lxxxiv. 7.] + +The infatuation of Mark Antony for Cleopatra enabled Antigonus to hold +his kingdom for three years (40-37 B.C.E.). Then Herod, who had escaped +to Rome, returned to Syria to conquer the kingdom that Antony had +bestowed on him. He brought with him the Roman legions, and for two +years a fierce struggle was waged between the Idumeans, Romans, and +Romanizing Jews on the one hand, and the national Jews and Parthian +mercenaries of Antigonus on the other. The struggle culminated in a +siege of Jerusalem. As happened in all the contests for the city, the +power of trained force in the end prevailed over the enthusiasm of +fervent patriots. Herod stormed the walls, put to death Antigonus and +his party, and established a harsher tyranny than even the Roman +conqueror had imposed. For over thirty years he held the people down +with the aid of Rome and his body-guard of mercenary barbarians. His +constitution was an autocracy, supplemented by assassination. In the +civil war between Antony and Octavian, he was first on the losing side, +as his father had been in the struggle between Pompey and Caesar; but, +like his father, he knew when to go over to the victor. The master of +the Roman Empire, henceforth known as Augustus, was so impressed with +his carriage and resolution that he not only confirmed him in his +kingdom, but added to it the territories of Chalcis and Perea to the +north and east of the Jordan. Throughout his reign Herod contrived to +preserve the friendship of Rome as effectually as he contrived to arouse +the hatred of his Jewish subjects. "The Imperial Eagle and some +distinguished Roman or other," says George Adam Smith,[1] "were always +fixed in Herod's heaven." He ruled with a strong but merciless hand. He +insured peace, and while he turned his own home into a slaughter-house, +he glorified the Jewish dominion outwardly to a height and magnificence +it had never before attained. Yet the Jewish deputation that went to +plead before Augustus on his death declared that "Herod had put such +abuses on them as a wild beast would not have done, and no calamity they +had suffered was comparable with that which he had brought on the +nation."[2] Beneath the fine show of peace, splendor, and expansion, the +passions of the nation were being aroused to the breaking-point. + +[Footnote 1: Jerusalem, ii. 504.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XVII. xi. 2.] + +Augustus himself, following the example of his uncle Julius Caesar, yet +lacking the same large tolerance, held towards Judaism an ambiguous +attitude of impartiality rather than of favor. He caused sacrifices to +be offered for himself at the Temple at Jerusalem,[1] but he praised his +nephew Gaius for having refrained from doing likewise during his Eastern +travels.[2] He was anxious that the national laws and customs of each +nation should be preserved, and he issued a decree in favor of the Jews +of Cyrene; but he initiated the worship of the Emperors, which +necessitated a conflict between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of +Caesar, and in the end destroyed the religious liberty that Julius +Caesar had given to the Empire. His aim was at once to foster the +veneration of the Imperial power and establish an Imperial worship that +should replace the effete paganism of his subjects. He made no attempt +to force this worship on the Jews, but its existence fanned the +prejudice against the one nation that refused to participate. And the +Jews could not but look with distrust on a government that "derived its +authority from the deification of might, whereof the Emperor was the +incarnate principle."[3] + +[Footnote 1: Philo, De Leg. ii. 507.] + +[Footnote 2: Suetonius, Aug. 93.] + +[Footnote 3: Schechter, Aspects of Rabbinic Theology, p. 108.] + +Marcus Agrippa, the trusted minister of Augustus, was also an intimate +friend of Herod, and served to link the two courts. But on the death of +Herod, in 4 C.E., the friendship of Rome for the Idumean royal house was +modified. Archelaus, who claimed the whole succession, was appointed +simply as ethnarch of Judea, while Herod's two other sons, Philip and +Herod Antipas, divided the rest of his dominions. The Zealots, rid of +the powerful tyrant who had held them down, sought again to throw off +the hated yoke of Idumea, which, not without reason, they identified +with the yoke of Rome. With their watchword, "No king but God," they +attempted to make Judea independent, and a fierce struggle, known as the +War of Varus, ensued. Jerusalem was stormed once again by Roman legions +before the Zealots were subdued. Archelaus was deposed by his masters +after a few years, and the province of Judea was placed under direct +Roman administration. The Roman procurator was at first less detested +than the Idumean tyrant, since he interfered less with the legal +institutions, such as the Sanhedrin and the Bet Din; but his presence +with the legionaries in the Holy City and his constant, though often +involuntary, affronts to the religious sentiments of the people roused +the hostility of the nationalist party, who looked forward to the day +when Israel should "tread on the neck of the Eagle." The Pharisees, who +were anxious for the spiritual rather than the political independence of +the Jews, counseled submission to Rome, and were willing "to render unto +Caesar the things that are Caesar's," so long as they were not compelled +to give up the Torah. But the Zealots desired political as well as +religious freedom, and they fomented rebellion. They have been compared +by Merivale to the Montagnards of the French Revolution, driven by their +own indomitable passion to assert the truths that possessed them with a +ferocity that no possession could justify. They were continually rousing +the people to expel the foreign rulers, and in the northern province of +Galilee, where they found shelter amid the wild tracts of heath and +mountain, they maintained a constant state of insurrection.[1] + +[Footnote 1: It is important to notice that much of our knowledge of the +Zealots is derived from Josephus, who, as will be seen, set himself to +misrepresent them, and repeated the calumnies of hostile Roman writers +against them. The Talmud contains several references to them, describing +them as Kannaim (the Hebrew equivalent of Zealots), and it would appear +that they were in their outlook successors of the former Hasidim, +distinguished as much for their religious rigidity as their patriotic +fervor. See Jewish Encyclopedia, s.v. Zealots.] + +The Romans, on their side, accustomed to the ready submission of all the +peoples under their sway, could not understand or tolerate the Jews. To +them this people with its dour manners, its refusal to participate in +the religious ideas, the social life, and the pleasures of its +neighbors, its eruptions of passion and violence on account of abstract +ideas, and its rigid exclusion of the insignia of Roman majesty from the +capital, seemed the enemies of the human race. In their own religion +they had freely found a place for Greek and Egyptian deities, but the +Jewish faith, in its uncompromising opposition to all pagan worship, +seemed, in the words that Anatole France has put into the mouth of one +of the Roman procurators, to be rather an _ab_ligion than a _re_ligion, +an institution designed rather to sever the bond that united peoples, +than bind them together. Every other civilized people had accepted their +dominion; the Jews and the Parthians alone stood in the way of universal +peace. The near-Eastern question, which, then as now, continually +threatened war and violence, irritated the Romans beyond measure, and +they came to feel towards Jerusalem as their ancestors had felt two +hundred years before towards Carthage, the great Semitic power of the +West, _delenda est Hierosolyma_. As time went on they realized that this +stubborn nation was resolved to dispute with them for the mastery, and +every agitation was regarded as an outrage on the Roman power, which +must be wiped out in blood. It was the inevitable conflict, not only +between the Imperial and the national principle, but between the ideas +of the kingdom of righteousness and the ideas of the kingdom of might. + +During the reign of Tiberius, however, the Roman governors were held in +check to some extent by strong central control from Rome, and their +extortion was comparatively moderate. The worst of them was Pontius +Pilate, and the _odium theologicum_ has, perhaps, had its part in +blackening his reputation. Nevertheless, the broad religious tolerance +initiated by the first Caesar was being continually impaired. The Jewish +public worship was prohibited in Rome, and the Jews were expelled from +the city in 19 C.E.; while at Alexandria an anti-Jewish persecution was +instigated by Sejanus, the upstart freedman, who became the chief +minister of Tiberius. In Palestine, though we hear of no definite +movement, it is clear from after-events that the bitterness of feeling +between the Hellenized Syrians and the Jewish population was steadily +fomented. The Romans were naturally on the side of the Greek-speaking +people, whom they understood, and whose religion they could appreciate. +The situation may best be paralleled by the condition of Ireland in the +sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when England supported the +Protestant population of Ulster against the hated Roman Catholics, who +formed the majority of the people. + +It had been the aim of Tiberius to consolidate the unwieldy mass of the +Empire by the gradual absorption of the independent kingdoms inclosed +within its limits. In pursuance of this policy, Judea, Chalcis, and +Abilene, all parts of Herod's kingdom, had been placed under Roman +governors. But when Gaius Caligula succeeded Tiberius in 32 C.E., and +brought to the Imperial throne a capricious irresponsibility, he +reverted to the older policy of encouraging client-princes, and doled +out territories to his Oriental favorites. Prominent among them was +Agrippa, a grandson of Herod, who had passed his youth in the company of +the Roman prince in Italy. He received as the reward of his loyal +extravagance not only Judea but Galilee and Perea, together with the +title of king. He was not, however, given permission to repair to his +kingdom, since his patron desired his attentions at Rome. Later he was +detained by a sterner call. Gaius, who had passed from folly to lunacy, +was not content with the customary voluntary worship paid to the +Emperors, but imagined himself the supreme deity, and demanded +veneration from all his subjects. He ordered his image to be set up in +all temples, and, irritated by the petition of the Jews to be exempted +from what would be an offense against the first principle of their +religion, he insisted upon their immediate submission. In Alexandria the +Greek population made a violent attempt to carry out the Imperial order; +a sharp conflict took place, and the Jews in their dire need sent a +deputation, with Philo at its head, to supplicate the Emperor. In the +East the governor of Syria, Petronius, was directed to march on +Jerusalem and set up the Imperial statue in the Holy of Holies, whatever +it might cost. Petronius understood, and it seems respected, the +faithfulness of the Jews to their creed, and he hesitated to carry out +the command. From East and West the Jews gathered to resist the decree; +the multitude, says Philo, covered Phoenicia like a cloud. Meantime King +Agrippa at Rome interceded with the Emperor for his people, and induced +him to relent for a little. But the infatuation again came over Gaius; +he ordered Petronius peremptorily to do his will, and, when the legate +still dallied, sent to remove him from his office. But, as Philo says, +God heard the prayer of His people: Gaius was assassinated by a Roman +whom he had wantonly insulted, and the death-struggle with Rome, which +had threatened in Judea, was postponed. The year of trial, however, had +brought home to the whole of the Jewish people that the incessant moral +conflict with Rome might at any moment be resolved into a desperate +physical struggle for the preservation of their religion. And the +warlike party gained in strength. + +The date of the death of Gaius (Shebat 22) was appointed as a day of +memorial in the Jewish calendar; and for a little time the Jews had a +respite from tyranny. Agrippa, who, after the murder of Gaius, played a +large part in securing for Claudius the succession to the Imperial +throne, was confirmed in the grant of his kingdom, and, despite his +antecedents and his upbringing, proved himself a model national king. +Perhaps he had seen through the rottenness of Rome, perhaps the trial of +Gaius' mad escapades had deepened his nature, and led him to honor the +burning faith of the Jews. Whatever the reason, while remaining dutiful +to Rome, he devoted himself to the care of his people, to the +maintenance of their full religious and national life, and to the +strengthening of the Holy City against the struggle he foresaw. To the +Jews of the Diaspora, moreover, the succession of Claudius brought a +renewal of privileges. An edict of tolerance was promulgated, first to +the Alexandrians, and afterwards to the communities in all parts of the +habitable globe, by which liberty of conscience and internal autonomy +were restored, with a notable caution against Jewish missionary +enterprise. "We think it fitting," runs the decree, "to permit the Jews +everywhere under our sway to observe their ancient customs without +hindrance; and we hereby charge them to use our graciousness with +moderation and not to show contempt of the religious observances of +other people, but to keep their own laws quietly."[1] Nevertheless the +tolerant principle on which Caesar and Augustus had sought to found the +Empire was surely giving way to a more tyrannical policy, which viewed +with suspicion all bodies that fostered a corporate life separate from +that of the State, whether Jewish synagogue, Stoic school, or religious +college. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIX, v. 2.] + +The conflict between Rome and Jerusalem entered on a bitterer stage when +Agrippa died in 44 C.E. Influenced by his self-seeking band of +freedmen-counselors, who saw in office in Palestine a golden opportunity +for spoliation, Claudius placed the vacant kingdom again under the +direct administration of Roman procurators, and appointed to the office +a string of the basest creatures of the court, who revived the +injustices of the worst days of the Republic. + +From 48-52 C.E. Palestine was under the governorship of Ventidius +Cumanus, who seemed deliberately to egg on the Jews to insurrection. +When a Roman soldier outraged the Jewish conscience by indecent conduct +in the Temple during the Passover, Cumanus refused all redress, called +on the soldiers to put down the clamoring people, and slew thousands of +them in the holy precincts.[1] A little later, when an Imperial officer +was attacked on the road and robbed, Cumanus set loose the legionaries +on the villages around, and ordered a general pillage. When a Galilean +Jew was murdered in a Samaritan village, and the Jewish Zealots, failing +to get redress, attacked Samaria, Cumanus fell on them and crucified +whomever he captured. Then, indeed, the Roman governor of Syria, not so +reckless as his subordinate, or, it may be, corrupted by the man anxious +to step into the procurator's place, summoned Cumanus before him, and +sent him to Rome to stand his trial for maladministration. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XX. v. 3.] + +But this act of belated justice brought the Jews small comfort; Cumanus +was succeeded by Felix, an even worse creature. He was the brother of +the Emperor's favorite Narcissus, "by badness raised to that proud +eminence," and the husband of the Herodian princess Drusilia, who had +become a pagan in order to marry him. Tacitus, the Roman historian, +says[1] that "with all manner of cruelty he exercised royal functions in +the spirit of a slave." Under his rapacious tyranny the people were +goaded to fury. Bands of assassins, Sicarii (so called by both Romans +and Jews because of the short dagger, sica, which they used), sprang up +over the country. Now they struck down Romans and Romanizers, and now +they were employed by the governor himself to put out of the way rich +Jewish nobles whose possessions he coveted. From time to time there were +more serious risings, some purely political, others led by a +pseudo-Messiah, and all alike put down with cruelty. Roman governors +were habitually corrupt, grasping, and cruel, but Mommsen declares that +those of Judea in the reigns of Claudius and Nero, who were chosen from +the upstart equestrians, exceeded the usual measure of worthlessness and +oppressiveness. The Jews believed that they had drunk to the dregs the +cup of misery, and that God must send them a Redeemer. There were no +prophets to preach as at the time of the struggle with Babylon and +Assyria, that the oppression was God's chastisement for their sins. And +it was inconceivable to them that the power of wickedness should be +allowed to triumph to the end. + +[Footnote 1: Hist. v. 9.] + +Steadily the party that clamored for war gained in strength, and the +apprehensions of the Pharisees who viewed the political struggle with +misgiving, lest it should end in the loss of the national center and the +destruction of religious independence, were overborne by the fury of the +masses. The oppression by Roman governors and Romanizing high priests +did not diminish when Nero succeeded Claudius. For the rest of the +Empire the first five years of his reign (the _quinquennium Neronis_) +were a period of peace and good government, but for the Jews they +brought little or no relief. The harsh Roman policy toward the Jews may +have been specially instigated by Seneca, the Stoic philosopher, who was +Nero's counselor during his saner years, and who entertained a strong +hatred of Judaism. But we need not look for such special causes. It had +been the fixed habit of Republican Rome to crush out the national spirit +of a subject people, "to war down the proud," as her greatest poet +euphemistically expressed it; and now that spirit was adopted by the +Imperial Caesars in dealing with the one and only people resolved to +preserve inviolate its national life and its national religion. Nero +indeed recalled Felix, and Festus, who was appointed in his place, made +an attempt to mend affairs, but he died within a year, and was succeeded +by two procurators that were worthy followers of Felix. The first of +them was Albinus (62-64), of whom Josephus says that there was no sort +of wickedness in which he had not a hand. The same authority says that +compared with Gessius Florus, the governor under whom the Rebellion +burst out, he was "most just." Florus owed his appointment to Poppaea, +the profligate wife of Nero, and his conduct bears the interpretation +that he was deliberately anxious to fill the measure of persecution to +the brim and drive the nation to war. + +The very forms of privilege which had been left to the Jews were turned +to their hurt. The Herodian tetrarchs of Chalcis, to whom the Romans +granted the power of appointing the high priests, true to the tradition +of their house, appointed only such as were confirmed Romanizers, and +the most unscrupulous at that. When Felix was governor, the high priest +was the notorious Ananias, of whom the Talmud says, "Woe to the House of +Ananias; woe for their cursings, woe for their serpent-like +hissings."[1] Herod Agrippa II, the son of Agrippa, who held the +principate from 50-100 C.E., and was the faithful creature of Rome +throughout the period of his people's stress, proclaiming himself on his +coins "lover of Caesar and lover of Rome," deposed and created high +priests with unparalleled frequency as a means of extorting money and +rewarding the leading informers. There were seven holders of the office +during the last twenty years of Roman rule, and "he who carried furthest +servility and national abnegation received the prize." The high priests +thus formed a kind of anti-national oligarchy; they robbed the other +priests of their dues, and reduced them to poverty, and were the willing +tools of Roman tyranny. Together with the Herodian princes, who indulged +every lust and wicked passion, they undermined the strength of the +people like some fatal canker, much as the priests and nobles had done +at the first fall of Jerusalem, or, again, in the days of the Seleucid +Emperors. Apart from governors, tax-collectors, and high priests, the +Romans had an instrument of oppression in the Greek-speaking population +of Palestine and Syria, which maintained an inveterate hostility to the +Jews. The immediate cause of the great Rebellion actually arose out of a +feud between the Jewish and the Gentile inhabitants of Caesarea. The +Hellenistic population outnumbered the Jews in the Herodian foundations +of Caesarea, Sepphoris, Tiberias, Paneas, etc., as well as in the old +Greek cities of Doris, Scythopolis, Gerasa, Gadara, and the rest of the +Decapolis. This population regarded religion only as the pretext for +public ceremonials and entertainments; it was scornful of the Jewish +abstention from these things, and was aroused to the bitterest hatred by +the social aloofness of their neighbors. Violent riots between Jew and +Gentile were constantly taking place, and whether they were the +aggressors or merely fighting in self-defense, the Jews were the +scapegoats for the breaking of the peace. Stung by constant outrage on +the part of their neighbors, the Jews turned upon them at Caesarea, and +drove them out of the town. Thereupon Florus called them to reckoning, +marched on Jerusalem, and plundered the Temple treasury. This event +happened on the tenth day of Iyar in the year 66 C.E. The war-party +determined to force the struggle to a final issue. Hitherto they had +only been able to arouse a section to venture desperate sporadic +insurrection against the might of Rome. Now they carried the people with +them to engage in a national rebellion. + +[Footnote 1: Pesahim, 57a.] + +Agrippa II, who was amusing himself at Alexandria when the first +outbreak occurred, hurried back to Jerusalem, and sought to quiet the +people by impressing upon them the invincible power of Rome. But he +failed, and the Romanizing priests' party failed, and the peaceful +leaders of the Pharisees failed, to shake their determination. Messianic +hopes were rife among the masses, and were invested with a materialistic +interpretation. The Zealots, it is alleged by the pagan as well as the +Jewish authorities for the period, believed that the destined time was +come when the Jews should rule the world. The people looked for the +realization of the prophecy of Isaiah (41:2), "He shall raise up the +righteous one from the East, give the nations before Israel, and make +him rule over kings." + +The belief in the approach of the Messianic kingdom was undoubtedly one +of the mainsprings of the revolt. There had been a series of popular +leaders claiming to be Messiahs, but in the final struggle it was not +the claim of any individual, but the passionate faith of the whole +people, that inspired a belief in the coming of a perfect deliverance. +Some events appeared to favor the fulfilment of their hopes of temporal +sovereignty, bred though they were of despair. Rome under the corrupting +influence of Nero seemed to be passing her zenith; national movements +were stirring in the West, in Gaul and in Germany; in the East the +Parthians were again threatening the security of the Roman provinces. +The Jewish cause, on the other hand, seemed to be gaining ground +everywhere. Its converts, numerous in the West, were still more numerous +and important in the East. Among those recently brought over to the true +faith as full proselytes were Helena, the queen of Adiabene, a kingdom +situate in Mesopotamia, and her son Izates, who built themselves +splendid palaces at Jerusalem. In Babylon the Jews had made themselves +almost independent, and waged open war on the Parthian satraps. A large +section of the people cherished a somewhat simple theodicy. How could +God allow the wicked and dissolute Romans to prosper and the chosen +people to be oppressed? The Hellenistic writers of Sibylline oracles and +the Hebrew writers of Apocalypses, imitating the doom-songs of Isaiah +and Ezekiel, announced the coming overthrow of evil and the triumph of +good. Evil had reached its acme in Nero, and the time had come when God +would break the "fourth horn" of Daniel's vision (ch. 8), and exalt his +chosen people. + +The fight for national independence was bound to have come, for nothing +could have prevented the Romans from their attempt to crush the spirit +of the Jews, and nothing could have held back the Jews from making a +supreme effort to obtain their freedom from the hated yoke. For one +hundred and twenty years Palestine had been ground beneath the iron heel +of Roman governors and Romanizing tyrants. The conditions of the foreign +rule had steadily grown more intolerable. At first the oppression was +mainly fiscal; then it had sought to crush all political liberty, and +finally it had come to outrage the deepest religious feeling and menace +the Temple-worship. As Graetz says, "The Jewish people was like a +captive, who, continually visited by his jailer, rattles at his fetters +with the strength of despair, till he wrenches them asunder." It was not +only the freedom of the Jew, but the safety of Judaism that was +imperiled by the misrule of a Claudius and a Nero. The war against the +Romans was then not merely a struggle for national liberty, but, equally +with the wars of the Maccabees against the Seleucids, an episode in the +more vital conflict between Hebraism and paganism, between material +force and the ardent passion for religious freedom. + + + + +II + +THE LIFE OF JOSEPHUS TO THE FALL OF JOTAPATA + + +Josephus was essentially an apologist, and his writings include not only +an apology for his people, but an apology for his own life. In contrast +with the greater Jewish writers, he was given to vaunting his own deeds. +We have therefore abundant, if not always reliable, information about +the chief events of his career. It must always be borne in mind that he +had to color the narrative of his own as well as his people's history to +suit the tastes and prejudices of the Roman conqueror. He was born in 37 +C.E., the first year of the reign of Gaius Caesar, the lunatic Emperor, +who nearly provoked the Jews to the final struggle. Though he is known +to history as Josephus Flavius, his proper name was Joseph ben +Mattathias, Josephus being the Latinized form of the Hebrew [Hebrew: +Yosef] and his patronymic being exchanged, when he went over to the +Romans, for the family name of his patrons, Flavius. His father was a +priest of the first of the twenty-four orders, named Jehoiarib, and on +his mother's side he was connected with the royal house of the +Hasmoneans. His genealogy, which he traces back to the time of the +Maccabean princes, is a little vague, and we may suspect that he was not +above improving it. But his family was without doubt among the priestly +aristocracy of Jerusalem, and his father, he says, was "eminent not only +on account of his nobility, but even more for his virtue."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Vita, 2.] + +He was brought up with his brother Matthias to fit himself for the +priestly office, and he received the regular course of Jewish education +in the Torah and the tradition. He says in the _Antiquities_ that "only +those who know the laws and can interpret the practices of our +ancestors, are called educated among the Jews;" and it is likely that he +attended in his boyhood one of the numerous schools that existed in +Jerusalem at the time. According to the Talmud there were four hundred +and eighty synagogues each with a Bet Sefer for teaching the written law +and a Bet Talmud for the study of the oral law.[1] From his silence we +may infer that he did not study Greek at this period, and Aramaic was +his natural tongue. He was never able to speak Greek fluently or with +sufficient exactness, because, as he says in the _Antiquities_, "Our own +nation does not encourage those who learn the language of many peoples, +and so color their discourses with the smoothness of their periods: for +they look upon this sort of accomplishment as common, not only to +freemen, but to any slave that pleases to learn it."[2] When, in his +middle age, he set himself to write the history of his people in Greek, +he was compelled to get the help of friends to correct his composition +and syntax. + +[Footnote 1: Yer. Meg. iii. 1.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XX. xi. 2.] + +As to his Hebrew accomplishments, he tells us, with his native +immodesty, that he acquired marvelous proficiency in learning, and was +famous for his great memory and understanding. When he was fourteen +years of age, he continues, such was his fame that the high priests and +principal men of the city frequently came to consult him about difficult +points of the law. His mature works do not show any profound knowledge +either of the Halakah or of the Haggadah, so that the statement is not +to be taken strictly. It is probably nothing more than a grandiloquent +way of saying that he was a precocious child, who impressed his elders. +Paul, too, claimed that he was "a Pharisee of the Pharisees, and zealous +beyond those of his own age in the Jews' religion," and yet he can +hardly be regarded as an authority on the tradition. The autobiography +of Josephus, it is pertinent to remember, was designed to impress the +Romans with the greatness of the writer, and its readers were not +equipped with the means of criticising his Jewish accomplishments. With +the same object of impressing the Romans, Josephus recounts that, when +about the age of sixteen, he had a mind to imbue himself with the tenets +of the three Jewish parties, the Sadducees, the Pharisees, and the +Essenes. + +Elsewhere he describes the teaching of these sects for the benefit of +his Roman readers according to a technical classification borrowed from +his environment, i.e. he represents them as three philosophical schools +of the Greek type, each holding different views about fate and +Providence and the nature of the soul and its immortality. But just as +this is demonstrably a misleading coloring of the difference between the +sections of the Jewish people, so is his attempt to represent that he +attended, as a cultured Greek or Roman of the time would have done, +three philosophical colleges. He was compelled by the needs of his +audience to present Jewish life in the form of Greco-Roman institutions, +however ill it fits the mould, and his remarks about sects and schools +must always be taken with caution. It is as though a modern writer +should describe Judaism as a Church, and express its ideas and +observances in the language of Christian theology. + +There is, however, no reason to doubt that Josephus made himself +acquainted with the tenets of the chief teachers of the time, and he may +conceivably have sat at the feet of Rabbi Gamaliel, then the chief sage +at Jerusalem. But, anxious to exhibit his catholicity, after professing +himself a Pharisee, he says that, not content with these studies, he +became for three years a faithful disciple of one Banus, who lived in +the desert, and used no other clothing than grew upon trees, ate no +other food than that which grew wild, and bathed frequently in cold +water both night and day.[1] The extreme hermit form of the religious +life was more fashionable in the first century of the Christian era +among Gentiles than among Jews, and it is not unlikely that Josephus is +embroidering his idea of life in an Essene community, rather than +setting down his actual experience. An Essene he never became, but he +remained throughout his life very partial to certain forms of the Essene +belief, more especially those which coincided with the Greco-Roman +superstitions of the time, such as the literal prediction of future +events, the meaning of dreams, the significance of omens.[2] These +ideas, handed down from primitive Israel, had lived on among the masses +of the people, though discarded by the learned teachers, and Josephus, +finding them in vogue among his masters, readily professed acceptance of +them. + +[Footnote 1: Vita, 2.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. B.J. II. viii. 12; III. viii. 3; VI. v. 4.] + +Abandoning apparently the idea of being a hermit, Josephus at the age of +nineteen returned to Jerusalem, and began to conduct himself according +to the rules of the Pharisee sect, which is akin, he says, to the school +of the Stoics. The comparison of the Pharisees with the Stoics is again +misleading, and based on nothing more than the formal likeness of their +doctrines about Providence. The Pharisees were essentially the party +that upheld the whole tradition and the separateness of Israel. They +numbered in their ranks the most popular teachers, and politically, +though opposed to Rome and all its ways, they counseled submission so +long as religious liberty was not infringed. It may be that Josephus +only professed his attachment to them after his surrender, because, as +pacifists and believers in moral as against physical force, they were +favorably regarded by the Romans; but even if as a young and ambitious +priest he attached himself to their body early in life in order to gain +influence among the people, he was not a representative Pharisee. He +obtained a certain acquaintance with the teaching of the Pharisees, and +partly shared their political views, though not from the same motives as +their true leaders. Yet the very next step in his life that he +chronicles marks his outlook as fundamentally different. + +At the age of twenty-six, after seven years in Jerusalem, during which +he exercised his priestly functions, he journeyed to Rome. The cause of +his voyage, on which he was picturesquely wrecked and had to swim for +his life through the night, was the deliverance from prison of certain +priests closely related to him, who had been sent there as prisoners by +Felix, the tyrannical Roman governor. At Rome, through his acquaintance +with Aliturius, an actor of plays, a favorite of Nero, and by birth a +Jew, he came into touch with the profligate court. To the genuine +Pharisee a Jewish play-actor would have been an abomination. Josephus +used his acquaintance to obtain an introduction to Poppaea Sabina, the +Emperor's wife for the time. Though a by-word for shamelessness of life, +she was herself one of "the fearers of the Lord" ([Greek: sebomenoi]), +who professed adherence to the Jewish creed without accepting the Jewish +law. Josephus won her favor, and through it procured the liberation of +the priests. The Imperial city was then at the height of its material +magnificence, and must have made an immense impression of power upon the +young Jewish aristocrat. Having acquired a lasting admiration for Rome +and a desire to enter her society and a conviction of her invincibility, +he returned to Palestine in triumph--and with the spirit of an +opportunist. This at least is the picture he draws of himself, but a +more kindly interpretation might see in the moment of his return the +indication of a genuine patriotic feeling. + +When he arrived in Jerusalem, in the year 65 C.E., he found his country +seething with rebellion. The crisis soon came to a head. Gessius Florus, +who owed his governorship, as Josephus owed the success of his errand, +to the favor of the "God-fearing" Poppaea, roused the people to fury by +his pillage of the Temple, and the moderates could no longer hold the +masses in check. The Zealots seized the fortress of Antonia, which +overlooked the Temple, and, having become masters of the city, murdered +the high priest Ananias. Eleazar, whom Josephus, perhaps confusedly, +describes as his son, an intense nationalist among the priests, became +the leader in counsel, and sealed the rebellion by persuading the people +to discontinue the daily sacrifice offered in the name of the Roman +Emperor. + +At the same time the extermination of the Jews in the Hellenistic +cities, Caesarea, Scythopolis, and Damascus, by the infuriated Syrians, +who organized a kind of Palestinian Vespers, convinced the people that +they were engaged in a war to the death. The Herodian party, as the +royal house and its supporters were called, endeavored to preserve +peace, by dwelling on the overpowering might of Rome and the inevitable +end of the insurrection, but in vain. In fear the priests withdrew to +their duties in the Temple, and did not venture out till the Zealots +were for a time dislodged. The Roman legate of Syria, Cestius Gallus, +after the defeat of the Romanizing party by the Zealots, himself marched +on Jerusalem in the autumn of 68 C.E. with two legions. But he failed +ignominiously to quell the revolt. The Roman garrison in the city was +put to the sword, and the legate, while beating a hasty retreat, was +routed in the defiles of Beth-Horon, where two centuries before the +Syrian hosts had been decimated by Judas the Maccabee. The two legions +were cut to pieces. The fierce valor of the untrained national levies +had broken the serried cohorts of the Roman veterans, and in the +unexpectedness of this deliverance the party of rebellion for a time was +triumphant among all sections of the Jewish people. + +Even those who had been the most determined Romanizers, such as the +high-priestly circle, were induced, either by a belief in the chances of +success or from a desire to protect themselves by a seeming adherence to +the national cause, to throw in their lot with the war party. It might +have been better for their people, had they, like Agrippa, joined the +Romans. Half-hearted at best in their support of the struggle, yet by +their wealth and position able at first to obtain a commanding part in +the conduct of the war, they used it to temporize with the foe and to +dull the edge of the popular feeling. Josephus unfortunately does not +enlighten us as to the inner movements in Judea at this crisis. He +merely relates that the Sanhedrin became a council of war, and Palestine +was divided into seven military districts, over most of which commanders +of the Herodian faction were placed. Joseph the son of Gorion and +Ananias the high priest, both members of the moderate party, were chosen +as governors of Jerusalem, with a particular charge to repair the walls, +and the Zealot leader Eleazar the son of Simon was passed over. + +Josephus himself, though he possessed no military experience, and had +apparently taken no part in the opening campaign, was made governor of +Lower and Upper Galilee, the most important military post of all; for +Galilee was the bulwark of Judea, and if the Romans could be +successfully resisted there, the rebellion might hope for victory. It +lay in a strategic position between the Roman outposts, Ptolemais (the +modern Acre) on the coast and Agrippa's kingdom in the east. It was a +country made for defense, a country of rugged mountains and natural +fastnesses, and inhabited by a hardy and warlike population, which, for +half a century, had been in constant insurrection. Thence had come the +founders of the Zealots and the still more violent band of the Sicarii, +and each town in the region had its popular leader. Josephus was +expected to hold it with its own resources, for little help could be +spared from the center of Palestine. Guerrilla fighting was the natural +resource of an insurgent people, which had to win its freedom against +well-trained and veteran armies. It had been the method of Judas +Maccabaeus against Antiochus amid the hills of Judea. Josephus, however, +made no attempt to practise it, and showed no vestige of appreciation of +the needs of the case. + +It is difficult to gather the reason of his appointment, unless it be +that in his writings he deliberately kept back from the Romans the more +enthusiastic part he had played at the outset of the struggle. So far as +his own account goes, neither devotion to the national cause, nor +experience, nor prestige, nor power of leadership, nor knowledge of the +country recommended him. His distinguished birth and his friendship for +Rome were hardly sufficient qualifications for the post. The influence +of his friend, the ex-high priest Joshua ben Gamala, may have prevailed, +and one is fain to surmise that those who sent him, as well as he +himself, were anxious to pretend resistance to Rome, but really to work +for resistance to the rebellion. + +At all events, at the end of the autumn of 67, Josephus repaired to his +command, taking with him two priests, Joazar and Judas, as +representatives of the Sanhedrin at Jerusalem. In the record which he +gives of his exploits in the _Wars_, he says that his first care was to +gain the good-will of the people, drill his troops, and prepare the +country to meet the threatened invasion. In the _Life_, which he wrote +some twenty years later, when he had perforce to cultivate a more +complete servility of mind, and was anxious to convince the Romans that +he was a double-dealing traitor to his country, he represents that he +set himself from the beginning to betray the province. The record of his +actions points to the conclusion that he fell between the stools of +covert treachery and half-hearted loyalty, that he was neither as +villainous in design nor as heroic in action as he makes himself out to +be. He made some show of preparation at the beginning, but from the +moment the Roman army arrived under Vespasian, and he realized that Rome +was in earnest, he abandoned all hope of success, and set himself to +make his own position secure with the conqueror. + +The chief cities of Galilee were Sepphoris, situated on the lower spurs +of the hills near the plain of Esdraelon, which divides the country from +Samaria and Judea; Tiberias, a city founded by Herod Antipas on the +western borders of the Lake of Gennesareth, and Tarichea, also an +Herodian foundation, situate probably at the southeast corner of the +lake. All these Josephus fortified; and he strengthened with walls other +smaller towns and natural fortresses, such as Jotapata, Salamis, and +Gamala.[1] He says also that he appointed a Sanhedrin of seventy members +for the province, and in each town established a court of seven judges, +as though he were come to exercise a civil government. He did, however, +get together an army of more than a hundred thousand young men, and +armed them with the old weapons which he had collected. Though he +despaired of their standing up against the Romans, he ordered them in +the Roman style, appointing a large number of subordinate officers and +teaching them the use of signals and a few elementary military +movements. His army ultimately consisted of 60,000 footmen, 4,500 +mercenaries, in whom he put greatest trust, and 600 picked men as his +body-guard. He had little cavalry, but as Galilee was a country of +hills, this deficiency need not have proved fatal, had he been a +strategist or even a loyalist. During the eight months' respite that he +enjoyed before the appearance of the Roman army, he spent most of his +time in civil feud, and succeeded in dividing the population into two +hostile parties. He boasts that, though he took up his command at an age +when, if a man has happily escaped sin, he can scarcely guard himself +against slander, he was perfectly honest, and refrained from stealing +and peculation[2]; but he is at pains to prove that he threw every +obstacle in the way of the patriotic party, and did all that an open +enemy of the Jews could have done to undermine the defense of the +province. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. II. xx. 6. His account of his actions in Galilee is, +however, from beginning to end, open to question; and the contemporary +account of Justus has unfortunately disappeared entirely. It is likely +that his rival's narrative would have shown him in a better light than +his own.] + +[Footnote 2: Vita, 15.] + +Before his arrival in the north, the leader of the national party was +John the son of Levi, a man of Gischala, which was one of the mountain +fastnesses in Northern Galilee, now known as Jish, near the town of +Safed.[1] Josephus heaps every variety of violent abuse upon him in +order, no doubt, to please his patrons. When he introduces him on the +scene, he describes him as "a very knavish and cunning rogue, outdoing +all other rogues, and without his fellow for wicked practices. He was a +ready liar, and yet very sharp in gaining credit for his fictions. He +thought it a point of virtue to deceive, and would delude even those +nearest to him. He had an aptitude for thieving," and so forth. Whenever +the historian mentions the name of his rival, he rattles his box of +abusive epithets until the reader is wearied by the image of the monster +conjured up before him. But, unfortunately for his credit, Josephus also +records John's deeds, and these reveal him as one who, if at times cruel +and intriguing, yet lived and died for his country, while his enemy was +thinking of saving himself. + +[Footnote 1: The Hebrew name of the fortress was [Hebrew: Nosh Halav], +meaning "clot of cream"; the place was so called because of the +fertility of the soil on which it stands.] + +It is not surprising then that John, having eyes only for the defense of +the land, was not blind to the double-dealing of the priestly governor, +who had been sent by the Romanizing party to organize resistance. The +first event that brought about a collision between them was the +suspicious conduct of Josephus in the matter of some spoil seized from +the steward of King Agrippa and brought to Tarichea. Agrippa had +entirely turned his back on the national rising, and was the faithful +ally of the Romans. He was therefore an open enemy, and Tiberias, which +had been under his dominion, had revolted from him. Josephus upbraided +the captors for the violence they had offered to the king, and declared +his intention to return the spoil to the owner. A little later he +prevented John from destroying the corn in the province stored by the +Romans for themselves. The people were naturally indignant at this +conduct, and led by John and another Zealot, Jesus the son of Sapphias, +the governor of Tiberias, and by Justus of the same city, who was +afterwards to be a rival historian, they rose against Josephus. With +stratagems worthy of a better cause he evaded this onslaught. + +More briefly in the _Wars_, and in the _Life_ at wearisome length, +Josephus tells a tale of intrigue and counter-intrigue, mutual attempts +at assassination, wiles and stratagems to undermine the power of each +other, which took place between him and John. The city of Tarichea was +his stronghold, Tiberias the hot-bed of the movement against him. The +part he professes to have played is so extraordinary in its meanness +that we are fain to believe that it is largely fiction, composed to show +that he was only driven in the end by danger of his life to fight +against the sacred power of Rome. However that may be, John reported his +doings to the Sanhedrin at Jerusalem, and that body, which was now, it +seems, in the control of the Pharisees and Zealots, sent a deputation to +recall him. Simon, the celebrated head of the Sanhedrin and leader of +the national party, had pressed for the dismissal of Josephus.[1] +Ananias, the ex-high priest and Sadducee, had at first been his +champion, but he had been overborne. The deputation consisted of two +Pharisees, Jonathan and Ananias, and two priests, Joazar and Simon. +Warned by his friends in Jerusalem of their coming, Josephus had all the +passes watched, seized the embassy, and recaptured the four cities that +had revolted from him: Sepphoris, Gamala, Gischala, and Tiberias. +According to the account in the _Wars_, the cities revolted again, and +were recaptured by similar stratagems; and when the disturbances in +Galilee were quieted in this way, the people, ceasing to prosecute their +civil dissensions, betook themselves to make preparations for the war +against the Romans. The invasion had begun in earnest, and Josephus, +fortified, as he said, by a dream, which told him not to be afraid, +because he was to fight with the Romans, and would live happily +thereafter, decided for the time not to abandon his post. + +[Footnote 1: It is notable that this is the only reference in the work +of Josephus to the great Rabbi; the name of his successor in the +headship of the Sanhedrin, Johanan ben Zakkai, does not occur even +once.] + +Josephus had displayed his administrative talents in these eight months +of peaceful government by losing all that had been gained in the four +months of the successful rebellion at Jerusalem. He now had an +opportunity of displaying his military abilities. In the spring of 67 +C.E., Flavius Vespasian, the veteran commander of the legions in Germany +and Britain, who, on the defeat of Cestius Gallus, had been chosen by +Nero to conduct the Jewish campaign, brought his army of four legions +from Antioch to Ptolemais. He was met there by King Agrippa, who brought +a large force of auxiliaries, and by a deputation of citizens from +Sepphoris, the chief city of Galilee, who tendered their submission and +invited him to send a garrison. Josephus, though he knew of the city's +Romanizing leanings, had negligently or deliberately failed to occupy +it, so that the place was lost without a blow. He made a feeble effort +to recapture it, for appearance sake it would seem, and then, though he +had an unlimited choice of favorable positions, and the Roman forces +were not very large at the time, he abandoned the attempt of meeting the +enemy in the field. Titus arrived from Alexandria, with two more +legions, the fifth and the tenth, and then the Roman army, numbering +with auxiliaries 60,000 men, set out from Ptolemais, and proceeded to +occupy Galilee. + +The Jewish forces were encamped on the hills above Sepphoris. Josephus +describes the wonderful array and order of the Roman army on the march. +The sight seems to have led a large part of his army to run away. He +himself, when he saw that he had not an army sufficient to engage the +enemy, despaired of the success of the war, and determined to place +himself as far as he could out of danger. In this inspiring mood he +abandoned the rest of the country, sent a dispatch to Jerusalem +demanding help, and threw himself into the fortress of Jotapata, +situated on the crest of a mountain in Northern Galilee, which he chose +as the most fit for his security. Vespasian, hearing of this step, and, +as Josephus modestly suggests, "supposing that, could he only get +Josephus into his power, he would have conquered all Judea," straightway +laid siege to the town (Iyar 16). For forty-two days the place was +besieged, and during that period every resource that heroic resistance +could suggest, according to the narrative of its commandant, was +exhausted. The height of the wall was raised to meet the Roman +embankments, provisions were brought in by soldiers disguised in +sheep-skins, the Roman works were destroyed by fire, boiling oil was +poured on the assailants, and finally the city was not stormed till the +garrison was worn out with famine and fatigue. But, as has been pointed +out, the details recorded are "the commonplaces of poliorcetics," and +may have been borrowed by Josephus from some military text-book and +neatly applied. Jotapata fell on the first day of Tammuz, and whatever +the heroism of his army, the general did not shine in the last days of +his command or in the manner of his surrender. Suspected by his men and +threatened by them with death, he was unable to give himself up openly. +He took refuge with some of his comrades in a deep pit, where they were +discovered by an old woman, who informed the Romans. Vespasian, who, we +are again told, believed that, if he captured Josephus, the greater part +of the war would be over, sent one Nicanor, well known to the Jewish +commandant, to take him. Josephus, professing prophetical powers, +offered to surrender, and quieted his conscience by a secret prayer to +God, which is a sad compound of cant and cowardice: + +"Since it pleaseth Thee, who hast created the Jewish nation, now to +bring them low, and since their good fortune is gone over to the Romans, +and since Thou hast chosen my soul to foretell what is to come to pass +hereafter, I willingly surrender, and am content to live. I solemnly +protest that I do not go over to the Romans as a deserter, but as Thy +minister." + +It may be that Josephus really believed he had prophetic powers, and +thought he was imitating the great prophets of Israel and Judah who had +proclaimed the uselessness of resistance to Assyria and Babylon. But +they, while denouncing the wickedness of the people, had shared their +lot with them. And Josephus, who weakly sought a refuge for himself +after defeat, resembles rather the prophets whom Jeremiah denounced: +"They speak a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of the +Lord. They say still unto them that despise me, The Lord hath said, Ye +shall have peace; and they say unto everyone that walketh after the +imagination of his own heart, No evil shall come upon you."[1] His +comrades however prevented him from giving himself up, and called on him +to play a braver part and die with them, each by his own hand. He put +them off by talking philosophically, as he has it, about the sin of +suicide, a euphemism for a collection of commonplaces on the duty of +preserving their lives. But when this enraged them, he bethought him of +another device, and proposed that they should cast lots to kill each +other. They assented, and by Divine Providence he was left to the last +with one other, whom he persuaded to break his oath and live +likewise.[2] Having thus escaped, he was led by Nicanor to Vespasian, +the whole Roman army gathering around to gaze on the hero. Continuing +his prophetical function, when he found that he was like to be sent to +Nero, he announced to Vespasian, "Thou art Caesar and Emperor, thou, and +this thy son.... thou art not only lord over me, but over the land and +the sea and all mankind." The Roman general was incredulous, till, +hearing that his prisoner had foretold the length of the siege of +Jotapata--a prophecy which, of course, he had the ability to fulfil--and +further, on the report of the death of Nero, having conceived the +possibility of becoming Emperor, he had regard to the Jewish prophet, +and, without setting him at liberty, bestowed favors on him, and made +him easy about his future. Such was the end of the military career of +Josephus. + +[Footnote 1: Jer. 23: 16-17.] + +[Footnote 2: A charitable explanation of this self-debasing account of +Josephus is that he was driven to invent some story to extenuate his +resistance to the Romans, and had to blacken his reputation as a patriot +to save his skin. The fact that he was kept prisoner some time by +Vespasian suggests that he was not so big a traitor as he pretends.] + +The Talmud relates that Rabbi Johanan ben Zakkai, the head of the +Pharisees, was carried in a coffin outside the walls of Jerusalem by his +disciples, and was brought to the Roman camp, where he hailed Vespasian +as Emperor and Caesar, and thereby gained his favor. If not apocryphal, +the event must have happened in 69 C.E., when the Roman commander was +generally expected to aim at the Imperial throne, then the object of +strife between rival commanders. The rabbi belonged to the peace party, +and from the beginning had opposed the war. And though his action was +disapproved by the later generations, it was justified by his subsequent +conduct; for it was he who, by founding the famous college at Jabneh, +kept alive the Jewish spirit after the fall of the nation. For him +surrender was a valid means to the preservation of the nation. The +action of Josephus hardly bears the same justification. His desire for +self-preservation was natural enough, but his manner of effecting it was +not honorable. He was a general who, having taken a lead in the struggle +for independence, had seen all his men fall, and had at the end invited +the last of his comrades to kill each other, and he saved his life by +sacrificing his honor. His mind was from the beginning of the struggle +subjugated to Rome, but unhappily he accepted the most responsible post +in the national defense and betrayed it. His address to Vespasian was +mere flattery, designed to impose on a superstitious man's credulity; +for the ear of Vespasian, says Merivale, "was always open to pretenders +to supernatural knowledge." Lastly Josephus used his safety, not for the +purpose of preserving the Jewish heritage, but for personal ends. He +became a flunkey of the Flavian house, and straightway started on the +transformation from a Jewish priest and soldier into a Roman courtier +and literary hireling. Hard circumstances compelled him to choose +between a noble and an ignoble part, between heroic action and weak +submission. He was a mediocre man, and chose the way that was not heroic +and glorious. Posterity gained something by his choice; his own +reputation was fatally marred by it. + + + + +III + +THE LIFE OF JOSEPHUS FROM THE TIME OF HIS SURRENDER + + +Josephus was little more than thirty years old at the time of his +surrender. At an age when men usually begin to realize their ambition +and ideal, his whole life's course was changed: he had to abandon all +his old associations, and accommodate himself to a different and indeed +a hostile society. Henceforth he was a liege of the Roman conqueror, and +had to submit to be Romanized not only in name but in spirit. His +condition was indeed a thinly-disguised servitude. The Romans were an +imperious as well as an Imperial people, and though in some +circumstances they were ready to spare the lives of those who yielded, +they required of them a surrender of opinion and an abasement of soul. +For the rest of his years, which comprehended the whole of his literary +activity, Josephus was not therefore a free man. He acted, spoke, and +wrote to order, compelled, whenever called upon, to do the will of his +masters. His legal condition was first that of a _libertus_ (a freedman) +of Vespasian, and as such he owed by law certain definite obligations to +his patron's family. But the moral subservience of the favored prisoner +of a subjugated people must have been a far profounder thing than the +legal obligation arising from his status; and this enforced moral and +mental subservience is a cardinal point to be remembered in forming a +judgment upon Josephus. His expressed opinions are often not the +revelation of his own mind, but the galling tribute which he was +compelled to pay for his life. And apart from the involuntary and +undeliberate adoption of Roman standards, which, living isolated from +Jewish life in Rome, he could not escape, he had in writing, and no +doubt in conversation, deliberately and consciously to assume the +deepest-seated of the Roman prejudices towards his own people. Liberty +has been defined as the power of a man to call his soul his own. And in +that sense Josephus emphatically did not possess liberty. We must be on +our guard, therefore, against regarding him as an independent historian, +much less as writing from an independent Jewish point of view. From the +time of his surrender till his death he lived and wrote as the client of +the Flavian house, and all his works had to pass the Imperial +censorship. + +His domestic life is characteristic of his subservience. At the bidding +of Vespasian, when in the Roman camp at Caesarea, he divorced his first +wife, who was locked up in Jerusalem during the siege. Though by Jewish +law it was forbidden to a priest to marry a captive woman, he took as +his second wife a Jewess that had been brought into the Roman camp. +Having no children by her, he divorced her after a year, and married +again at Alexandria. By his third wife he had three sons, but with a +Roman's carelessness of the marriage bond he divorced her late in life, +and married finally a noble Jewess of Crete, by whom he had two more +sons, Justus and Simon Agrippa. His last two wives, be it noted, came +from Hellenistic-Jewish communities, and were doubtless able to assist +him in acquiring Greek. + +The public as well as the domestic life of Josephus was controlled by +the Roman commander. Till the end of the Jewish struggle it followed the +progress of the Roman arms. He continued to play an active part in the +war, not, however, as a leader of the Jews, but as the adviser of their +enemies. He was attached to the staff of Titus, and after witnessing the +fall of the two fortresses of Galilee, Gamala and Gischala, which held +out bravely under John after the capture of Jotapata, he accompanied the +Roman at the end of the year 68 to Alexandria. There he spent a year, +till a change of fortune came to him. + +During the year 68, Vespasian captured the two chief cities which the +Jewish national party held to the east side of the Jordan, Gadara and +Gerasa. He then prepared to lay siege to Jerusalem. But hearing of the +death of Nero and of the chaos at Rome that followed it, he stayed +operations to await events in Italy. In the following year, largely by +the aid of the Jewish apostate Tiberius Alexander, he secured the +allegiance of all the Eastern legions, and was proclaimed Emperor. Three +other generals laid claim to the same dignity, under the same title of +armed force, but in the end Vespasian's friends in Italy made themselves +masters of Rome, and he repaired himself to the capital and donned the +purple. Josephus was rewarded with his complete freedom, and assumed +henceforth the family name of his Imperial patrons. When, at the end of +the year 69, Titus was appointed by his father to finish the war, he +accompanied him back to Palestine. In the eighteen months' respite that +had been vouchsafed to them, the Jews had spent their energy and +undermined their powers of resistance by internecine strife. According +to the account in the _Wars_, which unfortunately is the only full +record we have of events, John of Gischala, fleeing to Jerusalem after +the fall of the Galilean fortresses, roused the Zealots against the high +priest Ananias, who was directing the Jewish policy towards submission +to Rome. Ananias, who was of the same party as Josephus, seems to have +come to the conclusion that resistance was hopeless, and he was anxious +to make terms. John called in to his aid the half-savage Idumeans, who +had joined the Jewish rebellion against Rome. They entered the city, +and, possessing themselves of the Temple mount, spread havoc. The Temple +itself ran with blood, and 8500 dead bodies, among them that of the high +priest, defiled its precincts.[1] Josephus, who, to suit the Roman +taste, identifies religion and ritual, declares that the fall of the +city and the ruin of the nation are to be dated from that day, and upon +Ananias he passes a eulogy that is likewise written with an eye to Roman +predilections: + +"He was a prodigious lover of liberty and of democracy; he ever +preferred the public welfare before his own advantage, and he was +thoroughly sensible that the Romans were invincible. And I cannot but +think that it was because God had doomed the city to destruction on +account of its pollution, and was resolved to purge His sanctuary with +fire, that He cut off thus its great protector." + +[Footnote 1: B.J. IV. vi. 1.] + +For the better part of a year, according to our historian, the Zealots +maintained a reign of terror, and the various parties fought against one +another in the Holy City as fiercely as the Girondists and Jacobins of +the French Revolution. But on the approach of Titus they abandoned their +strife and united to resist the foe. The Roman general brought with him +four legions, the fifth, tenth, twelfth, and fifteenth, besides a large +following of auxiliaries, and his whole force amounted to 80,000 men. As +head of his staff came Tiberius Alexander, the renegade nephew of Philo +and formerly procurator of Judea. Josephus also was on the besieger's +staff--possibly he was an officer of the body-guard (_praefectus +praetorio_)--and was employed to bring his countrymen to reason. Himself +convinced, almost from the moment when he took up arms, of the certainty +of Rome's ultimate victory, and doubly convinced now, partly from +superstitious fatalism, partly from a need for extenuating his own +submission, he wasted his eloquence in efforts to make them surrender. +He knew that within the besieged city there was a considerable +Romanizing faction (including his own father), and either he believed, +or he had to pretend to believe, that he could bring over the mass to +their way of thinking. On various occasions during the siege he was sent +to the walls to summon the defenders to lay down their arms. He enlarged +each time on the invincible power of Rome, on the hopelessness of +resistance, on the clemency of Titus if they would yield, and on the +terrible fate which would befall them and the Temple if they fought to +the bitter end. What must have specially aroused the fury of the Zealots +was his insistence that the Divine Providence was now on the side of the +Romans, and that in resisting they were sinning against God. It is +little wonder that on one occasion when making these harangues he was +struck by a dart, and that his father was placed in prison by the +Zealots. Indeed it says much for the tolerance of those whom he +constantly reviles as the most abandoned scoundrels and the most cruel +tyrants that they did not do him and his family greater hurt. + +Titus, after beating back desperate attacks by the Jews, fixed his camp +on Mount Scopas, by the side of the Mount of Olives, to the north of the +city, and, abandoning the idea of taking the city fortress by storm, +prepared to beleaguer it in regular form. The Jews were not prepared for +a siege. Josephus and the Rabbis[1] agree that the supplies of corn had +been burnt by the Zealots during the civil disturbances; and as the +arrival of Titus coincided with the Passover, myriads of people, who had +come up from all parts of the country and the Diaspora to celebrate the +festival, were crowded within its walls. It is estimated that their +number exceeded two and a half million. The capital was a hard place to +capture. Josephus, following probably a Roman authority, gives an +account of the fortifications of Jerusalem from the point of view of the +besieger, which is confirmed in large part by modern research.[2] On the +southeast and west the city was unapproachable by reason of the sheer +ravines of Kedron and Hinnom, overlooked by almost perpendicular +precipices, which surrounded it. It was vulnerable therefore only on the +north, where the two heights on which it was built were connected with +the main ridge of the Judean hills; and here it was fortified with three +walls. The outermost, which was built by Agrippa I, encompassed the new +quarter of Bezetha, which lay outside the Temple mount to the northeast. +The second wall encompassed the part of the city on the Temple Mount and +reached as far as the Tower of Antonia, which overlooked and protected +the Temple. The third or innermost wall was the oldest, and encompassed +the whole of the ancient city where it was open, including the hill Acra +or Zion on the southeast, which was divided from Mount Moriah by the +cleft known as the Tyropoeon, or cheese-market. Beyond this hill there +was another eminence sloping gradually to the north, till it dropped +into the valley of Jehoshaphat with an escarpment of two hundred feet. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Abot de Rabbi Nathan, vi., ed. Schechter, p. 32.] + +[Footnote 2: B.J. V. iv. 1.] + +Thus the rampart surrounded the two hills with a continuous line of +defense, and the three quarters of the city were separated from each +other by distinct walls, so that each could hold out when the other had +fallen. The walls were strengthened with several towers, of which the +most important were Psephinus, on the third wall at the northwest +corner, Hippicus, on the old wall, which was opposite Phasaelus, and +Mariamne. But the strongest, largest, and most beautiful fortress in +Jerusalem was the Temple itself. It was not merely the visible center of +Judaism, it was the citadel of Judea. As each successive court rose +higher than the last, the "Mountain of the House" itself stood on the +highest point of the inclosure. The Temple was guarded by the tower of +Antonia, situated at the corner of the two cloisters, upon a rock fifty +cubits high, overlooking a precipice. Like the other towers, Antonia was +built by Herod, and manifested his love of largeness and strength. +Within these fortifications there were eleven thousand men under Simon, +and not more than thirty thousand trained soldiers under John, to pit +against eighty thousand Roman veterans; but of the two and a half +million people who, it is calculated, were shut up in the city, +thousands were ready at any moment to sally upon the besiegers and lay +down their lives for their beloved sanctuary. + +Within the city, however, there were also a number of persons wavering +in their desire for resistance and anxious to find a favorable +opportunity of going over to the Romans. The leaders of the +high-priestly party had been killed by the Zealots, but their followers +remained to hamper the defense of the city. If Josephus is to be +believed, during the respite of the Passover festival at the beginning +of the siege, while the Romans were preparing their approaches and siege +works, the party strife again broke out. Eleazar opened the gates of the +Temple to admit the people for the festival, but John, taking +treacherous advantage of the opportunity, led his men in with arms +concealed beneath their garments, put his opponents to the sword, and +seized the sanctuary. Josephus further represents that throughout the +siege Simon and John, while resisting the Romans and defending different +parts of the walls, were still engaged in their internecine strife, "and +did everything that the besiegers could desire them to do."[1] + +[Footnote 1: B.J. V. vi.] + +The story has not the stamp of probability, and it is more likely that +Josephus is distorting the jealousies of the two commanders into the +dimensions of civil strife. Anyhow, the resistance which the Jews +offered to the Romans showed the stubbornness of despair, or what the +historian calls "their natural endurance in misfortune." At every step +the legionaries were checked; in pitching their camp, in making their +earthworks, in bringing up their machines; and frequently desperate +sallies were made by the defenders upon the Roman entrenchments. +Nevertheless, after fifteen days the first wall was captured, and in +five days more the second was taken. By a desperate sally the besieged +recovered it for a little, but were again driven back by superior +numbers and force. Josephus is fond of contrasting the different tempers +of the two armies: on the one side power and skill, on the other +boldness and the courage born of despair; here the habit of conquering, +there intense national ardor. + +After the capture of the second wall, he was sent to parley with the +besieged, and urged, as he had done before, the invincible power of his +masters.[1] "And evident it is," he added with his renegade's theology, +"that fortune is on all hands gone over to them, and that God, who has +shifted dominion from nation to nation, is now settled in Italy."[2] +When his address was received with scorn, he proceeded, according to his +account, to lecture the people from their ancient history, in order to +prove that they had never been successful in aggressive warfare. "Arms +were never given to our nation, but we are always given up to be fought +against and taken." The Zealots' desecration of the Temple deprived them +of Divine help, and it was madness to suppose that God would be +well-disposed to the wicked. Had He not shown favor to Titus and +performed miracles in his aid? Did not the springs of Siloam run more +plentifully for the Roman general? All his appeals had no effect, and +though some faint-hearted persons deserted, the multitude held firm, and +the siege was pressed on more vigorously than ever. A wall of +circumvallation was built round the city, and the horrors of starvation +increased daily. Between the months of Nisan and Tammuz one hundred and +fifty thousand corpses were carried out of the town.[3] Josephus +expatiates on the terrible suffering, and again and again he denounces +the iniquity of the Zealots, who continued the resistance. "No age had a +generation more fruitful in wickedness; they confessed that they were +the slaves, the scum, the spurious and abortive offspring of our +nation." John committed the heinous sacrilege of using the oil preserved +in the Temple vessels for the starving soldiers. "I suppose," says the +ex-priest writing in the Roman palace, "that had the Romans made any +longer delay in attacking these abandoned men, the city would either +have been swallowed up by the ground opening on them, or been swept away +by a deluge, or destroyed as Sodom was destroyed, since it had brought +forth a generation even more godless than those that suffered such +punishments."[4] + +[Footnote 1: B.J. V. ix. 3.] + +[Footnote 2: We are reminded of the saying of Rabbi Akiba some +half-century later. When asked where God was to be sought now that the +Temple was destroyed, he replied, "In the great city of Rome" (Yer. +Taanit, 69a). But the Rabbinical utterance had a very different meaning +from the plea of Josephus.] + +[Footnote 3: B.J. V. xiii. 7.] + +[Footnote 4: B.J. V. x. and xiii.] + +Famine and weariness were breaking down the strength of the Jews, and, +after fierce resistance, the tower of Antonia was captured and razed to +the ground. Josephus adds another chapter to detail the horrors of the +famine, in which he recounts the story of the mother eating her child, +which occurs also in the Midrash.[1] The Romans, he tells us, were +filled with a religious loathing of their foes on account of their sins +in violating the Temple and eating forbidden food, and Titus excused +himself for the sufferings he caused, on the ground that, as he had +given the Jews the chance of securing peace and liberty, they had +brought the evil on themselves. Slowly but surely the Romans gained a +footing within the Temple precinct; inch by inch John was driven back, +and on the Ninth of Ab the sanctuary was stormed. A torch, hurled +probably by the hand of Titus (see below, p. 128), set the cloisters +alight, and the fire spread till the whole house was involved. The +crowning catastrophe, the burning of the Holy of Holies, happened on the +following day. + +[Footnote 1: Ekah R. 65a.] + +Josephus remained in the Roman camp throughout the siege, advising Titus +at each step how he might proceed. After the fall of the Temple he +witnessed the last desperate struggle, when a half-starved remnant of +the defenders "looked straight into death without flinching." A great +modern writer sees in this unquenchable passion of the Zealots for +liberty a sublime type of steadfastness[1]; but Josephus, who after the +fall of the Temple had made another unavailing effort to persuade them +to lay down their arms, again pours forth his abuse upon those who +fought against the sacred might of Rome. Over a million had perished in +the siege, and less than one hundred thousand were captured, of whom +only forty thousand were preserved. His favor with Titus enabled him to +redeem from captivity his brother and a large number of his friends and +acquaintances and one hundred and ninety women and children.[2] His own +estates near Jerusalem having been taken for a military colony, he +received liberal compensation in another part of Judea. From the victor +he also obtained a scroll of the law. + +[Footnote 1: George Eliot, Impressions of Theophrastus Such.] + +[Footnote 2: Vita, 75.] + +It is not certain whether he accompanied "the gentle Titus" through +Syria after the fall of the city and the razing of its walls. The +victor's progress was marked at each stopping-place by the celebration +of games, where thousands of young Jewish captives were made to kill +each other, "butchered to make a Roman holiday" and feast the eyes of +the conqueror and the Herodian ally and his spouse. But he certainly +witnessed at Rome the triumph of the Flavii, father and son, and gazed +on the shame of his country, when its most holy monuments were carried +by the noblest of the captives through the streets amid the applause and +ribald jeers of a Roman crowd. Josephus enlarges with apparent apathy on +the procession, which is commemorated and made vivid down to our own day +by the arch in the Roman Forum, through which no Jew in the Middle Ages +would pass. He records, too, that Vespasian built a Temple of Peace, in +which he stored the golden vessels taken from the Jewish sanctuary, and +put up the whole of Judea for sale as his private property.[1] Josephus +himself was housed in the royal palace, and it does not appear that he +ever returned to Palestine. The tenth legion had been left on the site +of Jerusalem as a permanent Roman garrison, and a fortified camp was +built for it on the northern hill. "The legions swallowed her up and +idolaters possessed her." _A chacun selon ses oeuvres_ is the comment of +Salvador, the Franco-Jewish historian (fl. 1850), comparing the gilded +servitude of Josephus with the fate of the patriots of Jerusalem; and +another recent historian, Graetz, has contrasted the picture of Jeremiah +uttering his touching laments over the ruins at the fall of the first +Temple with the position of Josephus pouring out his fulsome adulation +of the destroyer at the fall of the second. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. VII. vi. 6.] + +Henceforth Josephus lived, an exile from his country and his countrymen, +in the retinue of the Caesars, and entered on his career as his people's +historian. But he was never allowed to forget his dependence. His first +work was an account of the Roman war, in which he vilified the patriots +to extenuate his own surrender and his master's cruelty. It is true that +he afterwards composed an elaborate apology for his people in the form +of a history in twenty volumes, which may be considered as a kind of +palliation for the evil he had done them in action. It was more possible +to refute the Roman prejudices based on utter ignorance of Jewish +history, than the prejudices based on their narrowness of mind. But even +here the writer has often to accommodate himself to a pagan standpoint, +which could not appreciate Hebrew sublimity. When he wrote the +_Antiquities_, his mind was already molded in Greco-Roman form, and +where he seeks to glorify, he not seldom contrives to degrade. His works +are a striking example of inward slavery in outward freedom, for by dint +of breathing the foreign atmosphere and imbibing foreign notions he had +become incapable of presenting his people's history in its true light. +He had been granted full Roman citizenship, and received a literary +pension. Still he was not loved by other courtiers as worthy as himself, +and he had frequently to defend himself against the charges of his +enemies. In the reign of Vespasian, after the Zealot rising in Cyrene +had been put down, the leader, Jonathan, who was brought as a prisoner +to Rome, charged Josephus before the Emperor with having sent him both +weapons and money. The story was not believed, and the informer was put +to death. After that, Josephus relates, "when they that envied my good +fortune did frequently bring censure against me, by God's Providence I +escaped them all." + +He remained in favor under Titus and Domitian, who in turn succeeded +their father in the purple. Domitian indeed, though he persecuted the +Jews, and laid new fiscal burdens upon them, punished the accusers of +Josephus, and made his estate in Judea tax-free, and the Emperor's wife, +Domitia, also showed him kindness. But perhaps the amazing and pathetic +servility of the _Life_ is to be explained by fear of the vainglorious +despot, whose hand was heavy on all intellectual work. Historical +writers suffered most under his oppression, and it may have been +necessary to Josephus to make out that he had been a traitor. It may +appear more to his credit as a courtier than as a Jew that the enemy of +his people was friendly towards him. But his position must have been +perilous during the black reign of the tyrant, who rivaled Nero for +maniac cruelty. His chief patron was one Epaphroditus, by his name a +Greek, perhaps to be identified with a celebrated librarian and scholar, +to whom he dedicated his _Antiquities_ and the books _Against Apion_. He +lived on probably[1] till the beginning of the second century, through +the short but tranquil rule of Nerva, when there was a brief interlude +of tolerance and intellectual freedom, into the reign of Trajan, who was +to deal his people injuries as deep as those Titus had inflicted. It is +uncertain whether he survived to witness the horrors of the desperate +rising of the Jews, which sealed their national doom throughout the +Diaspora. At least he did not survive to describe it. His last work that +has come down to us is the _Life_, which is an apologetic pamphlet, +perversely self-vilifying, in which he sought to refute the accusation +of his rival Justus of Tiberias, that he had taken a commanding part in +the war against the Romans in Galilee, and had been the guiding spirit +of the Rebellion. + +[Footnote 1: It has, however, been suggested that the date of Agrippa's +death, which is recorded in the _Life_, was really 95 C.E., instead of +103 C.E., as is usually accepted; if that is so, Josephus may not have +outlived the black reign of Domitian, which lasted till 97 C.E. See J.H. +Hart, s.v. Josephus, in Encycl. Brit. 11th ed.] + +The _Life_ is the least creditable of Josephus' works; but, as we have +seen, it was wrung from him under duress, and cannot be taken as a +genuine revelation of his mind. It is not a full autobiography; save for +a short Prologue and a short Epilogue, it deals exclusively with the +author's conduct in Galilee prior to the campaign of Vespasian, and it +differs materially in political color as well as in the narrative of +facts from the account of the same period in the _Wars_. In the earlier +work his object had been to excuse his countrymen for their revolt, and +at the same time to show the ability with which he had served their true +interests, as the representative of the party that sought to preserve +the nation at the sacrifice of its independence. But in the later work +he is writing not a partisan but a personal apology, composed when his +life was in danger, and when he no longer was anxious to save +appearances with his countrymen. And he devoted his ingenuity to showing +that throughout the events in Galilee he was the friend of Rome, seeking +under the guise of resistance to smooth the way for the invaders and +deliver the gates of Palestine into their hands. That he had so to +demean himself is the most pathetic commentary on the bitter position +which he was called on to endure after twenty years of servile life. The +work was published or reissued after the death of King Agrippa, which +took place in 103 C.E., and is recorded in it.[1] Agrippa was the last +of the Herodians to rule, and with his death the last part of Palestine +that had the outward show of independence was absorbed into the Roman +Empire. But though the whole of the Jewish temporal sovereignty was +shattered before his last days, Josephus may have consoled himself with +the progressive march of Judaism in the capital city of the conqueror. + +[Footnote 1: See note above, p. 73.] + +It may be put down to the credit of Josephus that amid the court society +at Rome he to the end professed loyalty to his religion, and that he did +not complete his political desertion by religious apostasy. His loyalty +indeed is less meritorious than might seem at first sight. The Romans +generally were tolerant of creeds and cults, and the ceremonial of +Judaism, especially its Sabbath, appealed to many of them. Within the +_pomoerium_ (limits), of the ancient city none but the city gods might +be worshiped, but in Greater Rome there were numerous synagogues. In the +time of Pompey, an important Jewish community existed in the +cosmopolitan capital of the Empire, and later we have records of a +number of congregations. Philo expressly mentions the religious +privileges his brethren enjoyed at the heart of the Empire,[1] and save +for an occasional expulsion the Jews appear to have been unmolested. The +Flavian Emperors, satisfied with the destruction of the sanctuary and +the razing of Jerusalem, did not attempt to persecute the communities of +the Diaspora. For the old offering by all Jews to the Temple, they +substituted a tax of two drachmas (the equivalent of the shekel +voluntarily given hitherto to Jerusalem), which went towards the +maintenance of the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus. Later the fiscus +Judaicus, to which every Jew and proselyte had to pay, became an +instrument of oppression, but in the reigns of Vespasian and Titus it +was not harshly administered. Domitian indeed vented his indignation on +the people which he had not had the honor of conquering, and instituted +a kind of inquisition, to ferret out the early Maranos, who dissembled +their Judaism and sought to evade the tax. But his gentle successor +Nerva (96-98) restored the habit of tolerance, and struck special coins, +with the legend calumnia Judaica sublata (on the abolition of +information against the Jews), in order to mark his clemency. Save, +therefore, for the short persecution under Domitian, Judaism remained a +_licita religio_ (legalized denomination) at Rome. More than that, it +became a powerful missionary faith among the lower classes, and in small +doses almost fashionable at the court. A near relative of the Emperor, +Flavius Clemens, outraged Roman opinion by adopting its tenets.[2] It +has been suggested, and it is likely, that the chief historical work of +Josephus was written primarily for a group of fashionable proselytes to +Judaism, to whom he ministered. He mentions members of the royal house +that commended his work.[3] Some scholars have sought to associate him +with the philosopher at Rome that was visited by the four rabbis of the +Sanhedrin, the Patriarch Rabban Gamaliel, Rabbi Joshua, Rabbi Eleazar +ben Arach, and Rabbi Akiba, when they came to Rome in the reign of +Domitian.[4] But apart from the fact that he would hardly be described +as a philosopher--a term usually reserved in the Talmud for a pagan +scholar--it is as unlikely that the leaders of the Pharisaic national +party would have had interviews with the renegade, as that the renegade +would have befriended them. At Jotapata he deserted his people, and he +passed thenceforth out of their life. It is significant that, while the +history of the war was originally written in Aramaic for the benefit of +the Eastern Jews, none of his later works was either written in his +native language or translated into it, nor were they designed to be read +by Jews. + +[Footnote 1: De Leg, 82.] + +[Footnote 2: It is interesting that the wife of the first Roman governor +of Britain was accused, in 57 C.E., of "foreign superstition," and is +said to have lived a melancholy life (Tac. Ann. xiii. 32), which may +mean that she had adopted Jewish practices.] + +[Footnote 3: C. Ap. i. 5.] + +[Footnote 4: Sukkah, 22, quoted in Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der +Juden in Rom, pp. 28 and 29.] + +In the palace of the Caesars Josephus became a reputable Greco-Roman +chronicler, deliberately accommodating himself to the tastes of the +conquerors of his people, and deliberately seeking, as Renan said, "to +Hellenize his compatriots," i.e. to describe them from a Hellenized +point of view. He achieved his ambition, if such it was, to be the +classical authority upon the early history of the Jews. His record of +his people survived through the ages, and his works were included in the +public libraries of Rome, while among the Christians they had for +centuries a place next the Bible. + +As a writer, Josephus has, by the side of some glaring defects, +considerable merits: immense industry, power of vivid narrative, an +ability for using authorities, and at times a certain eloquence. But as +a man he has few qualities to attract and nothing of the heroic. He was +mediocre in character and mind, and for such there is no admiration. It +may be admitted that he lived in hard times, when it required great +strength of character for a Jew born, as he was, in the aristocratic +Romanizing section of the nation, to stand true to the Jewish people and +devote his energies to their desperate cause. He may have honestly +believed that submission to Rome was the truest wisdom; but he placed +himself in a false position by associating himself with the +insurrection. And while his national feeling led him later to attempt to +defend his people against calumny and ignorance, the conditions under +which he labored made against the production of a true and spirited +history. Yet if he does not appear worthy of admiration, we must beware +of judging him harshly; and there is deep pathos in the fact that he was +compelled in writing to be his own worst detractor. The combination, +which the autobiographical account reveals, of egoism and self-seeking, +of cowardice and vanity, of pious profession and cringing +obsequiousness, of vaunted magnanimity and spiteful malice to his foes, +of religious scruples and selfish cunning, points to a meanness of +conduct which he was forced to assume by circumstances, but which, it is +suggested, was not an expression of his true character. The document of +shame was wrung from him by his past. He might have been a reliable +historian had he not been called on to play a part in action. But the +part he played was ignoble in itself, and it blasted the whole of his +future life and his literary credit. It made his work take the form of +apology, and part of it bear the stamp of deliberate falsehood. His +besetting weakness of egoism led him as a general to betray his +countrymen; as historian of their struggle with Rome, to misrepresent +their patriotism and give a false picture of their ideals. Yet, though +to the Jews of his own day he was a traitor in life and a traducer in +letters, to the Jews of later generations he appears rather as a tragic +figure, struggling to repair his fault of perfidy, and a victim to the +forces of a hostile civilization, which in every age assail his people +intellectually, and which in his day assailed them with crushing might +physically as well as intellectually. + + + + +IV + +THE WORKS OF JOSEPHUS AND HIS RELATION TO HIS PREDECESSORS + + +The Jews, though they are the most historical of peoples, and though +they have always regarded history as the surest revelation of God's +work, have produced remarkably few historians. It is true that a large +part of their sacred literature consists of the national annals, from +the earliest time to the restoration of the nation after its first +destruction, i.e. a period of more than two thousand years. The Book of +Chronicles, as its name suggests, is a systematic summary of the whole +of that period and proves the existence of the historical spirit. But +their very engrossment with the story of their ancestors checked in +later generations the impulse to write about their own times. They saw +contemporary affairs always in the light of the past, and they were more +concerned with revealing the hand of God in events than in depicting the +events themselves. Thus, during the whole Persian period, which extended +over two hundred years, we have but one historical document, the Book of +Esther, to acquaint us with the conditions of the main body of the +Jewish people. The fortunate find, a few years back, of a hoard of +Aramaic papyri at Elephantine has given us an unexpected acquaintance +with the conditions of the Jewish colony in Upper Egypt during the fifth +and fourth centuries, and furnished a new chapter in the history of the +Diaspora. But this is an archeological substitute for literary history. + +The conquest of the East by Alexander the Great and the consequent +interchange of Hellenic and Oriental culture gave a great impulse to +historical writing among all peoples. Moved by a cosmopolitan +enthusiasm, each nation was anxious to make its past known to the +others, to assert its antiquity, and to prove that, if its present was +not very glorious, it had at one time played a brilliant part in +civilization. The Greek people, too, with their intense love of +knowledge, were eager to learn the ideas and experiences of the various +nations and races who had now come into their ken. + +Hence, on the one hand, there appeared works on universal history by +Greek polymaths, such as Hecataeus of Abdera, Theophrastus, the pupil of +Aristotle, and Ptolemy, the comrade of Alexander; and, on the other +hand, a number of national histories were written, also in Greek, but by +Hellenized natives, such as the Chaldaica of Berosus, the Aegyptiaca of +Manetho, and the Phoenician chronicles of Dius and Menander. The people +of Israel figured incidentally in several of these works, and Manetho +went out of his way to include in the history of his country a lying +account of the Exodus, which was designed to hold up the ancestors of +the Jews to opprobrium. From the Hellenic and philosophical writers they +received more justice. Their remarkable loyalty to their religion and +their exalted conception of the Deity moved partly the admiration, +partly the amazement of these early encyclopedists, who regarded them as +a philosophical people devoted to a higher life. The Hellenistic Jews +were led later by the sympathetic attitude of Hecataeus to add to his +history spurious chapters, in which he was made to deal more +eulogistically with their beliefs and history, and they circulated +oracles and poems in the names of fabled seers of prehistoric +times--Orpheus and the Sibyl--which conveyed some of the religious and +moral teachings of Judaism. Nor were they slow to adapt their own +chronicles for the Greek world or to take their part in the literary +movement of the time. In Palestine, indeed, the Jews remained devoted to +religious thought, and never made history a serious interest. But in +Alexandria, after translating the Scriptures into Greek in the middle of +the third century, they began, in imitation of their neighbors, to +embellish their antiquities in the Greek style, and present them more +thoroughly according to Greek standards of history. + +A collection of extracts from the works of the Hellenistic Jews was made +by a Gentile compiler of the first century B.C.E., Alexander, surnamed +Polyhistor. Though his book has perished, portions of it with fragments +of these extracts have been preserved in the chronicles of the +ecclesiastical historian Eusebius, who wrote in the fourth century C.E. +They prove the existence of a very considerable array of historical +writers, who would seem to have been poor scholars of Greek, but +ingenious chronologists and apologists. The earliest of the adapters, of +whose work fragments have been thus preserved to us, is one Demetrius, +who, in the reign of Ptolemy II, at the end of the third century B.C.E., +wrote a book on the Jewish kings. It was rather a chronology than a +connected narrative, and Demetrius amended the dates given in the Bible +according to a system of his own. This does not appear to have been very +exact, but such as it was it appealed to Josephus, who in places follows +it without question. Chronology was a matter of deep import in that +epoch, because it was one of the most galling and frequent charges +against the Jews that their boasted antiquity was fictitious. To rebut +this attack, the Jewish chroniclers elaborated the chronological +indications of their long history, and brought them into relation with +the annals of their neighbors. + +Demetrius is followed by Eupolemus and Artapanus, who treated the Bible +in a different fashion. They freely handled the Scripture narrative, and +methodically embellished it with fictitious additions, for the greater +glory, as they intended, of their people. They imitated the ways of +their opponents, and as these sought to decry their ancestors by +malicious invention, so they contrived to invest them with fictitious +greatness. Eupolemus represents Abraham as the discoverer of Chaldean +astrology, and identifies Enoch with the Greek hero Atlas, to whom the +angel of God revealed the celestial lore. Elsewhere he inserts into the +paraphrase of the Book of Kings a correspondence between Solomon and +Hiram (king of Tyre), in order to show the Jewish hegemony over the +Phoenicians. Artapanus, professing to be a pagan writer, shows how the +Egyptians were indebted to the founders of Israel for their scientific +knowledge and their most prized institutions: Abraham instructed King +Pharethothis in astrology; Joseph taught the Egyptian priests +hieroglyphics, and built the Pyramids; Moses (who is identified with the +Greek seer Musaeus) not only conquered the Ethiopians, and invented +ship-building and philosophy, but taught the Egyptian priests their +deeper wisdom, and was called by them Hermes, because of his skill in +interpreting ([Greek: Hermaeneia]) the holy documents. Fiction fostered +fiction, and the inventions of pagan foes stimulated the exaggerations +of Jewish apologists. The fictitious was mixed with the true, and the +legendary material which Artapanus added to his history passed into the +common stock of Jewish apologetics. + +The great national revival that followed on the Maccabean victories +induced both within and without Palestine the composition of works of +contemporary national history. For a period the Jews were as proud of +their present as of their past. It was not only that their princes, like +the kings of other countries, desired to have their great deeds +celebrated, but the whole people was conscious of another God-sent +deliverance and of a clear manifestation of the Divine Power in their +affairs, which must be recorded for the benefit of posterity. The First +Book of the Maccabees, which was originally written in Hebrew, and the +Chronicles of King John Hyrcanus[1] bear witness to this outburst of +patriotic self-consciousness in Palestine; and the Talmud[2] contains a +few fragments of history about the reign of Alexander Jannaeus, which +may have formed part of a larger chronicle. The story of the Maccabean +wars was recorded also at great length by a Hellenistic Jew, Jason of +Cyrene, and it is generally assumed that an abridgment of it has come +down to us in the Second Book of the Maccabees. + +[Footnote 1: They are referred to at the end of the book. Comp. I Macc. +xvi. 23f.] + +[Footnote 2: Kiddushin, 66a.] + +In Palestine, however, the historical spirit did not flourish for long. +The interest in the universal lesson prevailed over that in the +particular fact, and the tradition that was treasured was not of +political events but of ethical and legal teachings. Moral rather than +objective truth was the study of the schools, and when contemporary +events are described, it is in a poetical, rhapsodical form, such as we +find in the Psalms of Solomon, which recount Pompey's invasion of +Jerusalem.[1] The only historical records that appear to have been +regularly kept are the lists of the priests and their genealogy, and a +calendar of fasts and of days on which fasting was prohibited because of +some happy event to be commemorated. + +[Footnote 1: See above, p. 14.] + +In the Diaspora, on the other hand, and especially at Alexandria, which +was the center of Hellenistic Jewry, history was made to serve a +practical purpose. It was a weapon in the struggle the Jews were +continually waging against their detractors, as well as in their +missionary efforts to spread their religion. It became consciously and +essentially apologetic, the end being persuasion rather than truth. Fact +and fiction were inextricably combined, and the difference between them +neglected. + +The story of the translation of the Septuagint by the Jewish sages sent +to Alexandria at the invitation of King Ptolemy, which is recounted in +the Letter of Aristeas, is an excellent example of this kind of history. +It is decked out with digressions about the topography of Jerusalem and +the architecture of the Temple, and an imaginative display of Jewish wit +and wisdom at a royal symposium. The Third Book of the Maccabees, which +professes to describe a persecution of the Jews in Egypt under one of +the Ptolemies, is another early example of didactic fiction that has +been preserved to us. The one sober historical work produced by a Jewish +writer between the composition of the two Books of the Maccabees and of +the _Wars_ of Josephus was the account given by Philo of Alexandria of +the Jewish persecutions that took place in the reigns of Tiberius and +Gaius. It was originally contained in five books, of which only the +second and third have been preserved. They deal respectively with the +riots at Alexandria that took place when Flaccus was governor, and with +the Jewish embassy to Gaius when that Emperor issued his order that his +image should be set up in the Temple at Jerusalem and in the great +synagogue of Alexandria. Philo wrote a full account of the events in +which he himself had been called upon to play a part. He is always at +pains to point the moral and enforce the lesson, but his work has a +definite historical value, and contains many valuable details about +Jewish life in the Diaspora. + +But if the Jews were somewhat careless of the exact record of their +history, many of the Greek and Roman historians paid attention to it, +some specifically for the purpose of attacking them, others incidentally +in the course of their comprehensive works. The fashion of universal +history continued for some centuries, and works of fifty volumes and +over were more the rule than the exception. These "elephantine books" +were rendered possible because it was the fashion for each succeeding +historian to compile the results of his predecessor's labors, and adopt +it as part of his own monumental work. Distinguished among this school +of writers were Apollodorus of Athens, who in 150 B.C.E. wrote +Chronicles containing the most important events of general history down +to his own time, and Polybius, who was brought as a prisoner from Greece +to Rome in 145 B.C.E., and in his exile wrote a history of the rise of +the Roman Republic, in the course of which he dealt with the early +Jewish relations with Rome. Then, in the first century, there flourished +Posidonius of Apamea (90-50 B.C.E.), a Stoic and a bitter enemy of the +Jews, who continued the work of Polybius down to the year 90, and, +besides, wrote a separate diatribe against Judaism, which he regarded as +a misanthropic atheism. The succession was carried on by Timagenes of +Alexandria, who wrote a very full history of the second and the first +part of the first century. + +Among Roman writers of the period that dealt with general affairs were +Asinius Pollio, the friend of Herod, and Titus Livius, who, under the +name of Livy, has become the standard Latin historian for schoolboys. +Josephus refers to both of them as well as to Timagenes, Posidonius, and +Polybius; but as there is no reason to think that he ever tried to +master the earlier authorities, it is probable that he knew them only so +far as they were reproduced in his immediate sources and his immediate +predecessors. The two writers whom he quotes repeatedly and must have +studied are Strabo of Amasea (in Pontus) and Nicholas of Damascus. +Strabo was an author of remarkable versatility and industry. Besides his +geography, the standard work of ancient times on the subject, he wrote +in forty-seven books a large historical work on the period between 150 +(where Polybius ended) and 30 B.C.E. Nearly the whole of it has +disappeared, but we can tell from Josephus' excerpts that he appreciated +the Jews and their religion as did few other pagans of the time. He +dealt, too, at considerable length with the wars of the Hasmonean kings +against the Seleucids, and he is one of the authorities cited by +Josephus for the period between the accession of John Hyrcanus and the +overthrow of Antigonus II by Herod. The Jewish historian follows still +more closely, and in many places probably reproduces, Nicholas, who was +the court historian of Herod. Nicholas was a man of remarkable +versatility. He played many parts at Herod's court, as diplomatist, +advocate, and minister. He was a poet and philosopher of some repute, +and he wrote a general history in forty-four books. In the first eight +books he dealt with the early annals of the Assyrians, the Greeks, the +Medes, and the Persians. Josephus, who took him for his chief guide +after the Bible, often reproduces from him comparative passages to the +Scripture story which he is paraphrasing. And for the later period of +the _Antiquities_, from the time of Antiochus the Great (ab. 200 +B.C.E.), he depends on him largely for the comparative Hellenistic +history, which he brings into relation with the story of the Hasmoneans. +When he comes to the epoch of Herod, the disproportionate fulness, the +vivacity, and the dramatic power of the narrative in books XIV-XVI of +the _Antiquities_ are due in a large measure to the historical virtues +of the court chronicler. We can tell how far this is the case by the +immediate and marked deterioration of the narrative when Josephus +proceeds to the reigns of Archelaus and Agrippa--where Nicholas failed +him. + +Among Roman writers of his own day whom Josephus used was the Emperor +Vespasian himself, who, to record his exploits, wrote _Commentaries on +the Jewish War_, which were placed at his client's disposal.[1] In the +competition of flattery that greeted the new Flavian dynasty, various +Roman writers described and celebrated the Jewish campaigns.[2] Among +them were Antonius Julianus, who was on the staff of Vespasian and Titus +throughout the war, and at the end of it was appointed procurator of +Judea; Valerius Flaccus, who burst into ecstatic hexameters over the +burning of the Temple; and Tacitus, the most brilliant of all Latin +historians. Besides these writers' works, which have come down to us +more or less complete, a number of memoirs and histories of the war +appeared, some by those who wrote on hearsay, others by men who had +taken some part in the campaigns. It was an age of literary +dilettantism, when nearly everybody wrote books who knew how to write; +and in the drab monotony of Roman supremacy, the triumph over the Jews, +which had placed the Flavian house on the throne, was a happy +opportunity for ambitious authors. + +[Footnote 1: Vita, 68.] + +[Footnote 2: C. Ap. 9-10.] + +It has been suggested that the Roman point of view that pervades the +_Wars_ of Josephus, the frequent absence of sympathy with the Jewish +cause, and the incongruous pagan ideas, which surprise us, can be +explained by the fact that the Jewish writer founded his account on that +of Antonius Julianus, which is referred to by the Christian apologist +Minucius[1] as a standard authority on the destruction of Jerusalem. +Antonius is mentioned by Josephus as one of the Roman staff who gave his +opinion in favor of the burning of the Temple, and he has also been +ingeniously identified with the Roman general (called [Hebrew: Otaninus] +or [Hebrew: Ananitus]) who engaged in controversy with Rabbi Johanan ben +Zakkai.[2] The evidence in favor of the theory is examined more fully +later; but whether or not the history of Antonius was the main source of +the _Wars_, it is certain that Josephus had before him Gentile accounts +of the struggle, and he often slavishly adopted not only their record of +facts but their expressions of opinion. In point of time Tacitus might +have derived from Josephus his summary of the Jewish Wars, part of which +has come down to us, and on some points the Jewish and the Roman authors +agree; but the correspondence is to be explained more readily by the use +of a common source by both writers. It is unlikely that the haughty +patrician, who hated and despised the Jews, and who had no love of +research, turned to a Jewish chronicle for his information, when he had +a number of Roman and Greek authors to provide him with food for his +epigrams. + +[Footnote 1: Epist. ad Octav. 33.] + +[Footnote 2: Yer. Sanhedrin, i. 4. Comp. Schlatter, Zur Topographie und +Geschichte Palaestinas, pp. 97_ff_.] + +One other writer on contemporary Jewish history to whom Josephus refers +as an author, not indeed in the _Wars_, but in his _Life_, was Justus of +Tiberias, Unfortunately we have to depend almost entirely on a hostile +rival's spitefulness and malice for our knowledge of Justus. He did not +produce his work on the wars till after Josephus had established his +reputation, and part of his object, it is alleged, was to blacken the +character and destroy the repute of his rival. The conduct of Justus in +the Galilean campaign had been little more creditable than that of +Josephus--that is, if the latter's account may be believed at all. He +had been a leader of the Zealot party in Tiberias, and had roused the +people of that city against the double-dealing commander; but on the +breakdown of the revolt he entered the service of Agrippa II. He fell +into disgrace, but was pardoned. Some twenty-four years after the war +was over he wrote a History of the Jewish Kings and a History of the +War. It is difficult to form any judgment of the work, because, apart +from the abuse of Josephus, the criticism we have comes merely from +ecclesiastical historians, who imbibed Josephus' personal enmity as +though it were the pure milk of truth. Eusebius and Jerome[1] accuse him +of having distorted Jewish affairs to suit his personal ends and of +having been convicted by Josephus of falsehood. His chief crime in their +eyes and the reason for the disappearance of his work are that he did +not mention any of the events connected with the foundation of the +Christian Church, and had not the good fortune to be interpolated, as +Josephus was, with a passage about Jesus.[2] Hence Photius says that he +passed over many of the most important occurrences.[3] We know of him +now only by the charges of Josephus and a few disconnected fragments. + +[Footnote 1: Hist. Eccl. III. x. 8; De Viris Illustr, 14.] + +[Footnote 2: See below, pp. 241 ff.] + +[Footnote 3: Bibl. Cod. 33.] + +Coming now to the works of Josephus, his prefaces give a full account of +his historical motives. He originally wrote seven books on the Wars with +Rome in Aramaic for the benefit of his own countrymen. He was induced to +translate them into Greek because his predecessors had given false +accounts, either out of a desire to flatter the Romans or out of hatred +to the Jews. He claims that his own work is a true and careful narrative +of the events that he had witnessed with his own eyes and had special +opportunities of studying accurately. "The writings of my predecessors +contain sometimes slanders, sometimes eulogies, but nowhere the accurate +truth of the facts." He goes on to complain of the way in which they +belittle the action of the Jews in order to aggrandize the Romans, which +defeats its own purpose; and he contrasts the merit of one who composes +by his own industry a history of events not hitherto faithfully +recorded, with the more popular and the easier fashion of writing a +fresh history of a period already fully treated, by changing the order +and disposition of other men's works. He iterates his determination to +record only historical facts, and says, "It is superfluous for me to +write about the Antiquities [i.e. the early history] of the Jews, +because many before me, both among my own people and the Greeks, have +composed the histories of our ancestors very exactly."[1] By the +Antiquities he means the Bible narrative. He proposes therefore to begin +where the Bible ends and, after a brief survey of the events before his +own age, to give a full account of the great Rebellion. Josephus falls +short of his promise. Many of the shortcomings he pointed to in his +predecessors are glaringly present in his work. Nor is it probable that +his profession of having taken notes on the spot is true. At the time of +the siege of Jerusalem he had no literary pretensions, and it is +unlikely that he contemplated the writing of a history. It has been +pointed out that his account is much more accurate in regard to events +in which he did not take part than in regard to those in which he +assisted. + +[Footnote 1: B.J., Preface. The Greek name _Archaeologia_ is regularly +rendered by _Antiquities_, but it means simply the early history.] + +In the first book and the greater part of the second, where he is taken +up with the preliminary introduction, he had ample sources before him, +and his functions were only to abstract and compile; but when he comes +to the final struggle with Rome, he would have us believe that he +depended mainly on his independent knowledge. Recent investigation has +thrown grave doubts on his claim, and has suggested that with Josephus +it is true that "once a compiler, always a compiler." The habit of +direct copying from the works of predecessors was fixed in the literary +ethics of the day. In company with most of the historians of antiquity +he introduces his general ideas upon the march of events in the form of +addresses, which he puts into the mouth of the chief characters at +critical moments. Here he is free to invent and intrude his own +opinions, and here he almost unfailingly adopts a Roman attitude. The +work, in fact, bears the character of official history, and has all the +partiality of that form of literature. Titus, as the author proudly +recalls, subscribed his own hand to it, and ordered that it should be +published, and King Agrippa wrote a glowing testimonial to it in the +most approved style.[1] It was accepted in Rome as the standard work +upon the Jewish struggle. Patronage may have saved literature at certain +epochs, but it always undermines the feeling of truth. It is not +improbable that a juster appreciation of events was contained in the +original writings of Josephus, but was corrected at the order of the +royal traitor or the Imperial master, to whom he perforce submitted +them. + +[Footnote 1: C. Ap. 8. See below, p. 221.] + +If in the _Wars_ Josephus assumes the air of a scientific historian, in +the _Antiquities_ he is more openly the apologist. Despite his +professions in the preface of the earlier work, he seems to have found +it necessary or expedient to give to Greco-Roman society a fresh account +of the ancestry and the early history of his people and of the +constitution of their government. The Roman _Archaeologia_ of Dionysius +of Halicarnassus, who fifty years earlier had written in twenty books +the early events of Rome, probably suggested the division and the name +of the work. He issued it after the death of his protector, in the +thirteenth year of the reign of Domitian and in the fifty-sixth year of +his own life.[1] In the preface, inconsistently with the statement in +the earlier work, he declares that he intended from the beginning to +write this apology of his people, but was deterred for a time by the +magnitude of the labor of translating the history into an unaccustomed +tongue. He ascribes the impulse to carry out the task to the +encouragement of his patron Epaphroditus and of his other friends at +Rome. It probably came also from his circumstances at Rome and the +necessity of refuting calumnies made against him on account of his race +and religion. And with all his weaknesses and failings he was not +lacking in a feeling of national pride, which must have moved him to +defend his people. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XX. xi. 3.] + +Following on the destruction of Jerusalem, a passion of mixed hatred and +contempt against the Jews moved the Roman nobility and the Roman masses. +The Flavian court, representing the middle classes, by no means shared +the feeling, and indeed the infatuation of Titus for the Jewish princess +Berenice, the sister of Agrippa, was one of the scandals that most +stirred the anger of the Romans. But the nobles hated those who had +obstinately fought against the Roman armies for four years, and scorned +those whose God had not saved them from ruin. At the same time Jewish +persistence after defeat and the continuance of Jewish missionary +activity offended the majesty of Rome, which, though tolerant of foreign +religious ideas, was accustomed not merely to the physical submission of +her enemies, but to their cultural and intellectual abasement. The +hatred and scorn were fanned by a tribe of scribblers, who heaped +distortion on the history and practices of the Jewish people. On the +other hand, the proselytes to Judaism, "the fearers of God," who +accepted part of its teaching--and in the utter collapse of pagan +religion and morality they were many--desired to know something of the +past grandeur of the nation, and doubtless were anxious to justify +themselves to those who regarded their adoption of Jewish customs as an +utter degradation. For those who mocked at him as a renegade member of a +wretched people, which consisted of the scum of the earth, which +harbored all kinds of low superstition, and which fostered inhumanity +and misanthropy, and for those who looked to him as the accredited +exponent of Judaism and the writer most able to set it in a favorable +light, Josephus wrote the twenty books of his _Antiquities_. + +The work differed from all previous apologies for Judaism in its +completeness and its historical character. Philo had sought to recommend +Judaism as a philosophical religion, and had interpreted the Torah as +the law of Nature. Josephus was concerned not so much with Judaism as +with the Jews. He seeks to show, by his abstract of historical records, +that his people had a long and honorable past, and that they had had +intercourse with ancient empires, and had been esteemed even by the +Romans. The _Antiquities_ comprised a summary of the whole of Jewish +history, as well that which was set out in the books of the Bible as +that which had taken place in the post-Biblical period down to his own +day. Some of his predecessors had elaborated only the former part of the +story, and that, it is probable, not nearly so fully as Josephus. He +claims not to have added to or diminished from the record of Scripture. +Though neither part of the claim can be upheld, he does undoubtedly give +a tolerable account of the Bible so far as it is an historical +narrative. The finer spirit of the Bible, even in its narrative parts, +its deep spiritual teaching, its simple grandeur, its arresting +sincerity, he was utterly unable to impart. In style, too, his Greek +falls immeasurably below the original. We feel as we read his abstract +with its omissions and additions: + + The little more and how much it is; + The little less and what miles away. + +His is a mediocre transcription, which replaces the naivete, the +rapidity, the unaffected beauty of the Hebrew, with the rhetoric, the +sophistication, and the exaggerated overstatement of the Greek writing +of his own time. Impressiveness for him is regularly enhanced by +inaccuracy. His own or his assumed materialistic fatalism lowers the God +of the Bible to a Power which materially rewards the righteous and +punishes the wicked. In this immediate retribution he finds the surest +sign of Divine Providence, and it is this lesson which he is most +anxious to assert throughout his work. But he is at pains to dispel the +idea of a special Providence for Israel. The material power of Rome made +him desert in life the Jewish cause; the material thought of Rome made +him dissimulate in literature the full creed of Judaism. + +The second part of the _Antiquities_ is a more ambitious piece of work. +The compiler brings together all that he could find, in Jewish and +Gentile sources, about Jewish history from the time of the Babylonian +captivity to the outbreak of the war against Rome. And he was apparently +the first of his people to utilize the Greek historians systematically +in this fashion. There are long periods as to the incidents of which he +was at a loss. Without possessing the ability or desire for research, he +is not above confounding the chronology and perverting the succession of +events to cover up a gap. But he does contrive to produce a connected +narrative and to provide some kind of continuous chronicle. And for this +service he is not lightly to be esteemed. Without him we should know +scarcely anything of the external history of the Jewish people for three +centuries. In style the last ten books vary remarkably. It depends +almost entirely on his source whether the narrative is dull and +monotonous or lively and dramatic. Where, for example, he is +transcribing Nicholas and another historian of the period, he succeeds +in presenting a picture of Herod that has a certain psychological value. +Where, on the other hand, he has had to trust largely to scattered +notes, as in the record of Herod's successors, his history is little +better than a miscellany of disjointed passages. He lacks throughout a +true sense of proportion, and for the deeper aspects of history he has +no perception. He does not show in spite of his Jewish training the +slightest appreciation of the spiritual power of Judaism or of the +divine purpose illustrating itself in the rise and fall of nations. His +conception of history is a biography of might, tempered by occasional +manifestations of divine retribution. The concrete event is the +important thing, and of culture and literature he says scarcely a word. +His occasional moral reflections are on a mediocre plane and not true to +the finer spirit of Judaism. He is consciously or unconsciously obsessed +by the power of Rome, and makes little attempt to inculcate the higher +moral outlook of his people. In soul, too, he is Romanized. He admires +above all material power; he exhibits material conceptions of +Providence; he looks always for material causes. Altogether the +_Antiquities_ is a work invaluable for its material, but a somewhat +soulless book. + +Josephus conveys more of the spirit of Judaism in his two books commonly +entitled _Against Apion_, which are professedly apologetic. They were +written after the _Antiquities_, and further emphasize two points on +which he had dwelt in that work: the great age of the Jewish people and +the excellence of the Jewish law. He was anxious to refute those +detractors who, despite the publication of his history, still continued +to spread grotesquely false accounts of Israel's origin and Israel's +religious teachings; and he wrote here with more spirit and with more +conviction than in his earlier elaborate works. He has no longer to +accommodate himself to the vanity of a Roman Emperor, or to distort +events so as to glorify his nation or to excuse his own conduct. He is +able for once to set out his idea wholeheartedly, and he shows that, if +he had few of the qualities required for a great historian, he had +several of the talents of an apologist. His own calculated +misrepresentation of his people in their last struggle would have +afforded an opponent the best reply to his apology. In itself that +apology was an effective summary of Judaism for his own times, and parts +of it have a permanent value. For seventeen centuries it remained the +sole direct answer from the Jewish side to the calumnies of the enemies +of the Jews. + +The last extant work of Josephus was the _Life_, of which we have +already treated, and it were better to say little more. It was provoked +by the publication of the History of Justus, which had accused Josephus +and the Galileans of having been the authors of the sedition against the +Romans.[1] Josephus retorts that, before he was appointed governor, +Justus and the people of Tiberias had attacked the Greek cities of the +Decapolis and the dominions of Agrippa, as was witnessed in the +Commentaries of Vespasian. Not content with this crime, Justus had +failed to surrender to the Romans till they appeared before Tiberias. +Having charged his rival with being a better patriot than himself,[2] +Josephus proceeds to argue that he was a worse historian: Justus could +not describe the Galilean campaign, because during the war he was at +Berytus; he took no part in the siege of Jerusalem, and, less privileged +than his rival, he had not read the Commentaries of Caesar, and in fact +often contradicted them. Conscious of this weakness, he had not ventured +to publish his account till the chief actors in the story, Vespasian, +Titus, and Agrippa, had died, though his books had been written some +twenty years before they were issued. But in his pains to gainsay Justus +and his own patriotism, such as it was, Josephus, as has been noticed, +gives an account of his doings in Galilee that is often at complete +variance with his statements in the _Wars_. The _Life_, in fact, is +untrustworthy history and unsuccessful apology. + +[Footnote 1: Vita, 65.] + +[Footnote 2: Justus, no doubt, had done the converse, representing +himself as a thorough Romanizer and Josephus as an ardent rebel.] + +At the end of the _Antiquities_ Josephus declares his intention to write +three books concerning the Jewish doctrines "about God and His essence, +and concerning the laws, why some things are permitted, and others are +prohibited." In the preface to the same work, as well as in various +passages in its course, he refers to his intention to write on the +philosophical meaning of the Mosaic legislation. The books entitled +_Against Apion_ correspond neither in number nor in content to this +plan, and we must therefore assume that he never carried it out. He may +have intended to abstract the commentary of Philo upon the Law, which he +had doubtless come to know. Certainly he shows no traces of deeper +allegorical lore in the extant works, and his mind was hardly given to +such speculations. But a humanitarian and universalistic explanation of +the Mosaic code, such as his predecessor had composed, notably in his +Life of Moses, would have been quite in his way, and would have rounded +off his presentation of the past and present history of the Jews. The +need of replying to his personal enemies and the detractors of his +nation deterred him perhaps from achieving this part of his scheme. Or, +if it was written, the Christian scribes, who preserved his other works, +may have suppressed it because it did not harmonize with their ideas. + +Photius ascribes to Josephus a work on _The Universe_, or _The Cause of +the Universe_ ([Greek: peri taes tou pantos aitias]), which is extant, +but which is demonstrably of Christian origin, and was probably written +by Hippolytus, an ecclesiastical writer of the third century and the +author of _Philosophumena_. Another work attributed to Josephus in the +Dark and Middle Ages, and often attached to manuscripts of the +_Antiquities_, is the sermon on _The Sovereignty of Reason_, which is +commonly known as the Fourth Book of the Maccabees. The book is a +remarkable example of the use of Greek philosophical ideas to confirm +the Jewish religion. That the Mosaic law is the rule of written reason +is the main theme, and it is illustrated by the story of the martyrs +during the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes, whence the book takes its +title. In particular, the author points to the ethical significance +underlying the dietary laws, of which he says in a remarkable passage: + +When we long for fishes and fowls and fourfooted animals and every kind +of food that is forbidden to us by the Law, it is through the mastery of +pious reason that we abstain from them. For the affections and appetites +are restrained and turned into another direction by the sobriety of the +mind, and all the movements of the body are kept in check by pious +reason. + +Again, of the Law as a whole he says: + +It teaches us temperance, so that we master our pleasures and desires, +and it exercises us in fortitude, so that we willingly undergo every +toil. And it instructs us in justice, so that in all our behavior we +give what is due, and it teaches us to be pious, so that we worship the +only living God in the manner becoming His greatness. + +Freudenthal has conclusively disposed of the theory that Josephus was +the author of this work.[1] Neither in language, nor in style, nor in +thought, has it a resemblance to his authentic works. Nor was he the man +to write anonymously. It reveals, indeed, a mastery of the arts of Greek +rhetoric, such as the Palestinian soldier who learnt Greek only late in +life, and who required the help of friends to correct his syntax, could +never have acquired. It reveals, too, a knowledge of the technical terms +of the Stoic philosophy and a general grasp of Greek philosophy quite +beyond the writer of the _Antiquities_ and the _Wars_. Lastly, it +breathes a wholehearted love for Judaism and a national ardor to which +the double-dealing defender of Galilee and the client of the Roman court +could hardly have aspired. + +[Footnote 1: Freudenthal, Die Flavius Josephus beigelegte Schrift ueber +die Herrschaft der Vernunft, 1879.] + +The genuine works of Josephus reveal him not as a philosopher or sturdy +preacher of Judaism, but as an apologetic historian and apologist, +distinguished in either field rather for his industry and his ingenuity +in using others' works than by any original excellence. He learnt from +the Greeks and Romans the external manner of systematic history, and in +this he stood above his Jewish predecessors. He learnt from them also +the arts of mixing false with true, of invention, of exaggeration, of +the suggestion of the bad and the suppression of the good motive. He was +a sophist rather than a sage, and circumstances compelled him to be a +court chronicler rather than a national historian. And while he acquired +something of the art of historical writing from his models, he lost the +intuitive synthesis of the Jewish attitude, which saw the working of +God's moral law in all human affairs. On the other hand, certain defects +of his history may be ascribed to lack of training and to the spirit of +the age. He had scant notion of accuracy, he made no independent +research into past events, and he was unconscionable in chronology. In +his larger works he is for the most part a translator and compiler of +the work of others, but he has some claim to originality of design and +independence of mind in the books against Apion. The times were out of +joint for a writer of his caliber. For the greater part of his literary +life, perhaps for the whole, he was not free to write what he thought +and felt, and he wrote for an alien public, which could not rise to an +understanding of the deeper ideas of his people's history. But this much +at least may be put down to his credit, that he lived to atone for the +misrepresentation of the heroic struggle of the Jews with the Romans by +preserving some record of many dark pages in their history and by +refuting the calumnies of the Hellenistic vituperators about their +origin and their religious teachings. + + + + +V + +THE JEWISH WARS + + +The first work of Josephus as man of letters was the history of the wars +of the Jews against the Romans, for which, according to his own +statement, he prepared from the time of his surrender by taking copious +notes of the events which he witnessed. He completed it in the fortieth +year of his life and dedicated it to Vespasian.[1] He seems originally +to have designed the record of the struggle for the purpose of +persuading his brethren in the East that it was useless to fight further +against the Romans. He desired to prove to them that God was on the side +of the big battalions, and that the Jews had forfeited His protection by +their manifold transgressions. The Zealots were as wicked as they were +misguided, and to follow them was to march to certain ruin. It is not +unlikely that Josephus was commissioned by Titus to compose his version +of the war for the "Upper Barbarians," whose rising in alliance with the +Parthians might have troubled the conqueror of Jerusalem, as it +afterwards troubled Trajan. But, save that it was written in Aramaic, we +cannot tell the form of the original history, since it has entirely +disappeared. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. VII. xv. 8.] + +Josephus says in the preface to the extant Greek books that he +translated into Greek the account he had already written. But he +certainly did much more than translate. The whole trend of the narrative +and the purpose must have been changed when he came to present the +events for a Greco-Roman audience. He was concerned less to instill +respect for Rome in his countrymen than to inspire regard for his +countrymen in the Romans, and at the same time to show that the +Rebellion was not the deliberate work of the whole people, but due to +the instigation of a band of desperate, unscrupulous fanatics. He was +concerned also to show that God, the vanquished Jewish God, as the +Romans would regard Him, had allowed the ruin of His people, not because +He was powerless to preserve them, but because they had sinned against +His law. Lastly, he was anxious to emphasize the military virtue and the +magnanimity of his patrons Vespasian and Titus. He intersperses frequent +protests in various parts of the seven books, and repeats them in the +preface, to the effect that while his predecessors had written +"sophistically," he was aiming only at the exact record of events. But +it is obvious that, in the _Wars_ as in his other works, he has a +definite purpose to serve, and he colors his account of events to suit +this purpose and to please his patrons. + +He sets out to establish, in fact, that it was "a sedition of our own +that destroyed Jerusalem, and that the tyrants among the Jews brought +upon us the Romans, who unwillingly attacked us, and occasioned the +burning of our Temple."[1] And he apologizes for the passion he shows +against the tyrants and Zealots, which, he admits, is not consistent +with the character of an historian; it was provoked because the +unparalleled calamities of the Jews were not caused by strangers but by +themselves, and "this makes it impossible for me to contain my +lamentations."[2] The historian, therefore, in the work which has come +down to us, is dominated by the conviction, whether sincere or feigned, +that the war with Rome was a huge error, that those who fomented it were +wicked, self-seeking men, and that the Jews brought their ruin on +themselves. This being his temper, it is necessary to look very closely +at his representation of events and examine how far partisan feeling and +prejudices, and how far servility and the courtier spirit, have colored +it. We have also to consider how far his reflections represent his own +judgment, and how far they are the slavish adoption of opinions +expressed by the victorious enemies of his people. + +[Footnote 1: B.J., Preface.] + +[Footnote 2: B.J., Preface, 4.] + +The alternative title of the work is _On the Destruction of the Temple_, +but its scope is larger than either name suggests. It is conjectured by +the German scholar Niese that the author called it _A History of the +Jewish State in Its Relations with the Romans_. It is in fact a history +of the Jews under the Romans, beginning, as Josephus says, "where the +earlier writers on Jewish affairs and our prophets leave off." He +proposes to deal briefly with the events that preceded his own age, but +fully with the events of the wars of his time. The history starts, +accordingly, with the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes, and, save that +he expatiates without any sense of proportion on the exploits of Herod +the Great, Josephus is generally faithful to his program in the +introductory portion of the work. For the Herodian period he found a +very full source, and the temptation was too powerful for him, so that +the greater part of the first book is taken up with the story of the +court intrigues and family murders of the king. Very brief indeed is his +treatment of the Maccabean brothers, and not very accurate. They are +dismissed in two chapters, and it is probable that the historian had not +before him either of the two good Jewish sources for the period, the +First and the Second Book of the Maccabees. In his later work, in which +he dealt with the same period at greater length, the account which he +had abstracted from a Greek source, probably Nicholas of Damascus, is +corrected by the Jewish work. The two records show a number of small +discrepancies. Thus, in the _Wars_ he states that Onias, the high priest +who drove out the Tobiades from Jerusalem, fled to Ptolemy in Egypt, and +founded a city resembling Jerusalem; whereas in the _Antiquities_ he +states that the Onias who fled to Egypt because Antiochus deprived him +of office was the son of the high priest. Again, in the _Wars_ he makes +Mattathias kill the Syrian governor Bacchides; whereas, in the +_Antiquities_, agreeing with the First Book of the Maccabees, he says +that the Syrian officer who was slain at Modin was Appelles. + +Josephus in the _Wars_ follows his Hellenistic source for the history of +the Hasmonean monarchy without introducing any Jewish knowledge and +without criticism. His summary is of incidents, not of movements, and he +has a liking for romantic color. The piercing of the king's elephant by +the Maccabean Eleazar, the prediction by an Essene of the murder of +Antigonus, the brother of King Aristobulus I, are detailed. The inner +Jewish life is passed over in complete silence until he comes to the +reign of Alexander. Then he describes the Pharisees as a sect of Jews +that are held to be more religious than others and to interpret the laws +more accurately.[1] The description is clearly derived from a Greek +writer, who regards the Jewish people from the outside. It is quite out +of harmony with the standpoint which Josephus himself later adopts. In +this passage he presents the Pharisees as crafty politicians, +insinuating themselves into the favor of the queen, and then ordering +the country to suit their own ends. Without describing the other sects, +he continues the narration of intrigues and wars till he reaches the +intervention of Pompey in the affairs of Palestine. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. I. v. 2.] + +From this point the treatment is fuller. No doubt the Hellenistic +historians paid more attention to the Jews from the moment when they +came within the orbit of the Roman Empire; but while in the +_Antiquities_ Josephus refers several times to the statements of two or +three of the Greco-Roman writers, in the _Wars_ he quotes no authority. +From this it may be inferred that in the earlier work he is following +but one guide. + +He gives an elaborate account of the rise of the Idumean family of +Antipater, and hence to the end of the book the history passes into a +biography of Herod. The first part of Herod's career, when he was +building up his power, is related in the most favorable light. His +activity in Galilee against the Zealots, his trial by the Sanhedrin, his +subsequent service to the Romans, his flight from Judea upon the +invasion of the Parthians, his reception by Antony, his triumphal return +to the kingdom that had been bestowed on him, his valiant exploits +against the Arabians of Perea and Nabatea, his capture of Jerusalem, his +splendid buildings, and his magnificence to foreigners--all these +incidents are set forth so as to enhance his greatness. The description +throughout has a Greek ring. There is scarcely a suggestion of a Jewish +point of view towards the semi-savage godless tyrant. And when Josephus +comes to the part of Herod's life which even an historian laureate could +not misrepresent to his credit, his family relations, he adopts a +fundamentally pagan outlook. + +The foundation of the Greek drama was the idea that the fortunate +incurred the envy of the gods, and brought on themselves the "nemesis," +the revenge, of the divine powers, which plunged them into ruin. This +conception, utterly opposed as it is to the Jewish doctrine of God's +goodness, is applied to Herod, on whom, says Josephus, fortune was +revenged for his external prosperity by raising him up domestic +troubles.[1] He introduces another pagan idea, when he suggests that +Antipater, the wicked son of the king, returned to Palestine, where he +was to meet his doom, at the instigation of the ghosts of his murdered +brothers, which stopped the mouths of those who would have warned him +against returning. The notion of the avenging spirits of the dead was +utterly opposed to Jewish teaching, but it was a commonplace of the +Hellenistic thought of the time. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. I. xxii. 1.] + +Of Hillel and Shammai, the great sages of the time, we have not a word; +but when he recounts how, in the last days of Herod, the people under +the lead of the Pharisees rose against the king in indignation at the +setting up of a golden eagle over the Temple gate, he speaks of the +sophists exhorting their followers, "that it was a glorious thing to die +for the laws of their country, because the soul was immortal, and an +eternal enjoyment of happiness did await such as died on that account; +while the mean-spirited, and those that were not wise enough to show a +right love of their souls, preferred death by disease to that which is a +sign of virtue." The sentiments here are not so objectionable, but the +description of the Pharisees as sophists, and the suggestion of a +Valhalla for those who died for their country and for no others--for +which there is no authority in Jewish tradition--betray again the +uncritical copying of a Hellenistic source. + +Finally, in summing up the character of Herod, all he finds to say is, +"Above all other men he enjoyed the favor of fortune, since from a +private station he obtained a kingdom, and held it many years, and left +it to his sons; but yet in his domestic affairs he was a most +unfortunate man." Not a word of his wickedness and cruelty, not a breath +of the Hebrew spirit, but simply an estimate of his "fortune." This is +the way in which the Romanized Jew continued the historical record of +the Bible, substituting foreign superstitions about fate and fortune for +the Jewish idea that all human history is a manifestation of God. + +Josephus ends the first book of the _Wars_ with an account of the +gorgeous pomp of Herod's funeral, and starts the second book with a +description of the costly funeral feast which his son Archelaus gave to +the multitude, adding a note--presumably also derived from Nicholas-- +that many of the Jews ruin themselves owing to the need of giving such a +feast, because he who omits it is not esteemed pious. As his source +fails him for the period following on the banishment of Archelaus, the +treatment becomes fragmentary, but at the same time more original and +independent. An account of the various Jewish sects interrupts the +chronicle of the court intrigues and popular risings. Josephus +distinguishes here four sects, the Essenes, the Pharisees, the +Sadducees, and the Zealots, but his account is mainly confined to the +first.[1] He describes in some detail their practices, beliefs, and +organizations. Indeed, this passage and the account in Philo are our +chief Jewish authorities for the tenets of the Essenes. He is anxious to +establish their claim to be a philosophical community comparable with +the Greek schools. In particular he represents that their notions of +immortality correspond with the Greek ideas of the Isles of the Blessed +and of Hades. "The divine doctrines of the Essenes, as he calls them, +which consider the body as corruptible and the soul an immortal spirit, +which, when released from the bonds of the flesh as from a long slavery, +rejoices and mounts upwards, lay an irresistible bait for such as have +once tasted of their philosophy." The ideas which the sect cherished +were popular in a certain part of Greco-Roman society, which, sated with +the luxury of the age, turned to the ascetic life and to the pursuit of +mysticism. Pliny the Elder, who was on the staff of Titus at Jerusalem, +appears to have been especially interested in the Jewish communists, and +briefly described their doctrines in his books; and the circle for whom +Josephus wrote would have been glad to have a fuller account. + +[Footnote 1: B. J. II. viii.] + +Of the other two sects he says little here, and what he says is +superficial. He places the differentiation in their contrasted doctrines +of fate and immortality. The Pharisees ascribe all to fate, but yet +allow freewill--a Hellenizing version of the saying ascribed to Rabbi +Akiba, "All is foreseen, but freedom of will is given"[1]--and they say +all souls are immortal, but those of the good only pass into other +bodies, while those of the bad suffer eternal punishment. This +attribution of the doctrine of metempsychosis and eternal punishment is +another piece of Hellenization, or a reproduction of a Hellenistic +misunderstanding; for the Rabbinic records nowhere suggest that such +ideas were held by the Pharisees. "The Sadducees, on the other hand, +deny fate entirely, and hold that God is not concerned in man's conduct, +which is entirely in his own choice, and they likewise deny the +immortality of the soul or retribution after death." Here the attempt to +represent the Sadducees' position as parallel with Epicurean materialism +has probably induced an overstatement of their distrust of Providence. +Josephus adds that the Pharisees cultivate great friendships among +themselves and promote peace among the people; while the Sadducees are +somewhat gruff towards each other, and treat even members of their own +party as if they were strangers. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Abot, iii. 15.] + +Of the fourth party, the Zealots, Josephus has only a few words, to the +effect that when Coponius was sent as the first procurator of Judea, a +Galilean named Judas prevailed on his countrymen to revolt, saying they +would be cowards if they would endure to pay any tax to the Romans or +submit to any mortal lord in place of God. This man, he says, was the +teacher of a peculiar sect of his own. While the other three sects are +treated as philosophical schools, Josephus does not attribute a +philosophy to the Zealots, and out of regard to Roman feelings he says +nothing of the Messianic hopes that dominated them. + +After the digression about the sects, Josephus continues his narrative +of the Jewish relations with the Romans. He turns aside now and then to +detail the complicated family affairs of the Herodian family or to +describe some remarkable geographical phenomenon, such as the glassy +sands of the Ladder of Tyre.[1] The main theme is the growing irritation +of the Jews, and the strengthening of the feeling that led to the +outbreak of the great war. But Josephus, always under the spell of the +Romans, or writing with a desire to appeal to them, can recognize only +material, concrete causes. The deeper spiritual motives of the struggle +escape him altogether, as they escaped the Roman procurators. He +recounts the wanton insults of a Pontius Pilate, who brought into +Jerusalem Roman ensigns with the image of Caesar, and spoiled the sacred +treasures of the Korban for the purpose of building aqueducts; and he +dwells on the attempt of Gaius to set up his statue in the Temple, which +was frustrated only by the Emperor's murder. But about the attitude of +the different sections of the Jewish people to the Romans, of which his +record would have been so valuable, he is silent. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. II. x. 2. The same phenomenon is recorded in Pliny and +Tacitus, and it was a commonplace of the geography of the age.] + +After the brief interlude of Agrippa's happy reign, the irritation of +Roman procurators is renewed, and under Comanus tumult follows tumult, +as one outrage after another upon the Jewish feeling is countenanced or +abetted. The courtier of the Flavian house takes occasion to recount the +Emperor Nero's misdeeds and family murders; but he resists the desire to +treat in detail of these things, because his subject is Jewish +history.[1] He must have had before him a source which dealt with +general Roman history more fully, and he shows his independence, such as +it is, in confining his narrative to the Jewish story. But the reliance +on his source for his point of view leads him to write as a good Roman; +the national party are dubbed rebels and revolutionaries ([Greek: +stasiastai]). The Zealots are regularly termed robbers, and the origin +of war is attributed to the weakness of the governors in not putting +down these turbulent elements. All this was natural enough in a Roman, +but it comes strangely from the pen of a soi-disant Jewish apologist, +who had himself taken a part in the rebellion. Characteristic is his +account of the turbulent condition of Palestine in the time of Felix: + +"Bands of Sicarii springing up in the chaos caused by the tyranny +infested the country, and another body of abandoned men, less villainous +in their actions, but more wicked in their designs, deluded the people +under pretense of divine inspiration, and persuaded them to rise. Felix +put down these bands, but, as with a diseased body, straightway the +inflammation burst out in another part. And the flame of revolt was +blown up every day more and more, till it came to a regular war."[2] + +[Footnote 1: B.J. II. xiii. 1.] + +[Footnote 2: B.J. II. xiii. 6.] + +Josephus vents his full power of denunciation on the last procurator, +Floras, who goaded the people into war, and by his repeated outrages +compelled even the aristocratic party, to which the historian belonged, +to break their loyalty to Rome: "As though he had been sent as +executioner to punish condemned criminals, he omitted no sort of +spoliation or extortion. In the most pitiful cases he was most inhuman; +in the greatest turpitudes he was most impudent, nor could anyone outdo +him in perversion of the truth, or combine more subtle ways of deceit." +Josephus, not altogether consistently with what he has already said, +seeks to exculpate his countrymen for their rising, up to the point in +which he himself was involved in it; and though he admits that the high +priests and leading men were still anxious for peace at any price, and +he puts a long speech into Agrippa's mouth counseling submission, he is +yet anxious to show that his people were driven into war by the +wickedness of Nero's governors. His masters allowed him, and probably +invited him, to denounce the oppression of the ministers of their +predecessors, and the Roman historians Suetonius and Tacitus likewise +state that the rapacity of the procurators drove the Jews into revolt. +He had authority, therefore, for this view in his contemporary sources. + +The die was cast. Menahem, the son of Judas the Galilean and the head of +the Zealots, seized Jerusalem, drove the Romans and Romanizers into the +fortress of Antonia, and having armed his bands with the contents of +Herod's southern stronghold of Masada, overpowered the garrison and put +it to the sword. Menahem himself, indeed, was so barbarous that the more +moderate leader Eleazar turned against him and put him to death. But +Josephus sees in the massacre of the Roman garrison the pollution of the +city, which doomed it to destruction. In his belligerent ethics, +massacre of the Romans by the Jews is always a crime against God, +requiring His visitation; massacres of the Jews are a visitation of God, +revealing that the Romans were His chosen instrument. + +With the history of the war, so far as the historian was involved in it, +we have already dealt. We are here concerned with the character and the +reliability of his account. Josephus is somewhat vague and confused +about the dispositions of the Jewish leaders, but when he is not +justifying his own treachery, or venting his spite on his rivals, he +shows many of the parts of a military historian. He surveys with +clearness and conciseness the nature of the country that the Romans had +to conquer, and he describes the Roman armies and Roman camp with +greater detail than any Roman historian, his design being "not so much +to praise the Romans as to comfort those who have been conquered and to +deter others from rising."[1] It has, however, been pointed out with +great force, in support of the theory that he is following closely and +almost paraphrasing a Roman authority on the war, that his geographical +and topographical lore is introduced not in its natural place, but on +the occasions when Vespasian is the actor in a particular district.[2] +Thus, he describes the Phoenician coast when Vespasian arrives at +Ptolemais, Galilee when Vespasian is besieging Tarichea, Jericho when +Vespasian makes his sally to the Jordan cities.[3] + +[Footnote 1: B.J. III. v. This remark must clearly have appeared in the +original Aramaic.] + +[Footnote 2: Schlatter, Zur Topographie und Geschichte Palastinas, pp. +99 _ff_.] + +[Footnote 3: B.J. III. iii. 1 and x. 7.] + +All this would be natural in a chronicler who was one of Vespasian's +staff, but it is odd in the Jewish commander of Galilee. Again, he makes +certain confusions about Hebrew names of places, which are easily +explained in a Roman, but are inexplicable in the learned priest he +represents himself to be. He says the town of Gamala was so called +because of its supposed resemblance to a camel (in Greek, Kamelos), and +the Jews corrupted the name.[1] A Roman writer no doubt would have +regarded the Hebrew [Hebrew: Namal] as a corruption of the Greek word: a +Jew should have known better. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. III. iv. 2.] + +Again, he explains Bezetha, the name of the northeastern quarter of +Jerusalem, as meaning the new house or city,[1] a mistake natural to a +Roman who was aware that it was in fact the new part of the city, and +alternatively called by the Greek name [Greek: kainopolis], but an +extraordinary blunder for a Jew, who would surely know that it meant the +House of Olives, while the Aramaic or popular name for "new city" would +be Bet-Hadta. He does not once refer to Mount Zion, but knows the hill +by its Greek name of Acra. Yet again it is significant that he inserts +in his geography pagan touches that are part of the common stock of +Greco-Roman notices of Palestine. At Joppa, he says, one may still see +on the rock the trace of the chains of Andromeda,[2] who in Hellenistic +legend was said to have been rescued there by the fictitious hero +Perseus. Describing the Dead Sea,[3] he mentions the destruction of the +cities of Sodom and Gomorrah as a myth, as a Greek or a Roman would have +done.[4] His very accuracy about some topographical details is +suspicious. Colonel Conder[5] points with surprise to the fact that his +description of the fortress of Masada overlooking the Dead Sea, the +siege of which he had not seen, is absolutely correct, while his account +of Jotapata, which he defended, is full of exaggeration. The probable +explanation is that in the one place he copied a skilled observer; in +the other, he trusted to his own inaccurate memory. We may infer that as +in the _Antiquities_ he mainly compiled the work of predecessors that +are known, so in the _Wars_ he compiled the works of predecessors that +are unknown, adding something from his personal experience and his +national pride. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. V. v. 8.] + +[Footnote 2: B.J. IV. ix. 3. Pliny says the same thing in Latin.] + +[Footnote 3: B.J. IV. viii. 4.] + +[Footnote 4: Tac. Hist. v. 7.] + +[Footnote 5: Tent Work in Palestine, 1. 207.] + +Apart from his dependence on others' work, his chronicle of the war is +marred by the need of justifying his own submission, his Roman +standpoint, and his ulterior purpose of pleasing and flattering his +patrons. Vespasian and Titus are the righteous ministers of God's wrath +against His people, His vicars on earth, and every action in their +ruthless process of extermination has to be represented as a just +retribution required to expiate the sin of Jewish resistance. Titus +especially is singled out for his unfailing deeds of bravery; and when +anything is amiss with the proceedings of the Romans, the Imperial +family is always exculpated. Characteristic is the palliation of +Vespasian's brutal treatment of the people of Tarichea. When they +surrendered, they were promised their lives, but twelve hundred old men +were butchered, and over three thousand men and women were sold as +slaves. Josephus cannot find the execution of the divine will in this, +and so he is driven to explain that Vespasian was overborne by his +council, and gave them an ambiguous liberty to do as seemed good to +them. + +It is the pivot of the story of the wars, as has been stated, that the +internal strife of the Jews brought about the ruin of the nation, and +the testimony of Josephus has perpetuated that conception of the last +days of Jerusalem. Our other records of the struggle go to suggest that +civil strife did take place. Tacitus[1] states that there were three +leaders, each with his own army in the city, and the Rabbinical +authorities[2] speak of the three councils in Jerusalem. It is further +said that the second Temple was destroyed because of the unprovoked +hatred among the Jews, which was the equal of the sins of murder, +unchastity, and idolatry that brought about the fall of the first +Temple.[3] Yet the fact that the men who were the foremost agitators of +the Rebellion were its leaders to the end suggests that the people had +reliance on their leadership; and Josephus probably traded largely on +his prejudices for the particulars of the civil conflicts, and he placed +all the blame on the party that was least guilty. Adopting the Roman +standpoint, he denounced the whole Zealot policy, and for John of +Gischala, their leader, he entertained a special loathing. It is +therefore his purpose to show that all the sedition was of John's +making, while it would seem more probable that the disturbances arose +because the Romanizing aristocrats were planning surrender. + +[Footnote 1: Hist. v. 12.] + +[Footnote 2: Midr. Kohelet, vii. 11.] + +[Footnote 3: Yoma, 9b.] + +According to Josephus, the Zealots, who were masters of the greater part +of Jerusalem during the struggle, established a reign of terror. They +trampled upon the laws of man, and laughed at the laws of God. They +ridiculed the oracles of the prophets as the tricks of jugglers. "Yet +did they occasion the fulfilment of prophecies relating to their +country. For there was an ancient oracle that the city should be taken +and the sanctuary burnt when sedition should affect the Jews." Josephus +shares the pagan outlook of the Roman historian Tacitus, who is +horrified at the Jewish disregard of the omens and portents which +betokened the fall of their city, and speaks of them as a people prone +to superstition (what we would call faith) and deaf to divine warnings +(what we would call superstition).[1] Josephus and his friends were +looking for signs and prophecies of the ruin of the people as an excuse +for surrender; the Zealots, men of sterner stuff and of fuller faith, +were resolved to resist to the end, and would brook no parleying with +the enemy. They were in fact political nationalists of a different +school and leaning from the aristocrats and the priests. The latter +regarded political life and the Temple service as vital parts of the +national life, and believing that the legions were invincible were +anxious to keep peace with Rome. The Zealots regarded personal liberty +and national independence as vital, and, to vindicate them, fought to +the end with Rome. Both the extreme political parties lacked the +spiritual standpoint of the Pharisees, who believed that the Torah even +without political independence would hold the people together till a +better time was granted by Providence. The party conflicts induced +violence and civil tumult, and Josephus would have us believe that +"demoniac discord" was the main cause of the ruin of Jerusalem. During +the respite which the Jews enjoyed before the final siege of Jerusalem, +he alleges that a bitter feud was waged incessantly between Eleazar the +son of Simon, who held the Inner Court of the Temple, Simon, the son of +Gioras, who held the Upper and the greater part of the Lower city, and +John of Gischala, who occupied the outer part of the Temple. He +describes the situation rhetorically as "sedition begetting sedition, +like a wild beast gone mad, which, for want of other food, falls to +eating its own flesh." And he bursts into an apostrophe over the +fighting that went on within the Temple precincts: + +"Most wretched city! What misery so great as this didst thou suffer from +the Romans, when they came to purify thee from thy internecine hatred! +Thou couldst no longer be a fit habitation for God, nor couldst thou +continue longer in being, after thou hadst been a sepulcher for the +corpses of thine own people, and thy holy house itself had been a burial +place in their civil strife." + +[Footnote 1: Hist. v. 13. Gens superstitioni prona, religioni obnoxia.] + +It is curious that a little later, when he resumes the narrative of the +Roman campaign, and returns presumably to a Roman source, he says that +the Jews, elated by their unexpected success, made incursions on the +Greek cities. The success referred to must be the defeat of Cestius +Gallus, and it looks as if this lurid account of the horrors of the +civil war in Jerusalem were not known to the Roman guide, and that at +the least Josephus has embroidered the story of the feud to suit his +thesis. The measure of the Jewish writer's dependence for the main part +of his narrative of the siege is singularly illustrated by a small +detail. Josephus throughout his account uses the Macedonian names of the +months, and equates them loosely with those of the Jewish calendar; but +it is notable that the three traditional Jewish dates in the siege which +he inserts, the fourteenth of Xanthicus (Nisan), when it began, the +seventeenth of Panemos (Tammuz), when the daily offering ceased, and the +ninth and tenth of Loos (Ab), when the Temple was destroyed, conflict +with the other dates he gives in his general account of the siege. So +far from being a proof of his independence, as has been claimed, his +Jewish dates show his want of skill in weaving his Jewish information +into his scheme. When he is original, he is apt to be unhistorical. +Josephus agrees with the Talmud that the fire lasted to the tenth of the +month,[1] but while the Rabbis cursed Titus, who burnt the Holy of +Holies and spread fire and slaughter, and Roman historians[2] declared +that Titus had deliberately fired the center of the Jewish cult in order +to destroy the national stronghold, Josephus is anxious to preserve his +patron's reputation for gentleness and invest him with the appearance of +piety and magnanimity. Voicing perhaps the conqueror's later regrets, he +declares that he protested against the Romans' avenging themselves on +inanimate things and against the destruction of so beautiful a work, but +failed despite all his efforts to stay the conflagration. The historian +writes a lurid description of the catastrophe, but he omits the simple +details that make the account in the Talmud so pathetic. "The Temple," +runs the Talmudic account[3] "was destroyed on the eve of the ninth day +of Ab at the outgoing of Sabbath, at the end of the Sabbatic year; and +the watch of Jehoiarib was on service, and the Levites were chanting the +hymns and standing at their desks. And the hymn they chanted was, 'And +He shall bring upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them off with +their own wickedness' (Ps. 94:23); and they could not finish to say, +'The Lord our God shall cut them off,' when the heathen came and +silenced them." This account may not be historically true, but it +represents the unquenchable spirit of Judaism in face of the disaster. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Yer. Taanit, iv. 6.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. Sulpicius Severus, who used Tacitus (Chron. I. xxx. +6.); and the poet Valerius Flaccus acclaims the victor of Solymae, who +hurls fiery torches at the Temple. Dion Cassius (lxvi. 4.) declares that +when the Roman soldiers refused to attack the Temple in awe of its +holiness, Titus himself set fire to it; and this appears to be the true +account.] + +[Footnote 3: Taanit, 29a.] + +Josephus, on the other hand, regards the fall of the Temple as a +favorable opportunity to give a list of the prodigies and omens that +heralded it. For example, he finds a proof of Providence in the +fulfilment of the oracle, that the city and the holy house should be +taken when the Temple should become foursquare. By demolishing the tower +of Antonia the Jews had made the Temple area foursquare, and so brought +the doom upon themselves. He tells, too, the story of a prophet Jesus, +who for years had cried, "Woe, woe to Jerusalem," and in the end, struck +by a missile, fell, crying, "Woe, woe to me!" For any reflections, +however, on the immortality of the religion or for any utterances of +hope for the ultimate restoration of the Temple and the coming of the +Messiah, we must not look to the _Wars_. Such ideas would not have +pleased his patrons, had he entertained them himself. He pointed to the +fulfilment of prophecy only so far as it predicted and justified the +destruction and ruin of his people. The expression of the national agony +at the destruction of the national center is to be found in the +apocryphal book of Esdras II. + +Over his account of the final acts of the tragedy we may pass quickly. +Undismayed by the fall of the sanctuary and still hoping for divine +intervention, John and Simon withdrew from the Temple to the upper city. +Driven from this, they took refuge in the underground caverns and caves +to be found everywhere beneath Jerusalem, and finally they stood their +ground in the towers, until these too were captured, a month after the +destruction of the Temple, on the eighth of Elul (Gorpiaeus, as the +Greek month was called). + +"It was the fifth time that the city was captured; and 2179 years passed +between its first building and its last destruction. Yet neither its +great antiquity, nor its vast riches, nor the diffusion of the nation +over the whole earth, nor the greatness of the veneration paid to it on +religious grounds, was sufficient to preserve it from destruction. And +thus ended the siege of Jerusalem." + +Though the war was not finished, the crisis of the drama was over, and +Josephus, doubtless following his source, relaxes the narrative to +digress about affairs in Rome and the East. The last book of the _Wars_ +is episodic and disconnected. It is a kind of aftermath, in which the +historian gathers up scattered records, but does not preserve the +dramatic character of the history. He had apparently here to fall back +on his own feeble constructive power, and was hard put to it to eke out +his material to the proportions of a book. + +So careless, too, is he that he abstracts references from his source +that are meaningless. In the excursion into general history, he refers +to "the German king Alaric, whom we have mentioned before,"[1] though he +is brought in for the first time; and in the account of the siege of the +Zealots' fortress Machaerus he records the death of one "Judas whom we +have mentioned before,"[2] though again there was no previous mention of +the warrior. In the same chapter he describes some magical plant, +"Baaras, possessing power to drive away demons, which are no other than +the spirits of the wicked that enter into living men and kill them, +unless they obtain some help against them." This apparently was a +commonplace of Palestinian natural science, as known to the Greco-Roman +world, and Josephus simply copied it. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. VII. iv. 4.] + +[Footnote 2: B.J. VII. vi. 4.] + +The Zealots still maintained resistance in remote parts of the country, +and the legate Bassus was sent to take their three fortresses. He died +before the capture of Masada, the last stronghold, a natural fastness +overlooking the Dead Sea, which had been fortified by Herod. In this +region David and centuries later the Maccabean heroes had found a refuge +at their time of distress, and here the Jewish people were to show that +desperate heroism of their race which is evoked when all save honor is +lost. Masada had been occupied by Eleazar, a grandson of Judas of +Galilee, the leader of the most fanatical section of the Zealots; and it +fell to the procurator Flavius Silva to reduce it. + +Josephus utters a final outburst against the hated nationalist party and +especially its two leaders, Simon of Gioras and John of Gischala, though +both had become victims of Roman revenge. "That was a time," he +exclaims, "most prolific in wicked practices, nor could anyone devise +any new evil, so deeply were they infected, striving with each other +individually and collectively who should run to the greatest lengths of +impiety towards God and in unjust actions towards their neighbors." The +more incongruous is it that after this invective he puts into Eleazar's +mouth two long speeches, calling on his men to kill themselves rather +than fall into the hands of the Romans, which sum up eloquently the +Zealot attitude.[1] Josephus indeed introduces in the speech the +Hellenized doctrine of immortality, which regards the soul as an +invisible spirit imprisoned in the mortal body and seeking relief from +its prison. He goes on, however, to make the Jewish commander point out +how preferable is death to life servitude to the Romans, in a way in +which Eleazar might himself have spoken. + +[Footnote 1: B.J. VII. viii.] + +"'And as for those who have died in the war, we should deem them +blessed, for they are dead in defending, and not in betraying, their +liberty: but as to the multitude of those that have submitted to the +Romans, who would not pity their condition? And who would not make haste +to die before he would suffer the same miseries? Where is now that great +city, the metropolis of the Jewish nation, which was fortified by so +many walls round about, which had so many fortresses and large towers to +defend it, which could hardly contain the instruments prepared for the +war, and which had so many myriads of men to fight for it? Where is this +city that God Himself inhabited? It is now demolished to the very +foundations; and hath nothing but that monument of it preserved, I mean +the camp of those that have destroyed it, which still dwells upon its +ruins; some unfortunate old men also lie upon the ashes of the Temple, +and a few women are there preserved alive by the enemy for our bitter +shame and reproach. Now, who is there that revolves these things in his +mind, and yet is able to bear the sight of the sun, though he might live +out of danger? Who is there so much his country's enemy, or so unmanly +and so desirous of living, as not to repent that he is still alive? And +I cannot but wish that we had all died before we had seen that holy city +demolished by the hands of our enemies, or the foundations of our holy +Temple dug up after so profane a manner. But since we had a generous +hope that deluded us, as if we might perhaps have been able to avenge +ourselves on our enemies, on that account, though it be now become +vanity, and hath left us alone in this distress, let us make haste to +die bravely. Let us pity ourselves, our children, and our wives, while +it is in our power to show pity to them; for we are born to die, as well +as those whom we have begotten; nor is it in the power of the most happy +of our race to avoid it. But for abuses and slavery and the sight of our +wives led away after an ignominious manner with their children, these +are not such evils as are natural and necessary among men; although such +as do not prefer death before those miseries, when it is in their power +to do so, must undergo even them on account of their own cowardice.' + +"Responding to their leader's call, the defenders put their wives and +children to the sword, and then turned their hands on themselves: and +when the Romans entered the place, to their amazement and horror they +found not a living soul." + +Eleazar's speech is one of the few patriotic outbursts in the seven +books of the Wars, and it reads like a cry of bitter regret wrung from +the unhappy author at the end of his work. Like Balaam he set out to +curse, and stayed to bless, his enemies, and cursed himself. Perhaps +this apostrophe hides the tragedy of Josephus' life. Perhaps he inwardly +repented of his cowardice, and rued the uneasy protection he had secured +for himself. Perhaps he had denounced the Zealots throughout the history +perforce, to please his taskmasters, and in his heart of hearts envied +the party that had preferred death to surrender. We could wish he had +ended with the story of Masada's noble fall, and left us at this +pathetic doubt. But he had not the dramatic sense, and he rounds off the +story of the wars with an account of the futile Jewish rising in +Alexandria and Cyrene, fomented by the surviving remnants of the +Zealots. The first led to the closing in Egypt of the Temple of Onias, +the last sanctuary of the Jews; the second to slanderous attacks on the +historian. Jonathan, who had stirred up the Cyrenaic rising and started +the slanders, was tortured and burnt alive. As to Catullus, the Roman +governor, who admitted the calumnies, though the Emperor spared him, he +fell into a terrible distemper and died miserably. "Thus he became a +signal instance of Divine Providence, and demonstrated that God punishes +the wicked." + +Instead of concluding upon some national reflection, Josephus, +pathetically enough, disfigures the end of his work with a final +revelation of personal vanity and materialistic views of a Providence +intervening on his behalf. Egoism and incapacity to attain to the noble +and sublime either in action or thought were the two defects that +lowered Josephus as a man, and which mar him as an historian. In the +last paragraph of the work he insists that he has aimed alone at +agreement with the facts; but industrious as is the record of events, +the claim is shallow. His history of the Jewish wars lacks authority +because it is palpably designed to please the Roman taste, and because +also it has to serve as a personal apology for one who, when heroism was +called for, had failed to respond to the call, and who was thus rendered +incapable in letters as in life of being a faithful champion of his +people. + + + + +VI + +JOSEPHUS AND THE BIBLE + + +In the preface to the _Antiquities_ Josephus draws a distinction between +his motives for the composition of that work and of the _Wars_. He wrote +the latter because he himself had played a large part in the war, and he +desired to correct the errors of other historians, who had perverted the +truth. On the other hand, he undertook to write the earlier history of +his people because of the great importance of the events themselves and +of his desire to reveal for the common benefit things that were buried +in ignorance. He was stimulated to the task by the fact that his +forefathers had been willing to communicate their antiquity to the +Greeks, and, moreover, several of the Greeks had been at pains to learn +of the affairs of the Jewish nation. + +It would appear that he is here referring to the Septuagint translation of +the Bible, since he proceeds to summarize the well-known story of King +Ptolemy recounted in the Letter of Aristeas, which he afterwards sets out +more fully.[1] Josephus shares the aim of the Hellenistic-Jewish writers +to make the Jewish Scriptures known to the Gentile world, and he inherits +also, but in a much smaller degree, their method of presenting Judaism to +suit Greek or Greco-Roman tastes, as a philosophical, i.e. an ethical- +philosophical, religion. Perhaps he had become acquainted, either at +Alexandria or at Rome, with Philo's _Life of Moses_, which was a popular +text-book, so to speak, of universal Judaism. Certain it is that the +prelude to the _Antiquities_ is reminiscent of the earlier treatise. +Josephus reproduces Philo's idea that Moses began his legislation not as +other lawgivers, "with the detailed enactments, contracts, and other rites +between one man and another, but by raising men's minds upwards to regard +God and His creation." For Moses life was to be an imitation of the +divine. Contemplation of God's work is the best of all patterns for man to +follow. With Philo again, he points out the superiority of Moses over +other legislators in his attack upon false ideas of the divine nature; +"for there is nothing in the Scriptures inconsistent with the majesty of +God or with His love of mankind: and all things in it have reference to +the nature of the universe." He claims, too, that Moses explains some +things clearly and directly, but that he hints at others philosophically +under the form of allegory. And to these commonplaces of Alexandrian +exegesis he adds as the lesson of the history of his people that "it goes +well with those who follow God's will and observe His laws, and ill with +those who rebel against Him and neglect His laws." To exhibit to the +Greco-Roman world the power and majesty of the Jewish God and the +excellence of the Jewish law--these are the two main purposes which he +professes to set before himself in his rendering of the Bible story, which +occupies the first half of the _Antiquities_. No Jewish writer before him +had treated the Bible to suit Roman predilections, which attached supreme +importance to material strength and the concrete manifestation of +authority, and Josephus in order to carry out his aim had therefore to +proceed on new lines. + +[Footnote 1: See below, p. 175.] + +In effect, he rarely attempts to ethicize the Bible story. For the most +part he paraphrases it, cuts out its poetry, and reduces it to a prosaic +chronicle of facts. The exordium in fact has little relation to the +book, and looks as if it were borrowed without discrimination. Josephus +next, indeed, professes that he will accurately set out in chronological +order the incidents in the Jewish annals, "without adding anything to +what is therein contained or taking anything away from it." It may be +that he regarded the oral tradition as an inherent part of the law, and +therefore inserts selections of it in the narrative, but anyhow he does +not observe strictly the command of Deuteronomy (4:2) that prompted his +profession, "Ye shall not add unto the word I have spoken, neither shall +ye diminish aught from it." Not only does he freely paraphrase the +Septuagint version of the Bible, but, more especially in the earlier +part of the work, he incorporates pieces of Palestinian Haggadah and to +a smaller extent of Alexandrian interpretation, and he omits many +episodes that did not seem to him to redound to the glory of his people. +He seeks to improve the Bible, and though he did not invent new legends, +he accepted uncritically those which he found in Hellenistic sources or +in the oral tradition of his people. His work is, therefore, valuable as +a storehouse of early Haggadah. It is unnecessary to accept his +description of himself as one who had a profound knowledge of tradition, +but he was acquainted with the popular exegesis of the Palestinian +teachers; and twenty years of life at the Roman court had not entirely +eliminated his knowledge. + +In the very first section of the first book, he notes that Moses sums up +the first day of Creation with the words, "and it was _one_ day"; +whereas afterwards it is said, "it was the second, the third day, etc." +He does not indeed supply the interpretation, saying that he will give +the reason in a separate treatise which he proposes to write; but the +same point is discussed in the Rabbinic commentary. He gives the +traditional interpretation of the four rivers of the Garden of Eden.[1] +He derives the name Adam from the Hebrew word for red, because the first +man was formed out of red earth.[2] He states that the animals in the +Garden of Eden had one language, a piece of Midrash which occurs also in +the Book of Jubilees. He relates that Cain, after the murder of his +brother, was afraid of falling among wild beasts, agreeing with the +Midrash that all the animals assembled to avenge the blood of Abel,[3] +but God forbade them to destroy Cain on pain of their own destruction. +Seth he describes as the model of the virtuous, and of him the Rabbis +likewise say, "From Seth dates the stock of all generations of the +virtuous." He pictures him also as a great inventor and the discoverer +of astronomy, and tells how he set up pillars of brick and stone +recording these inventions, so that they might not be forgotten if the +world was destroyed either by fire or water: here again agreeing with +the Book of Jubilees, which relates that Cainan found an inscription in +which his forefathers had described their inventions. Examples might be +multiplied from the first chapters of the _Antiquities_ of the way in +which Josephus weaves into the Bible account traditional Midrashim, but +these instances will suffice. + +[Footnote 1: Gen. R. ii. and iii., quoted in Bloch, Die Quellen des +Flavius Josephus, 1879. The rivers are the Ganges, Euphrates, Tigris, +and Nile.] + +[Footnote 2: Yalkut Gen. 21, 22.] + +[Footnote 3: Gen. R. xxii.] + +Besides embroidering the Bible text with Haggadic legends, Josephus is +prone to place in the mouths of the characters rhetorical speeches in +the Greek style, either expanding a verse or two in the Bible or +composing them entirely. Thus God says to Adam and Eve in the Garden of +Eden after the fall: + +"I had before determined about you that you might lead a happy life +without affliction and care and vexation of soul; and that all things +which might contribute to your enjoyment and pleasure should grow up by +My Providence of their own accord. And death would not overtake you at +any period. But now you have abused My good-will and disobeyed My +commands, for your silence is not the sign of your virtue but of your +guilty conscience." + +Anticipating, moreover, the methods of latter-day Biblical apologists, +he loses no opportunity of adding any confirmation he can find for the +Bible story in pagan historians. He cites for the truth of the story of +the flood Berosus the Chaldean, Hieronymus the Egyptian, Menander the +Phoenician, and a great many others[1]; and he finds confirmation of the +early chapters of Genesis in general in Manetho, who wrote a famous +Egyptian history, and Mochus, and Hestiaeus, and in some of the earliest +Greek chroniclers, Hesiod and Hecataeus and Hellanicus and Acesilaus. In +later years he was to deal more elaborately with the question of the +authority of the Scriptural history,[2] and then he set out the pagan +testimony more accurately. In the _Antiquities_ he is usually content to +refer to it. It is significant that in the passages in which he adduces +pagan corroboration he refers to Nicholas of Damascus, and in the first +of them repeats his words about the remains of the Ark lying on a +mountain in Armenia. It is well-nigh certain that Josephus did not study +the writings of any of these chroniclers and historians at first hand, +for he shows no acquaintance with the substance of their works. They +were quoted by Nicholas, and where his source had given excerpts from +their writings that threw any light, or might be taken to throw light, +on the Hebrew text, Josephus, following the literary ethics of his day, +inserts them. His archeology extended only to the reading of one or more +writers of universal ancient history and taking from them whatever bore +upon his own subject. He finds authority for the story of the tower of +Babel in the oracles of the Sibyl, which we now know to be Jewish +forgeries, but which professed to be and were regarded by the less +educated of his day as being the utterances of an ancient seeress. +Josephus paraphrases the hexameters which described how, when all men +were of one tongue, some of them built a high tower, as if they would +thereby ascend to heaven; but the deity sent storms of wind and +overthrew the tower, and gave everyone his peculiar language. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. I. iii. 3.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. below, p. 223.] + +Josephus sets considerable store by the exact chronology of the Bible, +stopping continually to enumerate the number of years that had passed +from the Creation to some other point of reckoning. His habit in this +respect is marred by a singular inaccuracy in dealing with dates and +figures, varying as he often does from chapter to chapter, sometimes +from paragraph to paragraph, according to the source he happens to be +following. He gives the year of the flood as 2656, though the sum of the +years of the Patriarchs who lived before it in his reckoning totals only +2256. It has been conjectured[1] that he followed the Septuagint +chronology from the Creation to the flood and that of the Hebrew Bible +from Abraham onwards, and for the intermediate period he has his own +reckoning. The result is that his calculations are often inconsistent. +In his desire to impress the Greco-Roman reader, he dates an event by +the Macedonian as well as the Jewish month, whenever he knows it, i.e. +when he found it in his source. Thus the flood is said to have taken +place "in the month Dius, which is called by the Hebrews Marheshwan." +From the same motive he dwells on the table of the descendants of Noah, +identifying the various families mentioned in the Bible with peoples +known to the Greek world. The sons of Noah inhabited first the mountains +Taurus and Amanus, and proceeded along Asia to the river Tanais, and +along Europe to Cadiz, giving their names to nations in the lands they +inhabited. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Destinon, Die Chronologie des Josephus, 1880.] + +What Josephus then insists on in his paraphrase of Scripture is the fact +and not the lesson, the letter and not the spirit; while Philo, who is +the true type of Jewish Hellenist, was always looking for deeper +meanings beneath the literal text. The Romans had no bent for such +interpretations, and Josephus Romanizes. He treats, for example, the +genealogies, the chronology, and the ethnology of Genesis as things of +supreme value, and though he occasionally inserts Haggadic tradition, he +misses the Haggadic spirit, which sought to draw new morals and new +spiritual value from the narrative. In his account of Abram, indeed, he +touches upon the patriarch's higher idea of God, which led him to leave +Chaldea. But here, too, he distorts the genuine Hebraic conception, and +presents Abram as a kind of Stoic philosopher.[1] + +[Footnote 1: Ant. I. vii. 1.] + +He was the first that ventured to publish this notion, that there was +but one God, the Creator of the Universe, and that, as to the other +gods, if they contributed to the happiness of men, they afforded it +according to their appointment and not according to their own power. His +opinion was derived from the study of the heavenly bodies and the +phenomena of the terrestrial world. If, said he, these bodies had power +of their own, they would certainly have regular motions. But since they +do not preserve such regularity, they show that in so far as they work +for our good, they do it not of their own strength but as they are +subservient to Him who commands them. + +This is one of the few pieces of theology in the _Antiquities_, and we +are fain to believe that he borrowed it from Nicholas, who is quoted +immediately afterwards, or from pseudo-Hecataeus, a Jewish +pseudepigraphic historian, to whom a book on the patriarch was ascribed. +So, later, following the Hellenistic tradition, he represents Abraham as +the teacher of astronomy to the Egyptians. + +Josephus was a wavering rationalist, as is shown by his acceptance of +the story of Lot's wife being turned into a pillar of salt, "I have seen +the pillar," he adds (though again he may be blindly copying), "and it +remains to this day." It is not the place here to enter into the details +of his version of the story of the patriarchs. He gives the facts, and +loses much of the spirit, often spoiling the beauty of the Biblical +narrative by a prosy paraphrase. Thus God assures Abraham after the +offering of Isaac,[1] that it was not out of desire for human blood that +he was commanded to slay his son; and Isaac says to Jacob, who comes to +receive the blessing: "Thy voice is like the voice of Jacob, yet because +of the thickness of thy hair thou seemest to be Esau." One is reminded +of Bowdler's improvements of Shakespeare in the eighteenth century. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. I. xiii. 4.] + +The first book of the _Antiquities_ ends with the death of Isaac. The +second deals with the story of Joseph and of the Exodus from Egypt. The +method is the same: partly Midrashic and partly rhetorical embellishment +of the Biblical text, conversion of the poetry into prose, and, where +occasion offers, correlation of the Scripture with Hellenistic history. +The chapters dealing with the life of Moses are particularly rich in +legendary additions: Amram is told in a vision that his son shall be the +savior of Israel;[1] the name of Pharaoh's daughter is given as +Thermuthis, in accordance with Hellenistic, but not Talmudic, tradition. +Moses in his childhood dons Pharaoh's crown, and is only saved from death +by the king's daughter.[2] Finally a whole chapter is devoted to an +account of the wars of Moses, as an Egyptian general fighting against the +Ethiopians, which is taken from the histories of pseudo-Artapanus.[3] +Josephus makes no attempt to rationalize the account of the plagues, but +on the contrary dilates on them, "both because no such plagues did ever +happen to any other nation, and because it is for the good of mankind, +that they may learn by this warning not to do anything which may displease +God, lest He be provoked to wrath and avenge their iniquity upon them." At +the same time, following a tradition reflected in the Apocalyptic and +Rabbinic literature, he modifies the Biblical statement, that the Jews +spoiled the Egyptians before leaving the country, by explaining that they +took their fair hire for their labor.[4] And after describing the drowning +of the Egyptians in the Red Sea--which Moses celebrates with a +thanksgiving song in hexameter verse[5]--he apologizes for the strangeness +of the narrative and its miraculous incidents. He explains that he has +recounted every part of the history as he found it in the sacred books, +and people are not to wonder "if such things happened, _whether by God's +will or by chance_, to the men of old, who were free from the wickedness +of modern times, seeing that even for those who accompanied Alexander the +Greek, who lived recently, when it was God's will to destroy the Persian +monarchy, the Pamphylian sea retired and afforded a passage." This homily +smacks of some Hellenistic-Jewish rationalist, whom he copied. But he +concludes the whole with a formula, which is regular when he has stated +something which he fears will be difficult of belief for his audience, "As +to these things, let everyone determine as he thinks best." He treats the +account of the Decalogue in a similar way. "I am bound," he says, "to +relate the history as it is described in the Holy Writ, but my readers may +accept or reject the story as they please." Josephus therein applied the +rule, "When at Rome, do as Rome does." For it is noteworthy that the Roman +historian Tacitus, who wrote a little later than Josephus, manifests the +same indecision about the interference of the divine agency in human +affairs, the relation of chance to human freedom, and the necessity of +fate; and in many cases he likewise places the rational and transcendental +explanations of an event side by side, without any attempt to reconcile +them. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Mekilta, ed. Weiss, p. 52. This and the following +Rabbinic parallels are collected by Bloch, _op. cit._] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. Tanhuma, xii. 4.] + +[Footnote 3: Comp. Eusebius, Praep. vii. 2.] + +[Footnote 4: Comp. Book of Jubilees, xlviii. 18, and Sanhedrin, 91a.] + +[Footnote 5: He probably had in mind the Greek version of the Song of +Moses made by the Jewish-Alexandrian dramatic poet Ezekiel, which was +written in hexameter verse.] + +Josephus deals summarily with the Mosaic Code in the _Antiquities_, but +announces his intention to compose "another work concerning our laws." +This work is, perhaps, represented by the second book _Against Apion_; +or possibly the intention was never fulfilled. He does not set out the +ten commandments at length, explaining that it was against tradition to +translate them directly.[1] He refers probably to the rule that they +were not to be recited in any language but Hebrew, though, of course, +the Septuagint contained a full version. On the other hand, he describes +the construction of the Tabernacle with some fulness, and dwells +particularly on the robes of the priests and the pomp of the high +priest. Ritual and ceremonial appealed to his public; and his account, +which was based on the practice of his own day, supplements in some +particulars the account in the Talmud. But unfortunately he does not +describe the Temple service. He attaches marked importance to the Urim +and Thummim, which formed a sort of oracle parallel with pagan +institutions, and says that the breastplate and sardonyx, with which he +identifies them, ceased to shine two hundred years before he wrote his +book[2] (i.e. at the time of John Hyrcanus). The Talmud understands the +mystic names of the Bible in a similar way,[3] but represents that the +oracle ceased with the destruction of the first Temple, and was not +known in the second Temple. Josephus enlarges, in a way common to the +Hellenistic-Jewish apologists,[4] on the symbolism of the Temple service +and furniture. + +"One may wonder at the contempt men bear us, or which they profess to +bear, on the ground that we despise the Deity, whom they pretend to +honor: for if anyone do but consider the construction of the Temple, the +Tabernacle, and the garments of the high priest, and the vessels we use +in our service, he will find our lawgiver was inspired by God.... For if +he regard these things without prejudice, he will find that everyone is +made by way of imitation and representation of the Universe."[5] + +[Footnote 1: Ant. III. vi. 4.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. III. vii. 7.] + +[Footnote 3: Yer. Sotah, ix. 13.] + +[Footnote 4: Comp. Philo, De V. Mos. iii. 6.] + +[Footnote 5: Ant. III. vii. 7.] + +The ritual, in brief, typifies the universal character of Judaism, which +Josephus was anxious to emphasize in reply to the charge of Jewish +aloofness and particularism. The three divisions of the Tabernacle +symbolize heaven, earth, and sea; the twelve loaves stand for the twelve +months of the year; the seventy parts of the candlestick for the seventy +planets; the veils, which were composed of four materials, for the four +elements; the linen of the high priest's vestment signified the earth, +the blue betokened the sky; the breastplate resembled the shape of the +earth, and so forth. We find similar reflections in Philo, but in his +work they are part of a continuous allegorical exegesis, and in the +other they are a sudden incursion of the symbolical into the long +narrative of facts. + +Following the account of the Tabernacle and the priestly vestments, +Josephus describes the manner of offering sacrifices, the observance of +the festivals, and the Levitical laws of cleanliness. In his account of +these laws Josephus makes no attempt either to derive a universal value +from the Biblical commands or to read a philosophical meaning into them +by allegorical interpretation. He normally states the law as it stands +in the text, and in the selection he makes he gives the preference, not +to general ethical precepts, but to regulations about the priests. He +had a pride of caste and a love of the pomp and circumstance of the +Temple service; and the national ceremony could be more easily conveyed +to the Gentile than an understanding of the spiritual value of Judaism. +The Hellenistic apologists enlarged on the humanitarian character of the +Mosaic social legislation; Josephus mentions without comment the laws of +the seventh year release and the Jubilee, though in his later apology, +which was addressed to the Greeks, in the books _Against Apion_,[1] he +dwelt more carefully on them. His interpretation of the laws, so far as +it goes, in places agrees with the Rabbinic Halakah, but he admits some +modification of the accepted tradition. Thus he states that the high +priest was forbidden to marry a slave, or a captive, or a woman who kept +an inn. He translates the Hebrew [Hebrew: zonah], which probably here +means a prostitute, by innkeeper, a meaning the word has in other +passages;[2] but the Aramaic version of the Bible supports him. He +gives, too, a rationalizing reason for the observance of Tabernacles, +saying, "The Law enjoins us to pitch tabernacles so that we may preserve +ourselves from the cold of the season of the year."[3] The Feast of +Weeks he calls Asartha, perhaps a Grecized form of the Hebrew [Hebrew: +Atzereth], which was its old name, and he does not regard it as the +anniversary of the giving of the Law. He promises to explain afterwards +why some animals are forbidden for food and some permitted, but he fails +to fulfil his promise. Since, however, the interpretation of the dietary +laws as a discipline of temperance was a commonplace of Hellenistic +Judaism, which is very fully set forth in the so-called Fourth Book of +the Maccabees,[4] the absence of his comments is not a great loss. + +[Footnote 1: See below, p. 234.] + +[Footnote 2: Judges, 4:1; Josh. 2; and Ezek. 23:44.] + +[Footnote 3: Ant. IV. viii. 4.] + +[Footnote 4: See above, p. 105.] + +In the next book of the _Antiquities_, Josephus deals with other parts +of the Mosaic Law, especially such as might appear striking to Roman +readers. Thus he gives in detail the law as to the Nazarites, the Korban +offering, and the red heifer, and he completes his account of the Mosaic +Code by a summary description of the Jewish polity, in which he +abstracts a large part of the laws of Deuteronomy together with some of +the traditional amplifications.[1] Moses prefaces his farewell address +with a number of moral platitudes. "Virtue is its own principal reward, +and, besides, it bestows abundance of others."--"The practice of virtue +towards other men will make your own lives happy," and so forth. +Josephus again proclaims that he sets out the laws in the words of +Moses, his only innovation being to arrange them in a regular system, +"for they were left by him in writing as they were accidentally +scattered." The influence of Roman law may have suggested the arranging +and digesting of the Mosaic Code, as well as several of his variations +from the letter of the Bible. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. IV. viii.] + +A few of his interpretations are noteworthy as comprising either +Palestinian or Hellenistic tradition. He understands the command not to +curse those in authority ([Hebrew: Elohim], Exod. 22:28) as referring to +the gods worshiped in other cities, following Philo and a Hellenistic +tradition based on a mistranslation of the Septuagint. A late passage in +the Talmud, on the other hand, says that all abuse is forbidden save of +idolatry.[1] With Philo again, he inserts into the code a law +prohibiting the possession of poison on pain of death,[2] which is based +on an erroneous interpretation of the law against witchcraft. Josephus +follows the Hellenistic school also when he deduces from the prohibition +against removing boundary stones the lesson that no infraction of the +law and tradition[3] is to be permitted. Nothing is to be allowed the +imitation of which might lead to the subversion of the constitution. He +introduces a law about evidence, to the effect that the testimony of +women should not be admitted "on account of the levity and boldness of +their sex."[4] The rule has no place in the Code of the Pentateuch, but +is supported in the oral law. He adopts another traditional +interpretation when he limits the commands against women wearing men's +habits to the donning of armor in times of war.[5] He misrepresents, on +the other hand, the law of [Hebrew: shemitah] (seventh year release), +stating that if a servant have a child by a bondwoman in his master's +house, and if, on account of his good-will to his master, he prefers to +remain a slave, he shall be set free only in the year of jubilee. The +Bible says he shall be branded if he refuse the proffered liberty in the +seventh year, and Philo in his interpretation has drawn a fine homily +about the regard set on liberty. But Josephus may have thought that the +institution would appear ridiculous to the legal minds of Romans. To +accommodate the Jewish law again to the Roman standard, he moderates the +_lex talionis_ (the rule of an eye for an eye), by adding that it is +applied only if he that is maimed will not accept money in compensation +for his injury, a half-way position between the Sadducean doctrine, +which understood the Biblical law literally, and the Pharisaic rule, +which abrogated it. But in several instances he makes offenses +punishable with death, which were not so according to the tradition, +_e.g._ the insulting of parents by their children and the taking of +bribes by judges.[6] Summing up the version of Deuteronomy, it may be +said that Josephus, by omitting a law here, adding one there, now +softening, now modifying, in some places broadening, in others narrowing +the scope of the command, presents a code which lacks both the +ruggedness of the Torah and the maturer humaneness of the Rabbinical +Halakah, but was designed to show the reasonableness of the Jewish +system according to Roman notions. + +[Footnote 1: Sanhedrin, 63b.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. Philo, De Spec. Leg. ii. 815.] + +[Footnote 3: Comp. Deut. 22:5, and Nazir, 59a, with Ant. IV. viii. 43.] + +[Footnote 4: Shebuot, 30a.] + +[Footnote 5: Comp. Philo, De Spec. Leg. ii.] + +[Footnote 6: Comp. C. Ap. ii. 27. It has been suggested by Judge Mayer +Sulzberger that he falsely interpreted the Hebrew [Hebrew: 'Arur] +(cursed be!) to mean death punishment. Comp. J.Q.R., n.s., iii. 315.] + +Josephus, from a different motive, is silent about the golden calf and +the breaking of the tablets of stone. Those incidents, to his mind, did +not reflect credit on his people; therefore they were not to be +disclosed to Greek and Roman readers. He omits, for other reasons, the +Messianic prophecies of Balaam, which would not be pleasing to the +Flavians. At the same time one of the blessings in the prophecies of +Balaam gives him the opportunity of asserting some universal +humanitarian doctrines, to which Philo affords a parallel. The Moabite +seer talks like a Hellenistic apologist of the second century B.C.E. or +a Sibylline oracle: "Every land and every sea will be full of the praise +of your name. Your offspring will dwell in every clime, and the whole +world will be your dwelling-place for eternity."[1] He is at pains to +extol Moses as of superhuman excellence, as is proved by the enduring +force of his laws, which is such that "there is no Jew who does not act +as if Moses were present and ready to punish him if he should offend in +any way."[2] He quotes examples of the Jewish steadfastness in the Law, +which would have impressed a Roman: the regular pilgrimage from Babylon +to the Temple, the abstention of the Jewish priests from touching a +crumb of flour during the Feast of Passover, at a time when, during a +severe famine, abundance of wheat was brought to the Temple. But he +somewhat mars the effect of his praise by adding a not very exalted +motive for the piety of his people--the dread of the Law and of the +wrath which God manifests against transgressors, even when no man can +accuse the actor. Josephus is in a way a loyal supporter of the Law, and +he had a sincere admiration for its hold on the people, but he was led +by the conditions of his appeal to materialize the idea of Jewish +religious intensity and to present it as a fear of punishment. Nor is it +the humanity, the inherent excellence of the Law which he emphasizes, +but its endurance and the widespread allegiance it commands. Looking at +Judaism through Roman spectacles, he treats it as a positive force +comparable with the sway of the Roman Emperor. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Orac. Sib. 111. 271: [Greek: pasa de gaia sethen +plaeres kai pasa thalassa] and Philo, De V. Mos. ii. 126.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. IV. vi 4.] + +In the description of the death of Moses the same habit of enfeebling +the majesty of the Biblical text to suit the current taste is +manifested. Moses weeps before he ascends the mountain to die. He +exhorts the people not to lament over his departure. As he is about to +embrace Joshua and Eleazar, he is covered with a cloud and disappears in +a valley, although he piously wrote in the holy books that he died lest +the people should say that, because of his marvelous virtue, he was +taken up to God. For the last statement Josephus has the authority of +some sages, who discussed whether the last verses of Deuteronomy were +written by Moses himself.[1] + +[Footnote 1: Baba Batra, 15a.] + +Josephus continues the Biblical narrative in less detail in the fifth +book, which covers the period of Joshua and the Judges and the first +part of Samuel. The Book of Joshua is compressed into the limits of one +chapter, but the exploits of each of the judges of Israel, with one or +two omissions, are recounted in order, and the episode of Ruth is +inserted after the story of Samson. He substitutes for the famous +declaration of Ruth to Naomi the prosy statement: "Naomi took Ruth along +with her, as she was not to be persuaded to stay behind, but was +resolved to share her fortune with her mother-in-law, whatsoever it +should prove." And he justifies his insertion of the episode by the +reflection that he desires to demonstrate the power of God, who can +raise those that are of common parentage to dignity and splendor, even +as He advanced David, though he was born of mean parents. + +With his fondness for royal history, and no doubt with an eye to his +noble audience, he devotes a whole book to the account of Saul's reign, +adhering closely to the narrative in Samuel, but occasionally adding a +passage from the Book of Chronicles, or softening what seemed an +asperity in Scripture. Samuel, for example, orders Agag to be killed, +whereas in the Bible he puts him to death with his own hand.[1] The +incident of Saul and the Witch of Endor is expanded and invested with +further pathos.[2] The Witch devotes her only possession, a calf, for +the king's meal, and the historian expatiates first on her kindness and +then on Saul's courage in fighting, though he knew his approaching doom. +We may suspect that this digression was induced by a supposed analogy in +the king of Israel's lot to the author's conduct in Galilee, when, as he +claimed, he fought on though knowing the hopelessness of resistance. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. VI. viii. 5.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. VI. viii. 14.] + +The next book is taken up entirely with the reign of David, and contains +little that is noteworthy. On one point Josephus cites the authority of +Nicholas of Damascus to support the Bible, and here and there he adopts +a traditional interpretation. David's son by Abigail is said to be +Daniel,[1] whereas the Book of Samuel gives the name as Kitab. Absalom's +hair was so thick that it could be cut with difficulty every eight +days.[2] David chose a pestilence as the punishment for his sin in +numbering his people, because it was an affliction common to kings and +their subjects.[3] The historian ascribes the Psalms to David, and says +they were in several (Greek) meters, some in hexameters and others in +pentameters. Lastly he enlarges on the wonderful wealth of David, which +was greater than that of any other king either of the Hebrews or of +other nations. Benjamin of Tudela relates, and the Mohammedans believe +to this day, that vast treasure is buried with the king, and lies in his +reputed sepulcher. The story must have been accepted in the days of +Josephus, for he records how Hyrcanus, the son of Simon the Maccabee, +being in straits for money to buy off the Seleucid invader, opened a +room of David's sepulcher and took out three thousand talents, and how, +many years later, King Herod opened another room, and took out great +store of money; yet neither lighted on the body of the king. Such +romantic tales pleased the readers of the Jewish historian, who lived +amid the wonderful material splendor of Rome, and prized, above all +things, material wealth. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Ant. VII. i. 4; Berakot, 4a.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. VII. viii.; comp. Nazir, 4b.] + +[Footnote 3: Ant. VII. xiii.; comp. Yalkut, ii. 165.] + +When he comes to the history of Solomon, he speaks of his proverbial +writings, and inserts a long account of his miraculous magical powers, +based no doubt on popular legend.[1] + +"He composed books of odes and songs one thousand and five [here he +follows Chronicles] and of parables and similitudes three thousand. For +he spoke a parable on every sort of tree, from the hyssop to the cedar, +and in like manner about every sort of living creature, whether on the +earth or in the air or in the seas. He was not unacquainted with any of +their natures, nor did he omit to study them, but he described them all +in the manner of a philosopher. God also endowed him with skill in +expelling demons, which is a science useful and health-giving to +men."[2] + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Yalkut, ii. 177. The apocryphal Wisdom of Solomon +similarly credits the king with power over spirits (vii. 20).] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. VIII. ii. 5.] + +Josephus goes on to describe how, in the presence of Vespasian, a +compatriot cured soldiers who were demoniacal. We know from the New +Testament that the belief in possession by demons was widespread among +the vulgar in the first century of the common era, and the Essenes +specialized in the science of exorcism. As the belief was invested with +respectability by the patronage which the Flavian court extended to all +sorts of magic and witchcraft, Josephus enlarges on it. Solomon is +therefore represented as a thaumaturgist, and while not a single example +is given of the proverbs ascribed to him, his exploits as a +miracle-monger are extolled. Josephus sets out at length the story of +the building of the Temple, and dwells on Solomon's missions to King +Hiram, of which, he says, copies remained in his day, and may be seen in +the public records of Tyre. This he claims to be a signal testimony to +the truthfulness of his history.[1] He modernizes elaborately Solomon's +speech at the dedication of the sanctuary, and converts it into an +apology for the Jews of his own day. Again he follows an Alexandrian +model, and describes God in Platonic fashion: "Thou possessest an +eternal house, and we know how, from what Thou hast created for Thyself, +Heaven and Air and Earth and Sea have sprung, and how Thou fillest all +things and yet canst not be contained by any of them."[2] Solomon is +here a preacher of universalism; he prays that God shall help not the +Hebrews alone when they are in distress, "but when any shall come hither +from the ends of the earth and repent of their sins and implore Thy +forgiveness, do Thou pardon them and hear their prayer. For thereby all +shall know that Thou wast pleased with the building of this house, and +that we are not of an unsociable nature, nor do we behave with enmity to +such as are not of our people, but are willing that Thou shouldst bestow +Thy help on all men in common, and that all alike may enjoy Thy +benefits." Solomon's dream after the dedication service provides another +occasion for pointing to the Jewish disaster of the historian's day. For +he foresees that if Israel will transgress the Law, his miseries shall +become a proverb, and his neighbors, when they hear of them, shall be +amazed at their magnitude. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. below, p. 223.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. VIII. iv. 2. Comp. Philo, De Confus. Ling. i. 425.] + +The description of the Temple is followed by a glowing account of the +king's palace, of which the roof was "according to the Corinthian order, +and the decorations so vivid that the leaves seemed to be in motion." We +are told, too, of the great cities which the king built, Tadmor in the +wilderness of Syria, and Gezer, the Bible narrative being supplemented +here with passages from Nicholas. The Queen of Sheba is represented as +the Queen of Egypt and Ethiopia, and it is to her gift that Josephus +attributes "the root of balsam which our country still bears." Reveling +in the material greatness of the Jewish court during the golden age of +the old kingdom, Josephus catalogues the wealth of Solomon, the number +of his horses and chariots. He reproaches him not only for marrying +foreign wives, but for making images of brazen oxen, which supported the +brazen sea, and the images of lions about his throne. For these sins +against the second commandment he died ingloriously. + +With the death of Solomon the legendary and romancing character of this +part of the _Antiquities_ comes to an end. In the summary of the +fortunes of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, Josephus adheres almost +exclusively to the Biblical text, and allows himself few digressions. He +moralizes a little about the decay of the people under Rehoboam, +reflecting that the aggrandizement of a kingdom and its sudden +attainment of prosperity often are the occasion of mischief; and he +controverts Herodotus, who confused Sesostris with Shishak when relating +the Egyptian king's conquests. It is, he claims, really Shishak's +invasion of Jerusalem which the Greek historian narrates, as is proved +by the fact that he speaks of circumcised Syrians, who can be no other +than Jews. The fate of Omri and Zimri[1] moves him to moralize again +about God's Providence in rewarding the good and punishing the wicked; +and Ahab's death evokes some platitudes concerning fate, "which creeps +on human souls and flatters them with pleasing hopes, till it brings +them to the place where it will be too hard for them."[2] Artapanus, or +one of the Jewish Hellenists masking as a pagan historian, may have +provided him with this reflection. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. IX. xii. 6.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. IX. xv. 6.] + +He spoils the grandeur of the scene on Mount Carmel, when Elijah turned +the people from Baal-worship back to the service of God. In place of the +dramatic description in the Book of Kings he states that the Israelites +worshiped one God, and called Him the great and the only true God, while +the other deities were names. He omits altogether the account of +Elijah's ascent to Heaven, probably from a desire not to appear to +entertain any Messianic ideas with which the prophet was associated. He +says simply that Elijah disappeared from among men. But he gives in +detail the miraculous stories of Elisha, which were not subject to the +same objection. Occasionally his statements seem in direct conflict with +the Hebrew Bible, as when he says that Jehu drove slowly and in good +order, whereas the Hebrew is that "he driveth furiously."[1] Or that +Joash, king of Israel, was a good man, whereas in the Book of Kings it +is written, "he did evil in the sight of the Lord."[2] But these +discrepancies may be due, not to a different Bible text, but to +aberrations of the copyists. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. IX. vi. 3; II Kings, 9:20.] + +[Footnote 2: II Kings, 13:11.] + +The story of dynastic struggles and foreign wars is varied with a short +summary of the life of Jonah, introduced at what, according to the +Bible, is its proper chronological place,[1] in the reign of Jeroboam +II, king of Israel. The picturesque and miraculous character of the +prophet's adventures secured him this distinction, for in general +Josephus does not pay much regard to the lives or writings of the +prophets. It is only where they foretold concrete events that their +testimony is deemed worthy of mention. Of the other minor prophets he +mentions Nahum, and paraphrases part of his prophecy of the fall of +Nineveh, cutting it short with the remark that he does not think it +necessary to repeat the rest,[2] so that he may not appear troublesome +to his readers. In the account of Hezekiah he mentions that the king +depended on Isaiah the prophet, by whom he inquired and knew of all +future events,[3] and he recounts also the miracle of putting back the +sun-dial. For the rest, he says that, by common consent, Isaiah was a +divine and wonderful man in foretelling the truth, "and in the assurance +that he had never written what was false, he wrote down his prophecies +and left them in books, that their accomplishment might be judged of by +posterity from the events.[4] Nor was he alone, but the other prophets +[i.e. the minor prophets presumably], who were twelve in number, did the +same." It is notable that this phrase of the _Antiquities_ about the +prophets bears a resemblance to the "praise of famous men" contained in +the apocryphal book of Ben Sira, which Josephus probably used in the +Greek translation. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. IX. x. 1.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. IX. xi. 3.] + +[Footnote 3: Ant. IX. xiii.] + +[Footnote 4: Ant. X. ii. 2. Comp. Is. 30:8_f_.] + +While he thus cursorily disposes of the prophetical writers, he seizes +on any scrap of Hellenistic authors which he could find to confirm the +Bible story, or rather to confirm the existence of the personages +mentioned in the Bible. Thus he quotes the Phoenician historian +Menander, who confirms the existence and exploits of the Assyrian king +Shalmaneser. So, too, he brings forward Herodotus and Berosus to confirm +the existence and doings of Sennacherib.[1] He refutes Herodotus again, +doubtless on the authority of a predecessor, for saying that Sennacherib +was king of the Arabs instead of king of the Assyrians. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. X. ii. 4.] + +As with Ahab, so with Josiah, Josephus sees the power of fate impelling +him to his death, and substitutes the Hellenistic conception of a blind +and jealous power for the Hebrew idea of a just Providence. He ascribes +to Jeremiah "an elegy on the death of the king, which is still +extant,"[1] apparently following a statement in the Book of Chronicles, +which does not refer to our Book of Lamentations. Jeremiah is treated +rather more fully than Isaiah. Besides a notice of his writings we have +an account of his imprisonment. He ascribes to Ezekiel two books +foretelling the Babylonian captivity. Possibly the difference between +the last nine and the first forty chapters of the exile prophet +suggested the idea of the two books, unless these words apply rather to +Jeremiah, + +"The two prophets agreed [he remarks] on all other things as to the +capture of the city and King Zedekiah, but Ezekiel declared that +Zedekiah should not see Babylon, while Jeremiah said the king of Babylon +should carry him thither in bonds. Because of this discrepancy, the +Jewish prince disbelieved them both, and condemned them for false +tidings.[2] Both prophets, however, were justified, because Zedekiah +came to Babylon, but he came blind, so that, as Ezekiel had predicted, +he did not see the city." + +[Footnote 1: Ant. X. v. 2. Comp. II Chron. 35:25.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. X. vii. 2.] + +The episode is possibly based on some apocryphal book that has +disappeared, and the historian extracts from it the lesson, which he is +never weary of repeating, that God's nature is various and acts in +diverse ways, and men are blind and cannot see the future, so that they +are exposed to calamities and cannot avoid their incidence.[1] + +[Footnote 1: Ant. X. viii. 3.] + +Following on the account of the fall of the last of the Davidic line and +the destruction of the Temple, Josephus gives a chronological summary of +the history of Israel from the Creation, together with an incomplete +list of all the high priests who held office. The latter may be compared +with the list of high priests with which he closes the _Antiquities_.[1] +These chronological calculations were dear to him, but perhaps he +borrowed them from one of the earlier Hellenistic Jewish chroniclers. He +takes an especial pride throughout the _Antiquities_ as well as in the +_Wars_ in recording the priestly succession, which served to emphasize +the antiquity not only of his people, but of his own personal lineage, +and was moreover congenial to the ideas of the Romans, who paid great +heed to the records of their priests. + +[Footnote 1: See below, p. 202.] + +As might be expected, he dwells at some length on Daniel,[1] whose book +was full of the miraculous legends and exact prophecies loved by his +audience, and he recommends his book to those who are anxious about the +future. He elaborates the interpretation of the vision of the image (ch. +3:7), but finds himself in a difficulty when he comes to the explanation +of the stone broken off from the mountain that fell on the image and +shattered it. According to the traditional interpretation, it portended +the downfall of Rome, or maybe the coming of the Messiah, an idea +equally hateful to the Roman conquerors. He excuses himself by saying +that he has only undertaken to describe things past and present, and not +things that are future. Later he disclaims responsibility for the story +of Nebuchadnezzar's madness, on the plea that he has translated what was +in the Hebrew book, and has neither added nor taken away. The story +probably looked too much like an implied reproach on a mad Caesar. He +adds a new chapter to the Biblical account of the prophet: Daniel is +carried by Darius to Persia, and is there signally honored by the king. +He builds a tower at Ecbatana,[2] which is still extant, says the +historian, "and seems to be but lately built. Here the kings of Persia +and Media are buried, and a Jewish priest is the custodian." Josephus +borrowed this addition from some apocalyptic book recounting Daniel's +deeds, and he speaks of "several books the prophet wrote and left behind +him, which are still read by us." The short story in the Apocrypha of +_Bel and the Dragon_, with its apologue about Susannah, affords an +example of the post-Biblical additions to Daniel, and in the first +century, when Messianic hopes were rife among the people, such +apocryphal books had a great vogue. Daniel is in fact elevated to the +rank of one of the greatest of the prophets, because he not only +prophesied generally of future events like the others, but fixed the +actual time of their accomplishment. It is claimed for him that he +foretold explicitly the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes and the Roman +conquest of Judea. Anticipating the theological controversialists of +later times, Josephus sets special store on the Bible book that is most +miraculous, because miracle and exact prognostication of the future are +for his audience the clearest testimony of God. Hence the predictions of +Daniel are the best refutation of the Epicureans, who cast Providence +out of life, and do not believe that God has care of human affairs, but +say that things move of their own accord, without a ruler and guide. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. X. x.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. X. xi. 7.] + +When he comes to the history of the Restoration from Babylon, Josephus +follows what is now known as the apocryphal Book of Esdras, in +preference to the Biblical Ezra and Nehemiah, probably because a +Hellenistic guide whom he had before him did likewise. It is clear that +he based his paraphrase on the Greek text. His chronicle therefore +differs considerably from that given in our Scripture, and on one point +he differs from his guide. For while Esdras represents Artaxerxes as the +king under whom the Temple was rebuilt, Josephus, relying on a fuller +knowledge of Persian history, derived probably from Nicholas of +Damascus, substitutes Cambyses.[1] Our Greek version of Esdras I is +unfortunately not complete, but the book, differing from that included +in the Bible, must have originally comprised an account of Nehemiah. +According to Josephus, Ezra dies before Nehemiah[2] arrives in Judea, +whereas in the canonical books they appear for a time together. He +states also that Nehemiah built houses for the poor in Jerusalem out of +his own means, an incident which has not the authority of the Bible, but +which may well have reposed on an ancient tradition. The account of the +marriage of Sanballat with the daughter of Manasseh the high Priest, +which is touched on in our Book of Nehemiah, is described more fully by +Josephus,[3] who based this account on some uncanonical source. And +following the Rabbis, who shortened the Persian epoch in order to eke +out the Jewish history over the whole period of the Persian kingdom till +the conquest of Alexander, he makes the marriage synchronize with the +reign of Philip of Macedon. Josephus was anxious to avoid a vacuum, and +by a little vague chronology and the aid of the fragmentary records of +Ezra and Nehemiah and a priestly chronicle, the few Jewish incidents +known in that tranquil, unruffled epoch are spread over three centuries. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XI. ii.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XI. v.] + +[Footnote 3: Ant. XI. vii. 2.] + +The episode of Esther is treated elaborately, and, following the +apocryphal version, is placed in the reign of Artaxerxes. The Greek Book +of Esther, which embroidered the Hebrew story, and is generally +attributed to the second century B.C.E., is laid under contribution as +well as the Canonical book; from it Josephus extracted long decrees of +the king and elaborate anti-Semitic denunciations of a Hellenized Haman. +He omits the incident of casting lots, and contrives to explain Purim, +by means of a Greek etymology, as derived from [Greek: phroureai], which +denotes protection. Here and there the Biblical simplicity is +elaborated: Mordecai moves from Babylon to Shushan in order to be near +Esther, and soldiers with bared axes stand round the king to secure the +observance of the law that he shall not be approached. We have some +moralizing on Haman's fall and the working of Providence ([Greek: to +theion]), which teaches that "what mischief anyone prepares against +another, he unconsciously contrives against himself." Less edifying is +the addition that "God laughed to scorn the wicked expectations of +Haman, and as He knew what the event would be, He was pleased at it, and +that night He took away the king's sleep." The Book of Esther does not +mention God: Josephus calls in directly the operation of the Divine +Power, but represents it unworthily. + +With the completion of the eleventh book of the _Antiquities_, we +definitely pass away from the region of sacred history and miracles, and +find ourselves in the more spacious but more misty area of the +Hellenistic kingdom, in which Jewish affairs are only a detail set in a +larger background. Though Josephus himself does not explicitly mark the +break, the character of his work materially changes. He has come to the +end of the period when the Bible was his chief guide; he has now to +depend for the main thread on Hellenistic sources, filling in the +details when he can from some Jewish record. His function becomes +henceforth more completely that of compiler, less of translator, and his +work becomes much more valuable for us, because in great part he has the +field to himself. Although, however, the Bible paraphrase, with the +embroidery of a little tradition and comparative history and its +Romanizing reflections, which constitutes the first part of the +_Antiquities_, had not a great permanent value, for a very long period +it was accepted as the standard history of the Jewish people; and in the +pagan Greco-Roman world it appealed to a public to which both the Hebrew +Bible and the Septuagint translation were sealed books. It was written +for a special purpose and served it, doing for the Jewish early history +what Livy did for the hoary past of the Romans. If it was not a worthy +record in many parts, it was yet of great value as an antidote to the +crude fictions of the anti-Semites about the origin and the institutions +of the people of Israel, which had for some two centuries been allowed +to poison the minds of the Greek-speaking world, and had fanned the +prejudices of the Roman people against a nationality of whose history +they were ignorant and of whose laws they were contemptuous. + + + + +VII + +JOSEPHUS AND POST-BIBLICAL JEWISH HISTORY + +(THE ANTIQUITIES, BOOKS XII-XX) + + +Josephus is the sole writer of the ancient world who has left a +connected account of the Jewish people during the post-Biblical period, +and the meagerness of his historical information is not due so much to +his own deficiencies as to the difficulty of the material. From the +period when the Scriptures closed, the affairs of the Jews had to be +extracted, for the most part, out of works dealing with the annals of +the whole of civilized humanity. With the conquest of Alexander the +Great, the Jewish people enter into the Hellenistic world, and begin to +command the attention of Hellenistic historians. They are an element in +the cosmopolis which was the ideal of the world-conqueror. At the same +time the nature of the history of their affairs vitally changes. The +continuous chronicle of their doings, which had been kept from the +Exodus out of Egypt to the Restoration from Babylon, and which was +designed to impress a religious lesson and illustrate God's working, +comes to an end; and their scribes are concerned to draw fresh lessons +from that chronicle. The religious philosophy of history is not extended +to the present. The Jews, on the other hand, chiefly engage the interest +of the Gentiles when they come into violent collision with the governing +power, or when they are involved in some war between rival Hellenistic +sovereigns. Hence their history during the two centuries following +Alexander's conquests, i.e. until the time when we again have adequate +Jewish sources, is singularly shadowy and incoherent. + +Josephus was not the man to pierce the obscurity by his intuition or by +his research. Yet we must not be too critical of the want of proportion +in his writing when we remember that he was a pioneer; for it was an +original idea to piece together the stray fragments of history that +referred to his people. It has been shown that in his attempt to stretch +out the Biblical history till it can join on to the Hellenistic sources, +Josephus interposes between the account of Esther and the fall of the +Persian Empire a story of intrigue among the high priests. He there +describes the crime of the high priest John in killing his brother in +the Temple as more cruel and impious than anything done by the Greeks or +Barbarians--an expression which must have originated in a Jewish, +probably a Palestinian, authority, to whom Greek connoted cruelty. And +in the next chapter Josephus inserts the story of the Samaritan +Sanballat and the building of the Samaritan Temple on Mount Gerizim,[1] +as though these events happened at the time of Alexander's invasion of +Persia. Rabbinical chronology interposes only one generation between +Cyrus and Alexander. The Sanballat who appears in the Book of Nehemiah +is represented as anticipating the part played by the Hellenists of a +later century, and calling in the foreign invader against Judea and +Jerusalem in order to set up his own son-in-law Manasseh as high priest. +Probably, in the fashion of Jewish history, the events of a later time +were placed in the popular Midrash a few generations back and repeated. +Jewish legendary tradition is more certainly the basis of the account of +Alexander's treatment of the Jews. The Talmud has preserved similar +stories.[2] According to both records, the Macedonian conqueror did +obeisance before the high priest, who came out to ask for mercy, because +he recognized in the Jewish dignitary a figure that had appeared to him +in a dream. And when Alexander is made to revere the prophecies of +Daniel and to prefer the Jews to the Samaritans and bestow on them equal +rights with the Macedonians, the historian is simply crystallizing the +floating stories of his nation, which are parallel with those invented +by every other nation of antiquity about the Greek hero. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Neh. 13: 23.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. Megillat Taanit, 3, and Yoma, 69a.] + +Passing on to Alexander's successors, he has scarcely fuller or more +reliable sources. For Ptolemy's capture of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day, +when the Jews would not resist, he calls in the confirmation of a Greek +authority, Agatharchides of Cnidus. But he has to gloss over a period of +nearly a hundred years, till he can introduce the story of the +translation of the Scriptures into Greek,[1] for which he found a +copious source in the romantic history, or rather the historical +romance, now known as the Letter of Aristeas. This Hellenistic +production has come down to us intact, and therefore we can gather how +closely Josephus paraphrases his authorities. Not that he refrained +altogether from embellishment and improvement. The Aristeas of his +version, as of the original, professes that he is not a Jew, but he adds +that nevertheless he desires favor to be done to the Jews, because all +men are the work of God, and "I am sensible that He is well pleased with +all those that do good." Josephus states a large part of the story as if +it were his own narrative, but in fact it is a paraphrase throughout. He +reproduces less than half of the Letter, omitting the account of the +visit of the royal envoy to Jerusalem and the discourse of Eleazar the +high priest. For the seventy-two questions and answers, which form the +last part, he refers curious readers to his source. But he sets out at +length the description of the presents which Ptolemy sent to Jerusalem, +rejoicing in the opportunity of showing at once the splendor of the +Temple vessels and the honor paid by a Hellenistic monarch to his +people. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XII. ii.] + +From his own knowledge also, he adds a glowing eulogy, which Menedemus, +the Greek philosopher, passed on the Jewish faith. The Letter of +Aristeas says that the authors of the Septuagint translation uttered an +imprecation on any one who should alter a word of their work; Josephus +makes them invite correction,[1] adding inconsequently--if our text is +correct--that this was a wise action, "so that, when the thing was +judged to have been well done, it might continue forever." + +[Footnote 1: Josephus may have used a different text of Aristeas from +that which has come down to us. Or the passage in our Aristeas may be a +later insertion introduced as a protest against Christian interpolations +in the LXX.] + +Having disposed of the Aristeas incident, Josephus has to fill in the +blank between the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus (250 B.C.E.) and the +Maccabean revolt against Antiochus Epiphanes, nearly one hundred years +later, which was the next period for which he had Jewish authority. He +returns then to his Hellenistic guides and extracts the few scattered +incidents which he could find there referring to the Jewish people. But +until he comes to the reign of Antiochus, he can only snatch up some +"unconsidered trifles" of doubtful validity. Seleucus Nicator, he says, +made the Jews citizens of the cities which he built in Asia, and gave +them equal rights with the Macedonians and Greeks in Antioch. This +information he would seem to have derived from the petition which the +Jews of Antioch presented to Titus when, after the fall of Jerusalem, +the victor made his progress through Syria. The people of Antioch then +sought to obtain the curtailment of Jewish rights in the town, but Titus +refused their suit.[1] Josephus takes this opportunity of extolling the +magnanimity of the Roman conqueror, and likewise of inserting a +reference to the friendliness of Marcus Agrippa, who, on his progress +through Asia a hundred years before, had upheld the Jewish +privileges.[2] He derived this incident from Nicholas' history, and thus +contrived to eke out the obscurity of the third century B.C.E. with a +few irrelevancies. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. B.J. VII. v. 3.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XIII. iii. 2.] + +His material becomes a little ampler from the reign of Antiochus the +Great, because from this point the Greek historians serve him better. +Several of the modern commentators of Josephus have thought that his +authorities were Polybius and Posidonius, who wrote in Greek on the +events of the period. He cites Polybius explicitly as the author of the +statement about Ptolemy's conquest of Judea, and then reproduces two +letters of Antiochus to his generals, directing them to grant certain +privileges to his Jewish subjects as a reward for their loyal service. +We know that Polybius gave in his history an account of Jerusalem and +its Temple, and his character-sketch of Antiochus Epiphanes has been +preserved in an epitome. Josephus, however, be it noted, has only these +scanty extracts from his work. The letters are clearly derived, not from +him, but from some Hellenistic-Jewish apologist, and the passages from +Polybius, it is very probable, are extracted from some larger work.[1] +Here, as elsewhere, both facts and authorities were found in Nicholas of +Damascus. + +[Footnote 1: Dr. Buechler (J.Q.R. iv. and R.E.J. xxxii. 179) has argued +convincingly that Josephus had not gone far afield. For the genuineness +of the Letter, comp. Willrich, Judaica, p. 51, and Buechler, Oniaden und +Tobiaden, p. 143.] + +We know from Josephus himself that Nicholas had included a history of +the Seleucid Empire in his _magnum opus_. He is quoted in reference to +the sacking of the Temple by Antiochus Epiphanes and the victory of +Ptolemy Lathyrus over Alexander Jannaeus.[1] Josephus, indeed, several +times appends to his paragraphs about the general history a note, "as we +have elsewhere described." Some have inferred from this that he had +himself written a general history of the Seleucid epoch, but a more +critical study has shown that the tag belongs to the note of his +authority, which he embodied carelessly in his paraphrase.[2] + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIII. xii. 6.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. Ant. XIV. I. 2-3; xi. I.] + +Josephus supplements the Jewish references in the Seleucid history of +Nicholas by an account of the intrigues of the Tobiades and Oniades, +which reveals a Hellenistic-Jewish origin.[1] Possibly he found it in a +special chronicle of the high-priestly family, which was written by one +friendly to it, for Joseph ben Tobias is praised as "a good man and of +great magnanimity, who brought the Jews out of poverty and low condition +to one that was more splendid." The chronology here is at fault, since +at the time at which the incidents are placed both Syria and Palestine +were included in the dominion of the Seleucids; yet Tobias is +represented at the court of the Ptolemies. Josephus follows the story of +these exploits with the letters which passed between Areas, king of the +Lacedemonians, and the high priest Onias, as recorded in the First Book +of the Maccabees (ch. 12). The letters are taken out of their true +place, in order to bridge the gap between the fall of the Tobiad house +and the Maccabean rising. Areas reigned from 307-265, so that he must +have corresponded to Onias I, but Josephus places him in the time of +Onias III. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XII. iv.] + +For his account of the Maccabean struggle he depends here primarily upon +the First Book of the Maccabees, which in many parts he does little more +than paraphrase. Neither the Second Book of the Maccabees nor the larger +work of Jason of Cyrene, of which it is an epitome, appears to have been +known to him. It is well-nigh certain that in writing the _Wars_ he had +no acquaintance with the Jewish historical book, but was dependent on +the less accurate and complete statement of a Hellenistic chronicle; and +in the later work, though he bases his narrative on the Greek version of +the Maccabees, and says he will give a fresh account with great +accuracy, he yet incorporates pieces of non-Jewish history from the +Greek guide without much art or skill or consistency. Thus, in the +_Wars_ he says that Antiochus Epiphanes captured Jerusalem by assault, +while in the _Antiquities_ he speaks of two captures: the first time the +city fell without fighting, the second by treachery. And while in the +Book of the Maccabees the year given for the fall of the city is 143 of +the Seleucid era, in the _Antiquities_ the final capture is dated 145[1] +of the era. He no doubt found this date in the Greek authority he was +following for the general history of Antiochus--he gives the +corresponding Greek Olympiad--and applied it to the pillage of +Jerusalem. For the story of Mattathias at Modin, which is much more +detailed than in the _Wars_, he closely follows the Book of the +Maccabees, though in the speeches he takes certain liberties, inserting, +for example, an appeal to the hope of immortality in Mattathias' address +to his sons.[2] He turns to his Greek authority for the death of +Antiochus, and controverts Polybius, who ascribes the king's distemper +to his sacrilegious desire to plunder a temple of Diana in Persia. +Josephus, with a touch of patriotism and an unusual disregard of the +feelings of his patrons, who can hardly have liked the implied parallel, +says it is surely more probable that he lost his life because of his +pillage of the Jewish Temple. In confirmation of his theory he appeals +to the materialistic morality of his audience, arguing that the king +surely would not be punished for a wicked intention that was not +successful. He states also that Judas was high priest for three years, +which is not supported by the Jewish record;[3] and he passes over the +miracle of the oil at the dedication of the Temple, and ascribes the +name of the feast to the fact that light appeared to the Jews. The +celebration of Hanukkah as the feast of lights is of Babylonian-Jewish +origin, and was only instituted shortly before the destruction of the +Temple.[4] + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XII. v. 3.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XIII. vi. 3.] + +[Footnote 3: In his own list of high priests at the end of the work, the +name of Judas does not appear.] + +[Footnote 4: Comp. Krauss, R.E.J. xxx. 32.] + +His use of the Book of the Maccabees stops short at the end of chapter +xii. He presumably did not know of the last two chapters of our text, +which contain the history of Simon, and probably were translated later. +Otherwise we cannot explain his dismissal, in one line, of the league +that Simon made with the Romans.[1] The incident is dwelt on in the +extant version of the First Book of the Maccabees, and Josephus would +surely not have omitted a syllable of so propitious an event, had he +possessed knowledge of it. On the other hand, he inserts into the +history of the Maccabean brothers an account of the foundation of a +Temple by Onias V in Leontopolis,[2] in the Delta of Egypt, and +describes at length the negotiations that led up to it;[3] and in the +same connection he narrates a feud between the Jewish and Samaritan +communities at Alexandria in the days of Ptolemy Philometor. From these +indications it has been inferred that he had before him the work of a +Hellenistic-Jewish historian interested in Egypt--the collection of +Alexander Polyhistor suggests that there were several such at the +time--while for the exploits of the later Maccabees he relied on the +chronicle of John Hyrcanus the son of Simon, which is referred to in the +Book of the Maccabees,[4] but has not come down to us, + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIII. vii. 3.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XII. ix. 7. The ruins of the Temple were unearthed a +few years ago by Professor Flinders Petrie.] + +[Footnote 3: Ant. XIII. iii.] + +[Footnote 4: I Macc, xvi, 23.] + +From this period onwards till the end of the _Antiquities_, Josephus had +no longer any considerable Jewish document to guide him, nor have we any +Jewish history by which to check him. For an era of two hundred years he +was more completely dependent on Greek sources, and it is just in this +part of the work where he is most valuable or, we should rather say, +indispensable. Save for a few scattered references in pagan historians, +orators, and poets, he is our only authority for Jewish history at the +time. It is, therefore, the more unfortunate that he makes no +independent research, and takes up no independent attitude. For the most +part he transcribes the pagan writer before him, unable or unwilling to +look any deeper. And he tells us only of the outward events of Jewish +history, of the court intrigues and murders, of the wars against the +tottering empires of Egypt and Syria, of the ignoble feuds within the +palace. Of the more vital and, did we but know it, the profoundly +interesting social and religious history of the time, of the development +of the Pharisee and Sadducee sects, we hear little, and that little is +unreliable and superficial. Josephus reproduces the deficiencies of his +sources in their dealings with Jewish events. He brings no original +virtue compensating for the careful study which they made of the larger +history in which the affairs of Judea were a small incident. + +The foundation of his work in the latter half of book xiii and +throughout books xiv-xvii is Nicholas, who had devoted two special books +to the life of Herod, and by way of introduction to this had dealt more +fully with the preceding Jewish princes.[1] We must therefore be wary of +imputing to Josephus the opinions he expresses upon the different Jewish +sects in this part of the _Antiquities_. He introduces them first during +the reign of Jonathan, with the classification which had already been +made in the _Wars_:[2] the Pharisees as the upholders of Providence or +fate and freewill, the Essenes as absolute determinists, the Sadducees +as absolute deniers of the influence of fate on human affairs.[3] The +next mention of the Pharisees occurs in the reign of Hyrcanus,[4] when +he states that they were the king's worst enemies. + +"They are one of the sects of the Jews, and they have so great a power +over the multitude that, when they say anything against the king or +against the high priest, they are presently believed.... Hyrcanus had +been a disciple of their teaching; but he was angered when one of them, +Eleazar, a man of ill temper and prone to seditious practices, +reproached him for holding the priesthood, because, it was alleged, his +mother had been a captive in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes, and he, +therefore, was disqualified." + +[Footnote 1: Buechler, Sources of Josephus for the History of Syria, +J.Q.R. ix. 311.] + +[Footnote 2: B.J. II. viii.] + +[Footnote 3: Ant. XIII. v. 9.] + +[Footnote 4: Ant. XIII. x. 5.] + +This account is taken from a source unfriendly to the Pharisees. Though +the story is based apparently on an old Jewish tradition, since we find +it told of Alexander Jannaeus in the Talmud,[1] it looks as if Josephus +obtained his version from some author that shared the aristocratic +prejudices against the democratic leaders. The reign of Hyrcanus had +been described by a Hellenistic-Jewish chronicler or a non-Jewish +Hellenist, from whom Josephus borrowed a glowing eulogy,[2] with which +he sums it up: "He lived happily, administered the government in an +excellent way for thirty-one years, and was esteemed by God worthy of +the three greatest privileges, the principate, the high priesthood, and +prophecy." To the account of the Pharisees is appended a paragraph, +seemingly the historian's own work, where he explains that "the +Pharisees have delivered to the people the tradition of the fathers, +while the Sadducees have rejected it and claim that only the written +word is binding. And concerning these things great disputes have arisen +among them; the Sadducees are able to persuade none but the rich, while +the Pharisees have the multitude on their side." Again, in the account +of the reign of Queen Alexandra, he represents the Pharisees as powerful +but seditious, and causing constant friction, and ascribes the fall of +the royal house to the queen's compliance with those who bore ill-will +to the family. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. I. Levi, Talmudic Sources of Jewish History, R.E.J. +xxxv. 219; I. Friedlaender, J.Q.R., n.s. iv. 443_ff_.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XIII. x. 7.] + +Whenever the opportunity offers, Josephus brings in references to Jewish +history from pagan sources. He quotes Timagenes' estimate of Aristobulus +as a good man who was of great service to the Jews and gained them the +country of Iturea; and he notes Strabo's agreement with Nicholas upon +the invasion of Judea by Ptolemy Lathyrus.[1] General history takes an +increasingly larger part in the account of the warlike Alexander +Jannaeus and the queen Alexandra, and reference is made to the consuls +of Rome contemporary with the reigns of Aristobulus and Hyrcanus, in +order to bring Jewish affairs into relation with those of the Power +which henceforth played a critical part in them. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIII. xii. 6.] + +Josephus marks the new era on which he was entering by a fresh preface +to book xiv. His aim, he says, is "to omit no facts either through +ignorance or laziness, because we are dealing with a history of events +with which most people are unacquainted on account of their distance +from our times; and we purpose to do it with appropriate beauty of +style, so that our readers may entertain the knowledge of what we write +with some agreeable satisfaction and pleasure. But the principal thing +to aim at is to speak truly."[1] It is not impossible that the prelude +is based on something in Nicholas; but it is turned against him; for in +the same chapter Josephus controverts his predecessor for the statement +that "the Idumean Antipater [the father of Herod] was sprung from the +principal Jews who returned to Judea from Babylon." The assertion, he +says, was made to gratify Herod, who by the revolution of fortune came +to be king of the Jews. He shows here some national feeling, but in +general he accepts Nicholas, and borrows doubtless from him the details +of Pompey's invasion of Judea and of the siege of Jerusalem. He appeals +as well to Strabo and the Latin historian Titus Livius.[2] But though it +is likely that he had made an independent study of parts of Strabo, +since he drags in several extracts from his history that are not quite +in place,[3] there is no reason to think he read Livy or any other Latin +author. He would have found reference to the work in the diligent +Nicholas. We may discern the hand of Nicholas, too, in the praise of +Pompey for his piety in not spoiling the Temple of the holy vessels.[4] +Josephus writes altogether in the tone of an admirer of Rome's +occupation, attributing the misery which came upon Jerusalem to Hyrcanus +and Aristobulus. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIV. i. 1.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XIV. iv. 3; vi. 4.] + +[Footnote 3: Comp. Ant. XIV. vii. 2; viii. 3.] + +[Footnote 4: Ant. XIV. iv. 5.] + +Thanks to his copious sources, he is able to give a detailed account of +the relation of the Jews to Julius Caesar and of the decrees which were +made in their favor at his instance. It has been conjectured with much +probability that Josephus obtained his series of documents from +Nicholas, who had collected them for the purpose of defending the Jews +of Asia Minor in the inquiry which Marcus Agrippa conducted during the +reign of Herod.[1] He says that he will set down the decrees that are +treasured in the public places of the cities, and those which are still +extant in the Capitol of Rome, "so that all the rest of mankind may know +what regard the kings of Asia and Europe have had for the Jewish +people." In a subsequent book, when he is recounting the events of +Herod's reign,[2] Josephus sets forth a further series of decrees in +favor of the Jews, issued by Caesar Augustus and his lieutenant Marcus +Agrippa. These likewise he probably derived from Nicholas, who was the +court advocate and court chronicler at the time they were promulgated. +But he enlarges on his motive for giving them at length, pointing to +them with pride as a proof of the high respect in which the Jews were +held by the heads of the Roman Empire before the disaster of the war. +Though in his own day they were fallen to a low estate, at one time they +had enjoyed special favor: + +"And I frequently mention these decrees in order to reconcile other +peoples to us and to take away the causes of that hatred which +unreasonable men bear us. As for our customs, he continues, each nation +has its own, and in almost every city we meet with differences; but +natural justice is most agreeable to the advantage of all men equally, +and to this our laws have the greatest regard, and thereby render us +benevolent and friendly to all men, so that we may expect the like +return from others, and we may remind them that they should not esteem +difference of institutions a sufficient cause of alienation, but join +with us in the pursuit of virtue and righteousness, for this belongs to +all men in common."[3] + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Bloch, Die Quellen des Flavius Josephus.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XVI. ii.] + +[Footnote 3: Comp. below, p, 234.] + +The Jewish rising and defeat had increased the odium of the Greco-Roman +world towards the peculiar people, and the captive in the gilded prison +was fain to dwell on their past glory in order to cover the wretchedness +of their present. + +Josephus claims to have copied some of the decrees from the archives in +the Roman Capitol.[1] The library was destroyed with the Capitol itself +during the civil war in 69.[2] It was restored, it is true, during the +reign of Vespasian, and it is not impossible that the old decrees were +saved. But Josephus might have collected from the Jewish communities +those documents which he did not find ready to hand in Nicholas, if they +formed part of an apology for the Jews of Antioch in 70 C.E. At least +there is no good reason to doubt their authenticity, and they are in +quite a different class from the letters and decrees attributed to the +Hellenistic sovereigns, which lack all authority. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIV. x. 20.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. Tac. Hist. iii. 71.] + +The story of Herod's life, which is set out in great detail in these +books, has more dramatic unity than any other part of the _Antiquities_. +It bears to the whole work the relation which the story of the siege of +Jerusalem bears to the rest of the _Wars_. Josephus seems to manifest +suddenly a power of vivid narrative and psychological analysis, to which +he is elsewhere a stranger. But at the same time, where the story is +most vivid and dramatic, its framework is most pagan. The Greco-Roman +ideas of fate and nemesis, which dominate the shorter account of the +king's life in the _Wars_, are still the underlying motives. The reason +for the dramatic power and the pagan frame are one and the same: +Josephus uses here a full source, and that source is a pagan writer. + +It is apparent at the same time that Josephus had a better acquaintance +with the historical literature about Herod than when he wrote the +_Wars_, and that he compared his various authorities and exercised some +judgment in composing his picture. For example, in relating the murder +of the Hasmonean Hyrcanus, he first gives the account which he found in +Herod's memoirs, designed of course to exculpate the king, and then sets +out the version of other historians, who allege that Herod laid a snare +for the last of the Maccabean princes. Josephus proudly contrasts his +own critical attitude towards Herod with the studied partisanship of +Nicholas,[1] who wrote in Herod's lifetime, and in order to please him +and his courtiers, + +"touching on nothing but what tended to his glory, and openly excusing +many of his notorious crimes and diligently concealing them. We may, +indeed, say much by way of excuse for Nicholas, because he was not so +much writing a history for others as doing a service for the king. But +we, who come of a family closely connected with the Hasmonean kings, and +have an honorable rank, think it unbecoming to say anything that is +false about them, and have described their actions in an upright and +unvarnished manner. And though we reverence many of Herod's descendants, +who still bear rule, yet we pay greater regard to truth, though we may +incur their displeasure by so doing." + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XIV. xvi. 7.] + +It was not so difficult for the historian to write impartially of Herod +as to write impartially of Vespasian and Titus. At the same time +Josephus, though in these books more critical, seldom escapes the yoke +of facts, and says little of the inner conditions of the people. Of +Hillel we do not hear the name, and Shammai is only mentioned, if indeed +he, and not Shemaya, is disguised under the name of Sameas, as the +member of the Sanhedrin who denounced Herod.[1] + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XV. i. 1. Schlatter ingeniously conjectures that +Pollio, who is mentioned as predicting to the Sanhedrin, that this Herod +would be their enemy if they acquitted him, is identical with Abtalion, +of whom the Talmud tells a similar story. [Greek: pollion] may be an +error for [Greek: Eudalion] as the Hebrew name would be transcribed in +Greek.] + +The speeches, which are put into the mouth of the king on various +occasions, are rhetorical declamations in the Greek style, which must be +derived either from Nicholas or from Herod's Memoirs, to which the +historian had access through his intimacy with the royal family. Yet, +prosaic as the treatment is, it has provided the picture of the +"magnificent barbarian" which has inspired many writers and artists of +later ages. It is from the Jewish point of view that it is most wanting. +He does indeed say that Herod transgressed the laws of his country, and +violated the ancient tradition by the introduction of foreign practices, +which fostered great sins, through the neglect of the observances that +used to lead the multitude to piety. By the games, the theater, and the +amphitheater, which he instituted at Jerusalem, he offended Jewish +sentiment; "for while foreigners were amazed and delighted at the +vastness of his displays, to the native Jews all this amounted to a +dissolution of the traditions for which they had so great a +veneration."[1] And he points out that the Jewish conspiracy against him +in the middle of his reign arose because "in the eyes of the Jewish +leaders, he merely pretended to be their king, but was in fact the +manifest enemy of their nation." It has been suggested that Justus of +Tiberias supplied him with this Jewish view of Herod, which is +unparalleled in the _Wars_. But in another passage, where he must be +following an Herodian and anti-Pharisaic source, he makes some remarks +in quite an opposite spirit, as if the Pharisees were in the wrong, and +provoked the king. He says of them: "They were prone to offend +princes;[2] they claimed to foresee things, and were suddenly elated to +break out into open war." He calls them also Sophists,[3] the scornful +name which the Greeks gave to their popular lecturers of morality. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XV. viii. 1.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XVII. ii. 8.] + +[Footnote 3: Ant. XVII. vi. 2.] + +In dealing with Herod's character, Josephus is more discriminating than +in the _Wars_. He sums him up as "cruel towards all men equally, a slave +to his passions, and claiming to be above the righteous law: yet was he +favored by fortune more than any man, for from a private station he was +raised to be a king."[1] One piece of characterization may he quoted,[2] +which is not the less interesting because we may suspect that it is +stolen: + +"But this magnificent temper and that submissive behavior and liberality +which he exercised towards Caesar and the most powerful men at Rome, +obliged him to transgress the customs of his nation and to set aside +many of their laws, by building cities after an extravagant manner, and +erecting Temples, not in Judea indeed, for that would not have been +borne, since it is forbidden to pay any honors to images or +representations of animals after the manner of the Greeks, but in the +country beyond our boundaries and in the cities thereof. The apology +which he made to the Jews was this, that all was done not of his own +inclination, but at the bidding of others, in order to please Caesar and +the Romans, as though he set more store on the honor of the Romans than +the Jewish customs; while in fact he was considering his own glory, and +was very ambitious to leave great monuments of his government to +posterity: whence he was so zealous in building such splendid cities, +and spent vast sums of money in them." + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XVII. viii. 1.] + +[Footnote 2: Ant. XV. ix. 5.] + +He bursts out, too, with unusual passion against Herod for his law +condemning thieves to exile, because it was a violation of the Biblical +law, "and involved the dissolution of our ancestral traditions." + +If the account of the Jewish spiritual movement at a time of great +spiritual awakening is meager, the picture of Herod's great buildings, +despite occasional confusion and vagueness, is full and valuable. He +gives us an excellent description of Caesarea and Sebaste, the two +cities which the king established as a compliment to the Roman Emperor, +and an account of the Temple and the fortress of Antonia, which he +himself knew so well. Of the Temple we have another description, in the +Mishnah, which in the main agrees with Josephus. Where the two differ, +however, the preference cannot be given to the writer who had grown up +in the shadow of the building, and might have been expected to know its +every corner.[1] As we have seen in the _Wars_, he was in topography as +in other things under the influence of Greco-Roman models. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. George A. Smith, Jerusalem, ii. 495 _ff_.] + +Josephus did not enjoy the advantage of a full chronicle to guide him +much beyond the death of Herod. Nicholas died, or ceased to write, in +the reign of Antipater, who succeeded his father. Apparently he had no +successor who devoted himself to recording the affairs of the Jewish +court. Hence, though the events of the troubled beginning of Antipater's +reign are dealt with at the same length as those of Herod, and we have a +vivid story of the Jewish embassy that went to Rome to petition for the +deposition of the king, the history afterwards becomes fragmentary. Such +as it is, it manifests a Roman flavor. The nationalists are termed +robbers, and the pseudo-Messiahs are branded as self-seeking +impostors.[1] After an enumeration of various pretenders that sought to +make themselves independent rulers, there is a sudden jump from the +first to the tenth year of Archelaus, who was accused of barbarous and +tyrannical practices and banished by the Roman Emperor to Gaul. His +kingdom was then added to the province of Syria. Josephus dwells on the +story of two dreams which occurred to the king and his wife Glaphyra, +and justifies himself because his discourse is concerning kings, and +also because of the advantage to be drawn from it for the assurance both +of the immortality of the soul and the Providence of God in human +affairs. "And if anybody does not believe such stories, let him keep his +own opinion, but let him not stand in the way of another who finds in +them an encouragement to virtue." + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XVII. xiii. 2.] + +The last three books of the _Antiquities_ reveal the weaknesses of +Josephus as an historian: his disregard of accuracy, his tendency to +exaggeration, his lack of proportion, and his mental subservience. He +had no longer either the Scriptures or a Greek chronicler to guide him. +He depended in large part for his material on oral sources and scattered +memoirs, and he is not very successful in eking it out so as to produce +the semblance of a connected narrative. His chapters are in part a +miscellany of notes, and the construction is clumsy. The writer +confesses that he was weary of his task, but felt impelled to wind it +up. Yet, just because we are so ignorant of the events of Jewish history +at the period, and because the period itself is so critical and +momentous, these books (xviii-xx) are among the most important which he +has left, and on the whole they deal rather more closely than their +predecessors with the affairs of the Jewish people. The palace intrigues +do not fill the stage so exclusively, and some of the digressions carry +us into byways of Jewish history. + +At the very outset[1] Josephus devotes a chapter to a fuller delineation +than he has given in any other place of the various sects that +flourished at the time. The account, ampler though it is than the +others, does not reveal the true inwardness of the different religious +positions. He repeats here what he says elsewhere about the Pharisaic +doctrine of predestination tempered by freewill, but he enlarges +especially on the difference between the parties in their ideas about +the future life.[2] The Pharisees believe that souls have an immortal +vigor, and that they will be rewarded or punished in the next world +accordingly as they have lived virtuously or wickedly in this life; the +wicked being bound in everlasting prisons, while the good have power to +live again. The Sadducees, on the other hand, assert that the souls die +with the bodies, and the Essenes teach the immortality of souls and set +great store on the rewards of righteousness. Their various ideas are +wrapped up in Greco-Roman dress, to suit his readers, and the doctrine +of resurrection ascribed to the Pharisees is almost identical with that +held by the neo-Pythagoreans of Rome.[3] But Josephus' account is more +reliable when he refers to the divergent attitudes of the sects to the +tradition. + +"The Pharisees strive to observe reason's dictates in their conduct, and +at the same time they pay great respect to their ancestors; and they +have such influence over the people because of their virtuous lives and +their discourses that they are their friends in divine worship, prayers, +and sacrifice. The Sadducees do not regard the observance of anything +beyond what the law enjoins them, but since their doctrine is held by +the few, when they hold the judicial office, they are compelled to +addict themselves to the notions of the Pharisees, because the mass +would not otherwise tolerate them. The Essenes live apart from the +people in communistic groups, and exceed all other men in virtue and +righteousness. They send gifts to the Temple, but do not sacrifice, on +which account they are excluded from the common court of the Temple." + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XVIII. i. 1.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. B.J. II. viii.] + +[Footnote 3: Comp. Vergil, Aeneid, vi.] + +Lastly, Josephus turns to the fourth sect, the Zealots, whose founder +was Judas the Galilean: + +"These men agree in all other things with the Pharisees, but they have +an inviolable attachment to liberty, and they say that God is to be +their only Ruler and Lord. Moreover they do not fear any kind of death, +nor do they heed the death of their kinsmen and friends, nor can any +fear of the kind make them acknowledge anybody as sovereign." + +Josephus, however, cannot refrain from imputing low motives to those who +belonged to the party opposed to himself and hated of the Romans. "They +planned robberies and murders of our principal men," he says, "in +pretense for the public welfare, but in reality in hopes of gain for +themselves." And he saddles them with the responsibility for all the +calamities that were to come. About the Messianic hope, which appears to +have inspired them, he is compulsorily silent. + +The historical record that follows is very sketchy. We have a bare list +of procurators and high priests down to the time of Pontius Pilate, a +notice of the foundation of Tiberias by the tetrarch Herod, and an +irrelevant account of the death of Phraates, the king of the Parthians, +and of Antiochus of Commagene, who was connected by marriage with the +Herodian house. Still there is rather more detail than in the +corresponding summary in the second book of the _Wars_, and Josephus +must in the interval have lighted on a fuller source than he had +possessed in his first historical essay. It is not impossible that the +new authority was again Justus of Tiberias. Of the unrest in the +governorship of Pontius Pilate he has more to say, but the genuineness +of the passage referring to the trial and death of Jesus, which is dealt +with elsewhere,[1] has been doubted by modern critics. It is followed in +the text by a long account of a scandal connected with the Isis worship +at Rome, which led to the expulsion of Jews from the capital. In this +way the chronicler wanders on between bare chronology and digression, +until he reaches the reign of Agrippa, when he again finds written +sources to help him. The romance of Agrippa's rise from a bankrupt +courtier to the ruler of a kingdom is treated with something of the same +full detail as the events of Herod's career, and probably the historian +enjoyed here the use of royal memoirs. He may have obtained material +also from the historical works of Philo of Alexandria, which were partly +concerned with the same epoch. He refers explicitly to the embassy which +the Alexandrian Jews sent to the Roman Emperor to appeal for the +rescission of the order to set up in the synagogue the Imperial image, +at the head of which went Philo, "a man eminent on all accounts, brother +to Alexander the Alabarch, and not unskilled in philosophy." Bloch[2] +indeed is of the opinion that the later historian did not use his +Alexandrian predecessor, either in this or any other part of his +writings, and points out certain differences of fact between the two +accounts; but in view of the references to Philo and the fact that +Josephus subsequently wrote two books of apology, one of which was +expressly directed in answer to Philo's bitter opponent Apion, it is at +least probable that he was acquainted with Philo's narrative. He may, +however, have used it only to supplement the memoirs of the Herodian +house, which served him as a chief source. Josephus devotes less +attention to the Alexandrian embassy than to the efforts of the +Palestinian Jews to obtain a rescission of the similar decree which +Petronius, the governor of Syria, was sent to enforce in Jerusalem. His +account is devised to glorify the part which Agrippa played. The prince +appears as a kind of male Esther, endangering his own life to save his +people; and indeed higher critics have been found to suggest that the +Biblical book of Esther was written around the events of the reign of +Gaius. + +[Footnote 1: Ant. XVIII. iii. Comp. below, p. 241.] + +[Footnote 2: Die Quellen des Flavius Josephus.] + +The story of Agrippa is interrupted by a chapter about the Jews of +Babylon, which has the air of a moral tale on the evils of +intermarriage, and may have formed part of the popular Jewish literature +of the day. Another long digression marks the beginning of the +nineteenth book of the _Antiquities_, where Josephus leaves Jewish +scenes and inserts an account of Caligula's murder and the election of +Claudius as Emperor. This narrative, while of great interest for +students of the Roman constitution, is out of all proportion to its +place in the Jewish chronicle. Josephus, it has been surmised, based it +on the work of one Cluvius (referred to in the book as an intimate +friend of Claudius), who wrote a history about 70 C.E.; he may besides +have received hitherto unpublished information from Agrippa II, whose +father had been an important actor in the drama, or from his friend +Aliturius, the actor at Rome, who had mixed in affairs of state. Anyhow, +he took advantage of this chance of making a literary sensation. +Doubtless also, the recital, which threw not a little discredit on the +house of the earlier Caesars, was for that reason not unwelcome to the +upstart Flavians, and may have been inserted at the Imperial wish. + +Agrippa I is the most attractive figure in the second part of the +_Antiquities_. He is contrasted with Herod, + +"who was cruel and severe in his punishments, and had no mercy on those +he hated, and everyone perceived that he had more love for the Greeks +than for the Jews.... But Agrippa's temper was mild and equally liberal +to all men. He was kind to foreigners and was of agreeable and +compassionate feeling. He loved to reside at Jerusalem, and was +scrupulously careful in his observance of the Law of his people. On his +death he expressed his submission to Providence; for that he had by no +means lived ill, but in a splendid and happy manner." + +His peaceful reign, however, was only the lull before the storm, and the +last book of the _Antiquities_ is mainly taken up with the succession of +wicked procurators, who, by their extortions and cruelties and flagrant +disregard of the Jewish Law and Jewish feeling, goaded the Jews into the +final rebellion. It contains, however, a digression on the conversion of +the royal house of Adiabene to Judaism, which is tricked out with +examples of God's Providence. Yet another digression records the +villainies of Nero (which no doubt was pleasing to his patrons) and the +amours of Drusilia, the daughter of Agrippa I. But of the rising +discontent of the Jewish people in Palestine we have no clear picture. +Josephus fails as in the _Wars_ to bring out the inner incompatibility +of the Roman and the Jewish outlook, and represents, in an +unimaginative, matter-of-fact, Romanizing way, that it was simply +particular excesses--the rapacity of a Felix, the knavery of a +Florus--which were the cause of the Rebellion. This is just what a Roman +would have said, and when the Jewish writer deals at all with the Jewish +position, it is usually to drag in his political feud. He especially +singles out the sacrilege of the Zealots in assassinating their +opponents within the Temple precincts as the reason of God's rejecting +the city; "and as for the Temple, He no longer deemed it sufficiently +pure to be His habitation, but brought the Romans upon us and threw a +fire on the city to purge it, and brought slavery on us, our wives, and +our children, to make us wiser by our calamities." Thus the priestly +apologist, accepting Roman canons, finds in the ritual offense of a +section of the people the ground for the destruction of the national +center. He is torn, indeed, between two conflicting views about the +origin of the rebellion: whether he shall lay the whole blame on the +Jewish irreconcilables, or whether he shall divide it between them and +the wicked Roman governors; and in the end he exaggerates both these +motives, and leaves out the deeper causes. + +The penultimate chapter contains a list of the high priests, about whom +the historian had throughout made great pretensions of accuracy. He +enumerates but eighty-three from the time of Aaron to the end of the +line, of whom no less than twenty-eight were appointed after Herod's +accession to his kingdom; whereas the Talmud records that three hundred +held office during the existence of the second Temple alone.[1] That +number is probably hyperbolical, but the statement in other parts of the +Rabbinical literature, that there were eighty high priests in that +period,[2] throws doubt on this list, which besides is manifestly +patched in several places. + +[Footnote 1: Yoma, 9a.] + +[Footnote 2: Yer. Yoma, ix., and Lev. R. xx.] + +With the procuratorship of Florus, Josephus brings his chronicle to an +end, the later events having been treated in detail in the _Wars;_ and +in conclusion he commends himself for his accuracy in giving the +succession of priests and kings and political administrators: + +"And I make bold to say, now I have so completely perfected the work +which I set out to do, that no other person, be he Jew or foreigner, and +had he ever so great an inclination to it, could so accurately deliver +these accounts to the Greeks as is done in these books. For members of +my own people acknowledge that I far exceed them in Jewish learning, and +I have taken great pains to obtain the learning of the Greeks and +understand stand the elements of the Greek language, though I have so +long accustomed myself to speak our own tongue that I cannot speak Greek +with exactness." + +He makes explicit his standpoint with this _envoi_, which shows that he +was writing for a Greek-speaking public and in competition with Greeks, +and this helps to explain why he sets special store on the record of +priests and kings and political changes, and why he so often disguises +the genuine Jewish outlook. As an account of the Jewish people for the +prejudiced society of Rome, the _Antiquities_ undoubtedly possessed +merit. History, indeed, at the time, was far from being an exact +science, nor was accuracy esteemed necessary to it. Cicero had said a +hundred years earlier, that it was legitimate to lie in narratives; and +this was the characteristic outlook of the Greco-Roman writers. The most +brilliant literary documents of the age, the _Annals_ and _Histories_ of +Tacitus, are rather pieces of sparkling journalism than sober and +philosophical records of facts; and therefore we must not judge Josephus +by too high a standard. + +Weighed in his own balance, he had done a great service to his people by +setting out the main heads of their history over three thousand years, +so that it should be intelligible to the cultured Roman society; and had +he been reproached with misrepresenting and distorting many of their +religious ideas, he would have replied, with some justice, that it was +necessary to do so in, order to make the Romans understand. On the same +ground he would have justified the omission of much that was +characteristic and the exaggeration of much that was normal. He shows +throughout some measure of national pride. To-day, however, we cannot +but regret that he weakly adopted much of the spiritual outlook of his +Gentile contemporaries, and that he did not seek to convey to his +readers the fundamental spiritual conceptions of the Jews, which might +have endowed his history with an unique distinction. His record of two +thousand years of Israel's history gives but the shadow of the glory of +his people. + + + + +VIII + +THE APOLOGY FOR JUDAISM + + +In every age since the dispersion began, the Jews have appeared to their +neighbors as a curious anomaly. Their abstract idea of God, their +peculiar religious observances, their refusal to intermarry with their +neighbors, their serious habits of life--all have served to mark them +out and attract the wonder of the philosophical, the vituperation of the +vulgar, and the dislike of the ignorant. Their enemies in every epoch +have repeated with slight variation the charge which Haman brought in +his petition to King Ahasuerus, "There is a people scattered abroad and +dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and +their laws are diverse from those of every people, neither keep they the +king's laws" (Esther 3:8). In the cosmopolitan society that arose in the +Hellenistic kingdoms, it was their especial offense that they retained a +national cohesion, and refused to indulge in the free trade in religious +ideas and social habits adopted by civilized peoples. The popular +feeling was fanned by a party that had a more particular grievance +against them. Though certain philosophical sects, notably the schools of +Pythagoras and Aristotle, were struck with admiration for the lofty +spiritual ideas and the strict discipline of Judaism, another school, +and that the most powerful of the time, was smitten with envy and +hatred. + +The Stoics, who aspired to establish a religious philosophy for all +mankind, and pursued a vigorous missionary propaganda, particularly in +the East, saw in the Jews not only obstinate opponents but dangerous +rivals, who carried on a competing mission with provoking success. The +children of Israel were spread over the whole of the civilized world, +and everywhere they vigorously propagated their teaching. Of all +enmities, the enmity of contending creeds is the bitterest. The Stoics +became the first professional Jew-haters, and set themselves at the head +of those who resented Jewish particularism, either from jealousy or from +that unreasoning dislike which is universally felt against minorities +that live differently from the mass about them. + +The ill-will and sectarian hatred were most prevalent at Alexandria, +where the powerful Jewish community excited the attacks of the +half-Hellenized natives. The campaign was fought mainly as a battle of +books. The Hebrew Scriptures represented the early Egyptians in no +favorable light. The Greco-Egyptian historians retaliated by a +malevolent account of the origin and history of the Hebrew people, of +which Manetho's story is the prototype. In this work of the third +century B.C.E. the children of Israel were represented as sprung from a +pack of lepers, who were expelled from Egypt because of their foul +disease. A still more virulent attack on the Jewish teaching is found in +two Stoic writers of the first century B.C.E., Posidonius of Apamea, a +town of Phrygia, and Molon,[1] who taught at Rhodes. The former raised +the charge that the Jews alone of all peoples refused to have any +communication with other nations, but regarded them as their enemies. +Molon, besides a general travesty of their early history, wrote a +special diatribe against them--the first document of the kind which +history records--accusing them of atheism and misanthropy, cowardice and +stupidity. These remained the stock charges for centuries, and they +assumed an added bitterness after the Roman conquest, when to the +peculiarity of Jewish customs was added the stigma of being a subject +people. The hatred of Greek and Jew, despite all the ostentatious +friendliness of a Herod for Greek things, became deeper, and it showed +itself as well without as within Palestine. At Alexandria, in the +beginning of the first century, the antagonism developed into open +riots, and the leaders of the anti-Jewish party were again two Stoics, +Apion and Chaeremon, the one orator and grammarian, the other priest and +astrologer. There is nothing very original in their libels, which are +modeled upon those of Posidonius and Molon; but some fresh detail is +added. It was said that the deity worshiped at Jerusalem was the head of +an ass, to which human sacrifices were offered, and that the Jews took +an oath to do no service for any Gentile. Apion, a man of some repute, +was the head of the Alexandrian Stoic school, and called "the toiler," +because of his industry. He was, however, also known as "the +quarrelsome"[2] ([Greek: ho pleistonikeas]). Another critic of ancient +times says he was notorious for advertising his ideas (_in doctrinis +suis praedicandis venditator_)[3], and the Emperor Augustus declares +that he was the drum of his own fame (i.e. the blower of his own +trumpet). He was in fact a mixture of scholar and charlatan, as many of +his successors have been, the Houston Chamberlain of the first century. + +[Footnote 1: Schuerer (iii. 503_ff_) has brought cogent reasons to show +that Molon is not the same as Apollonius, another Jew-baiter, with whom +he has often been identified.] + +[Footnote 2: Clemens, Strom. i. 21, 101.] + +[Footnote 3: Gallus, Noctes Atticae, v. 2.] + +Apion wrote a history of Egypt in which his attack upon the Jews appears +to have been an episode,[1] but his prominence as an anti-Semite is +shown by the fact that he went as the spokesman of the Greek embassy to +Caligula on the memorable occasion when Philo was the champion of the +Jewish cause. In that capacity Philo prepared an elaborate apology for +his people, which he had not the opportunity to deliver; but it +contained in part an account of the religious sects, designed to show +their philosophical excellence, and it was known to the Church fathers +of the early centuries of the Christian era. Only small fragments of it +are preserved by Eusebius, and the rest of the apologetic writing of +Alexandria, which was in all probability very extensive, has +disappeared. Yet the Hellenistic-Jewish literature is colored throughout +by an apologetic purpose. Whether the work is a professedly historical +or ethical or philosophical treatise, the idea is always present of +representing Judaism as a sublime and a humanitarian doctrine, and of +refuting the calumnies of the Greek scribes. Thus, besides his elaborate +apology prepared for the Roman Emperor, Philo had written a popular +presentation of Judaism in the form of a Life of Moses, with appended +treatises on Humanity and Nobility, which was but a thinly-veiled work +of apologetics. Another part of the defensive literature took the form +of missionary propaganda under a heathen mask. The oracles of the Sibyl +and Orpheus, a forged history of Hecataeus, and monotheistic verses +foisted on the Greek poets, were but attempts to carry the war into the +enemy's territory. Further, there must have been a more direct +presentation of the Jewish cause by way of public lectures and popular +addresses in the synagogues. Nevertheless, the specific answers to the +charges advanced by the anti-Jewish scribblers are now to be found most +fully stated in Josephus. In his day the literary campaign against the +Jewish name was as remorseless as the military campaign that had +destroyed their political independence. The Romans, tolerant themselves +in religion, had long been intolerant of Jewish separatism and national +exclusiveness, and Cicero,[2] shortly after the capture of Jerusalem by +Pompey, had denounced their "barbarian superstition" in language that is +typical of the outlook of the Roman aristocracy. "Even when Jerusalem +was untouched, and the Jews were at peace with us, their religious +ceremonies ill accorded with the splendor of our Empire; still less +tolerable are they to-day, when the nation has shown, by taking up arms, +its attitude towards us, while the fact that it has been conquered and +reduced to servitude proves how much the gods care for it." + +[Footnote 1: The idea, which is derived from the Church fathers, that he +wrote a separate [Greek: logos] against the Jews, appears to be based by +them on a misunderstanding of Ant. XVIII. viii. 1. Comp. Schuerer, _op. +cit._ iii. 541.] + +[Footnote 2: Pro Flacco, 68.] + +The later poets of the Augustan age, Horace, Tibullus, and Ovid, +expressed a supercilious disdain for the Jewish customs of +Sabbath-keeping, etc., which were spreading even in the politest +circles. As the political conflict between the Romans and their stubborn +subjects became more pronounced, the Roman impatience of their obstinacy +increased. Seneca, writing after Palestine had been placed under a Roman +governor, speaks bitterly of "the accursed race whose practices have so +far prevailed that they have been received all over the world." Hating +the Jews as he did with the double hatred of a Roman aristocrat and a +Stoic philosopher, he is yet fain to admit that their religion is +diffused over the Empire, and anxious as he is to decry their +superstition, he reveals part of the reason of their success. "They at +least can give an explanation of their religious ceremonies, whereas the +pagan masses cannot say why they carry out their practices." The pagan +cults were languishing because of the frigidity of their forms and their +incapacity for providing men with an ideal or a discipline or a solace; +and the people turned to a living religion. The day had come that was +foretold by the prophet, when men shall catch hold of the skirts of a +Jew, saying, "We will go with you, because we have heard that God is +with you" (Zech. 8:23). + +The bitterest and the most envenomed attacks on the Jews were written +after the destruction of Jerusalem, when the failure of Rome to break +the stubborn spirit of her conquered foe became apparent. The legions +could destroy Jerusalem; they could not uproot Judaism or even stay its +progress. The presence of thousands of Jewish captive slaves at Rome +accelerated indeed the march of conversion. Vespasian and Titus forebore +to take the title "Judaicus" after their triumph, lest it should be +taken to mean that they had Judaized. The speedy defection of Roman +citizens to the superstition of a conquered people was an insult, which, +added to the injury of their obstinate resistance, roused to fury the +remnants of the Roman conservatives. The entanglement of Titus with the +Jewish princess Berenice was the final outrage. The satiric poets +Martial and Juvenal inserted frequent ribald references to Jewish +customs; but the nature of their works precluded a serious criticism. +Martial was a master of flouts, jeers, and gibes, and Juvenal was a +soured and disappointed provincial, who delighted to hurl wild +reproaches. He declaimed against the passing away of the old manners of +Republican Rome, and for him the spread of Jewish habits was among the +surest signs of degeneracy. The poets, however, did not so much endeavor +to misrepresent as to ridicule the Jews and their converts. But the +classical exponent of Roman anti-Semitism is Tacitus, the historian who +wrote in the time of Nerva and Trajan, i.e. just after Josephus, and who +treated of the Jews both in his _Annals_, which were a history of the +last century, and in his _Histories_, which dealt with his own times. He +surpassed all his predecessors, Greek or Roman, in distortion and abuse, +and he combined the charges invented by the jealousy and rancor of Greek +sophists with the abuse of Jewish character induced by Imperial Roman +passion. His account cannot be mistaken for a sober judgment. By the +transparent combination of earlier, discredited sources, by blatant +inconsistencies, and by neglect of the authorities that would have +provided him with reliable information, he shows himself the partisan +pamphleteer. But the indictment is none the less illuminating. Mommsen +speaks of the solemn enmity which Tacitus cherishes to the section of +the human race "to whom everything pure is impure, and everything impure +is pure." Doubtless his hatred was founded on intense national pride, +but it was fed by his tendency to blacken and exaggerate. His audience +was composed, as Renan says, of "aristocrats of the race of English +Tories, who derived their strength from their very prejudices." Their +ideas about the Jewish people were as vague as those of the ordinary man +of to-day about the people of Thibet, and they were willing to believe +anything of them. + +Tacitus gives several alternative accounts of the origin of the Jews.[1] +According to some they were fugitives from the Isle of Crete (deriving +their name from Mount Ida), who settled on the coast of Libya. According +to others they sprang from Egypt, and were driven out under their +captains Hierosolymus and Judas; while others stated that they were +Ethiopians whom fear and hatred obliged to change their habitation. He +supplies himself a fanciful account of the Exodus, tricked out with a +variety of misrepresentations of their observances, which are +ludicrously inconsistent with each other: + +"They bless the image of that animal [the ass], by whose indication they +had escaped from their vagrant condition in the wilderness and quenched +their thirst. They abstain from swine's flesh as a memorial of the +miserable destruction which the mange brought on them. That they stole +the fruits of the earth, we have a proof in their unleavened bread. They +rest on the seventh day, because that day gave them rest from their +labors, and, affecting a lazy life, they are idle during every seventh +year. These rites, whatever their origin, are at least supported by +their antiquity.[2] Their other institutions are depraved and impure, +and prevailed by reason of their viciousness; for every vile fellow +despising the rites of his ancestors brought to them his contribution, +so that the Jewish commonwealth was augmented. The first lesson taught +to converts is to despise their gods, to renounce their country, and to +hold their parents, children, and brethren in utmost contempt: but still +they are at pains to increase and multiply, and esteem it unlawful to +kill any of their children. They regard as immortal the souls of those +who die in battle, or are put to death for their crimes.[3] Hence their +love of posterity and their contempt of death. They have no notion of +more than one Divine Being, who is only grasped by the mind. They deem +it profane to fashion images of gods out of perishable matter, and teach +that their Being is supreme and eternal, immutable and imperishable. +Accordingly, they erect no images in their cities, much less in their +temples, and they refuse to grant this kind of honor to kings or +emperors." + +[Footnote 1: Hist. v. 2_ff_.] + +[Footnote 2: Ch. lvii.] + +[Footnote 3: This statement agrees remarkably with what Josephus puts +into the mouth of several of his speakers. See above, p. 114.] + +The sage Pliny, who himself laughed at the crude paganism of his time, +could also point the finger of scorn at the Jews as "a people notorious +by their contempt of divine images." To the genuine Roman, the state +religion might not be true, but it was part of the civic life, and +therefore its rejection was unsocial and disloyal. Yet the account of +Tacitus contains several remarks which, in their author's despite, +reveal the moral superiority of the conquered over the conquerors. He +notes their national tenacity, their ready charity, their freedom from +infanticide, their conviction of the immortality of the soul, their +purely spiritual and monotheistic cult. Tacitus certainly wrote after +the works of Josephus had been published, so that the apology is not an +answer to him; but his methods of misstatement were anticipated at Rome +by a host of anti-Semitic writers. Though Josephus never mentions a +single Roman detractor of his people, and confines his reply to Greeks +who were long buried, it was doubtless against this class that he was +anxious to defend himself and his faith. + +He declared at the end of the _Antiquities_ his intention to write three +books about "God and His essence, and about our laws," proposing, +perhaps, to imitate Philo's apology for Judaism, which was in three +parts. But the virulence of the calumny against Judaism induced him to +modify his plan and write a specific reply to the charges made against +the Jews. It was necessary to refute more concisely and more definitely +than he had done in his long historical works the false tales about the +Jewish past and the Jewish law that were circulated and believed in the +hostile Greco-Roman world. He directed himself more particularly to +uphold the antiquity of the Jews against those who denied their +historical claims and to disprove the charges leveled against the Jewish +religious ideas and legislation. These two subjects form the content of +the two books commonly known to us as _Against Apion_. Only the second, +however, deals with Apion's diatribe, and the current title is certainly +unauthentic. Origen,[1] Eusebius, and Hieronymus[2] refer to the first +book as _About the Antiquity of the Jews_, and Hieronymus adds the +description [Greek: antirraetikos logos], _A Refutation_. Eusebius +similarly[3] speaks of the second book as the Refutation of Apion the +grammarian. Porphyry calls it simply [Greek: pros tous Hellaenas], _The +Address to the Greeks_, and it is possible that Josephus so entitled his +work. It is noteworthy that he directed his pleading to the +Greek-speaking and not to the Latin public; the Greeks, he recognized, +were the source of the misrepresentations of his people, and, as Greek +was read by all cultured people in his day, in refuting them he would +incur less obloquy and attain his end equally well. + +[Footnote 1: Orig. C. Cels. i. 14.] + +[Footnote 2: De Viris Illustr. 13.] + +[Footnote 3: H.E. III. viii. 2.] + +The first point that Josephus seeks to make good in his apology is the +antiquity of the Hebrew people and the historical character of their +Scriptures. In the Greco-Roman world, which had lost confidence in +itself, and looked for inspiration to the past, age was a title to +respectability, and it was the aim of the Jewish apologist to explain +away the silence of the Greeks. For the certificate of the Hellenic +historians was in the Hellenistic world the most convincing mark of +genuineness. + +"By my works on the Antiquity of the Jews--thus Josephus begins--I have +proved that our Jewish nation is of very great antiquity and had a +distinct existence. Those Antiquities contain the history of five +thousand years, and are derived from our sacred books, but are +translated by me into the Greek tongue." + +Josephus loosely represents that the whole of the _Antiquities_ is based +on the Bible, and reckons the period of history at nearly a thousand +years more than it covered. + +"But since I observe that many people give ear to the reproaches that +are laid against us by those who bear us ill-will, and will not believe +what I have written concerning the antiquity of our nation, while they +take it for a plain sign that our nation is of late date because it is +not so much as vouchsafed a bare mention by the most famous historians +among the Greeks, I therefore have thought myself under an obligation to +write somewhat briefly about these subjects, in order to convict those +who reproach us of spite and deliberate falsehood and to correct the +ignorance of others, and withal to instruct all those who are desirous +of knowing the truth of what great antiquity we really are. As for the +witnesses whom I shall produce for the proof of what I say, they shall +be such as are esteemed by the Greeks themselves to be of the greatest +reputation for truth and the most skilful in the knowledge of all +antiquity. I will also show that those who have written so reproachfully +and falsely about us are to be convicted by what they have themselves +written to the contrary, and I shall endeavor to give an account of the +reasons why it has happened that a great number of Greeks have not made +mention of our nation in their histories." + +Acting on the principle that the best defense is attack, Josephus starts +by turning on the Greeks themselves and discrediting their antiquity. +They were a mushroom people, or at least their records were modern, and +not to be compared in age with the records of the Phoenicians, the +Hebrews, or the Babylonians. Comparative sciences had flourished in the +cosmopolitan city of Alexandria, and in the light of them the Greek +claim to exclusive wisdom had been shattered. Josephus had made himself +master of the current knowledge of the subject. The Greeks learnt their +letters from the Phoenicians, they have no record more ancient than the +Homeric poems, and even Homer did not leave his poems in writing,[1] +while their earliest historians lived but shortly before the Persian +expedition into Greece, and their earliest philosophers, Pythagoras and +Thales, learnt what they knew from Egyptians and Chaldeans. Having shown +the lateness and Oriental origin of Greek culture, Josephus accuses +Greek writers of unreliability, as is manifest by their mutual +disagreement. He makes a great show of learning on the subject and uses +his material effectively. Doubtless he found the topic ready to hand in +some predecessor, and it is somewhat ironical that a Josephus should +throw stones at a Thucydides on the score of inaccuracy. + +[Footnote 1: It is interesting that this casual statement of Josephus +was one of the starting points of modern Homeric criticism.] + +The reason for the want of authority in the Greek historians--continues +Josephus--is to be found in the fact that the Greeks in early times took +no care to preserve public records of their transactions, which afforded +those who afterwards would write about them scope for making mistakes +and displaying invention: conditions which favored literary art, but +marred historical accuracy. Those who were the most zealous to write +history were more anxious to demonstrate that they could write well than +to discover the truth. + +The contrast between the individual creative impulse of the Hellene and +the respect for tradition of the Hebrew, which anticipates in a way +Matthew Arnold's contrast between Hellenic "spontaneity of +consciousness" and Hebraic "strictness of conscience," is pointedly made +by the apologist:[1] + +"We Jews must yield to the Greek writers as to style and eloquence of +composition, but we concede them no such superiority in regard to the +verity of ancient history, and least of all as to that part which +concerns the affairs of our country. The reliability of the Hebrew +records is vouched for by the unbroken succession of official annals +handed down by priests and prophets. The purity of the priestly caste +was strictly maintained by the law of marriage, which impelled every +priest to make a scrutiny into the genealogy of his wife and forward a +register of it to Jerusalem, where it was duly recorded in the archives. +And we possess the names of our high priests from father to son for a +period of two thousand years. Nor is there individual liberty of writing +among us: only the prophets (i.e. inspired persons) have written the +earliest accounts of things as they learned them of God Himself by +inspiration, and others have written about what happened in their own +times, and that too in a very distinct manner. We have no mass of books +disagreeing with each other, but only twenty-two books containing the +records of all our past, which are rightly believed to be inspired." + +[Footnote 1: C. Ap. 6_ff_.] + +The reckoning of the Canon is interesting:[1] there are five books of +Moses, thirteen books of the prophets, recording the history from the +death of Moses to the reign of Artaxerxes, and the remaining four books, +the Ketubim, contain hymns to God and precepts for the conduct of human +life. The books written since the time of Artaxerxes have not the same +trustworthiness, because the exact succession of prophets has not been +maintained. The intense sentiment which the Jews feel for their +Scriptures is proved by their willingness to die for them. + +[Footnote 1: The accepted number of books in the Jewish Canon is +twenty-four, and this number is found in the Book of II Esdras, xiv. 41, +which is probably contemporaneous with Josephus. The number 22 is to be +explained by the fact that Josephus must have linked Ruth with Judges +and Lamentations with Jeremiah. See J.E., s.v. Canon.] + +Again a contrast is pointed between the seriousness of the Hebraic and +the levity of the Greek attitude towards literature. Josephus +egotistically draws an example from the record of the recent war. The +Greeklings who wrote about it + +"put a few things together by hearsay, and, abusing the word, call their +writings by the name of histories. But I have composed a true history of +the whole war and of all the events that occurred, having been concerned +in all its transactions; for I acted as general of those among us that +are named Galileans, as long as it was possible for us to make any +resistance. I was then seized by the Romans, and became a captive. +Vespasian and Titus kept me under guard, and forced me to attend on them +continually. At the first I was put into bonds, but later was set at +liberty and sent to accompany Titus when he came from Alexandria to the +siege of Jerusalem, during which time nothing was done that escaped my +knowledge. For what happened in the Roman camp I saw, and wrote down +carefully; and what information the deserters brought out of the city, I +was the only man to understand. Afterwards, when I had gotten leisure at +Rome, and when all my material was prepared for the work, I obtained +some persons to assist me in learning the Greek tongue, and by these +means I composed the history of the events, and I was so well assured of +the truth of what I related, that I first of all appealed to those that +had the supreme command in that war, Vespasian and Titus, as witnesses +for me. For to them first of all I presented my books, and after them to +many of the Romans that had been engaged in the war. I also recited them +to many of my own race that understood Greek philosophy, among whom were +Julius Archelaus, Herod, king of Chalcis, a person of great authority, +and King Agrippa himself, a person that deserved the greatest respect. +Now all these bore their testimony to me that I had the strictest regard +to truth; who yet would not have dissembled the matter, nor been silent, +if I, out of ignorance, or out of favor to any side, either had given a +false color to the events, or omitted any of them." + +Josephus here indignantly replies to his Roman detractors, who accused +him of having composed a mere partisan thesis. As a priest he had a +special knowledge of the Scriptures, which were the basis of his +_Antiquities_, and as an important actor in the drama of the Roman war, +he wrote of its events with the knowledge of an eye-witness. He excuses +his digression as being made in self-defense, and claims to have proved +that historical writing is indigenous rather to those called Barbarians +than to the Greeks. He then returns to the task of refuting those who +say that the Jewish polity is of late origin because the Greek authors +are silent about it. One main cause of the silence was the isolation of +Judea and the character of the Jewish people, who did not delight in +merchandise and commerce, but devoted themselves to the cultivation of +the soil. This, of course, is a picture of the Bible times, because in +the writer's days they were beginning their mercantile development. +Hence the Jews were in quite a different condition from the Phoenicians, +the Thracians, the Persians, and the Medes, with all of whom the +Hellenes came into contact. They are rather to be compared with the +Romans, who only entered into the Greek sphere of interest later in +their history. + +Josephus makes the point that it would be as reasonable for the Jews to +deny the antiquity of the Greeks because there is no mention of them in +Hebrew records, as for the Greeks to deny the antiquity of the Jews for +the converse reason. And if the Greeks are ignorant of the Hebrews, he +argues that there is abundant testimony in the histories of other +peoples. He starts with the Egyptian evidence, and quotes from Manetho, +the anti-Jewish historian, giving extracts about the Hyksos tribes and +Hyksos kings, whom he identifies with Joseph and his brethren. The +identification was popular till recent times, but modern historical +criticism has rejected it. Josephus dates the invasion of the Hyksos at +three hundred and ninety-three years before Danaus came to Argos, which +in turn was five hundred and twenty years before the Trojan war. Thus he +puts the Bible story far ahead in age of Greek myth. Passing on to the +testimony in the Phoenician records, he derives from the public archives +of Tyre, to which reference was made also in the _Antiquities_,[1] +evidence of the relations between Solomon and Hiram, and further quotes +the account given by the Hellenistic historian Alexander of Ephesus, who +mentions the same incident. This Alexander had written a world-history, +and had collected the chronicles of the various peoples that formed part +of Alexander's empire. Josephus, who probably knew of his work through +Nicholas or some other chronicler, cites him to confirm the Bible. +Collections of extracts about the Jewish people and references to the +Bible in Greek literature were already in vogue, for it was an age +similar to our own in its love of encyclopedias. Josephus uses with not +a little skill these foreign sources, and supplements the comparative +material which he had introduced in the _Antiquities_. Confirmation of +the account of the flood, as also of the rebuilding of the Temple after +the return of the Jews from Babylon, is found in the Chaldean history of +Berosus; and other long extracts from Babylonian history are inserted +that furnish a casual mention of Judea or Jerusalem. Josephus attempts, +too, with doubtful success, to combine the Phoenician and Babylonian +records in order to prove that they agree about the date of the +rebuilding of the Temple. The only justifiable inference from the +passages, however, appears to be that both sources agreed on the +existence of Cyrus, king of Persia. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. above, p. 159.] + +Finally he adduces passages from various Greek writers, to show that the +Jews were not entirely unknown to the Hellenes before Alexander's +conquests. Josephus had no doubt predecessors among the Hellenistic +Jewish litterateurs in the search for testimony, as well as successors +among the Christian apologists; but his collection has alone survived, +and has become invaluable to modern scholars, who have ploughed the same +field for a different purpose. Authority is brought forward to show that +Pythagoras had connection with the Hebrews, and Herodotus, it is argued, +referred to the Jews as circumcised Syrians.[1] More apposite is a +passage quoted from Clearchus, a pupil of Aristotle, about a discussion +which his master had with a Jew of Soli, "who was Greek not only in +language but in thought." The genuineness of this excerpt has been +questioned, but without good reason. Aristotle's school had a scientific +interest in the Jews as in other peoples that had come under Greek sway +through Alexander's conquests. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Ant. VIII. x. 3.] + +Josephus then sets out some very eulogistic passages about his people, +purporting to be from Hecataeus of Abdera, which are very much to his +taste and his purpose. Unfortunately, however, they are too good to be +true, and modern criticism has established that, while the genuine +Hecataeus, an historian who wrote at the end of the fourth century +B.C.E., did insert in his work an account of Jerusalem and the Jews, the +glowing testimonials which Josephus adduces are from forged books +devised by Jews to their own glory. A passage of a less favorable tone, +and of which the genuineness is therefore not open to suspicion, is +quoted from Agatharchides, a Seleucid historian. Finally, with an +incidental mention of a half-dozen Hellenistic writers that have made +distinct reference to the Jewish people, and of three Jewish writers, +Demetrius, the elder Philo, and Eupolemus, "who have not greatly missed +the truth about our affairs," Josephus closes his evidence as to the +antiquity of his nation.[1] Possibly he did not realize that his last +three witnesses were of his own race, and it is not improbable that this +string of names was to him also a string of names culled from Alexander +Polyhistor or a similar authority. + +[Footnote 1: C. Ap. 23.] + +The latter part of the first book is devoted to the refutation of the +anti-Jewish diatribes of several Greeks, and starts off with a few +commonplaces upon the topic, to the effect that every great nation +incurs the jealousy and ill-will of others. "The Egyptians," says +Josephus, "were the first to cast reproaches upon us, and in order to +please them, some others undertook to pervert the truth. The causes of +their enmity are their chagrin at the events of the Exodus and the +difference of their religious ideas."[1] Josephus deals with Manetho's +description of the going-out from Egypt, and undertakes to demonstrate +that "he trifles and tells arrant lies." He dissects the charge that the +Hebrews were a pack of lepers exiled from the country, and insists upon +its absurdity and the lack of consistency in the details. He offers +ingenuously as a proof of the falsity of the allegation that Moses was a +leper the Mosaic legislation about lepers. "How could it be supposed," +he asks, "that Moses should ordain such laws against himself, to his own +reproach and damage?" Chaeremon is unworthy of reply, because his +account, though equally scurrilous, is inconsistent with that of +Manetho. But the story of Lysimachus, a writer of the same genus, is +more critically examined and found wanting, because it gives no +explanation of the origin of the Hebrews. Lysimachus derived the name +Jerusalem from the Greek Hierosylen--to commit sacrilege--the Hebrews, +according to his story, owing their settlement to the plunder of +temples; and Josephus points out triumphantly that that idea is not +expressed by the same word and name among the Jews and Greeks. But, to +vary a saying of Doctor Johnson, this section of Josephus must be read +for the quotations, for if one reads it for the argument of either +assailant or apologist, one would shoot oneself. + +[Footnote 1: C. Ap. 24.] + +The second book of the apology, which is a continuation of the first, +opens with an elaborate refutation of Apion. Josephus questions whether +he should take the trouble to confute the scurrilous stories of the +Alexandrian grammarian, "which are all abuse and vulgarity"; but because +many are pleased to pick up mendacious fictions, he thinks it better not +to leave the charges without an answer. He disposes first of Apion's +tales about Moses and the Exodus, which are of the same character as +those of Manetho and Chaeremon. Loaded abuse and unmeasured invective +color the refutation, but Apion apparently deserved it. We may take, as +a fair specimen of his veracity, the statement that the Hebrews reached +Palestine six days after they left Egypt and rested on the seventh day, +which they called Sabbath, because of some disease from which they +suffered, and of which the Egyptian name was Sabbaton. Apion had in +particular attacked the Alexandrian Jews, and Josephus takes the +opportunity of enlarging on the privileged position of his people, not +only in the Egyptian capital, but in the other Hellenistic cities where +they had been settled.[1] He elaborates and amplifies what he had stated +on this subject in the _Antiquities_, and adds a short account of the +miraculous delivery of the Egyptian Jews during the short-lived +persecution of Ptolemy Physcon, which is recorded more fully and with +some variation of detail in the so-called Third Book of the Maccabees. +In reply to Apion's charge, that the Jews show a lack of civic spirit +because they do not worship the same gods as the Alexandrians, Josephus +launches out into an explanation of their conception of God, describes +their abhorrence of idolatry, and deals also with their refusal to set +up in their temples the image of the Emperor. "But at the same time they +are willing," he says, "to pay honors to great men and to offer +sacrifices in their name." He deals also, in a digression, with +calumnies derived from Posidonius and Melon about the worship of an ass +in the sanctuary at Jerusalem. + +[Footnote 1: This part of the book, it may be noted, has only been +preserved in the Latin version; the Greek original has been lost.] + +Apion had invented a detailed story of ritual murder to justify +Antiochus Epiphanes for his spoliation of the Temple. The origin of this +charge is instructive of the methods of a classical anti-Semite. There +was, in the innermost sanctuary, a stone[1] on which the blood of the +burnt offering was sprinkled by the high priest on the Day of Atonement. +It was known as the [Hebrew: Even Shtiah] and tradition said that the +ark of the covenant had rested on it. Mystery centered around it, and +the Greek scribes imagined that it was the object of worship. Now, the +Greek word for a stone was Onos, which likewise meant an ass, and it was +probably on the strength of this blunder that prejudice for centuries +accused Jews and Christians of worshiping an ass' head. Josephus brings +proof of the emptiness of the charge, and retorts that Apion had himself +the heart of an ass; and then, describing the ritual of the Temple, +insists that there was no secret mystery about it. It gives a touch of +pathos that he speaks as if the Temple services were still being carried +out, whether because he was copying a source written before the +destruction, or because he deliberately disregarded that event. Apion, +like Cicero, had taunted the Jews on account of their political +subjection, which proved, he argued, that their laws were not just nor +their religion true. Josephus meets the charge--which in the +materialistic thinking of the Roman world was hard to answer--by the not +very happy plea that the Egyptians and Greeks had suffered a like +fortune. So, too, he meets the gibe that the Jews do not eat pork, by +saying that the Egyptian priests abstain likewise. He omits in both +cases the true religious answer, which would probably not have appealed +to his public. + +[Footnote 1: Yer. Yoma, v. 2.] + +At this point the reply to the Alexandrian anti-Semite comes to an end, +and the rest of the book comprises a defense of the Jewish legislation, +"which is intended not as an eulogy but as an apology." The broad aim is +to show that the Law inculcates humanity and piety; but Josephus, before +setting himself to this, again labors to point out that it is +pre-eminent in antiquity over any of the Greek codes. This done, he +gives a summary of the principles of Judaism, which is unlike anything +else he wrote in its masterly grasp of the spirit of the religion and in +its philosophical attitude. So great indeed is the contrast between this +epilogue and the bald summary of the Mosaic laws in the _Antiquities_ +that it is safe to say that Josephus had for his later work lighted on a +fresh and more inspired source. His presentation has the regular +characteristic of the Alexandrian school, an insistence on the universal +and philanthropic elements of the Mosaic law; and it is likely that he +had before him either Philo's work on the Life of Moses, or another +work, which his predecessor had used. It matters little that there are +differences of detail between his and Philo's interpretations: the +manner and the general purport are the same, and the manner is not the +usual manner of Josephus, and altogether different from the treatment in +the _Antiquities_. + +He lays down with great clearness the dominant features of the Mosaic +constitution. It is a theocracy, i.e. the state depends on God. The +passage in which he makes good this principle is a striking piece of +reasoning in comparative religion, worthy to be quoted in full: + +"Now there are innumerable differences in the particular customs and +laws that hold among all mankind, which a man may briefly reduce under +the following heads: Some legislators have permitted their governments +to be under monarchies, others put them under oligarchies, and others +under a republican form; but our legislator had no regard to any of +these forms, but he ordained our government to be what, by a strained +expression, may be termed a Theocracy, by ascribing the authority and +the power to God, and by persuading all the people to have a regard to +Him as the Author of all the good things enjoyed either in common by all +mankind or by each one in particular, and of all that they themselves +obtain by praying to Him in their greatest difficulties. He informed +them that it was impossible to escape God's observation, either in any +of our outward actions or in any of our inward thoughts. Moreover he +represented God as un-begotten and immutable through all eternity, +superior to all mortal conceptions in form, and though known to us by +His power, yet unknown to us as to His essence. I do not now explain how +these notions of God are in harmony with the sentiments of the wisest +among the Greeks. However, their sages testify with great assurance that +these notions are just and agreeable to the divine nature; for +Pythagoras and Anaxagoras and Plato and the Stoic philosophers that +succeeded them, and almost all the rest profess the same sentiments, and +had the same notions of the nature of God; yet durst not these men +disclose those true notions to more than a few, because the body of the +people were prejudiced beforehand with other opinions. But our +legislator, whose actions harmonized with his laws, did not only prevail +with those who were his contemporaries to accept these notions, but so +firmly imprinted this faith in God upon all their posterity that it +could never be removed. The reason why the constitution of our +legislation was ever better directed than other legislations to the +utility of all is this: that Moses did not make religion a part of +virtue, but he ordained other virtues to be a part of religion--I mean +justice, and fortitude, and temperance, and a universal agreement of the +members of the community with one another. All our actions and studies +have a reference to piety towards God, for he hath left none of these in +suspense or undetermined. There are two ways of coming at any sort of +learning and a moral conduct of life: the one is by instruction in +words, the other by practical exercises. Now, other lawgivers have +separated these two ways in their opinions, and, choosing the one which +best pleased each of them, neglected the other. Thus did the +Lacedemonians and the Cretans teach by practical exercises, but not by +words; while the Athenians and almost all the other Greeks made laws +about what was to be done, or left undone, but had no regard to +exercising them thereto in practice. + +"But our legislator very carefully joined these two methods of +instruction together; for he neither left these practical exercises to +be performed without verbal instruction, nor did he permit the learning +of the law to proceed without the exercises for practice; but beginning +immediately from the earliest infancy and the regulation of our diet, he +left nothing of the very smallest consequence to be done at the pleasure +and disposal of the individual. Accordingly, he made a fixed rule of +law, what sorts of food they should abstain from, and what sorts they +should use; as also what communion they should have with others, what +great diligence they should use in their occupations, and what times of +rest should be interposed, in order that, by living under that law as +under a father and a master, we might be guilty of no sin, neither +voluntary nor out of ignorance. For he did not suffer the guilt of +ignorance to go without punishment, but demonstrated the law to be the +best and the most necessary instruction of all, directing the people to +cease from their other employments and to assemble together for the +hearing and the exact learning of the law,--and this not once or twice +or oftener, but every week; which all the other legislators seem to have +neglected." + +This passage contains, in many ways, an admirable explanation of Judaism +as a law of conduct, inculcating morality by good habit; it lacks, +indeed, any deep spiritual note or mystical exaltation, but it was +likely for that reason to appeal to the practical, material-minded +Roman. Josephus corroborates what Seneca had grudgingly remarked, that +the Jews understood their laws; and it is this, he says, which made such +a wonderful accord among us, to which no other nation can show a +parallel. The eloquent insistence on the harmony uniting the Jewish +people is another proof that Josephus is here reproducing the ideas of +others, for it is in complete and glaring contrast with what he had +repeatedly written in his _Antiquities_ and his _Wars_ about the strife +of different sects. His books would have supplied the best argument to +any pagan criticising his apology. Josephus further ascribes to the +singleness of the tradition the absence of original genius among the +people. The excellence of the Law produces a conservative outlook, +whereas the Greeks, lacking a fixed law, love a new thing. S.D. +Luzzatto, the Hebraist of the middle of the nineteenth century, +emphasized the same contrast between Hellenism and Hebraism. + +Turning in detail to the precepts of the Law, Josephus gives eloquent +expression in the Hellenistic fashion to the idea of the divine unity. +"God," he says, "contains all: He is a being altogether perfect, happy, +and self-sufficient, the beginning, the middle, and the end of all +things; God's aim is reflected in human institutions. Rightly He has but +one Temple, which should be common to all men, even as He is the common +God of all men." He develops, too, the humanitarian aspect of Judaism in +the manner of the Hellenistic school. "And for our duty at the +sacrifices, we ought in the first place to pray for the common welfare +of all and after that for ourselves, for we were made for fellowship, +one with another, and he who prefers the common good before his own is +above all dear to God." He points to the excellence of the Jewish +conception of marriage, another commonplace of the Hellenistic +apologist, as we know from the Sibylline oracles; to the respect for +parents and to the friendliness for the stranger. He insists with +Philo[1] that kinship is to be measured not by blood, but by the conduct +of life. He dwells, likewise in company with the Hellenists, on a law +that lacks Bible authority: that the Israelites should give, to all who +needed it, fire and water, food and guidance.[2] The impulse to this +interpretation of the Torah is found in the charge made by the Jews' +enemies, that they were to assist only members of their own race.[3] +Josephus appears to be original, and, as is quite pardonable, he may be +writing with a view to Roman proclivities, when he praises the law for +the number of offenses to which it attaches the capital penalty. Like +many a later Jewish apologist living amid an alien and dominant culture, +Josephus accepts foreign standards, and he is silent about the Pharisaic +teaching which softened the literal prescripts of the Bible.[4] + +[Footnote 1: Comp. De Nobilitate.] + +[Footnote 2: Comp. Philo, II. 639.] + +[Footnote 3: Comp. Juvenal, Sat. xiv. 102.] + +[Footnote 4: It has been noticed above (note, p. 153) that Josephus +appears to misunderstand or deliberately misinterpret the Hebrew +[Hebrew: aror] (cursed be!), which precedes many prohibitions of the +Mosaic law, to mean "he shall be put to death."] + +In a peroration Josephus returns to a general eulogy of the Jewish Law, +on account of the faithful allegiance which it commands, and denounces +the pagan idolatry in the manner of the Greek rationalists, who had made +play with the Olympian hierarchy. While the inherent excellence of the +Jewish Law is dependent on the sublime conception of God, the inherent +defect of the Greek religion is that the Greek legislators entertained a +low conception of God, and did not make the religious creed a part of +the state law, but left it to the poets to invent what they chose. The +greatest of the Greek philosophers, indeed, agreed with the Jews as to +the true notions about God: "Plato especially imitated our legislation +in enjoining on all citizens that they should know the laws accurately." +A later generation made bold to declare that Plato had listened to +Jeremiah in Egypt and learnt his wisdom from the Jewish prophet. +Josephus compares with the Jewish separateness the national +exclusiveness of the Lacedemonians, and claims that the Jews show a +greater humanity in that they admit converts from other peoples. They +have, moreover, shown their bravery not in wars for the purpose of +amassing wealth, but in observing their laws in spite of every attempt +to wean them away. The Mosaic law is being spread over the civilized +world: + +"For there is not any city of the Greeks, nor any of the barbarians, nor +any nation whatsoever whither our custom of resting on the seventh day +has not come, and by which our fasts and lighting up of lamps and divers +regulations as to food are not observed. They also endeavor to imitate +our mutual accord with one another, and the charitable distribution of +our goods, and our diligence in our trades, and our fortitude in bearing +the distresses that befall us; and what is here matter of the greatest +admiration, our Law hath no bait of pleasure to allure men to it, but it +prevails by its own force; and as God Himself pervades all the world, so +hath our Law passed through all the world also." + +The task of the apologist is completed; "for whereas our accusers have +pretended that our nation are a people of late origin, I have +demonstrated that they are exceedingly ancient, and whereas they have +reproached our lawgiver as a vile man, God of old bare witness to his +virtues, and time itself hath been proved to bear witness to the same +thing."[1] In a final appreciation he concludes: + +"As to the laws themselves, more words are unnecessary, for they are +visible in their own nature, and are seen to teach not impiety, but the +truest piety in the world. They do not make men hate one another, but +encourage people to communicate what they have to one another freely. +They are enemies to injustice, they foster righteousness, they banish +idleness and expensive living, and instruct men to be content with what +they have and to be diligent in their callings. They forbid men to make +war from a desire of gain, but make them courageous in defending the +laws. They are inexorable in punishing malefactors. They admit no +sophistry of words, but are always established by actions, which we ever +propose as surer demonstrations than what is contained in writing only; +on which account I am so bold as to say that we are become the teachers +of other men in the greatest number of things, and those of the most +excellent nature only. For what is more excellent than inviolable piety? +What is more just than submission to laws? And what is more advantageous +than mutual love and concord? And this prevails so far that we are to be +neither divided by calamities nor to become oppressive and factious in +prosperity, but to contemn death when we are in war, and in peace to +apply ourselves to our handicrafts or to the tilling of the ground; +while in all things and in all ways we are satisfied that God is the +Judge and Governor of our actions." + +[Footnote 1: C. Ap. ii. 41.] + +As we read this final outburst of the Jewish apologist and think of what +he had himself written to gainsay it, and what he was yet to write in +his autobiography, we are fain to exclaim, _o si sic omnia_! One would +like to believe that in the defense of the Jewish Law we have the true +Josephus, driven in his old age by the goading of enemies to throw off +the mask of Greco-Roman culture, and standing out boldly as a lover of +his people and his people's law. Such latter-day repentance has been +known among the Flavii of other generations. And the two books _Against +Apion_ show that when Josephus had not to qualify his own weakness nor +to flatter his patrons, he could rise to an appreciation and even to an +eloquent exposition of Jewish ideals. Yet it was not the Greek-writing +historian, but the Palestinian Rabbis, that were to prove to the world +the undying vigor, the unquenchable power of resistance of the Jewish +Law. The Vineyard of Jabneh founded by Johanan ben Zakkai was the +sufficient refutation of Roman scoffers, while the apology of Josephus +became the guide of the early Church fathers in their replies to heathen +calumniators who repeated against them the charges that had been +invented against the Jews. It is significant that Tacitus, who wrote his +history some few years after the defense of Josephus was published, +repeated with added virulence the fables which the Jewish writer had +refuted. The charges of anti-Semites have in every age borne a charmed +life: they are hydra-headed, and can be refuted, not by literature, but +by life. + +Nevertheless literary libels, if unanswered in literature, tend to +become fixed popular beliefs, and in the Dark and Middle Ages the Jewish +people were to suffer bitterly from the lack of apologists who could +obtain a hearing before the peoples of Europe. In the early centuries of +the Christian era, before the Christian Church was allied with the Roman +Empire, tolerance ruled in the Greco-Roman world, and the narrow Roman +hatred of Judaism was in large part broken down. Celsus, Numenius, and +Dion Cassius, three of the most notable authors of the second century, +speak of the Jewish people and Jewish Scriptures in a very different +tone from that of a Tacitus and an Apion. And as it has been said, "Who +shall know how many cultured pagans were led by the books of Josephus to +read the Bible and to look on Judaism with other eyes?"[1] If the +apologies of Philo and Josephus could not pierce the armor of prejudice +and hatred which enwrapped a Tacitus or a Christian ecclesiastic, they +at least found their way through the lighter coating of ignorance and +misunderstanding which had been fabricated by Hellenistic Egyptians, but +which had not fatally warped the minds of the general Greco-Roman +society. + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Joel, Blicke in die Religionsgeschichte, ii. 118.] + + + + +IX + +CONCLUSION + + +The works of Josephus early passed into the category of standard +literature. It is recorded that they were placed by order of the Flavian +Emperors in the public library of Rome; and though Suetonius, the +biographer of the Caesars, who wrote in the second century, and +Diogenes, the biographer of the philosophers, who wrote a century later, +do not apparently hold them of any account, it is certain that they were +carefully preserved till the triumph of the Christian Church gave them a +new importance. For centuries henceforth they were the prime authority +for Jewish history of post-Biblical times, and were treasured as a kind +of introduction to the Gospels, illuminating the period in which +Christianity had its birth. The traitor-historian was soon forgotten by +his own people, if they ever had regard for him, and with the rest of +the Hellenistic writers he dropped out of the Rabbinical tradition. +Possibly the Aramaic version of the _Wars_ survived for a time in the +Eastern schools, but while the Jews were struggling to preserve their +religious existence, they had little thought for such a history of their +past. + +The Christians, on the other hand, had a special interest in the works +of Josephus, since they found in them not only the model of their +defense against pagan calumnies, but the earliest external testimony to +support the Gospels. Josephus was venerated as the Jew who had recorded +the fate of Jesus of Nazareth. The _Antiquities_ contain two references +to John the Baptist and an account of the execution of James, the +brother of Jesus; but the most celebrated of the "evidential" passages +occurs in book xviii of the _Antiquities_, where in our text, following +on the account of Pilate's persecution, occurs this paragraph: + +"Now, there lived about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to +call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such +men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of +the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was the Christ; and when Pilate, +at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to +the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him, for he +appeared alive to them again the third day, as the divine prophets had +foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. +And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this +day (ch. 3)." + +An enormous literature has been provoked by these lines, and the weight +of modern opinion is that they are altogether spurious. The passage is +first quoted by Eusebius,[1] the historian of Caesarea, who wrote about +the beginning of the fourth century C.E.;[2] but Origen, his predecessor +by a hundred years, significantly enough does not know of it. Josephus, +he says simply, did not acknowledge the Christ.[3] At the same time +Origen quotes a passage from the same book of the _Antiquities_,[4] to +show that the Jews ascribed the defeat of the Tetrarch Herod to his +murder of John the Baptist. The earliest of the Patristic writers, +Clement of Alexandria, quotes Josephus as to chronology, but it is +fairly certain that he did not know the works at first hand, since the +era he refers to runs from Moses to the tenth year of Antoninus,[5] i.e. +till the better part of a century after the death of Josephus. Origen +likewise probably knew Josephus only at second hand, and the inference +is that both the Alexandrian ecclesiastics derived their citations and +their interpolation in the text of Josephus from a pious Christian +abstract and improvement. The uncompromisingly Christian character of +the text, the discrepancy between Origen and Eusebius, and the notorious +aptitude of early Christian scribes for interpolating manuscripts, and +especially the manuscripts of Hellenistic Jewish writers, with +Christological passages make it well nigh certain that the paragraph was +foisted in between the second and third century. That was a period when, +as has been said, "faith was more vivid than good-faith." The will to +believe its genuineness, however, persisted to our own day, and some +have made a compromise between their sentiment and their critical +faculty, by arguing that the passage, though partly corrupt, is founded +on something Josephus wrote.[6] + +[Footnote 1: Comp. Schlatter, _op. cit._ 403.] + +[Footnote 2: H.E. i. 41; Comp. Freimann, Wie verhielt sich das Judenthum +zu Jesus? (Monatsschrift fur die Geschichte und Wissenschaft des +Judenthums, 1911, p. 296).] + +[Footnote 3: Comm. in Matth. ch. xvii.] + +[Footnote 4: Ant. XVIII. v. 5.] + +[Footnote 5: Strom. I. xxi. 409.] + +[Footnote 6: Among those who uphold this view is the Franco-Jewish +savant Theodore Reinach, whose opinion is that the Christian scribe +changed a _testimonium de Christo_ into a _testimonium pro Christo_ +(R.E.J. xxxv. 6). Both Renan and Ewald hold that our passage is a +corrupted fragment of a much fuller account of Jesus in the +_Antiquities_. See Joel. _op. cit_. p. 52.] + +It is alleged that many of the words are such as Josephus might have +used, but, apart from the fact that this is contested by other +authorities, it is unreasonable to suppose that the interpolator would +go out of his way to stamp the insertion as a forgery by using +extraordinary words. It is urged again that the passages about John and +James in the _Antiquities_ support the likelihood of Josephus' having +mentioned Jesus. But these passages are themselves open to very grave +suspicions. There is no reference to them in the epitome of the chapters +furnished at the head of each book, which according to Niese dates from +the age of the Antonines, or the end of the second century. Nor does the +Slavonic version of Josephus contain the passage about James, and while +Origen refers to that passage, he had a different version of it from +that which appears in our manuscripts. It seems that he has incorporated +the gloss of a Christian believer. And again, while our text imputes the +blame of the stoning of James to the Sadducees, and gives credit to the +Pharisees for endeavoring to prevent it, Hegesippus, the Christian +writer of the second century, uses the alleged account of the incident +by Josephus to gird at the Pharisees. The probability is then that +different Christological insertions were made in the manuscripts of +Josephus according to the leaning of the scribe, but that none of the +supposed evidences are genuine, or based on a genuine narrative. The +absence of any reference to Jesus and the apostles in Josephus would +have seemed damaging to the truth of the Christian testament, and +therefore the passages were supplied. + +Nevertheless we may be grateful to the interpolators, because, on the +strength of these passages, Josephus was especially treasured through +the Dark and Middle Ages, and he alone survived of the Hellenistic +apologists. When Christianity established its center at Rome, Josephus +was soon translated into Latin, and in the Vulgate version (if we may so +call it) he was best known for centuries. The seven books of the _Wars_ +were rendered into Latin by one Tyrannus Rufinus of Aquilea, who was a +contemporary of Jerome (Hieronymus, 345-410 C.E.), and a very +industrious translator of the works of the Greek Patristic writers. The +translation of the _Antiquities_, though ascribed to the same author, +was made later. Jerome apparently was invited to undertake the task, for +in one of his letters he writes:[1] "The rumor that the works of +Josephus and Papian and Polycarp have been translated by me is false. I +have neither the leisure nor the strength to render his writings into +another tongue with the same elegance" [as those already done]. It is +uncertain who the translator was, but the work was carried out at the +instigation of Cassiodorus (480-575), who lived in the time of +Justinian, and was a versatile historian. He wrote himself a chronicle +of events from Adam to his own day as well as a history of the Goths. In +his book on the Institutions of Holy Literature he says: + +"As to Josephus, who is almost a second Livy, and is widely known by his +books on the _Antiquities of the Jews_, Jerome declared that he was +unable to translate his works because of their great volume. But one of +my friends has translated the twenty-two books [i.e. the _Antiquities_ +and the two books of the _Apology_], in spite of their difficulty and +complexity, into the Latin tongue. He also wrote seven books of extreme +brilliancy on the Conquest of the Jews, the translation of which some +ascribe to Jerome, others to Ambrose, and others to Rufinus." + +[Footnote 1: Epist. ad Lucrinum, 5.] + +The autobiography of Josephus, alone of his writings, does not appear to +have been done into the language of the Western Church. Perhaps its +worthlessness was apparent even in the dark days. More ancient, however, +and even more popular than the complete Latin version of Josephus, was +an abridgment of his works which passed under the name of Hegesippus. +The name is not found till the ninth century, but it is likely that the +work was written in the time of Ambrosius, the famous bishop of Milan +(C.E. 350). In this form the seven books of the _Wars_ are compressed +into five, and the words and phrases of the original are modified +throughout. The writer in his preface explicitly declares that it is a +kind of revised version, and he improves the original by Christological +insertions, explaining, for example, the destruction of Jerusalem as a +judgment upon the Jews for the murder of Christ. Josephus, he says, aims +at the careful unraveling of events and at sobriety of speech, but he +lacks faith (_religio_) and truth; "and so we have been at pains, +relying not on intellectual force but on the promptings of faith, to +probe for the inner meaning of Jewish history and to extract from it +more of value to our posterity." Josephus is often mentioned by name as +authority for the statements, but at the same time considerable +additions are made from other Roman sources. Some have thought that +there was a compiler named Hegesippus, others that the word is but a +corruption of the Latinized form of the Jewish historian's name: +Josippus, formed from [Greek: Io saepos], would become Egesippus, and +finally Hegesippus. + +A Greek epitome of Josephus also existed. We find it used by a Byzantine +historian, John Zonaras, during the tenth and the eleventh century, in +the composition of his chronicles. It omitted the speeches and +historical evidences of the fuller work and pruned its excessive +garrulousness. By the uncritical scholiasts and the prolix chroniclers +of the Byzantine and Papal courts, Josephus was esteemed as a +distinguished and godlike historian, and as a truthloving man ([Greek: +philalaethaes anaer]). He was dubbed by Jerome "the Greek Livy," and to +Tertullian and his followers he was an unfailing guide. Choice passages +in his writings are frequently extracted, often with a little purposive +modification, to emphasize some Christological design. Eustathius of +Antioch in the sixth century, Syncellus in the eighth, and Cedrenus and +Glycas some three or four hundred years later, are among those whose +extant fragments prove a frequent use of Josephus. And the neo-Platonist +philosopher Porphyry (ab. 300 C.E.), who was well acquainted with Jewish +literature, reproduces in his treatise on Abstinence the various +passages about the Essenes from the _Wars_ and the _Antiquities_. The +Emperor Constantine later ordered extracts from the _Wars_ to be put +together for his edification in a selection bearing the title _About +Virtue and Vice_. + +Owing to this popularity, we have abundant manuscripts of Josephus. The +oldest of the Latin is as early as the sixth century; the Greek date +from the tenth century and later. Niese, the most authoritative editor +of Josephus in modern times, thinks that our manuscript families go back +to one archetype of the second century in the epoch of the Antonines. +The earliest printed copy like the earliest manuscript of his work +contains the Latin version, being a part of the _Antiquities_, which was +issued in 1470 at Augsburg. The whole corpus was printed in 1499, and, +after a number of Latin editions, the first Greek edition was published +at Basel by Arten, in 1544, together with the Fourth Book of the +Maccabees, which was ascribed to the historian. + +In the days of vast but undiscriminating scholarship that followed the +Renaissance, Josephus still enjoyed a great repute, and Scaliger, prince +of polymaths, regarded him as superior to any pagan historian. The great +Dutch scholar Havercamp made a special study of the manuscripts, and +produced, in 1726, a repertory of everything discovered about his +author. A little later Whiston, professor of mathematics at Cambridge, +published an English translation of all the works, which is still +serviceable, but not critical, together with some dissertations, which +are neither serviceable nor critical. Later translations into English +and almost every other language were made, but the greatest work of +modern times on Josephus is the edition of Niese. Lastly, it may be +mentioned that we have a Slavonic version, which goes back to the eighth +or the ninth century, and a Syriac version of the sixth book of the +_Wars_, which is included, immediately after the Fourth Book of the +Maccabees, in a manuscript of the Syriac version of the Bible dating +from the sixth century, and is entitled the Fifth Book of the Maccabees. +It has been suggested that the Syriac was based on the work which +Josephus published in Aramaic before he wrote the Greek; but Professor +Noeldeke has shown that the theory is not probable, since the translator +clearly used the Greek text.[1] Somewhat late in the day a Hebrew +translation of the books _Against Apion_, which were regarded as the +most Jewish part of his work, was made in the Middle Ages, and printed, +together with Abraham Zacuto's Yuhasin, at Constantinople, in 1506, by +Samuel Shullam. The Hebrew translation is very free, and is marred by +several large omissions. It was very probably made with the help of the +Latin version. + +[Footnote 1: Literarisches Centralblatt, 1880, no. 20, p. 881.] + +While Josephus enjoyed great honor among Christian scholars, for +centuries he passed out of the knowledge of his own people. The Talmud +has no reference to him, for the surmise that he is the "philosopher" +visited by the four sages who journeyed from Palestine to Rome[1] is no +more than a vague possibility. Nor has the supposed identification with +the Joseph Hakohen that is mentioned in the Midrash anything more solid +to uphold it.[2] In the Middle Ages, however, when Spain, Italy, and +North Africa witnessed a remarkable revival of Jewish literature, both +secular and religious, and when scientific studies again interested the +people, the historical literature of other peoples became known to their +scholars, and several Jewish writers mention the chronicles of one +Yosippon, or "little Joseph." The text of the chronicle itself is widely +known from the eleventh century onwards. The first author to mention it +is David ben Tammum (ab. 950), and an extract from the book is found +about a century later. Four manuscripts of it have come down to us: two +in the Vatican, one in Paris, and one in Turin, and it was among the +earliest Hebrew books printed. Professing to be the work of Joseph ben +Gorion, one of the Jewish commanders in the war with Rome and a prefect +of Jerusalem, it is written in a Rabbinical Hebrew that is nearer the +classical language than most medieval compositions. It was indeed argued +on the ground of its pure classical idiom that it dated from the fourth +century, but Zunz[3] showed that this was impossible. It bears all the +traces of the pseudepigraphic tendency of a period that produced the +first works of the Cabala, the Seder Olam Zutta of Rabbi Joshua, and the +neo-Hebraic apocalypses. The attempt to write an archaic Hebrew is +marred by the presence of Rabbinical and novel terms. Reference to +events or things only known to later times is combined with the +pretension of an ancient chronicle. The country and the date of the +author are uncertain, but probabilities point to Italy, where in the +ninth and tenth centuries Jewish culture flourished, and where both +Arabic and Latin works were well known in the Ghettos. The transcription +of foreign names, the frequent introduction of the names of places in +Italy, the acquaintance with Roman history, and the fact that Italian +Jews are among the first to recognize Yosippon favor this theory. It is +fitting that the country where Josephus wrote his history should also +have produced a Jewish imitation of his work. Yosippon indeed was soon +translated into Arabic, and its narratives and legends passed into the +current stock of Ghetto history. The book was swollen by later +additions, which Zunz has proved to belong to the twelfth century. One +Yerahmeel ben Shelomoh who flourished in that epoch is mentioned in an +early manuscript as a compiler of Yosippon and other histories; and it +is possible that he was himself responsible for parts of the work in its +present form. + +[Footnote 1: Derek Erez, ed. Goldberg, iii. 10.] + +[Footnote 2: Moed Katon, 23a. See above, p. 177.] + +[Footnote 3: Comp. Zunz, Gottesdienstliche Vortraege, pp. 154_ff_.] + +The chronicle of Yosippon is a summary of Jewish history, with +considerable digressions--many of them later interpolations--about the +history of the nations with whom the Hebrew people came into contact, +Babylon, Greece, and Rome. Like the Book of Chronicles, it begins with +Adam and genealogies, explains the roll of the nations in Genesis, and +then springs suddenly from the legendary origin of Babel and Rome to the +relation of the Jews with Babylon. The history proper contains the +record of the Jews from the first to the second captivity, but is broken +by a mass of legendary material about Alexander the Great--reproducing +much of what is found in pseudo-Callisthenes--and by a short account of +the Carthaginian general Hannibal and several incidents of Roman +history. These include a description of a coronation of the Emperor, +which, it is suggested, applies to the medieval and not the classical +period of the Empire. + +The book was known throughout the later part of the Middle Ages and down +to the eighteenth century as the Hebrew Josephus, and contrasted with +the [Hebrew: Yosifon la-Romim], or "Latin Josephus." When the genuine +works of our worthy became known to the Jews, Yosippon was regarded as +the true representative of the Jewish point of view against the +paganizing traitor. Its author had not a first-hand acquaintance with +our Josephus. He knew him only through the Latin versions, which were +mixed with much later material. Possibly he meant to pass off his work +as the Hebrew original of the Jewish history, and confused Joseph ben +Gorion with Joseph ben Mattathias; for in the introduction to one +manuscript we read, "I am Joseph, called Josephus the Jew, of whom it is +written that he wrote the book of the wars of the Lord, and this is the +sixth part." This, however, may be the gloss of a later scribe, who +found an anonymous book, and thought fit to supply the omission. In +places the Hebrew translator reproduces, though with some blunders, the +Latin Hegesippus, but he sought to give charm to his work by legendary +additions, which more often show Arabic and other foreign influences +than traces of the Jewish Haggadah. Interpolations have served to +increase the legendary element, and take away from the historical value. +But it is this element, reflecting the ideas of the age, that gives the +composition a peculiar literary interest. + +Though only to a small extent representing Jewish tradition, the book +remained very popular among the Jews both of the West and the East, and +was long regarded as authoritative. The first printed edition was issued +at Mantua, in 1476, and was followed by the edition of Constantinople, +in 1520, arranged in chapters and enlarged, and an edition of Basel, in +1541, containing a Latin preface and a Latin translation of the greater +part. In 1546 a printed Yiddish edition appeared in Zurich, and in the +Ghetto it retains its popularity to the present day. Other editions and +translations have followed. Steinschneider has noted that as late as +1873 an abstract of the Arabic translation together with the Arabic +version of the Book of the Maccabees was published at Beirut.[1] The +spuriousness of the work has now been established, and of modern +scholars Wellhausen[2] is almost alone in ascribing to it any +independent historical worth. In the Spanish period of Jewish culture +the real as well as the spurious Josephus was read by many of his race, +and some hard things were said of him. Thus Rabbi Isaac Abrabanel, the +statesman and apologist (1457-1508), regarded him as a common sycophant +and wrote, "In many things he perverted the truth, even where we have +the Scriptures before us, in order to court favor with the Romans, as a +slave submits himself to the will of his master." Azariah de Rossi (ab. +1850), anticipating the ideas of a later age, alone balanced his merits +against his demerits. Among the great Christian scholars of the +Renaissance, however, he enjoyed great fame. Joseph Scaliger, the most +eminent of the seventeenth century critics, could write of him, +"Josephus was the most diligent and the most truthloving of all writers, +and one can better believe him, not only as to the affairs of the Jews, +but also as to the Gentiles, than all the Greek and Latin writers, +because his fidelity and his learning are everywhere conspicuous."[3] It +is illustrative of his popularity that Rembrandt named one of his great +Jewish pictures after him. Whiston's English translation of his works +became a household book, found side by side with the Bible and _The +Pilgrim's Progress_.[4] + +[Footnote 1: J.Q.R. xvi. 393.] + +[Footnote 2: Der arabische Josippus; see J.E., s.v. Joseph ben Gorion.] + +[Footnote 3: De Emend. Temp. Proleg. 17.] + +[Footnote 4: Readers of Rudyard Kipling may recall that in _Captains +Courageous_ one of the seamen on board the "We're Here" Schooner reads +aloud on Sunday from a book called Josephus: "It was an old +leather-bound volume very solid and very like a Bible, but enlivened +with accounts of battles and sieges."] + +In modern times his reputation as a trustworthy authority has +depreciated considerably, and it is still depreciating. More accurate +study and wider knowledge have exposed his grave defects as an +historian, and the critical standpoint has dissipated the halo with +which his supposed Christian sympathies had invested him, and laid bare +his weakness and his essential unreliability. Yet with all his glaring +faults and unlovable qualities he has certain solid merits. The greatest +certainly is that his works so appealed to later generations as to have +been preserved, and thereby posterity has been enabled to get some +knowledge, however inadequate, of the history of the Jewish polity +during its last two hundred years--between the time of the Maccabees and +the fall of the nation--which would otherwise have been buried in almost +unrelieved darkness. And at the same time he has preserved a record of +some interesting pieces of Egyptian, Syrian, and Roman history. Just +because he was so little original, he has a special usefulness; for he +reproduces the statements of more capable writers than himself, who have +disappeared, and he has embodied an aspect of the Hellenistic-Jewish +literature which had otherwise been lost. We can estimate his value to +us as an historian from our ignorance of what was happening in Judea +during the fifty years after his account comes to an end. + +It is true that he brings before us, for the most part, but the external +facts and the court scandals in place of the vital movements and the +underlying principles; and in dealing with contemporary events he has a +perverted view, borrowed largely from Roman foes and feebly corrected. +But it is something to have preserved even these facts, and in the +account of the _Wars_ he often draws a vivid picture. The siege of +Jerusalem has passed into the roll of the world's heroic events, and it +owes its place there largely to the narrative of Josephus. Moreover, in +spite of his pusillanimity and his subservience to his Roman patrons, +Josephus did possess a distinct pride of race and a love of his people. +It led him at times to glorify them in a gross way, but notably in the +books _Against Apion_ it could inspire a certain eloquence; and many +hostile outsiders must have learnt from his pages to appreciate some of +the great qualities of the Jewish people. + +To appraise him fairly is difficult. He has few of the qualities, either +personal or literary, that attract sympathy and many of the defects that +repel. He is at once vain and obsequious, servile and spiteful, +professing candor and practising adulation, prolix and prosaic. As a +general he proved himself a traitor; as apologist of the Jews, a +function which he asserted for himself, he marred by a lack of +independence the service which he sought to render his people. In his +account of their past he was often false to their fundamental ideas of +God and history. Whether he was really under the influence of the +debased Greco-Roman culture of the day, which consigned mankind to the +dominion of fatality, or whether he deliberately masked his own +standpoint to please his audience, he presented the history of the +Hebrew nationality in the light of ideas of fate strange to it. He has +perpetuated a false picture of the Zealots, whose avowed enemy he was, +and he reveals an inadequate understanding of the deeper ideas and +deeper principles of the Pharisees, whose champion he professed to be. +Generally, in dealing with the struggle against Rome, his dominating +desire to justify his own submission and please the Romans led him to +distort the facts, and rendered him blind to the real heroism of his +countrymen. The client in him prevails over the historian: we can never +be sure whether he is expressing his own opinion or only what he +conceives will be pleasing to his patrons and masters. This dependence +affects his presentation of Judaism as well as of the Jewish people. He +dissembled his theological opinions in his larger historical works, and +it is only in his last apologetic composition that he asserts +confidently a Jewish point of view. + +Yet it is but fair to Josephus to consider the times and circumstances +in which he wrote. It was an age when the love of truth was almost dead, +extinguished partly by the crushing tyranny of omnipotent Emperors, +partly by the intellectual and moral degeneration of pagan society. The +Flavian house soon showed the same characteristics of a vainglorious +despotism as the line of Caesars which it had supplanted. Under Domitian +"the only course possible for a writer without the risk of outlawry or +the sacrifice of personal honor was that followed by Juvenal and Tacitus +during his reign, viz., silence." It was an age when, in the words of +Mazzini, "a hollow sound as of dissolution was heard in the world. Man +seemed in a hideous case: placed between two infinities, he knew +neither. He knew not past nor future. All belief was dead; dead the +belief in the gods, dead the belief in the Republic." The material power +of Rome, while it dazzled by its splendor, seemed invincible, and it +crushed, in all save the strongest, independence of thought and +independence of national life. Unfortunately it fell to Josephus to +write amid these surroundings his account of the Jewish wars and the +history of the Jews, and he may have been driven to distortion to keep +his perilous position at court. The moral environment, too, was such as +to contaminate those who had not a deep faith and a strong Hebrew +consciousness. At Alexandria it was possible to achieve a harmony +between Judaism and the spiritual teaching of Greek philosophy; but the +basic conceptions of Roman Imperialism were not to be brought into +accord with Jewish ideas. + +Josephus had no conception of the moral weakness, he felt only the +invincible power, of the conqueror. He was a Jew, isolated in Rome, +estranged from his own people, and not at home in his environment, a +favored captive in a splendid court, a member of a subject people living +in the halls of the mighty. Did ever situation more strongly conduce to +moral servility and mental dependence! It was well nigh impossible for +him, even had he possessed the ability, to write an honest and +independent history of the Jews. It required some courage and +steadfastness to write of the Jews at all. In such circumstances he +might well have become an apostate, as his contemporary Tiberius +Alexander had done, and it is a tribute to his Jewish feeling that he +remained in profession and in heart true to his people, that he was not +among those who with the fall of the second Temple exclaimed, "Our hope +is perished: we are cut off." He had indeed chosen the easier and less +noble way on the destruction of the national life of his people; he +preferred the palace of the Palatine with its pomp to the Vineyard at +Jabneh with its wise men. While Johanan ben Zakkai was saving Judaism, +Josephus was apologizing for it. Yet he too has done some service: he +preserved some knowledge of his people and their religion for the +Gentiles, and became one of the permanent authorities for that heretical +body of Jewish proselytes who in his own day were beginning to mark +themselves off as a separate sect, and who carried on to some extent the +work of Hellenistic Judaism. Perhaps the true judgment about him is that +he was neither noble nor villainous, neither champion nor coward, but +one of those mediocre men of talent but of weak character and +conflicting impulses struggling against adversity who succumb to the +difficulties of the time in which their life is passed, and sacrifice +their individuality to comfort. But he wrote something that has lived; +and for what he wrote, if not for what he was, he has a niche in the +literary treasure house of the Jewish people as well as in the annals of +general history. As a man, if he cannot inspire, he may at least stand +as a warning against that facile subservience to external powers and +that fatal assimilation of foreign thought which at once destroy the +individuality of the Jew and deprive him of his full humanity. + + + + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + + +The best Greek text of Josephus is that edited by Niese (Berlin, +1887-1894), but the editions of Bekker (Leipzig, 1855) and Dindorf +(Paris, 1845) are still serviceable. + +The standard English translation of the complete works is that made by +William Whiston, of Cambridge, a century ago. It has been revised in +modern times--not very thoroughly--by Shilleto (London, 1890) and by +Margoliouth (London, 1909). + +A French translation, which contains excellent notes to the text, is in +the course of publication under the general editorship of M. Theodore +Reinach; and there are German translations of the whole works, by Demme, +and of the _Antiquities_, by Martin (Koeln, 1852) and Clementz (Halle, +1900). The _Life_ and the books _Against Apion_ were translated by M. +Jost (Leipzig, 1867) and books xi-xiii of the _Antiquities_ by +Horschitzky. And there is another elaborately annotated edition of the +books _Against Apion_ by J. G. Mueller. + +The best modern works on the Roman history of the period are Mommsen's +_Roman Provinces_, and Merivale's _History of the Roman Empire_; and of +the literature of the contemporaries of Josephus, the _Annals_ and +_Histories_ of Tacitus and the _Lives of the Caesars_ by Suetonius are +the most valuable historical sources. + +For Jewish history, the fullest account is provided by Schuerer's +_Geschichte des juedischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu_ (fourth edition), +which contains a thorough criticism of Josephus and the best general +investigation into his sources. The work has been translated into +English. Joel's _Blicke in die Religionsgeschichte_ is suggestive upon +certain aspects of the period. + +Graetz, of course, deals with the events, and in the _Stories of the +Nations Series_ (Putnam) there is a volume on _The Jews under the +Romans_ by Hosmer, which is readable. + +The opening chapters of Berliner's _Die Juden in Rom_, and of Vogelstein +and Rieger's _Geschichte der Juden in Rom_ (Berlin, 1895) are concerned +with the relations of Jews and Romans in the first century; and a series +of articles on the same subject by Hils, in the _Revue des etudes +juives_ (vols. viii and xi), is noteworthy. Anatole France has written +two very vivid sketches of the Roman attitude to the Jews, which give a +better impression of the inner conflict between the two peoples than any +strictly historical work, "Gallion" in _Sur la pierre blanche_, and "Le +Procurateur de Judee" in _L'etui de nacre_. + +Among critical studies of Josephus as an historian the most striking +works are: + +Schlatter, _Zur Topographie und Geschichte Palaestinas_ (Stuttgart, +1893). + +Bloch, _Die Quellen des Flavius Josephus_ (Leipzig, 1879). + +Nussbaum, _Observationen in Flavius Josephus_ (Goettingen, 1875). + +Destinon, _Die Chronologie des Josephus_ (Kiel, 1880) and _Die Quellen +des Josephus_ (1882). + +Buechler, A., _Les Sources de Josephe_, R.E.J. xxii. and xxiv., and _The +Sources of Josephus for the History of Syria_, J.Q.R. ix. + +Holscher, G., _Die Quellen des Josephus_, etc. (Leipzig, 1904). + +For the relation of Josephus to the Bible and Jewish tradition, the +following monographs may be consulted: + +Duschak, _Josephus und die Tradition_ (Vienna, 1864). + +Olitzki, _Flavius Josephus und die Halacha_ (Berlin, 1885). + +Schlatter, _Die hebraeischen Namen bei Josephus_ (Guetersloh, 1913). + +Gruenbaum, _Die Priester-Gesetze bei Fl. Josephus_ (1887). + +Poznanski, _Ueber die religionsphilosophischen Anschauungen des Fl. +Josephus_ (Berlin, 1887). + +The apologetic works of Josephus are especially dealt with by: + +Friedlaender, M., _Die Geschichte der juedischen Apologetik_ (Vienna, +1906). + +Mueller, J.G., _Des Fl. Josephus Schrift gegen den Apion_ (Basel, 1877). + +Gutschmid, _Kleine Schriften_, iv. (Leipzig, 1893). + +The work of M. Theodore Reinach, _Textes des auteurs grecs et romains +relatifs au judaisme_, is a very useful collection of the pagan accounts +of Jewish life which Josephus was seeking to refute. + +Among general appreciations of Josephus, there may be mentioned those +of: + +Edersheim, in Smith and Wace's Dictionary of Christian Biography. + +Foakes-Jackson, in the Jewish Review, iv. + +Margoliouth, in his edition of Whiston's translation. + +Niese, in the Historische Zeitschrift, lxxvi. + +ABBREVIATIONS USED IN REFERRING TO THE WORKS OF JOSEPHUS + +Ant.: _The Antiquities of the Jews_. +B.J.: _The Wars_ (Bellum Judaicum) +C. Ap.: _Against Apion_ (Contra Apionem) + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Josephus, by Norman Bentwich + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JOSEPHUS *** + +***** This file should be named 9793.txt or 9793.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/9/7/9/9793/ + +Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, David King +and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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