Jewish Revolts (66-351)
Under the procurators (44-66) the higher clergy and the large landowners tended to be acquiescent to Roman sovereignty, but the Jewish people in general naturally yearned to be free of foreign rule. The procurators’ lack of sympathy for Jewish tradition angered the population and there was a progressive breakdown of law and order in the country over the period.
A certain Theudas persuaded a large crowd to follow him to the River Jordan, which he promised to divide with his staff. Cuspius Fadus (r.44-46) sent cavalry to disperse them, and the ‘prophet’ was caught and beheaded. Judas of Galilee was the leader of a resistance to the census of AD 6. Josephus records that Judas’ sons, James and Simon, were arrested and crucified by Tiberius Julius Alexander (r.46-48), presumably for planning a revolt.
During the Passover a Roman soldier insulted the crowd and started a riot. The procurator Ventidius Cumanus (r.48-52) brought in reinforcements and many people were killed. A Galilean was murdered in Samaria, and Jews led by a bandit called Eleazar rushed to avenge him, attacking Samarian villages and killing the inhabitants. Cumanus arrived with mounted troops and killed many of Eleazar’s followers.
Felix (r.52-58) captured the bandit Eleazar, promised him a pardon, and then sent him in chains to Rome. In Jerusalem the sicarii (‘knifemen’) were growing more active. Felix arranged for the sicarii to murder the high priest Jonathan, who had been grumbling about Felix’s administration and threatening to complain to Rome. A group of ‘magicians’, pretending to be divinely inspired, persuaded a crowd to follow them into the desert with the promise that God would show them how to win their liberty. Felix sent his troops in pursuit and killed many of them. He dealt in the same way with the self-proclaimed prophet known as ‘the Egyptian’, who deluded a mob into believing that they could take the city. In Caesarea there was an outbreak of violence between the Jews and the Syrians, the Jews argued that they had a right of equality with the gentiles, a privilege from which they had been excluded. Felix had them chased off the streets.
Porcius Festus (r.60-62) was unable to reduce the turmoil in Judaea. The sicarii continued their murderous activities. Another (unnamed) prophet led rebels into the desert and was killed by Festus’ troops. In Rome, Nero’s decision in favour of the Syrians in the dispute in Caesarea added fuel to the fire.
Immediately upon his arrival in Jerusalem, Lucceius Albinus (r.62-64) began an effort to remove the sicarii from the region. The sicarii responded by capturing an assistant to the chief administrator of the Temple and demanded the release of ten imprisoned sicarii in exchange for the assistant. When Albinus learned that he was to be succeeded by Gessius Florus, he emptied the prisons by executing prisoners charged with more serious offences and allowing the remaining prison population to pay for their release.
• First Jewish Revolt (66-73)
On taking office in Caesarea, Gessius Florus (r.64-66), just as Nero had done previously, endorsed the claim by the Greeks for pre-eminence over the Jews. Open hostilities were finally provoked by Florus confiscating seventeen talents from the Temple, claiming the money was for the emperor, and by the brutal quelling of the enraged Jews by his troops. A fierce street battle developed and Florus, seeing that his forces were too weak to subdue the masses, withdrew to Caesarea.
Eleazar, the son of the high priest Ananias (r.46-52), ceased sacrifices for the emperor at the Temple. This was tantamount to a declaration of revolt against the Romans. Bloody battles took place in many other cities inhabited by Jews and gentiles. Rebels succeeded in occupying the Masada fortress. In the midst of this, Menahem the leader of the sicarii arrived in Jerusalem. However, after assassinating Ananias, Menahem himself was murdered and the sicarii retreated to Masada.
Cestius Gallus (d.67), the legate of Syria, marched with his army on Jerusalem but was quickly repulsed. When this news reached Rome, the emperor Nero dispatched Vespasian (69; r.69-79) to crush the rebellion. By 68 Jewish resistance in the north had been crushed, but its leaders John of Gischala and Simon bar Giora (d.70) managed to escape to Jerusalem.
Jerusalem lay on two hills, a higher western one, and a smaller one to the east. On the larger western hill stood the upper city, on the smaller eastern hill, the lower city. The Temple was located on the central east side of the city; it was surrounded by a strong wall which at its northwest corner was protected by the Antonia Fortress built by Herod the Great,
Eleazar ben Simon was the leader of an anti-Roman, anti-priestly group that controlled the inner court of the Temple; John of Gischala held the outer court and part of the lower city; and Simon bar Giora controlled the upper city and the remainder of the lower city. The inability of these three men to establish unity between themselves weakened the Jewish resistance against the Romans’ siege.
When Nero died, Vespasian gave the responsibility of reducing Jerusalem to his son Titus (41; r.79-81). North is the only approach to Jerusalem not protected by steep ravines, and it was from this direction in the spring of 70 that Titus began his siege. After fourteen days the outer (Agrippa’s) wall was breached. Another five days of heavy fighting led to a breach in the second north wall, bringing Titus to the northern part of the west wall of the Temple.
Antonia was taken after two months of hard fighting. The fortress was then demolished to facilitate an attack on the temple along a broader front. The defences of the fortresses were every bit as formidable as the city walls. Finally in August 70 the Roman troops broke into the temple compound, forcing its defenders to retreat into the inner courts.
During the fighting a Roman soldier threw a burning stick onto one of the Temple’s walls. The fire spread quickly and the Temple was destroyed. The Romans quickly crushed the remaining resistance. Some of the remaining Jews escaped, while others made a final stand in the upper city. John and Simon were taken back to Rome to be exhibited in Titus’ triumph in AD 71.
Over the next two years the Romans crushed the Judaean resistance at the strongholds at Herodium and Machaerus. In May 73 the last Jewish insurgents took refuge in Masada. Led by Eleazar ben Yair, the sicarii had endeavoured to continue the resistance. The Roman governor of Judaea, Lucius Flavius Silva (r.73-81), constructed an assault ramp against the western slope. The Romans breached the wall, but the defenders faced with certain defeat had all committed suicide.
• Kitos Revolt (115-117)
There were few places the Jews could go to that were beyond the reach of the despoilers of Jerusalem and the Temple, but many Jews made lives for themselves in Egypt, Cyprus and Cyrenaica as tradesmen, farmers and herders. Around 115 while Trajan (63; r.98-117) was campaigning against the Parthians, a Jewish rebellion began in Cyrenaica and spread to Cyprus, Alexandria and Babylonia.
In Cyrenaica the rebels were led by a Cyrenean, Lukuas-Andreas. His supporters wreaked havoc with the non-Jewish population and destroyed their temples and civil structures symbolic of Rome, such as their roads and public buildings. In 116 Lukuas let his army into Alexandria and set fire to the city after the Roman governor Marcus Rutilius Lupus and his troops had fled for their lives. The pagan temples, and the tomb of Pompey who had captured Jerusalem two centuries before, were destroyed.
On Cyprus the leader’s name was Artemion. Salamis appears to have been captured and sacked by the Jewish rebels, who slaughtered its Greek population. In Babylonia the Jewish rebellion seems to have been part of a general revolt of the population against Roman rule.
The rebellions were finally crushed by Roman legionary forces. Quintus Marcius Turbo defeated the Jews in several pitched battles in Egypt and Cyrene. Lucius Quietus organised a force that killed many Cypriote, Mesopotamian and Syrian Jews, wiping out all the pockets of resistance; as a reward, he was appointed governor of Judaea (117). ‘Kitos’ is a later corruption of ‘Quietus’.
• Bar Kokhba Revolt (132-135)
In 130 Hadrian (62; r.117-138) went to Judaea and announced that Jerusalem (which had not yet recovered from being razed by Titus) was to be rebuilt into a Roman city with a temple dedicated to the Roman god Jupiter. His intention was to put an end to Jewish rebelliousness; the new city would accommodate a new population of Romans and would be used to suppress the Jews. Work on the rebuilding began in 131; and in 132 a revolt led by Simon bar Kosiba, also known as Bar Kokhba (‘Son of the Star’), quickly spread across the country.
The Romans sent Quinctius Certus Publicius, the governor of Syria, who brought with him Syrian legions as well as legions from Egypt and Arabia. The Jewish rebels beat these back, severely damaging the Roman Twelfth Legion. The decisive stage of the revolt began when Julius Severus, the governor of Britain, arrived with his own legions and those of the Danube provinces. The rebels were pushed out of Galilee and fierce fighting now ensued in Judaea. The Jews were gradually pushed back to their fortress village of Betar, southwest of Jerusalem, which subsequently came under siege. In August 135 Betar fell and Bar Kokhba was killed.
After crushing the revolt the Romans consolidated the political units of Judaea, Galilee and Samaria into the new province of Syria-Palaestina. Hadrian rebuilt Jerusalem as a city but as the Roman pagan polis of Aelia Capitolina, and Jews were forbidden to enter it.
• Jewish Revolt against Gallus (351)
In 350, Magnentius (50; r.350-353) rebelled and killed Constans (c.27; r.337-350). Constantius II (44; r.337-361) prepared to move against the usurper, but needed a representative in the East, so he called his cousin Gallus (c.325-354) at Sirmium and raised him to the rank of caesar (15 March 351). The centre of the rebellion was the city of Diocaesarea. The Jews attacked the Roman garrison at night; destroyed it and took their weapons. Gallus entrusted his general Ursicinus with putting down the revolt. Tiberias and Diospolis, two of the cities captured by the rebels, were almost completely destroyed; Diocaesarea was razed to the ground. Thousands of the rebels perished, many fled to other countries.
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