The Jewish War Series (Part 1: The Beginning of the Revolt)

Throughout the rest of this year, I have determined to write my own, more simplified version of Josephus’ account of the Jewish Revolt of AD 66-70. As mentioned in a previous series on my blog involving Jesus and the Olivet Discourse, I believe that at the heart of Jesus’ prophetic declaration during the Passion week shortly before he was crucified was that since Jerusalem and the Temple priesthood had rejected him as the Messiah, that within a generation God would allow Rome to come in and destroy both Jerusalem and the Temple as punishment.

This prophetic condemnation and declaration of the coming Day of the Lord (which, I believe, the early first century Church spoke of as the “Day of Christ”) had its root in the prophetic tradition of Israel. Many of the Old Testament prophets prophesied of the “Day of YHWH”–a time when God would not only judge and punish the enemies of His people, but would also vindicate and save His people from their oppressors. In the Old Testament, there were many “Days of YHWH” prophesied against many nations: Assyria, Babylon, the surrounding nations, and even Israel and Judah.

But in the gospels, Jesus pronounces a coming day when God would bring judgment upon Jerusalem, because Jerusalem had proven itself to be God’s enemy by rejecting His Messiah and persecuting the followers of Jesus. We see this prophecy specifically in Mark 13, Matthew 24, and Luke 21. I believe that the early Christians saw the events of the Jewish War of AD 66-70 as the fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy.

Yet most people simply don’t know the magnitude of what happened during the Jewish War. I want to rectify that. And so, over the course of the rest of this year, I’m going to tell you the story of what happened. I will be essentially simplifying Josephus’ account in his book The Wars of the Jews. I am going to keep each Jewish War post between 1,000-1,500 words, so they can be easily and quickly read.

I hope you enjoy these posts. I hope they serve as a doorway to a time that most Christians sadly do not know much about, for it sheds an incredible amount of light on the events and circumstances of the early Church in its infancy.

***

A Brief Background
In the tenth year of the reign of Nero Caesar (64 AD), Gessius Florus succeeded Lucceius Albinus as the procurator of Judea. He proved to be the spark that lit the tinderbox that was Judea. He was viciously anti-Semitic and did almost everything conceivable to goad the Jews into all-out rebellion. But the beginning of the end, as it were, started with a minor altercation that any sensible procurator could have resolved quite easily.

Two years into his tenure as procurator (66 AD), in the city of Caesarea, certain Greeks decided to goad the local Jews of the city by sacrificing birds to their gods in front of the local synagogue. When the Jews complained to Florus, he ordered the Roman garrison not to intervene, and subsequent tensions further escalated.

Within the year, riots had broken out across Judea, including Jerusalem. The riots escalated in Jerusalem to the point that Florus ended up sending Roman troops into the temple precincts to destroy a number of the cloisters (?).

That is where we pick up Josephus’ story of the Jewish War.

Book 2, Chapter 17

The Flight of Agrippa
After the Roman destruction of numerous cloisters in the temple complex, King Agrippa and his wife Bernice toured the temple and surveyed the damage. Throughout Jerusalem, tensions were at a fever pitch and talk of an all-out insurrection could be heard in the air. For the past sixty years, various zealot leaders have called for their fellow Jews to unite, overthrow Rome, and final establish a true kingdom of God. But every single one of them was soon cut down by Roman imperial might, and their followers who weren’t killed simply disappeared into the countryside.

Agrippa was in a difficult spot. On one hand, the entire Herodian family owed Rome their very position as rulers of the Jews. Any zealot uprising against Rome was also an attack on him, and he knew it. On the other hand, from the time he stepped foot into Judea, Florus seemed to be on a mission to antagonize and infuriate the Jews at every turn. For the sake of the peace of the region, not to mention Agrippa’s own throne, Florus had to go. He had single-handedly pushed the Jews to the brink of rebellion—it already may be too late to turn things around.

Still, Agrippa had to try. After he toured the temple, he spoke with the various Jewish leaders in the Sanhedrin, and they decided it would be best to try to calm the populace down and convince them to obey Florus until Agrippa could write to Emperor Nero, and Nero could send another procurator to replace Florus. They just needed some time.

Unfortunately, when Agrippa addressed the people of Jerusalem, it was clear that time had run out. The people had had enough, and more and more began to listen to the calls by the zealots to finally rise up and fight back against Rome. And that fight would start then and there, with Agrippa being the first target. As soon as he began to urge them to obey Florus for a little while more, someone began to throw a stone in Agrippa’s direction. Then another, and another, and another.

Agrippa’s soldiers had to act, so they surrounded Agrippa and his party, and got him to safety. No, they didn’t take him to the palace—if they did, the mob would surround the place, and Agrippa would be trapped. There was only one option—get out of Jerusalem altogether. And, because the city leaders were in obvious peril as well, Agrippa ordered them to get out of the city as well and go to Caesarea until Rome could send troops to get Jerusalem back under control.

The Attack on Masada and the End of Sacrifices on Behalf of Caesar
The sight of Agrippa and the compromising city leaders who had collaborated with Rome for far too long fleeing the city filled the people of Jerusalem with euphoria. More and more people began to believe that maybe the time was now that God was going to act and give them the strength to rise up against Rome, just as Judas Maccabeus had led the Jews 200 years ago against Antiochus Epiphanes IV.

Any movement, though, obviously needs a leader, and there was no shortage of Jewish zealots who were all too eager to try to grab the reins of leadership. And in their grasp for power, they were going to make sure to push the things to the point of no return.

A group of zealots in Jerusalem quickly travelled down to Herod’s great fortress of Masada, located a couple of day’s journey (60 miles) southeast of Jerusalem, near the shores of the Dead Sea, where a garrison of Roman soldiers were stationed, before word could reach them. The zealots made an assault on Masada, slaughtered the Romans there, and took over the fortress. The rebellion gained steam.

Meanwhile, back in Jerusalem, another assault of a different kind took place among the priesthood. Eleazar, the son of Ananias the high priest, was a young firebrand who had deep sympathies with the zealot movement. He also happened to be the current governor of the temple. And so, he made a decision that would be even more consequential than the raid on Masada. He convinced the priests in the temple who were in charge of offering the daily sacrifices to stop receiving any more gifts or sacrifices from foreigners.

The reason why this was so consequential was because ever since the time Judea had come under the jurisdiction of the Roman Empire, the Jews and the Emperor had come to an agreement. Normally, it was required for the conquered peoples to offer sacrifices to the Emperor. The Jews, though, were fanatically opposed to that—it was blasphemy. It was the very thing they refused to do under Antiochus Epiphanes IV. And so, the Emperor thought up a compromise: instead of offering sacrifices to him, he requested that the Jews offer a daily sacrifice to their God on behalf of the Emperor. And so, that had been the agreement for about 100 years.

Eleazar’s order, though, changed that: no more sacrifices on behalf of foreigners meant no more sacrifices on behalf of Caesar. And that mean a giant middle finger to Caesar—that mean a declaration of outright rejection of Caesar and rebellion against Rome.

An Appeal that was Too Late
As soon as the chief priests and other Temple authorities realized what Eleazar and his priests had done, they immediately convened at the Brazen Gate of the Temple and publicly condemned their actions, accusing them of being seditious rebels who were inviting open conflict with Rome and who were spelling certain doom for Jerusalem and the Temple.

The chief priests then appealed to the crowds, telling them that the Temple had always received sacrifices and gifts from foreign nations. Such appeals, though, proved to be ineffective. And so, the Temple authorities immediately sent a man named Simon as an ambassador to Florus, and also Saul, Antipas, and Costobarus to Agrippa, begging both men to send troops to Jerusalem quickly in order to put down the revolt before it spread throughout the entirety of Judea.

Florus, though, chose to ignore the request, and didn’t send anyone. Agrippa, on the other hand, sent 3,000 horsemen. In the meantime, Jerusalem proved to be a boiling pot, and was on the brink of spilling over.