After the zealots had seized control of the temple complex and thrown out all the established priests, the high priest Ananus made one last effort to regain control of the city and crush the zealot revolutionaries. The fact was the majority of the citizens in Jerusalem, although they had no love for Rome, quickly saw that the zealot revolutionaries were proving themselves to be more vicious and dangerous than Roman rule had been. The zealots had done what the more unscrupulous revolutionaries have done throughout history: they took advantage of a less than desirable situation (i.e. being under Roman rule, specifically the horrible governorship of Florus) and proceeded to antagonist and agitate the situation, slowing working the populace into a riotous frenzy, and thus making it possible to manipulate the masses toward their own ends.
The people of Jerusalem saw that they essentially had been played and manipulated by the zealot revolutionaries in order to spark the revolt against Rome and were now at the mercy of blood-thirsty killers who had no mercy to show. And Ananus clearly saw that if they didn’t rise up against the zealots soon, all hope would be lost, and they would find themselves essentially prisoners in Jerusalem, with the ravenous zealots as their tormenters within the city and the Roman legions besieging them from without.
The Appeal of Ananus
And so, the high priest Ananus, along with Gorian ben-Josephus, Simeon ben-Gamaliel, as well as fellow high priests Jesus ben-Gamalas and Ananus ben-Ananus, met with the populace at a place within the city far removed from the temple complex, and made his appeal:
“It would have been better for me to have died before I had seen the House of God filled up with so many abominations, or our sacred places that should never be trampled upon in such a blasphemous manner be filled with the feet of these blood-shedding villains! We thought that Roman rule was oppressive, yet now, under these zealots, we are under a much greater tyranny than Rome ever displayed!
“Why are we taking it? Why aren’t we rising up to expel these seditious beasts? We made the huge mistake of overlooking them and not taking them seriously when they were but few in number, and now they have been able to gain strength, seize control of the House of God, and take over the entire city! Are you going to stand for this? Are you going to just stand idle and let your Sanctuary be trampled! Rise up! Rise up! And turn upon those beasts that profane the Temple of our God and beat you down into the dust!
“We can bear up under submission to foreigners, for it seems that fortune has already doomed us to it. It has been this way for the past 600 years: Babylon, Persia, Greece, and now Rome. I don’t know why, but God has ordained this! But are we called to submit to the wicked people of our own nation? No! To submit to such evil is too unmanly, too docile, too shameful, especially when we know this all happened because we allowed it to happen! Those wicked men who are trampling upon your liberties and profaning the House of God deserve to be destroyed! If we rise up to fight them, they will cower like the dogs they are, and we will be able to tame them!
“But even if we fail, to rise up and fight them is still the right thing to do! If the danger is too great and we perish, it would be better to die before the holy gates of God’s House, knowing that we have given our lives for the sake of our children, for the sake of our wives, for the sake of God Himself, and for the sake of the Sanctuary!”
An Initial Success, and John of Gischala’s Betrayal
Inevitably, there were informants who alerted the zealots regarding Ananus’ speech. Ananus’ plan entailed having the people come into the Temple complex to take part in the regular sacrifices and offerings made daily in the Temple, but then to launch a surprise attack on the zealots, and hopefully retake the Temple and drive the zealots out of the city. Yet since the zealots had been informed of Ananus’ plan, they were ready, and in fact proceeded to attack the crowds in the Temple before they were able to launch what they thought would be a surprise attack on the Zealots.
As the zealots began to attack the crowds, Ananus tried to mobilize his forces on the spot—the numbers vastly favored the people, but it was the zealots had access to more weapons, and there were heavy casualties on Ananus’ side. Nevertheless, the people were able to press forward and force the zealots to retreat back within the inner court of the Temple, at which time they shut the gates.
Once Ananus’ people had successfully taken control of the outer courts, he quickly set guards all around the inner court. And then he and the other leaders among the people strategized what to do next. John of Gischala, surprisingly, had not sided with the more radical of the zealots. Of course, the reason probably had more to do with the fact that he had been unable to secure a position of power among the zealots, than he had actually opposed their revolutionary ambitions. He wanted to be in charge, and so he had to find a way to get in charge—and that meant playing both sides against one another.
Ever since he had come to Jerusalem, though, Ananus had been suspicious of John—after all, he came into Jerusalem, calling for war, and yet here he was, with Ananus, supposedly standing against the revolutionaries. And so, Ananus and his people confronted John with their suspicious, and required him to take an oath of allegiance before God before they were to trust him—and to this, he quickly agreed.
For some reason, Ananus became so convinced of John’s loyalty to the people, that he chose John to be his spokesman to the zealots. He sent John into the inner court to try to get the zealots to agree to lay down their arms and agree to leave the city. Yet, once inside the Temple, instead of laying out Ananus’ offer, John proceeded to lie to the zealots by telling them that Ananus had already sent for the Romans to come and retake the city. Such a suggestion infuriated the zealots. And then John, in attempt to win them over and have them look upon him as their leader, told them that if some of them snuck out of the city, they could send word to the Idumeans, tell them that Ananus was planning to betray Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans, and convince the Idumeans to liberate Jerusalem from the Roman sympathizers.
The zealots really had no other choice, so they listened to John’s advice and sent for the Idumeans. Ananus had been so close to avert disaster for Jerusalem, yet it was to all come to naught.
