Scene in the Pass of Beth-Horon

To accelerate the retreat, he issued orders to abandon all impedimenta. So the mules, asses and all the beasts of burthen were killed, excepting those that carried 116missiles and engines of war; these they clung to, both for their own use and especially from fear that they might fall into Jewish hands and be employed against themselves. He then led his army on towards Beth-Horon. In the open their movements were less harassed by the Jews, but, once the Romans became involved in the defiles on the descent, one contingent of the enemy went ahead of them and blocked their exit, another drove the rearmost down into the ravine, while the main body lined up in extended order above the gorge and covered the phalanx with their missiles. Here, powerless as were the infantry to protect themselves, the cavalry were in even greater jeopardy. To advance in order down the road under the hail of darts was impossible, while the charge up the steep slopes was impracticable for horse. On either side were precipices and ravines, down which they slipped and were hurled headlong. None had room for flight, none had any plan of defence. In their utter helplessness they gave vent to groans and the wailings of despair, which were answered by the war-whoop and shouts of the Jews, exultant and mad with rage. Cestius and his whole army would have been well-nigh annihilated^[266] had not night intervened, under cover of which the Romans escaped to Beth-Horon.^[267] The Jews meanwhile occupied all the surrounding district and kept guard against their egress.

Flight of Cestius

Cestius, now despairing of open retreat, took measures for flight; and, selecting about four hundred of his bravest men, stationed them upon the roofs, with orders to shout out the watchwords^[268] of the camp-sentinels, that 117the Jews might think that the whole army was still on the spot. He himself with the remainder then stealthily advanced another thirty furlongs. At daybreak the Jews, discovering that the enemy’s night quarters were deserted, charged the four hundred who had deluded them, quickly shot them down with their spears, and started in pursuit of Cestius.

He had gained much upon them during the night, and, when day came, quickened the pace still more; the men in consternation and terror abandoning the siege engines, catapults and most of the other machines, which the Jews then captured and afterwards employed against those who had relinquished them. The Jews continued the pursuit as far as Antipatris, and then, failing to overtake the Romans, turned and carried off the machines, plundered the corpses, collected the booty which had been left behind, and, with songs of triumph, retraced their steps to the capital. Their own losses had been quite inconsiderable; of the Romans and their allies they had slain five thousand three hundred infantry and of cavalry four hundred and four score.^[269] This action took place on the eighth of the month Dius in the twelfth year of Nero’s reign |November A.D. 66|.

Cestius Reports to Nero

After this catastrophe of Cestius many distinguished Jews left the city as swimmers desert a sinking ship. For example, the brothers Costobar and Saul with Philip, son of Jacimus, King Agrippa’s camp-commander, escaped from the city and joined Cestius.... Cestius, at their request, despatched Saul and his party to Nero in Achaia, to inform him of their own difficulties and also to lay the blame for the war on Florus. For he 118hoped by exciting resentment against Florus to lessen the danger to himself....

Jewish Preparations for War

The Jews who had pursued Cestius, on their return to Jerusalem, partly by force, partly by persuasion, brought over to their side such pro-Romans as still remained; and, assembling in the Temple, appointed several generals to conduct the war. Joseph, son of Gorion, and Ananus the high priest were elected to the supreme control of affairs in the city, with a special charge to repair the city walls. As for Eleazar, son of Simon, notwithstanding that he had in his hands the Roman spoils with the money taken from Cestius, as well as much of the public treasure, they did not entrust him with office, because they saw him to be aiming at despotic power, and that his subordinate Zealots acted the part of his bodyguard. Gradually, however, financial needs and the intrigues of Eleazar so far prevailed upon the people that they ended by submitting in all matters to his authority.—B.J. II. 18. 9-20. 3 (499-565).

(42) Jerusalem before the Siege

The disturbances in Galilee were thus quelled; |Spring A.D. 67| and, desisting from civil strife, the Jews directed their attention to preparations against the Romans. In Jerusalem Ananus the high priest and those of the leading men who were not pro-Romans busied themselves with the repair of the walls and the accumulation of engines of war. In every quarter of the city missiles and suits of armour were being forged; masses of young men were undergoing a desultory training; and the whole scene was one of confusion. On the other side, the dejection of the moderate party was profound; and many foresaw and 119openly lamented the impending disasters. There were also omens, which to the friends of peace boded ill, while those who had kindled the war readily invented favourable interpretations for them;^[270] and the city before the coming of the Romans wore the appearance of a place doomed to destruction. Ananus, indeed, was anxious gradually to desist from warlike preparations and to bend the revolutionaries and the infatuated Zealots, as they were called, to a more salutary policy; but their violence was too much for him. The sequel of our narrative will show the fate which befell him.^[271]—B.J. II. 22. 1 (647-651).

(43) The Fall of Jotapata. Josephus taken Prisoner.

Capture of the Town through Information of a Jewish Deserter

A.D. 67

The defenders of Jotapata were still holding out and beyond all expectation enduring their miseries, when on the forty-seventh day (of the siege) the earthworks of the Romans overtopped the wall. That same day a deserter reported to Vespasian the reduced numbers and strength of the defence, and that, worn out with perpetual watching and continuous fighting, they would be unable longer to resist a vigorous assault^[272] and might be taken by stratagem, if the attempt were made. He stated that about the last watch (of the night)—an hour when they expected some respite from their sufferings and when tired frames succumb most readily to morning slumber—the sentinels used to drop asleep; that was the hour when he advised the Romans to attack.

Vespasian, knowing the Jews’ loyalty to each other and their contempt of chastisement, viewed the deserter 120with suspicion. On a former occasion a man of Jotapata who had been taken prisoner held out under every variety of torture, and, without uttering a word about the besieged to his enemies who were trying him by fire, was crucified, smiling at death. Probability, however, lent credit to the traitor; and so, thinking that the man might be speaking the truth and that even a trap, if it were one, was not likely to lead to any serious reverse, Vespasian ordered him into custody and made ready his army for the capture of the city.

At the hour named they advanced in silence to the walls. The first to mount them was Titus, with one of the tribunes,^[273] Domitius Sabinus, at the head of a few men of the fifteenth legion.^[274] Having cut down the sentries they entered the city in silence, and were followed by Sextus Calvarius, a tribune, and Placidus with the troops under their command. The citadel had been taken and the enemy were moving to and fro in the heart of the town, before the vanquished inhabitants, though it was now broad daylight, were aware of the capture. Most of them, worn out with fatigue, had fallen fast asleep, while a thick mist, which happened at the time to envelop the city, obscured the vision of those who started up. Not until the whole army had poured in, were they fully roused only to realize their misery; the discovery that they were being slain was the first assurance of their capture.

Remembering what they had borne during the siege, the Romans showed no compassion or pity for any one, but thrust the people down the steep descent from the citadel in a general massacre. And here the difficulty of the ground deprived those still able to fight of the means of defence. Crushed in the narrow alleys and 121slipping down the declivity, they were overwhelmed by the wave of war that streamed from the citadel. The situation drove many even of Josephus’s picked men to suicide. Perceiving that they could not kill a single Roman, they at least forestalled death at Roman hands, and, huddled together at the outskirts of the city, put an end to themselves....

On that day the Romans slew all who showed themselves; on the ensuing days they searched the hiding-places and went in pursuit of such as had fled to the mines and caverns, sparing none, whatever their age, save infants and women. The prisoners thus collected were twelve hundred; the number of those killed at the time of the capture and in the previous conflicts was computed at forty thousand. Vespasian ordered the city to be razed, and burnt all its forts to the ground. Thus was Jotapata taken in the thirteenth year of the reign of Nero, on the new moon of Panemus. |July A.D. 67|

Josephus’s Hiding-place Discovered

A search for Josephus was then instituted by the Romans, instigated both by their own resentment and by the earnest wish of their general, since his capture would constitute a turning-point in the war. So the bodies of the slain and the men in hiding^[275] were closely examined. Now Josephus, when the city was on the point of being taken, had, with the aid of some divine providence, stolen out of the enemy’s midst and leapt into a deep pit, giving access on one side to a broad cavern, invisible to those above. There he found forty persons of distinction in hiding, with a supply of provisions sufficient to last for a considerable time. During the day he lay hid, the enemy occupying every quarter 122of the city, but at night he would come up and look for some loophole for escape and reconnoitre the sentries; but, finding every spot guarded on his account and no means of eluding detection, he descended again into the cave. So for two days he continued in hiding. On the third, his secret was betrayed by a woman of the party, who was captured, whereupon Vespasian at once in eager haste despatched two tribunes,^[276] Paulinus and Gallicanus, with orders to offer Josephus security^[277] and to exhort him to come up.

Josephus Parleys with the Roman Officers

So they came and urged him, giving pledges that his life would not be endangered. Their persuasion, however, was unavailing. His suspicions were based not on the natural clemency of those who invited him, but on the penalties which so active an opponent was likely to incur; and the presentiment that he was being summoned to punishment persisted, until Vespasian sent a third tribune, Nicanor, known to, and formerly an intimate associate of, Josephus. He, on his arrival, dwelt on the innate generosity of the Romans to those whom they had once subdued,^[278] assuring him that his valour made him an object rather of admiration, than of hatred, to the commanding officers, and that the general was anxious to bring him up from his retreat, not for punishment—that he could inflict though he refused to come forth—but from a desire to save a brave man. He added that Vespasian, had he intended to entrap him, would never have sent a friend as his emissary, using the noblest of relationships as a cloak for the basest—friendship as a mask for perfidy; nor would he 123himself have consented to come in order to deceive a friend.

While Josephus was still hesitating even at Nicanor’s persuasions, the soldiers in their rage made a rush to set the cave on fire, but were restrained by the officer,^[279] who was anxious to take the Jewish leader alive. And as Nicanor urgently pressed his proposals, Josephus heard the threats of the hostile crowd; and there came back into his mind those nightly dreams, in which God had foretold to him the impending fate of the Jews and the destinies of the Roman sovereigns. As an interpreter of dreams he had the capacity of extracting a coherent meaning from the ambiguous utterances of the Deity;^[280] a priest himself and of priestly descent, he was, moreover, not ignorant of the prophecies in the sacred books. At that hour he was inspired to read their meaning, and, recalling the dreadful images of his recent dreams, he offered up a secret prayer to God. “Since it pleases Thee” (so it ran), “who didst create the Jewish nation, that it should now sink into the dust, and fortune has wholly passed to the Romans, and since Thou hast made choice of my spirit to announce the things that are to come, I willingly surrender to the Romans and consent to live; but I appeal to Thee to witness that I go as no traitor, but as Thy minister.”

Josephus’s Life Threatened by his Men

With these words he was about to surrender to Nicanor. But when the Jews who had sought refuge along with him understood that Josephus was yielding to entreaty, they came round him in a body, crying out, “Ah! well might the laws of our fathers groan aloud and God Himself, who implanted in Jewish breasts souls that 124make light of death, hide His face for shame! Is life so dear to you, Josephus, that you will endure to see the light in slavery? How soon have you forgotten yourself! How many have you persuaded to die for liberty! False, then, was that reputation for bravery, false that renown for sagacity, if you look for security from those against whom you have fought so bitterly or deign to accept the gift of your life at their hands, even were it sure. Nay, if the fortune of the Romans has cast over you some strange forgetfulness of yourself, the care of our country’s honour devolves on us. We will lend you a right hand and sword. If you die of your own free will, you shall die as general of the Jews; if involuntarily, as a traitor.” With these words they pointed their swords at him and threatened to kill him if he surrendered to the Romans.

Josephus, fearing an assault, and holding that it would be a betrayal of God’s commands, should he die before delivering his message, began to reason with them philosophically upon the emergency.^[281]...

There follows a rhetorical speech, which one can hardly believe that Josephus’s companions would have tolerated, on the iniquity of suicide. One sentence will suffice.

“Know you not that they who depart this life in the order of nature and repay the loan which they received from God, when the Giver is pleased to recover it, enjoy eternal renown; that their houses and families are secure; that their souls remain unspotted and attentive to prayer, being allotted the most holy place in heaven, from whence, in the revolution of the ages, they again find a new habitation in saintly bodies;^[282] while the souls of those who have laid mad hands upon themselves are 125received into the darkest region^[283] of the underworld,^[284] and God, who is their father, visits upon the children their fathers outrageous actions?”^[285]...

With many such words did Josephus attempt to deter them from self-slaughter. But desperation stopped their ears, for they had long since devoted themselves to death; and, infuriated with him, they rushed upon him from every side, sword in hand, upbraiding him as a coward, and one and all manifestly prepared at once to strike. But he, addressing one by name, fixing his general’s eye of command upon another, clasping the hand of a third, and shaming a fourth by entreaty, distracted as he was by conflicting passions at this critical moment, yet succeeded in staving off the blades of all, always turning, like a wild beast surrounded (by the hunters), upon his last assailant. Even in his extremities, they still held their general in reverence; their hands were paralyzed, their daggers glanced aside, and many, in the act of thrusting at him, of their own impulse dropped their swords.

The Drawing of the Lots

But, in his straits, his resource did not forsake him. Trusting to the guardianship of God, he put his life to the hazard, and said: “Since you are determined to die, come, let us commit our mutual slaughter to the lot; let him who draws the first lot fall by the hand of him who comes next; so shall fate take her course through the whole number. But let not each be laid low by his own hand;^[286] it would be unjust that, when the rest were gone, any should repent and escape.” This proposal appeared 126to them a fair one;^[287] his advice was taken, and he drew lots with the rest. The winner of the first lot bared his throat to the next, in the assurance that his general was forthwith to share his fate; for death with Josephus they thought sweeter than life. He, however, (should one say by fortune or by the providence of God?) was left with one other; and, anxious neither to be condemned by the lot nor, should he be left to the last, to stain his hand with the blood of a fellow countryman, he persuaded him also, on a pledge given, to remain alive.

Josephus before the Romans

Having thus survived both the war with the Romans and that with his own friends, Josephus was brought by Nicanor into Vespasian’s presence. The Romans all flocked to see him, and from the multitude crowding around the general arose a hubbub of discordant voices: some exulting at his capture, some threatening, some forcing their way to obtain a nearer view. Those further off clamoured for the punishment of the enemy, while those close beside him were touched by the recollection of his exploits and filled with astonishment at the change in his condition. Of the officers there was not one who, whatever his past resentment, did not then relent at the sight of him.

Titus in particular was moved exceedingly^[288] by the fortitude of Josephus under misfortunes and by pity for his youth. As he recalled the combatant of yesterday and saw him now a prisoner in his enemy’s hands, he was led to reflect on the power of fortune, the quick turn of the scale in war and the instability of human affairs. He, therefore, brought over many at the time 127to share his commiseration of Josephus, and by his intercession with his father was mainly instrumental in saving his life. Vespasian, however, ordered him to be guarded with every precaution, intending shortly to send him to Nero.

Josephus tells Vespasian’s Fortune

On hearing this, Josephus said that he desired private speech with him. Vespasian having ordered all to withdraw except his son Titus and two of his friends, the prisoner thus addressed him: “You suppose, Vespasian, that in the person of Josephus you have taken a mere captive; but I come to you as a messenger of greater destinies. Had I not been sent on this errand by God, I knew the law of the Jews and how it becomes a general to die. To Nero do you send me? Why then? Will those who succeed Nero before your accession continue?^[289] You, Vespasian, are Cæsar and Emperor—you and this your son. Bind me now yet more securely and keep me for (trial by) yourself. For you, Cæsar, are master not of me only, but of land and sea and the whole human race. And I—I deserve to be reserved for punishment in even stricter custody,^[290] if I dare to trifle with the words of God.”

To this speech Vespasian, at the moment, seemed to attach little credit, supposing it to be an ingenious device of Josephus to save his life. Gradually, however, he was led to believe it, since God was already turning his thoughts to the imperial office^[291] and by other tokens foreshadowing the throne. He found, moreover, that 128Josephus had proved a veracious prophet in other matters. For, one of the two friends in attendance at the private interview having expressed his surprise that he had not predicted the fall of Jotapata to its inhabitants nor his own captivity, if his present words were not a nonsensical invention to avert the indignation which he had aroused, Josephus replied that he had foretold to the people of Jotapata that their city would be captured after forty-seven days and that he himself would be taken alive by the Romans.

Vespasian, having privately questioned the prisoners on these statements and found them true, then began to credit those concerning himself. He did not, however, exempt Josephus from custody or bonds, though he presented him with raiment and other precious possessions, and continued to treat him with kindness and attention, Titus contributing much to these complimentary honours.—B.J. III. 7. 33-8. 9 (316-408).

(44) Reception at Jerusalem of the News of the Fall of Jotapata

When news of the fate of Jotapata reached Jerusalem, the magnitude of the calamity and the absence of any eyewitness of the events reported at first induced general incredulity. For not one had escaped to tell the tale; Rumour, own sister to Black Tidings,^[292] came as her own herald of the city’s capture. Little by little, however, the truth found its way through the adjacent districts, and the fact was now regarded by all as established beyond doubt. But the facts were embroidered by fiction; thus Josephus was reported to have fallen when the city was taken. This intelligence filled Jerusalem with the deepest sorrow. In every household and family 129there was mourning of the relatives for their own lost ones; but the lamentation for the commander was national. Some mourned for their former guests, others for relatives, others for friends, but all alike for Josephus. Thus for thirty days the lamentations in the city were incessant, and many flute-players were hired, who used to take the lead in their dirges.^[293]

But when the true story of what had happened at Jotapata was in time disclosed, and the reported death of Josephus was found to be a fabrication, and it became known that he was alive and in Roman hands and being treated by the commanding officers with a respect beyond the common lot of a prisoner, the demonstrations of anger at his escaping alive were as loud as the former expressions of affection when he was believed to be dead. Some abused him as a coward, others as a traitor; and the city was filled with indignation and imprecations upon his devoted head.

They were exasperated, moreover, by their reverses, and their failures added fuel to the flames. A defeat, which with the wise induces precaution and care to provide against similar misfortunes, but goaded them on to further disasters; and the end of one calamity was always the beginning of the next. At any rate, the desire for vengeance on Josephus, now in the enemy’s ranks, impelled them to fiercer assaults upon the Romans. Such was the uproar that now prevailed in Jerusalem.—B.J. III. 9. 5 f. (432-442).

(45) Murder of the High Priest Ananus; also of Zacharias after a mock trial

The Idumæans had been summoned by the Zealots to aid them against the party of Ananus, and had with difficulty gained entrance to Jerusalem during a thunderstorm at night. After massacring 130their Jewish enemies these “children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem” subsequently repented of their adventure and withdrew from the city. For Zacharias see Appendix, Note V.

Winter A.D. 67-68

The fury of the Idumæans being still unsatiated, they turned (from the Temple) to the city, looting every house and killing all who fell in their way. But, thinking their energies wasted on the common people, they went in search of the chief priests. The main body rushed to attack them, and they were soon caught and slain. Then, standing over their dead bodies, they scoffed at Ananus for his patronage of the people and at Jesus for the address which he had delivered from the wall. They actually went so far in their impiety as to cast out the corpses without burial, although the Jews are so careful about funeral rites that even malefactors who have been sentenced to crucifixion are taken down and buried before sunset.^[294]

I do not think I shall be wrong in saying that the capture of the city began with the death of Ananus; and that the overthrow of the walls and the downfall of the Jewish state dated from the day on which the Jews beheld their high priest, the captain of their salvation, butchered in the heart of Jerusalem.

A man in all ways venerable and in integrity unsurpassed, Ananus, with all the distinction of his birth, his rank and the honours to which he had attained, yet delighted to treat the very humblest as his equals. Unrivalled in his love of liberty and an admirer of democracy, he on all occasions put the public welfare above his private interests. To maintain peace was his supreme object. He knew that the Roman power was irresistible; but, when driven to provide for a state of war, endeavoured to secure that, if the Jews would not break off hostilities, the struggle should at least be 131skilfully conducted. In a word, had Ananus lived, they would undoubtedly either have come to terms—for he was an effective speaker, whose words carried weight with the people, and was already gaining control over those who thwarted him—or else, had hostilities continued, they would, under such a general, have greatly retarded the victory of the Romans.

With him was linked Jesus, who, though not comparable with Ananus, excelled the rest of his contemporaries.

It was, I suppose, because God had, for its pollutions, condemned the city to destruction and desired to purge the sanctuary by fire, that He thus cut off those who clung to it with such tender affection. So they who but lately were clad in the sacred vestments, had led the ceremonies of world-wide significance^[295] and were reverenced by visitors to the city from every quarter of the earth, were now seen cast out naked, to be devoured by dogs and beasts of prey. Virtue herself, I think, groaned over these men’s fate, lamenting that she should have been so completely defeated by Vice. Such, then, was the end of Ananus and Jesus.

Having disposed of them, the Zealots with the mass of the Idumæans fell upon and butchered the people as though they had been a herd of unclean animals....

The Mock Trial and Murder of Zacharias

Having now come to loathe indiscriminate massacre, the Zealots instituted mock trials and courts of justice. They had determined to put to death Zacharias, son of Baris,^[296] one of the most eminent of the citizens. His pronounced hatred of wrongdoing and love of liberty 132exasperated them, and, as he was also rich, they had the double prospect of plundering his property and of getting rid of a powerful and dangerous opponent. So they issued a peremptory summons to seventy of the leading citizens to appear in the Temple, assigning to them, as in a play, the rôle, without the authority, of judges; and accused Zacharias of betraying the state to the Romans and of holding treasonable communications with Vespasian. They adduced no evidence or proof in support of these charges; but declared that they were fully convinced of his guilt themselves and claimed this as sufficient guarantee that the accusation was true.

Perceiving that no hope of escape was left him, as he had been treacherously summoned not to a court of justice but to prison, Zacharias did not allow despair of life to rob him of liberty of speech. He rose and ridiculed the probability of the accusation, and in few words quashed the charges laid against him. Then, rounding upon his accusers, he went over all their enormities in order, and bitterly lamented the confusion of public affairs. The Zealots were in an uproar and could scarce refrain from drawing their swords, although anxious to play out their part in the farce of a trial to the close, and desirous, moreover, to test whether the judges would put considerations of justice above their own peril.

The seventy, preferring to die with the defendant rather than be held answerable for his destruction, brought in a unanimous verdict in his favour. The Zealots raised an outcry at his acquittal, and were all indignant with the judges for not understanding that the authority entrusted to them was a mere pretence. Two of the most daring of them then set upon Zacharias and slew him in the midst of the Temple; and addressing him as he lay with jeering words, “There you have our 133verdict as well and a surer release,”^[297] forthwith cast him out of the Temple into the ravine below. Then they insolently struck the judges with the backs of their swords and drove them from the precincts; their sole reason for sparing their lives was that they might disperse through the city and proclaim to all the servitude to which they were reduced.—B.J. IV. 5. 2-4 (314-326; 334-344).

(46) How Josephus was Liberated

Probably Summer A.D. 69

Now that fortune was everywhere furthering his wishes and that circumstances had in large measure conspired in his favour, the thought arose in Vespasian’s mind that divine providence had played a part in his rise to sovereignty and that some just destiny had laid the empire of the world upon his shoulders. Among many other omens, which had everywhere foreshadowed his imperial office, he recalled the expressions of Josephus, who had ventured to address him as emperor while Nero was still alive. He was shocked to think that the man was still a prisoner in his hands, and summoning Mucianus with his other generals and personal friends, he first reminded them of his doughty deeds and how much trouble he had given them at Jotapata; and then referred to his predictions, which at the time he himself had suspected of being the fabrications of fear, but which time and the course of events had proved to be divine. “It is disgraceful,” he said, “that one who foretold my elevation to power and was a minister of the voice of God should still rank as a captive and endure a prisoner’s fate”; and calling for Josephus, he ordered him to be liberated.

The officers from this requital of a foreigner were led to augur brilliant honours for themselves. But Titus, who was beside his father, said, “Justice demands, 134father, that, with his bonds, the disgrace should also be removed from Josephus. If, instead of loosing, we sever his chains, he will be as though he had never been in bonds at all.” This is the usual custom when a man has been unjustly chained. Vespasian approving, an attendant came forward and severed the chain with an axe. Thus Josephus won his freedom^[298] as the reward of his divination, and his power of insight into the future was no longer discredited.—B.J. IV. 10. 7 (622-629).

(47) A Roman Reverse Inspires false Confidence

May A.D. 70

Thus, after gaining possession of the second wall, were the Romans ejected. The spirits of the war party in the city, elated at their success, rose to a high pitch; they thought that the Romans would never again venture into the city, or that, if they did, they themselves would prove invincible. For God was blinding their minds because of their transgressions; and they perceived neither how the forces still left to the Romans far out-numbered those which had been expelled nor the stealthy approach of famine. It was still possible to feed upon the public miseries and to drink of the city’s life-blood; but honest men had long since felt the pinch of want, and many were already failing for lack of necessaries. The factions, on the other hand, considered the destruction of the people to be a relief to themselves; they maintained that only those should be preserved who were enemies to peace and determined to devote their lives to resisting the Romans; the crowds of their opponents they regarded as a mere encumbrance^[299] and their gradual extinction a cause for satisfaction. Such were their feelings towards those within the walls. As for their external foes, having blocked and walled up the breach with their 135own bodies, they attempted to beat off the Romans who were once more attempting to break through.

For three days they maintained a stubborn defence and held their ground; but on the fourth, unable to withstand a gallant assault of Titus, they were compelled to fall back as before. Titus, once more master of the wall, immediately razed the whole of the northern portion; and, placing garrisons in the towers on the south side, made preparations to attack the third wall.—B.J. V. 8. 2 (342-347).

(48) Cessation of the Daily Sacrifice. Josephus appeals to the Jews

Titus now ordered the troops at his disposal to raze the foundations of Antonia^[300] and to prepare an easy ascent (to the Temple) for his whole army. On the seventeenth of Panemus, |July A.D. 70| having heard that on that day the so-called continual sacrifice^[301] had ceased to be offered to God from lack of men and that the people were in consequence terribly despondent, he put Josephus forward with instructions to repeat to John^[302] the same message as before; namely “that if he was the slave of a depraved love of fighting, it was open to him to come out with as many men as he chose and carry on the war, without involving the city and the sanctuary in his own ruin; but that he should no longer pollute the Holy Place nor sin against God; and that he would be permitted to perform the interrupted sacrifices through the ministry of any Jews he might select.”

Josephus, in order that his words might be listened to^[303] 136not by John only but by the multitude, delivered Cæsar’s message in Hebrew,^[304] with earnest appeals to them “to spare their country, to disperse the flames that were already licking^[305] the sanctuary and to restore to God the customary expiations.”^[306] This address was received by the people with dejection and silence; the tyrant,^[307] on the contrary, after many invectives and imprecations upon Josephus, ended by saying that “he could never fear capture, since the city was God’s.”

At this Josephus cried aloud:—

“Pure indeed have you kept it for God! The Holy Place too remains undefiled! No impiety are you guilty of against your looked-for Ally and He receives His customary sacrifices! Most impious wretch, should any one deprive you of your daily food, you would consider him an enemy; and do you hope to have God for your ally in the war, whom you have bereft of His everlasting ceremonial? And do you impute these sins to the Romans, who, to this day, are concerned for our laws and are trying to force you to restore to God those sacrifices which you have interrupted? Who would not bewail and lament for the city at this amazing transposition, when aliens and enemies rectify your impiety, while you, a Jew, nurtured in our laws, treat them with greater cruelty even than your foes?

“Yet, be sure, John, it is no disgrace to repent of misdeeds, even at the last; and, if you desire to save your country, you have a noble example set before you in Jeconiah, king of the Jews. He, when in the old days the Babylonian led out his army on his account, of his own free will left the city before it was taken, and with his family endured voluntary captivity, rather than deliver up these holy places to the enemy and suffer the 137house of God to be set on fire.^[308] For this he is commemorated in sacred story by all Jews, and memory, flowing ever fresh from age to age, transmits his undying fame to after generations. A noble example, John, even were it dangerous to follow; but I can warrant you even pardon from the Romans. Remember, too, that I who exhort you am your compatriot, that I who make this promise am a Jew; and it is right that you should consider who is your counsellor and of what country he comes. For I pray that I may never live to be so abject a captive as to abjure my race or to forget the traditions of my forefathers.

“Once again you are indignant and shout your abuse at me; and indeed I deserve even harsher treatment for offering advice in fate’s despite and for struggling to save those whom God has condemned. Who is ignorant of the records of the ancient prophets and of that oracle which threatens this poor city and is now on the eve of fulfilment? They foretold that it would be taken when one should begin to slaughter his own countrymen. And is not the city and the whole Temple too filled with the corpses of your fellow-citizens? God it is then, God Himself, who with the Romans is bringing the fire to purge His Temple and desolation upon a city so laden with pollutions.”—B.J. VI. 2. 1 (93-110).

(49) Conflagration of the Temple

“There shall not be left here one stone upon another which shall not be thrown down.”

Titus, to protect his forces, had ordered the gates of the outer court to be set on fire, and from the gates the fire extended to the porticoes. But, after a council of war, it was decided that the main fabric—the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies—must be saved; Titus urging that “if it were burnt, the Romans would be the losers; if preserved, it would be an ornament of his Empire.” His attempts to check the spread of the conflagration proved, however, unavailing.

August A.D. 70

138Throughout that day fatigue and consternation checked the Jews from attacking; but, on the following day, about the second hour, with recruited strength and renewed courage, they sallied out through the eastern gate and charged the guards of the outer court of the Temple.

The Romans stubbornly met their charge and, forming a screen in front with their shields, closed up their ranks like a wall. It was evident, however, that they would not long be able to hold together, overpowered as they were by the number and élan of their assailants. Cæsar, who from the (tower of) Antonia was watching the scene, anticipating the breaking of the line, came to their rescue with his picked cavalry. The Jews could not withstand their onset; the foremost fell and the main body retreated. Yet whenever the Romans retired the Jews returned to the attack, only to fall back once more when the Romans wheeled round; until, about the fifth hour of the day, the Jews were overpowered and shut up in the inner court of the Temple.

Titus then withdrew to Antonia, with the determination on the following day, about dawn, to attack with his whole force and invest the Temple. But God, it seems, had long since sentenced that building to the flames; and now in the revolution of the years had come round the fated day, the tenth of the month Lous, |August| on which it had once before been burnt by the king of Babylon. Those flames, however, owed their origin and cause to God’s own people.^[309] For, on the withdrawal of Titus, the insurgents, after a brief respite, again attacked the Romans, and an engagement ensued between the (Jewish) guards of the sanctuary and the (Romans) who were endeavouring to extinguish the fire in the inner court. 139The latter routed the Jews and pursued them right up to^[310] the sanctuary.

At this moment, one of the soldiers, without waiting for orders and with no horror of so dread a deed, but moved by some supernatural impulse, snatched a brand from the burning timber^[311] and, hoisted up by one of his comrades, flung the fiery missile through a golden window,^[312] which gave access on the north side to the chambers surrounding the sanctuary. As the flame shot up, a cry, such as the calamity demanded, arose from the Jews, who rushed to the rescue, lost to all thought of self-preservation, all husbanding of strength, now that the object of all their past vigilance was gone.

Titus was resting in his tent after the engagement, when a messenger rushed in with the tidings. Starting up just as he was, he ran to the Temple to arrest the conflagration, followed by all his generals, while in their train came the excited legionaries, with the clamour and confused noise arising from the movement in irregular order of so large an army. Cæsar, both by word of mouth and by a wave of his hand, signalled to the combatants to extinguish the fire; but they neither heard his shouts, drowned in the louder din which filled their ears, nor, distracted as they were by the fever of battle or rage, did they heed his beckoning hand. The impetuosity of the legionaries, when they joined the fray, neither exhortation nor threat could restrain; passion was for all the one officer in command. Crushed together about the entrances, many were trampled down by their companions; while many, stumbling on the still hot and smouldering ruins of the porticoes, suffered the same fate as the 140vanquished.^[313] As they came nearer the sanctuary they pretended not even to hear Cæsar’s orders and shouted to those in front of them to throw in the firebrands.

The (Jewish) insurgents were now powerless to rescue (the Temple). On all sides was carnage and flight. Most of the slain were civilians, a weak and unarmed mob, each butchered where he was caught. Around the altar a pile of corpses was accumulating; down the sanctuary steps flowed a stream of blood; and down the same decline slid the bodies of the victims killed above.

Cæsar, finding himself unable to restrain the impetuosity of his frenzied soldiers and that the fire was gaining the mastery, passed with his generals within the building and beheld the holy place of the sanctuary and all that it contained—things far exceeding the reports current among foreigners and not inferior to their proud reputation among our own nation. As the flames had nowhere yet penetrated to the interior, but were consuming the outbuildings of the sanctuary, Titus, rightly supposing that the structure might still be preserved, rushed out and endeavoured by personal appeals to induce the soldiers to quench the fire; at the same time directing Liberalius, a centurion of his bodyguard of lancers, to restrain, by resort to clubs, any who disobeyed orders. But their respect for Cæsar and their fear of the officer who was endeavouring to check them were overpowered by their rage, their hatred of the Jews and the lust of battle, an even mightier master. Most of them were further stimulated by the hope of plunder, believing that the interior was full 141of money and actually seeing that all the surroundings were made of gold.

Moreover, when Cæsar rushed out to restrain the soldiers, even one of those who had entered with him baulked his purpose by thrusting a firebrand, in the darkness,^[314] into the sockets of the gate. At once a flame shot up from the interior, whereupon Cæsar and his generals withdrew, and there was none left to prevent those on the outside from kindling a blaze. Thus, then, against Cæsar’s wishes, was the sanctuary set on fire.

Deeply as one must mourn for the most marvellous edifice which we have ever seen or heard of, whether we consider its structure, its magnitude, the richness of every detail or the reputation of its Holy Places,^[315] yet may we draw very great consolation from the thought that there is no escape from Fate, for works of art and places any more than for living beings. And one may well marvel at the exactness of the cycle of Destiny; for, as I said, she waited until the very month and the very day on which in bygone times the Temple had been burnt by the Babylonians.—B.J. VI. 4. 4-8 (244-268).

(50) Portents and Oracles^[316]

Thus it happened that the wretched people were deluded at that time by charlatans and pretended messengers of God;^[317] while they paid no heed to or discredited the manifest portents that foretold the coming desolation, but, as if thunderstruck and bereft of eyes and mind, disregarded God’s plain proclamations 142(of disaster). So it was when a star, resembling a sword, stood over the city, and a comet which continued for a year. So again when, before the revolt and the outbreak of war, at the time when the people were assembling for the Feast of Unleavened Bread, on the eighth of the month Xanthicus,^[318] at the ninth hour of the night, so brilliant a light shone round the altar and the sanctuary that it seemed to be broad daylight; and this continued for half an hour. By the inexperienced this was regarded as a good omen, but by the sacred scribes it was at once interpreted in accordance with after events.

At that same feast a cow that had been led by some one^[319] to the sacrifice gave birth to a lamb in the midst of the Temple. Moreover, the eastern gate of the inner court, which it took twenty men to close with difficulty at even—it was of brass and very massive, and was secured by bars shod with iron, and had bolts which were sunk to a great depth into a threshold consisting of a solid block of stone—this gate was observed at the sixth hour of the night to have opened of its own accord. The watchmen of the Temple ran and reported the matter to the captain,^[320] and he came up and with difficulty succeeded in shutting it. This again to the uninitiated seemed the best of omens, as they supposed that God had opened to them the gate of blessings; but the learned understood that the security of the Temple was dissolving of its own accord and that the opening of the gate indicated a present to the enemy, interpreting the portent in their own minds^[321] as a symbol of desolation.

Again, not many days after the festival, on the twenty-first 143of the month Artemisium,^[322] there appeared a phenomenon so miraculous as to surpass belief. Indeed, what I am about to relate might well, I suppose, be regarded as fictitious, were it not for the narratives of eyewitnesses and for the subsequent calamities which deserved to be so signalized. In all parts of the country before sunset chariots were observed in the air and armed battalions rushing through the clouds and closing in round the cities. Also, at the feast which is called Pentecost, the priests on entering the inner court of the Temple by night, as their custom was, for the discharge of their ministrations, reported that they first became aware of a movement and a resounding noise and afterwards heard a voice as of a crowd, “We are departing hence.”^[323]

But a further portent was even more alarming. Four years before the war, when the city was enjoying profound peace and prosperity, there came to the feast at which it is the custom of all Jews to erect tabernacles to God,^[324] one Jesus, son of Ananias, a rude peasant, who suddenly began to cry out in the Temple, “A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the four winds; a voice against Jerusalem and the sanctuary, a voice against bridegrooms and brides, a voice against all the people.” Day and night he went about all the alleys with this cry on his lips. Some of the leading citizens, incensed at the fellow’s ill-omened words, laid hands on him and severely chastised him. But he, without uttering a word on his own behalf or for the private ear of those who smote him, continued his cries as before. Thereupon, the rulers, supposing, as was 144indeed the case, that the man was under some supernatural impulse, brought him before the Roman governor, where, although flayed to the bone with scourges, he neither begged for mercy nor shed a tear, but, merely introducing the most mournful of variations into his ejaculation, responded to each stroke with “Woe to Jerusalem!” When Albinus, the governor, asked him who and whence he was and why he uttered these words, he made no reply whatever to his questions, but never ceased reiterating his dirge over the city, until Albinus pronounced him a maniac and let him go.

During all that period up to the outbreak of war he neither approached nor was seen talking to any of the citizens, but, as if it were a prayer on which he had pondered, daily repeated his lament, “Woe to Jerusalem!” He neither cursed any of those who beat him day after day nor blessed those who offered him food; to all that melancholy and ominous refrain was his one reply. At the festivals his cries were loudest. So for seven years and five months he continued his wail, his voice never flagging nor his strength exhausted, until during the siege, after witnessing the verification of his presage, he ceased. For, while going his round on the wall, shouting in piercing tones “Woe once more to the city and to the people and to the Temple,” as he added a last word, “And woe to myself also,” a stone shot from the military engine^[325] struck and killed him instantaneously. So with those ominous words still on his lips he passed away.

If we reflect on these things, we shall find that God shows care for men, and by all kinds of premonitory signs indicates to His people the means of salvation, and that they owe their destruction to folly and calamities 145of their own choosing. For example, the Jews, after the demolition of the (tower of) Antonia, reduced the Temple to a square, although they had it recorded in their oracles that the city and the sanctuary would be taken when the Temple should become four-square. But what more than all else incited them to the war was an ambiguous oracle, likewise found in their sacred writings, to the effect that about that time some one from their country should become ruler of the world. This they understood to mean some one of their own race, and many of their wise men went astray in their interpretation of it. The oracle, however, in reality signified the sovereignty of Vespasian, who was proclaimed Emperor on Jewish soil.

For all that, it is impossible for men to avoid Fate, even though they foresee it. For some of these portents, then, the Jews found agreeable meanings, others they treated with contempt, until the ruin of their country and their own destruction convicted them of their folly.—B.J. VI. 5. 3 f. (288-315).

(51) The Last Scene. Capture of the Upper City. Jerusalem in Flames

“Tum vero omne mihi visum considere in ignes....”

September A.D. 70

The Romans, now masters of the walls, planted their standards on the towers, and with clapping of hands and jubilation raised the song of triumph in honour of their victory. They had found the end of the war a much lighter task than the beginning; indeed, they could hardly believe that they had surmounted the last wall without bloodshed, and were truly^[326] at a loss on finding no enemy in sight.

Pouring into the alleys, sword in hand, they massacred 146indiscriminately all whom they met and burnt over their heads the houses of those who had taken refuge within. Often in the course of their raids, on entering the houses for loot, they would find whole families of dead bodies and the rooms filled with the victims of the famine, and then, shuddering at the sight, would retire empty-handed. Yet, while they pitied those who had thus perished, they had no similar feelings for the living, but, running every one through that fell in their way, they choked the alleys with corpses and deluged the whole city with blood, insomuch that the flames of many of the burning buildings were extinguished by the gory stream. Towards evening they ceased slaughtering, but when night fell the fire gained the mastery, and the dawn of the eighth day of the month Gorpiæus |September| broke upon Jerusalem in flames; a city which had suffered such calamities in the siege, that, had she from her first foundation enjoyed an equal share of blessings, she would have been thought wholly enviable; and undeserving, moreover, of these great misfortunes on all other grounds, save that she produced so evil a generation as that which caused her overthrow.

Of all the strong defences of the city those which chiefly aroused the admiration of Titus, on his entry, were the towers, which the tyrants, in their infatuation, had abandoned. Indeed, when he beheld their solid lofty mass, the magnitude of each block of stone and the accuracy of the joinings, and saw how great was their breadth, how vast their height, “We have indeed,” he exclaimed, “had God on our side in the battle. God it was who ejected the Jews from these strongholds; for what power have human hands or engines against these towers?” He made many similar observations to his friends on that occasion, and also liberated all who had been imprisoned by the tyrants and left in the forts. 147And when, at a later period, he demolished the rest of the city and razed the walls, he left these towers as a memorial of his attendant fortune, to whose co-operation he owed his conquest of defences which defied assault.—B.J. VI. 8. 5-9. 1 (403-413).

(52) The Spoils from the Temple in the Triumphal Procession in Rome

The Jewish spoils—the table of shew-bread, incense-cups and trumpets—as borne in the procession still figure on the Arch of Titus in Rome; a representation e.g. in Driver’s Exodus (Camb. Bible), p. 273.

The rest of the spoils borne (in procession) were not systematically assorted; but conspicuous above all stood out those captured from the Temple at Jerusalem. These consisted of a golden table,^[327] many talents in weight, and a lampstand,^[328] likewise made of gold, constructed on a different pattern from those which we use in ordinary life. Affixed to a pedestal was a central shaft, from which there extended slender branches, arranged trident-fashion, a wrought lamp being attached to the extremity of each branch. There were seven of these lamps, indicating the honour paid to that number among the Jews. After these, and last of all the spoils, was carried a copy of the Jewish Law.—B.J. VII. 5. 5 (148-150).

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