Judea (Roman province)

Judea (in Latin, Iudæa; in inscriptions, IVDÆA) was a a Roman province in the region known as Palestine, on the southeastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. The Roman Empire changed the name of Judea to Palestine or Syrian Palestinian Province in AD 135, after crushing the Bar Kochba rebellion; which for some historians was an attempt to erase the Jewish memory of the region, although this interpretation has been questioned. The geographers Strabo and Ptolemy describe the Province of Judea as encompassing the territory of Judea proper along with Galilee, Samaria, Gaulanitis, Perea, and Idumea. In the New Testament the name Judea is used to designate both the region and the province as a whole.

Background

Hasmonean Kingdom

Between 129 B.C. C. and 116 a. C., the Seleucid kingdom suffered a series of defeats that were taken advantage of by its client states to rebel. Among them, the High Priest of Jerusalem and ruler of the Jews, John Hyrcanus, began from 110 a. C. the conquest of neighboring territories until consolidating an independent Jewish state. This state formally became a kingdom under Aristobulus, son of John in 104 BC. C. and acquired the greatest expansion during the reign of his brother and successor Alexander Jannaeus (103 BC-76 BC)

Pompey enters the Temple of Jerusalem (Jean Fouquet).

Civil war and Roman intervention

The succession of Alexander, after the death of Salome Alejandra, triggered a civil war that was resolved with the Roman intervention in the year 63 BC. C. Indeed, after the end of the Third Mithridatic War, the Roman province of Syria was established on the remains of the disappeared Seleucid kingdom, in this way the Hasmonean kingdom had Rome, then its ally, also as a neighbor. In Syria was the victorious Roman general Pompey, who was called to his aid by the ousted Hasmonean prince Hyrcanus II to regain power. Pompey took Jerusalem and enthroned his client as High Priest and ethnarch, but not king, of the Jews. Thus, the kingdom became a protectorate of Rome.

After the Parthian invasion and faced with the dubious loyalty of the last Hasmoneans, the Roman Senate appointed Herod king of Judea, of Idumean origin but raised as a Jew, who was an official of Hyrcanus II, married to his granddaughter Mariamna I.

Herodian Kingdom of Judea

Model of the Temple of Jerusalem (called the Second Temple) and the city in the 1st century. Exhibited at the Museum of Israel, Jerusalem.

The kingdom of Judea under Herod begins in 37 B.C. C., with the capture of Jerusalem and includes, in addition to Judea, an extensive territory in the Levant. During this period the city and port of Caesarea Maritima was built, which became, along with Jerusalem, one of the capitals of the kingdom.

On Herod's death in 4 B.C. C., Augusto divided the kingdom between three of his sons: two of them, Filipo II and Antipas, were established as tetrarchs of Iturea-Traconítide and Galilea-Perea, respectively, while the third; Archelaus, received the rest of the kingdom, Judea, Samaria and Idumea, as ethnarch. Before the protests of the Jewish aristocracy by the bad government of Arquelao, Augusto decided, in 6 d. C., relieve him of command and make Judea a province, governed by a prefect of equestrian rank.

Judea, Roman province

An amphitheater of Cesarea.

The territory of the province was made up of Judea, Samaria and Idumea, although some cities, such as Ashkelon, were attached directly to the province of Syria. Galilee, Gaulanitis (the current Golan), Perea and the Decapolis were not part of it either. His income was of little consequence to the Roman treasury, but he controlled the coastal land and sea routes to Egypt, the breadbasket of the Empire, and was a frontier territory to the Parthian Empire. Judea was not an imperial or senatorial province, but a subordinate territory to the province of Syria, so its governor was an equestrian prefect. Its capital was Caesarea instead of Jerusalem.

Population

The province of Judea was not ethnically homogeneous. Its inhabitants included Jews, concentrated in the regions of Judea and Galilee, Idumeans, originally pagans forcibly converted to Judaism by John Hyrcanus, Samaritans, linked to the Jews but separated from them since Persian times, and "Greeks"., that is, Hellenized Syrians. In addition, in the inland regions, there was a significant number of Syrians who maintained the Aramaic language and culture, Nabataean nomads of Arab origin, and minorities of settlers from Mesopotamia. The Transjordan peoples, descendants of Ammonites and Moabites, also had a strong Greek cultural imprint.

Rivalries and disputes

One of the characteristics of the province was the permanent opposition between the Greco-Syrian populations, generically called "Greeks", and Jews. Among the first, distrust was widespread towards the “Hebrews”, as they were called, whom they considered alien to Hellenistic culture, understood as universal, reluctant to assimilate, exclusivist and malicious. The Jews, especially in the popular classes, saw their "Greek" co-provincials as infidels, oppressors and sinners. At times and in certain radical sectors, especially from the middle of the first century, the link between the Jewish aristocracy and their fellow "Greeks" was understood as a betrayal of Jewish identity.

Another dispute that appears frequently in the sources is the one between the inhabitants of Judea proper and the Samaritans. Both peoples had a common origin, the ancient kingdoms of Israel and Judah, worshiped the same God and followed what they called his law or Torah, which had been, according to the tradition shared by Jews and Samaritans, given to Moses by God. The main difference was that each one considered the other as a renegade to the ancestral customs. The Samaritans believed that the Temple in Jerusalem did not correspond to divine mandates and instead had a sanctuary on Mount Gerizim, and they remembered that John Hyrcanus had destroyed it. The Jews, for their part, maintained that the inhabitants of Samaria were mestizos, descendants of the ancient Israelites mixed with peoples from Mesopotamia, whose cult was illegitimate and half pagan.

In Galilee, Jewish settlers, brought by the Hasmoneans, predominated in rural areas and in some small towns. The largest, such as Sepphoris, the region's first capital, and Tiberias, founded in AD 20 by Antipas, were Greek-type cities, with a minority Jewish population that increased throughout the century.

Like other provinces of the Empire, the cities rivaled each other and sometimes came to armed confrontation, at which time Roman troops intervened to protect order. Inside them, riots originated from the lack of food, ethnic rivalries and the antagonism between the aristocracy and the popular classes used to break out; these conflicts often began with the burning of archives, the disappearance of debt records, the organization of factions, and usually ended in the presence of Roman troops.

Regions

The historical center of the province was the region of Judea, the nucleus of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdom, whose capital, Jerusalem, constituted what is called a temple-state, that is, a political entity governed by a priestly aristocracy. The Temple, in addition to being a sanctuary, was the economic axis of the region: it administered large tracts of land, possessed an enormous treasury, and also functioned as a bank. Unlike other temple states, common in the Middle East, that of the Jews was characterized by the rejection of all kinds of syncretism; While the others accepted that the local god be identified with the Greek Zeus or another Olympian divinity, the priests of Jerusalem rejected this commitment and, furthermore, were opposed to admitting the cult of other divinities in their Temple and even in their territory. This repudiation extended to the use of religious images or even those that only had a temporary relationship with the cult, such as the eagles of the Roman legions or the statues of the emperor. However, the priests admitted the legitimacy of the imperial government and offered sacrifices for "the health of the emperor."

Jerusalem has been called “the ungovernable city of the Roman Empire” because of the characteristics mentioned. It was also a pilgrimage center for Jews from the province and from the rest of the Empire or from neighboring regions such as Arabia and Mesopotamia. From the 4th century B.C. C., numerous Jewish communities existed in the Mediterranean world and the Near East. These groups, generically called the Diaspora, maintained a close relationship with the city that they considered holy to whose Temple they paid an annual tax and sent numerous offerings. A small number of non-Jews, known as God-fearing or proselytes, had embraced some beliefs of Judaism, but not the Torah as a whole, and also remitted valuable donations to the Temple.

The rest of the province was made up of Hellenistic-type cities, with the civic institutions of the polis such as the Assembly and the Bulé, adorned with Greek-style public buildings and temples, and by rural villages dependent on them or on powerful absentee landowners, some of them members of the imperial family or the Herodian dynasty. On the fringes were Arab tribes linked to the independent kingdom of the Nabataeans, with their capital at Raqmu (Petra).

Some cities in the province, such as Ashkelon, or neighboring cities, such as those that made up the Decapolis, depended directly on the province of Syria, although they maintained close commercial and cultural ties with Judea.

Languages

The language spoken in the province was predominantly Koine Greek. Although the Roman administration made use of Latin in inscriptions and some documents, Greek was used for conversation, drafting contracts, local coinage, and literary texts. In Judea, Samaria and Galilee, Aramaic was also used, which had been the language of common use in the region since at least the Persian empire. It was a particular variant of Aramaic, later called Palestinian Aramaic, which was widespread mainly in rural areas, and was one of the dominant languages of the province. The use of Hebrew during this period is a disputed issue, the accepted version with almost no exceptions until the middle of the 20th century, was that shortly before the beginning of the Christian Era, Hebrew had ceased to be spoken even in Judea, replaced by Aramaic., as evidenced by some expressions in the New Testament. The discovery of contemporary manuscripts in Qumran and Wadi Muhabarat and the study of the Mishnaic texts reveal the widespread use of the Hebrew language, as a living language and understandable by large sectors of the population. Recent studies postulate a situation of trilingualism in the province: Hebrew, with Aramaic, as the local and religious language, Aramaic for exchange with the peoples of the interior or Mesopotamia, as well as for internal commercial affairs, and Greek as the language of relations with other provinces of the empire, the Roman administration and international culture. Other authors, without denying the above, consider a geographical division; Aramaic as the vernacular language of Galilee and Samaria, and Hebrew as the language of the aristocracy in Judea. Greek, for its part, was the main means of communication in the cities of the coast and in the upper class of Jerusalem, but not from the popular classes who spoke mostly Aramaic in the city and Hebrew in the countryside.

History

The history of the province can be divided into five periods:

1) the government of the prefects between Augustus and Claudius

2) autonomy under King Herod Agrippa I

3) the government of the procurators between Claudius and Nero, which led to

4) the First Judeo-Roman War

5) the military government of the legacies between the capture of the province and the outbreak of the Bar Kojba Rebellion.

Prefects (6-41)

In the year 6, the ethnarchy of Archelaus (Judea, Samaria and Idumea) came under direct Roman administration as a second-order province called Judea. In the internal order it was divided into administrative districts whose number varied according to the extension of the territory The capital was Caesarea, where the prefect resided, who moved to Jerusalem, the most important city and the center of the Jewish people, during religious celebrations, especially Easter. The province was created at the behest of the Jewish aristocracy, which is why it enjoyed extensive powers under Roman command; this included the right to judge under their own laws and courts and even the exercise of capital punishment until 28 AD. During this period, except for extraordinary events, there were no riots or signs of discontent among the population, although there are indications of some incidents during the prefecture of Pontius Pilate.

The first act of Roman administration was the conduct of a tax census, conducted by the Roman governor (legate) of Syria; Quirinius. This caused riots and, according to Josephus, the birth of the Zealot party. According to the Christian texts that make up the so-called New Testament and, possibly, Flavio Josephus (see: Flavian testimony) as well as the most recent research, Jesus of Nazareth lived at this time, considered the Messiah by some contemporary Jews, from whose movement Christianity originated.

Despite some unrest, the province was not the scene of major revolts against Roman rule since the end of Augustus's empire and under Tiberius (AD 7–37), only at the end of Caligula's reign (37–41). the first crisis between the empire and the Jews took place (see Episode of the statue of Caligula below), which was resolved by the intervention of Agrippa, king of Galilee and friend of the emperor, or, according to other sources, with the death of the sovereign.

First prefects

Coponium

Coponius was the first prefect of the province after its organization. During his administration, the revolt of Judas the Galilean took place, related to the census, which this prefect ended, and the arrival of Roman troops in the province.A door in the Temple of Jerusalem bore, for unknown reasons, his name.

Valerio Grato

The sources do not mention any notable events under the next two prefects, Marco Ambivulo and Annio Rufo. In the year 15, already under the rule of Tiberius, Valerio Grato is appointed prefect, a position that he will hold until the 26th. During his government, he frequently intervened in the election of the High Priest; He deposed Annas, naming Ishmael ben Fabo, first, then Eleazar, one of Annas's sons, then Simon ben Camith, and finally Joseph Caiaphas, Annas's son-in-law. In the novel Ben Hur , Grato appears as a cruel and corrupt governor, who condemns the protagonist to the galleys.

Pontius Pilate

Pilate was appointed by Tiberius, at the behest of his praetorian prefect, Sejanus, an adversary of Agrippina and a prominent anti-Jew. He attempted to introduce images of the emperor into Jerusalem and to build an aqueduct with funds from the Temple. Some authors point out that these disagreements with the Jewish people led him to transfer his command center from Caesarea to Jerusalem in order to better control the revolts, especially since armed groups opposed to Roman power began to operate in the province. Pontius Pilate was relieved of command of Judea in AD 36, after harshly suppressing a revolt by the Samaritans, during which he crucified several rioters.

Last Prefects

Marcelus was Pilate's successor. Friend of Vitellius, governor of Syria, there is no certainty that he held the position of prefect, in fact, Josephus calls him epimeletēs ( ἐπιμελητής ) that is, supervisor. After a year, he was succeeded by Marullo, appointed by Caligula, the last prefect, who was in office until the year 41. During his term, an attempt to place the statue of the emperor in the Temple took place, but there are no records of his intervention. in the facts. After Caligula's death, the new emperor, Claudius, gave command of the province to Herod Agrippa with the title of king.

Statue of Caligula Episode

The Emperor Caligula wanted to impose the cult of the imperial divinity throughout the Roman world. The practice of this cult, of Hellenistic roots, was common in the Empire, but always at the initiative of the provincials. In this case, and for reasons that are not entirely clear, it was the emperor himself who promoted him and announced his desire for his statue to be enthroned with the emblems of Jupiter and the name Zeus Epiphanes Neos Gaios, in the Temple of Jerusalem. This horrified the Jewish subjects of the Empire and caused disturbances in the Diaspora, both in Rome, Alexandria, Thessalonica, Antioch and Judea, particularly in Galilee, then ruled by Agrippa, son of Aristobulus IV. and grandson of Herod the Great.

The person in charge of the mission was not the governor of Judea, but his superior, the new proconsul of Syria, Publius Petronius, who had two legions stationed in Ptolemaida, with which he would march to Jerusalem carrying the image cast in Sidon. The inhabitants of Galilee, with the support of the Jewish religious authorities, went to the residence of Petronius to protest. The Galileans and the inhabitants of Judea threatened to burn the harvest and prepared for the fight (Josephus indicates a peaceful protest, but Tacitus expressly mentions the intention to "take up arms"). Faced with this situation, the proconsul traveled to Tiberias, where he met with representatives of the aristocracy and with Aristobulus, Agrippa's brother (he was in Rome). Convinced that a great revolt was imminent, Petronius tried to dissuade the emperor by means of of letters, in which he exposed the situation of the province. Caligula's first response is quite moderate, although other sources report an 'angry' response.

Agrippa's Intervention

During these events, Agrippa was in Rome with Caligula, with whom he had an old friendship; learning of the facts after a few days of reflection, he took sides and risked helping his Jewish compatriots in the defense of the Temple threatened with desecration. Agrippa spoke with the emperor (during a banquet, according to Josephus, through a letter in Philo's account) and began by gratefully recalling all the benefits he had received from Caligula, but clearly stating that he would voluntarily exchange them for only one thing: "that the ancestral institutions be undisturbed. Because what about my reputation among my countrymen and other men? Either I have to be considered a traitor to myself or I have to stop being counted among your friends; there is no other option..." At first, Caligula seemed to give in to his friend's plea and instructed Petronius to suspend his march towards Jerusalem, while warning the Jewish populations not to do anything against the shrines, statues and altars. erected in his honor. Later, however, he reversed his decision and it was his assassination that put an end to the company and prevented popular uprisings. Flavius Josephus relates that the emperor, suspecting that Petronius had been bribed, ordered him to commit suicide, but this letter arrived after the announcement of Caligula's death; in which Josephus sees the action of Providence.

Ancient Roman gate, known as Bab al-'Amud, in the old city of Jerusalem.

Autonomy under Herod Agrippa (41-44)

The Emperor Claudius, who according to Josephus owed his power to Herod Agrippa, Herod's grandson and king of Galilee replacing Antipas, granted him the title of King of the Jews in the year 41. Although this was fortunate After the restoration of the Herodian dynasty and Judea obtained a wide autonomy, there are no indications to think that it ceased to be a province to once again become a client kingdom.

Agrippa followed an internal policy aimed at favoring coexistence between the two ethnic groups of the province, the Jews and the "Greeks"; testimony of this was the existence of two capitals; Jerusalem, the center of religious life, and Caesarea, built as a small Rome. In the first, he favored the party of the Pharisees, who were the most respected by the population, and developed an ambitious public works program, financed by with the treasury of the Temple, which extended the urban area to the north, Bezeta, and built a new belt of walls in the north and west, the most vulnerable places in the city. In the "Greek" He continued the evergetism policy of his grandfather Herod, financing amphitheaters and baths, as well as offering games, including gladiators prohibited by Jewish law. In foreign policy, he sought to maintain good relations with other Middle Eastern client sovereigns. This initiative, as well as the fortification of Jerusalem, made him suspect in the eyes of the Roman Syrian authorities.

However, his government was so brief that it did not significantly modify the current domain relations. Indeed, Agrippa died in the year 44 after three years of reign, during the games in honor of Claudius that took place in Caesarea. His death was, according to rumors of the time, the result of a poisoning by order of the Syrian legate, Vibio Marso, due to his attempts to increase his autonomy, although it is also possible that it was a disease. Agrippa I was the last king of the Jews and, according to some historians, the expectations of recovering the country's freedom aroused by his brief reign were one of the causes of the Jewish revolt that broke out twenty years later.

Attorneys (44-66)

Agrippa II, the young son of Agrippa, did not receive his father's domains. Claudio put the territory, once again, under direct Roman control, adding the regions of Galilee and Perea. Procurators were placed at the head of the administration of this new province of Judea, always based in Caesarea. These officials, of equestrian rank and even freedmen, reported directly to the emperor, in whose name they acted. Their choice is usually interpreted as an indication of Claudio's distrust of Marso, in fact Cuspio Fado, the first of them, was commissioned to investigate the riots that occurred after Agrippa's death.

At this point the first signs of rebellion against Roman rule began. Theudas, who claimed to be a prophet, led a crowd toward the Jordan announcing that the river would part, as of old under Joshua, to let them pass. Fado, aware of the messianic implications of this preaching, had him executed. Two years later he was succeeded in office by Tiberius Julius Alexander, of Alexandrian Jewish origin, but who had abandoned the religion of his ancestors to pursue a career in the Roman administration. He was a procurator well connected with the Jewish aristocracy, since he was the son of the alabarch of Alexandria and was related to the family of Agrippa; there is no news of revolts during his government, although he was responsible for executing, by crucifixion, James and Simon, sons of the zealot Judas of Galilee. A severe famine was recorded in Judea and surrounding regions at this time.

At that moment, in the year 48, Agrippa II, already of legal age, received from Claudius the tiny kingdom of Chalcis (today Anjar in Lebanon), where his uncle had reigned, and the title of King of the Jews, purely nominal but implying the supervision of the Temple. In the year 53, Agrippa II ceded the kingdom of Chalcis to his nephew and received in return the ancient Tetrarchy of Philip (Iturea and Traconitida) and the Tetrachy of Lysanias.

Alexander's successor was Ventidius Cumanus; It is disputed, due to the discrepancy between the sources, whether his authority extended to the entire province, since Tacitus alludes to Felix as the authority of Judea and Samaria, Cumano being in charge of Galilee, while Josephus, closer to the facts, He considers him attorney for the entire province. The truth is that in this period the riots in the region increased. The first took place during Easter; Faced with the influx of pilgrims to Jerusalem, Cumano ordered the local detachment to position itself in the vicinity of the Temple in order to maintain order. However, these soldiers began to mock the customs of the Jewish people, uttering offensive names. The representatives of the town appeared before the procurator to complain, but the crowd went to action and stoned the offenders. Unable to deal with the mob on his own, Cumano called for reinforcements and fortified himself in the Antonia Fortress, a easily defended building that dominated the city and the Temple. Flavius Josephus estimates that in the stampede that followed the arrival of the Romans between 20,000 and 30,000 people were crushed to death, although these figures are probably an exaggeration, the truth is that the death toll was considerable.

Some time later, Esteban, an imperial slave, was robbed near Beth Horón; In response to the robbery, Cumano sent troops to all the nearby towns with orders to arrest the leaders of these towns. A soldier from one of these detachments publicly destroyed a copy of the Torah, which caused a new disturbance. A delegation of Jews met with the prosecutor to demand the punishment of the guilty. The governor acted decisively, had the person responsible arrested and, after a trial, sentenced him to death. The soldier was beheaded and calm was briefly restored.

The next event took place in Samaria and ended up costing Cumano his job. Some Galilean pilgrims were allegedly killed by Samaritans. A Galilean embassy raised the case with the procurator, but it was not taken into account, according to Josephus, because Cumano had been bribed by the Samaritans. Eleazar and Alexander, two Zealots, organized a militia, attacked Samaria and plundered the region, killing several samaritans. Cumano ordered the repression; the insurgents were defeated, some were executed, others were taken prisoner, and the rest were convinced by the leaders in Jerusalem to give up the fight. Despite the pacification of the territory, guerrillas began to operate in rural areas.

The Samaritans, for their part, sent an embassy to the Syrian legate, Gaius Umidius Durmius Square, to complain about the attack by the Jews. These, in turn, also appealed to the legate, blaming the Samaritans for the violence and accusing Cumano of supporting them. Cuadrado agreed to investigate, and began his investigations in Judea in 52, where he ordered that all Jewish prisoners who Cumanos had captured them to be crucified and ordered the beheading of other Jews and Samaritans who had been involved in the fighting.

Faced with the accusations against him, Cumano was summoned to Rome, along with several Jewish and Samaritan leaders, to answer to Claudius. The accused included the High Priest Ananias. During the process, several of the most influential freedmen of the imperial court positioned themselves on the side of Cumano, but the Jews had the support of Herod Agrippa II, a friend of Claudius. The process was favorable to the Jews, the Samaritan leaders were executed and Cumano was sent into exile.

The new attorney was Marco Antonio Félix, brother of Pallas, the freedman and secretary of Claudio, to whom he owed his appointment. He took as his wife Drusilla, daughter of Agrippa I and sister of Agrippa II, who divorced her previous husband, the king of Emesa, Gaius Julius Azizo. Félix's government, according to sources, was marked by corruption and cruelty, which caused an increase in riots in the province. In Rome, Felix was accused of taking advantage of a dispute over citizenship rights between Jews and "Greeks"; in Caesarea to extort money from its inhabitants, but given the influence of Pallas before Nero, the new emperor, he was able to get away with it.

Bronze coin (prutah) coined by Porcio Festo. Antiverse: Greek letters NO. WNOO (Nero) with a crown and X. Reverso: Greek letters KAICAPOC (César) and the date LE (year 5 = 58/59), along with a bouquet of palm.

Felix's successor was Porcius Festus, whose beginning of office is not clear, but who seems to have taken place between 58 and 60, according to numismatic data. Festus inherited from his predecessor the discussion about the right of citizenship in the polis of Caesarea. The "Greek" he considered that the Jewish inhabitants lacked the same, since the city was not an integral part of the old kingdom and had been founded for non-Jews. These, for their part, claimed to be since a Jewish king, Herod, had founded it and it was the capital of the province. This fact was the trigger of the war. Another conflict during his government was the controversy between Agrippa II and the priests of the Temple, for the construction of a wall that prevented the view of the courtyard from the king's palace; discussion that questioned the supervisory role of the monarch over the Jewish national sanctuary. Festus died in his charge, possibly of tuberculosis.

In 62, Luceyo Albino took command. Before his arrival, the High Priest Ananias ben Ananias sentenced the religious leader of the Christians, James, known as the Just, to death by stoning. This fact provoked the protests of a large part of the town and a delegation was sent to the new attorney to account for the illegality committed by the priest. Albino reproached Ananias for having assembled the Sanhedrin without his permission and King Agrippa deposed the pontiff, putting Jesus ben Damneo in his place. Nonetheless, Ananias continued to be an important political figure and sought support among the Zealots.

Albino's successor was Gesio Floro, who took office in 64. A native of Clazómenas, his wife was a friend of Poppaea Sabina, the wife of Nero, in whose favor his appointment may have been due. According to Flavio Josefo, his greed and incompetence were one of the causes that motivated the riots in Jerusalem that triggered the first Judeo-Roman war. Under his rule, part of Galilee, the cities of Tiberias and Tariquea, and some regions of Perea were segregated from the province of Judea and incorporated into the kingdom of Agrippa II, which comprised the former Tetrarchy of Philippo.

According to the account of Josephus, his contemporary, Florus hastened the outbreak of the rebellion by assuming a marked anti-Jewish leaning. This was not due, however, to prejudice against that people, but to their venality. For this reason, he protected the so-called hit men, in exchange for receiving a part of the loot, and allowed the Greek citizens of Caesarea to act in a conflict with the Jewish citizens, simply because the former paid so that he did not interfere in the matter. Faced with the protest of the Judean aristocracy, Florus responded by putting the envoys in prison.

War against Rome

Preliminaries

The revolt began in the year 66 in Caesarea, when, after winning a legal dispute against the Jews, the Greeks perpetrated a pogrom against the neighborhood in which the Roman garrison did not intervene. The anger of the Jews was It increased when it was learned that the procurator Gesio Floro had stolen money from the temple treasury. Thus, in an act of defiance, the son of the high priest, Eleazar ben Ananias, ceased the prayers and sacrifices in the temple in honor of the Roman emperor and ordered an attack on the Roman garrison in Jerusalem. The tetrarch of Galilee and governor of Judea, Herod Agrippa II, and his sister Berenice fled while Gaius Cestius Gallus, the Roman legate in Syria, assembled a large force at Acre to march on Jerusalem and put down the rebellion.

Self-government

Silver coin (half shekel) coined by the autonomous government of Judea. Pale-object characteristics. Inverse: "Year 3 (equivalent at 68/9). Shekel of Israel", and cup of a capacity omer with a perched edge. Reverso: "Jerusalem, the Holy One", and branch with three grenades. The coinage of silver coin was a right reserved for the imperial government.

As a result of the disturbances in Judea, Gallus marched with the XII Fulminata Legion, reinforced with units of III Gallica, IV Scythica and VI Ferrata, as well as auxiliaries and allies, numbering some thirty thousand strong, to restore order. After a few victories, he withdrew to the coast, where he was ambushed and defeated by Judean rebels at the Battle of Beth Horon, a Jewish triumph that shocked Rome, with six thousand legionaries killed and the loss of the aquila of the XII. Gallus barely escaped and withdrew to Antioch where he died the following year.

The victorious Judean militias, which included aristocrats but with support from the peasantry led by Simon Bar Giora, seized the initiative and attempted to expand their control to the city of Ashkelon, but such a campaign proved disastrous and the tactic was abandoned. of open combat.

In Jerusalem an Assembly, or an assembly, was convened, the text of Josephus is not conclusive, and it was resolved to form an autonomous government from an alliance of the most important political-religious movements: Pharisees, Essenes, Zealots and sadducees The deposed high priest Ananias ben Ananias was one of the heads of government along with Joseph ben Gurion and Jesus ben Gamla. The city walls were reinforced and governors were appointed for the different districts of the province. Joseph (Josephus) ben Mataiah, the future historian Flavius Josephus, was appointed commander in Galilee and Golan, Joseph ben Simon, was left in charge of Jericho, John, the Essenes was sent to Lydda and the region of Timna and Eleazar ben Ananias, Niger of Perea and Jesus ben Sapphas received command of Idumea.

The assassins, excluded from power, tried to take control of the city under the command of Menahem ben Yehuda, but they were defeated and their leader executed. The surviving hitmen fled from Jerusalem and seized Masada, which was held by the Romans, from where they controlled the Judean desert. Simon bar Giora, a charismatic and radical peasant leader, was also expelled from Jerusalem by the new government, and his supporters joined the Masada hitmen where they remained until the winter of 67-68.

Roman campaign in Galilee

Nero sent General Vespasian in command of the X Fretensis and V Macedonian legions to crush the rebellion. The Roman troops landed in Ptolemaida in April 67, where they were joined by his son Titus, at the head of the XV Apollinaris legion, coming from Alexandria. Auxiliaries sent by the region's client kings, including Agrippa II, reinforced the army, which eventually numbered over 60,000 soldiers.

Military operations began with the subjugation of Galilee. The forces in the region were made up of the troops sent by the central government in Jerusalem, under the command of Josephus, who had the partial support of the local aristocracy, and the Galilean militias, Zealots or their sympathizers, made up of peasants, fishermen and refugees.. Faced with the Roman advance, some cities decided to surrender without resistance, such as Sepphoris and Tiberias, whose citizens found that the provisional government could not defend them and with the prospect of falling into the hands of the Zealots. Others, however, put up strong resistance, among them Tariquea, Gamala and Jotapat. In the latter, the legate of Jerusalem, Josephus, was captured, who saved his life by going over to the Roman side. The Zealot fortress of Giscala was abandoned by its defenders during the siege, who decided to withdraw to Jerusalem.

Map of territories controlled by the autonomous government of Judea during the war of 66-73: Roman province of Syria Judea controlled by Rome at the beginning of the uprising Under Jewish control (66-67) Under Jewish control (66-68) Under Jewish control (66-70) Under Jewish Control (66-73)

In the winter of 68, the Jewish resistance in Galilee had been crushed, so Vespasian established his headquarters in Caesarea Maritima, dedicating himself to the repression of the rebels on the coast, avoiding direct confrontation with the rebels fortified in Judea.

Civil war in Judea

Vespasian remained in Caesarea until the spring of 68, preparing for the campaign in the highlands of Judea and Samaria. The rebels driven out of Galilee, occupied Joppa, destroyed by Cestius Gallus, and built a light flotilla to cut off the grain supply from Alexandria to Rome.

In Jerusalem, the arrival of the Galilean fugitives changed the balance of power. Juan de Giscala, a Zealot leader, allied himself with the local militia of Eleazar ben Simón, seizing entire neighborhoods of the city. The aristocratic government was unable to maintain order and a factional struggle began that would lead to civil war.

A rumor spread, according to false Josephus, that the provisional government had come to terms with the Roman army, whereupon a force of twenty thousand Idumeans marched to defend the city. The Zealots allowed them entry and with their help overthrew the aristocratic government, executing its top leaders and seizing the Temple. Upon learning of these facts, Simon bar Giora left Masada and settled in Idumea, joining forces with local leader Jacob ben Susa.; at this time, supporters of the deposed government called him into the city to restore order.

Judean Campaign

In the spring of 68, Vespasian began a systematic campaign in Judea: Afec, Lydda, Yavne and Jaffa fell to the Romans. He then attacked Idumea and Perea, ending up in the highlands of Judea and Samaria. Gofna, Bethel, Jericho and Hebron had already been recaptured in July 69. At that time, the Essene community of Qumran was attacked and dispersed, but before they hid their library in nearby caves, where it would be found in 1948.

At the same time, in Rome, the Senate, with the support of the Praetorian Guard, declared Nero an enemy of the people; the deposed emperor fled Rome and committed suicide. Galba, governor of Hispania, seized power, but was assassinated a few months later by his rival Otto, which triggered a civil war in what is known in history as the "year of the four emperors." Indeed, Vitellius, military commander in Lower Germany, rebelled and deposed Otto, but was not recognized by the eastern provinces. The legions under the command of Vespasian, acclaimed him emperor in July 69, with the agreement of the governor of Syria, Muciano, and of Egypt, Tiberius Alexander. Vespasian then marched against Vitellius to seize power and left his son Titus in Judea to end the war.Titus advanced rapidly through the mountainous region, causing a huge wave of refugees into the fortified Jerusalem. The rebels, for their part, avoided direct confrontation with the Roman troops. At the end of 69, the Romans found themselves in front of the Jewish capital and prepared the siege. Some later Christian writers noted that at this time, the city's Judeo-Christians fled to Pella in Perea.

Siege and fall of Jerusalem

Jerusalem, the fortified capital city of the province, was held by two rival factions. On the one hand, the zealots of Juan de Gíscala, who controlled the Temple, and on the other, the assassins of Bar Giora. Both groups were at odds with each other and only ceased hostilities and joined forces to defend the city when the Romans began building siege walls. Indeed, unable to break through the city's defences, the Roman armies established a permanent camp on the outskirts, dug a moat around the walls and erected a fortification that completely surrounded it. This type of siege, already used by the legions since the time of Caesar, was intended to prevent the eventual arrival of reinforcements but, above all, to prevent the flight of the besieged in order to reduce them due to hunger. Numerous Jews fleeing the city were crucified daily.

In the summer of 70, after a seven-month siege, Tito's troops breached the city walls, taking advantage of its weakest point: the third wall, built shortly before the seat. The fight in the city was house to house, and until the end the zealots of Juan de Giscala kept the Temple in their power, converted into a fortress. The assassins under the command of Simón Bar Giora, resisted in the Upper City. On July 29 or 30, 70, the Temple was taken, looted and destroyed, a moment that Jewish tradition commemorates with the so-called Tisha b'Av. The conquest of the remainder of the city was completed by early September; the walls and the rest of the city were completely destroyed. The leaders Juan de Giscala and Simón bar Giora were taken prisoner.

According to Josephus, present at the siege, more than a million people died during the siege and the survivors, some 97,000, were turned into slaves. While these numbers have been disputed, the truth it is that the demographic consequences of the war were great for the Jews living in and around Jerusalem. Many were sold in the markets of the reconquered province and others were taken to Rome where they were part of Titus' triumph and worked on the construction of the Forum of Peace and the Colosseum. As for Simon, as an enemy leader, he was beheaded during the victory celebrations and Juan ended his days in prison. The immense treasures of the Temple were part of the imperial treasury and some of the spoils, such as the Menorah, are represented on the Arch of Titus.

In the province, after the conquest of Jerusalem, some fortresses such as Macheron and Masada continued in the hands of the rebels, the capture of the latter, in 73, marked the definitive end of the war.

Judea under the rule of the Legates

After the war, the emperor decided that Judea would have the presence of a senatorial-ranking governor capable of commanding legions. For this reason, Judea became a Roman province separated from Syria, although it kept its old name. This meant that it was the seat of a legion, the X Fretensis, whose headquarters were the ruins of Jerusalem, although the governor resided, with other detachments of the X, in Caesarea, to which Vespasian had become a Roman colony. Until the first half of the 2nd century, the governor of Judea, and therefore the province, was of praetorian rank, but, from about 120, it became a consular province; that is, of the first category.As a reward for his loyalty, Agrippa II held his kingdom until his death (ca. 93/94 or 100), at which time it again became part of the province under strict Roman control.

The destruction of Jerusalem marked a turning point in the history of the province. The population of Jewish origin, especially in Judea proper, dwindled and ceased to influence the affairs of the Jewish communities in the Galilee and Diaspora, where the synagogue became the center of Jewish life and rabbis replaced the priests as community leaders. Certain authors consider that only from this time can one speak of Judaism. Indeed, before Vespasian left for Rome, Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai obtained his permission to establish a rabbinical school at Yavne, which became an important center of Mishnaic study whose influence was felt beyond the province..

Despite the defeat, tensions between Jews and Greeks continued to be present in the region, although not in the Diaspora where, except for the Fiscus judaicus, Jewish communities felt protected by Roman law. However, due to unknown circumstances, this situation began to change in some regions such as Cyprus, Cyrenaica and Egypt, where some groups of Jews rose up in arms again during 115-117. This episode, which marginally affected Judea, is known as the Kitos War, and also involved the Jews residing in Mesopotamia.

War of Kitos

The immediate causes of the war are unknown, but it is part of the Parthian war waged by Trajan in 113. At the end of the campaign, when the emperor had already conquered Mesopotamia (year 116) the revolt broke out. The Jewish rebels residing in the new province began to attack the small garrisons in the rear. At the same time, a rebellion by Jews broke out in Cyrenaica and soon spread to Egypt and Cyprus, eventually reaching Judea, where an uprising centered on Lydda threatened the grain supply from Egypt to the front. The Jewish insurrection spread rapidly, especially in Mesopotamia, where cities with significant Jewish populations such as Nisibis, Edessa, Seleucia, and Arbela joined the rebellion and massacred their small Roman garrisons. The revolt was crushed by the legions under the command of Lusio Quieto, whose name identifies the conflict in Jewish history, since "Kitos" is the Hebrew form of Quiet.

The Jewish leader of Cyrene, Lukuas, also called Andrew by some sources, fled to Judea where he met with local leaders, the brothers Julián and Pappo. They put their headquarters in Lydda, which was besieged by Quietus, expressly sent by Trajan. The city was taken and the rebels executed.

At that time the death of the emperor and the ascension to the throne of Hadrian took place, who abandoned the Mesopotamian conquests. Lusio Quieto was deprived of the command of the province, and died shortly after.

Judea was pacified, but the tension between Romans and Jews continued. Hadrian sent the VI Ferrata legion to the province, stationing it in Caesarea. At the same time he announced his intention to rebuild Jerusalem, which aroused the interest of the entire Jewish people.

Bar Kochba revolt

The Bar Kochba rebellion (132-135) against the Roman Empire, also known as the Second Judeo-Roman War, was the second great Jewish revolt in Judea and the last of the Judeo-Roman Wars.

Led by Simon bar Kokhba (transition from a system of family or communal land ownership to sharecropping), the presence of Roman garrisons in the province, the changes in the country's economy and administration and, above all, the repression during the Kitos War.

The immediate cause, however, seems to have been Hadrian's proposal to rebuild Jerusalem as a Roman colony, called Aelia Capitolina, by erecting a temple to Jupiter Capitolinus on the Temple Mount. Ancient Jewish and Christian testimonies emphasize the role of the Roman legate Rufus in the outbreak of the revolt.

Silver coin (tetradracma) coined during the Kojba Bar Rebellion (between 132-135), without date. Reverse: Temple Facade with the Ark of the Covenant and a star. Reverso, lulav with etrog.

Territory of the province of Judea, in red areas under Roman control, in celestial, areas under the command of the rebels.

Regarding the development of the revolt, there is a lack of sources as precise as Josephus for the first war, however, rabbinic literature, the Church Fathers and Roman historians such as Cassius Dio provide some data on it, completed from the middle of the 20th century due to the discovery of contemporary documents in wadi al-Khabat. The war is usually divided into four phases, during the first Simon and Eleazar rose up in arms in Modin and attacked the Roman garrison in Jerusalem, which inflicted heavy casualties. Troops from the VI Ferrata legion were sent to reinforce the Roman position but were unable to subdue the rebels, who almost conquered Jerusalem. Consequently additional reinforcements were sent from the neighboring provinces, with the reinforcements there were some eighty thousand Roman soldiers. According to the Talmud, which has been partly confirmed by documents, numerous Diaspora Jews headed for Judea to join the Bar Kokhba forces, which had superior numbers and knowledge of the terrain. The second phase began with the proclamation of Simon as "Prince (nasi) of Israel", being identified by the wise Jewish Rabbi Akiva as the Messiah and taking the name of "Bar Kochba" which means "Son of a star" in Aramaic, alluding to a verse from the prophecy of Jacob's star recorded in the Bible (Numbers 24:17). A large number of coins were minted with the legend "Redemption of Israel" and the name of Bar Kokhba was used as the colophon of the contracts. At the same time, in the face of the Roman advance, guerrilla tactics were employed and the rebels prepared for a defense on the ground.

The third phase began when Hadrian called in Sextus Julius Severus, then in Britain, who landed in Judea with three legions, some additional cohorts, and between 30 and 50 auxiliary units. He took the title of provincial legate and launched a massive campaign to systematically subdue the rebel forces in Judea. The size of the Roman army amassed against the rebels was much larger than that commanded by Titus sixty years earlier: almost a third of the Roman army took part in the campaign. The decisive battle took place at Tel Shalem in the Beit She'an valley, near what is now identified as the legionary camp of the VI Ferrata legion. Simon made his way to the Herodium fortress and gradually was losing ground until it was reduced to the fortress of Betar, where the fourth and final phase of the war took place against the Romans who, in the meantime, had carried out a campaign of annihilation. Betar, was besieged in the summer of 135 by the legions V Macedonica and XI Claudia, according to Jewish tradition, it was also taken at Tisha B'av, on the same day as the first and second Temples. The Jerusalem Talmud recounts the conquest of the city as a massacre.

The Romans executed eight leading members of the Sanhedrin, the so-called Ten Martyrs, including two previously executed rabbis, including R. Akiva. Bar Kochba's fate is not certain, there are two alternative traditions in the Babylonian Talmud that attribute his death to a snake bite or other natural causes during the siege or to an execution by order of the Sanhedrin as a false Messiah. After the Fall of Betar, the Roman forces unleashed a fierce repression, led mainly by the Cyrenaic III Legion. By early 136, the revolt had been completely defeated and the Jewish population wiped out in what some scholars consider to be a true genocide.

The Romans also suffered heavy losses in this war, to the point that according to Cassius Dio, Hadrian, when reporting the victory to the Senate, omitted the usual phrase: 'I and the army are well';

Disappearance of the province of Judea

After the suppression of the revolt, Hadrian decided to eradicate Judaism from the province, since he saw it as the cause of the rebellions; Consequently, he prohibited the study of the Torah, the use of the Hebrew calendar and, according to some sources, also circumcision, a prohibition in force until Antoninus Pius. The repression was particularly harsh on some rabbis, who were seen as instigators of the latest revolt.

Mosaic of the sixth century in which Cardus Maximus is seen, the main street that began at the north gate (the current gate of Damascus) and crossed the city to the south.

The city of Jerusalem, as was the imperial purpose, was rebuilt as a Roman colony with the name of Aelia (in homage to Hadrian's gens) Capitolina. New walls were erected, the cardo maximus and the decumans were drawn up, whose traces are preserved in the current old city of Jerusalem, and a sanctuary dedicated to Jupiter was built on the Temple Mount, taking advantage of the Herodian terrace. The new city was populated by Greeks and Jews were forbidden to enter it except, according to later sources, on the anniversary of the destruction of the Temple. The measures even affected the Judeo-Christian community, which had not participated in the revolt, in fact it had been persecuted by Bar Kojba, so that the Christians of Aelia were also of Greek origin. According to later texts, the site revered by the Judeo-Christians as the Sepulcher of Christ, was desecrated with the erection of a temple dedicated to Venus: although it is unknown if this was the intention, the truth is that the forum of the colony, with its temples, was located in this area.

The province ceased to be called Judea and became part of Syria, which took the name Syria Palestine (Latin: Syria Palaestina, Greek Συρία ἡ Παλαιστίνη, Syría hē Palaistínē) with capital in Antioch. In 193, the regions of Coelesyria to the north and Phoenicia to the south were elevated to the rank of province and Syria Palestine was reduced to what later became the geographical region known as Palestine, with Caesarea as its capital. This province, divided into three in the 4th century, remained until the Muslim conquest in the 7th century, when it became the Military District of Palestine (Arabic: جُنْد فِلَسْطِيْن‎, Yund Filastin).

The oldest evidence of the change of name and jurisdiction is numismatics and dates from the empire of Marcus Aurelius, although the name Palestine was already used by Greek writers, including those of Jewish origin, from the 5th century BC. C. Although the name change of the province has been presented as Adriano's decision and numerous authors link it to his anti-Jewish policy, the exact date of the event does not appear in the sources and its intention has been questioned.

The province was the seat of two legions and numerous auxiliary units, three colonies (Aelia, Caesarea and Sebaste, the ancient Samaria) and the Jewish populations, received new names, of Greco-Roman origin, and Greek settlers, although it is possible that many of these were of Jewish origin, but converted to paganism or Christianity. The center of Jewish settlement moved north towards the Galilee and the Golan.

After 135, the Jews no longer had political, urban, or territorial institutions that could support another revolt, but they managed to maintain national identity as a result of the growth of rabbinic institutions and patriarchy in the Galilee. Nor did the radical messianism of earlier periods revive until the third century, when the empire-wide economic crisis left the Jews too weak to mount any organized resistance. Rabbinic sources vividly reflect the poverty of the people in the troubled third century due to rampant inflation and the collapse of the monetary economy, famine and plague, and crime.

Syria Palaestina became much less of a problem for the imperial government than Judea. The government continued to allow Jews certain religious liberties, such as exemption from imperial worship, and gradually Roman governors allowed Jews to regain some of their communal rights, such as local courts and internal government, under the general authority of the patriarch in Tiberias. The Samaritans fared worse, as the Romans took steps to prevent a resurgence of Samaritan nationalism by founding a pagan temple on Mount Gerizim just south of Neapolis, refusing to make any concessions to Samaritan religious practices.

Judea would not again be a center of Jewish religious, cultural, or political life until the modern era, although Jews continued to populate it sporadically and important religious developments still took place there. The Galilee became a major center of rabbinical Judaism, where the Jerusalem Talmud was compiled in the 4th and 5th centuries. In the aftermath of the defeat, the maintenance of the Jewish settlement in Palestine became a major concern of the rabbinate. The Sages strove to stop the Jewish dispersion, and even forbade emigration from Palestine, branding those who settled outside its borders as idolaters.

Rulers of the province