Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 13.djvu/444

428 ISRAEL accomplished the work of the Zealots. The old magistracy of Jerusalem was destroyed, Anauus with the heads of the aristocracy and very many other respectable citizens put to death. The radicals, for the most pait not natives of the city, came into power ; John of Giscala at their head tyrannized over the inhabitants. While these events were taking place in Jerusalem, Vsspasian had subdued the whole country, with the excep tion of one or two fortresses. But as he was setting about the siege of the capital, tidings arrived of the death of Nero, and the offensive was discontinued. For almost tvo years (June 68 to April 70), with a short break, war was suspended. When Vespasian at the end of this period Titus, became emperor, he entrusted to Titus the task of reducing Jerusalem. There in the interval the internal struggle had been going on, even after the radicals had gained the mastery. As a counterpoise to John of Giscala the citizens had received the guerilla captain Simon bar Giora into the city ; the two were now at feud with each other, but were alike in their rapacity towards the citizens. John occupied the temple, Simon the upper city lying over against it on the west. For a short time a third entered into competition with the two rivals, a certain Eleazar who had separated from John and established himself in the inner temple. But just as Titus was beginning the siege (Easter, 70) John contrived to get rid of this inter loper. Titus attacked from the north. After the lower city had fallen into his hands, he raised banks with a view to the storm of the temple and the upper city. But the defenders, who were now united in a common cause, taught him by their vigorous resistance that his object was not to be so quickly gained. He therefore determined to reduce them by famine, and for this end completely sur rounded the city with a strong wall. In the beginning of July he renewed the attack, which he directed in the first instance against the temple. The tower of Antonia fell on the 5th, but the temple continued to be held notwith standing; until the 17th the daily sacrifice continued to bs offered. The Romans succeeded in gaining the outer court in August only. To drive them out, the Jews in the night of August 10-11 made a sortie, but were compelled to retire, the enemy forcing their way behind them into the inner court. A legionary flung a firebrand into an annexe of the temple, and soon the whole structure was in flames. A terrible slaughter of the defenders ensued, but John with a determined band succeeded in cutting his way out, and by means of the bridge over the Tyropoeon valley made his escape into the upper city. No attack had as yet been directed against this quarter ; but famine was working terrible ravages among the crowded population. Those in command, however, refused to capitulate unless freedom to withdraw along with their wives and children were granted. These terms being withheld, a storm, after the usual preparations on the part Fall of of the Romans, took place. The resistance was feeble ; the Jerusa- strong towers were hardly defended at all; Simon bar Giora and John of Giscala now thought only of their personal safety. In the unprotected city the Roman soldiers spread fire and slaughter unchecked (September 7, 70). Of those who survived also some were put to death ; the rest were sold or carried off to the mines and amphitheatres. The city was levelled with the ground ; the tenth legion was left behind in charge. Titus took with him to Rome for his triumphal procession Simon bar Giora and John of Giscala, along with seven hundred other prisoners, also the sacred booty taken from the temple, the candlestick, the golden table, and a copy of the Torah. He was slightly premature with his triumph ; for some time elapsed, and more than one bloody battle was necessary, before the lem. rebellion was completely stifled. It did not come wholly End of to an end until the fall of Masada (April 73). the re- 16. Even now Palestine continued for a while to be the l3enion centre of Jewish life, but only in order to prepare the way for its transition into thoroughly cosmopolitan forms. The development of thought sustained no break on account cf the sad events which had taken place, but was only directed once more in a consistent manner towards these objects which had been set before it from the time of the Baby lonian exile. On the ruins of the city and of the temple the Pharisaic Judaism which rests upon the law and the school celebrated its triumph. National fanaticism indeed The was not yet extinguished, but it burnt itself completely out rabbins in the vigorous insurrection led by Simeon bar Koziba (Bar Cochebas, 132-135). That a conspicuous rabbin, Akiba, should have taken part in it, and have recognized in Simeon the Messiah, was an inconsistency on his part which redounds to his honour. Inasmuch as the power of the rabbins did not depend upon the political or hierarchical forms of the old common wealth, it survived the fall of the latter. Out of what hitherto had been a purely moral influence something of an official position now grew. They formed themselves into a college which regarded itself as a continuation of the old synedrium, and which carried forward its name. At first its seat was at Jamnia, but it soon removed to Galilee, and remained longest at Tiberias. The presidency was hereditary in the family of Hillel, with the last descendants of whom the court itself came to an end. 1 The respect in which the synedrial president was held rapidly increased ; like Christian patriarchs under Mahometan rule, he was also recognized by the imperial government as the municipal head of the Jews of Palestine, and bore the secular title of the old high priests (nasi, ethnarch, patriarch). Under him the Palestinian Jews continued to form a kind of state within a state until the 5th century. From the non- Palestinian Jews he received offerings of money. (Comp. Gothofredus on Cod. Theod., xvi. 8, " De Juclyeis " ; and Morinus, Exer. Bibl, ii., exerc. 3, 4.) The task of the rabbins was so to reorganize Judaism Their under the new circumstances that it could continue to assert its distinctive character. What of external consistency had been lost through the extinction of the ancient com monwealth required to be compensated for by an inner centralization proportionally stronger. The separation from everything heathenish became more pronounced than before ; the use of the Greek language was of necessity still permitted, but at least the Septuagint was set aside by Aquila (Cod. Justinian., Nov. 146) inasmuch as it had now become the Christian Bible. For to this period also belongs the definitive separation between the synagogue and the church ; henceforward Christianity could no longer figure as a Jewish sect. Intensified exclusiveness was accompanied by increased internal stringency. What at an earlier period had still remained to some extent fluid now became rigidly fixed ; for example, an authentic text of the canon was now established, and at the same time the distinction between canon and apocrypha sharply drawn. The old tendency of the scribes to leave as little as possible free to the individual conscience, but to bring everything within the scope of positive ordinance, now celebrated its greatest triumphs. It was only an apparent movement in the direction of liberty, if regulations which had become quite impossible were now modified or cancelled. The most influential of the rabbins were indeed the least solicitous about the maintenance of what was old, and had no hesita- 1 The following is the genealogy of the first Nasi : Gamaliel ben Simeon (Jos., Vit., 38) ben Gamaliel (Acts v. 34, xxii. 3) lien Simeon ben Hillel. The name Gamaliel was that which occurred most frequently among the patriarchs ; see Cod. Theod., xvi. 8, 22.