 Book 4, Chapter 3 of the Wars of the Jews. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Wars of the Jews by Josephus, translated by William Weston. Chapter 3, Concerning John of Geshalla, Concerning the Zealots and the High Priest Ananas. Also how the Jews raised seditions one against another in Jerusalem. 1. Now upon John's entry into Jerusalem, the whole body of the people were in an uproar, and ten thousand of them crowded about every one of the fugitives that were come to them and inquired of them what miseries had happened abroad, when their breath was so short and hot and quick that of itself it declared the great distress they were in. Yet did they talk big under their misfortunes and pretended to say that they had not fled away from the Romans but came thither in order to fight them with less hazard, for that it would be an unreasonable and a fruitless thing for them to expose themselves to desperate hazards about Geshalla and such weak cities, whereas they ought to lay up their weapons and their zeal and reserve it for their metropolis. But when they related to them the taking of Geshalla and their recent departure as they pretended from that place, many of the people understood it to be no better than a fight. And especially when the people were told of those that were made captives, they were in great confusion and guessed those things to be plain indications that they should be taken also. But for John he was very little concerned for those whom he had left behind him but went about among all the people and persuaded them to go to war by the hopes he gave them. He affirmed that the affairs of the Romans were in a weak condition and extolled his own power. He also gested upon the ignorance of the unskillful as if these Romans, although they should take to themselves wings, could never fly over a wall of Jerusalem who found such great difficulties in taking the villages of Galilee and had broken their engines of war against their walls. Two, these harangues of John's corrupted a great part of the young men and puffed them up for the war. But as to the more prudent part and those in years there was not a man of them but foresaw what was coming and made lamentation on that account as if the city was already undone and in this confusion were the people. But then it must be observed that the multitude that came out of the country were at discord before the Jerusalem sedition began. Fortidus went from Ghashala to Cisades and Vespasian from Caesarea to Jamnia and Dezotus and took them both and when he had put garrisons into them he came back with a great number of the people who were come over to him upon his giving them his right hand for their preservation. For besides disorders and civil wars in every city and all those that were at quiet from the Romans turned their hands one against another there was also a bitter contest between those that were fond of war and those that were desirous for peace. At the first this quarrelsome temper caught hold of private families who could not agree among themselves after which those people who were the dearest to one another break through all restraints with regard to each other and everyone associated with those of his own opinion and began already to stand in opposition one to another so that seditions arose everywhere while those that were for innovations and were desirous of war by their youth and boldness were too hard for the aged and prudent men. And in the first place all the people of every place betook themselves to rapine after which they got together in bodies in order to rob the people of the country in so much that for barbarity and iniquity those of the same nation did no way differ from the Romans. Nay, it seemed to be a much lighter thing to be ruined by the Romans than by themselves. 3. Now the Roman garrisons which guarded the cities partly out of their uneasiness to take such trouble upon them and partly out of the hatred they bear to the Jewish nation did little or nothing towards relieving the miserable till the captains of these troops of robbers being satiated with rapines in the country got all together from all parts and became a band of wickedness and all together crept into Jerusalem which was now become a city without a governor and as the ancient custom was received without distinction all that belonged to their nation and these they then received because all men supposed that those who came so fast into the city came out of kindness and for their assistance although these very men besides the seditions they raised were otherwise the direct cause of the city's destruction also for as they were an unprofitable and a useless multitude they spent those provisions beforehand which might otherwise have been sufficient for the fighting men moreover besides the bringing on of the war they were the occasions of sedition and famine therein for there were besides these other robbers that came out of the country and came into the city and joining to them those that were worse than themselves omitted no kind of barbarity for they did not measure their courage by their rapines and plunderings only but proceeded as far as murdering men and this not in the night time or privately or with regard to ordinary men but did it openly in the daytime and began with the most eminent persons in the city for the first man they meddled with was Antipas one of the royal lineage and the most potent man in the whole city in so much that the public treasures were committed to his care him they took and confined as they did in the next place to Levius a person of great note with Sophus the son of Ragwell both which were of royal lineage also and besides these they did the same to the principal men of the country this caused a terrible consternation among the people and everyone contented himself with taking care of his own safety as they would do if the city had been taken in war five but these were not satisfied with the bonds into which they had put the men for mention nor did they think it safe for them to keep them thus in custody long since they were men very powerful and had numerous families of their own that were able to avenge them nay they thought the very people would perhaps be so moved at these unjust proceedings as to rise in a body against them it was therefore resolved to have them slain accordingly they sent one John who was the most bloody minded of them all to do that execution this man was also called the son of Dorcas in the language of our country footnote this name Dorcas in Greek was Tabitha in Hebrew or Syriac as in Acts 936 accordingly some of the manuscripts set it down here Tabitha or Tabeta nor can the context in Josephus be made out by supposing the reading to have been this the son of Tabitha which in the language of our country denotes Dorcas or a doe end footnote ten more men went along with him into the prison with their swords drawn and so they cut the throats of those who were in custody there the grand lying pretense these men made for so flagrant and enormity was this that these men had had conferences with the Romans for a surrender of Jerusalem to them and so they said they had slain only such as were traitors to their common liberty upon the whole they grew the more insolent upon this bold prank of theirs as though they had been the benefactors and saviors of the city six now the people were come to that degree of meanness and fear and these robbers to that degree of madness that these last took upon them to appoint high priests so when they had annulled the succession according to these families out of which the high priests used to be made they ordained certain unknown and ignoble persons for that office that they might have their assistance in their wicked undertakings for such as obtained this highest of all honors without any dessert were forced to comply with those that bestowed it on them footnote here we may discover the utter disgrace and ruin of the high priesthood among the Jews when undeserving ignoble and vile persons were advanced to that holy office by the seditious which sort of high priests as Josephus well remarks here were there upon obliged to comply with and assist those that advanced them in their in pious practices the names of these high priests or rather ridiculous and profane persons were Jesus the son of Damneus Jesus the son of Gamaliel Matthias the son of theophilus and that prodigious ignoramus Fanias the son of Samuel all whom we shall meet with in Josephus's future history of this war nor do we meet with any other so much as pretended high priest after Fanias till Jerusalem was taken and destroyed and footnote they also set the principal men at variance one with another by several sorts of contrivances and tricks and gained the opportunity of doing what they pleased by the mutual quarrels of those who might have obstructed their measures till at length when they were satiated with the unjust actions they had done towards men they transferred their contumulious behavior to God himself and came into the sanctuary with polluted feet seven and now the multitude were going to rise against them already for Ananias the ancient of the high priests persuaded them to it he was a very prudent man and had perhaps saved the city if he could have but escaped the hands of those that plotted against him these men made the temple of God a stronghold for them and a place where they might resort in order to avoid the troubles they feared from the people the sanctuary was now become a refuge and a shop of tyranny they also mixed justing among the miseries they introduced which was more intolerable than what they did for in order to try what surprised the people would be under and how far their own power extended they undertook to dispose of the high priesthood by casting lots for it whereas as we have said already it was to be sent by succession in a family the pretense they made for this strange attempt was an ancient practice while they said that of old it was determined by lot but in truth it was no better than a dissolution of an undeniable law and a cunning contrivance to seize upon the government derived from those that presumed to appoint governors as they themselves pleased eight here upon they sent for one of the pontifical tribes which is called Anayakim and cast lots which of it should be the high priest footnote this tribe or course of the high priests or priests here called Anayakim seems to the learned Mr. Loth one well versed in Josephus to be that first chronicles twenty four twelve the course of Jacob where some copies have the course of and I think this to be by no means an improbable conjecture and footnote by fortune the lot so fell as to demonstrate their iniquity after the plainest manner for it fell upon one whose name was Fanias the son of Samuel of the village after he was a man not only unworthy of the high priesthood but that did not well know what the high priesthood was such a mere rustic was he yet did they hail this man without his own consent out of the country as if they were acting a play upon the stage and adorned him with a counterfeit the they also put upon him the sacred garments and upon every occasion instructed him what he was to do this horrid piece of wickedness was sport and pastime with them but occasioned the other priests who at a distance saw their law made a jest of to shed tears and sorely lament the dissolution of such a sacred dignity nine and now the people could no longer bear the insolence of this procedure but they did all together run zealously in order to overthrow that tyranny and indeed they were gory in the son of Josephus and Simeon the son of Gamaliel who encouraged them by going up and down when they were assembled together in crowds and as they saw them alone to bear no longer but to inflict punishment upon these pests and plagues of their freedom and to purge the temple of these bloody polluters of it. The best esteemed also of the high priests Jesus the son of Gamalus and Ananus the son of Ananus when they were at their assemblies bitterly reproached the people for their sloth and excited them against the zealots. Footnote this Simeon the son of Gamaliel is mentioned as the president of the Jewish Sanhedrin and one that perished in the destruction of Jerusalem by the Jewish rabbins as Reland observes on this place. He also tells us that these rabbins mentioned one Jesus the son of Gamaliel as once a high priest but this long before the destruction of Jerusalem so that if he were the same person with this Jesus the son of Gamaliel Josephus he must have lived to be very old or they have been very bad chronologists. And footnote for that was the name they went by as if they were zealous in good undertakings and were not rather zealous in the worst actions and extravagant in them beyond the example of others. Ten and now when the multitude were gotten together to an assembly and every one was in indignation at these men seizing upon the sanctuary at their rapine and murders but had not yet begun their attacks upon them the reason of which was this that they imagined it to be a difficult thing to suppress these zealots as indeed the case was. Ananas stood in the midst of them and casting his eyes frequently at the temple and having a flood of tears in his eyes he said, quote, certainly it had been good for me to die before I had seen the house of God full of so many abominations or these sacred places that ought not to be trodden upon it random filled with the feet of these bloodshedding villains yet do I who am clothed with the investments of the High Priesthood and am called by that most venerable name of High Priest still live and am but too fond of living and cannot endure to undergo a death which would be the glory of my old age and if I were the only person concerned and as it were in the desert I would give up my life and that alone for God's sake for to what purpose is it to live among a people insensible of their calamities and where there is no notion remaining of any remedy for the miseries that are upon them for when you are seized upon you bear it and when you are beaten you are silent and when the people are murdered nobody dares so much as send out a groan openly oh bitter tyranny that we are under but why do I complain of the tyrants was it not you and your sufferance of them that have nourished them was it not you that overlooked those that first of all got together for they were then but few and by your silence made them grow to be many and by conniving at them when they took arms in effect arm them against yourselves you ought to have then prevented their first attempts when they fell are reproaching your relations but by neglecting that care in time you have encouraged these wretches to plunder men when houses were pillaged nobody said a word which was the occasion why they carried off the owners of those houses and when they were drawn through the midst of the city nobody came to their assistance they then proceeded to put those whom you have betrayed into their hands into bonds I do not say how many and of what characters those men are whom they thus served but certainly they were such as were accused by none and condemned by none and since nobody suckered them when they were put into bonds the consequence was that you saw the same person slain we have seen this also so that still the best of the herd of brute animals as it were have been still led to be sacrificed when yet nobody said one word removed his right hand for their preservation will you bear therefore will you bear to see your sanctuary trampled upon and will you lay steps for these profane wretches upon which they may mount to higher degrees of insolence will you not pluck them down from their exaltation for even by this time they had proceeded to hire enormities if they had been able to overthrow anything greater than the sanctuary they have seized upon the strongest place of the whole city you may call it the temple if you please though it be like a citadel or fortress now while you have tyranny in so great a degree walled in and see your enemies over your heads to what purpose is it to take counsel and what have you to support your minds with all perhaps you wait for the Romans that they may protect our holy places are our matters then brought to that pass and are we come to that degree of misery that our enemies themselves are expected to pity us oh wretched creatures will you not rise up and turn upon those that strike you which you may observe in wild beasts themselves that they will avenge themselves on those that strike them will you not call to mind every one of you the calamities you yourselves have suffered nor lay before your eyes would afflictions you yourselves have undergone and will not such things sharpen your souls to revenge is therefore that most honorable and most natural of our passions utterly lost I mean the desire of liberty truly we are in love with slavery and in love with those that lorded over us as if we had received that principle of subjection from our ancestors yet did they undergo many and great wars for the sake of liberty nor were they so far overcome by the power of the Egyptians or the means but that still they did what they thought fit not withstanding their commands to the contrary and what occasion is there now for a war with the Romans I meddle not with determining whether it be an advantageous and profitable war or not what pretense is there for it is it not that we may enjoy our liberty besides shall we not bear the lords of the habitable earth to be lords over us and yet bear tyrants of our own country although I must say that submission to foreigners may be born because fortune hath already doomed us to it while submission to wicked people of our own nation is too unmanly and brought upon us by our own consent however since I have had occasion to mention the Romans I will not conceal a thing that as I am speaking comes into my mind and affects me considerably it is this that though we should be taken by them God forbid the event should be so yet can we undergo nothing that will be harder to be born than what these men have already brought upon us how then can we avoid shedding of tears when we see the Roman donations in our temple while we with all see those of our own nation taking our spoils and plundering our glorious metropolis and slaughtering our men from which enormities those Romans themselves would have abstained to see those Romans never going beyond the bounds allotted to profane persons nor venturing to break in upon any of our sacred customs nay having a horror on their minds when they view at a distance those sacred walls while some that have been born in this very country and brought up in our customs and called Jews do walk about in the midst of the holy places at the very time when their hands are still warm with the slaughter of their own countrymen besides can anyone be afraid of a war abroad and that with such as will have comparatively much greater moderation than our own people have for truly if we may suit our words to the things they represent it is probable one may hereafter find the Romans to be the supporters of our laws and those within ourselves the subverters of them and now I am persuaded that every one of you here come satisfied before I speak that these over throwers of our liberties deserve to be destroyed and that nobody can so much as devise a punishment that they have not deserved by what they have done and that you are all provoked against them by those their wicked actions once you have suffered so greatly but perhaps many of you are affrighted at the multitude of these zealots and at their audaciousness as well as at the advantage they have over us in being higher in place than we are for these circumstances as they have been occasioned by your negligence so will they become still greater by being still longer neglected for their multitude is every day augmented by every ill man's running away to those that are like to themselves and their audaciousness is therefore inflamed because they meet with no obstruction to their designs and for their higher place they will make use of it for engines also if we give them time to do so but be assured of this that if we go up to fight them they will be made tamer by their own consciences and what advantages they have in the height of their situation they will lose by the opposition of their reason perhaps also God himself who has been affronted by them will make what they throw at us return against themselves and these impious wretches will be killed by their own darts let us but make our appearance before them and they will come to nothing however it is a right thing if there should be any danger in the attempt to die before these holy gates and to spend our very lives if not for the sake of our children and wives yet for God's sake and for the sake of his sanctuary I will assist you both with my counsel and with my hand nor shall any sagacity of ours be wanting for your support nor shall you see that I will be sparing of my body neither and quote 11 by these motives aninus encouraged the multitude to go against the zealots although he knew how difficult it would be to disperse them because of their multitude and their youth and the courage of their souls but chiefly because of their consciousness of what they had done since they would not yield as not so much as hoping for pardon at the last for those their enormities however aninus resolved to undergo whatever sufferings might come upon him rather than overlook things now they were in such great confusion so the multitude cried out to him to lead them on against those whom he had described in his exhortation to them and every one of them was most readily disposed to run any hazard whatsoever on that account 12 now while aninus was choosing out his men and putting those that were proper for his purpose in array for the zealots got information of his undertaking for there were some who went to them and told them all that the people were doing and were irritated at it and leaping out of the temple in crowds and by parties spared none whom they met with upon this aninus got the populace together on the sudden who were more numerous indeed than the zealots but inferior to them in arms because they had not been regularly put into array for fighting but the alacrity that everybody showed supplied other defects on both sides the citizens taking up so great a passion as was stronger than arms and deriving a degree of courage from the temple more forcible than any multitude whatsoever and indeed these citizens thought it was not possible for them to dwell in the city unless they could cut off the robbers that were in it the zealots also thought that unless they prevailed there would be no punishment so bad but it would be inflicted on them so their conflicts were conducted by their passions and at the first they only cast stones at each other in the city and before the temple and through their javelins at a distance but when either of them were too hard for the other they made use of their swords and great slaughter was made on both sides and a great number were wounded as for the dead bodies of the people their relations carried them out to their own houses but when any of the zealots were wounded he went up into the temple and defiled that sacred floor with his blood in so much that one may say that it was their blood alone that polluted our sanctuary now in these conflicts the robbers always sallied out of the temple and were too hard for their enemies but the populace grew very angry and became more and more numerous and reproached those that gave back and those behind would not afford room to those that were going off but forced them on again to let length they made their whole body to turn against their adversaries and the robbers could no longer oppose them but were forced gradually to retire into the temple when Ananas and his party fell into it at the same time together with them footnote it is worth noting here that this Ananas the best of the Jews at this time and the high priest who was so very uneasy at the profanation of the Jewish courts of the temple by the zealots did not however scruple the nation of the court of the Gentiles as in our savior's days it was very much profaned by the Jews and made a marketplace nay a den of thieves without scruple Matthew 21 verses 12 and 13 Mark 11 verses 15 to 17 accordingly Josephus himself when he speaks of the two inner courts tells them both Hagia or holy places but so far as I remember never gives that character of the court of the Gentiles and footnote this horribly affrighted the robbers because it deprived them of the first court so they fled into the inner court immediately and shut the gates now Ananas did not think fit to make any attack against the holy gates although the other through their stones and darts at them from above he also deemed it unlawful to introduce the multitude into that court before they were purified he therefore chose six thousand armed men and placed them as guards in the cloisters so there was a succession of such guards one after another and everyone was forced to attend in his course although many of the chief of the city were dismissed by those that then took on them the government upon their hiring some of the poorer sort and sending them to keep the guard in their stead 13 now it was John who as we told you ran away from as the occasion of all these being destroyed he was a man of great craft and wore about him in his soul a strong passion after tyranny and at a distance was the advisor in these actions and indeed at this time he pretended to be of the people's opinion and went all about with Ananas when he consulted the great men every day and in the night time also when he went round the watch but he divulged their secrets to the zealots and everything that the king wanted about was by his means known to their enemies even before it had been well agreed upon by themselves and by way of contrivance how he might not be brought into suspicion he cultivated the greatest friendship possible with Ananas and with the chief of the people yet did this overdoing of his turn against him for he flattered them so extravagantly that he was but the more suspected and his constant attendance everywhere even when he was invited to be present made him strongly suspected of betraying their secrets to the enemy for they plainly perceived that they understood all the resolutions taken against them at their consultations nor was there anyone whom they had so much reason to suspect of that discovery as this John yet was it not easy to get quit of him so potent was he grown by his wicked practices he was also supported by many of those eminent men who were to be trusted upon all considerable affairs it was therefore thought reasonable to oblige him to give them assurance of his good will upon oath accordingly John took such an oath readily that he would be on the people's side and would not betray any of their councils or practices to their enemies and would assist them in overthrowing those that attacked them and that both by his hand and his advice so Ananas and his party believed his oath and did now believe him to their consultations without further suspicion nay so far did they believe him that they sent him as their ambassador into the temple to the zealots with proposals of accommodation for they were very desirous to avoid the pollution of the temple as much as they possibly could and that no one of their nations should be slain therein. 14 but now this John as if his oath had been made to the zealots and for confirmation of his good will and not against them went into the temple and stood in the midst of them and spake as follows that he had run many hazards to their accounts and in order to let them know of everything that was secretly contrived against them by Ananas and his party but that both he and they should be cast into the most imminent danger unless some providential assistance were afforded them for that Ananas made no longer delay but had prevailed with the people to send ambassadors to Vespasian to invite him to come presently and take the city and that he had appointed a fast for the next day against them that they might obtain admission into the temple on a religious account or gain it by force and fight with them there that he did not see how long they could either endure a siege nor how they could fight against so many enemies he added further that it was by the providence of God that he was himself sent as an ambassador to them for an accommodation for that our Tannis did therefore offer them such proposals that he might come upon them when they were unarmed that they ought to choose one of these two methods either to intercede with those that guarded them to save their lives or to provide some foreign assistance for themselves that if they fostered themselves with the hopes of pardon in case they were subdued they had forgotten what desperate things they had done or could suppose that as soon as the actors repented those that had suffered by them must be presently reconciled to them while those that have done injuries though they pretend to repent of them are frequently hated by the others for that sort of repentance and that the sufferers when they get the power into their hands are usually still more severe upon the actors that the friends and kindred of those that had been destroyed would always be laying plots against them and that a large body of people were very angry on account of their gross breaches of their laws and illegal judicatures in so much that although some part might commiserate them those would be quite overborn by the majority. The Wars of the Jews by Josephus translated by William Weston Chapter 4 The Idumeans being sent for by the zealots came immediately to Jerusalem and when they were excluded out of the city they lay all night there. Jesus one of the high priests makes a speech to them and Simon the Idumean makes a reply to it. 1 Now by this crafty speech John made the zealots afraid and thirsting not directly name what foreign assistance he meant but in a covert way only intimated at the Idumeans. But now that he might particularly irritate the leaders of the zealots he columnated Ananas that he was about a piece of barbarity and did in a special manner threaten them. These leaders were Eleazar the son of Simon who seemed the most plausible men of them all both in considering what was fit to be done the execution of what he had determined upon and Zacharias the son of Phaelik both of whom derived their families from the priests. 2 Now when these two men had heard not only the common threatenings which belonged to them all but those particularly leveled against themselves and besides how artinous in his party in order to secure their own dominion had invited the Romans to come to them for that also was part of John's lie and ascitated a great while what they should do considering the shortness of the time by which they were straightened because the people were prepared to attack them very soon and because the suddenness of the plot laid against them had almost cut off all their hopes of getting any foreign assistance for they might be under the height of their afflictions before any of their confederates could be informed of it. However it was resolved to call in the Idumeans this effect that Ananus had imposed on the people and was betraying their metropolis to the Romans that they themselves had revolted from the rest and were in custody in the temple on account of the preservation of their liberty that there was but a small time left wherein they might hope for their deliverance and that unless they would come immediately to their assistance they should themselves be soon in the power of artinous and the city would be in the power of the Romans. They also charged the messengers to tell many more circumstances to the rulers of the Idumeans. Now there were two active men proposed for the carrying this message and such as were able to speak and to persuade them that things were in this posture and what was a qualification still more necessary than the former they were very swift of foot for they knew well enough that these would immediately comply with their desires as being ever a tumultuous and disorderly nation always on the watch upon every motion delighting in mutations and upon their flattering them ever so little and petitioning them they soon take their arms and put themselves into motion and make haste to a battle as if it were to a feast. There was indeed occasion for quick dispatch in the carrying of this message in which point the messengers were in no way defective. Both their names were Ananias who soon came to the rulers of the Idumeans. Two. Now these rulers were greatly surprised at the contents of the letter and at what those that came with it further told them where upon they ran about the nation like mad men and made proclamation that the people should come to war so a multitude was suddenly got together sooner indeed than the time appointed in the proclamation and everybody caught up their arms in order to maintain the liberty of the messengers and 20,000 of them were put into battle array and came to Jerusalem under four commanders John and Jacob the son of Soses and besides these were Simon the son of Catholics and Phineas the son of Clusithas. Three. Now this exit of the messengers was not known either to Ananias or to the guards but the approach of the Idumeans was known to him that the gates to be shut against them and that the walls should be guarded yet did not he by any means think of fighting against them but before they came to blows to try what persuasions would do accordingly Jesus the eldest of the high priests next to Ardenas stood upon the tower that was over against them and said thus Many troubles indeed and those of various kinds have fallen upon this city have I so much wondered at her fortune as now when you are come to assist wicked men and this after a manner very extraordinary for I see that you are come to support the vilest of men against us and this with so great alacrity as you could hardly put on the like in case our metropolis had called you to her assistance against barbarians and if I had perceived that your army was composed of men like unto those who invited them your attempt so absurd for nothing does so much cement the minds of men together as the alliance there is between their manners but now for those men who have invited you if you were to examine them one by one every one of them would be found to have deserved ten thousand deaths for the very rascality and off scouring of the whole country who have spent in debauchery their own substance and by way of trial beforehand the neighboring villages and cities in the upshot of all have privately run together into this holy city they are robbers who by their prodigious wickedness have profaned this most sacred floor and who are to be now seen drinking themselves drunk in the sanctuary and expending the spoils of those whom they have slaughtered upon their insatiable bellies as for the multitude that is with you one may see them so decently adorned in their armor as it would become them to be had their metropolis called them to her assistance against foreigners what can a man call this procedure of yours but the sport of fortune when he sees a whole nation coming to protect a sink of wicked wretches I have for a good while been in doubt what it could possibly be that should move you to do this so suddenly because certainly you would not take on your armor on the behalf of robbers and against a people of kin to you without some very great cause for your so doing but we have an item that the Romans are pretended and that we are supposed to be going to betray the city to them for some of your men have lately made a clamour about these matters and have said they are come to set their metropolis free now we cannot but admire at these wretches in their devising such a lie as this against us for they knew there was no way to irritate against us men that were naturally desirous of liberty on that account the best disposed to fight against foreign enemies but by framing a tale as if we were going to betray that most desirable thing liberty but you ought to consider what sort of people they are that raise this calamity and against what sort of people that calamity is raised and to gather the truth of things not by fictitious speeches but out of the actions of both parties for what occasion is there for us to sell ourselves to the Romans while it was in our power not to have revolted from them at the first or when we had once revolted to have returned under their dominion again and this while the neighboring countries were not yet laid waste whereas it is not an easy thing to be reconciled to the Romans if we were desirous of it now they have subdued Galilee and are thereby become proud and insolent and to endeavor to please them at the time when they were so near us would bring such a reproach upon us as were worse than death as for myself indeed I should have preferred peace with them before death but now we have once made war upon them and fought with them I prefer death with reputation before living in captivity under them but further whether do they pretend that we who are the rulers of the people ascent thus privately to the Romans or hath it been done by the common suffrages of the people who themselves only that have done it let them name those friends of ours that have been sent as our servants to manage this treachery hath any one been caught as he went out on this errand or seized upon as he came back are they in possession of our letters how could we be concealed from such a vast number of our fellow citizens among whom we are conversant every hour while what is done privately in the country is it seems known by the zealots that there are few in number and under confinement also and are not able to come out of the temple into the city is this the first time that they are become sensible how they ought to be punished for their insolent actions for while these men were free from the fear they are now under there was no suspicion raised that any of us were traitors but if they lay this charge against the people this must have been done at a public consultation and not one of the people prevented from the rest of the assembly in which case the public fame of this matter would have come to you sooner than any particular indication but how could that be must there not then have been ambassadors sent to confirm the agreements and let them tell us who this ambassador was that was ordained for that purpose but this is no other than a pretense of such men as our loath to die and are laboring to escape those punishments that hang over them for if fate had determined that this city was to be betrayed into its enemy's hands no other than these men that accuse us falsely could have the impudence to do it there being no wickedness wanting to complete their impudent practices but this only that they become traitors and now you itemians are come hither ready with your arms it is your duty in the first place to be assisting to your metropolis and to join with us in cutting off those tyrants who have infringed the rules of our regular tribunals and have trampled upon our laws and made their swords the arbitrators of right and wrong for they have seized upon men of great eminence and under no accusation as they stood in the midst of the marketplace and tortured them with putting them into bonds and without bearing to hear what they had to say or what supplications they made they destroyed them you may if you please come into the city though not in the way of war to take a view of the marks still remaining of what I now say and may see the houses that have been depopulated by their rapacious hands with those wives and families that are in black mourning for their slaughtered relations as also you may hear their groans and lamentations all the city over for there is nobody but hath tasted of the incursions of these profane wretches who have proceeded to that degree of madness as not only to have transferred their impudent robberies out of the country and the remote cities into this city the very face and head of the whole nation but out of the city into the temple also for that is now made their receptacle and refuge and the fountain head whence their preparations are made against us and this place which is adored by the habitable world and honored by such as only know it by report as far as the ends of the earth is trampled upon by these wild beasts born among ourselves they now triumph in the desperate condition they are already in when they hear that one people is going to fight against another people and one city against another city and that your nation hath gotten an army together against its own bowels instead of which procedure it were highly fit and reasonable as I said before for you to join with us in cutting off these wretches and in particular to be revenge on them for supporting this very cheat upon you I mean for having the impudence to invite you to assist them of whom they ought to have stood in fear as ready to punish them but if you have some regard to these men's invitation of you yet may you lay aside your arms and come into the city under the notion of our kindred and take upon you a middle name between that of auxiliaries and of enemies and so become judges in this case however consider what these men will gain by being called into judgment before you for such undeniable and such flagrant crimes who would not vouchsafe to hear such as had no accusations laid against them to speak a word for themselves however let them gain this advantage by your coming but still if you will neither take your part in that indignation we have at these men nor judge between us the third thing I have to propose is this that you let us both alone and neither insult upon our calamities nor abide by those plotters against their metropolis for though you should have ever so great a suspicion that some of us have discourse with the Romans it is in your power to watch the passages into the city and in case anything that we have been accused of is brought to light then to come and defend your metropolis and to inflict punishment on those that are found guilty for the enemy cannot prevent you but if after all none of these proposals seem acceptable and moderate do not you wonder that the gates are shut against you while you bear your arms about you and quote for thus spake Jesus yet did not the multitude of the Idomians give any attention to what he said but were in a rage because they did not meet with a ready entrance into the city the generals also had indignation at the offer of laying down their arms and looked upon it as equal to a captivity to throw them away at any man's injunction whomesoever but Simon the son of Cathlas one of their commanders with much ado quieted the tumult of his own men and stood so that the high priests might hear him and set as follows quote I can no longer wonder that the patrons of liberty are under custody in the temple since there are those that shut the gates of our common city to our own nation and at the same time are prepared to admit the Romans into it footnote this appellation of Jerusalem given it here by Simon the general of the Idomians the common city of the Idomians who were proselytes of justice as well as of the original native Jews greatly confirms that maximum of the rabbins here set down by Rieland that quote Jerusalem was not assigned or appropriated to the tribe of Benjamin or Judah but every tribe had equal right to it at their coming to worship there at the several festivals end quote see a little before chapter 3 section 3 or worldly worship as the author to the Hebrews calls the sanctuary a worldly sanctuary and footnote nay perhaps are disposed to crown the gates with garlands at their coming while they speak to the Idomians from their own towers and enjoin them to throw down their arms which they have taken up for the preservation of its liberty and while they will not entrust the guard of our metropolis to their kindred profess to make them judges of the differences that are among them nay while they accuse some men of having slain others without a legal trial they do themselves condemn a whole nation after an ignominious manner and have now walled up that city from their own nation which used to be open to even all foreigners that came to worship there we have indeed come in great haste to you and to a war against our own countrymen and the reason why we have made such haste is this that we may preserve that freedom which you are so unhappy as to betray you have probably been guilty of the like crimes against those whom you keep in custody and have I suppose collected together the like plausible pretenses against them also that you make use of against us after which you have gotten the mastery of those within the temple and keep them in custody while they are only taking care of public affairs you have also shut the gates of the city in general against nations that are the most nearly related to you and while you give such injurious commands to others you complain that you have been tyrannized over by them and fix the name of unjust governors upon such as are tyrannized over by yourselves who can bear this your abuse of words while they have a regard for the contrarity of your actions unless you mean this that those Idomians do now exclude you out of your metropolis whom you exclude from the sacred offices of your own country one may indeed justly complain of those that are besieged in the temple that when they had courage enough to punish those tyrants whom you call eminent men and free from any accusations because of their being your companions in wickedness they did not begin with you thereby cut off beforehand the most dangerous parts of this treason but if these men have been more merciful than the public necessity required we that are Idomians will preserve this house of God and will fight for our common country and will oppose by war as well those that attack them from abroad as those that betray them from within here will we abide before the walls in our armor until either the Romans grow weary in waiting for you friends to liberty and repent of what you have done against it end quote five and now did the Idomians make an acclamation to what Simon had said but Jesus went away sorrowful and seeing that the Idomians were against all moderate councils and that the city was besieged on both sides nor indeed were the minds of the Idomians at rest for they were in a rage at the injury that had been offered them by their exclusion out of the city and when they thought the zealots had been strong but saw nothing of theirs to support them they were in doubt about the matter and many of them repented that they had come thither but the shame that would attend them in case they returned without doing anything at all so far overcame that their repentance that they lay all night before the wall though in a very bad encampment for there broke out a prodigious storm in the night with the utmost violence and very strong winds with the largest showers of rain with continued lightnings, terrible thunderings and amazing concussions and bellowings of the earth that was an earthquake these things were a manifest indication that some destruction was coming upon men when the system of the world was put into this disorder and anyone would guess that these wonderings foreshadowed some great calamities that were coming 6 now the opinion of the Idomians and their citizens was one and the same the Idomians thought that God was angry at their taking arms and that they would not escape punishment for their making war against their metropolis Aninus and his carty thought that they had conquered without fighting and that God acted as a general for them but truly they proved both ill conjectures at what was to come and made those events to be ominous to their enemies while they were themselves to undergo the ill effects of them the Idomians fenced one another by uniting their bodies into one band and thereby kept themselves warm and connecting their shields over their heads were not so much hurt by the rain but the zealots were more deeply concerned for the danger these men were in than they were for themselves and got together and looked about them to see whether they could devise any means of assisting them the hotter sort of them thought it best to force their guards with their arms after that to fall into the midst of the city and publicly open the gates to those that came to their assistance as supposing the guards would be in disorder and give way at such an unexpected attempt of theirs especially as the greater part of them were unarmed and unskilled in the affairs of war and that besides the multitude of the citizens would not be easily gathered together but confined to their houses by the storm and that if there were any hazard in their undertaking it became them to suffer anything whatsoever themselves rather than to overlook so great a multitude as were miserably perishing on their account but the more prudent part of them disapproved of this forcible method because they saw not only the guards about them very numerous but the walls of the city itself carefully watched by reason of the Idaunians they also supposed that Ananis would be everywhere and visit the guards every hour not upon other knights but was omitted that night not by reason of any slothfulness of Ananis but by the overbearing appointment of fate that so both he might himself perish and the multitude of the guards might perish with him for truly as the night was far gone and the storm very terrible Ananis gave the guards in the cloisters leave to go to sleep while it came into the heads of the zealots to make use of the saws belonging to the temple and the bars of the gates to pieces the noise of the wind and that not inferior sound of the thunder did hear also conspire with their designs that the noise of the saws was not heard by the others seven so they secretly went out of the temple to the wall of the city and made use of their saws and opened that gate which was over against the Idaunians now at first there came a fear upon the Idaunians themselves which disturbed them as imagining that Ananis and his party were coming to attack them so that every one of them had his right hand upon his sword in order to defend himself but they soon came to know who they were that came to them and were entered the city and had the Idaunians then fallen upon the city nothing could have hindered them from destroying the people every man of them such was the rage they were in at the time but as they first of all made haste to get the zealots out of custody which those that brought them in earnestly desired them to do and not to overlook those for whose sakes they were come in the midst of their distresses nor to bring them into a still greater danger for that when they had seized upon the guards it would be easy for them to fall upon the city but if the city were once alarmed they would not then be able to overcome those guards because as soon as they should perceive they were there they would put themselves in order to fight them and hinder their coming into the temple Book 4 Chapter 5 of the Wars of the Jews This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The Wars of the Jews by Josephos translated by William Weston Chapter 5 The cruelty of the edomans when they were gotten into the temple during the storm and of the zealots concerning the slaughter of Ananos and Jesus and the Harius and how the edomans retired home This advice pleased the edomans and they ascended through the city to the temple The zealots were also in great expectation of their coming and earnestly waited for them When therefore these were entering they also came boldly out of the inner temple and mixing themselves among the edomans they attacked the guards and some of those that were upon the watch but were fallen asleep they killed as they were asleep but as those that were no awakened made a cry the whole multitude arose and in the amazement they were in cold hold of their arms immediately and they took themselves to their own defense and so long as they thought there were only the zealots who attacked them they went on boldly as hoping to overpower them by their numbers but when they saw others pressing in upon them also they perceived the edomans were got in and the greatest part of them laid aside their arms together with their courage and they took themselves to lamentations but some few of the younger sort covered themselves with their armor and valiantly received the edomans and for a while protected the multitude of old men others indeed gave a signal to those that were in the city of the calamities they were in but when these were also made sensible that the edomans were come in none of them durst come to their assistance only they returned the terrible echo of wailing and lamented their misfortunes a great howling of the woman was excited also and every one of the guards were in danger of being killed the zealots also joined in the shouts raised by the edomans and the storm itself rendered the cry more terrible nor did the edomans spare anybody for as they were naturally a most barbarous and bloody nation and had been distressed by the tempest they made use of their weapons against those that had shut the gates against them and acted in the same manner as to those that supplicated for their lives and to those that fought them in so much that they ran through those with their swords who desired them to remember the relation there was between them and begged of them to have regard to their common temple now there was at present neither any place for flight nor any hope of preservation but as they were driven one upon another in heaps so where they slain thus the greater part were driven together by force as there was now no place of retirement and the murderers were upon them and having no other way through themselves down had long into the city whereby in my opinion they underwent a more miserable destruction than that which they avoided because that was a voluntary one and now the outer temple was all of it overflowed with blood and that day as it came on they saw 8500 dead bodies there but the rage of the idomans was not satiated by these slaughterers but they now betook themselves to the city and blundered every house and slew every one they met and for the other multitude they esteemed it needless to go on with killing them but they sought for the high priests and the generality went with the greatest zeal against them and as soon as they called them they slew them and then standing upon their dead bodies in way of jest a braided ananus with his kindness to the people and Jesus with his speech made to them from the wall they proceeded to that degree of impiety as to cast away their dead bodies without burial although the Jews used to take so much care of the burial of men that they took down those that were condemned and crucified and buried them before the going down of the sun I should not mistake if I said that the death of ananus was the beginning of the destruction of the city and that from this very day maybe dated the overthrow of her wall and the ruin of her affairs whereon they saw their high priest and the procurer of their preservation slain in the midst of their city he was on other accounts also a venerable and a very just man and besides the grandeur of that nobility and dignity and honor of which he was possessed he had been a lover of a kind of parity even with regard to the meanest of the people he was a prodigious lover of liberty and an admirer of a democracy in government and did ever prefer the public welfare before his own advantage and preferred peace above all things for he was thoroughly sensible that the Romans were not to be conquered he also foresaw that if necessity a war would follow and that unless the Jews made up matters with them very texturously they would be destroyed to say all in a word if Ananos had survived they had certainly compounded matters for he was a shrewd man in speaking and persuading the people and had already gotten the mastery of those that opposed his designs or were for the war and the Jews had then put abundance of delays in the ways of the Romans if they had had such a general as he was Jesus was also joined the same and although he was inferior to him upon the comparison he was superior to the rest and I cannot but think that it was because God had doomed the city to destruction as a polluted city and was resolved to purge his sanctuary by fire that he cut off these their great defenders and well-wishers while those that a little before had warned the sacred garments and had presided over the public worship and had been esteemed venerable by those that dwelt on the whole habitable earth when they came into our city were cast out naked and seen to be the food of dogs and wild beasts and I cannot but imagine that virtue itself grown at these men's case and lamented that she was here so terribly conquered by wickedness and this at last was the end of Ananos and Jesus now after these were slain the zealots and the multitude of the Edomans fell upon the people as upon a flock of profane animals and cut their throats and for the ordinary sort they were destroyed in what place so ever they caught them but for the noblemen and the youth they first caught them and bound them and shut them up in prison and put off their slaughter in hopes that some of them would turn over to their party but not one of them would comply with their desires but all of them preferred death before being enrolled among such wicked wretches as acted against their own country but this refusal of theirs brought upon them terrible torments for they were so scorched and tortured that their bodies were not able to sustain their torments till at length and with difficulty they had the favor to be slain those whom they caught in the daytime were slain in the night and then their bodies were carried out and thrown away that there might be room for other prisoners and the terror that was upon the people was so great that no one had courage enough either to weep openly for the dead man that was related to him or to bury him but those that were shut up in their own houses could only shed tears in secret and theirs not even grown without great caution and their enemies should hear them for if they did those that mourned for others soon underwent the same death with those whom they mourned for only in the night time they would take up a little dust and throw it upon their bodies and even some that were the most ready to expose themselves to danger would do it in the daytime and there were twelve thousand of the better sort who perished in this manner and now these zealots and independents were quite weary of barely killing men so they had the impudence of setting up fixtures tribunals and judicators for that purpose and as they intended to have the Harriers, the son of Baroch one of the most imminent of the citizens slain so what provoked them against him was that hatred of wickedness and love of liberty which were so imminent in him he was also a rich man so that by taking him off they did not only hope to seize his effects but also to get rid of a small that had great power to destroy them footnote some commendators are ready to suppose that this the Harriers, the son of Baroch hear most unjustly slain by the Jews in the temple was the very same person with the Harriers, the son of Barachias whom our saviour says the Jews slew between the temple and the altar Matthew 2335 this is a somewhat strange exposition since the Harrier, the prophet was really the son of Barachias and grandson of Idole the Harriers 11 and how he died we have no other account than that before us in St. Mathew while this the Harriers was the son of Baroch since the slaughter was passed when our saviour speaks these words the Jews had then already slain him whereas the slaughter of the Harriers the son of Baroch in Josephus was then about 34 years future and since the slaughter was between the temple and the altar in the court of the priest one of the most sacred and remote parts of the whole temple while this was in Josephus was own words in the middle of the temple and much the most probably in the court of Israel only for you have no intimation that the zealots had at this time profane the court of the priest nor do I believe that our Josephus who always insists on the peculiar sacredness of the inmost court under the holy house that was in it would have omitted so material an aggravation to this barbarous murder as perpetrated in a place so very holy had that been the true place of it end of the food note so they called together by a public proclamation 70 of the principal men of the populace for a show at the saviour real judges while they had no proper authority before these was the Harriers accused of a design to betray their polity to the Romans and having traitorously sent to the Spazian for that purpose now there appeared no proof or sign of what he was accused but they affirmed themselves that they were well persuaded that so it was and desired that such their affirmation might he taken for sufficient evidence now when the Harriers clearly saw there was no way remaining for his escape from them as having been treacherously called before them and then put in prison but not with any intention of a legal trial he took great liberty of speech and that despair of his life he was under accordingly he stood up and laughed at their pretended accusation and in a few words confuted the crimes laid to his charge after which he turned his speech to his accusers and went over distinctly of the law and made heavy lamentations upon the confusion they had brought public affairs to in the meantime the zealots grew to multus and had much adieu to abstain from drawing their swords although they designed to preserve the appearance and show of duty-cutter to the end there were also desires on other accounts to try the judges whether they would be mindful of what was just at their own peril now the seventy judges brought in their verdict that the person accused was not guilty as choosing rather to die themselves with him than to have his death laid at their doors here upon there arose a great clamour of the zealots upon his acquittal and they all had indignation at the judges for not understanding that the authority that was given them was but ingest so two of the boldest of them fell upon the harriers in the middle of the temple and slew him and as he fell down dead they bantered him and said though has also our verdict and this will prove a more sure acquittal to thee than the other they also threw him down from the temple immediately into the wally beneath it moreover they struck the judges with the backs of their swords and their reviews and thrust them out of the court of the temple and spared their lives with no other design than that when they were dispersed among the people in the city they might become their messengers to let them know they were no better than slaves but by this time the edomians repented of their coming and were displeased at what had been done and when they were assembled together by one of the zealots who had come privately to them he declared to them what a number of wicked pranks they had themselves done in conjunction with those that invited them and gave a particular account of what mischiefs had been done against their metropolis he said that they had taken arms as though the high priests were betraying their metropolis to the romans but had found no indication of any such treachery but that they had suckered those that had pretended to believe such a thing while they did themselves the works of war and tyranny after an insolent manner it had been indeed their business to have hindered them from such their proceedings at the first but seeing they had once been partners with them in shedding the blood of their own countrymen it was high time to put a stop to such crimes and not continue to afford any more assistance as they are subverting the laws of their forefathers for that if any had taken it ill that the gates had been shut against them and they had not been permitted to come into the city yet that those who had excluded them have been punished and Ananos is dead and that almost all those people had been destroyed in one night's time that one may perceive many of themselves now repenting for what they had done and might see the horrid barbarity of those that had invited them and that they had no regard to such as had saved them that they were so impudent as to perpetrate the vilest things and that the eyes of those that had supported them and that their wicked actions should be laid to the charge of the idioments and would be sold aged their charge till somebody obstructs their proceedings or separates himself from the same wicked action that they therefore ought to retire home since the imputation of treason appears to be a colony and that there was no expectation of the coming of the Romans at this time and that the government of the city was secured by such walls as cannot easily be thrown down and by avoiding any further fellowship with these bad men to make some excuse for themselves as to what they had been so far deluded as to have been partners with them either too End of Book 4, Chapter 5 Book 4, Chapter 6 of the Wars of the Jews This is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The Wars of the Jews by Josephus translated by William Wiston Chapter 6 How the zealots when they were freed from the Idomians slew a great many more of the citizens and how Vespasian dissuaded the Romans when they were very earnest to march against the Jews from proceeding in the war at that time The Idomians complied with these persuasions and in the first place they set those that were in the prisons at liberty being about two thousand of the populace who thereupon fled away immediately to Simon one whom we shall speak of presently After which these Idomians retired from Jerusalem and went home which departure of theirs was a great surprise to both parties for the people not knowing of their repentance pulled up their courage for a while so many of their enemies While the zealots grew more insolent not as deserted by their confederates but as freed from such men as might hinder their designs and plot some stop to their wickedness Accordingly they made no longer any delay nor took any deliberation in their enormous practices but made use of their shortest methods for all their executions and what they had once resolved upon they put in practice sooner than any one could imagine but their thirst was chiefly after the blood of valiant men and men of good families the one sort of which they destroyed out of envy the other out of fear for they thought their whole security lay in leaving no potent men alive on which account they slew Gorion a person eminent in dignity and on account of his family also he was also for democracy and of his great boldness and freedom of spirit as were any of the Jews who so ever the principal thing that ruined him added to his other advantages was his free speaking nor did Niger of Paris escape their hands he had been a man of great valor in their war with the Romans but was no drown through the middle of the city and as he went he tried out and showed the scars of his wounds and when he was drawn out of the gates and the spirit of his preservation he bestowed them to grant him a burial but as they had threatened him beforehand not to grant him any spot of earth for a grave which he chiefly desired of them so did they slay him without permitting him to be buried now when they were slaying him he made this implication upon them that they might undergo both famine and pestilence in this war and besides all that they might come to the mutual slaughter of one another all which implications God confirmed against these impious men and was what came most justly upon them when not long afterward they tasted of their own madness in their mutual seditions one against another so when this Niger was killed their fears of being overturned were diminished and indeed there was no part of the people but they found out some pretense to destroy them for some were their first slaying because they had had differences with some of them and as to those that had not opposed them in times of peace they watched reasonable opportunities to gain some accusation against them and if anyone did not come near them at all he was under their suspicion as a proud man if anyone came with boldness he was esteemed a contender of them and if anyone came as aiming to oblige them he was supposed to have some treacherous plot against them while the only punishment of crimes whether they were of the greatest or smallest sort was death nor could anyone escape unless he were very inconsiderable either on account of the meanness of his birth or on account of his fortune and now all the rest of the commanders of the Romans deemed this sedition amongst their enemies to be of great advantage to them and were very earnest to march to the city and they urged Vespasian as their lord and general in all cases to make haste and said to him that the providence of God is on our side by setting our enemies at variance against each other that still the change in such cases may be sudden and the Jews may quickly be at one again either because they may be tired out with their civil miseries or repent them of such doings but Vespasian replied that they were greatly mistaken in what they thought fit to be done as though that upon the theater love to make a show of their hands and of their weapons but do it at their own hazard considering what was for their advantage and for their security for that if they now go and attack the city immediately they shall put occasion their enemies to unite together and shall convert their force now it is in its height against themselves but if they stay a while they shall have fewer enemies because they will be consumed in this sedition that God acts as a general of the Romans better than he can do and is giving the Jews up to them without any pains of their own and granting their army a victory without any danger but therefore it is their best way while their enemies are destroying each other with their own hands and falling into the greatest of misfortunes which is that of sedition to sit still as spectators of the dangers they run into rather than to fight hand to hand with men who love murdering and are mad one against another but if anyone imagines that the glory of victory when it is gotten without fighting will be more insipid let him know this much that the glorious success quietly obtained is more profitable than the dangers of a battle for we ought to esteem these that do what is agreeable to temperance and prudence no less glorious that have gained great reputation by their actions in war that he shall lead on his army with greater force when their enemies are diminished and his own army refreshed after the continual labours they had undergone however that this is not a proper time to propose ourselves the glory of victory for that the Jews are not now employed in making of armor or building of walls nor indeed in getting together auxiliaries while the advantage will be on their side who gives them such opportunity of delay but that the Jews are vexed to pieces every day by their civil wars and dissensions and are under greater misery then if there were ones taken could be inflicted on them by us whether therefore anyone has regard to what is for our safety he ought to suffer these Jews to destroy one another or whether he has regard to the greater glory of the action we ought by no means to meddle with these men now they are afflicted with a distemper at home for should we now conquer them it would be said the conquest was not owing to our bravery but to their sedition footnote this prediction that the city Jerusalem should then be taken and the sanctuary burned by right of war when a sedition should invade Jews and their own hands should pollute the temple or when anyone should begin to slay his countrymen in the city is wanting in our present copies of the Old Testament but this prediction as Josephus well remarks here though with the other predictions of the prophets it was now laughed at by the seditious was by their worry means soon exactly fulfilled however I cannot but here take notice of grocery's positive assertion upon Matthew 269 here quoted by Dr. Hudson that it ought to be taken for granted as a certain truth that many predictions of the Jewish prophets were preserved not in writing but by memory whereas it seems to me so far from certain that I think it has no evidence for probability at all end of the footnote and now the commanders joined in their approbation of what the Spazian had said and it was soon discovered how wise an opinion he had given and indeed many there were of the Jews that deserted every day and fled away from the zealots although their flight was very difficult since they had guarded every passage out of the city and every one that was caught at them as taking it for granted they were going over to the Romans yet did he who gave them money get clear off while he only that gave them none was voted a traitor so the upshot was this that the rich purchased their flight by money while none by the poor were slain along all the roads also vast numbers of dead bodies lay in heaps and even many of those that were so zealous in deserting at length choose rather to perish within the city for the hopes of Burial made death in their own city appear of the too less terrible to them but these zealots came at last to that degree of barbarity as not to bestow a Burial either on those slain in the city or on those that lay along the roads but as if they had made an agreement to cancel both the laws of their country and the laws of nature and at the same time that they defiled men with their wicked actions they would pollute the divinity itself also they left the dead bodies to potrify under the sun and the same punishment was allotted to such as buried any as to those that deserted which was no other than death while he that granted the favor of a grave to another would presently stand in need of a grave himself to say all in a word no other gentle passion was so entirely lost among them as mercy for what were the greatest objects of pity did most of all irritate these vretches and they transferred their rage from the living to those that had been slain and from the dead to the living nay the terror was so very great that he who survived called them that very first dead happy as being the at rest already as did those that were under torture in the prisons declare that upon this comparison those that lay and buried were the happiest these men therefore trampled upon all the laws of men and laughed at the laws of God and for the articles of the prophets they ridiculed them as the tricks of jugglers yet did these prophets foretell many things concerning the rewards of virtue and punishments of vice which when these zealots were violated they occasioned the fulfilling of those very prophecies belonging to their own country for there was a certain ancient oracle of those men that the city should then be taken and the sanctuary burned by right of war when a sedition should invade the Jews and should pollute the temple of God now while the zealots did not quite disbelieve these predictions they made themselves the instruments of their accomplishment end of book 4 chapter 6 book 6 chapter 7 of the wars of the Jews this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The Wars of the Jews by Josephus translated by William Weston chapter 7 how John tyrannized over the rest and what mischiefs the zealots did at Masada how only Vespasian took Gadara and what actions were performed by Placidus by this time John was beginning to tyrannize and sought it beneath him to accept only the same honors that others had and joining to himself by degrees a party of the wickedest of them all he broke off from the rest of the faction this was brought about by his still disagreeing with the opinions of others and giving out injunctions of his own in a very imperious manner so that it was evident he was setting up a monarchial power now some submitted to him out of their fear of him and others out of their good will to him for he was a shrewd man to entice men to him both by deluding them and putting cheats upon them nay many is aware that daughters should be safer themselves if the causes of their past insolent actions should now be reduced to one head and not a great many his activity was so great and that both in action and in council that he had not a few guards about him yet was there a great party of his antagonists that left him among whom Envy at him weighed a great deal while they thought it a very heavy thing to be in subjection to one that was formerly their equal but the main reason that moved men against him was the dread of monarchy for they could not hope easily to put an end to his power if he had once obtained it and yet they knew that he would have his pretense always against them that they had opposed him when he was first advanced while everyone choose rather to suffer anything whatsoever in war than that when they had been in a voluntary slavery for some time they should afterward perish so the sedition was divided into two parts and John reigned in opposition to his adversaries over one of them but for their leaders they watched one another nor did they at all or at least very little meddle with arms in their quarrels but they fought earnestly against the people and contended one another which of them should bring home the greatest prey but because the city had to struggle with three of the greatest misfortunes war and tyranny and sedition it appeared upon the comparison that the war was the less troublesome to the populace of them all accordingly they ran away from their own houses to foreigners and obtained that preservation from the Romans which they despaired to obtain amongst their own people and now a force misfortune arose in order to bring our nation to destruction there was a fortress of a great strength not far from Jerusalem the ancient kings both at their repository for their effects in the hazards of war and for the preservation of their bodies at the same time it was called Masada those that were called Sikari had taken possession of it formerly but at this time they overrun the neighboring countries aiming only to procure to themselves necessaries for the fears they were then in prevented but when once they were informed that the Roman army lay still and that the Jews were divided between sedition and tyranny they boldly undertook greater matters and at the feast of unleavened bread which the Jews celebrate in memory of their deliverance from the Egyptian bondage when they were sent back into the country of their forefathers they came down by night without being discovered by those that could have prevented them and overrun a certain small city called Ngadi in which expedition they prevented those citizens that could have stopped them before they could arm themselves and fight them they also dispersed them and cast them out of the city as for such as could not run away being women and children they slew of them above 700 afterward when they had carried everything and had seized upon all the fruits that were in a flourishing condition they brought them into Masada and indeed these men laid all the villages that were about the fortress waste and made the whole country desolate while there came to them every day from all parts not a few men as corrupt as themselves at that time all the other regions of Judea that had hitherto been at rest were in motion by means of the robbers now as it is in a human body if the principal part be inflamed all the members are subject to the same distemper so by means of the sedition and disorder that was in the metropolis had the wicked men that were in the country opportunity to ravage the same accordingly when every one of them had plundered their own villages they then retired into the desert yet were these men that now got together and joined it's a conspiracy by parties too small for an army and too many for a gang of thieves and thus did they fall upon the holy places and the cities could not by these here are or holy places as distinct from cities must be meant prosoi here or houses of prayer out of cities of which we find mention made in the New Testament and other authors C. Luke 612 Acts 1613-16 so were situated sometimes by the sides of rivers Acts 1613 or by the seaside so did the 72 interpreters go to pray every morning by the seaside before they went to their work end of the footnote yet did it now so happen that they were sometimes very ill treated by those upon whom they fell with such violence and were taken by them as men are taken in war but still they prevented any further punishment as do robbers who as soon as the ravages are discovered run their way nor was there now any part of Judea that was not in a miserable condition as well as its most imminent city also these things were told with spazian by deserters for although the seditious watched all the passages out of the city and destroyed all who so ever they were that came thither yet were there some that had concealed themselves and when they had fled to the Romans persuaded their general to come to their city's assistance and save the remainder of the people informing him with all that it was upon account of the people's good will to the Romans that many of them were already slain and the survivors in danger of the same treatment the spazian did indeed already pity the calamities these men were in and arose in appearance as though he was going to besiege Jerusalem but in reality to deliver them from a worse siege they were already under however he was obliged first to overthrow what remained elsewhere and to leave nothing out of Jerusalem behind him that might interrupt him in that siege accordingly he marched against Gadara the metropolis of Perea which was a place of strength and entered that city on the fourth day of the month's distrust, Adar for the men of power had sent an embassage to him without the knowledge of the seditious to treat about the surrender which they did out of the desire they had of peace and for saving their effects because many of the citizens of Gadara were rich men this embassy's opposite party knew nothing of but discovered it as the spazian was approaching near the city however they despaired of geekping possession of the city as being inferior in number to their enemies who were within the city and seeing the Romans very near to the city so they resolved to fly but thought it dishonorable to do it because they were not shedding some blood and revengeing themselves on the authors of the surrender so they seized upon Delesus a person not only the first in rank and family in the city but one that seemed the occasion of sending such an embassy and slough him and treated his dead body after barbarous manner so very violent was their anger at him and then run out to the city and as now the Roman army was just upon them the people of Gadara admitted the spazian with joyful acclamations and received from him the security of his right hand as also a garrison of horsemen and footmen to guard them against the excursions of the runnigates for as to their war they had pulled it down before the Romans desired them to do so that they might thereby give them assurance that there were lovers of peace and that if they had a mind they could not now make war against them and now the spazian sent placidus against those that had fled from Gadara with 500 horsemen and 3000 footmen while he returned himself to Caesarea with the rest of the army but as soon as these fugitives saw the horsemen that pursued them just upon their backs and before they came to a close fight they ran together to a certain village which was called Besennebris where finding a great multitude of young men and arming them partly by their own consent partly by force they rushly and suddenly assaulted placidus and the troops that were with him these horsemen at the first onset gave way a little as contriving to entice them further off the wall and when they had drawn them into a place fit for their purpose they made their horse encompass them round and threw their darts at them so the horsemen cut off the flight of the fugitives while the foot terribly destroyed those that fought against them for those Jews did no more than show their courage and then were destroyed for as they fell upon the Romans when they were joined close together and as it were walled about with their entire armor they were not able to find any place where the darts could enter nor were they any way able to break their ranks while they were themselves run through by the Roman darts unlike the wildest of wild beasts rushed upon the point of other swords so some of them were destroyed as cut with their enemy swords upon their faces and others were dispersed by the horsemen now placidus concern was to exclude them in their flight from getting into the village I was in his horse to march continually on that side of them he then turned short upon them and at the same time his men made use of their darts and easily took their aim at those that were the nearest to them as they made those that were further off turn back by the terror they were in till it lost the most courageous of them breaks through those horsemen and fled to the wall of the village and now those that guarded the wall were in great doubt what to do for they could not veer the thoughts of excluding those that came from Gadara because of their own people that were among them and yet if they should admit them they expected to perish with them which came to pass accordingly for as they were crowding together at the wall the Roman horsemen were just ready to fall in with them however the guards branded them and shut the gates when Placidus made an assault upon them and fighting courageously till it was dark he got possession of the wall and of the people that were in the city when the useless multitude were destroyed but those that were more potent ran away and the soldiers plundered the houses and set the village on fire as for those that ran out of the village they stirred up such as were in the country and exaggerating their own calamities and telling them that the whole army of the Romans were upon them they put them in great fear on every side so they got in great numbers together and fled to Jericho for they knew no other place that could afford them any hope of escaping it being a city that had a strong wall and a great multitude of inhabitants but Placidus relying much upon his horsemen and his former good success followed them and stole all that he overtook as far as Jordan and when he had driven the whole multitude to the riverside where they were stowed by the current for it had been augmented lately by rains and was not affordable he put his soldiers in array over against them so the necessity the others were in provoked them to hazard a battle because there was no place with her they could flee they then extended themselves a very great way along the banks of the river and sustained the darts that were thrown at them as well as the attacks of the horsemen who beat many of them and pushed them into the current at which fight hand to hand 15,000 of them were slain while the number of those that were unwillingly forced to leap into Jordan was prodigious there were besides 2,200 taken prisoners a mighty prey was taken also consisting of asses and sheep and camels and oxen now this destruction that fell upon the Jews as it was not inferior to any of the rest in itself so did it still appear greater than it really was and this because not only the whole country through which they fled was filled with slaughter and Jordan could not be passed over to the dead bodies that were in it but because the lake asphaltedes was also full of dead bodies that were carried down into it by the river and no blessedus after this good success that he had fell violently upon the neighboring smaller cities and villages when he took Abila and Julius and Bezemoth and all those that lay as far as the lake asphaltedes and put such of the deserters into each of them as he thought proper he then put his soldiers on board the ships and slow such as had fled to the lake in so much that all Piraea had either surrendered themselves or were taken by the Romans as far as Maheros End of Book 6, Chapter 7 Book 4, Chapter 8 of the Wars of the Jews This is the Librivox recording all Librivox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit Librivox.org The Wars of the Jews by Josephus translated by William Weston Chapter 8 How was Buzian upon hearing of some commotions in Gaul made haste to finish the Jewish war? A description of Jericho and of the Great Plain with an account besides of the lake asphaltedes In the meantime an account came that there were commotions in Gaul Food note, Greek Galatia and so everywhere and food note and that Vindex, together with the men of power in that country had revolted from Nero which a fair is more accurately described elsewhere This report thus related to Vespasian excited him to go on briskly with the war There is a civil wars which were coming upon them nay, that the very government was in danger and he thought if he could first reduce the eastern parts of the empire to peace he should make the fears of Italy the lighter While therefore the winter was his hindrance from going into the field he put garrisons into the villages and smaller cities for their security He put the curians also into the villages and sent turians into the cities He besides this rebuilt many of the cities that had been laid waste But at the beginning of the spring he took the greatest part of his army and led it from Caesarea to Antipatris where he spent two days in settling the affairs of that city and then on the third day he marched on laying waste and burning all the neighboring villages And when he laid waste all places about the topography of Thomas he passed on to the Lida and Jamnia and when both these cities had come over to him he placed a great many of those that had come over to him from other places as inhabitants therein and then came to Emmaus where he seized upon the passage which led sense to their metropolis and fortified his camp and leaving the fifth legion therein he came to the topography of Bethletophone He then destroyed that place and the neighboring places by fire and fortified at proper places the strongholds all about Idumea And when he had seized upon two villages which were in the very midst of Idumea Betaris and Capvartobas he slew above ten thousand of the people and carried into captivity above a thousand and drove away the rest of the multitude and placed no small part of his own forces in them who overrun and laid waste the whole mountainous country while he with the rest of his forces returned to Emmaus when he came down through the country of Samaria and hard by the city by others called Neopolis or Sihem but by the people of that country Marborta to Korea where he pitched his camp on the second day of the month of Dissius Sivan and on the day following he came to Jericho on which day Trajan, one of his commanders joined him with the forces he brought out of Perea all the places beyond Jordan being subdued already Hereupon a great multitude prevented their approach and came out of Jericho and fled to those mountainous parts while that part which was left behind was in a great measure destroyed they also found the city desolate it is situated in a plain but a naked and barren mountain of a very great length hangs over it which extends itself to the land about Skeetopolis northward but as far as the country of Sodom and the utmost limits of the lake Asphaltides southward this mountain is all of it very uneven and uninhabited by reason of its barrenness there is an opposite mountain that is situated over against it on the other side of Jordan this last begins at Julius and the northern quarters and extends itself southward as far as Somoron which is the bounds of Petra in Arabia footnote whether this Somoron or Somorra ought not to be here is written Gomorra as some manuscripts in a manner habit for the placement by Josephus seems to be near Segor or Zor at the very south of the Dead Sea hard by which stood Sodom and Gomorra cannot now be certainly determined but seems by no means improbable end of the footnote in this ridge of mountains there is one called the Iron Mountain that runs in lengths as far as Moab now the region that lies in the middle between these ridges of mountains is called the Great Plain it reaches from the village Ginnepris as far as the lake Asphaltitis its length is 230 for longs and its breath 120 and it is divided in the midst by Jordan it has two lakes in it that of Asphaltitis and that of Tiberias whose natures are opposite to each other for the former is salt and unfruitful but that of Tiberias is sweet and fruitful this plain is much burnt up in summer time and by reason of the extraordinary heat contains a very unwholesome air it is all destitute of water accepting the river Jordan which water of Jordan is the occasion why those plantations of palm trees that are near its banks are more flourishing and much more fruitful as are those that are remote from it not so flourishing or fruitful notwithstanding which there is a fountain by Jericho that runs plentifully and is very fit for watering the ground it arises near the old city which Joshua the son of Naue the general of the Hebrews took the first of all the cities of the land of Canaan by right of war the report is that this fountain meaning caused not only the blasting of the earth and the trees but of the children born of women and that it was entirely of a sickly and corruptive nature to all things whatsoever but that it was made gentle and very wholesome and fruitful by the prophet Elisha this prophet was familiar with Elisha and was his successor who when he once was the guest of the people of Jericho and the men of the place had treated him very kindly he both made them amends as well as the country by a lasting favor for he went out of the city to this fountain and threw into the current an earthen vessel full of salt after which he stretched out his righteous hand into heaven and pouring out a mild drink offering he made this supplication that the current might be modified and that the veins of fresh water might be opened that God also would bring into the place a more temperate and fertile air for the current and would bestow upon the people of that country plenty of the fruits of the earth and the succession of children and that this prolific water might never fail them while they continued to be righteous to these prayers Elisha joined proper operations of his hands after skillful manner and changed the fountain and that water which had been the occasion of barrenness and famine before from that time did supply a numerous posterity and afforded great abundance to the country footnote this excellent prayer of Elisha is vanting in our copies 2 Kings 2 21 22 though it be referred also in the apostolical constitutions and the success of it is mentioned in them all and footnote accordingly the power of it is so great in watering the ground that if it do but once touch a country it affords a sweeter nourishment than other waters do when they lie so long upon them till they are satiated with them for which reason the advantage gained from other waters when they flow in great plenty is but small water is great when it flows even in little quantities accordingly it waters a larger space of ground than any other waters do and passes along a plain of 74 longs long and 20 broad wherein it affords nourishment to those most excellent gardens that are thick-thread with trees there are in it many sorts of palm trees that are watered by it from each other in taste and name the better sort of them when they are pressed yield an excellent kind of honey not much inferior in sweetness to other honey this country with all produces honey from bees it also bears that bosom which is the most precious of all the fruits in that place zippers trees also and those that bear myrobalanum so that he who should pronounce this place to be divine would not be mistaken wherein is such plenty of trees produced as are very rare and of the most excellent sort and indeed if we speak of those other fruits it will not be easy to light on any climate in the habitable earth that can be well compared to it what is here soon comes up in such clusters that cause of which seems me to be the warmth of the air and the fertility of the waters the warmth calling forth the sprouts and making them spread and the moisture making every one of them take root firmly and supplying that virtue which it stands in need of in summer time now this country is then so steadily burned up that nobody cares to come at it and if the water be drawn up before sun rising and after that exposed the air it becomes a seeding cold and becomes of a nature quite contrary to the ambient air as in winter again it becomes warm and if you go into it it appears very gentle the ambient air is here also so good a temperature that the people of the country are closed in linen only even when snow covers the rest of Judea this place is 154 longs from Jerusalem and 60 from Jordan the country as far as Jerusalem is desert and stony but that as far as Jordan and the lake as Faltities lies lower indeed though it be equally desert and barren but so much shall suffice to have said about Jericho and of the great happiness of its situation the nature of the lake as Faltities is also worth describing it is as I have said already bitter and unfruitful it is so light or thick that it bears up the heaviest things that are thrown into it nor is it easy for anyone to make things sink there into the bottom if he had a mind so to do accordingly when Vespasian went to see it he commanded that some who could not swim should have their hands tied behind them and be thrown into the deep when it so happened that they all swam as if a wind had forced them upwards moreover the change of the color of this lake is wonderful for it changes its appearance thrice every day and as the rays of the sun fall differently upon it the light is variously reflected however it casts up black clods of bitumen in many parts of it these swim at the top of the water and resemble both in shape and by weakness headless bulls their leg come to it and catch hold of it as it hangs together they draw it into their ships and when the ship is full it is not easy to cut off the rest for it is so tenacious as to make the ship hang upon its clods till they set it loose with the menstrual blood of women and with urine to which alone it yields this bitumen is not only useful for the caulking of ships but for the cure of men's bodies it is mixed in a great many medicines the length of this lake is 584 longs where it is extended as far as Zor in Arabia and its breath is 150 the country of Sodom borders upon it it was of old a most happy land both for the fruits it bore and the riches of its cities although it be now all burned up it is related how in the impiety of its inhabitants it was burned by lightning in consequence of which there are still the remainders of that divine fire and the traces or shadows of the five cities are still to be seen as well as the ashes growing in their fruits which fruits have a color as if they were fit to be eaten but if you plug them with your hands they dissolve into smoke and ashes and thus what is related to Sodom has these marks of credibility which our very sight affords us End of book 4, chapter 8