Victor R. Claveau, MJ
It is one of the less proud facts of Jewish history that Rome occupied Jerusalem in BC 63 — not by invasion, but by invitation. The throne of Israel was vacant from the time of the Babylonian exile to the time of Alexander Jannæus. Alexander was a self-proclaimed king and high priest who ruled from BC 103 to 76. Driven by a craze for power, he was a cruel, intolerant ruler, involved in political intrigues and warlike campaigns.
A Sadducee, Alexander Jannæus had an undying hostility toward the Pharisees, whom he considered his personal enemies. The Pharisees considered him a usurper to the throne of King David and, because he married a widow — in violation of God’s law that forbade a priest to do so — should not and could not be high priest. He was for them a common soldier whose hands were always wet with human blood.
The Pharisees did their best to incite the common people against the king. In kind, the king’s hatred knew no bounds. His quest for power was responsible for the death of thousands of Jews. The Pharisees eventually provoked a revolt against Alexander that lasted six years and cost the lives of an estimated 50,000 rebel Jews.
After years of wars and bloodshed, Alexander died in BC 76, after an illness of three years, most probably caused by alcoholism. He left the throne to his wife, Alexandra Salome, who ruled until her death in BC 67. Alexandra made peace with the Pharisees and relinquished control of the country to them.
The Pharisees grew in power and authority. Sorely outraged by the abuses heaped upon them, they would not allow their enemies to escape without punishment. They in turn began a series of persecutions and judicial murders, which opened up the old wounds and the cycle of violence continued.
There was a dispute over who should occupy the throne of Israel upon the death of Queen Alexandra. Two of her sons, Aristobulus II and Hyrcanus II, the high priest, entered into a full-scale fraternal and civil war to decide who should reign. The two brothers decided to submit their dispute to Pompey, the Roman General in Syria, who ruled in favor of Hyrcanus, apparently believing him to be the more pliable of the two. No match for the Roman army, Aristobulus surrendered to Pompey. Hyrcanus’s ability to rule depended upon Roman support; thus he invited the Roman Army to occupy Jerusalem in BC 63.
Pompey encountered resistance only at the Temple Mount. After a three-month siege, the Romans succeeded in entering the Temple after killing several thousand of its priests and defenders.[1] Pompey further horrified Jewish sensibilities by walking straight into the Temple’s Holy of Holies, a room which, according to Jewish Law, was to be entered only once a year on Yom Kippur[2] and then only by the High Priest.
After the conquest, there followed the slaughter of approximately 12,000 of the defenders. Most were killed not by the Romans but by the Pharisees who supported Hyrcanus.
The day following the conquest, Pompey ordered the Temple to be cleansed and the liturgical services resumed. He installed Hyrcanus as high priest but not with the title of king.
The Roman occupation marked the end of the Jewish State’s independence. Pompey wasted no time in converting the Jewish kingdom into a Roman tributary. Hyrcanus’ major responsibility was to collect the tribute for his Roman masters. Clashes and rebellions plagued the Romans until 6 AD, when the policy of native rulers for Palestine was ended. Strategically, for the Romans, the country was too important and its people too turbulent to do without direct Roman rule. A procurator (Roman officer) was placed in control, responsible only to the emperor.
As the years passed, there were clashes and the land seethed with rebellion against all the procurators, bad and good alike.
The most serious resistance came from Galilee, where the leaders were the Zealots. They were extremists who shrank from nothing to bring down their pagan rulers. Their watchword was: “No God but Yahweh, no tax but to the temple, no friends but the Zealot.” These anti-Roman rebels were active for more than 60 years, and later instigated the Great Revolt in 66 AD.
The Great Revolt
Excessive taxes by the Herodian kings (who ruled from BC 43 to AD 79) and the corrupt bureaucracies the Romans led to economic disarray. Combined with other socio-religious and political conflicts, the situation resulted in social turmoil that prepared the ground for the ultimate conflict.
Although the Zealots began the rebellion, the command soon passed to the aristocratic leadership, who planned to create an army powerful enough to meet the Romans on the field of battle. The Jews’ Great Revolt against Rome led to one of the greatest catastrophes in Jewish history. No one could argue with the Jews for wanting to throw off the Roman yoke. Since their occupation during the rule of Hyrcanus II, the ruling Romans had grown more and more repressive. From almost the beginning of the century, Judea was ruled by Roman Procurators, whose chief responsibility was to deliver the annual tribute to Rome.
[1] Telushkin, Rabbi Joseph, Jewish Literacy(New York: William Morrow and Company Inc., 1991), p. 120. See also “Hyrcanus II,” Encyclopedia Judaica, Vol. 8, pp. 1145-1146.
[2] Yom Kippur: Day of Atonement, a solemn Jewish fast day falling on the 10th day of the Jewish new year and marked by continuous prayer and repentance according to the rotes described in Lev. 16. Yom Kippur is also the holiest day of the Jewish year, or in the Torah’s words, the “Sabbath of Sabbaths.”