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The Antiquities of the Jews

F >> Flavius Josephus >> The Antiquities of the Jews




(16) How Trypho killed this Antiochus the epitome of Livy informs
us, ch. 53, viz. that he corrupted his physicians or surgeons,
who falsely pretending to the people that he was perishing with
the stone, as they cut him for it, killed him, which exactly
agrees with Josephus.

(17) That this Antiochus, the son of Alexader Balas, was called
"The God," is evident from his coins, which Spanheim assures us
bear this inscription, "King Antiochus the God, Epiphanes the
Victorious."

(18) Here Josephus begins to follow and to abridge the next
sacred Hebrew book, styled in the end of the First Book of
Maccabees, "The Chronicle of John [Hyrcanus's] high priesthood;"
but in some of the Greek copies," The Fourth Book of Maccabees."
A Greek version of this chronicle was extant not very long ago in
the days of Sautes Pagninus, and Sixtus Senensis, at Lyons,
though it seems to have been there burnt, and to be utterly lost.
See Sixtus Senensis's account of it, of its many Hebraisms, and
its great agreement with Josephus's abridgement, in the Authent.
Rec. Part I. p. 206, 207, 208.

(19) Hence we learn, that in the days of this excellent high
priest, John Hyrcanus, the observation of the Sabbatic year, as
Josephus supposed, required a rest from war, as did that of the
weekly sabbath from work; I mean this, unless in the case of
necessity, when the Jews were attacked by their enemies, in which
case indeed, and in which alone, they then allowed defensive
fighting to be lawful, even on the sabbath day, as we see in
several places of Josephus, Antlq. B. XII. ch. 6. sect. 2; B.
XIII. ch. 1. sect. 2; Of. the War, B. I. ch. 7. sect. 3. But then
it must be noted, that this rest from war no way appears in the
First Book of Maccabees, ch. 16., but the direct contrary; though
indeed the Jews, in the days of Antiochus Epiphanes, did not
venture upon fighting on the Sabbath day, even in the defense of
their own lives, till the Asamoneans or Maccabees decreed so to
do, 1 Macc. 2:32-41; Antiq. B. XII. ch. 6. sect. 2.

(20) Josephus's copies, both Greek and Latin, have here a gross
mistake, when they say that this first year of John Hyrcanus,
which we have just now seen to have been a Sabbatic year, was in
the 162nd olympiad, whereas it was for certain the second year of
the 161st. See the like before, B. XII. ch. 7. sect. 6.

(21) This heliacal setting of the Pleiades, or seven stars, was,
in the days of Hyrcanus and Josephus, early in the spring, about
February, the time of the latter rain in Judea; and this, so far
as I remember, is the only astronomical character of time,
besides one eclipse of the moon in the reign of Herod, that we
meet with in all Josephus; the Jews being little accustomed to
astronomical observations, any further than for the uses of their
calendar, and utterly forbidden those astrological uses which the
heathens commonly made of them.

(22) Dr. Hudson tells us here, that this custom of gilding the
horns of those oxen that were to be sacrificed is a known thing
both in the poets and orators.

(23) This account in Josephus, that the present Antiochus was
persuaded, though in vain, not to make peace with the Jews, but
to cut them off utterly, is fully confirmed by Diodorus Siculus,
in Photiua's extracts out of his 34th Book.

(24) The Jews were not to march or journey on the sabbath, or on
such a great festival as was equivalent to the sabbath, any
farther than a sabbath day's journey, or two thousand cubits, see
the note on Antiq. B. XX. ch. 8. sect. 6.

(25) This account of the Idumeans admitting circumcision, and the
entire Jewish law, from this time, or from the days of Hyrcanus,
is confirmed by their entire history afterward. See Antiq. B.
XIV. ch. 8. sect. 1; B. XV. ch. 7. sect. 9. Of the War, B. II.
ch. 3. sect. 1; B. IV. ch. 4. sect. 5. This, in the opinion of
Josephus, made them proselytes of justice, or entire Jews, as
here and elsewhere, Antiq. B. XIV. ch. 8. sect. 1. However,
Antigonus, the enemy of Herod, though Herod were derived from
such a proselyte of justice for several generations, will allow
him to be no more than a half Jew, B. XV. ch. 15. sect. 2. But
still, take out of Dean Prideaux, at the year 129, the words of
Ammouius, a grammarian, which fully confirm this account of the
Idumeans in Josephus: "The Jews," says he, are such by nature,
and from the beginning, whilst the Idumeans were not Jews from
the beginning, but Phoenicians and Syrians; but being afterward
subdued by the Jews, and compelled to be circumcised, and to
unite into one nation, and be subject to the same laws, they were
called Jews." Dio also says, as the Dean there quotes him, from
Book XXXVI. p. 37, "That country is called Judea, and the people
Jews; and this name is given also to as many others as embrace
their religion, though of other nations." But then upon what
foundation so good a governor as Hyrcanus took upon him to compel
those Idumeans either to become Jews, or to leave the country,
deserves great consideration. I suppose it was because they had
long ago been driven out of the land of Edom, and had seized on
and possessed the tribe of Simeon, and all the southern parts of
the tribe of Judah, which was the peculiar inheritance of the
worshippers of the true God without idolatry, as the reader may
learn from Reland, Palestine, Part I. p. 154, 305; and from
Prideaux, at the years 140 and 165.

(26) In this decree of the Roman senate, it seems that these
ambassadors were sent from the "people of the Jews," as well as
from their prince or high priest, John Hyrcanus.

(27) Dean Prideaux takes notice at the year 130, that Justin, in
agreement with Josephus, says, "The power of the Jews was now
grown so great, that after this Antiochus they would not bear any
Macedonian king over them; and that they set up a government of
their own, and infested Syria with great wars."

(28) The original of the Sadducees, as a considerable party among
the Jews, being contained in this and the two following sections,
take Dean Prideaux's note upon this their first public
appearance, which I suppose to be true: "Hyrcanus," says be,
"went over to the party of the Sadducees; that is, by embracing
their doctrine against the traditions of the eiders, added to the
written law, and made of equal authority with it, but not their
doctrine against the resurrection and a future state; for this
cannot be supposed of so good and righteous a man as John
Hyrcanus is said to be. It is most probable, that at this time
the Sadducees had gone no further in the doctrines of that sect
than to deny all their unwritten traditions, which the Pharisees
were so fond of; for Josephus mentions no other difference at
this time between them; neither doth he say that Hyrcanna went
over to the Sadducees in any other particular than in the
abolishing of all the traditionary constitutions of the
Pharisees, which our Savior condemned as well as they." [At the
year.]

(29) This slander, that arose from a Pharisee, has been preserved
by their successors the Rabbins to these later ages; for Dr.
Hudson assures us that David Gantz, in his Chronology, S. Pr. p.
77, in Vorstius's version, relates that Hyrcanus's mother was
taken captive in Mount Modinth. See ch. 13. sect. 5.

(30) Here ends the high priesthood, and the life of this
excellent person John Hyrcanus, and together with him the holy
theocracy, or Divine government of the Jewish nation, and its
concomitant oracle by Urim. Now follows the profane and
tyrannical Jewish monarchy, first of the Asamoneans or Maccabees,
and then of Herod the Great, the Idumean, till the coming of the
Messiah. See the note on Antiq. B. III. ch. 8. sect. 9. Hear
Strabo's testimony on this occasion, B. XVI. p. 761, 762:
"Those," says he, "that succeeded Moses continued for some time
in earnest, both in righteous actions and in piety; but after a
while there were others that took upon them the high priesthood,
at first superstitious and afterward tyrannical persons. Such a
prophet was Moses and those that succeeded him, beginning in a
way not to be blamed, but changing for the worse. And when it
openly appeared that the government was become tyrannical,
Alexander was the first that set up himself for a king instead of
a priest; and his sons were Hyrcanus and Aristobulus." All in
agreement with Josephus, excepting this, that Strabo omits the
first king, Aristobulus, who reigning but a single year, seems
hardly to have come to his knowledge. Nor indeed does
Aristobulus, the son of Alexander, pretend that the name of king
was taken before his father Alexander took it himself, Antiq. B.
XIV. ch. 3. sect. 2. See also ch. 12. sect. l, which favor Strabo
also. And indeed, if we may judge from the very different
characters of the Egyptian Jews under high priests, and of the
Palestine Jews under kings, in the two next centuries, we may
well suppose that the Divine Shechinah was removed into Egypt,
and that the worshippers at the temple of Onias were better men
than those at the temple of Jerusalem.

(31) Hence we learn that the Essens pretended to have ruled
whereby men might foretell things to come, and that this Judas
the Essen taught those rules to his scholars; but whether their
pretense were of an astrological or magical nature, which yet in
such religious Jews, who were utterly forbidden such arts, is no
way probable, or to any Bath Col, spoken of by the later Rabbins,
or otherwise, I cannot tell. See Of the War, B. II. ch. 8. sect.
12.

(32) The reason why Hyrcanus suffered not this son of his whom he
did not love to come into Judea, but ordered him to be brought up
in Galilee, is suggested by Dr. Hudson, that Galilee was not
esteemed so happy and well cultivated a country as Judea, Matthew
26:73; John 7:52; Acts 2:7, although another obvious reason
occurs also, that he was out of his sight in Galilee than he
would have been in Judea.

(33) From these, and other occasional expressions, dropped by
Josephus, we may learn, that where the sacred hooks of the Jews
were deficient, he had several other histories then extant, (but
now most of them lost,) which he faithfully followed in his own
history; nor indeed have we any other records of those times,
relating to Judea, that can be compared to these accounts of
Josephus, though when we do meet with authentic fragments of such
original records, they almost always confirm his history.

(34) This city, or island, Cos, is not that remote island in the
Aegean Sea, famous for the birth of the great Hippocrates, but a
city or island of the same name adjoining to Egypt, mentioned
both by Stephanus and Ptolemy, as Dr. Mizon informs us. Of which
Cos, and the treasures there laid up by Cleopatra and the Jews,
see Antiq. B. XIV. ch. 7, sect. 2.

(35) This account of the death of Antiochus Grypus is confirmed
by Appion, Syriac. p. 132, here cited by Spanheim.

(36) Porphyry says that this Antiochus Grypus reigned but
twenty-six years, as Dr. Hudson observes. The copies of Josephus,
both Greek and Latin, have here so grossly false a reading,
Antiochus and Antoninus, or Antonius Plus, for Antiochus Pius,
that the editors are forced to correct the text from the other
historians, who all agree that this king's name was nothing more
than Antiochus Plus.

(37) These two brothers, Antiochus and Philippus are called twins
by Porphyry; the fourth brother was king of Damascus: both which
are the observations of Spanheim.

(38) This Laodicea was a city of Gilead beyond Jordan. However,
Porphyry says that this Antiochus Pius did not die in this
battle; but, running away, was drowned in the river Orontes.
Appian says that he, was deprived of the kingdom of Syria by
Tigranes; but Porphyry makes this Laodice queen of the Calamans;
- all which is noted by Spanheim. In such confusion of the later
historians, we have no reason to prefer any of them before
Josephus, who had more original ones before him. This reproach
upon Alexander, that he was sprung from a captive, seems only the
repetition of the old Pharisaical calumny upon his father, ch.
10. sect. 5.

(39) This Theodorus was the son of Zeno, and was in possession of
Areathus, as we learn from sect. 3 foregoing.

(40) This name Thracida, which the Jews gave Alexander, must, by
the coherence, denote as barbarous as a Thracian, or somewhat
like it; but what it properly signifies is not known.

(41) Spanheim takes notice that this Antiochus Dionysus [the
brother of Philip, and of Demetrius Eucerus, and of two otbsrs]
was the fifth son of Antiochus Grypus; and that he is styled on
the coins, "Antiochus, Epiphanes, Dionysus."

(42) This Aretas was the first king of the Arabians who took
Damascus, and reigned there; which name became afterwards common
to such Arabian kings, both at Petra and at Damascus, as we learn
from Josephus in many places; and from St. Paul, 2 Corinthians
11:32. See the note on Antiq. B. XVI. ch. 9. sect. 4.

(43) We may here and elsewhere take notice, that whatever
countries or cities the Asamoneans conquered from any of the
neighboring nations, or whatever countries or cities they gained
from them that had not belonged to them before, they, after the
days of Hyrcanus, compelled the inhabitants to leave their
idolatry, and entirely to receive the law of Moses, as proselytes
of justice, or else banished them into other lands. That
excellent prince, John Hyrcanus, did it to the Idumeans, as I
have noted on ch. 9. sect. 1, already, who lived then in the
Promised Land, and this I suppose justly; but by what right the
rest did it, even to the countries or cities that were no part of
that land, I do not at all know. This looks too like unjust
persecution for religion.

(44) It seems, by this dying advice of Alexander Janneus to his
wife, that he had himself pursued the measures of his father
Hyrcanus. and taken part with the Sadducees, who kept close to
the written law, against the Pharisees, who had introduced their
own traditions, ch. 16. sect. 2; and that he now saw a political
necessity of submitting to the Pharisees and their traditions
hereafter, if his widow and family minded to retain their
monarchical government or tyranny over the Jewish nation; which
sect yet, thus supported, were at last in a great measure the
ruin of the religion, government, and nation of the Jews, and
brought them into so wicked a state, that the vengeance of God
came upon them to their utter excision. Just thus did Caiaphas
politically advise the Jewish sanhedrim, John 11:50, "That it was
expedient for them that one man should die for the people, and
that the whole nation perish not;" and this in consequence of
their own political supposal, ver. 48, that, "If they let Jesus
alone," with his miracles, "all men would believe on him, and the
Romans would come and take away both their place and nation."
Which political crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth brought down the
vengeance of God upon them, and occasioned those very Romans, of
whom they seemed so much afraid, that to prevent it they put him
to death, actually to "come and take away both their place and
nation" within thirty-eight years afterwards. I heartily wish the
politicians of Christendom would consider these and the like
examples, and no longer sacrifice all virtue and religion to
their pernicious schemes of government, to the bringing down the
judgments of God upon themselves, and the several nations
intrusted to their care. But this is a digression. I wish it were
an unseasonable one also. Josephus himself several times makes
such digressions, and I here venture to follow him. See one of
them at the conclusion of the very next chapter.

(45) The number of five hundred thousand or even three hundred
thousand, as one Greek copy, with the Latin copies, have it, for
Tigranes's army, that came out of Armenia into Syria and Judea,
seems much too large. We have had already several such
extravagant numbers in Josephus's present copies, which are not
to be at all ascribed to him. Accordingly, I incline to Dr.
Hudson's emendation here, which supposes them but forty thousand.

(46) This fortress, castle, citadel, or tower, whither the wife
and children of Aristobulus were new sent, and which overlooked
the temple, could be no other than what Hyrcanus I. built,
(Antiq. B. XVIII ch. 4. sect. 3,) and Herod the Great rebuilt,
and called the "Tower of Antonia," Aatiq. B. XV. ch. 11. sect. 5.

BOOK 14 FOOTNOTES

(1) Reland takes notice here, very justly, how Josephus's
declaration, that it was his great concern not only to write "an
agreeable, an accurate," and "a true" history, but also
distinctly not to omit any thing [of consequence], either through
"ignorance or laziness," implies that he could not, consistently
with that resolution, omit the mention of [so famous a person as]
"Jesus Christ."

(2) That the famous Antipater's or Antipas's father was also
Antipater or Antipas (which two may justly be esteemed one and
the same frame, the former with a Greek or Gentile, the latter
with a Hebrew or Jewish termination) Josephus here assures us,
though Eusebias indeed says it was Herod.

(3) This "golden vine," or "garden," seen by Strabo at Rome, has
its inscription here as if it were the gift of Alexander, the
father of Aristobulus, and not of Aristobulus himself, to whom
yet Josephus ascribes it; and in order to prove the truth of that
part of his history, introduces this testimony of Strabo; so that
the ordinary copies seem to be here either erroneous or
defective, and the original reading seems to have been either
Aristobulus, instead of Alexander, with one Greek copy, or else
"Aristobulus the son of Alexander," with the Latin copies; which
last seems to me the most probable. For as to Archbishop Usher's
conjectures, that Alexander made it, and dedicated it to God in
the temple, and that thence Aristobulus took it, and sent it to
Pompey, they are both very improbable, and no way agreeable to
Josephus, who would hardly have avoided the recording both these
uncommon points of history, had he known any thing of them; nor
would either the Jewish nation, or even Pompey himself, then have
relished such a flagrant instance of sacrilege.

(4) These express testimonies of Josephus here, and Antiq. B.
VIII. ch. 6. sect. 6, and B. XV. ch. 4. sect. 2, that the only
balsam gardens, and the best palm trees, were, at least in his
days, near Jericho and Kugaddi, about the north part of the Dead
Sea, (whereabout also Alexander the Great saw the balsam drop,)
show the mistake of those that understand Eusebius and Jerom as
if one of those gardens were at the south part of that sea, at
Zoar or Segor, whereas they must either mean another Zoar or
Segor, which was between Jericho and Kugaddi, agreeably to
Josephus: which yet they do not appear to do, or else they
directly contradict Josephus, and were therein greatly mistaken:
I mean this, unless that balsam, and the best palm trees, grew
much more southward in Judea in the days of Eusebius and Jerom
than they did in the days of Josephus.

(5) The particular depth and breadth of this ditch, whence the
stones for the wall about the temple were probably taken, are
omitted in our copies of Josephus, but set down by Strabo, B.
XVI. p. 763; from whom we learn that this ditch was sixty feet
deep, and two hundred and fifty feet broad. However, its depth
is, in the next section, said by Josephus to be immense, which
exactly agrees to Strabo's description, and which numbers in
Strabo are a strong confirmation of the truth of Josephus's
description also.

(6) That is, on the 23rd of Sivan, the annual fast for the
defection and idolatry of Jeroboam, "who made Israel to sin;" or
possibly some other fast might fall into that month, before and
in the days of Josephus.

(7) It deserves here to be noted, that this Pharisaical,
superstitious notion, that offensive fighting was unlawful to
Jews, even under the utmost necessity, on the Sabbath day, of
which we hear nothing before the times of the Maccabees, was the
proper occasion of Jerusalem's being taken by Pompey, by Sosius,
and by Titus, as appears from the places already quoted in the
note on Antiq. B. XIII. ch. 8. sect. 1; which scrupulous
superstition, as to the observation of such a rigorous rest upon
the Sabbath day, our Savior always opposed, when the Pharisaical
Jews insisted on it, as is evident in many places in the New
Testament, though he still intimated how pernicious that
superstition might prove to them in their flight from the Romans,
Matthew 25:20.

(8) This is fully confirmed by the testimony of Cicero, who:
says, in his oration for Flaecus, that "Cneius Pompeius, when he
was conqueror, and had taken Jerusalem, did not touch any thing
belonging to that temple."

(9) Of this destruction of Gadara here presupposed, and its
restoration by Pompey, see the note on the War, B. I. ch. 7.
sect. 7.

(10) Dean Prideaux well observes, "That notwithstanding the
clamor against Gabinius at Rome, Josephus gives him a able
character, as if he had acquitted himself with honor in the
charge committed to him" [in Judea]. See at the year 55.

(11) This history is best illustrated by Dr. Hudson out of Livy,
who says that "A. Gabinius, the proconsul, restored Ptolemy of
Pompey and Gabinius against the Jews, while neither of them say
any thing new which is not in the other to his kingdom of Egypt,
and ejected Archelaus, whom they had set up for king," &c. See
Prid. at the years 61 and 65.

(12) Dr. Hudson observes, that the name of this wife of Antipater
in Josephus was Cypros, as a Hebrew termination, but not Cypris,
the Greek name for Venus, as some critics were ready to correct
it.

(13) Take Dr. Hudson's note upon this place, which I suppose to
be the truth: "Here is some mistake in Josephus; for when he had
promised us a decree for the restoration of Jerusalem he brings
in a decree of far greater antiquity, and that a league of
friendship and union only. One may easily believe that Josephus
gave order for one thing, and his amanuensis performed another,
by transposing decrees that concerned the Hyrcani, and as deluded
by the sameness of their names; for that belongs to the first
high priest of this name, [John Hyrcanus,] which Josephus here
ascribes to one that lived later [Hyrcanus, the son of Alexander
Janneus]. However, the decree which he proposes to set down
follows a little lower, in the collection of Raman decrees that
concerned the Jews and is that dated when Caesar was consul the
fifth time." See ch. 10. sect. 5.

(14) Those who will carefully observe the several occasional
numbers and chronological characters in the life and death of
this Herod, and of his children, hereafter noted, will see that
twenty-five years, and not fifteen, must for certain have been
here Josephus's own number for the age of Herod, when he was made
governor of Galilee. See ch. 23. sect. 5, and ch. 24. sect. 7;
and particularly Antiq. B. XVII. ch. 8. sect. 1, where about
forty-four years afterwards Herod dies an old man at about
seventy.

(15) It is here worth our while to remark, that none could be put
to death in Judea but by the approbation of the Jewish Sanhedrim,
there being an excellent provision in the law of Moses, that even
in criminal causes, and particularly where life was concerned, an
appeal should lie from the lesser councils of seven in the other
cities to the supreme council of seventy-one at Jerusalem; and
that is exactly according to our Savior's words, when he says,
"It could not be that a prophet should perish out of Jerusalem,"
Luke 13:33.

(16) This account, as Reland observes, is confirmed by the
Talmudists, who call this Sameas, "Simeon, the son of Shetach."

(17) That Hyreanus was himself in Egypt, along with Antipater, at
this time, to whom accordingly the bold and prudent actions of
his deputy Antipater are here ascribed, as this decree of Julius
Caesar supposes, we are further assured by the testimony of
Strabo, already produced by Josephus, ch. 8. sect. 3.

(18) Dr. Hudson justly supposes that the Roman imperators, or
generals of armies, meant both here and sect. 2, who gave
testimony to Hyrcanus's and the Jews' faithfulness and goodwill
to the Romans before the senate and people of Rome, were
principally Pompey, Scaurus, and Gabinius; of all whom Josephus
had already given us the history, so far as the Jews were
concerned with them.

(19) We have here a most remarkable and authentic attestation of
the citizens of Pergamus, that Abraham was the father of all the
Hebrews; that their own ancestors were, in the oldest times, the
friends of those Hebrews; and that the public arts of their city,
then extant, confirmed the same; which evidence is too strong to
be evaded by our present ignorance of the particular occasion of
such ancient friendship and alliance between those people. See
the like full evidence of the kindred of the Lacedemonians and
the Jews; and that became they were both of the posterity of
Abraham, by a public epistle of those people to the Jews,
preserved in the First Book of the Maccabees, 12:19-23; and
thence by Josephus, Antiq. B. XII. ch. 4 sect. 10; both which
authentic records are highly valuable. It is also well worthy of
observation, what Moses Chorenensis, the principal Armenian
historian, informs us of, p. 83, that Arsaces, who raised the
Parthian empire, was of the seed of Abraham by Chetura; and that
thereby was accomplished that prediction which said, "Kings of
nations shall proceed from thee," Genesis 17:6.

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