FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER IV
[150] This term elah (or elohi) hash-shemim is distinctive of the age after the return from the captivity (Ezra v. 11, vi. 9, 10, vii. 12, 21, 23; Neh. i. 4, 5, ii. 4, 20; Dan. ii. 18, 19, 28, 37, 44); it never occurs in any of those passages in the Pentateuch which some critical writers assign to this later age.
[151] Brugsch, “Hist. Egt.,” ii. pp. 294–96; Prof. H. Gunkel, Deutsche Rundschau, January 1908. Sanballaṭ (“Sinu has given life”), Delaya (“set free by Ya”), and Shelemya (“friend of Ya”), are Semitic and apparently Babylonian names.
[152] Ezra iii. 12; Hag. ii. 3.
[153] Ezra iv. 6, 8, 12, 21, 24.
[154] Hilprecht, in his “Nippur Memoirs” (vol. ix. pp. 27, 28), gives instances of Persians with Babylonian wives as early as the reign of Artaxerxes I., together with many names of Hebrews who were residing in Babylonia.
[155] Taylor, “Alphabet,” vol. i. p. 258.
[156] Neh. iii. 7.
[157] Neh. ii. 13–15.
[158] The Hebrew ’abar does not of necessity mean “crossing” any valley. The word is constantly used in the Old Testament with the more general meaning to “go on,” as in the English of this passage.
[159] Neh. iii. and xii.
[160] 1 Chron. xxix. 19; Neh. ii. 8. Mishnah, Zebakhim, xii. 3; Tamid, i. 1; Middoth, i. 9.
[161] Neh. iii. 1, xii. 39; Jer. xxxi. 38; Zech. xiv. 10.
[162] Neh. iii. 1–32.
[163] Neh. iii. 3, xii. 39, xiii. 16.
[164] Neh. iii. 6; 2 Kings xxii. 14; Zeph. i. 10.
[165] Neh. xii. 39; 2 Chron. xxv. 23, xxvi. 9; Jer. xxxi. 38. Josephus describes the streets in this part as oblique to the wall (“Wars,” V. viii. 1).
[166] Neh. iii. 8, xii. 38.
[167] “Mem. West Pal. Survey,” Jerusalem vol., pp. 393–7; Bliss, “Excavations at Jerusalem,” pp. 2–10.
[168] Neh. iii. 16, xii. 37; see 2 Kings xii. 20; 1 Chron. xxvi. 16. Bliss, “Excavations at Jerusalem,” p. 151.
[170] Neh. iii. 15, xii. 37; 2 Kings xii. 20; 1 Chron xxvi. 16.
[171] Neh. iii. 23–6, xii. 37. See [p. 65].
[172] 2 Chron. xxvii. 3, xxxiii. 14; Neh. iii. 26, xi. 21.
[173] Neh. iii. 31–2, xii. 39.
CHAPTER V
THE GREEK AGE
THE GREEKS
The influence of Greece, which afterwards became so important a feature of Hebrew history, began to be felt in Palestine after the rough he-goat of Macedon had smitten the ram with two horns—the Medes and Persians—“in the fury of his power,” and when the four “notable” horns had sprung up after Alexander died. Hitherto we have seen Israel under the power of Semitic Assyrians and Babylonians, and of Egyptians. The first Aryan race with which the Hebrews came in contact was that of the Persians, but Persian civilisation also was founded on that of Babylon, and for long ages the Greeks in the West had been the pupils of Hittites and Semitic Lydians, in Asia Minor, before they developed an art and culture of their own superior to that of Asia. It is true that the enthusiasm of classical scholars has led them to over-estimate the antiquity and importance of Hellenic influence,[174] but the first appearance of Greeks near the shores of Syria is in the time of Sargon (about 710 B. C.), when the names of Greek and of Phœnician kings in Cyprus are noticed. It is of course possible that Cypriote pottery reached Palestine in this age, and it is known that wild Aryans attacked North Syria in the fourteenth century B. C., and even invaded Egypt about 1265 B. C. These fair-haired and blue-eyed peoples are represented on an Egyptian picture about 1200 B. C., but they were defeated on each occasion by the Pharaohs, and were driven back to Asia Minor. Thus they never formed an element of population in Palestine, nor is Greek influence discernible in the monumental remains before about 300 B. C. at earliest.
Alexander won the empire of Western Asia in three great battles, at Issos, at Arbela, and on the Indus; battles which are well worth study, on account of the tactical skill of his arrangements, which—at Issos especially—nullified the numerical superiority of the Persians. After he had entrapped them in the valley east of Tarsus, and after the fall of Tyre and the capture of Damascus, his march on Egypt met with resistance only at Gaza. The statesmanship of Aristotle’s pupil and the generous tolerance of his character rendered him acceptable to Semitic races which had long groaned under the tyranny of the later degenerate Persian monarchs. It is doubtful, perhaps, whether his visit to Jerusalem can be regarded as historical,[175] though there is nothing very inconsistent with Alexander’s method in the accounts; but it is clear that the Hebrews submitted to him without any struggle, and that he favoured the Jews in Egypt, who had a quarter in his new city Alexandria.
TYRUS
Alexander died at Babylon in 324 or 323 B. C., and Laomedon became ruler of Syria and Phœnicia; but Palestine became part of the dominions of Ptolemy I. of Egypt, who took Jerusalem on the sabbath day—the year, however, not being stated.[176] Seleucus, another of these generals, conquered Babylon in 312 B. C., and the “era of the Seleucidæ” dates from October 1 of that year. After the battle of Ipsos in 301 B. C., when the number of independent rulers in West Asia and Greece and Egypt was reduced to four, Seleucus built Antioch as the new trading capital of Syria. Ptolemy II.[177] was a very cultivated ruler, who caused the Law of Moses to be translated into Greek at Alexandria, and sent splendid gifts to the Temple at Jerusalem. The city remained under the Egyptians during the wars between Seleucidæ and Ptolemies, till after the great victory of Antiochus III. (at Baniâs in 198 B. C.) over Scopas, the general of Ptolemy V.[178] Antiochus marched into Gilead, and occupied Samaria. He brought elephants with him even to Jerusalem, where he besieged the citadel and expelled the Egyptian garrison, being apparently received with favour by the Jews. He presented costly gifts to the Temple, including salt (for the sacrifices), which was probably a royal monopoly, and caused the cloisters to be rebuilt, permitting the inhabitants to live according to their own law. He afterwards made a league with Ptolemy V., and Palestine was surrendered as the dower of Cleopatra—daughter of this Ptolemy—whom Antiochus married.[179] During this period the influence of Greek art begins to be notable in extant buildings in Palestine, and not much later a gymnasium was built even at Jerusalem, introducing ideas which were very repugnant to the Jews, but natural to the Greeks.[180] Onias, the high-priest, was the son of Simon the Just, and held office under Ptolemy III. (247–22 B. C.), whom he angered in the matter of taxes. A Levite named Joseph successfully settled the dispute—which was no doubt due to religious scruples. After his death, apparently in 187 B. C., Hyrcanus, a son of this Levite, retired to Gilead—driven out by his elder brothers—and there established himself at Tyrus, making war on the Arabs. His fortress with rocky caves and stables, and his palace of huge masonry, still exist at the place called ’Araḳ el Emîr, or “the Prince’s Cavern”; and the ruins are of great importance as showing that Greek ideas and Greek architectural style dominated the work even of Hebrew priests before 175 B. C. For in that year Hyrcanus, fearing punishment by the new tyrant, Antiochus IV., committed suicide at his palace,[181] which remained apparently unfinished, and is thus the earliest absolutely dated monument of Jewish art under Greek influence.[182]
Josephus mentions the lions that adorned this palace, in defiance of the law, which Hyrcanus broke as Solomon had done, and as even the rabbis of our second century did later, by the representation of living beasts. But the ruins furnish yet more remarkable evidence of Greek influence. The cliff has a gallery excavated more than half-way up its height, and various chambers run in from it, while below are the rock stables with their mangers, and the guard-house with its Aramaic text carved beside the door, proving that we are not dealing with a Greek site. These were planned by Lieut. Mantell, R.E., in 1881, when he also photographed the inscription, which I studied at the same time. It is in Aramaic characters, similar to those of other texts, and to those of the Jewish coins about half a century later. The comparison with these shows very clearly that the earlier copyists mistranslated the text, which reads ’Aûryah, from a root meaning “to be watchful.” It is thus either a direction to the “watch-house,” or an exhortation to the guard to be alert. The palace itself, on the flat ground above the stream, is surrounded on three sides by a broad court having boundary walls 10 feet high. The building itself measures 70 yards north and south, by 50 yards east and west, with a pillared entrance on the north. The unfinished capitals of huge pillars lie amid the ruins inside. On the east wall the top course at each angle is carved with lions, two facing north and two facing south respectively towards the corners. These also were unfinished. The total height of the building is 21 feet, and the lowest course is 8 feet high. The corner-stone is over 17 feet in length, and this fine masonry thus rivals that of Herod at Jerusalem and of the Romans at Ba’albek.
DRAFTED STONES
The reason for thus detailing the characteristics of this building is that it furnishes us with a dated example of Hebrew architecture in the Greek age, in a style which continued in fashion till the last days of ancient Jerusalem. We here find the gigantic ashlar finished with a sunk draft round each block, in imitation of the Greek masonry which characterises the Acropolis at Athens. Earlier explorers, who had a very imperfect acquaintance with Palestine architecture, have spoken of this finish as a “Phœnician bevel,” which is doubly incorrect, since there is no bevel, but a sunken border or draft, while there is no evidence that in Palestine—or in Phœnicia either—such masonry was in use before the Greek age. It never occurs in the older ruins as yet excavated in Judæa, though some writers have attributed to Hebrews and Phœnicians the masonry of later ages, including that of Herod and of the Romans, which they have failed to distinguish from inferior Byzantine imitations found in the walls of churches and monasteries, and even from the drafted masonry of the Franks in the twelfth century, which is distinguishable by the rude projecting bosses, the peculiar tooling of the smooth drafts, and the mason’s marks on stones used in interiors. That Solomon or Hiram ever used drafted masonry there is no evidence at all to prove.
Not only is this masonry Greek in style, but other details are equally classic, such as those of the Corinthian capitals at the north gate, the frieze with triglyphs, and the details of ornament with conventional honeysuckles and ovulæ of a cornice. We have just that combination of Greek and Asiatic ideals which we find in the Herodian architecture, and in the rock tombs of the Herodian age at Jerusalem, as will be noticed later. The palace of Hyrcanus is evidence of the rapid Hellenising of the Jews, which might have gone on without a check had not the intolerance of Antiochus IV. roused the patriotism of the Hasmonæans, and the puritanism of the Ḥasidim, or “pious,” whom they led in the great struggle for civil and religious liberty.
The Romans, who had defeated Antiochus III. at Magnesia in 190 B. C., forbade Antiochus IV. to make war on their protégé Ptolemy VII. in Egypt. Whether in wrath and disappointment he revenged himself on his Jewish subjects, or whether he regarded the consolidation of power as best effected by Hellenising them—as Russian Tsars have regarded the Russianising of Germans, Finns, and Jews in our own times—may be doubtful. But whatever the object with which Antiochus IV. deserted the tolerant policy of his predecessors, it is recorded that, on his return from Egypt in 170 B. C., he entered Jerusalem and plundered the city[183]; and two years later, on Cisleu 25, 168 B. C., he placed a Greek altar on that of Jehovah, and offered swine upon it, as also on other altars in every city and village of the country. Swine were offered to Aphrodite among Greeks in connection with the legend of Adonis, and to Osiris in Egypt.[184] Their bones have been found—as sacrifices to Demeter—in the ruins of the temple at Cnidus; but the pig was an unclean animal to Semitic peoples, and we can hardly doubt that the desecration was wilful, especially as the Semitic custom of circumcision was then also forbidden.
THE AKRA
At the same time Antiochus IV., having—according to Josephus—burned the principal buildings and thrown down the city walls, “built a citadel in the lower part of the city; for the place was high and overlooked the Temple, on which account he fortified it with high walls and towers, and put into it a garrison of Macedonians.” This was the famous Akra (or “citadel”) which played so important a part in the history of the struggle between Judas Maccabæus and his brothers on the one part, and the Greek kings of Syria on the other, and concerning which so many mistaken views survive from pre-scientific days.[185] The statements in the First Book of Maccabees are not very definite, though it is clear that this Akra was in the city of David, and that it was “alongside” the “hill of the Temple.” The Greek translators of the Old Testament, as already noticed, identified this Akra with the Millo of Solomon’s time. Josephus is more definite, and his evidence should not be lightly set aside because it contradicts the theories of modern literary critics, who have no hesitation in saying that the Jewish historian is wrong when his words cannot be reconciled with their understanding of the topography. Some writers[186] have placed the Akra south of the Temple, supposing the existence of an intervening valley (which, it may be said with certainty, never existed, since the levels of the rock forbid the supposition) and the existence of a summit on Ophel which was afterwards cleared away, and which would have had to be 150 feet high. They crowd all the nomenclature—city of David, Zion, Akra, Millo, Ophel, lower city, and the m’ṣudah or “hill-top”—into the narrow area of 15 acres (including also the supposed valley), leaving the city generally without any names for its quarters; and they reject the measurements and statements of the Bible and Josephus, except when these are misunderstood as confirming an unpractical theory. Others, on the contrary, would have us believe that the Akra destroyed by Simon the Hasmonæan was the same as the citadel Baris, which he or one of his family built soon after. They have been misled by Whiston’s translation “adjoined the Temple,” where the Greek really reads “lay over against the Temple.” If the Akra was levelled that it might not overlook the Holy House, it could not afterwards have been that rock which defended the Temple in later times, and which still rises with a high scarp above the inner courts. Both views are impracticable, and American scholars[187] seem always to have understood the topography better than some scholars in England, perhaps because they are not unconsciously influenced by the desire to save the traditional site of Calvary, which was the original cause of these attempts to twist the literary evidence from its natural explanation. The first school are involved in the dilemma that the city of David was first lower than the Temple, then—about 800 years later—was higher, and then lower again; while the supposed peak, 150 feet high, is geologically a very improbable feature, and the supposed valley never existed. The second school would make the Hasmonæans first cut down a hill as being a danger to the Temple, and then—later—build on the same hill a fortress overlooking and defending the Temple. Disregarding these dilemmas, we may inquire into the actual statements of ancient writers concerning the position of the Akra or “citadel,” though these have again and again been explained, without any answer having been given to the argument by those who are otherwise convinced.
THE AKRA
The word akra is Greek, and means “a citadel.” Josephus never applies the term to the fortress north of the Temple, which he calls the phrourion. In the First Book of Maccabees we read that the Greeks “built up the city of David with a great and strong wall and mighty towers, and it became a citadel (akra) for them.”[188] In another passage[189] we learn that this “city of David” was Jerusalem; and again[190] that this citadel was “in Jerusalem.” Jonathan, the brother of Judas Maccabæus, “piled up a great mound between the Akra and the city, to separate it from the city”[191]; and, as already noted, the “hill of the temple” lay “alongside the Akra,” which was finally taken by Simon, the elder brother of Judas.[192] The statements of Josephus are very clear on this subject. He says that this citadel was in the “lower part of the city,”[193] yet was “high and overlooked the Temple.” It moreover “lay over against the Temple,” and commanded the approach to it. Jonathan, he says, “built another wall to exclude the market from the Akra,” and this wall was “in the midst of the city.”[194] Simon took the “Akra of Jerusalem” and destroyed it, and the Jews then “levelled the mountain, and in that work spent both day and night without intermission, which cost them three whole years before it was removed, and brought quite to a level with the plain of the rest of the city. After which the Temple was the highest of all the buildings, now that the Akra, as well as the mountain on which it stood, was demolished.” Again he says that Simon “demolished the Akra,” and that the “hill which was called Akra and defended the lower city was gibbous” in shape; “and over against this was a third ridge, naturally lower than the Akra, and at first divided from the other by a flat valley. But in the times when the Hasmonæans ruled, they filled up the valley, deciding to join the Temple to the city; and, having levelled the mound of the Akra, they made it flatter, so that the Temple might be above the same.”[195]
There does not seem to be any difficulty in understanding these notices when taken together, nor do they contradict one another. The city lay over against the Temple “like a theatre,”[196] the upper city being on the south, and the lower city in the broad Tyropœon to the north; the horseshoe head of the valley gave the theatre form, and the hill defending the lower city was that “gibbous” spur—resembling the moon in the third quarter—which bulges out eastwards near the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. At its highest point—the rock of the traditional Calvary—it is 2,497 feet above sea-level, or more than 60 feet higher naturally than the rock site of the Temple. Originally the high ground stretched farther east, not far from the Temple, but separated from it by a flat valley 40 feet deep, which is the confluent of the Tyropœon, having its head near the present Damascus Gate on the north side of the city. By digging down this ridge, and filling the valley east of it, the surface in this part of Jerusalem became much what it now is; for the rock in the confluent valley—usually known as the Hasmonæan Valley—is now 40 feet under the street, and the visitor who follows the Via Dolorosa from the cathedral to Antonia (the Turkish barracks) is unaware of the original depth of this valley, though the street is not quite level throughout. East of this valley the present street rises towards Antonia, running over the fosse north of that citadel, which was filled in in 70 A. D., and over the Byzantine roof vaults of the Twin Pools, which were cut in that fosse. It is thus 40 feet higher than it was in the Hasmonæan age when the fosse was visible, and the road nearly level. There was plenty of room on the Akra spur for a citadel with towers, and the keep of the fortress was probably at the rock of the orthodox Calvary. The valley has been filled in at some period of history, and there is no reason to doubt that this was done by Simon the Hasmonæan. Josephus does not say that the rock was cut away, but merely that the “mound” on which the Akra stood was “worked down.”
THE HASMONÆANS
Considering the site to be thus settled, we may briefly sum up the history of the fortress. It was built as the Macedonian citadel in 170 B. C., the rest of the city being more or less destroyed; and—after the persecution of 168 B. C. and the setting up of “the abomination that maketh desolate” on the altar—the Temple itself was deserted. The revolt of the Hasmonæans (commonly known as “Maccabees”[197]) began at Modin, a little village in the low hills, 6 miles east of Lydda and 17 miles from Jerusalem, overlooking the plains, with a view of the sea. Here Mattathias the Hasmonæan and his five sons were successively buried, and their monument perhaps still awaits excavation under the tell south of the village of Medyeh. Mattathias died in 166 B. C., and the heroic Judas about five years later. The energy and ability of the brothers brought about final independence, in spite of occasional checks and misfortunes. The relief of the Akra garrison was the objective of the various Greek generals, and the Macedonian resistance in this citadel continued for thirty years, until the weakness of the Seleucidæ, due to internecine disputes in Antioch, rendered Antiochus VII. willing to accept Simon, the surviving brother of Judas, as ethnarch of Palestine, under a suzerainty which soon became nominal.
The first great victory of Judas Maccabæus was won over the Greeks near Emmaus Nicopolis, not far from Modin, in 165 B. C.; he subsequently defeated Lysias at Bethzur, south of Jerusalem, in an attempt to reach the city by the southern pass. After this second victory Judas and his men went up to Mount Sion—that is, to Jerusalem—to cleanse the Temple[198]: “And when they saw the sanctuary desolate and the altar profaned, and the gates burned up, and shrubs growing in the courts as in a forest or in one of the mountains, and the chambers pulled down, they rent their clothes, and made great lamentation, and cast ashes on their heads.” The defiled stones were carried out to an unclean place, but those of the Altar of Jehovah were laid up in the “Mountain of the Temple,” “until there should come a prophet to show what should be done with them.” They appear to have remained in the north-east chamber of the great gate-house called Moḳed (on the north side of the priests’ court), until the final destruction of the city.[199] The Temple was rebuilt, with a new altar of white stones, and was reconsecrated on Cisleu 25, 164 B. C. The Feast of Dedication has been commemorated ever since on that day. But hardly had this work been accomplished when Jerusalem was retaken by Lysias, and the Macedonian garrison relieved. The year 163 B. C. was a sabbatic year, and no resistance appears to have been made by the majority of the nation. Judas was defeated at Beth-zachariah, south of Jerusalem, and his brother Eleazar perished under one of the elephants of the enemy. The Hasmonæans shut themselves up in the Temple courts, but fortunately—at the moment of their greatest need—bad news from the north reached Lysias, and he hastily made peace, and conceded the main demand that the Jews should be at liberty to follow the law. The young king Antiochus V. appears to have been with the army, and when he entered Sion and saw the strength of the place, he commanded the destruction of the walls.[200]
DEATH OF JUDAS
Judas took occasion of the troubles that arose in Syria next year to expel the Hellenisers from the city. Alcimus (the high-priest recognised by this party) came back with a force sent by Demetrius Soter[201] under the command of Bacchides, and the Ḥasidim admitted the Greeks because they were accompanied by “a priest of the seed of Aaron.”[202] Bacchides removed his camp to a place called Bezeth, which has been supposed to be the later Bezetha north of the Temple, not yet within the city. His successor, Nicanor, was attacked by Judas at Caphar-salama—perhaps the modern Selmeh near Jaffa—and forced to flee back to the “city of David”—that is, to Jerusalem. The priests came out of the temple to “Mount Sion,” but were wrathfully received by the defeated general, and in the cold winter month of Adar he went forth to meet the advance of Judas, and was slain at Adasa, north of the city. The new usurper, Demetrius Soter, had fled from Rome to Antioch, and to the Romans Judas turned for help, little foreseeing the future results of this policy, to which his successors also adhered. But Roman armies were still far away, and in the year 161 B. C. Demetrius sent Bacchides once more by the north road through Samaria, and Judas was outflanked and slain at Beth-zetho—apparently the present Bîr ez Zeit, commanding a pass four miles north-west of Bethel.[203] The Akra garrison was thus once more relieved.[204]
After this disaster the Hasmonæan party under Jonathan were hunted to the Jordan marshes, and the Greeks maintained order for two years, and then made peace with Jonathan, who took up his residence at Michmash. In the year 152 B. C. another revolution in Syria placed Alexander Balas on the throne of Antioch.[205] The new ursurper made Jonathan high-priest, and the only garrisons maintained by the Greeks were those of Bethzur, and of the Akra in Jerusalem. Yet another revolution occurred in 147 B. C., when Demetrius Nicator became king of Syria.[206] Jonathan then struck for freedom once more, capturing Joppa and Ascalon, and returning to Jerusalem, where he besieged the Akra. Demetrius granted to him an extension of Judæa at the expense of Samaria, and the next usurper, Trypho, confirmed his position as ruler. In 144 B. C. Jonathan and Simon built the wall, or mound, in the midst of Jerusalem, to separate the Akra from the market-place. They also repaired the city walls, especially at a place called Caphenatha, on the east near the brook Kidron. The word “Caphenatha” is Aramaic for a “heap,” and is thus probably equivalent to the Hebrew ’Ophel, or “mound.” As regards the wall or mound in the middle of the city, it should be observed that the only market-place in Jerusalem mentioned by Josephus is that in the upper city. It is possible, therefore, that the wall to which he refers was that which defended the upper city on the north side, running through the middle of the town to the Temple. But in the history which he follows it was called a “mound,” and not a wall. It may therefore have been raised as a covered way on the narrow neck of land near the Jaffa Gate. This would serve to protect those who came in to the upper market from any attack by the Akra garrison. No wall on the Ophel spur nor any north of the Temple could be described, in this age, as being in the “midst of the city,” and this allusion serves therefore to confirm the supposition that the Akra lay north of the upper city.[207]
JEWISH COINS
The aim of Jonathan, who combined the offices of high-priest and civil governor, was to restore Hebrew freedom not only in Judæa, but throughout Palestine, and even to restore the empire of Solomon, to the Eleutherus River or “entering in to Hamath.” But the usurping general Trypho enticed him into the city of Accho, and led him prisoner to Gilead, where he was put to death, in 143 B. C. Thus Simon alone survived of the five famous brethren. He fortified Jerusalem, against which Trypho intended to advance, but the city was saved by a heavy fall of snow, which blocked the roads.[208] The year 142 B. C. was called—in the commercial contracts of Israel—the “first year of Simon the high-priest, general and governor of the Jews.”[209] A bronze tablet recording his treaty with Rome was set up, two years later, on Mount Sion, in which he was called “high-priest to the army of God [Ṣaramel],” the great congregation of the priests, the people, and the chiefs ratifying his action.[210] This term, taken from the Aramaic original of the First Book of Maccabees, is left untranslated in our Greek version. Antiochus VII., in 139 B. C., bestowed on Simon the right to strike a silver coinage,[211] and these coins appear to have borne the name “Simon” on one side, and the legend “Deliverance of Jerusalem” on the other, in letters of the old alphabet of Israel, the forms of which were but slightly modified from those of the Siloam text, though manifestly later.[212] Simon was thus the most successful of the Hasmonæan brothers, and his greatest triumph was the final conquest of the Akra citadel. The garrison was at length withdrawn from the “city of David in Jerusalem,”[213] and the fortress was at first occupied by Jews, and—as we have already seen—finally demolished, about 140 B. C.
When Simon was murdered near Jericho in 135 B. C., his son John Hyrcanus succeeded him, and manifested the same courage and ability which distinguished his father. He was unfortunate, however, at first, for Antiochus VII. attacked Jerusalem in 134 B. C. Josephus relates that the Greeks established seven camps round the city, and raised an hundred siege-towers (probably an exaggeration) “about the north part of the wall, where it happened that it was upon a level with the outer ground.”[214] This agrees with the supposition that the wall ran on the spur north of the Tyropœon. It was the time of the Feast of Tabernacles—in autumn—and the granting of a truce for seven days, that the festival might be held, produced so favourable an impression on the Jews that peace was soon made on fair terms. It was on this occasion that Hyrcanus opened David’s sepulchre, whence—as rumour said—he took 3,000 talents. Some ten years later he became more powerful, and destroyed the Samaritan temple on Gerizim. He died in 106 B. C., and the decadence of the race began in the next generation.
TOMB OF JANNÆUS
Aristobulus, his eldest son, ruled for one year only. His coins are still inscribed in Hebrew, but on those of his brother, Alexander Jannæus, the Greek language for the first time appears on Jewish money. The more peaceful relations with the later Seleucidæ apparently led to a revival of Greek influence, and the grandchildren of Simon followed Greek fashions, Aristobulus being the first of these rulers to set a diadem on his head,[215] though he retained the old title “High-priest and Uniter of the Jews,” as is known from his bronze coins. Alexander Jannæus went further and called himself in Hebrew “Jehonathan the King,” while the reverse of the coin bears in Greek the words “of Alexander the King.”[216] His reign (105 to 78 B. C.) was one of very chequered fortune, and he appears to have been a very ordinary tyrant. The events immediately connected with Jerusalem include the building of a wooden partition wall round the Temple and Altar; the riot in which—at the Feast of Tabernacles—he was pelted with the lemons which were already carried as sacred emblems by the worshippers; and the crucifixion of eight hundred Jewish rebels at Jerusalem, which shows us that he adopted a punishment then in use among Greeks and Romans, as it had been yet earlier among Carthaginians.[217]
In a later passage[218] Josephus speaks of the defenders of the Temple, in 70 A. D., as fighting the Romans “from the tower Antonia, and from the north cloister of the Temple, and ... before the monument of King Alexander”—an allusion which raises a very interesting question as to existing antiquities: for the attack on the Temple walls thus met was evidently that of the tenth legion from Olivet, and the tomb or monument in question may have been that now called the “Tomb of Absalom,” belonging to a group of four conspicuous Greco-Jewish tombs on the east bank of the Kidron, opposite the south part of the eastern wall of the Ḥaram. The style of the palace of Hyrcanus in Gilead shows us that these tombs might well be as old as 78 B. C. They resemble the rock sepulchres of Petra, though the latter may be somewhat later. “Absalom’s Tomb”[219] is a chamber with two loculi, or rock coffins, one in each side. The block of rock has been cut out from the cliff, and is 20 feet square. It is adorned with Ionic pillars, and a Greek frieze, over which is a bold corbelled cornice, and above the cornice a square masonry base, and a drum supporting a peculiar dome which has a finial 55 feet above the ground. The dome is a feature of Herodian architecture half a century later, and may well have been known in Palestine in the time of Alexander Jannæus, for domes are represented on Assyrian bas-reliefs even in the seventh century B. C.
South of this monument is the tomb of the Bene Hezir priests,[220] which has kokîm graves in the Hebrew style, but a porch supported by two Doric pillars cut out of the rock. The inscription above them, recording the names of these priests, is in characters which are practically square Hebrew, but such characters are found in Aramaic papyri even as early as 200 B. C. It is evident that a monument to Jewish priests, of such importance, must have been made in the prosperous times either of the Hasmonæans or of the Herodians, and could not have been hewn after the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A. D. The characters are not like those of the coinage of Alexander Jannæus, though the lettering on these is much less antique than that of Simon’s coinage. But in this age there were many variations of the old Aramean alphabet in use, and (according to the Talmud) the square characters were used for sacred writings in the Hebrew tongue, side by side with the older script, which was used for Aramaic texts and civil documents.[221] It thus seems possible that the characters on a priests’ tomb might differ from those of the contemporary civil coinage. It may, on the other hand, be thought that this tomb is somewhat later than 78 B. C.
HEBREW INSCRIPTION.
Tomb of Beni Ḥezir.
THE KIDRON TOMBS
The third monument of this group is yet farther south, and is now called the “Tomb of Zechariah.” It is entirely rock cut, and similar to “Absalom’s Tomb” except in having a pyramidal roof. It has also the same bold corbelled cornice. The fourth tomb is north of the village of Silwân, and is rarely noticed in early accounts. It was called by de Vogüé the “Egyptian Tomb,” because it has a corbelled cornice—like the others—which he regarded as Egyptian. This kind of cornice is not only found with Greek pillars in the other instances, but it also occurs in the Ḥaram at Hebron, in connection with Herodian masonry. The tomb has no other adornment outside; on the inside it has a ridge ceiling.[222] There is no reason to suppose that it is any older than the other three. To the left of the door there are two marks cut in the rock. M. Clermont-Ganneau regards them as letters, and thinks that the height of the door was increased, cutting off the rest of the text. The marks are much weathered, and it is doubtful if they are letters at all. Nor could I find (after careful examination) any sign of the door having been altered. They are certainly not Egyptian signs, and if accepted would still prove nothing towards the improbable theory of Egyptian origin.
A brief account of the Roman conquest of the holy city will close this narrative of the Greek age in Jerusalem. The power of Rome was constantly increasing in the north, as she successively defeated Mithridates of Pontus and Tigranes of Armenia; and Pompey in 65 B. C. deposed Antiochus Asiaticus, last of the Seleucidæ, and set up Antiochus of Commagene in north-eastern Syria—a ruler half Greek, half Persian, whose remarkable tomb, with its valuable Greek texts, has been found on the Taurus north of Samosata.
POMPEY
Judea had been wisely ruled for nearly ten years by Salome Alexandra, the widow of Alexander Jannæus, supported by the Pharisees, who are first noticed as a Jewish sect in the time of Jonathan, but who now became the leaders of the nation, adding many traditions—which often seem to be of Persian rather than of Hebrew origin—to the law of Moses. The quarrels of the degenerate sons of Alexander Jannæus, after the death of their mother in 69 B. C., gave a pretext to Pompey for interference in Jewish affairs. They at first agreed that Aristobulus the elder should be high-priest, and Hyrcanus the younger king. But the latter called to his aid the powerful Arab king Aretas (or Ḥârith) from Petra, and Aristobulus offered Pompey a bribe of 400 talents for his support. So Scaurus was sent by the great conqueror of Armenia to settle the affairs of the Jews.[223]
Hyrcanus had been persuaded by Antipater the Idumæan, whom his father had made commander in Edom,[224] to flee to Petra, and he thence returned with his Arab allies to besiege his brother in Jerusalem. Scaurus commanded them to depart, and leaving Aristobulus in the city, he returned to Damascus. Pompey, having subdued Tigranes, soon followed and marched to Jericho.[225] Aristobulus was ready to submit to Pompey’s demand that he should surrender his strongholds, but the Jerusalem Jews refused to admit the Roman envoy Gabinius within the walls of Jerusalem. The city at this time is described as having strong walls, and was only weak on the north, where there was no deep outer valley. The patriotic party and the unhappy Aristobulus held the Temple, defended on the north by the citadel afterwards called Antonia, which had a deep ditch dug beneath great towers, and was also protected by a natural valley. The ditch still exists, and will be noticed again. The valley is to the east, and is an affluent of the Kidron, the existence of which was unknown before the excavations of Sir Charles Warren on the north and north-east sides of the Ḥaram enclosure. The defenders also broke down the bridge leading from the upper city to the Temple hill, and—though the natural slopes of the ridge of Moriah were still visible on the west side—it is possible that there was already a wall between the city and the Temple. The voussoirs of this bridge lie jammed in the rock-cut aqueduct, 20 feet below the later Herodian pavement.
Pompey attacked on the north, and, having broken in, besieged the Antonia citadel, partly filling in the fosse. Banks were raised, and battering-rams and catapults from Tyre battered the wall. On the fatal day of the fast or 27th of the 3rd month of the year 63 B. C. the Temple fell. But Pompey—unlike the rapacious Crassus, who plundered its riches in 55 B. C., when on his way to meet his fate in Parthia—refrained from pillaging it, though he entered the Holy of Holies, and saw in the holy place, the golden table, golden altar, and seven-branched lamp, with many other treasures. Jerusalem was made tributary to Rome; Hyrcanus was set up in the stead of Aristobulus as high-priest; and five local councils were established in Palestine under Gabinius, one of these being in the Holy City.