Alexander and Aristobulus were then, by their father’s orders, removed to Sebaste[[121]] and there strangled. Their bodies were conveyed by night to Alexandrium,[[122]] where their mother’s father[[123]] and most of their ancestors lay buried.
Now some, perhaps, may not find it strange that a long cherished hatred should grow so great as to surpass all bounds and overpower the natural affections. Yet the apportionment of the guilt for so grave a crime may well give pause for reflection. Should it be laid to the charge of the youths that they drove their father to extremities[[124]] and by long and persistent recalcitrance paved the way for their own ruin? Or was the father himself the culprit—without feelings and so extravagant in his lust for dominion and fame that he was prepared to sacrifice any one[[125]] to ensure unquestioning obedience to his every whim? Or, again, was it Fortune—Fortune whose power is mightier than any considerate thought,[[126]] so that we believe that human actions are foreordained by her by an inevitable necessity, and we call her Destiny, because we think that nothing happens of which she is not the ultimate cause?
It will suffice, I think,[[127]] merely to propound this last view as an alternative to the other.[[128]] We do not thereby deprive ourselves[[129]] of all free-will nor disclaim responsibility for acting in this way or that in matters which long before our time have been elsewhere philosophically treated in the Law.
As between the two other alternatives, one might censure the lads, in that, with youthful impetuosity and princely insolence, they tolerated calumnies upon their father, and were no fair critics of the actions of his life.[[130]] Malicious in their suspicions, and intemperate in speech, they were on both grounds an easy prey to the flattering informers who lay in wait for them.
As for the father, his impious treatment of his sons seems to admit of no extenuation. With no clear evidence of a plot, with no proof of any preparations for an attempt on his life, he had the heart to slay his own flesh and blood. Men of the noblest presence, the darlings of all outside the family, proficient in their pursuits, whether hunting or military exercises or discourse on everyday topics—they had all these gifts, in particular Alexander, the elder of the two. Granted that he had actually found them guilty, it would have been punishment enough to confine them in prison or to banish them from the realm, without taking their lives; he had the sure shield of the power of the Roman Empire[[131]] to secure him from assault and violence. But to kill them out of hand to gratify an overmastering passion was a clear case of impiety beyond measure; this appalling crime was, moreover, the act of an old man. The long struggle and procrastination cannot be urged in his excuse. That a man taken by surprise should in a fit of excitement commit some monstrous crime, though distressing, is an event of common occurrence. But this deliberate and leisurely procedure—often to take the deed in hand and as often to postpone it, and then at last to undertake it and carry it through—that was the work of a murderous mind, rooted in depravity.
He displayed the same character in the sequel, when he did not stay his hand even from those whom he held dearest of the remaining members of his family.[[132]] In their case the justice of the sentence created less sympathy for the victims, but the barbarity was the same as was shown in his refusal of mercy to the others.—Ant. XVI. 11. 7 f. (394-404).
(21) Herod’s Dying Provision for a National Mourning
With this passage we reach the N.T. period. The grim story of an intended massacre, happily in this case averted, affords a parallel to the Gospel story of the murder of the innocents.
4 B. C.
Now, although his sufferings seemed beyond human endurance, he did not despair of recovery. He sent for physicians, and consented to try every remedy which they prescribed. He crossed over the river Jordan, and surrendered himself to treatment in the hot springs at Callirrhoe. These waters, besides their general remedial properties, are fit to drink; they debouch into the so-called Bituminous[[133]] Lake. Here, the physicians deciding that a higher temperature was needed, he was placed in a vat of oil. To this treatment he appeared to have succumbed, but when his attendants fell to lamentation, he rallied, and now abandoning all hope of recovery, gave orders that every soldier should be paid fifty pieces of silver;[[134]] he made further large bequests to their commanding officers and to his personal friends. Returning to Jericho, he had an attack of black bile, which rendered him so savage with all the world[[135]] that, although now nearing his end, he contrived the scheme which I proceed to describe.