Great that history has bestowed on him. He was great as a soldier, great
as a diplomatist, great as an administrator. Made king in his youth;
established in his power by the Roman senate; confirmed in his state by
Augustus; entrusted with all but unlimited powers; absolved from the
duty to pay tribute to the empire; his long reign of more than forty
years was of great moment to the Jewish state. Internally he corrupted
it, but externally he beautified it. The superb temple, one of the
wonders and ornaments of the Eastern world, was of his building, and so
delicately as well as munificently was it done, that the shock of
removing the old edifice to make room for the new was quite avoided. He
adorned the city besides, with sumptuous monuments and structures. His
palaces, theatres, tombs were of unexampled magnificence. Nor was his
attention confined to the city of Jerusalem; Caesarea was enriched with
marble docks and palaces; Joppa was made handsome; Antonia was
fortified. Games and feasts relieved the monotony of Eastern life, and
gratified the Greek taste for splendid gaiety. But this was all in the
interest of paganism. If he rebuilt the temple at Jerusalem, he rebuilt
also the temple at Samaria. If he made superb the worship of Jehovah in
the holy city, he encouraged heathen worship in the new city of Caesarea.
This introduction of Roman customs deeply offended the religious sense
of the nation. Outside the city walls he had an amphitheatre for
barbarous games. Inside, he had a theatre for Greek plays and dances.
The castle, Antonia, well garrisoned, a castle and a palace combined,
commanded the temple square. The Roman eagle, fixed upon the front of
the temple, was an affront that no magnificence or munificence could
atone for. His private life was not calculated to win the favor of a
severely puritanical people, or persuade them of the advantage of being
under imperial dominion. The Greek legends on his coins, his
ostentatious encouragement of foreign usages and people, his rude
treatment of Hebrew prejudices, and his haughty bearing towards the
"first families" added bitterness to the misery of foreign sway.
Yet the situation became worse at his death. For his successors had his
audacity without his prudence, and were disposed, as he was, to be
oppressive, without being, as he was, magnificent. He did keep the
nation at peace by his tyranny, if by his cruelty he undermined security
and provoked the disaffection that made peace impossible after him. The
last acts ascribed to him, the order that the most eminent men of the
nation should be put to death at his decease, and that the infants of
Bethlehem, the city of David, should be massacred, attest more than the
vulgar belief in his cruelty; they bear witness to a conviction that the
spirit of the people was not dead, that the despotism of Rome had failed
to crush the hope of Israel. The death of Herod, which occurred when
Jesus was a little child, was followed by frightful social and political
convulsions. For two or three years all the elements of disorder were
afoot. Between pretenders to the vacant throne of Herod, and aspirants
to the Messianic throne of David, Judaea was torn and devastated. Revolt
assumed the wildest form, the higher enthusiasm of faith yielded to the
lower fury of fanaticism; the celestial visions of a kingdom of heaven
were completely banished by the smoke and flame of political hate.
Claimant after claimant of the dangerous supremacy of the Messiah
appeared, pitched a camp in the wilderness, raised the banner, gathered
a force, was attacked, defeated, banished or crucified; but the frenzy
did not abate. Conservative Jews, in their despair, sent an embassy to
Rome, praying for tranquility under the equitable reign of law. They
wanted no king like Herod, or of Herod's line; they prayed to be
delivered from all kings who were not themselves subject to imperial
responsibility. The governor of Syria they would acknowledge. The
petition was not granted. Herod's three sons, Archelaus, Antipas and
Philip divided their father's dominion between them; Judaea was made a
Roman province, subject to taxation like any other.
The best of the three kings was Philip, who received as his portion the
North Eastern division, the most remote from the centre of disturbance.
He was a quiet, well-disposed man, who staid at home, attended to his
own business, developed the resources of his dominion, and showed
himself a father to his people. Caesarea Philippi was built by him;
Bethsaida was rebuilt. Antipas, called also Herod, was appointed ruler
over Galilee and Peraea; a cunning, unprincipled man, nicknamed "the
fox;" despotic and wilful, like his father, and like his father, fond of
display. He built Dio Caesarea, as it was afterwards called, and
Tiberias, on the sea of Galilee. He too was a good deal of a pagan, and
deeply outraged the Hebrew conscience by repudiating his wife, the
daughter of Aretas, an Arabian king, and marrying the wife of his
half-brother, Philip. He was an oriental despot, superstitious,
luxurious, sensual, wilful and weak; quite destitute of the
statesmanship required in the ruler of a turbulent province, where
special care and skill were necessary to reconcile the order of civil
government with the aspiration after theocratic supremacy. The spiritual
fear, which compelled him to stand in awe of religious enthusiasm, put
him on more than half earnest quest of prophetic messengers, made him
curious about miracles and signs, and anxious not to offend needlessly
the higher powers, was incessantly at war with the self-regarding policy
which resented the smallest encroachment on his own authority. To
maintain his ducal state, and meet the cost of his public and private
extravagance, he imposed heavy taxes, and collected them in an
unscrupulous fashion, which made him and the empire he represented
extremely unpopular. Jealous of his prerogative, and ambitious of regal
rank, he brought himself into disagreeable collision with the
aspirations of the people he governed. His immediate neighborhood to the
centres of Jewish enthusiasm,--he lived in the very heart of it, for
Galilee was the seat and head-quarters of Hebrew radicalism--made his
every movement felt. In him the spirit of the Roman empire was, in the
belief of the people, incarnate.
The oldest brother, Archelaus, held the chief position, bore the highest
title, received the largest tribute, more than a million of dollars, and
resided in Judaea, nearer the political centre of the country. His reign
was short. His cruelty and lawlessness, his disregard of private and
public decencies raised his subjects against him. Augustus, on an appeal
to Rome for redress, summoned him to his presence, listened to the
charges and the defence, and banished him to Gaul. This was in the year
6 of our era, only three years after the death of Herod. The reign of
his brothers, Philip and Antipas, covered the period of the life of
Jesus.
The "taxing" which excited the wildest uproar against the Roman power,
took place at this period,--A. D. 7,--under Cyrenius or Quirinus,
governor of Syria; it was the first general tax laid directly by the
imperial government, and it raised a furious storm of opposition. The
Hebrew spirit was stung into exasperation; the puritans of the nation,
the enthusiasts, fanatics, the zealots of the law, the literal
constructionists of prophecy, appealed to the national temper, revived
the national faith, and fanned into flame the combustible elements that
smouldered in the bosom of the race. A native Hebrew party was formed,
on the idea that Judaea was for the Jews; that the rule of the Gentile
was ungodly; that all support given to it was disloyalty to Jehovah. The
popular feeling broke out in open rebellion; the fanaticism of the
"zealots" affected the whole nation. Whoever had the courage to draw the
sword in the name of the Messiah was sure of a following, though there
was no chance that the uprising would end in anything but blood and
worse oppression. The most extravagant expectations were cherished of
miraculous furtherance and super-human aid. The popular imagination,
inflamed by rhetoric taken from Daniel, Enoch, and other apocryphal
books, went beyond all sober limits. The primary conditions of divine
assistance, sanctity, fidelity, patience, meekness of trust, reverence
for the Lord's will, were neglected and forgotten; the promise alone was
kept in view; the word of Jehovah was alone remembered; his command was
disregarded. But the Lord's promise was not kept. Every new uprising was
followed by fresh impositions; the detestable dominion was fastened upon
the people more hopelessly than ever. The temper of the domination
became bitter and contemptuous, as it had not been before. The name of
Jew was synonymous to Roman ears with vulgar fanaticism.
In place of Archelaus, Augustus sent procurators, as they were called,
Coponius, Marcus Ambivius, Annius Rufus. The country was generally
tranquil under their short administrations; but the internal feuds were
not pacified. The enthusiasm of the Jews provoked the malignity of the
Samaritans, who, having been longer wonted to foreign rule, less
resented it, and were not unwilling to put themselves in league with the
despot to crush an ancient foe. It is related that during the
administration of Coponius, some evil-minded Samaritans, stole into the
open temple of Jerusalem, on the passover night, and threw human bones
into the holy place. The building was desecrated for the season and must
be purified by special sacrifices before it could be used again. The
dastardly act was associated, in the minds of the people, with the
insulting degradations of the Gentile power, and the spirit of rebellion
was exasperated.
Augustus died A. D. 14, and was succeeded by Tiberius, whose policy
towards Judaea, was not oppressive so much as contemptuous. He was too
merciful to the "sick man" to drive away the carrion flies that were
already surfeited, and let in a fresh swarm of blood-suckers. His
viceroys enjoyed a long term of office and plundered at leisure. Pontius
Pilate was appointed to this position in the year 26, about four years
before the public appearance of Jesus, and was kept there till the year
37. He was, in many respects, a good administrator: overbearing, of
course, for he was a Roman; his subjects were by nature, irritating,
and by reputation, factious. He was greedy of gain, though not rapacious
or extortionate; not a man of high principle; not a sympathetic or
sentimental man, cold, indifferent, apathetic rather; still, moderate,
and, on the whole, just; liable to mistakes through stubbornness and
imprudence, but neither cruel, jealous, nor vindictive. The reputation
of being all these was easily earned by a man in his position; for the
Jews were sensitive, not easily satisfied, and disposed to construe
unfavorably any acts of a foreign ruler. As viceroys went, Pilate was
not a bad man, nor was he a bad specimen of his class. The smallest
imprudence might precipitate riot in Jerusalem. On one occasion, the
troops from Samaria, coming to winter at Jerusalem, were allowed to
carry, emblazoned on their banner, the image of the emperor, to which
the Roman soldiers attached a sacred character. The sight of the
idolatrous standard on the morning of its first exhibition created great
excitement. A riot broke forth at once; a deputation waited on the
governor at Caesarea, to protest against the outrage and demand the
removal of the sacrilege. Pilate firmly withstood the supplicants,
thinking the honor of the emperor at stake. Five days and five nights
the petitioners stayed, pressing their demand. On the sixth day, the
governor, wearied by their importunity and resolved to put an end to the
annoyance, had his judgment-seat placed on the race-course, ordered
troops to lie concealed in the near neighborhood, and awaited the visit
of the Jews. The deputation came as usual with their complaint; at a
signal, the soldiers appeared and surrounded the suppliants, while the
procurator threatened them with instant death, if they did not at once
retire to their homes. The stern puritans, nothing daunted, threw
themselves at his feet, stretched out their necks, and cried: 'It were
better to die than to submit to insult to our holy laws.' The astonished
governor yielded, and the insignia were removed.
On another occasion Pilate was made sensible of the inflammable
character of the people with whom he had to deal. He had allowed the
construction, perhaps only the restoration, of a costly aqueduct to
supply the city, but more especially the temple buildings, with pure
water. It was built at the instance of the Sanhedrim and the priests, to
whom an abundance of water was a prime necessity. In consideration of
this fact, as well as of the circumstance that the benefit of the
improvement accrued wholly to the Jewish people, it seemed to Pilate no
more than just that the expense should be defrayed from moneys in the
temple treasury that were set apart for such purposes. There is no
evidence that his action was unreasonable or his method of pursuing it
offensive; but clamors at once arose against his project, and on
occasion of his coming to Jerusalem a tumultuous crowd pressed on him,
and insulting epithets were flung at him from the rabble. To still and
scatter them soldiers were sent, in ordinary dress, with clubs in their
hands, their weapons being concealed, to overawe the malcontents. This
failing, and the tumult increasing, the signal of attack was given; the
soldiers fell to with a will; blood was shed; innocent and guilty
suffered alike. As this occurred on a feast day, near the Praetorium, and
not far from the temple itself, it is quite possible that the sacred
precincts were disturbed by the uproar, and that the stain of blood
touched consecrated pavement. The popular mind, excited and maddened,
seized on the occurrence, represented it as a deliberate affront on the
part of the governor, and charged him with mingling the blood of
innocent people with the sacrifices they were offering to Jehovah. It is
not unlikely that the "tower of Siloam" which fell, crushing eighteen
citizens, was a part of this very aqueduct wall, and its fall may have
been and probably was, regarded as a judgment on the work and on all who
countenanced it. That it made a profound impression on the popular
imagination appears in the gospel narratives written many years
afterwards. Ewald supposes that this accident happened at an early stage
of the work, and was a leading cause of the fanatical outbreak that
expressed the popular discontent.
Philo tells a story of Pilate's administration, so characteristic that
it deserves repeating, although, as Ewald remarks, it may be another
version of the incident of the standards. Ewald, however, is inclined to
think it a distinct occurrence. According to this narrative, Pilate, in
honor of the emperor, and in accordance with a custom prevalent
throughout the empire, especially in the East, caused to be set up in a
conspicuous place in Jerusalem, two votive shields of gold, one bearing
the name of Tiberius, the other his own. The shields had nothing on them
but the names; no image, no inscription, no idolatrous emblem, simply
the two names. But even this was resented by the fiery populace who
could not endure the lightest intimation of their subjection to a
Gentile power. The indignation reached the aristocracy; at least, the
force of the movement did; and the sons of Herod, all four of them,
accompanied by members of the first families and city officials,
formally waited on Pilate to demand the removal of the tablets, and on
his refusal went to Rome to lay the matter before Tiberius, who granted,
on his part, the request. Be the incident as recorded true or not, the
record of it by so near a contemporary and so clear a judge as Philo,
throws a strong light on the situation, brings the two parties into bold
relief, as they confront one another, and affords a glimpse into the
secret workings of Hebrew political motives.
The pressure of the Roman authority was incessant and severe, though the
apparatus of it was kept in the background. The governor held his court
and head-quarters at Caesarea, a seaport town on the Mediterranean, about
mid-way between Joppa on the south, and the promontory of Carmel on the
north, admirably situated with regard to Rome, on the one side, and
Palestine on the other. For strategic purposes the place was well
chosen. The military force in the country was not large--about a
thousand men--but it was effectively disposed. The castle of Antonia, in
the city of Jerusalem, contained a garrison judiciously small, but
sufficient for an exigency. The viceroy was present in the Holy City on
public days when great assemblages of people, gathered together under
circumstances provocative of insurrection, required closer watch than
usual. He had a residence there, and a judgment-seat on a marble balcony
in front of the palace; he exercised regal powers, held the issues of
life and death, could depose priests of any order; in short, ruled the
subject people with as much consideration as the peculiar circumstances
of the case demanded, but no more. The people were never permitted to
forget their subject condition. The hated tax-gatherer went his rounds,
exacting tribute to the empire. The evolutions of soldiers gave an
aspect of omnipresence to the foreign dominion. The hope of deliverance
lost its spiritual character, and took on decidedly a political shape.
The anticipation of the Messiah became less ideal, but more intense. The
armed figure of king David haunted the dreams of fanatics; even the
angels that hovered before the imagination of gentler enthusiasts wore
breast-plates and had swords in their hands. The kingdom looked for was
no reign of truth, mercy, and kindness, but a reign of force, for force
alone could meet force.
III.
THE SECTS.
The popular aspect of the Messianic hope was political, not religious or
moral. The name "Messiah," was synonymous with "King of the Jews;" it
suggested political designs and aspirations. The assumption of that
character by any individual drew on him the vigilance of the police. In
this condition of affairs the public sentiment was divided between the
Conservatives and the Radicals. The first party comprised the wealthy,
settled, permanent, cautious people whose patriotism was tinged with
prudent reflection. They saw the hopelessness of revolt, its inevitable
failure, and the worse tyranny that would follow its bloody suppression;
they put generous interpretations on the acts and intentions of the
imperial power, did justice and a little more than literal justice to
acts of clemency or forbearance, appreciated the value of the Roman
supremacy in preserving internal quiet and keeping other plunderers at a
distance; and had confidence that patience and diplomacy would
accomplish what force could not undertake. They were careful,
therefore, to maintain a good understanding with the powers that were,
and frowned on all attempts to revive the national spirit.
The conservatives were of all shades of opinion, and of all parties; the
radicals were, as is usually the case, confined mostly to those who had
little to lose, either of wealth, reputation, or social position. The
supremacy of Israel, the restoration of the Jewish Commonwealth, the
overthrow of the wealthy and powerful, the reinstatement of the poor,
the unlettered, the weak, the suffering, the downtrodden "children of
Abraham," composed the group of ideas which made up the sum of their
intellectual life. The Roman dominion was abhorred not because it was
cruel, but because it was sacrilegious. Diplomacy, with these, was
another word for time-serving; policy another phrase for cowardice; they
detested prudence as ignoble; they distrusted conciliation as apostacy;
they put the worst construction on the fairest seeming deeds, dreading
nothing so much as agreement between the chief men of Israel and the
minions of the empire.
The educated and responsible classes were chiefly conservative. No sect
was so entirely, for no sect comprised all of these classes; but some
sects were naturally more conservative than others. The Sadducees were,
on the whole, the most so; not by reason of their creed particularly,
but through the influence of their historical antecedents. After the
capture of Jerusalem by Ptolemy, 320 B. C., some hundred thousand Jews
went to Egypt and attained consequence there; had their own religious
rites and temple. Contact with Greek thought and life there enlarged
their minds. Their old-fashioned Hebraism seemed strait and prim by the
side of the splendid exuberance of Gentile life in Alexandria. Jerusalem
looked, in the distance, like a provincial town; the wealth of pagan
literature dwarfed their Scriptures to the dimensions of a single deep
but narrow tradition. They were Jews still, but bigoted Jews no longer.
How unreasonable seemed now the prejudices of exclusive race! how unwise
the attempts to maintain peculiarities of custom! how fanatical the
efforts to impose them upon others! The world was large and various: the
order of the world followed the track of no one law-giver, prophet or
saint.
The sect of Sadducees is supposed to have risen from this pagan soil. It
was a sect of rationalists, free-thinkers, skeptics, eclectics; Jews,
but not dogmatists of any school. They believed in culture and general
progress, and had the characteristic traits of men so believing. They
were cool, unimpassioned, scientific; sentimentalism they abjured;
enthusiasm to them was folly. They were glad to graft Greek culture on
Hebrew thought, and would not have been sorry to see the small Hebrew
state absorbed by some world-wide civilization. Moses they revered, and
his law; but the aftergrowth, priestly and prophetic, they discarded. No
doubt they thought the priests superstitious, the prophets mad, the
restorationists a set of fools, the vision of Israel's future supremacy
the mischievous nightmare of distempered minds. As a literary class the
Sadducees were few and select; aristocratic in taste, supercilious in
manners. They were in favor with the governors placed over the people by
Roman authority, on account of their cultured moderation; and in return
for social and political support, received offices in the State, and
even in the Church. Caiaphas, the high priest in the time of Jesus, was
a Sadducee, and was raised to that dignity by Valerius Gratus, Pilate's
predecessor in office.
The Sadducee was a man of the world; not in the bad sense, but in the
strict sense of the term. Disbelieving in immortality, he confined his
view to the possibilities of the time; disbelieving in angels and
special providences, he put confidence in temporal powers; disbelieving
the doctrine of divine decrees and manifest destiny, he pursued the
calculations of policy and held himself within the reasonable compass of
human motives. Compromisers on principle, the Sadducees were unpopular
in a community of earnest Jews. They bore bad names, were called
epicureans, sensualists, materialists, cold-blooded aristocrats, allies
of despotism; but they deserved these abusive appellations no more than
men of the same description in modern states deserve them. The abusive
epithet was one of the penalties they had to pay for the intellectual
and social consequence they enjoyed.
The Pharisees were more numerous, more commonplace and more popular.
They were, in fact, the great popular sect. They were of more recent
origin than the Sadducees, their history going back only about a century
and a half before the time of Jesus. Their name, which means "exclusive"
or "elect," "set apart," sufficiently indicates their character. They
were the "strait" sect; Hebrews of the Hebrews; Puritans of the
Puritans; the quintessence of theocratic fervor and patriotic faith; the
true Israel. Strict constructionists they were; friends to the law and
the testimony; worshippers of the letter and the form; painstaking
preservers of every iota of the written word; firm believers in the
destiny of Israel, in the special providence that could accomplish it,
in the angelic powers whose agency might be needed to fulfil it, in the
future life when it was to be fulfilled. They held to the law, and they
held to the prophets, major and minor; they could divide the word of the
Lord to a hair.