HYRCANUS'S SUCCESSORS, ARISTOBULUS I, ALEXANDER JANNÆUS, AND SALOME
ALEXANDRA.
Character of Aristobulus--Antigonus--Mythical Account of his
Death--Alexander Jannæus: his Character and Enterprises--His
Support of the Pharisees--Simon ben Shetach--Alexander's
Breach with the Pharisees, and its Consequences--His
last Wars and Death--Salome Alexandra's Relations to the
Opposing Parties--The Synhedrion--Judah ben Tabbai and Simon
ben Shetach--Institutions against the Sadducees--Party
Hatred--Diogenes--Persecution of the Sadducees--Death of
Alexandra.
106.69 B. C. E.
John Hyrcanus had proclaimed his wife queen, and his eldest son, Judah,
high priest. The latter is better known by his Greek name Aristobulus,
for he, like his brothers and successors, bore a Greek as well as a
Hebrew name. But it was soon evident that the Greek custom of placing a
female ruler at the head of the State was not looked upon with favor in
Judæa. Thus Aristobulus was able to remove his mother from her official
position without creating any disturbance, and he then united in his
own person the two dignities of ruler and high priest. It is said that
he was the first of the Hasmonæans to assume the royal title; but this
title did not add in any way to his power or his importance. His coins,
indeed, which have since been discovered, bear only the following
inscription, "The High Priest Judah, and the Commonwealth of the
Judæans," and they are engraved with the same emblem as those of his
father, viz., a cornucopia, although this symbol of plenty was hardly a
truthful characteristic of the times.
The seed of discord sown by Hyrcanus grew and spread alarmingly in the
reigns of his descendants. In vain did the successive rulers attempt
to raise the importance of the royal dignity, in vain did they surround
themselves with a body-guard of trusty hirelings and perform the most
brilliant feats of valor, the breach between them and their subjects
became irreparable, and no remedy proved effectual. The royal house and
the people were no longer at one; political life was separated from
religious life, and the two were pursuing opposite paths.
The king, Aristobulus, not only supplanted his mother upon the
throne, but he also imprisoned her with three of his brothers. His
brother Antigonus alone, of like temperament to himself and his
companion-in-arms, whom he tenderly loved, was permitted to take part
in the government. In spite of the meager and unsatisfactory accounts
of his short reign, we may gather from them that he followed the
example of his father's last years, in remaining closely connected
with the Sadducees, and in keeping the Pharisees from all power and
influence. Aristobulus had but few friends in his own family, and he
does not appear to have been beloved by his subjects. The fact of his
having had a decided preference for Hellenism accounts for his surname,
which was honored by the Greeks and hated by the Judæans--"Friend
of the Hellenes." This one characteristic gave such offense to the
people that they were ready to ascribe to him the authorship of any
evil deed that might occur in the kingdom. Whilst the Greeks called
him fair-minded and modest, the Judæans accused him of heartlessness
and cruelty. His mother expired during her imprisonment, possibly of
old age; evil report whispered that her own son was guilty of having
allowed her to die of starvation. His favorite brother, Antigonus, was
foully murdered (probably through the intrigues of the party hostile to
the Hasmonæans); sharp-tongued calumny affirmed that the king, jealous
of him, was the author of the foul deed, and tradition has woven a web
of tragic incidents round the sad fate of Antigonus. But of this later.
Aristobulus had inherited not only his father's military ability, but
also his plans of extending Judæa in a northeasterly direction. The
Ituræans and the Trachonites, who often left their mild, pastoral
pursuits for the rougher trade of war, occupied the district
surrounding the gigantic Mount Hermon, and eastwards as far as
the lovely plain of Damascus. Against these half-barbaric tribes
Aristobulus undertook a campaign, probably continuing what his father
had commenced. His brother Antigonus, in whose company he had won his
first laurels when fighting against the Samaritans and the Syrians, was
once more his companion-in-arms. The fortunes of war were favorable to
Aristobulus, as they had been to his father; he acquired new territory
for Judæa, and, like his father, forced the Judæan religion upon the
conquered people. Continued conquests in the same direction would have
put the caravan roads leading from the land of the Euphrates to Egypt
into the hands of the Judæans; which possession, combined with the
warlike courage of the inhabitants and the defensive condition of the
fortresses, might have permitted Judæa to attain an important position
among the nations. But, as though it had been decreed by Providence
that Judæa should not gain influence in such a manner, Aristobulus
was forced by severe illness to abandon his conquests and to return
to Jerusalem. Antigonus, it is true, carried on the war successfully
for some little time; but after his return to the capital, for the
celebration of the festivals in the approaching month of Tishri,
neither he nor his royal brother was fated ever again to tread the
arena of war. Antigonus fell, as was mentioned previously, by the hand
of an assassin, and Aristobulus died of a malignant disease, after a
reign of one year (106-105).
The deaths of the two brothers following in close succession gave
evil-tongued calumny the opportunity of inventing the following
fearful tragedy: It was said that the opponents of Antigonus seized
the occasion of his triumphal return to excite the suffering king's
jealousy. Aristobulus, while still reposing confidence in his brother,
sent for Antigonus, and intimated that he should appear unarmed. For
greater protection he had his body-guard stationed in one of the
passages, and gave orders that Antigonus was to be dispatched forthwith
if he should enter armed. The queen, who hated Antigonus, made use of
this order for the destruction of her brother-in-law, for she persuaded
him to go fully equipped to the king's chamber, and in one of the dark
passages of the tower of Straton the foul deed was executed. When the
king heard that his commands had been carried out he was violently
affected, and his grief caused a hemorrhage. His servant, in carrying
away a vessel filled with the blood that he had lost, slipped upon the
floor of the antechamber, still wet with the blood of the assassinated
man, and, dropping the vessel, caused the blood of the two brothers to
mingle. This accident was said to have had so overpowering an effect
upon the king's mind that he instantly declared himself to be his
brother's murderer, and the agony of remorse was the final cause of his
death. Tradition adds that an Essene seer of the name of Judah had not
only predicted the violent death of Antigonus, but also that it would
take place in the tower of Straton.
The commencement of the reign of Aristobulus's successor is involved in
legend. From this we gather that Alexander, whose Judæan name Jannaï
(Jannæus) is the abbreviation of Jonathan, had not only been imprisoned
by his brother, but had been so hated by his father that he had been
banished to Galilee. This was the result of a dream, in which it had
been revealed to John Hyrcanus that his third son would one day be king
of Judæa. The widow of Aristobulus is said to have released him from
prison, and to have given him her hand with the crown. But in that case
Alexander would have married a widow, which it was unlawful for him,
as high priest, to do. It is more probable that Alexander ascended the
throne, being the nearest heir to it, without the aid of the widow of
Aristobulus. Nor is there any foundation for the story that Alexander
commenced his reign by the murder of a brother with whom he had
actually shared the sufferings of his captivity. Alexander appears to
have begun by studying the people's wishes, for the Pharisees were once
more allowed to appear at court. Simon ben Shetach, the brother of his
wife, Queen Salome, the champion of the Pharisees, was constantly in
the king's presence.
Alexander Jannæus, who came to the throne at the age of twenty-three,
was as warlike as the family from which he sprung, but he was wanting
in the generalship and the judgment of his ancestors. He rushed madly
into military undertakings, thus weakening the power of the people,
and bringing the State more than once to the verge of destruction. The
seven and twenty years of his reign were passed in foreign and civil
wars, and were not calculated to increase the material prosperity of
the nation. His good luck, however, was greater than his ability, for
it enabled him to extricate himself from many a critical position into
which he had brought himself, and also, upon the whole, to enlarge the
territory of Judæa. Like his father, he employed mercenaries for his
wars, whom he hired from Pisidia and Cilicia. He did not dare enroll
Syrian troops, the hatred that existed between Judæans and Syrians
being too deeply ingrained to permit the harmonious working of the two
to be counted upon.
Alexander's attention was principally directed to the seaports which
had managed to free themselves from Syrian rule, owing to the rivalry
that existed between the two half-brothers, Antiochus Grypus and
Cyzicenus. He was particularly anxious to possess himself of the
thickly-populated and important seaport town of Ptolemaïs, colonized by
Judæans. Whilst his troops overran the district of Gaza, then under the
dominion of Zoïlus, a captain of mercenaries, he pressed the seaport
town himself with a persistent siege. The inhabitants of Ptolemaïs
turned for help to the Egyptian prince Ptolemy Lathurus, who, at open
warfare with his mother, had seized upon Cyprus. Lathurus, glad to have
found an opportunity of acquiring greater power, and of being able
at the same time to approach the caravan roads of Egypt, hastened to
send thirty thousand men to the Judæan coast. He chose a Sabbath day
for victoriously driving the Judæan army, consisting of at least fifty
thousand men, from Asochis, near Sepphoris, back to the Jordan. More
than thirty thousand of Alexander's troops remained on the field of
battle, many were taken prisoners, whilst the others fled. Lathurus,
with part of his army, marched through Judæa, slaughtering the
inhabitants, without sparing women or children. He wished not only to
revenge himself upon Alexander, but also upon the Judæans, for had they
not been his enemies in Egypt? Accho likewise surrendered, and Gaza
voluntarily opened its gates to him.
This crushing defeat would doubtless have brought Judæa into the most
revolting slavery, had not Cleopatra attempted to snatch the fruit of
her son's triumphs from him before he could turn them against herself.
She sent a mighty army against Lathurus, under the command of two
Judæan generals, Helkias and Ananias, the two sons of Onias, to whom
she was indebted for the integrity of her crown. Helkias died during
the campaign, and his brother took his place in the council and in
the field. The position of trust occupied by Ananias was of distinct
advantage to his compatriots in Judæa. Cleopatra had been urged not
to lose the favorable opportunity, when Judæa was unable to forego
her help, of invading that country and of dethroning Alexander. But
Ananias was indignant at this advice. He not only pointed out the
disgrace of such faithlessness, but he made the queen understand the
evil consequences that would follow upon such a step. Many Egyptian
Judæans, who were the upholders of her throne against the threatened
attacks of her son, would make common cause with her enemies, were she
to strike a blow at the independence of their country. His words even
contained the menace that he would, in such case, not only withhold his
political knowledge and his generalship from her interests, but that he
might possibly devote them to the cause of her opponents. This language
had its desired effect upon the queen; she rejected the cunning advice
of the enemies of the Jews, and made an offensive and defensive league
with Alexander at Bethzur (98). Lathurus was obliged to leave Judæa and
to retreat with his army to Cyprus. All the cities that had resisted
the arms of the Judæan king were now visited by his wrath.
But he was, above all things, determined upon retaking Gaza. This
object was accomplished only after a year of desperate fighting, and
was finally brought about by an act of treachery. All the cruelty
inherent in Alexander was poured out upon the besieged inhabitants of
Gaza. He executed some of the most distinguished amongst them, and the
terror he inspired was so great that many of the men killed their own
wives and children to prevent them from falling into Judæan slavery
(96).
The nine years of Alexander's reign had been too prolific in dangerous
and perplexing situations to allow of his disturbing the internal
harmony of his country. He appears to have been strictly neutral in
the strife that was raging between the Pharisees and Sadducees. His
wife Salome may have exercised her influence in urging him to maintain
this neutral position, as she was a warm partisan of the once-hated
Pharisees.
Alexander appears to have made Simon ben Shetach the mediator between
the two parties; the Pharisees being still somewhat in the background,
and the Sadducees holding posts of trust. Ever since John Hyrcanus's
secession from Pharisaism, the Great Council had been composed of
Sadducæan members, and as long as one party was thus openly preferred
to the other, peace and reconciliation seemed impossible. The king may,
therefore, have been inspired by the wish to bring about some kind of
equality between the two parties by dividing offices and dignities
between them. But the Pharisees positively refused to act conjointly
with their opponents and offered the most active resistance. Simon
ben Shetach alone allowed himself to be chosen member of the Council,
secretly determining to purge it by degrees of its Sadducæan element.
Alexander's impartial conduct continued only so long as the critical
position drew his attention away from home affairs. It changed visibly
when he returned from his campaign, the conqueror of cities and
provinces deeming himself the despotic master of his people. Either
the newly acquired influence of the Pharisees threatened to be an
obstacle in his path, or he may have wished to reward and attract the
Sadducees upon whom he might rely for carrying on his campaigns, or he
may have been influenced by his favorite, the Sadducee Diogenes; at
all events, Alexander appeared as the inveterate opponent of Pharisaic
teaching, and made his views public in a most insulting manner. Whilst
officiating as high priest, during the Feast of Tabernacles, it was
his duty, in accordance with an ancient custom, to pour the contents
of a ewer of water upon the altar as an emblem of fruitfulness. But in
order to show his contempt for a ceremony considered by the Pharisees
as a religious one, Alexander poured the water at his feet. Nothing
more was required to ignite the wrath of the congregation assembled in
the outer court of the Temple. With reckless indignation they threw
the branches and the fruit, which they carried in their hands in honor
of the festival, at the heretical king, denouncing him as an unworthy
high priest. Alexander would certainly have paid for this disgraceful
action with his life had he not called in the help of the Pisidian and
Cilician mercenaries, who had been ordered to be in waiting, and who
fell upon the congregation, slaughtering 6000 within the precincts
of the Temple (95). In order to avoid a repetition of such scenes,
Alexander thenceforth prevented the worshipers from entering the court
of sacrifices, by building up a partition wall. But these events gave
rise to an implacable hatred between the king and the Pharisees. Thus,
after three generations, the descendants of the great Hasmonæans had
so far weakened the edifice raised at the expense of their ancestors'
lives, that it appears marvelous how it could have continued to resist
such repeated attacks. The bitter rivalry of the two kingdoms of Judah
and Israel in the days of Rehoboam and Jeroboam was repeated in the
history of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.
But Alexander did not see the breach that his hand had childishly and
ruthlessly made; absorbed in magnificent schemes of future conquest he
ignored the fact that if the harmonious intercourse between the king
and his subjects, the very life of the State, were to cease, greater
possessions would but weaken and not strengthen the kingdom. He had
set his heart upon invading the trans-Jordanic land, still called
Moabitis, and the southeastern provinces of the sea of Tiberias, called
Galaditis or Gaulonitis. But his progress in this campaign was checked
by the Nabathæan king Obeda, who lured him into a pathless country
broken up by ravines, where Alexander's army found its destruction,
and where the king himself escaped only with his life to Jerusalem
(about 94). There the wrath of the Pharisees awaited him. They had
excited the people to revolt, and six years of bloody uprisings against
him were the consequence (94-89). Alexander succeeded in putting
down one revolt after another by the aid of his mercenaries, but the
horrible butcheries that took place on these occasions were a perpetual
incentive to fresh uprisings. Alexander, worn out at length by these
sanguinary proceedings, offered to make peace with the Pharisees. It
was now, however, their turn to reject the proffered hand of peace,
and to be guilty of an act of treachery towards their country which
must remain as an indelible stain upon their party. Upon Alexander's
question as to what conditions of peace they required, the Pharisaic
leaders answered that the first condition was the death of the king.
They had, in fact, secretly offered their aid to the Syrian monarch
Eucærus to humble Alexander. Summoned by their promises, Eucærus
advanced upon Judæa with 40,000 infantry and 3000 cavalry. Upon the
news of this impending danger, Alexander marched out at the head of
20,000 infantry and 1000 cavalry. In the terrible encounter that ensued
at Shechem, Judæan fought against Judæan, Greek against Greek, for
each army remained true to its leader and could not be bribed into
desertion. The battle, disastrous for both sides, was finally gained by
Eucærus, and Alexander was driven, through the loss of his mercenaries,
to wander among the mountain-passes of Ephraim. There, his solitary
position moved his people to pity, and six thousand of his Pharisaic
opponents left the Syrian camp and went over to their king, who was now
able to force Eucærus's retreat from Judæa.
But the more relentless amongst the Pharisees still held out against
Alexander, and after an unsuccessful battle in the open field, threw
themselves for safety into the fortress of Bethome, which, however,
they were obliged to surrender. Urged by his Sadducæan favorite
Diogenes, and impelled by his own thirst for revenge, the king had
eight hundred Pharisees crucified in one day. Tradition even relates
that the wives and children of the victims were butchered before their
eyes, and that Alexander, surrounded by his minions, feasted in the
presence of this scene of carnage. But this exaggeration of cruelty was
not required to brand him with the name of "Thracian"; the crucifixion
of eight hundred men was enough to stigmatize him as a heartless
butcher, and this action alone was to bring forth bitter fruits for the
Sadducees who had witnessed it with malicious joy. During the civil
wars that had lasted for six years, fifty thousand men of both parties
had been sacrificed, but the Pharisees had suffered most. The remaining
Pharisees trembled for their lives, and the night after the crucifixion
of the eight hundred, eight thousand fled from Judæa, part of them to
Syria and part to Egypt.
The weakness of Alexander's position may readily be gauged by the fact
of his powerlessness to prevent Judæa from being made the seat of
war by the kings of Nabathæa and Syria. Yet his good fortune did not
forsake him, for a sudden change in the affairs of Syria, resulting in
the overthrow of its king, Aretas, worked to Alexander's advantage.
Thereby he was enabled to engage in the siege of some important
towns, colonized by Greeks and subject to Aretas: Diospolis, Pella
and Gerasa. Marching north, he invaded the lower Gaulonitis, with its
capital, Gamala, the upper province, with the town of Sogane, and the
city of Seleucia. He forced the inhabitants of these towns to accept
Judaism and the sign of the covenant. The city of Pella, making a
show of resistance, was destroyed. He also recovered the cities lying
east of the Red Sea, which had been taken from him by Aretas. The
territory of Judæa now embraced within its circumference a number of
important towns; it extended on the other side of the Jordan, from
Seleucia in the north to Zoar, the city of palms, south of the Dead
Sea; from Rhinokolura and Raphia in the south, on the shores of the
Mediterranean, to the mountains of Carmel in the northwest. The cities
on the sea-coast were of the most importance. Alexander ordered some
coins to be struck for his Greek subjects, with the Greek inscription,
"KING ALEXANDER," while an anchor was stamped upon one side, and upon
the other, in Hebrew characters, "JONATHAN THE KING" (Jehonathan
ha-Melech). His coins of an earlier date bore the same inscription as
those of his predecessors, "THE HIGH PRIEST JONATHAN, THE COMMONWEALTH
OF THE JUDÆANS."
After a campaign of three years' duration Alexander returned to
Jerusalem, where he was received with the honors due to a conqueror. He
had caused his crimes in part to be forgiven. In the very center of the
kingdom, on a mount near the Jordan, he built a strong fortress, called
after him, ALEXANDRION; and in the neighborhood of the Dead Sea, upon
a towering height, protected on all sides by deep ravines, he raised
the citadel of Machærus, the formidable guardian of his trans-Jordanic
conquests. These two mountain fortresses, together with the third,
Hyrcanion, built by John Hyrcanus, on Middle Mountain, were so amply
fortified by nature and by art that they were considered impregnable.
Even in the last years of Alexander's reign, although he was suffering
from an intermittent fever, he undertook the siege of some of the yet
unconquered fortresses of the trans-Jordanic territory. During the
siege of Argob, however, he was seized with so severe an attack that
he was forced to prepare himself for death. The solemnity of his last
hours led him to look upon his former actions in a new light. He was
horror-stricken to think how cruelly and foolishly he had persecuted
the Pharisees, and how in consequence he had alienated himself from
his people. He earnestly enjoined upon his queen, whom he declared
regent, to connect herself closely with the Pharisees, to surround
herself with counselors from their ranks, and not to embark in any
undertaking without having their consent. He also impressed upon her
to keep his death secret from his army until the beleaguered fortress
should have fallen, and then to resign his body to the Pharisees, that
they might either vent their rage upon it or else generously inter it.
From an obscure but more authentic source we gather that Alexander
sought to allay the queen's anxiety with regard to the party strife
rampant in Jerusalem by the following words: "Do not fear either the
true Pharisees or their honest opponents, but be on your guard against
hypocrites of both sides (the counterfeit ones), who, when they
commit sins, like the dissolute Prince Zimri, expect to be rewarded
like Phineas, who was zealous for the Law." Alexander died in the
forty-ninth year of his life and the twenty-seventh of his reign (79),
and left two sons, Hyrcanus and Aristobulus. The Pharisees ungenerously
appointed the anniversary of his death as a day of rejoicing.
It was indeed most fortunate for the Judæan nation that a woman of
gentle nature and sincere piety should have been called to the head of
the State after it had been torn asunder by the recklessness of its
former ruler. She came like the refreshing dew to an arid and sunburnt
soil. The excited passions and the bitter hatred of the two parties
had time to abate during her reign, and the country rose above narrow
partisanship to the worthier occupation of advancing the common welfare
of the nation. Although Queen Salome, or, as she was called, Alexandra,
was devoted with her whole soul to the Pharisees, entrusting them
with the management of home affairs, yet she was far from persecuting
the opposing party. Her authority was so greatly respected by the
neighboring princes that they did not dare make war with Judæa, and she
shrewdly succeeded in keeping a mighty conqueror, who had possessed
himself of Syria, from the confines of her own kingdom. Even the
heavens, during the nine years of her reign, showered their blessings
upon the land. The extraordinarily large grains of wheat gathered
during this time in the fields of Judæa were kept and exhibited during
many subsequent years. The queen ordered coins to be struck, bearing
the same emblems as her predecessors, with the Greek inscription,
"QUEEN ALEXANDRA." On the whole, her reign passed peacefully and
happily. The Law, which had fallen into great neglect, became a fixed
institution, and if it occasionally affected the Sadducees, who were
constantly breaking it, they could not consider themselves victims of
caprice. The crowded prisons were opened; the Pharisees returned from
exile, with their narrowed vision widened by the experience they had
gained in foreign lands.
Salome Alexandra proclaimed her eldest son Hyrcanus high priest; he was
a weak prince, whose private life was irreproachable, but who was not
fitted for a public post of importance.
Simon ben Shetach, the brother of the queen, the oracle of the
Pharisaic party, stood high in her favor. So great a part did he play
in the history of that time that it was called by many "the days
of Simon ben Shetach and of Queen Salome." The chief post in the
Council of Seventy, hitherto possessed by the high priest, was now,
however, given up to the Pharisees by order of the queen. The Nasi,
or president of the Great Council, was from this time on, as a rule,
the most learned and the most respected of the Pharisees. No one, of
course, could lay juster claim to this distinction than Simon ben
Shetach. But Simon was not an ambitious man, and he determined to waive
his own rights of precedence in favor of Judah ben Tabbai, who was
then residing in Alexandria, of whose profound learning and excellent
character he had formed a high estimate. The Alexandrian Judæan
community had probably entrusted this celebrated Palestinean scholar
with some important office. A flattering epistle was sent to Judah,
inviting him to return to Jerusalem and was couched in this form:
"From me, Jerusalem, the holy city, to thee, Alexandria: my spouse
dwells with thee, I am forsaken." Judah ben Tabbai responded to this
appeal by hastening to Jerusalem. With the help of Simon he undertook
the reorganization of the Council, the improvement of administration
of the law, the re-establishment of neglected religious observances,
the furthering of education, and generally the fashioning of such
regulations as the times required. Like Ezra and Nehemiah of old,
these two zealous men insisted upon a return to the strictest form of
Judaism; and, if they were often obliged to employ severe and violent
measures, these are not to be accounted to any personal malice, but to
the sternness of the age itself. They were indeed scrupulously strict
in their own conduct, and in directing those closely connected with
them. From the days of Judah ben Tabbai and Simon ben Shetach, the rule
of Judæan Law, according to the views of the Pharisees, may be said to
have begun, and it grew and developed under each succeeding generation.
These two celebrated men have therefore been called "Restorers of the
Law," who "brought back to the Crown (the Law) its ancient splendor."
Their work commenced with the reorganization of the Synhedrion. The
Sadducæan members were deprived of their seats, the penal code which
they had added to the Biblical penal laws was set aside, and the old
traditionary methods again made valid. The people had nothing to
complain of in this change, for they hated the severity of the "eye
for eye" punishment of the Sadducees. On the other hand, certain
days of rejoicing, disregarded by the Sadducees, were proclaimed as
half-holidays by the Pharisees. Witnesses in the law courts were no
longer to be questioned merely upon the place where and the time when
they had seen a crime committed, but they were expected to give the
most detailed and minute evidence connected with it, so that the judge
might be better able to pronounce a correct judgment and to detect the
contradictory statements of witnesses. This was particularly designed
as a protection against the charges of informers, who were numerous
enough in an age when conquerors and the conquered were constantly
changing parts. A salutary measure also was enforced to lessen the
number of divorce cases, which the literal interpretation of the
Pentateuchal divorce laws, as administered by the Sadducees, had failed
in doing. The High Court, as reorganized by the Pharisees, ordered the
husband to give his repudiated wife a certain sum of money, by which
she could support herself, and, as there was but little current coin
amongst a people whose wealth consisted principally in the fruits of
the soil or in cattle, the husband would often pause before allowing a
momentary fit of passion or excitement to influence his actions.
One of the reforms of this time expressly attributed to Simon ben
Shetach was the promotion of better instruction. In all large towns,
high schools for the use of young men from the age of sixteen sprung up
at his instance. But all study, we may presume, was entirely confined
to the Holy Scriptures, and particularly to the Pentateuch and the
study of the Law. Many details or smaller points in the Law which had
been partly forgotten and partly neglected during the long rule of the
Sadducees, that is to say, from Hyrcanus's oppression of the Pharisees
until the commencement of Salome's reign, were once more introduced
into daily life. Neglected customs were renewed with all pomp and
solemnity, the days of their re-introduction being celebrated with
rejoicing, and any public mourning or fast thereon was suspended. Thus
the ceremony of pouring a libation of water upon the altar during the
Feast of Tabernacles, which had been mockingly ridiculed by Alexander,
was in time reinstated with enthusiasm, and became a favorite and
distinctive rite. Upon these occasions, on the night succeeding the
first day of the festival, the women's outer court of the Temple was
brilliantly illuminated until it glowed like a sea of fire. All the
people would then crowd to the holy mount to witness or take part
in the proceedings. At times these bore a lively character, such as
torch-light processions and dancing; at others they took the more
solemn form of musical services of song and praise. This jubilee would
last the whole night. At break of day the priests announced with a
blast of their trumpets that the march was about to commence. At every
halting-place the trumpets gathered the people together, until a huge
multitude stood assembled round the spring of Siloah. Thence the water
was drawn in a golden ewer. In solemn procession it was carried back to
the Temple, where the libation was performed. The water streamed over
the altar, and the notes of the flute, heard only upon the most joyful
occasions, mingled with the rapturous strains of melody that burst from
countless instruments.
A similar national festival was the half-holiday of the wood-feast,
held in honor of the wood that was offered to the altar of the
Temple; it fell upon the fifteenth day of Ab (August). A number of
white-robed maidens were wont to assemble upon this occasion in some
open space among the vine-trees, where, as they trod the measure of
the dance, they chanted strophes of song in the Hebrew tongue. It was
an opportunity for the Judæan youths, spectators of this scene, to
select their partners for life. This festival, like the preceding one,
was inaugurated by the Pharisees in opposition to Sadducæan customs.
The Synhedrion seized upon the sacrificial ardor of the people to
introduce a measure which, above all things, was calculated to arouse
feelings of patriotism in the nation, and which was diametrically
opposed to the views of their rivals. The Sadducees had declared that
the daily offerings, and in fact the needs of the Temple, should not
be paid for from a national treasury, but with individual, voluntary
contributions. But the Council, in the reign of Salome Alexandra,
decreed that every Israelite from the age of twenty--proselytes and
freed slaves included--should contribute at least a half-shekel yearly
to the treasury of the Temple. In this way the daily sacrifices
acquired a truly national character, as the whole nation contributed
towards them. Three collections were instituted during the year: in
Judæa at the beginning of spring; in the trans-Jordanic countries, in
Egypt and Syria, at the Feast of Weeks; and in the yet more distant
lands of Babylonia, Media and Asia Minor, at the Feast of Tabernacles.
These last collections were the richest, the Judæans who dwelt
outside Palestine being very generous as well as very wealthy; thus,
instead of the silver or copper shekel or denaria, they offered gold
staters and darics. Central places in each land were chosen where the
offerings should be deposited until they could be taken to Jerusalem.
The most distinguished Judæans were selected to carry them thither,
and they were called "holy messengers." In the Mesopotamian and
Babylonian towns of Nisibis and Nahardea (Naarda), treasure-houses
were built for these Temple gifts, whence, under a strong escort to
protect them from the Parthian and Nabathæan robber-hordes, they were
safely borne to Jerusalem. The communities of Asia Minor had likewise
their treasure-houses, Apamea and Laodicea, in Phrygia, Pergamus and
Adramyttium, in the country of Aeolis. From this stretch of land nearly
two hundred pounds weight of gold was sent to Jerusalem about twenty
years after the first proclamation had been issued. From this we may
gather what an immense revenue poured into the Temple, leaving a large
surplus after all the requisites for divine service had been obtained.
The Temple of Jerusalem became thereby in time an object of envy and of
greed.
So far, the revival, introduced by Judah ben Tabbai and Simon ben
Shetach, bore a harmless character; it reinstated old laws, created
new ones, and sought means of impressing them upon the memory and
attention of the people. But no reaction can remain within moderate
bounds; it moves naturally towards excesses. The Sadducees, who were
unwilling to adopt the Pharisaic rendering of the Law, were summoned
to appear before the seat of justice and were unsparingly condemned.
The anxiety to exalt the Law and to banish all opposition in the
rival party was so great that upon one occasion Judah ben Tabbai had
a witness executed who had been convicted of giving false testimony
in a trial for a capital crime. He was, in this instance, desirous of
practically refuting the Sadducæan views, forgetting that he was at the
same time breaking a law of the Pharisees. That law required all the
witnesses to be convicted of perjury before allowing punishment to be
inflicted; and, as one witness alone could not establish an accusation,
so one witness alone was not punishable. But the two chiefs were
so clean-handed that Simon ben Shetach did not fail to upbraid his
colleague on account of ill-advised haste, and Judah ben Tabbai evinced
the profoundest remorse at the shedding of the innocent blood of the
executed witness by resigning his office of president and by making
a public acknowledgment of his contrition. A favorite maxim of Judah
ben Tabbai reveals his gentle disposition. "Consider accused persons
as lawbreakers only whilst before you for judgment; the moment that is
rendered, look upon them as innocent."
Simon ben Shetach, who succeeded Judah as President of the Council,
does not seem to have relaxed in severity towards the infringers of
the Law. The rare case of witchcraft was once brought before him, when
eighty women were condemned for the offense, and crucified in Ascalon.
On account of his unsparing severity, Simon ben Shetach brought upon
himself such hatred of his opponents that they determined upon a
fearful revenge. They incited two false witnesses to accuse his son of
a crime punishable with death, in consequence of which he was actually
condemned to die. On his way to the place of execution the young man
uttered such vehement protestations of innocence that at last the
witnesses themselves were affected, and confessed to their tissue of
falsehoods. But when the judges were about to set free the condemned,
the prisoner himself drew their attention to their violation of the
law, which enjoined that no belief was to be given witnesses who
withdrew their previous testimony. "If you wish," said the condemned
youth to his father, "that the salvation of Israel should be wrought
by your hand, consider me but the threshold over which you must pass
without compunction." Both father and son showed themselves worthy of
their sublime task, that of guarding the integrity of the Law; for to
uphold it one sacrificed his life, and the other, his paternal love.
Simon, the Judæan Brutus, let the law pursue its course, although he,
as well as all the judges, were convinced of his son's innocence.
The severity of the Pharisaic Synhedrion had naturally not spared
the leaders of the Sadducees. Diogenes, the favorite of Alexander,
and a number of others who had advised or authorized the execution
of the 800 Pharisees, expiated this act of cruelty with their lives.
The most distinguished of the Sadducees began to be uneasy at this
constant persecution; they felt the sword of justice hanging over their
heads, ready to descend upon them if they were guilty of the slightest
infringement of the Law. In fear of their lives they turned to
Alexander's second son, Aristobulus, who, without being a warm adherent
of the Sadducees, was prepared to be the protector of their party. He
sent their chiefs to Alexandra, commending them warmly to her mercy.
When they appeared before the queen they reminded her of their services
to the late king, and of the terror with which their name had once
inspired Judæa's neighbors, and they threatened to offer their valuable
services to the Nabathæan king Aretas or to the Syrian monarch. They
implored the queen to grant them a safe retreat in some fortress where
they would not be under the constant supervision of the Pharisees.
The gentle-hearted queen was so much moved by the tears of these
gray-haired warriors that she entrusted them with the command of most
of the fortresses, reserving, however, the three strongest--Hyrcanion,
Alexandrion, and Machærus.
No political events of any great importance occurred during Alexandra's
reign. Tigranes, king of Armenia, master of nearly the whole of Syria,
had threatened to invade some of the Judæan provinces which had
formerly belonged to the Syrian kingdom. The proximity of this ruler
had greatly alarmed the queen, and she endeavored by gentle words and
rich presents to prevent a contest with this powerful Armenian king.
Tigranes had received the Judæan embassy, and accepted the queen's
gifts most courteously, but they would hardly have prevented him from
moving upon Judæa, had he not been compelled to devote himself to the
defense of his own country from the attack of the Roman commander
Lucullus (69).
Alexandra fell hopelessly ill, and her illness occasioned the saddest
of entanglements. The violent and ambitious Aristobulus, supposing
that his mother destined his weak brother Hyrcanus as her successor,
left the capital secretly, and arriving at the Galilean fortress of
Gabata in the neighborhood of Sepphoris, upon the friendship of whose
governor, the Sadducee Galaistes, he could rely, insisted upon its
being entirely given up to him. He garrisoned it with mercenaries,
furnished by some of the minor Syrian trans-Jordanic princes and the
robber-hordes of Trachonitis, and was thus enabled to hold a large
force at his command. Hyrcanus and the chiefs of the Synhedrion,
fearing an impending civil war, entreated of the queen to take measures
to prevent it, but without avail. Alexandra bade them trust to the
army, to the fortresses that had remained faithful, and to the rich
treasury, and devoted herself exclusively to preparation for death. She
expired soon after, in the year 69, leaving her people and her kingdom
to all the horrors of a civil war which was ultimately to destroy their
dearly won independence. Salome Alexandra had reigned for only nine
years; she had witnessed the happy days of her people's freedom, and,
when lying on her death-bed, may have felt in her troubled soul the
presentiment that the coming night of slavery was at hand. She was the
only queen in Judæan history whose name has been handed down to us with
veneration, and she was also the last independent ruler of Judæa.