War with the Romans.

65

sacre followed upon massacre, until Cestius Gallus, the Prefect of Syria, moved his troops towards Jerusalem. In Jerusalem a war-party, called Zealots, under Eleazar, prepared for the defence of the Temple, though they had to contend against a great peace-party who wished to receive the Roman soldiery with open arms. Cestius, overrating the strength of the insurgents, acted less boldly than he might have done, and was repulsed, bringing disgrace on the Roman banners. Thus, in spite of all attempts at peacemaking on the part of Agrippa, Judæa was at open war with the Emperor Nero. That the Jewish revolution was not considered unimportant may be seen from the circumstance that Nero sent the first general of the empire, Vespasian, to subjugate Palestine. Josephus (a man of priestly and, on his mother's side, of kingly descent) was by the Jews entrusted with the defence of Galilee. He proved himself a most able general, and kept the enemy at bay for some time, while he was entrenched in Jotapata. But when at last the siege of this place changed into a blockade, there was no escape from the imminent famine, and Josephus surrendered. Though a captive, this eminent man soon be

came the friend of Vespasian, with whom he went to Rome, where he remained to the end of his life. It was but natural that Josephus should have been hated by the Jews, who looked upon him as a renegade; but we, at all events, owe him a debt of gratitude, for having, in his writings, lifted the veil from a long period of Jewish history (from the death of Nehemiah to the destruction of the second temple), of which, but for him, we should know next to nothing.

At

While Galilee and the other provinces fell one after the other (though not without hard fighting) into the hands of Vespasian, Jerusalem awaited the enemy, not with her whole united strength, but torn up into three fractions, under John of Gishala, Eleazar, and Simon, son of Gioras, who made war upon each other and flooded the streets of the city with blood. length, however, when Vespasian, who in the meantime had become Emperor, sent his son Titus to reduce Jerusalem, the three parties within the city began to negociate with each other, and offered a united resistance to the enemy. Titus besieged Jerusalem, and in spite of the brave stand the Jews made against him, he took wall after wall, till at last he reached and

Siege of Jerusalem by Titus.

67

took the temple, which he burned to the ground (on the 15th of August A.D. 70) thus fulfilling that remarkable prophecy of our blessed Lord, "that not one stone should be left upon another." The horrors connected with this siege and surrender I will pass by in silence; suffice it to state that, according to Josephus, no less than 1,100,000 people perished during the

war.

But even after this greatest of all calamitiesthe loss of Jerusalem and the Temple—the remaining fortified places surrendered only after a gallant resistance. One among these will always be remembered as an example of rare heroism, namely, the fortress of Masada, which was bravely defended by Eleazar, a descendant of Judas the Galilean. When it became clear that the place could no longer be held, Eleazar exclaimed to his compatriots, "It is better to fall into the hands of God than of the Romans !” and he persuaded the whole population of Masada to choose voluntary death. The men embraced their wives and children, and in the next minute they stabbed them through their hearts, and that done, they fell on their own swords. Ten men were chosen to gather up all that might prove

useful to the enemy and to burn it. When they had finished their mournful task, these ten cast lots who was to kill the rest, and the last survivor of this brave band had to kill himself. A few women and children who had escaped into some caverns were the only living persons the invading Romans found in the fortress, and from them they heard, not without admiration, the touching tale of their enemies' self-destruction.

This was the last act in the great drama of the subjugation of Judæa. Vespasian ordered that thenceforth the annual contributions which the Jews in the whole world had been in the habit of sending to Jerusalem towards the maintenance of the temple-worship, should be paid into the Imperial treasury, and thus caused the last bond of union to be dissolved which till then had held the nation together, notwithstanding its dispersion throughout the world.

CHAPTER VI.

The Oral Law.-The Origin and formation of the Talmud.-Rabbi Jehuda Hanasi.-The Mishna.—Rabbi Ashi.-The Gemara. -The Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmud.-Emperor Domitian. Nerva.-Trajan. -Revolt of the Jews.-Barcochab.—Rabbi Akiba.-Turnus Rufus.-Adrian's Tyranny.-General Severus. -Rebuilding of Jerusalem as a Heathen City.

IT is with astonishment that we perceive what unforeseen effect the dreadful fate of the Jewish nation had upon its future. Many nations besides the Jews had succumbed to the power of the stronger, and had to suffer all the evil consequences of war and subjection; many of them succeeded afterwards in regaining their freedom and independence. Such is the ordinary course of history. But here, in the case of the Jews, we see quite a peculiar spectacle. A people entirely shattered and, as it were, for ever destroyed; its native soil partly devastated, partly inhabited by strangers; what few of its native people remained behind impoverished, become mere inferior labourers; with no prospect for the nation to regain any power, and each individual in the