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110 C.E. Tacitus (56 C.E. ― 120 C.E.)

TacitusThe Temple Mount/ The Jewish Revolt

TACITUS (E.G. ROME’S GREATEST HISTORIAN) REFERS TO JEWS AND JUDAEA IN SEVERAL PLACES IN THE HISTORIES AND ANNALS. His main treatment of the subject, however, is to be found in the excursus at the beginning of Historiae, Book V, Sections 2-13 (No. 281). This is the most detailed account of history and religion of the Jewish people extant in classical Latin literature; Tacitus’ account, written in the first decade of the second century C.E., reflects the feelings of influential circles of Roman society in the age following the destruction of the Temple, when Judaism still constituted an important and militant factor in the Mediterranean world.

As the formal justification for its inclusion, Tacitus states that he is about to describe the last days of Jerusalem (Historiae, V, 2:1). The account falls into the following parts: the origin of the Jewish people, their religion and customs, a geographical description of Judaea, and a cursory historical survey.

IN HIS ACCOUNT OF ROMAN RULE IN JUDAEA, TACITUS NOWHERE BLAMES THE JEWS FOR THEIR MUTINIOUS CONDUCT, NOR DOES HE IMPUTE TO THEM THE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE JEWISH WAR AGAINST ROME. HE IMPLIES RATHER THAT THE ROMAN PROCURATORS WERE TO BLAME. ALTHOUGH THE JEWS HAD RESORTED TO ARMS IN THE TIME OF CALIGULA, TACITUS STATES THAT THEY DID SO ONLY AFTER THE EMPEROR HAD ORDERED THEM TO SET UP HIS STATUE IN THE TEMPLE, AND THE DEATH OF GAIUS CALIGULA PUT AN END TO THE UPROAR THIS HAD CAUSED.

The Annales were composed later than the Historiae, and at least the later books belong to the years subsequent to the violent Jewish revolts at the end of Trajan’s reign (115–117). However, these events make little impact in the few chapters dealing with Jews in the extant portions of the Annales. Loss of Jewish life is considered “vile damnum” in Annales, II, 85 (No. 284), whether we take this as the view of the historian himself or of the instigators of the “senates consultum”, as surmised by Tacitus. The villains of the piece are mainly the Roman procurators and not the Jews in Annales, XII, 54 (No. 288), and the burden of taxation in the province of Judaea is barely mentioned in Annales, II, 42 (No. 283). In the famous passage in Annales, XV, 44 (No. 294), Judaea is stated to be the “origo eius mali” (scil. Christianity), but the historian adds no comment concerning Judaism.

Moses, Passover, Sabbath, Shmetah, Kosher, The Temple Mount, Judaea, Jerusalem

Historiae, V, 1–13

To establish his influence over this people for all time, Moses introuduced new religious practices, quite opposed to those of all other religions. The Jews regard as profane all that we hold sacred; on the other hand, they permit all that we abhor… They abstain from pork… the unleavened Jewish bread is still employed in memory of the haste with which they seized the grain. They say that they first chose to rest on the seventh day because that day ended their toils; but after a time they were led by the charms of indolence to give over the seventh year as well to inactivity.

A great part of Judaea is covered with scattered villages, but there are some towns also; Jerusalem is the capital of the Jews. In it was a Temple possessing enormous riches. The first line of fortifications protected the city, the next the palace, and the innermost wall the Temple. Only a Jew might approach its doors, and all save the priests were forbidden to cross the threshold.

The first Roman to subdue the Jews and set foot in their Temple by right of conquest was Gnaeus Pompey (63 B.C.E.): thereafter it was a matter of common knowledge that there were no representations of the gods within, but that the place was empty and the secret shrine contained nothing. The walls of Jerusalem were razed, but the Temple remained standing.

Christ/Christianity, Pontius Pilate

Annales, XV, 44: 2–5

But neither human help, nor imperial munificence, nor all the modes of placating Heaven, could stifle scandal or dispel the belief that the fire (in Rome in 64 C.E.) had taken place by order. Therefore to scotch the rumour, Nero substituted as culprits, and punished with the utmost refinements of cruelty a class of men, loathed for their vices, whom the crowd styled Christians. Christus, the founder of the name, had undergone the death penalty in the reign of Tiberius, by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilatus, and the pernicious superstition was checked for a moment, only to break out once more, not merely in Judaea, the home of the disease, but in the capital itself, where all things horrible or shameful in the world collect and find a vogue. First, then, the confessed members of the sect were arrested; next, on their disclosures vast numbers were convicted, not so much on the count of arson as for hatred of the human race. And derision accompanied their end: they were covered with wild beasts’ skins and torn to death by dogs; or they were fastened on crosses, and, when daylight failed were burned to serve as lamps by night. Nero had offered his gardens for the spectacle, and gave an exhibition in his Circus, mixing with the crowd in the habit of a charioteer, or mounted on his car. Hence in spite of a guilt, which had earned the most exemplary punishment, there arose a sentiment of pity, due to the impression that they were being sacrificed not for the welfare of the state but to the ferocity of a single man.

The Jewish Revolt of 66 C.E./ Vespasian 68 C.E.

Historiae, I, 10:3; 11:1

The war against the Jews was being directed with three legions by Flavius Vespasianus, whom Nero had selected as general. Neither Vespasian’s desires nor sentiments were opposed to Galba, for he sent his son, Titus, to pay his respects and to show his allegiance to him, as we shall tell at the proper time.

Source: Menahem, Stern. Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism.

Christ, Christians, Pontius Pilate

Codex Mediceus 68 II, fol. 38r, the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence, Italy

CHRESTIANS OF CHRIST. Book XV of Tacitus’s Annals is preserved in the 11th–12th-century Codex Mediceus II, a collection of medieval manuscripts now housed in the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana in Florence, Italy, along with other manuscripts and books that belonged to the Medici family. Highlighted above is the Latin text reading

“… whom the crowd called ‘Chrestians.’ The founder of this name, Christ, had been executed in the reign of Tiberius by the procurator Pontius Pilate …”

Codex Mediceus

Source: Stern, Menahem. Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism, Volume II (p. 1, 3-5, 7, 25, 28-29, 89) (Stern # 273, 281, 294)

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