When Jerusalem Fell In 70 CE

      General  Pompey  After a 3 month-long siege of Jerusalem- the artist had no idea of what people would look like after such an ordeal.  This on box of  French chocolates.  
 Nadene Goldfoot

                 Key Milestones of the Decline and Fall of Jerusalem

• Roman Intervention (63 BCE): The Roman general Pompey conquered Jerusalem after a 3 month long siege  during a Hasmonean civil war, ending Jewish political independence and turning Judea into a Roman client state.   Parthian Invasion (40 BCE): The Parthians invaded and placed the Hasmonean prince Antigonus II on the throne.  Herod's Conquest (37 BCE): Backed by the Roman Senate and Roman legions, Herod the Great retook Jerusalem, executed Antigonus, and established the Herodian dynasty.  
  
           Herod the Great (73 BCE-4 BCE) king of Judea, son of  Antipater the Idumean by his Nasabatean wife, Cypros.  , associated by Christian reference  with the Massacre of the Innocents. [The Massacre of the Innocents is a biblical story from the Gospel of Matthew (2:16–18) in which King Herod the Great orders the execution of all male children aged two and under in Bethlehem]  This is a copy of the story of Moses who was born in 1391 BCE, over a thousand years after he was born. This was the cause of much anti-Semitism then and now.    He had the Temple in Jerusalem rebuilt and erected new cities of Sebaste and Caesarea.  
• So, the Hasmonean dynasty ended in 37 BCE, when Herod the Great captured Jerusalem and had Matatiah executed;   the last Hasmonean ruler, Antigonus II Matatiah. Antigonus II Mattathias was executed by the Roman general Mark Antony in 37 BCE at Antioch, after being captured during the siege of Jerusalem and handed over at the instigation of Herod the Great.  
• Herod the Great's  victory ended the rule of the Jewish Hasmonean dynasty.   Herod ruled as a Roman client king until his death in 4 BCE, during which he launched major construction projects like the expansion of the Second Temple and the fortress of Masada.
• After King Herod the Great died in 4 BCE, his kingdom was split among his sons and sister by Roman Emperor Augustus into the Herodian Tetrarchy: 

  

  Herod Archelaus: Ruled Judea, Samaria, and Idumaea as ethnarch (not independent ) (4 BCE–6 CE) until Roman authorities banished him for cruelty, turning Judea into a direct Roman province.

  ---

  

  Herod Antipas: Ruled Galilee and Peraea as tetrarch (ruler of a 4th part) (4 BCE–39 CE).

  ---

  

  Philip the Tetrarch: Ruled the northeastern territories (Gaulanitis, Trachonitis, Batanea, etc.) as tetrarch (4 BCE–34 CE).
• None of the sons inherited the title of full king (basileus)
• 

  Salome I: Received the coastal region around Ashdod.
• 
  

  

Salome I was the sister of Herod the Great and the mother of Berenice by her husband Costobarus, governor of Idumea. She was a nominal queen regnant of the toparchy of Iamnia, Azotus, Phasaelis from 4 BCE.  She was the cause of her sister-in-law, Mariamne to be executed on charges of adultery, and caused Herod to go against her nephews.  Herod thought she, his sister, was the only loyal family member,  so  left her the town of Jabneh. in his will.    She died in 10 CE.  

After Herod Archelaus was deposed in 6 CE for cruel and incompetent rule, Judea came under direct Roman rule as a Roman province. Herod Archelaus and Herod Antipas were brothers and sons of Herod the Great, who divided his kingdom among them after his death in 4 BCE. He  ruled as ethnarch of Judea, Samaria, and Idumea (4 BC–AD 6).

• The Deposition: Emperor Augustus banished Archelaus (who ruled Judea, Samaria, and Idumea as ethnarch) to Gaul after Jewish and Samaritan delegations complained about his tyranny. He was known for extreme cruelty and tyranny. He brutally suppressed early protests, killing 3,000 people in the temple
• Roman Administration: Emperor Augustus placed Judea under direct Roman administration, appointing a prefect (such as Quirinius, who oversaw the census) to govern the region. 
• Later Exceptions: The territory briefly returned to Herodian rule under King Herod Agrippa I from 41 to 44 CE, before reverting permanently to Roman provincial status. 
•                                 Roman Rule of Judah
• In 44 CE, following the sudden death of King Herod Agrippa I, Judah (then known as the Roman province of Judaea) reverted back to direct Roman rule.
  This transition marked a critical turning point that altered the region's geography and governance, ultimately setting off a chain reaction toward total collapse:
  

  • Territorial Expansion: When direct Roman rule was restored, the borders of the Judaea Province were officially expanded. In addition to Judea, Samaria, and Idumaea, the province was enlarged to encompass Galilee and Peraea.
  • Transition to Procurators: Governance was stripped away from the local Jewish royalty and handed over to a succession of Roman governors (procurators), starting with Cuspius Fadus. 
  • Escalating Tensions: The new Roman administrators severely mismanaged the region. Corrupt leadership, heavy taxation via local tax collectors, and a blatant disregard for Jewish religious customs fueled widespread resentment. 
  •                   First Jewish-Roman War
  • The Path to War: This administrative corruption triggered the rise of radical anti-Roman rebel groups. The boiling socio-political unrest directly culminated in the First Jewish–Roman War in 66 CE. [
  • Destruction of Jerusalem: The conflict ended in tragedy for the region.
    
  • 
    
  •  In 70 CE, Roman forces under Titus besieged and captured Jerusalem, resulting in the destruction of the Second Temple and the mass displacement of the Jewish population     
    
      Relief of Arch of Titus in Jerusalem showing captives carrying Temple vessels, shewbread table, 7 branched candlesticks and the trumpet;  the Jordan;  and the sacrificial procession  from Temple for Romans; erected by the Senate in honor of Vespasian and Titus. They show the goddess of victory crowning Titus. 
  • 
    
  • Resource:
  • The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
  • Wikipedia
  •  

What Transpired After 70 CE to King David's Jerusalem Part II

  Nadene Goldfoot                                              

It all started with our heroes of Chanukah, Judah, the Maccabee and his descendants.  Remember that Mattathias of Modiin Hashmonai (HASMONEAN) and his five sons, Judah, Jonathan, Simon, John, and Eleazar led a revolt against the Greek Syrians and their hellenizing policy of the Syrian king ANTIOCHUS EPIPHANES .  The Hasmoneans fought against them in 166-164 BCE who had also occupied Jerusalem and had taken over the Temple and placed their idols in it and tried to rub out Judaism.    

Rome had occupied Jerusalem a good 100 years before its destruction in 70 CE by them.  It was in 63 BCE that the Roman General Pompey had profited from war between the 2 Hasmonean Jewish half -brothers, went into Jerusalem and occupied it;  John Hyrcanus (son and successor of Simon the Hasmonean who ruled from 135 to 104 BCE who had fought against Ptolemy), and Aristobulus II (who reigned from 67 to 63 BCE, King of Judea, younger son of Alexander Yannai and Salome Alexandra, to occupy Jerusalem.  

                                          

Queen Salome Alexandra  was the ruler of Judea from 76 to 67 BCE.  She had succeeded her husband, Alexander Yannai, and reversed his policy toward the Pharisees, according to his dying request, she said.  Salome handed internal control to the Pharisees while keeping the responsibility for the army and foreign policy.  She appointed her eldest son, Hyrcanus, as high priest and heir which was opposed by his brother, Aristobulus II. 

As it happened, after Salome's death, her elder son, Hyrcanus II became king, but Aristobulus II usurped the throne.  Civil war broke out and in the year 63, the 2 brothers appeared in Damascus to urge their own claims before the Roman Emperor, Pompey who ordered Aristobulus II to surrender all the Judean strongholds, including Jerusalem.  

Hyrcanus remained a Roman puppet while Aristobulus II and his sons, kalexander and Antigonus Mattathias tried to regain power in Jerusalem but failed to do so.  Hyrcaanus' granddauaghter, MARIAME, married Herod but was put to  death by him in  29.  Also put to death were the susrviving Hasmoneans, ARISTOBULUS III in 35,  Hyrcanaus II in 30, and Mariamne's sons, Alexander and Aristobulus in 7.  

                                              

Rome occupied Jerusalem and then sieged it during the Roman War in 70 CE.  It was one of the most horrid of all wars, as people were starved to death first, becoming terribly desperate.  The 2nd Temple had been burned down and looted first.  It had served as a center of military activity before it's very end.  After its destruction, the Romans built their own Roman temple over the same site.  Since the Moslem  Period, a mosque has stood  there, which is the Mosque of Omar.  The area around the western and southern walls of the Herodian Temple (2nd Temple after Herod's updating) was extensively excavated by B. MAZAR from 1968.

The Jewish General, Bar Kochba from 132 to 135 retook Jerusalem with an army he had amassed which shocked the Romans and embarrassed them.  They were so furious that they let this happen that they renamed the land Palaestina for the enemy of the Jews, the Phillistines.  The General was killed in battle in 135.

The Roman Emperor Hadrian rebuilt it as the roman colony, Aelia Capitolina, forbidding Jews to approach it under pain of death.  

Then came the Christianization of the Roman  empire under Constantine and his mother, Helena in 325.  Jerusalem became a Holy City again, but for Christianity this time.  The Church of the Holy Sepulcher was built in 335.  Jerusalem became a city of churches and monasteries, pilgrimages and religious disputes.  In 363 Emperor Julian made an attempt to restore the Temple.  In 614 it was occupied for some years by the Persians, assisted by a Jewish force;  but in 628, Byzantine rule was restored by Emperor Heraclius.  

By 638, the city fell to the caliph Omar, now a Muslim as Mohammad died in 632, who set up a place of prayer in the Temple esplanade; magnificently rebuilt in 691 as the DOME OF THE ROCK by the Umayyad caliph, Abd-el Malik.  Now under Arab rule, the Jews were allowed to return;  but the city began to decay after the transfer of the center of Abbasid rule to Baghdad in 750.  The Fatimids of the 11th century built their 2nd principal mosque, El-Aksa, on the temple site.  Al-Aqsa Mosque, located in the Old City of Jerusalem, is the third holiest site in Islam. The mosque was built on top of the Temple Mount, known as the Al Aqsa Compound or Haram esh-Sharif in Islam. Muslims believe that Muhammad was transported from the Great Mosque of Mecca to al-Aqsa during the Night Journey. ( Unobtainable picture.)

                                                                       

In 1099, Jerusalem was stormed by the Crusaders  under Sir Godfrey of Bouillon and it became a capital of the Latin Kingdom.  In 1187 the Ayyubid sultan, Saladin, retook the city for Islam and it remained in Moslem hands except for a few years in the middle of the 13th century, despite all the crusades that had followed.  

In the Mameluke Period of the 14th -15th centuries, many new buildings were erected and the water supply was improved.  Under Ottoman rule that lasted for 400 years, it decayed till in the 18th-19th  centuries.  The city had reached its nadir;  its population sank below 10,000. Part of the city laid in ruins.  The Jewish community was destroyed by the Crusaders and almost wiped out in the 13th century.  It was then reinforced by pious Jewish immigrants from many lands, especially after the expulsion from Spain in 1492, but its numbers were restricted by the Ottoman government.  In 1625, they were brutally despoiled by the local pasha Muhammad ibn Farukh.  

                                            

European pogrom influence increased the population in the 19th century.  The population rose from 11,000 (3,000 Jews) in 1838 to 68,000 (50,000 Jews) in 1910.  New Quarters outside the Old city wall were built and pioneered by Sir Moses Montefiore)  from 1855 on.  In the 1880's, Jerusalem was connected with Jaffa by a railway line.  In 1898, the German emperor, William II, visited the city through a breach made in its wall near the Jaffa Gate in his honor;  and he was greeted on this occasion by Herzl in behalf of the Zionist Organization.  

WWI lasted from 1914 to 1917 when Jews saw that there was no hope for them living in other people's countries; too much anti-Semitism and killing of them, so they met with the allies and had many meetings about Palestine and what was to happen to is as it was also in the war and Jews were fighting on the  ally side from Palestine.   It was  agreed through the Balfour Doctrine that they would help to create the JEWISH HOMELAND.  FINALLY!  HOPE!  

    Jerusalem under siege, 1947 

The UN partition resolution of November 29, 1947, provided for the creation of an independent area of Jerusalem under UN administration.  Arab outbreaks  reached the dimension of warfare between the Jews' Haganah and the Arabs which soon included the Arab legion of Transjordan who put an end to the internationalization scheme.  The struggle lasted from December 1947 to July 1948.  In the fight, the Jewish quarter in the Old City of Jerusalem had to be evacuated and was destroyed.  All the New City with the exception of the Arab quarter north of the walls fell into Jewish hands.  The Arab Legion tried to shell and starve the Jew of Jerusalem into surrender and it was foiled by the fortitude of the population and by the opening of the "Burma road" which restored the connection between Jewish Jerusalem and the coast.  In 1949, the government and Knesset were transferred to Jerusalem. Arabs intended to take the whole city, not a section.  Already, 80% of the Jewish Homeland went to Jordan to king Abdullah instead of to the Jews as promised.    

Resource:

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

Video movie-MGM:  Cast a Giant Shadow with Kirk Douglas, Angie Dickinson, Yul Brynner, John Wayne, Frank Sinatra, Senta Berger-the 1947-48 struggle of Jews for Independence