Three legions positioned themselves on Jerusalem’s west side while a fourth waited to the east on the Mount of Olives. Titus allowed pilgrims to enter the crowded city to celebrate Passover but refused to let them leave. The inhabitants were nearing starvation, and the increased number only further drained the remaining supplies. Outside the city deserters were captured, crucified, and left for the city dwellers to see. After several attempts by Titus to negotiate Jerusalem’s surrender, the rebels continued to refuse his terms. Frustrated by the delays, the Roman leader ordered the attack.
The walls of the Antonia fortress and temple gates were breeched. Soldiers set fire to the upper and lower city, and the Second Temple, then came Titus’ command for total destruction. Although the number of slaughtered men, women, and children was exaggerated to be over a million, in truth, hundreds of thousands died. 97,000 of the city’s inhabitants were captured and sent to Rome. There they were sold as household slaves; became gladiators for the entertainment of the citizens; slave labor for construction projects, and the more youthful prisoners were placed in brothels. The city’s rebel leaders were sent to Rome to undergo humiliation, trial and execution. After the legions ransacked and destroyed Jerusalem, the Second Temple laid in ruin.
Yeshua’s forewarning as he had stood in front of the temple on the day of his Jerusalem entry came true. “No stone that stands here one upon another will not be thrown down... And no Judean—man, woman, or child will survive that time.”
The Sanhedrin Council lost their authority and control and were expelled to Yavne in the southern coastal plain, south of Jaffa. The Pharisees, rather than the Sadducees, became the governing sect. Their practice of Judaism was followed, and the Sadducees and Essenes fell to the wayside.
After the massacre of the Roman garrison on Masada, the Sicarii retained it as their base camp from which to raid surrounding villages. As the madman Menahem had wanted years before, the Sicarii attacked the Jewish settlement of En Gedi. Over seven hundred of its inhabitants were slain and the ‘city of palm trees’ was left in ruin.
Once forced from Jerusalem by the Zealots, the Sicarii chose to make the mountaintop fortress of Masada their family refuge. When Jerusalem fell to Titus, Eleazar ben Yair and 960 people remained there with no place else to go.
In 72 A.D. the Roman governor Lucius Flavius Silva was ordered to destroy the Sicarii fortress. His 15,000 men of the Legion X Fretensis, auxiliary units and slave labor laid siege to Masada. Though the mountain defied direct assaults, Silva chose to build a ramp to reach its top. But when the soldiers finally entered the stronghold, they were met with silence. The inhabitants of Masada had chosen to die by having their throats slit, choosing suicide over Roman slavery. Only a man, woman, and several children were found alive.
The persecution of Jews throughout the empire persisted for years to come. Insurrections rose wherever Jewish colonies remained, and their revolt in 115 A.D. was called Kitos War.
Hadrian came to power as emperor in 117 A.D. Leaving Roman boundaries as they were, he chose to unite the empire’s diverse people and encourage building along with military preparedness. He distrusted written reports and personally inspected his empire’s provinces.
While visiting Jerusalem in 130 A.D., Hadrian considered reconstructing for the Jews, but a Samaritan priest, based upon his people’s hatred of Jews dating back hundreds of years, discouraged the idea. Accepting the priest’s reasoning, Hadrian ordered Jerusalem to be rebuilt as a Roman colony along with the erection of two temples to honor Roman gods. A Temple to Jupiter was ordered built atop where the Second Temple had stood, and a Temple to Venus to be erected atop Golgotha and the rock cave tomb of Yeshua’s burial.
More decrees came from Hadrian. Jerusalem was to be renamed ‘Aelia Capitolina,’ and the Jewish religious practice of circumcision, considered mutilation, was to be abolished. But in Rome, the tradition of Romans castrating their slaves was still permitted.
In 132 A.D., the Bar Kokhba Revolt erupted. Although the Kitos War was never declared as the Second Jewish War, Simon bar Kokhba’s rebellion received that distinction. Roman oppression, abolishment of circumcision, the renaming of the Holy City of Jerusalem, and the erection of pagan temples over Jewish hallowed ground became only a few of the reasonings for the war.
From his fortress in Betar, Simon bar Kokhba and his rebels withstood a three-and-a-half-year siege by the might of the Roman Empire’s legions. Enraged by the troubles with Judaism and the Jewish people, Hadrian decided to obliterate the religion from the country. The legions crushed the revolt with violent force, slaughtering over a half-million men, women, and children. The number of enslaved persons was believed to be several hundred thousand, but that number cannot be verified.
Renaming the Judean Province to Syria Palaestina, Hadrian expelled all Jews and Christian Jews from Aelia Capitolina, the former city of Jerusalem. Upon penalty of death, they were never to enter the city except for one day each year—the holiday of Tisha B’Av.
And for the next one hundred fifty years, the city remained a pagan Roman town.
About the Author
Glenn Starkey is an award-winning author living in Texas with his family. He served in the Marine Corps; is a Vietnam veteran; worked in Texas law enforcement; was security manager over petrochemical facilities, and security director of a major Gulf Coast port. For the past eleven years Glenn has volunteered as a reading mentor to elementary school children. He has been baptized in the Jordan River.
Feel free to contact Glenn through [email protected] and browse his website, https://www.glennstarkey.net . His novels are available from all major booksellers.
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