brother of Jesus.
THE FIRST CENTURY
| 4 B.C. | Death of King Herod. |
| A.D. 6 | Zealot uprising, led by Judas of Galilee. |
| A.D. 26 | Pontius Pilate appointed prefect of Judaea (until A.D. 36). |
| A.D. 36 | Pontius Pilate recalled to Rome and exiled. |
| A.D. 38 | Anti-Jewish riots and killings in Alexandria are encouraged by the prefect Flaccus. |
| A.D. 39 | Herod Antipas exiled to the French Pyrenees. |
| c. A.D. 44 | James, the brother of Jesus, is executed. |
| A.D. 46-48 | Tiberius Alexander is prefect of Judaea. |
| A.D. 64 | Burning of Rome under Nero. Arrest of Christians. |
| A.D. 66 | Jewish general in Roman army, Tiberius Alexander, is prefect of Egypt. Sends in his troops to put down revolt in Alexandria. Several thousand Jews are killed. |
| A.D. 66-73 | War in Judaea. Roman army under Vespasian invades through Galilee. |
| A.D. 67 | Josephus, a Jewish military leader in Galilee, defects to the Roman side following a defeat. Writes Jewish histories (The Jewish War, A.D. 77-78; The Antiquities of the Jews, c. 94) while living in the imperial palace in Rome. |
| A.D. 69 | Vespasian is proclaimed emperor. Places his son Titus in charge of the army. Titus appoints Tiberius Alexander his chief of staff. |
| A.D. 70 | The Temple in Jerusalem is destroyed. Afterwards, Vespasian seeks out and executes all members of the royal Line of David. Jerusalem is renamed Aelia Capitolina, and all Jews are for bidden to enter the city. The Romans allow the Pharisee Johanan ben Zakkai to establish a religious school and the Sanhedrin at Jabneh, giving rise to rabbinical Judaism. (The school and the Sanhedrin will survive there until A.D. 132) |
| A.D. 73 | Masada is destroyed, and 960 Zealots commit suicide rather than be captured. Jewish temple of Onias in Egypt is closed. |
Both sides needed peace and the wealth that arose from it—conflict never plants seeds or grows crops, and idle land never produces food or money for the farmers, nor taxes for the rulers—and Rome relied upon Judaea for the forty talents it produced each year for the Roman treasury (the approximate equivalent of 3,750 pounds of silver).1 Through careful political husbandry, this unstable balance had lasted for half of the century. And then suddenly it all fell to pieces.
A group of anti-Roman priests in the Temple in Jerusalem decided to stop non-Jews from giving offerings. This cessation of the customary daily sacrifices performed for Caesar and for Rome in the Temple was a direct and abrupt challenge to the emperor. There was no turning back. The Zealots and the anti-Roman priests had led their people across the threshold of the doorway to hell. As Josephus reports, war against Rome was inevitable because of this act. The Zealots, in their misplaced ambition, thought that they would recover control of their nation, but so great was their loss that all such hope was to vanish for nearly two thousand years.
Fighting first erupted in A.D. 66 in the coastal city of Caesarea. Attempts to calm the situation were futile in the face of the frustration and hatred that had fueled the attacks. The Zealots had been waiting for this day, and now they had it. For them, tomorrow had finally come. Thousands were killed: Zealots took the fortress of Masada on the Dead Sea; others took over the lower city of Jerusalem and the Temple, burning down the palace of King Agrippa and that of the high priest. They also burned the official records office.
Leaders emerged from within the Jewish ranks: in Jerusalem the son of the high priest had been in charge. Then Judas of Galilee’s son appeared in Masada and looted the armory before returning to Jerusalem like a king, clothed in royal robes, to take over the palace. The official high priest was murdered.
At first, unprepared for such a catastrophic outpouring of hatred toward them, the Romans were readily beaten. The governor of Syria, Cestius Gallus, marched into Judaea from his capital in Antioch at the head of the Twelfth Legion. After destroying many communities and towns, his army besieged Jerusalem. But he was driven off with very heavy losses, including the commander of the Sixth Legion and a Roman tribune. Cestius himself seems to have escaped only by the speed of his retreat. In the debacle, the Zealots seized a great deal of weapons and money. Despite this show of strength, many prescient Jews fled Judaea, as they knew the situation could only get worse.
Judea and Galilee
And they were right: the Romans withdrew, but only to gather their strength. They were to return with brutality and vengeance. Meanwhile, in the absence of the Roman overlords, the Zealots regrouped too. They elected commanders for the various regions, raised troops, and began to train them in Roman military techniques and formations. The first fighting was to be in Galilee, where Josephus—yet to become the historian and friend of the Romans—was commander of the Zealot forces.
The Roman emperor Nero was outraged by the eruption of revolt in Judaea and ordered a respected army veteran, Vespasian, to take charge of regaining control over the country. Vespasian sent his son, Titus, to Alexandria to get the Fifteenth Legion. Vespasian himself marched down from Syria with the Fifth and Tenth Legions, together with twenty-three cohorts of auxiliaries—around eighteen thousand cavalry and infantry.
