The Jewish War: Last half of book 6

[cahn]

Last week:Lament for the destroyed trees and landscape around Jerusalem. A woman eats her own child. More discussion of Titus and whether he wanted to spare the Temple or not. The Carthage and Alexandria precedents for Romans treating defeated opponents. Torching a temple = REALLY BAD LUCK. The timetable of the siege of Jerusalem set by Vespasian's ascent as emperor.

This week: The aftermath of the burning of the temple, and the end of the siege of Jerusalem. Still some pretty awful stuff.

Next week: First half of book 7... isn't this the last book?! OK, selenak, give us a stopping point... :)

Comments

Re: Recap

[selenak]

Great point about the various omina like the comet and the sword-shaped star. Though I don’t recall the star the Three Wise Men are following in the gospels being so specifically described - it gets presented like this in art, of course, and now I wonder whether this is because those early monks who first made drawings have read Josephus. I also dimly recall from school that there is the theory that it was Halley’s Comet. In any case, it is fascinating to have this two source confirmation there were some astronomical phenomena observed causing long term speculation over the next few decades. (Since the usual Christian timeline, based on Pontius Pilatus named as governor, is that Jesus was crucified under Tiberius, while we’re now many an Emperor and decade later.

The phrasing about the prophecy and the common Jewish interpretation plus the conclusion that no, it clearly meant Vespasian is almost identical to how Suetonius phrases it in his Vespasian biography, and since Josephus writes before Suetonius, I assume it’s (additional) confirmation Suetonius must have read “The Jewish War” as part of his research. Incidentally, if such a prophecy really was commonly believed pre Jewish War, it is indeed believable that Josephus, talking for his life after surrendering to Vespasian, should hit on it.

Now, on to my own impressions: it continues to be brutal, no matter how often Josephus repeats that Titus is a merciful guy at heart. Among many things, his “now that the Temple is burned, what is the point of you anyway?” Statement to the priests whom he has then executed are a case in point. Also, we get some numbers in this part: 40 000 Jews are let go by Titus without further negative consequences. 1.100 000 people died during the siege. 11.000 then die of starvation post imprisonment because either their guards don’t feed them or they can’t stomach the food after such a lengthy period of starvation. And overall, for the entire campaign, a staggering 97 000 are taken prisoner, who minus the 40 000 freed are sent either to the mines to work (and that’s brutal work, an almost sure death sentence after a few years at best) or into the arena for the games (i.e. death by beast or gladiator), with the most attractive ones destined to be presented at the triumph first. That’s Roman callousness in its most blatant form. Reminder: the games in question where the ones the Colluseum - or the “Flavian Theatre”, as it was actually called at the time - was inaugurated with once it had been finished (which took some years; Suetonius mentions the lengthy games as a plus in his Titus biography, meaning these Jewish captives, minus the ones destined for provincial games not in Rome, I guess, had to wait for years (i.e. the entirety of Vespasian’s reign) to get slaughtered in the arena. It’s just awful on every level.

(Feuchtwanger uses both the Triumph at the end of book 1 and the games in the last third of book 2 in his trilogy.)

Josephus mentions that Titus freed the prisoners whom John, Simon and their followers incarcerated; I am intrigued that he doesn’t tell us whether or not these included his father (whom he earlier mentions getting locked up by John & Co.). You’d think he’d tell us both if Matthias didn’t make it this far or if he’d survived and they were reunited, but no, zilch. Pure speculation: his father did survive, but the reunion wasn’t a happy one, Josephus got cursed by his Dad, and that’s why he can’t bring himself to write about it.

Next week: Yes, book 7 is the last one (we’re still due the siege of Masada, after all). We could read it completely, but if you do want a division, I would suggest interrupting at: “The purple drapes that used to be in front of the Holy of Holies and the Jewish Law, on the other hand, (Vespasian) carefully kept at his residence”.

One more historical footnote: Titus being hailed Imperator by his soldiers is a reminder that the term originally referred to successful generals under specific conditions (i.e. just winning a run of the mill battle won’t do it), and while it will end up being used synonymous with “Emperor” later on, we’re not quite there yet. (Presumably because none of the Julio-Claudians after Tiberius were in fact great and active generals - Caligula made a mockery of it with his “battle against Neptune”, Claudius invaded Britain but not in the sense of personally generalling there, he sent others to do it for him, and Nero didn’t go on campaign, either -, and Vespasian’s immediate predecessors in the Year of the Four Emperors were too briefly in power to influence language.)