MATITYAHU 23

2 Saying, The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat:

Moses seat

Christ, who in the days of his weakness suffered every indignity and could get no redress from the then present court of appeal, because those who sat in "Moses' seat" were the transgressors against him.

He resisted not evil but left all to the Father's treatment. We have plenty of proof that God will avenge His own elect, which cry day and night.

"Woe unto him through whom offences come."

The Christadelphian, Aug 1888

27 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness.

Whited Sepulchres

With the Jews, contact with a dead body implied ceremonial defilement, which excluded the person so defiled from the performance of many of his religious and civil duties.

Great care was, therefore, taken to prevent such accidental contact, and all sepulchres were required to be marked in such a manner as to be easily recognised. It was usual to surmount the grave with some pillar, pyramid, or other monument, or to ornament the face of the rock with an inscription or façade.

Where no other means of distinguishing the spot was employed, the sepulchre was conspicuously "whited" once a year. This enables us to appreciate the point of our Lord's reproof,

The Christadelphian, June 1874

29 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous,

Building the Tombs of the Prophets

Christ "knew what was in man."—(Jno. 2:25). Therefore he was able to put the right interpretation on actions which on the face of them bore an exactly contrary meaning.

The Scribes and Pharisees, (like their class in all ages and countries,) while hating the righteous, like to have the credit of approving them. They dearly prize the reputation of being on the side of the righteous while dearly loving the practice of wickedness under various respectable guises.

To achieve this reputation is easy concerning those who are dead, because the dead cause them no irritation by a living antagonism to their evil course. Their real character is shown in their treatment of those who are alive.

Do they take care of the righteous of their own generation? The Scribes and Pharisees were the destroyers of the latter (Jesus and his friends) showing therefore that their zeal for the dead prophets was a mere deception—perhaps an unconscious one.

Jesus expressed the true state of the case by an ironical construction of their action. Burial was a part of the process by which the prophets were got rid of. Tombs are connected with burial. Therefore, Jesus makes their building of the tombs an evidence of participation in the whole process; their fathers killed and they approvingly buried.

Many would gladly attend the funeral of a man in whose recovery from death they would not have rejoiced. On the surface, attending the funeral and garnishing the sepulchre is a token of respect and an expression of sorrow; but as often as not, it is a mock compliance with men's customs, in no way corresponding to the actual state of the heart.

Jesus knew the hypocritical character of the whole proceeding, and, therefore, adroitly turned their own actions against themselves.

The Christadelphian, Jan 1875

35 That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.

Titus was then sent by Vespasian against Gischala, which was full of military fugitives. Titus perceived the place was capable of an easy assault, and already satiated with blood-shedding, he proposed favourable terms of capitulation. This was on the Sabbath. A certain violent man named John, who had made himself leader of the place, asked Titus to wait till the Sabbath was over, which Titus, peaceably inclined, consented to do, and withdrew his troops to camp at some distance.

John took advantage of the opportunity to flee. He escaped by night. Several thousands of the citizens with their families fled with him—a multitude of women and children. When three miles out of the city, finding the people with him slow in their movements, he left them, and rode in all haste to Jerusalem. Many of the men accompanied him, notwithstanding the agonising importunities of wives and children to stay.

The multitude thus deserted were in great distress. They were afraid to go back and unable to go forward. They dispersed among the hills, and vast numbers of the women and children perished. Next day, the Romans slew crowds of them. Three thousand of them were driven back like a flock of sheep to the city. The city was spared and occupied by a garrison.

Vespasian then advanced from Caesarea to Jamnia and Azotus, both of which he captured and garrisoned. Disorder and civil war now prevailed throughout the country. The Jews were everywhere divided between those who wanted war and those who wanted peace. This raised feuds even in private families, and led to bitter quarrels.

The more violent banded together in bodies and betook themselves to rapine, and for barbarity and iniquity exceeded the Romans themselves. The Roman garrisons took no notice of these disorders, and the country became a prey to misery. The lawless bands, after exhausting their opportunities of plunder and cruelty, repaired one after the other to Jerusalem, which became crowded with the refuse of the country.

JERUSALEM BEFORE THE SEIGE

Galilee subdued, the Romans next turned their eyes anxiously to Jerusalem, which, on account of its great strength and abundance of supplies, threatened a stubborn resistance. John of Gischala, arriving there, incited the people to war, by reporting the Romans to be in a weak condition on account of the resistance of Galilee. John's harangues had the effect of inciting the young and violent part of the city, but saddening the aged and the prudent. The numerous vagabonds from the country sided with John, and soon evinced a disposition to domineer over the city. They supplied their own private wants by robbery, and murdered all who stood in their way.

They assassinated the public treasurer, a man of royal lineage, and two other public men. Other leading men soon fell a prey to their violence, under the pretence that their victims were in secret correspondence with the Romans. Terror prevailed in the city even before the Romans arrived. Ananus, the high priest, persuaded the people to rise against John's party, who, after a collision and much effusion of blood, took refuge in the Temple, and fortified themselves there against their assailants. John's party sent secretly for the Idumean Jews to come to their assistance. The Idumeans came to the number of twenty thousand, but the party of the high priest refused them admittance.

John's party, who may be called the Temple party, cut open one of the gates at night during a tempest, and admitted the Idumeans to the Temple. When their presence was discovered, dismay filled the city. Fighting ensued, during which the Idumeans slew nearly nine thousand persons. The outer wall of the Temple was covered with blood. The Idumeans proceeded to violent measures in the government of the city. They assassinated the high priest Ananus, who, had he lived, had influence enough to have persuaded the Jews to submit to the Romans and save the city.

Jesus, the next in influence to Ananus, was also slain, and the bodies of both thrown out of the city naked and without burial. General massacre ensued. The better class of citizens were imprisoned in the hope they would join the Idumean party; refusing which, they were put to all manner of tortures. Public terror prevailed. Nobody had even courage to weep for the dead or bury them, for anyone suspected of sympathy with the murdered were immediately put to death.

***

The Temple party increased in arrogance with their success, and resolved to assume the government of the city. They determined to get rid of Zacharias, a leading man in Jerusalem, of great influence by reason of his wealth, wisdom, and probity. They arraigned him before the Sanhedrin on the accusation of designing to betray the city to the Romans.

They furnished no proof, and the Sanhedrin acquitted him of the charge; whereupon two of the party slew Zacharias before the Sanhedrin, and dismissed the Sanhedrin with a blow on the back of each member with a sword. The Idumeans then got out of love with the proceedings of the Temple party, and left Jerusalem in a body. The high-priest party were glad of this, but without reason, for the Temple party became more audacious and lawless in their proceedings—arresting and assassinating prominent citizens at their pleasure.

Anarchy then set in. The Roman commanders hearing of what was going on, advised Vespasian to march on the city. Vespasian replied that God was fighting for the Romans, and that it would be far better to leave the Jews to wear themselves out in their seditions than to unite them by attacking them. Many of the Jews left the city and deserted to the Romans. The exodus was stopped by the Temple party, who killed all who were found fleeing, unless they were able to pay a large sum of money for their liberty to go.

All along the road vast numbers of dead bodies began to accumulate in heaps. The Temple party refused burial, and the bodies putrefied in the sun. If any man in the city granted a grave to any of the slain, he was himself killed instantly. The terror of the living was so great that the dead were envied. To increase the dreadfulness of the situation, the Temple party laughed at the law, and poured contempt on the prophets as "jugglers"; though, as Josephus observes, they proved the prophets true by the miseries they brought on the city. John, the leader of the Temple party, aspired to the position of dictator; upon which the Temple faction split into two parts—one for, and the other against him.

The fortress of Masada, outside of Jerusalem, at this point was seized by a large band of lawless men, who made incursions from the fortress into the neighbouring country, and plundered the villages, slaying the inhabitants. Engaddi, a small city in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem was taken by them. The population fled, and the women and children left behind, to the number of seven hundred were butchered. The whole region was quickly desolated, and those parts of Judea hitherto quiet, were now in commotion and misery.

Vespasian was importuned to come to the rescue. He temporised, but at last decided to move, resolving, however, to reduce what Jewish cities still held out in the provinces, so that nothing might interrupt him in the siege of Jerusalem when once begun. Accordingly, he marched against Gadara, the metropolis of Perea, a place of some strength. The place was surrendered on the fourth day, and the walls demolished, but the people spared on account of their friendly disposition to the Romans.

Numerous seditious fugitives escaped from Gadara to Bethennabris, and made a stand with the Jews there. A detachment of the Roman horse followed them and took the place by storm, and put all the inhabitants to the sword, and burnt the village. A few survivors escaped; they spread the news of the Roman arrival throughout the district, and declared that the only hope lay in insurrection en masse. The population accordingly left their homes in the hills and mountains, and fled to Jericho, which was fortified, and had many inhabitants. Before they got there they were overtaken by the Roman horse and driven to the banks of the Jordan and compelled to accept battle. A massacre—not a battle—ensued; 15,000 were slain by the Romans; large numbers were drowned in the Jordan, and 2,200 taken prisoners.

***

The Roman commander, Placidus, who performed this exploit, next fell on the smaller cities and villages in the district, subduing Abila, Julias, and Bezemoth, and all other places toward the Dead Sea.

Vespasian marched to Jericho. Hearing of his approach, a great multitude left Jericho and took refuge in the mountains. Vespasian took the city and built a citadel in which he placed a garrison. He despatched a Roman officer, with horse and foot, to Gerasa. The place was taken at the first assault, the young men slain, the houses pillaged and then burnt. The adjoining villages were treated in the same way.

The mountainous district of Judea was now desolate and also the plain country, and escape from Jerusalem was impossible. Returning to Caesarea to make final arrangements for the siege of Jerusalem, Vespasian was informed of the death of Nero, and suspended his plans till he should see who was made Emperor, and what instructions he should receive as to the Jewish war.

The death of Nero postponed the fate of Jerusalem for many months. Meanwhile, new trouble arose for that unhappy city. One Simon, of Gerasa, a man of violent and domineering disposition, got himself appointed captain of the marauding bands in the fortress of Masada. Increasing his numbers by various means, he extended his operations in the open country about Jerusalem till he was in a position to invade Idumea.

The Temple party in Jerusalem—headed by John of Gischala—watched Simon's movements with great jealousy. They captured his wife and household. Simon appeared before Jerusalem in a great rage, and demanded the restoration of his wife. He laid hold of all the stragglers he could find outside Jerusalem; killed many by torture, and cut off the hands of others and sent them maimed into Jerusalem. His threatenings were so formidable that the Temple zealots at last sent his wife out to him. He departed into Idumea, but returned in a short time and environed the whole city with his soldiers, torturing and slaying all who ventured out of the city.

Meanwhile, inside the city, affairs became worse. John of Gischala propitiated the support of his party by giving them licence to pillage and murder and ravish without restraint. His men revelled in every form of violence and excess. Many sought to escape from the city, but in fleeing from John inside the walls, they fell into the hands of Simon outside.

 Affairs grew so bad that the high priest party tried to overthrow John by admitting Simon. The people welcomed Simon with joyful acclamation: but the remedy proved worse than the disease. Simon having obtained possession of Jerusalem, treated those who had admitted him as enemies equally with those of John's party. He made an assault on the temple where John's party were established. A great deal of bloodshed ensued, but with little result.

A faction then sprang up in John's party, headed by Eleazar the priest. Desirous of getting rid of John's tyranny, this faction established themselves against John in the inner court of the Temple and assailed John's adherents from the upper part of the building. John was thus between two fires—Simon in the city and Eleazar in the inner and higher parts of the Temple. Constant and desperate fighting ensued between the parties. Simon and John both resorted to the use of fire, by which the principal calamity of the city was prepared.

In addition to the houses near the Temple where the strife raged, the granaries near the Temple in which had been stored corn that would have lasted the city several years, were burnt down. This was the cause of famine afterwards. The city now sank to a state of extreme wretchedness, and the elder part earnestly desired the arrival of the Romans, but had no means of communicating with them, or in any way of influencing the course of events, as every exit from the city was carefully guarded, and every one suspected of favouring the Romans was put to death, equally by the three factions at war with each other.

The Roman army at Caesarea proclaimed Vespasian emperor. Vespasian departed to Alexandria, and thence to Rome, leaving the direction of the war to his son Titus. Titus remained for a time at Caesarea, making preparations for the siege of Jerusalem. At last he marched and was reinforced at various points.

Ways of Providence Ch 25