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bring the authors of this murder to punishment, for that there was no other way to make the multitude separate without coming to blows. However Cumanus postponed their supplications to the other affairs he was then about, and sent the petitioners away without success.

4. But when the affair of this murder came to be told at Jerusalem, it put the multitude into disorder, and they left the feast, and without any generals to conduct them, they marched with great violence to Samaria; nor would they be ruled by any of the magistrates that were set over them, but they were managed by one Eleazar, the son of Dineus, and by Alexander, in these their thievish and seditious attempts. These men fell upon those that were in the neighbourhood of the Arcabatene toparchy, and slew them, without sparing any age, and set the villages on fire,

5. But Cumanus took one troop of horsemen, called the troop of Sabaste, out of Cæsarea, and came to the assistance of those that were spoiled; he also seized upon a great number of those that followed Eleazar, and slew more of them. And as for the rest of the multitude of those that went so zealously to fight with the Samaritans, the rulers of Jerusalem ran out clothed with sack cloth, and having ashes on their head, and begged of them to go their ways, lest by their attempt to revenge themselves upon the Samaritans they should provoke the Romans to come against Jerusalem; to have compassion upon their country, and temple, their children and their wives, and not bring the utmost dangers of destruction upon them, in order to avenge themselves upon one Galilean only. The Jews complied with these persuasions of theirs, and dispersed themselves; but still there were a great number who betook themselves to robbing, in hopes of impunity, and rapines and insurrections of the bolder sort happened over the whole country; and the men of power among the Samaritans came to Tyre, to * Ummidius Quadratus, the president of Syria, and desired that they that had laid waste the country might be punished: the great men also of the Jews and Jonathan the son of Ananus, the highpriest, came thither and said, that the Samaritans were the beginners of the disturbance, on account of that murder they

This Ummidius, or Numidius, or, as Tacitus calls him, Winidius Quadratus, is mentioned in an ancient inscription, still preserved, as Spanheim here informs us, which calls him UMMIDIUS QUAD

RATUS.

had committed, and that Cumanus had given occasion to what had happened, by his unwillingness to punish the original authors of that murder.

6. But Quadratus put both parties off for that time, and told them, that when he should come to those places be would make a diligent inquiry after every circumstance. After which he went to Cæsarea, and crucified all those whom Cumanus had taken alive; and when from thence he was come to the city Lydda, he heard the affair of the Samaritans, and sent for eighteen of the Jews whom he had learned to have been concerned in that fight, and beheaded them; but he sent two others of those that were of the greatest power among them, and both Jonathan and Ananias, the high-priests, as also Ananus the son of this Ananias, and certain others that were eminent among the Jews, to Cæsar; as he did in like manner by the most illustrious of the Samaritans. He also ordered that Cumanus [the procurator,] and Cæsar the tribune, should sail to Rome, in order to give an account of what had been done to Casar. When he had finished these matters, he went up from Lydda to Jerusalem, and finding the multitude celebrating their feast of unleavened bread without any tumult, he returned to Antioch.

7. Now when Cæsar at Rome had heard what Cumanus and the Samaritans had to say, (where it was done in the hearing of Agrippa, who zealously espoused the cause of the Jews, as in like manner, many of the great men stood by Cumanus,) he condemned the Samaritans, and commanded that three of the most powerful men among them should be put to death; he banished Cumanus, and sent Cæsar bound to Jerusalem, to be delivered over to the Jews to be tormented, that he should be drawn round the city, and then beheaded.

8. After this Cæsar sent Felix,* the brother of Pallas, to be procurator of Galilee, and Samaria, and Perea, and re

• Take the character of this Felix, (who is well known from the Acts of the apostles, particularly from his trembling when St. Paul discoursed of righteousness, chastity, and judgment to come, Acts xxiv. 25; and no wonder, when we have elsewhere seen that he lived in adultery with Drusilla, another man's wife, Antiq. B. xx. ch vii. 1. vol. iv.) in the words of Tacitus produced here by Dean Aldrich; "Felix exercised, says Tacitus, the authority of a king, with "the disposition of a slave, and relying upon the great power of "his brother Pallas at court, thought he might safely be guilty of all "kinds of wicked practices." Observe also the time when he was made procurator, A. D. 52. that when St. Paul pleaded his cause

moved Agrippa from Chalcis unto a greater kingdom; for he gave him the tetrarchy which had belonged to Philip, which contained Batanea, Trachonitis, and Gaulanitis: he added to it the kingdom of Lysanias, and that province [Abilene] which Varus had governed. But Claudius himself, when he had administered the government thirteen years, eight months, and twenty days, died, and left Nero to be his successor in the empire, whom he had adopted by his wife Agrippina's delusions, in order to be his successor, although he had a son of his own whose name was Britannicus, by Messalina his former wife, and a daughter whose name was Octavio, whom he had married to Nero; he had also another daughter by Petina, whose name was Antonia,

CHAP. XIII.

Nero adds four cities to Agrippa's kingdom; but other parts of Judea were under Felix. The disturbances which were raised by the Sicarii, the Magicians, and an Egyptian false prophet. The Jews and Syrians have a contest at Cæsarea.

§ 1. Now as to the many things in which Nero acted like a madman, out of the extravagant degree of the felicity and riches which he enjoyed, and by that means used his good fortune to the injury of others; and after what manner he slew his brother, and wife, and mother, from whom his barbarity spread itself to others that were most nearly related to him;

before him, A. D. 58. he might have been many years a judge unto that nation, as St. Paul says he had then been, Acts xxiv. 10. But as to what Tacitus here says, that before the death of Cumanus, Felix was procurator over Samaria only, does not well agree with St. Paul's words, who would hardly have called Samaria a Jewish nation. In short, since what Tacitus here says, is about countries very remote from Rome, where he lived; since what he says of two Roman procurators, the one over Galilee, the other over Samaria at the same time, is without all example elsewhere, and since Josephus, who lived at that very time in Judea, appears to have known nothing of this procuratorship of Felix, before the death of Cumanus, I much suspect the story itself is nothing better than a mistake of Tacitus, especially when it seems not only omitted but contradicted by Josephus; as any one may find that compares their history together. Possibly Felix might have been a subordinate judge among the Jews some time before under Cumanus, but that he was in earnest a procurator of Samaria before, I do not believe. Bishop Pearson, as well as Bishop Lloyd, quote this account, but with a doubtful clause; si fides Tacito, If we may believe l'acitus. Pears. Annal. Paulin. page 8. Marshal's Tables, at A. D. 49.

and how, at last, he was so distracted, that he became an actor in the scenes, and upon the theatre, I omit to say any more about them, because there are writers enough upon those subjects every where; but I shall turn myself to those actions of his time in which the Jews were concerned.

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2. Nero therefore bestowed the kingdom of the Lesser Armenia upon Aristobulus, Herod's son, and he added to Agrippa's kingdom four cities, with the toparchies to them belonging; I mean Abila, and that Julias which is in Perea, Tarichea also, and Tiberias of Galilee; but over the rest of Judea he made Felix procurator. This Felix took Eleazar the arch robber, and many that were with him alive, when they had ravaged the country for twenty years together, and sent them to Rome: but as to the number of robbers whom he caused to be crucified, and of those who were caught among them, and whom he brought to punishment, they were a multitude not to be enumerated.

3. When the country was purged of these, there sprang up another sort of robbers in Jerusalem, which were called Sicarii, who slew men in the day-time, in the midst of the city; this they did chiefly at the festivals, when they mingled themselves among the multitude, and concealed daggers under their garments, with which they stabbed those that were their energies; and when any fell down dead, the murderers became a part of those that had indignation against them, by which means they appeared persons of such reputation, that they could by no means be discovered. The first man who was slain by them was Jonathan the high-priest, after whose death many were slain every day, while the fear men were in of being so served was more afflicting than the calamity itself, and while every body expected death every hour, as men do in war, so men were obliged to look before them, and to take notice of their enemies at a great distance; nor, if their friends were coming to them, durst they trust them any longer; but, in the midst of their suspicions and guarding of themselves, they were slain. Such was the celerity of the plotters against them, and so cunning was their contrivance.

4. There was also another body of wicked men gotten together, not so impure in their actions, but more wicked in their intentions, which laid waste the happy state of the city no less than did these murderers. These were such men as * i. e. Herod king of Chalcis.

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deceived and deluded the people under pretence of divine inspiration, but were for procuring innovations and changes in the government; and these prevailed with the multitude to act like madmen, and went before them into the wilderness, as pretending that God would there shew them the signals of liberty. But Felix thought this procedure was to be the beginning of a revolt; so he sent some horsemen and footmen, both armed, who destroyed a great number of them.

5. But there was an Egyptian false prophet that did the Jews more mischief than the former; for he was a cheat, and pretended to be a prophet also, and got together thirty thousand men that were deluded by him: these he led round about from the wilderness to the mount which was called the Mount of Olivès, and was ready to break into Jerusa lem by force from that place; and if he could but once conquer the Roman garrison, and the people, he intended to domineer over them by the assistance of those guards of his that were to break into the city with him. But Felix prevented his attempt, and met him with his Roman soldiers, while all the people assisted him in his attack upon them, insomuch that, when it came to a battle, the Egyptians ran away, with a few others, while the greatest part of those that were with him were either destroyed or taken alive; but the rest of the multitude were dispersed every one to their own homes, and there concealed themselves.

6. Now when these were quieted, it happened, as it does in a diseased body, that another part was subject to an in flammation; for a company of deceivers and robbers got together, and persuaded the Jews to revolt, and exhorted them. to assert their liberty, inflicting death on those that continued in obedience to the Roman government, and saying, that such as willingly chose slavery, ought to be forced from such their desired inclinations; for they parted themselves into dif ferent bodies, and lay in wait up and down the country, and plundered the houses of the great men, and slew the men themselves, and set the villages on fire; and this till all JuIdea was filled with the effects of their madness. And thus the flame was every day more and more blown up, till it -came to a direct war.

7. There was also another disturbance at Cæsarea, those Jews who were mixed with the Syrians, that lived there raising a tumult against them. The Jews pretended that the city was theirs, and said that he who built it was a Jew,

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