KAIAFA AND HIS PALACE
3:001 am – YERUSHALAYIM, FRIDAY, APRIL 7, A.D. 30
IN THE PALACE OF KAIAFA, the chief priests, scribes, and elders of the people gathered in an informal meeting of the Sanhedrim, or in other words, all anxiously awaiting the outcome of the expedition led by Yehudhah, not that they did not already know the outcome of it. , but just waiting for the outcome of everything that was previously agreed.
When Yeshua, the object of their sworn hatred and preordained victim, was introduced as a bound prisoner, he was immediately put on trial in disregard of the law, both written and traditional, of which those assembled Jewish rulers professed to be such zealous guardians. No legal hearing on a capital charge could properly be held except in the designated and official court of the Sanhedrim, but they made an exception that dawn.
The Prisoner was first subjected to interrogation by the high priest himself, Kaiafa, just as Ananus first inquired of Yeshua concerning His disciples and His doctrine. Such a preliminary inquiry was wholly illegal, inasmuch as the Hebrew code required that witnesses for the prosecution in any case brought before the court should define the imputation against the aforesaid, and that the latter should be protected against any effort to make him testify against himself.
The Lord's reply should have been a sufficient protest to the high priest against the new illegal procedure.
Yeshua declared to him:
— I spoke openly to the world, I always taught in the synagogue and in the temple, where all the Jews gather, and I said nothing in secret. Why do you ask me? Ask those who heard what I taught them; behold, they know what I have said to them.
This was a legal objection to denying a prisoner on trial the right to be confronted with his accusers, but it was met with evident contempt, especially after one of the close officers, wishing perhaps to win favor with his superiors, threw Yeshua a treacherous slap.
Though laced with submission, this response constituted more of an appeal to principles of justice; if what Yeshua had said was wrong, why didn't the attacker accuse Him, and if he had spoken correctly, what right did the police officer have to judge, condemn, and punish, and all that too, in the presence of the high priest?
Both Law and Justice had been dethroned that night.
The chief priests, the elders, and the whole council sought false witness against Jesus, so that they could put him to death. Whether the whole council meant a legal quorum, which could be twenty-three or more, or the full presence of the seventy-two Sanhedrists, is of little importance. Any evening session of the Sanhedrim, let alone to consider a capital charge, directly violated Jewish law. Likewise it was unlawful for the council to consider such an accusation on a Sabbath day, a feast day, or the eve of any such day.
In the Sanhedrim, all the members were judges, the judicial body was destined to hear the testimony and, according to that testimony and nothing else, to make a decision, in each case duly presented. The accusers should appear in person, and receive a preliminary warning against giving perjury. Anyone who defended himself should be considered and held innocent until he is declared guilty within due procedure.
However, in Yeshua's trial, the judges not only looked for witnesses, but specifically tried to find false witnesses. Although many false witnesses appeared, there was, however, no testimony against the Prisoner, for the bribed perjurers could not come to an agreement among themselves, and even the lawless Sanhedrists themselves were hesitant to openly violate the fundamental requirement that, at the very least, least two concurring witnesses testify against the accused person, otherwise the case should be closed.
That Yeshua should be condemned on one charge or another, and put to death, had already been determined by the priestly judges, their failure to find witnesses against Him, threatening to delay the execution of His nefarious plan. Haste and haste characterized their procedure throughout; had unlawfully arrested Yeshua during the night, were unlawfully carrying out a mock trial at night, their purpose was to convict the Prisoner, in time to present Him to the Roman authorities as early as possible in the morning, as a duly tried and deserving criminal. of death.
The lack of two hostile witnesses who could tell the same falsehoods was a serious embarrassment.
But at last two witnesses came and said:
— This man said he would tear down the temple of God, and rebuild it in three days, not made by hands.
He had answered the request at the time the cry of the Jews, for a sign of his authority, saying:
— Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.
There was a rumble and Kaiafa said it more excitedly.
— Silence everyone.
— Do you realize what you just said, Nazarene?
— I did not speak at all of myself as the destroyer of the temple, you are the destroyers and I the restorer. But the temple of his body, and by no means these buildings erected by human hands.
But the veneration with which the Jews professed an interest in the Holy House, while insolently desecrating its precincts, offered a partial but insufficient answer to their yearnings.
The conspirators' plan was to accuse him of sedition, making him look like a dangerous disturber of the national peace, an attacker of established institutions, and consequently an inciter of opposition against the vassal autonomy of the Jewish nation, and the supreme rule of Rome.
The vaguely defined shadow of a legal charge, produced by the obscure and inconsistent testimony of false witnesses, was enough to encourage the wicked court.
Kaiafa, rising from his seat to add dramatic emphasis to the question, inquired of Yeshua:
— Do you not answer anything to what they testify against you?
There was nothing to answer. No consistent or valid testimony had been brought against Him, and therefore He remained in majestic silence.
So Kaiafa, violating the legal prohibition of requiring anyone to testify in his own case but voluntarily, and of his own free will, not only asked for an answer from the Prisoner, but also exercised the potent prerogative of his office of high priest, to place the accused under oath, as a witness before the priestly court.
And the high priest, insisting, said to him:
— I adjure you by the living God that you tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God.
The fact of a distinct specification of "the Christ," and "the Son of God," is significant, as the Jews expected a Messiah, but did not recognize that he was distinctively of divine origin. Nothing that had happened so far can be considered as a basis for such a question.
The accusation of sedition was about to be overcome by another, according to them, of greater importance, that of blasphemy.
To the wholly unjust, yet official, conjuration of the high priest, Yeshua replied:
— You said so; But I say to you, soon you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven.
The expression "Thou hast said" was equivalent to "I am what thou hast said". It was an unqualified confession of divine sonship and inherent divinity.
Then the high priest tore his clothes, saying:
— Blasphemed; why do we still need witnesses? Behold, you have now heard his blasphemy! What do you think?
And they, answering, said:
— He is liable to death!
Thus the judges in Israel, comprising the high priest, chief priests, scribes and elders of the people, the illegally assembled Great Sanhedrim, decreed that the Son of God deserved death, based on the sole evidence of His own admission.
By express statute, the Jewish code forbade the conviction, specifically on a capital charge, of any person, based on His own confession, unless it was amply supported by credible witnesses. As in the Garden of Gethsemane Yeshua had voluntarily surrendered, so before the judges, he personally and voluntarily provided the evidence so that they would unjustly declare him guilty of death. There could be no crime in the assertion of messianism or divine sonship unless it were false.
The high priest's gesture of tearing his robes was a dramatic affectation of worst horror at the blasphemy with which his ears had been wounded. It was expressly forbidden in the law for the high priest to tear his garments; but the tearing of the garments as a testament to the most nefarious guilt, such as that of blasphemy, was permitted by traditional regulation. There is no indication that the judges' vote was received and recorded in the precise and orderly manner required by law.
Yeshua was found guilty of the most heinous offense known to the Jewish people. Though unfairly, he had been found guilty of blasphemy by the high court.
The Sanhedrists sentenced Christ to death, but the power to pass capital sentences had been taken away from the Jewish council by Roman decree. The high priest's court, however, had decided that Yeshua was liable to death, and had made this known by transferring him to Pilatus.
In their outburst of evil wrath, the judges of Israel abandoned their Lord to the mocking will of the servants present, who unloaded on Him every indignity their animalistic instincts could suggest. They threw their filthy sputum in his face, and having blindfolded him, they amused themselves in striking him again and again, saying:
— Prophesy to us, O Christ, who it is that hit you!
The heretical populace mocked him, surrounding him with jests and insults, and branded themselves as blasphemers in fact, but in doing so the Roman soldier stabbed one of them in the leg.
— They were warned that if anyone else laid a finger on the prisoner they would suffer the consequences.
Kaiafa, unaware of the advance notice, had no choice but to present the prisoner to Pontius Pilatus in the morning.
The law and customs of the day dictated that every person guilty of a capital offense, after having been duly tried before a Jewish court, should be retried the next day, and at this later hearing any of the judges, or even all the judges those who had voted for conviction could change their vote, but none of those who had voted for acquittal could change their conduct.
A simple majority was sufficient to acquit, but more than that was required to convict. A clause which may seem to us to be extremely out of place, provided that if all the judges unanimously voted for the death penalty, the verdict should not prevail and the accused would have to be released; for, it was argued, a unanimous vote against a prisoner indicated that he had no friends or supporters in the courtroom, and that the judges might have entered into a conspiracy against him.
According to this rule of Hebrew jurisprudence, the verdict against Yeshua, rendered in that illegal night session of the Sanhedrists, was null, as all found him guilty of death.
Evidencing the intention to establish an illusory pretense of legality in their procedure, the Sanhedrists suspended the session, to meet again at daybreak. In this way, they technically obeyed the precept that, in all cases in which a death sentence had been decreed, the court should re-enquire and judge a second time in a later session; however, they completely ignored the equally indispensable determination that the second trial be held the day after the first hearing. In the interval between the two sessions, on consecutive days, the judges were to pray and fast, giving the case at trial slow and serious attention.
***
A VISIT TO ZACHEUS
JERICHO, SATURDAY, APRIL 1, A.D. 30
WHEN Yeshua's procession entered Jericho, the sun was almost setting and he was willing to remain there that night. As Yeshua was passing in front of the customs house, it happened that Zacchaeus, the publican and tax collector, was there and wanted very much to see Yeshua. This publican ruler was quite wealthy and had often heard about the prophet from Galilee. He had decided that he would find out what kind of man Yeshua was the next time he had the opportunity to visit Jericho, and so Zacchaeus tried to make his way through the crowd, but they were very numerous, and being of short stature, he did not could see over their heads. And so the chief publican followed the crowd until they were all near the center of the city, not far from where he lived.
When he realized that he would not be able to penetrate the crowd, and thinking that Yeshua could go through the city without stopping, he ran ahead and climbed a plane tree whose outstretched branches protruded over the road. He knew that from there he would have a good view of the Rabbi as he passed.
And he was not disappointed, for as he passed, Yeshua stopped and, looking at Zacchaeus, said:
"Hurry up, Zacchaeus, and come down, for tonight I must stay at your house."
And when Zacchaeus heard these amazing words, he almost fell out of the tree in his haste to come down, and, going to Yeshua, he expressed his great joy at the fact that Yeshua wanted to spend the night at His house.
And they went immediately to the house of Zacchaeus.
Those who lived in Jericho were very surprised that Yeshua would consent to stay in the publican ruler's house. And while the Rabbi and his apostles were with Zacchaeus at the door of the house, one of the Pharisees from Jericho, who was standing nearby, said:
— See how this man went to lodge with a sinner, an apostate son of Abraham, and who is an extortioner and a thief of his own people.
And when Yeshua heard this, he looked at Zacchaeus and smiled.
Then Zacchaeus climbed up on a stool and said:
"Men of Jericho, hear me!" I may be a publican and a sinner, but the great Teacher has come to stay at my house; and before he enters I tell you that I will give half of all my goods to the poor, and beginning tomorrow, if I have exacted anything unjust from any man, I will repay fourfold. I will seek my salvation with all my heart and learn to act righteously in the eyes of God.
After Zacchaeus finished speaking, Yeshua said:
"Today salvation has come to this house, and you have truly become a son of Abraham.
Turning to the crowd gathered around them, Yeshua said:
— And do not be astonished at what I say to you, nor be offended by what we do, for I have always declared that the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost.
They stayed at Zacchaeus' house for the night. The next morning they got up and headed for Bethany, along the "road of thieves", on the way to Passover in Yerushaláyim.
***
WHILE YESHUA WAS PASSING
JERICÓ, MONDAY, APRIL 7, A.D. 30
YESHUA DISTRIBUTE JOY wherever he went. It was full of grace and truth. His followers never ceased to marvel at the pleasant words that came from his mouth. You can cultivate kindness, but kindness and sweetness are the aroma of friendship that emanates from a soul saturated with love.
Kindness always leads to respect, but when it is devoid of grace, it often repels affection. Kindness is universally attractive only when it is full of grace. Kindness becomes effective only when it is attractive.
Yeshua really understood men; and thus he was able to manifest true sympathy and show sincere compassion. But he rarely allowed himself pity. While his compassion was boundless, his sympathy proved to be practical, personal and constructive. Never did his familiarity with suffering breed indifference, and he was able to minister to afflicted souls without increasing their piety.
Yeshua could help men so much because he loved them so sincerely. In fact, he loved every man, woman, and child. And he could be such a true friend because of his remarkable insight – he knew so deeply what went on in the heart and mind of man. He was an interested and penetrating observer; able enough to understand the needs of men, and sagacious to detect human aspirations.
Yeshua was never rushed. He had time to comfort his fellow men "as he passed." And he always made his friends feel at ease. He was a charming listener. And he never tried to probe indiscreetly into the souls of his companions. When he comforted hungry souls and ministered to thirsty souls, those who received his mercy did not feel at all that they were confessing to him, but felt that they were talking to him. Their trust in him was limitless, because they realized that he too had a deep faith in them.
He never seemed to be curious about people, and he never expressed a desire to direct, manage, or investigate them. He inspired deep confidence and robust courage in everyone who enjoyed his company. When he smiled before a man, that mortal experienced a greater ability to solve his multiple problems.
Yeshua loved men so much, and so wisely, that he never hesitated to be severe with them when the occasion called for such discipline. And he would often start helping a person by asking for their help. In this way he aroused her interest, drawing on the best of human nature.
The Rabbi could discern saving faith in the gross superstition of the woman seeking healing by touching the hem of her robe. He was always ready and willing to interrupt a sermon or stop a crowd while ministering to the needs of a single person, even if he was a small child. Great things happened, not only because people had faith in Yeshua, but also because Yeshua had so much faith in them.
Most of the really important things that Yeshua said or did seemed to happen casually, "as He passed." There was little on the professional, well-planned, or premeditated side of Yeshua's ministry. He dispensed and spread health and happiness naturally and gracefully on his journey through life. It was literally true that, "he walked doing good".
And it was up to the Rabbi's followers, of all ages, to learn to minister as they "pass" - to do good, unselfishly, as they go about their daily duties.
THEY DID NOT LEAVE Jericho until close to noon, for they had been up late the night before while Jesus was teaching Zacchaeus and his family the gospel of the Kingdom. The group stopped for lunch almost halfway up the road ascending to Bethany, as the crowd passed by on their way to Yerushaláyim, not knowing that Yeshua and the apostles were staying that night on the Mount of Olives.
Unlike the parable of the talents, which was intended for all the disciples, the parable of the minas was told more strictly to the apostles and was largely based on Archelaus' experience and his futile attempt to achieve the rule of the kingdom of Judea. This is one of the few parables of Yeshua that is based on an actual character in history. No wonder they had thought of Archelaus, for Zacchaeus' house at Jericho was very close to Archelaus' ornate palace, and its aqueduct ran beside the road by which they had left Jericho.
Yeshua said:
— You think that the Son of Man is going to Yerushaláyim to receive a kingdom, but I declare to you that you are doomed to disappointment. Do you not remember a certain prince who went to a distant country to receive a kingdom for himself, but even before he returned, the citizens of his province, who had already rejected him in their hearts, sent an ambassador after him, to say:
'We do not want this man to reign over us'?
Just as this king was rejected from the temporal government, so will the Son of Man be rejected from the spiritual government. And again I declare that my Kingdom is not of this world; but if the Son of Man had been granted the spiritual government of this people, he would have accepted such a Kingdom from the souls of men and would have reigned over the dominion of human hearts. Notwithstanding they have rejected my spiritual rule over them, I will return to receive from others this Kingdom of the spirit which is now denied me. You will see the Son of Man rejected today, but in another age what the children of Abraham now reject will be received and exalted. And now, like the noble rejected man of this parable, I would like to call before me my twelve servants, special administrators, to deliver the sum of a mina into each one's hands, and it would be well to admonish you all to pay a great deal. Pay attention to my instructions so that you can deal diligently with the capital entrusted to you during my absence, so that you will have a way of justifying your administration when I return, for then an accounting will be required of you. And even if this rejected Son does not return, another Son will be sent to receive this Kingdom, and that Son will then call upon all of you to receive your stewardship report and to rejoice in your gains.
When these administrators were subsequently brought together for an accounting, the former stepped forward and said:
'Amo, with your mina I made ten more mina'.
And his lord said to him:
'Well done; you are a good servant. Because you have shown faithfulness in this matter, I will give you authority over ten cities.
And the second came, and said:
'Your mina, left with me, Master, made five mina'.
And the lord said:
'In the same way I will make him ruler of five cities.
And so were the others, until the last of the servants who, when called, reported:
'Master, look, here is your chick, which I kept safely wrapped in this napkin. And I did it out of fear; I believed you to be unreasonable, seeing that you reap where you have not deposited and that you seek to reap where you have not sowed.
Then the lord said:
'You, negligent and unfaithful servant, I will judge you according to your own mouth. Thou knewest that I reap where I have apparently not sowed, and therefore thou knewest that this account would be required of thee. Knowing this, you should at least have given my money to a banker, so that on my return I could have it with the proper interest.
And then the ruler said to those who were waiting:
'Take this lazy man's money and give it to him who has ten minas.
And when they reminded the lord that the first servant already had ten minas, he said: 'To everyone who has, more will be given, but from those who do not have, even what they have will be taken away'.
And so the apostles sought to know the difference between the meaning of this parable and that of the earlier parable of the talents, but Yeshua would only say, in answer to the many questions:
— Ponder these words well in your hearts, so that each of you may find their true meaning.
When lunch was over, and after the multitude of followers had gone to Yerushaláyim, Yeshua, standing before the apostles, in the shadow of a rock ledge beside the road, with jovial dignity and graceful majesty, pointed with the finger to the west, saying:
— Come, my brothers, let us enter Yerushaláyim, to receive there what awaits us; so we will fulfill the will of the Heavenly Father in all things.
And so Yeshua and his apostles resumed that journey, the last that the Rabbi would make to Yerushaláyim in the likeness of the flesh of mortal man.
***
THE CITY OF MANY KINGS
A FEW YEARS after the conquest of Yerushaláyim by the Romans, a mass of landless peasants found themselves deprived of their property, with no means to feed themselves or their families. Many of these peasants migrated to the cities in search of work. But in Galilee, a handful of farmers and landowners who had lost their land switched from plowshares to swords and began fighting those they held responsible for their misfortunes.
From their hiding places in the caves and grottoes of rural Galilee, these warrior peasants launched a wave of attacks against the Jewish aristocracy and the agents of the Roman republic. They roamed the provinces, gathering together the afflicted, the dispossessed and mired in debt. They stole from the rich and sometimes gave to the poor. To the faithful, these peasant gangs were nothing less than the physical embodiment of the rage and suffering of the poor against everything they hated most in such an intimate relationship between slave and enslaver.
They were heroes: symbols of fervor against Roman aggression, dispensers of divine justice for traitorous Jews. The Romans had a different term for them. They called them lestai, being the generic term for any rebel or uprising who used armed violence against Rome or against Jewish collaborators. For the Romans, the word "bandit" was synonymous with "thief" or "agitator". But these were no ordinary criminals.
The lestais represented the first signs of what would become a nationalist resistance movement against the Roman occupation. This peasant revolt rushed from village to village, many poor like Emmaus, Beth-Horom and Bethlehem. But it was something else, too. The bandits claimed to be agents of God's vengeance. They dressed their leaders in emblems of biblical kings and heroes and presented their actions as a prelude to the restoration of the Kingdom of God on earth.
Rome had recently faced the worst slave revolt in her entire empire under the leadership of Spartacus, after which she ruled her empire with an iron fist over her servile ones.
The bandits took advantage of the widespread apocalyptic expectation that had gripped the Jews of Palestine after the Roman invasion. One of the most fearsome of all bandits, the charismatic chief Yehudhah ben Hezekiah, openly claimed to be the messiah, the promised one, the one who would restore the Jews to the glory of his people.
Messiah meant "anointed". The title alluded to the practice of pouring or dripping oil on someone charged with a divine office: a king, like Saul, David, or even Solomon, a priest, like Aaron and his sons, who were consecrated to do the work of God, a prophet, like Isaiah or Elisha, who had a special relationship with God, an intimacy that came from being appointed as God's representative on earth. The Messiah's main task, according to popular belief, was to be a descendant of King David and rebuild David's kingdom and reestablish the nation of Israel. Thus, calling oneself the messiah during the Roman occupation was tantamount to declaring war on Rome.
These bands of rabid peasant peasants would form the backbone of an apocalyptic army of fervent revolutionaries, who would force the Romans to flee in humiliation from Yerushaláyim. In those early years of occupation, however, the Lestals were little more than a nuisance. Still, they needed to be contained; someone had to restore order to the countryside. That someone turned out to be an intelligent young Jewish nobleman from Edom named Herod the Great.
Herod's father Antipater was fortunate enough to be on the right side of the civil war between Pompeius the Great and Julius Caesar. Caesar rewarded Antipater for his loyalty by granting him Roman citizenship in 48 BC and giving him administrative powers on behalf of Rome over all of Judea. Before he died a few years later, Antipater cemented his position among the Jews, appointing his sons Phasael and Herod as proxies for Yerushaláyim and Galilee, respectively.
Herod was only fifteen years old at the time, but he soon distinguished himself as an effective leader and energetic defender of Rome, launching a bloody crusade against the bandit gangs, capturing the bandit chief, Yehudhah ben Hezekiah, crucifying him, putting an end to temporary to the rebel threat.
While Herod was ridding Galilee of bandit gangs, Antigonus, son of Aristobulus, who had lost his throne and high priesthood to his brother Hyrcanus after the Roman invasion, was causing trouble in Yerushaláyim. With the help of the Parthians, Rome's sworn enemies, Antigonus besieged the Holy City in 40 BC, taking both the high priest Hyrcanus and Herod's brother Phasael as prisoners. Hyrcanus was mutilated, which made him ineligible, according to Jewish law, to continue serving as high priest; Herod's brother, Phasael, committed suicide in captivity.
The Roman Senate determined that the most effective way to retake Yerushaláyim from Parthian control was to make Herod his client king and let him perform the task on behalf of Rome, and he did so until the end of his life, dying precisely at the hands of Yehudhah. bene Hezekiah.
The appointment of client kings was common practice during the early years of the Roman Empire, allowing Rome to expand its borders without expending valuable resources to directly administer conquered provinces.
In 37 BC, Herod marched to Yerushaláyim with a massive Roman army under his command. He drove the Parthian forces out of the city and eliminated what was left of the Maccabean dynasty. In recognition of his services, Rome named him "King of the Jews", granting him a kingdom that would eventually outgrow King Solomon's.
Herod the Great was a profligate and tyrannical ruler, marked by ridiculous excesses and bestial acts of cruelty. He was implacable with his enemies and tolerated no hint of revolt from the Jews under his reign. Upon ascending the throne, he massacred nearly all the members of the Sanhedrim and replaced the Temple priests with a cadre of admirers and sycophants who bought their positions directly from him. This act effectively neutralized the Temple's political influence and redistributed power to a new class of Jews, whose dependence on the king's favor turned them into a kind of nouveau riche aristocracy.
Herod's penchant for violence and his widely publicized domestic disputes, which verged on burlesque, led him to execute so many members of his own family, in fact, being King of the Jews, in Herod's time, was no enviable task. There were twenty-four rebellious Jewish sects in and around Yerushaláyim. Although none had complete dominance over the others, three sects were influential in shaping Jewish thought at the time: the Pharisees, who were primarily lower- and middle-class rabbis and scholars who interpreted the laws for the masses; the Sadducees, more conservative and, as far as Rome is concerned, more compliant priests, coming from wealthier, land-owning families; and the Essenes, a predominantly priestly movement that broke away from Temple authority and made its base on a barren hill in the valley of the Dead Sea called Qumran.
Charged with pacifying and administering an unruly and motley population of Jews, Greeks, Samaritans, Syrians, and Arabs, who hated him more than they hated each other, Herod did a masterful job of maintaining order in the name of Rome. His reign ushered in an era of political stability among Jews that had not been seen for centuries. He initiated monumental construction and public works projects that employed tens of thousands of peasants and day laborers, permanently altering the physical landscape of Yerushaláyim. He built markets and theaters, palaces and ports, all inspired by the classical Greek style.
To pay for his colossal building projects and satisfy his own extravagance, Herod levied crushing taxes on his subjects, from which he continued to send a heavy tribute to Rome, and with pleasure, as an expression of his esteem for the Roman lords.
Herod was not just a client king of the emperor; he was a close and personal friend, a loyal citizen of the Republic who wanted more than to emulate Rome, he wanted to remake it on the sands of Judea. He instituted a program of forced Hellenization for Jews, bringing gymnasiums, Greek amphitheaters, and Roman baths to Yerushaláyim. He made Greek the language of the court and minted coins with Greek letters and pagan insignia. However, Herod was also a Jew and as such understood the importance of appealing to the religious sensibilities of his subjects. That's why he embarked on his most ambitious project: the reconstruction and expansion of the Temple of Yerushaláyim.
It was Herod who erected the Temple on a platform atop Mount Moriah, the highest point in the city, and embellished it with broad Roman colonnades and massive marble pilasters that gleamed in the sun. Herod's Temple was designed to impress his patrons in Rome, but he also wanted to please his fellow Jews, many of whom did not consider the King of the Jews to be a Jew himself. Herod was a convert, after all.
His mother was Arab. His people, the Edomites, had converted to Judaism only a generation or two earlier. The rebuilding of the Temple was, for Herod, not just a means of solidifying his political domination, it was a desperate plea to be accepted by his Jewish subjects. Did not work. Despite the rebuilding of the Temple, Herod's bold Hellenism and aggressive attempts to "Romanize" Yerushaláyim infuriated religious Jews, who seem never to have stopped seeing the king as a slave to foreign masters and a devotee of foreign gods. Not even the Temple, the supreme symbol of Jewish identity, could mask Herod's enchantment with Rome.
Shortly before the work was completed, Herod placed a golden eagle over the main portal, symbol of Roman rule, and compelled the high priest he himself had selected to offer two sacrifices a day in the name of Caesar Augustus as "the Son of God." However, it was a sign of how tightly Herod kept his kingdom in check that the general hatred of the Jews towards his reign never reached the level of insurrection, at least not during his lifetime.
When Herod the Great died in 4 BC, Augustus divided the kingdom between the three sons of the former king: Archelaus received Judea, Samaria and Edom; Herod Antipas, known as "the Fox", ruled over Galilee and Perea, and Philip was given control over Gaulanitis and the lands northeast of the Sea of Galilee. None of Herod's three sons was given the title of king.
Antipas and Philip were named tetrarchs, and Archelaus was named ethnarch, or "ruler of a people"; both titles were deliberately intended to signal the end of the unified monarchy over the Jews.
The division of Herod's kingdom turned out to be a disaster for Rome, as all the anger and resentment that had been bottled up during his long and oppressive reign exploded in a flood of riots and violent protests that his feeble sons, numbed by a life of idleness and languor they could hardly contain. Protesters burned one of Herod's palaces on the banks of the Jordan River. Twice the Temple itself was raided: first during Passover, then on Shavuot, or Festival of Weeks. In the countryside, the bandit gangs that Herod had overpowered once again began to cross Galilee, killing supporters of the former king. In Edom, Herod's home region, 2,000 of his soldiers mutinied. Even Herod's allies, including his own cousin Achiab, joined the rebellion.
These revolts were fueled by the Messianic expectations of the Jews. In Perea, a former slave of Herod – an imposing, gigantic man named Shim-on – crowned himself as messiah and gathered a band of bandits to plunder the royal palaces at Jericho. The rebellion ended when Shim-on was captured and beheaded.
A little later, another Messianic aspirant, a poor young shepherd named Athronges, placed a crown on his head and launched a reckless attack on the Roman forces. He, too, was captured and executed.
Chaos and bloodshed continued unabated until Caesar Augustus finally sent his own troops into Judea to put an end to the uprising. Although the emperor allowed Philip and Antipas to remain in their positions, he sent Archelaus into exile, placed Yerushaláyim under a Roman procurator, and in AD 6, converted all of Judea into a province ruled directly by Rome. There would be no more semi-independence. No more customer kings. No longer King of the Jews. Yerushaláyim now belonged fully to Rome.
Herod, died on the eve of Passover in 4 BC, at the ripe old age of seventy, having reigned over the Jews for 37 years. On the day of Herod's death there was an eclipse of the moon, a sign of ill omen, perhaps foreshadowing the turmoil that would follow.
Sometime shortly before his death in 3 BC and Rome's takeover of Yerushaláyim in 6 AD, in an obscure mountain village in Galilee, a child was born who would one day claim the mantle for himself. of Herod as king of the Jews, and like his disaffected Jehudhah ben Hezekiah, another Jehudhah would cause him to be crucified in his place.