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1. Now, by this crafty speech, John made the zealots afraid;
yet durst he not directly name what foreign assistance he meant,
but in a covert way only intimated at the Idumeans. But now, that
he might particularly irritate the leaders of the zealots, he
calumniated Ananus, that he was about a piece of barbarity, and
did in a special manner threaten them. These leaders were
Eleazar, the son of Simon, who seemed the
most plausible man of them all, both in considering what was
fit to be done, and in the execution of what he had
determined upon, and Zacharias, the son of Phalek; both of whom
derived their families from the priests. Now when
these two men had heard, not only the common threatenings which
belonged to them all, but those peculiarly leveled against
themselves; and besides, how Artanus and his party, in order to
secure their own dominion, had invited the
Romans to come to them, for that also was part of John's lie;
they hesitated a great while what they should do, considering the
shortness of the time by which they were straitened; because the
people were prepared to attack them very soon, and because the
suddenness of the plot laid against them had almost cut off all
their hopes of getting any foreign
assistance; for they might be under the height of their
afflictions before any of their confederates could be informed
of it. However, it was resolved to call in the Idumeans; so they
wrote a short letter to this effect: That Ananus had imposed on
the people, and was betraying their metropolis to the Romans;
that they themselves had revolted from the rest, and were in
custody in the temple, on account of the
preservation of their liberty; that there was but a small time
left wherein they might hope for their deliverance; and that
unless they would come immediately to their assistance, they
should themselves be soon in the power of Artanus, and the city
would be in the power of the Romans. They also charged the
messengers to tell many more circumstances to the rulers of the
Idumeans. Now there were two active men proposed
for the carrying this message, and such as were able to speak,
and to persuade them that things were in this posture, and, what
was a qualification still more necessary than the former, they
were very swift of foot; for they knew well enough that these
would immediately comply with their desires, as being ever a
tumultuous and disorderly nation, always on the watch upon every
motion, delighting in mutations; and upon your flattering them
ever so little, and petitioning them, they soon take their arms,
and put themselves into motion, and make haste to a battle, as if
it were to a feast. There was indeed occasion for quick despatch
in the carrying of this message, in which point the messengers
were no way defective. Both their names were Ananias; and they
soon came to the rulers of the Idumeans.
2. Now these rulers were greatly surprised at the contents of
the letter, and at what those that came with it further told
them; whereupon they ran about the nation like madmen,
and made proclamation that the people should come to war; so a
multitude was suddenly got together, sooner indeed than the time
appointed in the proclamation, and every body
caught up their arms, in order to maintain the liberty of their
metropolis; and twenty thousand of them were put into
battle-array, and came to Jerusalem, under four commanders,
John, and Jacob the son of Sosas; and besides these were Simon,
the son of Cathlas, and Phineas, the son of Clusothus.
3. Now this exit of the messengers was not known either to
Ananus or to the guards, but the approach of the Idumeans was
known to him; for as he knew of it before they came, he ordered
the gates to be shut against them, and that the walls should be
guarded. Yet did not he by any means think of
fighting against them, but, before they came to blows, to try
what persuasions would do. Accordingly, Jesus, the eldest of the
high priests next to Artanus, stood upon the tower that was over
against them, and said thus: "Many troubles indeed, and those of
various kinds, have fallen upon this city, yet in none of them
have I so much wondered at her fortune as
now, when you are come to assist wicked men, and this after a
manner very extraordinary; for I see that you are come to support
the vilest of men against us, and this with so great alacrity, as
you could hardly put on the like, in case our metropolis had
called you to her assistance against
barbarians. And if I had perceived that your army was
composed of men like unto those who invited them, I had
not deemed your attempt so absurd; for nothing does so
much cement the minds of men together as the alliance there is
between their manners. But now for these men who have invited
you, if you were to examine them one by one, every one of them
would be found to have deserved ten thousand deaths; for the very
rascality and offscouring of the whole country, who have spent in
debauchery their own substance, and, by way of trial beforehand,
have madly plundered the neighboring villages and cities, in the
upshot of all, have privately run together into this holy city.
They are robbers, who by their prodigious wickedness have
profaned this most sacred floor, and who are to be now seen
drinking themselves drunk in the sanctuary, and expending the
spoils of those whom they have slaughtered upon their unsatiable
bellies. As for the multitude that is with you, one may see them
so
decently adorned in their armor, as it would become them to be
had their metropolis called them to her assistance against
foreigners. What can a man call this procedure of yours but the
sport of fortune, when he sees a whole nation coming to protect a
sink of wicked wretches? I have for a good while been in doubt
what it could possibly be that should move you to do this so
suddenly; because certainly you would not take on your armor on
the behalf of robbers, and against a people of kin to you,
without some very great cause for your so doing. But we have an
item that the Romans are pretended, and that we are supposed to
be going to betray this city to them; for some of your men have
lately made a clamor about those matters, and have said they are
come to set their
metropolis free. Now we cannot but admire at these wretches in
their devising such a lie as this against us; for they knew there
was no other way to irritate against us men that were naturally
desirous of liberty, and on that account the best disposed to
fight against foreign enemies, but by framing a tale as if we
were going to betray that most desirable thing, liberty. But you
ought to consider what sort of people they are that raise this
calumny, and against what sort of people that calumny is raised,
and to gather the truth of things, not by fictitious speeches,
but out of the actions of both parties; for what occasion is
there for us to sell ourselves to the Romans, while it was in our
power not to have revolted from them at the first, or when we had
once revolted, to have returned under their dominion again, and
this while the
neighboring countries were not yet laid waste? whereas it is
not an easy thing to be reconciled to the Romans, if we were
desirous of it, now they have subdued Galilee, and are
thereby become proud and insolent; and to endeavor to
please them at the time when they are so near us, would
bring such a reproach upon us as were worse than death. As for
myself, indeed, I should have preferred peace with them before
death; but now we have once made war upon them,
and fought with them, I prefer death, with reputation, before
living in captivity under them. But further, whether do they
pretend that we, who are the rulers of the people, have sent thus
privately to the Romans, or hath it been done by the common
suffrages of the people? If it be ourselves only that have done
it, let them name those friends of ours that have been sent, as
our servants, to manage this treachery. Hath any one been caught
as he went out on this errand, or seized upon as he came back?
Are they in possession of our letters? How could we be concealed
from such a vast number of our fellow citizens, among whom we are
conversant every hour, while what is done privately in the
country is, it seems, known by the zealots, who are but few in
number, and under
confinement also, and are not able to come out of the temple
into the city. Is this the first time that they are become
sensible how they ought to be punished for their insolent
actions? For while these men were free from the fear they are now
under, there was no suspicion raised that any of us were
traitors. But if they lay this charge against the people, this
must have been done at a public consultation, and not one of the
people must have dissented from the rest of the assembly; in
which case the public fame of this matter would have come to you
sooner than any particular indication. But how could that be?
Must there not then have been
ambassadors sent to confirm the agreements? And let them tell
us who this ambassador was that was ordained for that purpose.
But this is no other than a pretense of such men as are loath to
die, and are laboring to escape those
punishments that hang over them; for if fate had determined
that this city was to be betrayed into its enemies' hands, no
other than these men that accuse us falsely could have the
impudence to do it, there being no wickedness wanting to complete
their impudent practices but this only, that they become
traitors. And now you Idumeans are come hither
already with your arms, it is your duty, in the first place, to
be assisting to your metropolis, and to join with us in cutting
off those tyrants that have infringed the rules of our regular
tribunals, that have trampled upon our laws, and made their
swords the arbitrators of right and wrong; for they have seized
upon men of great eminence, and under no accusation, as they
stood in the midst of the market-place, and tortured them with
putting them into bonds, and, without bearing to hear what they
had to say, or what supplications they made, they destroyed them.
You may, if you please, come into the city, though not in the way
of war, and take a view of the marks still remaining of what I
now say, and may see the houses that have been depopulated by
their rapacious hands, with those wives and families that are in
black, mourning for their slaughtered relations; as also you may
hear their groans and lamentations all the city over; for there
is nobody but hath tasted of the incursions of these profane
wretches, who have proceeded to that degree of madness, as not
only to have transferred their impudent robberies out of the
country, and the remote cities, into this city, the very face and
head of the whole nation, but out of the city into the temple
also; for that is now made their receptacle and refuge, and the
fountain-head whence their preparations are made against us.
And this place, which is adored by the habitable world, and
honored by such as only know it by report, as far as the ends of
the earth, is trampled upon by these wild beasts born among
ourselves. They now triumph in the desperate
condition they are already in, when they hear that one people
is going to fight against another people, and one city against
another city, and that your nation hath gotten an army
together against its own bowels. Instead of which procedure, it
were highly fit and reasonable, as I said before, for you to join
with us in cutting off these wretches, and in particular to be
revenged on them for putting this very cheat upon you; I mean,
for having the impudence to invite you to assist them, of whom
they ought to have stood in fear, as ready to punish them. But if
you have some regard to these men's invitation of you, yet may
you lay aside your arms, and come into the city under the notion
of our kindred, and take upon you a middle name between that of
auxiliaries and of enemies, and so become judges in this case.
However, consider what these men will gain by being called into
judgment before you, for such undeniable and such flagrant
crimes, who would not
vouchsafe to hear such as had no accusations laid against them
to speak a word for themselves. However, let them gain this
advantage by your coming. But still, if you will neither take our
part in that indignation we have at these men, nor judge between
us, the third thing I have to propose is this, that you let us
both alone, and neither insult upon our
calamities, nor abide with these plotters against their
metropolis; for though you should have ever so great a
suspicion that some of us have discoursed with the Romans, it
is in your power to watch the passages into the city; and in case
any thing that we have been accused of is brought to light, then
to come and defend your metropolis, and to inflict punishment on
those that are found guilty; for the enemy cannot prevent you who
are so near to the city. But if, after all, none of these
proposals seem acceptable and moderate, do not you wonder that
the gates are shut against you, while you bear your arms about
you."
4. Thus spake Jesus; yet did not the multitude of the
Idumeans give any attention to what he said, but were in a
rage, because they did not meet with a ready entrance into the
city. The generals also had indignation at the offer of laying
down their arms, and looked upon it as equal to a captivity, to
throw them away at any man's injunction
whomsoever. But Simon, the son of Cathlas, one of their
commanders, with much ado quieted the tumult of his own
men, and stood so that the high priests might hear him, and
said as follows: "I can no longer wonder that the patrons of
liberty are under custody in the temple, since there are those
that shut the gates of our common city to their own
nation, and at the same time are prepared to admit the
Romans into it; nay, perhaps are disposed to crown the gates
with garlands at their coming, while they speak to the
Idumeans from their own towers, and enjoin them to throw down
their arms which they have taken up for the
preservation of its liberty. And while they will not intrust
the guard of our metropolis to their kindred, profess to make
them judges of the differences that are among them; nay, while
they accuse some men of having slain others without a legal
trial, they do themselves condemn a whole nation after an
ignominious manner, and have now walled up that city
from their own nation, which used to be open to even all
foreigners that came to worship there. We have indeed come in
great haste to you, and to a war against our own
countrymen; and the reason why we have made such haste is this,
that we may preserve that freedom which you are so unhappy as to
betray. You have probably been guilty of the like crimes against
those whom you keep in custody, and
have, I suppose, collected together the like plausible
pretenses against them also that you make use of against us;
after which you have gotten the mastery of those within the
temple, and keep them in custody, while they are only taking care
of the public affairs. You have also shut the gates of the city
in general against nations that are the most nearly related to
you; and while you give such injurious commands to others, you
complain that you have been tyrannized over by them, and fix the
name of unjust governors upon such as are tyrannized over by
yourselves. Who can bear this your abuse of words, while they
have a regard to the contrariety of your actions, unless you mean
this, that those Idumeans do now exclude you out of your
metropolis, whom you exclude from the sacred offices of your own
country? One may
indeed justly complain of those that are besieged in the
temple, that when they had courage enough to punish those tyrants
whom you call eminent men, and free from any
accusations, because of their being your companions in
wickedness, they did not begin with you, and thereby cut off
beforehand the most dangerous parts of this treason. But if these
men have been more merciful than the public necessity required,
we that are Idumeans will preserve this house of God, and will
fight for our common country, and will oppose by war as well
those that attack them from abroad, as those that betray them
from within. Here will we abide before the walls in our armor,
until either the Romans grow weary in waiting for you, or you
become friends to liberty, and repent of what you have done
against it."
5. And now did the Idumeans make an acclamation to what
Simon had said; but Jesus went away sorrowful, as seeing that
the Idumeans were against all moderate counsels, and that the
city was besieged on both sides. Nor indeed were the minds of the
Idumeans at rest; for they were in a rage at the injury that had
been offered them by their exclusion out of the city; and when
they thought the zealots had been strong, but saw nothing of
theirs to support them, they were in doubt about the matter, and
many of them repented that they had come thither. But the shame
that would attend them in case they returned without doing any
thing at all, so far overcame that their repentance, that they
lay all night before the wall, though in a very bad encampment;
for there broke out a
prodigious storm in the night, with the utmost violence, and
very strong winds, with the largest showers of rain, with
continued lightnings, terrible thunderings, and amazing
concussions and bellowings of the earth, that was in an
earthquake. These things were a manifest indication that some
destruction was coming upon men, when the system of the world was
put into this disorder; and any one would guess that these
wonders foreshowed some grand calamities that were coming.
6. Now the opinion of the Idumeans and of the citizens was one
and the same. The Idumeans thought that God was angry at their
taking arms, and that they would not escape
punishment for their making war upon their metropolis.
Ananus and his party thought that they had conquered
without fighting, and that God acted as a general for them; but
truly they proved both ill conjectures at what was to come, and
made those events to be ominous to their enemies, while they were
themselves to undergo the ill effects of them; for the Idumeans
fenced one another by uniting their bodies into one band, and
thereby kept themselves warm, and
connecting their shields over their heads, were not so much
hurt by the rain. But the zealots were more deeply concerned for
the danger these men were in than they were for
themselves, and got together, and looked about them to see
whether they could devise any means of assisting them. The hotter
sort of them thought it best to force their guards with their
arms, and after that to fall into the midst of the city, and
publicly open the gates to those that came to their
assistance; as supposing the guards would be in disorder, and
give way at such an unexpected attempt of theirs, especially as
the greater part of them were unarmed and unskilled in the
affairs of war; and that besides the multitude of the citizens
would not be easily gathered together, but confined to their
houses by the storm: and that if there were any hazard in their
undertaking, it became them to suffer any thing whatsoever
themselves, rather than to overlook so great a multitude as were
miserably perishing on their account. But the more prudent part
of them disapproved of this forcible method, because they saw not
only the guards about them
very numerous, but the walls of the city itself carefully
watched, by reason of the Idumeans. They also supposed that
Ananus would be every where, and visit the guards every
hour; which indeed was done upon other nights, but was
omitted that night, not by reason of any slothfulness of
Ananus, but by the overbearing appointment of fate, that so both
he might himself perish, and the multitude of the guards might
perish with him; for truly, as the night was far gone, and the
storm very terrible, Ananus gave the guards in the cloisters
leave to go to sleep; while it came into the heads of the zealots
to make use of the saws belonging to the temple, and to cut the
bars of the gates to pieces. The noise of the wind, and that not
inferior sound of the thunder, did here also conspire with their
designs, that the noise of the saws was not heard by the others.
7. So they secretly went out of the temple to the wall of the
city, and made use of their saws, and opened that gate which was
over against the Idumeans. Now at first there came a fear upon
the Idumeans themselves, which disturbed them, as imagining that
Ananus and his party were coming to attack them, so that every
one of them had his right hand upon his sword, in order to defend
himself; but they soon came to know who they were that came to
them, and were entered
the city. And had the Idumeans then fallen upon the city,
nothing could have hindered them from destroying the
people every man of them, such was the rage they were in at
that time; but as they first of all made haste to get the zealots
out of custody, which those that brought them in earnestly
desired them to do, and not to overlook those for whose
sakes they were come, in the midst of their distresses, nor to
bring them into a still greater danger; for that when they had
once seized upon the guards, it would be easy for them to fall
upon the city; but that if the city were once alarmed, they would
not then be able to overcome those guards, because as soon as
they should perceive they were there, they would put themselves
in order to fight them, and would hinder their coming into the
temple.
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