interesting study. Bloch (Mos. Talm. Polizeir.) holds, that there were two classes of market-officials. But this is not supported by sufficient evidence, nor, indeed, would such an arrangement seem likely. 3 That of Botnah was the largest, Jer. Ab. Z. 39 d.] Not only was there an upper and a lower market in Jerusalem, [f Sanh. 89 a.] but we read of at least seven special markets: those for cattle, [g Erub. x. 9.] wool, iron-ware, [h Jos. War v. 8. 1.] clothes, wood, [i Ibid. ii. 19. 4.] bread, and fruit and vegetables. The original market-days were Monday and Tuesday, afterwards Friday, [k Tos. Baba Mets. iii.] The large fairs (Yeridin) were naturally confined to the centres of import and export, the borders of Egypt (Gaza), the ancient Phoenician maritime towns (Tyro and Acco), and the Emporium across the Jordan (Botnah). Besides, every caravansary, or khan (qatlis, atlis,), was a sort of mart, where goods were unloaded, and especially cattle set out [1 Kerith. iii. 7;] for sale, and purchases made. But in Jerusalem one may suppose the sellers to have been every day in the market; and the magazines, in which greengrocery and all kinds of meat were sold (the Beth haShevaqim), [m Makhsh. vi. 2] must have been always open. Besides, there were the many shops (Chanuyoth) either fronting the streets, or in courtyards, or else movable wooden booths in the streets. Stangely enough, occasionally Jewish women were employed in selling, [a Kethub. ix. 4] Business was also done in the resturants and wineshops, of
which there were many; where you might be served with some dish: fresh or salted fish, fried locusts, a mess of vegetables, a dish of soup, pastry, sweetmeats, or a piece of a fruit-cake, to be washed down with Judaean or Galilean wine, Idumaean vinegar, or foreign beer.
If from these busy scenes we turn to the more aristocratic quarters of the Upper City, [1 Compare here generally Unruh, D. alte Jerusalem.] we stillsee the same narrow streets, but tenanted by another class. First, we pass the High-Priest's palace on the slope of the hill, with a lower story under the principal apartments, and a porch in front. Here, on the night of the Betrayal, Peter was 'beneath in the Palace.' [a St. Mark xiv. 66.] Next, we come to Xystos, and thenpause for a moment at the Palace of the Maccabees. It lies higher up the hill, and westward from the Xytos. From its halls you can look into the city, and even into the Temple. We know not which of the Maccabees had built this palace. But it was occupied, not by the actually reigning prince, who always resided in the fortress (Baris, afterwards Antonia), but by some other member of the family. From them it passed into the possession of Herod. There Herod Antipas was when, on that terrible Passover, Pilate sent Jesus from the old palace of Herod to be examined by the Ruler of Galilee, [b St. Luke xxiii. 6,7] If these buildings pointed to the difference between the past and present, two structures of Herod's were, perhaps, more eloquent than any words in their accusations of the Idumaean. One of these, at least, would come in sight in passing along the slopes of the Upper City. The Maccabean rule had been preceded by that of corrupt High-Priests, who had prostituted their office to the vilest purposes. One of them, who had changed his Jewish name of Joshua into Jason, had gone so far, in his attempts to Grecianise the people, as to build a Hippodrome and Gymnasium for heathen games. We infer, it stood where the Western hill sloped into the Tyropoeon, to the south-west of the Temple, [c Jos. War ii.3. 1] It was probably this which Herod afterwards enlarged and beautified, and turned into a threatre. No expense was spared on the great games held there. The threatre itself was magnificently adorned with gold, silver, precious stones, and trophies of arms and records of the victories of Augustus. But to the Jews this essentially heathen place, over against their Temple, was cause of deep indignation and plots, [d Ant. xv. 8. 1] Besidesthis theatre, Herod also built an immense amphitheatre, which we must locate somewhere in the north-west, and outside the second city wall, [e Ant. xvii. 10. 2; War ii.3. 1,2]
All this was Jerusalem above ground. But there was an under ground Jerusalem also, which burrowed everywhere under the city, under the Upper City, under the Temple, beyond the city walls. Its extent may be gathered from the circumstance that, after the capture of the city, besides the living who had sought shelter there, no fewer than 2,000 dead bodies were found in those subterranean streets.
Close by the tracks of heathenism in Jerusalem, and in sharp contrast, was what gave to Jerusalem its intensely Jewish character. It was not only the Temple, nor the festive pilgrims to its feasts and services. But there were hundreds of Synagogues, [1 Tradition exaggerates their number as 460 (Jer. Kethub. 35 c.) or even 480 (Jer. Meg. 73 d). But even the large number (proportionally to the size of the city) mentioned in the text need not surprise us when we remember that ten men were sufficient to form a Synagogue, and how many, what may be called 'private', Synagogues exist at present in every town where there is a large and orthodox Jewish population.] some for different nationalities, such as the Alexandrians, or the Cyrenians; some for, or perhaps founded by, certain trade-guilds. If possible, the Jewish schools were even more
numerous than the Synagogues. Then there were the many Rabbinic Academies; and, besides, you might also see in Jerusalem that mysterious sect, the Essenes, of which the members were easily recognized by their white dress. Essenes, Pharisees, stranger Jews of all hues, and of many dresses and languages! One could have imagined himself almost in another world, a sort of enchanted land, in this Jewish metropolis, and metropolis of Judaism. When the silver trumpets of the Priests woke the city to prayer, or the strain of Levite music swept over it, or the smoke of the sacrifices hung like another Shekhinah over the Temple, against the green background of Olivet; or when in every street, court, and housetop rose the booths at the Feast of Tabernacles, and at night the sheen of the Temple illumination threw long fantastic shadows over the city; or when, at the Passover, tens of thousands crowded up the Mount with their Paschal lambs, and hundreds of thousands sat down to the Paschal supper, it would be almost difficult to believe, that heathenism was so near, that the Roman was virtually, and would soon be really, master of the land, or that a Herod occupied the Jewish throne.
Yet there he was; in the pride of his power, and the reckless cruelty of his ever-watchful tyranny. Everywhere was his mark. Temples to the gods and to Caesar, magnificent, and magnificently adorned, outside Palestine and in its non-Jewish cities; towns rebuilt or built: Sebaste for the acient Samaria, the splendid city and harbour of Coesarea in the west, Antipatris (after his father) in the north, Kypros and Phasaelis (after his mother and brother), and Agrippeion; unconquerable fortresses, such as Essebonitis and Machoerus in Peraea, Alexandreion, Herodeion, Hyrcania, and Masada in Judaea, proclaimed his name and sway. But in Jerusalem it seemed as if he had gathered up all his strength. The theatre and amphitheatre spoke of his Grecianism; Antonia was the representative fortress; for his religion he had built that glorious Temple, and for his residence the noblest of palaces, at the north-western angle of the Upper City, close by where Milo had been in the days of David. It seems almost incredible, that a Herod should have reared the Temple, and yet we can understand his motives. Jewish tradition had it, that a Rabbi (Baba ben Buta) had advised him in this manner to conciliate the people, [a Baba B. 3 b] or else thereby to expiate the slaughter of so many Rabbis, [b Bemid. R. 14.] [1 The occasion is said to have been, that the Rabbis, in answer to Herod's question, quoted Deut. xvii. 15. Baba ben Buta himself is said to have escaped the slaughter, indeed, but to have been deprived of his eyes.] Probably a desire to gain popularity, and supersition, may alike have contributed, as also the wish to gratify his love for splendour and building. At the same time, he may have wished to show himself a better Jew than that rabble of Pharisees and Rabbis, who perpetually would cast it in his teeth, that he was an Idumaean. Whatever his origin, he was a true king of the Jews, as great, nay greater, than Solomon himself. Certainly, neither labour nor money had been spared on the Temple. A thousand vehicles carried up the stone; 10,000 workmen, under the guidance of 1,000 priests, wrought all the costly material gathered into that house, of which Jewish tradition could say, 'He that has not seen the temple of Herod, has never known what beauty is.' [c Baba B. 4a.] And yet Israel despised and abhorred the builder! Nor could his apparent work for the God of Israel have deceived the most credulous. In youth he had browbeaten the venerable Sanhedrin, and threatened the city with slaughter and destruction; again and again had he murdered her venerable sages; he had shed like water the blood of her Asmonean princes, and of every one who dared to be free; had stifled every national aspiration in the groans of the torture, and quenched it in the gore of his victims. Not once, nor twice, but six times did he change the High-Priesthood, to bestow it at last on one who bears no good name in Jewish theology, a foreigner in Judaea, an Alexandrian. And yet the power of that Idumaean was but of yesterday, and of mushroom growth!
FROM THE MANGER IN BETHLEHEM TO THE BAPTISM IN JORDAN
THE PERSONAL HISTORY OF HEROD, THE TWO WORLDS IN JERUSALEM.
CHAPTER II
It is an intensely painful history, [1 For a fuller sketch of this history see Appendix IV.] in the course of which Herod made his way to the throne. We look back nearly two and a half centuries to where, with the empire of Alexander, Palestine fell to his successors. For nearly a century and a half it continued the battle-field of the
