factions effectively fuse. The names prove to be merely different designations — or, at most, different manifestations — of the same religious and political impetus, diffused throughout the Holy Land and beyond, from the 2nd century BC on. The ostensibly separate factions would have been, at most, like the variety of individuals, groups and interests which coalesced to form the single movement known as the ‘French Resistance’ during the Second World War. At most. For Robert Eisenman personally, any distinction between them is but a matter of degree; they are all variations on the same theme. But even if some subtle gradations between them did exist, they would still have been unified by their joint involvement in a single ambitious enterprise — the ridding of their land of Roman occupation, and the reinstatement of the old legitimate Judaic monarchy, together with its rightful priesthood.
That enterprise, of course, did not end with the destruction of Jerusalem and Qumran between ad 68 and 70, nor with the fall of Masada in ad 74. In the immediate aftermath of the debacle, large numbers of ‘Zealots’ and Sicarii fled abroad, to places where there were sizeable Judaic populations — to Persia, for example, and to Egypt, especially Alexandria. In Alexandria, they attempted to mobilise the local Jewish population for yet another uprising against Rome. They met with little success, some six hundred of them being rounded up and handed over to the authorities. Men, women and children were tortured in an attempt to make them acknowledge the emperor as a god. According to Josephus, ‘not a man gave in or came near to saying it’. And he adds:
But nothing amazed the spectators as much as the behaviour of young children; for not one of them could be constrained to call Caesar Lord. So far did the strength of a brave spirit prevail over the weakness of their little bodies.25
Here again is that strain of fanatical dedication — a dedication that cannot be political in nature, that can only be religious.
More than sixty years after the war that left Jerusalem and the Temple in ruins, the Holy Land erupted again in a new revolt, led by the charismatic Messianic figure known as Simeon bar Kochba, the ‘Son of the Star’. According to Eisenman, the terminology suggests that Simeon was in reality descended by blood from the ‘Zealot’ leaders of the previous century.26 In any case, the image of the ‘Star’ had certainly figured prominently among them during the period culminating with the first revolt.27 And, as we have noted, the same image figures repeatedly in the Dead Sea Scrolls. It derives ultimately from a prophecy in the Book of Numbers (24:17): ‘a star from Jacob takes the leadership, a sceptre arises from Israel’. The ‘War Rule’ invokes this prophecy, and declares that the ‘Star’, or the ‘Messiah’, will, together with the ‘Poor’ or the ‘Righteous’, repel invading armies. Eisenman has found this ‘Star’ prophecy in two other crucial places in the Qumran literature.28 One, the ‘Damascus Document’, is particularly graphic: ‘The star is the Interpreter of the Law who shall come to Damascus; as it is written… the sceptre is the Prince…’29
Josephus, as well as Roman historians such as Suetonius and Tacitus, reports how a prophecy was current in the Holy Land during the early 1st century ad, to the effect that ‘from Judaea would go forth men destined to rule the world’.30 According to Josephus, the promulgation of this prophecy was a major factor in the revolt of ad 66. And, needless to say, the ‘Star’ prophecy finds its way into Christian tradition as the ‘Star of Bethlehem’, which heralds Jesus’ birth.31 As ‘Son of the Star’, then, Simeon bar Kochba enjoyed an illustrious symbolic pedigree.
Unlike the revolt of ad 66, Simeon’s insurrection, commencing in AD 132, was no ill-organised conflagration resulting, so to speak, from spontaneous combustion. On the contrary, much prolonged and careful planning went into the enterprise. Jewish smiths and craftsmen pressed into Roman service would, for example, deliberately forge slightly sub-standard weapons. When these were rejected by the Romans, they would be collected and stored for use by the rebels. From the war of the previous century, Simeon had also learned that there was no point in capturing and holding fortresses such as Masada. To defeat the Romans, a campaign based on mobility, on hit- and-run tactics, would be necessary. This led to the construction of vast underground networks of rooms, corridors and tunnels. In the period prior to the revolt, Simeon used these networks for training. Subsequently, once hostilities had begun, they served as bases and staging areas, enabling the rebels to launch a sudden lightning assault, then disappear — the kind of ambush with which American soldiers, to their cost, became familiar during the war in Vietnam.32 But Simeon did not confine himself solely to guerrilla operations. His army included many volunteers from abroad, many mercenaries and professional soldiers with considerable military experience. Indeed, surviving records discovered by archaeologists have revealed that a number of Simeon’s officers and staff spoke only Greek.33 With such well-trained forces at his disposal, he could, on occasion, meet the Romans in pitched battle.
Within the first year of the revolt, Simeon had destroyed at least one complete Roman legion, and probably a second.34 Palestine had been effectively cleared of Roman troops. Jerusalem had been recaptured and a Judaic administration installed there. The campaign came within a hair’s-breadth of total success. It failed primarily because Simeon was let down by his expected allies. According to his overall grand design, his troops were to be supported by forces from Persia, where a great many Jews still resided and enjoyed the sympathetic favour of the reigning dynasty. Just when Simeon most needed these reinforcements, however, Persia itself was invaded from the north by marauding hill tribes, who effectively pinned down Persian resources, leaving Simeon bereft of his promised support.35
In Syria, safely outside Palestine, the Romans regrouped under the personal leadership of the Emperor Hadrian, with Julius Severus, formerly governor of Britain, as his second-in-command. Another full-scale invasion ensued, involving as many as twelve legions, some eighty thousand troops. In a two-pronged advance, they fought their way from post to post down the entire length of the Holy Land. Eventually Simeon was cornered, making his last stand at Battir, his headquarters, a few miles west of Jerusalem, in ad 135.
During the entire course of the revolt, Simeon’s troops were in constant occupation of Qumran. Coins found in the ruins attest to their presence in what would, after all, have been a site of considerable strategic importance. It is thus possible, despite the claims of Father de Vaux, that some, at least, of the Dead Sea Scrolls were deposited in Qumran as late as Simeon’s time.
15. Zealot Suicide
Once the broad messianic movement of 1st-century Palestine is seen in perspective, and once the apparently diverse sects are seen as integral parts of it, a number of hitherto inexplicable elements and anomalies slip into place. Thus, for example, the apocalyptic and eschatological ferocity of John the Baptist begins to make sense, as does his role in the events recounted by the Gospels. Thus, too, can one account for a number of theologically awkward passages and incidents pertaining to Jesus’ own career. There is, as we have noted, at least one ‘Zealot’ in his following, and possibly more. There is the violence of his action in overturning the tables of the money-changers at the Temple. There is his execution not by Judaic but by Roman authorities, in a fashion specifically reserved for political offenders. There are numerous other instances, which the authors of this book have examined at length elsewhere. Finally, there are Jesus’ own words:
Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth; it is not peace I have come to bring, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother… (Matt. 10:34-5)
And, more tellingly still, in unmistakably Qumranic phraseology:
Do not imagine that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have come not to abolish but to complete [or fulfil] them… not one dot, not one little stroke shall disappear from the Law until its purpose is achieved. Therefore the man who infringes even one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be considered the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. (Matt. 5:17-19)!
In this passage, it is almost as if Jesus had anticipated Paul’s advent. Certainly he could not have warned against it any more specifically. By the standards he lays down, Paul’s status in the Kingdom of Heaven cannot be
