Preface
The consequences of the war of rebellion against Rome were
very disastrous. The number of those killed, as well as the total death
toll, was enormous. The total number of those taken captive, or taken
into exile, was extremely high. The Temple was burnt down. The Priesthood,
as well as the Sanhedrin, were abolished; all the institutions of the
Nation were discontinued. All the factions remained impoverished and powerless
– faced [as they were] with the new [political] situation. Instead
of people eagerly anticipating the Redemption, there were now Mourners
for Zion, who denied themselves any material pleasure in this world. It
remained to be ascertained, to what extent the Romans had left the Jews
communal rights: what was absolutely clear was that all landed-estate
had become the property of Rome, while previous landowners were from now
on merely leaseholders. The land itself was now deprived of any political
independence, and became a Roman colony, just another territory conquered
by Rome.
Rabbi Yochanan, who had quitted Jerusalem before it was conquered and
suppressed, set about re-organizing Jewish national existence –
in the city of Yavne (Jamnia).
The Pharisees gave top priority, in their concerns, to the internal set-up
of Jewish religious life, according to Torah (i.e. Jewish Law); they were
thereby continuing and perpetuating the tradition, and Jewish ideology,
which had been formulated in writing since Ezra’s time. Their political
control enabled them to realize their principles in public life, under
the newly changed circumstances as well. A higher Court named ‘Sanhedrin’
was established; the ritual appointment of sages was enacted; [religious]
communities were set up in all regions; local courts-of-Law were founded;
Torah-study and the Reading of the Law were practised on Sabbaths, as
well as on market-days [=Mondays and Thursdays]; a fixed text was determined
for the prayers – incorporating expansions reflecting the Religious,
national resentment toward the so-called ‘Slanderers’, namely
the heretics, as well as in favor of the Proselytes – a distinct
emphasis was placed on the national conviction, and expectation, of the
Coming of Messiah and the Rebuilding of the Temple.
The prototype of what was to become the Jewish Community [Kehillah] all
through the generations of Exile was established in those times, together
with those institutions which became hallowed for all time: the Synagogue,
the Talmud-Torah [=the School for Youngsters], the Study-Hall [known as
‘Beit-HaMidrash’] as well as institutions for charity purposes:
the Moneybox [‘Kuppah’], the Soup-Kitchen, and the Maintenance-Fund
for the Rabbi {arche-synagogus} as well as for the Torah-Reader and School-Teacher,
known as the Hazzan, and for the ‘Translator [or: ‘Expounder’]
of the Law’.
The Jews could not forget how harshly Rome had dealt with them; and their
hearts refused to surrender. The Land of Israel groaned bitterly under
the pressure of the Roman regime; she was now surrounded by hostile ‘neighbors’:
the Samaritans and the Greeks – both resident in adjoining countries.
But in the countries of the wider Orient, there was a plethora of Jewish
settlements. When, in his latter days, Trajan went out to make war on
the sovereign nations in the East, viz. the Parthians and the Amanians,
these peoples had trustworthy allies: namely the Jews of all the Roman
colonies in the Orient – in Egypt, in Lybia and in Cyprus. With
extreme bravery, Jews of the Diaspora fought the battles against the enemies
of their People.
Simon of Cyrene, in Lybia, headed the offensive – and made sure
that Rome was thoroughly bombarded with heavy, troublesome battles. In
one of the surviving buildings in the ruins of the old city, built by
Trajan, there stands out boldly an inscription setting out the utter defeat
of that Roman emperor in his war against the Jews. Temporarily, the Jews
of Egypt subdued the Romans. With cruelty comparable only to the brutality
characteristic of their enemies, the Cypriot-Jews fought with the Romans
and their mercenaries.
Eventually, the Romans drowned the rebellion with a gory bloodbath –
with the same cruelty as that of Titus’ conquest of Jerusalem. But
the Jews still refused to concede defeat: they instigated an open rebellion
in Babylon. It is reasonably likely that the Jews of Erez Israel also
joined this war, because Quietus [as he was so called] was the one who
restored order in Babylon, with extreme brutality, and it was he who was
later appointed as governor in Judea.
In the midst of their tense optimism for the Redemption
– which increased in the wake of those Decrees – and in the
throes of severe economical crisis, political subjugation and spiritual
suppression in which non-Jews were constantly abusing and maltreating
them, a new dreadful report was rumored: a decree forbidding circumcision.
Hadrian, with the aim of bolstering the Empire from without as well as
from within, unearthed an old and long-forgotten law prohibiting anyone
from inflicting on himself any physical injury whatsoever. It may well
be that originally Hadrian did not have the Jews in mind in this legislation;
but clearly he calculated that the reenacted ban would include the widely-
promulgated Jewish practice of circumcision: this had from time immemorial
constituted a sign and covenant distinctive of Jewish stock. Jews were
the one-and-only people practising circumcision in the entire Roman Empire.
The indignity of being subservient to an uncircumcised people –
that was the trauma which the Jewish heart dreaded. The recent decree
came to show only too clearly and unambiguously the Romans’ aim:
to exterminate the Jewish nation from the face of the Earth. This edict
was not directed merely at those persons who were specifically politically-minded,
but at each and every Jew! It evoked memories of ages past – in
particular of the epoch of Antiochus Epiphanes, who had also issued a
decree forbidding circumcision, and of the Hasmonean revolt which had
erupted on account of that edict. Now, too, a revolt broke out: the Bar-Kochba
rebellion.
Who headed the rebellion? In Jewish sources he is named
‘Bar Koziba’ or ‘Ben Koziba’, whereas the Christian
historians call him ‘Kochba’ or ‘Bar Kochba’.
It can be surmised that his true name was Ben Koziba – after his
home-town. If so, he was given the appellation ‘Ben Kochba’
because of the allusion which his admirers used to spread: they had adopted
Rabbi Akiva’s exegesis on the Biblical verse “...A star-[king]
will rise from Jacob [i.e. the House of Jacob]” (Num 24:17) as prophetically
referring to this Jewish hero-rebel, Bar-Kochba [The Hebrew word Kochav
(Kochva) means ‘star’]. There may in fact be such an allusion
to Bar-Kochba in Rabbi Aqiba’s interpretation, though this was one
of the verses which had traditionally always been interpreted as alluding
to the Coming of the Messiah.
The revolt spread all over the Land of Israel. Just as
the Hasmoneans in earlier times had done, so likewise did these rebels
fight, all over the country – exploiting, tactically, every suitable
nook and cranny, each road and cave. Fortified spots in Israel from that
revolt are more numerous than such as from any other period in our history.
The Romans brought troops from their forces located in other countries,
and shipped over the cream of their commanders from far-out battlefronts.
The concluding battles were in the environs of the fortress-city ‘Beth
Tor’ [i.e. Bethar] (it is probable that the reference in the source-texts
is to Bethar in the vicinity of Jerusalem.). Once Bethar had been conquered
– this was done through an act of treachery or trickery –
Bar-Kochba was found dead.
One can conceive the intensity of this war, and the immensity of the faith
and determination deep in the heart of the Jewish nation, by the enormous
and mighty effort and exertion expended by the Romans, with all their
troops and officers, before they managed to suppress the Jewish revolt.
It should be remembered that our people had been defeated and thoroughly
crushed only some sixty years earlier; all these decades they had been
living under subjugation, persecution and misery. Indeed, this was one
of the hardest victories achieved by the Romans in that period: and for
that reason, they struck out, in a fury, letting out their vengeance brutally
and indiscriminately – both on the living and on the dead. They
killed and murdered; pillaged and burned; and they filled the market-places
with male and female slaves – who were sold for next to nothing.
The land of Israel was laid waste: on the 9th of Av, on
that inopportune day reserved for punishments, once again the entire soil
of the Holy City and the Temple-site were ploughed. The City was turned
into a pagan, Roman city, with a shrine for the idol Jupiter. The image
of a pig was engraved upon the gate of Jerusalem. Within the town, statues
of Baal and Ashtoret {identified as Bakhsos and Aphrodite} were erected
– together with a statue of the Roman emperor.
Jews were banished – far away from the City and its vicinity. The
rebels and their leaders sanctified the Divine Name and gave up their
lives for this: Rabbi Akiva most of all. Nonetheless, no enemy could uproot
from the Jewish heart the conviction of the Coming of Messiah. Quite the
opposite – the more edicts that were enacted, the more intense and
persistent did that fiery flame of eager expectation of Redemption burn
in their hearts. The Coming of Messiah was always imminently expected.
It would be true to state that in the Bar Kochba revolt the Jewish people
had invested all their national hope for redemption – the hope of
a people residing in their own Land but subjugated to aliens and suppressed.
Bar-Kochba was – in that epoch – the last of those of our
People, pressing for the immediate redemption. The Sages of Yavne well
understood: Gone were the days of a warrior-liberator who wielded mere
weaponry and physical strength! The time for the True Redeemer had not
yet come. The True Messiah is the one created before the Creation: he
will be the Redeemer for all mankind, too. It will not be his mundane
might [which he might have] that will epitomize his Messianic status,
but, more significantly, he will be chosen by the Almighty God in Heaven,
and by nobody else.
All those with claims for the messianic title from then on – whether
in a smaller or in a larger measure – must match the above definition.
Source: Aaron Ze’ev Eshkoli Messianic Movements
in Israel. Bialik Institute. Excerpt translated by David Lions
Chronicle - Eusebius
The year is 132.
The days are the days of the governor of province, Tineus Rufes. The Jews
have rebelled, and destroyed Palestine. Hadrianus sent many of his troops
to subdue the rebels.
The year is 133.
Kochva, the leader of the Jews, was killing Christians and torturing them
for not willing to fight for him (in battle) against the Roman troops.
The year is 134.
The Jewish war in Palestine has come to an end, and the deeds of the Jews
were completely subjected; from then on, they were deprived of the privilege
even to go to Jerusalem (the year 135), first, by the decree of God, as
in the prophecy of the prophets, secondly, with the power of interdiction
that the Romans have laid under.
The year is 136.
Elius Hadrianus founded Elia. On Its gate, facing the road to Bethlehem,
a swine's shape was engraved in marble, indicating the submission of the
Jews to Rome.
Source: Eusebius Chronicon, the translation of
Hieronyimus (Abesius' scripts collection, the R. Helm edition). Translated
by Liat Teperman
Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai taught: 'Aqiba, my master, used to
interpret a star goes forth from Jacob as 'Kozeba goes forth from Jacob'.
Rabbi Aqiba, when he saw Bar Kozeba, said: 'This is the king Messiah!'
Rabbi Johanan ben Torta said to him: 'Aqiba! Grass will grow on your cheeks
and still the son of David does not come!'
Eighty thousand trumpeters besieged Bethar where Bar Kozeba
was located, who had with him two hundred thousand men with an amputated
finger. The Sages sent him the message, 'How long will you continue to
make the men of Israel blemished?'
He asked them, 'How else shall they be tested?'
They answered, 'Let anyone who cannot uproot a cedar from Lebanon be refused
enrollment in your army.'
He thereupon had two hundred thousand men of each class; and when they
went forth to battle they cried, 'O God, neither help nor discourage us!'
Source: Midrash Rabbah Lamentations
2.2§4.
Forthwith the sins [of the people] caused Bethar to be
captured. Bar Kozeba was slain and his head taken to Hadrian. He asked:
'Who killed him?'
A Cuthean said to him: 'I killed him.'
'Bring his body to me,' he ordered.
He went and and found a snake encircling its neck. So Hadrian, when told
of this, exclaimed: 'If his God had not slain him, who could have overcome
him?'
And there was applied to him the verse: Except their rock had given them
over.
Source: Midrash Rabbah Lamentations 2.2§4.
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