For the Temple: A Tale of the Fall of Jerusalem. Henty George Alfred
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were going just as he wished; but Agrippa, anxious to preserve the city, sent three thousand horsemen, commanded by Darius and Philip. When these troops arrived, the party of peace took possession of the upper city; while Eleazar and the war party held the Temple.
"For a week, fighting went on between the two parties. Then, at the festival of the Wood Carrying, great numbers of the poorer people were allowed by the party of the chief priest to pass through their lines; and go, as usual, to the Temple. When there, these joined the party of Eleazar, and a great attack was made on the upper city. The troops of Darius and Philip gave way. The house of Ananias–the high priest–and the palaces of Agrippa and Bernice were burned, and also the public archives. Here all the bonds of the debtors were registered and, thus, at one blow the power of the rich over the poor was destroyed. Ananias himself, and a few others, escaped into the upper towers of the palace, which they held.
"The next day, Eleazar's party attacked the fortress of Antonia, which was feebly garrisoned and, after two days' fighting, captured it, and slew the garrison. Manahem, the son of Judas the Zealot, arrived two days later, while the people were besieging the palace. He was accepted as general, by them; and took charge of the siege. Having mined under one of the towers, they brought it to the ground, and the garrison asked for terms. Free passage was granted to the troops of Agrippa, and the Jews; but none was granted to the Roman soldiers, who were few in number and retreated to the three great towers, Hippicus, Phasaelus, and Mariamne.
"The palace was entered, and Ananias and Hezekiah–his brother–were found in hiding, and put to death. Manahem now assumed the state of a king; but Eleazar, unwilling that, after having led the enterprise, the fruits should be gathered by another, stirred up the people against him, and he was slain. The three towers were now besieged; and Metilius–the Roman commander–finding he could no longer hold out, agreed to surrender, on the condition that his men should deliver up their arms, and be allowed to march away, unharmed.
"The terms were accepted and ratified but, as soon as the Roman soldiers marched out, and laid down their arms, Eleazar and his followers fell upon them and slew them; Metilius himself being, alone, spared. After this terrible massacre, a sadness fell on the city. All felt that there was no longer any hope of making conditions with Rome. We had placed ourselves beyond the pale of forgiveness. It was war, to the death, with Rome.
"Up to this time, as I have told you, I was one of those who had labored to maintain peace. I had fought in the palace, by the side of Ananias; and had left it only when the troops, and we of their party, were permitted to march out when it surrendered. But, from this time, I took another part. All hope of peace, of concessions, or of conditions was at an end. There remained nothing now but to fight and, as the vengeance of Rome would fall on the whole Jewish people, it was for the whole Jewish people to unite in the struggle for existence.
"On the very day and hour in which the Romans were put to death, retribution began to fall upon the nation; for the Greeks of Caesarea rose suddenly, and massacred the Jews. Twenty thousand were slain, in a single day. The news of these two massacres drove the whole people to madness. They rose throughout the land, laid waste the country all round the cities of Syria–Philadelphia, Sebonitis, Gerasa, Pella, and Scythopolis–and burned and destroyed many places.
"The Syrians, in turn, fell upon the Jewish inhabitants of all their towns; and a frightful carnage, everywhere, took place. Then, our people made an inroad into the domains of Scythopolis but, though the Jewish inhabitants there joined the Syrians in defending their territory, the Syrians doubted their fidelity and, falling upon them in the night, slew them all, and seized their property. Thirteen thousand perished here. In many other cities, the same things were done; in Ascalon, two thousand five hundred were put to the sword; in Ptolemais, two thousand were killed. The land was deluged with blood, and despair fell upon all.
"Even in Alexandria, our countrymen suffered. Breaking out into a quarrel with the Greeks, a tumult arose; and Tiberias Alexander, the governor–by faith a Jew–tried to pacify matters; but the madness which had seized the people, here, had fallen also upon the Jews of Alexandria. They heaped abuse upon Alexander, who was forced to send the troops against them. The Jews fought, but vainly; and fifty thousand men, women, and children fell.
"While blood was flowing over the land, Cestius Gallus–the prefect–was preparing for invasion. He had with him the Twelfth Legion, forty-two hundred strong; two thousand picked men, taken from the other legions; six cohorts of foot, about twenty-five hundred; and four troops of horse, twelve hundred. Of allies he had, from Antiochus, two thousand horse and three thousand foot; from Agrippa, one thousand horse and three thousand foot; Sohemus joined him with four thousand men–a third of whom were horse, the rest archers. Thus he had ten thousand Roman troops, and thirteen thousand allies; besides many volunteers, who joined him from the Syrian cities.
"After burning and pillaging Zebulon, and wasting the district, Cestius returned to Ptolemais, and then advanced to Caesarea. He sent forward a part of his army to Joppa. The city was open, and no resistance was offered; nevertheless, the Romans slew all, to the number of eight thousand five hundred. The cities of Galilee opened their gates, without resistance, and Cestius advanced against Jerusalem.
"When he arrived within six miles of the town, the Jews poured out; and fell upon them with such fury that, if the horse and light troops had not made a circuit, and fallen upon us in the rear, I believe we should have destroyed the whole army. But we were forced to fall back, having killed over five hundred. As the Romans moved forward, Simon–son of Gioras–with a band, pressed them closely in rear; and slew many, and carried off numbers of their beasts of burden.
"Agrippa now tried, once more, to make peace, and sent a deputation to persuade us to surrender–offering, in the name of Cestius, pardon for all that had passed–but Eleazar's party, fearing the people might listen to him, fell upon the deputation, slew some, and drove the others back.
"Cestius advanced within a mile of Jerusalem and–after waiting three days, in hopes that the Jews would surrender, and knowing that many of the chief persons were friendly to him–he advanced to the attack, took the suburb of Bezetha, and encamped opposite the palace in the upper city. The people discovered that Ananias and his friends had agreed to open the gates; and so slew them, and threw the bodies over the wall. The Romans for five days attacked and, on the sixth, Cestius, with the flower of his army made an assault; but the people fought bravely and, disregarding the flights of arrows which the archers shot against them, held the walls, and poured missiles of all kinds upon the enemy; until at last, just as it seemed to all that the Romans would succeed in mining the walls, and firing the gates, Cestius called off his troops.
"Had he not done so, he would speedily have taken the city; for the peace party were on the point of seizing one of the gates, and opening it. I no longer belonged to this party; for it seemed to me that it was altogether too late, now, to make terms; nor could we expect that the Romans would keep to their conditions, after we had set them the example of breaking faith.
"Cestius fell back to his camp, a mile distant, but he had no rest there. Exultant at seeing a retreat from their walls, all the people poured out, and fell upon the Romans with fury.
"The next morning Cestius began to retreat; but we swarmed around him, pressing upon his rear, and dashing down from the hills upon his flanks, giving him no rest. The heavy-armed Romans could do nothing against us; but marched steadily on–leaving numbers of dead behind them–till they reached their former camp at Gabao, six miles away. Here Cestius waited two days but, seeing how the hills around him swarmed with our people, who flocked in from all quarters, he gave the word for a further retreat; killing all the beasts of burden, and leaving all the baggage behind, and taking on only those animals which bore the arrows and engines of war. Then he marched down the valley, towards Bethoron.
"The multitude felt now that their enemy was delivered into their hands. Was it not in Bethoron that Joshua had defeated the Canaanites, while the sun stayed his course? Was it not here that Judas, the Maccabean, had routed the host of Nicanor? As soon as the Romans entered the defile, the Jews rushed down upon them, sure of their prey.
"The Roman horse were powerless to act. The men of the legions could not climb the rocky sides and, from every point, javelins, stones, and arrows were poured down upon them; and all would have been slain,