nation saw, with the utmost joy, a fabric of stately architecture crowning the brow of Mount Moriah with glittering masses of white marble and pinnacles of gold. Yet during this pious undertaking the Jewish monarch maintained his double character; presiding at the Olympic games, granting large donations for their support, and even allowing himself to be nominated president of this pagan festival.* As he advanced towards old age his troubles multiplied, and his apprehensions were increased, till, at length, four years anterior to the common era of Christianity, Herod sank under the pressure of a loathsome disease. He was permitted by the Romans so far to exercise the privileges of an independent prince as to distribute by will the inheritance of sovereignty among the more favoured of his children; and in virtue of this indulgence he assigned to Archelaus the government of Idumea, Samaria, and Judea, while he bestowed upon Antipas a similar authority over Peræa and Galilee. But the young princes required the sanction of the Roman emperor, whom they both regarded as their liege lord; and with that view repaired to the capital of Italy. The will of the late king was acknowledged and confirmed by Augustus, who was moreover pleased to give to Herod Philip, their elder brother, the provinces of Auranitis, Trachonitis, Paneas, and Batanea. Archelaus, the metropolis of whose dominions was Jerusalem, ruled in quality of ethnarch about nine years; but so little to the satisfaction either of his master at Rome or of the people whom he was appointed to govern, that at the end of this period he was summoned to render an account of his administration at the imperial tribunal, when he was deprived of his power and wealth, and finally banished into Gaul. Judea was now reduced to a Roman province, dependent on the prefecture of Syria, though usually placed under the inspection of a subordinate officer, called the procurator or governor. Thus the sceptre passed away from Judah, and the lawgiver descended from the family of Jacob ceased to enjoy power within the confines of the Promised Land. No reader can require to be reminded, that it was at this * History of the Jews, vol. ii, p. 96. epoch, in the last year of the reign of Herod, the Messias was born, and conveyed into Egypt for security. The unjust and cruel government of Archelaus, for which, as has just been related, he was stripped of his authority by the head of the empire, was probably the cause why the holy family did not again take up their residence in Judea, but preferred the milder rule of Antipas. When Joseph "heard that Archelaus did reign in Judea in the room of his father Herod, he was afraid to go thither: notwithstanding, being warned of God in a dream, he turned aside into the parts of Galilee and he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth."* The first thirty years of the Christian era did not pass away without several insurrections on the part of the Jews, and repeated acts of severity and extortion inflicted upon them by their stern conquerors. The commotion excited by Judas, called the Galilean, is regarded by historians as one of the most important of those ebullitions which were constantly breaking forth among that inflammatory people, not only on account of its immediate consequences, but for the effects produced on the national character, in regard to the speculative tenets connected with tribute and submission to a heathen government. Upon the exile of Archelaus, the prefecture of Syria was committed to Publius Sulpicius Quirinius. This commander is mentioned in the Gospel of St. Luke by the name of Cyrenius, and is described as the person under whom the taxing was first made in that province. Hence we may conclude, that the enrolment which took place at the birth of our Saviour was merely a census, comprehending the numbers, and perhaps the wealth and station of the several classes of the people. It was about the twenty-sixth year of our epoch that * Matth. ii. 22, 23. "Among the atrocities which disgraced the later days of Herod, what is called the Massacre of the Innocents (which took place late in the year before, or early in the same year with the death of Herod) passed away unnoticed. The murder of a few children in a village near Jerusalem would excite little sensation among such a succession of dreadful events, except among the immediate sufferers. The jealousy of Herod against any one who should be born as a king in Juden, the dread that the high religious spirit of the people might be re-excited by the hope of a real Messiah,-as well as the summary manner in which he endeavoured to rid himself of the object of his fears, are strictly in accordance with the relentlessness and decision of his eharacter."-History of the Jews, vol. ii. p. 106, Pontius Pilate was nominated to the government of Judea. Ignorant or indifferent as to the prejudices of the Jews, he roused among them a spirit of the most active resentment, by displaying the image of the emperor in Jerusalem, and by seizing part of their sacred treasure for the purposes of general improvement. As the fiery temper of the inhabitants drove them, on most occasions, to acts of violence, he did not hesitate to employ force in return; and we find, accordingly, that his administration was dishonoured by several acts of military execution directed against Jews and Samaritans indiscriminately. His severity towards the latter people finally led to his recall and disgrace about the year 36, when Vitellius, the father of the future emperor of the same name, presided over the affairs of the Syrian province. The plan of our work does not permit us to do more than allude to the great event which took place at Jerusalem under the auspices of Pilate. We may nevertheless observe, that the narrative of the gospel is in strict harmony with the character, not only of the time to which it refers, but also of all the persons whose acts it describes. The expectation of the Jews when Jesus of Nazareth first appeared, their subsequent disappointment and rage, their hatred and impatience of the Roman government, the perplexity of the military chief, and the motive which at length induced him to sacrifice the innocent person who was sisted before him, are facts which display the most perfect accordance with the tone of civil history at that remarkable period. During the troubles which agitated Judea, the districts that owned the sovereignty of Antipas and Philip, namely, Galilee and the country beyond the Jordan, enjoyed comparative quiet. The former, who is the Herod described by our Saviour as "that fox," was a person of a cool and rather crafty disposition, and might have terminated his long reign in peace, had not Herodias, whom he seduced from his brother-the second prince just mentioned-irritated his ambition by pointing to the superior rank of his nephew, Herod Agrippa, whom Caligula had been pleased to raise to a provincial throne. Urged by his wife to solicit a similar elevation, he presented himself at Rome, and obtained an audience of the emperor; but the successor of Tiberius was so little pleased with his conduct on this occasion, that he divested him of the tetrarchy, and banished him into Gaul. The death of Herod Philip and the degradation of the Galilean tetrarch paved the way for the advancement of Agrippa to all the honour and power which had belonged to the family of David. He was permitted to reign over the whole of Palestine, having under his direction the usual number of Roman troops, which experience had proved to be necessary for the peace of a province at once so remote and so turbulent. The only event that disturbed the tran- . quillity of his government was an insane resolution expressed by Caligula to place his own statue in the temple of Jerusalem, as an object of respect, if not of positive and direct worship, to the whole Jewish nation. The prudence of the Syrian prefect, and the influence which Agrippa still possessed over the mind of his imperial friend, prevented the horrors that must have arisen from the attempt to desecrate, in this odious manner, a sanctuary deemed most holy by every descendant of Abraham. But no position could be more difficult to hold with safety and reputation than that which was occupied by this Hebrew prince. He was assailed on the one hand by the jealousy of the Roman deputies, and on the other by the suspicion of his own countrymen, who could never divest themselves of the fear that his foreign education had rendered him indifferent to the rites of the Mosaical law. To satisfy the latter, he spared no expense in conferring magnificence on the daily service of the temple, while he put forth his hand to persecute the Christian church in the persons of St. Peter and James the brother of John. To remove every ground of disloyalty from the eyes of the political agents who were appointed by Claudius to watch his conduct, he ordered a splendid festival at Cesarea in honour of the new emperor; on which occasion, when arrayed in the most gorgeous attire, certain words of adulation reached his ear, not fit to be addressed to a Jewish monarch. The result will be best described in the words of sacred Scripture: "And upon a set day Herod, arrayed in royal apparel, sat upon his throne, and made an oration unto them. And the people gave a shout, saying, it is the voice of a god, and not of a man. And immediately the angel of the Lord smote him, because he gave not God the glory; and he was eaten of worms, and gave up the ghost."* He left a son and three daughters, of whom Agrippa, Bernice, and Drusilla make a conspicuous figure towards the close of the book of Acts. These events took place between the fortieth and the forty-fifth years of the Christian faith. The youth and inexperience of the prince dictated to the Roman government the propriety of assuming once more the entire direction of Jewish affairs. The prefecture of Syria was confided to Cassius Longinus, under whom served, as procurator of Judea, Caspius Fadus, a stern though an upright soldier. But the impatience and hatred of the people were now inflamed to such a degree, that gentleness and severity were equally unavailing to preserve the tranquillity of the country. Impostors appeared on every hand, proclaiming deliverance to the oppressed children of Jacob, and provoking the more impetuous among their brethren to take up arms against the Romans. Various conflicts ensued, in which the discipline of the legions hardly ever failed to disperse or destroy the tumultuary bands who, under such unhappy auspices, attempted to restore the kingdom to Israel. The holy city, which was from time to time beleaguered by both parties, sustained material injury from the furious assaults of pagan and Jew alternately. The predictions of its downfall, already circulated among the Christians, began to mingle with the shouts of its fanatical inhabitants; and already, even at the accession of Agrippa the Second to his limited sovereignty, every thing portended that miserable consummation which at no distant period closed the temporal scene of Hebrew hope and dominion. Every succeeding day witnessed the progress of that ferocious sect founded on the opinions of Judas the Gaulonite, who acknowledged no sovereign but Jehovah, and who constantly denounced as the greatest of all sins those payments or services by means of which a heathenish government was supported. In prosecuting their révolutionary schemes, they esteemed no man's life dear, and set as little value upon their own. Devoted to the principles of a frantic patriotism, they were content to sacrifice to its claims the clearest dictates of humanity and religion; being at all times ready to bind themselves by an oath that they would *Acts xii. 21, 22, 23. |