Varus succeeded, however, in tempting seventy of the most distinguished Judæans into his power, the greater number of whom were murdered by his command. At the news of this assassination, terror seized upon all the Babylonian Judæans who were settled in the various cities of Galilee. They rushed into Gamala for protection, breathing vengeance, not only against Varus, but against all the Syrians who had supported him. They were joined by Philip, who with difficulty restrained them from some signal act of vengeance. But even after Agrippa had dismissed the unscrupulous Varus from his office, the Babylonian Judæans still evinced great eagerness to coalesce with the enemies of Rome, and were therefore ordered to leave the fortress of Gamala and return to Batanæa. But this caused so great a tumult and division in the city that some of the inhabitants rose and attacked the Babylonians who were about to leave them, whilst others, under the leadership of a certain Joseph, revolted from the rule of Agrippa. It was at this moment, when the volcano of revolutionary passions was ever ready to burst forth in fresh eruptions, that Joseph ben Matthias was entrusted by the Great Synhedrion with the command of Upper and Lower Galilee. In those provinces the powerful city of Sepphoris alone remained faithful to the Romans, and in all Galilee there reigned a bitter feeling of enmity against Sepphoris. For the people of Tiberias were angered that their city should have taken only a secondary place in the province, in spite of Agrippa II's having chosen it for his capital. It was the business of the governor to promote a spirit of concord amongst the inhabitants of Galilee, and at the same time to win the Sepphorites to the popular cause. Upon the shoulders of this man rested a heavy responsibility. For it would naturally depend greatly upon him whether this revolt, which had burst into life with such extreme energy, would attain the end desired by the patriots, or would have a tragic termination. Unfortunately, Joseph was not the man who could successfully pilot so gigantic a scheme, but by his conduct he materially contributed to the fall of the Judæan nation.