The Wars of the Jews; Or, The History of the Destruction of JerusalemJosephus, Flavius
Religion
The Wars of the Jews; Or, The History of the Destruction of Jerusalem
Josephus, Flavius
Jews -- History
3. After this there happened a fight between the Galileans and the
Samaritans; it happened at a village called Geman, which is situate in
the great plain of Samaria; where, as a great number of Jews were going
up to Jerusalem to the feast [of tabernacles,] a certain Galilean was
slain; and besides, a vast number of people ran together out of Galilee,
in order to fight with the Samaritans. But the principal men among
them came to Cumanus, and besought him that, before the evil became
incurable, he would come into Galilee, and bring the authors of this
murder to punishment; for that there was no other way to make the
multitude separate without coming to blows. However, Cumanus postponed
their supplications to the other affairs he was then about, and sent the
petitioners away without success.
4. But when the affair of this murder came to be told at Jerusalem, it
put the multitude into disorder, and they left the feast; and without
any generals to conduct them, they marched with great violence to
Samaria; nor would they be ruled by any of the magistrates that were set
over them, but they were managed by one Eleazar, the son of Dineus, and
by Alexander, in these their thievish and seditious attempts. These
men fell upon those that were in the neighborhood of the Acrabatene
toparchy, and slew them, without sparing any age, and set the villages
on fire.
5. But Cumanus took one troop of horsemen, called the troop of Sebaste,
out of Cesarea, and came to the assistance of those that were spoiled;
he also seized upon a great number of those that followed Eleazar, and
slew more of them. And as for the rest of the multitude of those that
went so zealously to fight with the Samaritans, the rulers of Jerusalem
ran out clothed with sackcloth, and having ashes on their head, and
begged of them to go their ways, lest by their attempt to revenge
themselves upon the Samaritans they should provoke the Romans to come
against Jerusalem; to have compassion upon their country and temple,
their children and their wives, and not bring the utmost dangers of
destruction upon them, in order to avenge themselves upon one Galilean
only. The Jews complied with these persuasions of theirs, and dispersed
themselves; but still there were a great number who betook themselves
to robbing, in hopes of impunity; and rapines and insurrections of the
bolder sort happened over the whole country. And the men of power among
the Samaritans came to Tyre, to Ummidius Quadratus, 15 the president of
Syria, and desired that they that had laid waste the country might be
punished: the great men also of the Jews, and Jonathan the son of Ananus
the high priest, came thither, and said that the Samaritans were
the beginners of the disturbance, on account of that murder they had
committed; and that Cumanus had given occasion to what had happened, by
his unwillingness to punish the original authors of that murder.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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