THE WARS OF THE JEWS
OR
THE HISTORY OF THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM
Book II: Chapter 8
ARCHELAUS’S ETHNARCHY IS REDUCED INTO A [ROMAN]
PROVINCE. THE SEDITION OF JUDAS OF GALILEE. THE THREE
SECTS.
1. AND now Archelaus’s part of Judea was
reduced into a province, and Coponius, one of the
equestrian order among the Romans, was sent as a
procurator, having the power of [life and] death put
into his hands by Caesar. Under his administration it
was that a certain Galilean, whose name was Judas,
prevailed with his countrymen to revolt, and said they
were cowards if they would endure to pay a tax to the
Romans and would after God submit to mortal men as
their lords. This man was a teacher of a peculiar sect
of his own, and was not at all like the rest of those
their leaders.
2. For there are three philosophical sects among
the Jews. The followers of the first of which are the
Pharisees; of the second, the Sadducees; and the third
sect, which pretends to a severer discipline, are
called Essens. These last are Jews by birth, and seem
to have a greater affection for one another than the
other sects have. These Essens reject pleasures as an
evil, but esteem continence, and the conquest over our
passions, to be virtue. They neglect wedlock, but
choose out other persons children, while they are
pliable, and fit for learning, and esteem them to be
of their kindred, and form them according to their own
manners. They do not absolutely deny the fitness of
marriage, and the succession of mankind thereby
continued; but they guard against the lascivious
behavior of women, and are persuaded that none of them
preserve their fidelity to one man.
3. These men are despisers of riches, and so very
communicative as raises our admiration. Nor is there
any one to be found among them who hath more than
another; for it is a law among them, that those who
come to them must let what they have be common to the
whole order, — insomuch that among them all there is
no appearance of poverty, or excess of riches, but
every one’s possessions are intermingled with every
other’s possessions; and so there is, as it were, one
patrimony among all the
brethren. They think that oil is a defilement; and
if any one of them be anointed without his own
approbation, it is wiped off his body; for they think
to be sweaty is a good thing, as they do also to be
clothed in white garments. They also have stewards
appointed to take care of their common affairs, who
every one of them have no separate business for any,
but what is for the uses of them all.
4. They have no one certain city, but many of them
dwell in every city; and if any of their sect come from
other places, what they have lies open for them, just
as if it were their own; and they go in to such as
they never knew before, as if they had been ever so
long acquainted with them. For which reason they carry
nothing at all with them when they travel into remote
parts, though still they take their weapons with them,
for fear of thieves. Accordingly, there is, in every
city where they live, one appointed particularly to
take care of strangers, and to provide garments and
other necessaries for them. But the habit and
management of their bodies is such as children use who
are in fear of their masters. Nor do they allow of the
change of or of shoes till be first torn to pieces, or
worn out by time. Nor do they either buy or sell any
thing to one another; but every one of them gives what
he hath to him that wanteth it, and receives from him
again in lieu of it what may be convenient for
himself; and although there be no requital made, they
are fully allowed to take what they want of whomsoever
they please.
5. And as for their piety towards God, it is very
extraordinary; for before sun-rising they speak not a
word about profane matters, but put up certain prayers
which they have received from their forefathers, as if
they made a supplication for its rising. After this
every one of them are sent away by their curators, to
exercise some of those arts wherein they are skilled,
in which they labor with great diligence till the
fifth hour. After which they assemble themselves
together again into one place; and when they have
clothed themselves in white veils, they then bathe
their bodies in cold water. And after this
purification is over, they every one meet together in
an apartment of their own, into which it is not
permitted to any of another sect to enter; while they
go, after a pure manner, into the dining-room, as into
a certain holy temple, and quietly set themselves
down; upon which the baker lays them loaves in order;
the cook also brings a single plate of one sort of
food, and sets it before every one of
them; but a priest says grace before meat; and it
is unlawful for any one to taste of the food before
grace be said. The same priest, when he hath dined,
says grace again after meat; and when they begin, and
when they end, they praise God, as he that bestows
their food upon them; after which they lay aside their
[white] garments, and betake themselves to their
labors again till the evening; then they return home
to supper, after the same manner; and if there be any
strangers there, they sit down with them. Nor is there
ever any clamor or disturbance to pollute their house,
but they give every one leave to speak in their turn;
which silence thus kept in their house appears to
foreigners like some tremendous mystery; the cause of
which is that perpetual sobriety they exercise, and
the same settled measure of meat and drink that is
allotted them, and that such as is abundantly
sufficient for them.
6. And truly, as for other things, they do nothing
but according to theinjunctions of their curators;
only these two things are done among them at
everyone’s own free-will, which are to assist those
that want it, and to show mercy; for they are
permitted of their own accord to afford succor to such
as deserve it, when they stand in need of it, and to
bestow food on those that are in distress; but they
cannot give any thing to their kindred without the
curators. They dispense their anger after a just
manner, and restrain their passion. They are eminent
for fidelity, and are the ministers of peace;
whatsoever they say also is firmer than an oath; but
swearing isavoided by them, and they esteem it worse
than perjury 4 for they say that he who cannot be
believed without [swearing by] God is already
condemned. They also take great pains in studying the
writings of the ancients, and choose out of them what
is most for the advantage of their soul and body; and
they inquire after such roots and medicinal stones as
may cure their distempers.
7. But now if any one hath a mind to come over to
their sect, he is notimmediately admitted, but he is
prescribed the same method of living which they use
for a year, while he continues excluded’; and they
give him also a small hatchet, and the fore-mentioned
girdle, and the white garment. And when he hath given
evidence, during that time, that he can observe their
continence, he approaches nearer to their way of
living, and is made a partaker of the waters of
purification; yet is he not even now admitted to live
with them; for after this demonstration of his
fortitude, his temper is
tried two more years; and if he appear to be
worthy, they then admit him into their society. And
before he is allowed to touch their common food, he is
obliged to take tremendous oaths, that, in the first
place, he will exercise piety towards God, and then
that he will observe justice towards men, and that he
will do no harm to any one, either of his own accord,
or by the command of others; that he will always hate
the wicked, and be assistant to the righteous; that he
will ever show fidelity to all men, and especially to
those in authority, because no one obtains the
government without God’s assistance; and that if he be
in authority, he will at no time whatever abuse his
authority, nor endeavor to outshine his subjects
either in his garments, or any other finery; that he
will be perpetually a lover of truth, and propose to
himself to reprove those that tell lies; that he will
keep his hands clear from theft, and his soul from
unlawful gains; and that he will neither conceal any
thing from those of his own sect, nor discover any of
their doctrines to others, no, not though anyone
should compel him so to do at the hazard of his life.
Moreover, he swears to communicate their doctrines to
no one any otherwise than as he received them himself;
that he will abstain from robbery, and will equally
preserve the booksbelonging to their sect, and the
names of the angels 5 [or messengers]. These are the
oaths by which they secure their proselytes to
themselves.
8. But for those that are caught in any heinous
sins, they cast them out oftheir society; and he who
is thus separated from them does often die after a
miserable manner; for as he is bound by the oath he
hath taken, and by the customs he hath been engaged
in, he is not at liberty to partake of that food that
he meets with elsewhere, but is forced to eat grass,
and to famish his body with hunger, till he perish;
for which reason they receive many of them again when
they are at their last gasp, out of compassion to
them, as thinking the miseries they have endured till
they came to the very brink of death to be a
sufficient punishment for the sins they had been
guilty of.
9. But in the judgments they exercise they are most
accurate and just, nordo they pass sentence by the
votes of a court that is fewer than a hundred. And as
to what is once determined by that number, it is
unalterable. What they most of all honor, after God
himself, is the name of their legislator [Moses], whom
if any one blaspheme he is punished capitally. They
also think it a good thing to obey their elders, and
the major part. Accordingly, if ten of them be sitting
together, no one of them will speak while the other
nine are against it. They also avoid spitting in
the midst of them, or on the right side. Moreover,
they are stricter than any other of the Jews in
resting from their labors on the seventh day; for they
not only get their food ready the day before, that
they may not be obliged to kindle a fire on that day,
but they will not remove any vessel out of its place,
nor go to stool thereon. Nay, on other days they dig a
small pit, a foot deep, with a paddle (which kind of
hatchet is given them when they are first admitted
among them); and covering themselves round with their
garment, that they may not affront the Divine rays of
light, they ease themselves into that pit, after which
they put the earth that was dug out again into the
pit; and even this they do only in the more lonely
places, which they choose out for this purpose; and
although this easement of the body be natural, yet it
is a rule with them to wash themselves after it, as if
it were a defilement to them.
10. Now after the time of their preparatory trial
is over, they are partedinto four classes; and so far
are the juniors inferior to the seniors, that if the
seniors should be touched by the juniors, they must
wash themselves, as if they had intermixed themselves
with the company of a foreigner. They are long-lived
also, insomuch that many of them live above a hundred
years, by means of the simplicity of their diet; nay,
as I think, by means of the regular course of life
they observe also. They contemn the miseries of life,
and are above pain, by the generosity of their mind.
And as for death, if it will be for their glory, they
esteem it better than living always; and indeed our
war with the Romans gave abundant evidence what great
souls they had in their trials, wherein, although they
were tortured and distorted, burnt and torn to pieces,
and went through all kinds of instruments of torment,
that they might be forced either to blaspheme their
legislator, or to eat what was forbidden them, yet
could they not be made to do either of them, no, nor
once to flatter their tormentors, or to shed a tear;
but they smiled in their very pains, and laughed those
to scorn who inflicted the torments upon them, and
resigned up their souls with great alacrity, as
expecting to receive them again.
11. For their doctrine is this: That bodies are
corruptible, and that thematter they are made of is
not permanent; but that the souls are immortal, and
continue for ever; and that they come out of the most
subtile air, and are united to their bodies as to
prisons, into which they are drawn by a
certain natural enticement; but that when they are
set free from the bonds of the flesh, they then, as
released from a long bondage, rejoice and mount
upward. And this is like the opinions of the Greeks,
that good souls have their habitations beyond the
ocean, in a region that is neither oppressed with
storms of rain or snow, or with intense heat, but that
this place is such as is refreshed by the gentle
breathing of a west wind, that is perpetually blowing
from the ocean; while they allot to bad souls a dark
and tempestuous den, full of never-ceasing
punishments. And indeed the Greeks seem to me to have
followed the same notion, when they allot the islands
of the blessed to their brave men, whom they call
heroes and demi-gods; and to the souls of the wicked,
the region of the ungodly, in Hades, where their
fables relate that certain persons, such as Sisyphus,
and Tantalus, and Ixion, and Tityus, are punished;
which is built on this first supposition, that souls
are immortal; and thence are those exhortations to
virtue and dehortations from wickedness collected;
whereby good men are bettered in the conduct of their
life by the hope they have of reward after their
death; and whereby the vehement inclinations of bad
men to vice are restrained, by the fear and
expectation they are in, that although they should lie
concealed in this life, they should suffer immortal
punishment after their death. These are the
Divinedoctrines of the Essens 6 about the soul, which
lay an unavoidable bait for such as have once had a
taste of their philosophy.
12. There are also those among them who undertake
to foretell things tocome, 7 by reading the holy
books, and using several sorts of purifications, and
being perpetually conversant in the discourses of the
prophets; and itis but seldom that they miss in their
predictions.
13. Moreover, there is another order of Essens, 8
who agree with the rest as to their way of living, and
customs, and laws, but differ from them in the point
of marriage, as thinking that by not marrying they cut
off the principal part of human life, which is the
prospect of succession; nay, rather, that if all men
should be of the same opinion, the whole race of
mankind would fail. However, they try their spouses
for three years; and if they find that they have their
natural purgations thrice, as trials that they are
likely to be fruitful, they then actually marry them.
But they do not use to accompany with their wives when
they are with child, as a demonstration that they do
not many out of regard to pleasure, but for the
sake of posterity. Now the women go into the baths
with some of their garments on, as the men do with
somewhat girded about them. And these are the customs
of this order of Essens.
14. But then as to the two other orders at first
mentioned, the Phariseesare those who are esteemed
most skillful in the exact explication of their laws,
and introduce the first sect. These ascribe all to
fate [or providence], and to God, and yet allow, that
to act what is right, or the contrary, is principally
in the power of men, although fate does co-operate in
every action. They say that all souls are
incorruptible, but that the souls of good men only are
removed into other bodies, — but that the souls of bad
men are subject to eternal punishment. But the
Sadducees are those that compose the second order, and
take away fate entirely, and suppose that God is not
concerned in our doing or not doing what is evil; and
they say, that to act what is good, or what is evil,
is at men’s own choice, and that the one or the other
belongs so to every one, that they may act as they
please. They also take away the belief of the immortal
duration of the soul, and the punishments and rewards
in Hades. Moreover, the Pharisees are friendly to one
another, and are for the exercise of concord, and
regard for the public; but the behavior of the
Sadducees one towards another is in some degree wild,
and their conversation with those that are of their
own party is as barbarous as if they were strangers to
them. And this is what I had to say concerning the
philosophic sects among the Jews.
|
