With the transition to full Roman province, Judaea became subject to direct Roman rule, replacing a system of semi-autonomous vassalage that had existed since the Roman Republic conquest of the region in 63 BCE. The change was enacted by the Roman emperorAugustus after an appeal by the populace against the ill rule of Herod Archelaus. With the onset of direct rule, the official census instituted by Publius Sulpicius Quirinius, the governor of Roman Syria, nevertheless caused tensions and led to an uprising by Judas of Galilee. In other notable events in the period, the crucifixion of Jesus in 30–33 CE led to the emergence of the Jewish Christian groups that later developed into Christianity, while in 37 CE, Emperor Caligula ordered the erection of a statue of himself in the Jewish temple, an episode known as the Caligula Crisis.
Herod died in 4 BCE, and his kingdom was divided among three of his sons, two of whom (Philip and Herod Antipas) became tetrarchs ('rulers of a quarter part'). The third son, Archelaus, became an ethnarch and ruled over half of his father's kingdom.[7] One of these principalities was Judea, corresponding to the territory of the historic Judea, plus Samaria and Idumea.
Archelaus ruled Judea so badly that he was dismissed in 6 CE by the Roman emperorAugustus, after an appeal from his own population. Herod Antipas, ruler of Galilee and Perea from 4 BCE, was dismissed by Emperor Caligula in 39 CE. Herod's son Philip ruled the northeastern part of his father's kingdom.[8]
Judea as Roman province(s)
The Roman empire in the time of Hadrian (ruled 117–138 CE), showing, in western Asia, the Roman province of Judea. 1 legion deployed in 125.
A messianic revolt erupted in Judea in 4 BCE because of Archelaus's incompetence; the revolt was brutally crushed by the Legate of Syria, Publius Quinctilius Varus, who occupied Jerusalem and crucified 2000 Jewish rebels.[9][10]
Because of his failure to properly rule Judea, Archelaus was removed from his post by Emperor Augustus in 6 CE, while Judea, Samaria and Idumea came under direct Roman administration.[11]
The Judean province did not initially include Galilee, Gaulanitis (today's Golan), nor Peraea or the Decapolis. Its revenue was of little importance to the Roman treasury, but it controlled the land and coastal sea routes to the "bread basket" of Egypt and was a buffer against the Parthian Empire. The capital was moved from Jerusalem to Caesarea Maritima.[12]
Still, Jews living in the province maintained some form of independence and could judge offenders by their own laws, including capital offenses, until c. 28 CE.[16] Judea in the early Roman period was divided into five administrative districts with centers in Jerusalem, Gadara, Amathus, Jericho, and Sepphoris.[17]
In 30-33 CE, Roman prefect Pontius Pilate, at the request of the Jewish authorities, had Jesus of Nazarethcrucified on the charge of sedition, an act that led to the birth of Christianity.[18][19][20] In 36 CE another messianic revolt erupted near Mount Gerizim, under the lead of a Samaritan, and was quickly crushed by Pilate; the Samaritans complained against Pilate's brutality to the Legate of Syria Lucius Vitellius the Elder, who removed Pilate from his post and sent him to Rome to account, replacing him with an acting prefect called Marcellus.[21]
Old Roman era gate, Bab al-'Amud in Jerusalem's Old City (today part of Damascus Gate)
In 37 CE, Emperor Caligula ordered the erection of a statue of himself in the Jewish Temple of Jerusalem,[22] a demand in conflict with Jewish monotheism.[23] The Legate of Syria, Publius Petronius, fearing civil war if the order was carried out, delayed implementing it for nearly a year.[24] King Herod Agrippa I finally convinced Caligula to reverse the order.[25] Caligula later issued a second order to have his statue erected in the Temple of Jerusalem, but he was murdered before the statue reached Jerusalem and his successor Claudius rescinded the order.[26] The "Crisis under Caligula" has been proposed as the first open break between Rome and the Jews.[27]
Autonomy under Herod Agrippa (41–44)
Between 41 and 44 CE, Judea regained its nominal autonomy, when Herod Agrippa was made King of the Jews by the emperor Claudius, thus in a sense restoring the Herodian dynasty, although there is no indication that Judea ceased to be a Roman province simply because it no longer had a prefect. Claudius had decided to allow, across the empire, procurators, who had been personal agents to the Emperor often serving as provincial tax and finance ministers, to be elevated to governing magistrates with full state authority to keep the peace. He may have elevated Judea's procurator to imperial governing status because the imperial legate of Syria was not sympathetic to the Judeans.[28]
Under a procurator (44–66)
Following Agrippa's death in 44, the province returned to direct Roman control, incorporating Agrippa's personal territories of Galilee and Peraea, under a row of procurators. Nevertheless, Agrippa's son, Agrippa II was designated King of the Jews in 48. He was the seventh and last of the Herodians.
A famine took place in Jerusalem, likely between 44 and 48,[29] which Josephus describes as follows:[30]
she went down to the city Jerusalem, her son conducting her on her journey a great way. Now her coming was of very great advantage to the people of Jerusalem; for whereas a famine did oppress them at that time, and many people died for want of what was necessary to procure food withal, queen Helena sent some of her servants to Alexandria with money to buy a great quantity of corn, and others of them to Cyprus, to bring a cargo of dried figs. And as soon as they were come back, and had brought those provisions, which was done very quickly, she distributed food to those that were in want of it, and left a most excellent memorial behind her of this benefaction, which she bestowed on our whole nation. And when her son Izates was informed of this famine, he sent great sums of money to the principal men in Jerusalem.
From 70 until 135 Judea's rebelliousness required a governing Roman legate capable of commanding legions. Because Agrippa II maintained loyalty to the Empire, the Kingdom was retained until he died, either in 93/94 or 100, when the area returned to complete, undivided Roman control.
Judaea was the stage of two, possibly three, major Jewish–Roman wars:
66–70 CE– First Jewish–Roman War, resulting in the siege of Jerusalem, the destruction of Herod's Temple and ending with the siege of Masada in 73–74 (see Josephus). Before the war Judaea was a Roman province of the third category, that is, under the administration of a procurator of equestrian rank and under the overall control of the governor of Syria. After the war it became an independent Roman province with the official name of Judaea and under the administration of a governor of praetorian rank, and was therefore moved up into the second category (it was only later, in about 120, that Judaea became a consular province, that is, with a governor of consular rank).[31]
115–117 – the Kitos War (Second Jewish-Roman War); Judea's role in it is disputed though, as it played itself out mainly in the Jewish diaspora and there are no fully trustworthy sources on Judea's participation in the rebellion, nor is there any archaeological way of distinguishing destruction levels of 117 CE from those of the major Bar Kokhba's revolt (Third Jewish-Roman War) revolt of just a decade and a half later.
132 – The province of Judaea was merged with Galilee into an enlarged province named Syria Palaestina.[2][3][4] As a result of the Jews' defeat in the Third Jewish-Roman War, Jerusalem was destroyed. A few years later, a new colony was founded in its place, named Aelia Capitolina. One scholarly view the aim of renaming Judea was to disassociate the Jewish people from the land,[32] though other explanations have also been proposed,[33] and an alternative theory is that the renaming efforts preceded and helped precipitate the rebellion.[34] The renaming did not prevent the Jewish people from referring to the country in their writings as either "Yehudah" (Hebrew: יהודה)[35][36] or "The Land of Israel" (Hebrew: ארץ ישראל).[37]
Division into three provinces (135)
Roman stepped road in the Shephelah hill country of Judea (adjacent to Highway 375)
Under Diocletian (284–305) the region was divided into three provinces:[38]
Palaestina Prima (Judea, Samaria, Idumea, Peraea and the coastal plain, with Caesarea Maritima as capital)
Agriculture played a significant role in economic life in Judaea. It is thought that grain was the main crop grown in Judaea's fields, namely wheat but also the harder and less common barley in drier regions. Many olive and winepresses have been discovered by archaeologists, demonstrating the significance of olive oil and wine as well. Evidence for the cultivation of herbs, garden vegetables, and legumes comes from Rabbinic literature, Josephus' works, and the New Testament. Writings from the late first and early second centuries indicate that Jewish farmers introduced rice to Palestine during the early Roman period. The local crop was fine, large-kernel rice.[39][40]
^Jewish War 1.14.4: Mark Antony "... then resolved to get him made king of the Jews ... told them that it was for their advantage in the Parthian war that Herod should be king; so they all gave their votes for it. And when the senate was separated, Antony and Caesar went out, with Herod between them; while the consul and the rest of the magistrates went before them, to offer sacrifices [to the Roman gods], and to lay the decree in the Capitol. Antony also made a feast for Herod on the first day of his reign."
^"Founded in the years 22–10 or 9 B.C. by Herod the Great, close to the ruins of a small Phoenician naval station named Strato's Tower (Stratonos Pyrgos, Turns Stratonis), which flourished during the 3d to 1st c. B.C. This small harbor was situated on the N part of the site. Herod dedicated the new town and its port (limen Sebastos) to Caesar Augustus. During the Early Roman period Caesarea was the seat of the Roman procurators of the province of Judea. Vespasian, proclaimed emperor at Caesarea, raised it to the rank of Colonia Prima Flavia Augusta, and later Alexander Severus raised it to the rank of Metropolis Provinciae Syriae Palestinae." A. Negev, "CAESAREA MARITIMA Palestine, Israel" in: Richard Stillwell et al. (eds.), The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites (1976).
^Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, Book 17, Chapters 271-272
^Malamat, Abraham; Tadmor, Hayim (1976). A History of the Jewish People. Harvard University Press. ISBN978-0-674-39731-6. When Archelaus was deposed from the ethnarchy in 6 CE, Judea proper, Samaria and Idumea were converted into a Roman province under the name Iudaea.
^A History of the Jewish People, H. H. Ben-Sasson editor, 1976, page 247: "When Judea was converted into a Roman province [in 6 CE, page 246], Jerusalem ceased to be the administrative capital of the country. The Romans moved the governmental residence and military headquarters to Caesarea. The centre of government was thus removed from Jerusalem, and the administration became increasingly based on inhabitants of the Hellenistic cities (Sebaste, Caesarea and others)."
^H. H. Ben-Sasson, A History of the Jewish Peoples, page 247–248: "Consequently, the province of Judea may be regarded as a satellite of Syria, although, in view of the measure of independence left to its governor in domestic affairs, it would be wrong to say that in the Julio-Claudian era Judea was legally part of the province of Syria."
^H. H. Ben-Sasson, A History of the Jewish People, Harvard University Press, 1976, ISBN0-674-39731-2, The Crisis Under Gaius Caligula, pages 254–256: "The reign of Gaius Caligula (37–41) witnessed the first open break between the Jews and the Julio-Claudian empire. Until then – if one accepts Sejanus' heyday and the trouble caused by the census after Archelaus' banishment – there was usually an atmosphere of understanding between the Jews and the empire ... These relations deteriorated seriously during Caligula's reign, and, though after his death the peace was outwardly re-established, considerable bitterness remained on both sides. ... Caligula ordered that a golden statue of himself be set up in the Temple in Jerusalem. ... Only Caligula's death, at the hands of Roman conspirators (41), prevented the outbreak of a Jewish–Roman war that might well have spread to the entire East."
^Josephus, "Book XX", The Antiquities of the Jews, retrieved 9 March 2023
^Schäfer, Peter (2 September 2003). The History of the Jews in the Greco-Roman World: The Jews of Palestine from Alexander the Great to the Arab Conquest. Routledge. p. 131. ISBN1-134-40316-X. [From 74 to 123 CE] The consequences of the first great war of the Jews against Rome were extremely far-reaching and their significance for the future history of Judaism can hardly be overestimated. The immediate political consequences were drastic. As has already been mentioned, before the war Judaea was a Roman province of the third category, that is, under the administration of a procurator of equestrian rank and under the overall control of the governor of Syria. After the war it became an independent Roman province with the official name of Judaea and under the administration of a governor of praetorian rank, and was therefore moved up into the second category (it was only later, in about 120 CE, that Judaea became a consular province, that is, with a governor of consular rank). This new status of the province also implies that a standing legion, the legio X Fretensis, was stationed in Judaea. The headquarters of the 10th legion was the totally destroyed Jerusalem; the governor resided with parts of the 10th legion in Caesarea (Maritima), which Vespasian had converted into a Roman colony.
^H.H. Ben-Sasson, A History of the Jewish People, Harvard University Press, 1976, ISBN0-674-39731-2, page 334: "In an effort to wipe out all memory of the bond between the Jews and the land, Hadrian changed the name of the province from Iudaea to Syria-Palestina, a name that became common in non-Jewish literature."
^Jacobson 2001, p. 44–45:"Hadrian officially renamed Judea Syria Palaestina after his Roman armies suppressed the Bar-Kokhba Revolt (the Second Jewish Revolt) in 135 C.E.; this is commonly viewed as a move intended to sever the connection of the Jews to their historical homeland. However, that Jewish writers such as Philo, in particular, and Josephus, who flourished while Judea was still formally in existence, used the name Palestine for the Land of Israel in their Greek works, suggests that this interpretation of history is mistaken. Hadrian's choice of Syria Palaestina may be more correctly seen as a rationalization of the name of the new province, in accordance with its area being far larger than geographical Judea. Indeed, Syria Palaestina had an ancient pedigree that was intimately linked with the area of greater Israel."
^Ronald Syme suggested the name change preceded the revolt; he writes "Hadrian was in those parts in 129 and 130. He abolished the name of Jerusalem, refounding the place as a colony, Aelia Capitolina. That helped to provoke the rebellion. The supersession of the ethnical term by the geographical may also reflect Hadrian's decided opinions about Jews." Syme, Ronald (1962). "The Wrong Marcius Turbo". The Journal of Roman Studies. 52 (1–2): 87–96. doi:10.2307/297879. ISSN0075-4358. JSTOR297879. S2CID154240558. (page 90)
