The Zealots and the revolts

From the sword to Jerusalem’s fall

From the census of AD 6 to the fall of Jerusalem in 70 and of Masada, armed resistance to Rome grew until it became war — the backdrop to Jesus’ words about the sword and peace.

The zeal of Phinehas and the Maccabees

To understand the Zealots, we have to go back to ancient heroes. The book of Numbers tells how Phinehas, Aaron’s grandson, acted with zeal for God against idolatry and was praised for it (Numbers 25:11). Centuries later, in 167 BC, when the Seleucid king Antiochus IV defiled the Temple and banned circumcision and the Sabbath, the priest Mattathias of Modein killed a Jew who was about to offer a pagan sacrifice, along with the king’s officer, and called everyone zealous for the Law to follow him into the hills (1 Maccabees 2). His sons, the Maccabees, won, purified the Temple in 164 BC, the origin of Hanukkah, and founded the Hasmonean dynasty. That memory was alive in Jesus’ day: God had already freed his people from a pagan empire by the sword. Many wondered whether he would do the same with Rome. Zeal could mean fervent devotion, but also a readiness to kill and die for Israel’s purity.

Judas the Galilean and the “fourth philosophy”

When Judea became a Roman province in AD 6, Quirinius’ census lit the fuse. Judas, called the Galilean, together with a Pharisee named Saddok, taught that paying tribute to Rome meant accepting slavery and that Israel must have no master but God. Josephus calls this movement the ‘fourth philosophy,’ alongside Pharisees, Sadducees and Essenes, and blames it for the disasters to come (Antiquities 18.4-10 and 18.23-25). Judas’ revolt was crushed, as Gamaliel recalls in Acts 5:37, but the ideas stayed in the family. Two of Judas’ sons, James and Simon, were crucified around AD 46 to 48; another descendant, Menahem, seized Masada in 66; and Eleazar ben Yair, a relative of his, commanded the fortress to the end. That is why the question about paying taxes to Caesar, put to Jesus, was not abstract: it touched a nerve that had already cost many lives.

Who were the “Zealots”?

The word calls for care. Josephus uses ‘Zealots’ as the name of an organized party only during the war of 66 to 70, for a Jerusalem faction led largely by priests. Before that, ‘zealot’ could simply mean someone zealous for the Law; Paul, for example, says he was extremely zealous for the traditions of his ancestors (Galatians 1:14). So scholars debate what it meant to call one of the Twelve Simon the Zealot. He may have belonged to a circle of resistance to Rome, or he may simply have been known for his religious fervor. Either way, the detail is striking: in the same band of disciples were Matthew, who had collected taxes within the system, and Simon, whose nickname recalled the rejection of that system. Jesus called them both. The community he formed was not organized along the line dividing collaborators from rebels, but by loyalty to him.

Sicarii and prophets in the desert

In the 50s, under the governor Felix, a more radical group emerged: the sicarii, named after the sica, the small curved dagger they hid under their clothes. They blended into crowds, especially at the festivals in Jerusalem, and killed opponents, mainly members of the Jewish elite seen as collaborators. Their first victim, according to Josephus, was the former high priest Jonathan (Jewish War 2.254-257). At the same time, prophets appeared promising signs of liberation. Theudas led followers to the Jordan, saying he would part its waters, and was beheaded under the governor Fadus around AD 45. A prophet from Egypt gathered people in the desert and marched toward the Mount of Olives, announcing that the walls would fall; Felix attacked, and he fled. Josephus speaks of 30,000 followers, a number probably inflated; in Acts the Roman commander speaks of 4,000. When that officer mistakes Paul for the Egyptian (Acts 21:38), we glimpse the climate of suspicion of the time.

The war of 66–70

The spark came in AD 66. The governor Florus took 17 talents from the Temple treasury, and the protests were violently suppressed (Jewish War 2.293-308). Soon after, Eleazar, captain of the Temple and son of a former high priest, persuaded the priests to stop accepting offerings from foreigners, which halted the sacrifices on behalf of the emperor: in practice, a declaration of war. The Roman garrison in Jerusalem was massacred, and the governor of Syria, Cestius Gallus, who came with a legion and reinforcements, had to withdraw and suffered a heavy defeat on the descent of Beth-horon. Nero then sent the general Vespasian, who reconquered Galilee in 67. The Jewish commander of the region, a young priest named Joseph, surrendered at Jotapata and went over to the Roman side: he is the historian Flavius Josephus. Meanwhile in Jerusalem, the factions of John of Gischala, Simon bar Giora and the Zealots fought one another and even burned the city’s grain stores.

The fall of Jerusalem

In 69 Vespasian became emperor, and his son Titus took over the siege in the spring of 70 with four legions. The city was full of Passover pilgrims, and famine spread. The Romans encircled Jerusalem with a wall, took the ramparts one by one and, in August of 70, the Temple was set on fire. Josephus, watching from the Roman side, says Titus wanted to spare the building; another ancient writer suggests the opposite, and the question is debated. Josephus speaks of more than a million dead and 97,000 captives (Jewish War 6.420); historians consider the first number exaggerated, but the catastrophe was immense. In Rome, the Arch of Titus still shows soldiers carrying the Temple’s seven-branched lampstand. The tax Jews had paid to the Temple was now collected for the temple of Jupiter in Rome. Eusebius records the tradition that the Christians of Jerusalem, having been warned, had left for Pella, across the Jordan.

Masada and the way of Jesus

The last stronghold of resistance was Masada, Herod’s fortress-palace by the Dead Sea, held by the sicarii under Eleazar ben Yair. In AD 73 or 74 the governor Flavius Silva surrounded the rock with the Tenth Legion and built an enormous ramp. Josephus says that on the eve of the final assault the defenders chose to die by their own hands and that 960 people died, with two women and five children surviving (Jewish War 7.389-406). Yigael Yadin’s excavations, from 1963 to 1965, confirmed the siege, the ramp and the Roman camps; the account of the mass suicide is accepted by many and questioned by others. Against this backdrop, Jesus’ choices stand out. He refused to be made king by force (John 6:15), told Peter to put away his sword, said his Kingdom was not of this world (John 18:36) and wept over Jerusalem, foreseeing the siege. He died in place of Barabbas, an insurgent, between two men condemned like him. He won in another way.

Did you know?

• Among the Twelve were Matthew the tax collector and Simon the Zealot: one tied to the tax system, the other bearing the nickname of those who rejected it. Matthew 10:3-4; Luke 6:15
• According to Josephus, the sicarii’s first victim was a former high priest, Jonathan, stabbed in broad daylight in the middle of Jerusalem. Josefo, Guerra Judaica 2.254-256
• On the Arch of Titus in Rome, Roman soldiers are shown carrying the seven-branched lampstand of the Jerusalem Temple in triumph. Arch of Titus, Rome (around AD 81)
• At Masada, Yigael Yadin found about a dozen pottery shards bearing names, one reading ‘ben Yair’; he suggested they were the lots Josephus describes, an interpretation still debated. Masada excavations, Yigael Yadin (1963–1965)
• Eusebius records the tradition that Jerusalem’s Christians left the city before the siege of 70 and took refuge in Pella, beyond the Jordan. Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 3.5.3

Where this shows up in the Bible

• Atos 5:34-39: Gamaliel cites two leaders who came to nothing: Theudas and Judas the Galilean. Josephus also mentions both, though he places a Theudas around AD 45, after the time of this speech; some propose they were different men with a common name, and the point is debated. Gamaliel’s argument is clear: human movements dissolve; what comes from God cannot be stopped.
• Atos 21:37-38: The Roman commander assumes Paul is the Egyptian who led the ‘Assassins,’ that is, the sicarii, into the desert. The mix-up shows how the authorities lived on alert against prophets and armed groups. Paul clears up the mistake by speaking Greek and introducing himself as a Jew from Tarsus, a citizen of an important city.
• Mateus 26:51-52: At a time when many believed God would free Israel by the sword, as in the days of the Maccabees, Jesus tells Peter to put his weapon away. The saying about those who take the sword sounds almost like a warning to the next generation, which took up arms against Rome and saw Jerusalem destroyed.
• Lucas 19:41-44: Jesus weeps over the city and describes what was coming: enemies raising a barricade around it, hemming it in on every side, leaving not one stone on another. Josephus describes exactly such a siege wall built by Titus in AD 70. Jesus’ tears are not of vengeance but of grief over a path of peace refused.
• Lucas 21:20-24: Jesus tells people to flee to the mountains when Jerusalem is surrounded by armies, against the instinct to shelter behind the walls. The tradition preserved by Eusebius says the Christians of Jerusalem left before the final siege, heading for Pella. The words about sword, captivity and the city trampled by the Gentiles describe what happened in 70.
• Marcos 15:6-7: Barabbas was in prison with insurgents who had killed during a rebellion: exactly the kind of man Rome crucified. The crowd chooses the rebel, and Jesus, who had refused the sword, dies in his place. The scene sums up the dilemma of the age and the different way of the Kingdom.

To go deeper

• Flavius Josephus, The Jewish War, books 2–7
• Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, books 18 and 20
• 1 Maccabees, chapter 2 (historical source)
• Eusebius of Caesarea, Ecclesiastical History 3.5
• Yigael Yadin, Masada: Herod’s Fortress and the Zealots’ Last Stand (1966)
• Martin Goodman, Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of Ancient Civilizations (2007)

Where to read in the Bible

• Luke 6:15
• Atos 5:37
• Lucas 21:20

Connections

• linked to Simon the Zealot · factual · Luke 6:15
• rebelled against The Roman Empire · factual · Atos 5:37
• linked to Barabbas · inferencia · Marcos 15:7

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