CHAPTER VIII
HEROD, CALLED “THE GREAT”
The death of Antigonus in 37 B.C. left Herod master of the situation with the title of king. Though we have come to call him “the Great” there is no contemporary support for this claim. He founded a dynasty under whose regime the Seventy Weeks Nation was doomed to expire in cruel convulsions. Herod himself was the first and last independent sovereign of his house to reign over Palestine; his successors held office in their various provinces subject to their Roman masters.
Herod was an Idumean descended from Esau. Esau sold his birthright to Jacob, but the long and dreary chapters of history show that the transfer was resented by Esau’s posterity. By the irony of fate, a descendant of Esau was destined to be instrumental in bringing about those conditions which led to the overthrow of the Seventy Weeks Nation which arose among the posterity of Jacob. That nation was doomed to expire in the bitter throes of long-drawn-out agony with which history furnishes no parallel, and many bloody scenes can be traced to the evil influence of the Idumean House of Herod.
The character of Herod must ever remain an intriguing study because of its violent contrasts. He was magnanimous, yet petty; self-willed, yet cringing; clever, but crafty; barbarously cruel, yet kind; a bully, and a snob; capable of the deepest domestic affection, yet guilty of the most revolting crimes against his wives and children. Like Henry VIII of later times, Herod was a man of many wives. “Now Herod the King had at this time nine wives; one of them Antipater’s mother (Doris),
and another the high-priest’s daughter, by whom he had a son of his own name. He had also one who was his brother’s daughter, and another his sister’s daughter; which two had no children. One of his wives also was of the Samaritan nation ... Herod had also to wife Cleopatra of Jerusalem ... Pallas was also one of his wives ... and besides these, he had for his wives Phedra and Elpis.” 1 In addition to the nine named above, who appear to have been living at the same time, he had married and subsequently put to death Mariamne, grand-daughter of the Asmonean Hyrcanus II. Five of them with their offspring figure in the history of this time. It would carry me beyond the limits imposed for this essay to give a detailed account of Herod’s life. The following table presents in simple form some of the essential features and characters of the period under review:
HEROD, CALLED “THE GREAT”
His Wives His Sons
1. Doris, divorced. 1 Antipater Killed by Herod.
2. Mariamne, grand-duaghter 2. Aristobulus Killed by Herod.
of Hyrcanus II (Asmonean). 3 Alexander Killed by Herod.
Mariamne was put to death
by Herod. 2
3. Mariamne, daughter 4. Herod Philip I 3 Excluded from benefits
of Simon the married under his fathers will
the high priest Herodias because of supposed
treason.
4. Malthaea, a Samaritan 5. Herod Antipas Tetrarch of Galilee. 4
6. Archelaus Ethnarch of Judea. 5
Banishes A.D. 41
5 Cleopatra 7. Herod Philip II Tetrarch of Northern
married Perea. 6
Salome
daughter of
Philip I and
Herodias
1 Josephus, Antiq. xvii, 1, 3. 2 Ibid. xv, vii, 4.
3 Matthew xiv, 3. 4 Ibid. xiv, 1.
5 Ibid. ii, 22. 6 Luke iii, 1.
Herod’s succession to the throne was marked by a curious condition of things. The hellenising policy which had been so strenuously opposed by the Asmoneans, was now carried out by men who professed to be adherents to the Law. To signalise his accession to the crown, Herod made offerings to the Capitoline Jupiter as though he would reinflame the old Jewish [sic Judaean], passionate resistance. To show that he was master, he massacred forty-five of the chief adherents to the cause of the late Antigonus and confiscated the property of others. The whole of the Sanhedrim, with the exception of two, were put to death, the two being spared because they had advised the surrender of the city during the recent siege.
Since the mutilation of Hyrcanus there had been no high-priest. It must be set down to the credit of Herod that he made no attempt to fill the sacred office himself. He brought from Babylon an obscure priest named Ananel to fill the vacancy. At this time there was one surviving scion of the Asmonean house, the youthful Aristobulus, a brother of Herod’s wife Mariamne, whose claims to the holy office could not be overlooked. Alexandra, his mother, pressed his claims with such effect that Herod was constrained to install him. At the age of sixteen, the handsome Aristobulus performed the duties of the high-priest with such grace and dignity that the people could not restrain their admiration. Their appreciation inflamed the jealousy of Herod and sealed the doom of the youth. A few months later, Alexandra arranged a feast in honour of her son-in-law, Herod, in the neighbourhood of Jericho. The day was hot. As a cooling diversion Herod and his friends went to bathe. The youthful high-priest was induced to join them, and was treacherously drowned at the instigation of Herod. l
1 Josephus, Antig. xv, iii, 3.
Herod dissembled and sought to display his pretended grief by arranging an impressive funeral for the boy. Alexandra was not deceived by this palpable dissimulation. She resolved on redress. She carried her case to Mark Antony, and found a powerful ally and advocate in the person of Cleopatra of Egypt who, at this time, held Antony in her toils. Herod had serious misgivings about meeting his Roman master. In the end, he decided to face the court of Antony, but before leaving he gave secret instructions that, if his own life should be forfeit, Mariamne, his Asmonean wife, should be put to death. His costly presents to Antony, together with his personal influence with one who had favoured his kingship, carried the day in his favour. But the secret instructions for the murder of Mariamne leaked out later and liberated a train of evil influences which cost Mariamne her life and clouded the subsequent life of Herod with vain regrets. In 29 B.C. Mariamne was executed by the order of, or with the consent of, her husband. l Herod undoubtedly cherished a deep affection for the Asmonean princess, and his guilty conscience not only robbed him of peace but made him apprehensive of coming retribution.
After the death of the youthful Aristobulus, Herod reappointed the Babylonian Ananel to the high-priesthood. In the eighteenth year of his reign he announced his intention to build a new Temple. He contended that the existing Temple built by Zerubbabel was an unworthy successor of the Temple of Solomon, and advanced the view that the comparative meanness of the existing structure was due to restrictions imposed by the Persian overlords of that distant period. Since the reign of Herod was marked by personal ostentation and
1 Josephus, Antiq. xv, vii, 4.
self-gratification we may reasonably conclude that his desire to see a magnificent Temple was as much for the glorification of Herod as for the honour of God. By this act he might ingratiate himself with all sections of the people, and by keeping them occupied provide an interval in which their hostility would pass. The Jews [sic Judaeans] affected little enthusiasm for the cause. They suspected him of ulterior designs. It was only on his assurance that “he would not pull down their Temple till all things were gotten ready for building it up entirely again” that they assented. To Herod’s credit it must be said that he honoured his word. The new Temple, built of white marble, was of Graeco-Roman design and became the pride of the Jewish [sic the nation’s] people.
All the direct descendants of the Asmonean princes had now been violently removed from his path, but the Idumean usurper still trembled on his throne. Aristobulus and Alexander, his own sons by Mariamne, had been sent to Rome for their education. They returned to Jerusalem, after three years abroad, with all the grace and dignity the people had learned to associate with the Asmonean house. They were received with open and general enthusiasm. Herod himself welcomed them with a show of paternal pride. But the darker side of his suspicious nature asserted itself and he viewed them as possible avengers of their mother’s death, and as a threat to his own ascendancy in the state. With his usual cunning, he caused them to be put to death.
The same brooding fear liberated the dark forces of his mind when, about 4 B.C., a caravan from the East arrived enquiring: “Where is He that is born King of the Jews [sic Judahites]?” The words sounded ominous to Herod. Was not he King of the Jews [sic Judaea]? Was this another rival for the throne given to him by Rome?
1 Matthew, ii, 2.
He would brook no rival for the diadem. He “sent forth and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under.” 1
But at this time there appeared on the horizon a foe the brutal Herod was powerless to resist. He was stricken with a loathsome disease, like that attributed to Antiochus Epiphanes in II Maccabees ix, 9, 10. A few months after Jesus, to whom God had given the throne of His father David, was born, the alien usurper of the race of Edom passed painfully into the shadows with few to grieve voluntarily at his departure.
1 Matthew ii. 16.
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