Heinrich Graetz - History of the Jews (Vol. 1-6)

Caligula's successor upon the throne of the Cæsars was Claudius, a learned pedant and a fool. He owed his crown to chance, and to the diplomacy of King Agrippa, who had induced the reluctant Senate to accept the choice of the Prætorians. Rome must indeed have fallen low when a somewhat insignificant Judæan prince was allowed to speak in the Senate House, and, in some measure, to have influence in the choice of her ruler. Claudius was not ungrateful to his ally; he lauded him before the assembled Senate, raised him to the dignity of consul, and made him king of all Palestine, for Judæa and Samaria were incorporated with the monarchy.

As a remembrance of these events, the emperor ordered an inscription to be engraved on tablets of bronze, in pedantic imitation of the classical age, and coins to be struck, bearing on one side two clasped hands, with these words, "Friendship and comradeship of King Agrippa with the Senate and the Roman people." On the other side was the emperor between two figures, and the inscription: "King Agrippa, friend of the emperor." The kingdom of Judæa had thus recovered its full extent; indeed, it had acquired even a greater area than it possessed formerly under the Hasmonæans and Herod I.

Herod II., brother and son-in-law of King Agrippa, received from Claudius the rank of Prætor, and was made prince of Chalcis, in Lebanon. The Alexandrian Judæans greatly benefited by the new order of things which was brought about in the vast Roman Empire by the death of Caligula. The emperor Claudius freed the Alabarch Alexander, with whom he was on friendly terms, from the imprisonment into which his predecessor had thrown him, and settled the disputes of the Alexandrians in favor of the Judæans. Caligula's prejudice against that unfortunate community had developed their independence, and their strength was far from being broken. Their rights and privileges were fully re-established by an edict of the new emperor, and they were placed on an equal footing with the Greek inhabitants of Egypt. The dignity of the Alabarch was restored by the emperor, and this was most important to the Judæans, for it assured them of the leadership of one of their own race, and made them independent of the Roman officials. It was during this reign that Philo gave the wealth of his learning to a wide circle of readers, and was instrumental in bringing Judæan-Greek culture to its zenith. Claudius extended his goodwill to the Judæans of the entire Roman Empire, granting them complete religious freedom, and protecting them from the interference of the pagans.

When Agrippa, laden with honors, left Rome for Judæa to take possession of his kingdom, his subjects remarked that some great change was manifest in him, and that the stirring revolution in Rome, by which a headstrong emperor had been dethroned in favor of a weak one, had deeply impressed their own monarch. The frivolous Agrippa returned an earnest-minded man; the courtier had given place to the patriot; the pleasure-loving prince to the conscientious monarch, who was fully aware of what he owed his nation. The Herodian nature had, in fact, been entirely subdued by the Hasmonæan. For the last time, Judæa enjoyed under his reign a short span of undisturbed happiness; and his subjects, won by his generous affection, which even risked forfeiting the good will of Rome in their cause, repaid him with untiring devotion, the bitterest enemies of his scepter becoming his ardent supporters. Historians do not weary of praising Agrippa's loving adherence to Judaism; it seemed as if he were endeavoring to rebuild what had been cast down by Herod. He mixed freely with the people when they carried the first fruits into the Temple, and bore his own offering of fruit or grain to the Sanctuary. He re-established the old law that obliged the king to read the book of Deuteronomy in the Court of the Temple at the close of each year of release. Facing the congregation, Agrippa performed this act for the first time in the autumn of the year 42, and when he came to the verse, "From amongst your brethren shall you choose a king," he burst into a passion of tears, for he was painfully aware of his Idumæan descent, and knew that he was unworthy of being a king of Judæa. But the assembled multitude, and even the Pharisees, exclaimed with enthusiasm: "Thou art our brother; thou art our brother!"

Agrippa's careful government made itself felt throughout the entire community. Without doubt the Synhedrion, under the presidency of Gamaliel I. (ha-Zaken, the elder), the worthy grandson of Hillel, was permitted to take the management of home affairs into its own hands. The presidency acquired greater importance under Gamaliel than it had enjoyed before; for the Synhedrion, modeled upon the political constitution of the country, partook somewhat of a monarchical character. The consent of the president was required for the interpolation of a leap year, and all letters or mandates addressed to near or distant communities were sent in his name. The formulæ of these letters, which have in some instances been handed down to us, are extremely interesting, both in contents and form, for they prove that all Judæan communities, as well as their representatives, acknowledged the supreme authority of the Synhedrion. Gamaliel would address a foreign community through the pen of his accomplished secretary, Jochanan, in these terms: "To our brethren in Upper and Lower Galilee, greeting: We make known to you that the time has arrived for the ingathering of the tithes of your olive yards." "To our brethren, the exiles in Babylon, Media, Greece (Ionia), and to all other exiles, greeting: We make known to you that as in this season the lambs are still very small, and the doves have not yet their full-grown wings, the spring being very backward this season, it pleases me and my colleagues to prolong the year by thirty days."

Many excellent laws emanated from Gamaliel; they were principally directed against the abuses that had crept in, or were aimed at promoting the welfare of the whole community. It was the true spirit of Hillel that pervaded the laws framed by Gamaliel for the intercourse between the Judæans and the heathens. The heathen poor were permitted to glean the fields in the wake of the reapers, and were treated exactly like the Judæan poor, and the pagans were given the peace greetings upon their own festivals when they were following their own rites. The poor in all towns of mixed population received equal treatment; they were helped in time of distress, their sick were nursed, their dead were honorably treated, their sorrowing ones were comforted, whether they were pagans or Judæans. In these ordinances, so full of kindly feeling towards the heathen, the influence of Agrippa is plainly visible. Rome and Judæa had for the moment laid aside their mutual antipathy, and their intercourse was characterized by love and forbearance. The generosity of the emperor towards the Judæans went so far that he severely punished some thoughtless Greek youths in the town of Dora for attempting to introduce his statues into the synagogues. The governor Petronius was ordered to be strict in the prevention of such desecration.

Agrippa had inherited from his grandfather Herod the wish to be popular among the Greeks. As Herod had sent presents to Athens and other Greek and Ionian towns, so his grandson conferred a great benefit upon the degenerate city, once mother of the arts, a benefit which her citizens did not easily forget. He also showered favors upon the inhabitants of Cæsarea, the city that Herod had raised as a rival of Jerusalem, and upon the Greeks of the seaboard Sebaste, who lived in their own special quarter. These recipients of his benefits exerted themselves to give proofs of their gratitude. The people of Sebaste raised statues to his three daughters, and struck coins in his honor, bearing the inscription—"To the great king Agrippa, friend of the emperor." The last years of this monarch's reign were happy for his nation, both within and without the kingdom of Judæa. They were like the rosy flush in the evening sky that precedes, not the dawn of day, but the blackness of night. In some respects they call to mind the reign of King Josiah in the earlier history of the nation, when the kingdom enjoyed tranquillity at home and independence abroad, with no dearth of intellectual activity.