How did Jewish people resist Roman rule?

Answer 1

By refusing to listen and obey the laws of the hellenists. And to keep their roots as Jews, and the laws of the Torah unbroken. Usually resulting in death.

Answer:

Unfortunately, as with assimilation today, many did not resist it. Those who did resist it were involved in the events leading up to Hanukkah:

The Seleucids (Syrian-Greeks) under Antiochus Epiphanes (2nd century BCE), at the instigation of the Hellenizers, had forbidden various Torah-practices such as Sabbath-observance and circumcision. One of the leading elder Jewish sages called upon the people to keep observing the Torah anyway; and if necessary, to use force in resisting the decrees. When a Hellenized Jew offered a sacrifice to the Greek idols in a nearby village, the sage killed him as well as the Greek overseer. This brought a violent reaction from the Greeks; and the loyal Jews, led by the Hasmonean family, were forced to retreat from their towns and strike out at the Greeks in an attempt to oust them from the Holy Land and to enable the people to once again observe the Torah. The Torah-Jews were heavily outnumbered by the attacking Greek armies, but God gave them miraculous victories again and again. After three years of struggle, the Greek armies retreated from Jerusalem, and the Hasmoneans (also called Maccabees) entered the Holy Temple which the Greeks had defiled, reconsecrated it to God, and began the Temple service once more. Among other things, they wanted to relight the olive oil candelabrum (Exodus ch. 25), but could only find one day's supply of undefiled oil - and it would take eight days to make and bring some more.

Miraculously, the menorah stayed lit for eight days (Talmud, Shabbat 21b), allowing enough time for new oil to be prepared and brought. The Torah Sages instituted the festival of Hanukkah at that time (Talmud, Shabbat 21b).

This is what Hanukkah represents: the closeness to God; and the avoidance of Hellenization (assimilation).

It should also be noted that the main goal for which the Maccabees fought was not political independence. They fought to enable the people to observe the Torah's commandments; as we say in the Al Hanisim prayer: "The Greeks (and that includes the Hellenizers) sought to cause us to forget Your Torah and leave Your statutes."

Answer 2

Jewish people within the ancient Roman empire showed great resilience by using armed force to resist Roman dominance. However the nature of these revolts cannot be clearly explained without understanding the context of the times in history in which the Jewish rebellions took place.

It first should be noted that the empire had a vast number of non Roman inhabitants. With this in mind, one can certainly see that these large numbers of people and the territorial expanse & geographical distances the Roman legions had to control left room for minor and sometimes major revolts.

Many legions were positioned in or near the great cities of the eastern empire. For Example:

The greater part of the 2 legions forming the garrison in Egypt were based in the "international" city of Alexandria. It indeed was an international city based on its former great ancient civilization, the conquest of centuries before Rome by Alexander the great, the Greek kings that replaced Alexander and the entry of Rome into the situation. Alexandria was home to many of the peoples that settled there from other eastern civilizations.

The large garrison was deployed to make it clear that a low tolerance of disturbances was Rome's policy in this large multi ethnic and political center. The legions were frequently called upon to quell rioting in the city.

The presence of the legions has led to the incorrect perception that they were primarily an army of occupation whose main role was to control the subject population. The popular notion of these troops as brutal oppressors is an attractive one for a generation of historians who viewed ancient empires as an abomination of the ancient world.

They somehow find a relationship between the realities of the ancient world and to some dream like Walt Disney World ruled by Mickey and his nephews.

With that said, when an army was called in to subdue and enforce taxation of communities or to halt the spread of flouting Rome's authority, it had to become brutally efficient at burning villages and crucifying large numbers to terrify the rest into order.

These actions were relatively rare and the initial battles and wars conducted to expand the empire saw the most of the brutality from both sides. The legions however were successful based on their superior tactics and battle proved soldiers.

Around the time of the Jewish revolts the Roman military did not number more than 300,000 men compared to the empires population that is estimated to be between 60 and 70 million people. Therefore it can be concluded that the Roman legions were not large enough to have ruled purely through naked force.

Based on the nature of the kingdoms Rome conquered much of the provinces benefited by the existence of the Empire.

Many of these provincial peoples were granted Latin Rights which was the first step to becoming a Roman citizen. Along with that came administrative jobs and opportunities for ex enemy soldiers to find military careers in the legions as auxiliaries.

Many revolts were based on the history of the region before the Romans even arrived. Ethnic & religious problems that existed in the kingdoms the Romans conquered remained problems that Rome was often unable to control.

One of the most frequent causes of rioting in Alexandria was the natural tensions between Jewish & Gentile communities. Also the disruptions in Judea was due to differences between Jews & Samaritans.

All of the above places us in the proper context to understand the Jewish revolts.

Long before Rome, the Jewish people had shown themselves to be great warriors and they were pitted against many great ancient empires and survived all of them.

In 66 AD CE we see the truth in this in Judea and in Jerusalem. This was not a simple revolt, it was a war and called the First Jewish War. It required a maximum effort of the empire to retake this area in terms of men and time. The war effort ran from 66 to 73 AD CE.

Initial attempts to resolve the war were failures. It took two full years to resolve Judea but the city of Jerusalem still remained under Jewish control.

In 66 Ad CE Nero was still the emperor. He sent Vespasian to Judea to fix the problem. Outside of Jerusalem the Jews were conducting what might be called a guerilla war which hampered Vespasian. But within the Jewish population there was much dissension among the leaders of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. This gave Vespasian a break however before he could take advantage of it, he was declared emperor by his troops at the death of Nero. Vespasian had to travel to Rome so he left his son Titus in charge of the war in Judea.

After allot of work, Titus was able to beat the fortifications of the city and enter it. He destroyed the Great Temple and most of the war was over, but that almost lasted until 73 AD CE.

The courage of the Jewish fighters was in a way the downfall of Judea. If they had been weak and surrendered easily to Titus, the other problems may have been less destructive.

The war decimated Judea's population and in Jerusalem the High Priests were killed. The destruction of the Holy of Holies ended worship there. To add to the situation the taxes that had been paid to the Temple for its upkeep were now earmarked for the Temple of Jupiter in Rome.

Future Jewish revolts were also disruptive to Rome and different emperors had to handle those revolts.

Answer 3

When Judea became a client state of the Romans in 63 BC, the Jews had good relations with Rome. The emperor Augustus annexed Judea in 6 A.D. The Jews requested this because they were fed up with their king. Tensions between the Jews and both the Romans and the Greeks occurred under the reign of Caligula. Later there was a number Jewish revolts against the Romans: Great Revolt (66-73) the Kitos War (115-117) and the Bar Kokhba revolt (132-135) and the Jewish revolt against Heraclius (614-17).

Riots erupted in Alexandria of Egypt (which had a very large Jewish population) between Jews and Greeks in 40, during the reign of Caligula. In the city of Jamnia (in Judea) Jews were angered by the erection of a clay altar and destroyed it. Caligula's response to the crisis was to order the erection of a statue of himself in the Jewish Temple of Jerusalem. The governor of Syria feared that this would provoke a revolt and delayed its implementation for nearly a year. Caligula was persuaded to abandon this idea.

The Great Revolt started with tensions between the Jews and the Greeks of Judea. Some Greeks certain sacrificed birds in front of a synagogue in Caesarea. The Roman Garrison did not intervene. A clerk at the Jewish temple in Jerusalem stopped prayers and sacrifices for the Roman emperor. Anti-taxation protest broke out. The Roman governor broke into the Jewish temple to seize some money claiming it was for the emperor. There were protest and the governor got the army to arrest some city leaders who were whipped and crucified. A Jewish nationalist faction overran the Roman Garrison in Jerusalem. The pro-Roman Jewish king, Agrippa II, fled. The revolt spread and militias killed Romans and pro-Roman Jews. The Romans deployed more than 60,000 troops, two legions from Egypt and one from Syria, together with the forces of local allies. They besieged and stormed Jerusalem and destroyed the city and the Jewish Tempe, killed many people and took some 97,000 slaves.

The Kito revolt was a series of revolts of Jews in Mesopotamia (Iraq) which spread to Egypt, Cyrenaica (eastern Libya) and Cyprus. There were tensions between the Jewish population of the Roman Empire and Greeks and Romans. While the emperor Trajan was conquering Mesopotamia from the Persians, Jewish rebels attacked small Roman garrisons left in Trajan rear. The revolt spread to the other mentioned areas. This encouraged revolt in Judea and a rebellion in the city of Lydda threatened the supply of grain from Egypt to Trajan's front. Cities with substantial Jewish populations in Mesopotamia ( Nisibis, Edessa, Seleucia, Arbela) slaughtered other small Roman garrisons. According to the ancient historian Cassius Dio 200,000 Romans and Greeks were killed in Cyrenaica and 240,000 Greeks were in Cyprus. However these might be exaggerated figures. The rebellions were eventually suppressed by the Roman armies led by Lucius Quietus, who undertook his campaign very methodically.

The Bar Kohba Revolt was sparked the emperor Hadrian's decision built a temple to Jupiter in the place of the Jewish Temple which had been destroyed by the Romans during the Great Revolt and to rebuild Jerusalem as a Roman city, renaming it Aelia Capitolina (after the name of his clan and the Roman God Jupiter Capitolinus) and forbade circumcision. According to one source, Hadrian also banned circumcision, which he was as mutilation. Initially the rebels gained some victories and established an independent state of Israel over parts of Judea for over two years. However, six legions and other Roman forces were deployed and the rebellion was suppressed. Half a million Jews died and 50 towns and over 900 villages were destroyed. After he suppressed the rebellion, Hadrian persecuted Judaism. He banned the Torah law and the Hebrew calendar and executed Judaic scholars. The sacred scroll was burned on the Temple Mount. Hadrian wanted to erase the memory of Judaea. He joined Judea with Galilee and renamed the two areas Syria Palaestina (Palaestina meant land of the Philistines). The Jews were forbidden from entering Jerusalem.

The last Jewish rebellion was much later in history was the Jewish revolt against Heraclius (614-17). It broke out during the Byzantine-Sasanian War of 602-628 when Khosrau II, the king of the Persians, overrun parts of the Byzantine Empire and captured Antioch (in Syria). Khosrau made an alliance with the Jews in his empire, who supplied a militia of 20,000 men. Heraclius sent an army which was defeated by the Persian-Jewish forces at the Battle of Antioch. Khosrau then marched south and was joined by Jews from Galilee. Jerusalem was taken in 614 and was put under Jewish rule. There was a Christian rebellion, but the combined forces retook the city. The then Jews swept across Judea and beyond. For five years the area was ruled by the Jews as an autonomous province of the Sasanian (Persian) Empire. However, Judea was retaken by the Byzantines.

Answer 4

As long as their internal affairs were not tampered with, the Jews did not object to the Seleucids ruling over them. The revolt of the Hasmoneans took place only when the observances of the Torah were banned and the Greek idols were foisted upon the Jews. Under the Romans, however, there were Zealots who flouted the counsel of the Torah-scholars and fomented political rebellion against Rome. The majority of Jews, however, were loyal to their Torah and followed the circumspect advice of the Sages, avoiding superfluous provocation against the Romans.

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