History of the Jews (Vol. 1-6). Graetz Heinrich
aid of his mercenaries, but the horrible butcheries that took place on these occasions were a perpetual incentive to fresh uprisings. Alexander, worn out at length by these sanguinary proceedings, offered to make peace with the Pharisees. It was now, however, their turn to reject the proffered hand of peace, and to be guilty of an act of treachery towards their country which must remain as an indelible stain upon their party. Upon Alexander's question as to what conditions of peace they required, the Pharisaic leaders answered that the first condition was the death of the king. They had, in fact, secretly offered their aid to the Syrian monarch Eucærus to humble Alexander. Summoned by their promises, Eucærus advanced upon Judæa with 40,000 infantry and 3000 cavalry. Upon the news of this impending danger, Alexander marched out at the head of 20,000 infantry and 1000 cavalry. In the terrible encounter that ensued at Shechem, Judæan fought against Judæan, Greek against Greek, for each army remained true to its leader and could not be bribed into desertion. The battle, disastrous for both sides, was finally gained by Eucærus, and Alexander was driven, through the loss of his mercenaries, to wander among the mountain-passes of Ephraim. There, his solitary position moved his people to pity, and six thousand of his Pharisaic opponents left the Syrian camp and went over to their king, who was now able to force Eucærus's retreat from Judæa.
But the more relentless amongst the Pharisees still held out against Alexander, and after an unsuccessful battle in the open field, threw themselves for safety into the fortress of Bethome, which, however, they were obliged to surrender. Urged by his Sadducæan favorite Diogenes, and impelled by his own thirst for revenge, the king had eight hundred Pharisees crucified in one day. Tradition even relates that the wives and children of the victims were butchered before their eyes, and that Alexander, surrounded by his minions, feasted in the presence of this scene of carnage. But this exaggeration of cruelty was not required to brand him with the name of "Thracian"; the crucifixion of eight hundred men was enough to stigmatize him as a heartless butcher, and this action alone was to bring forth bitter fruits for the Sadducees who had witnessed it with malicious joy. During the civil wars that had lasted for six years, fifty thousand men of both parties had been sacrificed, but the Pharisees had suffered most. The remaining Pharisees trembled for their lives, and the night after the crucifixion of the eight hundred, eight thousand fled from Judæa, part of them to Syria and part to Egypt.
The weakness of Alexander's position may readily be gauged by the fact of his powerlessness to prevent Judæa from being made the seat of war by the kings of Nabathæa and Syria. Yet his good fortune did not forsake him, for a sudden change in the affairs of Syria, resulting in the overthrow of its king, Aretas, worked to Alexander's advantage. Thereby he was enabled to engage in the siege of some important towns, colonized by Greeks and subject to Aretas: Diospolis, Pella and Gerasa. Marching north, he invaded the lower Gaulonitis, with its capital, Gamala, the upper province, with the town of Sogane, and the city of Seleucia. He forced the inhabitants of these towns to accept Judaism and the sign of the covenant. The city of Pella, making a show of resistance, was destroyed. He also recovered the cities lying east of the Red Sea, which had been taken from him by Aretas. The territory of Judæa now embraced within its circumference a number of important towns; it extended on the other side of the Jordan, from Seleucia in the north to Zoar, the city of palms, south of the Dead Sea; from Rhinokolura and Raphia in the south, on the shores of the Mediterranean, to the mountains of Carmel in the northwest. The cities on the sea-coast were of the most importance. Alexander ordered some coins to be struck for his Greek subjects, with the Greek inscription, "King Alexander," while an anchor was stamped upon one side, and upon the other, in Hebrew characters, "Jonathan the King" (Jehonathan ha-Melech). His coins of an earlier date bore the same inscription as those of his predecessors, "The High Priest Jonathan, the Commonwealth of the Judæans."
After a campaign of three years' duration Alexander returned to Jerusalem, where he was received with the honors due to a conqueror. He had caused his crimes in part to be forgiven. In the very center of the kingdom, on a mount near the Jordan, he built a strong fortress, called after him, Alexandrion; and in the neighborhood of the Dead Sea, upon a towering height, protected on all sides by deep ravines, he raised the citadel of Machærus, the formidable guardian of his trans-Jordanic conquests. These two mountain fortresses, together with the third, Hyrcanion, built by John Hyrcanus, on Middle Mountain, were so amply fortified by nature and by art that they were considered impregnable.
Even in the last years of Alexander's reign, although he was suffering from an intermittent fever, he undertook the siege of some of the yet unconquered fortresses of the trans-Jordanic territory. During the siege of Argob, however, he was seized with so severe an attack that he was forced to prepare himself for death. The solemnity of his last hours led him to look upon his former actions in a new light. He was horror-stricken to think how cruelly and foolishly he had persecuted the Pharisees, and how in consequence he had alienated himself from his people. He earnestly enjoined upon his queen, whom he declared regent, to connect herself closely with the Pharisees, to surround herself with counselors from their ranks, and not to embark in any undertaking without having their consent. He also impressed upon her to keep his death secret from his army until the beleaguered fortress should have fallen, and then to resign his body to the Pharisees, that they might either vent their rage upon it or else generously inter it. From an obscure but more authentic source we gather that Alexander sought to allay the queen's anxiety with regard to the party strife rampant in Jerusalem by the following words: "Do not fear either the true Pharisees or their honest opponents, but be on your guard against hypocrites of both sides (the counterfeit ones), who, when they commit sins, like the dissolute Prince Zimri, expect to be rewarded like Phineas, who was zealous for the Law." Alexander died in the forty-ninth year of his life and the twenty-seventh of his reign (79), and left two sons, Hyrcanus and Aristobulus. The Pharisees ungenerously appointed the anniversary of his death as a day of rejoicing.
It was indeed most fortunate for the Judæan nation that a woman of gentle nature and sincere piety should have been called to the head of the State after it had been torn asunder by the recklessness of its former ruler. She came like the refreshing dew to an arid and sunburnt soil. The excited passions and the bitter hatred of the two parties had time to abate during her reign, and the country rose above narrow partisanship to the worthier occupation of advancing the common welfare of the nation. Although Queen Salome, or, as she was called, Alexandra, was devoted with her whole soul to the Pharisees, entrusting them with the management of home affairs, yet she was far from persecuting the opposing party. Her authority was so greatly respected by the neighboring princes that they did not dare make war with Judæa, and she shrewdly succeeded in keeping a mighty conqueror, who had possessed himself of Syria, from the confines of her own kingdom. Even the heavens, during the nine years of her reign, showered their blessings upon the land. The extraordinarily large grains of wheat gathered during this time in the fields of Judæa were kept and exhibited during many subsequent years. The queen ordered coins to be struck, bearing the same emblems as her predecessors, with the Greek inscription, "Queen Alexandra." On the whole, her reign passed peacefully and happily. The Law, which had fallen into great neglect, became a fixed institution, and if it occasionally affected the Sadducees, who were constantly breaking it, they could not consider themselves victims of caprice. The crowded prisons were opened; the Pharisees returned from exile, with their narrowed vision widened by the experience they had gained in foreign lands.
Salome Alexandra proclaimed her eldest son Hyrcanus high priest; he was a weak prince, whose private life was irreproachable, but who was not fitted for a public post of importance.
Simon ben Shetach, the brother of the queen, the oracle of the Pharisaic party, stood high in her favor. So great a part did he play in the history of that time that it was called by many "the days of Simon ben Shetach and of Queen Salome." The chief post in the Council of Seventy, hitherto possessed by the high priest, was now, however, given up to the Pharisees by order of the queen. The Nasi, or president of the Great Council, was from this time on, as a rule, the most learned and the most respected of the Pharisees. No one, of course, could lay juster claim to this distinction than Simon ben Shetach. But Simon was not an ambitious man, and he determined to waive his own rights of precedence in favor of Judah ben Tabbai, who was then residing in Alexandria, of whose profound learning and excellent character he had formed a high estimate. The Alexandrian Judæan community had probably entrusted this celebrated Palestinean scholar with some important office.