Product Description

In AD 70, after a war that had flared sporadically for four years, three Roman legions under the future Emperors Vespasian and his son Titus surrounded, laid siege to, and eventually devastated the city of Jerusalem, destroying completely the magnificent Temple which had been built by Herod only eighty years earlier. What brought about this extraordinary conflict, with its extraordinary consequences? This superb book, by one of the world’s leading scholars of the ancient Roman and Jewish worlds, narrates and explains this titanic struggle, showing why Rome’s interests were served by this policy of brutal hostility, and how the first generation of Christians first distanced themselves from its Jewish origins and then became increasingly hostile to Jews as their influence spread within the empire. The book thus also provides an exceptional and original account of the origins of anti-Semitism, whose history has had often cataclysmic reverberations down to our own time.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #19934 in Books
• Published on: 2008-01-31
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 656 pages

Review
A comprehensive and accessible study of two great ancient cities that finally came to fatal blows.As a scholar of both Roman and Jewish studies, Goodman (Jewish Studies/Oxford) displays impressive depth in his fleshing out of the two cities in terms of their sense of identities, communities, lifestyles, government, politics and religion. Relying on the writings of the "main witness" Josephus, a priest in Jerusalem who eventually turned sides, Goodman demonstrates how Roman rule of Judea was relatively benign since Herod was appointed king in 40 BCE and devoted himself to rebuilding Jerusalem and embellishing his Temple. Both cultures adapted to the Hellenism pervasive in the area since Alexander's conquest, and both were fairly tolerant of diversity. The first signs of trouble, writes Goodman, were mainly isolated skirmishes "largely internal to Jewish society rather than symptoms of widespread resentment to Roman rule." After a series of venal Roman governors, the Captain of the Temple, Eleazar son of Ananias, persuaded his fellow priests in 66 CE to stop offering sacrifices made to the Jewish God on behalf of the Roman emperor - an assertion of war by the ruling elite. Roman reaction was swift and brutal over the next four years, culminating in Emperor Vespasian's instructions to his son Titus to squelch the rebellion at any cost. With the razing of the Temple in the summer of 70 CE, 60 years of rebellion followed, and Hadrian's new Roman city Aelia Capitolina was established on the site. Goodman pursues the growth of the Church in the wake of Constantine's embrace of Christianity, which changed the nature of the region and pushed Jews increasingly to the margins. He also devotes a fine epilogue to the origins of anti-Semitism.Absorbing work by a strong, capable writer and teacher who imparts his vast knowledge with great style and clarity. (Kirkus Reviews)

Paul Johnson, the Tablet
'This is an important book, on a difficult subject: the reason why the
Romans, who had so much in common with the Jews, sought to destroy the Jews
and Judaism completely. Only one man could have written it.'

Tom Holland, Sunday Times
'Sombre and magisterial ... a brilliant comparative survey of the two very
different civilisations'