The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1881-03-09
THE ZRREPRESSLBLE JEW

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the siege and destruction of Jerusalem by
Titus. 1.-THE whole city" says Josephus,
ran with blood" There is no doubt
very considerable exaggeration in the
numbers, but the same historian, who
was an eyewitness of these scenes, states
that in the city alone 100000 Jews
persisted, and he reckons 100000 to have
been slain in the adjacent provinces.
Many hundreds, he says, were cruci6ed,
the Roman soldiers mailing them, one
after one way, and another after another,
to crosses, by aOay of jest, until at length
the multitude became SO great that room
was wanting for crosses, and crosses for
the bodies"
At this time Jerusalem was splendid
city. Pliny, in his Natural History, calls
1T "longe clarissimum urbium orientis,
non Jud@e modo"-"by far the most
renowned of the cities of the East, not of
Judea only"
When the city was taken by Titus, it
was entirely destroyed, and the plough
share run over its site. Ofthe inhabitants
who had survived the siege, the aged and
infirm were killed; the children under
seventeen were sold as slaves; the rest
were sent, some to. the Egyptian mines,
some to the provincial amphitheatres, and
some to grace the triumph of the Con-
queror
But in the reign Of Hadrian, Jerusalem
again energies from obscurity, and owing
to an attempt of that emperor to populate
it with colony of soldiers, there was
new rebellion under Bar Cocheba. The
Jews all focked to his standard and the
greatest of Hadrian's generals, julius
Severus, was summoned from Britain to
bring them to order. There was des-
perate defence Of Jerusalem again, but
after terrible slaughter it was again
taken. The Rabbinical chroniclers say
that the Romans waded to their horse
brides in blood, and that the corpses of
the slain extended for more than thir-
teen miles. Five hundred and eighty
thousand are said to have persisted by
the sword, while those who persisted by
disease were probably as numerous. Je-
rusalem was again RACED to the ground,
and colony of Roman legionaries occu-
pied the new city which was created. A
temple to Jupiter Capitolinus was reared
on the site of the sacred edifce of the
Jews. The whole of Judea was turned
into desert; about 995 towns and vii
lagos were laid in ashes; the Jews were
forbidden to approach Fila Capitolina
this was the new name for Jerusalem)
on pain of death. Many were reduced
to slavery, and such as could not thus be
disposed of were carried to Egypt. 1.-THE
previous invasions and conquests," says
writer, "civil strifes and oppression,
prosecutions and famine, had carried
hosts of Jewish captives into the remotest
provinces of the Medo- Persian empire,
all over Asia Minor, into Armenia, Ara
bia, Egypt, Cyrene, Cyprus, Greece, and
Italy. The Roman conquests and perse-
cutions completed the dispersion" Thus,
scattered over the face of the earth, the
Jews were deprived of the bond of con-
nection which is ordinarily only afforded
by the possession of common country.
What did they do? They reorgan-
ised the Sanhedrim, and wherever
half-dozen Jews could be found, they Or
ganised synagogue. This was their
bond Of union throughout the world. At
Tiberias theological school was estab-
lished, which about the beginning of the
third century gave to the world that
great digest of their oral law-the Mishna
and the Gemara, better known as the
Babylonian Taln1ud.
All are familiar with the oppression
and cruelties practiced on the Jews dur
ing the Middle Ages, and even in mod
ern Europe In England they enjoyed
some privileges under William the Con-
queror, and they even had three halls at
Oxford, where both Christians and Jews
went to learn Hebrew. They were
treated under the reign Of King John
hardly as human beings. Even under
Richard the Lion-hearted, there was a