Jesus: Last of the Pharaohs by Ralph Ellis

Author:Ralph Ellis [Ellis, Ralph]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: SCB Distributors - A
Published: 2010-06-30T04:00:00+00:00

Herod the Great

King he may have been, but it still took Herod four years of hard fighting, occasionally with Antony’s assistance, to win back Palestine and much of Syria and finally to gain control of Jerusalem. Just as he had achieved this, there was further misfortune. Antony was under the spell of the Egyptian queen Cleopatra, who was demanding estates, provinces and entire kingdoms. He mollified her demands, but still granted some valuable lands of Herod’s to Cleopatra, which he had to then lease back at an exorbitant rate.

More calamities were to follow. Without consulting his fellow consul (the triumvirate having been reduced to two), Mark Antony unilaterally declared Caesarion, Cleopatra’s son by Caesar, to be Julius Caesar’s heir. Octavian Caesar, Mark Antony’s fellow consul and Julius Caesar’s nephew and official heir, responded by sending a battle fleet. Mark Antony was defeated at Actium by Octavian Caesar in 31 BC and took his own life the following year. Herod was forced to sail to Rhodes to assure Octavian of his allegiance; a dangerous diplomatic task since he had been backing Octavian’s enemy, Mark Antony. Octavian, who was later designated Augustus Caesar by the Roman Senate, confirmed Herod’s status as king and he was allowed to return to Palestine with lands and authority intact. It was only then, in the relative calm of the latter part of his reign, that the task of rebuilding the Temple of Jerusalem finally began, in about 20 BC, more than 550 years after the destruction of Solomon’s temple.

This temple was the one described by Josephus, quoted earlier in the chapter. Its lavish appointment was underwritten mainly by the Diaspora, the exiled Jews who had remained in Persia and Asia Minor after the Babylonian exile. Large contributions were also made by the exiled Jews who had fled to Alexandria, Rome, Ephesus and many other major European cities, following their dispersal as far back the Jacobite exodus from Egypt. The Diaspora recognized the spiritual value of the Temple of Jerusalem and then, as now, vast sums of money poured into Jerusalem from around the known world to maintain the spiritual motherland.

Despite the new prosperity, there were still bitter feuds within Herod’s family and the royal court. Herod’s extended family was permeated by close inter-family marriages and, consequently, it was also riddled with intrigue and strife. It is probably owing to episodes like the following, that our modern prohibitions on close family marriages have been reinforced.

The family tree of Herod here has been greatly simplified to show the main players in this important saga; for the complete version, please see the appendix. The ramifications of this complex family for Christianity are crucial and events that were about to unfold will probably lead us to another sensitive biblical secret that has lain dormant for nearly two millennia. In the diagram of Herod’s family, note that the role of king and high priest are often interchangeable in this era. Quite obviously, despite the scribes insisting that only the Levites could

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