CHAPTER XVI.

HEROD AGRIPPA.

Death of Herod Antipas—Suicide of Pilate—Punishment of Pride—Great Riot—Tyranny—Assassinations—False Prophets.

It was not long after the death and resurrection of our Lord, while His infant Church was struggling against its first difficulties, that Philip, brother of Herod Antipas, died. As he left no son, his territory was annexed to the Roman province of Syria; but his nephew, Herod Agrippa, was high in favour with the Emperor Caligula, and from him received the tetrarchy of Philip, together with the title of King.

Herod Agrippa was the son of Aristobulus, one of the unfortunate sons of Mariamne, who, like their unhappy mother, had perished by the cruelty of Herod the Great. He had, therefore, Jewish blood in his veins; and when, by the favour of a succeeding emperor, Judea and Samaria were added to his dominions, he made efforts to win to himself the affections of the people whom he governed. He began to encompass Jerusalem with a magnificent wall, which he deemed would render it impregnable—thus emulating the noble work of Nehemiah, although influenced by a very different spirit.

The greatness and prosperity of this king inflamed the ambition of his uncle. “Why should Herod Agrippa enjoy the regal title, while Herod Antipas remains but a tetrarch?” such were the envious reflections of the tyrant. His partner, the detestable Herodias, more than shared his ambition. She urged Herod Antipas to go in person to the emperor at Rome, assuring him that it was only because he had not appeared before Cæsar (such was the title then common to the Roman despots) that he was destitute of royal dignity.

It was meet that Herodias, who had been Herod’s tempter to crime, should be also his tempter to ruin, and then share the misery which she had wrought.

Herod Antipas sailed for Rome. Herod Agrippa followed his uncle, not to befriend, but to accuse. The emperor lent a willing ear to his favourite. The tetrarch of Galilee was not suffered to return to the land which he had stained with innocent blood. He was banished to Spain, and his dominions were bestowed on Herod Agrippa.

Herodias followed the tetrarch to the place of his banishment. There he who had slain the Baptist, and mocked the Baptist’s Lord, died an exile from his country.

The fate of Pilate was yet more striking. After ruling over Judea for ten years, he was deprived of his office for his malpractices, involved in various calamities, and banished to Vienne in Gaul. There despair overwhelmed this miserable man, deprived of that favour to retain which he had sacrificed his conscience and his soul. Pilate put an end to his own life by that hand from which he had once vainly attempted to wash the stain of the blood of the Messiah.

In the year 44 A.D., Herod Agrippa the king, in order to win the favour of the Jews, openly joined the persecutors of the Church. James, one of the apostles, was put to death by the tyrant; and Peter would have shared the same fate, had he not been delivered from prison at night by the intervention of an angel.

The career of the monarch was to be but a brief one. Herod Agrippa appeared to have all that the world could give. Riches, honours, power had been freely lavished upon him. In the splendour of his public works he appears to have emulated his grandfather, Herod the Great. Never had the grandeur of his position been more striking than when, on a public occasion, he made an oration to the people. Arrayed in a robe of silver tissue, which glittered in the rays of the rising sun, the display of his magnificence combined with his eloquence to dazzle the admiring throng. With a shout, the people exclaimed, “It is the voice of a god, and not of a man!”

Herod rebuked not such impious flattery—the pride of his heart was gratified; and immediately the angel of the Lord smote him, because he gave not God the glory. He was suddenly seized with agonizing pain, so that he could not refrain from calling out, “I, that ye called a god, am now going to die!” Stricken with a mysterious disease, which seems to have resembled that which destroyed the two great persecutors, Antiochus Epiphanes and Herod the Great, Herod Agrippa was borne to his palace. There, eaten of worms, and enduring exquisite torture, this proud enemy of God and of His Church died in the fifty-fourth year of his age.

His son Agrippa, being but seventeen years old, was deemed too young to succeed to the power and dignity of his father. Three years afterwards, however, the Roman emperor made him king of Chalcis. Judea again sank to the condition of a province, ruled by governors appointed by Rome.

Under Cuspius Fadus, and Tiberius Alexander, Jerusalem appears to have had a short breathing-space of comparative rest. But they were very soon succeeded by Cumanus, and in his time war, tumult, and sedition spread misery over the land. The Jews were discontented with their Roman masters, and their efforts to break from their bondage only drew the cords still tighter.

In one alarming riot in the temple, at the feast of unleavened bread, ten thousand Jews were trodden down and killed, and the feast became a cause of mourning throughout the nation. There were fierce and bloody dissensions between the Samaritans and Jews. Villages were set on fire, and their inhabitants massacred without distinction of age. Bold bands of robbers ravaged the land, and insurrection was rife in all quarters. In the year 52 A.D., Cumanus was removed by the emperor, and Felix was appointed procurator.

The miserable Jews soon discovered the evil qualities of their new master. Felix was mean, avaricious, and cruel. He established his residence in Cesarea; and there, under pretence of administering justice, he practised the grossest extortion. The number of robbers, or those whom he chose to punish under that name, who were crucified by this barbarous governor, was fearfully great.

About this time a horrible system of assassination prevailed in Jerusalem. A band of men who were called Sicarii, bearing daggers concealed about their persons, mingled with crowds in the city, especially at the Jewish festivals. Suddenly they stabbed those whom they regarded as their enemies, but so secretly and treacherously that the murderers usually escaped detection. The first man slain by them was Jonathan the high priest (the office had become annual); and after him so many were thus treacherously assassinated, that men looked upon their neighbours with suspicion, and even in the day-time felt their lives insecure.

An Egyptian false prophet arose, who deluded a great number of the people. He led, according to the historian Josephus, thirty thousand of them through the wilderness to the Mount of Olives, whence he proposed to attack Jerusalem itself, and drive the Romans from the city. At the approach of Felix with his troops, the deceiver’s courage failed him, and he fled, leaving his miserable followers to the vengeance of the stern procurator.

In the year 62 A.D., Felix was succeeded by Porcius Festus. It was during a visit paid to this procurator by Agrippa, king of Chalcis, the son of Herod Agrippa, that the Apostle Paul, long detained in prison by Felix, pleaded his own cause before an august assembly in Cesarea, and appealed to the judgment-seat of the emperor of Rome.

CONTEMPORANEOUS EVENTS. 33-62 A.D. A.D. London founded by the Romans 50 Caractacus carried to Rome 51 Boadicea defeated 61