Written accounts describing the days preceding the destruction of Jerusalem

 

Tacitus

These paragraphs are from  “The Histories”, Book 5 describing the days preceding the destructions of Jerusalem:

 

12. The Temple was like a citadel and had its own  walls, which had been built even more laboriously and  skilfully than the rest. The porticoes around it consituted  in themselves an excellent defensive position. In addition, there was a spring of water which flowed all the  time, chambers cut in the living rock and tanks and cisterns for the storage of rainwater. Its builders had foreseen only too well that the Jews would face constant  wars as a result of their strange practices. Hence everything was available for a siege, however long. Moreover,  after Pompey’s capture of Jerusalem, fear and experience  taught them many lessons. So, taking advantage of the  greedy instincts of the Claudian period, they bought the right to fortify the city, and during peacetime they built  walls meant for war. Already the home to a motley  crowd, its population had been swollen by the fall of the  other Jewish cities, for all the most determined types had  fled there, and thereby added to the turmoil. There were  three different leaders and three armies. The long outer  perimeter of the walls was held by Simon, the central  part of the city by John and the Temple by Eleazar. John  and Simon could rely on numbers and equipment,  Eleazar on his strategic position. However, it was against  one another that they directed battles, ambush and fires,  and great stocks of corn went up in flames.⁴⁵ Then John  sent off a party of men, ostensibly to offer sacrifice, but  actually to slaughter Eleazar and his followers, and so he  gained control of the Temple. Thus Jerusalem was di vided into two factions, until – since the Romans were  approaching – the prospect of a war against foreigners  made them cooperate.
13. Various prodigies had occurred, but a nation  steeped in superstition and hostile to proper religious practices considered it unlawful to atone for them by  offering victims or solemn vows.⁴⁶ Clashing battlelines  with glittering arms were seen in the sky and a sudden  flash of lightning from the clouds lit up the Temple. The  doors of the shrine abruptly opened, a superhuman  voice was heard to declare that the gods were leaving,  and in the same instant came the rushing tumult of their  departure. Few people saw this as reason to be afraid.  Most were convinced that, according to the ancient writings of their priests, now was the time when the East  would triumph and from Judaea would set out men destined to rule the world. This mysterious prophecy really  referred to Vespasian and Titus, but the common people,  true to the selfish ambitions of mankind, thought that  this mighty destiny was reserved for them, and not even  their calamities opened their eyes to the truth.  We are told that the number of the besieged, old and  young, men and women, amounted to 600,000. All who  could carry weapons did so, and far more were ready to  fight than one would expect from their numbers. The  women were no less determined than the men, and the  thought that they might be forced to leave their homes  made them fear life more than death.  This, then, was the city and people which Titus  faced. Since the nature of the place made a headlong assault and surprise attacks impossible, he decided to use  earthworks and moveable defences. Each legion had its  allotted task, and there was a lull in the fighting while  they prepared every conceivable device for storming  cities, whether invented long ago or by modern ingenuity.

 

2. Flavius Josephus

This is from “Jewish Wars”, Book 6, chapter 3

Thus were the miserable people persuaded by these deceivers, and such as belied God himself; while they did not attend nor give credit to the signs that were so evident, and did so plainly foretell their future desolation, but, like men infatuated, without either eyes to see or minds to consider, did not regard the denunciations that God made to them. Thus there was a star ¹ resembling a sword, which stood over the city, and a comet, that continued a whole year. Thus also before the Jews’ rebellion, and before those commotions which preceded the war, when the people were come in great crowds to the feast of unleavened bread, on the eighth day of the month Xanthicus, ² [Nisan,] and at the ninth hour of the night, so great a light shone round the altar and the holy house, that it appeared to be bright day time; which lasted for half an hour. This light seemed to be a good sign to the unskillful, but was so interpreted by the sacred scribes, as to portend those events that followed immediately upon it. At the same festival also, a heifer, as she was led by the high priest to be sacrificed, brought forth a lamb in the midst of the temple. Moreover, the eastern gate of the inner ³ [court of the] temple, which was of brass, and vastly heavy, and had been with difficulty shut by twenty men, and rested upon a basis armed with iron, and had bolts fastened very deep into the firm floor, which was there made of one entire stone, was seen to be opened of its own accord about the sixth hour of the night. Now those that kept watch in the temple came hereupon running to the captain of the temple, and told him of it; who then came up thither, and not without great difficulty was able to shut the gate again. This also appeared to the vulgar to be a very happy prodigy, as if God did thereby open them the gate of happiness. But the men of learning understood it, that the security of their holy house was dissolved of its own accord, and that the gate was opened for the advantage of their enemies. So these publicly declared that the signal foreshowed the desolation that was coming upon them. Besides these, a few days after that feast, on the one and twentieth day of the month Artemisius, [Jyar,] a certain prodigious and incredible phenomenon appeared: I suppose the account of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those that saw it, and were not the events that followed it of so considerable a nature as to deserve such signals; for, before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armor were seen running about among the clouds, and surrounding of cities. Moreover, at that feast which we call Pentecost, as the priests were going by night into the inner [court of the temple,] as their custom was, to perform their sacred ministrations, they said that, in the first place, they felt a quaking, and heard a great noise, and after that they heard a sound as of a great multitude, saying, “Let us remove hence.” But, what is still more terrible, there was one Jesus, the son of Ananus, a plebeian and a husbandman, who, four years before the war began, and at a time when the city was in very great peace and prosperity, came to that feast whereon it is our custom for every one to make tabernacles to God in the temple, began on a sudden to cry aloud, “A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the four winds, a voice against Jerusalem and the holy house, a voice against the bridegrooms and the brides, and a voice against this whole people!” This was his cry, as he went about by day and by night, in all the lanes of the city. However, certain of the most eminent among the populace had great indignation at this dire cry of his, and took up the man, and gave him a great number of severe stripes; yet did not he either say any thing for himself, or any thing peculiar to those that chastised him, but still went on with the same words which he cried before. Hereupon our rulers, supposing, as the case proved to be, that this was a sort of divine fury in the man, brought him to the Roman procurator, where he was whipped till his bones were laid bare; yet he did not make any supplication for himself, nor shed any tears, but turning his voice to the most lamentable tone possible, at every stroke of the whip his answer was, “Woe, woe to Jerusalem!” And when Albinus (for he was then our procurator) asked him, Who he was? and whence he came? and why he uttered such words? he made no manner of reply to what he said, but still did not leave off his melancholy ditty, till Albinus took him to be a madman, and dismissed him. Now, during all the time that passed before the war began, this man did not go near any of the citizens, nor was seen by them while he said so; but he every day uttered these lamentable words, as if it were his premeditated vow, “Woe, woe to Jerusalem!” Nor did he give ill words to any of those that beat him every day, nor good words to those that gave him food; but this was his reply to all men, and indeed no other than a melancholy presage of what was to come. This cry of his was the loudest at the festivals; and he continued this ditty for seven years and five months, without growing hoarse, or being tired therewith, until the very time that he saw his presage in earnest fulfilled in our siege, when it ceased; for as he was going round upon the wall, he cried out with his utmost force, “Woe, woe to the city again, and to the people, and to the holy house!” And just as he added at the last, “Woe, woe to myself also!” there came a stone out of one of the engines, and smote him, and killed him immediately; and as he was uttering the very same presages he gave up the ghost.