surnamed the Great, king of the Jews, second son of Antipater the
Idumean, born B. C. 71. At the age of twenty-five he was made by his
father governor of Galilee, and distinguished himself by the suppression
of a band of robbers, with the execution of their leader, Hezekiah, and
several of his comrades. As he had performed this act of heroism by his
own authority, and had executed the culprits without the form of trial,
he was summoned before the sanhedrim, but, through the strength of his
party and zeal of his friends, he escaped any censure. In the civil war
between the republican and Cæsarian parties, Herod joined Cassius, and
was made governor of Cœlo-Syria; and when Mark Antony arrived
victorious in Syria, Herod and his brother found means to ingratiate
themselves with him, and were appointed as tetrarchs in Judea; but in a
short time an invasion of Antigonus, who was aided by the Jews, obliged
Herod to make his escape from Jerusalem, and retire first to Idumea, and
then to Egypt. He at length arrived at Rome, and obtained the crown of
Judea upon occasion of a difference between the two branches of the
Asmodean family. Hyrcanus had been for a considerable time prince and
high priest of the Jewish nation; but while the Roman empire was in an
unsettled state, after the death of Julius Cæsar, Antigonus, son of
Aristobulus, brother of Hyrcanus, made himself master of the city and
all Judea. In this state Herod found things when he came to Rome, and
the most that he then aimed at was to obtain the kingdom for
Aristobulus, his wife’s brother; but the senate of Rome, moved by the
recommendations of Mark Antony, conferred the kingdom of Judea upon
Herod himself. Having met with this unexpected success at Rome, he
returned without delay to Judea, and in about three years got possession
of the whole country. He had, however, to fight his way to the throne,
which, as we have seen, was in the possession of Antigonus. Though aided
by the Roman army, he was obliged to lay siege to Jerusalem, which held
out for six months, when it was carried by assault, and a vast slaughter
was made of the inhabitants, till the intercession and bribes of Herod
put an end to it. Antigonus was taken prisoner and put to death, which
opened the way to Herod’s quiet possession of the kingdom. His first
cares were to replenish his coffers, and to repress the faction still
attached to the Asmodean race, and which regarded him as a usurper. He
was guilty of many extortions and cruelties in the pursuit of these
objects. Shortly after this, an accusation was lodged against Herod
before Mark Antony by Cleopatra, who had been influenced to the deed by
his mother-in-law, Alexandra. He was summoned to answer to the charges
exhibited against him before the triumvir; and on this occasion he gave
a most remarkable display of the conflict of opposite passions in a
ferocious heart. Doatingly fond of his wife, Mariamne, and not being
able to bear the thought of her falling into the hands of another, he
exacted a solemn promise from Joseph, whom he appointed to govern in his
absence, that should the accusation prove fatal to him he would put the
queen to death. Joseph disclosed the secret to Mariamne, who, abhorring
such a savage proof of his love, from that moment conceived the deepest
and most settled aversion to her husband. Herod, by great pecuniary
sacrifices, made his peace with Antony, and returned in high credit.
Some hints were thrown out respecting Joseph’s familiarity with Mariamne
during his absence; he communicated his suspicions to his wife, who,
recriminating, upbraided him with his cruel order concerning her. His
rage was unbounded; he put Joseph to death for communicating the secret
entrusted to him alone, and he threw his mother-in-law, Alexandra, into
prison.
2. In the war between Antony and Octavius, Herod raised an army for the
purpose of joining the former; but he was obliged first to engage
Malchus, king of Arabia, whom he defeated and obliged to sue for peace.
After the battle of Actium, his great object was to make terms with the
conqueror; and, as a preliminary step, he put to death Hyrcanus, the
only surviving male of the Asmodeans; and, having secured his family, he
embarked for Rhodes, where Augustus at that time was. He appeared before
the master of the Roman world in all the regal ornaments excepting his
diadem, and with a noble confidence related the faithful services he had
performed for his benefactor, Antony, concluding that he was ready to
transfer the same gratitude to a new patron, from whom he should hold
his crown and kingdom. Augustus was struck with the magnanimity of the
defence, and replaced the diadem on the head of Herod, who remained the
most favoured of the tributary sovereigns. When the emperor afterward
travelled through Syria, in his way to and from Egypt, he was
entertained with the utmost magnificence by Herod; in recompense for
which he restored to him all his revenues and dominions, and even
considerably augmented them. His good fortune as a prince, was poisoned
by domestic broils, and especially by the insuperable aversion of
Mariamne, whom at length he brought to trial, convicted, and executed.
She submitted to her fate with all the intrepidity of innocence, and was
sufficiently avenged by the remorse of her husband, who seems never
after to have enjoyed a tranquil hour.
3. His rage being quenched, Herod endeavoured to banish the memory of
his evil acts from his mind by scenes of dissipation; but the charms of
his once loved Mariamne haunted him wherever he went: he would
frequently call aloud upon her name, and insist upon his attendants
bringing her into his presence, as if willing to forget that she was no
longer among the living. At times he would fly from the sight of men,
and on his return from solitude, which was ill suited to a mind
conscious of the most ferocious deeds, he became more brutal than ever,
and in fits of fury spared neither foes nor friends. Alexandra, whose
malignity toward her daughter has been noticed, was an unpitied victim
to his rage. At length he recovered some portion of self-possession, and
employed himself in projects of regal magnificence. He built at
Jerusalem a stately theatre and amphitheatre, in which he celebrated
games in honour of Augustus, to the great displeasure of the zealous
Jews, who discovered an idolatrous profanation in the theatrical
ornaments and spectacles. Nothing, it is said, gave them so much offence
as some trophies which he had set round his theatre in honour of
Augustus, and in commemoration of his victories, but which the Jews
regarded as images devoted to the purposes of idol worship. For this and
other acts of the king a most serious conspiracy was formed against him,
which he, fortunately for himself, discovered; and he exercised the most
brutal revenge on all the parties concerned in it. He next built
Samaria, which he named Sebaste, and adorned it with the most sumptuous
edifices; and for his security he built several fortresses throughout
the whole of Judea, of which the principal was called Cæsarea, in honour
of the emperor. In his own palace, near the temple of Jerusalem, he
lavished the most costly materials and curious workmanship; and his
palace Herodion, at some miles’ distance from the capital, by the beauty
of its situation, and other appropriate advantages, drew round it the
population of a considerable city.
4. To supply the place of his lost Mariamne, he married a new wife of
the same name, the beautiful daughter of a priest, whom he raised to the
high rank of the supreme pontificate. He sent his two sons, by the first
Mariamne, to be educated at Rome, and so ingratiated himself with
Augustus and his ministers, that he was appointed imperial procurator
for Syria. To acquire popularity among the Jews, and to exhibit an
attachment to their religion, he undertook the vast enterprise of
rebuilding the temple of Jerusalem, which he finished in a noble style
of magnificence in about a year and a half. During the progress of this
work he visited Rome, and brought back his sons, who had attained to
man’s estate. These at length conspired against their father’s person
and government, and were tried, convicted, and executed. Another act
deserving of notice, performed by Herod, was the dedication of his new
city of Cæsarea, at which time he displayed such profuse magnificence,
that Augustus said his soul was too great for his kingdom.
Notwithstanding the execution of his sons, he was still a slave to
conspiracies from his other near relations. In the thirty-third year of
his reign, OUR SAVIOUR was born. This event was followed, according to
the Gospel of St. Matthew, by the massacre of the children of Bethlehem.
About this time, Antipater, returning from Rome, was arrested by his
father’s orders, charged with treasonable practices, and was found
guilty of conspiring against the life of the king. This and other
calamities, joined to a guilty conscience, preying upon a broken
constitution, threw the wretched monarch into a mortal disease, which
was doubtless a just judgment of Heaven on the many foul enormities and
impieties of which he had been guilty. His disorder was attended with
the most loathsome circumstances that can be imagined. A premature
report of his death caused a tumult in Jerusalem, excited by the
zealots, who were impatient to demolish a golden eagle which he had
placed over the gate of the temple. The perpetrators of this rash act
were seized, and by order of the dying king, put to death. He also
caused his son Antipater to be slain in prison, and his remains to be
treated with every species of ignominy. He bequeathed his kingdom to his
son Archelaus, with tetrarchies to his two other sons. Herod, on his
dying bed, had planned a scheme of horrible cruelty which was to take
place at the instant of his own death. He had summoned the chief persons
among the Jews to Jericho, and caused them to be shut up in the
hippodrome, or circus, and gave strict orders to his sister Salome to
have them all massacred as soon as he should have drawn his last breath:
“for this,” said he, “will provide mourners for my funeral all over the
land, and make the Jews and every family lament my death, who would
otherwise exhibit no signs of concern.” Salome and her husband, Alexas,
chose rather to break their oath extorted by the tyrant, than be
implicated in so cruel a deed; and accordingly, as soon as Herod was
dead, they opened the doors of the circus, and permitted every one to
return to his own home. Herod died in the sixty-eighth year of his age.
His memory has been consigned to merited detestation, while his great
talents, and the active enterprise of his reign, have placed him high in
the rank of sovereigns.
Idumean, born B. C. 71. At the age of twenty-five he was made by his
father governor of Galilee, and distinguished himself by the suppression
of a band of robbers, with the execution of their leader, Hezekiah, and
several of his comrades. As he had performed this act of heroism by his
own authority, and had executed the culprits without the form of trial,
he was summoned before the sanhedrim, but, through the strength of his
party and zeal of his friends, he escaped any censure. In the civil war
between the republican and Cæsarian parties, Herod joined Cassius, and
was made governor of Cœlo-Syria; and when Mark Antony arrived
victorious in Syria, Herod and his brother found means to ingratiate
themselves with him, and were appointed as tetrarchs in Judea; but in a
short time an invasion of Antigonus, who was aided by the Jews, obliged
Herod to make his escape from Jerusalem, and retire first to Idumea, and
then to Egypt. He at length arrived at Rome, and obtained the crown of
Judea upon occasion of a difference between the two branches of the
Asmodean family. Hyrcanus had been for a considerable time prince and
high priest of the Jewish nation; but while the Roman empire was in an
unsettled state, after the death of Julius Cæsar, Antigonus, son of
Aristobulus, brother of Hyrcanus, made himself master of the city and
all Judea. In this state Herod found things when he came to Rome, and
the most that he then aimed at was to obtain the kingdom for
Aristobulus, his wife’s brother; but the senate of Rome, moved by the
recommendations of Mark Antony, conferred the kingdom of Judea upon
Herod himself. Having met with this unexpected success at Rome, he
returned without delay to Judea, and in about three years got possession
of the whole country. He had, however, to fight his way to the throne,
which, as we have seen, was in the possession of Antigonus. Though aided
by the Roman army, he was obliged to lay siege to Jerusalem, which held
out for six months, when it was carried by assault, and a vast slaughter
was made of the inhabitants, till the intercession and bribes of Herod
put an end to it. Antigonus was taken prisoner and put to death, which
opened the way to Herod’s quiet possession of the kingdom. His first
cares were to replenish his coffers, and to repress the faction still
attached to the Asmodean race, and which regarded him as a usurper. He
was guilty of many extortions and cruelties in the pursuit of these
objects. Shortly after this, an accusation was lodged against Herod
before Mark Antony by Cleopatra, who had been influenced to the deed by
his mother-in-law, Alexandra. He was summoned to answer to the charges
exhibited against him before the triumvir; and on this occasion he gave
a most remarkable display of the conflict of opposite passions in a
ferocious heart. Doatingly fond of his wife, Mariamne, and not being
able to bear the thought of her falling into the hands of another, he
exacted a solemn promise from Joseph, whom he appointed to govern in his
absence, that should the accusation prove fatal to him he would put the
queen to death. Joseph disclosed the secret to Mariamne, who, abhorring
such a savage proof of his love, from that moment conceived the deepest
and most settled aversion to her husband. Herod, by great pecuniary
sacrifices, made his peace with Antony, and returned in high credit.
Some hints were thrown out respecting Joseph’s familiarity with Mariamne
during his absence; he communicated his suspicions to his wife, who,
recriminating, upbraided him with his cruel order concerning her. His
rage was unbounded; he put Joseph to death for communicating the secret
entrusted to him alone, and he threw his mother-in-law, Alexandra, into
prison.
2. In the war between Antony and Octavius, Herod raised an army for the
purpose of joining the former; but he was obliged first to engage
Malchus, king of Arabia, whom he defeated and obliged to sue for peace.
After the battle of Actium, his great object was to make terms with the
conqueror; and, as a preliminary step, he put to death Hyrcanus, the
only surviving male of the Asmodeans; and, having secured his family, he
embarked for Rhodes, where Augustus at that time was. He appeared before
the master of the Roman world in all the regal ornaments excepting his
diadem, and with a noble confidence related the faithful services he had
performed for his benefactor, Antony, concluding that he was ready to
transfer the same gratitude to a new patron, from whom he should hold
his crown and kingdom. Augustus was struck with the magnanimity of the
defence, and replaced the diadem on the head of Herod, who remained the
most favoured of the tributary sovereigns. When the emperor afterward
travelled through Syria, in his way to and from Egypt, he was
entertained with the utmost magnificence by Herod; in recompense for
which he restored to him all his revenues and dominions, and even
considerably augmented them. His good fortune as a prince, was poisoned
by domestic broils, and especially by the insuperable aversion of
Mariamne, whom at length he brought to trial, convicted, and executed.
She submitted to her fate with all the intrepidity of innocence, and was
sufficiently avenged by the remorse of her husband, who seems never
after to have enjoyed a tranquil hour.
3. His rage being quenched, Herod endeavoured to banish the memory of
his evil acts from his mind by scenes of dissipation; but the charms of
his once loved Mariamne haunted him wherever he went: he would
frequently call aloud upon her name, and insist upon his attendants
bringing her into his presence, as if willing to forget that she was no
longer among the living. At times he would fly from the sight of men,
and on his return from solitude, which was ill suited to a mind
conscious of the most ferocious deeds, he became more brutal than ever,
and in fits of fury spared neither foes nor friends. Alexandra, whose
malignity toward her daughter has been noticed, was an unpitied victim
to his rage. At length he recovered some portion of self-possession, and
employed himself in projects of regal magnificence. He built at
Jerusalem a stately theatre and amphitheatre, in which he celebrated
games in honour of Augustus, to the great displeasure of the zealous
Jews, who discovered an idolatrous profanation in the theatrical
ornaments and spectacles. Nothing, it is said, gave them so much offence
as some trophies which he had set round his theatre in honour of
Augustus, and in commemoration of his victories, but which the Jews
regarded as images devoted to the purposes of idol worship. For this and
other acts of the king a most serious conspiracy was formed against him,
which he, fortunately for himself, discovered; and he exercised the most
brutal revenge on all the parties concerned in it. He next built
Samaria, which he named Sebaste, and adorned it with the most sumptuous
edifices; and for his security he built several fortresses throughout
the whole of Judea, of which the principal was called Cæsarea, in honour
of the emperor. In his own palace, near the temple of Jerusalem, he
lavished the most costly materials and curious workmanship; and his
palace Herodion, at some miles’ distance from the capital, by the beauty
of its situation, and other appropriate advantages, drew round it the
population of a considerable city.
4. To supply the place of his lost Mariamne, he married a new wife of
the same name, the beautiful daughter of a priest, whom he raised to the
high rank of the supreme pontificate. He sent his two sons, by the first
Mariamne, to be educated at Rome, and so ingratiated himself with
Augustus and his ministers, that he was appointed imperial procurator
for Syria. To acquire popularity among the Jews, and to exhibit an
attachment to their religion, he undertook the vast enterprise of
rebuilding the temple of Jerusalem, which he finished in a noble style
of magnificence in about a year and a half. During the progress of this
work he visited Rome, and brought back his sons, who had attained to
man’s estate. These at length conspired against their father’s person
and government, and were tried, convicted, and executed. Another act
deserving of notice, performed by Herod, was the dedication of his new
city of Cæsarea, at which time he displayed such profuse magnificence,
that Augustus said his soul was too great for his kingdom.
Notwithstanding the execution of his sons, he was still a slave to
conspiracies from his other near relations. In the thirty-third year of
his reign, OUR SAVIOUR was born. This event was followed, according to
the Gospel of St. Matthew, by the massacre of the children of Bethlehem.
About this time, Antipater, returning from Rome, was arrested by his
father’s orders, charged with treasonable practices, and was found
guilty of conspiring against the life of the king. This and other
calamities, joined to a guilty conscience, preying upon a broken
constitution, threw the wretched monarch into a mortal disease, which
was doubtless a just judgment of Heaven on the many foul enormities and
impieties of which he had been guilty. His disorder was attended with
the most loathsome circumstances that can be imagined. A premature
report of his death caused a tumult in Jerusalem, excited by the
zealots, who were impatient to demolish a golden eagle which he had
placed over the gate of the temple. The perpetrators of this rash act
were seized, and by order of the dying king, put to death. He also
caused his son Antipater to be slain in prison, and his remains to be
treated with every species of ignominy. He bequeathed his kingdom to his
son Archelaus, with tetrarchies to his two other sons. Herod, on his
dying bed, had planned a scheme of horrible cruelty which was to take
place at the instant of his own death. He had summoned the chief persons
among the Jews to Jericho, and caused them to be shut up in the
hippodrome, or circus, and gave strict orders to his sister Salome to
have them all massacred as soon as he should have drawn his last breath:
“for this,” said he, “will provide mourners for my funeral all over the
land, and make the Jews and every family lament my death, who would
otherwise exhibit no signs of concern.” Salome and her husband, Alexas,
chose rather to break their oath extorted by the tyrant, than be
implicated in so cruel a deed; and accordingly, as soon as Herod was
dead, they opened the doors of the circus, and permitted every one to
return to his own home. Herod died in the sixty-eighth year of his age.
His memory has been consigned to merited detestation, while his great
talents, and the active enterprise of his reign, have placed him high in
the rank of sovereigns.