43. Compare here generally Unruh, D. alte Jerusalem.
44. St. Mark xiv. 66.
45. St. Luke xxiii. 6, 7.
46. Jos. War ii. 3. 1.
47. Ant. xv. 8 . 1.
48. Ant. xvii. 10. 2; War ii. 3. 1, 2.
All this was Jerusalem above ground. But there was an under ground Jerusalem also,
which burrowed everywhere under the city - under the Upper City, under the Temple,
beyond the city walls. Its extent may be gathered from the circumstance that, after the
capture of the city, besides the living who had sought shelter there, no fewer than 2,000
dead bodies were found in those subterranean streets.
Close by the tracks of heathenism in Jerusalem, and in sharp contras t, was what gave to
Jerusalem its intensely Jewish character. It was not only the Temple, nor the festive
pilgrims to its feasts and services. But there were hundreds of Synagogues,49 some for
different nationalities - such as the Alexandrians, or the Cyre nians; some for, or perhaps
founded by, certain trade-guilds. If possible, the Jewish schools were even more
numerous than the Synagogues. Then there were the many Rabbinic Academies; and,
besides, you might also see in Jerusalem that mysterious sect, the Essenes, of which the
members were easily recognized by their white dress. Essenes, Pharisees, stranger Jews
of all hues, and of many dresses and languages! One could have imagined himself almost
in another world, a sort of enchanted land, in this Jewish metropolis, and metropolis of
Judaism. When the silver trumpets of the Priests woke the city to prayer, or the strain of
Levite music swept over it, or the smoke of the sacrifices hung like another Shekhinah
over the Temple, against the green background of Olivet; or when in every street, court,
and housetop rose the booths at the Feast of Tabernacles, and at night the sheen of the
Temple illumination threw long fantastic shadows over the city; or when, at the Passover,
tens of thousands crowded up the Mount with their Paschal lambs, and hundreds of
thousands sat down to the Paschal supper - it would be almost difficult to believe, that
heathenism was so near, that the Roman was virtually, and would soon be really, master
of the land, or that a Herod occupied the Jewish throne.
49. Tradition exaggerates their number as 460 (Jer. Kethub. 35 c.) or even 480 (Jer. Meg.
73 d). But even the large number (proportionally to the size of the city) mentioned in the
text need not surprise us when we remember that ten men were sufficient to form a
Synagogue, and how many - what may be called 'private' - Synagogues exist at present in
every town where there is a large and orthodox Jewish population.
Yet there he was; in the pride of his power, and the reckless cruelty o f his ever-watchful
tyranny. Everywhere was his mark. Temples to the gods and to Cæsar, magnificent, and
magnificently adorned, outside Palestine and in its non-Jewish cities; towns rebuilt or
built: Sebaste for the ancient Samaria, the splendid city and harbour of Cæsarea in the
west, Antipatris (after his father) in the north, Kypros and Phasaelis (after his mother and
brother), and Agrippeion; unconquerable fortresses, such as Essebonitis and Machoerus in
Peræa, Alexandreion, Herodeion, Hyrcania, and Masada in Judæa - proclaimed his name
and sway. But in Jerusalem it seemed as if he had gathered up all his strength. The theatre