Herod the Great
The outsider
We know more about Herod than we do about Jesus. His life and times were faithfully recorded in extraordinary detail by the historian Flavius Josephus, who lived 75-100 years after the Judaean monarch. Josephus’s books The Jewish Antiquities and The Jewish War were both based on a history written by Nicolaus of Damascus, who had been Herod’s personal secretary.
Legitimacy
Under Herod, the land of Judaea became an enterprise zone, and the Jewish faith was so fashionable that even some Romans took it up. But there was a problem: Herod wasn’t Jewish.
He was, in fact, an Arab. His mother, Cyprus, was a princess from the rose-red city of Petra in what is now Jordan. His diplomat father, Antipater, was an Idumaean, a member of a desert tribe that had been forced into Judaism at the point of a sword. To ‘real’ Jews, Herod came from a family of heathens. He would never be accepted as the legitimate ruler of Judaea and of the Jewish nation – the Bible said that only one of King David’s descendants could rule the Jews.
Herod was born in 73 BC, when Judaea was part of the Roman empire. It was ruled (under Roman control) from Jerusalem by a popular Jewish family, the ultra-religious Hasmonaeans, who were direct descendants of King David. Herod’s Arab father was their prime minister and a statesman of genius, a man the Romans could do business with.
Herod grew up in Jerusalem playing in the corridors of power. But he might as well have been in Rome. His father was on first-name terms with Julius Caesar, who in 47 BC made him epitropos – regent – and bestowed Roman citizenship on him, the empire’s greatest honour.
Herod and the bandits
Herod was already being groomed for power when only in his teens, and when he was 26, he was made tetrarch (governor) of Galilee:
But his youth was no hindrance. Rather, born shrewd, this young man found opportunity waiting to demonstrate his ability. For, on getting word that Hezekiah, the bandit chieftain, was overrunning the Syrian border with a big mob, [Herod] captured and executed him and many of the bandits with him.
Now the Syrians prized this deed of his very much, for he purged their territory of the bandits from whom they longed to be freed. And so for this they celebrated him throughout their villages and cities, saying he had restored peace and guaranteed them enjoyment of their properties. And so he became known to Sextus Caesar, the governor of Syria and relative of the great [Julius] Caesar.
Josephus, The Jewish Antiquities
These ‘bandits’ might actually have been Jewish nationalists, taking advantage of problems the Romans were having in their extended empire, to try to increase Hasmonaean power. But even if they weren’t Jewish, Herod’s execution of them got him in trouble. The Sanhedrin, the supreme Jewish council, went to Hyrcanus, the Hasmonaean figurehead, and complained:
Look how [Antipater's] son Herod has executed Hezekiah and many with him in violation of our Torah, which prohibits doing away with a man, even if he is evil, unless he is first condemned by the Sanhedrin to endure this. [Herod] ordered this without getting authorisation from you.
Josephus, The Jewish Antiquities
Hyrcanus ruled that Herod should be tried by the Sanhedrin, but in the event, the case was dropped. This might have been due to pressure brought by the Romans, or it may have had something to do with Herod himself. According to Josephus:
When Herod stood in the Sanhedrin surrounded by his soldiers, he struck terror in all of them. And none of those who had brought charges before he arrived dared to accuse him any more. Instead, there was silence and doubt about what was to be done.
The Jewish princess
Herod was now the Romans’ man, and they appointed him governor in Syria. In about 47 BC, he also married his first wife, Doris. Their son Antipater, named after his paternal grandfather, was the apple of Herod’s eye. But after six years of marriage he banished mother and child from his household – he had fallen for a Jewish princess.
Mariamme was probably only 13 or 14 at the time. She would become marriageable when she turned 16 in 37 BC, but to Herod, she was worth waiting for. She was royalty, the granddaughter of Hyrcanus, and by marrying her, Herod hoped to gain a place among the Jewish aristocracy. Her blood would guarantee their children the legitimacy that he craved. Mariamme was an investment in his future.
Mark Antony
However, the true key to Herod’s future success would be his relationship with Rome. That had started with a close friendship with Rome’s man in the east – playboy and politician Mark Antony. Unfortunately, Herod’s champion had fallen under the spell of the world’s most desirable woman, Cleopatra. Mark Antony was responsible for Rome’s interests in the eastern Mediterranean, including Judaea, but while he cavorted in Egypt, he neglected his military duties.
Herod watched in dismay as Judaea was invaded by the Parthians, a superpower to rival the Romans, who conquered an enormous territory stretching from modern-day Turkey to Pakistan. Now they occupied Jerusalem and installed their own Jewish puppet king.
Flight to Rome
Herod made a lightning escape from Jerusalem, heading south-east to Petra to rally neighbouring rulers to organise a counter-attack. When Petra refused to allow him in, he went to Alexandria where he had a meeting with Cleopatra. Then, in the middle of winter, he boarded a ship for Rome to seek the Romans’ help. If Judaea were no longer part of the Roman empire, Herod’s dreams of power and influence would come to nothing.
Even pirates stayed off the Mediterranean in winter. News of Herod’s daring voyage reached Rome before he did. When he appeared in the Senate house in 40 BC, his Roman masters were already impressed. This crucial meeting would change his life for ever.
The two most powerful people in Rome were Mark Antony and Octavian. Herod had had a long-term relationship with Mark Antony but virtually no contact with Octavian. Mark Antony was, in effect, his advocate.
The Romans’ hard man
Herod must have appeared very confident. He traded on his father’s good name to lend weight to his plea for continued support for the Hasmonaean royal family. But the senators didn’t care who ruled Judaea. They just wanted it to be Roman again, the Parthians to be defeated and a hard man to be in place to keep order.
To Herod’s surprise, his diplomatic mission became a job interview. The Senate pledged military support to remove the Parthians from Judaea, but they were not going to restore the rule of the Hasmonaeans.
Octavian Caesar convened the Senate. To it, Messala, along with Atratinus, presented Herod, detailing both the good services of his father [Antipater] and [Herod's] own support for the Romans ... And since the Senate was moved by these things, when [Mark] Antony came up and said that Herod should be king to help carry on the war with Parthia, all concurred.
Josephus, The Jewish War
The hard man the Romans needed was before them. Herod would be the new king of the Jews, whether the Jews liked it or not.
