Jewish Revolt Agains Rom at Masada
Masada: A heroic last stand against Rome
Two chiliad years agone, 967 Jewish men, women, and children reportedly chose to take their own lives rather than suffer enslavement or death at the hands of the Roman army. They were the final holdouts of the First Jewish Revolt against Rome, which had ended officially 3 years earlier, in 70 CE, with an unimaginable disaster: the destruction of Jerusalem and the 2d Temple. During the revolt, these families establish refuge atop Masada, a remote mountain overlooking the Expressionless Sea that had been fortified by King Herod the Great seventy years before. Now, withal, they were besieged by an overwhelming Roman force, and it was clear the fortress would autumn. At this disquisitional moment, the insubordinate leader Eleazar Ben-Yair gathered the men together and convinced them to commit mass suicide. So persuaded, each man killed his own wife and children. Then the men gathered together and drew lots, determining which x of them would put the others to death. The ten remaining men drew lots again, and one man killed the other nine before taking his own life, as the aboriginal Jewish historian Flavius Josephus describes:
"Finally, then, the nine bared their throats, and the concluding alone survivor, later surveying the prostrate multitude, to meet whether haply amid the shambles there were yet one left who needed his hand, and finding that all were slain, set the palace ablaze, and then collecting his force drove his sword clean through his torso and fell abreast his family."
(War vii.397-398; Loeb translation)
Present most visitors to Masada come up from Jerusalem via a highway along the western shore of the Dead Bounding main, arriving on the mountain's east side. Others make the trip from the due west, past way of the town of Arad and arriving at the Roman ramp. In the summer months, thousands of youth from away class a continuous line climbing the mountain earlier sunrise past fashion of the Ophidian Path. After the dominicus comes up, many more tourists pack the cablevision car for a ride to the summit. All these visitors share one goal: to stand on the very spot where a small band of Jewish rebels made their final stand up against the mighty Roman Empire.
Josephus' business relationship of the mass suicide at Masada is so compelling that later on Israel was established in 1948, the slogan "Masada shall not fall again" became symbolic of the modern state. The example of Jews putting upwards a heroic resistance to the death instead of going meekly to their slaughter had slap-up appeal in the wake of the Holocaust and at a time when State of israel's population felt embattled. Still, times take changed, and with them, so have perspectives on Masada. For one affair, fifty-fifty those who comprehend the mass suicide as a symbol of modern State of israel must reconcile it with Judaism's prohibition against taking one'southward ain life (although according to Josephus' account, only the last man died by his ain paw). More importantly, in today'southward post-Zionist era the story of Masada has become a less compelling model for Israelis. And scholarly views take changed as well. For example, many scholars at present believe Josephus' description of the mass suicide (the merely aboriginal account of this episode) is fabricated—that it never happened!
One of the "myths" surrounding Masada that I explore in my book, Masada: From Jewish Revolt to Mod Myth (Princeton University Press, 2019), concerns whether the mass suicide really happened. As I explicate, this is a question that archaeology is not equipped to answer. For example, nowadays visitors to Masada are shown the spot where the "lots" were constitute, in a infinite to the west of the big bathhouse in the northern palace circuitous. This area displayed signs of a violent conflagration, and more than 250 ostraca (inscribed potsherds) were found dumped here, some inscribed with names which might be connected to the distribution of food among the rebels. The famous Israeli archaeologist Yigael Yadin, who excavated Masada from 1963–1965 and was also principal-of-staff of the Israel Defense force Forces (IDF), identified twelve of the ostraca as lots because they were written past the same hand and are inscribed with Hebrew names, including "ben Yair." Yet, Joseph Naveh, who published these ostraca, was unable to identify them conclusively as the lots mentioned by Josephus. 1 problem is that there are twelve ostraca in the group, not ten. Yadin argued that 1 ostracon had never been completed, which leaves xi ostraca. He therefore suggested that Josephus did not include Eleazar ben Yair among the final 10 men who drew lots, based on the supposition that the ostracon inscribed ben Yair refers to the insubordinate leader. Another problem noted past Naveh is that the lots resemble ostraca inscribed with names found elsewhere around Masada. Therefore, whether these ostraca are lots or were used for other purposes remains an open question. The ostraca and other archaeological remains can be interpreted differently every bit either supporting or disproving Josephus' account. Whether or not the mass suicide story is true depends on how one evaluates Josephus' reliability every bit an historian.
A second "myth" concerns Masada'southward iconic status: how did the site of a reported mass suicide of a band of Jewish rebels who terrorized other Jews become a symbol of the modern Israel? These rebels included the sicarii, who, by the winter of 67/68 C.E., were using Masada as a base for raiding nearby settlements including Ein Gedi, where they massacred upward of seven hundred villagers during the Passover festival (Josephus, State of war 4.399-405). The creation of the Masada myth — in which these Jewish rebels are transformed into freedom fighters and the mass suicide becomes a heroic last stand — has been explored by a number of scholars. While archeology has been used in many countries to advance political or nationalistic agendas, Masada perhaps best exemplifies this phenomenon. Although Masada's eventual fame is largely a result of Yadin's excavations, the site had become a symbol of the modern Israel long before the 1960s thanks to the Israeli archeologist Shmaryahu Gutman. First in the 1930s, Gutman organized treks to Masada for youth movements which established the site equally an keepsake of Zionist aspirations. With the creation of State of israel in 1948, Masada became a symbol of the new state.
Afterwards Yadin'due south excavations, the archaeological remains underwent restoration and Masada became a national park. Masada'south prototype as a symbol of Jewish heroism, the Zionist enterprise, and the State of Israel was elevated through its connection to Yadin, who promoted this association in various ways. In 2001 Masada became Israel'southward commencement UNESCO World Heritage site, and it remains the second-nearly visited archaeological site in Israel. Although Masada has lost much of its relevance to Israelis as a national symbol, it still resonates with Diaspora Jews who brand the pilgrimage to the top of the mountain, where their guides relate the story of a small ring of liberty fighters who fabricated a heroic terminal stand up confronting Rome.
Jodi Magness is the Kenan Distinguished Professor for Instruction Excellence in Early Judaism in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Her books includeThe Archaeology of the Holy Land from the Devastation of Solomon's Temple to the Muslim Conquest andStone and Dung, Oil and Spit: Jewish Daily Life in the Time of Jesus. In 1995, Magness codirected excavations in the Roman siege works at Masada, and since 2011 she has directed excavations at Huqoq in Galilee.
Source: https://press.princeton.edu/ideas/masada-a-heroic-last-stand-against-rome
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