604

JEWS CAST INTO GEHENNA.

After offering heathen sacrifice over the ruins of the holy temple, the Roman soldiers turned their attention to the remaining Jews fortified on Mount Zion. Famished and disheartened they were forced to seek a parley with their hated conquerors.

John and Simon came to the western end of the bridge, over the Tyropean valley, and Titus, with his staff, stood on the eastern end, not four hundred feet apart. John and Simon knew not a word of Latin, Titus not a word of Hebrew, but through interpreters the parley began and ended. Briefly it was as follows:

TITUS. Surrender, and your lives will be spared.

JEWS.-We have sworn never to surrender to pagans.

This haughty reply exasperated the Roman general, who answered that they might prepare for the worst, for extermination would surely follow their further resistance.

To carry the fortifications of Zion was an impossibility; therefore Titus erected four great mounds under the eastern wall of Herod's palace-the very building in which Pilate had examined Jesus and declared, “I find no fault in Him." On these mounds the Roman engines were set up, and heated stones and other deadly missiles were flung into the Jewish garrison. . . . Driven from thence the Jews fled into the three great towers, at the western extremity of the city (Mariamne,· Phaselis, and Hippicus), built by Herod the Great. These were connected by underground passages. Here the last desperate struggle ensued; but the Jews, too weak and exhausted for long resistance, soon were overpowered. The Romans made a breach in the first wall and fell madly upon the staggering, famished foe. A few escaped and fled-where? Into the Valley of Hinnom!

Already had 600,000 Jewish carcasses been cast over the southern wall of Jerusalem into Gehenna! They had become so numerous and offensive within the city as to impede the progress and endanger the lives of the Roman soldiers, hence, during (probably) the several days' (20) parley and delay in erecting engines, these bodies had been cast into Gehenna.

END OF THE JEWISH AGE.

605 Now the remnant of the Jews fled through Siloam and into and over Hinnom, "secreting themselves in the caves and vaults as best they could." The wall of Titus circumvallated the hills just south of this valley of bones, preventing all escape. Having completed the slaughter at the towers and in all the city, the Romans fell upon the remnant of the Jews and finished them up in the Valley of Hinnom! The caves were searched and the last fugitive put to the sword.

Then Titus razed the entire city to the ground, beginning with the temple, "leaving not one stone upon another that was not thrown down," as Jesus had foretold; following by destroying the two bridges over the Tyropean valley, leaving but a spring of the eastern arch standing, and the western foundation wall of the temple, north of it, now known as "the Jews' Wailing-place."

In the hiding of the Jews in the caves and under the rocks of the southern hills, above mentioned, we find a literal fulfilment of the words of Jesus, that they should in these last days call for the "Mountains to fall on them and the rocks to cover them."

One landmark, only, was left by the Roman general

"I wish to show to the world," said Titus with no little pride, "what was the strength of the city, which only Roman valor could subdue."

The tower of Hippicus was therefore left standing. It is called, erroneously, the "Tower of David."-See illustration, page 52.

Simon and John were captured alive, and carried to Rome to grace the victor's triumph, according to Roman custom. Some thousands were sold as slaves, others were distributed among the theatres to fight wild beasts, or as gladiators. So perished the Jewish Nation! *

"And they who do not fall by the sword shall be led away captives unto all nations, and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles."

* History of the Jews; Josephus' Wars; Dr. Schaff, Dr. Israel P. Warren, and others.

THE SANHEDRIM,

"MORE properly Sanhedrin, the supreme judicial council of the Jews, especially for religious affairs."-Bib. Encyc., Kitto. 'This council consisted of a president, who was the high priest, and seventy councilmen. These latter were chosen of the most eminent priests, and scribes (and elders) of the people, who were chosen for life, but each of whom had to look to his own industry for support."—Dr. Jost.

These are the "priests," "elders of the people" and "scribes" of the gospels. Once they are called "doctors -in Luke 2: 46. It is with the Sanhedrin of the time of Christ that we have to do here. Its origin is not clear.

"The Sanhedrin had power to try capital offences, but it had no power to execute the sentence of death." John 18:31 -Andrews. This power had been taken from them by the Roman government.

་

"The Tabernæ,' where they establish their sessions, were shops near the gate Shusan (door into the temple) and so connected with the temple. They went up to that room where they usually met" (Greswell, Krafft, Andrews, 508). In emergencies they might meet at the high-priest's house.

The "chief priest" of the gospels is one, the head, of the ecclesiastical power of the Jews, but the "chief priests" were the heads of the twenty-four priestly classes (Dr. Abbott). "The scribes" were the rabbis (fathers) who were learned in the literature of the church, both scriptural and traditional. A "lawyer" was equivalent to the title of scribe. -Dr. Smith.

THE SANHEDRIN BEFORE WHICH JESUS WAS BROUGHT, on the night of April 7, A. D. 30, was as follows:

The members sat in a semicircle, on mats, with their bare feet crossed before or under them and heads turbaned. The president, i. ., chief priest, CAIAPHAS, in full costume, sat in the centre; the vice-president, Annas, sat at his right hand (Talmud); Gamaliel, the venerable "doctor of the law (Acts 5: 34) and a Pharisee,” may have sat at the left hand; John and