ouster failed. But the brutality of Jannaeus’s repressive regime thwarted
any possibility of peace between himself and his alienated subjects. (Qum-
ran texts remember him as the “Lion of Wrath.”) A more conciliatory situ-
ation appears to have developed under Jannaeus’s wife, Shelamzion
(Salome) Alexandra, who succeeded him (ruled 76-67).
According to Josephus, a key ingredient in Alexandra’s success was her
cultivation of the Pharisees, a group whose existence is first mentioned in
the context of the time of Jonathan. Josephus himself ascribes anti-
Hasmonean activity to Pharisaic instigation, a thesis that gains some plau-
sibility from his claim that Jannaeus crucified 800 members of the sect.
Alexandra, at any rate, placated the populace by involving the Pharisees in
her administration. It is clear, however, that for some Jews, the excesses of
Jannaeus and the sectarian flip-flopping of Hyrcanus were symptoms of a
more fundamental wrong: monarchic rule itself. When the contentious
sons of Alexandra appealed to Pompey for arbitration of their competing
claims in 63b.c.e., they were challenged by a third party, comprising more
than 200 of the most prominent men of Judea. Virulently opposed to both
Hasmoneans, these Jewish notables demonstrated to the Roman general
that their own forebearshad negotiated with the Senate, and had received the leadership of the
Jews as a free and autonomous people — the title of king not having
been taken, but with a high priest set over the nation. But that now these
men [Aristobulus II and Hyrcanus II] were holding power by virtue of
the fact that they had annulled the ancestral laws and had unjustly re-
duced the citizenry to slavery; for by a mass of mercenaries and by out-
rages and by many impious murders they had acquired royal power for
themselves. (Diodorus 40.2)The significance of this indictment, delivered at so pivotal a moment
in Jewish history (the eve of Rome’s first direct intervention into Judean
affairs), lies not in the historical veracity of its claims (which are debat-
able). Its importance lies rather in the contrast it draws between two vi-
sions of early Judaism: the ideal temple-community, governed by the To-
rah and presided over by a high priest; and the historical contingencies of a
sovereign state, struggling to maintain its independence amidst the
successor-kingdoms of Alexander the Great. In 63b.c.e., both the Hasmo-
nean princes and their aristocratic opponents viewed Rome as the key to
preserving their vision.48chris seeman and adam kolman marshakEERDMANS -- Early Judaism (Collins and Harlow) final text
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