Customer Reviews

Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of Ancient Civilizations

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If you have any interest in the ancient world, you will not be able to put this one down. Every page yields new insights. The book is structured as a detailed refutation of everything you thought you knew about the mutual antipathy of the Romans and the Jews resulting in the destruction of the Second Temple. Whatever you thought you knew about Second Temple Judaism will be turned upside down. Whether or not you agree with the author's ultimate conclusion as to why the Temple was destroyed or are swayed by his belief that the aftermath of that destruction is still being felt today, the writer's erudition and plain-speaking, straightforward prose will draw you in.

A fascinating an in-depth look at these two iconic cities. Goodman pulls out all the stops in this exploration of The Roman Empire from the 1st to 4th century CE and it's responses and interactions to one of it's most exotic members, Jews in Palestine. Goodman explodes all the theories you've heard before about why the Jews were persecuted and how antisemitism developed in western Europe. Goodman points out that both Jews and Romans were content with the status-quo that had developed by the beginning of the 1st century CE, and if it hadn't of been for political radicals in Jerusalem, the fall of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty in Rome, and the beginning of Christianity as a faith independent of Judaism history would have played out quite differently. A great read for fans of Roman and Jewish history

You can be sure that any book which includes on its cover the words "magisterial" (twice), "monumental" and "massive" is not going to be a quick read. Martin Goodman's 550 plus page analysis of the relationship between the Jews and Rome is clearly a work of scholarship. His knowledge of both Rome and the Jews during the Roman Empire is prodigious.

His conclusion is not new that the Jews, prior to the destruction of the temple in 70, had actually been treated relatively well under the Romans and given, in many ways a privileged position compared to other conquered people. The Romans, like most world powers (the British and now Americans) were arrogant and sure that their ways must be the best - the God or Gods must be on their side! However, he shows convincingly that the strength of the Roman response to the various Jewish revolts and the subsequent opprobrium were driven more by political needs of Vespasian and his successors in Rome then any underlying prejudice to the Jews. He also clearly shows how the longer term anti-Jewish sentiments were created more by the Christians as they tried to separate from what were now the "impious" and "malodorous" Jews and establish that the destruction of the temple was God's punishment for the Jews' murder of Jesus, as he had prophesied.

In its Prologue ("The Destruction of Jerusalem") and its Epilogue ("The Origins of Antisemitism"), Goodman shows his ability to write succinctly and clearly. Many parts of the rest of the book can be more of a struggle as he includes multiple quotes and diverts off the main theme. Just one example of this is his section "Diversity and Toleration". It is important to understand how tolerate Rome was, however he goes on at great length about Spanish, Greek and other examples - about half way through I would have been happy to take his word on some of this.

The final couple of paragraphs of the book give me some concern as he tries to project this forward to today. It seems his inclusion of Moses Hess's vision for a Jewish state in Palestine (called "Rom and Jerusalem" - just like Goodman's book) as a test of tolerance towards Jews is an oversimplification of the issue of the creation of a Jewish state by Christian countries in the middle of Islamic lands. However, this is a minor variation from an otherwise balanced and objective analysis of a complex situation. This book is worth reading but with a little more editing it could have been a great book.

The title of this book and the Prologue about the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE might lead one to expect that this book would focus on the direct relationships between Rome and the Judean provinces over which it acquired formal or informal control from about 63 BCE onwards. Had it done that, it would have been much shorter than it is. We will indeed learn what brought the two societies into such violent conflict in the end; but for the most part the Romans tolerated great differences in the life-styles and institutions in the empire they controlled. With the exception of Caligula, they even allowed the Jews freedom from Emperor worship, and they exempted Jews from having to pay taxes in Sabbath years (one in seven) when Jewish law insisted that farm land remain fallow. Even when the ultimate authority was vested in the procurators, the Romans generally preferred to rule through the local Jewish authorities: High Priests, client kings or tetrarchs. These, or more particularly their Jewish subjects, did not like to have the ultimate authority vested in an alien power and may have disliked the culture of these aliens, but as long as their rule was not too intolerable, the two cultures rubbed along reasonably well. It did become intolerable in the end, and about a sixth of this immensely long book will deal with the Jewish revolts and the violent Roman repression. But for its first 400 pages or so, with a formidable display of detailed knowledge of Roman and Jewish society, it is simply interested in comparing and contrasting them, without suggesting that these differences made the final showdown inevitable. Occasionally we even lose sight of the relationship between the two societies, when, for example, Goodman embarks on surveys of the Roman history in general, with extensive passages, for example, on how the Romans treated their other possessions, on the nature of trade within the Empire, or on dynastic politics. Curiously, there are some major gaps in his account of Jewish history between 70 and 135: there is nothing on the significance of Johanan ben Zakkai, of Gamaliel II, of Jabneh or of the establishment of the Patriarchate there.

What were the reasons for the clash between the Romans and the Jews that led to the catastrophes of 70 CE? Goodman rejects the widely entertained idea that it was about the tension between Roman Hellenism and Hebraism. That tension had caused the Maccabean Revolt which began in 166 BCE; but Goodman implies that by the time of the Revolt of 66 CE the Jews in Judea had been too Hellenized for that to have been a significant factor (p.113). Even so, a later section of the book, entitled `Moralities', does highlight the differences between, on the one hand, the ethical foundations of the various Hellenistic schools, and on the other those of the synagogues.

Here are some other cultural differences between Romans and Jews:

The Romans had an acute sense of time and were interested in all the periods of their history; the Jews were vague about dates and were interested in little more than biblical history: Josephus is a a rarity in that he was at least interested in the history of his life-time; but he had to rely on gentile historians to fill in the gap of the 300 or so years which had elapsed between the end of the history in the Bible and his own life-time.

The Romans believed in Roma Aeterna and did not envisage its end; the Jews had the messianic belief that history would end at the End of Days with the coming of the Messiah.

The Romans believed in the sovereignty of the Populus Romanus, whether embodied in the old constitution or in the Emperor; the Jews, certainly after the end of the Hasmonean monarchy, believed only in the sovereignty of God.

The Romans were unashamed of nudity and of bodily functions; the Jews were obsessed with pollution and were self-conscious about nudity; and of course the Romans had none of the dietary rules that so dominated Jewish life. The Romans indulged in gladiatorial displays and the slaughter of animals and criminals in the arena; the Jews found this abhorrent and resented Herod staging similar events.

Goodman describes many other such contrasts in social attitudes, beliefs and institutions, though most of those would not lead to such tensions between Romans and Jews that they would contribute towards the clash between the two.

The Roman army had had to intervene several times before the Revolt to put down disorders, but Goodman, basing himself on Josephus, says that these disorders were caused by brigandage or by fights between Jews and Samaritans (and between Jews and Greeks in Alexandria) rather than being directed against Roman rule. What finally provoked the Jewish Revolt was the low calibre of a series of procurators, their tactlessness, and in particular the attempt of the procurator Florus to collect back taxes in Jerusalem. The 600 strong Roman garrison was surrounded, and surrendered their weapons on a promise of safe conduct but was then massacred - an outrage that the Romans could not possibly accept without condign punishment; and since it took four years for them to suppress the revolt and take Jerusalem, nothing less than massive destruction could satisfy them. The fact that the Revolt had swiftly spread throughout Judaea surely suggests that there had been more simmering anti-Roman feeling than Josephus - and, following him, Goodman - conveyed: Josephus, after all, wrote after having gone over to the Romans. Goodman sides with Josephus against a lost but recorded passage of Tacitus, that the destruction of the Temple had not been intended by Titus, but was set off on the initiative of a single soldier.

The last 150 pages show the aftermath: the crushing of the revolts against Trajan and against Hadrian; and then the impact of the growth of the Church and Rome becoming Christian.

When I saw that Martin Goodman had written a book devoted to events surrounding the so-called "Jewish war" of 66-70, I expected to be impressed. I have not been disappointed. Goodman writes as an historian. This means, among other things, that he makes a serious effort to bring the past before us for its own sake, and at least partly for the mere delight of examining it. So, in the former part of his study, he offers lucid and informative chapters on the nature and makeup of the Roman Empire at this period; on parallels, differences, and at times surprising similarities between Jewish and Roman identities and communities; on their sensitivities and lifestyles; and on their understandings of law, government, and politics. Each of these chapters is a major essay in its own right, as well as a mine of fascinating and often overlooked information. But while Goodman evidently has a historian's delight in this material, he does also have a specific purpose. The thread that runs through all is the question, What caused the war of 66? Cutting clean across much that has been written on this subject within recent decades, particularly from within the New Testament guild, Goodman's conclusion is, put simply, that there was no particular hostility between Roman and Jew before 66. Romans and Jews were certainly different from each other, but being different does not have to mean being in conflict. Particularly good here is Goodman's use of Josephus, which (contrary to what some critics have suggested) is judicious and apt. It is, as Goodman observes, "remarkable that Josephus' detailed narratives of those sixty years make so little mention of any consistent anti-Roman ideology at the heart of all the variegated disturbances he describes." Why is that remarkable? Because "in his account in Antiquities of the uprising led by Judas at the time of the Roman census in 6 CE, [Josephus] had alleged precisely that the `Fourth Philosophy' begun by Judas and his accomplice Saddok was responsible for the collapse of Jewish society and the eventual destruction of the Temple." The point is, given Josephus disapproved of anti-Roman sentiment, and attributed it only to those whom he called "bandits," nevertheless, the existence of such sentiment was exactly what he wanted his readers to believe had caused the war. What he writes, however, gives us the impression that even he had no real evidence that many had held such views. (The claim that owing to his "elite status" Josephus would not have known what was going on is, of course, absurd, and takes no account of how porous first century society actually was. It is notable that those who make such a claim frequently go on to advocate views of the relationship between Rome and Israel for which there is, in fact, no evidence whatever, generally in the light of misapplied social science theories that were intended as tools to explain data, not substitutes for it!) From the Roman viewpoint, a clear sign of how little, prior to 66, they expected trouble from Jewry is in the small number of troops felt necessary to control the Jews' politically rather insignificant homeland, and the poor quality (testified to by both Josephus and Tacitus) of those whom they sent out to run it.
So what led to the war? If Goodman is right - and I find him convincing, given the nature of the evidence - the disaster came about through a depressing mixture of chance, incompetence, and cynical political calculation that seems eerily similar to events that have led our own society into war more recently.
My praise of Goodman does not mean that I consider him beyond criticism. Clearly he does not understand how either Jews or Christians interpret Scripture. Nor, I think, does he really understand Virgil. Still, these (and other) faults do not affect his main thesis. If you want to know about relationships between first century Rome and Israel, and have time to read only one book, this is probably the one to choose.
For fuller discussion see my review article "Jersualem and Rome: A Tale of Two Cities" in The Sewanee Theological Review 51.1 (2007) 91-100.

Martin Goodman's book, Rome and Jerusalem is a detail study on why those two cities went to war against each other that resulted in utter destruction of the latter. The author takes a great deal of time and energy trying to explored the similarities and differences of the two cities to explained why the Jewish people so foolishly decided to revolt against the most powerful military forces of their times, not only once but twice!

From this book, I began to realized how stubborned the Jewish people were during that time period and amazingly, how tolerant Rome was in response. Not too many conquering power of the ancient world would tolerant two such revolts without whole scale genocidal slaughter and enslavement. Penalty of Jewish second revolt was diaspora of their people to four corners of the Roman Empire and lost of their homeland until the post World War II period. The book also reflects on the fact that anti-Semitism of the Jews originated strongly with the second revolt, a reflection of the Roman distaste for people who caused them so much problem.

If I was disappointed about one thing, it was that the author spent a considerable amount of pages writing about culture, way of life, religion and that sort things to mark the similarity and differences between the two cities. I was hoping on more detail view of the two Jewish Revolts, especially the second one since there isn't much written about it. However, he does make it clear the Zealots, a minority among the Jews were primary responsible for the destruction of many of their fellow citizens and their nation as a whole. Of course, after watching a fictional mini-series like Masada, I am not surprised by the terror tactics used by the zealots to enforced their will and to provoke a massive Roman response like murdering Roman prisoners after guaranteeing their safety.

Overall, this book gives a very good background information on the clash between the Roman Empire and the Jewish state but it doesn't give much on the actual revolts itself.

This is one of those dense history books that separates the true history buff (or academic) from the casual reader. Starting more or less from the reign of the Julio-Claudians - the first imperial dynasty of the Roman Empire after the fall of the Republic - the book compares the cultures when the vassalage of "Judea" (as worked out by Herod during Augustus' reign) functioned well, follows the deterioration of relations that culminated in the destruction of Jerusalem, and then examines the aftermath of repeated rebellion and the rise of Christians (and anti-Semitism). For many reasons, this is one of the most interesting historical nexuses there is.

First, the Imperial Regime of Rome is consolidating itself. The republican forms, such as rule (or some checks and balance) by the Senate as well as alternation of power, still exist but are increasingly irrelevant. Instead, a kind of quasi-religious autocracy (hinting at a totalitarian regime) has firmly taken hold. From the prudent Augustus, you witness the decadent and perhaps senile Tiberius, the cruelly insane Caligula, the almost-great Claudius, and finally the unbalanced Nero - all the time, the institutions related to the transfer of power are increasingly in crisis, leading to the terrible year 69 CE, in which there were 4 emperors who took power in civil war. The Army and Praetorians emerge as vital power brokers for the rest of Rome's history. Goodman's treatment of these years covers it as a narrative, but also as political science and cultural critique. This was a special treat for me, as I have long hoped to find a detailed description of what Augustus' regime led to, and here it is, in great detail.

Second, the Jews had reached a crucial period that would define their religion and culture into the modern era: with their monotheism and strictly prescribed culture of purity and moral comportment, their "tribal" mentality was beginning to distinguish clearly who belonged and who didn't. Compared to the licentious Romans with their multiple gods and tolerance for diversity and morals, they appeared rigid and exotic. This filled the greatest gap in my historical knowledge and hence was most instructive for me, but it was very heavy going at times.

Third, there were the Christians, who at that time were merely a sect of the Jews, in effect transforming their moral code to an evangelical universalism while discarding some of their practices, such as the circumcision that so horrified the Romans. Their numbers grew slowly, amazingly to become the official creed under the Emperor Constantine around 300 CE, almost totally divorced from its cultural and ethnic origins with the Jews.

What the book accomplishes so masterfully is to explain how circumstances aligned themselves to create a terrible cataclysm for the Jews. It was at the time that Nero was ousted, he argues, that Vespasian - the military governor of the province of Assyria - needed the appearance of a major victory to make his claim to the office of Emperor. Somehow, under his son Titus, this meant crushing the Jews and perhaps even purposefully burning Herod's temple in 70 CE, though that may have been an accident as Goodman argues. The result was a fundamental disenfranchisement of nearly unprecedented savagery, which stamped the Jewish soul forever afterwards, as deeply as occurred over 1,000 years before, under the Egyptians. Interestingly, he argues that this was not at all inevitable but a direct consequence of the power struggles in Rome; the bitterness and rebelliousness it engendered among the Jews then led to a series of violent wars and periodical repression and persecution. Hadrian took over, in 117 CE, and after a major rebellion he turned old Jerusalem into a Roman colony, which lasted under the Byzantines until the Moslem conquests. Finally, Goodman sees the emergence of the Christians as the basis for anti-semitism, an argument that I didn't quite follow.

For anyone who can concentrate on historical detail, this is a great read full of insight and fascinating trains of reasoning. While academic and targeting a sophisticated audience with at least university education, it is beautifully written and flows in a uniquely informal style that incorporates rigorous logic and wonderful narrative description. Once I was with it, I deeply enjoyed it. Warmly recommended.

They are both eternal cities. Rome: symbol of law and secular power standing astride the world from the majestic elevation of the seven hills. Jerusalem: the most famous religious city where Herod's splendid Temple stood as thousands of Jewish pilgrims trekked to the Holy City to make sacrifices in the name of the Lord.
These two cities: Rome a libertine city and Jerusalem a puritanical city would clash in the first century during the Jewish wars of 66-70 and 132-135. Rome would emerge triumphant as the Temple was destroyed; thousands of Jews killed, enslaved and driven from their homes as Roman hegemony in the Near East was made a brutal fact.
Martin Goodman, a British historian, and expert on both Judaism and Rome tells the story of the clash of civilizatins with a scholarly, sober and sound expertise. The book would best be read by the reader who is already familiar with the major players of the era; a knowledge of the Bible and an understanding of the early Roman empire following the downfall of the Republic. Goodman is good in the rise to power of such Roman emperors as Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Gaius, Claudius, Nero, Hadrian, Trajan and others.
The Jewish War of 66 began due to widespread hatred of the Roman governor of Judea the infamous Florus. It came at a time when a fight for power was going on in Rome. Vespasian and his son Titus who conquered Jerusalem made much ado of their conquest winning brownie points back home in Rome cementing their new position as emperors. Until then the Romans had governed Judea with a light hand inside their iron glove.
Goodman chronicles the rise of Christianity and its growing antisemitism as church fathers sought to assure the Roman authorities that the new faith was completely at odds with Judaism. It was Constantine in the fourth century who became the first Christian emperor making Christianity the official religion of the Roman state.
The book is lengthy as Goodman quotes numerous first person authors of the period from the Jewish historian Josephus to such Roman writers as Tacitus, Suetonious, Cicero, Horace, Livy and others. He also quotes from the Bible and prominent rabbis who comment on the clash of cultures.
This is a book which demands your respect and attention. It would be a good textbook in a course on the Roman Empire and Judaism in the first century.

It was my pleasure to be supervised by Prof Martin Goodman whilst I was conducting research into aspects of First Century Palestine at St Cross College Oxford. As a summary reading of the various reviews posted about this book will reveal, it is relatively easy thing to find cavils with another scholar's work, but the task of reconstructing periods of history from the ancient world is an intricate one and can be, at times, a patently thankless exercise.

This chunky tome (even in paperback) spreads some 650 pages and is dense with valuable information and historical observations; it is a referential fund with respect to the areas of interfacing and interaction between the forces of Roman imperialism and the culture of the Jews.

But this is far more than either merely a cultural or an historical study; for example, Prof Goodman expounds an entire thesis regarding the origin and subsequent development and expansion of the messianic movement, amongst other things. In fact, more than one previous reviewer has been somewhat overwhelmed by the sheer density of the historical data contained herein.

As ever, Prof Goodman makes deft use of his sources and his treatment of Flavius Josephus is a model which most writers can only hope to aspire towards. Despite its length and scope, the author knows what to omit as well as what to include; apart from an abundance of pertinent observations, the reader is spared overbearing philosophizing although, inevitably, it is difficult to produce studies on events like the probable mass suicide at Masala without including a degree of comment, be that implicit or explicit.

This book is probably not something to read casually and deserves a notebook by its side. As a single volume reference book which 'does what it says on the cover' this reviewer has absolutely no hesitation in recommending it on the bases of its sound, thorough, scholarship and its general - albeit demanding in parts - readability.

Michael Calum Jacques

It was with great anticipation that I took up Martin Goodman's latest volume, having learned much from his 1996 work, "Mission and Conversion." However, I found myself initially disappointed by his reliance on Josephus as a central source for Judean/Jewish self-understanding. Further reading compounded my disappointment by revealing numerous factual errors.

Josephus is certainly one primary source that cannot be ignored when seeking to understand Jerusalem in the first century and its relationship to Rome. However, as authors such as Richard Horsley have shown (e.g., in his "Bandits, Prophets and Messiahs: Popular Movements at the Time of Jesus"), Josephus's elite status both covers up and fails to understand the diversity of views among people "below" him. Goodman's presentation would lead an uninformed reader to overreliance on Josephus's "view from above."

Goodman knows that the very term "Jew" is unclear in the first century, but gives short shrift to the extensive evidence provided by Shaye JD Cohen in his "Beginnings of Jewishness" (2001), using the term "Jews" to refer to a wide variety of people. One begins to suspect a hidden agenda, which is then brought out partially into the open on pp. 185-186:

"The notion that Jews in the late Second Temple period saw themselves as sinners permanently punished by God and in need of salvation from the sufferings of exile and Roman domination is a myth expressed particularly by New Testament scholars in order to provide a theological grounding for the mission of Jesus to Israel."

This "myth" has been argued more and more in recent years, with enormous evidence to support it. A primary exponent has been N.T. Wright (see "The New Testament and the People of God" [1996] and "Jesus and the Victory of God" [1997]). However, beyond this polemical statement, Goodman provides no evidence to support his statement.

It becomes more and more clear that at least part of Goodman's agenda is to refute Christian perspectives on first century Jerusalem's relationship with its Roman context. The ironic result, however, is precisely the kind of polemic that led to the division over Jesus in the first place. For instance, Goodman mentions some of the apocalyptic texts popular at the time (e.g., 4 Ezra) but fails to understand how apocalyptic "works" in terms of its "bifurcated" time structure (see, e.g., my co-authored "Unveiling Empire: Reading Revelation Then and Now"). Thus, he repeatedly refers to "end of the world" predictions within such literature that make "New Jerusalem" a fantasy world (p. 195) rather than an available, God-given alternative to empire generally, and in the first century context, Rome in particular.

Other errors abound. For instance, on p. 245, he refers to the rabbinic anticipation that all "Israel have a share in the world to come" as a "belief in the afterlife," when what is being referenced is the messianic "age to come" which, as clearly stated in texts such as Daniel 12, was anticipated as an earthly kingdom of God. Hence, the very Jewish Jesus could tell his disciples to pray: "Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." Neither the rabbis nor Jesus were speaking of "afterlife," but of the world made "righteous" by God's definitive action. Then on p. 263, he claims that "the garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus was arrested, was a kitchen garden or an orchard." However, there is no such place mentioned anywhere in the New Testament or other contemporaneous documents referring to a "garden of Gethsemane." For example, Mark 14.32 refers to a "place" or "spot" "called Gethsemane" on the Mount of Olives. John 18.1 refers simply to a "garden," which is clearly symbolic, not geographic, given that gospel's numerous echoes of the book of Genesis (see also John 19.41). To make the leap from a nonexistent place (which comes from a naive conflating of the two gospel texts) to a factual sounding categorization of it is very poor scholarship indeed, and renders many of Goodman's other statements suspect. I often found myself wondering if I could trust him on topics for which I didn't already have enough background from which to evaluate his claims.

There is a lot of solid literature on the first century relationships among Rome and its clients and other dependent peoples. Unfortunately, this volume is not among them.