Photograph by Michael Melford
Posted on 11/19/2008 4:55:19 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Herod was born in 73 B.C. and grew up in Judaea, a kingdom in the heart of ancient Palestine that was torn by civil war and caught between powerful enemies. The Hasmonaean monarchy that had ruled Judaea for 70 years was split by a vicious fight for the throne between two princely brothers, Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II. The kingdom was in turn caught in a larger geopolitical struggle between the Roman legions to the north and west, and the Parthians, historic enemies of Rome, to the east. Herod's father, the chief adviser to Hyrcanus and a gifted general, threw in his lot with the Romans, who banished Aristobulus and made Hyrcanus king of Judaea.
From boyhood, Herod saw the benefits of entente with the Roman overlords -- a stance that has long been judged a betrayal of the Jewish people -- and it was the Romans who would eventually make Herod king. Throughout his career he strove to reconcile their demands with those of his Jewish subjects, who jealously guarded their political and religious independence... and though Herod was raised as a Jew, he lacked the social status of the powerful old families in Jerusalem who were eligible to serve as high priest, as the Hasmonaean kings had traditionally done. Many of his subjects considered Herod an outsider -- a "half Jew," as his early biographer, the Jewish soldier and aristocrat Flavius Josephus later wrote -- and continued to fight for a Hasmonaean theocracy. In 43 B.C., Herod's father was poisoned by a Hasmonaean agent. Three years later, when the Parthians suddenly invaded Judaea, a rival Hasmonaean faction allied themselves with the invaders, deposed and mutilated Hyrcanus, and turned on Herod.
(Excerpt) Read more at ngm.nationalgeographic.com ...
Photograph by Michael Melford
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Just got mine in the mail - very cool map of the vicinity of Israel, and Temple Mount info on the back. Yes I am a mapaholic.
Israeli archaeologists unearth Herod family tombs
Reuters | Nov. 19, 2008 | Allyn Fisher-Ilan
Posted on 11/19/2008 4:43:06 PM PST by decimon
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2134982/posts
I do like their maps. :’)
I enjoy maps and the photos. But I cannot take anymore of NG’s snotty PC NPR writings. After another year of just looking at the picturs because the the articles are sooooo insulting I have decided after twentyfive years, not to renew.
the gay and cowardly visionary.
The interesting story here is the location of the Herodium. The article says it is “near Jerusalem”. However, it was about a days march from Jerusalem. You see Herod’s family were from Edom. Edom was south of Israel. Herod was an outsider and considered his reign as tenuous. To protect himself he built several palaces which were designed to protect a possible retreat to Edom should the Jews revolt.
The Herodium was one of those palaces. It stood on top of a large hill at the end of a valley. It was at least five stories high with the highest level intended to house Herod’s family. It was an imposing sight.
Now for the irony. Edomites are descended from Esau while Jews were descended from Jacob. They were twins in the womb, but Esau happened to come out first. The Bible, in the book of Genesis, promised the Jews that the eldest would serve the youngest. The promise was that the Edomites would serve the Jews, but instead, the Jews were serving the Edomites.
Consider that Bethlehem was within that valley. Consider that Jesus was born literally in the shadow of the Herodium. When the shepherds looked up they saw the symbol of Herod the Great, the King, the descendant of Esau. When they looked down, they saw the promised King, our Lord in a manger, the descendant of Jacob. They worshiped the promised King while ignoring the majesty of the earthly king.
This information was included in an archaeological video produced by Focus on the Family. The suggested lesson is that it is easy for us to be dazzled by the imposing world around us and forget to cling to the promise embodied by the King of Kings.
Yeah, I’m with that. Once in a while an issue looks interesting, so I’ll check it out, and if there’s enough reason, I’ll buy it off the newsstand. But I avoid any global warming demagoguery issues, and never read the “letters” section because apparently they only print the most stupid ones.
One detail that Herod might have used as a justification for infanticide is a variation of an Arab custom that lasted long into the Ottoman Empire.
Whenever a subservient people were left untended for a while, they would have lots of children, and their greater numbers tended to cause unrest. So the dominant people who slaughter a bunch of them, to keep them down.
This was not seen as unusual to the point that Moses threatened that it be done to the first born of Egypt far earlier. And this is important, because even then it could be a specialized rather than a general slaughter. That is, just first born. Not the whole family.
The Syrians under Roman rule were known to sacrifice children to the Roman gods. Besides the Carthaginians, other Phoenicians, and the Canaanites, Moabites and Sepharvites offered lots of their first-born as a sacrifice to their gods. Sometimes in the thousands.
Both Moses and later Jeremiah had to strongly demand that Hebrews not sacrifice their children, as late as 585 B.C.
So this lays the groundwork for Herod. If he had wanted to commit a mass infanticide, either to put the Hebrews in their place, or out of paranoia, for that time it wouldn’t have been unthinkable or impossible.
I’m also thinking of dumping them after 35 years. National Geographic’s compass has deviated left :(
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
Please ping me to note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of interest.
Obama Says A Baby Is A Punishment
Obama: “If they make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby.”
Please remove me from your list
If you open a Bible to Matthew 2:16-18, you’ll encounter one of the most notorious stories in any religion.
Suspicious of a prophesy about a new king, Herod the Great tricks the Magi into telling him where baby Jesus was born, then sends his soldiers to massacre every child under the age of two in Bethlehem.It’s a scene of shocking cruelty, one that has ensured King Herod’s name is still synonymous with evil today.
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