Siege of Jerusalem

“ Let us, at least, award them the meed of praise for a courage which has never been equalled. Let us acknowledge that, in all the history of the world, if there has been no siege more bloody and tragic, so there has been no city more fiercely contested, more obstinately defended; and though we may believe that the fall of Jerusalem had been distinctly prophesied by our Lord, we must not therefore look on the Jews as the blind and fated victims of prophecy. ”

“ As he ascended the opposite slope of the ravine, he saw, descending toward the battle, the front of a rushing multitude, as irresistible and as destructive as a great sea in a storm.
He saw that the mob was turning toward Akra, and to avoid it, the Christian climbed up to the Tyropean Bridge, and from that point viewed the whole of Jerusalem sweeping down upon the heathen.
At the head of the inundation passed a melodious voice crying:
"An end, an end is come upon the four corners of the land! Draw near every man with his destroying weapon in his hands for the glory of the Lord! ”

“ By daybreak on June 10, 1099, the Christian army came in sight of Jerusalem. The spectacle transported all with mingled feelings of joy, reverence, and remorse. Some fell on their knees and prayed; others kissed the sacred soil; many wept for their sins; and the air ever and anon resounded with the shout: "It is God's will!" The siege was commenced at once, Godfrey fixing his camp on Mount Calvary. The Egyptians had prepared for a protracted defence, by strengthening the fortifications and furnishing the garrison with ample provisions. ”

“ Meanwhile, the soldiers of Simon and John came to prevent citizens from gathering in bodies, and with sword and spear drove into the struggle and added murder to it all. The spirit of terror then issued out of that bloody alley and seized upon street by street. Far and wide the tumult ran, growing in volume with every accession, until the raging and humiliated Titus, among his six hundred, heard Jerusalem howl like a beaten slave and hushed his pagan curses to listen. ”

“ But what is here chiefly remarkable is this, that no foreign nation ever came thus to destroy the Jews at any of their solemn festivals, from the days of Moses till this time, but came now upon their apostasy from God, and from obedience to him. Nor is it possible, in the nature of things, that in any other nation such vast numbers should be gotten together, and perish in the siege of any one city whatsoever, as now happened in Jerusalem. ”

“ In a.d. 66 the Jews rose in revolt against the Romans. In the war that followed there was a terrible siege of Jerusalem. Before the siege the Christians in the city had fled to Pella, east of the Jordan. ”

“ Meanwhile Jerusalem was in the fury of barbarous warfare. At this ravine and that debouching upon Golgotha, the Vale of Hinnom and the Valley of Tophet, whole legions of besiegers were stationed. Along the walls the men of Simon and the men of John tramped in armor. From the various gates furious sorties were made by swarms of unorganized Jews who fell upon the Romans unused to frantic warfare, and slaughtered, set fire to engines, destroyed banks and threw down fortifications and retreated within the gates before the demoralized Romans could rally. ”

“ But he proved to be a deformed old man, mute and weary, who was distressed for fear he would be detained by them and who hobbled out into the besieged city and posted as fast as his legs could carry him toward the house of Amaryllis, the Seleucid.
But at the edge of a great open space where the Herodian palaces had stood he came upon a concourse which seemed to be all Jerusalem. It was a gaunt horde, shouting, raging, prophesying and drowning the roar of battle at the Temple fortifications with the sound of religious frenzy. ”

“ Meeting a rush at the gate they drew swords and coolly hacked their way through screams of fear and pain and amazement. After them went a wave of curses and complaint. Citizens against the visitors; visitors against the citizens; soldiers against them all!
"And this cousin of mine meant to pacify all this!" the Ephesian exclaimed to himself.
Jerusalem, that had for fifteen hundred years adorned herself at this time with tabrets and had gone forth in the dance of them that make merry, was drunken with wormwood and covered with ashes. ”

“ Philadelphus repeated to himself. "Then, by Ate, I am the prince!"
"While we wait," Amaryllis continued, "let us talk of details which you may not have patience to hear after she comes. Jerusalem, as you have learned, is in grave danger–"
"Jerusalem should fear the Roman army less than herself. I have seen its disease."
"The citizens will hail Titus as a deliverer. But this week's ceremonies are bringing us disaster. Should Titus be forced to lay siege about us, how shall we feed this multitude of a million on the supplies gathered for only a third of that number?" ”

“ At the time, its population was swollen ten or twenty-fold by the pilgrims attending the Passover. The reserves of food were destroyed in faction fights even before the Romans arrived outside the city walls. "Of all wretched and bloody sieges in the world's history, few, if any, have been more wretched or more bloody than the siege of Jerusalem by Titus. Fierce and bloody as was the fighting, the deaths from sickness and famine were yet more terrible. Dead bodies were thrown out into the valleys, where they lay rotting, a loathsome mass. ”

“ Clouded by the vapor, targets for the immense missiles, the Jews heaving and writhing in personal encounters appeared black and inhuman. Every combatant shouted; the great stones screamed; the boiling pitch hissed and roared, and the thunder of the conflict shook the Temple to its very foundations.
Without, the Romans planted scaling ladders, mounted them and were pitched backward into the moat regularly. Regularly, the ladders were set up again after struggle, mounted without hesitation and thrown down again, with an inevitability which furnished a grim travesty to the struggle. ”

“ The nations are restless; a siege of Jerusalem is imminent, and her salvation is to be assured only by much war and a terrible shedding of blood. We know exactly how Israel fared and felt in the early sections of the Persian period: her interests in the politics of the world, her feelings towards her governors and her whole attitude to the heathen were not at that time those which are reflected in “Zech.” ”

“ After a siege of five weeks, they took Jerusalem by assault; and, impelled by a mixture of military and religious rage, they put the numerous garrison and inhabitants to the sword, without distinction. Neither arms defended the valiant, nor submission the timorous; no age or sex was spared; infants on the breast were pierced by the same blow with their mothers, who implored for mercy; even a multitude, to the number of ten thousand persons, who had surrendered themselves prisoners and were promised quarter, were butchered in cold blood by those ferocious conquerors. ”

“ That I shall do, dear father, for unto you it belongeth to command, and for me to obey.
⁠In the first year of the reign of Vespasian Titus muttered his army and found them sufficient for the siege of Jerusalem: he then Marched to Samaria and from thence to Atelona thirty furlongs from Jerusalem, where he pitched his camp, and the next day he brought his whole army to Jerusalem, a little before the feast of unleavened bread, which was April the 14th, so that an infinite number of people that came to celebrate were all shut up in the city, which raised a famine ”

“ He does not wish to begin His message in Jerusalem where His enemies, gathered together, are the strongest. He wishes to surround the city, take it from the outside, arrive there later with a following behind Him, when already the Kingdom of Heaven has begun slowly to lay siege to it. The Conquest of Jerusalem will be the last test, the supreme trial, the great battle, the tremendous battle between the greater than the Prophets and Jerusalem, slayer of Prophets. ”

“ Previous to this, he celebrated in Samaria, with hands stained with the blood of its inhabitants, his nuptials with Mariamne, to whom he had now for several years been betrothed.
88 As soon as Sosius had advanced into Judæa with a large army of Roman infantry, cavalry and Syrian mercenaries, the siege of Jerusalem was pressed. The besieging army numbered one hundred thousand men. They built ramparts, filled up the moats, and prepared their battering-rams. The besieged, though suffering from want of food, defended themselves heroically. ”

“ The city of Jerusalem was taken, after a long and tedious siege, in which the Jews suffered the extreme of famine, pestilence and the sword; filling houses with the dead, for want of a place to bury them, while women ate their own children, for want of all things. In this struggle there perished, in Judea, near one million and a half of Jews, besides those taken captive. Their country was laid waste, their city burned, their temple destroyed, and the miserable remnant dispersed abroad into all the nations of the earth ”

“ Within the Roman lines was a bent and deformed figure of an old waif that the soldiers had picked up attempting to run the lines into Jerusalem the second day after the siege had been laid about the Holy City.
The old man, though wrinkled and twisted and bowed, had fought with such terrible savagery and had incontinently laid in the dust in succession three of the camp's best fighting-men, that the Roman soldiers, for ever partizan to the strong man, had finally with great difficulty succeeded in trussing the old belligerent and had brought him before Titus. ”

“ It was therefore to be expected that the prediction of this event would be eagerly sought for by Christian commentators, in a prophecy relating to the establishment of the Messiah's [pg 134] kingdom, especially by those who chiefly look to political affairs for its fulfilment.
And accordingly this chapter appears to afford distinct intimation of such an event, as it opens with the express mention of the siege of Jerusalem. Yet is it mentioned in a way not a little embarrassing to the political exposition; for, instead of the destruction, the prophecy declares the triumph of Jerusalem ”

“ Still, considering all things, it might have been worse and, were it all over now--did no more dangers threaten our nation--we might even rejoice that no greater evils have befallen us, for our revolt against Rome. But what has been done is but a preparation for the siege of Jerusalem.
"However, do not let us begin to mourn over the future. The storm has, for the present, passed away from us and, whatever misfortunes have befallen our countrymen, we have happily escaped. The farm stands uninjured, and no harm has come to any of us."
"And all the villagers have escaped, John? ”

“ And when they had whipped the Idumeans and had a chance for flight before reinforcements came, they obeyed my voice in so far as they followed me into a subterranean chamber beneath a burned ruin on Zion.
"We were not followed and our hiding-place was not discovered. In fact, their resistance was a complete success. Whereupon, they were ready to unite and take Jerusalem! No–it was not strange! It is the nature of men. I never saw a wine-merchant in Ephesus, who, after clearing his shop of brawlers single-handed, was not ready thereupon to march upon Rome and besiege Cæsar on the Palatine! ”

“ Therefore, you are come as a student of this wonderful drama to be enacted in Jerusalem presently. You may live under part of your name. Substitute, however, your city for your surname. Be Philadelphus of Ephesus. No one then will question your presence here.
"I have bound to me by oath and by fear one hundred Idumeans who will rise or fall with you. They are of John's own army and alienated to you without his knowledge. Hence they are in armor and ready at any propitious moment. This house is provisioned and equipped for siege; everything is prepared."
"At what cost, my Amaryllis?" ”

“ Those that came to fight with the Chaldeans, to beat them off from the siege, did more hurt than good, provoked the enemy to be more fierce and furious in their assaults, so that the houses in Jerusalem were filled with the dead bodies of men, who died of the wounds they received in sallying out upon the besiegers. God says that they were such as he had slain in his anger, for the enemies' sword was his sword and their anger his anger. ”

“ The enemy has come to the gate of Jerusalem. Soon after the destruction of Samaria and the ten tribes, the Assyrian army, under Sennacherib, laid siege to Jerusalem, came to the gate, but could not force their way any further; however, it was with great concern and trouble that the prophet foresaw the fright, so dearly did he love the peace of Jerusalem. ”

“ Every day the Christians of Jerusalem were loaded with fresh outrages; and several times the infidels had formed the project of giving them up to the flames, and completely destroying the Holy Sepulchre, with the Church of the Resurrection. The Christian fugitives, whilst making these doleful recitals to the warlike pilgrims, earnestly exhorted them to attack Jerusalem. In the early days of the siege, an anchorite, who had fixed his retreat upon the Mount of Olives, came to join his entreaties to those of the banished Christians, to persuade the Crusaders to proceed to an immediate assault ”

“ The siege being raised, by which they were kept close within the walls of Jerusalem, they shall now be at liberty to go abroad upon business or pleasure without danger of falling into the enemies' hand: They shall behold the land that is very far off ”