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Y
EAR AFTER YEAR
the Ro–
mans had tightened
th~ir
g rip on Judea. One re–
strictive decree after another had
pushed the Jews of Judea closer
and closer toward the brink of
rebellion.
Events finally carne to a head
in the spring of A.D. 66. The
Roman imperial procurator, Ges–
sius Florus, scized the vestments
of the Jewish High Priest during
the annual Passover celebration
and demanded payments from the
temple fund!
That was the last straw.
The Jews erupted into gen–
eral revolt-defying the mil–
itary might of the entire
Roman Empire!
In response, thc Roman
generaJ Titus, son of Emper–
or Vespasian, fi nally swept
into Judea with his legions.
In A.D. 70 he conquered
Jerusa lem, burning the
Temple to the ground, lay-
ing waste to the city and slaugh–
tering an estimated 600,000 Jews.
Thousands of others were sold
into slavery.
Sorne few Jews managed to
escape. Evading capture, they
made their way across thc barren
Judean wilderness. Their objec–
tive: to join a group of Jewish
Zealots that had earlier taken
refuge in an ancient mountaintop
fortress near the Dead Sea- the
fortress of
Masada.
The stage was now set for one
of the most dramatic episodes in
all of Jewish history!
Jews' Last Stand
The events which followed have
often been retold. Now a major
multimillion-dollar motion pic–
ture spectacle made for television
brings the story into the homes of
millions worldwide.
But few realize the amazing
paraJiels with prophesied events
soon to sbake the world from the
Holy Land! For the Jews are
destined to
yet again
confront the
power of the final reviva! of the
Roman Empire!
But first, Jet us look briefty at
the outcome of that earlier drama
as it unfolded 19 centuries ago.
Following Iengthy prepara–
tions, Flavius Silva, the Roman
governor, marched on Masada
with his Tenth Legion. His objec–
tive was to capture this last for–
tress of Jewish resistance. The
seige against Masada began early
in A.D.72.
The ancient mountaintop for–
tress stands in the eastern Judean
Desert on the west coast of the
Dead Sea. Originally a Hasmon–
ean (Maccabean) stronghold, it
had later been rebuilt and consid–
erably en larged by Herod the
Great, King of Judea under the
Romans.
Perched on a mountaintop
more than 1,400 feet above the
leve! of the Dead Sea, Masada–
with its combination of natural
and man-made fortifications–
was considered
vi~tually
impreg–
nable.
At the start of the Jewish
Revolt in A.D. 66, an unsuspect–
ing Roman garr ison stationed at
Masada was massacred by Jewish
Zealots. The ZeaJots were a sect
noted for their uncompromising
opposition to Rome and its pagan
polytheism. Their leader through
the period of Jewish revolt was
Eleazar ben Jair (Yair).
By the time of Silva's siege, the