Everything about Zealot totally explained
Zealotry was a movement in first century
Judaism, described by
Josephus as one of the "four sects" at this time. The term
Zealot, in
Hebrew kanai (קנאי, frequently used in plural form, קנאים), means one who is on behalf of God. The term derives from
Greek ζηλωτής (
zelotes), "emulator, zealous admirer or follower". The Zealots were a religious group and were frequently in rebellion.
History
The Zealots were a
Jewish political movement in the
1st century which sought to incite the people of
Iudaea Province to rebel against the
Roman Empire and expel it from the country by force of arms during the
Great Jewish Revolt (CE
66-
70). When the Romans introduced the
imperial cult, the Jews unsuccessfully rebelled. The Zealots continued to oppose the Romans due to Rome's intolerance of their culture and on the grounds that
Israel belonged only to a Jewish king descended from
King David.
Josephus's
Jewish Antiquities states that there were three main Jewish sects at this time, the
Pharisees, the
Sadducees, and the
Essenes. The Zealots were a "fourth sect", founded by
Judas of Galilee (also called Judas of Gamala) and
Zadok the Pharisee in the year 6 against
Quirinius' tax reform, shortly after the Roman state declared what had most recently been the territory of the tribe of
Judah a Roman Province, and that they "agree in all other things with the Pharisaic notions; but they've an inviolable attachment to liberty, and say that God is to be their only Ruler and Lord." (18.1.6)
According to the
Jewish Encyclopedia article on
Zealots:
In either case, it has also been argued that the group wasn't so clearly marked out (before the first war of 66-70/3) as some have thought.
The
Crisis under Caligula (37-41) has been proposed as the first open break between Rome and the Jews.
Two of Judas' sons, Jacob and Simon, were involved in a revolt and were executed by
Tiberius Alexander, the
procurator of Iudaea province from 46 to 48.
The Zealots had the leading role in the Jewish Revolt of
66. They succeeded in taking over
Jerusalem, and held it until
70, when the son of Roman Emperor
Vespasian,
Titus, retook the city and destroyed
Herod's Temple during the
destruction of Jerusalem.
The Zealots objected to Roman rule and sought violently to eradicate it; Zealots engaged in violence were called the
Sicarii. They raided Jewish habitations and killed Jews they considered collaborators, while also urging Jews to fight Romans and other Jews for the cause.
Josephus paints a very bleak picture of their activities as they instituted what he characterized as a murderous "reign of terror" prior to the Jewish Temple's destruction.
According to
Josephus, the Zealots followed
John of Gischala, who had fought the Romans in
Galilee, escaped, came to Jerusalem, and then inspired the locals to a fanatical position that led to the Temple's destruction.
Talmud
In the
Talmud, the Zealots are also called the
Biryonim meaning "boorish" or "wild", and are condemned for their aggression, their unwillingness to compromise to save the survivors of besieged
Jerusalem, and their blind-
militarism. They are further blamed for having contributed to the demise of Jerusalem and the second
Jewish Temple, and of ensuring Rome's retributions and stranglehold on Judea. According to the
Babylonian Talmud,
Gittin:56b, the Biryonim destroyed decades worth of food and firewood in besieged Jerusalem to force the Jews to fight the Romans out of desperation, an event that directly led to the escape of
Yochanan ben Zakkai out of Jerusalem, who met
Vespasian which led to the foundation of the
Academy of Yavneh which produced the
Mishnah.
The Zealots advocated violence against the Romans and their Sadducee Jewish collaborators, raiding for provisions and other activities that aided their cause.
Masada
After the destruction of Jerusalem and the Second Temple in AD 70, 960 Zealots took refuge by capturing the Roman fortress of Masada and taking no prisoners. Rome sent the Tenth Legion to attempt to retake the stronghold, but for three years they met with no success. It is estimated that they took over 1,000 casualties in the process. The Zealots continued to hold the fortress even after the Romans invented new types of
siege engines. Finally, in the third year of the siege, Rome, unable to take the fortress intact, gave up and burned the walls down. When the Romans stormed in to capture the Zealots, they found that the fighters and their families had nearly all committed suicide rather than live a life of slavery.
One of their leaders,
Elazar ben Yair escaped to the desert fortress of
Masada and fought alongside the
Sicarii Zealots until Masada was captured in
73. The Jewish Revolt was suppressed thereafter and the Zealots declined in power and finally faded into history
Today, members of some units of the
Israel Defense Forces, climb Masada and declare "
Masada Shall Not Fall Again
",
in Hebrew, at their graduation from basic training.
Sicarii
One particularly extreme group of Zealots was also known in
Latin as
sicarii, meaning "daggermen" (sing.
sicarius, possibly a morphological reanalysis), because of their policy of killing Jews opposed to their call for war against Rome. Probably many Zealots were
sicarii simultaneously, and they may be the
biryonim of the Talmud that were feared even by the Jewish sages of the
Mishnah.
The main differences between the Sicarii and the Zealots were: (1) the Jerusalem Zealots never attached themselves to one particular family and never proclaimed any of their leaders king; (2) the Sicarii had their original base in Galilee, while the Zealots were concentrated in Jerusalem; and (3) the Galilean Sicarii were fighting for a social revolution, while the Jerusalem Zealots placed less stress on the social aspect.
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