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Brandon Marlon
One of the People

Jewish History: The Proselytes (Part 2/4: Classical)

Antipater Shows Caesar his Scars, by Jan Luyken (1704). Wikimedia Commons.
Antipater Shows Caesar his Scars, by Jan Luyken (1704). Wikimedia Commons.

The Classical Era

Antipater II the Idumean was the son of Antipas (Antipater I), governor of Idumea first under King Yannai Alexander of Judea then under Queen Shlomtzion (Salome Alexandra) of Judea. Antipas and Antipater—members of an affluent and distinguished Idumean (Edomite) family—were converted to Judaism during the era of the Hasmonean ruler and high priest Yohanan Hyrkanos, whose forced conversion of the Idumeans (c. 110 BCE) was an unprecedented measure in Jewish history (and a fateful misstep that led to the eventual demise of the Hasmoneans, since the Herodians who unseated them were of Idumean stock). Antipater, who would have been a young child when he was converted, succeeded his father as governor of Idumea during the reign of Queen Shlomtzion. The ambitious and designing Antipater bore no allegiance to Judaism or Judea; cunning and inclined to intrigue, he was contemned by the younger Hasmonean prince Aristoboulos II and thus resorted to manipulation of the older Hasmonean prince Hyrkanos II in order to achieve his own self-serving objectives. He married Kufra (Cypros), a Nabatean Arab noblewoman with whom he had four sons, Phasael, Herod, Joseph, and Pheroras, and a daughter, Salome; the eminent Kufra was related to King Harith (Aretas) III of Nabatea, with whom Antipater forged an alliance to further his own interests. By making himself useful to the Romans, the wily Antipater acquired the power and influence he craved. In 47 BCE, Julius Caesar appointed Antipater regent of Judea, and the latter in turn appointed his son Phasael governor of Jerusalem and his son Herod governor of Galilee. Thus did he exact vengeance against the Jews, who had conquered and converted the Idumeans but who were now largely governed by them. After Caesar’s assassination in 44, Antipater sided with Gaius Cassius Longinus, who had captured Syria. In 43, while feasting with Hyrkanos, Antipater was poisoned by a royal cupbearer bribed by Antipater’s political rival Malik (Malichus), who similarly aspired to attain high position in Judea. In this way was his comeuppance effected, and thereafter he was overshadowed by his son King Herod the Great.

Tomb of Queen Helena of Adiabene, by William Henry Bartlett (c. 1800s). Wikimedia Commons.

Helena of Adiabene (Helleni HaMalkah) (d. 56 CE) – The sister-wife of King Monobaz I of Adiabene, and mother of Izates II and Monobaz II. Although likely of Hellenistic origin, Helena was influenced by a Jewish merchant named Hananiah (Ananias) and converted to Judaism around 30; her sons also embraced Judaism and were circumcised (Izates was influenced to do so by another Jewish visitor to Adiabene, a Galilean named Elazar). Helena spent the latter part of her life in Jerusalem, where she built herself a royal palace. Five of her grandsons (sons of Izates) also went to live and study as Jews in Judea. She earned a reputation for munificence by purchasing grain from Alexandria, Egypt and dried figs from Cyprus to alleviate the famine afflicting the capital in 45–46, and by endowing gifts to the Temple, including a golden candelabrum over the sanctuary’s door and a golden tablet engraved with the scriptural passage concerning the suspected adulteress (sotah). According to the Talmud, Helena vowed to become a Nazirite for seven years if her son Izates returned safely from war, and when this occurred she dutifully fulfilled her oath. Helena died in Adiabene—then a newly independent kingdom east of the northern Tigris River, in what was formerly Assyria—but her remains and those of Izates were transferred by Monobaz II to Jerusalem for burial in the pyramidal mausoleum, known erroneously as the Tombs of the Kings, that Helena had erected just north of the city (now in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in Jerusalem). According to Greek geographer and traveler Pausanias, Helena’s tomb featured a special mechanism that kept its door shut except for once a year. A sarcophagus discovered within the catacombs in the 19th century—which contained bones wrapped in shrouds with golden embroidery and which bears the Aramaic inscriptions, in the Palmyrene and the Hebraic scripts, “Tzaddan Malkhata” and “Tzaddah Malkhatah”—was supposed to be that of Helena, but might have belonged to another member of the royal family. Her palace, burned down during the Great Revolt (66–73 CE), is believed to be the monumental structure excavated between the Ophel and the City of David in 2007. 

Illustration of Onkelos (Aquila) from Hartmann Schedel’s Nuremberg Chronicle (1493). Wikimedia Commons.

A disciple of Rabban Gamliel II, Eliezer ben Hyrcanus, Joshua ben Hananiah, and Akiva ben Joseph, Onkelos (Aquila) son of Kalonymos/Kalonykos was the nephew of Emperor Titus of Rome (per other accounts, of Emperor Hadrian of Rome) and highly educated in Greco-Roman culture. He is the author of the Aramaic translation (targum) of the Torah Targum Onkelos, which also includes exegesis. The Talmud preserves a tradition that Ezra the Scribe composed an Aramaic translation of the Torah—as opposed to merely rewriting the Torah in Assyrian (imperial Aramaic) script—upon his repatriation to Judah early in the Second Temple period; this ancient translation (or “Ezran edition”) in time was forgotten and lost, however, which prompted Onkelos to reestablish it. He was especially close to his master Gamliel, upon whose decease Onkelos arranged for expensive exequies befitting royalty. He earned a reputation for his tremendous piety and was meticulous in observing the Judaic ritual purity laws. He eschewed bathing in the ritual baths (mikvaot) of Ashkelon, then primarily a heathen city, and instead performed his ritual immersion (tvilah) in the Mediterranean Sea. The Talmud preserves his assertion that the cherubim (khruvim) “were of the form of children and their faces were angled sideways, like a student taking leave of his teacher.” Some scholars believe there were two distinct personages: the convert Onkelos, an Aramaic translator of the Torah, and the convert Aquila, a Greek translator of the Torah. Other scholars claim that Aquila, by birth a Greek from Sinope in Pontus (Sinop, Turkey) and a kinsman of Hadrian, was the sole genuine personage and proselyte, who translated the Torah into Greek, and that Babylonian Jewry—familiar with this Greek translator Aquila—muddled matters by misattributing the contemporary anonymous Aramaic translation of the Torah to “Onkelos the Proselyte”, so that Targum Onkelos is apparently misnamed. Certainly, the likelihood of there having been two discrete personages with almost identical names and several uncanny commonalities— both proselytes, both taught by the same sages, both translators of the Torah, both related to Roman emperors—is exceedingly improbable, though considerable confusion remains. 

Relief from Zafar (Yemen) of a crowned man. Wikimedia Commons.

For more than four centuries (110–525 CE), the Kingdom of Himyar—which had supplanted the earlier Kingdom of Qataban by the late 1st century CE and the even older Kingdom of Sheba by 175—was a significant polity in southwestern Arabia (modern Yemen), where a confederation of tribes (most notably the Kindah, Banu Ghassan, and Azd) concentrated around their capital of Zafar. The Himyarite kings began to favor monotheism over polytheism. Under Malkikarib Yuhamin (r. c. 375–400), who with his sons embraced Judaism in 383/384, Judaism became the religion of the ruling class in Himyar. This king is credited with constructing the Barik synagogue (in Arabic, mikrab) in Marib, the ancient capital of Sheba, to replace its pagan great temple of Almaqah, a lunar god. He also constructed a new royal palace with his sons Abu Karib As’ad al-Kamil (r. c. 390–420/440) and Dhara’ Amar Ayman. Judaism was officially adopted as the state religion under Abu Karib As’ad, during whose reign Himyar greatly expanded its political power and influence and dominated most of the Arabian Peninsula. Certain Arabic traditions regard him as the first ruler to cover the Kaaba with the kiswah, during his attempted invasion of Mecca. He had at least four sons, two of whom (Hassan Yuhamin and Sharhabil Yafar) succeeded him, as well as two daughters. His nephew, Harith ibn Amr, likewise a Jewish convert, is said to have been appointed governor of Mecca and Yathrib (Medina). For some 150 years (380–530), Judaism was the sole religion attested in Himyarite inscriptions.

About the Author
Brandon Marlon is an award-winning Canadian-Israeli author whose writing has appeared in 300+ publications in 33 countries. He is the author of two poetry volumes, Inspirations of Israel: Poetry for a Land and People and Judean Dreams, and two historical reference works, Essentials of Jewish History: Jewish Leadership Across 4,000 Years and its companion volume Essentials of the Land of Israel: A Geographical History.
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