CHAPTER 17

THE YEARS OF HEROD’S REIGN

    We now come to the most sensitive area of all. Probably all the arguments connected with this chronological survey, to find a date for Christ’s birth, hinge on a proper understanding of Josephus and his Herodian dates. In this chapter I want to deal with the subject as rapidly as possible, not omitting the basic problems and how they are solved, but leaving a fuller analysis to an additional note at the end of the chapter.

    The problem arises like this. In Ant.XIV.14.5 we read, "He [Antony] procured it [the kingship] for him [Herod] so suddenly that he obtained what he did not expect, and departed out of Italy in so few days as seven in all - - -. Antony also feasted Herod the first day of his reign. And thus did this man receive the kingdom, having obtained it in the 184th Olympiad, when Gaius Domitius Calvinus was Consul the 2nd time, and Gaius Asinus Pollio the 1st time."

   There couldn’t be a fuller statement for determining the date. Olympiad 184 ran from July B.C.44 to June B.C. 40, and the Consular dates of ancient Rome were well attested in terms of the Roman Calendar, known as Anno Urbis Conditæ, ("in the year of the founding of Rome".) Referring to these lists, we find these names for A.U.C. 714, which is B.C. 40. Not only was Herod proclaimed king in B.C. 40, but we also know that it must have been during the first six months of the year, otherwise Josephus would have mentioned the 185th Olympiad.

    So far so good. Now we turn to the last chronological notice of Herod’s reign, the time of his death. Josephus (Ant.XVII.8.1) tells us that "He [Herod] died, - - - having reigned, since he had procured Antigonus to be slain, 34 years, but since he had been declared king by the Romans, 37 years."

    By a simple reading of these two passages we cannot help but come to the conclusion that if Herod had received his kingship in B.C.40, and he reigned for 37 years, that he must have died in B.C.4, a conclusion that would demand the date of Christ’s birth to be put back to at least B.C.6, four years earlier than most of the patristic writers suggest, and also that our own survey has required so far. What does this mean?

    My old friend Alan in Hong Kong was fully aware of this impasse, and it was the main reason why he didn’t want me wasting my time "chasing the chimerical", as he would have put it! However, it’s good to find a puzzle and attack it until a resolution presents itself. And that’s what has been achieved here. Furthermore, I’ve found a few others travelling the same road and reaching the same conclusion, but I had to approach it myself rather than just accept their logic. This is what I found.

    In the first of the quotes above we read the words, "Antony feasted Herod the first day of his reign." This would seem to demand that Herod’s first year began in the spring of A.D.40. But unfortunately William Whiston was not too careful in translating the Greek of Josephus at this point. I am indebted to the writings of Rev William Brown Galloway for this information. The following extract has been taken from page 461 of his book, entitled "The Chain of Ages", published in 1881.

Eistia de prwthn hmeran Hrwdhn thV basileiaV AntwnioV

Grammatically this should be translated

And on the first day, Antony feasted Herod [in honour of] his kingsghip

    So we have no license to assume that his reign began on that day.  Herod was in Rome for just seven days, and it was on the first of those days that Antony feasted him. Likewise, King David’s reign never began on the day that the Prophet Samuel anointed him king. In fact he had to wait fourteen years before he could ascend the throne.

    In the ensuing drama of those days, Herod, after leaving Rome, enlisted the assistance of the Roman General Sosius to make an attack on Jerusalem, which was then governed by the priestly King Antigonus. The Jews were quite content to have Antigonus as their ruler. He was part of the Hasmonean dynasty that began over 120 years earlier in the days of Judas Maccabæus. Hence there was a real threat to Herod, that he might be unable to establish his kingship in Judæa. This was why he enlisted the help of Sosius. Eventually, having raised a sufficiently large army, they marched on the city of Jerusalem and began their siege in the summer of B.C.37. Five months later, and only with great difficulty, they broke through the walls and occupied the city. It finally fell to them on a momentous date. See Josephus Ant.XIV.16.4. The destruction befell the city when Marcus Agrippa and Caninus Gallus were Consuls at Rome, in the 185th Olympiad, on the 3rd month, on the solemnity of the fast, as if a periodical revolution of calamities had returned since that which befell the Jews under Pompey, for the Jews were taken by him on the same day, and this was after 27 years time."   (See the next chapter for further details of these 27 years.)

    And so we are presented with another very precise date. From the Consul lists we know that Josephus was referring to B.C.37, and from the mention of the fast, we deduce that the "third month" must be reckoned from Tishri (autumn) otherwise it would not accord with November/December being five months after the setting up of the siege in the summer. Hence the fast is that of 8th Kisleu, commemorating the burning of Jeremiah’s scroll by King Jehoiakim. In the Hebrew Calendar this date corresponds with 1st December B.C.37.

    However, when Josephus recalled the years of Herod’s reign, he said that it was 34 from the death of Antigonus, but 37 from when he was made king by the Romans. If the 37 years began at Rome in BC 40, then Antigonus must have been slain in BC 37, but significantly Josephus by-passed the actual event of the capture of Jerusalem, and only mentioned the death of Antigonus. One might have expected the wording to be,  "34 from the taking of Jerusalem with the aid of Sosius."

    It now turns out that Antigonus was certainly not slain at the time when Jerusalem was taken. Josephus, when read carefully, shows that Antigonus was taken from Jerusalem by Herod and kept in bonds for Antony, "who received Antigonus as his captive, and determined to keep him against his triumph." (Ant.XV.1.2) However, Herod was suspicious, and realised that the tables might turn against him, whereby  Antony, under pressure from the Jews, and Antigonus himself, might reinstate the Hasmonean dynasty and prevent Herod from achieving his kingship. He therefore plied Antony with magnificent gifts, and made a request, the result of which Josephus records from the pen of the historian Strabo, (Ant.XV.1.2) "Antony ordered Antigonus the Jew to be brought to Antioch, there to be beheaded."

    How long after the capture of Jerusalem was this act performed? The text doesn’t give any information relating to the Consular year, but Josephus says in Ant.XIV.16.4, "Thus did the government of the Hasmoneans cease, 126 years after it was first set up." Eusebius, in his Chronicon Paschale, relates that Judas Maccabæus was made High Priest on the death of Alcimus in BC 160. A simple calculation then tells us that Antigonus was slain in BC 34. Reverting now to the statement that Josephus made about the length of Herod’s reign, he distinctly said that it was 34 years from when he had caused Antigonus to be slain, and this number, added to BC 34, brings us to the beginning of AD 1, as expected.

    Then, on reading that his reign lasted 37 years from when he was "made king by the Romans", we are forced to accept the understanding of this as meaning the capture of Jerusalem. Josephus did not say "made king at Rome", and this is borne out by Ant.XV.1.1, "Sosius and Herod took Jerusalem by force, - - - and since Herod had NOW the government of all Judæa PUT INTO HIS HANDS . . ." Such language is clear enough, and when all these things are put together, we can see that the old knotty problem allows of a satisfactory solution. The remainder of the Gordian Knot has been severed, and we are ready to step forward on our journey to Bethlehem, having established the date of Herod’s death, and confirmed it by his regnal years.

 

Additional Note on Herod’s Years

 

            In this chapter I sought to undo the tangle of dates of Herod’s reign, based on the information provided by Josephus. Indeed, scholars have long argued over the interpretation of this material, but always, I believe, in isolation, rather than in conjunction with other chronological benchmarks from the Bible and other extant literature of the period.

 

            Admittedly, the problem is one that taxes the ingenuity, but seeing that the overwhelming majority of writers have insisted that Herod died in BC 4, it has made the task of settling the date of Jesus’ birth almost impossible. Occasionally a researcher has suggested an alternative method of dating, but only to be opposed quite vigorously by others. A case in point may be cited here. W.E. Filmer, writing in the “Journal of Theological Studies” (Volume 17, 1966, pp. 283-298) came to the conclusion that, based on a more careful reading of Josephus, Herod would have died in January BC 1. In reading and re-reading his article, I saw the force of what he was saying, and found his paper most interesting. But two years later, in the same Journal, (Volume 19, 1968, pp. 204-209) Timothy Barnes wrote on “The Date of Herod’s Death”, and this is how he introduced his thesis –

 

            “Historians and works of reference have long accepted the view that Herod of Judæa, surnamed the Great, died in the spring of 4 BC. Recently, however, this date has been called into question by W.E. Filmer. Lest another such attempt ever be made to deny it, the evidence that Herod died in 5/4 BC will here be set out in detail. It will also be suggested that the precise date need not be March/April 4 BC, as is normally assumed, but may instead be December 5 BC.”

 

            Note this language! “Lest another such attempt ever be made to deny it - -.” What sort of controlling influence is it that insists on one particular avenue of enquiry, almost forbidding anyone ever again to look at the evidence in another way? How can we advance in our understanding whilst such an attitude prevails? I personally find Barnes’ words offensive, especially because they were uttered in a prestigious theological journal. Such in-fighting should never be witnessed amongst scholars. Each should be allowed to express the results of his work, thereby to be assessed by others; criticised, yes, but not suppressed as though by some authoritative power. Well, I’m sorry Mr. Barnes, but I suspect others have also wanted to investigate Josephus in the manner employed by Filmer, and in my present thesis, I have shown that there is certainly a most cogent reason for thinking otherwise than the usual 4 BC date.

 

            The “traditional dates” for the start of Herod’s reign are BC 40 (when Antony feasted Herod in Rome) and BC 37, when it is assumed that Antigonus was slain. This gives rise to two distinct starting points for the measurement of the years of his reign. It provides a useful tool in the hands of those who seem aggressively intent on making Herod’s death fall in BC 4, but see how this compares with the alternative dates posited in this work. We have suggested that Herod was not king of Judæa until he was made king by the Romans, that is, when Jerusalem fell to Sosius in B.C.37, and that Antigonus was not slain until three years later in B.C.34. If we use the dating of B.C.37 for when Herod was “made king”, it is virtually the same as the traditional dating used by others when they start from their supposed date of Antigonus’ death in B.C.37. The only problem then arises in interpreting Josephus when he dates Herod’s death.

 

            What I am trying to say is that if they should have used B.C.40 for their dating, then they would have found insuperable problems in their chronology. But is it not reasonable for kings to have their regnal years counted from when they were “made king”? Why then use the death of Antigonus as an alternative benchmark? The following time-line may be helpful at this juncture.

 

 

Type

40 B.C.

37 B.C.

34 B.C.

A

Made King at Rome

Death of Antigonus

 

B

Sponsored by Antony

Made King by Sosius

Death of Antigonus

 

A. is the traditional view, accepted by the majority of scholars. B. is the alternative assessment adopted in this work, also by Adam Rutherford and William Brown Galloway. It will be seen from the time-line that both use B.C.37, but for different reasons. See what happens if we quote Josephus Ant.XVI.5.1.  “About this time it was that Cæsarea Sebaste, which he had built, was finished. The entire building being accomplished in the tenth year, the solemnity of it fell into the 28th year of Herod’s reign, and into the 192nd Olympiad.”  The traditionalists date this from the death of Antigonus, but we prefer to date it from the capture of Jerusalem by Sosius. Both fall on B.C.37. But if the traditionalists had been correct in dating from B.C.40, Josephus would have written “Olympiad 191” instead of 192.

 

Likewise, Josephus’s dating of the Battle of Actium gives us another anachronism. See Ant.XV.5.1.  “The Battle of Actium was now expected, which fell into the 187th Olympiad.”   And also Ant.XV.5.2.  “At this time it was that the fight happened at Actium, between Octavius Cæsar and Antony, in the 7th year of the reign of Herod.”  The Battle of Actium has been settled by various authors, and is known to have been September 2nd B.C.31. This can only have been Herod’s 7th year if dating began in B.C.37, and not B.C.40. Hence all the traditionalists use the death of Antigonus as their starting point, whereas we have adopted B.C.37 as the time when Sosius “made Herod king” on the taking of Jerusalem. As argued before, how can a man be considered reigning until he is established? Samuel anointed King David some 14 years before he actually ascended the throne in Hebron. Only on a sort of de jure reckoning can anyone say that David was king at the anointing. But all his dates were measured from when he was king de facto. So it must be with the years of Herod’s reign.

 

Once this matter has been properly understood, no problem arises when assessing the date of Herod’s death. See Wars.33.8.  “So Herod, having survived the slaughter of his five sons, died, having reigned 34 years since he had caused Antigonus to be slain, and obtained his kingdom, but 37 years since he had been made king by the Romans.”  If the traditional method of counting were used, this gives a date of B.C.4 for Herod’s death, but if our alternative method were employed, it gives a date of B.C.1/A.D.1. Timothy Barnes suggested that Herod died, not in the spring of B.C.4, but in December. His argument about the months was good, but the year was out of phase. We found that it was more appropriate to extend the date to the middle of January in A.D.1 rather than December B.C.1.  And with that we shall leave the topic.

 

It has been argued that the dates of Herod’s successors disprove the theory presented above. But as Rutherford has pointed out very clearly in his Pyramidology Volume 2, Josephus nowhere states that their “reigns” began exactly at the death of Herod. (See the chart on page 236) There was an overlap, produced partly by virtue of Herod’s bad health. The actual dates of “accession” were as follows –

Archelaus  2 B.C.,  Herod Antipas, 4 B.C., and Herod Philip 4 B.C.

 

SSTB.INDEX

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