The Jews in Rome at the time of Cicero formed, we have seen, an important and numerous class amidst the largely orientalized plebs of the city. With the other foreigners resident in the city they had a powerful patron in Caesar, as their grief at his death attested. Under his successor they found at least an indulgent, if somewhat contemptuous, toleration, which however was directed not toward them specially, but toward the other foreigners in the capital as well. And as we have seen, the religious reformation of Augustus, and his active disapproval of foreign cults, did not prevent the Jews from spreading rapidly in all classes of society.
Under Tiberius we hear of a general expulsion of the Jews, as afterward under Claudius. “Expulsion of Jews” is a term with which later European history has made us familiar. In the case of such expulsions as the Jews suffered in England, France, Spain, and Portugal, we know that the term is literally exact. Practically all Jews were in the instances cited compelled to leave the country and settle elsewhere. The expulsion ordered by Tiberius was unquestionably wholly ineffective in practice, since there were many Jews in Rome shortly after, although we have no record that the decree was 305repealed. But it may be questioned whether even in theory it resembled the expulsions of later times.
The facts are given fully by Suetonius (Tiberius, 36):
Externas caerimonias Aegyptios Iudaicosque ritus compescuit, coactis qui superstitione ea tenebantur religiosas vestes cum instrumento omni comburere. Iudaeorum iuventutem per speciem sacramenti in provincias gravioris caeli distribuit: reliquos gentis eiusdem vel similia sectantes urbe summovit sub poena perpetuae servitutis nisi obtemperassent.
He checked the spread of foreign rites, particularly the Egyptian and Jewish. He compelled those who followed the former superstition to burn their ritual vestments and all their religious utensils. The younger Jews he transferred to provinces of rigorous climate under the pretense of assigning them to military service. All the rest of that nation, and all who observed its rites, he ordered out of the city under the penalty of being permanently enslaved if they disobeyed.
Undoubtedly the same incident is mentioned by Tacitus in the Annals (ii. 85), where we hear that “action was taken about the eradication of Egyptian and Jewish rites. A senatusconsultum was passed, which transferred four thousand freedmen of military age who were affected by this superstition to Sardinia in order to crush brigandage there.... The rest were to leave Italy unless they abandoned their impious rites before a certain day.”
Between these two accounts there are discrepancies that cannot be cured by the simple process of amalgamating the two, as has generally been done. These divergences will be treated in detail later. For the present it will be well to compare an independent account, that of Josephus, with the two.
306Josephus (Ant. XVIII. iii. 5) tells us of a Jew, “a thoroughly wicked man,” who was forced to flee from Judea for some crime, and with three worthy associates supported himself by swindling in Rome. This man persuaded Fulvia, a proselyte of high rank, the wife of a certain Saturninus, to send rich gifts to the temple. The presents so received were used by the four men for themselves. Upon the complaint of Saturninus, “Tiberius ordered all the Jews [π?ν τ? ?ουδα?κ?ν] to be driven from Rome. The consuls enrolled four thousand of them, and sent them to the island of Sardinia. He punished very many who claimed that their ancestral customs prevented them from serving.” Apart from the incident which, Josephus says, occasioned the expulsion, we have a version here which is not quite in accord with the one either of Tacitus or of Suetonius.
Of these men Josephus is probably the nearest in time to the events he is describing, but also the most remote in comprehension. Besides the story just told, Josephus tells another, in which it is a votary of Isis who is deceived, with the connivance of the priests of the Egyptian goddess. The two incidents which he relates are placed in juxtaposition rather than connection by him, but the mere fact that they are told in this way indicates that a connection did exist in the source, written or oral, from which he derived them. Josephus does not mention that the Egyptian worship was attacked as well as the Jewish, and indeed he takes pains to suggest that the two incidents were not really connected at all.
307From all these statements, and from the reference that Philo makes in the Legatio ad Gaium,[332] there is very little that we can gather with certainty. This much, however, seems established: an attempt was made to check the spread both of Judaism and of Isis-worship. In this attempt a certain number of Jews were expelled from the city or from Italy. Four thousand soldiers—actual or reputed Jews—were transferred to Sardinia for the same reason. There are certain difficulties, however, in the way of supposing that it really was a general expulsion of all Jews, as Josephus and Suetonius, but not Tacitus, say.
Tacitus’ omission to state it, if such a general expulsion took place, is itself a difficulty; but like every argumentum ex silentio, it scarcely permits a valid inference. It seems strange, to be sure, that a severe and deserved punishment of the taeterrima gens, “that disgusting race,” should be represented to be something much milder than really was the case. But Tacitus is neither here nor in other places taking pains to cite the decree accurately, and the omission of even a significant detail may be laid to inadvertence.
But what Tacitus does say cannot be lightly passed over. Four thousand men, libertini generis, “of the freedmen class,” were transferred to Sardinia for military service. All these four thousand were ea superstitione infecti, “tainted with this superstition.” Now, the Jews who formed the community at Rome in the time of Cicero may have been largely freedmen, but their descendants were not classed as libertini generis. 308The phrase is not used in Latin of those who were of servile origin, but solely of those who were themselves emancipated slaves. There is, however, scarcely a possibility that there could have been at Rome in 19 C.E. so large a body of Jewish freed slaves of military age. There had been no war in recent times from which these slaves could have been derived. We may assume therefore that most, if not all, of these men were freedmen of other nationalities who were converts to Judaism.
This is confirmed by the words ea superstitione infecti, “tainted with this superstition.” These words are meaningless unless they refer to non-Jewish proselytes.[333] Men who were born Jews could not be so characterized. If Tacitus had meant those who were Jews by birth, it is scarcely conceivable that he would have used a phrase that would suggest just the opposite. The words, further, imply that many of these four thousand were rather suspected of Jewish leanings than definitely proselytes. Perhaps they were residents of the districts largely inhabited by Jews, notably the Transtiberine region.
Again, to suppose that all the Jews were banished by Tiberius involves an assumption as to that emperor’s methods wholly at variance with what we know of him. A very large number of Jewish residents in Rome were Roman citizens (Philo, 569 M), and so far from being a meaningless distinction in the early empire, that term through the influence of the rising science of jurisprudence was, in fact, just beginning to have its meaning and implications defined. A wholesale expulsion of 309Roman citizens by either an administrative act or a senatusconsultum is unthinkable under Tiberius. Exile, in the form of relegation or expulsion, was a well-known penalty for crime after due trial and conviction, which in every instance would have to be individual. Even in the Tacitean caricature[334] we find evidence of the strict legality with which Tiberius acted on all occasions. No senatusconsultum could have decreed a general banishment for all Jews, whether Roman citizens or not, without contravening the fundamental principles of the Roman law.
How thoroughly confused the transmission of this incident had become in the accounts we possess, is indicated in the final sentence from Suetonius: “He ordered them out of the city, under the penalty of being permanently enslaved if they disobeyed.” The very term perpetua servitus, as though there were a limited slavery in Rome at the time, is an absurdity. It becomes still more so when we recall that slavery, except in the later form of compulsory service in the mines and galleys, was not known as a penalty at Roman law. The state had no machinery for turning a freeman into a slave, except by his own will, and then it did so reluctantly. We shall be able to see what lies behind this confusion when we have considered one or two other matters.
The alleged expulsion is not mentioned by Philo in the extant fragments. The allusion to some oppressive acts of Sejanus (In Flaccum, § 1. ii. p. 517 M; and Leg. ad Gaium, § 24. ii. p. 569 M) is not clear. But it is difficult 310to understand the highly eulogistic references to Tiberius, then long dead, if a general Jewish expulsion had been ordered by that emperor.
That the senatusconsultum in question was general, and was directed indiscriminately at all foreign religions, appears not merely from the direct statement of Suetonius and Tacitus, and the association of the two stories by Josephus, but also from a reference of Seneca. In his philosophic essays, written in the form of letters to his friend Lucilius (108, 22), he says: “I began [under the teaching of Sotion] to abstain from animal food.... You ask me when I ceased to abstain. My youth was passed during the first years of Tiberius Caesar’s rule. At that time foreign rites were expelled; but one of the proofs of adherence to such a superstition was held to be the abstinence from the flesh of certain animals. At the request of my father, who did not fear malicious prosecution, but hated philosophy, I returned to my former habits.”
The words of Seneca, sacra movebantur, suggest the τ?ν ?ν ?ταλ?? παρακινηθ?ντων of Philo (loc. cit.), “when there was a general agitation [against the Jews?] in Italy.” It is further noticeable that the mathematici, i.e. the soothsayers, against whom the Roman laws were at all times severe, were also included in this decree.[335]
SYMBOLS AND INSCRIPTIONS FROM JEWISH CATACOMBS AND CEMETERIES IN ROME
(From Garrucci)
It has been pointed out before (above, p. 242) that the observance of foreign religious rites was never forbidden as such by Roman laws. From the first of the instances, the Bacchanalian persecution of 186 B.C.E., it was always some definite crime, immorality or imposture, 311that was attacked and of which the rites mentioned were alleged to be the instruments. The “expulsion” of the Isis-worshipers during the republic meant only that certain foreigners were summarily ordered to leave the city, something that the Lex Junia Penni in 83 B.C.E. and the Lex Papia of 65 B.C.E. attempted to enforce, and which the Roman police might do at any time when they thought the public interest demanded it. Roman citizens practising these rites could never be proceeded against, unless they were guilty of one of the crimes these foreign practices were assumed to involve.
The two stories cited by Josephus, one concerning an Isis-worshiper, the other a Jew, may not be true. Whether true or not, the incidents they record surely did not of themselves cause the expulsion of either group. But these are fair samples of the stories that were probably told and believed in Rome, and similar incidents no doubt did occur. The association of the mathematici with the other two makes it probable that the senatusconsultum was directed against fraud, the getting of money under false pretenses, and that the Jewish, Isiac, and other rites, as well as astrology, were mentioned solely as types of devices to that end.
What actually happened was no doubt that in Rome and in Italy overzealous officials undertook to treat the observance of foreign rites as conclusive or at least presumptive evidence of guilt under this act. Perhaps, as Philo says, it was one of the instances of Sejanus’ tyranny to do so. But there is no reason to doubt Philo’s express testimony that Tiberius promptly 312checked this excess of zeal and enforced the decree as it was intended (loc. cit.): ?? ο?κ ?π? π?ντα? προβ?ση? τ?? ?πεξελε?σεω?, ?λλ’ ?π? μ?νου? το?? α?τ?ου?—?λ?γοι δ? ?σαν—κιν?σαι δ? μηδ?ν ?ξ ?θου?; i.e. “since the prosecution was not directed against all, but only against the guilty, who were very few. Otherwise there was to be no departure from the customary attitude.”
The transference of the four thousand recruits, libertini generis, to Sardinia undoubtedly took place, and was very likely the expression of alarm on the part of Sejanus or Tiberius at the spread of Judaism in Rome. It may well be that the removal of these men was caused rather by the desire to withdraw them from the range of proselytism than by the purpose of allowing them to die in the severe climate of Sardinia. There is as a matter of fact no evidence that Sardinia had a noticeably different climate from that of Italy. It was one of the granaries of the empire.[336]
Perhaps we may reconstitute the decree as follows: The penalty imposed was, for foreigners, expulsion; for Roman citizens, perhaps exile; for freedmen, forfeiture of their newly acquired liberty in favor of their former masters or the latter’s heirs. This last fact will explain the statement of Suetonius. Many of the people affected were no doubt freedmen, and several instances where such a penalty was actually inflicted would account quite adequately for the words perpetua servitus of Suetonius. The “malicious prosecution,” calumnia, which Seneca asserts his father did not fear, would be based, as against Roman citizens, on the violation 313of this law against fraudulent practices, of which, as we have seen, the adoption of foreign rites would be taken as evidence.
The personal relations between Gaius and the Jewish king Agrippa seemed to guarantee an era of especial prosperity for the Roman Jews. However, the entire principate of that indubitable paranoiac was filled with the agitation that attended his attempt to set up his statue at Jerusalem. His death, which Josephus describes in gratifyingly minute detail, brought permanent relief on that point.
It is during the reign of his successor Claudius that we hear of another expulsion: Iudaeos impulsore Chresto adsidue tumultuantis Roma expulit (Suet. Claud. 25), “The Jews who engaged in constant riots by the machinations of a certain Chrestus, he expelled from Rome.” It has constantly been stated that this refers to the agitation in the Roman Jewry which the preaching of Christianity aroused. For that, however, there is no sufficient evidence. Jesus, to be sure, is called Chrestus, Χρηστ??, the Upright, in many Christian documents.[337] This play upon words is practically unavoidable. But Chrestus is a common name among all classes of society.[338] Jews would be especially likely to bear it, since it was a fairly good rendering of such a frequently occurring name as Zadok. The riot in question was no doubt a real enough event, and the expulsion equally real, even if it did not quite imply all that seems to be contained in it.
314If it were a decree of general expulsion of all Jews, it would be strikingly at variance with the edicts in favor of the Jews which Claudius issued, and which are contained in Josephus (Ant. XIX. v.). As in the case of other documents cited here, there is no reason to question the substantial accuracy of their contents, although they are surely not verbatim transcriptions from the records. It is as clearly impossible in the case of Claudius as in that of Tiberius to suppose an arbitrary disregard of law on his part, so that a general ejection of all Jews from the city, including those who were Roman citizens, is not to be thought of.
Neither Tacitus nor Josephus mentions the expulsion. The silence of neither is conclusive, but it lends strong probability to the assumption that the decree cannot have been so radical a measure as a general expulsion of all Jews from the city would be. The passage from Suetonius is concerned wholly with acts of Claudius affecting foreigners—non-Romans, i.e. Lycians, Rhodians, Gauls, Germans—and if we keep in mind Suetonius’ habits of composition, it is highly likely that he has put together here all that he found together in his source. We are to understand therefore by the Iudaei of this passage only foreign Jews, which implies that the majority of the Jews were not affected by it at all.
But were even all foreign Jews included? Is there anything in the passage that is not perfectly consistent with the assumption that some relatively small group of Jews led by a certain Chrestus was ejected from the 315city for disorderly conduct? The silence of the other writers, the total absence of effect on the growth of the Jewish population, would seem to make this after all the simplest meaning of Suetonius’ words.
The fact of the expulsion is confirmed by that passage in the Acts of the Apostles in which the meeting of Paul and Aquila at Corinth is mentioned (Acts xviii. 1, 2): “[Paul] found a certain Jew born in Pontus, lately come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, (because that Claudius had commanded all Jews to depart from Rome).” The testimony is late,[339] but it will be noticed that Aquila is an Asiatic by birth, and so very likely had no legal right of residence at Rome in any circumstances.
Finally, expulsion “from Rome” may have meant only exclusion from the pomoerium, the sacral limit of the city that followed an imaginary line not at all coincident with its real walls. To es............