Bar Kokhba Revolt

Background

Even after the Roman army captured Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem in 70, resentment of Roman rule persisted in Judea. In the early second century, under Emperor Hadrian, this conflict intensified once more. The Roman historian Cassius Dio wrote that the revolt was provoked by Hadrian's plan to build a Roman city, Aelia Capitolina, on the site of Jerusalem and to erect a temple to Jupiter where the Temple had stood. Another Roman source gives a ban on circumcision as the cause, but scholars disagree about whether this ban was in force before the revolt.

Course of the Revolt

• 132: The revolt began. Its leader was Simon bar Kosiba; letters discovered in caves in the Judean Desert preserve the name "Simon ben Kosiba, Nasi (leader) of Israel." His epithet "Bar Kokhba" means "son of the star," a name linked to Numbers 24:17, "there shall come a Star out of Jacob." According to Jewish tradition, Akiva, the leading rabbi (teacher of Jewish law) of the day, recognized him as the Messiah.
• The rebels gained control of much of Judea and struck coins bearing inscriptions such as "Year One of the Redemption of Israel" and "For the Freedom of Jerusalem." It remains unclear, however, whether they actually held Jerusalem.
• Hadrian summoned Sextus Julius Severus, then governor of Britain, to put down the revolt, and the Roman army destroyed the rebels' fortresses and villages one by one.
• c. 135: With the fall of Betar, southwest of Jerusalem and the rebels' last stronghold, Bar Kokhba was killed and the revolt came to an end.

Results and Influence

Cassius Dio recorded that 580,000 Jews died in the fighting and that 50 fortresses and 985 villages were destroyed, though these figures may be exaggerated. Jerusalem was rebuilt as Aelia Capitolina, and Jews were forbidden to enter the city. The province is also reported to have been renamed Syria Palaestina. Thereafter the center of Judaism shifted to Galilee.

The revolt is also significant for its bearing on the early church. Justin Martyr, a second-century Christian apologist, wrote that Bar Kokhba punished Christians who would not deny that Jesus was the Messiah. Eusebius, the fourth-century church historian, recorded that after the revolt the church in Jerusalem had, for the first time, a bishop of Gentile origin. Jewish Christians who believed Jesus to be the Messiah could not join a revolt that put forward another messiah. For this reason the revolt is understood as one stage in the process by which the church and Judaism parted ways.

Assessment

Later rabbinic literature sometimes called him "Bar Koziba," meaning "son of the lie." The medieval Jewish scholar Maimonides wrote that once he was killed, the sages ceased to regard him as the Messiah. In modern Israel, by contrast, he is sometimes honored as a hero who fought for national independence.

In Christianity the revolt is frequently cited as a historical instance of the fulfillment of Jesus' warnings: "For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ" (Matthew 24:5) and "For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets" (Matthew 24:24). Present-day research relies heavily on ancient literary sources together with archaeological evidence, including letters, documents, and coins discovered in caves in the Judean Desert in the mid-twentieth century.