Samaria, Roman province of

Judah under the Hasmonean Dynasty becomes comparable in extent and power to the ancient Davidic dominion.

Internal political and religious discord run high, however, especially between the Pharisees, who interpret the written law by adding a wealth of oral law, and the Sadducees, an aristocratic priestly class who call for strict adherence to the written law.

Dynastic contenders for the throne in 64 BCE appeal for support to Pompey, who is establishing Roman power in Asia.

The next year Roman legions seize Jerusalem, and Pompey installs one of the contenders for the throne as high priest, but without the title of king.

Eighty years of independent Jewish sovereignty end, and the period of Roman dominion begins.

Herod, confirmed by the Roman Senate as king of Judah in 37 BCE in the period of wars subsequent to the Roman occupation of the country, reigns until his death in 4 BCE.

Nominally independent, Judah is actually in bondage to Rome, and the land is formally annexed in 6 BCE as part of the province of Syria Palestina.

Rome does, however, grant the Jews religious autonomy and some judicial and legislative rights through the Sanhedrin.

The Sanhedrin, which traces its origins to a council of elders established under Persian rule (333 BCE to 165 BCE) is the highest Jewish legal and religious body under Rome.

The Great Sanhedrin, located on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, supervises smaller local Sanhedrins and is the final authority on many important religious, political, and legal issues, such as declaring war, trying a high priest, and supervising certain rituals.

Scholars have sharply debated the structure and composition of the Sanhedrin.

The Jewish historian Josephus and the New Testament present the Sanhedrin as a political and judicial council whereas the Talmud describes it as a religious, legislative body headed by a court of seventy-one sages.

Another view holds that there were two separate Sanhedrins.

The political Sanhedrin was composed primarily of the priestly Sadducee aristocracy and was charged by the Roman procurator with responsibility for civil order, specifically in matters involving imperial directives.

The religious Sanhedrin of the Pharisees was concerned with religious law and doctrine, which the Romans disregarded as long as civil order was not threatened.

Foremost among the Pharisee leaders of the time are the noted teachers, Hillel and Shammai.

The Pharisees, according to Josephus, ultimately opposed Herod and thus in 4 BCE fell victims to his bloodthirstiness ("The Antiquities of the Jews, xvii. 2, § 4; 6, §§ 2–4).

Young students of the Torah smash the golden eagle over the main entrance of the Temple of Jerusalem after the Pharisee teachers claim that is a Roman symbol.

Herod has the students arrested, brought to trial, and punished.

The family of Boethus, whom Herod had raised to the high-priesthood, revives the spirit of the Sadducees, and henceforth the Pharisees will again have them as antagonists (The Antiquities of the Jews, xviii. 1, § 4).

Augustus in this year approves of the death penalty for Antipater, who Herod executes.

Having thus executed his sole heir, Herod again changes his will: Archelaus (from the marriage with Malthace) is to rule as king over Herod's entire kingdom, while Antipas (from Malthace) and Philip (from the fifth marriage with Cleopatra of Jerusalem) as Tetrarchs over Galilee and Peraea, also over Gaulanitis (Golan), Trachonitis (Hebrew: Argob), Batanaea (now Ard-el-Bathanyeh) and Panias.

Salome I is also given a small toparchy in the Gaza region.

Since the work of Emil Schürer in 1896 (Emil Schürer, A History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ, 5 vols. New York, Scribner’s, 1896) most scholars have agreed that Herod died at the end of March or early April in 4 BCE.

However, Schürer's consensus did not go unchallenged in the twentieth century, with several scholars endorsing 1 BCE as the year of Herod's death.

Evidence for the 4 BCE date is provided by the fact that Herod's sons, between whom his kingdom is divided, date their rule from 4 BCE, and Archslaus apparently also exercised royal authority during Herod's lifetime.

Josephus states that Philip the Tetrarch's death took place in 34 CE after a thirty-seven-year reign, in the twentieth year of Tiberius; he also writes that Herod's final illness was excruciating.

Modern scholars agree he suffered throughout his lifetime from depression and paranoia.

More recently, others report that the visible worms and putrefaction described in his final days are likely to have been scabies; the disease might have accounted for both his death and psychiatric symptoms.

Similar symptoms will attend the death of his grandson Agrippa I in CE 44.

Josephus also states that Herod was so concerned that no one would mourn his death, that he commanded a large group of distinguished men to come to Jericho, and he gave order that they should be killed at the time of his death so that the displays of grief that he craved would take place.

Fortunately for them, Herod's son Archelaus and sister Salome do not carry out this wish.

Archelaus is proclaimed king by the army, but declines to assume the title until he has submitted his claims to Augustus in Rome.

Before setting out, he quells with the utmost cruelty a sedition of the Pharisees, slaying nearly three thousand of them.

Herod's plans for the succession have to be ratified by Augustus because of Judea's status as a Roman client kingdom,

The three heirs therefore travel to Rome to make their claims, Antipas arguing he ought to inherit the whole kingdom and the others maintaining that Herod's final will ought to be honored.

Despite qualified support for Antipas from Herodian family members in Rome, who favor direct Roman rule of Judea but consider Antipas preferable to his brother, Augustus largely confirms the division of territory set out by Herod in his final will.

Archelaus has, however, to be content with the title of ethnarch rather than king.

Augustus allots to Archelaus the greater part of the kingdom (Judea and Idumea, which are Jewish, and Samaria, which is not).