Alexander Jannaeus

At the death of Aristobulus in 103 BCE, his widow, Salome Alexandra, liberates his brother Alexander Jannaeus, who had been held in prison.

Jannaeus succeeds Aristobulus as the Judaean king and high priest; and marries Salome Alexandra, whose brother is Shimon ben Shetach, a leading Pharisee.

After a failed siege against Gaza, Jannaeus strikes a phony league of friendship with the Egyptian co-ruler Ptolemy Lathyrus.

In reality Jannaeus seeks the assistance of Lathyrus’ mother, Cleopatra III, against her son.

When Lathyrus learns of this treachery, he takes out his fury on Judea.

After defeating Jannaeus near the Jordan River, Lathyrus’ soldiers slaughter fleeing Jewish troops.

Afterwards, Lathyrus attacks a small village in Judea with utter malice.

The Egyptian troops strangle women and children.

Then the deceased are cut into pieces, boiled in cauldrons, and eaten as a sacrifice.

This act of cannibalism is used to terrify the Judean people and their military.

After this massacre, Jannaeus is in no position to stop the onslaught of Lathyrus.

However, Cleopatra III, who is probably swayed to support Jannaeus through two Jewish commanders in her military, steps in to prevent Lathyrus from sacking Jerusalem.

Jannaeus, with a mercenary army similar to that of his father, leads a Judean army that conquers the entire coastal plain …

…except for Ashkelon.

Greek culture had taken root in Gaza following the siege and conquest by Alexander the Great, and the city-state has earned a reputation as a flourishing center of Hellenic learning and philosophy.

Gaza experiences another siege in 96 BCE by the Hasmonean king Alexander Jannaeus, who, after a yearlong investment, "utterly overthrew" the city, killing five hundred senators who had fled into the temple of Apollo for safety.

During the conflict, the besieged Gazans had requested help from "Aretas, King of the Arabs", but the Nabatean monarch had not come to their aid and the city is destroyed.

This victory gains the Hasmonean kingdom control over the Mediterranean outlet for the Nabataean trade routes.

The Judeans triumph over the cities of Raffah and Antedon.

Alexander Jannaeus, whose reign over Judea is long and largely filled with wars, imposes his rule rigorously over an increasingly large area, including both the cities of the coast and the area east of the Jordan River.

Still more clearly than Hyrcanus I, he attests the change in direction and aim of the Hasmonean house.

He is the bitter enemy of the Pharisees, he hires Greek mercenaries, his coins bear Greek as well as Hebrew legends, and his title on them is simply “King Alexander”.

During the Hasmonean period, the Sadducees and Pharisees functione primarily as political parties.

The Sadducees, are avid supporters of Jannaeus.

The Pharisaic opposition to Jannaeus had continued with his marriage to his brother’s widow, which is forbidden by Torah law.

Furthermore, Jannaeus has established himself as a ruler concerned mainly with conquests rather than his religious obligations.

Although the Pharisees had opposed the wars of expansion of the Hasmoneans and the forced conversions of the Idumeans, the political rift between them became wider when Pharisees demanded that the Hasmonean king choose between being king and being High Priest.

In response, the king openly sided with the Sadducees by adopting their rites in the Temple.

One year during the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, Jannaeus, while officiating as the High Priest (Kohen Gadol) at the Temple in Jerusalem, had demonstrated his support of the Sadducees by denying the law of the water libation.

The crowd had responded with shock at his mockery and showed their displeasure by pelting Alexander with the etrogim (citrons) that they were holding in their hands.

Unwittingly, the crowd had played right into Alexander's hands: he had intended to incite the people to riot and his soldiers fell upon the crowd at his command.

The soldiers killed more than six thousand people in the Temple courtyard.

This incident during Tabernacles was a major factor leading up to the Judean Civil War by igniting popular opponents of Jannaeus.

A Qumran document sheds further light on another opponent of Jannaeus.

The scroll 4Q390 was written by an adversary of Jannaeus seeking popular support to overthrow the Hasmonean King.

The author called for an end to the dispute between Jannaeus and the Pharisees.

According to the author, the only acceptable solution was an end to the Hasmonean Priesthood and secular control.

The Judean Civil War initially began after the conquest of Gaza by Jannaeus.

Due to Jannaeus’ victory at Gaza, the Nabatean kingdom no longer controls their trade routes to Rome and Damascus.

Therefore Nabatean king Obodas I launches an attack on the Hasmonean state in the Golan.

Potentially, the war with the Nabateans is the last straw against a warmongering king and an incompetent High Priest.

After Defeated in battle against Obadas, Jannaeus returns to fierce Jewish opposition in Jerusalem.

A civil war breaks out between Pharisaic-supported Jewish rebels and Jannaeus.

Jannaeus is defeated at Acre, and …

…Hasmonean forces take the coastal ports of Dor and …

…Stratonospyrgos (Straton's Tower), founded by Straton I of Sidon, likely an agricultural storehouse in its earliest configuration.

Jannaeus captures the site as part of his policy of developing the shipbuilding industry and enlarging the Hasmonean kingdom; the port will eventually become developed as Caesarea Maritima.

The civil war in the Hasmonean kingdom has lasted six years and left fifty thousand Judeans dead.

After Jannaeus succeeded early in the war, the rebels had asked for Seleucid assistance, and Judean insurgents had joined forces with Demetrius III to fight against Jannaeus.

The Seleucid forces defeated Jannaeus at Shechem and forced him into exile in the mountains.

However, these Judean rebels ultimately decided that it was better to live under a terrible Jewish king than backtrack to a Seleucid ruler.

After six thousand Jews returned to Jannaeus, Demetrius was defeated.

The end of the war brings a sense of national solidarity against Seleucid influence.

Nevertheless, Jannaeus is uninterested in reconciliation within the Hasmonean state.

The aftermath of the war consists of popular unrest, poverty and grief over the fallen soldiers on both sides.

The greatest impact of the war is the victor’s revenge.

Josephus reports that Jannaeus brought eight hundred rebels to Jerusalem and had them crucified.

Even worse, Jannaeus had the throats of the rebel’s wives and children cut before their eyes as Jannaeus ate with his concubines.