Agrippa II
Encyclopedia
- For other with this name, see Agrippa (disambiguation)Agrippa (disambiguation)-Classical era:*Agrippa , a semi-mythological king of Alba Longa*Agrippa Menenius Lanatus, a Roman consul in 503 BC*Various members of the Roman gentes Furia and Menenia...
.
Agrippa II (born AD 27/28), son of Agrippa I
Agrippa I
Agrippa I also known as Herod Agrippa or simply Herod , King of the Jews, was the grandson of Herod the Great, and son of Aristobulus IV and Berenice. His original name was Marcus Julius Agrippa, so named in honour of Roman statesman Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, and he is the king named Herod in the...
, and like him originally named Marcus Julius Agrippa, was the seventh and last king of the family of Herod the Great
Herod the Great
Herod , also known as Herod the Great , was a Roman client king of Judea. His epithet of "the Great" is widely disputed as he is described as "a madman who murdered his own family and a great many rabbis." He is also known for his colossal building projects in Jerusalem and elsewhere, including his...
, thus last of the Herodians
Herodians
The Herodians were a sect or party mentioned in the New Testament as having on two occasions — once in Galilee, and again in Jerusalem — manifested an unfriendly disposition towards Jesus .In each of these cases their name is coupled with that of the Pharisees...
. He was the brother of Berenice, Mariamne, and Drusilla
Drusilla (daughter of Agrippa I)
Drusilla was a daughter of Herod Agrippa I and thus sister to Berenice, Mariamne and Herod Agrippa II.-First marriage:She was six years of age at the time of her father's death at Caesarea in 44...
(second wife of the Roman procurator Antonius Felix
Antonius Felix
Marcus Antonius Felix was the Roman procurator of Iudaea Province 52-58, in succession to Ventidius Cumanus.- Life :...
). He is sometimes also called Herod Agrippa II.
Life
Agrippa was educated at the court of the emperor ClaudiusClaudius
Claudius , was Roman Emperor from 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, he was the son of Drusus and Antonia Minor. He was born at Lugdunum in Gaul and was the first Roman Emperor to be born outside Italy...
, and at the time of his father's death was only seventeen years old. Claudius therefore kept him at Rome, and sent Cuspius Fadus
Cuspius Fadus
Cuspius Fadus was an Ancient Roman eques and procurator of Iudaea Province in 44–46 AD.After the death of King Agrippa, in 44 AD, he was appointed procurator by Claudius. During his administration, peace was restored in the country, and the only disturbance was created by one Theudas, who came...
as procurator of the Roman province of Judaea
Judaea (Roman province)
Judaea or Iudaea are terms used by historians to refer to the Roman province that extended over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms of Israel...
. While at Rome, he voiced his support for the Jews to Claudius, and against the Samaritan
Samaritan
The Samaritans are an ethnoreligious group of the Levant. Religiously, they are the adherents to Samaritanism, an Abrahamic religion closely related to Judaism...
s and the procurator of Iudaea Province
Iudaea Province
Judaea or Iudaea are terms used by historians to refer to the Roman province that extended over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms of Israel...
, Ventidius Cumanus
Ventidius Cumanus
Ventidius Cumanus was the Roman procurator of Iudaea Province from AD 48 to c. AD 52. A disagreement between the surviving sources, the Jewish historian Josephus and the Roman Tacitus, makes it unclear whether his authority was over some or all of the province...
, who was lately thought to have been the cause of some disturbances there. On the death of Herod of Chalcis
Herod of Chalcis
Herod of Chalcis , also known as Herod V, was a son of Aristobulus IV, and the grandson of Herod the Great, Roman client king of Judaea. He was the brother of Herod Agrippa I and Herodias....
(in 48
48
Year 48 was a leap year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Vitellius and Poplicola...
), his small principality (Chalcis, Syria
Chalcis, Syria
Chalcis was an ancient city in Syria. Syrian Chalcis was the birthplace of 3rd century Neoplatonist philosopher Iamblichus.It is thought to be the site of the modern town of Qinnasrin, though Anjar in Lebanon has also been suggested as the site of ancient Chalcis....
) was given to Agrippa, with the right of superintending the Temple in Jerusalem
Temple in Jerusalem
The Temple in Jerusalem or Holy Temple , refers to one of a series of structures which were historically located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem, the current site of the Dome of the Rock. Historically, these successive temples stood at this location and functioned as the centre of...
and appointing its high priest. In 53
53
Year 53 was a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Silanus and Antonius...
, he was deprived of that kingdom by Claudius, who made him governor over the tetrarchy of Philip and Lysanias
Lysanias
Lysanias was the ruler of a small realm on the western slopes of Mount Hermon, attested to by the Jewish writer Josephus and in coins from circa 40 BC. There is also mention of a Lysanias dated to 29 AD in the gospel of Luke. It has been debated whether these are the same person.- Lysanias in...
. Agrippa celebrated by marrying off his two sisters Mariamne
Mariamne (daughter of Herod Agrippa I)
Mariamne was a daughter of King Herod Agrippa I. She was betrothed by her father to Gaius Julius Archelaus Antiochus Epiphanes, first son of King Antiochus IV of Commagene, but this marriage had not yet been enacted upon her father's death. Her brother Agrippa II enacted the marriage once he had...
and Drusilla
Drusilla
Julia Drusilla was the second daughter and fifth living child of Germanicus and Agrippina the Elder, and the sister of the Roman Emperor Caligula. Drusilla also had two sisters and two other brothers...
. Flavius Josephus, the Jewish historian, repeats the gossip that Agrippa lived in incestuous carnality with his sister, Berenice.
In 55
55
Year 55 was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Caesar and Vetus...
, Nero added the cities of Tiberias and Taricheae in Galilee
Galilee
Galilee , is a large region in northern Israel which overlaps with much of the administrative North District of the country. Traditionally divided into Upper Galilee , Lower Galilee , and Western Galilee , extending from Dan to the north, at the base of Mount Hermon, along Mount Lebanon to the...
, and Julias, with fourteen villages near it, in Peraea. Agrippa expended large sums in beautifying Jerusalem and other cities, especially Berytus. His partiality for the latter rendered him unpopular amongst his own subjects, and the capricious manner in which he appointed and deposed the high priests made him disliked by the Jews. Agrippa failed to prevent his subjects from rebelling, and urged instead that they tolerate the behavior of the Roman procurator Gessius Florus
Gessius Florus
Gessius Florus was the Roman procurator of Judea from 64 until 66. Born in Clazomenae, Florus was appointed to replace Lucceius Albinus as procurator by the Emperor Nero due to his wife's friendship with Nero's wife Poppaea...
. But in 66
66
Year 66 was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Telesinus and Paullinus...
the Jews expelled him and Berenice from the city. During the First Jewish-Roman War
First Jewish-Roman War
The First Jewish–Roman War , sometimes called The Great Revolt , was the first of three major rebellions by the Jews of Judaea Province , against the Roman Empire...
of 66–73, he sent 2,000 men, archers and cavalry, to support Vespasian
Vespasian
Vespasian , was Roman Emperor from 69 AD to 79 AD. Vespasian was the founder of the Flavian dynasty, which ruled the Empire for a quarter century. Vespasian was descended from a family of equestrians, who rose into the senatorial rank under the Emperors of the Julio-Claudian dynasty...
, showing that, although a Jew in religion, he was entirely devoted to the Romans
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
. He accompanied Titus
Titus
Titus , was Roman Emperor from 79 to 81. A member of the Flavian dynasty, Titus succeeded his father Vespasian upon his death, thus becoming the first Roman Emperor to come to the throne after his own father....
on some campaigns, and was wounded at the siege of Gamala. After the capture of Jerusalem, he went with his sister Berenice to Rome, where he was invested with the dignity of praetor
Praetor
Praetor was a title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to men acting in one of two official capacities: the commander of an army, usually in the field, or the named commander before mustering the army; and an elected magistratus assigned varied duties...
and rewarded with additional territory.
According to Photius, Agrippa died, childless, at the age of seventy, in the third year of the reign of Trajan
Trajan
Trajan , was Roman Emperor from 98 to 117 AD. Born into a non-patrician family in the province of Hispania Baetica, in Spain Trajan rose to prominence during the reign of emperor Domitian. Serving as a legatus legionis in Hispania Tarraconensis, in Spain, in 89 Trajan supported the emperor against...
, that is, 100
100
Year 100 was a leap year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Traianus and Frontinus...
, but statements of historian Josephus
Josephus
Titus Flavius Josephus , also called Joseph ben Matityahu , was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of...
, in addition to the contemporary epigraphy
Epigraphy
Epigraphy Epigraphy Epigraphy (from the , literally "on-writing", is the study of inscriptions or epigraphs as writing; that is, the science of identifying the graphemes and of classifying their use as to cultural context and date, elucidating their meaning and assessing what conclusions can be...
from his kingdom, cast this date into serious doubt. The modern scholarly consensus holds that he died before 93
93
Year 93 was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Pompeius and Priscinus...
/94
94
Year 94 was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Calpurnius and Magus...
. He was the last prince of the house of the Herods.
It was before him and his sister Berenice that, according to the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
, Paul the Apostle pleaded his cause at Caesarea Maritima, in 59
59
Year 59 was a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Capito of Apronianus and Capito...
.
He lived on terms of intimacy with the historian Josephus, having supplied him with information for his history, Antiquities of the Jews
Antiquities of the Jews
Antiquities of the Jews is a twenty volume historiographical work composed by the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus in the thirteenth year of the reign of Roman emperor Flavius Domitian which was around 93 or 94 AD. Antiquities of the Jews contains an account of history of the Jewish people,...
. Josephus preserved two of the letters he received from him.
Other sources
- Yohanan AharoniYohanan AharoniYohanan Aharoni , was an Israeli archaeologist and historical geographer, chairman of the Department of Near East Studies and chairman of the Institute of Archeology at Tel-Aviv University.-Life:...
& Michael Avi-Yonah, "The MacMillan Bible Atlas", Revised Edition, p. 156 (1968 & 1977 by Carta Ltd.).
External links
- Jewish Encyclopedia: Agrippa II
- Agrippa II - Article in historical sourcebook by Mahlon H. Smith
- Livius.org: Julius Marcus Agrippa