Eleazar ben yair biography examples

Flavius Josephus: (?AD)  As a young priest who was initially opposed to the Jewish revolt he nevertheless accepted command of the rebel forces of the Galilee.  In 67 the Roman General Vespasian took Josephus a prisoner after the battle of Jotopata.  He was about to be sent to Rome in chains when he caught the attention of Vespasian, convinced him that he had the gift of prophecy, and told Vespasian that he would become the next Roman emperor and that his son, Titus, would be emperor after him.  Vespasian released Josephus and kept him as his lucky Jewish rabbit's-foot. When the army proclaimed Vespasian Roman Emperor, Josephus' job as resident Jewish advisor was assured.  He accompanied Titus to the siege of Jerusalem and returned with Titus to Rome after the war where he spent the rest of his writing 4 major works.  The best know are The Jewish War, the only eyewitness account of the war that survives, and Antiquities of the Jews, a history of the people of Israel.  In his bo

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Eleazar ben Judah of Worms

ELEAZAR BEN JUDAH OF WORMS (c. –c. ), scholar in the fields of halakhah, theology, and exegesis in medieval Germany. Eleazar was the last major scholar of the Ḥasidei Ashkenaz movement (see *Ḥasidei Ashkenaz). Born in Mainz, he traveled and studied in many of the centers of learning in Germany and northern France. He spent most of his life in Worms. Eleazar was a member of the *Kalonymus family, one of the most important German-Jewish families of that period. His father *Judah b. Kalonymus, one of the leading scholars of his generation, taught his son both halakhah and esoteric theology. *Judah b. Samuel, he-Ḥasid ("the Pious"), the leading figure in the Ḥasidei Ashkenaz movement, to whom Eleazar was related, was, however, his main teacher in the latter field and R. Moses ha-Kohen and R. Eliezer of Metz were his most prominent teachers in halakhah. Eleazar witnessed and suffered personally from the new outburst of persecution of the Jews by the C

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Life and Reliability of Josephus: An Introduction

6. Final Observations

Value of Josephus&#x; Works in Comparison to Sources About the Second Jewish Revolt

The works of Josephus företräda the most valuable historiographical sources for the study of the events and processes of first-century Judea. Largely because of Josephus, this turbulent and for Christians the most important period of Judean history is also the most documented. How poor and deficient our historical knowledge of first-century Judea without Josephus would be, is perhaps best evident in comparison to the gods major event of ancient Jewish Judean history, the Bar Kokhba revolt. After the Bar Kokhba revolt AD &#x; Jewish political thought profoundly and seemingly permanently changed: active messianism was rejected, political activism with the purpose of the reestablishment of an independent Judea was considered theologically illegitimate, and messianic expectations were reduced to passive awaiting for a divine esc