their city with walls: they also, of their own
accord, admitted of a garrison of Roman legions,
sent them by Cestius Callus, who was then
president of Syria, and so had me in contempt,
though I was then very powerful, and all were
greatly afraid of me: and at the same time that
the greatest of our cities, Jerusalem, was besieged,
and that temple of ours, which belonged to us all,
was in danger of falling under the enemy's power,
they sent no assistance thither, as not willing to
have it thought they would bear arms against the
Romans; but as for thy country, O Justus!
situated upon the lake of Genesareth, and distant
from Hippos thirty furlongs, from Gadara sixty,
and from Scythopolis, which was under the king's
jurisdiction, an hundred and twenty; when there
was no Jewish city near, it might easily have
preserved its fidelity [to the Romans] if it had so
pleased them to do; for the city and its people
had plenty of weapons; but, as thou sayest, I
was then the author [of their revolt]; and pray,
O Justus! who was that author afterward?—for
thou knowest that I was in the power of the
Romans before Jerusalem was besieged, and
before the same time Jotapata was
taken by force, as well as many
other fortresses, and a great many
Josephus
defends him-
self concerning
the war.
of the Galileans fell in the war.
It was therefore, then a proper
time, when you were certainly
freed from any fear on my account, to throw
away your weapons, and to demonstrate to the
king and to the Romans that it was not of choice,
but as forced by necessity, that you fell into the
war against them; but you stayed till Vespasian
came himself as far as your walls with his whole
army; and then you did indeed lay aside your
weapons out of fear, and your city had for certain
been taken by force, unless Vespasian had
complied with the king's supplication for you, and
had excused your madness. It was not I,
therefore, who was the author of this, but your own
inclinations to war. Do not you remember how
often I got you under my power, and yet put
none of you to death?—Nay, you once fell into
a tumult one against another, and slew one
hundred and eighty-five of your citizens, not on
account of your good will to the king and
to the Romans, but on account of your own
wickedness, and this while I was besieged by
the Romans in Jotapata. Nay, indeed, were
there not reckoned up two thousand of the
people of Tiberias during the siege of Jerusalem,
some of whom were slain, and the rest caught and
carried captives? But thou wilt pretend that
thou didst not engage in the war, since thou didst
flee to the king? Yes, indeed, thou didst flee to
him; but I say it was out of fear of me. Thou
sayest, indeed, that it is I who am a wicked man.
But then, for what reason was it that king
Agrippa, who procured thee thy life when thou
wast condemned to die by Vespasian, and who
bestowed so much riches upon thee, did twice
afterwards put thee into bonds, and as often
obliged thee to run away from thy country, and,
when he had once ordered thee to be put to death,
he granted thee a pardon at the earnest request
of Bernice? and when (after so many of thy wicked
pranks) he had made thee his secretary, he caught
thee falsifying his epistles, and drove thee away
from his sight. But I shall not inquire accurately
into these matters of scandal against thee. Yet
cannot I but wonder at thy impudence,
when thou hast the assur-
ance to say, that thou hast better
Justus
a criminal.
related these affairs [of the war]
than have all the others that have written about
them, whilst thou didst not know what was done
in Galilee; for thou wast then at Berytus with
the king; nor didst thou know how much the
Romans suffered at the siege of Jotapata, or what
miseries they brought upon us; nor couldst thou
learn by inquiry what I did during that seige
myself; for all those that might afford such
information were quite destroyed in that siege. But
perhaps thou wilt say, thou hast written of what
was done against the people of Jerusalem exactly.
But how should that be? for neither wast thou
concerned in that war, nor hast thou read the
Commentaries of Cæsar; of which we have
evident proof, because thou hast contradicted
those Commentaries of Cæsar in thy history.
But if thou art so hardy as to affirm that thou
hast written that history better than all the rest,
why didst thou not publish thy history while the
emperors Vespasian and Titus, the generals in
that war, as well as king Agrippa and his family,
who were men very well skilled in the learning of
the Greeks, were all alive? for thou hast had it
written these twenty years, and then mightest
thou have had the testimony of thy accuracy.
But now when these men are no longer with us,
and thou thinkest thou canst not be contradicted,
thou venturest to publish it. But
then I was not in like manner
afraid of my own writing, but I
Josephus
asserts his
integrity.
offered my books to the emperors
themselves, when the facts were
almost under men's eyes; for I was conscious to
myself that I had observed the truth of the facts;
and as I expected to have their attestation to
them, so I was not deceived in such expectation.
Moreover, I immediately presented my history to
many other persons, some of whom were concerned
in the war, as was king Agrippa and some of his
kindred. Now the emperor Titus was so desirous
that the knowledge of these affairs should be
taken from these books alone, that he subscribed
his own hand to them, and ordered that they
should be published; and for Agrippa, he wrote
me sixty-two letters, and attested to the truth of
what I had therein delivered; two of which
letters I have here subjoined, and thou mayest
thereby know their contents. "King Agrippa to
Josephus, his dear friend, sendeth greeting.—I
have read over thy book with great pleasure, and
it appears to me that thou hast
done it much more accurately,
and with greater care, than have
Letter from
King Agrippa.
the other writers. Send me the
rest of these books. Farewell, my dear
friend."—"King Agrippa to Josephus, his dear friend,
sendeth greeting.—It seems by what thou hast
written, that thou standest in need of no
instruction, in order to our information from the
beginning. However, when thou comest to me, I will
Page:Works Translated by William Whiston.djvu/35
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21
LIFE OF FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS.