Josephus, a contemporary, reports that " Jerusalem ... was so thoroughly razed to the ground by those that demolished it to its foundations, that nothing was left that could ever persuade visitors that it had once been a place of habitation.

During the New Testament period, although the tensions went unrecognized by Roman authorities, Josephus reports numerous violent confrontations between Jews and Samaritans throughout the first half of the first century.

This inscription is supplemented by the contemporary Jewish historian, Josephus ( 37 – 100 ), who reports in the Jewish Wars ( book 7, ch.

In the Antiquities of the Jews, Josephus refers to Seth as virtuous and of excellent character, and reports that his descendants invented the wisdom of the heavenly bodies, and built the " pillars of the sons of Seth ", two pillars inscribed with many scientific discoveries and inventions, notably in astronomy.

Josephus reports that the pillar of stone remained in the land of Siriad in his day.

First of all, Josephus reports elsewhere that the Pharisees did not grow to power until the reign of Queen Salome Alexandra ( JW. 1. 110 ) The coins minted under Hyrcanus suggest that Hyrcanus did not have complete secular authority.

Josephus Flavius ( Antiquities IX 283-287 ) reports a naval battle between Tyre and the king of Assyria who was aided by the other cities in Phoenicia.

As Josephus reports in Jewish Antiquities ( Book XVIII, Chapter 5, 4 ): Herodias, [...], was married to Herod, the son of Herod the Great by Mariamne II, the daughter of Simon the High Priest.

Josephus does not provide a number for Theudas ' followers, but the Acts of the Apostles, if it is referring to the same Theudas ( see below ), reports that they numbered about 400.

Josephus reports that during the Great Jewish Revolt of AD 66-70, Hippos persecuted its Jewish population.

Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels directed Admiral William S. Sims, Commander U. S. Naval Forces Operating in European Waters, to collect war diaries, operational reports, and other historic war materials of naval commands in his London headquarters.

Josephus reports that Ananus ' act was widely viewed as little more than judicial murder, and offended a number of " those who were considered the most fair-minded people in the City ".

Most participants in the Jesus Seminar believe Jesus practiced exorcisms, as Josephus, Philostratus, and others wrote about other contemporary exorcists, but do not believe the gospel accounts were accurate reports of specific events or that demons exist.

Another example of the textual arguments against the Testimonium is that it uses the Greek term poietes to mean " doer " ( as part of the phrase " doer of wonderful works ") but elsewhere in his works, Josephus only uses the term poietes to mean " poet ," whereas this use of " poietes " seems consistent with the Greek of Eusebius.

Philip Carrington states that there is no reason to question the authenticity of the Josephus passage on James, and elaborates the background by stating that Ananus continued to remain a power within the Jewish circles at the time even after being deposed, and that it is likely that the charges brought against James by Ananus were not only because of his Christian association but because he objected to the oppressive policies against the poor ; hence explaining the later indignation of the more moderate Jewish leaders.

Josephus uses only the terms " angel ", " divine angel ", and " angel of God ", describing the struggle as no small victory.

For many years, printed editions of the works of Josephus appeared only in an imperfect Latin translation from the original Greek.

Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses on account of his marriage to an Ethiopian, Josephus explains the marriage of Moses to this Ethiopian in the Antiquities of the Jews and about him being the only one through whom the Lord spoke.

The Roman-Jewish historian Flavius Josephus states that three of the seven lamps were allowed to burn during the day also ; however, according to the Talmud ( Rashi, Tractate Shabbat 22b ), only the center lamp was left burning all day, into which as much oil was put as into the others.

Josephus understood theocracy as a fourth form of government in which only God and his law is sovereign.

Despite the fact that the ancient Jewish historian Josephus, as well as other sources, refers to the crucifixion of thousands of people by the Romans, there is only a single archaeological discovery of a crucified body dating back to the Roman Empire around the time of Jesus.

In ancient writings the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were first described by Berossus, a Babylonian priest of Marduk who lived in the late 4th century BC, although his books are known only from quotations by later authors ( e. g., Flavius Josephus ).

Immediately after the death of Tiberius ( 37 AD ), Caligula made over to Herod Agrippa, at that time a prisoner in Rome, the tetrarchy of Philip and the tetrarchy of Lysanias, while Claudius, upon his accession ( 41 ), not only confirmed the liberality of his predecessor towards Herod Agrippa, but added all that portion of Judaea and Samaria which had belonged to the kingdom of his grandfather Herod the Great, together ( says Josephus ) with Abila, which had appertained to Lysanias, and the adjoining region of Libanus.

Legend has it that the construction of the entire complex lasted only three years, but other sources such as Josephus say that it took far longer, although the Temple itself may have taken that long.

The 1st century CE historian Josephus mentions that Rahab kept an inn but is silent as to whether merely renting out rooms was her only source of income.

Josephus records the false etymology that the Greek phrase Hyksos stood for the Egyptian phrase Hekw Shasu meaning the Shepherd Kings, which scholars have only recently shown means " rulers of foreign lands.

Josephus was not the only ancient writer to suggest incestuous relations between Berenice and Agrippa.

The finds confirms the description by historian Josephus Flavius, which state that constructions were finished only during the reign of King Agrippa II, Herod ’ s great-grandson.

Josephus records the earliest account of the false but understandable etymology that the Greek phrase Hyksos stood for the Egyptian phrase Hekw Shasu meaning the Bedouin-like Shepherd Kings, which scholars have only recently shown means " rulers of foreign lands.

Josephus ' account is the only primary source covering the history of the Hasmonean dynasty during the period of its expansion and independence between 110 to 63 BCE.

Josephus scholar Louis H. Feldman has stated that " few have doubted the genuineness " of Josephus ' reference to Jesus in Antiquities 20, 9, 1 and it is only disputed by a small number of scholars.

Josephus ' James passage not only attests to the existence of Jesus as a historical person but that some of his contemporaries considered him the Messiah.

Most of the Talmudic rabbis, and Josephus, following the belief that Urim meant lights, argued that divination by Urim and Thummim involved questions being answered by great rays of light shining out of certain jewels on the breastplate ; each jewel was taken to represent different letters, and the sequence of lighting thus would spell out an answer ( though there were 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet, and only 12 jewels on the breastplate ); two Talmudic rabbis, however, argued that the jewels themselves moved in a way that made them stand out from the rest, or even moved themselves into groups to form words.

The second story is of Josephus, an early Christian hermit who acquires a reputation for piety but is inwardly troubled by self-loathing and seeks a confessor, only to find that same penitent had been seeking him.

The earliest and only surviving reference to Manetho's Aegyptiaca is that of the Jewish historian Josephus in his work " Against Apion ".

The identication sometimes made with a certain Thallus of Samaria who is mentioned in some editions of Josephus ' Antiquities ( 18. 167 ) fails because that name only appears in those editions because of an idiosyncratic alteration of the text by John Hudson in 1720.

According to Josephus, the Essenes had settled " not in one city " but " in large numbers in every town ".

Craig A Evans states that although some scholars had in the past supported the Slavonic Josephus, " to my knowledge no one today believes that they contain anything of value for Jesus research ".

However, Eusebius does not acknowledge Origen as one of his sources for the reference to James in Josephus.

Eusebius does not acknowledge Origen as one of his sources for the reference to James in Josephus.

Dunn states that Josephus positions John as a righteous preacher ( dikaiosyne ) who encourages his followers to practice " righteousness towards one another, and piety towards God " and that Mark 6: 20 similarly calls John " a righteous ( dikaios ) and holy man ".

According to Evans, if the passage had been an interpolation after the emergence of conflicts between Jews and Christians, it would have had a more accusative tone, but in its current form reads as one would expect it to read for a passage composed by Josephus towards the end of the first century.

called י ִ ש ְׂ ר ָ א ֵ ל, Israel ( Yisra ` el, meaning " one that struggled with the divine angel " ( Josephus ), " one who has prevailed with God " ( Rashi ), " a man seeing God " ( Whiston ), " he will rule as God " ( Strong ), or " a prince with God " ( Morris ), from, " prevail ", " have power as a prince ").

Josephus suggested a method of collective suicide: they drew lots and killed each other, one by one, counting to every third person.

The person executed may have been attached to the cross by rope, though nails are mentioned in a passage by the Judean historian Josephus, where he states that at the Siege of Jerusalem ( 70 ), " the soldiers out of rage and hatred, nailed those they caught, one after one way, and another after another, to the crosses, by way of jest.

Josephus describes multiple tortures and positions of crucifixion during the Siege of Jerusalem as Titus crucified the rebels ; and Seneca the Younger recounts: " I see crosses there, not just of one kind but made in many different ways: some have their victims with head down to the ground ; some impale their private parts ; others stretch out their arms on the gibbet.

According to Josephus, Titus had ordered that the Temple should not be destroyed, but while the fighting around the gates continued, a soldier hurled a torch inside one of the windows, which quickly set the entire building ablaze.

It is later described in the territory of the tribe of Asher and according to Josephus, was ruled by one of Solomon's provincial governors.

Josephus particularly associates them with the mass suicide at Masada in 73 CE and to the subsequent refusal " to submit to the taxation census when Cyrenius was sent to Judea to make one " ( Josephus ) as part of their religious and political scheme as resistance fighters:

) Josephus, at first sight, seems to contradict himself, in so far that in one passage ( Ant.

According to Josephus, there were ten entrances into the inner courts, four on the south, four on the north, one on the east and one leading east to west from the Court of Women to the court of the Israelites, named the Nicanor Gate.

Josephus describes the harbor as being as large as the one at Piraeus, the major harbor of Athens.

According to Josephus, the besiegers kept the enormous price of one thousand drachmas they had asked for the lamb.

After occupying Jerusalem, he crucified 2000 Jewish rebels, and may have thus been one of the prime objects of popular anti-Roman sentiment in Judaea, for Josephus, who made every effort to reconcile the Jewish people to Roman rule, felt it necessary to point out how lenient this judicial massacre had been.