Episode One: A Scorching Summer in Samaria

Pilate puts down a religious movement at Mount Gerizim before we step back and see how Rome came to rule this region.  SHOWNOTES Josephus, Ant. 18.55-59; War 2:175-203. Roman nobility had three ranks: curials, equestrians, and senators. To be an equestrian required free birth, certain moral standards and most importantly, wealth equating to at least 400,000 sesterces. (Pliny NH 33.32). Pilate’s time in Judea was punctuated by his ‘venality, thefts, assaults, abusive behavior, and his frequent murder of untried prisoners’ (Philo, Embassy to Gaius, 38.302). Antipater (114 – 43 BCE) was from Idumea, a region just south of Judea. Its name is derived from Edom, the Iron Age name of that land, as Judea is derived from Judah, the Iron Age name of that land. Antipater’s son Herod, (72 – 4 BCE) was made provincial governor of Galilee, and was eventually known as Herod the Great, the founder of the Herodian dynasty.