On the Destruction of Jerusalem 1.14–1.24

But there were some whom fear and the change of affairs had seized, who remembered that they had worked against Aristobulus, and above the rest Antipater. He was an Idumean by race, distinguished among his people for his character, not poor in money and therefore very powerful, and by a wonderful skill he had trained himself to despise money for the sake of winning favor. He alarmed Hyrcanus with his counsels, saying that he, who had given up the rule, had no well-founded hope of safety unless he looked to himself by flight; and when he had bent him to his own designs, he worked his way in with King Aretas, saying that the man who had been tricked into giving up the kingdom should be supported with help; it would be honorable for a king to become the arbiter of restoring a rule, and much finer if he ordered what had been taken by fraud from the defrauded man, to whom the birthright of the kingdom belonged, to be restored. The one, he said, was crafty and cunning and therefore suspect to his neighbors; this one was mild and quiet, and would take as the greatest kindness whatever a foreigner gave him, since his brother had taken from him even the right to reign. So, announcing to Hyrcanus that King Aretas's favor had been prepared, he held out the hope of flight and showed him the way, so that he went with him to Petra, situated in the territory of Arabia, where they approached the king. Moved by Antipater's prayers and gifts, the king joined a very large force of fighting men to Hyrcanus to restore him to the kingdom. There were about fifty thousand foot and horse. Beaten by them in the first encounter, Aristobulus fled to Jerusalem, and there he was unsafe against so great a multitude of enemies, which would have stormed the city with him shut inside, had not Scaurus, commander of the Roman army, lifted the siege on the occasion of another war, the one being waged against Tigranes. He had been sent by Pompey, who was burning with heavy resentment because Mithridates had been received, and with the purpose of carrying the war against his father-in-law; for this reason he had ordered Syria to be harassed by Scaurus, while he himself pressed Tigranes and Armenia. So when Scaurus came to Damascus, which Metellus and Lollius had utterly overthrown, envoys of the brothers met him, each begging the help of Roman power for himself; and although Aristobulus was weaker in strength, he outweighed the other by an offer of money. The decision of the contest of battle was sold for three hundred talents, and justice in the claim was weighed by price. When this money had been counted out to him, Scaurus warned Hyrcanus and the king of Arabia to leave the siege, or, if they stayed, to know that they would have to fight a war against Pompey and the Romans. By this threat the siege was lifted: Aretas went to Philadelphia, and Scaurus returned to Damascus. Aristobulus, however, though scarcely fit to drive off danger, gathered a force, pursued the enemy, and at Papyron (that is the name of the place) routed six thousand of the enemy in battle, and with them Phallion, Antipater's brother. The hope of Hyrcanus and Antipater collapsed, for all their confidence was in the strength of Arabia.

But when Pompey the Great began to approach Syria and came to Damascus, the very men whose victory had slipped from their hands, broken by Roman help, asked the Romans for aid, and they went to Pompey as a just arbiter and the least greedy for money. So they began to rely on pleadings, not on gifts as before, since his upright mind, proof against the corruption of money, was not caught in the snares of greed, and he could hate freely a man who had plotted against his brother's honor. So they approached him with complaints by which odium would fall on Aristobulus, as one who unworthily had seized what was another's, and favor would be won for Hyrcanus, to whom the right to reign belonged both by the merit of his life and by the claim of age, supported above all by the authority of his mother, who had both the judgment to choose and the right to confer. Nor was Aristobulus long absent, although he saw nothing in that great breast that would serve his arts; yet he presumed on having bought Scaurus and boasted of his alliance. So he came arrayed in royal dress and attended by a retinue almost greater than usual, as one who, disagreeing about what was just, ruled out any presumption of acquiescing and denied any hope of obedience. But he could not long endure the loftiness of the Roman consul, whose custom it was to command kings of upstart kingdoms. So when they came to the city called Dium, he went off, scorning in the pride of kingship the haughtiness of Roman dignity. By this withdrawal of Aristobulus no small ground for offense was given, and the consul was so moved that at once the arms of the Romans were turned against Judea, with very many auxiliaries from Syria joined to them. When Aristobulus learned that he was approaching the city of Scythopolis and from there Coreae, where the territory of Judea began, he fled to the fortress of Alexandrium, very strongly fortified and set on a very high mountain. Learning this, Pompey ordered him to come down. But he, thinking it unbecoming to obey as if at a master's command, judged in his immoderate spirit that danger should be faced rather than an order obeyed. Yet looking down on the Roman camp crowded with peoples, and at the same time warned by his own men not to provoke those to whose name and power almost the whole world had yielded, he came down; and having used many arguments by which he tried to prove that the kingdom had been conferred on him by right—either as owed to his birth by kinship, or by the judgment of the army, which had followed the stronger and deserted the coward, or by the outcome of battle, or by the agreement of a pact—he went back to his stronghold. Again, when Hyrcanus had gone to the consul, Aristobulus was summoned to judgment and presented himself. But when he saw that the hearing was still being put off, he went back to the fortress. For, between hope and fear, he thought that by obeying Pompey's orders he might bend him to favor him; but so as not to be forced to yield to command a second time, he kept withdrawing into Alexandrium. Nor did the king's craftiness escape the Great: he ordered him to leave his strongholds and to bind himself to do so by giving letters to each of the commanders of the strongholds. He did obey the orders, which he did not dare refuse; yet at once he hid himself within the walls of Jerusalem and began to prepare war against the Romans. Pompey for his part pursued him as he fled, pressed him when shut in, and gave him no time to prepare what was needed for war. The news about Mithridates, that he had ended the war by his death, came to occupy the Great's attention. The city of Jericho held Pompey within its territory when the report of this came. Near the city is a place where balsam grows: it springs from shrubs which the farmers' boys cut with stones, and through these cuts the juice drips in beautifully dewy tears. From there the old soldier, having drawn up his ranks, moved camp toward evening, and at first dawn he stood before the walls of Jerusalem and unexpectedly poured in his armed lines.

Aristobulus, astonished at the appearance of the array, the strength of the men, and the eagerness of the soldiers, came out of his own accord and begged pardon, offering money, the city, and himself. With soft and suppliant words he had softened the consul's anger; but his prayer was in vain, because the fulfillment of his promise was lacking: not only was the money refused, but Gabinius, who had come to fetch what was offered, was even shut out of the city; and war came on. For the Great, having put guards on Aristobulus, began to survey the walls of the city and explore more carefully at which points to attempt an assault. But when he saw that the walls were strong and could not be stormed, and that the temple within the city was surrounded by fortifications no weaker, so that an entry would be doubly dangerous—both from the defenders of the temple and from those guarding the ramparts of the walls—he was in doubt for some time and uncertain of his decision, when suddenly an uprising broke out inside the city: Hyrcanus's partisans wanted to receive Pompey into the city, Aristobulus's champions resisted; the former wanted to open the gates to the Great, the latter to bar them and make war, so that the king would not be taken from them. But the weaker gave way to the more numerous, whose number the terror of Roman power had swollen, and they withdrew into the temple, breaking down the bridge that had linked the city and the temple between them with a passage. So the Roman army was received into the city, and the Jews opened the gates with their own hands to those who not long after would storm the city and the temple. And that word of David was fulfilled: “O God, the nations have come into your inheritance; they have defiled your holy temple.” So they handed over their royal palace of their own accord and gave up the court. Piso, a man distinguished among his people and practiced in military service, was charged with holding the royal palace and the rest of the city with a strong force; he saw to this carefully, as though he had led the Roman army to defend these places rather than to seize them. For the assault on the temple, since it was stubbornly defended, the Great made ready Jews—namely, partisans of Hyrcanus—so that, if possible, the Romans might not profane mysteries foreign to them, and at the same time so that the Jews might fill up the ditches with their own hands; by a wicked service and a shameful compliance their hands served with the basket, their minds with sacrilege. But the heaping up achieved nothing, since Aristobulus's supporters resisted from the walls and threw down obstacles from above; and Pompey's beginnings would have been in vain, had he not, when the sacred days of religion came round, on which an old observance required the Jews to rest from all work, ordered his men to press on with heaping up mounds of earth. For only the act of joining battle has become their custom: even on the sabbath, if battle is brought against them and their safety is threatened with extreme danger, the Jews think they must fight with the sword; other struggles they count against religion. Already the rampart had risen, already the engines had been moved up; the king's men fought back, fiercer for the height of the walls, and were not bent by the closer approach of the Great, though mixed in battle. Pompey was amazed at the fierce spirit of the men, at the beauty and size of the wall, and at the services of the priests, never relaxed amid the fury of war: as though there were deep peace, nothing was lacking in the solemnity of the sacrifices; the blood of victims was poured out amid the javelins and the deaths of the slain; the victim was placed on the altars, and men were struck down standing before the altar. The third month already held the struggle still undecided. First Faustus, son of Cornelius Sulla, and two centurions, one named Furius and the other Fabius, threw down the earth of the walls and broke into the temple, each followed by his own company; and surrounding the inner parts of the temple on every side, they ran through with swords whomever they found. Those who fled were cut down; others who resisted were slaughtered. There was no measure of sparing; yet even such savagery of the fighters did not hinder the service of the priests. The enemy stood over them with drawn swords, yet they carried out the turn of their customary duty without any disturbance. No kind of office was interrupted. Whatever could pertain to the solemnity of purification, whatever to the observance of sacred worship, was performed. So great was their care for the ministry—and would that it had been for the truth of devotion and faith! Greater dangers also arose from their own people than were brought on them by the Hebrews in turn, and the fighting inside was fiercer, and from the rebels came a nearer and doubtful danger: in front was the foreign enemy, behind and on the flanks the enemy at home.

So, shut in on every side, some threw themselves down, others were burned in the fires of their fatherland. The priests, however, persevered in their office to the very last, urging one another not to put the duty of religion after the protection of their lives: it would go well with them if they spent on piety what was owed to necessity, and it would be most beautiful if they might be buried in the bosom of their fatherland. What use would it be to escape and live on, surviving their religion? Rather, it was a glorious work to die in a pious office. If anyone deserted it for fear of danger, it was sacrilege; if anyone fulfilled it, it was a sacrifice and the victory of a pious death. So the priests in their headbands were slaughtered among their own victims, and, clothed in their priestly robes, they lay on the ground among the bodies of the slain. Twelve thousand of the Jews were killed there; of the Romans few were killed and more were wounded. Yet in that misery the Jews groaned at nothing more heavily than that the mysteries of the sanctuary, hidden before, were uncovered and exposed to the nations. In the end Pompey, turning aside from needless concerns of this kind while he sought rather the scorched trophies of a triumph, with very many of his men following him, saw the tabernacle—the inner one, which was open only to the high priest at his solemn entry—and inside he saw the lamp, the table, the incense, the tablets of the covenant and the cherubim above them, a quantity of spices scattered about, and two thousand talents of sacred money. Though there was a great deal of gold in these, he, untouched by any greed, ordered both it and whatever sacred vessels were found to be kept untouched; and on the day after the capture he ordered the temple attendants to cleanse the inner parts of the temple and to celebrate the customary sacrifices. To Hyrcanus he gave the high priesthood, having made use of his ready service in the needs of the siege: for though faithless to his own people, he was faithful to the Romans, so that his fatherland was stormed. But I think no one can be called faithful who has been hostile to his own. So he helped the enemies of his people in the very battle in no perfunctory way, especially in drawing away from alliance with Aristobulus the multitude of the people outside the walls who were striving for him. In everything, however—whether in forestalling Aristobulus, in leading him away by his authority, or in finishing the war quickly—Pompey was an outstanding commander. He added this glorious thing, that he kept moderation in victory: in the end he bound to himself those he had conquered by kindness rather than terror, and struck with the axe only the authors of the war. He also imposed tribute on the conquered, appointed a ruler, and fixed the boundaries of Judea. So Judea was confined within its own borders. He also restored Gadara, which the Jews had overthrown, at the request of Demetrius, who had asked his patron for this favor to his native city; in this matter and in very many others Demetrius stood high with the Great, beyond the usual standing of freedmen, to the point of envy. Aristobulus, with his sons and his father-in-law, he decided to take with him to Rome as captives. But one of the royal offspring slipped from his guards on the way and returned home; his name was Alexander, older than his brother; and there were two sisters. Antigonus, the younger in age, was brought to the City with his sisters, and Pompey went to Cilicia, then to Rome.

In Syria, Scaurus, who held the office of commander, recovered the cities the Jews had seized—inland, Scythopolis, Hippos, Pella, Samaria, Jamnia, Marisa, Azotus, Arethusa; on the coast, Gaza, Joppa, Dora, and the place once called Strato's Tower but afterwards named Caesarea under the rule of Herod, who both adorned it and changed its name. He then set about a war against the Arabs, restraining Judea between the Euphrates and Egypt, and Syria too, restored to its own borders, by his judgment, and by greed for plunder—which I think the more likely motive, rather than extending the empire. He wanted to attack Petra, the capital of the kingdom of Arabia, but, hindered by the difficulty of the ground, he could not break in. Yet he laid waste many places, either near the city or far off. While his army lingered in these places hunger came upon it, and a pitiable disaster would almost have happened had not Hyrcanus, through Antipater, supplied provisions to the struggling Romans; and Antipater also, on Scaurus's advice, urged Aretas to end the war with money. In the end the Arab rid himself of the enemy for three hundred talents and bought off Scaurus; this was the price of his withdrawal. This confirmed Hyrcanus's good faith with the Romans and fostered alliance and security in deep peace, because by his help, out of grievous want, the Roman army in hostile country was given plenty of grain, and aid was at hand.

But when Alexander, who had escaped from the Great's chains, at first secretly and for some time gathering a suitable force, then began openly to overrun Judea, Hyrcanus was harried and distracted in his affairs, while the Romans' concern was pressing, lest the war spread. Indeed Alexander had even decided to restore the wall at Jerusalem that the Great had destroyed, and he had almost begun the work, had not Gabinius, who succeeded Scaurus, having vigorously dealt with the other places through which he had spread the terror of his name, judged that Alexander's attempts must be met. Nor did Alexander think he should flee; daring to decide it in battle with ten thousand foot and fifteen hundred horse, he also repaired the fortresses of Alexandrium, Hyrcania, and Machaerus, to be a refuge for himself if need arose or a hindrance to the enemy, since Arabia, not very loyal to the Romans, was close by. Gabinius, to meet him the sooner, sent Mark Antony ahead with part of the army to block the enemy's march until he himself arrived with the whole column. Antipater, arriving with picked men, and Malichus and Peitholaus, supported by different companies of Jews, joined forces with Antony. When Alexander saw them massed together (for Gabinius too was already present), he changed his plan and withdrew. But when they were not far from Jerusalem, he was forced to join battle; he was defeated and fled, about three thousand of his men being killed and the rest captured or scattered. Hardly a few remained to Alexander, and these more as companions in flight than with daring to rebel. In the end, asking Gabinius for peace, he handed over even the fortresses to the Romans, so that they would have nothing to suspect. In that war Antony's courage shone out remarkably, though everywhere he gave glorious proof of his bravery. Gabinius divided Judea into five councils, to diminish the power from which the greater insolence in affairs arose. To Hyrcanus, because of the mildness of his character, the honor of the priesthood remained. The council of the whole region was entrusted by Gabinius not to one man but in common to the people of Jerusalem; and likewise the other councils were assigned in a similar way, divided among Gadara, Amathus, Jericho, and the people of Sepphoris—that is, the leading cities—so that nothing would be left to the power of individuals, and the administration of the regions, which awaited public care, would not waver. This was undertaken by the Romans to lift the fear of rebellion, and was received gratefully by the Jews as a means of laying aside resentment, since the Hebrew race would live not under a king but under the nobles, after the likeness of the Roman republic, in which not one man ruled but all the best men in turn, to whom magistracies had fallen by lot, administered it—without a share in kingship, but judges of kings. It was thought a provident measure against the restlessness of the nation.

But the flight of Aristobulus and his return to Judea had stirred up a great deal of turmoil among very many, as men flowed back to him whom the favor of old friendship had stirred, or desperate circumstances, for which a remedy was sought in public discord—men eager to throw everything into confusion, since their other hopes had collapsed. So Aristobulus, having returned, began to build fortifications and to restore Alexandrium. When Gabinius learned this, he sent Sisenna, Antony, and Servilius with part of the army and stopped the work. Abandoning the fortifications, Aristobulus prepared for battle; and because he was dragging along a column larger in numbers than in usefulness, he relieved the mass of the people of their arms and gathered only eight thousand armed men, adding also Peitholaus, who had come of his own will from Jerusalem with a thousand men. Then battle began (the Romans were pressing on his neck), and for some time there was a vigorous fight; yet Roman courage prevailed, and five thousand of the Jews were cut down. Aristobulus with a thousand men broke through the line and took refuge in the defenses of the fortress of Machaerus; two thousand scattered elsewhere. The Romans attacked the garrison, but were held off for about two days, since Aristobulus fought it out to the last danger with all his strength. But he could by no means hold out longer. He was captured with his son Antigonus, whom he had taken with him from captivity when he fled; they were sent to Gabinius and by him sent on to Rome. The senate thrust Aristobulus into custody but released his sons to Bithynia, as they say Gabinius had suggested in letters; this had been promised to Aristobulus's wife to reward her zeal in handing over the fortresses to him.

When these things had been done in Judea, Gabinius, thinking he should venture something, prepared an expedition against the Parthians; but the suspect state of King Ptolemy's party called him back after he had set out. For Gabinius turned his march from the Euphrates toward Egypt, using in everything the indispensable services of Antipater and Hyrcanus (but of Hyrcanus through Antipater), who helped the army with money, grain, arms, and auxiliaries; and the clashes around Pelusium in particular would easily have deterred Gabinius had not the Jews, who knew the places and the whole kind of warfare, provided everything. But again, while the army was delayed, Alexander, son of Aristobulus, was trying to plunge into Syria a second time as into an empty province, had not Gabinius, roused by the rumors, hastened his return and, sending Antipater ahead, called back very many of the Jews from alliance with Alexander. Relying on their numbers, Alexander was preparing to drive into exile all the Romans he had found in the region. In the end, though most of the Jews had slipped away through Antipater's negotiation, he did not lay aside his daring; he joined battle with thirty thousand men, but near Mount Tabor, ten thousand being routed, he fled; and with the scattering of the rest the war was ended. Gabinius, having settled the affairs of the Jerusalem state at Antipater's discretion, set out from there and subdued the Nabateans in battle; and Mithridates and Tigranes, fugitives from Persia, he secretly let go, though he declared openly to the soldiers that they had escaped by flight. Crassus succeeded Gabinius, and as he was about to set out for the Parthian war, he took away all the gold that was in the temple at Jerusalem, and in addition ordered the removal of the two thousand talents that Pompey had left untouched. Nor did he rejoice long: when he crossed the Euphrates he lost his army and was himself killed. Made happier by this success, the Parthians decided to cross into Syria. Cassius met them vigorously with ambushes and drove them from the borders of the province entrusted to him, not without heavy loss to the enemy: as they came on in loose order, thinking no one would dare to oppose them, he caught them in narrow places he had seized beforehand. In the end, with many of their men routed, they abandoned the war. Cassius, having driven off the enemy and being secure about his province, rushed into Judea, destroyed Tarichaeae, and sold thirty thousand Jews into slavery. Peitholaus too, suspected of a plot to support Aristobulus's party, he ordered to be put to death. Nor was Antipater without a share in that counsel, so as to remove as far as possible a rival to his power.

This Antipater married a wife named Cypros, born of a most distinguished family among the women of Arabia, and by her he had four sons and one daughter. The sons' names were these: the first was called Phasael, the next Herod, the third Joseph, the fourth Pheroras; and the daughter was Salome. For this reason the man, who was remarkably skilled at earning the partnership of the powerful by gifts and friendship, had won above all the favor of the king of the Arabs, since he put forward the kinship of a wife taken from the region of Arabia. In the end, when he was preparing to fight Aristobulus, he sent his sons to that king of the Arabs as pledges of mutual affection. He received them as an inviolable deposit, treated them with the same care with which he kept his own children at home, and afterwards, when they were asked for, gave them back to their father. But when Aristobulus, beaten in war, was being held in chains; when his son Alexander was keeping from battle in accordance with the terms of peace by which Cassius, on his way back to the Euphrates, had bound him; when the borders of Persia were not troubled by any suspected crossing of the Parthians, and a pleasant appearance of calm in the regions of the East relieved human anxieties—Caesar, pouring himself out of the Gallic lands beyond the Alps into Italy, drove Pompey and the senate across the Ionian Sea. Shut out of Italy, the Great went to Emathia, and ordered the Roman columns from various places to follow him there, because he was preparing war there. While he was occupied with these preparations, Caesar—who stood between the city of Rome and Pompey, since he was following the Great by short cuts from the Flaminian to the Appian Way, to catch either him or his army—freed from his chains Aristobulus, whom Pompey had left bound at Rome, and, giving him also detachments of soldiers, sent him into Syria, to win Judea for himself and to press Pompey from behind. But at the outset of his attempts, when he reached the place, he was killed by poison and left the business unfinished. Rumor ascribed his death to Pompey's supporters. So Caesar's plans were mocked and Aristobulus's desires thwarted by a strange variety of changes, so that he was safer as an exile among enemies and a captive in chains than as a citizen among his own, a master in his bedchamber, a king at his banquet. When he learned this, Pompey, because Aristobulus had tried to renew wars against him in Judea, ordered his son Alexander also to be put to death, as too suspect on account of the Caesarian party. Scipio, obeying Gnaeus's orders, set him as a defendant before the tribunal, so as to put forward a show of a trial, with accusers also brought in; and when sentence was passed against him as one who had disturbed the Roman state with arms, he was struck with the axe, in the manner of enemy commanders convicted of rebellion, so that it might be thought done by the authority of law rather than in execution of an order.

When the deaths of both were known, Ptolemy, who had taken in Aristobulus's brothers and Alexander's wife, sent his son Philippion to the city of Ascalon to fetch the brothers named. On arriving he took Antigonus and his sisters to bring them to his father. Through daily contact and familiarity a spark of love crept into the young man—one to be pardoned, surely, if tyrants knew how to pardon—and he took one of the sisters to himself in the partnership of marriage. His father Ptolemy did not bear this: he killed his son and openly joined his daughter-in-law to himself—a fine censor of morals, who condemned in his son an unlicensed union so that he himself could pollute himself with parricide and incest. When Pompey was killed—who, while fleeing Caesar's arms, offered his head to be cut off by an Egyptian eunuch—the situation changed. Yet he offered his head with the patience that befitted one who had several times conquered such great peoples: seeing in that lot of the vanquished and the state of an exile the mockery and changeableness of human affairs, he offered his neck to the sword, about to receive death in return for kindness from the one to whom he had given a kingdom. After his death a change took place, as very many of the Great's friends sought Caesar's friendship, and especially Antipater, who was gifted to an incredible degree for winning all whose friendship he desired. For resources are needed by all, especially in the preparations of war, where men are very often made dearer than before out of enemies and opponents. For Ptolemy, king of Egypt, since he had wronged him, was being pressed by Caesar himself with very heavy wars.

Mithridates of Pergamum, with the whole force he had brought with him, had been repulsed by the obstacles at Pelusium and had halted in the city of Ascalon. Despairing of a passage, his attempt having failed, he no longer dared to commit himself to battle, the ground being unfavorable and his strength unequal. Antipater first brought in the Arabs to help him, then led with him three thousand Jews, a strong and well-armed force. He also stirred the powerful men of Syria to his aid: Ptolemy, who lived in Lebanon, Iamblichus, and another Ptolemy. Encouraged by their alliance, other peoples too were roused to war. Relying on these added forces, Mithridates approached Pelusium, and when he was prevented from passing, he began a siege. There Antipater gave splendid proof of his soldiership: when the townsmen resisted and the fight was decided with the greatest force on both sides, he was the first, with his men, to break through the part of the walls where he himself was fighting, burst into the city, and take it. Nor was this the end of his labor and help. When the army was advancing inland and, around the district called Onias's, the Egyptian Jews wished to resist so as to block the route, Antipater again not only averted battle but even brought it about that the very men who had prepared arms against them supplied what was needed for the army's use. As a result the people of Memphis too called back their minds from battle and willingly gave themselves to alliance with Mithridates. He, having passed the suspected places, judged that he must engage the rest of the Egyptians, in more open ground indeed but against stronger men, and fought vigorously in the region called by the name of the camp of the Jews who lived there; so much so that he threw himself into headlong danger and would almost have been killed, had not Antipater, seeing that the whole right wing, where Mithridates was, was being pressed by a cohort and shut in on the other side by the river, with no way of escape for the men, charged from the left wing on those who were pursuing Mithridates as he gave way. He pursued them until the whole host of the enemy was destroyed. In that battle Antipater lost only eighty of his men, Mithridates over eight hundred, so that he himself escaped beyond hope; and this slaughter followed in a single moment. Antipater, having received many wounds in his body, found an outstanding testimony to his courage with Caesar, especially since Mithridates was not only the interpreter of his acquittal but the herald of his bravery. Caesar, greatly pleased by this, received Antipater, as was fitting, among his friends with honor. Then, when he had arranged what was to be settled in Egypt and had advanced into Syria, he bestowed on him the honors of the Roman state; he also conferred a talent and imparted the other pledges of his favor as to a man he had proved. At Antipater's suggestion he also willingly confirmed the high priesthood to Hyrcanus.