The Jewish War in full Flavius Josephus's Books of the History of the Jewish War against the Romans , also referred to in English as The Wars of the Jews and The History of the Destruction of Jerusalem, is a book written by the 1st century Jewish historian Josephus

Josephus

Titus Flavius Josephus , also called Joseph ben Matityahu , was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of...

.

It is a description of Jewish history

Jewish history

Jewish history is the history of the Jews, their religion and culture, as it developed and interacted with other peoples, religions and cultures. Since Jewish history is over 4000 years long and includes hundreds of different populations, any treatment can only be provided in broad strokes...

 from the capture of Jerusalem by the Seleucid

Seleucid Empire

The Seleucid Empire was a Greek-Macedonian state that was created out of the eastern conquests of Alexander the Great. At the height of its power, it included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir and parts of Pakistan.The Seleucid Empire was a major centre...

 ruler Antiochus IV Epiphanes

Antiochus IV Epiphanes

Antiochus IV Epiphanes ruled the Seleucid Empire from 175 BC until his death in 164 BC. He was a son of King Antiochus III the Great. His original name was Mithridates; he assumed the name Antiochus after he ascended the throne....

 in 164 BC

164 BC

Year 164 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Torquatus and Longinus...

 to the fall and destruction of Jerusalem in the First Jewish–Roman War in AD 70. The book was written about 75, originally in Josephus's "paternal tongue", probably Aramaic

Aramaic language

Aramaic is a group of languages belonging to the Afroasiatic language phylum. The name of the language is based on the name of Aram, an ancient region in central Syria. Within this family, Aramaic belongs to the Semitic family, and more specifically, is a part of the Northwest Semitic subfamily,...

, though this version has not survived. It was later translated into Greek, probably under the supervision of Josephus himself.

The sources of knowledge that we have of the First Jewish–Roman War are: Josephus's account, the Talmud (Gittin 57b), Midrash

Midrash

The Hebrew term Midrash is a homiletic method of biblical exegesis. The term also refers to the whole compilation of homiletic teachings on the Bible....

 Eichah

Lamentations Rabbah

The Midrash on Lamentations or Eichah Rabbah , like Bereshit Rabbah and the Pesiḳta ascribed to Rab Kahana, belongs to the oldest works of the Midrashic literature. It begins with 36 consecutive proems forming a separate collection, certainly made by the author of the Midrash...

, and the Hebrew inscriptions on the Jewish coins

First Jewish Revolt coinage

First Jewish Revolt coinage was issued by the Jews after the Zealots captured Jerusalem and the Jewish temple from the Romans in 66 AD at the beginning of the First Jewish Revolt...

 minted.

The text also survives in an Old Slavonic

Old Slavonic

Old Slavonic may refer to:*Old Church Slavonic language*Common Slavonic language...

 version, which contains material not found in the Greek version, and which is missing other material found in the Greek version.

External links

• Resources > Second Temple and Talmudic Era > Flavius Josephus The Jewish History Resource Center - Project of the Dinur Center for Research in Jewish History, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• The Wars of the Jews at the Perseus Project
  Perseus Project
  The Perseus Project is a digital library project of Tufts University that assembles digital collections of humanities resources. It is hosted by the Department of Classics. It has suffered at times from computer hardware problems, and its resources are occasionally unavailable...
  
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  • Original Greek edition.
• Notes on the Old Slavonic Josephus