The shocking story of Mariah daughter of Elazar

About one of the atrocities from the bloody civil war that preceded the great rebellion

In 69 AD, on the eve of the Roman siege war on Jerusalem and with the end of the suppression of the rebellion, or quasi-rebellion in the Galilee, groups of Galilean fanatics made their way to Jerusalem, such as those of Shimon bar Giura, Yohanan of Gush Halab and the horrible-delusional of all - the sons of the "fourth philosophy" ”, as Yosef ben Mattathias calls them, who were fanatical zealots, whose whole object was to rule the kingdom of God on earth and drive out the Romans. These groups flee towards Jerusalem, with the aura of redemption, messiahship and apocalypse surrounding them, because mother Jerusalem is calling her sons, and they immediately mobilize to her aid.
Following the arrival of the groups to Jerusalem, when each of them believes that she has the right to lead the struggle, Jerusalem is dragged into a hard and bloody civil war. The most surprising of all in its violence, its zeal and its cruelty was the group of Sikriim, who did not resort to any means, including destruction, robbery and murder, to realize their desires. This group carried out a mysterious and cruel act of burning the food treasures in the city, apparently, so it seems, in order to arouse all the inhabitants of the city, most of whom were sick of opposing Rome, to take up arms without any choice and rebel against the Romans. This story about the burning of the food and its dire consequences, as recorded by Yosef ben Matthew, receives an interesting verification in the literature of Sages, when in one of the versions of Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai's departure from Jerusalem, the Rabbi turns to Abba Sikra, "Rish bully of Jerusalem", and wonders how the zealots cause hunger Unbearably heavy in the besieged city to the point of high mortality in the population.
This move, including the terrible war between the brothers in Jerusalem, brought down a terrible famine on the city and "in every house there was a war at the time when the shadow of something that would be eaten was seen there, and the lovers ran together arm in arm and devoured each from his brother's hand the poor little ones, in order to revive their souls" - says Yosef ben Matthiyahu in his book " The Wars of the Jews" (Book XNUMX, Chapter Three) - and continues with the description of the horror: "Even in the dying, no one believed, since they had nothing, and the robbers (the zealots) attacked the dying and searched them, lest someone hid something edible in the wing of his cloak and led them astray by disguising themselves as prone to die. Due to the magnitude of the hunger, the people opened their mouths like mad dogs, and as drunken people reveling in subam, they smashed the doors, and, at a loss for any advice, broke into one house two or three times. The lack forced them to have nothing between their teeth, and they collected the things, which even the unclean animals were sick of, and did not refrain from chewing and swallowing. Recently, they didn't even pull their hands from the old leather belts and shoes, they even tore the skins over the guards and chewed them."
But, and this is what Joseph ben Matthew testifies to, all the above-mentioned testimonies are dwarfed in front of a terrible story, which will make anyone who hears it stand on end. And the act that was like this was: one rich and generous woman from across the Jordan named Marya daughter of Elazar from the village of Beit Azov arrived in Jerusalem in the general stream of refugees from the east of the city and with her her great possessions. The zealots had no mercy on her assets and often looted them and left her destitute. In her anger and heartbreak, she took her baby and called to him: "O wretched wretch! Who and why will I take care of you this time? Here the hater (referring to the Roman) is standing outside, and hunger and brotherly strife are leaving the house. Both a house of slaves is our inheritance in the hands of the Romans, if we also have our souls for booty, and hunger will have a harvest for us before we enslave them, and the rebels are harder for us than both of these judgments together. death! There was peace for your mother and an evil spirit for tyrants, and also, for example, for wit in the mouth of life, because only this thing remains to fill the seven sufferings of the Jews." (The Wars of the Jews, XNUMX:XNUMX).
At the end of her agitated words, which contained a heavy accusation against the rebels and what they had caused in Jerusalem, much more than the Romans who had besieged the city, she killed her son, roasted him and ate half of him, and left the rest to watch. When this became known to the fanatical rebels, they asked to see the horror with their own eyes, but they immediately fled from the place, gripped by the oozing and boiling water. The account of the event that spread throughout the city resulted, according to Yosef ben Matthew, in an increase in the number of suicides.
Atrocities of this kind were expressed, albeit somewhat allegorically, in the external literature and the literature of sages that were compiled and written after the rebellion. In the composition Baruch al-Suri, the writer brings the atmosphere of terror after the destruction in this way: "Blessed is the man who was not born, or who was born and dies, and we the living, woe to us, who see the distress of Zion... you farmers do not sow any more... and you bridegrooms do not come to your shelter... and you wives do not Pray for her to give birth... after this mother (Jerusalem and the Temple) is desolate and her sons have gone into captivity" (XNUMX:XNUMX). In Sage literature it is told about Rabbi Yehoshua ben Hananiah who learned about groups of ascetics after the Holocaust, who imposed severe asceticism on themselves in the field of nutrition (Tosefta Sota, XNUMX, XNUMX-XNUMX).
Phenomena of this kind after the destruction were indeed logical and natural, but all of them hide a sharp criticism towards the rebellion and the rebels, to such an extent that here and there you also find defiance towards God, how he allowed the horrors of the destruction to take place. It is not known whether the story of Marya daughter of Eleazar took place, or whether it was a product of Joseph's writing. In any case, he teaches about the true horror of the rebellion, about which Agrippa II warned in his moving speech, who asked to prevent the rebellion from happening, namely - the fraternal wars and their consequences. This is not a fight between the supporters of the rebellion and its opponents, but between the fanatical elements that caused the rebellion and seem to have been fed by the bloodshed they themselves initiated.