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[284]
Now at this time it happened that the Grecians at Cesarea had been
too hard for the Jews, and had obtained of Nero the government of the city,
and had brought the judicial determination: at the same time began the
war, in the twelfth year of the reign of Nero, and the seventeenth of the
reign of Agrippa, in the month of Artemisins [Jyar.] Now the occasion of
this war was by no means proportionable to those heavy calamities which
it brought upon us. For the Jews that dwelt at Cesarea had a synagogue
near the place, whose owner was a certain Cesarean Greek: the Jews had
endeavored frequently to have purchased the possession of the place, and
had offered many times its value for its price; but as the owner overlooked
their offers, so did he raise other buildings upon the place, in way of
affront to them, and made working-shops of them, and left them but a narrow
passage, and such as was very troublesome for them to go along to their
synagogue. Whereupon the warmer part of the Jewish youth went hastily to
the workmen, and forbade them to build there; but as Florus would not permit
them to use force, the great men of the Jews, with John the publican, being
in the utmost distress what to do, persuaded Florus, with the offer of
eight talents, to hinder the work. He then, being intent upon nothing but
getting money, promised he would do for them all they desired of him, and
then went away from Cesarea to Sebaste, and left the sedition to take its
full course, as if he had sold a license to the Jews to fight it out.
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