Mrwarfare

Josephus was born into a wealthy Jewish, aristocratic family and was raised by his Jewish parents. Josephus grew up and became the commander of the Galilean forces during the first Jewish-roman revolt during 60-73CE. Suffering great loss and suicide of many close men, Josephus had no choice but to join the Roman Empire. He did so and became wingman of his once seen enemy; Vespasian. As Josephus spent the next years of his life as a Roman citizen, he wrote many Books in order to explain the Jewish religion to the gentiles on who the Jewish people were and what the values and beliefs of the religion consisted of. He also wrote a book called the ‘Wars of the Jews’ which describes the wars involved with the Jewish people; this leads to his accounts on the fortress of Masada. Josephus is the only written source we have upon Masada, this therefore raises many historiographical issues on the reliability of his works as they may contain BIAS and one sided accounts. Josephus describes the geographical spread of Masada as a fortress built by King Herod the great during 31-37CE to escape the conflict of Jewish discrimination, only later to be overrun by the ‘Sicarii’ during the fall of Jerusalem in 73CE alongside Jewish Zealots. As Jerusalem had been totally obliterated at the time, the commanders of the roman army appointed individual commanders to destroy the last of Jewish strongholds. This is where Flavius Silva is appointed the job of taking his force to Masada where he arrives and sets camps around the fortress. Josephus describes the camps and the ramp which are still visible today which shows some integrity of his works. However, Josephus’ account explains that upon arrival on the top of the fortress, the romans saw complete destruction and a mass suicide. The complexity of his statements comes in because the Jews opposed suicide as their religion said so. Yadin, a Zionist, also states that the people who died there were Jews, even without DNA testing he confirms Josephus’ account. As a Jewish fundamentalist, it is undoubling seen through the pattern that Yadin is promoting heroism and patriotism of the Jewish religion. This close linking shows that Josephus too could have written for the same purpose. Therefore, the reliability of Josephus’ accounts is desolate as many of his works form contradiction. The reliability of his works is rather bleak but still useful as Josephus is the sole account on the fortress of Masada. His works are useful as they vaguely elucidate the events which occurred during the first Jewish revolt and fall of Jerusalem. Even if Josephus’ misconceptions lie between the facts, it our duty to look past the flaws and piece together the facts because that is what history is about. Josephus wrote his books for literary purposes, and that was to highlight the Jewish revolt and explain the Jewish people to the gentiles. This therefore shows that there should be some fact but there could also be fabrications. For example he describes the fortress’ geographical and physical features and they are backed up by archaeological finds, however, when he explains the suicide, his accounts have been proved wrong. Therefore, Josephus is useful when it comes to some aspects of history.