Against Apion

Flavius Josephus was a Roman-Jewish historian and military officer who lived from around AD 37 to around 100. He was born in Jerusalem, then part of the Roman province of Judea, to a priestly father and a royal mother. He is best known for his novel The Jewish War. He initially fought against the Roman Empire as the general of the Jewish armies in Galilee during the First Jewish-Roman War, until surrendering in 67 AD to the Roman army led by military commander Vespasian following a six-week siege of Yodfat. According to Josephus, the Jewish messianic prophecies that sparked the First Jewish-Roman War mentioned Vespasian becoming Roman emperor. As a result, Vespasian opted to keep Josephus as a slave and interpreter. When Vespasian became Emperor in AD 69, he awarded Josephus his freedom, and he took the Emperor’s surname of Flavius. Flavius Josephus surrendered completely to the Romans and was granted Roman citizenship. When Titus led the siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD, he became an advisor and companion of Vespasian’s son Titus, working as his translator. After the siege failed to quell the Jewish insurrection, the city was pillaged, and Herod’s Temple (the Second Temple) was looted and destroyed.