In 40 CE, a Jewish delegation led by the prominent philosopher Philo traveled to Rome to petition Emperor Caligula. They sought relief from a violent pogrom in 38 CE and Greek efforts to strip Jews of their civil rights. Caligula mocked the envoys, demanding their assimilation and threatening to install a statue of himself in Jerusalem.
The Crisis in Alexandria
The 38 CE Pogrom: Tensions between Alexandria's Jewish population and the ethnic Greek citizens violently boiled over. The Greeks, resentful of Jewish privileges and success, rioted, killing Jews, destroying property, and confining the community to a small section of the city.
Denial of Rights: The Greeks accused the Jews of not honoring the emperor and attempted to strip them of their civil standing.
The Delegations: Both communities elected delegations to present their cases to the emperor in Rome, with the anti-Semitic Greek writer Apion leading the opposition.
The Mission of Philo
Who: The Jewish delegation was led by Philo of Alexandria, a deeply respected scholar and philosopher who sought to harmonize Jewish law with Greek thought.
What They Wanted: They sought protection, the reaffirmation of traditional rights, and an official end to the pogroms.
The Encounter with Caligula
The Imperial Stance: Caligula famously declared himself a god. Because the Jews were the only group in the empire who refused to worship him or place his statue in their synagogues, Caligula viewed them as traitors.
A Hostile Audience: The emperor treated the Jewish delegation with ridicule rather than as diplomats. While walking through his gardens, he interrupted the men's pleas to give orders to his gardeners and mockingly questioned why the Jews did not eat pork.
The Jerusalem Crisis: During the delegation's time in Rome, the situation worsened. Following Jewish resistance to an imperial altar in Jamnia, Caligula ordered a golden statue of himself to be erected in the holy Temple of Jerusalem.
The Aftermath
Philo documented this harrowing diplomatic mission in his surviving treatise, On the Embassy to Gaius. The delegation achieved no immediate relief from Caligula, who dismissed their pleas. Fortunately, Caligula was assassinated in January 41 CE. His successor, Emperor Claudius, issued an edict later that year that reaffirmed the rights and privileges of the Alexandrian Jewish community, bringing temporary peace.
Would you like to know more about the specific philosophical arguments Philo used when defending Judaism to the Emperor, or explore the historical background of the Greek delegations?