reigned ingloriously in Jerusalem for ten years, and was banished.  Judaea was then ruled by procurators, Pilate being the fifth one of them, ruling from A.D. 26-36.  In the year A.D. 65 the Jews rebelled against the Romans, after being their subjects for one hundred and twenty-two years.  They were not subdued until the terrible destruction of the Holy City in A.D. 70, when, according to Josephus, one million one hundred thousand Jews perished in the siege, two hundred and fifty-six thousand four hundred and fifty were slain elsewhere, and one hundred and one thousand seven hundred prisoners were sold into bondage.  The Temple was completely destroyed along with the city, which for sixty years “lay in ruins so complete that it is doubtful whether there was a single house that could be used as a residence.”  The land was annexed to Syria, and ceased to be a Jewish country.  Hadrian became emperor in A.D. 117, and issued an edict forbidding the Jews to practice circumcision, read the law, or to observe the Sabbath.  These things greatly distressed the Jews, and in A.D. 132 they rallied to the standard of Bar Cochba, who has been styled “the last and greatest of the false Messiahs.”  The Romans were overthrown, Bar Cochba proclaimed himself king in Jerusalem, and carried on the war for two years.  At one time he held fifty towns, but they were all taken from him, and he was finally killed at Bether, or Bittir.  This was the last effort of the Jews to recover the land by force of arms.  Hadrian caused the site of the temple to be plowed over, and the city was reconstructed being made thoroughly pagan.  For two hundred years the Jews were forbidden to enter it.  In A.D. 326 the Empress Helena visited Jerusalem, and built a church on the Mount of Olives.  Julian the Apostate undertook to rebuild the Jewish temple in A.D. 362, but was frustrated by “balls of fire” issuing from under the ruins and frightening the workmen.  In A.D. 529 the Greek emperor Justinian built a church in the city in honor of the Virgin.  The Persians under Chosroes II. invaded Palestine in A.D. 614 and destroyed part of Jerusalem.  After fourteen years they were defeated and Jerusalem was restored, but the Mohammedans under Omar captured it in A.D. 637.  The structure called the Dome of the Rock, on Mt.  Moriah, was built by them in A.D. 688.

The Crusades next engage our attention.  The first of these military expeditions was made to secure the right to visit the Holy Sepulcher.  It was commenced at the call of the Pope in 1096.  A force of two hundred and seventy-five thousand men began the march, but never entered Palestine.  Another effort was made by six hundred thousand men, who captured Antioch in 1098.  A little later the survivors defeated the Mohammedan army of two hundred thousand.  Still later they entered Jerusalem, and Godfrey of Bouillon was made king of the city in 1099.  By conquest he came to rule the whole of Palestine.  The orders of Knights Hospitallers and Knights Templars