Though he had married ten wives, had nine sons and five daughters, yet within one hundred years not a relative of the great lierodian family was left to curse the earth. He left three sons as heirs of his immense estates—Archelaus, An tipas, Philip II; and two grandsons. Agrippa I and Agrippa II. Despite all his inhuman vil lainy, he did much for Judea and his kingdom. His greatest work was the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem, the main part of which was completed in less than two years; but addi tions continued for "forty and six years." It stood complete but a short time, when Herod's great work fell before the legions of Titus; and the beautiful house where the Divine Master walked and talked was no more.
(2) Archelaus cApx0mos) was the elder of the two sons of Herod by Malthace, a Samaritan woman (Ant. xvii, 1, 3). He was brought up at Rome with his own brother Antipas, at a private house. He had been accused by Anti pater of disloyalty, and so had been at first kept out of any inheritance. His visit to Rome has been narrated above. After he had acquired the kingdom, there is little related of him. He outraged Jewish sentiment by marrying Glaphyra, widow of his brother Alexander, although she had had children by him, and had another hus band (Juba of Mauritania) living, and his own wife was alive. He built a palace at Jericho, and a village in his own honor, of the name of Archelais. He was the worst of all Herod's sons that survived, and, after nine years of his rule, the people of Judxa and Samaria could no longer endure his cruelty and tyranny. They complained to Augustus, who summoned Arche laus to Rome, and, after hearing the case, ban ished him to Vienne. From this time to the year A. D. 41 Palestine was under Roman procura tors.
Archelaus is mentioned once in the New Testa ment, in Matt. ii :22.
(3) Herod Antipas, of Galilee and Perxa. This Herod was first married to a daughter of King Aretas of Arabia ; but forming an unholy attachment for Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip, he soon becaine involved in a course of guilt which ended in his utter ruin. Aretas, to avenge his daughter, sent a considerable army against Herod, whose generals in vain attempted to oppose its progress. The forces which they led were totally destroyed. and instant ruin seemed to threaten both Herod and his domin ions. An appeal to the Romans afforded the only hope of safety. Aretas was haughtily ordered by the emperor to dcsist from the prosecution of the war, and Herod accordingly escaped the ex pected overthrow. But he was not allowed to enjoy his prosperity long. His nephew Agrippa having obtained the title of king, Herodias urged him to make a journey to Italy and demand the same honor. He weakly assented to his wife's ambitious representations; bin the project proved fatal to them both. Agrippa anticipated their designs; and when they appep.red before Caligula they were met by accusations of hnstility to Rome, the truth of which they in vain attempted to disprove. Sentence of deposition was accordingly passed upon Herod, and both he and his wife were sent into banishment and died at Lyons in Gaul.
(4) Philip (4,IXorros) was the son of Herod the Great by Cleopatra, a woman of Jerusalem (Ant. xvii :1, 3). He had been educated at Rome, like the remainder of Herod's sons. The terri tory to uhich he succeeded on the death of his father and by the decision of Augustus (see above), consisted, according to Josephus, of Ba tanea, Trachonitis, Auranitis, Gaulanitis, and Paneas (Ant. xvii, viii, 1, xi, 4, xviii, iv, 6; BI 11,
vi :3), according to St. Luke (iii :I) the country of Iturxa and Trachonitis.
Unlike the rest of his family, he was distin guished for justice and moderation. He married his niece Salome, the daughter of Herodias and his brother Herod (Philip), who was the young woman that danced before Herod Antipas. Philip is referred to twice in the New Testament (Luke iii it ; Acts xiii:i).
He ruled for 38 years from his accession in B. C. 4. His character is sumined up by Josephus (Ant. xviii, iv, 6) : 'He was moderate and peace ful in his rule, and spent his whole life in his country. He went out with only a small retinue, always taking with him the throne on which he might sit and judge. Whenever he met any one who had need of him, he made no delay, but set down the throne wherever he might be and heard the case.' (5) Herod Agrippa, or Agrippa. I, al.. luded to above, was the son of Aristobulus, so cruelly put to death by his father Herod the Great. The earlier part of his life was spent at Rome, where the magnificence and luxury in which he indulged reduced him to poverty. After a variety of adventures and sufferings he was thrown into bonds by Tiberius, but on the succes sion of Caligula was not only restored to liberty, but invested with royal dignity, and made te trarch of Abilene, and of the districts formerly pertaining to the tetrarchy of Philip. His in fluence at the Roman court increasing, he subse quently obtained Galilee and Perxa, and at length Judxa and Samaria, his dominion being thus ex tended over the whole country of Palestine.
To secure the good-will of his subjects, he yielded to their worst passions and caprices. Memorable instances are afforded of this in the apostolic history, where we are told that 'He stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church, and he killed James, the brother of John, with the sword; and because he saw it pleased the Jews. he proceeded further to take Peter also' (Acts xii :1-3). His awful death, described in the same chapter, and by Josephus almost in the same words (..4ntiq. xix, 8), occurred in the fifty fourth year of his age.
(6) Herod Agrippa, or Agrippa II, the son of the above named, was in his seventeenth year when his father died. The emperor Claudius, at whose court the young Agrippa was then residing. purposed conferring upon him the dominions en joyed by his father. From this he was deterred. says Josephus, by the advice of his ministers, who represented the danger of trusting an important province of the. empire to so youthful a ruler. Herod was, therefore. for the time. obliged to content himself with the small principality of Chalcis, but was not long after created sovereign of the tetrarchies formerly belonging to Philip and Lysanias; a dominion increased at a sub sequent period by the grant of a considerable por tion of Perma. The habits which he had formed at Rorpe, and his strong attachment to the peo ple to whose rulers he was. indebted for his pros perity, brought him into frequent disputes with his own nation. In Acts xxv and xxvi we have an account of the speech of St. Paul before Agrippa, Bernice, and Festus. St. Paul's compli ment, that Agrippa was 'expert in all customs and questions which are among the Jews,' was well deserved, and the somewhat enigmatic 'Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian' may be in terpreted according to our conception of Agrippa's character. He died, at the age of seventy, in the early part of the reign of Trajan. H. S.