A fresh deportation was carried out by Arta- xerxes Ochus, who about the year B.C. 350 trans- ported Jewish prisoners to Hyrcania(Euseb. Chron., ed. Schoene, ii. 112, ad ann. Abr. 1657; Orosius, iii. 7), probably because they had taken part in the revolt of the Phceenicians against the Persian sway.
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All these Israelites who lived in the Euphrates districts maintained communication with the mother country, and, as the centuries ran their course, took their share in its religious develop- ment. Instead of being absorbed by the sur- rounding heathenism (as one would naturally have expected), they rather advanced in the direc- tion of proper, strict, legal Judaism. And to such an extent did their numbers increase that in the Roman period they were counted by millions ; and thus, even from a political point of view, constituted a power with which the Romans had to reckon, seeing that their settlements lay on the border of [down to the time of Trajan chiefly outside] the sphere of Roman authority. P. Petronius, the legate of Syria, considered it dangerous in the year A.D. 40 to provoke them to a hostile disposition towards Rome (Philo, Legatio ad Gaium, § 31 [ed. Mangey, ii. 578]). Trajan in his advance against the Parthians was exposed to areal danger by the revolt of the Mesopotamian Jews which threatened his rear. It is not prob- able that these millions (uvpiddes drerpor) of Jewish inhabitants were simply descendants of the former exiles. We must rather think of a successful propaganda among the surrounding heathen. This propaganda, too, must have been directed from Judea, for the population of which we are speak- ing was Jewish in the sense of Pharisaism, as is evident from the forms of activity displayed by its religious life (pilgrimages to the feasts, sending of dues to the temple, etc.; see, on this, below). The main stock, however, was certainly composed of the ancient exiles, for in the Roman period we find the Jewish population most thickly settled in the very spots to which the Assyrians and the Chaldeans once transported their prisoners. Josephus names, as their two principal cities, Nehardea (Néepda, Ndapda) and Nisibis (An¢. XVIII. ix. 1 and 9 fin.). The former of these was in Babylonia ; the latter on the Mygdonius, a tribu- tary of the Chaboras (Habor), in the centre of the localities named in 2K 17°18". Around Nehardea were thus grouped the descendants of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin; around Nisibis, the de- scendants of the Ten Tribes.
It may be further mentioned that, in the time of Tiberius, two brothers, Asineeus and Anilzeus, founded in the neighbourhood of Nehardea a robber State, which, owing to the weakness of the Par- thian monarchy, maintained its existence for several decades (Jos. Ant. XVIII. ix.),—In_ the time of Claudius the royal house of Adiabene (Izates, his mother Helena, and his brother Mono- bazus) adopted the Jewish faith, and proved its attachment by keeping up intimate relations with Jerusalem, by establishing various foundations there, and by taking part with the Jews in their great war with the Romans under Nero and Ves- pasian (Jos. Ané. XX. ii.-iv. ; BJ Il. xix, 2, IV. ix. 1l, V. ii. 2, iii. 3, iv. 2, vi. 1, VI. vi. 3, 4).
2. SyRIA.—This is characterized by Josephus as the country which, on account of its proximity to Palestine, had the largest percentage of Jewish inhabitants, these being specially numerous in the capital, Antioch (BJ VIL ill, 3: 70 yap “Iovdaiwy yévos TONY ev KaTa TacaY Thy olKoumevyy mapéomapTaL rots emtxwplos, mAciaotov Sé TH Zupta Kara Thy yerr- viacw dvawenwvypévoy eEarpétws ert THs “Avtioxetas fv jwond dua TO THs moAews péyedos) At Antioch the Jews enjoyed the rights of citizenship, they had a splendid synagogue, and carried on a zealous and successful propaganda among the heathen popula- tion (Jos. U.c.). It is true that by all this they drew upon themselves the hatred of the pagan inhabitants. Regarding the state of things in most of the other towns of Syria we know nothing very definite. But Philo states that there are
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‘great numbers of Jews in every city of Asia and Syria’ (Legatio ad Gaiwm, § 33 [ed. Mangey, ii. 582]: "Lovdaioe kad’ éxdorny roArw eiot TapumrAnbets "Aclas te kal Zuplas). For Damascus exact figures are given by Josephus, who, however, contradicts himself on this point. In one passage he states that, at the outbreak of the great war in the year A.D. 66, there were 10,500 [so Niese’s text of BJ Ul. xx. 2; according to another reading, 10,000] Jews massacred at Damascus. In another passage (BJ vit. viii. 7 [Niese, § 368]) he gives, instead of this number, ‘18,000, with women and children.’ According to the first cited passage (BJ I. xx. 2), the women of Damascus were almost all devoted to the Jewish religion (ras yuvatcas dardoas wdhy ONywv trnyuévas TH Lovdacy Opnoxela).
3. SOUTH ARABIA, — At what date Judaism reached this quarter is unknown, but it was strongly diffused there from the 4th cent. A.D. at the latest. When, under Constantius, attempts were made to extend Christianity in that quarter, these had to contend with Jewish opposition (Philostorgius, iii. iv.). At the beginning of the 6th cent. a Jewish king reigned there. Owing to his persecution of the Christians, he was dethroned by the Christian king of Abyssinia (see Fell, ‘ Die Christenverfolgung in Siidarabien,’ etc., in ZDMG xxxy. [1881] 1-74. Against Halévy, who argued that the king in question was not a Jew but an Arian, see Duchesne in REJ xx. [1890] 220-224).