Lysanias was the ruler of a small realm on the western slopes of
Mount Hermon
Mount Hermon ( ar, جبل الشيخ or جبل حرمون / ALA-LC: ''Jabal al-Shaykh'' ("Mountain of the Sheikh") or ''Jabal Haramun''; he, הַר חֶרְמוֹן, ''Har Hermon'') is a mountain cluster constituting the southern end of th ...
, mentioned by the Jewish historian
Josephus
Flavius Josephus (; grc-gre, Ἰώσηπος, ; 37 – 100) was a first-century Romano-Jewish historian and military leader, best known for '' The Jewish War'', who was born in Jerusalem—then part of Roman Judea—to a father of priestly ...
and in coins from c. 40 BCE. There is also mention of a Lysanias dated to 29 in
Luke's Gospel.
Lysanias in Josephus
Lysanias was the ruler of a tetrarchy, centered on the town of
Abila. This has been referred to by various names including
Abilene,
Chalcis and
Iturea, from about 40-36 BC. Josephus is our main source for his life.
The father of Lysanias was
Ptolemy, son of Mennaeus, who ruled the tetrarchy before him. Ptolemy was married to Alexandra, one of the sisters of
Antigonus, and he helped his brother-in-law during the latter's successful attempt to claim the throne of
Judea
Judea or Judaea ( or ; from he, יהודה, Standard ''Yəhūda'', Tiberian ''Yehūḏā''; el, Ἰουδαία, ; la, Iūdaea) is an ancient, historic, Biblical Hebrew, contemporaneous Latin, and the modern-day name of the mountainous sou ...
in 40 BC with the military support of the
Parthians. Ptolemy had previously supported Antigonus's unsuccessful attempt to take the throne of Judea in 42 BC.
Josephus says in ''
The Jewish War
''The Jewish War'' or ''Judean War'' (in full ''Flavius Josephus' Books of the History of the Jewish War against the Romans'', el, Φλαυίου Ἰωσήπου ἱστορία Ἰουδαϊκοῦ πολέμου πρὸς Ῥωμαίους ...
'' that Lysanias offered the Parthian satrap
Barzapharnes
Barzapharnes was a Parthian general during the latter half of the 1st century BC. In 40 BC, Barzapharnes commanded a Parthian invasion of the Levant, commanded and aided by Pacorus, who allied himself with the Roman outlaw Quintus Labienus, an ...
a thousand talents and 500 women to bring Antigonus back and raise him to the throne, after deposing Hyrcanus though in his later work, the ''
Jewish Antiquities
''Antiquities of the Jews'' ( la, Antiquitates Iudaicae; el, Ἰουδαϊκὴ ἀρχαιολογία, ''Ioudaikē archaiologia'') is a 20-volume Historiography, historiographical work, written in Greek language, Greek, by historian Josephus, F ...
,'' he says the offer was made by Antigonus. In 33 BCE Lysanias was put to death by
Mark Antony
Marcus Antonius (14 January 1 August 30 BC), commonly known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and general who played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic from a constitutional republic into the au ...
for his Parthian sympathies, at the instigation of
Cleopatra, who had eyes on his territories.
Coins from his reign indicate that he was "tetrarch and high priest". The same description can be found on the coins of his father, Ptolemy son of Mennaeus and on those of his son
Zenodorus who held the territory in 23–20 BCE.
Lysanias in Luke
Luke 3:1 mentions a Lysanias () as
tetrarch
Tetrarch, Tetrarchs, or Tetrarchy may refer to:
* Tetrarchy, the four co-emperors of the Roman Empire instituted by the Emperor Diocletian
* Portrait of the Four Tetrarchs - a sculpture of the four co-emperors of the Roman Empire
* Herodian Tetrarc ...
of Abilene in the time of
John the Baptist
John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...
.
According to
Josephus
Flavius Josephus (; grc-gre, Ἰώσηπος, ; 37 – 100) was a first-century Romano-Jewish historian and military leader, best known for '' The Jewish War'', who was born in Jerusalem—then part of Roman Judea—to a father of priestly ...
the emperor
Claudius in 42 confirmed
Agrippa I in the possession of
Abila of Lysanias already bestowed upon him by
Caligula, elsewhere described as Abila, which had formed the tetrarchy of Lysanias:
[
:"He added to it the kingdom of Lysanias, and that province of Abilene"
]
Archaeological Lysanias
Two inscriptions have been ascribed to Lysanias. The name is conjectural in the latter case.
The first, a temple inscription found at Abila, named Lysanias as the Tetrarch of the locality.
The temple inscription reads:
It has been thought that the reference to August lords as a joint title was given only to the emperor Tiberius
Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus (; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was the second Roman emperor. He reigned from AD 14 until 37, succeeding his stepfather, the first Roman emperor Augustus. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC. His father ...
(adopted son of Augustus
Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pr ...
) and his mother Livia (widow of Augustus). If this analysis is correct, this reference would establish the date of the inscription to between 14 (when Tiberius began to reign) and 29 (when Livia died), and thus could not be reasonably interpreted as referring to the ruler executed by Mark Antony in 36 BCE. However, Livia received suitable honors while Augustus was still alive, such as "Benefactor Goddess" (Θεα Εύεργέτις) at a temple at Thassos, so there would be no clear reason that "August Lords" could not be Augustus and Livia.
Possible identity of the two figures
The reference to Lysanias in Luke 3:1, dated to the fifteenth year of Tiberius, has caused some debate over whether this Lysanias is the same person son of Ptolemy, or some different person.
Some say that the Lysanias whose tetrarchy was given to Agrippa cannot be the Lysanias executed by Antony, since his paternal inheritance, even allowing for some curtailment by Pompey
Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (; 29 September 106 BC – 28 September 48 BC), known in English as Pompey or Pompey the Great, was a leading Roman general and statesman. He played a significant role in the transformation of ...
, must have been of far greater extent.[ Therefore, the Lysanias in Luke (28–29) is a younger Lysanias, tetrarch of Abilene only, one of the districts into which the original kingdom was split up after the death of Lysanias I. This younger Lysanias may have been a son of the latter, and identical with, or the father of, the Claudian Lysanias.][
But Josephus does not refer to a second Lysanias. It is therefore suggested by others][ that he really does refer to the original Lysanias, even though the latter died decades earlier. In ''The Jewish War'' Josephus refers to the realm as being "''called'' the kingdom of Lysanias", while Ptolemy writing c. 120 in his Geography Bk 5 refers to Abila as "''called'' of Lysanias"][Cited in Hogg, loc. cit., p.42]
The explanation given by M. Krenkel (''Josephus und Lucas'', Leipzig, 1894, p. 97)[ is that Josephus does not mean to imply that Abila was the only possession of Lysanias, and that he calls it the tetrarchy or kingdom of Lysanias because it was the last remnant of the domain of Lysanias which remained under direct Roman administration until the time of Agrippa.][
]
References
* WRIGHT, N.L. 2013: “Ituraean coinage in context.” Numismatic Chronicle 173: 55–71
(available online here)
{{New Testament people
1st-century BC rulers in Asia
People in the canonical gospels
Gospel of Luke