But after the death of Tiberius, Caius, having received the rule, committed many other outrages against many people, but most of all did no small harm to the whole nation of the Jews. This may be learned briefly from his own words, in which he writes thus, word for word:
«So great, then, was the inconstancy of Caius's character toward all men, but especially toward the race of the Jews, whom he grievously hated; he appropriated to himself the houses of prayer in the other cities, beginning with those at Alexandria, filling them with images and statues of his own likeness (for, by permitting others to set them up, he himself in effect set them up by his power); and the temple in the holy city, which alone remained untouched, having been deemed worthy of complete inviolability, he was altering and transforming into a shrine of his own, that it might be called the temple of Caius, the new and manifest Zeus.
Now ten thousand other dreadful things, beyond all description, which befell the Jews at Alexandria in the time of the aforesaid emperor, the same writer relates in his second treatise, which he entitled «On the Virtues.» And Josephus agrees with him, likewise indicating that the calamities against the whole nation began from the times of Pilate and the crimes ventured against our Saviour.
Hear, then, what this man too sets forth in these very syllables, in the second book of the Jewish War, saying: «Pilate, having been sent into Judaea as procurator by Tiberius, brought by night into Jerusalem the images of Caesar, covered over (they are called «standards»). This, when day came, stirred up a very great tumult among the Jews; for those near at hand were dismayed at the sight, as though their laws had been trampled upon — for they hold it unlawful that any image be set up in the city.»
And if you compare these things with the writing of the Gospels, you will know that not long afterward there overtook them that cry which they uttered in the presence of this very Pilate, when they cried out that they had no king but Caesar only.
Then next the same writer relates that yet another calamity overtook them, in these words: «After this he stirred up another disturbance, by expending the sacred treasure (it is called Corban) upon a conduit for bringing in water; and it was brought down from a distance of three hundred stadia. At this there was indignation among the multitude.
And when Pilate was present at Jerusalem, they surrounded the tribunal and cried out against him. But he — for he had foreseen their disturbance — had mingled among the multitude soldiers in arms, covered with civilian dress, and, having forbidden them to use the sword but ordered them to beat with clubs those who clamoured, gave the signal from the tribunal. And the Jews, being beaten, perished — many from the blows, and many trampled by one another in the flight; and the multitude, dismayed at the calamity of the slain, fell silent.»
Besides these things, the same writer makes clear that countless other revolts were stirred up in Jerusalem itself, showing that from that time onward there never ceased to be in the city and in all Judaea seditions and wars and contrivances of evils following one upon another, until at the very last the siege under Vespasian overtook them. Thus, then, did the punishments from divine justice pursue the Jews for what they had dared against Christ.