Unconfirmed Acts

The following are Acts that are missing either a full date and/or an Official source.

Displaying 1 – 25 of 742
1. Full Date of Act 410 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Destruction of the Jewish Temple” ordered by Vidranga
3. Geography of Act Achaemenid Kingdom/First Persian Empire
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “The Temple which is in Elephantine the fortress let them demolish.” . Schäfter, Peter: Judeophobia: Attitudes Toward the Jews in the Ancient World (Harvard, 1997) p. 104
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes
Researcher
Vidranga was a Persian commander and the father of Naphaina who was in turn a garrison commander in Syene (Present-day Egypt), and referred to as a local representative of the Persian government
1. Full Date of Act 400 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Order” of Bagoas*
3. Geography of Act Achaemenid Empire
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “[…] as punishment for the fratricide** in this temple, Bagoas imposes a fine of fifty [Greek] Drachma for each lamb they (Jews) sacrifice in the[ir] temple.” [*Bagoas was a Visier (Chief Minister) in the Achaemenid Empire. **According to the source, this order came after the death of the high-priest and his son Jonathan’s succession. His other son, Joshua, however, wanted to hold the same position and tried to gather favor with the governors of Syria and Phoenicia. An altercation between the two brothers ensued in the temple and Joshua was killed.] Weigl, Johann Baptist: Theologisch-Chronische Behandlung über das wahre Geburts- und Sterb-Jahr Jesu Christi. Zweiter, praktischer Theil. (Theological-chronological treatment of the real birth-year and year-of-death of Jesus Christ, Second part.); (Sulzbach; 1849)
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 225 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Order of Ptolemy III Euergetes (Ptolemy III Euergetes ruled 246-222 B.C.E.)
3. Geography of Act Ptolemaic Kingdom; Present-day Egypt, Cyprus, Palestine, Jordon, Lebanon, Libya, Turkey, Greece [Provisional]
4. Text of Act ““Ptolemy Euergetes orders his emissary Athenion to collect the outstanding tributes of the past 8 years – accompanied by the [threat] that should Jews refuse [to submit the outstanding dues] they will be chased away from the land and their place/position be given to Egyptians.” ”
5. Source Weigl, Johann Baptist: Theologisch-Chronische Behandlung über das wahre Geburts- und Sterb-Jahr Jesu Christi von Johann Baptist Weigl. Zweiter, praktischer Theil. (Theological-chronological treatment of the real birth-year and year-of-death of Jesus Christ, Second part.); (Sulzbach; 1849);
6. Researcher Ziba Shadjaani
7. Year of Research 2020
8. Notes
Researcher
The above is a translation of a German summary of the original text.
1. Full Date of Act 216 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Order of Ptolemy IV Philopator
3. Geography of Act Present-day Egypt; Ptolemaic Kingdom
4. Text of Act None
5. Source Commentary from other sources:
1) “[…] Jews are to be downgraded from first-class citizens to the lowest, third-class citizens [and] each Jew is to re-register again […] and one is to brand each Jew’s body with a red-hot iron in [the shape of] an ivy-leaf as a sign for their servitude/bondage (‘Knechtschaft’) […] A death-sentence awaits anyone who opposes the implementation of this order […].”
Weigl, Johann Baptist: Theologisch-Chronische Behandlung über das wahre Geburts- und Sterb-Jahr Jesu Christi. Zweiter, praktischer Theil. (Theological-chronological treatment of the real birth-year and year-of-death of Jesus Christ, Second part.); (Sulzbach; 1849)
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 168 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Order of Philipp, the governor (‘Statthalter’) of Jerusalem
3. Geography of Act Present-day Israel
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “Philipp, the governor (‘Statthalter’) of Jerusalem orders the murder of a number of Jews, who were hiding in a cave, on a Sabbath.” [This order came after Antiochus [IV Epiphanes] had decided and decreed that all of his subjects were to denounce their gods and worship that of the king. The above is a translation of a German summary of the original text.] Weigl, Johann Baptist: Theologisch-Chronische Behandlung über das wahre Geburts- und Sterb-Jahr Jesu Christi. Zweiter, praktischer Theil. (Theological-chronological treatment of the real birth-year and year-of-death of Jesus Christ, Second part.); (Sulzbach; 1849)
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 164 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Decree by King Antiochus IV Epiphanes
3. Geography of Act Present-day Turkey / Seleucid Empire / Asia Minor
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “According to II Macc. 6:1, Antiochus sent a special emissary to Judaea to carry out the decree ‘in order to force the Jews to transgress the laws of their fathers and not to live according to God’s commandments.’…The persecution not only involved a complete abomination of the Temple and the altar, but copies of Torah were burned, and Sabbath keeping and circumcision were forbidden. The religious persecutions of Antiochus IV in 167 BC can be attributed to many factors…The conservative religious community of Jerusalem posed too great a threat to his hand on Jerusalem and he resorted to measures he felt would put an end to this threat…he would try to eliminate their faith.” Dr. J. Paul Tanner: “The rise of Antiochus IV Epiphanes and his Assault Against Judaea.” Online Paper at paultanner.org (June 11, 2001) pp. 12 & 14 2) “He also compelled them to forsake the worship which they paid their own God, and to adore those whom he took to be gods; and made them build temples, and raise idol altars, in every city and village, and offer swine upon them every day. He also commanded them not to circumcise their sons…” Josephus: Antiquitates Judaicae, 12.5.4
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 139 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Expulsion of Jews from Rome” issued by the Praetor Hispalus
3. Geography of Act Holy Roman Empire; Present-day Italy
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “In 139 BC Jews were expelled from Rome after being accused of trying to aggressively convert [Christians].” Van Voorst: Jesus, 2000. p. 37; wikisource.org;wikipedia.org; Scherer, J. E.: Die Rechtsverhältnisse der Juden in den deutsch-österreichischen Ländern. (Leipzig; 1901); p. 9
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 116 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Military command of Ptolemy
3. Geography of Act Asia Minor
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “…he commanded his soldiers to strangle them (Jewish women and children), and to cut their throats like a butcher, and then to cast them into boiling caldrons, and then to devour their limbs as sacrifices.” Josephus: Antiquitates Judaicae, 13.12.6
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 3 B.C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Expulsion of Jews,”
3. Geography of Act Egypt
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) Jews are expelled from Egypt. “Jewish Persecution | Timeline of Judaism | History of AntiSemitism;” simpletoremember.com; “TIMELINE OF JEWISH PERSECUTIONS;” whatreallyhappened.com
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 19
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Decree of Emperor Tiberius
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “He supressed all foreign religions, the Egyptian and Jewish rites, obliging those who practiced that kind of superstition to burn their vestments and all their sacred utensils. He distributed the Jewish youth under the pretense of military service among the provinces noted for an unhealthy climate, and dismissed from the city (Rome) all the rest of that nation (Jews) as well as those who were proselytes to that religion under pain of slavery for life, unless they complied.” Suetonius: Lives of the Caesars, Tiberius, XXXVI
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act Nov. 10, 41
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Edict” of Emperor Claudius to Alexandrians
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire; Present-day Italy
4. Text of Act ““[…] and on the other hand, I explicitly order the Jews not to agitate for more privileges than they formerly possessed, and not in the future to send out a separate embassy as though they lived in a separate city (a thing unprecedented), and not to force their way into gymnasiarchic or cosmetic games, while enjoying their own privileges and sharing a great abundance of the advantages in a city not their own, and not to bring in or admit Jews who come down the river from Egypt or from Syria, a proceedings which will compel me to conceive serious suspicions. Otherwise I will by all means take vengeance on them as fomenters of which is a general plague infecting the whole world. […]” ”
5. Source Loeb Classical Library; Select Papyri II; ed. A. S. Hunt and G. C. Edgar; (1934);
6. Researcher Ziba Shadjaani
7. Year of Research 2018
8. Notes
Researcher
This letter of Claudius is written on the verso of a long roll, whose recto bears the text of a tax register and turned up in the Fayum, Philadelphia.
1. Full Date of Act 49 C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Decree of Emperor Claudius
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “He banished all the Jews from Rome…” Suetonius: Lives of the Caesars, Claudius, XXV.4
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 70 C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Military command of Caesar Titus
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire/Judea
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “Now as soon as the army had no more people [Jews] to slay or to plunder, because there remained none to be the objects of their fury… [Titus] Caesar gave orders that they should now demolish the entire city (Jerusalem) and Temple.” Josephus: De bello Judaico, VII.1.1
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 73
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) JONATHAN THE WEAVER
3. Geography of Act Libya
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) Convinced the poorer Jews of Cyrene to revolt by promising them as a “prophet” that he would walk them through the desert. The Roman Governor, L. Valerius Catullus, had them executed. At the same time the Governor also murdered a few thousand wealthy Jews and appropriated their property. “73 JONATHAN THE WEAVER (Libya);” jewishhistory.org
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 85
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Special Taxation of Jews” (“Fiscus Judaicus”) issued by Emperor Domitian
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire; Present-day Italy
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “All Jews in the Roman Empire had to pay a heavy tax under Domitian.” Real-Encyclopädie für Bibel und Talmud. Ausgearbeitet von Dr. J. Hamburger (“Real-Encyclopedia for the Bible and Talmud” prepared by Dr. J. Hamburger”); (Strelitz; 1883) 2) With respect to the fiscus Judaicus, this relatively early date is corroborated by the use of the me adulescentumlum by Suetonius when speaking about his being present at the court of the procurator. In another passage he refers to himself as adulescens in the year 88, so he would have been adulescentulus a few years earlier and this indicates a date close to 85 and certainly no later than 88. Heemstra, Marius: Fiscus Judaicus and the Parting of Ways. (Tübingen, 2010)
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 116
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Order of Emperor Trajan
3. Geography of Act Present-day Cypress; Roman Empire
4. Text of Act ““[… all Jews in Cypress are wiped out … and] a death-sentence is placed on any Jew who arrives in Cypress in the future […]””
5. Source Weigl, Johann Baptist: Theologisch-Chronische Behandlung über das wahre Geburts- und Sterb-Jahr Jesu Christi von Johann Baptist Weigl. Zweiter, praktischer Theil. (Theological-chronological treatment of the real birth-year and year-of-death of Jesus Christ. Second part.); (Sulzbach; 1849);
6. Researcher Ziba Shadjaani
7. Year of Research 2020
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 117 C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Expulsion of Jews from Cyprus
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) Jews were forbidden to live in Cyprus. 2) They attempted to convert the Jews to Christianity under the ideas of Jesus. Under the leadership of Artemion, the Cypriot Jews participated in the great rebellion against the Romans ruled by Trajan in 117 AD. and they are reported by Dio Cassius to have massacred 240,000 Greeks. In punishment a severe law was enacted, according to which no Jew was allowed to land on Cypriot soil, not even in case of shipwreck.” “History of the Jews in Cyprus;” wikipedia.org; jewishhistory.org
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 119
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Ban on circumcision” issued by Roman Emperor Hadrian
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire; Present-day Italy
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “Emperor Hadrian bans circumcision, making Judaism de facto, illegal.” “Pre-Christian Antisemitism, the Nascent Church, and the Beginnings of Teaching of Contempt;” coursehero.com
2) “Emperor Hadrian bans circumcision in an attempt to ban the expression of Judaism.” The Holocaust and Persecution of the Jewish People; essaydocs.org
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 132 C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Ban on Castration and Circumcision” Roman Emperor Hadrian*
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “At this time also the Jews began war, because they were forbidden to practice circumcision” (moverunt ea tempestate et Iudaei bellum, quod vetabantur mutilare genitalia). Scriptores historiae Augustae: Hadrian 14.2, in The Scriptores Historiae Augustae, trans. David Magie, 3 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1979, 1:42–45; Alfredo Mordechai Rabello, “The Ban on Circumcision as a Cause of Bar Kokhba’s Rebellion,” Israel Law Rev., 1995, 29: 176–214)
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes
Editor
*Hadrian was the Roman emperor from 117 to 138 CE. The Bar Kokhba Revolt was 132-136 C.E.
1. Full Date of Act 132 C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Ban on Circumcision” issued by Tinneius Rufus
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “According to the Talmud, Roman governor of Judea, Tinneius Rufus, banned circumcision.” jewishhistory.org
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 135 C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Expulsion of Jews”
3. Geography of Act Judea
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “Jews are banned from entering Judea.” “Bar Kokhba Revolt;” britannica.com; “Jewish diaspora;”wikipedia.org
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 136
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Jews Banned” by Emperor Hardian
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire; Present-day Italy
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) “Hadrian renamed Jerusalem to Aelia Capitolina, [… and] banned Jews from visiting the city. […]” Edited by Florin Curta and Andrew Holt: Great Events in Religion: An Encyclopedia of Pivotal Evens in Religious History. Volume I: Prehistory to AD 600 (Santa Barbara/California, Denver/Colorado; 2017)
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 138
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) “Restriction on Circumcision” edict issued by Roman Emperor Antonius Pius
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire; Present-day Italy [Provisional]
4. Text of Act ““Jews are permitted to circumcise only their sons (circumcidere Judaeis filios suos tantum) on the authority of a rescript of the Divine Pius; if anyone shall commit it on one who is not of the same [Jewish] religion, he shall suffer the punishment of a castrator.” ”
5. Source Modestinus, Herennius: “Modestinus libro sexto regularium” (The Rules of Modestinus); Schäfter, Peter: Judeophobia: Attitudes Toward the Jews in the Ancient World; (Harvard, 1997); p 104;
6. Researcher Ziba Shadjaani
7. Year of Research 2016
8. Notes
Researcher
The original manuscript and the date of this edict have been lost. A copy of a reprint can be found in Herennius Modestinus “Modestinus libro sexto regularim” (Modestinus Sixth Law Book) who was considered one of the last great jurists of the classic age of Roman law.
1. Full Date of Act 213 C.E.
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) Law issued by Emperor Antoninus
3. Geography of Act Roman Empire [Provisional]
4. Text of Act ““What Cornelia Salvia bequeathed to the community of Jews, who are established in the city of Antiocheans, cannot be claimed (in court).””
5. Source Codex Justinianus 1.9.1,
6. Researcher Joan Paez
7. Year of Research 2015
8. Notes None
1. Full Date of Act 219
2. Name of Act (or Short Description) ABBA ARIKA
3. Geography of Act Babylon
4. Text of Act Commentary from other sources: 1) The word “Rav” means master. He was a student of Judah HaNasi and after his death he opened the Torah academy at Sura, which became one of the pillars of Babylonian Jewry. At its peak, over 1,200 students studied there. The beginning of the third century saw a rise in Jewish activities and a decline in the supremacy of Israel. The decline was due to the constant despoiling of Israel by the weakened Roman army and the rise of another ruler in Palmyra (ancient city of central Syria), who heavily taxed the inhabitants of Israel, reducing them to poverty. This directly affected support for schools of learning, which soon migrated to quieter, more tolerant, and more affluent shores. Rav was noted for improving moral and intellectual positions through his responsa (ordinances), including a ban on marriage without courtship and forbidding fathers to betroth a daughter without her consent. These responsa came in the form of questions. They became a popular way of maintaining contact with dispersed communities and, in various contexts, they still continue today. “Jewish History;” Online article
5. Source None
6. Researcher None
7. Year of Research N/A
8. Notes None