Alexander the Alabarch

Alexander the Alabarch, full name Tiberius Julius Alexander Major (Major, Latin for the elder, 15 BC/10 BC – 69 AD) was an Alexandrian Jewish aristocrat who was one of the pro-Roman leaders of the Alexandrian Jewish community and one of the brothers of the exegete and philosopher Philo.

Ancestry and family

Alexander was born and raised in Alexandria, Egypt. He came from an aristocratic family who lived in Alexandria for generations. His ancestors and family were contemporaries to the rule of the Ptolemaic dynasty and the rule of the Seleucid Empire. Although the names of his parents are unknown, Alexander came from a family who were noble, honourable and wealthy. According to Josephus (Antiquities 20.100), Alexander surpassed his fellow local Jewish citizens in Alexandria in both ancestry and wealth.

It was either his father or paternal grandfather who was granted Roman citizenship from the Roman dictator Gaius Julius Caesar. Alexander’s eldest brother was Philo and according to Philo On Animals, Alexander had another brother called Lysimachus. His ancestors and family had social ties and connections to the priesthood in Judea, the Hasmonean dynasty, the Herodian Dynasty, and the Julio-Claudian dynasty in Rome.

Life

What is known of Alexander’s life comes from referenced sources from Philo; the historian Josephus; possibly the New Testament of the Bible (he may be mentioned in Acts chapter 4) and the surviving letters of Roman Governor Pontius Pilate. Alexander was a contemporary to the life of Jesus of Nazareth and the lives of The Apostles of Jesus.

Alexander along with his brothers received a thorough education. They were educated in the Egyptian, Jewish, Greek and Roman cultures, particularly in the traditions of Judaism, the study of the Old Testament and in Greek philosophy. He was devoted to Judaism and to his ancestral practices.

At some unknown date, Alexander was appointed as Alabarch of Alexandria. The alabarch was a magistrate responsible for customs in Alexandria. Later Alexander became an administrator for the extensive land estates in Egypt, owned by Antonia Minor. Antonia Minor was a Roman noblewoman, who was the niece of Emperor Augustus and the youngest daughter of the triumvir Mark Antony. Alexander had been a long-time friend of Antonia Minor’s youngest child, the future Emperor Claudius.

In 35 AD, the Herodian prince and future King Agrippa I, was broke and needed to travel to Italy. Agrippa sailed to Alexandria and begged Alexander to loan him 200,000 drachmas. Alexander loaned Agrippa the money and the prince repaid the money back to Alexander in 41.

As an indication of Alexander’s great wealth, he had nine gates at the Temple in Jerusalem overlaid with massive plates of silver and gold. This was most probably done as a gift to the temple and could be a sign that Alexander was on good terms with the high priests at the Temple.

Between 37 and 41, the Emperor Caligula, in a fit of anger for an unknown reason, ordered Alexander to be imprisoned in Rome. This could be connected to Philo’s embassy to Caligula in Rome in 38, when there was rising racial tensions in Alexandria. After the death of Caligula in 41, his paternal uncle Claudius became Emperor.

Claudius released Alexander from prison and at unknown date in Claudius’ reign, Claudius promoted Alexander to Equestrian rank. Alexander married an unnamed Roman woman and they had two sons: Tiberius Julius Alexander and Marcus Julius Alexander. In 41, Alexander with Agrippa I arranged for their children to marry each other. His second son Marcus Julius married one of the daughters of Agrippa, who was princess Berenice. Unfortunately, Alexander’s second son died in 43 or 44 and left no children from his marriage to Berenice.

Sources

• Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia 2002
• Article: Hellenistic Jewish Literature - Chapter 6: The Life in the Mind: Reader’s Digest: Jesus and His Times, The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc. Printed by Fourth Printing USA, July 1990
• http://www.livius.org/jo-jz/julius/alexander2.html
• http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=1159&letter=A
• http://www.livius.org/am-ao/antisemitism/antisemitism01.html#pogrom2
• http://kassevans.com/Alexander/AlexanderTheAlabarch_RomanAndJew-Sum...

_____________

Alexander the Alabarch: Roman and Jew

Summary

Katherine G. Evans

Summary presented to the Philo of Alexandria Seminar of the Nov. 1995 annual meeting of Society of Biblical Literature. Full text of article published in SBL Seminar Papers, 1995, p. 576-594.

The present study represents a "back door" entry to Philonic studies in that it attempts to reconstruct the historical Philo based on what can be known about his brother Alexander the alabarch. I propose that Alexander was both a very prominent Roman citizen and a very prominent Jew with social ties that stretched from the Imperial family in Rome to the royal family and priesthood in Judea and that Philo to some extent shared this status.

Alexander is known to us directly only through 5 references in Josephus and indirectly through Philo's On Animals. Although Josephus' reliability is always at issue, I believe that here he was probably accurate because Josephus almost certainly had met a number of Alexander's relatives if not the alabarch himself and because the War and Antiquities were dedicated to the Emperors Vespasian and Titus who were close friends with Alexander's son Ti. Alexander.

In War 5.205 it is learned that Alexander had the nine gates of the Temple in Jerusalem overlaid with massive plates of silver and gold, a gift which one can assume would have placed him on very good terms with the Temple High Priest among others. This is but one of a number of indications of Alexander's great wealth. In around 35 C.E. Agrippa sailed to Alexandria and begged Alexander for a loan of 200,000 drachmas (Antiquities 18.159-160). Agrippa and Alexander were probably previously acquainted particularly since both men were friends of Claudius before he became Emperor. Josephus tells us that Alexander was "old friends" with Claudius which would suggest that they were roughly contemporary in age or born around 10 B.C.E. Since there is no evidence that Claudius ever journeyed to Egypt, Alexander probably spent time in Rome. It is plausible that he was educated there and grew up "in the circle of Claudius" as Josephus reports Agrippa did. Alexander also became an epitropos for the mother of Claudius, Antonia Drusus, which I suggest meant that Alexander became the procurator of Antonia's extensive land estates in Egypt. At some point Alexander was appointed "alabarch" which appears to have been a Roman magistry responsible for tax assessment.

Sometime between 37 and 41 C.E. the Emperor Gaius imprisoned Alexander in a fit of anger. The exact reason is unknown but may have been connected somehow with Philo's embassy to Gaius in 39/40. Upon becoming Emperor, Claudius released Alexander from prison and soon thereafter Alexander's son Marcus married Agrippa's daughter Berenice thus linking Alexander's family to the Jewish ruling class through marriage. Josephus also reported that Alexander surpassed all his fellow citizens in both ancestry and wealth (Antiquities 20.100). What Josephus considered to be "superior ancestry" may be elucidated by the beginning of his Life where he relates that for Jews a claim to nobility includes a connection to the priesthood and having royal blood by being descended from the Hasmoneans. If this characterization applies then we can deduce that Alexander was considered a nobleman in both Alexandria and Judea tracing his ancestry back to the Hasmoneans and the priesthood. Josephus also mentions Alexander's religious devotion and adherence to his ancestral practices.

There can be no question that Alexander was a Roman citizen. This is supported by the Roman names of his two sons, Marcus and Ti. Julius Alexander and the status of the latter. Ti. Alexander held the exalted status of inlustris eques or "knight of the first rank" which was second only to the Roman senatorial class. Besides being a procurator of Judea he attained the two pinnacles of an equestrian career, Prefect of Egypt and Praetorian Prefect. It would have been virtually impossible for Ti. Alexander to obtain such distinguished rank and titles if his father had not already been established as one of the Roman elite. In all likelihood Roman citizenship was granted to Alexander's father or grandfather by Julius Caesar.

Alexander's full Roman name would have been some unknown first name or praenomen followed by Julius Alexander. A variation of Alexander's name is found in some manuscripts of Antiquities 19.276. In the passage which mentions Alexander's imprisonment by Gaius some manuscripts call him Alexander Lysimachus or simply Lysimachus. This is likely a later confusion with a third brother named Lysimachus as clarified in Philo's On Animals.

Finally, I return now to the question at hand. What can knowledge of the status of Alexander reveal to us about Philo's relationship to Judaism? The answer to this question may depend partly upon the exact blood relationship of the brothers. Did they have the same two parents and if not did they share the parent through whom Alexander derived his "superior ancestry?" Josephus tells us that Philo was a man held in the highest honor which may indicate that they did. I have suggested above that Alexander was descended from priests and Jerome provides an independent witness that this was also true of Philo. Philo was also related to the ruling class of Judea through the marriage of his nephew Marcus if not before that. I have no doubt that when Philo made his pilgrimmage to Jerusalem as described in On Providence that he was welcomed as an honored guest for his brother's sake as well as for his own. It is also very likely that Philo was a Roman citizen since Alexander's parents would have only married Romans to keep the citizenship in the family. Interestingly the possession of Roman citizenship appears to have opened doors among both Jews and Romans for the family of Alexander the alabarch and may have done so as well for Philo.

http://kassevans.com/Alexander/AlexanderTheAlabarch_RomanAndJew-Sum...

____________

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/1055-alabarch

___________

http://kassevans.com/Alexander/EvansK_AlexanderTheAlabarch_SBLSemin...

__________

http://historyhuntersinternational.org/2010/03/21/the-lysimachus-dy...

Alexander the Alabarch

Alexander the Alabarch (c. 10 BC – unknown AD) was an Alexandrian Jewish aristocrat. His brother was the exegete and philosopher Philo of Alexandria.

Ancestry and family

Alexander's family lived in Alexandria, Egypt. Although nothing is known about Alexander's parents, they must have been noble and wealthy, because Josephus reports that Alexander "surpassed all his fellow citizens both in ancestry and in wealth." (Antiquities 20.100). Philo was Alexander's older brother.

Alexander had two sons, Tiberius Julius Alexander and Marcus Julius Alexander. After 41 AD, Alexander and Agrippa I arranged for their children to be married. Alexander's second son Marcus Julius was wed to princess Berenice. (Antiquities 19.276-277) Marcus Julius died prematurely without producing any children with Berenice. (Evans, p. 581) Tiberius Julius was the Procurator of Judea from 46 to 48 and the Prefect of Egypt from 66 to 69. In 70, he participated in the Siege of Jerusalem as Titus' second-in-command.

It is possible that either Alexander's father or paternal grandfather was granted Roman citizenship by the Roman dictator Julius Caesar. (Evans, p. 584) His ancestors and family had social ties and connections to the priesthood in Judea, the Hasmonean dynasty, the Herodian Dynasty, and the Julio-Claudian dynasty in Rome.

Life

Contemporary evidence of Alexander’s life only comes from the historian Josephus. There is one reference in The Jewish War and four in Antiquities of the Jews. Alexander's brother Philo only refers to him indirectly in On Animals. (Evans, p. 577)

At some unknown date, Alexander was appointed Alabarch of Alexandria. The alabarch was a magistrate responsible for customs in Alexandria. ("Alabarch," Jewish Encyclopedia) Later Alexander became an administrator for the extensive land estates in Egypt, owned by Antonia Minor. Antonia Minor was a Roman noblewoman, who was the niece of Emperor Augustus and the youngest daughter of the triumvir Mark Antony. Alexander had been a long-time friend of Antonia Minor’s youngest child, the future Emperor Claudius.

As an indication of Alexander’s great wealth, he had nine gates at the Second Temple in Jerusalem "overlaid with massive plates of silver and gold." (War, 5.205)

In around 32-35 AD, the Herodian Agrippa I was indebted to Rome for 300,000 pieces of silver. (Evans, pp. 578–9) Agrippa escaped Judea and sailed to Alexandria to beg Alexander to loan him 200,000 drachmas. Alexander refused to give the money directly to Agrippa, but agreed to loan Agrippa's wife Cypros the money because Alexander "marvelled at her love of her husband and all her other good qualities." (Antiquities, 18.159-160)

Sometime between 37 and 41 AD, the Emperor Caligula ordered Alexander to be imprisoned in Rome for an unknown reason. This could be connected to Philo’s embassy to Caligula in Rome in 39/40. After the death of Caligula in 41, his paternal uncle Claudius became Emperor and he immediately released Alexander from prison. Josephus wrote that Alexander was "an old friend of [Claudius], who had acted as guardian for his mother Antonia." (Antiquities, 19.276)

Source :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_the_Alabarch