Herodians
To the theocratic belief that was the life of the Jewish polity, the accession of a foreign, half-heathen dynasty like that of Herod to the throne of David must have been a cruel shock. The sceptre had "departed from Judah", and yet, in the popular belief, the Shiloh "had not come" In such circumstances the time-serving and politic would strive to make the best of the new order of things, paying court to the reigning family, and themselves gaming the solid advantage, while all truly pious Jews would mourn, and the more heedless or fanatical would wildly rebel. Hence it was one and the same condition of affairs which gave rise at the one extreme to the Herodian sect, and at the other to the Zealots, the Galilœans, and the Sicarii.
It was in vain that Herod the Great and his descendants endeavored to propitiate the great mass of the people. Idumeean by descent, although in profession Jews, they were by education, taste, and habit altogether Roman. Repeated visits to the capital, and constant attendance on the imperial family, necessary to the stability of their vassal throne, imbued them more and more with the ideas and principles of their heathen masters, which as far as practicable they imported into Palestine. It is true that Herod the Great restored the Temple with great splendour, but this he did in the spirit of Augustus, not of Zerubbabel; to adorn his reign, to propitiate and dazzle his subjects, and to preserve the ascendancy of his name.
The Jew might be proud of those "goodly stones", but was at least equally shocked to observe here a temple and there a statue to the deified Emperor, to witness Roman games even in Jerusalem, and to see the Roman Eagle (to Hebrew eyes an idolatrous emblem) over the very portal of the Temple. In a word, the Herods had largely Romanised the Holy Land and its people. Courtly Jews fell in with the fasnion to their own profit, and justified it to their compatriots. These were the Herodians ", true successors of those who had conformed to the will of Antiochus Epiphanes, and had betrayed Judaism in the days of the "mingling'.
Their natural antagonists were the Pharisees, who prided themselves on nothing so much as on being Heorews first and last. Yet Herodians and Pharisees, being alike underminers of the Hebrew faith — the former by their foreign corruptions, the latter by their native traditions—are condemned by Jesus in the same breath (Mark viii. 15). "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the leaven of Herod". The parallel passage (Matt. xvi. 6) has "Sadducees" in the place of "Herod", implying that the Herodians were infected with Sadducean tenets, as indeed was natural.
That the Pharisees deserved thus to be classed with their natural opponents is ehown by the association of the two in deadly enmity to Jeusus (Mark iii. 6); and especially in proposing the insidious question about the tribute money (Matt. xxii. 16,17). The Pharisees no doubt paid the tax, but under protest; thus at once propitiating the ruling party and saving their own conscience. Their payment showed them to be loyal subjects ; their protest proved them faithful Jews : but on the other hand, if Jesus admitted the claim, the Pharisees would vilify Him to their own party: if He repudiated it; the Herodians would endanger Him with the authorities. His answer silenced both.
A slightly differing view is that the Herodians represented a national party in opposition to the Roman power. Herod Antipas and Pilate were "at enmity" (Lukexxiii. 12); and though the sovereignty of the Herods was heathen in comparison with the theocracy, it was Jewish in comparison with that of Rome. The Horodian in this view would be, comparatively speaking, the patriotic party; hence their alliance with the Pharisees. Specious as this theory may be, the evidence against it seems to preponderate. Some have contended that both aspects of Herodianism by turns prevailed, but this can scarcely be regarded as probable.
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