The Wicked Kingdom

Known as “the wicked kingdom,” Rome also appeared in the rabbinic imagination as the brutal imperial power responsible for the destruction of the Second Temple, the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Jews, and the repression of Jewish religious practice. Although it might have surprised the Romans, rabbinic tradition identified Esau/Edom—the rejected twin brother of Jacob, the ancestor of Israel—as the ancient forebear of Rome. Thus, the rivalry between the descendants of Jacob (Israel) and the descendants of Esau (Rome) was not the ordinary rivalry between nations. Echoing biblical language, it was a bitter sibling rivalry, with all the poignant and potent hatreds, jealousies, and fears that such a rivalry entails.

The rabbis’ interpretations of the biblical character Esau, whose wickedness is amplified in these later accounts to include murder, patricide, rape, robbery, and more, express their attitudes toward contemporaneous Romans, who are said to be guilty of the same barbarity. Genesis Rabbah 63:6 emphasizes the differences between “pious Israel” and its brother, “idolatrous Rome,” and in Genesis Rabbah 67:8, the biblical Esau’s hatred for Jacob endures through a false etymology based on contemporary Roman hatred of the Jews (see also “Jacob and Esau”). This hatred is mutual, as evidenced by the denigration of Rome in Genesis Rabbah 65:1. Similar to their swinelike ancestor Esau, the Romans are a hypocritical and lawless barbarian people who rob and oppress, all the while claiming the mantle of humanity. According to Genesis Rabbah 67:7, the two nations are locked in a zero-sum struggle.

In the tradition of the biblical books of Daniel and Jonah, the rabbis occasionally fantasize about their enemy’s recognition of the Jewish God and admiration for Jewish tradition. Thus, y. Bava Kamma 4:3, 4b contains a fanciful tale in which Roman officers study and praise the Torah and inspire improvements to rabbinic law. Similarly, in b. Avodah Zarah 10b, the rabbis imagine a Roman emperor serving the Jewish patriarch and even inquiring anxiously about his own fate in the next life.