Editing Hadrian (section)

====Background, causes====
In [[Roman Judaea]], Hadrian visited [[Jerusalem]], which was still in ruins after the [[First Roman–Jewish War]] of 66–73. He may have planned to rebuild Jerusalem as a [[Roman colony]]&nbsp;– as [[Vespasian]] had done with [[Caesarea Maritima]]&nbsp;– with various honorific and fiscal privileges. The non-Roman population would have no obligation to participate in Roman religious rituals but were expected to support the Roman imperial order; this is attested in Caesarea, where some Jews served in the Roman army during both the 66 and 132 rebellions.<ref>Giovanni Battista Bazzana, "The Bar Kokhba Revolt and Hadrian's religious policy", IN Marco Rizzi, ed., '' Hadrian and the Christians''. Berlim: De Gruyter, 2010, {{ISBN|978-3-11-022470-2}}, pp. 89–91</ref> It has been speculated that Hadrian intended to assimilate the [[Temple in Jerusalem|Jewish Temple]] to the traditional Roman civic-religious [[Imperial cult (ancient Rome)|imperial cult]]; such assimilations had long been commonplace practice in Greece and in other provinces, and on the whole, had been successful.<ref>Bazzana, 98</ref><ref>Cf a project devised earlier by Hellenized Jewish intellectuals such as [[Philo]]: see Rizzi, ''Hadrian and the Christians'', 4</ref> The neighbouring Samaritans had already integrated their religious rites with Hellenistic ones.<ref>Emmanuel Friedheim, "Some notes about the Samaritans and the Rabbinic Class at Crossroads". In Menachem Mor, Friedrich V. Reiterer, eds., '' Samaritans&nbsp;– Past and Present: Current Studies''. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2010, {{ISBN|978-3-11-019497-5}}, p. 197.</ref> Strict Jewish [[monotheism]] proved more resistant to imperial cajoling, and then to imperial demands.<ref name=":0">[[Peter Schäfer]] (1981), ''Der Bar Kokhba-Aufstand'' (in German), Tübingen, pp. 29–50.</ref>

A tradition based on the ''Historia Augusta'' suggests that the revolt was spurred by Hadrian's abolition of [[History of male circumcision#Male circumcision in the Greco-Roman world|circumcision]] (''[[brit milah]]'');<ref>{{cite book |author=[[Peter Schäfer|Schäfer, Peter]] |title= Judeophobia: Attitudes Toward the Jews in the Ancient World |publisher= Harvard University Press |year= 1998 |pages= 103–105 |quote = [...] Hadrian's ban on circumcision, allegedly imposed sometime between 128 and 132 CE [...]. The only proof for Hadrian's ban on circumcision is the short note in the ''Historia Augusta'': 'At this time also the Jews began war because they were forbidden to mutilate their genitals (''quot vetabantur mutilare genitalia''). [...] The historical credibility of this remark is controversial [...] The earliest evidence for circumcision in Roman legislation is an edict by Antoninus Pius (138–161 CE), Hadrian's successor [...] [I]t is not utterly impossible that Hadrian [...] indeed considered circumcision as a 'barbarous mutilation' and tried to prohibit it. [...] However, this proposal cannot be more than a conjecture, and, of course, it does not solve the questions of when Hadrian issued the decree (before or during/after the Bar Kokhba war) and whether it was directed solely against Jews or also against other peoples. |isbn= 978-0-674-04321-3 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=8jIhYBwkO80C |access-date= 1 February 2014}}</ref> which as a [[Philhellenism|Hellenist]] he viewed as [[mutilation]].<ref name=Mackay>Mackay, Christopher. ''Ancient Rome a Military and Political History'': 230</ref> The scholar [[Peter Schäfer]] maintains that there is no evidence for this claim, given the notoriously problematical nature of the ''Historia Augusta'' as a source, the "tomfoolery" shown by the writer in the relevant passage, and the fact that contemporary Roman legislation on "genital mutilation" seems to address the general issue of [[castration]] of slaves by their masters.<ref>Peter Schäfer (2003), ''The Bar Kokhba War Reconsidered: New Perspectives on the Second Jewish Revolt Against Rome'', Mohr Siebeck, p. 68.</ref><ref>Peter Schäfer (2003), ''The History of the Jews in the Greco-Roman World: The Jews of Palestine from Alexander the Great to the Arab Conquest''. Routledge, p. 146.</ref><ref>[[Augustan History|Historia Augusta]], ''Hadrian'' [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Hadrian/1*.html#14.2 14.2].</ref> Other issues could have contributed to the outbreak: a heavy-handed, culturally insensitive Roman administration; tensions between the landless poor and incoming Roman colonists privileged with land-grants; and a strong undercurrent of messianism, predicated on [[Jeremiah]]'s prophecy that the Temple would be rebuilt seventy years after its destruction, as the [[Solomon's Temple|First Temple]] had been after the [[Babylonian captivity|Babylonian exile]].<ref>Shaye Cohen (2013), ''From the Maccabees to the Mishnah'', 3rd edition. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, pp. 25–26, {{ISBN|978-0-664-23904-6}}.</ref>