SIMON BAR-GIORA was a Jewish military leader. Together with John of Giscala he helped defend the city of Jerusalem against the Roman onslaught in the final year and a half of the Jewish Revolt (69-70 CE).
Background
Unlike John, Simon was a representative of the lower classes, with a decidedly social-revolutionary outlook, physically castigating the wealthy and granting many Jewish slaves their freedom. His name, Giora, implies that he was of proselyte stock and, according to the Jewish historian, Josephus, came from the Hellenistic city of Gerasa in Transjordan.
Career
As in the case of John of Giscala and other Jewish personalities of the period of the Great Revolt, the primary source of information on Shimon is Josephus. Josephus must be treated with the greatest caution in this respect however, since he was notoriously antipathetic to Simon, as he was to the other Jewish rebels.
Simon appeared in the fighting at the outset and toward the latter part of the revolt - more specifically in the year 66 CE, with the successful assault upon the Roman commander, Cestius Gallus, and from the spring of 69 to the destruction of the Temple in the summer of 70 CE.
After entering Jerusalem in the spring of 69, Simon gained control of the Upper City and part of the Lower City. The remaining portion of the Lower City and the Temple Mount area was held by John of Giscala. Hostility and bitter clashes marred relations between the two groups. Eventually they made common cause to face the Roman general Titus and his legions, but the previous period of divisiveness had taken its toll and Jerusalem fell before the Roman onslaught in the summer of 70.
Both leaders fell into Roman hands. After the Temple was destroyed Simon hid in an underground passage; when he emerged among the Roman soldiers, dressed in white, with a purple mantle, they seized and bound him.
Taken to Rome, he and John of Giscala were exhibited in the Roman victory parade, but only Simon was sentenced to execution, indicating that the Romans regarded him as their foremost opponent.
Politics
Simon seems to have leaned more toward the extreme zealot Sicarii revolutionary party. Many Sicarii left the fortress of Masada to make common cause with Simon, who fought in the south, capturing Idumea and Hebron.
Personality
Simon’s courage, military leadership, and physical prowess were noted even by Josephus. Some fifteen thousand of the total of twenty-four thousand fighting men of all factions flocked to his banner. Equally apparent are his charisma and semimessianic aura, indicated by the fact that his followers are reported to have treated him with kingly respect.