Hasmonean and Herodian Dynasties

Hasmonean dynasty 168–37 BCE

The Maccabees founded the Hasmonean dynasty, which ruled from 168 BCE – 37 BCE, reasserting the Jewish religion and expanding the boundaries of the Land of Israel by conquest. In the post-Maccabean period the high priest was looked upon as exercising in all things, political, legal, and sacerdotal, the supreme authority.

• Mattityahu – who began a war for independence. , (Tribe of Levi)
• Judas Maccabeus – during whose reign, Alcimus succeeded Menelaeus as high priest.
• Jonathan – assumed the high priesthood.
• Simon – succeeded his brother Jonathan as high priest and was also installed as ethnarch. Under his reign, Judea gained its independence.
• John Hyrcanus I – also succeeded as ethnarch and high priest.
• Aristobulus – succeeded his father John Hyrcanus I as high priest and was also installed as king.
• Alexander Jannaeus – high priest and king.
• Salome Alexandra - reigning as queen only.
• Hyrcanus II – succeeded his father Alexander as high priest beginning with the rule of Salome. Became king upon the death of Salome.
• Aristobulus II – succeeded as high priest and king. During his reign, Judea lost its independence and passed under the rule of Rome (63 BCE) who overthrew him and reinstalled:
• Hyrcanus II as high priest only.
• Antigonus – high priest and king.

Herodian dynasty (37 BCE – 70 CE) - PRETENDERS

• King Herod the ''Great''
• Ethnarch Herod Archelaus (4 BCE – 6 CE), ruler of Samaria, Judea, and Idumea, known as the Tetrarchy of Judea

After Archelaus and during the intervening period, the Sanhedrin, founded by Ezra, became the sole rulers of the Jewish people in Judea in conjunction with the High Priest. The heads, or nesiim, of the Sanhedrin beginning in 20 BCE, were Hillel the Elder, his son Shimon, and his son Gamaliel I whose rule extended into the reign of:

• King Agrippa I (41–44)
• King Herod of Chalcis (41–48)
• King Agrippa II (53–100). In 66 CE, the great revolt began against Rome, resulting in the Zealot Temple Siege and culminating in the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE, the abolition of the High Priesthood, and the final defeat at Massada in 73 CE.