History of the Jews

by Paul Johnson

there is no evidence that Simon regarded himself as a Messiah, the anointed one or in any way a spiritual leader. The letters show him ruling an extensive territory, concerned with farm leases, agricultural supplies, the mobilization of the countryside to supply men and food for his war. He was in every respect a secular ruler, a nasi as he calls himself in his letters, harsh, practical, unbending, ruthless: ‘I call Heaven to witness…I shall put you in chains’; ‘if you will not do this you will be punished’; ‘You are living well, eating and drinking off the property of the house of Israel, and care nothing about your brethren.’125 The later rabbinic legends woven around the ‘Son of a Star’ seem to have no basis in fact. Simon was more of a prototype for a modern Zionist fighter: unromantic and professional, a man who lived and died a guerrilla and nationalist.