Herodus Magnus! By that name, I am known. You call me Herod the Great, but you do so contemptuously. You cast me as the monster in your Bible story. Yet my deeds in reference to your Jesus were not unlike those of many people, some of you among them. It is easy for all of us to see in others the very faults we never notice in ourselves.

Mine was a prominent family. From my grandfather, Antipater, and my father, Antipas, to my own seed and their offspring - Archalaeus, Philip, Agrippa, and Felix - our House of Herod ruled wisely and well. We gave crucial help to Julius Caesar when he was in Egypt. It was I who warned Mark Anthony against involvement with Cleopatra. For thirty-three years, I reigned as Rome's client king in Palestine. I must have done some things right to have stayed in pow…