Mannaeus had already attended to all these details, because Iaokanann
was a Jew, and, like all the Samaritans, Mannaeus hated the Jews.

Their temple on the Mount of Gerizim, which Moses had designed to be the
centre of Israel, had been destroyed since the reign of King Hyrcanus;
and the temple at Jerusalem made the Samaritans furious; they regarded
its presence as an outrage against themselves, and a permanent
injustice. Mannaeus, indeed, had forcibly entered it, for the purpose of
defiling its altar with the bones of corpses. Several of his companions,
less agile than he, had been caught and beheaded.

From the tetrarch's balcony, the temple was visible through an opening
between two hills. The sun, now fully risen, shed a dazzling splendour
on its walls of snowy marble and the plates of purest gold that formed
its roof. The structure shone like a luminous mountain, and its radiant
purity indicated something almost superhuman, eclipsing even its
suggestion of opulence and pride.

Mannaeus stretched out his powerful arm towards Zion, and, with clenched
fist and his great body drawn to its full height, he launched a bitter
anathema at the city, with perfect faith that eventually his curse must
be effective.

Antipas listened, without appearing to be shocked at the strength of the
invectives.

When the Samaritan had become somewhat calmer, he returned to the
subject of the prisoner.