(Updated July 16, 2025)
This Quote Archive collects pertinent quotes from the Pagan, Emperor Julian “the Apostate.”
Next to each quote are the Topic Quote Archives in which they are included.
This Quote Archive is being continuously updated as research continues. Quotes marked with “***” have not yet been organized into their respective Topic Quote Archives.
Letters
Emperor Julian “the Apostate,” To the Community of the Jews (c. 362-63)1
In times past, by far the most burdensome thing in the yoke of your slavery has been the fact that you were subjected to unauthorized ordinances and had to contribute an untold amount of money to the accounts of the treasury [ever since Vespasian, about AD 72, the Jews had been paying the Romans special Jewish taxes, like the Fiscus Judaicus]. Of this I used to 177 | 179 see many instances with my own eyes, and I have learned of more, by finding the records which are preserved against you. Moreover, when a tax was about to be levied on you again I prevented it, and compelled the impiety of such obloquy to cease here, and I threw into the fire the records against you that were stored in my desks, so that it is no longer possible for anyone to aim at you such a reproach of impiety.
My brother [cousin] Constantius of honored memory [in whose reign, 337-61, severe laws were enacted against the Jews] was not so much responsible for these wrongs of yours as were the men who used to frequent his table, barbarians in mind, godless in soul. These I seized with my own hands and put them to death by thrusting them into the pit, that not even any memory of their destruction might still linger amongst us.
And since I wish that you should prosper yet more, I have admonished my brother Iulus [Hillel II, the Jewish patriarch of the Sanhedrin, who died in 365], your most venerable patriarch, that the levy which is said to exist among you [the taxes paid by world Jewry for support of the Palestinian patriarchate] should be prohibited, and that no one is any longer to have the power to oppress the masses of your people by such exactions, so that everywhere, during my reign, you may have security of mind, and in the enjoyment of peace may offer more fervid prayers for my reign to the Most High God, the Creator, who has deigned to crown me with his own immaculate right hand. For it is natural that men who are distracted by any anxiety should be hampered 179 | 181 in spirit, and should not have so much confidence in raising their hands to pray, but that those who are in all respects free from care should rejoice with their whole hearts and offer their suppliant prayers on behalf of my imperial office to Mighty God, even to Him who is able to direct my reign to the noblest ends, according to my purpose.
This you ought to do, in order that, when I have successfully concluded the war with Persia, I may rebuild by my own efforts the sacred city of Jerusalem [closed to the Jews since the time of Emperor Hadrian in 135], which for so many years you have longed to see inhabited, and may bring settlers there, and, together with you, may glorify the Most High God therein.
Fragments
Emperor Julian, “the Apostate,” Fragment 112
For I am rebuilding with all zeal the temple of the Most High God.
Footnotes
- Emperor Julian, W.C. Wright, trans., The Works of the Emperor Julian, Vol. 3 (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1923), 177-81. Another source: Fordham University, Internet Jewish History Sourcebook: The Emperor Julian and the Jews 361-363 CE. ↩︎
- Emperor Julian, W.C. Wright, trans., The Works of the Emperor Julian, Vol. 3 (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1923), 301. ↩︎
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