Herod Antipas built a capital on a graveyard and lost a war over a divorce
The Herod who judged Jesus and had John the Baptist killed was a Roman client ruler of Galilee for 42 years. He named his new capital after the emperor Tiberius, found that devout Jews would not live there, and later lost a disastrous war sparked partly by ditching his Nabatean wife.
Antipas was a son of Herod the Great by Malthace, a Samaritan, and was educated in Rome. He was not the first choice of heir: two older half-brothers were executed and another convicted of plotting to poison their father. For a time Herod's will named Antipas as successor, but a final revision split the kingdom. Augustus largely upheld that last version despite Antipas arguing in Rome for the whole realm, so he received Galilee and Perea with the lesser title of tetrarch, ruler of a quarter.
He inherited trouble. Rebels had raided the palace at Sepphoris, and a Roman reprisal burned the town. Antipas rebuilt it, fortified Betharamphtha in Perea, renamed after Augustus's wife Livia, and founded Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee. Because it stood on a burial ground, which made it ritually impure, he had to settle it with foreigners, the poor and freed slaves. Elsewhere he respected Jewish law, issuing coins without images and joining his brothers to force Pilate to remove offending votive shields in Jerusalem.
His marriage caused the lasting damage. Antipas divorced Phasa'el, daughter of the Nabatean king Aretas IV, to marry Herodias, who was both his niece and the former wife of his half-brother. The Gospels say John the Baptist condemned the union, while Josephus says Antipas feared John's popularity would spark revolt; either way John was imprisoned at Machaerus and executed. Aretas, already quarrelling over borders, went to war and routed Antipas's army, generally dated to 36. Tiberius ordered a Roman counterattack, but it was called off when the emperor died in March 37.
Luke alone says Pilate sent Jesus to Antipas, who mocked him and sent him back. Some historians, including Robin Lane Fox, suspect that scene was invented. Antipas's end came in 39, when his nephew Agrippa I accused him of plotting against Caligula, who exiled him to Gaul.
Source: Herod Antipas
