Written in 75 AD by the Jewish historian and Roman citizen Titus Flavius Josephus, "The Wars of the Jews" describes Jewish history from the capture of Jerusalem in 164 BC to the destruction of that city in 70 AD. Josephus was additionally an apologist with ancestors of royalty and from the priesthood, and his uniquely blended heritage allows an interesting perspective in 'The History of the Destruction of Jerusalem, ' or 'The Jewish War.' Beginning with Antiochus IV Epiphanes, a Seleucid ruler who captured the city, and going through the revolts against the Roman Empire to the events of the First Jewish-Roman War in which Jerusalem was razed, Josephus opens modern eyes to the conditions of Judaism in the first century.