. >> the jewish historian josephus has a very memorable line. he says, "one temple for the one god." the jews saw themselves as a unique people with one god, one god alone, and this one god of this one special people had one temple. and that's a very powerful idea, reflecting-- accurately, i think-- the historical truth that the temple was a very powerful unifying source within the jewish community. this was the one, most sacred place on earth, the one place on earth where the earth rises up and the heavens somehow descend just enough that they just touch. this was the only one place on the entire earth where this was so. >> the temple in jerusalem was the symbolic heart of the country. jews everywhere, if they chose to, if they were pious, would put aside part of their income-- it's sort of like, oh, the way christmas clubs operate now-- you'd put aside money explicitly to be spent having a party in jerusalem. >> narrator: although the temple was the centerpiece of jewish life and worship, judaism was not a state religion. >> there's no such th

but josephus' version of the story turned masada into the powerful symbol of a noble failure. >> the failure of the first revolt really was a traumatic event for everyone living in the jewish homeland, jews and christians alike. as a result, they had to start rethinking some of their own assumptions. when jerusalem was destroyed, a whole new series of questions had to be asked. "what do we do without the temple?" "where is the source of our faith and our authority?" "what does god want us to do?" >> this era was an age of definition, not just for christianity, but also for judaism. it marks the emergence, for the first time, into the light of history of a new group and a new culture, and a new literature and a new way of thinking and writing. >> narrator: without the temple, the priesthood that had presided over its rituals lost its power. there emerged new leaders, the pharisees, rabbis who would lead the jewish people in a new direction. >> and the rabbis represent for us a new age of definition. it is the rabbis who now emerge as a new kind of judaism, and it is this judaism which