Prominent Roman
jurist during the middle of the 1st c.
CE.
The great-grandnephew of
Caesar's assassin of
the same name was a socially conservative aristocrat who
became leader of the school of legal strict constructionists
known as the Sabinians. Elected consul of Rome shortly after
Jesus was crucified at Jerusalem (30
CE),
Cassius Longinus was noted for judicial decisions that gave
public order priority over personal rights. During
Nero's reign (61
CE), he silenced protests
against an old law that ordered the execution of all
slaves of a patrician who was killed by one of his own household
by arguing: "There is some injustice in every great
precedent, which, though injurious to individuals, has its
compensation in the public advantage" (Tacitus,
Annals 14.44).
Despite his
support of the imperial establishment--which led
Claudius to
appoint him imperial legate to greater Syria (44-49
CE)--Nero banished him to Sardinia (65
CE) just for keeping a bust
of his namesake ancestor. Recalled by Vespasian (70
CE), he died quietly in
Rome.
His 10 volumes
of legal opinions continued to influence Roman jurisprudence for
centuries. Sections were later incorporated into the Digest
of the emperor Justinian (6th c. CE).
References:
Tacitus,
Annals
14.42-45,
16.7-9.
Suetonius,
Lives: Nero 37.
Other online resources:
Perspective on the
World of Jesus 