FELIX, ANTONIUS. - Procurator of Judea from 52 to 60 A.D. A slave emancipated by Antonia, mother of the emperor Claudius (v.). Supported at court by his brother Pallas and a favorite of Agrippina, he was appointed governor of Samaria, then in 52, at the request of the high priest Jonathan, procurator of Judea.
"He exercised the royal authority with the spirit of a slave, resorting to every cruelty and lust" (Tacitus, Hist., 5, 9). He married successively three princesses. Suetonius calls him "trium reginarum maritus" (Claudi., 28). The first was Drusilla, daughter of the triumvir Antony and of Cleopatra, the third another Drusilla, a Jewess, formerly the wife of Aziz king of Emesa, and compelled by F. to divorce. Under his misrule the Zealots or assassins raged, whom he persecuted, but whose services he used to kill the high priest Jonathan. He was removed by Nero in 60 and replaced by Festus. Cf. Fl. Josephus, Ant. Jud., XX, 8; Bell. Jud., II, 13.
To his tribunal at Caesarea Paul was sent in 58, having been arrested at Jerusalem by the tribune Lysias (Act. 23, 25-35). The Apostle defended himself against the high priest Ananias (v.) and the advocate Tertullus frightened F. and "his wife Drusilla, who was a Jewess, as he spoke of justice, of continence and of the judgment to come" (Act. 24, 25). Hoping for financial gain, F. kept him a prisoner in the praetorium of Herod until the arrival of Festus (Act. 23, 35-24, 27).
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