the religious centre of the Samaritans, was constituted a temple of Zeus Xenios.1 To purge Jerusalem of all trace of Judaism was comparatively easy; it was another matter to master the country. In the country villages and smaller towns of Judaea the royal officers met with instances of extreme resistance. Their instructions were to compel the population to break with the old religion by taking part in the ceremonies of Hellenic worship, especially in eating the flesh of sacrificed swine, and to punish even with death mothers who circumcised their children. The books of which the Jews made so much were destroyed, if found, or disfigured by mocking scribbles, or defiled with unholy broth. There can be no question that these measures threw the bulk of the Jewish people, who had perhaps wavered when there seemed a possibility of combining Judaism with Hellenism, into definite antagonism. But immense force was brought to bear upon them. Antiochus did not omit to have the reasonableness of Hellenism put in a friendly way to those who would hear, and he punished without mercy those who would not. And under the stress of those days numbers of the Jews conformed; those who held fast generally forsook their homes and gathered in wandering companies in desolate places. But there also shone out in that intense moment the sterner and sublimer qualities which later Hellenism, and above all the Hellenism of Syria, knew nothing of—uncompromising fidelity to an ideal, endurance raised to the pitch of utter self-devotion, a passionate clinging to purity. They were qualities for the lack of which all the riches of Hellenic culture conld not compensate. It was an epoch in history. The agony created new human types and new forms of literature, which became permanent, were inherited by Christendom. 1 The correspondence between the Samaritans and Antiochus (Joseph. Arch. xii. § 258 f.) is thought by many to be a "poisonous forgery" of the Jews. Its genuineness is defended by Niese (Kritik d. Makk. p. 107). In speaking of the Samaritans it seems to be often lost sight of that they were no doubt, equally with the Jews, divided into two parties. The letter given by Josephus might have been sent by the Hellenizing party without the whole Samaritan community being involved. A similar letter would be quite credible from Menelaus and his friends. The figure of the martyr, as the Church knows it, dates from the persecution of Antiochus; all subsequent martyrologies derive from the Jewish books which recorded the sufferings of those who in that day "were strong and did exploits." 1 The resistance was at first passive. The people of the country villages, if they did not flee and join the roving bands, either conformed, which was probably the most common, or underwent martyrdom. The roving bands were without any general leader or clear principles of action. When one band had been overtaken on the Sabbath by a party from the akra in Jerusalem, they allowed themselves to be butchered without resistance, that they might not profane the holy day but rather "die in their simplicity." 2 It was when the Hasmonaean family came forward that all this was changed. The passive resistance passed into a revolt. But the beginnings of the Maccabaean revolt are wrapped in a certain degree of uncertainty. The origin of the name Hasmonaean is a question.3 The personality and the rôle of Mattathiah, which the First Book of Maccabees presents to us, have been recently pronounced a fiction.4 Our two accounts of the first conflicts with the Seleucid power do not easily admit of reconcilement. But this much may be taken for history. Before the persecution had continued long, a certain family among the refugee bands marked itself out by its gifts of leadership, the children of Hashmûnai, of the priestly tribe, with their home in the little town of Modin (mod. al-Madya). They made a nucleus round which the scattered bands drew together, and 1 Daniel 11, 32. 21 Macc. 2, 29 f. 3 Acc. to 1 Macc. 2, 1, Judas was the son of Mattathiah, the son of John, the son of Symeon, and Josephus (Arch. xii. § 265) makes Symeon the son of Asamonaeus (Hebrew, Hashmûnai). Wellhausen (Israel. u. jüd. Gesch.3 p. 253) thinks that the Symeon of 1 Macc. is really himself Ashmôn, disguised by a mistranslation. This makes Asamonaeus the great-grandfather of Judas. In another place (Bell. i. § 36) Asamonaeus is represented by Josephus as the father of Mattathiah and the grandfather, therefore, of Judas. Finally, Niese, suppressing Mattathiah or identifying him with Asamonaeus (as Schlatter, Jason v. Kyrene, p. 10) makes Asamonaeus the father of Judas (Kritik d. Makk. p. 43 f.). Niese, see preceding note. Schürer in the last edition of his work (1901) professes himself unconvinced by Niese's argument (p. 202, note 42). It they were strengthened by the adhesion of the Hasidim.1 was resolved to fight, even on the Sabbath day, and thereafter the towns and villages which had settled down comfortably to a Hellenic régime found themselves suddenly visited by bands of fierce zealots, who repaid massacre for massacre, circumcised the children by force and destroyed the emblems of Hellenic religion. Naturally the Seleucid government was concerned to protect the new order of things from such disturbance. But it had not sufficient force on the spot to cope with the mobile irregular bands. Some collisions between the local forces and the Jewish insurgents took place, with the result that the royal troops were swept away by the furious onset, or found the enemy upon them in dark nights before they were aware.2 3 In these encounters the people of Israel learnt that the Lord had raised up a man to lead and deliver them as of old. Of the five Hasmonaean brethren it was Judas, surnamed Maccabaeus, who bore the military command and became surrounded with the halo of a popular hero. The effect of his successes was to rally to the cause all those who had only unwillingly and from fear accepted Hellenism, and these, together with the refugees, made the mass of the population of Judaea. The country towns and villages resumed their Jewish complexion; those who loved Hellenism, or were too deeply compromised, fled to the Greek cities. Jerusalem was still held by the Macedonian garrison in the akra, but the rest of Judaea was won back for Judaism. Jerusalem continued a heathen city, Mizpeh, where been "a place of prayer aforetime for Israel," was the 11 Macc. 2, 42. So long as 4 there had 2 This phase of the struggle is briefly indicated in 2 Macc. 8, 5-7. In 1 Macc. it is elaborated in greater detail in the defeats of Apollonius and of Seron (ἄρχων τῆς δυνάμεως Συρίας). It is impossible to make out the official position of either. The title of Seron is taken from the Old Testament, 2 Kings 5, 1 (καὶ Ναιμὰν ὁ ἄρχων τῆς δυνάμεως Συρίας ἦν ἀνὴρ μέγας = 7). See Appendix H. 3 According to 1 Macc. 2, 2, he was the third of the five; according to Joseph. Bell. i. § 37 he was the eldest, and this Niese thinks the most probable. The surname of Maccabaeus is generally believed to be from, a hammer. 41 Macc. 3, 46; cf. Judges 20, 1; 1 Samuel 7, 5; 10, 17. national centre. What had been scattered bands were now Things had perhaps not reached this stage when Antiochus left Syria for his expedition in the North and East. It was thenceforth upon Lysias, the guardian of the young Antiochus, that the responsibility for restoring order in southern Syria fell. How Antiochus himself construed the revolt we do not know, or if he divined its gravity, but the letter given in the Second Book of Maccabees, if genuine, throws light on his attitude.1 The letter is addressed, not as Jason of Cyrene would have us think, to the insurgent Jews, but to the Hellenizing Jews of Jerusalem, whom Antiochus regards, or affects to regard, as the Jewish people. He addresses them, in well-understood contrast to the other part of the nation, as the loyal Jews. He describes himself as their fellow-citizen and strategos. He writes from the East, mentioning his illness and stating his hope of recovery, but requesting the Jews, in the event of his decease, to remain loyal to the young Antiochus. The bands of Judas are ignored. 1 2 Macc. 9, 19. Niese defends its genuineness (Kritik d. Makk. p. 30). See Appendix I. 2 τοῖς χρηστοῖς Ἰουδαίοις. The use of the word χρηστός in a political sense for the approved party is familiar; Pseudo-Xen. De repub. Ath., passim; ¿Niyov τὸ χρηστόν, Αr. Frogs, 783. 3 Niese in his suggestion that Antiochus had been elected honorary strategos in the Atticized city of Jerusalem seems to me very happy. The translation of our Bibles "noisome sickness" is unwarranted if understood in any other sense than "dangerous." The Greek does not imply that it was offensive to other people's senses. VOL. II N CHAPTER XXVI ANTIOCHUS V EUPATOR AND THE ADMINISTRATION OF LYSIAS WHEN Antiochus Epiphanes left Syria in 166-165 the government of the West was confided, as has been said, to Lysias, one of those who held the rank of Kinsmen.1 in the early days of his administration that the first attempt of any importance was made to quell the Jewish insurrection. The matter having proved too great for the troops on the spot, the forces of the Cole-Syrian province had to be concentrated to deal with it. Under the authority of the strategos of Cole-Syria and Phoenicia, Ptolemy the son of Dorymenes, an army was launched upon Judaea, commanded by Nicanor and Gorgias. Such complete confidence was felt in the Gentile cities as to the result of the expedition that the force was followed by a great company of merchants, alert to buy up the numbers of Jewish prisoners who would be thrown upon the slave-market.2 The way of approach chosen was one of the western valleys which run down from the Judaean upland to the Philistine plain. At Emmaus, in the valley of Ajalon, the force encamped before making the ascent. It was the first great ordeal through which the new Jewish army was to pass, and many lost heart as the crisis approached and slunk away. Judas with those who remained took up a position on the slopes to the south of Emmaus. 1 2 Macc. 11, 1. 2 As a matter of fact Delphian inscriptions of this time show us Jewish slaves there. In one (Wescher-Foucart, Inscriptions recueillies à Delphes, No. 364) we read σῶμα ἀνδρεῖον ᾧ ὄνομα Ἰουδαῖος (= Ιούδας ?) τὸ γένος Ἰουδαῖον. |