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After Ezra and Nehemiah the Judeanprovince, at the extreme end of the Persianempire, lived on the fringes of history forthree centuries. Those with greater initiativededicated themselves to trading and left theircountry to settle in all the urban centersaround the Mediterranean. Yet, one hundredyears after Nehemiah, in 333 B.C., Alexan-der the Great began to chart the Middle Eastcountries, defeating all the enemy armiesand overthrowing the kings. Although hedied when he was thirty years old, his tri-umphs opened the way for the spread of Greek culture with its longing for growth, itsconfidence in human potential and its openspirit which surpassed national individual-ism.Alexander’s generals parceled out hishuge empire among themselves. The Ptole-mies, who dominated Egypt and Palestine,were understanding and did not disturb theJews for the sake of their religion and cus-toms. But when the Antiochians of Syria de-feated the Egyptians in 197 and took Pales-tine away from them, they began to imposetheir pagan religion on the Jews.This fierce persecution caused the up-rising of the Jews headed by the Maccabeanfamily. The first book of Maccabees—ac-knowledged as one of the most perfectbooks of ancient history—relates the events in the war and the deeds of the five Maccabeanbrothers, from the year 170 to 130 B.C.
 Holy War, Liberation War 
The book of Maccabees shows us a people who desire to live but for whom faith is morevaluable than even life itself. When all have become accustomed to living without conflicts,persecution begins. Many are convinced they can do nothing against such a great power andthat the risks are too great to overcome. Then the Spirit of God engenders new heroes throughwhom people recover their sense of dignity, fighting for those rights that make them fullyhuman and true believers.The Jewish people found themselves alone against their oppressors, and their Roman al-lies were not much help. They relied on their own strength and God helped them in their ef-forts.The Maccabean wars are models of holy wars. They also proved that holy wars do notsolve everything. Caught up in military problems and in political games, the Maccabees’ de-scendants soon became materialistic and were despised or opposed by true believers.
 
 Alexander
•
1
Everything began with the con-quests of Alexander the first, son of Philip, the Macedonian. Setting out fromGreece, he killed Darius, king of the Per-sians and the Medes. Being already kingof Greece, he took the throne of Darius.
2
After fighting many battles, conqueringstrongholds and putting to death thekings of those nations,
3
he reached theends of the earth and plundered severalnations. And when the world becamequiet and subject to his power, he be-came proud.
4
He gathered a strongarmy, ruled over provinces and nations,and rulers paid him taxes.
5
But he fellsick, and knowing he was going to die,
6
he summoned his generals and the no-blemen who had been brought up withhim from his youth; and while still alive,he divided his kingdom among them.
7
Alexander had reigned for twelve yearswhen he died.
8
His generals assumed power, eachone in the region assigned to him.
9
Andimmediately after Alexander’s death,they made themselves kings and theirsons after them, filling the earth with evilfor many years.
10
From their descen-dants there came a godless offshoot, An-tiochus Epiphanes, son of king Anti-ochus, who had been held as hostage inRome. He became king in the one hun-dred and thirty-seventh year of the Greekera (175 B.C.).
11
It was then that some rebelsemerged from Israel, who succeeded inwinning over many people. They said,“Let us renew contact with the peoplesaround us for we had endured many mis-fortunes since we separated from them.”
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This proposal was well-received
13
and some eagerly went to the king. Theking authorized them to adopt the cus-toms of the pagan nations.
14
With hispermission, they built a gymnasium inJerusalem in the pagan style.
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And asthey wanted to be like the pagans in
1
everything, they made artificial foreskinsfor themselves and abandoned the HolyCovenant, sinning as they pleased.
 Antiochus despoils the Temple
16
When Antiochus felt confident of hispower, he decided to seize Egypt andrule over the two nations.
17
He enteredEgypt with a strong army, with chariotsof war, elephants, horses and a great fleet
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and attacked Ptolemy, king of Egypt.Ptolemy had to retreat and was defeated,and many of his men died.
19
The victorsseized the fortified cities of Egypt andplundered the land.
20
In the year onehundred and forty-three (169 B.C.),when Antiochus returned after defeatingEgypt, he passed through Israel and wentup to Jerusalem with a strong army.
21
He arrogantly broke into the sanc-tuary and removed the golden altar, thelampstand for the light with all its acces-sories,
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the table for the bread of offer-ing, the libation vessels, the cups, thegolden censers, the curtains and thecrowns, and stripped away all the deco-rations, the golden moldings that used tocover the Temple entrance.
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He alsotook possession of the silver, gold, valu-able objects and all the hidden treasureshe could find.
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He took everything withhim and left for his country, after shed-ding much blood and making arrogantstatements.
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There was great mourning through-out the land of Israel:
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The leaders andthe elders groaned, young men andmaidens lost courage, and women grewpale;
27
bridegrooms sang lamentations,and the young bride wept in her mar-riage-bed.
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The earth quaked, in sorrowfor its inhabitants, and all the people of Jacob were humiliated.
29
After two years, the king sent to thecities of Judah the chief tax collector andhe came to Jerusalem with a strongarmy.
30
He spoke to the people withwords of peace in order to deceive them.
•
1.
1 This first paragraph summarizes theperiod of history from Alexander until Anti-ochus Epiphanes, king of Syria. Note the pas-sage 1:11-15 where the beginning of themoral crisis in Judah is emphasized.Two things characterize the Greek civiliza-tion of the Syrians: – Art and the multiplicity of statues which,however beautiful they may have been, wereused in pagan worship. – Physical education: stadiums, sports,swimming pools. Sports were practiced in thenude, which scandalized the Jews. This ex-plains why those who were ashamed to be
2Mac 4:7;4:19-171:34;10:611Cor 7:18Dn 11:25;2Mac5:112Mac5:212Mac 5:24-26
1 MACCABEES 1610
 
But when he had gained their confidence,he suddenly fell on the city and dealt it aterrible blow, killing many Israelites.
31
Heplundered the city, burning and destroy-ing the palaces and the surrounding walls.
32
He took women and children cap-tive and seized the livestock.
33
Then theyrebuilt the city of David with a high andsolid wall protected by strong towers,and this became their fortress.
34
Therethey set evil men and apostates who de-fended it.
35
They stored up weapons andprovisions, and everything they looted inthe city, posing a constant threat.
36
It be-came an ambush for the sanctuary, agrave and constant threat to Israel.
37
They shed innocent blood around thesanctuary and defiled the sanctuary itself.
38
The inhabitants of Jerusalem fledbecause of them. She became a colonyof strangers, and was a stranger to herchildren who abandoned her.
39
Her sanc-tuary became empty as the desert, herfeasts became days of mourning, herSabbaths were ridiculed, and her famebecame an object of contempt.
40
As herglory had been great, so now was herdishonor, for her greatness was turnedinto grief.
Religious persecution
•
41
Antiochus issued a decree tohis whole kingdom.
42
All the peoplesof his empire had to renounce theirparticular customs and become onepeople.
43
All the pagan nationsobeyed and respected the king’s de-cree, and even in Israel many ac-cepted the imposed cult. They of-fered sacrifices to idols and no longerrespected the Sabbath.
44
The kingsent messengers to Jerusalem andthe cities of Judea to carry the de-cree which imposed strange cus-toms.
45
In accordance with it, burntofferings, sacrifices and other offer-ings in the sanctuary were sup-pressed. It also ordered that Sab-baths and sacred feasts be likeordinary days.
46
The sanctuary andits ministers were no longer to be re-garded sacred,
47
instead, altars, sa-cred enclosures and temples were tobe dedicated to idols. They were tooffer pigs and unclean animals insacrifice,
48
and not perform on theirsons the rite of circumcision. To sumup, they were to defile themselves byall kinds of impurity and profanity
49
in order to forget the Law andchange all their customs.
50
The de-cree finally declared: “Anyone who
known as Jews had to have their missing fore-skins—after circumcision—replaced through asurgical procedure.• 41. This chapter presents two aspects ofthe crisis:1) A moral crisis. The Jews were in contactwith a more advanced, though pagan, civiliza-tion. Could one adapt to and take advantage ofthis culture without giving up one’s faith?At that time the Jews were about to pay forthe error they had made in keeping apart fromthe cultural progress of neighboring nations.For three centuries they emphasized that allthe laws and customs of Israel came directlyfrom God and could not be revised. So, whenmodern currents emerged, the most openamong them went through a conscience crisis:could they perhaps change the customs with-out betraying God? It was very difficult to openup to Greek civilization without being seen asa renegade, that those who wanted to be mod-ern, not only changed their life style, but alsoabandoned their religion. Think about whathappens today when young people, educatedin super-conservative schools or parishes, dis-cover revolutionary currents which inspirethem.2) Then came organized persecution. Thepowerful kings wanted to unite all the groupswithin their empire. They said that religion wasdivisive. Freedom of conscience seemed dan-gerous to them. The kings struggled againstthose who wanted to serve God and to followtheir consciences.The people were worried: up to what pointcan one endure the undermining and the mak-ing fun of one’s religious practices?In 1:54, there is mention of the “abom-inable idol of the invaders,” which is also men-tioned in Daniel 9:27. This is the way they re-fer to a pagan altar built on the site of theancient altar of the Temple. Jesus will give anew meaning to this expression in Mark 13:14.
2Mac6:1-92Mac 6:2;Dn 11:38
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