II Maccabees and the Afterlife

I finished the Deutero-canonical book of II Maccabees last night.  I was not planning to read II Maccabees during Hanukkah, which commemorates some of the historical events that II Maccabees is about.  It just happened that way.  I started the Deutero-canonical writings about four months ago, and I ended up in II Maccabees in December.

A question that is in my mind concerns the afterlife in II Maccabees.  Here are some thoughts:

1.  In II Maccabees 7, we read the story of the time that the evil Seleucid King Antiochus Epiphanes tried to compel seven Jewish brothers and their mother to eat swine’s flesh, in violation of their religious convictions.  The brothers and the mother are unafraid to die, and one reason is that they believe in the resurrection of the dead.  In v 14, one of the brothers tells Antiochus, “But for you there will be no resurrection to life!” (NRSV).  What does that mean exactly?  Does the brother in this story believe that Antiochus will not be resurrected from the dead, period, but will remain in the grave, or in Hades?  Or does the brother think that Antiochus will have a resurrection, but it will not be unto life, but rather unto damnation?  Daniel 12:2 contrasts two such resurrections: “Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt” (NRSV).  The later Book of IV Maccabees, in its telling of the story, depicts one of the brothers telling Antiochus: “but you, because of your bloodthirstiness toward us, will deservedly undergo from the divine justice eternal torment by fire” (NRSV).

2.  The thing is, in both I Maccabees and II Maccabees, Antiochus does repent.  In I Maccabees 6:1-17, after losing a battle, Antiochus reflects that he was wrong to treat Jerusalem as he did.  In II Maccabees 9, Antiochus actually converts to Judaism.  Still, he dies of a horrible disease in II Maccabees 9, and II Maccabees 9:18 (and also II Maccabees 1:13-17, which has a different story of his death and does not depict him actually repenting) attributes his death to God’s just punishment.  Did God not forgive Antiochus for the evils that he had done, notwithstanding Antiochus’ regret or repentance?  Could Antiochus find God’s forgiveness in the afterlife?  IV Maccabees does not have a story of Antiochus repenting, but it does depict him admiring the seven Jewish brothers for their bravery (IV Maccabees 17:23-24).  As far as Antiochus’ eternal destiny is concerned, IV Maccabees maintains that Antiochus has, is, and will experience postmortem punishment: “The tyrant Antiochus was both punished on earth and is being chastised after his death…For these crimes divine justice pursued and will pursue the accursed tyrant” (NRSV).

3.  Interestingly, II Maccabees briefly refers to a Seleucid idea regarding the afterlife.  II Maccabees 11:23 depicts Antiochus V writing to his brother Lysias, “Now that our father has gone on to the gods…” (NRSV).  This suggests that Antiochus V believed his father went to the gods after death.

4.  In II Maccabees 6, we read the story of the elderly Jew Eleazar refusing to eat swine’s flesh, choosing to die instead.  V 23 says that he told people to send him to Hades.  In this story, he believed that even he, a righteous person, would go to the Underworld after death.

5.  II Maccabees 12:40-45 tells the story of Judas Maccabeus finding the corpses of Jewish soldiers who had been carrying “sacred tokens of the idols of Jamnia” (NRSV).  Judas says that these soldiers fell in battle on account of this sin, yet he arranges for an offering of atonement to be made on their behalf.  The author of II Maccabees says that Judas did so because he believed in the resurrection.  “For if he were not expecting that those who had fallen would rise again, it would have been superfluous and foolish to pray for the dead.

But if he was looking to the splendid reward that is laid up for those who fall asleep in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Therefore he made atonement for the dead, so that they might be delivered from their sin” (NRSV).  This statement leads me to ask questions.

a.  Did Judas necessarily believe in the resurrection when he had that offering offered for atonement?  Daniel Harrington in the HarperCollins Study Bible distinguishes II Maccabees’ interpretation of Judas’ act from what Judas’ intention may have been: “The sin offering was probably intended by Judas to ward off punishment against the living” (see Josh 7).”  Harrington’s idea is that Judas offered the sin offering so that God would not punish the living Jews for the sins of the Jews who carried those talismans, not to atone for the sins of the dead Jews who had carried the talismans.  That could be, but I wondered something: Could one believe that Judas atoned for the sins of the dead Jews who carried the talismans, without accepting that this had anything to do with them receiving a good afterlife?  The ancient Israelites seemed to believe that dead people survived through their name being around and honored after their death, or through their children.  Could Judas’ atonement be a way to ensure that people would still honor and remember these men’s name and posterity?

b.  II Maccabees seems to imply that Judas making atonement for the dead Jews only makes sense in light of a belief in the resurrection.  It makes that statement as if resurrection was the only possible afterlife.  Yet, II Maccabees 15:14-16 depicts Judas seeing the departed Onias and Jeremiah in heaven, praying for the Jews.  Does II Maccabees there believe that souls go to heaven?  If so, why can’t that be a post-mortem reward?  The answer may be that II Maccabees prioritized resurrection over the immortality of the soul: that, sure, souls may go to a place temporarily after the death of the body, but the ultimate hope is the resurrection.  Notice also that Onias and Jeremiah are in heaven, whereas righteous Eleazar in II Maccabees 6:23 expected to go to Hades after death.  Do only very special souls go to heaven, in II Maccabees?  Why wouldn’t Eleazar qualify for this designation, though, since he died out of commitment to God?

Enoch, Jubilees, and the Mosaic Torah

I read two essays that I really enjoyed in Enoch and the Mosaic Torah: The Evidence of Jubilees.  The first one was Gabriele Boccaccini's "From a Movement of Dissent to a Distinct Form of Judaism: The Heavenly Tablets in Jubilees as the Foundation of a Competing Halakah".  The second one was Hindy Najman's "Reconsidering Jubilees: Prophecy and Exemplarity".

1.  Boccaccini discusses the Enochic perspective, the Mosaic perspective, and the combination of the two in Jubilees.  It has been argued (by George Nickelsburg, for example) that the Enochic perspective dismissed the Mosaic Torah in favor of an "Enochic revealed wisdom" (Nickelsburg's words, as quoted on page 200).  Boccaccini does not go that far, but he does maintain that the Enochics consisted of priests who "felt excluded from, or marginalized within, the Zadokite priesthood" (page 201).  For these Enochic priests, according to Boccaccini, the world was so corrupted by evil that it was impossible to follow any laws, even the Mosaic Torah.  Meanwhile, the Zadokite priests offered sacrifices in the Temple and affirmed "that this world was the perfect and eternal order regulated by the Mosaic Torah" (page 200).  

With the Maccabees, Boccaccini contends, the Enochic and Mosaic perspectives were both strengthened.  The Enochic perspective was validated because their enemies, the Zadokites, had been replaced, and thus were shown to be illegitimate.  But the Mosaic Torah became the national law of Israel.  According to Boccaccini, both perspectives were fused in Jubilees, in which the world was still deemed to be corrupt and in need of eschatological renewal, but the corruption was believed to exist among the Gentiles and thus did not impact God's covenant with Israel.

I appreciated Boccaccini's essay because he clearly delineated competing ideologies that could account for the Enochic and Mosaic perspectives and what is in Jubilees.  But I still have questions.  First of all, did the Enochic perspective truly believe that no laws could be followed in a corrupt world?  I would not be surprised if even I Enoch maintains that there are moral norms that should be followed!  Second, was it the case that the Mosaic Torah was not the law of Israel until the time of the Maccabees?  I have a slight problem with this idea, for II Maccabees depicts the Torah as Israel's ancestral constitution, which Hellenizers sought to undermine, plus I Maccabees shows the Israelites observing customs even before the Maccabean rise to power, such as the Sabbath.

2.  Najman interacts with the question of whether Jubilees was intended to replace the Mosaic Torah.  He argues that it was not.  Rather, according to Najman, Jubilees aimed to put the Sinai revelation in a "pre-Sinaitic context"----to show Israelites how to "observe the law properly" by teaching them the traditions that Enoch transmitted.  In short, Jubilees was halakah that was clarifying how to observe the Torah.

I should note, however, that both Boccaccini and Najman present the situation during the Hellenistic period as rather complex.  Boccaccini quotes John Collins, who argues that a Jewish movement that does not focus on the Mosaic Torah was not "without precedent" (Collins' words), for biblical wisdom literature does not talk explicitly about the Mosaic Torah and Israel's history, and "Judaism in the early second century BCE was not uniformly Torah centered, even among those who were familiar with the Torah and respected it as one source of wisdom among others" (Collins' words).  And Najman on page 230 expresses problems with the notion that there was "an authoritative or canonical Pentateuch in the second century", though he acknowledges that "there is evidence for a stabilizing, circulating, and authoritative text much like what is eventually called the Pentateuch."

Oniads Vs. Hasmoneans

On page 498 of his Anchor Bible commentary on II Maccabees, Jonathan Goldstein speculates that the break between Onias IV and the Hasmoneans occurred after their battle with Nicanor.

When Alcimus was installed as high priest, the Oniads and the Hasmoneans found common ground, for they did not want Alcimus to be high priest.  The Oniads believed that they should have that position, which they had for some time.  But after Nicanor was defeated and the Hasmoneans gained control, the Hasmoneans did not appoint Oniads to the high priesthood.  Rather, they established a Hasmonean high priestly line.  At that point, according to Goldstein, there was a break between the Oniads and the Hasmoneans, and Onias IV went to Egypt and established another sanctuary.

The question of who should be high priest permeates various histories of the time of the Maccabees.  I Maccabees is considered to be Hasmonean propaganda.  Josephus was a Hasmonean, and so his depiction of the Oniads is not all that positive.  II Maccabees, according to Goldstein, contains a memoir of Onias IV.  Goldstein argues that II Maccabees is favorable in its portrayal of Judas Maccabeus, but it is not pro-Hasmonean by any means.  I wonder why.  Was Jason the Cyrene, the one who wrote much of II Maccabees, pro-Oniad?  I could not find much scholarly speculation about who Jason the Cyrene actually was, let alone what his political leanings might be.

Some Interesting Points in Goldstein's II Maccabees

I started Jonathan Goldstein's Anchor Bible commentary on II Maccabees.

Goldstein dates I Maccabees to 90 B.C.E., Jason of Cyrene's work to 86 B.C.E., and the abridgement of Jason's work that we recognize as II Maccabees to 78/7-63 B.C.E.  Goldstein offers various reasons for his date for I Maccabees, but he believes that II Maccabees came later because it appears to respond to I Maccabees----to dispute some of I Maccabees' details.  At the same time, Goldstein maintains that I Maccabees and II Maccabees drew from a common source, for they overlap on a variety of details, such as Jason's construction of a gymnasium.

I go into the ideological differences between I Maccabees and II Maccabees in my post here.  In this write-up of Goldstein, I'll mention two details that stood out to me.  First, Goldstein argues that II Maccabees does not regard the Jerusalem Temple as fully chosen by God and thus recognizes other sanctuaries; I Maccabees, by contrast, appears to dislike sanctuaries other than the one in Jerusalem.  Second, Goldstein maintains that I Maccabees and II Maccabees had different approaches to the Book of Daniel (which Goldstein may date to the second century B.C.E.).  I Maccabees does not shy away from mentioning the events surrounding Antiochus that did not transpire as Daniel predicted; II Maccabees, by contrast, ignores those details or tries to show that many of Daniel's prophecies indeed were fulfilled.

Psalm 74

For my weekly quiet time this week, I will blog about Psalm 74.

Psalm 74:8 says (in the KJV): "They said in their hearts, Let us destroy them together: they have burned up all the synagogues of God in the land. "

The Hebrew word translated as "synagogues" is moadei, which is the plural construct form of the word moed.  Moed in the Hebrew Bible can refer to a religious assembly, a feast, a congregation, or a designated time.

The Septuagint translates the verse as "They said in their heart, their kin together, 'Come and let us burn all the feasts of God from the land.'"  The Septuagint understands moadei in this verse to mean "festivals".  It presumes that Psalm 74:8 relates to what appears to be the topic of Psalm 74 as a whole: Israel's sadness at the destruction of the Temple, her perplexity as she wonders when God will help her, and her attempts to reassure herself as she reminds herself of God's displays of power in the past.  For the LXX, the festivals were held in the Temple, which is destroyed in Psalm 74, and so Psalm 74:8 most likely relates to the destruction of the Temple.  Interpreters who relied on the Septuagint, such as Augustine and Theodore of Mopsuestia, had this understanding.

But there is another view: that Psalm 74:8 is acknowledging the existence of places outside of the Temple in the land of Israel where Israelites gathered together to worship.  For one, Psalm 74:8 says that the moadei were "burned", and it makes more sense to say that a place of assembly was burned rather than a festival.  Second, the MT has "in the land", which implies that these moadei are throughout the Holy Land, not only at the Temple.

But then the problem of the date of Psalm 74 arises.  When were there places of worship outside of the Temple in the land of Israel?  In II Kings 4:23, we read that Northern Israelites in the time of Elisha could go to a prophet on a Sabbath or a new moon.  But would these places of worship exist in 587 B.C.E., at the time when the Temple was destroyed?  Josiah had gotten rid of other sanctuaries besides the Temple, and a predominant theological school of the Bible, the Deuteronomists, opposed those sanctuaries.  Psalm 74 may be related to the Deuteronomistic school in some manner, for Psalm 74:7 refers to the Temple as the dwelling-place for God's name, and the Deuteronomists were emphatic that the sanctuary was to be a dwelling-place of God's name, not God himself (Deuteronomy 12, 14, 16).  Would Psalm 74 support sanctuaries other than the Temple?

Others have noted that there were places of prayer in Israel's exilic and post-exilic times.  Zechariah 7:3-5 and 8:19 refer to fasts, which the Jews practiced even when there was not a Temple.  And I Maccabees 3:46 mentions a former place of prayer at Mizpah.  Consequently, some have related Psalm 74 to Antiochus IV's attack on the Temple right before the time of the Maccabean revolt.  The idea is that Antiochus not only attacked the Temple, but other places of worship throughout the land of Israel as well.  But my problem with that view is that Psalm 74 appears to describe a destruction of the Temple, not merely a pollution of it.  The destruction of the Temple occurred in 587 B.C.E., so I think that Psalm 74 is about that particular event.

My conclusion is that there were places of worship outside of the Temple in 587 B.C.E., and that these places were deemed valid by the Deuteronomists.  As I talk about in my post here, we see in Deuteronomy 16:7-8 that a solemn assembly could be held outside of the Temple on the last Day of Unleavened Bread.  Deuteronomy most likely did not support sacrifices occurring outside of the Temple, but perhaps these places of assembly only had prayer, not sacrifice.

Scattered Ramblings on II Maccabees

For my write up today on The Cambridge History of Judaism, Volume Two: The Hellenistic Age, I'll focus on the book of II Maccabees.

On pages 294-295, Jonathan Goldstein defines a difference between I Maccabees and II Maccabees:

"The author of I Maccabees was an ardent partisan of the Hasmoneans. He believed that the Hasmonean dynasty was the stock to whom God had granted the privilege of bringing permanent victory to the Chosen People. Jason of Cyrene, the author of the lost work of which the history in 2 Maccabees is an abridgement, approved of only one Hasmonean, Judas Maccabeus. As viewed by Jason, the others were incompetent and even wicked."

On page 529, Paul Hanson states: "A whole group of writings from the period after the Seleucid persecutions is characterized by fidelity to the Torah and orthodoxy in regard to Temple praxis, but is open in varying degrees to Hellenistic forms of expression. In contrast to Sirach and I Maccabees, this group of writings stands at a greater distance from Sadducean thought, and in closer relation to the mileau of the Pharisees, sometimes explicitly defending their doctrines (for example, resurrection) against the criticism of the Sadducees (compare 2 Maccabees and the Psalms of Solomon)." My impression of what Hanson is saying is that II Maccabees is closely related to the Pharisees' mileau, for II Maccabees defends the resurrection.

On page 427, Mathias Delcor goes into the teaching of II Maccabees. Whereas I Maccabees presents the Hasmonean Mattathias allowing Jews to defend themselves on the Sabbath, II Maccabees affirm that "the holy Law (6:23, 28) cannot be transgressed, even in the interests of legitimate self-defense (5:25; 6:6; 15:3)." In II Maccabees, heavenly forces take part in the Maccabean struggle, whereas I Maccabees is less extravagant when discussing heavenly intervention. I wonder how the Sabbath absolutism squares with the Pharisees, for even Jesus acknowledged that the Pharisees allowed people to lift an ox from a ditch on the Sabbath (Luke 14:5), and so at least those Pharisees were not absolutist.

Delcor also states the following about II Maccabees' teaching:

"The issue in the struggle is in fact one not of this world. It could be said that what Judas is working toward is the enjoyment of the kingdom of the saints, of which Daniel speaks. The enjoyment of the good things God has promised is transferred to another world by belief in the resurrection (7:14, 36). But, while awaiting the achievement of this, all the saints work together for the coming of the kingdom. Prayer, ritual sacrifice, and the willing sacrifice of one's own life acquire a significance which is not limited to the present generation (7:32-38; 12:39-45; 15:11-16)."

Is Delcor's point that II Maccabees is saying that Judas is helping to usher in the eschatological Kingdom of God, or merely that the Jews' good deeds will receive rewards in the afterlife? If it's the former, then how would II Maccabees account for the failure of the Kingdom of God to arrive in the time of Judas? In terms of the date of II Maccabees, the book ends with the death of the Seleucid general Nicanor, with Judas still being alive. So was the book written before the death of Judas in battle? The problem here, for Delcor, is that the book claims to be about Judas and his brothers, and so Delcor thinks that there must be more to II Maccabees than has survived----presumably narrating the events after the time of Judas. Delcor dates II Maccabees "towards the end of the second century B.C.E., but earlier than I Maccabees" (page 463), which is after the death of Judas (in 160 B.C.E.). Was Jason (on whose account II Maccabees was based) a Pharisee? According to Delcor, we do not know much about Jason, except that "he was a member of the Jewish community in Cyrenaica", which is in Lybia. But perhaps II Maccabees came to be prominent in Pharisaic circles, whether or not Jason was a Pharisee.

Delcor states that the rabbis did not care for the Hasmoneans, for the Pharisees opposed John Hyrcanus, and Alexander Janneus crucified many Pharisees. Hyrcanus ruled in the end of the second century B.C.E., which is when Delcor dates II Maccabees. That could explain why II Maccabees dislikes the Hasmoneans, with the lone exception of Judas the Maccabee.

The Maccabees and Discerning God's Will

In my reading of The Cambridge History of Judaism, Volume Three: The Hellenistic Age, a theme that I often encountered was discerning the will of God. In this post, I'll be drawing from Jonathan Goldstein's contribution to the volume, "The Hasmonean revolt and the Hasmonean dynasty".

Throughout the time of the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucids, there were different opinions among Jews about how they should react to their oppressors. As Goldstein discusses on page 300, there were many Jews who embraced the revolt, viewing it as God's will for them to stand up to their oppressors and to resist attacks on their culture (and, on page 295, Goldstein says that the Hasmonean Mattathias admired Phinehas, the biblical character who killed an idolatrous Israelite who intermarried with a pagan). But others had another point of view. Some thought that the rebels should offer to cease fighting if the Seleucid official Lysias stopped the persecution. Others were hesitant to attack the high priest Menelaus, who had collaborated with the Seleucid king Antiochus IV, for they saw him as a leader in Israel. Still others believed that "God's sentence of subjection to foreign rulers still stood" (page 300), meaning that God was still punishing Israel with foreign oppression. In this view, the Maccabees' revolt against the Seleucids was presumptuous and would not be blessed by God.

On pages 309-310, Goldstein says that the victory of Judas over the Seleucid general Nicanor convinced Judas and many other pious Jews that "the age of servitude was over". But many still did not know what God wanted them to do. Goldstein states, and I am placing his biblical references in parentheses:

"Even for the Hasmoneans and the majority the course was not clear. Should they do nothing themselves and wait for God to destroy the illegitimate empire of Demetrius I[, a Seleucid king after Antiochus IV] (Isaiah 30:15)? Should they, alone of mankind, join in God's work of destroying the wicked kingdom (Isaiah 63:5)? Would other nations become allies in God's work (Isaiah 55:5)? Surely the hostile neighbors of Judea would never be such allies. Alliances with the 'inhabitants of the land' were forbidden. Egypt was condemned by the prophets as a broken reed. The Parthians, however, lay inaccessible across long reaches of Seleucid territory and were not yet an important power. Rome was now the superpower in the Mediterranean world. No Graeco-Macedonian kingdom dared to clash with her...Accordingly, the official organs of the Jewish nation, perhaps prompted by Judas and the Hasmonean party, in 161 B.C.E. sent Eupolemus son of John of the priestly clan Hakkoz and Jason son of Eleazar on an embassy to Rome to establish ties of alliance. The ambassadors succeeded."

The Jews in the time of the Maccabean revolt were looking to Scripture to determine what God wanted for them to do, and they were presented with a variety of biblical paradigms. They struggled to discern which paradigm fit them, and they disagreed about this issue. They also looked at the situation around them to see if there were open doors: who (if anybody) could be their friend in this struggle? And did God desire for them to form alliances with certain people?

In the aftermath of the Jewish alliance with Rome, Judas Maccabeus was a casualty, for Judas died in battle. Although I Maccabees implies that Judas' brothers and comrades "urged him to withdraw and wait for a better day" (page 311), Judas plunged into the fight. Perhaps he was trusting in an oracle in I Enoch 90:31, which "had predicted that Judas would live to see God's miraculous triumph" (page 311). But Judas did not live to see that. And the response to Judas' death was yet another attempt to discern the will of God. According to Goldstein, some Jews probably interpreted Daniel 12:7 (which talks about when "the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end") to mean that Judas' death would immediately precede the victory of God and of Israel. But I Maccabees 9:23 reflects that something different actually happened----that evildoers only flourished after Judas' death, for they solidified their power and hunted down Hasmoneans, plus a crop failure hurt the rebels.

Sabbath observance was another issue that pertained to the Maccabees and attempts to discern God's will. Several Jews chose not to fight on the Sabbath, with the result that they were slaughtered when their enemies attacked them on that day. Consequently, Mattathias proclaimed that Jews could fight to defend themselves on the Sabbath, and the author of I Maccabees (perhaps in response to critics of Mattathias' policy) insists that "Mattathias and his son Jonathan enjoyed divine favor after engaging in defensive warfare on the Sabbath" (Goldstein's words on page 296).

The appeal to the Maccabees' military successes for validation that they were following God's will cut both ways, however, for there were struggles to account for how God could allow tragedies and the Maccabees' military failures. Sometimes, there really was no good answer.

Even after the Maccabees succeeded against the Seleucids and inaugurated a period of independence for Israel from foreign oppression, there were still debates about God's will. The Hasmonean rulers believed that the time of God's wrath on Israel was over and that God supported their rule over Israel, but there were a few Jews who were eager to point out that the Hasmoneans were not descendants of David, and so they were not qualified to be rulers of Israel. Moreover, when the Roman Pompey took Judea for the Romans, that disappointed people who believed that "the age of God's wrath had ended forever with the heroic Hasmonean liberation of Israel", for "Now, contrary to the promises at Isaiah 52:1 and Zechariah 9:8, unclean and uncircumcised foreigners and tax-gatherers marched through the Holy Land" (page 349).

Is there a way to discern God's will? Or is "discerning God's will" instead an attempt to make a coherent narrative out of the chaos of life? Can wisdom still emerge out of the struggle to discern, however? And when can beliefs about God's will inhibit wisdom?

Antiochus, Transubstantiation, Edenic Sabbath

1. Source: Isaiah Gafni, "Historical Background," Jewish Writings of the Second Temple Period, ed. Michael E. Stone (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984) 7-8.

"The change in Seleucid policy may be attributed at least in part to external events. Following the defeat of Antiochus III at the hands of Roman legions in Magdala in 190 B.C.E., and the ensuing peace treaty of Apamea (188), the Seleucid Empire found itself in dire need of funds to pay the tributes forced upon it by Rome. Antiochus III himself was killed while attempting to sack a temple in Elymais (187), and under his successor Seleucus IV (187-175) the Jews of Palestine experienced a similar attempt to extract funds from the Temple of Jerusalem. The event, described in 2 Maccabees 3, reflects not only on predicaments of the Seleucids, but more importantly on the internal developments among the ruling class of Jerusalem. Apparently, elements within the priesthood and particularly the family of Bilga, had joined forced with the Tobiads in an attempt to usurp power from Onias. This new coalition seems to indicate not only a power struggle within the priestly oligarchy, but a cultural clash as well, for it is this element that ultimately carried out (if it did not instigate) the reforms initiated by Antiochus IV in Jerusalem, culminating with religious persecution. [Antiochus also] devoted the first seven years of his reign to plans for the conquest of Ptolemaic Egypt. In this context one can understand the steps taken to ensure a loyal leadership in Judaea, which would necessarily serve as a staging area for the invasion of Egypt."

This doesn't explain to me why Antiochus IV persecuted the Jews. Do the ancient sources give us guidance? Some. I Maccabees 1 doesn't really give a reason for Antiochus' activity, as far as I can see. And II Maccabees 5 states that Antiochus invaded Jerusalem to put down Jason's attack of the city. Antiochus had given the Jewish priesthood to Jason, then to Menelaus. When Jason thought that Antiochus was dead, he (Jason) gathered up some men and attacked Jerusalem. That's when Antiochus launched his persecution. As far as Antiochus' attack of Egypt was concerned, I and II Maccabees present Antiochus as already engaging in that when he decided to go after Jerusalem. So I don't think he started the persecution to invade Egypt.

So I'm not entirely satisfied with Gafni's explanation so far, but maybe he'll go into more detail in the coming pages. Maybe Antiochus was trying to show the Jews who's boss, hoping to maintain his base of operations in Palestine.

2. Source: Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Volume II: Ante-Nicene Christianity (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1910) 242.

"Irenaeus says repeatedly, in combatting the Gnostic Docetism, that bread and wine become, by the presence of the Word of God, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, the body and blood of Christ, and that the receiving of them strengthens soul and body (the germ of the resurrection body) unto eternal life. Yet this would hardly warrant our ascribing either transubstantiation or consubstantiation to Irenaeus. For in another place he calls the bread and wine, after consecration, 'antetypes,' implying the continued distinction of their substance from the body and blood of Christ."

Roman Catholics believe that the bread and wine of communion become the literal body and blood of Jesus Christ. What did the second century church fathers teach about this? Schaff documents ambiguity. Ignatius talked as if the elements of communion were the flesh and blood of the Lord. Others, however, tended to view the bread and wine as symbolic. Then there was Irenaeus, who either contradicted himself, or had a nuanced position.

3. Jacob Neusner, Judaism's Story of Creation: Scripture, Halakhah, Aggadah (Boston: Brill, 2000) 55.

"The Halakhah forms a social system for the sanctification of Israel's here-and-now, aiming at the salvation of Israel--its ultimate victory over the grave--at the end of days. The basic teleology of the Halakhah aims at the recovery of Eden. It promises the restoration, now within the household of Israel, of the conditions that ought to have prevailed in Eden: the occasion of perfect Repose, sanctified by God's own action at the instance of the advent of the Sabbath. God has defined the condition for restoring Eden's Sabbath: sanctifying the Sabbath day at the climax of the week of work."

Neusner's argument is not entirely clear to me. For one, I don't understand why Israel's system in the here-and-now should have anything to do with victory beyond the grave. Is it solely a matter of earning one's way into the good afterlife by keeping the Torah, or is there another connection? Second, does the Sabbath restore Eden? Adam and Eve didn't just rest in the Garden, for they had to dress and keep it. That's work, right? Neusner says that the Sabbath restores the Edenic Sabbath because Jews don't create things that are permanent on that day, as God on the original Sabbath rested from his work of creating something long-lasting: the heavens and the earth.

According to Neusner, did the Sages believe that Adam and Eve kept the Sabbath? I wouldn't be too surprised if such were the case, since there is a rabbinic tradition that God created Adam circumcised, and circumcision (in Judaism) is specifically for Jews. By and large, the rabbis viewed the Sabbath as an Israelite institution, not something for all people, regardless of whether Adam and Eve kept it or not.

Stoic Martyrs

Source: John Sellars, Stoicism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006) 108-109.

"If I am doing my best to be a rational being who is free and independent of others, then I will sometimes have to make choices that may appear not to further my own self-preservation. For instance, if a tyrant threatens to kill me if I do not do certain things that I find objectionable or think to be wrong, then--if I am to preserve myself as a rational being--I should stand up to the tyrant even if this may mean the loss of my life (see e.g. Epictetus, Diss. 1.2). But why? How could getting myself killed possibly contribute to my self-preservation? Well, it may not contribute to my self-preservation in so far as I am merely a living animal, but giving in to the tyrant will equally destroy me as an independent rational being. I may remain biologically alive if I give in to the tyrant, but I will have lost something far more important, having reduced myself to a slave. Thus the Stoic doctrine of self-preservation will, in cases of rational beings--that is, philosophers working towards the ideal of the sage--sometimes lead to choices that may actually threaten an individual's physical existence. But then as Socrates famously put it, it is not merely living, but living well that matters (Plato, Crito 48b)."

When I read the books of Maccabees, a question that entered my mind every now and then was, "Why does any of this matter?" What do I mean by that? Well, basically, the books are about the Jews being willing to fight and die for their religion. They fought to preserve the Sabbath and circumcision. When Antiochus threatened them with death if they refused to eat pork, many of them held fast to God's food laws. I guess my question was, "Why? What's the big deal?" What's it matter if a Jew leaves his foreskin on rather than taking it off? Or if a he works on a Saturday rather than resting on it? Or if he has a taste of nice, juicy pig-meat?

I wonder how Catholics would answer my question. They see I-II Maccabees as canonical, yet they believe that Jesus abolished the Sabbath, circumcision, and biblical food laws. Were Jews dying for things that Jesus would soon abolish, anyway? What was the point of that?

I've wondered at times if I would be willing to die for the Christian faith. To be honest, Christianity often looks to me like one religion among others. Why should I die for this particular belief system? Does it really matter?

I guess this quote on Stoicism made certain things clear to me. One should be willing to die for something because otherwise he's a slave. He's a slave to someone who tries to force others to see things his way, while eliminating belief systems that contain a lot of good.

I'm approaching this from a perspective of modern-day tolerance, and the ancients may not have done that. Jews and Christians believed that their deaths demonstrated their commitment to the sovereignty of God, not some petty dictator. And I'm not sure why the Stoics died. Maybe they wanted to show that nothing shook them, not even death.

Self-Defense on the Sabbath

Source: H. Graetz, History of the Jews, volume II (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1893) 2.

This isn't on my reading list, but I don't care because I've wanted to read Graetz's history for a long time--ever since I learned about it in Herman Wouk's classic book on Judaism, This Is My God. Wouk calls Graetz's work a "banquet."

Here's a line the jumped out to me:

"The fact is, however, that Hyrcanus withdrew without accomplishing his siege. It may have been the Sabbatical year which prevented him from proceeding with the siege..."

The context concerns Ptolemy ben Habeb, the brother-in-law of Hyrcanus who killed his (Hyrcanus') father and wanted to take Hyrcanus' life as well. This occurred in the second half of the second century B.C.E. Graetz is unsure about why Hyrcanus stopped his siege of Ptolemy ben Habeb, so he offers the Sabbatical year as one explanation, and the arrival of Ptolemy's Syrian friends as another.

But why would the Sabbatical year have stopped the siege? Hyrcanus was trying to protect his own life, right? Isn't that acceptable on the Sabbath? In I Maccabees 2:32-41, we see that the Maccabees allowed Jews to fight on the Sabbath rather than allowing themselves to be killed. Why wouldn't that apply to the Sabbatical year?

Paper on IV Maccabees: Looking for Diodorus

Diodorus of Sicily was a Greek historian who lived in the first century B.C.E. In his Bibliotheca Historica, Book 40, he discusses the Jews. Martin Hengel cites him to say that some Jews believed the Hasmoneans were violating their ancestral laws. Later in Book 40, Diodorus refers to Hecataeus, who describes the Jews as xenophobic and committed to their political system.

Reading this may give me insight into what violation of ancestral laws actually meant, as well as why Jews may have been eager to unite with the Gentiles. I Maccabees 1:11 states, after all: "In those days certain renegades came out from Israel and misled many, saying, 'Let us go and make a covenant with the Gentiles around us, for since we separated from them many disasters have come upon us'" (NRSV). What laws separated Jews from Gentiles?

I could not find all of this Diodorus passage online, but I found some of it in Greek and French. Next week, I may try to translate it (see here, pages 76-77).

I'm trying to order it on the library, but my computer is slow today.

Tomorrow, I'll probably shift gears and write some about my Fishbane paper.

Paper on IV Maccabees: Other Changes in Government

Today, I read Robert Doran's "Jason's Gymnasion," Of Scribes and Scrolls, ed. Harold W. Attridge, John J. Collins, Thomas H. Tobin (Lanham: University Press of America, 1990) 99-109.

Here is a quote about a change in education impacting the politeia:

"The strong connection between education and politeia is particularly well attested for Sparta. When Solon praises Spartan practices, Anacharsis asks why the Athenians have not imitated them. Solon's reply is interesting: 'Because we are content, Anacharsis, with these exercises which are our own; we do not much care to copy foreign customs..." (Lucian, Anach. 39) In every discussion of Greek education, Sparta's system...is given a separate chapter. Sparta had its own way of forming its citizens. Awareness of this deep division between Sparta and other Greek cities is important in understanding what Philopoemen did to Sparta in 188 BCE. Besides demolishing the walls of Sparta, dispersing foreign mercenaries and scattering newly-freed slaves, the Achaeans are said by Livy to have abrogated the laws and customs...of Lycurgus and to have forced the Spartans to adopt the laws and institutions of the Achaeans: 'so that they would all become one body, and concord would be established among them...The state of Lacedaemon having, by these means, lost the sinews of its strength, remained long in subjection to the Achaeans; but nothing did so much damage as the abolition of the discipline of Lycurgus...in the practice of which they had continued during seven hundred years' (Livy 38.34)" (104).

Doran then quotes Plutarch, Phil. 16.5-6, which discusses the destruction and later reinstitution of Sparta's politeia. Doran's argument is that, by altering Sparta's notorious educational system, the Achaeans were challenging its ancestral constitution. The same thing is said about Jason's introduction of the gymnasium in Jerusalem in I Maccabees 1:13-14, II Maccabees 4:9-15, and IV Maccabees 4:19-10: that it challenged Israel's law.

Now, I wonder about Sparta the same thing that I'm wondering about Jason's reform of Jerusalem: what exactly changed?

Paper on IV Maccabees: Was Jerusalem a Polis?

II Maccabees 4:22 says that Antiochus IV "was welcomed magnificently by Jason and the city, and ushered in with a blaze of torches and with shouts" (NRSV). The Greek word for city is polis.

In Hellenistic Civilization and the Jews (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2004), Victor Tcherikover states about this passage: "It may well be that this mention of the 'city' (the Greek polis of Antioch) is not by chance, but possesses a deeper significance; possibly the visit of Antiochus and the festivities associated with it marked the actual juridicial foundation of the polis..." (165).

I have some thoughts/questions about this:

1. Just because I-II Maccabees call Jerusalem a polis, that doesn't mean it was a formal Greek city. Fergus Millar points out in "The Problem of Hellenistic Syria," Hellenism in the East, ed. Amelie Kuhrt and Susan Sherwin-White (University of California Press: Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1987): "In 1 Macc. 5.26-27 a whole string of places across the Jordan, all of which have retained analogous Arabic names until modern times--'Bosora', 'Bosor', 'Alema', 'Chaspho', 'Maked', 'Karnaim'--are described as large fortified poleis. These too will have been fortified villages; it is worth noting that the author of 1 Macc. has no notion that polis ought to be restricted to self-governing cities formally recognized as such; he uses it for instance of Modein (2.15), the village from which the Maccabees came" (123).

R.J. van der Spek makes the same argument about Greek sources in his essay (58-59 of the same book): that they don't limit the term polis to Greek city-states.

2. A city could have a gymnasium without being a polis. Babylon had a gymnasium, yet it was allowed to keep its own traditions and system of government (20-65). Similarly, van der Spek asserts that "the action by the high priest Jason to hellenise Jerusalem did not affect the government structure, even though a dynastic name was introduced (2 Macc. 4.9, 12, 14)" (59).

What's my point? Maybe Jerusalem was a Greek polis, or maybe it wasn't. II Maccabees 4:9, 19 says that Jason wanted to enroll the Jerusalemites as citizens of Antioch. That may mean that Jerusalem became a polis.

But the change in the government was minor. I have a hard time thinking that this offended Jews, especially when Jerusalem got to keep its high priest and gerousia. Since challenges to the politeia can encompass sins in general (see Paper on IV Maccabees: Other Challenges to Politeia), I think that the authors of II and IV Maccabees believe that the introduction of foreign customs into their country encouraged a violation of the politeia, the law.

What I may get into Sunday is the idea that a polis could exist alongside traditional Jerusalem. That could work, but what would happen when the authorities of traditional Jerusalem were the participants in the polis? Could that result in the polis undermining traditional Jerusalem?

Paper on IV Maccabees: Leads--Homosexuality

Someone suggested to me that the Jewish objection to Jason's gymnasium in the second century B.C.E. might have related to homosexuality that was occurring there. I found an Internet site that claims this: First Maccabees - Marriage and Giving in Marriage. The site itself is ideologically charged, but it refers to other articles. It sites Johansson and Percy:34, but it doesn't tell me what book. But these guys have written about homosexuality in encyclopedias, so maybe they're worth checking out. The other article is Patrick G.D. Riley, Homosexuality & the Maccabean Revolt, New Oxford Review (September 1997). He teaches classical civilization at Concordia University of Wisconsin, so perhaps he offers some evidence.

I may look more into this tomorrow, or some time thereafter. Tomorrow, I'll be picking up more books at the library about Israel and Hellenism. I'm beat right now. I'll read through some French and German, watch an episode of Lost, and go to bed.

Paper on IV Maccabees: Bickerman on the Gym

I'm going through Elias Bickerman's The God of the Maccabees (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1979) right now. He states the following:

"[W]hereas athletic contests were merely strange to Cappadocian custom, they were objectionable according to Jewish law...These high priests, then, one minute watched the exercises of the naked ephebes in the palaestra 'directly below the citadel,' and the next, climbed the steps of the altar to offer the sacrifice, adorned with the princely golden crown over the tiara, while the bells attacked to the gowns of the sons of Aaron rang, 'to make music as they walked' (Ecclus. 45:9). We must try to realize for ourselves the juxtaposition of these scenes, in order to make clear that, what was natural to the Greeks and an abomination to the Hebrews, could be seen in Jerusalem year after year. No schism occurred because of this, either in Jerusalem or in the diaspora. No new Pinchas (I Macc. 2:26) raised his hand against the transgressors of the law, and no indignant revolt broke out among the people" (41-42).

I'd like to know more. What's Bickerman source for his claim that athletic contests were objectionable according to Jewish law? Why did Jews deem it abominable for priests to be in the gymnasium once minute, then at the temple the next minute? Unfortunately, he doesn't offer documentation here. Maybe he will later in the book.

Paper on IV Maccabees: Antiochus' Decree

Antiochus III (not to be confused with the evil Antiochus IV Epiphanes) allowed the Jews to live according to their ancestral constitution, or politeia. Josephus records the following about his decree:

"'King Antiochus to Ptolemy, sends greetings:--Since the Jews, upon our first entrance on their country, demonstrated their friendship toward us; and when we came to their city of [Jerusalem], received us in a splendid manner, and came to meet us with their elders, and gave abundance of provisions to our soldiers, and to the elephants, and joined with us in ejecting the garrison of the Egyptians that were in the citadel, we have thought fit to reward them, and to retrieve the condition of their city, which has been greatly depopulated by such accidents as have befallen its inhabitants, and to bring those who have been scattered abroad back to the city; and, in the first place, we have determined, on account of their piety toward God, to bestow on them, as a pension, for their sacrifices of animals that are fit for sacrifice, for wine and oil, and frankincense, the value of twenty thousand pieces of silver, and [six] sacred artabrae (about 240 litres) of fine flour, with one thousand four hundred and sixty medimni (1 medimni = 50 litres) of wheat, and three hundred and seventy-five medimni of salt; and these payments I would have fully paid them, as I have sent orders to you. I would also have the work about the temple finished, and the cloisters, and if there be anything else that ought to be rebuilt; and for the materials of wood, let it be brought to them out of Judea itself and out of the other countries, and out of Libanus tax free; and the same I would have observed as to those other materials which will be necessary, in order to render the temple more glorious; and let all of that nation live according to the laws of their own country; and let the elders, and the priests, and the scribes of the temple, and the sacred singers, be discharged from poll money and the crown tax and other taxes also; and that the city may the sooner recover its inhabitants, I grant a discharge from taxes for three years to its present inhabitants, and to such as shall come to it, until the month of Hyperberetaios. We also discharge them for the future from a third part of their taxes, that the losses they have sustained may be repaired; and all those citizens that have been carried away, and have become slaves, we grant them and their children their freedom; and order that their substance be restored to them.' And these were the contents of this letter. He also published a decree, through all his kingdom in honour of the temple, which contained what follows: 'It shall be lawful for no foreigner to come within the limits of the temple around about; which thing is forbidden also to the Jews, unless to those who, according to their own custom, have purified themselves. Nor let any flesh of horses, or of mules, or of asses be brought into the city, whether they be wild or tame; nor that of leopards, or foxes, or hares; and, in general, that of any animal which is forbidden for the Jews to eat. Nor let their skins be brought into it; nor let any such animal be bred up in the city. Let them only be permitted to use the sacrifices derived from their forefathers, with which they have been obliged to make acceptable atonements to God. And he that transgresses any of these orders, let him pay to the priests three thousand drachmas of silver''' (AJ 12:138-146 BibleWorks).

See Victor Tcherikover, Hellenistic Civilization and the Jews (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2004) 82-86, 438 for discussion on the decree's authenticity. I may not get into this in detail in my paper, since I'm more interested in what the Jews believed about their politeia--as in, how did they define it? Or I may discuss the debates on historicity, since the interaction between history and Jewish literature may be important. I'll have to see.

The decree doesn't exactly specify what it means for the Jews to live according to their politeia. But the issues it touches on include tax exemption for the Jews' structure of authority (priests, elders, and scribes), Antiochus' material support for the sacrificial system, and the preservation of the temple and Jerusalem from impurity.

When we see the Hellenistic reforms in I, II, and IV Maccabees, what do we find? Let's take a look!

I Maccabees 1:11-15: "In those days certain renegades came out from Israel and misled many, saying, 'Let us go and make a covenant with the Gentiles around us, for since we separated from them many disasters have come upon us.' This proposal pleased them, and some of the people eagerly went to the king, who authorized them to observe the ordinances of the Gentiles. So they built a gymnasium in Jerusalem, according to Gentile custom, and removed the marks of circumcision, and abandoned the holy covenant. They joined with the Gentiles and sold themselves to do evil" (NRSV).

II Maccabees 4:10-15: "When the king assented and Jason came to office, he at once shifted his compatriots over to the Greek way of life. He set aside the existing royal concessions to the Jews, secured through John the father of Eupolemus, who went on the mission to establish friendship and alliance with the Romans; and he destroyed the lawful ways of living and introduced new customs contrary to the law. He took delight in establishing a gymnasium right under the citadel, and he induced the noblest of the young men to wear the Greek hat. There was such an extreme of Hellenization and increase in the adoption of foreign ways because of the surpassing wickedness of Jason, who was ungodly and no true high priest, that the priests were no longer intent upon their service at the altar. Despising the sanctuary and neglecting the sacrifices, they hurried to take part in the unlawful proceedings in the wrestling arena after the signal for the discus-throwing, disdaining the honors prized by their ancestors and putting the highest value upon Greek forms of prestige."

IV Maccabees 4:19-21: "Jason changed the nation's way of life and altered its form of government in complete violation of the law, so that not only was a gymnasium constructed at the very citadel of our native land, but also the temple service was abolished. The divine justice was angered by these acts and caused Antiochus himself to make war on them."

The problems we see in these passages include a neglect of the sacrifices, putting a gymnasium under the citadel (in Jerusalem, I think), and a removal of the marks of circumcision. The part in I Maccabees 1 about not being separate from the Gentiles may relate to rules that distinguished the Jews from the Gentiles, such as Sabbath observance and circumcision. These overlap with certain contents of Antiochus' decree, namely, sacrifices and the sanctity of Jerusalem. See Elias J. Bickerman, The Jews in the Greek Age (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988) 295.

There doesn't seem to be much about government in these passages. Does politeia only mean a system of government? Or can it mean a system of laws, which would include sacrifices and circumcision? That's something for me to check out! The two could have overlapped, since converting Jerusalem into a Greek polis may have undermined the Jewish authorities' power to enforce the Torah. We now have a council serving as the nexus of authority, not God's law (Tcherikover 163-166). I don't know. Couldn't a polis decide to enforce God's law? Maybe the problem was that it didn't always do so (Tcherikover 162).

Another thorny issue is that the books of Maccabees may exaggerate. IV Maccabees 4's statement that the temple service was abolished may be such an example. I'm basing this on what I've heard, but I may need to document that claim with a source.

Moreover, Bickerman says that Ben Sira, Enoch, and Jubilees also criticize the Hellenizers (299). Perhaps I should check out how they present the Hellenistic reform.

Stay tuned!

My Agenda for a While: Three Papers

I have three papers to write for this month (and maybe the next). I'm going to brainstorm some on this blog.

Writing papers can be hard. I don't always know where to start. This blog can be a place where I can get my thoughts out, refine my ideas, do some of the hard work of documentation (which will save me time when I actually sit down to write the papers), and maybe get some feedback.

Warning: a lot of what I write will be rough. I may retread some of the same ground over and over. I will not always be crisp in my questions and proposed solutions. But I'll identify my "paper" posts with the word "paper." Then, if people don't want to read them, they can go on to my more interesting posts.

So what are my topics? They are three:

1. I'm writing a book review of Michael Fishbane's Biblical Interpretation of Ancient Israel (Oxford: Clarendon, 1988).

2. I'm doing a project that relates to the interpretation of the Bible. I'm planning to talk more with my professor about this sometime soon. What I'm doing is looking at how the Temple Scroll (in the Dead Sea Scrolls) interacts with a particular Scripture. I'm also going to trace how other Second Temple sources interact with that same passage. Part of my question is this: Can we determine how Second Temple scribes viewed the passage by looking at how they treated it?

You see, Fishbane has a traditum-traditio sort of model in his description of inner-biblical exegesis. The traditum is the authoritative tradition, which the scribe considers to be sacred Scripture. The traditio is the scribe's method of interpreting that Scripture. Like the rabbis, the biblical scribes and authors tried to understand, clarify, and update biblical traditions. They do this when they add notes to the text itself, or refer to the text and add clarification, or rewrite a text according to their own ideology (as I-II Chronicles supposedly does with I-II Samuel and I-II Kings). Eventually, the traditio itself becomes a traditum--the sacred text that is subject to interpretation. (Fishbane 7-8, 10-11, 262)

I guess my question is this: Does the Temple Scroll view the passages with which it interacts as an authoritative traditum? On some level, this is a no-brainer, since the Temple Scroll is obviously appealing to the laws of the Pentateuch. Why would it do so if it did not deem them to be authoritative (Fishbane 7)? At the same time, it does not always adhere rigidly to those laws. It sometimes alters them or adds new laws altogether!

My professor recommended that I look at one passage or theme. Right now, there are two that come to mind: plunder and conquest.

a. Plunder. In Temple Scroll 58, we read the following:

"If they triumph over their enemies, smash them, put them to the sword and carry away their booty, they shall give the king his tithe of his, the priests one thousandth and the Levites one hundredth from everything. They shall halve the rest between the combatants and their brothers whom they have left in their cities." The translation is from Geza Vermes, The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls (New York: Penguin, 1997). I'll get into the Hebrew later on in my research.

What makes this topic fruitful is that I know it appears in Second Temple literature: II Maccabees talks about the division of spoils. II Maccabees 8:28 says, "After the sabbath they gave some of the spoils to those who had been tortured and to the widows and orphans, and distributed the rest among themselves and their children" (NRSV).

As far as the Hebrew Bible is concerned, the division of spoils is discussed in at least two places: Numbers 31:25-30 and I Samuel 30:20-25.

Numbers 31:25-30 has:

"The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 'You and Eleazar the priest and the heads of the ancestral houses of the congregation make an inventory of the booty captured, both human and animal. Divide the booty into two parts, between the warriors who went out to battle and all the congregation. From the share of the warriors who went out to battle, set aside as tribute for the LORD, one item out of every five hundred, whether persons, oxen, donkeys, sheep, or goats. Take it from their half and give it to Eleazar the priest as an offering to the LORD. But from the Israelites' half you shall take one out of every fifty, whether persons, oxen, donkeys, sheep, or goats-- all the animals-- and give them to the Levites who have charge of the tabernacle of the LORD.'"

And I Samuel 30:20-25 states:

David also captured all the flocks and herds, which were driven ahead of the other cattle; people said, 'This is David's spoil.' Then David came to the two hundred men who had been too exhausted to follow David, and who had been left at the Wadi Besor. They went out to meet David and to meet the people who were with him. When David drew near to the people he saluted them. Then all the corrupt and worthless fellows among the men who had gone with David said, 'Because they did not go with us, we will not give them any of the spoil that we have recovered, except that each man may take his wife and children, and leave.' But David said, 'You shall not do so, my brothers, with what the LORD has given us; he has preserved us and handed over to us the raiding party that attacked us. Who would listen to you in this matter? For the share of the one who goes down into the battle shall be the same as the share of the one who stays by the baggage; they shall share alike.'"

So let's summarize, going from the earliest text to the latest:

Numbers 21:25-30: The spoil is divided, with half going to the warriors, and half going to everyone else. Of the warriors' spoil, 1/500 goes to the high priest, and 1/50 goes to the Levites.

I Samuel 30:20-25: I guess everyone gets the same amount of spoil.

II Maccabees 8:28: The soldiers distributed the spoils among themselves and their children, while giving some to the widows, the orphans, and the tortured.

Temple Scroll 58: The king gets a tenth of all the spoil, the priests 1/1000, and the Levites 1/100. Then, the rest of the spoil is divided between the warriors and the congregation.

You know, come to think of it, Temple Scroll 58 may think that it's actually being faithful to Numbers 21:25-30. In Numbers 21:25-30, the high priest gets 1/500 of 1/2 of the spoil, and the Levites get 1/50 of 1/2 of the spoil. 1/500 times 1/2 is 1/1000, and 1/50 times 1/2 is 1/100, which are the numbers that appear in Temple Scroll 58. I haven't yet looked at the similarity (or dissimilarity) in language and vocabulary between the two passages, but I'll do so at another time.

Here's another factor: Temple Scroll 60 says the following:

"To the Levites shall belong the tithe of the corn, the wine, and the oil that they have sanctified to me first; the shoulder from those who slaughter a sacrifice and a proportion of the booty, the plunder and the catch of birds, wild animals and fish, one hundredth; the tithe from the young pigeons and from the honey one fiftieth. To the priests shall belong one hundredth of the young pigeons, for I have chosen them from all your tribes to attend to me and minister (before me) and bless my name, he and his son always."

There are echoes here of Deuteronomy 18:1-5, but I can't think of anywhere in the Pentateuch that specifies that the Levites will receive 1/100 of one type of plunder, and 1/50 from another. I'm not sure if it arrives at these numbers through exegetical math, or what exactly.

b. Conquest. I won't spill my guts here as I did on the plunder. Basically, the Bible tells the Israelites to slaughter all of the Canaanites. But I read in a commentary on Wisdom of Solomon that God actually wanted to have mercy on the people of Canaan. And I wonder if, in I Maccabees, it is people of Canaan who surrender to the Maccabees and get spared. In rabbinic literature, the Canaanites are offered a chance to repent, and they're only destroyed if they do not do so. I know that the Temple Scroll touches on this topic, but I'm not sure at the moment what it says. I'll look into that today.

3. I'll cut to the chase here too, and offer more details in a coming post. In II and IV Maccabees, Antiochus is God's punishment on Israel for what it is already doing: Hellenizing. Hellenization involved a change in Israel's ancestral constitution, or politeia, as Jerusalem was converted into a Greek polis. Why did the Maccabees, or the authors of II and IV Maccabees, or other defenders of the Maccabees deem that to be wrong? As Victor Tcherikover points out through an analysis of the sources, it's not as if Hellenization meant Israel had to worship idols. So what was the problem?

I know that this third topic needs to be crisper, but that's why I'm writing all this. Consider it a rough draft.

More to come!

Still More on Maccabees and Theodicy

I finished III Maccabees last night. III Maccabees is not actually about the Maccabees, for it relates to the persecution of the Jews under King Ptolemy Philopator of Egypt (221-203 B.C.E.). Ptolemy defeats the Seleucid Antiochus III at the Battle of Rafia, and the Jews of Jerusalem are eager to congratulate the victor. Ptolemy then goes to the holy city in order to offer a sacrifice, and he is so enamored by the temple that he wants to go inside. The Jews tell him he can't do that, since only the high priest can enter the holy of holies--and once a year, at that. But Ptolemy doesn't listen, and he tries to go into the innermost sanctuary. God then knocks him down. That makes Ptolemy mad, and the Egyptian king tries to wipe out the Jews of Alexandria (in Egypt) and other places.

In III Maccabees, there are Jews who want to take up arms against Ptolemy, but the elders dissuade them from doing so (III Maccabees 1:23). The Jews of III Maccabees solve their problems through prayer, as they trust God to work in unexpected ways. And the Jews in that book really don't do much else but pray. God is the one who fights their battles for them. God strikes down Ptolemy when he tried to enter the temple (III Maccabees 2:21-24). When Ptolemy's intoxicated elephants are about to stomp the Jews to death, God sends two angels to frighten them, leading them to stomp Ptolemy's men instead (III Maccabees 6:18-21). And God is the one who changes Ptolemy's heart and makes it favorable towards the Jews (III Maccabees 6:22ff).

In I-II Maccabees, by contrast, God does not fight Israel's battles as it passively looks to him. Rather, the Israelites have to fight for the survival of their nation and customs, and they trust in God to assist them in battle (I Maccabees 3-4). And they try to conduct themselves in a godly manner in their fight against Antiochus, for they rest and purify themselves on the Sabbath rather than pursuing their enemies (II Maccabees 8:26-28; 12:38). But they are not passive, for God helps them through their action, not apart from it.

But they realize early on that they may have to break the Sabbath to preserve their nation and their laws. In I Maccabees 2, we read that Antiochus' army attacked a group of observant Jews on the Sabbath, and the Jews refused to fight back. As a result, the Jews got killed. The priest Mattathias then declared that Jews are allowed to fight on the Sabbath.

But why didn't God protect those Jews who chose to honor his Sabbath day rather than fight? And God could have done so. Sure, he could've used some of the techniques we see in III Maccabees, but let's look at Scriptures whose canonicity Protestants, Catholics, Jews, and the Greek Orthodox can agree on. God could have put the Seleucid army in a frenzy so that they killed each other off (Judges 7:22; II Chronicles 20). He could have dropped heavenly stones on the Seleucids (Joshua 10:11). He could have sent an angel to kill them off before they arrived at the Jews' location (II Kings 19:36). He could have blinded them (II Kings 6:16-18). He could've arranged for Antiochus to meet a hot Jewish babe who would make him favorable to the Jewish people (Esther). God had done these things before, so they were not logically impossible for him. Why didn't he help out those who were simply honoring his Sabbath?

I don't know why God acts one way in one situation, and another way in another. In the case of the Maccabees, perhaps he wanted the Jews to take an active stand for his laws, or to value life above the rigid observance of the Sabbath. The latter idea set the stage for Jesus' Sabbath ministry (Mark 2; Luke 6:7-10; 14:5), in which Jesus declared that the Sabbath is made for man, not man for the Sabbath. But there may have been other times when the Jews were not militarily strong enough to take on their opponents, and so God intervened in a miraculous sense.

But then another question confronts us: Why didn't God intervene during the Holocaust? I guess he did, in the sense that he used the allies to defeat Hitler, but that was after millions of Jews had died.

Were the Maccabees Aaronides?

The Catholic Study Bible says the following about the Hasmoneans, the priesthood that took over in Jerusalem after the Jews' defeat of Antiochus Epiphanes (second century B.C.E.):

"The purpose of 1 Maccabees is clear: it defends the legitimacy of the Hasmonean dynasty...[T]he Hasmoneans functioned as high priests even though they were not descendants of Aaron as required by tradition. The principal opponents of the Hasmoneans were the Hasidim (the Pious Ones) who were the spiritual ancestors of the Essenes and the Pharisees. The Hasidim saw themselves as careful observers of the law but held the Hasmoneans to be illegitimate interlopers as religious and political leaders. 1 Maccabees tries to show that the Hasmonean dynasty owed its origins to a revolutionary movement that had zeal for the Torah at its heart. The Hasidim, on the other hand, were not always very prudent in their self-styled devotion to the Torah. In their concern to have a high priest from the family of Aaron, they acquired a collaborator who betrayed them (7, 8-18)" (RG 225).

I may be misreading this, but the Catholic Study Bible seems to be denying that the Hasmoneans were from the house of Aaron. It says that the Hasidism wanted a priest who was from Aaron's family, and that they disliked the Hasmoneans. That must mean the Hasmoneans weren't from Aaron's family, right?

But I Maccabees claims that they were. I Maccabees 2:1 says that Mattathias (father of Judah the Maccabee) was a "priest of the family of Joarib." And I Chronicles lists Jehoiarib as a descendant of Aaron (9:10; 24:7).

The Catholic Study Bible may be basing its argument on I Maccabees 7:8-18, in which the Hasidim embrace Alcimus because he's a priest of the house of Aaron. "A priest of the line of Aaron has come with the army, and he will not harm us," they exult, right before Alcimus proceeds to kill them. Was I Maccabees arguing against Aaronide descent being a criterion for priesthood?

Not necessarily. The Hasidim may have been excited to get an Aaronide high priest, for the simple reason that Alcimus' predecessor, Menelaus, was not one. Menelaus was the brother of Simon, who was of the house of Benjamin (II Maccabees 3:4; 4:23).

But not everyone agrees with that notion. In the HarperCollins Study Bible, Daniel Harrington states regarding II Maccabees 3:4: "Simon was more likely from the priestly clan of Bilgah (Neh 12:5, 18; 1 Chr 24.14), not of the tribe of Benjamin." Harrington doesn't support this statement, but he may be assuming that the Jews wouldn't tolerate a non-Aaronide high priest, so Menelaus had to be from a priestly family to get off the ground.

Personally, I think that the Hasidim in I Maccabees 7 were just gullible about the house of Aaron. I don't think I Maccabees in that scene is ruling out the criterion of Aaronide descent for the high priesthood.

Still, there was concern about lineage. The Maccabees were indeed descendants of the family of Aaron, but not through Zadok. The Zadokites were the high priests before the Hasmoneans took over, and they most likely resented the Maccabees taking their position. The Dead Sea Scrolls refer to the Zadokites on numerous occasions (e.g., Zadokite Fragments, Community Rule 5, etc.), indicating that the Qumran community had some pretty upset Zadokites. And they could appeal to the Bible to support their claim to the priesthood, for Ezekiel 44:15 states: "But the levitical priests, the descendants of Zadok, who kept the charge of my sanctuary when the people of Israel went astray from me, shall come near to me to minister to me; and they shall attend me to offer me the fat and the blood, says the Lord GOD" (NRSV).

More on Maccabees and Theodicy

In my post, Theodicy and Maccabees, I talked about the bad things that happen to good people in I-II Maccabees. One such incident was the death of Judah the Maccabee in battle. I said the following:

"Moreover, God doesn't always intervene on behalf of each and every individual. A puzzling passage is Deuteronomy 20:5-6, where it's acknowledged that Israelites can actually die in battle, even when God is with the Israelite army. But shouldn't each and every Israelite soldier be invincible? It doesn't necessarily work that way. So is it really a surprise that Judas died in battle?"

As I read through II Maccabees again, however, I saw that God indeed could protect individuals in battle, as far as II Maccabees is concerned. In II Maccabees 10:29-30, we read the following:

"When the battle became fierce, there appeared to the enemy from heaven five resplendent men on horses with golden bridles, and they were leading the Jews.
Two of them took Maccabeus between them, and shielding him with their own armor and weapons, they kept him from being wounded. They showered arrows and thunderbolts on the enemy, so that, confused and blinded, they were thrown into disorder and cut to pieces" (NRSV).

In this passage, God sent his angels to protect Judah from the enemy's arrows.

And, conversely, God could strike down people who sinned against him. II Maccabees 12:40 states about a group of fallen Jewish soldiers: "Then under the tunic of each one of the dead they found sacred tokens of the idols of Jamnia, which the law forbids the Jews to wear. And it became clear to all that this was the reason these men had fallen."

In this case, God ensured that certain soldiers died in battle on account of their sin.

And so God's providence extends to each and every individual. We see something similar in Exodus 12:12-13: "Whoever strikes a person mortally shall be put to death. If it was not premeditated, but came about by an act of God, then I will appoint for you a place to which the killer may flee." According to this passage, was seems to be an accident is actually an act of God.

So why did Judah the Maccabee die in battle? Why did Jonathan get kidnapped and murdered? Why did God protect Judah in one battle, but not in another?

II Maccabees doesn't seem to deal with that, for it doesn't go as far as I Maccabees in its story. II Maccabees is like Episode IV of Star Wars: You'd think that good has totally triumphed over evil, if you watched that movie alone. But I Maccabees is like Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back put together: good wins initially, but then evil makes a powerful comeback, and it just keeps on striking.