The Maccabees (), also spelled Machabees (, or ; or ; ), were a group of Jewish rebel warriors who re-took control of Judea, which at the time was occupied by the Seleucid Empire. Its leaders, the Hasmoneans, founded the Hasmonean dynasty, which ruled from 167 BC (after the Maccabean Revolt) to 37 BC, being a fully independent kingdom from 104 to 63 BC. They reasserted the Jewish religion, ended the Syrian-Greek occupation of Judea, and reduced the influence of Hellenism and Hellenistic Judaism.
Etymology The name "Maccabee" is often used as a synonym for the entire Hasmonean dynasty. But the Maccabees often and more narrowly refers to Judas Maccabeus and his four brothers.Latin: Maccabaeus; Greek: Μακκαβαῖος Makkabaios; from Hebrew maqqeb et, "hammer" (Oxford English Dictionary). The name Maccabee was a personal epithet of Judah,See 1 Maccabees 2:4 and the later generations were not his direct descendants. One explanation of the name's origins is that it derives from the Aramaic maqqəḇa, "the hammer", in recognition of Judah's ferocity in battle. The traditional Jewish explanation is that Maccabee ( ) is an acronym for the Torah verse that was the battle-cry of the Maccabees, "Mi kamocha ba'elim YHWH", "Who is like You among the heavenly powers, oh God!",Exodus 15:11 as well as an acronym for "Matityahu haKohen ben Yochanan" (Matthias the priest, son of John). The correlating Torah verse Exodus 15:11, The song of Moses and the Children of Israel by the Sea, makes a reference to elim, with a mundane notion of natural forces, heavenly might, war and governmental powers. The scholar and poet Aaron Kaminka argues that the name is a corruption of Machbanai, a mighty warrior in the army of King David.
Background In the 2nd century BC, Judea lay between the Ptolemaic Kingdom (based in Egypt) and the Seleucid Empire (based in Syria), monarchies which had formed following the death of Alexander the Great. Judea had initially come under Ptolemaic rule but fell to the Seleucids around 197 BC, after the Battle of Panium, during the Fifth Syrian War. Judea at that time had been affected by the Hellenization initiated by Alexander the Great. Some Jews, mainly those of the urban upper class, notably the Tobiad family, wished to dispense with Jewish law and to adopt a Greek lifestyle. According to historian Victor Tcherikover, the main motive for the Tobiads' Hellenism was economic and political. The Hellenizing Jews built a gymnasium in Jerusalem, competed in international Greek games, "removed their marks of circumcision and repudiated the holy covenant".I Maccabees, i, 15
When Antiochus IV Epiphanes became ruler of the Seleucid Empire in 175 BC, Onias III held the office of high priest in Jerusalem. To Antiochus, the high priest was merely a local governor within his realm, a man whom he could appoint or dismiss at will, while orthodox Jews saw the holder of the high priesthood as divinely appointed.Oesterley, W.O.E., A History of Israel, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1939. Jason, the brother of Onias, bribed Antiochus to make him high priest instead of Onias. Jason abolished the traditional theocracy and "received from Antiochus permission to convert Jerusalem into a Greek polis called Antioch".De Lange, Nicholas, Atlas of the Jewish World, Oxford: Andromeda, 1992 In turn, Menelaus then bribed Antiochus and was appointed high priest in place of Jason. Menelaus had Onias assassinated. Menelaus' brother Lysimachus stole holy vessels from the Temple; the resulting riots led to the death of Lysimachus. Menelaus was arrested for Onias' murder and was arraigned before Antiochus, but he bribed his way out of trouble. Jason subsequently drove out Menelaus and became high priest again. In 168 BCE, Antiochus pillaged the Temple, attacked Jerusalem and "led captive the women and children."I Maccabees, i, 30–32 From this point onwards, Antiochus pursued a zealous Hellenizing policy in the Seleucid satrapies of Coele Syria and Phoenicia.
Now Antiochus was not satisfied either with his unexpected taking the city (Jerusalem), or with its pillage, or with the great slaughter he had made there; but being overcome with his violent passions, and remembering what he had suffered during the siege, he compelled the Jews to dissolve the laws of their country, and to keep their infants uncircumcised, and to sacrifice swine's flesh upon the altar; against which they all opposed themselves, and the most approved among them were put to death. —Flavius Josephus, The War of the Jews, Book 1.1 §2
The author of the First Book of Maccabees regards the Maccabean revolt as a rising of pious Jews against the Seleucid king (who had tried to eradicate their religion) and against the Jews who supported him. The author of the Second Book of Maccabees presents the conflict as a struggle between "Judaism" and "Hellenism", concepts which he coined.Nicholas de Lange (ed.), The Illustrated History of the Jewish People, London, Aurum Press, 1997, Most modern scholars argue that King Antiochus reacted to a civil war between traditionalist Jews in the Judean countryside and Hellenized Jews in Jerusalem, though the king's response of persecuting the religious traditionalists was unusual in antiquity, and was the immediate provocation for the revolt. According to Joseph P. Schultz, modern scholarship "considers the Maccabean revolt less as an uprising against foreign oppression than as a civil war between the orthodox and reformist parties in the Jewish camp", but John J. Collins writes that while the civil war between Jewish leaders led to the king's new policies, it is wrong to see the revolt as simply a conflict between Hellenism and Judaism, since "[t]he revolt was not provoked by the introduction of Greek customs (typified by the building of a gymnasium) but by the persecution of people who observed the Torah by having their children circumcised and refusing to eat pork."
In the conflict over the office of high priest, traditionalists with Hebrew/Aramaic names like Onias contested with Hellenizers with Greek names like Jason and Menelaus. Some scholars point to social and economic factors in the conflict.Tcherikover, Victor Hellenistic Civilization and the Jews, New York: Atheneum, 1975 What began as a civil war took on the character of an invasion when the Hellenistic kingdom of Syria sided with the Hellenizing Jews against the traditionalists. As the conflict escalated, Antiochus prohibited the practices of the traditionalists, thereby, in a departure from usual Seleucid practice, banning the religion of an entire people. The motives of Antiochus remain unclear: he may have been incensed at the overthrow of his appointee, Menelaus, or – encouraged by a group of radical Hellenizers among the Jews, he may have been responding to an orthodox Jewish revolt that drew on the Temple and the Torah for its strength. Other scholars argue that, while the rising began as a religious rebellion, it was gradually transformed into a war of national liberation.Jewish Life and Thought Among Greeks and Romans: Primary Readings, By Louis H. Feldman, Meyer Reinhold, Fortress Press, 1996, p. 147
According to 1 Maccabees, Antiochus banned many traditional Jewish and Samaritan religious practices: he made possession of the Torah a capital offense and burned the copies he could find;I Macccabees. 1:57 sabbaths and feasts were banned; circumcision was outlawed, and mothers who circumcised their babies were killed along with their families; and traditional Jewish ritual sacrifice was forbidden. It was said that an idol of Olympian Zeus was placed on the altar of the Temple and that Israelites set up altars to Greek gods and sacrificed "unclean" animals on them.I Maccabees, 1, 41–50
The main objective of Antiochus is explained throughout Chassidic thought. It says that Antiochus didn't mind that the Jews kept the culture of Judaism, rather all he wanted was to eradicate the laws of the Torah (mitzvos) that weren't logical but rather kept solely because it is God's command. But when he saw that even the logical/rational and cultural commandments of the Torah were being practiced by the Jews in a way higher than logic, he then opposed Judaism in its entirety.Toras Menachem Melukat volume 2 pg. 162
Revolt
In the narrative of I Maccabees, after Antiochus issued his decrees forbidding Jewish religious practice, a rural Jewish priest from Modi'in, Mattathias the Hasmonean, sparked the revolt against the Seleucid Empire by refusing to worship the Greek gods. Mattathias killed a Hellenistic Jew who stepped forward to offer a sacrifice to an idol in Mattathias' place. He and his five sons fled to the wilderness of Judah. After Mattathias' death about one year later in 166 BCE, his son Judah Maccabee led an army of Jewish dissidents to victory over the Seleucids in guerrilla warfare, which at first was directed against Hellenizing Jews, of whom there were many. The Maccabees destroyed pagan altars in the villages, circumcised boys and forced Jews into outlawry. As a result, one explanation of the name Maccabees is based on the Aramaic word for "hammer", because they "strike hammer blows against their enemies".
The revolt involved many battles, in which the Maccabean forces gained notoriety among the Seleucid army for their use of guerrilla tactics. After the victory, the Maccabees entered Jerusalem in triumph and ritually cleansed the Temple, reestablishing traditional Jewish worship there and installing Jonathan Maccabee as high priest. A large Seleucid army was sent to quash the revolt but returned to Syria on the death of Antiochus IV. Its commander Lysias, preoccupied with internal Seleucid affairs, agreed to a political compromise that restored religious freedom.
The Jewish festival of Hanukkah celebrates the re-dedication of the Temple following Judah Maccabee's victory over the Seleucids. According to rabbinic tradition, the victorious Maccabees could only find a small jug of oil that had remained uncontaminated by virtue of a seal, and although it only contained enough oil to sustain the Temple menorah for one day, it miraculously lasted for eight days, by which time further oil could be procured.
Hasmonean dynasty
Following the re-dedication of the Temple, the supporters of the Maccabees were divided over the question of whether to continue fighting. When the revolt began under the leadership of Mattathias, it was seen as a war for religious freedom to end oppression by the Seleucids. However, as the Maccabees realized how successful they had been, many wanted to continue the revolt and conquer other lands with Jewish populations. This policy exacerbated the divide between the Pharisees and Sadducees under later Hasmonean monarchs such as Alexander Jannaeus.Cohen, Shaye J.D., From the Maccabees to the Mishnah (Second Edition. Westminster John Knox Press, 2006) Those who sought the continuation of the war were led by Judah Maccabee.
On his death in battle in 160 BCE, Judah was succeeded as army commander by his younger brother, Jonathan, who was already high priest. Jonathan made treaties with various foreign states, causing further dissent between those who merely desired religious freedom and those who sought greater power.