Maccabees II: Chapters 6 to 11

Last time, Maccabees II began.

CHAPTER 6

Now we get into the central conflict of early Maccabees I: the attempt by evil King Antiochus to destroy Judaism.  Again, it’s weird reading about Hellenization as an evil thing.  Usually, the spread of Greek culture in the generations after Alexander the Great is seen as a good thing, because we owe so much from that culture.  Aye, but we also owe a lot to the Jews, so seeing one trying to force out the other makes the Greeks the bad guys. 

But it’s still a little funny to read a sentence like, “It was obvious, therefore, that disaster had befallen [the Jews]” when “disaster” means “Greek culture.” 

This book clearly has a different writer than Maccabees I, though. This guy is probably a priest.  Aside from the greater interest in the Temple, this guy also gives us much thicker, clearer moral statements about what is going on.  Here, we’re explicitly told that God is punishing the Jews for their sins by inflicting Greek culture upon them.  But, in a bit of a tangent, the moralistic writer tells us to never fear.  For while God might be upset with his people, he’ll never fully withdraw his mercy from them.  They might be stuck eating gyros for a while, but it won’t last forever.

And then we get something most unexpected from the Old Testament: martyrdom.  Usually, that’s more a Christian thing.  But here it’s going on with Jews.  A good scribe named Eleazer is supposed to eat pork, but he refuses.  He’s even taken aside and told, look – just pretend to eat pork.  You don’t actually have to do it.  Never!  This is martyrdom at its purest.  He’s been given an easy out, he can avoid being harassed and still not violate the law, but he won’t take the easy out.  He’ll make his stand.  And so he is killed. 

I’m reminded of a line longtime Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels once said about the bizarre Late Night TV wars when Conan O’Brien bolted from NBC.  Michaels didn’t quite get O’Brien’s whole approach, and thought he should’ve been willing to move back by a half-hour.  It’s just a half-hour, after all.  Michaels though it might be some Irish Catholic martyrdom complex, but said he didn’t understand it because “Jews don’t do martyrdom.”  Well, this book isn’t in the Jewish Bible after all.

CHAPTER 7

It’s an entire chapter of nothing but martyrs.  It’s a mother and her seven sons, all of whom are making the same stand as Eleazer – death before pork!  This story is pretty clearly apocryphal.  Not only is it really extreme in all its details, but none of the characters have any names.  It’s just the mother and her seven sons.

One by one they are all told that they can be saved a horrible death if they just agree to eat pork.  One by one they all refuse.  You get details on each one.  None are allowed to die easily, either.  They are tortured to death.  For example, the first one has his tongue cut out, his scalp cut off, his hands and feet chopped off – and he gets to live through all this.  Still breathing, he’s cast into fire.  Naturally, his mom and brothers all see this.  Then they all go through it, one after the other.  One offers his hands to the tortures to be cut off.  Dude, that’s so gangster.  The mom is the toughest of all.  Not only does she watch all her kids get maimed and killed, but she urges them to keep the faith throughout.

Interestingly, we get a notion of the afterlife here as well.  The fourth brother says, “It is my choice to die at the hands of mortals with the hope that God will restore me to life, but for you, there will be no resurrection to life.”  So you have a sense what popular Jewish beliefs were about the great beyond.  You don’t see that in the Torah, but it’s not too surprising.  Again, Jesus shouldn’t have completely come out of nowhere.  His belief in an afterlife was outgrowth of folk belief of the people he lived around. 

CHAPTER 8

Now we get back on track with the politics and military stuff.  Judas Maccabeus leads the Jews in fighting.  We’re told that God’s wrath now changed to mercy for the Jews, so they start winning battles.  You didn’t see nearly this much moralism in the first book of Maccabees. 

The battles are just the stuff we saw last time.  It’s worth noting how devout the army is.  At one point they are chasing their enemy, but have to break off because it was the day before the Sabbath, and had to be ready for it.  Actually, I think there is some interesting fun with translations going on here.  From what I know, classic Jewish belief is that the Sabbath (and all days) begins at nightfall. So Judas is stopping his army because Sabbath begins at dusk. But the Bible translates it as “the day before” because that’s easier to understand without getting into a needless aside about when days begin.  (Though it could handle it in a footnote.  Well, maybe I’m wrong about nightfall beginning the day, but I don’t think I’m wrong).

CHAPTER 9

The bad guys dies.  Again.  King Antiochus dies.  It’s a little different from Maccabees I, but not really.  There, he gets ill and repents for how he treats the Jews.  He does that here, too – eventually.

When he first falls ill (with “excruciating pains in this bowels and sharp internal torment.  Bummer) he is enraged, and rages against the Jews.  But he gets much, much worse.  His body starts rotting, worms start devouring him – gross! – and he raises up an all-mighty stench.  The writer is delighting in this, noting what a huge ego he once had.  Well, finally having received his royal comeuppance, he repents.  He writes a letter to the Jews, totally changing his course with them.  Then he dies “a miserable death.” 

CHAPTER 10

Time to purify the temple.  The intro to this book says it covers the story of Hannakuh.  I’m really not sure where it is, though.  The opening chapter had the story of the magic light.  And this has the story of an eight day celebration of purifying the temple – and it’s written that this should be celebrated every year from now on.  But I don’t see the two really being combined.  There is no light talk here, and I didn’t see eight days mentioned earlier.  This is likely my failure as a reader.

Well, the temple is purified but as any good reader of Maccabees I knows, the death of that first bad guy just opens the door for more bad guys.  And we get them.  The rest of the chapter is just some more military stuff that we already went over.  Short version: Judas wins.

Oh wait, there is one detail worth noting.  We get another miracle.  Yeah, there are plenty of those in this chapter.  And it’s the favorite miracle of the chapter – a mystical horseman.  Actually, five horsemen.  They ride above the battle leading on the Jews.  No wonder they win.  Again – this is not the same writer we had I the previous book. 

CHAPTER 11

More military stuff.  Oh, we get another mystical horseman. Naturally, he helps the Jews win in battle.  It sure would ruin the point if a mystical horseman showed up and got his ass kicked by the other side. 

Much of this chapter is just a series of letters to the Jews from various leaders of the era.  It is boring.

Click here for the final chapters of Maccabees II.