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1 Maccabees 13:1-16:24

Simon Maccabaeus leads the Jews. (1Mace.13.1-53)

13¹Simon heard that Trypho had collected a large army to invade and devastate Judaea, ²and when he saw how the people were quaking with fear, he went up to Jerusalem, called the people together, ³and exhorted them thus, 'You know yourselves how much I and my brothers and my father's family have done for the laws and the sanctuary; you know what wars and hardships we have experienced. ⁴That is why my brothers are all dead, for Israel's sake, and I am the only one left. ⁵Far be it from me, then, to be sparing of my own life in any time of oppression, for I am not worth more than my brothers. ⁶Rather will I avenge my nation and the sanctuary and your wives and children, now that the foreigners are all united in malice to destroy us.' ⁷The people's spirit rekindled as they listened to his words, ⁸and they shouted back at him, 'You are our leader in place of Judas and your brother Jonathan. ⁹Fight our battles for us, and we will do whatever you tell us.' ¹⁰So he assembled all the fighting men and hurried on with completing the walls of Jerusalem, fortifying the whole perimeter. ¹¹He sent a considerable force to Joppa under Jonathan son of Absalom who drove out the inhabitants and remained there in occupation. ¹²Trypho now left Ptolemais with a large army to invade Judaea, taking Jonathan with him under guard. ¹³Simon pitched camp in Adida, facing the plain. ¹⁴When Trypho learned that Simon had taken the place of his brother Jonathan and that he intended to join battle with him, he sent envoys to him with this message, ¹⁵'Your brother Jonathan was in debt to the royal exchequer for the offices he held; that is why we are detaining him. ¹⁶If you send a hundred talents of silver and two of his sons as hostages, to make sure that on his release he does not revolt against us, we shall release him.' ¹⁷Although Simon was aware that the message was a ruse, he sent for the money and the boys for fear of incurring great hostility from the people, ¹⁸who would have said that Jonathan had died because Simon would not send Trypho the money and the children. ¹⁹He therefore sent both the boys and the hundred talents, but Trypho broke his word and did not release Jonathan. ²⁰Next, Trypho set about the invasion and devastation of the country; he made a detour along the Adora road, but Simon and his army confronted him wherever he attempted to go. ²¹The men in the Citadel kept sending messengers to Trypho, urging him to get through to them by way of the desert and send them supplies. ²²Trypho organised his entire cavalry to go, but that night it snowed so heavily that he could not get through for the snow, so he left there and moved off into Gilead. ²³As he approached Baskama he killed Jonathan, who was buried there. ²⁴Trypho turned back and regained his own country. ²⁵Simon sent and recovered the bones of his brother Jonathan, and buried him in Modein, the town of his ancestors. ²⁶All Israel kept solemn mourning for him and long bewailed him. ²⁷Over the tomb of his father and brothers, Simon raised a monument high enough to catch the eye, using dressed stone back and front. ²⁸He erected seven pyramids facing each other, for his father and mother and his four brothers, ²⁹surrounding them with a structure consisting of tall columns surmounted by trophies of arms to their everlasting memory and, beside the trophies of arms, ships sculpted on a scale to be seen by all who sail the sea. ³⁰Such was the monument he constructed at Modein, and it is still there today. ³¹Now Trypho, betraying the trust of young King Antiochus, put him to death. ³²He usurped his throne, assuming the crown of Asia, and brought great havoc on the country. ³³Simon built up the fortresses of Judaea, surrounding them with high towers, great walls and gates with bolts, and stocked these fortresses with food. ³⁴He also sent a delegation to King Demetrius, to get him to grant the province a remission, since all Trypho did was to despoil. ³⁵King Demetrius replied to his request in a letter framed as follows: ³⁶'King Demetrius to Simon, high priest and Friend of Kings, and to the elders and nation of the Jews, greetings. ³⁷'It has pleased us to accept the golden crown and the palm you have sent us, and we are disposed to make a general peace with you, and to write to the officials to grant you remissions. ³⁸Everything that we have decreed concerning you remains in force, and the fortresses you have built may remain in your hands. ³⁹We pardon all offences, unwitting or intentional, hitherto committed, and remit the crown tax you now owe us; and whatever other taxes were levied in Jerusalem are no longer to be levied. ⁴⁰If any of you are suitable for enrolment in our bodyguard, let them be enrolled, and let there be peace between us.' ⁴¹The gentile yoke was thus lifted from Israel in the year 170, ⁴²when our people began engrossing their documents and contracts: 'In the first year of Simon, eminent high priest, commander-in-chief and ethnarch of the Jews'. ⁴³About that time Simon laid siege to Gezer, surrounding it with his troops. He constructed a mobile tower, brought it up to the city, opened a breach in one of the bastions and took it. ⁴⁴The men in the mobile tower sprang out into the city, where great confusion ensued. ⁴⁵The citizens, accompanied by their wives and children, mounted the ramparts with their garments torn and loudly implored Simon to make peace with them: ⁴⁶'Treat us', they said, 'not as our wickedness deserves, but as your mercy prompts you.' ⁴⁷Simon came to terms with them and stopped the fighting; but he expelled them from the city, purified the houses which contained idols, and then made his entry with songs of praise. ⁴⁸He banished all impurity from it, settled in it people who observed the Law, and having fortified it, built a residence there for himself. ⁴⁹The occupants of the Citadel in Jerusalem, prevented as they were from coming out and going into the countryside to buy and sell, were in desperate need of food, and numbers of them were being carried off by starvation. ⁵⁰They begged Simon to make peace with them, and he granted this, though he expelled them and purified the Citadel from its pollutions. ⁵¹The Jews made their entry on the twenty-third day of the second month in the year 171, with acclamations and carrying palms, to the sound of lyres, cymbals and harps, chanting hymns and canticles, since a great enemy had been crushed and thrown out of Israel. Simon made it a day of annual rejoicing. ⁵²He fortified the Temple hill on the Citadel side, and took up residence there with his men. ⁵³Since his son John had come to manhood, Simon appointed him general-in-chief, with his residence in Gezer.

In praise of Simon. (1Mace.14.1-49)

14¹In the year 172, King Demetrius assembled his forces and marched into Media to raise help for the fight against Trypho. ²When Arsaces king of Persia and Media heard that Demetrius had entered his territory, he sent one of his generals to capture him alive. ³The general defeated the army of Demetrius, seized him and brought him to Arsaces, who imprisoned him.

⁴The country was at peace throughout the days of Simon. He sought the good of his nation and they were well pleased with his authority, as with his magnificence, throughout his life. ⁵To crown his titles to glory, he took Joppa and made it a harbour, gaining access to the Mediterranean Isles. ⁶He enlarged the frontiers of his nation, keeping his mastery over the homeland, ⁷resettling a host of captives. He conquered Gezer, Beth-Zur and the Citadel, ridding them of every impurity, and no one could resist him. ⁸The people farmed their land in peace; the land gave its produce, the trees of the plain their fruit. ⁹The elders sat at ease in the squares, all their talk was of their prosperity; the young men wore splendid armour. ¹⁰He kept the towns supplied with provisions and furnished with fortifications, until his fame resounded to the ends of the earth. ¹¹He established peace in the land, and Israel knew great joy. ¹²Each man sat under his own vine and his own fig tree, and there was no one to make them afraid. ¹³No enemy was left in the land to fight them, the very kings of those times had been crushed. ¹⁴He encouraged the afflicted members of his people, suppressing every wicked man and renegade. He strove to observe the Law, ¹⁵and gave new splendour to the Temple, enriching it with many sacred vessels.

¹⁶When it became known in Rome and as far as Sparta that Jonathan was dead, people were deeply grieved. ¹⁷But as soon as they heard that his brother Simon had succeeded him as high priest and was master of the country and the cities in it, ¹⁸they wrote to him on bronze tablets to renew the treaty of friendship and alliance which they had made with his brothers, Judas and Jonathan, ¹⁹and the document was read out before the assembly in Jerusalem. ²⁰This is the copy of the letter sent by the Spartans: 'The rulers and the city of Sparta, to Simon the high priest and to the elders and priests and the rest of the people of the Jews, greetings. ²¹'The ambassadors whom you sent to our people have informed us of your glory and prosperity, and we are delighted with their visit. ²²We have recorded their declarations in the minutes of our public assemblies, as follows, 'Numenius son of Antiochus, and Antipater son of Jason, ambassadors of the Jews, came to us to renew their friendship with us. ²³And it was the people's pleasure to receive these personages with honour and to deposit a copy of their statements in the public archives, so that the people of Sparta might preserve a record of them. A copy was also made for Simon the high priest.' ' ²⁴After this, Simon sent Numenius to Rome as the bearer of a large golden shield weighing a thousand mina, to confirm the alliance with them. ²⁵When these events were reported to our people, they said, 'What mark of appreciation shall we give to Simon and his sons? ²⁶He stood firm, he and his brothers and his father's house: he fought off the enemies of Israel and secured its freedom.' So they recorded an inscription on bronze tablets and set it up on pillars on Mount Zion. ²⁷This is a copy of the text: 'The eighteenth of Elul, in the year 172, being the third year of Simon, eminent high priest: ²⁸'In Asaramel, in the Grand Assembly of priests and people, of princes of the nation and of elders of the country: 'We are acquainted with the matters following: ²⁹'When there was almost incessant fighting in the country Simon, son of Mattathias, a priest of the line of Joarib, and his brothers courted danger and withstood their nation's enemies to safeguard the integrity of their sanctuary and of the Law, and so brought their nation great glory; ³⁰'For when, Jonathan having rallied his nation and become its high priest and having then been gathered to his ancestors, ³¹the enemy planned to invade the country, intending to devastate their territory and to lay hands on their sanctuary, ³²Simon next came forward to fight for his nation: spending much of his personal wealth on arming his nation's fighting men and on providing their pay; ³³fortifying the towns of Judaea, as well as Beth-Zur on the Judaean frontier where the enemy arsenal had formerly been, and stationing in it a garrison of Jewish soldiers; ³⁴fortifying Joppa on the coast, and Gezer on the borders of Azotus, a place formerly inhabited by the enemy, founding a Jewish colony there, and providing the settlers with everything they needed to set them on their feet; ³⁵'In consequence of which, the people, aware of Simon's loyalty and of the glory which he was determined to win for his nation, have made him their ethnarch and high priest, for all his services and for the integrity and loyalty which he has shown towards his nation, and for having by every means sought to enhance his people's power; ³⁶'It has fallen to him in his time to expel the foreigners from his country, including those in the City of David in Jerusalem, who had converted it into a citadel for their own use, from which they would sally out to defile the surroundings of the sanctuary and to violate its sacred character; ³⁷to station Jewish soldiers there instead for the security of the country and the city; and to heighten the walls of Jerusalem; ³⁸'And since King Demetrius has heard that the Romans call the Jews their friends, allies and brothers, ³⁹and that they have given an honourable reception to Simon's ambassadors, and, furthermore, ⁴⁰that the Jews and priests are happy that Simon should, pending the advent of a genuine prophet, be their ethnarch and high priest for life ⁴¹therefore he has confirmed him in the high-priestly office, has raised him to the rank of Friend and has showered great honours on him, also confirming him as their commander-in-chief, ⁴²with the right to appoint officials to oversee the fabric of the sanctuary and to administer the country, munitions and fortresses; ⁴³he is to have personal charge of the sanctuary, and to be obeyed by all; all official documents in the country must be drawn up in his name; and he may assume the purple and may wear golden ornaments; ⁴⁴'Furthermore, it is against the law for any member of the public or of the priesthood to contravene any of these enactments or to contest his decisions, or to convene a meeting anywhere in the country without his permission, or to assume the purple or wear the golden brooch; ⁴⁵and anyone acting contrary to, or rejecting any article of, these enactments is liable to punishment; ⁴⁶'And since the people have unanimously agreed to grant Simon the right to act as aforesaid, and ⁴⁷since Simon, for his part, has given his assent, and has consented to assume the high-priestly office and to be commander-in-chief and ethnarch of the Jews and their priests, and to preside over all: ⁴⁸'So, be it now enacted: that this record be inscribed on bronze tablets and be erected at some conspicuous place within the precincts of the Temple, ⁴⁹and that copies be deposited in the Treasury for Simon and his descendants.'

Antiochus VII (Euergetes) asks for Simon's support.. (1Mace.15.1-14)

15¹Antiochus son of King Demetrius addressed a letter from the Mediterranean Isles to Simon, priest and ethnarch of the Jews, and to the whole nation; ²this was how it read: 'King Antiochus to Simon, high priest and ethnarch, and to the Jewish nation, greetings. ³'Whereas certain scoundrels have seized control of the kingdom of our fathers, and I propose to claim back the kingdom so that I may re-establish it as it was before, and whereas I have accordingly recruited very large forces and fitted out warships, ⁴intending to make a landing in the country and to hunt down the men who have ruined it and laid waste many towns in my kingdom; ⁵'I now, therefore, confirm in your favour all remissions of taxes granted to you by the kings my predecessors, as well as the waiving of whatever presents they may have conceded. ⁶I hereby authorise you to mint your own coinage as legal tender for your own country. ⁷I declare Jerusalem and the sanctuary to be free; all the arms you have manufactured and the fortresses you have built and now occupy may remain yours. ⁸All debts to the royal treasury, present or future, are cancelled henceforth in perpetuity. ⁹Furthermore, when we have won back our kingdom, we shall bestow such great honour on yourself, your nation and the sanctuary as will make your glory known throughout the world.' ¹⁰Antiochus invaded the land of his ancestors in the year 174 and, since the troops all rallied to him, Trypho was left with few supporters. ¹¹Antiochus pursued the usurper, who took refuge in Dora on the coast, ¹²knowing that misfortunes were piling up on him and that his troops had deserted him. ¹³Antiochus pitched camp outside Dora with a hundred and twenty thousand fighting men and eight thousand cavalry. ¹⁴He laid siege to the city while the ships closed in from the sea, so that he had the city under attack from land and sea, and allowed no one to go in or come out.

Rome supports the Jews. (1Mace.15.15-24)

¹⁵Numenius and his companions, meanwhile, arrived from Rome, bringing letters addressed to various kings and states, in the following terms: ¹⁶'Lucius, consul of the Romans, to King Ptolemy, greetings. ¹⁷'The Jewish ambassadors have come to us as our friends and allies to renew our original friendship and alliance in the name of the high priest Simon and the Jewish people. ¹⁸They have brought a golden shield worth a thousand mina. ¹⁹Accordingly, we have seen fit to write to various kings and states, warning them neither to molest the Jewish people nor to attack either them or their towns or their country, nor to ally themselves with any such aggressors. ²⁰We have seen fit to accept the shield from them. ²¹If, therefore, any scoundrels have fled their country to take refuge with you, hand them over to Simon the high priest, to be punished by him according to their law.' ²²The consul sent the same letter to King Demetrius, to Attalus, Ariarathes and Arsaces, ²³and to all states, including Sampsames, the Spartans, Delos, Myndos, Sicyon, Caria, Samos, Pamphylia, Lycia, Halicarnassus, Rhodes, Phaselis, Cos, Side, Arados, Gortyn, Cyprus and Cyrene. ²⁴They also drew up a copy for Simon the high priest.

Antiochus VII breaks with Simon. (1Mace.15.25-36)

²⁵Antiochus, meanwhile, from his positions on the outskirts of Dora, was continually throwing detachments against the town. He constructed siege-engines, and blockaded Trypho, preventing movement in or out. ²⁶Simon sent him two thousand picked men to support him in the fight, with silver and gold and plenty of equipment. ²⁷But Antiochus would not accept them; instead, he repudiated all his previous agreements with Simon and completely changed his attitude to him. ²⁸He sent him Athenobius, one of his Friends, to confer with him and say, 'You are now occupying Joppa and Gezer and the Citadel in Jerusalem, which are towns in my kingdom. ²⁹You have laid waste their territory and done immense harm to the country; and you have seized control of many places properly in my kingdom. ³⁰Either now surrender the towns you have taken and the taxes from the places you have seized outside the frontiers of Judaea, ³¹or else pay me five hundred talents of silver in compensation for them and for the destruction you have done, and another five hundred talents for the taxes from the towns; otherwise we shall come and make war on you.' ³²When the King's Friend, Athenobius, reached Jerusalem and saw Simon's magnificence, his cabinet of gold and silver plate and the state he kept, he was dumbfounded. He delivered the king's message, ³³but Simon gave him this answer, 'We have not taken foreign territory or any alien property but have occupied our ancestral heritage, for some time unjustly wrested from us by our enemies; ³⁴now that we have a favourable opportunity, we are merely recovering our ancestral heritage. ³⁵As regards Joppa and Gezer, which you claim, these were towns that did great harm to our people and laid waste our country; we are prepared to give a hundred talents for them.' Without so much as a word in answer, ³⁶the envoy went back to the king in a rage and reported on Simon's answer and his magnificence, and on everything he had seen, at which the king fell into a fury.

John's victory over Cendebeus. (1Mace.15.37-16.10)

³⁷Trypho now boarded a ship and escaped to Orthosia. ³⁸The king appointed Cendebaeus military governor of the coastal region and allotted him a force of infantry and cavalry. ³⁹He ordered him to deploy his men facing Judaea, and instructed him to rebuild Kedron and fortify its gates, and to make war on our people, while the king himself went in pursuit of Trypho. ⁴⁰Cendebaeus arrived at Jamnia and began to provoke our people forthwith, invading Judaea, taking prisoners, and massacring. ⁴¹Having rebuilt Kedron, he stationed cavalry and troops there to make sorties and patrol the roads of Judaea, as the king had ordered. 16¹John then went up from Gezer and reported to his father Simon what Cendebaeus was busy doing. ²At this, Simon summoned his two elder sons, Judas and John, and said to them, 'My brothers and I, and my father's House, have fought the enemies of Israel from our youth until today, and many a time we have been successful in rescuing Israel. ³But now I am an old man, while you, by the mercy of Heaven, are the right age; take the place of my brother and myself, go out and fight for our nation, and may Heaven's aid be with you.' ⁴He then selected twenty thousand of the country's fighting men and cavalry, and these marched against Cendebaeus, spending the night at Modein. ⁵Making an early start, they marched into the plain, to find a large army opposing them, both infantry and cavalry; there was, however, a stream-bed in between. ⁶John drew up facing them, he and his army and, seeing that the men were afraid to cross the stream-bed, crossed over first himself. When his men saw this, they too crossed after him. ⁷He divided his army into two, with the cavalry in the centre and the infantry on either flank, as the opposing cavalry was very numerous. ⁸The trumpets rang out; Cendebaeus and his army were put to flight, many of them falling mortally wounded and the rest of them fleeing to the fortress. ⁹Then it was that Judas, John's brother, was wounded, but John pursued them until Cendebaeus reached Kedron, which he had rebuilt. ¹⁰Their flight took them as far as the towers in the countryside of Azotus, and John burnt these down. The enemy losses amounted to ten thousand men; John returned safely to Judaea.

The murder of Simon. (1Mace.16.11-23)

¹¹Ptolemy son of Abubos had been appointed general in command of the Plain of Jericho; he owned a great deal of silver and gold, ¹²and was the high priest's son-in-law. ¹³His ambition was fired; he hoped to make himself master of the whole country and therefore treacherously began to plot the destruction of Simon and his sons. ¹⁴Simon, who was inspecting the towns up and down the country and attending to their administration, had come down to Jericho with his sons Mattathias and Judas, in the year 172, in the eleventh month, the month of Shebat. ¹⁵The son of Abubos lured them into a small fortress called Dok, which he had built, where he offered them a great banquet, having previously hidden men in the place. ¹⁶When Simon and his sons were drunk, Ptolemy and his men reached for their weapons, rushed on Simon in the banqueting hall and killed him with his two sons and some of his servants. ¹⁷He thus committed a great act of treachery and rendered evil for good. ¹⁸Ptolemy wrote a report of the affair and sent it to the king, in the expectation of being sent reinforcements and of having the cities and the province made over to him. ¹⁹He also sent people to Gezer to murder John, and sent written orders to the military commanders to come to him so that he could give them silver, gold and presents; ²⁰and he also sent others to seize control of Jerusalem and the Temple mount. ²¹But someone had been too quick for him and had already informed John in Gezer that his father and brothers had perished, adding, 'He is sending someone to kill you too!' ²²Overcome as John was by the news, he arrested the men who had come to kill him and put them to death, being forewarned of their murderous design. ²³The rest of John's acts, the battles he fought and the exploits he performed, the city walls he built, and all his other achievements, ²⁴from the day he succeeded his father as high priest, are recorded in the annals of his pontificate.