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. 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.
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". 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." 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. 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." Some scholars point to social and economic factors in the conflict. 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. According to 1 Maccabees, Antiochus banned many traditional Jewish and
Samaritan 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. 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. ==Revolt==