without the support of Bacchides and was forced to retire to Antioch. In response to his complaints Nicanor was appointed governor of Judaea with power to treat with Judas. It appears that the two became friends at first, but fresh orders from Antioch made Nicanor guilty of treachery in the eyes of Judas’s partisans. Warned by the change of his friend’s manner Judas fled. Nicanor threatened to destroy the Temple if the priests would not deliver Judas into his hands. Soon it came to his knowledge that Judas was in Samaria, whither he followed him on a sabbath with Jews pressed into his service. The day was known afterwards as Nicanor’s day, for he was found dead on the field (Capharsalama) by the victorious followers of Judas (13th of Adar, March 161 B.C.). After this victory Judas made an alliance with the people of Rome, who had no love for Demetrius his enemy, nor any intention of putting their professions of friendship into practice. Bacchides and Alcimus returned meanwhile into the land of Judah; at Elasa “Judas fell and the rest fled” (1 Macc. ix. 18). Bacchides occupied Judaea and made a chain of forts. Jonathan, who succeeded his brother Judas, was captain of a band of fugitive outlaws. But on the death of Alcimus Bacchides retired and Jonathan with his followers settled down beyond the range of the Syrian garrisons. The Hellenizers still enjoyed the royal favour and Jonathan made no attempt to dispossess them. After an interval of two years they tried to capture him and failed. This failure seems to have convinced Bacchides that it would be well to recognize Jonathan and to secure a balance of parties. In 158 Jonathan began to rule as a judge in Michmash and he destroyed the godless out of Israel—so far, that is, as his power extended. In 153 Alexander Balas withdrew Jonathan from his allegiance to Demetrius by the offer of the high-priesthood. He had already made Jerusalem his capital and fortified the Temple mount: the Syrian garrisons had already been withdrawn with the exception of those of the Akra and Bethzur. In 147 Jonathan repaid his benefactor by destroying the army of the governor of Coele-Syria, who had espoused the cause of Demetrius. The fugitives took sanctuary in the temple of Dagon at Azotus. “But Jonathan burned the temple of Dagon and those who fled into it.” After the death of Balas he laid siege to the Akra; and “the apostates, who hated their own nation,” appealed to Demetrius. Jonathan was summoned to Antioch, made his peace and apparently relinquished his attempt in return for the addition of three Samaritan districts to his territory. Later, when the people of Antioch rose against the king, Jonathan despatched a force of 3000 men who played a notable part in the merciless suppression of the insurrection. 1 Maccabees credits them with 100,000 victims. Trypho, the regent of Antiochus VI., put even greater political power into the hands of Jonathan and his brother Simon, but finally seized Jonathan on the pretext of a conference. Simon was thus left to consolidate what had been won in Palestine for the Jews and the family whose head he had become. The weakness of the king enabled him to demand and to secure immunity from taxation. The Jewish aristocracy became peers of the Seleucid kingdom. Simon was declared high priest: Rome and Sparta rejoiced in the elevation of their friend and ally. In the hundred and seventieth year (142 B.C.) the yoke of the heathen was taken away from Israel and the people began to date their legal documents “in the first year of Simon the great high priest and commander and leader of the Jews.” The popular verdict received official and formal sanction. Simon was declared by the Jews and the priests their governor and high priest for ever, until there should arise a faithful prophet. The garrison of the Akra had been starved by a close blockade into submission, and beyond the boundaries of Judaea “he took Joppa for a haven and made himself master of Gazara and Bethsura.”
29. John Hyrcanus and the Sadducees.—But in 138 B.C. Antiochus Sidetes entered Seleucia and required the submission of all the petty states, which had taken advantage of the weakness of preceding kings. From Simon he demanded an indemnity of 1000 talents for his oppression and invasion of non-Jewish territory: Simon offered 100 talents. At length Antiochus appeared to enforce his demand in 134. Simon was dead (135 B.C.) and John Hyrcanus had succeeded his father. The Jewish forces were driven back upon Jerusalem and the city was closely invested. At the feast of tabernacles of 132 Hyrcanus requested and Antiochus granted a week’s truce. The only hope of the Jews lay in the clemency of their victorious suzerain, and it did not fail them. Some of his advisers urged the demolition of the nation on the ground of their exclusiveness, but he sent a sacrifice and won thereby the name of “Pious.” In subsequent negotiations he accepted the disarmament of the besieged and a tribute as conditions of peace, and in response to their entreaty left Jerusalem without a garrison. When he went on his last disastrous campaign, Hyrcanus led a Jewish contingent to join his army, partly perhaps a troop of mercenaries (for Hyrcanus was the first of the Jewish kings to hire mercenaries, with the treasure found in David’s tomb). After his death Hyrcanus took advantage of the general confusion to extend Jewish territory with the countenance of Rome. He destroyed the temple of Gerizim and compelled the Idumaeans to submit to circumcision and embrace the laws of the Jews on pain of deportation.
In Jerusalem and in the country, in Alexandria, Egypt and Cyprus, the Jews were prosperous (Jos. Ant. xiii. 284). This prosperity and the apparent security of Judaism led to a breach between Hyrcanus and his spiritual directors, the Pharisees. His lineage was (in the opinion of one of them at least) of doubtful purity; and so it was his duty to lay down the high-priesthood and be content to rule the nation. That one man should hold both offices was indeed against the example of Moses, and could only be admitted as a temporary concession to necessity. Hyrcanus could not entertain the proposal that he should resign the sacred office to which he owed much of his authority. The allegation about his mother was false: the Pharisee who retailed it was guilty of no small offence. A Sadducean friend advised Hyrcanus to ask the whole body of the Pharisees to prescribe the penalty. Their leniency, which was notorious, alienated the king or probably furnished him with a pretext for breaking with them. The Pharisees were troublesome counsellors and doubtful allies for an ambitious prince. They were all-powerful with the people, but Hyrcanus with his mercenaries was independent of the people, and the wealthy belonged to the sect of the Sadducees. The suppression of the Pharisaic ordinances and the punishment of those who observed them led to some disturbance. But Hyrcanus “was judged worthy of the three great privileges, the rule of the nation, the high-priestly dignity, and prophecy.” This verdict suggests that the Sadducees, with whom he allied himself, had learned to affect some show of Judaism in Judaea. If the poor were ardent nationalists who would not intermingle with the Greeks, the rich had long outgrown and now could humour such prejudices; and the title of their party was capable of recalling at any rate the sound of the national ideal of righteousness, i.e. Sadaqah.
The successor of Hyrcanus (d. 105) was Judas Aristobulus, “the friend of the Greeks,” who first assumed the title of king. According to Strabo he was a courteous man and in many ways useful to the Jews. His great achievement was the conquest of a part of Ituraea, which he added to Judaea and whose inhabitants he compelled to accept Judaism.
The Sadducean nobility continued in power under his brother and successor Alexander Jannaeus (103–78); and the breach between the king and the mass of the people widened. But Salome Alexandra, his brother’s widow, who released him from prison on the death of her husband and married him, was connected with the Pharisees through her brother Simon ben Shetach. If his influence or theirs dictated her policy, there is no evidence of any objection to the union of the secular power with the high-priesthood. The party may have thought that Jannaeus was likely to bring the dynasty to an end. His first action was to besiege Ptolemais. Its citizens appealed to Ptolemy Lathyrus, who had been driven from the throne of Egypt by his mother Cleopatra and was reigning in Cyprus. Alexander raised the siege, made peace with Ptolemy and secretly sent to Cleopatra
