CHAPTER XXIX

NEW OPPRESSORS AND NEW WARS FOR FREEDOM

After the death of Alexander the Great his empire was broken into fragments ruled by those of his generals who were able to snatch these smaller kingdoms for themselves.  One of them named Ptolemy seized Egypt.  His descendants, known as the Ptolemies, reigned there for centuries.  Another, named Seleucus, gained control of the greater part of the old Persian empire.  He built the city of Antioch, in northern Syria, naming it after his father Antiochus.  His descendants, on the throne of the new kingdom, are known in history as the Seleucids.

THE JEWS UNDER GREEK RULERS

Canaan at first became part of the kingdom of the Ptolemies, and this continued for about a century.  During this period the Jews seemed to have been treated with a fair degree of kindness and justice.  At least they were left most of the time in peace.  But about B.C. 200, Canaan was taken from the Ptolemies by the Seleucids, and this turned out to be for the Jewish people an unhappy change.  In the year 175 B.C., there came to the throne in Antioch a young prince named Antiochus Epiphanes who, like Alexander the Great, thought of himself as a kind of missionary for Greek art and civilization.  He became more and more angry because so many of the Jews refused to worship Greek gods.  About B.C. 170, he issued a decree that all persons in his dominion must offer sacrifices to Zeus.  When the Jews refused they were put to death.

=New persecutions.=—­A terrible persecution was thus begun.  A Greek officer would come into a Jewish town or village, set up an altar to Zeus, and summon all the people to join in the sacrifice of worship.  As many as possible of those who refused were hunted down and killed.  All copies of the Jewish law that could be found were burned.  Every month a search was made throughout Judaea to see whether any Jew still had copies of the Scriptures.  A heathen altar was set up in the temple at Jerusalem and swine were sacrificed upon it.  To the Jews, who were taught to regard swine’s flesh as unclean and unholy, nothing could have seemed more horrible.

Of course there were some traitors and renegades.  But the great majority of the Jewish people were nobly true to the faith of their fathers.  Hundreds and thousands, young and old, allowed themselves to be tortured and slain rather than take part in a heathen sacrifice.  Many even of those who had fallen in with some of the evil customs of the Greeks now refused to be known as anything else than faithful Jews, even though it might cost them their lives.

THE MACCABEAN REVOLTS AND VICTORIES