Anakalypsis / Unveiling the Word
← →
⚙ Annotations & References ▾
Empires 1 ▾
Seleucid Empire c. 312-63 BC 32
Manuscript witnesses 2 ▾
Codex Sinaiticus Aleph c. AD 330-360 Codex Vaticanus B c. AD 300-325
What is 1 Maccabees 3 about?

With Mattathias buried, his son Judas Maccabeus takes up the leadership, and a song opens the chapter praising him as a lion in his exploits. Judas defeats and kills Apollonius, then routs Seron and the Syrian force at the ascent of Beth-horon, so that dread of him spreads among the nations. Antiochus, enraged and short of funds, departs for Persia to gather tribute and leaves Lysias as regent, who dispatches Ptolemy, Nicanor, and Gorgias with a great army and slave traders expecting to sell captive Jews. Judas gathers the people at Mizpah to fast, pray, and read the law, then orders them for battle, and the chapter shows the revolt maturing from local defense into open war for survival.

Historical backdrop

Alexander's empire had shattered into the kingdoms of his generals, and Judea lay under the Seleucids who ruled the East from Antioch. When Antiochus the Fourth outlawed the Law, forced Greek ways on Jerusalem, and raised an altar to Zeus on the altar of the LORD, a priest's family in the hills rose in revolt. The war that followed pitted farmers and their sons against the Seleucid phalanx and its armored war elephants, and it ended with the temple cleansed and rededicated, a rising Jewish state, and envoys sent to a distant new power named Rome. This is the world between the Testaments, the fight that set the stage on which the Gospels open.

The Church Fathers on 1 Maccabees 3
Deuterocanon (Catholic & Orthodox) · Accepted as canonical Scripture by the Catholic and Orthodox traditions and included in the original 1611 KJV (between the Old and New Testaments). Not in the Protestant 66-book canon. Read with the same care you bring to other Scripture, conscious that Protestants and Catholics weigh its authority differently.

1 Maccabees 3

1 Maccabees Chapter 3
3
← Chapter 2 Chapter 4 →
What is 1 Maccabees 3 about?

With Mattathias buried, his son Judas Maccabeus takes up the leadership, and a song opens the chapter praising him as a lion in his exploits. Judas defeats and kills Apollonius, then routs Seron and the Syrian force at the ascent of Beth-horon, so that dread of him spreads among the nations. Antiochus, enraged and short of funds, departs for Persia to gather tribute and leaves Lysias as regent, who dispatches Ptolemy, Nicanor, and Gorgias with a great army and slave traders expecting to sell captive Jews. Judas gathers the people at Mizpah to fast, pray, and read the law, then orders them for battle, and the chapter shows the revolt maturing from local defense into open war for survival.