Anakalypsis / Unveiling the Word
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Manuscript witnesses 2 ▾
Codex Sinaiticus Aleph c. AD 330-360 Codex Vaticanus B c. AD 300-325
What is 1 Maccabees 5 about?

The victories at Jerusalem provoke the surrounding peoples, who turn in fury against the Jews living among them in Idumea, Gilead, and Galilee. Judas and Jonathan march to rescue the Jews of Gilead and defeat Timothy, while Simon delivers those in Galilee and brings them home with rejoicing. When Joseph and Azariah, left in charge, disregard their orders and attack Jamnia out of ambition, they are defeated, for they were not of the family through whom deliverance had been given. The chapter shows the brothers guarding scattered Israel on every side, and it warns that the victories belonged not to any man's glory but to the appointed deliverers under Heaven.

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 5

1 Maccabees 5

1 Maccabees Chapter 5
5
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What is 1 Maccabees 5 about?

The victories at Jerusalem provoke the surrounding peoples, who turn in fury against the Jews living among them in Idumea, Gilead, and Galilee. Judas and Jonathan march to rescue the Jews of Gilead and defeat Timothy, while Simon delivers those in Galilee and brings them home with rejoicing. When Joseph and Azariah, left in charge, disregard their orders and attack Jamnia out of ambition, they are defeated, for they were not of the family through whom deliverance had been given. The chapter shows the brothers guarding scattered Israel on every side, and it warns that the victories belonged not to any man's glory but to the appointed deliverers under Heaven.