Brenton's Septuagint · Under the Greeks
3 Maccabees 4
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1Wherever this was received, the people kept up a revelry of joy and shouting; as if their long-pent-up, hardened hatred, were now to shew itself openly. 2The suffered great throes of sorrow, and wept much; while their , all things around being lamentable, were set on as they bewailed the sudden which was decreed against them. 3What home, or city, or place at all inhabited, or what streets were there, which their condition did not fill with and ? 4They were sent out unanimously by the generals in the several cities, with such stern and pitiless feeling, that the exceptional nature of the infliction moved even some of their . These, influenced by sentiments of common humanity, and reflecting upon the uncertain issue of life, shed tears at this their miserable expulsion. 5A multitude of aged hoary-haired men, were driven along with halting bending feet, urged onward by the impulse of a , shameless force to quick speed. 6Girls who had entered the bridal chamber quite lately, to enjoy the partnership of marriage, exchanged pleasure for misery; and with scattered upon their myrrh- heads, were hurried along , and, in the midst of outlandish insults, set up with one accord a lamentable cry in lieu of the marriage hymn. 7Bound, and exposed to public gaze, they were hurried violently on board ship. 8The husbands of these, in the prime of their youthful vigour, instead of wore halters round their necks; instead of feasting and youthful jollity, spent the rest of their nuptial days in wailings, and saw only the at hand. 9They were dragged along by unyielding chains, like wild : of these, some had their necks thrust into the benches of the rowers; while the feet of others were enclosed in hard fetters. 10The planks of the deck above them barred out , and shut out the day on every side, so that they might be treated like traitors during the whole voyage. 11They were conveyed accordingly in this , and at the end of it arrived at Schedia. The king had ordered them to be cast into the vast hippodrome, which was built in front of the city. This place was well adapted by its situation to expose them to the gaze of all comers into the city, and of those who went from the city into the country. Thus they could hold no communication with his forces; nay, were deemed unworthy of any civilized accommodation. 12When this was done, the king, hearing that their brethren in the city often went out and the melancholy distress of these victims, 13was full of rage, and commanded that they should be carefully subjected to the same (and not one whit milder) treatment. 14The whole nation was now to be registered. Every individual was to be specified by name; not for that hard servitude of labour which we have a little before mentioned, but that he might expose them to the before-mentioned tortures; and finally, in the short space of a day, might extirpate them by his cruelties. 15The registering of these men was carried on cruelly, zealously, assiduously, from the rising of the sun to its going down, and was not brought to an end in forty days. 16The king was filled with great and constant joy, and celebrated banquets before idols. His erring , far from the truth, and his profane , gave to idols, deaf and incapable of speaking or aiding, and uttered unworthy speech against the Greatest . 17At the end of the above-mentioned interval of time, the registrars brought word to the king that of the was too great for registration, 18inasmuch as there were many still left in the land, of whom some were in inhabited houses, and others were scattered about in various places; so that all the commanders in were insufficient for the work. 19The king threatened them, and charged them with taking bribes, in order to contrive the escape of the []: but was clearly convinced of the truth of what had been said. 20They said, and proved, that paper and pens had failed them for the carrying out of their purpose. 21Now this was the active interference of the unconquerable Providence which assisted the from .
Sir Lancelot Brenton's 1851 English translation of the Greek Old Testament, public domain. Used here for books received in Orthodox canons that the other editions do not carry. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Under the Greeks, 332 BC to 63 BC ›
Alexander's conquest and the kingdoms of his successors. Greek language and custom press in everywhere, and the crisis under Antiochus IV provokes the Maccabean revolt.
- The successors
- Alexander dies at thirty-two and his generals carve up the empire. Judea sits on the border between the Ptolemies in Egypt and the Seleucids in Syria, and is fought over by both for a century and a half, which is the ordinary condition of the corridor.
- Hellenism
- Not just conquest but a culture: the gymnasium, the theatre, Greek names, Greek dress, Greek as the language of anyone with ambitions. Some Jews embraced it, some resisted it, and the argument between them is the real subject of the Maccabean books. In Alexandria the Hebrew scriptures are translated into Greek, producing the Septuagint, which is the Bible most New Testament writers quote.
- The crisis
- Antiochus IV bans the practice of Judaism, plunders the temple, and sets up a pagan altar in it in 167 BC. The revolt under the Maccabees wins, the temple is rededicated in 164 BC, which is the origin of Hanukkah, and Judea has about eighty years of independence under the Hasmoneans before Rome arrives.
- Further afield
- Rome fights Carthage three times and ends up master of the Mediterranean. Euclid writes the Elements and Archimedes does his work at Syracuse. In China the Qin unify the country in 221 BC and the Han follow, opening what becomes the Silk Road.