Commentaria in II Machabaeorum
4. MAY HE OPEN YOUR HEART IN HIS LAW.—That is, may God by his grace enlighten and inflame you with heavenly light, that you may fully know his law, and having known it, fulfil it; but especially that you may return from your temple at Heliopolis, your own high priest, and the sacrifices there forbidden by God, to Jerusalem and our temple and the high priest Jonathan. For God had forbidden sacrifice to be offered to him anywhere but in the temple at Jerusalem, Deuteronomy AND SEND YOU PEACE.—Both from wars, and rather from the division of the temple and schism, that you may unite with us into one synagogue, and assemble with us at one temple, and there celebrate the feast of Tabernacles, as follows.
7. WHEN DEMETRIUS REIGNED (called the younger, Nicanor, son of Demetrius Soter), IN THE YEAR ONE HUNDRED SIXTY-NINE—of the Greeks; for this was the third year of the reign of Demetrius, who after three years, that is in the year 172 of the Greeks, was taken by Arsaces king of the Parthians, as was said in 1 Maccabees 14, verses 1 and 3.
AFTER JASON WITHDREW HIMSELF—of whom in chapter 4, verse 7.
Jason, Antiochus through his guards burned the gates of Jerusalem and of the temple and of the remaining cities of Judah. BUT WE PRAYED TO THE LORD, AND WERE HEARD (that by the valour of Judas Maccabeus the profaned temple might be purified and newly dedicated, in which, now newly dedicated) WE OFFERED SACRIFICE (and restored the rest to its former state, namely) WE LIGHTED THE LAMPS (seven on the golden seven-branched candlestick) AND SET FORTH THE LOAVES, 12—according to the 12 tribes of Israel, on the table of the loaves of proposition.
9. AND (that is, therefore) NOW CELEBRATE (and by celebrating, keep) THE DAYS OF THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES—that is, the feast of the Dedication, instituted by Judas Maccabeus in memory of the purification and new dedication of the temple made by him, and that on the 25th day of the month Casleu, which corresponds to our November. Note that the feast of Tabernacles was properly the feast of Tents, which was celebrated for eight days in the month Tisri, that is in September; but here by catachresis they call the feast of the Dedication the feast of Tabernacles, because it was similar: for both were celebrated with great rejoicing of the whole people, with branches, thyrsi, trumpets and drums, for eight days, as is clear from 1 Maccabees 4:54 and 2 Maccabees 10:6, where it is said that the feast of the Dedication was instituted and celebrated “in the manner of the feast of Tabernacles”; whence it is called “the Feast of Tabernacles of Casleu,” not of Tisri. They exhort, therefore, that the Jews in Egypt celebrate the feast of the Dedication by carrying green branches, by the sounding of trumpets, and similar signs of joy, but not by offering victims to God in the temple at Heliopolis: for this was forbidden by the law of God. Thus the Maccabees, fugitives in the mountains, celebrated the Feast of Tabernacles with thyrsi without sacrifices, as is clear from chapter 10, verse 6.
10. IN THE YEAR 188 (of the Greeks), THE PEOPLE THAT IS AT JERUSALEM AND IN JUDEA, AND THE SENATE, AND JUDAS.—This Judas, says Rupert, Book X De victoria verbi Dei, chapter 15, Serarius, Salianus, Mariana and others, seems to be the author of this later letter, and therefore of this whole second book of Maccabees, namely Judas the Essene, who, as Josephus says, Book XIII, chapter 19, was at this time held in great esteem by all for the gift of great prophecy, and after 20 years foretold the death of Antigonus, son of John Hyrcanus, which also followed shortly after. And Josephus adds that his predictions never failed, but always actually came to pass.
Sanchez, however, thinks this Judas was the son of John Hyrcanus, the leader and high priest, who at this time had succeeded his father, and was leader and high priest of Israel, according to Josephus, Book XX of the Antiquities, chapter 6. Where he adds that this Judas was called by another name Aristobulus, and reigned for only one year; so that, dying without a son, he left the kingdom and the priesthood to his brother Alexander, who by another name was called Jannaeus. But against this stands the fact that this Judas or Aristobulus was the first to put a diadem on himself, and to name himself king of Judea, and starved his own mother to death in chains: and killed his brother Antigonus, already mentioned; and kept the remaining brothers in chains as long as he lived, according to Josephus, Book XIII of the Antiquities, chapters 19 and 20; all of which seem unworthy of a sacred writer. Add that this Aristobulus reigned not in the year 188, as is said here, but 209 of the Greeks, as Salianus and others show. Wherefore in this year 188 the father of Aristobulus, John Hyrcanus, still ruled Israel, and so it was his task rather than that of his son Aristobulus to write this letter. Lastly Bellarmine, Book I De Verbo Dei, chapter 15, thinks this Judas is Judas Maccabeus. But he had already fallen in battle 36 years before.
Moreover, here begins the later letter, and this is its title. For Rupert, Book X, chapter 15, the Gloss, Lyranus, Bellarmine, Melchior Canus, Book II De Locis, chapter 11, and Medina, Book VI De Fide, chapter 13, hold that two letters are joined here. But it seems truer that there is not two but only one letter, written in the year 188 of the Greeks, in which, however, they repeat and renew the letter written by themselves in the year 169 of the Greeks, as if to say: In that year we wrote this, but in this year we write to you what follows: but for that purpose they repeat the salutation, with the addition of the proper names of those who send the letter and of those to whom it is sent, which had been omitted at the beginning. So Salianus and Sanchez.
TO ARISTOBULUS, PRECEPTOR OF KING PTOLEMEE, WHO IS OF THE STOCK OF THE ANOINTED (that is, anointed with holy oil) PRIESTS.—This Aristobulus, says Rabanus, was a Jew by nation, but is known to have been a Peripatetic philosopher, who wrote to Ptolemy Philometor commentaries of explanations on Moses, as the chronographers report. So Rabanus. But he means Eusebius, whose words these are in the Chronicle at the beginning of the reign of Philometor: “Aristobulus,” he says, “whom the second book of Maccabees mentions at the beginning, and who, it is agreed among philosophers, was skilled in Aristotelian learning: in the book which he wrote to Ptolemy he declares that the hands and the other members, when they are spoken of God, are to be understood in a like manner, etc.” Clement of Alexandria says the same, Stromata Book V. Eusebius adds that he came from Paneas, where the Jordan has its source. “He seems,” says Salianus, “to have obtained the name of the king’s preceptor either from that book he wrote, in which he taught king Philometor, or because he taught him concerning the matters of the Mosaic law, which he then included in that book.” Others, however, think that he was the preceptor of Ptolemy Lathyrus, who was the son of Ptolemy Physcon: for the words seem to sound so. For, as Rupert says in the place cited: “The kings of Egypt, from the times of Ptolemy Philadelphus (who had the law interpreted for himself by the 72) had been accustomed to have Jews as preceptors.” Where note: Physcon was the younger brother of Philometor; whence, when the latter died childless, he succeeded him in the kingdom, and he was reigning at this time: whence he seems to have given the Jewish priest Aristobulus as preceptor to his son Lathyrus.
11. WE GIVE HIM GREAT THANKS, FORASMUCH AS WE HAVE BEEN IN WAR WITH SUCH A KING,—who afterwards was slain in Persia by the priests of the goddess Nanea, as follows.
You will ask who this king was. First, some think he was Antiochus the Great, who was the father of Antiochus Epiphanes, and who, fighting with Hannibal against the Romans, was defeated by Scipio, who thence received the surname Asiaticus. But this Antiochus had died 58 years before, namely in the year 124 of the Greeks. Add: he was not an enemy of the Jews but a friend, as Josephus testifies, Book XII, chapter 3.
Secondly, others take him to be Antiochus Epiphanes, who was the bitterest enemy of the Jews and the temple. So Tornielli, Bellarmine in the place cited, and Pereira, Book IX on Daniel. But Epiphanes was not slain in the temple of Nanea, as is said here, but expired struck by God, as we shall hear in chapter 9. Emmanuel Sa replies that this letter has not the authority of Sacred Scripture, as neither have the other letters of the Spartans, Romans and others cited in these books, and so can be mistaken and err, but that Sacred Scripture only relates that they wrote so. But this is hard to say. For so the same could be said of this whole book, which is a letter of Judas and the people of Jerusalem to the Egyptian Jews: which be far from us.