Commentaria in II Machabaeorum
3. AND STRIKING FIRE OUT OF FLINT STONES THEY OFFERED SACRIFICES.—By “flint stones” Salian and Mariana understand flints and the like, from which, struck together, fire is easily knocked out onto tinder and, being caught, is kindled, as we do daily by nature. But the Greek is “fiery stones,” that is, stones taking fire, and receiving fire. But flints struck together do not burn, but only emit sparks of fire. Wherefore it seems truer that by the prayers of Judas and the priests fire called down from heaven set the stones aflame; and from them the priests received the fire by which the sacrifices were burned. For so Nehemias had done before Judas, and so God had ordained, Leviticus vi, 12, that the victims be burned with fire not common but heavenly and divine, and for this reason Judas instituted the feast of the fire given, or rather restored, by God, as we heard, chapter i, verse 19 and following. So Serarius, Sanchez and others. So also Gorionides, Book III, chapter xiii: “When they had laid the wood,” he says, “they did not find the holy fire, but cried to the Lord, and fire leaped out of the stone that lay under the altar, and they added wood to it. That fire lasted to the third captivity,” which was made by Titus and Vespasian, when the temple was burned.
AFTER TWO YEARS.—To be reckoned not from the profanation of the temple, as some will have it (for from that three years had passed), but from the rule of Judas, as I said in Book I, chapter iv, verse 54. So Serarius, Salian and others. It is strange that some learned men reckon this two years from the death of Antiochus; for Antiochus died after the purging of the temple and the sacrifice, as I said in the synopsis of the chapter.
6. AND THEY KEPT EIGHT DAYS WITH GLADNESS, IN THE MANNER OF THE FEAST OF THE TABERNACLES,—as if to say, they celebrated the feast of the Dedication for eight days with the same rite and applause with which, according to the law, they celebrate every year the feast of Tabernacles on the 15th day of the month Tisri, and that in thanksgiving, because God had restored them to the city of Jerusalem and to their houses, whereas shortly before, fleeing the persecution of Antiochus, they had lain hid in woods and mountains, and there had built themselves huts and tabernacles of branches of trees.
7. THEREFORE THEY NOW CARRIED BOUGHS.—Thyrsi were leaves and twigs, with which soldiers, victory won, clothed themselves and their spears and arms. Hence among the Gentiles the thyrsus was a pointed spear covered with ivy, which they brandished in the Orgies (sacred rites) of Bacchus; whence Bacchus is called thyrsus-bearer.
11. HE (Antiochus Eupator, son of Epiphanes), etc., APPOINTED OVER THE AFFAIRS OF THE KINGDOM (that is, appointed as his deputy and viceroy in the government, or, as the Greek has, Protarch) LYSIAS.
12. FOR PTOLEMEE, WHO WAS CALLED MACER.—The “for” implies that Ptolemee had administered the affairs of the kingdom before Lysias, but, falsely accused of treason before Eupator, had fallen from his rank. This Ptolemee seems to be the same who, chapter viii, verse 8, is called governor of Celesyria and Phenicia, and sent Nicanor against Judas and the Jews; but soon, seeing their innocence and that God fought for them, he began to favour and patronise the Jews; and therefore was accused before Eupator as a traitor, because he seemed to have gone over from him to the Jews, in that he defended their cause.
13. HE POISONED HIMSELF AND DIED.—In some Greek copies it is added that Ptolemee, from weakness of mind, of his own accord had recourse to poison, and drank it voluntarily, because he could not hear and bear the slander and infamy of treason cast upon him. For it is the mark not of a firm and great mind but of a weak and small one to be broken by men’s taunts, and therefore to kill oneself; for it is the brave man who bears all these things manfully and overcomes them with manly magnanimity, according to the saying of Martial:
He acts bravely who can be wretched and endure.
Holy Scripture narrates this misfortune of Ptolemee to signify that the Jews were bereft of so great a friend and patron, and therefore were entangled in new wars with Eupator.
14. NOW GORGIAS, etc., HIRED SOLDIERS.—“Foreigners” he calls soldiers levied from Thrace, Egypt, Africa and other foreign regions. Hence verse 24 calls them “armies of a foreign multitude.” For the natives were Asiatics and Syrians.
15. AND THE JEWS THAT HAD THE STRONGHOLDS NEAR, RECEIVED THOSE THAT WERE DRIVEN OUT OF JERUSALEM, AND ENDEAVOURED TO MAKE WAR,—as if to say, the Jews snatched some strongholds from Gorgias and the Antiochians, and admitted into them their fellow Jews who were being driven out of their homes at Jerusalem by the enemy: of whom many, flocking to Judas, increased his forces, so that he boldly attacked the Antiochians and happily overthrew them, as a little later he laid low twenty thousand of them. So Sanchez.
But instead of “Jews” we seem to have to read Idumeans, as the Greek codices read: for the strongholds of the Idumeans are so called in the following verse; for it means to signify two enemies of the Jews, namely Gorgias and the Idumeans. The sense, then, is this: The Idumeans, perpetual enemies of the Jews, occupied some strongholds of the Jews, into which they received Jewish apostates and deserters, namely those who fled to them from Jerusalem on account of apostasy and crimes, and with them “endeavoured to make war,” and bring war upon Jerusalem and the Jews. But Judas, having called upon God, burst with an armed hand into these strongholds of the Idumeans and slew twenty thousand, as follows. So Serarius, Salian and others.
17. TWENTY THOUSAND.—The Greek has nine thousand.
19. JOSEPH.—This is Joseph, brother of Judas, Jonathan and Simon, of whom chapter viii, verse 22.
20. BUT THEY THAT WERE WITH SIMON, LED BY COVETOUSNESS (avarice), etc., TAKING SEVENTY THOUSAND DIDRACHMAS (of silver, which, if Attic, make 5833 gold pieces; if Hebrew, twice as much), LET SOME (of the enemies shut up in the towers) ESCAPE.
21. AND WHEN MACCABEUS WAS TOLD WHAT WAS DONE, etc., HE ACCUSED THEM THAT THEY HAD SOLD THEIR BRETHREN FOR MONEY, BY LETTING THEIR ENEMIES ESCAPE.—For he betrays the safety of the citizens who lets go their enemies, taken or about to be taken; for those let go will again attack the citizens, spoil and kill them, especially that they may recover the ransom they paid for themselves.
28. AND AS SOON AS THE SUN WAS RISEN, THEY JOINED BATTLE (the fight): THE ONE PART (those who were with Judas) HAVING, TOGETHER WITH VIRTUE, THE LORD FOR A SURETY OF THEIR SUCCESS AND VICTORY.—For God put into Judas and his men, as they prayed, a sure hope of victory, which was increased by the virtue, that is, the probity, fortitude and nobility, of Judas and his companions, who were ready to fight to the death for the law and worship of God, and had resolved to leave the battle only as victors, but either to conquer or to fall. The Greek is: Having as a surety of victory and success, together with virtue, their refuge to the Lord; for these two, namely the invocation of God and their own virtue, and the generous effort of mind for fighting or accomplishing any other task, are the most efficacious remedies, which as it were pledge a sure victory and a happy issue from God.
THE OTHER (the enemies of the Jews under Timothy) MAKING THEIR RAGE (in Greek thymos, that is, spiritedness, anger, pride) THEIR LEADER IN BATTLE,—because, relying on the number of their soldiers, they despised the fewness of the Jews, and thought they would devour them like a morsel of bread; but God laid low their spiritedness and pride, and showed that victory depends not on number but on the favour of God, and is given by it.
29. THERE APPEARED TO THE ENEMIES FROM HEAVEN FIVE MEN ON HORSES, WITH BRIDLES OF GOLD, LEADING ON THE JEWS.
30. TWO OF WHOM TOOK MACCABEUS BETWEEN THEM, AND COVERING HIM ON EVERY SIDE WITH THEIR ARMOUR, KEPT HIM SAFE: BUT THEY SHOT ARROWS AND LIGHTNINGS AGAINST THE ENEMIES: SO THAT BEING CONFOUNDED WITH BLINDNESS, AND FULL OF TROUBLE, THEY FELL DOWN.—These five were Angels fighting for Judas and the faithful people by God’s command. So Angels fought for Theodosius against Eugenius, turning back upon the enemy’s own men the darts his soldiers had hurled, as Theodoret testifies, Book V, chapter xxiv. So for St. Wenceslaus, as his Life has it, fighting a duel with Radislaus, Duke of Curima, an Angel fought and struck the Duke, so that, prostrate, he begged pardon and life. So for Constantine the Great Angels fought, who, as Panegyric VI says, “flashed with I know not what dread from their gleaming shields, and the terrible light of heavenly arms blazed. For such they came that they might be believed to be thine. This was their talk, this they carried among those who heard: We seek Constantine, we go to Constantine’s aid.” Serarius here recounts more examples.
32. AND TIMOTHY FLED INTO GAZARA.—Gorionides thinks it is “Gaza,” but others with Serarius distinguish these two. See here the constant victories of Judas granted him by God, especially that in which he slew 20 thousand of Timothy’s men, as a little before he had slain twenty thousand Idumeans, and at last killed Timothy himself with Chereas and Apollophanes.
35. TWENTY YOUNG MEN, INFLAMED IN THEIR MINDS BECAUSE OF THE BLASPHEMY,—See here what the spirit and ardour of young men effects. See again how foolish and dangerous it is to provoke and inflame the spirits and angers of enemies by mocking and blaspheming.
So Alexander the Great, as Curtius relates near the end of Book VII, besieging a sheer rock which Arimazes the Sogdian held with thirty thousand armed men, and demanding that he surrender, was derided by him, and asked whether he could fly? Stung by this taunt, Alexander said: I will show that this very night the Macedonians can even fly; wherefore he inflamed three hundred young men with the greatest rewards and promises to climb the rock at night from behind by inaccessible places, while he himself attacked the rock in front, where the way lay open. The inflamed young men made their way onto the rock with the greatest labours, mindful of that saying of Alexander: “Nature has set nothing so high that virtue cannot climb it.” Wherefore Arimazes, struck with terror, surrendered himself with his kinsmen to Alexander, who ordered them all, after scourging, to be fixed to crosses at the very foot of the rock.
37. FOUND HIM HIDING IN A CERTAIN PLACE,—in Greek, a pit.