Commentaria in II Machabaeorum
WE THOUGHT IT NECESSARY TO SIGNIFY IT TO YOU, THAT YOU ALSO MAY KEEP THE DAY OF THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES (that is, the feast of the Dedication, like the feast of Tabernacles, as I said at verse 9), AND THE DAY OF THE FIRE.—For on the same day, the 25th of Casleu, when in the Dedication already mentioned they offered sacrifices, fire was sent by God from heaven upon them to burn them, and therefore the feast of the fire given was instituted, which was celebrated on the same 25th of Casleu, or certainly on the next day (that the feast of the fire might have its own proper day): the history of which matter is related at length in what follows.
19. FOR WHEN OUR FATHERS WERE LED INTO PERSIA (that is, into Chaldea or Babylon, by Nabuchodonosor).—Chaldea is here called Persia, both because many Jews led away into Chaldea were scattered through Persia, Media and other regions subject to the Chaldeans; and because in the time of Nehemias, when the fire was given, the monarchy of the Chaldeans had been transferred to the Persians; for then Artaxerxes, king of the Persians, ruled both the Chaldeans and the Persians: wherefore all the regions then subject to the Persians, among which was Chaldea, are called Persia, as Serarius proves from St. Chrysostom, Lucan and others.
THE FIRE FROM THE ALTAR THEY PRIVATELY HID IN A VALLEY WHERE THERE WAS A DEEP PIT WITHOUT WATER,—that is, they hid the fire in a pit which was in the valley. This fire, as is clear from Leviticus 9:24, was first given by God to Aaron when he first offered sacrifice on the altar made by Moses: for it was burnt up with this heavenly fire, that God might approve it and show it pleasing to himself: whence also he commanded that this fire, with wood and fuel added, should always be kept thereafter, so that the sacrifices of their posterity should be burnt to God only with this divine fire, and Nadab and Abiu were struck down because they had offered incense with profane fire. When the city, altar and temple were destroyed by the Chaldeans, the priests carried out this fire lest it perish, and hid it in the valley and pit already mentioned, hoping that God would revive this fire after their return from Babylon. So Rupert, Book X De victoria verbi Dei, chapter 18: “The dying fire,” he says, “which could not be fed, which had nowhere to be fed, they committed to him to be revived, in whom is the hope of the resurrection of the dead, nor did their hope deceive them. How?” because God here, through Nehemias, fulfilled their hope. In a similar way St. Ambrose, Book I De Officiis, chapter 14, praises the faith, hope and piety of these priests: “They had no zeal,” he says, “to bury gold, to hide silver, to keep for their posterity, but, in their last extremity, having a care for honour, they thought the sacred fire should be preserved: lest either impurity should contaminate it, or the blood of the dead extinguish it, or a heap of shapeless ruins destroy it. They went therefore into Persia, free in religion alone, since that alone could not be wrested from them by captivity. But after a very long time, when it pleased God, he gave this mind to the king of the Persians, to order the temple to be restored in Judea, and the lawful uses to be repaired at Jerusalem. In favour of which gift the king of the Persians sent the priest Nehemias. And he sent with him the grandsons of those priests, who, about to depart from their native soil, had hidden the sacred fire lest it perish.”
20. THAT NEHEMIAS BEING SENT BY THE KING OF PERSIA.—Nehemias was sent three times by the king of Persia into Judea: first, by Cyrus in the first year of his monarchy: for then Nehemias returned to Jerusalem from the Babylonian captivity with Zorobabel, Esdras and Jesus the high priest, and so was one of the chiefs and leaders of those returning, as is clear from 1 Esdras 2; secondly, by Artaxerxes Longimanus in the 20th year of his reign, Nehemias 2:4. Thirdly, he was sent by the same in the 32nd year of his reign, as is clear from Nehemias, last chapter, 6. The question therefore is, of which mission there is question here, and consequently when this sending of fire from heaven to Nehemias took place. Francis Ribera, Book V De Templo, chapter 17, probably takes this of the second mission; for this was the mission proper to Nehemias alone. Wherefore this happened in the 20th year of Artaxerxes at the feast of Tabernacles, which Nehemias first celebrated solemnly after his return from Persia, as is clear from Nehemias 8, and therefore at that feast, when he offered, according to the law, the appointed sacrifices, fire sent by God from heaven kindled and consumed the sacrifices. Wherefore, in memory of this benefit, the Jews thereafter kept the feast of the fire given at the very feast of Tabernacles, at which it had first been given, and for this reason it is said here at verse 9: “And now celebrate ye the days of the Feast of Tabernacles.”
But it is more probable that the fire was given by God a little after the first mission of Nehemias made by Cyrus, namely in the sixth year of Darius Hystaspes, on the third day of the month Adar, that is February. For then the building of the new temple was completed, and its solemn dedication was made with the offering of many victims. Therefore then the sacred fire was given from heaven by which the victims were to be burnt, according to Leviticus 6:12, where it is forbidden that victims be burnt with common and profane fire, and therefore the priests are commanded always to foster and keep the sacred fire sent from heaven, Leviticus 9. Otherwise the Hebrews for 70 years (for so many flowed from the sixth year of Darius, in which the temple was dedicated by sacrifices, to the 20th year of Artaxerxes, who sent Nehemias a second time into Judea) would have lacked sacred fire in the temple, and would have immolated all their victims with lay and profane fire, which God had forbidden by his law.
You will say: In the sixth year of Darius Nehemias was a young man, and more worthy than he were Zorobabel, Esdras and Jesus the high priest; wherefore this sending of fire should rather be ascribed to them than to Nehemias. I answer: all these were contemporaries of Nehemias, and therefore equal or nearly equal to him in age. But this is ascribed to Nehemias rather than to the others: first, because of the zeal for religion in which he excelled; secondly, because of his nobility and dignity: for he was one of the first leaders of the Jews returning from Babylon. Thirdly, because he was in great honour with Artaxerxes, being his cupbearer; whence he was made by him governor and prince of Judah, and rebuilt the walls and houses of Jerusalem, and imbued and established the city with the best laws, all of which is clear from the book of Nehemias.
You will say secondly: From what has been said it follows that the feast of the fire was celebrated on the third day of Adar, that is February, on which the fire was given, and not on the 25th of Casleu, as is said here. I answer that before Antiochus Epiphanes and Judas Maccabeus the feast of the fire was on the day on which it had been given, namely the third of Adar. But because Antiochus Epiphanes, profaning the temple, also extinguished or took away the sacred fire given from heaven, hence Judas Maccabeus, purifying the temple, and restoring the altar and victims on the 25th of Casleu, on the same day received this sacred fire again from God; and therefore on the same day, or certainly on the next, he ordained the feast of the fire given, or rather restored, to be celebrated as its proper feast. For Judas, the sacred fire being extinguished, could not sacrifice with profane fire: for this was forbidden by the law; wherefore it was necessary that God should restore this fire. This he did when, from the stones of the temple and altar once made fiery under Nehemias, this sacred fire again shone forth under Judas by God’s command, as is expressly asserted in chapter 10, verse 3, where it is said of Judas: “And having purified the temple, they made another altar, and taking fire out of the fiery stones (once under Nehemias), they offered sacrifices.” This happened at the purification and new dedication of the temple, which was made by Judas on the 25th of Casleu, as is said in the same place, verse 5. So Sanchez: Those stones, he says, I understand to be fiery which Nehemias sprinkled with the thick water, which they first drank in, then, by the fire which blazed from that water, were burnt; wherefore in these stones the seeds of the sacred fire seem to have been preserved for the future: for from them, in the time of Judas, the same flame shone forth. So also Serarius, Question 13. Whence Gorionides: “When,” he says, “they had arranged the wood, they did not find the holy fire; but they cried to the Lord, and fire came forth from the stone which was placed under the altar, and they added wood to it; that fire lasted until the third captivity,” which, namely, happened in the time of Vespasian. The Hebrews therefore err in saying that the sacred and heavenly fire was lacking in the second temple, which was built after the return from Babylon.
21. AND THE PRIEST NEHEMIAS COMMANDED THE SACRIFICES THAT WERE LAID ON TO BE SPRINKLED WITH THE SAME WATER,—and that twice, once for the victims to be burnt up, a second time for the stones to be set on fire, and to implant in them the power of kindling, of which at verses 31 and 32. So Sanchez.
22. THE TIME CAME THAT THE SUN SHONE OUT, WHICH BEFORE WAS IN A CLOUD, THERE WAS A GREAT FIRE KINDLED.—God seems here to have used the sun, and by its rays to have drawn thick vapours out of the thick water, and by continually striking them with its rays to have kindled them, and so to have produced fire, as there are produced in the air from vapours by the force of the sun comets, shooting stars, will-o’-the-wisps, halos, fiery dragons, etc.