point of interest and value, must be placed the First Book of Maccabees. Written within fifty years of the events which it records, at a time, it must be remembered, that was singularly barren of historical literature, it is a careful, sober, and consistent narrative. It is our principal, not unfrequently our sole, authority for the incidents of a very important period, a period that was in the highest degree critical in the history of the Jewish nation and of the world which that nation has so largely influenced. It is commonly said that the great visitation of the Captivity finally destroyed in the Hebrew mind the tendency to idolatry. But the denunciations of Ezekiel prove to us that the exiles carried into the land of their captivity the evil which they had cherished in the land of their birth, and it is no less certain that they brought it back with them on their return. It grew to its height in the early part of the Second Century B.C., along with the increasing influence of Greek civilization in Western Asia. The feeble Jewish Commonwealth was more and more dominated by the powerful kingdoms which had been established on the ruins of the empire of Alexander, and the national religion was attacked by an enemy at least as dangerous as the Phœnician Baal-worship had been in earlier days, an enemy which may be briefly described by the word Hellenism. The story of how Judas and his brothers led the movement which rescued the Jewish faith from this peril is the story which we have endeavoured to tell in this volume. Our plan has been to follow strictly the lines of the First Book of Maccabees, going to the Second, a far less trustworthy document, only for some picturesque incidents. The subsidiary characters are fictitious, but the narrative is, we believe, apart from casual errors, historically correct. We have to acknowledge special obligations to Captain Conder’s “Judas Maccabæus,” a volume of the series entitled “The New Plutarch.” We also owe much to Canon Rawlinson’s notes in the “Speaker’s Commentary on the Bible,” to Canon Westcott’s articles in the “Dictionary of the Bible,” and to Dean Stanley’s “Lectures on the Jewish Church.” If any reader should be curious as to the literary partnership announced on the title-page—a partnership that has grown, so to speak, out of another of many years’ standing, shared by the writers as author and publisher—he may be informed that the plan of the story and a detailed outline of it have been contributed by Richmond Seeley, and the story itself written for the most part by Alfred Church. LONDON, _Sept. 3, 1889._ CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE I. A NEW ORDER OF THINGS 1 II. ANTIOCHUS 19 III. MENELAÜS 37 IV. AT ANTIOCH 49 V. THE WRATH TO COME 68 VI. THE EVIL DAYS 79 VII. THE DARKNESS THICKENS 90 VIII. SHALLUM THE WINE-SELLER 101 IX. THE PERSECUTION 113 X. IN THE MOUNTAINS 124 XI. NEWS BAD AND GOOD 135 XII. THE PATRIOT ARMY 148 XIII. GUERILLA WARFARE IN THE MOUNTAINS 159 XIV. THE BURIAL OF MATTATHIAS 171 XV. THE SWORD OF APOLLONIUS 184 XVI. NEWS FROM THE BATTLE-FIELD 193 XVII. THE BATTLE OF EMMAUS 208 XVIII. THE BATTLE OF BETH-ZUR 225 XIX. IN JERUSALEM 235 XX. THE CLEANSING OF THE TEMPLE 242 XXI. THE DEDICATION OF THE TEMPLE 254 XXII. WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS 263 XXIII. MORE VICTORIES 274 XXIV. THE SABBATICAL YEAR 284 XXV. REVERSES 294 XXVI. LIGHT OUT OF DARKNESS 304 XXVII. A PEACEFUL INTERVAL 314 XXVIII. HOPES AND FEARS 323 XXIX. CIVIL WAR 331 XXX....