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Alexander I Theopator Euergetes, surnamed Balas, was the ruler of the Greek Seleucid kingdom in 150/Summer 152 – August 145 BC. Alexander defeated Demetrius I Soter for the crown in 150 BC. Ruling briefly, he lost the crown to Demetrius II Nicator during his defeat at the Battle of Antioch in Syria, dying shortly after. His reign marks the beginning of the disintegration of the Seleucid realm, with important eastern satrapies such as Media being lost to the nascent Parthian Empire.
The deuterocanonical books are books and passages considered by the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches and the Assyrian Church of the East to be canonical books of the Old Testament but which are considered non-canonical by Protestant denominations. They date from the period 300 BC–AD 100 approximately. While the New Testament never directly quotes from or names these books, the apostles most frequently used and quoted the Septuagint which contains them. Some say there is a correspondence of thought, and others see texts from these books being paraphrased, referred or alluded to many times in the New Testament, particularly in the Pauline epistles depending in large measure on what is counted as a reference.
The Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah were two related Israelite kingdoms from the Iron Age period of the ancient Southern Levant. After an emergent and large polity was suddenly formed based on the Gibeon-Gibeah plateau and destroyed by Shoshenq I in the first half of 10th century BCE, a return to small city-states was prevalent in the Southern Levant, but between 950 and 900 BCE another large polity emerged in the northern highlands with its capital eventually at Tirzah, that can be considered the precursor of the Kingdom of Israel. The Kingdom was consolidated as an important regional power by the first half of the 9th century BCE, before falling to the Neo-Assyrian Empire in 722 BCE.
The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint, is the earliest extant Koine Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible, various biblical apocrypha, and deuterocanonical books. The first five books of the Hebrew Bible, known as the Torah or the Pentateuch, were translated in the mid-3rd century BCE. The remaining books of the Greek Old Testament are presumably translations of the 2nd century BCE.
Demetrius II, called Nicator, was one of the sons of Demetrius I Soter. His mother may have been Laodice V, as was the case with his brother Antiochus VII Sidetes. Demetrius ruled the Seleucid Empire for two periods, separated by a number of years of captivity in Hyrcania in Parthia, first from September 145 BC to July/August 138 BC, and again from 129 BC until his death in 125 BC. His brother Antiochus VII ruled the Seleucid Empire in the interim between his two reigns.
Antiochus IV Epiphanes was a Hellenistic king of the Seleucid Empire from 175 BC until his death in 164 BC. He was a son of King Antiochus III the Great. His original name was Mithradates ; he assumed the name Antiochus after he ascended the throne. Notable events during the reign of Antiochus IV include his near-conquest of Egypt, his persecution of the Jews of Judea and Samaria, and the rebellion of the Jewish Maccabees.
The Maccabees, also spelled Machabees, were a group of Jewish rebel warriors who took control of Judea, which at the time was part of the Seleucid Empire. They founded the Hasmonean dynasty, which ruled from 167 BCE to 37 BCE, being a fully independent kingdom from about 110 to 63 BCE. They reasserted the Jewish religion, partly by forced conversion, expanded the boundaries of Judea by conquest and reduced the influence of Hellenism and Hellenistic Judaism.
The Hasmonean dynasty was a ruling dynasty of Judea and surrounding regions during classical antiquity, from c. 140 BCE to 37 BCE. Between c. 140 and c. 116 BCE the dynasty ruled Judea semi-autonomously from the Seleucid Empire, and from roughly 110 BCE, with the empire disintegrating, Judea gained full independence and expanded into the neighboring regions of Samaria, Galilee, Iturea, Perea, and Idumea. The Hasmonean rulers took the Greek title "basileus,, and some modern scholars refer to this period as an independent kingdom of Israel. The kingdom was ultimately conquered by the Roman Republic and the dynasty was displaced by Herod the Great in 37 BCE.
Simon Thassi was the second son of Mattathias and thus a member of the Hasmonean family. The name "Thassi" has a connotation of "the Wise", a title which can also mean "the Director", "the Guide", "the Man of Counsel", and "the Zealous".
The First Book of Maccabees, also called 1 Maccabees, is a book written in Hebrew by an anonymous Jewish author after the restoration of an independent Jewish kingdom by the Hasmonean dynasty, around the late 2nd century BC. The original Hebrew is lost and the most important surviving version is the Greek translation contained in the Septuagint. The book is held as canonical scripture by the Catholic, Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox churches, but not by Protestant denominations nor any major branches of Judaism; it is not part of the Tanakh. Some Protestants consider it to be an apocryphal book.
The Second Book of Maccabees, also called 2 Maccabees, is a deuterocanonical book originally in Greek which focuses on the Maccabean Revolt against Antiochus IV Epiphanes and concludes with the defeat of the Seleucid Empire general Nicanor in 161 BC by Judas Maccabeus, the "hero of the Jewish wars of independence".
The Third Book of Maccabees, also called 3 Maccabees, is found in most Orthodox Bibles as a part of the Anagignoskomena. Catholics consider it to be an example of pseudepigrapha and do not regard it as canonical. Protestants likewise regard it as non-canonical, though some like the Moravian Brethren include it in their bibles as apocrypha. It is included in the Bible used by the Armenian Apostolic Church. The Apostolic Canons approved by the Eastern Council in Trullo in 692 but rejected by Pope Sergius I cited as canonical the first three books of Maccabees.
The Fourth Book of Maccabees, also called 4 Maccabees or IV Maccabees, is a homily or philosophic discourse praising the supremacy of pious reason over passion. It was written in Koine Greek in the first or second century AD.
The Books of the Maccabees or Sefer Hamakabim, Book of the Maccabees, recount the history of the Maccabees, the leaders of the Jewish rebellion against the Seleucid dynasty.
Jonathan Apphus was one of the sons of Mattathias and the leader of the Hasmonean dynasty of Judea from 161 to 143 BCE.
The biblical apocrypha denotes the collection of apocryphal ancient books thought to have been written some time between 200 BC and 400 AD. Some Christian churches include some or all of the same texts within the body of their version of the Old Testament, terming them deuterocanonical books. Traditional 80 book Protestant Bibles include fourteen books in an intertestamental section between the Old Testament and New Testament called the Apocrypha, deeming these useful for instruction, but non-canonical.
The Maccabean Revolt was a Jewish rebellion, lasting from 167 to 160 BCE, led by the Maccabees against the Seleucid Empire and the Hellenistic influence on Jewish life. The recapture of Jerusalem in 164 BCE from the armies of Antiochus IV was a significant early victory for Judah Maccabee's fighters, who came to be known as the Maccabees. The subsequent cleansing of the temple and rededication of the Altar on the 25th of Kislev, was celebrated in following years as the Hanukkah festival. After Judah's death, and that of his brother Jonathan Apphus, their brother Simon Thassi succeeded in expelling the Syrian Greeks under Diodotus Tryphon from Judea in 140 BCE, and establishing the Second Jewish Commonwealth under the Hasmonean dynasty.
A Catholic Bible is a Christian Bible that includes the whole 73-book canon recognized by the Catholic Church, including the deuterocanonical books.
Ptolemy was the son of Abubus. He was appointed governor of the Jericho region of Israel by the Seleucid king Antiochus VII Sidetes in the late second century BCE and married a daughter of Simon Maccabaeus, military commander of the Maccabees and founder of Israel's Hasmonean dynasty. According to 1 Maccabees 16:11-24, Ptolemy held a banquet for his father-in-law Simon and two of Simon's sons during which he had them all killed. He then attempted to have Simon's third son, John Hyrcanus, killed also, but failed.
The historical books are a division of Christian Bibles, grouping 12 books of the Old Testament. It includes the Former Prophets from the Nevi'im and two of the ungrouped books of Ketuvim of the Hebrew Bible together with the Book of Ruth and the Book of Esther which in the Hebrew are both found in the Five Megillot. These 12 books make up the historical books in the Protestant Bible, but several other books not found in the Hebrew Bible are also included in Catholic and Orthodox Bibles.
References
- Abubus, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia at BibleHub.com
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