Part 7 (1/2)

(M223) The number of the returned Jews, under Zerubbabel, a descendant of the kings of Judah, were forty-two thousand three hundred and sixty men-a great and joyful caravan-but small in number compared with the Israelites who departed from Egypt with Moses. On their arrival in their native land, they were joined by great numbers of the common people who had remained.

They bore with them the sacred vessels of the temple, which Cyrus generously restored. They arrived in the spring of the year B.C. 536, and immediately made preparations for the restoration of the temple; not under those circ.u.mstances which enabled Solomon to concentrate the wealth of Western Asia, but under great discouragements and the pressure of poverty.

The temple was built on the old foundation, but was not completed till the sixth year of Darius Hystaspes, B.C. 515, and then without the ancient splendor.

(M224) It was dedicated with great joy and magnificence, but the sacrifice of one hundred bullocks, two hundred rams, four hundred lambs, and twelve goats, formed a sad contrast to the hecatombs which Solomon had offered.

Nothing else of importance marked the history of the dependent, impoverished, and humiliated Jews, who had returned to the country of their ancestors during the reign of Darius Hystaspes.

(M225) It was under his successor, Xerxes, he who commanded the h.e.l.lespont to be scourged-that mad, luxurious, effeminated monarch, who is called in Scripture Ahasuerus,-that Mordecai figured in the court of Persia, and Esther was exalted to the throne itself. It was in the seventh year of his reign that this inglorious king returned, discomfited, from the invasion of Greece. Abandoning himself to the pleasures of his harem, he marries the Jewess maiden, who is the instrument, under Providence, of averting the greatest calamity with which the Jews were ever threatened. Haman, a descendant of the Amalekitish kings, is the favorite minister and grand vizier of the Persian monarch. Offended with Mordecai, his rival in imperial favor, the cousin of the queen, he intrigues for the wholesale slaughter of the Jews wherever they were to be found, promising the king ten thousand talents of silver from the confiscation of Jewish property, and which the king needed, impoverished by his unsuccessful expedition into Greece. He thus obtains a decree from Ahasuerus for the general ma.s.sacre of the Jewish nation, in all the provinces of the empire, of which Judea was one. The Jews are in the utmost consternation, and look to Mordecai. His hope is based on Esther, the queen, who might soften, by her fascinations, the heart of the king. She a.s.sumes the responsibility of saving her nation at the peril of her own life-a deed of not extraordinary self-devotion, but requiring extraordinary tact. What anxiety must have pressed the soul of that Jewish woman in the task she undertook! What a responsibility on her unaided shoulders? But she dissembles her grief, her fear, her anxiety, and appears before the king radiant in beauty and loveliness. The golden sceptre is extended to her by her weak and cruel husband, though arrayed in the pomp and power of an Oriental monarch, before whom all bent the knee, and to whom, even in his folly, he appears as demiG.o.d. She does not venture to tell the king her wishes. The stake is too great. She merely invites him to a grand banquet, with his minister Haman. Both king and minister are ensnared by the cautious queen, and the result is the disgrace of Haman, the elevation of Mordecai, and the deliverance of the Jews from the fatal sentence-not a perfect deliverance, for the decree could not be changed, but the Jews were warned and allowed to defend themselves, and they slew seventy-five thousand of their enemies. The act of vengeance was followed by the execution of the ten sons of Haman, and Mordecai became the real governor of Persia. We see in this story the caprice which governed the actions, in general, of Oriental kings, and their own slavery to their favorite wives. The charms of a woman effect, for evil or good, what conscience, and reason, and policy, and wisdom united can not do. Esther is justly a favorite with the Christian and Jewish world; but Vashti, the proud queen who, with true woman's dignity, refuses to grace with her presence the saturnalia of an intoxicated monarch, is also ent.i.tled to our esteem, although she paid the penalty of disobedience; and the foolish edict which the king promulgated, that all women should implicitly obey their husbands, seems to indicate that unconditional obedience was not the custom of the Persian women.

(M226) The reign of Artaxerxes, the successor of Xerxes, was favorable to the Jews, for Judea was a province of the Persian empire. In the seventh year of his reign, B.C. 458, a new migration of Jews from Babylonia took place, headed by Ezra, a man of high rank at the Persian court. He was empowered to make a collection among the Jews of Babylonia for the adornment of the temple, and he came to Jerusalem laden with treasures. He was, however, affected by the sight of a custom which had grown up, of intermarriage of the Jews with adjacent tribes. He succeeded in causing the foreign wives to be repudiated, and the old laws to be enforced which separated the Jews from all other nations. And it is probably this stern law, which prevents the Jews from marriage with foreigners, that has preserved their nationality, in all their wanderings and misfortunes, more than any other one cause.

(M227) A renewed commission granted to Nehemiah, B.C. 445, resulted in a fresh immigration of Jews to Palestine, in spite of all the opposition which the Samaritan and other nations made. Nehemiah was cup-bearer to the Persian king, and devoted to the Persian interests. At that time Persia had suffered a fatal blow at the battle of Cindus, and among the humiliating articles of peace with the Athenian admiral was the stipulation that the Persians should not advance within three days'

journey of the sea. Jerusalem being at this distance, was an important post to hold, and the Persian court saw the wisdom of intrusting its defense to faithful allies. In spite of all obstacles, Nehemiah succeeded, in fifty-two days, in restoring the old walls and fortifications; the whole population, of every rank and order having devoted themselves to the work. Moreover, contributions for the temple continued to flow into the treasury of a once opulent, but now impoverished and decimated people.

After providing for the security of the capital and the adornment of the temple, the leaders of the nation turned their attention to the compilation of the sacred books and the restoration of religion. Many important literary works had been lost during their captivity, including the work of Solomon on national history, and the ancient book of Jasher.

But the books on the law, the historical books, the prophetic writings, the Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Songs of Solomon, were collected and copied. The law, revised and corrected, was publicly read by Ezra; the Feast of Tabernacles was celebrated with considerable splendor; and a renewed covenant was made by the people to keep the law, to observe the Sabbath, to avoid idolatry, and abstain from intermarriage with strangers. The Jewish const.i.tution was restored, and Nehemiah, a Persian satrap in reality, lived in a state of considerable magnificence, entertaining the chief leaders of the nation, and reforming all disorders.

Jerusalem gradually regained political importance, while the country of the ten tribes, though filled with people, continued to be the seat of idolaters.

(M228) On the death of Nehemiah, B.C. 415, the history of the Jews becomes obscure, and we catch only scattered glimpses of the state of the country, till the accession of Antiochus Epiphanes, B.C. 175, when the Syrian monarch had erected a new kingdom on the ruins of the Persian empire. For more than two centuries, when the Greeks and Romans flourished, Jewish history is a blank, with here and there some scattered notices and traditions which Josephus has recorded. The Jews, living in va.s.salage to the successors of Alexander during this interval, had become animated by a martial spirit, and the Maccabaic wars elevated them into sufficient importance to become allies of Rome-the new conquering power, destined to subdue the world. During this period the Jewish character a.s.sumed the hard, stubborn, exclusive cast which it has ever since maintained-an intense hostility to polytheism and all Gentile influences. The Jewish Scriptures took their present shape, and the Apocryphal books came to light. The sects of the Jews arose, like Pharisees and Sadducees, and religious and political parties exhibited an unwonted fierceness and intolerance. While the Greeks and Romans were absorbed in wars, the Jews perfected their peculiar economy, and grew again into political importance. The country, by means of irrigation and cultivation, became populous and fertile, and poetry and the arts regained their sway. The people took but little interest in the political convulsions of neighboring nations, and devoted themselves quietly to the development of their own resources. The captivity had cured them of war, of idolatry, and warlike expeditions.

(M229) During this two hundred years of obscurity, but real growth, unnoticed and unknown by other nations, a new capital had arisen in Egypt; Alexandria became a great mart of commerce, and the seat of revived Grecian learning. The sway of the Ptolemaic kings, Grecian in origin, was favorable to letters, and to arts. The Jews settled in their magnificent city, translated their Scriptures into Greek, and cultivated the Greek philosophy.

(M230) Meanwhile the internal government of the Jews fell into the hands of the high priests-the Persian governors exercising only a general superintendence. At length the country, once again favored, was subjected to the invasion of Alexander. After the fall of Tyre, the conqueror advanced to Gaza, and totally destroyed it. He then approached Jerusalem, in fealty to Persia. The high priest made no resistance, but went forth in his pontifical robes, followed by the people in white garments, to meet the mighty warrior. Alexander, probably encouraged by the prophesies of Daniel, as explained by the high priest, did no harm to the city or nation, but offered gifts, and, as tradition a.s.serts, even wors.h.i.+ped the G.o.d of the Jews. On the conquest of Persia, Judea came into the possession of Laomedon, one of the generals of Alexander, B.C. 321. On his defeat by Ptolemy, another general, to whom Egypt had fallen as his share, one hundred thousand Jews were carried captive to Alexandria, where they settled and learned the Greek language. The country continued to be convulsed by the wars between the generals of Alexander, and fell into the hands, alternately, of the Syrian and Egyptian kings-successors of the generals of the great conqueror.

(M231) On the establishment of the Syro-Grecian kingdom by Seleucus, Antioch, the capital, became a great city, and the rival of Alexandria.

Syria, no longer a satrapy of Persia, became a powerful monarchy, and Judea became a prey to the armies of this ambitious State in its warfare with Egypt, and was alternately the va.s.sal of each-Syria and Egypt. Under the government of the first three Ptolemies-those enlightened and magnificent princes, Soter, Philadelphus, and Evergetes, the Jews were protected, both at home and in Alexandria, and their country enjoyed peace and prosperity, until the ambition of Antiochus the Great again plunged the nation in difficulties. He had seized Judea, which was then a province of the Egyptian kings, but was defeated by Ptolemy Philopator. This monarch made sumptuous presents to the temple, and even ventured to enter the sanctuary, but was prevented by the high priest. Although filled with fear in view of the tumult which this act provoked, he henceforth hated and persecuted the Jews. Under his successor, Judea was again invaded by Antiochus, and again was Jerusalem wrested from his grasp by Scopas, the Egyptian general. Defeated, however, near the source of the Jordan, the country fell into the hands of Antiochus, who was regarded as a deliverer.

And it continued to be subject to the kings of Syria, until, with Jerusalem, it suffered calamities scarcely inferior to those inflicted by the Babylonians.

(M232) It is difficult to trace, with any satisfaction, the internal government of the Jews during the two hundred years when the chief power was in the hands of the high priests-this period marked by the wars between Syria and Egypt, or rather between the successors of the generals of Alexander. The government of the high priests at Jerusalem was not exempt from those disgraceful outrages which occasionally have marked all the governments of the world-whether in the hands of kings, or in an oligarchy of n.o.bles and priests. Nehemiah had expelled from Jerusalem, Mana.s.seh, the son of Jehoiada, who succeeded Elias.h.i.+b in the high priesthood, on account of his unlawful marriage with a stranger. Mana.s.seh, invited to Samaria by the father of the woman he had married, became high priest of the temple on Mount Gerizim, and thus perpetuated the schism between the two nations. Before the conquests of Alexander, while the country was under the dominion of Persia, a high priest by the name of John murdered his brother Jesus within the precincts of the sanctuary, which crime was punished by the Persian governor, by a heavy fine imposed upon the whole nation. Jaddua was the high priest in the time of Alexander, and by his dignity and tact won over the conqueror of Asia.

Onias succeeded Jaddua, and ruled for twenty-one years, and he was succeeded by Simon the Just, a pontiff on whose administration Jewish tradition dwells with delight. Simon was succeeded by his uncles, Eleazar and Mana.s.seh, and they by Onias II., son of Simon, through whose misconduct, or indolence, in omitting the customary tribute to the Egyptian king, came near involving the country in fresh calamities-averted, however, by his nephew Joseph, who pacified the Egyptian court, and obtained the former generals.h.i.+p of the revenues of Judea, Samaria, and Phnicia, which he enjoyed to the time of Antiochus the Great. Onias II. was succeeded by his son Simon, under whose pontificate the Egyptian monarch was prevented from entering the temple, and he by Onias III., under whose rule a feud took place with the sons of Joseph, disgraced by murders, which called for the interposition of the Syrian king, who then possessed Judea. Joshua, or Jason, by bribery, obtained the pontificate, but he allowed the temple wors.h.i.+p to fall into disuse, and was even alienated from the Jewish faith by his intimacy with the Syrian court. He was outbidden in his high office by Onias, his brother, who was disgraced by savage pa.s.sions, and who robbed the temple of its golden vessels. The people, indignant, rose in a tumult, and slew his brother, Lysimachus. Meanwhile, Jason, the dispossessed high priest, recovered his authority, and shut up Onias, or Menelaus, as he called himself, in a castle. This was interpreted by Antiochus as an insurrection, and he visited on Jerusalem a terrible penalty-slaughtering forty thousand of the people, and seizing as many more for slaves. He then abolished the temple services, seized all the sacred vessels, collected spoil to the amount of eighteen hundred talents, defiled the altar by the sacrifice of a sow, and suppressed every sign of Jewish independence. He meditated the complete extirpation of the Jewish religion, dismantled the capitol, hara.s.sed the country people, and inflicted unprecedented barbarities. The temple itself was dedicated to Jupiter Olympius, and the reluctant and miserable Jews were forced to join in all the rites of pagan wors.h.i.+p, including the baccha.n.a.lia, which mocked the virtue of the older Romans.

(M233) From this degradation and slavery the Jews were rescued by a line of heroes whom G.o.d raised up-the Asmoneans, or Maccabees. The head of this heroic family was Mattathias, a man of priestly origin, living in the town of Modin, commanding a view of the sea-an old man of wealth and influence who refused to depart from the faith of his fathers, while most of the nation had relapsed into the paganism of the Greeks. He slew with his own hand an apostate Jew, who offered sacrifice to a pagan deity, and then killed the royal commissioner, Apelles, whom Antiochus had sent to enforce his edicts. The heroic old man, who resembled William Tell, in his mission and character, summoned his countrymen, who adhered to the old faith, and intrenched himself in the mountains, and headed a vigorous revolt against the Syrian power, even fighting on the Sabbath day. The ranks of the insurrectionists were gradually filled with those who were still zealous for the law, or inspired with patriotic desires for independence.

Mattathias was prospered, making successful raids from his mountain fastnesses, destroying heathen altars, and punis.h.i.+ng apostate Jews. Two sects joined his standard with peculiar ardor-the Zadikim, who observed the written law of Moses, from whom the Sadducees of later times sprang, and the more zealous and austere Chasidim, who added to the law the traditions of the elders, from whom the Pharisees came.

Old men are ill suited to conduct military expeditions when great fatigue and privation are required, and the aged Mattathias sank under the weight which he had so n.o.bly supported, and bequeathed his power to Judas, the most valiant of his sons.

(M234) This remarkable man, scarcely inferior to Joshua and David in military genius and heroic qualities, added prudence and discretion to personal bravery. When his followers had gained experience and courage by various gallant adventures, he led them openly against his enemies. The governor of Samaria, Apollonius, was the first whom he encountered, and whom he routed and slew. Seron, the deputy governor of Clesyria, sought to redeem the disgrace of the Syrian arms; but he also was defeated at the pa.s.s of Bethoron. At the urgent solicitation of Philip, governor of Jerusalem, Antiochus then sent a strong force of forty thousand foot and seven thousand horse to subdue the insurgents, under the command of Ptolemy Macron. Judas, to resist these forces, had six thousand men; but he relied on the G.o.d of Israel, as his fathers had done in the early ages of Jewish history, and in a sudden attack he totally routed a large detachment of the main army, under Gorgias, and spoiled their camp. He then defeated another force beyond the Jordan, and the general fled in the disguise of a slave, to Antioch. Thus closed a triumphant campaign.

(M235) The next year, Lysias, the lieutenant-general of Antiochus, invaded Judea with a large force of sixty-five thousand men. Judas met it with ten thousand, and gained a brilliant victory, which proved decisive, and which led to the re-establishment of the Jewish power at Jerusalem. Judas fortified the city and the temple, and a.s.sumed the offensive, and recovered, one after another, the cities which had fallen under the dominion of Syria. In the mean time, Antiochus, the bitterest enemy which the Jews ever had, died miserably in Persia-the most powerful of all the Syrian kings.

(M236) On the accession of Antiochus Eupater, Lysias again attempted the subjugation of Judea, This time he advanced with one hundred thousand foot, twenty thousand horse, and thirty-two elephants. But this large force wasted away in an unsuccessful attack on Jerusalem, hara.s.sed by the soldiers of the Maccabees. A treaty of peace was concluded, by which full liberty of wors.h.i.+p was granted to the Jews, with permission to be ruled by their own laws.

(M237) Demetrius, the lawful heir of Antiochus the Great, had been detained at Rome as a hostage, in consequence of which Antiochus Eupater had usurped his throne. Escaping from Rome, he overpowered his enemies and recovered his kingdom. But he was even more hostile to the Jews than his predecessor, and succeeded in imposing a high priest on the nation friendly to his interests. His cruelties and crimes once more aroused the Jews to resistance, and Judas gained another decisive victory, and Nicanor, the Syrian general, was slain.

(M238) Judas then adopted a policy which was pregnant with important consequences. He formed a league with the Romans, then bent on the conquest of the East. The Roman senate readily entered into a coalition with the weaker State, in accordance with its uniform custom of protecting those whom they ultimately absorbed in their vast empire: but scarcely was the treaty ratified when the gallant Judas died, leaving the defense of his country to his brothers, B.C. 161.

(M239) Jonathan, on whom the leaders.h.i.+p fell, found the forces under his control disheartened by the tyranny of the high priest, Alcimus, whom the nation had accepted. Leagued with Bacchides, the Syrian general, the high priest had every thing his own way, until Jonathan, emerging from his retreat, delivered his countrymen once again, and another peace was made.