Lessons
from the Wilderness, Volume 43: Today, on the Eve of Chanukah, I am sharing
some insightful articles from TheTorah.com. I encourage any who wish to see concise
scholarship about the Torah and more visit their site.
©2021,
David E. Robinson: At the Gates of Yerushalayim Ministries
Lessons
from the Wilderness, Volume 43
...Sharing the Insight of Jewish
Scholars...
Judea versus Judaism: Between 1 and 2 Maccabees[v]
The story of the Hasmonean (or “Maccabean”) revolt is
preserved in 1 and 2 Maccabees—two very different works, in style, content, and
values.[1] To state the most obvious differences:
1 Maccabees was originally written in Hebrew (but preserved
only in a Greek translation), and it tells the story of the entire revolt,
beginning with Mattathias, and on through his sons Judah, Jonathan, Simon, and
ending with the rise of the dynasty under Simon’s son, John Hyrcanus. It covers
the period of roughly 175–134 B.C.E. 2 Maccabees, in contrast, was
originally written in Greek, and it covers only the first part of that period,
from 175–161 B.C.E., following the story only in the days of Judah
Maccabee.
Sadducees versus Pharisees? Geiger’s Thesis
Abraham Geiger (1810–1874), one of the founders of Reform
Judaism and a central figure in the Wissenschaft des Judentums (the
scientific study of Judaism), suggested in 1857 that each of the two books of
Maccabees stems from a different branch of Second Temple Judaism.[2] In
his view, 1 Maccabees is a Sadducean work, and 2 Maccabees is a Pharisaic
response to it.
This is part of Geiger’s overall thesis that the Sadducees
of the latter half of the Second Temple period—as described in the writings of
Josephus, the New Testament, and rabbinic literature—were a continuation of the
Zadokite high priests, who were prominent of the first half of that period, in
the absence of Jewish sovereignty. (Geiger assumes, as most scholars still do,
that the name “Sadducees,” צדוקים, derives from “Zadokites.”[3])
Geiger argued that the Pharisees, who arose in the last three centuries of the
Second Temple period and competed with the Sadducees, were not part of the
priestly class.[4] After the destruction of the Temple this
group eventually developed into Rabbinic Judaism.
Much can be said in support of Geiger’s characterization of
the two works.
Pro-Hasmonean or Not
First, 1 Maccabees, written during the days of John
Hyrcanus, the son of Simon the Maccabee, is a dynastic history that recounts
the Hasmoneans’ rise to power and argues that their revolt and consequent rule
were justified. As the Hasmoneans were high priests, it makes sense to
associate them with the Sadducees. Indeed, as reported by Josephus (Ant. 13.295–296),
John Hyrcanus made an alliance with the Sadducees. This alliance led to the
conflict with the Pharisees and their supporters in the days of his son,
Alexander Jannaeus—a bloody civil war with tens of thousands of casualties
(Josephus, Ant. 13.372–376).
2 Maccabees, in contrast, is not interested in the Hasmonean
dynasty. Judah Maccabee, the successful leader of the war against the
Seleucids, is a hero of 2 Maccabees, but not a word is said about his father
Mattathias or the Hasmonean dynasty that Judah’s brother Simon will found. In fact,
the two short references to Simon (2 Macc 10:20; 14:17) portray him as a
something of a bumbler. It is not clear whether that was meant as criticism of
his dynasty (as Geiger and others have thought) or only reflected lack of
concern with it, perhaps even lack of knowledge of it, but one way or another,
the book is not a dynastic history.
Theological differences
A well-known theological divide between the Pharisees and
the Sadducees was the belief in resurrection: the Pharisees believed in it, and
the Sadducees did not.[5] This divide is reflected in the two
books.
In 2 Maccabees, Judah raises money to bring sacrifices on
behalf of dead soldiers to ensure their future resurrection and the author
approves quite emphatically:
2 Macc 12:43 After making a collection for
each man, totaling around 2000 silver drachmas, he sent it to Jerusalem for the
bringing of a sin-offering – doing very properly and honorably in taking
account of resurrection, 12:44 for had he not expected
that the fallen would be resurrected, it would have been pointless and silly to
pray for the dead – 12:45 and having in view the most
beautiful reward that awaits those who lie down in piety – a holy and pious
notion. Therefore, he did atonement for the dead, in order that they be
released from the sin.[6]
In contrast, 1 Maccabees makes no reference at all to belief
in resurrection.
The role of prayer in the two books also differs: in 2
Maccabees, prayer is ubiquitous, whereas it is mostly absent in 1 Maccabees.[7] Prayer
competed with sacrifice as a mode of worship and did not need priests to
mediate it. It thus makes sense that it would be a key feature of the Pharisaic
2 Maccabees, while the Sadducean 1 Maccabees would not emphasize it.
Points such as these, about the books’ differential
attitudes toward the Hasmoneans, resurrection, and prayer, support Geiger’s
characterization of the books.
Difficulties with Geiger’s Thesis
Nevertheless, Geiger’s thesis did not win much support.
Neither work explicitly mentions Zadokites, Sadducees, or Pharisees, and that
imposes quite a heavy burden of proof upon anyone who would claim that they
are, respectively, Sadducean and Pharisaic tracts. Furthermore, there is no
evidence that 2 Maccabees is responding to 1 Maccabees; indeed, it might be
earlier than 1 Maccabees.
Most significantly, 2 Maccabees, as the book’s preface
explains, (2:23), is an abbreviation of a work by a Jew named Jason living in
Cyrene (Libya), and we have no evidence for Pharisees and Sadducees outside of
Palestine. As for 2 Maccabees’ failure to relate to the Hasmonean dynasty, that
might derive merely from it being composed before that dynasty became
established.
Reformulating Geiger’s Theory
Despite these objections to the specific formulation of this
theory, Geiger’s observation of significant differences between 1 and 2
Maccabees is still valid and deserves further explanation, along with some
modification.
1 Maccabees has a Judean orientation and is meant to serve
the interests of a Hasmonean dynasty that ruled Judea. In contrast, 2 Maccabees
is a diasporic work, and is interested in “Judaism,” a word that is absent from
1 Maccabees but appears several times in 2 Maccabees (2:21; 8:1; 14:38). Thus,
the contrast between 1 and 2 Maccabees is better formulated as between a Judean
work and a Judaic work: one oriented around a state and one oriented around a
religion.
Indeed, Geiger’s hypothesis about a Sadducean work versus a
Pharisaic one can be tweaked and rephrased, based on the recognition that
Sadducean values are basically Judean values, while Pharisaic ones, wherever
they are found, are essentially, diasporic—Judaic, not Judean.[8]
With this in mind, we can approach the differences between
these two books anew:
a. Judean vs. Diasporic
1 Maccabees is clearly of Judean origin: The book’s
orientation is around the ruling dynasty of Judea, it relates to Judean
geography in a detailed way that bespeaks familiarity, and the book’s original
language was Hebrew.
As for 2 Maccabees: most scholars hold that it originated in
the diaspora, as may be inferred from such points as the fact that Jason of
Cyrene wrote the text that 2 Maccabees abridges, that the work has a positive
attitude toward Gentile rule and Gentiles in general, that it expresses little
interest in and knowledge of Judean geography, and that it is written in good
Hellenistic Greek.
b. The Sadducees Were a Priestly Party
As Geiger observed, the Sadducees were oriented around the
high priesthood. The New Testament’s Acts of the Apostles takes this as a
given, when it describes the reaction of the priests (kohanim) to
Peter’s gathering a large group of followers:
Acts 5:17 Then the high priest took action;
he and all who were with him (that is, the sect of the Sadducees), being filled
with jealousy… (NRSV)[9]
The same assumption is at the core of the Talmudic story (b. Yoma 19b)
in which a high priest explains the reason that he followed a Pharisaic
practice אף על פי שצדוקין אנו “Even though we are Sadducees…”
Priests are defined by their descent (from
Aaron), and they alone were allowed to serve in the Temple. Thus, Sadducean
Judaism thrived in Jerusalem, where the Temple stood. In the diaspora, however,
Jews preferred to view God as the “God of Heaven,” as present and accessible
even outside the land of Israel.
The tension between God being in the Temple and God dwelling
in heaven is laid out in a humorous anecdote narrating the conversation between
the Seleucid king [10] and his general Heliodorus, who had just
been vanquished by a miraculous intervention when he tried to rob the Jerusalem
Temple:
2 Macc 3:37 When the king asked Heliodorus,
“Who would be the most appropriate person to send some other time to
Jerusalem?” he said: 3:38 “If you have some enemy or
conspirator against the state, send him thither, and you’ll get him back
flogged, if he survives at all; for around that place there is truly some power
of God. 3:39 For He, though He has His residence in
heaven, watches over and aids that place and with blows destroys those who come
there to do evil.”
Here God watches over the Temple, but lives in heaven, where
he can see everywhere in the world, including the diaspora.
c. Pharisees Were Largely Diasporic
The leaders of the Pharisees were sages—later they develop
into “rabbis”—who were endowed with their standing not by their pedigree but by
their learning and/or charisma. They were not connected to the Jerusalem Temple
and functioned wherever their followers’ established houses of study or
synagogues.
Diaspora Jews, quite naturally, tended to concentrate on the
importance of people rather than the place, something that 2 Maccabees even
states stridently:
2 Macc 5:19 But God did not choose the
people on account of the Place; rather, He chose the Place on account of the
people.
Thus, the Pharisees, who lived in Judea, shared this basic
value with diasporic Judaism.
d. Attitude towards Gentiles
Diaspora Jews were used to rubbing shoulders with Gentiles.
That easily leads—in hospitable contexts, such as those of the Hellenistic
world—to an undercutting of the Jew vs. non-Jew distinction. Thus, 2 Maccabees
frequently emphasizes the goodwill of the Jews’ neighbors (e.g., 4:35–36, 49;
12:30–31).
This explains an important difference in how each book
perceives Antiochus IV Epiphanes. For 2 Maccabees, he was an exception to the
rule, for Gentile kings, even Antiochus’ brother, were, as a rule, beneficent
to the Jews. Indeed, before an internal squabble between competitors for the
high priesthood involved the Seleucid king in a negative way, Judea was living
in an ideal state underwritten by Gentile kings:
2 Macc 3:1 The Holy City being inhabited in
complete peace and the laws being observed optimally due to the high priest
Onias’ piety and hatred of evil, 3:2 it happened that the
kings themselves used to honor the Place and aggrandize the Temple with the
most outstanding gifts, 3:3 just as King Seleucus of Asia
used to supply out of his own revenues all the expenses incurred for the
sacrificial offices.[11]
In contrast, for 1 Maccabees, the wicked Antiochus was a
typical Greek king. Seleucid kings are all wicked and perfidious, and (1 Macc
1:9) “multiplied evils on the earth.”[12] Antiochus may have
been an extreme case, but, according to 1 Maccabees, he was no exception. Any
ascription of goodwill to Syrian kings or to the Judeans’ neighbors would
undermine the Hasmonean dynasty. Indeed, 1 Maccabees often refers quite
sweepingly to “the Gentiles around us” as murderous and hostile (5:1, 10, 38,
57; 12:13, 53).
e. Wicked Greeks or Sinful Jews?
For 1 Maccabees, Judeans suffer because the wicked Greek
kings and the Judeans’ nasty neighbors persecute them, and they are rescued by
the valiant efforts of military heroes, the Hasmoneans.
For 2 Maccabees, in contrast, Jews suffer because their sins
cause God “to hide His face” (as it is put in Deut 31:17 and 32:20, paraphrased
in 2 Macc 5:17[13]), i.e., to suspend his providence. They are
rescued through the death of Jewish martyrs, which serves as an atonement (chs.
6–7), and so God’s “wrath turns into mercy,” allowing Judah Maccabee to be
victorious:
2 Macc 8:5 As soon as Maccabaeus got his
corps together, he could not be withstood by the Gentiles, the Lord’s anger
having turned into mercy.[14]
f. Martyrdom
For the diasporic 2 Maccabees, whose expected readers—like
Christians in the Roman empire—could not contemplate military resistance if
ever oppressed, martyrdom, in the hope that it would move God to intervene, is
the best they could do and, indeed, it is effective: 2 Macc 8:5, which was just
quoted, is the turning-point of the entire story.[15]
For 1 Maccabees, in contrast, martyrs, who are killed due to
their adherence to Jewish religion, accomplish nothing; they are part of the
problem, not the solution, and are, however it is phrased, no more than pious
fools.[16]
g. A State-Oriented Book
1 Maccabees never mentions “Lord” or “God,” and although it
does refer to God a few times as “heaven,” that is mostly limited to the first
few chapters.[17] As noted, it makes little reference to
prayer, and never mentions sin and atonement, angels, heavenly apparitions, or
miracles. 1 Maccabees further takes the trouble to note, more than once, that
prophecy has ceased (4:46; 9:27).
For 1 Maccabees, that is, especially after the first few
chapters, God has nothing to do with what happens on earth. The Hasmoneans were
high priests, but that was only a governmental position.[18] Jonathan’s
rise to the high priesthood, for example, is important insofar as it allows him
to build up his army:
1 Macc 10:21 So Jonathan donned the holy
vestment in the seventh month of the 160th year, on the festival of
Tabernacles, and he assembled troops and prepared numerous weapons.[19]
h. Chance or Providence?
Finally, 1 Maccabees repeatedly attributes events and their
outcomes to blind chance (Greek: kairos); you win some and you lose
some (9:10; 12:1; 15:33–34). This goes hand in hand with 1 Maccabees’ failure
to ascribe to sin and atonement any role in explaining the ups and downs of its
story. This is quite different from 2 Maccabees’ insistence on divine providence
but is a necessary part of a tract meant to support the political state of
Judea.
No one in a Judean state, with a Judean army, could
subscribe to the assertion of 2 Maccabees that the Jewish soldiers who die in
battle must be guilty of a sin, for otherwise God might be suspected of
injustice (2 Macc 12:40–41). That can be said only by someone living in the
diaspora interested in inculcating belief in divine providence, who had no need
to worry that his son might one day have to fight in a Judean army.
Ancient Tensions between Judaism and the Judean State
The comparison of these two books leads us to contemplate
tensions between Judaism and a Jewish state. 1 Maccabees provides us with a
glimpse of the values of the dynasty that rebelled, was victorious, and managed
to rule Judea for close to eighty years, from the end of Seleucid rule in 142 B.C.E.
(1 Macc 13:41) until the Roman conquest in 63 B.C.E. That dynasty, as we
know from Josephus, came into conflict with opposing religious groups, led by
the Pharisees—a conflict that eventually degenerated into a bloody civil war
that helped pave the way for the Roman conquest.
The Dead Sea Scrolls provide some scraps of evidence for the
motivations and values of those who opposed the Hasmoneans,[20] but
2 Maccabees provides a substantial statement of a religious view opposed to the
Hasmoneans. True, it does not oppose the Hasmoneans directly; it was probably
written too early for that and is written from a diasporic point of view.
Nonetheless, these two books show an early tension between an orientation
around Judaism and an orientation around a Jewish state, a tension that
continues today as well.[vi]
Last Updated: November 28, 2021
Footnotes:
- That is, these are not two
parts of the same work (like 1 and 2 Samuel, for example), nor are they
part of a series. They are independent works, both quite substantial (16
and 15 chapters, respectively). Neither work was preserved by Jews, but
they can easily be found in any Catholic Bible or Protestant Apocrypha,
including in online translations. As for the nomenclature, note that
although “Maccabee” was, originally, the nickname of only one member of
the Hasmonean clan, Judas (see 1 Macc 2:4), in popular usage it is common
to use it, as does the title of 1 Maccabees, of the entire clan and
dynasty.
- Abraham Geiger, Urschrift
und Übersetzungen der Bibel in ihrer Abhängigkeit von der innern
Entwickelung des Judenthums [The Original Text and
Translations of the Bible in Their Dependence upon the Inner Development
of Judaism] (Breslau: Hainauer, 1857), 200–230. The first 230 pages of
the work are a historical survey of the history of the Hebrew Bible in the
Second Temple period; it is divided between Part I, on the history of the
Bible between the return from Babylonia in the sixth century B.C.E., and
Part II, on the history of the Bible between the Maccabees, in the second
century B.C.E., and the days of Rabbi Akiba in the second century C.E.
Although one of the foremost achievements of the early years of modern
Jewish studies, Geiger’s Urschrift was never translated
into English.
- Geiger’s main thesis is
expressed clearly by the titles of the opening chapter of the book’s first
two parts, which are really a sequential whole: Part I opens with a
chapter on “Die Zadokiden,” the Zadokite clan (b’nei Zadok) of high
priests that was prominent in Judea in the post-exilic era, while Part II
opens with a chapter on “Sadducäer und Pharisäer,” Sadducees and
Pharisees.
- Given human nature, and given
Geiger’s own central role in the lively and often acerbic inner-Jewish
disputes of the mid-nineteenth century, it is not surprising that he
tended to view the Pharisees as not only non-priestly but also anti-priestly.
- See esp. Josephus, Ant.
18.16, Luke 20:27, and Acts 23:6, also m. Sanhedrin 10:1.
Editor’s note: See also discussion in Devorah Dimant, “The
Valley of Dry Bones and the Resurrection of the Dead,” TheTorah (2018).
- All translations from 2
Maccabees are my own. See also in the story of the mother and her seven
sons (7:22–23). Editor’s note: For a discussion of this story’s ideology,
including the belief in resurrection, see Malka Z. Simkovich, “The
Faith of the Martyred Mother and her Seven Sons,” TheTorah (2015).
- The first four chapters are
somewhat exceptional in this regard. This may be because the story of the
rededication of the Temple, which appears in this section of the book, may
have derived from a separate source.
- Distinguishing between what
makes something Judean versus what makes it Judaic, and how this relates
to the Sadducee/Pharisee divide, is a complicated topic. With the help of
predecessors and colleagues, I have done some of that in my Judeans
and Jews: Four Faces of Dichotomy in Ancient Jewish History (Toronto:
Univ. of Toronto Press, 2014) and my commentaries 2 Maccabees (De Gruyter,
2008) and 1 Maccabees (soon to be published by Yale
University Press).
Acts 5:17 Ἀναστὰς
δὲ ὁ ἀρχιερεὺς καὶ πάντες οἱ σὺν αὐτῷ, ἡ οὖσα αἵρεσις τῶν Σαδδουκαίων, ἐπλήσθησαν
ζήλου
[Translation:
As the hierarchs and all those who are in them, the services of the Sadducees,
were filled with zeal.]
- The king is unnamed in the
story, though in context, it is referring to Seleucus IV Philopator (187–175
B.C.E.).
- See also 2 Maccabees 5:16,
which refers to how Antiochus IV took from the Temple “the votive
offerings which had been given by other kings for the aggrandizement,
honor and respect of the Place.”
- See also, on their
perfidiousness, 1 Maccabees 6:62; 7:10; 10:46; 15:27.
- For the sin-and-atonement
scheme of Moses’s Song in Deut 32 as the basic scaffolding of 2 Maccabees,
see my 2 Maccabees (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2008), 20–22.
- Note especially the author’s
explicit lectures to his readers at 4:16–17; 5:17–20, and 6:12–17.
- Note J. W. Van Henten, The
Maccabean Martyrs as Saviours of the Jewish People: A Study of 2 and 4
Maccabees (Leiden: Brill, 1997). 4 Maccabees is a later work based on
2 Maccabees. Editor’s note: See also, Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz, “2
and 4 Maccabees: Evolving Responses to Hellenism,” TheTorah (2018);
Martin Lockshin, “Chanukah:
The Greek Influence of Martyrdom,” TheTorah (2017).
- See especially 1 Maccabees
2:29–41 and 7:11–18.
- As noted above, the
reclamation of the Temple story in this section, which also includes
references to prayer, may stem from a separate source.
- As has been observed, “the
priestly office did not correspond well to what the family really did;
that was probably recognized by the author of 1 Maccabees himself. . . of
high priesthood one notices [in 1 Maccabees, DRS] nothing but the title.”
Diego Arenhoevel, Die Theokratie nach dem 1. und 2. Makkabäerbuch (Mainz:
Matthias-Grünewald Verlag. 1967), 45–46.
- Similarly, note the ingenuous
report at 16:11–12 that “Ptolemy son of Aboubos had been appointed
governor of the plain of Jericho and had much silver and gold, for he was
the son-in-law of the high priest.”
- See Hanan Eshel, The
Dead Sea Scrolls and the Hasmonean State (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
and Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi Press, 2008).
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[iv] Author’s note: Throughout this study I may be using the NET Bible® and the NET Notes®: within the notes you will see symbols like this: (א B Ψ 892* 2427 sys). These are abbreviations used by the NET Bible® for identifying the principal manuscript evidence that they (authors and translators of the NET Bible®) used in translating the New Testament. Please go to https://bible.org/netbible/ and see their section labeled “NET Bible Principals of Translation” for a more complete explanation on these symbols and other items pertinent to the way the NET Bible uses them.
[vi] Minor grammatical and punctuation
errors corrected by David Robinson. Any translations are done with the help of the Google® Translator. If there are any
mistakes, I apologize. Also, the picture I arranged in a different place for appearance on this blog only.
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