What heavier fate is it than to bear the weight of a people upon your back?
It’s tough enough being a soldier in war … your death could come at any time, and painfully.
But just imagine the added burden of knowing your soldiers depended upon your leadership, and your people depended upon your courage and your decision-making to throw off their chains and become free.
This is why every liberator is a hero to his people … those who appreciate the burdens they had to carry to make it possible for them to live free rightly give them this honor. George Washington, Michael Collins, Simon Bolivar, Giuseppe Garibaldi, and Jomo Kenyatta all have earned such adulation.
So have men like Lech Walesa and Vaclav Havel. Poles and Czechs may question the day-to-day decisions they make in running their nations, but they appreciate the sacrifices these men made. Even Boris Yeltsin has won many admirers for his courage in preventing the Communists from regripping the throats of the Russian people.
Irish patriot Wolfe Tone said it so well in court, as he awaited execution at the hands of British tyrants, “In a case like this, success is everything. Success, in the eyes of the vulgar, fixes its merits. Washington succeeded, and Kosciusko (who fought in vain to prevent the murder of Poland by Russia, Prussia, and the Hapsburg Empire) failed. Tone tried to escape the public ritual torture murder that the British used on rebels by committing suicide in his cell. He died in agony of his self-inflicted wounds.
However, people who are more substantial do appreciate the sacrifices people like Wolfe Tone made. Joan of Arc has special meaning to the French, even though she was captured, treated immorally, and burned publicly. Kosciusko, Imre Nagy, Alexander Dubcek, Toussaint L’Overture, Francisco Miranda, and the fighters of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, the Polish National Uprising a year later, the Hungarian Uprising, and the Irish Troubles all receive today the respect of those who appreciate what they tried to do for their people. And Ireland and Poland are free, many years after Tone and Kosciusko bled for them.
This is why the Maccabees are so special to the Jews . This whole FAMILY — several generations of it — took upon themselves the burdens of war, courage, and decision-making. They kept the Jews free from foreign enslavement so they could worship God and live freely.
The predicament of the Jews that led to the Maccabees’ emergence had its roots in the empire of Alexander the Great. He divided his empire among his key officers before he died. But then they and their successors fought among themselves to be rulers of all the others. So the Jews, whose land of Israel was between Syria and Egypt, was a battleground for rulers from these two areas. Thanks to these pagan egotists, the Jews became prisoners, and their homeland became a plundered and scavenged wasteland.
The persecution of the Jews for resisting pagan oppression was intolerable. People who kept the Jewish faith were starved to death, or were tortured fiendishly and executed. Men who had scrolls of the Law were stabbed to death. Mothers who had their babies circumcised were put to death, and their murdered babies were hung from their necks. The pagan rulers defiled the Temple and used it for orgies and drunken revelry. Under such pressure, many Jews gave up their faith.
Mattathias the priest decided to fight the pagans. He and his sons defied the ruler’s command to sacrifice to pagan idols, then one day in the streets of his hometown, he and his sons publicly killed the ruler’s officer who demanded them to submit, and challenged the other Jews to join them in a war to liberate their nation.
From the hill country of Israel, Mattathias and his sons waged guerrilla warfare against the pagan invaders and the Jews who had sold out. His son Judas was such a good leader in combat that he earned the nickname “Maccabeus” (Hebrew for “hammerer) … and the people soon started calling the whole family “The Maccabees.”
Rubens’ Painting of Judas Maccabee
When Mattathias was about to die, he gathered his sons around him and said, “Arrogance and scorn have now grown strong … My sons, be zealous for the Law and give your lives for the covenant of our fathers … Gather about you all who observe the Law, and you shall avenge the wrongs of your people. Pay back the pagans what they deserve, and observe the precepts of the Law.” He blessed them all and then died.
Judas and his brothers led the Jews to victory against the pagans. In 164 BC, they liberated Jerusalem, and purified the Temple that the pagans had defiled. For eight days Judas and his men celebrated the purification of the Temple and the dedication of its altar … and the small cruet of oil that was supposed to keep the holy lamps lit for only one day kept the Temple illuminated for eight. (Even today, the Jews commemorate this miracle with the holy week of Hanukkah, the Feast of Lights.)
Judas also led prayers for his dead soldiers, to ensure their souls would be pure so they could eventually reach Heaven. The author of the Second Book of Maccabees (2 Macc, 12: 43-46) noted, “In doing this (praying for the dead and taking up a collection for their widows and orphans), he (Judas) acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view… For if he were not expecting the fallen to rise again, it would have been useful and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid award that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin.”
(The books of Maccabees are in the Catholic Bible. Luther opposed them, in part because the above text supports the Catholic and Orthodox belief in Purgatory for the deceased who avoid Hell, but are not saintly enough yet to merit instant entry into Heaven.)
Judas would live only four years more. The pagan armies from Israel’s hostile neighbors never quit trying to invade Israel. Judas and his men would spend the rest of their lives in almost constant warfare against these would-be oppressors.
Even in death Judas was unconquered. His little army was approached by so many invaders that most of his men fled. His captains tried to talk him into retreating, but he replied, “If our time has come, let us die bravely for our kinsmen and not leave a stain on our glory!”
Judas rallied his men, restored their discipline, and formed them into fighting formations. He died in hand-to-hand combat even as his little group was pushing back a force ten times its size.
The Books of Maccabees chronicle how the family members kept taking upon themselves the responsibility of keeping the Jews free. When a Maccabee died, there was another one as brave and as talented to take his place. Judas’ brothers, and the succeeding generations of Maccabees kept the Jews free until almost the time of Christ, when they fell under the power of Rome. Herod the Great (traitor) gave up his faith, betrayed his fellow Jews, and served as the Romans’ puppet princeling. Herod’s men killed John Hyrcanus, the last of the Maccabees.
What the Books of Maccabees do not say is the hardships the Maccabee women endured. We’ll dwell a little on that here.
You ladies out there … imagine being the wife or sweetheart of a Maccabee – a man who had pledged his life to the freedom of your people. Undoubtedly you would be proud … but always fearful for his safety, for he could fall in battle at almost any time. And when your man did die in combat, you had to be prepared to raise your children without him, and carry on as best you could.
But think of how the women in the Maccabees’ lives helped their husbands in their work by being mistresses on the home front … raising children, organizing alms for those whose men who died in battle, bringing charm and love and commitment to their men’s lives , making their men’s lives that much more worth living.
Think also of how well the Maccabee women raised successive generations of Maccabee children. The sons and grandsons and great-grandsons and great-great-grandsons of Judas Maccabee and his brothers did their part to preserve the Jews’ liberty and their freedom to worship God … and they wouldn’t have had the morality to make this choice nor the character to stick with it if their mothers weren’t there day after day teaching them right from wrong and encouraging them to do what was right. The Maccabee women made sure the children would grow into decent adults who would do what their people needed them to do.
The Maccabees should be special not only to the Jews, but to us all, because we as Christians owe them so much. They kept the faith of the Jews alive so they could fulfill their destiny as the only people who worshiped and spread the word of the True God, the people from whom Christ would come into the world, and the people who would provide Him with the apostles and disciples He would need to establish Christianity and make it spread. Even today, they are shining examples of righteous anger and resistance to unjust power, and are examples of wise leaders who liberated their people and tried to lead them according to basic God-given morality instead of the latest silly and sinful tread of the day.
My own Dad, a tough man who served his country in World War II, told me when he was a boy, he got to meet relatives who fought in Ireland’s wars of liberation against the British. He said it was an honor to meet men who had volunteered to carry the cause and the fate of a people on their backs.
This is what the Maccabees mean to the Jews … and should mean to all of us who choose to follow the faith of the Messiah for Whom they prayed and fought so zealously.
SHERLOCK JUSTICE
WE CAN SHOW YOU HOW TO BE YOUR OWN DETECTIVE.
