96 A History of Judaism
brothers and all the assembly of Israel determined that every year at
that season the days of dedication of the altar should be observed with
joy and gladness for eight days,’ marking the origins of the celebration
of Hanukkah.^8
The significance of Judah’s victories for the future of Judaism is hard
to overestimate. Other native cults in the regions around Judaea lost
their distinctive local characteristics as they were reinterpreted in Greek
fashion, but the Maccabean revolt set up a powerful notion of oppos-
ition between Judaism and Hellenism. The notion, which was to
reappear at different times in the later history of Judaism, was in part
the product of the propaganda of Judah’s family in their efforts to estab-
lish themselves in power in Judaea in the decades following the death of
Judah in battle in the autumn of 161 bce.
By the time the First Book of Maccabees was written, probably in the
120s bce, Judaea was being ruled by John Hyrcanus, a grandson of
Mattathias and nephew of Judah Maccabee, and Hyrcanus was in firm
control of an independent Judaea, with the status of High Priest. This
state of pre- eminence had not been easily won by the dynasty of the
Hasmonaeans (as they called themselves, in deference to an ancestor of
Mattathias). Judah had succeeded in restoring the ancestral cult in Jeru-
salem in 164 bce, but a Seleucid garrison remained in the city’s citadel,
and the military forces at the disposal of the Jewish insurgents would
have proved quite incapable of retaining control of the Temple if Anti-
ochus IV had not died while on an eastern campaign in 163 bce and if
the attentions of the Seleucid state had not been distracted by internal
strife. The rival pretenders to the Seleucid throne sought political sup-
port against each other from wherever it might arise, and Judah’s
brothers – first Jonathan and then Simon – cleverly exploited the oppor-
tunities to extort concessions from one pretender or the other.^9
The Hasmonaeans were priests, but, since they did not belong to the
Zadokite line which had provided the High Priests in the Temple since
the time of Solomon’s Temple up to the deposition of Jason by Mene-
laus in 171 bce, they did not immediately seize the high priesthood
upon their assumption of political control. After the rededication of the
Temple by Judah Maccabee, the High Priest was a certain Alcimus,
from the party of the Hellenizers. Despite later traditions to the con-
trary in Josephus, there is no hint in the First Book of Maccabees that
Judah ever became High Priest, and Josephus explicitly stated that the
Temple was without a High Priest for seven years after the death of
Alcimus in 159 bce.^10