deserts, tribes and empires 15
the Jews to continue undisturbed their ancestral worship in Jerusalem,
with a proclamation published throughout the kingdom:
It is unlawful for any foreigner to enter the enclosure of the Temple which
is forbidden to the Jews, except to those of them who are accustomed to
enter after purifying themselves in accordance with the law of the country.
Nor shall anyone bring into the city the flesh of horses or of mules or of
wild or tame asses, or of leopards, foxes or hares or, in general, of any
animals forbidden to the Jews. Nor is it lawful to bring in their skins or
even to breed any of these animals in the city. But only the sacrificial ani-
mals known to their ancestors and necessary for the propitiation of God
shall they be permitted to use. And the person who violates any of these
statutes shall pay the priests a fine of three thousand drachmas of silver.^18
Such toleration of the special taboos of the Jews was not to last. After
factional strife between the Jews for control of the high priesthood in
Jerusalem, which was in the gift of the Seleucid king, some of the Jewish
leaders informed Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the son of Antiochus the Great,
that they wished ‘to abandon their country’s laws’ and ‘to adopt the
Greek way of life’. Antiochus Epiphanes marched against Jerusalem, took
the city and despoiled the Temple. His motivation was greed, because of
the Temple’s wealth, but he did not stop at looting. The king ‘built a pagan
altar upon the altar of the temple and slaughtered pigs on it’ and ordered
the Jews to give up the worship of their own God and to cease their prac-
tice of circumcising their sons, torturing those who refused to obey.
Persecution instigated rebellion, led by an aged priest named Mattathias
and his sons, notably Judah Maccabee. The success of that revolt, and the
purification of the Temple, established the family as a new ruling dynasty,
named ‘Hasmonaean’ after the great- grandfather of Mattathias. They
ruled as High Priests, and in due course also as kings and in one case
(Alexandra, the widow of Alexander Jannaeus) as queen.^19
Josephus’ narrative unsurprisingly became increasingly detailed
closer to his own day. The Hasmonaean regime for a while revelled in
independence from Seleucid control and then in conquests outside the
region of Jerusalem, incorporating Galilee to the north and Idumaea
(the region around Hebron) to the south into the territory of the Jews,
but dissension within the Hasmonaean dynasty gave an opportunity to
the great Roman general Pompey to intervene, capturing Jerusalem
after an intense siege in which he took advantage of the Jews’ observ-
ance of Sabbaths to build up his earthworks. Thus, as Josephus noted
bitterly, ‘we lost our freedom and became subject to the Romans.’^20