Josephus · a new plain-English translation from the Greek
How Cyrus, king of the Persians, released the Jews from Babylon and let them return home, permitting them to build the Temple and giving them funds for it. How the king's governors obstructed them, hindering the work of building the sanctuary. How, after Cyrus died, his son Cambyses took over the government and absolutely forbade the Jews to build the Temple. How Darius, son of Hystaspes, when he became king of the Persians, honored the Jewish nation and rebuilt their Temple. How, after him, his son Xerxes was likewise well disposed toward the Jews. How, in the reign of Artaxerxes, the whole Jewish nation was placed in danger. How Bagoas, the general of the younger Artaxerxes, committed many outrages against the Jews. How Alexander, king of the Macedonians, treated them kindly once he had conquered Judea. This book covers a period of two hundred and forty-three years and five months.
In the first year of the reign of Cyrus — which was the seventieth from the day our people had been driven from their homeland into Babylon — God took pity on the captivity and misfortune of those unhappy people, and, just as he had foretold them through the prophet Jeremiah before the city was destroyed, that after serving Nebuchadnezzar and his descendants and enduring that slavery for seventy years he would restore them again to their ancestral land, and they would build the Temple and enjoy their former prosperity — this he now brought about for them. For he stirred the spirit of Cyrus and moved him to write throughout all Asia as follows: "King Cyrus says this: Since God Most High has appointed me king of the inhabited world, I am persuaded that he is the one whom the nation of the Israelites worships. For he foretold my name through the prophets, and that I would build his Temple in Jerusalem, in the land of Judea."
Cyrus learned this by reading the book that Isaiah had left behind of his prophecy two hundred and ten years earlier; for Isaiah had said, in a hidden utterance, that God spoke thus: "I wish, having appointed Cyrus king over many great nations, to send my people back to their own land and to have my Temple built." This Isaiah prophesied a hundred and forty years before the Temple was torn down. When Cyrus read this and marveled at the divine word, an eager impulse and ambition seized him to carry out what was written. He summoned the most eminent of the Jews in Babylon and told them he permitted them to go to their own homeland, to rebuild the city of Jerusalem and the Temple of God; for God himself, he said, would be their ally, and he would write to the governors and satraps neighboring that region, so that they might contribute gold and silver toward the building of the Temple, and, besides these, livestock for the sacrifices.
When Cyrus announced this to the Israelites, the leaders of the two tribes, Judah and Benjamin, together with the Levites and the priests, set out eagerly for Jerusalem; for many remained behind in Babylon, unwilling to leave their possessions. And when they arrived, all the king's friends assisted them and contributed to the building of the Temple, some gold, others silver, others great numbers of livestock together with horses. They rendered their vows to God and performed the customary sacrifices according to ancient practice, as though the city were being founded anew for them and the old custom of their worship were coming back to life.
Cyrus also sent back to them the vessels of God which King Nebuchadnezzar had plundered from the Temple and carried off to Babylon. He handed these over to be brought by Mithridates, his treasurer, instructing him to give them to Abassar, so that he might keep them until the building of the Temple was finished, and once it was completed, hand them over to the priests and leaders of the people for deposit in the Temple.
Cyrus also sent a letter to the satraps in Syria, reading as follows: "King Cyrus to Sisines and Sarabasanes, greetings. Of the Jews living in my country, I have permitted those who wish to go back to their own homeland, to rebuild the city and to build the Temple of God in Jerusalem on the same site as before. I have also sent down my treasurer Mithridates and Zerubbabel, the leader of the Jews, so that they may lay the foundations of the Temple and build it sixty cubits high and the same in breadth, with three courses of polished stone and one of native timber, and likewise an altar on which they shall sacrifice to God. I wish the expense for this to be met from my own funds."
"And the vessels which King Nebuchadnezzar plundered from the Temple I have sent, having handed them over to Mithridates the treasurer and to Zerubbabel the leader of the Jews, so that they may carry them to Jerusalem and restore them to the Temple of God. Their number is as follows: fifty golden bowls for cooling wine, four hundred of silver; fifty golden goblets, four hundred of silver; fifty golden pitchers, five hundred of silver; forty golden libation bowls, three hundred of silver; thirty golden phials, two thousand four hundred of silver; and a thousand other large vessels besides. I also grant them the customary allowance from their forefathers' time of livestock and wine and oil — two hundred and fifty-five thousand drachmas — and for fine flour, twenty thousand five hundred artabas of wheat. I order that the supply of these be drawn from the tribute of Samaria."
"The priests in Jerusalem shall offer these sacred things according to the laws of Moses, and in presenting them shall pray to God for the safety of the king and his family, that the kingdom of the Persians may endure. As for those who disobey these orders and set them aside, I wish them to be crucified and their property confiscated to the crown." Such was the content of the letter. Of those who returned from the captivity and gathered at Jerusalem there were forty-two thousand four hundred and sixty-two.
While the foundations of the Temple were being laid and the people were showing great eagerness for its construction, the surrounding nations, and especially the Cutheans, whom Shalmaneser, king of the Assyrians, had brought from Persia and Media and settled in Samaria when he removed the people of Israel from their land, urged the satraps and overseers to hinder the Jews both in restoring the city and in building the Temple. And these officials, being corrupted with money, sold to the Cutheans their own neglect and laxity regarding the Jews' construction; for Cyrus, occupied with other wars, knew nothing of this, and, having gone on campaign against the Massagetae, soon after met his death.
When Cambyses, Cyrus's son, took over the kingdom, the people in Syria, Phoenicia, Ammanitis, Moab, and Samaria wrote a letter to Cambyses stating the following: "Master, your servants Rathymus, who records everything that is done, and Semelius the scribe, and the judges of the council in Syria and Phoenicia. You should know, O king, that the Jews who were led away to Babylon have come into our territory, and are building the rebellious and wicked city, repairing its marketplaces and walls, and raising up a temple. Be assured that once these things are done, they will not consent to pay tribute or submit to authority, but will resist even kings, preferring to rule rather than obey."
"Since, then, the work on the Temple is underway and being pursued eagerly, we thought it right to write to you, O king, and not overlook the matter, so that you might examine the records of your ancestors; for you will find in them that the Jews were rebels and enemies of kings, and that their city — for this very reason — lies desolate even now. We also thought it right to inform you of this, in case you are unaware of it: once the city is resettled in this way and has recovered the circuit of its walls, the road to Coele-Syria and Phoenicia will be closed to you."
When Cambyses read the letter — being by nature wicked — he was stirred by what was reported, and wrote back as follows: "King Cambyses to Rathymus, who records events, and to Beelzemus and Semelius the scribe, and to the rest who are associated with them and who live in Samaria and Phoenicia, says this. Having read the letter you sent, I ordered the records of my ancestors to be examined, and it was found that the city has always been hostile to kings, and that its inhabitants have caused uprisings and wars, and that their kings, whom we know to have been powerful and violent men, exacted tribute from Coele-Syria and Phoenicia. I have therefore given orders not to allow the Jews to build the city, lest their wickedness increase further — the wickedness which they have persistently shown toward kings."
When this letter was read, Rathymus and Semelius the scribe and their associates immediately leapt onto horses and hurried to Jerusalem, bringing a large force with them, and stopped the Jews from building the city and the Temple. And this work was suspended until the second year of the reign of Darius, king of the Persians — that is, for nine more years; for Cambyses, after reigning six years, in the course of which he subdued Egypt, died at Damascus on his way back.
After the killing of the Magi, who for one year had seized the Persian government following the death of Cambyses, the so-called seven noble houses of the Persians appointed Darius, son of Hystaspes, as king. While still a private citizen, he had vowed to God that, if he became king, he would send all the vessels of God still remaining in Babylon to the Temple in Jerusalem. It happened that at that very time Zerubbabel, who had been appointed leader of the captive Jews, had come from Jerusalem to Darius; for he had long enjoyed friendship with the king, on account of which he had, together with two others, been judged worthy to serve as one of his bodyguards, and so obtained the honor he had hoped for.
In the first year of his reign, Darius entertained lavishly and with great preparation both those of his own household and the visitors from abroad, the governors of the Medes, the satraps of Persia, the toparchs of India as far as Ethiopia, and the generals of the hundred and twenty-seven satrapies. When they had feasted to satiety and fullness, they each withdrew to their own quarters to sleep. But King Darius went to his bed and, after resting only a short while in the night, woke up, and, unable to fall asleep again, fell into conversation with his three bodyguards. To whichever of them should speak most truly and wisely on a question he himself intended to put to them, he promised to grant a prize: to wear victor's purple, to drink from golden cups, to sleep on a golden couch, to have a chariot with a golden bridle, a headdress of fine linen, and a golden necklace; and, after himself, this man would hold the seat of highest honor for his wisdom, and, he said, would be called "my kinsman." Having promised them these gifts, he asked the first whether wine is the strongest thing, the second whether kings are, and the third whether women are, or truth rather than these. Having set this question before them to consider, he fell silent.
At dawn he summoned the nobles, satraps, and toparchs of Persia and Media, and, taking his seat where he was accustomed to conduct business, ordered each of the bodyguards, in the hearing of all, to declare his opinion on the question set before them.
The first began to speak, demonstrating the power of wine in this way: "Gentlemen," he said, "in judging the strength of wine, I find that it surpasses everything, in this manner: it deceives the minds of those who drink it and leads them astray, and it makes the mind of a king like that of an orphan child in need of a guardian, and it rouses a slave's spirit to the boldness of a free man, and it makes the poor man's condition equal to the rich man's; for, once it has entered them, it transforms and remakes their souls, and it quenches the grief of those in misfortune, and brings to those burdened with others' debts a forgetting of them, making them seem to themselves the wealthiest of all men, so that they utter nothing trivial but speak only of talents and the sort of names that belong to the fortunate. Moreover, it renders generals and kings insensible, and strips away the memory of friends and companions; for it arms men even against those dearest to them and makes them seem the greatest strangers of all. And when men have become sober again, and wine has left them after a night's sleep, they rise knowing nothing of what they did while drunk. On these grounds I judge wine to be the most overpowering and violent thing of all."
When the first man, having spoken these things, finished declaring his view on the strength of wine, the one after him began to speak about the power of the king, showing this to be the strongest, surpassing all other things that seem to derive their power from either force or intelligence. He took up his demonstration from this point: he said that men rule over all things, and that they force even the land and the sea to be useful to them for whatever they wish; and over these men the kings rule and hold authority; and those who have mastery over the strongest and mightiest creature of all — man — would rightly be judged to have unsurpassed power and strength. Indeed, when they command wars and dangers for their subjects, they are obeyed, and when they send men against their enemies, these men, out of respect for the kings' power, comply; and when kings order mountains to be leveled and walls and towers torn down, those who are ordered submit both to being killed and to killing, so as not to seem to transgress the king's commands, and once victorious they bring the spoils of war to the king. And those who do not serve as soldiers but instead work the land and plow it, once they have labored and endured all the hardship of their work and reaped the harvest and gathered in the crops, bring their tribute to the king. Whatever he says and commands is done without exception, none daring to overstep it. Further, the king himself sleeps steeped in every luxury and pleasure, while he is guarded by men who stay awake, bound as if by fear; for not one of them dares to leave him sleeping and go off to see to his own affairs, but treats guarding the king as his one task,
regarding it as one of his essential duties to keep watch over the king, remains at his post for that reason. How, then, could the king fail to seem to surpass everyone else in power, when so vast a crowd obeys him at his command?
When this man too had fallen silent, the third speaker, Zorobabel, began to instruct them about women and about truth, speaking as follows: "Wine is strong, and so is the king, whom all obey, but women are more powerful still than either. It was a woman who brought the king himself into the light, and women are the ones who planted the vines that make the wine, for they are the ones who bear children and raise them. In short there is nothing we have that does not come from them, for they weave our clothing for us, and it is through them that our households are managed and cared for. We cannot be separated from women. We may amass great quantities of gold and silver and other costly and coveted things, but when we catch sight of a beautiful woman we abandon all of that, gape at the sight before us, and are ready to give up everything we own just to win and enjoy her beauty. We forsake father and mother and the very land that raised us for the sake of women, and we often forget those dearest to us on their account, and endure giving up our lives along with them. You can best appreciate the power of women this way: after all our labor and hardship, over land and sea, when something remains to us from our toil, do we not bring it and hand it over to women as though to mistresses? And I myself once saw the king, master of so much, being slapped by Rhabezacus, daughter of Themasius, his concubine, and enduring it while she took the diadem from his head and set it on her own, and smiling when she smiled and scowling when she was angry, flattering the woman and reconciling with her through these changes of mood, humbling himself utterly whenever he saw her displeased."
While the satraps and governors looked at one another over the matter of truth, he began to speak again: "I have shown," he said, "how strong women are, yet even they, and the king as well, are weaker than truth. For if the earth is vast, and the sky is high, and the sun swift, and all these things move according to the will of God, and he is true and just, then for that same reason truth must be held to be the strongest thing, with nothing unjust able to prevail against it. Furthermore, all other things that possess strength are mortal and short-lived, but truth is a thing immortal and eternal. It offers us not beauty that withers with time, nor wealth that fortune can take away, but justice and lawfulness, distinguishing what is right from what is unjust and refuting the latter."
With this Zorobabel concluded his speech on truth, and when the crowd shouted out that he had spoken best of all, and that truth alone possesses a strength that is unchanging and never grows old, the king ordered him to ask for something beyond what he himself had already promised, for he would grant it to a man proven wise and shown to be more intelligent than the rest: "You shall sit beside me," he said, "and be called my kinsman." When the king said this, Zorobabel reminded him of the vow he had made, should he obtain the kingdom: to build Jerusalem, to construct the temple of God within it, and to restore the vessels that Nebuchadnezzar had plundered and carried off to Babylon. "And this," he said, "is my request, which you now allow me to make as one judged wise and intelligent."
Delighted at this, the king rose and kissed him, and wrote to the toparchs and satraps ordering them to escort Zorobabel and those with him who were about to set out for the building of the temple. He also wrote to the people of Syria and Phoenicia to cut cedar timber and bring it down from Lebanon to Jerusalem, to help build the city with him, and he decreed that all the captives who went off to Judea should be free. He forbade his stewards and satraps to impose royal levies on the Jews, and released to them, free of tribute, the whole of the territory they should be able to occupy. He further ordered the Idumaeans, the Samaritans, and the people of Coele-Syria to give up the villages of the Jews that they held, and moreover that fifty talents be given toward the building of the temple. He permitted them to offer the customary sacrifices, and ordered that the whole provision for them, including the sacred vestments in which the high priest and the priests serve God, be furnished from his own funds, and that instruments be given to the Levites for their hymns to God. He also ordered that allotments of land be given to the guards of the city and of the temple, and a fixed sum of money each year for their sustenance, and that the vessels be sent, and everything that Cyrus before him had intended concerning the restoration of the Jews, Darius likewise ordained.
Having obtained all this from the king, Zorobabel went out from the palace, and looking up to heaven began to give thanks to God for the wisdom and for the victory he had won over it in Darius's presence: "For I would not have been thought worthy of these things," he said, "had you not, Master, granted me your favor." Having given this thanks to God for his present blessings, and having prayed that God show himself the same toward what was to come, he came to Babylon and brought his countrymen the good news of what the king had granted. When they heard it they gave thanks to God for restoring their ancestral land to them once again, and turning to drinking and feasting, they spent seven days in celebration, rejoicing over the recovery and rebirth of their homeland.
After this they chose the leaders who were to go up to Jerusalem from the ancestral tribes, together with their wives, children, and pack animals, and these, with Darius sending an escort, traveled all the way to Jerusalem amid joy and delight, with singing to the harp and the flute and the clash of cymbals around them. The rest of the Jews who remained behind escorted them on their way amid rejoicing. And so they departed, each ancestral house numbering a fixed count. I have not thought it right to list the names of the ancestral houses, so as not to distract the minds of my readers from the connected thread of events and make the narrative hard to follow. The sum total of those who set out, of those twelve years old and above from the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, was four hundred sixty-two thousand and eight thousand more, and the Levites numbered seventy-four, while the women and infants together numbered forty-seven thousand seven hundred forty-two. Besides these,
there were Levite singers, one hundred twenty-eight; gatekeepers, one hundred ten; temple slaves, three hundred ninety-two; and, in addition to these, others who claimed to be Israelites but could not demonstrate their lineage, six hundred fifty-two. Also excluded were priests who had taken wives from among those held in dishonor, whose descent neither they themselves could state nor was it found in the genealogies of the Levites and priests; these numbered about five hundred twenty-five. The multitude of servants who accompanied those going up to Jerusalem numbered seven thousand three hundred thirty-seven, male and female singers two hundred forty-five, camels four hundred thirty-five, and pack animals five thousand five hundred twenty-five. The leader of this numbered multitude was Zorobabel, son of Salathiel, one of the sons of David descended from the tribe of Judah, and Jesus son of Josedek the high priest. In addition to these, Mordecai and Serebaeus, chosen leaders from among the people, also contributed a hundred minas of gold and five thousand of silver. In this way the priests, the Levites, and a portion of the whole people of the Jews who had been in Babylon settled in Jerusalem, while the rest of the multitude withdrew to their own homelands.
In the seventh month after their departure from Babylon, the high priest Jesus and Zorobabel the leader sent word around and gathered together those from the countryside to Jerusalem, everyone in full attendance and holding nothing back, and they built an altar on the site where one had previously stood, so that they might offer the customary sacrifices upon it to God according to the laws of Moses. In doing this they were not welcomed by the neighboring nations, all of whom were hostile toward them. They also observed the Feast of Tabernacles at that time, just as the lawgiver had ordained concerning it, and afterward the offerings and the so-called perpetual sacrifices, the sabbath sacrifices, and those of all the sacred feasts, and those who had made vows fulfilled them by sacrificing from the new moon of the seventh month onward. They also began the building of the temple, giving large sums of money to the stonecutters and carpenters and for the provisioning of those brought in for the work, and the Sidonians were glad and eager to bring down the cedar timber from Lebanon, binding the logs together and constructing rafts to carry them to the harbor of Joppa, for this Cyrus had first ordered, and now it was being done at Darius's command.
In the second year of their return to Jerusalem, in the second month, the construction of the temple was pressed forward, and having raised the foundations on the new moon of the second month of the second year, they built it up, placing in charge of the works those of the Levites who had already reached twenty years of age, together with Jesus and his sons and brothers, and Zodmoel, brother of Judas son of Aminadab, and his sons. The temple, thanks to the full diligence of those entrusted with its oversight, was completed sooner than anyone would have expected. When the sanctuary was finished, the priests, adorned in their customary vestments, and the Levites and the sons of Asaph, rose to the sound of trumpets and sang hymns to God, in the manner that David had first established for his praise.
But the priests and Levites and the elders of the ancestral houses, recalling in memory the former temple, how great and costly it had been, and seeing the one now built, poorer because of their poverty than the one built long ago, and reckoning how far they had fallen short of their ancient prosperity and of the temple's worth, grew downcast, and unable to master their grief over this, were driven to weeping and tears. But the people were content with what they had, giving no thought and no memory to the earlier temple, nor tormenting themselves with comparison to it as though what they now had was somehow less, and the crowd's joy drowned out the sound of the trumpets, along with the wailing of the elders and priests, who felt the temple was inferior to the one destroyed.
When the Samaritans heard the sound of the trumpets, they ran together, wanting to learn the cause of the commotion, for they happened to be hostile toward both the tribe of Judah and that of Benjamin. Learning that those who had been carried captive to Babylon were rebuilding the temple, they came to Zorobabel and Jesus and the leaders of the ancestral houses, asking to be permitted to help build the temple with them and to share in the construction. "For we worship God no less than they do," they said, "and we pray to him above all, and we have been devoted to this worship ever since the time when Salmanassar, king of the Assyrians, brought us here from Chouthia and Media."
When they had made these words, Zorobabel and Jesus the high priest and the leaders of the ancestral houses of the Israelites answered them that it was impossible for them to share in the building, since they themselves had been ordered to build the temple, first by Cyrus, and now by Darius, but that they granted them leave to worship, and this alone was to be common between them, if they so wished, and to all people who came to the temple, that they might worship God there. Hearing this, the Chuthaeans, for that is the name the Samaritans bear, took offense, and persuaded the peoples of Syria among the satraps to petition, in the same manner as they had done earlier under Cyrus and then under Cambyses, to halt the construction of the temple, and they worked to bring about delay and postponement for the Jews concerning it.
At this time, when Sisinnes, governor of Syria and Phoenicia, and Sarobazanes, together with certain others, had gone up to Jerusalem, and the leaders of the Jews were asked by what authority they were building the temple in this way, so that it was more like a fortress than a sanctuary, and why they had surrounded the city with such strongly fortified porticoes and walls, Zorobabel and the high priest Jesus said that they were servants of the greatest God, and that this temple had been built for him by a king of theirs, blessed and surpassing all others in virtue, and had stood for a long time. But when their fathers had sinned against God, Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Babylonians and Chaldeans, took the city by force, tore it down, plundered and burned the temple, and carried the people off captive to Babylon; and Cyrus, who ruled Babylonia and Persia after him, wrote an order to rebuild the temple, and, handing over to Zorobabel and to Mithridates the treasurer all the votive offerings and vessels that Nebuchadnezzar had carried off from it, ordered them to be brought to Jerusalem and restored again to the temple, once it had been rebuilt. He had ordered this to be done at once,
commanding Sabasares to go up to Jerusalem and take charge of the building of the temple; and this man, after receiving the letter from Cyrus, came at once and laid the foundations, and from that time it has been under construction right up to now, left incomplete because of the malice of its enemies. "If, then, you wish and think it right, write this to Darius, so that upon examining the royal archives he may find that we have said nothing false." When Zorobabel and the high priest had said this, Sisinnes and those with him decided not to halt the building until this had been reported to Darius, and they wrote to him about it at once. Meanwhile the Jews cowered in fear, dreading that the king might change his mind about the building of Jerusalem and the temple,
At that time there were two prophets among them, Haggai and Zechariah, who urged the people to take courage and to fear nothing untoward from the Persians, since God himself was foretelling these things. Trusting the prophets, they pressed on with the building without slackening a single day. But Darius, when the Samaritans wrote to him accusing the Jews by letter, claiming that they were fortifying the city and building the temple to look more like a fortress than a sanctuary, that these proceedings would not be to his advantage, and moreover producing the letters of Cambyses by which he had forbidden the building of the temple, learned from them that the restoration of Jerusalem would not be safe for his affairs. And when he had also read the documents brought by Sisinnes and his companions,
he ordered a search made in the royal records concerning these matters. A scroll was found at Ecbatana, in the fortress in Media, in which the following was written: in the first year of his reign King Cyrus had ordered the temple in Jerusalem built, along with the altar, sixty cubits high and the same in breadth, with courses of stone, three of hewn stone and one of native timber, the expense to be met from the king's own funds; and the vessels which Nebuchadnezzar had plundered and carried off to Babylon were to be restored to the people of Jerusalem. Oversight of these matters was entrusted to Anabassar, prefect and governor of Syria and Phoenicia, and to his colleagues, on condition that they
keep away from the place themselves and allow the servants of God, the Jews and their leaders, to build the temple. He further ordered them to assist the work, and to pay the Jews, from the tribute of the region under their charge, for sacrifices — bulls, rams, lambs, kids, fine flour, oil, wine, and whatever else
the priests should specify — and that the Jews should pray for the safety of the king and of the Persians. Anyone who transgressed any of these orders, once seized, was to be crucified, and his property confiscated to the royal estate. Cyrus had further prayed to God that if anyone should attempt to hinder the building of the temple, God himself would strike him down and restrain him from the wrong. Having found this
in the memoranda of Cyrus, Darius wrote back to Sisinnes and his companions in these words:
"King Darius to Sisinnes the governor, and to Sarabazanes and their colleagues, greeting. I have sent you the copy of the letter which I found among the memoranda of Cyrus, and I wish everything done exactly as it states there. Farewell."
On learning the king's intention from this letter, Sisinnes and his companions resolved to carry out the rest accordingly. They now oversaw the sacred works, joining with the elders of the Jews and the rulers of the community, and the construction of the temple went forward with great zeal, Haggai and Zechariah prophesying by the command of God and with the sanction of both Cyrus and Darius. It was completed
in seven years. In the ninth year of Darius's reign, on the twenty-third of the twelfth month — called Adar among us, Dystros among the Macedonians — the priests, the Levites, and the rest of the multitude of Israelites offered sacrifices renewing their former blessings, now that the captivity was past and the sanctuary had been received back restored: a hundred bulls, two hundred rams,
four hundred lambs, and twelve goats for each tribe — for that is the number of the tribes of Israel — on behalf of the sins each tribe had committed. The priests and Levites also stationed doorkeepers at each gate according to the laws of Moses, for the Jews had also built the colonnades running around the temple, on the inner side of the sanctuary. When the feast of Unleavened Bread arrived, in the first month —
called Xanthicus by the Macedonians, Nisan among us — the whole people streamed in from the villages to the city, and kept the festival, purifying themselves together with their wives and children according to the ancestral law, and having offered the sacrifice called the Passover on the fourteenth of the same month, they feasted for seven days, sparing no expense, but also
bringing burnt offerings to God and performing thank offerings, in return for which the divine will had led them home, longing as they were, to their ancestral land and to the laws it held, and had made the disposition of the Persian king favorable toward them. Those who thus lavished sacrifices and devotion on God settled in Jerusalem, living under a constitution that was aristocratic
with an admixture of oligarchy, for the high priests presided over affairs until it happened that the descendants of the Hasmoneans came to reign as kings. Before the captivity and the exile, they had been governed by kings, beginning first with Saul and David, for five hundred and thirty-two years, six months, and ten days; and before these kings, rulers called judges and single leaders had governed them, and living under this
arrangement they passed more than five hundred years after the death of Moses and of Joshua the general. Such, then, was the state of the Jews who had been brought safely back from the captivity, in the times of Cyrus and Darius. The Samaritans, however, hostile toward them and malicious, did the Jews much harm, relying on their wealth and claiming kinship with the Persians, since
they too came from there. Whatever the king had ordered paid to the Jews out of the tribute for their sacrifices, they were unwilling to provide, having governors who were only too eager to assist and cooperate with them in this; and whatever other harm they could do the Jews, either themselves or through others, they did not shrink from doing. So the people of Jerusalem resolved to send an embassy to King Darius
to bring charges against the Samaritans, and Zerubbabel and four other leaders went as ambassadors. When the king had learned from the ambassadors the accusations and charges they brought against the Samaritans, he gave them a letter to carry to the governors of Samaria, and dismissed the council. What was written was as follows:
"King Darius to Tanganas and Sambas, governors, and to Sadrakes and Boudon of the Samaritans, and to the rest of their fellow servants in Samaria. Zerubbabel, Ananias, and Mordecai, ambassadors of the Jews, have accused you of obstructing them in the building of the temple and of not supplying what I ordered you to spend on their sacrifices. I wish you, therefore, upon reading this letter, to supply them from the royal treasury of the tribute of
Samaria everything useful for sacrifices, as the priests require, so that they may not fail to sacrifice daily nor to pray to God for me and for the Persians." Such was the content of the letter. When Darius died, his son Xerxes succeeded to the kingdom, and inherited from his father his piety and honor toward God, for
he carried on everything concerning worship exactly as his father had, and was most eager in his regard for the Jews. At that time the high priest was Joakim, son of Jeshua. There was also in Babylon a righteous man enjoying a fine reputation among the multitude, called the foremost priest of God, named Ezra, who, being thoroughly versed in the laws of Moses, became a friend
to King Xerxes. Deciding to go up to Jerusalem and to bring with him some of the Jews then living in Babylon, he asked the king to give him a letter to the satraps of Syria, by which he would be made known to them for who he was. The king wrote to the satraps in the following terms:
"King of kings Xerxes to Ezra, priest and reader of the laws of God, greeting. Considering it an act of my own humanity that those who wish, from among the Jewish nation and the Levites in my kingdom, should set out together for Jerusalem, I have given this order, and let whoever wishes depart, as has seemed good both to me and to my seven counselors, so that they may look into the affairs of Judea in accordance with the law of God, and carry gifts to the God of the Israelites,
which I myself and my friends have vowed; and let all the silver and gold found in the country of Babylon that has been dedicated to God be carried to Jerusalem for God, for the sacrifices, and whatever else you wish to have made of silver and gold, you are permitted to do, together with your brethren. The sacred vessels given to you, you shall dedicate, and
whatever further you conceive of, you shall have made as well, drawing the expense from the royal treasury. I have also written to the treasurers of Syria and Phoenicia, that they attend to whatever is requested by Ezra the priest and reader of the laws of God. And so that no anger may fall upon me or my descendants from the divine, I require all
things be fulfilled for God according to the law, up to a hundred cors of wheat. And I say to you further, that you shall impose neither tribute nor anything else oppressive or burdensome upon the priests, the Levites, the sacred singers, the doorkeepers, the temple servants, or the scribes of the temple. And you, Ezra, according to the wisdom of God, appoint judges, so that
they may render judgment in all Syria and Phoenicia for those who know your law, and for those who do not, you shall provide instruction, so that if any of your countrymen transgresses the law of God or the royal law, he shall suffer punishment, as one who transgresses not through ignorance but knowingly, in bold defiance and contempt. They shall be punished either by death or by a fine
of money. Farewell." On receiving this letter, Ezra was overjoyed and began to worship God, acknowledging him as the author of the king's kindness toward him, and for this reason said that all the gratitude belonged to God. Having read the letter to the Jews present in Babylon, he kept the original himself but sent a copy of it to all his countrymen
who lived in Media. When these learned of the king's piety toward God and his goodwill toward Ezra, all of them loved him exceedingly, and many took up their possessions and came to Babylon, longing to go down to Jerusalem. But the whole body of the people of Israel remained in the country; and that is why two tribes now happen
to be subject to the Romans, in Asia and in Europe, while the ten tribes are beyond the Euphrates to this day, countless myriads whose number cannot be known. To Ezra came priests and Levites and doorkeepers and sacred singers and temple servants in great numbers. Having gathered those from the captivity on the far side of the Euphrates, and having spent three
days there, he proclaimed a fast for them, so that they might pray to God for their safety and that nothing untoward should befall them on the road, whether from enemies or from some other difficulty; for Ezra, having already told the king that God would bring them safely through, had not thought it right to ask him for cavalry to escort them. Having made
their prayers, they set out from the Euphrates on the twelfth of the first month, in the seventh year of the reign of Xerxes, and arrived at Jerusalem in the fifth month of the same year. Ezra at once handed over the sacred funds to the treasurers, who were of the priestly family: six hundred and fifty talents of silver, silver vessels weighing a hundred talents, gold vessels weighing twenty talents, and bronze vessels
more valuable than gold, weighing twelve talents; for these had been given by the king, his counselors, and all the Israelites remaining in Babylon. Having handed these over to the priests, Ezra offered to God the sacrifices customarily made from burnt offerings: twelve bulls for the common safety of the people, ninety rams, seventy-two lambs, and twelve goats for the remission of sins committed.
He also delivered the king's letters to the king's stewards and to the governors of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia. Being obliged to do what he had ordered, they honored the nation and cooperated with it in every need. All this, then, Ezra himself had planned, and it succeeded for him, since God, I think, had judged him worthy of
what he desired, on account of his goodness and righteousness. Some time later, however, certain men came to him with accusations, saying that some of the people, and even some of the priests and Levites, had transgressed the constitution and broken the ancestral laws by taking foreign wives, and had thereby thrown the priestly line into confusion, begging him to come to the defense of the laws, lest a common wrath fall on all and cast them once more into calamity. At once, in his grief, he tore
his garment, tore at his hair, tore at his beard in his distress, and threw himself to the ground, because the foremost men of the people had incurred this charge. But reflecting that if he ordered them to cast out their wives and the children born of them, he would not be heeded, he remained lying on the ground. And all the
moderate men ran to him, weeping themselves and sharing in the grief at what had happened. Rising from the ground, Ezra stretched out his hands to heaven and said he was ashamed to lift up his eyes, because of the sins the people had committed, who had cast from memory what had befallen our fathers on account of their impiety; and he called on God to preserve some seed
and remnant out of their present calamity and captivity, and to restore it once more to Jerusalem and to its own land, and to compel the kings of the Persians to take pity on them, and to forgive the sins now committed — worthy of death though they were — and, in view of God's goodness, to release even such men from punishment. And with this he ceased from his prayers.
While all who had come to him with their wives and children were still lamenting, a certain Achonius, a leading man among the Jerusalemites, came forward and said that they had sinned by taking wives from other peoples, and urged Ezra to put them all under oath to send these women away, along with the children born of them, and to have anyone who would not obey the law punished. Persuaded by this, Ezra had the heads of the priestly, Levitical, and Israelite clans swear to send away their wives and children, following Achonius's advice.
Once he had taken the oaths, he went at once from the temple to the chamber of John son of Eliashib, and ate nothing at all that day for grief, remaining there. A proclamation was then made that all who had returned from the captivity should assemble at Jerusalem, and that anyone who failed to appear within two or three days would be excluded from the community and would have his property confiscated by decision of the elders. So they assembled from the territory of Judah and Benjamin within the three days, on the twentieth of the ninth month, which the Hebrews call Xenios and the Macedonians Apellaios. They sat in the open court of the temple, the elders present as well, all miserable from the cold.
Ezra rose and accused them of having broken the law by marrying women not of their own people, but said that they would now do what was pleasing to God and advantageous to themselves by sending their wives away. They all cried out that they would do this, but said that the crowd was large, the season of the year wintry, and the task not one to be finished in a single day, or even a second. "Rather, let the leaders among them, and those living with foreign women, come forward, taking time for it, along with elders chosen from whatever place they wish, who will examine the number of those who have married." This being resolved, they began on the new moon of the tenth month to search out those living with foreign wives, and continued until the new moon of the following month.
In this inquiry they found many among the descendants of the high priest Jeshua, the priests, the Levites, and the Israelites who, giving little weight to observance of the law or to their own affection for these women, at once sent them away, and, seeking to appease God, offered sacrifices, slaughtering rams to him. It did not seem necessary to us to record their names. Having thus corrected this offense concerning the marriages of the men named, Ezra purified the practice surrounding them, so that from then on it remained fixed.
In the seventh month, when they were celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles and nearly the whole people had gathered for it, they went up to the open area of the temple by the gate facing east, and asked Ezra to read them the laws of Moses. Standing in the middle of the crowd, he read from the beginning of the day until midday. As they listened to the laws being read, they were taught to be just for the present and the future, but they grieved over the past and were moved to tears, reflecting among themselves that they would have suffered none of the evils they had experienced if they had kept the law.
Seeing them in this state, Ezra told them to go home and not weep, for it was a festival and weeping was not permitted on it; it was not lawful. He urged them instead to turn to feasting and to do what suited the festival and was pleasing to it, and told them that their repentance and grief over their past offenses would secure them safety and protection against anything similar happening again. At Ezra's urging they began to keep the festival, and doing so for eight days in booths, they returned to their homes with hymns to God, grateful to Ezra for correcting the violations of their civic order. It fell to him, after gaining this reputation among the people, to die in old age and be buried with great honor in Jerusalem. About the same time the high priest Joakim also died, and his son Eliashib succeeded to the high priesthood.
One of the Jews taken captive, a cupbearer of King Xerxes named Nehemiah, was walking before the Persian capital of Susa when he overheard some strangers who had just arrived in the city from a long journey speaking to one another in Hebrew. He approached them and asked where they had come from. When they answered that they had come from Judea, he began to ask further how the people and the capital, Jerusalem, were faring. When they said things were bad—for the walls had been razed to the ground, and the surrounding nations were doing the Jews much harm, overrunning and plundering the country by day and doing damage by night, so that many had been carried off captive from the country and from Jerusalem itself, and the roads were found full of corpses every day—Nehemiah wept in pity for the misfortune of his countrymen, and looking up to heaven said, "How long, Master, will you look on while our nation suffers this, becoming the spoil and plunder of everyone?"
While he lingered at the gate lamenting these things, someone came forward and told him that the king was already about to recline for dinner. He hurried at once, just as he was, without even washing, to attend the king at his drinking. When after dinner the king relaxed and, in a happier mood, looked at Nehemiah and saw him downcast, he asked why he was so gloomy. Nehemiah, having prayed to God to grant him favor and persuasiveness as he spoke, said, "How, O king, can I not appear like this, and not grieve in my soul, when I hear that in my homeland Jerusalem, where the tombs and monuments of my ancestors lie, the walls have been thrown to the ground and its gates burned? Grant me the favor of going there to rebuild the wall and to complete what remains of the temple."
The king agreed to grant the favor, and to send letters to the satraps instructing them to honor him and to provide every supply for whatever he wished. "Stop grieving now," he said, "and serve us joyfully from now on." So Nehemiah, having bowed in worship to God and thanked the king for his promise, cleared the gloom and distress from his face through his pleasure at what had been promised. The next day the king summoned him and gave him a letter to carry to Addaeus, the governor of Syria, Phoenicia, and Samaria, in which he had written concerning the honor due Nehemiah and the supplies for the building work.
So, having come to Babylon and taken with him many of his countrymen who followed him willingly, he arrived at Jerusalem in the twenty-fifth year of Xerxes's reign. Having shown God the letters, he delivered them to Addaeus and the other governors, and, calling together all the people to Jerusalem, he stood in the middle of the temple and addressed them in these words: "Men of Judea, you know that God has remained faithful in remembrance of our fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and through their righteousness has not abandoned his providence for you. Indeed, he helped me obtain authority from the king to raise your wall and to complete what remains of the temple."
"I want you to know clearly the hostility of the surrounding nations toward us, and that if they learn we are eager about this building work, they will oppose it and contrive many obstacles against it. So trust in God first, as those who will withstand their hatred as well, and neither by day nor by night give up the building, but with all diligence keep the work going continuously, since the time is our own." Having said this, he at once ordered the officials to measure the wall and to distribute the labor on it among the people by village and by city, according to what each could manage, and, promising that he himself with his own household would join in the building, he dismissed the assembly. And the Jews prepared themselves for the work. They had been called by this name from the day they went up from Babylon, from the tribe of Judah, which, being the first to come to those regions, gave its name to both the people and the land.
When the Ammonites, Moabites, Samaritans, and all who dwelt in Coele-Syria heard that the building of the walls was being pressed forward, they took it hard, and kept contriving plots against the Jews to hinder their purpose. They killed many of the Jews and sought to destroy Nehemiah himself, hiring some foreigners to kill him. They also threw the people into fear and confusion, spreading rumors that many nations were about to make war on them, and, terrified by this, the people came close to abandoning the building. But none of this shook Nehemiah from his zeal for the work; rather, surrounding himself with a body of guards for his protection, he endured tirelessly, insensible to hardship because of his desire for the work.
So intently and providently did he look to his own safety, not out of fear of death, but out of conviction that after his death the walls would never again rise for his fellow citizens. He next ordered the builders to work girded with weapons: the builder carried a sword, as did the one carrying materials, and he had shields set close beside them, and stationed trumpeters at intervals of five hundred feet, instructing them, if the enemy appeared, to signal this to the people so that they might arm themselves and fight, and not be caught unarmed. He himself went about the circuit of the city by night, sparing himself nothing in labor, diet, or sleep, for he did none of these things for pleasure but out of necessity.
And he endured this hardship for two years and four months, for in that time the wall of Jerusalem was rebuilt, in the twenty-eighth year of Xerxes's reign, in the ninth month. When the walls were finished, Nehemiah and the people sacrificed to God for the building of them and spent eight days feasting. The nations settled in Syria were distressed when they heard that the building of the walls had reached its end.
Seeing the city thinly populated, Nehemiah urged the priests and Levites to leave the countryside and move into the city and remain there, building houses for them at his own expense; and he ordered the farming population to bring the tithes of their produce to Jerusalem, so that the priests and Levites, having a continuous supply of food, would not abandon their service. The people gladly obeyed what Nehemiah ordered, and in this way the city of Jerusalem came to be more populous. Having accomplished many other good and praiseworthy things, Nehemiah died, having reached old age. He was a man of good and just nature, and most devoted to his countrymen, leaving behind an eternal monument in the walls of Jerusalem. These things happened, then, in the reign of Xerxes.
When Xerxes died, the kingdom passed to his son Cyrus, whom the Greeks call Artaxerxes. Under his rule the entire nation of the Jews, with their wives and children, came close to perishing. We shall soon explain the reason, for it is fitting to relate first the affairs of the king, how he married a Jewish woman of royal descent, who is said to have saved our nation.
When Artaxerxes had taken the kingdom and appointed governors over the satrapies, one hundred and twenty-seven in number, extending from India to Ethiopia, in the third year of his reign he received his friends, the Persian nobles, and their leaders, and entertained them lavishly, as befits a king wishing to display his wealth, for one hundred and eighty days. Then he feasted the nations and their envoys at Susa for seven days.
The banquet was arranged in this manner: he set up a pavilion of gold and silver columns, over which he spread hangings of linen and purple, so that many thousands could recline there. They were served in golden cups and in vessels made of precious stone, fashioned both for pleasure and for display. He ordered the attendants not to force the drink upon the guests continually, as is done among the Persians, but to let each of those reclining indulge as he wished.
He also sent word throughout the country that people should be released from their labors and hold festival for many days in honor of his reign. Likewise, among the women, Queen Vashti held a banquet in the palace, and the king, wishing to display her to his guests, sent and ordered her to come to the banquet, since she surpassed all women in beauty. But out of observance of the Persian law, which forbade women to be seen by strangers, she did not go to the king, and though he repeatedly sent eunuchs to her, she still refused, declining to come, until the king, roused to anger, broke off the banquet, and, rising, summoned the seven Persians who have the interpretation of the laws among them, and had them accuse the woman, saying that he had been insulted by her, for though summoned by him many times to the banquet she had not once obeyed.
He ordered them to declare what law they determined applied against her. One of them, named Mouchaeus, said that this insult had been done not to him alone but to all Persians, who risked living out their lives despised and scorned by their wives, for no woman would feel any reverence for the husband she lived with if the queen's arrogance toward you, the ruler of all, were held up as an example. He urged that the one who had insulted him so should be made to pay a heavy penalty, and that this being done, word of what had been decreed concerning the queen should be proclaimed to the nations. It was decided to depose Vashti and to give her honor to another woman.
Being now disposed toward her with passionate feeling and unable to bear
The separation from her he could not undo because of the law, but he went on grieving over what he wanted and could not have. Seeing him so distressed, his friends advised him to give up his memory and longing for the woman, since it did him no good, and instead to send men throughout the whole world to search out beautiful young women, of whom whichever was judged best would be his wife; for the affection he felt for the former queen would be quenched by the introduction of another, and the goodwill he had for her would gradually be drawn away by the one now with him.
Persuaded by this counsel, he ordered certain men to select the young women of his kingdom renowned for beauty and bring them to him. When many had been gathered, there was found in Babylon a girl, orphaned of both parents, being raised by her uncle Mordecai — for that was his name. He was of the tribe of Benjamin, one of the leading men among the Jews. Esther, for that was her name, surpassed all the others in beauty, and the grace of her face drew the eyes of those who looked on her more than the rest. She was handed over to one of the eunuchs for care, and she received every attention, with abundance of perfumes and costly ointments with which her body was anointed as required.
Four hundred women in all enjoyed this treatment for six months. When the king judged that the young women had received sufficient care in the appointed time and were now fit to go to the king's bed, he sent one to him each day to spend the night with him. As soon as he had lain with her, he sent her back to the eunuch.
When Esther came to him, he was delighted with her, and falling in love with the girl he took her lawfully as his wife and held the wedding in the twelfth month of the seventh year of his reign, the month called Adar. He sent out the couriers called angaroi to every nation, commanding them to celebrate his marriage, and he himself feasted the Persians, the Medes, and the leading men of the nations for a whole month in honor of his wedding. When she was brought into the palace he set the diadem on her, and so Esther became his consort, without making known to him the people from which she came.
Her uncle moved from Babylon to Susa in Persia and spent every day there, staying near the palace and inquiring after the girl, how she was faring — for he loved her as his own daughter.
The king also made a law that none of his own people should approach him uncalled whenever he sat on his throne. Men bearing axes stood around his throne to punish anyone who approached without being summoned. The king himself, however, sat holding a golden rod, which, whenever he wished to spare one of those who approached uncalled, he extended toward him; and whoever touched it was safe. On these matters we have said enough.
Some time later, when Bagathous and Theodositus plotted against the king, Barnabazus, a servant of one of the eunuchs and by birth a Jew, learned of the plot and reported it to his master's uncle, and Mordecai, through Esther, made the conspirators known to the king. The king, alarmed, investigated and found the truth; he had the eunuchs crucified, but for the moment gave Mordecai nothing for having been the cause of his deliverance, except that he ordered his name to be recorded by those who kept the chronicles, and that he remain at the palace as a most trusted friend of the king.
Now Haman, son of Hammedatha, by race an Amalekite, whenever he came before the king was bowed to by both the foreigners and the Persians, this honor having been ordered for him by Artaxerxes. But Mordecai, because of his wisdom and the law of his own people, would not bow to a man. Watching him closely, Haman asked where he was from, and on learning that he was a Jew, he was indignant and said to himself that while free Persians bowed to him, this man, a mere slave, did not think it right to do so.
Wanting to punish Mordecai, he thought it too small a thing to ask the king for his punishment alone, and resolved instead to wipe out his whole nation; for by nature he hated the Jews, since the people of the Amalekites, from whom he himself descended, had been destroyed by them. So he came before the king and accused the Jews, saying that theirs was a wicked nation, scattered throughout the whole world he ruled, mingling with no one, sharing neither the same religion as others nor using the same laws, hostile in its customs and practices both to his people and to all mankind.
"This nation — if you wish to grant your subjects some benefit — you should order destroyed root and branch, leaving not even a remnant of it, whether kept for slavery or for captivity. But so that you may suffer no loss of the tribute they pay, I myself promise from my own estate to give forty thousand talents of silver, wherever you order. This money I offer gladly, so that from it the kingdom may be freed from these troubles."
When Haman had made this request, the king granted him both the silver and the people, to do with them as he wished. Having obtained what he desired, Haman at once sent out a decree in the king's name to all the nations, worded in this way: "The great king Artaxerxes writes this to the governors of the hundred and twenty-seven satrapies from India to Ethiopia.
"Having ruled many nations and gained mastery of the whole world I wished to control, and having never, through the arrogance that power brings, been forced into harshness toward my subjects, but having shown myself fair and mild, providing for their peace and good order, I have sought how they might all enjoy the benefit of this. Since the man who holds the first place of honor and esteem with me for his prudence and justice,
"and who ranks second after me for his loyalty and steady goodwill — Haman — has shown me, out of his solicitude, that a nation hostile to all mankind, at odds with the laws, disobedient to kings, at variance in its customs, hating monarchy, and ill-disposed to our government, has been mixed in among all peoples, I command that those pointed out by Haman, my second father, be destroyed together with their wives and children, with no pity shown,
"nor should anyone, out of mercy, disobey what has been written by yielding to a plea beyond what has been commanded. I wish this to happen on the fourteenth day of the twelfth month of the present year, so that our enemies everywhere, destroyed in a single day, may henceforth allow us to live out our lives in peace."
When this order had been carried to the cities and the countryside, all were ready for the destruction of the Jews on the appointed day; and this was pressed forward in Susa as well. The king and Haman gave themselves to feasting and drinking, while the city was in turmoil.
Mordecai, on learning what was happening, tore his clothing, put on sackcloth, poured ashes over himself, and went through the city crying out that a nation guilty of no wrong was being destroyed. Still saying this, he came to the palace and stood before it, for he was not permitted to enter clothed in such a garment. All the Jews in the cities where the decree had been posted did the same, mourning and lamenting the calamities announced against them.
When some reported to the queen that Mordecai stood before the court in so pitiable a state, she was troubled at the report and sent men to change his clothing. When he would not consent to remove the sackcloth — for it was no small grief that had forced him to take it up, and it could not simply be laid aside — she summoned the eunuch Achratheus, who happened to be present with her, and sent him to Mordecai to learn what misfortune had befallen him that he mourned and wore this garb, and would not remove it even at her urging.
Mordecai showed the eunuch the cause: the decree against the Jews sent throughout the whole country under the king's rule, and the promise of money by which Haman had bought from the king the destruction of the nation. He gave him also a copy of the notice posted in Susa to bring to Esther, and charged her to petition the king about it and, for the sake of the nation's deliverance, not to think it beneath her to take on a humble bearing by which she might plead for the Jews who were in danger of destruction;
for the man who held second honor with the king, Haman, had accused them and provoked the king against them. Learning this, Esther sent word back to Mordecai that she had not been summoned by the king, and that whoever entered his presence uncalled dies, unless he chooses to spare someone and holds out the golden rod — for the one to whom the king does this when he approaches uncalled does not die but obtains pardon and is saved.
When the eunuch brought these words back to Mordecai from Esther, he told him to say to her that she should not look to her own safety alone but to the common safety of the nation; for if she neglected this now, help would certainly come to him from God, but she and her father's house would be destroyed along with the rest for their neglect.
Esther sent the same servant back to Mordecai with word that he should go to Susa and gather the Jews there into an assembly, and that all should fast, abstaining from everything, on her behalf for three days; she herself, doing the same with her handmaids, would then go in to the king contrary to the law, and if she must die for it, she would endure it.
So Mordecai, following Esther's instructions, made the people fast, and himself entreated God not even now to overlook his nation as it perished, but, just as he had cared for it many times before and forgiven its sins, so now to rescue it from the destruction announced against it; for it was in no wrongdoing of its own that it faced this shameful death, but he himself was the cause of Haman's anger,
since — "because I would not bow down, master," he said, "and give him the honor I give to you, and could not bring myself to grant him that honor, he grew angry and, out of this, has plotted this scheme against those who do not transgress your laws." The people raised the same cries,
calling on God to provide for their safety and to deliver the Israelites in every land from the calamity about to fall on them, for they already saw it before their eyes and were expecting it. Esther too entreated God according to the custom of her people, throwing herself to the ground, putting on mourning garments, and for three days abstaining from food, drink, and every pleasure, asking God to have mercy on her
and to grant that when she was seen by the king she might, by both means at once, be persuasive in her words and lovelier in appearance than she had ever been — so that she might use both her plea to turn aside his anger, should the king be provoked against her, and her advocacy on behalf of her countrymen now tossed on the very edge of ruin, and so that hatred might arise in the king against the enemies of the Jews,
who were contriving destruction for them, should they be neglected by him. Having entreated God in this way for three days, she then took off that mourning garment and changed her appearance, and adorned as a queen ought to be, with two handmaids — one of whom bore her up lightly as she leaned on her, while the other followed, holding up with the tips of her fingers the deep, trailing hem of her gown that spread to the ground —
she came before the king, her face full of a blush, but wearing an expression at once gentle and dignified beneath her beauty. She entered his presence in fear. But when she came opposite him as he sat on the throne, arrayed in his royal ornament — this consisted of richly worked robes, gold, and precious stone — he seemed more terrible,
and all the more so for these very things when she looked at him, and as he too glanced at her rather harshly, his face still inflamed with anger, a faintness at once overcame her, and she collapsed, senseless, into the arms of those standing beside her. But the king, by the will of God I think, changed his mind, and, fearing for the woman lest she suffer some harm from her fright, leapt up from his throne,
and, catching her in his arms, revived her, embracing her and speaking to her gently, urging her to take heart and to suspect nothing grim in the fact that she had come to him uncalled; for that law, he said, was laid down for his subjects, while she, who reigned equally with him, enjoyed complete freedom from it. As he said this he placed her scepter in her hand and extended his rod toward her neck,
releasing her from the fear the law required. Reviving at this, she said, "My lord, I cannot easily tell you what suddenly came over me; for when I saw you, so great, so handsome, and so terrible, my breath at once failed me and I was abandoned by my own spirit." As she said even this with difficulty and in a faint voice,
anguish and agitation seized him too, and he encouraged Esther to take heart and to expect better things, promising that he would grant her even half his kingdom, should she need it. But Esther asked that he come to a banquet with his friend Haman, saying that she had prepared a dinner for him. When he assented and they were present, in the midst of the drinking he told Esther
to make known to him what she wanted, for she would fail in nothing, even if she wished to take half the kingdom. But she put off telling him her wish until the next day, if he would come to her again for a banquet, together with Haman. When the king had agreed, Haman went out overjoyed that he alone had been thought worthy to dine with the king at Esther's table, and because
no one else received such honor from the kings. But seeing Mordecai in the courtyard he grew furious, since Mordecai showed him no mark of honor even on catching sight of him. Going in to his own house, he called for his wife Zeresh and his friends, and in their presence recounted the honor he enjoyed not only from the king but from the queen as well; for that very day
When he had dined with her alone, together with the king, he would be invited back again the next day. He said too that he took no pleasure in seeing the Jew Mordecai in the courtyard. His wife Zosara told him to order a beam cut, sixty cubits long, and in the morning to ask the king for leave to impale Mordecai on it. Pleased with the plan, he ordered his servants to prepare the beam and set it up in
the courtyard, ready for Mordecai's punishment. This was all made ready; but God laughed at Haman's wicked hope, and knowing what was to happen, took pleasure in what was coming. For that very night he took sleep away from the king. Unwilling to let his wakefulness pass idly, but wanting to spend it on some matter of use to the kingdom, the king had his secretary bring
the records of the kings before him and of his own deeds, and ordered him to read them aloud. As the secretary brought them and read, it was found that a certain man had received an estate as a reward for valor, his name being recorded there. He also mentioned another who had been granted a gift for loyalty, and came to the case of Gabathas and Theodestes, the eunuchs who had plotted against the king, whose informer had been Mordecai. When
the secretary had said only this and was moving on to another matter, the king stopped him, asking whether the man had not been given some reward recorded for this. The secretary said there was none. The king ordered him to be silent, and asked those appointed for the purpose what hour of the night it was. Learning that it was already dawn, he ordered that whichever of his friends they should find already present before the courtyard
should be brought in to him. It happened that Haman was the one found there; for he had come earlier than his usual hour to ask the king for Mordecai's death. When the attendants said that Haman was before the courtyard, the king ordered him called in. When he had entered, the king said, "Since I know that you alone are well disposed toward me, I ask your advice: how might I honor someone whom I love greatly,
in a manner worthy of my own greatness of spirit?" Haman, reasoning that whatever counsel he gave would be given on his own behalf—for he supposed himself alone to be loved by the king—made known what he thought was the best plan. He said, "If you wish to surround with glory the man you say you love, have him ride on horseback wearing your own robe and a golden collar, and have
one of your closest friends go before him proclaiming through the whole city that this is the honor bestowed on the man whom the king delights to honor." So Haman gave this counsel, thinking that this reward would fall to himself. The king, pleased with the advice, came forward and said, "You have the horse, the robe, and the collar. Go seek out Mordecai the
Jew, and give these things to him, leading his horse yourself; for you, he said, are my dear friend—be his attendant, since you have proven a good counselor. This shall be his reward from us for saving my life." Hearing this, against all expectation, Haman's mind was thrown into confusion, and, struck with helplessness, he went out leading the horse, the purple robe, and the golden collar, and
finding Mordecai before the courtyard dressed in sackcloth, he ordered him to put it off and put on the purple robe. Mordecai, not knowing the truth but thinking he was being mocked, said, "Worst of men, do you mock our misfortunes like this?" But when he was persuaded that the king had truly given him this honor in return for the safety he had provided by exposing the eunuchs who had plotted against him, he put on the purple robe
which the king himself always wore, and put on the collar, and mounting the horse rode around the city with Haman going before him and proclaiming that this would be done by the king's order for whomever he loved and judged worthy of honor. When they had gone all around the city, Mordecai went in to the king, while Haman, from shame, went home,
and with tears told his wife and friends what had happened. They said he could no longer defend himself against Mordecai, for God was with him. While they were still talking with one another about this, the eunuchs of Esther arrived, hurrying Haman to the banquet. Sabuchadas, one of the eunuchs, having seen the stake set up in Haman's house,
which they had prepared for Mordecai, and having learned from one of the servants for whom it had been prepared, realized it was meant for the queen's uncle—for Haman was intending to ask the king for it, for his punishment—but for the time being he kept quiet. When the king, feasting with Haman, asked the queen to tell him what gift she wished to receive,
assuring her she would obtain whatever she desired, she lamented the danger to her people and said she had been handed over to destruction along with her nation, and that this was why she was speaking of the matter; for she would not have troubled him if they had merely been ordered sold into bitter slavery—that would have been a moderate evil—but she begged to be delivered from this. When the king asked by whom this had been done,
she now openly accused Haman, charging that he, being wicked, had contrived this plot against them. The king, disturbed at this, sprang up from the banquet and went out into the gardens, while Haman began to beg Esther and implore her to forgive his wrongdoing; for he now understood that he was in trouble. He fell upon her couch
and was pleading with the queen when the king came back in, and, all the more provoked at the sight, said, "Worst of all men, do you even try to force my wife?" At this Haman was struck with terror and could no longer say a word. Then Sabuzanes the eunuch came forward and accused Haman, saying he had found a stake set up at Haman's house, prepared for Mordecai—for the servant, when asked,
had told him this, when he had come to summon him to the banquet—and he said the stake was sixty cubits high. When the king heard this, he decided on no other punishment for Haman than the one devised for Mordecai, and ordered that he be hanged from that very stake and put to death at once. Hence I am led to marvel at the divine
and to observe its wisdom and justice, in that it not only punished Haman's wickedness, but made the very punishment he had contrived against another fall upon himself, teaching everyone else to understand that whatever a man prepares against another he unknowingly prepares first against himself. Thus Haman, through the immoderate use of the honor the king gave him, was destroyed in this manner,
and the king gave his estate to the queen. He then summoned Mordecai—for Esther had revealed to him her kinship with him—and gave him the ring he had given to Haman. The queen also gave Mordecai Haman's property, and begged the king to free the Jewish nation from the fear for their lives, disclosing what had been written throughout
the country by Haman son of Hammedatha; for since her homeland had been destroyed and her kinsmen were perishing, she said she could not bear to go on living. The king promised that nothing unpleasant would happen to her, nor anything contrary to what she was eager for, and ordered her to write whatever she wished concerning the Jews in the king's name and, having sealed it with his ring, to send it throughout the kingdom; for
those who read letters secured with the royal seal would not oppose anything written in them. So he summoned the royal scribes and ordered them to write to the nations concerning the Jews, and to the stewards and governors of the hundred and twenty-seven satrapies from India to Ethiopia. What was written ran in this manner: "The great king Artaxerxes, to the governors and those loyal to us,
greetings. Many men, because of the greatness of the benefits and honor which they enjoyed through the excessive kindness of their benefactors, not only grow insolent toward their inferiors, but do not hesitate to wrong even those who benefited them, stripping gratitude from among men, and through tastelessness, thinking that the surfeit of goods they did not expect will let them escape the notice of the divine in these matters and
escape justice from it. And some of these, entrusted by their friends with the management of affairs, and holding private hatred toward certain persons, have deceived those in power with false charges and slanders, and persuaded them to take up anger against people who had done no wrong, by which they were brought into danger of destruction. This is a thing to be seen not from more ancient times nor known to us only by hearsay, but from
what has been dared before our own eyes—so that from now on we should pay no heed to slanders and accusations, nor to what others attempt to persuade us of, but should judge according to what each man himself knows to have been done, punishing where such things are so, but showing favor where matters stand otherwise, holding to the deeds themselves and not to those who speak of them. As for Haman, son of Hammedatha, an Amalekite by race,
a stranger to Persian blood, who, received among us as a guest, enjoyed our kindness toward all so greatly that he came to be called my father and continued to be bowed down to, and to receive after us the second place of royal honor from everyone—he did not bear his good fortune, nor did he manage the greatness of his blessings with sound judgment, but plotted against my kingdom and my life,
seeking to remove from me the man responsible for my authority, and by wicked and deceitful means sought the destruction of my benefactor and savior Mordecai and of Esther, the partner of my life and my rule; for by this means, having stripped me of those loyal to me, he intended to turn the kingdom over to others. But I, having recognized that the Jews handed over to destruction by that accursed man are not wicked,
but conduct themselves in the best manner as citizens and hold fast to God, who has preserved the kingdom for me and for our ancestors, not only release them from the punishment contained in the earlier letters, which you will do well to disregard, but also wish them to receive every honor; and the man who contrived these things against them I have impaled before the gates of Susa, together with
his family, God who watches over all things having brought this judgment upon him. I command you, having set up a copy of this letter throughout the whole kingdom, to allow the Jews to live by their own laws in peace, and to help them so that they may take vengeance on those who wronged them in their time of misfortune, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is Adar, on that same day;
for God has made this day one of salvation instead of destruction for them. It is a good reminder for those loyal to us, and a memorial of the punishment of those who plotted against them. I wish every city and every nation to know that if anyone disregards what has been written, he will be consumed by fire and sword. Let what has been written be posted throughout the whole country subject to us, and let all make ready for
the appointed day, so that they may take vengeance on their enemies." The horsemen carrying the letters set out at once and hastened along the road before them. Mordecai, having put on the royal robe and set the golden crown upon his head and the collar around his neck, went forth; and the Jews in Susa, seeing him so honored by the king, took his good fortune
as shared by all. Joy and a light of salvation attended both the Jews in the city and those throughout the country as the king's letters were published, so much so that many of the other nations, out of fear of the Jews, had themselves circumcised and thereby secured their own safety. For on the thirteenth of the twelfth month, which among the Hebrews is called
Adar, and among the Macedonians Dystros, those who carried the king's letters made known that on the very day they themselves had expected to be in danger, they should instead destroy their enemies. The rulers of the satrapies, the governors, the kings, and the scribes held the Jews in honor; for the fear that came from Mordecai compelled them to act prudently. When the royal
letter had gone throughout the whole country subject to him, it happened that the Jews in Susa killed about five hundred of their enemies. When the king told Esther the number of those who had perished, and asked, being uncertain what had happened in the country and what she wished to be done further—for it would be carried out—she asked that the Jews be permitted
to deal in the same way with the enemies still remaining on the following day as well, and that the ten sons of Haman be impaled. The king granted this to the Jews, being unable to refuse Esther anything; and they, gathering again on the fourteenth of the month of Dystros, killed about three hundred of their opponents, and touched none of the property belonging to them. There also died
at the hands of the Jews in the country and in the other cities seventy-five thousand of their enemies. These they killed on the thirteenth of the month, and made the following day a festival. Likewise the Jews in Susa, gathering on the fourteenth and the day following in the same month, feasted together. For this reason the Jews throughout
the whole world still celebrate these days, sending portions of food to one another. Mordecai wrote to the Jews living in the kingdom of Artaxerxes to observe these days and keep them as a festival, and to hand them down to their descendants so that the festival should last for all time and not be lost through forgetfulness; for it was right,
since they had been intended to perish on these very days at Haman's hands, that having escaped the danger in them and having taken vengeance on their enemies, they should observe them, giving thanks to God. For this reason the Jews celebrate the aforesaid days, calling them Purim. Mordecai was great and illustrious at the king's court, and shared with him the administration of the kingdom, enjoying at the same time
For the Jews, too, things turned out through them far better than anyone had hoped. Such, then, was the outcome of these affairs under the reign of Artaxerxes.
When the high priest Eliashib died, his son Jodas succeeded to the high priesthood. And when he too died, his son John received the office—the same John on whose account Bagoses, the general of the other Artaxerxes, defiled the temple and imposed tribute on the Jews, requiring them, before offering the daily sacrifices, to pay fifty drachmas from the public funds for every lamb.
The cause of this came about as follows. John had a brother named Jesus. Bagoses, being on friendly terms with him, promised to secure the high priesthood for him. Relying on this assurance, Jesus quarreled with John in the temple and provoked his brother to such a pitch that John killed him. It was a terrible thing that a man should commit so monstrous an impiety against his own brother in the sanctuary itself, worse than anything done before it—so much so that neither among the Greeks nor among barbarians had so savage and impious a deed ever occurred. But the divine did not overlook it: the people were enslaved on this very account, and the temple was defiled by the Persians.
Bagoses, the general of Artaxerxes, learning that John the high priest of the Jews had murdered his own brother Jesus in the temple, at once came upon the Jews in a rage and began to say, "You have dared to commit murder in your own temple!" And when he tried to enter the sanctuary, they tried to stop him. But he said to them, "Am I not purer than the man who was killed in the temple?" And having said this, he went into the sanctuary. Using this pretext, Bagoses harassed the Jews for seven years over the death of Jesus.
When John's life came to its end, his son Jaddus succeeded to the high priesthood. He too had a brother, named Manasses. To this man Sanaballetes—a Cuthean by birth, from whom the Samaritans are descended, who had been sent to Samaria as satrap by Darius, the last king—gladly gave in marriage his own daughter, called Nicaso, thinking that this match would serve as a pledge to secure for himself the goodwill of the whole Jewish nation.
At this same time Philip, king of the Macedonians, was treacherously murdered at Aegae by Pausanias, of the family of the Orestae. His son Alexander received the kingdom and, crossing the Hellespont, defeated Darius's generals in battle at the Granicus; then, advancing through Lydia, enslaving Ionia, and overrunning Caria, he pressed on into the regions of Pamphylia, as has been shown elsewhere.
Now the elders of Jerusalem, deeply offended that the brother of the high priest Jaddus was married to a foreign woman and yet shared in the high priesthood, rose up in opposition to him. For they considered his marriage a stepping-stone for those who might wish to transgress the laws concerning marriage to foreign women, and that it would be the beginning of fellowship with foreigners for the whole people. They held, moreover, that their earlier captivity and their misfortunes had been caused precisely by certain men's offenses in the matter of marriages, and by their taking wives who were not of their own people. They therefore demanded that Manasses either divorce his wife or else not approach the altar.
When the high priest, sharing the people's indignation, barred his brother from the altar, Manasses went to his father-in-law Sanaballetes and told him that, though he loved his wife Nicaso, he was unwilling to be deprived, on her account, of the priestly honor, which was the greatest dignity in the nation and remained fixed within his family line. Sanaballetes promised not only to preserve the priesthood for him but also to secure for him the power and honor of a high priest, and to appoint him governor of all the territory he himself ruled, provided he consent to marry his daughter—and he said he would build a temple like the one at Jerusalem on Mount Garizein, the highest of the mountains of Samaria, and that he would do this with the approval of King Darius.
Elated by these promises, Manasses stayed on with Sanaballetes, believing he would obtain the high priesthood as a gift from Darius—for it happened that Sanaballetes was already an old man. But since many priests and Israelites had become entangled in such marriages, no small disturbance gripped the people of Jerusalem, for all of them began to go over to Manasses, Sanaballetes supplying them with money, allotting them land for farming and settlement, and in every way courting favor with his son-in-law.
At this same time Darius, hearing that Alexander had crossed the Hellespont, defeated his satraps in the battle at the Granicus, and was advancing farther, gathered together an army of cavalry and infantry, resolved to meet the Macedonians before they could overrun the whole of Asia. So he crossed the river Euphrates, passed over the Taurus range in Cilicia, and waited at Issus in Cilicia to meet the enemy there in battle.
Sanaballetes, delighted at Darius's advance, at once told Manasses that he would fulfill his promises as soon as Darius, having defeated the enemy, returned—for he was convinced, as were all the people of Asia, that the Macedonians, given the size of the Persian forces, would not even come to close quarters with the Persians. But it turned out otherwise than they expected: the king engaged the Macedonians and was defeated, losing much of his army; his mother, his wife, and his children were taken captive, and he himself fled into Persia.
Alexander, having come into Syria, took Damascus, and after mastering Sidon laid siege to Tyre. He also sent letters demanding that the high priest of the Jews send him aid, supply provisions for his army, and give to him whatever gifts they had previously paid to Darius, choosing the friendship of the Macedonians instead—for otherwise, he said, they would come to regret it. But the high priest answered the letter-bearers that he had given oaths to Darius not to bear arms against him, and that he would not break these oaths so long as Darius remained alive. Hearing this, Alexander was enraged; yet he decided not to abandon Tyre, which was on the point of being taken, but resolved that, once he had reduced it, he would march against the high priest of the Jews and teach everyone whose oaths they ought to keep. Accordingly, prosecuting the siege with still greater vigor, he took Tyre.
Having settled affairs there, he advanced against the city of the people of Gaza and laid siege to Gaza and to its garrison commander, named Babemesis.
Sanaballetes, judging the moment favorable for his design, now openly renounced Darius. Taking eight thousand of his subjects, he went over to Alexander and, finding him just beginning the siege of Tyre, told him that he was handing over to him the territories under his own command and that he would gladly accept him as master in place of King Darius. Alexander received him gladly, and Sanaballetes, now emboldened concerning the matter he had in view, brought the subject to him, explaining that he had as a son-in-law Manasses, brother of Jaddus, the high priest of the Jews, and that many others of his countrymen with him wished now to build a temple in the territory under his rule. This, he said, would also be advantageous to the king, since it would divide the strength of the Jews in two, so that the nation, being neither of one mind nor united, would not prove troublesome to kings should it ever attempt revolt—just as had happened before to the rulers of the Assyrians.
Alexander consented, and Sanaballetes, applying all his energy to the task, built the temple and installed Manasses as its priest, considering this the greatest privilege he could confer on his future grandchildren through his daughter. But when seven months had passed in the siege of Tyre and two in that of Gaza, Sanaballetes died.
Alexander, having taken Gaza, was eager to go up against the city of Jerusalem. When the high priest Jaddus heard this, he was in anguish and fear, at a loss how he should meet the Macedonians, since the king was angered at his earlier refusal to obey. He therefore ordered the people to offer supplication, and together with them offered sacrifice to God, begging him to shield the nation and deliver it from the dangers now approaching. When he had gone to sleep after the sacrifice, God spoke to him in a dream, telling him to take courage, to crown the city with garlands and open its gates, and that the people should go out to meet Alexander dressed in white, while he himself, together with the priests, should go out in their prescribed vestments, expecting to suffer nothing terrible, since God himself was watching over them.
Rising from sleep, he rejoiced greatly, made known to everyone the message he had received, did all that had been commanded him in the dream, and awaited the king's arrival.
Learning that Alexander was not far from the city, he went out with the priests and the body of the citizens to meet him with a reception fitting the sanctuary and unlike that of any other nation, at a place called Sapha. This name, translated into Greek, means "lookout," for from there one could see both Jerusalem and the temple.
Now the Phoenicians and the Chaldeans who accompanied the army, expecting the king's anger to give them license to plunder the city and put the high priest to a shameful death, found the very opposite happen. For Alexander, while still some way off, seeing the multitude clothed in white, the priests standing in front of them in their linen robes, and the high priest himself in his robe of blue and gold, wearing on his head the mitre with the golden plate on which the name of God was inscribed, came forward alone, bowed down before the Name, and greeted the high priest first.
The Jews with one voice, all together, greeted Alexander and surrounded him. The kings of Syria and the rest, seeing him do this, were astonished and supposed the king's mind had been unhinged. Only Parmenio approached him and asked why, when all men bowed down to him, he himself had bowed down to the high priest of the Jews. "It was not him I bowed to," he said, "but the God whose high priesthood he holds. For it was this very man, in this very dress, whom I saw in a dream when I was at Dium in Macedonia; and as I was turning over in my mind how I might master Asia, he urged me not to delay but to cross over boldly, for he himself would lead my army and hand over to me the empire of the Persians. Since, then, I have seen no one else clothed in such a manner, but now behold this man, and remember the vision and the exhortation I received in my sleep, I believe that it is under divine guidance that I have made this expedition, and that I shall defeat Darius, overthrow the power of the Persians, and that everything I intend will succeed as I wish."
Having said this to Parmenio, he clasped the high priest's hand and, with the Jews running alongside, entered the city. Going up to the temple, he offered sacrifice to God under the high priest's direction, and paid fitting honor to the high priest himself and to the priests. When the book of Daniel was shown to him, in which it was declared that one of the Greeks would destroy the empire of the Persians, he supposed that he himself was the one signified; and, pleased at the time, he dismissed the crowd, but the next day summoned them and told them to ask for whatever gifts they wished. When the high priest asked that they be permitted to live by their ancestral laws, and that the seventh year be free of tribute, he granted everything.
They further asked him to allow the Jews in Babylon and Media also to live by their own laws, and he gladly promised to do as they requested. And when he said to the crowd that, if any of them wished to serve with him as soldiers while still keeping their ancestral customs and living according to them, he was ready to take them along, many eagerly welcomed the chance to campaign with him.
Having settled these matters at Jerusalem, Alexander marched on with his army against the neighboring cities. Everywhere he was received with warmth by those to whom he came. But the Samaritans, whose chief city was then Shechem, which lies by Mount Garizein and was inhabited by renegades from the Jewish nation, seeing how splendidly Alexander had honored the Jews, decided to claim that they themselves were Jews. For the Samaritans are of such a character, as we have already shown before: when the Jews are in misfortune, they deny being their kinsmen—thereby confessing the truth of the matter—but whenever they see some stroke of good fortune come to them, they leap at once to claim relationship, saying they belong to them, and tracing their own descent from Ephraim and Manasses, the sons of Joseph.
With great pomp, then, and displaying much eagerness on his behalf, they went out to meet the king, not far from Jerusalem. When Alexander praised them, the people of Shechem came up to him, bringing with them also the soldiers whom Sanaballetes had sent to him, and asked him, when he came to their city, to honor their temple as well. He promised he would look into the matter on his return. But when they asked him to remit the tribute of the sabbatical year, since they did not sow in it, he inquired who they were to be making such a request. When they said they were Hebrews, but were known as the Sidonians of Shechem, he asked them again whether they happened to be Jews. When they said they were not, he replied, "But it was to the Jews that I granted these things. Still, when I return and am more accurately informed by you, I will do what seems best." With these words he dismissed the people of Shechem.
As for the soldiers of Sanaballetes, he ordered them to follow him into Egypt, since there he would give them allotments of land—which shortly afterward he in fact did, in the Thebaid, assigning them to garrison the region.
When Alexander died, his empire was divided among his successors, but the temple on Mount Garizein remained standing. And whenever anyone at Jerusalem was charged with eating forbidden food, or violating the Sabbath, or any other such offense, he would flee to the people of Shechem, claiming he had been unjustly expelled.
By that time the high priest Jaddus, too, had already died, and his son Onias had succeeded to the high priesthood. Such, then, was the state of affairs concerning the people of Jerusalem.