CHAPTER X.

REIGNS OF JONATHAN, SIMON, AND JOHN HYRCANUS.

Treachery of Tryphon—Judea Free—Asmonean Monument—Murder of Simon.

A period of extreme distress succeeded the death of Judas. The sky had not appeared darker over Judea even during the bloody persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes. Whereupon all the wisest amongst the Jews flocked to the standard of Jonathan, the youngest of the five sons of Mattathias, and made him their captain and leader, in the place of his noble brother.

In the next year Alcimus, the traitorous high priest, who had been restored to power by Bacchides, was cut off in the midst of his crimes. In his anxiety to preserve the favour of his heathen protectors, he had given orders that, in the temple, the wall of partition should be broken down which divided the court of the Gentiles from that which Jews only might enter. But he was not suffered to complete his impious work: the Almighty suddenly smote him with palsy, and summoned him to his awful account.

The death of this wicked high priest removed one great difficulty from the path of Jonathan. In his time Syria was convulsed with civil wars, from the competitors who struggled together for its crown. In the wild storm which raged around him, Jonathan guided the affairs of Judea as a wise and experienced pilot steers his vessel through rocks and shoals. While contending monarchs rose and fell, even from their disputes the skilful ruler won advantages for his country. Jonathan, by the grant of a prince named Alexander, who was at that time opposing Demetrius, assumed the office of high priest with the full consent of the Jewish people, 152 B.C. From this period, till the time of Herod, the dignity became hereditary in the Asmonean family. Jonathan was now enabled to proceed with his various improvements and repairs, restoring justice throughout the land, and reforming, to the best of his power, that which was amiss both in church and in state.

For many years Jonathan had ruled over Judea, when an act of shameful treachery removed him from his post of usefulness and honour. Tryphon, who had been governor of Antioch, aspired to the crown of Syria, and his unscrupulous ambition was eager to trample down every obstacle that stood in his way. Such an obstacle he foresaw in the firm integrity of the high priest of Judea, whom the ambitious noble found at the head of a formidable force.

Tryphon, seeing Jonathan so powerfully attended, durst not openly attempt anything against him, but deceived him by flattering words, and a false appearance of friendship. He assured the high priest that he only came to consult him on matters which regarded their common interest, and that he was about to place the town of Ptolemais in Jonathan’s hands.

By these treacherous pretences Tryphon induced his unsuspecting victim to trust himself with a small force within the walls of Ptolemais. No sooner had they entered than the gates were closed by order of the traitor, and a massacre commenced. Of those who had accompanied Jonathan not a man was spared; and though he himself lingered for a space in captivity, and earnest were the efforts of his brother to save his life, the merciless Tryphon completed his crime, and the noble prisoner was slain by his command, 144 B.C.

With indignation and horror the Jews heard of the treachery of Tryphon. Deprived by this sudden stroke of their leader, and seeing enemies gathering around them, their hearts failed them for fear. At this hour of peril Simon, the elder brother of Jonathan and Judas, showed himself worthy of his race. He went up to Jerusalem, assembled the terrified people, and offered himself as their leader. With joy the Jews hailed as their captain the last surviving son of Mattathias.

One of the first acts of the new high priest was to strengthen the friendship with Rome which had been commenced by Judas Maccabeus. He also sent a crown of gold to Demetrius, the rival of the guilty Tryphon, and received from him a grant of the principality of Judea, free from all taxes, tolls, and tributes, on the condition of the Jews aiding him to crush Tryphon, the murderer of Jonathan. Thus Simon became not only high priest, but sovereign prince of Judea, which for a space was entirely freed from the yoke of any foreign nation.

Simon showed himself to be an able leader as well as a prudent statesman. He took Gazara, Joppa, and Jamnia, drove the heathen from the fortress which overlooked the temple at Jerusalem, and razed the fortress itself to the ground.

Nor, amidst his labours for the good of his people, did Simon omit to pay due reverence to the memory of the dead. The body of the murdered Jonathan was taken from the place where he died, and buried in the sepulchre at Modin, beside those of his brave father and brothers. Simon raised there a splendid monument of white marble, with seven stately pyramids—one for his father, one for his mother, four for his brethren, and the seventh for himself. This monument being on an eminence, was seen far off at sea; and often as the Jewish mariner turned his eyes towards it, would he think with grateful reverence of the heroes sleeping beneath it, the memory of whose noble deeds has proved more enduring than marble.

After ruling Judea for about nine years, Simon was cut off by treachery even yet more base than that to which Jonathan had fallen a victim.

Ptolemy, his own son-in-law, who held an office under the high priest, secretly aspired to fill his place. This most wicked and perfidious man invited Simon to an entertainment which he had prepared in a neighbouring castle. The venerable high priest suspected no evil from one to whom he was so nearly connected, accepted the invitation, and went to the fortress with two of his sons.

In the midst of the feast, when the wine-cup went round, and the unsuspecting guests never dreamed of danger, suddenly assassins burst in amongst them, and Simon and his two sons were ruthlessly murdered!—135 B.C. Not contented with committing this fearful crime, determined to leave no son to succeed to the slaughtered prince, or to avenge his death, Ptolemy sent a party to Gazara to assassinate John Hyrcanus, the son of Simon. But tidings of the foul murder of his father and brothers reached Hyrcanus in time to put him on his guard. Hastening to Jerusalem, he secured the city and the temple against those whom the traitor had sent to take possession of both. His activity, wisdom, and courage defeated the designs of Ptolemy, and wrested from him the fruit of his crime.

John Hyrcanus was declared prince and high priest of the Jews, whom he governed for many years with great wisdom and success. Emulating the military prowess of his predecessors, Hyrcanus made himself master of all Galilee and Samaria, and other places in the country around him, till none of the neighbouring tribes dared attempt to cope with the Jews, and he passed the remainder of his days in full repose from all foreign wars.

In the latter part of his life, however, Hyrcanus met with much trouble from the Pharisees, a large and mutinous sect of the Jews. These, with pretensions to singular sanctity of life, and the strictest obedience to the law of Moses, covered a spirit of insolent ambition and intolerable pride.

Hyrcanus, who knew the great influence acquired by the Pharisees over the people, attempted at first to attach them to himself by all manner of favours. He invited the heads of the sect to an entertainment, and having there liberally regaled them, he addressed his guests to the following effect:—He told them that the fixed purpose of his mind had always been to be just in his actions towards men, and to do all things towards God that should be well-pleasing to Him, according to the doctrines which the Pharisees taught. He desired those whom he now saw at his table, should they behold anything in him wherein he failed of his duty in either of these its two branches, to give him the benefit of their instructions, that he might thenceforth reform and amend.

In reply to this humble address, the Pharisees loaded their high priest with praises for his wisdom and goodness, with the exception of one Eleazar, a man of turbulent and mutinous spirit, who, when the rest were silent, stood up, and with astounding audacity exclaimed, “Since you are desirous to be told the truth, if you would approve yourself a just man, quit the high priesthood, and content yourself with being the governor of the people!”

Eleazar tried to support this very startling demand by the false assertion that the mother of Hyrcanus not having been a Jewess, he was debarred by the law from exercising the holy office of high priest.

Hyrcanus was deeply wounded. Insulted in his own house, in the presence of his guests, and on a point where, both as a pontiff and a Jew, he was most keenly sensitive, he appealed to the Pharisees around to declare what punishment was merited by one who dared to defame the high priest and prince of his people. Their reply was so little satisfactory to Hyrcanus, that he suspected that the insult which he had received had been a thing previously concerted amongst them. He became from thenceforth the bitter enemy of the Pharisees, and transferred all the favour which he had previously shown them to the rival sect of the Sadducees.

It cannot be supposed, however, that so righteous a man as John Hyrcanus adopted all the errors of a sect that afterwards denied the existence of angel or devil, and rejected the blessed doctrine of a resurrection. It is probable that at this time the Sadducees themselves had not gone further than renouncing the unwritten traditions, to which the Pharisees gave great and dangerous weight, regarding them with the same reverence which they paid to the inspired Word of God.

Hyrcanus died 107 B.C., and was succeeded in both his offices by his eldest son Aristobulus.

CONTEMPORANEOUS EVENTS. 152-107 B.C. B.C. Carthage destroyed 146 Numantia destroyed 133