CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY GIFT FROM
Alfred C. Barnes
The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text.
http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029308503
THE
FOURTH BOOK
OF MACCABEES:
CONTAINING
REFLECTIONS ON RELIGIOUS PRINCIPLE: LIKEWISE, AN ACCOUNT OF HELIODORUS’ ATTEMPT TO PLUNDER THE TEMPLE: AND THE HISTORY OF ELEAZAR AND THE SEVEN BRETHREN PERSECUTED EVEN TO DEATH FOR THEIR ADHERENCE TO RELIGION.
CHAPTER IX
B.C. 167
The noble address of the young men. The first and second are put to death.
” Why waits thou a O tyrant? for we are prepared to die, rather than transgress the commands of our fathers. For we feel, and justly, that we disgrace our ancestors, if we follow not obedience to the law and Moses as our guide. Do not, O tyrant, who advises us to violate the law; —do not, while you hate us, pity us more than we pity ourselves. For we consider your compassionate wish, that we should save our lives by transgressing the law, to be worse than death c itself. And you think to frighten us, threatening us with a death by torture, asthough we had not lately learned d this from Eleazar. But if aged men of the Hebrews have died, and even after enduring torturings, for religion’s sake; with more justice we young me ought to die, despising the torments of your persecutions, which even the old man, who is our instructor, overcame.”
” Make the experiment, therefore, O tyrant! And even if you take away our lives for religion’s sake, think not that you hurt us by these torments. For we indeed, through this suffering and endurance, shall hereafter receive the rewards of virtue; and shall be e with God, in whose cause we are suffering. But you, on account of the wilful foul murder of us, shall suffer from Divine vengeance eternal torment by fire.”
When they had thus spoken, the tyrant was not only vexed with them as disobedient but also was wroth with them as being ungrateful f persons. So that the guards being commanded brought out the eldest of them; and having rent off his coat, they bound his hands and arms to each side of his body with leather thongs. And when they had tired themselves by beating him with scourges, producing no effect, they threw him upon the wheel. Upon the circumference of which the noble youth being extended had his joints dislocated. And while he was being fractured in every limb, he inveighed against Antiochus, saying: “O most foul tyrant, enemy of heavenly justice, and cruel-minded ; you do not maltreat me in this manner for having committed murder or sacrilege, but for standing up in defence of the Divine Law.”
And when the guards said, “Consent to eat, that you may be released from torments; he said to them, your wheel, O ye accursed ministers, is not so powerful as to break g my principle. Cut up my limbs, and burn my flesh, and wrench my joints asunder. For throughout all your tortures I will cause you to believe that the children of the Hebrews alone are invincible in virtue’s cause.”
As he was saying this, they placed fire under him h ; and turned the wheel about with great violence, extending him at length upon it. And the wheel was besprinkled with blood on every side; and the heap of hot coals was extinguished by the droppings of gore; and pieces of his flesh flew about the axles of the machine. And although he already had the frame of his bones wrenched and mangled, the high-minded youth, true son i of Abraham, never uttered a groan. But, as if he were being transformed by fire into immortality, he nobly endured the racking: saying, “Follow my example, brethren: desert not k the post of honour which my life exhibits; nor forswear your fraternal fellowship with me in magnanimity. War a holy and noble warfare l “
” for Religion; by which means the providence of our Just Father, becoming appeased towards our nation, may take vengeance on the execrable tyrant. And having spoken thus, the holy admirable youth breathed out his soul. And when all had wondered at his persevering spirit, the officers brought out the one who was next to him in age; and having fitted on themselves iron gauntlets m with sharp nails, they bound him to the machines called catapeltae. And when, on asking whether he would consent to eat; before he was tortured, they heard his noble sentiment tearing him with the iron claws from the muscles of his neck, the savage beasts like panthers n drew off all the flesh to the chin, and the skin of his head. But he with gravity bearing this pain, said: “How pleasant is every form of death on behalf of our country’s Religion!” And to the tyrant he said, “Do you not think, most inhuman of all tyrants, that you are now suffering torments greater than mine, on seeing the haughty calculations of your tyranny defeated by our endurance in Religion’s cause? For I truly lighten my own pains with the delights which virtue yields. But you are tormented with the apprehensions of impiety: and you shall not escape, O most infamous tyrant, the Divine wrath !”
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