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THE FIVE BOOKS FROM MACKABEANS IN ENGLISH INTRODUCTION BOOK IV
WITH NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS, BY
HENRY COTTON, D.C.L.
ARCHDEACON OF CASHEL,
AND DECEASED STUDENT AT CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD
OXFORD, AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. MDCCCXXXII.
TO
THE PROVOST, FELLOWS AND SCHOLARS, VAN TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN, TO WHOSE VALUABLE LIBRARY I HAD THE MOST GENEROUS ACCESS, THE PRESENT PUBLICATION IS ENGRAVED, IN TESTIMONY OF RESPECT AND REGARD.
Note from the Webmaster.
The books of the MACCABEES tell us the passages between Maleági in the OLD TESTAMENT to the birth of Jesus in the New Testament. There is nothing in the Bible about this. (±450 years) These books tell us about Judah and Benjamin, two of the tribes of Israel that remained and are now known to us as Jews, to the other 10 tribes known as Israel in exile carried off through Syria to this day. We must never forget that after the sin of Solomon for marrying Gentile women, God divided as punishment the old Israel which consisted of 12 tribes, into 10 Northern tribes known as Israel and the two Southern tribes known as Judah, now also called Jews. Read the Bible from 1 Kings 11 from verse 1 to Malachi.
The events described in the five books took place under the rule of Greek leaders as the third world rulers as described in the Dream of Nebuchadnezzar. First there was Babylon, then the Persians then the Greeks who were taken over by the fourth viz. The Romans. Why not read the book of Daniel in the Bible? The events of the MACCABEES take place after Alexander the Great died, and his four Generals divided the world among them as rulers.
P.J.C.Schutte
BOOK IV INTRODUCTION
The fourth book, such as we now possess it, contains the history of the martyrdom of Eleazar and the seven brethren, under Antiochus Epipha together with mention of Heliodorus’ attempt to plunder the temple at Jerusalem.
It exists in Greek, in the Alexandrian manuscript of the Septuagint; and from thence was printed by Dr. Grabe, about 125 years ago, and was reprinted at Oxford in 1817, 8vo., and again in the folio Septuagint by Parsons. (In fact it had appeared in Greek Bibles at least so long ago as the year 1545.) From the various readings of this last edition I have been enabled to correct the text of 1817, which is extremely faulty.
The author of this fourth book is not known for a certainty; but it has been generally attri- buted to Josephus ; with whose treatise De Maccahcαεis, or De imperio rationis, it certainly agrees very much ; yet not entirely, as may be readily seen upon a close comparison.
Its character as a composition is highly spoken of both by Augustin and Jerome : the former of whom thus expresses himself in his Sermo de Maccahcαεis
” Quorum mirabiles passiones cum ” legerentur non solim audivimus, sed etiam vidi
” mus et spectavimus.” Augustin. Oper. torn. V.
p. 850. And Jerome, at greater length, and with still warmer admiration, thus writes on the subject :
” Quid memorem insignes Macchabseorum
“victorias ? qui ne illicitis carnibus vescerentur,
“et communes tangerent cibos, corpora obtuler
“cruciatibus ; totiusque orbis in ecclesiis Christi
“laudibus praedicantur, fortiores poenis, ardentio-
“res quibus comburebantur ignibus. Victa sunt
“in eis omnia crudelitatis ingenia, et quicquid ira
”persecutoris invenerat, patientium fortitudo su
“peravit. Inter poenas magis paternae legis quam
“dolorum memores : lacerantur viscera, tabo et
“sanie artus diffluebant, et tamen sententia per
“severabat immobilis : liber erat animus, et mala
“prsesentia futurorum spe despiciebat. Lassa
“bantur tortores, et non lassabatur fides : frange
“bantur ossa, et volubili rota omnis compago
“nervorum atque artuum solvebatur, et in im
“mensum spirantia mortem incendia consurge
“bant: plenae erant ferventis olei sartagines, et
“ad frigenda sanctorum corpora terrore incredi
“bili personabant : et tamen inter haec omnia pa
“radisum anirao deambulantes, non sentiebant
“quod patiebantur sed quod videre cupiebant.
“Mens enim Dei timore vallata flammas superat
“varios tormentorum spernit dolores. Cumque
“semel virtuti se tradiderit, quicquid adversi eve
“nerit calcat et despicit.” Hieron. Epist. 100.
Oper. tom. I. p. 613. edit. Vallarsii.
The English translation for the above from Latin reads like this:
“Whose marvelous sufferings when read we not only heard but also saw and witnessed.” Augustine. Works, vol. V, p. 850. And Jerome, at greater length, and with still warmer admiration, thus writes on the subject: “Why should I recount the remarkable deeds of the Maccabees Victors? Those who would not feed on illicit meats, and who offered their bodies to torments; and in the churches of Christ throughout the world, they are preached in praises, stronger in punishments, burning in fires. All the inventions of cruelty were conquered in them, and whatever the persecutor’s wrath had devised, the fortitude of the sufferers overcame. Among punishments, more of the paternal law than “dolorum memores : lacerantur viscera, tabo et “They suffer, but what they wish to see. For a mind fortified by the fear of God overcomes the flames and scorns various torments. And once it has devoted itself to virtue, it tramples and despises whatever misfortune may occur.” Hieron. Epist. 100. Oper. tom. I. p. 613. edit. Vallarsii.”
In fact, this is the treatise which, by Athana sius and other ancient writers, is understood by ” the fourth book of Maccabees :” yet Sixtus Senensis, in his Bibliotheca Sancta, asserts that he had seen in the library of Sanctes Pagninus, a learned friar, a manuscript calling itself the fourth hook, but very different from the above, and containing the acts of John Hyrcanus : [thus following the series of history of our second book.] This manuscript was never published, and the library of Sanctes Pagninus, at Lyons in France, was destroyed by fire : I shall therefore subjoin a translation of the whole account, as given by Sixtus.
” The fourth book of Maccabees, which the
“synopsis of Athanasius classes among the apocryphal books, contains the history of thirty-one
” years ; that is, the acts of John Maccabaeus,
” who, from having conquered Hyrcanus, took ” that surname. After the treacherous murder of
” his father Simon by Ptolemy, John succeeded
” both to the high-priesthood and the chieftaincy;
” and instantly led out an army against his fa
” ther’s murderer. He afterwards entered into
” a treaty with Antiochus king of Syria, upon
” whose death he took by force of arms many
” cities of Syria. He was the first Jewish leader ” who employed hired soldiers. He dug up three
” thousand talents which were buried in the tomb
” of David. He renewed the treaty which his
” father had entered into with the Romans. He
” conquered and put to flight Antiochus Cyzicenus
“ king of Syria. After a siege of a year, he
” levelled with the ground the rival city of Samaria ; and, by bringing the course of some
” streams over the spot, utterly erased all traces
“ of the vanquished city. He renewed the walls of Jerusalem, which had fallen down through age.
” After these successful achievements, he dies
“in the thirty-first year of his authority, (being
“a man illustrious in three distinct characters, as “a priest, a general, and a prophet,) in the
“hundredth year before Christ ; at which period
“the fourth and last book of the Maccabees ends.
“The commencement of which book is thus, as it
“is found in a Greek manuscript which I have
“read in the library of that very learned preacher
“The series of the history, and the narrative, are
“almost the same with those which are in the
“thirteenth book of Antiquities of Josephus
“but the style abounds with Hebrew idioms, and
“is very unlike his. It is most probable that
“this work was translated, by some unknown hand, from
“ the Book of Days’ (Chronicles) of the priesthood of John, of “whom it is written at the end of the first book of Maccabees, “The rest of the sayings of John, &c. &c.’
” From the above, it clearly appears that those
“persons are mistaken, who think that the fourth
“book of Maccabees is that in which Josephus
“has described the martyrdom of the Maccabean
“mother and her seven sons ; which book also is
“found in some Greek Bibles, with the title,
Biblioth. lib. i. sect, 3.
But Calmet, in his ” Dictionary of the Bible,” under the article ” Maccabees,” supposes that Six tus was mistaken in his opinion of this being the true fourth book : and that probably what he saw was that work which in Arabic has been printed in the Paris and London Polyglotts, [namely my fifth book:] this latter however contains much more than Sixtus takes notice of, and reaches down to the birth of Jesus Christ. In his ” Literal Comment on Scripture,” Calmet has given our fourth book both in Latin and French. I do not believe that it has ever yet appeared in English ; except in a very loose paraphrase, in L’Estrange’s translation of Josephus, folio, Lon don, 1702 : but Whiston, a subsequent translator of that author, does not consider it as the pro duction of Josephus, and therefore has wholly passed it by, for reasons which may be seen at the end of his version of the treatise against Apion. I have endeavoured to suit the style and language to those of the preceding books, as closely as was consistent with a careful adherence to the Original.
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