Book 4

4.1. So Cyrus brought to an end the empire of the Assyrians. In the first year of his reign, which was the seventieth since the Hebrews had been carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon, he permitted the Jews in Babylon to depart to Jerusalem and to rebuild both the city and the temple, just as the prophet Jeremiah had foretold, and before him Isaiah had spoken of it. For Jeremiah lived at the time when the city was taken and the temple razed, while Isaiah lived a hundred and forty years before the city was captured and the temple destroyed. And Cyrus not only granted the captives their return and the raising up again of the city and the temple, but also sent back with them the vessels of the temple which Nebuchadnezzar had carried off to Babylon, handing them over to Mithridates his treasurer and to Zerubbabel to convey. He wrote also to the satraps in Syria to help them in the building of the works and to supply the whole cost from the royal funds. When Cyrus had so decreed, the leaders of the two tribes, of Judah and of Benjamin, together with the Levites and the priests, set out; but many remained in Babylon, unwilling to abandon their possessions. When they reached Jerusalem, all of Cyrus's officials assisted them in the building and worked together with them. Those who returned were forty-two thousand six hundred in number.

While they were already pressing forward with the building of the city and the temple, the surrounding nations, and above all the Cuthaeans, whom Shalmaneser had settled in Samaria when he carried the Israelites into captivity, out of envy first won over the satraps not to assist the Jews in the building. Then, when Cyrus had ended his life and Cambyses his son had succeeded to the kingdom, they wrote to Cambyses, slandering the Hebrews as a rebellious and ungovernable nation, and saying that, if they completed the city and the temple, they would neither pay tribute nor be subject. By writing these things and many more of the kind they persuaded him to forbid the rebuilding of the city and the temple; and the works were halted until the second year of the reign of Darius the son of Hystaspes, for nine years. For Cambyses, having reigned seven years and in that time having subdued Egypt, died at Damascus on his return, while the Magi made themselves masters of the kingdom. It is well to recount these matters too in summary.

Cambyses had a brother named, according to Xenophon, Tanaoxares, but according to Herodotus, Smerdis. While Cambyses was in Egypt, it seemed to him in his sleep that someone stood over him and said that Smerdis had sat upon the royal throne and touched the vault of heaven with his head. Fearing then for his kingdom, he at once sent Prexaspes to Susa to kill his brother secretly. And so Smerdis was destroyed; but Cambyses did not escape his destiny. For there were two Median brothers, called Magi, of whom one was named Cataziethes and the other Smerdis. This Smerdis shared with Smerdis the son of Cyrus not only his name but also his appearance. One of these two Cambyses had taken as the steward of his affairs. While Cambyses lingered in Egypt, Cataziethes, learning of the murder of Smerdis the son of Cyrus and that his death was known to few, planned to seize the kingdom; and he set his brother, who bore the name of Smerdis and had a great resemblance to him, upon the royal throne, not as his own blood-brother, but as the son of Cyrus and the brother of Cambyses. And he sent heralds everywhere to proclaim Smerdis the son of Cyrus as king. When Cambyses learned of this, he examined Prexaspes as one who had not carried out his command. But Prexaspes maintained that it was not his brother who had risen against him: "For I," he said, "as you commanded, killed and buried him." Cambyses therefore ordered the man who in the army was proclaiming that Smerdis the son of Cyrus reigned over the Persians to be arrested. When he was arrested, he was asked whether he himself had seen Smerdis, and whether Smerdis had ordered him to say what he was saying. He answered that he had not seen Smerdis, but that he had been ordered to say these things by the Magus who governed the palace. Learning the truth from this, Cambyses lamented that he had killed his brother in vain, and at once set out to march against the Magi. But as he leaped upon his horse, the cap fell from the scabbard of his sword, and the bared blade struck his thigh a mortal blow. He asked then what the city was called, and learning that it was Ecbatana, he said, "Here it is fated for me to die." For it had been prophesied to him that he would die at Ecbatana; and he had supposed that his end would overtake him at the Median Ecbatana, but the oracle meant not that place, but the Syrian Ecbatana. So a few days later he died childless,

4.2. having reigned seven years and five months. And the Magus, when Cambyses was dead, reigned without fear, ascribing to himself the name of Smerdis the son of Cyrus. He sent word to every nation he ruled and proclaimed remission of taxes for all for three years. But when he had reigned seven months, it became known who he was, and it became known in this way. Otanes was a man who rivalled the foremost of the Persians in birth and wealth. Cambyses had married his daughter, who was called Phaedymia; and the Magus made use of her, as of the other women whom he found in the palace. Her father, therefore, secretly sent and asked her whether she lay with Smerdis the son of Cyrus or with some other man. She answered that she had never seen Smerdis the son of Cyrus, and did not know with whom she shared a bed. Again he sent to her, charging her, if need be, to take the risk, in order to fulfil her father's command, and instructing her that, when she should lie with the king and find him asleep, she should feel for his ears; and if she found that he had ears, she should know that she lay with Smerdis the son of Cyrus, but if he had none, she should consider him to be the Magus Smerdis. Phaedymia obeyed her father, and finding that the man who lay with her had no ears, she made it known to her father. He had no ears because Cyrus had once cut them off for some offence. Then Otanes shared the secret with Aspathines and Gobryas, the foremost of the Persians and his friends. They, already suspecting the matter, at once accepted his words. They resolved to take in others as well. And Otanes brought in Intaphernes, Gobryas brought in Megabyzus, and Aspathines brought in Hydarnes; and to Darius the son of Hystaspes, who had just come to Susa from Persis, they communicated the secret. He too accepted the proposal, and advised them to set about the deed at once, saying that if the present day passed in vain, he himself would become the informer of the plot to the Magus. The others were persuaded by Darius's advice and held to the work.

Something else also occurred which spurred them to hasten the attempt. For the Magi, knowing that Prexaspes had with his own hand wrought the murder of Smerdis the son of Cyrus, and that for this reason he stood accused among the Persians, summoned him, made him their friend, and bound him beforehand with oaths and brilliant promises not to reveal their device to anyone. When he had agreed to do this, they went further and proposed that they would gather the multitude beneath the wall of the palace, and that he should climb upon a tower and cry out within hearing of all that they were ruled by Smerdis the son of Cyrus and by no other; for they had spared him, and had not killed him as Cambyses had commanded. When he had agreed to do this too, the multitude was gathered, and Prexaspes went up upon the tower and told of all the good that the Persians had received from Cyrus. But he added that he himself had killed Cyrus's son Smerdis, compelled by Cambyses, and declared plainly that it was the Magi who held the kingdom, and called down curses on the Persians if they did not avenge themselves on them. Having said this, he threw himself down and died.

The seven men, learning on the road what Prexaspes had done, hastened at once to the palace and entered it, unhindered by the guards, who stood in awe of the eminence of the men. Passing into the court, they met the eunuch messengers, who asked them on what errand they had come and tried to prevent them going further. They cut down the eunuchs on the spot and ran on inside. The Magi, who were within, learning of the tumult from the eunuchs, turned to defend themselves: one took up a spear, the other a bow. The one with the spear struck Aspathines in the thigh and Intaphernes in the face, whereby his eye was injured; but the bow proved useless to those who fought hand to hand at close quarters. The one who held it slipped into a chamber, and Darius and Gobryas burst in after him. Gobryas grappled with the Magus, while Darius, at a loss because of the darkness and afraid of striking his comrade, stood idle. Gobryas asked why he stood inactive; and he told the cause. "Then thrust your sword through both of us," said Gobryas. Darius drove in his dagger, and struck the Magus. So they killed both, and cut off the heads of both. The two wounded men they left in the citadel, both because of their wounds and to guard the acropolis; the rest, carrying the heads of the Magi, ran out and showed them to the Persians and explained what had happened. The Persians, learning of the deception, killed every Magus they met.

4.3. When the tumult had subsided and some days had passed, they took counsel about the management of affairs. Otanes urged them to choose a democracy, Megabyzus an aristocracy, but Darius advised that they choose a kingdom once again. The other four agreed with his opinion; and they resolved to mount their horses, and that whoever's horse, when they had come into the suburb, should neigh first at sunrise, he should hold the kingdom. Darius explained the plan to his groom. The man was clever, and "Take courage, master," he said, "for the kingdom shall be yours." When night came, he took a mare which Darius's horse loved, and tying it in the suburb he led the horse there and walked it close to the mare, and at last let it cover her. At dawn, when the seven had come into the suburb and were riding through it, as soon as they reached the place where the mare had been tied, Darius's horse, remembering her, went forward and neighed; and thereby the kingdom fell to Darius. Some say that it was Oebares — for that was the name of Darius's groom — who contrived this; but others say that his contrivance was different: that he touched with his hand the parts of the mare which Darius's horse loved, and kept his hand hidden in his trousers; and when the sun was rising and the seven men were mounting their horses, he brought his hand to the nostrils of Darius's horse, and the horse, at once catching the scent, snorted and neighed. Whether it happened in the one way or the other, Darius obtained the kingdom.

This man, while still a private person, had vowed to God that, if he became king, he would send to the temple in Jerusalem all the vessels of God that were still in Babylon. He had also long had a friendship with Zerubbabel, on account of which Zerubbabel, having lately come to him from Jerusalem, had been thought worthy to serve among his bodyguards together with two others. In the first year of his reign Darius prepared a banquet for his nobles; and when they had feasted and departed, he himself fell asleep beside his couch. Having slept a little, he woke and conversed with his bodyguards. He set each of them a contest of speech: to the first, whether wine prevails over all things; to the second, whether kings do; and to the remaining one — this was Zerubbabel — whether women, and above them truth, prevail. And he promised to give the victor as a prize to wear purple, and a turban of fine linen, and a golden collar, and to drink from golden cups, and to sleep upon gold, and to have a chariot with a golden bridle, and to sit next after himself, and to be called his kinsman. At dawn, then, summoning the nobles, he bade each of the bodyguards declare his opinion on the question. The first extolled the strength of wine, as deceiving the mind of those who indulge in it, altering the dispositions of their souls, and making the drunken now this, now that. The second argued that the king prevails over all, since men, ruling all other things through wisdom, are themselves ruled by kings, to whom all things are subject. But Zerubbabel declared that women are stronger, since kings and those who plant the vines are born of women, and all men honour them above their parents and their homelands and their dearest; and even kings themselves are mastered by women, flattering them and humbling themselves if they perceive them displeased in anything. But truth, he said, is stronger than all these; for God too is true and is so called, and while all else is mortal, truth is an immortal thing and everlasting. When all judged that he had argued best concerning truth, Darius granted him to ask whatever he wished beyond what had been promised. And he reminded Darius of the vow which he had made, if he should obtain the kingdom. This was, to build the temple of God in Jerusalem, and to restore all the vessels that still remained in Babylon. "This," he said, "is my request." The king, pleased at this, wrote to the satraps to supply cedar timber for the building of the temple, and to help Zerubbabel build the city, and that all the captives of the Israelites who had gone away to Judaea should be free and exempt from tribute, and that fifty talents should be given for the raising of the temple. And he sent all the vessels that were still with him; and whatever Cyrus had decreed concerning the Jews, this Darius too ordained in addition.

4.4. When these things had been done, Zerubbabel came to Babylon and announced to his countrymen the king's good tidings; and all who were eager to return to Jerusalem departed. The sum of those who went away was four million six hundred and twenty-eight thousand, apart from the Levites and gatekeepers and temple servants and attendants who followed those going up. Their leader was Zerubbabel, son of Salathiel, of the tribe of Judah, a descendant of David, and Jesus the son of Josedek the high priest; and besides these, Mardochaeus and Sereb were appointed as leaders from among the multitude. Having gone away to Jerusalem, they offered sacrifice and began the building of the temple. The temple was soon completed; and when the sanctuary was finished, the priests and the Levites and the sons of Asaph sang hymns to God. But the elders of the families, recalling the former temple in their memories and seeing that the one now built was inferior to the old, were moved to tears and lamentation, and their wailing drowned out the sound of the trumpets.

The Samaritans came to Zerubbabel while the temple was still being raised, asking to share with them in the building of the temple. But he did not allow them to share in the building, though he said they were permitted to worship in the temple. At this the Samaritans were aggrieved, and they persuaded the nations in Syria to ask the satraps to halt the raising of the temple. The governors of Syria and Phoenicia went up to Jerusalem and asked by whose leave they were raising the temple like a fortress and surrounding the city with walls exceedingly strong. Zerubbabel and the high priest Jesus said that the building had first been permitted by Cyrus, and then again by Darius. The governors of the lands of Syria and Phoenicia did not decide to halt the building of the works, but wrote at once to Darius. The Jews, fearing lest the king should change his mind about what he had ordained, were urged by the prophets Haggai and Zechariah to take courage and to fear nothing untoward. Trusting therefore in the prophets, they pressed on intently with the building. Darius, on receiving the letters and the accusations of the Samaritans — that the Jews were fortifying the city and building the temple like a fortress, and that Cambyses had forbidden their building — ordered that the matter be searched out in the royal records. And it was found written at Ecbatana, the fortress in Media, that in the first year of his reign Cyrus had commanded the temple in Jerusalem and the altar to be built, and had ordained that the expense for these should come from the royal funds, and that the vessels of the temple should be restored, and had commanded the rulers there to help with the work and to supply the Jews for sacrifice with bulls and rams and lambs and kids, and fine flour and wine and oil. Finding these things in the records, Darius wrote back to those who had written to him: "I have sent you the copy of the letter which I found in the records of Cyrus, and it is my will that all be done as it contains. Farewell." When the governors of those lands learned the king's purpose, they worked together with the Jews. And the temple was built in seven years, and the Israelites offered sacrifices of renewal for the good things of former times. When the feast of unleavened bread came, all the people streamed together from the villages into the city, and they kept the feast and accomplished the sacrifice called the Passover.

They settled in Jerusalem, employing an aristocratic government tempered with oligarchy. For the priests presided over affairs until it came about that the descendants of Asamonaeus reigned. Before the captivity they had been ruled by kings for five hundred and thirty-two years, six months, and ten days; and before the kings, those called judges and monarchs governed them as rulers. And living under this form of government they passed more than five hundred years after Moses and Joshua.

But the Samaritans, being hostile toward them, did the Jews many injuries. Envoys, therefore, were sent from Jerusalem to Darius — Zerubbabel and four others of the rulers. When the king learned the charges against the Samaritans, he wrote to the commanders and the council of Samaria not to trouble the Jews in any way, but rather to supply them from the royal treasury, out of the revenue of Samaria, with all things useful to them for sacrifice.

4.5. When Darius died, his son Xerxes succeeded to the kingdom and inherited also his piety toward God, and he behaved most generously toward the Jews. There was at that time in Babylon Ezra, a good man and most exactly versed in the laws of Moses. He became a friend of Xerxes, and wishing to go up to Jerusalem and to take with him some of the Hebrews in Babylon, he asked the king to make him known to the satraps by his letters. And the king wrote thus: "Considering it a work of my own benevolence that those of the Israelites who wish should depart with him to Jerusalem, I have given this command to Ezra, priest and reader of the divine law; and let whoever wishes depart. And whatever silver and gold may be found in the land of the Babylonians that has been dedicated to God, I command that all of it be conveyed to Jerusalem. And whatever you may devise, O Ezra, this also do, making the expense for it out of the royal treasury. And I command that on the priests and Levites and all the servants of the temple no tribute nor any other burden be imposed. And you, Ezra, according to the wisdom of God, appoint judges, that they may give judgment throughout all Syria and Phoenicia, men who know the law; and to those who do not know it you shall grant the means of learning it." When Ezra had received this letter, he read it in Babylon to the Jews there, and sent a copy of it to all his countrymen; and they all rejoiced greatly. Many of them took up their possessions and came to Babylon, that they might return to Jerusalem; but the whole body of the Israelites remained in their place. Therefore Josephus says that two tribes in Asia and in Europe were subject to the Romans, but that the ten tribes were beyond the Euphrates, being countless myriads and not able to be reckoned by number. Many in number came to Ezra and went up with him to Jerusalem. And Ezra handed over to the treasurers what Xerxes and his counsellors and the Israelites in Babylon had given to God, amounting to many talents of silver and bronze, and delivered the king's letters to the governors of the lands. They honoured the nation and helped them in every need. Then, learning that some of the people and of the priests and Levites had married foreign wives, he persuaded them, with many tears and frequent exhortations, to put away the foreign wives and the children born of them. When the feast of Tabernacles came, nearly the whole multitude of the people gathered together for it, and they asked Ezra that the laws of Moses be read. Hearing them, they were moved to tears, grieving over the past. But Ezra said that they ought not to lament during a feast, but to keep festival and to feast and to observe the laws in time to come.

So Ezra died an old man; and one of the captives, Nehemiah by name, who was cup-bearer to Xerxes, while walking before Susa saw certain strangers entering the city, and hearing them speaking in Hebrew, he approached and asked whence they came. When they said they had come from Jerusalem, he asked further how the multitude and the mother-city Jerusalem fared. When they answered that they fared ill, for the surrounding nations brought many terrible things upon them, Nehemiah wept; and when the hour came, he went in to serve the king as he was. The king, seeing him downcast, asked why he was dejected. He told that the cause of his grief was the misfortunes of his homeland, and begged that he might be allowed to go and raise up the wall and complete what was lacking of the sanctuary. The king assented to the request, and the next day gave him a letter to the governor of Phoenicia and Syria and Samaria, charging him to honour Nehemiah and to supply the expense for the building. So Nehemiah came to Jerusalem, with many of his countrymen following him, in the twenty-fifth year of the reign of Xerxes, and delivered the letter to the governor of the said lands. He distributed the building of the wall among the people by villages and cities, that it might be finished as quickly as possible. And the Jews prepared themselves for the work — so called from the day when they went up from Babylon, for since the tribe of Judah came first to those places, both the people themselves and the land alike were renamed from them as Jews. But the Ammonites and Moabites and Samaritans were vexed at the building of the walls, and attacked them and slew very many, and plotted against Nehemiah himself. And the multitude, thrown into disorder by these things, almost gave up the building. But Nehemiah, setting a body of men to guard his person, persevered unwearied, going around the circuit of the city by night and day; and this hardship he endured for two years and four months. For in that time the wall of Jerusalem was completed, in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Xerxes, in the ninth month. Nehemiah, seeing the city short of inhabitants, urged the priests and Levites to leave the countryside and move into the city. Nehemiah died an old man, a man honest in character and just and most generous toward his countrymen.

4.6. When Xerxes died, the kingdom passed to his son Cyrus, whom they also call Artaxerxes. In the third year of his reign he summoned the governors and satraps of his subject nations and feasted them lavishly for many days; and the queen Vashti likewise held a banquet for the women. Since she surpassed all in beauty, the king wished to display her to those banqueting with him, and he sent and bade her come to the banquet. But she would not obey; and though he sent often, she remained unyielding. The king therefore was angered at her disobedience. And he communicated her disobedience to the seven counsellors of the Persians; and they judged that she must be cast out. So she was cast out; but the king grieved, for he was in love with her. To him in this state his friends advised that he gather fair maidens from everywhere and take as wife the one judged most worthy.

He was persuaded by this advice, and when many maidens had been assembled, there was found in Babylon a certain Jewish maiden by birth, of the tribe of Benjamin, orphaned of both parents and reared by her uncle Mardochaeus, one of the foremost among the Jews. Esther was the maiden's name. The king, delighted with her, took her to wife and set the diadem upon her. And her uncle moved from Babylon to Susa, spending his time about the palace and inquiring after his niece. For neither did she make plain the nation from which she came, nor did Mardochaeus acknowledge his kinship with her. The king had made a law that no one might approach him while he sat upon his throne unless summoned, or else the one so approaching would die at the hands of the axe-bearers who stood by him, unless he held out toward him the rod which he kept in his hand; for whoever touched the rod was safe. When two of his eunuchs plotted against the king Artaxerxes, Barnabazus, a servant of one of them, a Jew by birth, perceiving the plot, reported it to Mardochaeus, who through Esther disclosed the conspirators to the king. The king crucified the eunuchs, and ordered the name of Mardochaeus to be written in the records and that he should remain at the palace.

Now Haman, being a particular friend of the king, was reverenced by all. But when Mardochaeus did not reverence him on account of his law, Haman, learning that he was a Jew, was indignant and said to him that, while the free Persians reverenced him, he, being a slave, refused to do so. Coming therefore to the king, he accused the whole nation, and asked that he order it to be destroyed root and branch and that no remnant of it be left; and that the king might not be deprived of their tribute, he himself undertook to give four hundred thousand pieces of silver. So Haman asked these things; but the king both made him a gift of the silver and gave him the people, to do with them as he wished. At once, then, a decree was sent by Haman to all the nations as if from the king, containing this: "Those designated by my second father Haman I command all to be destroyed, with their wives and children, and I will this to be done on the fourteenth of the twelfth month of the present year." When this letter was carried to the cities and the lands, the destruction of the Jews was being prepared. And those in Susa were in the same case.

When Mardochaeus learned what had happened, he put on sackcloth and poured ashes upon himself and cried aloud that a nation that had done no wrong was being destroyed. Coming to the palace, he stood outside; for it was not permitted to enter in such a garb. When Esther the queen learned of this, she sent a eunuch to Mardochaeus to learn why he mourned; and he made known to the eunuch what had happened, and charged Esther to entreat the king concerning these things. But she, learning this, sent word to him that, unless summoned by the king, she feared she would die if she came to him unsummoned. Mardochaeus replied that she should not look to her own safety, but to that of the nation; and that, if she did not, help would by all means come to it from God, but she and her father's house would be destroyed. She then charged him to go to Susa and prepare the Jews there to fast three days for her sake. Mardochaeus did so; and Esther, casting herself upon the ground in mourning garb and remaining without food for three days, prayed to God. After the three days she put on royal attire and, with two handmaids — on one of whom she leaned lightly, while the other bore up with her fingertips the deep folds of her robe that flowed even to the ground — she came to the king and entered with fear. When she came before him as he sat in royal state upon the throne, and he looked upon her sternly, a faintness seized her from fear, and she fell senseless upon the maid who walked at her side. But the king, fearing for the woman — God so providing it — leaped up from the throne, and taking her in his arms revived her, kissing her and bidding her take courage, and stretching out toward her his golden staff and placing the sceptre in her hands. She, taking heart from this, asked him to come to a banquet, together with Haman, with her. When he had assented and they were present, the king bade her declare what she wished, for she would fail of nothing. But she said she would tell him her wish on the morrow, if he would come again to her at a banquet together with Haman. When the king had promised, Haman went out full of joy; and seeing Mardochaeus in the court, he was indignant that he did not reverence him. Coming home to his wife and friends, he told of the honour he enjoyed both at home and from the queen, and how it grieved him to see Mardochaeus in the court. His wife bade him have a stake of fifty cubits cut, and in the morning to ask the king for leave to crucify Mardochaeus. Approving the counsel, he ordered his servants to prepare a stake and set it up in the court for the punishment of Mardochaeus.

And the stake was ready; but God that night took away the king's sleep. Lying awake, he ordered the secretary to bring the records of his own deeds and to read them. As they were being read, it was found that Mardochaeus had become the king's informer concerning the plot of the eunuchs. When the secretary had told only this and was passing on to another deed, the king stopped him, asking whether there was recorded any reward given to Mardochaeus. When he heard that there was none, he asked what hour of the night it was; and learning that it was already dawn, he commanded that whichever of his friends they found before the court should be called in. Haman was found, having hastened to ask for Mardochaeus. When he was summoned, the king said to him, "Advise me how I might honour a man who is loved by me." Reckoning that whatever opinion he gave he would be giving on his own behalf — for he supposed himself loved by the king more than the rest — he said, "If you wish to glorify this man, set him upon a horse, wearing the same attire as yourself and bearing a golden collar, and let one of your most intimate friends go before him and proclaim throughout the whole city that he obtains this honour whom the king wishes to honour." Pleased with the advice, the king said, "Seek out Mardochaeus the Jew, and giving him the horse and the robe and the collar, go before him and make the proclamation yourself; for you are my most intimate friend. These things shall be his from me, for he saved my life." Hearing this, Haman was confounded, and though stricken with helplessness, he nevertheless went out, leading the horse and bearing the purple and the collar. Finding Mardochaeus before the court clad in sackcloth, he bade him put on the purple. But he said, "Most wicked of men, do you thus mock our misfortunes?" When he learned, however, that the king had granted him this as a reward instead of death, for revealing the plot of the eunuchs, he put on the purple and the collar, and mounting the horse he rode around the city, with Haman going before and proclaiming that thus the king honours whomever he loves.

So when Haman had gone around the city, he returned to the king;

4.7. and Haman went home and recounted to his wife, weeping, what had befallen him. While they spoke, there came from Esther eunuchs urging Haman to hasten to the dinner. One of these, seeing the stake in his house and learning from one of the servants that they had prepared it to ask for the punishment of Mardochaeus, departed for the moment. When the banquet was drawing to its close, the king bade the queen say whom she begged for. She lamented the danger of her people, and said that she too, together with her nation, had been given over to destruction, and that it was Haman who had moved to ask for this. The king, troubled at this, sprang up from the banquet; and Haman entreated Esther, falling upon the couch and supplicating the queen. As the king came back in, "Most wicked man," he said, "do you also attempt to violate my wife?" At this moment the eunuch who was present spoke of the stake that he had seen prepared for Mardochaeus. And the king at once ordered that Haman be hanged upon that very stake. So he perished, and the queen received his property as a gift. When the king learned the kinship of Mardochaeus with Esther, he gave him the ring which he had formerly given to Haman. And the queen gave the property to Mardochaeus, and begged the king to deliver the nation of the Hebrews from danger. He granted leave to write in his name whatever they wished concerning the nation. And what was written was as follows. They accused Haman as wicked and ungrateful, who had asked for the destruction of a nation that had done no wrong, but they called Mardochaeus the saviour, and the Jews men who lived in the best manner and reverenced God; and they not only freed them from the punishment to which Haman had condemned them, but even thought them worthy of honour, and permitted them to live in peace using their own laws, and granted them on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is Adar, to defend themselves against those who had wronged them; and they ordered the satraps of the lands to help them, that they might take vengeance on their enemies.

When the Jews in Susa learned of the affair of Mardochaeus, they considered the good fortune common to all; and on the thirteenth of the month Adar, which the Macedonians call Dystros, the Jews in Susa killed about five hundred of their enemies, and those in the other cities and lands destroyed seventy-five thousand. Those in Susa, on the following day also, destroyed three hundred more, at Esther's request; and the ten sons of Haman were crucified, the king granting her this too. The fourteenth of the month the whole nation made a festival. And from that time they keep both days as a festival, calling them Days of Defence. And Mardochaeus was great, and helped the king govern the realm.

When the high priesthood passed to Joannes the son of Jodae, his brother Jesus, being a friend of Bagoas the general of the army of Artaxerxes, received a promise of obtaining the high priesthood. For this reason Joannes, provoked, killed his brother in the temple. And Bagoas, coming at once upon the temple, entered it, saying, "If those who have dared murder in the temple may enter it, I too will enter, being purer than they." And for seven years he afflicted the Jews. When Joannes ended his life, his son Joad succeeded to the high priesthood. He too had a brother, Manasses, to whom Sanaballetes, a satrap of Darius the last king of the Persians, gave his daughter, named Nicaso, in marriage. The leading men of the people of Jerusalem were in an uproar, because the brother of the high priest had married a foreigner, and ordered him either to divorce her or to abstain from the altar. He came to his father-in-law and told him this. Sanaballetes promised both to preserve his priesthood and to make him high priest and governor of the places he himself ruled, if he would not part from his daughter, and to build a temple on Mount Garizin, the highest of the mountains about Samaria, greater than the one in Jerusalem, with the consent of king Darius. Elated by these things, Manasses remained with Sanaballetes. And since many other priests and Israelites were entangled in such marriages, they all gathered to Manasses. Sanaballetes was preparing to bring his request concerning the building of the temple on Garizin to king Darius; but Darius, having engaged Alexander at Issus in Cilicia and being defeated, fled. Despairing then of Darius, Sanaballetes went over to Alexander with eight thousand of his men, and said that he handed over himself and the places he ruled to him. When Alexander received him, being now confident concerning his son-in-law, he brought his request for the raising of the temple on Garizin. And being permitted the building, he built the temple with all haste, and appointed Manasses his son-in-law high priest.

4.8. Since the course of the history has made mention of Alexander, it is well to recount briefly his deeds and his character, and from whence and of whom he sprang, and so to bring the account back again to its continuity; and the more so because this king visited Jerusalem, and something worthy of wonder happened from him toward the high priest and the people, and he himself recounted a certain divine vision, as Josephus records — which the account, as it proceeds, will set forth after the history concerning him.

He was the son of Philip the king of the Macedonians, born to him of Olympias; though it is told in fable that he was the son of Ammon, who lay with Olympias in the form of a serpent — and they say that Ammon is Zeus. But this is a fable. It is said, however, that his mother, on the night before she lay with Philip, dreamed that a thunderbolt fell upon her womb, and that from it a great fire blazed up and, carried in every direction, was dispersed. And after the marriage Philip dreamed that he set a seal upon his wife's womb, and that a lion was engraved on the seal. The other seers interpreted the dream variously, but Aristander said that she who had been sealed was with child — for empty things are not sealed — and that the child to be born would prove spirited and lion-like. He was born on the very day on which the temple of Artemis in Ephesus was burned down; when certain Magi present there ran about, saying that on that day there had been born for Asia a great ruin and grievous calamity.

Alexander was white of complexion, and the whiteness flushed red especially about his chest and face, and a sweet odour breathed from his skin and from his mouth. The cause of this would have been the heat of his body; for being fiery and very hot, it consumed the moisture and let nothing decaying come to the surface of his body. From childhood he showed the gravity of his spirit. For though he was swift of foot, to those who asked whether he would run the foot-race at Olympia, he said, "Yes, if I were to contend against kings." And if some famous city had been captured by his father and was announced to him, or some conspicuous victory won in battle, he would say, as if vexed, to his companions, "My father will leave me, along with you, no brilliant deed to display." When the horse Bucephalas was brought to Philip at a price of thirteen talents, and would neither accept a rider, as was shown to Philip, nor endure a voice, and seemed thereafter quite unmanageable, Alexander said, "What a horse they send away, because they do not know how to handle him!" And his father, rebuking him, said, "And could you handle him?" He answered, "I could handle him better than another." Being permitted to handle the horse, he took the rein and turned it toward the sun, perceiving perhaps that it was disturbed by its own shadow moving before it. Stroking it a little, he leaped up and mounted it, and after cantering a short way let it go at a run; and the onlookers were anxious. When he had turned back with spirit and joy, Philip's company shouted aloud, while Philip himself shed tears of joy, and kissing the boy said, "Seek for yourself, my child, a kingdom to match you; for Macedonia cannot contain you." His nature was hard to move when he was given orders, but if one approached him with reason and persuasion, he was obedient. He associated with Aristotle, sharing not only in ethical and political teaching, but also in the more secret doctrines, which they did not communicate to many, calling them esoteric and acroamatic. For there is extant a letter of his to Aristotle, which runs thus: "You did not act rightly in publishing the acroamatic doctrines; for in what shall we differ from others, if the teachings in which we were trained are to be common to all?" And Aristotle wrote back that "they are published and not published," signifying by this their obscurity and difficulty of comprehension. Of medicine too he pursued not only the theory but the practice itself. When he had become sixteen years old, and was already giving proof of his spirit and courage, he was greatly beloved by his father. But because of Philip's loves unbecoming to his age and his mother's jealousy and heavy temper, Alexander came to have differences with his father.

4.9. When Pausanias had killed Philip, Alexander succeeded to the kingdom, being twenty years old. Though affairs were everywhere thrown into confusion at his accession, by daring and weight of spirit he quickly settled them, taking Thebes and razing it and selling the captured Thebans, but making peace with the Athenians. At that time a certain Thracian, one of the commanders, violated and shamed Timocleia, a Theban woman and one of the noble, and then questioned her about money. She, taking him aside alone, led him to a well, saying that she had hidden the best of her treasures in it. When the commander bent over the mouth of the well, the woman pushed him down into it and, throwing stones from above, killed him. Brought in bonds to Alexander, she was asked by him who she was. She answered fearlessly, "I am the sister of Theagenes, who was chosen general against Philip, and fell fighting for the freedom of the Greeks." Admiring then both the woman's high-mindedness and the steadfastness of her soul, Alexander released her free, together with her children. Coming to Diogenes of Sinope, who was staying near Corinth, and finding him warming himself in the sun, he greeted the man and asked whether he needed anything. Diogenes said that he needed the warmth of the sun, and asked him to step aside. As Alexander departed, those about him laughed at Diogenes; but Alexander, admiring the man's loftiness of spirit, said to them, "If I were not Alexander, I would be Diogenes."

Setting out on the expedition into Asia, he did not embark on the ship before he had assigned to one of his companions a field, to another a village, to another some other revenue. When Perdiccas said, "But what, O king, do you leave for yourself?" he answered, "My hopes." When he had crossed the Hellespont, the satraps of Darius met him with a heavy force at the crossing of the Granicus. While those about him feared the depth of the river, the force of the current, and on top of these the attack of the enemy, he with thirteen squadrons of cavalry plunged into the stream, hazarding himself against it and against the enemy and against banks steep and broken. For this reason it seemed at the time that he made the crossing rather madly than as a general would. Having so crossed, he was forced to fight in disorder. And when many rushed upon him — for he was conspicuous by his arms — he was struck by a javelin but not wounded; and when someone struck his helmet with a sabre, the blow reached so far through the helmet that the sabre grazed his hair. The battle being so joined, the Macedonian forces crossed the Granicus; and the men of Darius no longer held out, but turned to flight. From this battle, then, there came to Alexander a great tide of good fortune; for Sardis came over to him, and the rest joined his cause. Thence he turned to the coast, and held Pamphylia and Cilicia and Phoenicia, Pisidia and Phrygia; then he subdued the Paphlagonians and Cappadocians.

Darius set out from Susa with six hundred thousand men, both elated by the multitude of his army and confident, supposing Alexander to be afraid because he tarried long in Cilicia. But this was due to illness, when he had been given up by the other physicians, and Philip the Acarnanian alone dared to treat him with medicine. When Parmenion had beforehand written to him that Philip had been corrupted by Darius with great gifts and promises to destroy him if he killed him, Alexander read the letter, and revealing it to no one, kept it by him. Just as Philip brought him the cup of medicine, Alexander confidently took it, and put the letter into Philip's hands. And the one drank while the other read, each looking at the other — Alexander with a gracious and cheerful countenance, Philip with one fearful and shaken. When Darius was hastening against Alexander, in order, as he said, that the enemy might not escape, Amyntas, a Macedonian who was a deserter to him, said, "Take courage, O king; for Alexander will not flee, but is even now coming to you as fast as he can march."

When the battle was joined at Issus in Cilicia, the place itself, through its narrowness, gave Alexander great advantage, and he gave himself still more by his skilful generalship. There too he was struck in the thigh by a sword, fighting among the foremost. Having won a conspicuous victory, he did not capture Darius, who fled, but took his chariot and his bow. The camp of Darius was plundered by the Macedonians; but the tent of Darius was reserved for Alexander, with its attendants and its wealth and all its other furnishings. Then someone announced to him that the mother and wife of Darius and his two daughters were being led away captive, wailing as if Darius were dead, since they had seen his chariot and bow taken. Moved with pity at the news, because of the instability of fortune, he sent someone to the women to tell them both that Darius lived and that nothing unpleasant would befall them; for he did not regard Darius as an enemy, but disputed with him over the kingdom. He took nothing from the attendance they had, nor came into their sight, nor allowed them to suffer or expect anything unworthy from anyone.

4.10. Having now conquered at Issus, he became master also of Damascus, where the Persians and Darius himself had left their treasures and most of their baggage. After this Cyprus and Phoenicia, except Tyre, were put into his hands. But Tyre was taken by siege, while Alexander, in besieging it, saw two dreams. For it seemed that Heracles was calling him from the wall and welcoming him; and the other dream showed him a Satyr playing before him, who, when he wished to seize it, escaped, and at last came into his hands. This dream was interpreted to signify to him, by a division of the word, that Tyre would be his ("sa Tyros," yours is Tyre). Then, besieging Gaza, a great city of Syria, he was struck on the shoulder by a stone, but took the city. Having become master of Egypt, he wished to found in it a Greek city under his own name, and had already marked out a certain place for the city. As he slept, a man seemed to stand over him, grey-haired and venerable; and the one who appeared was Homer, who spoke these verses: "There is, moreover, an island in the much-tossed sea before Egypt, and they call it Pharos." Springing up, then, he at once came to Pharos, and pleased with the natural fitness of the place, he founded the city there, joining it to the mainland by a mole, though it had before been an island. It is said that, delighted with the natural suitability of the place, he said that Homer, besides being great in other things, was also a wise architect. As he went to the temple of Ammon through a waterless and sandy region, he found the good fortune that attended him in all things lightening there too the toil of that journey. For rains came and warded off the danger of the drought and made the air temperate, the sand being moistened and packed together by the wetness. And when the marks of the road were obliterated and its guides went astray, ravens flying overhead led the march for those with him, and if any, going slowly, were left behind, by night they brought them up again with their cries. Having so passed through the hardship of the journey and come to the temple of Ammon, the prophet there, wishing to address him in the Greek tongue, made a barbarism at the end of the greeting, saying "O paidios" instead of "paidion" ("O child"). And the barbarism gave many the belief that Alexander's birth was from the gods, since a report was spread that the prophet had said to him "O son of Zeus." And he boasted to the barbarians of his birth from the god, so that he would say, "Will Olympias never cease to slander me to Hera?" But before the Greeks he refrained from this talk. Once, being wounded by a missile, as the blood ran down from the wound he said, "This is blood that flows, and not ichor, such as flows from the blessed gods."

When Darius wrote to him, offering ten thousand talents as ransom for his dearest ones, and ceding to him all the land within the Euphrates, and seeking to make him his friend by giving him one of his daughters in marriage, Parmenion said, "If I were Alexander, I would accept these terms." "And so would I, by Zeus," he answered, "if I were Parmenion." He wrote back to Darius that, if he came to him, he would fail of none of his kindnesses. Then a eunuch of Darius's wife, having fled and made his way safely to Darius, announced the death of the queen; for she had died in childbirth. Darius wept, saying that not only had the queen become a captive, but she had also failed of a royal burial. But the eunuch said, "Nay, take courage, master. For neither did my mistress while living, nor your mother, nor your children, experience any evil, nor in death did she lack a fitting burial, but she was honoured even with the tears of enemies." At this Darius fell into strange suspicions, and taking the eunuch apart, bound him beforehand with oaths to say whether any passion had arisen in Alexander toward his wife. "For how," he said, "has the wife of an enemy been so honoured, as you say, by a young and hostile man?" But the eunuch, cutting short the suspicion, said, "Speak no ill word, master, and neither shame your wife nor again slander Alexander, who has shown more self-control toward the Persian women than nobility toward the Persian men." And he confirmed his words with oaths, recounting the continence of Alexander and his other virtue. And Darius prayed that he might be able to requite Alexander for the noble conduct he had shown toward his dearest, or else that no other than Alexander might sit upon the throne of Cyrus.

4.11. Having now received the land within the Euphrates, Alexander set out against Darius, who was bringing against him a hundred myriads of soldiers. When the armies came in sight of each other, and it was night, and the plain between gleamed with the fires of the barbarians, and a great din reached them from their camp, Parmenion and some others of the companions, astonished at the multitude, advised Alexander to attack the enemy by night; for they would not be able to stand against so great an army in close combat. But he said, "I do not steal my victory." On the following day, when the battle was joined — according to some at Arbela, according to others at Gaugamela — the barbarians gave way, and there was a pursuit of them. Alexander, seeing Darius from afar upon a high chariot, surrounded by very many horsemen splendidly armed, drove the fugitives there, so as to throw into confusion by them those who stood firm and to scatter many of them. When many had fallen before Darius, and it was not possible to drive out the chariot, hemmed in by the corpses, Darius dismounted from it and, mounting a mare, fled. He would have been captured, had not Parmenion summoned Alexander to come to the aid of the wing under his own command, which was hard pressed.

So a brilliant victory came to Alexander, and from then the kingdom of the Persians was overthrown, and Alexander was proclaimed king of Asia, and all Babylonia came under him. Having taken Susa, he found in the palace forty thousand talents of coined money and a profusion of other untold treasures. Becoming master also of Persis, he found a quantity of coin as great as at Susa. The rest of the wealth, they record, was carried off by ten thousand pairs of mules and five thousand camels. Having set fire to the palace, he quickly repented and ordered it to be quenched. Being magnificent in his gifts, he gave still more freely as his affairs grew. Seeing those about him living luxuriously and extravagant in their ways of life, he reproved them gently, saying that he wondered they had not learned, from comparing the life of the Persians with their own, that to live in luxury is most slavish, but to toil is most kingly. He himself, however, did not relax, but toiled in campaigns and hunts. But his companions, wishing to live in luxury because of their wealth, yet compelled to follow him, went so far as to slander him. At first he bore the slanders gently, saying that it was kingly to be ill spoken of while doing good. Later, however, the many calumnies exasperated him and made him harsh and implacable toward those who slandered him. And yet formerly, when he heard capital cases, he was wont to put his hand over one of his ears, keeping it untouched and unshared in the accusation, for the sake of the accused.

Marching against Darius with three thousand men, he pursued him for many days, so that most gave up because of the harshness of the road and the lack of water. At that time some Macedonians, carrying water in skins, met him, and filling a helmet brought it to him, who was sorely afflicted with thirst. But he, taking the helmet and seeing those about him looking toward it, did not drink, but gave it back to those who had given it, saying, "If I alone drink, these men will lose heart." Having now fallen upon the enemy, he passed by their camp and hastened to overtake Darius. But Darius lay in a covered wagon, covered with wounds and already failing. Asking for water and drinking, he said to Polystratus, who gave it, "This is the height of all my misfortune, that having received a kindness I cannot requite you; but may Alexander repay you the favour, and may the gods repay Alexander for his clemency toward my mother and wife and children." With these words he expired. Standing over him when he was dead, Alexander wrapped his corpse in his own cloak and sent it, royally adorned, to his mother. Bessus, who had killed him, he tore asunder, ordering him to be fastened to two trees bent down by force, and then the trees to be released, so that the man was torn apart, each of the trees springing back violently to its natural upright position. Going to Hyrcania, near the Hyrcanian sea, which is also called the Caspian, when certain barbarians stole his horse Bucephalas, he was angered, and sending word threatened to kill them all unless they sent the horse back; and they both restored the horse and surrendered themselves to him.

4.12. Thence he marched into Parthia, where he first put on barbarian dress, less ostentatious than the Median, but more pompous than the Persian; and the sight seemed offensive to the Macedonians. Choosing out thirty thousand boys of the captives, he ordered them to be taught Greek letters and to be armed in the Macedonian manner. Falling in love with Roxane, a beautiful woman, he approached her in no other way than by lawful marriage. Of his friends, he called Hephaestion, who praised the dress he wore and changed his own attire to match, a lover of Alexander; but Craterus, who did not depart from the ancestral ways, a lover of the king. And he used the one in dealing with the barbarians, but through Craterus he transacted business with the Macedonians and the Greeks. Philotas the son of Parmenion, who boasted that the successes came about through himself and his father, and called Alexander a stripling, and then was found to be plotting, he put to death. And sending into Media, where his father was, he killed him too. Cleitus also, who was one of his companions, when at a drinking-party certain poems were sung that had been composed against some generals lately defeated by barbarians, and Alexander listened to them with pleasure, grew harsh and indignant and boastful from arrogance and drink, and slandered Alexander; whereupon Alexander first threw an apple at him, and then, as he persisted insolently and rashly and quoted the iambics of Euripides, "Alas, how ill are things ordered throughout Greece," and the rest, Alexander, boiling over with anger, ran him through with a spear and killed him. But at once, when his anger had passed, repenting, he set out to kill himself also; he was restrained, however, by his bodyguards, and was carried into a chamber, where he passed that night and the following day in lamentation, and lay exhausted and speechless, only groaning most grievously. And when his friends came in to him, he would not accept their words. But when Aristander the seer reminded him of a vision he had seen concerning Cleitus and of certain signs that had occurred to him, and said that what had happened was fated, he began to give way.

When he was about to invade India, after the wagons had been packed, he first set fire to his own, then to those of his friends, and after this ordered those of the Macedonians to be burned. This deed grieved a few, but the rest, with shouting and enthusiasm, rushed to the work and filled Alexander with eagerness for the campaign. By now he was also a fearful and inexorable chastiser of wrongdoers. Many dangers, then, befell him in the battles, and he met with bold men's wounds; but the greatest destruction of the army was wrought by the lack of necessities and the unhealthiness of the climate. He himself, through daring, thought nothing impregnable to the bold, nor anything secure for the timid. Assaulting a sheer rock with the younger of the Macedonians, he addressed a certain one of them, called Alexander, saying, "You at least, because of your name, ought to play the man." When the Macedonians shrank from crossing a deep river, he said, "Have I, the worst of men, not even learned to swim?" When envoys came to him from the besieged cities, the eldest of them, Acouphis by name, asked what they should do to be reckoned his friends; and Alexander said, "If they choose you as ruler, and send me the hundred best men." Laughing at this, Acouphis said, "But I shall rule better, O king, if I send you the worst men and not the best."

4.13. Now Taxiles, ruler of a portion of India, fertile and prosperous, not inferior to Egypt, being a wise man, sent and greeted Alexander, and said, "What need have we of wars, if you have come neither to take away our water nor our necessary food? As for other things, if I am the stronger, I am ready to do good; if the weaker, I do not refuse to be grateful for good received." Pleased at this, Alexander said, "I shall contend with you and strive in kindnesses, that you, being noble, may not surpass me." Receiving many gifts and giving more, he at last presented him with a thousand talents of coin. Having made a truce with a certain Indian city, he killed all the mercenaries among the most warlike of the Indians as they were departing from it — a deed which clings like a stain to his military exploits. Then he fought against Porus, who reigned over a region of India, whose body reached to a height of four cubits and a span. Having conquered him and taken him alive, Alexander asked how he should treat him. He answered, "Like a king." And when Alexander asked further whether he had anything else to say, Porus said, "Everything is contained in 'like a king.'" So he released him and gave him to rule, naming him satrap not only of what he had ruled before, but also of much else. In this battle Bucephalas too was wounded, and after a time died, being now very old; and Alexander grieved as if he had lost a friend.

The Macedonians, however, worn out in the battle against Porus, would not obey Alexander when he tried to compel them to cross also the river Ganges, which had a breadth of thirty-two stades and a depth of a hundred fathoms. Despondent, he remained without going out, in his tent, reckoning that not to cross the Ganges was a confession of defeat. But when his friends exhorted him and his soldiers besought him with weeping, he gave way and broke camp. Building many boats and rafts, he was conveyed through the rivers, wishing to behold the outer sea; and sailing along he disembarked and subdued cities. Being among the Mallians, the most warlike of the Indians, he nearly came to grief. For being the first to mount the wall by a ladder, when the ladder broke and the enemy pressed upon him and shot at him, he gathered himself together and leaped down from above into the midst of his foes; and by chance he stood upright. At first the barbarians scattered; but seeing him with only two shield-bearers, they turned back and defended themselves and wounded him with close-fighting weapons. One of them, standing off, struck him with an arrow from a bow and drove the missile into the bones about the breast, and the blow reached him so that the bone gave way and was bent; whereupon the one who struck him ran upon him with a sword. Peucestas and Limnaeus, covering him with their shields, were both wounded; and the one died, but Peucestas still defended himself, and Alexander killed the barbarian who had wounded him. Wounded in many places, and then struck on the neck with a club, he leaned against the wall and looked toward the barbarians. Meanwhile, the Macedonians having gathered, he was caught up and carried, senseless, into the tent. When the point of the arrow, which had lodged in one of the bones, was drawn out, sharp pains and faintings came upon him, so that he was even expected to die. Yet escaping the danger and being treated for a long time, he threw into a tumult the Macedonians, who longed for him; and he came forth.

4.14. When he had recovered, he again advanced, subduing much territory and many cities. Seizing some of the naked sages and setting them difficult questions, he gave them gifts and let them go. But one of those held in repute among them, called Calanus, Taxiles persuaded to come to Alexander. This man cast a dry hide before the king and walked around treading on its edges. As each edge was pressed down by his treading, it rose up in the other parts. Then, when he had trodden on its centre and held it down, the whole hide stayed still and motionless. By this example he advised Alexander not to dwell on the edges of his empire, but to hold the centre, so that thereby the surrounding parts too might be at rest.

Carried in seven months down the rivers to the sea, he is said to have sailed out with his ships into the ocean. Then, turning back, he ordered the ships to sail along keeping India on the right, while he himself, marching by land, came into the utmost difficulty, and lost so great a number that not even a fourth part of the army was brought back from India, through diseases and wretched ways of living and heat and famine. For he passed through a barren land, having few sheep, and these fed on sea-fish and having flesh that was bad and ill-smelling. In sixty days, having passed through that country and reached Gedrosia, he came among abundance, and recovered his force and himself revelled. Coming down to the sea, he punished the wicked among his generals. For the expedition into the interior, and the wound at the Mallians, and the destruction of the multitude, had made them disbelieve in his survival and had incited the generals and satraps to insolence and injustice; and they had stirred the tributaries to revolt. When Abuletes, one of the satraps, had prepared no provisions, but brought him three thousand talents of coin, Alexander ordered the money to be set before the horses; and when they would not eat it, he said, "What use to us is this?" When he was in Persis and saw the tomb of Cyrus dug open, he killed the one who had dug it, a man of Pella and not of the obscure. The tomb of Cyrus had this inscription: "O man, whoever you are and whencever you have come — for that you will come I know — I am Cyrus, who won the empire for the Persians. Do not, then, begrudge me this little earth that covers my body." When this was read, it made Alexander deeply moved, as he reckoned the instability of human affairs.

Having betrothed to himself Statira the daughter of Darius, in celebrating the marriage he presented each of the nine thousand guests with a golden cup, and was magnificent in other things, and paid the debts on behalf of the debtors, amounting to a little short of ten thousand talents. At that time Antigenes, one of the commanders, having falsely pretended to be in debt and having brought forward a false creditor, took the money and was found out. The king, angered, drove him from the court and took away his command. But when the man was suspected of intending to kill himself out of grief, Alexander, fearing this, both relaxed his anger toward him and remitted the money.

Of the thirty thousand boys whom he had ordered to be educated, when they turned out noble and comely and not unfit for the exercises, Alexander was pleased, but the Macedonians were vexed. When he sent away the weak and maimed as if to the sea, they called this an outrage and an insult, and demanded that he dismiss them all and content himself with the young pyrrhic dancers. Angered at this, Alexander handed over the guard-duties to the Persians. But when the Macedonians were humbled, he received them back again, and dismissed the useless ones, presenting them magnificently, and wrote to Antipater that they should have precedence at the games and theatres and should sit crowned.

When he was at Ecbatana, Hephaestion fell into a fever, and the disease being aggravated by an intemperate way of living, he died. Alexander did not bear his grief with reason, but crucified the physician, and ordered the horses and mules to be shorn, and pulled down the battlements of the cities, and stopped music and flutes in the camp for a long time. As he was going to Babylon, Nearchus returned, having sailed again into the Euphrates from the great sea, saying that the Chaldaeans had met with him and counselled Alexander to keep away from Babylon. But he, not heeding the saying, went on. And when he was at the walls, ravens fighting one another fell before him. It was announced to him that Apollodorus the general of Babylon had offered sacrifice concerning him; and the seer who had sacrificed, named Pythagoras, not denying it, was asked the manner of the offering. When he said that the liver was without a lobe, Alexander said, "Alas, a powerful sign," and let the seer go free. Other signs too occurred to him, and this among them. As he had stripped for anointing and ball-play, the young men who were playing ball, when about to dress, saw someone sitting silently on the king's throne, clad in the royal robe and wearing the diadem. When he was questioned who he was, he was long speechless, and at last said with difficulty that he was called Dionysius, that he was a Messenian by birth, that he had been brought in bonds because of an accusation, that Sarapis had loosed his chains, and had led him there and bidden him put on the robe and the diadem and sit in silence. Alexander, as the seers advised, did away with the man, but himself grew despondent and, becoming fearful and troubled, made an omen of everything. Having bathed, and gone to Media to revel, and there passed the night in revelry and the following day, he began to be feverish. Being feverish and very thirsty, he drank wine, and became delirious and died. This is one account of his death; but another holds that he was feverish for several days and bathed, and that the fever so prevailed that he lay speechless; that the Macedonians were thrown into an uproar, supposing him dead, and cried out against the commanders, until the doors were opened to them and they saw Alexander on his couch; and that after this he died. Some say that there was later a report that he had been killed by poison, and that Aristotle had become Antipater's counsellor in the deed, and that through him the poison was brought. The poison was a water cold and icy, from a certain rock in Nonacris, which they take up like a fine dew into the hoof of an ass; for no other vessel holds it, but it is broken through by its coldness and sharpness. But most say it is a fabrication that Alexander died by poison, and prove this from the fact that his body, lying for several days in hot places untended, while the commanders quarrelled with one another, showed no sign of such corruption, but remained pure and seemed fresh.

It is said that, knowing his life was already failing him, he wished to throw himself secretly into the Euphrates, so that, becoming invisible, he might give the impression of having passed over to the gods, as being sprung from them; but Roxane, learning this, prevented the attempt; and he said with a groan, "So you have begrudged me, woman, the glory of being made a god and not dying."

So Alexander, having been raised to such great fortune,

4.15. died. When he was besieging Tyre, he wrote to the high priest of the Jews, asking him to send an alliance and provisions for the army, and to give him what they had paid as tribute to Darius. But when the high priest said that he had given oaths to Darius not to take up arms against him, and that he would not transgress these while Darius lived, Alexander was angered and threatened to march against Judaea. Having just taken Tyre, he set out for Jerusalem. The high priest Joad was in anguish because of the king's wrath, and prayed to God to defend the nation. God answered him in his sleep, bidding him take courage, and adorn the city and open the gates, and that he himself, with the priests in their customary robes, should go to meet the king, and the multitude in white garments. He did as had been answered him; and when Alexander was already approaching the city, the high priest went forth with the priests and the multitude of the city to a place from which the city and the temple could be seen. While those following the king supposed that he would order the city to be plundered and the high priest destroyed, Alexander, seeing from afar the multitude and the priests adorned as has been said, and the high priest clad in the hyacinth-coloured and gold-wrought robe and bearing on his head the turban with the golden plate on which the name of God was inscribed, went forward alone and did reverence, and greeted the high priest. At this all the others were astounded, and Parmenion asked why he did reverence to the high priest of the Jews. He said, "It was not this man I reverenced, but the God by whose high priesthood he is honoured. For I saw him in my sleep, while I was still near Macedonia, in this very robe; and as I was considering how I might gain mastery of Asia, he urged me not to delay, and promised that he himself would lead my army and would hand over to me the empire of the Persians. Having therefore seen no one in such a robe but this man, I now recalled the vision of the dream, and believe that with God's help I have made the expedition and shall conquer Darius and gain the empire of the Persians." Having said this, and greeted the high priest, he entered the city; and going up to the temple, he sacrificed to God as the high priest directed. And he saw the book of Daniel, in which it is written that one of the Greeks would overthrow the empire of the Persians, and he was pleased with it; and he granted all that the Jews asked.

Seeing this, the Samaritans, who were themselves not far from Jerusalem, met Alexander splendidly arrayed, and asked him to honour with his presence them too and their temple. He said, "I will come when I return." When they asked him to grant them the same as the Jews, he inquired who they were. They said they were Hebrews, but were called the Sidonians in Sicima. And he asked again whether they were Jews. When they admitted they were not, he said, "It was to the Jews that I granted what you ask." And the temple on Mount Garizin became a refuge for transgressors; for if anyone had eaten forbidden food or otherwise transgressed and fell under accusation, he fled to the Sicimites. When the high priest Joad died, his son Onias succeeded to the high priesthood.

4.16. When Alexander died, his kingdom was divided into four governments; Antigonus ruled over Asia, and the others ruled the rest, as recorded before. While these were in strife with one another, there were continual wars, and the cities suffered. Ptolemy the son of Lagus, who reigned over Egypt and was styled Soter, proved the contrary of his title toward Syria, and took Jerusalem by deceit. For entering the city on the sabbath as if to sacrifice, he mastered it without effort; for the Jews, neither knowing his purpose and being idle because of the day, did not resist. Having so mastered the nation, he ruled most harshly, and taking many captives, led them away to Egypt and settled them there. The people of Jerusalem had disputes with the Samaritans, the people of Jerusalem calling their temple holy and saying that the sacrifices ought to be made in it, while the Sicimites exalted the temple on Mount Garizin.

When Ptolemy son of Lagus had reigned over Egypt for forty years and died, his son Ptolemy Philadelphus succeeded to the rule. He was eager to have the Hebrew scriptures translated from their ancestral tongue into the Greek dialect, and he freed the people of Jerusalem who were enslaved in Egypt. For wishing to make a collection of books, and being zealous about this, he had Demetrius of Phalerum over his libraries. Once, when Ptolemy asked Demetrius how many myriads of books he now had, he said that those collected were about twenty; and that there were also among the Hebrews writings of their own laws worthy of zeal, and that these too should be acquired. The king therefore wrote to the high priest about these things. But Aristaeus, who was a friend of the king, said, "Since we have resolved not only to transcribe the laws of the Jews but also to translate them, how shall we accomplish this, while many Jews in your kingdom are slaves? Free them then, O king, from slavery, and so you will make the nation eager to have the scriptures both transcribed and translated." The king, persuaded by Aristaeus's argument, ordered all the Jews enslaved in Egypt to be set free, paying for each from their masters a hundred and twenty drachmas. The number of those freed amounted to more than ten myriads. The sum paid for their ransom came to four hundred and sixty talents.

So Ptolemy wrote to Eleazar the high priest. For when the high priest Onias had died, his son Simon, who was also called the Just, succeeded him; and when he died, leaving an infant son named Onias, Eleazar the brother of Simon held the high priesthood. To him, then, Ptolemy wrote, announcing the freedom of the enslaved Jews and his goodwill toward the nation, and asking both that the laws themselves be sent and that six men from each tribe be sent who had trained accurately in their ancestral language and in the Greek tongue, that the scriptures among them might be translated by them into the Greek language. He sent also to the temple offerings: a hundred talents of silver, twenty golden bowls and thirty silver, and five mixing-bowls, and a golden table. So Eleazar, receiving Ptolemy's letter and the offerings, chose six men from each tribe, and sent them, bringing the law also. When they had come to Alexandria, and had brought to the king both the parchments containing the law written in golden letters and the gifts sent to him by the high priest, the king was exceedingly pleased, and greeted the men, and feasted with them, and gave them three talents each, and prepared for them most excellent lodgings. Then Demetrius took them, and leading them to a single quiet house, asked them to set to work. They made the translation as accurate as they could, with all zeal. When the work had been finished in seventy-two days, and what was translated was read to the king, he both rejoiced that his purpose had been brought to effect, and greatly admired the mind and wisdom of the lawgiver. And he wondered how none, either of the historians or of the other sages, had made mention of it. Demetrius told him that no one had dared to touch the writing of these laws, because it was divine, and that some who had attempted it had been harmed by God. For Theopomptus, wishing to write about these things, was injured in his mind for more than thirty days; and perceiving whence his derangement had come, in the intervals he sought to appease God; and he saw in a dream that his affliction had befallen him because he meddled with divine things and wished to bring them out to common men. Abstaining therefore from the work, he recovered his mind. "And Theodectes too," he said, "the poet of tragedies, wishing in one of his dramas to make mention of things written in the sacred book, was afflicted in his eyes and blinded; and learning the cause, he was freed from his misfortune, having entreated God." So the king, taking the books and doing reverence to them, and rewarding the men most generously, and sending offerings to the temple and most excellent gifts to the high priest, sent them back to Jerusalem.

So Josephus has recorded the translation of the Hebrew scriptures to have come about; but others say that the translators did not make the paraphrase of the scriptures gathered together, but were divided two by two, and being in separate lodgings, set out their translation, and after its completion came together, and that when the writings of each were compared with one another, they were found to differ neither in sense nor indeed in wording, but to agree in all things. So the translation took place under Ptolemy Philadelphus,

4.17. in the one way or the other. The Jews, when Antiochus the Great reigned over Asia and was at war with Ptolemy Eupator and with his son Ptolemy Epiphanes, were grievously afflicted. When Antiochus had conquered, he brought Judaea over to himself. But when Ptolemy Epiphanes, after his father's death, sent a great force against Coele Syria and took many cities, the nation of the Jews, being warred upon, went over to Epiphanes. Again, when Antiochus conquered, the Jews willingly went over to him, and received him into the city, and helped him as he besieged the soldiers of Ptolemy who garrisoned the citadel; and from then the nation was friendly to him. Then Antiochus made peace with Ptolemy and contracted a marriage-alliance with him, giving him his daughter Cleopatra, and providing as her dowry Coele Syria and Phoenicia and Judaea, and also Samaria. These things happened in the time of the high priest Onias. For when Eleazar died, his uncle Manasses succeeded him, after whom Onias, the son of Simon the Just, was thought worthy of the high priesthood. Simon was the brother of Eleazar, as has been recorded.

Now the said Onias, through love of money and weakness of judgment, by not giving Ptolemy the yearly tribute which his predecessors had paid to the kings, provoked him to anger. Ptolemy therefore sent and threatened to deal harshly both with the nation and the city; but the high priest, mastered by greed, was shameless. But Joseph the son of Tobias, the nephew of the high priest, asked his uncle whether he would permit him to go as envoy to Ptolemy. When he gave leave, Joseph entertained most generously the man sent by Ptolemy, and providing him with lavish gifts, sent him on his way, promising to follow himself. The man returned to Ptolemy, reporting what had happened and recounting the goodness of Joseph, and saying that the man would come as envoy, and uttering many praises of him to the king and queen. Joseph, having made his preparations, afterward came to Alexandria. Hearing that Ptolemy was at Memphis, he went to meet him. The king happened to be seated in a carriage with his wife, and the man entertained by Joseph was also present. Seeing him, he said to the king, "This is the man about whom I told you, that he is good and a generous young man." Ptolemy, hearing this, both greeted him first and bade him mount the carriage. When the king blamed the high priest, Joseph said, "Pardon him because of his age; for the minds of the old and of infants are alike; but we, the young, will pay you all that is owed." From this the king's disposition toward him increased the more. When the king had come to Alexandria, the chief men of Syria — for they happened to have come to buy the taxes of the cities, the king every year selling these to the powerful men of the cities — were displeased to see Joseph sitting with him. When the powerful men in the cities were buying the taxes of Coele Syria and of Phoenicia and Judaea and Samaria for eight thousand talents, Joseph promised to give double. When the king assented and asked whether he had any to guarantee for him, "I will give," he said, "men whom you will not distrust." And when he asked, "Who are these?" he said, "I give you, O king, yourself and your wife as guarantors." Ptolemy, laughing, granted him the collection of the taxes. So taking about two thousand soldiers, he set out for Syria. When he was at Ascalon, since they gave him nothing but even insulted him, he seized the chief men and killed them, and confiscating their property sent the king about a thousand talents. The king, praising what had been done, gave him leave to do as he wished. This struck fear into the Syrians, and they received Joseph eagerly and paid the taxes. Gaining much from this, he sent great gifts to the king and to Cleopatra and to all about them; whereby for twenty-two years he enjoyed this good fortune.

Marrying two wives, by the one he had seven sons, and by the other one. This latter was his niece, with whom he came to live thus:

4.18. he fell in love with a certain dancing-girl and was tormented with love for her. He revealed his passion to his brother. The brother promised to serve him in his love, and by night, bringing his own daughter to him, laid her at his side. When this had happened often, he loved her more vehemently. When his brother revealed to him what had been concealed, he married his niece, and by her had a son, calling him Hyrcanus. When this son was thirteen years old, he showed both intelligence and cleverness. For his father, giving him three hundred yoke of oxen, sent him to a region two days' journey distant to till the land, but kept back the straps of the yokes. Coming there and having no straps, when the ploughmen said he ought to send to his father for them, he did not heed their advice, but slaughtering ten yoke distributed the flesh to the workers, and cutting up the hides bound the yokes with them, and so doing the work returned. His father, learning of his ingenuity, both admired him and loved him and honoured him above his other sons; but they were vexed. When a son was born to Ptolemy, the chief men of his lands celebrated the birthday, going to Alexandria; and Joseph, having become hard to travel because of age, urged one of his sons to go there. When the elder sons declined, Hyrcanus agreed to go. He advised his father not to send gifts to the king from home, but to write to his steward in Alexandria to provide him with gold, that through him he might buy gifts. His father, praising his son for the counsel, wrote to the steward of the funds in Alexandria, which were not less than three thousand talents, to give his son whatever money he needed, expecting the expense for the king's gift to be not more than ten talents. Taking the letter, Hyrcanus departed for Alexandria. The other sons of Joseph wrote to their father's friends to plot against Hyrcanus and destroy him. When he was in Alexandria, he gave the steward his father's letter. The steward asked how many talents he needed; and he said a thousand. The steward offered no more than ten. Angered, the young man bound the steward. Ptolemy, sending to Hyrcanus, said that he wondered why he had not appeared to him and had bound his father's steward. He said that he had not come because he was waiting to prepare gifts, and that he had punished the slave for disobeying his orders. At this the king both laughed and admired the young man's high spirit. Arion the steward, learning that there was no help for him, gave the thousand talents and was loosed from his bonds. Hyrcanus bought a hundred boys in their prime and skilled in letters, paying a talent for each, and as many maidens at an equal price. While all the others offered the king ten talents each, and those who gave more did not exceed twenty, Hyrcanus presented the boys and maidens to the king and to Cleopatra, each of whom also bore a talent; and to the king's friends and to those about his court he gave gifts of many talents. Ptolemy, admiring the young man, urged him to ask what he wished. He asked nothing but that the king write on his behalf to his father and brothers. The king did this, and presenting him royally, sent him away. But his brothers, learning that he was returning with honour, went out to meet him and destroy him, their father not even hindering them, in his anger over the expenditure of the money. When his brothers attacked him, many of those with them fell, and two of the brothers. Fearing therefore because of this, he went away beyond the Jordan and made war on the Arabs, and built there a costly stronghold, and held those parts for seven years, as long as Seleucus the son of Antiochus the Great ruled Syria. When Seleucus died, and his brother Antiochus, called Epiphanes, succeeded to the rule, Hyrcanus, fearing him, became his own slayer; and Antiochus took his property.

4.19. Ptolemy Epiphanes too, the ruler of Egypt, died, leaving two very young sons, of whom the one was called Philometor, the other Physcon. Despising these, Antiochus made an expedition against Egypt; but he was driven from it, the Romans charging him to keep away from the country. Returning thence, he set out for Jerusalem, and seized the city without a battle, those who shared his views opening the gates to him. For when the high priest Onias died, Antiochus gave the honour to his brother Jesus. But being angered with him, he again assigned the high priesthood to the younger brother, called Onias. For Simon had had three sons, and the high priesthood passed among the three. Jesus changed his name to Jason, and Onias to Menelaus. When Jesus quarrelled with Onias, who was also Menelaus, the people too were divided; and the greater number sided with Jason, but the others with Menelaus, whom the sons of Tobias also supported. Being worn down by the greater number, both these and Menelaus withdrew to Antiochus, and abandoning the ancestral laws they adopted Greek customs, and concealed the circumcision of their members by drawing the skin over. When those of their party opened the gates of the city to Antiochus Epiphanes, he became master of the city, and killed many, and plundering much treasure, returned to Antioch.

After two years Antiochus again went up to Jerusalem, and mastering the city by deceit, he did not even spare those who had received him, but plundered the temple and took away its hidden treasures, and forbade the lawful sacrifices, and pillaged the city, and killed some of the people and led others away captive, and burned the fairest parts of the city, and sacrificed swine in the temple, and at last pulled down the walls, and building a citadel in the lower city, set in it a garrison of Macedonians. He compelled the multitude to worship the gods he held to be such, and not to circumcise their children, and those who forced them to do these things he left there. At that time also Eleazar the priest and his disciples — the Maccabees, that is — together with their mother, contended for the keeping of the divine laws. Those overcome by force obeyed the orders; but as many as were noble in soul, not yielding to the lawless commands, died bitterly under torture, or, while still a little breathing, were crucified; and their wives and the children whom they circumcised, the tyrant's servants hung from their necks and strangled. And wherever a book of the Hebrew scripture was found, they both destroyed it and pitiably killed those who possessed it. Because of these things the Samaritans no longer acknowledged themselves kindred to the Jews, but named themselves Sidonians, and called the temple among them on Garizin that of Zeus Hellenios.

There was at that time a certain priest named Mattathias, son of John, son of Symeon, of the house of Asamonaeus, who had five sons: John called Gaddis, Simon called Thathis, Judas called Maccabaeus, Eleazar called Auran, and Jonathan called Apphous. When the king's officers came to their village and ordered them to sacrifice in the Greek manner, Mattathias first, as being the chief of the others, refused. When another sacrificed, Mattathias, filled with zeal, with his sons killed both the one who sacrificed and the general Apelles, who was compelling them to sacrifice, and pulling down the altar, set out with his sons to the wilderness. Many others, emulating them, fled with their wives and children to the wilderness and lived in caves. The generals of Antiochus, gathering a force, came against them, and attacked on the sabbath, and burned many in the caves, who did not even defend themselves because of the idleness of the day. Those who escaped joined Mattathias; and he urged them to fight even on the sabbaths, that the enemy might not destroy them without effort by attacking on the sabbaths. So Mattathias, gathering a force, pulled down the altars and killed the impious, and ordered those of the children who were not circumcised to be circumcised. Having ruled for a year and falling sick, he exhorted his sons to imitate his zeal and to die, if need be, for the laws, and to be of one mind with one another. Having given them these charges, he died.

4.20. The leadership of affairs his son Judas, also called Maccabaeus, girded upon himself; and with his brothers and others joining him, he drove the enemy from the country and punished those of his countrymen who had transgressed. Apollonius the general of Samaria, marching against Judas, both fell himself and most of those with him. When the general of Cilicia learned this, he came against Maccabaeus, and on joining battle was routed and slain, and those under him fled; and Judas, pursuing, killed many of them. Angered at these things, Antiochus ordered Lysias, the steward of his affairs, to subdue Judaea and to enslave the nation and to raze Jerusalem. He, choosing three generals, sent them with a heavy force. Judas, seeing the multitude of the enemy, urged those with him to place their hopes on God. And having dined in the evening, and leaving many fires in the camp, he marched through the night and fell upon the men of Antiochus about dawn; and fighting he killed many and pursuing the rest, so that more than three thousand fell. After the defeat of the enemy, Judas returned and despoiled their camp, and taking much spoil and abundant wealth, returned home rejoicing. The next year Lysias, gathering a larger army, invaded Judaea. Judas, engaging his advance guard, conquered. Therefore Lysias, taking up the rest of his force, returned to Antioch, and prepared to invade Judaea with a greater army. Judas, however, went up to Jerusalem to cleanse the temple, and finding it deserted and in parts burned, he lamented. Cleansing it, he brought in new vessels — a lampstand, a table, an altar, all of gold — and built a new altar of stones not cut with iron, and burned incense and made whole burnt offerings and set loaves upon the table. These things took place on the very day on which the temple had been defiled and the worship profaned, three years having passed, according to the prophecy of Daniel made four hundred and eight years before. And from then the Jews celebrate the recovery of the worship, calling it Lights. Having fortified the city, he set guards in it. When the surrounding nations destroyed many of the Jews, lying in wait through envy, Judas defended them with wars and held the enemy off.

Antiochus, learning that there was a city in Persis rich in wealth, named Elymais, with a temple of Artemis in it full of costly offerings, set out against it and besieged it. But being repulsed by those in the city, who came out against him, he fled to Babylon, and lost most of his army. While Antiochus was grieving over this, the defeat of his generals by the Jews was announced to him. The grief being added, he fell sick; and knowing that he would die, he gathered those under him, and said that he suffered thus because he had afflicted the nation of the Jews and plundered the temple. Saying this, he expired, leaving Philip, one of his friends, as steward of the kingdom, and giving him the diadem and the ring, that he might convey these to his son Antiochus. But Lysias, learning that Antiochus was dead, proclaimed his son king, calling him Eupator.

4.21. The Macedonians in the citadel of Jerusalem harassed the Jews who went up into the temple to sacrifice. Therefore Judas was eager to remove the garrison and besieged it vigorously. The young Antiochus, learning this, was angered, and with a great force set out against Judaea and Jerusalem. Judas, meeting him, killed about six hundred of his advance guard. And Eleazar, the brother of Judas, also called Auran, seeing the tallest of the elephants armed with royal trappings, and supposing the king to be riding on it, attacked it with a violent rush, and getting beneath the beast's belly, struck and killed it. But the elephant, sinking down upon Eleazar and crushing him with the weight of its body, destroyed him. Seeing the strength of the enemy, Judas returned to Jerusalem and prepared for a siege. Antiochus, coming to Jerusalem, besieged the temple, while those within defended it vigorously; but as their food ran out, many slipped away. Since Philip, whom Antiochus had left as steward of the kingdom when he died, was usurping the kingdom, Lysias the general and Antiochus, learning this, made terms with the besieged, that they should use their ancestral laws. So Antiochus was received into the city; but seeing the temple very strong, he broke his oaths and razed the wall; and so he returned, taking with him the high priest Onias, who was also called Menelaus, on the charge of having persuaded his father to compel the Jews to transgress the ancestral customs and of being the cause of many evils. And sending him to Beroea in Syria, he destroyed him, after he had held the high priesthood for ten years and had been impious. Alcimus, who was also called Joacim, became high priest. Antiochus, having made war on Philip and overcome him, killed him. But Onias, the son of the high priest Simon, whom his father at his death had left an infant, as has been said, seeing that Antiochus had given the high priesthood to Alcimus, who was not of the family of the high priests, fled to Ptolemy in Egypt; and being honoured, he received a place in the Heliopolitan district, and built there a temple resembling the one in Jerusalem.

Demetrius the son of Seleucus, fleeing from Rome and coming to Tripolis in Syria, seized both Antiochus and Lysias and destroyed them both, Antiochus having reigned two years. To this Demetrius the high priest Alcimus came, and many of the Jews, fugitives and wicked men, accused Judas Maccabaeus and the whole nation of having killed his friends. Provoked, he sent Bacchides, a very close associate of his, with a very great force, charging him to kill both Judas and those with him. Coming into Judaea, he sent to Judas and his brothers, calling them to peace. But they did not trust him. Some of the people, however, having received oaths from Bacchides, came over to him; but he, despising the oaths, killed sixty of these, and so checked the impulse of the rest to come over to him. He ordered all in the country to obey the high priest Alcimus. And having done these things, he returned to Antioch. Alcimus, dealing with each man in a way to please him, and winning all over, quickly gathered a large force, the greater part of whom were from among the fugitives and the impious, through whom he killed those who held with Judas; and Judas on the other side destroyed the partisans of Alcimus. Alcimus incited Demetrius against Judas. The king therefore sent Nicanor again with a very great force, charging him not to spare the nation. He, going forth, tried to seize Judas by guile and invited him to peace; and Judas, having given and received pledges, received Nicanor with his force. But Nicanor, greeting him and conversing with him, gave a signal to his men to seize Judas. The man, perceiving the plot, sprang out toward the Jews and escaped. When the ambush became known, Nicanor joined open battle, and conquered. From this Judas fled to the citadel of Jerusalem. Nicanor threatened the people that, if they did not hand Judas over to him, he would pull down the temple. But Judas, conversing with the thousand who were with him, roused them to valour, and engaging the enemy he conquered, many falling, including Nicanor himself; and the rest fled, and were all destroyed as they were overtaken. And so for a little while the Jews

4.22. had rest from wars.

When the high priest Alcimus, also called Joacim, was struck with a heaven-sent stroke and so ended his life, four years after he had become high priest, the people assigned the high priesthood to Judas. Judas, hearing that the Romans were very powerful, and had subdued the Galatians and Iberians and Carthaginians and Libyans and all Greece and the kings Perseus and Philip and Antiochus, sent asking for friendship, and asked them to write to Demetrius not to make war on the Jews. The senate both agreed to friendship and consented to be allies of the Jews. Demetrius, learning of the death of Nicanor and the destruction of the army, again sent Bacchides. He hastened against Judas, who had encamped in a certain village with a thousand men. They, fearing the army with Bacchides, advised him to withdraw and save himself. But when he said, "May the sun never see this happen, that I turn my back to the enemy," many of those with him fled. Engaging Bacchides, he fought for a long time on equal terms; but toward sunset, pressing forward with the bravest on the right wing, where Bacchides himself was, he broke the phalanx and turned it to flight. But those on the left wing, advancing, surrounded Judas. He, standing firm, fought with those about him, and after killing many, at last fell himself; and when he had fallen, those with him fled. Having distinguished himself in the high priesthood for three years, and having been a noble man, and ready to do and suffer everything for the freedom of the nation, he died.

When he was dead, Bacchides committed the charge of the country to those of the Jews who were impious and had transgressed the ancestral customs. They afflicted their countrymen in every way, and seizing those who held with Judas, brought them to Bacchides, who, after tormenting them, then destroyed them. The remaining companions of Judas, having persuaded Jonathan his brother, appointed him general of the Jews. Bacchides sought to kill Jonathan by guile; but he, with his brother Simon and his companions, fled to the wilderness. Bacchides set out against them; and Jonathan sent his brother John to the Nabataean Arabs, for they were friends, to deposit with them the baggage. As John was departing, the sons of Amaraeus, lying in wait, killed him with his followers and plundered what was being conveyed. Bacchides attacked Jonathan on the sabbath, supposing he would not fight because of the law. But Jonathan, saying that the danger was for their lives, drew up against him, and after killing many and rushing at Bacchides as if to strike him, but missing, he leaped into the river with his companions and swam across. Bacchides returned to the citadel in Jerusalem, and taking as hostages the sons of the chief men of Judaea, shut them up in the citadel. Jonathan made it his care to avenge the murder of his brother John. When the sons of Amaraeus were celebrating a wedding, and were conducting the bridegroom and the bride from one city to another with a costly procession, he lay in ambush in a mountain with his men and fell upon those in the procession, and destroyed them all, and plundered all that they carried. Jonathan and Simon, with their followers, retired to the marshes of the river. Bacchides, leaving a garrison in Judaea, returned to Demetrius. The nation being thereafter at peace for two years, Jonathan and his men dwelt in the country in safety. The impious Jews therefore sent to king Demetrius, declaring that Jonathan could be taken without difficulty if someone were sent against him. And the king sent Bacchides. He, coming into Judaea and striving to seize Jonathan, was not able; and when fifty of Jonathan's men had made the report to the king, he killed the chief of them as having lied. Jonathan and Simon and their followers withdrew into the wilderness, where, having built towers, he awaited the event. Bacchides came and besieged him. But Jonathan, leaving his brother Simon there, himself went out secretly and, gathering many from the country, by night attacked Bacchides and his army. He himself killed many, and Simon killed many also, having come out from the strongholds, and they burned the siege-engines. Dispirited by this, Bacchides wished to break camp, but sought a respectable pretext for the withdrawal. Jonathan, learning this, sent an embassy concerning friendship, that each side might restore to the other the captives they held. Bacchides accepted the embassy and made terms. And they swore no longer to make war on each other, and exchanged the captives. So Bacchides, returning, no more came against Judaea; and Jonathan, having obtained security, directed the affairs of his countrymen and punished those who had transgressed.

4.23. Alexander the son of Antiochus Epiphanes, having received Ptolemais by treachery, so disturbed Demetrius that he gathered his forces and sent to Jonathan concerning goodwill and alliance. He permitted him to raise an army, and granted that he should take back the sons whom Bacchides had shut up in the citadel as hostages. Receiving the king's letter, Jonathan came to Jerusalem, and read it in the hearing of the people and the garrison, and taking the sons from the citadel, gave each one back to his own parents; and he himself stayed in Jerusalem, renewing the city and rebuilding its walls. Alexander too wrote to Jonathan, calling him to alliance and making him his friend and granting him the high priesthood and sending him gifts. Receiving the letter, he put on the high-priestly robe at the feast of Tabernacles, four years having been measured out since his brother Judas died, and gathered a force and prepared arms. Joining battle with Demetrius, Alexander conquered, Demetrius having fallen with his horse into a deep and hard-to-escape mire, where, the enemy standing around him, he was wounded and fell, having himself killed many. He had reigned eleven years.

Alexander, having received the kingdom of Syria, betrothed to himself as wife the daughter of Ptolemy Philometor. As the marriage was being celebrated, he wrote to Jonathan to come to Ptolemais. Arriving, he was honoured both by Ptolemy and by Alexander. When Demetrius, the son of the deceased Demetrius, sailed from Crete to Cilicia with a heavy force, Alexander was in distress, and hastened to Antioch to secure things there, leaving Apollonius the Daus as governor of Syria. He, sending to Jonathan, said it was unjust that he alone should not submit to the king, and challenged him to battle, and reproached the nation for cowardice. Provoked by this, the high priest joined battle with Apollonius, and conquered, and killed many of the enemy, and took cities of Syria, and with much spoil returned to Jerusalem. King Alexander, learning this, sent to Jonathan, rejoicing at the defeat of Apollonius, as one who had fought against him, his friend and ally, contrary to his wishes. But Ptolemy Philometor, going to the aid of Alexander with a naval and land force, and coming to Ptolemais, was nearly endangered, Alexander having plotted against him through one of his friends, Ammonius. Escaping the plot, he demanded Ammonius for punishment; but Alexander would not give him up. Whence Ptolemy, perceiving Alexander to be privy to the plot, both withdrew from the alliance and dissolved the marriage-connection. For taking his daughter from him, he sent her to Demetrius, promising to be his ally and to join his daughter to him and to establish him in his ancestral kingdom. And Demetrius gladly accepted the marriage and the alliance. Ptolemy was eager to persuade the people of Antioch to receive Demetrius. And he easily accomplished what he sought, the people of Antioch hating Alexander both because of his father's transgressions against them and because of Ammonius; and they quickly drove him out of Antioch. He, being cast out thence, came to Cilicia, and the people of Antioch proclaimed Ptolemy king, and compelled him to wear two diadems, as ruling both Syria and Egypt. But he, being able through prudence to reckon the future, lest he should seem envied by the Romans, who were now very powerful, persuaded the people of Antioch to receive Demetrius. When Alexander came against Syria with a large army and ravaged the territory of the people of Antioch, Ptolemy, together with Demetrius, to whom he had now joined his daughter in marriage, marched against him; and Alexander, defeated, fled to Arabia, while Ptolemy, fallen from his horse, which was startled by the cry of an elephant and threw him off, received many wounds on his head as the enemy stood around him, and was with difficulty snatched away by his bodyguards, and lay for four days, neither understanding nor speaking. Recovering on the fifth of the days, and receiving the head of Alexander sent to him by the ruler of the Arabs, and pleased at his destruction, he himself died a little after.

4.24. Demetrius the son of Nicanor, having received the kingdom of Asia after Alexander, who had reigned five years, began to destroy Ptolemy's soldiery, forgetting both the kinship and the alliance. The soldiers, fending off his attempt, withdrew to Alexandria; but he gained control of the elephants. Jonathan the high priest besieged the citadel of Jerusalem, which had within it Macedonian guards and some of the impious Jews. Some of these, going out by night, reported the siege to Demetrius. He came with a force to Jonathan, and being at Ptolemais wrote to him to come to him. But he did not cease the siege; instead, taking the priests and the elders of the people and bringing much money, he came to Demetrius. Having gratified him with these things, he was honoured by him and confirmed in the high priesthood.

When, since no war was pressing, Demetrius reduced the soldiers' pay, and from this was hated by them, a certain general of Alexander, surnamed Tryphon, perceiving the hatred toward him, went to Malchus the Arab, and asked for the son of Alexander, Antiochus, who was being reared with him, saying that he would restore to him his ancestral rule; and Malchus gave him up. Demetrius, sending to Jonathan, asked for an alliance, promising him many favours. Jonathan therefore sent him three thousand men, through whom he routed the people of Antioch, who had risen against Demetrius out of the enmity they nursed because they were ill-treated by him; and he burned the city and killed many of them, until they were forced to lay down their arms and surrender themselves to him. So the revolt was ended; and Demetrius sent the Jews back to Jonathan, presenting them with gifts and acknowledging his gratitude to him. But later he broke his promises and threatened him with war. And he would have carried out his threats, had not Tryphon, returning from Arabia into Syria, set a diadem upon Antiochus, who was then a stripling, and stirred up war against Demetrius, the soldiers who had abandoned Demetrius because of the reduction of pay coming over to him. Tryphon, having gained the upper hand in the battle, took Antioch and the elephants. Demetrius went off to Cilicia; and the boy Antiochus summoned Jonathan to an alliance. He agreed to be his friend and ally, and undertook to make war on Demetrius, and at once set about the work. First he made many cities go over to Antiochus, having revolted from Demetrius; then, leaving his brother Simon in Judaea, he advanced against the generals of Demetrius. Simon besieged Bethsura, a place in Judaea held by Demetrius's men, who, hard pressed by the siege, on receiving pledges abandoned the place; and Simon set his own garrison in it. Jonathan, engaging the generals of Demetrius, both turned them to flight and, after killing about two thousand, returned to Jerusalem. And he sent an embassy to Rome, to renew the former friendship which they had with the nation. The members of the senate ratified again what had before been decreed. The envoys, on returning, came also to Sparta, having this too charged upon them by Jonathan. And the Spartans received the envoys kindly, and passed a decree concerning friendship and alliance with the Jews. But the generals of Demetrius, eager to retrieve their defeat, came against Jonathan with a larger force. He met them swiftly. Afraid to stand against him in open battle, they fled by night. By day, learning of their flight, Jonathan pursued, but did not overtake them; instead, coming into Arabia and falling upon the Nabataeans, and driving off much spoil from there and taking captives, he returned. Gathering the people, he advised them to renew the walls of Jerusalem and to set up again as much of the circuit of the temple as had been pulled down. The counsel pleasing all, he himself set to the work, and sent his brother Simon to secure the country.

Demetrius came into Mesopotamia, intending to take over Babylon and the upper satrapies. For the Greeks and Macedonians who dwelt there promised to surrender themselves to him and to help him make war on Arsaces the king of the Parthians; and so they received him. But joining battle with Arsaces, he lost his whole army and was himself captured. Tryphon, learning what had befallen Demetrius, plotted against Antiochus, contriving to kill him and usurp the rule. But he feared Jonathan, who was a friend of Antiochus. And he was eager first to take him by deceit, and so to attempt what concerned Antiochus. Therefore he went to Scythopolis, where Jonathan met him with forty thousand fighting men. Tryphon, dealing with him deceitfully, received him with gifts and honours, wishing to remove all suspicion, that he might take him off his guard. He advised him to dismiss his army, and himself to come with him to Ptolemais with a few men, to take over the city and all the strongholds there. Jonathan, suspecting nothing, sent back his army, and went off keeping only a thousand men. But being shut up in Ptolemais, he himself was taken alive, and those with him were destroyed. When those in Jerusalem learned this, they fell into fear because of the surrounding nations, which, learning of the seizure of Jonathan, had been stirred against the Jews. But Simon, conversing with the multitude and encouraging it, was chosen by it as leader, and gathering the fighting men of the people, he attended to the walls of the city, and took thought for all that concerned the security of affairs. Tryphon came into Judaea, leading Jonathan a prisoner. Simon met him with a force; and Tryphon sent to him, declaring that he would give a hundred talents of silver and two of Jonathan's sons as hostages, if he wished his brother to be released. Simon understood the villainy of Tryphon, but, that he might not be blamed for being unwilling to save his brother, sent both the money and the sons. Receiving these, Tryphon did not keep the agreement, but went up with his army toward Jerusalem. Simon followed alongside, always encamping opposite. But a heavy snowfall hindered his arrival at Jerusalem; and he turned aside into Syria, and as he departed killed Jonathan.

Simon, when his brother Jonathan was dead, after a high priesthood of four years, was himself put forward as high priest by the multitude, and no longer paid tribute to the Macedonians. The nation prospered greatly under him, and they mastered the surrounding nations, and subdued many of the cities, that they might not be bases for the enemy. And the mountain on which the citadel was built, being very high, by labouring continuously for three years they moved into a plain, so that the temple might stand above it.