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tnat 500 elephants should be intoxicated with wine and incense and let loose upon the Jews in the racecourse. Although all was in readiness for it, the execution of the order was delayed for another day because the king had slept until it was past the hour fixed for his principal daily meal (5'-*). Next morning, however, Ptolemy was providen- tially made to forget the orders he had given, and recollected nothing but the loyalty of the Jews to himself and his ancestors (5%-*), Yet the same evening he summoned the keeper of the elephants and renewed his order for the destruction of the Jews; and in reply to the higher officials, who expressed amazement at his instability of purpose, he swore that he would send the Jews to Hades, and that he would invade Judea and destroy the temple (5°**), When, accordingly, on the third day at dawn an enormous crowd had collected, and the king rushed forth to see his commands executed, the Jews called upon the Lord to show them mercy (54), At the prayer of the vener- able priest Eleazar, ‘two angels, glorious and terrible,’ appeared from heaven, to the conster- nation of the king and his army. The elephants also turned upon and angled. down the royal forces (6), The king now directed his wrath eenet his counsellors, ordered the Jews to be released from their fetters, and feasted them for seven days at the imperial expense. They re- solved on their part to observe these days in all time coming as a festival to commemorate their deliverance. The king also provided them with a letter to the provincial authorities securing them against injury and reproach (6%-7%). They were further empowered to put to death more than 300 of their kinsmen who had apostatized from the law of God, and, after duly availing them- selves of this concession, they joyfully set out for their homes. At Ptolemais they celebrated their deliverance for another seven days, and erected a house of prayer. On arriving at their several destinations they had all their property restored to them, and were held in higher esteem than ever by the Egyptians (7°).
2. Historwity.—That the narrative has to some extent a historical background is clear from the opening sketch of the war between Philopator and Antiochus. The details given agree broadly with the statements of Livy, Justin, and Polybius. At Raphia the scale was turned in favour of Philo-
ator, through the appeal made to the soldiers by nis sister trie (1.2, whom, however, Livy (xxxvii. 4) names Cleopatra, and Justin (xxx. 1. 7) Eurydice. According to Polybius (v. 87), Philo- pator remained for three months in Ceele-Syria and Phoenicia. His Bacchanalian proclivities (2235: are also mentioned by Justin (xxx. 1) and Strabo (xvii. 796). Theodotus (15) is a historical person- age; Polybius (v. 40, etc.) speaks of him as an Atolian Who was Ptolemy’s commander-in-chief over Cole-Syria, but who in B.c. 219 went over to the side of Antiochus. Grimm (Jntrod. 8 3) fur- ther regards the observance of the two annual festivals (6% 7"), and the existence of the syna- gogue at Ptolemais (7%), when the author wrote, as the witness of tradition to some great deliver- ance; but there is force in the remark of Fritzsche (‘ Makkabiier’ in Schenkel’s Bid. -Lez. ), that among the Jewish writers of that period it had become an almost stereotyped custom to link on a festival to every event of importance.
Certainly, in spite of the historical allusions which it contains, and the manifest intention that it should pass for real history, the work must be regarded as a fiction, and that not of the highest order. It abounds in incredible situations (4™, ef. with 5° 6)” 718) and 5 a are absurdities (57); it is characteriz y false statements (5? VOL, I1I.—13
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15) and inconsistencies (418); it shows, too, great zest in the interpretation of providence (4*! 5” ete. ). In short, it bears every mark of being a mythical tale founded perhaps on some no longer definitely ascertainable historical occurrence. ‘There is no- where else any mention of Philopator having either visited Jerus. or persecuted the Jews. But in Jos. (c. Ap. ii. 5) there is a story of a somewhat similar character connected with the reign of Ptolemy vil. Physcon. That monarch, it is said, punished the Alexandrian Jews for their loyalty to Cleopatra by putting them in fetters and throwing them to intoxicated elephants. As the animals, however, turned against Physcon’s friends and killed many of them, and as the king saw a terrible visage which forbade him to injure the Jews, he abandoned his intention, and the Jews kept a feast in commemoration of the event. This appears to be the older as it is also a simpler version of the same floating tradition, which may have been based upon an actual but unsuccessful attempt on the part of some monarch to enter the temple at Jerus. by foree—an attempt which was followed up by an effort to be avenged on the Jews. But in 3 Mac, which was apparently un- known to Josephus, the reference a the story to an earlier king of Egypt, and the addition of other embellishments, already mark a deviation from the older tradition. According to many scholars (Ewald, Reuss, ete.), the legend is founded upon the attempt of the emperor Caligula to erect his statue in the temple at Jerus. (Jos. Ant. XVIII. viii. 2), and his subsequent persecution of the Jews, the transference of the event to the reign of Ptolemy Iv. Philopator being due to prudential reasons. ut there is nothing in the work which definitely points to Caligula’s time, and our author does not represent Ptolemy as aspiring to the honours of deity. The one significant parallel to the times of Caligula is the circumstance, vouched for by Philo, that the Roman governor Flaccus Avillius deprived the Jews of the rights of citizen- ship. On the other hand, if the work be referred to this period (c. A.D. 40), the confinement of the Jews in the hippodrome of Alexandria (4᾽}8.) might have been suggested by Herod’s command that his leading opponents should be so dealt with at Jericho (Jos. Ant. xv. vi. 5; BJ τ. xxxiii. 6). But the exact tate of writing remains uncertain. The Greek additions to Daniel are known to the author, who cannot therefore have written earlier than the Ist cent. B.c., but he very possibly lived as late as the Ist cent. A.D. is design was evidently to cheer and console his co-religionists in a time of persecution at Alexandria.