Grosey's Messages

The author of the First Book of Maccabees regarded the Maccabean revolt as a rising of pious Jews against the Seleucid king who had tried to eradicate their religion and against the Jews who supported him. The author of the Second Book of Maccabees presented the conflict as a struggle between "Judaism" and "Hellenism", words that he was the first to use.^[29] Modern scholarship tends to the second view.

Most modern scholars argue that the king was intervening in a civil warbetween traditionalist Jews in the countryside and Hellenised Jews in Jerusalem.^[30][31][32] According to Joseph P. Schultz, modern scholarship, "considers the Maccabean revolt less as an uprising against foreign oppression than as a civil war between the orthodox and reformist parties in the Jewish camp."^[33] In the conflict over the office of High Priest, traditionalists with Hebrew/Aramaic names like Onias contested against Hellenisers with Greek names like Jason or Menelaus.

What began as a civil war took on the character of an invasion when the Hellenistic kingdom of Syria sided with the Hellenising Jews against the traditionalists.^[37] As the conflict escalated, Antiochus prohibited the practices of the traditionalists, thereby, in a departure from usual Seleucid practice, banning the religion of an entire people.^[36] Other scholars argue that while the rising began as a religious rebellion, it was gradually transformed into a war of national liberation.

Pompey entered the Holy of Holies(this was only the second time that someone had dared to penetrate into this sacred spot). Judaea had to pay tribute to Rome and was placed under the supervision of the Roman governor of Syria. Aristobulus was taken to Rome a prisoner, and Hyrcanus was restored to his position as High Priest but not to the Kingship. Political authority rested with the Romans whose interests were represented by Antipater. This factually ended the Hasmonean rule of the area and Jewish independence.