2 Maccabees 2: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

The chapter begins with records saying that Jeremiah told the exiles about the fire and the law, and that he hid the tent of worship, the ark, and the incense altar in a cave on the mountain Moses climbed, saying the place would stay unknown until God gathered his people again. It also tells how fire came down at the prayers of Moses and of Solomon, and how Nehemiah and later Judas collected writings; the letter closes by inviting the readers to keep the days of the purification. The rest of the chapter is the writer's preface, in which he says he is condensing the five books of Jason of Cyrene into one, and explains what belongs to a first author and what belongs to a man who shortens a work.

Claim by Claim

1. 2:1
   • It is found in the records that Jeremiah the prophet commanded those who were carried away into exile.
   • Jeremiah was a prophet.
   • Jeremiah commanded the exiles to take some of the fire.
   • This matter has already been indicated.
2. 2:2
   • The prophet gave the exiles the law.
   • The prophet charged the exiles not to forget the commandments of the Lord.
   • The prophet charged them not to be led astray in their minds.
   • They would see images made of gold and silver.
   • The images had ornamentation about them.
3. 2:3
   • The prophet exhorted them with other such words.
   • He exhorted them that the law should not depart from their hearts.
4. 2:4
   • The same writing contained an account of the prophet.
   • The prophet was warned by God.
   • The prophet commanded that the tabernacle and the ark go with him.
   • The prophet went out to the mountain.
   • Moses had climbed up that mountain.
   • Moses saw the inheritance of God from that mountain.
5. 2:5
   • Jeremiah came to the mountain.
   • Jeremiah found a cave-like dwelling.
   • Jeremiah brought the tabernacle into it.
   • Jeremiah brought the ark into it.
   • Jeremiah brought the altar of incense into it.
   • Jeremiah blocked up the entrance.
6. 2:6
   • Some of those who followed him came to mark the way.
   • They could not find the way.
7. 2:7
   • Jeremiah learned what they had done.
   • Jeremiah blamed them.
   • Jeremiah said the place would remain unknown.
   • Jeremiah said it would remain unknown until God gathers his people together again.
   • Jeremiah said it would remain unknown until mercy comes.
8. 2:8
   • Then the Lord will show these things.
   • The glory of the Lord will be seen.
   • The cloud will be seen.
   • The glory and the cloud were shown in the time of Moses.
   • Solomon asked that the place be greatly consecrated.
9. 2:9
   • It was also declared that he offered a sacrifice of dedication.
   • It was also declared that he offered a sacrifice for the finishing of the temple.
   • He had wisdom.
10. 2:10
    • Moses prayed to the Lord.
    • Fire came down from heaven.
    • The fire consumed the sacrifice.
    • Solomon likewise prayed to the Lord.
    • Fire came down from heaven.
    • The fire consumed the burnt offerings.
11. 2:11
    • Moses said that the sin offering was consumed.
    • Moses said it was consumed because it was not eaten.
12. 2:12
    • Solomon likewise kept the eight days.
13. 2:13
    • The same things were reported in the records.
    • The same things were reported in the memoirs of Nehemiah.
    • Nehemiah founded a library.
    • Nehemiah gathered together the books about the kings.
    • Nehemiah gathered together the books of the prophets.
    • Nehemiah gathered together the writings of David.
    • Nehemiah gathered together letters of kings about sacred offerings.
14. 2:14
    • Judas likewise gathered together the things that had been lost.
    • They were lost because of the war that came upon us.
    • Those things are with us.
15. 2:15
    • If you have need of them, send people to fetch them to you.
16. 2:16
    • We are about to celebrate the purification.
    • We have written to you.
    • You will do well if you keep these days.
17. 2:17
    • We hope in God.
    • God saved all his people.
    • God gave them the inheritance.
    • God gave them the kingdom.
    • God gave them the priesthood.
    • God gave them the sanctuary.
18. 2:18
    • God promised this through the law.
    • We hope that God will soon have mercy on us.
    • We hope that God will gather us together out of every land under heaven into the holy place.
    • God delivered us out of great evils.
    • God purified the place.
19. 2:19
    • This account concerns Judas Maccabeus.
    • This account concerns the brothers of Judas.
    • This account concerns the purification of the great temple.
    • This account concerns the dedication of the altar.
20. 2:20
    • This account concerns the wars against Antiochus Epiphanes.
    • This account concerns the wars against Eupator.
    • Eupator was the son of Antiochus Epiphanes.
21. 2:21
    • This account concerns the manifestations that came from heaven.
    • The manifestations came to those who fought bravely for Judaism.
    • Those who fought were few in number.
    • They overran the whole country.
    • They chased barbarian multitudes.
22. 2:22
    • They recovered the temple.
    • The temple was renowned throughout the whole world.
    • They freed the city.
    • They restored the laws that were about to be abolished.
    • The Lord became gracious to them with all kindness.
23. 2:23
    • Jason of Cyrene declared these things.
    • Jason declared them in five books.
    • We will attempt to abridge them into one volume.
24. 2:24
    • We considered the vast number of details.
    • There is difficulty for those who wish to enter into the narratives of the history.
    • The difficulty arises from the abundance of the material.
25. 2:25
    • We took care that those who wish to read may have delight.
    • We took care that those who wish to commit it to memory may have ease.
    • We took care that all who come upon it may have profit.
26. 2:26
    • We have taken upon ourselves the painful labour of abridging.
    • The task is not easy for us.
    • The task is a matter of sweat and sleeplessness.
27. 2:27
    • It is not easy for one who prepares a banquet and seeks the benefit of others.
    • For the gratitude of the many we will gladly endure this painful labour.
28. 2:28
    • We leave the exact handling of every particular to the author.
    • We labour to follow the outlines of an abridgement.
29. 2:29
    • The master builder of a new house must care for the whole structure.
    • He who undertakes to decorate and paint it must seek out things fit for its adorning.
    • I think it is the same in our case.
30. 2:30
    • To enter into every point, to go over things at length, and to be curious in particulars belongs to the original author of the history.
31. 2:31
    • To pursue brevity of expression and to avoid elaborate treatment is to be granted to the one who makes the abridgement.
32. 2:32
    • We will begin the narrative here.
    • We add only this much to what has been said.
    • It is foolish to make a long prologue and then abridge the history itself.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

2:1

"The records" are archives of official documents. "The fire" refers back to the story told in chapter 1, where priests hid the fire from the altar in a dry well when the temple was destroyed. Jeremiah was a prophet in Jerusalem when the Babylonians took the city in 587 BC and deported much of its population; those deportees are the people "carried away" here.

2:2

The exiles were going to live in Babylon, a city full of gilded and silver-plated statues of its gods. The warning is about what they would see every day there.

2:3

The people had been taken far away from home. Enemy soldiers marched them to a land called Babylon.

2:4

The tent of worship, usually called the tabernacle, was the portable shrine Israel carried through the wilderness before the temple was built. The ark was the gold-covered chest that held the tablets of the law and stood in the innermost room. The mountain is Nebo, where according to Deuteronomy 34 Moses looked out over the land of Canaan before he died. The ark disappears from the historical record at the fall of Jerusalem; this chapter preserves one tradition about what became of it.

2:5

The altar of incense was a small altar standing inside the sanctuary itself, where fragrant incense was burned. It was a different object from the large altar outside in the courtyard, where animals were sacrificed.

2:6

Incense is a sweet-smelling smoke. It was burned on a small altar as a gift to God.

2:7

Mercy means being kind to someone instead of punishing them.

2:8

The cloud is the one described in Exodus 40 and again in 1 Kings 8, which filled the tabernacle and later the temple at their dedication and was understood as the visible sign of God's presence.

2:9

"He" is Solomon. The reference is to the dedication of the first temple in Jerusalem, told in 1 Kings 8 and 2 Chronicles 7.

2:10

A burnt offering was an animal burned whole on the altar, with no part of it eaten by anyone. Fire falling from heaven to consume a sacrifice is reported at Leviticus 9:24 and again at 2 Chronicles 7:1.

2:11

This is a compressed allusion to Leviticus 10:16 to 20. A sin offering was normally eaten by the priests as part of the ritual; Moses found that one particular sin offering had been burned up instead, and accepted Aaron's explanation.

2:12

Solomon's dedication festival lasted eight days according to 2 Chronicles 7:8 to 9. The length is the point: the letter is urging its readers to keep an eight-day festival of their own.

2:13

Nehemiah was governor of Judea around 445 BC and rebuilt Jerusalem's walls. "The accounts of the kings and of the prophets, and the writings of David" mean what we call the books of Kings, the prophetic books, and the Psalms. The "letters from kings about the holy gifts" are decrees of the Persian rulers authorizing donations to the temple, of the kind quoted in the book of Ezra.

2:14

Judas Maccabeus led the Jewish revolt against the Seleucid kings of Syria from 167 to 160 BC. "The war we went through" is that revolt, during which the temple was seized and Jewish books were destroyed.

2:16

"The purification" is the festival marking the cleansing and rededication of the temple in 164 BC, after it had been taken over for foreign worship. It was kept for eight days beginning on the twenty-fifth of the month Kislev, roughly late November or December, and is the festival now called Hanukkah.

2:17

Priests were men with a special job. They worked in the temple and brought people's gifts to God.

2:18

The letter that began at 1:10 ends here. From verse 19 the author of this book speaks in his own voice, introducing the work that follows.

2:19

An altar is a stone table. Gifts for God were placed and burned on it.

2:20

Antiochus IV ruled the Seleucid kingdom of Syria from 175 to 164 BC. "Epiphanes" was a title he took for himself, meaning roughly "the god made visible." His son Antiochus V Eupator succeeded him as a child and reigned about two years.

2:21

The Greek word behind "clear signs" is epiphaneiai, meaning appearances or manifestations, the same word family as Antiochus Epiphanes' own title. The phrase rendered "the Jewish religion" translates Ioudaismos, "Judaism"; this is the earliest surviving use of the word, coined as the opposite of Hellenismos, the Greek way of life. "Barbarians" was the Greek term for anyone who did not speak Greek; here a Jewish writer turns it back on the Greek-speaking armies.

2:23

Jason of Cyrene is otherwise unknown, and his five books have not survived. Cyrene was a Greek city on the coast of North Africa, in what is now Libya, with a large Jewish population. What follows in this book is the condensed version he describes.

2:28

"The author" is Jason of Cyrene, the original historian, not the writer of this book, who calls himself only the abridger.

2:32

A long beginning means many pages before the real story starts.