1 The previously mentioned Simon, who had given information about the money against his country, slandered Onias, saying that it was he who had incited Heliodorus and had been the real cause of these evils. (WEB) 2 He dared to call him a conspirator against the state who was actually the benefactor of the city, the guardian of his fellow countrymen, and a zealot for the laws. (WEB) 3 When his hatred grew so great that even murders were perpetrated through one of Simon’s approved agents, (WEB) 4 Onias, seeing the danger of the contention, and that Apollonius the son of Menestheus, the governor of Coelesyria and Phoenicia, was increasing Simon’s malice, (WEB) 5 appealed to the king, not to be an accuser of his fellow citizens, but looking to the good of all the people, both public and private; (WEB) 6 for he saw that without the king’s involvement it was impossible for the state to obtain peace any more, and that Simon would not cease from his madness. (WEB) 7 When Seleucus was deceased, and Antiochus, who was called Epiphanes, succeeded to the kingdom, Jason the brother of Onias supplanted his brother in the high priesthood, (WEB) 8 having promised to the king at an audience three hundred sixty talents of silver, and out of another fund eighty talents. (WEB) 9 In addition to this, he undertook to assign one hundred fifty more, if it might be allowed him through the king’s authority to set him up a gymnasium and a body of youths to be trained in it, and to register the inhabitants of Jerusalem as citizens of Antioch. (WEB) 10 When the king had assented, and Jason had taken possession of the office, he immediately shifted those of his own race to the Greek way of life. (WEB) 11 Setting aside the royal ordinances of special favor to the Jews, granted by the means of John the father of Eupolemus, who went on the mission to the Romans to establish friendship and alliance, and seeking to overthrow the lawful ways of living, he brought in new customs forbidden by the law. (WEB) 12 For he eagerly established a gymnasium under the citadel itself, and caused the noblest of the young men to wear the Greek hat. (WEB) 13 Thus there was an extreme of hellenization, and an advance of a foreign religion, by reason of the exceeding profaneness of Jason, who was an ungodly man and not a high priest; (WEB) 14 so that the priests had no more any zeal for the services of the altar; but despising the sanctuary and neglecting the sacrifices, they hastened to enjoy that which was unlawfully provided in the wrestling arena, after the summons to the discus-throwing. (WEB) 15 They despised the honors of their fathers, and valued the prestige of the Greeks best of all. (WEB) 16 For this reason, severe calamity overtook the… (WEB)
2 Maccabees 4:1–50
Semantically similar passages
2 Maccabees 12:7–9
7 But when the town gates were closed, he withdrew, intending to come again to root out the whole community of the men of Joppa. (WEB) 8 But learning that the men of Jamnia intended to do the same thing to the Jews who lived among them, (WEB) 9 he attacked the Jamnites at night,… (WEB)
4 Maccabees 4:20–22
20 So that he not only erected a gymnasium on the very citadel of our country, but neglected the guardianship of the temple. (WEB) 21 Because of that, Divine vengeance was grieved and instigated Antiochus himself against them. (WEB) 22 For being at war with Ptolemy in Egypt, he hea… (WEB)
2 Maccabees 6:1–2
1 Not long after this, the king sent out an old man of Athens to compel the Jews to depart from the laws of their fathers and not to live by the laws of God, (WEB) 2 and also to pollute the sanctuary in Jerusalem and to call it by the name of Olympian Zeus, and to call… (WEB)
1 Maccabees 14:16–18
16 It was heard at Rome that Jonathan was dead, and even in Sparta, and they were exceedingly grieved. (WEB) 17 But as soon as they heard that his brother Simon was made high priest in his place, and ruled the country and the cities in it, (WEB) 18 they wrote to him on brass tablet… (WEB)
1 Maccabees 11:24–26
24 by taking silver, gold, clothing, and various other presents, and went to Ptolemais to the king. Then he found favor in his sight. (WEB) 25 Some lawless men of those who were of the nation made complaints against him, (WEB) 26 and the king did to him even as his predecessors had… (WEB)
1 Maccabees 7:8–10
8 So the king chose Bacchides, one of the king’s friends, who was ruler in the country beyond the river, and was a great man in the kingdom, and faithful to the king. (WEB) 9 He sent him and that ungodly Alcimus, whom he made the high priest; and he commanded him to tak… (WEB)
2 Maccabees 10:20–22
20 But Simon and those who were with him, yielding to covetousness, were bribed by some of those who were in the towers, and receiving seventy thousand drachmas, let some of them slip away. (WEB) 21 But when word was brought to Maccabaeus of what was done, he gathered the… (WEB)
2 Maccabees 11:1–2
1 Now after a very little time, Lysias, the king’s guardian, kinsman, and chancellor, being very displeased about the things that had happened, (WEB) 2 collected about eighty thousand infantry and all his cavalry and came against the Jews, planning to make the city a ho… (WEB)
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