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[316]
When therefore the generals of Antiochus's armies had been beaten
so often, Judas assembled the people together, and told them, that after
these many victories which God had given them, they ought to go up to Jerusalem,
and purify the temple, and offer the appointed sacrifices. But as soon
as he, with the whole multitude, was come to Jerusalem, and found the temple
deserted, and its gates burnt down, and plants growing in the temple of
their own accord, on account of its desertion, he and those that were with
him began to lament, and were quite confounded at the sight of the temple;
so he chose out some of his soldiers, and gave them order to fight against
those guards that were in the citadel, until he should have purified the
temple. When therefore he had carefully purged it, and had brought in new
vessels, the candlestick, the table [of shew-bread], and the altar [of
incense], which were made of gold, he hung up the veils at the gates, and
added doors to them. He also took down the altar [of burnt-offering], and
built a new one of stones that he gathered together, and not of such as
were hewn with iron tools. So on the five and twentieth day of the month
Casleu, which the Macedonians call Apeliens, they lighted the lamps that
were on the candlestick, and offered incense upon the altar [of incense],
and laid the loaves upon the table [of shew-bread], and offered burnt-offerings
upon the new altar [of burnt-offering]. Now it so fell out, that these
things were done on the very same day on which their Divine worship had
fallen off, and was reduced to a profane and common use, after three years'
time; for so it was, that the temple was made desolate by Antiochus, and
so continued for three years. This desolation happened to the temple in
the hundred forty and fifth year, on the twenty-fifth day of the month
Apeliens, and on the hundred fifty and third olympiad: but it was dedicated
anew, on the same day, the twenty-fifth of the month Apeliens, on the hundred
and forty-eighth year, and on the hundred and fifty-fourth olympiad. And
this desolation came to pass according to the prophecy of Daniel, which
was given four hundred and eight years before; for he declared that the
Macedonians would dissolve that worship [for some time].
Flavius Josephus. The Works of Flavius Josephus. Translated by. William Whiston, A.M. Auburn and Buffalo. John E. Beardsley. 1895.
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