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[648]
There also now happened to him, among his other calamities, a certain
popular sedition. There were two men of learning in the city [Jerusalem,]
who were thought the most skillful in the laws of their country, and were
on that account had in very great esteem all over the nation; they were,
the one Judas, the son of Sepphoris, and the other Mattbias, the son of
Margalus. There was a great concourse of the young men to these men when
they expounded the laws, and there got together every day a kind of an
army of such as were growing up to be men. Now when these men were informed
that the king was wearing away with melancholy, and with a distemper, they
dropped words to their acquaintance, how it was now a very proper time
to defend the cause of God, and to pull down what had been erected contrary
to the laws of their country; for it was unlawful there should be any such
thing in the temple as images, or faces, or the like representation of
any animal whatsoever. Now the king had put up a golden eagle over the
great gate of the temple, which these learned men exhorted them to cut
down; and told them, that if there should any danger arise, it was a glorious
thing to die for the laws of their country; because that the soul was immortal,
and that an eternal enjoyment of happiness did await such as died on that
account; while the mean-spirited, and those that were not wise enough to
show a right love of their souls, preferred a death by a disease, before
that which is the result of a virtuous behavior.
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