Jonathan Writes to Sparta

Now one of Alexander’s generals, a native of Apamea named Diodotus, who was also called Trypho, took note of this ill will of the soldiers toward Demetrius. He went to Imalkue the Arab, who was bringing up Antiochus, Alexander’s son, told him how the army hated Demetrius, and urged him to hand Antiochus over to him, for he would make him king and restore to him his father’s kingdom. At first Imalkue held out against him, because he did not believe him; but in the end, after Trypho had pressed him for a long time, he was won over to what Trypho urged. This was how matters stood with that man. [a] Jonathan the high priest wanted to be rid of those in the citadel of Jerusalem, the Jewish deserters and ungodly men, and of the garrisons throughout the country. He sent gifts and ambassadors to Demetrius and asked him to remove the men in the strongholds of Judea. Demetrius promised to grant him not only this but greater things too, once the war on his hands was over, for that was what occupied him now. Meanwhile he asked Jonathan to send him help, telling him that his army had deserted him. So Jonathan picked three thousand soldiers and sent them.

The people of Antioch hated Demetrius for the wrongs they had suffered from him, and they were hostile to him also on account of his father Demetrius, who had sinned greatly against them; so they were watching for a chance to fall upon him. When they learned that help was coming to Demetrius from Jonathan, they agreed among themselves that he would gather a large army unless they struck first and seized him. They snatched up their weapons, surrounded his palace as if to besiege it, cut off the ways out, and tried to take their king captive. When he saw the people of Antioch at war with him and under arms, he took his mercenaries and the Jews Jonathan had sent and attacked them; but he was overpowered by them, for they were many tens of thousands, and he was beaten. When the Jews saw that the people of Antioch were winning, they climbed onto the roofs of the palace and shot at them from there. Being so high above them, they suffered nothing themselves, while from their height they did the others great harm, and they drove them out of the houses nearby. These they set on fire at once, and the flames spread over the whole city and consumed all of it, for the houses stood close together and most of them were built of wood. Unable to help themselves or master the fire, the people of Antioch turned and fled. The Jews leaped from roof to roof and chased them that way, so that the pursuit was an astonishing thing. When the king saw the people of Antioch hurrying to save their children and wives and fighting no longer, he attacked them through other narrow streets, joined battle, and killed many of them, until they were forced to throw down their arms and surrender to Demetrius. He pardoned them for what they had dared and put an end to the uprising. He gave the Jews the profit of the spoils, thanked them as the chief cause of his victory, and sent them back to Jonathan in Jerusalem with a testimony to the help Jonathan had given. But afterward he dealt badly with Jonathan, broke his promises, and threatened him with war unless he paid all the tribute the Jewish nation had owed since the first kings. He would have done it, had Trypho not checked him and drawn the preparations he was making against Jonathan away to cares for his own safety. For Trypho came back from Arabia into Syria with the boy Antiochus, who was still a youth, and put the diadem on his head. The whole army that had left Demetrius for want of pay came over to him, and he made war on Demetrius, defeated him in battle, and took both the elephants and the city of Antioch. [c]

Demetrius, defeated, withdrew into Cilicia. The boy Antiochus sent ambassadors and a letter to Jonathan, made him his friend and ally, confirmed him in the high priesthood, and granted him the four districts that had been added to the land of the Jews. He also sent him gold vessels and drinking cups and a purple robe, with leave to use them; he presented him with a gold clasp and named him one of his First Friends. He appointed his brother Simon general of the army from the Ladder of Tyre as far as Egypt. Jonathan was pleased with what Antiochus had done for him. He sent ambassadors to him and to Trypho, declaring himself their friend and ally and promising to make war with them against Demetrius. Demetrius, he pointed out, had made him no return for the many kindnesses he had received from him when he was in need, but had repaid good treatment with further wrongs. [d] So Antiochus gave Jonathan leave to gather a large army from Syria and Phoenicia and make war on Demetrius’s generals, and Jonathan set out at once for the cities. They received him splendidly but gave him no troops. From there he came to the city of Ashkelon, where the people met him with lavish gifts. He urged them, and every one of the cities of Coele-Syria, to break with Demetrius and join Antiochus, and by fighting at his side to try to make Demetrius pay for the wrongs he had once done them; there were many reasons, he told them, for them to think this way, if they were willing. When he had persuaded the cities to agree to fight for Antiochus, he came to Gaza, to win its goodwill for Antiochus too. But he found the people of Gaza far more hostile than he had expected. They shut their gates against him, and though they had abandoned Demetrius, they had not decided to go over to Antiochus. This provoked Jonathan to besiege them and lay waste their country. He posted part of his army around Gaza, and with the rest he went through their land himself, destroying and burning it. When the people of Gaza saw what they were suffering, and that no help was coming to them from Demetrius — what hurt them was already upon them, while what might help them was still far off, and it was uncertain whether it would come at all — they judged it prudent to stop holding to the one side and to court the other. So they sent to Jonathan and pledged friendship and alliance. For people do not understand their own interest before they have experienced hardship; but once they have fallen into some misfortune, they change their minds, and what it would have been better to do before they had been harmed at all, they choose to do afterward, when they have suffered loss. Jonathan made a treaty of friendship with them and took hostages, whom he sent to Jerusalem, while he himself went through the whole country as far as Damascus.

Then he heard that Demetrius’s generals had advanced to Kedesh with a large army. Kedesh lies between the land of the Tyrians and Galilee. They supposed they would draw him away from Syria to help the Galileans, since he would not stand by while the people of Galilee were attacked. He went to meet them, leaving his brother Simon in Judea. Simon gathered as large an army from the country as he could and sat down to besiege Beth-zur, the strongest place in Judea; a garrison of Demetrius’s held it, as we have told before. Simon raised earthworks, set up his siege engines, and pressed the siege of Beth-zur hard, until the garrison grew afraid that if the place were taken by storm they would be killed. They sent to Simon asking for his oath that they would come to no harm from him, and that they might leave the place and go away to Demetrius. He gave them these pledges, put them out of the city, and installed a garrison of his own. [e] Jonathan set out from Galilee, from the waters called Gennesaret, where he had been encamped, and came into the plain called Hazor, not knowing that the enemy were there. Demetrius’s men had learned a day ahead that Jonathan was about to march against them. They set an ambush with men to lie in wait on the mountain, while they themselves met him in the plain with their army. When Jonathan saw them ready for battle, he too made his own soldiers ready for the fight as best he could. But the men Demetrius’s generals had set in ambush came up behind the Jews, and they, afraid of being caught in the middle and destroyed, broke and fled. All the rest deserted Jonathan; only a few, about fifty in number, stood fast with him, and with them Mattathias son of Absalom and Judas son of Chalphi, the commanders of the whole army. These hurled themselves boldly and desperately at the enemy, struck them with terror by their daring, and turned them to flight by force of arms. When Jonathan’s soldiers who had retreated saw the enemy routed, they rallied from their flight and set off in pursuit, and they kept it up as far as Kedesh, where the enemy had their camp. [f]

Having won a brilliant victory and killed two thousand of the enemy, Jonathan returned to Jerusalem. Seeing that everything was going as he wished by the providence of God, he sent ambassadors to the Romans, wishing to renew the friendship the nation had had with them before. He instructed the same ambassadors to go to the Spartans on their way back from Rome and remind them of their friendship and kinship. When they came to Rome, they went into the senate and said what Jonathan the high priest had told them: that he had sent them to confirm the alliance. The senate ratified what it had decided before concerning its friendship with the Jews, and gave them letters to carry to all the kings of Asia and Europe and the magistrates of the cities, so that by these they might have safe conduct home. On their way back they came to Sparta and delivered the letter they had received from Jonathan. This is a copy of it: “Jonathan, high priest of the nation of the Jews, and the council of elders, and the body of the priests, to the ephors and council of elders and people of the Spartans, their brothers, greeting. If you are well, and your public and private affairs go as you wish, it is as we would have it. We too are well. In former times a letter was brought by Demoteles to Onias, who was then our high priest, from Arius, who was then your king, concerning the kinship between you and us. A copy of it is attached below. We received the letter gladly, and were well disposed toward Demoteles and Arius, though we needed no such proof, since we were assured of it from our sacred writings. We do not presume to be the first to claim the relationship, so as not to seem to snatch beforehand the honor that you yourselves offer. But much time has passed since our kinship was first renewed, and on our holy and appointed days, when we offer sacrifices to God, we pray to him for your safety and your victory. Although many wars have surrounded us because of the greed of our neighbors, we decided not to trouble either you or any others who are related to us. But now that we have overcome our enemies, and are sending Numenius son of Antiochus and Antipater son of Jason, men held in honor in our council, to the Romans, we have given them a letter for you as well, so that they may renew our kinship with you. You will therefore do well to write to us yourselves and tell us whatever you need, since we will be eager in everything to do what you wish.” The Spartans received the ambassadors in a friendly way, passed a decree of friendship and alliance with them, and sent it to them. [g]

At this time there were three sects among the Jews, which held different views about human affairs. One was called the sect of the Pharisees, the second that of the Sadducees, and the third that of the Essenes. The Pharisees say that some things, but not all, are the work of fate, and that some things lie in our own power, whether they happen or not. The Essenes declare that fate is master of all things, and that nothing befalls human beings except by its decree. The Sadducees do away with fate. They hold that there is no such thing and that human affairs do not reach their outcome by it, but that everything lies in our own power, so that we ourselves are the cause of our good things and receive the worse ones through our own folly. But I have given a more exact account of these views in the second book of my history of the Jewish War. [k]

Demetrius’s generals, wanting to make good their defeat, gathered a larger army than before and came against Jonathan. As soon as he learned they were coming, he went quickly to meet them in the country of Hamath, for he was determined not to give them the chance to invade Judea. He camped about six miles from the enemy and sent men to spy out their camp and see how they were encamped. The spies told him everything, and they also caught some men by night who reported that the enemy were about to attack. Warned in advance, he made himself secure. He posted outposts beyond the camp and kept his whole force under arms all night, and he ordered them to keep up their spirits and to hold themselves ready to fight even in the night if need be, so that the enemy’s plan would not take them unawares. When Demetrius’s generals learned that Jonathan knew, they could no longer think clearly. It shook them to have been found out by the enemy, and they had no hope of beating them any other way now that their plot had failed; for if they took their chances in the open, they did not think themselves a match for Jonathan’s men. So they decided to flee. They lit many fires, so that the enemy, seeing them, would suppose they were still there, and they withdrew. At dawn Jonathan attacked their camp and found it empty; realizing that they had fled, he pursued them, but he could not overtake them, for they had already crossed the river Eleutherus and were safe. Turning back from there, Jonathan went into Arabia, made war on the Nabateans, drove off a great deal of plunder, took captives, and came to Damascus, where he sold it all. About the same time his brother Simon went through all Judea and Palestine as far as Ashkelon and made it secure with forts, making them very strong both with buildings and with guards. Then he came to Joppa, seized it, and brought a large garrison into it, for he had heard that the people of Joppa meant to hand the city over to Demetrius’s generals. [l]

When Simon and Jonathan had settled these matters, they went to Jerusalem. Jonathan gathered all the people in the temple and advised them to repair the walls of Jerusalem, to rebuild the part of the wall around the temple that had been pulled down, and to fortify the area around it with high towers; besides this, to build another wall through the middle of the city to shut the city off from the garrison in the citadel and so cut them off from their supply of food; and further, to make the forts in the country much stronger than they were. When the people approved the plan as good, Jonathan himself took charge of the building in the city and sent Simon out to secure the country. Demetrius, meanwhile, crossed over into Mesopotamia, wanting to hold it and Babylon, and once master of the upper provinces, to make them his base for recovering the whole kingdom. For the Greeks and Macedonians who lived there kept sending embassies to him, promising that if he came to them they would surrender to him and help him make war on Arsaces, the king of the Parthians. Buoyed by these hopes, he set out for them, resolved that if he could subdue the Parthians and gain an army of his own, he would make war on Trypho and drive him out of Syria. The people of that country received him eagerly. He gathered an army and made war on Arsaces, lost his whole army, and was himself taken alive, as has been told elsewhere. [n]