Even before the good Queen Salome died storm clouds began to darken the horizon of Judah. Her second son, Aristobulus, inherited all his father's fierceness and tyranny. The throne had been naturally left to the elder brother, Hyrcanus, but the headstrong Aristobulus seized the reins of power on the dangerous theory that he was more fit to rule. Civil war began before the good queen had quite breathed her last. Hyrcanus, the weak, yielded, and all might have been well were it not for the interference of a new enemy who was eventually to bring about the ruin of the Jewish State. Antipater the Idumean. It will be recalled that John Hyrcanus had conquered the Idumeans and made them, seemingly, Jews. We shall now see the kind of Jews they were. One of them, Antipater, was the local governor of this Idumean province. He was a man who lusted for power and had absolutely no scruples as to the means of gaining his ends. He saw that if only he could place the weak Hyrcanus on the throne, he might become a power behind it. He began by insinuating himself into the favor of the Jewish nobility, and, ostensibly, as a pleader for justice, emphasized the evils of Aristobulus' usurpation. Letting that poison work, he came to the innocent Hyrcanus and played upon his fears with a made-up story of conspiracy against his life. Most reluctantly was Hyrcanus persuaded to flee with him from Jerusalem to an Arabian prince, Aretas. Aretas was induced to lend his aid in the expectation that Hyrcanus, once in power, would restore the cities Alexander Janneus had taken from the Arabians. So unhappy Judah was plunged in war again to gratify the unworthy ambitions of unworthy men and men not of their own people. Aristobulus was defeated in battle by Aretas and was besieged in the Temple Citadel. Prayer of Onias. An interesting incident is told at this juncture that recalls the Bible story of Balaam. (Numbers xxii-xxiv.) In the party of Hyrcanus there was a man, Onias, who, so said credulous rumor, had brought rain in times of drought through his fervent prayer. He was now brought into the camp and asked to invoke God's curse on Aristobulus and his allies. But such prayer he considered blasphemous, therefore he voiced his petition to heaven in these words: "O God, King of the whole world, since those that stand now with me are Thy people and those that are besieged are also Thy priests, I beseech Thee that Thou wilt neither hearken to the prayer of those against these, nor bring about what these pray against those." Alas, the temper of warfare had not patience or appreciation with this sublime attitude. The man was stoned. But in a sense his prayer was answered. Pompey Takes Jerusalem.