“Still the yoke of foreign dominion pressed heavily, till at last Jehovah hardened the heart of Antiochus Epiphanes, king of Syria, who carried his cruelty to such a length, as to prepare the way for the complete emancipation of Israel. This Antiochus, whom the surname of Epimanes (_frantic_) would have better suited, bestowed on the wretched Joshua, the brother of Onias the third, the office of high-priest, and allowed him, in consideration of an enormous increase of tribute, to open a Grecian gymnasium in Jerusalem, and grant to the Jews the privileges of citizens of Antioch. A strange infatuation seized a part of the people, to witness the contests of this gymnasium; even priests, for this object, forsook their duties in the temple. His younger brother Onias, (who as Joshua, in his passion for every thing Greek, had called himself Jason, took the name of Menelaus) tempted Epiphanes by still higher offers, abjured in Antioch the religion of his fathers, promised an increase of three hundred talents of tribute, and by force of arms installed himself high-priest. A report being spread, that Antiochus had died in Egypt, Jason returned with 1000 men of the Ammonites, and possessed himself of Jerusalem. Antiochus hastened back from Egypt, took Jerusalem, plundered the city, cut to pieces 80,000 men, and sold as slaves, or carried away captive, an equal number. He added impiety to cruelty. Entering the temple with Menelaus, he reviled the God to whom it was dedicated, directed all the gold and silver, the table of shew-bread and the candlestick to be carried away, and then offered—I can scarce relate the horrible atrocity, a swine upon the sacred altar, and sprinkled the whole temple with the water in which a part of it had been boiled. This was not all that Israel was doomed to bear from the heathen. Some time after, being in Egypt, and being compelled to return home by an embassy of the Romans, he vented his ill-humour upon Jerusalem, sent thither 22,000 men, who marched in on the sabbath day, plundered the houses, pulled down the walls of the city, turned the hill of Zion into a fortification, and made the streets of Jerusalem flow with the blood of its inhabitants. The daily sacrifice ceased. The worship of the Grecian idols was commanded upon pain of death; the holy scriptures were cut to pieces or taken away; the temple on Garizim dedicated to Jupiter Xenius; that at Jerusalem to Jupiter Olympius. On the altar of burnt-offering another was erected to these idols, and groves and shrines of idolatrous worship were introduced into every town. To practise circumcision, or to observe the sabbath, was forbidden on pain of death. Two women were discovered to have circumcised their children; the infants were bound on their breasts, they were led round the whole city, and at last precipitated from the walls. Some had crept into caverns near the city, in order to keep the sabbath—they were all burnt alive.