12. I have comprehended all these things in seven books, and have left no occasion for complaint or accusation to such as have been acquainted with this war; and I have written it down for the sake of those that love truth, but not for those that please themselves [with fictitious relations]. And I will begin my account of these things with what I call my First Chapter. WAR PREFACE FOOTNOTES 1 (return) [ I have already observed more than once, that this History of the Jewish War was Josephus's first work, and published about A.D. 75, when he was but thirty-eight years of age; and that when he wrote it, he was not thoroughly acquainted with several circumstances of history from the days of Antiochus Epiphanes, with which it begins, till near his own times, contained in the first and former part of the second book, and so committed many involuntary errors therein. That he published his Antiquities eighteen years afterward, in the thirteenth year of Domitian, A.D. 93, when he was much more completely acquainted with those ancient times, and after he had perused those most authentic histories, the First Book of Maccabees, and the Chronicles of the Priesthood of John Hyrcanus, etc. That accordingly he then reviewed those parts of this work, and gave the public a more faithful, complete, and accurate account of the facts therein related; and honestly corrected the errors he had before run into.] 2 (return) [ Who these Upper Barbarians, remote from the sea, were, Josephus himself will inform us, sect. 2, viz. the Parthians and Babylonians, and remotest Arabians [of the Jews among them]; besides the Jews beyond Euphrates, and the Adiabeni, or Assyrians. Whence we also learn that these Parthians, Babylonians, the remotest Arabians, [or at least the Jews among them,] as also the Jews beyond Euphrates, and the Adiabeni, or Assyrians, understood Josephus's Hebrew, or rather Chaldaic, books of The Jewish War, before they were put into the Greek language.] 3 (return) [ That these calamities of the Jews, who were our Savior's murderers, were to be the greatest that had ever been since the beginning of the world, our Savior had directly foretold, Matthew 24:21; Mark 13:19; Luke 21:23, 24; and that they proved to be such accordingly, Josephus is here a most authentic witness.] 4 (return) [ Titus.] 5 (return) [ These seven, or rather five, degrees of purity, or purification, are enumerated hereafter, B. V. ch. 5. sect. 6. The Rabbins make ten degrees of them, as Reland there informs us.] BOOK I. Containing The Interval Of One Hundred And Sixty-Seven Years. From The Taking Of Jerusalem By Antiochus Epiphanes, To The Death Of Herod The Great. CHAPTER 1. How The City Jerusalem Was Taken, And The Temple Pillaged [By Antiochus Epiphanes]. As Also Concerning The Actions Of The Maccabees, Matthias And Judas; And Concerning The Death Of Judas.