The battle at Ammaus took place sometime in September 165 b.c. (see p. 472 below), that is, at least half a year after the failures of Apollonius and Seron (p. 200), and about three years after the start of the religious persecutions. At that stage the suppression of the Revolt in Judaea did not have a prominent place in the plans of Antiochus Epiphanes, who was occupied with more serious problems. The Ammaus campaign was preceded by important events in the history of the Seleucid realm. Antiochus Epiphanes had gathered his whole army (apart from that of the Upper Satrapies) in Syria, and even displayed it at the famous festival at Daphne. When preparations were completed he set out on a great expedition to subdue the Upper Satrapies. The western part of the kingdom was put in charge of the regent Lysias. The new acting ruler began to turn his attention to the military situation in Judaea, and the initiative and supervision passed from low-ranking officers and officials to Ptolemy, son of Dorymenes, who was in charge of the satrapy of Coele Syria and Phoenicia, which included Judaea.

The background and phases of the battle of Ammaus are given in I Maccabees 3.38–4.25 and II Maccabees 8.8–29,34–6. The two sources differ in important points relating to the preparations before the battle: the hierarchy and staffing of the Seleucid command, the size of the contending armies, and the tactical division of the Jewish force. An examination of the differences indicates that in administrative details concerning the Seleucid army the information in II Maccabees is preferable, while I Maccabees is more accurate in regard to the organization of the Jewish force.

The exact location of the Seleucid fortress in Jerusalem, which is of great importance for the understanding of the events in the city during the period of the persecutions and the Revolt, has been a matter of dispute for many years. The question is regarded as the most difficult in the geographical history of Jerusalem, and the identifications proposed are scattered over almost the entire area of city that was inhabited during the Second Temple period.

The evidence of the sources

The sources in fact give clear indications of the placement of the Akra: I Maccabees places the citadel in the City of David (14.36), and states more than once that the Seleucid garrison was concentrated in the City of David (1.33, 2 2.31, 7.32), while Josephus puts it in the Lower City (Bell. 1.39, 5.137; Ant. 12.252), both of them referring to the south-eastern hill, south of the Dung Gate.3 This location, however, does not seem to fit in with the tradition that the citadel hill dominated the Temple, and that only in the time of Simeon the Hasmonaean was it levelled so that the Temple hill would tower above it (Ant. 12.252, 362, 13.215, 217; Bell. 1.50, 5.139). The top of that hill is about 40 metres lower than the Temple Mount, and for archaeological-topographical reasons it is impossible to assume that until Simeon's time any part of it was considerably higher than it is today.

Military historians tend to laud Judas Maccabaeus’ talents for guerrilla and indirect warfare, and his ability to exploit to the fullest the advantages provided by rugged mountainous terrain. This is a fair evaluation of the first phase of the military struggle, before the purification of the Temple. But care should be taken not to extend it to cover all the stages of Judas Maccabaeus’ military operations.

After entrenching themselves in their mountain refuge in the Gophna region, Mattathias and his sons began with measures against internal opponents (I Macc. 2.43–7, 3–8; II Macc. 8.6) and perhaps also against elements that were compliant, undecided or fence-sitters. Since the religious question was the central one at this stage of the Revolt, some religious coercion was applied by the Jews as well: on the one hand the destruction of altars for idol worship (I Macc. 2.45) and on the other forced circumcision (ibid. 2.46: ἐν ἰσχύι = by force). II Maccabees even gives some details of the tactical methods adopted by Judas Maccabaeus in accomplishing his ends: making surprise raids against towns and villages, probably against homes and estates of opponents, burning them down, setting nocturnal ambushes, and the like (8.6–7). It appears from I Maccabees that at this stage no actions were taken against the civil authorities or the Seleucid forces. However, one may presume that raids on small Seleucid supply convoys had already been carried out by then.

The episode at Modein and the escape to the Gophna Hills

Organized popular opposition to the religious persecutions began with Mattathias’ charismatic action at Modein, described in great detail in I Maccabees (2.15–18). Sporadic outbreaks of resistance no doubt occurred in various places at the same time. Mattathias’ public defiance was the signal for the rural population to raise its head and rally around the leadership of the Hasmonaean family. The audacity and initiative to assault the representative of the government doubtless derived from the special personality of Mattathias and his family. However, since Mattathias himself resided in Jerusalem at the start of the persecutions (I Macc. 2.1) and refrained from responding to Seleucid provocations in the city, most certainly geographic and accessibility factors contributed to making Modein the site of the most serious spontaneous uprising against the authorities, and the cradle of the general revolt.

Modein, today Tel al-Ras near the village of El-Midya, is located close to the meeting point of three geographical regions, and is itself on relatively gentle and easily accessible terrain. East and north of it, however, stretches rugged, mountainous terrain that is not easily traversable. Modein is situated at the north-eastern extremity of the Low Shephela. South of Modein is the Shephela, the hilly transitional region between the steep rugged slopes of the Judaean Hills and the coastal plain. The Shephela consists of two parts, a higher one that is more difficult to traverse and a lower one which is relatively easy. The boundary between them passes by Ni'lin, slightly east of Modein.

The Books of the Maccabees report several confrontations between Judas Maccabaeus and a military commander named Timotheus. In the I Maccabees description of the expeditions Judas Maccabaeus conducted to rescue the Jews of Transjordania, Timotheus is the leader of the enemy camp defeated three times by the Jews. The first campaign, to Ammanitis, is described only briefly: Judas Maccabaeus defeated Timotheus, conquered Iazer, and returned to Judaea (5.6–8). In the second expedition, to Gilead (Galaaditis), the Jewish commander made a surprise assault on Timotheus’ men, who were besieging the ‘fortress’ (apparently Dathema, see 5.9–13) and threw them into a panic (5.29–34). After Timotheus reorganized his forces, another clash between the sides took place near Karnayim; Timotheus’ army was defeated, his men took refuge in Karnayim, and Judas Maccabaeus conquered the place (536–45). Timotheus is mentioned in three separate places in II Maccabees as well. He first appears together with a commander named Bacchides in an episode that became interposed in the description of the battle against Nicanor and Gorgias, that is, the battle of Ammaus (8.30–3). According to the text, the battle ended with a decisive victory, the death of one of the enemy subcommanders, the capture of forts, and the distribution of spoils and their transfer to Jerusalem. The second episode comes later, after the report on the purification of the Temple (10.24–38): Timotheus gathered some mercenaries and ‘Asian horses’ in order to conquer Judaea (10.24), Judas Maccabaeus prayed ‘before the altar’ and set out to meet the foe ‘very far from the city’ (10.27).

The Seleucid phalanx, the backbone of the army, was mobilized for the big wars primarily from among the military settlers of Greco-Macedonian descent who were called to the colours in time of need. However, the possibility of utilizing military settlers was not unlimited. As farmers, they could not leave their settlements for very long periods, and their mobilization itself was a lengthy process because of the great distances between settlements, and between the settlements and the governmental centres and the battle sites. To fulfil basic military needs and supply manpower for ordinary guard duties and police functions as well as extinguish small local conflagrations, the Seleucid kings had a Royal Guard. Like all royal armies even to the present day, the Guard was at the disposal of the king at all times in peace and in war, and in battle the kings always took their place in one of the Royal Guard units. As might be expected, most of the Seleucid Royal Guard were foot soldiers, only a minority being mounted. We shall deal here solely with the infantry Royal Guard. This investigation can illuminate not only the matter of the regular arrangements for the security of the Seleucid empire, but also the way that the military settlements were organized, and in particular the manner in which the military capability of the heavy infantry forces in general was preserved.

Among the various units of the Seleucid army mentioned in the sources, three – the argyraspides, hypaspists and peltasts – refer at different times to units of the Royal Guard in the armies of Alexander, the Diadochs, and the Antigonid dynasty.

The main sources for reconstructing the course of the battles are I and II Maccabees. The complex questions connected with the identity of the authors, the language and date, the provenance, aims and characteristic features of these two books have often been discussed and reviewed in scholarly literature, so that there remains only to refer the reader to the numerous introductions to and studies of the Books of the Maccabees. In the present survey we shall deal only with those questions that are of decisive importance in reconstructing the course of the battles, or where an analysis of battle accounts contributes to a solution.

The First Book of the Maccabees

I Maccabees, originally written in Hebrew, reached us in Greek translation. It covers the period from the plunder of the Temple by Antiochus Epiphanes in 169 b.c. (1.16ff.) until the murder of Simeon the Hasmonaean by Ptolemy son of Abubus in 135 b.c. (16.11–22). After a short introduction reporting briefly the successes of Alexander the Great, the dissolution of his empire, the accession of Antiochus Epiphanes and the Hellenistic reform in Jerusalem (1.1–15), the book surveys at length the coercive edicts (1.16–64), the start of the Revolt under the leadership of Mattathias the Hasmonaean (2.1–69), the period of Judas Maccabaeus’ leadership until his death in the battle of Elasa (3.1–9.22), the leadership of Judas’ brother Jonathan and the political and military struggle in his time-160 to 143 b.c. (9.23–12.52). It ends with the period of Simeon after the achievement of independence and the start of the Hasmonaean state – 143 to 135 b.c. (13.1–16.16).

A re-evaluation of the battles that Judas Maccabaeus led against the Seleucid troops – in the light of the historical circumstances, the information we have on the Seleucid army, and our familiarity with the battlefields – indicates that I Maccabees describes the course of most of the battles with considerable accuracy, and suggests that the author was an eye-witness of some of them (Ammaus, Beth Zacharia, and perhaps Elasa). The final passages of the book testify to its having been written a generation after the events. On the other hand, an examination of the book's character and purposes, hints, ‘slips of the pen’ in the two Books of the Maccabees, as well as external information on the size and movements of the Seleucid army, and an analysis of the course of some of the battles according to the conditions of the terrain, can repudiate absolutely most of the information contained in the book on the relative strength of the two sides. The same negative evaluation applies also to the battle orations attributed to Judas Maccabaeus. The great discrepancy in credibility between the figures of the armies as well as the battle orations on the one hand, and the descriptions of the course of the battles on the other, is well known from the historiographic literature of antiquity.

The pattern of the Hasmonaean Revolt is identical to that of revolutionary wars and struggles for freedom, as analysed by military theoreticians on the basis of the experience in such wars in the twentieth century. Like them, it is divisible into two main stages.

The contacts between various elements among the Jews, including the rebels, and the Seleucid authorities at the start of Demetrius Fs reign have been discussed above in a variety of contexts. The understanding of the aims and course of those contacts affected the assessment of the rebel recruitment and resistance capability during the second phase of the Revolt.1 Indeed during the reigns of Antiochus Epiphanes and Antiochus Eupator there were already diplomatic contacts between the Jews and the Antioch authorities. An accurate identification of the parties involved, the establishment of the exact timing, the way they evolved, their progress and outcome can illuminate Judas Maccabaeus’ diplomacy at the end of the first phase of the Revolt, and contribute to the understanding of the nature of the contacts during Demetrius Fs reign. They help also to clarify the political tactics of the Hellenizers and the internal struggle for power in Antioch in which the Jewish question played quite an important role.

The documents in II Maccabees 11

The information on the negotiations during the reigns of Antiochus Epiphanes and his son Antiochus Eupator is included in the four documents inserted in the eleventh chapter of II Maccabees. These documents have been the subject of much research in the last century, mainly because they present many fundamental difficulties which have attracted the attention of philologists as well as historians. The documents follow the description of Lysias’ first campaign, but it is impossible to fit the contents of some of them into the situation that developed immediately after that expedition.

Just as the mistaken notions about the national origin and military ability of the phalangites were employed to explain the failures of the Seleucid troops, so the victories of Judas Maccabaeus were explained on the premise that the phalanx combat method was antiquated and rigid, and prevented satisfactory performance in terrain that was hard to traverse. In this chapter we shall examine the available information on the number and weight of the light infantry contingents in the Seleucid army, the tactical composition of the units that operated in Judaea, as well as the ability to operate in mountainous areas of the light warriors separately and the army as a whole, including the phalanx troops.

The Seleucid army had no lack of units fit and well trained to fight in mountainous terrain. The various surveys of Seleucid manpower list soldiers from mountainous countries in the Aegean area, Asia Minor and the eastern satrapies making up the light and semi-heavy forces. These contingents comprised about half the total infantry, and sometimes even more. They were assuredly not inferior to Judas Maccabaeus’ men in fitness for mountain combat. Among the units mentioned as operating in Judaea at the time of the crisis the only nationals specifically noted in the Books of the Maccabees are the Cypriots, Mysians and Thracians.

The failure of the expedition to Ammaus – an expedition initiated by Ptolemy son of Dorymenes, the stratēgos of Coele Syria and Phoenicia – marked a change in the military situation in Judaea. The Antioch authorities realized that as long as the main army was occupied in the Upper Satrapies, it would be rather difficult to effect a decision and turned therefore to negotiations which lasted about six months (see below pp. 533ff.). The failure of these negotiations brought about the direct intervention of the regent Lysias, who was also in charge of the western part of the kingdom. Lysias personally led the expedition to Judaea, the first of the two. Like the battle of Ammaus, it was conducted at a time when the majority of the Seleucid army stayed with Antiochus Epiphanes in the eastern satrapies, a situation which inevitably severely reduced the numerical strength of the troops sent to Judaea.

There is a certain similarity between the I Maccabees descriptions of Lysias’ two expeditions (4.26–35, 6.28–54): in both Lysias broke into the Judaean Hills from the south, and in both a confrontation with the Jews took place in Beth Zur. However, contrary to the views of a number of scholars, there is no justification for doubting that there were really two expeditions. The resemblance derives from the fact that in both expeditions Lysias tried to solve the problem of the ascent to the Judaean Hills in the same way, and in both he first of all had to break the blockade of Beth Zur, the southernmost fort in Judaea, which could not be bypassed.

Students of the history of the halakha, the Jewish Oral Law, have generally agreed on the assumption that defensive warfare on the Sabbath was not permitted until early in the Hasmonaean Revolt. This assumption became a basic point in the theory on the development of the halakha. The few dissenters, some of whom came from the ranks of the orthodox rabbinate, were disregarded, either because of a dogmatic approach to the source and antiquity of the Oral Law, or because of unsystematic and incomplete consideration of Hellenistic sources.

The accepted view is based on the story of Agatharchides of Cnidus quoted by Josephus that the Jews did not defend themselves when Ptolemy I son of Lagus overcame Jerusalem on the Sabbath (Ant. 12.6), and on the tradition in I Maccabees (2.29–37) concerning the devout who took refuge in caves and did not defend themselves when attacked on the Sabbath. According to this view, the change took place with the declaration of Mattathias and his company, who in response to that incident demanded to fight on the Sabbath (I Macc. 2.38–40). And indeed from then on the Jews defended themselves on the Sabbath; so it was in the time of Jonathan (I Macc. 9.43–8), Alexander Jannaeus (Ant. 13.337) and at the height of the Great War with Rome. This array of evidence is augmented by various references in II Maccabees (5.25–6, 6.11, 8.25–6, 15.1–5) from which there was an attempt to deduce that its author opposed defensive warfare on the Sabbath.