Ancient Israel's religious leadership involved priests and Levites, crucial for maintaining covenant worship patterns, instruction, and national identity through history.
What Do We Know About the Israelite Priests and Levites?
Who Were the Essenes?
The Essenes was a Jewish sect or community in Palestine in the last century BC and the 1st century AD.
Who Were the Maccabees?
The name Maccabeus was first applied to Judas, one of the sons of Mattathias generally called in English the Maccabees, a celebrated family who defended Jewish rights and customs in the 2nd century B.C.E. (1 Macc 2:1-3). The word has been variously derived (e.g. as the initial letters of Mi Khamokha, Ba-'elim Jehovah! "Who is... Continue Reading →
BETWEEN MALACHI AND MATTHEW: The Hasmoneans and Their Legacy
Hasmoneans: A remarkable priestly family of Modin, in Judea, also called Asmoneans or Maccabees. They belonged to that portion of the Jewish nation which under all trials and temptations remained loyal to Jehovah, even when the national life and religion seemed at their lowest ebb, and they succeeded, for a while at least, in restoring... Continue Reading →
TRYPHON: Diodotus a Usurper of the Syrian Throne
tri'-fon (Truphon): The surname of Diodotus, a usurper of the Syrian throne. He was a native of Apamea and had been in the service of Alexander Balas. On the death of Balas (145 BC), Tryphon, taking advantage of the complaints of discontent among the troops of Demetrius II (Nicator), set up the younger son of... Continue Reading →
THE BOOKS OF MACCABEES: The Hasidaeans
The Hasideans (Hebrew: חסידים הראשונים, Hasidim ha-Rishonim, Greek Ἀσιδαῖοι, also transcribed Hasidæans, Assideans, Hassideans or Assideans) were a Jewish religious party which played an important role in political life only during the time of the Maccabean wars, although it had existed for quite some time previous. – Wikipedia Hasideanz (Hasidaioi, a transliteration of chacidhim, "the pious," "Puritans"): A name assumed... Continue Reading →
Between the Old Testament and the New Testament
The Period in General The Exile left its ineffaceable stamp on Judaism as well as on the Jews. Their return to the land of their fathers was marked by the last rays of the declining sun of prophecy. With Malachi it set. Modern historical criticism has projected some of the canonical books of the Bible... Continue Reading →
