Thursday, December 07, 2023

Two revolts against Hellenistic Kings

HANUKKAH RELATED: Two Major Native Rebellions Against Hellenistic Kings. Here are two stories of Greco-Macedonian rulers of the Hellenistic period coming to blows with the native population of their empires (Benjamin Davies, The Collector).
The Hellenistic period saw Macedonian rulers on the thrones of both Asian and African empires from 323 BCE until 31 BCE. Although there was certainly a division between the Greek culture of the rulers and the native cultures of the ruled, Hellenistic kings were far more invested in cooperating and displaying themselves as the rightful rulers of their native subjects. However, there were still tensions between the rulers and the ruled. Native rebellions did sometimes erupt and two of these rebellions will be the subject of this article: the Maccabean revolt and the Great Rebellion.

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The "Great Rebellion" of the Ptolemies against the Egyptians is the lesser-known one today. But King Ptolemy IV Philopater appears in the Bible. For more on him, see here and links. And the Rosetta Stone is arguably connected with the aftermath of the revolt.

The Maccabean Revolt is the better-know and more immediately seasonal one. This article gives a good, brief but nuanced, account of that revolt.

Some PaleoJudaica posts on the Maccabean Revolt are here, here, here, and links.

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