Forgetting the Seleucids

Abstract The place given to Antiochus III ’s first edict for Jerusalem ( Ant . 12.138–44) in the historiography of Hellenistic period Judea and Judaism, the Maccabean revolt, and the Hasmonean state is exceptional. But this is an internal Seleucid document that is absent of any local Judean perspectives, and in fact does not contain the actual instrument of royal benefaction. In recent years there has been a growing realization that empire and imperial rule relied on the acceptance of local elites that was guaranteed through negotiation. This paper traces Antiochus III ’s Judean elite negotiants and the ways in which this decree was received and employed in Judea in Ben Sira, 1 and 2 Maccabees. It thus restores a local perspective to this crucial moment in Jewish history.