It was about 180 years before the Christian era. The Jews had long since
come home from Babylon, and built up their city and Temple at Jerusalem.
But they were not free as they had been before. Their country belonged
to some greater power, they had a foreign governor over them, and had to
pay tribute to the king who was their master.

At the time we are going to speak of, this king was Antiochus Epiphanes,
King of Syria. He was descended from one of those generals who, upon the
death of Alexander the Great, had shared the East between them, and he
reigned over all the country from the Mediterranean Sea even into Persia
and the borders of India. He spoke Greek, and believed in both the Greek
and Roman gods, for he had spent some time at Rome in his youth; but in
his Eastern kingdom he had learnt all the self-indulgent and violent
habits to which people in those hot countries are especially tempted.

He was so fierce and passionate, that he was often called the 'Madman',
and he was very cruel to all who offended him. One of his greatest
desires was, that the Jews should leave their true faith in one God, and
do like the Greeks and Syrians, his other subjects, worship the same
idols, and hold drunken feasts in their honor. Sad to say, a great many
of the Jews had grown ashamed of their own true religion and the strict
ways of their law, and thought them old-fashioned. They joined in the
Greek sports, played games naked in the theatre, joined in riotous
processions, carrying ivy in honor of Bacchus, the god of wine, and
offered incense to the idols; and the worst of all these was the false
high priest, Menelaus, who led the King Antiochus into the Temple
itself, even into the Holy of Holies, and told him all that would most
desecrate it and grieve the Jews. So a little altar to the Roman god
Jupiter was set up on the top of the great brazen altar of burnt
offerings, a hog was offered up, and broth of its flesh sprinkled