=14. Late Persian and Early Greek Periods.=--After the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, we have no clear topographical references to Jerusalem until the second century B. C. It seems probable that Jerusalem and Judah rebelled against one of the later Persian kings and that the city suffered.[256] We hear that Ptolemy I of Egypt also captured Jerusalem,[257] but whether these experiences led to any modification in the form of the city, we do not know. The _Wisdom of Jesus, the Son of Sirach_, often called _Ecclesiasticus_, which was written about 180 B. C., indicates that Jerusalem was a carefully organized city. Many professions and much commerce were represented in it, as well as many human sins and foibles.[258] The author declares[259] that a high priest, Simon, the son of Onias (probably Simon II, 218-198 B. C.), repaired the temple and fortified the city. What the nature of either work was, we do not know. So far as can be ascertained, he confined himself to the strengthening of old defenses, and did not change the topography.
In the early part of the reign of Antiochus IV, while many Jews were kindly inclined to Greek culture and to Greek ways, an outdoor gymnasium was established in Jerusalem.[260] This was in a hollow just above the Tyropoeon valley to the west of the south end of the temple enclosure.[261] Josephus calls it the Xystus, a Greek name that reveals its character. Some reminder that it was once a gymnasium perhaps lingers in _Maidan_, the modern Arabic name for the locality, which means hippodrome, or place of combat.
=15. In the Time of the Maccabees.=--In the Maccabæan period the city was divided into three parts--the city proper, the temple, and the Akra or citadel. As to the situation of the Akra, there is a wide difference of opinion. Into the different theories it is impossible to go.[262] The writer agrees with George Adam Smith, that in all probability the Akra was the "City of David" of the earlier time, as 1 Maccabees states (1:33; 7:32, 33; 14:36). We first hear of this Akra in 198 B. C., when an Egyptian garrison held out in it against Antiochus III.[263] It was so shut off from the rest of Jerusalem that, though, after the onslaught of Antiochus IV on the Jews in 168 B. C., Judas Maccabæus recovered the city and temple as early as 165 B. C., the Syrians kept possession of the Akra for twenty-three years more, until they were finally dislodged by Simon the Maccabee in 142 B. C.[264]