By the command of Judas Maccabeus, high walls, strengthened with towers, were raised around the sacred building, to protect it from future attack, and a garrison was appointed to guard it, 164 B.C.
When Antiochus, who was on his way from Ecbatana to Babylonia, heard how the Jews had defeated Lycias, recovered the temple of Jerusalem, pulled down his idols, thrown their altars to the ground, and restored the pure worship of Jehovah, he was enraged to the utmost pitch of fury. He commanded his charioteer to double his speed, that he might the sooner arrive in Judea to execute a fearful revenge. He threatened to make Jerusalem one vast grave for the nation that had dared to defy his power.
But the tyrant’s hour was come. He was now, according to the prophetic words of the young martyr whom he had slain, to receive the just punishment of his pride. Antiochus Epiphanes was smitten with a most horrible and loathsome disease. Yet, hatred struggling against physical pain, he endeavoured to pursue his course, till his chariot being overturned, the king was so sorely injured by the fall, that it was necessary to carry him in a litter to Tabœ, a town on the confines of Persia and Babylonia.
Here the miserable tyrant endured tortures more intolerable than any that he himself had inflicted, and was forced openly to acknowledge them to be God’s retribution for his impiety and cruelty. His reason at length gave way beneath them, spectres appeared to haunt him, and this enemy of God and of his people expired at length in the greatest agonies both of body and mind.
Meanwhile Judas gained victory after victory. He defeated the people of Edom, Bean, and Ammon; took Gazer, with the towns belonging to it; won a great triumph over a vast host, under a leader named Timotheus; and subdued the cities of the country of Galaad. He smote Hebron, and passed through Samaria; turned to Azotus, in the land of the Philistines; and when he had levelled their altars, and burned their carved images with fire, he returned back in triumph to Judea.
Antiochus had been succeeded by his son of the same name, to which was added that of Eupator. The king being too young to assume the reins of power, Lycias took the government into his own hands. The regent raised an enormous army to crush the forces of Judas. A hundred thousand foot soldiers, twenty thousand horse, thirty war elephants, and three hundred chariots were gathered together, and headed by the young monarch in person, who laid siege to the town of Bethsura.