Why does Eleazar reject the proposed appearance of compliance?

Atlas of Saints · Chapter summary

Eleazar refuses the offered dissimulation because it could deceive young people and dishonor his age, while the author separately explains the nation’s calamities as correction.

Chapter breakdown

Not long afterward, the king sends an old man of Antioch to compel the Jews to abandon ancestral and divine laws. He orders Jerusalem’s temple defiled and called Jupiter Olympius’s, and the temple in Garazim Jupiter Hospitalis’s, according to its inhabitants. The note identifies the latter as the Samaritans’ temple and explains Hospitalis as belonging to strangers, applicable because they were originally strangers. The commissioner is not called Athenian here.

The invasion of evils is grievous. Gentile riot and revelling fill the temple, with men lying with lewd women; women enter holy places of their accord and bring unlawful things. The altar contains things forbidden by law. Sabbaths and ancestral solemn days are not observed, and no one openly professes to be a Jew. Bitter constraint drives people to sacrifices on the king’s birthday, and Bacchus’s feast brings forced going about in ivy crowns. A decree to neighboring Gentile cities, suggested by the Ptolemeans, extends compulsory sacrifice and death for nonconformity. Monthly birthdays, annual frequency and a specific sacrificial meal are not supplied.

Two women accused of circumcising their children are publicly led through the city with infants hanging at their breasts and thrown headlong from the walls. Others secretly keeping the Sabbath in nearby caves are discovered by Philip and burned because they conscientiously refrain from helping themselves with their hands on the day. The note identifies Philip as Jerusalem’s governor. Betrayal by an informer is not stated.

The author asks readers not to be shocked but to understand these events as the nation’s correction rather than destruction. Prompt punishment rather than allowing prolonged sin is called a sign of great goodness. Unlike other nations, whom the Lord patiently awaits to punish at judgment in their sins’ fullness, his people are not allowed to reach that height before vengeance. He never withdraws mercy; chastisement in adversity does not mean abandonment. These are the author’s comments about the narrated calamities. The passage does not declare a threshold of unpardonable guilt or identify every later affliction’s cause.

Eleazar, an aged and comely chief scribe, is pressed to open his mouth for swine’s flesh. He chooses glorious death over a hateful life and advances voluntarily to torment, determining not to do unlawful things for life’s sake. The text does not say he spits out meat or stands at a rack. Longstanding friends among those present draw him aside, proposing lawful flesh so that he can pretend to have eaten sacrificial flesh as ordered and thus escape death. The note calls their pity wicked because it proposes saving his life by dissimulation.

Considering his age, grey hair, honor and good conduct since childhood, Eleazar answers without delay according to God’s holy law that he would rather enter the other world. At ninety, dissembling might make young people believe he had adopted heathen life. Deceiving them for a short remaining life would stain and curse his old age. Escaping human punishment would not escape the Almighty’s hand alive or dead. He intends a manful death worthy of his age and an example of ready, constant fortitude for young men under the holy laws.

He is taken immediately to execution. His formerly milder escorts grow angry, interpreting his words as arrogance. Dying under stripes, he groans to the Lord of holy knowledge: he could have avoided death but bears severe bodily pain while his soul is content to suffer because he fears God. His death leaves the young and the whole nation a memory of virtue and fortitude. The narrative gives his stated reasons and this remembered example, without adding a general rule that every ambiguous compromise is equivalent to his proposal.

The story inside

Coercion changes worship and public observance, extending to neighboring cities and deadly persecution. The author interrupts with a warning about correction and mercy. Eleazar then receives a concrete life-saving proposal but explains why its public appearance conflicts with his responsibilities and accountability to God.

Lessons worth keeping

1
The emissary is from Antioch, and the Ptolemeans suggest the neighboring-city decree.
2
Neither spitting meat nor an execution rack is in this admitted span.
3
Eleazar’s reasons include the young, his old age and the Almighty’s hand; his body’s pain and soul’s contentment remain distinct.

Test your recall

What lawful substitute do Eleazar’s old friends propose?

Source edition and notes

Douay–Rheims, revised by Richard Challoner (1749–1752). Project Gutenberg no. 1581. Locators refer to lines in the admitted pg1581.txt edition. Source notes may include Challoner commentary.

Lines 108709–108777
6:1. But not long after the king sent a certain old man of Antioch, to compel the Jews to depart from the laws of their fathers and of God: 6:2. And to defile the temple that was in Jerusalem, and to call it the temple of Jupiter Olympius: and that in Garazim of Jupiter Hospitalis, according as they were that inhabited the place. That in Gazarim.... Viz., the temple of the Samaritans. And as they were originally strangers, the name of Hospitalis (which signifies of or belonging to strangers) was applicable to the idol set up in their temple. 6:3. And very bad was this invasion of evils, and grievous to all. 6:4. For the temple was full of the riot and revellings of the Gentiles: and of men lying with lewd women. And women thrust themselves of their accord into the holy places, and brought in things that were not lawful. 6:5. The altar also was filled with unlawful things, which were forbidden by the laws. 6:6. And neither were the sabbaths kept, nor the solemn days of the fathers observed, neither did any man plainly profess himself to be a Jew. 6:7. But they were led by bitter constraint on the king’s birthday to the sacrifices: and when the feast of Bacchus was kept, they were compelled to go about crowned with ivy in honour of Bacchus. 6:8. And there went out a decree into the neighbouring cities of the Gentiles, by the suggestion of the Ptolemeans, that they also should act in like manner against the Jews, to oblige them to sacrifice: 6:9. And whosoever would not conform themselves to the ways of the Gentiles, should be put to death: then was misery to be seen. 6:10. For two women were accused to have circumcised their children: whom, when they had openly led about through the city, with the infants hanging at their breasts, they threw down headlong from the walls. 6:11. And others that had met together in caves that were near, and were keeping the sabbath day privately, being discovered by Philip, were burnt with fire, because they made a conscience to help themselves with their hands, by reason of the religious observance of the day. Philip.... The governor of Jerusalem. 6:12. Now I beseech those that shall read this book, that they be not shocked at these calamities, but that they consider the things that happened, not as being for the destruction, but for the correction of our nation. 6:13. For it is a token of great goodness, when sinners are not suffered to go on in their ways for a long time, but are presently punished. 6:14. For, not as with other nations, (whom the Lord patiently expecteth, that when the day of judgment shall come, he may punish them in the fulness of their sins:) 6:15. Doth he also deal with us, so as to suffer our sins to come to their height, and then take vengeance on us. 6:16. And therefore he never withdraweth his mercy from us: but though he chastise his people with adversity he forsaketh them not. 6:17. But let this suffice in a few words for a warning to the readers. And now we must come to the narration.
Lines 108779–108840
6:18. Eleazar one of the chief of the scribes, a man advanced in years, and of a comely countenance, was pressed to open his mouth to eat swine’s flesh. 6:19. But he, choosing rather a most glorious death than a hateful life, went forward voluntarily to the torment. 6:20. And considering in what manner he was to come to it, patiently bearing, he determined not to do any unlawful things for the love of life. 6:21. But they that stood by, being moved with wicked pity, for the old friendship they had with the man, taking him aside, desired that flesh might be brought which it was lawful for him to eat, that he might make as if he had eaten, as the king had commanded, of the flesh of the sacrifice: Wicked pity.... Their pity was wicked, inasmuch as it suggested that wicked proposal of saving his life by dissimulation. 6:22. That by so doing he might be delivered from death; and for the sake of their old friendship with the man, they did him this courtesy. 6:23. But he began to consider the dignity of his age, and his ancient years, and the inbred honour of his grey head, and his good life and conversation from a child; and he answered without delay, according to the ordinances of the holy law made by God, saying, that he would rather be sent into the other world. 6:24. For it doth not become our age, said he, to dissemble: whereby many young persons might think that Eleazar, at the age of fourscore and ten years, was gone over to the life of the heathens: 6:25. And so they, through my dissimulation, and for a little time of a corruptible life, should be deceived, and hereby I should bring a stain and a curse upon my old age. 6:26. For though, for the present time, I should be delivered from the punishments of men, yet should I not escape the hand of the Almighty neither alive nor dead. 6:27. Wherefore, by departing manfully out of this life, I shall shew myself worthy of my old age: 6:28. And I shall leave an example of fortitude to young men, if with a ready mind and constancy I suffer an honourable death, for the most venerable and most holy laws. And having spoken thus, he was forthwith carried to execution. 6:29. And they that led him, and had been a little before more mild, were changed to wrath for the words he had spoken, which they thought were uttered out of arrogancy. 6:30. But when he was now ready to die with the stripes, he groaned: and said: O Lord, who hast the holy knowledge, thou knowest manifestly that whereas I might be delivered from death, I suffer grievous pains in body: but in soul am well content to suffer these things, because I fear thee. 6:31. Thus did this man die, leaving not only to young men, but also to the whole nation, the memory of his death, for an example of virtue and fortitude.