Book of 1 Maccabees 1 Maccabees, written by Unknown Jewish author in Judea, writing in Hebrew

It was written in Hebrew but kept only in the Greek Old Testament used by the early Church, not in the Hebrew Bible. The Catholic and Orthodox Churches count it as Scripture; the Reformers placed it among the Apocrypha, which the King James Version printed in a separate section between the Testaments.

Hanukkah, the feast of Dedication, commemorates the day Judas and his brothers dedicated the new altar, the twenty-fifth of Casleu, three years after its profanation. The book records that they ordered it to be kept every year for eight days; the story of the oil that burned for eight days comes from later Jewish tradition, not from this book.

The name comes from Judas, called Maccabeus, probably 'the hammer'. It was later extended to his father Mattathias and his brothers John, Simon, Eleazar and Jonathan. Simon's descendants, beginning with his son John, ruled Judea as the Hasmonean dynasty until the Roman conquest.

The book counts years from the start of the Seleucid kingdom, 'the kingdom of the Greeks', in 312-311 BC. The 137th year, when Antiochus Epiphanes became king, is 175 BC; the profanation of the temple in the 145th year falls in 167 BC; and Simon's death in the 177th year in 134 BC.

The Hebrew original is lost, so translations rest on the Greek, which has come down in several forms. The King James Version follows the Greek verse divisions, while Catholic Bibles long kept those of the Latin Vulgate, so chapter 1 has three more verses in a Bible like the Crampon and the abomination of desolation falls in 1:57 rather than 1:54. Names also vary: Spain or Syria in 11:2, Samaria or Marisa in 5:66, Darius or Areus for the Spartan king in 12:7.