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how does the Bible deal with the topic of dying for the state?

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the First Book of Maccabees

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summary

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the two Books of Maccabees contain independent accounts of events that accompanied the attempted suppression of Judaism in Palestine in the second century B.C.

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first Maccabees was written about 100 B.C. in Hebrew, but the original has not come down to us. Instead, we have an early, pre-Christian, Greek translation full of Hebrew idioms

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there is no doctrine of individual immortality except in the survival of one's name and fame

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the author insists on fidelity to the law as the expression of Israel's love for God

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found in the Catholic canon

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not within the Rabbinic or Protestant tradition

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command or Syrian army

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decides to wage war on Maccabees and his forces

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intention is to win and honor the kingdom

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he achieves the opposite

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Judas Maccabees gives speech and they route the Syrians

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1 Maccabees 3:25-26

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"Judas and his brothers began to be feared, and alarm seized the surrounding peoples. His name even reached the king's ears, and among the nations there was talk of Judas and his battles."

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1 Maccabees 6:45

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"Boldly charging towards the creature through the thick of the phalanx, dealing death to right and left, so that the enemy scattered on either side at his onslaught, he darted in under the elephant, thrust at it from underneath, and killed it. The beast collapsed on top of him, and he died on the spot."

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1 Maccabees depicts men driven to war by aspirations of name and fame

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not altogether disparaging these ambitions

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portrays true glory being awarded by higher and collective concerns, i.e. survival of people and their laws

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fame seeking or name making is presented as vainglorious and reckless

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yet it glorifies heroic death

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e.g. Avaran killing the elephant

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Judas falls in battle

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his army vanquished

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later at his funeral, all Israel extols this warriors name lamenting, "How is the mighty fallen the savior of Israel"

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the portrayal of heroic death in 1 Maccabees lacks a parallel in Rabbinic canon

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it was left out because

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the glorification of heroic death

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there are great stories of name making

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David making a name for himself in battle against Goliath

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but nothing about name-making in battle

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they sanction name-making through heroic valor

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but not heroic death

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this is remarkable since commemoration of the war dead occupies such a central place in public ritual and space

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we would expect to find in the Bible of Israel coming together to commemorate the war dead

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the reason there are none is that those who die in battles in the Bible, die because of sin

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there are no heroic glorified, war deaths

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no martyrdom

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no national commemoration of the war dead