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Whatever was the precise meaning of the name, the new leader girt his warlike harness about him (1 Macc. iii.3), rallied his forces, and bent all his energies to the task of uniting in a compact body all who were zealous for the national faith. “By night attacks, by sudden surprises (2 Macc. viii. 6,7), he taught his people how to fight and conquer. Alert of foot and quick of brain; yesterday in the mountains, to-day in the plain; now marching on a post, now storming a castle; in a few months of service he changed his rabble of zealots into an army of solid troops, capable of meeting and repelling the royal hosts commanded by generals trained in the Macedonian school of arms29.”

At length Apollonius, who had recently signalized himself by plundering Jerusalem and massacring its inhabitants, deemed it time to interfere. At the head of a large army, mostly composed of Samaritans and apostate Jews, he marched against the patriot chief, but was totally defeated and slain (1 Macc. iii. 10–12). Tidings of this disaster roused Seron, the deputy-governor of Cœlesyria, and he went forth at the head of a still larger force, determined to have his revenge. Judas did not decline the combat, which took place at Beth-horon, famous as the scene of Joshua’s victory over the southern Canaanites30, and resulted in the complete defeat of the Syrian general, whose troops were driven in confusion down the rocky pass to the western lowlands (1 Macc. iii.24).