Fourth Maccabees-Eleazar

Eleazar A Faithful Man
The tyrant of Syria, whom some called Epiphanes, The Madman. Roman history of the first centuries records two such tyrants – the other, Caligula, the Second Brilliant Madman.
At a time when our fathers enjoyed great peace through the due observance of the Law, and were in happy case, so that Seleucus Nicanor, the king of Asia, sanctioned the tax for the Temple-service and Apollonius, the governor of Syria, being loyal to the king when to rob the treasuries of Jerusalem, and made his way into the temple to violate all that was in it. Upon Seleucus death, his son Antiochus Epiphanes became his successor and he made his brother, Jason, the new high-priest with the purpose of collection 3660.00 talents a year from him. He plundered the city and also made a decree denouncing the penalty of death upon any who should be seen to live after the Law of their fathers. This shows the details of the successive tortures (suggesting the instruments of the Spanish Inquisition centuries later) and with this narrator conjures Courage. Have we learned from the past or advanced in its tactics?
Males what were circumcised and their mothers were flung, together with their offspring, headlong from the rocks. Circumcision was a covenant to be ye separate unto G-d.
Jason personally tried to force by tortures each man separately to eat unclean meats and thus abjure the Jewish religion. His guards were ordered to drag every singles man of the Hebrews and compel them to eat swine’s flesh and things offered to idols; but if any should refuse to defile themselves with the unclean things, they were to be tortured and put to death.
One man first from the mass of people was a Hebrew whose name was Eleazar, a priest by birth, trained in knowledge of the Law, a man advanced in years and well known to many of the tyrant’s court for his philosophy ‘having accepted the Divine Law and the obedience to the Law, not even so would it be right for Believers to destroy their reputation for faithfulness. Think it not a small sin for us to transgression of the Law, be it in small things or great, is equally terrible; for in either case equal the Law is unloved by many. If we were living in a manner contrary to reason, not so, for the Law teaches us self-control, so that we are masters of all our pleasures and desires and are thoroughly trained in manliness so as to endure all pain and readiness; and it teaches justice, so that with all our various dispositions we ace fairly, and it teaches righteousness, so that with due reverence we worship only the G-d who is. Believing in the Law, to be given by G-d, we know also that the Creator of the world, as a Lawgiver, fells for us according to our nature. He has commanded all of us to eat the things that will be convenient for our souls, and He has forbidden us to eat that which would be the contrary. ”
Eleazar told his tormentors, “I am not so unmanned by old age but that when righteousness is at stake the strength of youth returns to my Reason. So twist hard your racks and blow your furnace hotter. I do not so pity mine old age as to break the Law of my fathers in mine own person. Clean shall my fathers receive me, unafraid of thy torments even to the death.”
The gently spirited old man, shows such fortitude it seems like an inextinguishable fire!
They first unclothed the old man, who was adorned with the beauty of holiness. Then binding his arms on either side they scourged him. But the great-souled and noble man, an Eleazar in very truth, was no more moved in his mind than if he were being tormented in a dream; the old man keeping his eyes steadfastly raised to heaven suffered his flesh to be torn by the scourges till he was bathed in blood and his sides became a mass of wounds; and even when he fell to the ground because his body could no longer support the pain he still kept his Reason erect and inflexible.
With his foot then one of the cruel guards as he fell kicked him savagely in the side to make him get up. But he endured the anguish, and despised the compulsion, and bore up under the torments, and like a brave athlete taking punishment, the old man outwore his tormentors. The sweat stood on his brow, and he drew his breath in hard gasps, till his nobility of soul extorted the admiration of his tormentors themselves, and stopped. To this Eleazar said: “O minions of the tyrant, why pause ye in your work? Contrary to Reason, were it for us, after living unto the truth till old age, and guarding in lawful guise the repute of so living, now to change and become in our own persona a pattern to the young so impiety, to the end that we should encourage them to disobey the Law, shame be if we should live on a little longer, curing that little being mocked of all men for cowardice, and while despised by the tyrant as unmanly should fail to defend the Divine Law unto the death.” They seeing him thus triumphant over the tortures and unmoved even by the pity of his executioners, dragged him to the fire, where they cast him on it, burning him with cruelly cunning devices, and they poured broth of evil odor into his
Nostrils, but when the fire already reached to his bones and he was about to give up the ghost, he lifted up his eyes to G-d and said:
Thou, O G-d, be merciful unto Thy people, and let our punishment be a satisfaction in their behalf. Make my blood their purification, and take my soul to ransom their souls.” And with these words the holy man nobly yielded up his spirit under the torture, and for the sake of the Law held out by his Reason even against the torments unto death. His Reason having conquered his passions, we properly attribute to it the power of commanding them for it conquers pains that come from outside ourselves, neither does it surrender to them.
Eleazar though buffeted by the threats of the tyrant and swept by the swelling waves of the tortures, never shifted for one moment the helm of sanctity until he sailed into the haven of victory over death. O priest worthy of thy priesthood, thou didst not defile thyself! Such should those be whose office is to serve the Law and defend it with their own blood and honourable sweat in the face of sufferings to the death. So the son of Aaron, Eleazar, being consumed by the melting heat of the fire, remained unshaken in his Reason. O blessed age, O reverent grey head, O life faithful to the Law and perfected by the seal of death! Not all men are masters of the passions because not all men have their Reason enlightened. But as many as with tier whole heart make righteousness their first thought, these alone are able to master the weakness of the flesh, and live unto G-d.
Therefore, there is nothing contradictory in certain persons appearing to be slaves to passion in consequence of the weakness of their Reason, having put his trust in G-d, and knowing that it is a blessed thing to endure all hardness for the sake of virtue, would not conquer his passions for the sake of righteousness?
How the Law was loved! To Christians it seems to hard to follow and understand, famous saying is ‘we are not under the Law but under grace.’ What is grace with out instructions to live righteously? Do we believe in anything enough to lay down our lives for it?