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Context No. 1583 of 4322 · 2 Maccabees

Context · Reflection

2 Maccabees 4:23-29: in context

23Now after a space of three years, Jason sent Menelaus, the previously mentioned Simon’s brother, to carry the money to the king, and to make reports concerning some necessary matters. 24But he being commended to the king, and having been glorified by the display of his authority, secured the high priesthood for himself, outbidding Jason by three hundred talents of silver. 25After receiving the royal mandates, he returned bringing nothing worthy of the high priesthood, but having the passion of a cruel tyrant and the rage of a savage animal. 26So Jason, who had supplanted his own brother, was supplanted by another and driven as a fugitive into the country of the Ammonites 27Menelaus had possession of the office, but of the money that had been promised to the king nothing was regularly paid, even though Sostratus the governor of the citadel demanded it— 28for his job was the gathering of the revenues—so they were both called by the king to his presence. 29Menelaus left his own brother Lysimachus for his deputy in the high priesthood; and Sostratus left Crates, who was over the Cyprians.

The corruption of the high priesthood deepens. Jason had bought the sacred office with a bribe; now Menelaus, sent to deliver money to the king, uses the opportunity to outbid Jason by three hundred talents of silver and buys the high priesthood for himself. He returns with royal authority but no qualification for the office, ruthless and greedy. Jason, who had supplanted his own brother to gain the priesthood, is now supplanted in turn and driven into exile; and Menelaus, having bought the office, fails even to pay what he promised.

Two ugly things run through this passage. The first is the buying and selling of the sacred office. The high priesthood, the holiest office in Israel, meant to be held by God's appointment for God's service, had become a commodity sold to the highest bidder, gained by whoever could offer the biggest bribe. Menelaus simply outbid Jason and bought the office, treating what was holy as a thing for purchase and ambition. There is a grievous corruption in that, the profaning of the holy by turning it into a matter of money and self-advancement, and it has recurred throughout the history of religion whenever sacred office or holy things are made objects of purchase and ambition rather than of calling and service. The second ugly thing is the cycle of treachery. Jason had supplanted his own brother to gain the priesthood; now Jason is supplanted by Menelaus, the grasper grasped by a greater grasper. Those who seize corruptly are often undone by others as corrupt as themselves; the treachery Jason practiced came back on him. There is a rough justice in that, and a warning. What we gain by corrupt grasping we may lose to someone who grasps harder; the supplanter is supplanted. And what is holy is not ours to buy or seize for our ambition; to treat sacred things, or any trust, as a commodity for our advancement is to profane them, and to enter a game of grasping in which we are likely, in the end, to be outgrasped.

Do I treat holy things, or any sacred trust, as commodities for my own advancement and ambition, as the priesthood was bought and sold, and do I see the warning in the supplanter supplanted, that what is gained by corrupt grasping is often lost to a greater grasper?

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