[Eternal_Bear]

The Maccabees were fighting Seleucid Greeks not Persians.

[FatherofFive]

The Maccabees were fighting Seleucid Greeks not Persians.

I was responding to a comment that the Spartans were the bad guys, but they were friends of the Jews. No big deal.

[Ancesthntr]

“The Maccabees were fighting Seleucid Greeks not Persians.”

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True. But the Jews at about the time of the Battle of Thermopylae were largely in Persia, and nearly wiped out in a genocide that the Emperor’s chief aide, Haman, tried to perpetrate (with the Emperor’s acquiescence). Check out the Book (Scroll) of Esther, or an article about the Jewish holiday of Purim.

FYI, it is possible that the same Emperor, Xerxes, was in charge for both Thermopylae and Purim. The Scroll of Esther describes the Emperor as ruling 127 provinces in a vast empire, being totally hedonistic, being rash, etc. This is about the same as the Thermopylae Emperor. Thermopylae took place in 480 BC, and according to some Purim in 465 BC. Note that there are also a lot of historians who say that these events were much more widely separated, so maybe is wasn’t the same guy. However, there was most definitely conflict in the Biblical era between the Jews and at least a large number of Persians.