The son of Simon Maccabeus, king of Judea, as well as High-Priest of the Jews from 135 to 105 B.C.; achieved the independence of his country from the Syrian yoke, extended the borders of it, and compelled the Edomites to accept the Jewish faith at the point of the sword; in the strife then rampant between the Sadducees and the Pharisees he sided with the former.

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