Chapter two in my dissertation on 'The Conflict Between Obedience to God and Obedience to the State in the Book of Revelation' deals with second century Judaism as a backdrop for the political conflict of Christians vs Rome (which is essentially what Revelation is all about). I've found this absolutely fascinating, because as a Protestant my Bible wouldn't normally include deutero-cannonical literature (also known as the Apocrypha), yet a lot of it seems very relevant to understanding the type of attitude that Jesus argued against.
The Macabees by Wojciech Stattler
So here I would like to provide a brief introduction to the history between the OT and the NT for anyone who would like to know a bit about what happened between Ezra/Nehemiah and Jesus.
After the temple was rebuilt under Ezra and Nehemiah between 450 - 425BCE, the ruling Persian empire started to decline and became weaker and weaker. This is when the last books that we have in the Bible were written (1-2 Chronicles and Malachi were also written at this point).
Alexander the Great was born in 356BCE and very quickly expanded the Greek empire to all of Israel's neighbours and including Israel, easily taking over the weak Persian empire. After Alexander died in 323BCE, however, the Greek rule broke down quite quickly, and factions of Alexander's commanders split off in a large power struggle.
During this time the Egyptians (Ptolmaics) attacked and took over Israel from 315 - 198BCE. We don't know much about Israel's history at this point, but some of the Dead Sea Scrolls might have been written at this time.
After the Egyptians grew weak, the Syrians (Seleucids) attacked Israel, but they didn't get as far as Egypt. This happened in 198BCE and they stayed in Israel until 142BCE. During this time the Syrians tried to force the Jews into adopting Greek culture, which was very popular in the area after Alexander's conquests. Some of the Jews joined in whole-heartedly and actually tried hard to gain favour in the eyes of their Greek masters through building gymnasiums. Since the Greeks thought that circumcision was barbaric some Jewish men attempted to undo their circumcision through surgery in order to fit in at the public baths. Others, however, strongly opposed the Greek culture and everything that came with it.
A coin depicting Antiochus IV Epiphanes. The back shows Jupiter and reads, Basileos Antiochou Theou Epiphanous Niketorou, approximately meaning 'king Antiochus: god, revealed, victorious' (let me know if you think I've translated this wrong!).
This tension increased in 167BCE when the Syrians, under Antiochus IV Epiphanes, attacked and completely ransacked Jerusalem. Pigs were sacrificed on the altar to God in the temple, circumcision was made illegal and punishable by death, all copies of the Torah had to be burned and Jews were forced to sacrifice to Antiochus IV and eat pork or be executed. Some Jews followed along, others refused and paid with their lives. Finally, Antiochus set up a statue of Zeus in the Holy of Holies, which seems to be what Daniel described when he spoke of the "abomination that causes desolation" (Dan 9:27, 11:31, and 12:11).
In this context a man called Mattathias and his sons John, Simon, Judas, Eleazar and Jonathan strongly opposed the Syrians and formed a rebel army. They fought for years, and each time one brother died the next one took over the rebel movement. Eventually, through war and political turmoil, these rebels (also known as 'the Maccabees', which comes from the Aramaic word for 'hammer') set up Israel as a free kingdom. This kingdom lasted from 142 - 63BCE and was known as the Hasmonean Dynasty.
But this was not a time of peace, sadly. The most peace the Israelites got was when the last Hasmonean ruler took over from 76 - 67BCE, and she was known as Queen Salome.
In 63BCE the Romans invaded and took over right up to 400CE. During this time the Herodians took over ruling Jerusalem under Roman authority, and Jesus had his ministry in this context. When Herod Agrippa I died in 44CE, Israel was put under the governing of the prefect of Syria and thus ended the rulers of Israel until 1947.
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