time that went by, the less significant that victory—and the festival commemorating it—would have seemed. And then there is the book’s focus on the high priest Onias, who functions as a hero in chapter 3, as a martyr in chapter 4, and as a heavenly protector in chapter 15. Given that Onias IV founded a Jewish temple in Egypt, a move that certainly would have aroused hostility among partisans of the Temple of Jerusalem (including our author), it seems likely that the book was put together before the