“Maccabees, and all that Mess”
Antiochus declared himself to be
Epiphanes – a god unto himself
And persecuted suffering Israel
With pagan images and fire and death
The blood of martyrs Mattathias moved
And all his sons, hammers chosen by God
To cleanse the Temple of all perfidy
And through eight days rededicate the world
But now
Dismissed by the café theologian
As merely “Maccabees, and all that mess”
(A reflection on one of those tiresome and pointless arguments on scriptural canon overheard in a cafe')