Chapter 4
The judgment of the wicked, and reward of the just. An exhortation to observe the law. Elias shall come for the conversion of the Jews.
4:1. For behold the day shall come kindled as a furnace: and all the proud, and all that do wickedly shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall set them on fire, saith the Lord of hosts, it shall not leave them root, nor branch.
4:2. But unto you that fear my name, the Sun of justice shall arise, and health in his wings: and you shall go forth, and shall leap like calves of the herd.
4:3. And you shall tread down the wicked when they shall be ashes under the sole of your feet in the day that I do this, saith the Lord of hosts.
4:4. Remember the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded him in Horeb for all Israel, the precepts, and judgments.
4:5. Behold, I will send you Elias the prophet, before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.
4:6. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers: lest I come, and strike the earth with anathema.
He shall turn the heart, etc... By bringing over the Jews to the faith of Christ, he shall reconcile them to their fathers, viz., the
## partiarchs and prophets; whose hearts for many ages have been turned
away from them, because of their refusing to believe in Christ.-Ibid. With anathema... In the Hebrew, Cherem, that is, with utter destruction.
THE FIRST BOOK OF MACHABEES
These books are so called, because they contain the history of the people of God under the command of Judas Machabeus and his brethren: and he, as some will have it, was surnamed Machabeus, from carrying in his ensigns, or standards, those words of Exodus 15.11, Who is like to thee among the strong, O Lord: in which the initial letters, in the Hebrew, are M. C. B. E. I. It is not known who is the author of these books. But as to their authority, though they are not received by the Jews, saith St. Augustine, (lib. 18, De Civ. Dei, c. 36,) they are received by the church: who, in settling her canon of the scriptures, chose rather to be directed by the tradition she had received from the apostles of Christ, than by that of the scribes and Pharisees. And as the church has declared these two Books canonical, even in two general councils, viz., Florence and Trent, there can be no doubt of their authenticity.
1 Machabees