Eleazar Avaran in the Maccabean Revolt
Eleazar Avaran (died 162 BC) was the younger brother of Judas Maccabeus, leader of the 167 – 160 BC Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire. He became famous – or infamous – for a brave but ultimately misguided battlefield exploit that got him killed. The revolt in which Eleazar fought was caused by decrees from the Seleucid King Antiochus IV that banned Jewish religious practices and ordered the worship of Zeus instead. The father of Eleazar and Judas sparked the rebellion by killing a Hellenized Jew who sacrificed to Greek idols. He then fled into the wilderness with his five sons and began a guerrilla campaign.
After his death, his son Judah took over the revolt, and in 164 BC, he successfully entered Jerusalem and restored Jewish worship in its temple – an event commemorated in the feast of Hanukkah. Eleazar’s misguided heroics that led to his death occurred at the Battle of Beth Zechariah in 162 BC, two years after his older brother Judas Maccabeus had defeated Judea’s Seleucid overlords and entered Jerusalem. The city’s liberation was incomplete, however, because a Seleucid garrison retained control of a fortress inside the city, in front of the Temple Mount. That stage for Eleazar’s historic exploit.