In the month of November, we pray for the dear departed. We strongly believe that the souls in purgatory, the Suffering Church, can be aided by our prayers, indulgences and good works. What is the origin of this time-tested tradition?
Let us scrutinize the classical passage in 2 Maccabees 12,39-46 which lauds in Greek language the excellent, noble way and the holy, pious thought of Judas Maccabeus: “On the following day, since the task had now become urgent, Judas and his men went to gather up the bodies of the slain and bury them with their kinsmen in their ancestral tombs. But under the tunic of each of the dead they found amulets sacred to the idols of Jamnia, which the law forbids the Jews to wear. So it was clear to all that this was why these men had been slain … Turning to supplication, they prayed that the sinful deed might be fully blotted out … He then took up a collection among all his soldiers, amounting to two thousand silver drachmas, which he sent to Jerusalem to provide for an expiatory sacrifice … Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin.”
This Deuterocanonical Text has to be read in its proper historical context. Because of harassment by surrounding people, whose governors provoked hostility, the Jews took up arms in a series of punitive raids and defensive measures. Judas Maccabeus, who led the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire (167-160 BC), realized, following his battle against Gorgias, governor of Idumea, that some soldiers had fallen dead in battle due to their sin – namely, taking as booty or for protection or cupidity, amulets from pagan temples or from the enemy dead, probably in the attack on Jamnia (1 Maccabees 5,58) in gross violation of the Law of Deuteronomy, which had ordered such materials to be burnt: “The images of their gods you shall destroy by fire. Do not covet the silver or gold on them, nor take it for yourselves, lest you be ensnared by it; for it is an abomination to the LORD, your God. You shall not bring any abominable thing into your house, lest you be doomed with it; loathe and abhor it utterly as a thing that is doomed” (7,25-26).
The inspired author makes the sin the cause of their death.
On the other hand, the Jewish soldiers had been defending their homeland against the Syrian Seleucid Greeks and hence they died in godliness. Therefore Judas made atonement through prayers and sacrifices for them, having firmly believed in the resurrection of the just – that those who died piously would rise again. Since they died in a battle for God’s Law, he prayed and offered sacrifices that they would be delivered from their un-expiated sin, which had angered God and impeded their attainment of a joyful resurrection.
