Who composed the oratorio 'Judas Maccabeus'?
Judas Maccabeus for the Chapel of the Dead in Tournai cathedral. In the 19th century, Paul Gustave Doré executed an engraving of Judah Maccabee victoriously pursuing the shattered troops of the Syrian enemy. In music, almost all the compositions inspired by the Hasmonean rebellion revolve around Judah. In 1746, the composer George Frideric Handel composed his oratorio "Judas Maccabeus," putting the biblical story in the context of the Jacobite rising of 1745. This work, with libretto by Thomas Morell, had been written for the celebrations following the Duke of Cumberland's victory over the Scottish Jacobite rebels at the Battle of Culloden in
Judas Maccabeus Judas Maccabeus Judah Maccabee (or Judas Maccabeus, also spelled Machabeus, or Maccabaeus, Hebrew: יהודה המכבי, "Yehudah ha-Makabi") was a Jewish priest ("kohen") and a son of the priest Mattathias. He led the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire (167–160 BCE). The Jewish holiday of Hanukkah ("Dedication") commemorates the restoration of Jewish worship at the temple in Jerusalem in 164 BCE, after Judah Maccabeus removed all of the statues depicting Greek gods and goddesses and purified it. Judah was the third son of Mattathias the Hasmonean, a Jewish priest from the village of Modiin. In 167 BCE Mattathias, together with his