APOLLONIUS. - Four (or three) officials of the Seleucid kings, mentioned by I and II Macc.
1. A., son of Mnestheus, military governor of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia under Seleucus IV Philopator (187-175 B.C.); he is identical with A. of Tarsus or Thraseas (of Tarsus). He advised his king to plunder the riches of the temple of Jerusalem and followed Heliodorus in his ill-fated enterprise. By Antiochus IV Epiphanes (175-163) he was sent as ambassador to Ptolemy IV Philometor of Egypt. He was killed in 166 B.C. by Judas Maccabeus (I Macc. 3, 4-12; II Macc. 4, 4-21).
2. A., "chief of the tax collectors" (I Macc. 1, 30), sent by Antiochus IV Epiphanes to Jerusalem to impose Hellenization through terrorism. With an army of 22,000 men he treacherously defeated the Jews, attacking them on the sabbath (II Macc. 5, 24-26). He is perhaps identical with the preceding A.
3. A., governor of Coele-Syria under Alexander Balas; having then sided with Demetrius II Nicator, he made war on Jonathan Maccabeus, a partisan of Alexander, and was defeated near Azotus in 147 B.C. (I Macc. 10, 67-87). Flavius Josephus (Antiq. Iud., XIII, 4, 3) names him A. Dans, a member of the Sogdian tribe of the Dai.
4. A., son of Gennaeus (II Macc. 12, 2), general of Antiochus V Eupator (163-162 B.C.), attacked the Maccabees in time of peace.