Alexander the Great, Alexander the Accursed

I’m writing a lecture about Alexander the Great. He was brilliant and utterly fearless, and he was a cruel tyrant, his hands red with the blood of countless innocents. He threw down the Persian Empire, only to replace its peace and stability with the endless bloody wars of his generals, the kingdoms of the Diadochi. He led from the front, throwing himself into danger alongside his men, and in a drunken fury murdered Black Cletius, who had saved his life at the Battle of the Granicus River. He never lost a battle, and was utterly merciless to those who pushed him past a certain point.

In twelve years he reshaped the world forever. And in parts of Iran to this day, he is still known as “Ishkandar Guzastag”, Alexander the Accursed, a bloody-handed tyrant and brutal conqueror. A Dark Lord, to put it as Tolkien might have.

The first book of the Maccabees sums up Alexander’s career nicely:

“It came to pass after Alexander of Macedon, the son of Philip, who cam from the land of Chittim, had utterly defeated Darius, the king of the Medes and Persians, that he reigned in his stead, as he had before reigned over Greece. And he waged many wars and captured fortresses and slaughtered the kings of the earth; and he made his way to the ends of the earth and despoiled multitude of nations. The whole earth was silent before him, and he became exalted…”

Alexander’s coming was prophesied in the Old Testament book of Daniel:

“Suddenly a goat with a prominent horn between its eyes came from the west, crossing the whole earth without touching the ground. It came toward the two-horned ram I had seen standing beside the canal and charged at it in great rage. I saw it attack the ram furiously, striking the ram and shattering its two horns. The ram was powerless to stand against it; the goat knocked it to the ground and trampled on it, and none could rescue the ram from its power. The goat became very great, but at the height of its power the large horn was broken off, and in its place four prominent horns grew up toward the four winds of heaven.”

(The goat is Alexander, the ram is the Persian Empire, and the four prominent horns are the kingdoms of the Diadochi – Macedon, Pergamum of the Attalids, the Seleucid Empire, and Ptolemaic Egypt.)

In fact, there is a tradition that this prophecy saved the city of Jerusalem from Alexander’s wrath. The High Priest surrendered to Alexander and showed him the book of Daniel, and Alexander (ever the egomaniac) was so pleased by the prophecy that he spared the city and continued on to Gaza and Egypt.

And speaking of religion, the New Testament is written in koine Greek – the dialect of Greek Alexander’s conquest spread throughout the world.

Needless to say, when writing about Alexander it is only appropriate to listen to a heavy metal song.

-JM