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Description: Alexander the Great's conquest of the Ancient Near East initiated a social revolution that nearly swept away Jewish civilization and its thousand-year-old Mosaic beliefs, customs, and values. Overwhelmed by foreign languages, art, music, philosophies, sports, theater, polytheism, and political theory, tiny Judea was like a small boat battered by an enormous tsunami. The Jewish people contended with two main adversaries: the Seleucids, the kings of the North, who ruled Syria and Mesopotamia; and the Ptolemies, the kings of the South in Egypt. Paying tribute to both, the Jews were caught amid the dynastic and military intrigues of the two powers. They also faced insidious efforts to erase the Yahwist religion from Jewish life - threats not just to domestic stability, but to Judea's very existence in those tumultuous years. This short snap-shot discusses the advent of Hellenism in Judea and its largely detrimental impact, which inevitably led to the rise of the fourth kingdom of Biblical prophecy.