The breaking point came at Mod'aith. According to the Chronicles of Jerahmeel, a 12th-century Hebrew chronicle preserved by Moses Gaster in 1899, after Antiochus departed for Macedon, he left behind officers with a single command: "Blot out the very memory of Judah from the face of the earth. Let anyone who even mentions the name 'Jew' be slain. But let those willing to assimilate live, and call them 'Javan.'"
Phillipos and his captains carried out these orders ruthlessly, killing every Jew they found observing the Torah. The sole exception was a group that had fled with Mattathiah ben Jochanan to the town of Mod'aith. Mattathiah refused to bear the reproach of seeing God's law trampled.
When the Macedonian officers arrived at Mod'aith and set up an altar for idol worship, they ordered the people to sacrifice. A Jewish man stepped forward to comply. Mattathiah drew his sword and killed him on the spot. Then he turned on the Macedonian officer and killed him too, pulling down the altar with his own hands.
Standing in the town square, Mattathiah raised his voice: "Whoever is zealous for the Lord, let him follow me!" He and his five sons fled to the mountains, where the pious faithful—the Hassidim—gathered around them. Their numbers grew. Mattathiah became the first to raise his hand against the Macedonian kingdom, and he issued a ruling that would reshape Jewish law: the obligation to fight even on the Sabbath when survival demanded it.
With his sons and brothers, Mattathiah led the Hassidim across the land of Judah. They pursued those who had hidden from the oppressors, rallied the fearful, and struck down collaborators until none remained. They circumcised their sons. The chronicle declares that through Mattathiah, "great salvation was brought about by the Lord."