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Was the 25th Kislev the right date? The books of Maccabees contain contradictions.

	I Maccabees says the rededication happened before Antiochus died.
	II Maccabees says the hated king died first.

Most modern scholars since the 1950s argued that Antiochus Epiphanes died before the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem and that his death influenced the choice of date. However we now know that he died while fighting in Persia, and the news did not reach Jerusalem until January 163 BCE.

So, as the Maccabees didn't know Antiochus had died, the date of his death is irrelevant. There must be a different explanation for the choice of the rededication date.

There is also a contradiction of dates in the first book of I Maccabees that confuses things.

	In 4:54 it gives the date of the rededication as the precise anniversary of that on which "the gentiles had profaned the altar",
	Yet in 4:52, it says "the rededication happened on the 25th"
	And in 1:54 it gives the date of profanation as 15th Kislev, not the 25th.

The 1st Century Roman historian, Josephus, (a converted Jew), says it happened on the 25th and that this was the 3rd anniversary of the profanation, (Antiquities 12:7:6).

In cases like this a well-known principle of textual criticism says the more difficult reading is more likely to be the original one. People change things to make them less awkward.

Goldstein used this to argue that the profanation did happen on the 15th, and that it was was wrong to say the rededication fell on the anniversary of the profanation.

However, he later changed his mind and said the profanation happened on the 25th as well!

Either way, the 25th seems to be the most likely date for the rededication, but why?