Maccabees and 'atonement' for the dead?

[JustinMartyr100]

I have not read Maccabees, but I hear there is a passage that mentions praying for the dead, which is one of our arguments for purgatory, I have no problem with that. But I was just reading a passage in the NAB that confuses me.

The following passage seems to be talking about expiation, and freeing the dead from their sin so they can go to heaven. I know this is not what purgatory is, in purgatory, your sins are already forgiven, and it’s just a temporal punishment. How does this passage interpret?

2 Maccabees 12:38-46

Judas rallied his army and went to the city of Adullam. As the week was ending, they purified themselves according to custom and kept the sabbath there. On the following day, since the task had now become urgent, Judas and his men went to gather up the bodies of the slain and bury them with their kinsmen in their ancestral tombs. But under the tunic of each of the dead they found amulets sacred to the idols of Jamnia, which the law forbids the Jews to wear. So it was clear to all that this was why these men had been slain. They all therefore praised the ways of the Lord, the just judge who brings to light the things that are hidden. Turning to supplication, they prayed that the sinful deed might be fully blotted out. The noble Judas warned the soldiers to keep themselves free from sin, for they had seen with their own eyes what had happened because of the sin of those who had fallen. He then took up a collection among all his soldiers, amounting to two thousand silver drachmas, which he sent to Jerusalem to provide for an expiatory sacrifice. In doing this he acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view; for if he were not expecting the fallen to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid reward that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin.

 

[TAS2000]

I’m so NOT a bible scholar but here’s my whack at it…

Only mortal sins keep you out of heaven, venial ones don’t. Mortal sins involve breaking the ten commandments. In this case, the only commandment I can think that would apply is having no other gods. So- maybe these soldiers weren’t worshipping those other gods by wearing their amulets, but were kind of hedging their bets, like a superstition kind of thing. (ever see those movies where a guy has medals for like ten different religions around his neck when trouble come, and he tries one after another to ward off the bad beastie?) Thus they never meant to commit a mortal sin, and they only had venial sins on their souls. So then, now they would be in purgatory and all the works of the others to pray for them would not be out of line.

Besides, we can’t know for sure if anyone is in purgatory or not, and there’s no suchthing as a wasted prayer. I once heard a preist say something like “God is outside of time, so who says He can’t take our prayers for someone who is dead to us, and apply it outside of our time to that person whilke they were still living and would still dothem benefit?”

Makes my head hurt to think about it for too long.

 

[Genesis315]

Sometimes the term atonement can refer to the temporal punishments and the expiation required for them.