Hebrews 11:35

ἔλαβον γυναῖκες.… “Women received their dead by resurrection,” as is narrated of the widow of Sarepta, 1 Kings 17:17-24, and the Shunamite, 2 Kings 4:34. ἄλλοι δὲ ἐτυμπανίσθησαν … “others were beaten to death”. τύμπανον (sc. τύπανον from τύπ. strike) a drum, τυμπανίζω, I beat. From the expression in 2Ma 6:17; 2Ma 6:28, ἐπὶ τὸ τύμπανον, it might be supposed that some instrument more elaborate than a rod was meant and Josephus speaks of “a wheel” as being used. But that it was substantially a beating to death is proved by what is said of Eleazar (2Ma 2:30), μέλλων ταῖς πληγαῖς τελευτᾶν, εἶπε. That Eleazar and the seven brethren (2 Maccabees 7) are alluded to is obvious, for it was characteristic of them that they died οὐ προσδεξάμενοι τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν, not accepting the offered deliverance. Eleazar was shown a way by which he could escape death (2Ma 6:21), and the seven brethren also were first interrogated and would have escaped death had they chosen to eat polluted food. They endured martyrdom, not accepting the escape that was possible, ἵνα κρείττονος ἀναστάσεως τύχωσιν, “that they might obtain a better resurrection,” “unto eternal life ‘better' than that spoken of in the beginning of the verse, to a life that again ended” (Davidson, Weiss, von Soden). How fully the resurrection was in view of the seven brethren is shown in the saying of the second: “the King of the world shall raise us εἰς αἰώνιον ἀναβίωσιν ζωῆς; of the third who when his hands were cut off declared that he would receive them again from God; of the fourth, who in dying said, “It is good, when put to death by men, to look for hope from God to be raised up again by Him;” and the youngest said of them all, “they are dead under God's covenant of everlasting life”.