Direct answer: Yes. According to the surviving ancient witnesses, 1 Maccabees 1:56 and Josephus (Antiquities, Book 12), during the Seleucid persecution under Antiochus, around 167 BCE, discovered scrolls of the Turah were torn to pieces and burned, and anyone found keeping them was put to death.
It is not a legend. Two separate ancient witnesses, the record of 1 Maccabees and the historian Josephus, describe the same thing: the deliberate destruction of the scrolls of the Turah during the Seleucid persecution.
This is an excerpt. The full article, with the complete Scroll witness and sources, is published on the ZoreaYahu website:
Read the full article: Did They Actually Tear Up and Burn Copies of the Turah?
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