Anonymous (Septuagint) · a new plain-English translation from the original language
1| Now Maccabeus and those with him, the Lord leading them on, recovered the temple and the city.
2| The altars that the foreigners had built in the marketplace, and the sacred precincts as well, they tore down.
3| And having purified the sanctuary, they made another altar; and striking fire from flints, they took fire from these and offered sacrifices after an interval of two years, and incense, and lamps, and they set out the loaves of the presence.
4| When they had done these things, they fell upon their faces and begged the Lord that they might no longer fall into such evils, but that if they should ever sin, they might be disciplined by him with clemency, and not handed over to blasphemous and barbarous nations.
5| Now on the very day on which the sanctuary had been profaned by the foreigners, it happened that the purification of the temple came about on that same day, the twenty-fifth of the same month, which is Chislev.
6| And they kept eight days with rejoicing in the manner of the feast of booths, remembering how not long before, during the feast of booths, they had been living in the mountains and in caves like wild animals.
7| Therefore, carrying wands wreathed with leaves and beautiful branches, and palm fronds too, they offered hymns of thanksgiving to him who had brought success in purifying his own place.
8| And they decreed by a common ordinance and vote, for the whole nation of the Jews, to keep these days every year.
9| Such, then, was the manner of the death of Antiochus who was called Epiphanes.
10| Now we shall set forth what concerns Antiochus surnamed Eupator, who was the son of that impious man, condensing the evils that attended his reign.
11| For this man, on taking over the kingdom, appointed a certain Lysias to have charge of affairs, as chief governor of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia.
12| For Ptolemy, called Macron, taking the lead in maintaining justice toward the Jews because of the wrong that had been done to them, tried to conduct affairs with them peaceably.
13| Whereupon, being accused before Eupator by his friends, and hearing himself called a traitor at every turn, because he had abandoned Cyprus, which had been entrusted to him by Philometor, and had withdrawn to Antiochus Epiphanes, and having brought no honor to his noble office, he poisoned himself and departed from life.
14| Gorgias, having become military governor of the region, kept hiring foreign troops, and at every opportunity kept the war going against the Jews through his own men.
15| Along with him, the Idumeans too, being in control of well-placed strongholds, harassed the Jews, and taking in those who had fled from Jerusalem, they attempted to keep the war alive.
16| Now the men with Maccabeus, having made supplication and having implored God to become their ally, rushed upon the strongholds of the Idumeans.
17| Attacking them vigorously, they gained control of the places, and beat back all who fought upon the wall, and cut down those who fell into their hands, killing no fewer than twenty thousand.
18| When no fewer than nine thousand had fled together into two very strong towers, having everything needed for a siege,
19| Maccabeus, leaving Simon and Joseph, and also Zacchaeus and those with him in sufficient number for the siege of these men, himself went off to more urgent places.
20| But those with Simon, being fond of money, were persuaded with silver by some of the men in the towers; and having received seventy thousand drachmas, they let a number of them slip away.
21| When the matter was reported to Maccabeus, he gathered the leaders of the people and accused these men of having sold their brothers for silver by releasing the enemy against them.
22| These men, then, having become traitors, he put to death, and immediately he took the two towers.
23| Succeeding in everything he undertook by arms, he destroyed in the two strongholds more than twenty thousand.
24| Now Timotheus, who had earlier been defeated by the Jews, gathered together a vast multitude of foreign forces and assembled no small number of horses brought from Asia, and came intending to seize Judea by force of arms.
25| But the men with Maccabeus, as he drew near, scattered dust over their heads and wrapped their waists in sackcloth, pleading before God,
26| and falling before the base opposite the altar, begged that he would become gracious to them, be an enemy to their enemies, and stand against their adversaries, just as the law makes clear.
27| Having finished their prayer, they took up their arms and advanced further from the city; and drawing near to the enemy, they held themselves apart.
28| Just as the dawn was spreading its light, both sides joined battle: the one side having, as a pledge of success and victory together with valor, their refuge in the Lord, the other taking rage as the leader of their struggle.
29| While the battle was raging fiercely, there appeared to the adversaries from heaven five splendid men on horses with golden bridles, and they led the way for the Jews, two of them
30| taking Maccabeus between them, and shielding him with their own armor, kept him unwounded, while they hurled arrows and thunderbolts against the enemy; so that, thrown into confusion by blindness, they were cut to pieces, filled with panic.
31| There fell twenty thousand five hundred, and six hundred horsemen.
32| Timotheus himself fled for refuge into a stronghold called Gazara, a very well-fortified fortress, with Chaereas commanding there.
33| The men with Maccabeus eagerly laid siege to the fortress for forty days.
34| But those inside, trusting in the strength of the place, kept blaspheming excessively and hurling out unlawful words.
35| As the twenty-fifth day was dawning, young men of Maccabeus's company, inflamed with rage over the blasphemies, attacked the wall, and with manly and beast-like fury cut down whoever fell in their way.
36| Others likewise climbed up in the same assault against those inside, set the towers on fire, and kindling flames, burned the blasphemers alive; while others broke down the gates, and letting in the rest of the troops, seized the city beforehand,
37| and they slaughtered Timotheus, who had hidden himself in a certain cistern, and his brother Chaereas, and Apollophanes.
38| Having accomplished these things, with hymns and thanksgiving they blessed the Lord who greatly benefits Israel and gives them the victory.