those who were with him were astonished at the young man’s soul, for he regarded the pains as nothing.
13 When he too was dead, they shamefully handled and tortured the fourth in the same way. 14 Being near to death he said this: “It is good to die at the hands of men and look for the hope which is given by God, that we will be raised up again by him. For as for you, you will have no resurrection to life.”
15 Next after him, they brought the fifth and shamefully handled him. 16 But he looked towards †the king and said, “Because you have authority amongst men, though you are corruptible, you do what you please. But don’t think that our race has been forsaken by God. 17 But hold on to your ways, and see how his sovereign majesty will torture you and your descendants!”
18 After him they brought the sixth. When he was about to die, he said, “Don’t be vainly deceived, for we suffer these things for our own doings, as sinning against our own God. Astounding things have come to pass; 19 but don’t think you that you will be unpunished, having tried to fight against God!”
20 But above all, the mother was marvellous and worthy of honourable memory; for when she watched seven sons perishing within the space of one day, she bore the sight with a good courage because of her hope in the Lord. 21 She exhorted each one of them in the language of their fathers, filled with a noble spirit and stirring up her woman’s thoughts with manly courage, saying to them, 22 “I don’t know how you came into my womb. It wasn’t I who gave you your ‡spirit and your life. It wasn’t I who brought into order the first elements of each one of you. 23 Therefore the Creator of the world, who shaped the first origin of man and devised the first origin of all things, in mercy gives back to you again both your §spirit and your life, as you now treat yourselves with contempt for his laws’ sake.”
24 But Antiochus, thinking himself to be despised, and suspecting the reproachful voice, while the youngest was yet alive didn’t only make his appeal to him by words, but also at the same time promised with oaths that he would enrich him and† raise him to high honour if he would turn from the ways of his ancestors, and that he would take him for his ‡friend and entrust him with public affairs. 25 But when the young man would in no way listen, the king called to him his mother, and urged her to advise the youth to save himself. 26 When he had urged her with many words, she undertook to persuade her son. 27 But bending towards him, laughing the cruel tyrant to scorn, she spoke this in the language of her fathers: “My son, have pity upon me who carried you nine months in my womb, and nursed you three years, and nourished and brought you up to this age, and sustained you. 28 I beg you, my child, to lift your eyes to the sky and the earth, and to see all things that are in it, and thus to recognise that God made them not of things that were, and that the race of men in this way comes into being. 29 Don’t be afraid of this butcher, but, proving yourself worthy of your brothers, accept your death, that in God’s mercy I may receive you again with your brothers.”
30 But before she had finished speaking, the young man said, “What are you all waiting for? I don’t obey the commandment of the king, but I listen to the commandment of the law that was given to our fathers through Moses. 31 But you, who have devised all kinds of evil against the Hebrews, will in no way escape God’s hands. 32 For we are suffering because of our own sins. 33 If for rebuke and chastening, our living Lord has been angered a little while, yet he will again be reconciled with his own servants. 34 But you, O unholy man and of all most vile, don’t be vainly lifted up in your wild pride with uncertain hopes, raising your hand against the heavenly children. 35 For you have not yet escaped the judgement of the Almighty God who sees all things. 36 For these our brothers, having endured a § short pain that brings everlasting life, have now † died under God’s covenant. But you, through God’s judgement, will receive in just measure the penalties of your arrogance. 37 But I, as my brothers, give up both body and soul for the laws of our fathers, calling upon God that he may speedily become ‡gracious to the nation, and that you, amidst trials and plagues, may confess that he alone is God, 38 and that in me and my brothers § you may bring to an end the wrath of the Almighty which has been justly brought upon our whole race.”
39 But the king, falling into a rage, handled him worse than all the rest, being exasperated at his mocking. 40 So he also died pure, putting his whole trust in the Lord.
41 Last of all, after her sons, the mother died.
42 Let it then suffice to have said thus much concerning the sacrificial feasts and the extreme tortures.
8
1 But Judas, who is also called Maccabaeus, and those who were with him, making their way secretly into the villages, called together their kindred. Enlisting those who had continued in the Jews’ religion, they gathered together about six thousand. 2 They called upon the Lord to look at the people who were oppressed by all, and to have compassion on the sanctuary that had been profaned by the ungodly men, 3 and to have pity on the city that was suffering ruin and ready to be levelled to the ground, and to listen to the blood that cried out to him, 4 and to remember the lawless destruction of the innocent infants, and concerning the blasphemies that had been committed against his name, and to show his hatred of wickedness.
5 When Maccabaeus had trained his men for service, the heathen at once found him irresistible, for the wrath of the Lord was turned into mercy. 6 †Coming without warning, he set fire to cities and villages. And in winning back the most important positions, putting to flight no small number of the enemies, 7 he especially took advantage of the nights for such assaults. His courage was loudly talked of everywhere.
8 But when Philip saw the man gaining ground little by little, and increasing more and more in his success, he wrote to Ptolemy, the governor of Coelesyria and Phoenicia, that he should support the king’s cause. 9 Ptolemy quickly appointed Nicanor the son of Patroclus, one of the king’s ‡ chief friends, and sent him, in command of no fewer than twenty thousand of all nations, to destroy the whole race of Judea. With him he joined Gorgias also, a captain and one who had experience in matters of war. 10 Nicanor resolved by the sale of the captive Jews to make up for the king the tribute of two thousand talents which he was to pay to the Romans. 11 Immediately he sent to the cities upon the sea coast, inviting them to buy Jewish §slaves, promising to deliver seventy †slaves for a talent, not expecting the judgement that was to overtake him from the Almighty.
12 News came to Judas concerning Nicanor’s invasion. When he communicated to those who were with him the presence of the army, 13 those who were cowardly and distrustful of God’s judgement ‡ran away and left the country. 14 Others sold all that they had left, and at the same time implored the Lord to deliver those who had been sold as slaves by the impious Nicanor before he ever met them, 15 if not for their own sakes, then for the covenants made with their ancestors, and because he had called them by his holy and glorious name. 16 So Maccabaeus gathered his men together, six thousand in number, and exhorted them not to be frightened by the enemy, nor to fear the great multitude of the heathen who came wrongfully against them, but to fight nobly, 17 setting before their eyes the outrage that had been lawlessly perpetrated upon the holy place, and the torture of the city that had been turned to mockery, and further the overthrow of the way of life received from their ancestors. 18 “For they,” he said, “trust their weapons and daring deeds, but we trust in the almighty God, since he is able at a nod to cast down those who are coming against us, and even the whole world.” 19 Moreover, he recounted to them the help given from time to time in the days of their ancestors, both in the days of Sennacherib, when one hundred and eighty-five thousand perished, 20 and in the land of Babylon, in the battle that was fought against the§ Gauls, how they came to the battle with eight thousand in all, with four thousand Macedonians, and how, the Macedonians being hard pressed, the †six thousand destroyed the hundred and twenty thousand because of the help which they had from heaven, and took a great deal of plunder.
21 And when he had with these words filled them with courage and made them ready to die for the