2 Maccabees 8:9-23
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
9 (A)Ptolemy promptly selected Nicanor, son of Patroclus, one of the Chief Friends, and sent him at the head of at least twenty thousand armed men of various nations to wipe out the entire Jewish nation. With him he associated Gorgias, a general, experienced in the art of war.(B) 10 Nicanor planned to raise the two thousand talents of tribute owed by the king to the Romans[a] by selling captured Jews into slavery. 11 So he immediately sent word to the coastal cities, inviting them to buy Jewish slaves and promising to deliver ninety slaves for a talent[b]—little anticipating the punishment that was to fall upon him from the Almighty.
12 When Judas learned of Nicanor’s advance and informed his companions about the approach of the army, 13 those who were fearful and those who lacked faith in God’s justice deserted and got away. 14 But the others sold everything they had left, and at the same time entreated the Lord to deliver those whom the ungodly Nicanor had sold before even capturing them. 15 They entreated the Lord to do this, if not for their sake, at least for the sake of the covenants made with their ancestors, and because they themselves invoked his holy and glorious name. 16 Maccabeus assembled his forces, six thousand strong, and exhorted them not to be panic-stricken before the enemy, nor to fear the very large number of Gentiles unjustly attacking them, but to fight nobly. 17 They were to keep before their eyes the lawless outrage perpetrated by the Gentiles against the holy place and the affliction of the humiliated city, as well as the subversion of their ancestral way of life. 18 He said, “They trust in weapons and acts of daring, but we trust in almighty God, who can by a mere nod destroy not only those who attack us but even the whole world.” 19 He went on to tell them of the times when help had been given their ancestors: both the time of Sennacherib, when a hundred and eighty-five thousand of his men perished,(C) 20 and the time of the battle in Babylonia against the Galatians,[c] when only eight thousand Jews fought along with four thousand Macedonians; yet when the Macedonians were hard pressed, the eight thousand, by the help they received from Heaven, destroyed one hundred and twenty thousand and took a great quantity of spoils. 21 (D)With these words he encouraged them and made them ready to die for their laws and their country.
Then Judas divided his army into four, 22 placing his brothers, Simon, Joseph,[d] and Jonathan, each over a division, assigning them fifteen hundred men apiece.(E) 23 There was also Eleazar.[e] After reading to them from the holy book and giving them the watchword, “The help of God,” Judas himself took charge of the first division and joined in battle with Nicanor.(F)
Read full chapterFootnotes
- 8:10 Tribute owed by the king to the Romans: the payment imposed on Antiochus III in 188 B.C. by the treaty of Apamea.
- 8:11 Ninety slaves for a talent: a low price for so many slaves, thus expressing the opponents’ contempt for the Jews.
- 8:20 Galatians: a mercenary force, defeated by Jews and Macedonians in Babylon. Nothing else is known about this battle.
- 8:22 Joseph: called John in 1 Mc 2:2; 9:36, 38. This paragraph interrupts the story of Nicanor’s defeat, which is resumed in v. 34. The purpose of the author apparently is to group together the defeats suffered by the Syrians on various occasions. Battles against Timothy are recounted in 1 Mc 5:37–44 and 2 Mc 12:10–25; against Bacchides, in 1 Mc 7:8–20.
- 8:23 Eleazar: this parenthetical reference notes the existence of a fifth brother; cf. 1 Mc 2:5.
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