42
and the people began to write in their documents and contracts, "In the first year of Simon the great high priest and commander and leader of the Jews."
43
In those days Simon encamped against Gazara and surrounded it with troops. He made a siege engine, brought it up to the city, and battered and captured one tower.
44
The men in the siege engine leaped out into the city, and a great tumult arose in the city.
45
The men in the city, with their wives and children, went up on the wall with their clothes torn, and they cried out with a loud voice, asking Simon to make peace with them;
46
they said, "Do not treat us according to our wicked acts but according to your mercy."
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.