5
As soon as Maccabeus got his army organized, the Gentiles could not withstand him, for the wrath of the Lord had turned to mercy.
6
Coming without warning, he would set fire to towns and villages. He captured strategic positions and put to flight not a few of the enemy.
7
He found the nights most advantageous for such attacks. And talk of his valor spread everywhere.
8
When Philip saw that the man was gaining ground little by little, and that he was pushing ahead with more frequent successes, he wrote to Ptolemy, the governor of Coelesyria and Phoenicia, for aid to the king's government.
9
And Ptolemy promptly appointed Nicanor the son of Patroclus, one of the king's chief friends, and sent him, in command of no fewer than twenty thousand Gentiles of all nations, to wipe out the whole race of Judea. He associated with him Gorgias, a general and a man of experience in military service.
10
Nicanor determined to make up for the king the tribute due to the Romans, two thousand talents, by selling the captured Jews into slavery.
11
And he immediately sent to the cities on the seacoast, inviting them to buy Jewish slaves and promising to hand over ninety slaves for a talent, not expecting the judgment from the Almighty that was about to overtake him.
12
Word came to Judas concerning Nicanor's invasion; and when he told his companions of the arrival of the army,
13
those who were cowardly and distrustful of God's justice ran off and got away.
14
Others sold all their remaining property, and at the same time besought the Lord to rescue those who had been sold by the ungodly Nicanor before he ever met them,
15
if not for their own sake, yet for the sake of the covenants made with their fathers, and because he had called them by his holy and glorious name.