2 Maccabees 1:10-17

Common English Bible

¹⁰ in the year 188.^[a]

The second letter

The citizens of Jerusalem and Judea, the council of elders, and Judas send greetings and wishes of good health to Aristobulus, teacher of King Ptolemy and a member of the family of the anointed priests, and to the Jews in Egypt. ¹¹ God saved us from great danger when we were battling against the king. So we greatly praise God ¹² because he forced those fighting in the holy city to leave.

¹³ The ruler and his armed forces that went into Persia seemed invincible. But they were slain in the goddess Nanea’s temple, when Nanea’s priests tricked them. ¹⁴ Since Antiochus came in order to marry the goddess, he and his political advisors^[b] came into the temple^[c] to take the great wealth as payment for her dowry. ¹⁵ When the priests of Nanea had set it out, the king entered with a few men into the enclosed space of the shrine. After closing off the temple as Antiochus entered, ¹⁶ and opening the hidden door of the ceiling, they threw stones that struck down the ruler like a bolt of lightning. After dismembering and beheading the bodies, they tossed the heads to those outside.

¹⁷ May our God who gave up the immoral to death be praised in every way!