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Deceit and Treachery of Trypho

12 Then Trypho left Ptolemais with a large army to invade the land of Judah, and Jonathan was with him under guard. ¹³Simon encamped in Adida, facing the plain. ¹⁴Trypho learned that Simon had risen up in place of his brother Jonathan, and that he was about to join battle with him, so he sent envoys to him and said, ¹⁵‘It is for the money that your brother Jonathan owed the royal treasury, in connection with the offices he held, that we are detaining him. ¹⁶Send now one hundred talents of silver and two of his sons as hostages, so that when released he will not revolt against us, and we will release him.’

17 Simon knew that they were speaking deceitfully to him, but he sent to get the money and the sons, so that he would not arouse great hostility among the people, who might say, ¹⁸‘It was because Simon^* did not send him the money and the sons, that Jonathan^* perished.’ ¹⁹So he sent the sons and the hundred talents, but Trypho^* broke his word and did not release Jonathan.

20 After this Trypho came to invade the country and destroy it, and he circled around by the way to Adora. But Simon and his army kept marching along opposite him to every place he went. ²¹Now the men in the citadel kept sending envoys to Trypho urging him to come to them by way of the wilderness and to send them food. ²²So Trypho got all his cavalry ready to go, but that night a very heavy snow fell, and he did not go because of the snow. He marched off and went into the land of Gilead. ²³When he approached Baskama, he killed Jonathan, and he was buried there. ²⁴Then Trypho turned and went back to his own land.

Jonathan’s Tomb

25 Simon sent and took the bones of his brother Jonathan, and buried him in Modein, the city of his ancestors. ²⁶All Israel bewailed him with great lamentation, and mourned for him for many days. ²⁷And Simon built a monument over the tomb of his father and his brothers; he made it high so that it might be seen, with polished stone at the front and back. ²⁸He also erected seven pyramids, opposite one another, for his father and mother and four brothers. ²⁹For the pyramids^* he devised an elaborate setting, erecting about them great columns, and on the columns he put suits of armour for a permanent memorial, and beside the suits of armour he carved ships, so that they could be seen by all who sail the sea. ³⁰This is the tomb that he built in Modein; it remains to this day.