Bible Browser

³²Many pursued them, and overtook them; they encamped opposite them and prepared for battle against them on the sabbath day. ³³They said to them, ‘Enough of this! Come out and do what the king commands, and you will live.’ ³⁴But they said, ‘We will not come out, nor will we do what the king commands and so profane the sabbath day.’ ³⁵Then the enemy^* quickly attacked them. ³⁶But they did not answer them or hurl a stone at them or block up their hiding-places, ³⁷for they said, ‘Let us all die in our innocence; heaven and earth testify for us that you are killing us unjustly.’ ³⁸So they attacked them on the sabbath, and they died, with their wives and children and livestock, to the number of a thousand people.

39 When Mattathias and his friends learned of it, they mourned for them deeply. ⁴⁰And all said to their neighbours: ‘If we all do as our kindred have done and refuse to fight with the Gentiles for our lives and for our ordinances, they will quickly destroy us from the earth.’ ⁴¹So they made this decision that day: ‘Let us fight against anyone who comes to attack us on the sabbath day; let us not all die as our kindred died in their hiding-places.’