3 Maccabees

3 Maccabees 2

Simon’s Prayer

1 Then Simon the chief priest bent his knees facing the sanctuary, stretched out his hands in quiet order, and prayed like this:

2 “Lord, Lord, King of the heavens and Master of all creation,

holy among the holy, you who rule alone, Almighty:

give heed to us, worn down by a man unholy and common,

swollen with his own boldness and strength.

3 For you created all things and have mastery over the whole;

you are the just Sovereign,

and you judge those who do anything with insolence and arrogance.

4 You destroyed those who did wrong in the old days,

and among them were giants, trusting in their strength and their boldness,

and you brought water on them past all measure.

5 You burned up the men of Sodom, who gave themselves to pride

and became notorious for their evils,

with fire and sulfur, and made them a warning to those who came after.

6 You tried bold Pharaoh, who made your holy people Israel his slaves,

with punishments many and of many kinds, and made your power known;

and by them you made known your great might.

7 And when he chased after them with chariots and a great host of men,

you swept him under in the depth of the sea,

but those who trusted in you, who hold sovereign power over all creation,

you carried through safe and whole.

8 They saw the works of your hand and praised you, the Almighty.

9 You, King, created the earth without end or measure,

and chose this city, and made this place holy for your name,

though you have need of nothing from anyone;

and you honored it beyond all expectation by a magnificent appearing,

setting it up for the glory of your great and honored name.

10 And loving the house of Israel, you promised

that if we turned away, and hard straits took hold of us,

and we came to this place and prayed,

you would hear our prayer.

11 And you are faithful and true.

12 Time and again our fathers were pressed hard,

and you helped them in their low state

and rescued them out of great evils.

13 See now, holy King:

because of our many and great sins we are worn down,

made subject to our enemies, left slack and without strength.

14 And in our fall this bold and common man

sets himself to insult the holy place on the earth

that was marked out for the name of your glory.

15 For your dwelling, the heaven of heaven,

is out of the reach of men.

16 But since it pleased you to set your glory among your people Israel,

you made this place holy.

17 Do not take vengeance on us through the uncleanness of these men,

and do not call us to account by its being treated as common,

so that the lawbreakers may not boast in their rage

or be glad in the pride of their tongue and say,

18 ‘We trampled down the house of holiness

the way the houses of loathsome things are trampled.’

19 Blot out our sins and scatter our failings,

and let your mercy appear at this hour.

20 Let your pity run to meet us quickly,

and put praises in the mouth of those who have fallen

and whose souls are crushed; make peace for us.”

The King Struck Down

21 At that, God, who watches over all, the Forefather, holy among the holy, heard the plea made as custom directs, and flogged the man who had lifted himself so high in insolence and boldness. 22 He shook him this way and that, like a reed under the wind, so that he lay on the floor helpless, his limbs gone slack, unable even to make a sound, struck through by a just judgment.

23 So his friends and his bodyguards saw how sharply the reckoning had caught him, and, afraid he might lose his life as well, they dragged him out at once, stunned themselves with overwhelming fear. 24 Some time later he pulled himself together, but the check brought him to no regret at all; he went away with bitter threats.

The Order Cut in Stone

25 He crossed over to Egypt and went on adding to his wickedness, helped by the drinking companions and comrades already spoken of, men cut away from everything just. 26 He was not satisfied with countless acts of shamelessness. He went so far in boldness that ill reports were raised in those parts, and many of his friends, watching the king’s purpose closely, followed his will themselves. 27 He set out to spread a public slander against the nation. On the tower by the palace court he set up a pillar and cut an inscription into it —

28 that no one who did not sacrifice was to go into their temples; that all the Jews were to be brought under a head-count of the people and into the standing of household slaves; and that those who spoke against it were to be carried off by force and put to death; 29 and that those who were written into the register were to be branded on the body with fire, with the ivy leaf that is the mark of Dionysus, and set down under the reduced standing already laid out.

30 But so that he would not appear to be hated by everyone, he wrote underneath, “If any of them choose to live among those initiated in the rites, they are to be citizens on equal terms with the Alexandrians.”

31 Now some of them, with only a shallow distaste for the steps that led up to the city’s devoutness, gave themselves over readily, thinking they would share in some great honor from keeping the king’s company. 32 But most of them held firm with a noble soul and did not stand apart from their devoutness; and trading their money for their lives, they tried without fear to get themselves clear of the registers. 33 They kept good hope of finding help, and they detested those who went off from them, judged them enemies of the nation, and shut them out of the life they all shared and everything useful in it.