3 Maccabees 4

1 Everywhere the decree came, the nations held a feast at public expense, with shouting and joy, as though the hatred long hardened in their minds were now showing itself openly. 2 For the Jews there was grief that would not stop, and a cry of tears and wailing on every side; their hearts burned with groaning as they mourned the ruin that had suddenly been decided against them out of nowhere. 3 What district, what city, what inhabited place at all, what streets were not filled with beating of breasts and wailing over them? [a]

4 They were sent off, all together, by the commanders in the cities with such bitterness and such pitiless feeling that even some of their enemies, with the strange punishments in front of their eyes, took to heart the mercy men owe one another, thought how uncertain the end of a life is, and wept at that most wretched deportation. [b] 5 A crowd of old men was driven along, thick with gray hair, slow on their feet with age and bent over, and the shoving forced them into a quick march with no respect shown them at all.

6 Young women who had just gone under the bridal canopy to share a life took wailing in place of delight. Their hair, still wet with perfume, was fouled with dust; they were led along with their heads uncovered; and all together they struck up a dirge instead of the wedding song, torn as they were by the rough hands of foreigners. 7 Bound, in full public view, they were dragged by force to the loading of the ship. 8 Their husbands, in the prime of their young strength, had ropes around their necks instead of garlands; instead of feasting and the ease of youth they spent what was left of their wedding days in dirges, seeing Hades already lying at their feet. [c]

9 They were brought down like wild animals, driven in iron bonds: some with their necks fastened to the rowing benches of the boats, others with their feet made fast in fetters that would not break, 10 and a close-laid deck of planks was set over them as well, so that with their eyes darkened on every side they would be handled the whole voyage down like men caught plotting.

11 When they had been brought to the place called Schedia and the voyage was finished, the king ordered, as he had already determined, that they be penned in the hippodrome in front of the city. It was a ring of ground of enormous size, and very well placed for making an example of them to everyone coming down into the city and to everyone setting out from it into the country. They were to have no dealings with his troops, and were not to be thought worthy of any shelter at all. [d] 12 When this was done, he heard that their countrymen in the city were slipping out in secret, more and more often, to grieve over the shameful misery of their brothers. 13 He flew into a rage and ordered that these be dealt with along with the others, in exactly the same way and just as thoroughly, so that they should come off no better in any respect than the first;

14 and that the whole race be registered by name — not for the crushing service of hard labor spoken of a little before, but so that, racked with the tortures he had ordered, they might be wiped out at last within the space of a single day. [e] 15 So the registering of them went on with bitter haste and eager, unbroken attention, from sunrise to sunset, and after forty days it had still come to no end. 16 The king was filled with a great and unbroken joy, and set up drinking parties in front of all the idols. With a mind far astray from the truth and a common mouth he praised things that are deaf and cannot speak to men or help them, while against the greatest God he said what should never be said. [f]

17 When the stretch of time just named had passed, the scribes brought word to the king that they could no longer carry out the registering of the Jews, because their number was past measuring — 18 and most of them were still out in the country, some still holding together in their houses, others scattered here and there — so that the thing was impossible for all the commanders in Egypt.

19 He threatened them harshly, as men who had taken bribes to contrive an escape; but it turned out that he was plainly satisfied on the point, 20 for they said, and proved, that the paper itself and the reed pens they had been using had run out. 21 This was the working of the unconquerable provident care of the one who was helping the Jews from heaven. [g]