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22 placing his brothers, Simon, Joseph,[a] and Jonathan, each over a division, assigning them fifteen hundred men apiece.(A) 23 There was also Eleazar.[b] After reading to them from the holy book and giving them the watchword, “The help of God,” Judas himself took charge of the first division and joined in battle with Nicanor.(B) 24 With the Almighty as their ally, they killed more than nine thousand of the enemy, wounded and disabled the greater part of Nicanor’s army, and put all of them to flight.

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Footnotes

  1. 8:22 Joseph: called John in 1 Mc 2:2; 9:36, 38. This paragraph interrupts the story of Nicanor’s defeat, which is resumed in v. 34. The purpose of the author apparently is to group together the defeats suffered by the Syrians on various occasions. Battles against Timothy are recounted in 1 Mc 5:37–44 and 2 Mc 12:10–25; against Bacchides, in 1 Mc 7:8–20.
  2. 8:23 Eleazar: this parenthetical reference notes the existence of a fifth brother; cf. 1 Mc 2:5.