12. He commanded his soldiers to cut down without mercy anyone they met and to slaughter those fleeing into their houses.
13. They killed young and old, murdered adolescents, women and children, and slaughtered virgins and infants.
14. Over a three-day period, eighty thousand people’s lives were ruined. Forty thousand were killed in hand-to-hand fighting, and no fewer than those slaughtered were sold as slaves.
15. Not content with these measures, he dared to enter into the holiest temple of all the earth, guided by Menelaus, who had become a traitor to the laws and to his native land.
16. Clutching the holy equipment with polluted and unclean hands, Antiochus made off with them and the things donated by other kings to increase the prestige, glory, and honor of the holy place.
17. Antiochus was really pleased with himself, not realizing the Lord had become angry for a short time because of the sins of those who lived in the city. For this reason, he had shut his eyes to the holy temple.
18. If they hadn’t previously been involved in so many sins, Antiochus would have been forced to abandon his rashness and been defeated at once when he attacked, just like Heliodorus (the one King Seleucus sent to inspect the treasury).
19. But the Lord didn’t choose the nation because of the place, but the place because of the nation.
20. So the temple also shared the misfortunes of the nation, but afterward it also shared in its good fortunes. That which the almighty abandoned in his wrath would again be restored with all glory when the nation was reconciled to the great Lord.