56. For eight days they celebrated the rededication of the altar. With great joy they brought burnt offerings and offered fellowship offerings and thankofferings.
57. They decorated the front of the Temple with gold crowns and shields, rebuilt the gates and the priests' rooms and put doors on them.
58. Now that the Jews had removed the shame which the Gentiles had brought, they held a great celebration.
59. Then Judas, his brothers, and the entire community of Israel decreed that the rededication of the altar should be celebrated with a festival of joy and gladness at the same time each year, beginning on the 25th of the month of Kislev and lasting for eight days.
60. Then they built high walls and strong towers round Mount Zion, so that the Gentiles could not come in and trample and defile it again.
61. Judas placed a detachment of soldiers there to guard the Temple. He also fortified the town of Bethzur, so that the people of Israel would have a fortress facing Idumea.