1. Now about this time Antiochus made his second inroad into Egypt.
2. And it so befell that throughout all the city, for the space of almost forty days, there appeared in the midst of the sky horsemen in swift motion, wearing robes inwrought with gold and carrying spears, equipped in troops for battle;
3. and drawing of swords; and on the other side squadrons of horse in array; and encounters and pursuits of both armies; and shaking of shields, and multitudes of lances, and casting of darts, and flashing of golden trappings, and girding on of all sorts of armor.
4. Wherefore all men implored that the vision might have been given for good.
5. But when a false rumour had arisen that Antiochus was deceased, Jason took not less than a thousand men, and suddenly made an assault upon the city; and they that were upon the wall being routed, and the city being now at length well near taken, Menelaus took refuge in the citadel.
6. But Jason slaughtered his own citizens without mercy, not considering that good success against kinsmen is the greatest ill success, but supposing himself to be setting up trophies over enemies, and not over fellow-countrymen.
7. The office however he did not get, but, receiving shame as the end of his conspiracy, he passed again a fugitive into the country of the Ammonites.
8. At the last therefore he met with a miserable end: having been shut up at the court of Aretas the prince of the Arabians, fleeing from city to city, pursued of all men, hated as an apostate from the laws, and held in abomination as the butcher of his country and his fellow-citizens, he was cast forth into Egypt;
9. and he that had driven many from their own country into strange lands perished himself in a strange land, having crossed the sea to the Lacedaemonians, as thinking to find shelter there because they were near of kin;
10. and he that had cast out a multitude unburied had none to mourn for him, nor had he any funeral at all, or place in the sepulchre of his fathers.
11. Now when tidings came to the king concerning that which was done, he thought that Judaea was in revolt; whereupon setting out from Egypt in a furious mind, he took the city by force of arms,
12. and commanded his soldiers to cut down without mercy such as came in their way, and to kill such as went up upon the houses;
13. and there was killing of young and old, making away of boys, women, and children, slaying of virgins and infants.
14. And in all the three days of the slaughter there were destroyed fourscore thousand, whereof forty thousand were slain in close combat, and no fewer were sold than slain.