4 Maccabees 17:20-22

Revised Standard Version

²⁰ These, then, who have been consecrated for the sake of God,^[a] are honored, not only with this honor, but also by the fact that because of them our enemies did not rule over our nation, ²¹ the tyrant was punished, and the homeland purified—they having become, as it were, a ransom for the sin of our nation. ²² And through the blood of those devout ones and their death as an expiation, divine Providence preserved Israel that previously had been afflicted.