I and my sons and my brothers will continue to live by the covenant of our ancestors.

Then Mattathias cried out in the town with a loud voice, saying: “Let every one who is zealous for the law and supports the covenant come out with me!”

Now, my children, show zeal for the law and give your lives for the covenant of our ancestors.

Phinehas our ancestor, because he was deeply zealous, received the covenant of everlasting priesthood.

And now, let us cry to heaven to see whether he will favor us and remember his covenant with our ancestors and crush this army before us today.

He sent envoys to King Demetrius, saying, “Come, let us make a covenant with each other, and I will give you in marriage my daughter who was Alexander’s wife, and you shall reign over your father’s kingdom.

May God do good to you, and may he remember his covenant with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, his faithful servants.

For our brothers, after enduring a brief suffering for everlasting life, have fallen under God’s covenant, but you, by the judgment of God, will receive just punishment for your arrogance.

if not for their own sake, then for the sake of the covenants made with their ancestors and because he had called them by his holy and glorious name.

When the terms had been fully considered and the leader had informed the people and it had appeared that they were of one mind, they agreed to the covenant.

Nicanor Turns against Judas

But when Alcimus noticed their goodwill for one another, he took the covenant that had been made and went to Demetrius. He told him that Nicanor was disloyal to the government, since he had appointed that conspirator against the kingdom, Judas, to be his successor.

The king became excited and, provoked by the false accusations of that depraved man, wrote to Nicanor, stating that he was displeased with the covenant and commanding him to send Maccabeus to Antioch as a prisoner without delay.

Now I call upon you, father, as a witness in addition to the mother of the children, because they would not keep my covenant,

Let them be scattered among the nations; let their names be blotted out from the earth, because they have despised my covenant.

You made an everlasting covenant with him and promised him that you would never forsake his descendants, and you gave him Isaac, and to Isaac you gave Jacob and Esau.

Or has another nation known you besides Israel? Or what tribes have so believed the covenants as these tribes of Jacob?

For I did not wish to inquire about the ways above but about those things that we daily experience: why Israel has been given over to the nations in disgrace; why the people whom you loved has been given over to godless tribes and the law of our ancestors has been brought to destruction and the written covenants no longer exist.

And those who opposed your promises have trampled on those who believed your covenants.

They scorned his law and denied his covenants; they have been unfaithful to his statutes and have not performed his works.

But what of those for whom I prayed? For who among the living is there who has not sinned, or who is there among mortals who has not transgressed your covenant?

The third way: they shall see the reward laid up for those who have trusted the covenants of the Most High.

Do not take note of the endeavors of those who act wickedly but of the endeavors of those who have kept your covenants amid afflictions.

our harp has been laid low, our song has been silenced, and our rejoicing has been ended; the light of our lampstand has been put out, the ark of our covenant has been plundered, our holy things have been polluted, and the name by which we are called has been almost profaned; our children have suffered abuse, our priests have been burned to death, our Levites have gone into exile, our virgins have been defiled, and our wives have been ravished; our righteous men have been carried off, our little ones have been cast out, our young men have been enslaved and our strong men made powerless.