Tobias left to find some poor person among our relatives. When he returned, he said, “Father?” I answered, “I’m here, my son.” He exclaimed, “Father, one of our people has been murdered and tossed into the marketplace; his strangled body is just lying there.”

“You are just, Lord, and all your deeds are just; mercy and truth mark all your ways. You judge the world.

He gained control of Arphaxad’s cities, marched as far as Ecbatana, captured its towers, looted the marketplace, and turned its glory into disgrace.

Wisdom and a spotless life are the marks of honorable maturity.

They’re gone like a ship passing through a storm-tossed sea: once it has passed, it leaves no trace of its passing; its keel leaves no lasting mark on the waves.

But I knew that there was no way I could possess Wisdom unless God gave her to me (and to know this was also a mark of intelligence!). So I came before the Lord and pleaded with him. I said with all my heart:

that your all-powerful word had leaped down from heaven, the royal throne. Like a fierce warrior, he had entered the land that was marked for destruction.

They even took steps to remove the marks of circumcision, utterly abandoning the holy covenant. They joined with Gentiles and gave themselves over to an evil course.

Yet even with all this, not one of them has put on a crown or worn purple as a mark of pride.

Some who had accompanied him went along to mark the way but couldn’t find it again.

But a certain Simon from the tribe of Benjamin, who had been appointed administrator of the temple, had a difference of opinion with the high priest about the management of the city market.

With his last breath he said, “You, who are marked out for vengeance, may take our present life, but the king of the universe for whose laws we die will resurrect us again to eternal life.”

They demolished the altars that the foreigners built near the marketplace, as well as the sacred precincts.

But the blow didn’t strike its mark because of the haste of the struggle and the surge of the mob through the doors. Running with honor out onto the wall, he courageously threw himself down into the mob.

Nicanor, holding his head high with all his boasting, decided to build a public monument marking the defeat of Judas’ forces.

Our master the king, may you know that the Judeans who came up to us have come to Jerusalem and are rebuilding that rebellious and evil city, restoring its marketplaces and walls, and laying the foundations for a temple.