⁷Then Nebuchadnez'zar king of the Assyrians sent to all who lived in Persia and to all who lived in the west, those who lived in Cili'cia and Damascus and Lebanon and An''ti-leb'anon and all who lived along the seacoast, ⁸and those among the nations of Carmel and Gilead, and Upper Galilee and the great Plain of Esdrae'lon, ⁹and all who were in Samar'ia and its surrounding towns, and beyond the Jordan as far as Jerusalem and Beth'any and Chelous and Ka'desh and the river of Egypt, and Tah'panhes and Ra-am'ses and the whole land of Go'shen, ¹⁰even beyond Tanis and Memphis, and all who lived in Egypt as far as the borders of Ethiopia. ¹¹But all who lived in the whole region disregarded the orders of Nebuchadnez'zar king of the Assyrians, and refused to join him in the war; for they were not afraid of him, but looked upon him as only one man,^a and they sent back his messengers empty-handed and shamefaced.

¹²Then Nebuchadnez'zar was very angry with this whole region, and swore by his throne and kingdom that he would surely take revenge on the whole territory of Cili'cia and Damascus and Syria, that he would kill by the sword all the inhabitants of the land of Moab, and the people of Ammon, and all Jude'a, and every one in Egypt, as far as the coasts of the two seas. ¹³In the seventeenth year he led his forces against King Arpha'xad, and defeated him in battle, and overthrew the whole army of Arphaxad, and all his cavalry and all his chariots. ¹⁴Thus he took possession of his cities, and came to Ecbat'ana, captured its towers, plundered its markets, and turned its beauty into shame. ¹⁵He captured Arpha'xad in the mountains of Ragae and struck him down with hunting spears; and he utterly destroyed him, to this day. ¹⁶Then he returned with them to Nin'eveh, he and all his combined forces, a vast body of troops; and there he and his forces rested and feasted for one hundred and twenty days.

2In the eighteenth year, on the twenty-second day of the first month, there was talk in the palace of Nebuchadnez'zar king of the Assyrians about carrying out his revenge on the whole region, just as he said. ²He called together all his officers and all his nobles and set forth to them his secret plan and recounted fully, with his own lips, all the wickedness of the region;^{b 3}and it was decided that every one who had not obeyed his command should be destroyed. ⁴When he had finished setting forth his plan, Nebuchadnez'zar king of the Assyrians called Hol''ofer'nes, the chief general of his army, second only to himself, and said to him,

⁵“Thus says the Great King, the lord of the whole earth: When you leave my presence, take with you men confident in their strength, to the number of one hundred and twenty thousand foot soldiers and twelve thousand cavalry. ⁶Go and attack the whole west country, because they disobeyed my orders. ⁷Tell them to prepare earth and water, for I am coming against them in my anger, and will cover the whole face of the earth with the feet of my armies, and will hand them over to be plundered by my troops,^{c 8}till their wounded shall fill their valleys, and every brook and river shall be filled with their dead, and overflow; ⁹and I will lead them away captive to the ends of the whole earth. ¹⁰You shall go and seize all their territory for me in advance. They will yield themselves to you, and you shall hold them for me till the day of their punishment. ¹¹But if they refuse, your eye shall not spare and you shall hand them over to slaughter and plunder throughout your whole region. ¹²For as I live, and by the power of my kingdom, what I have spoken my hand will execute. ¹³And you—take care not to transgress any of your sovereign’s commands, but be sure to carry them out just as I have ordered you; and do not delay about it.”

¹⁴So Hol''ofer'nes left the presence of his master, and called together all the commanders, generals, and officers of the Assyrian army, ¹⁵and mustered the picked troops by divisions as his lord had ordered him to do, one hundred and twenty thousand of them, together with twelve thousand archers on horseback, ¹⁶and he organized them as a great army is marshaled for a campaign. ¹⁷He collected a vast number of camels and donkeys and mules for transport, and innumerable sheep and oxen and goats for provision; ¹⁸also plenty of food for every man, and a huge amount of gold and silver from the royal palace. ¹⁹So he set out with his whole army, to go ahead of King Nebuchadnez'zar and to cover the whole face of the earth to the west with their chariots and horsemen and picked troops of infantry. ²⁰Along with them went a mixed crowd like a swarm of locusts, like the dust of the earth—a multitude that could not be counted.

²¹They marched for three days from Nin'eveh to the plain of Bec'tileth, and camped opposite Bectileth near the mountain which is to the north of Upper Cili'cia. ²²From there Hol''ofer'nes^d took his whole army, his infantry, cavalry, and chariots, and went up into the hill country ²³and ravaged Put and Lud, and plundered all the people of Rassis and the Ish'maelites who lived along the desert, south of the country of the Chel'leans. ²⁴Then he followed^e the Euphrates and passed through Mesopota'mia and destroyed all the hilltop cities along the brook Abron, as far as the sea. ²⁵He also seized the territory of Cili'cia, and killed every one who resisted him, and came to the southern borders of Ja'pheth, fronting toward Arabia. ²⁶He surrounded all the Mid'ianites, and burned their tents and plundered their sheepfolds. ²⁷Then he went down into the plain of Damascus during the wheat harvest, and burned all their fields and destroyed their flocks and herds and sacked their cities and ravaged their lands and put to death all their young men with the edge of the sword.

²⁸So fear and terror of him fell upon all the people who lived along the seacoast, at Si'don and Tyre, and those who lived in Sur and Oci'na and all who lived in Jam'nia. Those who lived in Azo'tus and Asca'lon feared him exceedingly.

⁵The men came to Hol''ofer'nes and told him all this. ⁶Then he went down to the seacoast with his army and stationed garrisons in the hilltop cities and took picked men from them as his allies. ⁷And these people and all in the country round about welcomed him with garlands and dances and tambourines. ⁸And he demolished all their shrines^f and cut down their sacred groves; for it had been given to him to destroy all the gods of the land, so that all nations should worship Nebuchadnez'zar only, and all their tongues and tribes should call upon him as god.

⁹Then he came to the edge of Esdrae'lon, near Do'than, fronting the great ridge of Jude'a; ¹⁰here he camped between Ge'ba and Scythop'olis, and remained for a whole month in order to assemble all the supplies for his army.

⁸So the Israelites did as Jo'akim the high priest and the senate of the whole people of Israel, in session at Jerusalem, had given order. ⁹And every man of Israel cried out to God with great fervor, and they humbled themselves with much fasting. ¹⁰They and their wives and their children and their cattle and every resident alien and hired laborer and purchased slave—they all clothed themselves with sackcloth. ¹¹And all the men and women of Israel, and their children, living at Jerusalem, prostrated themselves before the temple and put ashes on their heads and spread out their sackcloth before the Lord. ¹²They even surrounded the altar with sackcloth and cried out in unison, praying earnestly to the God of Israel not to give up their infants as prey and their wives as booty, and the cities they had inherited to be destroyed, and the sanctuary to be profaned and desecrated to the malicious joy of the Gentiles. ¹³So the Lord heard their prayers and looked upon their affliction; for the people fasted many days throughout Jude'a and in Jerusalem before the sanctuary of the Lord Almighty. ¹⁴And Jo'akim the high priest and all the priests who stood before the Lord and ministered to the Lord, with their loins clothed with sackcloth, offered the continual burnt offerings and the vows and freewill offerings of the people. ¹⁵With ashes upon their turbans, they cried out to the Lord with all their might to look with favor upon the whole house of Israel.

⁵Then A'chior, the leader of all the Am'monites, said to him, “Let my lord now hear a word from the mouth of your servant, and I will tell you the truth about this people that dwells in the nearby mountain district. No falsehood shall come from your servant’s mouth. ⁶This people is descended from the Chalde'ans. ⁷At one time they lived in Mesopota'mia, because they would not follow the gods of their fathers who were in Chaldea. ⁸For they had left the ways of their ancestors, and they worshiped the God of heaven, the God they had come to know; hence they drove them out from the presence of their gods; and they fled to Mesopota'mia, and lived there for a long time. ⁹Then their God commanded them to leave the place where they were living and go to the land of Canaan. There they settled, and prospered, with much gold and silver and very many cattle. ¹⁰When a famine spread over Canaan they went down to Egypt and lived there as long as they had food; and there they became a great multitude—so great that they could not be counted. ¹¹So the king of Egypt became hostile to them; he took advantage of them and set them to making bricks, and humbled them and made slaves of them. ¹²Then they cried out to their God, and he afflicted the whole land of Egypt with incurable plagues; and so the Egyptians drove them out of their sight. ¹³Then God dried up the Red Sea before them, ¹⁴and he led them by the way of Sinai and Ka'desh-bar'nea, and drove out all the people of the wilderness. ¹⁵So they lived in the land of the Am'orites, and by their might destroyed all the inhabitants of Heshbon; and crossing over the Jordan they took possession of all the hill country. ¹⁶And they drove out before them the Canaanites and the Per'izzites and the Jeb'usites and the She'chemites and all the Ger'gesites, and lived there a long time. ¹⁷As long as they did not sin against their God they prospered, for the God who hates iniquity is with them. ¹⁸But when they departed from the way which he had appointed for them, they were utterly defeated in many battles and were led away captive to a foreign country; the temple of their God was razed to the ground, and their cities were captured by their enemies. ¹⁹But now they have returned to their God, and have come back from the places to which they were scattered, and have occupied Jerusalem, where their sanctuary is, and have settled in the hill country, because it was uninhabited. ²⁰Now therefore, my master and lord, if there is any unwitting error in this people and they sin against their God and we find out their offense, then we will go up and defeat them. ²¹But if there is no transgression in their nation, then let my lord pass them by; for their Lord will defend them, and their God will protect them, and we shall be put to shame before the whole world.”

²²When A'chior had finished saying this, all the men standing around the tent began to complain; Hol''ofer'nes’ officers and all the men from the seacoast and from Moab insisted that he must be put to death. ²³“For,” they said, “we will not be afraid of the Israelites; they are a people with no strength or power for making war. ²⁴Therefore let us go up, Lord Hol''ofer'nes, and they will be devoured by your vast army.”

²“And who are you, A'chior, and you hirelings of E'phraim, to prophesy among us as you have done today and tell us not to make war against the people of Israel because their God will defend them? Who is God except Nebuchadnez'zar? ³He will send his forces and will destroy them from the face of the earth, and their God will not deliver them—we the king’s^f servants will destroy them as one man. They cannot resist the might of our cavalry. ⁴We will burn them up,^g and their mountains will be drunk with their blood, and their fields will be full of their dead. They^h cannot withstand us, but will utterly perish. So says King Nebuchadnez'zar, the lord of the whole earth. For he has spoken; none of his words shall be in vain.

⁵“But you, A'chior, you Am'monite hireling, who have said these words on the day of your iniquity, you shall not see my face again from this day until I take revenge on this race that came out of Egypt. ⁶Then the sword of my army and the spearⁱ of my servants shall pierce your sides, and you shall fall among their wounded, when I return. ⁷Now my slaves are going to take you back into the hill country and put you in one of the cities beside the passes, ⁸and you will not die until you perish along with them. ⁹If you really hope in your heart that they will not be taken, do not look downcast! I have spoken and none of my words shall fail.”

¹⁰Then Hol''ofer'nes ordered his slaves, who waited on him in his tent, to seize A'chior and take him to Beth''uli'a and hand him over to the men of Israel. ¹¹So the slaves took him and led him out of the camp into the plain, and from the plain they went up into the hill country and came to the springs below Beth''uli'a. ¹²When the men of the city saw them,^j they caught up their weapons and ran out of the city to the top of the hill, and all the slingers kept them from coming up by casting stones at them. ¹³However, they got under the shelter of the hill and they bound A'chior and left him lying at the foot of the hill, and returned to their master.

¹⁴Then the men of Israel came down from their city and found him; and they untied him and brought him into Beth''uli'a and placed him before the magistrates of their city, ¹⁵who in those days were Uzzi'ah the son of Micah, of the tribe of Simeon, and Chabris the son of Gotho'niel, and Charmis the son of Melchi'el. ¹⁶They called together all the elders of the city, and all their young men and their women ran to the assembly; and they set A'chior in the midst of all their people, and Uzzi'ah asked him what had happened. ¹⁷He answered and told them what had taken place at the council of Hol''ofer'nes, and all that he had said in the presence of the Assyrian leaders, and all that Holofernes had said so boastfully against the house of Israel. ¹⁸Then the people fell down and worshiped God, and cried out to him, and said,

¹⁹“O Lord God of heaven, behold their arrogance, and have pity on the humiliation of our people, and look this day upon the faces of those who are consecrated to you.”

²⁰Then they consoled A'chior, and praised him greatly. ²¹And Uzzi'ah took him from the assembly to his own house and gave a banquet for the elders; and all that night they called on the God of Israel for help.

⁴When the Israelites saw their vast numbers they were greatly terrified, and every one said to his neighbor, “These men will now lick up the face of the whole land; neither the high mountains nor the valleys nor the hills will bear their weight.” ⁵Then each man took up his weapons, and when they had kindled fires on their towers they remained on guard all that night.

⁶On the second day Hol''ofer'nes led out all his cavalry in full view of the Israelites in Beth''uli'a, ⁷and examined the approaches to the city, and visited the springs that supplied their water, and seized them and set guards of soldiers over them, and then returned to his army.

⁸Then all the chieftains of the people of Esau and all the leaders of the Moabites and the commanders of the coastland came to him and said, ⁹“Let our lord hear a word, lest his army be defeated. ¹⁰For these people, the Israelites, do not rely on their spears but on the height of the mountains where they live, for it is not easy to reach the tops of their mountains. ¹¹Therefore, my lord, do not fight against them in battle array, and not a man of your army will fall. ¹²Remain in your camp, and keep all the men in your forces with you; only let your servants take possession of the spring of water that flows from the foot of the mountain—¹³for this is where all the people of Beth''uli'a get their water. So thirst will destroy them, and they will give up their city. We and our people will go up to the tops of the nearby mountains and camp there to keep watch that not a man gets out of the city. ¹⁴They and their wives and children will waste away with famine, and before the sword reaches them they will be strewn about in the streets where they live. ¹⁵So you will pay them back with evil, because they rebelled and did not receive you peaceably.”

¹⁶These words pleased Hol''ofer'nes and all his servants, and he gave orders to do as they had said. ¹⁷So the army of the Am'monites moved forward, together with five thousand Assyrians, and they encamped in the valley and seized the water supply and the springs of the Israelites. ¹⁸And the sons of Esau and the sons of Ammon went up and encamped in the hill country opposite Do'than; and they sent some of their men toward the south and the east, toward Ac'raba, which is near Chu'si beside the brook Moch'mur. The rest of the Assyrian army encamped in the plain, and covered the whole face of the land, and their tents and supply trains spread out in great number, and they formed a vast multitude.

¹⁹The people of Israel cried out to the Lord their God, for their courage failed, because all their enemies had surrounded them and there was no way of escape from them. ²⁰The whole Assyrian army, their infantry, chariots, and cavalry, surrounded them for thirty-four days, until all the vessels of water belonging to every inhabitant of Beth''uli'a were empty; ²¹their cisterns were going dry, and they did not have enough water to drink their fill for a single day, because it was measured out to them to drink. ²²Their children lost heart, and the women and young men fainted from thirst and fell down in the streets of the city and in the passages through the gates; there was no strength left in them any longer.

²³Then all the people, the young men, the women, and the children, gathered about Uzzi'ah and the rulers of the city and cried out with a loud voice, and said before all the elders, ²⁴“God be judge between you and us! For you have done us a great injury in not making peace with the Assyrians. ²⁵For now we have no one to help us; God has sold us into their hands, to strew us on the ground before them with thirst and utter destruction. ²⁶Now call them in and surrender the whole city to the army of Hol''ofer'nes and to all his forces, to be plundered. ²⁷For it would be better for us to be captured by them;^k for we will be slaves, but our lives will be spared, and we shall not witness the death of our infants before our eyes, or see our wives and children draw their last breath. ²⁸We call to witness against you heaven and earth and our God, the Lord of our fathers, who punishes us according to our sins and the sins of our fathers. Let him not do this day the things which we have described!”

²⁹Then great and general lamentation arose throughout the assembly, and they cried out to the Lord God with a loud voice. ³⁰And Uzzi'ah said to them, “Have courage, my brothers! Let us hold out for five more days; by that time the Lord our God will restore to us his mercy, for he will not forsake us utterly. ³¹But if these days pass by, and no help comes for us, I will do what you say.”

³²Then he dismissed the people to their various posts, and they went up on the walls and towers of their city. The women and children he sent home. And they were greatly depressed in the city.

⁹When Judith heard the wicked words spoken by the people against the ruler, because they were faint for lack of water, and when she heard all that Uzziah said to them, and how he promised them under oath to surrender the city to the Assyrians after five days, ¹⁰she sent her maid, who was in charge of all she possessed, to summon^l Chabris and Charmis, the elders of her city. ¹¹They came to her, and she said to them,

“Listen to me, rulers of the people of Beth''uli'a! What you have said to the people today is not right; you have even sworn and pronounced this oath between God and you, promising to surrender the city to our enemies unless the Lord turns and helps us within so many days. ¹²Who are you, that have put God to the test this day, and are setting yourselves up in the place of^m God among the sons of men? ¹³You are putting the Lord Almighty to the test—but you will never know anything! ¹⁴You cannot plumb the depths of the human heart, nor find out what a man is thinking; how do you expect to search out God, who made all these things, and find out his mind or comprehend his thought? No, my brethren, do not provoke the Lord our God to anger. ¹⁵For if he does not choose to help us within these five days, he has power to protect us within any time he pleases, or even to destroy us in the presence of our enemies. ¹⁶Do not try to bind the purposes of the Lord our God; for God is not like man, to be threatened, nor like a human being, to be won over by pleading. ¹⁷Therefore, while we wait for his deliverance, let us call upon him to help us, and he will hear our voice, if it pleases him.

¹⁸“For never in our generation, nor in these present days, has there been any tribe or family or people or city of ours which worshiped gods made with hands, as was done in days gone by—¹⁹and that was why our fathers were handed over to the sword, and to be plundered, and so they suffered a great catastrophe before our enemies. ²⁰But we know no other god but him, and therefore we hope that he will not disdain us or any of our nation. ²¹For if we are captured all Jude'a will be captured and our sanctuary will be plundered; and he will exact of usⁿ the penalty for its desecration. ²²And the slaughter of our brethren and the captivity of the land and the desolation of our inheritance—all this he will bring upon our heads among the Gentiles, wherever we serve as slaves; and we shall be an offense and a reproach in the eyes of those who acquire us. ²³For our slavery will not bring us into favor, but the Lord our God will turn it to dishonor.

²⁴“Now therefore, brethren, let us set an example to our brethren, for their lives depend upon us, and the sanctuary and the temple and the altar rest upon us. ²⁵In spite of everything let us give thanks to the Lord our God, who is putting us to the test as he did our forefathers. ²⁶Remember what he did with Abraham, and how he tested Isaac, and what happened to Jacob in Mesopota'mia in Syria, while he was keeping the sheep of La'ban, his mother’s brother. ²⁷For he has not tried us with fire, as he did them, to search their hearts, nor has he taken revenge upon us; but the Lord scourges those who draw near to him, in order to admonish them.”

²⁸Then Uzzi'ah said to her, “All that you have said has been spoken out of a true heart, and there is no one who can deny your words. ²⁹Today is not the first time your wisdom has been shown, but from the beginning of your life all the people have recognized your understanding, for your heart’s disposition is right. ³⁰But the people were very thirsty, and they compelled us to do for them what we have promised, and made us take an oath which we cannot break. ³¹So pray for us, since you are a devout woman, and the Lord will send us rain to fill our cisterns and we will no longer be faint.”

³²Judith said to them, “Listen to me. I am about to do a thing which will go down through all generations of our descendants. ³³Stand at the city gate tonight, and I will go out with my maid; and within the days after which you have promised to surrender the city to our enemies, the Lord will deliver Israel by my hand. ³⁴Only, do not try to find out what I plan; for I will not tell you until I have finished what I am about to do.”

³⁵Uzzi'ah and the rulers said to her, “Go in peace, and may the Lord God go before you, to take revenge upon our enemies.” ³⁶So they returned from the tent and went to their posts.

²“O Lord God of my father Simeon, to whom you gave a sword to take revenge on the strangers who had loosed the girdle^o of a virgin to defile her, and uncovered her thigh to put her to shame, and polluted her womb to disgrace her; for you have said, ‘It shall not be done’—yet they did it. ³So you gave up their rulers to be slain, and their bed, which was ashamed of the deceit they had practiced, to be stained with blood, and you struck down slaves along with princes, and princes on their thrones; ⁴and you gave their wives for a prey and their daughters to captivity, and all their booty to be divided among your beloved sons, who were zealous for you, and abhorred the pollution of their blood, and called on you for help—O God, my God, hear me also, a widow.

⁵“For you have done these things and those that went before and those that followed; you have designed the things that are now, and those that are to come. Yes, the things you intended came to pass, ⁶and the things you willed presented themselves and said, ‘Behold, we are here’; for all your ways are prepared in advance, and your judgment is with foreknowledge.

⁷“Behold now, the Assyrians are increased in their might; they are exalted, with their horses and riders; they glory in the strength of their foot soldiers; they trust in shield and spear, in bow and sling, and know not that you are the Lord who crushes wars; the Lord is your name. ⁸Break their strength by your might, and bring down their power in your anger; for they intend to defile your sanctuary, and to pollute the tabernacle where your glorious name rests, and to cast down the horn of your altar with the sword. ⁹Behold their pride, and send your wrath upon their heads; give to me, a widow, the strength to do what I plan. ¹⁰By the deceit of my lips strike down the slave with the prince and the prince with his servant; crush their arrogance by the hand of a woman.

¹¹“For your power depends not upon numbers, nor your might upon men of strength; for you are God of the lowly, helper of the oppressed, upholder of the weak, protector of the forlorn, savior of those without hope. ¹²Hear, O hear me, God of my father, God of the inheritance of Israel, Lord of heaven and earth, Creator of the waters, King of all your creation, hear my prayer! ¹³Make my deceitful words to be their wound and stripe, for they have planned cruel things against your covenant, and against your consecrated house, and against the top of Zion, and against the house possessed by your children. ¹⁴And cause your whole nation and every tribe to know and understand that you are God, the God of all power and might, and that there is no other who protects the people of Israel but you alone!”

10When Judith^p had ceased crying out to the God of Israel, and had ended all these words, ²she rose from where she lay prostrate and called her maid and went down into the house where she lived on sabbaths and on her feast days; ³and she removed the sackcloth which she had been wearing, and took off her widow’s garments, and bathed her body with water, and anointed herself with precious ointment, and combed her hair and put on a tiara, and arrayed herself in her most festive apparel, which she used to wear while her husband Manas'seh was living. ⁴And she put sandals on her feet, and put on her anklets and bracelets and rings, and her earrings and all her ornaments,* and made herself very beautiful, to entice the eyes of all men who might see her. ⁵And she gave her maid a bottle of wine and a flask of oil, and filled a bag with parched grain and a cake of dried fruit and fine bread; and she wrapped up all her vessels and gave them to her to carry.

⁶Then they went out to the city gate of Beth''uli'a, and found Uzzi'ah standing there with the elders of the city, Chabris and Charmis. ⁷When they saw her, and noted how her face was altered and her clothing changed, they greatly admired her beauty, and said to her, ⁸“May the God of our fathers grant you favor and fulfil your plans, that the people of Israel may glory and Jerusalem may be exalted.” And she worshiped God.

⁹Then she said to them, “Order the gate of the city to be opened for me, and I will go out and accomplish the things about which you spoke with me.” So they ordered the young men to open the gate for her, as she had said. ¹⁰When they had done this, Judith went out, she and her maid with her; and the men of the city watched her until she had gone down the mountain and passed through the valley and they could no longer see her.

¹¹The women^q went straight on through the valley; and an Assyrian patrol met her ¹²and took her into custody, and asked her, “To what people do you belong, and where are you coming from, and where are you going?” She replied, “I am a daughter of the Hebrews, but I am fleeing from them, for they are about to be handed over to you to be devoured. ¹³I am on my way to the presence of Hol''ofer'nes the commander of your army, to give him a true report; and I will show him a way by which he can go and capture all the hill country without losing one of his men, captured or slain.”

¹⁴When the men heard her words, and observed her face—she was in their eyes marvelously beautiful—they said to her, ¹⁵“You have saved your life by hurrying down to the presence of our lord. Go at once to his tent; some of us will escort you and hand you over to him. ¹⁶And when you stand before him, do not be afraid in your heart, but tell him just what you have said, and he will treat you well.”

¹⁷They chose from their number a hundred men to accompany her and her maid, and they brought them to the tent of Hol''ofer'nes. ¹⁸There was great excitement in the whole camp, for her arrival was reported from tent to tent, and they came and stood around her as she waited outside the tent of Hol''ofer'nes while they told him about her. ¹⁹And they marveled at her beauty, and admired the Israelites, judging them by her, and every one said to his neighbor, “Who can despise these people, who have women like this among them? Surely not a man of them had better be left alive, for if we let them go they will be able to ensnare the whole world!”

²⁰Then Hol''ofer'nes’ companions and all his servants came out and led her into the tent. ²¹Hol''ofer'nes was resting on his bed, under a canopy which was woven with purple and gold and emeralds and precious stones. ²²When they told him of her he came forward to the front of the tent, with silver lamps carried before him. ²³And when Judith came into the presence of Hol''ofer'nes^r and his servants, they all marveled at the beauty of her face; and she prostrated herself and made obeisance to him, and his slaves raised her up.

11Then Hol''ofer'nes said to her, “Take courage, woman, and do not be afraid in your heart, for I have never hurt any one who chose to serve Nebuchadnez'zar, the king of all the earth. ²And even now, if your people who live in the hill country had not slighted me, I would never have lifted my spear against them; but they have brought all this on themselves. ³And now tell me why you have fled from them and have come over to us—since you have come to safety. ⁴Have courage; you will live, tonight and from now on. No one will hurt you, but all will treat you well, as they do the servants of my lord King Nebuchadnez'zar.”

⁵Judith replied to him, “Accept the words of your servant, and let your maidservant speak in your presence, and I will tell nothing false to my lord this night. ⁶And if you follow out the words of your maidservant, God will accomplish something through you, and my lord will not fail to achieve his purposes. ⁷Nebuchadnez'zar the king of the whole earth lives, and as his power endures, who had sent you to direct every living soul, not only do men serve him because of you, but also the beasts of the field and the cattle and the birds of the air will live by your power under Nebuchadnezzar and all his house. ⁸For we have heard of your wisdom and skill, and it is reported throughout the whole world that you are the one good man in the whole kingdom, thoroughly informed and marvelous in military strategy.

⁹“Now as for the things A'chior said in your council, we have heard his words, for the men of Beth''uli'a spared him and he told them all he had said to you. ¹⁰Therefore, my lord and master, do not disregard what he said, but keep it in your mind, for it is true: our nation cannot be punished, nor can the sword prevail against them, unless they sin against their God.

¹¹“And now, in order that my lord may not be defeated and his purpose frustrated, death will fall upon them, for a sin has overtaken them by which they are about to provoke their God to anger when they do what is wrong. ¹²Since their food supply is exhausted and their water has almost given out, they have planned to kill their cattle and have determined to use all that God by his laws has forbidden them to eat. ¹³They have decided to consume the first fruits of the grain and the tithes of the wine and oil, which they had consecrated and set aside for the priests who minister in the presence of our God at Jerusalem—although it is not lawful for any of the people so much as to touch these things with their hands. ¹⁴They have sent men to Jerusalem, because even the people living there have been doing this, to bring back to them permission from the senate. ¹⁵When the word reaches them and they proceed to do this, on that day they will be handed over to you to be destroyed.

¹⁶“Therefore, when I, your servant, learned all this, I fled from them; and God has sent me to accomplish with you things that will astonish the whole world, as many as shall hear about them. ¹⁷For your servant is religious, and serves the God of heaven day and night; therefore, my lord, I will remain with you, and every night your servant will go out into the valley, and I will pray to God and he will tell me when they have committed their sins. ¹⁸And I will come and tell you, and then you shall go out with your whole army, and not one of them will withstand you. ¹⁹Then I will lead you through the middle of Jude'a, till you come to Jerusalem; and I will set your throne^s in the midst of it; and you will lead them like sheep that have no shepherd, and not a dog will so much as open its mouth to growl at you. For this has been told me, by my foreknowledge; it was announced to me, and I was sent to tell you.”

²⁰Her words pleased Hol''ofer'nes and all his servants, and they marveled at her wisdom and said, ²¹“There is not such a woman from one end of the earth to the other, either for beauty of face or wisdom of speech!” ²²And Hol''ofer'nes said to her, “God has done well to send you before the people, to lend strength to our hands and to bring destruction upon those who have slighted my lord. ²³You are not only beautiful in appearance, but wise in speech; and if you do as you have said, your God shall be my God, and you shall live in the house of King Nebuchadnez'zar and be renowned throughout the whole world.”

⁵Then the servants of Hol''ofer'nes brought her into the tent, and she slept until midnight. Along toward the morning watch she arose ⁶and sent to Hol''ofer'nes and said, “Let my lord now command that your servant be permitted to go out and pray.” ⁷So Hol''ofer'nes commanded his guards not to hinder her. And she remained in the camp for three days, and went out each night to the valley of Beth''uli'a, and bathed at the spring in the camp.^{t 8}When she came up from the spring she prayed the Lord God of Israel to direct her way for the raising up of her people. ⁹So she returned clean and stayed in the tent until she ate her food toward evening.

¹⁰On the fourth day Hol''ofer'nes held a banquet for his slaves only, and did not invite any of his officers. ¹¹And he said to Bago'as, the eunuch who had charge of all his personal affairs, “Go now and persuade the Hebrew woman who is in your care to join us and eat and drink with us. ¹²For it will be a disgrace if we let such a woman go without enjoying her company, for if we do not embrace her she will laugh at us.” ¹³So Bago'as went out from the presence of Hol''ofer'nes, and approached her and said, “This beautiful maidservant will please come to my lord and be honored in his presence, and drink wine and be merry with us, and become today like one of the daughters of the Assyrians who serve in the house of Nebuchadnez'zar.” ¹⁴And Judith said, “Who am I, to refuse my lord? Surely whatever pleases him I will do at once, and it will be a joy to me until the day of my death!” ¹⁵So she got up and arrayed herself in all her woman’s finery, and her maid went and spread on the ground for her before Hol''ofer'nes the soft fleeces which she had received from Bago'as for her daily use, so that she might recline on them when she ate.

¹⁶Then Judith came in and lay down, and Hol''ofer'nes’ heart was ravished with her and he was moved with great desire to possess her; for he had been waiting for an opportunity to deceive her, ever since the day he first saw her. ¹⁷So Hol''ofer'nes said to her, “Drink now, and be merry with us!” ¹⁸Judith said, “I will drink now, my lord, because my life means more to me today than in all the days since I was born.” ¹⁹Then she took and ate and drank before him what her maid had prepared. ²⁰And Hol''ofer'nes was greatly pleased with her, and drank a great quantity of wine, much more than he had ever drunk in any one day since he was born.

³Now Judith had told her maid to stand outside the bedchamber and to wait for her to come out, as she did every day; for she said she would be going out for her prayers. And she had said the same thing to Bago'as. ⁴So every one went out, and no one, either small or great, was left in the bedchamber. Then Judith, standing beside his bed, said in her heart, “O Lord God of all might, look in this hour upon the work of my hands for the exaltation of Jerusalem. ⁵For now is the time to help your inheritance, and to carry out my undertaking for the destruction of the enemies who have risen up against us.”

⁶She went up to the post at the end of the bed, above Hol''ofer'nes’ head, and took down his sword that hung there. ⁷She came close to his bed and took hold of the hair of his head, and said, “Give me strength this day, O Lord God of Israel!” ⁸And she struck his neck twice with all her might, and severed his head from his body. ⁹Then she tumbled his body off the bed and pulled down the canopy from the posts; after a moment she went out, and gave Hol''ofer'nes’ head to her maid, ¹⁰who placed it in her food bag.

Then the two of them went out together, as they were accustomed to go for prayer; and they passed through the camp and circled around the valley and went up the mountain to Beth''uli'a and came to its gates. ¹¹Judith called out from afar to the watchmen at the gates, “Open, open the gate! God, our God, is still with us, to show his power in Israel, and his strength against our enemies, even as he has done this day!”

¹²When the men of her city heard her voice, they hurried down to the city gate and called together the elders of the city. ¹³They all ran together, both small and great, for it was unbelievable that she had returned; they opened the gate and admitted them, and they kindled a fire for light, and gathered around them. ¹⁴Then she said to them with a loud voice, “Praise God, O praise him! Praise God, who has not withdrawn his mercy from the house of Israel, but has destroyed our enemies by my hand this very night!”

¹⁵Then she took the head out of the bag and showed it to them, and said, “See, here is the head of Hol''ofer'nes, the commander of the Assyrian army, and here is the canopy beneath which he lay in his drunken stupor. The Lord has struck him down by the hand of a woman. ¹⁶As the Lord lives, who has protected me in the way I went, it was my face that tricked him to his destruction, and yet he committed no act of sin with me, to defile and shame me.”

¹⁷All the people were greatly astonished, and bowed down and worshiped God, and said with one accord, “Blessed are you, our God, who have brought into contempt this day the enemies of your people.”

¹⁸And Uzzi'ah said to her, “O daughter, you are blessed by the Most High God above all women on earth; and blessed be the Lord God, who created the heavens and the earth, who has guided you to strike the head of the leader of our enemies. ¹⁹Your hope will never depart from the hearts of men, as they remember the power of God. ²⁰May God grant this to be a perpetual honor to you, and may he visit you with blessings, because you did not spare your own life when our nation was brought low, but have avenged our ruin, walking in the straight path before our God.” And all the people said, “So be it, so be it!”*

⁶So they summoned A'chior from the house of Uzzi'ah. And when he came and saw the head of Hol''ofer'nes in the hand of one of the men at the gathering of the people, he fell down on his face and his spirit failed him. ⁷And when they raised him up he fell at Judith’s feet, and knelt before her, and said, “Blessed are you in every tent of Judah! In every nation those who hear your name will be alarmed. ⁸Now tell me what you have done during these days.”

Then Judith described to him in the presence of the people all that she had done, from the day she left until the moment of her speaking to them. ⁹And when she had finished, the people raised a great shout and made a joyful noise in their city. ¹⁰And when A'chior saw all that the God of Israel had done, he believed firmly in God, and was circumcised, and joined the house of Israel, remaining so to this day.

¹¹As soon as it was dawn they hung the head of Hol''ofer'nes on the wall, and every man took his weapons, and they went out in companies to the passes in the mountains. ¹²And when the Assyrians saw them they sent word to their commanders, and they went to the generals and the captains and to all their officers. ¹³So they came to Hol''ofer'nes’ tent and said to the steward in charge of all his personal affairs, “Wake up our lord, for the slaves have been so bold as to come down against us to give battle in order to be destroyed completely.”

¹⁴So Bago'as went in and knocked at the door of the tent, for he supposed that he was sleeping with Judith. ¹⁵But when no one answered, he opened it and went into the bedchamber and found him thrown down on the platform dead, with his head cut off and missing. ¹⁶And he cried out with a loud voice and wept and groaned and shouted, and tore his garments. ¹⁷Then he went to the tent where Judith had stayed, and when he did not find her he rushed out to the people and shouted, ¹⁸“The slaves have tricked us! One Hebrew woman has brought disgrace upon the house of King Nebuchadnez'zar! For look, here is Hol''ofer'nes lying on the ground, and his head is not on him!”

¹⁹When the leaders of the Assyrian army heard this, they tore their tunics and were greatly dismayed, and their loud cries and shouts arose in the midst of the camp.

15When the men in the tents heard it, they were amazed at what had happened. ²Fear and trembling came over them, so that they did not wait for one another, but with one impulse all rushed out and fled by every path across the plain and through the hill country. ³Those who had camped in the hills around Beth''uli'a also took to flight. Then the men of Israel, every one that was a soldier, rushed out upon them. ⁴And Uzz'iah sent men to Bet''omastha'im and Bebai and Choba and Ko'la, and to all the frontiers of Israel, to tell what had taken place and to urge all to rush out upon their enemies to destroy them. ⁵And when the Israelites heard it, with one accord they fell upon the enemy,^u and cut them down as far as Cho'ba. Those in Jerusalem and all the hill country also came, for they were told what had happened in the camp of the enemy; and those in Gilead and in Galilee outflanked them with great slaughter, even beyond Damascus and its borders. ⁶The rest of the people of Beth''uli'a fell upon the Assyrian camp and plundered it, and were greatly enriched. ⁷And the Israelites, when they returned from the slaughter, took possession of what remained, and the villages and towns in the hill country and in the plain got a great amount of booty, for there was a vast quantity of it.

⁸Then Jo'akim the high priest, and the senate of the people of Israel who lived at Jerusalem, came to witness the good things which the Lord had done for Israel, and to see Judith and to greet her. ⁹And when they met her they all blessed her with one accord and said to her, “You are the exaltation of Jerusalem,* you are the great glory of Israel, you are the great pride of our nation! ¹⁰You have done all this singlehanded; you have done great good to Israel, and God is well pleased with it. May the Almighty Lord bless you for ever!” And all the people said, “So be it!”

¹¹So all the people plundered the camp for thirty days. They gave Judith the tent of Hol''ofer'nes and all his silver dishes and his beds and his bowls and all his furniture; and she took them and loaded her mule and hitched up her carts and piled the things on them.

¹²Then all the women of Israel gathered to see her, and blessed her, and some of them performed a dance for her; and she took branches in her hands and gave them to the women who were with her; ¹³and they crowned themselves with olive wreaths, she and those who were with her; and she went before all the people in the dance, leading all the women, while all the men of Israel followed, bearing their arms and wearing garlands and with songs on their lips.

²¹After this every one returned home to his own inheritance, and Judith went to Beth''uli'a, and remained on her estate, and was honored in her time throughout the whole country. ²²Many desired to marry her, but she remained a widow all the days of her life after Manas'seh her husband died and was gathered to his people. ²³She became more and more famous, and grew old in her husband’s house, until she was one hundred and five years old. She set her maid free. She died in Beth''uli'a, and they buried her in the cave of her husband Manas'seh, ²⁴and the house of Israel mourned for her seven days. Before she died she distributed her property to all those who were next of kin to her husband Manas'seh, and to her own nearest kindred. ²⁵And no one ever again spread terror among the people of Israel in the days of Judith, or for a long time after her death.*