1. Judas Maccabaeus and his friends went secretly from village to village until they had gathered a force of about 6,000 Jewish men who had remained faithful to their religion.
2. They begged the Lord to help his people, now trampled under foot by all nations, to take pity on the Temple, now defiled by pagans,
3. and to have mercy on Jerusalem, now destroyed and almost levelled to the ground.
4. They also asked the Lord to show his hatred of evil by taking revenge on those who were murdering his people, mercilessly slaughtering innocent children, and saying evil things against the Lord.