9. The ancient men sat in the streets, they communed all of them together of good things, and the young men put on glorious and warlike apparel.
10. He provided food for the cities, and furnished them with all manner of munition, until the name of his glory was named to the end of the earth.
11. He made peace in the land, and Israel rejoiced with great joy:
12. and they sat each man under his vine and his fig tree, and there was none to make them afraid:
13. and there ceased in the land any that fought against them: and the kings were discomfited in those days.
14. And he strengthened all those of his people that were brought low: the law he searched out, and every lawless and wicked person he took away.
15. He glorified the sanctuary, and the vessels of the temple he multiplied.
16. And it was heard at Rome that Jonathan was dead, and even to Sparta, and they were exceeding sorry.
17. But as soon as they heard that his brother Simon was made high priest in his stead, and ruled the country, and the cities therein,
18. they wrote to him on tables of brass, to renew with him the friendship and the confederacy which they had confirmed with Judas and Jonathan his brethren;
19. and they were read before the congregation at Jerusalem.
20. And this is the copy of the letters which the Spartans sent: The rulers of the Spartans, and the city, to Simon the high priest, and to the elders, and the priests, and the residue of the people of the Jews, our brethren, greeting:
21. The ambassadors that were sent to our people made report to us of your glory and honor: and we were glad for their coming,
22. and we did register the things that were spoken by them in the public records after this manner: Numenius son of Antiochus, and Antipater son of Jason, the Jews’ ambassadors, came to us to renew the friendship they had with us.
23. And it pleased the people to entertain the men honorably, and to put the copy of their words in the public records, to the end that the people of the Spartans might have a memorial thereof: moreover they wrote a copy of these things to Simon the high priest.
24. After this Simon sent Numenius to Rome with a great shield of gold of a thousand pound weight, in order to confirm the confederacy with them.
25. But when the people heard these things, they said, What thanks shall we give to Simon and his sons?
26. for he and his brethren and the house of his father have made themselves strong, and have chased away in fight the enemies of Israel from them, and confirmed liberty to Israel.
27. And they wrote on tables of brass, and set them upon pillars in mount Sion: and this is the copy of the writing: On the eighteenth day of Elul, in the hundred and seventy and second year, and this is the third year of Simon the high priest,
28. in Asaramel, in a great congregation of priests and people and princes of the nation, and of the elders of the country, was it notified to us: