Judith 4

Israel Fortifies the Passes and Prays

1The Israelites who lived in Judea got word of everything Holofernes had done to the nations — Holofernes, commander in chief of Nebuchadnezzar king of the Assyrians — and how he had looted every one of their sanctuaries and given them over to annihilation. 2Terror upon terror took hold of them before his face, and over Jerusalem and the temple of their God, the Lord, they were thrown into turmoil, 3because they had only recently come up from the exile; only lately had all the people of Judea been gathered again, and the vessels, the altar, and the house been hallowed after their defilement. 4So they sent word into every district of Samaria, and to Kona, Beth-horon, Belmain, and Jericho, and to Choba, Aesora, and the valley of Salem. 5They took the summits of every high hill in advance, walled the villages on them, and stored up food against a war, for their fields had just been harvested. 6And Joakim, the high priest, who was in Jerusalem in those days, wrote to the people of Bethulia and Betomesthaim — which faces Esdraelon, across from the plain near Dothan — 7telling them to hold the ascents into the hill country, since through them ran the way into Judea, and it would be no hard thing to stop men coming up, the approach being narrow, two men abreast at the most. 8The Israelites did just what Joakim the high priest had laid down for them, together with the council of elders of the whole people of Israel, which sat in Jerusalem. 9Every man of Israel called out to God with great insistence, and with great insistence they humbled their souls: 10they and their wives, their little ones, their livestock, and every resident alien, hired hand, and purchased slave among them, all with sackcloth around their waists. 11Every man of Israel, and the women, and the children, all who lived in Jerusalem, fell face down in front of the temple, covered their heads with ashes, and stretched out their sackcloth in the Lord’s presence. 12They wrapped the altar in sackcloth as well, and cried out to the God of Israel with one heart and without pause: that he would not give up their little ones to be carried off, their wives to be taken as spoil, the towns of their inheritance to ruin, or the holy things to profanation and mockery, a thing for the nations to gloat over. 13The Lord heard their voice and saw how hard they were pressed. Day after day the people went on fasting throughout Judea and in Jerusalem, in front of the holy place of the Lord Almighty. 14Joakim the high priest, and all who stand in the Lord’s presence as priests, and those who minister to the Lord, went with sackcloth bound at their waists as they offered the perpetual burnt offering and the votive and freewill gifts of the people. 15Ashes lay on their turbans, and they cried out to the Lord with all their strength, that he would look on the whole house of Israel for good.