1In the eighteenth year, on the twenty-second day of the first month, a word came in the house of Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Assyrians, to take vengeance on all the earth, just as he had spoken.
2He summoned all his attendants and all his nobles, and he laid before them the secret of his counsel, and from his own mouth he detailed the complete evil plan for the earth.
3And they decreed to destroy all flesh that had not obeyed the word of his mouth.
4When he had concluded his council, Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Assyrians, summoned Holofernes, the commander-in-chief of his army and his second-in-command, and said to him,
5“Thus says the great king, the lord of all the earth: Behold, you shall go forth from my presence and take with you men who trust in their own strength—120,000 foot soldiers and a host of horses with 12,000 cavalry.
6And you shall go out against all the western lands, because they disobeyed the command of my mouth.
7And you will tell them to prepare earth and water, because I will march out in my wrath against them. I will cover the whole face of the earth with the feet of my army, and I will give them over to my soldiers for plunder.
8Their wounded will fill their ravines and wadis, and every torrent will be choked and overflow with their dead.
9And I will lead their captives to the ends of all the earth.
10But as for you, go out and seize all their territory for me beforehand. They will surrender themselves to you, and you shall keep them for me until the day of their punishment.
11But as for the disobedient, your eye shall not spare them; you are to give them over to slaughter and plunder in all your land.
12For as I live, and by the power of my kingdom, I have spoken these things and I will accomplish them by my own hand.
13And you shall not transgress a single one of the commands of your lord, but you shall carry them out completely, just as I have commanded you, and you shall not delay in doing them.”
14Then Holofernes went out from the presence of his lord and summoned all the rulers, generals, and officers of the Assyrian army.
15And he mustered choice men for battle, as his lord had commanded him: 120,000 men, and 12,000 mounted archers.
16He arranged them in the manner that a great army is arrayed for war.
17He took camels, donkeys, and mules for their baggage, a very great number, and sheep, oxen, and goats for their provisions, a numberless quantity.
18He also took abundant rations for every man, and a very great amount of gold and silver from the king’s house.
19And he and all his army set out on the campaign to go ahead of King Nebuchadnezzar and to cover the whole face of the earth to the west with their chariots, their cavalry, and their choice foot soldiers.
20A great mixed multitude, like locusts, went out with them, and like the sand of the earth; for they were innumerable because of their great number.
21They marched from Nineveh a three days’ journey toward the plain of Bectileth, and they encamped beyond Bectileth near the mountain that is to the north of Upper Cilicia.
22He took his whole army—his foot soldiers, cavalry, and chariots—and departed from there into the hill country.
23He cut through Put and Lud, and plundered all the sons of Rassis and the sons of Ishmael who lived opposite the wilderness, south of the land of the Chaldeans.
24Then he crossed the Euphrates, went through Mesopotamia, and razed all the fortified cities along the wadi Abrona, until he came to the sea.
25He seized the territory of Cilicia, cut down all who resisted him, and came to the borders of Japheth, which are to the south, opposite Arabia.
26He surrounded all the sons of Midian, burned their tents, and plundered their sheepfolds.
27Then he went down into the plain of Damascus during the time of the wheat harvest, burned all their fields, and gave their flocks and herds to destruction. He plundered their cities, laid waste their plains, and struck down all their young men with the edge of the sword.
28And fear and trembling of him fell upon the inhabitants of the seacoast—those in Sidon and Tyre, the inhabitants of Sur and Ocina, and all the inhabitants of Jamnia. And the inhabitants of Azotus and Ascalon feared him greatly.
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