Then the king, boastful of his present good fortune … : The connector Then may be omitted. Contemporary English Version begins this verse well with “King Philopator was….” Boastful of his present good fortune means the king was pleased with the way things were going for him. Contemporary English Version says “was very proud of what he was accomplishing,” and Anderson has “priding himself on his present prosperity.” Either of these models is adequate.

And not considering the might of the supreme God may be rendered “and not considering the power of God Most High [or, All-Powerful].” For the supreme God, see the comments on 3 Macc 1.9.

But assuming that he would persevere constantly in his same purpose indicates that the king thought he could go on indefinitely with the same policies—in particular, his policies against the Jews.

Wrote this letter against them: The pronoun them refers to the Jews, which should be made explicit at the beginning of this section (see the model below).

Here is an alternative model for this verse:

• King Philopator was proud of his success [or, what he was accomplishing], and knew of no reason why he could not continue persecuting the Jews. (He was not counting on the power of God Most High.) He wrote the following letter against the Jews:….

Verses 12-29 are the content of the king’s letter. Translators may want to consider some way of setting this material apart from the rest of the book, so that the reader can see on the page that this is a special unit of material. Contemporary English Version does this by indenting the entire letter. There is another such letter in 3 Macc 7.1-9.

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on 3-4 Maccabees. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2018. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.