But whoever shelters any of the Jews, old people or children or even infants, will be tortured to death with the most hateful torments, together with his family: To make sure his orders are carried out, the king threatens his own people. He will torture to death anyone who tries to help a single Jew, even a baby. Not only will that person die, but his whole family will suffer torture along with him. It will be better to begin this verse with the conjunction “If” by saying “If any Egyptian hides a Jew….” Will be tortured to death with the most hateful torments may be rendered “will die by the most cruel tortures,” “we will kill them using the most cruel tortures,” or even “we will torture them as cruelly as we can until they die.” Here are alternative models for this verse:

• If any Egyptian hides a Jew, even an old person, a child or a baby, that Egyptian will die by the most cruel torture, along with his whole family.

• … we will torture that Egyptian and his family as cruelly as we can until they die.

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.