2 Maccabees 4:46-48

New Catholic Bible

⁴⁶ Ptolemy therefore took the king aside into a colonnade, as though for a breath of air, and persuaded him to change his mind. ⁴⁷ Menelaus, the cause of all the trouble, the king acquitted of all the charges against him. But he condemned to death those unfortunate men who had brought forward the accusations and who would have been adjudged as innocent and set free even if they had pleaded their case before the Scythians.^{[a] 48} Therefore, those who had pleaded the cause of the city, the people, and the sacred vessels quickly incurred an unjust punishment.