3 Maccabees 7:2-4

Revised Standard Version

² We ourselves and our children are faring well, the great God guiding our affairs according to our desire. ³ Certain of our friends, frequently urging us with malicious intent, persuaded us to gather together the Jews of the kingdom in a body and to punish them with barbarous penalties as traitors; ⁴ for they declared that our government would never be firmly established until this was accomplished, because of the ill-will which these people had toward all nations.