because we have not gods in common with other nations, if
our fathers were so easily prevailed upon to have Apollo
come to them, and thought they saw him walking upon the
earth, and the stars with him? for certainly those who have so
many festivals, wherein they light lamps, must yet, at this
rate, have never seen a candlestick! But still it seems that
while Zabidus took his journey over the country, where were
so many ten thousands of people, nobody met him. He also,
it seems, even in a time of war, found the walls of Jerusalem
destitute of guards. I omit the rest. Now the doors of the holy
house were seventy (13) cubits high, and twenty cubits broad;
they were all plated over with gold, and almost of solid gold
itself, and there were no fewer than twenty (14) men required
to shut them every day; nor was it lawful ever to leave them
open, though it seems this lamp-bearer of ours opened them
easily, or thought he opened them, as he thought he had the
ass's head in his hand. Whether, therefore, he returned it to
us again, or whether Apion took it, and brought it into the
temple again, that Antiochus might find it, and afford a
handle for a second fable of Apion's, is uncertain.

11. Apion also tells a false story, when he mentions an oath
of ours, as if we "swore by God, the Maker of the heaven,
and earth, and sea, to bear no good will to any foreigner, and
particularly to none of the Greeks." Now this liar ought to
have said directly that" we would bear no good-will to any
foreigner, and particularly to none of the Egyptians." For
then his story about the oath would have squared with the
rest of his original forgeries, in case our forefathers had
been