Exhortation to Martyrdom 26

Last of all Antiochus took the youngest into his hands, and being persuaded that he too was brother to those who counted such great pains as nothing and had the same resolve as they, he used other approaches, thinking that he would be persuaded by entreaties and by promises confirmed with oaths that he would make him rich and “envied” “if he turned from the ways of his fathers,” and would enroll him among his Friends and entrust him with royal “offices.” But when he achieved nothing at all, since the young man paid no attention to what was said, as foreign to his own resolve, “he called the mother and urged her to become the boy's counselor for his safety.” She, making a show of persuading her son to what the king wished, and mocking the tyrant, spoke many words to her son about endurance, so that the young man did not wait for the punishment that was being brought but went ahead and called out to the executioners, saying: “Why do you delay and hesitate? For we listen to the law given by God; one must not accept a command that opposes the divine words.” And even like a king pronouncing sentence on those tried before him, he pronounced judgment against the tyrant, judging him rather than being judged; and he said that, having raised his hands against the heavenly children, he would not escape “the judgment of the almighty, all-seeing God.”