3 Maccabees 5:31-33

New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised

³¹ ‘If your parents or children were present, I would have prepared them to be a rich feast for the savage animals instead of the Jews, who give me no ground for complaint and have exhibited to an extraordinary degree a full and firm loyalty to my ancestors. ³² In fact you would have been deprived of life instead of these, if it were not for an affection arising from our nurture in common and your usefulness.’ ³³ So Hermon suffered an unexpected and dangerous threat, and his eyes wavered and his face fell.