3 Maccabees 5:40-42

Revised Standard Version

⁴⁰ “O king, how long will you try us, as though we are idiots, ordering now for a third time that they be destroyed, and again revoking your decree in the matter?^{[a] 41} As a result the city is in a tumult because of its expectation; it is crowded with masses of people, and also in constant danger of being plundered.” ⁴² Upon this the king, a Phalaris in everything and filled with madness, took no account of the changes of mind which had come about within him for the protection of the Jews, and he firmly swore an irrevocable oath that he would send them to death^[b] without delay, mangled by the knees and feet of the beasts,