For what is difficult about men who have been shown to be ignorant being now refuted by a man of like passions? And what is strange, according to your own sophist, in growing old while always learning everything? However, let Homer be not only later than the Trojan War, but let him be supposed to have lived at that very time of the war, and even to have campaigned with Agamemnon's men. and, if anyone wishes, even before the invention of the letters of the alphabet. For the aforementioned Moses will be shown to be older than the capture of Troy itself by very many years, and far more ancient than the founding of Ilium and of Tros and Dardanus. And for the sake of proof, I will use as witnesses Chaldeans, Phoenicians, Egyptians. And why should I say more? For he who professes to persuade ought to make his narratives of the events for his hearers more concise than *** Berosus, a Babylonian man, a priest of their Belus, who lived in the time of Alexander, having arranged the history of the Chaldeans in three books for Antiochus, the third after him, and having set forth the accounts of the kings, narrates that one of them was named Nebuchadnezzar, who campaigned against the Phoenicians and the Jews. These things we know through our own prophets were proclaimed to have happened much later than the age of Moses, but seventy years before the Persian dominion. And Berosus is a most competent man; and proof of this is that Juba, writing *On the Assyrians*, says that he learned the history from Berosus; and he has two books *On the Assyrians*. After the Chaldeans, the Phoenician accounts are as follows. There were among them three men, Theodotus, Hypsicrates, Mochus; Laetus, who also diligently treated the lives of the philosophers, translated their books into the Greek language. Indeed, in the histories of the aforementioned it is shown in the time of which of the kings the abduction of Europa took place, and the arrival of Menelaus in Phoenicia, and the events concerning Hiram, who gave his own daughter to Solomon the king of the Jews for marriage and presented timber of all sorts of wood for the construction of the temple. And Menander of Pergamum also made a record of the same things. The time of Hiram is somewhere near the time of the Trojan War; but Solomon, who was contemporary with Hiram, is much later than the age of Moses. The Egyptians have accurate records of dates, and the interpreter of their writings is Ptolemy, not the king, but a priest of Mendes. This man, setting forth the deeds of the kings, says that the journey of the Jews out of Egypt to the places they wished, with Moses leading, happened in the time of Amosis, king of Egypt. And he says thus: Amosis lived in the time of king Inachus. And after him Apion the grammarian, a most esteemed man, in the fourth of his *Aegyptiaca* (and he has five writings), says many other things, but also that Amosis razed Auaris, having lived in the time of Inachus the Argive, as Ptolemy of Mendes wrote in his *Chronicles*.

τί γὰρ χαλεπὸν ἀνθρώπους πεφηνότας ἀμαθεῖς ὑπὸ ἀνθρώπου νῦν ὁμοιοπαθοῦς συνελέγχεσθαι; τί δὲ καὶ ἄτοπον κατὰ τὸν οἰκεῖον ὑμῖν σοφιστὴν γηράσκειν ἀεὶ πάντα διδασκομένους; Πλὴν Ὅμηρος ἔστω μὴ μόνον ὕστερος τῶν Ἰλιακῶν, ἀλλὰ κατ' ἐκεῖνον αὐτὸν ὑπειλήφθω τὸν τοῦ πολέμου καιρόν, ἔτι δὲ καὶ τοῖς περὶ τὸν Ἀγαμέμνονα συνεστρατεῦσθαι. καί, εἰ βούλεταί τις, πρὶν καὶ τῶν στοιχείων γεγονέναι τὴν εὕρεσιν. φανήσεται γὰρ ὁ προειρημένος Μωυσῆς αὐτῆς μὲν τῆς Ἰλιακῆς ἁλώσεως πρεσβύτερος πάνυ πολλοῖς ἔτεσι, τῆς δὲ Ἰλίου κτίσεως καὶ τοῦ Τρωὸς καὶ ∆αρδάνου λίαν ἀρχαιό τερος. ἀποδείξεως δὲ ἕνεκεν μάρτυσι χρήσομαι Χαλδαίοις Φοί νιξιν Aἰγυπτίοις. καὶ τί μοι λέγειν πλείονα; χρὴ γὰρ τὸν πείθειν ἐπαγγελλόμενον συντομωτέρας ποιεῖσθαι τὰς περὶ τῶν πραγμά των πρὸς τοὺς ἀκούοντας διηγήσεις ἢ *** Βηρωσσὸς ἀνὴρ Βαβυλώνιος, ἱερεὺς τοῦ παρ' αὐτοῖς Βήλου, κατ' Ἀλέξανδρον γεγονὼς Ἀντιόχῳ τῷ μετ' αὐτὸν τρίτῳ τὴν Χαλδαίων ἱστο ρίαν ἐν τρισὶ βιβλίοις κατατάξας καὶ τὰ περὶ τῶν βασιλέων ἐκθέ μενος, ἀφηγεῖταί τινος αὐτῶν ὄνομα Ναβουχοδονόσορ, τοῦ στρα τεύσαντος ἐπὶ Φοίνικας καὶ Ἰουδαίους· ἅτινα διὰ τῶν καθ' ἡμᾶς προφητῶν ἴσμεν κεκηρυγμένα γεγονότα μὲν πολὺ τῆς Μωυσέως ἡλικίας κατώτερα, πρὸ δὲ τῆς Περσῶν ἡγεμονίας ἔτεσιν ἑβδομή κοντα. Βηρωσσὸς δέ ἐστιν ἀνὴρ ἱκανώτατος· καὶ τούτου τεκμήριον, Ἰόβας Περὶ Ἀσσυρίων γράφων παρὰ Βηρωσσοῦ φησι μεμαθηκέναι τὴν ἱστορίαν· εἰσὶ δὲ αὐτῷ βίβλοι Περὶ Ἀσσυρίων δύο. Μετὰ δὲ τοὺς Χαλδαίους τὰ Φοινίκων οὕτως ἔχει. γεγόνασι παρ' αὐτοῖς ἄνδρες τρεῖς, Θεόδοτος Ὑψικράτης Μῶχος· τούτων τὰς βίβλους εἰς Ἑλληνίδα κατέταξεν φωνὴν Λαῖτος ὁ καὶ τοὺς βίους τῶν φιλοσόφων ἐπ' ἀκριβὲς πραγμα τευσάμενος. ἐν δὴ ταῖς τῶν προειρημένων ἱστορίαις δηλοῦται κατὰ τίνα τῶν βασιλέων Eὐρώπης ἁρπαγὴ γέγονεν Μενελάου τε εἰς τὴν Φοινίκην ἄφιξις καὶ τὰ περὶ Χείραμον, ὅστις Σολο μῶνι τῷ Ἰουδαίων βασιλεῖ πρὸς γάμον δοὺς τὴν ἑαυτοῦ θυγα τέρα καὶ ξύλων παντοδαπῶν ὕλην εἰς τὴν τοῦ ναοῦ κατα σκευὴν ἐδωρήσατο. καὶ Μένανδρος δὲ ὁ Περγαμηνὸς περὶ τῶν αὐτῶν τὴν ἀναγραφὴν ἐποιήσατο. τοῦ δὲ Χειράμου ὁ χρόνος ἤδη που τοῖς Ἰλιακοῖς ἐγγίζει· Σολομὼν δὲ ὁ κατὰ Χείραμον πολὺ κατώτερός ἐστι τῆς Μωυσέως ἡλικίας. Aἰγυπτίων δέ εἰσιν ἀκριβεῖς χρόνων ἀναγραφαί, καὶ τῶν κατ' αὐτοὺς γραμμάτων ἑρμηνεύς ἐστι Πτολεμαῖος, οὐχ ὁ βασιλεύς, ἱερεὺς δὲ Μένδητος. οὗτος τὰς τῶν βασιλέων πράξεις ἐκτιθέμενος κατ' Ἄμωσιν Aἰγύπτου βασιλέα γεγονέναι Ἰουδαίοις φησὶ τὴν ἐξ Aἰγύπτου πορείαν εἰς ἅπερ ἤθελον χωρία, Μωυσέως ἡγουμένου. λέγει δὲ οὕτως· ὁ δὲ Ἄμωσις ἐγέ νετο κατ' Ἴναχον βασιλέα. μετὰ δὲ τοῦτον Ἀπίων ὁ γραμ ματικὸς ἀνὴρ δοκιμώτατος, ἐν τῇ τετάρτῃ τῶν Aἰγυπτιακῶν (πέντε δέ εἰσιν αὐτῷ γραφαί) πολλὰ μὲν καὶ ἄλλα, φησὶ δὲ καὶ ὅτι κατέσκαψε τὴν Ἀουαρίαν Ἄμωσις κατὰ τὸν Ἀργεῖον γενό μενος Ἴναχον, ὡς ἐν τοῖς Χρόνοις ἀνέγραψεν ὁ Μενδήσιος Πτολε