their land from my hands, because the Lord will deliver Jerusalem from my hand? But according to the oracles which the Assyrian received from the soothsayers, he uttered such words, both against the nations and against Jerusalem; and with God's permission the Assyrian succeeded in the oracles against the nations, but against Jerusalem he failed in the oracles because God did not permit it. How then did the Seven against Thebes fail in their divination to destroy the city utterly? For the failure of the divination becomes a proof of the weakness of the god, who through the divination foretold things that did not come to pass. And if, according to the unerring voice of the Savior, not a sparrow will fall to the ground without God, much more would a whole nation or a whole city not perish unless God permitted it. That every Greek nation being destroyed by a Greek nation is destroyed by the rod and saw of God's wrath has been made clear from what was said about the Assyrian. Moreover, if the things said by the Greeks about the seer Teiresias are utterly ridiculous, how is it possible for the things spoken by him to be true? For they say about him that he had been both a man and a woman, and had the forms of both, and, having settled many quarrels of the gods, for this reason Hera, being angered with him, blinded him, but Zeus, as a consolation for his blindness, granted him the gift of prophecy. But if the myths told about him are foreign to belief, how is it possible for the things mythologized by him to be true? Furthermore, if, as the Greeks say, the things spun by the Fates cannot be unspun, how are divinations not useless to those who use them, since the Fates necessarily bring what is spun by them to its inescapable end? But if these things are so, how are both the Fates and the divinations not false, being refuted by one another? And how is it that Menoeceus did not slay himself in vain according to what seemed good to the divination, since the cause for the enemies to be destroyed and the city to be saved was not from the demon who gave the oracle through the seer, but from the permission of the Master, the true God?

τὴν γῆν αὐτῶν ἐκ τῶν χειρῶν μου, ὅτι ·ύσεται κύριος τὴν Ἱε ρουσαλὴμ ἐκ τῆς χειρός μου; Κατὰ δὲ τοὺς χρησμούς, οὓς ἐδέ ξατο ὁ Ἀσσύριος παρὰ τῶν μάντεων, τοιαύτας ἐφθέγξατο φωνάς, καὶ κατὰ τῶν ἐθνῶν καὶ κατὰ τῆς Ἱερουσαλήμ· καὶ τοῦ θεοῦ συγχωρήσαντος ἐπέτυχεν ὁ Ἀσσύριος τῶν χρησμῶν κατὰ τῶν ἐθνῶν, κατὰ δὲ τῆς Ἱερουσαλὴμ ἀπέτυχε τῶν χρησμῶν τοῦ θεοῦ μὴ συγχωρήσαντος. Πῶς οὖν ἀπέτυχον τῆς μαν τείας οἱ ἑπτὰ ἐπὶ Θήβαις τοῦ ἄρδην ἀπολέσαι τὴν πόλιν; Ἡ γὰρ ἀποτυχία τῆς μαντείας ἔλεγχος γίνεται τῆς ἀσθενείας τοῦ θεοῦ, τοῦ διὰ τῆς μαντείας προμηνύσαντος τὰ ἀνέκβατα. Καὶ εἰ κατὰ τὴν ἀψευδῆ τοῦ σωτῆρος φωνὴν χωρὶς θεοῦ στρου θίον οὐ πεσεῖται ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, πολὺ μᾶλλον ἔθνος ὅλον ἢ πόλις ὅλη οὐκ ἂν ἀπόλοιτο μὴ τοῦ θεοῦ συγχωρήσαντος. Ὅτι δὲ πᾶν ἔθνος ἑλληνικὸν ὑπὸ ἔθνους ἑλληνικοῦ ἀπολλύμενον ὑπὸ ·άβδου καὶ πρίονος τῆς ὀργῆς τοῦ θεοῦ ἀπόλλυται, φανερὸν καθέστη κεν ἐκ τῶν περὶ τοῦ Ἀσσυρίου εἰρημένων. Ἔτι δὲ εἰ τὰ παρὰ τῶν Ἑλλήνων περὶ τοῦ μάντεως Τειρεσίου εἰρημένα παντάπασίν ἐστι καταγέλαστα, πῶς ἐνδέχεται τὰ δι' αὐτοῦ λεχθέντα εἶναι ἀληθῆ; Φασὶ γὰρ περὶ αὐτοῦ ἄνδρα καὶ γυναῖκα γεγονέναι αὐ τόν, καὶ ἀμφοτέρων ἔχειν τὰς πλάσεις, καί, πολλὰς μάχας τῶν θεῶν διαλύσαντος, διὰ ταύτην τὴν αἰτίαν ἡ μὲν Ἥρα χολωθεῖσα αὐτῷ ἐπήρωσεν αὐτόν, ὁ δὲ Ζεὺς εἰς παραμυθίαν τῆς πηρώσεως αὐτοῦ ἐχαρίσατο αὐτῷ τὴν μαντικήν. Ἀλλ' εἰ ἀλλότρια πίστεως ὑπάρχει τὰ περὶ αὐτοῦ μυθευόμενα, πῶς ἐνδέχεται ἀληθῆ εἶναι τὰ ὑπ' αὐτοῦ μυθευόμενα; Ἔτι δὲ εἰ, καθώς φασιν Ἕλληνες, τὰ ὑπὸ τῶν Μοιρῶν ἐπικλωθόμενα ἀδύνατόν ἐστιν ἀνακλωθῆναι, πῶς οὐκ εἰσὶν ἀνωφελεῖς αἱ μαν τεῖαι τοῖς αὐταῖς χρωμένοις, τῶν Μοιρῶν ἐπὶ τὸ ἀναπόδραστον τέλος ἀναγκαίως ἀγουσῶν τὰ ὑπ' αὐτῶν ἐπικλωθόμενα; Ἀλλ' εἰ ταῦτα οὕτως ἔχει, πῶς οὐκ εἰσὶ ψευδεῖς αἵ τε Μοῖραι καὶ αἱ μαντεῖαι, ὑπ' ἀλλήλων ἀναιρούμεναι; Πῶς δὲ οὐκ ἔστιν ὁ Μενοικεὺς μάτην κατασφάξας ἑαυτὸν κατὰ τὸ δοκοῦν τῇ μαν τείᾳ, τῆς αἰτίας τοῦ ἀναιρεῖσθαι μὲν τοὺς πολεμίους, σώζεσθαι δὲ τὴν πόλιν, μὴ ἐκ τοῦ δαίμονος τοῦ διὰ μάντεως χρηματί σαντος ὑπαρχούσης, ἀλλ' ἐκ τῆς τοῦ δεσπότου τοῦ ἀληθινοῦ θεοῦ συγχωρήσεως;