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[69]
And this was what Onias wrote to king Ptolemy. Now any one may observe
his piety, and that of his sister and wife Cleopatra, by that epistle which
they wrote in answer to it; for they laid the blame and the transgression
of the law upon the head of Onias. And this was their reply: "King
Ptolemy and queen Cleopatra to Onias, send greeting. We have read thy petition,
wherein thou desirest leave to be given thee to purge that temple which
is fallen down at Leontopolis, in the Nomus of Heliopolis, and which is
named from the country Bubastis; on which account we cannot but wonder
that it should be pleasing to God to have a temple erected in a place so
unclean, and so full of sacred animals. But since thou sayest that Isaiah
the prophet foretold this long ago, we give thee leave to do it, if it
may be done according to your law, and so that we may not appear to have
at all offended God herein."
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