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After these three prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi,
during the same period of the liberation of the people from the
Babylonian servitude Esdras also wrote, who is historical rather than
prophetical, as is also the book called Esther, which is found to
relate, for the praise of God, events not far from those times;
unless, perhaps, Esdras is to be understood as prophesying of Christ
in that passage where, on a question having arisen among certain young
men as to what is the strongest thing, when one had said kings,
another wine, the third women, who for the most part rule kings, yet
that same third youth demonstrated that the truth is victorious over
all. For by consulting the Gospel we learn that Christ is the
Truth. From this time, when the temple was rebuilt, down to the
time of Aristobulus, the Jews had not kings but princes; and the
reckoning of their dates is found, not in the Holy Scriptures which
are called canonical, but in others, among which are also the books of
the Maccabees. These are held as canonical, not by the Jews, but
by the Church, on account of the extreme and wonderful sufferings of
certain martyrs, who, before Christ had come in the flesh, contended
for the law of God even unto death, and endured most grievous and
horrible evils.
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