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Having therefore forged Acts of Pilate and our Saviour full of every
kind of blasphemy against Christ, they sent them with the emperor's
approval to the whole of the empire subject to him, with written
commands that they should be openly posted to the view of all in every
place, both in country and city, and that the schoolmasters should
give them to their scholars, instead of their customary lessons, to be
studied and learned by heart. While these things were taking place,
another military commander, whom the Romans call Dux, seized some
infamous women in the market-place at Damascus in Phoenicia, and by
threatening to inflict tortures upon them compelled them to make a
written declaration that they had once been Christians and that they
were acquainted with their impious deeds—that in their very churches
they committed licentious acts; and they uttered as many other slanders
against our religion as he wished them to. Having taken down their
words in writing, he communicated them to the emperor, who commanded
that these documents also should be published in every place and city.
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