“What is indicated by this mother of seven sons, if not the fruitfulness of Mother Church, who through the grace of the sevenfold Spirit brings forth for God the Father adopted sons? The cruelty of typical Antiochus, that is, of Antichrist, although it tears apart through its ministers the offspring of the fathers, and…”
Rabanus Maurus, 9th c. — Commentary on 2 Maccabees
Original
1It came to pass also, that seven brethren with their mother were taken, and compelled by the king against the law to taste swine’s flesh, and were tormented with scourges and whips.
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In context
— 2 Maccabees 7:1 —
2But one of them that spake first said thus, What wouldest thou ask or learn of us? we are ready to die, rather than to transgress the laws of our fathers.
3Then the king, being in a rage, commanded pans and caldrons to be made hot: