So the prophecy was literally fulfilled against them. Learn why it was if you desire to know. Because Emmanuel, God with us, the Child of the Virgin, was not with them, for if they had had Him, they would not have suffered thus. Wherefore the prophet next cries to the Gentiles, saying, "Emmanuel, God with us: know ye nations and yield." And this I have interpreted, so as to shew that most prophecies can be explained either literally or figuratively. Hence we must proceed to consider the remainder of the prophecy before us in both ways. And if the Jews say that even now (334) we are to expect the fulfilment in the future, expecting these things to be accomplished actually and literally by the Christ they look for, let us ask them, how he that is to come will take the power of Damascus and the spoils of Samaria against the king of the Assyrians, inasmuch as Samaria at the present time is destroyed, and no longer exists, and the power that bore the name of Damascus is abolished, and so is the Assyrian Empire, which the Medes (b) and Persians destroyed and superseded between them? And as none of these people hold empire, how is it possible to look for their destruction in the future?