The souls of the men who before worshipped idols, or the impure and horrid powers, I think, are called flies, and flies of Egypt, as delighting in sacrifices and the blood of idols. And the bee is an animal armed with a sting, that knows how to rule and to obey and to fight, and can defend itself and wound its enemies. These two then combining together, the one from the land of the Rulers (which is the meaning of "Assyrians") the other from the land of the idolaters, will be bidden, it says, as by the hissing of the Lord God of the Universe, to rule the whole of Judaea, because of their unbelief in Christ, in the day of Emmanuel. And it means by this that a foreign military power will occupy Jerusalem and Judaea. This too our Saviour foretold more definitely, when He said, "And Jerusalem shall be trodden by the Gentiles." This was fulfilled not long after our Saviour spoke, when the Romans took the city, and settled strangers there, and established them on its site.