2 Maccabees 9:5–12

5 But the all-seeing Lord, the God of Israel, smote him with a fatal and unseen stroke; the words were no sooner out of his mouth than he was seized with an incurable pain in the bowels, 6 and his internal organs gave him cruel torture—a right proper punishment for one who had tortured the bowels of other people with many an exquisite pang. 7 He did not cease from his wild insolence, however, but waxed more arrogant than ever, breathing fire and fury against the Jews, and giving orders to hurry on with the journey. And it came to pass that he dropped from his chariot as it whirled along, so that the bad fall racked every limb of his body. 8 Thus he who in his overweening haughtiness had supposed the waves of the sea were at his bidding and imagined he could weigh the high mountains in his scales, was now prostrate, carried along in a litter—a manifest token to all men of the power of God. 9 Worms actually swarmed from the impious creature’s body; his flesh fell off, while he was still alive in pain and anguish; and the stench of his corruption turned the whole army from him with loathing. 10 A man who shortly before had thought he could touch the stars of heaven, none could now endure to carry, such was his intolerable stench. 11 Then it was that, broken in spirit, he began to abate his arrogance, for the most part, and to arrive at some knowledge of the truth. For, as he suffered more and more anguish under the scourge of God, unable even to bear his own stench, he said: 12 Right is it that mortal man should be subject to God, and not deem himself God’s equal.