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NON-CANONICAL ACTS OF THE APOSTLES
whom you perverted and led away from Christ. Your whole evil nature will therefore be manifested, and your mach inations will be spoiled. Now I say to you a last word: Jesus Christ says to you, ‘Be speechless by the power of my name and leave Rome till the coming Sabbath.’ ” At once he became speechless, and being constrained he left Rome till the next Sabbath and lodged in a stable. The woman returned to Peter with the baby and told Peter and the other brethren what the child had said to Simon. And they praised the Lord who had shown these things to humans.
16
When night came Peter, still awake, saw Jesus clothed with a shining garment, smiling and saying to him, “The greatest part of the brethren has already come back through me and through the signs which you have made in my name. But on the coming Sabbath you shall have a contest of faith, and many more Gentiles and Jews shall be converted in my name to me who was reviled, despised, and spat upon. For I shall show myself to you when you shall ask for signs and wonders and you shall convert many, but you will have Simon opposing you through the works of his father. But all his doings shall be mani fested as sorcery and magical deception. And do not delay and you shall confirm in my name all those whom I shall send to you.” When it was day he told the brethren how the Lord had appeared to him and what he had commanded him. . . .
20
When Peter had entered he saw one of the old women who was blind, and her daughter led her by the hand and conducted her into the house of Marcellus. And Peter said to her, “Come here, mother; from this day Jesus gives
you his right hand; through him we have light unapproachable which darkness cannot hide. Through me he says to you, ‘Open your eyes, see and walk on your own.’ ” And the widow at once saw Peter put his hand upon her. When Peter came into the dining-room he saw that the gos pel was being read. And rolling it up he said, “People, who believe in Christ and hope in him, you shall know how the holy scriptures of our Lord must be ex plained. What we have written down ac cording to his grace, though it may seem to you as yet so little, contains what is endurable to be understood by humanity. It is necessary that we first know God’s will or his goodness; for when deceit was spread and many thousands of people were plunging into perdition the Lord was moved by compassion to show him self in another form and to appear in the image of man, by whom neither the Jews nor we are worthy to be enlightened. For each of us saw him as his capacity per mitted. Now, however, I will explain to you that which has been read to you. Our Lord wished to let me see his majesty on the holy mountain;4 but when I with the sons of Zebedee saw his brightness I fell at his feet as dead, closed my eyes, and heard his voice in a manner which I can not describe. I imagined I had been de prived of my eyesight by his splendor. I recovered a little and said to myself, ‘Per haps the Lord has brought me here to deprive me of my eyesight.’ And I said, ‘If such is your will, O Lord, I shall not resist.’ And he took me by the hand and lifted me up. And when I arose I saw him again in a form which I could not com prehend. So the merciful God, most be loved brethren, has borne our infirmities and carried our transgressions, as the
4
Mark 9:2–8.