NON-CANONICAL GOSPELS
76
beside me will be thrown into prison for my name’s sake, and he will be very grieved and sorrowful, for while you cel ebrate the passover he who is in custody did not celebrate it with you. And I will send my power in the form of (my) angel, and the door of the prison will open, and he will come out and come to you to watch with you and to rest. And when you complete my Agape and my remem brance at the crowing of the cock, he will again be taken and thrown in prison for a testimony, until he comes out to preach, as I have commanded you.” And we said to him, “O Lord, have you then not com pleted the drinking of the passover? Must we, then, do it again?” And he said to us, “Yes, until I come from the Father with my wounds.”
16
And we said to him, “O Lord, great is this that you say and reveal to us. In what kind of power and form are you about to come?” And he said to us, “Truly I say to you, I will come as the sun which bursts forth; thus will I, shining seven times brighter than it in glory, while I am carried on the wings of the clouds in splendor with my cross going on before me, come to the earth to judge the living and the dead.”
17
And we said to him, “O Lord, how many years yet?” And he said to us, “When the hundred and fiftieth year is completed, between pentecost and passover will the coming of my Father take place.” And we said to him, “O Lord, now you said to us, ‘I will come,’ and then you said, ‘he who sent me will come.’ ” And he said to us, ‘I am wholly in the Father and the Father in me.”3 Then we said to him, “Will you really leave us until your coming? Where will we find a teacher?” And he answered and said to us, “Do you not know that until now I am both here and there with him who
sent me?” And we said to him, “O Lord, is it possible that you should be both here and there?” And he said to us, “I am wholly in the Father and the Father in me after his image and after his likeness and after his power and after his perfection and after his light, and I am his perfect word.”
18
This is, when he was crucified, had died and risen again, as he said this, and the work that was thus accomplished in the flesh, that he was crucified, and his ascension—this is the fulfilling of the number. “And the won ders and his image and everything perfect you will see in me with respect to re demption which takes place through me, and while I go to the Father and into heaven. . . .”
23
And we said again to him, “O Lord, but it is necessary, since you have commanded us to preach, prophesy, and teach, that we, having heard accurately from you, may be good preachers and may teach them, that they may believe in you. Therefore we ques tion you.”
24
He answered and said to us, “Truly I say to you, the flesh of every one will rise with his soul alive and his spirit.” And we said to him, “O Lord, then can what is departed and scattered become alive? Not as if we deny it do we ask; rather we believe that what you say has happened and will happen.” And he said to us, being angry, “You of little faith, how long yet do you ask me? And inquire (only) without anguish after what you wish to hear. “Keep my commandments, and do
3
John 10:38; 14:10–21.