Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete

CHAPTER VI.

1 Pi­late dis­mayed by the tur­bu­lence of the Jews, 5 who de­mand Barab­bas to be re­leased, and Christ to be cru­ci­fied. 9 Pi­late warm­ly ex­pos­tu­lates with them, 20 wash­es his hands of Christ’s blood, 23 and sen­tences him to be whipped and cru­ci­fied.

THEN Pi­late hav­ing called to­geth­er Nicode­mus, and the fif­teen men who said that Je­sus was not born through for­ni­ca­tion, said to them, What shall I do, see­ing there is like to be a tu­mult among the peo­ple.

2 They say un­to him, We know not; let them look to it who raise the tu­mult.

3 Pi­late then called the mul­ti­tude again, and said to them, Ye know that ye have a cus­tom, that I should re­lease to you one pris­on­er at the feast of the passover:

4 I have a not­ed pris­on­er, a mur­der­er, who is called Barab­bas, and Je­sus who is called Christ, in whom I find noth­ing that de­serves death; which of them, there­fore, have you a mind that I should re­lease to you?

5 They all cry out, and say, Re­lease to us Barab­bas.

6 Pi­late saith to them, What then shall I do with Je­sus who is called Christ?

7 They all an­swer, Let him be cru­ci­fied.

8 Again they cry out and say to Pi­late, You are not the friend of Cae­sar, if you re­lease this man; for he hath de­clared that he is the Son of God, and a king. But are you in­clined that he should be king, and not Cae­sar?

9 Then Pi­late filled with anger said to them, Your na­tion hath al­ways been sedi­tious, and you are al­ways against those who have been ser­vice­able to you.

10 The Jews replied, Who are those who have been ser­vice­able to us?

11 Pi­late an­swered them, Your God who de­liv­ered you from the hard bondage of the Egyp­tians, and brought you over the Red Sea as though it had been dry land, and fed you in the wilder­ness with man­na and the flesh of quails, and brought wa­ter out of the rock, and gave you a law from heav­en.

12 Ye pro­voked him all ways, and de­sired for your­selves a molten calf, and wor­shipped it, and sac­ri­ficed to it, and said, These are thy Gods, O Is­rael, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt:

13 On ac­count of which your God was in­clined to de­stroy you; but Moses in­ter­ced­ed for you, and your God heard him, and for­gave your in­iq­ui­ty.

14 Af­ter­wards ye were en­raged against, and would have killed your prophets, Moses and Aaron, when they fled to the taber­na­cle, and ye were al­ways mur­mur­ing against God and his prophets.

15 And aris­ing from his judg­ment seat, he would have gone out; but the Jews all cried out, We ac­knowl­edge Cae­sar to be king, and not Je­sus;

16 Where­as this per­son, as soon as he was born, the wise men came and of­fered gifts un­to him; which when Herod heard, he was ex­ceed­ing­ly trou­bled, and would have killed him:

17 When his fa­ther knew this, he fled with him and his moth­er Mary in­to Egypt. Herod, when he heard he was born, would have slain him; and ac­cord­ing­ly sent and slew all the chil­dren which were in Beth­le­hem, and in all the coasts there­of, from two years old and un­der.

18 When Pi­late heard this ac­count, he was afraid; and com­mand­ing si­lence among the peo­ple, who made a noise, he said to Je­sus, Art thou there­fore a king?

19 All the Jews replied to Pi­late, he is the very per­son whom Herod sought to have slain.

20 Then Pi­late tak­ing wa­ter, washed his hands be­fore the peo­ple and said, I am in­no­cent of the blood of this just per­son; look ye to it.

21 The Jews an­swered and said, His blood be up­on us and our chil­dren.

22 Then Pi­late com­mand­ed Je­sus to be brought be­fore him, and spake to him in the fol­low­ing words;

23 Thy own na­tion hath charged thee as mak­ing thy­self a king; where­fore I, Pi­late, sen­tence thee to be whipped ac­cord­ing to the laws of for­mer gov­er­nors; and that thou be first bound, then hanged up­on a cross in that place where thou art now a pris­on­er; and al­so two crim­inals with thee, whose names are Di­mas and Ges­tas.

CHAP. VII.

1 Man­ner of Christ’s cru­ci­fix­ion with the two thieves.

THEN Je­sus went out of the hall, and the two thieves with him.

2 And when they came to the place which is called Gol­go­tha, they stript him of his rai­ment, and girt him about with a linen cloth, and put a crown of thorns up­on his head, and put a reed in his hand.

3 And in like man­ner did they to the two thieves who were cru­ci­fied with him, Di­mas on his right hand and Ges­tas on his left.

4 But Je­sus said, My Fa­ther, for­give them, For they know not what they do.

5 And they di­vid­ed his gar­ments, and up­on his ves­ture they cast lots.

6 The peo­ple in the mean time stood by, and the chief priests and el­ders of the Jews mocked him, say­ing, He saved oth­ers, let him now save him­self if he can; if he be the son of God, let him now come down from the cross.

7 The sol­diers al­so mocked him, and tak­ing vine­gar and gall, of­fered it to him to drink, and said to him, If thou art king of the Jews, de­liv­er thy­self.

8 Then Long­inus, a cer­tain sol­dier, tak­ing a spear,’ pierced his side, and present­ly there came forth blood and wa­ter.

9 And Pi­late wrote the ti­tle up­on the cross in He­brew, Latin, and Greek let­ters, viz., THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS.

10 But one of the two thieves who were cru­ci­fied with Je­sus, whose name was Ges­tas, said to Je­sus, If thou art the Christ, de­liv­er thy­self and us.

11 But the thief who was cru­ci­fied on his right hand, whose name was Di­mas, an­swer­ing, re­buked him, and said, Dost not thou fear God, who art con­demned to this pun­ish­ment? We in­deed re­ceive right­ly and just­ly the de­mer­it of our ac­tions; but this Je­sus, what evil hath he done.

12 Af­ter this, groan­ing, he said to Je­sus, Lord, re­mem­ber me when thou comest in­to thy king­dom.

13 Je­sus an­swer­ing, said to him, Ver­ily I say un­to thee, that this day thou shalt be with me in Par­adise.