Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete

CHAPTER XV.

1 Quar­rel be­tween Sa­tan and the prince of hell, con­cern­ing the ex­pect­ed ar­rival of Christ in hell.

WHILE all the saints were re­joic­ing, be­hold Sa­tan, the prince and cap­tain of death, said to the prince of hell,

2 Pre­pare to re­ceive Je­sus of Nazareth him­self, who boast­ed that he was the Son of God, and yet was a man afraid of death, and said, My soul is sor­row­ful even to death.

3 Be­sides he did many in­juries to me and to many oth­ers; for those whom I made blind and lame and those al­so whom I tor­ment­ed with sev­er­al dev­ils, he cured by his word; yea, and those whom I brought dead to thee, he by force takes away from thee.

4 To this the prince of hell replied to Sa­tan, Who is that so pow­er­ful prince, and yet a man who is afraid of death?

5 For all the po­ten­tates of the earth are sub­ject to my pow­er, whom thou brought­est to sub­jec­tion by thy pow­er.

6 But if he be so pow­er­ful in his hu­man na­ture, I af­firm to thee for truth, that he is almighty in his di­vine na­ture, and no man can re­sist his pow­er:

7 When there­fore he said he was afraid of death, he de­signed to en­snare thee, and un­hap­py it will be to thee for ev­er­last­ing ages,

8 Then Sa­tan re­ply­ing, said to the prince of hell, Why didst thou ex­press a doubt, and wast afraid to re­ceive that Je­sus of Nazareth, both thy ad­ver­sary and mine?

9 As for me, I tempt­ed him and stirred up my old peo­ple the Jews with zeal and anger against him;

10 I sharp­ened the spear for his suf­fer­ing; I mixed the gall and vine­gar, and com­mand­ed that he should drink it; I pre­pared the cross to cru­ci­fy him, and the nails to pierce through his hands and feet; and now his death is near at hand, I will bring him hith­er, sub­ject both to thee and me.

11 Then the prince of hell an­swer­ing, said, Thou saidst to me just now, that he took away the dead from me by force.

12 They who have been kept here till they should live again up­on earth, were tak­en away hence, not by their own pow­er, but by prayers made to God, and their almighty God took them from me.

13 Who then is that Je­sus of Nazareth that by his word hath tak­en away the dead from me with­out prayer to God?

14 Per­haps it is the same who took away from me Lazarus, af­ter he had been four days dead, and did both stink and was rot­ten, and of whom I had pos­ses­sion as a dead per­son, yet he brought him to life again by his pow­er.

15 Sa­tan an­swer­ing, replied to the prince of hell, It is the very same per­son, Je­sus of Nazareth.

16 Which when the prince of hell heard, he said to him, I ad­jure thee by the pow­ers which be­long to thee and me, that thou bring him not to me.

17 For when I heard of the pow­er of his word, I trem­bled for fear, and all my im­pi­ous com­pa­ny were at the same dis­turbed;

18 And we were not able to de­tain Lazarus, but he gave him­self a shake, and with all the signs of mal­ice he im­me­di­ate­ly went away from us; and the very earth, in which the dead body of Lazarus was lodged, present­ly turned him out alive.

19 And I know now that he is Almighty God who could per­form such things, who is mighty in his do­min­ion, and mighty in his hu­man na­ture, who is the Saviour of mankind.

20 Bring not there­fore this per­son hith­er, for he will set at lib­er­ty all those whom I hold in prison un­der un­be­lief, and bound with the fet­ters of their sins, and will con­duct them to ev­er­last­ing life.