Page:Apocryphal Gospels and Other Documents Relating to the History of Christ.djvu/395

Rh people, Ye know that at the feast of unleavened bread it is customary for me to liberate for your sake one of the criminals confined in prison. Now I have a malefactor in gaol, a robber, called Barabbas, and I have Jesus, who hath never done evil. Which therefore of the two will ye that I should release to you? The people answered, Release unto us Barabbas. Pilate saith, What then shall I do with Jesus? They say, Let him be crucified. Again, others of them cried out, If thou dost release Jesus, thou art not the friend of Cæsar, because he calleth himself the Son of God and a king; and if thou settest him at liberty, he becometh a king, and will take Cæsar's kingdom.

Therefore, Pilate was angry, and said, Your race was always slanderous and unbelieving, and ye have been always the adversaries of your benefactors. The Hebrews said, And who were our benefactors? Pilate saith, God, who delivered you from the hands of Pharaoh, and led you over the Red Sea, as on dry ground, and fed you with quails, gave you water to drink from the dry rock, and gave you a law, which ye broke by denying God, and if Moses had not stood to plead with God ye would have perished with a bitter death. Therefore, ye have forgotten all these things. And so, also, now ye say that I love not Cæsar at all, but have hatred towards him, and wish to plot against his government.