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264 CHAPTER XXII.

Of our going up to Jerusalem; and of the Division between Parents and Children; and how Jesus testified of a Day of Judgment.

we passed through the country to Capernaum, we began to tell the people everywhere that Jesus had now determined to go up to Jerusalem at the head of his followers, and that the time of Redemption was at hand. But Jesus forbade us; for he would not that any man should know that he was passing through. Howbeit, even though we were silent, the rumor of his journey was everywhere noised abroad, so that he could not be hid. Many therefore left their ploughs, and their fishing-boats, and their trades, and followed with us: or, if they followed not, they appointed to be with us at the next Passover when we went up to the Holy City. For it was already the month called Adar, so that it wanted no more than four or five weeks to the Passover.

Now certain youths and striplings followed us, not deliberately, nor with forethought, but because they were ever unstable, and ever seeking after new things. Them therefore Jesus warned to go back to their homes, telling them that they had not counted the cost of the journey. Others were fain to have come with us; but their friends sought by all means to prevent them, telling them what cruelties the Romans had wrought upon their fathers and kinsfolk in former times; how some had been sold for slaves, some slain with the sword, some crucified; and