Page:The Apocryphal New Testament (1924).djvu/201

 I would have killed thee too. Why callest thou thyself Son of God and canst not help thyself in the hour of need? or how canst thou succour any other that prayeth? if thou be the Christ, come down from the cross that I may believe thee. But now I behold thee, not as a man but as a wild beast caught and perishing along with me. And much else he spake against Jesus, blaspheming and gnashing his teeth upon him: for he was caught in the snare of the devil.

3 But Demas, on the right, seeing the divine grace of Jesus, began to cry out thus: I know thee, Jesus Christ, that thou art the Son of God. I see thee, Christ, worshipped by ten thousand times ten thousand angels; forgive my sins that I have committed: make not the stars to enter into judgement with me, or the moon, when thou judgest all the world: for in the night did I work my evil plans: stir not up the sun that now is darkened for thy sake to tell the evil of my heart: for I can give thee no gift for remission of sins. Already death cometh on me for my sins, but pardon belongeth unto thee: save me, Lord of all things, from thy terrible judgement: give not power unto the enemy to swallow me up and be inheritor of my soul, as of his that hangeth on the left; for I see how the devil taketh his soul rejoicing, and his flesh vanisheth away. Neither command me to depart into the lot of the Jews, for I see Moses and the patriarchs weeping sore, and the devil exulting over them. Therefore before my spirit departeth, command O Lord that my sins be blotted out, and remember me the sinner in thy kingdom when thou sittest on the great throne of the Most High and shalt judge the twelve tribes of Israel: for thou hast prepared great punishment for thy world for thy sake.

4 And when the thief had so said, Jesus saith unto him: Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Demas, that to-day thou shalt be with me in paradise: but the sons of the kingdom, the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Moses shall be cast out into the outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. But thou only shalt dwell in paradise until my second coming, when I shall judge them that have not confessed my name. And he said to the thief: Go and say unto the cherubim and the powers that turn about the flaming sword, that keep the garden since Adam the first-created was in paradise and transgressed and kept not my commandments and I cast him out thence&mdash;but none of the former men shall see paradise until I come the second time to judge the quick and dead&mdash;And he wrote thus: Jesus Christ the Son of God that came down from the heights of heaven, that proceeded out of the bosom of the invisible Father without separation, and came down into the world to be incarnate and to be nailed to the cross, that I might save Adam whom I formed: unto my powers the archangels, that keep the doors of paradise, the servants of