Page:Apocryphal Gospels and Other Documents Relating to the History of Christ.djvu/537

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STORY OF JOSEPH.
421

with the sword, some he stripped, women he hung by their heels with their head downward, and cut off their breasts, and he drank the blood from the limbs of infants; he never acknowledged God, nor obeyed the laws, but practised such deeds of violence from the beginning.

Now the case of the other was this: He was called Demas, was a Galilean by origin, and kept an inn. He practised extortion upon the rich, but did good to the poor. The thief was like Tobit, for he buried the poor when they were dead.[1] He endeavoured to plunder the multitude of the Jews, taking away the very law at Jerusalem, and stripping the daughter of Caiaphas, who was a priestess of the sanctuary, taking away the mystical deposit of Solomon, which was laid up in the place. Such were his actions.

And Jesus also was apprehended on the third day before the passover, when it was evening. And no passover was held by Caiaphas and the multitude of the Jews, but they were in great heaviness because of the spoil which the robber had caused in the sanctuary. And they called Judas Iscariot and spake to him, for he was (son) of the brother of Caiaphas, the priest. Now he was not a disciple in the presence of Jesus, but all the multitude of the Jews urged him with guile to follow Jesus; not that he might be obedient to the miracles which were done

  1. Tobit i. 17. A questionable compliment to Tobit!