(he generally calls them somnia or deliramenta apocryphorum) that he was slain because he prophesied the coming of the Saviour. This, having no Scriptural authority, can be as readily rejected as proved."
Coupled with the evidence of the note on Ephesians, these passages seem to support Berendts's view that the principal Zacharias-apocryph did relate to the father of John. There may very well have been prophetical passages in it.
I find it more difficult to agree with him in his identification of it with the Slavonic document. That, however, is worth summarizing here for the interest of the story.
In the fortieth year of Herod's reign, Joseph was warned by the angel Saphodamuel to flee into Egypt, where the family lived twelve months in the house of Alpheus, a man of God.
The massacre of the Innocents followed. Elizabeth fled with John. Zacharias was questioned about the child, and slain (as in Protev. xxii. ff.). Elizabeth was sheltered within a rock by Uriel, and fed.
After four months Gabriel brought Jesus to the Temple, and Uriel brought John: Michael and Raphael also came; and in the midst appeared God, and the corpse of Zacharias. God breathed life into it. Jesus made a spring of water rise up in the Temple and from it baptized John, and Zacharias.
Thereafter Zacharias fell asleep again and was buried by the angels before the altar. Gabriel and Uriel bore away Jesus and John. The story concludes with the weaning of John, and his life in the wilderness, and the return from Egypt.
That it is an old tale is more than likely, for it seems a sound view that it has been incorporated into the Protevangelium and not extracted from it. But it seems to belong rather to the John Baptist cycle of legend than to that of Zacharias; and in the book we are seeking for, Zacharias ought to be the centre of interest, and not, as here, a rather subordinate figure. To put the matter in another way, this legend strikes
