CHAPTER XXXV

Thus spake Adam to his sons, and he was seized with violent pains, and he cried out with a loud voice, "What shall I do? I am in distress. So cruel are the pains with which I am beset." And when Eve had seen him weeping, she also began to weep herself, and said: "O Lord my God, hand over to me his pain, for it is I who sinned."

66

And Eve said to Adam: My lord, give me a part of thy pains, for this hath come to thee from fault of mine."

CHAPTER XXXVI

And Adam said to Eve: "Rise up and go with my son Seth to the neighborhood of paradise, and put dust on your heads and throw yourselves on the ground and lament in the sight of God. Perchance He will have pity upon you and send His angel across to the tree of His mercy, whence floweth the oil of life, and will give you a drop of it, to anoint me with it, that I may have rest from these pains, by which I am being consumed."

CHAPTER XXXVII

Then Seth and his mother went off toward the gates of paradise. And while they were walking, lo! suddenly there came a beast (a serpent)3 and attacked and bit Seth. And as soon as Eve saw it, she wept and said: "Alas, wretched woman that I am. I am accursed since I have not kept the commandment of God." And Eve said to the serpent in a loud voice: "Accursed beast! how is it that thou hast not feared to let thyself loose against the image of God, but hast dared to fight with it?"

CHAPTER XXXVIII

The beast. answered in the language of men: against you, Eve, that our malice is directed?

"Is it not Are not ye

3 The "serpent" is clearly a later interpolation to connect with the tale of the Fall. Originally this passage was to explain the beasts' revolt.

the objects of our rage? Tell me, Eve, how was thy mouth opened to eat of the fruit? But now if I shall begin to reprove thee thou canst not bear it."

CHAPTER XXXIX

Then said Seth to the beast: "God the Lord revile thee. Be silent, be dumb, shut thy mouth, accursed enemy of Truth, confounder and destroyer. Avaunt from the image of God till the day when the Lord God shall order thee to be brought to the ordeal." And the beast said to Seth: "See, I leave the presence of the image of God, as thou hast said.' Forthwith he left Seth, wounded by his teeth.

CHAPTER XL

But Seth and his mother walked to the regions of paradise for the oil of mercy to anoint the sick Adam: and they arrived at the gates of paradise, and they took dust from the earth and placed it on their heads, and bowed themselves with their faces to the earth, and began to lament and make loud moaning, imploring the Lord God to pity Adam in his pains and to send His angel to give them the oil from the "tree of His mercy."

CHAPTER XLI

But when they had been praying and imploring for many hours, behold, the angel Michael appeared to them and said: "I have been sent to you from the Lord I am set by God. over the bodies of men I tell thee, Seth, thou man of God, weep not nor pray and entreat on account of the oil of the tree of mercy to anoint thy father Adam for the pains of his body.

CHAPTER XLII

"For I tell thee that in no wise wilt thou be able to receive thereof save in the last days."

[When five thousand five hundred years have been fulfilled, then will come upon earth the most beloved king Christ, the son of God, to revive the body of Adam and with him to revive the bodies of the dead. He Himself, the Son of God,

when He comes will be baptized in the river of Jordan, and when He hath come out of the water of Jordan, then He will anoint from the oil of mercy all that believe in Him. And the oil of mercy shall be for generation to generation for those who are ready to be born again of water and the Holy Spirit to life eternal. Then the most beloved Son of God, Christ, descending on earth, shall lead thy father Adam to Paradise to the tree of mercy.]*

CHAPTER XLIII

"But do thou, Seth, go to thy father Adam, since the time of his life is fulfilled. Six days hence his soul shall go off his body, and when it shall have gone out thou shalt see great marvels in the heaven and in the earth and the luminaries of heaven." With these words, straightway Michael departed from Seth.

And Eve and Seth returned bearing with them herbs of fragrance, i.e., nard and crocus and calamus and cinnamon.

CHAPTER XLIV

And when Seth and his mother had reached Adam, they told him, how the beast (the serpent) bit Seth. And Adam said to Eve: "What hast thou done? A great plague hast thou brought upon us, transgression and sin for all our generations and this which thou hast done, tell thy children after my death, for those who arise from us shall toil and fail but they shall be wanting and curse us and say, All evils have our parents brought upon us, who were at the beginning." When Eve heard these words, she began to weep and moan.

CHAPTER XLV

And just as Michael the archangel had foretold, after six days came Adam's death. When Adam perceived that the hour of his death was at hand, he said to all his sons: "Behold, I am nine hundred and thirty years old, and if I die,

4 This whole passage in brackets is a Christian interpolation from the Gospel of Nicodemus.

bury me toward the sunrising in the field of yonder dwelling." And it came to pass that when he had finished all his discourse, he gave up the ghost.

CHAPTER XLVI

Then was the sun darkened and the moon and the stars for seven days, and Seth in his mourning embraced from above the body of his father, and Eve was looking on the ground with hands folded over her head, and all her children wept most bitterly. And behold, there appeared Michael the angel and stood at the head of Adam, and said to Seth: "Rise up from the body of thy father and come to me and see what is the doom of the Lord God concerning him. His creature is he, and God hath pitied him."

CHAPTER XLVII

And all the angels blew their trumpets, and cried: "Blessed art thou, O Lord, for thou hast had pity on Thy creature."

CHAPTER XLVIII

Then Seth saw the hand of God stretched out holding Adam, and he handed him over to Michael, saying: "Let him be in thy charge till the day of Judgment in punishment, till the last years when I will convert his sorrow into joy. Then shall he sit on the throne of him who hath been his supplanter."

And the Lord said again to the angels Michael and Uriel: 'Bring me three linen clothes of byssus, and spread them out over Adam, and other linen clothes over Abel his son, and bury Adam and Abel his son."

And all the "powers" of angels marched before Adam, and the sleep of the dead was consecrated. And the angels Michael and Uriel buried Adam and Abel in the parts of paradise, before the eyes of Seth and his mother and no one else, and Michael and Uriel said: "Just as ye have seen, in like manner, bury your dead."

CHAPTER XLIX

Six days after, Adam died; and Eve perceived that she would die, so she assembled all her sons and daughters, Seth with thirty brothers and thirty sisters, and Eve said to all: "Hear me, my children, and I will tell you what the archangel Michael said to us when I and your father transgressed the command of God.

"On account of your transgression, our Lord will bring upon your race the anger of his judgment, first by water, the second time by fire; by these two, will the Lord judge the whole human race.

CHAPTER L

"But harken unto me, my children. Make ye then tables of stone and others of clay, and write on them all my life and your father's, all that ye have heard and seen from us. If by water the Lord judge our race, the tables of clay will be dissolved and the tables of stone will remain; but if by fire, the tables of stone will be broken up and the tables of clay will be baked hard." 5

When Eve had said all this to her children, she spread out her hands to heaven in prayer, and bent her knees to the earth, and while she worshiped the Lord and gave him thanks, she gave up the ghost. Thereafter, all her children buried her with loud lamentation.

CHAPTER LI

When they had been mourning four days, then Michael the archangel appeared and said to Seth: "Man of God, mourn not for thy dead more than six days, for on the seventh day is the sign of the resurrection and the rest of the age to come; on the seventh day the Lord rested from all His works."

Thereupon Seth made the tables.

5 In some MSS. is added the story of Solomon finding "the tables," with a conclusion announcing the coming of Christ to judge the world.