Some of the most entertaining stories found among the apocryphal accounts of the apostles are in the “Acts of John,” stories of the missionary adventures of the son of Zebedee, the disciple commonly regarded as Jesus’ closest companion.1 Many of the stories demonstrate the uncanny power of God at
work within his great apostle, as he is able to perform remarkable miracles by healing the sick and raising the dead—evidence of the truth of his proclamation of the gospel of Christ.
The following excerpts narrate some of the apostle’s most remarkable deeds, including a tale in which he raises from the dead a prominent leader in the city of Ephesus, Lycomedes, and his beautiful wife, Cleopatra (chaps. 19–25). A second resurrection account involves a gripping tale of passion gone awry, in a love triangle involving the beautiful but ascetic Christian, Drusiana, her loving husband, Andronicus, and the unbeliever Callimachus, whose unsatisfied lust becomes known to Drusiana, causing her to die of grief for being the object of temptation. In a fit of passion, however, Callimachus bribes his way into the burial vault, where he plans to fulfill his lust on Drusiana’s corpse, only to be attacked by a preternatural serpent that stands as her guardian (chaps. 63–86).
Razor-sharp in its contrast between ascetic virtue and lustful vice, this intriguing Acts of John stresses both the need for purity before God and the power of the apostle, who is able to raise the dead and to right all that has gone wrong in the world (the pure Drusiana too, it should be noted, performs a resurrection in the account).
Other stories found here are somewhat more amusing—including John’s encounter with a host of unwanted bed-bugs at a roadside inn (chaps. 60–61). Yet other accounts, probably from a different source, involve more mystical reflections on the nature of Christ, who is described in ways that appear docetic—that is, suggesting that he did not have a real flesh-and- blood body (see esp. chaps. 85–103).
1See further Ehrman, Lost Christianities, 41–44.
Translation by J. K. Elliott; Apocryphal New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993) 311–26; 328–35; used with permission.
It is difficult to know when the Acts of John was composed, but many scholars locate it to the second half of the second century.
When we came near the city
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Lycomedes, the commander-in- chief of the Ephesians, a wealthy man, met us, fell down before John and asked him for help, with these words, “Your name is John; the God whom you preach has sent you to help my wife, who has been paralyzed for seven days and lies past recovery. But glorify your God and treat her out of compassion for us. Whilst I was reflecting what to do, a man came to me and said, ‘Desist, Lycomedes, from the evil thought which militates against you. Do not submit. For out of compas sion for my servant Cleopatra I have sent you a man from Miletus, named John, who will comfort her and restore her to you cured.’ Delay not, therefore, servant of the God who announced you to me, but hasten to the ailing woman.” And John went at once from the gate with the brethren who were with him and fol lowed Lycomedes into his house. And Cleobius said to his servants, “Go to my relative Callippus and make yourselves comfortable in his house—for I am com ing there with his son—that we may find everything prepared!”20
When Lycomedes and John had come into the house in which the woman was lying, he grasped his feet again, and said, “See, Lord, the lost beauty, see the youth, see the much talked of bloom of my unhappy wife, the ad miration of all Ephesus! Woe to me, un happy man! I was envied, humbled, the enemy’s eye was fixed on me. I never wronged anyone, although I could harm many. I envisaged this situation and I was always anxious to experience no sorrowor anything like it! Of what use is my care now, Cleopatra? What good was it to me, that I was called godly to this day? I suffer more than a heathen, seeing you, Cleopatra, suffering so. The sun in his circuit shall not see me, if you are no more with me. Cleopatra, I will die be fore you. I will not spare my life though I am still youthful. I will justify myself before the goddess of right, whom I served in righteousness, though I might indict her for her unrighteous sentence. I will avenge myself on her by coming as a shade. I will say to her, ‘You have forced me to leave the light of life, be cause you tore away Cleopatra. You are the cause of my death, by having pre pared for me this fate. You have forced me to blaspheme Providence by destroy ing my joy.’ ”
And Lycomedes spoke more to
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Cleopatra, went to her couch, and cried bitterly. But John drew him away and said, “Abandon these tears and unbecoming words! It is not proper for you, who saw the vision, to be disbeliev ing. Know that your partner for life will be restored to you. Therefore join us, who have come for her sake, and pray to the God whom you saw, when he showed me to you in a vision! What is the matter, Lycomedes? Wake up and open also your soul! Cast from you heavy sleep! Call on the Lord, beseech him for your wife, and he will support her.” But he fell to the ground and wept dejectedly. And John said with tears, “Woe to the treachery of the vision, woe to the new temptation prepared for me, woe to the new craft of him who devises cunnings against me!95
THE ACTS OF JOHN
Did the voice from heaven, which came to me by the way, intend this for me, predicting to me what should here take place? Will it deliver me up to such a great multitude of citizens, for the sake of Lycomedes? The man lies here life less, and I know that I shall not leave this house alive. Why do you delay, Lord? Why have you deprived us of your gra cious promise? I beseech you, Lord, let him not rejoice who delights in the sor row of others. Let him not dance who always laughs at us! But let your holy name and your compassion come quickly! Waken the bodies of the two, who are against me!”
While John was crying, the city
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of Ephesus ran to the house of Lycomedes, supposing him dead. And when John saw the great multitude, he prayed to the Lord, “Now the time of refreshing and confidence has come with you, O Christ; now is the time for us weary ones to have help from you, phy sician, who heal freely. Keep my entrance here free from derision! I beseech you, Jesus, help such a great multitude to come to the Lord of the universe. Behold the affliction, behold those who lie here! Even those who came here, make holy instruments for your service, after they have seen your gift. For you have said yourself, O Christ, ‘Ask and it shall be given you.’2 We therefore beseech you,O King, not for gold, not for silver, not for riches, not for possession, nor for any transient, earthly goods, but for two souls through whom you will convert those present to your way, to your knowledge, to your confidence, and to your infallible promise. For many of them shall be saved, after they have known your power through the resurrection of the departed. Give us, therefore, hope in you! I will go to Cleopatra and say, ‘Arise, in the name of Jesus Christ.’ ”
And he went, touched her face,
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and said, “Cleopatra, he whom every ruler fears, and every creature, power, abyss, and darkness and unsmil ing death and the heights of heaven and the caverns of the lower world and the resurrection of the dead and the sight of the blind and the whole power of the ruler of the world, and the pride of its prince, says, ‘Rise and become not a pretext for many who will not believe, and an afflic tion for souls who hope and could be saved.’ ” And Cleopatra cried out at once, “I will rise, master, save your hand maiden!” When she had risen after the seven days, the whole city of Ephesus was stirred by the miraculous sight. . . .. . . After two days the birthday
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of the idol’s temple was cele brated. While everybody was dressed in white garments, John wore black and went to the temple. They laid hold of him and tried to kill him. But John said, “Men, you are mad to lay hold of me, the servant of the only God.” And climbing on to the platform he spoke to them:“Men of Ephesus, you are in
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danger of behaving like the sea. Every discharging river and every precip itating spring, downpours and incessant waves and torrents rushing from the rock, are permeated by the bitter salt which is in the sea. Thus to this day you are un changeably hostile to true piety, and you perish in your old idolatry. How many miraculous deeds did you see me per form, how many cures! And still you are hardened in the heart and cannot see clearly. What now, men of Ephesus? I have ventured now to come up to this idol’s temple, to convince you that youare wholly without God and dead to hu man reasoning. Behold, here I stand. You all assert that Artemis is powerful. Pray to her, that I alone die! Or if you cannot accomplish this, I alone will call upon my God to kill you all because of your unbelief.”
Since they already knew him
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and had seen the dead raised, they cried aloud, “Do not treat us so and kill us, we beseech you, John; we know indeed that you can do it.” And John answered them, “If you do not wish to die, let me convince you of your idolatry. Any why? So that you may desist from your old error. Be now converted by my God or I will die at the hands of your goddess. For I will pray in your presence to my God, and ask him to have mercy upon you.”After these words he prayed,
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“God, who are God above all so-called gods, who to this day have been despised at Ephesus, you induced me to come to this place, which I never had in view. You have abrogated every form of worship through conversion to you. In your name every idol, every demon, and every unclean spirit is banished. May the deity of this place, which has deceived so many, now also give way to your name, and thus show your mercy on this place! For they walk in error.”And with these words of John
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the altar of Artemis suddenly split into many parts, and the oblations put up in the temple suddenly fell to the ground, and its glory broke, and so did more than seven of the idols. And half of the temple fell down, so that when the roof came down, the priest also was killed at one stroke. And the people of the Ephesians cried, “There is only one God, that of John, only one God who hascompassion for us; for you alone are God; now we have become converted, since we saw your miraculous deeds. Have mercy upon us, God, according to your will, and deliver us from our great error.” And some of them lay on their faces and cried; others bent their knees and prayed; others rent their gar ments and lamented; still others tried to escape.
And John stretched out his
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hands and prayed with uplifted soul to the Lord, “Glory be to you, my Jesus, the only God of truth, who procure your servants in manifold ways!” And after these words he said to the people, “Rise up from the ground, people of Eph esus, pray to my God, and know how his invisible power was made manifest and his miraculous deeds took place before your eyes! Artemis herself should have helped. Her servant should have received help from her and not have died. Where is the power of the deity? Where are the sacrifices? Where the birthday? Where the festivals? Where the garlands? Where the great enchantment and the poison al lied to it?”And the people rose up from
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the ground and made haste to destroy the remainder of the temple, cry ing, “We know that the God of John is the only one, and henceforth we worship him, since we have obtained mercy from him.” And as John came down, many of the people touched him, saying, “Help us, John, help us who die in vain! You see our intention; you see how the mul titude following you cleaves to hope in your God. We have seen the way in which we have gone astray when we were lost. We have seen that our gods were erected in vain. We have seen their great and disgraceful derision. But give us, we be seech you, help without hindrance, when97
THE ACTS OF JOHN
we have come to your house! Receive us, who are desperate!”
. . . On the first day we came to
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a lonely inn, and when we were trying to find a bed for John we experi enced a strange event. There was one bedstead with covers over which we spread our cloaks which we had brought and requested him to lie down and to rest, whilst we slept on the floor. He had hardly lain down, when he was molested by bugs. But as they became more and more troublesome, and as it was midnight already, we all heard him say to them, “I say to you, you bugs, be considerate; leave your home for this night and go to rest in a place which is far away from the servants of God!” And while we laughed and talked, John fell asleep. And we con versed quietly, and thanks to him we re mained undisturbed.61
When it was day, I rose first, and with me Verus and Andron icus. And in the door of the room which we had taken was a mass of bugs. And having called all the brethren, we went outside to have a full view of them. John was still asleep. When he woke up we showed him what we had seen. And sit ting up in bed and seeing them, he said, “Since you have been wise to heed my warning, go back to your place!” When he had spoken and had risen from the bed, the bugs hastened from the door to the bed, ran up the legs into the joints and disappeared. And John said again, “This creature heard the voice of a man and kept quiet and was obedient. We, however, hear God’s voice, and yet irre sponsibly transgress his commandments. And how long will this go on?”62
After this we came to Ephesus. And when the brethren who lived there had learned that John had returned after this long time, they met in the house of Andronicus, where he was also staying, grasped his feet, put his hands to their faces, and kissed them be cause they had touched his clothes.
And while great love and end
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less joy prevailed among the brethren, one, a servant of Satan, coveted Drusiana, although he saw and knew that she was the wife of Andronicus. Very many people remonstrated with him, “It is impossible for you to obtain this woman, especially since she has sepa rated even from her husband out of piety. Or do you alone not know that Andron icus, who was not the godly man he now is, had locked her up in a tomb, saying, ‘Either I’ll have you as a wife, as I had you before, or you must die?’ And she preferred to die rather than to commit the repugnant act. Now, if out of piety she withheld her consent to sexual inter course with her husband and master, but persuaded him to become like-minded, should she consent to you, who wish to commit adultery with her? Desist from your passion, which gives you no rest! Desist from your scheme, which you can not accomplish!”64
Though his intimate friends re monstrated with him, they could not persuade him. He was even so impudent as to send word to her. When Drusiana heard of his disgraceful passion and shameless demands, she became very despondent, and after two days she was feverish. She said, “Oh, if I only had not come back to my native city where I have become a stumbling-block to a man who believes not in the worship of God! For if he were filled with God’s word, he would not fall into such a passion. Therefore, O Lord, since I have become accessory to a blow which struck an ig norant soul, deliver me from this prisonand take me soon to you!” And without being understood by anyone Drusiana de parted this life in the presence of John, not rejoicing but sorrowing over the physical trouble of that man.