(3) In Myrr/^a.— Thekla left Paul in M>Trha. Here he healed of the dropsy a man named Hermo- krates, who was baptized. But Hermippus the elder son of Hermokrates was opposed to Paul, and the younger son, Dion, died. The text is here full of lacunse, but apparently Paul raised up Dion, and punished Hermippus with bUndness, but after- wards healed and converted him. He then went on to Sidon.
(4) In Sidon. — On the road to Sidon there is an incident connected with a heathen altar, and the power of Christians over the demons or heathen gods, but there is unfortunately a large lacuna in the text. In Sidon there is an incident which apparently is concerned with unnatural vice, and Paul and other Christians were shut up in the temple of Apollo. At the prayer of Paul the temple was destroyed, but Paul was taken into the amphitheatre. The text is defective, and the manner of his rescue is not clear, but apparently he made a speech and gained many converts, and then went to T>Te.
(5) In Tyre. — Only the beginning of the story is extant, but apparently the central feature is the exorcism of demons and the curing of a dumb child. After this there is a great lacuna, in which Schmidt places various fragments deahng with the question of the Jewish law ; and it appears possible that the scene is moved to Jerusalem and that Peter is also present.
(6) Paul in prison in the mines. — In this incident Paul appears as one of those condemned to work in the mines (? in Macedonia), and he restores to life a certain Phrontina. Presumably he ultimately escaped from his imprisonment, but the text is incomplete.
(7) In Philippi. — The most important incident connected with Philippi is a correspondence with the Corinthians, dealing with certain heretical views, of which the main tenets are (a) a denial of the resurrection of the flesh ; (6) the human body is not the creation of God ; (c) the world is not the creation of God ; (d) the government of the universe is not in the hands of God ; (e) the crucifixion was not that of Christ, but of a docetic phantasm ; (/) Christ was not born of Mary, nor was he of the seed of David.
(8) A farewell scene. — The place in which this scene is laid cannot be discerned from the frag- ments which remain, but it contains a prophecy of Paul's work in Rome, placed in the mouth of a certain Cleobius.
(9) The martyrdom, of Paul. — The last episode gives an account of the martyrdom of Paul, and the text of this is also preserved as a separate docu- ment in Greek. According to it, Paul preached without any hindrance, and there is no suggestion that he was a prisoner. On one occasion, while he was preaching, Patroclus, a servant of Nero, fell from a window and was killed. Paul restored him, and he was converted. When Nero heard of this miracle, Patroclus acknowledged that he was the soldier of the /3a(ri\€i>s l-qcrovs XpiarSs. Nero caused him and other Christians to be arrested, condemned Paul to be beheaded, and the other Christians to be burnt. In prison Paul converted the prefect Longinus and the centurion Cestus, and pro- phesied to them hfe after death. Longinus and Cestus were told to go to his grave on the next day, when they would be baptized by Titus and Luke. At hia execution milk spurted from his
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neck instead of blood, and afterwards he appeared to Nero, who was so impressed that he ended the persecution. The narrative ends with the baptism of Longinus and Cestus at the grave of Paul.
The testimony of early writers to the Acts of Paul. — Since the discovery of the Coptic Acts, which show that the 'Acts of Paul and Thekla' is an extract from the Acts of Paul, there is no justification for doubting that Tertullian refers to the Acts of Paul in de Baptistno, 17 :
'Quoflsi qui Pauli perperam inscripta le^funt, exemplum Theclae ad lieentiaiu niulienmi docendi tinguendique defendunt, sciant in Asia presbyteruin, qui earn scripturani construxit quasi titulo Pauli de suo cumulans, convictum atque confessum se id amore Pauli fecisse loco decessisse.'
This statement is extremely valuable, because it gives us clear evidence as to the provenance of the Acts, proves that it is not later than the 2nd cent., and shows that it was composed in the great Chm-ch, not in any heretical or Gnostic sect. _
Origen quotes the Acts in de Principiis, i. 2, 3, and in in Johannem, xx. 12. In both cases he gives the Acts of Paul definitely as the source of his quotation, but neither passage is found in the extant texts. He apparently regards the Acts as only shghtly inferior to the Canonical Scriptures.
Eusebius in HE iii. 25 ranks the Acts of Paul, with the Shepherd of Hermas, Ep. of Barnabas, the Apoc. of Peter, the Didache, and possibly the Johannine Apocalypse, as among the v6da. But he does not appear to place it with the Acts of Andi-ew and John and 'the other apostl6s' (per- haps the Acts of Peter and Thomas) which are AroTra iravT-rj Kal Sva-ffe^rj. Hence he probably did not regard the Acts of Paul as heretical.