Now when the darkness came over the earth Joseph of Arimathea, having
lighted a torch of pinewood, passed down from the hill into the valley.
For he had business in his own home.
And kneeling on the flint stones of the Valley of Desolation he saw a
young man who was naked and weeping. His hair was the colour of honey,
and his body was as a white flower, but he had wounded his body with
thorns and on his hair had he set ashes as a crown.
And he who had great possessions said to the young man who was naked and
weeping, ‘I do not wonder that your sorrow is so great, for surely He was
a just man.’
And the young man answered, ‘It is not for Him that I am weeping, but for
myself. I too have changed water into wine, and I have healed the leper
and given sight to the blind. I have walked upon the waters, and from
the dwellers in the tombs I have cast out devils. I have fed the hungry
in the desert where there was no food, and I have raised the dead from
their narrow houses, and at my bidding, and before a great multitude, of
people, a barren fig-tree withered away. All things that this man has
done I have done also. And yet they have not crucified me.’