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17 One of the MSS.: With his shepherds, and sheep, and goats, and oxen.
18 Ex. xxviii. 36-38. For traditions about the petalon, see Euseb., H. E., ii. 23, iii. 31, v. 24: Epiph., Hoer., 78.
19 Various readings are: Sixth, seventh, eighth.
20 One of the MSS inserts: On the eighth day.
22 This is the reading of most MSS.; but it is difficult to see any sense in it. One MS. reads: They attended on her. Fabricius proposed: They bathed her.
23 Two of the MSS. add: And they gave her the name of Mary, because her name shall not fade forever. This derivation of the name - from the root mar, fade-is one of a dozen or so.
24 This is taken to mean: Send someone to us to warn us that we have been too long in paying our vow. One MS. reads, lest the Lord depart from us; another, lets the Lord move away from us.
25 Or, fourteen. Postel's Latin version has ten.
26 Ex. xxviii. 28; Sirach xlv. 9; Justin, Tryph., xlii.
28 Lit., undefiled. It is difficult to say what colour is meant, or if it is a colour at all. The word is once used to mean the sea, but with no reference to colour. It is also the name of a stone of a greenish hue.
33 Other readings are: the wool-what she had in her hand.
36 Six MSS. have sixteen; one, fourteen; two, fifteen; and one, seventeen.
37 The Latin translation has hung down.
38 Ezek. xxi. 12; Jer. xxxi. 19.
40 Another reading is: As Adam was in Paradise, and in the hour of the singing of praise (doxology) to God was with the angels, the serpent, etc.
42 Lit., angelic; one MS. has holy; the Latin translation, following a slightly different reading, that it would not be fair to her.
44 Three MSS. have high priest.
47 Or: On this day of the Lord I will do, etc.
48 Another reading is: And his son Samuel led it, and James and Simon followed.
49 Bethlehem . . . used to be overhsadowed by a grove of Thammuz, i.e., Adonis; and in the cave where Christ formerly waile as an infant, they used to mourn for the beloved of Venus (Jerome to Paulinus). In his letter to Sabinianus the cave is repeatedly mentioned: "That cave in which the Son of God was born;" "that venerable cave," etc, "within the door of what was once the Lord's manger, now the alter." "Then you run to the place of the shepherds." There appears alos ot have been above the alter the figure of an angel, or angels. See also Justin, Tryph., 78.
50 Two MSS. here add: And thou Bethlehem, etc., from Mic. v. 2.
51 Matt. ii. 1-12. One of the MSS. here adds Matt. ii. 13-15, with two or three slight variations.
52 Four MSS. have all the male children, as in Matt. ii. 16.
53 Another reading is: And Herod, enraged at this, ordered him to be slain in the midst of the altar before the dawn, that the slaying of him might not be prevented by the people. [This incident was probably suggested by the reference to "Zacharias the son of Barachias" in Matt. xxiii. 35, Luke xi. 51; but comp. 2 Chron. xxiv. 20-22.-R.]
54 Lit., the blessing of Zacharias did not come forth, etc.
56 Another reading is: And was rent fro mthe top, etc.
57 Luke ii. 27. One of the MSS. ehre adds Matt. ii. 19-23, with two or three verbal changes.
58 [Assuming that this is among the most ancient of the Apocryphal Gospels, it is noteworthy that the writer abstains from elaborating his statements on points fully narrated in the Canonical Gospels. The supplementary character of the earliest of these writings is obvious. But what a contrast between the impressive silence of the New Testament narratives, and the garrulity, not to say indelicacy, of these detaile descriptions of the Nativity!-R.]
59 The MSS. vary much in the doxology.
1 [This introduction is, of itself, an evidence of late origin.-R.]
4 Two of the MSS. have this prologue: I James, the son of Joseph, living in the fear of God, have written all that with my own eyes I saw coming to pass in the time of the nativity of the holy virgin Mary, or of the Lord the Saviour: giving thanks to God, who has given me wisdom in the accounts of His Advent, showing His abounding grace to the twelve tribes of Israel.
6 One of the MSS. has: Only they vowed that, if God should give them offspring, they would devote it to the service of the temple; and because of this, they were wont to go to the temple of the Lord at each of the yearly festivals.
7 Another reading is: Where he has died-reading mortuus for moratus.