(5) "First I spoke with you in parables, and you did not understand. Now I am speaking with you openly, and you do not grasp it. Nevertheless, you were for me a parable among parables and a disclosure among things revealed.

(37) Now three parables were imparted to me, and I lifted up my voice and recounted them to those that dwell on the earth.

(9) "Since I was glorified like this once before, why do you hold me back when I am eager to go? After my labor you have made me stay with you another eighteen days because of the parables. For some people it was enough to listen to the teaching and understand 'The Shepherds,' 'The Seed,' 'The Building,' 'The Lamps of the Young Women,' 'The Wage of the Workers,' and 'The Silver Coins and the Woman.'

(57) And they shall all fall down and worship the Lord of Spirits. And this is the end of the second Parable.

(45) And this is the Second Parable concerning those who deny the name of the dwelling of the holy ones and the Lord of Spirits.

(29) And now also the whole economy which prophesied of the Lord appears indeed a parable to those who know not the truth, when one speaks and the rest hear that the Son of God - of Him who made the universe - assumed flesh, and was conceived in the virgin's womb (as His material body was produced), and subsequently, as was the case, suffered and rose again, being "to the Jews a stumbling-block, and to the Greeks foolishness," as the apostle says.

(12) Such a parable did Korah use in his argument, Such parables know to be as crows and owls, When Noah was building the ark in the desert, A hundred parable-mongers attacked him with irony, Saying, "In the desert, where is no water or well, He builds a boat! What ignorant folly is this!" The arguments of the Jabriyan, i.e., the Fatalists or Compulsionists. The men of Saba said, "O preachers, enough! What you say is enough, if there are any wise here. God has placed a 'lock upon our hearts,' That great Painter has painted us thus;

(89) And again I saw those sheep that they again erred and went many ways, and forsook that their house, and the Lord of the sheep called some from amongst the sheep and sent them to the sheep, but the sheep began to slay them.

(99) Woe to you, ye fools, for through your folly shall ye perish: and ye transgress against the wise, and so good hap shall not be your portion.

(6) Far more than uselessly he leaves the shore, (Since he returneth not the same he went,) Who fishes for the truth, and has no skill; And in the world proofs manifest thereof Parmenides, Melissus, Brissus are, And many who went on and knew not whither; Thus did Sabellius, Arius, and those fools Who have been even as swords unto the Scriptures In rendering distorted their straight faces. Nor yet shall people be too confident In judging, even as he is who doth count The corn in field or ever it be ripe. For I have seen all winter long the thorn First show itself intractable and fierce, And after bear the rose upon its top; And I have seen a ship direct and swift Run o'er the sea throughout its course entire, To perish at the harbour's mouth at last. Let not Dame Bertha nor Ser Martin think, Seeing one steal, another offering make, To see them in the arbitrament divine; For one may rise, and fall the other may."

(69) And this oath is mighty over them And through it ⌈they are preserved and⌉ their paths are preserved, And their course is not destroyed. Close of the Third Parable

(28) Wherefore also He employed metaphorical description; for such is the parable, - a narration based on some subject which is not the principal subject, but similar to the principal subject, and leading him who understands to what is the true and principal thing; or, as some say, a mode of speech presenting with vigour, by means of other circumstances, what is the principal subject.

(22) sufficient ingenuity for imposition. Such men are mingled by the Enemy of human welfare among those who seek to do good, thus making Truth more difficult of discovery. Believe us, Truth is simple and unconcealed, while falsehood is complex, deeply hidden, proud, and its fictitious worldly knowledge, seemingly a glitter with godly luster, is often mistaken for divine wisdom. You that are wise will turn from these false teachings and come to us, who seek not your money but freely offer you our greater treasure. We desire not your goods, but that you should become partakers of our goods. We do not deride parables, but invite you to understand all parables and all secrets. We do not ask you to receive us, but invite you to come unto our kingly houses and palaces, not because of ourselves but because we are so ordered by the Spirit of God, the desire of our most excellent Father C.R.C., and the need of the present moment, which is very great.

(30) But on the Scriptures being opened up, and declaring the truth to those who have ears, they proclaim the very suffering endured by the flesh, which the Lord assumed, to be "the power and wisdom of God." And finally, the parabolic style of Scripture being of the greatest antiquity, as we have shown, abounded most, as was to be expected, in the prophets, in order that the Holy Spirit might show that the philosophers among the Greeks, and the wise men among the Barbarians besides, were ignorant of the future coming of the Lord, and of the mystic teaching that was to be delivered by Him. Rightly then, prophecy, in proclaiming the Lord, in order not to seem to some to blaspheme while speaking what was beyond the ideas of the multitude embodied its declarations in expressions capable of leading to other conceptions. Now all the prophets who foretold the Lord's coming, and the holy mysteries accompanying it, were persecuted and killed. As also the Lord Himself, in explaining the Scriptures to them, and His disciples who preached the word like Him, and subsequently to His life, used parables. Whence also Peter, in his Preaching, speaking of the apostles, says:

(59) And you see clearly, that the wicked Pharisees and Scribes put these Things upon him; for these Things did not happen to him for nothing, or without Cause; for it was of Necessity to be so; for the Pharisees, Scribes, and Rulers, had put that in his Dish for him, which he must eat. Or shall we be silent? We must tell it, though it should cost us our Life.

(89) And that sheep which led them again ascended to the summit of that rock, but the sheep began to be blinded and to wander from the way which he had showed them, but that sheep wot not thereof.

(12) The one who ran on high and the one who drew him to himself were not barren, but in bringing forth a fruit in the Pleroma, they upset those who were in the defect.

(100) Woe to you who work godlessness, And glory in lying and extol them: Ye shall perish, and no happy life shall be yours.

(1) Concerning the elect I said, and took up my parable concerning them: The Holy Great One will come forth from His dwelling,

(58) And I began to speak the third Parable concerning the righteous and elect.