(1) MOSES writeth in his first book [Genesis] as if he had been present, and had beheld all with his eyes; but without doubt he received it in writing from his forefathers: It may be he, in the spirit, might well have discerned somewhat more herein than his forefathers did.

(1) And He said to the angel of the presence : "Write7 for Moses from the beginning of creation till My sanctuary has been built among them for all eternity.

(4) And he was moreover with the angels of God these six jubilees of years, and they showed him everything which is on earth and in the heavens, the rule of the sun, and he wrote down everything.

(1) And Moses was on the Mount forty days and forty nights, and God taught him the earlier and the later history * of the division of all the days of the law, and of the testimony.

(3) And each having severally translated each prophetic book, and all the translations being compared together, they agreed both in meaning and expression. For it was the counsel of God carried out for the benefit of Grecian ears. It was not alien to the inspiration of God, who gave the prophecy, also to produce the translation, and make it as it were Greek prophecy. Since the Scriptures having perished in the captivity of Nabuchodonosor, Esdras the Levite, the priest, in the time of Artaxerxes king of the Persians, having become inspired in the exercise of prophecy restored again the whole of the ancient Scriptures. And Aristobulus, in his first book addressed to Philometor, writes in these words: "And Plato followed the laws given to us, and had manifestly studied all that is said in them." And before Demetrius there had been translated by another, previous to the dominion of Alexander and of the Persians, the account of the departure of our countrymen the Hebrews from Egypt, and the fame of all that happened to them, and their taking possession of the land, and the account of the whole code of laws; so that it is perfectly clear that the above-mentioned philosopher derived a great deal from this source, for he was very learned, as also Pythagoras, who transferred many things from our books to his own system of doctrines. And Numenius, the Pythagorean philosopher, expressly writes: "For what is Plato, but Moses speak ing in Attic Greek?" This Moses was a theologian and prophet, and as some say, an interpreter of sacred laws. His family, his deeds, and life, are related by the Scriptures themselves, which are worthy of all credit; but have nevertheless to be stated by us also as well as we can.

(1) "For both is it a difficult task to discover the Father and Maker of this universe; and having found Him, it is impossible to declare Him to all. For this is by no means capable of expression, like the other subjects of instruction," says the truth-loving Plato. For he that had heard right well that the all-wise Moses, ascending the mount for holy contemplation, to the summit of intellectual objects, necessarily commands that the whole people do not accompany him. And when the Scripture says, "Moses entered into the thick darkness where God was," this shows to those capable of understanding, that God is invisible and beyond expression by words, And "the darkness " - which is, in truth, the unbelief and ignorance of the multitude - obstructs the gleam of truth. And again Orpheus, the theologian, aided from this quarter, says: "One is perfect in himself, and all things are made the progeny of one," or, "are born;" for so also is it written.He adds: "Him No one of mortals has seen, but He sees all."

(4) And he was the first to write a testimony, and he testified to the sons of men among the generations of the earth, and recounted the weeks of the jubilees, and made known to them the days of the years, and set in order the months and re- counted the Sabbaths of the years as we made (them) known to him.

(4) And he had a third name in heaven, after his ascension, as the mystics say - Melchi. Having reached the proper age, he was taught arithmetic, geometry, poetry, harmony, and besides, medicine and music, by those that excelled in these arts among the Egyptians; and besides, the philosophy which is conveyed by symbols, which they point out in the hieroglyphical inscriptions. The rest of the usual course of instruction, Greeks taught him in Egypt as a royal child, as Philo says in his life of Moses. He learned, besides, the literature of the Egyptians, and the knowledge of the heavenly bodies from the Chaldeans and the Egyptians; whence in the Acts he is said "to have been instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians." And Eupolemus, in his book On the Kings in Judea, says that "Moses was the first wise man, and the first that imparted grammar to the Jews, that the Phoenicians received it from the Jews, and the Greeks from the Phoenicians." And betaking himself to their philosophy, he increased his wisdom, being ardently attached to the training received from his kindred and ancestors, till he struck and slew the Egyptian who wrongfully attacked the Hebrew. And the mystics say that he slew the Egyptian by a word only; as, certainly, Peter in the Acts is related to have slain by speech those who appropriated part of the price of the field, and lied. And so Artapanus, in his work On the Jews, relates "that Moses, being shut up in custody by Chenephres, king of the Egyptians, on account of the people demanding to be let go from Egypt, the prison being opened by night, by the interposition of God, went forth, and reaching the palace, stood before the king as he slept, and aroused him; and that the latter, struck with what had taken place, bade Moses tell him the name of the God who had sent him; and that he, bending forward, told him in his ear; and that the king on hearing it fell speechless, but being supported by Moses, revived again." And respecting the education of Moses, we shall find a harmonious account in Ezekiel, the composer of Jewish tragedies in the drama entitled The Exodus. He thus writes in the person of Moses: "For, seeing our race abundantly increase, His treacherous snares King Pharaoh 'gainst us laid, And cruelly in brick-kilns some of us, And some, in toilsome works of building, plagued.

(1) He caused and produced Beth, predominant in wisdom, crowned, combined, and formed the Moon in the Universe, the first day of the week, and the right eye, of man.

(4) He • began to call on the name of the Lord on the earth. The Patriarchs from Adam to Noah (cf. Gen. v.) ; Life of Enoch ; Death of Adam and Gain (iv. -). 3°-3i5

(2) And the angel of the presence spake to Moses according to the word of the Lord, saying : Write the complete history of the creation, how in six days the Lord God finished all His works and all that He created, and kept Sabbath on the seventh day and hallowed it for all ages, and appointed it as a sign 7 i. e. in th« Messianic Kingdom. for all His works.

(36) The Glossies that are put upon Moses from Reason, will not show you Paradise, much less the Creator. The Prophets and Apostles learned more in the paradisical School in one Hour, than the Doctors in their Schools in thirty Years. One's own Wisdom avails nothing. God gives it to him whom he loves, for nothing. It cannot be bought for Money nor Favour, as King Solomon will tell you.

(1) And He said : " Incline thine heart to every word which I shall speak to thee on this Mount, and write them in a book in order that their generations may see how I have not forsaken them for all the evil which they have wrought in transgressing the covenant which I establish between Me and thee for their generations this day on Mount Sinai.

(27) Here I will faithfully admonish the Reader, deeply to consider Moses, for shere, under the Vail of Moses, he may look upon the Face of Moses: Also he may see the second Adam in the tLove of the Virgin: Also he may see him in his Temptation, and upon the Cross; as also in Death; and lastly, in the Virtue of the Resurrection at the Right Hand of God: Also you may see Moses on Mount Sinai; and lastly, the Clarification [or Transfiguration] of Christ, Moses and Elias on Mount Tabor: Also you may see herein the whole Scripture of the Old and New Testament: Also you find herein all the Prophets from the Beginning of the World to this Time, and all the Might and Power of all Tyrants, why Things have gone so, and must still go [as they do:] Lastly, you find the golden Gate of the Omnipotence, and of the great Power in the Love and Humility; and why the Children of God must still be tempted; and why the noble Grain of Mustard-Seed must grow in Storms, Crosses, and Misery, and why it cannot be otherwise: Also here you find the Essence of all Essences.

(65) He did all this, yet Moses was born, Had he but seen the Eternal workshop, Within his house was Moses safe and sound, Just so the slave of lusts who pampers his body Fancies that some other man bears him ill-will; Saying this one is my enemy, and this one my foe, While it is his own body which is his enemy and foe, He is like Pharaoh, and his body is like Moses, He runs abroad crying, "where is my foe?" While lust is in his house, which is his body,

(32) And He said unto him again : "I am the Lord who created the heaven and the earth, and I shall increase thee and multiply thee exceedingly, and kings will come forth from thee, and they will judge everywhere wherever the foot of the sons of men hath trodden.

(47) And Parmenides the great, as Plato says in the Sophist writes of God thus: "Very much, since unborn and indestructible He is, Whole, only-begotten, and immoveable, and unoriginated." Hesiod also says: "For He of the immortals all is King and Lord. With God none else in might may strive." Nay more, Tragedy, drawing away from idols, teaches to look up to heaven. Sophocles, as Hecataeus, who composed the histories in the work about Abraham and the Egyptians, says, exclaims plainly on the stage: "One in very truth, God is One, Who made the heaven and the far-stretching earth, The Deep's blue billow, and the might of winds.

(4) And he was the first among men that are born on earth who learnt writing and.tcnpwleage and wicdom * and who wrote down the signs of heaven according to the order of their months in a book, that men might know the seasons of the years according to the order of their separate months.

(70) And it came to pass after this that his name during his lifetime was raised aloft to that Son of Man and to the Lord of Spirits from amongst those who dwell on the earth.

(1) And it came to pass in the first year of the exodus of the children of Israel out of Egypt, in the third month, on the sixteenth day of the month, that God spake to Moses-; saying : " Come up to Me on the Mount, and I will give thee two tables of stone of the law and of the commandment, which I have written, that thou mayst teach them."