(1) JESUS went out from thence, and came into his own country. When the sabbath day was come, he began to teach in the synagogue: and many hearing him were astonished, saying, What wisdom is this which is given unto him? Is not this the carpenter, the son of Joseph? Is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas? and his sisters, are they not all here? Whence then has this man all these things and they were offended in him. But Jesus said unto them,

Philip the apostle said, “Joseph the carpenter planted a garden, for he needed wood for his trade. He is the one who made the cross from the trees he planted, and his own offspring hung on what he planted. His offspring was Jesus and what he planted was the cross.” The tree of life, however, is in the middle of the garden. It is an olive tree, and from it comes chrism, and from chrism comes resurrection.

(2) A rich man of Arimathea, a city of the Jews, Joseph was an honorable counsellor, a good man, and a just (he had not consented to the counsel and deed of them). He also waited for the kingdom of God, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews.

(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.

Jesus became a guide, quiet and at leisure. In the middle of a school he came and spoke the word, as a teacher. Those who were wise in their own estimation came to put him to the test. But he discredited them as empty-headed people. They hated him because they really were not wise. After all these came also the little children, those who possess the knowledge of the father. When they became strong they were taught the aspects of the father’s face. They came to know and they were known. They were glorified and they gave glory.

(4) When he had gone a little further thence, he saw James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, who were in a ship with their father, mending their nets. He called them: and they left their father in the ship with the hired servants, and followed Jesus.