gezezra 13

And on the third day, while I was sitting under an oak,

a voice came from over against that tree and said, Ezra, Ezra. And I said, Here I am. And I arose and stood.

And he said to me, I revealed myself in the bush and spoke to Moses, when my people were enslaved in Egypt;

and I sent him, and brought my people out of Egypt, and led them to Mount Sinai; and I kept him with me many days,

and I told him many wonders, and made known to him the secrets of the times, and declared to him the end of the seasons.

And I commanded him, saying, These words you shall proclaim openly, and these you shall keep hidden.

And now I say to you:

Keep in your heart the signs that I have shown you, and the dream that you saw, and the interpretation that you heard.

For you shall be taken up from among men, and from now on you shall dwell with my Son and with those who are like you, until the times are ended.

For the world has lost its youth, and its times are growing old.

For the age was divided into ten parts, and it has come to the tenth;

and there remains half of the tenth.

Now therefore set your house in order, and comfort the sorrowful among your people, and instruct the wise among them; and now renounce the life that is mortal,

and let go the thoughts of mortality; cast off from yourself the burden of man, put on that which does not die, lay aside the thought of sorrow, and hasten now to depart from this world.

For evils worse than those you have now seen shall yet come again.

For the more the world grows old and weak, the more shall the evils increase upon those who dwell in it.

For truth shall perish and falsehood shall stand; for this eagle which you saw hastens to come.

And I answered and said, Let me then speak before you.

For I will go, O Lord, as you have commanded me, and will reprove the people who are now living; but who will instruct those who shall be born hereafter?

For the world lies in darkness, and those who dwell in it are without light;

for your law has been burned, so that no one knows the things which have been done by you, nor the works that you are about to do.

But if I have found favor before you, send upon me the Holy Spirit, that I may write all that has happened in the world from the beginning, and all that was written in your law, so that men may be able to find the path of life, even those who desire to live in the last days.

And he answered me and said, Go, gather the people, and tell them not to seek you for forty days.

But prepare for yourself many writing tablets, and take with you Seraiah, Dabria, Shelemiah, Ethanan, and Asiel—these five men, for they are skilled in writing.

And you shall come here, and I will kindle in your heart the lamp of understanding, which shall not be put out until you have finished all that you are about to write.

And when you have finished, some things you shall make public, and some you shall deliver in secret to the wise. Tomorrow at this hour you shall begin to write.

And I went as he commanded me, and gathered all the people,

and said, Hear, O Israel, these words.

Our fathers dwelt as strangers of old in the land of Egypt, and were delivered from there,

and received the law of life, which they did not keep; and you also, who came after them, have rejected it.

And he gave us the land, and gave us the land of Zion for an inheritance; but you and your fathers sinned, and did not keep the ways of the Most High, which he commanded you.

And because he is a righteous Judge, he took from you in his time what he had given you.

And now you are here, but your brethren are farther within than you.

If then you will rule over your hearts, and discipline your minds, and keep your lives, you shall not die.

For after death the judgment shall come, and he will not bring us to life again; and in that time the names of the righteous shall be made manifest, and the deeds of the wicked shall be disclosed.

And let no one come to me now, nor seek me for forty days.

And I took those five men, as he had commanded me, and we went into the field and remained there.

And on the next day, behold, a voice came and called me, saying, Ezra, open your mouth, and drink what I give you to drink.

And I opened my mouth, and behold, a full cup was handed to me; it was full of water, but its color was like fire.

And I took it and drank; and when I had drunk, my heart poured forth understanding, and wisdom grew within my breast, and my spirit retained its memory.

And my mouth was opened, and was no longer shut.

And the Most High gave understanding to those five men, and they wrote in order all that was dictated, in characters which they did not know; and they sat there forty days, writing in the daytime.

And at night they ate bread; but as for me, I spoke in the daytime, and at night I did not keep silent.

And in those forty days were written ninety-four books.

And then, when those forty days were ended, the Most High spoke to me, saying, Make public the books that you wrote first, that the worthy and the unworthy may read them;

but keep these, that you may deliver them to the wise among your people.

For in them is the lamp of light, and the fountain of wisdom, and the river of knowledge.

And I did so. And in that time they took Ezra up and carried him to the place of those who are like him, after he had written all these things; and he was called the scribe of the knowledge of the Most High, for ever and ever.