Core Texts
The main body of Acta Pilati is in two sections, with an appendix, Descensus ad Infernos—the Harrowing of Hell—that does not exist in the Greek texts, and is a later addition to the Latin versions. The first (chapters i–xi) contains the trial of Jesus based upon Luke 23. The second part (xii–xvi) regards the Resurrection. In it, Leucius and Charinus, the two souls raised from the dead after the Crucifixion, relate to the Sanhedrin the circumstances of the descent of Christ to Limbo. A literature of miracle-tale romance developed around a conflated "Leucius Charinus" as an author of further texts. The Harrowing of Hell episode depicts St Dismas accompanying Christ in Hell, and the deliverance of the righteous Old Testament patriarchs.
An appended text purports to be a written report made by Pontius Pilate to Claudius, containing an anti-Semitic description of the crucifixion, as well as an account of the resurrection of Jesus; both are presented as if in an official report. One series of Latin manuscripts includes as an appendix or continuation, the episode Cura Sanitatis Tiberii ("The Cure of Tiberius"), the oldest form of the Veronica legend, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia, in which Emperor Tiberius is cured of his malady. (Compare the legend of the Image of Edessa.)
Read more about this topic: Acts Of Pilate
Famous quotes containing the words core and/or texts:
“The threadbare trees, so poor and thin,
They are no wealthier than I;
But with as brave a core within
They rear their boughs to the October sky.
Poor knights they are which bravely wait
The charge of Winter’s cavalry,
Keeping a simple Roman state,
Discumbered of their Persian luxury.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I know that I will always be expected to have extra insight into black texts—especially texts by black women. A working-class Jewish woman from Brooklyn could become an expert on Shakespeare or Baudelaire, my students seemed to believe, if she mastered the language, the texts, and the critical literature. But they would not grant that a middle-class white man could ever be a trusted authority on Toni Morrison.”
—Claire Oberon Garcia, African American scholar and educator. Chronicle of Higher Education, p. B2 (July 27, 1994)