The Book of the Cave of Treasures 84

1And now, my brother Nemesius, be amazed and give praise to God that all the straps (or, ligatures) of the Cross of Christ were joined together on the bearing poles of the Ark of the service of God and the covering of the sanctuary of propitiation. This was what God commanded Moses: to make a breast-plate of judgment And when Joseph brought Him down from the Cross, he took away that inscription which was spread out above His head, that is to say, over the head of the Cross of Christ, because it had been written by Pilate in Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew. And why did Pilate write in it no word of the Syrians? Because the Syrians participated in no way whatsoever in the (shedding of the} blood of Christ. And Pilate, a wise man and a lover of the truth, did not wish to write a lie as wicked judges do, but he did according to what is written in the Law of Moses. Pilate wrote in the inscription [the names of the languages of] those who condemned the innocent in the order in which the slayers of Christ laid their hands upon Him, and he hung the writing above Him. Herod was a Greek, Caiaphas was a Hebrew, and Pilate a Roman. Now the Syrians had no part in the murder of Christ, and to this testifieth Abhgar, king of Edessa, who wished to take Jerusalem and destroy it because the Jews crucified Christ.