Page 9

Sample passages from the Apocalypse of Paul include the following:

And I saw another man up to his knees in the river of fire. And his hands were stretched
out and bloody, and worms came out of his mouth and from his nostrils and he was
groaning and weeping and crying, and he said: "Have mercy on me, for I suffer more than
the rest who are in this punishment." . . . he said . . . He whom you see was a deacon who
ate up the offerings and committed fornication and did not do right in the sight of God.
Therefore increasingly he pays the penalty (36).

And in that place I saw another set of pits and in the middle of it a river full of a
multitude of men and women whom worms were devouring. I then wept and with a sigh .
. . asked . . . he said . . . They are those who exacted usury at compound interest and
trusted in their riches and did not hope in God that he would be helper to them (37).

And again I saw men and women with very black faces in the pit of fire, and sighing and
weeping I asked . . . he said . . . These are fornicators and adulterers who although they
had their own wives committed adultery; and similarly the women committed adultery in
the same way, though they had their own husbands. Therefore increasingly they pay the
penalty (38).

And I saw other men and women suspended by their eyebrows and hair, and a river of fire
drew (?) them . . . They are those who did not give themselves to their own husbands and
wives but to adulterers, and therefore they pay their own particular penalty increasingly
(39).

And I saw other men and women covered with dust, and their faces were like blood, and
they were in a pit of tar and brimstone, and they were running in a river of fire.. . . They
are those who have committed the iniquity of Sodom and Gomorrah, men with men.
Therefore they pay the penalty increasingly (39).

The descending Christ, in response to the repentance and prayers of the damned and

prayers for the damned by the living, will show some mercy by moderating the punishments of
Hell, including ease on the Lords day (44).

This picture which is contrary to Gods Word

encourages the practice of prayers for the unredeemed dead, a practice that is also contrary to
Scripture.

D. Witness

1. Apocalypse of Peter
After his Tour of Hell during which he had been profoundly moved by the intense and

endless sufferings of the damned, Peter was described as being told by the Lord: "Spread thou
my gospel throughout the whole world in peace! For there will be rejoicing (?) at the source of
my word, the hope of life, and suddenly the world will be carried off " (14).

According to this non-canonical version of the Great Commission, Peter received his