have You forsaken me?"—when he was the very one who had surrendered himself! And how was it that his Father did not deliver him, though He was fully able to save him and to hurl a thunderbolt upon the cross and those who raised it? Or was the Lord powerless and subdued before the Jews?!

The Gospel also says that the Jews asked him to show them a sign proving he was the Messiah. He answered, “Demolish this house”—meaning the Temple in Jerusalem—“and I will rebuild it for you in three days.” They replied, “A house that was built in forty-five years—will you rebuild it in three days?” (1)

You likewise report in the Gospel that when the Jews seized him, took him to the praetorium of Caesar’s governor, and evidence (2) was summoned against him, two false witnesses came forward and said, “We heard him say, ‘I am able to rebuild the Temple in three days.’” (3)

By God, how astonishing! He claims that miracle and that power for himself, yet maintains that the two men who testified to it were perjurers!

Luke also relates that Christ said to two of his disciples, “Go to the fortress opposite you; when you enter it you will find a colt (4) tied up, on which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it to me.” (5)

But in Matthew’s Gospel, narrating this same event, it is said that the animal was a she-donkey accompanied by her foal. (6)