Apocrypha
Apocalypse of Abraham
Vision of the Throne
25 chapters · read and listen
Reading note
Abraham destroys his father's idols, is taken on high and sees the whole of history laid out like a picture, the fall in Eden included.
Chapters
Dossier
Abraham as a young man, still in his father's idol workshop, working out on his own that these are not gods — and then taken up to heaven to see the whole history of the world laid out in a picture.
Where this text comes from
Probably written in the late 1st or the 2nd century AD, from a lost Semitic original. It survives only in Old Slavonic, transmitted by the Russian church.
Why it is not in the Bible
Outside every canon, with no record of having been considered.
What you will find
- Abraham narrates in the first person: it was he who tended the gods of his father Terah and his brother Nahor.
- Merumath, the stone idol, is carried off to be cleaned — and it is while cleaning the gods that the young man begins to doubt them.
- The question that drives the whole book is in the second line: which of them is truly the strongest.
- It closes in praise, with the mysteries revealed and the formula for ever and ever.
Frequently asked questions
- Is the Apocalypse of Abraham Jewish or Christian?
- The core is Jewish, from the late 1st or 2nd century. There is one passage with the appearance of a Christian interpolation, added during Slavonic transmission.