Graphic Bible · Scene 4 of 4
Historical Library · Apostolic Fathers
Shepherd of Hermas — Vision 2, section i
The available POB edition is a partial translation, not a summary or the complete ancient work. Popular, not Scripture. Artwork interprets literary visions and teaching; it does not establish their portrayals as historical events.
Source and translation notes
The text names Hermas as its narrator. The illustrations do not identify a historical author or supply authenticated portraits.
Existing reader manuscript-image reference: Codex Sinaiticus. Working source: Lightfoot & Harmer 1891 (normalized OCR) · Greek
English witness: People's Open Bible provisional English rendering (Cartha Inc. and contributors) · CC BY 4.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ — for POB project outputs; source editions retain their original licenses
Numbered reading units are modern paragraph divisions, not ancient verse numbers. The available units follow Visions, Mandates, and Similitudes; absent passages are not reconstructed.
- The available edition begins mid-dialogue and ends mid-sentence in Similitude 8.iv; absent passages are not supplied.
Shepherd of Hermas 5:4
The Book Is Taken Away
Return to the Vision and the Little Book · Shepherd of Hermas 5
Story guide: Withdrawal, copying and empty-hand surprise are distinct images. Writing stays outside view; the unseen remover is not identified.
Open this scene in the reader →4So I took it, and withdrawing to a certain place in the field, I copied it all letter by letter, for I could not make out the syllables. And when I had finished the letters of the book, suddenly the little book was snatched from my hand; but by whom I did not see.
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