ABSTRACT
[Hast thou not considered] him who passed by a city (which was Jerusalem), riding upon an ass, and having with him a basket of figs and a vessel of the juice of grapes (and he was ’Ozeyr [Ezra]), and it was falling down upon its roofs, Nebuchadnezzar having ruined it ? He said, wondering at the power of God, How will God quicken this after its death ?–And God caused him to die for a hundred years. Then He raised him to life: [and] He said unto him, How long hast thou tarried here ?–He answered I have tarried a day, or part of a day.–For he slept in the first part of the day, and was deprived of his life, and was reanimated at sunset. He said Nay, thou hast tarried a hundred years : but look at thy food and thy drink: they have not become changed by time: and look at thine ass. –And he beheld it dead, and its bones white and shining.– We have done this that thou mayest know, and that We may make thee a sign of the resurrection unto men. And look at the bones of thine ass, how We will raise them; then We will clothe them with flesh.–So he looked at them, and they had become put together, and were clothed with flesh, and life was breathed into it, and it brayed. Therefore when it had been made manifest to him he said, I know that God is able to accomplish everything. (ii. 261.)
