the tribune multiplied greatly his supplications and entreated him to allow his wife to come to him, now the dwelling of the blessed man was situated in the mountainous desert about five miles distant from the city, the holy man would not be persuaded to do so, but said, “This thing is impossible”; and he dismissed the tribune in grief and in sorrow. And the woman tormented her husband by day and by night, and she took an oath, saying, “I cannot go to any other place until I have seen the holy prophet.” And when the oaths of the woman were revealed to the blessed man by her husband, he discerned the faith of the woman, and said unto her husband, “I will appear unto her in a dream this night, but she must never [try] in addition to see my face in the body”; and the tribune made known to his wife the words of the blessed man. And as she was lying in her bed at night she saw the prophet himself come to her, and he said unto her, “What have I to do with thee, O woman? Why dost thou so eagerly desire to see my face? Am I a prophet or a righteous man? I am a sinner and a man of passions even as ye are, but behold, I have prayed for thee and for thy husband, and for thy dwelling, that even as ye have believed, so may it be unto you. Therefore get ye gone in peace;” and having said these words he departed from her. And when the woman woke up she related to her husband the words of the prophet and described his form and appearance, and she offered her thanks to the prophet through her husband. Now when the holy man John saw that her husband had come, before he could speak he said unto him, “Behold, thy request is completed, for I have seen thy wife, and I have fulfilled her petition, and thou must never see my face again; but depart ye in peace.”
Now the wife of another prefect was with child, and she was nigh unto [her time] for bringing forth; and her husband was away at a distance, and on the day in which the blessed man John met her husband she was afflicted, even unto death, with the pains of her bringing forth. And the holy man John gave the news to her husband, and said unto him, “If thou didst only know the grace of God, for behold, a son hath been born unto thee this day, thou wouldst praise God, for his mother hath suffered in no small degree. Behold, thou shalt go and shalt find the boy to be seven days old on thine arrival, and thou shalt give him the name of John, and when he hath grown up, and hath been instructed, and is seven years of age, thou shalt send him to the solitary monks in the desert.”
And the blessed John also made manifest wonderful things like these to stranger folk who used to come to him, and he very frequently made known to the people of the city who used
