son, and lie not concerning the gift of Christ with the denial of an alien; for falsehood, whether it be uttered concerning a small matter or a great one, or something which is convenient, is still falsehood, and is not to be praised. For our Redeemer said, ‘All falsehood is of the Evil One’ ” (St. Matthew 5:33, 37; St. John 8:44). And the deacon being thus rebuked accepted the reproof of the old man pleasantly.
And when we had prayed and made an end of our supplications, one of us became afflicted with shiverings and strong fever, and he begged the blessed John that he might be healed. Then the blessed man said unto him, “This sickness is for thy benefit, because a diminution of faith hath come upon thee,” but he gave him some oil, and let him anoint himself therewith, and when the man had rubbed the oil upon his body, every evil thing which was inside him he cast forth through his mouth, and he was completely cured of his sickness, and departed on his own feet with us to the place where travellers rested.
Now the blessed man appears to have been about ninety years old, and his whole body was emaciated and frail as if by the severity of his rule of life, and no hair whatsoever remained upon his cheeks; and he ate nothing whatsover except dried vegetables (or fruits), and in the period of his old age he did this at sunset. In the early part of his career he suffered severely, because he would neither eat bread, nor anything which had been cooked by fire. And he commanded us, and we sat down with him, and we gave thanks unto God that we were esteemed worthy to see him; and he rejoiced [in us] as if we had been beloved children of his who were meeting their father after a long absence, and with a joyful countenance he held converse with us, saying, “Where do ye come from, my sons, and from what country? Ye have come to a miserable and wretched man.” And when we told him [the name of] the country, and that we had come to him from Jerusalem for the benefit of our souls, and that that which we had received with our ears we might see with our own eyes, for the hearing of the ears is less trustworthy than the sight of the eyes, and frequently error maketh its way into what is heard by the ears, whilst the remembrance of what a man hath seen can never be blotted out from the heart, and the description of the same will be permanently fixed in the mind, the blessed man John answered and said unto us, “What great thing did ye think ye would see, O beloved sons, that ye have come all this way, and have toiled all this great toil? Did ye desire to come and see miserable and wretched men? We possess nothing whatsoever which is worth looking or wondering at. There
