Barnabas, Epistle of Barnabas 7

Understand this, children of joy: the good Lord has revealed everything to us so that we may know the one to whom we owe thanks and praise in all things.

The Son of God is Lord and will judge the living and the dead, yet he suffered so that his wound might give us life. Therefore, let us believe that the Son of God could not have suffered except for our sake.

After being crucified, he was given vinegar and gall to drink. Listen to how the temple priests revealed this about him.

There is a written command: "Whoever does not fast the fast shall be destroyed by death." The Lord gave this command because he himself was about to offer the vessel of the Spirit as a sacrifice for our sins, so that the type involving Isaac — who was led to the altar — might be fulfilled (Leviticus 16:20-22).

What does the prophet say? "Let them eat from the goat offered for the fast on behalf of all sins." Pay close attention: "Let the priests alone eat all the entrails, unwashed, with vinegar." Why? Because I — who am about to offer my flesh for the sins of my new people — am going to be given gall mixed with vinegar to drink. You priests eat it alone, while the people fast and mourn in sackcloth and ashes, so that it may be shown that he must suffer at their hands.

Now pay attention to what he commanded: "Take two good, similar goats and offer them, and let the priest take one as a whole burnt offering for sins." What about the other one? "Cursed is that one," he says.

Notice how the type of Jesus is revealed: "Let everyone spit on it, pierce it, and put scarlet wool around its head, and thus let it be thrown into the wilderness." When this happens, the one carrying the goat leads it into the wilderness, removes the wool, and places it on a plant called Rachel — whose shoots we are accustomed to eating in the field; its fruits alone are sweet.

What does this mean? Pay attention: One goat is for the altar, the other is cursed. But why is the cursed one crowned? Because they will see him on that day wearing the scarlet robe around his flesh, and they will say: "Is this not the one whom we once crucified, despising, piercing, and spitting on him? Truly, this was the one who claimed to be the Son of God."

How is he similar to the goat? The goats were alike — good and equal — so that when they see him coming then, they may be astonished by the resemblance to the goat. See, then, the type of Jesus who was about to suffer.

And what of the wool placed among the thorns? It is a type of Jesus placed in the church: whoever wants to take the scarlet wool must suffer much because the thorn is fearsome, and must overcome it through affliction. Thus he says: those who want to see me and touch my kingdom must, through pressing and suffering, take hold of me.