Graphic Bible · Scene 5 of 5

A dry rod has small insect-eaten holes.
AI-generated artwork interprets this work's literary visions and teaching, not authenticated historical events or portraits. Source and translation notes preserve the available edition's limits and review uncertainty. Reported literary scene

Historical Library · Apostolic Fathers
Shepherd of Hermas — Similitude 8, 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.
  • Reading paragraph 1 [a]: Repentance and related expressions are read in this works own context; they are not restricted to feeling sorry, and no uniform Godward formula is imposed. Use repentance for moral change while preserving the works own teaching about baptism, forgiveness, conduct and the angel of repentance; do not impose a different tradition on it.

Shepherd of Hermas 60:5

The Rods Set Apart

The Willow and the Returned Rods · Shepherd of Hermas 60

Story guide: The angel sets groups apart according to their rods’ dryness, damage, splits and remaining green portions.

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5From some he received the rods dry and eaten as if by a moth; the angel ordered those who had handed in such rods to stand apart. Others handed in dry rods, but they had not been eaten by a moth; these too he ordered to stand apart. Others handed in rods half-dry; and these stood apart. Others handed in their rods half-dry and having splits; and these stood apart. Others handed in their rods green and having splits; and these stood apart. Others handed in their rods half dry and half green; and these stood apart. Others presented their rods with two parts of the rod green and the third part dry; and these stood apart. Others handed in two parts dry and the third part green; and these stood apart. Others handed in their rods almost entirely green, but a very little of their rods was dry—at the very tip; and they had splits in them; and these stood apart.

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