The Gospel of Barnabas

178.

'And let this suffice you,' said Jesus, 'for the knowledge of paradise.' Whereupon Bartholomew said again: 'O master, have patience with me if I ask thee one word.'

Jesus answered: 'Say that which thou desirest.'

Said Bartholomew: 'Paradise is surely great: for, seeing there be in it such great goods, it needs must be great.'

Jesus answered: "Paradise is so great that no man can measure it. Verily I say unto thee that the heavens are nine, among which are set the planets, that are distant one from another five hundred years' journey for a man: and the earth in like manner is distant from the first heaven five hundred years' journey.

'But stop thou at the measuring of the first heaven, which is by so much greater than the whole earth as the whole earth is greater than a grain of sand. So also the second heaven is greater than the first, and the third than the second, and so on up to the last heaven, each one is likewise greater than the next. And verily I say to thee that paradise is greater than all the earth and all the heavens [together], even as all the earth is greater than a grain of sand.'

Then said Peter: 'O master, paradise must needs be greater than God, because God is seen within it.'

Jesus answered: 'Hold thy peace Peter, for thou unwittingly blasphemest.'