“3rd. Your third question is concerning the wonders said to have been wrought by Christus, whether they are portents, or such as may be explained according to nature. To this I reply that, in the Tradition, almost all the works are works of healing, and all to be explained according to nature, saving some four or five; and these four or five relations seem to me to have arisen from figures of speech, or prophecies or hyperbole even as I wrote to you before. For example, the Tradition contains already that story of the casting out of the swine from the demoniac, whereof you wrote to me; but diversely reported, some saying that the matter happened at a place called Gerasa, but others at Gadara, and some affirming that one demoniac was thus healed, but others two.
“The other portents in the Tradition may be briefly mentioned, and some of them you yourself have already mentioned, by anticipation, in your letter; 1st. A certain testimony of Moses and Elias to Christus which is now said to have been delivered upon a ‘holy mountain,’ and it is added also that Christus conversing with them was suffused with a celestial splendor, and that there was a voice from heaven proclaiming Christus to be the Son of God. But as for this, and another case of a voice from above and a vision of the heavens opened and a dove descending, I know not whether it is not fitter to set it down as a vision or waking dream, rather than an error springing from a figure of speech; 2nd. The second is some story of a storm stilled by Christus wherein he walked upon the waves; as to which again I know not whether it has sprung from metaphor misunderstood, or may not also in part have sprung from some phantasm apparent to the first followers of Christus (for they were fishermen) while fishing in the lake in Galilee either before or after the death of Christus; 3rd. The third is, a relation how Christus fed many thousands of his followers with bread in the wilderness, and this on two occasions. Now this, as I judge, springs altogether from error of metaphor. For as I wrote before, Christus himself taught his followers to call him the Bread of Life, meaning that his doctrine must be the sustenance of their souls, and this manner of speech appears to be common with the Jewish Rabbis also, who say that in a certain ancient book all ‘feasting’ is to be understood of the feeding upon the Law, yea, and one even speaks of ‘eating’ the Messiah; and to this day the disciples of Christus use such language as this, which I myself heard but of late spoken by the priest of the Christians; ‘O thou who didst come down from heaven to be the Eternal Bread, and didst refresh the race of men, sojourning in the wilderness of the world, with the Bread from heaven, even with thine own body.’