The Married Lion

Paul baptised the lion in the wilderness according to the Ephesian episode of the Acts of Paul, as attested by the Bodmer Coptic.  And then:  “When the lion ran off to the field rejoicing … a lionness met him, and he did not direct his face towards her, but turned away and ran off towards the woods” (cited from Klauck, The Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles, 64).

Hans Josef Klauck comments (ibid.): “After this exquisite exemplification of the interconnection between baptism and the renunciation of marital intercourse, the narrative switches back to the house of Aquila and Prisca in Ephesus.”  So according to Klauck, this lion, who could speak with a human voice and who received baptism at the hand of Paul, was also married.

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