If Herod (Satan) arrests/kills John (Hell) only because the error of John(Hell), in the eyes of Herod(Satan), is to have failed to prevent the entry of Jesus, being John(Hell) the archon of Sheol(Galilee)…
...then the Josephian narrative about Herod killing John for the threat of a
sedition by John is virtually false. The author of the Josephian passage
knew:
1) that John was under the kingdom of Herod
2) that John was potentially rebel against Herod insofar he was winning a lot of followers.
But this is also true about Hell regarding Satan in
Acts of Pilate:
1 And as Satan the prince, and Hell, spoke this together, suddenly there came a voice as of thunder and a spiritual cry: Remove, O princes, your gates, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of glory shall come in. When Hell heard that he said unto Satan the prince: Depart from me and go out of mine abode: if thou be a mighty man of war, fight thou against the King of glory. But what hast thou to do with him? And Hell cast Satan forth out of his dwelling. Then said Hell unto his wicked ministers: Shut ye the hard gates of brass and put on them the bars of iron and withstand stoutly, lest we that hold captivity be taken captive.
2 But when all the multitude of the saints heard it, they spake with a voice of rebuking unto Hell: Open thy gates, that the King of glory may come in. And David cried out, saying: Did I not when I was alive upon earth, foretell unto you: Let them give thanks unto the Lord, even his mercies and his wonders unto the children of men; who hath broken the gates of brass and smitten the bars of iron in sunder? he hath taken them out of the way of their iniquity. And thereafter in like manner Esaias said: Did not I when I was alive upon earth foretell unto you: The dead shall arise, and they that are in the tombs shall rise again, and they that are in the earth shall rejoice, for the dew which cometh of the Lord is their healing? And again I said: O death, where is thy sting? O Hell, where is thy victory?
3 When they heard that of Esaias, all the saints said unto Hell: Open thy gates: now shalt thou be overcome and weak and without strength. And there came a great voice as of thunder, saying: Remove, O princes, your gates, and be ye lift up ye doors of hell, and the King of glory shall come in. And when Hell saw that they so cried out twice, he said, as if he knew it not: Who is the King of glory? And David answered Hell and said: The words of this cry do I know, for by his spirit I prophesied the same; and now I say unto thee that which I said before: The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle, he is the King of glory. And: The Lord looked down from heaven that he might hear the groanings of them that are in fetters and deliver the children of them that have been slain. And now, O thou most foul and stinking Hell, open thy gates, that the King of glory may come in. And as David spake thus unto Hell, the Lord of majesty appeared in the form of a man and lightened the eternal darkness and brake the bonds that could not be loosed: and the succour of his everlasting might visited us that sat in the deep darkness of our transgressions and in the shadow of death of our sins.
VI (XXII)
1 When Hell and death and their wicked ministers saw that, they were stricken with fear, they and their cruel officers, at the sight of the brightness of so great light in their own realm, seeing Christ of a sudden in their abode, and they cried out, saying: We are overcome by thee.
- Hell is under the kindgom of Satan.
- Hell was potentially a rebel against Satan insofar he was reluctant to open the gates, against the fact that an entire “multitude of the saints” moved him to open the gates.
Hence John is
caught between two fires in Josephus: he is pacifist, but he is potentially a seditious, given the increasing number of followers moving him against Herod and the ignorance of Herod about his real intentions.
But also Hell is
caught between two fires in
Acts of Pilate: he would like to close the gates to save Satan and himself from Jesus, but he is moved to open the gates, given the insistence of the
“multitude of the saints” and the ignorance of Satan.