1
An early prophetic passage preserved anonymously in both 1 Clement and the writing called 2 Clement has sometimes been proposed as another remnant of Eldad and Medad.
2
It rebukes the double-minded who say that the promises were heard already in the days of the fathers, yet they have grown old and nothing has happened.
3
It answers them by pointing to a vine: first the old leaf falls, then new growth appears; afterward come leaf and flower, then the unripe fruit, and finally the mature cluster.
4
So also, the prophetic word says, the people first pass through disturbance and affliction, and afterward receive the good things prepared for them.
5
The image teaches that delay is not absence and that fulfillment may ripen by stages hidden from those who judge only by the present hour. came from Eldad and Medad. M. R. James objected that its setting sounds more appropriate to a later …