From Jesus' birth in a cave to Saint Paul baptizing a lion, Elliott offers a selection of early Christian legends which did not get into the Bible, yet have had a profound influence on art, literature, and theology from the second century through the Middle Ages and even modern times. Some of these stories, especially those involving the Virgin Mary, have affected matters of doctrine. The apocryphal Acts offer a legendary history of the early church and some of the best examples of hagiography about Christianity's earliest saints. In this book Elliott provides introductions to each of the most important and significant of these remarkable and often bizarre apocryphal texts.