and he wrote three hundred and sixty-six books, and gave them to his sons.” Still more pointed is the passage in 2 (4) Esdras xii. 36-38[250]: “Thou alone hast been found worthy to learn this mystery of the Most High; therefore write all these things which thou hast seen in a book, and put them in a secret place; and thou shalt teach them to the wise of the people, whose hearts thou knowest are able to comprehend and keep these mysteries.” But perhaps the most striking passage of all is 2 (4) Esdras xiv. 44-47: “So in forty days were written ninety-four books. And it came to pass when the forty days were fulfilled, that the Most High spake unto me, saying: The twenty-four books which thou hast written publish, that the worthy and unworthy may read therein; but the seventy last thou shalt keep, to deliver them to the wise among thy people; for in them is the spring of understanding, the fountain of wisdom, and the stream of knowledge.” The “twenty-four books” are the canonical ones which were read in the synagogue and therefore known to all, but the “seventy last” are the secret ones which are reserved only for the initiated. From these passages it will, therefore, be seen that originally the term “apocryphal,” as applied to books, was used in a good sense; such books were held to contain deep and mysterious truths which might only be communicated to the initiated, and were therefore hidden from the outside world; this applies both to Gentile and to Jewish usage. It will also have been noticed, from the passages quoted, that there is a twofold idea contained in the term “apocryphal”; it means, on the one hand, hidden teaching which the book contains, and on the other, that the book itself is hidden.[251] Neither in the passages quoted, nor anywhere else, is the word “apocryphal” ever applied to the books of our Apocrypha; this is true right up to the fourth century A.D. Before pursuing further the history of the word “apocryphal,” and how it came to be applied to sacred books of the second rank, we must briefly consider the not unimportant question of the connection between the Hebrew _gānaz_ and the Greek _apokryphos_. It is better to do so at this point before we deal with _apokryphos_ in the later sense in which it was used. III. THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE TERMS _Gānaz_ AND _Apokryphos_