2 Esdras (also called4 Esdras,Latin Esdras, orLatin Ezra) is the name of an apocalyptic book in some English versions of theBible. Tradition ascribes it toEzra , a scribe and priest of the 5th century BCE, but scholarship places its composition between 70 and 218 CE. It is reckoned among the apocrypha by Roman Catholics, Protestants, and most Eastern Orthodox Christians. 2 Esdras was excluded by Jerome from his Vulgate version of the Old Testament, but from the 9th century onwards the Latin text is sporadically found as an appendix to the Vulgate, inclusion becoming more general after the 13th century.
Then were the entrances of thisworld amde narrow, full ofsorrow and travail: they are but few andevil, full of perils, and very painful For the entrances of the elderworld were wide and sure, and brought immortal fruit. If then they that live labour not to enter these strait and van things, they can never receive those that are laid up for them.
