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Bible Stories and Religious Classics

by Philip P. Wells · English · Gutenberg #10380 · 895,897 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Bible Stories and Religious Classics

Author: Philip P. Wells


        
Release date: December 1, 2003 [eBook #10380]
                Most recently updated: October 28, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BIBLE STORIES AND RELIGIOUS CLASSICS ***

BIBLE STORIES AND RELIGIOUS CLASSICS

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY ANSON PHELPS STOKES, JR.


_ILLUSTRATED BY_ BEATRICE STEVENS



1903




INTRODUCTION

There never was a time when the demand for books for young people was so
great as it is to-day or when so much was being done to meet the demand.
"Children's Counter," "Boys' Books," are signs which, especially at the
Christmas season, attract the eye in every large book shop. Tales of
adventure, manuals about various branches of nature study, historical
romances, lives of heroes--in fact, almost every kind of book--is to be
found in abundance, beautifully illustrated, attractively bound, well
printed, all designed and written especially for the youth of our land.
It is indeed an encouraging sign. It means that the child of to-day is
being introduced to the world's best in literature and science and
history and art in simple and gradual ways.

In the Middle Ages stories of the martyrs and legends of the Church,
along with some simple form of catechetical instruction, formed the
basis of a child's mental and religious training. Later, during and
after the Crusades, the stories of war and the mysteries of the East
increased the stock in trade for the homes of Europe; but still the
horizon remained a narrow one. Even the invention of printing did not
bring to the young as many direct advantages as would naturally be
expected. To-day, when Christian missionaries set up a printing press in
some distant island of the sea, the first books which they print in the
vernacular are almost invariably those parts of the Bible, such as the
Gospels and the stories of Genesis, which most appeal to the young, and,
what is of special importance, they have the young directly and mainly
in mind in their publishing work. This was not true a few centuries ago.
The presses were, perhaps naturally and inevitably, almost exclusively
occupied with books for the learned world. To be sure, the Legenda
Aurea, of which I shall speak later, although not intended primarily for
children, proved a great boon to them. So did the Chap Books of England.
But it was not until the middle of the eighteenth century, when John
Newbery set up his book shop at St. Paul's Churchyard, London, that any
special attention was given by printers to the publication, in
attractive form, of juvenile books. Newbery's children's books made him
famous in his day, but the world seems to have forgotten him. Yet he
deserves a monument along with Æsop, and La Fontaine, and Kate
Greenaway, and Andersen, and Scott and Henty, and all the other greater
and lesser lights who have done so much to gladden the heart and enlarge
the mind of childhood and youth.

But from Newbery's day to this year of our Lord nineteen hundred and
three is a very long jump in what we may call the evolution of juvenile
literature, for the preparation of reading matter for young people seems
now almost to have reached its climax. There is one field, however, and
that the one which this volume tries to cover, which strangely enough
seems to have been almost neglected. Of "goody-goody" Sunday School
library books of an old-fashioned type, which are insipid and lacking
both in virility of thought and literary form, there are, alas, already
too many. What we need is something to take their place, something which
will furnish real literature, and yet which from subject matter and
manner of handling is specially adapted to what I still like to call
Sunday reading, a phrase which unfortunately seems to mean little to
most people to-day. Bearing this in mind, it is the purpose of this book
to gather together, in attractive form, such religious classics as are
specially fitted to interest and uplift young people.

There is a wide variety in so far as _subject matter_, _source_ and
_form_ are concerned, but a certain unity is given to the contents of
the volume by the religious note, which, whether brought prominently
forward or not, is found alike in all the selections.

The Bible has furnished directly or indirectly most of the _subject
matter_ here used. The biographies of various Scripture characters
appear in large numbers. Adam and Noah head the list, and Peter and
Paul bring up the end of a procession of worthies whose heroic deeds as
the servants of Jehovah will always appeal to the imagination of
youthful minds. But it is not with Bible characters only that this book
deals. The lives of Christian saints who entered upon their inheritance,
such as Christopher and Sylvester and Francis of Assisi, also have their
place, while yet more prominent are stories and poems based on some
Bible incidents. Even selections such as Hawthorne's Great Stone Face or
Wordsworth's Ode to Duty have their roots deep in the Bible, for they
can be understood and explained only by those who know the Revelation it
contains. In so far, then, as the subject matter of the volume is
concerned, either it or its inspiration can always be traced back to the
Bible.

When we turn from the Bible material which, as we have seen, supplies
both subject and inspiration, to the _source_ from which the selections
in their literary form as here given are derived, we find that the old
foundations have sufficed for many kinds of structure. Probably the
source from which the editor has drawn most largely is the Golden
Legend. This work, which was translated into English and printed by
Caxton in 1483, although little heard of now, was for several centuries
a household word in Christendom. It was the creation of a Genoese
Archbishop, Jacobus de Voragine, and dates from about the middle of the
thirteenth century. The good Archbishop, using the Bible and the Lives
of the Saints as a basis, and as a sharer of the superstitions of the
time having unbounded faith in every legend of the Church, put together
in simple form for the edification of his flock the various stories
about Jewish and Christian worthies which compose the original Legenda
Aurea. This was translated into French by one Jean de Vignay in the
fourteenth century, and the English version was in turn mainly made from
this translation. In the simple, sturdy language of Caxton the book
became a most popular one, being often read aloud in the Parish Churches
of England, where it helped to familiarize the people, especially the
young, with sacred story as represented by the heroes of the Old
Testament and the saints of the Church. In Caxton's introduction there
is a quaint sentence regarding the name of the book. After mentioning
the Latin title, he adds "that is to say in Englyshe the golden legende
for lyke as passeth golde in vallwe al other metallys, soo thys legende
exedeth all other bokes." Whether the good printer's judgment be
justified or no, it is not for us to say. It is true, however, that
after the passing of over six centuries since its original production,
the editor of this volume in looking for religious classics for young
people has made more use of it than of any other collection. All honor,
then, to the old Archbishop of Genoa and to William Caxton, who made
his work accessible to the youth of England.

The only other work which deserves any special mention as a source for
the contents of this volume, is the Stories and Tales of Hans Christian
Andersen. If ever there was any one who deserved the title of the
Children's Friend, surely this son of a poor Danish shoemaker is the
man. His Tales have been translated into many languages, and because of
their true imagination and their simplicity of expression they have
appealed to all children. Ten or more of them appear in this volume.
They are charming and wholesome reading, and their continued popularity
makes us realize the truth of these closing lines in Andersen's The Old
Grave Stones: "The good and the beautiful perish never; they live
eternally in tale and song."

The other sources from which this collection has been made up are so
varied as to require no mention aside from that given with each title.
The Master Poets of English Literature have been freely drawn upon:
Byron to tell of the Destruction of Sennacherib, Milton to sing of
Christ's Nativity, Wordsworth to meditate aloud on Duty, and other great
writers to emphasize various deep truths of life.

       *       *       *       *       *

As we turn from subject matter and source to _form_, we again find great
variety. Almost every kind of literature is represented. The early
lengends of the Jewish people, told by the author of the Legenda Aurea
almost in the words of Scripture, bring to young and old alike the same
lessons about God and Duty. The fact that they are legends, rather than
exact history, does not in any way lessen their religious value. Then,
too, the book contains allegories, such as that of the Pilgrim's
Progress, Christendom's greatest religious classic next to the Bible
itself, and those of some of Andersen's Tales. Poetry also is well
represented, the selections being in large part suggested by Scripture.
There are in addition many stories in the ordinary sense of the
word--tales which are entirely the fabric of the imagination, but which,
like the selections from Hawthorne, have some great lesson to teach. In
fact, the literary forms represented in this volume are almost as
numerous as those of the Bible itself. The latter used to be looked upon
merely as a storehouse of historic facts and devotional songs; now we
see in it Legend, Oratory, Poetry, Allegory, History, Proverb and
Prophecy; and we find that all of these forms are used by God's servants
to teach His truth to men.

       *       *       *       *       *

Sufficient has been said, I think, to show the purpose and scope of this
volume and to introduce the reader to its contents. It is my hope and
belief that the effort of my friend, Mr. Philip P. Wells, to make this a
collection of religious classics in the full meaning of these words may
prove successful. My highest wish, however, is that those who read
these selections, with their great variety of source and form, may mark
the inspiration of thought or incident common to them all, and may find
an interest in refreshing what may be an old acquaintance with that Book
of Books which gives with classic truth the fundamental subject matter
for all deep thought and high aspiration.

ANSON PHELPS STOKES, JR.




CONTENTS

THE LIFE OF ADAM

HERE BEGINNETH THE HISTORY OF NOAH

THE RAINBOW

HERE FOLLOWETH THE LIFE OF ABRAHAM

HERE BEGINNETH THE LIFE OF ISAAC, WITH THE HISTORY OF ESAU AND OF JACOB

HERE BEGINNETH THE HISTORY OF JOSEPH AND HIS BRETHREN

HERE NEXT FOLLOWETH THE HISTORY OF MOSES

THE BURIAL OF MOSES

THE HISTORY OF JOSHUA

THE HISTORY OF SAUL

THE HISTORY OF DAVID

THE SONG OF DAVID

THE STORY OF A CUP OF WATER

THE HISTORY OF SOLOMON

THE HISTORY OF REHOBOAM

A LITTLE MAID

HERE FOLLOWETH THE HISTORY OF JOB

THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB

HERE FOLLOWETH THE HISTORY OF TOBIT

HERE BEGINNETH THE STORY OF JUDITH

THE VISION OF BELSHAZZAR

A CHRISTMAS CAROL

ON THE MORNING OF CHRIST'S NATIVITY

THE BURNING BABE

A CRADLE SONG

EASTER

THE LIFE OF ST. PETER THE APOSTLE

THE LIFE OF ST. PAUL THE APOSTLE

THE LIFE OF ST. CHRISTOPHER

THE SEVEN SLEEPERS

THE LIFE OF ST. SILVESTER

OF ST. AUSTIN THAT BROUGHT CHRISTENDOM TO ENGLAND

EDWIN AND PAULINUS

THE LIFE OF ST. GEORGE, MARTYR

THE LIFE OF ST. PATRICK

OF ST. FRANCIS

SONG OF THE EMIGRANTS IN BERMUDA

LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS IN NEW ENGLAND

THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS

THE PILGRIM

THE GREAT STONE FACE

THE GENTLE BOY

THE ANGEL

THE RED SHOES

THE LOVELIEST ROSE IN THE WORLD

A VISION OF THE LAST DAY

THE OLD GRAVESTONE

GOOD-FOR-NOTHING

IN THE UTTERMOST PARTS OF THE SEA

SOMETHING

THE JEWISH GIRL

THE STORY OF A MOTHER

THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL

FLOWERS WITHOUT FRUIT

CONTENTMENT

THE SEARCH FOR PEACE

A SONG OF PRAISE

THE TRAVELLER

TRUE GREATNESS

CHARACTER OF A HAPPY LIFE

A THANKSGIVING TO GOD FOR HIS HOUSE

FRIENDS DEPARTED

THE LAND OF DREAMS

ADORATION




BIBLE STORIES AND RELIGIOUS CLASSICS




THE LIFE OF ADAM

_The Sunday of Septuagesima beginneth the story of the Bible, in which
is read the legend and story of Adam which followeth_


In the beginning God made and created heaven and earth. The earth was
idle and void and covered with darkness. And the spirit of God was borne
on the waters, and God said: Be made light, and anon light was made. And
God saw that light was good, and divided the light from darkness, and
called the light day and darkness night.

And thus was made light with heaven and earth first, and even and
morning was made one day. The second day he made the firmament, and
divided the waters that were under the firmament from them that were
above, and called the firmament heaven. The third day were made on the
earth herbs and fruits in their kind. The fourth day God made the sun
and moon and stars, etc. The fifth day he made the fishes in the water
and birds in the air. The sixth day God made the beasts on the earth,
every one in his kind and gender. And God saw that all these works were
good and said: Make we man unto our similitude and image. Here spake the
Father to the Son and Holy Ghost, or else as it were the common voice of
three persons, when it was said make we, and to our, in plural number.
Man was made to the image of God in his soul. Here it is to be noted
that he made not only the soul with the body, but he made both body and
soul. As to the body he made male and female. God gave to man the
lordship and power upon living beasts. Thus in six days was heaven and
earth made and all the ornation of them. And then he made the seventh
day on which he rested, not for that he was weary, but ceased his
operation, and showed the seventh day which he blessed. Thus he shortly
showed the generations of heaven and earth, for here he determined the
works of the six days and the seventh day he sanctified and made holy.
God had planted in the beginning Paradise a place of desire and delices.
And man was made in the field of Damascus; he was made of the slime of
the earth. Paradise was made the third day of creation, and was beset
with herbs, plants and trees, and is a place of most mirth and joy. In
the midst whereof be set two trees, that is the tree of life, and that
other the tree of knowing good and evil. And there is a well, which
casteth out water for to water the trees and herbs of Paradise. This
well is the mother of all waters, which well is divided into four parts.
One part is called Phison. This goeth about Inde. The second is called
Gijon, otherwise Nilus, and that runneth about Ethiopia, the other two
be called Tigris and Euphrates. Tigris runneth toward Assyria, and
Euphrates is called fruitful, which runneth in Chaldea. These four
floods come and spring out of the same well, and depart, and yet in some
place some of them meet again.

Then God took man from the place of his creation and brought him into
Paradise, for to work there, not to labor needily, but in delighting and
recreating him, and that he should keep Paradise. For like as Paradise
should refresh him, so should he labor to serve God, and there God gave
him a commandment. Every commandment standeth in two things, in doing or
forbidding, in doing he commanded him to eat of all the trees of
Paradise, in forbidding he commanded that he should not eat of the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil. This commandment was given to the
man, and by the man it went to the woman. For when the woman was made it
was commanded to them both, and hereto he set a pain, saying: Whatsoever
day thou eatest thereof thou shalt die by death.

God said: It is not good a man to be alone, make we to him an helper
like to himself for to bring forth children. Adam supposed that some
helper to him had been among the beasts which had been like to him.
Therefore God brought to Adam all living beasts of the earth and air, in
which he understood them of the water also, which with one commandment
all came tofore him. They were brought for two causes, one was because
man should give to each of them a name, by which they should know that
he should dominate over them, and the second cause was because Adam
should know that there was none of them like to him. And he named them
in the Hebrew tongue, which was only the language and none other at the
beginning. And so none being found like unto him, God sent in Adam a
lust to sleep, which was no dream, but as is supposed in an extasy or in
a trance; in which was showed to him the celestial court. Wherefore when
he awoke he prophesied of the conjunction of Christ to his church, and
of the flood that was to come, and of the doom and destruction of the
world by fire he knew, which afterward he told to his children.

Whiles that Adam slept, God took one of his ribs, both flesh and bone,
and made that a woman, and set her tofore Adam. Which then said: This is
now a bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; and Adam gave her a name
like as her lord, and said she should be called virago, which is as much
as to say as made of a man, and is a name taken of a man. And anon, the
name giving, he prophesied, saying: Because she is taken of the side of
a man, therefore a man shall forsake and leave father and mother and
abide and be adherent unto his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh;
and though they be two persons, yet in matrimony and wedlock they be but
one flesh, and in other things twain. For why, neither of them had power
of his own flesh. They were both naked and were not ashamed, for they
stood both in the state of innocence. Then the serpent which was hotter
than any beast of the earth and naturally deceivable, for he was full
of the devil Lucifer, which was deject and cast out of heaven, had great
envy to man that was bodily in Paradise, and knew well, if he might make
him to trespass and break God's commandments, that he should be cast out
also.

Yet he was afeard to be taken or espied of the man, he went to the
woman, not so prudent and more prone to slide and bow. And in the form
of the serpent, for then the serpent was erect as a man. Bede saith that
he chose a serpent having a maiden's cheer [face], for like oft apply to
like, and spake by the tongue of the serpent to Eve, and said: Why
commanded you God that ye should not eat of all the trees of Paradise?
This he said to find occasion to say that he was come for. Then the
woman answered and said: Ne forte moriamur, lest haply we die, which she
said doubting, for lightly she was flexible to every part. Whereunto
anon he answered: Nay in no wise ye shall die, but God would not that ye
should be like him in science, and knowing that when ye eat of this tree
ye shall be as gods knowing good and evil, he as envious forbade you.
And anon the woman, elate in pride and willing to be like to God,
accorded thereto and believed him. The woman saw that the tree was fair
to look on, and clean and sweet of savor, took and ate thereof, and gave
unto Adam of the same, happily desiring him by fair words. But Adam anon
agreed, for when he saw the woman not dead he supposed that God had said
that they should die to fear them with, and then ate of the fruit
forbidden. And anon their sight was opened that they saw their
nakedness, and then anon they understood that they had trespassed. And
thus they knew that they were naked, and they took fig leaves and sewed
them together for to cover their members in manner of breeches.

And anon after, they heard the voice of our Lord God walking, and anon
they hied him. Our Lord called the man and said: Adam, where art thou?
Calling him in blaming him and not as knowing where he was, but as who
said: Adam, see in what misery thou art. Which answered: I have hid me,
Lord, for I am naked. Our Lord said: Who told thee that thou wert naked,
but that thou hast eaten of the tree forbidden? He then not meekly
confessing his trespass, but laid the fault on his wife, and on him as
giver of the woman to him, and said: The woman that thou gavest to me as
a fellow, gave to me of the tree, and I ate thereof. And then our Lord
said to the woman: Why didst thou so? Neither she accused herself, but
laid the sin on the serpent, and privily she laid the fault on the maker
of him. The serpent was not demanded, for he did it not of himself, but
the devil by him.

And our Lord, cursing them, began at the serpent, keeping an order and
congruous number of curses. The serpent was the first and sinned most,
for he sinned in three things. The woman next and sinned less than he,
but more than the man, for she sinned in two things. The man sinned last
and least, for he sinned but in one. The serpent had envy, he lied, and
deceived, for these three he had three curses. Because he had envy at
the excellence of man, it was said to him: Thou shalt go and creep on
thy breast; because he lied he is punished in his mouth, when it was
said: Thou shalt eat earth all the days of thy life. Also he took away
his voice and put venom in his mouth. And because he deceived, it was
said: I shall put enmity between thee and woman, and thy seed and her
seed. She shall break thy head, etc. In two things the woman sinned, in
pride and eating the fruit. Because she sinned in pride, he meeked her,
saying: Thou shalt be under the power of man, and he shall have lordship
over thee, and he shall put thee to affliction. Now is she subject to a
man by condition and dread, which before was but subject by love; and
because she sinned in the fruit, she is punished in her fruit, when it
was said to her: Thou shalt bring forth children in sorrow; in the pain
of sorrow standeth the curse, but in bringing forth of children is a
blessing. And so, in punishing, God forgat not to have mercy. And
because Adam sinned but only in eating of the fruit, therefore he was
punished in seeking his meat, as it is said to him: Accursed be the
earth in thy work, that is to say for thy work of thy sin, for which is
made that the earth that brought forth good and wholesome fruits
plenteously, from henceforth shall bring forth but seldom, and also none
without man's labor, and also sometime weeds, briars, and thorns shall
grow. And he added: Thereto shalt thou eat herbs of the earth, as who
saith thou shalt be like a beast or jument. He cursed the earth because
the trespass was of the fruit of the earth and not of the water. He
added thereto to him of labor: In the sweat of thy cheer [face] thou
shalt eat thy bread unto the time thou return again into the earth; that
is to say till thou die, for thou art earth, and into earth thou shalt
go again.

Then Adam, wailing and sorrowing the misery that was to come of his
posterity, named his wife Eve, which is to say, mother of all living
folk. Then God made to Adam and Eve two leathern coats of the skins of
dead beasts, to the end that they bare with them the sign of mortality,
and said: Lo, Adam is made as one of us, knowing good and evil, now lest
he put his hand and take of the tree of life and live ever, as who
saith: beware and cast him out, lest he take and eat of the tree of
life. And so he was cast out of Paradise, and set in the field of
Damascus where as he was made and taken from, for to work and labor
there. And our Lord set Cherubim to keep Paradise of delight with a
burning sword and pliant, to the end that none should enter there ne
come to the tree of life.

After then that Adam was cast out of Paradise and set in the world, he
engendered Cain, the fifteenth year after he was made, and his sister
Calmana; but after another fifteen years was Abel born, and his sister
Delbora.

When Adam was an hundred and thirty years of age, Cain slew Abel his
brother. Truth it is, after many days Cain and Abel offered sacrifice
and gifts unto God. It is to be believed that Adam taught his sons to
offer to God their tithes and first fruits. Cain offered fruits, for he
was a ploughman and tiller of earth, and Abel offered milk and the first
of the lambs, Moses saith, of the fattest of the flock. And God beheld
the gifts of Abel, for he and his sacrifices were acceptable to our
Lord; and as to Cain his sacrifices, God beheld them not, for they were
not to him acceptable, he offered withies and thorns. And as some
doctors say, fire came from heaven and lighted the sacrifice of Abel,
and the gifts of Cain pleased not our Lord, for the sacrifice would not
belight nor burn clear in the light of God. Whereof Cain had great envy
unto his brother Abel, which arose against him and slew him. And our
Lord said to him: Where is Abel thy brother? He answered and said: I wot
never, am I keeper of my brother? Then our Lord said: What hast thou
done? The voice of the blood of thy brother crieth to thee from the
earth, wherefore thou art cursed, and accursed be the earth that
received the blood of thy brother by his mouth of thy hands. When thou
shalt work and labor the earth it shall bring forth no fruit, but thou
shalt be fugitive, vagabond, and void on the earth. This Cain deserved
well to be cursed, knowing the pain of the first trespass of Adam, yet
he added thereto murder and slaughter of his brother.

Then Cain, dreading that beasts should devour him, or if he went forth
he should be slain of the men, or if he dwelt with them, they would slay
him for his sin, damned himself, and in despair said: My wickedness is
more than I can deserve to have forgiveness, whoso find me shall slay
me. This he said of dread, or else wishing, as who said, would God he
would slay me. Then our Lord said: Nay not so, thou shalt die, but not
soon, for whosoever slayeth Cain shall be punished seven sithes more,
for he should deliver him from dread, from labor and misery, and added
that he should be punished personally sevenfold more. This punition
shall endure to him in pain unto the seventh, Lameth, whosomever shall
slay Cain shall loose seven vengeances. Some hold that his pain endured
unto the seventh generation, for he committed seven sins. He departed
not truly, he had envy to his brother, he wrought guilefully, he slew
his brother falsely, he denied it, he despaired and damned, he did no
penance. And after he went into the east, fugitive and vagabond. Cain
knew his wife which bare Enoch, and he made a city and named it Enoch
after the name of his son Enoch. Here it showeth well that this time
were many men, though their generation be not said, whom Cain called to
his city, by whose help he made it, whom he induced to theft and
robbery.

He was the first that walled or made cities; dreading them that he
hurted, for surety he brought his people into the towns. Then Enoch gat
Irad, and Irad Mehujael, and he gat Methusael, and he gat Lameth, which
was the seventh from Adam and worst, for he brought in first bigamy.
This Lameth took two wives, Adah and Zilla; of Adah he gat Jabal which
found first the craft to make folds for shepherds and to change their
pasture, and ordained flocks of sheep, and departed the sheep from the
goats after the quality, the lambs by themselves, and the older by
themselves, and understood the feeding of them after the season of the
year. The name of his brother was Jubal, father of singers in the harp
and organs, not of the instruments, for they were found long after, but
he was the finder of music, that is to say of consonants of accord, such
as shepherds use in their delights and sports. And forasmuch as he heard
Adam prophesy of two judgments by the fire and water, that all things
should be destroyed thereby, and that his craft new found should not
perish, he did do write it in two pillars or columns, one of marble,
another of clay of the earth, to the end that one should endure against
the water, and that other against the fire. Josephus saith that the
pillar of marble is yet in the land of Syria. Of Zilla he begat
Tubal-cain, which found first the craft of smithery and working of iron,
and made things for war, and sculptures and gravings in metal to the
pleasure of the eyes, which he so working, Tubal, tofore said, had
delight in the sound of his hammers, of which he made the consonants and
tunes of accord in his song. Noema, sister of Tubal-cain, found first
the craft of diverse texture.

Lameth was a shooter, and used to shoot at wild beasts, for none use of
the meat of them, but only for to have the skins for their clothing, and
lived so long that he was blind and had a child to lead him. And on a
time by adventure he slew Cain. For Cain was always afeard and hid him
among bushes and briars, and the child that led Lameth had supposed it
had been some wild beast and directed Lameth to shoot thereat, and so,
weening to shoot at a beast, slew Cain. And when he knew that he had
slain Cain, he with his bow slew the child, and thus he slew them both
to his damnation; therefore as the sin of Cain was punished seven
sithes, so was the sin of Lameth seventy sithes and seven. That is to
say, seventy-seven souls that came of Lameth were perished in the deluge
and Noah's flood; also his wife did him much sorrow, and evil-entreated
him. And he being wroth said that he suffered that for his double
homicide and manslaughter, yet nevertheless he feared him by pain,
saying: Why will ye slay me? he shall be more and sorer punished that
slayeth me, than he that slew Cain.

Josephus said that when Abel was slain and Cain fled away, Adam when he
was one hundred and thirty years old engendered Seth like to his
similitude, and he to the image of God. This Seth was a good man, and he
gat Enos, and Enos Cainan, and Cainan begot Malaleel, and Malaleel
Jared, and Jared Enoch, and Enoch Methuselah, and Methuselah Lamech, and
Lamech Noah. And like as in the generation of Cain the seventh was the
worst, so in the generation of Seth the seventh was the best, that was
Enoch whom God took and brought him into Paradise, unto the time that he
shall come with Elias for to convert the hearts of the fathers into the
sons. And Adam lived after he had begotten Seth eight hundred years, and
engendered sons and daughters. Some hold opinion thirty sons and thirty
daughters, and some fifty of that one and fifty of that other. We find
no certainty of them in the Bible. But all the days of Adam living here
in earth amount to the sum of nine hundred and thirty years. And in the
end of his life when he should die, it is said, but of none authority,
that he sent Seth his son into Paradise for to fetch the oil of mercy,
where he received certain grains of the fruit of the tree of mercy by an
angel. And when he came again he found his father Adam yet alive and
told him what he had done. And then Adam laughed first and then died.
And then he laid the grains or kernels under his father's tongue and
buried him in the vale of Hebron; and out of his mouth grew three trees
of the three grains, of which trees the cross that our Lord suffered his
passion on was made, by virtue of which he gat very mercy, and was
brought out of darkness into very light of Heaven. To the which he bring
us that liveth and reigneth God, world without end.




HERE BEGINNETH THE HISTORY OF NOAH

_The First Sunday in Sexagesima_


After that Adam was dead, died Eve and was buried by him. At the
beginning, in the first age, the people lived long. Adam lived nine
hundred and thirty years, and Methuselah lived nine hundred and
sixty-nine years. S. Jerome saith that he died the same year that the
flood was. Then Noah was the tenth from Adam in the generation of Seth,
in whom the first age was ended. The seventy interpreters say that this
first age dured two thousand two hundred and forty-four years. S. Jerome
saith not fully two thousand, and Methodius full two thousand, etc.

Noah then was a man perfect and righteous and kept God's commandment.
And when he was five hundred years old, he gat Shem, Ham, and Japhet.
This time men began to multiply on the earth, and the children of God,
that is to say of Seth, as religious, saw the daughters of men, that is
to say of Cain, and took them to their wives. This time was so much sin
on the earth, wherefore God was displeased and determined in his
prescience to destroy man that he had made, and said: I shall put man
away that I have made, and my spirit shall not abide in man for ever,
for he is flesh. As who said, I shall not punish man perpetually as I
do the devil, for man is frail, and yet ere I shall destroy him I shall
give him space and time of repentance and to amend him, if he will. The
time of repentance shall be one hundred and twenty years. Then Noah,
righteous and perfect, walked with God, that is in his laws, and the
earth was corrupt by sin and filled.

When God saw the earth to be corrupt, and that every man was corrupt by
sin upon the earth, he said to Noah: The end of all people is come
tofore me except them that shall be saved, and the earth is replenished
with their wickedness. I shall destroy them with the earth, id est [that
is], with the fertility of the earth. Make to thee an ark of tree, hewn,
polished, and squared. And make there divers places, and lime it with
clay and pitch within and without, that is to wit with glue which is so
fervent, that the timber may not be loosed. And thou shalt make it three
hundred cubits of length, fifty in breadth, and thirty of height. And
make therein divers distinctions of places and chambers and of
wardrobes. And the ark had a door for to enter in and come out, and a
window was made thereon, which that the Hebrews say was of crystal. This
ark was on making, from the beginning that God commanded first to make
it, one hundred and twenty years. In which time Noah oft desired the
people to leave their sin, and how he had spoken with God, and that he
was commanded to make the ship, for God should destroy them for their
sin, but if they left it. And they mocked him and said that he raved
and was a fool, and gave no faith to his saying and continued in their
sin and wickedness. Then, when the ark was perfectly made, God bade him
to take into it of all the beasts of the earth, and also of the fowls of
the air, of each two, male and female, that they may live. And also of
all the meats of the earth that be comestible, that they may serve and
feed thee and them. And Noah did all that our Lord commanded him. Then
said our Lord to Noah: Enter thou and all thy household into the ark,
that is to say thou and thy wife and thy three sons and their three
wives. I have seen that thou art rightful in this generation. Of all
beasts that be clean thou shalt take seven, and of unclean beasts but
only two. And of the birds seven and seven, male and female, that they
may be saved on the face of the earth. Yet after seven days I shall rain
upon the earth forty days and forty nights, and shall destroy all the
substance that I made on the earth. And Noah did all things that our
Lord commanded him.

He was six hundred years old when the flood began on the earth. And then
Noah entered in and his sons, his wife, and the wives of his sons, all
into the ark to eschew the waters of the flood. Of all the beasts and
the fowls, and of all that moved and had life on earth, male and female,
Noah took in to him as our Lord had bidden. And seven days after they
were entered, the water began to increase. The wells of the abysms were
broken, and the cataracts of heaven were opened, that is to say the
clouds, and it rained on the earth forty days and forty nights. And the
ark was elevate and borne upon the waters on height above the mountains
and hills, for the water was grown higher fifteen cubits above all the
mountains, that it should purge and wash the filth of the air. Then was
consumed all that was on the earth living, man, woman, and beast and
birds. And all that ever bare life, so that nothing abode upon the
earth, for the water was fifteen cubits above the highest mountain of
the earth. And when Noah was entered he shut the door fast without
forth, and limed it with glue.

And so the waters abode elevate in height an hundred and fifty days from
the day that Noah entered in. And our Lord then remembered Noah and all
them that were in the ark with him, and also on the beasts and fowls,
and ceased the waters. And the wells and cataracts were closed, and the
rains were prohibited, and forbidden to rain no more. The seventh month,
the twenty-seventh day of the month, the ark rested on the hills of
Armenia. The tenth month, of the first day of the month, the tops of the
hills appeared first. After these forty days after the lessing of the
waters, Noah opened the window and desired sore to have tidings of
ceasing of the flood. And sent out a raven for to have tidings, and when
he was gone he returned no more again, for peradventure she found some
dead carrion of a beast swimming on the water, and lighted thereon to
feed her and was left there. After this he sent out a dove which flew
out, and when she could find no place to rest ne set her foot on, she
returned unto Noah and he took her in. Yet then were not the tops of
the hills bare. And seven days after he sent her out again, which at
even returned, bearing a branch of an olive tree, burgeoning, in her
mouth. And after other seven days he sent her again, which came no more
again.

Then in the year of Noah six hundred and one, the first day of the
month, Noah opened the covering of the ark and saw that the earth was
dry, but he durst not go out, but abode the commandment of our Lord. The
second month, the twenty-seventh day of the month, our Lord said to
Noah: Go out of the ark, thou and thy wife, thy sons and the wives of
thy sons. He commanded them to go conjointly out which disjointly
entered, and let go out with them all the beasts and fowls living, and
all the reptiles, every each after his kind and gender, to whom our Lord
said: Grow ye and multiply upon the earth. Then Noah issued out and his
wife, and his sons with their wives, and all the beasts, the same day a
year after they entered in, every one after his gender. Noah then
edified an altar to our Lord and took of all the beasts that were clean
and offered sacrifice unto our Lord; and our Lord smelled the sweetness
of the sacrifice and said to Noah: From henceforth I shall not curse the
earth for man, for he is prone and ready to fall from the beginning of
his youth. I shall no more destroy man by such vengeance. And then our
Lord blessed them and said: Grow ye and multiply the earth and be ye
lords of all the beasts of the earth, of the fowls of the air, and of
the fishes. I have given all things to you, but eat no flesh with the
blood. I command you to slay no man, nor to shed no man's blood. I have
made man after mine image. Whosomever sheddeth his brother's blood, his
blood shall be shed. Go ye forth and grow and multiply and fill the
earth. This said our Lord to Noah and his sons: Lo! I have made a
covenant with you and with them that shall come after you, that I shall
no more bring such a flood to slay all people, and in token thereof I
have set my rainbow in the clouds of heaven, for who that trespasseth I
shall do justice otherwise on him. Noah lived after the flood three
hundred and fifty years. From the time of Adam until after Noah's flood,
the time and season was alway green and tempered; and all that time men
ate no flesh, for the herbs and fruits were then of great strength and
effect, they were pure and nourishing. But after the flood the earth was
weaker and brought not forth so good fruit, wherefore flesh was ordained
to be eaten. And then Noah began to labor for his livelihood with his
sons, and began to till the earth, to destroy briars and thorns and to
plant vines. And so on a time Noah had drunk so much of the wine that he
was drunk, and lay and slept. Ham, his middlest son, laughed and scorned
his father, and called his brethren to see, which rebuked Ham of his
folly and sin. And Noah awoke, and when he understood how Ham his son
had scorned him, he cursed him and also his son Canaan, and blessed Shem
and Japhet. All the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years and
then he died. And after his death his sons dealed all the world between
them, Shem had all Asia, Ham Africa, and Japhet all Europe. Thus was it
departed. Asia is the best part and is as much as the other two, and
that is in the east. Africa is the south part, and therein is Carthage
and many rich countries, therein be blue and black men. Ham had that to
his part Africa. The third part is Europe which is in the north and
west, therein is Greece, Rome, and Germany. In Europe reigneth now most
the christian law and faith, wherein is many a rich realm. And so was
the world departed to the three sons of Noah.




THE RAINBOW


Triumphal arch, that fill'st the sky
  When storms prepare to part,
I ask not proud Philosophy
  To teach me what thou art.

Still seem, as to my childhood's sight,
  A midway station given,
For happy spirits to alight,
  Betwixt the earth and heaven.

Can all that optics teach, unfold
  Thy form to please me so,
As when I dreamt of gems and gold
  Hid in thy radiant bow?

When science from creation's face
  Enchantment's veil withdraws,
What lovely visions yield their place
  To cold material laws!

And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
  But words of the Most High,
Have told why first thy robe of beams
  Was woven in the sky.

When o'er the green undeluged earth
  Heaven's covenant thou didst shine,
How came the world's gray fathers forth
  To watch thy sacred sign!

And when its yellow lustre smiled
  O'er mountains yet untrod,
Each mother held aloft her child
  To bless the bow of God.

The earth to thee her incense yields,
  The lark thy welcome sings,
When, glittering in the freshen'd fields,
  The snowy mushroom springs.

How glorious is thy girdle, cast
  O'er mountain, tower, and town,
Or mirror'd in the ocean vast
  A thousand fathoms down!

As fresh in yon horizon dark,
  As young thy beauties seem,
As when the eagle from the ark
  First sported in thy beam.

For, faithful to its sacred page,
  Heaven still rebuilds thy span;
Nor lets the type grow pale with age
  That first spoke peace to man.

T. CAMPBELL.




HERE FOLLOWETH THE LIFE OF ABRAHAM


The Sunday called Quinquagesima is read in the church the history of the
holy patriarch Abraham which was the son of Terah. This Terah was the
tenth from Noah in the generation of Shem. Japhet had seven sons and Ham
four sons. Out of the generation of Ham Nimrod came, which was a wicked
man and cursed in his works, and began to make the tower of Babel which
was great and high. And at the making of this tower, God changed the
languages, in such wise that no man understood other. For tofore the
building of that tower was but one manner speech in all the world, and
there were made seventy-two speeches. The tower was great, it was ten
miles about and five thousand and eighty-four steps of height. This
Nimrod was the first man that found mawmetry and idolatry, which endured
long and yet doth. Then I turn again to Terah which had three sons,
which was Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Of Nahor came Us, Bus, and Batuel. Of
Us came Job, of Bus came Balaam, and of Batuel Rebekah and Laban. Of
Haran came Lot and two daughters, Melcha and Sara.

Now I shall speak of Abram of whom our blessed lady came. He wedded
Sara, daughter of his brother Haran. Abram was ever faithful and true,
he was sixty-five years old when his father died, for whom he mourned
till our Lord comforted him, which said to Abram: Abram, make thee ready
and go out of thy land and kindred, and also from the house of thy
father, and come into the land that I shall show to thee. I shall make
thee grow into much people; I shall bless thee and magnify thy name, and
thou shalt be blessed, and I shall bless them that bless thee, and curse
them that curse thee, and in thee shall be blessed all the kindreds of
the earth.

Abram was seventy years old when he departed from the land of Haran, and
he took with him Sara his wife, and Lot the son of his brother, and
their meiny [company], and his cattle and his substance, and came into
the land of Canaan, and came into the vale of Sichem, in which were ill
people which were the people of Canaan. And our Lord said to Abram: I
shall give to thee this land and to thine heirs. Then Abram did raise an
altar on which he did sacrifice, and blessed and thanked our Lord. Abram
beheld all the land toward the south, and saw the beauty thereof, and
found it like as our Lord told him. But he had not been long in the land
but that there fell great hunger therein, wherefore he left that country
and went into Egypt and took with him Sara his wife. And as they went by
the way Abram said to his wife: I fear and dread sore that when we come
to this people, which be lawless, that they shall take thee for thy
beauty and slay me, because they would use thee. Wherefore say thou art
my sister, and I thy brother, and she agreed thereto. And when they
were come in to that country the people saw that she was so fair, and
anon they told the king, which anon commanded that she should be brought
into his presence. And when she was come, God of his good grace so
purveyed for her, that no man had power to do her villany. Wherefore the
king was feared that God would have taken vengeance on him for her, and
sent for Abram and said to him that he should take his wife, and that he
had evil done to say, that she was his sister, and so delivered her
again, and gave him gold and silver, and bade that men should worship
him in all his land, and he should freely at his pleasure depart with
all his goods. Then after this Abram took his wife Sara and went home
again, and came unto Bethel, and set there an altar of stone, and there
he adored and worshipped the name of God. His store and beasts began to
multiply, and Lot with his meiny was also there. And their beasts began
so sore to increase and multiply, that unnethe [hardly] the country
might suffice to their pasture, in so much that rumor and grudging began
to sourde and arise between the herdmen of Abram and the herdmen of Lot.
Then Abram said to Lot: Lo! this country is great and wide, I pray thee
to choose on which hand thou wilt go, and take it for thy meiny and thy
beasts. And let no strife be between me and thee, ne between my herdmen
ne thy herdmen. Lo! behold all the country is tofore thee, take which
thou wilt; if thou go on the right side, I shall go on the left side,
and if thou take the left, I will go on the right side. Then Lot beheld
the country and saw a fair plain toward flom Jordan, which was pleasant,
and the flood ran toward Sodom and Gomorrah, which was like a paradise,
and took that part for him. And Abram took toward the west, which was
beside the people of Canaan at the foot of mount Mamre. And Lot dwelled
in Sodom. The people of Sodom were worst of all people.

Our Lord said to Abram: Lift up thine eyes and see directly from the
place that thou art now in, from the north to the south, and from the
east to the west. All this land that thou seest I shall give thee, and
to thy seed for evermore. I shall make thy seed as powder or dust of the
earth, who that may number the dust of the earth shall number thy seed.
Arise therefore and walk the land in length and in breadth, for I shall
give it to thee. Abram moved then his tabernacle and dwelled in the
valley of Mamre, which is in Hebron, and set there his tabernacle. It
happened soon after that there was a war in that land, that four kings
warred again other five kings, which were of Sodom, Gomorrah and other.
And the four kings overthrew the five and slew them, and spoiled and
took all the substance of the country and took also with them Lot and
all his goods. And a man gat away from them and came to Abram, and told
him how that Lot was taken and led away. And then anon Abram did do
gather his people together, the number of three hundred and eighteen.
And followed after, and departed his people in two parties because they
should not escape. And Abram smote in among them, and slew the kings,
and rescued Lot and all his goods, and delivered the men of Sodom that
were taken and the women. And they of Sodom came against him, and
Melchisedech came and met with him, and offered to him bread and wine.
This Melchisedech was king and priest of Jerusalem and all the country,
and blessed Abram. And there Abram gave to him the tythes of all he had.
And the king of Sodom would that Abram should have had such prey as he
took, but he would not have as much as the latchet of a shoe, and thus
gat Abram much love of all the people.

After this our Lord appeared to Abram in a vision and said: Abram, dread
thee nothing, I am thy protector, and thy reward and meed shall be
great. Abram answered: Lord God, what wilt thou give me? Thou wottest
well I have no children, and sith I have none I will well that Eleazar
the son of my bailiff be my heir. Nay, said our Lord, he shall not be
thine heir, but he that shall issue and come of thy seed shall be thine
heir. Our Lord led him out and bade him behold the heaven, and number
the stars if thou mayst, and said to him, so shall thy offspringing and
seed be. And Abram believed it and gave faith to our Lord's words, and
it was reputed to him to justice. And our Lord said to him, I am the
Lord that led thee out of the land of Ur of the Chaldees for to give to
thee this land into thy possession. And Abram said: Lord, how shall I
know that I shall possess it? A voice said to Abram: Thy seed shall be
exiled into Egypt by the space of four hundred years, and shall be
there in servitude, and after, I shall bring them hither again in the
fourth generation. Thou shalt abide here unto thy good age, and shalt be
buried here, and go with thy fathers in peace. Sara was yet without
child, and she had a handmaid named Hagar, an Egyptian, and she on a day
said to Abram her husband: Thou seest I may bear no child, wherefore I
would thou took Hagar my maid, that thou might get a child which I might
keep and hold for mine. And ten year after that Abram had dwelled in
that land, he took Hagar, and anon she despised her mistress. Then Sara
said to Abram: Thou dost evil. My servant now hath me in despite, God
judge this between thee and me. To whom Abram answered: Thine handmaid
is in thine hands, chastise her as it pleaseth thee. After this Sara
chastised Hagar and put her to so great affliction that she went away;
and as she went an angel met with her in the wilderness by a well, and
said: Hagar, whence comest and whither goest thou? She answered: I flee
away from the face of my lady Sara. To whom the angel said, return again
and submit thee by humbleness unto thy lady, and I shall multiply thy
seed, and so much people shall come of it that it cannot be numbered for
multitude. And he said furthermore: Thou shalt bear a child and shalt
call him Ishmael. He shall be a fierce man, he shall be against all men,
and all men against him. Then Hagar returned home and served her lady,
and soon after this she was delivered of Ishmael. Abram was eighty-six
years old when Ishmael was born.

When Abram was ninety-nine years, our Lord appeared to him and said:
Abram, lo! I am the Lord Almighty, walk thou before me and be perfect,
and I shall keep covenant between me and thee and shall multiply thy
seed greatly. And Abram fell down lowting low to the earth and thanked
him. Then our Lord said I AM, and my covenant I shall keep to thee, thou
shalt be father of much people. Thou shalt no more be called Abram, but
Abraham, for I have ordained thee father of much people. I shall make
thee to increase most abundantly; kings and princes shall come of thee,
and shall stablish my covenant between me and thee, and thy seed in thy
generations. I shall give to thee and to thy seed after thee the land of
thy pilgrimage, all the land of Canaan, into their possession and I
shall be their God. Yet said God to Abraham: And thou shalt keep thy
covenant to me, and thine heirs after thee in their generations, and
this shall be the covenant that ye shall keep and thine heirs after
thee. Every child masculine that shall be born shall be circumcised when
he is eight days old. And see that the men in your generation be
circumcised, begin at thyself and thy children. And all that dwell in
thy kindred, who of you that shall not be circumcised shall be cast and
put out for ever from my people, because he obeyeth not my statute and
ordinance. And thy wife Sara shall be called no more Sara but she shall
be called Sarah, and I shall bless her, and shall give to thee a son of
her, whom I shall bless also. I shall him increase into nations, and
kings of peoples shall come of him. Abraham fell down on his face
toward the earth and laughed in his heart, saying: May it be that a
woman of ninety years may bear a child? I beseech thee, Lord, that
Ishmael may live before thee. Our Lord said to Abraham, Sarah shall
bring forth a son whom thou shalt name Isaac, and I shall keep my
covenant to him for evermore, and to his heirs after him. And I have
heard thy request for Ishmael also. I shall bless him and increase, and
shall multiply his seed into much people, twelve dukes shall come of
him. I shall keep my covenant to Isaac, whom Sarah shall bring forth the
next year.

After this on a time, as Abraham sat beside his house in the vale of
Mamre in the heat of the day, and as he lift up his eyes, he saw three
young men coming to him, and anon as he saw these three standing by him
he ran to them and worshipped one alone; he saw three and worshipped but
one. That betokeneth the Trinity, and prayed them to be harboured with
him, and took water and washed their feet: and prayed them to tarry
under the tree, and he would bring bread to them for to comfort them.
And they bade him do as he had said, he went and bade Sarah to make
three ashy cakes and sent his child for a tender fat calf, which was
sodden and boiled. And he served them with butter and milk, and the
calf, and set it tofore them. He stood by them, and when they had eaten
they demanded him: Where is Sarah thy wife? And he said: Yonder in the
tabernacle. And he said, I shall go and come again, and Sarah thy wife
shall have a child. And she stood behind the door and heard it and
laughed, and said softly to herself: How may it be that I should bear a
child? She thought it impossible. Then said our Lord to Abraham: Why
laugheth Sarah thy wife, saying in scorn, Shall I bear a child? but as I
said to thee before, I shall return and come again, and she shall have a
child in that time. And he asked Sarah why she smiled in scorn, and she
said she smiled ne laughed not, and our Lord said, It is not so, for
thou laughedst.

When they had rested Abraham conveyed them on the way. And our Lord said
to Abraham: I have not hid from thee what I purpose to do. The cry of
Sodom and Gomorrah is multiplied and their sin is much grievous. I shall
descend and see if the sin be so great, the stench thereof cometh to
heaven, I shall take vengeance and destroy them. Then Abraham said: I
hope, Lord, thou wilt not destroy the just and righteous man with the
wicked sinner. I beseech thee, Lord, to spare them. Our Lord said: If
there be fifty good and righteous men among them, I shall spare them.
And Abraham said: Good Lord, if there be found forty, I pray thee to
spare them. Our Lord said: If there be forty, I shall spare them, and so
from forty to thirty and from thirty to twenty and from twenty to ten,
and our Lord said: If there be found ten good men among them, I shall
not destroy them. And then our Lord went from Abraham, and he returned
home again. That same eventide came two angels into Sodom, and Lot sat
at his gate, and when he saw them he went and worshipped them and
prayed them to come and rest in his house, and abide there and wash
their feet. And they said: Nay, we shall abide here in the street, and
Lot constrained them and brought them into his house and made a feast to
them. Then said the angels to Lot: If thou have here of thy kindred,
sons or daughters, all them that long to thee, lead out of this city, we
shall destroy this place, for the cry thereof is come to our Lord, which
hath sent us for to destroy them. Lot went unto his kinsmen and said:
Arise and take your children, and go out of this city, for our Lord
shall destroy it. And they supposed that he had raved or japed [jested].
And as soon as it was day the angels said to Lot: Arise, and take thy
wife and thy two daughters, and go out of this town lest ye perish with
them. Yet he dissimuling, they took him by the hand and his wife and two
daughters, because that God should spare them, and led them out of the
city. And there they said to him: Save thy soul and look not behind thee
lest thou perish also, but save thee in the mountain. Lot said to them:
I beseech thee, my Lord, forasmuch as thy servant hath found grace
before thee, and that thou hast showed thy mercy to me, and that
peradventure I might take harm on the hill, that I may go into the
little city hereby and may be saved there. He said to Lot: I have heard
thy prayers, and for thy sake I shall not subvert this town for which
thou hast prayed, hie thee and save thyself there, for I may do nothing
till thou be therein. Therefore that town is called Zoar. So Lot went
in to Zoar; and the sun arose, and our Lord rained from heaven upon
Sodom and Gomorrah sulphur and fire, and subverted the cities and all
the dwellers of the towns about that region, and all that was there
growing and burgeoning. Lot's wife turned her and looked toward the
cities, and anon she was turned into a statue or image of salt, which
abideth so unto this day. Abraham arose in the morning early, and looked
toward the cities, and saw the smoke ascending from the places, like as
it had been the light of a furnace. What time our Lord subverted these
cities he remembered Abraham, and delivered Lot from the vengeance of
the cities in which he dwelled. Then Lot ascended from Zoar and dwelled
in the mountain, and his two daughters with him. He dreaded to abide any
longer in the town, but dwelled in a cave, he and his two daughters with
him.

Abraham departed from thence and went southward and dwelled between
Kadesh and Shur, and went a pilgrimage to Gerar. He said that his wife
was his sister. Abimelech the king of Gerar sent for her and took her.
God came to Abimelech in his sleep and said: Thou shalt be dead for the
woman that thou hast taken, she hath an husband. Abimelech said: Lord,
wilt thou slay a man ignorant and rightful? She said that she was his
sister, in the simpleness of my heart and cleanness of my hands I did
this. And God said to him: I know well that with a simple heart thou
didst it, and therefore I have kept thee from her, now yield the woman
to her husband, and he shall pray for thee, he is a prophet and thou
shalt live. And if thou deliver her not, thou shalt die, and all they
that be in thy house. Abimelech arose up the same night and called all
his servants, and told them all these words. All they dreaded sore. Also
Abimelech called Abraham and said to him: What hast thou done to us,
that we have trespassed to thee? Thou hast caused me and my realm to sin
greatly. Thou hast done that thou shouldst not have done. What sawest
thou for to do so? Abraham said: I thought that the dread of God was not
in this place, and that ye would slay me for my wife; and certainly
otherwise she is also my sister, the daughter of my father but not of my
mother, and I have wedded her. And after that I went from the house of
my father, I said to her: Wheresomever we go say thou art my sister.

Then Abimelech took sheep and oxen and servants and maidens, and gave to
Abraham, and delivered to him Sarah his wife, and said: Lo! the land is
here tofore thee, wheresoever thou wilt, dwell and abide. And he said to
Sarah: Lo! I have given to thy brother a thousand pieces of silver, this
shall be to thee a veil of thine eyes, and wheresomever thou go,
remember that thou wert taken. Abraham prayed for Abimelech and his
meiny [company] and God healed him, his wife and all his servants. Our
Lord then visited Sarah, and she brought forth a son in her old age,
that same time that God had promised. Abraham called his son that she
had borne, Isaac, and when he was eight days old he circumcised him as
God had commanded, and Abraham was then an hundred years old. Then said
Sarah: Who would have supposed that I should give suck to my child,
being so old? I laughed when I heard our Lord say so, and all they that
shall hear of it may well laugh. The child grew and was weaned, and
Abraham made a great feast at the day of his weaning. After this, on a
day when Sarah saw the son of Hagar her handmaid play with her son
Isaac, she said to Abraham: Cast out this handmaid with her son, the son
of the handmaid shall not be heir with my son Isaac. Abraham took this
word hard and grievously for his son. Then said God to him: Let it not
be hard to thee for thy son and handmaid, whatsomever Sarah say to thee
hear her voice, for in Isaac shall thy seed be called. Yet shall I make
the son of the handmaid grow into great people, for he is of thy seed.
Abraham rose early in the morning, and took bread and a bottle of water,
and laid it on her shoulder, and gave to her the child and let her go,
which, when she was departed, erred in the wilderness of Beersheba. And
when the water was consumed that was in the bottle, she left the child
under a tree that was there and went thence as far as a bow shot and sat
her down, and said: I shall not see my son die, and there she wept. Our
Lord heard the voice of the child, and an angel called Hagar saying,
What doest thou, Hagar? Be not afeard, our Lord hath heard the voice of
the child from the place which he is now in. Arise and take the child
and hold him by the hand, for I shall make him to increase into much
people. God opened her eyes and she saw a pit of water, and anon she
went and filled the bottle, and gave the child to drink, and abode with
him, which grew and dwelled in the wilderness, and became there a young
man and an archer, and dwelled also in the desert of Paran. And his
mother took to him a wife of the land of Egypt.

That same time said Abimelech, and Phicol the prince of his host, unto
Abraham: Our Lord is with thee in all things that thou doest. Swear thou
by the Lord that thou grieve not me, ne them that shall come after me,
ne my kindred, but after the mercy that I have showed to thee, so do to
me and to my land in which thou hast dwelled as a stranger. And Abraham
said, I shall swear. And he blamed Abimelech for the pit of water which
his servants had taken away by strength. Abimelech answered: I know not
who hath done this thing, and thou toldest me not thereof, and I never
heard thereof till this day. And then after this they made covenant
together, and promised each to other to be friends together.

After all these things God tempted Abraham, and said to him: Abraham,
Abraham. He answered and said: I am here, and he said to him: Take thou
thine only son that thou lovest, Isaac, and go into the land of Vision
and offer him in sacrifice to me upon one of the hills that I shall show
to thee. Then Abraham arose in the night, and made ready his ass, and
took with him two young men and Isaac his son. And when they had hewn
and gathered the wood together to make sacrifice, they went to the
place that God commanded him. The third day after, he lift up his eyes
and saw from afar the place, and he said to his children: Abide ye here
with the ass, I and my son shall go to yonder place, and when we have
worshipped there we shall return to you. Then he took the wood of the
sacrifice and laid it on his son Isaac, and he bare in his hands fire
and the sword. And as they went both together, Isaac said to his father:
Father mine. What wilt thou, my son? said Abraham, and he said: Lo! here
is fire and wood, where is the sacrifice that shall be offered? Abraham
answered: My son, God shall provide for him a sacrifice well enough.
They went forth and came to the place that God had ordained, and there
made an altar, and laid the wood thereon, and took Isaac and set him on
the wood on the altar, and took his sword and would have offered him up
to God. And lo! the angel of God cried to him from heaven saying:
Abraham, Abraham, which answered: I am here, and he said to him: Extend
not thy hand upon my child, and do nothing to him, now I know that thou
dreadest God, and hast not spared thine only son for me. Abraham looked
behind him, and saw among the briars a ram fast by the horns, which he
took, and offered him in sacrifice for his son. He called that place:
The Lord seeth. The angel called Abraham the second time saying: I have
sworn by myself, saith the Lord, because thou hast done this thing, and
hast not spared thine only son for me, I shall bless thee and shall
multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven, and like the gravel that is
on the seaside, thy seed shall possess the gates of their enemies, and
in thy seed shall be blessed all the people of the earth, for thou
obeyedst to me. Abraham then returned to his servants, and went into
Beersheba and dwelled there. Sarah lived an hundred and twenty-seven
years and died in the city of Arba, which is Hebron in the land of
Canaan; for whom Abraham made sorrow and wept, and bought of the
children of Heth a field, and buried her worshipfully in a double
spelunke.

Abraham was an old man, and God blessed him in all his things. He said
to the eldest and upperest servant in all his house: I charge and
conjure thee by the name of God of heaven and of earth that thou suffer
not my son Isaac to take no wife of the daughters of Canaan amongst whom
I dwell, but go into the country where my kindred is, and take of them a
wife to my son. And the servant answered: If no woman there will come
with me into this country, shall I bring thy son into that country from
whence thou earnest? Abraham said: Beware that thou lead not my son
thither. The Lord of heaven and of earth, that took me from the house of
my father and from the place of my nativity, hath said and sworn to me,
saying: To thy seed I shall give this land. He shall send his angel
tofore thee, and thou shalt take there a wife for my son. If no woman
will come with thee thou shalt not be bounden by thine oath, but in no
wise lead my son thither. His servant then swore and promised to him
that he would so do.

He took ten camels of the flock of his lord, and of all his goods bare
with him, and went in to Mesopotamia unto the town of Nahor. And he made
the camels to tarry without the town by a pit side at such time as the
women be wont to come out for to draw water. And there he prayed our
Lord, saying: Lord God of my lord Abraham, I beseech thee to help me
this day, and do mercy unto my lord Abraham. Lo! I stand here nigh by
the well of water, and the daughters of the dwellers of this town come
hither for to draw water, therefore the maid to whom I say: Set down thy
pot that I may drink, and then she set down her pot and say: I will give
to thee drink, and to the camels, that I may understand thereby that she
be the maid that thou hast ordained to thy servant Isaac, and thou
showest thy mercy to my lord Abraham. He had not fully finished these
words with himself, but that Rebekah, daughter of Bethuel, son of Milcah
wife of Nahor, brother of Abraham, came out of the town, having a pot on
her shoulder, which was a right fair maid, and much beauteous and
unknown to the man. She went down to the well and filled her pot with
water and returned. The servant of Abraham ran to her and said: I pray
thee to give me a little of the water in thy pot for to drink. Which
said: Drink, my lord, and lightly took the pot from her shoulder, and
held it, and gave him drink. And when he had drunk she said: Yet I shall
give to thy camels drink, and draw water for them till all have drunken;
and she poured out the water into a vessel that was there for beasts to
drink, and ran to the pit and drew water that every one drank his
draught. He then thought in himself secretly that God had made him to
have a prosperous journey.

After they had drunk, he gave her two rings to hang on her ears weighing
two shekels, and as many armlets weighing ten shekels, and asked her
whose daughter she was, and if there were any room in her father's house
to be lodged. And she answered: I am daughter to Bethuel, Nahor's son,
and in my father's house is place enough to lodge thee and thy camels,
and plenty of chaff and hay for them. And the man inclined down to the
ground and worshipped God saying: Blessed be the Lord God of my lord
Abraham, which hath not taken away his mercy ne his truth from my lord,
and hath brought me in my journey right into the house of my lord's
brother. The maid Rebekah ran and told at home all that she had heard.
Rebekah had a brother named Laban, which hastily went out to the man
where as he was when he had seen the rings in his sister's ears and her
poinettes or armlets on her hands; and had heard her say all that the
man said. He came to the man that stood by the well yet, and said to
him: Come in, thou blessed of God, why standest thou without? I have
made ready the house for thee, and have ordained place for thy camels.
And brought him in, and strawed his camels, and gave them chaff and hay,
and water to wash the camels' feet, and the men's feet that came with
him.

And they set forth bread tofore him, which said: I shall not eat till I
have done mine errand and said wherefore I am come. And it was answered
to him, say on, and he said: I am servant of Abraham, and God hath
blessed and magnified him greatly and hath given to him oxen and sheep,
silver and gold, servants men and women, camels and asses. And Sarah his
wife hath brought him forth a son in her old age, and he hath given to
him all that he had. And my lord hath charged and adjured me saying: In
no wise let my son Isaac have no wife of the daughters of Canaan in
whose land he dwelleth, but go unto the house of my father and of my
kindred, and of them thou shall take a wife to my son, wherefore I am
come hither. And told all how he prayed God of some token, and how
Rebekah did to him, and in conclusion desired to have Rebekah for his
lord Isaac; and if he would not, that he might depart and go into some
other place, on the right side or on the left, to seek a wife for his
lord's son. Then Bethuel and Laban said to him: This word is come of
God, against his will we may nothing do. Lo! Rebekah standeth tofore
thee, take her and go forth that she may be wife unto the son of thy
lord, as our Lord hath said. Which words when Abraham's servant had
heard, he fell down to the ground and thanked our Lord, and anon took
forth silver vessels and of gold and good clothes and gave them to
Rebekah for a gift. And to her brethren and mother he gave also gifts,
and anon they made a feast, and ate and were joyful together. On the
morn betimes, the servant of Abraham arose, and desired to depart and
take Rebekah with him and go to his lord. Then the mother and her
brethren said: Let the maid abide with us but only ten days, and then
take her and go thy way. I pray you, said he, retain ne let [hinder] me
not, our Lord hath addressed my way and achieved my errand, wherefore
let me go to my lord. And they said: We shall call the maid and know her
will; and when she was demanded if she would go with that man, she said:
Yea, I shall go with him. Then they let her go, and her nurse with her,
and so she departed, and they said to her: Thou art our sister, we pray
God that thou mayst increase into a thousand thousand, and that thy seed
may possess the gates of their enemies. Then Rebekah and her maidens
ascended upon the camels, and followed the servant of Abraham which
hastily returned unto his lord.

That same time, when they were come, Isaac walked by the way without
forth and looked up and saw the camels coming from far. Rebekah espied
him and demanded of the servant who that he was that came in the field
against them. He answered and said: That is my lord Isaac, and anon she
took her pall or mantle and covered her. The servant anon told unto his
lord Isaac all that he had done; which received her and led her into the
tabernacle of Sarah his mother and wedded her, and took her in to his
wife, and so much loved her, that the love attempered the sorrow that he
had for his mother. Abraham after this wedded another wife, by whom he
had divers children. Abraham gave to Isaac all his possessions, and to
his other children he gave movable goods, and departed the sons of his
concubines from his son Isaac whilst he yet lived. And all the days of
the life of Abraham were one hundred and seventy-five years, and then
died in good mind and age, and Isaac and Ishmael buried him by his wife
Sarah in a double spelunke [cave].




HERE BEGINNETH THE LIFE OF ISAAC

WITH THE HISTORY OF ESAU AND OF JACOB

_Which is read in the Church the Second Sunday in Lent_


Isaac was forty years old when he wedded Rebekah and she bare him no
children. Wherefore he besought our Lord that she might bring forth
fruit. Our Lord heard his prayer, and she had twain sons at once. The
first was rough from the head to the foot, and he was named Esau; and
the other was named Jacob. Isaac the father was sixty years old when
these children were born. And after this, when they were grown to
reasonable age, Esau became a ploughman, and a tiller of the earth, and
an hunter. And Jacob was simple and dwelled at home with his mother.
Isaac the father loved well Esau, because he ate oft of the venison that
Esau took, and Rebekah the mother loved Jacob.

Jacob on a time had made a good pottage, and Esau his brother had been
an hunting all day and came home sore an hungred, and found Jacob having
good pottage, and prayed him to give him some, for he was weary and much
hungry. To whom Jacob said: If thou wilt sell to me thy patrimony and
heritage I shall give thee some pottage. And Esau answered, Lo! I die
for hunger, what shall avail me mine inheritance if I die, and what
shall profit me my patrimony? I am content that thou take it for this
pottage. Jacob then said: Swear that to me thou shalt never claim it,
and that thou art content I shall enjoy it, and Esau sware it, and so
sold away his patrimony, and took the pottage and ate it, and went his
way, setting nothing thereby that he had sold his patrimony. This
aforesaid is to bring in my matter of the history that is read, for now
followeth the legend as it is read in the church.

Isaac began to wax old and his eyes failed and dimmed that he might not
clearly see. And on a time he called Esau his oldest son and said to
him: Son mine, which answered: Father, I am here ready, to whom the
father said: Behold that I wax old and know not the day that I shall die
and depart out of this world, wherefore take thine harness, thy bow and
quiver with tackles, and go forth an hunting, and when thou hast taken
any venison, make to me thereof such manner meat as thou knowest that I
am wont to eat, and bring it to me that I may eat it, and that my soul
may bless thee ere I die. Which all these words Rebekah heard. And Esau
went forth for to accomplish the commandment of his father, and she said
then to Jacob: I have heard thy father say to Esau, thy brother: Bring
to me of thy venison, and make thereof meat that I may eat, and that I
may bless thee tofore our Lord ere I die. Now my son, take heed to my
counsel, and go forth to the flock, and bring to me two the best kids
that thou canst find, and I shall make of them meat such as thy father
shall gladly eat, which when thou hast brought to him and hast eaten he
may bless thee ere he die: To whom Jacob answered: Knowest thou not that
my brother is rough and hairy and I am smooth? If my father take me to
him and taste me and feel, I dread me that he shall think that I mock
him, and shall give me his curse for the blessing. The mother then said
to him: In me, said she, be this curse, my son, nevertheless hear me; go
to the flock and do that I have said to thee. He went and fetched the
kids and delivered them to his mother, and she went and ordained them
into such meat as she knew well that his father loved, and took the best
clothes that Esau had, and did them on Jacob. And the skins of the kid
she did about his neck and hands there as he was bare, and delivered to
him bread and the pulment that she had boiled. And he went to his father
and said: Father mine, and he answered: I am here; who art thou, my son?
Jacob said: I am Esau, thy first begotten son, I have done as thou
commandedst me, arise, sit and eat of the venison of my hunting that thy
soul may bless me. Then said Isaac again to his son: How mightest thou,
said he, so soon find and take it, my son? To whom he answered: It was
the will of God that such thing as I desired came soon to my hand. Isaac
said to him: Come hither to me, my son, that I may touch and handle
thee, that I may prove whether thou be my son Esau or not. He came to
his father, and when he had felt him, Isaac said: The voice truly is the
voice of Jacob, but the hands be the hands of Esau. And he knew him not,
for his hands expressed the likeness and similitude of the more
brother. Therefore blessing him, he said to him: Thou art then my son
Esau? He answered and said: I am he. Then said Isaac: Bring to the meat
of thine hunting, my son, that my soul may bless thee; which he offered
and gave to his father, and also wine. And when he had eaten and drunken
a good draught of the wine, he said to Jacob: Come hither to me, my son,
and kiss me; and he went to him and kissed him. Anon as he felt the
sweet savour and smell of his clothes, blessing him he said: Lo! the
sweet odour of my son is as the odour of a field full of flowers, whom
our Lord bless. God give to thee of the dew of heaven, and of the
fatness of the earth, abundance of wheat, wine, and oil, and the people
serve thee, and the tribes worship thee. Be thou lord of thy brethren,
and the sons of thy mother shall bow down and kneel to thee. Whosomever
curseth thee, be he accursed, and who that blesseth thee, with blessings
be he fulfilled.

Unnethe [hardly] had Isaac fulfilled these words and Jacob gone out,
when that Esau came with his meat that he had gotten with hunting,
entered in, and offered to his father saying: Arise, father mine, and
eat of the venison that thy son hath ordained for thee, that thy soul
may bless me. Isaac said to him: Who art thou? To whom he answered, I am
thy first begotten son Esau. Isaac then was greatly abashed and
astonied, and marvelled more than can be thought credible. And then he
was in a trance, as the master of histories saith, in which he had
knowledge that God would that Jacob should have the blessing. And said
to Esau: Who then was he that right now a little tofore thy coming
brought to me venison? And I have eaten of all that he brought to me ere
thou camest. I have blessed him, and he shall be blessed. When Esau
heard these words of his father, he cried with a great cry, and was sore
astonied and said: Father, I pray thee bless me also. To whom he said:
Thy brother germain is come fraudulently, and hath received thy
blessing. Then said Esau: Certainly and justly may his name be called
well Jacob, for on another time tofore this he supplanted me of my
patrimony, and now secondly he hath undernome from me my blessing. And
yet then he said to his father: Hast thou not reserved to me one
blessing? Isaac answered: I have ordained him to be thy lord, I have
subdued all his brethren to his servitude. I have stablished him in
wheat, wine and oil. And after this what shall I do to thee, my son? To
whom Esau said: Hast thou not, father, yet one blessing? I beseech thee
to bless me. Then with a great sighing and weeping Isaac moved said to
him: In the fatness of the earth and in the dew of heaven shall be thy
blessing, thou shalt live in thy sword, and shalt serve thy brother.
Then was Esau woebegone, and hated Jacob for supplanting him of his
blessing that his father had blessed him with, and said in his heart:
The days of sorrow shall come to my father, for I shall slay my brother
Jacob. This was told to Rebekah, which anon sent for Jacob her son, and
said to him: Lo! Esau thy brother threateneth to slay thee, therefore
now my son hear my voice and do as I shall counsel. Make thee ready and
go to my brother in Aran, and dwell there with him unto the time that
his anger and fury be overpast, and his indignation ceased, and that he
forget such things that thou hast done to him, and then after that I
shall send for thee, and bring thee hither again. And Rebekah went to
Isaac her husband and said: I am weary of my life because of the
daughters of Heth, if Jacob take to him a wife of that kindred, I will
no longer live. Isaac then called Jacob and blessed him and commanded to
him saying: I charge thee in no wise to take a wife of the kindred of
Canaan, but go and walk into Mesopotamia of Syria, unto the house of
Bethuel, father of thy mother, and take to thee there a wife of the
daughters of Laban thine uncle. God Almighty bless thee, and make thee
grow and multiply, that thou mayst be increased into tourbes of people,
and give to thee the blessings of Abraham, and to thy seed after thee,
that thou mayst possess and own the land of thy pilgrimage which he
granted to thy grandsire. When Isaac had thus said, and given him leave
to go, he departed anon, and went into Mesopotamia of Syria to Laban,
son of Bethuel, brother of Rebekah his mother. Esau seeing that his
father had blessed Jacob and sent him into Mesopotamia of Syria to wed a
wife there, and that after his blessing commanded to him saying: Take
thou no wife of the daughters of Canaan; and he obeying his father went
into Syria, proving thereby that his father saw not gladly the daughters
of Canaan, he went to Ishmael, and took him a wife beside them that he
had taken tofore, that was Melech, daughter of Ishmael, son of Abraham.

Then Jacob departed from Beersheba and went forth on his journey toward
Aran. When he came to a certain place after going down of the sun and
would rest there all night, he took of the stones that were there and
laid under his head and slept in the same place. And there he saw in his
sleep a ladder standing on the earth, and the upper end thereof touched
heaven, and angels of God ascending and descending upon it, and our Lord
in the midst of the ladder saying to him: I am the Lord God of Abraham
thy father, and of Isaac; the land on which thou sleepest I shall give
to thee and to thy seed, and thy seed shall be as dust of the earth;
thou shalt spread abroad unto the east and unto the west, and north and
south, and all the tribes of the earth shall be blessed in thee and in
thy seed. And I shall be thy keeper wheresoever thou shalt go, and shall
bring thee again into this land, and I shall not leave till I have
accomplished all that I have said. When Jacob was awaked from his sleep
and dreaming, he said: Verily God is in this place, and I wist not of
it. And he said dreadingly: How terrible is this place, none other thing
is here but the house of God and the gate of heaven. Then Jacob arose
early and took the stone that lay under his head, and raised it for
witness, pouring oil thereon, and called the name of the place Bethel
which tofore was called Luza. And there he made a vow to our Lord,
saying: If God be with me and keep me in the way that I walk, and give
me bread to eat, and clothes to cover me, and I may return prosperously
into the house of my father, the Lord shall be my God, and this stone
that I have raised in witness, this shall be called the house of God.
And the good of all things that thou givest to me, I shall offer to thee
the tithes and tenth part. Then Jacob went forth into the east, and saw
a pit in a field and three flocks of sheep lying by it, for of that pit
were the beasts watered. And the mouth thereof was shut and closed with
a great stone, for the custom was when all the sheep were gathered, they
rolled away the stone, and when they had drunken they laid the stone
again at the pit mouth. And then he said to the shepherds: Brethren,
whence are ye? Which answered: Of Aran. Then he asking them said: Know
ye not Laban, son of Nahor? They said: We know him well. How fareth he,
said he, is he all whole? He fareth well, said they; and lo! Rachel his
daughter cometh there with her flock. Then said Jacob: It is yet far to
even, it is yet time that the flocks be led to drink, and after be
driven to pasture, which answered: We may not so do till all the beasts
be gathered, and then we remove the stone from the mouth of the pit and
water our beasts. And as they talked, Rachel came with the flock of her
father, for she kept that time the beasts. And when Jacob saw her and
knew that she was his erne's [uncle's] daughter, and that they were his
erne's sheep, he removed the stone from the pit's mouth, and when her
sheep had drunken, he kissed her, and weeping he told her that he was
brother to her father and son of Rebekah. Then she hied her and told it
to her father, which when he understood that Jacob, his sister's son,
was come, he ran against him and, embracing, kissed him, and led him
into his house. And when he had heard the cause of his journey he said:
Thou art my mouth and my flesh.

And when he had been there the space of a month, he demanded Jacob if he
would gladly serve him because he was his cousin, and what hire and
reward he would have. He had two daughters, the more was named Leah, and
the less was called Rachel, but Leah was blear-eyed, and Rachel was fair
of visage and well-favored, whom Jacob loved, and said: I shall serve
thee for Rachel thy younger daughter seven years. Laban answered: It is
better that I give her to thee than to a strange man; dwell and abide
with me, and thou shalt have her. And so Jacob served him for Rachel
seven years, and him thought it but a little while, because of the great
love that he had to her. And at the end of seven years, Jacob said to
Laban: Give to me my wife, for the time is come that I should have her.
Then Laban called all his friends and made a feast for the wedding, and
at night he brought in Leah, the more daughter, and delivered to her an
handmaid named Zilpah. Then Jacob, when the morning came, saw that it
was Leah. He said to Laban her father: What hast thou done? Have I not
served thee for Rachel, why hast thou brought Leah to me? Laban
answered: It is not the usage ne custom of our country to give the
younger first to be wedded, but fulfil and make an end of this marriage
this week, and then shall I give to thee Rachel my daughter for other
seven years that thou shalt serve to me. Jacob agreed gladly, and when
that week was passed, he wedded Rachel to his wife. To whom Laban her
father gave an handmaid named Bilhah. Nevertheless when the wedding of
the younger was finished, because of the great love that he had to her,
him thought that the other seven years were but short.

[And Jacob while he served Laban had these sons: Reuben, Simeon, Levi,
Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulon, Joseph.] When
Joseph was born, Jacob said to Laban his wives' father: Give me leave to
depart that I may go in to my country and my land; give to me my wives
and children for whom I have served thee that I may go hence. Thou
knowest what service I have served thee. Laban said to him: I have
founden grace in thy sight; I know it by experience that God hath
blessed me for thee; I have ordained the reward that I shall give to
thee. Then Jacob answered: Thou knowest how I have served thee, and how
much thy possession was in my hands. Thou hadst but little when I came
to thee, and now thou art rich, God hath blessed thee at mine entry; it
is now right that I provide somewhat toward mine house. Laban said: What
shall I give to thee? Jacob answered: I will nothing but that thou do
that I demand. I shall yet feed and keep thy beasts, and depart asunder
all the sheep of divers colors. And all that ever shall be of divers
colors and spotty, as well in sheep as in goats, let me have them for my
reward and meed, and Laban granted thereto. Then at time of departing,
Laban took them of two colors, and Jacob them that were of one color.
Thus was Jacob made much rich out of measure, and had many flocks, and
servants both men and women, camels and asses.

After that Jacob had heard Laban's sons say: Jacob hath taken all that
was our father's from him, and of his faculty is made rich, he was
abashed and understood well by Laban's looking that he was not so
friendly to himward as he had been tofore. And also our Lord said to him
that he should return into the land of his fathers and to his
generation, and that he would be with him. He then called Rachel and
Leah into the field whereas he fed his flocks, and said to them: I see
well by your father's visage that he is not toward me as he was
yesterday or that other day; forsooth the God of my father was with me,
and ye know well how I have served your father with all my might and
strength, but he hath deceived me, and hath changed mine hire and meed
ten times, and yet our Lord hath not suffered him to grieve me. When he
said the beasts of party color should be mine, then all the ewes brought
forth lambs of variable colors. And when he said the contrary they
brought forth all white. God hath taken the substance of your father and
hath given it to me. And now God hath commanded me to depart, wherefore
make you ready and let us depart hence. Then answered Rachel and Leah:
Shall we have nothing else of our father's faculty and of the heritage
of his house? Shall he repute us as strangers, and he hath eaten and
sold our goods? Sith God hath taken the goods of our father and hath
given it to us and to our children, wherefore all that God commanded to
thee, do it.

Jacob arose and set his children and his wives upon his camels, and went
his way and took all his substance, and flocks, and all that he had
gotten in Mesopotamia and went toward his father Isaac into the land of
Canaan. That time was Laban gone to shear his sheep, and Rachel stole
away the idols of her father. Jacob would not let Laban know of his
departing, and when he was departed with all that longed to him of
right, he came to the mount of Gilead. It was told to Laban, the third
day after, that Jacob was fled and gone, who anon took his brethren and
pursued him by the space of seven days and overtook him in the mount of
Gilead. He saw our Lord in his sleep saying to him: Beware that thou
speak not angrily ne hard words to Jacob. That time Jacob had set his
tabernacle in the hill, and when he came thither with his brethren, he
said to Jacob: Why hast thou done thus to me to take away my daughters
as prisoners taken by sword? Why fleddest thou from me and wouldst not
let me have knowledge thereof? Thou hast not suffered me to kiss my sons
and daughters, thou hast done follily. Now may I do thee harm and evil,
but the God of thy father said to me yesterday: Beware that thou speak
no hard words against Jacob. Thou desirest to go to the house of thy
father, why hast thou stolen my gods? Jacob answered: That I departed
thee not knowing, I dreaded that violently thou wouldst have taken from
me thy daughters. And where thou reprovest me of theft, whosoever have
stolen thy gods let him be slain tofore our brethren. Seek and what thou
findest that is thine, take with thee.

He, saying this, knew not that Rachel had stolen her father's gods. Then
Laban entered the tabernacle of Jacob and Leah, and sought and found
nothing. And when he came into the tabernacle of Rachel, she hied her
and hid the idols under the litter of her camel and sat upon it. And he
sought and found nought. Then said Rachel: Let not my lord be wroth for
I may not arise to thee, for sickness is fallen to me, and so she
deceived her father. Then Jacob, being angry and grudging, said to
Laban: What is my trespass and what have I sinned to thee that thou hast
pursued me, and hast searched everything? What hast thou now founden of
all the substance of thy house? Lay it forth tofore my brethren and thy
brethren, that they judge between me and thee. I have served thee twenty
years and have been with thee, thy sheep and thy goats were never
barren. I have eaten no wethers of thy flock, nor beast hath destroyed
none. I shall make all good what was stolen. I prayed therefore day and
night, I labored both in heat and in cold, sleep fled from mine eyes.
Thus I served thee in thy house twenty years, fourteen for thy daughters
and six for thy flocks. Thou hast changed mine hire and reward ten
times. But if the God of my father Abraham and the dread of Isaac had
been with me, haply thou wouldst now have left me naked. Our Lord God
hath beholden mine affliction and the labor of mine hands and reproved
thee yesterday. Laban answered to him: My daughters and sons, and thy
flocks, and all that thou beholdest are thine, what may I do to my sons
and nephews? Let us now be friends, and make we a fast league and
confederacy together. Then Jacob raised a stone, and raised it in token
of friendship and peace, and so they ate together in friendship, and
sware each to other to abide in love ever after. And after this Laban
arose in the night, and kissed his daughters and sons, and blessed them,
and returned into his country.

Jacob went forth in his journey that he had taken. Angels of God met
him, which when he saw, he said: These be the castles of God, and called
that place Mahanaim. He sent messengers tofore him to Esau his brother
in the land of Seir, in the land of Edom, and bade them say thus to
Esau: This saith thy brother Jacob: I have dwelled with Laban unto this
day, I have oxen and asses, servants both men and women. I send now a
legation unto my lord that I may find grace in his sight. These
messengers returned to Jacob and said: We came to Esau thy brother, and
lo! he cometh for to meet thee with four hundred men. Jacob was sore
afraid then, and divided his company into twain turmes [two troops],
saying: If Esau come to that one and destroy that, that other shall yet
be saved. Then said Jacob: O God of my father Abraham, and God of my
father Isaac, O Lord that saidst to me, return into thy land and place
of thy nativity, and saidst I shall do well to thee, I am the least in
all thy mercies, and in thy truth that thou hast granted to thy servant,
with my staff I have gone this river of Jordan, and now I return with
two turmes. I beseech the Lord keep me from the hands of my brother
Esau, for I fear him greatly lest he come and smite down the mother with
the sons. Thou hast said that thou shouldest do well to me and shouldest
spread my seed like unto the gravel of the sea, and that it may not be
numbered for multitude. Then when he had slept that night, he ordained
gifts for to send to his brother, goats two hundred, kids twenty, sheep
two hundred, and rams twenty; forty kine and twenty bulls, twenty asses
and ten foals of them. And he sent by his servants all these beasts; and
bade them say that Jacob his servant sent to him this present and that
he followeth after. And Jacob thought to please him with gifts.

The night following, him thought a man wrestled with him all that night
till the morning, and when he saw he might not overcome him, he hurted
the sinew of his thigh that he halted thereof, and said to him: Let me
go and leave me, for it is in the morning. Then Jacob answered: I shall
not leave thee but if thou bless me. He said to him: What is thy name?
he answered: Jacob. Then he said: Nay, said he, thy name shall no more
be called Jacob, but Israel, for if thou hast been strong against God,
how much more shalt thou prevail against men? Then Jacob said to him:
What is thy name? tell me. He answered, Why demandest thou my name,
which is marvellous? And he blessed him in the same place. Jacob called
the name of that same place Penuel, saying: I have seen our Lord face to
face, and my soul is made safe. And anon as he was past Penuel the sun
arose. He halted on his foot, and therefore the children of Israel eat
no sinews because it dried in the thigh of Jacob. Then Jacob lifting up
his eyes saw Esau coming and four hundred men with him, and divided the
sons of Leah and of Rachel, and of both their handmaidens, and set each
handmaid and their children tofore in the first place, Leah and her sons
in the second, and Rachel and Joseph all behind. And he going tofore
kneeled down to ground and, worshipping his brother, approached him.
Esau ran for to meet with his brother, and embraced him, straining his
neck, and weeping kissed him, and he looked forth and saw the women and
their children, and said: What been these and to whom longen they? Jacob
answered: They be children which God hath given to me thy servant and
his handmaidens, and their children approached and kneeled down, and
Leah with her children also worshipped him, and last of all Joseph and
Rachel worshipped him. Then said Esau: Whose been these turmes [troops]
which I have met? Jacob answered: I have sent them to thee, my lord,
unto the end that I may stand in thy grace. Esau said: I have many
myself, keep these and let them be thine. Nay, said Jacob, I pray thee
to take this gift which God hath sent me that I may find grace in thy
sight, for meseemeth I see thy visage like the visage of God; and
therefore be thou to me merciful, and take this blessing of me. Unnethe
[hardly] by compelling he taking it, said: Let us go together, I shall
accompany thee and be fellow of thy journey. Then said Jacob: Thou
knowest well, my lord, that I have young children and tender, and sheep
and oxen, which, if I over-labored, should die all in a day, wherefore
please it you, my lord, to go tofore, and I shall follow as I may with
my children and beasts. Esau answered: I pray thee then let my fellows
abide and accompany thee, whatsoever need thou have. Jacob said: It is
no need, I need no more but one, that I may stand in thy favor, my lord.
And Esau returned then the same way and journey that he came into Seir.
And Jacob came to Succoth and builded there an house, and from thence he
went in to Shalem, the town of Shechem which is in the land of Canaan,
and bought there a part of a field, in which he fixed his tabernacles,
of the sons of Hamor father of Shechem for an hundred lambs. And there
he raised an altar, and worshipped upon it the strongest God of Israel.

After this our Lord appeared to Jacob and said: Arise and go up to
Bethel and dwell there, and make there an altar to the Lord that
appeared to thee in the way when thou fleddest from thy brother Esau.
Jacob then called all them of his house and said: Cast away from you all
your strange gods that be among you, and make you clean and change your
clothes; arise and let us go into Bethel, and make we there an altar to
our Lord that heard me in the day of my tribulation, and was fellow of
my journey. Then they gave to him all their strange gods, and the gold
that hung on their ears, and he dalf a pit behind the city of Shechem
and threw them therein. And when they departed, all the countries
thereabout were afraid and durst not pursue them. Then Jacob came to a
place called Luz which is in the land of Canaan, and all the people with
him, which otherwise is called Bethel. He edified there an altar to our
Lord, and named that place the House of God. Our Lord appeared to him in
that place when he fled from his brother Esau. That same time died
Deborah, the nurse of Rebekah, and was buried at the root of Bethel
under an oak. Our Lord appeared again to Jacob after that he was
returned from Mesopotamia of Syria, and was come into Bethel, and
blessed him saying: Thou shalt no more be called Jacob but Israel shall
be thy name, and called him Israel, and said to him: I am God Almighty,
grow and multiply, folks and peoples of nations shall come of thee,
kings shall come of thy loins. The land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac
I shall give to thee and thy seed; and vanished from him.

He then raised a stone for a remembrance in the place where God spake to
him, and anointed it with oil, calling the name of the place Bethel. He
went thence and came in veer time unto the land that goeth to Ephrath,
in which place Rachel bare a son. And the death drawing near, she named
him Benoni, which is as much to say as the son of my sorrow. The father
called him Benjamin, that is to say the son of the right hand. There
Rachel died and was buried in the way toward Ephrath, that is Bethlehem.
Jacob raised a title upon her tomb; this is the title of the monument of
Rachel unto this present day. Jacob went thence and came to Isaac his
father into Mamre the city of Arbah, that is Hebron, in which dwelled
Abraham and Isaac. And all the days of Isaac were complete, which were
an hundred and fourscore years, and he consumed and died in good mind,
and Esau and Jacob his sons buried him.

Thus endeth the history of Isaac and his two sons Esau and Jacob.




HERE BEGINNETH THE HISTORY OF JOSEPH AND HIS BRETHREN

_Which is read the Third Sunday in Lent_


Joseph when he was sixteen years old began to keep and feed the flock
with his brethren, he being yet a child, and was accompanied with the
sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, wives of his father. Joseph complained on his
brethren, and accused them to their father of the most evil sin. Israel
loved Joseph above all his sons for as much as he had gotten him in his
old age, and made for him a motley coat. His brethren then seeing that
he was beloved of his father more than they were, hated him and might
not speak to him a peaceable word. It happed on a time that Joseph
dreamed, and saw a sweven [dream], and told it to his brethren, which
caused them to hate him yet more. Joseph said to his brethren: Hear ye
my dream that I had; methought that we bound sheaves in the field, and
my sheaf stood up and yours standing round about and worshipped my
sheaf. His brethren answered: Shalt thou be our king and shall we be
subject and obey thy commandment? Therefore this cause of dreams and of
these words ministered the more fume of hate and envy. Joseph saw
another sweven and told to his father and brethren: Methought I saw in
my sleep the sun, the moon, and eleven stars worship me. Which when his
father and his brethren had heard, the father blamed him, and said: What
may betoken this dream that thou sawest? Trowest thou that I, thy mother
and thy brethren, shall worship thee upon the earth? His brethren had
great envy hereat.

The father thought and considered a thing secretly in himself. On a time
when his brethren kept their flocks of sheep in Shechem, Israel said to
Joseph: Thy brethren feed their sheep in Shechem, come and I shall send
thee to them, which answered: I am ready, and he said: Go and see if all
things be well and prosperous at thy brethren and beasts, and come again
and tell me what they do. He went from the vale of Hebron and came unto
Shechem. There a man found him erring in the field, and asked him what
he sought, and he answered: I seek my brethren, tell me where they feed
their flocks. The man said to him: They been departed from this place, I
heard them say Let us go in to Dothan. Which then when his brethren saw
him come from far, tofore he approached to them they thought to slay
him, and spake together saying: Lo! see the dreamer cometh. Come and let
us slay him and put him into this old cistern. And we shall say that
some wild evil beast hath devoured him, and then shall appear what his
dreams shall profit him. Reuben hearing this, thought for to deliver him
from their hands, and said: Let us not slay him ne shed his blood, but
keep your hands undefouled. This he said, willing to keep him from their
hands and render him again to his father. Anon then as he came they
took off his motley coat, and set him into an old cistern that had no
water. As they sat for to eat bread they saw Ishmaelites coming from
Gilead, and their camels bringing spices and raisins into Egypt. Then
said Judah to his brethren: What should it profit us if we slew our
brother and shed his blood? It is better that he be sold to Ishmaelites
and our hands be not defouled, he is our own brother and our flesh. His
brethren agreed to his words, and drew him out of the cistern, and sold
him to the Midianitish merchants passing forth by to Ishmaelites for
thirty pieces of silver, which led him into Egypt. At this time when he
was sold Reuben was not there, but was in another field with his beasts.
And when he returned and came unto the cistern and found not Joseph, he
tare his clothes for sorrow, and came to his brethren and said: The
child is not yonder, whither shall I go to seek him? He had supposed his
brethren had slain him in his absence. They told him what they had done,
and took his coat, and besprinkled it with the blood of a kid which they
slew, and sent it to their father saying: See whether this be the coat
of thy son or not, this we have found. Which anon as the father saw it
said: This is my son's coat, an evil wild beast hath devoured him, some
beast hath eaten him; and rent his clothes and did on him a sackcloth,
bewailing and sorrowing his son a long time. All his sons gathered them,
together for to comfort their father and assuage his sorrow, but he
would take no comfort, but said: I shall descend to my son into hell for
to bewail him there. And thus, he abiding in sorrow, the Midianites
carried Joseph into Egypt, and sold him to Potiphar, eunuch of Pharaoh,
master of his knights.

Thus was Joseph led into Egypt, and Potiphar, prince of the host of
Pharaoh, an Egyptian, bought him of the hands of Ishmaelites. Our Lord
God was always with Joseph, and he was wise, ready, and prosperous in
all manner of things. He dwelled in his lord's house and pleased so well
his lord, that he stood in his grace that he made him upperest and above
all other, and betook him the rule and governance of all his house,
which well and wisely governed the household and all that he had charge
of. Our Lord blessed the house of Egypt for Joseph's sake, and
multiplied as well in beasts as in fields all his substance. Joseph was
fair of visage and well favored.

After many days the lady, his master's wife, beheld and cast her eyes on
Joseph, and tempted him to sin. He refused that, and would not attend ne
listen to her words, ne would not consent to so sinful a work, and said
to her: Lo! hath not my lord delivered to me all that he hath in his
house? and he knoweth not what he hath, and there is nothing therein but
that it is in my power and at my commandment except thee, which art his
wife. How may I do this evil and sin to my lord? Such manner, or
semblable words, he said daily to her, and the woman was the more
desirous and grievous to the young man, and he always forsook and
refused the sin. And when the lady saw that she was refused, she cried
and called the men of the house and accused Joseph falsely. When the
lord heard this, anon he gave faith and believed his wife, and being
sore wroth, set Joseph in prison where the prisoners of the king were
kept and he was there fast set in. Our Lord God was with Joseph, and had
mercy on him, and made him in the favor and grace of the chief keeper of
the prison, in so much that he delivered to Joseph the keeping of all
the prisoners, and what he did was done, and the chief jailer was
pleased with all. Our Lord was with him and directed all his works.

After this it fell so that two officers of the king's trespassed unto
their lord, wherefore he was wroth with them and commanded them to the
prison whereas Joseph was. That one of them was the butler, and that
other the baker; and the keeper betook them to Joseph to keep, and he
served them. After a while that they had been in prison they both saw on
one night a dream of which they were astoned and abashed, and when
Joseph was come in to serve them, and saw them heavy, he demanded them
why they were heavier than they were wont to be, which answered: We have
dreamed and there is none to interpret it to us. Joseph said to them:
Suppose ye that God may not give me grace to interpret it? Tell to me
what ye saw in your sleep. Then the butler told first and said:
Methought I saw a vine had three branches, and after they had flowered
the grapes were ripe, and then I took the cup of Pharaoh in my hand, and
took the grapes and wrang out of them wine into the cup that I held,
and presented it to Pharaoh to drink. Joseph answered: The three
branches be yet three days, after which Pharaoh shall remember thy
service and shall restore thee into thy foremost office and gree, for to
serve him as thou wert wont to do. Then I pray thee to remember me when
thou art at thine above, and be to me so merciful to sue unto Pharaoh
that he take me out of this prison, for I was stolen out of the land of
Hebrews and am innocently set here in prison. Then the master baker saw
that he had wisely interpreted the butler's dream; he said: Methought
that I had three baskets of meat upon my head, and in that one basket
that was highest methought I bare all the meat of the bakehouse and
birds came and ate of it. Joseph answered: This is the interpretation of
the dream; the three baskets be three days yet to come, after which
Pharaoh shall smite off thy head and shall hang thee on the cross, and
the birds shall tear thy flesh. And the third day after this Pharaoh
made a great feast unto his children, and remembered him, among the
meals, on the master butler and the master baker. He restored his butler
unto his office, and to serve him of the cup, and that other was hanged,
that the truth of the interpreter was believed and proved.
Notwithstanding the master butler in his wealth forgat Joseph his
interpreter.

Two years after Pharaoh saw in his sleep a dream. Him thought he stood
upon the river, from which he saw seven oxen ascend to the land which
were fair and right fat, and were fed in a fat pasture; he saw other
seven come out of the river, poor and lean, and were fed in places
plenteous and burgeoning. These devoured the other that were so fat and
fair. Herewith he started out of his sleep, and after slept again, and
saw another dream. He saw seven ears of corn standing on one stalk, full
and fair of corns, and as many other ears void and smitten with drought,
which devoured the beauty of the first seven. In the morning Pharaoh
awoke and was greatly afeard of these dreams, and sent for all
conjectors and diviners of Egypt, and wise men; and when they were
gathered he told to them his dream, and there was none that could
interpret it. Then at last the master butler, remembering Joseph, said:
I knowledge my sin, on a time the king being wroth with his servants,
sent me and the master of the bakers into prison, where we in one night
dreamed both prodigies of things coming. And there was a child of the
Hebrews, servant to the jailer, to whom we told our dreams and he
expounded them to us and said what should happen; I am restored to mine
office and that other is hanged on the cross.

Anon, by the king's commandment, Joseph was taken out of prison and
shaved, bathed, and changed his clothes, and brought tofore Pharaoh, to
whom he said: I saw a dream which I have showed unto wise men, and there
is none that can tell me the interpretation thereof. To whom Joseph
answered: God shall answer by me things prosperous to Pharaoh. Then
Pharaoh told to him his dreams, like as is tofore written, of the seven
fat oxen and seven lean, and how the lean devoured the fat, and in
likewise of the ears. Joseph answered: The king's dreams are one thing
which God hath showed to Pharaoh. The seven fat oxen and the seven ears
full, betoken seven years to come of great plenty and commodious, and
the seven lean oxen, and the seven void ears smitten with drought,
betoken seven years after them of great hunger and scarcity. Lo! there
shall come first seven years of great fertility and plenty in all the
land of Egypt, after whom shall follow other seven years of so great
sterility, barrenness, and scarcity, that the abundance of the first
shall be all forgotten. The great hunger of these latter years shall
consume all the plenty of the first years. The latter dream pertaineth
to the same, because God would that it should be fulfilled. Now
therefore let the king provide for a man that is wise and witty, that
may command and ordain provosts and officers in all places of the realm,
that they gather into garners and barns the fifth part of all the corn
and fruits that shall grow these first seven plenteous years that be to
come, and that all this wheat may be kept in barns and garners in towns
and villages, that it may be made ready against the coming of the seven
scarce years that shall oppress by hunger all Egypt, to the end that the
people be not enfamined. This counsel pleased much to Pharaoh and to all
his ministers. Then Pharaoh said to his servants: Where should we find
such a man as this is, which is fulfilled with the spirit of God? And
then he said to Joseph: Forasmuch as God hath showed to thee all that
thou hast spoken, trowest thou that we might find any wiser than thou
or like to thee? Thou shalt be upperest of my house, and to the
commandment of thy mouth all people shall obey. I only shall go tofore
thee and sit but one seat above thee. Yet said Pharaoh to Joseph: Lo! I
have ordained thee above and master upon all the land of Egypt. He took
a ring from his hand and gave it into his hand, and clad him with a
double stole furred with bise; and a golden collar he put about his
neck, and made him to ascend upon his chair; the second trumpet crying
that all men should kneel tofore him, and that they should know him
upperest provost of all the land of Egypt. Then said the king of Egypt
to Joseph: I am Pharaoh, without thy commandment shall no man move hand
nor foot in all the land of Egypt. He changed his name and called him in
the tongue of Egypt: The saviour of the world. He gave to him a wife
named Asenath, daughter of Poti-phera, priest of Eliopoleos.

Joseph went forth then into the land of Egypt. Joseph was thirty years
old when he stood in the favor and grace of Pharaoh. And he went round
about all the region of Egypt. The plenteousness and fertility of the
seven years came, and sheaves and shocks of corn were brought in to the
barns; all the abundance of fruits was laid in every town. There was so
great plenty of wheat that it might be compared to the gravel of the
sea, and the plenty thereof exceedeth measure. Joseph had two sons by
his wife ere the famine and hunger came, which Asenath the priest's
daughter brought forth, of whom he called the name of the first
Manasseh, saying: God hath made me to forget all my labors, and the
house of my father hath forgotten me. He called the name of the second
son Ephraim, saying: God hath made me to grow in the land of my poverty.

Then passed the seven years of plenty and fertility that were in Egypt,
and the seven years of scarcity and hunger began to come, which Joseph
had spoken of tofore, and hunger began to wax and grow in the universal
world; also in all the land of Egypt was hunger and scarcity. And when
the people hungered they cried to Pharaoh asking meat, to whom he
answered: Go ye to Joseph, and whatsoever he saith to you do ye. Daily
grew and increased the hunger in all the land. Then Joseph opened the
barns and garners, and sold corn to the Egyptians, for the hunger
oppressed them sore. All provinces came into Egypt for to buy meat to
them, and to eschew the hunger.

Jacob, father unto Joseph, heard tell that corn and victuals were sold
in Egypt, and said to his sons: Why be ye negligent? I have heard say
that corn is sold in Egypt; go ye thither and buy for us that is
necessary and behoveful, that we may live, and consume not for need.
Then the ten brethren of Joseph descended into Egypt for to buy wheat,
and Benjamin was left at home with the father, because whatsoever happed
to the brethren in their journey. Then they entered into the land of
Egypt with others for to buy corn. There was great famine in the land of
Canaan, and Joseph was prince in the land of Egypt, also by his
commandment wheat was sold unto the people. Then when his brethren were
come and had adored and worshipped him, he anon knew them, and spake to
them, as to strangers, hard words, demanding them saying: Whence be ye?
Which answered: Of the land of Canaan, and come hither to buy that is
necessary for us. And though he knew his brethren, yet was he unknown of
them. He remembered the dreams that he sometime had seen, and told them
and said: Ye be spies and be come hither for to espy the weakest places
of this land, which said to him: It is not so, my lord, but we thy
servants be come for to buy victuals. We be all sons to one man, we come
peaceably, ne we thy servants think ne imagine none evil. To whom he
answered: It is all otherwise, ye be come for to espy and consider the
secretest places of this realm. Then they said: We are twelve brethren,
thy servants, sons of one man in the land of Canaan, the youngest is at
home with our father, and that other is dead. That is, said he, that I
said; ye be spies. Now I have of you the experience. I swear to you by
the health of Pharaoh ye shall not depart till that your youngest
brother come. Send ye one of you for him to bring him hither. Ye shall
abide in fetters in prison till the truth be proved whether the things
that ye have said be true or false, else, by the health of Pharaoh, ye
be spies. And delivered them to be kept three days. The third day they
were brought out of prison, to whom he said: I dread God, if ye be
peaceable as ye say, do as ye have said, and ye shall live. Let one
brother be bounden in prison, and go ye your way, and lead home the
wheat that ye have bought into your houses, and bring to me with you
your youngest brother, that I may prove your words, that ye die not.
They did as he said, and spake together: We be worthy and well deserved
to suffer this, for we have sinned in our brother, seeing his anguish
when he prayed us and we heard him not, therefore this tribulation is
fallen upon us. Of whom Reuben said: Said not I to you, in no wise sin
not ye in the child, and ye would not hear me? Now his blood is wroken.
They knew not that Joseph understood them, forasmuch as he spake alway
to them by an interpreter. Then Joseph turned him a little and wept.
After he returned to them, and took Simeon in their presence and bound
him, and sent him to prison, and commanded to his ministers to fill
their sacks with wheat, and to put each man's money in their sacks, and
above that to give them meat to spend in their way; which did so. And
they took their wheat and laid it on their asses and departed on their
way. After, one of them, on the way, opened his sack for to give his
beast meat, and found his money in the mouth of his sack and said to his
brethren: My money is given to me again, lo! I have found it in my sack.
And they were all astonied: What is this that God hath done to us? Then
they came home to their father in the land of Canaan and told to him all
things that was fallen to them, saying: The lord of the country hath
spoken hard to us and had supposed that we been spies of that province,
to whom we answered that, we were peaceable people ne were no such
spies, and that we were twelve sons gotten of one father, one is dead
and the youngest is with our father in the land of Canaan. Which then
said to us: Now shall I prove whether ye be peaceable or no. Ye shall
leave here one brother with me, and lead home that is necessary for you,
and go your way and see that ye bring with you your youngest brother
that I may know that ye be none espies and that ye may receive this
brother that I hold in prison, and then forthon what that ye will buy ye
shall have license. And this said, each of them poured out the wheat,
and every man found his money bounden in the mouth of every sack. Then
said Jacob their father: Ye have made me without children. Joseph is
gone and lost, Simeon is bounden in prison, and Benjamin ye will take
away from me, on me come all these evils. To Reuben answered: Slay my
two sons if I bring him not again to thee; deliver him to me in my hand,
and I shall restore him again to thee. The father said: My son shall not
go with you, his brother is dead and he is left now alone, if any
adversity should hap to him in the way that ye go into, ye shall lead my
old hairs with sorrow to hell.

In the meanwhile famine and hunger oppressed all the land greatly. And
when the corn that they brought from Egypt was consumed, Jacob said to
his sons: Return ye into Egypt and buy for us some meat, that we may
live. Judah answered: That man said to us, under swearing of great
oaths, that: Ye shall not see my face ne come into my presence, but if
ye bring your youngest brother with you. Therefore if thou wilt send him
with us, we shall go together and shall buy for us that shall be
necessary, and if thou wilt not we shall not go. The man said as we oft
have said to thee, that if we bring him not we shall not see his visage.
Israel said to them: This have ye done into my misery, that ye told to
him that ye had another brother. And they answered: The man demanded of
us by order our progeny, if our father lived, if we had any brother. And
we answered him consequently after that he demanded, we wist not what he
would say, ne that he said bring your brother with you. Send the child
with us that we may go forth and live, and that we ne our children die
not for hunger. I shall receive thy son, and require him of my hand. If
I lead him not thither and bring him again, I shall be guilty to thee of
the sin ever after. If there had been no delay of this, we had been
there and come again by this time.

Then Israel their father said to them: If it be so necessary as ye say,
do ye as ye will; take with you of the best fruits of this land in your
vessels, and give ye and present to that man gifts, a little raisins,
and honey, storax, stacten, terebinthe, and dates, and bear with you
double money, and also the same money that ye found in your sacks, lest
there be any error therefore; and take with you Benjamin, your brother.
My God, that is almighty, make him pleasant unto you, and that ye may
return in safety with this your brother and him also that he holdeth in
prison; I shall be as a man barren therewhiles, without children. Then
the brethren took the gifts and double money and Benjamin, and went
forth into Egypt, and came and stood tofore Joseph; whom when he had
seen, and Benjamin, he commanded to the steward of his house that he
should do slay sheep and calves and make a feast, for these brethren
shall dine with me this day. He did as he was commanded and brought the
men unto his lord's house.

Then were they all afeard and said softly together: Because of the money
that we had in our sacks we be brought in that he take us with the
default, and shall by violence bring us and our asses into servitude.
Wherefore they said to the steward of the house, in the gate of the
house ere they entered, saying: We pray thee to hear us: the last time
that we came to buy victual, which when we had bought and departed, and
were on our way, for to give our beasts meat we opened our sacks, and we
found in the mouth of our sacks our money that we had paid, which we now
bring again of the same weight, and we have more other for to buy to us
that shall be necessary. It is not in our conscience to have it, we weet
never who put it in our sacks. He answered to him: Peace be among you,
fear ye nothing, the God of your father hath given to you the treasure
that ye found in your sacks, for the money that ye paid to me I have it
ready. And then he brought in Simeon to them, and brought them into the
house, and washed their feet, and gave meat to their asses. They made
ready and ordained their gifts and presents against the coming of
Joseph. They heard say that they should dine and eat there.

Then Joseph entered into the house, and they offered to him the gifts,
holding them in their hands, and worshipped him falling down to the
ground. And he debonairly saluted them and demanded them, saying: Is
your father in good health of whom ye told me, liveth he yet? They
answered: Thy servant our father is in good health and liveth yet, and
kneeled down and worshipped him. Then, said he, casting his eyes on his
brother Benjamin that was of one mother, and said: Is this your young
brother of whom ye told me? And also said, God be merciful to thee, my
son; he hied him from themward, for he was moved in all his spirits and
wept on his brother, and went into his bedchamber. After this he washed
his visage and came out making good countenance and commanded to set
bread on the board, and after that he set his brethren in order, each
after their age, and ate together, and Joseph sat and ate with the
Egyptians. For it was not lawful to the Egyptians to eat with the
Hebrews. And each of them were well served, but Benjamin had the best
part, and they ate and drank so much that they were drunken.

Then Joseph commanded the steward of his house to fill their sacks with
wheat as much as they might receive, and the money of the wheat put it
into every man's sack, and take my cup of silver, and the money of the
youngest, and put that in his sack. And all this was done. And on the
morn betimes they were suffered to depart with their asses. And when
they were gone out of the town and a little on their way, then Joseph
said to his steward: Make thee ready and ride after, and say to them:
Why have ye done evil for good? The cup that my lord is accustomed to
drink in, ye have stolen, ye might not do a worse thing. He did as
Joseph had commanded and overtook them, and said to them all by order
like as he had charge, which answered: Why saith your lord so, and doth
to us his servants such letting? The money that we found in our sacks we
brought again to thee from the land of Canaan, and how may it follow
that we should steal any gold or silver from the house of thy lord?
Look! at whom it be found of us all thy servants, let him die. Which
said to them: Be it after your sentence, at whom that it ever be found
he shall be my servant and the others shall go free and be not guilty.
Then he hied and set down all their sacks, beginning at the oldest unto
the youngest, and at last found the cup in the mouth of the sack of
Benjamin. Then they all for sorrow cut and rent their clothes, and laded
their asses again, and returned all into the town again. Then Judah
entered first with his brethren unto Joseph and all they together fell
down platte to the ground. To whom Joseph said: Why have ye done thus?
Know not ye that there is no man like to me in the science of knowledge?
To whom Judah answered: What shall we answer to thee, my lord; or what
shall we speak or rightfully desire? God hath found and remembered the
iniquity of us thy servants, for we be all thy servants, yea, we and he
at whom the cup was found. Joseph answered: God forbid that I should so
do, whosoever stole the cup shall be my servant, and go ye your way, for
ye shall be free and go to your father. Then Judah approached near him
and spake with a hardy cheer to him and said: I beseech thee my lord to
hear me thy servant that I may say to thine audience a word, and that
thou wilt not be wroth to thy servant. Thou art next to Pharaoh; my
lord, thou demandedst first of us thy servants: Have ye a father or
brother? And we answered to thee, my lord: Our father is an old man and
we have a brother a young child which was born to him in his old age,
whose brother of the same mother is dead, and he is an only son whom the
father loveth tenderly. Thou saidst to us thy servants: Bring him hither
to me that I may see. We told to thee my lord for truth: our father may
not forego the child, if he forego him certainly he shall die. And thou
saidst to us, thy servants: But if ye bring him not with you, ye shall
no more see my visage. Then when we came to our father and told him all
these things, and our father bade us to return and buy more corn. To
whom we said: We may not go thither but if our youngest brother go with
us, for if he be absent we dare not approach, ne come to the presence of
the man; and he answered to us: Ye know well that my wife brought to me
forth but two sons, that one went out, and ye said that wild beasts had
devoured him, and yet I heard never of him ne he appeared not. If now
ye should take this my son and anything happened to him in the way ye
should bring my hoar hair with sorrow to hell. Therefore if I should
come home to my father and bring not the child with me, sith the soul
and health of my father dependeth of this child, and see that he is not
come with us, he shall die and we thy servants should lead his old age
with wailing and sorrow to hell. I myself shall be thy proper servant
which have received him upon my faith and have promised for him, saying
to my father: If I bring him not again I shall be guilty of the sin to
my father ever after. I shall abide and continue thy servant for the
child in the ministry and service of thee my lord. I may not depart, the
child being absent, lest I be witness of the sorrow that my father shall
take. Wherefore I beseech thee to suffer this child to go to his father
and receive me into thy service. Thus said Judah, with much more; as
Josephus, Antiquitatum, rehearseth more piteously, and saith moreover
that the cause why he did do hide the cup in Benjamin's sack, was to
know whether they loved Benjamin or hated him as they did him, what time
they sold him to the Ishmaelites.

Then this request made, Joseph might no longer forbear, but commanded
them that stood by to withdraw them, and when all men were gone out sauf
he and his brethren, he began to say to them weeping: I am Joseph your
brother, liveth yet my father? The brethren were so afeard that they
could not speak ne answer to him. Then he debonairly said to them: Come
hither to me; and when they came near him he said: I am Joseph your
brother that ye sold into Egypt; be ye not afeard nor think not hard
unto you that ye sold me into these regions. God hath sent me tofore you
into Egypt for your health. It is two years since the famine began, and
yet been five years to come in which men may not ear, sow, ne reap. God
hath sent me tofore you that ye should be reserved on the earth, and
that ye may have meat to live by. It is not by your counsel that I was
sent hither, but by the will of God, which hath ordained me father of
Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and prince in all the land of Egypt.
Hie you, and go to my father, and say ye to him: This word sendeth thee
thy son Joseph: God hath made me lord of the universal land of Egypt,
come to me lest thou die, and thou shalt dwell in the land of Goshen.
Thou shalt be next me, thou and thy sons and the sons of thy sons, and I
shall feed thy sheep, thy beasts and all that thou hast in possession.
Yet rest five year to come of famine, therefore come lest thou perish,
thy house, and all that thou owest. Lo! your eyes and the eyes of my
brother Benjamin see that my mouth speaketh these words to you. Show ye
to my father all my glory and all that ye have seen in Egypt. Hie ye and
bring him to me. This said, he embraced his brother Benjamin about his
neck and wept upon each of them. After this they durst better speak to
him. Anon it was told and known all about in the King's hall that
Joseph's brethren were come. And Pharaoh was joyful and glad thereof and
all his household. And Pharaoh said to Joseph that he should say to his
brethren: Lade ye your beasts and go into the land of Canaan, and bring
from thence your father and kindred, and come to me, and I shall give
you all the goods of Egypt, that ye may eat the marrow of the earth.
Command ye also that they take carriages of this land of Egypt, for the
carriage of their children and wives, and say to them: Take your father
and come as soon as ye may, and leave nothing behind you, for all the
best things shall be yours. The sons of Israel did as they were
commanded. To whom Joseph gave carriages after the commandment of
Pharaoh, and meat to eat by the way. He commanded to give to every each
two garments. To Benjamin he gave three hundred pieces of silver, with
five garments of the best, and also he sent clothing to his father,
adding to them ten asses which were laden with all riches of Egypt, and
as many asses laden and bearing bread and victual to spend by the way.
And thus he let his brethren depart from him saying: Be ye not wroth in
the way. Then they thus departing came into the land of Canaan to their
father, and showed all this to their father, and said: Joseph thy son
liveth and he lordeth in all the land of Egypt.

When Jacob heard this he awoke as a man had been awaked suddenly out of
his sleep, yet nevertheless he believed them not, and they told to him
all the order of the matter. When he saw the carriage and all that he
had sent, his spirit revived and said: It sufficeth to me if Joseph my
son yet live, I shall go and see him ere I die. Then Israel went forth
with all that he had and came to the pit where tofore he had sworn to
God; and slew there beasts to make sacrifices to the God of Isaac his
father. He heard God by a vision that same night saying to him: Jacob,
Jacob, to whom he answered: I am here all ready. God said to him: I am
strongest God of thy father Isaac, dread thee not, but descend down into
Egypt. I shall make thee to grow there into great people. I shall
descend with thee thither, and I shall bring thee again when thou
returnest. Joseph soothly shall put his hands upon thine eyes. Jacob
then arose on the morn early, and his sons took him with their children
and wives and set them on the carriages that Pharaoh had sent to bring
him and all that he had into the land of Canaan. And so came into Egypt
with all his progeny, sons and children, etc.

These be the names of the sons of Israel that entered with him into
Egypt. The first begotten Reuben with his children four. Simeon with his
seven sons. Levi with his three sons. Judah and his sons three. Issachar
and his four sons. Zebulon and his sons three. These were sons of Leah
that Jacob gat in Mesopotamia, and Dinah his daughter. All these sons
and daughters were thirty-three. Gad also entered with his children
seven. Asher with his children five and of his children's children two.
These were sons of Zilpah, in number sixteen. The sons of Rachel were
Joseph and Benjamin. Joseph had two sons in the land of Egypt by his
wife Asenath, Manasseh and Ephraim. The sons of Benjamin were ten. All
these children that came of Rachel were in number fourteen. Dan entered
with one son, and Naphtali with four sons. These were the children of
Bilhah; they were in number seven. All the souls that were issued of his
seed that entered into Egypt with him, without the wives of his sons,
were sixty-six. The sons of Joseph that were born in Egypt twain. Summa
of all the souls of the house of Jacob that entered into Egypt were in
all seventy.

Jacob sent them tofore him Judah unto Joseph, to show to him his coming.
And he came to Joseph in Goshen, and anon Joseph ascended his chariot
and went for to meet his father, and when he saw him, he embraced him
meekly and wept. And his father received him joyously and embraced also
him. Then said the father to Joseph: Now shall I die joyously because I
have seen thy visage. Then said Joseph to his brethren and to all the
house of his father: I shall go and ascend to Pharaoh and shall say to
him, that my brethren and the house of my father that were in the land
of Canaan be come to me, and be men keeping sheep, and can the manner
well for to keep the flocks of sheep, and that they have brought with
them their beasts, and all that ever they had. When he shall call you
and ask you of what occupation ye be, ye shall say: We be shepherds, thy
servants, from our childhood unto now, and our fathers also. This shall
ye say that ye may dwell in the land of Goshen, for the Egyptians have
spite unto herdmen of sheep. Then Joseph entered tofore Pharaoh and said
to him: My father, my brethren, their sheep and beasts be come from the
land of Canaan, and be in the land of Goshen. And he brought five of his
brethren tofore the king, whom he demanded of what occupation they were
of. They answered: We be keepers of sheep, thy servants, we and our
fathers, we be come to dwell in thy land, for there is no grass for the
flocks of sheep of us thy servants, the famine is so great in the land
of Canaan. We beseech thee that thou command us thy servants to dwell in
the land of Goshen. Then said the king to Joseph: Thy father and thy
brethren be come to thee, the land of Egypt is at thy commandment, make
thou them to dwell in the best place, and deliver to them the land of
Goshen. And if thou know them for conning, ordain they to be masters of
my beasts. After this Joseph brought his father in, and made him stand
tofore the king which blessed him, and was demanded of the king how old
he was. He answered: The days of the pilgrimage of my life be an hundred
and thirty years, small and evil, and yet I am not come unto the days of
my fathers that they have lived. And he blessed the king and went out.
Then Joseph gave to his father and brethren possession in Egypt in the
best soil of Rameses like as Pharaoh had commanded, and there fed them,
giving to each of them victual.

In all the world was scarcity of bread, and hunger and famine oppressed
specially and most, the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan. Of which
lands Joseph gat all the money for selling of wheat, and brought it into
the king's treasury. When all people lacked money, all Egypt came to
Joseph saying: Give us bread, why die we to the lacking money. To whom
he answered: Bring to me your beasts and I shall give you for them
victuals, if ye have no money: which when they brought, he gave to them
victuals and food for horses, sheep, oxen and asses, and sustained them
one year for changing of their beasts. Then came they again the second
year and said: We hide not from thee our lord that our money is failed
and also our beasts be gone, and there is nothing left but our bodies
and our land. Why then shall we die in thy sight? And we ourselves and
also our land shall be thine, buy us into bondship and servitude of the
king, and give us seed to sow lest the earth turn into wilderness. Then
Joseph bought all the land of Egypt, every man selling his possessions
for the vehement hunger that they had. He subdued all unto Pharaoh, and
all his people from the last terms of Egypt unto the utterest ends of
the same, except the land longing to the priests, which was given to
them by the king, to whom were given victuals openly out of all the
barns and garners, and therefore they were not compelled to sell their
possessions. Then said Joseph to all the peoples: Lo, now ye see and
know that Pharaoh oweth and is in possession of you and of your land.
Take to you seed and sow ye the fields that ye may have fruit. The fifth
part thereof ye shall give to the king and four parts I promise to you
to sow, and for meat to your servants and to your children. Which
answered: Our health is in thine hand, let our lord only behold us and
we shall gladly serve the king. From that time unto this present day, in
all the land of Egypt the fifth part is paid to the king; and it is
holden for a law, except the land longing to the priests which is free
from this condition.

Then Israel dwelled in Egypt in the land of Goshen, and was in
possession thereof. He increased and multiplied greatly, and lived
therein seventeen years. And all the years of his life were an hundred
and seven and forty years. When he understood that the day of his death
approached, he called to him his son Joseph and said to him: If I may
find so much grace in thy sight, do to me so much mercy as thou promise
and swear that thou bury me not in Egypt, but that I may rest with my
fathers, and take and carry me from this land, and lay me in the
sepulchre of my forefathers. To whom Joseph answered: I shall do that
thou hast commanded. Then said he: Swear to me, and so he swore. And
then Israel adored and worshipped our Lord, and turned him toward his
bed's head. Then this done, anon after it was told to Joseph that his
father was sick and feeble; who anon took his sons Manasseh and Ephraim
and came to his father. Anon it was told to the father: Lo thy son
Joseph cometh to thee, which then was comforted, and sat up in his bed.
And Joseph entered in, and Jacob said: Almighty God appeared to me in
Luz which is in the land of Canaan, and he blessed me and said: I shall
increase thee and multiply thee into tourbes of peoples, I shall give to
thee this land and to thy seed after thee in sempiternal possession,
therefore thy two sons that be born to thee in this land of Egypt tofore
I came hither to thee, shall be my sons Ephraim and Manasseh, they shall
be reputed to me as Simeon and Reuben. The other that thou shalt get
after them shall be thine, and shall be called in the name of their
brethren in their possessions. Then he, seeing Joseph's sons, said to
him: Who be these children? Joseph answered: They be my sons which God
hath given to me in this place. Bring them hither, said he, to me that I
may bless them. Israel's eyes were dimmed and might not see clearly for
great age. He took them to him and kissed them and said to Joseph: I am
not defrauded from the sight of thee, and furthermore God hath showed to
me thy seed. Then when Joseph took them from his father's lap, he
worshipped him kneeling low to the earth, and set Ephraim on his right
side, and on the left side of Israel, and Manasseh on the right side of
his father Israel, which took his right hand and laid it on the head of
Ephraim the younger brother, and his left hand on the head of Manasseh
which was first born. Then Jacob blessed the sons of Joseph and said:
God, in whose sight walked my fathers Abraham and Isaac, God that hath
fed me from my youth unto this present day, the angel that hath kept me
from all evil bless these children, and my name be called on them, and
the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and grow they into multitude
upon earth. Then Joseph seeing that his father set his right hand upon
the head of Ephraim the younger brother took it heavily, and took his
father's hand and would have laid it on the head of Manasseh, and said
to his father; Nay father, it is not convenient, that ye do, this is the
first begotten son, set thy right hand on his head. Which renied that
and would not do so, but said: I wot, my son, I wot what I do, and this
son shall increase into peoples and multiply, but his younger brother
shall be greater than he, and his seed shall grow into gentiles, and
blessed them, saying that same time: In thee shall be blessed Israel,
and shall be said: God make thee like to Ephraim and Manasseh. And he
said to Joseph his son: Lo! now I die and God shall be with you, and
shall reduce and bring you again into the land of your fathers; and I
give to thee one part above thy brethren, which I gat and won from the
hand of the Amorite with my sword and my bow. Then Jacob called his sons
tofore him and said to them:

Gather ye altogether tofore me, that I may show to you things that be to
come, and hear your father Israel. And there he told to each of them his
condition singularly. And when he had blessed his twelve sons he
commanded them to bury him with his fathers in a double spelunke which
is in the field of Ephron the Hittite against Mamre in the land of
Canaan which Abraham bought. And this said he gathered to him his feet
and died. Which anon as Joseph saw, he fell on his visage and kissed
him. He commanded to his masters of physic and medicines, which were his
servants, that they should embalm the body of his father with sweet
spices aromatic; which was all done, and then went they sorrowing him
forty days. The Egyptians wailed him seventy days, and when the wailing
was past, Joseph did say to Pharaoh how he had sworn and promised to
bury him in the land of Canaan. To whom Pharaoh said: Go and bury thy
father like as thou hast sworn. Which then took his father's body and
went, and with him were accompanied all the aged men of Pharaoh's house,
and the noblest men of birth of all the land of Egypt, the house of
Joseph with his brethren, without the young children, flocks and beasts,
which they left in the land of Goshen. He had in his fellowship
chariots, carts and horsemen, and was a great tourbe and company, and
came over Jordan where as they hallowed the exequies by great wailing
seven days long. And when they of the country saw this plaint and
sorrowing they said: This is a great sorrow to the Egyptians. And that
same place is named yet the bewailing of Egypt. The children of Israel
did as they were commanded, and bare him into the land of Canaan, and
buried him in the double spelunke which Abraham had bought. Then when
Jacob the father was buried, Joseph with all his fellowship returned
into Egypt. Then his brethren after the death of their father spake
together privily, and dreading that Joseph would avenge the wrong and
evil that they had done to him, came to him and said: Thy father
commanded us ere he died that we should say thus to thee: We pray thee
that thou wilt forget, and not remember the sin and trespass of thy
brethren, ne the malice that they executed in thee. We beseech thee
that thou wilt forgive to thy father, servant of God, this wickedness.
Which when Joseph heard he wept bitterly, and his brethren came to him
kneeling low to the ground and worshipped him, and said, We be thy
servants. To whom he answered: Be ye nothing afeard ne dread you not,
ween ye that ye may resist God's will? Ye thought to have done to me
evil, but God hath turned it into good, and hath exalted me as ye see
and know, that he should save much people. Be ye nothing afeard, I shall
feed you and your children. And comforted them with fair words, and
spake friendly and joyously to them. And he abode and dwelled still in
Egypt with all the house of his father, and lived an hundred and ten
years, and saw the sons of Ephraim in to the third generation. After
these things he said to his brethren: After my death, God shall visit
you and shall do you depart from this land unto the land that he
promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. When that time shall come, take
my bones and lead them with you from this place, and then died. Whose
body was embalmed with sweet spices and aromatics and laid in a chest in
Egypt.




HERE NEXT FOLLOWETH THE HISTORY OF MOSES

_Which is read in-the Church on Mid-lent Sunday_


These be the names of the children of Israel that entered into Egypt
with Jacob, and each entered with their household and meiny. Reuben,
Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulon, Benjamin, Dan, Naphtali, Gad,
and Asher; they were all in number that entered seventy. Joseph was
tofore in Egypt. And when he was dead and all his brethren and kindred,
the children of Israel grew and multiplied greatly, and filled the
earth. Then was there a new king upon Egypt which knew nothing of
Joseph, and said to his people: Lo! and see the people of Israel is
great, and stronger than we be, come and let us wisely oppress them,
lest they multiply and give us battle and fight with us and drive us out
of our land. Then he ordained provosts and masters over them to set them
awork and put them to affliction of burdens. They builded to Pharaoh two
towns, Pithom and Raamses. How much more they oppressed them, so much
the more they increased and multiplied. The Egyptians hated the children
of Israel and put them to affliction, scorning and having envy at them,
and oppressed bitterly their life with hard work and sore labors of
tile and clay, and grieved all them in such works. Then Pharaoh
commanded to his people saying: Whatsomever is born of males cast ye
into the river, and what of women keep ye them and let ye them live.

After this was a man of the house of Levi went out and took a wife of
his kindred, which conceived and brought forth a son, and he saw him
elegant and fair, and hid him three months, and when he might no longer
hide him, took a little crib of rushes and wickers and pitched it with
glue and pitch, and put therein the child, and set it on the river, and
let it drive down in the stream, and the sister of the child standing
afar, considering what should fall thereof. And it happed that same
time, the daughter of king Pharaoh descended down to the river for to
wash her in the water, and her maidens went by the brink, which then,
when she saw the little crib or fiscelle she sent one of her maidens to
fetch and take it up, which so fetched and brought to her, and she saw
therein lying a fair child; and she having pity on it said: This is one
of the children of the Hebrews. To whom anon spake the sister of the
child: Wilt thou, said she, that I go and call thee a woman of the
Hebrews that shall and may nourish this child? She answered: Go thy way.
The maid went and called his mother, to whom Pharaoh's daughter said:
Take this child and nourish him to me, and I shall give to thee thy meed
and reward. The mother took her child and nourished it, and when it was
weaned and could go she delivered it to the daughter of king Pharaoh,
whom she received and adopted instead of a son and named him Moses,
saying that I took him out of the water. And he there grew and waxed a
pretty child. And as Josephus, Antiquitatum, saith: This daughter of
Pharaoh, which was named Termuthe, loved well Moses and reputed him as
her son by adoption, and on a day brought him to her father, who for his
beauty took him in his arms and made much of him, and set his diadem on
his head, wherein was his idol. And Moses anon took it, and cast it
under his feet and trod on it, wherefore the king was wroth, and
demanded of the great doctors and magicians what should fall of this
child. And they kalked on his nativity and said: This is he that shall
destroy thy reign and put it under foot, and shall rule and govern the
Hebrews. Wherefore the king anon decreed that he should be put to death.
But others said that Moses did it of childhood and ought not to die
therefore, and counselled to make thereof a proof, and so they did.

They set tofore him a platter full of coals burning, and a platter full
of cherries, and bade him eat, and he took and put the hot coals in his
mouth and burned his tongue, which letted his speech ever after; and
thus he escaped the death. Josephus saith that when Pharaoh would have
slain him, Termuthe, his daughter, plucked him away and saved him. Then
on a time as Moses was full grown, he went to his brethren, and saw the
affliction of them, and a man of Egypt smiting one of the Hebrews, his
brethren. And he looked hither and thither and saw no man. He smote the
Egyptian and slew him and hid him in the sand. And another day he went
out and found two of the Hebrews brawling and fighting together; then he
said to him that did wrong: Why smitest thou thy neighbor? which
answered: Who hath ordained thee prince and judge upon us? wilt thou
slay me as thou slewest that other day an Egyptian? Moses was afeard and
said to himself: How is this deed known and made open? Pharaoh heard
hereof and sought Moses for to slay him, which then fled from his sight
and dwelled in the land of Midian, and sat there by a pit side. The
priest of Midian had seven daughters which came thither for to draw
water, and to fill the vessels for to give drink to the flocks of the
sheep of their father. Then came on them the herdmen and put them from
it. Then rose Moses and defended the maidens and let them water their
sheep, which then returned to their father Jethro. And he said to them:
Why come ye now earlier than ye were wont to do? They said that a man of
Egypt hath delivered us from the hand of the herdmen, and also he drew
water for us and gave to the sheep drink. Where is he, said he, why left
ye the man after you? go call him that he may eat some bread with us.
Then Moses sware that he would dwell with him. And he took Zipporah one
of his daughters aad wedded her to his wife, which conceived and bare
him a son whom he called Gershom, saying: I was a stranger in a strange
land. She brought to him forth another son whom he named Eleazar,
saying: The God of my father is my helper and hath kept me from the
hand of Pharaoh.

Long time after this died the king of Egypt, and the children of Israel,
wailing, made great sorrow for the oppression of their labor, and cried
unto God for help. Their cry came unto God of their works, and God heard
their wailing, and remembered the promise he made with Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob, and our Lord beheld the children of Israel and knew them.

Moses fed the sheep of Jethro his wife's father. When he had brought the
sheep into the innermost part of the desert he came unto the mount of
God, Oreb. Our Lord appeared to him in flame of fire in the midst of a
bush, and he saw the fire in the bush, and the bush burned not. Then
said Moses, I shall go and see this great vision why the bush burneth
not. Our Lord then beholding that he went for to see it, called him,
being in the bush, and said: Moses, Moses, which answered: I am here.
Then said our Lord: Approach no nearer hitherward. Take off thy shoon
from thy feet, the place that thou standest on is holy ground. And said
also: I am God of thy fathers, God of Abraham, and God of Isaac, and God
of Jacob. Moses then hid his face, and durst not look toward God. To
whom God said: I have seen the affliction of my people in Egypt, and I
have heard their cry of the hardness that they suffer in their works,
and I knowing the sorrow of them am descended to deliver them from the
hand of the Egyptians, and shall lead them from this land into a good
land and spacious, into a land that floweth milk and honey, unto the
places of Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and
Jebusites. The cry of the children of Israel is come to me, I have seen
their affliction, how they be oppressed of the Egyptians. But come to me
and I shall send thee unto Pharaoh that thou shalt lead the children of
Israel out of Egypt. Then Moses said to him: Who am I that shall go to
Pharaoh and lead the children out of Egypt? To whom God said: I shall be
with thee, and this shall be the sign that I send thee. When thou shalt
have led out my people of Egypt, thou shalt offer to God upon this hill.
Moses said unto God: Lo! if I go to the children of Israel and say to
them: God of your fathers hath sent me to you; if they say: What is his
name? what shall I say? Our Lord said to Moses: I am that I am. He said:
Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: He that is, sent me to
you, and yet shalt thou say to them: The Lord God of your fathers, God
of Abraham, God of Isaac, and God of Jacob, hath appeared to me saying:
This is my name for evermore, and this is my memorial from generation to
generation. Go and gather together the seniors and aged men of Israel,
and say to them: The Lord God of your fathers hath appeared to me, God
of Abraham, God of Isaac, and God of Jacob, saying: Visiting I have
visited you, and have seen all that is fallen in Egypt, and I shall lead
you out of the affliction of Egypt into the land of Canaan, Ethei, etc.,
unto the land flowing milk and honey, and they shall hear thy voice.
Thou shalt go and take with thee the seniors of Israel to the king of
Egypt, and shalt say to him: The Lord God of the Hebrews hath called us;
we shall go the journey of three days in wilderness that we may offer to
our Lord God. But I know well that the king of Egypt shall not suffer
you to go but by strong hand. I shall stretch out my hand and shall
smite Egypt in all my marvels that I shall do amid among them. After
that he shall let you go. I shall then give my grace to this people
tofore the Egyptians, and when ye shall go out ye shall not depart void,
nor with nought, but every woman shall borrow of her neighbor, and of
her hostess, vessels of silver and of gold, and clothes, and them shall
ye lay on your sons, and on your daughters, and ye shall rob Egypt. Then
Moses answered and said: They shall not believe me ne hear my voice, but
shall say: God hath not appeared to thee.

God said then to him: What is that thou holdest in thine hand? He
answered: A rod. Our Lord said: Cast it on the ground. He threw it down
and it turned into a serpent, whereof Moses was afeard and would have
fled. Our Lord said to him: Put forth thy hand and hold him by the tail;
he stretched forth his hand and held him, and it turned again into a
rod. To this, that they believe thee, that I have appeared to thee. And
yet our Lord said to him: Put thy hand into thy bosom, which, when he
hath put in, and drawn out again, it was like a leper's hand. Our Lord
bade him to withdraw it into his bosom again, and he drew it out and it
was then like that other flesh. If they hear not thee, and believe by
the first sign and token, they shall believe thee by the second. If they
believe none of the two ne hear thy voice, then take water of the river
and pour on the dry ground, and whatsoever thou takest and drawest shall
turn into blood. Then Moses said: I pray the Lord send some other, for I
am not eloquent, but have a letting in my speech. Our Lord said to him:
Who made the mouth of a man, or who hath made a man dumb or deaf, seeing
or blind, not I? Go, therefore, I shall be in thy mouth and shall teach
thee what thou shalt say. Then said Moses: I beseech thee Lord, said he,
send some other whom thou wilt. Our Lord was wroth on Moses and said:
Aaron thy brother deacon, I know that he is eloquent, lo! he shall come
and meet with thee, and seeing thee he shall be glad in his heart. Speak
thou to him and put my words in his mouth, and I shall be in thy mouth
and in his mouth, and I shall show to you what ye ought to do, and he
shall speak for the people, and shall be thy mouth, and thou shalt be in
such things as pertain to God. Take with thee this rod in thine hand, by
which thou shalt do signs and marvels. Then Moses went to Jethro his
wife's father, and said to him, I shall go and return to my brethren
into Egypt, and see if they yet live. To whom Jethro said: Go in God's
name and place. Then said our Lord to Moses: Go and return into Egypt,
all they be now dead that sought for to slay thee. Then Moses took his
wife and his sons and set them upon an ass and returned in to Egypt,
bearing the rod of God in his hand. Then our Lord said to Aaron: Go
against Moses and meet with him in desert; which went for to meet with
him unto the mount of God, and there kissed him.

And Moses told unto Aaron all that our Lord had said to him for which he
sent him, and all the tokens and signs that he bade him do. They came
both together and gathered and assembled all the seniors and aged men of
the children of Israel. And Aaron told to them all that God had said to
Moses, and made the signs and tokens tofore the people and the people
believed it. They heard well that our Lord had visited the children of
Israel, and that he had beholden the affliction of them, wherefore they
fell down low to the ground and worshipped our Lord.

After this Moses and Aaron went unto Pharaoh and said: This saith the
Lord God of Israel: Suffer my people to depart that they may sacrifice
to me in desert. Then said Pharaoh: Who is that Lord that I may hear his
voice and leave Israel? I know not that Lord, nor I will not leave
Israel. They said to him: God of the Hebrews hath called us that we go
the journey of three days in the wilderness and sacrifice unto our Lord
God, lest peradventure pestilence or war fall to us. The king of Egypt
said to them: Why solicit ye, Moses and Aaron, the people from their
works and labor? Go ye unto your work. Pharaoh also said: The people is
much, see how they grow and multiply, and yet much more shall do if they
rested from their labor. Therefore he commanded the same day to the
prefects and masters of their works saying: In no wise give no more
chaff to the people for to make loam and clay, but let them go and
gather stubble, and make them do as much labor as they did tofore, and
lessen it nothing. They do now but cry: Let us go and make sacrifice to
our God, let them be oppressed by labor and exercised that they attend
not to leasings. Then the prefects and masters of their work said to
them that Pharaoh had commanded to give them no chaff, but they should
go and gather such as they might find, and that their work should not
therefore be minished. Then the children were disperpled for to gather
chaff, and their masters awaited on them and bade them: Make an end of
your work as ye were wont to do when that chaff was delivered to you.
And thus they were put to more affliction, and would make them to make
as many tiles as they did tofore. Then the upperest of the children of
Israel came to Pharaoh and complained saying: Why puttest thou thy
servants to such affliction? He said to them: Ye be so idle that ye say
ye will go and sacrifice to your God; ye shall have no chaff given to
you, yet ye shall work your customable work and gather your chaff also.

Then the eldest and the upperest among the Hebrews went to Moses and
Aaron and said: What have ye done? ye have so done that ye have made our
odor to stink in the sight of Pharaoh, and have encouraged him to slay
us. Then Moses counselled with our Lord how he should do, and said:
Lord, why hast thou sent me hither? For, sith I have spoken to Pharaoh
in thy name, he hath put thy people to more affliction than they had
tofore, and thou hast not delivered them. Our Lord said to Moses: Now
thou shalt see what I shall do to Pharaoh. By strong hand he shall let
you go, and in a boistous he shall cast you from his land.

Yet said our Lord to Moses: I am the Lord God that appeared to Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob in my might, and my name is Adonai, I showed to them
not that. I promised and made covenant with them that I should give to
them the land of Canaan in which they dwelled. I now have heard the
wailing and the tribulations that the Egyptians oppress them with, for
which I shall deliver and bring them from the servitude of the
Egyptians. Moses told all these things to the children of Israel, and
they believed him not for the anguish of their spirits that they were
in, and hard labor. Then said our Lord to Moses: Go and enter in to
Pharaoh and bid him deliver my people of Israel out of his land. Moses
answered: How should Pharaoh hear me when the children of Israel believe
me not? Then our Lord said to Moses and Aaron that they both should go
to Pharaoh and give him in commandment to let the children of Israel to
depart. And he said to Moses: Lo! I have ordained thee to be God of
Pharaoh, and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet. Thou shalt say to
him all that I say to thee, and he shall say to Pharaoh that he suffer
the children of Israel to depart from his land. But I shall enhard his
heart, and shall multiply my signs and tokens in the land of Egypt, and
he shall not hear ne believe you. And I shall lead the children of
Israel my people. And shall show mine hand, and such wonders on Egypt,
that Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord. Moses and Aaron did as our
Lord commanded them. Moses was eighty years old when he came and stood
tofore Pharaoh, and Aaron eighty-three years when they spake to Pharaoh.
Then when they were tofore Pharaoh, Aaron cast the rod down, tofore
Pharaoh, and anon the rod turned into a serpent. Then Pharaoh called his
magicians and jugglers and bade them do the same. And they made their
witchcraft and invocations and cast down their rods, which turned in
likewise into serpents, but the rod of Aaron devoured their rods. Yet
was the heart of Pharaoh hard and so indurate that he would not do as
God bade. Then said our Lord to Moses: The heart of Pharaoh is grieved
and will not deliver my people. Go to him to-morn in the morning and he
shall come out, and thou shalt stand when he cometh on the bank of the
river, and take in thine hand the rod that was turned into the serpent,
and say to him: The Lord God of the Hebrews sendeth me to thee saying:
Deliver my people that they may offer and make sacrifice to me in
desert, yet thou hast no will to hear me. Therefore our Lord said: In
this shalt thou know that I am the Lord: Lo! I shall smite with the rod
that is in my hand the water of the flood, and it shall turn into blood;
the fishes that be in the water shall die, and the Egyptians shall be
put to affliction drinking of it. Then said our Lord to Moses: Say thou
to Aaron: Take this rod and stretch thine hand upon all the waters of
Egypt, upon the floods, rivers, ponds, and upon all the lakes where any
water is, in that they turn to blood, that it may be a vengeance in all
the land of Egypt, as well in treen vessels as in vessels of earth and
stone.

Moses and Aaron did as God had commanded them, and smote the flood with
the rod tofore Pharaoh and his servants, which turned into blood, and
the fishes that were in the river died, and the water was corrupt. And
the Egyptians might not drink the water, and all the water of Egypt was
turned into blood. And in likewise did the enchanters with their
witchcraft, and the heart of Pharaoh was so indurate that he would not
let the people depart as our Lord had commanded, but he returned home
for this time. The Egyptians went and dolven pits for water all about by
the river, and they found no water to drink but all was blood. And this
plague endured seven days, and whatsomever water the children of Israel
took in this while was fair and good water. This was the first plague
and vengeance. The second was that God sent frogs so many, that all the
land was full, the rivers, the houses, chambers, beds, that they were
woebegone, and these frogs entered into their meat, so many that they
covered all the land of Egypt. Then Pharaoh prayed Moses and Aaron that
God would take away these frogs, and that he would go suffer the people
to do sacrifice; and then Moses asked when he would deliver them if the
frogs were voided, and Pharaoh said: In the morn. And then Moses prayed,
and they voided all. And when Pharaoh saw that he was quit of them, he
kept not his promise and would not let them depart. The third vengeance
that God sent to them was a great multitude of hungry horse-flies, as
many as the dust of the earth, which were on men, and bit them and
beasts. And then enchanters said then to Pharaoh: This is the finger of
God. Yet would not Pharaoh let them depart. The fourth vengeance was
that God sent all manner kind of flies and lice in such wise that the
universal land of Egypt was full of all manner flies and lice, but in
the land of Goshen were none. Yet was he so indurate that he would not
let them go, but would that they should make their sacrifice to God in
that land. But Moses would not so, but would go three days' journey in
desert, and sacrifice to God there. Pharaoh said: I will that ye go into
desert, but not far, and come soon again, and pray ye for me. And Moses
prayed for him to our Lord, and the flies voided that there was not one
left. And when they were gone Pharaoh would not keep his promise. Then
the fifth plague was that God showed his hand upon the fields and upon
the horses, asses, camels, sheep and oxen, and was a great pestilence on
all the beasts. And God showed a wonder miracle between the possessions
of the Egyptians and the possessions of his people of Israel, for of the
beasts of the children of Israel there was not one that perished. Yet
was Pharaoh so hard-hearted that he would not suffer the people to
depart. The sixth plague was that Moses took ashes out of the chimney
and cast on the land. And anon all the people of Egypt, as well men as
beasts, were full of blotches, boils, and blains and wounds, and
swellings in such wise that the enchanters could ne might not stand for
pain tofore Pharaoh. Yet would not Pharaoh hear them, nor do as God had
commanded. The seventh plague was a hail so great that there was never
none like tofore, and thunder and fire that it destroyed all the grass
and herbs of Egypt and smote down all that was in the field, men and
beasts. But in the land of Goshen was none heard ne harm done. Yet would
not Pharaoh deliver them. The eighth our Lord sent to them locusts,
which is a manner great fly, called in some place an adder-bolte, which
bit them and ate up all the corn and herbs that was left, in such wise
that the people came to Pharaoh and desired him to deliver, saying that
the land perished. Then Pharaoh gave to the men license to go and make
their sacrifice, and leave their wives and children there still, till
they came again, but Moses and Aaron said they must go all, wherefore he
would not let them depart. The ninth plague and vengeance was that God
sent so great darkness upon all the land of Egypt that the darkness was
so great and horrible that they were palpable, and it endured three days
and three nights. Wheresoever the children of Israel went it was light.

Then Pharaoh called Moses and Aaron and said to them: Go ye and make
your sacrifice unto your Lord God, and let your sheep and beasts only
abide. To whom Moses said: We shall take with us such hosties and
sacrifices as we shall offer to our Lord God. All our flocks and beasts
shall go with us, there shall not remain as much as a nail that shall be
necessary in the honor of our Lord God, for we know not what we shall
offer till we come to the place. Pharaoh was so indurate and
hard-hearted that he would not let them go, and bade Moses that he
should no more come in his sight. For when thou comest thou shalt die.
Moses answered: Be it as thou hast said: I shall no more come to thy
presence. And then our Lord said to Moses: There resteth now but one
plague and vengeance, and after that he shall let you go. But first say
to all the people that every man borrow of his friend, and woman of her
neighbor, vessels of gold and silver, and clothes; our Lord shall give
to his people grace and favor to borrow of the Egyptians; and then gave
to them a commandment how they should depart. And our Lord said to
Moses: At midnight I shall enter into Egypt and the first-begotten child
and heir of all Egypt shall die, from the first-begotten son of Pharaoh
that sitteth in his throne unto the first-begotten son of the handmaid
that sitteth at the mill, and all the first-begotten of the beasts.
There shall be a great cry and clamor in all the land of Egypt in such
wise that there was never none like, ne never shall be after, and among
all the children there shall not an hound be hurt, ne woman, ne beast,
whereby ye shall know by what miracle God divideth the Egyptian and
Israel. Moses and Aaron showed all these signs and plagues tofore
Pharaoh, and his heart was so indurate that he would not let them
depart. Then when Moses had said to the children how they should do,
they departed, and ate their paschal lamb, and all other ceremonies as
be expressed in the Bible, for a law to endure ever among them, which
the children of Israel obeyed and accomplished, it was so that at
midnight our Lord smote and slew every first-begotten son throughout all
the land of Egypt, beginning at the first son and heir of Pharaoh unto
the son of the caitiff that lay in prison, and also the first-begotten
of the beasts. Pharaoh arose in the night and all his servants and all
Egypt, and there was a great clamor and sorrowful noise and cry, for
there was not a house in all Egypt but there lay therein one that was
dead. Then Pharaoh did do call Moses and Aaron in the night, and said:
Arise ye and go your way from my people, ye and the children of Israel,
as ye say ye will, take your sheep and beasts with you like as ye
desired, and at your departing bless ye me. The Egyptians constrained
the children to depart and go their way hastily, saying: We all shall
die. The children of Israel took their meal, and put it on their
shoulders as they were commanded, and borrowed vessels of silver and of
gold, and much clothing. Our Lord gave to them such favor tofore the
Egyptians that the Egyptians lent to them all that they desired, and
they spoiled and robbed Egypt.

And so the children of Israel departed, nigh the number of six hundred
thousand footmen, besides women and children which were innumerable, and
an huge great multitude of beasts of divers kinds. The time that the
children of Israel had dwelt in Egypt was four hundred years. And so
they departed out of Egypt, and went not the right way by the
Philistines, but our Lord led them by the way of desert which is by the
Red Sea. And the children descended out of Egypt armed. Moses took with
him the bones of Joseph for he charged them so to do when he died. They
went in the extreme ends of the wilderness, and our Lord went tofore
them by day in a column of a cloud, and by night in a column of fire and
was their leader and duke; the pillar of the cloud failed never by day,
nor the pillar of fire by night tofore the people. Our Lord said to
Moses, I shall make his heart so hard that he shall follow and pursue
you, and I shall be glorified in Pharaoh, and in all his host, the
Egyptians shall know that I am Lord. And anon it was told to Pharaoh
that the children of Israel fled, and anon his heart was changed, and
also the heart of his servants, and said: What shall we do, shall we
suffer the children to depart and no more to serve us? Forthwith he took
his chariot and all his people with him. He took with him six hundred
chosen chariots, and all the chariots and wains of Egypt, and the dukes
of all his hosts and he pursued the children of Israel and followed them
in great pride. And when he approached, that the children of Israel saw
him come, they were sore afraid and cried to our Lord God, and said to
Moses: Was there not sepulchre enough for us in Egypt but that we must
now die in wilderness? Said we not to thee: Go from us and let us serve
the Egyptians: It had been much better for us to have served the
Egyptians than to die here in wilderness. And Moses said to the people:
Be ye not afraid, stand and see ye the great wonders that our Lord shall
do for you this day. The Egyptians that ye now see, ye shall never see
them after this day. God shall fight for you, and be ye still. Our Lord
said then to Moses: What criest thou to me? Say to the children of
Israel that they go forth. Take thou and raise the rod, and stretch thy
hand upon the sea, and depart it that the children of Israel may go dry
through the middle of it. I shall so indurate the heart of Pharaoh that
he shall follow you, and all the Egyptians, and I shall be glorified in
Pharaoh, and in all his host, his carts and horsemen. And the Egyptians
shall know that I am Lord when I shall so be glorified. The angel of God
went tofore the castles of Israel, and another came after in the cloud
which stood between them of Egypt and the children of Israel. And the
cloud was dark that the host of Israel might not come to them of all the
night. Then Moses stretched his hand upon the sea, and there came a wind
blowing in such wise that it waxed dry, and the children of Israel went
in through the midst of the Red Sea all dry foot; for the water stood up
as a wall on the right side and on the left side. The Egyptians then
pursuing them followed and entered after them, and all the carts,
chariots and horsemen, through the middle of the sea. And then our Lord
beheld that the children of Israel were passed over and were on the dry
land, on that other side. Anon turned the water on them, and the wheels
on their carts turned up so down, and drowned all the host of Pharaoh,
and sank down into the deep of the sea. Then said the Egyptians: Let us
flee Israel; the Lord fighteth for them against us. And our Lord said to
Moses: Stretch out thine hand upon the sea, and let the water return
upon the Egyptians, and upon their chariots and horsemen. And so Moses
stretched out his hand and the sea returned in to his first place. And
then the Egyptians would have fled, but the water came and overflowed
them in the midst of the flood, and it covered the chariots and
horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh, and there was not one saved of
them. And the children of Israel had passed through the middle of the
dry sea and came a-land.

Thus delivered our Lord the children of Israel from the hand of the
Egyptians, and they saw the Egyptians lying dead upon the brinks of the
sea. And the people then dreaded our Lord and believed in him, and to
Moses his servant. Then Moses and the children of Israel sang this song
to our Lord: Cantemus domino magnificatus est, Let us sing to our Lord,
he is magnified, he hath overthrown the horsemen and carmen in the sea.
And Miriam the sister of Aaron, a prophetess, took a timpane in her
hand, and all the women followed her with timpanes and chords, and she
went tofore singing Cantemus domino. Then Moses brought the children of
Israel from the sea into the desert of Sur, and walked with them three
days and three nights and found no water, and came into Marah, and the
waters there were so bitter that they might not drink thereof. Then the
people grudged against Moses, saying: What shall we drink? And he cried
unto our Lord which showed to him a tree which he took and put into the
waters, and anon they were turned into sweetness. There our Lord
ordained commandments and judgments, and there he tempted him saying: If
thou hearest the voice of thy Lord-God, and that thou do is rightful
before him, and obeyest his commandments, and keep his precepts, I shall
not bring none of the languors ne sorrows upon thee that I did in Egypt.
I am Lord thy saviour. Then the children of Israel came in to Elim,
where as were twelve fountains of water, and seventy palm trees, and
they abode by the waters. Then from thence went all the multitude of the
children of Israel into the desert of Sin, which is between Elim and
Sinai, and grudged against Moses and Aaron in that wilderness, and said:
Would God we had dwelled still in Egypt, whereas we sat and had plenty
of bread and flesh; why have ye brought us into the desert for to slay
all this multitude by hunger? Our Lord said then to Moses: I shall rain
bread to you from heaven, let the people go out and gather every day
that I may prove them whether they walk in my law or not; the sixth day
let them gather double as much as they gather in one day of the other.
Then said Moses and Aaron to all the children of Israel: At even ye
shall know that God hath brought you from the land of Egypt, and to-morn
ye shall see the glory of our Lord. I have well heard your murmur
against our Lord, what have ye mused against us? what be we? and yet
said Moses; Our Lord shall give you at even flesh for to eat and to-morn
bread unto your fill, for as much as ye have murmured against him; what
be we? Your murmur is not against us but against our Lord. As Aaron
spake to all the company of the children of Israel they beheld toward
the wilderness, and our Lord spake to Moses in a cloud and said: I have
heard the grudgings of the children of Israel; say to them: At even ye
shall eat flesh and to-morn ye shall be filled with bread, and ye shall
know that I am your Lord God. And when the even was come there came so
many curlews that it covered all their lodgings, and on the morn there
lay like dew all about in their circuit. Which when they saw and came
for to gather, it was small and white like to coriander. And they
wondered on it and said: Mahun, that is as much to say, what is this? To
whom Moses said: This is the bread that God hath sent you to eat, and
God commandeth that every man should gather as much for every head as is
the measure of gomor, and let nothing be left till on the morn. And the
sixth day gather ye double so much, that is two measures of gomor, and
keep that one measure for the Sabbath, which God hath sanctified and
commanded you to hallow it. Yet some of them brake God's commandment,
and gathered more than they ate and kept it till on the morn, and then
it began to putrify and be full of worms. And that they kept for the
Sabbath day was good and putrified not. And thus our Lord fed the
children of Israel forty years in the desert. And it was called Manna.
Moses took one gomor thereof and put it in the tabernacle for to be kept
for a perpetual memory and remembrance.

Then went they forth all the multitude of the children of Israel, in the
desert of Sin in their mansions and came, to Rephidim, where as they had
no water. Then all grudging they said to Moses, Give us water for to
drink. To whom Moses answered: What grudge ye against me, why tempt ye
our Lord? The people thirsted sore for lack and penury of water saying:
Why hast thou brought us out of Egypt for to slay us and our children
and beasts? Then Moses cried unto our Lord saying: What shall I do to
this people? I trow within a while they shall stone me to death. Then
our Lord said to Moses: Go before the people and take with thee the
older men and seniors of Israel, and take the rod that thou smotest with
the flood in thy hand, and I shall stand tofore upon the stone of Oreb,
and smite thou the stone with the rod and the waters shall come out
thereof that the people may drink. Moses did so tofore the seniors of
Israel and called that place Temptation, because of the grudge of the
children of Israel, and said: Is God with us or not? Then came Amalek
and fought against the children of Israel in Rephidim. Moses said then
to Joshua: Choose to thee men, and go out and fight against Amalek
to-morrow. I shall stand on the top of the hill having the rod of God in
my hand: Joshua did as Moses commanded him, and fought against Amalek.
Moses, Aaron, and Hur ascended into the hill, and when Moses held up
his hands, Israel won and overcame their enemies, and when he laid them
down then Amalek had the better. The hands of Moses were heavy; Aaron
and Hur took then a stone and put it under them, and they sustained his
hands on either side, and so his hands were not weary until the going
down of the sun. And so Joshua made Amalek to flee, and his people, by
strength of his sword. Our Lord said to Moses: Write this for a
remembrance in a book and deliver it to the ears of Joshua; I shall
destroy and put away the memory of Amalek under heaven. Moses then
edified an altar unto our Lord, and called there on the name of our
Lord, saying: The Lord is mine exaltation, for this is the hand only of
God, and the battle and God shall be against Amalek from generation to
generation.

When Jethro the priest of Midian, which was cousin of Moses, heard say
what our Lord had done to Moses and to the children of Israel his
people, he took Zipporah the wife of Moses, and his two sons, Gershom
and Eleazar and came with them to him into desert, whom Moses received
with worship and kissed him. And when they were together Moses told him
all what our Lord had done to Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel,
and all the labor that they endured and how our Lord had delivered them.
Jethro was glad for all these things, that God had so saved them from
the hands of the Egyptians and said: Blessed be the Lord that hath
delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and of Pharaoh, and hath
saved his people; now I know that he is a great Lord above all gods,
because they did so proudly against them. And Jethro offered sacrifices
and offerings to our Lord. Aaron and all the seniors of Israel came and
eat with him tofore our Lord. The next day Moses sat and judged and
deemed the people from morning unto evening, which, when his cousin saw,
he said to him: What doest thou? Why sittest thou alone and all the
people tarry from the morning until evening? To whom Moses answered: The
people came to me demanding sentence and the doom of God; when there is
any debate or difference among them they come to me to judge them, and
to show to them the precepts and the laws of God. Then said Jethro: Thou
dost not well nor wisely, for by folly thou consumest thy self, and the
people with thee; thou dost above thy might, thou mayst not alone
sustain it, but hear me and do there after, and our Lord shall be with
thee. Be thou unto the people in those things that appertain to God,
that thou tell to them what they should do, and the ceremonies and rites
to worship God, and the way by which they should go, and what work they
shall do. Provide of all people wise men and dreading God, in whom is
truth, and them that hate avarice and covetise, and ordain of them
tribunes and centurions and deans that may in all times judge the
people. And if there be of a great charge and weight, let it be referred
to thee, and let them judge the small things; it shall be the easier to
thee to bear the charge when it is so parted. If thou do so, thou shalt
fulfil the commandment of God, and sustain his precepts, and the people
shall go home to their places in peace. Which things when Moses had
heard and understood, he did all that he had counselled him, and chose
out the strongest and wisest people of all Israel and ordained them
princes of the people, tribunes, centurions, quinquagenaries, and deans,
which at all times should judge and deem the people. And all the great
and weighty matters they referred to him, deeming and judging the small
causes. And then his cousin departed and went into his country.

The third month after the children of Israel departed out of Egypt, that
same day they came into the wilderness of Sinai, and there about the
region of the mount they fixed their tents. Moses ascended into the hill
unto God. God called him on the hill and said: This shalt thou say to
the house of Jacob and to the children of Israel. Ye yourselves have
seen what I have done to the Egyptians, and how I have borne you on the
wings of eagles and have taken you to me. If ye therefore hear my voice
and keep my covenant, ye shall be to me in the reign of priesthood and
holy people. These be the words that thou shalt say to the children of
Israel. Moses came down and gathered all the most of birth, and
expounded in them all the words that our Lord had commanded him. All the
people answered: All that ever our Lord hath said we shall do,

When Moses had showed the people the words of our Lord, our Lord said to
him: Now I shall come to thee in a cloud that the people may hear me
speaking to thee, that they believe thee ever after. Moses went and told
this to the people, and our Lord bade them to sanctify the people this
day and to-morrow, and let them wash their clothes, and be ready the
third day. The third day our Lord shall descend tofore all the people on
the mount of Sinai. And ordain to the people the marks and terms in the
circuit. And say to them: Beware that ye ascend not on the hill ne touch
the ends of it. Whosoever touched the hill shall die by death, there
shall no hand touch him, but with stones he shall be oppressed and with
casting of them on him he shall be tolben; whether it be man or beast,
he shall not live. When thou hearest the trump blown then ascend to the
hill. Moses went down to the people and sanctified and hallowed them,
and when they had washen their clothes he said to them: Be ye ready at
the third day and approach not your wives; When the third day came, and
the morning waxed clear, they heard thunder and lightning and saw a
great cloud cover the mount, and the cry of the trump was so shrill that
the people were sore afraid. When Moses had brought them forth unto the
root of the hill they stood there. All the mount of Sinai smoked, for so
much as our Lord descended on it in fire, and the smoke ascended from
the hill as it had been from a furnace. The mount was terrible and
dreadful, and the sound of the trump grew a little more and continued
longer. Moses spake and our Lord answered him. Our Lord descended upon
the top of the mount of Sinai, even on the top of it, and called Moses
to him, which when he came said to him: Go down and charge the people
that they come not to the terms of the hill for to see the Lord, for if
they do, much multitude shall perish of them. The priests that shall
come let them be sanctified lest they be smitten down. And thou and
Aaron shall ascend the hill. All the people and priests let them not
pass their bounds lest God smite them. Then Moses descended and told to
the people all that our Lord hath said. After this our Lord called Moses
and said: I am the Lord God that brought you out of Egypt and of
thraldom. And gave him the Commandment first by speaking and many
ceremonies as be rehearsed in the Bible, which is not requisite to be
written here, but the ten commandments every man is bounden to know. And
ere Moses received them written, he went up into the mount of Sinai, and
fasted there forty days and forty nights ere he received them. In which
time he commanded him to make many things, and to ordain the laws and
ceremonies which now be not had in the new law. And also as doctors say,
Moses learned that time all the histories tofore written of the making
of heaven and earth, of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and of Joseph
with his brethren. And at last delivered to him two tables of stone,
both written with the hand of God, which follow.


The first commandment that God commanded is this. Thou shalt not worship
no strange ne diverse gods.

The second commandment is this, that thou shalt not take the name of
God in vain, that is to say, thou shalt not swear by him for nothing.

The third commandment is that thou have mind and remember that thou
hallow and keep holy thy Sabbath day or Sunday. These three commandments
be written in the first table and appertain only to God.

The fourth commandment is that thou shalt honor and worship thy father
and mother, for thou shalt live the longer on earth.

The fifth commandment is that thou shalt slay no man.

The sixth commandment is, thou shalt not do adultery.

The seventh commandment is that thou shalt do no theft.

The eighth commandment is that thou shalt not bear false witness against
thy neighbor.

The ninth commandment is that thou shalt not desire the wife of thy
neighbor, nor shalt not covet her in thine heart.

The tenth commandment is that thou shalt not covet nothing that is, or
longeth to, thy neighbor.


These be the ten commandments of our Lord, of which the three first
belong to God, and the seven other be ordained for our neighbors. Every
person that hath wit and understanding in himself, and age, is bound to
know them and to obey and keep these ten commandments aforesaid or else
he sinneth deadly.

Thus Moses abode in the hill forty days and forty nights and received
of Almighty God the tables with the commandments written with the hand
of God; and also received and learned many ceremonies and statutes that
God ordained, by which the children of Israel should be ruled and
judged. And whiles that Moses was thus with our Lord on the mount, the
children of Israel saw that he tarried and descended not, and some of
them said that he was dead or gone away, and would not return again, and
some said nay; but in conclusion they gathered them together against
Aaron, and said to him: Make to us some gods that may go tofore us, we
know not what is befallen to Moses. Then Aaron said: Take the gold that
hangeth in the ears of your wives and your children, and bring it to me.
The people did as he bade, and brought the gold to Aaron, which he took
and molt it and made thereof a calf. Then they said: These be thy gods,
Israel, that brought thee out of the land of Egypt. Then the people made
an altar tofore it, and made great joy and mirth, and danced and played
tofore the calf, and offered and made sacrifices thereto. Our Lord spake
to Moses, saying: Go hence and descend down, thy people have sinned whom
thou hast brought forth from the land of Egypt. They have soon forsaken
and left the way which thou hast showed to them. They have made to them
a calf blown, and they have worshipped it, and offered sacrifices
thereto, saying: These be thy gods, Israel, that have brought thee out
of the land of Egypt, Yet said our Lord to Moses: I see well that this
people is of evil disposition, suffer me that I may wreak my wrath on
them, and I shall destroy them. I shall make thee governor of great
people.

Moses then prayed our Lord God saying: Why art thou wroth, Lord, against
thy people that thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt in a great
strength and a boisterous hand? I beseech thee, Lord, let not the
Egyptians say that their God hath locked them out for to slay them in
the mountains. I pray thee Lord that thy wrath may assuage, and be thou
pleased and benign upon the wickedness of thy people. Remember Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob thy servants, to whom thou promisedst and swaredst by
thyself saying: I shall multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and
the universal, land of which I have spoken I shall give to your seed,
and ye shall possess and have it ever. And with these words our Lord was
pleased that he would do no harm as he had said unto his people; and
Moses returned from the mount, bearing two tables of stone, written both
with the hand of God. And the scripture that was in the tables were the
ten commandments as fore be written. Joshua hearing the great noise of
the children of Israel said to Moses: I trow they fight beneath, which
answered and said: It is no cry of exhorting men to fight, ne noise to
compel me to flee, but I hear the noise of singing. When he approached
to them he saw the calf and the instruments of mirth, and he was so
wroth that he threw down the tables and brake them at the foot of the
hill, and ran and caught down the calf that they had made, and burnt
and smote it all to powder, which he cast into water and gave it to
drink to the children of Israel. Then said Moses to Aaron: What hath
this people done to thee that thou hast made to sin grievously? To whom
he answered: Let not my lord take none indignation at me, thou knowest
well that this people is prone and ready to sin. They said to me: Make
us gods that may go tofore us; we know not what is fallen to this Moses
that led us out of Egypt. To whom I said: Who of you that hath gold give
it me; they took and gave it to me, and I cast it into the fire, and
thereof came out this calf. And then said Moses: All they that be of
God's part and have not sinned in this calf let them join to me; and the
children of Levi joined to him, and he bade each man take a sword on his
side and take vengeance and slay every each his brother, friend, and his
neighbor that have trespassed. And so the children of Levi went and slew
thirty-three thousand of the children of Israel. And then said Moses: Ye
have hallowed this day your hands unto our Lord, and ye shall be
therefore blessed. The second day Moses spake to the people and said: Ye
have committed and done the greatest sin that may be. I shall ascend
unto our Lord again, and shall pray him for your sin. Then Moses
ascended again, and received afterward two tables again, which our Lord
bade him make. And therein our Lord wrote the commandments. And after,
our Lord commanded him to make an ark and a tabernacle: in which ark was
kept three things. First the rod with which he did marvels, a pot full
of manna, and the two tables with commandments. And then after Moses
taught them the law; how each man should behave him against other and
what he should do, and what he should not do, and departed them into
twelve tribes, and commanded that every man should bring a rod into the
Tabernacle. And Moses wrote each name on the rod, and Moses shut fast
the tabernacle. And on the morn there was found one of the rods that
burgeoned and bare leaves and fruit, and was of an almond tree. That rod
fell to Aaron.

And after this, long time, the children desired to eat flesh and
remembered of the flesh that they ate in Egypt, and grudged against
Moses, and would have ordained to them a duke for to have returned into
Egypt. Wherefore Moses was so woe that he desired of our Lord to deliver
him from this life, because he saw them so unkind against God. Then God
sent to them so great plenty of curlews that two days and one night they
flew so thick by the ground that they took great number, for they flew
but the height of two cubits. And they had so many that they dried them
hanging on their tabernacles and tents. Yet were they not content, but
ever grudging, wherefore God smote them and took vengeance on them by a
great plague and many died and were buried there. And then from thence
they went into Hazeroth and dwelt. After this Miriam and Aaron, brother
and sister of Moses, began to speak against Moses, because of his wife
which was of Ethiopia, and said: God hath not spoken only by Moses,
hath he not also spoken to us? Wherefore our Lord was wroth. Moses was
the humblest and the meekest man that was in all the world. Anon then,
our Lord said to him, and to Aaron and to Miriam: Go ye three only unto
the tabernacle; and there our Lord said that there was none like to
Moses, to whom he had spoken mouth to mouth, and reproved Aaron and
Miriam because they spake so to Moses, and being wroth, departed from
them, and anon, Miriam was smitten and made leper and white like snow.
And when Aaron beheld her and saw her smitten with leprosy, he said to
Moses: I beseech the Lord that thou set not the sin on us which we have
committed follily, and let not this our sister be as a dead woman, or as
born out of time and cast away from her mother, behold and see, half her
flesh is devoured of the leprosy. Then Moses cried unto our Lord,
saying: I beseech thee Lord that thou heal her; to whom our Lord said:
If her father had spit in her face should she not be put to shame and
rebuke seven days? Let her depart out of the castles seven days, and
after she shall be called in again. So Miriam was shut out of the
castles seven days, and the people removed not from the place till she
was called again.

After this our Lord commanded Moses to send men into the land of Canaan
that he should give them charge for to see and consider the goodness
thereof, and that of every tribe he should send some. Moses did as our
Lord had commanded, which went in and brought of the fruits with them,
and they brought a branch with one cluster of grapes as much as two men
might bear between them upon a colestaff. When they had seen the country
and considered by the space of forty days they returned and told the
commodities of the land, but 

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