Heptateuch (the first seven books of the Bible in verse) 1.625–1.1251

“Roused by the immoderate outcry of Sodom and of Gomorrah joined with it, I have come and take care to see the truth,” so that, because the guilty crowd and the horrible outcry are so laden, the two towns together might burn with heaven’s lightning. Here the trembling prophet asked in a servant’s words what number of holy men would save the guilty walls. Beginning his sum at fifty, he learns, down to ten men, that under their strong protection a people overwhelmed by vices would escape ruin. At once two come to Sodom, the Son and the Nourisher, when the evening star was already bursting forth with moist fire. There Lot was sitting before the doors, as was his custom. And when he had looked on the men, glorious with like bodies, bowing low he led those he revered to his own threshold, though they wished rather to stay in the middle of the street. He feeds them with white unleavened bread of fine flour, and then they lay their limbs to sleep on a couch. See, the whole crowd of Gomorrah runs forward raging, surrounding Lot’s halls with savage uproar, and, demanding the men, it quarrels with swollen mouth. He, mindful of peace, tries to soften the raging men and even eagerly offers his daughters to the madmen, so that perverse pleasure might rather burn with a lawful lust, separating shameful acts from the same sex. But the words move nothing. The doors are broken with iron.

And while they crowd together and tear away the strong bars, their eyes, walled in, groaned in pitch-black darkness. This done, ordered to take his dear ones far away, he invites his sons-in-law, who refuse with sluggish mind. Yet, as far as his coaxing mind could obtain by constant asking, he led out his daughters, following with their mother. And while he goes forward and climbs the summit of the hill opposite and ponders with himself what will follow next, the woman, looking back at the citadels set behind, stiffened and took a form of salt for a body. He, secure, enters the roofs of lofty Zoar. Soon a crash from the horrid-sounding sky hurls thunderbolts, and sulphurous flames rush down with a stinking whirlwind, licking alike the walls and the lofty roofs. When all had been swept into ash by swift ruin, Abraham saw from afar the flames rising with ruddy peak, pondering with mindful heart that no falsehood is ever joined to the words of the Lord. And Lot too, settled in a safe hall, offered comfort with tender love to his daughters, who without husbands could not bring forth offspring. They, when they saw the means of offspring taken away and the honour of motherhood left to their father alone, prepare feasts and bring out wine for their father, so that, unknowing, he might have the forbidden intercourse with his daughters.

Without delay a burden grows in the women’s wombs, and the bodies of both swell with an equal kindling. The first bears a boy, Moab in their father’s speech; the other names Ammon with a different beginning. This one is the father of the Ammonites, that one the begetter of the Moabites. Meanwhile Abraham departs from the seats he had set and crosses to the lands of Gerar with his wife his partner. Here Abimelech, desiring union with Sarah by the prince’s will (for the eminent prophet had said she was his sister, lest his wife’s beauty should prepare a snare for him, innocent as he was, as he guards against a rival’s anger), yet could not, driven back by strong terrors, which assail the mind whenever lust is perverse: for God tormented the tyrant by sending an avenger, who broke his dreams with a terrifying vision; the king, trembling, his mind scarcely recovered, pursues the prophet, asking why Sarah was called his sister, as though no bonds of a husband bound the bride, when she was joined to the prophet. He explains the reasons and clears himself of crime, having lied in nothing; for Sarah was born of his father’s seed, a line drawing a shared blood. When these things were settled, the ruler gives a thousand talents and servants; to these he joins soft flock and herds, and acres too, spread through the broad fields, if only gifts might soften the guilt he had incurred.

For the king’s house, paying for the offence committed, with a host of diseases advancing through all alike, had long since shaken offspring from the women’s wombs. But when the peaceable prophet prayed for the king, prostrate before God, fertility at once gladly returned to all and filled the rich wombs. He himself too, by prayers unheard of at the end of his days, becomes a father, and, recalling the solace of glad laughter, names him Isaac, and carries out the commands of the high divine will, on the eighth day cutting the covering from the member; and, seeing him now take firm steps, among kinsmen joined from allied stock he feasts, and the father rejoices over rich tables; for grace is greater when prayers had been despaired of. And now, while the boy plays with the boy, his fellow nursling, it drove the mother to swell with fiery gall, so that she would drive out the hated slave woman with her child; and, though unwilling, the old man, observing the great commands of the Lord, thrust out both together. But after the woman was removed from her master’s house, she wanders through pathless, secret places in a far retreat. And now she had used up all the bread and all the wine, sighing with weary breast over her fainting son; she came to a well to which Oath had then given its name, and filled the pathless places with sorrowful lament:

when God, moved beyond the sky by the tears of the afflicted woman, strengthens her in her fear and promises to her son great realms prepared for him, over whose ruin she was then groaning. At once, drinking from the gushing springs of a watering pool, she rises and rejoices together with her rejoicing son. God’s pious commands go forward; already the little boy began to bend the bow and to shoot winged arrows. Meanwhile the prophet, lest the leader Abimelech should perhaps prepare something in secret, binds covenants of peace, so that, because quarrels had been stirred up over wells, leisure restored might make their life secure. An oath is sworn, and the concord of the welcome peace remains. Then the old man, while he furrows the earth with the curved plough, filled his great hall with glad harvests, and, praying in supplication to God on high with vows, settled peacefully in the fields of the Philistines. There he is tested by the words of the heavenly power: his only son is to lie slain by the sword at the altar. Without delay he climbs the summits of a swelling hill, leading a horn-footed beast, his servants and his son going with him. And now on the third day, when the sun, shining whiter in the middle of the sky, draws in all the shadows, the old man sends away the servants and takes his son, so that, carrying faggots, food for the flames, on his neck, he might climb with him the heights of the hill opposite.

And now, the flames rising, at the very altar he is set, bound, his hands twisted behind his back. And while the father hastens to cleave his son with the knife, watchful, he sees far off a white lamb, which would better fulfil the rite with its poured-out blood. After these things Sarah departs from her aged body. And when the sons of Heth offered a place for a tomb, the prophet declined, ready to set a price. The rich man gave four hundred sesterces to Ephron, as he gladly commits his partner to the double tomb. The age of the ancients had named the place Mamre. At once he orders one of his servants, whom his life and faithfulness had made distinguished, to speak in solemn words and to swear, putting his friendly right hand beneath and joining it to the thigh, that no woman of the Canaanite race would be joined to his son, since she must rather be taken from the stock of their parents; and if she should perhaps resist, he who easily softens anger would be sent from heaven. The servant eagerly loads gifts on the swelling camels and makes for Assyria, now seeing the houses of Nahor. And while silently he turns over his master’s commands, he sees the outstanding Rebecca coming from the spring, who without delay offers the man cool water and invites him home. She says whose daughter she is; the young man is joined to them in hospitality and soon brings out gifts.

When all had been explained, she goes to be married to her husband. And now Isaac sees close at hand those who have made the journey; Rebecca, seeing him, slid down from the high back and hides her bowed head with a thin veil. They are joined in silence and rejoice in the Lord as author. But after the old man had passed a hundred years and seventy, having bestowed gifts on all, he departed, given a seat in the double tomb. Meanwhile the son, having obtained his father’s house, lives by the well whose name was Vision. And now he had spent forty years there; with the wife we have named he had enriched his father’s hall: but she, though she shone with an outstanding star of beauty, was long barren and knew not the joys of a mother. But when he begged the Lord with holy mouth that his wife might conceive and bear a righteous heir, he is heard; Rebecca swells, pregnant with twins. She, long wondering at the weight of her growing womb, as a suppliant consults the answers of the heavenly Thunderer and learns that two peoples in her breast are rising to the light of life with unlike merits. For he who holds the first beginnings of the light is made subject and driven to serve the commands of the younger. So when the children were born by an easy birth,

the elder comes forth into the air with a ruddy body, covered all over his body with blackish bristles. His father called him Esau by a pleasing name. Afterward, holding his brother’s heel in his clasped hands, Jacob is born, very rich in an outstanding mind. The elder roamed the empty fields in hunting, while the horn filled the rocks with harsh-sounding tremor. But the other, keeping the ways of a gentle heart, rejoiced to live unharmed in his father’s house. The father caressed the elder with tender love, but the mother cherished the other with all her heart. When he had cooked an Egyptian lentil in water, he drove his brother, eager to take the food prepared, to hand over to him the honours of the firstborn. Meanwhile hunger, evil counsellor and first of evils, compelled the prophet to leave his native lands. He makes for the Philistine country and soon passes on to Gerar, which Abimelech then held under his rule. As he went he saw the Lord in bright light, warning him with words not to go to the realms of Canopus but to keep to the soil, the field that the Lord had given: “For though you may seem to dwell among strangers, yet, abiding as a father in the immeasurable world, you will rejoice that nations grow from your manifold seed, which will take up the greatest covenants of my word.”

At once, living in Gerar with his wife his partner, he declares she is rather his sister, as his father had done, lest the Philistine crowd, moved by light desire, should take up arms and carry off the prophet’s wife. But the king, while he looks into hidden places through an open window, sees the prophet playing with his snowy wife, and, seeing the marriage, he restrains all under law, that none should try to carry off the prophet’s partner. And now he who had long before fled famine from his native shores, while he scatters barley entrusted to the softened earth, gathered fruit a hundredfold from the glad turf. Meanwhile he grows rich in peaceful work amid manifold cattle and fertile land. Straightway unhappy envy, twisting their hearts, fouls the watering wells and fills them with earth, so that he would withdraw far away and leave the fields he possessed. Avoiding therefore the dangers of swelling strife, he departed and stayed long in the valley of Gerar, and when with anxious work he was sinking wells, he found cool waters from a gushing source. And, met by the trickery of the herdsmen, he leaves their anger behind and marks the hated place with the name of Strife. Thence he moves on, and again earth dug from the deep hollow brought cool streams into the light. And because he had been thrust out by biting quarrel,

he addresses the envious hearts with deserved words, and after golden peace had broken the harsh quarrels, he took care to give it the name of the land of Abundance. And while, shrewd, he moves to new pastures at a quick pace, he came to the hills whose name is Oath. There he sees the Lord in clear light, at the time when the stars unroll their middle courses, and is admonished to thrust sad emotions from his breast, since unconquered God protects him through wars, through enemies. Roused, after sleep he gathers his cold limbs and, revering the Lord, soon prays at an altar he built. Meanwhile kings come, Abimelech and Ahuzzath, with Phicol accompanying them and bearing the sword, so that, since the king wished to join himself to the peaceable prophet, he might bind covenants of concord with right hands clasped. He is received peacefully and, filled at the same table, carries back the desired peace, the danger set aside. Hence discord arises between the brothers; for their father, long since advanced in long age, bearing with peaceful mind the day lost with the sun and his eyes buried, and remembering that death was at hand, urges the elder son, whom his affection alone saw, to take his quiver and swift arrows and bring him game meat in the usual way, so that he might at once receive the gifts of his father’s tongue.

Rebecca, seeing this, lets dear Jacob know, urging him to bring two kids quickly and to take care to slaughter them for his father in place of his roving brother. And lest his smooth body perhaps betray the trick, he is covered with skins to make him seem hairy, and, veiling his chest and limbs with his brother’s robe, he offered food as though gained in hunting. Yet he did not wholly hide the heart that gave warning: for the old man, as his right hand feels over the whole young man, recognizes Esau by the bristles, but Jacob by the voice. And after hunger was quelled and the table removed, he bids him come nearer and stand close by. When he came beneath the right hand with head bowed, he received the bright words of his holy-speaking father, while he tastes sweet kisses with pressed lips. For after the longed-for dealings of a long life the elder brother is ordered to serve the youngest. Meanwhile Esau, driven through long wanderings, was bringing the captured meat to his father, already full. And though he had greatly pleased by his service and deed, yet he could not take the gifts that had been intercepted. Hence anger and tears and a plan sought to do harm, which Rebecca, seeing it in the brother’s heart, reveals, and warns Jacob to visit his kindred in Haran and to seek Laban, his mother’s brother, until a long time should soften the anger conceived.

And the prophet’s judgment is joined to the mother’s counsel, while, teaching peaceful things, he equips his son together with her: “Do not seek a marriage, young man, from the Canaanite race, but be mindful and cleave to the words of your dear father. There is a place among the Assyrians surrounded by a twin river. There is your mother’s father, our friend Bethuel, and his kinsman Laban, who holds rich estates throughout Haran and cherishes daughters in the years of youth. From that stock, I advise you, seek a wife who draws noble descent from our blood.” And the young man, glad to serve his father’s counsel, goes out, leaving his homeland, and, wearied with much toil, lowers his eyes in sweet sleep. And while he spreads the rocks as an ice-cold bed, he places a very hard stone under his weary head. And while his limbs are refreshed with untroubled sleep, he sees, unafraid, with the whole light of his mind, a ladder fixed beyond the clouds in the pure sky, down whose steps a lofty throng was rushing, while another was climbing from the earth to the citadels above. And while their bodies rolled down in headlong descent, the Almighty watched them rushing down, his brow bent toward them, adding these words above: “I am the great King of Olympus, long since your Lord and your father’s Lord:

drive away sad fears; the land on which you have laid your limbs will be a sure seat for you and for all your sons under your leadership. Now go on, mindful, and do not abandon the task begun. Under my leadership you will return again to the cities you left.” Great fear breaks his sleep and shakes all his bones, flooding his limbs with moist sweat. And besides this he says: “Here is the great house of the Thunderer and the gate that unbars heaven on its twin hinge.” Soon he anoints the stone that had been placed under his head, and, calling it the House of the Lord, with the stone as a marker, he promises that he will give a tenth of his fruits. And now, hastening the journey begun where the path led, he came to a well that alone, through the vast wilderness, had always cherished the soft flock with its watering waves. Here herdsmen with three flocks, in the hot sun, were drawing the thin waters and relieving the heat; greeting them, the prophet asks about each thing and learns that all whom he sought in his mind are safe. Meanwhile Rachel, walking with snowy form, was driving her father’s sheep to the familiar drinking place. The young man, as soon as he saw her coming from the kindred house, chastely joins her in an embrace to his kinsman’s breast, rolling away the stone that had covered the mouth of the well, and at the same time reveals himself as her kinsman by blood.

Laban, seeing him from afar with a glad mind, flies to him and settles the young man in his own hall. Nor does he allow the prophet, his kinsman, to serve for nothing, and in return for the man’s labour betroths his daughter to the lover. So when he had drawn out his wage over seven years, he asks that his betrothed be joined to him in the covenant of marriage. Without delay Leah is given by a false gift, with heavy eyes, but born of the first birth. But Jacob, grieving at the fraud contrived against him, reproaches his in-laws, cheated of the maiden agreed. Again, for the price of the other, by a separate wage, Jacob endures the duties of a long life, receiving Rachel, whom he had earned, the fraud now set aside. But God, the greatest ruler of the heavenly hall, made up for her lack of beauty by many offspring. For Leah bears Reuben, then next Simeon; the third, Levi, born with noble heart, possessed the holy altars of our Lord. Judah follows him, soon made the founder of a tribe. The other births, which Bilhah brought forth from her womb, one may know; now it is right to name the famous sons. After these Issachar is born as the fifth offspring. The sixth child comes next, receiving the name of Zebulun, and a maiden, Dinah, is born, fit for her brothers. At last God grants late gifts to Rachel:

she brings tender Joseph forth into the air of heaven. So when offspring had been born of both wives, he asks his in-laws for leave to depart and for what he had sought; when they wished to pay him a wage for his deserts, they set aside their purpose at their son-in-law’s request. He, desiring nothing of another’s, declared that he would grow rich by the Lord’s gifts alone, and went away, content only with having received both wives, striving to prepare for himself lasting memorials. He strips rods from the broken bodies of their mother trees: the first was of myrtle, then a second was taken from the storax, the third torn from the nut tree, so that the wool, gradually smeared with the sap of the rods, would take on parted colours. For, hastening to plunge the bleating flock in the pools, he marked it, dyed with various distinctions of colour, because of envy, since his father-in-law had said that the variegated stock should be his wage, which he had withheld for many years. When he, nourished with unbought riches, excelled, he stirred the envy of those grieving with sinister jealousy. And while the dread father-in-law shears the fleeces, the man was free to carry off all his goods and the household gods baked in the hot furnace, which the Syrian in his native Haran believed to be divinities. These, however, cautious Rachel kept hidden in wrappings, lest her father, finding the offence, punish the crime.

Having left, he crossed the river and climbed the hill that the natives call Gilead in their native tongue. And now on the third day it reached the father-in-law’s ears that his son-in-law and his daughters had departed together. At once he asks help from his brothers’ band, and, finding him, long sought, on the sixth day, he is forbidden by holy terror of the Lord to harm him, and gently asks for his own things that he believes divinities, and grieves that, sought in every place, they are not found. After sure peace returned and complaints were laid aside, a high heap is built of stones piled up, so that the place might remain a witness with its raised bulwark and the boundary set might settle the dispute over fields. See, in the middle of the way the prophet sees a lofty camp, which God the ruler leads with star-bearing governance, and he gave it a name, testifying: “God fills this.” Meanwhile he ordered chosen young men to run ahead, laden with gifts, which he bids his brother use, that he might grant a peaceable return; and to his request for peace the brother willingly assents; surrounded by companions and a large band he goes out to meet his brother, not at all troubled, and though the crowd of four hundred men caused alarm, their appearance did more harm than the weapons of their attendant arms. So, having divided the flocks, he placed these first, which his brother might deign to take as given to him, and at the same time, bowing low, he prayed to the Lord:

“O God, hope and substance of an immeasurable kingdom, who alone are always the God of my father and grandfather, whose commands make me return from exile, you who bestowed great benefits on your enriched servant commanded me to cross the river with a pliant staff and to cross your Jordan with humble step. And now you see me living in divided camps, to avoid various misfortunes with a twofold defence. Rescue me from these evils, unconquered one, and graciously strike the darts from my brother’s hand as soon as may be, their iron broken, lest in his haste he strike my breast with his harsh weapon.” So when he had settled his companions and sought sleep, he toils under night to overcome God, wrestling with him; for, the thigh being pressed, that part of his body went numb. And when he who had struck the prophet in strong contest long wished to loose the hold of their limbs, the Lord, once released, let him go after granting his gifts. His name changed, he ceases to be Jacob and is called by the mouth of all “Seeing the Lord”; he dared even to learn the Lord’s name, but could not, because it is the right of the Thunderer alone to know it. He himself calls the place by the name of the Lord who was seen, whose lofty face it had befallen him to behold. And when the Lord withdrew, the night now driven away, he goes out supporting his steps with a long staff.

Hence Judea, mindful, avoids eating the sinew that supports the thigh, bound with stiff strength. And now, seeing his brother surrounded by a band, bending low with bowed neck he greets him as lord; meeting, they join breast to breast with much weeping … and now, more and more, Esau asks in varied speech who these are coming with an escort, what crowd follows. Jacob explains from what father his wives were born and by what wage the various flocks were acquired. At once the wives, kneeling with bent knee, brought the tender children to their kinsman’s kisses. But the elder, while he graciously declines the gifts offered, gently caresses the children of the prophet, now at peace with him, and gladly, with his brother accompanying, leads the way, so that by turns of talk they might gradually recount their deeds. But because the ewes with young crept along with slow column, the prophet stayed behind to manage the flocks and servants and set up small huts with leafy roofs, which it pleased him to call by a fixed name, Booths. He came to Shechem, which is in the Canaanite region, having bought with a price the estates of the neighbouring land, and, making haste, prays to God at altars he built. There the Hivite shamelessly defiled Dinah, whom he loved, and took the tender maiden’s virginity, and, wishing to be joined to her, had his foreskin removed, bringing great gifts to the prophet for the bride he had seized.

Then on the third light, when wounds burn most, Hamor is slain together with all the young men. Jacob grieved at these deeds done by his sons’ sword, saying the covenant with the allied people had been broken. At once the Almighty warned the prophet to depart and to place his faithful house in the seat of Bethel. He hastens and obeys God and asks his sons to break the shrines of the gods formed of rigid metal and to put on garments under a snowy covering. He himself hid the gods, now nothing, in the hollow of the terebinth, and sees the mighty Lord bring forth his accustomed words to him, that he will be the prophet of the high divinity in the rich lands that the Lord had vowed to Abraham. He himself gave the place a name and consecrated the stone, which, revering, he drenched all over with liquid oil, and he set up his house under the roofs of the tower of Eder. Meanwhile, worn out with heavy pain, the mother, dying in childbirth, brought Benjamin forth from her womb. For besides the sons born of lawful mothers, the prophet had begotten children by substitute mothers, and gladly acknowledged from Bilhah, his wife’s partner, conspicuous Dan, whom Naphtali follows close. But soon Zilpah bears others, Gad and Asher. He obtains this too, which he knew he did not deserve, that he should see his father’s face with so great an offspring;

so that he who had been born of an already aged mother might rejoice, renowned, in twice six grandsons. So when at last the chief’s life had lasted twice ninety years and been drawn out through a long age, he is released and goes forth shining from his weary body, to see the holy seats that wisdom grants, in which, reclining through the ages on a starry couch, he invites the snow-white righteous to secure joys. And now the brothers resolve to divide the measured lands; for since they could not, within the narrow bounds of the land, keep their herdsmen, growing with many flocks, the elder receives Mount Seir beyond the Canaanite fields and, very rich, took glad pastures. Jacob, following, does not leave the Canaanite realms, so that his pious mind might always rejoice in his father’s rite. There Joseph takes up conspicuous deeds, shining among his brothers by as great a difference as the moon shines among the small stars of the sky. When he was now reaching seven and ten years, he kept his father’s breeding flocks in the grassy pasture, going about among them all, the youngest in birth, whom Jacob begot from noble marriage beds or from a slave concubine of the field. And because he flourished conspicuously in the band of brothers, he moved his brothers’ minds with the chill of envy.

His father, loving him above the whole stock of his sons, caressed the tender boy among his brothers’ strong bodies, and, so that he might be more conspicuous among them all, a flowing garment of varied dye clothed him. When he had served the Lord from his tender years, he chanced, his eyes lulled in peaceful sleep, to see himself among his brothers binding sheaves, while they reaped the grain in the middle of the fields, and his own sheaf rising lofty on an upright point, while his brothers’ sheaves, bowing low beside it, rushed toward it. After the young man revealed this in calm speech, he stirred their fearful hearts with a trembling tumult; speaking with a terrifying murmur of a king and lord, they betrayed that only the crime itself was still lacking to their secret plan. And, to break their gloomy hearts with a double wrath, he tells his learned father the dreams he had seen, with all present whom the line of blood binds. For he seemed to see the rosy sun and with it the moon, joined with trembling light, and with these ten stars and one rising together and bending their necks low to him as to a lord. After the father had heard this with a reproving mouth, he declared that soon he would be bowed to by his anxious brothers. At once the young men go out and seek, with their father’s flocks, the valleys by the river through the flowery grass;

Sent to them, he goes and wanders among silent thickets, taught by a young man who showed him the retreats to which the band of brothers had moved their pasture. When they could recognize him from afar by his varied garment, they contrive an ill-omened plan with discordant tongues. The decision stands among all to destroy the hated brother and to tell that he was killed by the bite of beasts, while, in haste, they mutter among themselves with windy murmur: “Let us see whether dreams can drive off death.” One, gentler, rejects this with calm words and warns the gnashing men to sheathe their hard iron, saying it was better to sink him in a stagnant pool. At once he is stripped and, naked, cast into the cold pit. Meanwhile one used to trade Sabaean wares was driving camels to carry heavy loads, hastening to bring the harvests of the Arabs to Canopus. So when the hope for the younger brother was crushed, Judah says it is better to sell Joseph for coins. The father is deceived and, seeing the garment dyed in blood, judges that he was killed with no deceit. He tears his garment with hooked hands and wraps himself in a black mantle of haircloth. Stricken with grief, the father seeks the lost one, whom a eunuch of Pharaoh had long since received and kept, one used to load the tyrant’s gilded tables with dishes and to rejoice in the din of the great kitchen.

Meanwhile Tamar gives birth, while the glad joys of guilt please, and her womb is filled with twin offspring. Of these, the boy who first earned the light of life thrust forth and put out his hand, which the skilful woman ties with a scarlet cord; soon it is drawn back into the womb and, the order changed, the other is at once born, taking the first place, who had been second by lot. Because this one had once been separated by a boundary, he has the name Zerah; the other they called Perez. The faithful guardianship of the Lord kept Joseph in that land, not suffering him to live subject to a harsh law. For the master named before gives everything to his servant, and not in empty hope; for the gentle Lord from on high increased more largely all that the young man kept. Yet he did not escape a cruel love in Potiphar’s house; for because his eyes shone in his conspicuous face, his mistress, sorely wounded, begs the slave to lie with her. But the boy shuns these foul things and refuses to press the consecrated bed with immoderate guilt. But the woman, lost in vain in forbidden flames, explores gentle approaches and watches for her time. By chance, when she found the house empty and him alone, she presses on and, seizing him by the hand, urges him to lie with her. So much the more eagerly he takes the garment from his body and slips away between his mistress’s two arms.

The woman cries out and takes strength from the crime, shouting that the young man, trusting in his beauty, had violated the sweet honour of her chastity, while, wanton in his youth, he burns and tries to climb into his master’s bed. Moreover she addresses her husband with a sad voice and wants to subject the innocent defendant to the penalty she pleases; he, thinking it true, shuts him in a hostile prison, in which punishment already confined the king’s servants. The keeper of the prison soon soothes him with a kind heart and, seeing him innocent, entrusts the prison to him. There by chance two, whom the grim tyrant, moved by black gall, had shut away from the lofty court, imprisoned, feared punishment in their trembling hearts, and while anxious cares were stealing their sight, they saw dreams announcing things to come. When Joseph with clear eye saw them sad, he asks the causes and makes them confess what was hidden. At once the one who served the tyrant his customary wine tells what he had seen in the drowsy night: “I saw a vine leafy with green shoot, creeping and hanging from its own twined lash, and three branches standing among the vine leaves, and the yellow grape hung in a nectar-sweet cluster. Then the king’s cup, from which he pours mild drinks, foamed with tender new wine that my right hand pressed,

which the lord took and held in his ready palm.” Then the young man reveals all the hidden things clearly: the three branches are three days, after which he will win back the favour he lost and regain it, to mix for the pleased king the cups he saw. “Only do this in return for such service,” he says, “that, when confidence to speak is granted you, you remove my punishment, due to no crime. I am said to be of the Hebrew race; for, sold through my brothers’ crime, though nobly born, I went into slavery.” After this the chief of the bakers begins: “I seemed to carry three baskets on my head, filled with kingly dishes and sumptuous fare, which countless birds carried off, seized in their talons.” At these words, true indeed but harsh to speak, he testifies that he will soon be slain by the cruel sword and his head, torn off, fixed on a high stake, for birds at once to tear with grim beaks. All that the young man had said is fulfilled, and soon the one is restored to his place, the other cut down, his body maimed. Meanwhile, as time slipped through two years, the stars were again turning their courses toward the east, when the ruler of the Nile saw these dreams: for he seemed, while he watched the pleasant river, to see seven heifers with sleek bodies cropping the young grass of the green bank;

that others, foul with leanness, came after them, and while, sluggish, they scarcely held together (a marvel!) on their bones, they were swallowing the excellent heifers with wide mouths. Dreams not unlike are joined, with like meanings; see, he sees seven ears from fertile seed, and others thin and empty of grain (dreadful to tell!) devouring the crops. Sad, he by no means keeps this vision in his mind, but in alarm ordered all who are skilled to come, asking what meaning lies in these hidden things. And when the Memphian seer, consulted, was silent, he who, long since released from prison, served the wine says that when the young Joseph explained it he had returned to the place he lost and his companion was killed. Men are sent in haste to take the prophet, cleared of every crime, swiftly out of the foul vault, and, shearing the unkempt cheeks and the hair grown long in prison, to make him flourish again in his former beauty. So the upright man, consulted, gives such answers and teaches that the cows are messengers of years, and explains the light ears as seven circling years. For so are the things to come signified in distinct forms: that for seven years the earth will be fertile enough, and that dire famine will prevail an equal time, in which the land, wholly dry in its thirsting veins, consumes the pale grass in the dusty furrow.