fathers

Altogether, not one of our fathers or of their children, remained on that holy mountain, except those three, Methuselah, Lamech, and Noah. For all the rest went down from the mountain and fell into sin with the children of Cain. Therefore were they forbidden that mountain, and none remained on it but those three men.

And I will give thee, Enoch, my intercessor, the archistratege Michael, for the handwritings of thy fathers Adam, Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahaleleel, and Jared thy father.

He who raises that generation, shall reveal to them the books of thy handwriting, of thy fathers, to them to whom he must point out the guardianship of the world, to the faithful men and workers of my pleasure, who do not acknowledge my name in vain.

Take these books of your father's handwriting and read them.

Blessed is he who keeps the foundations of his fathers made firm from the beginning.

And he said to them: My children, behold I am dying, and go the way of my fathers.

And so perisheth every young man, darkening his mind from the truth, and not understanding the law of God, nor obeying the admonitions of his fathers, as befell me also in my youth.

For until my father's death I had not boldness to look in his face, or to speak to any of my brethren, because of the reproach.

Therefore the God of your fathers delivered him from every evil and hidden death.

I was born of Jacob as my father's second son; and my mother Leah called me Simeon, because the Lord had heard her prayer.

But his God and the God of his fathers sent forth His angel, and delivered him out of my hands.

And when Simeon had made an end of commanding his sons, he slept with fathers, an hundred and twenty years old.

And after two days I and Judah went up with our father Jacob to Isaac our father's father.

And my father's father blessed me according to all the words of the visions which I had seen. And he would not come with us to Bethel.

Now, therefore, observe whatsoever I command you, children; for whatsoever things I have heard from my fathers I have declared unto you.

And if you were not to receive mercy through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, our fathers, not one of our seed should be left upon the earth.

The heavens shall be opened, and from the temple of glory shall come upon him sanctification, with the Father's voice as from Abraham to Isaac.

And thus Levi ceased commanding his sons; and he stretched out his feet on the bed, and was gathered to his fathers, after he had lived a hundred and thirty-seven years.

And I became enamoured of and I lay with her, and transgressed the commandment of the Lord and the commandment of my fathers, and I took her to wife.

But the God of my fathers had mercy on me, because I did it in ignorance.

And Judah, when he had said these things, fell asleep; and his sons did according to all whatsoever he commanded them, and they buried him in Hebron, with his fathers.

And having said these things, he commanded his sons that they should carry him up to Hebron, and bury him there in the cave with his fathers.

But meanwhile Reuben arose and said: Come, my brethren, let us not slay him, but let us cast him into one of these dry pits, which our fathers digged and found no water.

I saw a man in distress through nakedness in wintertime, and had compassion upon him, and stole away a garment secretly from my father's house, and gave it to him who was in distress.

For I have learnt in the writing of my fathers, that ye shall be divided in Israel, and ye shall follow two kings, and shall work every abomination.

But I am now hastening away to my rest, as did also my fathers.

And his sons laid him in a wooden coffin. And afterwards they carried him up and buried him in Hebron, with his fathers.

But the God of my fathers did not suffer him to fall into my hands, so that I should find him alone and slay him, and cause a second tribe to be destroyed in Israel.

And bury me near my fathers.

And it shall be, that after that they come into the land of their fathers, they shall again forget the Lord and become ungodly.

And when he had charged them with many such words, he exhorted them that they should remove his bones to Hebron, and that they should bury him with his fathers.

Thus the God of our fathers delivered him from our hands, that we should not work great lawlessness in Israel.

And when he had rested for a little while, he said again; My children, obey your father, and bury me near to my fathers.

And after five years they carried him up to Hebron, and laid him with his fathers.

And his sons did as he had commanded them, and they carried him up to Hebron, and buried him with his fathers.

They wished to slay me, but the God of my fathers guarded me:

And having so said, I prayed thus: The God of my fathers and the angel of Abraham, be with me; and ate.

For I know that after my death the Egyptians will afflict you, but God will avenge you, and will bring you into that which He promised to your fathers.

And when the children of Israel went out of Egypt, they took with them the bones of Joseph, and they buried him in Hebron with his fathers, and the years of his life were one hundred and ten years.

And his sons did as he had enjoined them, and they took up his body and buried it in Hebron with his fathers.

And the serpent said to the wolf, "The lambs and the goats and the sheep which thou hast eaten all thy life, wilt thou return them to their fathers and to their parents or no?"

We think that it was against our father's will and against all propriety that they should have been made captives and that the devastation of their land and the transportation of the Jews to Egypt was an act of military wantonness.

At a time when our fathers enjoyed great peace through the due observance of the Law, and were in happy case, so that Seleucus Nicanor, the king of Asia, sanctioned the tax for the temple-service, and recognized our polity, precisely then, certain men, acting factiously against the general concord, involved us in many and various calamities.

And he (Jason) introduced to our people a new way of life and a new constitution in utter defiance of the Law; so that not only did he lay out a gymnasium on the Mount of our fathers, but he actually abolished the service of the temple.

And when he had plundered the city he made a decree denouncing the penalty of death upon any who should be seen to live after the law of our fathers.

So twist hard your racks and blow your furnace hotter. I do not so pity mine old age as to break the Law of my fathers in mine own person.

Neither shalt thou sully the pure mouth of mine old age and my lifelong constancy to the Law. Clean shall my fathers receive me, unafraid of thy torments even to the death.

'Why dost thou delay, O tyrant? We are ready to die rather than transgress the commandments of our fathers.

War a holy and honourable warfare on behalf of righteousness, through which may the just Providence that watched over our fathers become merciful unto his people and take vengeance on the accursed tyrant.'

But he steadfastly enduring this agony said, 'How sweet is every form of death for the sake of the righteousness of our fathers!'

And I call upon the God of my fathers to be merciful unto my nation.

You are not ignorant of the love of brethren, whereof the divine and all-wise Providence has given an inheritance to those who are begotten though their fathers, implanting it in them even through the mother's womb; wherein brethren do dwell the like period, and take their form during the same time, and are nourished from the same blood, and are quickened with the same soul, and are brought into the world after the same space, and they draw milk from the same founts, whereby their fraternal souls are nursed together in arms at the breast; and they are knit yet closer through a common nurture and daily companionship and other education, and through our discipline under the Law of God.

O how may I express the passionate love of parents for children? We stamp a marvellous likeness of our soul and of our shape on the tender nature of the child, and most of all through the mother's sympathy with her children being deeper than the father's.

'My sons, noble is the fight; and do ye, being called thereto to bear witness for our nation, fight therein zealously on behalf of the Law of our fathers.

Remember that for the sake of God ye have come into the world, and have enjoyed life, and that therefore ye owe it to God to endure all pain for his sake; for whom also our father Abraham made haste to sacrifice his son Isaac, the ancestor of our nation; and Isaac, seeing his father's hand lifting the knife against him, did not shrink.

For when he failed utterly to constrain the people of Jerusalem to live like Gentiles and abandon the customs of our fathers, he thereupon left Jerusalem and marched away against the Persians.

'I was a pure maiden, and I strayed not from my father's house, and I kept guard over the rib that was builded into Eve.

In order, that I might redeem my people, and inherit it and that I might not make void my promises to the fathers, to whom I promised the salvation of their seed. Hallelujah.

If I have found grace in Your sight, first take my spirit that I may go to my fathers and not behold the destruction of my mother.

Our fathers went to rest without grief, And lo! the righteous sleep in the earth in tranquility;

Behold, I go unto my fathers According to the way of all the earth.

For to you and to your fathers the Lord gave a law more excellent than to all peoples.

He has decreed against you that you should be carried away captive-for what you have suffered is disproportioned to what you have done-in order that, at the last times, you may be found worthy of your fathers.

And remember you the law and Zion, and the holy land and your brethren, and the covenant of your fathers, and forget not the festivals and the Sabbaths.

And deliver this epistle and the traditions of the law to your sons after you, as also your fathers delivered (them) to you.

And at all times make request perseveringly and pray diligently with your whole heart that the Mighty One may be reconciled to you, and that He may not reckon the multitude of your sins, but remember the rectitude of your fathers.

[Know, moreover, that In former times and in the generations of old our fathers had helpers, Righteous men and holy prophets:

They did according to their uncleanness, even as their fathers (had done):

And Thou wilt not reject (us) for ever. Thou madest a covenant with our fathers concerning us;

They mocked their fathers and their mothers scorned;

And the foster-fathers, ageless all their days,

And fought not; for a father's oaths were there

The tribe and line of fathers and homeland--

Honor the All-Father's name, and let it not

He quickly flew unto his Father's house.

Foreseeing, fathers and young children then

Of fathers and the helpless little ones,

Then they, forgetful of their father's words

As king because of his own father's worth;

And when I heard it from above, fear and trembling fell upon me, and I rose up from my dream. And while the Voice of God was yet in mine ears, I said: How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. And I set up the stone that was under my head for a pillar, and poured oil on the top of it, and I called the name of that place the house of God . . . Lord God of Adam, of thy creature, and Lord God of Abraham and Isaac my father, and of all whose ways are right before thee, thou that sittest mighty upon the Cherubim and upon the throne of the majesty, of fire and full of eyes, as I saw in my dream; that holds the Cherubim with four faces, that bears the Seraphim full of eyes, that bears the whole world under his arm, and is borne of none. Thou hast established the heaven for the glory of thy name. Thou hast spread out upon the clouds of the heaven the heaven that flieth under thee, that under it thou mayest move the sun and hide it in the night lest it be held for God: thou hast ordained the way for the moon and the stars, and her thou makest to wax and wane, but for the stars, thou hast commanded them to pass over, lest these also should be supposed gods. Before the face of thy majesty the six-winged Seraphim fear, and hide their feet and their face with their wings, and with the others they fly, and sing . . . Highest, with twelve faces, many-named, fiery, lightning-formed, holy one! Holy, Holy, Holy, Jao Jaova, Jaoel, Sabakdos, Chabod, Sabaoth, Omlelech, Elaber, Ame S'me Barech, eternal king, strong, mighty, very great, long-suffering. Blessed One, that fillest heaven and earth and the sea and the abyss and all æons with thy glory. Hear my song wherewith I have praised thee, and grant me my petition for which I pray to thee, and show me the interpretation of my dream. For thou art strong and mighty and glorious, a holy God, the Lord of me and of my fathers.

But this said he to me: The ladder which thou sawest, which had twelve steps having two human faces which changed their appearance—now this ladder is this age, and the twelve steps are the times of this age, and the twenty-four faces are the kings of the lawless heathen of this age. Under these kings will be tried . . . of thy sons: they will rise up against the lawlessness of thy descendants and will lay this place waste through four descents of the sins of thy descendants, and of the substance of the forefathers will be built this palace in the temple of the name of thy God and thy fathers; but through the wrath of thy descendants will it be desolate until the fourth descent of this age: for thou didst see four visions.

That the Most High may have compassion; then will their women bear much fruit, and then fighteth the Lord for thy race with terrible and great signs, for the bondage inflicted on them. Their full storehouses will be found empty of wine and of every fruit: their land will boil over with creeping things and every deadly thing. Earthquakes and much destruction will there be. Then will the Most High accomplish his judgment on that place, and will lead forth thy seed out of the bondage of the heathen which rule over them with violence, and they will be saved from the reproaches of their enemies. But the head of the king will be for (an object of) revenge: bitterly standeth he up against them, but they cry, and the Lord heareth them and poureth out his wrath upon the Leviathan the sea serpent, and smiteth the lawless Thalkon with the sword: for against the God of gods raiseth he up his pride. But then, Jacob, appeareth thy righteousness and that of thy fathers, and of them that shall be after thee, walking in thy righteousness: and then shall thy seed blow with the trumpet, and the whole kingdom of Edom shall perish, with all the kings and peoples of the Moabites.

Then Michael went into the house of Abraham on that evening, and found them preparing the supper, and they ate and drank and were merry. And Abraham said to his son Isaac, Arise, my son, and spread the man's couch that he may sleep, and set the lamp upon the stand. And Isaac did as his father commanded him, and Isaac said to his father, I too am coming to sleep beside you. Abraham answered him, Nay, my son, lest we be troublesome to this man, but go to your own chamber and sleep. And Isaac not wishing to disobey his father's command, went away and slept in his own chamber.

And it happened about the seventh hour of the night Isaac awoke, and came to the door of his father's chamber, crying out and saying, Open, father, that I may touch you before they take you away from me. Abraham arose and opened to him, and Isaac entered and hung upon his father's neck weeping, and kissed him with lamentations. And Abraham wept together with his son, and Michael saw them weeping and wept likewise. And Sarah hearing them weeping called from her bed-chamber, saying, My Lord Abraham, why is this weeping? Has the stranger told you of your brother's son Lot that he is dead? Or has anything else befallen us? Michael answered and said to Sarah, Nay, Sarah, I have brought no tidings of Lot, but I knew of all your kindness of heart, that therein you excel all men upon earth, and the Lord has remembered you. Then Sarah said to Abraham, How dare you weep when the man of God has come in to you, and why have your eyes shed tears for today there is great rejoicing? Abraham said to her, How do you know that this is a man of God? Sarah answered and said, Because I say and declare that this is one of the three men who were entertained by us at the oak of Mamre, when one of the servants went and brought a kid and you killed it, and said to me, Arise, make ready that we may eat with these men in our house. Abraham answered and said, You have perceived well, O woman, for I too, when I washed his feet knew in my heart that these were the feet which I had washed at the oak of Mamre, and when I began to enquire concerning his journey, he said to me, I go to preserve Lot your brother from the men of Sodom, and then I knew the mystery.

And it happened about the seventh hour of the night Isaac awoke, and came to the door of his father's chamber, crying out and saying, Open, father, that I may touch you before they take you away from me. Abraham arose and opened to him, and Isaac entered and hung upon his father's neck weeping, and kissed him with lamentations. And Abraham wept together with his son, and Michael saw them weeping and wept likewise. And Sarah hearing them weeping called from her bed-chamber, saying, My Lord Abraham, why is this weeping? Has the stranger told you of your brother's son Lot that he is dead? Or has anything else befallen us? Michael answered and said to Sarah, Nay, Sarah, I have brought no tidings of Lot, but I knew of all your kindness of heart, that therein you excel all men upon earth, and the Lord has remembered you. Then Sarah said to Abraham, How dare you weep when the man of God has come in to you, and why have your eyes shed tears for today there is great rejoicing? Abraham said to her, How do you know that this is a man of God? Sarah answered and said, Because I say and declare that this is one of the three men who were entertained by us at the oak of Mamre, when one of the servants went and brought a kid and you killed it, and said to me, Arise, make ready that we may eat with these men in our house. Abraham answered and said, You have perceived well, O woman, for I too, when I washed his feet knew in my heart that these were the feet which I had washed at the oak of Mamre, and when I began to enquire concerning his journey, he said to me, I go to preserve Lot your brother from the men of Sodom, and then I knew the mystery.

And should bring the people into the land that was given to their fathers,

And now I tell you that the time of the years of my life is finished and I pass to sleep with my fathers in the sight of all the people . . .

. . . they shall go by thee into the land, which He decreed and promised to give to their fathers,

"Lord of all, King on Thy lofty seat, That rulest over the world, That didst will that this people should be unto Thee a peculiar people, and Thou didst will to be called their God according to the Covenant, which Thou madest with their fathers.

Then God will remember them because of the covenant, which He made with their fathers and will show forth His mercy also in those times.

And the two tribes shall remain in the faith laid down for them, sad and groaning, because they cannot offer sacrifice to the Lord God of their fathers.

Let us fast three days, and on the fourth day let us enter the cave, which is in the field, and there let us die, rather than transgress the commandments of the Lord of Lords, the God of our fathers.

But I go to sleep with my fathers:

If their enemies should once now do impious deeds against their Lord, they have no champion now to bear prayers on their behalf to the Lord, as was Moses the great messenger, who every hour by day and night had his knees fixed to the ground praying and beholding Him Who is omnipotent over the world in mercy and justice, reminding Him of the covenant of the fathers and by his oath propitiating the Lord.'

And I saddled my father's ass, and placed them upon it, and went towards the inn to sell them.

And I said in my heart: "If this be so, how can Merumath, my father's god, having the head of another stone, and himself being made of another stone, rescue a man, or hear a man's prayer and reward him?"

And while I cogitated thus, I reached my father's house; and having watered the ass, and set out hay for it, I brought the silver and gave it into the hand of my father Terah.

I, however, having thought over my father's anger, went out; [and after I had gone out] my father cried, saying: "Abraham!"

And He said: "Thou art seeking in the understanding of thine heart the God of Gods and the Creator; I am He: Go out from thy father Terah, and get thee out from the house, that thou also be not slain in the sins of thy father's house."

I am the one who was commissioned to set on fire thy father's house together with him, because he displayed reverence for dead (idols).