Barlaam and Ioasaph

command of a dread Angel that appeared to him in a dream, this hermit, who had performed the last rites, journeyed to the kingdom of India, and, entering in to King Barachias, made known unto him all that had befallen Barlaam, and this blessed Ioasaph. Barachias, making no delay, set forth with a mighty host, and arrived at the cave, and beheld their sepulchre, and wept bitterly over it, and raised the gravestone. There he descried Barlaam and Ioasaph lying, as they had been in life. Their bodies had not lost their former hue, but were whole and uncorrupt, together with their garments. These, the consecrated tabernacles of two holy souls, that sent forth full sweet savour, and showed naught distressful, were placed by King Barachias in costly tombs and conveyed by him into his own country.

Now when the people heard tell of that which had come to pass, there assembled a countless multitude out of all the cities and regions round about, to venerate and view the bodies of these Saints. Thereupon, sooth to say, they chanted the sacred hymns over them, and vied one with another to light lamps lavishly, and rightly and fitly, might one say, in honour of these children and inheritors of light. And with splendour and much solemnity they laid their bodies in the Church which Ioasaph had built from the very foundation. And many miracles and cures, during the translation and deposition of their relics, as also in later times, did the Lord work by his holy servants. And King Barachias and all the people beheld the mighty virtues that were shown by them; and many of the nations round about, that were sick of unbelief and ignorance of God, believed through the miracles that were wrought at their sepulchre. And all they that saw and heard of the Angelic life of Ioasaph, and of his love of God from his childhood upward, marvelled, and in all things glorified God that alway worketh together with them that love him, and granteth them exceeding great reward.

Here endeth this history, which I have written, to the best of my ability, even as I heard it from the truthful lips of worthy men who delivered it unto me. And may God grant that all we that read or hear this edifying story may obtain the heritage of such as have pleased the Lord, by the prayers and intercessions of blessed Barlaam and Ioasaph, of whom this story telleth, in Christ Jesu our Lord; to whom belongeth worship, might, majesty and glory, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, now and forevermore, world without end. Amen.

Endnotes

1. For Apology of Aristides see here. ↩

2. See here. ↩

3. For details see Max Müller, Contemp. Review (July, 1870). ↩

4. Cp. here: ἵνα γνῷς, ὦ βασιλεῦ, ὅτι οὐκ ἀπ’ ἐμαυτοῦ ταῦτα λέγω, ταῖς Γραφαῖς ἐγκύψας τῶν Χριστιανῶν εὑρήσεις οὐδὲν ἔξωθεν τῆς ἀληθείας με λέγειν. ↩

5. I.e. The Lord gathers. ↩

6. Simon Magus (?). ↩

7. The Latin pallium. παλλίον, or πάλλιον, is used by Epiphanius and others. See E. A. Sophocles’ Greek Lexicon. ↩

8. Greg. Naz. Orat. xl. 45. οὐκ ἔτι μὲν σάρκα, οὐκ ἀσώματον δέ, οἷς αὐτὸς οἶδε λόγοις, θεοειδεστέρου σώματος, κ.τ.λ. ↩

9. A play on the Greek word Kosmos which means: (1) An orderly arrangement, (2) Universe . ↩

10. It was the Apology of Aristides, written circa AD 125. See the Introduction. ↩

11. It should be Habakkuk. ↩

12. Serug, Gen. 11:20; Luke 3:35. ↩

13. This reference to an assembly suggests a variant version of this episode for above (see here) Theudas is closeted with Ioasaph and the king. ↩

14. Strictly a swimming-bath. Then, in Ecclesiastical Greek, a Font. ↩

Colophon

Barlaam and Ioasaph
was published circa 1050.
It was translated from Greek in 1914 by
George Ratcliffe Woodward and Harold Mattingly.

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