Hymn of the Pearl

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848 THE ACTS OF JUDAS THOMAS. have been a recluse* and an ascetic and a pauper and a wandering mendicant. Let me then receive of the bless- ing of the poor, and of the rest of the weary, and of the blessing of those whom men hate and persecute and revile and say of them (xx.4) odious words. Lo, for Thy sake I am hated and shunned by many; for Thy sake they say of me I know not what.” . And whilst he was praying, all those who were in the prison saw that he was praying and hegged of him to pray for them too. And when he had prayed and sat down, Judas began to chant this hymn. The Hymn of Judas Thomas the Apostle in the country of the Indians. “When I was a little child, and dwelling in my king- dom, in my father’s house, and was content with the wealth and the luxuries of my nourishers, from the East our home my parents equipped me (and) sent me forth ; and of the wealth of our treasury they took abundantly,” (and) tied up for me a load large and (yet) light, which I myself could carry—gold of Beth-‘Ellayé, and silver of Gazak the great,° and rubies of India, and agates* from Beth-Kashan ;* and they furnished me with » Adopting my conjecture tésases , and taking the word in its derivative sense, and not in the literal one of ¢ prisoner. b ܐܟܒܪ̈‎ for ܐܟܒܪܘ‎ . © 00007 and Gazak occur as names of villages in Assemani’s Bibl. Or., the former in £. ii., p. 419, £, iii., pars 1, p. 418, the latter in £. i., p. 189; but whether these are the localities meant here, I cannot say. 4 ܦܬܘ̈ܬܟܐ‎ seems to designate here not striped silke but striped or variegated stones. Perhaps wUls Kashan, in Persia, N. of Ispahan. In Cureton’s‏ ܘ