Joseph and Aseneth

Historical English source page 41

XI] ASENATH RESOLVES TO PRAY 37 the leathern cover containing the cinders and poured them upon the floor; and thereupon she took sackcloth and girded her loins ; and she loosed also the net of the hair of her head and sprinkled ashes over her head. And she strewed cinders also upon the floor, and fell upon the cinders and kept beating her breast constantly with her hands and weeping all the night with groaning until the morning. And, when Asenath arose in the morn- ing and saw, and lo ! the cinders were beneath her as clay from her tears, she again fell upon her face upon the cinders till the sun set. Thus Asenath did for seven ^ days, '"not tasting aught whatever.^ Asenath resolves to pray to the God of the Hebrews. XI. And on the eighth day, when the dawn came and the birds were already chirping and the dogs barking at the passers-by, Asenath lifted up her head a little from the floor and the cinders where- on she was seated, for that she was exceeding weary ^ and had lost the power of her limbs from her great humiliation;* for Asenath had waxed weary and faint and her strength was failing, and thereupon she turned toward the wall, sitting under the window that looked east ; and her head she ' I omit Taj, which is clearly wrong. * Lat. " of her humiliation " ; Syr. Arm. ins. " and ate no bread and drank no water," Syr. adding " in the seven days of the passion of her soul and of her humiliation." ' I read Kcx/iriKvla for KexAriKvia ; so versions. * Syr. ins. " and fasting and abstinence '' ; similarly Lat. Arm. For ff. to "Asenath" (p. 40, 1. 2) Slav, has "and stretched out her hands and looked toward the east and said,"