an ancient Egyptian prayer & vegetarian meal

[Guest guest]

James Bean spiritualawakening

 

The following prayer comes from an ancient Egyptian text called " The Prayer

of Thanksgiving, " one of 50 books found near the village of Nag Hammadi in

upper Egypt. This ancient library is the one that contains " The Gospel of

Thomas, " a collection of 114 sayings of Jesus.

 

The Prayer of Thanksgiving

Translated by James Brashler, Peter A. Dirkse and Douglas M .Parrott

--

 

This the prayer that they spoke:

 

" We give thanks to You! Every soul and heart is lifted up to You,

undisturbed name, honored with the name 'God' and praised with the name

'Father', for to everyone and everything (comes) the fatherly kindness and

affection and love, and any teaching there may be that is sweet and plain,

giving us mind, speech, (and) knowledge: mind, so that we may understand

You, speech, so that we may expound You, knowledge, so that we may know You.

We rejoice, having been illuminated by Your knowledge. We rejoice because

You have shown us Yourself. We rejoice because while we are in (the) body,

You have made us divine through Your knowledge.

 

" The thanksgiving of the man who attains to You is one thing: that we know

You. We have known You, intellectual Light. Life of life, we have known You.

Womb of every creature, we have known You. Womb pregnant with the nature of

the Father, we have known You. Eternal permanence of the begetting Father,

thus have we worshiped Your goodness. There is one petition that we ask: we

would be preserved in knowledge. And there is one protection that we desire:

that we not stumble in this kind of life. "

 

When they had said these things in the prayer, they embraced each other and

they went to eat their holy food, which has no blood in it.*

 

* a vegetarian meal.

 

 

|NAG HAMMADI INDEX | GNOSTIC SOCIETY LIBRARY | SOCIETAS GNOSTICA NORVEGIA |

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