Odes of Solomon

tr. Harris, 1911

Chapter 7

¹As the impulse of anger against evil, so is the impulse of joy over what is lovely, and brings in of its fruits without restraint: ²my joy is the Lord and my impulse is toward Him¹: this path of mine is excellent²: ³for I have a helper, the Lord. ⁴He hath caused me to know Himself, without grudging, by His simplicity: His kindness has ³humbled His greatness³. ⁵He became like me, in order that I might receive Him: ⁶He was reckoned like myself⁴ in order that I might put Him on; ⁷and I trembled not when I saw Him: because He was gracious to me: ⁸like my nature He became that I might learn Him and like my form, that I might not turn back from Him: ⁹the Father of knowledge is the word of knowledge: ¹⁰He who created wisdom is wiser than His works: ¹¹and He who created me when yet I was not knew what I should do when I came into being: ¹²wherefore He pitied me in His abundant grace: and granted me to ask from Him and to receive from His sacrifice⁵: ¹³because He it is that is incorrupt, the fulness of the ages and the Father of them⁶.

¹⁴He hath given Him to be seen of them that are His, ¹⁵in order that they may recognize Him that made them: and that they might not suppose that they came of themselves⁷: ¹⁶for knowledge He hath appointed as its way, He hath widened it and extended it; and brought it to all perfection; ¹⁷and set over it the traces of His light, and I walked ⌜therein⌝ from the beginning even to the end. ¹⁸For by Him it was wrought, and He was resting in the Son, and for its salvation He will take hold of everything: ¹⁹and the Most High shall be known in His Saints, to announce to those that have songs of the coming of the Lord; ²⁰that they may go forth to meet Him, and may sing to Him with joy and with the harp of many tones⁸: ²¹the seers shall come before Him and they shall be seen before Him, ²²and they shall praise the Lord for His love: because He is near and beholdeth, ²³and hatred shall be taken from the earth, and along with jealousy it shall be drowned: ²⁴for ignorance hath been destroyed, because the knowledge of the Lord hath arrived. ²⁵They who make songs shall sing the grace of the Lord Most High; ²⁶and they shall bring their songs, and their heart shall be like the day: and like the excellent beauty⁹ of the Lord their pleasant song: ²⁷and there shall neither be any thing that breathes without knowledge, nor any that is dumb: ²⁸for He hath given a mouth to His creation, to open the voice of the mouth towards Him, to praise Him: ²⁹confess ye His power, and show forth His grace. Hallelujah.

Notes

lit. my running: cf. Cant. i. 3.
So Schulthess.
So Flemming: seine Grösse klein erscheinen lassen.
lit. in likeness as myself.
Gk. θυσίας: Nestle conjectures οὐσίας: cf. Clem. Ep. ii. ad Cor. i. ἠθέλησεν ἐκ τοῦ μὴ ὄντος εἶναι ἡμᾶς: and the verse of the Ode that precedes, ‘when I came into being.’ Also Ode 8. 16. For an opposite error see Cod. k in Mk. ix. 49.
For the expression ‘Father of the Ages,’ cf. 1 Clem. ad Cor. xxxv. 2, lv. 6, lxi. 2, and Is. xi. 6 (Heb.).
Ps. c. 3.
lit. voices.
Gk. μεγαλοπρέπεια as in Ps. lxvii. (lxviii.) 34.