Another paen of praise. We also have a possible insertion regarding sinfulness that seems out of place when compared to other parts of the material. I would be very skeptical regarding such sentiments as we do not truly know their historicity.
Again that is very much part of the Hebrew bible and has been assigned to priestly influence.
However all this material is certainly part of the instruction of priests going back to Egypt. . .
CHAPTER TWENTY
A HYMN FROM THE BOOK OF SONGS - 2
O Great and Bountifiil One who is the
fountainhead of glory and the eternal spring of power; who sits enthroned in
wisdom; whose counsel is the Law, great are the manifestations of Your wrath
when it purges the land, even as it was done in the days of our fathers. Yet
we, weak, wayward and wilfiil men, know in the depth of our hearts that
whatever You do is done injustice and to our ultimate benefit.
With inscrutable wisdom You prepared a
compatible place for the spirits of men, a place encompassing the domain of
man, a place wherein man rules under the decrees of Your everlasting and unchanging Law. You have set the boundaries and they are held back, neither
troubling nor oppressing us beyond our endurance.
The spirits of men rule in the mysterious
domains governing the sun and the moon, the stars and the nightwatchers, the
mistmen and the hidden caves of power. They undertake their appointed tasks
there and are wave wanderers of the watery wastes, guardians of the deep.
You have created man in the likeness of an
original conceived in Your mysterious abode, and the manner of his life is
fixed according to Your plan. Great and wonderful is the ultimate destiny of
man who, as yet, has progressed but a few steps along the road towards the goal
of life. Yet You have opened his ear to mysterious and wonderful things.
You have revealed strange mysteries to his eye,
he knows things unbelievable in olden times. .
This being on whom You have conferred so much is
a thing of weakness and frailty. He was shaped from moistened clay and moulded
in water, then set upon a mound in the midst of the great chaos. His eyes were
shown the glory above but he wearied of looking, for such splendour was beyond
his comprehension. Therefore, he sought his pleasures among the things from
whence he came, and therein he now finds his delight. So he sits on a pedestal
of shame down by the polluted spring. His repast comes from the pot of
fornication and he is clad in the garments of wickedness.
Great One. You who are all wise know the words
which come forth from his lips. You know the fruit of his mouth, the pollen of
his tongue. Be merciful to man and overlook his weaknesses, for he is as he was
made and, perchance, so he was meant to be. Who can question the mystery? May
Your will prevail!
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