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until the season of the ninth hour; and when he gave us [his] blessing, he spake unto us also a word of prophecy, saying, “This day letters [recording] the victory of Theodosius the Emperor have entered Alexandria, and these make known that he hath slain [A.D. 394] Eugenius the tyrant, and the death which the Christian Emperor Theodosius himself will die.” Now these things actually happened as he said. And having seen many other fathers, other brethren came and informed us that the life of the blessed John had come to an end in a most excellent and exemplary manner; for he commanded him (i.e., his disciple) that for three days no man should be allowed to go up to him, and he bowed his knees in prayer, and his career was crowned, and he went to our Lord, to Whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Here end the Triumphs of the Blessed Mar John


Chapter III: The Triumphs Of The Holy Man Abba Hor

AND we saw also another wonderful man whose name was Abbâ Hôr, now he was the Abbâ of one thousand monks, and he had an angelic form and was about ninety years of age; his beard flowed down over his breast, and it was white and beautiful, and his countenance was so glorious that those that saw him were reproved by the sight thereof only. And this blessed man had for a very long time lived a life of the utmost austerity at a remote place in the desert, but subsequently he took certain monasteries in the desert which was near Shainâ, and gathered together a brotherhood, and he planted so many wild trees at that spot that they formed a dense wood in the wilderness. For the fathers who lived with him there said that before this man came there from the desert there was not even a shrub in the place; now he planted these trees in order to fill a want, and to prevent the brethren who were gathered together to him from being troubled by searching for wood. And in his prayer to God he took the same pains and strove that all the needs of the brethren might be supplied, so that they would only have to be anxious about their redemption, and that nothing which they used might be wanting for them, [so that they might have no excuse for negligence]. When formerly the blessed man lived in the desert of Dalgâw he used to eat roots and herbs, and to drink water when he was able, and he passed the whole time of his life in prayer and praise; but when he arrived at complete old age, an angel appeared unto him in a dream, in the desert, and said, “Thou shall become a great race, and shalt be set in authority over a numerous people, and those who shall be saved through thee shall be ten myriads [in