Hymns

Contents

1. 1.1Synesius tunes his lyre not to love-songs but to a hymn to God, prizing wisdom above strength, beauty, wealth, and honour, and asking only enough to live independently.
2. 1.31The hymn turns to God, the unbegotten Monad beyond being, whose unity unfolds ineffably into a threefold power, and then checks itself from revealing the mysteries to the uninitiated.
3. 1.61The soul, a portion of the divine spirit, descends into matter and forgets its origin, yet keeps a light within that can lead it back to the Father.
4. 1.91The end of a sentence on the soul's ascent; the rest of the passage is lost.
5. 1.121Blessed is the soul that escapes earthly cares and sees the divine depth.
6. 1.151Synesius urges his soul to rise, drink from the fount of good, and be united with the Father.
7. 2.1A morning hymn praising God, who made light and the ordered heavens, beyond which lies blessed silence and the intelligible world.
8. 2.31All the orders of being, down to earthly life, depend on God's will; he is root of all, beyond male and female, voice and silence, and the hymn greets him as the centre of being.
9. 2.61The hymn ends with prayers for a calm life, health, and freedom from passions, so that the poet may celebrate the ineffable mysteries.
10. 3.1Hymn 3 opens: wherever he is, on sea or land, Synesius sings God, the Begetter of the cosmos, to whom the stars, moon, and sun bear witness.
11. 3.31Synesius tells how he withdrew from the world to holy places and to the Libyan desert, untouched by godless or worldly men, to pray with a pure soul.
12. 3.61He prays that his purified soul may offer a hymn, and calls heaven and earth to silence.
13. 3.91A fragment of the hymn's call for cosmic silence and its prayer to the Father.
14. 3.121Synesius asks pardon if he has presumed to touch divine things, since no eye, not even of gods, can gaze on God's fire; he gives back to God what is God's own.
15. 3.151A fragment invoking God as Father of all fathers.
16. 3.181God is praised in Neoplatonic terms as the One before the One, Monad and number, mind and intelligible, begetter and begotten.
17. 3.211The Father pours himself forth to beget the Son, Wisdom and Craftsman; God is hymned as Monad that is Triad and Triad that is Monad, with no 'second' or 'third' ranked below the first.
18. 3.241The Spirit proceeds as a mean from the Father; the eternal begetting is beyond time; God upholds holy minds against the darkness of matter and is hymned by all the orders of being.
19. 3.271All races of beings, within and around the cosmos, hymn God.
20. 3.301Under God, ministering powers govern the parts of the cosmos down to mortal life; God is leader of the pure worlds and nature of natures.
21. 3.331All of nature in its cycles hymns God harmoniously.
22. 3.361The Greek of this part of the hymn is lost in the scan text.
23. 3.391Synesius, feeble and powerless, commends to God his land and his priestly office, and prays for upward-leading light so that his soul may not sink back into earthly ruin.
24. 3.421The poet offers his praise to the Father and to the wise Son, Wisdom poured forth from the Father's bosom yet remaining in him, who governs all things to the lowest depths and heals mortal cares.
25. 3.451Synesius begins to recount his return from Thrace (Constantinople), where God protected him.
26. 3.481Synesius recalls his three years at the imperial court on behalf of his homeland, his tears and prayers in all the churches that his embassy might not fail.
27. 3.511The martyrs and saints of Thrace and Chalcedon joined his prayers, and God rescued his homeland and strengthened him when he was worn out.
28. 3.541Synesius prays for his people and for himself: release from toil, sickness, cares, and poverty, so that he may have leisure for the things of God.
29. 3.571Synesius asks God for the light of wisdom and his seal to drive away evil spirits, to keep body and spirit pure, and to release him from evils.
30. 3.601God placed the soul, and mind in it, in the body to serve on earth; enslaved to matter, it still keeps a little strength of its inner eye.
31. 3.631Synesius prays that God pity his soul, strangled by matter, and kindle the divine spark in him so that it may escape the cycle of becoming.
32. 3.661He prays to bear the Father's seal, so that the powers who hold the keys of the ascent may open to him the gates of light, and renounces the godless pleasures and powers of the world.
33. 3.691The Greek of this part of the hymn is lost in the scan text.
34. 3.721The soul, enslaved on earth, has forgotten its goods; the mixed gifts of matter bring grief, and the poet flees them for the pure good of God.
35. 3.751The hymn ends with a prayer that the soul may escape the body and leap to God's courts, the fount of souls, to sing with the heavenly choir.
36. 3.781A fragment: the Greek of most of this passage is lost.
37. 4.1Hymn 4 opens: Synesius sings the Father at every hour and bids all nature fall silent so that the heavenly ministers may hear and carry up his prayers.
38. 4.31God the Father is praised as source of all, and with him the Son and the Holy Spirit, 'the middle principle'.
39. 4.61The Spirit is the outpouring through which the Son, God from God, is brought forth; God is Monad and Triad, the Son the one Word begotten by the Father's mind.
40. 4.91A fragment; the rest of the passage is lost.
41. 4.121The Son, sown by the ineffable Monad as the seed of all things, is in all things; through him the spheres and stars move in order.
42. 4.151The Son distributes the works of heavenly, airy, and earthly beings, gives souls and life, and holds the visible cosmos together as image of the intellectual world.
43. 4.181A guardian spirit, set by the Father's will, wards off passions and evil and carries prayer; the Father is unknown and ineffable, guardian of soul and life.
44. 4.211The hymn closes with prayers that the Father drive away sickness and the evil spirit of the earth from the poet's soul, prayers, life, and works, and call his soul up, outside the body, to its source.
45. 5.1Hymn 5, for the evening of Christ's birth: the Son born of the Virgin is light from the Father's fount, creator of the cosmos and saviour of men.
46. 5.31Synesius prays to the Son, source of light, mind, and soul, to heal his soul and body, give persuasion to his words, and grant him a pure life.
47. 5.61The hymn ends with alternating greetings to Father and Son and to the Holy Spirit, 'centre of the Son and the Father', and prays for the Spirit's gifts.
48. 6.1Hymn 6 crowns the Son, 'alone from the alone', Wisdom and principle of creation, who governs heaven, angels, and nature and frees mortals from death; it prays for calm, health, and freedom from passion.
49. 6.31He asks for good repute and persuasive speech.
50. 6.61A fragment of the hymn's closing prayer.
51. 7.1Hymn 7, the first hymn in a new metre to Jesus of Jerusalem: God, Son of God, corpse below the earth; the Magi bring incense for God, gold for the king, and myrrh for the tomb.
52. 7.31Christ cleansed earth, sea, air, and the underworld, going down to Hades to help the dead.
53. 8.1Hymn 8 asks the Virgin's Son to protect Synesius's household, his sister, children, and faithful wife, and to free his soul to join the heavenly choir.
54. 9.1Hymn 9: after Christ's descent the dog of Hades fled; Christ ascended with the freed souls, and the spirits of the air trembled while the stars, moon, and sun celebrated his victory.
55. 9.31Christ ascends to the intellectual spheres, the fount of goods.
56. 9.61The hymn ends with the realm above, free of death and doom, where Aeon, ancient and ever young, presides.