[ed. bishop Isho'yahb future Isho'yahb III, letter 12]
Ministers of God and servants earnest in virtue, to our venerable father Mar Hababa, and to the blessed fathers and holy brothers, who at the same time in mount Izala excel in the spiritual ministry of our Father Abraham, son of the common love of your fatherhood Iso'yahb: in our Lord greetings.
It pleased me, oh saints of God, last year to write to your Charity; sighing indeed with pain, that the intensity of the adversity which had taken place cut off my heart's desire from the encounter of your persons, the pain is commonly divided, because not even by missive from afar have we been able to meet with each other for a very long time. And henceforth since I wrote, you remained silent. To me alone, as it seems, remains the sole burden of sorrow, on account of loneliness and at the same time of longing, perhaps even of excessive pusillanimity. But when I was thus anticipating the hope of your visit back then, o saints of God, the storm of my sins carried me away to the abyss of Seleucia and for a long time hitherto I was compelled to remain there; but on account of nothing else than the law of friendship. For the increase of my daily friends made increase of my stay there; first of all, that my visit was altogether protracted by the hope of usefulness. When you like ...
[Here one or two leaves are missing leaving this epistle incomplete, and the following letters in lacuna. For the last epistle before our "#13" the MSS only has the ending: "make me earnestly joyful".]
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