Nisibene Hymn 1: Like Noah in the Flood

O God of mercies, you refreshed Noah,

and he in turn refreshed your mercies.

He offered sacrifice and stopped the flood;

he presented gifts and received the promise.

With prayer and incense he propitiated you;

with an oath and with the bow you showed him favor,

so that if the flood should ever try to harm the earth,

the bow would stretch itself out against it,

to drive it away and give the earth courage.

As you have sworn peace, so keep it,

and let your bow fight against your wrath!

Refrain: Stretch out your bow against the flood, for see, it has lifted up its waves against our walls!

Lord, it has been proclaimed by revelation

that the humble blood which Noah sprinkled

held back your wrath completely for all generations.

How much mightier, then, will the blood of your only Son be,

that its sprinkling should hold back our flood!

For see, it was only as mysteries of him

that those humble sacrifices which Noah offered gained their power,

and by them he stopped your wrath.

Be propitiated by the gift upon my altar,

and keep the deadly flood away from me.

So both your signs will bring deliverance:

your cross to me, and your bow to Noah!

Your cross will split the sea of waters;

your bow will stop the flood of rain.

See, all the billows trouble me,

and you showed the ark more favor than me:

for waves alone surrounded it,

but mounds and weapons and waves encircle me.

To you it was a storehouse of treasures,

but I have been a storehouse of debts.

In your love it subdued the waves;

in your wrath I am left desolate among the weapons.

The flood carried it; the river threatens me.

Helmsman of that ark, be my pilot on dry land!

You gave it rest in the harbor of a mountain;

give me rest too in the harbor of my walls!

The Just One has chastened me heavily,

but the ark he loved even among the waves.

For Noah overcame the waves of lust

that had drowned the sons of Seth in his generation.

Because his flesh rose up against the daughters of Cain,

his chariot rode on the surface of the waves.

Because no women defiled him,

he paired the animals, joining all the pairs together in the ark

in the yoke of marriage.

The olive, whose oil makes the face glad,

made their faces glad with its leaf.

But the river, whose water usually brings me joy to drink,

see, Lord, now makes me mourn by its flood.

Your righteousness has seen the foulness of my guilt,

and your pure eyes loathe me.

You have gathered the waters by the hand of the unclean,

to make them for me a cleansing of my guilt;

not to baptize and purify me in them,

but to chasten me with fear by them.

For the waves will stir me up to prayer,

and prayer will wash away my guilt.

The sight of them, which is full of repentance,

has been a baptism to me.

Lord, in the sea that should have drowned me,

let your mercies drown my guilt.

In the Red Sea you drowned bodies;

in this sea drown my guilt instead of bodies!

In your mercy you prepared an ark,

to preserve in it all that was left.

So that you would not lay the earth waste in your wrath,

your compassion made an earth of wood.

You emptied the one into the other,

and you gave them back again, the one to the other.

But my lands have been filled and emptied again three times,

and now the waves rebel against me,

to overwhelm the remnant that has escaped in me.

In the ark you saved a remnant;

Lord, save in me, yes, in me, a leaven.

The ark brought forth on the mountain;

let me bring forth my imprisoned ones in my lands!

Lord, gladden in me the imprisoned ones of my fortresses,

you who gladdened those prisoners with the olive leaf!

By means of the dove you sent healing

to the sick who were drowning in every wave;

it came in and drove out all their pains.

For their joy in it swallowed up their sorrow,

and their mourning vanished in its comfort.

As the commander of an army puts heart into those who are fleeing,

so the dove spread courage among the forsaken.

Their eyes tasted the sight of peace,

and their mouths hurried to open in your praise.

Like the olive leaf among the waves, save me,

so that you may gladden in me the prisoners of my fortresses!

The flood attacks and dashes against our walls:

may the might that upholds all things hold them up!

It does not fall like a building on the sand,

for I have not built my teaching upon the sand.

A rock will be my foundation,

for on your rock I have built my faith;

the hidden foundation of my trust will support my walls.

For the walls of Jericho fell

because she had built her trust on the sand.

Moses built a wall in the sea,

because his understanding built it on a rock.

Noah’s foundation was on a rock;

it held up the dwelling of wood in the sea.

Compare the souls that are in me

with the living creatures that were in the ark.

In place of Noah, who mourned in it,

see your altar, mourning and humbled.

In place of the married wives who were in it,

see my virgins, who are unmarried.

In place of Ham, who went out of it and uncovered his father’s nakedness,

see the workers of righteousness, who have fed and clothed apostles.

In my pains, my Lord, I rave in my speech;

do not blame me if my words provoke you!

You put the prosperous to silence when they grumbled;

have mercy on me as on those who were silenced long ago!

Before your wrath came, you made a house of refuge,

and all the nations rebelled against it.

Noah was refreshed with rest,

so that his dwelling would give rest, as his name says.

You closed the doors to save the righteous man;

you opened the floods to destroy the unclean.

Noah stood between the terrible waves outside

and the destroying mouths inside:

the waves tossed him, and the mouths dismayed him.

You made peace for him with those inside;

you brought down before him those outside.

Quickly you changed his troubles,

for hard things are light to you, Lord.

Hear and weigh the comparison between me and Noah,

and though my suffering is light beside his,

let your mercy make our deliverance alike.

For see, my children stand as he did,

between the wrathful and the destroyer.

Lord, give peace among those who are inside,

and humble before me those who are outside,

and give me a double victory!

And since the killer has made his rage threefold,

may he of the three days show me threefold mercy!

Do not let the Evil One overcome your loving-kindness:

since he has attacked me twice and three times, overcome him!

Let my victory fly abroad through the world,

to win you praise in the world!

You who rose on the third day,

do not give us over to death in our third danger!