From the book
The Manly Hall Manuscript Collection, Volume I
Attributed to Abraham the Jew · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordScriptural miracles supply figures, indications, and testimonies through which the writer explains purification, renewal, multiplication, and the Eucharist.
- In the bookHealing waters, oil and grain, a restored child, a transformed rod, manna, Cana, and multiplied food are brought into the account. Their roles differ and some details are combined or altered.
- TranslationThe English translates this witness’s wording and quantities. Biblical parallels identify comparisons without silently making the manuscript conform to a standard narrative.
- A place to readRead 127v–128r, scans 290–291, for the concentrated sequence, then 130r, scan 295, for the argument about figures and sacramental reality.
Meaning
A miracle in this exposition can serve as an image or anticipatory testimony of a mystery. The writer relates changes of substance, multiplying nourishment, healing, and restored life to the powers of the stone and to the sacrament of the altar. The terms figure, indication, testimony, and reality must remain distinct.
Multiplication has several settings. A reported natural preparation multiplies; biblical food supplies a miracle of abundance; Eucharistic doctrine concerns the sacrament. Their connection is the writer’s argument, whose particular comparisons should be inspected rather than replaced with one general equivalence.
Use in the book
On 37r, scan 99, the renewing bath is compared with Naaman’s seven immersions and with the pool stirred by an angel. Those belong to different biblical healing accounts. The manuscript combines them while defining the emblem’s blood as mercurial, sulfurous, or metallic spirits. The comparison concerns purification and healing, and its transmitted combination remains visible.248
On 127v, scan 290, enjoyment of the blessed tree and divine nectar is said to anticipate future blessedness. The author then praises the Eucharist’s power in every age and invokes the ancient philosophers of the first testament. He introduces multiplication of oil and grain by Elisha and the raising of the Naamatite woman’s son. The name Naamatite is preserved with a note comparing the Shunammite narrative; it is not quietly corrected in the translation.
On 128r, scan 291, the prophet’s limbs are placed against the child’s limbs. The narrative comparison with Elisha’s restoration of the Shunammite’s son is clear enough to locate while the source’s name remains distinct. The writer next invokes Moses’ rod becoming a serpent and devouring the others, and manna kept in the tabernacle with whatever taste was desired. He gathers transformation, overcoming, preservation, and nourishment as signs of the same elevated mystery.249
Christ is then named both author and prophet of the mystery. Cana’s change of water to wine and the limitless multiplication of one loaf and one or two small fish are said to leave certain signs. The manuscript’s numbers differ from the familiar Gospel feeding accounts. Its wording is retained because the essay explains how this witness makes the comparison, not a reconstructed Gospel quotation.250
The passage amplifies the sacrament’s majesty through angelic awe and the limits of speech. This rhetorical force belongs to the author’s argument for belief. It should be described as his response to a hidden mystery, rather than treated as a separate evidential account of a material operation.
On 130r, scan 295, the miracles of Elisha, Moses, and Christ return in a polemic about figures of the sacrament. The writer asks whether they could become figures of figures if the sacrament were merely a representation. He expressly says that created nature is a visible, sensible type of invisible things and is not Christ himself. The distinction is decisive: nature’s figurative capacity is used to support, rather than replace, the asserted sacramental reality.
The same side invokes what the Son, Father, and Holy Spirit could accomplish through a single word, then dwells upon Christ’s words as spirit and life. The miracle sequence consequently supports more than a theme of abundance. It leads toward an argument about divine agency, effective speech, and the relation of sign to reality.
The lexicon follows these different functions through the passages. A healing comparison, a transformed rod, a preserved food, a multiplication, and a returned life may meet in the author’s sacramental exposition without becoming indistinguishable events. Preserving their names, quantities, and occasional conflations lets the reader examine both the shared argument and the witness’s particulars.
Places to read
- Manuscript 37r · Scan 99Healing waters are combined within the bath’s metallic interpretation.
- Manuscript 127v · Scan 290Oil, grain, and a restored child introduce concentrated sacramental testimonies.
- Manuscript 128r · Scan 291Rod, manna, Cana, and multiplied food extend the sequence.
- Manuscript 130r · Scan 295The miracles return in the distinction between figures and sacramental reality.
Translation
Miracles, multiplication, and manna follow miracles, multiplication, and manne. Elisha and Moses are customary English forms. Naamatite retains the source’s designation while the note compares the Shunammite account. The one loaf and one or two fish likewise remain the manuscript’s quantities.
Figures of figures follows the polemical phrase figures des figures. The English preserves the explicit statement that created nature is not Christ himself. A reader can therefore follow the author’s use of natural images without attributing to him an identity that this passage rejects.
miracles
Attested: H001-S295. The miracles return in the argument about figures of the sacrament.
multiplication
Attested: H001-S290; H001-S291. The word concerns biblical abundance within the sacramental exposition.
manne
Attested: H001-S291. Manna supplies preservation and desired nourishment as a testimony.
Source note
Compare 2 Kings 5:10–14 and John 5:2–9 with its stirred-pool textual tradition. The manuscript combines distinct healing accounts on scan 99.
Compare 2 Kings 4:1–7 for oil, 4:32–37 for the restored Shunammite child, and 4:42–44 for multiplied barley loaves. The witness’s Naamatite designation and its combined wording are retained. The manuscript attributes the swallowing rod to Moses; Exodus 7:10–12 attributes that act to Aaron’s staff. See also Exodus 16:32–34 for preserved manna; Wisdom 16:20–21 supplies the desired-taste comparison.
Compare John 2:1–11 for Cana and Matthew 14:13–21 for feeding the multitude. This witness says one loaf and one or two small fish; the Gospel comparison does not authorize silently replacing those quantities.