It was impossible to strip off him the skin garment wherewith he was clothed, and we were therefore obliged to roll him up in cloth like a bundle and to bury him in that state.
To this man came the blessed Pachomius, and told him to cut down this fig-tree, and when Yâwnân heard this, he said unto Rabbâ, “Nay, O father, for we are accustomed to gather a large crop of fruit from this fig-tree for the brethren”; now although Rabbâ was greatly grieved because of this matter he did not wish to urge the old gardener any further, and he was the more grieved because he knew that Yâwnân lived a great and marvellous life, and that he was held to be wonderful by many, and by great and small alike. And it came to pass on the day following that the fig-tree was found to have become withered so completely that not one soft leaf or fruit was found upon it. Now when the blessed man saw these things, he was greatly grieved, not for the sake of the fig-tree, but because of his own disobedience, when Rabbâ told him to cut down the fig-tree, and he did not act according to his word.
Chapter xvij: Of how Abba Pachomius would not keep Beautiful Buildings
THE blessed man Pachomius built an oratory in his monastery, and he made pillars [for it], and covered the faces thereof with tiles, and he furnished it beautifully, and he was exceedingly pleased with the work because he had built it well; and when he had come to himself he declared, through the agency of Satan, that the beauty of the oratory was a thing which would compel a man to admire it, and that the building thereof would be praised. Then suddenly he rose up, and took ropes, and fastened them round the pillars, and he made a prayer within himself, and commanded the brethren to help him, and they bowed their bodies, and the pillars and the whole construction fell [to the ground]; and he said to the brethren, “Take heed lest ye strive to ornament the work of your hands overmuch, and take ye the greatest possible care that the grace of God and His gift may be in the work of each one of you, so that the mind may not stumble towards the praises of cunning wickedness, and the Calumniator may not obtain [his] prey.”
