Scholarship on Letter: ENA 4045.9

Recto, main text

1. [...on the package at] the top of the container [there was a note]

2. in my handwriting, on which was written: “I found this package. I don’t know who

3. deposited it with me. It will remain until its claimant arrives.” Consequently,

4. the community knew that it belonged to your excellency. I swear by He who created me

5. and created you and by He who decreed my safety on sea and land, where

6. I traveled and arrived safely—I had not been informed and

7. had no knowledge that it belonged to your excellency. No doubt you, my lord, laid it aside in

8. the warehouse, as you were accustomed to do, for the warehouse

9. was at your disposal and no one denied you access to it. No doubt the slave

10. threw the package in the container. I, your servant, know nothing about this.

11. And your excellency did not call attention to it among the things that you had mentioned, and I, your servant, had no knowledge

12. that it was yours. And when your excellency traveled to Barūṣ, I searched

13. the container and found the package and wondered to whom it belongs. Therefore,

14. I wrote a note and left it inside. I, your servant, traveled and did not—

15. I swear by God!—open the package and did not see what was in it, because it was

16. bound by a rope—even if I, your servant, should have snatched

17. it when I had that trouble.

18. But God did not let me derive any blessing or wealth from it, either in this world or in the hereafter.

19. Your excellency only said these words, no doubt, because I

20. had dropped in your esteem, because of my trouble. And I, your servant—far be it

21. from your excellency!—I don’t believe that you are capable of such a thing, not even

22. in your innermost thoughts. Men may suffer, my lord, from injury and leprosy

23. and the like. There is no escaping what God has decreed,

24. nor anything to do, my lord, about intentions. Concealed acts concern the Lord our God; the overt acts [concern us], etc.

25. My lord, a man cannot praise himself.

26. But the foreigners traveling to Egypt and others know

27. about everything. As to the package of clothing, the late Sheikh

28. Maḥrūz  acquired it at a reduced price from the man who collected its proceeds from my sons.

29. Likewise, your esteemed letter (to me) and letters to my sons reached me.

30. And they contained harsh words from your excellency. But my lord is absolved of any blame,

31. for I, your servant, could not have written this letter unless there remained

32. no grudge whatsoever against [you] in my heart. And you are absolved of blame in the broadest

33. sense of the word, //in this world and the hereafter,// with a pure heart. Likewise, when you write an answer to me, your servant,

34. you should consider me forgiven in this world and in the hereafter. To err is only human.

35. By God, my lord, my master, [I, your servant,] was saddened

36. by the paucity of your letters and [. . .]

Recto, right margin

1. Written on the last day of Rajab,

2. year forty-seven.}