Testament of Simeon

Chapter 2

  1. 1 Hearken, my children, to Simeon your father, And I will declare unto you what things I have in my heart.
  2. 2 I was born of Jacob as my father's second son; And my mother Leah called me Simeon, Because the Lord had heard her prayer.
  3. 3 Moreover, I became strong exceedingly; I shrank from no achievement, Nor was I afraid of ought.
  4. 4 For my heart was hard, And my liver was immovable, And my bowels without compassion.
  5. 5 Because valour also has been given from the Most High to men in soul and body. For in the time of my youth I was jealous in many things of Joseph, because my father loved him beyond
  6. 7 all. And I set my mind against him to destroy him, because the prince of deceit sent forth the spirit of jealousy and blinded my mind, so that I regarded him not as a brother, nor did I spare even
  7. 8 Jacob my father. But his God and the God of his fathers sent forth His angel, and delivered him
  8. 9 out of my hands. For when I went to Shechem to bring ointment for the flocks, and Reuben to Dothan, where were our necessaries and all our stores, Judah my brother sold him to the Ishmaelites.
  9. 10 And when Reuben heard these things he was grieved, for he wished to restore him to his father.
  10. 11 But on hearing this I was exceedingly wroth against Judah in that he let him go away alive, and
  11. 12 for five months I continued wrathful against him. But the Lord restrained me, and withheld from
  12. 13 me the power of my hands; for my right hand was half withered for seven days. And I knew, my children, that because of Joseph this had befallen me, and I repented and wept; and I besought the Lord God that my hand might be restored, and that I might hold aloof from all pollution and envy
  13. 14 and from all folly. For I knew that I had devised an evil thing before the Lord and Jacob my father, on account of Joseph my brother, in that I envied him.