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The Church Fathers · c. 465–475
The Life of Shenoute
Besa
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What it is
Written by Shenoute's successor: the miracles, the journeys, the confrontations with officials, and an old man who could be heard arguing with God. It is frank about how frightening he was to live under.
Why it lasted
The principal Coptic saint's life and the model for the genre in Egypt, preserving a portrait of monastic authority far harsher than the Greek desert literature admits.
Scripture it works from
Where to read it
Public domain and free to read in full, though not held here. The archives below have it.
These open a search on each archive rather than a direct link, which is the honest way to point at an edition nobody here has checked line by line.
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