Prayer from Delphi
(became the Prayer of the Salamanders)
Ineffable father of the immortals, eternal, adept,
lord, borne upon the ethereal widths of the ever-changing
worlds, where the might of your Power is established,
you who beholds all and hears all with your beauteous ears,
hear your children, whom you bore when the time was right.
For your great, golden, eternal Power lies
above the world and the starry heaven.
Above this Power you are exalted, raising yourself in light,
by ceaseless streams nursing Nous, your equivalent,
who then conceives all, elaborating the imperishable matter,
which appears to be its creation, for Thou bound all with seals.
From Nous flow the generations of the holy lords
around you, o you almighty king and sole father
of the mortals and of the blessed immortals. Other generations
come from you but are apart from you, carrying everything
under the orders of Thy first-born Nous and Thy Power.
In addition, you created another, third generation of lords,
who continuously address songs to you, praising you
according to your will, and sing eternally.
You are the father, the splendid beauty of the mother
the delicate flower of the parents, the beauty within the forms,
the soul, the spirit, the harmony and the numeral.
A theological oracle of Apollo (from Delphi, Didyma or Claros) from Late Antiquity. It was included in a lost work of Porphyri named “De Philosophia ex Oraculis Haurienda.”
