Ahikar retires from active participation in affairs of state. He turns over his possessions to his treacherous nephew. Here is the amazing story of how a thankless profligate turns forgerer. A clever plot to entangle Ahikar results in his being condemned to death. Apparently the end of Ahikar.
THUS spake Haiqâr, and when he had finished these injunctions and proverbs to Nadan, his sister's son, he imagined that he would keep them all, and he knew not that instead of that he was displaying to him weariness and contempt and mockery.
2 Thereafter Haiqâr sat still in his house and delivered over to Nadan all his goods, and the slaves, and the handmaidens, and the horses, and the cattle, and everything else that he had possessed and gained; and the power of bidding and of forbidding remained in the hand of Nadan.
3 And Haiqâr sat at rest in his house, and every now and then Haiqâr went and paid his respects to the king, and returned home.
4 Now when Nadan perceived that the power of bidding and of forbidding was in his own hand, he despised the position of Haiqâr and scoffed at him, and set about blaming him whenever he appeared, saying, 'My uncle Haiqâr is in his dotage, and he knows nothing now.'
5 And he began to beat the slaves and the handmaidens, and to sell the horses and the camels and be spendthrift with all that his uncle Haiqâr had owned.
6 And when Haiqâr saw that he had no compassion on his servants nor on his household, he arose and chased him from his house, and sent to inform the king that he had scattered his possessions and his provision.
7 And the king arose and called Nadan and said to him: 'Whilst Haiqâr remains in health, no one shall rule over his goods, nor over his household, nor over his possessions.'
8 And the hand of Nadan was lifted off from his uncle Haiqâr and from all his goods, and in the meantime he went neither in nor out, nor did he greet him.
9 Thereupon Haiqâr repented him of his toil with Nadan his sister's son, and he continued to be very sorrowful.
10 And Nadan had a younger brother named Benuzârdân, so Haiqâr took him to himself in place of Nadan, and brought up and honoured him with the utmost honour. And he delivered over to him all that he possessed, and made him governor of his house.
11 Now when Nadan perceived what had happened he was seized with envy and jealousy, and he began to complain to every one who questioned him, and to mock his, uncle Haiqâr, saying: 'My uncle has chased me from his house, and has preferred my brother to me, but if the Most High God give me the power, I shall bring upon him the misfortune of being killed.'
12 And Nadan continued to meditate as to the stumbling-block he might contrive for him.
king and the swordsman arrived the found the table set in order, and the wine and the luxurious viands, and they began eating and drinking till they were gorged and drunken.
45 Then Haiqâr took the swordsman aside apart from the company and said, 'O Abu Samîk, dost thou not know that when Sarhadum the king, the father of Sennacherib, wanted to kill thee, I took thee and hid thee in a certain place till the king's anger subsided and he asked for thee?
46 And when I brought thee into his presence he rejoiced in thee: and now remember the kindness I did thee.
47 And I know that the king will repent him about me and will be wroth with a great wrath about my execution.
48 For I am not guilty, and it shall be when thou shalt present me before him in his palace, thou shalt meet with great good fortune, and know that Nadan my sister's son has deceived me and has done this bad deed to me, and the king will repent of having slain me; and now I have a cellar in the garden of my house, and no one knows of it.
49 Hide me in it with the knowledge of my wife. And I have a slave in prison who deserves to be killed.
50 Bring him out and dress him in my clothes, and command the servants when they are drunk to slay him. They will not know who it is they are killing.
51 And cast away his head a hundred cubits from his body, and give his body to my slaves that they may bury it. And thou shalt have laid up a great treasure with me.
52 And then the swordsman did as Haiqâr had commanded him, and he went to the king and said to him, 'May thy head live for ever!'
53 Then Haiqâr's wife let down to him in the hiding-place every week what sufficed for him, and no one knew of it but herself.
54 And the story was reported and repeated and spread abroad in every place of how Haiqâr the Sage had been slain and was dead, and all the people of that city mourned for him.
55 And they wept and said: 'Alas for thee, O Haiqâr! and for thy learning and thy courtesy! How sad about thee and about thy knowledge! Where can another like thee be found? and where can there be a man so intelligent, so learned, so skilled in ruling as to resemble thee that he may fill thy place?'
56 But the king was repenting about Haiqâr, and his repentance availed him naught.
57 Then he called for Nadan and said to him, 'Go and take thy friends with thee and make a mourning and a weeping for thy uncle Haiqâr, and lament for him as the custom is, doing honour to his memory.'
58 But when Nadan, the foolish, the ignorant, the hardhearted, went to the house of his uncle, he neither wept nor sorrowed nor wailed, but assembled heartless and dissolute people and set about eating and drinking. 1
59 And Nadan began to seize the maidservants and the slaves belonging to Haiqâr, and bound them and tortured them and drubbed them with a sore drubbing.
60 And he did not respect the wife of his uncle, she who had brought him up like her own
boy, but wanted her to fall into sin with him.
61 But Haiqâr had been cut into the hiding-place, and he heard the weeping of his slaves and his neighbours, and he praised the Most High God, the Merciful One, and gave thanks, and he always prayed and besought the Most High God.
62 And the swordsman came from time to time to Haiqâr whilst he was in the midst of the hiding-place: and Haiqâr came and entreated him. And he comforted him and wished him deliverance.
63 And when the story was reported in other countries that Haiqâr the Sage had been slain, all the kings were grieved and despised king Sennacherib, and they lamented over Haiqâr the solver of riddles.
207:1 Compare this account of Nadan's revelry and his beating of the servants with Matthew XXIV. 48-51 and Luke XII. 43-46. You will see that the language of Ahikar has colored one of our Lord's parables.