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Click here to read at earlychurchtexts.com in the original Greek (with dictionary lookup links). The English translation below is by Lowther Clarke.

earlychurchtexts.com

• Is like an electronic encyclopedia of the first five centuries of Church History, with extensive links (subscription version only) to information on around 800 people and themes, and around 230 Church Councils;

• Is a Reader in Early Christian History and Theology with 250+, with over 2,200 printable pages, carefully prepared on-site texts (Greek and/or Latin with English translation alongside) from the first five centuries of the life of the Church. These cover a range of significant themes and represent several authors (a sample text is here and a complete list of on-site texts here). All have dictionary lookup links. There is also an introduction to each text (to help in understanding its context and significance) together with background notes linked with the text, carefully prepared printable versions, a site search engine and many other helpful features;

• Gives easy access to complete Greek and Latin texts which are in the public domain and translations (where found available) from the first five centuries. There are carefully indexed links to authors and their works, including an index of commentaries, homilies etc. by biblical book. Nearly all of the Greek and Latin texts from this period contained in the Migne Patrologia series are covered. Some other sources are also used. The texts used are the scanned versions available at Google Books and elsewhere. A distinctive feature of the Early Church Texts website is that where English translations have been found available online they can easily be read immediately alongside the original Greek and Latin. (A complete list of authors represented is here. A sample text is here.)

Try out the feature rich subscription version of the Early Church Texts website for just $5 for a trial period or $30 for a year ($15 student rate). Click here for more information. Check out the video demo of the site. Click here to go to the Early Church Texts Home Page for the publicly available version of the site which has just the original Greek and Latin texts with dictionary lookup links.

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Relevant books
available at Amazon

Hicks, Jonathan Douglas (2024), Lectures on the Psalms (Ancient Christian Texts), ‎(IVP Academic)

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Hill R. C. (2005), Didymus the Blind: Commentary on Zechariah (Fathers of the Church 111)

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DelCogliano, M., Radde-Gallwitz, A., and Ayres, L., (2012). Works on the Spirit (Popular Patristics Series) Athanasius' four letters to Serapion and Didymus' On The Holy Spirit

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Layton, R.A., 2004. Didymus the Blind and His Circle in Late-Antique Alexandria: Virtue and Narrative in Biblical Scholarship

 

Very many indeed of the men and women who reached perfection in the Church of Alexandria were worthy (to inherit) the land of the meek. Among these was Didymus the blind author. I met him four times in all, visiting him at intervals during a period of ten years. He was 85 years old when he died. He was blind, having lost his sight at the age of four, so he told me, and he had never learned to read nor gone to school. (This was not necessary) for he had nature’s teacher ----his own conscience----strongly developed. He was adorned with such a gift of knowledge, that, so it was said, the passage of scripture was fulfilled in him: “The Lord maketh the blind wise.” For he interpreted the Old and New Testament word by word, and such attention did he pay to doctrine, setting out his exposition of it subtly yet surely, that he surpassed all the ancients in knowledge. Once when he tried to make me say a prayer in his cell and I was unwilling, he told me this story: “Into this cell Antony entered for the third time on a visit to me. I besought him to say a prayer and he instantly knelt down in the cell and did not make me repeat my words, giving me by his action a lesson in obedience. So if you want to follow in the steps of his life, as you seem to, since you are a solitary and living away from home to acquire virtue, lay aside your contentiousness.” And he told me this also: “As I was thinking one day about the life of the wretched Emperor Julian, how he was a persecutor, and was feeling dejected ----and by reason of my thoughts I had not tasted bread even up to late evening----it happened that as I sat in my seat I was overcome by sleep and I saw in a trance white horses running with riders and proclaiming: ‘Tell Didymus, to-day at the seventh hour Julian died. Rise then and eat,’ they said, ‘and send to Athanasius the bishop, that he too may know,’ And I marked,” he said, “the hour and month and week and day, and it was found to be so.”