All language subtitles for THE BIRTH OF A NATION. Episode 4. Docudrama. English Subtitles. Russian History. (inglés)

With the Financial Support of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation

The Russian Military and Historical Society

present

The Birth of a Nation

He wanted to be the strongest but became the weakest.

Korsun, 988

He wanted to be the first but he became the last.

He was sure that he is in command of his own life.

But now he had no idea what tomorrow would bring. He went blind.

The creator of the universe,

the almighty God was standing by the doors of his stone-hard heart

waiting for the bandit, traitor and murderer Prince Vladimir to hear him.

Episode Four. The Sun

The Prince Vladimir of Kiev always got what he wished for

by any means. Nothing could stop him. At the age of 18,

"he took the power in Kiev; at 20, he joined the divided lands of Rus together

"under his wing; he also added the new ones and created a huge state."

In eight years, he carried out ten victorious campaigns

and even surpassed his father, a famous warrior.

At the age of 27, he had never been defeated.

He succeeded in everything that he was doing. He was unbeatable.

Rus had never been faring better. He got the gods of the sky,

the earth and the sun in his courtyard. He arranged grandioso sacrifices

and was the higher priest himself.

When he was already hitting the heaven

with his head being at the top of power and authority,

after a number of great victories he suffered a terrible defeat.

A common soldier won over the Prince. He was a Varangian.

Theodore decided to die

but not let his son be sacrificed to the pagan gods.

Theodore differed from the rest by being a Christian.

It meant that the crucified God of the Christians was giving those

who believed in Him incredible strength –

strength unknown to the pagans.

The time of the old gods was nearing its end.

The new time was demanding faith in one single God.

By the end of the 10th century Rus was almost the only pagan country in Eurasia.

To the south east of the Kiev Rus the world of Islam stretched.

To the east lied the lands of Khazars who were Jewish conquered by Svyatoslav.

To the west Rus bordered West Christianity.

"The Danish King Harald the “Bluetooth” was baptized in 960;"

Prince Mieszko I of Poland - in 966,

the same year as Boleslaw II the Pious Duke of Bohemia.

In another 12 years, former nomads the Hungarians became West Christians.

To the south of Rus there was Byzantium,

the cradle of the Western Christianity. To the south-west,

Bulgaria and Serbia accepted Christian faith from Byzantium.

Korsun, 988

Vladimir had the traders spreading the news across the adjoining lands

that the Prince of Kiev was ready to abolish paganism.

Now he was awaiting emissaries from each power

to try and covert him into their faith.

Vladimir was not in a hurry.

He knew that his choice would influence the fate of his country.

First, the Bulgars of Muhammad faith came.

They said: “You are wise and clever but you don’t know the law.

Believe in our law and kneel before Muhammad.”

Vladimir listened attentively to imams from the Volga Bulgaria.

He questioned them about the Sharia law.

Both the court and Vladimir knew

that belief in Allah was the faith of the winners.

The Prince liked the simplicity of the Muslim faith

but he didn’t like the ban on pork and wine.

The imams were stupefied by the frivolity of the Prince.

It was only an excuse.

The great khagan of all the Slavs just didn’t want someone else’s faith,

so different in culture and customs, so unlike the life of his people.

Violent and passionate faith of the Muslims

born in the hot Arabian sands was unsuitable for the forest lands of Rus.

"Then the Germans came from Rome; "

they claimed that they came as emissaries of the Pope.

“For our faith is the light. We worship God,

who has made heaven and earth, the stars, the moon,

and every breathing creature.”

Vladimir was cautious when he heard

that the Pope was supposed to be the mediator between him and God.

He wouldn’t accept someone else’s interfering in the earthly affairs.

However, he wanted to understand the essence of the Christian faith.

So, Vladimir straight away inquired what their teaching was.

Missionaries heard about the unsuccessful Muslims.

So, they offered what was most attractive to him from their point of view:

"Fast according to your strength.

Whatever one eats or drinks is all to the glory of God,

as our teacher Paul has said."

Vladimir was disappointed.

And he refused them without giving a reason.

"Vladimir answered: "Go on your way; our fathers don’t accept such principles".

Thus, he politely hinted on how his father Svyatoslav

drove the embassy of Pope away from Kiev.

The Jewish Khazars heard of those missions, and came too saying:

"We have learned that Bulgars and Christians came hither

to tell you about their faiths. The Christians believe in him

whom we crucified, but we believe in the one God

of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.''

Arrogance of the wise Rabbis made Vladimir quiver.

He knew something about the fate of the Jewish people.

So, he asked the most painful question: "Where is your native land?"

The Jews replied that it was in Jerusalem.

Vladimir pressed on ruthlessly: "Are you sure it’s there?"

Rabbis had to painfully admit that the Jews had no land.

"God got angry with our forefathers, and scattered us around the world."

"How can you teach others if you yourselves are cast out

and scattered abroad by the hand of God?

Do you expect us to accept that fate too?"

Kiev Prince was not interested in the peculiarities

of the oldest religion or the relationship of God with his people.

Israel died under the Roman heel. Rus conquered the Jewish Khazaria.

The Jewish belief belonged in the past.

Vladimir wanted the religion of the future.

Then the Greeks sent a philosopher to Vladimir who spoke thus:

"If you desire to hear the story,

I shall tell you from the beginning why God descended to the Earth."

The Byzantine philosopher didn’t speak of the rituals and law.

Instead he unravelled for the Prince of Kiev an incredible prophecy

about the coming of Christ, the son of God.

He recited the Gospel as if he was there with Jesus himself.

Listening to the philosopher,

Vladimir began to understand a little about the Christians.

But the most important thing remained uncomprehensive.

How was that possible? God was all mighty and infinite.

How could he be so weak to let himself be executed

and suffer a long and shameful death?

Could he really die?

The Greek responded: “God is almighty.“

It was quiet in the hall.

Vladimir kept silent for a long time.

He was thinking hard and painfully.

Finally, he told the philosopher that he put all his words in his heart.

Still, he needed more time to think and to take council,

to test different faiths.

Nobody knew that Vladimir had already approved a decision.

However, everything had to be done in a way to demonstrate

that it wasn't the Prince's personal choice

but the collective will of his statemen.

Vladimir went on with his many-steps game

that was called “The Testing of the Faiths”.

Vladimir summoned his nobles and the city elders, and said to them:

"What is your opinion on this matter, what will you answer?"

The nobles and the elders replied:

"Prince, no man condemns what is his but praises it instead.

If you desire to be sure, you have servants at your disposal.

Send them to inquire about the rituals of each people

and see how they worships God."

Vladimir dispatched his emissaries to the Volga Bulgars,

the Holy Roman Empire and Byzantium.

Emissaries had to attend the Muslim,

Western and Eastern Christianity ceremonies and to describe their impressions.

He appointed Olaf Tryggvason a head of his emissaries in Constantinople.

And it wasn’t accidental.

Vladimir knew that Olaf didn't believe either in Gods or spirits

and that he was imdifferent to the external beauty of the services.

Impressions of the emissaries exceeded Vladimir’s expectations.

"Then we went to the Greek land,

and they led us to the edifices where they worship their God,

and we knew not whether we were in heaven or on the Earth.

For on the Earth we never saw such splendour or such beauty,

and we are at a loss about how to describe it. We only know that there,

their God is with the people and their services are more impressive

than the rituals of the other nations, for we can’t forget that beauty.

After tasting something sweet, one is unwilling

to have something bitter. Therefore, we can’t bear coming back".

The Christ has resurrected!

"Then the nobles spoke and said, "If the Greek faith was bad,

your grandmother Olga wouldn’t adopt it

for she was the wisest of all the people".

It was exactly what Vladimir wanted to hear.

He knew what service what impress them the most.

No city both in the Volga Bulgaria and in Germany

had such grandioso temples that could be compared

to St. Sophia in Constantinople.

The St. Sophia Cathedral in Constantinople was built

in the time of Emperor Justinian in the sixth century;

in the course of a thousand years, until the St. Paul Cathedral

was erected in Rome, it remained the biggest temple of the Christian world.

It is 75 m long and 68 m wide. In that space,

150 Kiev homes and no less than 400 pagan heathens could be placed.

The distance from the floor to the top part was over 55 m.

The diameter of the dome was 31 m. The entire space was full of light.

The marble of the walls and the mosaics on the golden background,

the columns made of malachite and green jasper,

expensive decorations with precious stones,

and cloaks of the clergy embroidered with gold.

There were 500 people working in the Cathedral.

The Empire of Byzantium was the most powerful of the European countries.

It had held strong for over 500 years

and relied heavily on the Orthodox Christianity.

It was just the sort of leverage that Vladimir needed.

But he wanted to receive the faith not like a donation from the Empire,

not even as a gift but as a trophy.

The timing for that was just perfect.

Byzantium was at a difficult war with the Arabs and Bulgarians

and suffered from the civil war.

Their Emperor’s affairs were in a poor state.

The civil war in Byzantium was a ten-year long revolt

which took place at the beginning of the reign

of the Emperor Basil II Bulgar Slayer.

The unrest was instigated by the two high-ranking army leaders

Bardas Sclerus and Bardas Phocas.

On the 14th of September, Bardas Phocas openly proclaimed himself

Emperor and headed his army to march towards Constantinople.

All provincial nobles followed him. They saw him as their own emperor.

By the end of the year Phocas controlled the eastern part of the Empire,

all sea ports of Asia Minor

and was prepared to take full control over Constantinople.

“Emperor Basil II was concerned about Bardas Phocas

because of the size of his army. He feared he might be defeated.

His riches have thinned out. So, he had to send for Vladimir,

the Prince of Kiev asking for help in his current situation.”

According to the agreement of 971 concluded by Svyatoslav

and John I Tzimiskes, Rus was a war ally of the Empire.

An entire embassy arrived in Kiev, together with the philosopher.

They had to get military support from Vladimir

which they needed like never before.

Vladimir knew well about the civil war in Byzantium

and about the desperate position of the Emperor.

He told the ambassadors that he would provide help

only if the Emperor allowed him to marry his sister Princess Anna.

Ambassadors were terrified.

That condition was impossible to fulfil under any circumstances.

"If at some point someone out of the non-Christian

and evil northern tribes asks about becoming relatives

through a marriage with Basil or wants to marry his son to Basil’s daughter

or his daughter to Basil’s son, he shall decline such a silly request.”

Anna was not just a Princess but Porphyrogenita,

that means she was born in Porohyry Chamber,

a special pavilion of the Emperor’s Palace

where children of the ruling emperor were born.

Porphyrogenita-born princes and princesses possessed a special aura

of the sacred glory.

It was believed that their destinies were mysteriously linked

to the life of the Empire.

Therefore, they could not leave its borders.

The only one and much-loved Emperor’s sister Anna

was no more accessible than a moon.

The best grooms of Europe proposed to her,

including the son of the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.

And all of them got a refusal.

And now Basil II had to hand her over to the northern barbarian,

well-known for the lust for women?

But to refuse the Prince of Kiev meant a “no”

to so much needed military support for Byzantium.

If he got a Porphyrogenita Princess for a wife, Prince Vladimir

would not only enter the highest society of the European rulers.

He would be at the very top of the hierarchy…

He, the son of a slave who shamefully fled from his own brother ten years ago...

…and until recently was the ruler of just three towns

in a wild forest country… in the European backwaters.

Obviously that marriage was not possible while the Prince of Kiev was a pagan.

Vladimir expressed his readiness to be baptized.

So, he was now awaiting a response from Constantinople.

The response came very quickly. It caused absolute astonishment.

Emperor Basil II accepted Prince Vladimir’s terms.

He agreed to marry his sister off to him.

He agreed to become his remote godfather.

He agreed to send the priest and a bishop to Kiev.

He agreed to everything in order to get the military support.

His beloved sister Princess Anna was just a bargaining chip.

Some time ago the Greeks tricked his father Prince Svyatoslav

which cost him his life.

Vladimir had no intention to repeat anyone’s mistakes.

He worked everything out beforehand

and was going to use centuries of the art of deceit

that the Byzantine diplomacy had developed to his advantage.

In execution of the deal, Vladimir sent military help to Emperor Basil II,

his future in-law and godfather.

"When a decision on the marriage between them was taken,

the troops from Rus came and joined the troops of the Greeks

that Tsar Basil had. Together, they went against Bardas Phocas

by the sea and land. And they did defeat Phocas."

The Russian forces helped the Greeks change the outcome of the civil war.

Now emperor had to fulfil his promises.

Vladimir waited for the arrival of Princess Anna,

the daughter and sister of the Byzantine emperors of the Macedonian dynasty…

his future wife number six.

But spring came and went, then summer, then autumn,

but the bride was still absent.

By the end of the autumn Vladimir realized that he was tricked.

Greeks got the Russian army but they were not in a rush

to fulfil their side of the deal.

Anna rejected Vladimir just like the proud Rogneda did in her time.

It was an insult that only blood could wash off.

It meant that Vladimir could finally finish his clever game

with a powerful and spectacular accord.

To use weapons to get something from Byzantium what he wanted.

The Prince of Kiev attacked Korsun, the northern gates of the empire,

the main fortress and stronghold of the Crimea.

The town which the people of Rus called Korsun

was called Kherson in Byzantium, and it was originally called Chersonesus;

this word derived from the Greek word meaning "a peninsula"

because it was founded in the 5th century B.C. as an ancient Greek colony.

In 10 A. D., Chersonesus was a mighty fortress considered inaccessible.

It had the Black Sea on its north; to the east of it,"

there was an inlet now known as the Quarantine Bay of Sevastopol;

to the west - the bay which is now called the Streletskaya Bay.

The town was surrounded by the stone walls up to 15 m high

and from 3 to 10 meters wide.

In the most dangerous areas, an additional protective wall was erected.

From the time of its founding and until the end of the 10th century,

Chersonesus suffered many sieges but had never been conquered.

Vladimir approached Korsun with a big army –

about 6,000 people on 200 boats.

He could see that the town wouldn’t fall under siege.

The Russians were good in close combat.

The warriors under his command won many open battles.

But they were ill-equipped to storm the high stone walls and towers.

Vladimir ordered to construct an earthwork in the direction of the city.

The Greeks dug a tunnel under the city wall

through which they were stealing the earth the Russians were digging out

and carried it back into the city.

In six months, the town was still standing.

Finally, the Prince used the tested method.

If the enemy didn’t surrender, the treason might be the way.

“Then a man of Kherson shot an arrow on which he had written:

"There are springs behind you to the east

from which water flows in pipes. Dig down and cut them off."

Vladimir gave orders straight away to dig down to the pipes.

After six months of exhausting siege

the residents could not count on the mercy of the winners.

As was customarily, Vladimir let his army ransack the city.

The warriors robed, raped and killed.

They destroyed and burned everything in their path.

It was their right, the eternal right of war.

No ruler could stop them.

But it didn’t continue for long.

Vladimir didn’t come to take what belonged to somebody.

He came to make them give what belonged to him.

Only one more step separated him from his most grandiose,

splendid and glorious victory.

Upon finding out about the fall of Korsun

and seeing that Vladimir meant what he had threatened,

the Emperor decided not to play with fire.

The fate of Princess Anna was sealed.

She, a gentle angel, Porphyrogenita Princess

was to leave her homeland for good.

She was leaving its blue sky, fragrant gardens,

marble of her palaces for a cold country of gloomy impenetrable forests.

Anna was adamant that she would rather die than go to Rus.

But her brother the Emperor was determined.

"Through you, God may turn the land of Rus to repentance,

and you will relieve Greece from the danger of a terrible war."

She turned her face to St. Sophia and began to weep uttering a prayer:

"Oh Lord, do not be silent to my tears. Protect me oh Lord

and take me under your wing. You are the Almighty.

You’re the honour and glory. Forever and ever. Amen."

The Prince of Kiev Vladimir could be triumphant.

Without exaggeration, it was the biggest victory of his life.

He arrived at the warm sea to the gates of a millennium-old

Eastern Roman Empire, and he crushed the gates with his heel.

He wished to marry the most sought-after woman in the world

and she was soon to become his wife.

Prince Vladimir’s glory and his might exceeded all limits.

And nothing under the sun could stop him.

What did that man feel when his eyesight became dim?

What did that ruler feel when he became a powerless blind?

Rumours about Vladimir’s rowdiness and cruelty prepared Anne for the worst.

But when a week later at sea the boat moored in Korsun,

she saw a pitiful blind man in front of her.

The great Prince of Kiev was a warrior,

so even now he didn’t expect any mercy from his fate or from people.

When he heard Anna’s quiet voice in total darkness,

it was a voice of a person who felt sorry for him.

And it was the first time in Vladimir’s life.

A quiet voice of an invisible woman.

The rustling of her silk garment.

A faint smell of unknown flowers.

Gentle touch, like that of a butterfly’s wing.

He wanted to touch her but he could not even move.

He believed her instantly and unconditionally,

the way one believes in childhood.

Three times, a Greek priest dipped the Prince into baptismal font.

After the third time, the light poured back into Vladimir’s eyes.

But it was another kind of light. And very different eyes.

He didn’t realize straight away that he could see again.

More important for him was a sudden realization

of what the Christian faith was about all along.

God - crucified, buried and risen.

Impossible and undoubted.

God who conquered death by death.

He looked at Vladimir and He beckoned.

How Vladimir understood the obscure Greek writing.

He read those words with his embittered and bleeding heart.

"Come to Me, all you who labour and carry a heavy burden,

and I will give you relief".

Yesterday’s conqueror wandered about ancient Korsun.

Just yesterday, it was foreign and menacing.

Today, it became his motherland.

The place of birth of a new person - God’s slave Basil.

Clouds of the burning incense were sparkling in the air.

Vladimir kept glancing at the bride.

He could clearly see the light emanating from her face as if from an angel.

"And he saw the fair face of the Princess. And he kissed her.

And he married her and he loved her most of all, as she was loved by God.

And because of this miracle, most of the court got baptized too”.

Vladimir and Anna lived together in love and agreement for many years.

Even death could not part them. Vladimir took care of it beforehand.

He brought two marble sarcophagi from Korsun.

In 22 years, their coffins were put side by side

in the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin in Kiev,

erected at the site of death of the first Christian martyrs Theodor and John,

in the heart of the new Christian Rus.

"Upon arrival in Kiev, Vladimir ordered all the idols to be thrown away;

some were cut to pieces and others burned with fire.

He ordered that Perun should be tied to a horse's tail

and dragged down Borichev to the stream.

He appointed twelve men To beat the idol with sticks

and cast it into the Dnieper.

"Vladimir gave them an instruction: "If it halts anywhere,

then push it off the bank until it gets carried away by the rapids.

Then you may leave it.”

Execution and casting-out of the wooden idols was a pagan ritual,

well-known and understood by all and thus effective.

Every year in every village the scarecrow of the Mardi Gras,

Kostroma, Kupava, or Jarylo were ceremonially destroyed.

It was a way of saying good bye to the winter till the next spring.

The weeping for the death of the deities

meant feeling sorry for their departure into the afterlife.

According to an old tradition, a river was the main route into the afterlife.

When Perun made his way from Kiev,

its residents were expected to say good bye to it

and the other idols, just as they used to do it before.

However, that time it was not for some time - it was for good.

On the hill where the idol of Perun and the other gods were standing

and where the Prince and his people had been offering sacrifices,

Vladimir founded the Church of St. Basil.

He began to found churches and to assign priests in all cities

and to encourage people in all the cities and villages to baptize.

The next step was the conversion of the Prince’s sons

and all members of his family.

Everyone could come and watch the amazing ceremony.

The Princes were baptized at the mouth of Dnieper and the Pochayna River.

It was later called Khreschatyk.

They all adopted new Christian names.

"Svyatopolk was called Pyotr; Yaroslav - Georgiy;

"Mstislav – Konstantin; Boris – Roman and Gleb – David."

All these names were frequently used in the family of the Byzantine Emperors.

The Prince of Kiev now considered himself a part of it.

"Thereafter Vladimir sent heralds about the entire city

to proclaim that if any inhabitant, rich, poor or a slave,

failed to get to the river tomorrow, he or she would become his enemy.

The next day, the Prince went forth to the Dnieper

with the priests of the Princess and those from Korsun,

and a countless multitude assembled.

They all went into the water: some stood up to their necks,

the younger ones were near the bank,

some of people were holding infants in their arms,

while the adults were wading farther out.

The priests stood by and offered prayers.

There was joy in heaven and upon earth to behold so many souls saved.”

The main argument in favor of the new faith was the Prince himself –

reborn and changed after the baptism.

He accepted his new faith genuinely and warmly,

and he didn’t separate his personal destiny from that of his nation.

He baptized himself and he baptized Rus.

Soon Vladimir sent ambassadors to Constantinople

and gave the town of Chersonesus back as a “veno”,

a dowry traditional for the Slavs.

He let his harem free after taking care of each concubine and wife.

He married all of them off with a decent dowry.

He built a multitude of temples.

Foreign guests would later be amazed by the abundance of stone churches

in the predominantly forest-covered land.

Archbishop Leon arrived from Constantinople

which raised the Russian eparchy to the rank of a metropolitan.

He founded schools and set the foundation of the literary culture.

One generation later, that seed brought the shoots:

presbyter named Hilarion, Yakov Mnikh,

followed by Nestor the Chronicler and Daniil Zatochnik.

Those people laid the foundation of the great ancient Rus literature.

He brought numerous icon-painters and architects from Byzantine

which gave great boost to the ancient art of Rus.

He amazed his contemporaries with the span of his generosity.

From that time on, anyone could attend the legendary feasts

of Prince Vladimir, without exception.

For the poor and needy it was literally a way to avoid a hungry death.

If a person was too ill to reach the Prince’s court,

drinks and food were delivered to his home,

and not only in Kiev but in other towns as well.

Keeping to the commandment “thou shalt not kill”,

Vladimir abolished death penalty even for the dangerous criminals.

The top clergy of the church had to persuade Vladimir

to punish the criminals and to take sin upon his soul

in the name of peace and prosperity in the state that God entrusted him.

He held the Pechenegs off for many years to come.

Along the bordering in the steppe, he continued to build a long border line.

He erected a chain of mighty castles

and populated those lands with the Northerners.

He also erected the watchtowers and built town gates.

These war reforms defined the strategy of Rus

for fighting in the steppes for hundreds of years to come.

Through dynastical marriages of his numerous children

he firmly secured his place as one of the top Christian rulers of Europe.

And one generation later, Metropolitan Hilarion proudly and rightly wrote:

"And they did not reign in a poor and unknown land

but in Rus which is known and celebrated everywhere in the Earth."

The harder the heart ache, the hotter his prayer was.

By the end of his life,

Prince found that solitude was weighting him down like a solid.

He windowed four years ago and lost two of his elder sons –

Izyaslav and Vysheslav.

And the middle ones were big trouble.

Svyatopolk was in Turov, married to a Polish queen

and planned an upheaval against his father

with the support of his father-in-law, the Polish king.

However, he was captured and imprisoned.

Yaroslav, Prince of Novgorod suddenly refused to pay the usual tribute to Kiev.

It meant open opposition to the rule of Kiev and the Prince of Kiev.

Vladimir realized he had to attack Novgorod and his own son Yaroslav

to prevent further uprisings from his governors and generals,

to prevent general unrest and to prevent the division of the state.

He ordered to clear the roads for his trip to Novgorod

in a hope that it would scare Yaroslav.

Yaroslav got indeed afraid and brought the Varangian warriors

from across the sea, essentially repeating the story of Vladimir

of his younger years.

The son and his father were preparing for war.

Any outcome would be equally tragic.

Vladimir would have to kill his own son

or burden him with the sin of patricide.

Lord, merciful father! Commemorate me!

You brought me into this world, and I found you,

the Creator of all creatures. I’m wandering in the darkness,

and the Devil was seducing me. Honour me with your baptizing.

Father, believe me, for I did what I did from because I was evil.

I don’t want to die like cattle. Make me obey you and bless me.

Glory to you, Lord, and glory to the Father, and the Son,

and the Holy Spirit.

If you want to punish me, punish me yourself.

Don’t hand me over to the demons. Glory to you, Lord!"

God did not please the devil.

“Vladimir died on July 15. When the people heard of this,

they assembled in multitude and mourned him,

the nobles as the defender of their country,

the poor as their protector and benefactor.

They put him in a marble coffin, and buried the body of the holy Prince

amid their mourning.”

People of Kiev considered Vladimir a saint right after this death.

In about 300 years, in 14th century he was officially proclaimed one.

And up until now the Orthodox and Catholic Churches

consider his icons equal to those of the apostles.

However, that would happen later.

The Gospel from John, Chapter VI

"And he arose and came to his father.

But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him

and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him.

And the son said to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven

and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son."

But the father said to his servants: "Bring quickly the best robe,

and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet.

And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate.

For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ "