Chapter XX: How Ciaran Healed the Lepers (vg)

Leprosy, or at least a severe cutaneous disease so called, was common in ancient Ireland; and there are numerous stories, some of them extremely disagreeable, that tell how the saints associated with its victims as an act of self-abasement. We have already seen how Patrick was said to have kept a leper. Brigit also healed lepers by washing (LL, 1620), and Ruadan cleansed lepers with the water of a spring that he opened miraculously (VSH, ii, 249). Contrariwise, Munnu never washed except at Easter after contracting leprosy (VSH, ii, 237). The miraculous opening of a spring is a common incident in Irish hagiography; we have already seen an example, in the annotations to incident I.

Whitley Stokes points out (LL, note _ad loc._) that the "three waves" poured over the lepers are suggested by the triple immersion in baptism.