“Three penitents resolved to quit the world for the ascetic life, and so sought the wilderness. After exactly a year’s silence the first one said: ‘’tis a good life we lead.’ At the next year’s end the second answered: ‘it is so.’ Another year being run out, the third exclaimed: ‘if I cannot have peace and quiet here I’ll go back to the world."
That’s not half bad 
thanks for sharing
The version I heard was three monks at breakfast.
Year 1: the first monk says “I hate oatmeal.”
Year 2: the second monk says “I love oatmeal.”
Year 3: the third monk says “I’m sick and tired of this constant bickering over oatmeal.”
Or the man who joined a silent order, the rule was he could say two words to the Abbot every five years, so after the first five years he said “Bed hard” and was given a slightly thicker mattress, after another five years he said “Porridge cold” and was moved half a dozen places up the breakfast queue. Five years later again he said “Leaving now” and the Abbot said “Just as well - you’ve done nothing but complain since you got here”.
The OP is about a 1,000 year old joke translated to a version of English most of us can understand. And, that is the novelty of the thing—the joke is authentic, as if from the mouth of time itself.
But, what’s this! More recent versions of the same drollery, possibly overheard while waiting in the check-out line at Walmart, are apparently as fascinating as the ancient specimen.
Go, internet!
I’ve heard all three versions.
I am not, however, 1,000 years old.
Is this sarcasm? In what direction were you hoping the conversation would go?
For me, every discussion thread is like a crap shoot, and I’ve learned not to be expectant of anything very specific. Besides that, some charter member will probably be along any moment now to tell me what I should have expected; let’s wait and see.
The Spanish Inquisition?
<d/r>
Aha! Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!
Somebody did.
I love ancient humor. Nothing helps me think of these people as *real *so much as hearing a joke from their lives.
Graffiti on a bar wall in (Herculaneum or Pompei): Everybody writes on barroom walls but me.
According to a friend of mine, the “Say goodnight, Gracie” joke was done in ancient Greece, but I don’t know if that’s true - I don’t know if the language supports putting a person’s name on the end of a command like that.
I liked parts of Aristophane’s “The Birds,” but a lot of it just seemed like “get an unpopular stereotype on stage, and then flog him,” which doesn’t appeal to me.
I came in to post this joke. Still tickles me every time. 
Hmm… I’m pretty sure we had a thread here years ago that linked to pictures of such ancient graffiti jokes, and their translation. Some of the humour was quite bathroomish if I recall.
37!
62!
19!
It may be a shock, but digestin’
And functioning of the intestine
Aren’t recent inventions,
And back then, rude mentions
Weren’t any the less interestin’.
I doubt that basic humour has changed all that much in the past few thousand years. That 1000-year-old joke (and it’s a good one) is still being told in various forms, that’s all.
Knock-knock.
Who’s there?
PENIS!
Yeah, not changed much at all.
Hey! Those are all slight variations on the same joke!
You’re not telling it right!