Texts in Conversation
The Didache draws on Jewish wisdom traditions, echoing Sirach, which teaches patience and to accept life’s difficult challenges. The Didache highlights how early Christian tradition relied on Jewish wisdom texts to form its teaching.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Sirach 2:4
Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus
Deuterocanon
2 Set your heart aright, constantly endure, and don’t make haste in time of calamity. 3 Cling to him, and don’t depart, that you may be increased at your latter end. 4 Accept whatever is brought upon you, and be patient when you suffer humiliation. 5 For gold is tried in the fire, and acceptable men in the furnace of humiliation. 6 Put your trust in him, and he will help you. Make your ways straight, and set your hope on him.
Date: 195–180 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Didache 3:10
Early Christian
8 Be patient, merciful, honest, calm, and good, always mindful of the teachings you have heard. 9 Don't be arrogant or let yourself become presumptuous. Don't associate with arrogant people, but walk with those who are righteous and humble. 10 Accept whatever happens to you as good, knowing that nothing happens without God's involvement.
Date: 90–120 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... At the same time, however, materials from Sirach are not employed as the mainstay of the Two Ways tradition ... these passages are largely drawn from the Deuteronomistic tradition, with Sirach standing only secondarily in the background. As further example, Didache 2–3, is largely oriented around the absolute prohibitions of the Decalogue, supported by other warnings that serve as a fence against the possibility that the listener may violate the restrictions of Scripture. In this structure, Sirach appears only twice: (2:4), where one is warned not to be double-tongued—an important warning but hardly the apex of the passage—and (3:10), where one is counseled to receive all things as good ..."
Clayton N. Jefford, “The Wisdom of Sirach and the Glue of the Matthew–Didache Tradition,” in Intertextuality in the Second Century, ed. D. Jeffrey Bingham and Clayton N. Jefford, BAC 11 (Leiden: Brill, 2016), 8–23.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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