Texts in Conversation
Sirach teaches that children should be disciplined to prevent disobedience. The Christian theologian Augustine quotes this in City of God, showing that he uses Sirach as an authoritative guide for instruction.
Share:
2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Sirach 30:12
Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus
Deuterocanon
10 Don’t laugh with him, lest you have sorrow with him, and you gnash your teeth in the end. 11 Give him no liberty in his youth, and don’t ignore his follies. 12 Bow down his neck in his youth, and beat him on the sides while he is a child, lest he become stubborn, and be disobedient to you, and there be sorrow to your soul. 13 Chastise your son, and give him work, lest his shameless behavior be an offense to you. 14 Better is a poor man who is healthy and fit, than a rich man who is afflicted in his body.
Date: 195–180 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Augustine, City of God 22.22
On the City of God Against the Pagans
Early Christian
But because God does not wholly desert those whom He condemns, nor shuts up in His anger His tender mercies, the human race is restrained by law and instruction, which keep guard against the ignorance that besets us, and oppose the assaults of vice, but are themselves full of labor and sorrow. For what is the meaning of those many kinds of threats which are used to restrain the folly of children? What is the meaning of tutors, teachers, the birch, the strap, the cane, the schooling which Scripture says must be given a child, “beating him on the sides so that he does not grow stubborn,” and it becomes hardly possible or not possible at all to subdue him? Why all these punishments, except to overcome ignorance and restrain evil desires — these evils with which we come into the world? For why is it that we remember with difficulty, and without difficulty forget?
Date: 426 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
Search:
Notes and References
"... As to Augustine’s use of the Book of Ecclesiasticus, it is striking that more than once he quotes a text that is somewhat different from the Vetus Latina, which for the Book of Ben Sira, serves as the traditional Latin text. Since Augustine’s quotations from the Book of Ben Sira have more than once been brought in line with the Greek translation, a thorough investigation into this phenomenon is needed in order to find out whether he had (some) knowledge of the Greek text of the Book of Ecclesiasticus. Apart from Speculum in which Augustine for his quotations from the Book of Ben Sira usually follows the Latin, in his other works he rather frequently appears to correct the Latin Ben Sira quotations according to the Greek. An investigation into this intriguing question would be very useful. Such an in depth inquiry should also take into full consideration whether, and to what extent, St. Augustine has been influenced by a text type of Ecclesiasticus that was already used by St. Cyprian and has even been given its own siglum (K) by Thiele ..."
Pancratius C. Beentjes, “Saint Augustine's Sermons 38-41 on the Book of Ben Sira,” in The Scriptures of Israel in Jewish and Christian Tradition: Essays in Honour of Maarten J. J. Menken, ed. Bart Koet, Steven Moyise, and Joseph Verheyden, NovTSup 148 (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 81–94.
* 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.
Your Feedback:
Leave a Comment
Anonymous comments are welcome. All comments are subject to moderation.
User Comments
,