Texts in Conversation
The Christian theologian Clement of Alexandria uses Sirach as an authoritative source to teach the necessity of humility, demonstrating how the Jewish wisdom text influenced early Christian teaching and tradition.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Sirach 11:4
Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus
Deuterocanon
2 Don’t commend a man for his good looks. Don’t abhor a man for his outward appearance. 3 The bee is little among flying creatures, but what it produces is the best of confections. 4 Don’t boast about the clothes you wear, and don’t exalt yourself in the day of honor; for the Lord’s works are wonderful, and his works are hidden among men. 5 Many kings have sat down upon the ground, but one who was never thought of has worn a crown. 6 Many mighty men have been greatly disgraced. Men of renown have been delivered into other men’s hands.
Date: 195–180 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor 2.11
Paedagogus
Early Christian
The Instructor expressly admonishes, Boast not of the clothing of your garment, and be not elated on account of any glory, as it is unlawful. Accordingly, deriding those who are clothed in luxurious garments, He says in the Gospel: See, they who live in gorgeous apparel and luxury are in earthly palaces. He says in perishable palaces, where are love of display, love of popularity, and flattery and deceit. But those that wait at the court of heaven around the King of all, are sanctified in the immortal vesture of the Spirit, that is, the flesh, and so put on incorruptibility.
Date: 198 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... The eighty-fifth of the Apostolical Canons gives a list of the books of the Hebrew Canon, and adds the first three books of the Maccabees and the Wisdom of Sirach; these last four are not, however, included in the Canon, though the Wisdom of Sirach is specially recommended for the instruction of the young. Again, in the Apostolical Constitutions, 6:14, 15, quotations from Sirach are given with the same formula as those from the books of the Hebrew Canon, but in the list given in 2:57 of the same work, there is no mention of any of the books of the Apocrypha ... The evidence of Clement of Alexandria is conflicting; in his Paedagogus he quotes very often from Sirach, and speaks of it as 'scripture', from which it would evidently appear that he regarded it as canonical Scripture; but, according to Eusebius, Clement reckoned Sirach among the 'Antilegomena', for in speaking of Clement's works he mentions the Stromateis, or 'Medleys', and says: 'He quotes in them passages from the disputed Scriptures, the so-called Wisdom of Solomon, for example, and of Jesus the son of Sirach, and the Epistle to the Hebrews, and those of Barnabas, Clement, and Jude ..."
R. H. Charles, The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament (Oxford University Press, 1913), 299.
* 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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