Texts in Conversation
Sirach says God’s eyes shine brighter than the sun and see every hidden act, based on the ancient belief that eyes give off their own light. Matthew echoes this when Jesus calls the eye the lamp of the body and reflects the same belief about vision.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Sirach 23:19
Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus
Deuterocanon
17 All bread is sweet to a fornicator. He will not cease until he dies. 18 A man who goes astray from his own marriage bed says in his heart, “Who sees me? Darkness is around me, and the walls hide me. No one sees me. Of whom am I afraid? The Most High will not remember my sins.” 19 The eyes of men are his terror. He doesn’t know that the eyes of the Lord are ten thousand times brighter than the sun, seeing all the ways of men, and looking into secret places. 20 All things were known to him before they were created, and also after they were completed.
Date: 195–180 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Matthew 6:22
New Testament
20 But accumulate for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and devouring insect do not destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. 22 “The eye is the lamp of the body. If then your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. 23 But if your eye is diseased, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
Date: 70–90 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Expressions in the Old Testament imply that the Jews thought of the eye as having its own light. 'The light of my eyes – it also has gone from me' (Psalm 38[27]:10), 'The light of the eyes rejoices the heart' (Proverbs 15:30), 'The Lord gives light to the eyes' (Proverbs 29:13). In Tobit 10:5 we read: 'my child, that I let you go, you who are the light of my eyes'. Though these expressions could be interpreted metaphorically, the point of reference relies on common knowledge of the functioning of the eye. In eight places we read that eyes became darkened (Genesis 27:1; 48:10; Deuteronomy 34:7; 1 Samuel 3:2; Job 17:7; Psalm 69:23; Lamentations 5:17; Zechariah 11:17). The most natural explanation for this metaphor is to recognize the correlation between the eye and the sun. As the heavenly source of light darkens, so too can the bodily source of light dim. In Daniel 10:2–9, Daniel has a vision of a glorious man. He describes him: 'His body was like beryl, his face like the appearance of lightning, his eyes like flaming torches...' (Daniel 10:6). Zechariah tells of a vision in which he saw a lamp stand and seven lamps on it (Zechariah 4:1–14). The record of this vision is followed by a conversation with an angelic interpreter who concludes: 'These seven are the eyes of the Lord, which range through the whole earth' (Zechariah 4:10) ..."
Francois P. Viljoen, “A Contextualized Reading of Matthew 6:22-23: Your Eye is the Lamp of Your Body,” HvTSt 61.1 (2009): 1–9.
* 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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