4Q184
The Seductress
Dead Sea Scrolls
... speaks vanity and ... errors. She is ever prompt to oil her words, and she flatters with irony, deriding with iniquitous l[ips]. Her heart is set up as a snare, and her kidneys (affections) as a fowler’s nets. Her eyes are defiled with iniquity, her hands have seized hold of the Pit. Her legs go down to work wickedness, and to walk in wrong- doings. Her... are foundations of darkness, and a multitude of sins is in her skirts. Her... are darkness of night, and her garments... Her clothes are shades of twilight, and her ornaments plagues of corruption. Her couches are beds of corruption, and her ... depths of the pit. Her inns are couches of darkness, and her dominions in the midst of the night. She pitches her dwelling on the foundations of darkness she abides in the tents of silence. Amid everlasting fire is her inheritance, not among those who shine brightly. She is the beginning of all the ways of iniquity. Woe (and) disaster to all who possess her! And desolation to all who hold her! For her ways are ways of death, and her paths are roads of sin, and her tracks are pathways to iniquity, and her by-ways are rebellious wrong-doings.
Date: 100 B.C.E. - 60 B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
Source
Matthew 25:41
New Testament
39 When did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the king will answer them, ‘I tell you the truth, just as you did it for one of the least of these brothers or sisters of mine, you did it for me.’ 41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire that has been prepared for the devil and his angels! 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink. 43 I was a stranger and you did not receive me as a guest, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’
Date: 70-90 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
Source
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Notes and References
"... The last couplet of this first section introduces the theme of the fate of Lady Folly and those who are seduced by her: “Amid everlasting fire is her inheritance, not among all those who shine brightly.” Those who shine brightly are presumably the stars or the angels—the kind of imagery used in Daniel 12:3 to describe the immortality to be enjoyed by the righteous at the resurrection from the dead. The everlasting fire is on the other hand the abode of the wicked as in Matthew 25:41: “You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” In this respect—the theme of the eternal rewards for following Lady Wisdom and the eternal punishment for following Lady Folly, the Qumran text goes beyond what appears in its biblical model, Proverbs 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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